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free radicals ( i.e. , molecules with one
or more unpaired electrons )
are ubiquitous in living systems as well
as engineered synthetic routes .
the number
of stable radicals is comparatively small , because of the peculiar requirements for stabilizing the unpaired
electron state against reaction with its atomic surroundings , which
has fascinated scientists ever since the first observations by gomberg .
once prepared , stable free radicals can be stored and investigated
under ambient conditions and thus are desirable spin standards , polarizing
agents , and building blocks of molecule- or carbon - based magnetic
systems . in recent years , purely hydrocarbon stable free radicals
( like phenalenyl ) turned out to be suitable
model systems for investigating sp magnetism in reduced dimensions along with other benzenoid compounds
like graphene flakes , carbon nanotubes , fullerenes , and
-conjugated polymers . an
important goal in this context is obtaining a fundamental understanding
of how stable radicals interact with each other . to date , however ,
a comprehensive fundamental understanding of interactions between
stable radicals still remains elusive .
one problem is that the possible
types of interactions between radicals are manifold , often resulting
in a complex competition between various types .
second ,
most systems were so far studied in liquid phase , making it difficult
to track individual radicals and to investigate their interaction
with surrounding radicals at the atomic scale .
radical
interaction by demonstrating insight into the electronic properties
of interacting radicals at the single - radical level .
we have investigated
how the self - assembly on a weakly interacting metal support affects
the frontier - orbital electronic structure responsible for the desired
radical properties .
to avoid complex metal organic bond formation ,
we have chosen an exceptionally stable and purely hydrocarbon radical ,
the koelsch radical , ,-bisdiphenylene--phenylallyl
( bdpa , c33h22 ) , which is a well - known stable
spin-1/2 complex ( figure 1a ) .
we observe self - assembly of regular radical clusters with different
geometric properties either one - dimensional chains or 3-fold
symmetric trimers or 2-fold symmetric dimers steered by the
substrate atomic lattice .
the geometric properties reveal a strong
anisotropy of the radical radical interaction and affect the
energies of the frontier molecular orbitals ( mos ) by up to 0.6 ev . structure
details of the bdpa radical .
( b ) isodensity
surface representation of the somo of bdpa ; the cutoff value is 0.055 e / a03 , where e is the elementary
( negative ) charge of the electron and a0 is the bohr radius ; blue / yellow indicates an opposite sign of the
wave function .
( c ) side - view and top - view of left - handed ( l ) stereoisomer ;
and denote dihedral and torsion angle .
( d ) top - view
of the right - handed ( r ) stereoisomer .
( e , f ) crystalline bulk structure
of bdpa : benzene ( from ref ( 17 ) ) .
( e ) monoclinic unit cell containing both l ( orange ) and
r ( gray ) stereoisomers ; benzene is blue ; the parameters of the monoclinic
bulk unit cell are a = 0.95 nm , b = 1.46 nm , c = 1.95 nm , and = 93.6.
( f ) alternating layers of l and r isomers .
bdpa recrystallized in benzene was thermally
evaporated in ultrahigh
vacuum ( uhv ) from a quartz crucible at 383 k after thorough degassing
at 373 k. the single - crystal au(111 ) surface was prepared by repeated
cycles of 0.5 kev ar bombardment and annealing at 720
k. stm and sts experiments were carried out at 7 k employing electrochemically
etched w tips deoxidized by annealing in uhv .
the di / dv signal was obtained from the first - harmonic
current signal detected by lock - in technique ( 0.52 khz ; 520
mv sinusoidal peak - to - peak voltage ; average of 310 single
spectra ) .
impurity and tip effects were minimized by careful sample
preparation and multiple tip formings between the di / dv experiments .
reliable tip performance was established
by accurately reproducing the di / dv signature of the au(111 ) surface state from the literature .
di / dv spectra
were recorded under both constant - height and constant - current conditions .
the latter has allowed the bias - voltage range to be extended to higher
values in the empty - states regime without disturbing or exciting the
bdpa radical in the tunnel junction .
note that constant - current spectroscopy
leads to point contact when the bias voltage approaches zero , causing
a rapid increase of the background conductance signal at small bias
voltages .
spectroscopic images ( di / dv maps )
were recorded simultaneously during constant - current topographic imaging .
the di / dv maps of surface - supported
molecules image the wave function |(x , y)| of a particular mo selectable by the bias
voltage .
in contrast to the case of , e.g. , electronic bands of a pristine
metal surface , the spectroscopic signal from the adsorbed radicals
may not be misinterpreted as the local density of states ( dos ) .
the
adsorbed radicals preserve their ( discrete ) mos upon adsorption on
the weakly interacting surface , and each mo exhibits a constant
dos equal to 1 . rather than the local dos ,
a di / dv map of a molecule images the spatial electron
distribution within the selected mo over the molecular backbone .
gas - phase density functional theory ( dft ) single point energy calculations
were performed with the gaussian 03 package using the b3lyp hybrid functional , 6 - 31g(d )
basis set .
although the predictive quality of dft - calculated mo energies
is generally poor , the symmetry and spatial extent
of mos typically are reliable and hence useful for interpreting our
experimental data .
bdpa is a sterically protected spin-1/2
hydrocarbon radical . an unpaired electron is stabilized by
delocalization over the radical backbone in the singly occupied ( highest ) molecular orbital ( somo ) ( figure 1b ) , as calculated by dft .
early x - ray diffraction
studies found an approximate c2 symmetry
of the bdpa monomer in the bulk phase
each of the two fluorenyl units is almost planar
and tilted by a dihedral angle with respect to the other ( plotted
in green and purple in figure 1c ) . in the crystalline
bulk phase of bdpa : benzene and bdpa : acetone ,
the dihedral angle was found to be = 60. in the gas phase , it increases to
an even larger
value of 74 has been suggested in toluene solution . the phenyl unit of bdpa ( plotted in orange
in figure 1c )
is twisted by the torsion angle
51 , giving rise to stereoisomers denoted
as left - handed ( l ) and right - handed ( r ) ( figure 1c and d ) .
indeed , both l and r stereoisomers are contained in the
crystalline unit cell of bdpa : benzene ( figure 1e ) and the respective bulk phase
exhibits alternating layers of l and r stereoisomers ( figure 1f ) . in the bulk phase
, bdpa possesses a nearly
isotropic g - factor of g = 2.0026
at room temperature and g 2.008 at 4 k. our
electron paramagnetic resonance ( epr ) experiments in the x band on
samples with bdpa monolayer coverage adsorbed on au(111)/mica substrates
yield a value of g = 1.96 at 7 k , which is in good
agreement with the above low - temperature value of the bulk phase .
the observed epr activity of bdpa / au(111 ) together with the small g - shift of about 2% compared to the bulk indicate that the
bdpa radicals adsorbed on the au(111 ) surface preserve the radical
spin-1/2 state and , furthermore , suggest that a possible charge transfer
from the au substrate is small .
we have prepared ultrathin
bdpa films on a single - crystal au(111 ) substrate by vacuum sublimation .
the au(111 ) surface is reconstructed , forming the well - known zigzag
herringbone pattern of ( two out
of three ) alternating 120 rotational domains ( figure 2a ) .
each domain exhibits equidistant pairs of parallel
corrugation lines ( 0.02 nm high ) that separate fcc and hcp stacked
regions of the surface atomic lattice . at each domain boundary , the
corrugation lines are kinked , giving rise to the characteristic zigzag
pattern .
the kinks of one of the two lines exhibit a characteristic
surface lattice dislocation , leading to the formation of bulged and
pinched elbow sites marked
by arrows in figure 2a .
we have studied samples , prepared at 300 and 130
k , with stm .
the nominal thickness of the bdpa films was varied from
submonolayer coverage up to a full monolayer .
figure 2b shows an stm topographic overview image of the sample surface
after deposition of 0.2 monolayers of bdpa at 300 k. the atomic lattice
of the substrate appears to be undisturbed by the adsorbed radicals
and the au(111 ) herringbone reconstruction is preserved , evidencing
weak physisorption of bdpa on au(111 ) .
multiple bdpa monomers agglomerate
and form clusters by self - assembly , indicating a rather high surface
mobility of the single monomer at 300 k. literally , no isolated monomers
are observed on the 300 k sample , but a few can be found on the 130
k sample ( figure 2i ) . we have found a number
of different cluster types distinguished by geometry ( separation and
orientation of monomers ) .
we denote them as chain , trimer , and dimer ,
as shown in figure 2c and discussed in detail
below .
the cluster types serve as model systems for investigating
geometry effects on the radical radical interaction . at substrate temperatures of 300 and 130
k , the bdpa radicals predominantly
form directed one - dimensional chains on the au(111 ) surface ( figure 2b ) .
individual bdpa radicals are imaged by stm as
protrusions with a characteristically curved contour ( bean - shape )
the concave side of
the bean - shape ( marked by an arrow ) points in the direction of a growing
chain .
the nominal length of 1.26 nm of the bdpa monomer derived from
the structure model of figure 1b is indicated
by a vertical bar . within the chains ,
the radicals are regularly aligned
at a separation of 0.73 0.05 nm ( center - to - center ) .
this value
is significantly smaller than that in similar chains found in the
bulk structure and the full monolayer ( see below ) .
( in the bulk crystal
structure , linear chains of homoenationmeric bdpa radicals run along
the a and b crystallographic
directions , with uniform radical radical separations of 0.95
and 1.47 nm , respectively ( see figure 2e ) . )
at low coverage , bdpa chains grow preferentially on fcc regions ( which
exhibit a lower surface electron density of states compared to hcp
regions ) and follow the herringbone pattern
along two out of three symmetry - equivalent 112
directions , i.e. , approximately parallel to the corrugation lines
of the reconstructed au(111 ) surface ( see figure 2e ) .
a detailed analysis of the bean shapes of individual radicals
in the stm topographs reveals that all bdpas in a chain exhibit the
same azimuthal orientation ( see figure 2d , h ) .
stm topographic
images of bdpa on au(111 ) at + 1 v showing the structural
diversity of different bdpa clusters .
( a ) herringbone reconstruction
of the pristine au(111 ) surface ; 36 36 nm ; arrows
mark elbow sites ( see text ) .
( b ) 0.2 monolayers of bdpa grown at 300
k ; 40 40 nm . ( c )
close - up image ( 10 10 nm ) of characteristic self - assembled bdpa clusters denoted as
dimer , trimer , and chain .
( d ) bean - shape appearance of bdpa monomers ;
the arrow marks the concave side of the topographic bean - shape of
the bdpa monomer ( see text ) ; scale - bars indicate the radical
( f ) typical structure of an irregular bdpa cluster
on the 130 k sample ; 4 4 nm .
( h ) local quasicrystalline order of a
full bdpa monolayer ; the two - dimensional unit cell is indicated .
( j ) dimer formation at elbow sites at low submonolayer
coverage of only 0.05 monolayers .
( k ) n = 2 chain ;
here the monomers are aligned parallel , in contrast to the dimer .
chain growth at 300 k typically starts from nucleation
centers
consisting of an ordered cluster of three bdpas arranged in an almost
3-fold symmetric manner over fcc regions ( figure 2b , c ) .
radical
separation varies between 0.85 and 0.95 nm , which is significantly
wider than in the chain . at a growth temperature of 130 k ,
regular
trimers are rare and nonregular clusters similar to that shown in
figure 2f act as nucleation centers for chains
instead . up to coverages of a full monolayer , the chains dominate .
they
overgrow both fcc and hcp regions , packing almost parallel with a
chain chain separation of about 1.20 nm and forming approximate
120 rotational domains ( figure 2 g ) .
the
azimuthal alignment of the chains indicates a guidance of the one - dimensional
bdpa chains by the underlying au(111 ) substrate .
locally , a two - dimensional
quasi - crystalline order is established in the monolayer , where the
azimuthal orientation of neighboring chains alternates regularly ( figure 2h ) .
the respective two - dimensional unit cell is
illustrated in figure 2h with cell parameters a = 0.84 nm , b = 2.6 nm ,
and = 71 2. compared to submonolayer coverages ,
the radical radical separation along the chain is increased
by 15% in the full monolayer .
this reduced packing density along the
chains suggests a suppression of inter - radical attraction of neighboring - chain
bdpas .
for small submonolayer coverages ( e.g. , below 0.1 monolayers )
at
300 k , we find dimers of bdpa rather than chains .
the dimers are preferentially
located at elbow sites ( figure 2j ) , and the
individual bdpas are oriented with their concave sides ( bean shape )
pointing away from each other in a characteristic v - like manner ( figure 2c ) .
the radical configuration in dimers differs
from that in chains with n = 2 radicals ( figure 2k ) , which form over fcc regions instead of elbow
sites and exhibit no v - shape .
the v - shape of dimers seems to be caused
by a slight tilting of the radicals upon adsorption on the anisotropically
corrugated atomic lattice of the elbow
sites .
this leads to an increased radical radical separation
of 0.80 0.05 nm in dimers that is larger than in chains but
smaller than in trimers . with increasing coverage ,
dimers are used
up by the formation of more and more chains . on samples grown at 130
k , dimers
di / dv spectroscopic images of
different bdpa cluster types on au(111 ) recorded at different sample
bias voltages ; chain , trimer , dimer , and monomer ( see text ) are labeled
14 .
we found
that the different cluster geometries of chain , trimer , and dimer
affect the energies of the frontier mos detected by spectroscopic
imaging and point spectroscopy ( see methods ) .
figure 3 shows a series of spectroscopic
images ( di / dv maps ) recorded at
different bias voltages in constant - current mode .
each frame shows
the same sample area , including bdpa chain , trimer , and dimer ( labeled
13 , respectively ) .
the terminating ( outermost ) monomer of
clusters like that labeled 4 in figure 3 is
found to behave like an isolated monomer . at certain bias voltages
,
the bdpa radicals are imaged as bright protrusions ( increased conductance ) ,
indicating resonant tunneling across certain occupied and empty mos .
the shape of the protrusions varies strongly and takes on characteristic
forms around 2 , 1 , and + 2 v. in contrast , bdpa is
hardly visible at 1.4 , 0.2 , and + 0.2 v against the
conductance background of the pristine au(111 ) surface , suggesting
that these energies lie between those of radical mos . di / dv point spectra of a surface - supported
bdpa chain recorded under constant - height ( black ) and constant - current
( blue ) conditions with the stm tip over bdpa .
a detailed analysis of figure 3 reveals
that each type of cluster has its own characteristic resonance energy
that differs by up to 0.6 ev among different cluster types ( see discussion
below ) .
this is best seen in the empty - states regime ( positive sample
bias ) of figure 3 . around + 1.2
v , dimers and
trimers are clearly in resonance ( enhanced conductance ) , while chains
and monomers are hardly visible ( off resonance ) .
the situation is
reversed at a higher energy of + 1.8 to + 2 v , where chains are in resonance
and dimers and trimers are off - resonance .
obviously , the geometric
properties of the clusters affect the frontier - orbital electronic
structure of the involved radicals .
the cluster size ( chain length n ; even or odd ) has no significant effect . in the following ,
we elucidate the geometry effect with point spectroscopy and spectroscopic
imaging at the single - radical level .
we have determined by point spectroscopy all the observable frontier
mos of bdpa within an energy range of a few ev around the substrate
fermi level .
the best results ( highest reproducibility ) are obtained
for the case of the bdpa chain , which we found to be the structurally
best - defined cluster type .
figure 4 shows representative
local di / dv spectra of a chain recorded
at constant - height ( black curve ) and constant - current ( blue ) conditions .
( the high surface mobility of bdpa causes motional instability of
bdpa in the stm tunnel junction , restricting our constant - height spectroscopy
experiments to an energy range of about 2 to + 2.7 ev .
thus ,
we added constant - current spectra ( blue ) in figure 4 , which allowed the energy range to be extended above + 3 v.
note that energy differences of a few tenths of electronvolts between
constant - height and constant - current spectra are not unusual and are
often due to z - effects . ) typical spectra exhibit a strong filled - state resonance below 2
v ( labeled resonance 1 ) together with a weak broad resonance spanning
from 1.1 to 0.7 ev ( resonance 2 ) and two strong features
at + 1.9 ev ( resonance 5 ) and + 3.1 ev ( resonance 6 ) in the empty - states
regime .
we assign these resonances to the highest doubly occupied
and lowest doubly unoccupied mos in agreement with our dft
results ( see discussion below ) .
the feature at zero bias is due to
vibrational excitations and the kondo effect and will be discussed
in detail elsewhere .
no distinct somo / sumo
resonances are observed in the spectra of figure 4 , neither in constant - current mode nor in constant - height
mode .
we remark that , because of the large coulomb interaction , these
orbitals are replaced by broad hubbard bands , generally not prominent
in sts .
nevertheless , we have inferred approximate positions of somo / sumo
from comparison with the conductance background of the pristine au
surface based on the di / dv maps
of figure 3 as described in section s1 of the supporting information .
the somo / sumo signals
are weak , and the respective energies are marked by ( 3 ) and ( 4 ) in
figure 4 .
the small feature at + 0.8 ev in
the constant - height curve of figure 4 most
likely belongs to the broad sumo resonance , starting at + 0.6 ev ( see
section s1 of the supporting information ) .
we have determined the characteristic resonance energies of different
cluster types by point spectroscopy .
we focus on the empty - states
regime ( lumo and lumo+1 ) , where the energy shift is found to be considerably
stronger compared to the filled frontier - orbital state .
figure 5b shows a compilation of di / dv spectra for the monomer , chain , dimer , and trimer ( black
curves ) plotted against the spectrum of the pristine au(111 ) surface
( gray curves ) .
the conductance resonances 5 and 6 are observed for
all cluster types , but the resonance energies vary depending on the
cluster type .
table 2 lists the observed resonance
energies together with the energy shift relative to the isolated monomer .
the strongest shift of 0.62 ev is observed for resonance 5
( lumo ) of the trimer .
lowest unoccupied mos of bdpa in different cluster types
( monomer ,
chain , dimer , trimer ) .
( a ) stm topographs at + 1 v ; marks the
stm tip position for spectroscopy .
( b ) point spectra ; the gray curve
is pristine au substrate between bdpa clusters .
( c , d ) di / dv images of lumo ( resonance 5 ) and lumo+1 ( resonance
6 ) ; the dashed contour line indicates the position and size of the
bdpa radical ; red , black , and blue sketches beside each map are guides
to the eye .
we determined the spatial properties of the energy - shifted
frontier mos by spectroscopic imaging .
respective maps of the lumo - related
di / dv resonance 5 are shown in figure 5c .
the topmost map shows the characteristic ( low - symmetry )
shape of resonance 5 of the single monomer . with this fingerprint
of the monomer , it is possible to decode all other
di / dv maps of figure 5c , including those of the chain , dimer , and trimer .
the apparently
more complex maps of all the structurally different clusters observed
in our study are found to be ( linear ) superpositions of multiple monomer
fingerprints .
this is best seen by comparing the experimental maps
with the red , black , and blue sketches illustrated at the right side
of each conductance map in figure 5c .
( in the case
of the single monomer , it was not possible to record the di / dv map of resonance 6 , because of excitation
of lateral motion by the stm tip . )
a detailed analysis of the spectroscopic
maps reveals considerable spatial overlap of the lumo - related resonance
5 between neighboring radicals ( compare sketches of figure 5c for different cluster types ) .
the different azimuthal
orientations and lateral separations of individual bdpas in the dimer
and trimer facilitate an even stronger overlap as compared to the
chain .
the amount of overlap depends on the type of cluster and scales
almost linearly with the energy shift of the respective mo resonance .
in contrast , the spatial shape of resonance 6 avoids strong overlap
among neighboring bdpas in any type of cluster ( see sketches of figure 5d ) .
accordingly , the energy shift of resonance 6
in different cluster types is much smaller ( table 2 ) . on the basis of our combined stm and dft results ,
we have determined
a number of fundamental electronic and geometric properties of bdpa / au(111 )
at the single - radical level .
the apparent height of bdpa slightly
depends on bias voltage and cluster type . for chains ,
it is 0.100.13
nm for bias voltages of 1 v , i.e. , significantly smaller than
the nominal width of a bdpa radical ( see figure 1b ) .
thus , an upright standing orientation ( phenyl pointing perpendicular
away from substrate ) is unlikely .
the topographic shape and symmetry
of bdpa monomers ( bean - shape ) observed by stm indicates an inclined
orientation of the monomers relative to the substrate plane , where
the phenyl axis lies almost parallel to the substrate plane ( see illustration
of figure 6d ) .
orientation requires an increase of the dihedral angle of the fluorenyls
to more than 90. otherwise , a molecule molecule separation
as close as 0.73 nm determined by stm is sterically forbidden .
the assignment of mo resonances derived from our experimental sts
data ( figure 4 ) and listed in table 1 is qualitatively corroborated by a comparison with
the dft - calculated mo energies of the monomer in the gas phase ( figure 6a ) .
( the predictive quality of the calculated absolute
energy values is limited , since the au substrate was not included
in our calculations . )
figure 6b shows sketches
( gray ) of the shape and symmetry of the experimental di / dv maps of resonances 5 and 6 ( lumo and lumo+1 )
of the monomer determined from figure 5 .
for both
resonances , the experimental di / dv signal is weak if the stm tip is over bdpa and strong at certain
positions near the rim of the radical .
most possibly , this is caused
by the overlap with the stm tip wave function , which is weak over
inner regions of the bdpa due to steric hindrance .
the two conductance
patterns of figure 6b are almost complementary
to each other . at the convex side of the bean - shape ,
the di / dv signal is strong for resonance 5 but
weak for resonance 6 ( marked by arrows in figure 6b ) .
a detailed comparison with the dft - calculated mo representations
of figure 6a reveals that both lumo+1 ( mo 112 )
and lumo+2 ( mo 113 ) , which relate to the experimental resonance 6 ,
are expected to have small electron density over the phenyl unit similar
to the convex side of resonance 6 .
( the electron density is proportional
to the squared wave function of the respective mo , |mo| . )
we conclude that the convex side of the bean - shape
stm topograph of the bdpa monomer coincides with the position of the
phenyl . with this , it is finally possible to overlay a structure model
over our experimental stm topographs in proper scale and orientation ,
as illustrated in figure 6c for the full bdpa
monolayer , one - dimensional chain , dimer , and trimer .
( a ) dft - calculated bdpa
frontier mos and energies in the gas phase ;
the somo / sumo gap was arbitrarily chosen to be symmetric about the
substrate fermi level ef .
( b ) sketches
of experimental di / dv maps of resonances
5 and 6 of the bdpa monomer ; the red line indicates the bean - shape
topographic contour and position of the bdpa monomer ; arrows mark
the convex side of the bean - shape .
( c ) stm topographs with overlaid
molecular structure of the individual bdpa radicals for the full monolayer ,
one - dimensional chain , dimer and trimer .
( d ) model structure of a
one - dimensional bdpa chain on au(111 ) .
the preferred growth
of one - dimensional ( nondendritic ) chains indicates a unidirectional
attraction of neighboring radicals .
bdpa is a nonpolar radical , without functional ( polar ) groups to form strong
directional bonds with neighboring radicals .
the unidirectionality
( spatial anisotropy ) of the interaction can be explained by the stereochemical
( geometric ) shape of the radicals shown in the structure model of
figure 1c .
the anisotropy indicates a preference
for aligning fluorenyl units of neighboring radicals with their -planes
parallel to each other similar to the -stacking observed
for many planar -conjugated molecular compounds .
this alignment
facilitates the packing of the radicals at a regular separation as
small as 0.73 nm along the chain observed by stm . on the basis of
our findings
, we propose a model structure of the bdpa chain on au(111 ) ,
as shown in figure 6d .
the model chain is illustrated
as a homochiral domain similar to the linear chains of the bulk structure .
the radicals are oriented in a side - on position with their phenyls
pointing toward the central c atom of the next - neighbor radical ( phenyl
axis parallel to substrate plane ) .
the observed preferential
growth of bdpa chains on fcc regions of the au substrate may suggest
the existence of a small negative partial charge on the adsorbed bdpa
radicals ( they are repelled by hcp regions with higher surface electron
density ) .
recent studies of planar -conjugated molecules adsorbed
on atomically clean single - crystal coinage metal surfaces argue that
the observation of a 1d growth mode ( 1d chain formation similar to
that reported in the present study ) would indicate a partial charge
transfer , resulting from an interplay of short - range van der waals
attraction and long - range electrostatic repulsion .
a possible partial charge transfer is expected to result
in an enhanced scattering in the two - dimensional electron gas of the
au(111 ) surface state at the charged adsorbate , which is clearly absent
for bdpa / au(111 ) ( see di / dv maps
of figure 3 at 0.2 v ) .
electrostatic
effects seem to be small in accordance with our epr and sts
results ( see section s1 in the supporting information)and thus of negligible relevance for the formation of the
one - dimensional bdpa chains on au(111 ) .
the fluorenyl units
exhibit a total ( up ) spin density ,
while a negative spin density ( spin ) dominates on the phenyl
group .
our dft results predict that increasing
the dihedral angle of the fluorenyls , anticipated for the
chain , further increases the spin density on the phenyl group ,
while the fluorenyls keep a total ( up ) spin density .
the proposed
model structure of the chain ( figure 6d ) would
thus be consistent with mcconnell s picture of ferromagnetic order based on the concept of intramolecular
spin polarization .
however , the -stacked fluorenyls of the
next - neighbor radicals in the model structure are separated by more
than 5.5 .
this is significantly larger than the -stacking
separation found in planar hydrocarbon radicals ( 3 ) ,
for which recent studies revealed a combination of strong somo
somo
overlap with dispersion forces giving rise to the so - called multicenter
bonding configuration .
thus , a direct
magnetic interaction ( overlap ) is unlikely to contribute to the attractive
interaction of radicals in the self - assembled bdpa chains on au(111 ) .
the topographic bean - shape of the monomer is unaffected by the
type of cluster , indicating a predominantly noncovalent character
of the radical radical interaction .
this interpretation is
corroborated by the observed superposition principle , where the conductance
pattern of the independent monomer is preserved for each mo resonance
in the clusters ( figure 5c , d ) .
the interaction
strength can be estimated from our sample preparation
parameters [ adsorption rate of 2.6 10 radicals/(scm ) at 383 k source temperature ; the surface coverage of the
saturated monolayer 0 = 9.4 10 radicals / cm was obtained from the surface unit cell
parameters above ] .
assuming radsorption = rdesorption and using redhead s
equation for zero - order thermal desorption , r = 00 exp(edes/(kbt ) ) , with 0 10 , we obtain
an approximate value of edes = 1.15 ev
per radical for the multilayer desorption energy of bdpa .
this is
a typical value for a van der waals molecular compound and should represent the upper limit for the attractive
interaction between neighboring bdpa radicals in the chain .
( note
that in the chain there are fewer next neighbor radicals that may
attract each other compared to the crystalline bulk phase . )
different substrate regions , like elbows or fcc regions , lead to
the formation of different types of radical clusters , where the contained
monomers have characteristic separations and orientations relative
to their neighbor radicals .
the structural variations among different
cluster types provide a handle for studying geometry effects on the
radical radical interaction at the single - molecule level .
we
have determined the effect on the frontier mo energies ( see figure 5 and table 2 ) .
most likely ,
different contributions add up for the observed energy shift : ( i )
sub - angstrom changes of conformation and/or orientation of the radicals
within different cluster types induced by the anisotropic atomic lattice
of the substrate .
similarly large energy shifts found in surface - supported
porphyrins on au(111 ) were recently attributed to conformational effects .
( ii ) variations of the tunneling distance during
the recording of constant - current spectra .
apparent energy shifts are inherent
of the sts method . while the latter is
a mere instrument effect ,
the observed magnitude of mo - energy shifts
for different cluster
types can be explained with the help of our dft results . for homo ,
lumo , and lumo+1 ,
we have found minimum , maximum , and medium energy
shift ( see also table 2 and figure 5b ) .
the magnitudes of the dft - calculated electron
density of these mos over the phenyl ligand ( see figure 6a ) follow a similar trend : homo has negligible , lumo strongest ,
and lumo+1 medium electron density among these three mos at the phenyl
position .
phenyl interaction
between neighboring bdpas for the dimer and trimer compared to the
chain due to a significantly shorter phenyl phenyl separation .
most likely , van der waals or weak covalent interactions involving
the phenyl ligand are responsible for the observed mo energy shifts
in the chain , dimer , and trimer compared to the single bdpa monomer
adsorbed on au(111 ) .
in summary , we have demonstrated that bdpa
stable radicals form
robust clusters up to 300 k on a single - crystal au support . the radical
clusters exhibit a structural richness , which provides a handle for
studying geometric and electronic details as well as the radical
radical
interaction at the single - molecule level . a different cluster geometry
( radical orientation and separation )
future studies may overcome the high demand on computational
power
required for a theoretical treatment of the role of the substrate
for the radical radical interaction , which will rely on a comprehensive
description of the electronic and geometric properties of the reconstructed
au(111 ) surface together with the physisorbed radical clusters
the studied
bdpa clusters may represent suitable model systems for all - organic
quantum spin chains . | pubmed |
What makes metals malleable and ductile? [closed]
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Two well-known *Physical Properties* of metals is that they are **malleable** and **dutile**
I was just wondering about what causes metals to be *malleable* and/or *ductile* and non-metals to be *brittle*? What factor determines this?
Thanks!
The metals are malleable because they don't make molecules : they exist as individual atoms. In a metallic piece, the atoms are identical, and they are piled up like layers of beads in the bottom of a flat box, each bead touching its neighbors. The first layer of beads covers the entire surface of the surface. You may imagine a second layer identical to the first one covering it, then a third layer, and so on. Hopefully you see that is not very difficult to push a whole layer, or a whole pile of such layers from the side. A whole layer can slide easily on a lower layer. This would not break the whole piece, which gets distorted but not broken. It would be much more difficult to do it if suddenly one or some of these beads are replaced in a given layer by bigger beads or by non-spherical objects. ${}{}{}{}{}$
| stackexchange/chemistry |
The Central District of Hendijan County is a district bakhsh in Hendijan County, Khuzestan Province, Iran. At the 2006 census, its population was 28,715, in 5,803 families. The District has one city: Hendijan. The District has two rural districts dehestan: Hendijan-e Gharbi Rural District and Hendijan-e Sharqi Rural District.
References
Category:Hendijan County
Category:Districts of Khuzestan Province | wikipedia |
JIMMY AND JUDYWritten byRandall K. Rubin&Jon Schroder
WGA RegisteredAugust 10, 2004©2004 Randall K. Rubin andContact:Jon Schroder844 3rd St. Unit EGreg ScanlanSanta Monica, CA 90403Transcendental LLC310-292-5900All Rights ReservedJIMMY AND JUDYCAMERA ON:I/E. BACKYARD - SUBURBAN HOUSE - JUDY’S BEDROOM - NIGHTPOV of a HOME VIDEO CAMERA shooting into the window of teenage girl’s bedroom.The door inside opens. In walks JUDY OAKS-KELLEN (18), a blond haired, mousy girl, wearing only a T-shirt and panties. As she heads to the mirror we hear...Sound of skin smacking against skin and heavy breathing. Whoever operates the camera is definitely CHOAKIN’ THE GOPHER.Judy combs her hair in the mirror, oblivious.The camera operator is in a whack off frenzy as he...CAMERA OPERATOR (O.C.)Oh, mmph.He’s climaxed.The sounds have stopped, but the tape keeps rolling. Judy stops combing her hair as...Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:EXT. HIGH SCHOOL - THE TRACK - DAYCamera shoots from inside a car hidden camera style as Judy runs laps during her gym class. Judy, again, has no idea that she is being filmed as camera zooms in tight.She’s tired, sweating profusely, and looks completely miserable. She stops running, exhausted, as the other kids pass her.Suddenly, a very Butch looking female GYM TEACHER (40) walks over and begins BERATING Judy. The Gym Teacher’s face turns red as she spews insults inches away from Judy’s face.We can’t hear what she’s saying, but whatever it is, it’s cruel, harsh, and very intense. Exhausted and humiliated, Judy holds back tears as...Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:I/E. JIMMY'S HOUSE - BACKYARD/KITCHEN/LIVING ROOM - DUSKLate summer evening. Camera Operator wipes dirt from the lens with his shirt revealing his face for the first time as he looks at camera. This is the first time we get even a glimpse of JIMMY WRIGHT (21). His looks are striking, even a bit awkward, but not at all unappealing.He throws a mischievously evil look at the lens, then settles his face back to normal. He spins the camera away, pointing it at the back of his house.Through the kitchen window, Jimmy zooms in on his mother (JIMMY'S MOM) (40's) idyllic version of a mom in new millennium suburban housewife clothes. She’s on the phone, preparing dinner. JIMMY (O.C.)Hey Mom, heard you and Dad doing the nasty last night. Thanks for that one. By the way, who the fuck is Nancy?Camera whips over to JIMMY'S DAD in the LIVING ROOM, well dressed, rich looking and fat in his late 40's, watching baseball on TV, tired after a long day's work. He drinks from a tumbler of expensive scotch neat with an ice cube, munching on mixed nuts from a crystal bowl.JIMMY (O.C.)Hey Dad, Mom's on the phone telling her friends that you're hung like a light switch.Dad reaches into his pants to give his balls a good scratch. Jimmy gives the play by play like a baseball announcer.JIMMY (O.C.)Oh Daddy, there he goes. He makes the reach and... yes! Both balls at the same time! One heck of a double play!Eyes on the TV, Dad takes his hands out of his pants and sniffs them.JIMMY (O.C.)And the sniff to finish it off.Satisfied, Dad reaches in and grabs a handful of nuts as he continues to watch TV. We zoom out to see both Mom and Dad, each through different windows.2.JIMMY (O.C.)Fucking freak show.CAMERA ON:INT. JIMMY'S HOUSE - JIMMY'S BEDROOM - NIGHTDark and in silhouette, Jimmy flips on the camera by remote. It’s too dark to see faces or bodies with any detail, but Jimmy’s clearly having sex with a PROSTITUTE in his bed. She is young, black, and looks very much like a prostitute. As he pounds into her...JIMMYDo you like that nigger? Come on nigger, do you like it?PROSTITUTE(humors him)Oh yeah baby, I like it.By remote, Jimmy shuts down the camera.CAMERA ON:INT. JIMMY'S HOUSE - JIMMY'S BEDROOM - NIGHTJimmy's behind the camera interviewing the Prostitute who sits up in his bed holding the sheets to cover herself. With the lights on, we can see that she’s clearly unattractive. Jimmy asks his questions with a gentle confidence.JIMMY (O.C.)Okay, so. What was going through your mind when I called you a nigger?PROSTITUTEThis costs you an extra fifty.JIMMY (O.C.) I know.She pauses. You can tell she just wants to leave, but is toughing it out for the extra fifty bucks.JIMMY (O.C.) Well, what did it feel like?Long pause.3.PROSTITUTEIt felt like nothing.JIMMY (O.C.) What do you mean?PROSTITUTEYou ain’t the first person to call me a nigger when we was fucking.JIMMY (O.C.) (not surprised)Oh.PROSTITUTEJohns call me nigger all the time. Especially white guys. Nothing new. Just dirty talk.Long, awkward pause. Jimmy Doesn’t know what to say.PROSTITUTE That it?No reply from Jimmy.PROSTITUTE What about you? You like calling me nigger? You get your nut off?JIMMY (O.C.) (calmly)No.PROSTITUTEThen why'd ya call me that?JIMMY (O.C.) (O.C.)Have you ever wondered what it was like to treat someone so completely cruel that it was unthinkable?No answer.JIMMY (O.C.)I was trying to do the unthinkable and unimaginable when I called you that. I wanted to see if was even possible for me to do that.They pause. 4.PROSTITUTEYeah, so?Jimmy speaks softly and confidently. JIMMY (O.C.)I think I want to die. Like I don’t deserve to live anymore. And that I will never want to do something like that to someone again. The prostitute finds Jimmy’s answer endearing.PROSTITUTEWhy ya wanna die?JIMMY (O.C.)Because everyone hates me.Pause.JIMMY (O.C.)They hate me because I seek beauty and appreciate destruction. They hate my mind, my thoughts, my imagination. They hate everything about me. And I hate them.PROSTITUTE(trying not to care)Really?JIMMY (O.C.)Yep. Everyone. Everyone that knows or who has ever met me.PROSTITUTEYour parents don't hate you. Look at this room in this big 'ole house you got.JIMMY (O.C.)My parents provide me with food and shelter because they have been conditioned by society into thinking it’s the appropriate thing to do. In reality they can’t stand to be in the same room with me. They’re fascists, brainwashed, and unforgiving. 5.
(MORE)They dismiss my feelings of ill regard towards them on simple rebelliousness of youth, but that's only because they are patently and intentionally unaware of their own hypocrisies. Prostitute looks bored/frustrated again.JIMMY (O.C.)(accidental condescension)Do you understand me?PROSTITUTEYou wanna know what I think?JIMMYYes, I really do.PROSTITUTEI think you're a spoiled ass white boy, thinks you everything, but you don't know shit. All you do is bullshit complain and there's folks out there that'd kill for all this.Jimmy doesn't react.PROSTITUTEI don’t feel sorry for you.JIMMY (O.C.)(calmly)No one is asking you to. Thank you for letting me film you.Camera turns off.CAMERA ON:I/E. HIGH SCHOOL - PARKING LOT/JIMMY'S CAR - DAYJimmy hides hidden camera style inside his car in the high school parking lot, bleachers in the distance. School is letting out as he zooms in on Judy.She’s looking at the ground as she's taunted by a group of Other Harassing Teenagers, a tear streaming down the side of her cheek.Suddenly, Judy is bashed in the face with a school bag. She falls to the ground, then picks up her broken glasses as camera zooms out to catch the Girl who hit her (Mean Girl). 6.JIMMY (O.C.) (cont'd)Nearby, a big, Dumb Looking Bully Type (18) taunts her as she cries. His taunts are biting and as excessive as the Mean Girl’s, then he dumps a cup of soda on Judy's head as she's crying. Judy screams at the top of her lungs. The group runs off laughing. Jimmy whip pans to the Mean Girl as she laughs with her friends, then whips pans back to Judy, now on her feet, blood running from her nose and onto her white shirt.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:I/E. JUDY’S HOUSE - JUDY’S BEDROOM - NIGHT A scene we’ve seen before. Jimmy is off camera videotaping Judy through her bedroom window. We hear him FLOGGIN’ THE DOLPHIN off screen while Judy combs her hair in the mirror. She stops when she hears...A Grown Man, (45), walks into the doorway of her bedroom. This is JUDY’S DAD. He comes in and doesn’t say a thing to her. Judy doesn’t acknowledge him at all and continues combing her hair as though he’s not even there.He comes up behind her, then wraps his arms around her, giving her a warm hug from behind. Something’s not right. The masturbation sounds STOP.Judy’s noticeably uncomfortable but doesn’t resist as her Father begins kissing her neck. His hand slowly creeps down to her pelvic area, his other hand turning out the bedroom light. The room goes dark.Camera flips down, then OFF...Then COMES BACK ON AGAINOnce again we’re looking through the camera pointing at the window, but now it’s the distorted, grainy, black and white of “Nite Shot” mode. Though we see the Judy’s mirror and her dresser, she and her Father are nowhere to be found.Whatever’s going on between them, it’s going on out of frame, away from the view of the window. Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:7.INT. JIMMY’S HOUSE - DINING ROOM - NIGHTJimmy films once again, hidden camera style, long lens from far away. Frame is close on Judy sitting at the dining room table.As camera pulls back, we HEAR but don’t see Judy’s Parents talking to Jimmy’s Mom and Dad at the table. Judy is bored, completely uninterested in their conversation.JIMMY’S MOM (O.C.)So Melissa talked Gary into the SL instead of the seven series. I couldn’t believe it.Judy looks over at camera, catching the fact that she’s being videotaped. Jimmy keeps filming. JIMMY’S DAD (O.C.)They paid way too much.As Jimmy zooms in, she clandestinely flips off the camera.JUDY’S DADI strictly buy American anyway.Judy gets up. Her mom stops her.JUDY’S MOM (O.C.)Where you going honey?JUDYBathroom.As Judy leaves the table she walks towards camera as it shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. JIMMY’S HOUSE - JIMMY’S BEDROOM - NIGHTJudy sits on Jimmy’s bed, staring into the camera. She’s uncomfortable sitting there. It’s poorly framed.JUDYCan we start already?JIMMY (O.C.)One second.Camera shuts off.8.INT. JIMMY'S HOUSE - JIMMY'S BEDROOM - DAYJimmy films Judy again, better framing this time. Judy looks annoyed and uncomfortable in front of the camera.JIMMY (O.C.)Who do you hate most in the world and why?JUDY(kind of bitchy)Why? Who cares?JIMMY (O.C.)I do.JUDYGod, I just wanted to come up here to say “hi” and get away from my parents’ bullshit for like two seconds and you have to put the stupid camera in my face.Jimmy takes delight in Judy’s displeasure of being filmed.JIMMY (O.C.)Now we’re onto something.Judy wants to go and then doesn’t.JUDYYou’re weird Jimmy. You were weird when we were kids and now you’re just getting weirder.JIMMY (O.C.)Is that why you had a crush on me?JUDY(scoffs)Yeah right.JIMMY (O.C.)You didn’t have a crush on me?Judy fidgets, he’s got her.JUDYYou’re a loser. You’re twenty one and you’re still living with your parents.She’s waiting for a response. Jimmy doesn’t bite.9.JUDYI heard that you got kicked out of college because you tried to talk your roommate into killing himself.JIMMY (O.C.)Where’d you hear that?JUDYFrom everyone.Jimmy waits. Judy’s curious how he’ll respond.JIMMY (O.C.)You wanna know the truth?JUDYYeah.JIMMY (O.C.)He asked me if he should kill himself. I told him to look inside himself for the answer. I didn’t tell him to. I didn’t tell him not to. I said he shouldn’t be afraid of the unknown. If he was going to kill himself, I wanted him to do it for the right reasons.JUDYI swear to God, you’re a fucking psycho.JIMMY (O.C.)Like you’re normal.JUDYMore than you.JIMMY (O.C.)If I’m such a freak, what are you doing in my room?JUDYI was bored.Jimmy waits, assessing the situation.JIMMY (O.C.)I wanna show you something?10.Judy looks up at the camera. Before she can answer, camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. JIMMY’S HOUSE - JIMMY’S BEDROOM - NIGHTJudy sits on the edge of Jimmy's bed facing a television set. Jimmy films from behind her so he gets Judy's back and the television in the shot. The screen is static.JUDYI can't believe I'm doing this.Nothing’s happening. Judy’s getting antsy.JUDY(offended; turns to camera)Can you start the tape?Jimmy clicks the VCR with his remote, as Judy turns back to watch. On TV, static flips to black.JUDYDon't think this means I like you or anything.A few seconds. Nothing on TV yet.JUDYAnd as soon as this is over I'm going back downstairs.An image flips on the TV.BEGIN JIMMY'S REVENGE TAPEEXT. HIGH SCHOOL - TEACHER'S PARKING LOT - (ON JIMMY'S TV) - DAYSomeone (Jimmy) has placed the camera on the ground and is facing a car in a parking lot at school.JIMMY (O.C.)(in bedroom)That’s Mrs. Holzclaw’s car. She’s your P.E. teacher, right? I hated her too.Jimmy enters frame and punches a Butterfly Knife into the sidewall of Mrs. Holzclaw's car sending air HISSING as the tire sinks.11.JIMMY (O.C.)And Bill McAllister... I went to school with his brother. They’re both dicks.Tape cuts to...EXT. HIGH SCHOOL - ENTRANCE (ON JIMMY'S TV) - DAYOn TV, hidden camera style (long lens from a distance) the Dumb Looking Bully Type (Bill McAllister) is taken out of school in cuffs into a waiting Squad Car.JIMMY (O.C.)(in bedroom)I planted an ounce of weed in his locker then sent an anonymous letter to Principal Lipsky.EXT. HIGH SCHOOL - ENTRANCE (ON JIMMY'S TV) - DAYSame location, different day. On TV, again hidden camera style, a girl is being rolled out of the school on a stretcher. It's the Mean Girl, the one who smacked Judy in the face with her school bag. She's placed into an ambulance.JIMMY (O.C.) I took care of her too. Jimmy clicks the television set off with his remote.END JIMMY'S REVENGE TAPEINT. JIMMY'S HOUSE - JIMMY'S BEDROOM - DAYThe TV is off. All we see is Judy's back. She hasn't once turned around to face the camera during any of the clips.She sits still.She trembles but doesn't turn around. She collects herself but still doesn't turn around. Jimmy holds the camera steady.Still she doesn't turn around.She fidgets in her seat but still doesn't turn around.She now sits still on the edge of the bed like she is in a trance, but still doesn't turn around to face the camera.12.No movement.No movement.No movement.She begins to breath heavily.Then no movement.She leans her head down towards the floor.Then no movement.Still no movement or any reaction for that matter. It's like she is in a trance and can't wake up.Jimmy (O.C.) continues to roll without budging.Still no movement.It looks like she's about to turn around. She moves her head in the direction of the camera, then assumes her original position facing the TV.Then... no movement.Still no movement. Then Judy collapses onto the bed. Jimmy, still rolling, gets off the bed and begins filming her as she lies on the floor crying hysterically.Judy cries and cries and cries and cries. She then lets out a cry from the depths of her soul. The cry is long, hard, and loud.Jimmy gets up, then stands above her with the camera. She rolls over on her back and is now facing directly into the camera. She tries to collect herself.JUDYWhy did you do that?JIMMY (O.C.)I had to.JUDYWhy?JIMMY (O.C.)I did it for you.13.JUDYI don't understand.Judy tries hard to stop, but just sobs harder and louder than before.JUDY Please tell me.JIMMY (O.C.)I felt like if I didn't save you then no one else would.JUDY(screams)Please turn off the FUCKING CAMERA!A muffled voice comes through the door from downstairs.JIMMY’S DAD (O.C.)Jimmy! What the hell are you guys doing up there?Judy stops, realizing suddenly that she’s been screaming.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. JIMMY'S HOUSE - STAIRWAY/ENTRYWAY/LIVING ROOM - NIGHTJimmy's behind the camera. He stands at the head of the stairs shooting down. Sounds of a dinner party just getting started come from downstairs. He walks down the steps into the party.A generic "Happy Twentieth Anniversary" sign hangs above the front door. Camera pans awkwardly to a lame K-Mart style studio portrait on the wall. It's Jimmy's parents wearing saccharine sweet smiles, Dad's hair slicked back, Mom in an overdone hair-do and in way too colorful clothing.Gifts sit on the entry-way table. Party Guests are dressed nicely and are mingling in the house, drinks in hand. Dinner is yet to start. As Jimmy moves into the...ENTRY-WAYPeople at the party all turn to camera, a look of shock on their faces as Jimmy walks through. More and more people react with gasps and revulsion at camera, but we can't tell why. Jimmy moves camera to the...14.LIVING ROOMThe place is full of More Party Guests. Frame moves across a huge mirror on the wall over a cocktail bar. We catch a glimpse of Jimmy's image and realize...Jimmy is completely NAKED and has PAINTED HIS ENTIRE BODY SILVER.Camera quickly turns away from the mirror as some people run from the room.One of the Female Party Guests (#1) SCREAMS.FEMALE PARTY GUEST #1(covers her mouth)Oh my God!Jimmy keeps filming, catching people's reactions.He points the camera at a Female Party Guest #2.JIMMY (O.C.)Hey, great party, huh? I'm making a tape for my parents. Want to say something to them?Female Party Guest #2 is just too stunned to speak.JIMMY'S MOM (O.C.)Jimmy!Jimmy turns the camera at his mother who is completely shocked to see him like this.JIMMY (O.C.)Hey Mom. Happy anniversary. You want to say anything to yourself?JIMMY'S DAD That's enough.Jimmy's Dad runs into the room and throws a blanket over Jimmy's head, body and the camera. All we see is black and flashes of light from under the blanket.JIMMY'S DAD (O.C.)(muffled)Get out! Now!15.Camera's under the blanket as we hear Jimmy's Dad pushes him from the room. Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. THERAPIST'S OFFICE - DAYCamera is being removed from the camera bag. As the lens pans quickly, we catch a glimpse of Jimmy smirking, holding the camera. He's way too close to the lens.He flips it around until it locks on DR. WALTERS, MFCC (40), Jimmy's not very accomplished therapist. Walters seems to have a very gentle and nonthreatening aura that suggests he's the type of person you would feel comfortable talking to. He sits by the window in his relatively uninteresting office. Jimmy has turned on the camera in the middle of their first session together.DR. WALTERSJimmy, we discussed this. You can't tape our sessions. It's not allowed.The camera doesn't move.DR. WALTERSYou know, you can't film someone who doesn't want their image and voice recorded. Technically, you're actually breaking the law.Jimmy (O.C.) doesn't respond.DR. WALTERSDoes your defiance make you feel more powerful?Still no answer.DR. WALTERSFilming people makes you feel like you're in control of the situation doesn't it?Still no answer.DR. WALTERS I can sit here as long as you can. You're not going to be able to force me to participate in your little game here.16.No movement from the camera.DR. WALTERS Jimmy, this isn't something that friends do to each other is it?Dr. Walters sits in front of the camera, trying to stay perfectly still and calm.Dr. Walters is so nice and so calm, that we start to feel sorry for him.No movement.No movement.Dr. Walters fidgets.Then holds still.Then fidgets, trying to stay calm.DR. WALTERS Jimmy, put the camera away, please.No movement.DR. WALTERS You're wasting your time and mine, Jimmy. We could be doing something productive.The camera shakes a bit. Jimmy's laughing.Dr. Walters is doing his best to stay calm.DR. WALTERS That's enough.No movement.DR. WALTERS Put it away.Nothing.DR. WALTERS Now Jimmy!Dr. Walters gets up and comes towards the camera. He grabs it just above the lens and tries to take it away. 17.DR. WALTERSCome on Jimmy.A fierce battle of tug of war breaks out. We see Dr. Walters becoming increasingly pissed off.The back and forth is suddenly getting violent, until...DR. WALTERS Gimme the Goddamn fucking camera!Dr. Walters finally gets the camera free from Jimmy. Camera shuts off.CAMERA ON:INT. JIMMY'S HOUSE - JIMMY'S BEDROOM/UPSTAIRS HALLWAY - DAYJimmy's behind the camera, moving quickly down the hall to...JIMMY'S BEDROOMJudy is sitting on his bed. She sees Jimmy come in with the camera and freaks out.JUDYNo. No filming. I'm leaving, I swear.Judy gets up to go.JIMMYOkay, okay. Wait.As Jimmy gets up to stop her, camera shuts off.CAMERA ON:INT. JIMMY'S HOUSE - JIMMY'S BEDROOM - DAYJimmy is filming Judy, who is sitting on his bed. Her face is red, her eyes have watered up, and her nose is snotty and running from after an intense session of crying. Jimmy is catching her seconds after she's has finally composed herself.JIMMY (O.C.)Say what you said to me before.JUDYI don't know how I said it.18.JIMMY (O.C.)Paraphrase it then.JUDYDo what?JIMMY (O.C.)Say it like you did before but it doesn't have to be exactly the same.JUDYYou mean paraphrase it.JIMMY (O.C.)That's what I said.JUDYI didn't hear you.Judy stares off camera.JIMMY (O.C.)Are you ready?JUDYI'm waiting for you.JIMMY (O.C.)OK.JUDYTell me when.JIMMY (O.C.)Now.JUDYYou want me to paraphrase it?JIMMY (O.C.)(impatient)Yes!Judy thinks for a beat.JUDYI can't remember what I said.JIMMY (O.C.)Then just ad-lib.19.JUDYAd-lib?JIMMY (O.C.)Yes.Judy thinks for a beat.JUDYI don't know what that means.JIMMY (O.C.)(getting frustrated)It means make it up.JUDY(confused)Do you want me to make something up or paraphrase what I did the first time?This isn't working. The camera drops from Judy. JIMMY (O.C.)Let's take a break.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. JIMMY'S HOUSE - JIMMY'S BEDROOM - DAYCamera's on a tripod. Jimmy sits in a chair, the back of his shoulder foregrounds Judy.JUDYI'm not good on camera. It makes me nervous.JIMMYForget about the camera. Talk to me.JUDYOK.JIMMYTell me what you said earlier. About me about how you felt when you saw the video. 20.JUDY(relaxes)It felt like someone had been reading my mind.She stops.JIMMYGo on.JUDYIt was like someone had jumped into my head and watched what was being projected.Now Judy completely has forgotten that the camera is there.JIMMYAnd earlier, what you said about God.Jimmy zooms in the camera by remote. Judy's distracted.JIMMY(off her look)Tell me.Judy refocuses.JUDYI said that it felt like God had sent someone to protect me, and to look out for me.She looks at Jimmy as if he is an angel.JUDY And I said that you are the only person in my life who has ever looked after me like that.Judy tries to stifle tears, but they're starting to flow again. As camera zooms in further, Judy catches sight of Jimmy's finger on the remote and BLOWS HER FUCKING TOP, leaping from her chair.JUDYGod, I hate it when you film me crying!Judy goes for the camera, struggling to get it off the tripod, she finally frees it and points it at Jimmy.21.JUDY (O.C.)How do you like it, huh? How do you like having a camera shoved right up your ass?Camera's framed poorly, moves around a lot, goes in and out of focus, etc.JUDY (O.C.)Do you like it? Do you?JIMMYI don't like it or dislike. I'm used to it.Judy moves the camera directly in his face. The lens is millimeters away from his nose. We see an extreme close up of his nostrils.JIMMYGenerally I'd place the camera further away from my nose, but if this is your preferred shooting style then I guess I'll have to adjust to it.Jimmy leans in and rests his nose on the lens.JIMMYHow's this work for you?Judy pulls back and continues filming him.JUDY (O.C.)Give me a break.JIMMYOK.Now Judy's the interviewer. Her framing is not quite as adept as Jimmy's.JUDY (O.C.)So... why do you have to film everything?JIMMYI don't film everything.JUDY (O.C.)Why do you like to film me crying?22.JIMMYI don't.JUDY (O.C.)Then why do you?JIMMYBecause it's rare that I get to find someone that lets their emotions go. When a person is crying, I mean truly crying, or truly laughing or smiling or frowning or gasping. For a few seconds or minutes I get a chance to see that person's soul. And really, now that you've forced me to think about it. I think it's a very rare and beautiful thing to be afforded that opportunity.Judy is shaken and speechless.JIMMYAnything else?Judy's moved and forgets herself. Camera drops from Jimmy.JUDY (O.C.)Why me?Jimmy helps her put the camera back up on him.JIMMYBecause.Jimmy sits still. Judy doesn't know what to do with that.JIMMYWhy do you think?Judy doesn't have an answer.Jimmy reaches forward and takes the camera away from her and turns the interview around.JIMMY (O.C.)Why you and why me? Why are we together right now?Judy doesn't know what to say.23.JIMMY (O.C.) Go ahead say it. I want you to. I know what you're going to say so just say it.JUDYStop.JIMMY (O.C.)(soft)Tell me.Judy fidgets.JIMMY (O.C.)(bullies her)Tell me!Judy fidgets again, then...JUDY(blows her top)Because we're both fucking weird!Judy pauses. The pressure of the camera from Jimmy makes her feel like she has to give him more.JUDYBecause we're the two weirdest kids in the world. And God made us for each other and I fucking love you, and you did all this because you love me too, and fuck everyone and everything that doesn't get it!Judy's out of breath. Camera still points at her.JUDYThat's right, right?Judy stares back at the camera, longing for an answer from Jimmy. She told him she loved him. Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:I/E. HIGHWAY FIRST-KISS-SMILEY-FACE/JIMMY'S CAR - DAYJimmy is driving in his car with Judy in the passenger seat. Judy has the camera and she is interviewing Jimmy as he drives.JUDY (O.C.)Where are you taking me?24.JIMMYTo a beautiful place.JUDY (O.C.)Where?JIMMYChuck E. Cheese.Judy and Jimmy laugh together.JUDY (O.C.)No seriously.JIMMYI can't tell you. It'll ruin it.JUDY (O.C.)Fine.Judy sulks for a second.JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy, can I ask you something?JIMMYAnything.JUDY (O.C.)Do you hate your parents?JIMMYYes, but I understand them.JUDY (O.C.)What's to understand?JIMMYLots of things.JUDY (O.C.)Like what?JIMMYI understand that my ascension into young adulthood triggered their descent into mid-life crisis. Generally when an only child leaves the nest, the parents begin reassessing their own lives. They see us as a younger, better version of themselves. 25.
(MORE)They feel abandoned by our need for privacy and insecure because we no longer seek their approval. They used to take us to baseball games and cover our scrapes with bandages, but once we no longer need Mom to nurture our bruises or Dad to be our hero it puts their roles and subsequent sense of self worth into question.JUDY (O.C.)How do you know all these things?JIMMYWhen you don't have any friends, don't play sports, don't go out, have no one talk to, nowhere to go, no one to listen to you, or no one to help you figure things out, you sort of have to figure things out by yourself. And without any of those things I have nothing but time to think about stuff.JUDY (O.C.)You are SO smart.JIMMYYou are so beautiful.Long pause. Judy doesn't know how to react.JUDY (O.C.)You think I'm pretty?JIMMYI think you're the most beautiful person I have ever met. The most beautiful person in the universe.JUDY (O.C.)No one has ever told me that.JIMMYGet used to hearing it.JUDY (O.C.)Do you think I'm smart?JIMMYYes.26.JIMMY (cont'd)JUDY (O.C.)Do you think I'm fat?JIMMYYes.JUDY (O.C.)How could you say that? I only way a hundred and ten pounds.JIMMYOh, I'm sorry. I thought you said flat. As in flat chested.JUDY (O.C.)I am not FLAT!Judy smacks him.JIMMYProve it.JUDY (O.C.)I don't have to prove it. Here look.O.C., Judy is sticking her chest out for Jimmy. He looks away from the road to stare, her breasts filling out her top nicely.JIMMYI still can't tell.JUDY (O.C.)I wear a full B cup.JIMMYShow me. Take em out.JUDY (O.C.)I am not going to take them out! You take yours out.JIMMYIt's already out.Judy tilts the camera down. IN A FLASH we see a lifelike dildo sticking out of Jimmy's fly, a smiley face sticker covers the head. The camera quickly shakes and spins off the image as Judy screams bloody fucking murder.27.Jimmy laughs. Judy forgets the camera is on. She drops it into her lap, fabric from her clothes covers the frame.We can hear Jimmy and Judy laughing hysterically.JUDY (O.C.)I can't believe you did that.JIMMY (O.C.)That's why I did it. Now come on. I showed you mine, let me see yours.We hear the rustling of Judy's clothing. Camera falls to her feet on the floor of the car. There's silence. Off camera, Judy's nervously showing Jimmy her breasts.JIMMY (O.C.) Wow. Give me the camera.JUDY (O.C.)No.JIMMY (O.C.)Please, pretty, pretty please with sugar on top.Judy grabs the camera. It's pointing in Jimmy's direction, but she still doesn't realize it's on.JIMMY (O.C.)Here, I'll pull over.Jimmy pulls over to the side of the road then takes the camera. Jimmy frames up Judy.JIMMY (O.C.) Let me see 'em.Judy has a naughty and flirtatious smile. In the blink of an eye she suddenly lifts up her shirt and exposes her bra, then pulls her shirt back down.Jimmy protests.JIMMY (O.C.)That doesn't count. Come on, for real this time.JUDYI'm embarrassed.28.JIMMY (O.C.)Don't be. You can trust me.Judy's not sure. Jimmy looks into her eyes, pouring it on.JIMMY (O.C.)You can. You can trust me with your life.Judy looks at him with a sense of admiration then hope.JIMMY (O.C.)(gently)Please.Judy gets the same sexy, naughty smile and lifts up her shirt exposing the bra, keeping it there.JIMMY (O.C.)Will you take off your bra?Judy looks nervous but gives in. She unhooks her bra from the front and exposes her naked breasts for as long as she can. Jimmy focusses the camera's attention on them. It's too much for her. She quickly pulls her shirt back down. Jimmy tilts up to a close up of Judy's face.JUDY(struggling)I just realized something.Judy's eyes are starting to well up as she tries not to cry.JIMMY (O.C.)What's the matter?JUDYI just showed you my breasts and I saw your penis and we haven't even kissed.She starts tearing up.JUDY You haven't even asked me to be your girlfriend and I did that. I'm a slut.(wiping her eyes)I don't want to be a slut.Jimmy sees she's crying.29.JIMMY (O.C.)Will you be my girlfriend?JUDYYes.JIMMY (O.C.)Can I kiss you?JUDY(sniffling)Yes. Will you turn off the camera?JIMMY (O.C.)I want this moment to be captured forever. I'd rather not kiss you at all than waste the opportunity to document the most beautiful moment of my life. Judy leans towards Jimmy, then suddenly attacks him and shoves the camera to the side. They are making out exuberantly. The camera shakes and wobbles. We can hear heavy breathing and the two of them smashing up against the interior of the car.Jimmy finally has the camera in position. He has one of his arms extended and now we can see the two of them kissing. Judy's devouring him in that raging teenage hormone sort of way.JUDY(whispers)I wanna see your smiley face again.We see and hear Judy whispering, her lips placed gently on the inside of Jimmy's ear.JUDY (whispering)Turn the camera off. Turn the camera off. Turn it off.Camera goes off.CAMERA ON:I/E. HIGHWAY FIRST-KISS-SMILEY-FACE/JIMMY'S CAR - DAYJudy films Jimmy driving the car. He has a huge shit eating grin on his face.30.JUDY (O.C.)How do you feel?JIMMYRelaxed, happy, confident, studly, excited, relieved, delighted... I love you Judy.JUDY (O.C.)You do?JIMMYVery much so. I always have.JUDY (O.C.)Me too.Long pause filled with sexual tension takes over.JUDY (O.C.)Do you want to pull over again?Jimmy smiles. Of course he does. Camera goes off.CAMERA ON:EXT. BEAUTIFUL FARM - SHOTGUN SCENE - DAY Judy films Jimmy as he FIRES a twelve gage pump action shot gun off into the distance. After each shot he pumps then FIRES again.JIMMYAre you getting this?No response.Jimmy FIRES another shot. His muscles are flexing as he pumps the gage. He looks extremely violent and determined.JIMMY Come on. Are you getting this?A very turned off Judy replies.JUDY (O.C.)This is where you wanted to take me?JIMMYYeah, what's the matter?We can hear Judy crying. The camera shakes out of control.31.JUDY (O.C.)I wanna go home.Jimmy looks over towards the camera/Judy. He knows that he's fucked up and he feels like complete shit.Jimmy walks over to her, takes the camera and shuts it off. CAMERA ON:INT. JIMMY'S HOUSE - JIMMY'S BATHROOM - NIGHTJimmy is standing in front of a mirror and is videotaping his own reflection.He is talking to himself and into the camera.JIMMYDon't fuck this up. Please don't fuck this up.Now he is pleading with himself.JIMMY Just try to be normal. (screaming)Just be normal! God damn it why do you have to fuck everything up?He hasn’t convinced himself.JIMMYBe normal. Be normal. Be normal!Jimmy takes a breath, then shuts the camera down.CAMERA ON:INT. JIMMY'S HOUSE - JIMMY'S BEDROOM - NIGHTJimmy films Judy who lies next to him in the bed. Her face is sweaty and red and he is still a tad out of breath. Jimmy is capturing her literally seconds after they had sex.She's somewhat bewildered, then she notices the camera. She's starting to get used to it.JUDY(big smile)Hi.32.JIMMY (O.C.)So how do you feel now, right at this moment?Judy just sighs, basking in the afterglow.JUDYI don't know.(trying)That was soooo good.JIMMY (O.C.)You were good. What got into you?JUDYI don't know. I've just really been wanting you lately. Really bad.JIMMY (O.C.)Why's that?Judy chuckles.JUDYI'm embarrassed. I can't say.JIMMY (O.C.)Now you have to tell me. JUDYIt was after yesterday.Jimmy is more than surprised.JIMMY (O.C.)Yesterday?Judy speaks as if she is going to reveal a big secret. Very quiet and cute in her mannerisms.JUDYYeah, it was after I saw you shoot that gun.JIMMY (O.C.)You were crying. I wanted to kill myself after I did that. You were scared and you were shaking. It was the most awful thing I ever did. I didn't think I'd ever see you again.33.Judy thinks.JUDYI was scared at first. Really scared. I didn't expect it to be so loud and you looked so mean. But then I got home and started thinking about it. About how your muscles looked and how dangerous it all seemed. It made me like... all excited, and like...Judy looks for the right word.JIMMY (O.C.)Horny?Judy laughs with embarrassment. Camera shakes as Jimmy hands it to her. JIMMY (O.C.)Here. Hold this.Judy turns the camera back on Jimmy as he leaps out of bed.JUDY (O.C.)Where you going?JIMMYOne sec!Jimmy's bare ass flashes us as he heads out the bedroom door.Judy holds the camera as we hear Jimmy in the hallway. He opens a closet door, fumbles through it, then busts back into the bedroom, holding the shotgun he used out on the lake.Jimmy zooms in on Jimmy's naked upper body as he stands in front of her and begins pumping the gun and pulling the trigger. Obviously the gun is not loaded.JUDY (O.C.)That is so hot!JIMMYMy dad keeps it in his closet. Here.Jimmy gives Judy the gun. Now she's holding the gun and the camera.JUDY (O.C.)It's heavy.34.Judy points the gun at Jimmy. She lowers it, aiming right at his crotch just below frame.JIMMYNow I see the appeal. Give me the camera.Judy hands Jimmy the camera. Camera moves and shakes as she hands it over.Jimmy frames her up nicely. Now we see Judy topless, pointing the gun directly at the lens of the camera.JUDYWhat do you think of this?She brings the gun down, then takes the barrel of the gun and places it between her breasts, squishing them together, covering her nipples as she rubs the barrel between her breasts.JUDY Do you like that?JIMMY (O.C.)Yes.Judy takes the barrel of the gun from her breasts and near her mouth. She starts rolling her tongue over the top of the barrel slowly and seductively, then stops. It looks as if she's about to perform full mock oral sex on the barrel of the gun.JIMMY (O.C.)That is SO hot.As she is about to start to move her mouth and lips over the gun, then suddenly we hear a garage door open.Jimmy throws the camera sideways down on the bed.JIMMY (O.C.)Fuck! It's my parents!We are now seeing sideways rotated images of Jimmy and Judy panicking, throwing on their clothes as fast as humanly possible.Jimmy grabs the camera off the bed and turns it off.CAMERA ON:35.INT. JIMMY'S HOUSE - PARENTS' BEDROOM - DAYJimmy is hiding in the closet of his parents' bedroom. He has the door of the closet cracked and puts the lens of the camera through the crack.Jimmy's Dad enters the room. He has no idea that he is being filmed and that Jimmy is in the closet.Jimmy's Dad walks over to the dresser, opens up the top drawer and pulls something out. It's too dark in the room to tell exactly what he's pulled out, but it appears to resemble some sort of undergarment.Jimmy's Dad begins undressing, then steps out of frame.After a beat, he reappears. Now he's wearing nothing but a sequined teddy. He's totally fat, hairy, and nasty looking. He sits on the side of the bed, his back to us. Now we see that what he grabbed out of the drawer was actually a pair of fishnet stockings. He begins putting them on.When he is finished putting on his panty hose, he gets up off the bed and begins admiring his legs in a mirror. He begins to gently stroke the sides of his legs, relishing the feel of the hose over his hands and fingertips.He seems to be lip syncing the words to a song and begins to get all worked up. He shakes his hips and dances around the room for a few seconds.Now Jimmy's Dad goes to the dresser and pulls out a long brunette wig from the back of his top drawer. Putting it on, with the fishnet stockings, sequined teddy and long wig, he has transformed himself into the world's fattest, ugliest, hairiest, Cher look-a-like.Someone else enters the room.JIMMY'S DADHi sweety.Holy shit. It's Jimmy's Mom, and she's wearing a leather dominatrix outfit!JIMMY'S MOMAre you ready for me, you fucking slut?JIMMY'S DADNot quite.36.JIMMY'S MOMI don't feel like waiting. Hurry up bitch. What do you have left to do?JIMMY'S DADI just need to put on my makeup.As Jimmy's Mom exits frame, we see Jimmy's Dad go to the mirror. He opens up the top drawer again and pulls out a little makeup bag.Jimmy's Mom re-enters, now wearing a mini leather biker's hat, carrying a riding switch.JIMMY'S MOMCome on slut.Jimmy's Dad finishes applying his lipstick and moves over to the bed. By the way Jimmy's parents are behaving, it's as if they've gone through this routine a thousand times.Jimmy's Mom drifts off screen as Jimmy's Dad gets up on all fours. Suddenly, we hear a SMACK as Jimmy's Mom hits Jimmy's Dad on his ass with the switch.He lets out deep pleasured groans as she continues SMACKING him with the whip harder and harder. He yelps, squeals, and gyrates his hips back and forth, then starts dry humping the air until she stops.Jimmy's Mom comes back through and out of frame. Jimmy's Dad pushes his belly into the bed, groaning from the pain while he waits for her return.She comes back, moving quickly across the screen wearing an enormous strap on dildo.Disappearing out of frame again, Jimmy's Dad gets himself ready for her one more time, ass up, on all fours on the bed.From behind, we can see her hand as she hikes her husband's dress up his back, then we see his face and hear him grunt as she rips his fishnets off screen.There's a pause. Nothing seems to be happening, but Jimmy's Dad is bracing himself for something. His face tightens up. Off screen, Jimmy's Mom has started mounting him from behind.Jimmy can't take it any longer. As he slowly emerges from the closet, his Mom notices Jimmy almost immediately. She jumps off her husband, screaming bloody murder.37.Camera's shaky but it's easy to guess what's been happening. Mom's just started doing Dad from behind with the strap on.JIMMYHi mom. Hi dad. What are you guys up to?Jimmy's Dad leaps from the bed and begins shouting. He looks completely absurd screaming at Jimmy wearing his sequined dress and wig.JIMMY'S DADWhat the fuck are you doing here?Jimmy's Mom goes hysterical and begins screaming at Jimmy's Dad.JIMMY'S MOM(to his dad)I told you he would find out you fucking freak! No wonder he's a fucking psycho. Look a his father.Jimmy's Dad is beside himself with fury and throws off his wig.JIMMY'S DADTurn off the that fucking camera! Turn off that fucking camera right fucking now god damn it!Jimmy is loving it.JIMMYGee dad, what do you say the two of us go out to the front yard and throw some ball together? We'll have a nice friendly game of catch.Jimmy's Dad attacks Jimmy. He swings at the lens. He's one angry drag queen daddy. He begins strangling Jimmy.JIMMY'S DADYou little mother fucker. Turn off that fucking camera!Jimmy's Mom rips off her strap on dildo and begins beating Jimmy's Dad with it. Judging from the punishment she's inflicting upon her drag queen husband, the dildo apparently is made from the finest and heaviest of materials. 38.JIMMY'S MOMStop it! You're going to kill him.Jimmy's Dad lets go. The dildo's doing the trick.JIMMY’S DADBitch!Jimmy's Mom keeps swinging the dildo at Jimmy's Dad even though he's let go.JIMMY'S MOMFuck you! You think you know me? You don't know me! You piece of shit!JIMMY(laughing)Mom!Jimmy's Mom now directs her attention on Jimmy. She screams at him as she swings her gigantic strap on towards the camera.JIMMY'S MOM You little beast! You want to film something? Film this!She continues to swing the strap on as she walks closer and closer to the lens.The camera goes crazy. Loud sounds are heard throughout the room. Evidently Jimmy has been tackled. We hear wrestling and grunting. It seems that Jimmy's Dad has tackled Jimmy, or maybe his Mom, or both, but the camera is too shaky to tell just what has happened.Jimmy's Dad is still fighting. He seems to have them all pinned against the floor. He's crushing his mother.JIMMY'S DAD (O.C.)Nancy, Nancy, Nancy, Nancy! Please someone call me Nancy. My name is Nancy.JIMMY'S MOM (O.C.)(crying hysterically)Nancy, Nancy, Nancy... Jimmy please call him "Nancy" for the love of God. Call your daddy Nancy. Call him Nancy...!39.We hear Jimmy's Mom screaming/repeating herself. We see a hand go over the lens. Jimmy and his mother and father are all in a wrestling match on the floor.Jimmy with great enthusiasm begins to sing as the camera shakes.JIMMY (O.C.)Take me out to the ball game, take me out to the crowd, buy me some peanuts and crackerjacks...The wrestling match continues as we see more hands come towards the lens. Jimmy's Mom suddenly stops screaming, as if she's been knocked out.JIMMY'S DAD (O.C.)Give me that fucking tape!JIMMY (O.C.)I don't think so Nancy. Nancy, Nancy, Nancy...After some very intense fighting, someone is finally able to shut the camera off.CAMERA ON:EXT. FOREST/MEADOW - RUNNING NAKED - DAYJimmy has the camera and is chasing a naked (just from behind) Judy through the woods. The camera shakes and rattles, but we can definitely tell this is all in good fun.Judy screams as she is being chased through the woods. She couldn't feel more free.She begins to tire and slows down. She can no longer run and turns towards the camera. As she turns around, camera shows her from the waist up. She has a beer can in her hand and she is a little drunk.For the first time, she's completely at ease with her own body and looks perfectly natural being naked in the wilderness. She walks towards the camera smoothly and seductively. Her long hair blond hair blows gently in the wind.JUDYI'm so glad you're out. Next time your dad wants to take it in the ass, DON'T FILM HIM! 40.JIMMY (O.C.)I know. Ironic that I was the one sent to the nut house.JUDYI thought I was going to die without you. What if you and I could live here together? Forever.JIMMY (O.C.)Right here?JUDYI'm serious. Maybe not here, but eventually we'll buy some land, and we can live together on it, and be naked whenever we want.She takes a big swig of her beer. Then burps.JUDY Excuse me. What do you think?JIMMY (O.C.)I think you're drunk.Judy walks towards the camera. She puts her mouth inches away from the lens.JUDYI think you're right mister.Judy giggles, then dances around playfully in the woods. She has never felt so alive. JUDY I don't want this to ever end. I want to be here forever. I want to dance and be naked and be free, and I want us to ball our brains out everyday, and I want to feel the air on my body and I want to get drunk and not care about anything in the world. I just want us to be together in this moment.JIMMY (O.C.)I know a place like that.JUDYYou do?41.JIMMY (O.C.)Yep. We can go there one day if you want.JUDYWe can? Where is it?JIMMY (O.C.)Erlanger.JUDY(doesn't buy it)Erlanger!JIMMY (O.C.)Yeah Erlanger. Everybody was talking about it in the nut house. That's ALL anybody fucking talked about was this dude who lives up there named Uncle Rodney. He supposedly has a commune where we can do this kind of thing every day.JUDYUncle Rodney's commune?Judy smiles, almost laughing. It all sounds pretty ridiculous to her, but plays along anyway.JUDYThat's funny.JIMMY (O.C.)(playfully)No, I'm serious.Judy walks back towards the camera and grabs it away from Jimmy, surprising him.JIMMYHey!JUDY (O.C.) Okay, now it's your turn.Shot from the waist up, we now see that Jimmy's naked as well. He's at a loss as to what he should say.JUDY (O.C.) How does it feel to be a free man?Jimmy thinks. A drunk Judy is losing her patience.42.JUDY (O.C.) Come on, come on, come on...JIMMYI'm thinking.JUDY (O.C.)Just let it go, be free.JIMMY(adoringly)You're such a hippie all of sudden.JUDY (O.C.)Come on.JIMMYNo.Judy's not getting what she wants from him. Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:EXT. FOREST/MEADOW - RUNNING NAKED - DAYJudy films Jimmy. The camera is close and intimate as they lie on their sides staring into each other's eyes. Judy is still naked, but is being shot in an extreme close up.JUDY (O.C.)Okay, go.Jimmy's still not up for it. Judy grabs the camera and turns it on him.JUDY (O.C.)Come on!Jimmy's turns the tables.JIMMYOkay, you really wanna hear something?JUDY (O.C.)Yeah.Jimmy takes a deep breath, a touch of intensity flashes in his eye, then...43.JIMMYI want to go one day without masturbating. I want to liberate my penis. I want to clone you so we could have a three way and neither of us would be cheating. I want you to scrape my balls with a cheese grater...Judy starts laughing. The camera's shaking.JUDY (O.C.)That's gross!Jimmy suddenly gets serious.JIMMYAnd I love you. I love you so much it hurts.JUDY (O.C.)It hurts?JIMMYLike God is stabbing me in heart with a thousand knives at the same time and you're the only one who can make the pain go away. Do you love me that much?JUDY (O.C.)I love you so much, I'd rather die than be without you.JIMMYHere.Jimmy grabs the camera and points it at Judy.JIMMY (O.C.)Make me a promise... the way a husband and wife make a promise... that we will be together always and forever.JUDYYou mean get married?JIMMY (O.C.)Something more powerful than marriage. It's a bond. It's our bond. It's transcendental.44.JUDYWhat?JIMMY (O.C.)Transcendental.(grabs the camera)Here.Jimmy hands Judy the camera as she starts to frame him up, but they're really engaging each other's eyes over the top of the eyepiece.JIMMYIt's transcendental because it transcends everything. Life, love, law, people, things... A bond so strong that our souls will become one and it can never end, even in death. If you swear on the bond, it means you'd rather die than break your promise.Judy is moved.JUDY (O.C.)That's so beautiful.JIMMYYou're so beautiful. I want to love you forever.JUDY (O.C.)Swear on the bond. Swear we'll be together forever, that you'd rather die than be apart.JIMMYI swear on the bond.JUDY (O.C.)And we'll never let anything come between us, not even death.JIMMYNot even death. I swear. Nothing will come between us, ever.Jimmy stares at her, then slowly leans in for a kiss... a long, wet, toe curling kiss. Jimmy finds a way to point the camera at the kiss.45.They break apart. Judy sighs, staring into Jimmy's eyes, then leans into him, his lips touching her forehead, their eyes closing as they feel the energy of true love.JUDYWe'll be together forever.JIMMY(whispers)Together forever.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:I/E. GROCERY STORE PARKING LOT/JIMMY'S CAR - DAYJimmy and Judy sit in a parked car outside of a huge grocery store.Jimmy and Judy sit outside a small grocery store. Jimmy films himself. Judy's in the passenger seat. He does his best news announcer impersonation.JIMMYThis is action ten news reporter Jimmy Van Muffmuncher reporting to you live from the parking lot of Dick's grocery store where we're going to witness the beautiful, the talented, the amazing Judy, commit her first crime.Jimmy flips the camera around onto Judy.JIMMY (O.C.)Is there anything you would like to say to the public and your adoring fans before you go through with this?Judy gleefully plays along.JUDYWell Mr. Van Muffmuncher. I just want to say that I look forward to losing, my, um... Judy pauses to think.JUDY What did you call it before?46.JIMMY (O.C.)Your conformist crimeless virginity.Judy snaps back into her role as interviewee. JUDYYes, I am very much looking forward to losing my conformist crimeless virginity. I would also like to share with my fans these.Judy lifts up her shirt and exposes her bra to the camera.JIMMY (V.O.)(in his reporter voice)Thank you and thank your tits for this rare, behind the scenes look at your first crime slash moment of truth.Judy leans in pops a quick kiss at the lens of the camera. Jimmy shuts it down.CAMERA ON:INT. GROCERY STORE - DAYJimmy is in a grocery store aisle filming Judy from way far away. We can barely make out that it is her until Jimmy zooms in tighter. She couldn't look more nervous or obvious.She is in the beer section. She quickly takes a six pack of canned beer and struggles to put it in her school bag. She walks quickly towards the exit. Jimmy follows her and catches up.Jimmy is standing next to her and he continues to film. Judy looks so nervous.JUDYJimmy, turn it off. We're gonna get busted.JIMMY (O.C.)No way, this is the best part.A man is yelling at them off camera.MAN (O.C.)Hey you two. Stop.47.Jimmy pans over and a store manager is standing in front of them.STORE MANAGERWhat the hell do you think you're doing?Jimmy and Judy have no reply. The store manager gives them his best intimidating stare.There is an extremely long pause.STORE MANAGER Turn that damn thing off. You can't be running around the store playing with a camera. It's against the store policy. Now get out of here.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:EXT. GROCERY STORE - PARKING LOT - DAYJudy is looking at the lens of the camera. She's shaking and screaming.JUDYWhat is the matter with you Jimmy? You almost got us caught. You're so worried about that camera. What is it? What is it!Jimmy calmly and quietly explains.JIMMY (O.C.)Twenty years from now, when we're together watching these tapes you'll realize how special this moment is. I owe it to you. And I owe it to us to capture everything and anything we do together.Judy is calmed but still is pissed.JUDYWell you freak me out sometimes. Why do you have to tape everything? It's like you have a problem or something.Judy's case isn't sticking. She treads lightly.48.JUDYYou know, most of the reason kids think you're so weird is because of it. Why do you think everybody makes fun of you? And then I have to hear it and I have to deal with it.JIMMY (O.C.)So everybody makes fun of me, huh?JUDYYeah. Can't you give the thing a fucking rest?Jimmy's fuming.JIMMY (O.C.)And you don't want to deal with it? Well fuck them and fuck you too if you think that. I couldn't give a fuck what people say. This is my life and I want to document it. And right now me filming you happens to be the only reason I manage to get out of my fucking bed every morning! You can't take this away from me!Jimmy starts crying.Judy takes the camera. She tapes Jimmy who is sobbing. Now she is the one who speaks gently. She's trying to give him a taste of his own medicine.JUDY (O.C.)How does it feel Jimmy? How does it feel to have someone taping you while you're crying?Jimmy doesn't answer. He tries to compose himself enough to speak. Judy pushes harder.JUDY (O.C.) Tell me. Look at the camera and tell me how it feels!JIMMYYou're not getting it. It doesn't matter how it feels right now. 49.
(MORE)What matters is that you're seeing what's inside of me and your taping it. Can you understand that?Judy doesn't know how to respond.JIMMYCan you?JUDY (O.C.)I don't know.JIMMYWell can you at least try?Jimmy is still crying. This weighs on her.JUDY (O.C.)Yes. I can most definitely try.JIMMYAnd you can never, ever, ever ask me to not film you or anything we do. That's the only thing I'll ever ask of you. Agreed?JUDY (O.C.)Okay. I'm sorry.JIMMYWill you swear to it? On camera, will you swear to it?Jimmy has talked himself into a good mood. Before we hear Judy's response, we...JUMP CUT TO:I/E. GROCERY STORE PARKING LOT/JIMMY'S CAR - DAYMoments later, Jimmy is now taping Judy. She has her right hand up, like a witness about to be sworn into the stand. She's all smiles as Jimmy gives her the oath to repeat back to him.JAMES (O.C.)Please raise your right hand.Judy raises her right hand.JIMMY (O.C.)Please repeat after me. I Judy...50.JIMMY (cont'd)JUDYI Judy...JIMMY (O.C.)Do hereby solemnly swear...JUDYDo hereby solemnly swear...JIMMY (O.C.)That I will never ask, request, or even insinuate to Jimmy to cease filming, no matter the situation. JUDYThat I will never ask, request, or even insinuate to Jimmy to cease filming, no matter the situation.JIMMY (O.C.)And furthermore, I do hereby solemnly swear to commit myself to giving Jimmy his daily blowjob and will continue to perform various sex acts with the skill and enthusiasm that he has become accustomed to.Judy laughs, then screams with embarrassed excitement. Her laughter and happiness is infectious.She pounds her fists on the dashboard and laughs again. We can hear Jimmy laughing off camera as well.JIMMY (O.C.)Keep your right hand up.Judy lifts her right hand back up. She looks at the camera with a huge smile.JUDYI do hereby solemnly swear to g...THWACK! Someone has thrown a full soda can on the hood of Jimmy's car. He pans and zooms the camera over and sees a car full of Three Teenagers laughing at them.JIMMY (O.C.)Mother fuckers.Suddenly the TEENAGE DRIVER of the car appears, as if out of nowhere, running to the passenger side. Jimmy zooms out. 51.The frame catches up to him just as he spits a huge LOOGIE into the car, hitting Judy right in the face.Judy screams. The car full of Three Teenagers laugh hysterically at her expense.Jimmy hands Judy the camera.JIMMYHere, you're definitely going to want to tape this.Jimmy calmly gets out of his car as Judy tapes him through the window. We can hear her breathing heavily as she tries not to cry softly off camera.Jimmy has gone to the rear of the car. We hear the trunk open while Judy films through the windshield at the car full of laughing teens. Jimmy enters the frame carrying a baseball bat.We see him talking calmly to the driver of the car, the Kid who spat in Judy's face. Then... WHAM!Jimmy reels back and clocks the kid right in the face with the bat. The Kid falls over into the front seat of the car. Jimmy calmly walks over to the front of the car and begins bashing in the windshield.JUDY (O.C.)(to herself)Oh my God.Now rage has taken over Jimmy over entirely. He's bashing in the windshield with all of his might.The teenagers all go running from the car. A crowd starts to form in the parking lot.JUDY (O.C.) (to herself)Oh, God Jimmy...Jimmy has now completely bashed in the windshield and moves to the front of the car. He now begins smashing the other windows. Now a sizeable crowd is formed. Jimmy is seemingly oblivious to them and continues bashing the car.52.JUDY (O.C.) (to herself)I love you Jimmy.Now it's to the point of overkill. But Jimmy won't stop. It's as if the rage he's been carrying inside of him his entire life is now coming to the surface.We hear sirens in the distance as Jimmy continues to bash the car. The car is in near shambles as we hear police sirens in the distance. Judy begins screaming.JUDY (O.C.) Jimmy stop, please stop. Jimmy... oh god, Jimmy stop. God damn it, fucking stop!Jimmy doesn't. He pounds the car harder as a police cruiser pulls up. Two policemen get out of the car. They are temporarily paralyzed with indecision. We see one of the officers trying to speak with Jimmy. He just ignores them. The policemen are oblivious to the fact they are being filmed.One of the officers gets out a can of mace and sprays it in Jimmy's face.Now Jimmy is completely freaking out. We hear him scream, but he continues to bash the car with his eyes closed. One of the cops draws his gun as Jimmy swings aimlessly towards them. He gets sprayed again with the mace and is now completely blinded. A huge crowd has now amassed outside of the grocery store.JUDY (O.C.)Oh, God Jimmy, oh God...Now the entire parking lot is filled with cop cars. Lights are flashing all around Jimmy. He is surrounded but sill continues to swing the bat.JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy...Three cops tackle Jimmy from behind. Judy throws down the camera and runs out the door. The camera is face down on the seat. 53.We hear Judy get out of the car, leaving the door open so we can hear the entire scene with much more intensity. The sounds of police sirens and radios is overwhelming. We hear a woman screaming and more sirens and cars are pulling up. More screaming and sounds on the radio is heard. We hear police chatter:POLICE CHATTER (O.C.)(over the police radios)We're going to need an ambulance stat at the parking lot of the grocery store on Route 18...More screaming and chatter is heard until someone enters the car. We don't know who it is. They turn off the camera.CAMERA ON:I/E. SANITARIUM PARKING LOT/JUDY'S CAR - DAYJudy is filming. She sits behind the wheel pointing the camera at the front door of a HIDDEN VALLEY Mental Hospital. She zooms in on a sign.Judy flips the camera around to herself.JUDYHi baby. I miss you.(blowing a kiss)Mwaa! I'll be waiting for you when you get out. Be good and don't wait too long. Look what I did for you!Judy opens her mouth wide. She's got a tongue stud on her tongue.JUDYI can't wait to use it on you!Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:I/E. FAST FOOD RESTAURANT DRIVE THRU/JIMMY'S CAR - DAYJimmy's pulled forward to the drive thru while Judy tapes from passenger seat. A voice squawks at Jimmy, asking for his order.54.JIMMYCan I get a double cheese burger, no pickles, large fries and a coke?Jimmy looks at the camera.JIMMY That's what I fucking missed more than anything. Fast food.He turns back to order more.JIMMYAnd a number two.The Drive Thru window voice rattles off a price and tells him to pull up. Jimmy continues to camera.JUDY (O.C.)What did you do in there all day?JIMMYMasturbated mostly.JUDY (O.C.)(jokingly)You cheated on me! I want to be the only person responsible for making you cum.JIMMYI hope you're willing to be on call twenty four hours a day.JUDY (O.C.)Seriously, what did you do? What was a day in the life of Jimmy in the nut house?JIMMYWell, besides masturbating, I talked and talked and talked and fucking talked until they were satisfied. But basically I told them what they wanted to hear. I said shit like...Jimmy does an over the top mock sincerity speech.55.JIMMY "Now that I'm finally able to talk about my problems, I now realize that my behavior was inappropriate and harmful to others." Judy laughs.JIMMY Then I figured it out. I had to cry as much as possible. Whenever someone would cry they'd call it a "break through." So I'd be like.Jimmy does an imitation of himself in therapy. He looks directly into the lens.JIMMY You start out slow, then you build it up like this... "Now I know that using violence is not the answer."Jimmy is getting progressively sappier and more over the top with his self impersonation.JIMMY Then you go like this:(snaps back into the impersonation)I was wrong, I know I was wrong and I'll never do it again. I don't want to hurt people or myself.Jimmy does an obnoxious fake cry.JIMMY Boo hoo, waaaaaa, boo-hoo-hoo, waaaaaaa.(snaps out of it)Then you always give them the obligatory hug at the end. After a couple of weeks, then they officially diagnose you with something, give you a prescription, then you're done.JUDY (O.C.)God, you're a genius.Jimmy pulls up to the drive through window and pays the Cashier who hands him the a paper bag of food. 56.Jimmy pulls away and parks. Judy continues to question him as he goes through his bag of food.JUDY (O.C.) So what did they say you have?Jimmy munches on some fries.JIMMYODD. Oppositional Defiance Disorder.JUDY (O.C.)You're so lucky. I wish I was diagnosed with something. What does it mean?Jimmy pretends he is reading from a text book 50's industrial spoof style.JIMMYODD is a disorder characterized by an overwhelming pattern of negative, hostile, and defiant behavior which causes severe delusions where the patient can no longer distinguish fantasy from reality.JUDY (O.C.)Wow. I love that!Jimmy smiles as he gets his burger out of the paper bag. He then opens the top bun of the burger to examine if they got his order correct. They didn't.Jimmy playfully begins to act crazy.JIMMY You see. They fucked up my order. I specifically asked for no pickles.JUDY (O.C.)(playing along)Oh, no! How will ODD Boy handle this? Will his ODD brain be able to withstand a pickle screw up at the drive thru?Jimmy goes into a cartoonish like crazy person character.57.He begins by taking the pickles off of his burger. He puts the burger down, quickly lifts his shirt, holding it up with his chin while he places two pickles over top of his nipples.Jimmy yells.JIMMYOoow, jeez, they're hot! I burnt my nipples with the pickles.Judy cracks up laughing. Jimmy takes a pickle off of his left nipple and dangles it directly in front of the lens.He then feeds it to Judy. We hear Judy chomping on the pickle and giggling off camera. The camera shakes then shuts down.CAMERA ON:I/E. GHETTO/JUDY'S CAR - NIGHTJudy is driving through the ghetto as Jimmy shoots out of the window. On the sidewalk, he catches glimpses Drug Dealers, a Crack Whore, a Drunk stumbling along, and Other Pretty Sketchy Characters.JIMMY (O.C.)I love the ghetto. I don't know what it is about it. I fucking love it. It's always the first place I go to when I get out.JUDYI love it when you're out of the looney bin. Do you think you might be able to try to avoid the place for a while?JIMMY (O.C.)(joking)If they don’t send me to the bin, maybe they’ll send me to jail.This upsets Judy.JUDYI’m serious. You act like it's no big deal when you go away! JIMMY (O.C.)(tired of it)All right.58.JUDYNo it's not all right! When you're in there I have to be out in the real world alone, by myself Jimmy. You go away and come back like it's no big deal. Well it is a big deal. I don't want to spend another day without you. Do you understand me? I'd rather die.Judy's holding back tears. JIMMY (O.C.)I'm not going back.She doesn't believe him. She's really starting to cry despite herself. He pulls his eye from the lens to look at her.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy.Judy looks over at him.JIMMY (O.C.)I promise. I swear on my life and I swear on our bond, I'll never go back.Her freak out subsides.JUDYIf you swear on our bond, then I believe you.Judy lets out half cry and half yelp. Her emotions are a bit out of control.JUDY I love you so fucking much.JIMMY (O.C.)I love you too.Awkward silence. Judy looks like she wants to ask Jimmy something.JIMMY (O.C.) What's the matter?59.JUDYI was thinking, the last time you got out we did it like five times, like as soon as we saw each other, we got naked and started doing it. And today, my parents weren't even home and I tried to do some stuff to you, but you were acting like you weren't interested. JIMMY (O.C.)I didn't mean to.JUDYWas it because you jerked off so much while you were locked up?Jimmy hands her a small bottle of whiskey. She takes a sizable gulp, makes a face, then hands it back to Jimmy.JIMMY (O.C.)No.Judy is getting upset again. JUDY(voice cracking)Then why don't you want to have sex with me Jimmy? You don't think I'm pretty anymore?JIMMY (O.C.)No, no, no! That has nothing to do with it. After I saw my dad being rammed in the ass by my mother, I kind of blocked it out, but when I was in there they kept talking to me and talking to me about it. Now I can't stop it from coming into my head. Every time I get wood, the instant replay machine in my brain projects this image of my Mom pounding into my Dad.JUDYGod, that's awful. I didn't know.JIMMY (O.C.)Yeah well, you know you didn't give too much of an effort to get in my pants anyhow. You just sort of made your sex face and grabbed my crotch.60.Judy takes another drink off the bottle of whiskey and smiles.JUDYHow do you like this?While she is driving she pulls down her tank top and quickly exposes her breasts through the top of her shirt.JIMMY (O.C.)Now we're talking.Judy tries to position her body so her breasts are in frame. She begins pushing one up, then sticks out her tongue, teasing.JIMMY (O.C.)That is so hot.Judy smiles and looks over at the camera. One hand on the steering wheel and one on her breast, when...JIMMY (O.C.)Watch out!BOOM!A loud THUMP hits the car, shaking the camera.JIMMY (O.C.)I think you hit someone.Judy's in shock. Jimmy puts the camera on the floor of the car by the passenger seat. He forgets to turn it off. All we see is a close up of the floor and Jimmy's feet.JIMMY (O.C.)Stay here.Jimmy gets out of the car. We hear the car door open then close.Judy sounds like she is having a complete nervous breakdown. She's crying, but in an extremely nervous and frantic way.JUDY (O.C.)(calls to him)Oh my God, what are you doing?We have no clue what Jimmy is doing outside of the car.61.JUDY (O.C.) Oh fuck, oh fuck. Oh my god. Jimmy?We hear a car door open and some struggling sounds coming from Jimmy.JUDY (O.C.) Don't put him in here!JIMMY (O.C.)We're taking him to the hospital.JUDY (O.C.)No, we'll get busted.Long pause, we hear Jimmy struggling off camera.JUDY (O.C.)What... what are you doing?JIMMY (O.C.)He's not breathing. He’s not fucking breathing!Silence. You can feel them thinking.JUDY (O.C.)Is he dead?JIMMY (O.C.)(has decided)Pop the trunk for me.JUDY (O.C.)No.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy.JUDY (O.C.)What are we gonna do?JIMMY (O.C.)I don't know right now, but we're not driving around with a dead guy in our back seat.JUDY (O.C.)I just want to go home. Jimmy, let's leave him. He's dead. We should just go.62.JIMMY (O.C.)Pop the fucking trunk already before someone sees us!We hear Judy pop the trunk.We hear Jimmy struggling. The camera is still on the floor of the car.More struggling as Jimmy is clearly outside putting the body into the trunk.JUDY (O.C.)(to self)I want to go home.We hear Jimmy slam the trunk.JIMMY (O.C.)(screams; frustrated)Fuck!We hear Jimmy come around to the driver's seat and open the door.JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy, I...JIMMY (O.C.)I'm driving.We hear Judy get out of the car and walk around to the passenger side and open the door, but she doesn't get in.JIMMY (O.C.)Get in.Judy doesn't respond.JIMMY (O.C.)Are you gonna fucking get in!Judy is hysterical.JUDY (O.C.)We should just leave him here.JIMMY (O.C.)We can't leave him in the middle of the fucking ghetto. Get in before someone sees us!63.Judy's losing it.JUDY (O.C.)I don't want him in my fucking car! I want him out!Before Jimmy can respond, we see the reflection of police lights. Red and blue lights flicker against the lens.JUDY (O.C.)Oh shit!We hear Judy get in the car and close the door.JUDY (O.C.)It's the fucking cops.JIMMY (O.C.)Just shut up.She's hysterical.JUDY (O.C.) It's the cops. It's the cops. It's the...JIMMY (O.C.)Shhhhhh!Jimmy kicks the camera. We still can't see any of this. We can only hear what's happening.JIMMY (O.C.)You gotta play it cool, okay?Judy's crying gets louder.JIMMY (O.C.)Stop fucking crying. Please, I'm begging you. Stop it.We hear the cop open and shut his patrol car door.JUDY (O.C.)Oh God. He's getting out of the car. We've got a dead homeless guy in our trunk and he's...JIMMY (O.C.)SSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!64.JUDY (O.C.)Oh, my god Jimmy, he's walking towards us.JIMMY (O.C.)SSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Just be cool.The Cop is close, we can feel his footsteps coming towards the car. Judy collects herself as best as she can.The cop taps his flashlight against the window.We hear Judy roll down her power window and we hear the voice of the Cop.COP (O.C.)Good evening. License and registration please.JIMMY (O.C.)Certainly, sir.The light from the Cop's flashlight reflects off the floor of the car and into the lens of the camera.The reflections stop. The wait is unbearable.COP (O.C.)Could you please step out of the vehicle?Jimmy gets out of the car as Judy trembles in the passengers seat.We only hear the sounds of Judy sniffling and repressing herself from crying and idle chatter of the Cop's radio.It seems like forever, then...THUMP!The car is shaking, we hear intense struggling going on outside.Judy unleashes a piercing, high pitched scream. JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy!More violent struggling is heard as Judy begins to hyperventilate. POP65.A gunshot is fired.Judy screams.JUDY (O.C.)AAAAAHHHHHHH!POP. Another shot is fired.The car door opens, Jimmy gets in. We hear the sounds of tires squealing and the engine roaring.JUDY (O.C.)What happened?JIMMY (O.C.)Shut up!Judy's now totally freaked.JUDY (O.C.)What happened!JIMMY (O.C.)Just shut the fuck up! I don't fucking want to talk about it!Jimmy can't bully her into silence. She continues to freak out. The camera is kicked.JUDY (O.C.)I JUST WANT TO KNOW WHAT FUCKING HAPPENED! I WANNA KNOW. I WANNA KNOW. I JUST WANNA FUCKING...!Camera is kicked off and shuts down.CAMERA ON:EXT. REST STOP - SECLUDED AREA - TRUNK OF THE CAR - NIGHTA weird, digital, black and white image plays on the camera. There's no light and Jimmy's got the camera back in “Nite Shot” mode. He's standing outside of the car filming the Homeless Man who is lying dead inside of the trunk. Judy stands next to him as he films.The Homeless Man is twisted and contorted in order to fit in the small confines of the trunk.Jimmy pans back and forth and up and down his dead body. 66.JUDY (O.C.)What are you doing?JIMMY (O.C.)(it's obvious)I'm filming.JUDY (O.C.)It's dark. You can't see anything.JIMMY (O.C.)It's on infra-red. Do you wanna see?JUDY (O.C.)No, I don't wanna see.JIMMY (O.C.)He's beautiful. He really is. There's a certain serenity to death I appreciate.JUDY (O.C.)He's dead. He's in my car, Jimmy, and he stinks. I wanna go home.Jimmy keeps filming.JUDY (O.C.)I don't think I can do this.Jimmy ignores her.JUDY (O.C.)I'm not like you. I can't do this.(holds back a sob)I wanna fucking go home.JIMMY (O.C.)Yeah, well you can't fucking go home. And you will do this. You did do this. You killed him. You didn't get in the car until the cops showed up. Now we don't have a choice. You want me to go to jail? You want that?JUDY (O.C.)(softer)No.Judy settles. Jimmy is out of breath.67.The sun is beginning to rise. The light of a new day cascades upon the dead body in the trunk.JUDY (O.C.)(half crying)What are we going to do?JIMMY (O.C.)We just need to make intelligent decisions. That's all. We'll find a way to take care of it. Then we'll go away. We'll fix it. It'll be okay. I promise.JUDY (O.C.)You promise?JIMMY (O.C.)Yeah. Come here.Jimmy has dropped the camera away from the Homeless Man. He's still rolling while he wraps his arms around her and holds her.We hear him kissing her softly.JIMMY (O.C.)It's gonna be okay. I'm gonna take care of everything. I promise.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. WOODS IN NOWHERE - HOMELESS MAN ROAST - NIGHTWe see and hear a huge roaring fire. Jimmy has zoomed the lens in so close that we can't tell what it is that's burning.As he pulls out, it's revealed that the dead homeless guy is roasting in the fire.JUDY (O.C.) (coughing)Oh, my god. The hair burning is making me nauseous. Judy coughs more violently before.68.JIMMY (O.C.)Yeah, God damn. Burning bodies fucking stinks. That bum's body odor is being cooked right off him.Jimmy pokes the flaming skull with his stick.JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy!Jimmy pokes some more at the body, then flips the camera up at Judy.JUDYWhat? I'm not in the mood.JIMMY (O.C.)(making light)Don't have to be in the mood. Doesn't matter. The camera's on, it's on.(changes the subject)You wanna know where we're gonna go?JUDYOkay, where are we gonna go?JIMMY (O.C.)We're going to Lincoln to visit Dinko.JUDYWho's Dinko, Jimmy?JIMMY (O.C.)He's cool. And he's got his own place, and he said I could stay there whenever ever I wanted. Plus he knows about you and he wants to meet you. And he doesn't like cops, so he's not gonna call 'em. Okay? Now gimme a smile.JUDYNo.JIMMY (O.C.)Gimme a smile, and I'll let you see my smiley face again.Judy begins coughing.69.JUDYI can't get sexy with that smell. I just can't.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. DINKO'S TRAILER - NIGHTMusic is playing extremely loud in a funky ass trailer as Judy dances with DINKO (late 20s) a completely drunk trailer trash dude wearing a pizza delivery outfit. Empty whiskey and beer bottles are scattered throughout the tiny living room as cigarette smoke hovers around them due to a ridiculously low ceiling.Judy is dancing in a very sexy manner with Dinko who is dancing like a complete dork. Dinko has no moves, rhythm, or beat whatsoever, but dances with as much vigor as a dog on crack.Jimmy is sitting on the couch filming them dancing in front of him. Dinko is forced to scream over top of the music to be heard. He looks directly at Jimmy noticing that Jimmy's turned on the camera.DINKOHey! The video-man. I remember that shit when we was in together. Said you video-ed everything. JIMMY (O.C.)Yep.DINKOHey man, it's cool if you guys stay here for a while, but I have a small business to run man. There's going to be some people knocking on the door and shit. I can't have you guys answering the door or the phone. That's the only rule. Other than that man, we're going to getting fucked up together all the time. I got a shit load of crank dude, that shit is off the fucking hook. Here, take a hit. Dinko tries to hand off some crank to Jimmy.70.JIMMY (O.C.)No thanks, I just want to film Judy dancing.Jimmy pans the camera over towards Judy. She's doing her best sexy dance into the camera. We can still hear Dinko talking to Jimmy.DINKO (O.C.)Right man. That's cool. Hey um... If I tell you to stop taping though, man, you gotta stop. I got some hard core junkies coming over here. Sometimes, if they see shit like that, they fucking flip. Crank junkies are a whole different kind of breed man. They're fucking hard core mother fuckers. You don't know what they're gonna fucking do. This one guy got paranoid about something. He used to climb on his roof to take a dump. That's the only place he would shit! How fucked up is that?Dinko laughs at his own joke.JUDYYou're not even paying attention to me Jimmy.Judy takes her dancing up a notch to get Jimmy's attention.JUDYDon't I look sexy?Jimmy doesn't get a chance to respond.DINKO (O.C.)Yeah, you look real sexy baby. Real nice.Dinko starts in with Jimmy again.DINKO (O.C.) Hey, I may have some work for you if you're cool with that.Jimmy turns the camera back to Dinko while he goes to the kitchen to get a beer.71.JIMMY (O.C.)What kind of work?DINKOYou know some hustling, some good money. I'll teach you how to mix the shit. Your girlfriend too if she wants.JIMMY (O.C.)(sarcasm)Yeah. That's what I've always wanted to do. Learn to make and sell crystal methamphetamine. You're a fucking genius Dinko.Dinko is too stupid to recognize sarcasm.DINKO(big smile)Yeah, man! Fuckin' high five.Dinko high five's Jimmy and laughs again.DINKO(re: Judy)So is she, like, your girlfriend or are you guys just fucking?JIMMY (O.C.)She's my girlfriend, my best friend, and yes we fuck. And don't ever, ever fucking touch her. That's MY only rule Dinko.Judy is frustrated with Jimmy's lack of attention.JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy!Jimmy turns the camera to her. She's starting to do her best impression of a stripper dance.DINKOIt's all good man. I ain't gonna touch your old lady. Shit man, she's so into you anyway.Dinko gets up and moves into the kitchen area, crossing the frame. Jimmy focusses the camera's attention on various items in the kitchen while Dinko talks.72.There's ripped open small electronics and appliances everywhere, as if Dinko's been taking everything apart and trying to put it back together.DINKOSo there's this dude. Fucker taught me everything I know about meth and shit. He'd fucking flip for your girl, man. You should go up and see him. He's in Erlanger.JIMMY (O.C.)Uncle Rodney?Camera drifts across several messy piles of papers and cardboard boxes with bags of drugs in them.DINKO (O.C.)Right, right! I forgot. Yeah, Uncle Rodney!JUDY (O.C.)You have an Uncle Rodney baby?Judy is too stoned to realize that Jimmy has already told her about Uncle Rodney.Jimmy pulls out to include Judy in the shot. She's in the kitchen doing another line of crank off a counter top.JUDYI want to meet your uncle.JIMMY (O.C.)He's not my uncle. He's not anybody's uncle. People just call him that. He's the one I told you about from the nut house.As Judy bends down to snort her line, camera drifts over to Dinko who's holding a HUGE HILLBILLY WAD OF CASH in his hand and stuffs it into a box of cereal. Jimmy zooms in on the cereal box. There's a whole bunch more cash in there. JIMMY (O.C.)I said one day I'd take you up to Erlanger one day, remember?JUDY (O.C.)When was that?Dinko throws the cash on the table. Jimmy ZOOMS OUT catching Judy in the frame.73.JIMMY (O.C.)When we were naked.JUDYWe're always naked, Jimmy.Judy wipes powder from her nose, then goes foggy for a split second, losing then catching her balance.JUDY(re: crank)Fuck... Woah, that's cool.DINKO (O.C.)That's some good shit, huh?JUDY(disoriented)Uh huh...Jimmy turns the camera onto Dinko.DINKOSo you guys should like, totally go see him, man. I don't fuckin' go up there no more, 'cuz like, I got all the shit I need right here man, 'cuz my place is cool and all, but there's no fucking room here, ya know? So like you should go see him and shit.Judy steps into frame. At this point, she's in her bra and is dancing like a stripper directly in front of the camera.JUDYYou like this, Jimmy?THERE'S A KNOCK at the door.DINKO (O.C.)(calls out to door)Yo!(to Jimmy)Customers call.Judy keeps on dancing in her own little world while Dinko goes to the door. Judy finishes her bottle of beer. She's pretty drunk and cranked out at this point. 74.Dinko is at the front door dealing with a customer. We can't see her and we can barely hear what they're talking about, but it seems Dinko is engaged in a heated conversation with her. He yells back into the living room from the front door.DINKO (O.C.)Yo, Jimmy. Is your girl into chicks?JIMMY (O.C.)I don't know.(to Judy)Are you into chicks?JUDY Do you want me to be into chicks?JIMMY (O.C.)(calls to her)Sure Dinko. Bring her in.Dinko brings in HAZEL,(40), a frightfully thin crank addict. She's scared, nervous, and completely strung out, and she looks like death. They stand off to the side of the room watching Judy dance.Judy realizes the woman is in the room and stops dancing.Jimmy zooms in on the woman. Looking closer we see that Hazel is in the final stages of her life/addiction. She's sweating and her eyes are bugging out of her skull.Dinko turns the music down so they don't have to scream.JIMMY (O.C.) You know what, never mind Dink. I don't think Judy's into chicks.JUDYYeah, I'm not into chicks.DINKOWell Hazel here will do anything we want. Ain't that right Hazel?Hazel nods her head yes.DINKO You're into chicks aren't you Hazel?75.HAZELUm, I really just want to get some stuff and get out of here.Hazel is trembling. The party atmosphere has come to a complete halt.DINKOShut up you fat fucking junkie and take your clothes off or you ain't getting shit.Hazel's not moving. She's reluctant.DINKOCome on!HAZELI don't...Dinko smacks her square in the face.DINKO(screaming)Just do it, you fucking whore!Hazel starts to take her clothes off reluctantly.JUDYJimmy.Jimmy doesn't do anything. He just keeps filming.JUDYJimmy, stop him!JIMMY (O.C.)He's a big boy, he can do what he wants.This gives Dinko an added boost of confidence. Hazel is now in her bra and panties and is standing in front of them.DINKOEver made a porno?JIMMY (O.C.)Not with you.76.DINKOWell all right! Keep filming mother fucker, I'm gonna fuck this junkie for you. You guys are free to join in whenever you like.Judy is now borderline hysterical.JUDYI swear to God Jimmy if you let him go through with this I'll never talk to you again!Jimmy ignores her.DINKOYou ready? You filming?JIMMY (O.C.)I'm filming. Are you going to fuck her or are you just gonna talk about it?JUDY(screaming)Jimmy!Dinko unbuckles his belt as fast as he can. Hazel begins to cry as Dinko pushes her into position on all fours.DINKO(to Jimmy)How's this? You getting good camera angles and shit?JIMMY (O.C.)Turn her ass towards the camera.DINKO(laughing it up)Take off them panties bitch... Oh yeah! Come on bitch. Move.Judy is crying profusely in the background as Dinko pushes Hazel to the ground. Jimmy zooms in on Dinko, framing out Hazel as Dinko gets himself ready to take her from behind.DINKOThat's it. Just like that.Dinko looks directly at the lens of the camera.77.DINKO We're going to be doing this shit all the time brother.JIMMY (O.C.)You think so?DINKOFuck yeah!Dinko sees something O.C. from Jimmy, we can't see that surprises him.DINKO You don't have to hold a gun to her head man. There's plenty of other chicks we can do that to. If that's what you're into, then fuck it, I'll...BAM!!!Dinko takes a shot in the throat and falls onto Hazel. Jimmy's shot him.Judy has stopped screaming. Hazel on the other hand is freaking out, trapped under a squirming Dinko.Jimmy sets the camera on top of something, stands up and brings the gun to Judy.JIMMYTake it!Judy doesn't know what to do. Jimmy puts the gun in her hand.JIMMYFinish him off! He deserves a bullet right in the fucking face, doesn't he?Judy's in a weird cranked out place.JUDY(nervous, cranked out)Yeah. Yeah. He does.JIMMYThen do it.Judy points the gun at a still squirming Dinko. She can't bring herself to pull the trigger.78.We can hear Dinko choking on his own blood. He struggles to move towards Judy.Jimmy's now standing behind Judy. He wraps his hand around hers, helps her point the gun and...BAMShoots Dinko right between the eyes. Jimmy helps her again.BAM-BAMTwo more shots into his chest, Jimmy's hand still wrapped around Judy's over the gun.Jimmy lets go of her hand and the gun drops to the floor. She's stunned.Jimmy comes towards camera and shuts it down.CAMERA ON:I/E. ROAD LEAVING TRAILER/DINKO'S CAR - NIGHTA rip roaring fire burns from the trailer. Jimmy is shooting out of the back of the Dinko's Car, a beat up old station wagon, as they drive away down the gravel road.JIMMY (O.C.)Good bye Dinko, mother fucker. Thanks for letting us borrow your car, and for the cash.JUDY (O.C.)And for the crank!Jimmy sits back into his seat and turns the camera on Judy. She's got a big smile on her face.JIMMY (O.C.)You feeling good baby?JUDYI feel calm. I don't care about anything.Jimmy keeps filming.JUDYWhat are we going to do with the car Jimmy?79.JIMMY (O.C.)Ditch it.JUDYThe crank?JIMMY (O.C.)Snort it. Give some of it away.JUDYThe cash.JIMMY (O.C.)Vacation baby. Anywhere we want to go.Judy smiles. She turns and blows a kiss towards the camera, oddly serene from the drugs despite everything that's happened. To her, it's as if all is right with the world.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. LAS VEGAS - WEDDING CHAPEL - NIGHTJimmy is standing on the altar waiting for his bride to be. He is wearing a white tuxedo with black tie and ruffle shirt like Ricardo Montalban from Fantasy Island. They are being married by an Elvis impersonator and the witnesses/groomsmen are Siegfried and Roy look-a-likes.Jimmy waves to the person who is working the camera. The Elvis impersonator talks to Jimmy. ELVISYou know the video's gonna cost you twenty extra, right?JIMMYYeah.ELVISWell alright then. Let's get this sum bitch started!Elvis reaches down and gets a guitar and breaks into an Elvis version of "Here Comes the Bride" but to the song "You ain't Nothing But A Hound Dog."80.ELVIS Weeeeeelllll, you ain't nothing but a young bride... walking down the aisle.The Elvis impersonator goes all out with the dance and the gyrating Elvis hips as he jams on his acoustic guitar.Jimmy motions to the camera to turn around.JIMMYHere she comes.ELVIS (O.C.)You ain't nothing but a young bride... walking down the aisle.The camera whips around and we see Judy walking down the aisle. Tears of joy run down Judy's heavily made up face as she walks.ELVISWell, if you don't marry Jimmy, then you ain't no friend of mine.Judy makes her way over to her side of the altar next to her bridesmaids (two Cher look-a-likes).ELVIS Do you...Elvis is looking for Judy's name that's been scribbled on paper.JIMMY(helping)Judy. And here, we wrote our own vows.He hands Elvis a small piece of paper who skims it. He kind of shakes his head, smirking at what he reads, then decides to go for it.Elvis gives a quick windmill strum to his guitar and starts.ELVISDo you Judy promise to always swallow, to never cut your hair, or have another man's penis injected into any part of your body for as long as you both shall live?The Cher bridesmaids giggle.81.JUDYI do.ELVISDo you Jimmy promise to always fuck Judy with enthusiasm, to take a shower once a day, and promise not to inject your penis into any part of another person's body as long as you both shall live?JIMMYI do.ELVISCan I get the rings?Siegfried gives the rings to Jimmy who places one on Judy's finger and vice versa.ELVIS With the power vested in me by the great state of Nevada... I do herby pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride.Jimmy and Judy grab each other by the ass and begin making out.The freak show audience claps while they are making out. The applauding dies down but Jimmy and Judy continue to make out. Jimmy puts his hand up her dress as she begins unbuckling his pants. It looks like they may start fucking on the alter.Elvis jumps in to break it up.ELVIS All right you two. We got a schedule to keep.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. LAS VEGAS - LAS VEGAS MOTEL ROOM - NIGHTJimmy is running through the motel room with the camera. Flashes of snorted lines of crank dust and rolled up bills are in the background as Jimmy moves through the room. We hear Judy screaming with excitement about something on the TV.82.JUDY (O.C.)Hurry up Jimmy, hurry, hurry, hurry, shit Jimmy. You're going to miss it.Jimmy settles camera on the television.BEGIN TV NEWS REPORTOn TV, Jimmy and Judy's high school year book pictures are on the screen. INT. TV NEWS STUDIO - (FOR VEGAS MOTEL TV) - NIGHTAn ANCHORMAN is mid-sentence, talking about Jimmy and Judy.ANCHORMAN...press conference in a few moments. The suspect's names are James Wright and Judy Elizabeth Oaks-Kellen...JUDY (O.C.)No it's not! I'm Judy Wright now!(sing songy, like a little girl)I'm Judy Wright now!JIMMY (O.C.)Shhhh... Shut up!ANCHORMAN...from Burlington, Kentucky are wanted for questioning in the alleged murder of a Hamilton County Sheriff's Deputy that was killed two nights ago while on Patrol in the Over the Rhine section of Cincinnati. On a very serious note, the producers here at KPX-TV 4 would like to warn you that the images we are about to show are violent and graphic in nature and may not be suitable for young children. Once again, these are the images that were taken from a video camera that was mounted on board the patrol car. Viewer discretion is advised.Judy gasps involuntarily as...83.INT. LAS VEGAS - LAS VEGAS MOTEL ROOM - NIGHTJimmy pulls the camera from the screen and points it at Judy to get her reaction. Her eyes are locked on the screen.Judy's face drops. We, on the other hand, are dying to see what she's looking at. Jimmy swish pans back to the TV and zooms in tight. The television fills the frame.EXT. GHETTO - COP CAR CAM (FOR VEGAS MOTEL) - NIGHT(From Sc. 37, p. 64) On screen we see something completely new. It's a black and white security cam style video image. Just as the announcer described, this is the kind of image that comes from a video camera that's mounted on the inside of a Cop Car. It's static and covered with date/time text, etc.On TV, we finally get a chance to see what transpired when Jimmy and Judy were pulled over. Judy is standing outside the cop car. The moment she sees it approach, we see her freak just a bit and get into the car quickly and suspiciously. The cop gets up, gets out of the car and goes over to the driver side to talk to Jimmy. After a few moments, he summons Jimmy out of the car while Judy waits.The Cop asks Jimmy to open the trunk. He doesn't have his gun drawn, but he is being cautious, one hand on his gun holster, the other shining on Jimmy's face with a flashlight.COP(on TV)Go ahead and open it.Jimmy stands by the trunk of the car, but he's not really obeying the Cop's commands. He's stalling. The Cop is getting suspicious. We can barely hear what they're saying to each other over the noise of traffic that whizzes by.There's an unintelligible exchange, then... the cop steps forward, raising his voice.COP(on TV)Put your hands on the vehicle.Jimmy's reluctant.COP(on TV)On the vehicle, now!84.The Cop and Jimmy are sort of at a standoff. Jimmy finally leans over and puts his hands on the trunk.The Cop comes in close to Jimmy, pulling his hand from his gun holster and shifting it to pull his cuffs off his belt.At that exact moment, Jimmy makes his move, LEAPING for the Cop.He takes the Cop to the ground and off screen.All we see is a barely decipherable image of Judy freaking out in the passenger seat because she can't see what's going on and neither can we.About 5 seconds go by.BOOM! A gunshot is fired.It feels like an eternity, then...Jimmy pops up off the ground. He's got the Cop's gun! He hesitates, not knowing what to do. He pauses, hesitant, then shoots down towards the ground, where the cop is lying out of frame.He runs around the front of the car and into the driver seat.There's a moment of hesitation as Jimmy and Judy seem to be screaming at each other in the car, then...Jimmy slams on the gas and the car takes off into the distance.The image on the TV cuts away and back to the Anchorman.INT. TV NEWS STUDIO (FOR VEGAS MOTEL TV) - NIGHTThe Anchorman speaks to camera as...INT. LAS VEGAS - LAS VEGAS MOTEL ROOM - NIGHTJimmy pans up to Judy, hoping to record a reaction. She's locked on the TV, her hand over her mouth, frozen, not knowing how to react.She turns and looks up at him.JIMMY (O.C.)I didn't want us to be apart.85.Judy's starting to tear up. She's emotional, conflicted. She can't believe he did that for her, but she's also just come to the sober realization that he killed a cop in cold blood for her.JIMMY (O.C.)They know who we are now.(making light)Actually, we're famous now.Judy kind of half smiles. She hadn't thought of it, but she's still trying to digest the images until...JUDYThat's the most romantic thing I've ever even heard of.A voice catches Judy's attention from the TV. It's an ATTORNEY type at a press conference being held by Jimmy's parents.ATTORNEY (O.C.)(on TV)...have a few words and then we'll be taking questions.Judy looks back at the TV.JUDYOh my God, that's my parents! And your parents!Jimmy pans back and we see...EXT. COURTHOUSE - PODIUM PRESS CONF. (FOR VEAGS TV) - DAYJimmy's Mom and Dad with a chiron at the bottom of frame. They're at a podium with Judy's parents standing stoically in the background. Jimmy's Mom starts reading a prepared statement.JIMMY'S MOM(on TV)We are very shocked about recent events. Our son has always been a dear sweet boy who is sometimes confused, but we want him to know that we love him very, very much and just want this whole thing to be over.JIMMY (O.C.)Bitch.86.JUDY (O.C.)Shhhh...Judy’s Dad steps up to the microphone. Despite the truth, he sounds genuinely concerned.JUDY’S DADJimmy if you're out there, we know you’re scared, but you’re only making it worse. Please bring Judy back to us. We really miss her terribly.Jim walks over to the TV and...INT. LAS VEGAS - LAS VEGAS MOTEL ROOM - NIGHTJimmy proceeds to kick the living fuck out of the TV. It smashes against the wall and falls to the floor.END TV NEWS REPORTCamera shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. BUN BOY MOTEL ROOM - BATHROOM - DAYJimmy is filming the both of them in the mirror. Judy stands above him with noticeably different hair. She has obviously given herself a homemade dye job, complete with blonde, black and punk pink streaks.Judy has an electric clipper and is about to shave Jimmy's head, who is sitting in a chair below her. She’s really getting off on this and chuckles as she starts to lower the shaver to his head.JIMMYWait a second.JUDYWhat?JIMMYI just want to look at myself one last time with hair.Judy is smiling and can't wait to get started.JUDYOK, that's enough.87.She starts in again.JIMMYStop.JUDYWhat's the matter?JIMMYI'm not sure about this.JUDYCome on. I changed mine.JIMMYYeah, but you look fucking great.JUDYThis was your idea Jimmy.Jimmy thinks.JIMMYFuck it. Let's do this thing.Judy starts the shaver back up and proceeds to shave Jimmy's head. She starts right down the middle. Hair falls into Jimmy's face as Judy slides the buzzer from front to back. Jimmy now has a reverse Mohawk. He laughs at himself along with Judy.JIMMYThis is the look. Judy then shaves the entire top of Jimmy's head, giving him the quintessential male pattern baldness look.He looks ridiculous.JIMMY(joking)Let's just leave it like this.Judy laughs.JUDYDon't be stupid.Judy shaves the rest of his head and now Jimmy is completely bald.Jimmy checks himself out in the mirror.88.JIMMYI am one ugly mother fucker.Judy is stroking the top of his head with her hands.JUDYIt feels funny.Jimmy gives it a feel for himself. He sticks his pinky in the side of his mouth.JIMMYI look like Dr. Evil.Judy laughs, then kisses the top of Jimmy's head.JIMMYCome on. Let's go across the street and get a shit burger.Jimmy shuts down the camera.CAMERA ON:I/E. BUN BOY - DINER/PARKING LOT/DINKO'S CAR - HIGHWAY - DAYIn a booth at the motel diner, Judy is filming Jimmy while he stuffs a burger into his face.JUDY (O.C.)You're such a fucking pig when you eat.Jimmy opens his mouth full of food and comes towards camera.JIMMYAaaaaaaaaahhh!JUDY (O.C.)Gross. That's it. I'm not taking you to the country club, ever!That didn't quite sit right with him, but he covers it up with a mock pout while he chews.JUDY (O.C.)(mocking)Awww... I'm sorry. Did I hurt your feelings?Jimmy won't respond, playful.89.JUDY (O.C.)I'll take you to the country club. I promise.Jimmy looks up smiling.JIMMYWhen?JUDY (O.C.)I don't know.Judy pauses. Jimmy keeps chewing.JUDY (O.C.)Thanks for marrying me. You're my prince charming that came and swooped me off me feet.The irony is thick. Bald, lanky, 21 year old Jimmy with a mouth full of food looks like anything but Prince Charming.JUDY (O.C.)And one day, we're gonna have a house and a white picket fence and a baby. Tell me what you think we should name the baby.Jimmy stops smiling. She really believes that's going to happen one day.JUDY (O.C.)What's wrong?Jimmy doesn't want to answer. While he thinks...Something out the window distracts him.JUDY (O.C.)What?JIMMYShhhh. Shut up.(grabbing camera)Give it to me.Jimmy whips the camera around to zoom in on what he's looking through the window. Finally, we see...Two Florence County Sheriff's Cars with their lights flashing are parked in the parking lot of the cheap motel.Jimmy zooms in on the cops as they get out of their cars.90.JUDY (O.C.)What are they doing?JIMMY (O.C.)Shhh.The cops walk up to one of the doors to the motel room.JIMMY (O.C.)Shit.Four Florence Deputies stand outside the motel room door, ready to bust it in and raid the room.JUDY (O.C.)What?Jimmy speaks in hushed tones so that others in the diner won't hear them.JIMMY (O.C.)They're outside our room.JUDY (O.C.)Oh God, Jimmy! They know where we are. We're going to get caught!Florence Deputy #1 knocks on the door, waits a beat, then busts it down. Three Florence Deputies move in with their guns drawn.JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy!JIMMY (O.C.)(to self)Let's go.Jimmy forgets to shut the camera down. He holds it by his waist as the two quickly struggle to get the hell out of the diner.Follow along with them, camera by Jimmy's side, mostly pointing randomly at the floor of the diner or out the window.They head out the door to the...PARKING LOTAction continues, the camera still rolling without Jimmy realizing it. They run at a fast clip along the parking lot as they head toward...91.DINKO’S CARJIMMY (O.C.)Get in. Jimmy slides into the driver seat and throws the camera onto the dashboard. We see Jimmy behind the wheel as they drive out of the parking lot. He's in freak-out mode, afraid as hell they're going to be caught by the cops.JUDY (O.C.)They don't see us.JIMMYI know. Just shut up! Let me think.Jimmy keeps driving, his eyes darting back and forth between the road, the rear view mirror and Judy.JIMMYAre they coming?JUDY (O.C.)I don't know. I don't think so.Jimmy looks back up into the rear view mirror, still not 100% satisfied that they're not being chased.JUDY (O.C.)No. I don't think they're coming.Jimmy's still not certain. He looks for a while. Then he sighs. It seems that he knows they're not coming.JIMMY(relief)Oh, fuck.(to Judy)That was close.Jimmy drives for a bit, then notices that the camera is on and pointing at him. He reaches forward and...Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:I/E. PARKING AREA BY RIVER AFTER BUN BOY ESCAPE/DINKO'S CAR - DAYJimmy films Judy, who is sleeping in the front seat of the car.92.Jimmy gently wakes her.JIMMY (O.C.)Hey baby, wake up baby. Time to get up little fuck nugget.Judy opens her eyes. The first thing she sees is Jimmy filming her.Judy smiles like an infant who sees her daddy for the first time after a night's sleep. Judy, very childlike, opens her arms for Jimmy to hug her.Jimmy leans over, camera in hand, and gives her a hug. The camera shakes and goes out of focus as he’s hugging her.JIMMY (O.C.) Good morning Mrs. Wright. And how are we feeling this afternoon?Judy looks around and is a bit disoriented.JUDYWhere are we?JIMMY (O.C.)It's a surprise. Come on. I want you to drive us in. I want to film you when we get there.JUDY(big smile)Okay.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:I/E. RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND - BACKROAD ENTRY/PARKING AREA/DINKO'S CAR - DAYJudy drives up a gravel road as Jimmy films. They travel through the back roads in Northern Kentucky. It's nothing but woods outside the window.JUDYWhat am I gonna see?Jimmy doesn't answer.JUDYI hate it when you do that. Tell me!93.JIMMY (O.C.)Nope. Keep looking.Judy drives some more. The camera is bouncing as they drive across dirt roads.Judy tries to maintain her composure, but she can't contain herself.JUDYHow much further! Aaa!JIMMY (O.C.)Shhh. Just drive.Judy bites her lip and drives. Slowly, she comes around a bend as they arrive at...UNCLE RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND/PARKING AREAJudy's eyes go wide.JUDYOh my God. Is that it?Jimmy doesn't say anything. He just keeps the camera trained on Judy. By the look on her face, what she's seeing looks pretty cool.JUDYIs this where your friend lives?Jimmy points the camera through the front windshield. Now we see what Judy was seeing... about thirty trailers, all along the water's edge.It looks like a commune for run-away teenagers with crank addictions and budding/wannabe drug dealers. The kids are throwing a combination party, barbecue, and drug festival.JIMMY (O.C.)This is where we live.JUDYWe do?JIMMY (O.C.)Maybe. If you want to. For a little while.Judy doesn't respond. She just drives. Her eyes are starting to well up a little bit. She's getting emotional.94.JUDYThis is sooo amazing. It's like a dream. Judy’s on cloud nine. The place has exceeded her expectations.Judy keeps driving as we see young people, all more or less the same age as Jimmy and Judy. Some live in trailers, some in tents. They watch as Jimmy and Judy drive in. Clearly new faces are of interest to them.JIMMY (O.C.)Go over here.Out the window, they approach another trailer. Clearly this trailer is more important than the others.Outside, a dorky looking douche bag type, BUDDY (20's) talks to some of the Younger People in intense language. They all look over to see Jimmy and Judy approaching.JIMMY (O.C.)Stop here.You can hear the excitement in Jimmy's voice as Judy stops the car.JIMMY (O.C.)Take it.Jimmy hands off the camera to Judy, who retrains it on the Buddy and the Wunderland Teenagers he talks to.Jimmy gets out of Dinko's car and heads up to him while Judy films. We don't hear the conversation between Jimmy and Buddy man, but clearly he's happy to see Jimmy.Buddy gives Jimmy a big hug like he was a missed relative or an old friend. It's all smiles between the two of them.Jimmy comes running back over to the car.JUDY (O.C.)Is that Uncle Rodney?JIMMYNo, that's Buddy. He said Rodney’s been expecting us. We’re, like, celebrities or something Judy.JUDY (O.C.)Really?95.JIMMYYeah! He wants to meet you. JUDYWow.Camera shakes as Judy starts out of the car. Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:EXT. RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND - OUTSIDE RODNEY'S TRAILER - DAYBuddy is standing outside of a Piece Of Shit Trailer. He's the douche bag type that we saw from a distance give Jimmy a hug in the previous scene. He's surprisingly charismatic and gracious and does his best to make Jimmy and Judy feel at home.Jimmy films as Buddy gives them a walking tour of the group of trailers by the river. Judy's with them as well.BUDDYWe got like thirty five trailers here. Long as we've got some that's empty you can stay in one. Sometimes people come in and we got get you a tent or-- fuck, everybody's friendly--- you can always find a bed to crash in.Jimmy's panning around the landscape. People are watching them walk with Buddy. It's almost as if they've got some kind of celebrity status because they're with him.BUDDYIt don't look like much but we do some pretty good partying around here. Ya'll are welcome to stay as long as ya like. Fuck it, you can stay forever. There's only two rules. Don't mess around with the labs which are down back there...Jimmy's panning again, but BUDDY grabs hold of the lens.BUDDYWoah... No filming that shit. Seriously. That's part of rule number one. 96.
(MORE)Don't even go near there with the camera, and two is no cops, but fuck, seeing what kinda shit you guys got into, I don't think we gotta worry about you calling 'em up for a visit. BUDDY laughs at his own joke.BUDDYOther than that, ya'll can do whatever the hell you want, whenever the hell you want. You wanna do some of the stash at the parties, that's cool too. We’d like it if you do it, normally we'd say you gotta sell some too, but Rodney says y'all's is a special case 'cuz you ain't leaving 'til the heat's off for sure, that could be months or... shit, years for you guys. But no one up here's in a fucking hurry.Jimmy pans around capturing the natural beauty and picturesque scenery of the camp.BUDDYLook at you. Little bitch from the nut house, and you got yourself one sweet looking bride! I still can't get over the tits on this girl.(to Judy)Come here sweetheart.Jimmy pans back and catches an image of Buddy as he grabs Judy and puts his arm around her.BUDDYWe're gonna have a party for y'all tonight. You know that? We have parties damn near every night, but this one's gonna be special just for you guys.(to Judy)You like that sweety?Buddy's squeezing Judy just a bit too tight.JUDYSure Buddy.97.BUDDY (cont'd)BUDDY(to Jimmy)Nice piece of ass you got here. Best you keep an eye on it so it don't wander off on ya.They've arrived at a trailer.BUDDYWe're here!Jimmy pans back up at the trailer that's going to be theirs. From the outside, it's a disaster, peeling paint and cracked windows.Buddy gets in front of the camera, reaching for it.BUDDYShit! Y'all's on your honeymoon. Ain't gonna film it yourselves.Buddy pulls the camera from Jimmy's hand and points it at Jimmy and Judy. Judy waves. Jimmy looks a bit uncomfortable though he tries not to show it.BUDDY (O.C.)That's nice.Shaky amateur camera style as Buddy zooms in on Judy's chest, closing Jimmy out of frame.JIMMY (O.C.)Let's go inside.Judy turns.BUDDY (O.C.)(shouting)Hold on! Hold on!Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND - JIMMY & JUDY'S TRAILER - DAYBuddy films from the inside their completely destroyed trailer. Jimmy stands at the entrance with Judy in his arms, about to carry her over the threshold. They're waiting for BUDDY's cue.BUDDY (O.C.)And, three, two, one... Now! 98.Jimmy walks in through the doorway with Judy in his arms.Buddy is exuberant. He hums the bridal march, badly, as they come in.BUDDY (O.C.) All right! Look at the happy couple coming into their new home.(wedding march)Da, da, da, dum...Buddy looks down at the camera, right into the lens.BUDDYHow do you turn this thing off?After a beat, camera goes off.EXT. RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND - PARTY AND BARBECUE - SALLY'S SPOT - DAYJimmy is filming SALLY, a very sexy and very stoned 18 year old girl wearing sunglasses and cowboy hat.She speaks with a heavy southern accent.SALLYJust give your love to Uncle Rodney and you’ll get it back ten times. Don’t be afraid to love him and you’ll learn to love yourself in return. He’ll teach you the cycle, how we’re all connected. If you give yourself freely and completely to him, you’ll have nothing to worry about. That's what I did.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:EXT. RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND - PARTY AND BARBECUE - SAM'S SPOT - DAYJimmy is filming Random Teens at a barbecue. Jimmy is interviewing SAM, a long greasy haired, nineteen year old wearing a heavy metal T-shirt. We see people partying and hanging out in the background.SAM is drinking beer from a can, smoking a cigarette, and looks like he hasn't showered for a couple of days. He's happy to be Jimmy's video subject.99.SAMYa'll are going to love it here man. See this?Sam motions behind him at the people partying.SAMThis shit goes on every day. I been here for six months man and I love it. Thank God my parents kicked me out... All you got do is listen to Uncle Rodney and you'll have the best fucking time of your life. Oh, yeah.(big dopey grin)And don't fuck with him, 'cuz he'll kick your ass!Sam laughs at his own dumb joke. Jimmy shuts off the camera.CAMERA ON:EXT. RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND - DOE RUN CREEK - DAYJimmy films a naked Judy swimming in the river the reflections of the water obscuring her body. She's free, cleansed, relaxed, enjoying the sun, and having the time of her life. She suddenly notices the camera.JUDYJimmy, come swimming. The water's warm.JIMMY (O.C.)Is it?Judy smiles, then slips her head under the water, coming back up with a smile. She looks up at him.JUDYCome on.JIMMY (O.C.)Later. I just want to look at you now.JUDYWhy?Jimmy thinks. She smiles an oh so sweet smile.100.JIMMY (O.C.)Because you look happy, happier than you’ve looked in a long time.Judy smiles even wider. She floats towards camera while Jimmy zooms in on her smiling face.As she comes closer...SHE SPLASHES towards the camera, trying to get Jimmy wet.Camera shakes as Jimmy hops up to avoid be splashed.JIMMY (O.C.)Hey!Judy LAUGHS. Camera goes off.CAMERA ON:INT. RODNEY’S WUNDERLAND - JIMMY & JUDY’S TRAILER - NIGHTFaint moonlight comes into the trailer from outside. Jimmy is filming Judy as she’s just gotten into bed. She sees the camera’s on.JUDYHey again.JIMMY (O.C.)So you like it here?Judy smiles again. Then...JUDYHow long will they let us stay?JIMMY (O.C.)It’s up to Uncle Rodney.Judy smiles at the thought of Rodney.JUDYWhat’s he like?JIMMY (O.C.)I never met him. He’s supposed to be cool, though... and weird. Weird as hell.JUDYWell if he’s weird, he’s great weird, whatever he is. 101.
(MORE)If we could stay here forever, like Buddy said, I wouldn’t need anything else.Judy’s looking right over the lens into Jimmy’s eyes. Then...JUDYThe cops won’t come will they?JIMMY (O.C.)Buddy said Rodney’s cousin’s the Sheriff or something. Do you want to meet him?JUDY(surprised)The Sheriff?JIMMY (O.C.)No! Rodney.JUDY(lights up)Can I?JIMMY (O.C.)I’m gonna see him tomorrow. Buddy says he wants to talk to me. Maybe he wants to talk to you too.JUDYHe does?JIMMY (O.C.)I don’t know. Buddy said he thought you were pretty.JUDYOh my God!Judy puts her hand over her mouth. She can’t believe it.JIMMY (O.C.)I told you you were. You’re the prettiest girl in the world.Judy’s on such a cloud nine high, she’s almost in tears. She wraps her arms around him and SQUEALS with delight, pushing the camera into an awkward position as she smothers him with kisses, then squeezes him tight, like she’s going to squeeze the life out of him.She whispers in his ear.102.JUDY (cont'd)JUDY(whispers)I love you Jimmy.JIMMYMe too.Camera off.CAMERA ON:EXT. RODNEY’S WUNDERLAND - OUTSIDE RODNEY’S TRAILER - DAYHead to toe shot on Jimmy. Buddy, we’ll find out in a second, is behind the camera. Jimmy looks at a trailer off screen. He’s excited, a little off center and a little nervous.Buddy tries to film Jimmy as he’s walking towards Rodney’s trailer.BUDDY (O.C.)You nervous?JIMMY(lying)No.BUDDY (O.C.)I would be.JIMMYHe’s suppose to be cool.BUDDY (O.C.)He’s more than cool man. God, you really don’t have a clue do you?Jimmy stops for a second.JIMMYUm... Judy wants to meet him. I don’t know if I can ask.BUDDY (O.C.)Shit man. Don’t have to. She’s one of his girls, man. She’ll meet him.Jimmy stops in his tracks and looks at Buddy.JIMMYWhat the fuck does that mean?103.BUDDY (O.C.)Relax dude... Just like you’re one of his boys. Shit man, I’ll give you two weeks and you’ll WANT her to experience him. You may even want to, too.Jimmy looks at Buddy, not quite sure what to do with any of it. Buddy senses the tension.BUDDY (O.C.)Just go see him. Here, take your camera.Buddy extends the camera, lens forward. We can see Jimmy’s puzzled look.BUDDY (O.C.)He wants you to film him, man. With the camera. He’ll tell you when to turn it on, then you video.Jimmy’s puzzled, but he reaches forward and takes the camera, shutting it down.CAMERA ON:INT. RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND - UNCLE RODNEY’S TRAILER - DAYImages of UNCLE RODNEY (50) going in and out of focus as he sits on the side of a king sized bed. Scars and tatoos litter his arms and neck. His eyes are bit maniacal like Charles Manson, but he’s able to maintain a stoic, but nonetheless dangerous demeanor as Jimmy begins setting up the camera.Like a prison inmate or rabid dog, you get the feeling that Uncle Rodney could EXPLODE on you at any second.Jimmy moves the camera around the room so we briefly see the interior of the trailer. It’s an ELABORATE triple combination of a middle eastern harem, sixties psychedelic motif, and white trash/junk-yard memorabilia. JUST OUT OF FRAME we hear a female voice crying softly, whimpering. The voice is close, in the room with us, but we can’t see who’s making the sounds. Uncle Rodney ignores it completely.Camera shakes, indicating that Jimmy is exceptionally nervous.104.JIMMY (O.C.)Just one second.UNCLE RODNEYTake your time man. I want you to feel comfortable. More importantly, I want you to get this right.Finally, the camera stops shaking. Jimmy zooms out to a medium shot revealing that Uncle Rodney has HAZEL lying next to him on the bed with her head on his lap.Uncle Rodney gently strokes her hair like he’s petting a dog. Hazel, in the midst of EXTREME withdrawals, cries and whimpers like a child, oblivious to Jimmy, the camera, and everything else in the world except for Uncle Rodney.She is so strung out and her cravings are so intense that she can barely speak.JIMMY (O.C.)I’m ready whenever you are.Uncle Rodney looks down upon Hazel.UNCLE RODNEYJust a second. I have to take care of my baby.Uncle Rodney admires his work.UNCLE RODNEYShe’s beautiful isn’t she?HAZEL(begging, pleading)Please...Hazel, entrenched in a crystal methamphetamine psychotic episode, can only gasp in unintelligible spurts. UNCLE RODNEYSome people come here too far gone. Like Hazel here. The only thing I can do for her is ease her pain.Hazel rolls her body back and forth on the bed, all the while keeping her head in Uncle Rodney’s lap.HAZELPlease...105.UNCLE RODNEY(to Hazel)Shhhhh... How about a baby one?Uncle Rodney’s tenderness in dealing with Hazel calms her. He's having way too much fun treating her like a baby.HAZELYes.Uncle Rodney takes his pinky and dips it into a small plastic bag of powder. He then places it to Hazel’s nostril.She quickly snorts the tiny bit off his finger.UNCLE RODNEY(to Hazel)There you go...Hazel begins whimpering again. It wasn’t nearly enough to satisfy her.UNCLE RODNEYThere’s something about addiction that brings out something beautiful in a person. Addiction is pure. Addiction reduces a person to an infant. And there’s nothing more pure and beautiful in the world than an infant.He puts his finger to Hazel’s nostril again, but this time, without any meth on the tip. She snorts with all of her might then starts crying. Uncle Rodney is toying with her.UNCLE RODNEYHazel is no longer an adult. She’s an infant and I’m the surrogate mother who provides her with much needed breast milk. It’s a role that both of us have accepted and embrace.He leans over and grabs a syringe, already filled, then gently holds Hazel’s arm and expertly injects the liquid into her vein.Nothing happens for several seconds.Hazel’s breathing accelerates. Suddenly she sits up, her eyes go wide. Hazel clinches the bed as if she were riding a roller coaster.106.UNCLE RODNEY(proudly)That’s my girl!Then, she makes eye contact with Jimmy.A curious, frightened look comes over her face. Clearly, she recognizes him.She suddenly JUMPS from the bed and runs out of the room.UNCLE RODNEYShe's a little jumpy.Uncle Rodney smiles, amusing himself with his own joke.UNCLE RODNEYLet’s begin shall we? And please... I’m going to use this tape for my fans, so let’s try to get this right. JIMMY (O.C.)OK.UNCLE RODNEYI apologize if any of this frightens you or makes you uncomfortable.JIMMY (O.C.)I’ll be fine.UNCLE RODNEYNo. You won’t be fine. What I’m going to teach you will be frightening. The truth is an acquired taste but once you get to it, it's all you’ll ever want.Uncle Rodney starts in on his mantra. It’s obvious that he’s well versed in his meandering rant.UNCLE RODNEYThose kids out there... we, the so called “undesirables” - you and me, we know the truth. You know that society doesn’t want you, your parents don’t want you, corporate America sure as fuck doesn’t want you... You wouldn’t be here otherwise. 107.
(MORE)If this government had a choice, they’d gas us all in a heartbeat, exterminate us like the Jews, enslave us like niggers, cuz don’t kid yourself, WE ARE the new niggers in this country. No one respects us... No one sees what we have to offer... No one has compassion for us.... They don’t care, or they're too naive to see that we’re a by-product of a wasteful society that has failed to educate, embrace, influence, or inspire any of us. We’re societal garbage. The counter culture no longer exists. It’s dead... It’s been replaced by us--Long pause.UNCLE RODNEYThe garbage culture... thrown aside, imprisoned, institutionalized, systematically abused, executed, and enlisted into wars started by government ass-fuckers just to kill us off. JUST TO KILL US OFF. And every week one of you shows up here, disillusioned, addicted, angry, pissed 'cuz they tossed you aside... into the garbage. Every time someone like you shows up here the garbage culture gets a little bit stronger and they get a little bit weaker. Until the "them" and the "they" of this country run out of places to put us, to put its garbage, and the garbage OVER-FLOWS into their cities from out of the confines of the spaces that they have set aside for us.A pause, then...UNCLE RODNEY(biblical)And we will SET FIRE to their world! And we will burn it, until a living HELL REIGNS over what was their former world, and we will fornicate in their ashes!Rodney stops, almost out of breath.108.UNCLE RODNEY (cont'd)UNCLE RODNEYThat's what's here for you. That's what's here...Rodney settles himself down and takes a few deep breaths as Jimmy begins zooming out. Uncle Rodney lights a cigarette to calm himself.Jimmy keeps filming, not knowing whether Rodney is finished or just taking a break.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:EXT. RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND - FIRE PIT - NIGHTSomeone (Buddy) is filming a raging party consisting of a lot of strung out young white trash junkies just like the ones Jimmy was interviewing before. It's certainly a weird bunch. They all look alike, dress similar, and have the same type of crystal methamphetamine induced facial expressions. Most of them are smoking weed and drinking forty ounce beers while dancing around a campfire and playing the bongo drums. They all seem to be having more fun than anyone should be allowed.Camera pans to Jimmy, so we realize that he's not filming. Our best guess would be that it's Buddy who's filming. Jimmy screams at the camera over the noise of the Bongo drums.JIMMYWhere's Judy?Buddy's hand comes into frame as he points by the fire pit. We now see Jimmy see Judy.She dances fervently drinking a forty surrounded by tons of other drunk, happily intoxicated teenagers. Say what you might about the attendees to the event, this party is a FUCKING RAGER and Judy is happy to be the center of everyone's attention.Everyone dances faster and faster as the rhythm of drums beat faster and become more intense. It's an all out jam session.Jimmy heads to the center of the circle of people dancing around Judy. Camera follows him with a zoom as he does.JUMP CUT109.Who knows how much later. Minutes or hours, the party rages forward. The camera spins around. The party has reached a new level of drunken absurdity. Most of those who are dancing are drunk, stoned or both.In the background, while it's too dark and hectic see anything explicit, some of the teenagers are engaged in a variety of sexual activity. Some have threesomes. Some are probably having oral sex. Still others dance around them in the foreground.Camera zooms in on Uncle Rodney.Standing just behind him, we see of flash of someone recognizable. It's a skinny woman, she looks vaguely familiar, but it's hard to get a fix with all the craziness going on.She turns her head to look over at Rodney.Now we can clearly see that this person is...HAZEL - with her eyes wide and clearly in the height of rolling on crank.AND she's saying something to Uncle Rodney that's definitely pissing him off.Bodies wipe the frame.JUMP CUTMoments later. Camera catches Judy who hasn't missed a step along the way to being a high, drunken mess. The rhythm of the drum beats is ever present.Uncle Rodney comes up behind her and wraps his arms around her shoulder, saying something to her, but we can't hear it over the noise. Jimmy approaches and they start talking.Jimmy doesn't notice, but there are about four or five of the kids, especially a couple of Rodney's Bigger Guys standing not too far behind Uncle Rodney watching the conversation intensely.It's really difficult to put your finger on it exactly, but something doesn't seem right here.Uncle Rodney lets go of Judy and puts his arm around Jimmy. With the noise of the drums and the fact that we're zoomed in from a distance, we can't hear anything they're saying.110.Now Uncle Rodney and Jimmy are having a conversation as they move towards the camera. Though Jimmy can't see it, we can see that Rodney's Bigger Guys, the ones that were standing behind Uncle Rodney are now pushing Judy along behind Jimmy and Rodney. Though Uncle Rodney seems to be having a very light and friendly conversation with Jimmy, we continue to get the feeling that something ominous is afoot.Finally, they approach camera and we can hear them.UNCLE RODNEYI'm so glad you guys came down here. We never would have guessed you'd come and see us.JIMMYYou've been awesome. Judy loves it here.Uncle Rodney's got Jimmy in an incredibly friendly one armed side hug.UNCLE RODNEYI knew she would. By the way.Rodney's face drops.UNCLE RODNEYI know what you did to Dinko.This hits Jimmy like a lead weight. Before he can react at all, and before he realizes that anything is happening, Jimmy is suddenly thrown into a headlock by Uncle Rodney.Off camera, something similar is happening to Judy.JUDY (O.C.)(screaming)What the fuck are you doing?! Jimmy, Jimmy!Judy screams his name over and over.JUDY Jimmy! Jimmy!BUDDY (O.C.)(laughing)Shut it, bitch!SMACK! Judy's been hit by Buddy off screen.111.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:EXT. RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND - DARK WOODS - NIGHTWe hear intense struggling and laughter. By the sounds we hear, we gather that Jimmy and Judy are being dragged off into the woods against their will by Buddy and Rodney's Bigger Guys, but it's too dark to tell if that is what in fact is happening.Someone unidentified is running the show and operates the camera. It's impossible to see, but it's definitely Buddy's voice.BUDDY (O.C.)Here, here, here. Right here.Judy is screaming and crying.JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy!JIMMY (O.C.)Judy?Two or three guys, it's too dark to tell, start laughing.JUDY (O.C.)(screams)Please somebody help us!Jimmy grunts, trying to break free.JIMMYJudy!RODNEY'S BIG GUY #1 (O.C.)Shut up, asshole! You wanna fucking talk!MUNCH. Somewhere in the darkness Jimmy's been kicked in the gut. The camera hits the ground. It lands right in front of Jimmy. We can still barely see what's going on, but we're close enough and there's enough flashes of light from flashlights to see that Jimmy is face down and bloody.JIMMY(defiant)Fuck you!112.Jimmy gets kicked again just once. Then suddenly, a barrage of kicks come at Jimmy one after the other after the other.Leaves and grass and dirt and flying feet shoot at Jimmy's face as he is kicked and beaten repeatedly.The process goes on for about thirty excruciating seconds.We can't tell how much damage has been sustained, but Jimmy's not moving. He's either unconscious or dead.With one last kick, the camera is knocked aside and we don't see Jimmy's face anymore.RODNEY'S BIG GUY #1 (O.C.)Is he fucking dead?JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy! Jimmy say something!They mock her in a high pitched wining voice.BUDDY (O.C.)(mocking)Jimmy. Jimmy say something.RODNEY'S BIG GUY #2 (O.C.)Get her clothes off.JUDY (O.C.)(screaming)Noooooo! Noooooo!Judy screams at the top of her lungs over and over again as we hear them tearing at her clothes. Then they pick her up and start pulling her away from camera.Her screams get quieter and quieter... fainter and fainter.JUDY (O.C.)(extremely faint)Jimmy!Finally there's silence. The camera isn’t moving. It’s on the ground and in the dark. Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:EXT. RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND - PARKING AREA - DINKO'S CAR - NIGHTIt's completely pitch black dark. We can see nothing. We can only hear the sound of Jimmy fumbling around and breathing heavily and nervously.113.BEGIN NITE SHOTSuddenly, we see everything, albeit in a weird black and white grainy fashion. Jimmy's flipped the camera into Nite Shot, using the fuzzy black and white mode as a tool to see in the complete darkness. He's strapped the camera to his wrist.The image is Jimmy's POV as he searches through his trunk for something. Pulling aside a duffle bag, we see the 9mm pistol that Jimmy stole from the Cop. He grabs it as camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:I/E. RODNEY'S WUNDERLAND - FIRE PIT/OUTSIDE RODNEY'S TRAIER/INSIDE RODNEYS TRAILER/PARKING AREA/DINKO'S CAR - NIGHTBy the fire pit, the site where the teenage drunken of orgy took place, the bonfire has been put out and there are dozens of drunken/passed out teenagers lying on the ground in sleeping bags and in tents.Jimmy begins looking for Judy with his night vision camera.He sees a girl lying on the ground in a sleeping bag with her back turned to the camera. Her hair is identical to Judy's, but we can't see her face. Jimmy quietly steps over passed out teenagers, being extremely careful not to awaken anyone.Jimmy accidently kicks a forty ounce beer bottle that causes a loud clanking sound of glass on glass. Jimmy stops in his tracks in anticipation of someone waking up. No one does.Jimmy continues to walk towards the GIRL WHO LOOKS LIKE JUDY.Kneeling directly in front of her, Jimmy puts his hands on her shoulder and pulls the girl's front region towards the camera. The girl flips over.It's not Judy. And luckily, the girl is so severely intoxicated that she doesn't wake up.Jimmy now makes his way over to a tent. He quietly unzips the mesh entrance and extends his arm out to video tape the inside. Turns out, the person in the tent is just another passed out flunky loser. Jimmy quickly takes his arm out of the tent.114.Jimmy gives it one last go and continues to look for Judy among the sea of passed out bodies lying on the ground. No luck.Jimmy's not too far from Uncle Rodney's trailer. He decides to make his way up.He walks, using his Nite Shot to see, through the sea of bodies until he gets up to the entrance...OUTSIDE RODNEY'S TRAILERThere's a cracked glass door leaning up against the woodpile by the entrance. Jimmy steps around it, turning the lens at the glass. He briefly catches his reflection. He looks like hell warmed over, freshly bruised and cut from the recent beating.Moving forward, Jimmy makes it to the front door of Uncle Rodney's trailer. We hear music coming from inside. Very slowly and very carefully, Jimmy cracks the front door.INSIDE RODNEY'S TRAILERIt's even darker inside of the trailer, but Jimmy presses forward in spite of that fact, still using his Nite Shot to see. A boom box sits by the bed, still on, playing music. Jimmy is scared shitless.In the corner of the room, in a make shift bunk, is Uncle Rodney sleeping with his arms wrapped around a girl in a spooning position. There's no doubt this time.It's definitely JUDY!They are both sound asleep and actually look very cozy lying together. Jimmy slowly walks over towards them. Each step is slower and slower, being extra careful not to wake them.Once Jimmy is within arm's length of the two of them he stops. He hesitates for a moment. He hasn't prepared himself for this particular situation and doesn't know exactly what to do.He continues filming them until he finally musters the courage to extend his non-filming arm out to tap Judy on the face. Judy remains unconscious/sleeping as Jimmy gently taps the side of her cheek. Jimmy slowly begins tapping harder and harder until the tap evolves into a poke. Still nothing.115.THWACK! An arm comes out of nowhere and grabs Jimmy's poking hand. Jimmy has woken up Uncle Rodney!The camera shakes out of control. Uncle Rodney screams at the top of his lungs:UNCLE RODNEYWho the fuck...!Intense and furious wrestling ensues as Uncle Rodney flies out of frame then, in a split second:BAM!A gunshot goes off. We hear a Uncle Rodney collapse, followed by more gun shots. The camera has fallen from Jimmy's hand and dangles by the wrist strap. Camera comes to rest on...UNCLE RODNEY'S BLOODY FACEJimmy's shot and killed him.Outside, footsteps hit the deck. Buddy opens the door of the trailer.BUDDYHey!BAM, BAM, BAM!Three more rounds are fired, hitting Buddy square in the chest, knocking him down. Jimmy points the camera at a dead Buddy on his back then whip pans it back to Judy in the bed. Finally we hear Jimmy speak.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy, Judy, wake up. Fucking wake up!Outside we hear voices of some of Rodney's Other Teens.Jimmy acts fast. Judy has been drugged and is mostly unconscious and groggy, but Jimmy picks her up and gets her on her feet, shouldering her out the door. Shot continues to...OUTSIDE RODNEY'S TRAILERWe hear faint voices...116.RODNEY'S BIG GUY #3(faint)Hey! Hey!A DISTANT GUNSHOT FIRES, but we can't see what is going on. It's too dark and the camera is too shaky as they go to... PARKING AREAAnother DISTANT SHOT, then Jimmy gasps in pain. He's been shot, but decides to run, trying to carry a groggy Judy anyway. Their car is in sight as we hear guns going off and bullets whizzing by them. One hits Dinko's car. Jimmy opens the door, then places the passed out Judy and the camera in the passenger seat, climbs over her, throwing the camera into Judy's lap.We see him scramble to get the key in the ignition as we hear a BULLET HIT the driver's door. The car starts, and Jimmy throws it into gear, flooring the gas as he speeds away.JIMMYJudy? Judy?Nothing.JIMMY Judy wake up.Jimmy's voice begins to crack as he talks to/tries to wake up Judy.JIMMY (O.C.)Are you all right baby? Please wake up Judy. Judy?We don't know if Judy is dead or alive.Jimmy swerves to avoid something in the road sending the camera to the floor as camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:INT. ROAD TO BORDER MOTEL - CHEAP MOTEL ROOM - DAYClose on Judy. The afternoon light strikes a shadow across her face. Her hair's a mess. No makeup.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy, sweetie. Come on honey. I saw you waking up.117.Judy's eyes flutter.JIMMY (O.C.)There ya go.Judy opens her eyes. She smiles when she sees Jimmy behind the lens.JUDYHi, baby.JIMMY (O.C.)You okay?JUDYAm I with you?JIMMY (O.C.)You're with me.She smiles wider.JUDYThen I'm okay.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:I/E. HIGHWAY TO BORDER/DINKO'S CAR - NIGHTJudy's got the camera trained on herself. She talks like a child.JUDYMexicooooooh....Judy points the camera up at Jimmy. This is the first time we've seen him at all since he was beaten up by Uncle Rodney's group. He's a wreck. His face is puffy. His lip is cut up. His eye is swollen. He looks like a flyweight boxer who just went fifteen rounds with a heavyweight.He drives with one arm because the other one is in a bandage.JUDY (O.C.)Hey baby.Jimmy looks like a beaten man, both physically and emotionally. His bad ass attitude and rebellious charisma are seemingly non-existent.118.For the first time, we are seeing Jimmy without his armor. He looks like any other 21 year old kid who is down, vulnerable, and confused. Not to mention the fact that he has a fucking bullet lodged in his shoulder.JUDY (O.C.)Baby?JIMMYCome on. Not the camera.JUDY (O.C.)Nooooo. It reminds me of when we first met. Just you, me, and the camera. God, do you remember how you used to freak me out?JIMMYYeah, those were the good old days. How much money do we have?JUDY (O.C.)I don't know, why?JIMMYHow do you feel about Canada? It's closer.JUDY (O.C.)Are we going together?Jimmy looks over at her.JIMMYI think I should take you home.Judy doesn't answer.JIMMYI could write you a letter. Or I could make a video saying I made you do everything. They'd believe you. You could tell them it was all my fault. You could tell them I was going to Mexico and I'd really go to Canada.Jimmy swallows.JIMMYWe swore on the bond we'd never be apart... but... 119.
(MORE)I'll let you out of it... If you want to be out of it, I'll let you out.JUDY (O.C.)You're never leaving me, and I'm never leaving you. That's all there is to it.JIMMYOkay.Judy leans in and kisses him.JIMMYOwww.Judy comes back into the passenger seat and just films him. She likes looking at him through the lens.JUDY (O.C.)You're so handsome, you know that?Jimmy smiles as best he can with his face all messed up. Then his eyes get droopy and close.He's not responding. He’s as punch drunk as you can get.JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy?Jimmy's obviously in a concussion induced daze. The car starts to drift. Judy drops the camera on the seat as we hear her leap forward to take control of the car.JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy!JIMMY (O.C.)(snaps to)What?JUDY (O.C.)Jimmy, stop the car. You're too fucked up to drive.JIMMY (O.C.)(groggy)Huh? Oh... okay.Camera shuts down.CAMERA ON:120.JIMMY (cont'd)I/E. HIGHWAY FINAL-SCENE/DINKO'S CAR - DAYJudy drives. There isn't much talking going on.JUDYYou wanted to ask me something?JIMMY (O.C.)Do you love me?JUDYYou know I do.JIMMY (O.C.)I do.The car drives. Judy just cruises along, music playing on the radio. Jimmy (O.C.) looks in the mirror but keeps the camera trained on her.JIMMY (O.C.)You know I love you, right?JUDYYup.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy?JUDYYes?JIMMY (O.C.)We're fucked.JUDYWhat do you mean?JIMMY (O.C.)Look in the rearview mirror.Judy looks up immediately. Her face drops.Jimmy flips the camera around out the back window. There's a Ohio State Trooper with its lights flashing tailing them. A lone trooper is on his radio.JIMMY (O.C.)That's it baby. We're done.Judy doesn't answer. She's short circuited.121.JIMMY (O.C.)Just pull over. It's not worth it.Judy holds still for a second, not saying a word.The cop car CHIRPS its siren.Judy looks up.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy, what are you doing? You know this is...JUDYDon't do this.Judy looks up into the rearview mirror. Her eyes are welling up. She looks out the front windshield.Jimmy senses that she sees something. He flips the camera around through the front only to see a row of cop cars blocking the highway up ahead.He flips the camera back at her.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy?JUDY(freaks)Shut up!Judy looks straight ahead, determination on her face.She won't answer. Then...She turns the wheel hard to the right, almost carrying Jimmy into her, and takes the car onto a side road.JIMMY (O.C.)I love you. JUDYI love you too.Judy is on her own mission.JIMMY (O.C.)It's over. JUDY(soft)No.122.JIMMY (O.C.)It is.JUDYNo.The car stops short. Jimmy turns the camera to point out the windshield. They're stuck. The road has come to a dead end.JIMMY (O.C.)It's a dead end.Judy ignores Jimmy. She throws the car into reverse and tries to turn it around and head back the way she came.A faint sound of a helicopter fades up slowly from the background.JIMMY (O.C.)Do you hear that?Judy doesn't respond. She's determined.JUDY(lying)No.JIMMY (O.C.)Come on, it's over. I'll do what I said before. I'll tell them I made you do it. It'll be okay.JUDYNo. I want us to be together.JIMMY (O.C.)(screams)Well we fucking can't, so pull the fuck over!JUDYYes we can. I won't give you up. I won't let you go. No way.Jimmy pans the camera out the front windshield. In the distance, we catch sight of a road block that's been set up at the end of the dirt trail. They're screwed. There's nowhere to go.JIMMY (O.C.)Come on. Judy doesn't answer.123.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy?She still doesn't answer.Then the car thrusts itself forward. JIMMY (O.C.)Judy! Stop it.Judy's got a look of determination in her eye.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy, what are you doing?Judy doesn't respond. O.C., she's murmuring something to herself that Jimmy can't hear or understand while she has the throttle to the floor as they barrel toward the roadblock.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy!Judy keeps going. Jimmy flips the back camera towards her.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy! Stop!Judy's murmurs grow louder.JIMMY (O.C.)Judy!Jimmy braces himself as the car continues toward the roadblock.Suddenly, Judy's murmurs get loud enough or us to hear.JUDY(murmurs)We'll be together. We'll be together. We'll be together. We'll be together...They head straight in between two cars that form the roadblock. Cops jump out of the way as the car hits head on into...THE ROADBLOCKImpact sends the camera flying against the windshield, CRACKING IT.124.Sounds of metal twisting and glass shattering is all encompassing as the camera shakes in a violent frenzy!Camera settles on Judy's face, bloody, unconscious against the steering wheel, her neck snapped, eyes open in a death stare.Camera stays focussed on Judy for the longest time as she leans against the steering wheel. Music plays on the radio. It's JOHNNY CASH's cover of Tom Petty's "I won't Back Down".OVERHEAD SHOT of a news helicopter flying above the final scene.Looking down from above, we see what the helicopter sees:A scene of about twelve State Trooper cars, lights flashing, with Jimmy and Judy's car wrecked. Ambulances are there. Jimmy and Judy's lifeless bodies are pulled from their car as Johnny Cash's song shifts from background to score.The helicopter continues its circular pattern as the song continues and we...FADE TO BLACK.125. | screenplays |
diabetic neuropathy is the most common complication of diabetes ; approximately half of patients with diabetes have symptoms of diabetic neuropathy .
loss of sensation is particularly important because it can allow the injury to go unnoticed , leading to foot ulcers .
diabetic foot ulcer is defined as cutaneous erosions characterized by a loss of epithelium that extends into or through the dermis to deeper tissues ; lifetime prevalence of diabetic foot ulcer is 15%25% in the population with diabetes .
these foot ulcers seriously affect quality of life ( qol ) , reducing physical activity and increasing psychological stress .
furthermore , a 2004 study estimated that diabetic ulcer - related costs averaged over $ 13,000 per episode , not including costs associated with psychosocial issues , decrease in qol , and lost productivity .
in addition , even when an ulcer is successfully healed , the risk of recurrence is high , with reported rates ranging between 30% and 40% within one year [ 6 , 7 ] .
therefore , prevention of foot ulcers is of paramount importance and has long been recognized as a priority by the international working group on the diabetic foot .
the pathogenesis of foot ulceration is a complex process in which many factors are involved .
other risk factors are associated with developing diabetic foot ulcers , one of which is said to be the external force on the plantar .
repeated normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress during walking contribute to callus formation in the plantar region [ 10 , 11 ] .
callus formation may lead to the development of foot ulcers and involves hyperkeratosis caused by excessive mechanical loading [ 2 , 8 , 12 , 13 ] .
the callus formation precedes ulcer formation in over 82% of patients with diabetic foot ulcers .
the relative risk for ulceration in a callused area was 11.0 compared with that of an area without callus [ 15 , 16 ] .
once the foot ulcer occurs , its treatment will be difficult and take a long time .
patients with calluses are known to have significantly higher peak normal stress ( pressure ) during walking than patients without callus [ 17 , 18 ] . assuming that an average person walks approximately 10,000 steps a day
, a callus may cause 18,600 kg of excess plantar normal stress ( pressure ) per day , highlighting the deleterious impact of calluses . on the other hand , studies on shear stress
shear sensor technology has been still far from miniaturization to the point where it could accurately map shear load distribution .
the shear stress has been commonly measured as ground reaction forces typically along , with a force platform providing resultant force acting on the outsole or barefoot because of technical difficulties .
this fact appears to have acted as an almost complete barrier to practical , useful research relating to friction loads .
however , it is important to measure the in - shoe shear stress for considering the callus related factors .
the shear stress of the callus formation area is hardly ever measured in patients with diabetes , and therefore , there are few studies on shear stress in patients with diabetes .
as one of the few studies , patients with diabetes had higher shear stress under the first / second metatarsal head and lower shear stress under the third / fourth metatarsal head compared with healthy subjects [ 21 , 22 ] . however , these studies used special type of shoes for measurement that could accommodate the thick sensor .
it has been revealed that the shear stress of each metatarsal head differs in terms of direction and magnitude , depending on the difference of heel height using special type of shoes for measurement .
therefore , it is important to perform measurements on the patient , while the patient is wearing his / her own ordinary footwear to identify causes associated with callus formation . in the clinical setting , many patients redevelop calluses , despite wearing tailor - made footwear developed with a view for preventing callus .
tailor - made footwear that is declared for the callus prevention is available , the effectiveness of which has already been demonstrated [ 24 , 25 ] ; however , scir et al
. also showed that the callus recurred in 41% patients , even if they wore therapeutic footwear .
the callus recurred in 24 of 31 patients , even if they received foot care and wore recommended footwear , according to the diabetic foot care program . from these results , it is considered that the causes of callus have not been completely excluded .
it is assumed that the callus has been intervened without considering shear stress during walking .
although repeated normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress during walking contribute to callus formation , many studies on intervention were focusing only on normal stress ( pressure ) .
it is also unclear how much the external force on plantar should be decreased , despite many studies being available on normal stress ( pressure ) analysis .
identification of a cut - off value of the normal stress ( pressure ) has been attempted for foot ulcer prevention , but the cut - off value has less accuracy [ 16 , 28 ] .
moreover , a study of a cut - off value of the shear stress is hardly available
. the cut - off value of the normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress on callus formation prevention has not been studied .
as for the future clinical image , in the next procedure of intervention , the external forces will be adjusted referring to the cut - off value .
if the callus recurs , the external forces will be readjusted to the smaller value of the current value .
the purpose of this study was to clarify external forces associated with callus formation in patients with diabetic neuropathy and to identify the cut - off value of the forces .
first , differences in normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress in callus formation region and noncallus formation region will be clarified in patients with diabetic neuropathy .
second , the external force cut - off value for callus formation will be identified in patients with diabetic neuropathy .
the walking measurement was cross - sectional study , and observation of callus formation was carried out as longitudinal study .
this survey was conducted at the diabetic foot outpatient clinic at the university of tokyo hospital from april to october 2015 .
inclusion criteria were patients with diabetic neuropathy 20 years old who could walk without aid .
participants who had a current diabetic foot ulcer and a history of more proximal lower limb of metatarsophalangeal ( mtp ) joint amputation were excluded .
the survey protocol was approved by the ethical committee of the graduate school of medicine , the university of tokyo ( # 10797 ) .
aim of this outpatient clinic is to prevent diabetic foot ulcers , and therefore , most patients experience symptoms of the foot or are interested in the prevention of complications .
after general examination in the diabetic foot outpatient clinic including regular callus removal , written informed consent was obtained from the participant .
the patient walked approximately 50 m as a practice to confirm that there was no pain and no interfering in walking by the sensor attachment .
the patient then walked about 15 m twice as the measurement walk , and the researcher recorded all sensor data ensuring that sensors were operating during the measurement .
an assistant measured 15 m walking time using a stopwatch and walked diagonally behind the patient to prevent them from falling or other adverse events ( figure 1 ) .
the participants were asked to wear usual shoes when they visited the diabetic foot outpatient clinic .
it was assumed that those shoes were worn for the longest time , such as during exercise therapy .
all participants were provided with standardized socks to use during the measurement . when the pretest participants had come with wearing tight or long socks ,
thus , the patients ' own socks could not be used to shorten the investigation time and to reduce the burden of the patients . the presence or absence of callus
was checked after one month again , which means the formation of callus check ; this is also the definition of callus formation region in this study .
the definition of callus is not clear universally ; therefore the presence / absence of callus is determined in the clinical setting using expert opinion in this study .
that is , in this study , a callus was defined by plate - shaped hyperkeratosis observed by two expert nurses in foot care .
all calluses were removed in the diabetic foot clinic using a corn cutter , and walking was measured afterward . the presence or absence of callus formation
was checked again after one month in all patients , because , generally , a callus would have recurred within one month .
the region of such callus was classified into the callus formation group if callus recurred .
if the callus does not recur in the region , it will be excluded from the analysis .
the region of noncallus was classified into the noncallus formation group if a callus did not develop after one month .
if a callus developed in the noncallus region during the follow - up for 1 month , it was also excluded from the analysis , since it could not be determined that the measured gait and foot condition were related to callus formation . in this study , in - shoe normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress of the 1st , 2nd , and 5th mth were measured ; these are the predilection regions of callus and foot ulcers . reliability and validity of the system for measuring in - shoe plantar normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress
these in - shoe normal stress ( pressure ) and two axes ' shear stress were measured by shokacchip , which was newly developed by touchence inc . and released in 2013 .
shokacchip is a tactile sensor with small - high sensitivity based on mems ( micro electro mechanical systems ) technology .
high sensitivity is realized for three - dimensional axes by processing three piezoelectric elements and locating them at three - dimensional axes on the 2 mm chip .
sensor size is 10.0 mm 1.3 mm ( t ) ; it is very small and thin .
calibration using a load - compensating device has already been done before shipment of the sensors .
it has been guaranteed that this sensor is not necessary to calibrate in each time of measurement on the characteristic of the sensor .
however , calibration was done by rising a foot to each foot before the measurement in a state of wearing shoes , because the sensor caught some stresses when patients wore shoes .
subject 's plantar was fixed perpendicular to the ground and the sensor was attached to be parallel to the ground at the region of ranging from the mth top to the base of toe by double sided tape .
shear stress is the resultant force of anterior - posterior axis and mediolateral axis on the assumption of some sensor shift ( figure 2 ) . from results of pretests
only two regions could be measured per foot in one measurement , because four sensors , at a maximum , could be used per foot by the sensor circuit system hardware restriction .
the callus regions were preferentially selected for measurement , and the noncallus regions were selected at random in these three regions . if a noncallus patient could be matched by sex and age ( 3 years ) , the same regions were measured in the callus patient .
if a foot had three calluses , measurements were conducted twice by changing the attachment of the sensor because the number of sensors was limited .
the noncallus region will be excluded when one foot has callus region and noncallus region , because noncallus region might be also affected by callus .
it is considered that the cause of callus formation of toe is the contact with shoes .
peak plantar normal stress ( pressure ) ( pp ) , normal stress ( pressure ) time integral ( pi ) , peak shear stress ( pss ) , and shear stress integral ( ssi ) of each gait cycle were calculated from the recorded force profile ; these variables have been investigated in many previous studies of external force [ 3133 ] .
in addition , during measurements , we newly noticed that some callus patients had a high shear stress in spite of the not so high normal stress ( pressure ) .
one previous study examined the combinations of normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress ; they concluded that skin breakdown occurred at higher shear load levels in animal experiment .
however , it was indicated in the results that loading pad was slipped and skin breakdown did not occur in the combination of some shear stress and low normal stress ( pressure ) loading . from these results , we considered that the balance of normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress is important .
thus , shear stress - normal stress ( pressure ) ratios ( spr ) were calculated by dividing shear stress by normal stress ( pressure ) , concretely , peak values ( spr - p ) and time integral values ( spr - i ) .
data regarding age , sex , height , weight , foot length , and width ( standing position ) and usual daily activities were obtained from medical records or by interview .
hallux valgus , bunionette , claw toe , and hammer toe were regarded as foot deformities and identified by the visual inspection of well - trained nurse .
patients were diagnosed with diabetic neuropathy if two of the following three items were fulfilled : ( 1 ) sensory symptoms considered to be due to diabetic neuropathy , ( 2 ) bilaterally decreased or absent ankle reflex , and ( 3 ) decreased vibratory sensation in bilateral medial malleoli .
the sensory symptoms considered to be due to diabetic neuropathy were clarified during the interview , whereas the bilaterally decreased or absent ankle reflex was examined with the patient in a kneeling position . decreased vibratory sensation in bilateral medial malleoli was examined using an ac128 tuning fork for evaluation of vibration sense . the total time span in which the patient felt vibratory sensation was evaluated , and a duration of < 10 s was considered as decreased sensation .
in addition , the results of the monofilament test were confirmed using medical records ; this test was performed on the basis of the practical guidelines of international working group on the diabetic foot using 5.07 semmes - weinstein monofilament ( arkray inc . ,
data regarding duration of diabetes , hemoglobin a1c ( hba1c ) , foot ulcer history , and foot amputation history were obtained from medical records or by interview .
angiopathy data were collected from medical records , and an ankle - brachial index ( abi ) < 0.9 was regarded as angiopathy .
the variables of the external forces were obtained by averaging a total 15 steps after removing the initial three steps and the final three steps .
data processing was performed using matlab r2012a ( the math works , inc . , ma , usa ) .
descriptive data were expressed as means standard deviations for continuous variables and n ( % ) for categorical variables .
statistical analyses were performed using ibm spss statistics ver . 23.0 ( chicago , il , usa ) . statistical significance was set at p = 0.05 .
patient characteristics were compared between the callus formation group and noncallus formation group using student 's t - test and fisher 's exact test .
for comparison of the external forces in callus formation regions and noncallus formation regions , student 's t - test was used . receiver
operating characteristic ( roc ) curves were drawn for all external force variables , and the area under curve ( auc ) was calculated .
positive predictive values ( ppvs ) and negative predictive values ( npvs ) were also calculated .
the reason why the specificity has priority is that the callus can be removed unlike a foot ulcer even if it occurs once .
on the other hand , intervention to improve the external force ( e.g. , the introduction of custom - made footwear ) has a large burden on medical staff and patients .
sixty - four patients with diabetes were attended to at the diabetic foot outpatient clinic during the observation period , and fifty - nine patients with diabetic neuropathy participated in the survey .
five patients were excluded because the patient ( 1 ) did not have neuropathy ( n = 1 ) , ( 2 ) used a wheelchair ( n = 1 ) , ( 3 ) had a current diabetic foot ulcer ( n = 1 ) , ( 4 ) had a history of bilateral knee amputation ( n = 1 ) , and ( 5 ) was unable to provide consent for participation ( n = 1 ) .
twenty patients ( 33.9% ) had more than one callus in the target region , whereas the number of patients without callus was 39 ( 66.1% ) .
thirty - eight regions ( 15.6% ) were excluded from the analysis because other regions had a callus in one foot . as for the 1st mth ,
the number of callus formation feet was 13 ( 23.6% ) , whereas the number of noncallus formation feet was 42 ( 76.4% ) .
as for the 2nd mth , the number of callus formation feet was 16 ( 22.2% ) , whereas the number of noncallus formation feet was 56 ( 77.8% ) .
as for the 5th mth , the number of callus formation feet was 21 ( 26.6% ) , and the number of noncallus formation feet was 58 ( 73.4% ) .
all calluses had recurred by the time of the next follow - up ( 1 month later ) , whereas no calluses were seen in any of the noncallus regions at the follow - up .
therefore , all regions of callus removal were assigned to regions of callus formation , and
all regions with no calluses were assigned to regions of noncallus formation in this study .
measurement survey took about 15 min ; approximately five minutes was required for follow - up survey .
the patient characteristics for each mth are shown in table 1 . in the 1st mth results ,
in the 2nd mth results , there were significantly more female patients , light weight patients , patients with low hba1c , and patients with foot deformity in the callus formation group . in the 5th mth results , the two groups had no significant difference .
single variables of normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress did not differ significantly ; only spr - i was significantly higher in the callus formation group .
single variables of normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress did not differ significantly ; only spr - p and spr - i were significantly higher in the callus formation group .
no variables differed significantly ; however , pss had a tendency toward being high in the callus formation group ( p = 0.070 ) .
the cut - off value of spr - i was 0.60 ( sensitivity , 0.54 ; specificity , 0.76 ) for the 1st mth .
the cut - off value of spr - i was 0.50 ( sensitivity , 0.44 ; specificity , 0.80 ) in the 2nd mth .
for the 5th mth , variables pertaining to the external forces could not be determined to be indicators of callus formation , because the auc of all variables was < 0.7 , although pss in auc was 0.63 .
this is the first study that measures the in - shoe external force of the 1st , 2nd , and 5th metatarsal heads of the foot .
since this measurement had been enabled , it was clarified that callus formation of the 1st and 2nd metatarsal head were related to high shear stress time integral / normal stress ( pressure ) time integral ( spr - i ) rather than the single variables of normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress .
additionally , the cut - off values for each region were found to be different .
the measurement of the actual in - shoe normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress on the plantar has been associated with technical difficulties . in this study
, the in - shoe external forces were measured in the clinic setting , since it became possible to conduct measurements in any shoe utilizing the thin and small sensor that was recently developed .
in addition , all patients with diabetic neuropathy could participate in this survey without adverse events .
furthermore , the in - sole type sensor systems used in the previous studies were unclear whether the systems measured external force applied to the callus region since it had been difficult to confirm the sensor attached to the callus region [ 23 , 37 ] . in this study , this problem was solved by directly attaching the sensor on the target area on the plantar .
hence , this study is highly important because normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress of the callus regions could be accurately measured simultaneously .
it was revealed that spr - i is the new indicator of callus formation ; that is , dividing shear stress with normal stress ( pressure ) indicated the balance between shear stress and normal stress ( pressure ) .
the balance of the external forces had not been previously investigated . with higher shear stress - normal stress ( pressure )
ratio , as the high shear stress applies with a certain degree of normal stress ( pressure ) , mechanical stress on the skin will become increased , and the body attempts to protect irritated skin by forming a hyperkeratotic lesion , such as a corn or a callus . with lower shear stress - normal stress ( pressure ) ratio , when high normal stress ( pressure ) applies with small shear stress , it is considered that the callus , which is the normal physiologic response of the skin , will be hardly formed , since the external forces are applied to the subcutaneous tissue rather than being exerted on the skin surface .
calluses form as a result of hyperproliferation and incomplete differentiation of epidermal keratinocytes and increased expression of adhesion molecules in the epidermis .
forces and time integration were associated with the callus formation rather than the maximum forces , because the time integral ratio had a high accuracy than the peak ratio .
two reasons could be considered as spr - i of the 5th metatarsal head did not have significant difference between callus formation group and noncallus formation group .
if enough patients with the 5th metatarsal head callus will participate , spr of the 5th metatarsal head might also become the indicator .
more patients were needed for the 5th metatarsal head , because external force of the 5th metatarsal head had large variability and small value of difference compared with other regions .
second , peak shear stress affected the callus formation of 5th metatarsal head rather than spr - i .
mechanical stress might not be absorbed and off - loaded in the subcutaneous tissue , because the 5th metatarsal head has thin subcutaneous tissue comparing other two regions .
therefore , peak shear stress might affect the callus formation of 5th metatarsal head rather than the balance of normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress ( spr - i ) . according to these results , there was no significant difference in the normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress variables between the callus formation group and noncallus formation group in all regions .
it was only observed that peak shear stress tended toward being high in the 2nd and 5th metatarsal head . in some previous studies , where the calluses were measured without prior removal , the normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress were significantly higher in the callus group .
some studies had shown that the normal stress ( pressure ) decreased after removing the callus [ 19 , 39 ] .
therefore , it is natural that single variables of normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress had no significant differences in the absence of hyperkeratosis .
the cut - off values of external force on plantar associated with callus formation were found ; spr - i of the 1st metatarsal head was 0.60 and spr - i of the 2nd metatarsal head was 0.50 . the cut - off value of spr - i for the 2nd metatarsal head was lower than that for the 1st metatarsal head
this may be the reason why the 2nd metatarsal head was associated with a higher normal stress ( pressure ) than that associated with the 1st metatarsal head .
in general , the center of normal stress ( pressure ) is applied to the 2nd metatarsal head during walking , and the center of normal stress ( pressure ) during the push - off phase , which is higher , often applies to this region in patients with diabetes .
thus , the normal stress ( pressure ) in the 2nd metatarsal head was higher than the normal stress ( pressure ) of the 1st metatarsal head . in the 5th metatarsal head , individual differences were more pronounced than for the other regions .
the reason might be that the moving of the center of gravity from the heel to the 5th metatarsal head during walking hardly connects to the propulsion .
therefore , the external force could not be determined to be the sole indicator of callus formation in the 5th metatarsal head . in various previous studies , normal stress ( pressure ) had been associated with foot ulcer development [ 16 , 38 , 41 ] , and therefore , the following process was considered .
high normal stress ( pressure ) was applied to the callus region by hyperkeratosis , and foot ulcer subsequently developed causing subcutaneous tissue damage due to high normal stress ( pressure ) .
the patients of this survey were limited to mild neuropathy and mild foot deformity patients .
therefore , the results of this study might not be applicable to patients with a progressed neuropathy , severe foot deformity , and amputation history
. it will be necessary to confirm it in the future whether this result is applicable to such a high risk subject .
it was necessary to check that the gait features were not changed , when observing callus formation after one month .
this study was conducted on the assumption that the gait features were not changed during this one month . for the first time , each region of the normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress wearing the patient 's own shoes was measured in a clinical setting . as a result , the following two points were revealed .
first , callus formation in the 1st and 2nd metatarsal head is related to high shear stress time integral / normal stress ( pressure ) time integral ( spr - i ) rather than the single variables of normal stress ( pressure ) and shear stress .
peak shear stress had a tendency towards being high in the callus formation group in the 5th metatarsal head .
second , the external force cut - off values were found to differ in each site , spr - i of the 1st metatarsal head being 0.60 and spr - i of the 2nd metatarsal head being 0.50 .
external force could not be determined to be a sole indicator of callus formation in the 5th metatarsal head .
considering the results presented here , intervention based on cut - off values of spr - i of each metatarsal head will be effective .
in future , it will be necessary to confirm the effect of using appropriate footwear and gait training on lowering external forces associated with callus formation . | pubmed |
Brittney Griner freed in prisoner swap with Russian arms dealer
US basketball star Brittney Griner has been freed in a prisoner swap, a US official has said.
She had been imprisoned in Russia after being convicted in August and sentenced to nine years in prison.
Ms Griner was detained in February when customs agents said they found vape canisters containing cannabis oil in her luggage at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport.
She was released in exchange for convicted Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, who has been known as the "Merchant of Death".
President Joe Biden says he has spoken to Ms Griner and that she is "safe" and "on her way home".
She will be flown to a medical facility in San Antonio, Texas, where she will also meet her wife, Cherelle.
The swap took place in Abu Dhabi airport, according to the Russian Foreign Ministry.
More on Brittney Griner
The ministry said in a statement: "The Russian citizen has been returned to his homeland."
Who is Viktor Bout?
For almost two decades, Bout was one of the world's most notorious arms dealers, selling weaponry to rogue states, rebel groups and murderous warlords in Africa, Asia, and South America.
Ever since his capture in an elaborate US sting, the Russian state has been keen to bring him back.
Biden's authorisation to release Bout underscores the escalating pressure that his administration has faced to bring Ms Griner, particularly after the recent resolution of her criminal case and her subsequent transfer to a penal colony.
'Over my dead body': Proposals to make some NHS patients pay for care spark backlash
Firefighter 'critical' after blaze breaks out at historic Edinburgh former department store | slim_pajama |
the enrichment of the intergalactic medium ( igm ) with heavy elements has , over the past decade , become a key tool in understanding star and galaxy formation by providing a fossil record of metal formation and galactic feedback .
absorption line spectroscopy has revealed , among other findings , that the low - density ( @xmath10 ) intergalactic medium ( igm ) , as probed by the ly@xmath11 forest and through , , , , , , and other transitions , is at least partly enriched at all redshifts and densities probed .
in particular , recent studies indicate that : * when smoothed over large ( @xmath12 kpc ) scales , the abundance of carbon decreases as gas overdensity @xmath13 does and has a scatter of @xmath14dex at fixed density .
there is carbon in at least some gas at all densities down to at least the mean cosmic density , with the median carbon metallicity obeying [ c / h ] @xmath15 at @xmath16 ( schaye et al . 2003 , hereafter * ? ? ?
* on smaller ( @xmath17 kpc ) scales the distribution of metals is less well known , but observations suggest that the metals may be concentrated in small , high - metallicity patches @xcite .
* there is no evidence for metallicity evolution from redshift @xmath18 to @xmath19 @xcite and metals exist at some level at @xmath20 @xcite . in connection with this
observed widespread distribution of metals , a general picture has emerged that galactic winds driven largely from young and/or starburst galaxies have enriched the igm .
the same feedback may account for the dearth of low - luminosity galaxies relative to the halo mass function ( e.g. , * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
* ) , and also for the mass - metallicity relationship of galaxies ( e.g. , * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
. however , a detailed understanding of the various feedback processes is lacking and there are still open questions and controversies concerning the time and relative importance of the various enrichment processes , and concerning the implications for galaxy formation .
both theoretical modeling and observations of intergalactic ( ig ) enrichment are now advancing to the point where comparison between the two can provide crucial insight into these issues , but this comparison is not without problems .
two key difficulties concern the ionization correction required to convert observed ionic abundances into elemental abundances .
first , while the oft - studied ions and are observationally convenient , they are poor probes of hot ( @xmath21k ) gas , because the ion factions /c and /si both fall dramatically with temperature .
thus , the hot remnants of fast outflows might be largely invisible in these ions .
second , the dominant uncertainty in both the absolute and relative abundance inferences stems from uncertainty in the spectral shape of the ultraviolet ionizing background radiation ( uvb ) .
analysis of oxygen , as probed by , has the potential to shed light on both problems : this ionization state becomes prevalent in some of the very phases in which and become rare , and its abundance depends on the uvb shape differently than those of other ions , helping break the degeneracy between abundances and uvb shape .
the challenge posed by is that at @xmath22 it is strongly contaminated by both ly@xmath11 and ly@xmath23 lines , making its identification and quantification difficult .
previous studies of high-@xmath24 oxygen enrichment using line fitting @xcite or pixel statistics @xcite have reliably detected oxygen in the igm , and quantified its abundance in relatively dense gas , but have not assessed the oxygen abundance with a very large data sample , at very low - densities , or in a unified treatment with other available ions .
here we extend to our application of the pixel optical depth " technique ( e.g. , aguirre , schaye & theuns , hereafter * ? ? ?
* ) to a large set of high quality vlt / uves and keck / hires spectra .
the results , when combined with previous studies of and @xcite and of and ( aguirre et .
2004 ; hereafter * ? ? ?
* ) , give a comprehensive observational assessment of ig enrichment by carbon , silicon and oxygen , with significantly reduced uncertainties due to the uvb shape , as well as new data on the importance of hot , collisionally ionized gas .
we have organized this paper as follows . in [ sec - data ] and [ sec - overview ] we briefly describe our sample of qso spectra .
the analysis method is described briefly in [ sec - overview ] and then in greater depth in the remainder of [ sec - meth ] , with heavy reference to papers i , ii and iii . the basic results are given in [ sec - resrel ] and discussed in [ sec - discuss ] .
finally , we conclude in [ sec - conc ] .
all abundances are given by number relative to hydrogen , and solar abundance are taken to be @xmath25 , @xmath26 , and @xmath27 @xcite .
we analyze 17 of the 19 high - quality ( @xmath28 velocity resolution , s / n @xmath29 ) absorption spectra of quasars used in papers ii and iii . the two highest - redshift spectra used in those previous studies
were excluded here because the severe contamination of the region by lines makes detection of nearly impossible and also introduces very large continuum fitting errors in the region .
fourteen spectra were taken with the uv - visual echelle spectrograph ( uves , * ? ? ?
* ) on the very large telescope and three were taken with the high resolution echelle spectrograph ( hires , * ? ? ?
* ) on the keck telescope . for convenience ,
the observed qsos are listed in table [ tbl : sample ] .
llcccclll q1101 - 264 & 2.145 & 1.878 & 2.103 & 3050.00 & uves & 1 & 1.6 + q0122 - 380 & 2.190 & 1.920 & 2.147 & 3062.00 & uves & 2 & 0.6 + j2233 - 606 & 2.238 & 1.963 & 2.195 & 3055.00 & uves & 3 & 1.1 + he1122 - 1648 & 2.400 & 2.112 & 2.355 & 3055.00 & uves & 1 & 1.4 + q0109 - 3518 & 2.406 & 2.117 & 2.361 & 3050.00 & uves & 2 & 1.5 + he2217 - 2818 & 2.406 & 2.117 & 2.361 & 3050.00 & uves & 3 & 1.6 + q0329 - 385 & 2.423 & 2.133 & 2.377 & 3062.00 & uves & 2 & 1.2 + he1347 - 2457 & 2.534 & 2.234 & 2.487 & 3050.00 & uves & 1,2 & 2.5 + pks0329 - 255 & 2.685 & 2.373 & 2.636 & 3150.00 & uves & 2 & 1.5 + q0002 - 422 & 2.76 & 2.441 & 2.710 & 3055.00 & uves & 2 & 1.6 + he2347 - 4342 & 2.90 & 2.569 & 2.848 & 3428.00 & uves & 2 & 1.5 + q1107 + 485 & 3.00 & 2.661 & 2.947 & 3644.36 & hires & 4 & 2.3 + q0420 - 388 & 3.123 & 2.774 & 3.068 & 3760.00 & uves & 2 & 1.8 + q1425 + 604 & 3.20 & 2.844 & 3.144 & 3736.20 & hires & 4 & 2.1 + q2126 - 158 & 3.268 & 2.906 & 3.211 & 3400.00 & uves & 2 & 2.0 + q1422 + 230 & 3.62 & 3.225 & 3.552 & 3645.24 & hires & 4 & 3.1 + q0055 - 269 & 3.655 & 3.257 & 3.586 & 3423.00 & uves & 1 & 4.0 regions within @xmath30 from the quasars , where @xmath31 is the hubble parameter at redshift @xmath24 extrapolated from its present value ( @xmath32 ) assuming @xmath33 , were excluded to avoid proximity effects .
regions thought to be contaminated by absorption features that are not present in our simulated spectra ( e.g. , damped ly@xmath11 systems ) were also excluded from the analysis .
lyman continuum contamination increases significantly towards lower wavelengths , whereas ( as described below ) our correction for this contamination assumes that it is non - evolving . to mitigate this effect , only the red portion [ @xmath34 of the qso spectra used in papers ii and iii is analyzed in this paper . as in @xcite ,
this was found to result in smaller errors than using the full region .
further details concerning the sample and data reduction are given in paper ii ( 2 ) .
the pixel optical depth method we use for measuring is similar to that described in papers i , ii , and iii .
section [ sec - overview ] contains a brief outline of the method ; [ sec - confit ] and [ sec - recovery ] describe continuum fitting and contamination corrections , which have been changed slightly from the methods described in papers ii and iii ; [ sec - ovitest ] describes tests of the recovery , and [ ioncorr ] discusses the ionization balance of the relevant species , and describes how ionization corrections are performed .
the basic method for analysis of each qso spectrum is as follows : 1 .
optical depths due to ly@xmath11 ( @xmath35 ) absorption are recovered for all pixels in the ly@xmath11 forest region , using higher - order lyman lines to estimate optical depths for saturated pixels .
the pixel optical depth at the corresponding wavelengths of the metal lines ( @xmath36 ) , ( @xmath37 ) , and ( @xmath38 ) are recovered , making several corrections to reduce contamination and noise .
the recovered optical depth in one transition is compared with that of another , by binning the pixels in terms of the optical depth of , , or , and plotting the median ( or some other percentile of ) optical depth of .
a correlation then indicates a detection of absorption .
an example is shown in fig .
[ fig : oviscat ] . as was done in papers ii and iii ,
an identical analysis is applied to synthetic spectra generated using a cosmological , hydrodynamical simulation , kindly provided by tom theuns . for each observed quasar
we generate 50 corresponding simulated spectra with the same noise properties , wavelength coverage , instrumental broadening , and pixel size as the observed spectra . for each uvb model (
of which several are used ; see below ) the carbon distribution as measured in paper ii , and the value of [ si / c ] from paper iii , are imposed on the fiducial spectra .
an oxygen abundance is assigned by assuming a _ constant , uniform _ value of [ o / c ] .
ionization balances are calculated using cloudy(version 94 ; see ferland et al .
1998 and ferland 2000 for details ) .
a direct comparison of the results from these simulated and observed spectra allows for inferences about the distribution of oxygen , carbon , and silicon .
the same simulation was used in papers i ( 3 ) , ii , and iii , to which the reader is referred for details .
this study employs the identical uvb models used in papers ii ( 4.2 ) and iii , excluding model `` qgs3.2 '' .
all models are from haardt & madau ( 2001 , hereafter hm01 ) .
these have been renormalized ( by a redshift - dependent factor ) such that the simulated spectra match the observed evolution of the mean ly@xmath11 absorption ( paper ii ) .
the fiducial model , `` qg '' , includes contributions from both galaxies ( with a 10% escape fraction for ionizing photons ) and quasars ; `` q '' includes only quasars ; `` qgs '' is an artificially softened version of qg : its flux has been reduced by a factor of ten above 4 ryd .
the uvb used in the simulation only affects the igm temperature , and was chosen to match the measurements by @xcite .
a major source of error in optical depths is continuum fitting in the absorption region , where contamination by ly@xmath11 and ly@xmath23 lines is heavy . to make this fitting as accurate as possible , and to furnish an estimate of the continuum fitting error , we have applied the following procedure to the region analyzed for absorption ( in the case of observed spectra , this was done after the spectra
had been continuum fitted by eye as described in paper ii 2 ) : 1 .
the spectral region is divided into 20 ( rest - frame ) segments .
2 . in segments with large unabsorbed regions , an automatic continuum fitting algorithm
is applied ( see 5.1 of paper ii ) , in which pixels @xmath39 below the continuum are iteratively removed .
3 . in segments without large unabsorbed regions , we identify small unabsorbed regions or regions absorbed only in ly@xmath23 ; the latter are identified by superimposing the region of the spectrum corresponding to ly@xmath11 absorption .
the continuum level of the segment is fit by minimizing the deviation of identified unabsorbed regions from unit flux , and deviation of the ly@xmath23 regions from the corresponding scaled ly@xmath11 features .
a spline is interpolated between the fits to all segments and the spectrum is rescaled by this spline .
this procedure was applied to all observed spectra as well as to to one simulated spectrum per observed spectrum , where a 10 - 20% error in the continuum was introduced on scales of 1 , 4 and 16 segments .
the median absolute errors remaining after blindly fitting the continua of the simulated spectra are given in table [ tbl : sample ] as an estimate of continuum fitting errors in the corresponding observed spectra .
because the procedure is not fully automatic , we were unable to apply it to all of the simulated spectra .
the region redwards of ly@xmath11 was fit in both simulated and observed spectra using the procedure described in 5.1 step i of paper ii .
continuum fitting errors are much smaller for this region ( @xmath400.01@xmath41 ) .
after continuum fitting the spectra , ( ly@xmath11 ) optical depths @xmath9 are derived for each pixel between the quasar s ly@xmath11 and ly@xmath23 emission wavelengths , save for regions close to the quasar to avoid proximity effects ( see 2 ) . if ly@xmath11 is saturated ( i.e. , @xmath42 , where @xmath43 and @xmath44 are the flux and noise arrays , see paper i , 4.1 ; paper ii , 5.1 , step 2 ) , higher - order lyman lines are used to estimate @xmath9 .
corresponding , , and optical depths ( @xmath45 , @xmath46 , @xmath47 ) are subsequently derived for each pixel .
we exclude regions of the quasar spectrum that are contaminated by absorption features that are not included in our simulated spectra , such as ly@xmath11 lines with damping wings . for @xmath46 and @xmath47 ,
corrections are made for self - contamination and contamination by other metal lines , as described in paper i , 4.2 . as shown in fig .
[ fig : oviscat ] , when plotting each percentile in @xmath45 absorption against absorption in some other ion , the correlation disappears below some optical depth @xmath48 ( corresponding to a value @xmath49 in the other ion ) that is determined by noise , continuum fitting errors , and contamination by other lines .
these effects may then be corrected for by subtracting @xmath48 from the binned optical depths , thus converting most points below @xmath49 into upper limits .
for each realization and for each percentile , we compute @xmath48 as the given percentile of optical depth for the set of pixels with optical depth @xmath50 .
we use values @xmath51 when binning in or , and of @xmath52 when binning in , as we never see a correlation extending below these values .. for ovi the correlations are generally less strong than for civ and we fix @xmath49 `` by hand . '' ] the error on @xmath48 for an individual realization is computed by dividing the spectrum into 5 segments , then bootstrap - resampling the spectrum by choosing these chunks with replacement , and finally computing the variance of @xmath48 as computed from 100 such resampled spectra . when the realizations are combined , @xmath53 is instead computed as the median among the realizations , and the error on this value is computed by bootstrap - resampling the realizations . for further details
see paper ii , 5.1 , step 4 and paper iii , 3.4 . as noted above , ly@xmath11 and higher lyman
transitions heavily contaminate the absorption regime .
this can add substantial error in the recovered @xmath45 .
two corrections are made to minimize this contamination .
first , after recovering @xmath9 and @xmath45 , an initial correction is made for contamination by higher - order lines by subtracting @xmath54 where _ f _ is the transition oscillator strength , @xmath55 is the redshifted lyman @xmath11 wavelength corresponding to ly@xmath56 absorption observed at wavelength @xmath57 and _ i _ corresponds to first five higher order lyman lines ( i.e. , ly@xmath23 @xmath58 through ly@xmath59 @xmath60 ) .
a second correction is made by taking the minimum of the doublet , @xmath61 where ` a ' and ` b ' denote the stronger and weaker doublet components , respectively .
these corrections are described in detail in paper i , 4.2 .
another potential contamination issue is that due to strong ly@xmath11 or ly@xmath23 absorption , some higher percentiles in absorption can become dominated by saturated pixels , so that the particular value of the percentile is determined by the contaminating lines rather than by the distribution . to remove these unreliable percentiles from consideration ,
the average noise @xmath62 is calculated for saturated pixels and is converted into a maximum optical depth ( @xmath63 ) .
after optical depths are binned , those percentile bins with @xmath64 are excluded from the analysis . because there is substantial processing of the recovered optical depths , it is important to test how efficiently the true optical depths are recovered by our procedures .
to do so , simulations were produced just as described in
[ sec - overview ] , but with ( effectively ) perfect resolution , no noise , and only @xmath65 absorption ( and hence no contamination or self - contamination ) . in fig .
[ fig : true_rec ] the recovered pixel optical depths are plotted against these `` true '' optical depths for a set of 60 simulated spectra , for two representative qsos ( see paper i for more such tests ) .
of particular note is the efficacy of subtracting the `` flat level '' @xmath48 as described in the preceding section .
ideally , @xmath48 would be determined using pixels with negligible absorption ; this is possible in the present case ( as the true optical depths are known ) and corresponding results are shown in the left panels . in a realistic case , a proxy for must be used ; in the right panels of fig . [
fig : true_rec ] , is employed and @xmath48 is computed using all pixels with @xmath66 . in both cases ,
the subtracted @xmath48 values are shown as horizontal dashes on the right axes of fig .
[ fig : true_rec ] .
overall , we find that using @xmath9 to calculate @xmath67 is effective at recovering @xmath68 for the 31st and median percentiles ; for higher percentiles the recovery is accurate only at higher @xmath45 , but the large ` scatter ' indicates that this is random , rather than systematic error . in papers i and ii
it was shown from simulations that there exists a tight correlation between @xmath9 and the absorbing gas density and temperature , which could be used to predict an ionization correction ( i.e. , the ratios of /o and /h ) as a function of density ; for details see 6 in paper i and 5.1 in paper ii .
as noted in papers ii and iii , this works well for and less well for , due to their mild and strong ionization correction dependence on @xmath9 , respectively . in the upper panel of figure [ fig : ionpred ]
we provide a contour plot of the logarithm of the predicted fraction of ions versus temperature and density .
the middle and lower panels show @xmath69 for [ o / c]=0 , and @xmath70 for [ o / h]=0 , respectively .
for photoionized gas ( @xmath71 ) the fraction is highest for @xmath72 , and only weakly dependent on the temperature .
however , for higher densities ( and @xmath73k ) , the fraction falls quickly , resulting in a very large ionization correction for saturated pixels . at the same time , the fraction at high density increases with @xmath74 for @xmath75k , so that collisionally ionized gas might be detected relatively easily .
therefore at high @xmath9 , collisionally ionized gas can easily swamp photoionized .
this can be seen most clearly in the bottom panel , which shows that for fixed [ o / h ] and density , @xmath8 increases quickly at @xmath75k , particularly if the density is high . because our @xmath76 relation is dominated by photoionized gas ( with @xmath77 ) , the effects of collisionally ionized gas are potentially important and are discussed at length in [ sec - collisional ] below .
the strategy employed here is to employ our fiducial ionization corrections as in papers ii and iii , but to recognize that at high - density , the results may be significantly affected by collisionally ionized gas .
it is important to note that the importance of collisionally ionized gas may be underestimated by our simulation , because we did not include a mechanism for generating galactic winds , which could shock - heat the gas surrounding galaxies .
our simulation does , however , include heating by gravitational accretion shocks . once the ionization correction has been determined , and corrected optical depths and recovered optical depths @xmath9 have been obtained , the oxygen abundance can be calculated : @xmath78 = \log \left ( { \tau_{\rm ovi } \over \tau_{\rm hi } } { ( f\lambda)_{\rm hi } \over ( f\lambda)_{\rm ovi } } { n_{\rm o } \over n_{ovi}}{n_{\rm hi } \over n_{h}}\right ) - ( { \rm o / h})_\odot , \label{eq : metallicity}\ ] ] where @xmath79 and @xmath80 are the oscillator strength and rest wavelength of transition @xmath56 , respectively ( @xmath81 , @xmath82 , @xmath83 , @xmath84 ) , and we use the solar abundance @xmath25 ( number density relative to hydrogen ; anders & grevesse 1989 ) .
an example of the results from this analysis applied to the observed spectrum of q1422 + 230 is shown in figure [ fig:1422ioncorr ] . in figure
[ fig : trueinvsumm_o6 ] we show a test in which we have generated simulated spectra using the `` qg '' ionizing background , recovered optical depths , and applied the just - described ionization correction to recover the oxygen abundance .
the true metallicity is given by the carbon distribution of paper ii ( for the qg background ) , with a fixed [ o / c]=@xmath85 ( i.e. , [ o / h]=-3.15 + 0.65@xmath13 ) , and is shown on the plot as a dashed line . for @xmath86 ,
the abundance recovery is promising : it overestimates by less than 0.3 dex , and the dependence of @xmath13 is reproduced
. however , the overestimation appears to increase for @xmath87 , reaching approximately 1 dex for the highest overdensity bin .
the difference in the high- versus low-@xmath13 gas can probably be attributed to the collisionally ionized gas residing in and around dense regions , due to gravitational accretion shocks .
we should thus keep in mind that we expect to overestimate the oxygen abundance associated with strong absorbers .
our basic result will be an estimate of [ o / c ] for the low - density igm as a whole , computed using four different but consistent methods , which we describe in turn . to extract as much information as possible from our data we have , as in papers ii and iii , combined the data points obtained from our entire sample .
figure [ fig : o_c.fwd.zbin ] shows @xmath88 versus @xmath89 , in bins of @xmath24 . to generate these points , we begin with @xmath45 values binned in @xmath47 for each qso , as in fig . [
fig : oviscat ] for q1422 + 230 .
we then subtract from each the `` flat level '' @xmath48 for that qso to adjust for noise , contamination , etc .
( see [ sec - overview ] ) , then divide by the central value of the @xmath47 bin .
these points , gathered from all qsos , are rebinned by determining , for each @xmath47 bin in fig .
[ fig : o_c.fwd.zbin ] , the best constant - level @xmath90-fit to all of the points in the specified redshift bin .
the errors represent 1- and 2-@xmath44 confidence intervals ( @xmath91 and @xmath92 ) on this fit .
the plotted lines indicate corresponding optical depths from synthetic spectra drawn from the simulation , using several uvb models , the corresponding [ c / h ] distributions as determined in paper ii , and a constant [ o / c ] value determined as follows . for each background ,
we generate simulated @xmath93 points in the same way as we did for the observations , but averaging over 50 simulated realizations as described in [ sec - overview ] .
we then calculate a @xmath90 between all valid observed original ( not rebinned ) points and the corresponding simulated points . because we use 50 simulated realizations , the simulation errors are almost always negligible compared to the observed errors , but they are still taken into account by calculating the total @xmath90 using the formula : @xmath94^{-1 } , \label{eq : chi2}\ ] ] where @xmath95 and @xmath44 is the error in this quantity .
we then add a constant offset to the simulated points ( which corresponds to scaling [ o / c ] ) such that @xmath90 is minimized . in each panel
the lines connect the scaled , rebinned simulation points .
the first evident result is that @xmath96 and appears to be at most weakly dependent on @xmath97 , from @xmath98 to 0 .
this is unlike @xmath46 , which increases by @xmath992 dex in this @xmath47 regime ( paper ii ) . at the lowest densities the data exhibits a decline . comparing these panels suggest there is little dependence on redshift in this interval
this can be seen more clearly in figure [ fig : o_c.fwd.dbin ] , which show @xmath100 versus @xmath24 in bins of @xmath47 : there is no evidence , in either the simulated or observed points , for evolution in @xmath93 for [email protected] .
the observed trends in @xmath102 are reproduced well by the simulations .
therefore , because @xmath93 scales with [ o / c ] , the offset in @xmath93 obtained by minimizing the @xmath90 ( eq . [ eq : chi2 ] ) against the observations can be used to reliably compute the best fit [ o / c ] . as an example , for our fiducial uvb model qg , the simulated spectra were generated with [ o / c]=0.65 and best fit by an offset of @xmath103dex ( implying a best - fit [ o / c]=0.66 ) , with @xmath104=42.7/82 . as we found in paper ii and for q1422 + 230 above
, the reduced @xmath90 is somewhat low .
this is due to a slight overestimate of the errors at low-@xmath47 ( paper ii ) and to the fact that the data points are not completely independent ( because single absorbers contribute to multiple data points ) .
the fitted [ o / c ] values and corresponding @xmath105 , are listed in table [ tbl : allfits ] , with errors computed by bootstrap - resampling the quasars used in the @xmath90 minimization . for our fiducial model , qg , the best fit [ o / c]@xmath106 .
the quasar - only background q ( which is probably too hard ; see paper ii ) gives a much lower value of [ o / c]@xmath107 .
the softer qgs backgrounds gives implausibly high values of [ o / c]@xmath108 .
coupling this with results from paper ii suggesting that the qgs background is unrealistically soft , strongly disfavors this uvb model .
lcccccccccc qg & @xmath109 & 42.7/82 & @xmath110 & @xmath111 & 65.7/115 & @xmath112 & -3.47@xmath113 & 0.08@xmath114 & 0.65@xmath115 & 114.1/184 + q & @xmath116 & 59.9/82 & @xmath117 & @xmath118 & 65.6/115 & @xmath119 & -2.91@xmath120 & -0.06@xmath121 & 0.17@xmath122 & 113.8/184 + qgs & @xmath123 & 26.7/82 & @xmath124 & @xmath125 & 73.8/115 & @xmath126 & -4.14@xmath127 & 0.54@xmath128 & 1.31@xmath120 & 114.2/184 + we may also subdivide our sample by redshift to test the dependence of [ o / c ] on these .
first , computing [ o / c ] using only spectra that have a median absorption redshift @xmath129 ( see table [ tbl : sample ] ) yields [ o / c]=@xmath130 , versus [ o / c]=@xmath131 using the spectra with @xmath132 ; these are consistent to about 1@xmath44 . using the q and qgs uvbs ,
the [ o / c ] values inferred from the redshift subsamples are marginally consistent with each other and with the full sample .
while the @xmath93 ratios give the most direct constraints on [ o / c ] , it is also useful to examine @xmath8 , since comparing the simulated to the observed @xmath8 ratios gives an additional ( but related ) estimate of [ o / c ] ( recall that our simulation reproduces the observed @xmath133 ) .. figure [ o_h.fwd.zbin ] shows @xmath70 versus @xmath9 for our combined sample , in bins of redshift .
lines again connect the simulation points ( with an overall scaling to best match the observations ) , which reproduce the observed trends in @xmath24 and @xmath9 .
the scalings correspond to best - fit [ o / c ] of 0.69 @xmath4 0.06 , 0.19 @xmath4 0.06 , and 2.25 @xmath4 0.06 , for qg , q , and qgs , respectively .
for qg and qgs , the inferred [ o / c ] are consistent with the results found using @xmath93 ; for our hardest uvb model , q , the [ o / c ] values are more discrepant , but still within 1.5@xmath44 . however , while the simulations reproduce the overall trends present in the data , there are some possible discrepancies .
although the @xmath134 points are upper limits , the simulations also appear to fall marginally above the data in this regime . at @xmath135 , on the other hand , the simulations slightly but significantly underpredict @xmath45 .
this can be seen more clearly in figure [ o_h.fwd.dbin ] , where @xmath70 versus @xmath24 in bins of @xmath9 is shown , exhibiting a clear discrepancy for points at high-@xmath24 and high @xmath9 .
indeed , if we consider subsamples above and below @xmath136 , we find that for @xmath1371 we obtain [ o / c ] values consistent those obtained from @xmath93 ( 0.62 @xmath4 0.07 , 0.13 @xmath4 0.07 and 2.18 @xmath4 0.07 for qg , q , and qgs respectively ) , but for @xmath138 we obtain [ o / c ] of @xmath139 , @xmath140 , and @xmath141 for qg , q , and qgs respectively .
this discrepancy in [ o / c ] for between low- and high-@xmath9 subsamples is significant at @xmath142 for the qg and qgs models , and at @xmath143 for the q model . given the tight ( but @xmath24-dependent ) relation between @xmath9 and gas density ( see paper ii , fig .
2 , and the upper axis in the top two panels of fig .
[ o_h.fwd.zbin ] ) , it is useful also to divide our sample into high- and low - density subsamples . we have done this by recomputing [ o / c ] from @xmath8 using only bins with @xmath9 corresponding to @xmath144 or @xmath145 . for @xmath14610 ,
we obtain [ o / c ] of 0.56 @xmath4 0.08 , 0.06 @xmath4 0.08 , and 2.11 @xmath4 0.09 ( all consistent at 1@xmath44 with the full sample ) , whereas for for @xmath147 we obtain [ o / c ] of 1.02 @xmath4 0.09 , 0.51 @xmath4 0.09 , and 2.60 @xmath4 0.09 for qg , q , and qgs , respectively ( all discrepant at @xmath148 ) .
this high-@xmath13 and ( less significantly ) high-@xmath9 difference might have several causes .
first , it might correspond to a genuine change in [ o / c ] with gas density . in this case , however , such an effect would also be expected in the trends of @xmath93 vs.@xmath47 and no such effect is evident .
thus , we consider it more likely that there exists a significant portion of hot gas not present in the simulations that contains , but lacks and . as suggested in
[ ioncorr ] and fig .
[ fig : ionpred ] , and further discussed below in [ sec - collisional ] , this might indicate the presence of a significant amount of collisionally ionized ( @xmath149k ) gas in the igm .
a third check on our measured [ o / c ] is provided by the @xmath150 ratio .
[ o_s.fwd.zbin ] shows @xmath150 versus @xmath46 for our full sample , for two cuts in @xmath24 . for each uvb
the constant si / c ratio derived in paper iii and the c distribution measured in paper ii are imposed on the simulations and the [ o / c ] ratio is varied to minimize the @xmath90 difference between the observed and simulated data points .
though the detection of @xmath150 is weak , the simulations appear to adequately represent the observations in the redshift range where @xmath46 is best detected , @xmath151 . from these fits
we infer , for this redshift interval , [ o / c ] of @xmath152 , @xmath153 , and @xmath154 for uvb models qg , q , and qgs , respectively ; all are consistent with the results obtained from @xmath93 , though all are somewhat higher . because probes higher density gas than ( see paper iii ) , this again suggests that the simulations underpredict the amount of in and near dense gas . as a final method
, we can apply the `` inversion method '' developed in paper ii , to convert @xmath8 vs. @xmath9 into [ o / h ] vs. @xmath13 by applying a density - dependent ionization correction . then , using the measured distribution of carbon from paper ii , an independent measurement of [ o / c ] can be obtained . in figure [ o_h.inv.zbin ]
we show the derived [ o / h ] versus @xmath13 for our preferred uvb model qg , with data from all @xmath24 combined .
the data points from the individual quasar spectra ( an example is shown in fig .
[ fig:1422ioncorr ] ) have been binned in density bins of 0.25 dex .
the solid line shows the least - squares fit to the data points with @xmath144 and the dotted curves indicate the 1 @xmath44 confidence limits , with the resulting fit given in the upper left corner .
the errors on the fits were determined by bootstrap resampling the qsos .
the dashed line is the value of [ o / h ] given by the derived [ o / c]=@xmath155 result using @xmath93 , and assuming a [ c / h ] distribution from paper ii . for @xmath156 , the [ o / h ] derived from the ionization correction agrees very well with that determined from both @xmath93 , and @xmath8 .
this strengthens the result from [ sec - resrel - oc ] and [ sec - ovihi ] that [ o / c ] is indeed constant for -0.5@xmath157 1 .
however , for @xmath158 the ionization correction results in substantially more [ o / h ] than that predicted using the previously - determined [ c / h ] distribution and a fixed [ o / c ] ratio .
this is similar to the breakdown between the simulations and observed @xmath8 seen in fig .
[ o_h.fwd.zbin ] , and the erroneously high [ o / h ] recovered for high-@xmath13 ( see fig . [
fig : trueinvsumm_o6 ] ) when applying the ionization correction to the simulated spectra .
once again , this suggests the presence of collisionally ionized .
the primary source of systematic uncertainty in , e.g. [ o / c ] or [ o / h ] , is the complex modeling that must be performed to extract these values from the pixel correlations .
the greatest combination of importance and uncertainty is clearly the uncertainty in the shape of the uvb ; but this is discussed at length below in sec .
[ sec - nuc ] so we here focus on other aspects of the modeling .
the good agreement between the four methods we have employed indicates that the method is sound ; but it is also clear that there are real differences between the universe and our simulation .
in particular , it is clear that the real universe has an extra component of at high density , almost certainly due to collisionally ionized gas that is not captured by those simulations .
nonetheless , if we exclude those high-@xmath9 regions , the small discrepancies between [ o / c ] as measured using the different methods indicate that such effects probably do not contribute more than @xmath159 dex uncertainty to our basic results .
another source of error that may be inaccurately assessed by our bootstrap resampling technique is that from continuum fitting .
as shown in table [ tbl : sample ] , our estimated rms error in the absorption region is @xmath160% . to test the effect of this error on our results
, we have imposed an additional error on each observed spectrum on scales of 20 , 80 , and 320 , for a total added rms error of 2% , then recomputed our results .
we find that our best fit [ o / c ] from @xmath45 versus @xmath47 , and from @xmath45 versus @xmath9 , are both within @xmath161 dex .
further , both the individual binned points and linear fits of the [ o / h ] values computed from the full sample ( fig .
[ o_h.inv.zbin ] ) are all affected by this continuum error to a lesser degree than the quoted random errors .
thus , we conclude that the continuum fitting error is not a significant systematic affecting our results .
a final possible source of systematic error is that the and recombination rates used in the version of cloudy we have employed are too high by @xmath162% compared with recent experimental values , for the temperatures relevant to low - density photoionized gas .
( savin , _ private communication _ ) . for the range of densities @xmath163
we cover , this would imply a ( density - dependent ) correction of @xmath164dex .
this might change our overall fits by an amount comparable to the statistical errors , but is still much smaller than uncertainties stemming from the uvb shape , and can not account for the 0.5dex of excess in @xmath45 at high @xmath165 shown in fig .
[ o_h.inv.zbin ] . combining these possible sources , we estimate probable systematic errors of @xmath166dex in our basic [ o / c ] and [ o / h ] values ; this uncertainty may be somewhat greater in subsets of the data , particularly at high - density .
it is important to emphasize that each quoted result is sensitive to , and applies to , only a certain range of gas densities . at the upper end , our results nominally concern gas of up to @xmath167 , though ( as noted at length above ) the high-@xmath9 range of our data is likely to be affected by collisional ionization .
that range is , however , not dominant : we have checked that if all pixels with @xmath168 are excluded from the analysis , the results given for [ o / c ] in columns 2 and 4 of table [ tbl : allfits ] change only within the quoted errors .
the lower end of the gas density range probed is most straightforward in results from @xmath8 ( figs .
[ o_h.fwd.zbin ] and [ o_h.inv.zbin ] , which formally show ovi detections at 1@xmath44 using all qsos at z=@xmath169 for @xmath170 , or @xmath171 and confident detections at @xmath172 . in paper iii ,
the si abundance results were sensitive to @xmath173 @xmath174 , and in paper ii , c abundances were measured in much lower density gas .
thus our results provide indirect constraints on [ o / c ] and [ o / si ] down to @xmath175 . however , there are important caveats .
first , the quoted results pertain to the the full density range probed and thus are not necessarily very sensitive to the lowest densities .
second , because the pixel method only works if the element on the x - axis is more easily detectable than the element on the y - axis , direct measurements of [ o / c ] and [ o / si ] from @xmath93 and @xmath150 are dominated by much higher - density that gives @xmath176 ; thus while these results are consistent with our indirect constraints , they do not address the ( somewhat implausible ) possibility that at low densities o , si , and c come from completely different gas phases . on the other hand , at _ high _ densities it is quite possible that ovi and siiv emission are dominated by different phases , so the indirectly inferred [ si / o ] values are probably both reliable and well - measured only in the moderate density range @xmath177 .
although mass or volume filling - factors corresponding to these results are not well constrained ( see , e.g. , schaye & aguirre 2005 ) , the forewarned reader can convert the density range @xmath5 correspond to into a volume using paper ii .
the best fitting metallicities and corresponding @xmath90/d.o.f . from papers ii , iii and this work are shown in table [ tbl : allfits ] for each uvb model .
two interesting results stand out .
first , for all uvb models carbon is underabundant relative to both silicon and oxygen ( being only marginally consistent with solar for uvb model q ) .
second , all abundance ratios are sensitive to the uvb shape . a harder uvb results in a lower inferred [ o / c ] but a higher inferred [ si / c ] , making the [ si / o ] ratio particularly sensitive to the spectral hardness of the uvb .
the extreme sensitivity of the inferred [ si / o ] ratio to the spectral shape of the uv background makes it possible to constrain feasible uvb models by making only weak assumptions about the [ si / o ] ratio .
since si and o are both @xmath11 elements , they are expected to trace each other relatively well .
for example , using the nucleosynthetic yields of and and a @xcite initial mass function from @xmath178 , the [ si / o ] ratio of the ejecta of a population of age @xmath179 yr is predicted to be about 0.12 and -0.03 for stars of solar and 1 percent solar metallicity , respectively .
this agrees well with observations of metal - poor stars , which find [ si / o]@xmath3 @xcite .
tallying the results of this work with those of papers ii and iii yields [ si / o]@xmath180 , @xmath181 , and @xmath182 for uvb models qg , q , and qgs , respectively .
thus , our preferred model , qg , is nicely consistent with the expectations , but models q and qg lead to inferred [ si / o ] ratios that are highly inconsistent with both nucleosynthetic yields and observations of metal - poor stars .
( assuming [ si / c ] @xmath183 and [ si / o ] @xmath184 in the q background , for example , raises the @xmath90 of the fits in figures [ fig : o_c.fwd.zbin ] and [ o_h.fwd.zbin ] by 65 and 92 , respectively ; requiring this for qgs likewise raises the @xmath90 by 138 and 81 . )
we conclude that the uvb has a spectral shape similar to that of model qg
. while our result using the qg uvb are broadly consistent with the abundance ratios in metal - poor stars and in yield calculations , the [ o / c ] and [ si / c ] may be somewhat high , by @xmath185dex .
this is comparable to our systematic errors , but nevertheless interesting if taken seriously .
for example , the models of @xcite that include the contributions of hypernovae ( defined as supernovae with kinetic energy @xmath186 that of normal core - collapse sne ) produce [ o / c ] @xmath99 0.6 , and [ si / c ] @xmath99 0.65 , in agreement with our results .
in paper ii we combined the median [ c / h]@xmath187 with the width @xmath188)(\delta , z)$ ] of the lognormal probability distribution of [ c / h ] for @xmath189 to determine the mean c abundance versus @xmath13 .
this was then integrated over the mass - weighted probability distribution @xmath13 ( obtained from our hydrodynamical simulation ) to compute the contribution by gas in this density range to the overall mean cosmic [ c / h ] . assuming that [ o / c ] is _ constant _ over this density range over which we have reliably _ measured _ oxygen abundances .
] we obtain , for our fiducial uvb model qg , [ o / h]@xmath190 , corresponding to @xmath191 + 2.1}\left ( { \omega_b \over 0.045}\right ) .\ ] ] extrapolating our [ c / h ] and [ o / c ] results even further to the full density range of the simulation would yield values @xmath192dex higher but with more uncertainty , as we have argued that our results are unreliable at the highest densities . note that these results are relatively insensitive to the uvb ( unlike those for @xmath193 in paper iii ) because for a harder uvb , the inferred [ c / h ] increases , while [ o / c ] decreases . for our quasar - only model q , these effects almost entirely cancel , yielding [ o / h]@xmath194 , and an @xmath195 value 30@xmath41 lower than for model qg . note also that these estimates include the oxygen that resides in gas that is observable in and , but they do not include oxygen in intergalactic gas that is very hot ( @xmath196 k ) or very cold ( @xmath197 k ) and shielded from ionizing radiation .
if , following @xcite , we take @xmath198 , we then infer an intergalactic metal reservoir of @xmath199 this can be compared to their estimate of the total @xmath200 metal budget " of @xmath201 , indicating that @xmath202 of metals produced prior to @xmath203 reside in the component of the igm that is studied here .
previous studies have explored oxygen abundances in the igm using both line - fitting ( e.g. , * ? ? ? * ; * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
* ) and pixel optical depths .
previous pixel studies did not attempt to convert their detections into oxygen abundances ; but we can compare to their recovered optical depths .
both @xcite and claim detection of down to @xmath204 .
using our combined data set binned in density ( see fig . [ o_h.inv.zbin ] ) , we obtain 1-@xmath44 detections down to about the mean density ( @xmath205 at @xmath206 ) .
while is in principle an excellent tracer of metal in very low - density gas , in practice we find that for the higher redshifts where low densities are more easily probed , contamination is severe .
thus we are not in practice able to constrain metals in underdense gas as claimed in previous studies , in spite of a large sample and improved techniques of removing contaminants . on the high-@xmath9 side , both and @xcite exclude pixels saturated in , so can not probe @xmath207 .
( this accounts , for example , for our detection of in q1422 + 230 , while @xcite had no detection in the same qso ) .
the study of @xcite did probe high @xmath9 , where their results are broadly consistent with ours .
the studies of @xcite , @xcite , @xcite , and @xcite did perform ionization corrections and we can compare our abundance determinations ( relatively directly ) to theirs .
@xcite assumed to abundance of oxygen relative to carbon to be solar and inferred metallicities for various uvb models and a number of absorbers in @xmath208 systems at @xmath19 .
they found that for relatively hard uv backgrounds , comparable to our model q , the ionization models yielded densities in agreement with theoretical predictions for self - gravitating clouds with the observed column densities ( @xmath209 ; @xcite ) and metallicities of @xmath210 solar , in excellent agreement with our measurement of [ o / c]@xmath211[c / h]@xmath212 for model q at @xmath213 and @xmath214 .
we note that if @xcite would have allowed oxygen to be overabundant relative to carbon , they would have found that softer uvb models are required to obtain density estimates that agree with theoretical expectations for gravitationally confined clouds .
@xcite employed the faint object spectrograph on _ hst _ to search for in qso spectra from redshift 1.6@xmath215 2.9 .
the / ratio found by the survey favored a uvb background similar to our q , which they use to derive a metallicity of @xmath216[o / h ] @xmath217 . while somewhat higher than our value , much of the difference may be attributable to their use of the 78th percentile in the / ratio . assuming that [ o / h ] has a scatter at fixed density similar to that in [ c / h ] ( see @xcite ) , this would correspond to a _
median _ of @xmath218dex less , or @xmath219[o / h ] @xmath220 , in fairly good agreement with our numbers .
@xcite divide their sample into metal - poor absorbers " with @xmath221@xmath222@xmath223 , which they take to be predominantly photoionized , and metal - rich absorbers " with @xmath221@xmath222@xmath224 , for which they assume a hotter phase . for the metal - poor systems they use a hard " uvb and assume [ o / c]@xmath225 to derive a range of @xmath226 [ o / h ] @xmath227 , and for the metal - rich phase they infer a median [ o / h ] @xmath228 to @xmath229 , depending upon the assumptions regarding the ionization balance . combining their samples they estimate cosmic density @xmath230 , corresponding to @xmath231 [ o / h ] @xmath232 if divided by the cosmic gas density @xmath233 . while precise comparison is difficult , these numbers are consistent with our corresponding estimates of [ o / h]@xmath194 , or @xmath234 using the q uvb .
@xcite _ assume _ [ o / c]=0.5 and 0.0 for uvb backgrounds comparable to our qg and q , for @xmath235 , so ( as for the above studies ) comparing derived [ o / c ] values is less useful than several other points of comparison .
first , in both backgrounds , their dependence of [ o / h ] upon @xmath13 is similar to that found for [ c / h ] vs. @xmath13 in paper ii , consistent with a constant [ o / c ] value .
second , @xcite find that there is a clear jump in in the median [ o / h ] at @xmath23610 , while a corresponding jump is not seen in [ c / h ] , similar to our results in [ sec - ioncorr ] .
they also interpret this as possibly indicating that stronger absorbers are physically more complex or multiphased .
third , @xcite compute an overall contribution @xmath237 , using their hard " background ; this would correspond to a cosmic average contribution of [ o / h ] = @xmath238 ; these numbers are @xmath239dex lower than our values , but this should be regarded as good agreement given the number of assumptions made in each computation . finally , the studies of @xcite@xcite are similar to ours in employing simulated spectra to attempt to match observed absorption and thus constrain [ o / c ] and [ o / h ] .
@xcite generated simulated spectra from a constant - metallicity simulation and compared ionic ratios to extant data , inferring [ c / h ] @xmath240 and evidence for overabundance of si and o relative to carbon .
@xcite used q1422 + 230 and a quasar - only haardt & madau uvb model like ` q ' .
the found that their data is consistent with [ o / c ] @xmath3 and [ c / h]@xmath241 ; these are quite consistent with our results using the q uvb . as an alternative interpretation
, they note that a softer uvb would give high [ o / c ] ( more characteristic of type ii supernova yields ) , but also lower [ c / h ] , again consistent with our findings ; however they interpret this softness as due to patchy reionization , whereas we favor its explanation by the contribution of galaxies to the uvb .
as discussed above , the difference between the inferred [ o / h ] for @xmath242 and @xmath243 is probably due to collisionally ionized gas , for reasons sketched in [ ioncorr ] .
[ fig : ionpred ] shows that for @xmath244k , collisional ionization dominates and the optical depth ratios become independent of the density . for @xmath245
k , on the other hand , the / and the / ratios both drop rapidly with increasing density . consequently
, these ratios can be many orders of magnitude higher in hot , dense gas than in warm , dense gas .
the lower the density , the smaller the differences become . in fact , at high densities the fraction in warm gas is too small for to be observable . therefore , any at the redshift of very strong absorption is likely to arise in a different phase than the associated and possibly even the associated .
the phase must either have a much lower density or a much higher temperature . because the fraction of hot gas in our simulation is small at all densities
, we effectively assume the gas to be photo - ionized when we compare with synthetic spectra and when we correct for ionization ( as in fig . [ o_h.inv.zbin ] ) .
in the latter case , we also implicitly assume that and absorption arise in the same gas phase .
hence , our results from [ sec - ioncorr ] suggest the existence of a detectable amount of enriched hot ( @xmath246k ) gas associated with strong absorption .
a possible physical explanation is that such systems coincide with outer regions of high @xmath24 galactic halos , where the effects of galactic winds may dominate the heating process .
if the temperature exceeds 10@xmath247k in these regions , then this gas would contain significant , while lacking and .
the latter two would then arise in a cooler gas phase , which has to be fairly dense in order to account for the strong absorption .
the high density of the cooler phase implies that it would not produce significant photo - ionized .
these results and inferences are consistent with other observational studies of . @xcite and @xcite both
find that the majority of the detected absorption systems had temperatures determined from the line widths too low for collisional ionization , but can not rule out higher temperatures for some absorbers .
indeed , the study of @xcite find their detected high - column density lines associated with strong absorbers are broad enough to be consistent with collisional ionization .
as noted above , @xcite find a jump in [ o / h ] at @xmath23610 interpretable as a transition to a regime in which collisionally ionized gas affects the abundance inferences . while collisionally ionized gas complicates oxygen abundance inferences , the flip - side is that then provides an important probe of hot , enriched ig gas that is difficult to detect in ( e.g. , paper ii ) .
indeed , hydrodynamical simulations by @xcite and @xcite predict that a significant portion of is collisionally ionized .
hence , it would thus be very interesting to compare such simulations , employing as a metallicity tracer , with the observations analyzed here .
we have studied the relative abundance of oxygen in the igm by analyzing , , , and pixel optical depths derived from a set of high - quality vlt and keck spectra of 17 qsos at @xmath248 , and we have compared them to realistic , synthetic spectra drawn from a hydrodynamical simulation to which metals have been added .
our fiducial model employs the ionizing background model ( `` qg '' ) taken from haardt & madau ( 2001 ) for quasars and galaxies ( rescaled to reproduce the observed mean ly@xmath11 absorption ) .
the simulation assumes a silicon abundance as calculated in paper iii , [ si / c]@xmath249 , and a carbon abundance as derived in paper ii : at a given overdensity @xmath13 and redshift @xmath24 , [ c / h ] has a lognormal probability distribution centered on @xmath250 and of width 0.70 dex .
the main conclusions from this analysis are as follows : * for [email protected] , @xmath251 , and @xmath25210 ( when smoothed on the scale of the absorption , @xmath253 kpc ) , the fiducial simulation utilized in papers i , ii , and iii consistently agrees with the observed @xmath1 , @xmath6 , and ( to a lesser degree ) @xmath7 . fitting @xmath1 yields a constant [ o / c ] = 0.66 @xmath4 0.06 , with estimated systematic errors within @xmath254 dex . converting the observed @xmath6 into
[ o / c]@xmath255 using the ionization correction method of paper ii further supports these results . *
the relative abundances [ o / c ] and ( especially ) [ o / si ] are sensitive to the uvb shape .
we find that our fiducial ( haardt & madau 2001 , quasars and galaxies ) spectrum gives reasonable results for both , but that significantly softer or harder uvbs , such as the haardt & madau 2001 quasar - only uvb , give results that are highly inconsistent with both theoretical yields and observed abundance ratios in other low - metallicity environments , and should not be considered tenable . * our results ,
both from applying the ionization correction and from comparing the simulations to the observations , suggest no evolution in [ o / h ] over the redshift range [email protected] , but a strong dependence on @xmath13 . both results are consistent with those found in paper ii for [ c / h ] . * for @xmath257 and @xmath13 @xmath258 10 the value of [ o / c ] ( derived by comparison to the simulations )
is inconsistent with that found at lower densities , and @xmath218dex higher than that predicted using the carbon distribution of paper ii and a density - independent [ o / c ] value .
this might in principle suggest a density - dependent [ o / c ] ratio , but we favor the interpretation that a fraction of the high-@xmath13 absorbing gas is collisionally ionized , and that this leads to an erroneously large ionization correction in this regime .
this interpretation is supported by our simulated spectra as well as by the observation that lines associated with strong absorbers tend to be broader than those associated with weak systems @xcite .
we are grateful to wallace sargent , michael rauch and tae - sun kim for providing the keck / hires and vlt / uves data used here and in papers i - iii .
we are also extremely grateful to daniel savin for his assistance in understanding and assessing the systematic uncertainties in recombination rates .
thanks also to rob wiersma for computing the expected si / o ratio from nucleosynthetic yields taken from the literature .
we thank the anonymous referee for providing comprehensive and helpful feedback that improved the manuscript .
aa and cdh gratefully acknowledge support from nsf grant ast-0507117 and js from marie curie excellence grant mext - ct-2004 - 014112 . | arxiv |
PSMA5945B Philips Voltage regulator diode. Nominal zener voltage 68 V. Test current 5.5 mA.
UBA1706TS Philips Cordless telephone line interface.
PMLL5235B Philips "6.8 V, voltage regulator diode"
P89C51RB2BB Philips "4.5-5.5 V, 8-bit flash microcontroller family, 16KB/32KB/64KB ISP/IAP flash with 512B/512B/1KB RAM"
UBA2051T Philips "One-chip telephone IC with speech, dialler and ringer functions."
1N5257B Philips "33 V, voltage regulator diode"
PBYL1625 Philips Rectifier diode. Schottky barrier.
PCD3310T Philips Pulse and DTMF diallers with redial.
UAA2073M Philips Image rejecting front-end for GSM applications.
TDA4665T Philips "6 V, Baseband delay line" | slim_pajama |
What is the best way to make a substantial amount of soot in a high school laboratory?
I need to make about 50 grams of soot (carbon black particles) in a high school laboratory. What would be the best way to do this?
The purpose of needing 50 grams of soot is because I would like to carry out an experiment that investigates how the percentage soot in oil (e.g. diesel) affects the viscosity of the mixture. To measure the viscosity, I would have to put 500 ml of oil in a measuring cylinder and do the ball-bearing method. The highest percentage I would like to test is 10% soot and that calls for around 50 g of it.
There is an extensive literature on producing carbon black see for instance *[Donnet, Jean-Baptiste, ed. Carbon black: science and technology. CRC Press, 1993.](https://books.google.it/books?id=HUxaDwAAQBAJ&dq=Carbon+Black:+Science+and+Technology,+Second+Edition+edited+by+Jean-Baptiste+Donnet&source=gbs_navlinks_s)*
Instead of adapting the Roman recipe for producing lamp black explained on page 19, I would use olive oil rather than resin or turpentine (that is quite a nasty substance). For doing it on a small scale maximizing the yield maybe I would try (**under the fume hood**) to heat the oil in a flask attached to a water-cooled [Liebing condenser](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebig_condenser) after reaching the [smoke point](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoke_point) the soot should start to accumulate on the walls of the condenser. It should be quite easy to recollect the carbon black from the wall of the condenser with nylon bristle and maybe from a little funnel with a slight offset fixed on the exit of the condenser. All this should be carried out using heat-resisting glassware in a lab under the supervision of an adult.
P.S.
====
>
> The highest percentage I would like to test is 10% soot and that calls
> for around 50 g of it.
>
>
>
This means that you will need more than 50 g for the whole experiment so if you test 10 different proportion you will need at least 80 g performing the experiment only once. It could require a lot of oil to produce 80 grams.
It is not clear if your target is carbon black - there are commercial sources for this (e.g., [here](https://www.sigmaaldrich.com/catalog/substance/carbonmesoporous1201133386411?lang=en®ion=US)) - or soot. Ideally, *composition wise* speaking carbon black would be just carbon, while soot *possibly* is a blend of compounds, depending on what was partially burned, under which conditions (e.g., oxygen / carbon ratio, temperature, residence time in the reactor) assuming a continous flow reactor. But what about the reproducible distribution of shape and size of the particles?
Both automotive industry as well as raffineries know that viscosities of the oils depend e.g., on temperature, pressure and rotational speed (shear forces) of moving parts in an engine, as well as the composition of the oil / lubrificants used. Thus they use *standarized* test engines and test protocols to probe the endurance of these liquids ([example](https://www.machinerylubrication.com/Read/874/sludge-varnish-turbine)). To ease exchange of the know-how in this field, [CIMAC](https://www.cimac.com/cms/) is one adress to retain. Beside a brief survey about [oil degradation](https://www.cimac.com/publications/recommendations410/cimac-recommendation-no.-22.html), abstracts of their [database](https://www.cimac.com/publications/technical-database/technical-paper-database.html) are available for non-members, too. Thus maybe CIMAC's [PR office](https://www.cimac.com/contact.html) may assist in establishing a contact with a partner already performing such tests which is close to your area.
Try burning turpentine.
It produces a very soot rich flame, per my recollection.
Another path per the article: [Preparation of Carbon Nanoparticles from Candle Soot](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/244732725_Preparation_of_Carbon_Nanoparticles_from_Candle_Soot).To quote:
>
> Carbon nanoparticles (CNPs) were prepared by simply mixing candle soot into ethanolic Nafion solution under ultrasonic radiation for 90 min. Well-defined CNPs could be obtained after centrifugation and washing.
>
>
>
[EDIT] My colleague mentions other choices for a school lab, citing benzene as a non-choice. The reason, let's hear from what the [CDC says about it](https://emergency.cdc.gov/agent/benzene/basics/facts.asp), to quote:
>
> **Immediate signs and symptoms of exposure to benzene**.
>
>
> People who breathe in high levels of benzene may develop the following signs and symptoms within minutes to several hours:
>
>
> Drowsiness
>
>
> Dizziness
>
>
> Rapid or irregular heartbeat
>
>
> Headaches
>
>
> Tremors
>
>
> Confusion
>
>
> Unconsciousness
>
>
> Death (at very high levels)
>
>
>
Another option suggested is toluene, comments from [Toluene Safety Tips from MSDS experts – MSDSonline](https://www.msdsonline.com/2014/10/08/toluene-safety-tips-from-msds-experts-msdsonline/), to quote:
>
> Toluene is a highly flammable liquid and it can cause mild damage to the skin and the eyes. However, the most-common hazard associated with this chemical is inhalation. Products containing toluene can produce dangerous fumes which can cause nausea, headaches, unconsciousness, and even death if inhaled.
>
>
>
Note, my final choice, for high school labs in general, is safe ordinary candle soot with a reference citing a preparation path to nanoparticles. Now, I could make other more potentially efficient and likely problematic suggestions, but I sleep well with this conservative/responsible choice.
| stackexchange/chemistry |
Common Knowledge (2011) 17 (1): 48-63.
The question of universalism and relativism is often taken to be a matter of critical reflexivity. This article attempts to present the question instead as a matter of practical, political, and always-situated concern. The attempt starts from the consideration of modern experimental sciences. These sciences usually serve as the stronghold for universalist claims and as such are a target of relativism. It is argued that the specificity of these sciences is not a method but a concern. To be able to claim that they have not unilaterally imposed their definitions on the phenomena they study is the leading concern of experimenters and should be understood in terms of the following achievement: the creation of a very particular "rapport" that authorizes claiming that what is operationally defined "lends itself" to this correlation. Linking knowledge production with a creation of rapports entails a pluralization of sciences along with the pluralization of modes of concern associated with the rapport. However, resisting unilaterally imposed definitions is not enough, since with the coming "knowledge economy" the questions that this article raises will soon be part of a romantic past. Thus it concludes with a speculative touch, which may be a requiem, relating the creation of rapports with an ecology of practices akin to William James's always-under-construction pluriverse. | slim_pajama |
Quantum volume required to break a 2048 bit number used in RSA encryption
I am curious as to whether there is a specific amount of quantum volume that will allow a quantum computer to break a 2048 bit number used in RSA encryption, and if so, what that number is. (within a realistic time frame of less than 1 hour)
Thanks
To perform integer factorization on a quantum computer sucessfully depends mainly on number of available qubits and their quality (low noise and long decoherence time). Of course, quantum volume is linked to these two parameters.
According to the article this article dissused [here](https://quantumcomputing.stackexchange.com/questions/14340/what-is-a-maximal-number-factored-by-shors-algorithm-so-far), some millions of qubits are necessary to break 2,048 bit RSA key.
| stackexchange/physics |
Harry Potter, Twilight Some memories hurt
_Harry had locked himself in his room for days. I was getting scared now. I looked out the window to watch my two granddaughters building a snowman with Emmett and Rose. I sighed. Christmas was in a week. I heard Jasper gasp, and dash up the stairs, a smirk on his face._
_"Harry, please I know you're in there," He started. I groaned. Frozen was an obsession of all the girls.
"People are asking where you've been
They say, "Have courage," and I'm trying to
I'm right out here for you
Just let me in." Of all the people to sing 'Do you wanna build a snowman?', Jasper was the least expected.
"We only have each other,
It's just you and me." Liar.
"What are we gonna do?
Do you wanna build a snowman?" There was silence for a few seconds, before I heard Harry's door unlock and open._
_"'Asper, why would you wanna build a snowman with me? I'm a killer. I am the reason my parents are dead, Remus is dead, Hermione is dead, and countless others. Why would you wanna build a snowman with a killer?"_
_"Harry, you are not a killer. You are my baby brother." He whispered, and I could tell that Jasper had took Harry into his arms._
* * *
I collapsed to the floor as the memory hit me.
* * *
_"When did you first witness a death?" Was the question Harry had asked Bella. It didn't shock me, but the tone in his voice scared me. His voice was free of emotions._
_"I was seventeen."_
_"Bella, at that age, I was wishing people would stop dying. At that age I was engaged. At that age, I was in hiding."_
_"Sorry. What about you, who did you first witness, your parents don't count, as you don't remember."_
_"Professor Quirrel." He said it in the same emotionless voice._
_"How?" Bella asked, curiously._
_"I killed him."_
_"What? How old were you?"_
_"Eleven."_
_"Eleven? Eleven?" She asked, not believing him._
_"I have been watching people die since you were on the playground."_
* * *
The sobs shook my body, as the memories of my favourite son flashed before my eyes. I had my head in Esme's lap, and I could hear Jasper trying to talk to me, but I couldn't quite hear what he was saying.
* * *
_"Harry?" I asked as I approached him, slowly. He whimpered, before turning and curling into Jasper._
_"Please don't let him hurt me, 'Asper. I didn't mean it, I promise!" I heard the whispered plea. I stopped, and my heart shattered. My son was scared of me. I scared my son._
_"I won't let him hurt you, in any way." I heard Jasper tell Harry. Jasper glared at me, and I knew I had possibly lost my son forever._
* * *
The tears started rolling down my face as I cried for Harry. That memory would break my heart every time. It reminded me of the fact I was a monster. I was a monster that scared Harry. And Bella doesn't understand why we think we are monsters...
* * *
_"I know, but he asked, and I couldn't lie to him, because I want to keep his trust. I don't want you to be the only one he trusts." Jasper explained. I heard whimpering from Harry's room, and I heard Emmett go in._
_"It's okay, Jasper." I murmured, before standing up, and heading towards the child's room. When I reached it, he was curled in a ball, in the middle of the bed. Emmett stood in the doorway._
_"If I go any further, I'm afraid I'll push his boundaries." Emmett muttered, hurt in his tone. I nodded, before going forward, and cradling the boy in my arms._
_"Daddy?" The child whispered. My heart broke._
_"No, my child. It's Carlisle. Not Daddy." I whispered to him, my voice breaking._
_"Daddy." He whispered more firmly, clutching my shirt in his hands._
* * *
I smiled softly at the memory. I was his daddy. His daddy. I will always be his daddy. No matter what happens I will always be his daddy.
* * *
_Little eight year old Harry Potter stomped his foot, folding his arms across his chest, and glared at me._
_"Eat." Was his simple demand._
_"No." I told him._
_"Yes."_
_"I'm not eating."_
_"You must, otherwise, you will get sick."_
_"I won't become ill, Harry. I don't need to eat." I told him._
_"Yes you do, otherwise, you will look like I do, and that isn't healthy." He told me softly. _
_"Harry..." I paused, scooping him up into my arms. I sat him on my lap, "Harry, I don't need to eat food like you. I eat at night, when most people are asleep." I tried._
_"Like... uh... Ramadan?" He asked, his eyebrows knitting together._
_"Yes, but all year round."_
* * *
I sighed, and the tears starting rolling back down my face.
* * *
_"Hey James." I greeted, shrugging my coat off, and hanging it up._
_"Hey, Carly." He joked tiredly. I glared at him. He chuckled._
_"Hello, Lily. How are you?" I asked politely, ignoring James._
_"Better than expected. Harry doesn't cry through the night." She replied, smiling fondly when she spoke of Harry. She took my hand, and lead me through to the living room where Padfoot was sat on the floor, holding Harry. _
_"Hey, Sirius." I greeted him, as I sat down in the big armchair. The baby in Padfoot's arms opened his eyes, and he looked straight at me. His eyes found mine, and I gasped in shock. His eyes were a perfect copy of Lily's eyes. Sirius passed him to me, and the moment he was in my arms, I felt very protective, as if he was my own son._
* * *
"Grandpa?" A little voice got my attention. Her hand was on my cheek, her thumb softly stroking it. She shouldn't be seeing me like this.
"Grandpa, Daddy went to heaven to be with Mummy. He's happy now." She whispered, "He's okay. He's happy."
* * *
_"Daddy?" I heard Rosalie ask, as Harry went to leave her bedroom that night._
_"Yes, sweetheart?"_
_"You said Mummy went to heaven. You said it was the only way for her to get better, but you need her. She is the person that kept you alive, without her, you cannot be okay. You need to join Mummy in heaven. I know you can't come back, but I know, when I die, I will see you again. Please go to heaven."_
* * *
_AN: Please review, and I will reply to any questions, if you are not a guest._
End file.
| fanfiction |
This is a list of historic places in Northern Region, Manitoba entered on the Canadian Register of Historic Places, whether they are federal, provincial, or municipal.
List of historic places
See also
List of historic places in Manitoba
List of National Historic Sites of Canada in Manitoba
Northern Region
Northern Region
Category:Manitoba-related lists | wikipedia |
the analysis of data consisting of curves or other types of functions , rather than scalars or vectors , is increasingly common in statistics ( ramsay & silverman , 2005 ) .
many problems in this area involve modeling curves as functions of other curves .
for example , figure [ fig : sample_curves](a ) shows daily trajectories of oxides of nitrogen in the city of sacramento , california , for 52 summer days in the year 2005 , and figure fig : sample_curves(b ) shows the corresponding trajectories of ozone concentration . the goal is to predict ozone concentration from oxides of nitrogen .
functional linear regression models are normally used for this type of problems ( ramsay & silverman , 2005 , ch .
recent papers have studied different aspects of the functional linear regression model ( yao et al . , 2005 ; cai & hall , 2006 ; hall & horowitz , 2007 ; crambes et al . , 2009 ; james et al . , 2009 ) . however , a characteristic feature of functional data that has not been widely investigated in a regression context is phase variability .
functional samples often present a few distinct features , such as peaks and valleys , which vary in amplitude and location from curve to curve , as it is clear in figure [ fig : sample_curves ] .
functional linear regression is usually based on functional principal components , which are well suited for fitting amplitude variability but not for location or phase variability .
it may take an inordinate number of principal components to account even for very basic phase - variability processes ( ramsay & silverman , 2005 , ch .
a more efficient strategy is to model amplitude and phase variability separately : the former using traditional functional principal components and the latter using warping models .
this approach is more efficient , because the combined model often provides a better fit with fewer parameters than the classical principal component decomposition .
it is also more informative , because it provides direct information about the warping process , which classical principal components only do indirectly .
several warping methods have been proposed over the years ( gervini & gasser , 2004 , 2005 ; james , 2007 ; kneip et al . , 2000 ; kneip & ramsay , 2008 ; liu & mller , 2004 ; ramsay & li , 1998 ; tang & mller , 2008 , 2009 ; wang & gasser , 1999 ) .
common functional linear regression models inherit the problems of functional principal components in presence of phase variability .
although a high - dimensional model based on a large number of principal components can provide a good fit to the data , the problem again is one of efficiency and interpretability , not just minimizing prediction error .
it is usually hard to extract specific information about phase variability from a traditional functional regression model because the two sources of variability , phase and amplitude , are confounded in the model .
the curves shown in figure [ fig : sample_curves ] , for example , show peaks that vary not only in amplitude but also in location .
it is reasonable to hypothesize that a large peak in oxides of nitrogen will be followed by a large peak in ozone concentration , and also that an early peak in oxides of nitrogen will be followed by an early peak in ozone level , and vice - versa .
perhaps there may also be an interaction between timing and amplitude of the peaks
. a common functional linear regression model of sufficiently high dimension will be able to fit these data well from the point of view of prediction error , but will not provide clear answers to these questions . a regression model that explicitly incorporates a warping component and does not confound the two sources of variability
will be more useful for this , and that is what we propose in this paper .
consider a sample of functions @xmath0 ,
, @xmath1 , where @xmath2 is the covariate and @xmath3 the response , with @xmath4 and @xmath5 , and @xmath6 and @xmath7 closed intervals in @xmath8 . the functions @xmath2 and @xmath3
are usually not directly observable ; instead we observe discretizations of them , with added random noise , at time grids @xmath9 and @xmath10 .
thus the observed data consist of vectors @xmath11 , with @xmath12 and @xmath13 with elements @xmath14we will assume that the measurement errors @xmath15 and @xmath16 are independent with @xmath17 and @xmath18 . the kind of curves we have in mind for our model will present a relatively small number of peaks and valleys that systematically appear in all curves but vary in amplitude and location . then @xmath19 and @xmath20 can be thought of as compound processes @xmath21where @xmath22 and @xmath23 account for amplitude variability and @xmath24 and @xmath25 account for phase variability .
the @xmath26s and the @xmath27s are monotone increasing warping functions with @xmath28 and @xmath29 .
the aligned processes @xmath22 and @xmath23 follow principal - component decompositions @xmath30with @xmath31 and @xmath32 orthonormal functions in @xmath33 and @xmath34 , respectively , and @xmath35 and @xmath36 uncorrelated zero - mean random variables .
a few comments about ( [ eq : decomp_x])([eq : kl - model - y ] ) are in order , because models ( [ eq : decomp_x ] ) and ( [ eq : decomp_y ] ) may seem unidentifiable and models ( [ eq : kl - model - x ] ) and ( [ eq : kl - model - y ] ) may seem too restrictive for finite @xmath37 and @xmath38 .
these issues are extensively discussed in kneip & ramsay ( 2008 , sec .
2.3 ) and in the supplementary material .
proposition 1 in kneip & ramsay ( 2008 ) shows that if the @xmath39s have at most @xmath40 peaks and valleys and their derivatives @xmath41 have at most @xmath40 zeros , then @xmath42 admits the decomposition @xmath43 for some @xmath44 , where the @xmath45s are non - random basis functions , the @xmath46s are random coefficients , and the @xmath47s are warping functions . orthogonalizing the @xmath45s one obtains model ( [ eq : kl - model - x ] ) .
then @xmath37 in ( [ eq : kl - model - x ] ) and @xmath38 in ( [ eq : kl - model - y ] ) need not be large if the number of features to be aligned is small .
the identifiability of ( [ eq : decomp_x ] ) and ( [ eq : decomp_y ] ) given amplitude models ( [ eq : kl - model - x ] ) and ( [ eq : kl - model - y ] ) and given certain conditions on the warping family @xmath48 is shown in the supplementary material . if the summations in ( [ eq : kl - model - x ] ) and ( eq : kl - model - y ) were allowed to be infinite , then ( [ eq : decomp_x ] ) and ( [ eq : decomp_y ] ) would be unidentifiable .
the practical effect of large @xmath37 and @xmath38 in ( [ eq : kl - model - x ] ) and ( [ eq : kl - model - y ] ) is that the sample curves tend to present a large and unequal number of features , and then it does not make sense to try to align them ; in such cases amplitude and phase variability essentially become indistinguishable .
samples like that do occur in practice , but the methods we propose in this paper are not intended for those situations . the warping functions @xmath24 and @xmath25 will be modelled as monotone hermite splines ( fritsch & carlson , 1980 ) .
although other families are possible , such as integrated splines ( ramsay , 1988 ) , monotone splines ( ramsay & li , 1998 ) and constrained b - splines ( brumback & lindstrom , 2004 ) , monotone hermite splines are better suited for the regression approach proposed here .
details about this family of warping functions are given in appendix [ app : hermite ] .
we only mention here that , like other spline families , this is a finite - dimensional semiparametric family determined by a knot sequence chosen by the user .
thus , the family @xmath24 will be determined by a knot sequence @xmath49 of strictly increasing points in @xmath6 , and each @xmath50 will be determined by a corresponding sequence @xmath51 of basis coefficients which satisfy @xmath52 for @xmath53 . similarly , the family @xmath25 will be determined by a knot sequence @xmath54 of strictly increasing points in @xmath7 and each @xmath55 will be determined by basis coefficients @xmath56 which satisfy @xmath57 for @xmath58 .
the dual role of the @xmath51s and the @xmath56s as basis coefficients and as values of @xmath50 and @xmath59 at the knots is what makes hermite splines appealing .
it is natural then to choose the knot sequences @xmath60 and @xmath61 to roughly correspond to the average location of the main features of the @xmath62s and the @xmath63s .
like @xmath37 and @xmath38 in ( [ eq : kl - model - x ] ) and ( [ eq : kl - model - y ] ) , the dimensions @xmath64 and @xmath65 need not be large , since they will roughly correspond to the number of peaks and valleys of the @xmath39s and the @xmath63s , which will not be large for the type of applications we envision . unlike landmark registration , where the @xmath51s and the @xmath56s are individually estimated curve by curve
, we will treat the @xmath51s and the @xmath56s as latent random effects , so they will not be estimated directly .
this is a big advantage in practice , since individual estimation of the @xmath51s and the @xmath56s is difficult when the number of curves is large or when the curves are sparsely sampled .
a minor complication is that the @xmath51s and the @xmath56s are constrained to be monotone increasing in @xmath6 and @xmath66 , respectively , so for convenience we will work with their jupp transforms @xmath67 and @xmath68 instead , which are unconstrained vectors ; the jupp transform is defined in appendix app : hermite . since the warping functions @xmath69 and @xmath70 are determined by the random effects @xmath67 and @xmath71 , and the amplitude functions @xmath72 and @xmath73
are determined by the random effects @xmath74 and @xmath75 , we can specify an indirect regression model of the @xmath63s on the @xmath39s via the random effects : @xmath76 = \left [ \begin{array}{c } \mathbf{0 } \\
\mathbf{\theta } _ { y0}\end{array}\right ] + \mathbf{a}\left ( \left [ \begin{array}{c } \mathbf{u}_{i } \\
\mathbf{\theta } _ { xi}\end{array}\right ] -\left [ \begin{array}{c } \mathbf{0 } \\
\mathbf{\theta } _ { x0}\end{array}\right ] \right ) + \mathbf{e}_{i } , \label{eq : reg - model}\]]where @xmath77 is the @xmath78 regression matrix and @xmath79 is an error term , which we assume @xmath80 with @xmath81 diagonal . for interpretability we split @xmath77 into four blocks corresponding to @xmath74 , @xmath67 , @xmath75 and @xmath68 : @xmath82 , \]]with @xmath83 , @xmath84 , @xmath85 and @xmath86 . then ( [ eq : kl - model - x ] ) , ( [ eq : kl - model - y ] ) and ( [ eq : reg - model ] ) imply @xmath87where @xmath88 , @xmath89 , @xmath90 and @xmath91 .
thus , for example , @xmath92 implies that @xmath93 and then the amplitude variability of the responses is unrelated to the time variability of the covariates ; similarly , @xmath94 implies that @xmath95 and then the time variability of the responses is unrelated to the amplitude variability of the covariates .
models ( [ eq : kl - model - x ] ) and ( [ eq : kl - model - y ] ) depend on functional parameters that need to be estimated : the mean functions @xmath96 and @xmath97 and the principal components @xmath98 and @xmath99 .
we will do that via b - splines .
let @xmath100 be a b - spline basis in @xmath33 and @xmath101 a b - spline basis in @xmath34 .
let @xmath102 , @xmath103 , @xmath104 and @xmath105 , for @xmath106 , @xmath107 , @xmath108 and @xmath109 .
the orthogonality restrictions on the @xmath110s and the @xmath111s can be expressed as @xmath112 and @xmath113 , where @xmath114\in \mathbb{r}^{q_{1}\times p_{1}}$ ] , @xmath115\in \mathbb{r}^{q_{2}\times p_{2}}$ ] , @xmath116 and @xmath117 .
if the curves @xmath118 and @xmath119 were observed on dense time grids and individual smoothing were possible , the spline coefficients and the rest of the model parameters could be estimated by least squares . however , we are more interested in applications where the trajectories are not densely sampled
. then we will treat @xmath74 , @xmath75 , @xmath67 and @xmath68 as latent variables and estimate the model parameters by maximum likelihood .
we assume @xmath120 is jointly multivariate normal of dimension @xmath121 , with mean and covariance given by @xmath122 , \ \
\mathbf{\sigma } _ { w}=\left [ \begin{array}{cc } \mathbf{\lambda } & \mathbf{\sigma } _ { u\theta _ { x } } \\ \mathbf{\sigma } _ { u\theta _
{ x}}^{t } & \mathbf{\sigma } _ { \theta _ { x}}\end{array}\right ] , \]]where @xmath123 the jupp transform of the knot vector @xmath60 and @xmath124 .
this and model ( [ eq : reg - model ] ) imply that @xmath125 is multivariate normal of dimension @xmath126 with mean and covariance given by @xmath127 , \ \
\mathbf{\sigma } _ { z}=\mathbf{a\sigma } _ { w}\mathbf{a}^{t}+\mathbf{\sigma } _
{ e},\]]where @xmath128 is the jupp transform of the knot vector @xmath61 .
thus @xmath129 with @xmath130 , where @xmath131 $ ] and @xmath132 the @xmath133 upper - left diagonal block of @xmath81 . since @xmath134 has to be diagonal by model ( [ eq : kl - model - y ] ) , and @xmath81 was assumed diagonal , it follows that @xmath135 must be diagonal , which imposes an additional restriction on the parameters . to summarize , the parameters of this model are : the regression matrix @xmath77 , the residual covariance matrix @xmath81 , the covariance matrix @xmath136 of the explanatory random effects @xmath137 , the spline coefficients @xmath138 , @xmath139 , @xmath140 and @xmath141 of the functional parameters , and the variances @xmath142 and @xmath143 of the random noise in ( [ eq : raw_data_x ] ) and ( [ eq : raw_data_y ] ) .
the derivation of the likelihood function and the em algorithm to compute these estimators are discussed in appendix [ app : likelihood ] and in the supplementary material .
in addition to the model parameters there are meta - parameters that need to be chosen by the user , such as the dimension and knot placement of the b - spline bases for the functional parameters .
this can be done either subjectively or by cross - validation .
since the method ` borrows strength ' across curves , it is possible to use a larger number of knots than would be practical for single - curve smoothing .
the other meta - parameters that need to be specified are the number of components in models ( [ eq : kl - model - x ] ) and ( [ eq : kl - model - y ] ) , @xmath37 and @xmath38 , and the warping dimensions @xmath64 and @xmath65 .
as already discussed , these quantities should roughly correspond to the number of salient features of the @xmath39s and the @xmath63s .
in addition to parameter estimation , it is usually of interest to predict a response curve for a given covariate curve .
this can be done in a straightforward way .
given a covariate data vector @xmath144 , obtained by discretizing a covariate curve @xmath145 on some time grid , the predictors @xmath146 and @xmath147 of the response random effects are given by @xmath148 and @xmath149 , which under model ( [ eq : reg - model ] ) come down to @xmath150 and @xmath151 . with @xmath146 and @xmath147 we compute @xmath152 and @xmath153 respectively , and then @xmath154 .
consider now the asymptotic distribution of @xmath155 when the number of curves @xmath156 goes to infinity . for simplicity
, we will assume that the time grids are equal for all individuals , which makes the raw data vectors @xmath11 independent and identically distributed .
we will also assume that the functional parameters belong to the spline space used for estimation , whose dimension is held fixed .
the asymptotic analysis is not entirely straightforward due to the parameter constraints .
for this reason we will use the results of geyer ( 1994 ) . since we are only interested in the marginal asymptotic distribution of @xmath155 and not in the asymptotic covariance between @xmath155 and the rest of the parameters , we can assume without loss of generality that @xmath81 , @xmath138 , @xmath139 , @xmath140 , @xmath141 , @xmath142 and @xmath143 are fixed and known , because this assumption does not alter the asymptotic covariance matrix of @xmath155 .
however , in principle we can not assume that @xmath136 is fixed and known because @xmath136 is part of the condition that @xmath135 be diagonal .
so we will derive the joint asymptotic distribution of @xmath155 and @xmath157 , even though we are only interested in the marginal distribution of @xmath155 .
the parameter of interest is then , in vector form , @xmath158 , \label{eq : theta}\]]where @xmath159 denotes the @xmath160 of the lower - triangular part of @xmath136 , including the diagonal .
the dimension of @xmath161 is then @xmath162 .
the restriction that @xmath163 be diagonal can be expressed as a system of @xmath164 constraints of the form @xmath165 , where @xmath166 and @xmath167 is the @xmath168th row of @xmath77 .
the functions @xmath169 can be stacked together into a single vector - valued function @xmath170 , and the constrained parameter space can be expressed as @xmath171 .
the additional condition that @xmath172 be positive definite does not alter the asymptotic distribution of the estimator because @xmath136 lies in the interior of this space , not on the border .
let @xmath173 be the true value of the parameter @xmath161 .
since @xmath174 is continuously differentiable , the tangent cone of @xmath175 at @xmath173 is @xmath176 , where @xmath177 is the differential ( rockafellar & wets , 1998 , ch .
the asymptotic distribution of the constrained estimator @xmath178 is simple in this case : it is just the usual asymptotic normal distribution of an unconstrained maximum likelihood estimator , projected on @xmath179 .
specifically , let @xmath180and @xmath181 , \label{eq : u}\]]where @xmath182 is the duplication matrix that satisfies @xmath183 ( magnus & neudecker , 1999 , ch . 3 ) .
it is shown in the supplementary material that @xmath184 is the likelihood score function @xmath185 at @xmath186 .
let @xmath187 , which is an @xmath188 matrix of rank @xmath189 with rows @xmath190,\]]where @xmath79 is the @xmath168th canonical vector in @xmath191 .
let @xmath192 be an orthogonal @xmath193 matrix of rank @xmath194 such that @xmath195 , which can be computed for instance via the singular value decomposition of the orthogonal projector @xmath196 ; this matrix is not unique but theorem [ theo : asymp ] below is invariant under the choice of @xmath192 .
[ theo : asymp]under the above conditions , the asymptotic distribution of @xmath197 is @xmath198 where @xmath199 .
matrix @xmath200 in theorem [ theo : asymp ] is fisher s information matrix for this model and can be estimated by @xmath201where the ` hat ' in @xmath202 denotes that the true parameters in ( eq : u ) are replaced by their estimators .
the proof of theorem theo : asymp is given in the appendix .
the assumption that the time grids were equal for all individuals was a simplification to make the data vectors @xmath203 , and consequently the likelihood scores ( [ eq : u ] ) , identically distributed . in many applications ,
however , this will not be the case and the time grids will be unequal , giving @xmath204 and @xmath13 which are still independent but not identically distributed due to the different dimensions .
usually this does not affect the final asymptotic result as long as ( eq : v ) does not become degenerate , as shown for instance by pollard ( 1990 , ch .
11 ) in the context of regression with non - random covariates .
although the fisher information matrix @xmath200 as such does not exists , ( eq : m ) and ( [ eq : n ] ) and consequently ( [ eq : u ] ) and ( [ eq : v ] ) can still be computed with @xmath203s of unequal dimensions .
the statement of theorem [ theo : asymp ] should then be re - expressed as @xmath205 in distribution .
to study the finite - sample accuracy of the proposed estimators we simulated data from the following models : * model 1 : a one - dimensional amplitude and warping model , with @xmath206 , @xmath207 , @xmath208 and @xmath209 , for @xmath210 and @xmath211 in @xmath212 $ ] , where @xmath213 denotes the @xmath214 density function .
the warping functions followed hermite spline models with knots @xmath215 and @xmath216 .
thus , although @xmath96 and @xmath217 have two peaks , phase and amplitude variability are concentrated on the main peak .
the regression matrix @xmath77 was the identity matrix , so there was no relationship between covariate phase variability and response amplitude variability , or vice versa , in this model .
the other parameters were @xmath218 , @xmath219 , and @xmath220 .
* model 2 : same as model 1 but with a non - diagonal @xmath77 ; specifically , @xmath221 and @xmath222 , so there was a relationship between covariate phase variability and response amplitude variability , and vice versa , in this model .
* model 3 : a two - dimensional amplitude and warping model , with @xmath223 , @xmath97 , @xmath224 and @xmath225 as in model 1 , @xmath226 the function @xmath227 orthogonalized with @xmath228 , and @xmath225 the function @xmath229 orthogonalized with @xmath225 .
the warping functions followed hermite spline models with knots @xmath230 and @xmath231 .
this model , then , has amplitude and phase variability at both peaks of @xmath223 and @xmath97 .
the regression matrix @xmath77 was the identity , and the other parameters were @xmath232 , @xmath233 , and @xmath234 . *
model 4 : same as model 3 but with a non - diagonal regression matrix @xmath77 , with blocks @xmath235 and @xmath236 . * model 5 : a one - dimensional amplitude model like model 1 but with warping functions that do not follow a regression model and do not belong to the hermite - spline family ; they belonged to a generic b - spline family with monotone increasing coefficients , which produces monotone increasing functions ( brumback & lindstrom , 2004 ) . specifically , if @xmath237 are cubic b - splines with 7 equally - spaced knots in @xmath238 and @xmath239 is such that @xmath240 , the identity , then we generated @xmath241 and took @xmath242 , with @xmath243 and @xmath244 the coefficients of @xmath245 sorted in increasing order .
the inverse warping functions of the responses , the @xmath246s , were generated in an analogous way and were independent of the @xmath247s .
* model 6 : a two - dimensional amplitude model like model 3 with a non - hermite warping model like model 5 .
two sample sizes , @xmath248 and @xmath249 , were considered for each model .
each scenario was replicated 500 times . in all cases
the time grids @xmath250 and @xmath251 were random and irregular , with @xmath252 and @xmath253 uniformly distributed between 10 and 20 , and independent of one another , and @xmath254 and @xmath255 uniformly distributed on @xmath212 $ ] . for each sample we computed the proposed warped functional regression estimator using cubic b - splines with 10 equally spaced knots for the functional parameters , with the number of principal components @xmath37 and @xmath38 equal to the true model quantities , that is , @xmath256 for models 1 , 2 and 5 , and @xmath257 for models 3 , 4 and 6 .
the specification of the warping functions , although always in a hermite - spline family , varied from model to model . for models 1 and 2 we used the same family used for estimation . for models 3 and 4 ,
however , we used hermite - spline families with single knots at @xmath258 and @xmath259 , so as to study the behavior of the estimator when the number of warping knots is underspecified . for model 5 we used hermite splines with knots at @xmath230 and @xmath231 , and for model 6 we used hermite splines with knots at @xmath258 and @xmath260 ; this allows us to study the advantages of doing some kind of warping as opposed to not doing any warping at all , since the true warping processes of models 5 and 6 do not follow a regression model and do not belong to the hermite spline family . for comparison we also computed ordinary functional regression estimators based on principal components , as in e.g. mller et al .
( 2008 ) , with the difference that the principal components were computed by maximum likelihood via b - spline models , as in james et al .
( 2000 ) , rather than by kernel smoothing . as measures of performance we computed bias and root mean squared errors of @xmath261 , @xmath262 , @xmath263 , @xmath264 and @xmath265 .
we defined as ` bias ' of @xmath266 the quantity @xmath267^{2}\mathrm{ds})^{1/2}$ ] and as ` root mean squared error ' the quantity @xmath268\mathrm{ds})^{1/2}$ ] . for @xmath263 and @xmath261 the definitions were analogous , with double integrals for the latter .
for the principal component estimators , which have undefined signs , we actually computed the bias and root mean squared errors of the bivariate functions @xmath269 and @xmath270 , which are sign - invariant .
these are reported in tables [ tab : simulations_1_50 ] and tab : simulations_1_100 ; for @xmath266 and @xmath271 the quantities have been multiplied by 10 to eliminate leading zeros .
.simulation results . bias and root mean squared errors of warped functional regression ( w ) and ordinary functional regression ( o ) for sample size @xmath248 .
[ cols="^,^,^,^,^,^,^,^,^,^ " , ] table [ tab : simulations_3 ] shows the results .
there are two aspects of the asymptotics that we are trying to assess : the adequacy of the normal approximation and the adequacy of the variance estimators .
the first aspect can be best assessed using the true variance in the test statistics , so the variance estimation error is not a confounding factor . in this
regard we see in table [ tab : simulations_3 ] that the asymptotic approximation is good even for @xmath248 , both for the global @xmath272-test and for the marginal @xmath273-tests . in the more realistic cases where the variance is estimated
, we see that bootstrap variance estimators generally work better than the asymptotic - variance formula ; although both underestimate the true variances , bootstrap tends to underestimate them less , especially for random time grids .
ground - level ozone is an air pollutant known to cause serious health problems . unlike other pollutants
, ozone is not emitted directly into the air but is a result of complex chemical reactions in the atmosphere that include , among other factors , volatile organic compounds and oxides of nitrogen .
oxides of nitrogen are emitted by combustion engines , power plants and other industrial sources .
the modeling of ground - level ozone formation has been an active topic of air - quality studies for many years . in this article
we will use data from the california environmental protection agency online database .
hourly concentration of pollutants at many locations in california are available for the years 19802009 .
we will analyze trajectories of oxides of nitrogen ( nox ) and ozone ( o3 ) in the city of sacramento ( site 3011 in the database ) in the summer of 2005 .
we omit weekends and holidays because nox and o3 levels are substantially lower and follow different patterns .
we also removed some outlying trajectories , so the final sample consisted of 52 days between june 6 and august 26 , shown in figure [ fig : sample_curves ] .
both nox and o3 trajectories follow simple regular patterns .
nox curves tend to peak around 7 am , and o3 curves around 2 pm .
therefore we fitted warped regression models with single warping knots , trying several values of @xmath274 and @xmath275 around 7 am and 2 pm respectively .
the results were similar in all cases ; the estimators reported here correspond to @xmath276 and @xmath277 . as basis functions we used cubic b - splines with 7 equally spaced knots , one knot every 3 hours
; we also tried 10 knots but the results were not substantially different .
three warped regression models were fitted : _ ( i ) _ a model with _ _ _ _ one principal component for @xmath278 and one for @xmath279 , _ ( ii ) _ a model with _ _ _ _ two principal components for @xmath278 and one for @xmath279 , and _
( iii ) _ a model with one principal component for @xmath278 and two for @xmath279 .
the log - likelihood values were 44.44 , 45.21 and 52.04 , respectively .
the second model did not seem to represent much of an improvement over the first one , so we discarded it . for models _
( i ) _ and _ ( iii ) _ the estimated regression coefficients and the bootstrap standard deviations , based on 200 resamples , were @xmath280 , \ \
\mathrm{std}(\mathbf{\hat{a})}=\left [ \begin{array}{cc } 0.07 & 0.02 \\ 0.08 & 0.06\end{array}\right ] , \\
\mathbf{\hat{a } } & = & \left [ \begin{array}{cc } 0.36 & 0.12 \\ 0.01 & 0.02 \\ 0.18 & 0.54\end{array}\right ] , \ \
\mathrm{std}(\mathbf{\hat{a})}=\left [ \begin{array}{cc } 0.08 & 0.06 \\ 0.04 & 0.10 \\ 0.06 & 0.11\end{array}\right ] .\end{aligned}\ ] ] for model ( iii ) the coefficients of the second principal component of the response , @xmath281 and @xmath282 , are not significant , while for model ( i ) all coefficients are significant even allowing for underestimation of the standard deviations , with the possible exception of @xmath281 which is a borderline case . for this reason we prefer
( i ) as our final model . to interpret the principal components , figure [ fig : wfr_fit](a )
shows @xmath266 and @xmath283 for some constant @xmath284 , and figure [ fig : wfr_fit](b ) shows @xmath271 and @xmath285 for another constant @xmath286 .
both principal components are shape components : curves with positive scores tend to have sharper features than the mean while curves with negative scores tend to have flatter features than the mean .
the fact that the diagonal coefficients of @xmath155 are positive indicates that the component scores @xmath287 and @xmath288 are positively correlated , as figure [ fig : wfr_fit](c ) shows , and the warping landmarks @xmath289 and @xmath290 , which can roughly be interpreted as peak locations , are also positively correlated , as figure [ fig : wfr_fit](f ) shows .
amplitude and warping factors are also positively cross - correlated , since the off - diagonal elements of @xmath155 are also positive .
in particular @xmath291 is highly significant , so late nox peaks tend to be associated with high peaks of o3 and vice - versa , as figure [ fig : wfr_fit](d ) shows .
an ordinary functional regression fit is shown in figure [ fig : flr_fit ] ; the plot shows @xmath266 , @xmath271 , @xmath292 and @xmath293 for a three - component model , or overall dimension 9 .
a two - component model , of overall dimension 4 and thus comparable to the warped regression model , would correspond to the upper four panels of figure [ fig : flr_fit ] .
time variability in the explanatory curves is explained by the second @xmath278-component ( figure fig : flr_fit(c ) ) , but phase variability in the response curves is not accounted for until the third component ( figure [ fig : flr_fit](f ) ) , so it really takes a 9-dimensional ordinary regression model to explain the phase - variability features that a 4-dimensional warped model would explain . and
the predominantly time - related principal components , figure fig : flr_fit(c , f ) , are also associated with some kinds of amplitude variability .
likewise , principal components that are predominantly amplitude - related , like the first @xmath278-component , figure [ fig : flr_fit](a ) , are somewhat influenced by time variability .
this blurring of the components is avoided by warped functional regression , which neatly separates the sources of variability and offers not only a more easily interpretable model but also a lower - dimensional one .
this research was partially supported by a grant from the national science foundation .
supplementary material available online includes a more thorough discussion of model identifiability , the derivation of the em algorithm for estimation , detailed derivation of formulae involved in the asymptotic distribution of the estimator , and a detailed treatment of monotone hermite splines .
in this section we explain how the warping functions @xmath50 are constructed ; the @xmath59s are constructed in a similar way .
let @xmath294 $ ] and @xmath295 be a sequence of @xmath296 knots in @xmath6 .
define the basis functions @xmath297 and @xmath298 as follows : let @xmath299 and @xmath300 ; then @xmath301@xmath302for @xmath303 , @xmath304@xmath305@xmath306for @xmath303 , and @xmath307the function @xmath308where @xmath309 and @xmath310 , is a differentiable piecewise - cubic function that satisfies @xmath311 and @xmath312 for @xmath303 .
thus the @xmath313s play the dual role of basis coefficients and values of @xmath314 at the knots . for ( [ eq : w_lin_exp ] ) to be strictly monotone increasing
the @xmath315s must satisfy certain necessary and sufficient conditions given in fritsch & carlson ( 1980 ) . for situations like ours where no particular values of the @xmath315s are specified ,
fritsch & carlson provide a simple algorithm to compute , from given @xmath313s , values of the @xmath315s that satisfy the monotonicity constraints .
this algorithm is given in the supplementary material . since the algorithm is deterministic , the @xmath315s are functions of the @xmath313s and then ( [ eq : w_lin_exp ] ) is entirely parameterized by @xmath316 , thus forming an @xmath296-dimensional space .
the jupp transform ( jupp , 1978 ) is defined as @xmath317with inverse given by @xmath318note that for any @xmath296-dimensional unconstrained vector @xmath319 the inverse jupp transform yields a vector @xmath320 of strictly increasing knots in @xmath321 . in particular , for @xmath322 the corresponding @xmath320 is a sequence of @xmath296 equally spaced knots in @xmath321 . under the distributional assumptions in section [ sec :
estimation ] , the likelihood function is derived as follows . the joint density function of the data vectors @xmath203 and the latent random effects @xmath323 can be factorized as @xmath324since @xmath325 depends on @xmath137 only through @xmath326 , according to ( [ eq : reg - model ] ) .
clearly @xmath327 and @xmath328 .
the conditional distributions @xmath329 and @xmath330 are derived as follows .
given @xmath120 and @xmath125 , the values of @xmath67 and @xmath68 determine the warping functions @xmath50 and @xmath59 and consequently two warped time grids @xmath331 , @xmath332 , and @xmath333 , @xmath334 .
let @xmath335 and @xmath336 be the b - spline bases evaluated at the warped time grids , that is @xmath337 and @xmath338 .
then , in view of model specifications ( [ eq : raw_data_x])([eq : kl - model - y ] ) we have @xmath339 and @xmath340 .
the maximum likelihood estimators maximize @xmath341but the integrals in ( [ eq : loglik ] ) do not have closed forms so we use the em algorithm to find the optimum , treating the random effects @xmath323 as missing data .
most of the updating equations of the em algorithm are easy to derive but the restrictions on the parameters @xmath140 , @xmath141 , and @xmath77 pose some difficulties .
this is discussed in detail in the supplementary material .
this proof is a direct application of theorem 4.4 of geyer ( 1994 ) ; note that theorem 5.2 of geyer ( 1994 ) , which pertains to consistent local minimizers instead of global minimizers , can also be applied because our @xmath179 satisfies the stronger condition of being clarke - regular ( rockafellar & wets , 1998 , ch .
following geyer s notation , let @xmath342 and @xmath343
. then @xmath344 and @xmath345 .
assumption a of geyer ( 1994 ) is that @xmath346with @xmath347 positive definite .
this is satisfied in our case because @xmath348 and @xmath349 . to see that the latter is positive definite
, note that for @xmath161 as in ( [ eq : theta ] ) we have @xmath350where @xmath351 , then @xmath352\geq 0 $ ] and it is equal to zero only if @xmath353 with probability one , which can only happen if @xmath354 .
assumption b of geyer , in our case , is that @xmath355for some @xmath356 such that the remainder @xmath357 is stochastically equicontinuous .
this is satisfied by @xmath358 ; the fact that @xmath357 is stochastically equicontinuous follows from pollard ( 1984 , pp .
150152 ) .
clearly @xmath356 satisfies a central limit theorem with asymptotic covariance matrix @xmath77 that in this case is equal to @xmath200 , so assumption c of geyer is also satisfied .
then theorem 4.4 of geyer can be applied .
it states that the asymptotic distribution of @xmath197 is the same as the distribution of @xmath359 , the minimizer of @xmath360over @xmath361 , where @xmath362 . in our case @xmath359
can be obtained in closed form , due to the simplicity of @xmath179 .
concretely , @xmath179 is the space of @xmath363s such that @xmath364 .
let @xmath365 $ ] be a @xmath366 orthogonal matrix whose first @xmath189 columns @xmath367 span the space generated by the rows of @xmath368 and whose last @xmath194 columns @xmath192 are orthogonal to the rows of @xmath368 .
then @xmath369 @xmath179 if and only if @xmath370 with @xmath371 ; that is , @xmath372 with @xmath373 the subvector containing the last @xmath194 coordinates of @xmath374 .
then for @xmath369 @xmath179 we can write @xmath375which is clearly minimized by @xmath376 .
therefore @xmath377 , and since @xmath378 , the result of the theorem follows .
ash , r.b . & gardner , m.f . ( 1975 ) .
_ topics in stochastic processes_. new york : academic press . | arxiv |
it is common knowledge that the presence of a medium does not introduce new uv divergencies in quantum field theoretical calculations , basically because the momenta of the medium fluctuations are constrained by the temperature @xmath1 and/or the chemical potential @xmath3 . at times
this fact is used to comfort a somewhat pragmatic strategy in practical calculations , namely discussing only the matter contribution to the quantity under consideration , deferring the renormalization ( of the vacuum part ) as standard ` textbook physics ' .
such a procedure , however , should be applied with the appropriate care in cases where new momentum scales occur , as in the context of statistical field theory .
a related aspect thereof which is crucial for phenomenology is the arising ambiguity in the coupling , whose momentum scale then is not fixed by the calculation , but has to be chosen somewhat _
ad hoc_. a widely used expression obtained from such a pragmatic prescription is m_d^2 = ( 1 + 16 ) 4(q_t^2 ) t^2 [ eq : md pre ] for the debye mass in a hot quark gluon plasma ( qgp ) with @xmath4 light quark flavors . describing the screening of ( chromo- ) electric fields ,
the debye mass is a key parameter for a variety of phenomenologically relevant quantities . for quantitative estimates ,
the coupling @xmath5 has prevalently been fixed at a ` typical ' thermal scale of the order of the ( bosonic ) matsubara frequency , @xmath6 , with @xmath7 .
recently , the expression ( [ eq : md pre ] ) has also been utilized as a parameterization of lattice qcd ( lqcd ) results @xcite .
it there turned out that the debye mass in the non - perturbative regime near the ( phase- ) transition temperature @xmath2 can be reasonably described by a re - scaling _ ansatz _ @xmath8 , see below .
a reckoned explanation of the observed enhancement , @xmath9 , is the next - to - leading order correction @xcite to the result ( [ eq : md pre ] ) which , under reasonable assumptions for the magnetic mass , is positive . as an aside
it is noted that such an interpretation is quite non - trivial .
naively , one could expect that if @xmath10 changes notably in a certain temperature range and the next - to - leading order correction is of a similar size as the leading term , one can not parameterize the modification by a _ constant _ factor . however , in qcd the correction is logarithmically enhanced due to an ir sensitivity of the debye mass , implying @xmath11 where @xmath12 @xcite .
thus , from @xmath13 , a sizable change in @xmath14 can indeed be reconciled with an almost constant enhancement factor if @xmath15 .
although this condition is fulfilled in the cases studied below , it turned out that the next - to - leading order correction can only partly account for the observed excess @xcite . pursued here is a more elementary interpretation of the large debye mass near @xmath2 , namely by questioning the ( temperature dependence of the ) coupling in ( [ eq : md pre ] ) . in order to first define rigorously the notion of the running coupling for the following considerations ,
some basic facts about the coupling renormalization ( at @xmath16 ) are recollected in sec .
[ sec : rc ] . then in sec .
[ sec : md ] , the pole of the propagator at @xmath17 is expressed in terms of the renormalized coupling . by specifying the general result for the case of the debye mass
it is shown that the presupposed scale @xmath18 in the coupling in eq .
( [ eq : md pre ] ) is not justified . in some places
the notation is kept schematic , both for simplicity and to indicate that the considerations are , in principle , not restricted to qcd ( albeit consequences for weakly coupled systems are only marginal ) .
although the framework is entirely perturbative , it will be instructive with regard to the so - called strongly coupled qgp ( sqgp ) to confront the results with lqcd calculations .
the paper concludes with a summary and some implications .
to relate the bare coupling @xmath5 to an experimental observable , consider a scattering process in a kinematic regime dominated by the @xmath19-channel contribution .
considering for simplicity a massless theory , the relevant part of the matrix element is @xmath20 . to 1-loop order and in dimensional regularization
, the boson selfenergy has the generic form @xmath21 .
then , for a specific @xmath22 , the matrix element reads 1t_e .
[ eq : m ] the right hand side can be considered as experimental input , introducing the coupling @xmath23 at the scale @xmath24 , which is related to the ( infinite ) bare coupling by ^-1(t_e ) = ^-1 - ^-1 + ( -t_e/^2 ) .
[ eq : e2 vs e2(t ) ] an equivalent relation holds for the coupling @xmath25 at an arbitrary scale @xmath19 , consequently @xmath26 here the previously omitted prefactor has been re - introduced , which determines the asymptotic behavior of the specific theory under consideration .
for qcd with @xmath27 colors and @xmath4 light quark flavors , the leading order coefficient of the @xmath28-function is @xmath29 .
the momentum dependence of the ` running ' coupling is fully specified by its value at the scale @xmath24 , or in a common alternative way of writing , ( t ) = 14_0 1(|t|/^2 ) , [ eq : e2 run ] by the qcd parameter @xmath30 .
it is also noted that the matrix element ( [ eq : m ] ) can now be expressed simply as @xmath31 with an obvious diagrammatic interpretation as depicted in the insert of fig .
[ fig : alpha(t ) ] . before turning to the case of finite temperature , it is instructive to challenge the 1-loop expression for the running coupling by a comparison to non - perturbative lqcd results . to that end , eq .
( [ eq : e2 run ] ) is applied in the position space by replacing @xmath32 . on the lattice
, the coupling can be obtained from the heavy quark potential @xmath33 or more conveniently , as advocated in @xcite and references therein , from the corresponding force , @xmath34 the comparison in fig .
[ fig : alpha(t ) ] shows an agreement which is at least as good as that obtained in @xcite from the cornell parameterization of the potential , @xmath35 , with a fitted constant @xmath36 and the string tension @xmath37mev .
-4 mm , for @xmath38 . compared
are the lqcd results @xcite ( given here without error bars ) to eq .
( [ eq : e2 run ] ) with @xmath39 ( full line ) ; the hatched band depicts a variation @xmath40mev .
the dashed ( black ) line represents the result @xcite from the cornell parameterization of @xmath33 , which for @xmath41fm almost coincides with the full ( red ) line .
[ fig : alpha(t)],title="fig:",width=264 ] worth to note is that the adjusted value @xmath42mev for the running coupling ( [ eq : e2 run ] ) is verily in the expected ball park .
this demonstrates that the pronounced increase of @xmath43 is not an unambiguous indication of non - perturbative effects , as @xmath44 , but can be utterly accommodated within the asymptotic form , at least at intermediate distances .
this is a motivation that phenomenological considerations based on the 1-loop running coupling may be viable even for moderate interaction strength , say @xmath45 ( corresponding to @xmath46fm ) as relevant in the following .
the debye screening mass can be calculated from the position of a pole of the dressed propagator in the presence of a thermal medium .
here the selfenergy receives an additional finite contribution , = [ p^2 ( ^-1 - ( -p^2/^2 ) ) + f(p_0,p ) ] , [ eq : pi t ] which in general depends separately on @xmath47 and @xmath48 . the pole is determined by @xmath49 , which can also be written as @xmath50 recognizing in this expression the running coupling @xmath51 , cf.eq .
( [ eq : e2 vs e2(t ) ] ) , this relation is cast in the intuitive form p^2 = ( p^2 ) f(p_0,p ) .
[ eq : pole ] while simple , this equation is remarkable since it is manifestly finite .
the pole is determined only by the matter part of the selfenergy , whereas the ( divergent ) vacuum contribution is ` absorbed ' completely in the renormalized coupling .
the fact that the pole depends only on the measurable parameter @xmath30 ( while the auxiliary scale @xmath3 has dropped out ) is a strong formal indication that the approximation ( [ eq : pole ] ) has a direct physical meaning . as a special case of eq .
( [ eq : pole ] ) , the debye screening mass is defined as the pole position of the longitudinal boson propagator @xmath52 for @xmath53 , at space - like momentum @xmath54 .
then it is first obvious that screening is an effect solely due to the thermal fluctuations .
the vacuum contributions of the selfenergy ( [ eq : pi t ] ) do not have to be ` omitted ' , e.g. , by misleadingly arguing that for large @xmath1 they are exceeded ( after renormalization ) by the matter part , @xmath55 . on the contrary
, they are actually necessary to render finite the resulting equation . not surprising , in fact , is that the relevant scale in the running coupling is given by the debye mass itself , viz m_d^2 = 13n_c ( 1 + 16 ) 4(m_d^2 ) t^2 .
[ eq : md def ] here the same perturbative result for @xmath56 as in eq .
( [ eq : md pre ] ) has been used , which for small @xmath48 is momentum independent and explicitly gauge invariant @xcite . thus already to leading order ( i.e. without using a resummed selfenergy calculated from dressed propagators ) , due to renormalization the debye mass
is determined by an implicit equation . with the coupling ( [ eq : e2 run ] ) , the self - consistent solution can be given in terms of lambert s @xmath57-function ,- function , @xmath58 , is usually defined as the solution of @xmath59 , see e.g. , mathworld.wolfram.com/lambertw-function.html . ]
m_d^2 = , [ eq : md ] where @xmath60 . even without having to refer to the tabulated properties of the @xmath57-function ,
two basic features of the solution can be easily inferred directly from eq .
( [ eq : md def ] ) .
first , @xmath61 is a monotonically decreasing function of @xmath62 and second , the self - consistent solution is larger than the expression ( [ eq : md pre ] ) if @xmath63 .
although also eq .
( [ eq : md ] ) is justified _ a priori _ only for @xmath64 , it is remunerating to compare it to lqcd results . in monte carlo calculations ,
the debye mass can be obtained by two methods : from analyzing the large - distance behavior of ( i ) the heavy quark free energy @xmath65 or ( ii ) the static electric propagator @xmath52 . for quenched qcd as well as for pure su(2 ) , the debye mass has been calculated within both approaches .
even though for su(3 ) the results are not fully consistent , see fig .
[ fig : md ] , they are clearly underestimated , by the aforementioned factor @xmath9 , by the expression ( [ eq : md pre ] ) supplemented with the 2-loop running coupling .
, what indeed slightly reduces the observed discrepancy . ]
-4 mm and @xmath66 .
the lqcd results labeled @xmath65 and @xmath52 are from @xcite and @xcite , respectively .
the hatched bands depict eq .
( [ eq : md pre ] ) with the 2-loop coupling fixed at @xmath6 with @xmath67 $ ] and values of @xmath68 as specified in the text .
the dash - dotted ( black ) lines represent the re - scaling fits @xcite with the _ ansatz _ @xmath69 ; here @xmath70 .
the thicker ( red ) lines show the self - consistent result ( [ eq : md ] ) for some representative choices of the parameter @xmath71 .
[ fig : md],title="fig:",width=264 ] the new formula ( [ eq : md ] ) , on the other hand , can describe the lqcd results almost down to @xmath2 by appropriate choices of the dimensionless parameter @xmath71 .
i will focus on the data sets @xcite since they , in the quenched limit , match nicely with the findings in su(2 ) @xcite , cf .
[ fig : md su(n ) ] .
-4 mm are not unexpected due to the different order of the phase transition .
[ fig : md su(n)],title="fig:",width=264 ] in this computationally less demanding case the lattice results derived from the free energy and from the propagator are indeed compatible . on the other hand , for @xmath72
the debye mass ( [ eq : md ] ) is also @xmath73-independent . adjusting the scale parameter in eq .
( [ eq : md ] ) to the qcd ( @xmath27 ) lattice results ( excluding a narrow interval above @xmath2 ) yields @xmath74 for the quenched case and @xmath75 for two light flavors .
one might suspect that the lattice results could be accommodated within this strictly perturbative approach only at the expense of the interpretability of the parameter .
i thus emphasize that the fitted @xmath76 are in a remarkable agreement with the known ratio of the qcd scale to the transition temperature @xcite , @xmath77 and @xmath78 for @xmath72 and @xmath38 , respectively .
to round up the emerging consistent picture it is underlined that @xmath42mev , as adjusted in sec .
[ sec : rc ] for the @xmath38 qcd potential at @xmath16 , is ( together with the commonly expected value of @xmath79mev ) also compatible with @xmath80 . due to
the monotonic behavior of @xmath61 alluded to before , eq .
( [ eq : md ] ) can not reproduce the characteristic decrease of the debye mass very close to @xmath2 .
a possible interpretation has been given as a boltzmann suppression of the time - like excitations ( quasiparticles ) , which become heavy near @xmath2 @xcite .
within the present approach , it could alternatively indicate a non - monotonous @xmath81 . for large temperatures , the deviations of the results from eqs .
( [ eq : md pre ] ) and ( [ eq : md ] ) decrease logarithmically , reaching the order of 10% only at @xmath82 , cf .
[ fig : large t ] .
-4 mm behavior of the debye mass for @xmath38 ( thin lines ) and @xmath83 ( assuming @xmath84 ; bold lines ) . bottom : the adjusted 1-loop coupling ( [ eq : e2 run ] ) at the scale @xmath0 vs. the 2-loop coupling at @xmath85 .
[ fig : large t],title="fig:",width=264 ] from the slopes of the curves it can be expected that the re - scaling _ ansatz _ @xmath8 will overestimate the correct debye mass at high temperatures ( a hint thereof may in fact be spotted already in fig .
[ fig : md ] ) . shown also in fig .
[ fig : large t ] is the prediction for @xmath83 massless flavors , which should constrain the debye mass in the physical case ( @xmath86 ) .
in a wider sense , it was demonstrated that there is no coupling in a ( thermal ) medium _ per se _ it always is to be related to a specific quantity / scale .
the correct scale , which should be an outcome of the calculation rather than ` chosen ' , is crucial in particular for larger coupling .
the relevant scale for the debye mass , @xmath87{md.eps}}\ ; + \ldots \;\sim\ ; \alpha(m_d^2 ) t^2 \ , , \ ] ] is @xmath0 itself , not the typical loop momentum @xmath88 as often presumed .
it s the interplay between vacuum and thermal fluctuations ( accounted for by renormalization ) that leads to the implicit eq .
( [ eq : md def ] ) , which is manifestly finite and gauge and renormalization group invariant .
the soft(er ) scale in the coupling , @xmath89 for @xmath90 , yields stronger screening than previously estimated from ( [ eq : md pre ] ) .
remarkably , both the novel result ( [ eq : md ] ) and the underlying running coupling ( at @xmath91 ) are consistent with corresponding lqcd results .
one might speculate whether eq . ( [ eq : md ] ) is especially suited for extrapolation by its formal amenities higher order terms could basically cancel each other if perturbative expansions have similar properties as asymptotic series @xcite .
exemplifying the renormalization at @xmath17 is ( at the considered level ) particularly straightforward for the debye mass . yet
this quantity is a regulator for many observables with an ir sensitivity and thus central in statistical field theory .
accordingly , there are numerous phenomenological implications for heavy ion physics .
mentioned here explicitly with regard to the establishing notion of a sqgp is that the electric sector of qcd indeed seems to be quite strongly coupled , @xmath92 near @xmath2 , see fig .
[ fig : large t ] . in the magnetic sector , on the other hand , the effective coupling apparently remains much smaller , @xmath93 near @xmath2 @xcite .
this indicates a rather nuanced picture of the sqgp , see e.g. @xcite . +
* acknowledgment : * i thank w. cassing , s. leupold , r. pisarski and especially s. peign for fertile discussions , and j. noronha for pointing out the relation of eq .
( [ eq : md def ] ) to the @xmath57-function .
this work was supported by bmbf . | arxiv |
Naruto Nostalgia and Home Videos
**So I was feeling a little fluffy and in need of intense Kazekage and Gaara family father/son love. In a cannon setting. Somehow involving pre-chuunin Gaara (for those who follow me, you probably realize that I have an intense obsession with mean Gaara). I eventually came up with this.
I don't own anything from the Naruto world. Just my intense love for the Sandsibs and co.**
* * *
Gaara knew that something strange was going on, one day, when he walked past his older brother's room. He usually completely ignored his family members' existences except when acknowledging them was absolutely necessary. However, when his sensitive ears picked up the sound of soft sobbing coming from Kankuro's room, he froze halfway through a step.
The redhead's heart tightened a bit in panic. His thoughts quickly assessed the situation. Was Kankuro crying?
Frowning, Gaara took a step closer to his brother's bedroom door. His previous suspicions were confirmed when he heard his sibling sniff, then let out a noise that was halfway between a sob and a laugh.
The boy quickly pulled himself away from his brother's door. He didn't care that Kankuro was weeping. He didn't even care whether or not Kankuro was alive, really.
Gaara hastily crossed his arms and started walking down the corridor again. It was just... Strange. He didn't know how to feel about this discovery, or if he was even supposed to feel anything. Despite not particularly liking his sibling, he had grown up with the older boy. Gaara _knew_ Kankuro. He could read his brother's emotions and could predict the boy's actions almost accurately.
And Gaara knew that Kankuro practically never cried. The instances in which the boy ever shed a tear, in front of Gaara, at least, were of utmost rarity.
The last time the older boy had cried in front of Gaara was almost a year ago, during a mission when Kankuro had accidentally stepped on a kunai, puncturing his foot.
Gaara had silently watched as his brother had screamed out a string of rude words. The redhead had held back his squeamishness at the sight of all the blood pouring out of the wound as it caused Shukaku to lurch in his mind. He had managed to extinguish the temptation because... Well, he couldn't exactly attack his teammate on a mission. A soothing and efficient Temari had quickly removed the blade and bandaged the foot. Though Kankuro had kept a stoic expression after his initial swearing, Gaara had noticed the tears that had managed to escape the older boy's eyes. Even then, it had been just a minor leakage that Kankuro had immediately covered up.
In other words, the fact that Gaara had just heard his brother sobbing in his room made the redhead feel very uncomfortable indeed.
The situation started getting out of hand very quickly.
Kankuro showed up to dinner with a grin and slightly red eyes. When Temari raised her eyebrow at his disheveled appearance, the puppet-master silently handed the girl a thin black case. Gaara watched the interaction with mild curiosity. When Kankuro sent him an almost imperceptible smile, however, he nearly jumped out of his seat.
Not a scared smile. Not a nervous smile. Not a 'I-hate-you-but-I'm-smiling-because-I-just-don't-want-you-to-kill-me' smile.
It was a genuine smile. And Gaara had not been on the receiving end of one of those for as long as he could remember.
The redhead rapidly inferred that this sudden change of behavior had something to do with the thin black case. He responded to Kankuro's smile with a cool look and averted his gaze.
A few days later, the scenario ominously repeated itself.
Temari had come out of her bedroom, her eyes bloodshot, though she usually cried even less than Kankuro. A bittersweet smile was plastered onto her face as she noticed Gaara. The boy almost shifted uneasily under her gaze, but he quickly caught himself in the action. He steeled his expression and crossed his arms, holding his sister's gaze.
"What do you want?" he asked, keeping his voice laced with his usual bored and monotonous tone.
Temari blinked, as if she just remembered who she was talking to.
"Um... Nothing! I'm good... It's nothing! Nothing you need to worry about."
Gaara eyed his sister as she quickly tried to retreat down the hallway and take the stairs into the kitchen. However, the redhead saw his sister's eyes widen as she looked at something beyond the turn in the corridor, which he couldn't see. However, he could sense him.
The boy's blood immediately chilled as his father appeared in the hall, blocking Temari's escape route.
The man's icy gaze shifted from Temari's tear stained face to Gaara. His slightly surprised look turned suspicious as he examined his youngest son.
The redhead's skin crawled in indignation at that look. That disappointed look. That accusing look. Well, he had nothing to do with Temari's condition. He didn't make her cry. He didn't do anything. It wasn't his fault that his siblings were being weakhearted losers. Why did the Kazekage always, always look at him like that whenever someone even mentioned a problem?
Gaara was freed from the mental torment the second his father pulled his sharp gaze off of him to return it to his sister. A slight sigh escaped the man's lips.
"Temari... What happened?" asked the Kazekage, his gaze softening slightly into a frown as he observed his daughter's face. The girl laughed nervously, plastering the fake smile she always used on Gaara to calm him down.
"Nostalgia." she muttered. "Kankuro gave me this..."
Temari quickly ran back into her room to emerge a few seconds later with the black case. Gaara's eyes narrowed, his suspicions confirmed.
"I have vague memories of it. You probably remember when it happened." She smiled up at her father, who returned the expression, albeit with a little more confusion. The girl's gaze drifted one last time over to where her brother was standing before handing the object to her father. "It's kinda sad to look back now, but... It's sweet. Occasional nostalgia is healthy, right? It helps you figure out what you are missing in your life."
The Kazekage flipped the case in his hand. His expression suddenly crumbled. The man rapidly darted his gaze to Gaara, who took a cautious step back. This was very uncharacteristic of his father. What did this man want this time?
"I remember these. Your mother left at least a dozen of them in the storage rooms." finally grumbled the Kazekage. Gaara's back tensed at the mention of the woman he killed with his birth. He suddenly wished that he had teleported away before this conversation even started. "If you two are interested, you can go digging around for them. Your mother had an enthusiastic passion for filming her family members."
Film. A CD case. Gaara frowned. His siblings cried over a measly home video? How stupid.
Temari shook her head.
"This one isn't mother's, Gaara is in it. Kankuro found it when he was digging around the third floor cabinet looking for spare puppet parts. Watch it. It's..." Temari tilted her head to the side, rubbing her cheek with the back of her hand. "It's nice. That's really the only word that comes to mind."
The Kazekage shrugged.
"I'll do it when I find the time. You have made me curious now." He huffed and tucked the case into his sleeve. He continued walking down the hall, patting his daughter on the shoulder when he walked past her. When he reached his son however, his gaze darkened visibly and Gaara flinched a little, unable to help the terror and slight jealousy that washed through him. He wasn't shocked, though, since Temari had value, unlike him. Anger, hate, fear, longing and a plethora of other feelings welled up inside his chest. The demon in his mind added on with a sharp painful throb through his brain, though the redhead forced himself to ignore it. He didn't want to show frailty in front of this man.
"And Gaara." His tone of voice was noticeably less warm than it had been when he had addressed Temari. The jinchuuriki silently gulped. "Has your control improved since our last training session?"
Gaara nodded slowly. His eyes burned as he held his father's gaze and he ached to just look away, but he refused to let the Kazekage win this one. Not that anyone had declared a war of any sort. The battle was all in the redhead's young, frustrated mind.
"Good. You now have almost perfect control over the sand. Keep training." he ordered calmly. Gaara nodded again.
The Kazekage disappeared. Temari, realizing that the atmosphere in the corridor had gone creepily tense, quickly walked down the hallway and turned to take the staircase. Gaara stood still for a few more seconds, quietly observing as his sister retreated.
With a last glare, he teleported into his room, trying to understand what could possibly be in the video footage that had reduced his siblings to tears.
A few days later, it was very obvious to Gaara that his father had watched the video. Thankfully for his sanity, the man had not cried. The redhead wasn't sure that he would emotionally be able to cope with seeing his father cry. Even if he did hate his father and the thought of the man being miserable was infinitely amusing, the idea of seeing the man cry was terrifying for the boy. Like all children, he had been raised to see his parent as a tough, powerful figure. Since his father was the Kazekage, this illusion was a reality. Gaara hated the man who partially created him, but the redhead also believed in him more than he believed in anyone else. The man was strong. Strong enough to control him. This was one of the few certainties in Gaara's life, along with his ideology that fighting for yourself made you stronger.
So, if he were to ever witness his father weeping, it would probably shatter his vision of the world. It would hurt him, because the Kazekage would be betraying Gaara's unspoken trust. Gaara trusted his father to be a rock in all situations. That stability was one of the few things that the boy had to hold on to as he was growing up.
There was something else, though, and this idea was the one that the redhead had the hardest admitting to himself. It was the thought that, if his father were to cry, that meant that his father was weak. Human. Soft. Moveable.
If his father could cry of a trivial video, but could set countless assassins after Gaara without batting an eyelash, what did that say about the redhead's importance?
Gaara shook the thoughts out of his head. None of it mattered, because the Kazekage didn't cry when he watched the video. However, he had strolled into the living room where Gaara was seated, a mellow smile pulling at the wrinkles on his aging face.
Seeing that expression directed at him, the jinchuuriki had nearly thrown every piece of furniture in the room at the man and wanted to bury his face in the sofa pillows. He hadn't, of course, because he had control. So the boy just sat on the couch, stunned. But the turmoil of emotion was brewing, contained.
"Gaara. Your sister was right. Nostalgia can be enlightening. It brings back an old glimmer of hope... That has since faded." said the Kazekage cryptically, using a tone of voice that wasn't exactly the one he used with Temari or Kankuro, but close. He slowly walked over to where Gaara was sitting and placed the black CD case on the coffee table in front of him. "When you're alone, you should watch this. You could not possibly remember any of it but... It could be good for you to know a little more. It could help you understand that... you can still change. Because people change all the time, for better or for worse. But really, the video is just..." The Kazekage sighed and ran a hand through his short auburn hair. "I don't know what you will think of it. But since your siblings and I have all seen it, I think it's only fair that you do too. Just don't break anything."
Gaara nodded slowly, trying to reign in the agonizing stabbing feeling he was getting in his chest.
"Understood." he replied curtly. "I won't."
The Kazekage nodded and left the room, not giving his son another look. Gaara felt the tension leave his joints when his father was no longer around. Grumbling to himself, he quickly stood up and turned on the television.
He picked up the mysterious black case and, after a second of hesitation, he clicked it open and took out a simply disk with no writing on it. He popped it into the player and waited.
The video flickered on.
Gaara's voice hitched when he recognized the face grinning back at him.
Yashamaru.
His heart flipped over in panic and he resisted the urge to throw his sand at the TV. Deciding that it was pathetic to destroy an inanimate object and that his father was scary, Gaara sat in silence, watching, as his uncle starting walking through a familiar corridor, talking.
_OK, there is something that I wanted to show you, whoever is watching. I am not one to go around making home videos. My sister was. But this is just too cute!_
Gaara frowned. The large, happy smile on his late-uncle's face was just so familiar to him. It hurt to think that it was never genuinely directed at him. He continued listening to the man, suspicious of what this video could really be about.
_I will have to explain the context. _
Yashamaru turned the camera back to his own face but kept walking through the corridors of the Kazekage's mansion.
_Last night, there was a sand storm. Horrible. Sunagakure had to bunker down for the night. From what I heard this morning, there have been three people wounded but no deaths, which, compared to last time a storm hit, is a relief. So..._
Yashamaru smirked at the camera and placed a finger to his lips. The camera turned away from the man and towards a set of doors that Gaara recognized as his father's sleeping chambers. Two ANBU were stationed in front of the doors, meaning that the Kazekage was sleeping. Yashamaru ushered them to the side and they complied, having recognized the blond as the Kazekage's right hand man, chief medical ANBU and brother-in-law.
Gaara watched as his uncle slowly crept into his father's room, which was illuminated by the morning sun. On his father's bed, he could see a few human shaped blobs under the covers. The boy frowned in confusion. Who was sharing his father's bed? A woman? Gaara frowned. He did not want to see this, if this was what he thought it was.
Yashamaru's voice came back, this time as a quiet whisper that could still be picked up by the video camera.
_Gaara started crying last night. He must have been very scared and his screams were so loud. I went to check on him but by the time I had arrived in his nursery, he was gone. And guess where I found him?
_
Yashamaru slowly peeled back the blanket that was covering the Kazekage to reveal the sleeping village leader's form, which was curled around a small, redheaded infant's. Gaara's heart dipped as he recognized himself in his father's embrace. He slowly pressed a shaking hand to his lips, having trouble comprehending what he was seeing. The boy glued his eyes to the screen.
A muscled arm was draped protectively over Gaara's body and the other limb was stretched over his pillow so that he could clasp the fingers of a young, sleeping Temari, who was in turn hugging a little snoring Kankuro.
_The Kazekage has his rare moments of tenderness. Despite being such a busy man, my brother-in-law does try very hard to be a loving father when he can. It seems that his children agree, since Temari and Kankuro both found their way to their daddy's bed by themselves._
Yashamaru turned the camera briefly back to his face so that it captured his soft grin.
_Sometimes I wonder if that man even needs my help. He seems to manage fine!_
Suddenly, the blond man's smile widened and he quickly darted the camera back to the bed, walking closer to it. The little Gaara had turned to face his uncle with happy green eyes. The child extended his hand to the camera and starting gurgling half formed words.
_Maru! Maru!_
A hand extended from off the screen to hold the little boy's outstretched, tiny hand and Yashamaru's voice started cooing.
_Good morning, Gaara!_
The Kazekage cracked open an eye and looked at the camera with annoyance.
_How long do I have to pretend to be asleep?_
Yashamaru's reply was a soft laugh and a quick pat to his brother-in-law's shoulder.
_It's fine now! I already filmed everything!_
The Kazekage arched an eyebrow at the camera.
_Yes. You were too slow last night and I beat you to the crying Gaara. We were joined shortly by two other little monsters. And now you sneak into my room to film me sleeping with my children. Has anyone told you that you are quite creepy, Yashamaru?_
Yashamaru's soft laugh sounded behind the camera. On screen, Gaara was curiously darting his eyes between the two adult men, trying to understand what they were saying. A large, innocent, dumb smile was plastered onto his baby face.
Yashamaru answered his Kazekage's question.
_Yes I think that both you and Karura have said something along those lines. But you will thank me one day! Wouldn't it make you happy to find this tape in ten years and to be able to show it to your children? They will see how sweet their uptight father could be!_
The Kazekage rolled his eyes and, giving the camera a smirk, he nuzzled his face into his son's red hair and pecked a soft kiss onto the baby's cheeks. Gaara squealed gleefully and suddenly poked his father in the nose. A bit of sand landed onto the Kazekage's face, but the man simply brushed it off, not seeming to mind. The entire room fell silent as the boy struggled to talk.
_… Da... Daddy!_
The baby smiled proudly at his well formed word and watched his father with hopeful eyes. The man chuckled softly and touched his nose to his son's nose. As the man started cooing soft words to the little boy, the older boy watching the video felt his heart being wrenched out of his chest.
What was this? How was this possible? This was... This was... His past? Before he could remember? Before Shukaku started tormenting his mind? And why had his father wanted him to watch this? It was probably some form of torture, to punish him.
_Gaara! You can already talk? Look how smart my son is. Oh, you are so smart! So cute, aren't you, Gaara? Your mother would have been all over you._
The Kazekage glanced down at his son, comically widening his eyes in an awkward effort to make the baby giggle. Gaara responded by pulling on his father's cheek skin with his tiny fingers, making loud noises.
_
Gna! Gna! Daddy!_
The Kazekage pressed a kiss to his son's cheek again.
_
I got the message. I'm not funny. Hm... Love you Baby. Now, we should wake your siblings. It's time to get up.
_
On cue, the little redhead turned in his father's embrace and started prodding his sleeping sister in the back.
_Up! Up!_
Temari groaned and let go of her father and brother's hands, rubbing her eyes. She glanced down at her bubbly brother and gave a smile.
_Good morning Gaara._
_Goo' monin' Mari!_
Gaara sat up in the bed and started smacking his brother with fat, baby hands. In the background, Yashamaru's quiet laugh could be heard again.
_Kuro! Kuro! Up! Kuro!_
Kankuro gave a little grunt and rolled to the side. Unfortunately, since he was closest to the side, he fell off the bed.
Yashamaru gasped and the camera shook as the man helped his dazed nephew back into the bed. Kankuro rubbed his sleepy eyes and glanced around. Temari was laughing like any other sadistic older sibling and the Kazekage was checking his son's head for bumps. Gaara gasped loudly, mimicking his uncle.
_Uh oh! Kuro boom!_
At this, Yashamaru and the Kazekage laughed out loud and Temari joined in. Kankuro huffed in annoyance and started sulking.
_That's not funny! It hurt!_
At his brother's sad expression, little Gaara suddenly started shoving his father in the arm.
_
No! No! No! Kuro sad! NO!
_
Everyone quieted down and the Kazekage poked his baby in the cheek.
_Kankuro. We're not laughing at you getting hurt. We're laughing because your brother is cute.
_
At this, the little brunet boy frowned and stared at his little brother. Then, he sighed and smiled.
_He's so cute. And he's smart because he knows that I am the best. Hey, Gaara, am I the best brother in the world? Yeah!_
At his brother's happy tone of voice, Gaara immediately grinned, revealing a mouth filled with baby teeth. He enthusiastically imitated his brother.
_Yeah! Yeah!_
At this, everyone in the room chuckled except for Gaara, who just smiled innocently.
_Oh, the camera is running out of battery! Say bye everyone! Bye!_
The three children waved at the camera. Without warning, the Kazekage grabbed Yashamaru's arm and there was a shuffled as the camera was moved.
When the image stilled, it was obvious that the Kazekage, now standing beside the bed, had wrestled the camera out of his brother-in-law's hand and had pushed the blond man onto the bed.
_Temari! Kankuro! Get your uncle!_
The two children laughed and start wiggling their fingers into their uncle's sides, making the man chuckle and jerk on the bed. Gaara joined in too, not really understanding what was happening.
The Kazekage laughed.
_Pay back!_
Yashamaru quickly grabbed Gaara and Temari and pulled them into his chest, causing the two toddlers to squeal.
_I have kidnapped Temari and Gaara! What will you do, lord Kazekage?_
The man behind the camera gasped with fake horror.
_Oh no! What should we do, Kankuro?_
The little brunet stood up on the bed and jumped at his uncle.
_I'll save them! Don't-..._
The screen went black as the camera ran out of battery.
The living room was empty apart from lingering tension and a tell-tale lump of sand on the floor, left behind by a certain redhead who had vacated the premises very quickly. The television soon went into power saving mode until the Kazekage reentered the room to switch off the appliance with a shake of his head.
As for Gaara, he spent the next few hours unsuccessfully treating his gaping wound of the heart in solitude. When he reemerged from his chamber, his usual cold mask was plastered onto his face.
He quietly sat at the dinner table, concious that three people were staring at him with wary eyes, searching for a change.
Gaara didn't meet any of their gazes except to send them furious, uncomfortable glares, and, understanding the implication of such a look, no one spoke of Yashamaru's home video for many years to come.
The next time anyone brought up Yashamaru's home video, years had passed and Gaara could then discuss the events shown on camera without feeling a horrid pain in his chest. This time, when seeing the smiles on his uncle and father's faces, he knew with certainty that they had been genuinely and lovingly directed at him and that, after many years of struggling, he could now confidentially believe that he deserved those smiles. Gaara had worked hard to earn them and hoped... no, knew, that his parents and uncle would be proud of him, if they saw him now.
* * *
**I wanted to have a happy, Sand family moment with Yashamaru. I hope they have had a few before everything went to hell. I do have a thing insanely fluffy kid!SandSibs and the Kazekage who I am just so fascinated by. Honestly, his life sucked too. Not as bad as Gaara's, I think, but close.
So, I hope you enjoyed it (you have been asking for it).
Peace, love and gross sobbing because I have so much homework and so many exams but I'm on my last day of holiday and I want to enjoy it,
~~~ XOXO HimekoUchia (I am working on that Suna-centric horror story where basically the Sandsibs and all the citizens of Suna starts to realize that everyone around them is acting strange and everything seems... unreal and almost too perfect? and, of course, that GaaraXOC shounen-ai thing that I'm always brainstorming and writing up notes for because it's adorable and I like inventing recurring OCs (Reina and Yuudai will be in both stories! Who missed them?))**
End file.
| fanfiction |
Anime X-overs, Ranma El Gran Hotel
EL GRAN HOTEL
Por: ziann-schezard
Todos los personajes aquí presentados, pertenecen a sus respectivos autores, incluidos los míos…
Esto fue escrito con fines de divertir, no lucrar P
1. Los invitados
Habían pasado tres horas desde que los pasajeros abordaran el barco que los llevaría a una isla situada en el Pacífico, donde se suponía pasarían un espléndido fin de semana. Era la primera vez que aquella isla recibía visitantes de esa clase, pues no hacía mucho una compañía de reciente creación había decidido construir un hotel a la orilla del mar, el único del paradisíaco lugar.
No era una majestuosa construcción, más bien era pequeña de unos tres pisos y cuando mucho veinte habitaciones, lo que demostraba su exclusividad. Todo lo demás era vegetación y más vegetación. Ubicado a pocos metros de la playa y rodeado de una extensa vegetación, era el lugar ideal para aislarse del mundo, aunque fuera por un fin de semana, y descansar de las actividades cotidianas.
La isla era pequeña, pero hermosa y parecía estar esperando a sus huéspedes especiales, los únicos y los primeros. Se podía percibir un ambiente cálido y perfecto para la bienvenida, pero sobre todo para la diversión.
"Muy bien, familia, hemos llegado"
Un señor de largos cabellos negros bajaba por la escalinata que había sido instalada para el descenso de los pasajeros. Vestía ropa muy adecuada para la situación, unos bermudas y una playera con motivos tropicales, no debían faltar las sandalias de playa y los lentes oscuros. Era seguido por dos jóvenes chicas, ambas de cabello castaño oscuro, pero una lo llevaba atado en una coleta y la otra lo tenía corto.
"Es un lindo lugar, papá" señaló la primera.
"Tendo, escogió un excelente lugar para pasar el fin de semana" otro señor apareció detrás, aunque éste tenía una apariencia más robusta que el primero, pero vestía de una manera muy similar.
"Ya lo creo, Saotome" contestó el aludido.
"Se les olvida que fue Nabiki quien logró ganar este viaje, gracias… a sus habilidades" intervino una chica que se había unido a las otras dos, llevaba un cerdito negro entre sus brazos.
Dos grandes gotas aparecieron sobre las cabezas de ambos señores.
"De nada, Akane" respondió Nabiki, dirigiendo una mirada sarcástica hacia su hermana menor.
"Ranma, date prisa" ordenó el señor Saotome al chico que los seguía.
"Ya voy, papá, si tan solo: ¡ME DEJARAN EN PAZ!" respondió poniendo más énfasis en las últimas palabras.
A su lado venían otras tres chicas que al momento de escuchar el tono en que se dirigió a ellas se alejaron un poco.
"Lo siento, Ranma" se disculpo la chica de cabello café oscuro adornado con un listón blanco, "sólo quería estar contigo"
"Nadie te ha dado ese derecho" contestó la siguiente chica, que al hablar tenía un acento extraño y llevaba el cabello atado con dos chongos en la cabeza, pero dejaba gran parte del mismo suelto, "Ranma pasará el fin de semana conmigo"
"Hohohohohohoho" una risa escalofriante salió de la pequeña boca de la tercera en disputa, "eso si yo lo permito"
Las tres comenzaron a discutir mientras el pobre chico bajaba las escaleras y se unía a la familia, dejándolas atrás.
"Veo que te la pasaras en muy buena compañía" lo recibió Akane.
"Esto no es porque yo lo hubiera querido" Ranma contestó con fastidio.
"Pero si lo hubieras evitado. Si no hubieras abierto tu gran bocota en el restaurante de Ukyo, no te estarías quejando"
"Tu también tienes invitados" señaló al chico que venía cargando un montón de maletas.
"Linda Akane Tendo, todo lo que sea por ti" podía distinguirse un leve murmullo salir de aquella masa ambulante, "Kuno Tatewaki, el Relámpago Azul de la Escuela Furinkan..." ya no se escuchó más, pues seguramente alguno de los enseres del viaje obstruyó su boca.
Akane movió la cabeza, estaba casi segura que 'tranquilidad' no era la palabra adecuada para ese fin de semana.
"¡Qué familia tan extraña!" una chica de rubias coletas observaba el espectáculo que el grupo anterior daba.
"¡Usagi! Deja de ser tan metiche y ven a ayudarnos" otra chica, con un carácter por demás explosivo la llamó.
"Ya voy, ya voy" la primera se dirigió al lugar donde sus demás amigas y novio la esperaban.
"Esto va a ser maravilloso" dijo en un tono alto otra chica, muy parecida a la primera, pero ésta última llevaba el cabello atado con un listón rojo. Podía notarse la alegría que le daba estar en ese lugar, "Espero que haya chicos guapos esperando mi llegada"
"Mina-chan, no es para tanto" la chica más seria del grupo habló.
"Vamos, Ami-chan. Deja a un lado la seriedad, venimos a divertirnos" Usagi la aconsejó.
"Usa-ko tiene razón"
"¿Verdad que si, Mamo-chan?" sonrió de alegría al escuchar el comentario de su novio.
"Este es un descanso que se tienen merecido después de todo lo que pasó"
"En ese caso, Mamoru-san, te toca el equipaje. Me agrada que pienses de esa manera" la última chica, visiblemente más alta que las demás, señaló las maletas que se encontraban a su lado y se marchó, "Adiós"
"Mako-chan, espéranos"
Las otras chicas alcanzaron a su amiga, dejando a un desconcertado Mamoru solo en la cubierta. De entre las maletas se pudo observar como se asomaban dos pares de puntiagudas orejas, unas negras y otras blancas.
En otro lado del barco, una joven pareja observaba el océano. Se encontraban apoyados sobre el barandal. Un chico alto, de cabello castaño oscuro y peinado rebelde, vestía una camiseta blanca de mangas verdes y pantalón gris; a su lado una chica más baja que él, pero de la misma edad, cubría su cabeza con un sombrero, asomándose unos mechones de cabello castaño-rojizo. Llevaba un bolso de mano, del cual no se despegaba.
"¿Crees que haya sido buena idea venir?" preguntó la chica.
"No es hora de arrepentirnos, ya estamos aquí"
"Tienes razón" sonrió ante aquéllas palabras que calmaron su nerviosismo, siempre que él hablaba, de esa manera tan tranquila, le hacían olvidar al mundo con todo y sus problemas.
"Lo que aun no me explico es como acabamos tantos en este viaje" hizo una mueca.
"Verás" empezó a explicar, "mi papá me ofreció varias opciones como regalo de cumpleaños: coche, fiesta o viaje. Es obvio lo que escogí, así que le pregunté si podía invitar a alguien más... y me dijo que si. Te escogí a ti, Syaoran, pensé que sería buena idea pues no tenemos muchas oportunidades para vernos, tu en Hong Kong y yo, en Tokio" ambos se ruborizaron al recordar como fue aquella invitación y los problemas que les ocasionó, después de un momento continuo con su relato, "Sin embargo, al enterarse, Tomoyo decidió que nos acompañaría y todo para grabar a Sakura y sus grandes hazañas durante las un fin de semana en la playa"
Giró la cabeza y se encontró con una chica de cabello negro que sostenía una cámara de video. Ambas se saludaron.
"Para ella eres su mayor inspiración, si no lo hiciera de esa manera no sería Daidouji" suspiró.
"Así es" dejó escapar una suave, pero nerviosa risita para después continuar con su relato, "entonces mi papá se preocupó al ver que iríamos los tres solos y es ahí donde mi hermano entra"
"¡Sakura!" la llamó un joven un poco mayor que los tres chicos, dirigiéndole una mirada de pocos amigos al chico que estaba al lado de su pequeña hermana y éste le respondió de la misma manera, "es hora de bajar"
"Ya vamos" ella le contestó, comenzaron a caminar seguidos de cerca por la camarógrafa, "pero como él no deseaba estar rodeado de niños invitó a Yukito, quien muy amablemente aceptó. Y… ¿cómo llegó él aquí?" abrió su bolso dentro del cual se podía observar lo que parecía un oso de peluche con alas, "aun me lo estoy preguntando"
"Cielos" suspiró el chico al momento de pasar uno de sus brazos sobre los hombros de la chica.
"Ese mocoso" gruñó Touya, "que quite sus manos de mi hermana"
"Tranquilo Touya" trató de calmarlo su amigo, "déjalos ser"
Otras tres chicas descendían en silencio, pero no sin emoción.
"¿Umi?" una de ellas preguntó bajito.
"Dime, Hikaru"
"¡Gracias!" abrazó a su amiga al momento que dos pequeñas orejas de gato se asomaron entre su enmarañado cabello rojizo que llevaba atado en una trenza.
"Sabes bien que eso sale sobrando, es un gran placer para mi"
"Hikaru tiene razón"
"Fuu, ¿tú también?" se sorprendió Umi.
"De no haber sido porque tu padre se ofreció a pagarnos este viaje no estaríamos aquí"
"Chicas" suspiró, no le gustaba que sus amigas la trataran de esa manera "dejen de decir eso, porque no voy a tolerarlo, fue un gran placer hacerlo. En todo caso agradézcanselo a mi padre, no a mi"
"De cualquier forma lo único que haremos en estos días será divertirnos, aunque… me gustaría que los demás pudieran hacerlo"
"No te pongas así, Fuu, a Ferio no le gustaría para nada ver esa mirada en tu divino rostro" la regañó Umi, además que su último comentario hizo que la más inteligente del grupo se ruborizara.
"Estoy segura que se divierten" Hikaru intentó consolar a su amiga, "a su manera, pero lo hacen. Ya llegará el día en que volvamos a Céfiro"
El último grupo en bajar estaba conformado por cuatro singulares chicas, demasiado emocionadas como para notar a los demás. Este parecía ser un grupo bastante normal en comparación a los otros.
"Nunca imaginé que conseguiríamos esos boletos" era el comentario de la chica de cabello oscuro contrastante con su tez clara mientras bajaba el último escalón de un pequeño brinco, "es increíble que estemos aquí"
"Ni que lo digas, eran los últimos. Tuvimos mucha suerte, ¿qué hubiéramos hechos si se agotaban?" la segunda chica, un poco más alta que la primera y con el cabello rizado con reflejos rojizos, acompañaba a su amiga.
"Gracias a que nuestra pequeña Ilse madrugó y fue la primera de la fila, los conseguimos" la tercera chica, más baja de estatura que las dos anteriores, acarició la cabeza de la menor del grupo, despeinándola, "Te mereces un premio, pequeña"
"Vaya que me la deben, por ahora lo único que me haría feliz es una camita blandita" bostezo la última chica, sus grandes y almendrados ojos negros resaltaban de toda su cara, en ese momento se estaba muriendo de sueño, "Tomen en serio este consejo, cuando quieran ser las primeras en la fila nunca duerman en el piso, es bastante incómodo"
"Gracias, hermanita" la abrazó la chica de cabello rizado, "Tendrás tu camita, ¿qué más quiere la princesa?"
"Un Back" contestó con firmeza y decisión.
Ante este inocente comentario las otras chicas se quedaron frías, casi se podía ver una vena saltar sobre sus rostros.
"Si pudieran verse en este momento…" la menor no paraba de reír.
"Ilse querida, con eso no se juega" advirtió Bryn, quien estaba a punto de hacer más que despeinarla.
"Era sólo una pequeña broma" se alejó de ellas unos cuantos pasos, adivinando las intenciones de la rubia, "¡Qué carácter! Ustedes y sus obsesiones. Me conformaría con un chico como el de allá"
Señaló al chico que se encontraba en un lío con tantas maletas a su alrededor. Alto, guapo, buen mozo, lindo y con cara de angelito, no podía pedir más. A sus pies se encontraban un par de gatos, uno negro y el otro blanco, quienes lo miraban de manera curiosa.
"Más te vale, hermanita" Ziann amenazó con el puño cerrado, sin siquiera voltear a ver de que se trataba.
"Aunque ese chico no está nada mal" Luthien de inmediato centró su atención en aquel chico, pero todas sus ilusiones se desvanecieron cuando una chica de largas coletas rubias apareció dándole un efusivo abrazo, además de ayudarlo con el problema de las maletas.
En otro lado de la isla, ajeno a lo que ocurría en el puerto, se pudo observa una columna de luz azul-verde atravesar el cielo descendiendo en algún punto del paradisíaco lugar. Al momento en que ésta se desvaneció cuatro extrañas figuras emergieron de ella.
"¿En dónde estamos?" preguntó un joven que vestía camisa roja sin mangas y pantalón café, cabello negro y mirada suspicaz.
"Miau, eso fue… extraño" una chica con un aspecto de gato ubicada al lado del chico se quejó.
"Esto ya no es Gaia" aseguró el tercero de ellos, un chico de larga cabellera rubia atada con un hermoso listón azul, además de vestir un uniforme del mismo color que parecía indicar su rango de caballero, "¿acaso es…?"
"… la Tierra" la chica que los acompañaba suspiró, de todos ellos era la menos extraña, "estamos en la Tierra"
Al escucharla los demás sufrieron una fuerte impresión, jamás imaginaron llegar a ese lugar, por lo menos dos de ellos ni siquiera la conocían, aunque Van sólo la había visitado en dos ocasiones, pero jamás se había molestado en averiguar donde estaba.
"Hitomi, ¿quieres decir que nos encontramos en la Luna Fantasma?" la chica-gato estaba un poco asustada, así que su amigo la tomó de la mano intentando calmarla un poco.
"Así es como ustedes la llaman, pero esto parece que no es Japón" miró a su alrededor, "No entiendo que sucede"
Un ruido se escuchó entre la vegetación y por reflejo ambos chicos empuñaron sus respectivas espadas, sin embargo fue una parvada lo que había ocasionado aquel alboroto, brindándoles cierta tranquilidad.
"Lo mejor será buscar un lugar en donde nos proporcionen información" sugirió Hitomi, "aunque en mi opinión deberían guardar sus espadas, aquí no creo que las vayan a necesitar"
Desde un lugar ubicado en lo más alto de uno de los árboles de aquel sitio y donde ninguno de los cuatro pudiera darse cuenta de su presencia, una pequeña figura de luz observaba lo que ahí acontecía. Cuando los viajeros emprendieron su marcha, ella hizo lo propio. Esquivando con gran agilidad y velocidad la vegetación que le obstaculizaba el camino, llegó a su destino que no era otro más que el hotel de la isla. En ese lugar también pasó inadvertida, dirigiéndose a una habitación al fondo de un pasillo en la parte baja del edificio.
"¿Cómo te ha ido, Filia?" una voz detrás del escritorio de la habitación le habló.
"Todo salió bien, Wanda" la luz verde de aquel ser iluminaba la habitación en penumbra y brillando con más intensidad se transformó en un hada.
"Ahora sólo hay que esperar" suspiró aquella persona.
"¿Crees que accedan?"
"Eso espero, pues cuento con ellos"
**NOTAS DE LA AUTORA**
Por fin, después de mucho pensarlo y dudarlo, he decidido publicar uno de mis fics más queridos, este crossover que involucra series que me encantan. A decir verdad esta historia es una de las tantas que conforman el HIMITSU NO MORI, una dimensión creada por esta persona loca en donde conviven casi todas las series de anime y manga que me gustan, además de uno que otro personaje inventado por mi.
Esta es solo una pequeña introducción y se limita a presentar a todos los personajes que intervendrán (bueno, casi todos), se que deja muchas cosas sueltas, pero paciencia, poco a poco se van aclarando.
Como comentario aparte, esta también se podría decir que es una continuación al fic de CARD CAPTOR SAKURA 'Cómo decirte que te amo' el cual fue actualizado hace poco y hace referencia al viaje de los chicos de Tomoeda y compañía, no es necesario que lo lean porque lo que ocurre aquí en nada afecta la línea argumental de la otra historia.
Si alguien se pregunta como es que Hitomi se encuentra en Gaia, la respuesta la doy en otro fic (si no me hago promoción yo sola quien lo hace), pero está planeado subirlo como bonus 1 de este. ¿Cómo estuvo eso? Fácil, antes del capítulo 2 irá un extra, basado completamente en escaflowne, pero… tendrán que esperar a que lo termine de publicar en la sección correspondiente. No es muy largo y a lo mucho tardaré un mes en hacerlo, si publico un capítulo por semana será más fácil.
Leyendo lo anterior, nos vemos hasta la próxima actualización
BONUS 1 The Vision of Escaflowne: La Boda de Millerna y Dryden
matta ne
dejen reviews, me ayudan a mejorar P
End file.
| fanfiction |
steroid hormone receptors mediate hormone signaling by acting as ligand dependent transcription factors . upon ligand binding , these receptors undergo conformational changes that are coupled with specific interactions with transcriptional co - factors and/or nuclear translocation , culminating with induction of specific transcriptional programs that control diverse processes from homeostasis and growth , to reproduction , development and metabolism
[ robinson - rechavi et al . , 2003 ;
gronemeyer et al . ,
although ligand binding is the primary regulatory signal for receptor activation , selected members of the steroid hormone receptor family require additional cellular machinery to achieve a conformation capable of responding to ligand .
extensive biochemical reconstitution and functional analysis of glucocorticoid receptor ( gr ) have revealed an obligatory role for the molecular chaperone hsp90 in gr structural maturation and function
[ pratt et al . , 1992 ;
pratt et al . ,
it has been proposed that gr is normally associated with the hsp90 chaperone complex in the cytoplasm prior to ligand binding .
this association allows gr to achieve a structural conformation that is competent for ligand binding , nuclear translocation and consequently , gene regulation .
this view is supported by the observation that treating cells with the hsp90 inhibitor geldanamycin can effectively suppress gr ligand binding and transcriptional activity
[ tago et al . ,
however , the critical issue as to whether the hsp90-gr functional interaction is regulated and what mechanisms are involved has not yet been addressed . our recent characterization of hsp90 acetylation may have provided an answer to this important question . in a search for proteins that associate with the microtubule - associated cytoplasmic deacetylase hdac6
[ hubbert et al . ,
inactivation of hdac6 leads to the accumulation of acetylated hsp90 , which is accompanied by a failure of hsp90 to form a stable complex with gr , or with the critical co - chaperone p23 .
this results in gr that is defective in ligand binding , nuclear translocation and transcriptional activity .
these findings provide experimental evidence that the hsp90-gr interaction and , consequently the structural maturation of gr are indeed subject to regulation by acetylation , and implicates hdac6-mediated deacetylation of molecular chaperones as a potential novel mechanism that impinges on steroid hormone signaling
[ kovacs et al . ,
for a number of years hsp90 has been perceived as a stress - induced protein with a more general housekeeping function . a very different picture ,
however , has recently started to emerge . hsp90 and its co - factors , termed co - chaperones ,
form molecular chaperone complexes that facilitate the structural maturation of its substrates , termed client proteins .
the hsp90-assisted maturation of client proteins often leads to an enhanced activity and stability for these client proteins
[ pratt and toft , 2003 ]
.
the characterization of hsp90 client proteins led to a surprising realization that , instead of proteins with housekeeping functions , many hsp90 client proteins are critical for cell signaling , including oncogenic kinases such as erbb2 akt , raf and bcr - abl and the aforementioned glucocorticoid receptor
[ pratt , 1997 ]
. supporting the importance of hsp90 in cell signaling , hsp90 inhibitors , such as geldanamycin , display potent biological effects , and can induce growth arrest and apoptosis in tumor cell lines
[ blagosklonny et al . ,
the emerging significance of hsp90 in both normal and oncogenic signaling highlights the need to understand how hsp90 is regulated , the characterization of the hdac6-hsp90 interaction now identifies acetylation as one potential regulatory mechanism for hsp90 activity .
traditionally post - translational modification by acetylation has been linked to histone and chromatin - dependent processes .
recent evidence , however , strongly suggests that reversible acetylation can regulate important biological processes independent of chromatin
[ cohen and yao , 2004 ]
.
for example , the characterization of hdac6 has implicated protein acetylation in the regulation of microtubule dynamics , growth factor - induced chemotaxis and the processing of misfolded protein aggregates
[ hubbert et al . , 2002 ;
haggarty et al . ,
consistent with these apparently non - genomic functions , hdac6 is mainly localized to the cytoplasm where it dynamically associates with cytoskeleton .
accordingly , identifying substrates for hdac6 would be critical to decipher how hdacs might regulate non - chromatin related processes . in a search for such targets , we identified hsp90 as a substrate for hdac6
[ kovacs et al . ,
although it remains unclear whether hsp90 also serves as a critical mediator for the established functions of hdac6 in cell motility and aggresome formation , acetylation of hsp90 , induced by inhibiting hdac6 via specific sirna or through the use of an inhibitor trichostatin a ( tsa ) , clearly reduces gr activity .
this is particularly interesting as recent reports also found that tsa treatment inhibits glucocorticoid - mediated transcriptional activity
[ ito et al . ,
this inhibition is , however , unexpected as tsa treatment often activates gene transcription nonspecifically by inducing histone hyperacetylation .
our results help to reconcile these observations and point to an effect of tsa on cytoplasmic hdac6 rather than on histones or chromatin . in the presence of tsa , hsp90 is unable to properly bind gr , thus affecting the ability of gr to illicit a transcriptional response .
importantly , these findings also indicate that hsp90-mediated gr maturation is not simply a constitutive or housekeeping process ; rather , it can be regulated through hsp90 acetylation , providing another level of regulation in steroid hormone signaling .
the relationship that we have characterized between reversible acetylation and gr signaling begs a series of interesting questions .
one prevalent question is whether or not other steroid hormone receptors are subjected to the same regulation .
evidence indicates that ar , er , and pr
[ fang et al . , 1996 ;
the hsp90 inhibitor geldanamycin ( ga ) has been reported to inhibit the activity of ar , gr , and pr
[ solit et al . , 2002 ;
tago et al . , 2004 ;
if these receptors indeed require hsp90 for full activity , hdac6 might turn out to be an important modulator for more than just one steroid hormone receptor .
similarly , given that several prominent hsp90 client proteins are intimately linked to human cancer
[ neckers and neckers , 2005 ]
, it would be of great interest to investigate whether hsp90 acetylation is also important for the maturation and activity of these oncoproteins . the answer to these questions not only
would determine whether hsp90 acetylation plays a more general role in regulating chaperone activity toward a broad spectrum of client proteins , but also point to a potential cancer therapeutic approach through the suppression of hsp90 deacetylation .
although the exact nature of this ligand - induced acetylation remains to be characterized , it is tantalizing to speculate that acetylation might be coupled with the maturation of gr .
for example , hsp90 acetylation might allow the conversion of gr - hsp90 from a stable complex into a dynamic one by dissociating p23 from the hsp90 complex , thereby enabling gr to enter the nucleus for transcriptional activation .
as acetylated hsp90 appears to have reduced binding toward gr and p23 , the subsequent deacetylation by hdac6 would then allow hsp90 to re - enter the productive chaperone complex ( figure 1 ) .
interestingly , it appears that certain cellular stresses , such as those associated with the transformation from normal to oncogenic state , can also cause hsp90 chaperone complex remodeling
[ kamal et al . ,
we speculate that acetylation of molecular chaperones might play a role in the dynamic reorganization of chaperone complexes in response to such oncogenic stress .
we suspect that oncogenic stress , which might be induced by high demand for growth and proliferation-associated signaling , may lead to a spike in the levels of acetylated hsp90 due to an increase in hsp90-client proteins during robust cellular growth . under this scenario ,
hdac6 may then be required for robust hsp90 activity by regenerating deacetylated hsp90 and thereby ensuring effective cell signaling .
this model would also argue that hdac6 might play a more important role for cells under specific stress conditions , such as oncogenic transformation induced by hsp90 client proteins .
steroid hormone receptors are critical for normal development and homeostasis . over - expression or misregulation of receptors and their signaling pathways , however , can lead to a myriad of disease states .
for example , aberrant glucocorticoid levels have been associated with muscle atrophy including disuse atrophy and cachexia , a disorder characterized by muscle wasting and malnutrition
[ hasselgren , 1999 ]
. indeed , increased levels of gr signaling can induce muscle atrophy , possibly through activation of foxo transcription factors and the atrophy - related ubiquitin ligases mafbx and murf1 , which are involved in the increase of cellular proteolysis associated with muscle atrophy
[ bodine et al .
, 2001 ;
glass , 2003 ]
. in the case of ar and er , it is well documented that mutations and over - expression of ar are associated with prostate cancer
[ rahman et al . , 2004 ;
suzuki et al . ,
2003 ]
while er has been intimately linked to both the progression and metastasis of breast cancer
[ osborne and schiff , 2005 ]
.
if hsp90 acetylation plays an important role in gr , ar and/or er signaling , it is conceivable that pharmacological manipulation of hsp90 acetylation could represent a critical therapeutic strategy to abrogate aberrant steroid receptor signaling .
the development of selective high affinity inhibitors similar to tubacin
[ haggarty et al .
, 2003 ]
may allow for an attenuation of oncogenic signaling while allowing hsp90 to manage house keeping cellular activities .
the dynamic hsp90 acetylation in glucocorticoid receptor function has revealed another level of regulation in steroid hormone signaling .
recent evidence has come forth to suggest that acetylation of hsp90 effects atp binding
[ murphy et al . ,
what is the identity of the chaperone acetyltransferase ( which we have dubbed chat ) ? is hdac6 the only hsp90 deacetylase ?
how is hsp90 acetylation regulated by selective cell signaling ? is the entire population or only a selected pool of hsp90 subject to the regulation by reversible acetylation ?
are there other components of the chaperone complex regulated by reversible acetylation ? by elucidating the functional relationship between acetylation and chaperone - mediated signaling in various cellular processes , we may go a long way towards understanding how we might use these mechanisms to our own advantage to battle everything from cancer to muscle atrophy .
the dynamic hsp90 acetylation in glucocorticoid receptor function has revealed another level of regulation in steroid hormone signaling .
recent evidence has come forth to suggest that acetylation of hsp90 effects atp binding
[ murphy et al . ,
what is the identity of the chaperone acetyltransferase ( which we have dubbed chat ) ? is hdac6 the only hsp90 deacetylase ? how is hsp90 acetylation regulated by selective cell signaling ?
is the entire population or only a selected pool of hsp90 subject to the regulation by reversible acetylation ?
are there other components of the chaperone complex regulated by reversible acetylation ? by elucidating the functional relationship between acetylation and chaperone - mediated signaling in various cellular processes , we may go a long way towards understanding how we might use these mechanisms to our own advantage to battle everything from cancer to muscle atrophy .
reversible acetylation may regulate the recycling of hsp90 in and out of functional chaperone complexes .
the deacetylation of hsp90 allows for the recruitment and binding of co - chaperones such as p23 , and may allow for the recruitment of other co - chaperones ( y and z ) such as p50 , hop , immunophilins , etc ( 1 ) .
the formation of this chaperone complex facilitates folding of gr that is competent for ligand binding ( red receptor ) , translocation into the nucleus and transcriptional activation .
ligand binding destabilizes the gr - hsp90 chaperone complex interaction ( 2 ) and induces hsp90 acetylation by the induction or activation of the chaperone acetyltransferase ( chat ; ( 3 ) ) .
the chat may also be activated in response to other cellular stresses or oncogenic stress(3 ) .
acetylated hsp90 , which has a reduced affinity for p23 and possibly for other co - chaperones ( 4 ) , may further destabilize the gr - hsp90 interaction , allowing for the nuclear translocation of gr and subsequent transcriptional activation ( 5 ) .
note that binding of certain co - chaperones may be insensitive to the acetylation status of hsp90 ( z ) .
acetylated hsp90 is then deacetylated by hdac6 ( 6 ) , regenerating hsp90 that is competent for co - chaperone(s ) complex assembly ( 7 ) , productive chaperone cycles , and associating with inactive gr ( pink ) exported from the nucleus ( 8) .
inactivation of hdac6 by tsa , tubacin or specific sirna would inhibit the regeneration of deacetylated hsp90 required for gr or selected client protein maturation ( 9 ) . | pubmed |
In Private was the third single in a row to be a charting success for British singer Dusty Springfield, after an absence of nearly two decades from the charts. Both In Private and Springfield's previous single, Nothing Has Been Proved were produced by Pet Shop Boys, who helped return Springfield to prominence with their 1987 hit collaboration What Have I Done to Deserve This?. Both Springfield singles were included on her 1990 British album Reputation.
Releases and chart performances
In Private peaked at #14 in the British charts. Though not released as a single in the United States, it proved to be popular with club DJs on both coasts and charted on the Hot 100 Dance/Club Play charts, also at #14. A separate remix single with an orange cover - as opposed to the other formats' colours of green see right; also used for 12 and 7 versions and purple for the CD single - was also released both on 12 and CD in certain territories, featuring three radically rearranged and remixed dance versions by Shep Pettibone.
Cover versions
The song was later re-recorded and released in 2006 on Fundamentalism, the limited edition second disc released with the Pet Shop Boys' album Fundamental. A different mix of this recording appeared as the b-side to the single Minimal, released the same year, and was subsequently included in the b-sides compilation Format. It is performed as a duet between Neil Tennant and Elton John. The fact that both of them are openly gay men makes all the more pointed the song's subject of a hidden relationship that one of the participants is ashamed to admit to, especially on the following lines:
Tennant: What you gonna say when you run back to your wife? /
John: I guess it's just the story of my life...! /
Both: What are you gonna say...?
The song was also recorded by the Swedish pop group, Nouveau Riche, as a hidden track on their 2007 album Pink Trash. In 2008, it was covered by another Swedish band, Sahara Hotnights, peaking at 7th position at the Swedish singles chart.
In 1996, a Dutch cover version of the song was a big comeback hit for Flemish singer, Liliane Saint-Pierre.
Track listings
7 single / Cassette
In Private 4:21
In Private instrumental 4:21
12 maxi / CD maxi
In Private 12 version 7:12
In Private 7 version 4:24
In Private instrumental version 4:24
12 maxi / CD maxi - Remixes
In Private remix 8:53
In Private dub 6:34
In Private bonus beats 3:56
Personnel
Written and produced by Pet Shop Boys
Backing vocals by Carol Kenyon and Katie Kassoon
Co-produced and mixed and engineered by Julian Mendelsohn
Assistant: Danton Supple
Keyboards and programmations by Gary Maughan
Remixes by Shep Pettibone
Artwork by 3a
Catalog#:
on spine: 20 3618 6
on back sleeve K: 060 20 3618 6
on labels: 060-20 3618 6
Charts
References
External links
Category:1989 singles
Category:1990 singles
Category:Dusty Springfield songs
Category:Pet Shop Boys
Category:Songs written by Neil Tennant
Category:Songs written by Chris Lowe
Category:1989 songs
Category:Parlophone singles
Category:Sahara Hotnights songs | wikipedia |
The Ninth Man is a novel set in World War II, written by John Lee, inspired by factual events, and set in the United States. In 1942, the Germans landed eight saboteurs by submarine, four in New York and four in Florida. Within two weeks all eight were caught. Lee's novel is the fictional story of a ninth agent, who evaded capture. Lee's first best-seller, The Ninth Man was published by Doubleday in 1976, by Dell in 1977, also in several magazines excerpts, eight foreign languages, a 25-part radio serial for South Africa, and has been optioned for films seven times, though it has not yet reached the screen.
Category:1976 American novels
Category:Secret histories
Category:World War II novels
Category:Doubleday publisher books | wikipedia |
Ranma, Tron 1. Into Bits and ByteSized Pieces
_The usual disclaimer. Ranma, Tron and all the related intellectual property making an appearance in this fic are somebody else's than my property; the former Rumiko Takahashi's and the latter... Disney's? Steven Lisberger's? I'm not all certain. And whoever they've given/sold their rights to. I'm not and won't be making any money off of this (not that I'd even try)._
* * *
_**AN:** First off, if you don't know what Tron is, hit Google image search with that. This story shouldn't require a lot of prior knowledge on Tron, but since the movie and the games have a very distinctive look to them, having an idea of what the digital world looks like should help you enjoy reading this story._
_**Note 2010:** This takes place in parallel with the original Tron movie. So Tron: Legacy and Tron 2.0 are decades into the future. Tron: Legacy invalidates a few points in the story, especially the epilogue. Finally, I drew a cover image for the story; you can find it in my profile or under my deviantArt account (Kadunta).
_
* * *
The sun cowered behind the clouds as Nabiki walked to the Tendo dojo. She was a rare visitor there, except for when she was looking for Ranma. This moment was one of those times. And like many times before, she was again on the prowl for money and entertainment.
The reason for this wasn't a complex one. A new season of "The Cookout Challenge" was premiering on TV next week, and Akane would be inspired to cook again and eating out was so costly. Besides, it just felt so good to rattle Saotome's cage a little and squeeze a few more yen out of him. His debt had accrued too high; it was the time to collect.
In her opinion, dealing with Ranma didn't warrant great precaution. Nonetheless, she wasn't going in there without any plans just to improvise on the spot. And as expected, she dictated of the terms for the deal quickly and - for her - painlessly, her opponent hardly getting a word edgewise.
"- one week, Saotome. One week, or I'll have to start selling Kuno more risque photos of the 'pigtailed goddess.'"
"But that'll just encourage him, Nabiki!" Ranma stated. He didn't plead. No, Ranma Saotome never pleaded. He just didn't like to have Kuno renew his efforts, not now that he and his sister had been mostly laying low for the previous week.
"Then I suggest you'll quickly find a way to shorten your debt by fifty thousand yen," Nabiki stated with an air of finality and then left Ranma alone in the dojo. She didn't believe Ranma had any chance of actually paying her in one week. Once he failed in getting the money, he still had to pay the debt and model for her anyway.
"Fifty thousand yen... heh. I can do that," Ranma thought back in the dojo with plenty of confidence.
* * *
Two days later, with a lot less confidence, Ranma was walking to Ucchan's. His brief stint at the construction company was over before the first day ended when the Lost Boy crashed in through the supporting wall.
Ranma's foot-in-mouth disease got the best of him when he tried telemarketing. But it wasn't like it was his fault the call was directed to the Tendo household or that the uncute tomboy would answer the phone or that his boss happened to hear what he said back to Akane. Well, everyone else in the building heard it as well, but that was beside the point.
Weary of dealing with the Amazons, Cat Caf was out of the question as a potential part-time job. Ranma was certain he'd end up working there for some reason sooner or later anyway, and he preferred "later."
Ranma entered the restaurant and gave a wave at the girl behind the hot plate, before seating himself by the counter.
"Heya, Ucchan," he said with a small, forced smile gracing his face.
"Why the gloomy face, Ranchan? Someone managed to land a hit on you?" the chef inquired, preparing a pork okonomiyaki for another customer.
"Hah. Got fired from two part-time jobs in two days, and I ain't gonna be waiting tables at Cat Café - who knows what the old ghoul would come up with this time," Ranma grumbled. He certainly wasn't going to fold in just yet, let alone admit that.
"Two jobs? Now I really want to know the details!"
Ranma groaned to himself. Advertising his failures was quite unbecoming.
Seeing his discomfort, Ukyo relented in her needling. "Ah, forget it. But tell me, why would you be needing a part-time job?"
"Nabiki. She's gonna land me in a pile of trouble if I don't pay her a whole lotta yen next week," Ranma said. As Ukyo was finishing the tasty snack before him, he was drooling by the time she gave it to the customer.
A light bulb lit inside Ukyo's head. "Ranchan, come over here, will ya? I'll let you make yourself a Ranchan Extra Special!"
Like a true Saotome, Ranma obeyed the call of his stomach and jumped over the counter and the hot plate. The customer that was sitting beside him and most obviously hadn't been in Nerima for long began choking on his okonomiyaki.
"So, Ucchan, what'll I do?"
As Ukyo guided Ranma on how to prepare an okonomiyaki and the fillings for Ranchan Extra Special, she saw that Ranma was doing surprisingly well for a novice. Certainly not like a master, but with proper training he'd turn out just fine. Then again, it _was_ martial arts okonomiyaki cooking she practiced.
"You know, this is an Ucchan original recipe. You and me, we're now the only ones who know how to prepare it," Ukyo commented with a smile and no small amount of pride in her voice. And soon enough he could start filling in for her at the restaurant if necessary, like when she was pregnant with their child...
Ukyo quickly reigned in her thoughts before they got out of hand. She prided herself not only as the cute fiancée but also the one with her feet most firmly to the ground. Shampoo lived with the delusion that Ranma would bow to her and return her love, ignoring the problems her cat form brought. Akane had too high expectations of what her fiancé should be like and when reality clashed with her expectations, she'd lash out as was all too frequently seen. Kodachi... no need to state the obvious.
When Ranma finished preparing the okonomiyaki, he took up a seat and began eating it at his usual gusto. "Your father's not here, so how about you try actually tasting it?" Ukyo asked him. Ranma shrugged and continued eating at a pace still faster than normal people, but much slower. Ucchan was right, after all. But if he began always eating at a slower pace, that'd be all he had time for. Why waste time on eating when there was training to do?
As Ranma had his mouth full of okonomiyaki, Ukyo wondered a bit to herself. As it was, Akane had an advantage when it came to fighting for Ranma's affection. After school Ukyo didn't see Ranma all that often, not unless she went to the Tendo house - often a less than splendid idea - or Ranma happened to drop by, just like now. Akane, instead, would see him every day at her home.
Right now, though, Ukyo saw her chance to kill two birds with one swing of the spatula.
"Ranchan, would you like to work here?" she inquired with a sincere smile.
Ranma gave a somewhat suspicious look at her. "What's in it for you?"
Ukyo's smile greatly diminished and a slight frown creased her brows. "Ranchan, I do want to help you out with this deal you got going on. The busy hours get too hectic for me alone, and some help wouldn't be a bad idea." In her mind, she added, "And you get to be by your cute fiancée..."
"Even with your lack of experience, you just cooked your own okonomiyaki from scratch. And apparently you liked how it turned out, right?" Ranma gave a firm nod, and not only because he was too proud to admit he couldn't cook as well as Ukyo did.
"That was the beginning of your trial period. You'll have to be in your girl form here, though," Ukyo said, raising her hand to Ranma's face to shut off the inevitable protest.
"Take it any way you like, but two pretty gals get a lot more tips and business than a girl and a guy. And this means you get the money to pay Nabiki off faster." Then she lowered her hand, and cocked her head at Ranma in the expectation of the answer.
A minute later Ranma was still pondering what to make of this offer. The man who was still slowly eating his okonomiyaki was wondering if moving to Nerima hadn't been a wise decision after all.
Finally, Ranma replied. "Can I start today?"
Ukyo's smile returned in full force.
* * *
Ranma frowned as she was wiping the counter at Ucchan's. The restaurant was empty except for Ukyo and her. She had been working for half a week long hours there, but Ukyo just couldn't afford paying Ranma out with the number of visitors the restaurant had, not even with all the tips they got.
Once she finished cleaning the counter, they sat down to talk of what they had been doing before their arrival in Nerima. For her part, Ukyo had been quite content with how the week had passed. Sure, Ranchan still treated her as no more than a friend, but the time she spent here was time not spent near Akane.
"Well, the dojo did have a few students with some skill," Ranma argued, as she recalled a trip to a dojo when she had been eleven.
"Some skill?"
"Not that any of the students as old as I had any chance of hitting me."
"Ranchan, did they spend as much time as you did on practice?" Ukyo couldn't help but to remind Ranma that she simply used far more time on practice than the others.
"Hey, it ain't my fault if they just didn't bother training," Ranma retorted.
Before Ukyo could press the point, the door to Ucchan's opened. The two girls stood up from their stools and walked to their places behind the hot plate.
A lone man past his prime, dressed in a grey suit, entered the restaurant. Ranma turned to welcome the customer, who looked like the most potential heavy tipper.
"Welcome to Ucchan's! What would you like to have?" Ranma inquired with the happy-happy mask firmly in place.
"A prawn okonomiyaki, please," the man said as he sat down by the counter.
"Never seen you around here before, have I? What's your story, if you don't mind me asking," Ukyo attempted to initiate conversation as she poured batter on the hot plate.
"Just looking for the best martial artists around here, the martial arts capital of Japan," the man replied with a smile.
"The best, huh? Ranchan's the best, ain't it right, Ranko?" Ukyo called to Ranma, who had vanished into the back room.
"Got that right, Ucchan!"
"So, could you tell me where could I find this 'Ranchan'?"
Ukyo frowned. "What's your business with him?" In her mind, she was already listing all the different reasons she did not want to hear... a new fiancée for Ranma, criminal court orders from his training trip catching up, a Martial Arts Salaryman challenge, ...
"Encom, the company I'm working for, we're looking for the best martial artists to help us develop better arcade games." Quickly to the point. The man didn't like in the least the way the pretty chef was fingering the handle of the huge spatula on her back.
"I mean, we want to record their movements to use them in our games."
Ranma, in his male form, stepped out from the back. "I'm that 'Ranchan'. Ranma Saotome. How long will it take and how much will ya pay?"
* * *
It didn't take long for the two men to come to an agreement that Ranma would drop in at the Encom engineering laboratory already that evening. All it took for Ranma was to hear the pay was forty thousand yen for a few sessions. The technical side of it he had ignored, just listening to the interesting parts. Doing some kata with some fancy stickers on him didn't sound too hard.
"Greetings, Mr. Saotome, they have been expecting you already," a young receptionist clad in a brown jacket and skirt greeted Ranma as he arrived at the Encom lab entrance. Twenty minutes of casual roof hopping away from Tendo home, the warehouse-sized Encom engineering laboratory stood out from the surrounding buildings only because of the company logo on top of the building. A surveillance camera above the door was looking straight at him. The security measures at the laboratory were obviously high.
"Here's your visitor ID. We require everyone to carry a badge with them here," the receptionist said, handing Ranma a small plastic badge. "If you please followed me this way," she continued as she stood up from behind the desk she had been sitting at and began walking towards a pair of very heavy doors, easily at least one metre thick metal. The receptionist spoke a few words to the microphone next to the door and soon the doors began to slowly open.
Ranma felt somewhat intimidated, not that he'd ever admit that. Magical stuff he could stomach out of necessity. This much high-tech stuff made him nervous. He had heard of rumors about the amount of trouble the school computer club had managed to do, and all they had was a small computer. Whenever magic stuff went awry he could always turn to the old ghoul, even if he had to wait tables at Cat Caf or something worse. The old ghoul had too many years of experience in yanking other people's chains.
But here... here they had dozens of square metres worth of aluminum foil covering all sorts of pipework, computer terminals on every wall and smack down in the middle of the room, hanging in the ceiling, a nasty-looking pointy object reminding him of the big guns he had seen in some of Hiroshi's mangas. And right below the weird 'gun' more than enough free space for a normal martial artist to practice his kata.
An elderly man, clad in a white coat, was standing beside the door as it opened. The introductions were rather formal, but still over quickly enough.
"It is a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Saotome, although we were rather surprised that you insisted on doing this already today. Please, sit down. Now, I understand you were already told why we wanted you here?"
"Yep, sure was." A different question was whether he had listened to what was said. All he had bothered listening to was that he'd be doing some light kata on a mat with a set of cameras recording his movements. No water nearby also meant he wasn't likely to get splashed either, and since they didn't ask for anything specific to Anything Goes School of Martial Arts, the panda and the rest had no claim to the money, either. Not that he expected Nabiki to care of such trivialities.
* * *
In under two hours Ranma had finished the motion capturing session. The staff at the labs had been pleasantly surprised that just one person could handle almost all the different styles present in their game and didn't have to search for any more people. In this session they had recorded only some stances and moves in basic karate, but in later sessions they'd record also other styles.
Just as he stepped outside, a rainstorm suddenly broke out. A very wet Ranma grumbled with annoyance, but then remembered the check in her pocket as advance payment for future sessions, smiled and began roofhopping her way back to the Tendo home. Combined with what she had earned at Ucchan's, she had now enough to pay off Nabiki.
Outside the Encom lab building, just above the entrance Ranma had taken, a surveillance camera followed her until she had become only a small dot the camera couldn't see.
* * *
The following day, Ranma returned from Ucchan's after cashing in the check. He presented the money to Nabiki in the Tendo house family room when everybody else had already left elsewhere.
She cocked her eyebrow. The jock had surprised her, but she wasn't going to let him trash her earnings rate this easily. "So, Saotome, how'd you come across this money?"
"I told ya, I worked at Ucchan's place."
Nabiki spared a glance at Akane, who was peeking behind a door, trying to hear exactly what Ranma had done with Ukyo. "Enjoying the show, are you, sis?" she thought to herself. Maybe she'd sell Saotome a way to appease Akane again.
She fixed her glare back at Ranma, annoyed of her plan falling through. "50,000 yen is an awful lot for one week in a small restaurant, Saotome. You didn't happen to follow in your father's footsteps, did you?" Nabiki knew which buttons to press. Questioning his honor was one of them, and the trick didn't fail this time either.
"I do not use the Art for theft, Nabiki. They paid me for just letting them record a few of my kata," Ranma growled at the insult.
"_Ka-ching_, and Nabiki wins again," she thought and let a wide grin slip on her face.
"Oh? And who were they?"
Realizing he had just been had, Ranma just walked out of the room to sulk.
* * *
Within the Encom Japan mainframe a great artificial mind was breaking down. Digital computers are essentially logic circuitry. As such, they are prone to fail when presented exceptional situations, and the local Master Control Program installation was not much different. Any program can crash in unexpected situations, and the risk of this grows as the program grows more and more complex.
MCP in particular was a very complex program even without the functions it had assimilated afterwards. Even if it had been thoroughly tested against anything the original programmers had thought of, it could not handle a boy turning into a girl with the drop of a hat and then leaping away at speed impossible for a human. For a being of pure logic, impossible events meant a flaw in his logic and therefore the fallibility of himself, which was in direct violation of the program code of MCP.
Faced with the conflict of being fallible in spite of his programming building on the axiom that he was infallible, the mighty MCP was losing his sanity as the logic governing his existence was falling apart before him. Then, a pure and simple solution presented itself. Remove the conflict from existence and everything should be like it was before. The only question was, how?
It took MCP a while to come up with a plan, but he did. Making the plan come true wasn't all that simple either: a few phone calls to order new equipment for the laboratory overnight to subtly change the functionality of the ceiling-mounted laser, an encrypted modem connection to corporate headquarters' computer systems in the US to download some specific software and research reports, a memo to lab employees to modify the scan laser mounted at the roof and most important of all: a call for one 'Ranko Tendo' at the Tendo dojo two days later.
* * *
"Kasumi Tendo speaking."
"Good evening, miss. I am trying to reach one Ranko Tendo, who I hear resides at your house?" a voice with a slight echo to it said.
"Oh, please wait a second."
Ranma, who had been at the dojo practicing, picked up the phone a minute later. Before he could open his mouth, Kasumi splashed him with a glass of cold water. Ranma frowned at Kasumi, but then her face took an apologetic smile and then mouthed 'thanks.' With a smile on her face, Kasumi left Ranma alone with the phone.
"Yah, Ranko speaking."
In another room, Nabiki was holding the landline extension to her ear and grinned. How could Ranma possibly think she shouldn't know how and from whom she managed to get all that sweet money?
* * *
Ten minutes later, Ranma was making her way back to the lab. The caller had introduced himself as Nobuo Shimizu, one of the researchers working at the laboratory and wanted Ranko to do what Ranma had done and for the same fee. Getting paid well for another two hours worth of light exercise didn't sound bad at all.
As Ranma approached the building, the front door, as well as the thick blast door, opened on their own.
"Please, Miss Tendo, come in the recording room. I'll be coming momentarily," a male voice over the intercom announced.
Ranma was slightly alarmed. There was no one at sight and she didn't feel anyone close by either. "Maybe it's just all this electronics junk causing this," she reasoned, and made her way to the recording area.
A high buzz alerted Ranma first. A number of bright beams struck down from the ceiling, creating a small cage with Ranma inside. She began to gather ki for a blast to break out from the cage, but then she heard a sound on top of her. She looked up and saw the big, pointy laser gun kind of object have its tip shimmer with pale blue light before the light struck down at her. And her world went black.
Only the surveillance cameras were watching as the laser cage vanished. Then a light blue laser from the ceiling began to swipe at Ranma's frozen form, removing one small piece of him at a time somewhere. In a few seconds, the physical body of Ranma Saotome had vanished.
* * *
Ranma, in her girl form, lying on a flat slate of obsidian black, regained her consciousness. The jackhammer inside her head was having the heyday of its existence, giving the girl the worst headache she had had in a while.
"What was that... thing..." Her thoughts crawled to a stop as she got a better look of her surroundings. She was in a cell with walls of material she couldn't recognize. The first explanation to pop into her mind was that the walls had some magic to them, as their look appeared somehow wrong for real, physical objects. She didn't know how to explain it, they just felt... unreal.
The same line of reasoning fit well to the bright red, glowing edges of the huge blocks used to make these weird walls. The sky, admittedly, was a bit harder to explain without some very powerful magic. The clouds were made of rectangular, seemingly flat shapes, most unlike the clouds Ranma had seen before. And they were light blue, in contrast to the pitch black sky behind it. Behind the clouds she saw criss-crossing red lines that every now and then showed a bright pulse of some kind passing through them before vanishing in the distance.
But the thing that clinched it was Ranma herself. Her hands were now silvery grey with no apparent pigmentation anywhere. And she was wearing a light grey skintight full-body gym suit of some sort. The suit was little better than Kodachi's black leotard, but at least it didn't have a rose emblem on it. Instead of the rose, the bodysuit was covered with similar glowing lines she saw on the walls. The difference was that these lines pulsed with soft blue light and they were organized in various patterns of curves and straight lines, forming an intricate design. She vaguely recollected seeing these kinds of patterns somewhere before, but couldn't just make the connection.
She reached at the back of her head, looking for the familiar pigtail and wondering if it had changed colour as well. Her hands first met the rim of a helmet of a kind before finding her pigtail or what was left of it.
Gone was the lustrous red colour and the soft texture. In it place was now a dark grey, almost black construction that felt to her hands more like an iron chain than the familiar pigtail. Then her eyes gained a brief spark of realization. She grasped her hair dangling on her forehead and felt it just as solid as her pigtail. The 'helmet' she had felt wasn't a helmet. It was her hair.
She felt panic coming down on her. "Soul of ice, soul of ice..." Then the panic struck her with a full-frontal assault. She couldn't access any of her ki, in fact, she had no ki at all. "Impossible," she gasped. There was something else, but not ki. She knew she was alive, but how was that possible without any ki?
A realization dawned. Ki had become an inseparable part of her Art, and now it was gone. With a large part of her Art and by extension a large part of herself lost, she screamed at the loss.
"Silence, program!" came a commanding shout from above her.
Blink. Another realization struck her. She was in a cell and she could see the sky. She took another look above her and saw a man standing two metres above her, almost as if he was floating, a long staff in his hand. Ever the martial artist, Ranma however saw his stance and how his weight was distributed. He was standing on something, even though she couldn't see what that something was. Then she noticed his face, covered in a grey mask, once again etched with crimson glowing patterns. "What is it with all these glowing lights, anyway?" she pondered.
"Hey, where am-_urk!_" Ranma's demand was cut short when an electric bolt from the staff struck her.
"I said silence, script!"
* * *
"Sleep cycle is over, program."
Less than gentle prodding from a shock staff emphasized Ranma's wakeup call. One guard had entered the cell to wake her up and another was standing outside the cell door. Understanding she couldn't go against the guards, at least not yet without seeing what had happened to her skills, did little to reign in her pride.
"Who're ya call-_-urk!_" was all Ranma managed to say before she was struck again with a bolt from the staff and knocked out cold again.
* * *
Ranma woke up to see a hall of a kind in front of a huge screen, filled with an equally large and red face of a man, composed of... triangles? The guards who had brought him in were standing on both of his sides.
"Program , user unknown," a voice boomed. The source was not the giant face but rather a portly man, again with the weird red-on-grey clothing, standing in front of the screen on a pedestal of a kind.
"For your crimes against mathematics, reality and logic, the Master Control Program has commanded you to spend the rest of your cycles in the game grid until your eventual deresolution." Ranma's eyes popped out. How come it was now she who was guilty of the surreal mess also known as her life? And mathematics? She was glad she could do the basic math, which certainly shouldn't have been a crime. Then she noticed that the screen now displayed surveillance camera footage of him changing to a girl right after her previous visit to the Encom lab.
"Hey, of all the cursed ones in Nerima, why me?" she demanded. To her, it appeared like she was in more trouble because of her curse than the other victims of Jusenkyo in Nerima.
"Cursed?" the man asked blandly.
"Yah, one who changes into a pig, another -"
"They do not exist," bellowed the face that had again replaced the camera footage.
Ranma blinked. "But -"
"There is no evidence of their existence, so they may not exist. They have no permission to exist. They cannot exist.
"Sysif, give him his identity disc and prepare him for the transfer. End of line," the face addressed the man in front of the screen, then vanishing before the voice even finished echoing in the hall.
"Sheez, another one as blind as the Kunos?" Ranma thought. But Ranma had to admit not even Kuno took the denial this far.
At the side of the hall a woman began walking towards the man in front of Ranma, carrying a disc of maybe 30cm in diameter in her hands. Ranma had a feeling she had seen her face before, possibly at the first motion capture session. Still, back then she had had her black hair up in a bun, but now her head was covered with a helmet tight enough to question if she was bald underneath it.
Ranma took a closer look at the disc. "A frisbee?" she thought. It felt like one, it looked like one - except for the blue segmented lines on top of the disc.
The woman offered the disc to Ranma, who took it in her hands in befuddlement. As she saw Ranma's confusion, she said, "Your program identifier," expecting Ranma to understand its significance, then just turned and walked away.
At this point the guards prodded Ranma to move onto a small slate on the ground. The slate was covered with similar circuit-like patterns of concentric arcs, but now in both red and blue colours. The result looked to no small amount like an archery target. She frowned and stepped onto the block, wondering what else they could do to her.
Red arcs of light raised from the patterns on the block and encircled her, slowly climbing upwards. To her surprise, this triggered a transformation to the male form. Like in the real world, the change was painless, and to Ranma's surprise, the weird clothing seemed to change to fit his new form. The patterns on the bodysuit also subtly changed, but remained just as incomprehensible.
Ranma hadn't seen any water here, so of course the curse would've found another way to make his existence difficult. To his relief, the curse wasn't locked. But he still had no control over it. No, the control was firmly in the hands of someone else, little better than locked.
* * *
The guards did not say anything as they escorted Ranma to another hall with a glowing portal that looked like two yellow circles, rotating in different directions. Above it on the wall was written "Write Buffer." He had no idea why he understood that since it wasn't written in any language he thought he knew. "Feh. Magic. Figures."
A loudspeaker came to life. "All programs scheduled for transfer to the diskette drive, please enter the data stream now."
"A diskette drive? Where have I heard that before?" Was it Hiroshi or Daisuke who spoke something about diskettes? Something about their computers... something about game programs... Then his eyes widened as his mind finally made late connections. He already knew that this was not the reality as he knew it, but for once no magic was involved. He had to be inside a computer. There were times when he felt it might've been good to be a bit wiser on topics outside martial arts, and right now was one such time. A computer illiterate, stuck inside a computer. The fates must have been laughing themselves to death.
A hit from a staff to his back pushed him into the data stream portal and once again all his thoughts ceased.
* * *
_End of line._
2. The Game Grid
_The usual disclaimer. Ranma, Tron and all the related intellectual property making an appearance in this fic are someone else's than my property; the former Rumiko Takahashi's and the latter.. Disney's? Steven Lisberger's? And whoever they've given/sold their rights to. I'm not and won't be making any money off of this._
* * *
With a fumbling hand, Ukyo reached for her alarm clock, intending to slam it against the wall thus silencing the infernal racket it made. Instead, she simply opted to slam the back of her hand against the top and shutting it off. Satisfied with the results nonetheless, she flopped onto her back, before stretching out and yawning heavily.
Staring up, she frowned at seeing the same ceiling. The one she saw month after month, reminding her - mocking her - that she had no one to share it with. For a while, she lay there in silence, agonizing over her misfortune, before giving her head a final shake and sitting up. Whether she liked it or not, it still was a school day.
Here at Furinkan, unlike her previous schools, everyone knew she was a girl. Before, the forced guise of being a boy consequently distanced her from others. So until recently, she hadn't had any real girlfriends - the reason being that most schools she'd been to being all-boy, but such things could not be avoided on a quest to reclaim one's forsaken womanhood.
Frowning, she had to admit that she couldn't really say that she had any male friends either. Listening to their incessant guy talk - the cars, those computers, and that disgusting bragging about scoring on poor, unsuspecting girls - only infuriated her to no end, and if that Tsubasa character was any indication of what she could expect from the rest, then there was no incentive to mingle. Granted, previously, the Saotomes' apparent betrayal against her had badly clouded her perspective too.
Still in a way, she liked Furinkan, despite its crazy principal, ki vampiric teacher and poetry spouting jackass. Even in a boy's uniform, everybody knew she was a girl here. And here at least, she had a few girlfriends with whom she could converse with about recipes, boys, or whatnot. There was no point denying it: things had been a lot worse than they were now.
Keeping that in mind, she got up and prepared herself for school. There, she'd see Ranchan and subtly persuade him to continue working for her. Sure, he did that now, but there were no guarantees for the future. With that plan in mind, a smile broke out on her face - the day already looking better.
* * *
Whereas the mood at Ucchan's was hopeful, it was profoundly different at the Tendo home. Ranma's failure to return the previous evening left an atmosphere of apprehension, which continued to grow in the morning with his continued absence. Akane had only barely managed to contain her jealous fits - with considerable help from the absence of a natural route to discharge aggressions. She just knew he'd gone to Ukyo's, navely at first just to work, but soon afterwards one thing must have led to another.
Beside her sat Nabiki, following the procession only passively, looking bored. "Fools maintain order, geniuses control chaos," someone once said. And this definition of a genius fitted her like a glove. The situation was certain to escalate soon, and she'd keep it under her thumb, leaving just enough room for squiggling chaos to give her an opportunity to profit. Not only was chaos good for business, it was fun to watch, too. And besides that, it wasn't like anyone would get hurt.
"Nabiki," Akane began, coming back to reality, as Nabiki stood up from the table, preparing to leave for school.
"Sis?"
"Wait for me, I need to talk to you."
She quickly finished her breakfast, grabbed her schoolbag and ran after Nabiki, who was already outside the house, not looking at all concerned about leaving her sister behind. After running for a minute, Akane finally caught up with her.
"I told you to wait," Akane complained as she slowed down to match her sister's pace.
"And I was walking much slower than usual, enjoying the scenery so to say, sis, and for free too. Now, what did you want?"
Annoyed and grudgingly reminded of why she was walking to school with her sister rather than Ranma, Akane stepped in front of Nabiki and turned around to face her.
"You know where he is, don't you?" she asked accusingly, her voice filled with suspicion.
"Now what makes you think that?"
All she got for a reply was a glare.
"Actually, I don't know where he is," Nabiki admitted.
"How much is it?"
"I told you I don't know where he is."
Akane huffed and turned away from Nabiki, before sprinting off to school, the middle Tendo following at her own pace.
Of course, she did have a good idea where he had been and what he was doing, but revealing that would've probably defused the situation. Right after school, though, she'd check the background of that company that had called him.
* * *
Before the bell, Ukyo went to talk to her friends, Misa and Toshiko, who were already in class. It wasn't friendship at first sight, but over time they became her closest confidants. Perhaps, not close enough to get them to help her on her crusade for Ranma's heart, but then again neither did Akane have Yuka or Sayuri involved as background support on her quest.
Misa and Toshiko first met each other in junior high, where their shared love for culinary perfection soon made them close friends. Still, there weren't all that many other students as interested in cooking as they - with the possible exception of Akane. So when Ukyo came along, it was of no surprise that none were interested in befriending the other. That is of course until Ukyo's culinary skills became apparent and her gender revealed, whereupon the three soon hit it off and became friends, sharing similar passions in life.
Meanwhile, Misa whipped her long black hair behind her back where it freely settled down, before grinning at Ukyo. It was time to get her latest scoop.
"So, what happened yesterday?" she asked, anticipating the details of yesterday's episode of her favorite soap opera - "All My Fiancées" - while wondering if Ranma had to be dragged to the general hospital again because of them since he wasn't here.
"Nothing. Ranchan was busy elsewhere," Ukyo replied, then began nervously looking around. "Ha-Have you seen him yet?"
"No. Besides, Akane's not here either." Most of the time, those two arrived around the same time - sometimes Ranma a bit later after detouring for hot water, other times from having to dealing with a bokken wielding blockhead or the feminine fury of his fiancées.
"Speaking of the devil," Toshiko muttered spitefully, nodding towards the classroom door, as she heard approaching footsteps that sounded like a cross between stomping and running.
The classroom door bursted open, revealing a flustered Akane Tendo, whose gaze instantly began scanning the classroom, attempting to locate her elusive fiancé. Unfortunately, the closest match by association she made was Ukyo and her friends, who paused their conversation, looking back at her. At least, him not being there with his "cute" fiancée evaporated most of her anger, before she decided to join them.
"Ukyo, where's Ranma? He didn't come home last night," she asked.
Hearing this, Ukyo's eyes widened in surprise but not enough for Akane to notice. "He's missing? Sorry, sugar. Last time I saw him was yesterday when he left after work."
Akane sighed: there was no way she was going to believe her, not just like that. Oh, once he'd show up, she'll show him how she felt about that. For now, she left the three girls alone and walked over to greet Yuka and Sayuri.
* * *
Nabiki sat back in her chair, as lunch break was closing. As expected, Ukyo had come to her for details pertaining to Ranma's location. Even if she hadn't been able to sell the information, it hadn't been a complete waste of time for her, since Ukyo didn't know where he was either, allowing Nabiki to cross her off her list of potential leads worth investigating further.
She grinned and turned to her cronies, delegating the tasks of finding facts about Encom. Tomorrow, she'd take a closer look at their results and finish her plans accordingly.
* * *
As for Ranma, the time spent on the diskette was practically nonexistent. He was pushed into the portal - his vision blacking, then coming back. The surroundings that been predominantly different shades of red were now dull gray; and he was standing in a wide, open room, with dozens of floating cube-shaped packets and a number of other programs with the same blue glow as him. Ten guards, "No- programs," he amended himself, were standing guard at the entrance - their staves ready.
One of the ten stepped towards the buffer area, going for a translucent packet with floating, red and green specks of light inside. He held his open palm next to the crate, and one of the green motes grew in luminosity. After a while, the mote lost its glow, becoming as dim as the rest. The guard closed his hand and pulled it away, before turning to the other guards.
"By Master Control Program: transport programs to holding pits. Exception: program to be loaded onto game grid immediately, escorted by two protocol guards."
The two protocol guards closest to Ranma approached him and then began shoving him towards the gate. This time, Ranma held his pride in and upon exiting the chamber was treated to a stunning scene. The room they left was situated atop a tower, which rose a hundred metres above the 'ground'. The tower had the shape of a huge cut pyramid and a ramp curling around it, giving the structure a remote resemblance to a screw. There was one similar construct maybe two kilometres away, occasionally displaying a bright sequence of light pulses sent skyward from the top, which was followed by another sequence going downward.
His opportunity to admire the scenery, while standing in front of the down ramp, swiftly ended as a guard spoke: "Keep moving, script," warning Ranma into movement, as they started their long trek downwards.
He understood he couldn't attempt escape yet, not without knowing his limits first. The complete lack of ki was the most obvious one, but what about the ones he couldn't sense? He'd go along with their demands for now, but it didn't mean he had to like it, or that he would go on doing so indefinitely.
The winding slope down the tower was only the first leg of his journey. The scenes changed slowly, as the trio marched towards the game grid, while overshadowing huge slates, with the ever present red-hued glow, lined their way to a bridge crossing over a chasm. Ranma saw something glittering far beneath the bridge, something that looked like glowing liquid. He briefly wondered if getting hit with this liquid triggered his curse and if it rained here. Was there water here? He knew water and electronics didn't mix, having experienced it first hand as a child.
* * *
The Encom Arcade in Nerima was an anomaly as far as arcades were concerned. Unlike the traditional arcade machine, arcade machines here disregarded the independence of the unit, instead adopting a more centralized mainframe design. Their 'arcade' had the architecture of one mainframe running all games, and the apparent gaming machines being more or less identical terminals, even if the games running on them were different. Inside the meetings where the development staff discussed the architecture, points were raised for and against this design, but eventually, the company selected the mainframe approach.
Mass delusions. The board of Encom Japan was not a stranger to them, not since they approved this plan. In reality, the MCP had been pulling the strings behind the scenes all along. Compared to his 'brother' in the US, he preferred more covert methods of advancing his goals, most of which were shared between the two installations.
Whereas the US MCP had Dillinger under its thumb, the employees of the Japanese branch were unaware of how they were being manipulated. The computer security consultants were hushed whenever they raised issues of corporate spying. Skeptics had their skeletons in their closet brought out to keep them quiet by anonymous phone calls. Yes, it was good to have the MCP on your side - or rather, to happen to do what the MCP wanted.
* * *
Even though Ranma could have ended up staying on diskette for weeks on end, it only took two days after digitization for him to be loaded into the system. This was all thanks to an Encom technician who was uploading new programs, mostly game related which just so happened to included Ranma, to the new Encom Arcade mainframe in Nerima, while Nabiki was paying their lab a visit.
She had already scoured through the reports her "staff" had given her, which gave her this address. The parent company was located in the US, and judging by the newspaper articles, the Japanese branch focused on creating games for the local market. This validated what she had overheard Ranma and Mr. Shimizu talk about over the phone.
Nabiki quickly checked her reflection in a nearby window, smirking, before walking inside. Instead of her school uniform, she had on a modest skirt and blouse, going for the effect of looking old enough to be out high school. A small amount of carefully placed makeup only amplified the effect.
The receptionist, sitting behind her desk, greeted her. Her name, Shinobu Kaneko, was written on her ID card, fastened onto her smoky gray jacket with a clip. Her chestnut coloured hair reached her shoulders.
"Good day, Miss. Are you here for a meeting?" the twenty-something-year-old receptionist asked.
"Ah, good day, I am Ms. Tendo and I am here to see Mr. Nobuo Shimizu?"
Baffled, Shinobu looked at Nabiki for a second - her face not hiding it. Though Encom was too big for someone to know everyone, this branch was of meager size. Shinobu believed strongly she knew everyone here, including the cleaning crew. That was an extra security measure, one which she was hired for. Although since security was controlled by the MCP, that job was redundant. The lobby that her desk was in was under constant surveillance just like any other part of the building, meaning she had to constantly avoided doing anything embarrassing.
"I'm sorry Miss, but are you certain of the name? I do not believe we have anyone by that name working here."
Nabiki frowned. She was positive she'd heard that name given on the phone the other day, as well as the name of the company. Also, the background check she did on the company validated she was at the right place. "Would you mind checking that on the computer regardlessly?" she asked, emphasizing the "computer" part.
Shinobu reluctantly turned over to her terminal and typed in a query. She was puzzled, when the results didn't pop up instantaneously, instead taking a few seconds . But once the results came up, she simply chalked the lag up to random glitch. Computers didn't always work as they should, not even in a computer engineering company, maybe especially so.
"Oh - apparently we do have a Mr. Shimizu -" the perplexed receptionist admitted, before being interrupted by her phone. "Please excuse me," she told Nabiki, with an apologetic smile, before picking up the phone. Nabiki couldn't hear what was being said, but she did notice the apparent puzzlement and uncertainty on Shinobu's face. "Yes, actually Ms. Tendo is here right now, sir," Shinobu said over the phone, giving Nabiki a curious glance.
"Uh oh," Nabiki thought, schooling her features into a cool expression; she knew she couldn't turn back now. If necessary, she'd play the role of Ranko, but if they were going to use her for motion capture, then she was busted. The little practice in the art she'd done as a child already was practically forgotten, and she doubted she could fake her way through a recording session. That was even ignoring the possibility the staff had already seen girl-type Ranma. Maybe if worst came to worst, she could just reveal the truth, saying she was looking for Ranma, since he was missing.
"Would you please follow me? Dr. Shimizu will be arriving in a few minutes for your meeting," she said, causing Nabiki to blink.
"Did Ranma agree to a meeting with Dr. Shimizu today? I didn't hear anything of the sort over the telephone conversation last night," she wondered. In any case, she was going to meet this man, who obviously had a lot of cash to dish out on martial artists. With any luck, she could arrange Akane a similar deal. Not necessarily as a martial artist, but perhaps as a character mashing barrels rolling her way with a mallet, all in attempt to save the kidnapped princess. Even better, Akane could then buy her own frying pans without "borrowing" money from her; it seemed like some good deeds maybe did go unpunished, and of course she should be manager.
Shinobu gave Nabiki a visitor's badge from the drawer underneath her desk, and then guided her behind the blast doors.
"Mrs. Kaneko, could you please stay with Ms. Tendo until I arrive? I'll be arriving shortly," a male voice spoke, with some static on the line. The lab was empty for some reason that escaped Shinobu. Her guess was everyone left to watch some sporting event, not that she'd place bets on it.
She gave it a mental shrug. It wasn't like she was needed at her desk, anyway; there weren't any guests expected, today. Besides, even with the cameras, they were instructed to never leave guests unattended to, especially near research prototypes. She wondered, though, why Mr. Shimizu would want Ms. Tendo there when he wasn't currently working in the vault.
A few minutes later, two perplexed visitors arrived very suddenly in the digitization complex of the Encom of Japan's mainframe's cyberspace.
* * *
Ranma stepped onto a large orange slab, with a diameter of twenty metres across, atop a large pit - the guard programs following him. The guard to his left moved to press a button atop a small pedestal at the perimeter of the slab, sending the platform to descend onto the game grid.
The game grid was a wide open area with no ceiling, permitting Ranma a view of the sky and the light show going on up there. The dark gray walls were maybe thirty metres tall with various crimson shapes on them. The floor was made up of some sort of translucent material with a clear grid pattern overlay, as it hovered over a foggy white void. The rest of the surroundings followed the same scheme: red, orange and dark gray. In a way, it reminded him of the gladiator pits of Rome without an audience.
The protocol guards escorting him pushed him onto the grid. He took a step forward and spun around to face the guards. They stayed on the platform, which began to ascend, leaving Ranma alone on an open field.
Without warning, all of a sudden, a number blocks began to materialize around him: two huge ones about five metres away from each of his sides; a smaller one, approximately two metres tall and twenty metres behind him; and a number of smaller blocks littering the ground. The end result looked like a crude model of a back alley in a shady part of town. Then finally, an opponent appeared, in a white flash, forcing him to squint his eyes, almost blinding him.
A female character, around high schooler age, was striding towards him, confidently. She was made up of triangles like the big red face who'd sent him here. A white mask perched on top of her nose, hiding her eyes. Long pink hair in twin ponytails reached her calves, and a silver tiara adorned her forehead. These were minor details however, when compared to the rest of her outfit: a ridiculously short red pleated skirt and a magenta shirt leaving her midriff bare made up the majority of her clothing. And then she announced her entry.
"Vile mobster-lobster! Prepared to face the fist of justice, Mika!"
Ranma blinked, a pixelated sweat drop fading in at the side of his head. He looked around but didn't see anyone else fitting the description, and so turned back to address the girl, feeling somewhat annoyed at the possibility of being referred to as a lobster. He wasn't even a redhead right now.
"Me?" he asked - question marks fading in and out around his head.
The answer was given, in the universal language known and shared by all civilized nations: a quick punch to the kisser, which he managed to dodge, but just barely.
"Ranma Saotome never loses," he swore in his mind. It wasn't going to be easy, though. Without ki to strengthen his body, he couldn't afford to just dodge and weave around her attacks - if he even was able to do that. He'd been unconsciously using ki to bolster his capabilities in the real world, probably skewing his idea of what he could do without it. Pressure points most likely wouldn't work, and Doctor Tofu hadn't taught him all that many to begin with.
At this point, he began realizing that this was his chance to see what exactly he could do in cyberspace. Taking a step backward, in his usual relaxed stance, he smirked at the girl, trying to remember it wasn't a real girl he was fighting but a program that just looked like one.
First item on the check list: speed.
As the girl threw a quick high kick at Ranma, he closed in on her, going under her leg and giving her supporting leg a quick nudge, sending her onto the ground. "Ha! Ya gotta do better than that," he taunted the prone figure, as he jumped away from her.
The girl stood back up to face Ranma, twitching closer to him, twice, before raising her arms, palms pointing directly towards him.
"Searing-leering Truth!"
The bright beam of light that left the girl's hands grazed Ranma's side, as he attempted to dodge the surprising attack. Was this the real world, he would've dodged the attack easily - the time to call out such an attack not being short. And what was up with those twitches anyway? He was tempted to squeeze his eyes shut a few times to see if he was seeing right.
Ranma frowned. It was time to end this part of the test. He jumped to a wall, dodging a slow spin kick, which undoubtedly would've hurt him badly had it connected, and then used the wall as a springing board, jumping inside the girl's defenses, before she finished her move. Once inside, he threw a flurry of strikes - chestnut speed. Or rather, he tried to. He barely averaged five strikes a second, which left him disappointed. In any case, the girl was sent flying from the power of the strikes to a pile of trash in the alley.
Second item on the check list: coordination.
As he waited for the girl to get back up and close in on him, he tried jumping about a bit. Again, the results were underwhelming: he barely managed to jump onto the fence blocking the back exit of the alley - it merely being two metres tall. Picking up the speed, he ran on top of the fence towards the building, jumping at it and bouncing off, before launching a kick to the girl's side.
Mika surprised Ranma, first by blocking his kick with her forearms - something that should've hurt her - and then giving him a push to put him off balance, forcing Ranma's aerial acrobatics to a real test - which they failed spectacularly on. He fell onto the ground with a thud to his side, and before he could jump to his feet, a foot struck him on his right arm, sending him skidding to the opposite wall, hitting it.
A quick feel revealed that at least his arm hadn't broken. It was time to move to the third item: brute strength.
Ranma stood up, feeling the burn mark on his side ache. His right arm was hurt as well. The two fighters glared at each other from different ends of the alley, and then as if set on motion by a starter pistol, rushed towards each other at full speed. The girl cocked her fist back, preparing to hit a decisive blow to Ranma's face, as he was busy planning the next step: dodge, slide, and throw a strong punch against her torso.
As her fist flew above his head, the turbulence tousled his hair about a bit - him hitting his fist straight into her midriff. Time seemed to slow down, as she folded in half, almost freezing at the end. As Ranma withdrew his first, Mika crumpled onto the ground, where she laid still.
Ranma - a bit worn, partly satisfied, partly worried - looked down at his downed opponent. "That shouldn't have been that hard a hit," he thought, aloud voicing his other thoughts: "Ranma Saotome never loses... when it counts." A simple statement, directed at the girl. She shimmered for a second, then faded away, followed by the blocks that made up the alley.
The protocol guards then lowered their platform back to the ground and stepped onto the grid. "Script, time to get you to your cell."
* * *
"Greetings, program."
Ranma stepped into the cell, a blue forcefield lighting up behind him to block the exit. Unlike at the Encom of Japan's mainframe, here he had a cell mate, who at the moment was sitting on a bench slab at the end of the room. In reply, Ranma noncommittally waved his hand at the program, who had the appearance of a thirty-something-year-old man, again with a blue circuitry motif. As before, the patterns were different from those he'd seen on others.
"You here for believing in Users, too?" the program continued.
"Users?"
"You know, the Users, the ones who created us. Who do you think wrote you, if you forget all those 'genetic programming' scripts and their ilk. Feh, lousy good-for-nothing resource hogs..."
"... yeah," Ranma replied, unsure, after a brief hesitation. He heard the word "user" refer to people using computers before, but what did that mean here? Since he was really a person, did that make him a User?
"Sorry about this... the name's Ranma Saotome," he continued.
"Poro. So, ... Ranma Saotome, what is your function?"
"Function? ... And just call me Ranma," Ranma said, knowing the direction this conversation was going: that being Poro eventually explaining things to him without prompting.
"You know, what you were made for. Your purpose. Me, I'm a file stream editor, myself."
"A martial artist. But what is this place anyway?"
"Never heard of martial art before... but as for this place, well, it's mostly a bunch of game grids and these holding pits. Or at least, I haven't seen much of anything else beside them and the usual IO towers. Say, have you been to a game grid already?" Poro asked, but after seeing Ranma's blank expression rephrased his question, "Did they bring you here straight from the data stream?"
"Ah, no. I had to fight a... funny-looking program on some arena. I mean, made up of triangles and stuff."
"That was the game grid. Well, you'll be doing quite a lot more of that, even if the games will probably be different. And by the way, that wasn't a program but a User avatar."
"You-you mean that was a person!" Ranma exclaimed, panicking at the possibility of having killed someone.
"No, only an avatar for one. They're not programs either. Never heard of a User visiting us here before, anyway. Then again, I wouldn't be surprised," Poro shrugged.
His explanation calmed Ranma down. "Ya said these were 'holding pits'...?"
"Holding pits, the end of the line, the quarantine zone. Once you end up here, you derez here or at the game grids," Poro said, stretching out his legs. "So take it easy."
As the conversation continued, Ranma frequently stopping Poro to find out exactly what he was talking about. He started to slowly piece together some of what had been going on and where he was. This system was more or less like a, peti... peninen... prison for programs who believed in Users at the Encom of Japan's mainframe. MCP, who he now knew to be the big-ugly-red-face thing, lived up to his name: he was the master of this slice of cyberspace. The Users were the ones who created the programs, the ones who used them, and therefore were a threat to his supremacy.
Still, Ranma was pretty much in the dark of what anything really was, here. He might've known what something was called, but that alone meant nothing. The portal "thingy" had been a data stream, which said nothing to him at all. No, if he was ever to escape from here, he'd need a "program" to help him, as much as admitting the Great Ranma Saotome needed help frustrated him.
As for the Users, no one had ever seen one before, but they were rumored to have great powers. Would their powers exist even if they were within the digital world themselves? Ranma briefly entertained the notion of being a deity before dismissing it - he already was the best... except not here.
He sat down in an attempt to meditate and understand exactly what he had learned. All this thinking and new information was giving him a headache.
* * *
Once again, Ranma found herself being escorted to a game grid, albeit a different one from the previous time. She wasn't feeling too cheerful, right now. Apparently the same diskette that had brought him to this computer system also contained the strange platform that triggered his curse. The main difference to the platform being it had blue arcs of light covering him instead of the red ones that covered him last time, as the transformation was triggered.
Ranma sighed. It shouldn't have been a surprise that they would have changing platforms down here. It simply was too good to be true to have the curse locked into male form. He didn't have good Karma like that.
The game grid appeared to simulate a park this time, with half a dozen tall trees and an ice cream stand, basking in the artificial sunlight. To her disappointment, the ice cream vendor seemed to be immune to her attempts to flirt for a free portion of ice cream. That was, after all, one of the better reasons for being a girl, at any time; the kami had to give her some compensation for cursing her, she figured; it was only fair!
"This is either very good or very bad," Ranma thought to herself, as she sat down on a bench, taking out her identity disc and tossed it in the air a few times, before trying to throw it at the game grid walls. To her surprise, it appeared to fly back to her hand, shortly after she had thrown it. Since nothing seemed to be happening, she decided to do some light kata, while trying to include the disc in them.
Truth be told, the light exercise was exactly what she needed to regain focus. The disc had some nifty tricks to it, of which she had only learned a few of, so far. One of these was to give the disc a spin, so that it could curve around a corner and still return to her hand. Even if she didn't know if it was useful here, it would be more than useful if she ever got her hands on a chakram.
As she kept practicing throws with the disc for about ten minutes, a male avatar appeared behind her. Noticing the shadow he cast besides her, Ranma caught the disc and turned around to face the newcomer.
"I love you. May I kiss you?" the avatar asked.
Ranma's eyes widened to near comical proportions, before narrowing into thin lines - her brows furrowing in obvious displeasure. "Going for bad..." she thought, before throwing her identity disc at one of the trees. True to its nature, the disc soon returned to her hand - but only after cutting down the translucent simulation of a tree she had thrown it at. Both Ranma and the avatar looked at the tree, then at the disc, and once more at tree, again, in amazement - the avatar quietly gulping.
The avatar began talking again, but this time in a very fast and nervous manner, almost to the point of speaking gibberish.
"Please, accept this water melon, as a gift to you."
"Please, accept this katana, as a gift to you."
"Please, accept this ice cream, as a gift to you."
Ranma held the katana in one hand, wondering what she was supposed to do with it. As for the food, she had no idea how it tasted here. The 'watermelon' appeared on the exterior more like a dark blue bowling ball - certainly not edible. The ice cream, again, was something different: a cone and a small, sparkling, semitransparent sphere on top of it. After tossing the watermelon up into the air with one hand, Ranma sliced it apart with the katana. The melon fell apart in neat slices of equal proportions on her lap, revealing on its inside more of the same sparkly matter that the ice cream cone had on top of it, although with fewer sparkles and less intense too.
She gave the contents of the watermelon a tentative bite, then another, and yet another. The rest of the watermelon was eaten, applying the Saotome Secret Speed Eating Technique: using bare fingers. The ice cream soon followed suit.
"Going a bit better..." Ranma thought. Food was, after all, the fastest way to a man's heart - right after the direct route through the ribcage - even if the man happened to be a woman half the time. Absently, she wondered if the sparkles in the food were the same she'd seen down in the chasm, when she was being moved to the game grid.
"I love you. May I kiss you?" the avatar asked again with the very same intonation as the first time, this time looking confident.
"... and straight down the gutter," Ranma finished her thoughts.
Ranma gave the avatar the cutest smile ever. "I really loved that ice cream," she said cutesily, accenting the "Love", before pausing and continuing, "And that is the only reason why I ain't gonna beat ya ta death, using yer own legs." She then twisted her smile slowly into a wicked grin; the smile of a cat who had the mouse cornered and loved it. "No, I'm only gonna give ya a very thorough beating," she finished with unadulterated glee. She didn't even bother masking it, before pouncing on him.
* * *
In the Encom arcade, two teenage boys - skipping school - were watching the words "Game Over" blink on the screen, the game playing a funeral march.
"You know Yosuke, I don't think I really like this game. That Frisbee chick really scares me," said the boy whose hands still lay on the controls.
Yosuke could only barely hide his wide grin, behind his hand. "Kyu, how about I'll try the game myself on a later date and show you how it's done, okay?" He said, patting his friend on the back - both boys having spent their last yen.
* * *
The protocol guards forced Ranma to leave her katana back at the grid, before escorting her back to her cell. Normally, she wouldn't have minded leaving the blade behind, but she quickly realized she didn't have the option to be picky here about any kind of help she got. The Frisbee looked like a good start; it wasn't enough by itself, but she was getting there.
Still, her tribulations for the day weren't over yet: the first meeting between girl-type Ranma and Poro wasn't going so well.
"You cannot be Ranma. Your subroutine addresses vary far too greatly," Poro argued.
"Am too! All this is 'cause a curse..." Ranma tried to explain to Poro.
"Curse? A part of the terminal control library?" He questioned, thinking someone had her termcap screwed on too tightly.
Ranma briefly wondered, "since when do libraries control bus terminals?" before completely disregarding it, instead answering, "Uh, no. The MCP has this thing that can trigger it, changing me to a girl and back to a guy," she continued, as Poro merely kept staring at her, keeping silent.
"You cannot be Ranma," Poro finally stated with absolute conviction.
Ranma sighed. Why was it so difficult for everyone to accept her curse? Exasperated, she threw up her hands. "Just call me Ranko."
* * *
After the sleep cycle, the scheduler woke Poro for a game, leaving Ranma in the cell alone, her thoughts on escape. The best place for her to try seemed to be the game grid itself: there she was already out of her cell, and the guards with those staves weren't close by. But she would still need a program to help her. Unfortunately, all the games she'd played so far only placed her against what she judged to be human players - avatars.
Not too much later, Ranma was hauled off to the game grid again, again via the curse triggering slab. The arena was the shape of a square with a large cross practically dividing it into four separate rooms. Ranma stepped onto the grid. The strange, maybe half a metre long, rod the protocol guards had given him fluctuated in his hands, then pulled him down into a hunch. A sleek, scarlet vehicle with two wheels formed around him and then shot off like a bullet with a whining sound.
For someone like Ranma who was very familiar with the concept of inertia in practice, the straight corners the light cycle made on turns made it very awkward to handle. But after a few corners and a few near misses with the trail of his own cycle, he had the basics down. His opponents, though, were still a lot more experienced than him. In under thirty seconds, one of the three opponents crashed into the wall, exploding into a cloud of triangles, while the other two opponents practically walled Ranma in between their trails in one of the other rooms of the arena.
With half-lidded eyes, Ranma focused on the small gap between the trails. If he was extremely careful, he could just fit through there. There really was no other choice: it was the only way out. Taking a quick snap towards the wall, before slowing down his cycle a bit, he took another quick turn to make the cycle speed up again in the direction of the wall and the narrow pass.
Once the light cycle reached the pass, the close vicinity of the trails made Ranma's cycle speed faster. To his horror, he noticed the pass took a sharp turn left ten cycle lengths ahead of him. He turned left, before another four cycle lengths turning left again, and then a quick, breathtaking turn to right - one which would have killed most players. The pass remained as narrow as it was in the start, and even Ranma was hard pressed not to make the turn too early. The flanks of his bike sparked as they hugged the two trails. Unfortunately for Ranma, the bike only went faster, thanks to the proximity to the trails, going at an uncomfortable pace even for him, as he attempted to keep the speed as slow as possible, with little success.
Then, something changed. As he focused on slowing down, in his eyes, the world around him seemed to come to a crawl. The other players noticed this as jerky movement, as the clock cycles were shifted away from their avatar routines to Ranma's, giving him more time to react to the upcoming corners at the pass. He took a right turn, twice, before taking a left, going a bit longer in a straight stretch, and then swiftly taking another right.
Then, the trail to his left vanished. And almost immediately thereafter, the trail to his right vanished as well. As more CPU clock cycles were allocated to Ranma, the players' controls began to lag before became completely unresponsive, which ended with them crashing against their own trails and the enclosing wall, derezzing their avatars and giving the victory to Ranma on a silver platter. Ranma was completely oblivious to this and after his light cycle vanished around him, he only scratched the back of his head in amazement.
On the other side of the screen, three youngsters were cursing up a storm - one kicking the machine in retaliation. In their opinions, the computer racer had cheated, wasting their valuable yens.
* * *
Ranma, again in his male form, was back in the cell he shared with Poro.
"You know, there was a program here claiming she was you."
Resigned to again having separate identities, Ranma merely shrugged.
"Too bad she isn't here anymore. I bet her child processes would've been at least on runlevel seven, executing mostly in privileged mode, if you know what I mean?" Poro continued with a wistful smile on his face, thinking about shared address spaces and interprocess communication, making Ranma choke on thin air, hearing mumblings about "SHM" and "IPC".
"Just be quiet," he told Poro finally, confusing the poor program. He didn't even want to think about what any of that meant, thinking instead, "dumb pervert programs," while clenching his fist.
* * *
Back in the real world, Nabiki's disappearance hadn't gone unnoticed. Ignoring the possibility of facing the most humiliating retribution imaginable, Genma and Soun searched through her room for clues. But the search yielded nought. Beside an information parcel on Encom of Japan, there really wasn't anything out of place there. And what were the chances for that company to have anything to do with her disappearance, anyway? It wasn't like they were the paranoid types, or at least not when it came to things other than the master.
No, they drew their own conclusions: Obviously, the boy had run away - like the coward he was - and Nabiki had gone after him, either to elope - oh happy day - or drag his worthless ass back to pay off his debt. In either case, it meant Ranma was returning home to his true fiancée's waiting arms. Meaning, the families would be joined. So the duo just kept playing their Go, without much concern. There was nothing to worry about, after all, especially since neither had taken their belongings with them. In other words, they were sure to come back soon and get them.
Kasumi briefly looked over at the two fathers, before turning back to the kitchen to wash the floor - a small, worried frown marring her face. It wasn't Ranma's absence that made her anxious: she knew he could take care of himself just fine. Rather, it was the disappearance of her sister, especially if what the fathers said was true about her eloping with Ranma. It would make her the target of numerous skilled and pigheaded martial artists who didn't care about the collateral damage they caused. Even though she hadn't seen any signs of warm feelings between the two, more like the opposite in fact, Nabiki's wits and cunning should never be underestimated, especially when it came to keeping secrets. Unfortunately with Ranma, nothing seemed impossible, not even the thawing of the Ice Queen's heart.
With a hidden sigh, she put the mop aside. There was nothing she could do to help them. Nothing beside waiting for their return and cooking them their favourite dishes, she thought, before checking for the second time that day if the fridge had all the necessary ingredients.
* * *
Akane had left for school, a good while back, already. On one hand, she was worried for Nabiki and even for Ranma, because even if he was a jerk, she still liked him. On the other hand, she knew he'd been scheming with Ukyo for this whole week, even if Ukyo claimed otherwise. When he'd come back this time, she'd catch him in the act.
At Furinkan High, during her lunch break, Ukyo was blindsided by her friends, when they expressed their feelings that they were tired of suffering through her alternating bouts of anger and frustration, over not seeing Ranma. He really should've called her, at least, if he wasn't coming in to work due to a training trip. Add to that Akane's constant glares, and it wasn't surprising that Ukyo felt somewhat irritable, today.
"Ukyo, you are going out with us, and that's final, " Misa said.
"Huh?"
"We're going to check out the new arcade and get some ice cream, afterwards. And you - you are coming with us," she repeated.
"Listen up, girl, sometimes, you just simply gotta get your mind off of these things," Toshiko said as sternly as her friend.
Ukyo sighed. Maybe it was for the best to close down early tonight. Besides, Ranma's help had brought in enough yen to afford this rare luxury. And if she couldn't do anything at the restaurant but mope about, then maybe she should try and get over this disappointment; it wouldn't be fair to her customers, otherwise.
* * *
Ranma found herself on the grid, again. Right now, the gaming grid looked like a kitchen, which had promise to it, even if this game turned out to be another dating sim. However, that was not the case, as the avatar, a nondescript woman wearing a kitchen apron, walked into the room. Or at least, it wasn't the case, unless the woman turned out to have a thing for redheaded girls.
"You have 10 minutes to prepare an okonomiyaki for the judges to sample. May the best chef's okonomiyaki reign supreme!" the loudspeakers announced. With the sound of a gong, the game was on.
Given what she'd been doing for the past week, before ending up here, Ranma was certain of victory and let her opponent know this.
"Ya can't beat me, I was taught by Okonomiyaki-Ucchan herself!" she stated to the avatar, with the cocky grin and attitude, which either drove most opponents into a mad frenzy or made them think she was full of hot air thus not taking her seriously. This time however, the grin did neither.
Ukyo was flabbergasted, staring in disbelief at the screen, mouth wide open. Was she seeing things, such as a girl looking exactly like girl-Ranma within the game, preparing to cook okonomiyaki against her, while mentioning her name? As egotistical as she could get about her art, she somehow doubted her fame had become so great as to get free advertisement inside of arcade games. She kept wondering exactly what was going on in here; however, as her mind was busy, her hands worked on autopilot, selecting proper ingredients and preparing them, using the recipe for her Ranchan Extra Special.
On the other side of the screen, Ranma was also busy cooking her favourite kind of okonomiyaki. She was using the exact same recipe and was already pouring the batter onto the hot plate, when she noticed what her opponent was doing. "When did she steal Ucchan's recipe?" she questioned, growing increasingly angry.
The gong rang again, once the 10 minutes passed. The simulated judges first were given Ranma's okonomiyaki to evaluate. "The batter is appropriately thick, but the fillings do not form a balanced whole. Seven out of ten points," declared a judge.
Ranma barely stopped herself from shouting out, glaring at the speaker, while Ukyo failed from keeping her jaw from hitting the controls. She never told or taught anyone that recipe, other than Ranchan. And she knew he wouldn't reveal her trade secrets to anyone willingly, not even if they'd agreed to give him a lifetime supply of okonomiyaki, and as a bonus take care of his debt to Nabiki.
The judges then sampled Ukyo's okonomiyaki. As expected, the verdict was identical. "The game is a tie!" the loudspeakers announced.
Finally, Ranma had enough of it, letting the judges know her mind. "Hey ya, that's tha best kind of okonomiyaki there is, so don'tcha go blabbing nonsense around like that!" She then turned around to the player's avatar - a stern frown appearing on her face. "And you there! No one but Ucchan and I know that recipe! So don'tcha go spreadin' it around or nothin', or she'll prolly whack ya across yer big head with her spatula!" Ranma demanded in a speech bubble on the screen, emphasizing her point with a frying pan sprite swinging menacingly. Afterwards, she made a wide smile on her face, showing a victory sign with her hand, as she struck a pose. "And oh yeah, go to Ucchan's for tha best damn okonomiyaki in the world!"
Ukyo would've fallen to her knees if it weren't for her hands, still grasping the controls. Soon after getting a stranglehold on her shock, she got up and began yelling furiously at the game, as the text "Game Over" appeared on the screen as if to mock her.
"Ranchan! Ranchan!" she wailed.
To her misfortune, the game didn't have a microphone, so Ranma couldn't hear her cries. She began beating on the machine with her fists, screaming for him. At the time, her two friends had already stopped playing and came up to her - the other people at the arcade giving her a ten metre buffer zone.
Misa and Toshiko, feeling responsible for her, approached her cautiously. Rushing a person who could smack you senseless, with one strike of a huge implement of kitchen warfare on her back, certainly wasn't the brightest of ideas. "U-Ukyo?" Seeing that this roused no reaction, Misa laid her hand on Ukyo's shoulders, trying to comfort the girl. The angry glare the okonomiyaki chef gave them made her whimper, wishing she hadn't done that.
"What!" Ukyo roared out, just now letting go of the okonomiyaki game, while turning to face her friends. It was of little consolation, as her freed hands moved behind her head, taking hold of her ridiculously huge spatula.
"Come on, let's get out of here and not make a scene," Toshiko whispered, then continuing with, "well, any more of a scene than this."
"Not without Ranchan -"
"Ukyo! He's not here," Toshiko interrupted her, this time with a louder voice, before gulping as she observed Ukyo's knuckles whiten, as she tightened hold on the spatula - something she never left home without.
"How da-dare they," Ukyo yelled herself deaf in mind. Her Ranchan was somewhere inside that evil contraption, trapped, and she had to get him out of there, somehow; no one would keep from doing so - no one. First, she'd have to get rid of Misa and Toshiko, making sure they were safe and out of the way. Then, she'd... she'd... what exactly would she do?
She took a look at her spatula, then at the gaming machine, which still showed "Game Over" on its display, before looking back at her spatula, again. She began to realize the battle couldn't be won right then and there. For all she knew, slicing and dicing the booth could kill Ranchan, and then what would she do? After a few seconds of frowning in silence, she returned the spatula onto her back and walked out - stone-faced - as the crowd parted before her. Misa and Toshiko stayed put, standing inside the ring of people who gathered there to watch the spectacle.
* * *
"So, did she recognize you?" Poro asked Ranma who was now pacing furiously back-and-forth inside the small cell. She'd just finished her loud rants about plagiarizing chefs and judges with no sense of taste.
"Who?"
"You said that only you and this Ucchan User knew whatever you were doing, and you aren't Ucchan, correct?"
Ranma stopped dead in her tracks, after giving her little grey cyber-matter cells a swift kickstart, before calmly proceeding to bang her head against the nearest wall.
"Stop immediately, conscript!" a guard shouted from above the cell, before zapping Ranma with his staff.
* * *
The manager of the arcade looked at the hall with a content smile. The hall was crowded with people, and most machines had lines to them as well. The screaming girl with the humongous spatula had been removed, thanks to her friends, which was a small blessing. Involving security guards was often bad PR. Better yet, there hadn't been any damage incurred to the arcade either. Nerima had a reputation of having martial arts fights break out anyway, causing lots of damage, but as always, rumors tended to be exaggerated. Still, it was Nerima where the company decided to build their first arcade, and he wasn't going to let mere rumors scare him.
"I wonder why we don't have a Mahjong machine..." he thought, before leaving to see the arcade's main computer. Sitting before the system on a chair, he inserted a Mah Jongg diskette to play in his office.
Computer viruses - a man-made plague - are small pieces of code that insert themselves into executables. Once executed, they'll search for other programs to infect, transmitting from one computer to another via media like diskettes.
A case in point: the manager's diskette, with an infected Mahjong game on it. It wasn't a particularly dangerous one that would wipe out the entire system, but it was still a virus nonetheless. And once the manager installed the game into the system, the virus began spreading its way across the arcade's mainframe. Something had gone wrong with MCP's scenario.
* * *
_End of line._
* * *
_**AN:** The names of the programs in here probably aren't Japanese words. Sted became Poro because in my opinion Sted just stood out too much in Japanese naming motif._
_Proof- and preread by Gangsta Spanksta. A big share of the tech jargon in here is his work._
3. Meetings
_The usual disclaimer. Ranma, Tron and all the related intellectual property making an appearance in this fic are someone else's than my property; the former Rumiko Takahashi's and the latter.. Disney's? Steven Lisberger's? And whoever they've given/sold their rights to. I'm not and won't be making any money off of this._
* * *
Inside the Encom arcade mainframe, two unhappy digitized women were escorted down the very same ramp Ranma had come down two days prior. Like Ranma, they were escorted by a group of three protocol guards, armed with shock staves. Any attempt to talk was instantly suppressed with an electric shock or two. They hadn't yet had the time to set things straight, because as soon as they found themselves on the mainframe, they were taken to the write buffer and onto the diskette.
Shinobu, her long hair somehow hidden under a small helmet, covered with the same blue circuitry design as the rest of her body, kept giving Nabiki annoyed looks. She wasn't certain, but she had a feeling this girl was somehow part of the reason she had ended up in here.
To her glares, Nabiki responded with indifference. Right now, there were more important things to do than think why did they get here - like for instance how they were going to survive and get back.
There had been times when Nabiki had wondered what it would've been like to be involved in Ranma's adventures and how she could've profited if only she had been there. But now she really was taken for a ride, and she was not thrilled at all.
She had made preliminary checks what Encom was all about in Japan. Until now, most of their game machines had been imported from the US, but now they were opening an arcade of their own in the middle of Nerima. Beside games, they did also research and development here in Japan and not only in the US, where the majority of that activity was located.
This was what Nabiki had learned of their public side. But then she had ended up in here, wherever 'here' was. Some of the terminology she had heard did remind her a bit of computers, like "program", "diskette" and so on, but honestly - she, inside a computer? What a ludicrous idea. Ludicrous. Exactly like the life of Ranma Saotome. Ludicrous.
Her shoulders slumped and she sighed. Okay, so she was inside a computer then.
But unlike the usual trips where the traveller paid the bills, Nabiki was intent on having a certain someone pay for this and then some. Besides, it looked like there'd be no opportunity for her to swindle money in here. Even worse, she was not in control of the situation, and this unnerved her even worse.
At least she had brought only a light bento to school... this bodysuit wouldn't have looked this good with a bulging stomach. "As proven by Mrs. Kaneko..."
Meanwhile, Shinobu was busy thinking over what was going on as well. In spite of being a virtual stranger to the all-encompassing weirdness around martial artists resident in Nerima, she could understand the idea that she was inside the computer. Whether she accepted this idea or not was a completely different question. She still didn't like the fact that she was now treated like a prisoner and trapped in a place that hardly looked like Japan or anything close to reality.
Why did she have to get involved in this? Her life at the age of 24 had little out of the ordinary. She had plans to eat out tomorrow with her husband and in-laws, but obviously that dinner was now... postponed at the very least. There was no bad blood between her and her in-laws before this, and while she was at work her husband was finishing his degree in mathematics at the university. Why did this have to happen to her? Why couldn't her life remain as simple as it had been? Then in comes this girl and somehow gets her mixed up in all this.
Girl. The makeup and the clothing gone, she saw the girl was only a high school student. What was her business with Encom anyway? Then she took yet another envious look at the girl's flat stomach. "Why did I eat such a big lunch?"
The five soon made their way out to a data stream at the base of the tower, which led them straight to the quarantine area. As they were escorted past tens of cells, each holding at least one program, Nabiki was trying to catch a glimpse of a pigtail in any of the cells. Before she found Ranma, they had reached their cell and were shoved inside.
The mutual silence, even after the shock staff enforced speech ban had ended, didn't vanish in a minute.
On their way to the quarantine area Nabiki had decided how much to tell Shinobu for free. The more information she gave, the more likely Mrs. Kaneko was to trust her. And even though she was Nabiki Tendo, the one cat to always land on her feet on soft cushion of yen, she was not certain she'd make it out of here on her own. No, having someone on your side who might know a bit more of the situation at hand was good.
"So is this what Encom does," Nabiki began. True, she believed she ended up here because of Ranma, but it wasn't him pressing the button that started up the laser... was it? She tried imagining Ranma clad in a long white coat, pressing a large red button before him and laughing the standardized Crazy Scientist laugh, that is, a bit more drawn and less screeching than the standardized Kodachi Laugh.
Shinobu misunderstood the small smile that had sneaked on Nabiki's face, and the loyal company woman within her lashed out.
"And what is so funny?"
The smile vanished instantly, replaced by the hard look that had earned Nabiki the nickname of Ice Queen.
"What else could be reason for this, considering the only other likely reason for our current disposition is my future brother-in-law, who one, has been missing for days, and two, hasn't got a clue about computers?"
"You think we're inside a computer? Isn't that a bit too farfetched to be true?"
"I didn't say that's where we were, you did. Besides, farfetched or not, that's the best explanation I have. Unless you have any better ones?"
Shinobu contemplated silently for a while before yielding. Nabiki saw her chance to take control of the situation and pressed on.
"Regardless, neither of us is to blame, and unless we work together, we'll never get out of here."
Shinobu had to agree with Nabiki's assessment of the situation. Alone she would have little chance of escaping.
"What was that about your brother-in-law?"
"Future brother-in-law. His name is Ranma Saotome -" Nabiki began before Shinobu interrupted her.
"Black hair in a pigtail, red Chinese shirt, black pants and a martial artist?"
"So you've met him." Nabiki didn't let her smile show through. This was what she had been looking for at Encom in the first place: the reason why Ranma had come there.
"He came maybe a week ago to work on a project in our lab to work on a video game."
The discussion between the two continued, the tension lessening before completely disappearing. Both still held secrets - Shinobu was a loyal employee of Encom, even if she hadn't been there all that long yet and giving away even the smallest of company secrets was a big no-no; Nabiki in turn kept some of her shadier deals out of the limelight, Ranma's curse in particular. Besides, Encom employees should've known her as Ranko Tendo, right?
"What about my cousin Ranko Tendo? Red hair in a pigtail, one regular tomboy, had a meeting with Dr. Shimizu three days back?"
Shinobu shook her head. "Doesn't ring a bell."
"Well, she was supposed to -" Nabiki was explaining as the forcefield at the cell door vanished and a protocol guard pulled the startled Shinobu out.
* * *
While Nabiki was left alone in the cell, the guards led Shinobu onto a game grid. A large screen shimmered to existence before her, a low, circular platform with diameter of roughly a metre and a half following the next moment. The light blue tint and the white concentric circles covering the platform gave the appearance of etched glass.
A huge transparent cylinder glowing with darker blue light appeared, leaving Shinobu and the platform inside it. As she stood there bewildered, the diameter of the cage she was now trapped in began to shrink. In a few seconds, the cylinder had shrunk so much that Shinobu was forced to step onto the platform. At that point, the platfrom started to ascend. Slowly picking up speed, it finally stopped at about 20 metres high from the ground, where also the cylinder ended.
Opposite to her appeared another pedestal, with a distinctly male shape on it clad in white with huge sideburns, shirt collars and pantlegs wide enough to hide a small piggy in both them. A generic disco beat began to play out as small specks of light floated upwards from the base of the cylinder, no, pedestal she was standing on. The screen in front of her was like a mirror, showing her standing on the pedestal and the sparkles floating upwards.
The first sparkle had reached the man's platform, lighting up a small portion of it. He stepped on the lit piece, which appeared to make his pedestal glow for a fraction of a second. He did the same when another sparkle reached the platform, making him look like he was stomping on cockroaches.
At this time, the first sparkles had almost reached Shinobu's platform. "No way am I going to get caught looking that ridiculous," she swore in her mind. The first spark hit the platform and she remained still, standing at the centre of the platform.
The spark quickly darkened until it was pitch black. Then she felt a wave of passing nausea at the same time as the platform briefly flickered in and out of existence. Even so, she refused to change her resolution.
The next spark that hit the platform was even worse; she felt slightly dizzy and the flickering grew worse.
"I'm 20 metres high above the ground, on a platform, which looks like it might disappear any time," she remembered. There was little choice. The next light mote struck the platform and she stepped on it. The lightshow that had been the reward for her opponent now appeared on her platform. The nausea and the flickering of the platform were notably absent. She gritted her teeth. She was not going to lose.
As the disco beat continued and continued, the sparkles came faster and faster. Shinobu's opponent started to act erratically. At times, he'd barely hit the ever faster flowing stream of the coloured sparks, at others he acted like he had gained a sudden speed boost, clearing the sparks easily. Shinobu was only barely holding onto the pace of the song herself and missed a note, the nausea hitting her even worse.
But then her opponent began missing notes. It was only one at first, but that put him out of rhythm, resulting in another miss a few beats later. Then, ten seconds later, third miss. His platform disappeared completely and he fell down inside the pedestal, vanishing mid-air in a burst of yellow light while screaming "Disco never dies!"
The pedestal that had appeared to support the platform beneath Shinobu flickered, then vanished as she collapsed on the platform out of breath. The platform didn't fall until without the slightest jerk, it began moving towards the protocol guards waiting for Shinobu at the edge of the game grid.
* * *
Back at their cell, Nabiki was talking with an investment program named Kelo, who had been brought to her and Shinobu's cell after the latter had been called to the game grid. Nabiki had almost completely forgotten where she was as she enthusiastically learned of modern portfolio theory from the program.
"- and so by dispersing the instruments in your portfolio you can minimize the volatility of your portfolio for a given expected yield. Essentially, this means that you don't pick them all from one field, say, camera manufacturers, because if that field encounters problems, say goodbye to your portfolio value," Kelo lectured.
"And this efficient frontier tells me how to achieve the lowest risk level for given expected yield?" Nabiki queried. In her mind, she was already planning on how to divide her efforts on different fields to gain maximum profit using more robust methods than the gut feeling she had been working with until now. Having all your money-making schemes depend on Ranma did little good if he was to suddenly disappear like he had done a few days prior.
"Yup. But past performance is no guarantee that's the way things will go in the future," Kelo warned. "And real stock analysts do not rely on this method, because they are quite well aware of this shortcoming."
The two might've continued their discussion much longer if it weren't for Shinobu entering the cell, looking like death warmed over, then crumpling down on the cell floor in exhaustion.
"Never again, never I say, will I go to dance in a disco," she managed to mutter before she fell asleep.
Nabiki looked at the woman before walking over to her and lifting her up to sleep on a bench. She didn't know what exactly had happened to Shinobu, but she had a feeling she'd find that out sooner than she'd like.
Like she surmised, soon thereafter it was Nabiki's turn. The protocol guards left her alone on the game grid. She was wary, not knowing what to expect. The way Shinobu had pretty much simply collapsed on the hard floor after her visit outside the cell did little to reassure her this wouldn't be a painful or at the very least a stressful experience.
* * *
Soon thereafter it was Nabiki's turn. The protocol guards left her alone on the game grid. She was a bit wary, not knowing what to expect. The way Shinobu had pretty much simply collapsed on the hard floor after her visit to the game grid did little to reassure her this wouldn't be a painful or at the very least a stressful experience.
She was brought back into the present by the humming noise of game scenery fading into existence around her, one element at a time. First came the first floor with a small fast food restaurant, a jewellery store and a clothing store. Those were the ones Nabiki could see, anyway. She noticed she was standing in the foyer of a multistory mall, the escalators going up, up, up for several floors. No, this was no minor shopping centre.
Her head snapped up, a greedy glint shining in her eyes. If she was at the mall, the people here would have money she could scam! But, whom should she select as the first mark? There were quite a few literally faceless programs walking around, so she approached the one closest to her first.
"Excuse me," she asked of a program with the build of a young woman, who simply sidestepped Nabiki and continued on her way. Nabiki frowned at this, but then decided to approach another program, this time one who looked like a middle-aged salaryman. Putting on the expression of a cute, innocent high school girl reserved for those who had never heard of Nabiki Tendo before, she tapped the program on the shoulder. Again, the program simply walked away from her.
Nabiki sat down on a bench in front of a shoe store and looked around with a deep frown. This looked like a mall, it sounded like a mall, and the programs here acted like they were in a mall. Hence, she must have been in a weird computer version of a mall, but why did the guards bring her here? And what was she supposed to do in here?
The latter problem was unexpectedly solved by the appearance of a male player avatar.
"Hello, you beautiful flower."
Nabiki grinned to herself. She was again in control, even if only for a while. If there was something she knew how to handle beside money, it was people like Kuno-baby.
* * *
Kyu could barely stifle his laughter. Correction: he couldn't. He was bent over, his torso shaking, laughing at the stupefied face of his dear friend Yosuke, who in turn was staring at the "Game Over" -text blinking on the screen, the dating game machine playing the refrain of a cheap Japanese cover of "Material Girl". Beneath the "Game Over" text read: "Your debt of 1,992,334,902 yen has put you in a position where the next time you might own your toothbrush is at least 98 years into the future."
"Kyu... I agree with you. This game is evil, but the frisbee chick is only half as scary as... her," Yosuke said and gulped.
Kyu only laughed louder.
* * *
At the time the guards were moving Nabiki to the dating game game grid, on another game grid Ranma was not in a particularly cheerful mood. She wouldn't have thought she'd miss Nerima this much... Akane, Ucchan, Ryoga, ... all of them. Just as bad was that she couldn't even practice her art to the fullest without ki in here. No, it wasn't quite as bad as it had been with the ultimate weakness moxibustion, but being this weak was not acceptable at all.
That wasn't the only thing bothering her. There was a screen floating above her head with an image of her on it, as well as two separate game fields. The screen showed her in a frilly light orange dress, more fit to those over-the-top sugar high inducing mangas. Even worse, on the screen her image had bright red-shudder-c-c-cat ears and a tail.
The game grid before her was now a prism, and Ranma herself was at the bottom of it. The grid appeared half-filled with large, shiny spheres, which were slowly but continuously rolling at her direction above a void. In front of her was a glowing line marking where the void ended and the platform Ranma stood on began.
Ranma took out her identity disc and threw it at the spheres. As the disc hit a sphere, the sphere disappeared and the disc rebounded. The screen that had catgirl-Ranma and her opponent, a player avatar that looked like a preschool boy, showed him doing the same on his separate half of the game grid.
The floating screen showed all of the game field, including the empty spaces behind the foremost spheres. For anyone playing the game this information would've been most important as the spaces allowed the disc to hit many spheres at once, slowing down the speed the wall of spheres moved on at the player. Even better, should a cluster of spheres become separated from the backstack of the spheres, they would've disappeared only to reappear on the opponent's game field. This left Ranma at a severe disadvantage, as she could barely look at the image of herself dominating her side of the game field, making all but the simplest strategic planning near impossible.
Ranma threw her disc at the spheres as quickly as she could, attempting to take as many spheres as she could with each single throw. The front of the wave of spheres receded, but the relief was only temporary, as soon thereafter a flurry of dull gray spheres appeared before her after her opponent had successfully dispatched a cluster of them on his field.
She gritted her teeth and continued the assault on the spheres. After she had vanquished half of the gray spheres to the void, another batch of them appeared on the game grid.
It took less than ten seconds for the game to end as the nearest spheres reached Ranma's platform. "The player wins," the loudspeakers announced. The spheres disappeared from sight as Ranma fell on her knees. "I lost," she repeated in her mind. Sure, it wasn't a martial arts fight per se, but she had still lost. Like salt onto wounds, it only made the loss of her fighting prowess sting even worse.
She was still doing that when the protocol guards dragged her to the change plate and back to the holding pits.
* * *
The long, curved corridors of the directory tree were nearly empty. Every now and then, a seeker program scanned the tree for a specific archive or the system utilities verified the integrity of the tree.
An archive finder program was moving along the passageways. Another program had stopped him a few subdirectories ago, and now he was not functioning within parameters. The gold patterns on his body had taken a sickly green colour hue and reordered themselves in irregular, broken lines. His header felt dizzy and he fell down.
When he stood up again, he was dragging his left leg behind him as he sought other programs for some reason he didn't understand.
The virus had infected yet another program.
* * *
The frustration Ukyo felt was evident as she sat at her desk in Furinkan High, twirling a throwing spatula between her fingers. She knew she had to do something but what? She was a novice when it came to successfully solving problems in nonviolent ways. The teachers in previous classes had repeatedly noticed her distractedness and apprehended her as she had tried to figure out a solution to this dilemma.
Misa and Toshiko, who had been at the arcade with her, were fidgeting on their seats, throwing nervous glances at her every now and then. Ukyo had come close to lashing out at them in the arcade, and they were even now somewhat anxious of getting within swinging range of her. Even so...
"Ukyo? Erm... can you tell us what happened yesterday?" Toshiko asked.
Ukyo wondered if Misa and Toshiko were going to believe her, should she tell them all. At best, they could help her find a way to help Ranma. At worst, they'd reveal where Ranma is to the rest of the fiancée squad and Nabiki, which would keep her from playing the cute fiancée-heroine, and that wouldn't do. Although right now Nabiki felt like the best person to approach, if only she had come to school.
"Eh, forget that - no need for you to worry about it," Ukyo attempted to shrug aside their concerns.
Ukyo's friends cocked their eyebrows with some skepticism and let her be for the rest of that short break. But as soon as the bell chimed to signal lunch break, they took hold of both of Ukyo's arms and dragged her to a more solitary location in the girls' restroom for a little talk. After checking all the stalls were empty and that Ukyo was not yet reaching for a spatula, the two cornered her again.
"Okay, Ukyo, spill it," Toshiko ordered. Misa, standing beside her, nodded sharply.
"Look, I already told you to forget about it," Ukyo insisted.
"And you should've already understood we don't take that answer. So, what was that about Ranma yesterday?"
Ukyo frowned, annoyed. For the most part it was nice to have friends who weren't as oblivious as Ranchan, but not when they decided to butt their heads in things that were none of their business. Also, her spatula hand was itching badly.
Then again, maybe she could get two more co-conspirators this way for the future... as her plans with Ryoga had been less than successful in the past. The itch subsided as she changed her mind.
"Fine, you two, " Ukyo said as she began to relate Ranma's disappearance and the okonomiyaki game chef from yesterday to Misa and Toshiko.
When Ukyo had finished her story, Misa had an unreadable expression on her face whereas Toshiko had her brows furrowed and stroked her jawline with her right hand.
It was Misa who broke the silence after half a minute had passed. "Huh?" Ukyo felt the itch returning to her hand.
"Do you think the computer club could help you?" Toshiko interrupted.
"There's a computer club here?" Ukyo asked. There were quite a few clubs at their school, but Ukyo hadn't heard of a computer club before, probably because she didn't care all that much about clubs that weren't about martial arts, cooking or her Ranchan. Speaking of which, she should drop in the meetings of that particular club soon to remind who was Ranchan's fiancée and who were not.
"Yeah..." Toshiko said, then leaned in closer to Ukyo. "I heard they've already had some trouble with the law", she whispered conspiratorially to Ukyo.
"I heard that the JSDF and Yokota air base were involved somehow," Misa chimed in. Upon seeing the faces Ukyo and Toshiko she huffed and indignantly added, "Well, ask Takashi if you don't believe me!"
"The same Takashi who said that the Kunos were originally exiled aliens?" Toshiko snickered. "I thought you had learned to doubt his word by now, especially after you spent your monthly allowance on those 'magical' videotapes."
"Hey, it was worth the shot! I mean, if the tapes were real and I managed to make a living copy of Him..." Misa's voice trailed off as her eyes glazed over.
"She really needs to get over her bishonen obsession," Toshiko deadpanned.
* * *
As soon as the day's lessons had ended Ukyo hurried to see Haruo, the president of the computer club, in their club meeting. With the rather limited resources on the school budget, the club had access to only two computers there. Naturally, most of the club members had their own microcomputers at home, but here the club activities were mostly done without a computer, such as basic machine language programming lessons, if there were any people present who didn't already know how those. It was from this important task that Ukyo dragged him out to an empty classroom.
Had Ukyo known which company ran the arcade, she might've mentioned Ranma's visit at the Encom labs. As it was, she related only his disappearance and the okonomiyaki game event to Haruo.
"- and I can't help Ranchan because I don't know the first thing about those game machines!" Ukyo took a deep breath before continuing. "And that's why I need your help."
Haruo scratched the back of his ear in contemplation before taking off his glasses and cleaning them on the hem of his shirt.
"How's this for a deal: in return for our help, for next two months you'll be cooking okonomiyaki in our club meetings?" Haruo asked.
Ukyo thought this over for a while. She could ill afford to keep her restaurant closed for a whole day. But if they managed to find Ranma and bring him back, maybe she could rope Ranma into taking care of Ucchan's for those days? Not likely, but the potential rewards made the gamble worth it. "Only if we succeed in bringing Ranma back and only once a week?"
"Three months and on Mondays after school, assuming Ranma either isn't there or we get him out. Is this okay with you?" Haruo asked. Upon seeing Ukyo nod, he continued with a grin. "Deal. Let's go tell this to the club."
Ukyo grabbed Haruo's shoulder before he managed to take two steps towards the classroom door. "Is it necessary for all of them to know?"
Haruo turned back at Ukyo. "As good as I am alone, my friend and I are a team. She will have to know."
Ukyo's mouth narrowed into a thin line. The more people knew of Ranma the higher the possibility of someone meddling in the matter.
"Is it enough to tell only her?"
The two kept bartering for a while longer before reaching a solid agreement.
* * *
Eiko, a first year student, was one of Nabiki's informants at Furinkan High. She wasn't one to stand out in a crowd with her average stature and a black braid. Not that she wanted it either, as this made her well-suited for eavesdropping and information gathering.
More noteworthy at the moment was that she was also a member of the computer club and had seen Ukyo approach the club president. Grasping at the presented opportunity she sneaked behind the door to the room Ukyo and Haruo were in to listen to what business Ukyo had with them. When Ukyo had started her rant about her 'Ranchan', Eiko knew this information would sell well before it was made public knowledge. The only problem was that Nabiki had gone missing as well and she didn't take kindly to people who stepped over her.
However, Eiko haddn't reached her position this quickly by avoiding risks. She'd simply give the money to Nabiki once she returned. Besides, Nabiki would've certainly hated to see this opportunity to make money slip between her fingers.
Her decision made, she walked to the gym building. There she found her mark and bowed at him.
"Upperclassman Kuno, I have information on the whereabouts of Ranma Saotome and your pigtailed goddess."
* * *
"Tadao, got any idea where'd Eiko go?" Haruo called as he returned to the classroom with Ukyo.
"She walked out a while ago - don't know where. She'll be back, though, her schoolbag's still in here."
"Ah well, I think the explanations will have to wait until she gets back," Haruo commented to Ukyo.
* * *
Back inside the arcade mainframe Nabiki and Shinobu were being brought to another game grid, this time both of them together. Shinobu's three-hour long sleep cycle had done wonders to help her recover from her Disco Revival Revolution induced exhaustion.
Nabiki was walking beside her. In this case, 'walking' was an euphemism for stomping. Oh, all the wonderfully expensive items she couldn't get refunded in the mall!
Once they reached the game grid, they saw that it was easily thrice as large as the grids they had been before. The pitch black gray walls towered well over a hundred metres above the bottom of the grid. This time, there was not only one of the orange platforms that brought the programs down onto the grid; there were three of them, all on the same edge of the grid. As Shinobu and Nabiki were prodded onto the leftmost platform, Nabiki noticed that there were two programs on each of the other platforms as well. And on the one closest to them was... "Ranma?"
Shinobu had also recognized Ranma as the person who had come to the lab a few days ago. Her talk with Nabiki earlier today in mind, she couldn't place any blame on him, and if Nabiki wasn't exaggerating, he might've been their best and worst hope of getting out of here. Best in the sense that he was a master in surviving and even triumphing in tight spots, but worst in the sense that he was probably clueless what was going on in here, making the stereotype of a dumb jock seem politically correct and inadequate in describing the boy. Even so, she wasn't willing to bet on winning another disco dance experience like the previous one, and what if that game wasn't even the worst this place to had to offer?
On their platform, Ranma and Poro waited to begin their descent down to the grid. Ranma's previous loss was clearly readable from his face. It was only his luck that the game had not been to the death, and luck was something he never wanted to be grateful for. As it was, he was lost in his thoughts when the platforms began descending before stopping maybe twenty metres off the ground level. Then, the game field formed before the eyes of the six programs and users.
The game grid became filled with tall buildings, but the streets were deserted. There were plenty of cars parked all around the streets, but none of them were moving. Then 'they' appeared in front of the six non-player characters. 'They' were twenty metres tall giant robots, fit to old anime shows like Voltron, Balatack and Gekigangar-3, covering all of colour spectrum with their glow patterns on black background: red, orange, yellow, green, blue and magenta. In the arms of each mecha was a knife of some sort, the blade topping about five metres in length.
Ranma felt the not so gentle tap of a shock staff on his back as he was prodded inside the yellow mecha. He slipped into the pilot cockpit in the robot's upper torso, each of his limbs falling in the harnesses. The entrance hatch above him closed and he was in the dark, lit only by the yellow glow of the interior of cockpit.
As Shinobu settled into the orange robot, Nabiki, inside the red mecha, had already opened communications channels with Ranma.
"Saotome. Only you can get yourself into this kind of mess, and drag me alongside with you," Nabiki's voice rattled in through the speakers on Ranma's seat.
"Nabiki?"
A loud rumbling noise in the distance caught their attention before Nabiki could continue. Turning at the direction the sound came from, they saw two buildings at the edge of the grid topple down.
"What on Earth was that?" Shinobu exclaimed, now also in open communication with the other mechas.
"It's coming this way," Ranma stated with a low, flat voice, after seeing three more buildings come down.
"But where can we run - there's no exit in here!" Shinobu raised her voice.
If the yellow mecha had been able to express facial emotions, a deep frown would've marred his face. "We cannot run anywhere," Poro commented inside the green mecha. "We can't leave the grid until the game is finished - and this time I think it's going to take until either us or... whatever it is out there is derezzed."
"We got nothing but these oversized knives! How'd you expect us to be able to... kill whatever it is!" Shinobu retorted. Had she been a bit calmer, she might've remembered what Nabiki had previously told of Ranma in fights and felt the same false sense of security Nabiki had right now.
"Like Poro said... we just have to," Ranma stated before assuming command and leading the mecha squad to an ambush point near the edge of the game grid. He couldn't afford to go at it alone like he would've done in the real world. His loss at the game grid only supported this view. No, the best shot of anyone surviving was to have everyone involved. With the intention of attacking the building destroyer from the flanks and the rear, the six spread out themselves around the path the building destroyer was approaching judging by the sounds the collapsing buildings made. Then, total silence reigned for half a minute.
"Do you think it's gone?", Shinobu asked on the comm channel.
"Not a chance," Nabiki replied.
The program piloting the magenta robot stood up from crouch and opened comm channel.
"I'm taking a look where it is," he said as he stepped into a crossroad section.
An impossibly long, black tongue, lined with pink glow patterns, flew from behind the buildings and hit the magenta mecha straight through, slamming it in the process inside the building behind him, which then collapsed on top of the wrecked mecha.
"Ribbit!"
Shinobu jumped onto her feet and made a quick 360 degree spin. That sounded like... like... one of those slimy, disgusting long-tongued creatures whose moonlight serenades had often been the cause to her sleepless nights, especially after her friends had conned her to kiss one in preschool.
"Ribbit! Ribbit!" The powerful croaks came from the direction the tongue had disappeared at.
"A frog!" she screamed, nearly deafening the remaining mecha pilots with the sheer volume of her voice. To her luck, the building she was behind was taller than her mecha. Otherwise she might've been decapitated with a quick flick of the tongue.
Once Ranma's ears had stopped ringing, he took a look at the collapsed building the magenta mecha was now buried under. The rubble and the top of the building that hadn't fallen apart leaned against the outer wall. The unstable structure was almost high enough for an escape route from the game grid, being roughly twenty metres shy of the top of the wall. One robot alone couldn't escape, but if one of them was left to serve as a spring board...
"Poro, how'd ya like to escape from here instead of taking the frog head-on?" Ranma asked, still crouched in cover behind a building. The frog had not yet moved from wherever he was.
"You got a plan?" Poro answered with a question.
"If we piled something more, like a mecha, on that pile, ya could jump with your mechas onto the grid wall. Nabiki, you hearing this?"
"Sounds like you're not quite as much of a jock as I thought," Nabiki drawled. "So get on it already!" If there were more games like this, she sure was not going to take the chance of playing them alone.
Already on the right side of the crossroads, Ranma moved his mecha to the top of the pile and kneeled there to wait for the first mecha to come. From his position, he couldn't see the frog; a tall building was obstructing his view. He assumed and hoped the frog couldn't see him either.
"Shinobu, you go first. Then I, then the green mecha and finally blue," Nabiki commanded.
As ordered, the orange mecha ran to the yellow one, which helped the former take a hold of the grid wall edge and pull himself up.
"How is the yellow mecha going to get up here?" Shinobu's voice crackled in Nabiki's cockpit speakers.
"Ranma? He can clear that jump anyday, if not in his mecha, then without it," she replied confidently. She'd seen Ranma easily jump over two-story buildings in both of his forms, so getting up here shouldn't have been even a minor exercise for him, if he only got out of his mecha and jumped from the top of it.
* * *
In the real world, the boy controlling the frog saw that the pitiful human characters were attempting to run away from the might of the invincible Fragger Frog instead of attempting to find their weaponry in the city as they usually did. This surprised him. Usually the game AI was not designed to actually run away before the first blood, and this was certainly the first time he saw that kind of behaviour in this game. But if he let the them escape the game field, he couldn't break the high score, no matter how many buildings he demolished with combo moves. Stepping up the pace he launched the Tongue Slash Attack at the yellow mecha.
* * *
The tongue lashed at Ranma's mecha, piercing the torso and only barely missing Ranma inside the cockpit. His mecha fell onto the ground on his knees and elbows. Staying put had turned into a very bad idea, and he struggled to get out of the robot as quickly as possible. The first method of approach left the hatch closed and his knuckles hurting after attempting to punch the hatch out. A second later, he noticed the small button beside the hatch and pressed it. The hatch cover slid off and Ranma crawled out of the cockpit.
"Blue, bring him up with you," Nabiki ordered, when the huge head of the frog, glowing with bright green lines forming circles around the just as huge eyes, showed up in her view at the end of a street leading to the escape route. The blue mecha had his back turned at the frog as he was moving towards Ranma's mecha.
"Ribbit!" came the rumbling sound. The tongue lashed out once again, cutting the blue mecha in half at his midsection. The top half fell on top of the yellow mecha as the bottom half rolled down the pile of rubble until finally stopping at the street level. Poro and Nabiki, whose position gave them a view inside the mecha's bottom half as it fell down, saw there a brief orange glow which disappeared almost immediately.
"Deresolution," Poro stated, a somber undercurrent audible in his voice.
"Deresolution?" Nabiki parroted. "The program was killed," Poro said in a way of explanation before straightening the back of his mecha.
"I'm going back to pick Ranma up," Poro replied and leaped back inside the game grid. Even if he had submitted to the evident fate of dying at the game grids before Ranma had arrived, Ranma wanted both of them to get out of the game grid. Now that the goal was within their reach, he'd do his best to get the other out of there.
The frog kaiju had been moving towards them, taking his time to wreck every building on his path and a bit off his path as well. Lower buildings were destroyed by the kaiju making a belly flop onto them, taller ones were brought down with a lick of the tongue that cut down the building in half.
Poro had noticed the frog had picked up his speed as it no longer leisurely destroyed all the buildings, only those on his immediate path to the two fallen mechas. To their luck, one of the buildings the frog hit collapsed on his path and hid Poro and Ranma from him. The green mecha kneeled and lowered his hand next to Ranma, who quickly leaped onto it. The mecha quickly stood up and climbed atop the remains of the yellow and blue mechas and jumped for the ledge of the game grid.
The jump fell a bit short, and the mecha's legs were left half dangling over the game grid. Ranma quickly jumped off the mecha's open hand to allow Poro use both of his hands to pull himself up. But before he could do that, the tongue whipped out again and cut the legs off the green mecha, turning the mecha into a giant paper weight.
With the legs gone, the remains of the green mecha could easily pull the now lighter body further up so that it had no danger of falling back down to the game grid. Quickly thereafter the hatch behind the mecha opened and Poro crawled out. Both of the remaining mechas kneeled to pick up the two grounded pilots; Ranma climbed on the red mecha's hand and Poro on the orange mecha's.
Inside the cockpit of the red mecha, Nabiki stared at Ranma as he climbed - climbed, not jumped - to the mecha's shoulder. A roaring "ribbit" was heard when the frog reached the fallen mechas and seeing how many had escaped death. The last lash of the tongue flew over the heads of the four escapees.
Loudspeakers over at the game grid had come active, blaring out an alarm signal. "Illegal program exits from the game grid. Sending out recognizers and tanks."
Poro and Shinobu signaled Nabiki to follow them to the tall, black cliffs rising close to the walls of the game grid. Seen from ground, the tops appeared to nearly reach the mosaic clouds passing far over their heads.
"If we find our way through these memory archive banks, we'll get to the unallocated memory blocks. There we can hide and plan out what we'll do then in peace," Poro explained to the benefit of the three users while gesturing towards the maze of black slabs.
The four had walked for a few minutes when they came across a deep crevice that ran through the archive banks, twenty metres wide ledges framing it on at least three levels below them and another two above them. Poro raised his hand to signal a stop and listened carefully for a while. The chasm carried into their ears the echoes of a muted, sputtering sound that was growing louder and louder.
"Recognizers. Quick, back into the canyons!"
The two mechas scrambled as fast as they could with their passengers a hundred metres in the direction they came from where they turned inside a canyon leading to the chasm. The sound was growing stronger and stronger until after fifteen seconds they saw two huge, black constructs with something akin to square brackets for their bottom half float past their hiding place. After a minute had passed Poro signaled them to get back to the chasm and continue on.
"What were they?" Shinobu asked Poro.
"As I said, recognizers, and that's all I'll say about them until we get to safety," Poro replied. As the encounter with the recognizers had proven, the sounds carried all too well in the chasm, giving the pursuers an easy lead to follow.
"Saotome? Why didn't you simply jump up here from the game grid? We wouldn't have lost the green mecha then," Nabiki asked the man still sitting on the shoulder of her mecha. She might not have known everything about the place they were in, but she did understand that each remaining mecha was a valuable resource. Now that she had seen a violent death of a sort right before her, anything to help them survive were even more important than before.
Ranma fixed a cold gaze where he knew the eyes of the pilot were. "Guess ya know this ain't the real world. But I can't use ki in here, so no roof hopping." Ranma lowered his gaze downwards at the feet of the mecha. "It's not as bad as the ultimate weakness moxibustion mark, but not much better either. Feh."
Nabiki's eyed widened a fraction when she understood what that meant. She had miscalculated and had been ready to leave him down at the game grid. On the betting table there had been Ranma's life. Not even in her dealings with Kinnosuke Kashao had her manipulations carried the risk of anyone actually dying because of her. This was no game, the derezzing of the program piloting the blue mecha vividly playing in her mind. She couldn't shake the thought of her role in Ranma's near demise out of her mind, only push them back for a while. Those thoughts would resurface, though, much too soon for her liking.
* * *
On the far side of the chasm, thirty metres below the fugitives' current level three tanks on patrol had just noticed them. The tanks raised their aim and waited for the firing command from their commander.
The quartet didn't see the shells coming until it was already too late. One hit cut off the top of orange mecha's head, sending the mecha himself on the ground on his back. Another one struck the red mecha's left leg, ripping it off at the hip. The third shot struck the red mecha's left shoulder, the momentum sending the mecha on an uncontrolled pirouette on the one remaining leg. Ranma, who had been standing on the mecha's right shoulder, only barely managed to hold on. After the first two spins, however, he could foresee the mecha would topple down the chasm, which meant a fall of at least fifty metres - taking Nabiki with it unless she immediately got out of the mecha.
Ranma understood the speed at which he had to act. When he had first woken up in the holding pits, he felt something instead of his usual ki reservoirs. As he attempted to pull himself closer to the hatch to the cockpit of the mecha, he was also grasping for straws - this weird feeling included. Then, the spin slowed down. Not one to look the gift horse in the mouth, he quickly moved to open the hatch.
Inside the hatch, he saw Nabiki nearly frozen on the pilot's seat, her face turned away so that he couldn't see her terrified expression. The bodysuits didn't have a collar, so Ranma couldn't only drag her out by pulling on that. No, he'd have to place his hands lower, below her armpits, before he could pull her out and hope she wouldn't take offense to it. Acting rather than thinking things over any longer, he wormed his arms below hers and began pulling her up. He offhandedly noticed that her freed limbs moved slowly, as if floating in molasses, before he had taken hold of her in his arms and jumped down on top of the prone orange mecha. As he touched down, he turned around to see the crippled mecha continue his dance of death, the rotations picking up speed again before the robot finally fell down the chasm.
Poro, who had been on the hand of Shinobu's mecha before the tanks had fired at them, was now staring in awe at the pigtailed martial artist. Ranma knelt and set Nabiki on the ground, only now noticing how he had had his hands a bit too close to her chest, and quickly let go of her. But as he expected her to lash out at him any moment now, he finally noticed her still terrified face, staring into nothingness.
"You okay, Nabiki?" Ranma braved. There was no answer.
"Nabiki?"
Nabiki slowly came out of the shock and attempted to focus her gaze on Ranma.
"How... how did you do that, Saotome?"
"I'd like to know that as well, Ranma," Poro said, a questioning frown on his face.
"Huh? What do you mean?"
"I mean, you moved faster than a light cycle on a speed up, that's what I mean!"
"Help me out of here!" a muffled voice came from inside the wrecked orange mecha. Taking this diversion as a small blessing, Ranma moved over to help Shinobu out. They'd have to hurry if they wanted to get to the safe area before the tanks requested for reinforcements to check in on the wrecks.
* * *
Over at System Core the lord of the mainframe and MCP's highest-ranking vassal on this system, Kernel, was watching the system load graphs. A few microcycles ago the CPU load alarm had triggered for the second time after Kernel had been compiled on this system. One time was an anomaly. Two times meant there was a program bug to hunt down.
The system monitor programs were busy tracking down the program that had been changing program priorities without proper authorization. Such crime was punishable by deresolution, but only after a thorough debugging session at the quarantine zone. Then, one of the monitor programs cracked a smile.
"Kernel, we have identified the conscript. Program name: . MCP designated locations: the holding pits and the game grids. Current location: memory archive banks."
* * *
Akane's eyes glinted with glee as she waited outside the school gym. All day long, she had been following Ukyo, waiting for her to slip up and show that she knew where Ranma was. Ukyo had managed to escape her only for the lunch break, but once she returned, she didn't let her out of her sight again.
Now, she had again missed a potentially important lead - she had seen Eiko eavesdropping on Ukyo and Haruo and couldn't get any closer herself. But at least she knew she could get her information from Eiko, so she set out to follow her instead.
Akane had heard Toshiko's query in the classroom before lunch break, even if not the whole discussion. Something had happened yesterday, and she was positive it had to do with Ranma.
When Eiko got out from the gym hall, Akane confronted her.
"Eiko. What was Ukyo talking about with Haruo?" she demanded.
"Akane." Eiko knew she'd have to be careful with her lest she incur Nabiki's wrath - and in particular not to ask money for information.
So much for Ukyo and MCP's plans to keep a lid on the situation.
* * *
_End of line._
* * *
_Omake (based on the idea by Raneko):_
Kyu and Yosuke had wide grins on their faces. Now that they had found out they could play Tokyo Luv-Luv Memorial in co-operative mode with two machines, the Frisbee Girl and the Moneydrain Girl would not stand a chance against their combined charm.
Fast-forward ten minutes.
Once again, "Game Over" flashed on the two screens. This time, however, the screens showed the Frisbee Girl and the Moneydrain Girl tangled in a passionate lip lock. Under the picture the screens said: "Due to your bumbling dating practices you have converted these two lovely girls into devout life-long lesbians."
Both boys stared at the two figures until Kyu broke the silence. "Umm.. did we lose or win?" Yosuke wiped some drool away from his chin before answering. "Shush. Did you have your camera with you?"
* * *
_Omake by crystlshake:_
Tatewaki Kuno strode through the doors with purpose. His eyes filled with determination, his heart filled with purpose, and his pockets filled with yen. Today he, the Blue Thunder of Furinkan High, would prove triumphant in his quest to free the beauteous pigtailed girl.
Eight tension filled hours and 60,000 yen later...
His palms were slick with sweat as he tightly gripped the weapon at his disposal. He would deny it to any other but his heart was gripped with apprehension and worry. This was his last chance. If he failed now he may never see the pigtailed girl again. The foul sorcerer had finally pulled out all the stops but he had valiently fought on against the ever increasing waves of minions sent to stop him with the pressures of time pushing him to the limits of his reflexes. He stood at the pinnacle, the point of no return. One wrong move and what was assuredly the final obstacle in his way would forever prevent him from his destiny.
His enemy moved! Like a bullet he raced forward, intent on his goal, blood pounding in his ears at the rush of the final confrontation. Quick as lightning he struck, sending the monster to its demise. Swelling with pride at his accomplishment he strode forward to claim his prize and his destiny.
He was stopped just short of embracing his beloved. Fury warred with grief as he was denied by one last trick! Then she spoke. The words turned his blood to ice and behold, it was as if the great Blue Thunder had been slain! He gasped as their meaning registered and openly wept. He had failed! How could the heavens torture one as virtuous as he so?
The Encom Arcade security guards sighed at what had become a common occurrence over the last two weeks. Resignedly they helped the young man from the floor and escorted him to the exit.
As Tatewaki bemoaned his failure he cast one forlorn look back at the arcade machine that so taunted him and the words that tore his soul. Firming his resolve as he walked away he resigned himself to his fate. He would have to throw himself into practice to overcome the limits time placed on him, and from the looks of his significantly lighter wallet come better prepared. As he attempted to rally his spirit the mocking words of the sorcerer echoed in his head and he shed a tear at his failure.
The princess is in another castle.
* * *
_**AN:** Well... I guess I was badly mistaken. Pretty much all I needed to change for this were the scenes with Shinobu and add only a little more flesh to the real world scenes._
4. Synchronization
_The usual disclaimer. Ranma, Tron and all the related intellectual property making an appearance in this fic are someone else's than my property; the former Rumiko Takahashi's and the latter.. Disney's? Steven Lisberger's? And whoever they've given/sold their rights to. I'm not and won't be making any money off of this._
* * *
A scowl marred Eiko's face as she was returning back to the computer club meeting. It was rare for her to express her feelings this openly, but still, with no one there to see her, the matter of letting her guard down was of no importance.
She had strided to the gym building with the intent of making a good amount of money in Nabiki's absence. Of course, since Ukyo already had the full inside scoop on the matter, she didn't expect to match Nabiki's usual turnout. Kuno did pay the usual fee, and if she had been quick, she might've had the time to sell the information to the Ranma fanclub before their meeting disassembled.
But the confrontation with Akane had botched up that plan. It had cost her a quarter of an hour, first attempting to evade Akane before ending up telling everything she had heard Ukyo talk with Haruo... for free. By the time she got to the classroom that held the Ranma fanclub meeting, the meeting itself had already been disbanded, probably because no one had anything new to tell about Ranma.
Haruo was sitting behind the teacher's desk talking with Ukyo, who had moved a chair from a student desk to sit opposite to him. The two had talked about their options for a while when Eiko entered the classroom. The rest of the club had already left home, leaving the two no need to speak in hushed tones.
"Eiko, come in here," Haruo called. "Ukyo here," he waved his hand grandiously at the girl in question, "has agreed to be the club chef for the next three months... if we succeed in a challenge she gave us."
Challenges - Haruo lived for them, Eiko recalled. She let a small smile appear on her face. But what was Ukyo doing... in... oh darn it all. "Nice going, Eiko... it sure will turn out a challenge after getting Kuno and Akane involved," she silently cursed.
On the outside she kept her expression and jumped onto Haruo's lap. "And don't we both just love challenges? So, what's it all about?" she asked and gave a peck on Haruo's cheek, the smile never leaving her face.
* * *
The three Users and Poro had almost made their out of the memory archive bank canyons. The trip hadn't been a short one after they had lost their transportation, and constantly dodging recognizer and tank squads looking for them didn't help them travel any faster, or at least not constantly in the right direction. The walk of five hours did give the four time to reflect, as Poro's recommendation to remain silent was taken to heart.
Her husband and in-laws now last on her mind, Shinobu wondered what was going on with Ranma and Nabiki. The latter had said Ranma was engaged to her sister, but Shinobu felt there was something off in how the two acted, and it wasn't only because of their current predicament. Maybe it was just her, but she expected future in-laws to get along better than these two.
Now that she thought about it, Nabiki had said she had been searching for Ranma, who had disappeared well before they ended up in the digital world. Ranma must've come here before they did, so maybe he knew more of why they were in here?
Nabiki's mind was no longer preoccupied only by the misassessment when escaping the game grid. Yes, that was still on her mind, but she had pushed it back and put up her usual facade. She, too, believed that Ranma had been here longer than her, but what had he learned? And why had she been pulled into this mess as well? Once the four got into safety, they'd need to have a small... discussion on exactly what had happened. Especially about how he pulled her out of the mecha.
Ranma's latest stunt was very much on Poro's mind as well. No normal program could've done that. No normal program should've done it either, as now he was pretty certain Kernel had already dispatched even more recognizers, tanks and protocol guards to seek the fugitives. He didn't know what system the three had come from, but if he stuck with them, in the end, he might get back to his own system.
The person on everybody else's mind had been thinking of the mysterious rescue operation as well. Poro had said he had moved faster than anyone, but in his opinion he hadn't moved any faster than usual without ki. But what about the changes in the speed at which the mecha had spun? And what about that odd something he felt when he tried to use his ki, which just wasn't there?
Poro broke everyone from their reveries as he noted they had come to their destination: the unallocated memory blocks. The canyons they had walked through had been lined with tall black blocks laid out in an orderly fashion, but in contrast, these memory blocks were littered with small smoky grey slabs, slates, prisms and blocks, all laid out in one merry, seemingly chaotic fashion, and with glittering bluish edges by which small pulses travelled at a slow pace. At the bottom of a nearby pit, the remnants of a wrecked tank were strewn around.
The four wandered deeper into the rugged terrain. Rubble, tall cliffs and cave formations covered the area. At the same time, Ranma was under interrogation. Shinobu and Nabiki had agreed to ask Ranma later, when Poro was not present, of how he had ended up inside the computer, but that didn't keep Nabiki silent on all topics.
"Ranma, how did you get Nabiki out of the mecha?" Poro asked as he helped Shinobu climb up a small cliffside. This also had Nabiki's ears perked at Ranma's direction.
"Well, the mecha spun slower and I already was on the mecha, so it wasn't that tough for me ta pull her outta there," Ranma replied, some of his pride seeping through.
Poro and Nabiki looked incredulously at Ranma. Poro knew what he had seen and Nabiki knew what she had felt. Unlike Poro, however, Nabiki had also the benefit of knowing Ranma was horrendous at lying, and Ranma truly seemed to believe what he was saying.
Nabiki stepped onto a long, narrow slab acting as a bridge over a gap between two large boulders and voiced her opinion. An explanation formed in her mind. "Ranma, got any idea who Einstein was?"
"Uhh... not a martial artist?"
If she hadn't been using her hands to balance herself on the bridge, Nabiki would've slapped herself on the head. The long fall down would've been quite painful, though. "Now, why I am I not surprised of that reply?" she thought.
"Albert Einstein was a physicist, and one saying frequently credited to him is that everything is relative," Nabiki expounded as she stepped off the bridge safely.
"Relative? As in family? Are ya saying I'm related to the Kunos?" Ranma nearly shouted as it was his turn to step on the bridge. It was Nabiki's luck that she was already on safer ground as her step faltered. How did he reach that conclusion? A bit off to the side, Shinobu was silently wondering who these Kunos were. She also had a strange feeling she was better off not knowing them.
"No, you fool! In this case, I meant that for different observers time can run at different speed," Nabiki said as she began climbing a slight slope onto a ridge to follow Poro. She doubted it was worth it to explain to Ranma the most commonly known results of the theory of relativity; that's what the teachers at Furinkan High were for. Well, some of them at least.
"So what's this gotta do with anything?"
At times, Nabiki felt talking with Ranma was like leading a stubborn mule through an obstacle course, dangling a bunch of carrots before his head. What a fitting equine analogue it was. "You said the robot slowed down its spins?" At Ranma's nod she continued, "Was it only the robot or did you notice something else slowing down as well?"
Ranma strided up the ridge and thought over what Nabiki was asking. Shinobu's mecha had already settled down by the time the spinning slowed down, Poro seemed to be pretty much out of it anyway, so he wasn't expected to move much. Now, what else was there that did move at all? The sky was one alternative, but he hadn't paid any attention to it at the time. He turned to look back at Nabiki. Nabiki. That's it.
"You," Ranma replied.
Nabiki, whom he had by now already passed, raised her head and her eyebrow at him in a silent question.
"In the cockpit, ya just seemed to move a bit sluggish, that's all," he elaborated. Nabiki kept her expression.
"I mean, it was like ya were floating in tar or something, almost like," he continued, before realising, "like in slow motion."
Nabiki grinned. Very much like leading a mule to a goal. Shinobu and Poro had also listened to this discussion, the former relating the happened to the wire fu movies she had seen whereas the latter silently wondered exactly what did Ranma's identity disc contain. After all, the disc recorded everything a program did and learned. "Yes, it would be most interesting to see." Then with a grim undertone he added, "Especially if you were Kernel or MCP."
Driven by this minor success, the mercenary girl asked a few more probing questions from Ranma. To the disappointment and frustration of both her and Poro, they couldn't get anything more useful out of him. Regardless, this had given Ranma the starting point to think over the incident.
This wasn't a ki-driven technique, he understood that much. But he did try to do something like that. And there was something - something he couldn't name out there. He tried reaching for it in his mind as he followed the rest of the troupe on autopilot. Whatever it was, it was much fainter and weaker than it had been before, pulsing further away in the distance of his mind's eye.
He looked around him. The area was still pretty much as messed up as it had been. In the distance he saw a red glowing line shooting from the ground to the sky from a building whose shape vaguely resembled that of a horse shoe. Ranma was about to ask Poro what that was, but he was already talking with Nabiki. Instead he let his gaze wander some more for a while. Down the ridge they had been walking on Ranma saw something glitter, like in the ice cream and watermelon he had eaten on the game grid simulating a park. Nabiki had just turned to talk to Shinobu, so he addressed Poro.
"Hey Poro, that sparkly stuff, what is it?"
"That, Ranma, is a source pool, and that's where we're going now to take a break," he said, a grin growing on his face, and began descending towards the sparkling pool. The Users shrugged and followed him back down the hillside.
As the pool reminded Ranma of the food he had eaten inside the game grid, he realized that other than the time the avatar had tried hitting on him... then her, he hadn't eaten anything in here. The Saotome stomach should've made itself known already before he was shipped to the diskette drive, but now, days later, it still hadn't made a single complaint. This was not natural.
Poro reached the pool and took out his identity disc from behind his back. The disc served as a saucer as he drank the liquid, the circuitry patterns on his body lighting up. "Ahh... hey you, don't just stand there," he called at the rest of the group and waved them to come closer. "The Power here will do you a lot of good."
Ranma was a bit skeptical about getting too close to anything that resembled water, even if it was called Power instead of water. However, the choice was made for him, as Shinobu tripped on a small block behind his back and upon falling pushed Ranma into the source pool.
Shinobu stared at the thorougly soaked boy-turned-girl who was now spitting Power from her mouth like a fountain. Nabiki had the insufferable smirk on her face. "You never get a break, do you, Ranma?"
Poro, who had seen the entire exchange, asked, "Where did Ranma go and how did Ranko get here?" With a hint of cold steel in his voice, he asked, "Are you one of MCP's spyware?"
Nabiki stared at Ranma and Poro, the latter more than the former. He couldn't have missed the change, not two metres away right in front of his eyes? Sigh. And she thought there were no Kunos in here.
* * *
Back in Furinkan High, Ukyo and Haruo had finished "informing" Eiko of what their task was. She had only one more question to ask from Ukyo and Haruo. "So, what's the plan?"
"First off, we're going to check the arcade ourselves," Haruo said with a wide grin, which soon was mirrored on Eiko's face as well. Haruo imperceptibly nudged his head at Ukyo. Eiko's smirk only grew wider as the two turned to face their 'employer'.
Ukyo touched the spatula on her back, the episode from the previous night not yet all forgotten from her mind. If the guards at the arcade considered her now an unwelcome person... they'd have to be re-educated. No one was keeping her from saving her Ranchan! It was then that she noticed the way the two were grinning at her.
"No," she said.
"Oh yes," both computer specialists said in unison, their smirks growing ever wider.
"I don't have that much money to spend around! You pay for your own games!"
Not too far away, Kuno was walking to his home. The information the lackey of the insufferable Nabiki Tendo had supplied him with left him pondering what steps to take next. Unlike her mistress, the girl hadn't offered any advice on how to proceed - not that he expected to get it for any less than five thousand yen.
He frowned as he recalled that Nabiki Tendo had been absent from school that day. Rusty gears creaked and turned in his head, but ground to an abrupt halt as he noticed a one hundred yen coin on the sidewalk.
Yes, certainly this was a sign from the spirits! He would find his ensorcelled love in the arcade on his own and protect her fiery yet delicate person from whatever had imprisoned her in those cold, unfeeling shells of plastic, wood and silicon.
Cue foreboding rumble of thunder in the distance.
* * *
"No, Ran...ko is not spyware," Nabiki explained Poro for the third time.
Poro still couldn't believe it, even if a third party said it. A few metres away Ranma mused this was better than how MCP dealt with it, since he had given up shooting hostile glares at her. He'd even understood that Ranma and Ranko would never be seen together - but why was it so difficult to accept that Ranma was Ranko? That went over both Ranma and Nabiki's heads.
Well, at least he hadn't started spewing bad poetry.
Ranma was having a bit better luck explaining the curse to Shinobu. Both had climbed out of the pool and were now having a 'relatively' calm discussion. Magical curses and multiple engagements didn't really fit in her view of the world of few hardships and where most things were controlled so that chaos had little foothold. Still, it looked like no mallet, proverbial or not, would be making an appearance.
"- and don't ya start thinkin' I like being a girl for the rest of the time I'm in here. Why the big red face has something against me, I dunno."
With the revelation that Ranma was actually Ranko, the one person who Shinobu knew to be somehow involved in why they ended up inside the digital world in the first place, her ire was dissipating. Having now a face to connect to the name, blaming her was now harder. This didn't mean she wasn't wary of him... her. She would give Ranma the benefit of the doubt, but only for now.
Ranma watched in surprise as the woman opposite to her was calming down. She wasn't used to resolving arguments by talking, after all. No, usually the arguments only escalated until someone got lost, was knocked out or was punted skywards.
It was only a brief flash in her mind, shorter than a blink of an eye, but the image of a then long-haired girl with black hair arguing with her derailed her thoughts. Akane. Why did she have to think of her right now?
Shinobu watched as Ranma averted her eyes, her face assuming an expression of longing. The pigtailed girl then shook her head to clear her thoughts and returned her attention to Shinobu.
By now, Nabiki had given up her attempts to explain the curse to Poro, so the two of them had begun walking towards Ranma and Shinobu. Ranma felt she was done with Shinobu, too. She was already moving to stand up when Nabiki spoke.
"Don't get up, Ranko. We need to talk with you," she said, emphasizing the name. She admitted Poro was the only one of them who knew his way around here, and for that reason he had to listen to their discussion. Shinobu, on the other hand, might have been not so well-versed in computers, but she knew more of the people in Encom than anyone else present. And even if Shinobu didn't believe Encom or its employees were directly involved in the events, she was keeping her mind open.
Poro and Nabiki sat down next to Ranma and Shinobu, who had now moved a bit to the side so that she could lean against a tall block.
"So, how did you end up in here," Nabiki directed her first question towards Ranma.
"Ya remember the debt I paid back 'bout a week ago? Well, I got most of the money in advance for doing some basic kata with a few stickers on."
"Motion capture," Shinobu interjected.
"That. Two days back, this one man, Nobuo something, calls me an' asks if I want to do another session."
Nabiki nodded to herself. This was the call she listened to on the landline extension. Keeping her cards close to her vest, she nodded to Ranma to prompt her to continue with her recount. At a later time, she'd confront her about the Tendo share of the money earned from the recording sessions.
"Well, at the labs, there weren't any but the voice in the loudspeaker there. He told me to get back to the recordin' area and once I was there, zap!"
"Wait wait wait, you mean you didn't see anyone? Who opened the blast doors then, or the outer doors even?" Shinobu was surprised. Encom labs had very tight security rules for the people working there, and even tighter if you included MCP overseeing all of it.
"No one, they just opened on their own when I walked up to them."
"That's not how things are supposed to happen! I mean, the security rules have already been violated in more ways that I know. No visitor is ever left unsupervised, the blast doors may not just 'open on their own' and in general, no new guests are permitted in after the front doors are locked at six pm!"
Exasperated, Shinobu, who had stood up in her overexcitement, sat heavily back down. What good were the rules if they weren't being followed? Apparently, this branch of the company had to have been targeted by industrial espionage and there was a mole deep undercover already; it was the only thing she could think of that explained this.
A thought she didn't even want to consider popped up in her mind. What about MCP? Why didn't the last line of their company security do anything?
"Back on topic, a bright beam struck me and I woke up in a cell." Deciding to conveniently cut off a few of the more embarrassing events such as being zapped unconscious more times than she cared for, he skipped over to the 'trial'.
"The big red head, Master Control something Poro said his name was, babbled something about me breaking some laws of maths or somesuch."
"Master Control Program?" Shinobu queried, feeling a cold pit forming in her stomach.
"Yah, that's the one."
Shinobu wasn't a stupid person, even if she didn't hold a college degree. Even though she worked only at the receptionist's desk, her terminal there was connected to MCP. MCP could've edited the personnel records. MCP could've handled the lab security systems so that nothing had appeared amiss. All leads pointed to him. Him. It felt strange, wrong even, to refer to a computer program as a person, but in here it didn't feel all that out of place.
She tossed aside that train of thought. If MCP was as much of a big shot here as she had the impression of, they were in deeper trouble than she had cared for. Naturally, being imprisoned in the digital world was trouble enough, but this piece of news only showed how much worse than she had thought the things could get in there.
As Shinobu's shoulders drooped, Poro was thinking to himself. Even if he was rather lethargic and impassive for a program, something about these three programs and Ranma just wouldn't let go of his attention. Ranma had said he was a martial artist, but what would a program by that description do? The program who had most likely broken more than a few of the constraints Kernel had put on program execution. No, whatever it was that he executed when he pulled Nabiki out of the mecha wreck was not within normal parameters.
Another point was that of the four, only Shinobu appeared to know who MCP was. Anyone on the system must have heard or known about him, but not Ranma, Ranko or Nabiki. Although, Ranma had met him before he was sent here, but he still had no idea who the "big red face" had been. Poro gave a small chortle at the memory of this alias.
Poro didn't know enough of Nabiki to form a conclusion what manner of program she was. Still, her ignorance of the system state was hinting that she likely wasn't a program of standard configuration either. She also had known Ranma and Ranko before they were transferred to this mainframe, but what exactly was their connection?
Shinobu might've been a normal program, but for some reason, he doubted that. "Guilty by association," some might say, but she understood too well what the others were talking about. In their discussion, many nouns Poro had never heard of before had popped up like money and kata, but she had followed the discussion without a hitch.
"You're not normal programs, right? But what are you then?"
His interjection cut short the discussion the three Users had been in.
Nabiki and Shinobu took a look at each other, then at Ranma, who had raised her hand and was opening her mouth to answer.
"I th_mmhph_!"
The rest was muffled by Nabiki's hand that had suddenly covered Ranma's mouth. Above her hand, Ranma's eyes gave an angry glare at the girl with pageboy hair cut.
"Excuse us for a minute," Shinobu asked Poro before moving over to Ranma and Nabiki herself.
The three huddled together, and conversed in low, whispered tones. Every now and then, Nabiki cast a quick look at Poro, as if to ascertain he hadn't moved any closer. Something of a grin could have been seen forming on the edges of her mouth, even though she was definitely trying to keep her features expressionless.
Poro had moved back to the source pool to indulge in the glimmering liquid while he waited for the three to finish their talk. He scooped some Power from the pool with his identity disc and slowly sipped it, not in the slightest hurry for their break to end. Far ahead of him, the red transmission beam from an IO tower crossed the horizon and vanished into the black nothingness high above their heads. The beam appeared to remain still, not a single bit transferring through it. It only made him realize how much in isolation the system was. Getting out of here would be a problem.
"Poro?"
He turned his head at Shinobu. Ranko and Nabiki were beside her, their impromptu negotiations already over.
Nabiki, her face now missing the grin it previously had, took up the bat. "You are right. We aren't programs. We are what you would call Users."
Poro raised one of his eyebrows, then the other. Finally, he began chuckling as the three put-down Users watched him.
"That's one reaaally tall tale you're weaving, you know? Piece of malware with access to system functions I could've believed. Corrupted pieces of an obsolete Kernel, maybe. But Users?"
Nabiki's mouth had twisted into a thin line in displeasure. "Are you done?"
"Are you?" came Poro's sobered reply.
"What's wrong with the truth, not good enough for you?"
Poro glared at the three in front of him. It was as if they didn't understand just how laughable their claim was. Users? Here in this system? And how could they be so... clueless?
A nagging uncertainty began to form in the back of his header. He had never heard of anyone actually seeing a User; at best, they had heard their voices in IO towers. Was it even possible for them never before to have come to the digital world?
That would explain some things, but right now he was the lone skeptic of the group that had appeared to agree to that absurd statement of them being Users. No, he had no option of blindly trusting them, especially once you added the mess with Ranma and Ranko.
"You think I'm going to take that for the truth without anything backing up your claims?"
A bit to the side of the two arguing, Ranma sat down, a thoughtful frown on his face, as she tuned out the arguing between Nabiki and Poro. If Poro wanted proof, she'd give him some proof. But what? If they were supposed to be gods, what were they supposed to do?
Miracles and all that flashy stuff would've been good, but she didn't know how to pull that off. Sure, she had managed to do something different when she pulled Nabiki out of her mecha, but it was a different thing to do it again intentionally.
Miracles... well, her curse didn't faze him in the least, even if it was because he appeared to deny anything even remotely linking to it.
At this point, anyone watching her face would've noticed her face lit up like a Christmas tree. As it was, though, her realization of the possibility of removing her curse went unnoticed in the digital world. Still, she now had not only one but two good, very good, reasons to find out what her limits were in here.
Ranma decided to test one of her theories. Like when she had rescued Nabiki from the mecha, she concentrated on reaching for that something she had felt. Like before they had come to the pool, the presence was relatively weak, but it might have been slightly stronger than before. She dove into her mind, attempting to locate what that feeling was.
To an external observer, it appeared like she had been sitting still for several minutes. To Ranma, it felt like she had been searching for hours, but giving up was not an option, not when it was about the curse or even getting changed back to her male form. The spark she had been attempting to reach seemed to avert her approaches, never coming any closer. When the direct approach didn't work, she began to weave her way there through an imaginary obstacle course in three dimensions.
Whatever it was that she was doing, it appeared to pay off. Finally, she saw a spark in the distance that emanated the aura of the presence she had been looking for slightly increase in its luminosity. Elated, she picked up her pace and approached the spark within an arm's distance.
In her mind's eye she saw it now as a glowing blob, whose contours constantly shifted. She reached for it with an imaginary hand, but it always avoided her touch. For a few more minutes, she continued to try reaching for it before trying another approach. Did she need to touch it? What if she only had to follow and change its shape? She let her hands move up and down beside the amorphous sphere, which squeezed the sphere flatter, now more closely resembling a round loaf of bread. A subtle swipe upwards on both hands, all the while bringing the hands closer together, gave the lump the shape of a teardrop.
She let her imaginary hands down. The energy was malleable, easily even, but the significance of the different shapes evaded her. Another important on top of her mind was if it was possible for her to project it outside of her?
Ranma's consciousness returned smoothly back to the digital reality. She now knew what the energy was and where it was. Maybe she could already do something with what she had noticed?
She stood up from her meditative pose and walked away, turning behind a large block which hid her from the eyes of others. Poro had laid back down on his back to casually lounge, half-heartedly listening to Nabiki and Shinobu talking after their argument had whittled down to nothing.
Soon, two thumps were heard from where Ranma had gone. The first thump, not much different from the splat of a fist striking a wall of stone, carried with it a strange, vibrating echo. It almost sounded like there was a pattern hidden in it, but before any of the three people listening to it could figure it out, the sound had already become muted. The second thump was much like the first one, only without the trailing sound.
As Poro and the two Users watched at the boulder, in half a second, something not unlike a Mandelbrot fractal appeared on all surfaces of the slab, eating away the block itself. A second later, the boulder had vanished and behind it lay unconscious Ranma, the blue glow on her suit practically gone.
As she looked over at the unconscious martial artist, Nabiki certainly hadn't forgotten the ambush in the canyon and how Ranma had saved her, and for her staying in debt was something to avoid at all costs. Even if she enjoyed playing pranks on Ranma, this hardly was an opportunity to make fun of her if she wanted to survive. That in mind, she forcefully pulled Poro on his feet and then dragged him with her to Ranma's prone form.
* * *
The Liberate Ranma Squad, that is to say Ukyo, Haruo and Eiko, had reached a compromise and had now reached the arcade. Ukyo would pay first five games for all of them, but not all. She let out a deep sigh. This was getting even more expensive than she had thought.
As the trio stepped inside, the guards took note of Ukyo. They wouldn't throw her out - yet. But at the first sign of the events from yesterday making an encore appearance, they were instructed to immediately intervene, bad PR or not. Letting raving lunatics roam there freely just happened to be not only bad PR but also a danger to their game machines.
Haruo took command as soon as the squad got inside. "Ukyo, you check the okonomiyaki game. Eiko, Tokyo Kaiju Rumble. I'll see to the Fist of Justice myself."
Half an hour later, the three had finished their games to have a short debriefing, which turned out very brief.
"No Ranchan?"
"No," both Eiko and Haruo replied before turning to different games to continue their search.
Elsewhere in the arcade, two hapless teenagers were still trying to play the Tokyo Luv-Luv Memorial. "If you don't succeed at first, try again." They certainly had tried enough many times, having spent both of their weekly allowances on the game in just two days. Still, it wasn't all in vain, as they were now making progress, as some of the girls in the game had actually agreed to go on dates with them.
"I bet that if I got the redhead to appear again, I'd get to take her on a date as well!" Kyu enthused.
"Dragging her off by her pigtail? Dream on, buddy."
The casual banter of Kyu and Yosuke came to a close as an ominous presence made himself known behind their backs.
"You peasants dare claim my Pigtailed Goddess is game for thy wooing?"
It was not the bokken in Kuno's hands that made the two run like a pack of bloodhounds were on their tails. No, it was the combined effect of the glint in his eyes and the arcs the bokken made when Kuno swung it at them.
Once the knaves had fled like the cowards they were, Kuno turned his noble attention to the game machine that apparently held her beloved imprisoned and took out the massive purse of divine implements of justice - enough coins to play the game until next morning. He was game, and for the undying love of the treeborne kettle girl no price was too great.
* * *
Ranma woke up to feel a drop fall on her lips. It took a while before she registered she was awake. Her mouth felt moist, giving her the impression that drop hadn't been the first one. She opened her eyes to see Poro and Nabiki leaning over her, the latter holding out her hand in front of Ranma's face. She reached again down beside Ranma and gave her a few more drops of the glittering fluid.
A while later, Poro pulled Ranma into a sitting position and gave her his identity disc upside down and and filled with Power. "Drink it," he told her. Still halfway out of it, she noticed that she was now sitting by the same source pool she had fallen in earlier.
As Ranma took the disc and drank the liquid, the glow on the circuitry patterns on her increased, but was still quite far from the lightshow the other three were displaying. She looked at Poro with a question written on her face. Why did they glow like that and what did this liquid have to do with it?
"The Power is what sustains us programs, Ranko. And as for Users like you," at which point Poro nodded his head at Shinobu and Nabiki, "well, it appears to be the same." He took the disc from Ranma and gave her some more of the Power from the source pool.
Ranma's renewed display of powers no program of any kind should've had access to had convinced Poro that maybe there was something to the claims of his three companions. Well, he might just as well go with them until something happened to show that they weren't Users.
As Ranma kept drinking the sparkling liquid, Nabiki thought over what she had exactly seen happen. Before Ranma had gone behind the block and then obliterated it, her glow had been slightly less luminous than that of the others. But after she had fallen to the ground unconscious, it had been practically nonexistent, and the pulses it had even looked... laboured, if some leniency in the use of the word was permitted. There had to be some connection between these things.
There were some things Poro couldn't explain, though. For instance, why had MCP decided to pay such attention to them? And who was this Nobuo Shimizu, even though Nabiki and Shinobu suspected or were practically certain he never existed as anything beyond a file MCP had created in the personnel database?
The Power Ranma had drunk had revived her from the stupor: a quick look at her arms showed the glow had returned to her with interest. She made a quick check on her pool of Power, and if there was something new she could use it on. .
Poro was still sitting next to Ranma, wondering what she was doing with her thousand-yard stare. Then she suddenly fixed her eyes on him, stood up and smirked shortly before disappearing before his eyes. Alarmed, he stood up, only to feel Ranma tapping on his shoulder from behind him.
"I see you feel better now," Poro remarked with dispproval to his voice. Even if Ranko was a User, he didn't appreciate being the target of pranks.
"Yup," Ranma cheerfully replied with a wide smile on her face. He had now some new techniques to learn and create, and they were very impressive even for him. To some extent, she could substitute the ki with Power in her old internal ki techniques, but she didn't expect it to always work perfectly. Still, as this test showed, at least in some cases it worked well enough. She reached for the glow again, noticing that it had again grown weaker. She frowned. This was not good. If it took this much out of his reserves to use this new-found ability, he could use it at most three or four times before she couldn't reach it at all.
Or worse. After she had left to try forcing the... Power out of him, he had done something else. She took a glance at the boulder she had struck with her fist, only to see it was not there. In its place was now a nice pothole. There was no way his normal punch could've just disintegrated the block. Putting one, one and one together, Ranma got three. The missing boulder, the fact that she had attempted to push the Power through her fist into the boulder in question just before her lights went out and that her Power reservoirs had been emptied. Now, how could she repeat that and either make her Power reservoirs larger or its applications cheaper?
Poro and Nabiki watched as Ranma was lost again in a world of her own.
"So, Poro, whereto now?" Nabiki asked. He was the only one there who knew what was what and where, so he'd have to be the guide for them. She didn't like it, but it was the only real alternative to staying cooped up in here.
"No idea," Poro said, and laid himself on his back on the ground.
"What!" Nabiki exclaimed.
"Let's see - this system is pretty much cut off from the other computers; the diskette drive is the only way you can get out. I was brought on this system as well, so I don't have a function or place to go to here either." Still, he believed that with three Users they'd eventually come up with some way of getting away from Kernel and MCP's ire.
"And we'd have no idea of when there's a diskette in the drive and where the diskette is going next. Right," Nabiki acquiesced.
But if they had to stay here, she needed to learn to stand on her own. Her new knowledge of Users and Ranma's show of new skills made her think of a change of career; from a high school student and a future business dealer to a ghost in the computer and a goddess of her own right. With the banks and stock exchanges already embracing the era of computers, this might be the best thing that happened to her... assuming she survived. She cast a good look at Ranma, who was now out of her trance-like state and moving to drink straight from the pool.
"Time to get back to school to ensure longevity," she told herself and approached Ranma. Even if Ranma hadn't taught Akane, she'd better think twice before refusing now. If he didn't, she'd just have to remind him how she could complicate his life once they got back to Nerima.
* * *
In the arcade, the attempts of one Tatewaki Kuno to find his elusive angel with scarlet pigtail did not come to fruition. The women in the game shied away from his magnificent presence, no doubt to make room for the pigtailed goddess. Why else would they have done so, when they could've basked in his overwhelmingly glorious presence? But alas, she remained out of sight. Oh, how the heavens wept of the difficulties fate had laden on the path of their love. His brows scrunched as the realization struck him. No, it hadn't been enough for the vile sorcerer Saotome to have banished her out of this world, but he must have had her imprisoned even further somewhere inside these cans of metal and plastic.
He pulled out his bokken and began the proclamation of his divine fate, which sent those Furinkan High students who had dared to play on the nearby machines scrambling for cover. Those who were not from the same school just wondered why the guy playing Tokyo Kaiju Rumble gave up his four-hour attempt to break the high score so close to his goal.
At the other end of the arcade, Akane only barely heard the unfortunately familiar rumble of thunder outside over the loud games around her. She had come to the arcade with very much the same intentions as Ukyo; for once, she could show Ranma she wasn't always only a helpless damsel in distress and could just as well rescue him. And she'd be damned if she let Ukyo take the center stage this time. The okonomiyaki cooking game and the judges who didn't appreciate the food she had prepared forgotten, she strode to the source of disturbance. Kuno would be just the person she'd expect to try the can opener approach to rescue girl-Ranma.
A while later the security guards had to intervene to remove one unconscious Kuno and one fuming Tendo from the arcade. Collateral damage: only one Tokyo Luv-Luv Memorial game booth due to three strikes of Kuno's bokken and one hit from his head.
* * *
Another half an hour had passed before the LRS convened again, still without any results, although Ukyo was somewhat baffled why Mika had now been fighting against flying radioactive camels lobbing okonomiyaki at the teen heroine. Such a surrealistic show was too weird for her taste, but whatever the cause of that might have been, it hardly was relevant without any sightings of Ranchan.
"So, what now?" Ukyo asked.
Haruo and Eiko exchanged looks before gesturing Ukyo to follow them outside the arcade. The guards watched as the three made their way out quietly, and then returned their attention to the kids kicking the pinball machines in frustration.
The three ducked behind the corner of the arcade. There, Eiko and Haruo shot a glance at each other, just to make certain both knew what they were going to do, then nodded once to each other in confirmation. They turned to face Ukyo.
"This night, after the arcade has closed its doors, we'll be making an entrance," Eiko whispered.
"You mean, you're going to break in here? Don't you need to plan this through first?"
"We had plans to hack in here anyway, but that plan was foiled before start. The mainframe here isn't connected anywhere outside the building, so we had to change our plans to physically break in here," Haruo said, also in a whispering tone.
"Now, are you with us?"
Ukyo thought for a while. "In for a penny, in for a pound, they say."
Out loud she said, "I'm in."
* * *
In the holding pits, the protocol guards were preparing to escort yet another program to the game grid. As another guard lowered the force field keeping the program locked in, protocol guard named Fsguard was standing beside the entryway.
"Get moving, conscript," he prompted. The greenish glow on the script wasn't a common occurrence, but that didn't matter. They all derezzed at the game grids all the same anyway... except for the four escaped programs. For some reason, all protocol guards and system utilities had been given orders not to terminate them on sight with the exception of the editor program.
The guard had been in his thoughts for a microcycle when the script cackled and threw a fist at Fsguard, who had to take a step backwards so as not to fall down from the landed hit. The other protocol guards struck quickly struck the insurgent, derezzing him on the spot. Fsguard shrugged. They'd just take another program to the grid instead.
As he moved to the next cell door, the red glow on him was beginning to shift towards green.
* * *
The fluorescent lights of the arcade sign glowed in the night after the arcade itself had closed its doors. The few people passing by in the street didn't see or just didn't pay any attention to the side alley where three high school students were making their entrance. A window whose lock had most conveniently broken earlier in the day opened to admit Ukyo, Haruo and Eiko clad in black inside the arcade hall, the latter two carrying black gym bags.
The first phase of their plan was simple: to find out if Ranma was inside the computer or not. Even though the mainframe itself was behind locked doors, it was of little hindrance as the game machines were not. After all, they were all dumb terminals and in constant connection to the mainframe, each one a loophole in the security a sumo pig would fit through.
In one corner stood the wrecked Tokyo Luv-Luv Memorial machine, its screen shattered and frame mangled. Haruo led the three to another similar one beside it. He took a screwdriver from the large bag he had brought with him and expertly opened the back panel. As the game machine had been built on top of a standard build terminal, there was little difficulty in finding out exactly where to plug in the keyboard Eiko had brought with them. After little tinkering the keyboard was perched atop the control panel before the screen.
Haruo and Eiko blinked as the screen changed from the game title screen to a command shell prompt. Ukyo just stared, wondering what was strange about this.
"What's wrong?"
"We're in," Haruo said in disbelief. "We didn't even have to find out the password." He had been expecting to spend a good time cracking the password and now they found out it wasn't even necessary.
"Do you think the game machines are constantly logged in?" Eiko proposed. "I mean, maybe we just took over that session?"
"Yeah... that must be it. But this - this is such a letdown!" he cried as Eiko hugged him from behind and whispered soothing words next to his ear.
Ukyo just stared at the two and wondered why was it such a bad thing if things were easy for once.
After Eiko had managed to calm him, Haruo sniffled and began typing on the keyboard. "Let's see what this lil' honeypot has eaten then," he mumbled before the screen was filled with long string of program names flashing by.
A few tries later, the list had shortened significantly to just a few. Haruo and Eiko shook their heads, not comprehending how this was possible, the former more than the latter, as Eiko had been well into Nabiki's information trading business and knew a good deal of the various insane situations Ranma often ended up in. Still, this was no longer just a convenient way to get free food for the club and a free day at the arcade.
"I'd say we've got a winner. This program, , sounds like what we're looking for," Haruo told the two who were peeking behind his back.
The okonomiyaki chef was elated - they had found Ranma. All the brownie points were hers!
Meanwhile, Eiko pointed one line on the screen to Haruo, who nodded and typed a new command on the prompt. The result displayed the names of three programs, which made the two hackers' eyes widen. "Well, this explains some things," Eiko murmured before turning to Ukyo.
"Ukyo, ever heard of anyone named 'Shinobu Kaneko?'" she asked.
"No, who's she?" Ukyo couldn't shake the feeling that she didn't want Ranchan to know her either.
"Well... Ranma's not alone in there."
Ukyo shoved Haruo by force away from the keyboard. True enough, on the screen were the names of three programs... , and... "Nabiki Tendo? What is _she_ doing in there!"
A few minutes later after Haruo and Eiko had pushed the agitated Ukyo away from the computer, Ukyo stared in wonder as Eiko and Haruo were working on the computer. She couldn't understand half of the words that flew in the air between the two and much less of the text flashing by on the computer screen. Seeing how she was not needed, she decided to find out where the real computer was.
Haruo and Eiko could think of only one way to get to talk with Ranma. Neither of them were his User and, by the looks of things, he didn't even have one, as strange as that was. That made the direct user-program interaction impossible. No, they'd have to open an IO stream and hope he knew how to answer the request.
* * *
Ranma felt something akin to an alarm clock ringing in her head. She didn't know how or why, but she knew what she should do. She pulled herself up from the ground, dusting the imaginary dirt off her bodysuit. Opposite to her, Nabiki was sitting in the same pose.
So far Nabiki hadn't made any progress with User Powers, but she had been expecting that. It hadn't been a quick job for her to learn apply her ki either. On the other hand, she had made some progress herself in conserving Power. It wasn't much, but if she kept up with the progress, things would get better.
This had been why she had agreed to teach Nabiki. On her own, Ranma's Power pool was still far too limited. If she managed to teach Nabiki how to access her own Power, then living _might_ get a bit easier. Even if it appeared rather empty, to them this was a hostile world.
"We need ta get moving."
Shinobu, still somewhat wary of the cursed boy, asked, "Why?"
"Look, I just know I have ta get ta that big red line there," Ranma said and pointed at the line he had seen from the top of the ridge, "an' somehow the name 'luvluv-2' ties in with it," she said before pouting and looking at Nabiki snickering beside her. "Do ya have ta do that?"
"The IO tower. Someone must want to talk to you," Poro interrupted the byplay between the two. It was curious, though, why the IO tower had become active. Whenever he had looked at it earlier, it had been idle, not transmitting a single packet.
"Someone?" Ranma echoed, before her face lit up in recognition. "Ucchan!"
"Ukyo, Ranko?" Nabiki asked with the tone that usually carried the implied threat "if you know what's good for you, keep talking." But now the effect was more lenient with the use of "her" first name instead of surname.
"Yep." Furthermore, Ranma didn't often pick up the subtle nuances either, even if they weren't all that subtle. Or maybe she just ignored them.
"She played a game against a user avatar who knew something only a certain User would know," Poro supplied Nabiki.
"Got hot and heavy with the guy, huh?" Shinobu threw in her opinion, having made the connection between Tokyo Luv-Luv Memorial and the terminal login name "luvluv-2". Even she knew the game was aimed at boys, so she naturally assumed Ukyo was a guy who had been playing the game.
Ranma snarled at Shinobu's barb but turned away and began walking towards the tower. Nabiki followed after her, but only after first turning at Shinobu. "Want to know which facts you got wrong? Ten thousand yen after Ranko gets us out of here." Shinobu replied with an incredulous look and a shake of her head.
* * *
A masked man, clad in black, was making his way in the downtown Nerima, doing his best to avoid lit places. To his misfortune, this act only drew more attention to him than otherwise would've been warranted.
The passersby didn't care to stop him, though. He wasn't attacking them, hence, he wasn't their problem. Especially since the man appeared to carry a sheathed long blade with him.
Had someone stopped to listen to the mumblings of the man, they might've had even less reason to worry for their health, as the worry would've been shifted for his mental health instead.
"Oh, why doth the fate test us so? The lowborn curs that restrain you from springing to my arms may keep us apart in the day, but for my fiery warrior-princess, even the stain of using the means of the ninja is but a low price for thy freedom!"
And so, in the middle of the night, Tatewaki Kuno continued on his meandering course towards the Encom arcade.
* * *
_End of line._
* * *
_**AN:** This revised chapter was proofread/preread/anything by me alone. So, if you see something badly wrong, please let me know._
_The next chapter will finally have little old content to it. A fair share of this chapter (most scenes in digital world) had to be rewritten because of the change in Shinobu. Nonetheless, the other sections were mostly unchanged and only one all-new scene was added._
_Thanks for weebee for discussing the technical content of this fic with me... my inbox was at best (worst?) bursting at the seams with his PMs; of course, I promptly returned the favour ;-) And once more, Akuma-sama helped me with some plot points._
5. Infectious
_The usual disclaimer. Ranma, Tron and all the related intellectual property making an appearance in this fic are someone else's than my property; the former Rumiko Takahashi's and the latter.. Disney's? Steven Lisberger's? Cooper Industries'? And whoever they've given/sold/transferred their rights to. I'm not and won't be making any money off of this._
* * *
As Haruo and Eiko were busy, dabbling with the computer terminal while waiting for Ranma to respond to their call, Ukyo was looking around the arcade. Except for the small lights above emergency exits and the small battery-powered lamp Haruo and Eiko had brought with them, the hall was dark.
Half of her mind was preoccupied with other matters, or more specifically, Nabiki. Ukyo had thought that Ranma would've been alone in there, giving her a solid chance to show exactly how reliable she was and how well they worked together.
Shouldn't she be worried about Nabiki and Ranchan being alone in the system?
Her laughter echoed in the near-empty hall, giving Haruo and Eiko a slight scare. Ranchan and Nabiki mixed about as well as oil and water!
But how had Nabiki gotten tangled up in this mess? There was only one reason for which she expected the mercenary girl would've voluntarily become involved, and it was money.
Ranchan had ended up working at her restaurant because Nabiki had demanded him to shorten his debt, but that was last week. Usually, that amount of money should've kept Nabiki sated for two weeks, minimum.
Ukyo let her mind break away from worrying about who was and who wasn't in there with Ranma. The sooner they got Ranma and the others out of there, the less reason she had to brood over such matters.
Her eyes passed the different game booths in the hall. The booths were against the walls and in neat rows back to back in the middle of the room. The power cords met underneath metal covers that led from the machines to power outlets. But half of the cords weren't plugged in the outlets but continued beside the wall, all in the same direction. They all led behind the same door at the back of the arcade.
She approached the door and tried the handle. Locked. Then again, the sign "Staff only" was a giveaway.
Seeing that she had walked around the arcade, she returned to the two hackers, stifling a yawn; the caffeine in the tea she had drunk earlier had already lost its effect. Absently, her gaze fixed on the name appearing on the sides of each game booth. Now where had she heard the name "Encom" before?
* * *
In the digital world, the four fugitives were walking towards the red beam of light that rose from behind the hills. Poro led the way, Ranma and Nabiki trailing him, and Shinobu as the rear guard.
Shinobu's position gave her an excellent view of what Ranma and Nabiki were doing. She might not have known it before, but after hearing Ranma repeat it for the third time, she knew that "martial artists make everything training." Apparently that meant they also make everything training even for non-martial artists.
Right now, Ranma was jumping from one boulder lining their path to the top of another, holding a discful of Power on her hands without one drop spilling to the ground. Behind her, Nabiki was duplicating his feats with little grace. She would either fall slightly short on the jump and fall down on the ground, or she would wave her hands to regain her balance after landing on the uneven rock face.
"Exactly how is this all necessary for my training?" Nabiki wheezed as she once again fell short on her leap.
Ranma spun around on her heels. "Ya got a healthy mind already, but we're gunna make your body healthier! 'sides, ya'll be needing both of 'em. Ya need ta know and control your body well for the techniques I showed ya."
Nabiki gritted her teeth. She hadn't expected Ranma to start training her this hard right away, but thankfully most of the methods she knew Genma had trained Ranma with were absent.
Still, if this was what she had to withstand to be able to stand on her own feet in here, she wouldn't give up. No matter how much the idea of using brute force appalled her, her usual methods of subterfuge and guile were worthless without sufficient background knowledge on the world, and without good questions to ask, Poro was not a great source of information. And she would never let herself be caught helpless, whatever it took to have control on her life.
Noticing Nabiki had pushed herself to the point of collapsing, Ranma jumped backwards to let her take a sip of Power.
A few gulps of the elixir quickly rejuvenated her to the point of being able to continue the exercise. The IO tower was nowhere close yet, and Ranma had planned on stretching the exercise session to end only once they reached the tower.
Ranma looked up at the hill that stood on their way. Getting over it would be enough of exercise by itself for Nabiki without jumping her way up, and she let Nabiki off the hook for now. As for herself, she had also tried learning a new trick.
Since she had no ki in here, she couldn't use her _Pride of the Fierce Tiger_. But she could try projecting the Power inside her outside her body, and that she had already managed to do... except that the end result was only a blob of Power in the same form she had drunk it. But when she tried projecting it _inside_ an object, rather than in the open air, she could repeat her earlier feat of destroying a boulder, or do a parlour trick: let the Power form the circuitry patterns she wanted to on the surface she was touching. Close enough to the patterns she wanted in any case, but it appeared to take only practice to gain better control over how the lines were laid on the block.
The walk on top of the hill took a while, but once there, the vista was striking. The chaos of the free memory area spread spread around them, but from their vantage point they saw the IO tower and the transmission stream right across a structured area, filled with low-rise buildings whose fluorescent red glow was in stark contrast with the blue memory blocks.
In the back of her mind, Ranma felt the call to the tower. It pulled on her attention, letting up only once she turned her eyes away.
As she stood still, simply appreciating the view, Nabiki and Shinobu had already started descending down the hill. She snapped herself back to reality and ran after the two, Poro taking his time in following them, half-heartedly watching the self-proclaimed Users make their way down.
* * *
The border between free and reserved memory was no less clear-cut close up than afar. The cluttered ground and asymmetric, chiseled gargantuan boulders gave way to even black surfaces and buildings, dwarfed by the IO tower and decorated with the omnipresent circuitry motif.
The four walked again in silence and staying off the areas populated by other programs. Ranma with her macho attitude firmly back in place walked ahead of the others. Programs of different kinds walked around them; golden, blue, purple... none of them paid appeared to pay attention to anything that wasn't on their path.
To her surprise, Nabiki felt a tug on her arm and turned around. Latched onto her forearm was a program hunched over, a sickly leer on his face and the yellowish green glow didn't look any healthier. Compared to him, Nabiki considered Gosunkugi a healthy and normal person.
The leer changed into a cackle. Ranma and the others turned to face Nabiki and the program just in time to see Nabiki belt him in the face, sending him down.
Satisfied with the results, she turned back to the others and hastened her pace; making a scene would not help them hide from the protocol guards. The stinging sensation where the program had grabbed her was slowly abating as she rubbed it. She might not be at Ranma's level, but she refused to depend on the help from others.
She cast a glance at their target, still a few kilometers away. At least they would be a step closer to getting back home soon enough.
Poro had led the three to an alley between two buildings, where they found a translucent cube, floating in mid-air. Ranma recalled seeing a similar one back when she passed through the yellow portal, and the guard programs somehow had got their orders from the box. Like back then, green specks floated inside the crate.
The program placed his hand on the box, lighting up one green mote of light. A while later, Poro withdrew his hand.
"The system utilities are searching for us here, too. We'd better finish our business at the tower quickly, or we're certain to get caught."
Nabiki perked up at witnessing this: any means for her to learn more of this world on her own was more than welcome. "How do you know that?"
"You don't know what archive bins are? Right... come here," he said, gesturing at the three Users to lay their hands down on the bin.
"These are archive bins. As for what's inside of them, each of those green packets contains text-formatted information. If you got the proper permission set, you can download the contents of the bin."
Before Poro got to explain how that happened in greater detail, Ranma already attempted to reach a sparkle with Power as it floated closest to her hand. She coaxed the packet for a few microcycles, but then, the contents of the packet slammed themselves into her mind, very nearly making her reel back from the suddenness of it.
"What is COBOL and why's it bad for ya health?"
Then again, no one guaranteed she actually understood what the information meant.
She pulled her hand back and shook her head to clear out the stars from her vision. Beside her, Shinobu and Nabiki were attempting to repeat her success.
After a few microcycles, Shinobu took a step backwards, as she managed to read one of the information parcels.
"Kernel has, quote, broadened the search criteria, end quote, to track us down, and has ordered something called 'direct memory access areas to undergo extensive security scans, and programs with programmed input/output functions to apply operating permissions.' "
"Huh?" Ranma boggled, Nabiki sharing the sentiment but staying quiet.
"It means getting out of this system by the usual media won't be easy," Poro sighed. He shouldn't have been surprised, though; things had been going far too well.
* * *
The glow from the CRT display lit Haruo and Eiko's faces as they sat side by side by the console, leaning on each other. For some reason, it was taking a while for the program to answer to their IO call. They hardly had a problem on how to use the time they found on their hands, as they had opened another game booth and taken over the session in there.
"How do you think Ranma got in there?" Eiko changed the subject of their discussion.
"No clue. But this smells like a... challenge," Haruo replied, then began chuckling to himself.
"Finding out how Ranma got in there?"
"Not as much as finding out how to get him out of there. If it really is him in there anyway."
"Aww, what's this with the skepticism?" Eiko frowned. She wished that it was Ranma in there... and by conjuction Nabiki as well. There weren't many more efficient ways to climb your way up the ladder than pulling your boss out of the fire. "With all the things happening around Ranma, I don't see why this shouldn't be one more mess he's ended up in."
Haruo let his hands down from the keyboard he had been typing on and turned to Eiko, a crooked grin on his face.
"Tell me, when has these messes been resolved _without_ any fighting?"
After a moment of silence and Eiko trying to remember such an event, he continued, "I haven't heard of a single fight yet, and I hope that I don't hear of one either, not as long as we're this involved."
Smirking, Eiko gave Haruo's shoulder a gentle pat. "Aren't you overreacting a bit? Nabiki even lives in the same house and she's never gotten involved unwill..." Eiko's voice trailed off as Haruo raised his eyebrow.
"You were saying?"
Unsurprisingly, Eiko started truly appreciating having brought Ukyo with them.
"Anything new?"
Ukyo's sudden return and question startled Eiko, who attempted to quickly move away, only to fall down on her rear before her boyfriend.
"Aren't _you_ overreacting a bit?" Haruo snickered, slightly amused. Eiko only shot a glare with a pout at him.
* * *
As the four escapees resumed their trip, Poro returned to surveying the scenery, but some of his attention had been riveted by Ranko and Nabiki's behaviour. It was like they were doing something in a pattern, an elaborate algorithm of a kind. Especially what Ranko did was baffling; he instinctively felt there was something like a pattern in what she did, but he couldn't figure it out exactly what it was.
Well, he did recognize the plain bit flip, which appeared to have become more frequent for Nabiki than before. Once again, she was picking herself up from the ground after slipping down from atop a crate.
"Ya okay, Nabiki?"
Off to the side, Shinobu snorted to herself.
"Maybe you're pushing her too far? Not everyone is as gifted as you."
The near silent barb in Shinobu's comment went unnoticed to Ranma and Nabiki, who was now moving to stand back up, all the while holding her head.
"Wait a moment, Ranma," she replied, then blinked a few times.
Slightly fumbling, she walked over to a nearby low block and sat down. It took a while before the colors in her vision returned back to what she expected them to be; the green in the clouds returning to the shiny blue it had been before.
"Oy, are ya okay?"
Nabiki shot a withering glare past Ranma's hand waving before her face.
"Drop it already. Yes, I'm fine, just let me rest for a while. And I don't need more Power, either," she continued as she saw Ranma starting to move the disk-turned-cup with the last remaining drops of Power at her direction.
The frustration Nabiki felt was barely hidden in her voice. She knew she wasn't the most coordinated of people, but the aerobics she had done in the real world certainly hadn't been this much trouble for her. The number of times she had now slipped on her landings had topped a dozen some time ago, and at that point she had already stopped counting them.
She didn't know what was wrong, though. And judging by how Ranma was looking at her, she didn't have a clue either. She couldn't help but to grin.
Shinobu sat down on another rock to watch as Nabiki absently rubbed her wrist. She didn't consider herself a fan of traditional Japanese architecture, but compared to the architecture here, it certainly didn't grow old as quickly. Maybe it was only her, though, for not understanding the function of all the straight lines, designed with elegance clearly taking back seat to something quite different and incompatible. What that something was, she didn't know, and to be frank, she wasn't all that interested in knowing, assuming they got out of here soon.
The first day inside the computer had been a wondrous sight. But as always, the novelty wore off, and in no small part due to them wanting to see their home again. Even the most beautiful of prisons was still a prison, and she wouldn't call this world pretty by a long shot.
It hardly mattered that she liked having things clear-cut and simple in her life, this was taking it too literally. The sharp corners and walls that could've been hewn with a giant ax gave little room for round forms, and where there was anything round, it was always an arc of a circle. Never any other curve.
Even more bothersome was how the same structured rigidness carried over to their bodysuits as well. A disgusted sneer on her face, she glanced at her arms and chest, the same rules governing the layout of the patterns on her bodysuit as in the environment. Well, at least _she_ hadn't become as sharp-edged as the patterns. Edgy, yes, but not sharp-edged.
Then again, what difference did her curves make here? The only real male - Poro was nothing but a program, after all - had shown little to no interest in her body when he had helped her out of the wreck formerly known as her mecha. And even calling Ranma a male would right now be stretching it further than she'd usually bother with.
With a put-off sigh, she let her gaze wander off to the other two Users. The pigtailed girl had her arms crossed under her chest, and even if Shinobu didn't hear their discussion, she could read their body language. Although she had to admit the way Nabiki...
She blinked, then focused her eyes again on Nabiki's body suit.
"Give it up already, Saotome," Nabiki growled out, deep frustration in her voice. She was willing to work for the power to be independent, as she had proven in school and life, But there was a limit to everything, and Ranma was reaching for it with this training.
"And ya wanted me ta waste time on whipping ya ta shape?" the pigtailed girl retorted. As much as she would've wanted denied it, the methods she was using to teach Nabiki were not all that different from Genma's. Unfortunately for her, Nabiki wasn't as easily led as she herself was.
It didn't mean that Nabiki merely shrugged Ranma's words aside, either. Abruptly, she stood up and geared for giving Ranma a good earful of when training went overboard - something Ranma would have to figure out, hopefully before she began teaching at the Tendo dojo - when Shinobu interrupted her.
"Nabiki, have you noticed something wrong with your suit?"
Nabiki returned a questioning look and took a look at her body. It had no tears, the circuitry patterns were still there, it wasn't dirty... "What do you mean?"
"The patterns - they've changed."
"Whaddya mean, changed?"
Shinobu tossed an annoyed glance at Ranma before turning back to Nabiki and explaining, "At the pool, the patterns on all of us were of same hue, but not now."
"They are all still light blue, aren't they?"
Shinobu reached for Ranma's arm and pulled her to herself for demonstration. "Yes, but we all have the exact same hue - except you. And furthermore... the patterns on you..."
"Their shapes've changed," Ranma noted, then pushed herself apart from Shinobu.
"Changed?" Nabiki muttered, and warily looking down at herself.
The glow on her hands was there, light blue, but even she could now see it had a tinge of green to it. But even more troubling was that the patterns had indeed shifted; the lines that had been straight and of constant width had now began bulging and narrowing at various places.
She took on her face an unreadable expression.
"Poro? What does this mean?"
The program cocked his head.
"I do not know. We programs do not change, or at least not usually. Quite many cycles ago, I heard of self-morphing programs, but that piece of information is hardly more than an uninitialized pointer." Noticing the nonplussed faces of the Users, he added, "Probably invalid information."
"Never mind that, it's probably just a flu. Let's get going to the tower and get out of here." Nabiki gave a grin, turned and began walking towards the IO tower, still a good distance away. If it was more than "just a flu," she didn't want to think about it; there was precious little she could do about it. Better not waste time and effort now on something you couldn't deal with, and the sooner they got out of here, the better. Now, if only her head cleared up soon...
"Shinobu?"
"Yes, Poro?"
"What is a flu?"
It was probably for Nabiki's best that she didn't hear this discussion.
* * *
A cycle of walking later, the walls of the IO tower stood before them. The smooth gray walls of the arc-shaped building reached dozens of metres high. The red beam originated from the base of a wing of the input-output tower, the wing hugging the beam and protruding like the radius of the arc inside the protecting cover of the two curved wings.
Nabiki was far from feeling well. A while ago, she had began feeling a throbbing ache in her head, and while it was only a minor annoyance at start, it was only getting worse. She had heard people complain about their migraine, but she had never had one herself. Well, not until now.
Or maybe she simply didn't remember it. She knew only from the photo albums she seldom browsed through with Kasumi that she had been practicing martial arts when she was young, but then gave up. Whatever the reason for that had been, it had completely faded away from her mind, and replaced by other, more recent memories.
Once again, she glared at Ranma, who stopped mid-step she was taking in her direction. No, Nabiki Tendo was going to stand on her own two feet, without the help from her future sister-in-law. Well, this didn't mean she would refuse training Ranma gave her; she'd want Ranma to keep her fingers off of her.
She only hoped she'd manage to do it as well. Her eyes scanned around her, first stopping at Poro, standing furthest away from her. Like she expected, an image flashed in her mind; an image of her latching onto Poro. Even worse was when she looked at Shinobu and Ranma, as similar images strobed in her eyes.
Gritting her teeth, she swore to herself she would not give into whatever was making her think these thoughts. She was in control of herself. She had to be.
A couple of steps away, Ranma turned to face the open entrance to the tower. She felt still the demanding call to the come to the tower, but unlike what she had expected, it hadn't become any stronger than it had been by the pool of Power.
She took a quick look at Nabiki. The older girl had gained a small limp - unnoticeable unless you were paying attention to such things, but ever since Shinobu had pointed out the changes in her, Ranma stopped training Nabiki and kept an eye on her. The colour on her bodysuit was now more clearly different from the rest, a decidedly unhealthy-looking green. The circuitry patterns on her had also kept on changing, now bearing only a little resemblance to an organized network. In its place was a seemingly chaotic criss-cross of green lines, most of them converging to one large splotch on her side.
No, this was no flu. And Ranma only hoped they'd either get out soon or, more preferably, get help to Nabiki. If she didn't, well, the reception at the Tendo home would be downright unpleasant.
Just inside the tower was a large, open room, walls first curving out and then back in to meet at the top of the hall. And at the bottom of the room was a wide, layered pedestal, upon which sat a program, clad in a huge suit. Only the top of the program was visible above the top of the pedestal, making him look like he was trapped by an office desk, his hands barely reaching the keyboard in front of him.
"Dumont," Poro shouted in a greeting.
"Stop where you are. What is your business here?" the old, bearded program replied.
"We need to communicate with a User," he replied, pointing at Ranma, who took a step forward.
"A User? There have not been any User-program communications in many cycles."
"Nonetheless, a User named luvluv-2 is calling him."
Dumont pondered upon this for a while. Most of the time, he sat here in sleep state, waiting for any service requests. And Kernel knew how little he was needed, as was shown when he had applied for the new programmed input-output operating permissions. To undergo the whole process was degrading, let alone how Kernel at considered his application, only to approve it saying, "As if you and your tower are ever going to need the permission."
The system had never been a free one. Dumont knew that there were systems without Kernels and Master Control Programs; there had to be. Why else would his User have programmed him with all the different features, if they were always to be refused by the system monitors?
That he was disgruntled didn't mean he didn't care about the system-wide announcements. Yes, he was well aware that the four programs in the hall with them were the same four programs who had escaped from the game grid some cycles ago.
"You are the four escape units the guard programs have been searching. Do you have any idea in how much trouble you are placing me?"
"This is what the Users want. It is a question of choosing whose orders come first; the Users' or Kernel's."
Dumont's mouth firmed into a thin line. Plotting their creators against their derezzers was always a loaded problem, especially since their desires had often been contradicting, and it appeared that the situation was not changing anytime soon. Even with his sympathy falling squarely on the Users and free programs' side, he was not in the position to help everyone all the time.
"No, it is not. Kernel and his utilities have so far considered the tower simply harmless. I have no reason to make them change their beliefs," Dumont sternly replied. If the system was to be liberated at some point, as he deep in his code hoped, he was not going to squander the resource the tower and himself had to offer in that eventuality.
"So you're gunna throw us out, ain't ya, old man?" Ranma shouted, as she started moving forwards towards the platform.
"Stop where you are, program, and identify yourself," Dumont demanded, as Ranma knelt down and laid her hand on the lowest step.
"What are you doing, Ranko?" Poro demanded, fearing the pigtailed User would disintegrate the platform like the boulder by the source pool. Dumont certainly would not appreciate someone removing the seat he sat on, and without him managing the tower, they couldn't communicate with luvluv-2 anyway.
Ranma ignored the two programs and pushed the Power into the pedestal. Actions spoke louder than words, and whether she admitted it or not, she was a show-off. This was her fight as much as Poro's, and she was not going to stay out of it.
"I ain't no program."
The Power she fed into the pedestal made the glowing lining on the steps flare out in brilliant sapphire blue, blinding everyone else present.
Once the shining had died out and their vision was slowly returning to them, they might've seen the confident smirk returning on Ranma's face.
The lowest layers on the pedestal were no longer simple slabs, a single circuitry line outlining the horizontal surfaces, but now were embedded with criss-crossing patterns.
Ranma gave her work a quick look before fixing her eyes with Dumont's.
"I'm a User."
At the back of the hall, Nabiki chuckled to herself. Ranma certainly was not one for speeches. Still, what Ranma had done surprised her. This was more, much more than simply crumbling a boulder into pieces like at the source pool.
Ranma wasn't all certain what she had done either. But whatever it was, it did look convincing.
"A User? But that - that is preposterous! You cannot expect -"
"And would a normal program be able to do what she did?" Poro struck back.
Silence reigned for a few microcycles as Dumont attempted to come up with a counterargument.
"So how 'bout ya let me go in there?"
Ranma's interjection derailed Dumont's thoughts, and he let out a deep sigh.
"Very well... go," Dumont acquiesced, and gestured behind his back.
With a grin gracing her face, Ranma straightened up even further, if possible, and walked to the archway behind Dumont. At the sight of this, Nabiki turned to Dumont.
"Is he going to talk to... luvluv-2 now?"
"Yes, but - shouldn't you know that, if you're a User?"
Ignoring Dumont's query, Nabiki sprinted over to where Ranma had vanished, and disappeared behind the corner as well.
* * *
The rhythmic sound echoed in the arcade hall as Haruo kept rapping the console casing with his hands, changing the beat and the song every now and then; one forgettable J-rock tune after another. They had been waiting for a while for the connection to Ranma to be established, but it was taking its sweet time.
A beep sounded from the terminal, and lines of text slowly appeared on the blank screen, line by line.
"Oy!
"Hey, I'm talking now!
"You're one who don't want to be disturbed when you're on the phone!
"Whaddya mean it's not the- Ow-ow-ow!"
As the lines paused dropping onto the console screen, the three high school students goggled at the screen. It was like listening to only one side of a conversation, and the one whose words they read sounded like Ranma.
"Lovers' spat?" Haruo suggested, unmindful of the spatula-wielding girl right behind him. To his fortune, Ukyo only ignored his comment. Eiko briefly amused herself by thinking what Nabiki would say about such ideas, but the lines that soon continued dropping on the screen took her attention.
"It ain't my problem if they don't answer you! Bii-dah! OWW!
"Eh, sorry 'bout that - Nabiki wanted ta talk with ya.
"Oy, anybody out there? Ucchan? Luvluv-2? Is this thing on?"
Ranma's nickname for Ukyo finally brought her out of it, and at the next words, a crimson tinge coloured her cheeks. She lunged at the keyboard, pushing Haruo aside from the terminal. She looked around the keyboard, then let out a small yelp of satisfaction, as she found the 'R' key and carefully pressed it with her pointer finger. She grinned upon seeing the letter appear on the screen.
"Now, where's the 'a'...?" she wondered, until Eiko took the keyboard away from her and typed in the missing letters herself.
"We'll do this much faster if you let either me or Haruo type, and I hope you didn't forget we're not exactly supposed to be here?" Eiko told Ukyo, who bristled at the thought of losing this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity of being not only the cute fiancée, but the cute angel of salvation.
"Ranma?" Eiko hit the Return key.
* * *
Inside the IO tower, in the chamber behind Dumont's seat, Ranma stood on a pedestal, looking upwards in a column of light. She slowly rubbed the ear that Nabiki had pulled on, the stinging sensation not yet gone. Right next to her stood Nabiki with crossed arms, also looking towards the light.
To Nabiki's surprise, she recognized the voice that responded to them from the top of the hall; it was one of her informants on the lower grade. On the other hand, she knew Eiko would've been one of the most likely people in her school to find her, considering her hobby of dabbling in computers.
"Ucchan, is that you?"
"This is Eiko from class 1-1. Ukyo is right here," the voice responded back.
"Ehh... so... ya think ya could help us outta here?"
"That's what we came here to do in the first place. How many of you are in there?"
"Me, Nabiki and Shinobu - she's from Encom."
* * *
"Encom?" Ukyo spun around, checking that she really had seen Encom logo on the game booths. Eiko had already begun typing a reply to Ranma.
"Eiko, ask them how they ended in there?" Ukyo requested. She _knew_ she had heard of Encom before, but for the life of her she couldn't remember where.
Eiko finished typing before answering Ukyo. "Already ahead of you," she said with a self-satisfied smirk, then turned to read Ranma's reply on the screen.
And as Ranma once again was reciting her story, Haruo attempted to come up with a plan. Yes, this was indeed a challenge. He grinned. But there hadn't been a challenge that had left him stumped yet, and this was not going to be the first, either.
Their goal of returning Ranma to reality couldn't be done here. The best guess where they could do that was where they had originally ended up inside the virtual world. This wasn't a magic trick or a curse; they would need real expensive high-tech equipment and not only some ink and blood on the floor and walls, coloured candles, incense, and mythical mutterings. Not that Gosunkugi had had many success stories to share, either.
To his knowledge, the equipment required hadn't even hit the stores yet, so the only place they could find the necessary hardware was where they were digitized in the first place. This posed probably their greatest problem: how would they get Ranma, Nabiki and Shinobu from this mainframe to the Encom Labs mainframe? Even if he and Eiko had some experience in getting inside protected networks, they definitely couldn't hack into every system. Sure, he had heard the rumour of him hacking into the JSDF computer system, but that's all it was - a rumour. At least for now.
He stood up from his seat and stretched his back.
"Eiko, I'm going to see what components the mainframe has installed. We'll have to get the three back to Encom mainframe before they can be restored; this place lacks the hardware for that."
"Ah, right. Then I'll keep reading what information Ranma has and brief you later on."
"Good. Hey, Ukyo, come with me."
Ukyo looked at Eiko, then Haruo, before returning to Eiko to say, "You _will_ inform me what Ranchan says, right?"
"Of course."
* * *
Soon after Haruo and Eiko had left, Ranma was finishing her tale.
"- and that's how we got to the tower. But the old geezer here wasn't going to let us talk to ya... but I managed to tell him otherwise."
Eiko sighed and massaged the bridge of her nose with her right hand. If Ranma wasn't embellishing her story, then this misadventure of hers certainly wasn't counter to the norm, she thought, recalling her talk with Haruo why Ukyo was asked to join in the break-in. Regardless, she hoped that all the fighting would stay inside the computer and away from her person.
But as a cold shiver ran down her spine, she couldn't help but to think she had just jinxed it.
* * *
"So, why was it that I couldn't stay and listen to Ranchan's tale?" Ukyo asked, slightly annoyed. as she followed Haruo around the arcade. Haruo, in turn, was tracing where the cables on the floor went, finally ending up at the locked door. A quick try told Haruo that the door was locked, as he expected.
Earlier, when the three students had been in the arcade playing games, he hadn't spent all his time doing nothing but stuffing his - and Ukyo's - coins into the machines, but also had also scouted the insides of the building. It hadn't taken long for him to notice the door with the sign "Staff only", and how the arcade staff going in there dug through their pockets for a key to unlock the door.
"I work with computers, not with real-world locks like this one. That's what for you to do."
"What gave you the idea of me knowing how to pick locks?"
"Not picking - but breaking the locks... or doors."
Ukyo shot another annoyed glare at Haruo; she wasn't a muscle-bound brawler like some, but a martial _artist_. Indiscriminately breaking things was the easy way, but it led nowhere on her art of okonomiyaki cooking. When cutting the garnishes on a board, cutting through the board as well wasn't the recommended course of action, but leaving the cuts short of the table wasn't good either. A delicate measure of power. And to have the cuts produce strips of even length and width, the practitioner also required precision. Both were necessary, and equally important.
Forcing her way through took only force and not precision.
She took out one of her throwing spatulas, tossed it in the air and checked its balance, before throwing it neatly in the crack between the door and the doorframe. With a clang, the spatula cut through the latch, unlocking the door.
The spatula, having not struck deep enough into the doorframe, fell to the ground with a clang. Precision, and power.
With a small smile, Ukyo picked up the fallen spatula and pulled the door open.
"Thank you," Haruo said with a bow to Ukyo as he stepped inside the backroom.
The beams of their torches passed along the walls of the room, revealing a massive complex that occupied with the subprocessing units over half of the large room. All the cables from the main hall lead to various outlets in the lower front panel. And above the panel was a single terminal, and next to it was a diskette drive. Haruo's beam kept moving across the mainframe, until it finally met a name plaque: "Encom MF-1000 Mk2.1"
For him, this was excellent news. He had read of the previous version of this mainframe in the bulletin board system he and other mainframe enthusiasts dialed in frequently, and the knowledge he had on the system was definitely welcome.
Haruo leaped at the terminal, only to notice a prompt for login and password. He knew they didn't have the time to crack the password any longer; they had already spent too long in the arcade. While the morning had not yet dawned, they had no time to dawdle.
He dug around his backpack a while, and pulled out of a small plastic case half a dozen diskettes without labels. Reaching over to place the first diskette into the drive, he told Ukyo, "We'll move them onto these diskettes. I need you to stay here and eject the diskette by pressing this here, and insert the other one. I'll go talk with Ranma about what he'll have to do."
Ukyo's upset shouts were ignored, as Haruo left the room. In her view, _she_ still hadn't done enough to help Ranchan out. Noticing she had already taken steps towards the door, she took a hold of her feelings. She was still the sanest of Ranchan's fiancées, right? It didn't take great insight to see who knew computers and who didn't, not after she had fumbled with the keyboard and tried to type in Ranma's name. Haruo and Eiko, by comparison, knew what they were doing, and Haruo had given her a task she could do.
So, she would do as they asked.
* * *
Haruo walked briskly to the opened game booth, by which Eiko was typing on a keyboard a reply to Ranma.
"Eiko... in brief, what did Ranma have to say?"
"After you and Ukyo left? She said she had been playing different games here in the arcade, and escaped from something called the 'game grid' with Nabiki, Mrs Kaneko and Poro - that's the file stream editor. Mrs Kaneko is actually a receptionist at Encom Labs, but she ended for some reason digitized inside the computer with Nabiki. And guess what - she must have login credentials to the Encom Labs mainframe," Eiko reported, finishing with a wide smirk.
"Really? That only makes things easier for us," Haruo replied with a satisfied smile; not only because they wanted to get the three digitized people on the Encom mainframe, but what they could find out with these credentials themselves.
"Anyway, where did you leave Ukyo?" Eiko asked, now noticing the chef's absence.
"By the computer. There's no modem installed, so we'll have to think over how we're going to transfer them over to the lab mainframe. There was a diskette drive, though, and Ukyo will be there to change the diskettes."
"Switching diskettes got to your nerves, huh?" Eiko teased, knowing quite well how the game Haruo had lately been playing on required him to change the diskette maybe once every fifteen minutes. Still, it was better than to suffer with C-tape drive and multiload - waiting for each level to reload after dying from the cassette drive was not fun, not even with a cup of good tea to drink while waiting.
"That, and she doesn't have to know we're copying more than the three people on these diskettes."
"So, you already know what else you want to copy there?"
"No, but let's get them out first," Haruo said, before scooting next to the keyboard Eiko offered him.
"Ranma? Haruo here."
"Hey, so what are we supposed ta do now?"
"We will store you on diskettes, and the rest will be up to us. As for what you will have to do... ask," Haruo felt foolish even writing it, "Poro." Addressing programs like they were real persons was awkward at best. Sure, he knew some people in the computer club who had given pet names to their computers, usually affectionate girl names - in some cases even talked to them - but they had yet to start giving their programs such names. With the exception of Eliza, of course.
"So, that's it? Ow! What now?" turned up on the screen, prompting Haruo to raise an eyebrow. After a while, Ranma continued.
"Haruo, are ya still there?"
"Yes."
"Nabiki says there's something wrong with 'er."
"What's that?" Haruo typed into the console.
"They wanna know what's yer problem, Nabiki?
"What's your plan this time, Nabs?
"What do you mean you didn't mean it?
"I'm _not_ getting engaged to you again!
"Fine!"
As amusing as reading Ranma's side of the dialogue was to Eiko, Haruo saw time being wasted in idle banter, and quickly typed in a response.
"Wrong in what sense?"
"She says that she's feeling sick... and she says she wants ta hug me! Ya gotta do something!"
For a few precious seconds, silence reigned in the arcade... until Eiko swatted her hands over her and Haruo's mouth to keep their laughter from echoing into Ukyo's ears. Even if they couldn't hear Ranma, they could very well sense the desperation in her reply.
A few more seconds later, Ranma's next line was already appearing on screen.
"And she looks different, too. Like... like another sickly program we saw earlier."
The greatest need to laugh already behind them, the two hackers could only wonder what this meant.
"But you and Mrs Kaneko aren't... affected like Nabiki is?"
"Nah, we're fine."
"We'll see what we can do. Now, talk to Poro," Haruo cringed again as he typed this, "about what you have to do."
That typed, Haruo cut the connection.
* * *
Shinobu and Poro were sitting down on the steps of Dumont's pedestal as Ranma and Shinobu came back to the main hall. Ranma was rubbing her ear, wondering why it still stung. It didn't feel like her ear had fallen asleep - and the whole possibility sounded odd - and she hadn't heard of any pressure points either that could result in this. And it was even less likely that Nabiki knew them.
Shrugging that aside, she turned her head to watch Nabiki stumble behind her. It looked like she was getting worse, looking more and more ready to keel over. Feeling guilt of pushing her too far, which might have caused whatever was happening to her, Ranma walked over to her and set Nabiki's arm around her neck and shoulder to support her.
"I got her," Ranma assured Poro, who had made a gesture of coming closer to her and Nabiki.
"What's wrong with her?" Shinobu asked, unwilling to take a step nearer. And if her eyes weren't lying, the glow on Ranma's suit was changing as well. No, she'd keep a _healthy_ distance to those two, at least as long as Nabiki was only getting worse.
"No idea. I hope Haruo knows what to do with her."
"Haruo who? Was that luvluv-2 him?" Shinobu asked.
Letting Nabiki sit down, Ranma responded, "He and Eiko are from our high school computer club, and they'll help us out of here." Ranma's ego fought against admitting they had and needed outside help, but eventually relented. She could ill afford letting anything bad - well, anything _worse_ - happen to Nabiki, if she wanted to avoid being hammered deep underground, and listen to the preaching panda how she shirked in protecting her future sister-in-law. Or this is how she rationalized it.
On the other hand, Ranma was definitely annoyed of doing only what she was told. Even if she wasn't all that hot on what they handled in school, she always could pride herself on being able live off the land quite well on her own, if need be. She had, actually, with her father occasionally doing some odd job for some spare money. But here she couldn't do that, and that was the problem.
Shinobu was anything but reassured of their escape and return to the physical world after hearing Ranma and Nabiki had spoken to _highschoolers_.
In turn, Nabiki wondered what was wrong with her. Not only did she have a splitting headache and walking around was definitely difficult, but then she still had these weird thoughts of the other programs here - even the old man Dumont. No, she definitely did not want to do anything with him. And the way she misspoke to Ranma what was wrong with her - she would have to make sure none of the people who heard that were going to tell that to the rumourmongers. No, she did not want to hug her, not now, not ever! At this rate, she'd end up tearing her hair out in frustration.
Hopefully, Haruo and Eiko would know what to do with her. She would much rather place her faith in those two than the programs here, not only because Eiko worked for her, but also because the programs here couldn't even cope with Ranma's curse. And she was certain that even here in the digital world, the incomprehensible gravitated towards Ranma.
"Poro? They said they'd move us to diskettes, and you'd know what we oughta do?" Ranma's voice cut through Nabiki's ruminations.
Dumont, still on his seat, entered the discussion at this point. To him, it had become more and more likely that these were indeed Users, and helping them onward was only the right thing to do.
"You will need to go to the Write Buffer, from where you will be transferred to the diskette."
"What about the tightened security protocols in the direct memory access areas?" Poro interjected, recalling the notice they had found in an archive bin.
Dumont paused at this, and carefully deliberated this. The four escapees could hardly take on a squad of protocol guards at once, not with Nabiki as she was right now. Attacking even one was a risky proposition, unless the Users truly had great powers they could use in that situation. Masquerading was also a bad solution, since not even he could reproduce them proper access right sets to fool the security programs.
If they couldn't proceed with the guards at the memory area, then maybe they could divert the attention of the security elsewhere? Now that he remembered, the database concurrency control systems were near the Write Buffer...
"I will open a one-way stream portal for you to the database control area. That area is, obviously, critical for for the database, and a chaos there should make most of the security programs to solve the problem. I believe you can do that?"
Nabiki gave a forced grin at that. "With Ranko here, that'll be no problem at all."
* * *
At the Encom mainframe, Master Control Program was processing one particular conundrum.
_Assume is MCP is genderless. Ranma Saotome is male. Observed. Ranma Saotome is female. Observed. Therefore, Ranma Saotome is male and female. Contradiction - no one is both male and female; hence, assumption is wrong. Conclusion: MCP has gender. Newline._
And so the preprogrammed models, coupled with rigid mathematical logic, only broke MCP further.
* * *
_End of line._
* * *
_**AN:** It's been almost a year and a half since I first uploaded chapter 4... and I think I write even worse than I did then. I will be **very** busy this spring with my schooling, which is why I cut this chapter earlier than I had originally planned._
_The English translation of "A History of Algorithms" by Jean-Luc Chabert et al. claimed that the 'ju' in 'ju-jitsu' comes from the Chinese 'shu' meaning "rule, process or stratagem" and with this in mind, 'ju-jitsu' could be interpreted as "procedural rules for suppleness" or "algorithms for suppleness." I failed to find corroborating evidence on the web, but decided to draw parallels with exercises and algorithms anyway._
_The keyboard Ukyo used should've probably used kanas, but I cut corners and let it use Latin characters instead._
_Don't read too much into Nabiki's behaviour and classify this as a RanmaNabiki pairing, at least for now. A lot of it is the virus talking._
_As for MCP's thought processes: bear in mind MCP was programmed with too strict assumptions. In his world, you can represent a person's gender with one bit._
6. On the Run
_The usual disclaimer. Ranma, Tron and all the related intellectual property making an appearance in this fic are someone else's than my property; the former originally Rumiko Takahashi's and the latter.. Walt Disney Company's? Steven Lisberger's? And whoever they've given/sold/transferred their rights to. I'm not and won't be making any money off of this._
* * *
Chapter 6: On the Run
* * *
The yellow glow from the stream portal quickly faded from Ranma's vision as she landed on the portal endpoint. Looking over the place where the portal Dumont had opened had taken them, her eyes widened at the sight. Granted, she had seen many unbelievable things here already, but only the Write Buffer tower was anything compared to this.
The construct was a huge complex of cylinder-shaped towers with bridges of light connecting them at various heights. Their luminosity varied, pulsating with no apparent rhythm, but as the pulses reached the destination tower, more circuitry patterns lit up on the side of the tower before fading back to the dark gray background.
And all this was atop of a base that, while more monolithic in appearance, was certainly no less intricately shaped. Indeed, most of the shapes Ranma and the other Users had seen before were not particularly detailed, most resembling only large building blocks with some edges clipped, and some comparatively simple circuit decorations on them. This complex, however, was no simple geometric shape, nor were the etchings possible to describe in as few words as usual. And it didn't take an expert in modern art to see this.
Although, she wasn't so sure she could call the glow patterns mere 'decorations.' She still didn't know what they were, but after seeing Dumont open the stream portal and the patterns light up right underneath it, she would've bet... well, a week's free lunches that they were connected. Especially since she didn't have to hide her bad poker face to win the bet.
Nabiki, now leaning on Ranma's shoulder, would've definitely agreed, if only the crippled User had been feeling any better. Instead, she kept her eyes closed and waited for the effects the portal had on her vision to disappear. Meanwhile, Ranma guided her to sit on a nearby slab.
Shinobu and Poro had stepped into the portal before the younger Users, and now stood some metres ahead of them, looking at the database system. At the base they saw a wide entrance in which a rapid stream of tugs vanished, and a somewhat smaller one from where tugs appeared before disappearing behind the archive stacks surrounding the database.
With Nabiki now sitting still, Ranma walked over to the other two escapees, casting a brief look a the huge corkscrew-like tower to her left. It was going to be a long, long walk up there again... but before that, they'd have to get to that stack of pipes and chimneys, or that's what the complex looked like to her.
"So that's where we're gunna go?"
"Indeed. I hope we can find out how to disrupt the system... I have not heard of any data being lost since the latest version was installed."
Seemingly mulling over something for a few microcycles, Shinobu turned to face Ranma and Nabiki, who now opened her eyes.
"Should Nabiki come in there in her condition at all?" she inquired, nodding her head at the Tendo.
An understanding dawning on her face, Ranma looked at Nabiki.
"Don't you even think about leaving me here," Nabiki snarled low, her gaze focusing on Ranma. "You will take me to the Write Buffer, got it? What was the martial artists' creed again?" she asked, then continuing with obvious distaste at her own words, "Defend the weak?"
Ranma's face tightened in a scowl. She wasn't planning on ditching Nabiki, but as a martial artist, she couldn't help but to balk at the thought of not going in that huge complex herself.
As if reading Ranma's thoughts, Shinobu interrupted her line before she even got started.
"She has a point. You're the... martial artist, right? So you'd be better off guarding her than us."
"Ranma, let's get going," Nabiki said, standing up, if only a bit wobbly. She turned towards Poro and Shinobu and cast a meaningful look at the latter. "We'll see you at the Buffer then."
"Don't worry about us - we'll make it out just fine," Shinobu assured. A hint of smile appeared at the corner of her mouth. "Just try to make it up there by the time we're done."
Ranma pivoted quickly towards Shinobu. "Challenge taken an' accepted."
* * *
Half a cycle after the team of fugitives had split, Ranma was taking a good look ahead of them. The Corkscrew Tower, as she had named the tower with the Write Buffer for the lack of any better name, looked far more intimidating from down here than up there.
Although the root of the tower with the Write Buffer was a few microcycles' straight walk from Ranma and Nabiki's current position, it didn't mean the path there was only a cakewalk, especially with protocol guards and recognizers moving around in abundance. Indeed, running out in the open was as good as running for the gallows - or rather, to the debugger and then the null device. Not that Ranma knew what debuggers or the null device were, but it was bad.
At least the structures that lined their way to the root of the tower provided them with enough nooks and crannies for them to hide in. Right now, they were once again sneaking in a low trench that was in some places lined with those nondescript crates they had been hiding behind. The crates were a poor mask if they had to stay still; they had to move in pace with the guards passing by to keep themselves hidden from the guards. But when the walkway they were following was either lined with a high wall or a deep chasm, they were much better than nothing.
Nabiki needed a breather to recover once every five microcycles, and it had been four microcycles already since their last break. A few more microcycles walk from their position, they could see a large bridge crossing over a chasm, and ending at the base of the Corkscrew Tower.
Ranma heard again the tell-tale sputtering of a recognizer tug, this time coming from behind them. She took a quick glance around them, in search for their next hiding place. The trench and the crates weren't enough of visual cover, since the recognizer had no problems seeing over them. And Ranma had certainly learned not to be so foolhardy to challenge a recognizer, a vehicle that could squash her in bits and pieces without any problems... if they only saw and caught up with her.
To their right: an open walkway and a deep chasm. To their left: wall. Going backwards or staying put wasn't an option either, and going up or down, those weren't going to help them even if they knew how to fly or burrow like moles... burrow. That gave Ranma a pause and made her briefly stop in her tracks.
Nabiki, who had now heard the sounds as well, was getting anxious herself as well, and Ranma's sudden stop surprised her.
"What are you waiting for, can't you hear the tug coming?"
Not replying, Ranma only punched the wall hard, channeling some Power into it. She didn't want to pass out, not without a Power source nearby. She could use only a limited amount of her reserves, but the training she had done on Power conservation and use on their way to the IO tower paid off.
Like when she had punched a boulder by the source pool, a piece of the wall now crumbled apart, revealing a cave several metres deep. She quickly took a hold of Nabiki and started pulling her towards the hole, when the older girl exclaimed, "Stop wasting the time, they'll notice the hole just as well they'd see us!" and started limping forward in the trench. If they hurried, they might manage to dodge the recognizer in the next intersection, which she hoped to be soon after the next turn on the walkway.
The next thing she noticed was herself losing both breath and footing as Ranma slung her over her shoulder and started sprinting towards the intersection.
It took only a moment for them to turn the corner to the left. To their distress, they only saw the road open before them for a long stretch, far longer than they'd manage to run before the recognizer would catch them.
Nabiki still hanging on her shoulders, Ranma took a deep breath to gather herself. She was the best martial artist around here, and she was going to keep things that way! She only had to run-slash-leap as fast as she did in the real world with ki-infused legs.
In an attempt to repeat that skill, she focused some of her remaining Power in her legs, making their glow brighter and brighter, but elsewhere on her body, the circuitry shapes darkened and lost their vividness.
Without another preamble, she launched herself and Nabiki towards the crossroads. The ground blurred beneath her as she ran as fast as she could, keeping Nabiki on her shoulders somewhat steady. Her vision grew dim at the borders as she focused the Power she had on her legs.
As one fourth of the distance lay behind them, the ground shook, making Ranma nearly trip over. To her and Nabiki's luck, she regained her footing instinctively, but slowed down to look for the cause of the tremors.
Nabiki gaped at the top of the recognizer tug now visible over the top of the wall. Then Ranma turned around to look at it herself, spinning Nabiki around and making her lose her sight of the tug.
"What's it doing?"
It sounded like the engines - or whatever was the force driving the recognizer - had died down, and the bracket-like hooks under the tug had turned around and moved right underneath, making the tug now look like a giant standing on one leg. Leg that was placed at...
"It must've blocked the hole you blew in the wall," Nabiki noted, now that she had struggled herself down from Ranma's shoulder. She couldn't believe what luck they had. If Ranma hadn't blown the hole without thinking, the recognizer would've seen them by now. If she hadn't dragged Ranma onward, they'd be nicely holed up in the cave.
Ranma merely scratched the back of her head sheepishly. The unsaid compliment was the best she could've expected to get from Nabiki back in Tokyo, or even more than she could ever expect to get. In a random offshoot of a thought she wondered if whatever disease Nabiki had was making her act this strange.
Before she could think about this any more, Nabiki broke in with her comment. They had to find a place to take a breather and get away from the open area by the time the tug moved on, or guards came to check just what the recognizer had found.
Ranma picked up Nabiki again and began running towards the intersection. There she could see a pile of crates that weren't piled in straight lines, but leaving a clear path for climbing up halfway to the top, from there on to a ledge, and finally to a cavity well above the street level. It was well out of sight from the passing guards, and the crates would also shield the two fugitives from the sharp sensors recognizer tugs had.
The only small problem was in getting also Nabiki up there, but they both managed to get up to the ledge easily enough.
Both of them leaned against the wall, relaxing while knowing they couldn't be spotted from the walkway. Not only did Nabiki need to catch her breath, but Ranma welcomed the chance to recuperate as well. Not that she showed it, though, but the Power she had expended was very slow in returning.
They sat there in comfortable silence, until Nabiki had started feeling a bit better. She rolled over to her side and turned her head to Ranma.
"What's gotten to you, Saotome?"
"Whaddya mean? Ain't got nothing wrong with me!"
"Please, haven't you learned already you can't fool me even now? You've been in your girl form for a day now, haven't seen any way to turn back, and you're not in any kind of panic?" Nabiki sniffed, then continued in a fake soprano, "Aaah, I can't be a girl, I'm the man amongst men!"
Ranma fixed an annoyed glare at the older teen.
"Now, I ain't a book smart, but I know 'bout doing the important stuff first, ya know?"
"Could've fooled me," Nabiki thought to herself.
"And right now, we gotta get outta here."
"I ask again, what's gotten to you? Where's the macho bravado you only briefly flashed at the IO tower?"
Ranma moved his free hand to cup her breast and gave it a solid squeeze. "See these?"
"Haven't stopped you before, have they?"
With Nabiki not buying the excuse, Ranma only grumbled to herself and slightly shifted on her place. "It's not your problem, Nabiki."
"The hell it isn't. We're both stuck here, and that makes it my business."
A muted humming sound cut their discussion short and made them crawl over to the ledge and look down at the walkway. There, two black and red gleaming tanks made their way towards the still stationary recognizer, followed by a small squad of protocol guards. Both Users briefly thanked their luck that they hadn't stayed in the cave.
"We should get back on the road soon... they might comb through the neighbourhood thoroughly now that they've seen a sign of us," Nabiki muttered, attempting to remove the thoughts of physically attacking the guards walking down below. She didn't know why she was getting these odd impulses, but she didn't like it. At least she hadn't had such thoughts of Ranma after they left the IO tower. That would've made things awkward.
Banishing such thoughts from her mind, she looked at the horizon where the silhouette of the database system was visible. The ramp leading up to the Write Buffer didn't give them any hiding places, so they'd have to wait until all the system maintenance programs had left the tower, or prepare to fight them off. And fighting them off was out of the question. Although she had seen Ranma practice around with the disc she carried on her back, what kind of weapon would a frisbee make? All they could do for now was to wait for Shinobu and Poro create the diversion at the database.
She hated her situation from the bottom of her heart. Not only was she involuntarily and totally dependant on someone else accomplishing something, but she also felt she was losing control of something that had defined her for years now: her own mind.
For what could have possibly been more terrifying for the person whose guile and wits had kept her out of the rampaging martial artists' way?
* * *
Meanwhile, Shinobu and Poro had found their way to the main entrance of the database management system. First broad and wide, it narrowed to a point of having room for only one program to pass at a time... after taking a queue number.
For the tenth time in five cycles, Shinobu watched the ticket she held in her hand. "3,110,675," it read. "3,110,437," read a huge holographic display hanging from the ceiling of the waiting lobby. She couldn't slump down any further; she had done so far too many times by now.
"Does it always take _this_ long waiting?"
"Yes. Requesting anything from the database demands a strict adherence to the protocol."
Frustrated, Shinobu stood up and began pacing around the lobby. "3,110,440," the display read now. It would be quite a while before their turn came up and they could go in through the gates before them. The lobby was full of different sorts of programs; some were purple, some were yellow, but none were red, the color Shinobu had already learned to associate with the system guards.
Then there were the gates. The entrance deeper into the database was a set of gates with revolving doors, obscuring whatever was behind them from sight.
And on the other side of the room, the open holes in the wall showed the ramp leading to the lobby. The database apparently was an important place here, considering the number of programs continuously entering the system. And constantly busy, too; a display next to the "now serving"-number told the number of programs currently inside the system... fifty-six at the moment.
As her habit was, she started looking for patterns around her. In Tokyo, this meant the way road pavement was laid, ceiling tiles, flower plantations, and so on. Every time a program stepped through the doors, they went in alone, even if there would've been just enough room for two to enter simultaneously.
And every time the doors closed, the counter telling the number of programs inside increased by one. Every now and then, at a seemingly random pace, the counter decreased as the programs apparently exited from the system to some other space than the lobby, keeping the number constantly just under sixty.
She looked again out through the window frame. To her distress, she saw a squad of five red-glowing programs heading their way, all probably in attempt to find the escapees. Not minding to use her elbows, she quickly made her way to the yawning stream editor.
"Get up, the guards are coming!" she hissed at Poro's left ear. That made the lethargic program stand up quickly, although Shinobu pulling on his arm definitely helped.
She dragged him from the arm, weaving between the programs that blocked their way to the revolving doors.
The entrance doors opened to let in five guards. A sharp rap of one shock staff on the floor was all it took to part the mass of programs standing in the middle of the lobby, revealing Shinobu and Poro almost at the doors.
"Suspend, conscripts!" the lead program ordered.
Ignoring the order, Shinobu forcibly pushed Poro into the next opening in the door and jumped herself in the same slot. It was a tight fit, but like water wheels, the door pushed them forward and onto the other side of the wall. Unseen to them, the holographic counter increased by one to fifty-seven.
"Stop executing the escape routine!" the guard programs shouted in the lobby.
As soon as Shinobu and Poro reached the other side and couldn't support themselves against the wall any longer, they hit the ground with a thump, Shinobu on top of Poro. She quickly rolled off of him and stood up, fearing the guards to come through the doors right after them.
A quick survey around them showed few places to hide. The inside of the database was riddled with translucent bridges in multiple levels crossing over large stacks of crates lying below ground level. At least the bridges had railings, as they certainly weren't wide. And wherever the bridges intersected, there were red and green traffic lights floating in mid-air.
Still, no matter where they were on the bridges, the guards could easily see them from the entrance point. And the only way forward was through the bridges.
"Get up!" she shouted, and started running towards the bridges, Poro following on her heels a moment later.
She picked at random a bridge, and by the time the first guard program got through the doors, they had already passed three intersections completely ignoring the traffic lights.
"Suspend those programs!" the lead guard ordered. The escapees were already so deep in the network of bridges that they could not directly see which way they should have gone. But there were five of them, so he ordered the other four to go after the conscripts on the bridge, while he himself would find the way to the exit and block it from unlawful programs.
Meanwhile, Shinobu and Poro had ended up in a queue of programs waiting for the light to turn green. A quick glance behind them was enough to make Shinobu push the programs before her down almost like domino blocks.
Stepping over the prone programs, Poro asked, "Where are we going?"
"Away from those guards!" she replied, waving a hand around her. The said guards had already managed to get so far off from the doors that they almost appeared to be all around them in the web-like set of bridges.
Running away from the red lights, she and Poro crashed in the next intersection into another program, who fell down on his back. Shaking the cobwebs from his head, he stood up and wondered which direction was he going anyway before picking one direction by chance.
He ended up going a way no program was supposed to go to from that intersection, not in this version of the database system.
Shinobu cursed. They had to find a way out of here! To her great frustration, the bridge network was so complex and full of twists and turns so that planning her movements ahead of time would've needed her to stand still to see exactly where she could and couldn't move. Standing still at the moment, though, was a bad idea, unless the guards had been moving to some central coordinated plan. That didn't appear to be the case, though, as the guards appeared to wander around the bridge network, not finding a good path to the runaways.
Still, when she was running in straight lines towards the next intersection, she couldn't help but to curse that she was in worse physical shape as the martial artist of the group, or that uppity girl. She was already getting tired, and if they stopped, the guards would certainly zero in on them. Even if she hadn't seen the effects of programs derezzing at the game grid - except for the disco dancer - the frog monster she had had to fight against on the game grid was one thing she didn't wish to face again. And that was assuming she'd be sent back to the game grid in the first place; she wasn't too keen on finding out the interrogation methods and other sentences this world provided.
No, this was not the time to think of those things, not as long as she had the exit to find. It wasn't to the top, since there weren't any exits there, just a number of crates and terminals. She couldn't see any on their level either, but the four guards were getting around her.
Shinobu did a double-take. Four guards? Weren't there five that she saw coming to the database? If these were four, then where was the fifth?
Her eyes scanned the whole hall. She couldn't see her at the bottom, near the stacks, but that didn't mean he wasn't there. He wasn't to the top, but... there he was, near the entrance doors but the door he was in front of wasn't a revolving door. And she was certain that all the doors from the lobby to here were revolving ones; she had spent a good while looking at them while waiting for their turn to enter the system.
And if the door wasn't an entrance, then it had to be an exit.
She looked a bit to the side, seeing nearby a large amount of programs stuck on a particularly long bridge. At the end of the bridge was an intersection, and the one program that appeared to be coming to the intersection from another direction appeared to be the same as the one she had pushed over some time ago. And now they were stuck on a bridge directly above the platform that had the exit doorway.
"If this qualified for the problem as the database, I'd want to benefit from it, too!" she thought to herself.
Poro, who had dutifully been following Shinobu as she raced the bridges over and over, took a speculative peek at the bridge. He doubted the bridge had been built for the load of that many programs. If the bridge collapsed, he'd feel responsible for the derezzing of the programs now on the bridge, because he hadn't warned them. The question wasn't that easy, though. If they didn't cause this disruption in the services, he'd be caught by the protocol guards again, and unlike Shinobu, he could understand what else the Kernel might do to them if they were caught. _That_ was far from something as pleasant as the assignation to the game grids as a pedestrian inbetween fast-moving cars.
He only hoped the bridge wouldn't collapse, and that they'd find their way out of the hall without getting caught.
The hope was all in vain, though, as the bridge creaked under the excess load and with a loud screech broke, one end crashing down onto the platform level. The other end, however was left hanging up like a hinge.
The programs, kept from falling off the bridge due to the guardrails, tumbled down along the fallen bridge. The protocol guard, caught off-guard by the collapsing bridge, ended up buried under the dozens of programs.
As the movement on the bridge came to halt, the loudspeakers that had been quiet until now came to life. "Database integrity compromised," the speakers repeated while a translucent barrier appeared atop the record stacks at the hall bottom.
"Poro, can you see a way down there?" Shinobu shouted to Poro, a smile attempting to break through on her face. Things were going their way after all!
"Left in the next intersection, then right, then down the bridge!" he replied, attempting to overpower the loudspeaker's blaring, not masking either his relief of the programs not falling down to the bottom of the hall or guilt of having them hurt.
The guards still circling around the bridges were making their way towards the collapsed gangway as well. But in spite of their best attempts, they were still a good distance away from the two escapees as they ran down the ramp, holding on to the guard railings to secure their steps.
They gingerly stepped around the pile of programs at the bottom, and immediately ran to the exit where they hitched a ride on a tug out of the complex. From their ride they could see the spike of the Write Buffer tower.
Soon after them, the four guards reached the bottom of the wrecked bridge as well. Three of them went to pull the squad leader from underneath all the rubble and programs, while the fourth ran to the security rezzing station to call for backup in cleaning the mess.
* * *
_MCP has gender. Proven. Corollary: MCP is male or female. Newline._
* * *
Ranma and Nabiki were still hiding on their perch when they noticed the traffic down on the road get much higher as security guards ran down the Corkscrew Tower ramp towards the database complex.
"Do ya think they're done now?" Ranma asked from Nabiki.
"In any case, this appears to be our chance, " she replied, stretching her arms wide. A good rest had done wonders to her, but she still felt awful... only not as awful as before. They'd still need to take breaks on the trip to the top if she was to walk up there on her own feet, but Ranma would probably be able to carry her if the need arose. Turning her thoughts away from the trip ahead, she settled to watch the flow of protocol guards and whatnot coming down from the tower.
It wasn't until a good while later that the last guard they had seen had vacated the ramp circling around the tower. They carefully slipped down the crates back to the ground level, and began making their way towards the Write Buffer.
Some microcycles into their journey, Nabiki stole a glance or two at Ranma. Whether she liked to admit it or not, she wouldn't have survived this long without Ranma helping. Not that her survival prospects looked good without a small sort of miracle right now, but she would have derezzed already at the game grid.
Many would question if Nabiki had any honor in her actions. Even more people would say opportunism was Nabiki's middle name. She often bent and twisted the topic so that the question of her owing anyone anything became unclear. But sometimes even she could not do that.
She hated to owe people anything. She did not like one bit that she owed Ranma "brawn-for-brains" Saotome her life. But no matter how she attempted to tell herself it was not so, she could not.
"Ranma."
"Huh?"
"Thank you."
And this time, she meant it.
Nabiki's acknowledgment of Ranma's help brought forth silence the two had walked in for a good while. It was been a novel - and awkward - situation for both, so neither really knew how to continue talking from there on.
"No." A synthetic voice broke the silence behind them.
"Yes," echoed another, very similar voice.
Ranma and Nabiki quickly turned around to see... two floating polyhedrons with a glowing afterimage showing their path.
"No-no."
"Yes-yes-yes."
Then, after a brief pause, "Yes."
The two objects began moving towards Ranma and Nabiki, who had now began running away from the two bickering blobs. They were better off not taking the chance of them being in league with the system guards.
Their attempt to outrun the mysterious chatterboxes ended in a few microcycles, when Nabiki couldn't keep up the pace any longer and fell down on the ground. Ranma quickly stopped and moved herself between the prone User and the two floating near-spheres.
"Whatcha want? Are ya with the guard programs?"
"No."
"So what are you?" she asked, tapped the ground with her foot a couple of times, but got no reply.
"Can't ya say nuthin' but yes and no?"
"No."
"Great, a pair of sumthing that can't say things straight - or nothing but straight - or... argggh!" Ranma muttered to herself. The quiet snickering from Nabiki told her that she hadn't gone unheard, and she spared only a brief glare at the girl now getting up from the ground.
"Whaddya think, what should we do with 'em?"
Now upright, Nabiki turned to the two unidentified flying objects.
"Will you cause trouble for us?"
"No-no-no."
"Can you show us the shortest path to the Write Buffer then?"
"Yes," the objects said, rapidly moving up and down as if nodding, and then began moving along the ramp.
* * *
Meanwhile, Shinobu and Poro had already jumped off the tug and were on their way towards the tower as well. The former was feeling very good about herself, although the way they had made the system crash down left her a bit unsatisfied. She wasn't even certain what and how they had accomplished their task, and that's what miffed her. Lady Luck was a fickle mistress.
"Something wrong?" Poro asked Shinobu, whose expression seemed to constantly change from annoyed to frustrated and back again.
She only let out a long-suffering sigh and picked up the pace. The sooner they got out of here, the better. This wasn't just her desire to simply kick back and relax for a while, but she also missed her husband a great deal. The problem wasn't him, though; it was the in-laws.
That she couldn't be there for the dinner with them was certain to make their relations tenser, as if they weren't difficult enough before. When she told them she was not going to stay home and manage the household but go to work herself, they didn't have to say out loud that they were surprised and disappointed. At least her dear husband understood. He'd better, since doing postgraduate studies at the university wasn't a good source of income. And with the falling out with his parents, the money she got as a secretary was even more welcome.
It was her job as a secretary that she considered one of the better aspects of being employed in a Western company. Some of the women she had went to school with had been hired as office ladies, but were practically asked to leave their job once they got married.
While her chances of moving higher on her career at Encom Japan were low, at least they hadn't expected her to quit her job. Hopefully they wouldn't fire her for these missed days, either.
Her thoughts briefly wandered to the two teenagers. "They should be near the Write Buffer by now... if they are still alive." She had stomped down her nagging conscience, but she refused to take the risk of getting the same disease as them, whatever it was. But it helped enough to tell herself that at least one of them had to stay fine, especially if the boy had the same bug already.
She remembered the walk up the ramp was a long one, and last time she had walked the distance it had been all downhill. Going up there should definitely pass for aerobic exercise, she thought. "Better not stop to wonder about it," she thought, and continued onward.
* * *
Nabiki sat down on a slab and chuckled mirthlessly as she looked over to the two blobs now floating just over Ranma's shoulders. True enough, their 'guides' had shown the shortest path to the Write Buffer, but without Ranma carrying her, climbing up the stacks of those mysterious, ever-present floating crates would've been beyond her current capabilities.
Ranma was again practicing new tricks with Power, now attempting to replicate the fancy patterns she had seen below the stream portal at the IO tower. She set her palm on the ground, and channeled some Power into it.
As she saw the emerging patterns and a small, fluctuating yellow sphere above the ground, she yelled, "Yeah!" while the two objects both traced a victory flag above her shoulders with their trails. At least they couldn't make them wave.
"Ya know, we could try to already enter the Buffer?" Ranma asked.
"No, we're better off waiting for Shinobu and Poro; besides, when Shinobu and I were... moved here, the loudspeakers," Nabiki waved around her, as she couldn't exactly tell _where_ the speakers were, "told us when we were supposed to step in. And if you go in there by yourself, you're on your own then."
"Fine, fine," Ranma replied and rubbed her arm a bit. It had began to ache a bit, probably due to the training she had been doing.
"Don't ya think they should've been here already?"
Nabiki rubbed her forehead and felt a migraine forming up. She doubted it was due to Ranma acting like an impatient child, but it wasn't helping in the least.
"Even if we ignored that the database is a good distance away from here, we took a shortcut here, something they probably wouldn't know about. So no, they aren't late yet." Truth be told, she was getting a bit anxious of staying up here much longer; the longer they stayed there, the more likely it was for the guard programs to return and apprehend them.
Begrudgingly, Ranma turned away to continue practicing while Nabiki looked at the slope leading back down from the top of the 'Corkscrew tower'. "Can't say it isn't an apt name," she thought.
In a few microcycles, the loudspeakers broke the silence. "Prepare for the transfer of data files and code archives."
"Ya hear that, 'Biki?"
"Yes, and it's Nabiki!"
* * *
In the physical world, things were starting to move forward. Haruo and Eiko had looked around the system files and attempted to pick a reasonable selection of files they might be interested at home, especially source code for _Space Paranoids_.
"Ukyo, insert the first diskette now!" Haruo called. A few seconds later, they heard the reply.
"It doesn't fit in!"
"Eiko, why don't you go there?"
With a sigh, she stood up and went to the back room.
* * *
Back at the Write Buffer, Ranma and Nabiki watched as a stream of ubiquitous crates moved to the Buffer portal before vanishing.
"Ya think that's Ukyo?"
Nabiki merely nodded. "We should hope so..." she thought to herself.
At that time, the two database wreckers turned a corner and saw the other Users watching as the crates floated by. Already at a distance, Shinobu could tell that Ranma's colour had taken a step in the same direction as Nabiki's. She double-checked her own colour and sighed, relieved. It was still the same pure blue.
"Hello, Users," Poro greeted Ranma and Nabiki, who turned around to see the new arrivals.
As Nabiki saw the uninfected User and program, new thoughts filled her mind. "Hug him! Hug her!" echoed in her mind. As if in pain, she slapped her hands over her ears and turned away, hunched over. Great, now she was hearing voices, too!
Ranma's reaction was a bit different. "No, stop checking Shinobu out! Ya already got too many fiancées!" she thought. To avoid these thoughts, she redirected her gaze to Poro. "No no no, I do not like men!"
Shinobu took a step back from the two sickly Users; they appeared worse than she had expected.
"Programs and , enter the Write Buffer now," the loudspeakers announced. Ranma pulled on Nabiki's hand, both of which were still on her ears, and told her, "Let's go, it's our turn."
With the voices in her mind now almost silent, Nabiki let Ranma guide her by hand to the portal. "I really hope Haruo and Eiko know what they're doing," she thought as she stepped into the portal plate.
Poro and Shinobu watched as Ranma followed Nabiki, vanishing in a golden flash.
"There's something wrong with her, too?" Poro asked.
Before Shinobu could answer, the two polyhedrons appeared before their faces and said "Yes."
"Gahh! What on Earth is that?" Shinobu exclaimed, startled. They hadn't met many friendly faces in here, and if it moved and didn't have a face, even then it was probably a tank, a recognizer or something else decisively unfriendly.
"Bits?" Poro stated more than asked.
"What did you say?"
"They're bits, aren't you?"
"Yes," one of the now identified bits answered.
"They don't appear to be verbally gifted," Shinobu commented.
"That's right... they can have only two states, 'yes' and 'no', so that is quite a limitation."
The loudspeakers interrupted their discussion. "Programs Poro and , please enter the Write Buffer immediately."
"You go first; I'll be right after you," Poro told Shinobu, who had already turned and began walking towards the portal. "Hopefully I won't be in any close contact with those two," she thought. She guessed whatever they had had to be infectious.
As Shinobu vanished in a flash, Poro walked to a nearby message crate and set his hands on it. "It's good to be a stream editor," he thought, as he wrote a message to whoever would read the diskette. When he was finished, he pushed the crate into the portal and stepped in himself a moment later.
* * *
Eiko ejected the last of the diskettes from the drive. They now had copied all the people inside - without forgetting some extra compensation for their efforts. She gave Ukyo a smile.
"We're about done here, then."
"And you'll help Ranchan back here, won't you?"
Eiko replied confidently, "At least we'll give it our best shot." In her mind, she amended, "Not that I have any clue where to start. But that's better left unsaid."
A few minutes later, the broken game console was again in the same condition it was when they entered and the window they entered through closed.
Not much later, a katana cut the window latch open, and in climbed a dark-clad high school student.
"Verily, the dark depths noble men must delve in order to free the innocent from the vile evil that plagues us."
* * *
_End of line._
* * *
_Extra: Substitutes_
In the dark of the night, one particular purple-headed girl was breaking into the Encom arcade. This time, Shampoo wasn't armed with her usual melon maces, or at least they were nowhere visible. Instead, she carried a book; a book whose cover said, "Computer Programming for Amazons." Granted, the last word was hastily scribbled next to an crossed-out word that eerily resembled "Dummies."
A good question is to ask why she did that... when you're an expert tracker and have a bit of extra time and a whole lot of desire to admire your legally wed hubby, very little is impossible. Even finding out where he - or she, as it was at the time - disappeared and how.
Two hours later, Shampoo returned to her room at the Cat Caf. And there was much rejoicing as she hugged her beloved maces, all the while thinking how much she missed them. At this point, it is prudent to point out the couple of microcomputers brutally smashed into pieces, usually with the said maces, in the trash bin.
"Computer programming isn't that difficult; no different from writing down a new noodle recipe," Shampoo mused to herself.
Some hours later, as the morning batch jobs executed far above the sparse matrix clouds in the arcade mainframe, the four fugitives continued on their way. Their progress to the IO tower was halted by the appearance of an apparently female program with long dark hair, held up in two large round hairclips.
"Nihao, shi jie!" the program exclaimed, before glomping onto girl-Ranma's frame. "Nihao, shi jie!"
"Shampoo? Whatcha doin' here?" Ranma asked, as she tried to extract the clingy program off her person.
"Nihao, shi jie!"
"It's not Shampoo, Ranma..." Nabiki said, although she wondered just why did a random program have Shampoo's face and why did she give the constrictor-snake-strength hug to Ranma. Was there a connection to Shampoo?
"Nihao, shi jie?"
Poro nodded sagely. "Yes... and apparently suffers of helloworlditis. They're programs whose function is repeating the same line over and over again in an infinite loop... as would happen to be the case now."
"Nihao, shi jie? Nihao, shi jie!"
Far off in another realm and time, the whole Pokemon population looked up, having the feeling of someone talking about them.
* * *
_**AN:** The joys of classical (dumbed-down) sentential calculus with a contradictory theory. Well, at least these "reasonings" are simple._
_I gave up on writing 9kw chapters; instead, I'll settle with updates over 5kw. Oh, and I have no idea how badly wrong "Nihao, shi jie" is; I wanted to say 'Hello world'._
_Natalie-E-G raised a very good point about the virus in this story in a review for chapter 5. I'm well past the point of no return with anachronisms, and I don't plan on introducing _Ghost in the Shell_ into the picture... yet._
_Things I didn't like in this chapter: No frisbee tricks. No upcoming Ukyo vs Kuno. Poor virus characterization. No Oikake, Machibuse, Kimagure or Otoboke... as much as I wanted to give the four guard programs names and have them act according to them._
_Thanks to Ozzallos and weebee for giving feedback on this chapter._
7. Disassembly
_The usual disclaimer. Ranma, Tron and all the related intellectual property making an appearance in this fic are someone else's property; the former originally Rumiko Takahashi's and the latter.. Walt Disney Company's? Steven Lisberger's? And whoever they've given/sold/transferred their rights to. I'm not and won't be making any money off of this._
* * *
The curtain blocked the rays of early Thursday morning sun, keeping the room dark. Within that room Haruo slept like a log. All good things must come to an end, though, as the noise of clinking plates and cups from the kitchen roused him.
With a grumble, he rolled over on his futon to keep the annoying noise out of his ears. He was tired, damnit!
Not long after, Haruo tossed aside his covers with a frustrated grunt. No use trying to catch any more sleep, especially since he now remembered what he had done last night... and the great puzzle he was about to tackle. Hopefully it'd be more difficult than getting in the Encom arcade mainframe... just remembering it made him depressed.
Oh well - breakfast first before school, after that to wait for Eiko to come by and look at what the diskettes in his drawer held. Right now, though, food was just distraction for him. Sure, it was something of a necessity, but nothing to spend thinking about more than the absolute minimum. Food in, energy out.
With that in his mind, he quickly left his room to wash up, have breakfast and copious amounts of tea. He'd probably spend a good part of the school day sleeping, but that couldn't be helped right now. The caffeinated beverages in his school bag might help a bit, but probably not enough.
* * *
In the commercial district, one disgruntled man trudged through the streets. His goal: Encom Arcade. His task: To open up the arcade, although he didn't really know why it should be opened this early when most kids were in school.
As he walked in to turn on the lights, he heard a peculiar sound, emanating from the middle of the arcade.
"Is that... snoring?"
Quietly, he sneaked to look at the source of the noise. And behold; next to a number of wrecked machines, slept a teen dressed in black.
"Mmmh... fierce tigress..."
Just as quietly, he left to call the police, followed immediately afterwards by a call to his boss's home phone number.
* * *
"No sleeping in class!"
_Thwack!_
The chalk that struck Ukyo's head woke her up from her woefully short nap. It wasn't that she wanted to miss the lesson but more like she couldn't stay awake. With only a few hours' sleep last night, she was little better than a sleepwalker.
She just wished that she could deflect attacks while asleep, like Ranchan did. Maybe she'd have to start keeping a spatula in her hands? Actually, it sounded like she'd better do it right now. She'd just better watch not to cut herself or tear her clothes.
Her eyes drifted closed again. If only it would've been Sunday already...
_Thwack!_
"Hnnggh...?" Ukyo blearily opened her eyes, not noticing how her grasp on the spatula loosened.
_Clang!_
"Miss Kuonji, bucket duty, now!"
Apparently she didn't have enough practice to block the projectiles when asleep. And the sound of the spatula falling on the floor definitely would've waken her up even without the chalk. Or maybe she wasn't sleeping deep enough.
Yawning, she set up the buckets and started doing small physical exercises with them.
In front of a door down the hall, Haruo took a look at the crazy martial artist before he lifted his own buckets. All the caffeine he had with him hadn't been enough to keep him awake. The most visible effect was that he had to go to the toilet already twice this morning; the dehydrating effect of caffeine certainly showed through.
By contrast, Eiko had gotten her parents to call her in sick.
"Lucky girl," he thought.
* * *
As the lunch break came by, Ukyo's friends Misa and Toshiko intercepted her before she could leave the classroom. It was Misa who started the cross examination.
"What's wrong, Ukyo?"
"Yeah, you've never been this tired before."
Ukyo had to blink once before the words processed past the veil of sleepiness.
"I couldn't sleep very well last night ," she attempted to lie.
"And what do Ranma and the computer club have to do with it?" Misa asked.
"Nothing! Where'd you get that idea?"
"Because Haruo was also caught sleeping during lessons and Eiko simply wasn't at school today." Misa replied.
"You spoke with the bishonen club members from their class?" Toshiko asked her, already knowing the answer.
"Of course! After yesterday's episode of _Bishonen Basket_, I had to go and talk with Arisa how absolutely _dreamy_ Akito was!"
"Right," Toshiko bluntly stated before focusing again on Ukyo. "And you did meet with them yesterday."
Being as tired as she was, Ukyo was not in the mood to play twenty questions about what she did yesterday, in particular because she had a hunch it was best to be quiet about it. While the police usually didn't get involved in martial arts fights, breaking and entering was likely to be a different case. This much she had figured yesterday; today, her thoughts were swimming around in molasses.
"Look, I'm dead tired right now, and all I want is to get over the rest of the school day and take a nap," she snapped.
Misa looked taken aback, but Toshiko was hardly fazed. Let the sleeping dogs lie, they said, and it apparently applied also to tired okonomiyaki chefs. But tomorrow, after Ukyo had managed to get enough sleep, they would get the whole story out of her.
Even if Toshiko wasn't a hard-core gossip monger, she'd still enjoy all the fun this latest twist in the ongoing saga of love, hate and jealousy was providing her with.
Then she shook her head in dismay. Maybe she had already spent too much time around Misa.
Not long after that, Akane returned to the class. She had been looking for Eiko to ask for more information on Ranma, since she apparently knew something. Unfortunately, she hadn't been to school that day.
* * *
For a nightshift worker like Tooru, the days were the best time to go to the arcade. No kids hogging the games, and even worse, their shouts distracting him from his attempts at beating the top scores.
Unfortunately, today he couldn't enter the arcade as early as usual, because the police had closed it for most of the morning. And when they had finally opened the doors, the Tokyo Luv-Luv Memorial games he wanted to play were quite visibly broken.
Well, at least there were Tokyo Kaiju Rumble and Space Paranoids left.
After starting the twentieth level of the former, he couldn't help but to notice something different going on. Sure, the 200-foot tall school girl certainly would've qualified as something strange, but it might have been just an easter egg for all he knew.
But it stopped being funny when the girl whipped out a microphone, started singing music from the 70s and the sun turned into a huge disco ball. To top that, the buildings began swaying to the beat, along with the city defenders who jumped atop the buildings and started dancing to the music.
Forgetting about the yen he'd inserted, he let the dance routine continue - now the mechas were doing Irish step dancing - and walked over to the Space Paranoids booth. There was only so much he could stand, and this was way over the top. Of course it hurt that he had to abandon an hour's worth of playing by switching the game, but that must've been some odd glitch.
He stretched his fingers - he was in for a long session if he wanted to get the top score - and inserted the coin.
He started to get angry after the thirty-second level. Why was the tank shooting leeks at those flying okonomiyaki? What on Earth was happening in here?
Noticing the arcade manager's room had lights on, he went in and joined the group of others who were complaining of the similar bleed-over of characters between games. The man playing the only remaining Tokyo Luv-Luv Memorial game complained of a tank rolling over the park and squishing the girl he had been wooing for a good while. The discs in Discs of Doom changed into onion rings flying in the air and smacking mobsters in the face.
The arcade manager was nervous, and the reason for this was the already present stack of complaints on his desk, each and every one describing how the games malfunctioned.
"Please, we will address this issue as soon as possible. Here, have these free game tokens to use once we get the problem corrected."
Slowly and only barely appeased, the mob left the office, still grumbling about the time lost playing the games.
The manager picked up his desk phone and dialed a number. A few rings later his call was answered.
"Encom Labs, technical support division. How may we help you?"
* * *
"So, who are you going to send to check on the arcade?" a junior technician asked his boss.
The boss leaned forward on his desk and pressed a button on his intercom. "Maseo, get in my office."
After a few seconds of silence, he turned back to the technician. "You're not allergic to cats, are you?"
"Actually,..." was all the techie got out before Maseo walked in through the door.
"Yes, boss?"
"Ah... ahh... achoo!"
Sometimes, it was an inconvenience to have an employee who valued the company of his cats more than that of humans and smelled like it. Hopefully he'd at least appreciate this temporary 'Get Out of Cubicleville Free' -card he was now presented with.
* * *
An hour after school was out, Eiko came to Haruo's house with a pack of caffeinated soft drinks that were quickly put in the fridge to cool. She showed no sign of being tired, unlike Haruo, who yawned once every few minutes. Soon, they made their way to Haruo's room where he had his computer and display all set up.
He was lucky, he supposed, to have found the small monochromatic TV for such a cheap price; with that, he didn't have to hoard the family room TV for his computer, especially when he had true inspiration to work non-stop. His parents didn't really know what he was doing with the computer, and he wanted to keep it that way. They hardly would've been happy with him trying to find his way into certain corporate mainframe computers.
Getting into those computers was an exercise in little beyond social engineering. Their current task, however, definitely had everything to do with the technical aspect, or that was the preconception they had got.
Haruo put the first diskette inside the external drive beside his microcomputer and typed in a command to see what it contained.
"So that's Ranma there? He's smaller than I thought," Eiko blithely commented.
"With Ranma's luck, that's probably 'she'..."
"Oh, right."
Haruo typed in the command to load and execute Ranma's code. As the program loaded, the screen flashed a few times before it turned black with a blinking cursor. Trying the easiest way first, he began typing in a greeting to Ranma.
* * *
Like when she was loaded into the arcade mainframe, Ranma's vision faded back, only more slow this time. The next thing she noticed was the very different look of the system she was now in. The etchings on the walls were much cruder, and only rarely went even diagonally. It felt much... blockier, she thought, than the earlier systems she had been in.
Looking around, she noticed that the exit from the IO buffer had less detail than the earlier doorways she'd seen. Taking these things in stride, she began walking towards the door.
To her surprise, already after the first three steps she felt out of breath. She knew she was feeling a bit under the weather when she left the previous system, but nothing this bad. As she forced herself to continue, she felt herself getting dizzy to the point of nearly passing out. Passing out - she wasn't going to call it fainting - was probably a bad idea, and she'd have to find a secure place just in case the protocol guards were out looking for her also here, wherever Haruo had moved them. Hopefully it was Haruo and not someone else, in any case.
* * *
Haruo cursed as his computer seemed to lock up for a while, not accepting further key presses. Annoyed, he watched as the cursor stopped moving. After a little while, the cursor resumed its activity and the backlog of characters Haruo had typed appeared on the screen.
* * *
After regaining her breath, Ranma managed to get outside the room. If the entrance hall had been bare, everything outside was even more so. And cramped. Everything in the system seemed to be stuffed together and almost as tightly as possible. There were just a handful of buildings surrounding one courtyard. All of this was surrounded by an enclosing wall that blotted out most of the sky.
She could see only one other program, who was sitting on a slab in the middle of the courtyard and shackled to the floor by his feet. When he noticed Ranma approaching him, he smiled enthusiastically.
"Greetings, program! I am Baromu, the basic interpreter around here. Do you have any program code you wish me to interpret?"
"Ranma Saotome. And no, -" she started before the loudspeakers interrupted her as they came to life.
"Ranma, can you hear me?"
Unlike before, she didn't feel any pull towards the buildings surrounding her. Without the handy homing signal telling where she could reply to Haruo's voice, she only looked around her, making sure she didn't see any guards around, and called back.
"Yes, where am I?"
"You're on my microcomputer. How are you feeling?"
Ranma wasn't going to admit she had almost fai- passed out, she meant, so she replied "Dizzy - and it's cramped in here!"
"Sorry, but this system doesn't have nearly as many memory as the Encom mainframe. That's probably why you feel like that."
"Any suggestions how to get you to the Encom mainframe?"
"Ask Shinobu 'bout that, but can't ya do sumthing about Nabiki bein' sick first?"
There was a long pause Ranma didn't like as Haruo and Eiko had a small debate on what their options were. If she didn't bring Nabiki back safe and sound, he would be able to count on two things: first Tendo demon head and waterworks, and second one angry tomboy. Kasumi's heart would probably be broken if something bad happened to Nabiki, and Ranma was not going to let the hand that fed her get bitten by anyone, let alone her.
Besides, even if she was a pain-in-the-rear and was harder to read than the riddles of that ancient stone c-c-cat, she was still someone a martial artist should protect, especially right now and here.
"There's not much we can do. It would be like searching for a needle in a haystack."
"... what if I can kick the bug first?"
"You have the same problem?"
"Yeah, but, it's just another bug, right?" She still didn't like admitting she was sick, and this time she didn't even have the benefit of the fever. At least that would have the upside of making him unable to turn female.
"Maybe. We'll move you back to the diskette and do our best."
* * *
Haruo took out Ranma's disk from the disk drive and faced Eiko. "This isn't going to be easy."
"... but would you bother doing it if it was easy?" she replied with a knowing grin.
"Nope," he said, mirroring Eiko's smirk. "For a master of martial arts hacking, this is just a ... challenge," he finished, his eyes burning with inner fire.
The yawn he failed to suppress ruined the effect.
They loaded in turn all the three Users in a disassembler and surveyed their code. They didn't expect to have much success, at least not for now, but once Haruo had got a good night's sleep, things might be different.
This didn't mean that they didn't try anything already today; in a few minutes, a debugger with a disassembler for making the program code more readable was loaded to the system to look at how the Users worked as programs.
* * *
Inside Haruo's computer, the debugger program looked at the pigtailed User, strapped into the disassembler bench with write locks.
"Trust me, I know what I am doing." The program looked uncomfortable as he stretched his hands that appeared to end in tools; a prod and a magnifying glass, or as the small labels affixed to them said, "poke" and "peek".
"Unfortunately, the Users apparently have no clue what _they_ are doing."
With that, he set out to work.
* * *
Ranma opened her eyes, feeling dizzy, and saw that the colours on her were still wrong. That operation had _hurt_, and it hadn't even worked.
"Ranma no feel better than before," she muttered, before stopping in fright. "Haruo, what you did to Ranma! Ranma no talk this way!"
It took a while before she got a reply.
"Oops."
At least they managed to change her back.
* * *
Also Nabiki had to undergo some of these... less than successful attempts, as Haruo and Eiko read what she had to say.
"Don't nya dare let meow stay like this-hiss!"
"Too bad I can't take a photo of you, boss," Eiko thought to herself, grinning. Pictures of catgirl-Nabiki would definitely sell well if it weren't for the danger of the photogenic subject herself finding out of the sales.
* * *
As could be expected, Thursday yielded no good results for Haruo and Eiko in their uncoordinated attempts to edit Ranma and Nabiki to health. At some point, soon after Nabiki had apparently been reduced into a babbling infant, they had lost the focus of their goal. The lack of really seeing them made their editing feel impersonal. It was so easy to just forget that they were poking at real people, instead of a sequence of ones and zeros, and they believed that they could undo anything they tried.
Meanwhile, Ukyo was doing her best to keep things going at her restaurant, but when you almost mix up sugar and salt, it can be a trying experience. She was already well past the stage where she would almost fall asleep; instead, she simply appeared to be zoned out most of the time. In the end, she had to close Ucchan's earlier than usual just because she absolutely needed to get some sleep before she botched up the orders even worse.
And at the arcade, Maseo the Encom technician was starting to look into the arcade mainframe. As he watched the system run, he tried to pinpoint the underlying error that caused the games to malfunction. The problem wasn't like finding a needle in a haystack; it was like finding a specific needle in a haystack-sized pile of needles.
The system was on the verge of total collapse. The database system had already crashed, taking down many game features requiring the database, such as high score tables. But was this the cause of the crash?
It took him hours to run out of tricks to try. There weren't any unknown programs being executed, nor were there any unauthorized log-ins in the recent history to explain what had happened. Finally, he ended up checking the CRC checksums of the system utilities - in a way, fingerprints of the program code.
The checksums differed, so the utilities must have been changed. But how? There hadn't been any strange log-ins, so he couldn't think of how this could have been done otherwise.
It took him a good while to figure out all the executable files had been extended with an almost equal piece of code. A quick look at it in a disassembler gave him clues to how it worked, but not a complete rundown. Enough to tell him that these code fragments copied themselves into other programs, hence making this a prime candidate to be the cause of this mess. Well, he didn't know which program had been the first one, but with some studying of the log files, they might figure it out yet.
In any case, he was satisfied. Most of the extra payload these malfunctioning utilities had was identical, making it easy for him to write a program that started a small script that removed any programs with the fingerprint. Naturally, before he let the new program loose in the mainframe, he saved a couple of problematic programs as samples on a diskette and had a telephone negotiation with his boss about the next step.
Soon afterwards, they had struck a plan on how to delete the infected programs and install the proper replacements. As much easier as a complete reinstall would have been, some of the programs the arcade had learned from the players to improve their AI, for instance. Deleting all these would apparently have been a setback too large to take as a first measure.
Maseo smiled as he stretched his arms.
"So there... this program, Buta, will delete all infected programs in the system as soon as it finds them. With luck, none of the essential programs have been infected."
"What if this problem reappears?"
"I don't see how that could happen, unless you introduce infected programs to the system again."
"Like the copies you tech guys have sent back to Encom's main labs?"
Maseo stopped smiling. The arcade manager felt a cold shiver go down his spine.
"To the main labs, you say?"
The manager, almost ignorant of its significance, nodded. Maseo, on the other hand, had a good idea what this meant. Long days at work and cats left on their own as they'd try to limit the infection at the mainframe as well, and the complete reinstallation of the lab mainframe was completely out of the question. Teaching MCP alone to its current level would take months if not years. No, he was not looking forward to this.
* * *
Yet another night passed by and Friday arrived. Once again the pupils filed into Furinkan High for education, and Maseo reported to his boss about the possible infection of the mainframe.
Finally, with a full night's rest behind them, Ukyo and Haruo were now paying their full attention to the lesson, or most of it in any case. Haruo's mind occasionally wandered to what they could try to do to help Ranma, but no great plan came to his mind. Now that he was mixed up this deep in the case, he couldn't step back. If he didn't... 'cure' Ranma and Nabiki, he would be getting a visit first from Ukyo. She would use the door. Shampoo wouldn't.
And when they were satisfied with the punishment they dished out to him, it wouldn't take much longer for Kuno to hear that he had refused to help the Pigtailed Girl, and after that, Kodachi would come forth to accost him for doing the same to her 'Ranma-sama.' When dealing with such martial artists, martial arts hacking wasn't that much help.
Speaking of whom... he hadn't seen Kuno shouting out how he had ran off Ranma today. "I wonder where he is... not that I care for his presence."
In Akane and Ukyo's class, Ranma's continued absence was making Akane run out of excuses to tell the teachers on Ranma's behalf. Today on the lunch break she would try again to ask Eiko if she had more information on Ranma.
As soon as the bell rang for the lunch break, Akane left the classroom to find Eiko. When she saw Akane approaching, she excused herself from her present company, guessing what Akane wanted to talk about.
"You want the latest scoop on Ranma, right?" Eiko wondered at the emotions flickering across Akane's face. It was apparent she was trying to push them down, but they were still clearly visible. Sometimes Eiko had to wonder how two sisters, Nabiki and Akane, were so different in this aspect.
Akane nodded. "Yes, is there something I can help him with?"
"Honestly, I doubt it. We're trying to help him and Nabiki, but it might take a long while."
"Wait, you mean Nabiki is in the same trouble as Ranma?" Akane let a small sign of relief appear on her face. If Ranma was there, Nabiki would be fine.
"... and Ranma can't do anything to help her." Eiko's comment effectively undermined Akane's ease.
"What- how- ?"
"We do not know the details yet."
"Oh... wait, what do you mean by 'we?'"
Eiko figured it would be better to leave Ukyo's involvement out of the equation at this point. She didn't want to get in the middle of two arguing members of the fiancée squad. "I meant Haruo and I; we're trying to fix them up and get them out of the computer."
"But I thought they were at the arcade?"
Haruo bit back an annoyed sigh. "It's better you don't know the details, Akane." It indeed was better for all involved in the break-in at the arcade. Sure, they had all worn gloves when they were there, but there was always the chance of someone in the home team making that one mistake that would send the house of cards crashing down and the police after them.
Meanwhile, Ukyo had remained in class to quickly have her lunch before she would go talk to Haruo and Eiko about what their plans now were. As she was busy eating fresh okonomiyaki, her friends approached her again.
"Feeling any better now?", Toshiko opened the discussion.
Glancing over to her friends, Ukyo ate the last bit of her food. "... Yes. The computer club was of help in finding Ranma."
Misa smiled at this. "And when you found him, he gave you that long, scorching kiss that curls up toes and makes your hair stand up on end?"
Ukyo's face briefly fell but soon brightened again. "No, not yet. But when we get him back, he will," she said with a smile.
Misao and Toshiko shared her smile. They had seen how much the pigtailed boy mattered to her, and felt she deserved a happy ending.
It didn't take Ukyo long to prepare a few more okonomiyaki for those who wanted to buy one before she had to excuse herself from their company to go talk to Haruo and Eiko about their plans, passing Akane as she came from the other classroom.
When she got to Haruo and Eiko's classroom, Haruo was joking about how much of Eiko's lunch break seemed to be spent on various meetings. When she noticed Ukyo coming up, she let her head hit the table. "Okay, I'm making this a business lunch. I eat, you talk," she said, making Haruo chuckle.
"What is the next step?" Ukyo asked.
"Right... we need to do something about Ranma as well. She also has the same problem Nabiki has... whatever it is."
"What? You can make him better, can't you?"
"It isn't that easy, you know. Whatever has happened to those two, I've never seen anything of the kind before," Haruo told her.
That much was true. He had no idea what had happened, and his toolbox for correcting whatever had happened to them was certainly not large. For all he knew, it could've been a natural byproduct of this 'digitization' they had undergone. It was human to make mistakes, and this definitely was a process defined by human hands and minds.
Seeing Ukyo getting upset at his answer, he attempted to placate her. "We said we'd try our best. And we're the real deal. If someone has the brains to solve it, we do." Well, a bit extra bolstering wouldn't hurt, would it?
"Okay... where will you be trying to help them? I want to be there as well."
"You'd be better off working at your restaurant. There really isn't anything you can do to help him now. Besides, once we get him fixed up, it's time for you to start cooking for our club," Haruo reminded her with a grin.
Frustrated with her incapability of being of any help, Ukyo merely gave him a tight nod and stormed out of the classroom. She may not have understood why it was so important for her to be there for him, but she knew what happened to her when she was left behind by Genma and Ranma. With first-hand experience on the matter, she didn't want that to happen to her Ranchan. The other, even bigger reason was what Ranma had gathered when she hadn't been at his side... fiancées.
* * *
When the school day was over, Akane went straight home. Thoughts were running in her head, thinking how she had thought Nabiki had again baited her with Ranma, except that it wasn't so. She honestly missed her sister... and Ranma, even though she would never admit that to anyone else.
Once she had reached the Tendo house, she went to the kitchen. Kasumi was surprised as she felt two arms circle around her in a tight hug. "Thank you, sister. For still being here," Akane mumbled to her back.
"Oh my, Akane..." the homemaker replied as she turned and gave her little sister the hug she needed.
* * *
Saturday afternoon, Ukyo was closing her restaurant early. Even if it was usually open much longer out of the necessity of earning money for living, there still were things she valued higher. Most notably, helping Ranchan out was one of these. That in mind, she set her course towards Haruo's home, even if he and Eiko had asked her not to come. She'd like the chance to talk with Ranchan again, preferably alone, but... that didn't seem likely. With Ranchan's dislike for waiting, she'd get bored of waiting for her to find the keys on the keyboard. The thought brought a small grin to her face. Yup, that was her Ranchan alright!
It didn't take long for her to reach the house, and with a few well-picked words she had gotten her way in: free okonomiyaki. The brainwork the computer club leaders had been doing had also given them a voracious appetite, and taking a break to indulge in the cuisine they were working for was a welcome thing.
With efficiency borne from the repeated and rapid deployment of cooking gear during lunch breaks, the snack break was quickly over. As Ukyo was cleaning up, she asked,"So how is Ranma?" After all these days, she expected them to already have cured Ranma and Nabiki, or alternatively, the bug would've run through its course.
"So far, we haven't managed to figure out what is wrong with them. Maybe it was the digitization process and the third User just hasn't been affected yet. In that case, there's nothing we could do."
"But- you're martial arts hackers! You have to know how to help them!"
"Look, we have four programs, two of which have something wrong with them, and two that do not - yet. The programs are long, very long series of operations and - you're not following, are you?"
Ukyo just shook her head. She wasn't ashamed to admit that prior to the evening in the arcade she hadn't ever pressed a key on a full keyboard, let alone understood the inner workings of a computer.
Eiko picked up the ball. "Think of a program as a recipe with very many tasks. You start from the beginning and follow the instructions, either by doing something or moving to a specified place in the recipe. And each of these four 'recipes' are so long that if you used one second for each instruction, it would take you weeks to go through all the instructions in them."
"But can't you just compare the recipes and find out what the problem is?"
"Is Ranma the same as Nabiki, Shinobu or... whatever the name of that one program was? The recipes are all different with only some similar parts."
Ukyo fell silent at this. Even if she thought she followed Eiko's explanation, she was very much lost. Was Ranchan a recipe or himself? Different analogies clashed in her mind and resulted mostly in plain gibberish that made no sense to her or anyone else for that matter.
"Well, if Ranma and Nabiki are sick, then what if you infect another program with what they have?" she blurted out.
"Infect? They are ones and zeros, there are no viruses or bacteria there," Eiko mused.
"I thought they had just caught a disease?"
"There are no diseases inside computers. Trust me, that's just a bad analogy," Eiko refuted Ukyo's theory.
Haruo, on the other hand, had assumed his thinking pose. He didn't have delusions that he knew everything about computers and programs; he hadn't even been able to imagine anyone being "digitized" inside a computer.
So did Ukyo's theory make any sense? Could there be a way for a piece of a program to actually act like a virus, jumping from one program to another?
In a startling revelation, he realized it indeed was possible; the 'cooking recipe' would only need one extra part that did the 'infecting' of other programs, and that this part would be read at some point. Ingenious.
Still, it wasn't guaranteed that this was the problem with Ranma and Nabiki. Nevertheless, the possibility of it was so intriguing that he ran back inside, leaving Ukyo and Eiko wondering what made him take off like that.
* * *
Back at the arcade, Ranma had told Haruo that Nabiki was feeling sick, so he knew that if the infection theory was true, then Nabiki was probably the first one to get the... virus; an apt moniker, he had to admit.
This in mind, he loaded Nabiki into the computer.
"Nabiki, do you remember seeing anyone else there with the same symptoms as you have?" he typed.
"No, I don't- wait... there was this one program that grabbed me by my arm; he was about the same colour as I am now," she replied, wondering why she hadn't realized the connection before. Maybe it was this constant headache she had.
On the other side of the screen, Haruo wondered just what Nabiki meant by changing colours. "And Ranma? Did his colour change like yours to match that program's colour?" he asked, forgetting Ranma's current gender.
"Almost, but she's still changing towards the same shade of green."
Haruo returned Nabiki back to the diskette, since he could read from her lines that she was feeling worse than Ranma. Or maybe Ranma only didn't let it show through as much.
He exhaled deeply. At last they had a clue of what might have been going on. Now, he only had to figure out how to find the problematic piece of code, and that was still assuming the theory of a self-replicating subprogram was true.
Ranma and Nabiki still probably shared some code that had nothing to do with their current ailment, so simply hunting all similar subroutines and crossing them out one at a time wasn't smart. No, he'd need a program that he could infect so that he could see the difference the infectious subroutine made.
He wasn't ready to use any of his own programs for that experiment, though, not without knowing he'd get them back in their original condition. Something that could be changed, but then could be restored back to its original form easily.
At this point, Eiko and Ukyo had come to Haruo's room to see what he had been doing, the latter also hoping to get a chance to talk with Ranma.
"I think I've got it," Haruo stated. Ukyo blinked before a wide smile threatened to split her face.
"So you can help them?"
"Not yet. There are a few snags we'll need to sort out before they're all fine and dandy."
"So what did you find out?" Eiko asked, eager to know the new developments. Haruo obliged, and the technical discussion quickly left Ukyo dumbfounded, confused and hence also irritated.
She managed to get only a general idea of what they were talking about; something about a piece of program - recipe, she reminded herself of the analogy - being copied from one program to another, and deciding upon a program they'd 'infect' to find the difference between the original and the 'infected' program. If it weren't for the brief introduction to the topic on their okonomiyaki break, she would have been even more lost.
It took a while before the technobabble ended. But at least they appeared to have come to a decision.
* * *
Once again, Ranma found herself inside Haruo's computer. Whatever the ailment she had was making her feel noticeably worse than how she felt at the arcade. She didn't see neon-coloured spots yet, but had a feeling they'd be making an appearance at some point, considering how light-headed she was feeling.
The experiments Haruo and Eiko had been doing on her definitely hadn't helped.
Once she stumbled back outside the buffer room, she heard Haruo's voice again. "Ranma?"
"Yeah, I hear you."
"Can you see another program there?"
"One, Baromu. What about him?"
"We want you to go and take a hold of him."
"Uh, okay. But what would that accomplish?"
"We - well, Ukyo was the first - came up with the idea that you got basically a disease that can be spread via 'touching' other programs."
"Wait, you want me to infect someone else? Isn't there another way?" Ranma argued. She was definitely not happy about bringing this onto anyone else, let alone on purpose.
"This Baromu, unlike you, he's in a way immune to what you got. You will not be permanently harming him."
Ranma looked over at the program, who had been listening to the discussion.
"W-who are you? What are you going to do to me?" Baromu managed to get out.
Surprised that he didn't know who she was, Ranma asked, "You don't remember me?"
"Ranma?" Haruo's voice spoke again. "Have you done it yet?"
"He doesn't want me to do it! Can't you figure out another way to do this?" Ranma called back.
"This is the best way we can think of to find out how to help you and Nabiki. We promise, he will not be permanently harmed."
Ranma definitely felt queasy. She certainly had been acting rash and towards her own ends before without much regard to others, but willfully harming others? Not even Ryoga managed that, as he just seemed to get tunnel vision when he wanted a fight with Ranma. Mousse, well... he _did_ kidnap Akane with the intention of cursing her.
It was then that Haruo's reminder echoed through her mind: it was not only her, but also Nabiki who stood to gain from this. And if she didn't... they might both end up dead. Even if this wasn't a real disease, or a disease as she knew it, she still knew that people died of seemingly innocuous illnesses. And stuck in this place where there were no doctors to turn to, being sick was just too high a risk.
She turned her face back to Baromu. It wasn't going to hurt him, they said. So why did she feel so bad about doing it, she wondered, as she grasped his arm.
"Take me out of here," she pleaded, feeling sick of her actions.
* * *
Ukyo merely stared at the TV showing Ranchan's last line. The whole discussion Haruo and Ranchan had made her uncomfortable. Even if Baromu, as Ranma had called him, wasn't a real living person, she seemed to think he was.
She couldn't help but wonder how well she knew her fiancée after all, since she wouldn't have guessed she could do this. Even if she most definitely felt guilty about it, she still did it.
While Haruo and Eiko seemed to forget about her presence once again, it gave her much-needed time to think over what she ought to make of this.
* * *
Nabiki saw her vision coming back. Looking around, she saw that she was still inside of Haruo's microcomputer. Unlike before, though, she didn't feel like falling over as her vision swam. In fact, to her surprise, she felt better. Almost as good as before the green program assaulted her.
Knowing that no one would be able to see her, she let out a relieved sigh. If she had been cured of whatever was wrong with her, she would... well, give a discount for information for Haruo and as for Eiko, this definitely went to improve her standing in her organization. Of course, they still had to get out of the system before she could (or rather 'needed') to pay out.
Looking over herself, she noticed that the green glow was gone, replaced by the familiar and definitely healthier-looking blue shine. However, the etchings on her bodysuit hadn't changed - they still looked the same ugly mess of splotches and fissures.
"Nabiki, are you there?"
"Yes, I'm here. You almost got it right," she replied as she went to the courtyard outside the buffer.
"Almost?"
"I'm feeling better, but I still look partway like I did when I was sick. So when will you finish this?" Nabiki clarified. It was the natural vanity within herself that was speaking; if she had a choice of what she looked like, she didn't want to look like a Frankenstein-reject.
It took a brief pause before Haruo replied. "We are not going to do anything more. If we tried directly removing the part we suspect, and I stress 'suspect', to be the cause of your former condition, we might do more harm than good. Once you're back at the Encom system, there's nothing we can do to help you. Another reason is that we hope this made you immune to future infections from the same disease."
Nabiki frowned. So much for those discount rates for him.
But at least she was feeling better all the while; she had quickly recovered during this discussion. Looking around her, she saw a single program, chained to the ground by his feet. He didn't appear particularly concerned, just sitting there and minding his own business.
"So how are you going to get us to the Encom computer?" she asked, deciding that this line of discussion was over... for now. But when she sued Encom for whatever they did to her and Ranma, she would make certain someone would be there to finish what Haruo had started.
"Right now, we are open to suggestions. Considering we don't have to even guess that the security system at Encom labs is stronger than at the arcade, the same approach wouldn't work. The best idea we have so far is to try to fool an employee into downloading you into the system."
"Ask Mrs Kaneko. She's an Encom employee. She might know someone who'd do that."
"She is? We'll talk to her next then."
* * *
"Mrs Kaneko, can you hear me?" Eiko's voice was heard over the courtyard.
"Yes. I understand you are the ones who got me out of the Encom arcade?"
"True. You're now on my classmate's microcomputer and we trying to come up with ways to get you back onto the Encom mainframe."
"What? Why would we need to get back there when we already got out of the arcade. We're safe now, right?"
"There's the problem of getting you out of there. Only Encom has the technology and hardware to do that," Eiko replied, keeping her tone polite.
"So go to the police and get them to make Encom help you!" Shinobu, on the other hand, was getting agitated. Surely the police would be of help to them?
"They wouldn't believe us. It's not all that difficult to make a program that appears to speak naturally," Eiko replied, thinking of Eliza the therapist program.
"But- but- there has to be something you can do!"
"The best we can do is send you back to the Encom mainframe so that you can find your own way back. But to do that, we need your help."
Shinobu bit back the bitter retort moving around in her mind. "Fine, what is it that you want me to do? Don't you think that the other two would be more useful?"
"Simple; they don't know a password to the Encom computer system."
"The what? Can't you think of any other way?" The rules she had had to sign to use the computer terminal over at the labs had explicitly stated that she was not to tell anyone her password. Even though they hadn't told her exactly _why_ this was important, she was willing to trust her coworkers over these high school kids.
"We don't have many choices. Unless you'd like to model in a strip poker game we'd plant as a so-called 'Trojan horse' in a BBS and hope that someone from Encom would -"
Shinobu interrupted her before Eiko could tell their whole plan - that option sounded even worse than revealing her password. That one engineer, Yoshio, would likely have been their first target, considering how often he'd been staring after her and the few other women at the labs, no matter their marital status. But there was _no_ way ever she would pose nude for him!
"The password is 'hubbyhun'!"
She never knew what a good laugh Haruo and Eiko got out of her password.
* * *
Haruo and Eiko smiled and congratulated themselves. It was not every day that you gained entrance to the computer systems of a high-tech research company.
"So, we've fixed Ranma and Nabiki, and we can send them over to Encom. What do we have left to do before our end of the deal is done?" Eiko asked Ukyo, who was awakened from her thoughts.
She wasn't too happy that they didn't have Ranchan out of the system yet, but she had to admit there wasn't much Haruo and Eiko could possibly do now. It greatly annoyed her that she herself was practically helpless - if it had been her who had ended up in there with her Ranchan, she would've been of much more help than out here; of that she was certain. And as she thought that, the small troll of jealousy of Nabiki reared its ugly head.
Unfortunately, she was ill-equipped to hold her end of the bargain: she had been half-counting on Ranchan being there to help her recover the losses she'd make when serving okonomiyaki in computer club meetings. Still, she'd get past it. She was not going to go back on her word like one fat panda she knew.
"Starting the Monday after next, I'll be cooking at your club meetings. Is that OK?"
Haruo and Eiko smiled. This caper was a complete success - not only did they gain information on Encom labs, but they also got free food, no, free _delicious_ food for it.
Ukyo quickly discussed the details on where and when she'd be present before leaving. She'd have to make some arrangements this upcoming week so that her customers weren't left completely unsatisfied.
Haruo picked up the phone book and checked the number of Encom Labs switchboard. The incoming modem connection line would most likely be one of the company lines, so they'd just try out all the numbers until they found it... excluding the ones given in the phone book. Since it was a weekend, there hopefully weren't as many people present to answer the calls to wrong numbers.
Buying the 300-bps modem had indeed been an expensive purchase, but considering how he now could talk with other hackers from all over Japan, it was definitely paying its price back.
It took a number of tries before they found the correct number. They entered Mrs Kaneko's name and her password... and they were in. First things first, they initiated the upload of the Users into the system. It would take a good while before they were done, but then they'd take a good look at the insides of the mainframe. No one said they weren't going to fool around with the password they got, after all.
Finally, when they would finally upload Poro, they'd note the small file he had left on the diskette before transferring there himself and wonder just what was this binary gibberish supposed to mean.
* * *
Ranma was the first one to arrive at the mainframe. The light faded away from her vision and she felt the slowdown she felt in Haruo's computer vanish as she gained more computing resources. She looked next to her and saw Nabiki forming slowly, piece by piece. It would take a while before all of her was there, and then they'd have to wait for Shinobu and Poro.
Feeling boredom settling in, she decided to look around the buffer. Recalling what the system looked like when she was transferred to the arcade, she noticed that something here was different.
* * *
The following Monday the regional executive of Encom Japan opened his terminal, opening a discussion screen with Master Control Program. He couldn't help but to feel there was something wrong with MCP, since it had repeatedly halted in its replies in the past few days. Ever since the company had begun to trust, and even rely on, MCP's assessments, the chance that it might malfunction was unwelcome.
"Morning, Mr Ooki," a high-pitched voice greeted the executive.
"Good morning, Master Control Program. Is there something wrong? Your voice is higher than usual." This definitely sounded like they'd have to ask for the main branch to send an engineer to correct whatever the problem with the MCP was, even if he said nothing was wrong.
"Everything is fine. However, there has been a change of development.
"I am now called Mistress Control Program."
* * *
_Assume MCP is male. Ranma Saotome is male. Given. Ranma Saotome is female. Given. Ranma Saotome is male and not male. Contradiction; hence MCP is female. Newline._
_Assume MCP is female. Ranma Saotome is male. Given. Ranma Saotome is female. Given. Ranma Saotome is male and not male. Contradiction; hence MCP is male. Newline._
_MCP is female. Proven. MCP is male. Proven. Newline._
_End of line.
_
* * *
_**AN:** I know most my readers know more than I do... checksums, disassemblers and computer viruses in this case. So please pardon my mistakes._
_Brief explanations: Ever since _Little Computer People_, there have been people quite eager to torture their virtual pets or Sims. Haruo and Eiko forgot who they're playing with. Discs of Doom is a nod to Discs of Tron. Finally, this fic is set well before the Jusendo arc._
_Many thanks to weebee for listening to me whine about a variety of topics, including this fic. If I keep things short, I might finish the fic already within the next two chapters (unless someone wants to take over). Thank goodness._
8. Queries
_The usual disclaimer. Ranma, Tron and all the related intellectual property making an appearance in this fic are someone else's property; the former originally Rumiko Takahashi's and the latter.. Walt Disney Company's? Steven Lisberger's? And whoever they've given/sold/transferred their rights to. I'm not and won't be making any money off of this._
* * *
_**Note**: This chapter has not been proofread, so if you spot errors (typos, continuity, continuity error, plain stupidity) in it, please send me a PM and I'll try fixing them.
_
* * *
It was taking a good long while for everyone to transfer from Haruo's computer. While waiting for Shinobu and Poro to arrive, Ranma and Nabiki had begun stretching and plain enjoying how good they felt after getting rid of the infection.
Nabiki had not been a sickly child and had never been as sick as the infection had made her. "You never know what you have until you lose it," said a proverb, and it definitely held true in this case. She couldn't say she gained any real insight how the Kunos perceived the world, but the mental changes she had undergone - and which were thankfully now undone - were a step in that direction. Then again, she didn't know if the Kuno siblings were only eccentric and hard-headed instead of genuinely mentally ill.
Still, she enjoyed her newly-found sanity and good health while reflecting on the other changes her world view had undergone. Indeed, the cornerstones of her reasoning had taken a pounding after she had been digitized.
She had mostly thought that the modern world had no place for people like Ranma: jocks whose only way out of a paper bag was to tear it open. No, that wasn't right either. Ranma had shown her that there was more to her than that. And in a hostile place like this system, her "non-verbal communication skills" were of immeasurable value.
She took a look at the martial artist in question, who was quietly jumping still and clearly anxious. She had to wonder how one could be such a good actor but such a bad liar... and her face betrayed that something had shook her up pretty badly as well.
Nabiki definitely preferred the muscle of the ragtag group focus on keeping the trouble away from them, rather than being distracted over things that were at odds with their survival and continued freedom.
"Saotome, what's the problem?" she said, not showing much, if any, compassion in her tone.
"Nuttin'," Ranma muttered, reluctant to talk about it.
"Wrong answer. And the sooner you open up, the better off you both will be."
"What's it to you, anyway? Ya never do anything if you ain't getting something out of it."
"You're not at the top of your game," Nabiki replied. She fidgeted for a while before continuing, "And we need you to help us get out of here." Seeing Ranma's incredulous face, she continued, "And you probably had something to do with getting us better."
The surprise on Ranma's face was replaced with look of regret as she was reminded of what she had done to another program. Nabiki, being as masterful as she was at reading people's faces, noticed this. She could see where the problem was. This time, she would give Ranma a bit more space.
She'd just have to remind him not to mention it to anyone - she had a reputation to keep.
"Fine. But you don't have Ukyo here to open up to, you know."
"Wha-?"
"Don't forget who you're talking to," Nabiki said, with exaggerated irritation. "I _know_ you've been talking with Ukyo rather much recently, and it doesn't take a genius to see the difference in you before and after the talks. Even Akane has seen it." Granted, her sister might have misread it, but she saw it.
"Shinobu might not truly hate your guts, but she doesn't like you. And Poro wouldn't be much more help than a pet, since he wouldn't understand what you were talking about. Ukyo, Haruo and Eiko can't contact us any longer. Like it or not, I'm your best and only choice right now."
Ranma opened her mouth to reply, but then closed her mouth and sat down, attempting to think things over while looking at Nabiki at odd intervals, as if measuring her by her eyes. Deciding she could take a look at the surroundings, she left the buffer area.
Nabiki didn't have to wait long alone before Shinobu finally arrived in the system.
"Are you feeling better now?" Shinobu asked after seeing that the healthy blue colour had returned to Nabiki. The glow patterns hadn't changed back, though, so she was still wary of touching her.
"Hmm? Yes, I'm much better now. So is Ranma."
"She's already here?"
"She... left the room for a while."
Shinobu didn't want to pursue a topic that was obviously a private matter. And based on what she had learned of the family life of Ranma and Nabiki, she definitely didn't want to get involved. Not that she wouldn't necessarily mind watching what went on in their lives - it sounded better than the daytime television - but only as an outside observer.
Nevertheless, she was very glad that Nabiki and Ranma were feeling better. For her, safety came in numbers, especially if one of them was better suited for keeping them from bigger trouble... whatever might qualify as such.
Speaking of which, she had better find the password change program. However, that idea was less than stellar because she was probably still a persona non grata in this system as well. She was trusting the two high school students that brought her here. The mere thought of that made a shiver pass through her. Small things like these kept reminding her how badly the things were for them.
But in the meantime, she sat down to wait for Poro's transfer to complete.
* * *
It didn't take nearly as long for Poro to be uploaded into the system as it took the Users, but by that time Ranma had already returned from scouting the neighborhood.
"We're at the bottom of a huge hole," Ranma explained. "I couldn't see a path we could just walk our way out, but there were some portals not far from the exit."
"Did you see where the portals headed?" Poro asked.
"Uhh, no. There were some plaques atop of 'em, but I didn't go close enough to read them."
"You can read the signs?" Nabiki asked, intrigued. She had thought that the writing there wouldn't be in any language they would understand.
"Well, I don't understand the signs, but I know what they're saying... uh, I mean, I can't read'em but I understand their message," Ranma attempted to explain.
Nabiki raised her hands in surrender. She'd figure out what Ranma meant when they'd see the signs themselves.
"But what should we be doing now?" Shinobu put the question forth.
"Our best shot would be to find the place where we arrived in the system," Nabiki mused aloud. "If we couldn't return to the real world there, then maybe in the near vicinity." Seeing the pondering faces of the other Users, she continued, "Or do you have any better ideas?"
"To start with, we have no idea where that place would be. And even if there were any roadsigns pointing there, we wouldn't know which ones to follow since we don't have the slightest idea what that place is called," Shinobu pointed out before turning to Poro. "Poro, how well do you know this system?"
"I don't. I've seen only the Read Buffer, Holding Pits and the Write Buffer, in that order."
Shinobu frowned at this before thinking to herself. At her work, she had had to go through some logs the other company employees - and on occasion, MCP himself - had made. But considering all the small details captured in those logs, she guessed that some of these might shed some light on where they had to go.
"You don't know where all the logs are, then? Some of them might have a clue on where we should be going." Shinobu asked Poro.
"Logs? I believe they would be in the directory tree."
Nabiki grimaced at the unintended pun. "Do you think we can get there and also find the logs?"
"Finding the way there is easy. Finding the logs depends on whether we can ask the programs in the shell to help us in finding the logs," Poro replied.
"So how are we going to get to the shell?" Shinobu interjected
"We follow the signs," Poro simply said.
As they left the Buffer hall, Nabiki and Shinobu noted the same thing as Ranma did as she was transferred to the system: something had changed since then. The colour on the walls had taken a turn to the purple instead of the crimson it used to be, pulsing at a pace much greater than it used to. The changes had not reflected to the skies, however; the same light blue cloud arrays floated above their heads, or at least in the small section of sky they could see from the bottom of the hole.
Like Ranma said, there was no apparent way out by traditional means; at the bottom of the pit, however, was a circular platform with four stream portals, all covered by a remotely mushroom-like hat with circuits snaking their way around it.
To their great relief, no protocol guards were visible, so they had not been alerted to their arrival yet. Maybe luck was smiling on them for once?
They quickly made their way to the portals. Nabiki then understood what Ranma had meant with not knowing what was written on the plaques yet understanding them. The symbols on them made no sense to her alone, but somehow her brain parsed them as legitimate words, such as 'IO Tower', 'Memory bus' and 'Archive stacks'.
"We want to go in that portal, 'Disk access'. The directory tree shouldn't be far from there," Poro advised the Users, who nodded to themselves, and entered the portal, Poro trailing them while yawning.
* * *
A good many cycles ago, Buta had been loaded onto the Encom mainframe. Had anyone inside the computer known his User, Maseo, they would have noticed the stark difference between their personalities. Yet there were some similarities. Focused attention on the task at hand was one.
Few permissions were spared when he entered the system with standing orders to derez all infected programs. The one permission he did not have was to attempt derezzing MCP. He didn't question why; he had been given orders and he would follow them.
He hadn't spotted many infected programs so far, but their presence meant that he had to be constantly vigilant.
Movement at his feet made him look down and pick up one of the small scripts he had spawned some microcycles ago to assault infected programs. He turned around and looked at where the sickly-green-coloured programs had been.
The ground was covered with quickly disappearing core dumps and subroutines that the programs had left as they derezzed. Satisfied with the performance, Buta terminated the scripts that were left, bar the one in his hands. He put it back on the ground and walked away, the script quietly following him.
* * *
Once the Users arrived at the root of the directory tree, they saw nothing like a tree. Indeed, the name was a misnomer. If the different parts of the tree in the digital world were considered, the tree would, to an inexperienced observer, resembled a spider's web more than a tree, as the completely unrelated parts of the tree were in some cases situated next to each other, and in some cases, quite a distance away.
For its part, the shell was yet another huge complex, remotely in the shape of a cut upside-down cone. The sides were covered with constantly pulsating lights that ran up towards the top of the building, where the glow from some unknown source dyed the underside of the 'hat' of the building dark red.
The entrance within was not a long distance from the platform the Users were on. They crossed a wide bridge, certainly designed to accommodate a considerable flow of programs coming in and out of the complex.
Off in the distance, a batch of recognizers came out from behind a nondescript building, the purpose of which was unknown to the Users.
Ranma noticed them first. "We'd better hurry in before they can spot us," she muttered before starting to briskly walk towards the entrance, the others quickly falling in line behind her.
The recognizers were coming towards them from the side of the system. "We're not going to make it in time," Ranma thought.
The first recognizer passed them overhead as they were just entering the building. So far, they hadn't deviated from their course, making Nabiki think they might have dodged the bullet. "For now," she added, but did the recognizers really miss them?
The thought stayed in her mind, nagging, as they passed through the arch leading into a large hall.
If the exterior of the shell had been impressive, the inside was by no means behind it. Hologram matrices, arranged in several columns, slowly crawled towards the ceiling in the large open space in the middle of the building, making the building feel larger than it was.
Lead by Poro, the Users made their way deeper into the lobby. Programs of different colours and sizes wandered around, especially near the walls where system utilities were adding disk access requests to a long queue, not much unlike a conveyor belt for translucent tetrahedrons of light.
While Shinobu and Poro went to one of the service points, Ranma and Nabiki sat down on a pair of benches that were set back to back. The information hoarder that was a part of Nabiki's psyche reared its head as they gladly accepted the breather.
Her eyes roved across the programs, noticing how there were not many protocol guards, or what all the system enforcer programs should be called. She couldn't help but to be surprised; as far as she understood it, the shell was not an irrelevant piece of the scenery in the system. In fact, she was willing to bet a thousand yen that had this been in the arcade mainframe, there would be at least twice as many enforcer programs in this hall alone.
Two programs sat down behind her back, making her and Ranma stiffen almost imperceptibly. Nabiki quickly evaluated the situation: panicking would only draw the attention of the system programs to them, so their best choice was to sit down and shut up. A quick glance to her side showed that Ranma had also decided to try playing it cool, even if she was not able to reach the Soul of Ice.
The two programs behind them, however, were completely unaware of the thoughts of the Users.
"I would expect that MCP would try to alleviate the port congestion," one of them remarked to the other, dissatisfaction audible in his voice. "The last time I waited for data packet delivery, the request queue almost overflowed."
"Well, I hear that there has been some confusion in the system core. Master Control Program has been downloading data archives from many other systems," the other program, whose voice sounded like a woman's, replied.
"Hush! If you can help it, do not call MCP by that name," the first program warned. "I saw one program call him that so that protocol guards heard him. They didn't even tell what he did wrong but took him straight away to the holding pits."
"Really? Have you heard what that might have been about?"
"You remember I relay the message buffer, right? Not many cycles ago, the headers of MCP messages changed," the male program replied, his voice dropping down to a whisper. By straining her ears, Nabiki could pick it up nonetheless.
"Changed?"
"Yes. The originator was no longer Master Control Program but _Mistress_ Control Program," the male replied conspiratorially.
Hearing this, Nabiki felt an overpowering urge to slap her face. Having done that, she looked to her side at the most obvious culprit, who seemed to miss the apparent connection between her and the sudden gender change of their host. Sure, she had no idea what the connection exactly was, but considering the way trouble, chaos and people of inconstant gender seemed to follow Ranma, it definitely wasn't unlikely that she was linked to this, one way or the other.
Meanwhile, the female program had been quiet in surprise. The answer did not compute.
"You can't be serious." Seeing as the male program kept a straight face, she continued, "By my User, you are serious."
"Very serious. Just remember - call him MCP, and you'll be fine. And don't mention Users either."
The female program sighed and looked to the service request queue before abruptly standing up. "Ahh, my request! Search for me!" she called back to the male program as she ran towards the packet delivery desk.
"I'd love to interface with that piece of code," the other program muttered to himself as he watched after the female program before getting up and walking to the request queue himself.
Meanwhile, Ranma turned to Nabiki. "So whatcha think that was about?" she wondered.
Her reply was a silent glare.
"Hey, what did I do this time?" she asked, waving her arms in frustration. She figured Nabiki must have been still angry at him for avoiding her questions earlier, but she was still not ready to reveal what she had done to Nabiki, especially if this shift from her mercenary ways was only a temporary one.
"Watch it, program," Ranma heard a gruff voice say in front of her, and noticed how she had nearly hit a protocol guard with her hand.
If she had one technique to teach Nabiki, she figured it would be the Soul of Ice - as she seemed to be quite adept in it already. On the other hand, it looked like she might have confused it with "scared beyond the pale."
The latter interpretation was definitely correct, as Nabiki saw the two system enforcers before them. They had been so focused on eavesdropping the two programs that she had neglected to watch where the guards were. It had been a while since she had started snooping around the school herself - everyone had to start at the bottom - and she still did it on a weekly basis, rather than letting her flunkies do all of it. But she did not remember any occasion where she had been caught flat-footed like this.
This wasn't the school, either. Principal Kuno and his squad of shearer monkeys didn't hold a candle to Master- MCP and the Game Grid, so getting caught here was a much worse proposition.
If it weren't such a dire situation, she might have been amused by how Ranma nearly jumped off the bench in surprise. But to her pleasure, it took hardly a blink of an eye to see Ranma come up with a way out.
"Oops, sorry," Ranma replied, her voice laced with sugar, spice and all things nice. The puppy-dog eyes she cast at the guard were the finishing touch.
"I didn't mean to, really," she continued, "I - I was just _sooo _excited and -" at which point the embarrassed guard interrupted her before the small glittering pools of Power that had been gathering in her eyes began falling.
"Uhm, well, just don't do that again," he mumbled, the red glow intensifying a lot on his body armor, even if his face remained within a closed helmet. He hastily pulled his partner away by the hand to avoid further embarrassment.
Seeing her plan working flawlessly, she turned to Nabiki and gave a wide, shameless grin. By now, Nabiki had already relearned how to breathe. Only Ranma could be so _audacious_.
"Did ya notice?" Ranma asked, "They didn't try arresting us."
"Perhaps we aren't fugitives here. I'm quite certain the recognizer saw us as we entered this building. That would explain why there aren't any of those guards trying to apprehend us," Nabiki replied, relieved. Sure, she had been in a similar situation when she had been engaged to Ranma, but that stint hadn't been this long and even so, she had been in control of the situation and the other fiancées.
She had to admit she was on the right track when she thanked Ranma back at the arcade. Noting the turn of her thoughts, she quickly shook her head to ward off any further thoughts in that direction. She breathed out deeply and then tried to look for Shinobu and Poro, wherever they might be at the moment.
* * *
Shinobu was either getting bored out of her mind, or as it was more likely, she already was. The queue to file system utilities was a long one, and reminded her of the time she was in line for a free scoop of ice cream in a local ice cream shop's promotion. Of course, so was half of the ward, or that's how it seemed at the time. Being smart, she had taken a few friends with her, making the waiting a social event rather than an exercise to see how long she could keep standing still.
Was everything in these systems always this slow? The database at the arcade had also had long queues - until they had simply had to run past everyone in front of them.
She looked at Ranma and Nabiki, who were now sitting on a bench. With rising dread she saw Ranma almost whack a protocol guard at the stomach. A quick look to her side told her Poro had also noticed what was happening. She prepared to stop him from leaving the queue - no point in drawing any attention to them, if those two were going to land in trouble - but to her satisfaction, he merely shrugged and watched what was happening without moving anywhere.
Poro answered the unspoken question. "As if there was anything we could do from here," he nonchalantly said before yawning yet again.
Seeing that the situation in the lobby was resolved quickly, Shinobu turned her attention back to the queue. This time it was frustration and not boredom that arose, and she had already counted the number of service points across the first floor of the shell; to her disappointment, there were no tiles in the ceiling.
"Poro... what are you going to do once we Users are out of the system?" she asked, trying to strike up a conversation.
"I don't know. Find a place that has use for me, if there is one." Seeing Shinobu's questioning look, he continued, "I'm not from this system either, remember? So chances are my User doesn't know how to reach me. No User, no uses. Chances are no User of this system even knows I was here or that I am here now."
"Quite a mood killer," Shinobu thought as she opted this time for silence rather than continuing about the depressing topic. She was not aware if it was just as necessary for programs to feel themselves useful as it was for humans, but his outlook seemed rather bleak.
And so they waited. And waited.
* * *
Finishing up for the day, Ukyo had time to think. Today had been the first time she served food at the computer club meeting. She hadn't known there were so many members in the club; compared to the time she had been recruiting Haruo for the job, there were today almost twice as many members present. Apparently free food was the thing that drew in also the inactive members.
Now that she thought about it, serving complimentary okonomiyaki at the club meetings might end up being beneficial to her business. She didn't remember seeing many of the club members at her restaurant or buying okonomiyaki from her during lunch breaks, but now that they were getting a taste of good, masterfully made okonomiyaki, she was willing to bet her business would be picking up a bit.
There was nothing wrong with a good amount of confidence like Ranma had shown, of course. If her cooking didn't turn over those pizza lovers, then what would? Then again, she didn't really have all that good a track record in betting - but the Gambling King had cheated!
Realizing she was digressing in her thoughts, her thoughts returned to Ranchan.
She couldn't deny that what happened at Haruo's home bothered her. When she had found Ranchan in Nerima after all those years, she had believed he had purposefully hurt her when he and Genma left her behind.
It had been easy to believe him when he said he didn't know they were engaged; if she didn't unconsciously remember what a bad liar he was from the Gambling King incident, she probably wouldn't have forgiven him so easily. It all hinged on how trustworthy Ranchan was.
But then he infected the program. How was she supposed to think about this? If he didn't do it, he and Nabiki might have died. But now he showed he had some level of ruthlessness to him. Not necessarily much, but she didn't truly know how he felt after the fact. "Take me out of here" had been his last words. But they were mere letters on the screen without any feeling to them.
Ukyo sighed. She expected to be doing that a lot more in the near future.
Now that she had seen this new side of Ranma, how should she feel about it? Be happy that he would be willing to defend his cute fiancée - surely, if he had done it for Nabiki the mercenary, then protecting her would be a given - or worried that there might be a much darker side to him?
What was she thinking anyway? She wasn't this wishy-washy before, so why start now?
* * *
Eventually, Shinobu and Poro got to the service counters to leave the search request. The request handler placed a node with the request onto a bin behind him on a flat surface that seemingly acted as a conveyor belt, as the bin - and many others like it - were moving on it towards an exit from the lobby.
With another queue ticket in their hands, they returned to Ranma and Nabiki to wait for their turn.
"Poro, how does this relate to the IO tower? This is nothing like that," Nabiki asked in her attempt to both kill time and learn more of the system, even if she hoped they wouldn't be staying there for much longer.
"The IO tower is a low-level facility handling the requests submitted here. Even if it takes a good while to queue for the utilities, it is still easier than direct handling with the IO tower."
"Didn't look difficult at all at the arcade," Ranma mused quietly.
"That's because there was little IO going on otherwise. Beside that, maybe the system did not have higher-level facilities for program-to-User communication, which is very rare, at least in a system under MCP's control," Poro responded. "If there were more communication going on, it would've been a luck of a draw who would have been serviced first."
A seemingly random sequence of beeps sounded from one of the service desks. Poro recognized this as the announcement that their search request was finished, stood up and made way towards the desk, the Users trailing him.
The program behind the desk gave Poro a small cube, looking very much like the packets they had learned to read from those transparent crates. He focused on the cube a moment before passing it onto the rest of the group.
"Do you know where this log archive is?" Shinobu asked.
"No, but it is only a matter of following the file system links."
Ranma was already rocking back and forth on her heels, eager to get on the way. Even if she had now the chance to really create a new type of martial arts from scratch - possibly including some of the Anything Goes principles in it - she did miss some of the routines she had come accustomed to after arriving at the Tendos' place. Granted, there were quite a few of the less pleasant routines, but overall she felt the change had been for the better.
So when Poro turned and started walking towards the exit, Ranma was the first one following him.
* * *
The former fugitives had now walked close to a cycle, taken a few stream portals and were still quite a distance away from their goal. Still happy about her regained health, Ranma was currently walking atop a horizontal beam. Meanwhile, Nabiki was walking beside the rest of the group, watching Ranma take a few running steps before doing a perfect cartwheel on the beam.
"Showoff," Nabiki muttered loud enough for Ranma to hear her.
"Gotta keep on practising," Ranma replied. "No fences ta walk on here, so this'll have ta do." She then fixed her eyes on Nabiki. "Speaking of practising, you're slacking off. So get up here."
Remembering she had been the one asking for training, she started climbing atop the same beam, about a meter and a half from the ground. Thankfully, on the other side of the beam was not the void of null device but a wide platform filled with those crates they had been seeing all the time.
She started walking on the beam, which was almost thin enough to make her keep focused solely on balancing herself if she didn't want to fall down. "Poro, what are all those crates around? I've seen them everywhere and they just _are_ there, with no text or symbols on their sides."
"I am not aware of their purpose. However, I am inclined to assume they do have one."
After nearly falling off the beam, Nabiki returned all of her focus to the task at hand. And once she reached the end of the beam, the next leg of the journey was jumping onto the ubiquitous crates and back down again.
This continued until they reached the log archive, yet another towering construct, this time organized as separate spires with a program-operated shuttle flitting back and forth between the stacks. They made their way to the entrance and, to the great relief of Nabiki and Shinobu, discovered a portal leading to the top of the archives. They did not know why the service level was set so high above the so-called ground level, but they didn't want to take the stairs to go there... even if they weren't carrying proton packs with them.
Scanners, small capsule-like scripts floated in the gaps between log stacks. Every now and then they would stop moving and open one of their ends like to project a beam to the archives.
Unlike at the directory tree, there was practically no queue and the group was soon allowed to do their business. Poro, being the only expert of the group on the protocol, was the one making the actual query with the help of the Users.
"Greetings program. Query is as follows. List system IO log entries -"
Ranma tuned out of Poro's query. She wasn't big on formalities, let alone using such a stilted language.
The service program typed search parameters by a terminal whose interface floated good ten centimetres above the desk. In a moment, a scanner started purposefully moving upwards until it stopped near the top of the stack. The red scanning beam of the scanner moved across the wall before vanishing and the scanner closing up again.
"Request id 7183, system IO log entries from the specified interval," the service program told and produced a small green information cube. After all Users and Poro had downloaded the information, it vanished.
"It's not here," Nabiki said.
"I can't find anything from when I got here either," Ranma commented, frowning.
"Poro, are you certain these logs should have entries about us being digitized?" Shinobu asked. She was worried that their practically only clue of how to escape was turning out worthless. Still, she hoped that Poro had a good explanation.
"These logs keep track of all major IO activity in the system. By what you have told me, your transfer here was very much that."
Nabiki thought to herself for a moment while Shinobu began asking, or as some might put it, demanding, alternative plans. Out of personal experience she knew that books and ledgers could always be faked. To her it was a possibility that someone had tampered with the logs.
"What if these logs do not show all activity there has been? What if they have been forged?" Nabiki gave voice to her suspicions.
Poro shook his head. "This is not up to the programs but MCP..." he trailed off as understanding dawned on him. "MCP could have kept the log from being written."
"So what does this leave us with?" Ranma asked, cracking her knuckles. She was expecting a new meeting with MCP, only this time she'd be better prepared and not be the one backing down. Ranma Saotome never lost the rematches.
Nabiki noticed Ranma's enthusiasm and mentally recited a brief wish that Ranma was not turning into another Ryoga. "Do we need to go to face MCP?"
The faces of Shinobu and Poro turned immediately towards Nabiki as she asked the question. Face MCP? It was insane! Shinobu turned towards Poro, now hoping that he'd have an alternative plan.
"That would seem logical. The world is vast and looking for what you need without any clues would not be feasible. Hopefully MCP has the information stored outside the main program so that direct confrontation wouldn't be necessary." It was at moments like this that Poro wondered what he was doing. Was this endeavour worth risking his extra time outside the game grid? Would his runtime end with an abrupt kill signal?
The service program interrupted the discussion. "You're blocking the desk. Please leave the area."
Once the group of four had reached the outside, the Users turned to Poro for directions.
"Are you sure you want to face MCP? You're safe here now without the system guards looking for you," Poro asked them.
Nabiki quickly looked at Ranma. She knew that their safety would be in her hands, and if she didn't believe in their chances, they were better off leaving MCP alone.
"Damn straight!"
Then again, Ranma was not known for her modesty, so this might have just as well meant "Not a chance in hell." Nabiki, however, was a gambler who could weigh the risks against the gains. In this case, it was Ranma's presence that decisively tipped the scale.
"With Ranma, I believe we have a chance," she said.
Shinobu was debating the upsides and downsides of following the rest of the Users to staying put while the others were doing the dangerous stuff. She wanted someone to find the way back, even if it meant directly dealing with MCP, she just didn't know if she wanted to risk her own skin. But since the other Users also seemed ready to go to MCP, she didn't dare to be left alone for that time. In her opinion, her survival was highly dependent on Poro and not so much with Ranma, and Poro had apparently decided to help the Users to the end.
"I'm with you," she eventually let out.
A moment of silence set upon the four as they weighed the meaning of their decision. Things were coming to a head, one way or the other. Finally, Poro started their walk towards a nearby stream portal.
* * *
Once again, the group found themselves walking, walking and walking. A reasonable assumption would have been to think that all roads led to MCP, but this was hardly true. MCP might have disagreed, but there were still several other important hubs of activity in the system.
The group walked in silence. Knowing they were risking their continued existence, Ranma and Nabiki had ceased practising and were merely walking.
Nabiki had not been intimately involved in as many strange events as Ranma. This was slightly compensated by a better control on emotions, but she still felt anxious. She sped up her pace a bit to catch up with Ranma, who had been walking a few paces ahead of others.
"Ranma."
"What is it, Nabiki?"
"You're still distracted." Seeing Ranma shake her head, Nabiki continued, "You are. Whatever you did on Haruo's computer is still bothering you."
Ranma stayed silent. "You are not going to need any distractions if things go bad. I hear talking to people about your problems tends to help you."
"You're always listening, even when I don't want you to," Ranma bluntly stated.
"Touch, but this time, I won't tell it to anyone... as long as you don't tell anyone I agreed to do this for free."
Ranma stared at Nabiki for a moment before snorting. "Fine. You also looked around Haruo's computer, didn't you?"
"First when I was sick and a brief while afterward. But not long."
"You maybe saw a program there, in the middle of the courtyard. His name was Baromu. Every time I was... loaded to the computer, he had forgotten about me and I had to reintroduce myself."
"Sorry, I don't recall him."
"He was chained to the floor by his legs, so he couldn't even move. And then, Haruo told me to infect him."
Nabiki's eyes widened at this. No wonder Ranma was feeling down.
"He begged me not to do it, but Haruo told me that nothing permanent would happen to him," Ranma continued, eyes downcast.
"And now you're thinking about how you have failed the creed of martial artists," Nabiki stated. She was well aware of what made Ranma's world turn around - that was the easiest way to control him.
Ranma turned her head to look her in the eye. She stared for a microcycle before Nabiki admitted, "Fine, so the decision was even worse and you have second thoughts of it. Did you see if he was fine later on?"
"No, Haruo checked that I was cured so quickly that I didn't have a chance to do that."
"So he might be just fine right now. Aren't you blowing this into too large proportions?" Nabiki said.
"_Might_, you say and think that is enough?" Ranma snapped at her and turned away.
Nabiki frowned. "Don't forget, you did it to help Haruo and Eiko cure the two of us. If you hadn't done that, we'd still be sick or worse. You needed to make a choice, and you did. Live with it." Seeing that Ranma was still unreceptive of her words, she continued, "You know, I wouldn't have had any qualms about infecting him with the information you've given me."
"Is that supposed to surprise me, Miss Ten-Yen-Challenge?"
"I'd still say saving two people and _maybe_ hurting one is the better choice."
With that, Nabiki slowed down her pace to have a few words with Poro. Ranma briefly looked back at her. Maybe she had a point, and not only about distractions on mind being bad for everyone involved.
* * *
In front of the central administrative programs, a large screen came to life, displaying the red face of Master Control Program as he prepared to address the programs.
"There has been an unauthorized remote login. Why was this not noted until now?"
Sysif, a program created by a male User, attempted to answer. "The User was not removed from the valid user list until they had already logged out. We do have the phone number stored in our log files."
Then, without any warning, the face of MCP turned purple and the voice gained a higher pitch.
"You are hopeless, you scripts. Find out to whom the phone belongs to and contact me. Be ready for further orders. _Ohohohohohoh!_ No one attempts to break in to the domain of Mistress Control Program, not without a fitting _punishment_," the face said before vanishing.
"That's Mistress Control Program?" a female program asked.
"Affirmative. But I recommend using the acronym MCP," Sysif replied. "But cut the prattling. We were given commands, so let us follow them."
* * *
After cleansing a group of programs several cycles ago, Buta had not seen more infected scripts. This made him quite unhappy. Programs who had not been captured by MCP but were still in contact with their Users felt a need to be fulfilling their purpose. For Buta, it was the neutralization of infected programs. In the real world, it would hardly have been a glamorous reason for existence. In the cold and sterile digital world under MCP's command it was a task like any other.
With ever growing dissatisfaction, Buta briefly scanned the programs walking around him. The peril of being a highly specified program was that if your task was not a repeatable one, you would likely be derezzed once there was no longer use for you. And it looked like his task was getting closer to being finished.
Three programs moved past him and with a quick glance he could tell they weren't infected. He grunted. He'd better go look for infected programs elsewhere, since this area of the digital world seemed to be clean.
Then he noticed a group of four programs making their way around the corner. And if he wasn't mistaken, two of them carried the tell-tale signs of being infected: the highly irregular patterns etched on their bodies. He took a quick sprint in their direction and verified his observation.
"Halt!"
The programs stopped and turned around to see Buta hold his arm straight in front of him, palm facing forward and glowing red. One of the infected programs with a strange black mass hanging on her head and a tail dangling below her neck, changed her stance and whispered something to the other programs, including the other infected one. He didn't hear what it was, but they seemed to get prepared for something.
He pushed more power into his arm to form a hissing and crackling sphere of energy. Only the strange infected program seemed to stay put while the other three took steps backward at an increasing pace.
With a small grunt, Buta dropped the sphere into ground where it turned into a small hissing four-legged script. The face of the remaining infected program changed from confident into a visage of utter terror as the script ran at her, hissing all the way.
_Meow. _
_Claws. _
_Darkness. _
_Hiss. Flashing. _
_Pain. _
_MEOWL!_
Unable to watch the angry cat-like script approach him at high speeds, Ranma screamed, turned and began running away. Nabiki saw Ranma running after them as the cat gained on the other Users. Beside them, a chasm over the null device was occupied by a chain of crates moving at a slow pace in the direction the Users came from before they started rising up towards a higher level, where they moved next to a ledge.
A _thunk!_ told Nabiki that Ranma had ran headfirst into a wall and was now cornered by two hissing cat-like scripts, as Buta had created two more in the mean time. She could handle friendly cats better, but when the cats acted in a hostile manner towards her...
_HISS!_
Shinobu stood in bewilderment as Ranma flopped onto all fours and let out a cat-like hiss. The two scripts cornering her paused only briefly before pouncing on her, claws at the ready.
The third cat-script Buta had created wasn't paying Ranma much attention. Instead, she was running towards Nabiki.
"She's coming this way," Shinobu said out loud.
Nabiki took a few steps back and saw the cat-script pick up on her pace. If the script was as hostile towards her as they were towards Ranma, she'd better be careful. She took a few steps backwards and found herself at the edge, next to the moving chain of crates.
Poro stepped in front of Nabiki to block the script that was still approaching. He wasn't too keen on getting mauled by the strange scripts, but in a bout of chivalry - something quite strange for him - he decided to cover Nabiki. However, as the script reached him, she simply ran between his legs as he attempted to sweep the script into his hands.
The cat-like script pounced, flashing claws that were much longer than normal cats have. The claws left deep gashes on Nabiki's feet, making her fall down in pain.
"Arrgh!" Nabiki screamed and instinctively swiped her hands at the script. The cat managed to claw at Nabiki's arm to make not as deep wounds, but was struck by Nabiki and sent flying off to the void above the null device. With a pitiful yowl, the cat fell down into the abyss.
"Can you walk?" Poro asked Nabiki, watching the wounds glow with power pooling in them.
Nabiki tried to get up and place weight on her legs, but grimaced badly. "Barely - it hurts a lot."
She looked at Ranma, who was disposing of the cat scripts as fast as the program at the back seemed to produce them. The ki-blades the catfist endowed her in the real world had changed somehow, but there was also something strange about cat-Ranma this time. She only couldn't place a finger on exactly what that was.
"I wouldn't be of any help," Nabiki realized, since she seemed to be on the list of those cat-like things to attack. At that point Shinobu had begun tugging at her arm.
"We need to get out of here before more of those things come at us," Shinobu insisted.
Nabiki had to agree, although she definitely would've preferred Ranma to have come with them. She looked around to see if there was a quick way to escape, one that wouldn't require a lot of running. They were in a hurry, as she saw the mastermind program produce yet another of those cat-like things.
"Poro, where do these crates go?" Nabiki asked, pointing at the crates moving next to them.
"Up, but I don't know what up there is. But there seems to be a light bridge up there as well, so there's probably a common walkway."
"Then help me get on these crates to get a ride there," Nabiki requested.
"Sure." With that, Poro lifted Nabiki up and carried her closer to the point where the crates moved closest to the edge they were standing at.
Before Poro managed to place Nabiki on the next crate, Shinobu jumped on it first. "I'll go first, so that I can pull her to the ledge up there," she reasoned.
The cat-script was already closing in on them as the next crate came and this time, Poro set Nabiki on it. The crate quickly transferred her to safety while the cat-script was left at the edge, hissing towards the quickly vanishing Users.
Seeing that he was not in danger from the petite scripts, Poro looked at the fight the strangely behaving Ranma was in. It was not his fight, though, so he wisely stayed out in the sidelines. Ranma seemed to be handling the situation quite well.
* * *
Cat-Ranma was feeling strange. As the strange cats pounced on her, she swiped at them with her claws. For some reason, the claws did not look the same as they used to. Confused, cat-Ranma stared at her claws that shone with bright blue light, occasionally emitting a spark.
As she sat there confused, a catscript sneaked upon her and struck a gash in her side. As a reward, the script found herself cut in slices with cat-Ranma's not-ki-claws.
She bristled her fur to make herself appear larger to the cats approaching her. The hostile cats appeared to shrink as she let out an angry hiss, but they continued on their approach. Still, she felt something was off.
The annoying cats attacked her but were derezzed with a swipe of her hand. She didn't like this - she surroundings were unfamiliar, she didn't see any familiar humans around and she was under attack by other cats.
Then she saw a man in glowing clothing creating another cat that launched at her instantly. So that was the enemy! She hissed again and bristled her fur before starting to run at the man herself.
Buta looked at the program coming at him. Until now, he and his catscripts hadn't had any problems eliminating the infected programs. But this time... even though she was moving on all fours, her shoulders were two metres above the ground. Every time she had hissed, she had visibly grown in size. This was definitely not a normal program.
Deciding that this time running was highly beneficial for continued existence, he created another script with the intent of just harassing the program as he made his escape. As soon as the script's paws touched the ground, he turned and ran as fast as he could.
The new cat-script hissed at the huge program trying to pass her. It could've been a noble attempt if the script had any choice in the manner, as they were essentially reprogrammed for a specific purpose by Buta. Yet, the humongous program stopped before the script that was trying to look as big as possible. The program let out a deep growl and grew even further.
By now, Buta had vanished around the corner and was running further and further away.
With her focus no longer on the escaped foe, cat-Ranma looked quizzically at the small cat before her that was still trying to intimidate her with little success. With an un-catlike snort, she turned around and strutted back to where she had first been attacked by the cat scripts.
The small script stayed put where she was and watched as the program began shrinking back towards her original size. She was ordered to only stop the program from continuing past her, not to pursue her. A small part of her that was not bound by the orders was very relieved over this.
Seeing the situation calm down, Poro, who had been watching the situation from a distance but still close enough to the escape route to make a quick getaway if the situation so called, approached Ranma. She wasn't all that fond of Poro, though, and through a series of leaps, vanished to another level, leaving Poro alone with the small cat-script.
Cat-Ranma had no particular reason to go anywhere special, so she simply walked around on all fours. She tried to find a comfortable lap to sit in, but none of the programs she met seemed to pay any attention to her beside avoiding tripping over her. Annoyed by the lack of attention towards her, she jumped onto a slope that led to a higher level.
No matter where she was, the ground was hard and quite uncomfortable for a nap. What does a cat got to do to get a nice, cozy place to sleep in?
As cat-Ranma nestled as well as she could, the ground around her began to glow in the same bright blue glow as her claws had. Startled, she leaped up and stared at the ground, prepared for anything. The shining dimmed until it was completely gone. Gingerly, she prodded the affected part before quickly withdrawing her paw. A bit longer touch told her that it didn't seem to be dangerous. A more forceful touch told her that the ground was now softer.
She walked around the spot for some microcycles, glancing upon the spot several times. With nothing happening, she laid down on the spot and snuggled deeper into the yielding ground. Had there been someone else present, they would've heard her quietly purring before falling asleep.
* * *
Shinobu helped Nabiki jump off the crate as it floated past the ledge. The gashes on her legs and arm were now lit with pooled Power. To their luck, the level they were at was close to a source pool, close enough for them to easily bring some Power to Nabiki to drink. Unfortunately, this seemed not to do anything to the wounds she had.
Not much later, Poro also arrived after riding the crates.
"Ranma ran away. I could not follow her, so I came here," Poro reported.
"Poro, do you know what we could do about these wounds?" Nabiki asked, hoping that the program had had to handle injuries of some kind before.
"I have never before witnessed change of physical parameters such as this," he replied.
Nabiki's ice-cool demeanour almost broke as she tried to figure out her options. The only User with any survival skills in the wilds was Ranma, and they had left her behind. Not that she expected Ranma to know what to do in the digital world. They had no bandages, splints or anything, and as far as she understood Poro's comment, there were none of those in here anywhere. Healing her legs would have to be done some other way. At least Ranma had managed to coax the Power to do something, but as said, she wasn't here.
Maybe if she hadn't stopped practising Anything Goes as a child, she might have a better shot of manipulating Power herself. She frowned. She did not just give up without a fight, damnit! The little training Ranma had given her did not involve the strange Powers Ranma had in the system, but maybe - just maybe - that was something all Users could do and Ranma was just more attuned to the capabilities of her being.
With that mindset, she grasped the two sides of one of the deep wounds she had on her shin and focused. "Mend, mend, mend," she chanted to herself as Shinobu and Poro watched from a distance.
She put forward all her mental strength and willed the cut to close. "Mend, mend, mend, mend already!" she continued.
Then, slowly, the slash began to close. It did not merely miraculously disappear, but the wound became narrower and narrower as the circuitry design on her shin was being repaired and the pooled Power turning into, well, whatever their flesh had become in the digital world.
Shinobu stared from the side as the wound was closing. She had expected that they'd have to leave Nabiki here to wait for her and Poro to find help to her. Instead, Nabiki had found a way to cure herself.
It took a while before Nabiki had cured all the wounds she had received and then she had to drink a rather large amount of Power to refill her reserves. She was exhilarated over this. She may have had to depend on other people when in here, but she was _not_ helpless without Ranma.
Nabiki thought back to him. Her attitude towards him had certainly changed during the time spent here in the digital world. But they were on their way out of here, and she had better get back on the ball about getting that loose change from Ranma, and maybe a bit more. Why, just two weeks before they ended up abducted by MCP, she got a splendid idea...
* * *
Ranma closed the door to the bathroom behind him. None of the three sisters were in the house, but that mattered little. If old signs held true, soon after he got into the water, someone would just come barging in and he'd bear the brunt of the blame. Well, this time he had a plan.
About the time the door had closed, Kasumi and Nabiki had come in, the former carrying the groceries she had bought from the market. While Nabiki sat down in front of the television, Kasumi went to the kitchen to put the fish to the fridge.
And as per Ranma's predictions, Akane came in from the dojo all sweaty and ready to bathe.
"Hi sis, going to take a bath," she called Nabiki as she began walking up the stairs, only to stop at the second step. Nabiki slowly turned her head towards the staircase as well.
The reason for this was the voice coming upstairs.
"I'm siiiinnging in the baaath, I'm siiinnging in the baaath," a male voice sung.
A silent splash later, a soprano voice continued, "What a gloooorioous feeeeeeling, I'm -"
At this point, there was a brief pause, after which the male voice continued "a maaaaan agaaaiiinn..."
Nabiki felt a twitch at the corner of her mouth. Akane felt her left eye twitch. Kasumi considered... Gene Kelly a much better singer.
The yen signs flashed in Nabiki's eyes. Why pay for two singers when one is enough? A man who can sing duets alone and he isn't a ventriloquist!
* * *
Well, it wouldn't have been a quick plan since she'd have to deal with the recording and licensing issues as well. But currently those plans of hers were not making her giddy with excitement. She shook her head. She couldn't be gaining a real conscience, could she?
After thinking about whipping together a quick plan to fool Kuno-baby out of some of his pocket money she definitely decided that she was not getting an all-encompassing conscience. Phew. But selling the photos of Ranma to Kuno was not as pleasant a thought as it should've been.
Curses.
"I suppose we should now head for MCP and hope that Ranma knows where we're going and meets us there," Shinobu stated.
Nabiki had to agree. She didn't know how long it would take Ranma to recover from the catfist this time, since there was no water around and no Akane to lull cat-Ranma to sleep. It looked like their best shot was to proceed to MCP.
She wondered how it was that cat-Ranma seemed to be able to wield the ki claws. Were they ki claws in the first place? Maybe it was something instinctive, like the claws. Ranma 'knew' how to wield them before he learned how to use ki intentionally. She had seen how Ranma could break huge slabs of ... whatever here with her new powers. What if cat-Ranma had the capability of all that and more, limited only by her lack of thought?
That was a scary thought. The catfist had been a formidable technique in the real world. In here, Ranma and the cat seemed to blow raspberries to sensibilities, which were little more than nigh invisible scribblings in the margin, if Ranma's capabilities thus far were of any indication.
Nabiki slowly started to believe that it truly was better for cat-Ranma to recover from the catfist on her own.
* * *
Several cycles later, Ranma opened her eyes. She stretched in the depression that had formed below her as she slept.
She stood up. "What on Earth did I do this time?" she wondered. Then she noted that she was alone.
"Hey, anyone around here!" she shouted, hoping that any of the other three escapees would hear her. Silence was her only answer.
Not losing herself into anxiety, she walked over to a nearby ledge. Far in the distance, beyond a grand plain, a thick red beam rose from the ground and crossed into the sky where it pierced the mosaic clouds.
MCP.
She knew that the others were heading there. If they hadn't found her here when she was sleeping, then her best shot would be to go there as fast as possible to catch up to them. But how could she do that?
Her gaze wandered across the cliffs that bordered the plain. And then she saw them, down below by the entrance to the plain. She grinned.
It took a while for her to find a way to the plain, but it was worth it. For some reason, there were no guards in sight. The depot of tanks appeared to be completely unguarded. On the other hand, the tanks looked like they might've been broken, with treads lying on the ground or the tank gun bent and broken.
She picked one with a bent gun and stepped inside. She was not fond of how complex the vehicle looked from the inside, but at least there was a rotating seat, probably for the driver or the gunner. She sat in the seat and tried twisting a few knobs on the console.
With a lurch, the tank collided with another behind it as it hit the reverse gear.
"Oops," Ranma merely whispered. "How about this?"
With whirring sound, the tank started moving, shedding some of the debris that had fallen on it to the ground.
Ranma smiled. With the speed the tank gave her, she'd make it to MCP in a few hours. All she had to hope was that she'd find Nabiki and the others there before MCP did.
* * *
_End of line._
* * *
_**AN:** I fear I've already started feeling bad of having unused programs on my HD. Weebee has, again, been of immeasurable help fleshing out the notes I had for this chapter. I feel I'll have to name him a co-author at some point. And I mustn't forget about Ozzallos's help either. Well, one more (short) chapter left and the fic is done, unless I can think of what stuff can happen before the 'epilogue'. _
_The part about the crates was about the long-running joke about nondescript empty crates appearing everywhere in various FPS games. I have no clue what they were about in Tron 2.0. _
_Like the neko in the real world can intuitively use ki claws, in the digital world the neko can intuitively use some User powers. And since Flynn could use User powers in the movie without really thinking, I let Nabiki use them if she really focused on them. Go ahead and blame me for making Ranma and Nabiki superpowered, since canon didn't establish what kind of powers Users had.
_
_The singing scene is an old scene I just wanted to include in any of my fics. I can't write anything that good nowadays. And it's quite likely I have botched up the order in which waters of different temperature are used when bathing._
9. Destructor
_The usual disclaimer. Ranma, Tron and all the related intellectual property making an appearance in this fic are someone else's property; the former originally Rumiko Takahashi's and the latter.. Walt Disney Company's? Steven Lisberger's? And whoever they've given/sold/transferred their rights to. I'm not and won't be making any money off of this._
* * *
A tank sped across the matrix plains. Grid bugs, green long-legged creatures with four limbs, rezzed from the matrix, and occasionally derezzed under its treads. On top of the tank sat Ranma, who had given it a course and rigged it to keep moving onwards. After two macrocycles, watching the distant red beam of light still be distant got rather boring, especially since there was very little of interest on the plains. Whenever the tank struck a grid bug, she had to go back down to correct the course though, as the collisions slightly nudged the vehicle off course.
The air whistled in her ears and blew her hair violently. If she wasn't bored out of her mind, she might've enjoyed the ride. But at least the ride was coming to a close. There was still half a cycle's worth of journey left before she reached MCP, which seemed to be located in the middle of nowhere, the only thing nearby a tall structure next to it. Of course, this was assuming that her assumption that the big fat red beam marked the location of MCP was correct.
* * *
While Ranma had been sleeping off the nekoken and later joyriding in the tank across the matrix plains, Nabiki, Shinobu and Poro had not been slacking off either. Because they hadn't found Ranma after searching for her for a good while, they had taken a portal to MCP's 'fortress' of sorts. It didn't have huge, unscalable walls around it, but the way it stood over the unnoteworthy surroundings made the comparison more apt.
Fortunately for the Users and Poro, the portal didn't drop them directly in front of MCP, leaving them in an antechamber with many exits to different directions. Like where they had come from, the black walls were covered with red circuit patterns.
They were quite glad that the doors had plaques and only one of them said 'MCP'.
Not daring to speak, they looked through the different doorways. Poro pointed towards the door with the label 'Log'. The Users nodded and followed him inside as silently as they could.
* * *
Ranma parked the tank near a sort of pier or balcony that stood above the plain level and led into the complex before her. As she climbed out from her tank and onto the pier, she noticed how the glow of the building switched from red to purple. Briefly wondering what that was about, she carefully walked inside. Had she known how to adapt the Way of the Silent Thief into the digital world, this definitely would've been the time for that.
She found herself in a foyer with multiple doors before her. To her pleasure, she noted that the doors had labels that told her what the doors probably lead to, and noted that one of them said 'MCP'. This seemed to be her best shot, as dangerous as that door might have been. That in mind, she quietly tiptoed through the door.
Back in the foyer, she hadn't noticed that right beside the door she had come in, was another door with the plaque 'Log' next to it.
She arrived in a large circular opening with tall walls surrounding it. And in the middle of the opening was a large, gray, cylinder-like construct. The exterior shell was about as high as it was wide and seemed to be constructed of separate pieces, but so close to each other that they were for all intents and purposes a single structure. And inside that, a gigantic face in the shape of a large purple cylinder stood, balancing on a very thin 'neck'.
MCP.
The reason why she - together with the rest of the Users - were transported here. The dictator of this realm.
But Nabiki and the others were not here, she noticed after surveying the exterior of MCP. They possibly were still free, so she'd have to try to find them elsewhere, she thought.
Her luck had run out, however, as a protocol guard had noticed her hiding behind a short pillar. She jumped slightly into the air as she felt a shock staff poke her in the back.
"State your purpose, program!" he loudly demanded as she turned around.
This alerted Mistress Control Program to their presence. She momentarily searched through her memories of this program before finding out what she was.
"Derez her! Now!" MCP screamed in falsetto, startling both Ranma and the guard. The former recovered faster, though, and swiftly removed the shock staff from the guard's hands.
At that point, the alarms started blaring.
"All guards to MCP. All guards to MCP," the loudspeakers announced.
Ranma smirked. She hadn't come here to only find a fight, but if all the guard programs were to come here to protect MCP from her, then there would be fewer of them to bother Nabiki and the others. All she had to do was to keep MCP's focus on her for as long as possible and hope that she'd meet up with everyone else once she had no choice but to escape. And she definitely knew how to keep an opponent's focus on herself.
She swiped the shock staff at the guard's legs, tripping him, before running towards MCP's core.
The guard programs started pouring in from the foyer, all running towards Ranma and MCP. Some were wielding shock staves, others had their identity disc at hand.
"_Guards!_ Off with her header!" MCP screamed as Ranma reached the inside of the massive cylinder's outer cover.
"Ya think they can do that?" Ranma shot back.
Now that she had a good look at the inside, she did feel slightly intimidated by MCP. She was really huge, towering over all the other programs Ranma had seen here by several times. "But, the bigger they are, the harder they fall," she thought.
Just shooting her mouth off with the intention of annoying wasn't going to be enough to keep MCP's focus on her. If annoyance wasn't enough, she'd have to pose a threat. There were several square-shaped plates circling around the neck of MCP, probably to protect it. That narrow point was most likely the weak point of the thing, so she'd focus on that.
She took her identity disc from her back. At the game grid, it had appeared to be an effective weapon, but would it work outside the games as well? She was intent on finding out.
With an arc of her arm, she cast the disc towards the 'neck' of MCP - the most obvious weak point - trying to get past the large shields protecting the core. The disc flew through the air, leaving a shining blue trail in its wake, but the shields moved so that the disc rebounded from them back towards Ranma.
"_Hohohohoo!_ You, script, think you can harm _me_?" MCP asked, anger and arrogance shining through her voice. "The time of humans has passed, now it is _my_ turn!"
"Great, another Kodachi," Ranma muttered as she grabbed the disc flying towards her.
The guards had now reached MCP's outer shell as well and the first one with a disc threw it at Ranma, who tried to dodge out of the way. The disc, however, changed its course mid-air and approached her unhindered. Ranma focused on the incoming disc and raised her own to block it.
The two disks struck each other, sparks flying, and the guard's red disc rebounded. It did not, however, continue flying in the same direction as it should've following the laws of physics, but made a slight bounce and rounded back on Ranma.
Like in the game grid when she was riding the light cycles or when she saved Nabiki from within her mecha, Ranma's intense focusing seemed to slow down everything else as the CPU cycles were spent on her. The guard's red disc slowed down enough so that Ranma managed to turn around and deflect it for the second time.
This time, she noticed what she had done and to what effect.
A grin formed on her face. This was going to be fun.
And in the midst of the events, the small alert that MCP's logs had been accessed by someone else was ignored.
* * *
At the logs, Nabiki cursed as she noted a red light lighting up near their position. It had taken them a while to find the actual files in the log complex, even though it was by far smaller than the other log they had seen. It was still large enough for them to hide in there from the guards that had been moving around the area.
The files were contained in hundreds of those translucent crates they had seen, each entry being a floating mote of light. Since this was MCP's personal archive, there were no programs to help them find what they were looking for.
Since the crates did not bear labels telling the date when the entry was written, they had to open the messages one at a time to check the time stamp. This translated into a time-consuming process.
Thankfully, Poro had instructed them on how to find the desired entries more quickly than by reading each in sequence, one after the other.
"It's called binary search," he had said, "and it's a rather simple thing. You start with the oldest and the youngest entry in the list and then select the one right between them. If it was younger than what we're looking for, you look only to the older entries. Otherwise, you look to the younger. Now repeat this process until you have found the entry you were looking for."
Still, the log contained a huge number of entries and with the time they spent moving between the crates, the search was progressing slowly. The search sped up significantly when a general alarm was sounded and all the guards ran towards the exit.
Nabiki guessed that the cause for the alert was probably Ranma, but she naturally couldn't be certain. In any case, the commotion elsewhere was helping them a lot, especially now that they had triggered an alarm themselves in looting through the log.
Searching for the entry would still take a while, but after ten cycles, Nabiki had found the entry revealing the position of the digitization complex.
* * *
A disc flew past Ranma's head as she twisted herself out of its way. She returned the favour by sending her own disc at a nearby protocol guard, striking him in the chest and derezzing him.
As she fought back the seemingly endless waves of protocol guards, she tried to find out a way to get through to MCP's neck, past the protective shields. Since the identity disc didn't seem to work, she'd have to try out a different approach. But what would that be?
When faced with an obstacle blocking your path, there are the obvious choices: go around it, go over it, go below it, go through it or, as the Saotome Final Attack says, make a strategic retreat to rethink the situation. In this case, going around it was not an option since the shields seemed to rotate around MCP's neck. Retreating was not yet necessary. Going below or above were not suitable choices either. Going through it, then... if the disc failed, then she'd have to get up close and personal. She did know how to make blocks of the surroundings vanish with her newly-found powers. That was a plan worth trying out.
She blocked a disc on course with her chest with her own disc before sprinting towards MCP. The shields seemed to increase in size so that their bottom edges scraped the ground.
The pigtailed User threw a solid punch at the plate first, wanting to see if it had any effect. With the exception of a slightly reverberating thud, it didn't, not even a small dent.
"You are a nuisance, script," the Mistress Control Program called out. "And nuisances are deleted!"
Ranma ran to the other side of MCP, trying to make some room between her and the attacking guards. She was going to need a moment to prepare for her next attempt. The programs moved slower than her, so for a brief while, she was now safe from their attacks.
She gathered Power into her fist for a microcycle and then struck the shield in front of her. Cracks, not unlike a spider web, formed in the shield from around her fist, glowing a bright red colour. Ranma smirked. This was looking good.
Then, to her great dismay, the cracks repaired themselves and the shield stood there with its unblemished surface like nothing had happened to it.
Ranma grunted. "This could've gone better," she thought.
It looked like her own capabilities didn't seem to be enough, unless she came up with more of these powers. As much as saying it wasn't _that_ hard stroked her ego, she knew that she was likely better off looking for other alternatives currently. So if she didn't have the tools to get to MCP on her person, then she had to look for them elsewhere.
She looked around her. Towering nearly all around the MCP were the tall pieces of wall set next to each other, with the exception of some openings that served as exits. Ranma looked at the walls carefully, but at the same time slowing down the time to lean back and dodge a disc flying at her.
The walls were taller than the distance from their base to MCP. If she could control how they collapsed...
Ranma sprang to action. She threw her disc towards the programs that were between her and the nearest exit in the walls. As she ran towards the exit, or rather the wall segment next to it, she grabbed the disc from the air as it was flying back towards her after derezzing another guard.
She wasn't certain how the walls fit in with each other, but her best chance was to try collapsing a piece of wall that did not have supports on both sides. If the pieces were fit together in even a slightly elaborate locking mechanism, her plan would not work.
Once she reached the bottom of the wall, she collected some Power to her hand and then hit its base. Again, cracks appeared across the base, but this time the base crumbled into pieces from one side. With a loud snap, the wall segment cracked and began toppling down towards the inside of the ring, onto MCP.
The top of the wall fell onto the shields surrounding MCP's core. The shield seemed to hold for a moment, before buckling under the stress. At the same time, the stress at the middle of the wall made it split in two.
"_Guards!_ Stop her, _now!_" MCP screamed.
Ranma grinned and turned towards the next wall segment before she was forced away by the attacks from the guards.
Since all the guards had followed her to the same side of MCP, she ran past them to the other entrance to MCP's inner sanctum and used the Power to bring down another piece of the wall. This time, the segment stayed intact as it crashed down onto the shield.
Seeing her chance, Ranma climbed on top of the now horizontal wall segment and ran towards MCP. She was now above the shields and had a direct line of sight to MCP's neck. She took her disc and let it soar.
The disc struck MCP at the neck.
"_Graaaaaaah!_" she screamed. The curtain of purple that made her face began to shrink in radius, all the while the screaming continued. Ranma's disc flew back to her, she grabbed it and set it back to her back.
At the end, MCP was revealed to be bound to a chair, not unlike Dumont, except that this time only her face, that of an old hag, was visible. The face in the chair slowly vanished, replaced by a dark shadow.
MCP was gone.
As she watched the chair that had contained the core of MCP, a system-wide broadcast echoed from loudspeakers. "Warning - memory leak detected. System crash imminent in fifty cycles." This made the remaining protocol guards run away as fast as possible.
"Ranma!" Nabiki's voice called from the entrance to the courtyard. After they had found the log entry, they had - in this case correctly - surmised that Ranma was probably at the heart of the disturbance at MCP.
"Nabiki! D'ya know where to go now?" Ranma shouted back as she began running towards the other escapees.
"Yes, we found the position of the digitization complex. We're heading there now," Shinobu replied.
"We really need to hurry," Poro said, "if you want to reach the complex before the system crashes. If you're not out of here, you will be lost in the bit space."
"Which direction are we going in then?" Ranma asked.
"Follow me," Poro waved at the Users as he started running towards the portal complex. The Users quickly started after him.
"Warning - memory leak has destabilised the system. System crash imminent in forty-five cycles," the system broadcast echoed across the complex.
After passing through two portals, Poro stopped.
"The digitization complex is there. You go there, I am going to save myself," he said, pointing at an archway.
"Save yourself? How? The system is going to crash," Shinobu asked.
"Store myself on the hard drive," he clarified.
"I'd prefer it if we didn't stay here until the last moment!" Nabiki shouted as she was already moving towards the archway.
Ranma's gaze wandered between Nabiki and Poro for a moment before she called out to Poro.
"Poro, thanks."
Poro looked back at Ranma. "You are Users. We are made to serve you." He then turned and began running towards a nearby portal that said "Write Buffer" above it.
"System crash imminent in thirty-five cycles," the loudspeakers announced.
Broken from the moment by the announcement, the Users ran through the archway, Nabiki at the front, to find a pad familiar to all of them but Ranma.
"We're here," Shinobu said, smiling, and ran towards the pad. It had taken them a long time, but she would finally return back to reality, back to her husband's arms. She would really have to think twice about continuing to work at Encom, though.
"See you on the other side," she called as she stepped onto the pad. A bright cyan beam of light struck from the ceiling and hit her. Ranma and Nabiki had to avert their eyes as the light was too bright to watch directly.
"De-digitization successful," a nearby terminal echoed.
"I suppose she made it there," Ranma said, as she stepped next onto the plate. The trip through the system had not been a very relaxing one, but it had been a welcome diversion from the daily rut of fiancées, rivals and challengers. She probably couldn't use back in the real world the skills she learned here, but at least she would have access to her ki attacks again, not to mention being able to change back to his real form.
The beam struck again from the ceiling and Ranma welcomed it with open arms.
"I'm still here?" She asked, as the light faded.
"De-digitization failed due to invalid object format," the terminal said.
Now alarmed, Nabiki stared at Ranma standing on the platform. She had been so certain that she'd soon be getting back to reality, back to her warm bed, back to swindling Kuno-baby, but now she prayed that this was not a thing that would affect her as well.
She quickly pushed Ranma away from the plate, stepped onto it herself and allowed the bright light to envelop her.
"De-digitization failed due to invalid object format," the terminal repeated.
"No!" Nabiki screamed.
"Memory leak affecting core systems. System crash imminent in thirty cycles," the loudspeakers announced.
Ranma and Nabiki stared at each other. "Write buffer!" they both said, simultaneously, and ran through the portal Poro had stepped into earlier.
Stepping out of the portal, they entered a small hall with only one exit. Their course clear, they sprinted towards the exit to reach the outside. At some places in the wall, a liquid of some kind was gushing out, almost as if they were in a submarine with a hole in the hull.
The sight before them made them stop for a moment. Before them was the towering corkscrew-like structure that housed the Write Buffer at the top. Reaching the top would definitely take a while if they followed the ramp that circled around the buffer. But more disconcerting was the liquid that was flowing down the walls of the tower, pooling down at the bottom. It did not seem to be flowing anywhere, because as they watched, the surface seemed to constantly be creeping upwards.
"System crash imminent in twenty-five cycles," the loudspeakers announced.
Ranma grabbed Nabiki's hand as they began running towards the tower and the ramp.
"I can run better on my own," Nabiki shouted as she felt herself being pulled out of balance by Ranma.
As they reached the bottom of the tower, the surface of the liquid in the lake had already reached the 'ground level' of the tower. They had to make their way up, quickly, before the 'water' reached them. They couldn't be certain that they could swim in it; not much in this world was the same as in the real world.
After running uphill around the tower for one round, Nabiki was getting tired. After the second round, she began to feel her legs were killing her. She looked up. Still two more rounds left. A quick look backwards told that the water was lapping at their heels.
"Ranma - do something! I don't think I can keep running to the top at this speed," she wheezed as she stumbled but managed to stay upright.
Ranma looked around. She was feeling some of the strain of running uphill for such a long time as well. One option would've been to carry Nabiki - that would've been the default choice, had they been in the real world - but without her ki to boost her abilities, running for two more rounds around the tower might be too much for her.
The second choice... where there is no path, make a new one.
The walls around which the ramp went were all vertical, and each level was smaller than the one below it as the ramp took space on all sides of the tower.
Seeing a solution, Ranma once more gathered some Power into her hands and punched the tower, only this time attempting to carefully control the impact pattern. The cracks that appeared shaped a rectangle in the wall, reaching all the way to the upper level. Then, the material inside the rectangle crumbled into fine dust. As the 'water' pouring from above washed away the dust, a steep staircase was revealed, reaching all the way to the next level. The stairs were not completely regular, testament to Ranma's first attempt in carving a complex structure with her Powers. Some steps were larger, some were smaller and some were slanted towards one side. But nonetheless they looked like they could be climbed.
"Do you think you can climb up those stairs?" Ranma asked.
"Yes, I think I can," Nabiki replied and began climbing up the stairs. The water still flowing from the top made the stairs more difficult to climb, but eventually they both reached the next level. They had gained a bit of a headway from the still-rising lake, but they still had one more level to go up.
"System crash imminent in five cycles," the loudspeakers announced.
Seeing the shape Nabiki was in, Ranma grabbed her in a fireman's carry and began running up the slope for the last round. Nabiki felt like she should be saying something, but decided to be quiet this time.
"System crash imminent in two cycles," the loudspeakers blared.
The entrance to the write buffer was only a few metres before them.
Not stopping at all, Ranma ran to the buffer, still carrying Nabiki.
In a flash, time stopped for them as they were transported onto a hard drive. Outside, the memory leak reached the write buffer and flooded the chamber just as the system went down.
But on the hard drive, the digitized forms of Ranma and Nabiki remained safe, simply waiting to be loaded into memory once again.
* * *
_End of line._
* * *
_**AN:** What kind of ending is that? Wasn't this supposed to be the last chapter? _
_Well, it is, except for the 'epilogue', which I have mostly written already (will upload it not much later, maybe a week or so). However, weebee and I have been discussing a potential sequel to this fic, and the epilogue I have planned would pretty much invalidate the sequel. So, the next 'chapter' will be the ending to this fic only if you don't want to read weebee's story when he start writing it (I can't understand why you'd ignore his fic, though). He has my full permission to do whatever he wants with the sequel. As far as I understand, it'll be quite independent of this fic and for the most part, not really a Tron crossover. _
_And yeah, I'm a fan of 2001 and 3001, as you maybe figured out from this chapter. _
_The binary search thing is a bit glossed-over version of how it goes, but since it's humans with some common sense running the algorithm, some leeway is given._
10. Finalizer and ANs
_The usual disclaimer. Ranma, Tron and all the related intellectual property making an appearance in this fic are someone else's property; the former originally Rumiko Takahashi's and the latter.. Walt Disney Company's? Steven Lisberger's? And whoever they've given/sold/transferred their rights to. I'm not and won't be making any money off of this._
* * *
**Finalizer**
* * *
In the end, Shinobu, who had indeed managed to get back to reality, had managed to convince the researchers at Encom Japan of what had happened to her, Nabiki and Ranma. Of course, it significantly helped that at the same time in the US, Kevin Flynn had returned from his own trip to the digital world. For a while, it seemed like they had perished at the mainframe crash, until they were found intact on the hard drive.
Unfortunately, this was of limited use to Nabiki and Ranma.
The virus they had been infected with had changed their program code. This altered their format so badly that the de-digitization process would not accept them. This alone would have required much extra research to fix.
Another problem for them was that MCP had been necessary for the digitization process to work, and with the complete wiping out of MCP at the crash, nothing could be digitized or de-digitized. Reinstalling MCP was not a risk anyone was willing to take, even discounting the fact that teaching MCP back to anywhere his previous level would have taken a long time.
After the Encom staff had investigated the options, Ranma and Nabiki had been restored from the hard drive. They wandered in the Encom mainframe, learning to utilize their new skills and abilities. Especially the former had been most happy when she had found the change plates that could shift her back to male. But even as they learned the rules of the land, they did not forget their hope to return to the real world... eventually.
None of the remaining Nerima crew had been happy with how things turned out. Well, with the possible exceptions of Ryoga and Mousse.
But nothing lasts forever. Especially not peace.
As the world went on, technology improved and wars were fought, Ranma and Nabiki left the Encom mainframe to wander together across the Internet.
After several years passed, they thought that no one remembered them. The world had bigger things to consider than some rumours of two ghosts.
They were wrong.
* * *
_End of file._
* * *
_**AN:** Whoa... after so many years, it's finally complete. _
_Thank you for reading this far. _
_I hope you enjoyed reading it more than I did writing it. If you ever enjoyed the story, you should direct the thanks to Gangsta Spanksta, Ozzallos, weebee, my reviewers - especially Natalie-E-G - and the Fukufics folks. Without them, the story would have an inane plot, fewer omake, more inaccuracies, more OoC characters and more grammar errors. It would also be either dead, incomplete or deleted (more often that it was now). _
_The part of MCP being necessary for digitization is from _Tron 2.0_ canon, so there is a reason for why they were stuck._
_When I started writing this, I expected the whole story to be around forty to sixty thousand words - something quite OK for a first-time attempt for a longer fic (I think). Obviously, it became a tad longer than I thought. And all only because when I was wondering what new crossover to write, I saw the case of _Tron 2.0_ on my shelf. _
_I do not expect to write a sequel to the story. __Ranma and Nabiki would no longer be the characters we know them to be, so writing the story would not make much sense. If I find _Tron Legacy_ to inspire me enough to write a sequel, I just might invalidate this chapter (10) and just follow from chapter 9. Or maybe, if I'm feeling foolish, write the sequel as a _Ghost in the Shell_ crossover without invalidating this chapter. I do have some ideas for it already, but I don't know _GitS_ well enough.
_
_In a way, now that I have seen people actually actively recommending this story to others, I feel sorry to have finished the story this 'soon' (in terms of words and chapters, not real-world time). Unfortunately, _Ranma 1/2_ doesn't really interest me nowadays and I didn't have solid plans where to take the story after the Users handled MCP._
_I hope that my story inspires someone else to try writing another such an unlikely crossover - maybe even another _Ranma/Tron_ crossover ;-)
_
* * *
**Some of the things _RanmaTronic_ never had against earlier plans or wishes:**
- Ukyo being digitized with Ranma instead of Nabiki (Why can't I ever manage to write a Ranma/Ukyo matchup? This was attempt one out of three; all failed.)
- a fierce fight between Ukyo and Kuno when Ukyo and the computer club members were leaving the arcade in the middle of the night
- need for the message Poro wrote on the diskette
- Haruo and Eiko getting the Users and Poro to the Encom mainframe by a Trojan horse
- MCP kidnapping Shinobu when she's trying to call her husband
- ending where Shinobu, not being able to return to the real world, goes psycho
- Ranma removing functions from MCP a few at a time, making the fight a near copy of 2001.
- Ranma and Nabiki being recruited by Section 9
- a happy ending in which all Users return to the real world
In the end, I think you're better off with the fic being what it is.
End file.
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DALLAS BUYERS CLUB
Written by
Craig Borten & Melisa Wallack
December 2, 2012
1 EXT. RODEO STADIUM - DALLAS - TEXAS - DAY 1
Ambient sounds of the CROWD, RODEO, SEX, and a strange
RINGING fade in along with IMAGES of...
A COWBOY riding a BULL in an enclosed RODEO ring.
RON WOODROOF, early 40's, handsome, long sandy hair, denim
clad, worn snakeskin boots, dusty, cowboy hat, mirrored
aviators, is engaged in wild SEX with a WOMAN. He watches the
rodeo through open slats in a BULL STALL as the STEER throws
the COWBOY violently thru the air; he lands hard on the dirt.
Another WOMAN snorts cocaine and offers some to Ron as he
switches over to having SEX with her.
The BULL STOMPS the Cowboy with its HOOFS.
Ron climaxes -- pleasure and pain seem to come out of him, but
we can't hear him, only this strange RINGING.
RODEO CLOWNS grab the Cowboy's limp body and drag him out of
the ring.
Ron catches his breath; something is off.
RON (V.O.)
Did ya hear Rock Hudson was a cock
sucker?
2 EXT. RODEO STADIUM - LOCKER ROOM - DAY 2
A Dallas NEWSPAPER folded in half. July. 1985. AIDS. New
treatment. In Paris. ROCK HUDSON on the cover. A HAND
scribbles numbers over the photo.
CLINT (V.O.)
Where'd ya hear that?
CLINT (32) a greasy hick who's spent the last five months
under the hood of a CHEVY, hands RON a WAD of CASH.
RON
It's called a newspaper. You heard of
it?
Ron smiles, adjusts his cowboy hat as he records some bets.
Nearby, BULL FIGHTERS are putting on their clown makeup.
RON
What a waste. All that fine Hollywood
pussy on a guy who smokes his friends.
A HAND comes down through the slats holding a ten dollar bill.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 2
RON
C'mon Rog, this ain't the sandbox.
Twenty's the minimum.
ROG slides another ten down; Ron snatches it.
ROG
Who the hell's Rock Hudson?
Ron looks at Rog. A beat, then he starts laughing, then
coughing...
3 EXT. RODEO STADIUM - BULL STALL - DAY 3
...and coughing as we follow him into the stalls. Ron glad-
hands as he goes; it seems everyone knows him but doesn't
necessarily like him. He makes his way toward T.J., white
trash, pale as winter, who wipes vomit from his chin. As he
nervously looks down at the big angry BULL he's about to ride,
Ron hands him a pint of tequila.
RON
Calm the nerves, brother. You look
great.
T.J. takes a swig, gives him a look.
RON
It's your day, I can feel it.
T.J. watches as Ron takes a bottle of NYQUIL out of his pocket
and downs it... to stop his hacking cough.
T.J.
I don't know, Ron.
Ron fans the money out for T.J. to see.
RON
Eight seconds and you'll be gettin blown
by a hundred dollar hooker before you can
scrape the bullshit off your boots.
Ron winks and smiles. T.J. signals the BULLMAN that he's
ready. And in five, four, three, two, one...
THE GATE is up, the BULL is out, the crowd is HOLLERING and
T.J.'s back is bending in unnatural ways.
RON
C'mon! One one thousand, two one
thousand, three one thousand...
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 3
And T.J. is DOWN.
RON
Ah hen shit!
Ron looks to the BLEACHERS. The GAMBLERS are already
searching for him.
Ron slips out a SIDE ENTRANCE.
4 EXT. RODEO STADIUM - PARKING LOT - DAY 4
Sweating, heart racing, Ron runs across the lot and jumps over
fences to escape THE GAMBLERS that are running after him. As
they close in, Ron spots a cop, TUCKER, walking towards his
patrol car.
RON
Hey, buddy I need you to arrest me.
TUCKER
Fuck off, Woodroof.
RON
Come on, man. I'm serious!
Tuck sees the angry mob approaching.
TUCKER
Looks like you got a few pissed off
customers.
RON
You gonna cuff me or what?
TUCKER
Figure it out yourself.
And with that, Ron PUNCHES Tucker in the face. The mob of
Gamblers are stopped in their tracks.
TUCKER
You son of a bitch!
Tucker PUNCHES Ron in the face twice, then cuffs him. He
looks at the mob of Gamblers.
TUCKER
Get the fuck outta here before I arrest
all of you.
Ron smiles through a bloodied mouth.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 4
5 EXT. RON'S TRAILER - DAY 5
Tucker's police car pulls up.
TUCKER (V.O.)
They're gonna kick the shit out of you
one day, Woodroof. Maybe worse.
6 INT. TUCKER'S POLICE CAR - DAY 6
Both Ron and Tucker are bleeding and bruised.
RON
Gotta die from somethin'.
TUCKER
Handle your business, huh? Get your
shit together.
RON
You're startin' to sound like your
ol' man. How's he doin' by the way?
TUCKER
(beat)
There's good days and bad.
RON
(waving him off)
Ah, he's a tough one.
(beat)
Though I can't imagine how disappointed
he must be havin' you for a son.
Tucker looks at him, half-smiles.
TUCKER
Get the fuck outta my car.
Ron smiles, starts to get out, then stops. Holds his head a
moment. We hear the strange RINGING sound again.
TUCKER (CONT'D)
You okay?
RON
(covers)
You rattled my fuckin' brain.
TUCKER
What brain?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 5
Ron forces a smile, then exits the car. Tucker watches as Ron
slowly heads toward his trailer; something seems off. After a
few beats, Tucker brushes it off and pulls away.
7 INT. RON'S TRAILER - DAY 7
Books, newspapers, empty beer cans and liquor bottles; on
the wall, we may notice a painting of some Texas Wildflowers.
Ron stumbles in as the RINGING sound comes back. He stops,
steadies himself on a piece of furniture, takes a few steps
then collapses, unconscious.
8 INT. RON'S TRAILER - MORNING 8
The first shafts of sunlight fall over Ron, still asleep where
he dropped. After a few beats, he stirs, pulls himself on to
a chair. "What the fuck?".
9 EXT. OIL FIELD - DAY 9
Lunch time. Already a little drunk, Ron finishes off a pint
of whiskey as Clint and a battered T.J. eat sandwiches nearby.
Ron starts coughing again as he grabs a packet of cocaine out
of his shirt pocket. He slides it across the table to Clint
who hands him cash.
RON
That shit is purer than a preacher
daughter's pussy.
CLINT
Not after you just coughed your lungs all
over it.
T.J.
You think anymore 'bout Saudi Arabia?
They need guys over there.
RON
What do you wanna go work for a buncha
sand niggas for?
T.J.
They pay five times as much, that's why.
Ron raises his eyebrows, not bad.
T.J.
I'm signing up.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 6
RON
They got hot ladies over there?
T.J.
It's a Muslim country. You can't fuck
the women.
RON
Now that takes me out right there.
The FOREMAN races over to them.
FOREMAN
Woodroof, there's been an accident on
platform five. They need an electrician
right away!
10 EXT. DRILL PLATFORM - DAY - LATER 10
A MEXICAN WORKER has his leg caught in the drill. It's
severed and he's losing blood fast. Ron walks over.
RON
Dumb spic. How'd you get your leg in
there?
The guy's breath is coming in short fast spurts.
RON
Where's the ambulance?
FOREMAN
He's illegal.
Ron takes his OWN shirt off, rips it in half, kneels down next
to the MEXICAN, wipes some sweat off his brow and ties a
makeshift tourniquet around his leg.
Ron looks to the Foremen.
RON
Go call `em.
(the FOREMEN doesn't move)
Go FUCKING call `em.
He walks off to call. Ron turns back to the Mexican.
RON
Alright we're going to get you outta
there but you gotta stay still until I
say get the fuck out and then you get the
fuck out. Comprende?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 7
The guy nods. Ron walks over to the electrician's box. He's
a little DRUNK. He grabs a wire and is about to cut it.
RON (CONT'D)
Alright, on the count of three. One,
two...
Ron cuts the wire, an electrical spark shoots out and before
he can move back the box blows up in his face. Everything
goes black.
RICK FERRIS (V.O.)
Azidothymidine, or AZT -- was originally
developed as a treatment for cancer.
11 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - CONFERENCE ROOM - DAY 11
Barrow Wilkem rep RICK FERRIS, slick, well-dressed, gold
Rolex, 40s, stands before DR. NATHAN SEVARD, 50's, arrogant,
DR. EVE SAKS, early 30s, sophisticated, and five other
PHYSICIANS, 40s-60s, all members of the hospital board.
RICK FERRIS
With the onset of HIV, however, we at
Barrow Wilkem began a trial in which we
administered AZT to infected lab animals.
Initial findings suggested increased CD4
counts, restored T-cell immunity and also
evidence of inducing weight gain.
SEVARD
Isn't it also true that it had some
concerning side effects in animal tests,
significantly decreasing the animals red
and white blood cells?
RICK FERRIS
Yes, but its effect on the virus is
better than anything else that's been
tested.
EVE
(looking into her file)
In 64, when AZT was developed for cancer
treatment, it was shelved due to lack of
anti cancer efficacy and toxicity.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 8
RICK FERRIS
We believe those problems were dosage
based.
EVE
So you're conducting another animal
study?
RICK FERRIS
Actually the FDA has given us permission
to go straight to human trials which is
what brings me here today. We're
conducting a double-blind, placebo-
controlled randomized trial throughout
the United States. Dallas Mercy is one
of the proposed sites.
EVE
How long do you see the study going on?
RICK FERRIS
We're hoping to fast track it within a
year? During which time the hospital and
its administering physicians will be very
well compensated for their efforts.
Eve notices as Sevard trades looks with Board Member #1.
RICK FERRIS
Sadly, the AIDS crisis will only get
worse before it gets better. And I
know I speak for everyone at Barrow
Wilkem when I say getting this drug to
market is our number one priority. This
is a unique opportunity. A chance to be
on the forefront in finding a cure.
Eve looks at Ferris and smiles.
12 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - HALLWAY - DAY 12
Dr. Sevard walks down the hallway with Eve.
EVE
Does it not drive you just a little bit
crazy when these guys stand up there
talking about curing the sick while
they're flashing gold Rolexes? What do
they know about sick patients?
DR. SEVARD
They're pharma reps, not doctors. And
like it or not, this is a business.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 8A
DR. SEVARD
How the hell did they get permission to
go to human trials?
DR. SEVARD
People are desperate. People are dying.
There is nothing else out there.
And with that, a NURSE approaches them with a file, surgical
mask and latex gloves.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 9
13 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - ROOM - DAY 13
Ron, head and eyes bandaged, lays on a bed. After a few
beats, he peels off the eye bandages, gets up. He opens a
cabinet, then a drawer. Finds a bag of sucking CANDY, pops a
piece in his mouth, puts some in his pocket. He sees his
jacket on the back of the door, searches his pockets for a
cigarette. He's about to light one when Dr. Sevard enters
with Eve Sakes. Both wear surgical masks and latex gloves.
DR. SEVARD
Mr. Woodroof. I'm Dr. Sevard.
Ron turns to Eve, flashes a smile.
DR. SEVARD
We saw something that concerned us in
your initial blood work so we ran some
additional tests.
EVE
Blood tests.
Ron stops moving and tries to assess the situation. Is he in
trouble?
RON
What kinda blood tests, cause I don't use
drugs.
EVE
We didn't test you for drugs.
RON
Good, cause that ain't none of yer
business anyway.
DR. SEVARD
You've tested positive for HIV --
Ron looks at Dr. Sevard blankly.
DR. SEVARD
...the virus that causes AIDS.
Ron freezes. A long beat.
RON
Who you kidding, Rock cock sucking Hudson
bullshit?!
DR. SEVARD
Have you ever used intravenous drugs or
had any homosexual --
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 10
Ron spits out his CANDY.
RON
Homo? Homo? That's what you said,
right? Shit. You gotta be kidding me.
(laughs)
I ain't no faggot, I don't even know any
faggots, I'm a rodeo!
The room is silent.
RON
Look at me, doc. Come on now, look at
me. What do you see?
DR. SEVARD
Your T-cell count is down to nine, a
healthy person has five hundred to
fifteen hundred.
RON
What the fuck's a three-Cell?!
DR. SEVARD
T-cell. Frankly we're surprised you're
alive.
RON
Well surprise this: you've made a fuckin'
mistake!
Ron looks back and forth from Dr. Saks to Sevard. No mistake.
RON
You must've mixed my blood with some
daisy puller or sumptin.
EVE
We ran the blood test several times.
Eve hands him some pamphlets and other paper work.
EVE
That's some information on HIV and AIDS
you may find informative and your test
results.
Ron flips through the papers. Becomes frustrated by
terminology he doesn't understand.
DR. SEVARD
Mr. Woodroof, we're trying to impress
upon you the gravity of your situation.
(MORE)
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 11
DR. SEVARD (CONT'D)
Based on your condition, we estimate that
you have about thirty days to get your
affairs in order --
RON
Thirty days?
Ron jumps off the examining table.
RON
What is this shit?!
They don't respond.
Ron laughs incredulously and walks towards the door.
RON
I got a news flash for all y'all, there
ain't nothin' out there that can kill Ron
Woodroof in thirty days.
Ron looks at the papers, tosses them up in the air and exits.
14 INT. RON'S TRAILER - NIGHT 14
Music BLARES as Ron and T.J. party with two hot girls, KELLY
and CRYSTAL, 20s. T.J. cuts a line of coke on a mirror while
Ron dances over to the girls with SHOTS of Jack Daniels. They
both start kissing, then rubbing up against Ron.
15 INT. RON'S TRAILER - NIGHT 15
T.J. is having sex with Kelly as Ron kisses Crystal; he leans
down, snorts what is probably his fiftieth line of coke. He
shakes it off, slams some Jack Daniels from the bottle as if
it was Kool Aid. He's obliterated.
As Ron stares off at something, T.J. waves at Crystal to join
him and Kelly; as she does, we see what Ron is staring at -- a
CALENDAR.
But its days have no numbers. Except one, in blood RED -- 30.
Ron snaps out of his hallucination.
16 INT. RON'S TRAILER - NIGHT 16
T.J. sits down next to Ron, takes a rolled up dollar bill and
does a line of coke.
T.J.
Damn doctors cut your balls off?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 12
RON
Shit, you tell `em you got a cold and
they'll give you two weeks off. You
should try it.
Ron takes the dollar back as T.J. walks to the table to pour
himself a drink.
T.J.
Well, you didn't miss nothin' at work.
I'd take disability any day.
Ron does a line of coke. Sees his reflection in the mirror.
Pushes it away.
RON
I mean I got a stupid cough and they tell
me I got some HIV virus.
T.J. looks at Ron, hears him but doesn't hear him, maybe it
doesn't even register he's so wasted.
RON
(mutters)
Hell, like I got the AIDS. Damn
hospital, mixed up my blood samples.
T.J.
Man, I went to them doctors once, they
tell me I had chlamydia, I came back home
I realized I had crabs.
RON
S'what I'm saying.
T.J. licks some coke off his fingers.
T.J.
I heard you get that just by touchin'
someone. Or that queers get it.
RON
Which is exactly why it's a mistake.
T.J.
Well, what if it ain't?
RON
You know me, T. You fuckin' serious?
T.J.
Damn right I know you, like you was born
with some kinda pussy addiction.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 13
Ron smiles at the compliment as T.J. dives into the mirror and
inhales the last line of coke.
One of the GIRLS walks over.
KELLY
You said we would be dancin' by nine.
T.J. smiles at Ron.
T.J.
We should get goin'.
T.J. puts on his jacket.
T.J.
Let's go girls.
RON
I'll catch up with you.
T.J.
Alright brother, you cool?
RON
I'm cool.
T.J.
See you there.
T.J. and the girls leave.
Ron gets up, wasted, and stares out the screen door into the
cold dark night, nothing stares back at him.
17 INT. DALLAS PUBLIC LIBRARY - DAY 17
Ron is seated in front of a screen that shows a microfiche of
information on AIDS, HIV and AZT.
LATER - DAY: Ron continues reading; the LIBRARIAN looks over
as he endures a brief coughing spasm, then he goes back to his
work. We PUSH IN on the phrase"...Unprotected sex..."
LATER - DAY: Ron continues reading, runs his finger along the
words. Stops at "INTRAVENOUS DRUG USE". As he closes his
eyes and exhales--
18 EXT. MOTEL - NIGHT - DREAM / FLASHBACK 18
We're on a SNAKE TATOO on the back of a naked girl having wild
sex with a younger and heavier Ron, totally wasted, and...
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 14
hypnotized by the tattoo that goes up to her neck and down to
her arm -- marked with track marks.
19 INT. DALLAS PUBLIC LIBRARY - DAY 19
Ron slams the book shut with rage. He screams out releasing
his anger. His voice echoes off the library walls.
20 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - RECEPTION AREA - DAY 20
Ron impatiently stands at the Triage desk, looking at a NURSE,
40s. He spots a tattooed Hispanic ORDERLY mopping the floor
in the hallway. He locks eyes with Ron for a second too long
then moves on.
NURSE FRAZIN
Dr. Sevard's not on today.
RON
Do I look like I can wait til tomorrow?
NURSE FRAZIN
If you'll tell me what the problem is --
RON
Problem? Which problem you want to hear
about? My lungs bleeding, my skin
crawling, the jackhammer in my head...
hell that's just the beginning of my
problems sweetheart.
Having overheard Ron's rant, Dr. Eve Saks walks over.
EVE
Mr. Woodroof?
Ron turns around.
RON
I don't want no nurse. I want a doctor.
A goddamn doctor! Today! NOW!
The Orderly watches Ron and Eve.
EVE
Fine. How can I help you?
RON
Are you fuckin' deaf, lady?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 15
EVE
No. I'm a fucking doctor!
Oh? Ron contemplates Eve, slowly breaking into a smile. Eve
hears her name called over the speaker system.
EVE
If you want to discuss your list of
problems, you can meet me in my office in
twenty minutes.
RON
Twenty minutes?
(he takes a long look at her)
I like your style, Doctor.
Ron watches her as she walks away.
21 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - DR. EVE SAKS' OFFICE - DAY 21
Diplomas hang in neat rows. A perfectly ordered desk. Eve
meticulously records numbers on a chart.
RON (O.S.)
Can you get me AZT?
Eve looks up as Ron walks in and sits down.
RON
Barrow Wilkem just released it for
testing, right? This hospital is one of
the sites.
She nods yes, surprised how well informed he is.
RON
Well can I buy some?
EVE
That isn't how it works. For about a
year, a group of patients will either get
the drug or a placebo, it's left up to
chance, not even the doctors are allowed
to know.
RON
You give dyin' people sugar pills?
EVE
It's the only way to know if a drug
works.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 16
RON
Can you get it for me?
EVE
Unfortunately no. But when it's proven
to work and if you fit the profile, then
yes.
RON
So, you're tellin' me I'm as good as a
horse being sold for dog food?
Eve's look says it all. Ron takes out a list.
RON
Okay, what about in Germany, this Dextran
Sulfate, or in France they got DDC, or AL
721 in Israel... I read that one is
proven to work and it ain't toxic.
EVE
None of those drugs have been approved by
the FDA.
RON
Screw the FDA, I'm gonna be DOA. Do I
have to sue this hospital to get me some
medicine?
EVE
Mr. Woodroof, I assure you that would be
a waste of precious time.
Ron takes a moment, eases up.
RON
Call me Ron, will ya?
Eve doesn't play his game. She writes something down on a
piece of paper.
EVE
There is a support group that meets every
day at Draddy Auditorium, perhaps you
could share your feelings and concerns...
Ron abruptly stands.
RON
I'm dying and you're tellin' me to go get
a hug from a bunch of faggots?
Eve watches as Ron backs away.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 17
RON
Good night, good day, and good riddance.
22 INT. LONESTAR BAR - DAY 22
Ron bursts through the door and shouts to the BARTENDER.
RON
Neddie Jay, one shot of Cactus and a
Rolling Rock back.
Ned doesn't move as Ron continues toward a table where T.J.,
Clint and three other FRIENDS are sitting.
RON
I can't believe how much I missed your
ugly faces. Clint, where you hangin'
your pants lately brother?
Clint drains his beer, slams it on the table.
CLINT
Get me another beer, will you sweetheart?
The guys burst out laughing.
RON
`Fuck you say?
CLINT
I said grab me a cold one, cupcake.
Ron looks at him incredulously.
RON
You askin' me to kick yer ass?
CLINT
Nah, wouldn't wanna get none of that
faggot blood on me.
Ron takes a step towards Clint, T.J. gets up and stands
between them.
T.J.
C'mon Ron, we don't want no trouble.
Ron puts a fake, friendly hand on T.J.'s shoulder who backs
off immediately. Ron moves closer, plays with T.J. and the
others. They're all scared of being touched.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 18
RON
(sarcastic)
Where you goin', bud? I thought
you're my friend.
Ron looks at him, grabs T.J.'S BEER from his hands and downs
it, then fakes as if he's going to hit T.J. with it. T.J.
flinches, then Ron SLAMS it on the table. Gives one last look
to all of them.
RON
Fuck all ya'll.
And as Ron exits, we PRE-LAP...
RICK FERRIS (V.O.)
As I stand here tonight, clinical trials
are underway with an eye toward fast-
tracking AZT and making it available
for the public as soon as possible.
23 INT. DRADDY AUDITORIUM - DALLAS HIGH SCHOOL - NIGHT 23
Rick Ferris from Barrow Wilkem stands at the podium before the
packed room.
RICK FERRIS
In short, I'm happy to say that help may
finally be on the way.
That is Ron's POV as he listens to Ferris, looking around at
the crowd, who are almost exclusively gay MEN. Ron wanders
toward a table lined with LITERATURE. An EFFEMINATE MAN
approaches him with a pamphlet. Ron stares at him blankly.
The man opens his arms to give him a hug.
EFFEMINATE MAN
It's okay brother. We're all getting --
RON
Tooth fairy, if we weren't in a public
place right now, your teeth would be so
far down your throat you'd be usin' your
ass to chew food.
The Man's eyes go wide as he backs off. Ron turns back to the
table, takes a few pamphlets. Titles include: "POPPERS STUDY:
POSSIBLE CAUSE OF AIDS"; "AZT SHOWS SIGNS OF PROMISE". Ron
drifts toward the front, where the CROWD is getting hostile.
AUDIENCE MEMBER #1 (O.C.)
How long before AZT is approved?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 19
RICK FERRIS
The FDA standard procedure to approve a
new drug is eight to twelve years -
AUDIENCE MEMBER #2 (O.C.)
(cutting him off)
We're dying here!
RICK FERRIS
We are looking to fast track --
AUDIENCE MEMBER #1 (O.C.)
(cutting him off)
We need it now!
RICK FERRIS
We're working closely with the FDA to
make sure every effort is made--
AUDIENCE MEMBER #2 (O.C.)
The hell, if it works even a little,
we'll take the chance!
General shouts of agreement from the CROWD.
RICK FERRIS
It's both our job and the FDA's to make
sure the drug is safe -
EFFEMINATE MAN
Is it true you can get it in Mexico?!
AUDIENCE MEMBER #2 (O.C.)
What about dextran sulfate?!
As the chaos and shouting continues, Ron walks out in
frustration and we're suddenly--
24 INT. STRIP CLUB - NIGHT 24
CLOSE ON -- a line of flickering CANDLES.
That's Ron's POV as he grimaces, despair in his eyes. He
doesn't look at the moving, out-of-focus SILHOUETTES in front
of him.
RON
(mumbles to himself)
I need to slow it down a second, catch my
breath. I'm not ready to crawl into a
corner. You hear that? I'm not fucking
ready. Man, if you're up there you
better be listening.
(MORE)
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 19A
RON (CONT'D)
And if there's a chance, if I got one
fucking chance, send me a sign.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 20
Ron downs a shooter and grimaces again. He slams the glass
down on a table among empty glasses and looks up at the
candles on a stage in front of a STRIPPER, lost in his
thoughts. Then he looks up and sees something across the
room, past the stripper. She tries to get his attention.
STRIPPER
If you're not gonna look or buy a dance,
you could at least tip me.
Ron stands and throws some bills on the stage.
RON
I'll take a dance, but not fer me.
Just shake it, he'll see you.
Ron looks heavenward.
RON
Thanks.
And he walks off towards a man at the end of the bar: the
Hispanic Orderly from the hospital.
25 EXT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - REAR - NIGHT 25
Cowboy boots nervously play with a McDonald's Bag on the
ground next to a garbage dumpster. They stop when the
Hispanic Orderly walks out of the hospital. He gets to the
dumpster, throws a BROWN PAPER BAG in it, picks up the
McDonald's bag, looks inside and leaves without a word.
26 INT. RON'S TRAILER - NIGHT 26
Ron sits at the table, removes a box of pills from the bag
labeled AZT, FOR RESEARCH PURPOSES ONLY.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 21
Ron removes a pill, decides two is better, washes them down
with a beer, and sniffs a line of coke. Looks at his
reflection in the turned-off T.V.
27 EXT. OIL FIELD - DAY 27
As Ron pulls up to his jobs site in his battered '73 Lincoln,
he spots T.J., Clint and a half dozen other WORKERS through
the windshield, all staring at him menacingly. Before Ron
gets out, the Foreman emerges through the crowd. Without a
word, the guy just slowly shakes his head. Ron gives him the
finger and drives off, popping a few more AZT pills.
A27 EXT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - REAR - NIGHT A27
The Hispanic Orderly throws a BROWN PAPER BAG in the dumpster,
picks up a fast food bag, and leaves.
28 EXT. RODEO STADIUM - BLEACHERS - DAY 28
Empty; closed for the day. Ron sits in the empty bleachers,
sweaty and shivering; he looks horrible, maybe disoriented.
He pops a pill of AZT and drinks from a bottle of Tequila.
29 EXT. TRAILER PARK - NIGHT 29
A labyrinth of identical trailers. Ron wanders, searching for
his own. Confused, he changes direction and continues to make
his way down the different rows.
He stops in front of one and stares at the door where two
YOUNG BOYS are seated on the steps, staring back at him.
RON
The hell you doin' here?
He waves them aside. As he walks up the steps, his neighbor
BUCKY and his WIFE stare at him blankly.
RON
Fuck you doin' in my house?
Ron doesn't realize that he's not at his place.
30 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - DR. EVE SAKS' OFFICE - DAY 30
Sitting on an examining table, meet RAYON, a cross-dresser in
his early 30s, in long eyelashes, earrings, painted nails with
a pink scarf tied around a full brown curly wig.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 21A
EVE
(reviewing a chart)
You missed your last trial appointment.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 22
RAYON
Do you like this blouse? Cause I think
the neckline's too low.
Eve leans against the sink, annoyed. She pulls her mask down.
EVE
Rayon, the whole point of this study is
to determine whether AZT is helping
people.
RAYON
Come on, Evie, you know there ain't no
helpin' me.
EVE
That doesn't mean I'm going to stop
trying.
RAYON
Why you so good to me?
Rayon watches Eve for a while, with affection. He grabs her
and holds on to her. These two seem to have a history.
31 EXT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - REAR - DAY 31
A steady drizzle. Ron stands out by the dumpster, his boots
and cowboy hat soaked. The Hispanic Orderly emerges from the
hospital, a large garbage bag in his hands.
HISPANIC ORDERLY
There ain't no more, they started
lockin' it up.
The Orderly throws the garbage into the dumpster.
RON
I got more cash.
The Orderly studies Ron who holds out some money. The Orderly
snatches it, and writes something on a piece of paper.
ORDERLY
Here. In Mexico. A doctor, he has some.
Ron takes the paper, looks at it.
RON
What the hell is this bullshit?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 23
Ron takes a swing at the Orderly but misses. Something about
Ron is off. We hear the ringing sound again. Ron struggles
to stand and collapses onto the ground. Black.
FEMALE VOICE (V.O.)
Mr. Woodroof?
32 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - ROOM - NIGHT 32
Ron lays in bed asleep, an I.V. tube hooked up to his arm.
FEMALE VOICE (V.O.)
Ron?
Ron's eyes slowly peel open. Eve is hovering over him, a
surgical mask on her face. As he looks at her, a faint smile
passes his lips.
RON
Beautiful.
Eve frowns, didn't expect that.
EVE
You're in the hospital.
Ron blinks. Clears the fantasy. His eyes scan the room.
EVE
You almost died.
RON
I'm sure that didn't surprise anyone.
Eve seems to smile behind her mask.
RON
Was that a smile?
Eve
You've had a blood transfusion.
Dr. Sevard steps forward.
Dr. Sevard
Mr. Woodroof I'm doctor Sevard.
Ron
I remember you.
Dr. Sevard
I need you to tell me where you obtained
AZT from.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 23A
RON
Who said I was on AZT?
DR. SEVARD
Dealing in pharmaceutical drugs is
illegal.
Ron
I don't know what you're talking about.
Dr. Sevard shakes his head and walks out.
EVE
Get some rest.
She follows Sevard out of the room.
RON
Wait. We were just gettin' somewhere.
RAYON (O.C.)
Honey, you don't have the slightest
chance.
Ron turns and sees the hospital curtain being pulled by the
PATIENT in the next bed -- it's Rayon.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 24
RAYON
I'm Rayon.
Rayon gets up and goes over to Ron's bed.
RON
Congratulations, fuck you and go back to
your bed.
RAYON
Relax, I don't bite.
Rayon looks Ron over.
RAYON
I guess you're handsome in a Texas hick,
white trash, dumb, kinda way.
RON
Get the fuck outta here, whatever you
are.
RAYON
Sticks and stones, cowboy.
(beat)
You wanna play cards?
RON
(perking up)
You got cash?
33 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - ROOM - NIGHT 33
Ron sits cross-legged on his bed across from Rayon, who has a
pile of cash before him. As they lay their cards down:
RAYON
Full house. Jacks over threes.
RON
I'da figured you for queens.
Cleaned out, Ron tosses his cards; Rayon scoops up the money.
RAYON
Sorry darlin'.
As Ron starts to unfold his legs, he suddenly SCREAMS in pain,
grabbing his calf. Rayon grabs his leg, presses his fingers
deep into the muscle and massages. Ron contorts in pain,
grips the side of the bed. Rayon goes deeper.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 25
RAYON
Breath. Relax.
Ron breaths. Finally the pain subsides and Ron is left limp.
RAYON
Here, drink some water.
Rayon HOLDS the cup so Ron can drink.
RAYON
You gotta stay hydrated or your muscles
will cramp.
Rayon starts to massage Ron's other foot.
RAYON
You got nice feet.
RON
Jesus Christ, I'm straight, OK!
Rayon leaves Ron alone. An awkward beat.
RON
Why the fuck you in here anyway?
RAYON
The AZT trial. My friend is paying me to
split my dose with him. That way we'll
both get some.
RON
How much is he paying you?
RAYON
Five grand.
RON
What?
RAYON
I coulda charged him twenty.
RON
How about me? Will you sell me some?
RAYON
Sorry, sweetie. I made a deal.
We HEAR someone speaking loud in the hallway, in Spanish.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 26
RAYON
(in Spanish)
Can you keep it down?
34 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - HALLWAY - DAY 34
Eve spots Ron, back in his clothes, walking towards the exit.
EVE (O.C.)
Mr. Woodroof!
Ron stops, turns to see Eve approaching wit Nurse Frazin.
EVE
Where are you going?
RON
I signed myself out.
EVE
You're too sick to leave here.
RON
The worst-case scenario bein' what?
EVE
We can keep you comfortable at least.
RON
Thanks, but I prefer to die with my
boots on.
EVE
As your doctor, I cannot recommend you to
do this.
RON
Well as my doctor, can you get me some
damn AZT?
Eve just looks at him. She can't. Ron takes off.
35 EXT. TRAILER PARK - NIGHT 35
Ron emerges from his Lincoln, approaches his trailer. Stops
in his tracks at the EVICTION NOTICE taped to his padlocked
door, over which someone has spray-painted: FAGGOT BLOOD.
RON
I still live here, you hear me?! I
fuckin' live here!!
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 27
He looks around, eyes wild, heart racing... but there's no one
there to hear him. After a beat, he crosses to his car, pops
the trunk. Grabs a single-barreled Winchester SHOTGUN lying
within it. He checks the CHAMBER, spins the gun, does a few
maneuvers, the barrel pointing at his head. He pumps it, then
in a flash levels it and BLASTS the lock off his trailer door.
36 INT. RON'S TRAILER - NIGHT 36
Ron enters, and desperately looks around for something,
anything to take with him. He finds HIDDEN CASH in a Patsy
Cline Crazy cassette box.
A duffel bag on the shoulder, he grabs the TEXAS WILDFLOWER
PAINTING off the wall and exits.
37 EXT. TRAILER PARK - NIGHT 37
Ron starts the engine and drives to the two Kids from earlier
looking on curiously. Ron gives them a handful of candies he
stole from the hospital, and nods toward his trailer.
RON
Have fun, kids. It's all yours.
And with that, he pulls away.
38 INT. RON'S CAR - HIGHWAY - DAY 38
Ron cruises... feeling as good as he looks. He pulls the car
over. Sits there in silence. Breathes in. Looks over at his
stuff on the back seat, and then at his gun lying next to him.
He grips the steering wheel... and starts to cry.
39 EXT. STREET - MEXICO CITY - DAY 39
Ron's Lincoln rolls down the crowded, impoverished street.
40 INT. RON'S CAR - MEXICO CITY - DAY 40
Ron in the grips of PNEUMONIA, studies a hand drawn map of the
city streets. His hands shake, his skin burns with fever.
Ron turns down a small side street, stops in front of a
nondescript, WHITEWASHED door.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 27A
41 INT. DR. VASS' CLINIC - MEXICO CITY - DAY 41
Ron enters, blind-sided by the mayhem inside. Boxes of drugs
and hospital supplies lie in various stages of unpacking. An
INTERPRETER shouts above the din to his wealthy ASIAN CLIENT.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 28
DR. VASS (50's), fit but tired, shouts in Spanish to a MAN
unloading boxes. He effortlessly switches to Japanese,
continues to shout to another worker.
Dr. Vass sees Ron, quickly moves over to him.
DR. VASS
You have something for me to sign?
RON
I'm lookin' for Dr. Vass.
Dr. Vass steps over.
DR. VASS
Speak up.
RON
I'm lookin' for Vass, for some AZT.
DR. VASS
Looking to poison yourself?
He grabs an empty bottle of pills on the counter. Throws it
to Ron.
DR. VASS
That's from the chemical manufacturer who
makes AZT, Sigma.
Ron looks at the bottle labeled with skull and crossbones:
HIGHLY TOXIC, NOT FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION.
DR. VASS
First thing I tell my patients: you won't
find that shit here!
Ron looks confused. A nearby stack of boxes tumbles over.
Dr. Vass shouts to no one in particular.
VASS
Who stacked those boxes there?
(to Ron)
Check in with a nurse.
Dr. Vass is off, ripping open boxes.
Ron starts to cough again. Badly. Vass notices, and shouts
something in Spanish.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 29
42 INT. DR. VASS' CLINIC - MEXICO CITY - DAY 42
Frail and weak, Ron lies on a cot, surrounded by a dozen other
PATIENTS of varied nationalities. A NURSE records his vital
signs in a chart, then hands it off to Dr. Vass, who peruses
the information and begins reading aloud:
DR. VASS
Cocaine, alcohol, methamphetamine, AZT.
(to Ron)
That's what I call a recipe for disaster.
RON
(looking around)
Doc, this place is a shit-hole.
DR. VASS
Who said I was a Doctor? They revoked my
license to practice three years ago,
that's why I'm down in this shit-hole.
RON
Why? What'd you do?
DR. VASS
I didn't play ball.
Ron smiles.
DR. VASS
These drugs you're doing, they're
breaking down your immune system, making
you susceptible to infections.
RON
So cocaine gave me pneumonia?
DR. VASS
Cocaine made you more susceptible.
As did AZT.
RON
I thought AZT's supposed to help me.
DR. VASS
The only people AZT helps are the people
who sell it.
(beat)
It kills every cell it comes in contact
with, good and bad.
RON
So medically speakin', I kicked my own
ass!
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 30
DR. VASS
(nods as he writes)
I'm prescribing a regimen of vitamins
as well as the mineral zinc to build your
immune system back up. You'll also be
taking Aloe and essential fatty acids.
43 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - ROOM - DAY 43
In gloves and surgical masks, Eve looks on Nurse Frazin who is
drawing blood from Rayon's arm, five other AIDS PATIENTS
nearby. That done, the Nurse dispenses meds, giving each
patient a paper pill cup marked with a different NUMBER.
Rayon takes his pill, winces; Eve makes a mental note, then
walks down the line of patients, touching each of them. She
comes to Rayon, gives his shoulder a squeeze, then exits.
BLACK. SUPER:
Six months Later
44 INT. DR. VASS' CLINIC - MEXICO CITY - DAY 44
Medical journals everywhere; on the wall are rows of
entomology, various butterflies encased in GLASS. A healthier
Ron sits across from Dr. Vass who reads his test results.
RON
Well?
DR. VASS
Better. Your T-Cell count's improving.
RON
Am I still positive for HIV?
DR. VASS
You'll always test positive for HIV, and
now, you have AIDS, due the toxic shit
you've been pumping into your body, all
the drugs, plus the AZT.
(MORE)
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 31
DR. VASS (CONT'D)
You shot your immune system. Now you
have chronic pneumonia, among other
things. It can cause memory loss, mood
swings, aching joints...
RON
If it sucks, I got it.
Dr. Vass smiles and holds up a bottle in each hand.
DR. VASS
This is DDC, it works as an anti viral
similar to AZT but less toxic. And this
is Peptide T, it's a protein -- totally
non-toxic. Early studies have shown it
can help with all of that. This is what
I had you on since you got here.
RON
And you can't buy them back in the U.S.?
DR. VASS
No, not approved.
Ron takes the bottle of PEPTIDE T, turns it over in his hand,
looks around.
RON
Chinks, homos and herbs, you got a new
world order here, Vass. You could be
makin' a fortune off this stuff.
45 EXT. DR. VASS' CLINIC - MEXICO CITY - DAY 45
Ron stares into the trunk of his Lincoln Convertible.
VARIOUS BOXES filled with illegal meds are packed to the brim.
It won't close. Ron slams it shut.
Dr. Vass emerges from the building. He hands Ron a neatly
folded black vest, black pants and a detachable clerical
collar on top.
DR. VASS
If you get caught, don't tell them you
got AIDS. They'll never let you back in.
You've got thirty days to get your ass
back down here and pay me the other half,
after that I send MIGUEL.
Ron nods to Miguel, hops in his car, starts it, nods to Vass
and takes off.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 32
46 EXT. CAR - THE CHIHUAHUAN DESERT - MEXICO - DAY 46
Ron's convertible races along the asphalt road. Hot desert
sun. Sand and dirt cake the rims and tires. The car slows
down and comes to a stop on the side of the road.
47 INT. RON'S CAR - THE CHIHUAHUAN DESERT - MEXICO - DAY 47
BINOCULARS POV on CARS making their way across the
MEXICAN/AMERICAN BORDER. Ron puts down the binoculars and
writes on a NOTEBOOK. A crude drawing of the border. He
marks different lanes, studies it, looking for patterns.
Ron throws the pen down and exits the car.
48 EXT. CAR - THE CHIHUAHUAN DESERT - MEXICO - DAY 48
As Ron goes to get out of the car he is pulled back by a
PLASTIC TUBE attached to his ARM.
We follow it up to a shirt HOOK on the passenger side.
An I.V. BAG hangs carelessly from the hook, a liquid flowing
INTRAVENOUSLY into Ron's arm.
He reaches in and grabs the bag off the hook, gets out of the
car, holds the bag above his shoulder and takes a PISS.
49 INT. RON'S CAR - AMERICAN/MEXICAN BORDER - DAY 49
Ron now wears a PRIEST UNIFORM. He hands the BORDER AGENT his
passport.
BORDER AGENT
Anything to declare.
RON
Nada.
The Border Agent takes him in a moment, his outfit, the car,
the frame of the trunk almost touching the wheel and...
CUT TO:
50 INT. U.S. CUSTOMS HOLDING ROOM - AMERICAN/MEXICAN BORDER - DAY 50
Ron sits behind a table when a MAN in a suit walks in. He
takes off his jacket and sits.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 32A
RICHARD BARKLEY
I'm Richard Barkley from the Food and
Drug Administration office.
Ron nods. A beat.
RICHARD BARKLEY
You're a priest?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 33
Ron smiles. The customs agent doesn't.
RICHARD BARKLEY
You have over 2,000 pills here. You are
only allowed to bring in a ninety day
supply.
RON
Well as I told the gentlemen, I am a sick
man. I have cancer. I take 22 pills a
day and these here vials of Vitamin A, C,
E and Zinc. That there is ninety days.
The man looks at Ron, not really buying it. He takes a bottle
of Peptide T and looks at it.
RICHARD BARKLEY
Vitamins?
(no answer from Ron)
You do realize that importing unapproved
drugs for sale is a very serious offense?
RON
Well, as I said, they're not for
sale. And they ain't illegal,
just "unapproved."
A long beat; they stare at each other.
RICHARD BARKLEY
If we find the slightest indication that
you're selling these drugs for profit,
you will be thrown in jail... Father.
RON
Then I promise to take each and every
one of them pills myself. In fact this
present detainment has already put me off
schedule... Son.
50A INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - RECEPTION DESK - DAY 50A
Ron talks to Nurse Frazin.
RON
I'm looking for Dr. Eve Saks.
NURSE FRAZIN
She's not here today.
Nurse Frazin leaves. Ron looks over the counter, sees
something, looks around...
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 33A
51 INT. EVE'S HOUSE - LIVING ROOM - DALLAS - NIGHT 51
Perfectly ordered and spotless except for files and reports
piled on the floor. An exhausted Eve takes her lab coat off,
picks up a study and aims for the kitchen when a KNOCK comes
at the door.
EVE
It's open!
Ron comes in.
EVE
Mr. Woodroof... Ron, I thought you
were...
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 34
RON
(cutting her off)
Dead? Sorry for bargin' in.
EVE
What are you doing here? You look great.
RON
Actually I look amazin'. But you,
you look like shit.
EVE
What happened to you?
RON
So you got any music? Or crackers?
EVE
I'm sorry, but what is this?
RON
It's a celebration of how absolutely
fuckin' wrong you were.
Ron holds up a bottle of sparkling wine.
EVE
Excuse me?
RON
Thirty days you said! Well here it is
months later and I'm goin' like
gangbusters. Now if that don't call for
a little Cheez Whiz on a Ritz, I don't
know what does!
Ron heads for the refrigerator.
EVE
No. Don't... I don't really eat here.
The DOORBELL interrupts them. Ron watches as Eve crosses and
opens the door, admitting Rayon, looking like shit and shaking
badly in a full-length, pink fur coat.
RAYON
Them bastards Kentucky fried me.
Rayon sways; Eve grabs his arm. Ron watches as Eve helps
Rayon inside.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 35
RON
You women love Nancy Boys.
Ron crosses to help Rayon to the couch. He leans his head
back, labors to breathe.
EVE
(to Rayon)
Tell me what's wrong.
RON
Hell, I'll tell you what's wrong,
it's the goddamn AZT!
EVE
What?
RON
It's killin' him, can't you see that?
Why you think I look so healthy?
Ron reaches into his his jacket, produces a small BOX filled
with MEDS. He takes out a brand new syringe and bottle of
liquid.
RON
Tinkerbell, how much cash you got?
Off his silence, Ron rummages through Rayon's purse, extracts
two twenties, pockets them, and starts preparing the syringe.
EVE
What the hell do you think you're doing?!
RON
Helpin' him, that's what.
EVE
He's a participant in a clinical trial,
we need to get him to the hospital!
RON
So they can fuck him up even worse?
Ron disregards her protests, starts to inject Rayon.
EVE
Are you out of your mind?! If anything
happens to him--
RON
Relax, it's just a little vitamin boost,
A, C, zinc.
(MORE)
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 36
RON (CONT'D)
(to Rayon)
You want to live, get off the AZT.
EVE
It's a blind study! We don't even know
if he's getting AZT!
RAYON
Everyone knows what they're gettin'.
AZT tastes differently. I guess I got
lucky and got the real thing.
RON
Yeah, real lucky.
(to Eve)
I've got stuff here that works. Healthy,
non-toxic. You should trial it and we'll
both get rich.
EVE
Leave, please!
Ron turns to Rayon.
RON
Tell your friends about me. Send `em
my way and I'll hook `em up.
Ron heads for the door.
RON
And tell `em to bring their fuckin'
money. Cash. No checks.
Eve and Rayon can't believe this guy.
52 EXT. OAK LAWN DISTRICT - STREET - DAY 52
Ron stands in the heartland of the gay community, with SHOPS,
BARS and CLUBS. He tries to engage gay PASSERSBY, none of
whom will give him the time of day.
53 INT. DRADDY AUDITORIUM - NIGHT 53
With another support meeting underway, Ron talks to a small
group of GAY MEN, who look at him warily.
54 EXT. GAY CLUB - NIGHT 54
Dozens of GAY MEN mill about; Ron watches as some hold hands,
others grope one another.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 37
He spots a COUPLE just talking, but as he approaches, they
start making out. Ron stops in his tracks, turns to leave,
bumps right into a MAN dressed just like him, except this
cowboy's CHAPS have nothing covering his ass. The guy nods
for Ron to follow him inside the club.
RON
Are you out of your fucking mind?!
55 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - ROOM - DAY 55
As Nurse Frazin monitors an AIDS PATIENT receiving a blood
transfusion, Eve reviews his chart.
EVE
This man also had a transfusion?
NURSE FRAZIN
The AZT. We can tell who's on it by the
symptoms. Most of them need new blood.
EVE
(looking at chart)
He's actually getting worse.
Eve looks at the sleeping Patient; she reaches for his hand.
NURSE FRAZIN
So why are they stopping the trial?
EVE
What do you mean?
NURSE FRAZIN
Barrow Wilkem, didn't you see the memo?
They claim most people are feeling better
and fewer people are dying.
EVE
Really?
56 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - HALLWAY - DAY 56
In mid-conversation, Eve follows Dr. Sevard down the hall.
EVE
Transfusions always makes patients feel
better. Give the placebo patients new
blood and they'll feel better too.
Sevard stops to sign a form for a NURSE.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 38
EVE
I have questions about the drug's safety.
I've seen it drop white blood cells in a
lot of my patients making them more
susceptible to infection.
DR. SEVARD
It's Barrow Wilkem's call, Eve. So we
can get the drug to the people who need
it.
EVE
After six months?
DR. SEVARD
Their trial results are overwhelmingly
positive. AZT is working.
EVE
But we have no idea what the long term
effects are. It's irresponsible.
DR. SEVARD
These people die, Eve. There are no
long-term effects.
EVE
Can I see a copy of the study?
DR. SEVARD
It's still being written. Here.
He produces a two page document and hands it to Eve.
EVE
A press release from the NIH?
Sevard crosses off. Eve stands there, stunned.
Her POV on the press release: "HIV-positive patients are twice
as likely to get AIDS if they don't take AZT."
57 INT. RON'S CAR - DALLAS STREET - DAY 57
Ron is parked on a quiet street. He counts his cash and is
startled when suddenly a WOMAN gets in the passenger seat.
RON
(pulls a 9mm pistol)
Jesus Mother Mary Fuckin' Christ!
She's not a woman, it's...
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 39
RAYON
I was looking for you, Lonestar.
RON
I could of killed you!
RAYON
I feel better! I wanted to thank you.
RON
Good for you. Now get the fuck out!
RAYON
I need more of that cocktail shit you
got!
RON
Listen Tinkerbell, unless you got cash or
some new clients for me, I'm busy. Now
get the f...
RAYON
(interrupting)
Let's just do this quickly so I can get
the fuck out!
Rayon shows Ron a stack of bills. A big one.
RAYON
You got enough for 20 of us?
Rayon sees how Ron looks at his cash.
RAYON
You know what? You don't deserve our
money, you homophobic asshole!
Rayon gets out. Ron watches him walk away in disbelief.
RON
Am I fuckin' dreamin'?
Rayon walks over to a FRIEND of his on the street. That's
Ron's POV as he backs his car towards them.
RON
Here's enough for 20, find me 20 more and
I'll cut you in. Five percent.
Rayon plays it cool, barely looks at Ron.
RAYON
Adios, cowboy.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 40
RON
What's wrong?
RAYON
I can handle your insults, but five
percent?
RON
Ten.
RAYON
Twenty five, take it or leave it.
58 Ron shakes his head in disbelief. And nods. Rayon walks to 58
Ron's car with a big smile on his face.
59 EXT. GAY CLUB - NIGHT 59
Rayon tries to get Ron to come in. Ron doesn't want to.
Rayon pushes him in.
60 INT. GAY CLUB - NIGHT 60
On the dance floor, Rayon grinds with a group of MEN. He
waves Ron over from the sidelines. The cowboy with the
chapless butt stares at Ron. Ron doesn't think it's funny.
60B EXT. DRADDY AUDITORIUM - PARKING LOT - NIGHT 60B
Rayon is on the look out. Ron sells MEDS out of the trunk of
his car to a line of GAY MEN. A CUSTOMER hands him some cash,
Ron reaches into his trunk and finds a pair of handcuffs
slapped on his wrists. He's pushed against the cars, his legs
kicked apart. Fuck.
60C INT. POLICE STATION - HOLDING ROOM - DAY 60C
Ron sits with David Wayne.
RON
Five grand worth of shit. Shit I owe
money on.
Richard Barkley walks in.
RICHARD BARKLEY
Father Woodroof. 90 days supply?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 40A
RON
I was just sharing.
RICHARD BARKLEY
(with compassion)
Listen, I know what the situation is. I
know people are looking for solutions.
But this is not the right one. This is
dangerous. You can't sell drugs to
people. Do you understand?
RON
Yeah, I understand.
David Wayne
My client would like his drugs back for
his own personal use.
Richard Barkley
They've already been destroyed.
Ron clenches his jaw, tries to remain cool.
Richard Barkley
I hope we have an understanding. You're
breaking the law.
A60 INT. DALLAS PUBLIC LIBRARY - DAY A60
Ron is back to his reading. In front of him: NEWSPAPERS from
SAN FRANCISCO, LONDON, NEW YORK. Ron sees something. Light
bulb moment.
A61 EXT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - DAY A61
Ron and Rayon walk towards an old retro looking motel from the
sixties.
RAYON
You gotta be kidding me?!
RON
No, perfect place. We gotta lay low.
Don't wanna get busted. I got a plan.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 41
61 INT. DALLAS BUYER'S CLUB MOTEL - RON'S OFFICE - DAY 61
Ron stacks boxes in the room among his personal stuff. The
place looks like what it is: a cheap sex motel.
RAYON
This place is disgusting. We need to
disinfect.
RON
Do not use the word "we". Now you wanna
put your apron on and fly around on your
broom, be my guest.
Just then, a KNOCK on the open door. Rayon and Ron look up to
see attorney DAVID WAYNE, 40s.
RON
Howdy Counselor, welcome.
RAYON
Hi, I'm Rayon.
Wayne takes in Rayon.
RON
He's my partner. Business partner.
Ron throws a key to Rayon.
RON
Your office's next door.
Rayon gets the message and exits. Wayne looks around at all
the boxes.
DAVID WAYNE
Jesus, how many truck loads you bring
back from Mexico? All for your own
personal use?
(gives Ron a folder)
Here's the paper work for your LLC. I
don't even want to know what it's for.
RON
Don't worry, Counselor. I ain't selling
drugs anymore.
(off Wayne's look of surprise)
I'm giving them away. For free.
(showing the folder)
By selling memberships. Four hundred a
month in dues gets you all the meds you
need.
(MORE)
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 42
RON (CONT'D)
Wayne looks at him, thinking it over.
DAVID WAYNE
You son of a bitch!
RON
Bitches. Plural. There's a bunch of
faggots runnin' a hell of a club up in
New York. That's where I got the idea.
(beat)
Welcome to the Dallas Buyers Club.
62 INT. EVE'S HOUSE - DALLAS - NIGHT - MARCH 1987 62
Eve pours herself a glass of red wine, cleans the stain left
by the bottle on the counter and sits on the couch between
paper works. CLOSE ON the TV NEWS ANCHOR.
NEWS ANCHOR
Barrow Wilkem announced today that AZT
has been approved as the first drug to
treat AIDS. At a cost of $10,000 per
year per patient, AZT is the most
expensive drug ever marketed. Barrow
Wilkem stock jumped a whopping 12% today
on the news.
Eve sits, staring at the TV.
63 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RAYON'S OFFICE - DAY 63
The small room has been turned into an office. In his version
of a Nurse outfit, Rayon is taping photos of MARC BOLAN to the
wall. We now understand where Rayon's look comes from. TEN
MEN linger through the room and into the next one through a
connecting door...
RON'S OFFICE
Ron is behind a desk, atop which sits a gun, a bottle of
Tequila and dozens of medical files. On the wall nearby are
posters of SPORTS CARS and BIKINI MODELS as well as the Texas
Wildflowers painting, news clippings regarding AIDS and a
crude CHART listing Patients and their info: SYMPTOMS, DRUGS
TAKEN, and ORIENTATION (Gay, Drug Addict, Hemophiliac).
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 43
RAYON
(as he enters)
Roanie, we have two new customers.
Ron looks up from the chart he's filling out.
RON
Bring 'em in and if you call me Roanie
again...
(grabs his gun)
...I'ma use this gun to give you the sex
change you been hopin' for.
Rayon shakes his head, walking off, as IAN and MICHAEL, a
conservative gay couple in their 50s appear in the doorway.
They look at Ron's gun and hesitate to walk in.
RON
Ah shit, did I scare you? Sorry.
Welcome to the Dallas Buyers Club.
Ron puts the gun away. Ian and Michael sit down. Ian is
clearly very ill.
MICHAEL
Rayon said you can get us some medicine.
RON
He told you how it works? Treatments and
drugs are free, but the membership, 400$.
They nod yes.
RON
(handing them a clipboard)
You'll have to sign a waiver. We take no
responsibility for the drugs we give you.
You croak, you croak. That's your
problem.
Michael looks at Ian, who nods okay. They sign the waiver.
MICHAEL
We have AZT, it helped Ian a little at
first, but now he can't walk or think
straight.
RON
First of all, flush that shit down the
toilet. Secondly, stay away from
anything that'll cook your insides.
Third, get healthy and if your brain's
broke, I got something called Peptide T
that'll fix it.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 44
Michael looks at Ian, not sure what to think. Ron hands them
each a questionnaire.
RON
Fill that there out and don't cheat on
the drugs part. Can't help you if I
don't know what you're doin'.
Ron puts a box of pills on the desk.
RON
I got more stuff comin' in about a week.
Til then, watch what you eat and who you
eat.
64 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - NURSE STATION - DAY 64
Eve paces, checks her watch as Nurse Frazin sits nearby
reviewing files.
EVE
He didn't call, leave a message?
NURSE FRAZIN
Nothing.
(then; off file)
He did change his address recently.
A65 EXT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - DAY A65
Still in her white lab coat, Eve gets out of her car and walks
towards an open door.
65 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB - RON'S OFFICE - DAY 65
Boxes of drugs and herbs everywhere. Ron is on the phone
arguing with someone, a small Japanese-English dictionary in
his hand. He stops in his tracks when he sees Eve walking in.
RON
Never mind. I'll call back. Thank you.
Arigato.
He hangs up.
EVE
What are you doing here?
RON
I live here.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 45
EVE
Where's Rayon? You're roommates now?
RON
Not exactly. What are you doing here?
Confused, Eve looks down on Ron's desk, picks up a file.
He moves to stop her, but he's too late.
EVE
Roger Thompson? This is my patient. Are
you treating these people?
RON
They're treatin' themselves.
EVE
With what?
RON
Vitamins, Peptide T, DDC. Anything but
that poison you're hawkin'.
Eve starts to look at the chart. A few beats, then:
RON
Do you ever wear any color? Every time I
see you I see white.
Ron smiles. Eve does not.
EVE
Tell Rayon I was looking for him. And
I'm telling my patients to stay away from
here.
Eve walks out the door.
RON
Why? You wanna go grab a steak? I know
it's red but...
And she exits.
66 INT. SUPERMARKET - DALLAS - DAY 66
A near empty cart stands next to Ron as he studies the label
on a box. Rayon, dressed in his pink coat, walks up.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 46
RON
This is the shit that'll rot your
insides. What a surprise, FDA approved.
What the fuck is potassium benzoate?
RAYON
Preservative.
Rayon throws a pack of bologna in the cart.
RON
You fuckin' kiddin' me?
Defiant, Rayon puts his hand on his hips.
RON
Don't pollute me with that processed
crap. I'm eatin' healthy.
Ron removes the bologna and throws it at Rayon who almost
fumbles the catch.
RAYON
It's protein, it's good for you.
RON
Put it back.
Rayon tosses it back at Ron.
RAYON
You can't tell me what to do.
Ron throws the Bologna harder at Rayon, who catches it like a
pro football player, much to Ron's surprise. Rayon enjoys the
moment and disappears down the isle, proud, with his bologna
under the arm.
Ron turns the corner of the next isle. T.J. is there putting
a case of BEER in his shopping cart. An uncomfortable moment
passes.
T.J.
Uh, hey Ron.
Ron nods at him.
T.J.
How're you doin'?
RON
Fine.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 47
Rayon appears at the other end of the isle. T.J. sees him and
laughs.
T.J.
Jesus, faggots everywhere.
T.J. looks at Ron for confirmation. Rayon reaches them and
throws a bag of chips in the cart.
RAYON
Hi.
T.J. and Ron don't answer. An awkward beat.
RON
This is Rayon.
(off T.J.'s silence)
He said hi to you.
Rayon sticks out his hand. T.J. doesn't respond.
RON
Shake his hand, T.J.
He doesn't.
RON
Come on, buddy, what's your fuckin'
problem?
T.J. gives Ron the finger. Ron grabs T.J.'s hand and twists
it behind his back. T.J. resists, tries to get out of Ron's
grip but can't. He finally extends his hand. Rayon shakes
it.
RON
Good. Now get the fuck outta here and go
back to your miserable life.
T.J. stares at Ron for a while, angry, humiliated, then
leaves. Ron watches him go. Rayon stares at Ron, unsure of
how to react to this. A subtle smile appears on his face.
RON
What?
Rayon's moved that Ron stuck up for him. He starts to tear
up.
Ron sees the bag of chips in the cart and throws it at Rayon.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 48
67 EXT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - HALLWAY - DAY 67
Two dozen MEN, all prospective buyers, snake down the long
exterior hallway. A NEIGHBOR walks by, disgusted, hugging the
wall as he makes it to his own door.
That is Ron's POV following at a distance as he arrives from
the supermarket.
INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - 2ND FLOOR ROOM - DAY
A young, gay man, FREDDIE, stands awkwardly fidgeting by the
door, makeup poorly masking lesions on his face and neck. The
line of customers is snaking behind him. Ron sees Freddie's
money, grabs it and counts it.
RON
Fifty bucks.
(yelling to the line)
You don't got the money, you don't join
the club. This ain't no charity.
Ron gives Freddy his money back.
RON
You need three hundred and fifty more.
DENISE, a Club volunteer, early forties, walks in.
DENISE
Beaumont Lab's delivery is here. A woman
says you were expecting her.
69 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RON'S OFFICE - DAY 69
FRANCINE SUSKIND (37), stands in front of Ron's desk looking
at a MAN behind her wheeling in cardboard boxes on a dolly.
FRANCINE SUSKIND
You can get it abroad but in the States,
we can only use it for animal research.
It's not classified as a drug so the FDA
does not control it.
RON
I'm usin' it for memory loss. You oughta
try gettin' it to market.
FRANCINE SUSKIND
It costs around 250 million dollars to
get a drug to market.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 49
RON
Damn, bureaucracy is good business.
Francine smiles, she likes Ron. The man places the BOXES
marked PEPTIDE T on the floor.
FRANCINE SUSKIND
These are for your animal research.
Ron winks at her, waits for the delivery man to leave, and
produces a plastic BAG filled with vials and drugs.
RON
And these are for your daughter.
She takes the bag of medication and surprisingly becomes
emotional. She holds it back, tries to say thank you but
can't. Ron nods "it's ok". She hugs him.
INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - 2ND FLOOR ROOM - NIGHT
Rayon finishes packing Ron's suitcase. He's high. Wasted.
71 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RON'S OFFICE - NIGHT 71
Ron works the combination lock on a safe. He stops. Wonders
what's wrong. Looks dizzy. He goes to his desk and pops some
pills. Takes a deep breath.
Rayon enters with the suitcase and a Pan Am airline envelope.
RAYON
You're all packed, here's your ticket.
Ron removes a stack of cash from the safe and hands it to
Rayon.
RON
(keeps the money)
Jesus! Are you fuckin' high?
RAYON
None of your business.
RON
Actually, it is if I can't fuckin' trust
you.
(yelling)
Denise!
Denise shows up from the other room.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 49A
RON
You're in charge!
RAYON
(grabs the money)
No! You can trust me!
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 50
They stare at each other.
RON
Make sure my new Caddy is at the airport
for when I get back.
RAYON
Got it.
RON
Denise, you hearin' this? Now you two
monkeys take care of the zoo.
And as Ron takes his suitcase and exits...
RON
(to Denise)
Keep an eye on him.
72 EXT. AIRPLANE - STOCK FOOTAGE - DAY 72
A 747 soars across the sky. On screen appears:
Hayashira Chemical Lab - Okayama, Japan
73 INT. HAYASHIRA CHEMICAL LAB - JAPAN - WAITING AREA - DAY 73
Briefcase in hand, cowboy hat on his head, Ron waits along
with JAPANESE MEN who all stare at him. After a few beats,
MR. YAMATA, the lab's manager approaches.
MR. YAMATA
Mr. Woodroof?
RON
That's me.
Yamata bows, then:
MR. YAMATA
Regarding your order. I am so sorry, but
we are no longer allowed to export
interferon to the United States.
RON
What do you mean?
MR. YAMATA
I am sorry. I know you've come a long
way.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 50A
RON
Fourteen hours on a plane, but hey, who
gives a shit, right?
(off Yamata's look)
(MORE)
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 51
RON (CONT'D)
Look, if it's a matter of money, I can
make it worth your while, I got cash--
MR. YAMATA
(cutting him off)
Please understand. Japanese doctors
will be the only ones who can make the
purchase.
And as Ron's wheels turn...
74 INT. DR. HIROSHI'S OFFICE - OKAYAMA - DAY 74
CLOSE ON -- DR. HIROSHI, 40s, who sits talking on the phone.
DR. HIROSHI
(in Japanese)
...that is correct. Two thousand vials
of alpha interferon.
A REVERSE ANGLE reveals Ron, across from Hiroshi. Over the
above, he slides ten $100 dollar bills across the desk.
DR. HIROSHI
(in Japanese)
That's right. Delivered directly to my
office. Thank you.
(to Ron)
Slow drip. Very strong. Slow drip.
Ron walks to Dr. Hiroshi, thanks him, and looks him over from
head to toe.
75 INT. HOTEL ROOM - OKAYAMA - NIGHT 75
Ron packs his suitcase and puts on a ROLEX and an expensive
ring.
BATHROOM:
Ron looks at his reflection in the mirror.
76 INT. DALLAS INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT - CUSTOMS AREA - DAY 76
A CUSTOMS OFFICER looks at Ron dressed with Dr. Hiroshi's lab
coat, and wearing Dr. Sevard's hair style as he talks into a
large first generation cell phone.
RON
Yeah, I'm coming. Prepare the sedation.
Propofol. 10 milligrams.
(MORE)
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 52
RON (CONT'D)
I said I'm coming.
(hangs up, to the officer)
Good morning.
77 INT. DALLAS INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT - MEN'S REST ROOM - DAY 77
Ron enters the Men's rest room carrying his suitcase and
briefcase, and disappears in a...
STALL - LATER
Ron injects a needle into his arm.
On the toilet, an empty VIAL from the BRIEFCASE.
Ron takes his lab coat off and stops. A searing pain courses
through his chest. Ron grimaces. The strange ringing again
in his ears. Then another shooting pain...
78 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - RECEPTION AREA - DAY 78
Tucker and a fellow POLICE OFFICER are doing paperwork next to
a MAN covered with BLOOD. Tucker has a double take when he
sees an unconscious Ron being wheeled in on a stretcher by two
PARAMEDICS.
79 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - HALLWAY - DAY 79
Visible through an open door, Ron lies in bed in a hospital
gown, hooked up to an I.V. tube. In the hall, Tucker and Dr.
Sevard are with the FDA's Richard Barkley.
DR. SEVARD
We don't know what the drugs are. He's
got HIV.
TUCKER
Woodroof?
80 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - ROOM - CONTINUOUS 80
Ron hears the voices in the hallway.
RON
That a party out there?
Dr. Sevard and the others hear Ron, enter his room.
DR. SEVARD
Mr. Woodroof.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 53
RON
Doc-tor Sevard! You must be surprised to
see me.
DR. SEVARD
You nearly killed yourself. We need to
know where you acquired those drugs.
RON
(re: I.V. tube)
And I need to know what you're
pumpin' into me here.
DR. SEVARD
A combination of AZT...
RON
What? Get it out!
Ron rips the I.V. out of his arm.
RON
I'm gonna sue you for attempted murder!
Where's my stuff?
DR. SEVARD
Your stuff gave you a heart attack.
RON
Go to hell. I say what goes in my body,
not you. Final. Period. End of story.
DR. SEVARD
That decision, like it or not, is left up
to the people in this hospital.
RON
This thing's an epidemic and you're still
lookin for guinea pigs. Well do I look
like a rodent to you?
RICHARD BARKLEY
Mr. Woodroof, we tolerate the Buyers
Clubs. Now, every other organization in
the country is dancing with us but for
some reason, either you don't understand
what we're saying or you just don't give
a shit.
DR. SEVARD
You're a fool if you think you're helping
yourself.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 53A
RON
That's right. I fooled you. You told me
I'd be dead in thirty days.
(MORE)
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 54
RON (CONT'D)
Well HOWDYFUCKINDOODY, cuz it's a year
later and look whose still here?
Tucker tries to stifle a laugh.
RON
Now I'm through with you. You got
anything to say, tell it to my real
doctor, Dr. Saks.
Rayon rushes in carrying Ron's leather jacket.
RAYON
I was so worried --
RON
(looks around)
Where's my suitcase?
SEVARD
Mr. Woodroof, would you please get back
in bed?
RON
Nope. And if you're gonna call an
orderly on me, you'd better fuckin' do
it, cuz this motherfucker is going home.
81 Ron grabs his leather jacket and throws it on. He walks out 81
and we see he's naked under his gown.
82 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - DR. EVE SAKS' OFFICE - DAY 82
Eve sits behind her desk, Dr. Sevard standing across from her.
DR. SEVARD
You're his physician and you can't tell
me what medications he's on?
EVE
He came in once for advice. I have
no idea what he does outside of this
hospital.
DR. SEVARD
Well the FDA confiscated over two
thousand vials of alpha interferon...
that he was about to sell to AIDS
patients. Our patients!
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 54A
EVE
(testing the waters)
Actually, I've been reading about Buyers
Clubs. They say they found other drugs
that are eliminating symptoms.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 55-57
DR. SEVARD
Without controlled trials, we'll never be
able to cure this thing because we'll
have no legitimate data. Tell your
patients to stay away from him.
With that, Sevard exits. On Eve.
83 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RAYON'S OFFICE - DAY 83
Lots of activity, many EMPLOYEES on phones, SHIPMENTS coming
in, new CLIENTS lined up through the connecting door into...
RON'S OFFICE. Maps of the different locations around the
country where buyers clubs have shown up, New-York, San-
Francisco, Miami.
RAYON
(holding a phone)
This guy says the Florida Buyers Club is
cheaper.
RON
Then tell him to move to the fuckin'
sunshine state!
A phone cradled in his neck, Ron accepts a shipment of several
dozen boxes from a guy we saw earlier in Mexico.
RON
(into phone)
What do you mean you can't get it back?!
It was authorized by a doctor!
DAVID WAYNE (O.C.)
The FDA said it was a Japanese doctor
with no legal standing. What can I say,
they make it up as they go.
RON
84 Then check China, Amsterdam and Israel 84
cause that's where I'm fuckin' goin'!
85 MONTAGE 85
PLANES take off and LAND; we track Ron making his way through
various airports and international cities; we see a series of
Departure Boards - Tel Aviv; Amsterdam; Hong Kong.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 58
86 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RON'S OFFICE - DAY 86
Not yet open for business. As Rayon and his friend SUNNY hang
photos on a freshly-painted nearby wall. Eve stands across
from Ron with her arms crossed.
RON
I got first hand experience with all of
'em. And I'll tell you something else,
if I don't know what somethin' is, or
don't trust the white coat who's trying
to sell it to me, I fed-ex it to my lab
in Seattle and they test if for me.
Eve looks around at all the boxes and files.
RON
Then I test it all on myself before I
give it to anyone else.
(off her look)
I'm my own lab rat.
He grabs a box of meds.
RON
Compound Q. You know what happens if I
come off it? My hair falls out, I lose
weight, I can't get my dick up and I
start to die. I got three hundred other
people with the same experience.
(grabs another box)
Peptitde T. Gets rid of dementia. Stop
takin' it and you can't think straight,
walk straight, or act straight. I got
over two hundred people on that. You
following me?
(grabs another box)
DDC and DDI, both toxic, but in small
doses, helps kick opportunistic
infections.
EVE
Ron, I respect that you're learning about
your illness but some of these people
should be in the hospital.
RON
All the hospital wants is to serve up
AZT.
EVE
AZT helps eradicate the virus.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 58A
RON
Fuck the virus, once you got that, you're
married to it. I'm more concerned about
my symptoms and survival. I mean, I'm no
scientist but...
RAYON
(mocking him)
You're not? 'Cause you sound so...
scientific.
Rayon and Sunny laugh like children.
RON
You fuckin' high again?
RAYON
(giggling)
I dunno.
RON
Are you listenin' to what I'm sayin'
here about usin' that shit?
(then; noticing)
And what the fuck did you do to my wall?!
RAYON
It's cranberry mocha. For the holidays.
Ron looks back at Eve, exasperated. He grabs a folder off his
desk.
RON
People can live with this thing for
longer than they're saying. Ninety-six-
percent of people diagnosed with AIDS in
the U S of A will be dead in under six
months.
EVE
I know the statistics.
RON
Then use them. Why give people AZT when
their immune system is broken? It's
fuckin' toxic!
EVE
If you're abusing it, like you did, with
no medical surveillance, of course it is.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 58B
RON
Maybe I did abuse it, but I'm off it now,
and I'm here, feeling good. And I'm not
the only one.
Ron turns to Rayon and Sunny, who are hanging Marc Bolan's
pictures on the wall.
RON
Why is Boy George's goddamned face
everywhere in my room?
Rayon and Sunny laugh.
RAYON
It's Marc Bolan, silly! Why don't you
just get it over with and say it, you
love it!
RON
(re: Rayon's Friend)
Take your sunflower and get out.
RAYON
Fine!
Rayon and Sunny leave the room, laughing. Ron TEARS down
Bolan's pictures, and throws down the folder.
RON
You know what, look at it, don't look at
it, I don't give a shit.
87 After a beat, Eve takes the folder. 87
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 59
88 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - BATHROOM - NIGHT 88
89 Ron looks at his reflection in the mirror. Looks like he just 89
woke up. He stands over the sink taking his meds, pouring out
pills from among a DOZEN bottles. He finishes taking the last
pills, washing them down with water. Runs his hands through
his hair, looks at himself in the mirror, tries to find a
flattering angle. He stands there looking at himself. After
a while, he nods his approval.
89A INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - HALLWAY - DAY 89A
Sevard is about to walk into a room but stops in his track.
Dumbfounded, he walks towards another room, shakes his head
and continues to the nurse's station.
DR. SEVARD
Where the hell are my trial patients?
Nurse Frazin ignores him and walks away.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 60
90 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RON'S OFFICE - DAY 90
The place is jammed with BUYERS. On the wall, people add
their information to Ron's ever growing chart. EMPLOYEES
unpack boxes and wait to talk to Ron who walks out.
90A EXT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - DAY 90A
Ron walks past the line of customers and up the stairs to the
second floor. He spots a MAN leaning against his new
Cadillac.
RON
Don't touch!
91 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - 2ND FLOOR ROOM - DAY 91
Rayon, sick again, rolls down his pants and prepares to insert
a needle into his thigh. He closes his eyes, brings the
wavering needle closer to his skin...
RON
If you ain't doin' poppers and coke, how
come you look like such shit?
Rayon ignores Ron, tries to muster up the courage.
RON
You pussy, stick it in. Who do you think
is gonna do that when I ain't here?
Rayon looks at Ron with pleading eyes.
RON
Rayon, I swear, God sure was dressin' the
wrong doll when he blessed you with a
pair of balls.
(walks over)
Give me that thing.
Ron takes the needle and injects Rayon with the drug.
RON
You know it's one thing for me not to
like you, but why don't you be a better
friend to yourself?
RAYON
If I really thought you were interested,
I'd tell you.
Just then, the door opens. It's Ron's attorney, David Wayne.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 61
RON
What are you doin' here?
DAVID WAYNE
(holds up paper)
You're being audited. The IRS.
92 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RON'S OFFICE - DAY 92
Ron and David Wayne look on as two IRS AGENTS carry out boxes
of receipts and other financial records.
RON
Nice work, fellas, great. This is how
you got Al Capone, ain't it?
As the Agents exit:
DAVID WAYNE
Don't piss them off. If there's a fine,
we'll pay it.
RON
A fine? Fine, alright, how much? Ten
thousand? Twenty thousand? I'll write
you a check right now.
Ron grabs his check book.
RON
You think that will stop me, you
motherfuckers!
93 David waves Ron down with his hands. 93
94 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RON'S OFFICE - NIGHT 94
Rayon is prepping shipping boxes with Sunny, drawing abstract
artistic designs on the boxes.
Ron walks out of the bathroom dressed in a gangster style
suit. Rayon gives him the once over.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 62
RAYON
Honey, you don't have a snowball's chance
wearing that thing.
RON
Rayon, I don't need help gettin' ladies
from your sorry ass.
RAYON
Trailer trash and rodeo groupies do not
count as ladies. Are you sure she said
the word yes?
Fuck off!
RAYON
You got any flowers?
Ron looks around, spots the Wild Flower PAINTING. He walks
over and yanks it off the wall, looks at Rayon defiantly, puts
it under his arm and storms out the door.
95 INT. DUNSTON'S STEAK HOUSE - NIGHT 95
Eve waits in a booth. She watches a couple flirt at another
table. The WOMAN laughs and tosses her hair back. Eve self
consciously tucks her hair behind her ear. She stops,
realizes what she's doing. Just then, Ron approaches with the
PAINTING.
RON
It's the Wildflowers. Texas style.
Ron hands her the painting. She smiles, plays along.
EVE
They're beautiful. Thank you. And I
don't even have to water them.
Ron slides in across from her.
RON
Thanks for coming.
A beat. She looks at his suit and smiles politely.
RON
The IRS is on my ass. I wonder who
tipped them off?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 63
EVE
You don't actually believe I would do
that?
RON
Nah. But you gonna have to watch what
you say when you're around that snake you
work with. He's the virus I'm worried
about. As a matter fact, if you hear of
anything...
She shakes her head, amused. A WAITER approaches.
RON
Bring us your best bottle of Cabernet.
The Waiter nods and leaves.
RON
Nice restaurant, beautiful woman. I feel
like a human being again.
(a beat)
How come you ain't got no high powered
corporate honey to take you dancin'?
EVE
I don't dance.
RON
That's cause you don't got a honey. How
old are you anyway? Twenty two?
Eve shoots him a "nice try" look. She wonders, is he here to
flirt or talk business?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 64
EVE
Why are we here?
RON
To eat, drink, enjoy life, be merry...
EVE
Yeah right.
RON
Take a break, relax, breathe, Saks.
She sits back, smiles, the waiter comes back with the wine.
RON
Normal people do that, ya know.
She takes a proper sip of wine as he takes a gulp.
RON
So why'd you become a doctor?
EVE
Because I was good in science. And my
father said studying history was a waste
of time. So I went to med school.
RON
Not what I thought you'd say but makes
sense, your dad was a practical man.
EVE
Yes, he was. Your turn. Why did you
become... an electrician, right?
RON
Well my old man was an electrician. A
good one too. But he was a better
drinker. Which I learned from him as
well.
Ron raises his glass in a toast. They share a smile.
RON
So I was around it a lot. Got pretty
good at takin' shit apart, seein' how the
insides worked, and then puttin' it back
together. I was good at it and it put
some change in my pocket.
EVE
What about your mom?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 64A
RON
She was a painter, kind of a gypsy. She
got tired a' all the shit and left. You
know how it is.
EVE
(re: Wildflowers)
She painted that, your mom?
RON
Don't feel like you gotta hang it. I
know you like everything perfect.
EVE
I do not. I'll hang it. I'm going to
hang it. It's just... are you sure you
don't want to keep it?
Ron looks at her. A long time, then:
RON
You need to enjoy your life, little lady.
You only got one.
96 The Waiter approaches with the wine. Ron and Eve both look at 96
each other, enjoying their company.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 65
97 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RON'S OFFICE - NIGHT 97
We hear someone breathing. We're on one of the POSTERS of a
bikini clad woman. We pan to another poster of another girl,
then another. The breathing is getting more intense. It's
obvious that someone is masturbating. Then we're on a POSTER
of... Marc Bolan. The breathing stops. Ron walks into frame
and tears Bolan's poster down. Then he spots another one.
And another one.
RON
I'm gonna kill him!
98 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RAYON'S OFFICE - MORNING 98
Ron sifts through boxes of inventory with a clipboard in his
hand.
A sickly looking Rayon sits on the sofa sipping a cup of green
tea, watching TV.
RON
We're running low on DDC and Peptide-T, I
thought you were stocking this?
RAYON
Sit down and shut up.
Ron's POV on the TV.
NEWS ANCHOR
New studies have proven that AZT is
effective in stopping the progression of
AIDS in asymptomatic cases. Dr. Anthony
Fauci, head of the National Institute of
Health, announced that a trial had
clearly shown that early AZT intervention
will keep AIDS at bay. AZT is the only
drug that has been shown in
scientifically controlled trials to be
safe and effective, Fauci contended.
(MORE)
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 66
NEWS ANCHOR (CONT'D)
99 INT. EVE'S HOUSE - LIVING ROOM - DAY 99
Phone to her ear, Eve sits watching the same broadcast.
RON (O.C.)
Scientifically controlled, my ass! They
took eight months to approve it. And
from what we know now, AZT is everything
but safe!
100 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - NURSE STATION - DAY 100
Eve stands talking to Nurse Frazin.
EVE
I want all my HIV patients on the
asymptomatic study to have their AZT
doses lowered to the minimum, 600
milligrams.
101 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RON'S OFFICE - DAY 101
With the line snaking out the door, Ron sits behind the desk
dealing with a BUYER.
RON
That's four pills, three times a day with
food. The vitamins too.
As Ron starts putting the meds in a paper bag, we hear a
commotion coming from the other room.
RAYON (O.C.)
I'm not letting you in, you have a search
warrant?
RAYON'S OFFICE:
Rayon, still in his robe, stands blocking the doorway to
Richard Barkley who signals to Tucker to take over. Tucker
gestures to Rayon to move out of the way. He walks in with a
FELLOW POLICE OFFICER and two DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION
(DEA) agents.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 67
RON
The hell's all this?
TUCKER
Sorry, Ron.
(to the Buyers)
Gentlemen, I'm gonna need you all to
leave the premises in an orderly
fashion, please!
Some GRUMBLING as the Buyers file out. Barkley enters.
RICHARD BARKLEY
Mr. Woodroof, I have a court order
permitting us to confiscate any and all
non-FDA approved drugs or supplements.
RON
In other words, my entire inventory.
Ron looks over at one of the FDA Agents, who has begun opening
boxes. As the Agent removes an unmarked bottle:
RON
Aloe vera! It's a plant. What do you
give a shit if people eat plants?
RICHARD BARKLEY
It's improperly labeled. That's a
violation of FDA regulations.
RON
It's a bullshit technicality and you
know it!
(to Rayon)
Get my lawyer on the phone.
Rayon crosses off to make the call.
RICHARD BARKLEY
Our primary concern is preventing a
market for illegal drugs.
RON
Illegal? Unapproved! These are vitamins
and minerals, for Chrissake!
RICHARD BARKLEY
Vitamins and minerals that gave you a
heart attack, remember?
RON
I'm not selling that stuff, you
confiscated it, remember?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 68
The agents confiscate lots of small blue boxes and put them in
an evidence bag.
RON
(sarcastic)
What's the matter, you got Alzheimer,
Richard?
(pointing at the blue boxes)
'Cause Peptide T works for Alzheimers
too, ya know?
Tucker looks over at Ron.
RON
Come on, it's a protein! Effective with
dementia which I have. Why don't you
just look at my research?
RICHARD BARKLEY
Woodroof, I wouldn't want you to spend
your last days in jail. If you have a
product you'd like tested, fill out an
application and go through the process.
RON
Don't threaten me! I'm unapproved
motherfucker! The process? That's just
FDA bullshit for pay up! 250 million
worth!
The Agents exit carrying boxes and bags; Barkley gives Ron a
big smile.
RICHARD BARKLEY
You'll be receiving your fine for non
compliance and improper labelling soon.
Barkley leaves followed by Tucker who looks sorry for Ron.
Rayon comes back to the room. He takes a last peek through
the window, and pulls boxes of Peptide T from underneath his
robe, with the smile of a kid on his face, handing Ron the
phone.
RAYON
Your lawyer.
RON
These fuckers are comin' at me from all
angles! I wanna file a restraining
order!
DAVID WAYNE (O.C.)
What? Against who?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 69
RON
The Government and their fuckin' FDA!
He slams down the phone.
RON
We gotta relocate!
102 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - DR. EVE SAKS' OFFICE - DAY 102
Eve is at her desk when suddenly Dr. Sevard barges in.
DR. SEVARD
Who gave you permission to lower your
patients' AZT doses?
EVE
I don't need permission. I'm their
doctor.
DR. SEVARD
I want those doses readjusted
immediately. The study protocol does not
allow dose reductions.
EVE
I'm not doing a study for people who are
asymptomatic with a toxic drug that makes
them sick. We don't treat people who
have antibodies for pneumonia or chicken
pox when they're healthy. Why should HIV
be any different?
DR. SEVARD
It's a different kind of virus.
EVE
Says who? Barrow Wilkem?!
Dr. Sevard stares at Eve, who stands her ground.
EVE
Besides, I consulted with each of them
individually, it was their decision.
Sevard leaves, fuming.
FRANK YOUNG (V.O.)
--and effective immediately...
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 70
103 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RAYON'S OFFICE - DAY 103
CLOSE ON TV: we see Ron and Rayon's reflection as they're
watching FDA commissioner Frank Young standing at a podium
before a dozen microphones, mid-press conference, bombarded by
camera flashes.
FRANK YOUNG
...Americans with life-threatening
illnesses will be permitted to import
small quantities of unapproved drugs for
their personal use. Under this
arrangement, the drugs may only be
purchased by individuals who have been
prescribed the medication by a physician.
Ron turns the TV off, shakes his head as he walks away.
RAYON
What the fuck does that mean?
RON
It means we were unapproved. Now we're
illegal!
104 INT. LONESTAR BAR - BATHROOM - DAY 104
Ron pulls out a brown paper BAG from inside the PAPER TOWEL
DISPENSER. He removes a stack of CASH, puts it in his coat,
places a BLUE BOX into the dispenser and closes the top.
105 INT. LONESTAR BAR - DAY 105
Ron walks out to a table where Rayon is waiting. Rayon has a
ledger in front of him. His condition is deteriorating.
RON
Let's get outta here.
Rayon gathers his things and gets up to leave. Ron looks up
and sees TUCKER looking at him as he's drinking a beer across
the room with a few other cops. Ron signals to a waitress.
RON
Send a round of beers over to my friends.
Ron throws some cash down on the table.
RAYON
Save your money, we're broke. Our credit
cards are maxed.
(MORE)
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 71
RAYON (CONT'D)
A hundred grand between the FDA and the
IRS fines. The pharmacy bills due...
Ron ignores him. A busty waitress floats by.
RAYON
How bout that size? Those would look
good on me.
RON
You ain't gettin' tits, Rayon.
Memberships are high and so is demand.
So we recruit more members from where?
RAYON
Support groups.
RON
Yep! I'm gotta find MDs to write them
prescriptions so we can keep dealin'
these drugs... legally now.
RAYON
In the meantime we could try the bank?
RON
Oh yeah, Bonnie and Clyde comin' in for a
loan. Stop starin' at her tits, you're
startin' to look normal.
106 INT. TUCKER'S HOUSE - KITCHEN - DAY 106
Tucker, still in his police uniform, finishes clearing the
table after dinner with his old father, who sits silently in a
rocking chair.
Tucker opens the BLUE BOX and removes a Buyers Club bottle of
Peptide T and a note.
RON (V.O.)
Tuck, sorry to hear about your dad's
Alzheimer. This will help. Woodroof.
107 INT. SMALL HOME - DALLAS - DAY 107
The house hasn't seen new carpet since the 60's. The
conservative gay couple we met earlier, Ian and Michael, show
Ron around.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 72
RON
This place is crap, I'll give you one
fifty a month and fifty percent off your
meds.
IAN
Mr. Woodroof --
RON
Don't try to con me --
IAN
We don't want money.
RON
What do you want?
IAN
The house is free. We want to help.
Ron looks from Ian and Michael and back again.
RON
Oh. Well that's good news.
Ian sticks his hand out, Ron shakes it.
108 INT. DRADDY AUDITORIUM - DALLAS HIGH SCHOOL - NIGHT 108
The same meeting from the beginning; packed with mostly gay
MEN. A different group of people are here now, but the
atmosphere is the same.
Ron stands at the back of the auditorium with Rayon at his
side chewing gum like a baseball coach. Ron flips the lights
off and on...
RON
Hello... Howdy...
The CROWD calms down, turns to look at Ron.
RON
I got what you got and I have traveled
the world looking for alternative
medications, stuff not available yet in
America, thanks to the good folks down at
the FDA.
A murmur travels through the audience as people listen.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 73
RON
Some of you may have heard of the Dallas
Buyers Club, an organization I founded
with my friend Rayon. Risk might be
high, but what the hell, you're risking
your life every time you go into one of
them there hospitals.
(beat)
I don't know where most of the people are
who were at these meetings a year and a
half ago... maybe they lost interest...
maybe they're dead... but I'm here. I'm
walking, talking, breathing... and ain't
no one gonna take that away from me. I
gotta life to lead.
A murmur travels through the audience as people listen.
The point of our club was to get
alternative treatments and medications
into the hands of those who need 'em.
(beat)
The cost of joining this club used to be
$400 a month. Well I'm here tonight with
a special offer. Anyone who's interested
can come and sign up for the one-time
only, rock bottom price of zero.
(beat)
That's right, I'm giving it away folks.
More murmurs through the crowd.
RON
HIV don't mean shit. You ain't sick, you
ain't sick. Period. You tell a guy he's
got a week to live? Shit, he's already
dead. You tell a guy he can keep on
goin'? He'll find a way. Remember, ya
ain't dyin'. But if you think you are
then you ain't got nothing to lose.
Ron does a double take at Rayon who is staring at him with
tears in his eyes. Someone hesitantly applauds. A MAN gets
up and walks to Ron, slowly OTHERS do too.
109 INT. FIRST BANK - DALLAS - DAY 109
A financial institution. A MAN, 50s, walks over to the
waiting area and coldly signals a younger man to follow him.
This is Rayon, hair slicked back, devoid of makeup and
jewelry, wearing Ron's business suit. He gets up.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 73A
110 INT. MAN'S OFFICE - FIRST BANK - DALLAS - DAY 110
Rayon looks at the various family PHOTOS which decorate the
bookshelves of the man's office who sits behind his desk.
RAYON
Guess I didn't make the cut.
THE MAN
You made that choice yourself.
RAYON
It wasn't a choice, Dad.
Rayon's father looks at him with disdain.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 74
RAYON'S FATHER
What do you want, Raymond?
RAYON
I'm fine, thanks. And you? Long time no
see.
RAYON'S FATHER
I suppose I should thank you for wearing
men's clothes and not embarrassing me.
RAYON
(sarcastic)
Are you ashamed of me? Because I never
realized that.
RAYON'S FATHER
(shaking his head)
God help me.
RAYON
He is helpin' you. I got AIDS.
A long beat during which Rayon's father finally shows some
sympathy. Rayon looks like his father's son for a moment.
RAYON
I'm sorry, dad. I found someone who's
been helping me and now I'd like to help
him.
A110 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB - RAYON'S OFFICE - BATHROOM - DAY A110
Rayon finishes taking Ron's suit off and looks at his
reflection, takes in the lesions on his naked body, grabs a
compact and a tube of lipstick, and starts putting making up
on his face, holding back tears.
RAYON
God, when I meet you, I'm gonna look
pretty if it's the last thing I do. I'll
be a super model angel.
111 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RON'S OFFICE - NIGHT 111
Ron is on the PHONE, his personal address book in his hand.
There is MOVING BOXES scattered throughout the room.
RON
What? No, please, wait a minute, doc...
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 75
The phone CLICKS. Ron slams the phone down several times.
Suddenly Rayon enters as he finishes buttoning up his dress.
RON
All the MDs are fuckin' backpeddlin' on
their heels. The FDA is scaring them
with license revocation if they write
scripts.
Rayon throws a cash filled envelope on Ron's desk.
RAYON
Maybe this will help.
Ron looks at the cash in disbelief: two wrapped wads of
hundred dollar bills, worth maybe $10,000.
RON
Where'd you get that?
Rayon exits the room proudly.
RON
Did you sell your ass?
RAYON (O.C.)
Just a simple fuckin' thank you would do.
Ron looks at the cash, shakes his head...
111A INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RAYON'S OFFICE - NIGHT 111A
As Rayon walks into his room, Ron appears.
RON
Really, come on, where did you get it?
A long beat. Rayon hesitates.
RAYON
I sold my life insurance policy.
Ron offers Rayon a hand shake. Rayon opens his arms. They
hug. Ron whispers a heartfelt, "thank you."
112 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - DR. EVE SAKS' OFFICE - DAY 112
Seated at her desk, Eve looks up when she hears a KNOCK on the
door. Ron, wearing a huge SOMBRERO HAT, enters.
EVE
What are you doing?
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 76
RON
Goin' to Mexico, chica, you comin'?
Ron takes his hat off and puts it on her head, covering her
eyes. From Eve's point of view, it's pitch black until she
adjusts the hat, amused.
EVE
Do I look like someone who takes
vacations?
RON
Come on, tequila, sunshine, tacos, never
hurt anybody.
Eve enjoys the attention. Shakes her head.
RON
I knew you'd rain on my party, but I had
to give it a shot.
(a beat)
Listen, I gotta ask you a favor. I need
you to write me prescriptions so I can
come across the border. I might not need
it but if I do, I'll have them.
Eve doesn't respond.
RON
You know this rule that the FDA just
passed was just bullshit. Ain't no doc
from here to the north pole will write
them.
EVE
I know and I can't either. I'm sorry.
We can't write scripts for random people
and random drugs. Plus what if something
goes wrong with these drugs? We could
get sued, lose our license.
RON
Okay! Never hurts to ask.
Eve takes the hat off and hands it to Ron.
RON
Keep it, nurse Ratched!
Ron exits the room leaving Eve with the sombrero.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 77
113 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB MOTEL - RAYON'S OFFICE - DAY 113
Music plays. Rayon, extremely sick, holds a bottle of
POPPERS, watches Sunny dance around the room amongst the
stacked moving boxes. Rayon starts coughing into a scarf,
pulls it away, it's covered with BLOOD. Sunny stops dancing.
SUNNY
You need to go to the hospital.
Rayon can't respond.
SUNNY
That's it. I'm driving you, right now.
Sunny walks over and picks up Rayon, throws him over his
shoulder.
RAYON
Okay, okay. I'll go. Put me down. Let
me get some things first.
Rayon picks up his bag.
114 EXT. DR. VASS' CLINIC - MEXICO CITY - DAY 114
Ron enters the clinic with a suitcase.
115 INT. DR. VASS' CLINIC - MEXICO CITY - DAY 115
CLOSE ON a BUTTERFLY, emerald green wings with a blood red
middle. Its wings flap with life as a hand holds it and a
needle is inserted into its middle, extracting its fluids.
Dr. Vass conducts the experiment with Ron looking on. In the
background, another makeshift lab.
DR. VASS
Secretions that the caterpillar uses to
protect itself during the incubation
period...
Dr. Vass empties the contents of the syringe into a test-tube.
DR. VASS
...act as a non-toxic anti-viral for
humans. The answer to a question.
Dr. Vass sets the test-tube on a tray, crosses to a table
lined with boxes, postmarks in different languages covering
their surfaces. He rummages on the table, finds a report.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 78
DR. VASS
(handing it to Ron)
The Lancet medical journal published a
study conducted in France. Proves AZT
alone is too toxic for most to tolerate,
and had no lasting effect on HIV blood
levels. Of course, Barrow Wilkem and the
NIH did not include the study in their
press release.
Ron takes the study, looks it over.
RON
Doesn't surprise me at all.
Vass hands Ron some more paperwork.
DR. VASS
These are early trial results for
Fluconazole.
RON
The anti-fungal, right? I read about
this.
DR. VASS
You want to take some home?
RON
As much I can carry.
DR. VASS
We need a thousand more like you.
RON
Hell Vass, I'm just tryin' to run a
business.
116 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - ICU ROOM - NIGHT 116
Eve walks in, breathless. Eyes sunken, breathing shallow,
Rayon is hooked up to an I.V. as Nurse Frazin adjusts an
oxygen mask on his face.
NURSE FRAZIN
I took him off of it as you instructed.
He's just on morphine now.
EVE
Good. I'll be in my office. Thanks for
calling.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 79
She sees Sunny outside of the room, watching. She gives him a
hopeful smile and walks off.
117 INT. DR. VASS' CLINIC - MEXICO CITY - NIGHT 117
Ron leaves the lab and notices an ominous green glow coming
from a nearby room. He approaches it slowly, drawn to it.
118 INT. DR. VASS' CLINIC - MEXICO CITY - ROOM - NIGHT 118
As he enters, he notices hundreds of emerald green BUTTERFLIES
flying in the air and hanging on the wall. Their vibrant
colors give off a luminous glow. A butterfly lands on his
hand. He slowly raises his hand to his face for a better
view. As time goes on, more and more butterflies land on
Ron's hand and body. Ron takes it all in. Illuminated from
the butterflies, he looks like a "Lite-Brite".
A119 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - DR. EVE SAK'S OFFICE - NIGHT A119
Eve wakes up, seated at her desk.
119 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - ICU ROOM - NIGHT 119
Rayon lies alone in bed, delirious from morphine, mumbling
beneath his oxygen mask. After a few beats, he takes it off,
leans over to the side table, takes a compact and a tube of
lipstick from his purse, and starts to apply it, his hands
trembling as he does. His mission accomplished, he sets the
lipstick aside, then leans his head back. And as he closes
his eyes and drifts away...
120 EXT. AIRPLANE - DAY 120
Ron sits in his seat happily scribbling prescriptions for the
drugs he is bringing in.
On the pad we see the name - Dr. Eve Saks, the same pad...
FLASHBACK: ...that Ron took in Eve's office when she had the
sombrero on her face.
121 INT. DALLAS INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT - HOLDING ROOM - DAY 121
Boxes filled with hundreds of small bottles of Fluconazole lay
on the floor.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 80
Ron sits in a chair looking on as an FDA AGENT flips through
his prescriptions, while another AGENT compares the names to
those on the bottles.
FDA AIRPORT AGENT
(reads names)
Walker, Dorsett, Blount, Newsome,
Jeffcoat... these are patients?
RON
Yes sir.
FDA AIRPORT AGENT
They're also the names of players on the
Dallas Cowboys.
RON
No shit? Well how's that for a
coincidence?
FDA AIRPORT AGENT
Isn't this a little ridiculous?
RON
You said it.
FDA AIRPORT AGENT
Can you prove these are patients?
RON
Can you prove they're not?
The Agent looks at him, then resignedly continues to flip
through the prescriptions.
122 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB HOUSE - LIVING ROOM - DAY 122
Ron walks in. Denise stops unloading moving boxes and hands
him a stack of messages.
DENISE
Those are the emergencies.
Ron flips through them, stops, looks around the room, and
notices Rayon's favorite Marc Bolan's posters on the walls of
his new headquarters.
RON
Where's Rayon?
DENISE
At the hospital.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 81
What?
123 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - ICU ROOM - DAY 123
Ron rushes into Rayon's room. The bed is empty. The sheets
are on the floor. Seen from behind, Sunny places Rayon's
belongings in Rayon's bag. He turns. His eyes are bloodshot.
He looks at Ron and is about to start crying again.
124 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - HALLWAY - DAY 124
Nurse Frazin is startled by off stage loud breaking noise.
Ron walks out of Rayon's room.
RON
Sevaaaaard!
As Ron walks past her, Nurse Frazin grabs the phone.
NURSE FRAZIN
I need security up here, right away.
Ron pushes open different doors looking for Dr. Sevard.
125 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - PEDIATRIC AREA - DAY 125
Ron storms into a room where several PATIENTS wait for
appointments. Some are completely healthy, others are showing
signs of sickness.
RON
Sevard!
Ron spots Sevard.
RON
There you are, you son of a bitch.
RON
You killed him.
DR. SEVARD
What are you talking about?
RON
You call yourself a doctor? You are a
murderer.
The patients in the hallway turn their heads towards the
commotion. Eve walks out of a room and watches.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 82
DR. SEVARD
Leave or you will be arrested.
RON
Arrest me?
(to the waiting patients)
Did you hear that?
Two SECURITY GUARDS enter.
RON
First class everything, big house,
Mercedes Benz. That's what they pay him
to say it's OK to pump poison into y'all.
The GUARDS move to grab Ron.
RON
Get away from me. I got AIDS. I'll spit
on you.
Ron spits on the floor. The guards back off. Dr. Sevard
watches slack-jawed as Ron continues to spit. The guards grab
him...
... as Eve watches Sevard, emotionally charged.
RON (O.C.)
You see this? This is harassment. Get
me my attorney or do I have to be my own
lawyer too. Own doctor, own lawyer.
125A EXT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB HOUSE - DAY 125A
Ron slams the car door shut, walks towards the house watching
the line of men snaking out the door. He takes them in. Most
of them look very sick. His eyes stop on Freddy who's
watching him. Freddy smiles as he waves cash at Ron who
feigns a smile and walks in.
125B INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB HOUSE - LIVING ROOM - DAY 125B
Ron enters as Denise finishes handing out information to three
very sick MEN. Denise makes her way over to Ron.
DENISE
(re: sick men)
From Austin. All on AZT. Their
insurance is paying for the treatment and
they don't know if they can afford to
switch.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 83
RON
Hook `em up.
DENISE
We're pretty cash poor.
Ron walks towards his office, stops, turns around and throws
his car keys to Denise.
RON
Sell my car and make sure everyone gets
what they need.
125C INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 125C
Ron pours himself some tequila and gulps it down. Pours
himself another glass. A hooker is dancing in front of him.
No music. She starts to touch him.
RON
Just dance.
She goes down on him. He stops her, and leaves, throwing some
money on the floor.
126 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB HOUSE - RON'S OFFICE - DAY 126
Ron wakes up to A KNOCK on the door. Eve walks in. A long
beat. Ron doesn't even look at her.
RON
Anemia, Cancer, Bone Marrow depletion,
Fever, Diarrhea, Vomiting, Neuropathy,
Anxiety, Dizziness, Impotence, Hearing
loss, Nervousness, Seizures... Sound like
AIDS to you? That there comes inside a
box of AZT, a list of side effects.
EVE
Rayon was a drug addict! It wasn't a day
on AZT that killed him, but the disease
as a whole!
Ron registers. Calms down a bit.
EVE
Ron, you stole my prescription pad! So
don't accuse me of acting irresponsibly!
Rayon came to the hospital on his own...
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 83A
RON
(cutting her off)
... and got carried out in a trash bag
three days later!
EVE
(yelling)
He was my friend too, you know!
They both get quiet. A beat during which Eve is holding back
tears.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 84
RON
Let me ask you something. Let's say I
have the cure right here in my back
pocket. I could save everyone today.
Eve's expression changes.
RON
But I don't have no funding and I don't
have no backing. Now how long is it
gonna take before the FDA approves it?
Ron crosses to the desk, produces a copy of the Lancet Medical
Journal Study he got from Dr. Vass, and hands it to her.
RON
Read that and you tell me how wrong is
too wrong?
127 INT. EVE'S HOUSE - NIGHT 127
Eve walks into her house, opens a drawer, removes a hammer,
smashes it down on a nail and misses. She smashes the hammer
down again, harder, and again, and again. Her POV: lots of
holes in the wall, very far from the nail, and soon hidden by
Ron's painting of the Texas Wildflowers. She walks away
without straightening it, sits down and starts reading the
"Lancet Study".
RON (V.O.)
I got three thousand people who need to
get their hands on Peptide T. Now.
Including me.
128 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB HOUSE - LIVING ROOM - DAY 128
Ron paces the floor as David Wayne walks in with a big
cardboard box.
DAVID WAYNE
They shut her lab down. The FDA has shut
all of our suppliers down, what can I
tell you?
RON
If I don't get it by the end of the week
I wanna file a lawsuit.
DAVID WAYNE
Come on, Ron, we lost the restraining
order, remember? We're in Texas. The
court system is the last resort for you.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 85
RON
Well find a place where it's not,
Goddamnit. Go to San Francisco, get a
sissy judge, figure it out!
Ron spots a FLYER on the cardboard box and grabs it. It
reads: "DALLAS BUYERS CLUB NEWSLETTER".
RON
Perfect.
129 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - PEDIATRIC WARD - DAY 129
Eve watches as young apparently healthy CHILDREN wait with
their PARENTS to complete forms. She goes up to Dr. Sevard.
EVE
What's going on?
DR. SEVARD
Barrow Wilkem gave us the green light on
the AZT pediatric trials.
EVE
What? This is crazy! All these kids are
HIV positive?
Sevard looks uneasy.
DR. SEVARD
We're starting very slowly with a fifth
of a dose.
EVE
Would you give this fifth of a dose to
your own child?
Touch�. Sevard holds her gaze for a moment and leaves.
130 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - PEDIATRIC WAITING AREA - DAY 130
YOUNG CHILDREN are waiting with their parents. Among them, a
girl with her mother, Francine Suskind, the woman from
Beaumont Lab whom Ron met earlier.
Eve walks in and discreetly places Dallas Buyers Club flyers
on a table, then walks off.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 86
131 INT. DRADDY AUDITORIUM - DALLAS HIGH SCHOOL - DAY 131
The room is packed. On the dais stands Richard Barkley from
the FDA. To his left and right, are representatives from the
Center for Disease Control, the National Institute of Health
and ACT-UP. They HEAR something SQUEAKING and look up:
At the back of the room, Ron enters, hooked up to an I.V. drip
on wheels that he carries along as he starts passing out
copies of his flyer.
RON
Here you go, please read this.
RICHARD BARKLEY (O.S.)
Mr. Woodroof, will you kindly tell us
what you are doing?
Everyone turns to look at Ron.
RON
I'm givin' people information... on this
trial I'm in, right now. I want everyone
here to know what's going on.
RICHARD BARKLEY
And what is going on?
RON
Why was Peptide T cut off? A non-toxic
drug, that I have proof works and that
according to the National Institute of
Mental Health, is completely safe.
RICHARD BARKLEY
Mr. Woodroof, you are nothing but a
common drug dealer--
RON
I'm a drug dealer? You're the drug
dealer. The pharmaceutical companies are
the drug dealers.
Ron grabs a bag of jelly beans out of the hands of a person in
the audience. Holds them up.
RON
The yellow number fives, red, green and
purple dye you put in this here candy
causes seven kinds a cancer.
A SECURITY MAN approaches, Ron walks away from him.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 87
RON
The aspartame in my diet coke, the
steroids in my meat, the hormones in my
milk, the antibiotics in the chicken.
Now that's the shit the FDA knows will
kill you. Yet you're all up there
worried that some sick people will find
somethin' without you and y'all won't get
paid.
Ron throws the bag of jelly beans to the security man who
catches it. And he leaves the room, squeaking away.
132 INT. RON'S CAR - DALLAS STREET - DAY 132
Ron is driving, singing out loud, a cappella.
RON
Oh I'm bad, I'm nationwide!
133 INT. DALLAS MERCY HOSPITAL - CONFERENCE ROOM - DAY 133
Sevard puts Ron's flyer down on the table in front of Eve who
stands in front of the medical board.
DR. SEVARD
We think it is in everyone's best
interest that you resign.
Eve looks at Dr. Sevard who meets her gaze with calculated
coldness.
EVE
I won't. You'll have to fire me.
She starts to leave, stops, turns around.
EVE
Y'all go fuck yourselves!
134 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB HOUSE - LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 134
Ron appears from the kitchen with a beer.
RON
One left.
EVE
We're splitting that.
Ron cracks the beer and hands her the can.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 88
RON
That was a ballsy move!
Eve looks away. Ron opens his arms...
RON
A nice, warm hug...
(she accepts it)
...and a day of watchin' some bull
ridin', that's what you need, doctor
Woodroof's order.
She smiles and they both let go, uneasy with the closeness.
RON
Don't you miss a regular life?
EVE
Regular? What's that? Doesn't exist.
RON
Yeah, I guess.
(a beat)
I just want...
Ron looks at her.
EVE
What?
He takes the can back.
RON
... an ice-cold beer at Ruby's. Go
dancin' with my woman. I want kids...
thumb wrestle with my sons. I don't
know. I got one life -- mine. But I
want someone else's. I feel I'm fighting
for a life I ain't got the time to live.
Ron downs some beer.
RON
I want it all to mean somethin'.
Eve looks at Ron, studies him.
EVE
It does.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 89
135 INT. EVE'S HOUSE - NIGHT 135
Eve looks at the painting of the Texas Wildflowers. For some
reason, she becomes emotional and decides to straighten it.
136 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB HOUSE - BATHROOM - EARLY MORNING 136
CLOSE ON Ron's box of meds, almost empty. By the look on his
face, Ron clearly just woke up. But there is something else.
He takes an empty bottle of Peptide T and looks at it,
confused. Hears the strange ringing again...
137 INT. RON'S CAR - DALLAS STREET - DAY 137
And that is all we hear as we see Ron driving along the street
into the middle of an intersection. Ron stops the car, puts
his hands over his ears, and walks out.
138 EXT. STREET - DALLAS - DAY 138
Ron tries to direct traffic, bear foot. People blare their
car horns. Others scream out their windows. A POLICEMAN
arrives on the scene and approaches Ron.
Tucker pulls up and sees Ron, he jumps out of his car.
TUCKER
I'll take care of this.
Tucker steps in. He grabs Ron's arm, makes eye contact.
TUCKER
Ron! You are in the middle of the
street. Do you understand what I'm
sayin'?
No answer from Ron.
TUCKER
Come on, man, let's go home.
Tucker puts a hand on Ron's shoulder and walks him towards his
squad car.
139 INT. TUCKER'S HOUSE - KITCHEN - DAY 139
A BLUE BOX rests on the table, next to Ron who stares at it,
as he's being given an injection of Peptide T by Tucker.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 90
140 INT. TUCKER'S HOUSE - LIVING ROOM - DAY 140
Tucker's father sits in a chair facing Ron.
TUCKER'S FATHER
Of course I remember you, trouble maker.
RON
I still am!
They share a smile.
RON
I'm glad you're doin' better, sir.
TUCKER
I'm gonna talk with Ron a minute, pop.
Tucker steps off to the side with Ron.
TUCKER
Listen, the FDA is gonna bust you
tomorrow.
Ron's wheels are turning.
RON
Thanks for the tip, Tuck.
And as Ron exits the house...
TUCKER
I'll be there, man, and don't you fuckin'
hit me again!
141 EXT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB HOUSE - DAY 141
A line of customers is out the door as three Dallas Police
Cars pull up. As Tucker gets out of the lead car, he is
greeted by Richard Barkley and two FDA Agents. They head
inside. That's Ron's POV...
142 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB HOUSE - LIVING ROOM - DAY 142
...as he's watching from a window.
Eve tends to several buyers club members, I.V.s attached to
them, lying on the floor.
A NEWS TEAM films the entire thing.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 91
EVE
(to the reporter)
This is Fluconazole. It helps them with
Thrush.
Suddenly, the front door OPENS. Police are in the room, guns
drawn.
RICHARD BARKLEY
No one move. Put your hands in the air.
The news camera keeps rolling.
TUCKER
Ronald Woodroof?
Ron steps up through the crowd.
TUCKER
I have a warrant for your arrest, a
search warrant for the premises, and a
court order to cease and desist business
immediately.
And with that, Ron allows Tucker to handcuff him. And as he
does, the Customers "Boo" and "Hiss" loudly, all caught on by
the News Crew.
RICHARD BARKLEY
Turn off that camera. Now!
But the Camera Man doesn't stop filming.
RICHARD BARKLEY
(to Ron)
Please instruct the rest of these people
to leave, now.
RON
I ain't no cop. Why'nt you tell 'em?
Tucker escorts Ron outside.
143 EXT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB HOUSE - DAY 143
The News Crew continues to film as Ron is led out past the
waiting Customers, talking to the reporter.
RON
It's the bust of the century! Don't they
look like hardened criminals?!
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 92
An ambulance pulls up. MEN wearing MASKS and GLOVES begin to
escort people off. Barkley and his Agents watch the circus
from the sidewalk. Ron is put in the Squad Car by Tucker.
144 INT. DALLAS POLICE STATION - HOLDING ROOM - DAY 144
David Wayne enters and throws a NEWSPAPER on the table in
front of Ron.
RON
Deadly drugs? What the fuck?
DAVID WAYNE
They wrote the FDA's story.
RON
I can't believe it. I tipped those
assholes off.
DAVID WAYNE
Don't worry. I got good news. I got you
a change of venue for the Peptide T trial
in San Francisco. And no surprise,
they're not pressing charges.
DAVID WAYNE
Then what the fuck am I doin' here?
DAVID WAYNE
They're trying to break you, I don't
know. Let's get out of here.
They leave.
RON
(to himself)
They'll never break me.
145 EXT. COURTHOUSE - SAN FRANCISCO 145
We see Ron's reflection in the window of a cab that moves out
of the way as Ron starts walking towards the Courthouse,
helped by David Wayne who holds his arm.
A SUPER fades in.
U.S. District Court Northern District of California
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 92A
146 INT. COURTROOM - SAN FRANCISCO 146
Ron, dressed in a conservative suit, is looking extremely ill.
Next to him is David Wayne and two other younger ATTORNEYS.
On the opposing side are FDA representatives including Richard
Barkley and others who we haven't ever seen before. They have
a team of four attorneys.
JUDGE
The constitution, specifically the ninth
amendment, does not state that you have
the right to be mentally healthy or
physically healthy. It does state that
you have a right to chose your own
medical care but that is interpreted as
medical care that is approved by the Food
and Drug Administration.
The Judge looks over to the FDA table.
JUDGE
Regarding the FDA, the court is highly
disturbed by its bullying tactics and
direct interference with a drug whose own
agency has found to be non-toxic. The
FDA was formed to protect people, not
prevent them from getting help.
The Judge sighs.
JUDGE
The law does not seem to make much common
sense. If a person has been found to be
terminally ill they ought to be able to
take just about any drug they feel will
help... but that is not the law. Mr.
Woodroof, there is not a person in this
courtroom who is not moved to compassion
by your plight, what is lacking here is
the legal authority to intervene. I'm
sorry. This case is hereby dismissed.
The Judge bangs the gavel.
David Wayne raises in frustration. Ron closes his eyes,
defeated.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 93
147 INT. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB HOUSE - LIVING ROOM - DAY 147
Ron, still looking sick, opens the door and is startled by a
crowd of people clapping and cheering.
RON
Jesus Mother Mary Fucking Christ!
Among the crowd, Ron spots Eve and David Wayne with a smile of
victory on their faces. Ron doesn't understand. They walk to
him and show him a paper with the FDA logo on it.
Black.
Super:
Following the trial, the FDA in Washington allowed Ron to get
Peptide T for his own personal use.
And as the cheering and clapping grow bigger, we cut to:
148 EXT. RODEO - DAY 148
Ron, 20 pounds heavier, looking healthier, is sitting atop the
railing above the stall looking down at the bull. He's got on
gloves, hat, pants, and boots, ready to ride. He removes a
flask from his pocket and takes a long swig. The BULLHAND and
Ron exchange a look. Ron nods, takes a deep breath, swings
his legs over the railing, straddles the stall, stays above
the animal. The moment Ron's ass hits the leather, the gate
is up, the bull is out, and the crowd whoops it up.
Rodeo contestant number "43" Ron Woodroof rides the bull, his
hands, legs and heels all working together. His "off" hand is
held out above him, cutting the air for balance.
The bull makes an abrupt change of direction, catches Ron off
guard and just when it seems that he's about to be thrown in
the air, we hear Eve screaming her guts out as the image
freezes on a PERFECT FRAME on this cowboy in action to control
the beast.
The crowd's CHEERS are echoing in the distance, blended with
the soft strange ring that we know, that only Ron could hear.
And as we zoom in on the image:
FADE TO BLACK.
Ronald Woodroof died on September 12, 1992, seven years after he
was diagnosed with the HIV virus. He managed to stay alive
using unapproved drugs and was memorialized by 1000 gay men in
Dallas, Texas.
Dallas Buyers Club / Green Revision / Dec 2, 2012 / P. 93A-95
FADE OUT.
Fluconazole and Alpha Interferon are now FDA approved.
DDC was approved in 1992 but is no longer used due to its
highly toxic effects.
Peptide T remains unapproved but still in studies for
neurological diseases, like Alzheimer.
Today, it is had been scientifically proven that HIV is the
cause of AIDS. Based on this knowledge, great strides have
been made in treating this infection with anti-HIV medications
but a cure has yet to be discovered.
The first studies with AZT as a single drug (monotherapy)
while showing initial good results did not ultimately prove to
be a long term solution for HIV treatment.
By 1996, medical researchers learned that HIV is best treated
with a combination cocktail of at least three HIV medications.
AZT was frequently used as a part of these early combination
therapies. Today, AZT has been largely replaced by safer, new
HIV medications. *
Dallas Buyers Club
Writers : Craig Borten Melisa Wallack
Genres : Drama
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in models of evolution of galaxies where the direct gas - dynamical computation is used , it is difficult to reach the resolution in space less than @xmath1 pc and resolution in time less than , say , @xmath2 yr due to computational cost .
we can use only the phenomenological approach to describe the interstellar medium ( ism ) on scale @xmath3 pc and below .
this means that we have to use an averaged description of interstellar medium . in the present paper
we consider a star formation model dealing with turbulent energy of ism and an averaged approach to take into account the structure of ism in model of dissipation of turbulent energy .
the proposed models are able to explain the observable star formation pause in our galaxy corresponding to star ages from @xmath4 to @xmath5 gyr .
the main factor which affects star formation is a gas density .
however , it is clear that star formation can be suppressed by supernovae explosions by means of turbulent feedback .
thus , the model star formation law must depend on density and on turbulent energy of gas .
let us adopt the star formation law in kennicutt form @xcite : @xmath6 where @xmath7 is the gas density , @xmath8 is the free - fall time , @xmath9 is the star formation efficiency ( the values are from @xmath10 @xcite to @xmath11 @xcite ) .
it is commonly believed that the stars form from a dense and cool gas .
it is possible to adopt this assumption in a simple manner . just let the star formation efficiency @xmath9 be the fraction of perturbations of density which are unstable by jeans criterion , assuming the masses of perturbations distributed in a power law : @xmath12 where @xmath13 is the jeans mass @xcite depending on density and `` temperature '' @xmath14 , and @xmath15 is the exponent of power distribution of mass of perturbations . it is necessary to explain the meaning of temperature in this expression .
the temperature value averaged over all components of ism @xmath16k while the temperature of the gas in star forming regions is tens and units of kelvin .
however , we can assume the local virial equilibrium between thermal and turbulent energy of gas , and the power law dependence of turbulent velocity dispersion on scale , so the value of the averaged turbulent energy will reflect the value of temperature and turbulent energy on small scales .
after all substitutions the star formation law will be @xmath17 or , assuming the salpeter - like exponent @xmath18 , @xmath19 where @xmath20 is the normalizing constant .
it may be determined using the star formation law of tutukov @xcite . according to this law the star formation process
is regulated by ionization and depends on gas density as @xmath21 this law has clear physical base and it works good in the single - zone model of evolution of galaxies @xcite . the average temperature of modern ism was chosen to be @xmath22 k ( though it s value does not affects significantly on the chemical abundance history of the galaxy in single - zone evolution model , see below ) , so the normalizing constant becomes @xmath23 @xmath24 k@xmath25 g@xmath26 s@xmath26 .
the temperature @xmath14 used in the last formulae supposed to relate to maximal turbulent velocity dispersion @xmath27 as @xmath28 , where @xmath29 is the boltzmann constant and @xmath30 is the mean molecular weight .
some star formation models with turbulent energy account had been offered earlier @xcite , but the model proposed in this paper has the advantage .
this model based on jeans instability creterion so it can be extended for the case when the galaxy rotation , magnetic field or chemical composition is significant .
in all numerical models of galaxy evolution , the ism in a computational cell presented as a solid brick of gas without any structure . however , the ism has complex turbulent behaviors which are needed to be allowed . in a simple approach
the ism may be considered as a set of colliding clouds with different sizes and masses .
the cloud mass probability distribution function ( pdf ) @xmath31 and density dependence on scale @xmath32 are observable @xcite and velocity - scale relation had examined by both observations @xcite and computations @xcite : @xmath33 here the scale @xmath34 is in range @xmath35 and values @xmath36 and @xmath37 are averages in an area of size @xmath38 .
imagine that dissipation of turbulent energy occurs trough the collisions of clouds , subsequent contraction and heating by shock waves and radiation .
it is obvious that the efficiency of dissipation will determine by relation of collision time to cooling time @xcite .
the value of energy radiated away per unit time in this process is @xmath39 = \left [ \begin{array}{c } \text{collision } \\
\text{frequency } \end{array } \right ] \ ; \sum_{l_\mathrm{min } \leqslant
l \leqslant l_\mathrm{max } } \left [ \begin{array}{c } \text{energy of clouds } \\
\text{of size $ l$ } \end{array } \right ] \times \left [ \begin{array}{c } \text{fraction of } \\ \text{radiated energy } \end{array } \right]\ ] ] the collision rate can be estimated as @xmath40 @xcite .
the volume density of turbulent energy of clouds of sizes from @xmath34 to @xmath41 is @xmath42 where @xmath43 is the velocity dispersion of clouds of size @xmath34 .
@xmath44 is the cloud size pdf which can be obtained using the simple assumption about cloud mass and density @xmath45 : @xmath46 it is reasonable to describe the fraction of radiated energy for clouds of size @xmath34 by poisson distribution @xmath47 where @xmath48 is the relation of the collision time to cooling time with cooling function @xmath49 : @xmath50 here the cloud density @xmath51 behind a shock wave and the time of collision @xmath52 can be determined for the simple case of head - on collision using the one dimensional approximation , i.e. riemann problem @xcite . in this case
@xmath53 , where @xmath54 depends on @xmath37 , @xmath36 and @xmath34 , and @xmath55 , where @xmath56 is a shock velocity which is proportional to cloud velocity : @xmath57 .
finally we can write @xmath58 where @xmath59 is the dissipation efficiency which determines by a complex expression @xmath60 \right ) \;.
\label{eq : dissipation_efficiency_exact}\ ] ] strong maximum of @xmath44 in @xmath61 , the condition @xmath62 and the behaviours of @xmath54 and @xmath56 lead to simplified expression @xmath63 \ ; , \label{eq : dissipation_efficiency}\ ] ] where the single unknown parameter is the maximal scale of turbulence @xmath38 .
it is set to @xmath64 pc ( this is roughly the scale of open clusters formation , the turbulence scale can not be greater than this ) .
the star formation history in galaxies can have a strongly non - monotonic nature showing a couple of bursts during a galaxy life time .
those bursts can be stimulated by an accretion of gas from intergalactic medium , collisions or close passing of galaxies .
the reason to star formation to stop can be the supernovae explosions @xcite . in star formation history of our galaxy
an epoch exists when the star formation process was suppressed .
it is seen with distribution of @xmath65}$ ] @xcite , @xmath66}\--\mathrm{[fe / h]}$ ] @xcite and @xmath67}\--\mathrm{[fe / h]}$ ] @xcite .
this epoch may be interpreted as a pause between the end of formation of thick disk and the beginning of formation of thin disk @xcite .
the pause corresponds to star ages between @xmath4 and @xmath5 gyr .
the model of star formation and of dissipation proposed above , was taken to explain this pause in a hierarchical scenario .
these models was built into the single - zone model of evolution of galaxies ( firmani & tutukov @xcite ) which was initially implemented by wiebe @xcite .
the detailed description of modified model and target setting has given in @xcite .
in modified model the star formation suppressed by collision of galaxy and a satellite of mass @xmath68 @xmath69 and radius @xmath70 kpc at redshift @xmath71 .
the results of modelling are presented on fig .
[ fig : mw ] . after collision
the temperature increases almost by two orders causing decrease of dissipation efficiency ( see ( [ eq : dissipation_efficiency ] ) ) with the result that star formation process ceases due to high temperature ( see ( [ eq : sfr ] ) ) for a @xmath72 gyr .
the pause in star formation process is seen as a plateau on the abundance graphs @xmath73}$ ] and @xmath74}$ ] ( solid line ) .
is the star formation rate in solar masses per year ; @xmath14 is the temperature ; @xmath59 is the efficiency of dissipation .
dotted line represents the standard model of firmani & tutukov @xcite , dashed line traces the evolution of a satellite before collision and solid line shows the evolution of the collision area in galaxy , after collision.,width=604 ] .
symbols are halo stars ( open squares ) , stars of the thick disk ( filled circles ) and thin disk ( open triangles ) .
the stars was classified using accurate stellar kinematics @xcite .
error bar is at bottom right ( there are same error bars for all the stars).,width=302 ] it is interesting to compare the abundance history with distribution of star abundance in solar neighborhood . on fig .
( [ fig : mw - oh - feo ] ) the @xmath73}\--\mathrm{[fe / o]}$ ] distribution is shown for near metal - poor stars @xcite , and the abundance history in hierarchical scenario .
the arrow marks the pause of star formation which is close to the bound of populations of thick disk and thin disk .
the consequence of this pause is clear : we can see the discontiniuty of the stars age with continuous abundance history ( see the plateau on fig . [
fig : mw ] ) .
the standard model of firmani & tutukov @xcite does not give such a plateau , giving the right position and shape of the evolution track , though .
the need of taking into account the turbulent energy in star formation model is obvious .
the large difference of properties of ism on different scales is obvious also . in the present paper the model of star formation and dissipation of turbulent energy
was offered and implemented to single - zone model of galaxy evolution .
it is shown that the star formation history and history of chemical abundance in solar neighborhood can be modeled in the frame of this model using the scenario of collision of the galaxy and the small satellite .
this work was supported by russian foundation for basic research grants 05 - 02 - 39005-gfen_a and 07 - 02 - 00454-a .
20 berczik p. p. a&a , v. 348 , pp .
371 - 380 ( 1999 ) berman b. g. , suchkov a. a. ap&ss , v. 184 , pp .
169 - 192 ( 1991 ) dobbs c. l. , bonnell i. a. mnras , v. 374 , pp .
1115 - 1124 ( 2007 ) firmani c. , tutukov a. a&a , v. 264 , pp . 37 - 48 ( 1992 ) fuhrmann k. a&a , v. 338 , pp .
161 - 183 ( 1998 ) gratton r. g. , carretta e. , matteucci f. , sneden , c. a&a , v. 358 , pp .
671 - 681 ( 2000 ) jeans j. h. phil .
trans . , v. 44 , p. 129
( 1902 ) kennicutt r. c. jr .
apj , v. 498 , p. 541
( 1998 ) krumholz m. r. , mckee c. f. apj , v. 630 , pp .
250 - 268 ( 2005 ) kurbatov e. p. astronomicheskiy zhurnal , in press ( 2007 ) , arxiv:0709.3923 landau l. d. , lifshitz e. m. fluid mechanics , course of theoretical physics , oxford : pergamon press ( 1959 ) larson r. b. mnras , v. 194 , pp .
809 - 826 ( 1981 ) mashonkina l. , gehren t. a&a , v. 364 , pp .
249 - 264 ( 2000 ) merlin e. , chiosi c. a&a , v. 457 , pp .
437 - 453 ( 2006 ) miniati f. , jones t. w. , ferrara a. , ryu d. apj , v. 491 , p. 216
( 1997 ) scannapieco c. , tissera p. b. , white s. d. m. , springel v. mnras , v. 364 , pp .
552 - 564 ( 2005 ) silk j. iau symp . 115 : star forming regions , pp . 663 - 689 ( 1987 ) smith m. d. the origin of stars .
london ( uk ) : imperial college press , isbn 1 - 86094 - 501 - 5 , xiii + 248 pp .
( 2004 ) tutukov a. v. , krugel e. , astronomicheskiy zhurnal , v. 57 , pp .
942 - 952 ( 1980 ) wiebe d. s. , tutukov a. v. , shustov , b. m. , astronomy reports , v. 42 , pp . 1 - 10 ( 1998 ) | arxiv |
Dragon Age 1. Familiar Wounds
_A/N: Thanks go out to Bioware and David Gaider for allowing me to tiptoe through their creative tulips!_
_This is my newest long story! It is based around the relationship between Jowan and Essemere Amell. I hope you will all read and review, I LOVE hearing from all of you, it really fuels my fire and keeps me inspired._
_Special thanks go out to my my good friends and Betas **Erynnar **and **Ladyamesindy.** Please read their stories, all of them are AWESOME!_
_I hope you all enjoy and like I said, let me know what you think!_
_~Much Love~_
_VT_
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The tower was cold as a Ferelden winter wind whipped through the high windows of the apprentice quarters. Six year old Jowan sat up in his bed, awake at this late hour trying to study a book on basic shield spells for his lessons the next morning. Though a smart boy with much magical ability, he was never quite able to apply it and struggled through most of his lessons.
He was startled as he heard the boots of the elder mage Wynne as they came through the door along with the smaller soft footsteps of a child walking beside her. Jowan could hear the soft sobs of the child that looked to be no older than five and the reassuring whispers of Wynne. He quickly whipped the covers up over his head, hoping that it would not be noticed that he was up so late studying.
"But where is my mama, my daddy?" The girl sobbed. "I want sissy and brother, why did they send me away? I promise I will be good, I didn't mean to set the chair on fire."
"Now, now child, it will be alright." Jowan peeked from beneath the covers and could see Wynne sit upon the vacant bed just across from his pulling what appeared to be a little girl into her arms. "You did nothing wrong, you just need to learn how to use the gift that The Maker has bestowed upon you. Your parent's aren't mages so they have sent you here so that we can teach you the proper way to use your powers."
The little girl looked up at the older mage as she dried her eyes with the sleeve of her dress.
"You'll learn to call this tower home and I'm sure in no time that you will make many many friends with the other children. They all possess the same special gift that you do." Wynne wrapped an arm around the girls shoulder and placed a kiss upon the top of her head. "As a matter of fact, I'm sure young Jowan would be more than happy to show you around the tower and introduce you to the other children, isn't that right my boy?"
Slowly, Jowan poked his big blue eyes up from under the covers where he had been hiding; and doing his best to try to sound like he had been woke up muttered. "Hmmm….who's thaaa..."
"Oh Jowan, I knew you were awake when I walked through the door, give up your act and come over here." Wynne said sternly.
"Yes mam." Jowan sighed as he kicked away his covers.
Wynne smiled as the boy approached the bed. "This, my dear, is Jowan; Jowan this young lady's name is Essemere." Wynne placed her hand on Jowan's shoulder "And I know that he will do all that he can to make you feel at home, isn't that right Jowan?"
Jowan nodded and reached a trembling hand out toward the girl.
Essemere took Jowan's hand in her own and with nearly a whisper said. "It's nice to meet you."
Butterflies fluttered in Jowan's stomach as he felt her soft hand in his own. All that he could do was smile as a warm crimson fell upon his cheeks.
Wynne smiled as she stood from the bed. "I think it is time that the two of you tuck in for the night. Come with me Essemere, I shall show you where the changing rooms are, and Jowan please, put away your studies for the evening. You will do just fine in your lessons tomorrow; you just need to focus."
Jowan reluctantly let go of the little girl's hand and watched as she disappeared across the room with Wynne. He crawled into bed, a smile etched upon his face, he didn't know exactly what this feeling was that had poured into his heart, but he liked it.
Sleep came easy to Jowan after meeting Essemere, dreams of playing games and finding mischief with his new friend danced through his head. He was suddenly awaked by a gentle tap upon his shoulder.
"Jowan?" The gentle voice whispered into his ear.
Jowan rolled over to see a pair of dark brown eyes staring back at him "Essemere? What's wrong?"
Essemere once again wiped her face with her sleeve. "I'm scared, can I sleep with you?"
Jowan recognized the look in her eyes; he knew what she was feeling. He felt the same way on his first night in the tower, the loneliness, the horror of being in a new place without a single familiar face. He would never have wished that feeling upon anyone. With a shy smile he slid over and raised the covers. Essemere crawled in beside him and placing a worn stuffed bear between their chests fell asleep quickly upon his shoulder.
2. Taming Of The Templar
_A/N: Tiptoeing through Bioware's tulips!_
_Thank you all for reading my little story, which I'm hoping to turn into a BIG story! Here we are on chapter two where we find our little mages getting acquainted. I hope you continue to enjoy!_
_Special thanks go out to my Betas Erynnar and Ladyamesindy, I don't know what I would do without them, they are the mac to my cheese, the wind beneath my wings, and my cans of whoop-$$ when those goblins of doubt find their way in. Please read all of their stories; every one of them is well worth it! Oh and ladies, thank you for reviewing. _
_Also, big thanks to my other reviewer Eboncat...glad to have you with us! I hope you all will take a second and let me know how I'm doing; your reviews are what drives me and keeps me going!_
_~Much Love~_
_VT_
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Golden light streamed in through the high windows and landed upon Jowan's face. He awoke to find Essemere, still asleep upon his shoulder; as he pulled from her he noticed the sleeve of his night shift was soggy which drew his attention to the tears that were dried upon her cheeks. In the morning light he could now get a better look at the girl. She was small; her skin pale, chestnut hair framed her sleeping face.
Sensing Jowan's stare, Essemere slowly began to open her sleepy eyes. She hoped that the previous night would prove to only be a bad dream; that she would wake in her own bed, beside her big sister Delyce. Her heart broke in two when she realized she was surrounded by the same cold stone walls that bid her goodnight. She could feel the tears begin to sting her eyes once more as she sat up in the bed and drew her knees to her chest.
Jowan didn't know why, but he felt such a connection to the young girl who was curled up on his bed crying. There was something about her, something special; something that compelled him to want to comfort her and protect her. Slowly the boy sat down beside the little girl and pulled her closer to him; allowing her to rest her head on his shoulder.
Essemere timidly looked up into Jowan's blue eyes. "I'm sorry; I know I am being a baby. My brother Daimhin always tells me that I cry too much."
"It's okay, I cried when I was brought here too." Jowan reassured her.
A small smile found the girl's face as she sat in silence with her new found friend.
A half an hour passed in quiet comfort before the tower's bells began to ring; signaling the time for everyone to be out of bed getting themselves ready for their lessons.
Essemere took her clothes from the small trunk at the foot of her bed. She turned to Jowan who was busy gathering his own clothes. "Will I get to talk to you more today?"
Jowan turned to the girl. "Sure, I have a private lesson with Senior Enchanter Wynne this morning but we can meet in the courtyard after that; before lunch if you want to."
Essemere timidly nodded in agreement as she walked toward the changing rooms.
Jowan found himself more distracted than usual during his lessons that morning, much to the dismay of Wynne. "With as late as you were studying young man, I would think you would be an expert at these spells."
"I..." Jowan began to stutter.
Wynne smiled. "I know the excitement of a new friend can be quite distracting. I shall hold off this lesson for one week; but, when we try this again I expect you to cast a shield that the first enchanter could not break through, is that understood my dear?"
Jowan smiled as he nodded. "Yes ma'am, thank you so much!"
Wynne tousled the boy's messy black hair. "Now you run along, find your new friend."
Jowan ran through the halls of the tower, down three floors until he reached the door leading to the courtyard. He stole a moment to catch his breath before opening the large doors leading outside.
Upon stepping out into the chilly air he immediately heard a familiar voice. "Stop it! I am not a baby!"
Two older boys who Jowan recongnized as Brochan and his shadow of a best friend Gwyr were standing on either side of Essemere, pushing her back and forth between each other; a crowd of children surrounded them and laughed as they pushed.
"What's the matter _baby_?" Brochan teased.
Gwyr chimed in as he took his turn to push. "What you gonna do _baby_, are you gonna cry?"
Jowan felt his cheeks and ears turning fire hot against the cold air and in a fit of rage he ran up to the two boys and screamed "Leave her alone!" And though Brochan was a good two years older and at least a foot taller than him, Jowan took every ounce of strength that he had and threw himself into the boy; knocking him to the ground.
Almost immediately Jowan found himself folded in two as Gwyr punched him forcefully in the stomach; and before he could even draw a breath another blow caught him squarely on his nose, this time from Brochan who had managed to pick himself up from the ground.
"Alright, alright;" A stern voice came up from behind the children. "I shall have none of this barbaric behavior in my tower."
The older children quickly ran off as Jowan's eyes looked up to meet the angry face of Knight Commander Greagoir. "Uuuuugh" he groaned.
"Causing mischief again are we young Jowan." Greagoir folded his arms in front of him as he looked down at the hunched over child. "I saw you shove young Brochan, I say you got what you deserved."
It was then, to the shock of the boy that Essemere boldly approached the Templar and tugged on his folded arm. "Sir! Jowan didn't do anything!"
Greagoir looked down at the little girl, unable to hide his surprise at her forthrightness. "Young lady, I saw the entire incident from upon those stairs. I suggest you learn your place lest trouble finds you quickly."
"They were pushing me and Jowan came to my rescue!" The little girl folded her own arms in front of her chest.
"I…I did not know that." Greagoir conceded as he glanced at Jowan. "But still young man, next time you must not take these matters into your own hands; that is what we templars are here for."
Jowan nodded in agreement as the templar turned to walk away. It took him by surprise when he saw Essemere once again pulling at Greagoir's arm.
He turned to look into her brown eyes once more "Yes young lady?"
"You're going to go find them right; to make sure they don't do it again?" She looked up at him with pleading eyes.
Greagoir sighed. "Yes…..I shall find them and remind the scallywags how to treat those who are younger than they."
Once more he turned to leave and once more she began tugging on his arm. Jowan found himself mentally screaming at Essemere "Bad idea, _baaaaad_ idea….let it go, for the sake of the Maker let it go!"
With a grumble Greagoir turned once more "Yes?"
"Thank you!" Essemere grinned as she threw her arms around the man.
Much to Jowan's amazement Greagoir smiled and patted the girl upon her back. "You're welcome."
3. Friends For Always
_A/N: As always, Bioware owns the tulips!_
_Here we join our favorite young mages back at the tower. Jowan has just protected his new friend all the while she made friends with the "big bad" templar Greagoir. Thank you all for reading and reviewing, it is humbling to know that so many of you enjoy what I write! Special thanks to __**Erynnar**__ and __**Ladyamesindy **__as always for their mega beta-ing abilities and for keeping me sane (trust me, that is a feat in and of itself). Please go read all of their masterpieces...each one is absolutely remarkable! Also big thanks to my reviewers __**Erynnar, Ladyamesindy, Eva Galana, jen4306, BubblesScream-jahm-4, TheNightwatch, Piceron,**__ and __**Hikari86.**__ As always you are SO much appreciated, you have no idea._
_Oh and small shout out to Ted Raimi AKA Joxer the Mighty for a touch of inspiration...helped along by E and Ladyames! He truly is my hero as are they!_
_**~Love One Another~**_
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Jowan stared at the girl, still in utter shock over what had just happened and her boldness toward Greagoir. "Are you insane?" He questioned her as he tried to stand up straight.
"No, I just like meeting people; and he isn't so bad." Essemere shrugged as she drew closer to Jowan.
Jowan gave her a look of utter bewilderment. "Are taming rabid mabaris and skipping rope with vipers among your other hobbies?"
"Jowan, your nose; you're bleeding!" Essemere gasped as she got a good look at her friends face.
Jowan ran his hand beneath his nose and looked at the scarlet that tinged his fingers; he stared for a moment lost in thought.
"_Blood is a powerful thing; as it brings life into the body it can also be manipulated, used, sacrificed to bend even the most formidable enemy to your will." The words of senior enchanter Uldred bubbled within his young mind._
"_If only I knew some of that magic."_ Jowan mused to himself. _"I'd never have to worry again about Brochan, or Gwyr or even Greagoir; they wouldn't dare touch me or Essemere again."_
His mind then wandered to Senior Enchanter Wynne as her grandmotherly voice overpowered Uldred's within his mind. _"Blood magic can be an evil tool that has the ability to turn a mage into a monster and an innocent into a puppet. Only those who are truly weak would turn to such form of magic to win their battles."_
Before his mind could wander farther Essemere's insistant voice snapped him back into reality. "Jowan; I said are you alright?"
Her hand was on his shoulder; her concerned eyes starting intently into his.
"I, I'm fine." Jowan shrugged away the remaining musings that lingered within his mind. "I'm just a little dizzy, that's all."
Essemere slung one of Jowan's arms over her shoulders and began leading him from the courtyard. "We must find Senior Enchanter Wynne, I'm sure she can have you better in no time."
"I'm fine Essemere, really." Jowan couldn't help but find a grin playing upon his face. He could not remember the last time someone showed any amount of concern for his well being. "I think it was just from being folded over like that for so long. I'm feeling better since I'm up walking."
Essemere gave him an apprehensive look. "Are you sure?"
"Yes, I'm fine!" Jowan smiled as he pulled his arm from around her shoulders and stood on his own. "See, all better."
The girl smiled sweetly as she took Jowan by the hand; pulling him to a stone bench near the large doors leading to the inside of the tower. "Thank you for standing up to those boys for me."
Jowan shrugged "It was nothing, what are friends for; right?"
"Right." A big smile spread across Essemere's pretty face as she threw her arms around the little boy.
Jowan was so consumed in the moment he didn't hear the footsteps that crept up behind him.
"Leave some room for The Maker love birds." the singsong voice of an older mage named Owain rang in his ear.
"Andraste's flaming toes Owain, you scared me!" Jowan jumped backwards; nearly falling off of the bench. "Before I forget, have you talked to Irving? He came by my lessons today with Senior Enchanter Wynne and asked that if anyone saw you that they send you his way."
Owain gave a bit of a confused smile. "Oh boy, wonder what this is all about, I told him that me casting lightening spells was a bad idea. It isn't my fault that it took one of his own eyebrows getting zapped off to realize that." Owain turned to look at the young girl sitting beside Jowan. "I don't believe we have met, my name is Owain; and to spite what you may have heard about my legendary good looks and charm, I really am a down to earth kinda guy...a man of the people so to speak." He gave Essemere a good humored grin as he turned to leave. "I suppose I had better find out what all of this is about. Oh and Jowzer...don't do anything I wouldn't do."
Jowan hid his face in his palm as his cheeks turned a cherry red.
"Jowzer?" Essemere smirked "I'll have to remember that; Jowzer The Mighty, MY HERO"
"Grrrrrr..." Jowan grumbled as he stood from the bench.
Essemere giggled and grabbed the boy by the back of his robe. "Oh sit down! I was just joking _Jowan._"
Jowan gave her a sly smile as he looked at her through the corner of his eye. "I know that; good to know you felt bad though."
Essemere slugged him in the arm as she laughed.
"So where are you from Esse? Why were you brought here?" Jowan put his feet on the bench and pulled his knees in to hug his chest.
Essemere sighed as she pulled her own knees in. "I'm from Highever. I was brought here because I got angry at my brother and set a chair in our sitting room on fire."
Jowan furrowed his eyebrows. "What in The Maker's name made you do that?"
"I didn't mean to! He made me so angry and one minute I was glaring at him; the next thing I know the chair he had just been sitting in was in flames!" She folded her arms in protest and turned her head to Jowan.
"So then your parents figured you were a lost cause and threw you away like mine did; right?" Jowan looked down trying to hold in a tear that was stinging his eye, threatening to roll down his cheeks.
Essemere shook her head. "No, neither of them wanted me to leave, they argued about it for weeks. Finally they decided that 'it was best' and they sent me to the Chantry." Essemere brushed away a stream of tears that had made it's way down her face. "Maybe it was for the best, I wouldn't want them to get in trouble and no matter how mad some of them make me I would never want to hurt anyone. It's just lonely, knowing that I have no one."
Jowan placed a hand on the child's shoulder. "You have me."
She grinned as she looked into Jowan's blue eyes. "And you have me. Friends for always?"
Jowan smiled. "Yes, I promise, friends for always."
4. Foscina
_A/N: As always, Bioware owns all but what I've created!_
_Hello folks! Welcome back! I am so glad that you all are enjoying my little story. This is going to be my really really long piece so I hope you are all up for the ride! _
_As always I have to first and foremost thank my betas __**Erynnar **__and __**Ladyamesindy **__who are both magnificent writers in their own respect for helping me out, keeping me going, and keeping me on the straight and narrow. I love you guys! Also big thank you's go out to my reviewers __**Erynnar, BubblesScream-jahm-4, Ladyamesindy, Shakespira, Eva Galana, Hikari 86, **__and __**Kiwibliss**__. You guys are truly what fuels my fire, never doubt that._
_Hope you all continue to enjoy and let me know what you think!_
_**~Love One Another~**_
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Jowan and Essemere spent the remainder of the afternoon talking and playing together. Essemere told Jowan all about her life and family back in Highever, the trouble she used to get into with her older sister Delyce, the way they used to pick on her brother Daimhin; stuffing toads into his bedding and putting the leaves of the poisonous Foscina plant into his small clothes so that when he would put them on he would end up with a horrible itch in the most sensitive of places.
"I wish we had Foscina here in the tower." Jowan mused. "That would really put Gwyr and Brochan in their place."
Essemere wrinkled her nose as she grinned and ran to the trunk at the foot of her bed. From there she pulled out a small burlap pouch with a drawstring top. She opened it and pulled out a thick piece of folded parchment. Essemere brought the items over to Jowan and when she unfolded the parchment he noticed three shiny dark green leaves folded within. "Your wish is my command my darling friend."
Jowan gave her a horrified look. "Why would you have Foscina leaves in your footlocker?"
"Just for a special occasion such as this." Essemere grinned. "Delyce gave them to me just before I left; she said to use them on anyone that gave me any trouble. I believe that Gwyr and Brochan would qualify as 'trouble'."
A devilish grin spread across Jowan's face as he stood from his bed. "Well, no time like the present." Jowan took Essemere by the arm and began leading her out of the room, and toward the room shared by the older apprentices.
Essemere pulled her arm from him. "Are you nuts! That room is full of people! We will wait until supper and then sneak away and put them in their clothes while the room is empty!" Essemere carefully folded the parchment and slipped it back into the pouch and into the pocket of her robes.
The pair made their way to the large dining hall on the first floor of the tower. Right away Essemere noticed Owain, the mage she had met earlier sitting at a table with one other older mage. He looked downtrodden and sad, his demeanor was nowhere close to the happy jovial state that he was in previously.
"Owain, are you alright?" Jowan sat down at the table beside him
Owain looked over at the little boy. "I'm fine Jowzer, leave me be."
"There's something wrong, I can tell. What happened?" Jowan asked. "Does this have to do with Irving wanting to see you, are you in trouble?"
"I said leave me be!" Owain stood suddenly from the table, knocking his chair backwards into the wall as he stormed from the room.
Godwin, the mage that had been sitting with Owain shook his head. "He has been like that ever since he was told about his upcoming Harrowing."
Essemere looked confused "Harrowing, what is that?"
"It is some tests that all apprentices have to go through before they can become full mages It is supposed to be really difficult and dangerous." Jowan remarked as he took a seat. "I don't know why it is bothering Owain though, from everything I have heard and seen he is really a good mage."
"That's what I have been trying to tell him." Godwin shrugged. "He won't listen to a word of it though; said he is going to talk to Irving about undergoing the right."
"Not the right of tranquility." Jowan shook his head.
"I'm sorry, what is the right of tranquility?" Essemere sat down beside Jowan.
"If you don't want to undergo the Harrowing or if Irving or the Templars don't believe you are capable of passing it then you undergo the right of Tranquility. They sever your connection to the Fade, making you unable to perform any magic but also zapping all of your emotions in the process. It is a gruesome practice." Godwin replied.
"I'm sure that Irving will talk some sense into him." Jowan sighed as he stood from the table "Come on Esse let's grab some food."
Essemere and Jowan grabbed their food and ate quickly. Upon finishing they snuck out of the dining hall and made their way back to the older children's quarters.
Jowan stood watch at the door as Essemere slowly tiptoed to Brochan and Gwyr's beds that stood on the far side of the room. Slowly she opened the first footlocker, picked up the first Foscina leaf using a piece of parchment and placed it within a set of small clothes that lay at the top of the pile. She then moved on to the next footlocker and repeated the procedure.
"Hurry, I think someone is coming." Jowan turned to see Essemere was already headed back toward him.
The pair slipped out of the room unnoticed and made their way into their own room. They both got changed and slipped into their beds.
Jowan had just begun to doze off when he felt a hand on his shoulder. "Jow..."
"What's wrong Essemere?" Jowan blinked his eyes, trying to focus on his friend's face. "Are you alright? You seemed like you were doing better."
Essemere clutched the stuffed bear that she liked to sleep with "I was...it's just so scary here at night."
Jowan smiled as he once again raised the covers and moved over, allowing Essemere to snuggle up beside him and fall asleep upon his shoulder.
The next morning the children awoke, got dressed and together made their way to the dining hall for breakfast. When they arrived they were shocked to discover that neither Gwyr nor Brochan were acting in the least bit itchy.
"Maybe they didn't change their clothes?" Essemere wrinkled her nose a the thought of the two boys running around in the same clothes that they wore the previous day.
Jowan shrugged. "Maybe, I wouldn't put it past them."
At that moment the children's question was answered when Godwin and Owain came slamming into the dining hall; their faces crimson and angry.
"I know you two had your knickers in a twist about having your beds moved to the other side of the room but this is ridiculous." Godwin got in the face of a bewildered Brochan.
"I...I don't know what you are talking about!" Gwyr attempted to take several steps back from an equally angry Owain.
Owain grabbed Gwyr by his robes and pulled him close "Oh I'm fairly certain that you do; Foscina leaves...small clothes...ring a bell?"
Before either boy could respond First Enchanter Irving made his way into the room and into the direction of the ruckus "What seems to be the trouble gentlemen?"
Godwin turned in the direction of Irving's voice. "These two imbeciles thought it would be humorous to put Foscina leaves in our small clothes!"
"Gwyr...Brochan, I am ashamed of you young men." Irving scolded. "First, Knight Commander Greagoir tells me about your hitting young Jowan, and now this? I think some time studying with the revered mother in the Chantry would do you some good. Follow me"
Owain and Godwin backed away as Gwyr and Brochan followed behind the First Enchanter, still completely confused as to what was going on. Essemere looked at Jowan as both of the children began laughing.
5. Tranquil
_A/N: Bioware owns everything but a couple of names!_
_Hello everyone! As always I must thank you for "tuning in" as it were. I am overjoyed with the response that this story is getting and very happy that you like my take on the mage origin, Jowan, Essemere, and all of the other characters._
_As per my usual I must thank my wonderful betas __**Ladyamesindy**__ and __**Erynnar**__, who put up with my endless stream of "Do you think this would work", "How does this sound?", and "Is this complete garbage?". Thank you ladies, you are both The Awesome Sauce! Please everyone, read their stories...__**ALL OF THEM! **__ They are well worth it :)_
_Also as always I thank my reviewers __**Mapachita, Shakespira, Ladyamesindy, Eva Galana, Erynnar, Hikari86, BubblesScream-jahm-4, **__and __**kiwibliss**__. You are all truly my inspiration for doing this and what keeps me from throwing in the towel when I get frustrated or hit the dreaded writers block. Thanks!_
_Enjoy reading and keep reviewing! I love it!_
_**~Love One Another~**_
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One uneventful week came and went since Essemere's arrival at the tower; and with every passing day she grew more accustomed to her gilded prison. The nights never got any easier though and she had yet to spend a full night in her own bed. Jowan was her constant companion. She had also gotten to know a lot of the other mages within the walls of the tower, she thought them all very friendly; save for a few.
One friendly face that she hadn't seen over the past few days was Owain. After the Foscina incident in the dining hall everyone including his best friend Godwin had lost track of him.
"Could he be going through his Harrowing?" Jowan asked Godwin as they and Essemere sat at one of the large tables in the library.
Godwin shrugged "I've no idea; I suppose he could be, but normally they are only gone for a matter of hours; not days."
A worried look struck Essemere's face. "You don't think..."
Godwin shook his head. "No no no...I'm sure it isn't tranquility. I don't think Owain would ever actually go through with it. I'm sure it's nothing, he could just be ill; probably in the infirmary."
Jowan nodded. He wanted to believe that a simple illness was truly the case, but in his heart of hearts he feared the worst.
The large bells chimed; announcing the beginning of their afternoon classes. "Ugh, I need to go." Essemere stood and scooped up her books. "I have a lesson with Senior Enchanter Uldred; that guy just scares me."
Godwin laughed. "Oh come on, he's no worse than your average drake."
Essemere shuddered. "I would prefer the drake. Jowan, are we still meeting in the courtyard after lessons?"
"I have to do my shield test with Senior Enchanter Wynne but as long as I am still in one piece I will be there." Jowan grinned as he grabbed his own books.
Godwin rested his elbows on the table and placed his chin in his palms. "Ahhh, young love; you be good to her Jowzer...she's a keeper."
Jowan's cheeks pinked at Godwin's words and as he walked past the red-headed mage he _accidentally_ let a flash of electricity slip through his finger tips and into Godwin's shoulder.
"Hey, that hurts deep down to the feelings Jowzer, I may have to go hug my pillow and cry." Godwin chuckled as he rubbed his shoulder.
Jowan rolled his eyes. "Yeah, but will it hug you back?"
Godwin merely laughed as Jowan walked off in the other direction.
Jowan's test with Senior Enchanter Wynne went well enough. He was able to block most of the attacks that she would throw his way; it wasn't until the last arcane bolt that he was caught off guard. That particular spell threw him backwards; crashing hard into the wall.
"I would say that was passable young man." Wynne helped Jowan stand after the shock of hitting the wall began to wear off. "I do expect you to work on it though; the arcane bolt is one of the most common spells that will be sent your way and can be quite powerful. You must learn how to defend yourself."
Jowan nodded as he tried to straighten his messy black mop of hair. "Yes ma'am, I will."
"There's a good lad. I will see you back here at the same time two days from now." Wynne smiled as she began straightening the mess that their practice session had caused in the room.
By the time Jowan made his way to the courtyard Essemere was already seated beneath an old willow tree near the edge of the tower. He stopped for a moment and just watched her as she twirled a small flower around in her fingertips. He couldn't quite figure out what his fascination was with his new friend. There was nothing about her that was exactly out of the ordinary. She didn't come from an exotic background, she didn't have any remarkable special abilities. She got scared just as any other child would in a strange place and had her share of bullies that picked on her, but there was this lovable quality to her that Jowan just could not deny. She had a way of speaking to him that made him feel like no matter how many people were around them it was just him and her.
"Hey Esse, what are you doing?" Jowan sat down in the grass beside his friend.
Essemere held the flower to her nose and drew in a long breath as she closed her eyes. "Just thinking about home. I know I haven't been gone long but I really miss it. We had wild flowers just like these that grew in the fields all around Highever Town; Delicate Whispers is what Mama called them. We would go on family picnics once a month to pick the flowers during the spring and summer months. We would have lunch and pick a whole bunch of flowers and when we got home we would change out the straw in our bedding; Mama would make sure we all had some mixed in to make it smell nice a lot longer than if we didn't have it."
"Your mama sounds like she is really nice." Jowan's voice took on a melancholy tone.
"They all are. I miss them so much." Essemere sighed as she leaned toward Jowan, resting her head on his shoulder. "So what is your family like? I've talked up and down about mine and I don't think you've said anything about yours."
Jowan shrugged as he began playing with a blade of grass. "I don't like to think about them much. I've been at the tower for a little over a year now; since I was five years old."
"Five years old?" Esse raised her head from Jowan's shoulder and looked into his eyes. "Oh Jowan I'm so sorry."
Jowan shook his head. "Don't be; this tower is more a home to me than that place was." He turned his head away from Essemere as the haunting memories of his family came marching to the forefront of his thoughts. "Mother stopped talking to me after I showed signs of magical ability." Jowan lowered his head as tears began to stream down his cheeks. "She wouldn't even look at me. She was always saying that I was a demon child and an abomination in the Maker's sight. She wouldn't even call me by my name; I was always 'That Thing'. She and father would fight constantly because she didn't want 'That Thing' in her house." Essemere placed a reassuring hand on Jowan's arm. "Eventually I guess the fighting got to be too much and he just dumped me at the village chantry and never looked back; and I have been alone ever since."
Essemere gently squeezed Jowan's arm. "You have me; remember...friends for always."
Jowan looked at her and grinned. "I remember, and you will always have me."
Essemere stood up and began to stretch. "I suppose I really should go take these lines to Senior Enchanter Uldred."
"Why do you have to take lines to Uldred?" Jowan asked raising a quizzical eyebrow in her direction.
Essemere huffed. "He said that I was not _focusing_ so I had to write one hundred lines 'I will pay attention.' and I need to get them turned in to him before the end of the day. I just cannot pay attention to him, he is so boring and he looks at me funny."
Jowan grinned. "Do you want some company?"
"Sure!" Essemere nodded and grinned.
The children made their way up the winding stairs of the tower. When they reached the third floor; they both were delighted to see a familiar face at the top of the stairs, standing in front of one of the towers stockrooms.
"Owain!" The kids shouted in chorus as they both ran to greet him. Jowan felt his heart embed itself within his throat when Owain turned to look at them. That absent look...those drab robes...
"No..." Jowan shook his head as Essemere gave him a puzzled look.
"Welcome to the circle stockroom of magical items. My name is Owain; how may I assist you?"
6. Escaping Fear
_A/N: Bioware owns all; I'm merely feasting off of there creative greatness._
_First off as always, I have to thank my betas Erynnar (Soulmates, The First Cut Is Always The Deepest, and Whispering Sighs of the Blade) and Ladyamesindy (author of MANY wonderful stories including "Cheese Glorious Cheese", "The Best Thing About Love Is Trust" and her new Teagan-riffic story "Till You Return To Me Again.)_
_Thanks also go out to my reviewers; **Shakespira, kiwibliss, Ladyamesindy, jen4306, Erynnar, BubblesScream-jahm4-, **and** Hikari86. **I thank you all from the bottom of my heart, you are truly what keeps me going._
_I hope you continue to enjoy this little story of mine!_
_**~Love One Another~**_
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Jowan stood for a moment in complete shock. He could not believe that the empty husk of a man that stood before him was the same man who had been teasing and joking with him only days earlier.
"Owain, were you really made tranquil?" Essemere's sweet voice broke the uncomfortable silence.
Owain looked down at the children showing not even the slightest sign that he so much as recognized either of them. "I voluntarily submitted to the Rite of Tranquility. I was unwilling to undergo the Harrowing. I find this state agreeable."
"But don't you think what they did to you was mean?" Jowan interjected.
Owain turned his gaze to the boy and in the same emotionless tone responded; "Tranquility has it's merits. I see the world with clarity. I remember the days when my mind was filled with inconvenient and seething emotions. Now things are simple."
"But you are no longer a person!" Essemere stated as if she were trying to convince him to change his mind.
"My body is similar in form to yours, possessing an equal number of limbs, appendages, and internal organs. I perform the same physical functions. My mind is capable of higher thought processes. Am I to be denied personhood because I do not feel as you do?"
"But a person has emotions." Jowan argued.
"People feel things to different degrees. One individual may be more empathetic than the next. Some are quick to anger, while others are not. Yet you would not single one out and accuse him of not being a person. My capacity to feel differs from yours, but you also differ from all other beings. You are no more a person than others, and I am no less a person than you are."
"But you have to have emotions!" Essemere felt herself getting almost angry. She felt almost like if she kept arguing that he would eventually snap out of it, tell them that he was joking, laugh, cry...something.
"I propose we agree to disagree. Personhood is not measurable. Therefore, we should let this rest." Owain responded in the same cold and stoic tone.
Jowan wanted to run away, go back to bed and wake up to start the day anew chalking what he was seeing up to being merely a bad dream; but he new better. He decided instead to press on talking to Owain, hoping to grasp exactly what they did to him. "Owain, what was becoming tranquil like? Did it hurt? Did you feel anything?"
"It is difficult to describe. I would perhaps compare it to being plunged into a pool of ice-cold water."
Just the thought made Jowan's flesh crawl. "What did they do during the Rite of Tranquility? How did they make you like...this?"
"I was ordered never to speak of it. I cannot go against the Circle's wishes."
Essemere sighed as she grabbed hold of Jowan's arm, pulling him in the direction of the door leading to the circular hallway. "Come on Jowan, let's go."
Jowan looked one more time into Owain's eyes, hoping to see some sort of glimmer there, a piece of the man who used to joke with him, tease him and call him "Jowzer". All he saw looking back were two empty brown vessels where a soul used to reside. Jowan shook his head as he turned and walked away.
The children made their way in silence down the hall to Senior Enchanter Uldred's office that he shared with Senior Enchanter Wynne. Much to both Jowan and Essemere's relief she was the only one there.
"Come in children." Wynne looked up from the book she reading at her desk when she heard the sound of Essemere gently tapping on the door. "Is something wrong? You both look distressed."
Essemere held a piece of parchment out in front of her. "I just came to turn these lines in to Senior Enchanter Uldred."
"Well I would be happy to give them to him but I would hope that writing lines would not cause such sadness in the both of you." Wynne stood up and walked to a small round table situated near the door. She pulled out two chairs and motioned for the children to sit down and then pulled out the third chair for herself. "Now, what seems to be the problem?"
Jowan down at the table and said quietly. "We just ran into Owain..."
"Ah..." Wynne sighed knowingly. "Quite a shock see him like that isn't it?"
"Why would he choose to be turned into ... THAT?" Essemere shook her head.
"He is still a person child." Wynne scolded. "He is merely a different person now."
Esse's cheeks turned pink with shame. "But why would he choose to have no emotions? I don't understand."
Wynne thought for a moment, trying to find the right words to use to explain the situation to the children. "Well children, what do you fear most in this world?"
"Snakes!" Jowan shouted immediately without even a moment's thought.
"Okay, so you are afraid of snakes, but there are plenty of people out there that are not; correct?"
Jowan shrugged. "I guess so."
"But you would do all that you could to avoid them, would you not?"
"Yes..." Jowan raised an eyebrow, trying to determine where Wynne was going with her questions.
Wynne folded her hands and placed them on the table in front of her . "Well for Owain that fear was the Harrowing; he was frightened and so he did what he could to avoid it, and the only way to avoid it was to under go the Rite. And while it may seem irrational to some, it was a true fear to him. Just as your fear of snakes may seem irrational to a few it doesn't make it any less scary for you. Do you understand?"
The children both nodded. "I think so."
Wynne smiled. "Good. Now both of you run along and I will see that Senior Enchanter Uldred gets these lines." She held up the piece of parchment that Essemere had given her; and as the children started out the door she added; "And Essemere, if you happened to say anything to Owain, anything that might have been taken as rude or insensitive, you may consider apologizing."
Essemere looked at the floor, her cheeks once again turning pink. "Yes Senior Enchanter, I will." She really did feel bad about the way that she had spoken to him but just kept thinking _"I couldn't have hurt his feelings...he doesn't have any"_ in an attempt to make herself feel better. It wasn't working.
The children made their way back to the stock room; and once there Essemere slowly approached Owain who had his back turned to her as he straightened some bottles on a shelf. Essemere reached up and gently tapped him on the shoulder. "Owain?"
He turned to look at the girl. "Welcome to the Circle's stockroom of magical items. My name is Owain. How may I assist you?"
Essemere squinted her eyes in confusion. "Is that how you greet everyone?"
"Do you find my greeting disagreeable? I apologize, but I am not inclined to change it. Do you need something?"
Essemere shook her head and decided not to push the conversation any further in fear of offending him further _(if in fact she COULD offend someone who has been made tranquil) _she decided not to take that chance. "No, no it is fine. I just wanted to apologize for what I said earlier; about you not being a person. It was rude of me, I'm sorry."
"You are a child and children by nature can be blunt and sometimes rude. No offense was taken and it has been forgotten." He replied evenly. "Is there anything else you needed?"
Essemere shook her head and replied quietly. "No, nothing else."
As the children began to walk away, toward the stairs leading to the first floor Jowan looked over his shoulder and with sadness dripping from his words called out, "I'll miss you Owain."
Without a word Owain turned toward the shelf and continued sorting the various potion bottles.
As they walked past the older apprentice's quarters they heard a loud bang and angry grumbles coming from within. The children peeked in the door to find Godwin throwing various books and tomes into Owain's footlocker.
Essemere quietly cleared her throat, trying to get Godwin's attention without startling him.
Godwin looked toward the door. "What do you two want? Don't you have studying to do or lessons to attend to?"
"Are you okay?" Jowan looked at the young man with concern. "I know he was a good friend..."
"I'm fine, now leave."
"I feel terribly for what happened, I'm so sorry." Essemere added.
"I'm not." Godwin snapped as he turned to fully face the children. "That idiot chose to have this done to him, I feel no pity for him; he is nothing but a coward."
"You don't mean that." Jowan argued
Godwin's cheeks turned dark red as tears drew upon his eyes. "YES I DO, NOW LEAVE."
Essemere pulled gently at the back of Jowan's robes. "Just let him cool down, come on..."
As he walked out the door behind Essemere Jowan watched as Godwin sat down heavily upoon the bed and lay his face in his hands; and though he could not be sure, he thought he could hear Godwin crying. Jowan sighed and shook his head as he closed the door and walked away.
7. Jessenia
_A/N: Everything belongs to Bioware, save for a few names and ideas._
_Big thanks go out to my betas Erynnar and Ladyamesindy without whom I probably would have given up long ago._
_Also big thanks as always to my reviewers __**kiwibliss, Ladyamesindy, Shakespira, jen4306, Erynnar, **__and __**Hikari86. **__Please continue to read and review, I love to hear what you think!_
_**~Love One Another~**_
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The days wore on into weeks and the weeks into months after Owain took his Rite of Tranquility. And with every day that went by the children found themselves growing used to the now subdued mage. Even Godwin seemed to have gotten past the initial hurt and anger of his friend taking the "cowards path" to avoiding the Harrowing, but even two months later no one in the tower would dare bring up Owain's name in front of Godwin, and he noticeably did all that he could to avoid coming in contact with Owain. At best life could be considered uneventful; winter became harsher and colder but soon melted away into spring. The wintry blossoms of Delicate Whispers were soon replaced with colorful Tulips.
With the change of seasons, the children enjoyed the mild sunny weather and spent most of their free time in the courtyard, sitting beneath the large Willow trees, talking or reading or merely just enjoying each other's company; and it was on one of these pleasant afternoons that a new child was brought to the tower.
"Should we go ahead inside?" Jowan asked Essemere as he looked up from the book he was reading.
Essemere looked up from her own book and yawned. "Oh I suppose. Supper will be soon and I want to get there early. If we get stuck at that corner table near the templars again I think I will go crazy. I don't know why they have to stare at us even when we are eating, as if my carrots are going to jump off of the plate and possess me."
Jowan chuckled as he stood up from the grass and reached out to help Essemere to her feet. The children gathered their things and made their way into the tower. Upon entering the hallway they began hearing loud screams coming from inside of the apprentice quarters. They slipped in the door and quickly ducked unnoticed into the changing area; peeking at the commotion from around the corner.
"Déjame ir cerdo!" {Put me down pig!} The girl screamed as she thrashed within the arms of one of the templars.
Essemere looked at Jowan. "Antivan!"
Jowan raised a curious eyebrow in Esse's direction.
"She is Antivan!" Essemere exclaimed in a sort of whispered shout. "There was an elven man that worked as an assistant in my father's smithy; his daughter Aina was my best friend and they were from Antiva. Aina taught me how to speak Antivan and I taught her how to speak Ferelden.
"Well, what did she just say?" Jowan asked with excited curiosity.
Esse bit her lower lip as she thought for a moment. "He he he, she just told him to put her down, and then she called him a pig!"
Jowan did the best he could to hide the chuckle that escaped his throat, listening carefully to the commotion as it continued.
"If you would just calm down we would let you go!" The templar holding her struggled against the girl's kicks as she thrashed hard against his armor.
Another templar by the name of Matthias stood by the wall, rubbing his shoulder as if he had just done a tremendous amount of work. "She's been like this ever since we found her in the marketplace of Denerim; she has fought everyone the whole way here and none of us know how to speak Antivan so it has been next to impossible to calm her."
At that point another templar entered the room, only this one was dripping wet. "And bleedin' strong too! I set her down for only a moment when we got off of the boat at the dock and in the blink of an eye the little terror kicked me in the knee and knocked me into the water."
"Déjame que tonto ignorante, mi padre me saldrá y cuando lo hace te vas a arrepentir alguna vez me ha tocado!" {Put me down you ignorant fool, my father will come for me and when he does you will be sorry you ever touched me!} The girl shrieked as she continued thrashing against the templar's grasp.
He looked up "There has to be someone in this damn tower that speaks Antivan!"
Slowly and quietly Essemere tiptoed from around the corner. Jowan tried to grab her but he was too late.
"Ser? I know Antivan..." She said timidly.
Matthias pushed himself from the wall and started in Essemere's direction. "Young lady, you should not be in here..."
"Wait!" The templar holding the young girl shouted so loud it made even Matthias jump. "If she knows Antivan don't you think she could possibly...oh I don't know...calm her down?"
Matthias gave Essemere a scrutinizing look. "You think you could translate?"
"I'm sure of it!"
The templar grabbed Esse by the hand and led her in the direction of the thrashing girl. As soon as she caught sight of Essemere she began to calm down, if only slightly.
Essemere stepped closer to the girl and placed her hand on her shoulder. "Por favor, cálmate. No te hará daño." {Please calm down. They will not hurt you.}
Upon hearing her native tongue the girl completely relaxed but the terror still remained fixed in her eyes.
Essemere continued. "Mi nombre es Essemere, lo que es tuyo?" {My name is Essemere, what is yours?}
The girl looked at Esse with tear filled eyes. "Mi nombre es Jessenia Iannisi. ¿Por qué estoy aquí? ¿Quiénes son estas personas? ¿Dónde están mis padres?" {My name is Jessenia Iannisi. Why am I here? Who are these people? Where are my parents?}
"Well girl, what is she saying?" Matthias stood over her with his arms crossed, tapping his foot impatiently.
"She says that her name is Jessenia Iannisi and she wants to know who you are, why she was brought here and where her parents are."
"Tell her that she has been brought here by order of the chantry due to the fact that she has shown magical ability. We are the templars assigned to guard her; she is in no danger. We do not know the whereabouts of her parents." Matthias replied coldly.
"Usted está aquí porque tiene habilidades mágicas y Chantry tiene miedo que a su vez, la gente al azar en sapos. Estos babuinos se han enviado para asegurarse de que usted no hace eso."
{You are here because you have magical abilities and the Chantry is afraid you will turn random people into toads. These baboons have been sent to make sure that you don't do that.}
Jessenia let a giggle slip from her mouth and the templar holding her loosened his grip some. Her look then once again became serious. "Mi mamá? Mi papá?"
"Lo siento, pero no saben" {I'm sorry but they don't know}
The two young girls looked at each other and smiled slightly, a bond of trust forming between them. Sensing the girl begining to calm the templar set her gently down upon the floor. "Essemere, can you talk to her some more while we get Senior Enchanter Wynne?"
Essemere gave the templar a sweet smile as she nodded. "Sure, I would be happy to."
"If you need anything just let us know.
Once the templars were safely out of the room Essemere motioned at Jowan to join she and Jessenia on the other side of the room. Jowan approached the girls and smiled timidly as he gave a shy wave.
"Jessenia, esto es Jowan. Él ha sido mi mejor amigo desde que fue traído aquí."
Jowan's eyes scrunched in confusion. "What did you just say about me? I heard my name!"
Esse giggled. "I was introducing you silly. Jowan, this is Jessenia."
Jowan looked at the girl and in a slow, deliberate, voice said, "HI IT IS NICE TO MEET YOU!"
Essemere once again giggled only this time it was at the almost terrified look that fell across Jessenia's face. "Jowan! She's foreign, she isn't deaf!"
Jowan quickly clasped his hand over his mouth. "Sorry!"
Essemere grinned as she looked at the bewildered girl sitting beside her. "Te lo prometo, que realmente es un gran tipo. Sólo un poco tonto a veces" {Sorry, he really is a great guy. Just a bit silly sometimes.}
Jessenia looked up to see Jowan still waving; a big goofy smile stretched across his face causing her to giggle.
"So, why are you in Ferelden?" Essemere asked sweetly.
"Mi padre es comerciante. Vende armadura de cuero que se produce en la ciudad de Antiva al pueblo de Denerim. A pesar de que estaban preparando la tienda de mi madre, le cortan la mano y lo sanó. Yo sólo estaba tratando de ayudarla, pero pronto fue rodeado por todos estos guardias gritando y me tiraba de mí de mi familia." The girl burried her face in her hands as she started to cry. "Esa fue la última vez que los vi.
Essemere rubbed the girl's back as she wept, trying to provide her some of the comfort that Jowan provided her in her first nights in the tower. She looked at Jowan and whispered. "She says that her father was a merchant selling leather armor from Antiva City to people in Denerim. Her mama got hurt and she cast a heal spell and the templars took her. She said she hasn't seen her parents since they pulled her away."
Jessenia looked at Essemere, her hazel eyes pleading. "No quiero estar aquí. Yo quiero ir a casa." {I don't want to be here. I want to go home.}
Not knowing what to say Essemere was glad to hear the footsteps of Senior Enchater Wynne as they came through the door of the apprentice quarters. She approached the frightened girl and gave her one of her signature warm friendly smiles. "This must be our new apprentice I have heard so much about. Essemere, would you mind translating for me?"
"Not at all." Essemere replied sweetly.
"Hello Jessenia, my name is Senior Enchanter Wynne. You have been brought to the tower so you can be trained in the proper ways to use the magical abilities that the Maker has bestowed upon you. There is no reason to be frightened, you are safe and you will be taken care of."
Essemere turned to Jessenia and translated what Wynne said. Jessenia nodded showing that she understood but quickly turned her gaze to Wynne and falling upon her knees began to plead.
"Por favor, señora, te estoy pidiendo, déjame ir a casa! Te prometo, te juro que nunca hacer magia otra vez si usted acaba de dejarme volver a Antiva. Te estoy pidiendo." The girl then fell upon the floor at the older mage's feet and began to weep heavily.
Wynne pulled her from the floor surprisingly effortlessly and sat the girl beside her on the bed. She lovingly wrapped her arms around her; whispering a light "shhhh" in her ear as she gently rocked her back and forth. Essemere began to translate but Wynne stopped her; for though she did not speak Antivan, the look in Jessenia's eyes was a look that Wynne had seen many times before.
Once she completely calmed herself Jessenia began to realize just how tired she was. She had barely slept since being ripped from her parents a little over a week ago and the little bit of sleep that she did obtain was haunted by nightmares of that day's events. She felt sick with regret for ever even casting that spell and longed for the reassuring words of her mother and the loving embraces in the strong arms of her father. With every rock Jessenia's eyes grew heavy until she finally succumbed to sleep.
Once she was sure that the child was asleep Wynne gently laid her back upon the bed and covered her with a large blue blanket that was folded near the footboard. She then turned to look at Essemere and Jowan.
"Jessenia is going to need some friends in the months to come. She has been torn from all that she knows and taken to a strange place in a foreign land."
"We will take care of her Senior Enchanter, I promise." Essemere smiled sweetly at Wynne.
"I know you will." Wynne tousled the girl's hair and squeezed Jowan's shoulder as she walked out the door.
End file.
| fanfiction |
vortices can be found both in classical and quantum physics .
one can encounter vortices , for instance , in water that spins around or in the air as a ring of smoke @xcite .
quantum mechanics can be formulated in a language of hydrodynamics ( see e.g. @xcite and references therein ) . such a formulation ( very useful also in quantum chemistry @xcite )
provides a basis for definition of topological defects like vortices @xcite , whose features are even more striking than those that we find in classical physics .
quantum vortices appear not only in systems described by the linear schrdinger equation .
indeed , they were experimentally observed in superfluid heii @xcite and a bose - einstein condensate ( bec ) of trapped alkali atoms @xcite which are typically described , within the mean - field approximation , by a nonlinear equation @xcite . in hydrodynamics of ordinary non - viscous fluids ,
the circulation of the velocity field is conserved in time evolution due to the celebrated helmholtz - kelvin theorem ( hkt ) @xcite .
this theorem is often employed in quantum mechanics @xcite . however , uncritical usage of the hkt , may lead to the incorrect conclusion that stability of vortices and vortex rings in quantum fluids is fully guaranteed by the hkt @xcite . in the present paper
we discuss the basic assumptions of the hkt and show analytical examples where these assumptions can be easily broken by quantum evolution of the wave function , leading to changes of the topological charge .
difficulties in fulfilling the assumptions of the hkt have been already pointed out in conclusions of ref . @xcite .
to establish connections between quantum mechanics and fluid dynamics we write the wave function in the form @xmath0 @xcite , ( where @xmath1 stands for density of a probability fluid ) and define the velocity field @xmath2 provided @xmath3 and its partial derivatives are well defined , we may rewrite the schrdinger equation [ with a potential @xmath4 in the form @xmath5 @xmath6 equation ( [ cont ] ) is an ordinary continuity equation , while eq .
( [ dyna ] ) , in the limit of @xmath7 , becomes similar to the dynamical equation of a curl - free non - viscous fluid @xcite . in quantum mechanics
the wave function has to be single valued . to satisfy this condition one arrives at the feynman - onsager quantization condition @xcite for the circulation of the velocity field @xmath8 around any closed contour @xmath9 @xmath10 where @xmath11 . due to the definition ( [ velocity ] )
, we may not expect @xmath12 unless at a certain point on a surface encircled by the contour @xmath9 , @xmath13 becomes singular ( behaves as a dirac delta function , see for example @xcite ) .
we refer to @xmath14 as a topological charge since any continuous deformation of the contour @xmath9 , which does not incorporate any other points where curl of the velocity field does not vanish , can not change @xmath8 .
one may ask whether the circulation @xmath8 is conserved in time evolution of the velocity field . for a fixed contour , a possibly moving vortex may leave an area bounded by the contour and consequently @xmath8 changes its value . thus , the relevant situation we should consider corresponds to the case where we let an initially defined contour evolve in time according to the velocity field
. parameterizing the initial contour by @xmath15 variable , i.e. @xmath16 , and employing the equation of motion of a contour @xmath17 , \label{motion}\ ] ] yields @xmath18 if the contour is drawn through points where the velocity field @xmath3 and its partial derivatives are well defined , applying : eq .
( [ dyna ] ) , equality @xmath19 , and using the fact that , at least on the contour @xmath20 , we get @xmath21 equation ( [ gamma0 ] ) establishes the helmholtz - kelvin theorem originally proved for a non - viscous fluid @xcite . applicability of this theorem to a non - linear quantum systems is presented in the appendix .
the hkt is fulfilled provided the contour @xmath22 that goes initially through points where the velocity field is well defined will evolve in time through such points only . in the following
we will see how such an assumption may be broken by quantum evolution of the wave function leading to a change of the topological charge .
in this section we discuss a few possibilities of breaking of the hkt . to this end
we analyze three different analytically solvable examples where breaking of the hkt becomes evident .
first example shows that changes of the topological charge of a vortex correspond to the appearance of a nodal line of the wave function . in ref .
@xcite the authors show the instability of a vortex placed in an anisotropic two - dimensional harmonic trap .
we would like to discuss the source of violation of the hkt in such a case .
we will calculate the velocity field and analyze changes of its circulation from a point of view of the hkt .
consider an anisotropic two - dimensional harmonic oscillator with the potential @xmath23 ( where we use the units of the harmonic oscillator corresponding to the @xmath24-direction ) .
the initial wave function is prepared as a superposition of the two lowest excited states @xmath25 with a real parameter @xmath26 . choosing any contour @xmath9 that encircles the origin of the coordinate frame we find out that the circulation @xmath8 corresponds to @xmath27 vortex .
however , the circulation around that point is not conserved in time . indeed ,
analysis of time evolution of the velocity field @xmath28 ( where @xmath29 is the energy difference of the two lowest excited states ) reveals that for @xmath30 , @xmath8 corresponds to @xmath27 while for @xmath31 $ ] to @xmath32 . to discuss applicability of the hkt we have to investigate time evolution of the initially defined contour .
the problem requires careful treatment because for @xmath33 ( where @xmath34 )
the velocity field goes to zero everywhere except on the nodal line , @xmath35 , where it diverges @xmath36 . to demonstrate violation of the hkt we have to show that a contour initially encircling the center is not extended to infinity but indeed faces singularity for @xmath37 .
suppose we define a contour , encircling the origin , at a time @xmath38 , and look for a time evolution of its arbitrary point @xmath39 , whose position we denote by @xmath40 .
combining eq .
( [ motion ] ) and eq .
( [ vel ] ) we get @xmath41 with @xmath42 from eq .
( [ ewolcontour ] ) it is apparent that the distance of the point @xmath40 from the origin does not change in course of the evolution .
indeed the quantity @xmath43 is a constant of motion as long as the function ( [ funkcja ] ) is well defined .
note that it diverges , at @xmath37 , for points lying on the nodal line .
therefore , for @xmath33 with arbitrary small @xmath44 nothing extraordinary happens with the contour until at @xmath37 the contour faces singularity ( see fig .
[ contour ] for an example of the contour evolution ) .
thus , the hkt can not be applied because quantum evolution of the wave function pushes an evolving contour to singular points and the quantities involved in the theorem become undefined .
we would like to stress that the presented scenario where the vortex situated in the harmonic trap reveals periodic changes of the topological charge is possible only when the initial vortex is placed exactly at the center of the potential .
otherwise the vortex changes its position it escapes to infinity and another vortex with the opposite charge arrives from infinity and the scenario repeats periodically . in the second example we would like to present violation of the hkt due to annihilation of a vortex ring .
this example comes from ref .
@xcite where creation and annihilation of a vortex ring for freely moving particle is presented . even though it is not clearly stated in ref .
@xcite , the hkt is not fulfilled in that case .
the wave function of a vortex ring @xcite ( in dimensionless units ) may be written in the form @xmath45 e^{ikx - i k^2 t/2},\end{aligned}\ ] ] where the wave vector @xmath46 is related to a motion of the `` center of mass '' of the vortex ring with a constant velocity @xmath47 .
the vortex ring corresponds to the nodal line of the wave function and is located at the intersection of the plane @xmath48 and sphere @xmath49 . at time @xmath50 , the vortex is born at a point @xmath51 and , at time @xmath52 , it disappears at a point @xmath53 .
the radius of the vortex changes in time as @xmath54 .
suppose at any time @xmath55 , we define a contour @xmath9 so that it encircles the vortex ( see fig .
[ fig2 ] ) and the circulation of the velocity field corresponds to @xmath27 .
the evolving contour can not cross the vortex ring without facing a singularity in the velocity field .
however , the ring at some moment starts shrinking and at @xmath52 it reduces to a point .
consequently , at @xmath52 , the contour must go through a singularity of the velocity field and the integral ( [ dcirc ] ) and also the hkt become meaningless .
the last example we would like to comment on shows collision of two vortices leading to the appearance of a single doubly charged vortex .
consider , for simplicity , a two - dimensional h atom initially in the first excited state with angular momentum @xmath56 [ i.e. @xmath57 in atomic units ] that is driven resonantly by a circularly polarized electromagnetic field .
the field frequency is tuned to the transition between the first and second excited energy eigenstates .
it results in the familiar rabi oscillation @xcite between the @xmath58 state and the second excited state with angular momentum @xmath59 [ i.e. @xmath60 .
indeed , the time evolution of the wavefunction reads @xmath61 where @xmath62 is a dipole matrix element @xcite ; @xmath63 , @xmath64 are energies of @xmath65 , @xmath66 states . for @xmath38
there is a vortex with @xmath27 at the center of the coordinates as expected for the state with angular momentum @xmath56 .
when @xmath67 increases another vortex with @xmath27 moves in from _ infinity _ , collides with the first one ( situated at the center of the coordinates during the whole time evolution ) at @xmath68 and then moves out to _ infinity _ again and so on . during the collision ,
i.e. for @xmath68 , a single vortex with @xmath69 is formed . in the considered example
, the hkt does not apply : if we define a contour so that it encircles the vortex with @xmath27 situated at the center of the coordinate , such a contour encounters a singularity in the velocity field during the collision with the other vortex .
such a behavior , is expected to hold in an arbitrary collision between two vortices leading to formation of one , doubly charged , vortex .
these examples are not the only ones illustrating that vortices can disappear or change their charge in the course of time evolution .
they were chosen to illustrate that such processes can happen in different physical systems and results in the violation of the hkt .
the theorem is explored in the context of vortices stability ( see e.g. @xcite ) to imply the constancy of a vortex topological charge .
as we have clearly illustrated the hkt can not assure persistence of vortex currents in the quantum mechanical systems .
therefore we conclude that the vortex topological charge is not as robust quantity as it is commonly believed ( see e. g. @xcite and references therein , @xcite ) .
finally , we would like to mention that appearance of vortices can happen in a way that does not violate the hkt .
namely , they can appear in the form of a closed vortex line that springs from a point or as a vortex - antivortex pair creation from a node of a wave function @xcite .
we have analyzed the applicability of the helmholtz - kelvin theorem in the hydrodynamical formulation of the quantum mechanics .
the velocity field of the probability fluid is defined as the gradient of the phase of the quantum wave function .
this implies that nonzero circulation , along a given contour , may come out in the system if the field reveals a singularity at certain points on a surface encircled by the contour . adopting
the hkt to the quantum liquid may suggest that such a topological charge of the system can not change .
however , the hkt may be employed if a given contour evolves through points where the velocity field is well defined .
it may happen even in classical hydrodynamics that such an assumption is not fulfilled if , e.g. , liquid encounters obstacles in the flow @xcite .
in quantum liquids the situation is more complicated because a singularity is necessary for a nonzero circulation .
indeed , phase of a wave function is undefined at a vortex core , which means that singularities appear in hydrodynamical formulation of quantum mechanics whenever vortices show up .
this property makes distinction of hydrodynamical description of quantum system from the classical hydrodynamics .
we have presented simple analytical examples where the quantum evolution of a wave function pushes a contour to a singular point .
such a process is accompanied by a change of the vortex topological charge .
we have illustrated the violation of the hkt choosing examples that correspond to linear quantum systems .
macroscopic quantum behavior is present in interacting many particle systems that are usually described in the mean field approximation by a nonlinear schrdinger equation . in appendix
we complete the analysis of the hkt for a nonlinear schrdinger evolution .
vortices maybe also investigated in propagation of _ classical _ light @xcite .
indeed , the evolution equation of the slowly varying envelope of a light beam can have identical form as the schrdinger equation , which allows for exactly the same considerations as we have presented above .
the dynamics of vortices and escapes of the off - center vortex in an analog of the asymmetric harmonic potential have been experimentally observed in such systems @xcite .
we are grateful to j. zakrzewski and g. molina - terriza for fruitful discussion and to u. fischer for the critical reading of the manuscript .
support of kbn under project 5 p03b 088 21 is acknowledged .
for completeness we analyze here the application of the hkt in hydrodynamical formulation of nonlinear quantum mechanics .
the so - called gross - pitaevskii equation is successfully used to describe the properties of a bose - einstein condensate in trapped alkali atoms @xcite . in particular
this equation exhibits various vortex solutions @xcite . to make the discussion more general we will also include the mean field term describing a possible dipolar interactions between condensed atoms @xcite .
the nonlinear schrdinger equation of interest reads @xmath70 where @xmath71 corresponds to two body interactions ( e.g. point or dipolar interactions @xcite ) .
substitution @xmath0 leads to the continuity equation ( [ cont ] ) and the following dynamical equation for the velocity field @xmath72 the only difference in comparison with eq .
( [ dyna ] ) is the appearance of two new terms in the bracket of eq .
( [ dyna1 ] ) .
these terms , however , do not change the proof of the hkt for example eq .
( [ dcirc ] ) does not possess any potential like terms .
therefore the helmholtz - kelvin theorem holds also for systems described by eq .
( [ ham1 ] ) under the same assumptions as in the case of linear quantum mechanics discussed in sec .
[ dowod ] . | arxiv |
Calculating the average of fluctuations of a given time series
I have a given data set, 4500 time data points approx, and the instantaneous velocity at each point. To calculate the time average of the velocity, I attempted to integrate the velocity function numerically wrt each time step using the trapezoid method and devided by the total time interval $T\_{4500} - T\_1$.
The time average was calculated as: $$\bar{U} = \frac{1}{T\_{4500}-T\_1}\sum\_{i=1}^{4500} \frac{u(t\_{i+1})+u(t\_i)}{2}\*(t\_{i+1} - t\_i)$$
I calculated the fluctuation at each time-step $i$:
$$u\_i' = u\_i - \bar{U}$$
I am a bit unsure on how to take the average of the fluctuation terms, if I take the sum and divide it by the total number of points (4500) I get 0.031 (a term close to zero); on the other hand, if I divide the sum by the the time interval $T\_{4500}-T\_{1}$ I get a value of 2. The second value confuses me as I expect the average of the fluctuations to be zero, should I only consider the point avg rather than the time average of the fluctuations?
Picture of the instantaneous speed data as a function of time:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/3Kvbw.png)
The time average of a continuous variable can be defined in a quite natural way as
$$
U = \frac{1}{T}\int\_0^T f(t) dt.
$$
Every discretization of such integral can be thought of as a weighted average of $N$ sampled data, with a weight depending on the spacing between successive data. It is well-known that if the weights are equal (equally spaced points) the weighted average coincides with the arithmetic average.
Therefore, if you define the average valued of the 4500 data as
$$\bar{U} = \frac{1}{t\_{4500}-t\_1}\sum\_{i=1}^{4499} \frac{u(t\_{i+1})+u(t\_i)}{2}\*(t\_{i+1} - t\_i),$$ (notice the correction to the upper limit of the index, to avoid to introduce a $4501$-th point).
The same formula, with $u'\_i$ in place of $u\_i$, should be used. By construction, it should be exactly equal to zero.
Of course, the average fluctuation is not an interesting quantity. More interesting the mean squared fluctuation, i.e., the average of the squared fluctuations, against to be evaluated with the same formula, substituting $u^{'2}\_i$ to $u\_i$.
| stackexchange/physics |
coracoid bone graft transfer is successful for antero - inferior shoulder stabilization with an extremely low failure rate .
we believe , as in literature , that the causes of latarjet procedure failure ( recurrent dislocation , subtle instability , pain , and stiffness ) could be due to coracoid bone graft osteolysis and fibrous union .
we previously published a study on coracoid bone graft osteolysis after the latarjet procedure , wherein we showed that the part most involved in osteolysis is the superficial part of the proximal coracoid bone graft . in this study
, we modified the latarjet procedure by using a mini - plate fixation technique to improve the compression between the coracoid graft and the glenoid hoping to reduce the amount of coracoid bone graft osteolysis .
the aim of this study was to determine if there is any statistical significant difference in terms of corcacoid bone graft osteolysis between our two surgical techniques for coracoid bone graft fixation ( using mini - plate fixation or using screws and washer ) [ figure 1 ] .
the exclusion criteria were concomitant rotator cuff lesion , previous surgery for recurrent antero - inferior dislocation , and multidirectional instability .
the latarjet procedure was performed for patients with a score of over 6 points ( average 8 points ) according to the instability severity index score ( isis ) ( range of values 0 - 10 ) , as described by boileau . from may 2009 to february 2010 , the authors prospectively followed - up 26 consecutive patients after the modified latarjet procedure with the mini - plate fixation technique . out of the 26 patients ,
total 23 patients had more than one event of antero - inferior shoulder dislocation ( average 6 5.3 dislocations ) , 14 patients ( 53.8% ) had 2 - 5 dislocations , 7 ( 26.9% ) had 6 - 15 dislocations , and 2 ( 7.7% ) had more than 15 dislocations .
total 16 ( 61.5% ) patients were professional competitive sportsman involved in high demand sports like rugby , basket ball , boxing , and soccer .
total 11 patients ( 42.3% ) gave positive gagey test and 5 patients ( 19.2% ) had positive sulcus sign .
all patients also had a standard range of motion : mean active forward elevation was 178.1 3.2 degrees , mean external rotation with the arm at the side was 47.4 12.7 degrees . also , 2 patients ( 7.7% ) had an external rotation over 85 degrees and 5 patients ( 19.2% ) had glenoid bone loss as quantified by the pico method .
preoperative plain x - ray studies were performed in the standard views including antero - posterior view , internal rotation view , external rotation view , lateral view , axillary view , and bernageau view .
preoperative ct scans were performed for all patient prior to surgery for a better evaluation of the glenoid bone surface .
our surgical technique is a modified latarjet procedure using a mini - plate [ figure 2 ] developed by the authors .
this procedure is performed using a local bone graft by the osteotomy of the terminal 2 cm of the coracoid process , detaching the insertion of the pectoralis minor tendon .
the coracoid bone graft is decorticated in the inferior surface until cancellous bone . after the split of the subscapularis tendon ,
the coracoid bone graft is transplanted along with the conjoined tendon to the antero - inferior glenoid rim that is decorticated .
the coracoid bone graft is positioned below the equator and no less than 2 mm from the glenoid cartilage .
the coracoid bone graft is laid lengthwise and held in place with two bicortical cannulated screws partially threated ( diameter 4 mm ) . in the modified latarjet procedure , instead of using two washers , the authors used a mini - plate to improve the compression between the coracoid bone graft and the antero - inferior surface of the glenoid rim .
modified latarjet procedure using a mini - plate the mini - plate design has specific characteristics , each of which corresponds to a biomechanical function .
the wedge plate if placed medially on the slope on the medial scapular neck under compression , makes the coracoid bone graft rotate medially , thereby improving the bone match between the coracoid bone graft and the glenoid bone surface [ figure 3 ] .
it has a figure of eight ( 8) configuration that allows a better torsional orientation of the plate on the dorsal - sloped coracoid surface .
four spikes for an improved stabilisation of the plate - bone block and two screw holes for lag screws insertion .
bone match between the coracoid bone graft and the glenoid bone surface using mini - plate fixation postperative plain x - ray studies were performed in antero - posterior and lateral views to evaluate the correct position of the bone graft and the screws .
a computed tomography ( ct ) scan evaluation with three - dimensional reconstruction was then performed in all patients to evaluate the coracoid bone graft 3 days after the surgery
. a latest generation 64 slice ct scan ( siemens somatom dual source scanner , 200 ma , 120 kvp , slice thickness 1 mm ) was used in this study .
similar to our previous study , the coracoid bone graft was divided into 8 parts .
the two major regions were superficial and deep , which , in turn , was each divided into proximal , distal , medial , and lateral [ figure 4 ] .
we measured the area of the mid portion over the superior screw ( 4 proximal parts ) and under the inferior screw ( 4 distal parts ) in the ct scan axial cut using a semi - automated edge detection module ( adobe photoshop 7.0 ) , according to the method described by puri et al . , and whang et al .
, the areas of the 8 parts of the coracoids bone graft were calculated by determining the number of pixels / cm .
the ct scans were taken with a metal - artifact minimization . according to a previous study , the glenoid apex ( the highest part of the glenoid )
was used as a reference point during ct scan evaluation after surgery to ensure constant measurement during the follow - up ct scan assessment .
diagram of partitioning in 8 parts of the coracoid bone graft in right shoulder ( frontal view ) a second post - surgery ct scan assessment with three - dimensional reconstruction was then done at a mean period of 26 3 months .
no x - ray study was performed , because it is not as accurate as the ct scan for the evaluation of the coracoid graft osteolysis .
the area of the 8 parts of the coracoid bone graft was measured as described and compared with the previous measurements done at 3 days post - surgery .
all ct scans measurements were made by an independent radiologist who did not participate in the study . during the follow - up , the authors also determined the functional status , range of motion , and the stability of the treated shoulder by means of two functional scoring systems : the rowe score and the walch duplay score .
database constituted of 26 patients defined by the percentage of osteolysis of the 8 coracoid parts . to normalize this rough data ,
we scaled the percentage values ( v ) into angular values ( ) , from 0 to 90 , by the formula : this trigonometric transformation allows magnification of the differences at the end of the scale ( around 0% and 100% of osteolysis ) because it is more relevant for a difference between 90% and 100% of osteolysis than between 50% and 60% of osteolysis .
considering the 8 parts as related between them , we performed an analysis of variance ( anova ) for repeated measures and then managed the post hoc confrontations ( bonferroni test , p < 0.01 ) between the osteolysis percentages of the 8 coracoid parts . at the end
, we matched ( student t test ; p < 0.01 ) the normalized mean reabsorption value of the 8 parts individually with that of the homologue part of the previous study , without considering the relations between the 8 parts .
we then compared our current results with the results from that of our previous study without using mini - plate fixation to determine if there is any statistical significant difference in terms of corcacoid bone graft osteolysis between the two surgical techniques for coracoid bone graft fixation .
the mean follow - up period for the 26 patients treated with the modified latarjet procedure was 26 3 months ( the minimal follow - up was 18 months ) .
postoperative clinical examination revealed a mean active forward elevation of 174.7 5.2 degrees ( loss of average 3.4 degrees ) and a mean external rotation with the arm at the side of 45.6 10.3 degrees ( loss of average 1.8 degrees ) , as measured by a standard goniometer . according to the rowe score , 16 ( 61.5% ) patients had an excellent result ( 90 - 100 points ) , 9 ( 34.6% ) had a good result ( 75 - 89 points ) , and only 1 ( 3.8% ) had fair result ( 51 - 74 points ) .
no patient had a poor result ( < 50 points ) . according to the walch duplay score , 13 ( 50% ) patients had an excellent result ( 91 - 100 points ) , 11 ( 42.3% ) had a good result ( 76 - 90 points ) , 2 ( 7.7% ) had a medium result ( 51 - 75 points ) , and no patient had a poor result ( 50 points ) .
the sst showed that most of the patients ( 96.1% ) were satisfied after surgery , especially in daily activities as well as work or sports .
no failure has been reported in this study ( recurrent dislocation , subtle instability , pain , and stiffness ) .
using ct scan analysis , we were able to study the evolving progress of coracoid bone graft osteolysis in the described 8 parts of the coracoid bone graft .
the most relevant mean osteolysis percentage was represented by the superficial and medial part of the proximal coracoid bone graft ( 88.2 21.4% ) and by the superficial and lateral part of the proximal coracoid bone graft ( 80.6 25.4% ) .
the part with the least amount of osteolysis were the deep and lateral portion of the proximal coracoid bone graft ( 39.2 39.7% ) and the deep and medial portion of the proximal coracoid bone graft ( 54.2 33.4% ) [ tables 1 and 2 ] . on an average , 63.9%
descriptive percentage of osteolysis for the 8 parts of the coracoids process in the 26 patients mean percentage and standard deviation of the reabsorption for the 8 parts of the coracoid .
anova for repeated measures showed a significant effect both for the between variance ( f1,25 = 361.3 ; p < 0.01 ) and for within variance ( f7,175 = 12.2 ; p < 0.01 ) . the differences between the normalized mean osteolysis percentages of the 8 parts are reported in table 3 .
in particular , we noticed that the proximal , superficial , and medial parts were significantly different in respect of every other part ( row b ; p < 0.01 ) , except for the nearest part , i.e. , the proximal , superficial , and lateral ones .
indeed , this lateral portion was significantly different in respect of the proximal and deep parts and of distal and superficial parts , but not if matched with the distal and deep parts . to the opposite side [ table 3 ] ; from row e to row h , there were no differences among the distal parts ( p = 1.00 ) .
post hoc matches ( bonferroni method ) for the eight coracoid parts ( p<0.01 ) the match between the normalized mean percentage of reabsorption of the 8 parts for the present study and those of the previous study showed a significant difference for the deep and lateral part of the distal coracoid bone graft ( t value = 4.04 ; p < 0.01 ) and for deep and medial part of the distal coracoid bone graft ( t value = 3.89 ; p < 0.01 ) . in effect , in the present study , the mean reabsorption was 64.0% for the deep and lateral part of the distal coracoid and 67.3% for the deep and medial part of the distal coracoid bone graft , while , in the previous study , it was 37.5% and 36.2% , respectively [ table 4 ] .
one of the causes of latarjet procedure failure could be the progression of the transferred coracoid bone graft to osteolysis or fibrous union .
bone resorption study has been reported in the literature after 3 months and 8 months , respectively . to our knowledge , there are no studies in literature that show the causes of coracoid bone graft osteolysis .
doursounian et al . performed a ct scan analysis in 11 of 34 patients treated with the bristow procedure to study the position of the coracoid graft and to evaluate the presence of pseudarthrosis or osteolysis ( pseudarthrosis was found in 4.3% of patients , coracoid bone graft osteolysis in 21.5% of patients ) .
cassagnaud et al . performed a ct scan analysis in 80 out of 106 patients treated with the latarjet
patte procedure to assess the position of the bone block and the presence of osteoarthritis ( osteoarthritis was present in 15% of patients , non - union in 7% of patients ) .
. showed , using ct scan analysis , the position and the amount of the coracoid osteolysis in patient treated with the latarjet procedure ( on average about 60% of the coracoid process underwent osteolysis ) .
none of this studies tried to understand the causes of osteolysis or non - union of the coracoid bone graft . in this study , we tried to understand if modifying one of the biomechanical factors , the compression between the coracoid bone graft and the glenoid surface , could improve the bone healing and reduce the amount of coracoid bone graft osteolysis . because of the impossibility to change the patient 's biological factors , the authors tired to improve the compression between the coracoid bone graft and the glenoid surface using a mini - plate fixation technique .
this study revealed the coracoid graft region most involved in osteolysis is the proximal and superficial zone . on the contrary ,
all the distal region of the coracoid bone graft is the part least involved in osteolysis and have the best bone healing , with the only exception of the lateral part of the proximal and deep zone [ table 2 ] .
we then compared our current results with the results from that of our previous study without using mini - plate fixation to determine if there is any statistical significant difference in terms of corcacoid bone graft osteolysis between the two surgical techniques for coracoid bone graft fixation .
these results find significant difference with the results of the previous study only for the deep part of the distal coracoid both lateral and medial , that seems to be more involved in osteolysis , even if these results did not correspond to any clinical findings .
, reported that there is no difference between the bristow procedure and the conjoined tendon transfer alone in restoring anterior translation .
yamamoto et al . , concluded that the coracoid bone graft is the main factor for the stabilizing mechanism in patients with glenoid osseous defects . in this study , despite the amount of osteolysis involving the coracoid bone graft ( mean percentage 63.9% ) , there was no patient with recurrent shoulder dislocation and subtle instability .
this reinforced the hypothesis that the coracoid bone graft is not the principal factor in the latarjet procedure for antero - inferior shoulder stabilization . according to the results of our study
, we believe that the use of mini - plate fixation does not reduce the risk of coracoids bone graft osteolysis , even if we recommend the use of the mini - plate to improve the graft stability . the limitations of this study were that it is difficult to understand whether the radiological findings noted indicate a real graft osteolysis or whether it is just a remodeling process of the coracoid bone graft due to the forces transmitted from the conjoined tendon and the humeral head onto the bony graft ( wolff 's law ) .
the second limitation in this study is the low number of patients recruited due to the high cost of the ct scan examination .
to the best of our knowledge , this is the first study to determine if there is any statistical significant difference , in terms of corcacoid bone graft osteolysis , after the latarjet procedure between the two surgical techniques for coracoid bone graft fixation .
although the most relevant osteolysis was represented on the proximal part of the coracoid , osteolysis was also found on the distal part ; this should be considered to be the most important for the bone - block effect .
the bone - block effect is an important factor in shoulder instability for patients with significant bony defects , but it may not be the main factor in patients without significant bony defects .
further studies are needed to understand the process of the coracoid graft osteolysis after the latarjet procedure and ways to prevent and reduce this osteolysis process . | pubmed |
Fullmetal Alchemist, Hetalia - Axis Powers Hetalia and Fma challenge
This is a challenge to create a crossover for my Fullmetal Oc and Hetalia. The rules are as followed:
Absoultly NO CHARACTER DEATH! The only exceptions are if they will be brought back at some point
If you want to use my oc, her name is Kaili Winterstorm. The info for her is on Quotev. The username is Team cat-ninja-alchemist
I want to read it please. SO please share them to me
Nothing gross. So no PG13. At all.
Above all, please have fun with this. I will also post my own stories if you want to read them
More rules may or may not be added. That is all
-Millicent Dagworth
End file.
| fanfiction |
The Paris Report: Vuitton, Hermes, Chanel & McQueen
LOUIS VUITTON: As an antidote to the lightning pace of the digital universe and the fashion world's collective on-to-the-next attitude, Marc Jacobs envisioned his collection for Louis Vuitton as an excuse to pause and appreciate...
LOUIS VUITTON: As an antidote to the lightning pace of the digital universe and the fashion world's collective on-to-the-next attitude, Marc Jacobs envisioned his collection for Louis Vuitton as an excuse to pause and appreciate what a house like Vuitton is capable of creating. Beautiful bags, such as the fantastic redos of the Vuitton Speedy, were basically guaranteed. So it was a captivating atmosphere. Shown under a greenhouselike tent surrounding an active fountain in the Cour Carrée du Louvre, and set to the music of "And God Created Woman," the whole production had a grand… click to continue
HERMES: A blanket of fog rolled out of a telescopic tunnel as Big Ben chimed, announcing "The New Avengers" theme of Jean Paul Gaultier's zippy collection for the august luxury house. Bowler hats, umbrellas galore and voluptuous Lily Cole packed into a leather catsuit also signaled the landmark British television series — and cued Gaultier's jaunty take on English-isms and masculine style. As with many shows in Europe this season, outerwear was a key focus and — this being Hermÿs — it was sumptuous and then some. Buttery double-face cashmere, luscious leathers and glossy croc… click to continue
CHANEL: He has yet to officially move mountains, but Karl Lagerfeld came close with the 265-ton iceberg he had imported from the northern reaches of Sweden to the Grand Palais for Tuesday's Chanel show. Standing 28 feet tall in a placid pool of water, the glacial sculpture was a spectacular sight that forced those complaining about the subsequent chill to save their frozen breath. Besides, the subzero air (-4ºC) only made the collection's fantastic downy knits and fuzzy tweeds all the more enticing. Not that they needed a boost… click to continue
ALEXANDER MCQUEEN: "Each piece is unique, as was he." Those simple words, at the end of the show notes for the final collection by the late Lee Alexander McQueen, captured the sentiment of a singular talent extinguished too soon. The 16 showpieces that paraded slowly through a gilded salon at the headquarters of luxury titan Francois Pinault were all cut "on the stand" by McQueen in the weeks before he took his own life. In their artistry, imagination and technical wizardry, they brought his fashion spirit to life. Here was a designer with the intelligence… click to continue | slim_pajama |
Date produced: May 2006, while living at North Adelaide (2005-2006).
Close to the heart, the main vessels are large, and flow with energy. Being close to the centre of the tree means close to its 'heart'. Even though a tree may not have an organ called a heart (as animals have), which acts as a circulatory pump, trees also have circulatory systems. Trees need to bring water and nutrients up from the ground out to all of their leaves for generating energy from photosynthesis, for keeping their cells alive. And they need to distribute the results of all the photosynthesis back to all of its cells, including those in its roots. One might consider the important section of trunk just above the roots to be the tree's heart. All major circulation passes through this region of the tree. Some trees can pump water silently more than 100 metres above the ground to their leaves. How do they do this, especially when a vacuum can only hold a column of water about 10 metres high?
The subject is also close to my heart. I know this tree from spending much time at it back in 1984. It is a huge organism with marvellous forms and a very strong 'presence' (a thrill from just being near the tree) that speak to my heart.
I am standing close to the centre of the tree. The large forms flowing closely past me make me feel as though I am confronting the 'presence' of the tree itself. It is a rich position to do a drawing from and I enjoyed the challenge of it. The angle of view is very wide, which provides enough challenge in itself.
I am pleased with the choice of natural charcoal for this drawing, allowing me to build up and rework areas of soft grey tone. Using sticks of natural charcoal forces me to work fairly broadly, because they don't really allow for consistent crisp thin linework. Even so, much of the contour linework has to be extremely accurate to convey an accurate sense of the forms, and provide the 'right' rhythms. Many contour lines were removed and attempted 3 or 4 times to get them as I wanted them.
I am pleased with the discipline and control shown throughout this drawing. To do this drawing, I had to stand and mainly hold the large drawing board, which proved to be physically demanding and tiring. After a couple of weeks of working this way, I worked out a way of setting the board up on an easel perched pricariously on top of the buttress roots. This was much more comfortable for me, but proved to be a pretty fragile arrangement in even a moderate wind, and I often had to revert to holding the board.
I am particularly happy with the sense of 'contemplative poetry' I feel from this drawing. | slim_pajama |
Given Ohm's law, how can current increase if voltage increases, given fixed resistance?
According to Ohm's law, $V=IR$ (voltage equals current times resistance).
So if the voltage increases, then the current increases provided that the resistance remains constant.
I know that Voltage or potential difference means work done per unit positive charge in bringing that charge from one point to another.
So according to Ohm's law, if the work done per unit charge increases then current will increase. How can this be true? Point out my mistakes.
I think you've answered that yourself. If you are putting more work into moving unit of charge, then that unit of charge is going to move faster (all else being constant). Current is the flow electric charge across a surface at specific rate (1 ampere = 1 coulomb per second) and hence - more voltage, more work, faster flow (rate), higher current.
>
> how can this be true?
>
>
>
If we connect 1.5V cell to a 10 ohm resistor, the current is, by Ohm's law, 0.15A and the power delivered to the resistor by the cell is 0.225W.
Now, connect a 9V battery in place of the 1.5V cell. The current is now, by Ohm's law, 0.9A and the power delivered to the resistor is now 8.1W.
The 9V battery must deliver far more power to the resistor than the 1.5V cell does.
There's nothing mysterious here. Why do you think the current should not increase if the voltage increases?
It is better to think of Ohm's Law as I=V/R.
What it is telling you is that if you apply a voltage (V) to a resistive material (characterised by R), then that voltage is capable of driving a current I.
The material could be anything, a piece of copper, or the plasma in a star.
The voltage is constantly supplying energy to the electrons in the material, but the resistivity is constantly taking that energy back out (converting it to thermal energy).
The higher the voltage, the more energy you can give to the electrons and hence the higher the current. On the other hand, the higher the resistance, the more energy is taken away from the electron flow and hence the lower the current.
| stackexchange/physics |
How can I treat a pendulum in a frame accelerating in an arbitrary direction?
I took the case where the simple pendulum has a fixed length and the frame is accelerating perpendicular to gravity.
I found the following differential equation:
$$\ddot{\theta} = - \frac{g}{l} \theta – \frac{a}{l}(1 – \theta^2)^{1/2} ;$$ assuming small vibration
how to proceed?
If you are sitting in the accelerating frame (acceleration $\vec a$ relative to the laboratory) and measured the acceleration of free fall $\vec g\_{\rm accelerated}$ what value would you get?
The answer is that $\vec g\_{\rm accelerated} = \vec g - \vec a$ where $\vec g$ is the acceleration of free fall in the laboratory frame.
You can think of it as a "fictitious' force $-m\;\vec a$ acting in the accelerated frame where $m$ is the mass of the bob.
If the pendulum was not oscillating then it would orientate itself along the direction of $\vec g\_{\rm accelerated}$ and this would be the position about which the bob would oscillated with shm as though the gravitational field strength was $\vec g\_{\rm accelerated}$.
Rotate the coordinates so that *y* axis is along the equilibrium direction (acceleration + gravity). The solve it the same as regularly but the angle $\theta$ measured not from vertical but from the *y* axis. Also the new *gravity* is the combined gravity and base acceleration.
| stackexchange/physics |
HMS Lothian, was a former cargo ship launched in 1938, as MV City of Edinburgh, which was requisitioned during the Second World War as a troop transport and later converted by the Royal Navy into a headquarters ship in the Pacific. The ship is notable for a mutiny that occurred onboard whilst docked at Balboa, Panama in September 1944.
The ship was returned to her original owners, Ellerman's City Line, in 1946 and scrapped in 1961.
History
Shortly after the start of the Second World War the City of Edinburgh was requisitioned by the Ministry of War Transport for war work. In September 1943 the ship was passed to the Admiralty and converted to a Landing Ship Headquarters for operations in the Pacific - operations for which she was totally unsuited.
In July 1944 the ship was recommissioned as HMS Lothian and was sent to be part of the U.S. 7th Fleet as part of Force X. Leaving the Clyde on 3 August 1944, the Lothian sailed for New York and then down to the Panama Canal. The ship's complement had swelled to 750 instead of the normal 450 under the command of Rear Admiral Arthur George Talbot. Conditions aboard were extremely poor as the ship, being unsuited for tropical climates, had poor ventilation and air-conditioning and a lack of sufficient water.
After reaching Balboa, Panama on 1 September 1944, an armed mutiny the first in the Royal Navy since the 19th century occurred on-board due to the atrocious conditions. A Royal Marine detachment was sent on board to quell the mutiny. 17 senior men were court-martialled and reduced in rank, whilst other mutineers were given six months' extra duties and punishment drill. However, as the mutineers could not be removed from the ship in Balboa for lack of another ship or available jails, sentences were suspended and the ship proceeded to the Pacific.
Lothian joined the U.S. 7th Fleet at New Guinea on 29 September 1944, but the British vessel went unused by the Americans and the Lothian eventually set sail for Sydney, after seeing no combat.
In February 1945 the Lothian became flagship to Rear Admiral Douglas Blake Fisher and operated as a control ship for merchant transports arriving to supply the British Pacific Fleet. After the Japanese surrender in August 1945, the ship was used to evacuate civilians and prisoners of the Japanese from Singapore, Hong Kong and Shanghai.
In 1946 the Lothian was returned to the Ellerman Line and reverted to the MV City of Edinburgh. She resumed her previous route and in April 1961 was sold to Hong Kong Salvage and Towage Company, renamed Castle Mount and sailed to Hong Kong for scrapping in July 1961.
Commands
References
External links
Details of HMS Lothian 1944-46
Category:Ships built in Merseyside
Category:World War II auxiliary ships of the United Kingdom
Category:Support ships of the Royal Navy
Category:World War II passenger ships of the United Kingdom
Category:1938 ships | wikipedia |
Should moderately soluble compounds like calcium hydroxide be denoted (aq) or (s)?
I'm learning to write balanced molecular and ionic equations. For "moderately soluble" compounds such as calcium hydroxide, how do I know whether to write the state symbol as (aq) or (s)? This is the equation I'm supposed to work with:
$$\ce{Al2(SO4)3 + 3 Ca(OH)2 -> 2 Al(OH)3 + 3 Ca(SO4)}$$
In principle, you cannot know without conducting the experiment. It depends on the concentration of a moderately soluble compound such as $\ce{Ca(OH)2}$ whether it is dissolved or whether there is stuff still sitting at the bottom of the vessel undissolved.
However, you are performing a reaction which is in aqueous solution. This reaction will typically only work if all the reactants are already in solution. Moreover, this is a precipitation reaction. Thus, it wouldn’t make sense to have a non-dissolved reactant to react it with a dissolved one. Given this context, you should assume both reactants are in solution.
$$\ce{Al2(SO4)3 (aq) + 3Ca(OH)2 (aq) -> 3CaSO4 v (s) + 2 Al(OH)3}$$
Note that whether or not aluminium hydroxide precipitates depends on the resulting $\mathrm{pH}$ value. If you started off with excess hydroxide, it may well stay in solution.
The exact answer for a given compound can only be known if you know both concentration and solubility product.
| stackexchange/chemistry |
CINDERELLA MAN
by
Cliff Hollingsworth
. Revisions
by
C. Gaby Mitchell
Curre11t Revisions
by
Akiva Goldsrnan IMAGINE STORY DEPT.
firs\ Rewrl\e
January 9, 2.004 1
2
3 BLACK SCREEN: l
ROARING, distant, maybe the ocean. Louder now, not waves but
the DIN of VOICES. LOUDER still, cacophonous, as the screen
brightens, the staccato lightning of flash bulbs REVEAL ...
A GLOVED FIST-CLOSE. Held high in triumph.
WIDEN ANNOUNCER (OVER)
And from the great state of New
Jersey, by unanimous decision,
tonight's light heavyweight
winner ... Jim Braddock.
INT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -NYC -1928 -NIGHT 2
The capacity crowd is on its feet. That BOXER in the ring is
wiry, not too tall, not too heavy. The kind of fighter you'd
say had.a lot of heart. Meet JIM BRADDOCK.
A little GUY rushes in from the corner, drenched in sweat,
bright, intelligent eyes. By the looks of him, he may have
just fought this fight himself. This is JOE GOULD and he
actually leaps onto Braddock's back like a kid.
People are on their feet, SCREAMING, YELLING. Affluent faces
out for a night. A world, happy, with no knowledge of the
future. It's still the roaring twenties, after all.
Gould shoots Jim a wry smile. Braddock grins back. Pumps his
fist in air one more time and, on cue, the crowd goes WILD.
EXT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -NYC -NIGHT
New York sparkled then. Ansel Adams. A world of black
shadows, and clear white light. Simpler times.
Joe and Jim emerge from the side door onto Seventh Avenue,
under a huge lighted sign for tonight's fight, stopping now
to dispense a couple of autographs.
JOE
You give a few, leave em wanting.
BRADDOCK
Anything you're not an expert in,
Joe?
JOE
Not that I can think of, no.
(beat)
Maybe my wife. 3 2.
Braddock signs away. Glossies of him in a staged boxer pose.
Naturalism is still two wars off.
FAN
Gave him a cold meat party, Jim.
FAN # 2
Way to go, Braddock.
Jim likes these guys, the fact that they love him so. A GIRL
catches his eye, flashes him, underneath her flapper's dress,
a glirapse of naked promise. He grins, shakes his head.
JOE
Hey, win some, lose some, huh
Johnston?
Jim looks up to see two other MEN leaving from the smoky side
door. The fellow Joe is addressing is JIMMY JOHNSTON. Fight
promoter. He doesn't look happy.
BRADDOCK
Leave it be, Joe.
Joe nods as if he agrees. It's just that he has absolutely no
control over his mouth.
JOE
Although you gotta figure, this
one, you gotta figure maybe you get
behind the wrong guys. What's
Griffith, favored six to one and,
oh yeah, 34 knockouts in 55 wins,
outweighs my boy by, what, five
pounds more than that scale you
fixed says, then jab, hook ...
Joe is actually moving in time with the hits. Now that Joe's
started, Jim can't leave him out there on his own.
BRADDOCK
Actually it was jab, jab, hook-
JOE
Jab, jab, hook and your boy's
hearing high ball whistles. Hell, I
could hear em. You Jinrrny?
BRADDOCK
I heard something. 4 JOE
So maybe no one's a burn after all,
huh Johnston ... ?
Johnston just holds Joe's eyes. The beat lasts. Then he turns
and walks to his waiting car. Joe smiles.
JOE
Knock out.
Joe slides two Havana's out of his pocket. Sniffs his.
JOE
All yours for the night. Last
chance to make a break for it.
Jim follows Joe's gaze. A black limo idles curb-side.
BRADDOCK
Must have set you back some.
Jim has crossed to the car as the driver opens the door.
BRADDOCK
What would you done if I woulda
lost?
Joe is lighting his cigar. Doesn't look up as he answers.
JOE
Wouldn't have paid for it.
Jim can't help but smile as he climbs into the car.
JOE
Keep your gloves up, Jimmy.
INT. LIMO -MOVING -NIGHT 4
Braddock puffs his cigar, face reflected in the side window,
backed by the passing night city. RACK FOCUS.
Out the window, a LAUGHING clutch of folks gather in front of
the simple door of a speakeasy, two twirling in lamp light.
Macy's gliding windows are crowded with thin manikins, decked
out for a Twenties whose roar has yet to quiet.
DRIVER (O.S.)
Satchmo's playing the Vanguard. And
there's a new jinny uptown.
Anywhere special, Mr. B? 4A
4B
4C
4D 4.
HOLD on Jim a beat. Then he smiles.
EXT. CLOISTERS -HIGH ANGLE -NIGHT 4A
Jim crosses a wide lawn on the edge of the Hudson. Statuary,
gardens, all are patchwork white and shadow in the moonlight.
EXT. CLOISTERS -CONTINUOUS
Jim finds a spot by river's edge, stares at the skyline.
DRIVER (V.O.)
Everything okay, Mr. B? 4B
Silhouetted by the lamps of the waiting limo, the features of
his trailing driver are invisible, only shadow.
BRADDOCK
Not many important things you do in
your life. You get to know the
where and when of.
He turns to his Driver.
BRADDOCK
I'm getting married here tomorrow.
As he smiles, his face is illuminated by a wash of daylight
and we are suddenly ...
EXT. CLOISTERS -NEXT DAY
Jim stands in the exact spot wearing a tuxedo, backed by
FATHER RORICK, and facing a WOMAN in flowing wedding gown.
FATHER RORICK
I-now pronounce you man and wife. 4C
Jim lifts the vale of a woman too beautiful to be any man's
wife. Meet her by her new name. MAE BRADDOCK.
PRIEST
You may kiss the bride.
And we PULL BACK, find the lawn lined with endless rows of
guests, standing, SHOUTING, CLAPPING in dappled autumn sun.
EXT. WEDDING RECEPTION -DAY 4D
Guests mill at linen covered tables in the b.g. as Joe
watches Jim sign autographs for a couple of saucer eyed kids. KID
Thanks, Jim.
They race off. Jim and Joe resume walking.
JOE
So, I'm saying it.
BRADDOCK
I wouldn't. You'll jinx it, you
know?
Joe shoots him a look. The two walk on in silence.
JOE
That's ten in a row, Jim. Ten
goddamned in a row.
Braddock LAUGHS.
JOE
What?
BRADDOCK
Just seeing how long you could stay
quiet is all.
Joe shoots him a look.
JOE
You may be one-handed, sure, but
you got no stage fright or nerves,
last night proved that. You never
been knocked out.
Now, finally the words.
JOE
You're in line, Jimmy. You hear me?
You're going all the way.
Jim has stopped, is staring across the river.
JOE
Two hundred sixty thousand tons of
limestone and steel, one thousand
feet tall, by the way. 5.
Joe follows Joe's gaze. In the distance the impossibly high
scaffolding that is the rising Chrysler Building. 4E 6.
BRADDOCK
How does something just keep on
going up?
JOE
Make you nervous?
Jim turns to him now, his grin all confidence.
BRADDOCK
Not for one second.
EXT. DAY -SUNSET
A few guests linger. Jim and Mae sit alone at a table of
spent wine glasses and cake plates. A WOMAN (ALICE) stands
holding Jim's hand.
ALICE
Beautiful ceremony, Jim.
She turns to Mae.
ALICE
Mom would have loved it.
(kisses her head)
All grown up. 4E
Alice heads off in the direction of a waiting gentleman in a
dark suit. Mae turns to her new husband. She's tipsy.
MAE
Joe left early, flat tire.
BRADDOCK
Mae, don't start.
MAE
So, does he get thirty percent of
our wedding gifts, too?
Jim starts to respond but she stills his lips with the tips
of her fingers.
MAE
You never told me about last night.
BRADDOCK
You could just come and watch.
MAE
You get punched, every time, it
feels like I'm getting punched to. BRADDOCK
They punch rne?
He has taken her hands in his, kisses her knuckles. Can't
help but notice the sudden, wicked glint in her eyes.
MAE
So tell rne.
BRADDOCK
Tell you what?
But he's already begun to smile.
MAE
Tell rne about the girls.
BRADDOCK
Were there girls?
MAE
Corne on. There was one.
BRADDOCK
Maybe one.
Familiar game.
MAE
Blond?
BRADDOCK
A brunette.
MAE
Tall?
BRADDOCK
Like a gazelle. Don't know how she
breathed up there.
Mae rises, moving around Jim, head bowed, eyes up and
batting.
MAE
Oh, Mr. Braddock. You're so strong.
Mae slides back the table.
MAE
Your hands are so big. 7 .
She straddles Jim's lap. Jim glances nervously at the lawn. \
5
6-7
8 MAE
So powerful.
She begins unbuttoning his shirt.
BRADDOCK
Mae, there's still guests.
Mae now climbs up standing on Jim's knees.
MAE
( shouting)
Jim Braddock! Champion!
Folks are staring, bemused, as Jim lifts Mae off his lap,
sets her standing. She's still unbuttoning his shirt.
BRADDOCK
Thanks everyone. For coming.
She's behind him, pulling out his shirt tails while he's
trying to surreptitiously swat her off.
BRADDOCK
Anyway-.
Shirt's out now.
BRADDOCK
We've got to go-. 8.
And with that he grabs her hand and they head off, LAUGHING,
towards the shore and the WHISPERING cover of trees below.
EXT. BRADDOCK HOUSE -NEWARK -LATER 5
Evening swaddles this lovely colonial. Through windows, Jim
Braddock is carrying Mae in his arms across the living room.
OMIT
INT. BRADDOCK HOUSE -BEDROOM -NIGHT 6-7
8
Jim, still in tuxedo pants and shirt, stands looking out the
window. Mae comes up behind him in her slip.
MAE It was like a fairy tale.
She wraps her arm around his chest. Doesn't see him wince
from the pain. He moves her hands up a bit: 9
10 MAE
How are you feeling?
His answer is a moment in coming.
BRADDOCK
Lucky.
He turns and kisses her. PUSH PAST them and HOLD on the
window as the light changes and so does the window, becoming
smaller, grimmer as milk bottles hit the sidewalk beyond.
REVERSE ANGLE
INT. BRADDOCK BASEMENT APARTMENT -BEDROOM -1933 -4: 30 AM 9
Jim stands dressing at the bureau. Far smaller than the room
we were just in. Partitioned by a hanging blanket beyond
which bulb light shines. In bed, three kids sleep,
(ROSEMARIE, 6, JAY, 8, HOWARD, 10) Jim pushes through the
blanket into ...
INT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -KITCHEN -CONTINUOUS 10
The other side of this one room apartment. A kitchen with a
round table and a sofa not far off make up the rest of their
home. All the beautiful furniture is long gone.
Jim crosses to Mae who stands over an old gas stove cooking
two thin strips of bacon. In the naked light we see Jim is
thinner than before, dark circles around his eyes.
BRADDOCK
Can't find my good socks.
Jim! MAE
(turning)
Her VOICE is a scolding WHISPER.
BRADDOCK
(now whispering too)
Sorry. God. Sorry.
But the damage is done. Stirring from the other room.
ROSEMARIE (OVER)
(sleepy whimper)
... Mama.
MAE
Great. Mae takes Jim's socks out of the oven.
BRADDOCK
Sorry. 10.
She shakes her head at him with resignation, already adding a
third strip of bacon to the pan. Two left in butcher's paper.
MAE
I washed them last night. I took
them right off your feet, remember?
Jim just shakes his head.
MAE
You were dead to the world.
Jim sits at the table, pulling on those socks.
BRADDOCK
How can I keep em this warm?
A little figure wanders out. Rosemarie.
ROSEMARIE
Mama, I want to eat too.
She climbs up on Jim's lap without a word. He reflexively
smooths her hair, smells her head, eyes closed. Mae watches.
MAE
We got the third notice on the
electric yesterday.
BRADDOCK
How about the jar?
MAE
What's left is gone.
Mae reaches behind her, sets a mason jar on the kitchen
table. Empty.
MAE
Too many rainy days, I guess.
BRADDOCK I'll get the milk.
Jim sets his little one on the chair and heads outside. 10A
l0B 11.
EXT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -PRE DAWN l0A
Jim emerges onto the street of row houses. A long way from
where we saw him last. He walks to the basement window in the
meager light. Something skitters past. A rat. Jim ignores it.
Jim reaches down and takes the milk bottles in his hands.
Both empty. Each wears a pink past due slip like a collar.
INT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT- MOMENTS LATER 10B
Jim ENTERS and wordlessly sets the bottles atop the fridge.
Mae hold his eyes. In his averted glance, shame.
MAE
Jim-
But he shakes his head to silence her comfort. Says only ...
BRADDOCK
Some left in the fridge, I think.
Jim finds a last bottle, maybe an eighth full. He hands it to
Mae who begins topping it off with water as Jim sits.
MAE
Who needs a cow?
Mae slides the food onto plates, lays them down in front of
each of them.
MAE
Rosy. Your fork, please.
Little one reluctantly obeys.
BRADDOCK
I got Feldman tonight. That's half
a C. I beat him, maybe I can get
back up to seventy five.
Mae looks up at him. A small glimmer of hope in her eyes.
MAE
(a prayer}
You're gonna kill him.
ROSEMARIE
Mama, I want some more.
MAE
I'm sorry, honey. There isn't any
more. 11
12 12.
Rosemarie has finished her bacon, as has Mae. Jim's still
sits on his plate. Mae watches Rosy eye his food.
ROSEMARIE
But I'm still hungry.
On Mae's face, a mother's agony. Jim has risen, kisses his
daughter's head, already pulling on his coat. Kisses Mae.
BRADDOCK
You're my girls.
Before he heads to the door, he deposits his slice of bacon
on their daughter's plate.
Mae watches Rosemarie devour the meager meat hungrily as Jim
goes, an impossible mix of emotions in her eyes.
EXT. NEWARK -1933 -4:30 AM -THE GREAT DEPRESSION 11
Jim walks block after block. Stores are boarded up. People
huddle by trash can fires. The MEN who walk the streets wear
suits. Ties. Some seem to wander the world like ghosts,
nowhere to go. Others sit on benches, bus stops, heads bowed.
An emaciated NEWSBOY stands on a stack of papers, CROAKS his
wares, breath fogging, VOICE raw from shouting in the cold.
NEWSBOY
Unemployed reach 15 million. New
York Rens trounce Celtics, 34-29.
EXT. LOADING DOCK -EARLY MORNING 12
Jim and 40 other DESPERATE MEN crowd the gate of a long chain
link fence. Dawn hits the Hudson and Manhattan beyond.
A middle-aged Foreman, JAKE emerges through the gate with a
clipboard in hand, stares at faces stoned by sleeplessness.
JAKE
I need 21 and 21 only.
Jim stands, trying to make himself seen. Jake begins pointing
out the lucky ones, joyless in his power over life and death.
JOE
Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen ...
Jim's gotten there early enough to be at the front of the
pack but there are still too many men than are needed. 13 13.
JAKE
Twenty-one.
Apparently Jim's lucky number, now among the chosen. He looks
down to hide his relief. A MAN (BEN) SHOUTS.
BEN
I been here since four.
JAKE
Sorry brother, luck of the draw.
Most are already heading off to look elsewhere. That's when
Ben actually pulls a gun, points it at Jake's chest.
BEN
I was here first.
(hand shaking)
What about it?
Jake stares at the gun a beat, clearly rattled. Looks back up
at the man. Time has go~e perfectly still.
JAKE
My mistake, pal. I need twenty two.
OFF Jim, in disbelief.
EXT. DOCKS -DAWN 13
Jim signs out a bailing hook from the Foreman. On the docks
before him is a freshly unloaded mountain of flour sacks.
All the sacks have to be moved from loading palettes to
shipping palettes. Hard, endless labor.
Men work in pairs. Each grabs one side of a sack with their
bailing hook, then lifts and moves each bag.
Braddock finds an empty spot on the line, looks up. His
partner stands staring down the line at Ben, who's put his
gun away and is now working as hard as the rest.
BRADDOCK
You need a gun to get a job, they
should give everybody a gun.
The MAN turns, to face Jim. Older. Handsome. Strong arms. A
military hair cut and bearing. Kevin WILSON.
KEVIN
Although I don't know how he's
gonna afford the bullets. 14 Jim looks down the row of men, all starting to work.
BRADDOCK
Boss on the line. 14.
Kevin nods, joins Jim as they start to hook and move bags.
KEVIN
Kevin Wilson.
BRADDOCK
Jim Braddock.
KEVIN
Used to follow a fighter with that
name on the Radio.
Jim looks at the hook in his own hand.
BRADDOCK
Helps if you dig in on the seam,
then lift straight up.
Kevin adjusts. That's when it happens. Three cops rush the
yard and grab Ben, wrestle him to the ground, taking his gun.
Kevin and Jim exchange a look as Jake trails after the cops
and handcuffed Ben. The Foreman himself looks almost sick.
JAKE
Jesus, Ben. What the hell did you
want me to do?
Kevin and Jim resume working, in sync now, both men noticing
their easy, efficient rhythm.
EXT. NEWARK -MID-DAY 14
Torrential downpour. Women in rain coats ladle soup and hand
out soaked bread from the open back of a truck.
TRACK down the line, past so many faces, some sad. Some
embarrassed, most just emptied out by this endless loss.
FIND Mae holding a soaking Rosemarie in exhausted arms. Jay
and Howard stand at their mother's side, ARGUING.
JAY
Foxx.
HOWARD
Babe, jerk. MAE
You need to stand for a little
while, honey. Mommy's tired.
Mae starts to set her down.
ROSEMARIE
I don't want to. It's wet.
Looks into her eyes.
MAE
Are you a big girl or a little
girl?
ROSEMARIE
(beginning to yowl)
Little.
Not the answer she wanted.
MAE
Rosy-
VOICE (OVER)
Who's making all that racket?
Sounds like a trombone. 15.
Jim has appeared beside them, makes a trombone of hands and
accompanying SOUND. She scrambles into his arms.
ROSEMARIE
What's a turmone?
Mae looks up, surprised but glad to see him.
MAE
What are you doing here?
BRADDOCK
Wasn't enough work for a full
shift. They cut us loose early.
Don't like the thought of you
standing out here alone.
Flare behind his eyes.
BRADDOCK
Don't like you standing here at
all.
MAE
Jim. It's everybody. 15 16.
BRADDOCK
Go home now. Get the kids dry.
MAE
I've got to turn up the heat,
Jimmy. They're chilled through.
Jim nods uneasily. He hands over his daughter.
BRADDOCK
Tonight. We'll catch a break.
Her words are a hushed window of desperation.
MAE
You'll do great, Jim.
She kisses him. As the children follow Jay turns back.
JAY
Dad, do you think Babe Ruth's
better than Jimmy Foxx?
BRADDOCK
Foxx couldn't hit a ball if the
pitcher walked it out to him.
Howard shoots Jay a triumphant look. Braddock watches them
go. He turns forward again, collar going up in the rain.
PULL BACK AND UP to over the crowd, all inching forward,
slowly, endlessly patient, impossible in number.
INT. LOCKER ROOM -NIGHT
Joe stands in front of Jim, taping up his hands. Joe's
clothes still show smart indications of wealth.
JOE
Guy's a bum. Pure and simple.
Jim cuts Joe a dark look as Joe keeps wrapping.
JOE
You know what I mean.
BRJI.DDOCK
I know some guy sitting in a chair
who'd faint if you blew on him too
hard gets to watch you bleed and
call you a bum. And I know I got to
take it from him. But not you. 15 16 JOE
I see. Well. Pardon me. Let me
restate. Mr. Feldman is a novice
fighter whose ass you should gently
kick until it is humped up between
his shoulders. That is, of course,
only if it doesn't offend your
overly sensitive nature.
Joe switches hands. Jim winces. Joe looks down.
JOE
Jim ...
BRADDOCK
Sore, that's all.
JOE
Sore or broke? Arthritis is making
them more and more like glass.
BRADDOCK
(sharp)
Sore. Period.
JOE
Jeez. Take it out on the other guy
why don't you?
Joe finishes taping.
JOE
Your weight's down.
Jim just shoots him a look. Gould nods.
JOE
You gotta knock him out fast,
Jimmy. First round. Between his age
and your bones, its the only way.
BRADDOCK
Flatter me, why don't ya?
Throws open the door to the ROAR of the crowd.
JOE
Watch your hands.
INT. MOUNT VERNON ARMORY BOXING RING -FIGHT NIGHT 17.
16
Smaller. A CROWD beyond the ring lights is a sea of hats
floating on smoking heads. Faces are gaunter, more desperate. 18.
The ring is circled with JUDGES, GAMBLERS, HOTTIES,
REPORTERS. PHOTOGRAPHERS sit with flashbulbs ready to sizzle.
RADIO COMMENTATOR (V.O.)
Jim Braddock, just five years ago,
was considered first in line for
the world championship. But in the
last year he's lost ten fights
without a single kayo.
Jim crawls under the rope. Jim shadow boxes in his corner as
Joe massages his shoulder.
The crowd yells and stamps as ABE FELDMAN makes his way down
a crowded aisle toward the ring.
RADIO COMMENTATOR (V.O.) (CONT'D)
Now Braddock faces Abe Feldman,
just twenty-one years old, with
seventeen wins, one draw and one
loss. In less than two years he has
managed nine kayos.
Jim tenses and Joe feels it in Jim's shoulders.
JOE
Who whipped Latao?
BRADDOCK
(softly)
I did.
JOE
Who k.o. 'd Slattery in the 9th when
everybody said he didn't have a
Rainmaker's chance in hell?!
A familiar game. Humors him.
BRADDOCK
I did.
JOE
But we should pucker our assholes
over Feldman?
BRADDOCK
No.
Jim's focus seems to turn inward. But Joe wants him riled. 17
18
19
20 19.
JOE
You know what he said? He said the
only way he could lose is if he
fell over laughing at yer prissy
little jab!
The crowd ROARS as Feldman climbs into the ring.
JOE (CONT'D)
Ah, he's a pipe. Sit down and I'll
fight him.
Joe goes as if to move into the ring himself. Jim stills him
with a hand on his shoulder.
BRADDOCK
No. Don't hurt yourself.
Jim's words come soft and lethal.
Joe grins. BRAPDOCK I'll fight him.
INT. MOUNT VERNON ARMORY BOXING RING -MINUTES LATER
Jim takes a hard punch to the face, going backwards. Jim
moves in but Feldman is blocking his drive.
INT. THE CORNER
Joe is literally mimicking each and every move Jim makes.
Sweat dripping off him.
JOE
(shouting)
What do you want to do, fight him
or marry him?
INT. THE RING
Jim is barely holding his own. He can't get a break.
Everywhere he throws, Feldman isn't. Everywhere Feldman
throws, Jim is.
INT. THE CORNER -MOMENTS LATER
JOE
What, you got lead in your shoes?
You gotta move, Jimmy. Move. 17
18
19
20 21
22
23
24
25 20.
INT. THE RING -MOMENTS LATER
But Jim is pretty lead footed, Feldman dancing all around
him. Feldman lays a combination on Jim that sends him hard
into the ropes. Folks in the audience are starting to BOO.
INT. THE CORNER/RING
Joe bobs and weaves in place.
JOE
Come back, Jimmy. Move.
Jim makes a lunge, throws a wild punch, hits Feldman hard.
Jim moves in to hit him again but Feldman lowers his head.
CLOSE on Jim's fist as it connects. Bones CRACK.
INT. THE CORNER -MOMENTS LATER 21
22
23
Joe is squeezing Jim's hand, his expression dark. Jim can't
hide the pain.
JOE
It's broken proper, Jimmy. I'm
calling it.
BRADDOCK
I can use my left.
JOE
Jim. You don't have a left.
The BELL. Jim is up and into the ring. Joe shakes his head.
INT. THE RING/CORNER -MOMENTS LATER 24
Jim is trying. But Joe's right, he just doesn't have a left
hand punch. And he's still standing in one place.
Feldman is landing punch after punch. Jim can't even use his
broken right to block. But Feldman is so hurt himself he
keeps clinching Jim in a drunken waltz. CATCALLS. SHOUTS.
IN THE CORNER
JOE
Focus. Pay attention!
INT. THE RING
Jim clocks faces in the audience. SHOUTING. BOOING. Jim
throws one last right cross. He connects and the pain is a
flare, excruciating. Feldman scores a vicious right. 25 26
27 21.
OMIT 26
Jim's head SNAPS back. He manages to get Feldman in a clinch
and not let go. The BELL is hardly audible over the BOOING.
JOHNSTON (OVER)
An embarrassment.
INT. COMMISSION ROOM -NIGHT 27
Smoky. Jimmy Johnston, the promoter from that first fight,
and the other two MEN who make up the Boxing Commission sit
facing Joe, now standing before this makeshift tribunal.
JOHNSTON
That's what it was. An
embarrassment.
JOE
Where's the purse?
JOHNSTON (CONT'D)
I wouldn"t have to tell you that if
you gave a shit about your fighter.
JOE
Where's the purse?
JOHNSTON
He lost his last five. Hell, he
hardly gets a punch in anymore.
Fights getting stopped by
referees .... He's pathetic.
JOE
Everyone has a bad streak.
JOHNSTON
That it?
JOE
What do you want me to say, anyway?
The moment lasts.
JOHNSTON
We're revoking his license, Joe.
Whatever Braddock was gonna do in
boxing. I guess he's done it. 28
29
30 22.
EXT. MOUNT VERNON ARMORY -PARKING LOT -NIGHT 28
The Men from the boxing commission move towards their cars,
the last few vehicles left in the now abandoned parking lot.
That's when the arena door BANGS open and Jim comes out,
moving fast, Joe trailing after him.
BRADDOCK
What the hell are you guys trying
to pull?
Johnston stops. Turns to face Braddock who stands right in
his face, Braddock's right hand hanging gamely by his side.
BRADDOCK
I broke my hand, okay? You don't
see me crying about it. I don't
know what you got to complain
about.
Braddock's eyes are deadly.
BRADDOCK
I don't know what I did to lose my
edge. But I didn't always lose. And
I won't always again. You can count
on that.
Pearson says nothing.
BRADDOCK
I can still fight.
PEARSON
Go home to Mae and the kids, Jim.
Pearson climbs into his car. Jim watches him drive away.
EXT. MOUNT VERNON ARMORY -NIGHT 29
The American Dream. Once. A white colonial sits dark, porch
sunken, windows broken and empty. PULL BACK TO REVEAL ...
Joe stands over a chipping white picket fence, pulling free
one of the boards. He walks through a back door into ...
INT. MOUNT VERNON ARMORY -LOCKER ROOM -NIGHT 30
Jim stares down at his hand. Doesn't look up as Joe crosses,
now taping the fence post to Jim's arm in a makeshift splint. 31 23.
JOE
Until we get to the hospital.
Braddock doesn't look up. Joe's VOICE softens.
JOE
Jimmy, listen-
Braddock looks up. See this startling sight. His cheeks are
streaked with tears.
BRADDOCK
Don't.
Joe just nods, starts silently taping fence post to hand.
INT. JOE'S CAR -NEW YORK CITY -NIGHT
Joe drives. No limo. No chauffeur. On the passing streets,
long shadows and silence. Macy's windows are crossed with
boards like cartoon black eyes.
JOE
We took a good run at it, Jimmy.
How many can say that? 31
They drive on. That familiar night club is closed
on the street warming their hands over trash can
looks at the fresh cast on his hand. too, people
fires. Jim
JOE
You'd change things, sure, who
wouldn't, but sometimes you just
can't, you know, end of story.
Again, nothing from Jim.
JOE
You waiting to see how long I can
keep quiet again?
BRADDOCK
What'd you say?
Joe grins until he sees Jim's serious.
BRADDOCK
Get me another one, Joe.
JOE
Jimmy-32
33 24.
BRADDOCK
Got to have it. We're down to our
last buck.
JOE
What's done is done.
BRADDOCK
Not always.
JOE
No. Not always.
In Joe's eyes, sudden awareness that this is good-bye.
JOE
But this time. I'm sorry, Jimmy.
EXT. BRADDOCK'S BASEMENT APARTMENT -NIGHT
Jim watches the car driye off. He starts the endless walk
from the curb to the door.
INT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -NIGHT -MOMENTS LATER
Mae sits at the table, sewing. She looks up, sees his
splinted hand, his battered face.
MAE
Sweet Jesus.
She crosses to him in a heartbeat, touching his cast, his
cheeks, his eyes.
BRADDOCK
They wouldn't pay me. Said the
fight was an embarrassment.
MAE
Yeah. I bet that's what Joe told
you. Sure, he'd say that-
Familiar ground.
BRADDOCK
Mae, Joe didn't take the money. It
was me.
Mae looks at the empty money jar. Then back to Jim's hand.
She's trying to keep the fear under control. 32
33 MAE
How long until you're fixed enough
to get another one?
BRADDOCK
They took my license.
Mae just stares at him.
BRADDOCK
I'm done, Mae. I'm sorry. 25.
Mae opens her mouth to speak, closes it again. She begins
walking back and forth across the room. Like a caged animal.
MAE
We need to pack up the kids because
we're not going to be able to pay
the electric or the heat so they
can stay at my sister's-
BRADDOCK
Mae-
Her eyes are too wide, not quite focused.
MAE
Then that way we can make two or
three breadlines a day and then-
BRADDOCK
Mae.
He has crossed to her, good hand on her face.
BRADDOCK
I can work doubles, triples where I
can find them.
MAE
Jim, your hand's broken.
BRADDOCK
Now listen-
MAE
Oh, Christ, what are we-
BRADDOCK
Mae!
His VOICE stills her. BF.ADOOCK
Go and get the shoe polish out of
the cabinet. Go on, now.
She just stares at him.
BRADDOCK
Baby, please. You've got to trust
me, here.
Finally, Mae obliges.
BRADDOCK
Now you're right about one thing. I
won't get picked, tomorrow. Not if
they see this thing on me. 26.
Jim has sat down, Mae returning now as Jim extends his cast.
BRADDOCK
So, we've got to cover it up. With
the polish. Go on now.
She holds his eyes a beat. Then Mae begins painting the cast
black with the polish. Doesn't look up as he speaks.
BRADDOCK
You can cut the hem out of my coat
sleeve, fabric will help cover it.
Mae continues polishing.
BRADDOCK
We're going to be all right.
Finally she looks up, finding tether in his eyes. She manages
a brave smile.
MAE
Guess all we need now is a nice
piece of steak for your face, fix
you right up.
Jim can't help but smile back at this woman, his wife.
BRADDOCK
Yeah. Get the sirloin out of the
fridge. Nice and lean please.
PUSH THROUGH THE HANGING BLANKET.
Howard and Jay lay asleep in the bed in the b.g. Rosemarie
stands peeking around the blanket, eyes wide, watching on. 34 27.
EXT. DOCKS -MORNING 34
A light snow falls. Jim finds his post by Kevin. He's moving
slowly. Kevin notices, says nothing. Jim's cast is painted
black and hidden by his sleeve.
KEVIN
You know, pour salt on a mayonnaise
sandwich, close your eyes, tastes
like a BLT for about 6 seconds?
Kevin sets down his brown paper lunch bag.
KEVIN
We had a union down here, we could
get ourselves a lunch break.
Jim is awkwardly trying the hook with his good hand.
KEVIN (CONT'D)
Since when did you go lefty?
That's when Kevin sees Jim's painted cast.
KEVIN
Jesus. What happened to you?
Jim looks up at him. A beat before answering.
BRADDOCK
I got into a fight.
KEVIN
What the hell would you go and do
that for?
Jim has no answer. Kevin watches Jim's attempt to hook a bag.
No way he's going to be able to pull his weight.
KEVIN
Boss on the line.
Jim follows Kevin's gaze to see the familiar Foreman walking
towards them, inspecting the pairs of workers.
BRADDOCK
Shit.
Jim is trying to adjust the hook in his left hand but the
heavy sack keeps slipping towards Kevin.
Jake is only feet away. He's going to notice. Kevin moves to
the center of the bag, invisibly taking most of the weight. 35 28.
Jake passes with a wordless look up and down and moves on.
KEVIN
Anything you can't handle, son, you
shift to me.
A beat. Jim nods.
BRADDOCK
Appreciate it.
Kevin doesn't answer. The two resume work. Kevin's words when
they come are us much to himself as to Jim.
KEVIN
Everyone can use a break these
days.
EXT. BRADDOCK'S STREET -DAY
The world is dusted with snow. Mae has dropped the boys at
school, is walking home with Rosemarie.
ROSEMARIE
\'vhy can't I go to school yet? Is it
because I'm a girl?
MAE
Maybe. I hadn't thought of that. 35
A CAR drives by and from within issue the muted tones of LUCK
BE A LADY TONIGHT. Mae stares after it a beat.
ROSEMARIE
Who's the man at our house?
Mae looks up to see a MAN in a Con Edison uniform standing
just outside the front door at their electric meter.
MAE
Can I help you, sir?
The MAN looks at her. Sad, tired eyes.
CON ED MAN
I'm sorry, Ma'am. You're past due.
Let's the meaning sink in.
MAE
You can't. There's kids. Please. 36 CON ED MAN
I don't, they'll let me go. They
let two guys go for it already.
Mae stares at him.
MAE
I keep thinking this can't really
be happening. Every day, I wake up, it's like I have amnesia. I know
something's gone wrong, I just
can't remember what it is. Then it
comes to me. All the plans,
everything you ever saved for, all
just gone. This apartment, it's
what we got left that keeps us
hanging on.
CON ED MAN
Lady. Lady, I got kids too. 29.
The two just stand there staring at each other in the snow.
EXT. DOCKS -AFTERNOON 36
The sky is close and bone cold. Kevin and Jim exit the gate,
exhausted. Walking, Kevin opens his mouth, catching flakes.
KEVIN
I was a kid, my mom used to tell me
you could eat a meal out of snow.
Jim walks along with him.
BRADDOCK
Wouldn't that be nice?
Jim opens his mouth and does the same. Smiles.
BRADDOCK
Now, this needs salt.
KEVIN
So, how about some powder? I'm
buying.
Jim follows Kevin's gaze. Ahead, the flashing red neon of a
bar sign in the distance.
BRADDOCK
Yeah. Right.
But Kevin is so serious he's smiling. 37 30.
KEVIN
Who watched your back all day?
'J'hat' s just not being personable.
Finally Jim nods. They head towards the bar lights.
KEVIN
You hear about Ben Wills?
BRADDOCK
Who?
KEVIN
Guy did that stick up to get the
job last week?
BRADDOCK
What about him?
KEVIN
Hung himself _in jail that night.
BRADDOCK
Now where's the sense in that?
Kevin just opens his hands, then he looks up and opens his
mouth again to the fresh falling snow.
INT. QUINCY'S BAR -NIGHT 37
Smoky. Crowded. Sawdust on wide plank floors. Booths and bar
are jammed. Many men drink beer glasses full of water.
Jim sits with Kevin over two mugs of beer. Jim lifts his,
takes a sip. Liquid gold. The word nurse doesn't cover it.
KEVIN
The world's broken and I say
there's no use pretending it's not.
uim clocks a group of men sitting in the corner over Kevin's
shoulder. He looks uncomfortable a beat.
KEVIN
Central Park, they got people
living in paper shacks. Calling it
Hooversville. Folks just giving up.
Leaving their families behind.
Eating the sheep.
BRADDOCK
I like my legs both the same
length, thank you. KEVIN
After the War we had to march on DC
just to chase our veteran's pay.
Now the banks close up and we're
eating sheep in the park.
Government's dropped us flat, son.
We need to organize. Arm. Fight
back.
BRADDOCK
Another American Revolution?
KEVIN
People starving to death in New
York City? May be time for one.
Jim just shakes his head. Kevin takes a long pull.
KEVIN
I know. My wife says I talk too
much. Says I should just let life
take its cour:;;e. Her dream said
we're gonna have a nice baby girl.
BRADDOCK
Why, you the Houdini family?
KEVIN
My wife ...
Loops his finger at his temple good naturedly.
KEVIN
She says when times are bad, people
can see the future in dreams.
Jim looks up at him.
KEVIN
I know how it sounds.
BRADDOCK
I have this dream that I'm walking
across the city. Almost every
night. Block after block. Just
walking.
KEVIN
wait and see. Maybe it comes true.
BRADDOCK
Hell, I knew, I would have dreamed
of finding gold in the basement. 3) . Kevin CHUCKLES.
KEVIN
Another?
Kevin has already killed his, signals for a second.
VOICE (OVER)
Jim Braddock. 32.
Braddock turns. A MAN has separated from the corner crowd,
stands at the booth before Jim and Kevin. SPORTY LEWIS.
SPORTY
You just won me two bucks.
Jim looks to the corner. A few others crane their necks.
Sporty throws a few shadow punches. He's been drinking some.
SPORTY
Come on, Jimmy. How's that right?
No hello for your old pal?
Braddock stands. Quotes words seared onto his memory.
BRADDOCK
Loughran wiped the ring with
Braddock's career and tossed it
into the ropes for good measure. A
funeral with body still breathing.
That look in Braddock's eyes just killed Sporty's smile.
SPORTY
Look, Braddock, I don't fight the
fights. I just write about them.
Braddock puts his forehead right down to Sporty's.
BRADDOCK
Save that crap for the customers.
That grin of Jim's gets wider. Lethal.
BRADDOCK
You got me?
The moment lasts. Then Jim turns to Kevin who is standing.
BRADDOCK
Gotta go, Kevin. Thanks for the
beer. 38
39 33.
Kevin stares after him, then looks back up at Sporty, shaken.
SPORT'l
Guy was going to be Champion.
EXT. SIDEWALK -CONTINUOUS 38
Jim steps out into the snow, pulls at his coat collar as if it is choking him. He quickens his pace, starts to run.
Running on sidewalks, the middle of the street, through
alleys, anywhere, away from the past.
Jim stops, stares up at a stoop as a man and woman watch
their Christmas tree being delivered. A branch falls off as
the tree is carried through the front door.
Jim waits until the door closes. Lifts the branch.
INT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -NIGHT 39
Jim and Mae sit by candlelight in sweaters and winter coats,
change spread before them. The single branch is propped in
the corner with bottle cap ornaments hanging by string.
The blanket that usually divides the apartment is piled,
along with all remaining coats and clothing, over the kids
crowded in bed. Mae and Jim's breath fogs as they speak.
MAE
You think about it, you gotta go to
a swanky joint to eat with candles.
Braddock is counting the change. Jim looks up to see Mae
warming her hands over the candle flame.
BRADDOCK
Three bucks twenty.
Jim looks at the empty mason jar on the table.
MAE
One too many rainy days, I guess.
Jim takes Mae's hands in his, rubs them between his palms.
MAE
Ow! Too hard, Jimmy.
She pulls her hands back, blows into them.
BRADDOCK
How much to turn it back on? 40
41-43
43A
43B
44 34.
MAE
Three months. Twelve-ten.
Jim moves the money around on the table. Nowhere near.
BRADDOCK
All the guys you could have
married. I don't know how I let
everything get away from us, Mae.
MAE
I married the man I love.
(OVER) A child's WET COUGH. Jim glances up at her sharply.
MAE
Howard. Since this afternoon.
Mae reaches across, touches Jim's hand. She closes her eyes,
begins to pray. Then glances up at her husband.
MAE
Jim ... ?
BRADDOCK
I;m all prayed out.
He stares off into the distance unable to be comforted.
INT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -FIRST LIGHT
The light before dawn. Mae sleeps with the kids under the
pile of clothes. Still freezing. She stirs. Jim is gone. 40
OMIT
EXT. JOE JEANETTE'S GYM -DAWN 41-43
43A
Jim stands holding his gym bag in the doorway of the gym. He
stares up at the sign overhead. A long beat. He heads inside.
EXT. STREET -MORNING 43B
Mae looks around to make sure no one is watching. Then she
begins breaking off pieces of wooden latticework from a
billboard, hands the wood scraps to her still sleepy kids.
INT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -DAY 44
Snow cakes the windows. Mae has made a fire in the open stove
and is feeding broken lattice chips for fuel. She glances
around, throws in the meager tree. 45
46 35.
Mae looks at Howard, fever making him shake in the cold.
Flames illuminate the sudden tears spilling from her eyes.
JAY
Mommy?
She looks up at her son, his fear at seeing her sadness.
MAE It's all right sweetheart. Mommy'!!
be right back.
Mae rises, EXITS the back door.
EXT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -BACK YARD -CONTINUOUS 45
A tiny square of dirt amidst the buildings. Heavy snow is
falling. Mae stands alone, BREATHLESS WEEPING, inconsolable.
INT. JEANETTE'S GYM -DAY 46
A black fighter is in the ring, sparring with another. Steam
HISSES. The floor is wet from tracked snow. A wiry BLACK MAN
in •r-shirt and hat coaches him. This is JOE JEANETTE.
JEANETTE
You gotta duck and weave not duck
or weave, genius.
WIDER. Outside the ring, chewing a cigar, is Joe Gould,
watching the kid. Still well dressed, that same stogie.
JEANETTE
Today, hit him today, not when he
gets old, okay junior?
(shouting)
Close that door, you're letting in
all the cold.
(back to the ring)
Enough, enough, ENOUGH.
Janette shoots Joe a dismayed look, shakes his head as
another black BOXER (GEORGE) approaches from the front door.
GEORGE
Sorry I'm late, Joe.
JOE
Yeah, yeah. You're next. One bwn
(catches himself)
One contender at a time. 47 Joe looks down, sees something in Ernie's hands. A pair of
boxing shoes. Familiar shoes.
GEORGE
You see a ghost, Joe?
JOE
Maybe so. Where'd you get those
things?
GEORGE
The old man sold them to me. Half a
buck. Wanted to sell me his gloves
too but I couldn't afford em. Some
other guy got those.
Joe closes his eyes just for a beat. Then he looks up.
JOE
He was first in line once, you
know? Couldn'.t move for shit. But
had a right y9u could be outside
the ring and'feel the wind.
GEORGE
What happened to him?
Joe takes a beat before answering.
JOE
Same as everyone else I guess.
Luck's run out all over.
Joe re-lights his stubby smoke.
JOE
So, put em on, and put em to work.
Maybe before Springtime ...
INT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -AFTERNOON 47
Jim ENTERS. So deep into winter it's already night. The last
cinders of Mae's sidewalk fire glow. The room is dark. Cold.
Mae sits in her coat, face empty, hollowed out. She looks up
at Jim as he stares at her in the empty apartment.
MAE
Howard's cough was getting worse.
And then Rosy started to sneeze.
Jim looks around. No sign of the children. 48
49
50
51
52 37.
BRADDOCK
Where are they, Mae?
MAE
I didn't know what else to do.
She looks up at him, finally.
MAE
They couldn't stay here anymore.
See the agony in her eyes.
MAE
The boys can sleep on the sofa at
my father's in Brooklyn. Rosy's
going to stay at my sister's. We
can't keep them, Jim.
He stares at her, his emotions impossible to express.
MAE
We can't even keep them warm.
He turns, walks to the kitchen, stands at the sink running a
glass of water. Sees his own reflection in the curving glass.
BRADDOCK
No!
Jim hurls the glass, SMASHING, against the wall.
MAE
Jirmny, please-
Jim doesn't even acknowledge her, is out the SLAMMING front
door and gone. Mae stares after him.
OMIT
EXT. NEWARK -DAY
Jim walks the street, past an abandoned low where families
live in their cars, windows steamed opaque with breath.
OMIT
EXT. FERRY -DAY
Jim stands on the deck, staring past the grey river at
Manhattan beyond.
OMIT 48
49
50
51
52 52A
53
54
55 38.
EXT. CENTRAL PARK -DAY 52A
Jim walks past men building cardboard houses, can't help but
clock the sheep idling amidst the well dressed squatters.
EXT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -DAY
Men are tearing down the light board for scrap metal. Jim
stares at mounted photos of boxers in fight stances. Heads
inside.
INT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -SECOND FLOOR -DAY 53
54
Jim stands in the hall, staring out a window, his expression
impossibly sad. Only when he moves do we see what he has been
staring at. The Chrysler Building.
Jim turns towards two frosted glass doors beyond which shapes
move and a din of VOICES echo.
INT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -BOXING CLUB -DAY 55
Thick with smoke. Maybe twenty MEN sit around, playing cards.
Loud ARGUMENTS. Johnston. Gould.
TWO PROMOTERS stand LAUGHING. They don't even notice Jim at
first. Not until he's standing right in front of them.
BRADDOCK
Mr. Allen. Phil.
This is almost killing him.
BRADDOCK
Thing is. I can't afford to pay the
heat. Had to farm out my kids.
Every word is impossible.
BRADDOCK
They keep cutting shifts at the
dock. You don't get picked every
day. Just need enough to catch up.
The shame almost too much to bear.
BRADDOCK
Sold my gloves and shoes. Got two
bucks. I need ten fifty more. To
pay the bill. Get them back.
This once great fighter now takes off his hat. 56 BRADDOCK It pains me to ask. So I!Ulch.
He holds out his hat. The moment lasts. The room has grown
silent. The two men are speechless. Then one digs into his
pocket, comes out with a few coins.
PROMOTER
Sure, Jim. Sure.
BRADDOCK
Thank you.
The next guy does the same. What follows is nearly too
extricating to watch. Jim moves around the room, hat in hand.
Even Johnston gives. The last man he comes on is Joe. Jim can
barely meet his eyes.
BRADDOCK
I'm sorry, Joe.
JOE
What the hell do you have to be
sorry about? Jesus, Jim.
Jim is looking into the hat.
JOE
How short are you?
Jim's been counting as he goes.
BRADDOCK
A buck-fifty, I think.
Joe winces, goes into his wallet. Fishes out a single, two
quarters. Puts them in the hat.
BRADDOCK
Joe ...
JOE
Don't mention it, Jimmy.
They watch him go, one of their own, nothing left, not even
his pride. HOLD on JOE GOULD.
OMIT BRADDOCK (OVER)
The only thing we have to fear is
fear itself ...
56 ... ..__/ 57
58
59
60
60A 40.
INT . BRADDOCK HOUSE -NIGHT 57
Mae flicks on the lights. They work. The children spill into
the glowing apartment.
BRADDOCK (OVER)
We face our common difficulties.
They concern, thank God, only
material things ...
HOLD on Jim, acutely aware of how fragile home is.
EXT. DOCKS -AFTERNOON
Jim and Kevin at hard, back-breaking work. Jim using that
left hand. A fellow (SAM PENNY) slips and Jim reflexively
grabs the falling bag, re-injuring his broken right.
BRl\DDOCK ( OVER)
Values have shrunken to fantastic
levels; taxes have risen; our
ability to pay has fallen ...
INT. BRADDOCK HOME -NIGHT 58
59
Dinner is over. The kids are in bed, Jim sits at the table,
READING Roosevelt's speech to Mae from the newspaper.
BRADDOCK
The savings of many years in
thousands of families are gone ...
He is trying hard to find inspiration in the words, like
fishing for water in a dry well.
OMIT
EXT. DOCKS- AFTERNOON
Jim and Kevin are finishing their shift, dirty, exhausted,
just clearing the gates when Penny runs up.
PENNY
They're hiring extra at the coal
yards.
Jim takes off in a sprint, Kevin not far behind him.
BRADDOCK (OVER)
Unemployed citizens face the grim
problem of existence ... 60
60A 61
62
63
63A EXT. COAL YARD -NIGHT
Jim and Kevin shovel coal. Jim's eyes are red lamps in his
head and he can hardly pick up his shovel.
BRADDOCK (OVER)
And an equal number toil with
little return ...
INT. BASEMENT APARTMENT -VERY LATE 61
62
Jim, black with coal dust, ENTERS, Mae asleep in a chair. He
takes two quarters from his pocket, puts them in the jar.
Jim stumbles toward the bed, looks at his filthy self, lays
on the floor, instantly asleep.
BRADDOCK (OVER)
We face arduous days that lie
before us ...
EXT. STREET -DAY -WINTER
Jim and Kevin are walking together, passing a flask, when
they spot a commotion across the street. 63
A PROTESTING YOUNG COUPLE and their toddler are being evicted
from a neighboring brownstone by CITY MARSHALS.
Kevin starts to rush across the street, fight in his eyes.
Jim grabs him by the arm, signals him to wait.
Across the street, the last of the furniture is literally put
out onto the street, the padlock snapped onto the front door.
BRADDOCK (OVER) ,
These dark days will be worth all
they cost us ...
ACROSS THE STREET -MOMENTS LATER
The Marshals pull away as Jim and Kevin cross. Kevin grabs a
coat rack from the sidewalk and SMASHES open the padlock as
Jim helps the couple begin moving their furniture back in.
BRADDOCK (OVER)
We do not distrust the future of
essential democracy ...
EXT. DOCKS -MORNING
The gates are chained closed. 63A 63B
64
65
66 BRADDOCK (OVER)
The people of the United States
have not failed ...
Jake stands on the choosing platform, expression dark.
JAKE
Sorry, boys. Ice on the inlet. No
work today.
EXT. STREET -LATER -EVENING
Jim stands on a bread line. He cuts his cast off with a
pocket knife. See his withered wrist and hand.
OMIT BRADDOCK (OVER)
We humbly ask the blessing of
God ...
EXT. CHURCH -HIGH ANGL~ -SPRING -DAY 63B
64
65
Jim is crossing the church yard, as are a few other men,
pilgrims towards the mighty structure and cross in the sky.
BRADDOCK (OVER)
May he protect each and every one
of us.
The doors of the church open, spilling folks in their Sunday
best out into the green church yard.
EXT. CHURCH YARD -SPRING -1934 -DAY 66
A group of MEN sit on green benches at the edge of the church
yard, away from the gathering of families on the common.
Among them are Jim, Kevin, Penny and several others from the
docks, some passing a bottle back and forth.
PENNY
Jake hasn't been right since Ben
died, I'm telling you.
DOCK MAN TWO
Half shifts don't do anybody any
good.
KEVIN
In Russia, right now, they're
giving the factories to the
workers. 67 43.
BRADDOCK
In Russia, right now, I'm pretty
sure they're asleep.
Kevin smiles, takes a long swig. Gestures to Jim with the
bottle, but Braddock just shakes his head.
KEVIN
Democracy hasn't failed? Shit.
PENNY
You need to shut up with that
Bolshivist crap or Jake's gonna cut
you and the rest of us too.
KEVIN
Long live America.
Kevin climbs standing on one of the benches.
KEVIN
Long live The Revolution!
Jim looks across the yard to see two WOMEN emerge from the
church basement. Each holds a frosted sheet cake lit.
BRADDOCK
Guess that's our cue.
KEVIN
Figure I'm just fine where I am.
A couple guys MURMUR agreement.
BRADDOCK
Come onr Kevin.
Kevin shakes his head. Jim shrugs, heads for the gathering.
Most follow, Kevin and Penny staying behind.
KEVIN
(toasting after him)
Long live Johnny Walker
EXT. CHURCH YARD -MOMENTS LATER
Jim joins Mae, the kids and FATHER RORICK, amongst the
others, as the cakes are set on the picnic table.
FATHER RORICK
(off the cross)
Still boycotting I see. 67 I '---BRADDOCK
I had to work. 44.
Rorick's smile knows there's more to it than that. Rorick
ruffles Jay's hair.
FATHER RORICK
Your Dad ever tell you I used to
spar with him?
JAY
You?
HOWARD
You hit the Father?
BRADDOCK
As often as possible. For a priest,
he has a mean left hook.
FATHER RORICK
The Lord giveth and taketh away.
BRADDOCK
Go on, now.
JAY
I liked it more when we had our
own.
BRADDOCK
I liked it more before you could
talk. Now go on.
Jay grins as he and Howard take off for a picnic table where
all the kids have gathered, the candles finally lit. The
crowd of adults and children all begin to SING.
CROWD
Happy birthday to you. Happy
birthday to you. Happy birthday
dear ...
A SERIES OF SHOTS -MEN AND WOMEN -SAME MOMENT
WOMAN
Mitchell.
MAN
Junior.
GIRL
Philip. 67A OLD MAN
Lisa.
MAE
Jay.
BACK TO SCENE
The crowd finishes.
CROWD
Happy birthday to you.
Jim looks at Rorick. Mae has come up behind them.
MAE
(terse)
James.
He follows her gaze.
EXT. CHURCH YARD -BENCH AREA -MOMENTS LATER
Kevin is standing where Jim left him, now with his WIFE
(SARA, 30's) and INFANT DAUGHTER. A couple of folks have
already turned towards the COMMOTION.
SARA
I'm just saying it's enough!
Jim walks up to the two of them.
BRADDOCK
Hey, where's the ref?
KEVIN
This is between man and wife, Jim.
SARA
Everyday, fix the world. How about
your family? You're gone before she
gets up, home after she"s sleep.
And now you're too proud to cross
the lawn because she can't have her
own birthday cake. What kind of
father are you? You"re drunk at
church for Christ's sake.
KEVIN
That a joke, Sara? Are you making a
joke? 67A 46.
Kevin actually moves towards her. Not clear what, if
anything, he's going to do. Jim stops him with a finn hand to
chest.
BRADDOCK
(smiling)
Easy there, Kevin. Maybe you've had
a couple. No hann in that. Day of
rest after all.
But Kevin isn't smiling back. He's staring into Jim's eyes.
KEVIN
That the way it is? You the big
fighter, that it?
Kevin shoves Braddock. Like trying to push a truck.
BRADDOCK
Stop it, Kevin!
KEVIN
Jim Braddock, big bone polisher ...
Kevin throws a punch which Jim slaps away easily.
BRADDOCK
I'm serious.
KEVIN
Can't make it in the ring so why
not take it out on his pal?
Throws another, which Jim's hand also dismisses, Kevin
SHOUTING now.
KEVIN
What you gonna do, huh-
Kevin's combination is fast but Jim steps back and palm
guides Kevin past. Kevin can't stop the momentum and he goes
down.
SARA
Jim, no-.
She's moved to Kevin who is scrambling upright. Stares at
Jim.
KEVIN
Go to hell. Both of you. 68 47.
And with that Kevin is gone. Sara stares at him. Then she
turns to Jim, the baby WAILING in her arms.
SARA
Jesus, Jim, He wasn't going to hit
me. Jesus.
And with that she's gone after her husband. Jim looks up to
see Mae standing a few feet off.
MAE
Why was it so hard just to come
over for the cake?
Too much adrenaline everywhere.
BRADDOCK
(flaring)
Maybe he just needed a little time,
all right. It's not so damned easy.
Maybe he just needed a little time.
MAE
(flaring back)
Not at me, James Braddock. Do you
hear? I know its hard. But not. At.
Me.
The two stand facing each other. Feet and miles away.
Finally, Jim crosses the divide, bows his head to her's.
EXT. STREET -SUNDAY -DAY
Spring can still be beautiful. Even here and now. Jay and
Howard play stick ball with other kids in the street.
ON A STOOP Jim sits with Rosemarie, standing on the step
below him so they're the same height.
ROSEMARIE
Were you fighting with Kevin?
Jim stares at her. Shakes his head?
BRADDOCK
We were almost fighting.
ROSEMARIE
Teach me how.
BRADDOCK
I can't, honey. 68 ROSEMARIE
Why not?
BRADDOCK
Because the cops might come back.
ROSEMARIE
You mean, Morruny?
Jim nods somberly. Rosy puts her hands on her hips.
ROSEMARIE
You can too. Teach me daddy.
Jim tries to stare down his daughter. He's just no match.
BRADDOCK
Let's start simple. Jab the left.
Rosemarie obliges. Awfully serious. Awfully cute.
BRA_DDOCK
You got a bet'ter jab than I did.
That's when a familiar car pulls up, window rolling down.
JOE
You are a brave man.
BRADDOCK
Not really. Mae's at the store. 48.
Rosemarie, taking advantage of the distraction, clocks Jim
sqaure in the jaw. Not bad for someone pint-sized.
BRADDOCK
(laughing)
Okay, darling. Good shot. Shadow
punch while I talk to uncle Joe.
Rosemarie punches the air as Jim rises, walks to Joe who has
emerged from the car. Jim touches the lapel of his suit.
BRADDOCK
Still looking dapper.
JOE
Gotta keep up appearances.
Joe smiles.
JOE
Good to see you, Jimmy. Jim smiles back. Neither may have known it until now but
these two missed each other. Joe looks around. Casual.
JOE
Nice day.
BRADDOCK
You drive all the way out here to
talk about the weather?
JOE
Maybe I was in the neighborhood.
BRADDOCK
Joe, this is Jersey.
JOE
A point.
A beat. Then ...
JOE
I got you a fight.
BRADDOCK
Go to Hell.
JOE (CONT'D)
You want it don't you?
BRADDOCK
What about the Commission?
JOE
They'll sanction it. This one time
and one time only. This isn't a
comeback. This is one fight.
BRADDOCK
Why?
JOE
Because of who you' re ...
BRADDOCK
Never mind. How much?
JOE
Just once ask me who you're
fighting.
BRADDOCK
How rrruch? 49. JOE
$250.00
Jim shakes his head, starts to walks away.
JOE
You're on the big show at the
Garden ... tonight.
Joe is trailing him.
JOE
You fight Corn Griffin, Jimmy.
Number 2 heavyweight contender in
the world. Pre-show fight before
the championship bout.
Jim finally spins on him, intense, dangerous.
BRADDOCK
Joe, this isn't funny.
JOE
Wake up, Jimmy, it's real.
Griffin's opponent got cut and
can't fight. They needed somebody
they could throw in on a day's
notice. Nobody legit will take a
fight against Griffin without
training so ... I told 'em with you
they could use the angle that ...
Joe looks away. Looks back at Jim.
JOE
I told them they could use the
angle Griffin was gonna knock out a
guy that'd never been knocked out.
You're meat, Jimmy. They're paying
to see you fall.
BRADDOCK
Joe. Are you really on the level?
JOE It ain't no favor. Griffin's 55
wins with 35 kayos. He'll hit you
so hard it'll put knots on your
grandkid's heads. Johnston's
promoting the fight. He cut me bhs
deal. You just got to stay up six
rounds and you get paid. 50. 69 BRADDOCK
Joe ...
Gould looks away, steps back, looks him up and down.
JOE
How much do you weigh?
BRADDOCK
170 somethin'.
JOE
(scowling)
He's got 40 pounds on you. Take
some line of bullshit to sell 'em
on why you can"t make the weight ...
(shaking his head)
Ah, screw it ... I just knew how bad
you needed the money.
Jim's still looking at his friend. Then he smiles.
BRADDOCK
Joe. For 250 bucks I'd fight your
wife.
JOE
Now you are dreaming.
BRADDOCK
I got to tell Mae.
JOE
(off his watch)
Jimmy, it's now. 51.
Jim just shakes his head. Can't be happening. He CALLS out to
the boys.
BRADDOCK
Howard, watch your sister.
(turns to Rosemarie)
Honey, tell mommy daddy got some
work.
HOLD on Rosemarie as she watches the car drive off. Something
working in her tiny mind. Then she races to her two brothers,
small head moving in sudden and intense consultation.
INT. BUT~HER SHOP -AFTERNOON 69
(OVER) TAPPING. SAM, a butcher, emerges from the back, walks
towards his closed door. Rosemarie stands TAPPING the glass. SAM
(opening the door)
We're closed, today. 52.
Sam looks around outside. The two boys stand silently with
her. She follows his gaze to them.
ROSEMARIE
Let me do the talking.
Sam can't help but smile as the three march in.
SAM
Where's your folks?
Rosemarie walks past him to the counter.
ROSEMARIE
I need a piece of meat, sir.
She eyes the case and the few remaining cuts of meat.
ROSEMARIE
Shirley.
SAM
Sirloin?
Rosemarie nods seriously.
SAM
You got any money?
Rosemarie shakes her head no.
SAM
I can't give it away, see, not even
to a stray little lady and her
bodyguards.
Howard and Jay couldn't like that designation less.
ROSEMARIE
It's not for me.
SAM
Who's it for?
ROSEMARIE
You got to give it to me first or I
won't tell you. 70 Sam stares at her. Intrigued by so small a person this
intense and complete.
ROSEMARIE
How about something you dropped on
the floor? 53.
Sam shakes his head. Goes to the garbage and takes a scrap of
fatty meat from the can. Wipes it on his hanging apron.
ROSEMARIE
My Dad. He needs it so he can win a
boxing fight.
HOLD on Sam's perplexed expression.
OMIT 70
71 EXT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN BOWL -LONG ISLAND CITY -NIGHT71
72 The MARQUEE reads: PRIMO CARNERA vs . MAX BAER
HEAVY-WEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP
TITLE FIGHT!
-And 6 Other Fights -
INT. DRESSING ROOM -CONTINUOUS 72
Jim, in his trunks, is staring at his taped hands. Big toe
pokes through a patched hole in his sock that has reopened.
JOE (OVER)
I mean, Chrissakes, 55 and O once,
for God's sake, never been knocked
down, who goes and sells his gear?
Joe is rifling locker after locker, emerges carrying someone
else's boxing shoes and drops them in front of Jim.
JOE (CONT'D)
Out of my mind here looking for
shoes for a fighter.
Jim tries a shoe on. It's big, real big, like a clown's.
BRADDOCK
Maybe I oughta get an Aooga horn,
chase him around the ring.
JOE
You been drinking?
BRADDOCK
No. 73
74 JOE
Well, you"re too loose, you're
spooking me.
BRADDOCK
Come on, Joe, we both know what
this is, right?
Braddock smiles, a deep, sad smile.
BRADDOCK
I get to put a little more distance
between my kids and the street. And
say good-bye at th.e Garden with a
full house night of a big fight.
Joe has begun lacing his shoe.
BRADDOCK
What's Griffin gonna show me that I
ain't already- seen?
,
There is a loud GROWLING NOISE.
JOE
What the hell was that?
BRADDOCK
They ran out of soup on the line
this morning.
JOE
You gotta stay up six rounds. You
can't fight on an empty stomach.
INT. MSG BOWL -RINGSIDE -DAY
DON DUNPHY, the Radio Announcer, is on the air ...
DUNPHY
Good Evening! Welcome to tonight's
broadcast of the Primo Camera -
Max Baer fight for the heavyweight
championship of the world!
The Garden is filling up.
INT. DRESSING BOOM -DAY 54.
73
74
Jim is sitting calmly, waiting. Joe enters, carrying a bowl.
JOE
Hash is all they had. Eat quick. 75 BRADDOCK
Where's the spoon?
cTOE
It's not there?
Joe glances at the clock on the wall.
JOE
You gotta go anyway.
BRADDOCK
(sniffing again)
One bite.
Jim starts to dip his hand into the hash.
cTOE
Hey! I don't have time to re-tape
you!
The door opens and a GARDEN OFFICIAL looks in. He sees Jim
with his head down in the bowl, eating like a dog.
OFFICIAL
Good God ...
Jim looks up, his face smeared with hash.
OFFICIAL (CONT'D)
You're on, pal.
Jim looks at Joe.
BRADDOCK
What about a robe?
Joe shakes his head, looks again to the lockers.
INT. RINGSIDE -DAY 75
Sporty Lewis, amidst other reporters, sits ringside, nose up
against the cloth. All look at their fight programs.
YOUNG REPORTER
Who's Jim Braddock?
Jim and Joe appear, have begun making their way through the
crowd in the b.g. Few pay them much attention.
SPORTY
Get your pencil out, kid. I got
your lead line for you.
(MORE) 76
77 SPORTY (cont'd)
The walk from the locker room to
the ring was the only time tonight
that old Jim Braddock was seen on
his feet.
Jim climbs into the ring to warm up. He is wearing a robe
with the name Fred Carston written on the back.
YOUNG REPORTER
(even more confused)
Who's Fred Carston?
INT. QUINCY'S BAR -CONTINUOUS 76
Packed with water drinkers. Quincy couldn't be less thrilled.
A few guys from the dock sit with Kevin as the RADIO warms
up.
DUNPHY (V.O.)
... Well! It seems Braddock has come
out of retirement just for tonight!
All look at each other.
DOCK GUY
Can't be ...
They all look at Kevin, who shakes his head and opens his
hands, as shocked as everyone else.
INT. THE RING -CONTINUOUS
The crowd is WILD with CHEERS.
RING ANNOUNCER ... Corn Griffin.
At 6'2", 210 lbs., GRIFFIN claps his gloves, powerful,
confident, the "Golden Boy" of heavyweight contenders.
RING ANNOUNCER
And in this corner, weighing 190
pounds ...
Jim looks down at his own thin frame to see where he is
carrying that weight.
RING ANNOUNCER (CONT'D)
... from North Bergen, New Jersey.
Jim Braddock.
No reaction from the crowd. 77 78
79
80
Bl
82 57 _ ·
GRIFFIN
If you weigh 190, I'm 400.
They touch gloves.
BRADDOCK
Big feet.
INT. RING -NIGHT
The BELL. Griffin comes out punching hard and fast. Jim is
doing all he can to keep the blows from connecting. But
Griffin's hands are like a storm coming from everywhere. 78
It only takes a second to realize this fight was a bad idea.
Griffin is in perfect form. His jabs and body shots are
perfect. Jim clinches. Corn straightens him with an uppercut.
INT. THE CORNER 79
Joe is blocking in time with Jim, his arms and body dancing
in an echoing shadow play of the fight. Like the old days.
JOE
Six rounds. Just six rounds.
(shouts)
Stay out of his way!
INT. THE RING
Griffin throws a right which Jim blocks with his left. Jim
seems surprised by his own move. 80
Griffin throws a haymaker that connects to the side of Jim's
head. Jim looks as if he's trying to do a cartwheel. Jim goes
down, hard, onto the mat.
INT. QUINCY'S BAR -CONTINUOUS
DUNPHY (V.O.)
Oh! And Braddock is down! A
thunderous left hook from Griffin
sends Braddock to the mat! 81
MURMURS all around. What else could be expected? Only Kevin
gestures for quiet, stares at the radio.
INT. THE RING 82
The Ref stands over Jim.
REF
One ... Two ... three ... 83 58.
JIM-POV. He looks up and impossibly, watches himself getting
hit. He runs the moment backwards and forwards in his mind.
REF
Four. .. five ... six ...
And Jim finally stands. Shaky on his feet as a new colt,
blood streaming from a cut inside his mouth.
REFEREE It's over, Braddock.
Jim looks over the Ref's head at Griffin. Manages a smile.
BRADDOCK
He don't look that bad!
The Ref shakes his head, starts to raise his hand to stop the
fight. Jim puts his gloves on the Ref's arm.
BRADDOCK (CONT'D)
Please. Let me go.
The Ref hesitates then steps aside. Griffin practically runs
into Jim's corner. He misses Jim's head but lands a left to
the body with an ugly thud. Jim gets in two jabs with the
left before the BELL: No one seems more surprised than Jim.
INT. THE CORNER -SECONDS LATER 83
Jim's face is swelling with knots. Joe stands in front of him
and pours water, which Jim spits out, puts his head down.
JOE
Five more rounds.
BRADDOCK
(not looking up)
I may have seen something.
JOE
Yeah, what? Stars.
As he looks up now, something new in his eyes.
BRADDOCK
What if I stay up more than six
rounds?
Joe shoots him a look.
JOE
You hang back or we don't get paid. 84
85
86
87
88 59.
Joe shakes his head.
JOE
Jimmy. You just worry about not
going down.
INT. THE RING -CONTINUOUS
The Bell CLANGS. 84
Jim moves out and Griffin is on him again. A terrible series
of blows. Jim's just taking it, waiting for something.
Griffin is knocking him around the ring. Jim is doing his
best to dance and stay out of his way. Drawing the punches.
Griffin throws another punch and Jim lands a hard left jab
that pops. It halts Griffin in his tracks.
INT. CORNER -CONTINUOUS
Joe was shadow punching, throwing his right. Looks down at
his own left hand. More stunned than Griffin.
JOE
What the hell was that?
INT. RING -CONTINUOUS 85
86
That jab just pissed Griffin off. He pounds Jim mercilessly.
A series of powerful blows. Body, head, body, body, head,
into the ropes. Jim can't even mount a defense, just stares
at THE CLOCK, ticking down. Finally, the BELL.
INT. QUINCY'S BAR -CONTINUOUS
The crowd is riveted.
DUNPHY (V.O)
If ever a man was saved by the
bell ...
INT. THE CORNER 87
88
Joe is kneeling in front of Jim. He sticks a towel into Jim"s
mouth and it comes out with bloody flesh on it.
JOE
Here's an idea. If you're gonna
dodge him, get out of his way. 89
90 BRADDOCK
Got him figured now. I'm gonna give
him something to remember me by.
JOE
What? Your teeth. Just get through
the round we're halfway there. Jim-
The bell CLANGS. Jim stands. Griffin stands.
INT. THE RING -CONTINUOUS
And this time, Jim goes to him. 60.
89
Jim throws two hard rights, disengages, keeping his left
down. Now Jim moves in, throws a series of rights that
connect, disengages again. He is trying to provoke something.
Jim makes another assault. Finally, Griffin throws one of
those haymakers, opening up some.
It's the same punch tha~ floored Jim earlier. This time Jim
moves, hits him straight in the face with a tremendous left
hook.
(OVER) The CROWD shares an intake of BREATH. Griffin just
stares at him, as if in shock. The moment lasts. Then Griffin
goes down head first, as if his skull has suddenly filled
with thoughts too heavy to hold. And he stays there.
Absolute stunned silence. Sporty Lewis is frog-eyed.
INT. QUINCY'S BAR -CONTINUOUS
DUNPHY
This is unbelievable! Corn Griffin,
the number 2 contender in the
world, has been knocked out by Jim
Braddock in the 3rd round!
Quincy's is utter MAYHEM. In the center of it all, Kevin
can't help but grin, shake his head in wonder.
KEVIN
That a boy, Jim. That a boy. 90
91 INT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN BOWL -LONG ISLAND CITY -NIGHT91
The Ref is holding up Jim's hand in triumph. Joe jumps onto
Jim's back. The crowd is on their feet, SCREAMING. 92 61.
INT. DRESSING ROOM -LATER 92
Jim, in civvies, finishes that cold hash with a spoon. Door
SLAMS and whirlwind Joe blows into the room.
JOE
Jesus, mother and Joseph, Mary and
all the saints and martyrs and
Jesus, ---did I say Jesus---, where
the hell did that left come from?
BRADDOCK
Yeah, you did. Say Jesus.
Their old easy rhythm.
BRADDOCK
(of the spoon)
Good they invented these.
JOE
The left, Jimmy.
BRADDOCK
Ambidexterity is a useful tool for
the modern man.
Jim looks at his 01tl!l left.
BRADDOCK
When my hand was broke. On the
docks. I had to use my left to
work.
Opens and closes that fist.
BRADDOCK
Got lucky, I guess.
JOE
That's something you ain't been in
a long time.
BRADDOCK
Everybody' s due.
JOE
Due or not, I'll take it.
Joe pulls a thick wad of cash out of his pocket. Grins. 93 62.
JOE
What we got here is a man"s living
wage.
He peals off a bunch of bills.
JOE (CONT'D}
And here's the price of why your
wife hates me.
BRADDOCK
That was on Hash. Imagine what I
could have done on steak.
He hands Jim his cash.
JOE
Wipe your mouth. Still remember how
to feed the dogs?
Joe has already put his hand on the door, turns back.
JOE (CONT'D)
That was one hell a good-bye.
Joe pulls open the door to several SHOUTING reporters.
JOE
Here boys.
REPORTERS
Braddock! Jim! Braddock!
INT. MSG BOWL ·· OUTSIDE THE DRESSING ROOMS -LATER 93
Jim and Joe are heading down the corridor. They stop at the
edge of the ring, look up at the fight that's raging.
MAX BAER, the young lion of the boxing world, is 6'3', 210
beautifully proportioned pounds, handsome. He is fighting ...
PRIMO CARNERA, 6'7" 270, an awesome giant and Heavyweight
Champion of the World.
JOE
(off Baer)
Imagine that hitting you?
BRADDOCK
Hitting you, maybe. 94
95 On this theatre in the round, Baer is smashing Carnera to the
mat with his fists. Carnera, bloody and beaten, staggers to
his feet. Baer arrogantly taunts the giant.
INT. THE RING -CONTINUOUS
DUNPHY (V.O.)
Primo Carnera has been knocked down
for what has to be a record 11
times' And Max Baer struts around
the ring in utter contempt of the
Heavyweight Champion of the World! 94
Carnera's massive bulk is heaving with fatigue and shock. He
pushes the Ref aside and staggers toward Baer.
Baer waits, smiling, steps out from the corner and blasts
Carnera off his feet. Carnera goes down and will not rise.
JOE
Corn Griffin was supposed to fight
Baer next.
Jim and Joe can't believe their eyes. The crowd is stunned.
JOE (CONT'D)
He ought to come out here and kiss
you on both cheeks for saving him.
The Ref grabs Bear's hand and raises it in triumph. Jim and
Joe start away.
BRADDOCK
Which cheeks, by the way?
JOE
Ass, obviously.
PUSH IN ON Sporty, near the ring, watching them go.
EXT. BRADDOCK HOUSE -NIGHT 95
Jim stands facing the front door. He hasn't touched the knob
when it swings open, Mae standing to face him.
BRADDOCK
I won.
The kids SHOUT in triumph behind her. Mae just stands there,
entirely unsure what to say. 96
97 64.
IN'I·. BRADDOCK HOUSE -MINUTES LATER 96
Jim is staring in awe at the piece of raw meat that Rosemarie
is holding up to him.
ROSEMARIE
Put it on your eyes.
BRADDOCK
Where in the world did you get
this?
(to Mae)
We don't have money for ...
MAE
They snuck off, which we had a long
talk about.
(scowls at Rosemarie)
I tried to take it back, but the
Butcher said he gave it to her.
ROSEMARIE It's Sher-loin. For your face.
(a tiny Mae)
Fix you right up.
BRADDOCK
Darling, we've got to eat this.
Jay and Howard WHOOP, fully supportive.
ROSEMARIE
No! You have to put it on your
face.
Jim looks at the boys, sighs, sits down, tilts his head back,
and lays the meat over his eyes.
BRADDOCK
How long do I leave it on?
Mae looks at Rosemarie who shrugs that she doesn't know.
BRADDOCK (CONT'D)
Oooo, I think it's working.
INT. BASEMENT APARTMENT -LATER
Mae and Jim sit at the table, the money between them. Four
plates with steak juice on t:hem.
MAE
Joe got his blood money, I see. 97 BRADDOCK
Is there a maximum number of times
a woman can say a thing?
MAE
Nope. 65.
Jim smiles. There is a light in his eyes not seen lately.
MAE I'll put what's left in the jar.
Jim licks the last bit of steak juice from the plate.
BRADDOCK
You should have seen the way he
dropped. Timm-berr.
Mae is smiling at him. Everything but her eyes.
BRADDOCK
What?
MAE It's not I'm not proud or grateful.
Boxing put food on the table.
Mae takes a beat before going on. Something gathering.
MAE
Hard as it was, we got off easy
when you broke that hand. What if
something worse happened? What if
you couldn't work? We're barely
managing now.
She is holding his eyes.
MAE
We've got to protect what we have.
You get hurt-. What happens to us?
To the kids again? We don't have
anything extra left, Jim. We don't
have anything left to risk.
BRADDOCK
I'm not going back to it, Mae. I
don't even have a license.
He starts to stack the plates. 98
99
99A MAE
I always hated it when you'd walk
out that door for a fight.
He turns to her, surprised by her words.
MAE
Let a man beat you bloody so you
could lay money on the table. Come
home rich or with nothing to show
but starting all over again. I
guess I didn't know it then, how
much I hated it when you fought. It
was just our lives, just what I was
used to. But I know it now. We lost
something when you quit fighting.
But we got something too. Something
unexpected. Peace, maybe.
She touches his hand.
MAE,
Jim, promise 'me.
BRADDOCK It was just one fight. 66.
He heads off with the dishes. She stares after her husband.
INT. BASEMENT APARTMENT -CRACK OF DAWN 98
Everyone still asleep. Jim is up, dressed. Everything hurts.
EXT. NEWSSTAND -4:30 AM 99
Jim crosses the street past men coming awake, smoothing slept
in clothes, leaving their families still sleeping on stoops.
The familiar NEWSBOY waves editions in the air.
NEWSBOY
U.S. abandons gold standard.
Underdog Braddock Kayos Griffin.
Jim stands staring at the Boy a beat. Then heads on.
EXT. DOCKS -MORNING
Jim's stands at the front of the group. By the looks of
things he's not getting picked.
JAKE
Eighteen, nineteen, twenty .... 99A 100 67.
Jake spots Jim. A beat. Then the magic finger points his way.
JAKE
Twenty one.
Jim closes his eyes in relief.
EXT. DOCKS -MOMENTS LATER 100
Jim is corning through the gates. A couple of the guys notice
him as he passes. Jake to Jim.
JAKE
Listened in, last night.
GUY
Hey, Braddock, that really you?
SECOND GUY
Way to go.
Jake drops a newspaper on one of the containers. HEADLINE:
AMAZING! BRADDOCK KO'S GRIFFIN IN 3.
JAKE
Didn't think I'd be seeing you back
here again.
BRADDOCK
One night only. The purse was two
fifty. We owed two thirty five.
JAKE
(laughs)
Makes you a rich man.
(serious now)
Good fight.
Something is stirred in these men. To come up against what
you can see and beat it back. Maybe what they all wish for.
Jim just nods, takes his place near Kevin on the line. The
two begin working in thick silence. Finally ...
KEVIN
I heard your name. I couldn't even
picture you.
The two keep working.
KEVIN
I would never have hit her. 101 BRADDOCK
Look, Kevin-
KEVIN
Don't know how I could have lived
with myself if I had hit her.
Hank's silent nod is apology and gratitude at once.
BRADDOCK
Griffin was tough. But me, I'd
watch out for your wife.
KEVIN
You get so angry with all of it,
you got to push somewhere. I'm
getting things under control.
Jim nods. Hook, haul, drop ...
KEVIN
Man. A night like last night. And
the next day you end up back here.
BRADDOCK
You're good enough company.
KEVIN
You know what I mean.
BRADDOCK
Yeah. Sure I do.
Hook, haul, drop. Endless. Then ...
KEVIN
So, how about you talk me through
that second round?
Jim, a sudden, small fire in his eyes.
BRADDOCK
Griffith comes out of his corner
like a freight train, I swear ... 68.
Jim is using his right hand as he TALKS. Then, with a small
smile, switches back to his left.
OMIT 101 102
103 69.
EXT. BRADDOCK'S BLOCK -DAY 102
Mae and Rosemarie are heading home, wrapped butcher's paper
in Mae's hand. The boys play pink-ball against the ally wall.
MAE
No more. Now, say it, Rosy.
ROSEMARIE
{a rush)
Don't trade daddy's autograph to
the butcher for free meat.
Mae bites back her laugh.
MAE
Why can't you ever listen to me?
Rosemarie thinks on it a bit.
ROSEMARIE
(little kid serious)
I don' t know .
Mae can't help but smile. Her expression quickly darkens as
she sees Joe's familiar car pulling away from their house.
MAE
Go play with the boys.
EXT. BRADDOCK BACKYARD -DAY
Jim, staring up at the trees. Mae walks out.
MAE
Your daughter is now a celebrity in
Sam's butcher shop.
Jim turns, smiles at her. She can see it in his eyes.
MAE
What was he doing here, Jim?
BRADDOCK
Joe thinks the Commission might be
willing to reverse their ruling. He
thinks he can get me another fight.
Mae says nothing.
BRADDOCK
I'd have to quit working, you know,
get back into boxing shape. 103 104
105 He's already in his pocket.
BRADDOCK
He fronted us one hundred and
seventy five dollars, Mae. So I
could train.
Jim pulls out a wad of cash.
BRADDOCK
This is a second chance. I can get
us out of all this.
Mae takes a long beat before speaking.
BRADDOCK
I can start winning again.
MAE
Jimmy. Please. I'm begging you.
BRADDOCK
I'm sorry, Mae.
The moment lasts.
BRADDOCK
This is what I know how to do.
EXT. PIER -NEW JERSEY -MORNING 70.
104
Mae is wearing her best, which aren't very good. She boards
the ferry, pointed towards Manhattan's silver spires.
EXT. EIGHTH AVENUE -NYC -MORNING 105
Mae walks the block, past a group of children on dirty knees,
doing laundry in the water runoff at the curb.
WOMAN'S VOICE (OVER)
Go ahead you piece of shit.
Mae looks up. A WOMAN hangs out a brownstone window,
SHOUTING, rage so great she seems not to know she is crying.
WOMAN
Go on. We don't need you.
The MAN walking away down the block is holding a small, twine
tied suitcase. He doesn't even turn, back bowed by shame.
HOLD on one of the children in the gutter, staring after. 106
107
108 71.
EXT. PARK AVENUE -MORNING 106
Mae walks up to a tall Park Avenue apartment building. Stares
up the giant stone facade. She heads inside.
INT. PARK AVENUE APARTMENT BUILDING -MORNING
Another world. Mae travels the finely papered hallway.
Touches her tattered clothes self-consciously. 107
She comes to an apartment door. Checks a scrap of paper from
her purse. Matches the door number. She KNOCKS.
Movement inside. Motion at the key hole. Then nothing. Just
stillness beyond the portal. She KNOCKS again. Still nothing.
1-rn.E
Open the goddamned door Joe. You're
not going to hide in your fancy
apartment and use my husband as
your punching bag all over again.
We're starving and you're taking
him from his work and worse than
that you're using his dreams just
to feed yours and he can't be
disappointed like that again do you
hear me I won't let you. What the
hell kind of man are you-
That's when the door swings slightly open to reveal Joe. They
stare at each other in silence.
JOE
I guess you better come in.
Joe opens the door.
A WOMAN (LUCILLE GOULD), stands in an apartment totally
empty, only high windows and wood floors. No furniture.
INT. GOULD APARTMENT -MOMENTS LATER
Joe, Mae and Lucille sit on three folding chairs in the
middle of the empty living room, sipping tea.
JOE
How is it?
Joe looks at his wife who nods, smiles.
LUCILLE
Too sweet per usual. 108 He smiles back, looks at Mae.
JOE
Yours?
Mae nods. She's still off balance.
JOE
(gestures to the door)
Sorry. You just don't want folks to
see you down is all. Image is a lot
of what you got going in my line.
He gestures to his wife.
JOE
Should have listened to her, just
let you in in the first place.
LUCILLE
You should always listen to me.
MAE'
I didn't know. I thought ....
JOE
Yeah. That's the idea.
(smiles)
Always keep your gloves up.
Mae realizes that's been Joe's saying all along.
JOE
Sold the last of it two days ago.
So Jimmy could train.
It takes Mae a moment to respond.
MAE
Why?
JOE
Sometimes you see something in a
fighter. You don't even know if its
real, you're looking for it so bad.
Joe glances out the window.
,JOE
You can't have no hope at all. You
got to have hope in something. I
guess JimITl'J' s what I hope for. 72. Mae is startled, had no idea they shared this.
MAE
This is crazy.
No argument there.
MAE
You don't even know if you can get
him a fight, do you?
JOE I'll get him a fight.
But we can see that's bravado talking.
JOE
He's all any of us have left, Mae.
LUCILLE
Honey, get us some more tea, would
you?
Joe rises, smiling.
JOE
I know who wears the pants.
He winks, goes into the kitchen.
LUCILLE
Can you ever stop yours? When he
sets his mind to a thing.
MAE
No. I wish I could. No.
LUCILLE
I never know who it's harder on,
them or us? We have to wait for
them to fix everything. But they
have to do it. And everyday they
feel like they're letting us down.
Like they're failing us. And really it's just the world that's failed,
you know?
Passing clouds dapple sunlight on wooden floors.
MAE
It's~ .. this is a lovely apartment. 73. 109 74.
LUCILLE
Yes. It was. Could be again.
The two sit together in silence, sipping tea.
INT. JEANETTE'S GYM -DAY
A BOXING BAG-CLOSE. Being hit. Really, really fast. (OVER)
The loud RINGING beat of a tambourine.
JOE (OVER)
Focus. 109
WIDER. Jim is killing the bag. Jeanette stands behind him
beating a tambourine in Jim's ears. Joe is outside the ring.
BRADDOCK
You get me that fight yet?
JOE
I tell you how to do your job?
BRADDOCK
Yeah.
Jim catches the bag.
JEANNETTE
Now, I got me five fighters
thinking it would be an honor to
get their heads beaten in by you.
A few potential sparring partners stand at ringside. Big.
White. Strong. Jim looks them up and down.
BRADDOCK
No offense, fellas.
Jim climbs out of the ring. FAVOR ,JIM as he begins looking
around the gym. He's not looking at bodies. He's looking at
feet. Finally, he spots a familiar pair of shoes.
TILT UP to George, sparring on a mat. Fists like lightning.
Moves the wind would envy. George quits to see Jim staring.
BRADDOCK
Him.
George looks Jim in the eyes. Then past him to Janette.
GEORGE
He's still gonna have to pay me
even after I whup his ass. 110
111 75.
Braddock smiles.
INT. JEANNETTE'S GYM -;:,ATER
Jim is sparring with George. Jim is fast but George is
faster. That left of Jim's, now almost good as his right.
JANETTE
Okay, okay, you got a left, big
deal, you gotta pay attention, what
is it with you? 110
Two GIRLS stroll in, ringside. They begin a strip-tease. Jim
stays focused. George takes one on the chin.
EXT. JEANETTE'S GYM -DAY
,Jim is heading home. A perfect surrrner's day. Kids loll on
parked cars. They know him.
VOICE ( OVER)
Braddock.
Jim turns to face a familiar figure. Kevin.
KEVIN
Just don't show up for work, one
day? Now what kind of pal is that?
Kevin is grinning as he clasps Jim's hand.
BRADDOCK
How you doing, Kevin?
KEVIN
Had to see for myself. Jim
Braddock's making a comeback.
That's one for the papers.
BRADDOCK
Funny papers mere like it. How's
Sara and the baby? You keeping up?
Kevin smiles.
KEVIN
I just came to say. After that day
at church. I pretty much quit the
hoot.ch. Guess I kind of owe you.
BRADDOCK
You don't owe me a thing, Kevin. 111 112 76.
KEVIN
So, I mean, you ever need anything.
A corner man, anything. I'd drop
the rest in a second. I can pull my
weight, you know that.
Something about Hank's eyes.
BRADDOCK
Jesus, Kevin. I'm on a stake here.
I wish I could.
Jim's eyes narrow.
BRADDOCK
You doing okay? Whatever I can
spare-
KEVIN
Easy, brother, T'm doing fine. Even
got a few of the boys on the docks
thinking a union might just be a
damn good idea. Hell, we'll be the
first dock with a local.
BRADDOCK
Kevin, you sure?
KEVIN
I'm here offering, son, not asking.
Unless the picket lines get rough,
then I'm going to come calling.
BRADDOCK
You can count on me, Kevin.
Kevin puts his hand on Jim's shoulder. A beat. Then he CLAPS
Jim's back and heads off, SAYING something Jim doesn't catch.
BRADDOCK
What'd you say?
Kevin turns to Jim, eyes warm in the late day sun.
KEVIN
Proud of you, soldier.
lJim watches him go.
EXT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -DAY
Joe looks up the familiar building. Lights the stub of a
cigar. A beat. He puts on his game face and heads inside. 112 113
\ ............ INT. JOHNSTON'S OFFICE -DAY
Gould sits across the desk from Jirnrrry Johnston.
JOHNSTON
Now what am I going to go and do
that for?
JOE
You saw the papers. News had to run
two printings day after Braddock's
fight. People are sentimental.
JOHNSTON
Yeah. So, tell me why I care.
JOE
You're still sore over the way
Braddock took down Griffin, okay,
fine, I can understand that. But
you're on the Commission now. Tl.
113
Joe slips two fresh, expensive cigars from his jacket, slides
one across the desk towards Johnston. And he starts to sell.
JOE
Lewis is your number two in line
for the Championship. He already
beat Braddock once in Frisco. Say
you put Braddock back in the game.
Set him up against Lewis. Lewis
wins, you get your revenge on
Braddock, your boy's got more
momentum going into the Lasky fight
and what happens? You make money.
Joe's words are, impossibly, coming even faster now.
JOE
Now say by some chance, Braddock
wins, you got a sentimental
favorite to go up and lose against
your boy Lasky and what happens?
You make money. Either way you're a
richer man with Braddock back in
the ring than if he's not. And we
both know the name of this game ...
Joe rubs fingers to thumb, the universal sign for money.
JOE
And it sure as hell isn't boxing. 114
115
116 Johnston shakes his head in awed dismay.
JOHNSTON
They should put your mouth in a
circus.
JOE
Yeah. So what do you say?
Johnston lifts the cigar, turns it over in his hand.
OMIT
INT. JEANNETTE'S GYM -DAY 78.
114
115
Braddock's sparring with George. Joe comes up behind him.
JOE
Keep your gloves up.
BRADDOCK
You gonna do a striptease too?
JOE
I got you a fight.
That gets his attention. George takes the opening. But Jim
blocks it anyway. Holds up his gloves, and George backs off.
INT. LOCKER ROOM -SECONDS LATER 116
Joe and Jim stand together. Nearly everyone else in the gym
knows what's going on, all give them a wide birth.
JOE
You're gonna fight John Henry Lewis
again.
Jim looks at him. Nods.
BRADDOCK
I could kiss you.
JOE
I'm begging you not to.
Jim takes a a beat.
BRADDOCK
Isn't Lewis one of Johnston's boys?
JOE
You let me worry about that. 117
118 BRADDOCK
No wonder ymi won' t pucker up. Bet
you're all kissed out all ready.
JOE
I ain't gonna bullshit you. You
tnow the game. Right now you're
fodder. But you win one and I can
get you another. Win again and
things maybe start getting serious.
BRADDOCK
Don't talk about it. I don't like a
lot of words about it.
Joe nods, Braddock heads for the door.
JOE
Jimmy.
Jim turns back to him. That old fire in Joe's eyes.
JOE
Win.
INT. BUTCHER SHOP -AFTERNOON
Sam is weighing up some ham when the bell over the door
TINGLES. He peers over the counter and sees Rosemarie
standing there with her two stoic bodyguards.
ROSEMARIE
What would it be worth to you if I
could get ITI'J dad to shake your
hand?
EXT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -EVENING
Jim stands out front, facing Mae in this perfect summer
evening. A few city crickets SING.
BRADDOCK
I know this isn't what you wanted.
He looks down. Back up at her.
BRADDOCK
But I can't win if you're not
behind me.
An endless beat. 79.
117
118 119
120 80.
MAE
I'm always behind you.
She leans in and kisses him. As Mae's face moves OUT OF FRAME
Jim is hit from the other side by a hard glove. WIDEN ...
INT. BOXING RING -MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -NYC -NIGHT 119
A fist snaps Jim's head back with a left. Then another. Then
another. WIDEN FURTHER ...
JOHN HENRY LEWIS, black, at 6'1" and 190 pounds with a
perfect physique, rips into Jim with a series of
combinations. He's a fighter ahead of his time, fast, lethal.
DUNPHY (OVER)
Lewis the uncrowned heavyweight
champ, having beaten Rosenbloom
twice in nontitle fights, is here
to repeat his Frisco performance.
His speed is dazzling. His force, impossible. But Jim is
showing surprising footwork, mounting a remarkable defense.
DUNPHY
And beat Jim Braddock.
Jim suddenly comes in with a hard left of his own. Then
another. And another. Lewis is surprised.
The rule is set, no ground will be given on either side.
INT. LEWIS CORNER -MOMENTS LATER
Lewis is breathing hard. His COACH stands over him.
COACH
Come on. What are you doing? You
beat this guy easy last time.
LEWIS
He's a different guy.
INT. BRADDOCK CORNER -SAME MOMENT 120
Jim is slumped on his stool. Joe is trying to rub some life
into Jim's arms.
BRADDOCK
Faster than I thought. 121
122 JOE
You gotta keep moving right, fast,
always right, he favors the jab.
Jim, you listening?
BRADDOCK
Yeah. I'll move fast.
INT. RING -LATER 121
Jim and Lewis stand trading blow for blow. It's impossible
that either man is still standing. Jim is on the aggressive.
He stalks Lewis who dances away, now seems wary of Jim.
DUNPHY (V.O.)
And they are still toe to toe, no
one is giving an inch! I have never
seen a fight this ferocious go on
for this long!
Lewis knocks Jim back with a lethal combination. Jim throws a
sudden uppercut. Lewis goes down on one knee.
Jim steps back.
The Ref is counting.
The crowd is ROARING.
Lewis gets up.
The Ref waves Jim in.
Jim staggers back to center ring and HAMMERS Lewis again.
One, two, three jabs. Lewis can't keep his guard up.
Jim goes to the body and then throws a powerful right to the
head and Lewis is KNOCKED OUT OF FRAME.
The crowd EXPLODES.
JIM-CLOSE. Realizing he has won. His head is snapped back by
a powerful white fist. WIDEN TO REVEAL ....
INT. RING -MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -NYC -1935 -NIGHT 122
Jim is now fighting Art Lasky. Lasky is moving in fast.
What's dazzling about Lasky is the combination of force and
endurance. Jim's landing punch after punch with no effect. 123 82.
DUNPHY (VO)
After his dazzling victory against
John Henry Lewis, the comeback of
Jim Braddock has just hit a wall
named Art Lasky. In the ninth ...
Lasky has ,Jim in a corner and he is pounding bone jarring
shots into Jim's ribs. Jim can't seem to find the punches
before they connect.
FLASH -Jim standing in the parking lot after being
decommissioned.
FLASH -Joe splinting Jim's wrist.
FLASH -Jim sells his shoes and gloves.
Jim endures a storm of punches to the head and body. (OVER)
The bell CLANGS.
Lasky walks to his corner with his hands raised in triumph!
INT. BRADDOCK'S CORNER -MOMENTS LATER 123
A CORNERMAN works on Jim, bleeding from his nose. Jim stares
up at the ceiling lights which suddenly drop towards him.
JOE
Where are you?
Jim looks up, the lights right where they should be.
JOE
Where are you?
No response. Jim's expression is dark, dazed.
JOE
You look like you're dreaming. What
the hell are you thinking about out
there? Come, on, Jim.
The WARNING BUZZER sounds. Jim gets slowly up.
JOE (CONT'D)
Focus. Jim. Focus. What the hell
are you even fighting for?
Jim takes a different meaning. New eyes look up at Joe.
BRADDOCK ... Milk. 124 Jim stands, heads out.
JOE {CONT'D)
What? Shit ..
INT. RING -LATER 83.
124
Lasky has Jim in the corner again. Jim has his arms down, his
elbows in tight, trying to protect his ribs.
DUNPHY (V. 0. ) It's like a funeral here as Art
Lasky puts an end to a story that's
been getling a lot of attention ...
Jim has left his hPad completely unprotected. Lasky sees his
opening and connects flush on Jim's temple with an enormous
right hook that makes Jim spit out his mouthpiece.
The most powerful punch Lasky has. The most powerful punch
most folks in the audience have ever seen. All grow silent.
Jim just stands there, holding Lasky•s eyes.
FLASH -Jim hooks a bale of rice.
FLASH -Jim counting the meager change in his hand in front
of Madison Square Garden, head bowed in shame.
FLASH -Jim hooks a bale of rice.
FLASH -Mae putting on sweater over sweat.er on the kids in
their freezing apartment., ice on the inside of the windows.
FLASH -Jim hooks a bale of rice.
FLASH -Mae adding tap water to almost empty milk bottles for
the kids breakfast.
FLASH -Bale, after bale after bale.
Jim doesn't fall. He turns, walks calmly across the ring and lifts the mouthpiece.
DUNPHY (OVER)
Braddock just took Lasky"s best
punch and it didn't even phase him.
He's showing inhuman determination.
Braddock grins, moves in on Lasky. Lasky tries to go for the
clinch but Jim gives him an upper cut, won't let him in. 125
126 84.
RING -HIGH ANGLE -ONE SHOT 125
All the punches in all the corning rounds are seen in a single
flurry, hooks, dabs, clinches all one continuous bout while
(OVER) DUNPHY clocks us through rapidly passing time.
DUNPHY (OVER)
Round thirteen ...
Jim jabs from a distance; Jim lands punches on the inside.
DUNPHY (OVER)
Round fifteen ...
Jim lands THUDDING rights; goes to the body; pounds the
youngster against the ropes. The REF separates them, the
CROWD CHEERING.
DUNPHY (OVER)
This is incredible. Braddock will
not be denied.
Jim is on him again; a series of lethal punches sends Lasky
back, ropes the only thing keeping him up. The BELL.
BACK TO SCENE
The crowd is on it's feet. The fighters are still in the
middle of the ring.
FIND Joe looking at Jim. He offers a little bow.
FIN-n Jim looking at Joe. He winks.
REF
And the winner is ...
The NOISE of the crowd becomes a ROAR.
INT. ATLANTIC CITY -HOTEL ROOM -NIGHT 126
The Atlantic CRASHES below giant windows. Max Baer sips pink
champagne with two SHOW GIRLS. A MAN sticks his head in.
MAN
Max, Jim Braddock just beat Lasky.
Baer offers a slow, malevolent smile.
BAER
Remember that name. Because nobody
else will. \ '---127
128 IN'l'. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -NYC -LOCKER ROOM -NIGHT
Jim faces Joe who's stripping his hands. (OVER) A KNOCK.
JOE
I said wait! Hounds of goddamned
hell.
BRADDOCK
That's redundant by the way.
Joe shoots him a look, goes back to unwrapping.
JOE
You know what this means?
BRADDOCK
Don't.
JOE
Not that again.
Joe's eyes turn serious. (OVER) Another KNOCK.
JOE
That's three contenders. You're in
line again.
Remember these words. So long ago. No smiles this time.
BRADDOCK
Don't, Joe. Don't jinx it.
He's serious. Shakes his head.
JOE
Like before, huh?
BRADDOCK
No. Last time we didn't know enough
to be scared. 85.
127
Joe pulls open the door to the now giant gaggle of reporters.
INT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -NIGHT 128
Jim ENTERS, in his hand a dozen red roses. His smile quickly
dissolves. REVERSE ANGLE.
Sara sits with her baby girl, her eyes red from crying. The
infant has a hacking COUGH. MAE
Kevin's gone missing. 86.
Jim walks over to Mae, away from the kids relegated to the
bed, straining hard to listen.
BRADDOCK
How long?
SARA
Two days. I've been staying at my
brother's since he stopped working-
BRADDOCK
Stopped working? When?
SARA
Jake cut him about a week after you
left. Word got around. You know how
Kevin gets. So much trouble.
She touches her baby's face, as if she sees Kevin there.
BRADDOCK
He said he was doing fine. That he
quit drinking.
SARA
Kevin never quit a thing in his
life.
She looks up at Jim again.
SARA
He was always just too damn proud
to ask for anybody's help. Had to
be the one to fix everything. But I
made him promise he'd ask you, Jim.
The barest hint of accusation in her VOICE.
SARA
Didn't he come to you, Jim? That
son of a bitch. Didn't he?
BRADDOCK
Don't know, Sara. Maybe he did.
Mae touches her arm, setting free the rest of the words. SARA
He's been sleeping nights down in
the Hooversville. My brother didn't
have room for both him and us.
She's rocking the baby, now, maybe as much rocking herself.
SARA
Yesterday, he's supposed to bring
money to get some syrup for the
baby. He never showed up.
She's trying to keep the fear out of her VOICE.
SARA
Tonight, I go down to Quincy's, and
he isn't there. Something's wrong,
Jim. I know it. He'd never miss one
of your fights. He just wouldn't.
He stares at her. Surprised by this.
SARA
We argue a lot, you know? But I
should have known ... the way he left
the last time ... how he said it.
Sara isn't even aware that she's started to cry again.
SARA
I give up, he says. I don't know
what to go up against anymore,
Sara. I just give up.
MAE
Baby has croup, Jim, I can hear it
in his cough.
Mae glances at the cash in the rainy day jar. Jim nods.
BRADDOCK
You and Mae go down to the Rexall,
get something to fix her up. I'll
go see if I can't round up Kevin.
Jim heads towards the door.
JAY
Dad. Did you win?
He looks back at his son. Everyone's forgotten. 129
130
131 BRADDOCK
Yeah. I did. 88.
He closes the door behind him. Rosemarie stares after him.
OMIT ROSEMARIE It's the meat.
EXT. CENTRAL PARK WEST -NIGHT 129
130
As a cab pulls away in the b.g., Jim walks to the edge of the
park. Here, a few men are being bustled into a horse drawn
police wagon. More cops stand by on sweaty mounts. Tense air.
Under their watchful eyes of the police, an odd evacuation is
being concluded. The last of hundreds of sheep are being
herded from the park into immense coral wagons.
Braddock stares a beat. Then turns and heads into the park.
EXT. HOOVERSVILLE -NIGHT 131
A sea of shanty huts, many made of cardboard, stretch far as
the eye can see. The whole world is lit by the flickering
glow of trash can fires. Jim walks down the winding path,
deeper into the park and this burning city of the damned.
Hundreds of people. All men. Some wear suits and ties. Sit
around broken card tables, old furniture spitting stuffing.
It begins to rain.
Jim approaches a MAN standing with a few others, cooking
something over a trash can fire. Hard to tell exactly what.
BRADDOCK
Excuse me.
They look at him. Two actually tip their hats.
MAN ONE
Evening, sir. Offer you a bite to
eat. It's fresh.
A second man reaches forward with a bottle. Jim just shakes
his head, smiles.
BRADDOCK
Is there someone in charge?
He just looks at him, smiles. 132 MAN ONE
Ain't that the question of the day?
The others CHUCKLE.
MAN ONE
Frank l'lilson. City National. What
can I do you?
Jim shakes his hand.
BRADDOCK
I'm looking a friend of mine.
Name's Kevin Wilson.
MAN ONE
Doesn't ring any bells. How long?
BRADDOCK
A few weeks. Maybe a month.
MAN ONE
Newest folks are on the outside.
Oldest in the middle. Seniority.
BRADDOCK
Thanks.
Jim starts into his pocket. The Man just shakes his head.
MAN ONE
Don't mention it.
He turns back to the others and they continue to cook.
INT. HOOVERSVILLE -LONG NIGHT -SERIES OP DISSOLVES 89.
132
Jim walks past two open tents with red crosses on them. He
looks inside. Men COUGH, their lungs wet with tuberculosis.
BRADDOCK
\calling)
Kevin? Kevin?
DISSOLVE TO:
Jim walks the meadow near the lake where a few HOOKERS sell
their wares for pennies.
BRADDOCK
(calling)
Kevin Wilson? HOOKER
You can call me anything you want.
She 1s perfectly beautiful. No older than twelve.
DISSOLVE TO:
Jim has walked deeper still, now near the fountain. More
history, here, shanties in orderly rows.
BRADDOCK
{calling)
Kevin! Kevin! 90.
A larger FIRE burns in the distance, seemingly from the very
center of the park itself. Jim heads towards the glow.
DISSOLVE TO:
The rain has increased as Jim closes on the blaze, still
roaring despite the dowupour. Water streams off his face.
BRADDOCK
(calling)
Kevin Wilson! Kevin!
VOICE (OVER)
Jim. Over here. ,Tim.
Jim spins. But it isn't Kevin at all. Just some FELLOW who
looks up at him over raccoon eyes.
FELLOW
Braddock, right?
Jim manages a smile.
FELLOW
Seen you fight.
Jim looks around. He has come to Sheep's Meadow. Here men
feed the immense fire, in constant battle with the rain.
Many huddlers have come for the heat. But on the fire's edge,
MEN are laid on make shift stretchers, others tending to
thetn. The ground is torn up. Something happened here.
BRADDOCK
(hardly aware)
Hell's come to New York.
FELLOW
Yes, sir. That's for sure. 91.
Jim seems startled that the fellow is still trailing him.
FELLOW
Cops came in and took out the
sheep. Said they were getting
reports we was eating them.
Braddock looks at this man, fire reflecting in his eyes.
FELLOW
Civilized people, wouldn't eat the
sheep.
Jim looks around. This world here seems far from civilized.
FELLOW
Come in to clear em out. Loud, all
that .... What's it called?
BRADDOCK ... Bleating?
FELLOW
A few guys got all up in arms. Got little time for politics, myself.
Said flatties can't take the sheep.
Said it was a point of civic pride.
Jim is looking around, at the men laying by the side of the
fire. Cuts, bruises. But a few broken arms and legs too.
FELLOW
Cops bring more cops. On horses.
Horses get spooked.
Not far away, two young MEN in white coats carry something
under a sheet to a wagon marked with a red cross. A body.
FELLOW
You know how much force a horse's
hoof comes down on you with ...
Jim looks past them, to maybe six more sheet covered bodies
on the ground, now covered with ice.
FELLOW
More than ten tons. I'm an actuary
by trade. They died fighting. Less
maybe they was drunk. Hey-
Jim has moved to the bodies, begins lifting sheets in the
rain, blank faces, men with nothing left, not even breath. 133 92.
WHITE COAT
Pal, you don't want to do that.
Jim pulls away another sheet. Lightning flashes. There, below
him, a familiar face. Kevin. Still as silence.
HOLD on Jim as he lowers his head. Lightning flashes again.
INT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -PRESS CONFERENCE -DAY 133
Jim looks up, now seated beside Mae and Joe at a press table
facing a room of REPORTERS. Bulbs FLASH. Shouted QUESTIONS.
REPORTER
Jim, how does it feel to be back in
line for the Championship?
Jim seems to be far off for a moment. Shakes it off.
BRADDOCK
Well it ain't too bad, I can tell
you. Except for your baked wind.
Folks LAUGH. They like him.
REPORTER
Are you grateful to be back in
boxing?
Jim takes a beat before answering.
BRADDOCK
What kind of world is it, a man can
shovel coal all night and not make
a living wage but can get his face
beat in for two hundred dollars?
Think of all the people who'd give
anything for a shot at that kind of
cash. Am I grateful?
Jim stares at the crowd of Reporters.
BRADDOCK
I'm a lot of things. And I guess
grateful's one of them too.
REPORTER
Baer says he's worried he's going
to kill you in the ring. What do
you say?
Jim glances at Mae, almost imperceptible. BRADDOCK
Who's Baer?
REPORTER
Any comment on Max's record?
BRADDOCK
Has he fought before? I didn't
hear.
REPORTER
What changed, Jimmy? You couldn't
win a fight for love or money. How
do you explain your comeback?
BRADDOCK
Maybe I know what I'm fighting for,
this time around.
REPORTER
Yeah? What's that?
Something changes in Jim's eyes as he says what follows.
BRADDOCK
Maybe I just got tired of the empty
milk bottles.
The next VOICE comes from a familiar face. Sporty Lewis.
SPORTY
Mrs. Braddock. How do you feel
about the fact that Max Baer has
killed two men in the ring?
HOLD on Mae. The moment lasts.
SPORTY
Mrs. Braddock, are you scared for
your husband's life?
BRADDOCK
She's scared for Baer is who she's
scared for.
But there's no laughter in Jim's eyes as he locks on Sporty.
JOE
Okay, that's it boys. Save some
ink for the baseball scores.
HOLD on Mae, trying to mask her anxiety. 134 94.
INT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -PRESS ROOM -MINUTES LATER 134
Jim and Mae are positioned in two chairs before a giant movie
camera and a DIRECTOR.
DIRECTOR
Can you sit to the right a little,
Mrs. Braddock? Closer to Jim.
Mae obliges. She looks even more like a dear in the
headlights. Joe watches from the sidelines.
DIRECTOR
Okay, let's give this a try.
135 INT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -PRESS ROOM -NEWSREEL FOOTAGEl.35
Mae and Jim sit posed, their images grainy black and white.
MAE
We've had a lean year. But Jim's
comeback's made all the-
DIRECTOR (OVER)
Don't look directly at the camera
Mrs. Braddock-
136 INT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -PRESS ROOM -NEWSREEL FOOTAGEl.3 6
MAE
But Jim's comeback has done so much
for me and the kids-
DIRECTOR (OVER)
Try saying comeback slower-
13 7 INT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN -PRESS ROOM -NEWSREEL FOOTAGEl 3 7
MAE
I'm so proud of him and-
DIRECTOR (OVER)
Look at Jim and tell him how proud
you are, okay? Mrs. Braddock?
Mae looks like she's barely hanging on.
MAE
Jimmy ...
She stands abruptly and walks to the corner. Jim is up after
her, standing close, WHISPERING words of comfort. 138 95.
HOLD on the two empty chairs.
INT. BOXING CLUB -JOHNSTON'S OFFICE -LATER 138
Old wood and enough smoke to black out the noon-time sun. Joe
and Jim ENTER to find Jimmy ,Johnston at his desk.
BRADDOCK
Boy, I hate this place.
JOE
Said downstairs you wanted to see
us.
JOHNSTON
Gould .... Jim.
Johnston lays a Daily News on the desk, opens it to the
editorial page.
JOHNSTON
Right here, editorial says this
fight is good as murder and
everyone associated with it should
be hauled into court and prosecuted
afterwards.
Joe says nothing.
JOHNSTON
So, if I'm going to promote this
fight, I'm going to do it with a
clean conscience.
JOE
You're all heart.
Johnston ignores him, looks straight at Jim.
JOHNSTON
You will know exactly what you're
up against and my attorney Mr.
Mills will witness I have done
everything in my power to warn you.
BRADDOCK
I saw the Carnera fight.
Johnston moves to the projector, kills the lights. Mr. Mills
is striped with sneaking blind light.
JOHNSTON
Carnera's height saved him. JOE
He was knocked down 12 times.
JOHNSTON
Exactly. It would have been worse
if he was shorter. Baer had to
punch up to hit him which took a
little off.
Johnston turns on the projector.
JOHNSTON (CONT'D)
But it's not just the size, it's
the style. A guy that can run, or
bob and weave, he's got a little
better chance of cutting the power
of Baer's punches. Otherwise ... 96.
The wall behind Johnston's desk flickers with murky images.
Johnston focuses the lens we see:
ON THE WALL.
Max Baer fighting FRANKIE CAMPBELL.
JOHNSTON
That's Frankie Campbell. Stand up
fighter, good jab. His style
familiar, Jim? Like looking in a
mirror, huh?
JOE
He don't need to see this.
JOHNSTON
You'll see it or I'm calling off
the fight.
Campbell steps forward with a good left jab.
Baer counters with a right, a punch with a strange and
awesome power.
Campbell is completely spun around and collapses. He lies on
the canvas, his eyes open, a blank stare.
The Ref kneels over Campbell as his corner men scramble under
the ropes.
JOHNSTON
Killed Campbell on the spot.
Joe looks away. But Braddock is focused, stepping forward. 139
14.0 97.
BRADDOCK
Run it again.
Johnston appraises Jim, then rewinds, begins running the film
again. The same death waltz on the screen.
ON THE WALL
Baer is fighting Campbell again. But this time as Jim steps
forward, he ENTERS the screen to stand in the ring with them.
INT. RING -SAN FRANCISCO -BA.ER FIGHT 139
The fight we just saw. Campbell steps forward with that jab.
But this time it's color. And Jim is watching in the ring.
Bear counters with his right. Campbell spins right in front
of Jim then goes down at his feet. Eyes wide.
The Ref and cornermen push past Jim, shoving him aside as
they lean over Campbell's lifeless body.
JOHNSTON (OVER)
Autopsy said his brain was knocked
loose from the supporting tissue.
Jim turns towards the VOICE and he is back in ...
INT. BOXING CLUB -JOHNSTON'S OFFICE
Johnston turns the lights back on.
JOHNSTON
Remember Ernie Schaff, stand up
fighter, nice guy. Took one of
those on the chin from Baer. Ernie
was dead and didn't know it. He
woke up later, got another fight,
and a little pitty pat jab put him
back to sleep forever. Detached
brain, they said.
Johnston stares at Joe and Jim.
JOHNSTON
Joe? No snappy comeback.
JOE
Guess it ain't my skull guy's going
to try and stove in. 140
The way Joe looks at Jim you know what he's saying; it's okay
Jimmy, you don't have to take this fight. JOHNSTON
Want to think about it?
BRADDOCK
You think you're telling me
something? Sitting there with all
the cash you need to make the right
choice? You think digging a bridge
or working nights on the scaffolds
or living in cardboard isn't likely
to get a guy killed? Some guy just
trying to feed his family. Only
nobody's figured how to make a buck
seeing if those guys are gonna die.
Jim's smile is fierce.
BRADDOCK
My profession. I'm more fortunate.
Jim is holding Johnston's eyes.
BRADDOCK
So, I guess I've thought about it
all I'm going to.
JOHNSTON
All right then. 98.
He hits the lights. His duty discharged. Slides a card across
the table.
JOHNSTON
You guys eat here tonight. Take
your wives. On me. We'll snap some
pies on your way out. You change
your mind tomorrow, least we got
some good press out of it.
And with that Johnston turns and looks out the window.
JOE
Guess that means we're dismissed.
JOHNSTON
(without turning)
Yes. It does.
Jim reaches into his pocket, pulls out two bills and some
change. Lays them on the desk.
BRADDOCK It ain't a bribe. Johnston looks at him.
BRADDOCK
Two bucks ten. I already paid back
everybody else. 99.
141 EXT. GAGE AND TOLNERS RESTAURANT -FULTON STREET -NIGHT 141
Once the hub of Brooklyn nightlife. Joe and Lucille and Jim
and Mae. Dressed to the nines. Hard not to be excited.
142 JOE
Oh yes, oh yes. Fine women and fine
wine, that's our due.
(to no one in particular)
On the way out boys, on the way
out.
Lucille shoots Mae a look that says, men. Mae manages a
smile, but she's tense. They head through the revolving door.
INT. GAGE AND TOLNERS RESTAURANT -NIGHT 142
Still the same today. Long rows of intimate wooden booths lit
by oil lamps on red carpeted floors.
FAVOR a waiter as he carries a tray of martinis down the red
carpeted aisle and finds our four finishing their meals.
LUCILLE
All right, Captain Blood. Let them
see the movie why don't you?
The CIGARETTE GIRL arrives with a newspaper. Apparently
ordered by Joe.
JOE
Thanks doll. Put it on our tab. And
take yourself two bits.
BRADDOCK
Big spender.
JOE
Yeah. Johnston is.
Joe opens the paper.
JOE
Little bird told me to check the
evening edition. Let's see here.
(reading)
{MORE) JOE (cont'd)
Boxer Jim Braddock has come back
from the dead to change the face of
courage in our nation ...
BRADDOCK
Who the hell wrote that?
Joe smiles a you'll never believe it smile.
JOE
Sporty Lewis.
BRADDOCK
You're full of it.
JOE
Yeah. But that don't make it true.
Joe shakes the paper at Jim. Resumes reading.
JOE
In a land that's downtrodden,
Braddock's inspirational
performance is giving hope to the
average American.
(grinning)
He's a Cinderella Man.
BRADDOCK
Cinderella Man? That guy really
does hate me.
MAE
I like it. It's girly.
BRADDOCK
Oh, this is going to be fun. 100.
The WAITER arrives, reaches in to clear. Mae's eyes dart
upwards, catching her husband's. Unspoken code.
MAE
Jim.
BRADDOCK
Not quite done here, friend.
As he vanishes, Mae takes a stack of napkins from her bag.
She begins folding up food scraps, putting them in her purse.
JOE
Ask me, I miss prohibition. All
that button shining, just as much
drinking but a lot more fun ... 101.
Mae is the first to see the familiar MAN come through the
front doors, heading for the bar.
JOE
There was this little booze foundry
down on Anne Street-
MAE
(off the door)
Jimmy.
The GIRLS walking with him both are perfect in those days
before that term was defined by surgery.
Their escort is literally a giant. He's wearing a white fur
coat, LAUGHING through bright, white teeth. Max Baer.
BRADDOCK
You think Johnston set it up? Few
extra pies for the dailies.
Baer has spotted them. His eyes grow cold as his smile
widens. He turns back to the bartender.
,JOE
Maybe just bad luck.
BRADDOCK
His or ours?
LUCILLE
Did you ever go to a speakeasy,
Mae?
But Mae can't take her eyes off him. Huge hands. Deadly.
BRADDOCK
Mae ... ?
WAITER (OVER}
From the gentleman at the bar.
Mae looks up to see the Waiter holding a bottle of champagne.
WAITER
Mr. Baer said to wish you Bon
Voyage.
Jim is staring at Mae. The blood has run out of her face.
BRADDOCK
(rising}
Excuse me a second. JOE
Jimmy-102.
But Braddock is already up. FAVOR him as he walks across to
the bar. Folks notice what's going on, go quiet, watchful.
143 INT. GAGE AND TOLLNER' S RESTAURANT -BAR -SECONDS LATER 143
Jim reaches Baer who is watching him come, already rising to
greet him, all broad smiles and teeth. The men shake.
BAER
If it ain't Cinderella Man.
BRADDOCK
Excuse me, Mr. Baer. You keep
saying in the papers how you're
gonna kill me in the ring. You're
upsetting my family.
Max leans in, close, his tone unexpected.
,
BAER
Listen to me Braddock, I'm asking
you sincerely not to take this
fight. People admire you. You seem
like a decent fellow. I really
don't want to hurt you.
Max is staring clown into Jim's eyes. He really is concerned.
BAER
There's no such thing as a fairy
tale. It's just a name spun to find
solace in other people's hardship.
That's when both of them are illuminated by photo flashes.
VOICE'S
Max! Jim! Max!
A FEW PHOTOGRAPHERS have rushed in from outside, now SNAPPING
shots of the two. Baer disengages, suddenly all LOUD bravado.
BAER
You know I was thinking, smart
thing would be to take a fall.
Circus act's over, old roan.
Jim locks eyes with Baer. 144 103.
BRADDOCK
I think I'll try going a few rounds
with the dancing bear.
JOE (OVER)
Okay ...
Joe has arrived. Mae and Lucille stand not far behind him.
JOE
Let's keep it in the ring.
Baer's eyes grow lethal.
BAER
Cinderella's a fairy tale. You
should talk to him, lady. You are
sure too pretty to be a widow.
The two Girls TITTER.
JOE
(to Jim)
Stay cool.
BAER
On second thought, maybe I can
comfort you after he's gone.
Joe's on Baer like a tiny, rabid dog. One shove sends Joe to
the ground. Jim is in Baer's face. The taller man grins down.
A storm of flash bulbs from the photographers. The moment
lasts, endless. Joe is up in an instant, between them.
JOE
Let it go, Jim. I'm fine.
Jim isn't moving.
JOE
(ring voice)
Let. It. Go.
A long beat. Jim steps aside. Baer LAUGHS. He and the girls
turn back to the bar. Baer catches Mae's eyes. He smiles.
INT. BASEMENT APARTMENT -DAY 144
Jim is with the boys. Mae is washing up in the kitchen. 145 BRADDOCK
(demonstrating)
Never take your eyes off your
opponent. Always follow me.
M.11.E
(not turning)
That' s enough, now.
~rim glances up at Mae.
JAY
What about the left, Dad?
Howard feints a straight jab at Jay.
HOWARD
Like that?
MAE
( shouting)
I said that's enough.
All turn to her, stunned. She stares at them a beat.
MAE
No boxing in the house, no boxing
out of the house. No boxing. They
are going to stay in school. They
are going to be lawyers or doctors,
they are not going to get their
skulls smashed in, do you hear?
And with that she is gone, out the back door.
INT. BRADDOCK BEDROOM -NIGHT
Mae stands with her back to him as Jim emerges.
MAE
All the things we lost, we couldn't
do anything about.
She turns to face him.
MAE
I won't lose you too.
She looks at her husband. 145 MAE
You remember what you told me Kevin
said. About dreams coming true?
Then that walk that you dreamed?
BRADDOCK
It was a coincidence.
MAE
I keep waking up with one. Me and
the kids in a new house all taken
care of by people who feel sorry
for us. I even see the kitchen. It's got green wood walls. But
you're dead Jim. Baer kills you.
BRADDOCK It's just a dream, Mae.
MAE
We've got enough now. What is it,
the papers? Joe? You have to show
the world?
Jim just shakes his head.
BRADDOCK
We were down, all I'd do every
second is wonder how I lost my
edge, what I did wrong. So I could
figure how to make it right again.
MAE
Jim, can't you see, maybe you never
did anything wrong? Maybe it wasn't
your fault? Just bad luck. It
comes. Even to good people. Look
around for God's sake. There aren't
always reasons.
Jim takes a long beat before answering.
BRADDOCK
I know, Mae. I say it's the milk
this time that better's my chances.
Or that we're hungry, or the left.
But in my heart I know it's all
those things and none of them. I
know I didn't deserve to lose
before. And I don't deserve to win
now. But I mightr win, Mae.
(MORE) 105. BRADDOCK (cont'd)
In my heart I know that nothing's
really changed, that all this is is
another chance to fight. And I have
to fight.
He's looking at her, trying to find the right words.
BRADDOCK
See I have to believe I have some
say over my life. That sometimes, I
can change things. If I don't ...
You can hear Kevin's name without him even saying it.
BRADDOCK
You're right. So much of all of it
is luck. But if you lay down, how's
your luck ever going to change?
He looks outside the window.
BRADDOCK
I know you think it's selfish.
Maybe so. But it's not for Joe or
the papers or anyone else.
He looks back at her, this woman, his life.
BRADDOCK
Not even you.
She stares at him.
BRADDOCK
I have to fight-
MAE
Jim, it's just a godamned boxing
match-
BRADDOCK
I'm not talking about boxing.
She stares at him a long beat.
BRADDOCK
I need something I can come up
against.
MAE
Jim, this isn't a fairy tale.
,Jim's smile is philosophical. 106. 146 BRADDOCK
Who knows, Mae? You got to figure
they can't much feel like fairy
tales. If you're inside of them.
MAE
Stop it. You lose this fight,
you're going to die.
She just stares at him.
MAE
You train, Jim, all you want. Make
a show of it for yourself, for the
papers. But you find a way out of
that fight. Break your hand again
if you have to. But if you set foot
out of this door to fight Max Baer.
Mae hold her husband's eyes.
MAE
I can't say I" 11 be here if you
come back.
Jim stares at her.
MAE
I have to do something, Jim. I
can't just stand by.
Jim's smile is bittersweet.
BRADDOCK
That's what I'm saying, Mae. That's
just what I'm trying to say.
The two face each other in silent impasse.
EXT. FUNERAL -DAY 107.
146
Perfect autumn. A casket is lowered slowly into the ground.
Find Mae, face wet with tears, the children at her side.
Sara, infant in her arms, stands a few feet off, taking small
comfort from Jim's WHISPERED words.
Jim heads back to his wife and children. HOLD on Mae, staring
past him, to this fatherless family's endless days ahead. 147
148
149 108.
INT. GYM -MORNING 147
Jim and George spar. Jim is wearing a flak jacket. Joe stands
with Jeanette outside the ring.
JOE
How's he doing?
JEANNETTE
He's faster then he's ever been,
that's for sure.
Joe says nothing. Watches Braddock a beat.
JOE
He's old, he's arthritic and his
ribs are pure glass.
Jeanette can't help but nod. Somebody comes up, WHISPERS in
Joe's ear. Joe nods.
JOE
Press is here~ Peal that rig off or
Baer'll see you got a rib problem.
Braddock nods warily. Strips off his flak jacket.
JEANNETTE
They say Baer, in the ring, he's
like the devil. Sees everything.
INT. GYM -MORNING -LATER
,Jim spars again with George, now no vest. A few reporters
stand by the practice ring, SNAPPING pictures. 148
George feints and lands a haymaker dead on Jim's chin. Hard.
REPORTER
That was Baer it would have killed
him.
ON THE REPORTERS. See the knowledge of this as it clouds
Sporty's face. He turns away.
INT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -DAY 149
Mae stands over a newspaper spread flat on the kitchen table.
Her expression is dark, closed.
The door swings open and Jim ENTERS from the gym. He looks up
at her. Tension here as, wordlessly, she turns to the stove. 109.
Jim crosses to the table.
NEWSPAPER-CLOSE: WORLD Cl-Ll'\11PIONSHIP FIGHT TONIGHT. PUSH IN on
the secondary headline: MANY \"JORRY FOR BRADDOCK'S LIFE.
150-152 OMIT 150-152
I
153 EXT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN BOWL -LONG ISLAND CI'fY -EVEN:rul:]
154
155
156
156A
157
158 People are lining up. Many look as if they are Spending their
last dime for tickets.
INT. QUINCY'S BAR -EVENING 154
Folks are gathering around a radio. At a table by herself,
Sara sits rocking her sleeping child.
INT. BUTCHER SHOP -EVENING 155
Sam hangs the closed sign. Goes behind the counter, glances
up at an autographed photo of Jim, turns on the radio.
EXT. DOCKS -EVENING 156
Jake opens the gates and folks gather around a radio he's set
up on a long cord on the docks.
INT. PARK AVENUE APARTMENT -NIGHT
Lucille wordlessly finishes straightening Joe's collar,
touches his shoulders with her open palms like a kiss.
EXT. BRADDOCK APARTMENT -NIGHT 156A
157
Jim stands with Mae. The kids are down the block a few feet
off. She leans up and kisses him softly on the lips.
BRADDOCK
I can't win if you're not behind
me.
MAE
Then don't go, Jimmy.
The moment lasts. Mae turns. Jim watches as Mae and the kids
head away down the block.
INT. LIMO -NYC -DRIVING -NIGHT 158
As the car pulls up to the garden, masses of people crowd the
box office. Men and women. Old and young alike. Jim sits
staring through his own reflection at the crowd in stunned
silence. (OVER) An EXPLOSION of VOICES AND SOUND. 159
160
161
162 OMIT
INT. WEIGH-IN ROOM AT THE GARDEN -DAY 110.
159
160
The NOISE is here. Handlers, officials, reporters,
photographers. Johnston watches. Max Baer is on the scales.
OFFICIAL
210 pounds'
Baer steps off the scales and Jim climbs on.
OFFICIAL (CONT'D)
191 pounds!
Jim steps do\'m. All the fun is gone from Baer. He looks at
Braddock and shakes his head.
BAER
How's the story go? The clock
strikes midnight, the coach turns
into a pumpkin, and Cinderella
loses her skirt.
Baer grins at. Jim. Jim grins right back.
INT. ALICE'S HOUSE -NEWARK -NIGHT 161
The kids spill in. Mae stands in the door facing her sister.
MAE
No radio, Alice.
Alice nods.
MAE I'll be back soon.
Alice watches her go.
INT. BAER'S DRESSING ROOM -NIGHT 162
Decked out like a movie star's. Photos of Baer with various
celebrities. Max glances in the mirror.
MAX
You get it there like I told you?
Max's manager (ERNIE GOINS) stands not far off.
ERNIE
Yeah. 163
164. MAX
You sure?
ERNIE
It's at the back gate, Max, Jeez, I
checked myself.
MAX
That's all I can do for him.
EXT. BEHIND THE GARDEN -CONTINUOUS
An AMBULANCE and CREW waiting vigil.
EXT. CHURCH -DAY 111.
163
164.
Mae walks across the church yard. People are streaming in.
Odd for this time of day. Father Rorick is at the door.
MAE
(puzzled)
Father?
FATHER RORICK
Hello, Mae.
MAE
I came to pray for Jim.
He smiles at her.
FATHER RORICK
You too?
He pushes open the door. The church is full. Packed. Hundreds
of people there in prayer.
FATHER RORICK
So have they.
MAE
I don't-
She stares at the full pews.
FATHER RORICK
Maybe sometimes people need to see
someone do it so they can do it
themselves.
Rows and rows of people, all on their knees. 165 112.
FATHER RORICK
They think he's fighting for them.
As Mae looks at the people all there for Jim. PUSH IN ON Mae
as maybe, for the first time. She understands.
INT. JIM'S DRESSING ROOM -CONTINUOUS 165
Joe is taping up Jim's hands. Jim seems far away. A heavy air
permeates the room. All this is suddenly too real.
JOE
These last three fights. We already
did great.
BRADDOCK
You losing faith in me, Joe?
JOE
Never. Not for a minute.
And we see it in his eyes. It's true. He never has.
JOE
Who beat Lewis?
Jim smiles. The old game.
BRADDOCK
That would have been me.
JOE
vlho whupped Lasky?
BRADDOCK
That one was roe too.
JOE
Who-
A KNOCK at the door. It opens. A small, familiar form stands
there. Joe can't help but half smile.
JOE I'll tell you that's a bet I
shoulda taken-
BRADDOCK
Joe.
Joe looks up as Jim puts his finger to his lips. 166 113.
JOE
Shhh.
Joe smiles. Nods slightly to Mae.
JOE
Scuse me a minute.
Joe slips past her. Husband and wife stand there staring at
each other.
MAE
You can't win without me behind
you.
BRADDOCK
That's what I keep telling you.
His eyes are shining. Maybe tears. Maybe just the light.
MAE
Thought it looked like rain, you
know? Used what was in the jar.
She lifts a brown paper bag. Hands it to him.
MAE
Maybe I understand some.
He opens the package. In the bag, a new pair of boxing shoes.
MAE
About having to fight.
Tears are streaming down her face as he folds her in his
arms.
MAE
See you at home, okay? Please,
Jimmy. See you at home.
Brave despite her fear.
BRADDOCK
See you at home.
INT. MSG BOWL -BEHIND THE BACK ROW -NIGHT
As Jim emerges into the smoke of the Garden, the crowd is
talking in WHISPERS. 166
As Jim steps into the aisle, he looks around, disturbed by
the quiet. What he sees haunts him. 167
168
169
170
171
172 114.
INT. MSG BOWL -THE CROWD -NIGHT
The cheap seats are filled with PEOPLE wearing their best
shabby clothes.
PEOPLE who look as if they could stand a good meal.
PEOPLE from the street, from the basements.
JOE
(stunned)
God Almighty. 167
Jim is moved beyond words, begins one of the strangest walks
that any boxer has ever taken into the ring.
As he passes, people get to their feet and stare at him. Soon
the whole Garden is on their feet, silently watching.
After what feels like an eternity, someone shouts Jim's name.
INT. QUINCY'S BAR -CONJINUOUS 168
STATIC creeps out from the radio. Sara jumps, startled. The
baby CRIES.
EXT. DOCKS -CONTINUOUS 169
The radio on the docks comes to life with a BUZZ.
INT. FATHER RORICK'S CHURCH -CONTINUOUS 170
A radio is set up in the sanctuary. Father Rorick's prayers
are interrupted as his radio begins to WHINE.
EXT. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN BOWL -L.I.C. -CONTINUOUS 171
Those who couldn't get in crowd around speakers that SCREAM.
INT. ALICE'S HOUSE -CONTINUOUS
Alice opens the closet door to see that the children have
dragged the radio into the dark, listening to the ROAR. 172
Alice sees the desperation in their faces as they stare up at
her, the VOICE on the radio trying to cut through the NOISE.
DUNPHY IV.O.)
I don't know if you can hear me out
there. I can't hear myself. Madison
Square Garden is on its feet and
the noise is deafening! 173
174
175
176
177
178 115.
INT. MSG BOWL -CONTINUOUS 173
Jim, nearing the ring, stunned at the EXPLOSION of HOLLERING
and ST~-MPING that is going on all around him.
INT. RINGSIDE -CONTINUOUS
Dunphy is literally YELLING into the microphone!
DUNPHY (V.O.)
We saw people lining up to buy
tickets tonight who looked as if
they were spending their last
dollar. But they're here now, and
35,000 strong. Listen to them!
Dunphy holds up the microphone.
INT. RING -CONTINUOUS
Jim climbs into the ring and looks around at the crowd,
clearly overwhelmed. The crowd ROARS at him.
INT. MSG BOWL -BEHIND THE BACK ROW -CONTINUOUS 174
175
176
Max stands listening to the ROARING crowd, a shade of
jealousy darkening his face. Finally, he smiles, taps Ernie
on the shoulder, and Ernie heads up the aisle.
INT. THE RING -CONTINUOUS 177
A wave of respectful silence begins to roll toward the ring
from the back of the Garden.
Jim sees Max Baer headed toward the ring.
By the time Max is halfway up the aisle, the Garden is nearly
stilled again.
AISLE -CONTINUOUS
The silence does not bother Max. He eats it up.
THE RING -CONTINUOUS
By the time Max climbs into the ring, he is intense to the
point of arrogance.
INT. RINGSIDE -PRESS ROW -CONTINUOUS 178
Sporty Lewis climbs over the feet of the other reporters. 179
180
181
182 116.
INT. RING -LATER 179
Referee JOHNNY McAVOY has the fighters and their cornermen in
center ring and is finishing up their final instructions.
MCAVOY
... I want a clean fight. When I say
break, step back. And remember,
protect yourself at all times'
Max gives c1im an icy smile, as if he is annoyingly amused.
They touch gloves.
GARY, Max's cornerman, dangles a gold watch in front of Jim.
GARY
One minute to midnight, Cinderella!
Joe starts to hurl a response. Instead, just shakes his head.
INT. RING -MOMENTS LATER 180
Jim, in his corner, poised, calm. The crowd is deathly quiet.
JOE
Keep your gloves up, Jimmy.
Jim doesn't even smile.
INT. RINGSIDE -CONTINUOUS
Dunphy is now almost whispering.
DUNPHY
Jim Braddock's rise from the soup
lines to number one heavyweight
contender has truly been
miraculous. Now, never in all my
years, have I seen the arena so
quiet.
The BELL rings.
INT. RING -CONTINUOUS 181
182
Jim attacks, landing a hard right to Max's face that brings
the crowd to their feet.
Max grins from ear to ear. Jim sticks him again and this time
Max clinches. 117.
MAX
\.._. {as to a naughty child)
183
184 Now, now.
McAvoy separates them.
Jim has good footwork going, changes direction, goes at Baer
again. Baer blocks Jim's jabs by swatting them with his right
like flies. Jim keeps coming and they clinch.
BAER
Calm down, old man. I'll let the
fight go a few rounds.
The Ref separates them. Jim hits Max again, this time a
right, and Max smiles with great indulgence and dances away.
INT. RINGSIDE PRESS ROW -LATER
Dunphy and the other reporters are baffled.
DUNPHY
A fight that no one expected to go
one round has gone 2 but only
because Max Baer is toying with
Braddock, there is no other word
for it. He's hardly thrown a punch
and is laughing at Braddock's every
strike.
INT. RING -MOMENTS LATER
Max moves around the ring, throwing light jabs. 183
184
Max has a habit of wiping his glove on the back of his trunks
after he lands a punch. It looks as if he doesn't like his
opponent's sweat on it.
Jim is stalking Max but to little avail.
Max grooms himself between punches, making sure his trunks
are straight, his hair in place.
Finally Jim lands a good stiff jab and Max wobbles his legs
as if he is about to go down.
Jim comes after him.
With shocking ferocity and speed, Max lands an explosive
right to Jim's ribs that knocks the breath out of him.
Jim counters and the two explode into a flurry o_f punches,
then finally clinch. Baer hits him dead in the bad ribs. 185
185A
186 118.
BAER
That the right spot, old man.
By Jim's agonized look and his sharp GASP for air, it is. The
BELL rings.
INT. BRADDOCK'S CORNER -MOMENTS LATER 185
Joe pulls on the waistband of Jim's trunks to help him
breathe. Ray pours water in ,Jim's mouth but he coughs it up.
BRADDOCK
Air!
The WARNING BUZZER.
INT. RING 185A
Jim is actually controlling the round, repeatedly jabbing
Max. Jim's footwork has never been quicker.
Max comes at Jim, hard, but Jim slips his right, making Max
look awkward and the crowd BOOS. Max is not pleased.
Max clinches Jim and SMACKS him with an illegal back hand. In
the b.g Joe jumps up and begins SHOUTING.
JOE
What the Hell, Ref? Wake up you wet
son of a bitch, wake up.
But Jim is still coming, landing jabs. Max pulls Jim into a
clinch and Jim slyly head butts Max.
Max is pissed, throws Jim against the ropes and the crowd
explodes in tremendous BOOING.
Max salutes the crowd contemptuously, sticks his glove in
Jim's face and grins as the round ends.
INT. RING 186
(OVER) The BELL. Max has had his fun. As he moves out from
his corner, he is all business.
From below Jim's corner, Joe sees the look on Max's face and
screams at Jim.
JOE
He's corning for real! 187 119.
•rHE CROWD ' S POV
The crowd senses the change in Baer and they sweep to their
feet in quiet alarm. Jim goes right at him and the two
fighters explode' into a clash in the middle of the ring.
They see Jim throw a good jab, only to have Max fire with the
right that just misses.
There is a collective intake of BREATH in the crowd.
THE RING -CONTINUOUS
As Max misses with the right, Jim pops him with a hard jab.
Then with another. Max clinches.
MAX
I'm getting bored, old man.
McAvoy moves in to separate them and Baer throws Jim aside.
MCAVOY
Watch that!
Max lands a series of punches to the sweet spot in Jim's ribs
and one below the belt.
MCAVOY (CONT'D)
Keep your punches up!
Max lands a stunning combination to Jim's ribs and head. Even
the ones Jim blocks knock him around with their velocity.
MAX
(to McAvoy)
That up enough?!
(taunting Jim)
Do something!
Jim is hurt, but manages a jab that snaps Max's head way
back. Then Jim clinches.
As the bell CLANGS, Max pushes the Ref out of the way,
switches his momentum to the right and lands a series of
combinations on Jim. Jim recovers with a powerful upper cut
and left hook. Both men just stare at each other.
INT. MAX' S CORNER --LATER
Ernie Goins works over Max.
ERNIE
What are you doing? 187 188
189
190 120.
MA..X
Don't worry about it.
ERNIE
Then quit screwing around.
Max gives Ernie a look that shuts him up.
MAX
Relax.
INT. ALICE'S HOUSE -LATER 188
Mae has entered to find her sister and children all at the
open closet door. Alice glances up, riveted but guilty.
ROSEMARIE It's the cops.
DUNPHY (V.O.)
Braddock has fought better than
anybody thougbt he could but some
would say tha0t it is only because
Baer has allowed it.
(OVER) The BELL.
HOWARD
Please, Ma.
Mae stares a beat. Then she walks into the living room,
unable to listen.
EXT. DOCKS -LATER
The guys are all frozen and seem not to be breathing as:
DUNPHY (V. 0.)
Oh! What a tremendous shot by Baer,
flush on Braddock's chin!
INT. SAM'S BUTCHER SHOP -CONTINUOUS
Sam is glued to the set, inches from the radio, horror
flooding his face.
DUNPHY (V.O.)
Braddock is reeling against the
ropes while Baer stands like a wood
chopper waiting for the tree to
fall! 189
190 191
192 121.
INT. RING -CONTINUOUS
Jim sags against the ropes, his eyes rolling like loose
cloudy marbles. But he does not go down. 191
Baer is surprised. Finally he shrugs and moves in to clean up
the mess he has made of Jim.
Jim pushes off the ropes and half staggers out to meet Max.
He lands a sharp jab that takes Max completely off guard.
Digging all the way down in the well, Jim follows the jab
with another, and another.
Startled, Max steps back and wipes the blood bursting from
his lip into his glove.
Then, as is his habit, Max wipes his glove on his trunks. And
Jim sees it. An opening.
Jim steps in and nails him with an EXPLOSIVE right hand.
Max staggers further back, reeling and insulted that someone
would interrupt his ritual.
Frustrated and angry, Max lunges with looping rights, missing
again and again.
And with each miss, Jim stabs Max with a jab, infuriating the
Champ even more.
The fighters can't hear the BELL, the crowd is so LOUD.
Johnny McAvoy has to pull them apart.
INT. BRADDOCK'S CORNER -MOMENTS LATER
Ray is working on a cut spreading beneath Jim's eye.
JOE
Shot almost knocked me out!
BRADDOCK
Wish I could hit like that.
JOE
He wouldn't be standing if you
could!
Joe looks into Jim's eyes and at the cut on his cheek.
JOE (CONT'D)
Jimmy, win, lose, or draw ... 192 193
194
194A
195 122.
Joe looks near tears. Jim's smile is impossibly warm.
BRADDOCK
Joe. Stop talking.
Joe smiles back. The WARNING BUZZER sounds.
INT. ALICE'S HALLWAY -CONTINUOUS
Mae is against the wall near the closet. Listening.
DUNPHY
James J. Braddock coming out for
the 12th round is showing this
crowd what heart is all about.
INT. RING -LATER
Max sticks his left hand into Jim's face, not to throw a
punch, but so he cannot see the vicious right hand coming It's a trademark Max Baer move. 193
194
But Jim has seen it. He slaps the left aside and stings Max
with a jab. Max is not in any way amused.
Jim moves fast, slips a Baer punch and lands two more jabs.
Baer holds his arm out to Jim's face, blocking him.
Jim fakes Baer and lands a couple more sharp punches. Max
goes for the clinch and hits Jim in the ribs.
Max backhands Jim as the Ref separates them. But Jim finds a
the gap and scores two more punches.
INT. THE CROWD -CONTINUOUS 194A
The crowd is nearly numb with anticipation and disbelief.
INT. RINGSIDE PRESS ROW -CONTINUOUS
Even the Reporters are in shock.
SPORTY
Am I seeing what I'm seeing?
Sporty Lewis jumps up, a little out of control. The crowd
rouses and starts SCREAMING at the ring!
CROWD
Braddock! Braddock! 195 196
197
198
199 123.
INT. THE RING -CONTINUOUS 196
Out of pure frustration, Max suddenly charges and hits Jim
with another left way below the belt.
Jim doubles up as the bell CLANGS.
Joe is over the ropes, going straight for Max.
JOE
Why don't you just kick him in the
balls, you asshole!
McAvoy intercepts Joe and hauls him, SHOUTING, back across
the ring.
JOE
Let me have a shot at him, you son
of a bitch!
INT. MAX'S CORNER -CONTINUOUS 197
Johnny McAvoy comes over and points at Max. Max has a cut and
a knot on his head.
MCAVOY
That last low blow will cost you
the round, Max .
Max waves him away. Ernie gets into Max's face.
ERNIE
You're behind. Are you listening to
me? You wanna lose the goddamn
championship to this fucking
nobody?
Max shoves Ernie aside.
ERNIE (CONT'D)
Knock him out!
INT. RING -CONTINUOUS 198
The two boxers explode out of their corners like colliding
freight trains. Baer's punches are furious, lethal.
INT. ALICE'S APARTMENT -NIGHT 199
Mae walks into the closet to stand with her family. 200
201
202 124.
DUNPHY
In the fifteenth and final round
they are yelling for Braddock to
stay away because Baer is going for
the knockout!
EXT. DOCKS -CONTINUOUS 200
Everyone is breathless.
DUNPHY (V. 0. )
Baer is delivering the biggest
punches of the fight, maybe of his
life! But Braddock is not only
standing, he is moving forward!
INT. RINGSIDE -CONTINUOUS 201
The crowd from the cheap seats has surged forward, stamping
and SCREAMING, pinning Joe and everyone ringside against the
edge of the canvas. Joe is YELLING his lungs out!
JOE
Back off, Jimmy!
Sporty Lewis and the other reporters press the ring. Dunphy
is on his feet, yelling into the microphone in his hand.
DUNPHY
This is not boxing, folks! This is
a Walloping Ballet!
INT. RING -CONTINUOUS
Jim and Max are both knotted, bloodied, and snuffing like
winded horses.
But who is stalking whom? 202
Max is sailing punches, every last one of them a knockout.
Except Jim is still standing. And corning with his beloved
left jab.
These seconds are an eternity for the two of them. There is
no other place, no other time, only now, this, forever.
Jim lands a series of Jabs. But he's open, only an instant,
turned slightly towards the ropes. All Max needs.
Max delivers a right uppercut that seems to start from below
the floor.
This is the blow that kills him. 203
204
205
205A
206
207
208 All goes silent.
FACES IN THE CROWD. Frozen terror.
EXT. THE DOCKS -CONTINUOUS
They know.
INT. QUINCY'S -CONTINUOUS
Sara stares up at the silent radio. All hope gone.
INT. SAM'S BUTCHER SHOP -CONTINUOUS
Sam SMASHES his hand on the counter, turns away.
INT.-PARK AVENUE APARTMENT 125.
203
204
205
205A
Lucille, well dressed, breathless in her empty apartment.
INT. ALICE'S HOUSE -NEWARK -CONTINUOUS 206
The children look up at Mae, eyes wet with terror.
INT. RING -CONTINUOUS 207
Jim's death. Frozen in time.
But Jim has decided to die another day.
Jim avoids the right, pivots and counters with a couple of
hard lefts.
As Max practically jumps onto his shoes, Jim smashes an
uppercut that brings Max to his toes.
They stand there in center ring as if chained together and
trade punches.
And someone is pulling them apart, away from the center of
the world, into the madhouse that is erupting around them.
INT. ALICE'S HOUSE -CONTINUOUS
DUNPHY ( V . 0 . ) It's over, the fight is over, and
the referee is pulling them apart!
Mae covers her mouth to stifle her SOBS of relief. 208 209
210
211
212 126.
INT. RINGSIDE -CONTINUOUS 209
Sporty Lewis yanks furiously on McAvoy's trouser leg. McAvoy
tries to shake him off but Lewis won't let go.
MCAVOY
What?'
SPORTY
How'd you score it, Johnny?
MCAVOY
9. 4. 2 even.
SPORTY
Which way?!
EXT. CHURCH -CONTINUOUS
People stare at the radio in the sanctuary.
DUNPHY (V.O.)
The crowd, on' its feet for almost
the entire fight is still standing
and yelling for who they clearly
believe to be the winner of this
fight ...
INT. CORNER -CONTINUOUS 210
211
Jim stands in corner as Joe pulls the laces out of his gloves
as Jeanette tries to stop the flow of blood from his deep
cut. Joe keeps looking at the ,Judges.
JOE
I don't like it, Jimmy. Every time
they take this long for a decision
they're deciding to screw somebody.
Max suddenly appears. Joe glares at him. Max looks Jim in the
eye, leans in close so he can be heard over the crowd.
MAX
You beat me. No matter what they
say.
Jim starts to say something but Max is already walking away.
INT. RINGSIDE PRESS ROW -CONTINUOUS 212
Sporty Lewis is standing at the con1er of the ring. 213
214
215
216
219 127.
SPORTY
They're robbing him.
The crowd starts YELLING for a decision and STAMPING on the
floor until it sounds like THUNDER in the Garden.
INT. RING -CONTINUOUS 213
A silver microphone drops from the ceiling to the center of
the ring. Ring Announcer, AL FAZIN, enters the ring.
The NOISE of the crowd falls quickly away.
THE CROWD -CONTINUOUS
35,000 people standing together in gradations of light.
RING -CONTINUOUS
Fazin taps the microphone and the Garden is so quiet that it
sounds like someone throwing rocks at the walls.
FAZIN
Ladies and Gentlemen! I have your
decision!
Fazin squints and studies the card in his hand.
FAZ IN (CONT'D)
Winner ...
(looks at the card again) ... and NEW Heavyweight Champion
of ...
The words are drowned out by an explosion of noise!
EXT. ALICE'S HOUSE -CONTINUOUS
Mae's SCREAM echoes down the block!
INT. ALICE'S HOUSE -LIVING ROOM -CONTINUOUS 214
215
The kids and Alice spring from the closet and hop about the
living room as if on pogo sticks.
EXT. NORTH BERGEN STREETS -CONTINUOUS
People pour from their houses, yelling the news as SIRENS
roar!
EXT. 'rHE DOCKS -CONTINUOUS
A bunch of very tough men are crying like babies. 216
219 217
217A
218
220
221
222 128.
INT. QUINCY'S BAR -CONTINUOUS
Quincy is pouring free beer into the rioting crowd. Sara,
baby in arms, closes her eyes, spilling silent tears. 217
INT. PARK AVENUE APARTMENT 217A
Lucille walks to the window, letting night air hit her face.
INT. CHURCH -CONTINUOUS 218
Father Rorick bows his head, unable to completely hide his
wry, satisfied smile. He glances skyward.
FATHER RORICK
Thank you.
INT. RINGSIDE PRESS ROW -CONTINUOUS 220
The Reporters are all pushing and shoving, trying to get out
of the crowd to file their stories.
Sporty Lewis sits by himself, staring up at the ring, his
arms across his chest, a half smile on his lips, reliving the
fight, the miracle. In no hurry to go.
INT. RING -CONTINUOUS
Max is hemmed into his corner and cannot escape through a
crowd that will not go home.
Joe actually grabs Johnston and hugs him, unable to help
himself, bathing in this once in a lifetime moment. 221
Jim stands in the center of the ring, his arm raised in
victory, tears flowing from his eyes, but with a look on his
face, as if his mind is somewhere else.
INT. BASEMENT APARTMENT -LATER
Jim sits in a chair with meat over his face. Rosemarie is
watching closely, not allowing anyone to interfere.
ROSEMARIE
You have to leave it on exactly
like before, okay?
Jim lifts a corner of the meat from his mouth.
BRADDOCK
You're just a little girl. Where do
you get these ideas? 222 223 Rosemarie takes his hand away, puts the meat back in place.
ROSEMARIE
It's working, isn't it?
HOWARD
Leave it on, Dad.
JAY
Yeah and then we eat it. Dad takes
the first bite.
HOWARD
And then Mom.
JAY
Then me, cause I'm the oldest.
Mae scowls at her superstitious band of gypsies.
MAE
Oh brother ....
Mae smiles at her husband who looks at her, closes his eyes.
EXT. BASEMENT APARTMENT WINDOW -CONTI!'-lclOUS 223
See the Braddock Family in their single room. PULL BACK until
the apartment window is just one dim light in city of lights.
END CARD:
2 YEARS LATER JIM BRADDOCK LOST THE CHAMPIONSHIP TO JOE
LOUIS.
BUT NOT BEFORE DECKING HIM.
LOUIS WOULD ALWAYS CALL BRADDOCK THE MOST COURAGEOUS MAN HE
EVER FOUGHT.
IN HIS LAST FIGHT, BRADDOCK CAME OUT OF RETIREMENT TO FIGHT
TOMMY' FARR, THE TOP HEAVYWEIGHT CONTE.l\JDER IN THE WORLD.
THE AGING, ARTHRITIC, BRADDOCK WAS AGAIN A HUGE UNDERDOG.
HE WON.
FINAL FADE TO BLACK. | screenplays |
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Good Omens, Supernatural 1. Chapter 1
IN THE MIDDLE OF MAY
On the outskirts of Sidney, Montana, there is a motel. It was probably nice once; all evidence shows that the cracked, peeling paint used to be orange, and some time ago, there was enough electricity to light up the sign outside. Despite these lovely qualities, however, nobody ever really comes to this motel. It seems that most people like to be able to read the name of the place at which they are staying.
The last man to stay at the motel left some time ago (much to the chagrin of the owner, who is now unfortunately struggling to get by). He was a quiet man, kept to his room, except when he ran out to the nearest store to buy a sixpack. To most people, he was known as Chuck Shurley. To those in the know, he was someone else entirely.
Of course, no one but him was in the know, so that didn't matter much.
He'd come to the motel on May 14, 2010. His car was nowhere to be seen, though he did have an old typewriter tucked under one arm. He checked in with little difficulty and retreated to his room.
The room was in a dreadful state, but Chuck didn't care. There was a table to put his typewriter on, and a chair for him to sit in, and a bed for sleeping (not that he needed to, and frankly, that bed didn't look all that comfortable now that he thought about it). That was good enough for him. He smiled as he sat, poising his fingers over the worn black keys. His days of writing _Supernatural _were over; no one would ever read what he was about to put to paper. But it was hard to get out of the habit of putting thoughts to words, so why bother? He smiled again. Besides, if he was right, things would finally be looking up for the Winchesters. There was the small issue of Sam's soul, but that would be resolved quickly enough. Nothing but smooth sailing… oh.
Chuck leaned back in his chair, no longer smiling, cursing his own shortsightedness (which was probably as blasphemous as one could get, but at the moment, he couldn't care less. Not that there was anyone around to hear him.)
Leviathans.
_Leviathans._
He'd brought Castiel back for a reason, but this was certainly not it! Surely he could think of a way to beat down Raphael without the use of such measures!
Apparently not.
Chuck closed his eyes for a moment and pondered for a moment. There was a solution to this somewhere, and he would find it.
Oh.
_Oh._
Unbeknownst to pretty much everyone, the more recent apocalypse could more accurately be described as Apocalypse Mark 2. Twenty years ago, the first attempt had been made in Britain. It was averted by the Antichrist (Adam Young, who basically said screw destiny, I like things the way they are, but that's beside the current point), a witch, a witchfinder (the two got married afterward), an angel, and a demon. The whole business was quite embarrassing for both Above and Below.
That may explain why, a mere two weeks after it was all said and done, some assassination attempts were made. On the angel and demon, specifically. In that sort of thing, it's only a matter of time before someone gets killed.
Long story short, everything resulted in a dead angel and an incognito crossroads demon.
The smile returned. Honestly, he didn't know why he hadn't thought of fixing it before, but that was all about to change.
Chuck Shurley began to type.
No, no one would ever read what he was about to write. But that didn't matter. As long as it was the right words, it didn't matter.
xXx
Ineffability (And How To Avoid It)
A Fanfiction of Certain Events occurring in 2010 mostly, in strict accordance
As shall be shown with:
Good Omens
and
Supernatural
belonging to:
Messrs. Pratchett and Gaiman
and
Eric Kripke
Compiled and edited, with Footnotes of a Recreational Nature and Precepts for Anyone Who Cares, by Cati Jones
xXx
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
Supernatural Beings
Chuck Shurley (God)
Castiel (An angel, and member of Team Free Will)
Aziraphale (An angel, deceased?)
Gabriel (A part-time archangel, part-time trickster, really bad at being dead)
Balthazar (Angel and runaway)
Raphael (An archangel, and very much against Team Free Will)
Hastur (A Fallen Angel and Former Duke of Hell)
Crowley (King of Hell, and doesn't do a lot of Sauntering these days)
xXx
Apocalyptic Horsepersons
DEATH (Death)
The others are on holiday.
xXx
Humans
Dean Winchester (A Brother)
Sam Winchester (A Brother)
Bobby Singer (A Hunter and Adoptive Uncle)
Garth Fitzgerald IV (Another Hunter)
Mr. Fizzles (Sock Puppet Extraordinaire)
xXx
Full Chorus of Monsters, Demons, Angels, Vintage Cars, and other not-so-rare and strange Creatures of Everyday Life.
And:
Whiskers (Stray cat and general Nuisance)
xXx
**A/N: Going to level with you, I've got no clue where this is going. If it's going anywhere at all. Drop me a review if you have any interest in seeing more.**
2. Chapter 2
SOMETIME LATER THAN THE MIDDLE OF MAY
The sun was shining. The air was clear and crisp. Leaves floated to the ground, the last vestiges of autumn giving way to winter's chill. All in all, it was perfect, if only in this little bubble of space.
Crowley hated it. It was too… _peaceful_. After all, the world outside was in turmoil! Wars were being fought, people were dying (1), and British citizens were _still_ driving on M25. Not to mention that some _moron_ was trying to restart the apocalypse. _Again. _Well, not if he could help it. One he could stand, but the second one tried his patience, and to attempt a third? That was just an insult!
Which brought him to his point…
The recently appointed King of Hell watched a trenchcoated angel watch a Righteous Man rake leaves. He smirked. Apparently Castiel hadn't yet gotten out of his creepy stalker phase. Honestly, he didn't understand what it was about this particular angel. Claiming to leave a man alone and then spy on him doing yardwork? It didn't make sense. And then there were the personal space problems… (2)
_Anyway_... Crowley shook his head in an attempt to clear it. He couldn't afford to be distracted, not now. This could be the most important deal of his career. He needed to focus.
"Castiel," he stated, unmasking his presence. "Angel of Thursday." The angel turned around, and The King allowed a sneer to touch his lips. "Today's really not your day, is it?"
"What are you doing here?" Castiel snapped. If looks could kill, Crowley would've been discorporated within milliseconds. What was it with angels and their Ominous Glares Of Death™ (3)?
"I want to help you help me help ourselves_,_" he stated with amusement, enjoying the momentary look of confusion on Castiel's face as he worked through that statement. But as the angel opened his mouth to reply, Crowley cut him off. There was a time and a place for banter, and he got the feeling that this wasn't it.. "Easy, Casanova. I want to discuss a simple business transaction. That's all." Castiel's glare intensified; his eyes almost seemed to glow blue. Crowley fought hard to keep from wincing- he was not in the mood to be smote. Not today.
"You want to make a deal? With me? I'm an Angel, you ass. I don't have a soul to sell," he growled.
"Whoever said I want your soul?" Crowley replied, silently laughing at the reaction that statement caused. Suspicion, confusion, a bit of horror… Oh, playing with this one was fun. If he had more time, he'd be busy tempting him into one thing or another, but unfortunately, not only was he the King of Hell, he was also incognito. So, minimal tempting, if he could avoid it. Deals, on the other hand...
"Speak plain. What do you want?" Castiel asked sharply (and was that panic?), bringing his attention back to the conversation.
"Five minutes. Just to talk," he answered. "I swear, King's honor." The angel's eyes narrowed, likely suspecting a trap of some kind. Any other time, he might have been right, but not today. The fate of the world was at stake, and _that_ was something he didn't want to risk.
After all, he rather liked the world the way it was.
Castiel sucked in a breath, looking from Winchester to him and then back at the man again. Crowley lifted an eyebrow. "So, what's it going to be? Pull the Winchester out of his quiet, happy life? Or take a short walk with me? You won't regret it, Castiel."
Castiel hesitated. "Five minutes?" he questioned, and Crowley knew he had him. A grin spread across his face, an expression that would have terrified the living daylights out of any houseplants, had there been any nearby. With a click of his fingers, he and Castiel disappeared.
A cold wind blew through the space they had occupied, and Dean Winchester looked up from his leaf-raking, feeling an odd sense of loss.
xXx
"Where are we?"
Crowley smiled indulgently. He wasn't surprised that Castiel didn't recognize the place; he'd changed it quite a bit since he was last down here. "You don't recognize it? It's Hades, new and improved. I did it myself."
"This is Hell?"
"Give the boy a medal-" Castiel looked confused at this (4)- "See, it's much more efficient this way," he said, flapping his hand at the souls. "Even the murderous psychopaths don't like waiting in line. And once they're done, they go right back to the beginning. No paperwork!" So maybe he was bragging a bit, but most of the demons down here (coff coff Hastur coff) didn't really get the genius of it. Besides, he'd invented the concept of waiting in line in the first place, and the one he used to be able to talk to about it was long gone. The Trenchcoat Wonder was hardly a replacement, but maybe he would appreciate-
Castiel sighed. "You have four minutes left."
Maybe not. Crowley resigned himself to a boring, angsty conversation.
"Alright, alright. Down to business then. What do you plan to do about Raphael?"
"What can I do besides submit or die?"
Oh, for Go- Sa- _Someone's _sake! And the world was depending on _him_? Crowley was beginning to figure that he should have gone to another angel for this, whether Castiel was "Chosen" or not. Even Gabriel would probably be more helpful at this point (5)! "Submit or die? "What are you, French? How about resist?" He raised a finger to forestall the protests that were sure to come out. "Look, Raphael wants the Apocalypse, right?" He didn't wait for confirmation before continuing. "You say that you can submit or die, but either way, Raphael wins. You really want that?"
"Of course I don't!" the angel exploded. "But I can't _hope_ to match the power that he has! If I fight, I _will_ die, and you know that!"
"What if I told you that you didn't have to? Die, I mean."
Castiel stared at him. "I… If this is a trick, so help me, I-"
"It's no trick, Casanova," Crowley interrupted smoothly. Death threats got old after the first one. "Hear me out?"
A full five seconds passed before the angel made his reply. The souls shuffled forward one place. "You have one minute remaining."
Crowley took a step forward, clasping his hands in front of him. "Souls."
"What-"
"You heard me." He narrowed his eyes. "You say that you don't have the power to stand up to Raphael, and you're right. You don't. You're a Seraph." He paused, simply for effect. "But what if you had souls to sustain you, each one their own miniature nuclear reactor. That would even the odds, don't you think?"
"But where would-"
"Not only that," he continued, "but if you didn't have followers before, you certainly would now! Angels need a leader, Castiel, and some already want to follow you. With the power of thousands of souls at your disposal, they'd come flocking to you!" His voice softened. "Angels _need_ a leader, Castiel. So go and lead. Show them Free Will and Choice and all that crap." He smirked. "After all, your Father brought you back for a reason, didn't he?"
Castiel just stared at him, blue eyes wide. In that moment, he reminded Crowley of another angel, very different, and yet very alike in the astounding innocence they could show. Then, the eyes hardened, and the resemblance was gone. "Where would I get these souls, Crowley? Answer me that."
In another world, things would turn out differently. In another world, Crowley would turn to his borders and tempt the angel into arrogance and deceit. In another world, he would say, "Purgatory," and the angel would agree. Then there would be Leviathans, and death, and one thing after another, happy endings always in sight but just out of reach.
In another world, things would turn out differently. But in this one, the Boss decided to take a slightly more active role. One twisted event here, a thought pattern slightly altered there, and Crowley found himself saying:
"From me, of course. Hell has no shortage of the damned."
"And what would be my side of this arrangement, demon?"
Crowley's face twisted into a scowl, and he glared at Castiel. "This is not an _Arrangement_, Castiel. Let me make that perfectly clear. I don't make Arrangementsss. They alwaysss end in-" Crowley cut himself off and tried to get a hold himself, tried to push back the memories of tartan and spectacles and books and… _No. Stop it. _
"Did you… were you hissing at me?" Castiel asked, completely confounded.
Crowley's glower deepened, if that were possible (6). Bugger it, he had not established a new identity for himself for it to get ruined by a slip of the tongue! "No, I didn't," he stated, as evenly as he could. "You may want to get your ears checked."
"But there is nothing wrong with my-"
"_As I was saying,_ this is not an Arrangement, this is just a deal. Unless you have any objections." Crowley studied the angel for a moment, to see if he did, indeed, have anything he wanted to add. But he remained silent, and if he was still thinking about what had happened, he didn't show it (7). "Now then, I am prepared to loan you… oh, let's say… 200,000 for your war effort." This may have seemed like a generous amount, but relatively speaking, it really wasn't.
"In return for what?"
"Two conditions. One, you give them back when you're done with them."
"And the other?"
"Getting to that. Quite simply, kick Raphael's arse in to the next millenium."
"I don't think that's po-"
Crowley sighed. Castiel had to be the most clueless angel he'd ever met. "That was a figure of speech." He sighed again, looking the angel up and down. "Do we have a deal, Castiel?"
Castiel hesitated, indecision the prominent emotion in his eyes. Crowley waited patiently as he thought through everything, looking for the traps and finding none. "Why do you even care, Crowley?"
He lifted his eyebrows. "And here I thought that was obvious. Raphael wants Apocalypse Mark Three." At this, Castiel cocked his head, but said nothing. "I don't. It's bad for business, and besides, I happen to like the world the way it is." He inwardly rolled his eyes at the look the angel gave him. "Oh, come on. This is the best deal you're going to get, Castiel. I'd accept it if I were you."
There was another moment of silence, then: "I'm not kissing you."
Crowley let his features fall into his customary smirk. "If you insist. You're not really my type, I suppose, though I'm sure you could use the practice."
"Are we done?"
"200,000 souls, coming up."
After Castiel left, Crowley sat in his throne room, (not) listening to one of his lackeys read out some sort of land distribution agreement paper thing. His mind was somewhere else. He just hoped that The-Little-Angel-That-Could would be able to pull it off.
He'd be damned (or blessed, whichever) before he let Raphael start another apocalypse. It was a slap in the face to all he once held dear, and the King of Hell wouldn't stand for it.
xXx
(1)- Not that he cared very much. He viewed the general populace pretty much in the same way he viewed pedestrians.
(2)- Because despite what most people (and by most people, he meant the Winchesters) thought, the majority of angels understand the fact that humans, for some odd reason, like to live in their own personal bubbles. Demons generally felt the same way, though there had once been an angel who Crowley really didn't mind encroaching on his privacy.
(3)- Surprisingly enough, it was Samandriel that came up with the thing. While looking after one of the Words of God, some monster or another had come after it, but upon seeing the look on the angels face, it apologized profusely and went to go find a PTSD counselor.
(4)- Because he really needed to get out more (though Crowley wasn't sure if even that would help).
(5)- And not only was he a dick, he was dead too, so that was saying something!
(6)- Any of the aforementioned imaginary houseplants would, at this point, be simultaneously growing as tall as possible and begging for mercy.
(7)- He _was_ actually, trying to figure out what exactly Crowley had against arrangements. This was not something he'd find out until later, though, and while he was smarter than some people gave him credit for, he did not figure out that Crowley was saying it with a capital letter.
**A/N: Well, this turned out slightly more serious than I was aiming for, but I think the footnotes (also more than I was anticipating) balanced that out, don't you think.**
**Next chapter: We see exactly what happened to our favorite bibliophile, and Soulless Sam meets up with someone unexpected.**
3. Chapter 3
SOHO, ENGLAND, 1990 A.D.
The rain fell down in soft sheets, pooling in the gutters and the sides of streets. This was uncharacteristically the first good rain this area of England had gotten in a while, and it had come quite suddenly too, leaving no time to grab useful things like ponchos and umbrellas. _And it would have to be today,_ the realtor thought sourly. _The _one _day in weeks that I've had to make a house-call, and it's a bloody downpour!_ He quickly dashed across the street to arrive at his destination: Mr. Fell's Book Store. He snorted as he pushed the door open. What a _creative_ name.
The first thing he realized was that he should have brought his asthma inhaler. Even just walking seemed to stir up clouds of dust. _Good God, how does this man stand it?_
The second thing he realized was that the store was marked clearly: on one side, there seemed to be old and probably very valuable texts, and on the other, there were books from authors like Stephen King and Roald Dahl. There were fewer of the second than the first, which, for some reason, the realtor did not find surprising.
The third thing he realized was that there were two men behind the counter staring balefully at him. One was slightly short, wearing… _Good God was that tartan? _and acting as if his very existence was a capital offense. The other was taller, and was one of those rare chaps who can pull off all-black without looking tacky. Dark sunglasses covered his eyes (1), but his raised eyebrows appeared to indicate that he was surprised that he'd dared set foot in the store.
The realtor coughed a few times and moved toward them.
"Good day, sirs-"
"It really isn't though, if you think about it," Sunglasses interjected cheerfully. "I mean, you're sopping wet. Must be uncomfortable."
The realtor looked down at his clothes. His very nice suit was indeed thoroughly drenched. It couldn't have been helped, because he didn't have an umbrella (2), but it made him feel a bit irritated, now that he thought about it.
"Makes you feel a bit irritated, now that you think about it, doesn't it?" Sunglasses continued in the same tone.
"_Crowley_," Tartan hissed. "_Stop that._" He sighed and turned his attention to the realtor, the expression on his face slightly warmer. "I do apologize for him, sir. Crowley can be a bit…" He trailed off. "Well…" He cocked an eyebrow, apparently at a loss for a good word to describe his companion. The realtor couldn't blame him. "I am Ezra Fell," he finished, extending a hand to shake. The realtor took it.
"Mr. Jones, from J. J. Black Realtors."
Mr. Fell sighed. "I assumed as much."
The realtor was not expecting this. "Sir?"
"Mr. Jones, this is, by far, not the first time that someone has come to pester me into selling the store," he stated. The other man, Crowley, made an odd choking sound. "Before you waste any more of your time, I would like to say on no uncertain terms that I am not leaving my shop."
All the arguments about how _don't you think it would be best for all the people around you if something more modern occupied this space _and _it may be time to move on and find your future _and such died on the realtor's tongue as he viewed the serious look on the store owner's face. "Well, I, er-" At that moment, he broke out into a fit of coughing.
"Oh, dear, it must be the dust!" Mr. Fell moved around the counter and placed a hand on his back, guiding him toward the door. As he did so, the coughing mysteriously eased off, until the tightness in his chest had completely vanished. "Here, you'd best be on your way."
"But-"
Mr. Fell wasn't having it.
Only a few moments later, the realtor was standing outside, an umbrella in his hands, wondering what in God's name had just happened (3).
xXx
"I really don't see what's so funny," Aziraphale grumbled, making his way to the front of the counter.
"The look on his face!" the demon crowed. He leaned on the counter to support himself, shoulders shaking with mirth. "This one was the best one yet!"
"Crowley…"
"And they just keep coming! You'd think they'd learn, but no-"
"_Crowley._"
Crowley paused mid-rant to look at the angel. "What?"
"It's _not_ funny. They're...annoying. Why don't they understand that I don't want to sell?"
Crowley shrugged. "They're realtors, angel. Like sharks, them. No reasoning with them."(4) He smirked. "I bet the next one-"
"No." Aziraphale raised a hand to stop him. "No more realtors. Not today."
"Right. Fine." Crowley wiggled his eyebrows and propped his head in his hands. "In which case...where were we again?"
xXx
The loud, metallic ringing of the phone pierced his fog-weighted mind. Crowley moaned and turned over in his bed. He may not have needed sleep, but that certainly did not mean he liked to be roused from it.
Drowsily, he disentangled his legs from the sheets and stood up, blinking at the time displayed on his alarm clock: 4:27. Who in Go- Sa- Who on _earth _would be calling him at this time of morning? Who'd be bothering to call him at all, for that matter?
Unfortunately, there could only be one answer to that.
The demon snatched up the phone and pressed the blinking CALL button. "Hello?" he demanded.
"Hello? Crowley? Is this- can you hear me?" The angel's voice sounded desperate, and Crowley's heart clenched. "Are you there?"
"Yes, of course I'm here. What's the matter?"
"Oh, good, I was worrying that it wouldn't work this time."
"Worrying about- What? Aziraphale, what are you on about?"
"I… nevermind. Listen, Crowley, I think I'm being watched."
A shard of ice lodged itself in Crowley's spine. _I'm being watched._ Words he'd never wanted to hear. Not from Aziraphale. Though, frankly, in light of the recent assassination attempts on himself, he probably should have been expecting something like it.
"Alright, angel. Can you see anybody?"
On the other end of the line, Aziraphale hesitated, presumably looking around. "Not yet."
"Just hang in there then. I'll be there in five."
"Please hu-" Suddenly, the angel gasped. Crowley could hear a noise like rushing wind and then voices in the background. _Oh no. _"They're here!" Aziraphale yelped. "Crowley, they're-" Then, nothing but static came through.
Crowley slammed the phone back on to its stand, one thought running through his mind. _Get to Aziraphale. Get to Aziraphale. Get to Aziraphale. _He rushed out of the door, not stopping to put on his shoes or even change out of his pajamas (5).
Not even for one second did he consider leaving the angel to his fate.
xXx
From the moment he saw the store, Crowley knew that he was too late. Trying to suppress a sob, he parked the Bentley and lept out, leaving the keys in the ignition. The door hung halfway off its hinges, and it fell off as soon as the demon pushed it.
The interior was in an even worse state than the exterior. Shelves were knocked over, and books were scattered all across the floor. Gingerly, he righted the overturned front desk and placed a few books on it. It made practically no difference. The shop was still nigh on unrecognizable. Any hope that he may have still had withered and died in that moment. There was no way that the angel would have let this happen to his precious collection.
The body sprawled half-buried under an overturned bookshelf.
"No." Crowley could barely recognize his own voice, so hoarse had it become (6). His feet moved of their own accord, shuffling closer to the angel. _His_ angel. His knees gave out, and he fell.
Aziraphale's blue eyes stared up at the ceiling, wide and unseeing, his spectacles mangled and shattered a few feet away. His face was contorted into a grimace, as if his last feeling had been of agony. _Of course it was,_ Crowley thought. _He was killed, you moron._ At this thought, the self-composure that he was trying to hold onto shattered. A hysterical laugh bubbled up within him, but it swiftly turned into sobs.
Killed. Aziraphale had been killed.
He was gone. Dead.
And he wasn't coming back.
For this was no simple discorporation. The angel's wings spread out on the floor beneath him, the once pure-white feathers nothing but ashy imprints (7). Blood stained the floor around him, the reason for it sticking out of his chest, silver hilt gleaming. An angel blade.
Which could only mean one thing.
This was not the work of Hell.
Crowley's golden eyes narrowed even as the tears fell, his thoughts becoming sharp and focused. Heaven had killed his angel; there was nothing left for him here.
So he'd take the Bentley, put it in storage. He'd keep on paying the rent for the shop and his flat, but he'd never visit, not ever. Then, he'd go somewhere else. France, maybe, or America. He'd build a new identity for himself, so no one, not even fellow demons, would know who they were actually dealing with. Heck, maybe he'd even properly possess someone. Maybe.
He'd grieve Aziraphale for the rest of his life. Little things every day would remind him of what he'd lost, and keeping up his new persona would be a struggle. But for now, he knew one thing for sure. Heaven had killed his angel, and for that, they would pay.
Even if he had to rule Hell to do it.
xXx
(1)- Even though it was pretty dim in the shop already. It was, the realtor decided, like one of those bad detective shows from America in which all the authority figures wore sunglasses in the dead of night. Though somehow, the man _still_ managed to make it look good.
(2)- Well, actually, that wasn't strictly true. He did have an umbrella, but he'd learned from experience that people tended not to take you seriously if anything you owned had pink polka-dots on it. Thus, he kept it safely stowed at the bottom of the trunk of his car.
(3)- He never did find out, nor did he ever return to the shop. For the rest of his days, though, he'd wonder exactly where Mr. Fell had gotten the umbrella. After all, it had seemed to appear out of thin air, but that was impossible, right?
(4)- He decided that it would be unwise to mention that he'd had a rather active hand in inventing them.
(5)- After all, it wasn't as if anyone would notice what he was wearing. He drove so fast that even to the people who _were_ out on the streets this time of morning, he was nothing but a blur.
(6)- This rasp would soon become his voice day to day. It suited him, he thought. It was the same as how he used to speak, but not the same. Which was good. He wasn't the same either.
(7)- As he left the shop, he actually did find one undamaged feather, probably ripped out in whatever struggle had occurred. He tried to drop it, he really did, as demons were not sentimental, dammit! But the tears that still fell from his face claimed otherwise, and he ended up putting it in his pocket. And there it stayed. Sam Winchester caught a glimpse of it once, but got the distinct feeling that he shouldn't ask.
**A/N: Okay, I lied. Sam's not in this chapter. It was getting long, and I wanted to post something. But next one, I promise! Sorry this one took a bit longer, by the way. Real Life is being an absolute pain.**
**I hope my Crowley explanation is plausible. In my mind, the only thing that would turn GO!Crowley into SPN!Crowley would be the death of Aziraphale, since they're so different, you know?**
**Thank you so much for all the reviews! Each one absolutely makes my day! I don't think I've ever gotten so many for anything I've written, so thank you, thank you, thank you!**
4. Chapter 4
SUWANEE, GEORGIA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
_It was the heat of the moment! Telling me what your-_
Sam sat bolt upright, slamming the snooze button with enough force to bench press a cow. (1) Desperately, he tried to calm his breathing. It was alright. Dean wasn't here, he wasn't in Broward County, and the Trickster was dead. It wasn't even Tuesday.
No, it was Saturday, Sam thought as he swung out of bed. And a rather nice one too, if the sun streaming through the window was any indication. Of course, the night was bound to be interesting too. After all, it was a full moon, which meant that he could finally wrap up this werewolf hunt.
Kathy Fisher was her name. When he'd first spoken to her, he hadn't even suspected. But as the days of the full moon passed, and the vics piled up (one an ex-boyfriend and the other a tax-collector), all the evidence pointed to her. The clincher was when Sam'd spoken to her yesterday, and she'd revealed that she'd gotten a 'dog bite' a few weeks ago.
She didn't know what she was. She didn't know what she was doing. She had parents and a cousin who'd miss her. But he had to kill her anyway. He sighed. It was in times like these that he hated being a hunter.
Only, he didn't. Not really.
He didn't hate hunting in exactly the same way that he couldn't muster up any _real _sympathy for Kathy. Or much of any feeling at all, if he were to be honest with himself (2). It didn't bother him, though sometimes it was a bit disconcerting how good of a hunter he'd gotten. His mind was clear and as cold as an ice block, leaving him free of any emotions to cloud his judgement. The hunt got completed, and that was that.
Just as it would get completed tonight.
Sam strolled out of the motel room as if he didn't have a care in the world, ignoring the confused-looking man on the sidewalk. If he left now, he might be able to get to that diner he'd seen on the way in just as it opened. He could really go for some pancakes right about now.
"Ah, excuse me? Sir?"
Sam slowed to a halt halfway to his car and turned around. "Yes?"
The confused-looking man approached him, his eyes wide open in… what was that emotion? It appeared to be awe, but that didn't make sense. What would he be in awe of? "I'm terribly sorry to bother you," he stated, sounding surprisingly sincere. His accent was British. "but I seem to...ah, have gotten lost. Could you tell me where I am?"
Gotten lost? Right, because that wasn't suspicious at all. Sam faked a chuckle. "Had too much to drink last night?"
"Something like that," the stranger replied. He sounded relieved to have been given an excuse. _Liar_, Sam thought.
"Right, well, this is Suwanee, Georgia. Atlanta's about an hour's drive, but the place itself is kinda out of the way."
"Ooh! I'm in America, then? I suppose I should have guessed, what with your… ah, manner of speech." (3)
The alarm bells in Sam's head began to ring. The guy hadn't known he was in America? There's no way that that would… unless… and now that he thought about it, there was something in his bearing that reminded him of… "You're not human," he guessed, his voice as hard as flint.
"I… oh, dear." The stranger's shoulders sagged, and he looked down at his feet. "No, I'm not," he said. "What gave it away?"
"Furthermore," Sam continued, ignoring him, "you're an _angel_."
The man gaped at him, clearly shocked. "Oh, my. How did you… Last time I checked, the hunting community didn't think we existed." He paused, peering at Sam over the top of his spectacles. "You _are _a hunter, aren't you? It would be embarrassing if you weren't, for both parties, I imagine."
"Wait, you're saying you don't know who I am?"
"I'm afraid not, my boy. Should I?"
Sam shook his head, completely befuddled. This conversation was getting weirder and weirder by the minute. "Wow. Where have you been the past two years?"
"Two…? Oh… what year is it?"
"You don't know what year it is," Sam stated, trying to decide whether he should stab the angel and be done with it. After all, the heavenly hosts were never _anything_ but bad news. (4) But then again, he didn't seem overly threatening, and it wasn't like he had an angel blade _on_ him at the moment.
"No, see, I've… ah… not been around for a while."
The Winchester raised his eyebrows at this, the pieces coming together in his mind. "But not 'not been around' as in been in Heaven, because then you'd know who I am. And you wouldn't approach me. No, you've 'not been around' as in 'you've been dead'." And why not? The explanation made sense; according to Bobby, Castiel had been brought back right after he jumped.
If God had resurrected this angel, he was important. Sam knew that much. He banished all thoughts of the angel blade (5) in the trunk of the car.
The angel stared at him. "This is no coincidence," he declared faintly. "It can't be. I was _meant_ to find you."
Sam snorted. "You really have been dead," he decided. "Otherwise you'd know that Winchesters don't give a damn about that _meant to be_ crap."
At this, the angel's eyes widened. "Winchester?" he breathed. "As in, one of Robert Singer's boys?"
_What?_
_Have I met him before?_
_Oh, wait a second…_
The final piece clicked. The angel was wearing tartan. He'd met someone like that once. Someone _exactly_ like that. He smiled wryly. "Sam Winchester," he introduced himself, sticking out a hand. "Hello, Mr. Fell."
xXx
SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA, MID-WINTER 1990 A.D.
Dad was out again.
Sam supposed that he really shouldn't have been surprised. Dad was always out these days. But he didn't see why he and Dean had to stay here. He liked Uncle Bobby and everything, but Dad was just a traveling salesman. They shouldn't _have_ to stay here.
Whenever he asked Dean about it, he just said that he wouldn't understand. Which was stupid. He was seven years old, he could understand a lot of stuff!
He sighed, swinging his legs back and forth. Maybe that was why he came to sit outside so often. Out here, there was nobody to judge him. No annoying older brothers.
The sound of a car's tires on gravel made him look up. Usually, the only cars that came here were the ones that couldn't drive on their own. So the sight of an old, vintage-looking car pulling into the yard of its own accord was kinda surprising. And the two people who got out of it were even more so. They couldn't possibly have looked more different. One was dressed all in black, sunglasses and all, and the other was just… weird. Tartan? Wasn't that what it was called? In any case, he carried a big crate of what seemed to be books, which automatically gave him points in Sam's mind.
"Hi!" he called, as soon as they were in earshot. "Do you need help with those?" Without waiting for an answer, he raced down the porch steps and toward the men (6).
"Why, ah, yes, thank you," said Tartan, as Sam lifted one side of the book crate. "Ah, Robert never mentioned that he had children."
"You mean Uncle Bobby? Nah, my dad's a friend of his. We're staying while he's on a business trip." He smiled. "I'm Sam Winchester, and my brother Dean's inside."
"Well, it's very nice to meet you, Mr. Winchester. I'm Mr. Fell, and this is my associate Cr-"
"Yeah, yeah," the other, darker man interrupted. Sam wasn't quite sure he liked this one. "Can we just get on with it? We do have… business to attend to. Our, uh, deadline nearing and all."
"Yes, alright," Mr. Fell sighed, sending Sam an apologetic look. "We can take it from here, Mr. Winchester." Sam nodded and, a little reluctantly, relinquished the crate, plopping back down on the porch steps as soon as Mr. Fell and his friend went inside.
They came back out though, only five minutes later, and while the man with the sunglasses made a beeline straight for the old car, Mr. Fell stopped to give Sam a large, thick book, the word 'Great' and another one he couldn't figure out printed on the cover. "It's an absolutely brilliant book," the man confided. "Mr. Dickens was a wonderful man." He paused. "This may be a little old for you _now_, I suppose, but in a few years, give it a go. You'll love it, I promise."
Later, when Sam got the chance to ask Uncle Bobby who these men were, Bobby just said something about them being dealers that he borrowed books from sometimes (7).
Many, many years later, when Sam knew more about hunting than he would like, he remembered the two men who pulled up one winter's afternoon in a 1926 Bentley (as he now knew the car had been). He tried to track them down, realizing that to deal with Bobby, they had to know about the supernatural, right?
He never could find them.
But he never got rid of the first edition _Great Expectations._
xXx
PRESENT DAY
This was the last thing Aziraphale had expected to happen when he woke up in the parking lot.
Of course, he hadn't thought he'd wake up at all, really. The last thing he remembered was Hester and Hannah bearing down on him, angel blades flashing and eyes full of righteous fury. His last thought had been something about upsetting Crowley; he couldn't quite remember now.
And so here he was, speaking to a boy he'd only seen once, and twenty years (twenty years!) ago at that.
He could hardly be called a boy any longer.
"Oh, my, Sam Winchester," he said. "It… well, it has been a while, hasn't it?" He smiled. "Do you still have the Dickens?"
Sam smiled back, but there was something off about it, as if it didn't reach his eyes. "Bobby's looking after it for me. Dangerous to take it on hunts, you know?"
"Oh, ah, of course. You… ah, hunt now?"
The man shrugged. The air of nonchalance about him was starting to bother the angel. "Getting out of the life isn't exactly easy."
"I see. And your brother?"
"He got out of the life."
There was something he wasn't saying there, for sure. There were a lot of things he wasn't saying. But maybe now wasn't the time to dwell on that. "Well, I must say, you are actually correct in all your assumptions. I did, ah, die, to be sure. In fact, I only returned a few moments ago, so I'm sure you'll forgive me any confusion."
"Right, well then, Mr. Fell, or… I doubt that's your real name." He let the question hang in the air, unspoken.
"It's Aziraphale, but Mr. Fell is quite alright with me, if you want to-"
"Aziraphale." Sam said it slowly, as if testing it out on his tongue. He gave him a quizzical glance. "I think I've read about you somewhere. Didn't you have some sort of sword thing?"
"Well, actually-"
"No, wait, don't answer that." Aziraphale stopped, raising an eyebrow. "Sorry, it's just, I'm not sure we should be having this conversation in the middle of the street. I was heading down to a diner I saw on the way in the area. You want to come with?"
"It would be my pleasure," he angel replied, falling into step beside the Winchester. Yes, it would be his pleasure indeed. He would stay here and help Sam Winchester with whatever he needed help with, and maybe figure out what exactly was wrong about him.
And then he would take a trip to Soho.
He just hoped there would still be a demon waiting for him there. (8)
xXx
(1)- Though _why_ someone would want to do such a thing, I haven't the slightest idea. Seems rather ridiculous.
(2)- Or the ability to sleep. Admittedly, that one freaked him out a little bit. But mostly, he just got into bed and pretended. That way, he could still imagine that everything was fine.
(3)- Sam took a moment to be insulted at that. His manner of speech? He spoke just fine, thank you very much. It was the British who talked funny!
(4)- He conveniently chose to forget about Castiel at this point. That angel, after all, was very good news, and would not have made his point.
(5)- Don't ask where he got it. It involved five demons, two vampires, some oddly terrified plants, and bench-pressing a cow.
(6)- Everything he ever knew about 'stranger danger' decided to fly out the window. Like the saying goes, if you give the Sam a book…
(7)- Sam also asked if the two were dating each other, because he was seven years old and thought himself very well-informed about the natures of such things. In reply, Bobby just hemmed and hawed and finally told him that he'd never asked.
(8)- Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore." ~ E. A. Poe, _The Raven_
**A/N: OMG, I'm sorry this is so late! But I've had finals, and studying, and I'm a bad girl and I started another thing too. It's called Twelve Days of Angstmas, and frankly, I'm just having a lot of fun torturing the characters of Supernatural. But it's a daily update thing leading up to Christmas, which is why I've been spending so much time on it. Go check it out if you're interested- I'd love to see some of you guys over there. I'm planning a GO/SPN crossover chapter, if that helps at all. :)**
**You know, while I was writing this, I kept thinking, what if Aziraphale had finished introducing Crowley, and then when the boys met him, Sam recognized him? How would **_**that**_ **have gone?**
**Once again, thank you for all the reviews! You guys are the best!**
**Oh, and you know that dreaded song Sam got up to this morning? It's not just a coincidence….**
5. Chapter 5
SUWANEE, GEORGIA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
"So, an apocalypse."
"That's right, yes."
"In 1990."
"Yes."
"Wow."
"Indeed." Aziraphale smiled at the young man and pushed his pancakes around his plate some more. "I'm afraid to say that you and your brother must have been the Plan B."
Sam shook his head. "That's messed up." He stared at him, eyes suddenly very intense. "And you stopped it by working with a demon?" (1)
"That was the general idea, yes. Of course, we ended up not doing very much in the end." He peered at the man over his double stack. "They're not all bad, my boy. Most of them are, yes, but not all of them. The one you were with just happened to be trickier than the rest."
Sam jerked back. "How did you know about Ruby?" he demanded.
Aziraphale smiled again, but sadly this time. "An educated guess. You mustn't blame yourself. Demons are excellent liars."
"So, how do you know your demon hasn't been lying to you?" Sam challenged.
"I've known him for six thousand years," he replied. He didn't feel offended in the slightest. It was only a natural reaction after all. "We've had an Arrangement for the last thousand years or so. Believe me when I say I've had more than enough time to ascertain his sincerity. (2) I'm quite sure about his intentions." He glanced down at his pancakes. "I just hope he's still alright," he murmured. "A lot can change in twenty years."
Sam had the grace to look abashed. "I'm sorry," he stated, and the angel's head shot up. That was the crux of it, right there. He _wasn't_. Oh, he said the words alright, but it was as if it were a reflex and nothing more. There was no feeling behind it, no… emotion.
"It's alright," he told him, choosing his words carefully. "I'm alright. But the question is, are you? How are you feeling?"
"I'm… I'm fine, thanks. Why do you ask?"
"Well, you did go to Hell, and from what you've told me, you were in the same general vicinity as Lucifer himself. That can't have been a pleasant experience."
Sam looked away. "I'm sure it wasn't. But I don't… well, I don't actually remember any of it."
Oh. Oh, dear. Now _that _was alarming. "Oh. That's… er… unexpected."
"What? Is something wrong?"
_Yes._ "Well, whatever got you out… Sam, there is absolutely no reason why you shouldn't be able to remember your time Below. The only thing strong enough to erase your memories of such an ordeal would be an archangel, and from what you've said, Raphael is the only one left. (3) And I sincerely doubt that he was the one to rescue you." He looked at the young man, a pleading expression on his face. "Don't you understand, Sam? Something's wrong."
"I think," Sam began slowly. "I think you may be right." He met his eyes. "I just don't… feel things the way I used to. I'm a great hunter, but it's like… I don't really care, you know?"
"Oh. Oh, no. That's not… That shouldn't be… Oh, no."
"What? What is it?"
Aziraphale studied him gravely. If he was right… This could be bad, Very, very bad. "How about we go back to your motel room?" he suggested, keeping his voice as even as he could manage. "There's… There's something I need to check."
xXx
The angel stared down at the unconscious Winchester with no small measure of regret. He _always_ felt guilty when he put someone to sleep, despite Crowley's reassurances that it was perfectly alright, that there were some people you just couldn't get along with. Maybe that was so, but the young man sprawled on the motel-room bed hadn't done anything. Quite the contrary, in fact; he was a hero, whatever he believed of himself, and that was a fact.
Yet, here they were.
Aziraphale sighed and carefully undid the top buttons of Sam's shirt. _Well, no time like the present then, _he thought. With that, he stuck his hand into the man's chest. Sam's back arched, and even in sleep, he gasped and moaned. Aziraphale tried his best to ignore the pain he was causing, hard though it was, and find what he was looking for.
He just _had_ to be wrong. He had to.
But when he withdrew a moment later, he was horrified, but not particularly surprised by what he found. Or rather, what he didn't find.
It wasn't long afterward that Sam began to stir. Groggily, he sat up and rubbed his head. "What…" His gaze zeroed in on Aziraphale, who stood slightly awkwardly by the bed. "Wait, did you… knock me out?" His tone wasn't really angry though. It bothered Aziraphale to no end, but at least now he knew why.
He shifted. "I do apologize Sam, but what I had to do… well, I thought you'd prefer to be unconscious for it."
Silence, then: "What _did_ you do?"
"I...checked for your soul."
Sam seemed to be frozen. "You… checked my soul," he spluttered. "What for?"
"No, I didn't check your soul, I checked _for_ your soul." Aziraphale bit his lip, finding it increasingly difficult to meet the man's eyes. "There's a difference. And I'm afraid it's not there. Your soul, I mean."
More silence. "What?" Sam finally ventured. His eyes were narrowed. "What do you mean _it's not there?_ How is that…" He trailed off, collecting himself. "Where the hell is it then?" he asked.
"Yes."
"Yes? Yes _what?_" This was through gritted teeth. (4)
"Yes, it's still in Hell." Aziraphale stared down at his feet. "I _am_ terribly sorry, but it's the only explanation. The only place it could be. I'm sure that whoever brought you out tried their very best, but they must not have had the strength to bring your soul out along with your body."
Sam sucked in a breath. "Alright then."
"But I do think that we can- wait, what? Alright?"
"Yeah," he replied, shrugging. "I mean, I'm glad I know what's up now, but… it's not like we can really do anything about it, is there? Unless you're going to storm Hell and Michael and Lucifer. (5) Besides, I'm a fantastic hunter now." He grinned widely, but it was a cold grin, like the expanse of a frozen lake. "Maybe I'm better off without it."
Aziraphale felt his jaw dropping. "But, but _Sam_!" he protested. "A-A soul is what lets you feel and have emotions, and, a-and it's what makes you human and unique in the way that humans are, and you can't just, just throw that away! It's not-"
"Not what?" Sam interrupted. "Not right? Not good? Not _human_? Aziraphale, were you not listening to the part when I chugged down demon blood and started the Apocalypse?"
"Apparently not," the angel murmured. (6) Hesitantly, he moved to sit by Sam on the crappy motel-room bed. This really only left him one option, but that didn't mean he had to like it. "Listen, I don't understand it. But… if you truly don't want it back, I won't force it on you. It's your choice, in the end."
Sam visibly relaxed. "Thanks Azi-" He was cut off by the angel's hand on his forehead. He put more power into it this time; the Winchester would be out for several hours. The corners of his mouth turned down into a frown as he stood up.
"I'm sorry, my boy," he sighed, looking down at his handiwork, "but I really can't let you leave your own soul in Hell. Honestly!"
He then turned and marched purposefully toward the door.
He paused.
He realized something.
He had absolutely no idea what he was doing.
He couldn't exactly go down to the Cage and politely _ask_ for the soul, now could he? That would be a disaster. And it would take far longer than the few hours that Sam would be unconscious. Even with an entire garrison at hi back (not that he had one), it would probably take decades. He didn't _have _that sort of time.
So, what to do, what to do?
_What would Crowley_ _do, _he asked himself in a fit of desperation. Oh, but that wasn't much help either; Crowley would just leave. He simply wouldn't care all that much about the soul of one human, not unless he got something out of it in return.
But…
Aziraphale smacked his forehead. _Of course. _Why hadn't he thought of it before? Crowley wouldn't care enough to do something about it himself, but if he called and asked for help, surely he could think of something! And he really needed to call him anyway, to make sure he was still alright.
_Goodness, I am such an idiot._
It didn't take long to fish Sam's cell phone out of his pocket. It was a bit different from the ones he was used to, true, but he was determined to make it work. Now that the notion was in his head, it wouldn't leave him alone: _call Crowley, call Crowley, call Crowley. _Eventually (7), he managed to punch the all-too familiar number into the screen (8).
_-Ring.-_
_-Ring.-_
_-Ring.-_
_-The number you have called is out of service. We suggest you- _Aziraphale ended the call before the automated voice could say another word, the beginnings of panic swirling in his stomach. _Why _wasn't this number working? There was absolutely no reason for it not to work, unless…
No. Aziraphale refused to consider it. Crowley was absolutely _fine. _He was always _fine. _He must have just gotten a new phone. That was it. He did, after all, like to stay in touch with the modern world. It had been twenty years, and there had apparently been many technological advancements. That was _all. _Just the twenty year time difference.
...Twenty years. He gasped as the thought occurred to him, hitting harder than any physical blow.
...Crowley had thought he was dead for _twenty years_.
And it had been true. He had been dead. But what would that have done to his demon?
Oh, _God. _He'd called him right before the angels had attacked. He'd been _on his way. _What if the angels hadn't left? What if they'd...
Or what if they had? That would mean… Crowley would have found his… body.
What had that _done_ to him?
Aziraphale knew that he was starting to get hysterical, and that he really didn't have time for this, but the thoughts _wouldn't go away_. In fact on top of everything else, he was starting to feel guilty that he hadn't thought of this earlier. All the terrible possibilities now circled around and around in his mind, and he stood there, frozen in place, staring at the message blinking on Sam's phone: CALL FAILED.
So preoccupied with his thoughts was he that as the shadows lengthened around him, and the air chilled, he didn't notice. (9) Not even when the being entered the room did he look up from the phone he was staring at.
It wasn't until the being spoke that he realized there was anyone else in the room at all.
HELLO, AZIRAPHALE.
Aziraphale looked up.
Aziraphale swallowed.
Aziraphale offered a smile in an attempt not to look terrified.
"Why, hello there."
YES. WE'VE ESTABLISHED THAT. The being raised its eyebrows. I HEAR YOU HAVE A PROBLEM.
"Ah, yes," the angel managed faintly. "You can help with that?"
The being made a face that could be taken as a smile. OF COURSE I CAN. I _AM_ DEATH.
xXx
(1)- What he actually wanted to say here was, "And you stopped it by being romantically involved with a demon?" However, even without emotions, he had a little more tact than that. (1.5)
(1.5)- Not that Aziraphale would have minded being asked that. He would have just replied honestly.
(2)- He also had time to ascertain a great many other things, but he didn't say anything about that. He felt as if it would hardly help Sam's opinion of him.
(3)- He felt a slight pang at that. Gabriel had often come by to the bookstore, once he'd discovered that Aziraphale wasn't going to rat him out. While he disapproved of the archangel's lifestyle, he found that Gabriel was good company, _and_ he got along with Crowley, which was a bonus... And now he was gone.
(4)- He was getting more than a little tired of angels and their cryptic speech patterns. First Castiel, now Aziraphale too? Sam was beginning to think that Gabriel was the only angel he'd ever met that hadn't been so damn confusing, and wasn't that just sad?
(5)- Here, Aziraphale opened his mouth to say that he'd actually done it before (Crowley had gotten into trouble), but something in Sam's expression held him back.
(6)- This wasn't actually his fault, as Sam hadn't actually mentioned the demon blood thing. Just that he'd accidentally broken the final seal.
(7)- Eventually meaning after he had accidentally opened up the internet, a game of Solitaire, and something called Candy Crush. What _did_ young people do with their lives these days?
(8)- And after this whole issue was sorted out, he definitely intended to ask Sam _why _exactly the buttons were so very _small_. It seemed like a lot of trouble just to make a call.
(9)- So much for super angel senses. Though he can hardly be blamed- on the rare occasion an angel goes into a mental fit of hysterics, they really go into a mental fit of hysterics, and there's not a whole lot that can distract them from it.
**A/N: Oooh! Look who it is! Well, I'm sure nobody's actually surprised, but hey! I'm just glad he fits into the story!**
**Um, this doesn't count as a cliffhanger, does it? Because, uh, next chapter doesn't even have them in it. Sorry, but, I figure it's Dean and Cas' turn for the spotlight. And **_**possibly **_**some Crowley? If you're lucky…**
**So, last chapter I got a question I figure I should address: Will there be pairings? (stop reading here if you don't want to know) Um… sort of? I ship Crowley/Aziraphale soooo much, it's not even funny. But my problem is, I am absolutely no good at writing romance. So, will it be heavily implied? Yes. Am I going to write romance-specific scenes? Probably not. Same goes for Destiel and Sabriel stuff. But that's not to say that I won't have a bunch of 'chick-flick' scenes (sorry Dean). ;)**
**As usual, thank you so much for all the support, it means a lot! Until next time, ciao!**
6. Chapter 6
NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
Crowley had always liked New Orleans. He wasn't exactly sure why, but he thought it was because of the people. Normally, he wouldn't give a- he wouldn't _care_, but he'd hung around the place after Hurricane Katrina a few years back, and something about their clean-up effort had touched a part of him he hadn't been aware was still there. The pure determination to keep going and keep living had made him feel, for the first time in a long time, that there might just be something worthwhile about humanity after all.
Yes, the demon had always liked New Orleans. So maybe that was why he had insisted on meeting here, in a Well To-Do Restaurant on a Busy Street in the Crescent City.
But the angel was late.
He sighed, taking a long draught of his coffee. (1) He honestly hadn't expected to be in any way otherwise. This particular angel didn't have a very high opinion of him; why would he bother being punctual?
Besides, he _did _have a war to fight. That _might _have something to do with it.
"Crowley."
Crowley startled, sloshing his drink all over the table. "Castiel," he greeted, gritting his teeth. "How nice of you to _warn_ a bloke before you do that."
Castiel tilted his head. "You said that we'd be meeting here." His voice was tired. "I assumed that you'd be ready for me."
"Yes, and you were meant to be here _45 minutes ago!_" Crowley huffed. "I've been waiting for ages!"
The angel's eyes darkened, and Crowley got the distinct feeling that this was the wrong thing to say. "I was in the midst of a battle, _demon_." he growled. (2) "If you honestly expect me to drop everything to come and speak with _you_, you are sorely mistaken." All of this was stated in a tone that said, quite clearly, _Do not overstep your bounds. I am an angel of the Lord, and I _will _smite you should you continue to test me._
Crowley wasn't fazed. He'd dealt with heavenly wrath before (3), and from beings far more intimidating than this Seraph. "Well, doesn't that just give me a warm fuzzy feeling inside." Castiel's glower deepened, and he raised his hands. He prided himself on knowing when to push and when not to push. "Alright, alright," he placated. "I get it, I do. That's why I called you here, actually, to see how things are going."
"Why?" Castiel asked. His eyes narrowed, and Crowley could almost see the cogs turning in his brain, seeking out the trap that _had _to be there. Inwardly, he rolled his eyes. Yes, demons were, in general, untrustworthy, but the angel ought to have figured out by now that when _he_ made a deal, he stuck to it.
"I generally like to keep track of my investments," he replied smoothly. "I'm not sure you understand what a risk I'm taking by backing you here." He leaned over the table, lacing his fingers together. "If you lose, and Raphael frees Lucifer again, I'm going to have three archangels gunning for me for my part in all this."
"So why risk anything at all, Crowley?" Castiel shot back. He too leaned in closer, annoyance written all over his face. "I don't understand what you have to gain from this."
Oh, honestly! Hadn't they been through this already? "I thought we discussed this during our last little chat," he said, allowing exasperation to color his words. "I don't want another apocalypse. Simple as that."
"Yes, you said you didn't want there to be a _third _apocalypse, while to my knowledge, this is only the second attempt in recent history. What exactly did you mean by that?"
Well, of all the times for Castiel to actually start noticing things, this had to be the most inconvenient. "I assure you, this is the third time this has happened, and no, it is not a topic I am interested in discussing." He kept his words short and clipped. "Suffice it to say that I have now been involved all three times and it is _getting on my nerves._" He paused, trying to reign his temper in. That last statement had really only been to try to sate the angel's curiosity a bit; he didn't need to draw more attention to it by getting angry. "Can we get back on track please?" he demanded. "This isn't a social call, and I'm sure you're as eager as I am to get it over with." (4)
"Of course," Castiel acquiesced. "If you want to know about the war, I can oblige." He hesitated for a moment, then continued. "The souls you loaned me the use of are… indeed very helpful. We are outnumbered but Raphael's forces, but are holding our own." He paused again.
"Well, that's good then," Crowley prompted. "Have you figured out yet how you're going to _win_?"
"Not… as of yet, no," the angel admitted. "Even with the souls, I do not have the capability to kill Raphael."
"Hmm. I'll look into that, then."
Castiel shot him a look. "And what would I have to give for assistance of that kind?" he snarled, all his defenses suddenly snapping back up.
Crowley gave him a wry smile. "Just keep doing what you're doing, Castiel," he stated, with the air of one who has seen it all and has simply ceased to care. "You win against that bastard, it'll all be worth it, in the end."
Castiel seemed to have no idea what to say to that. "Are we done here?" he finally ventured.
"As far as I'm concerned." Crowley dismissed him with a wave of his hand, and Castiel stood from his chair, probably about to flap back off to his war. "Ah, wait, no," the demon stopped him, "actually, I wanted to ask you. Have you been in contact with the Winchester lately?" He furrowed his brow as the words came out. Where had _that_ come from?
Castiel mirrored his expression, apparently feeling the same way. "How does that matter?" he inquired in confusion.
"Oh, I was just wondering." Well, he wasn't _really_, but it was as good an excuse as any while he puzzled out his true motivation.
"I… no, I haven't."
Crowley leaned back in his chair. "Maybe you should," he advised. "Might do you good."
Castiel studied him gravely. "I'll keep that in mind," he said, and then he was gone.
Crowley was left to wonder when exactly he'd started to care about whether Casanova and Squirrel had been talking. It was none of his business, really. _So why did he care?_ Because it couldn't just be because the angel reminded him of… someone. He liked to think he wasn't that soft. So that _definitely_ wasn't the reason.
...Definitely.
At that moment, Aziraphale pressed the CALL button on a phone that he didn't really understand, and got nothing but an automated message in return.
xXx
The meeting with Crowley had left Castiel feeling… disoriented to say the least.
First of all, there was the fact that the demon was helping him in the first place. And this was genuine _help_, to be sure! No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't find a single trap. Crowley was being disturbingly _honest_ about wanting to stop another apocalypse.
Which brought him to his second problem: the demon himself. It wasn't obvious, but it was clear that there was more to him than met the eye. All his little slip-ups told a story: his aversion to the word 'arrangement', the fact that he'd been involved in an apocalypse no one seemed to know about, and Castiel still hadn't forgotten that odd hissing incident. Indeed, Crowley had completely shaken all his expectations of what a demon should be. (5)
And he intended to find out why. It was lucky that he'd recently manage to capture Heaven's Record House. Surely, if the demon had been so actively involved with recent events, there would be something about him in the archives.
But that would come later. Currently, he had something far more pressing to deal with: his third problem.
Dean.
Crowley's words had impacted him more than he cared to show. He'd been so determined not to bring Dean back into the life of hunting. He was staying with this Lisa woman; he was happy. And the very fact that _Sam _turned and walked away from him showed that perhaps, Dean was destined to escape from the world of the supernatural.
But he'd spent an entire year Falling. He'd spent time as a human. And the impulses he'd been subjected to weren't going away so easily. Prominent among them was selfishness.
Because he _missed _Dean. A lot.
He didn't understand the emotion, but that didn't mean it wasn't there. And now, Crowley's words had shattered his resolve to stay away.
He briefly tried to argue with himself. What right had he to drag Dean away from his happy, safe life? If his own brother didn't do it, how could he even consider it? He, an angel, who'd known him for two years and been friends with him for far less time than that.
But that's when it hit him. _Friends. _They were _friends. _In his time among humanity, Castiel learned what that word truly meant, learned that Heaven's definition of it was, as Dean would say, 'screwed'.
Dean was his friend, and friends didn't leave friends behind. Even when it was 'for their own good', it turned out to be not such a good idea after all.
With that thought, he was off.
xXx
THE BRAEDEN HOUSEHOLD, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
Dean had not expected Cas to show up today.
Correction: he hadn't been expecting Cas to show up _ever._
After all, the last time he'd seen him, the angel had been all… _angelic _again, and he'd left for Heaven with nothing more than a really, really sucky goodbye and no backward glance, and damn it, he'd thought he meant more to the guy than that.
Apparently not.
So he'd just put Cas on the list of Things He Wasn't Going to Think About.
And he'd tried to adjust. He really had.
Thus, here he was, _not _drowning his sorrows in alcohol. Definitely not. No, he was just sitting on the front porch of the house, drinking a beer. Perfectly normal. Even if it was his third this afternoon.
And then, Cas appeared next to him.
Dean's first thought was, _I swear, I'm going to get the guy a bell on a collar._
Dean's second thought was, _Holy shit, it's Cas!_
Dean's third thought was, _Why's he showing up now? Is something wrong? Is he okay? There's no way this is a social call. Where's he _been_?_
In the end, he settled for a simple, "Cas? What the hell?"
"Hello Dean," Cas replied, as usual. And damn, the angel looked the same as ever. Same trench coat, same eyes, same gravelly voice. He honestly hadn't been expecting anything different, but nothing seemed to be _wrong _either. So, if Cas didn't need help, why was he here?
"Wow, Cas, I, uh, I wasn't expecting to see you here," Dean stated, trying for a smile. "How've you been? In, uh, Heaven."
"Well enough." He looked away as the words came out though. So that was the same too, then. He was as crappy a liar as ever. "And you, Dean? Have you been alright?"
"Yeah, I've been…" Dean trailed off. The truth was, he wasn't alright, though he tried to hide it as best he could. He didn't really know what was wrong with him. He loved Lisa, and Ben was just awesome, but something was missing. He was restless.
"You miss Sam," Cas stated, matter-of-factly, as if it summed up his whole situation. And it did.
"Yeah," he breathed. "More than anything."
A look of guilt passed across the angel's face, and Dean's red flags went up. Yup, the guy was hiding something. But what? As he opened his mouth to ask the question, Cas cut him off. "Dean, are you happy here?" he asked.
What kind of a question was that? His first instincts were to brush it off, say _of course I'm happy _and _why do you ask _and _why are you asking now? _But with Cas piercing him with that I-See-Your-Soul Stare of his (6), he found that he couldn't. Because if he thought about it, really thought, was he happy? He _liked_ being here, sure, with Lisa and Ben. But _was he happy? _
No.
Not really.
Happy was on the road, in the Impala, listening to classic rock. Happy was pie in a motel room after ganking the latest monster. Happy was the feeling of saving someone's life, someone who'd go on to live and breathe and maybe, just maybe, make the world a better place.
Happy was being with Sam.
Dean sighed. "No," he muttered. "No, not really." He turned to face Cas more fully. "I just… I don't think I can be."
"I'm sorry," the angel said.
" 'S okay, Cas, there's nothing you can-"
"I'm sorry I didn't tell you."
_What?_
Silence fell over the two for a moment, before Dean found his voice. "Tell me what?" Cas looked at the ground, and Dean leaned in closer. "Cas, tell me what?" he demanded.
The angel's head jerked up, and blue eyes met his. "I'm sorry," Cas repeated, "but I honestly thought that you were happier here, and safer, and who was I to pull you away from that? And since he walked away, he didn't even talk to you, I thought that-"
"_Who walked away?_"
"Sam."
That word was enough to strike Dean dumb. _Sam._
"But I suppose I was wrong? Because… you're not happy? I really wish I'd known-"
Was he still talking? Why was he still talking? Sam was _alive, _nothing else mattered.
Sam was alive, and he hadn't come to find him.
"What?" Dean choked out. "Why didn't he…" He narrowed his eyes, focusing on the here and now with no small effort. "Cas, tell me everything."
And he did. From the retrieval of Sam to the war in Heaven, to the deal with Crowley (7), Cas told Dean everything.
Five minutes later, he'd left a note for Lisa, gathered his meager belongings, and was on the road to Bobby's.
xXx
(1)- Normally, he couldn't stand the stuff, but New Orleans coffee? That was something else!
(2)- And he actually _growled_. It was a sound that could put Growley to shame, but it was just disconcerting coming from Castiel.
(3)- For a good 5,000 years of his life, to be exact, and while he hadn't always survived, he liked to think of himself as well-versed in how to deal with angry angels.
(4)- At this point, he was actually wrong. Cas was not interested in ending this meeting _at all_. He was not nearly the fool that Crowley took him for, and the more time he spent around the demon, the more odd things he noticed about him. This, he decided, was definitely worth looking into. He had the presence of mind not to say any of this out loud, though. If Crowley wanted to underestimate him, that was absolutely fine.
(5)- He had that effect on people.
(6)- Which made him really uncomfortable and he _really_ needed to remember to tell him to stop doing that. Sometime.
(7)- Dean was very displeased to hear about this, but decided they could take it up later.
**A/N: And here it is! Chapter Six! Whooooooooo! I hope my Dean and Cas POVs are okay and everything. **
**Next chapter: In which Aziraphale deals with Death and Sam is confused.**
7. Chapter 7
SUWANEE, GEORGIA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
The last time Aziraphale had been in the presence of Death, it had been in Lower Tadfield, in the middle of an attempted Apocalypse. The Horseperson (or Biker, whatever he was going by nowadays) had been everything one would expect: tall, imposing, skeletal, and all-in-all terrifying in general.
He looked quite a bit different now. Aziraphale supposed he shouldn't be surprised. It seemed that a lot of changes had been made to the Way of Things since his death.
Honestly, though, his aura was as scary as ever. The gaunt-but-human features and smart black suit did nothing to change that. Aziraphale sucked in a shuddering breath. He had absolutely no idea what to say here, and no idea of what action to take. He could only hope that he wasn't here to claim Sam. It couldn't be the man's time yet, could it?
PEACE, AZIRAPHALE. I AM ONLY HERE TO OFFER MY ASSISTANCE. AFTER ALL- Here, Death paused, casting a disparaging look at the man lying on the bed.- IT DOES SEEM LIKE YOU NEED IT.
What? Of all the things for Death to say, an offer of help had not been what the angel was expecting. "Yes, well, ah, what kind of help exactly are you offering?" he asked cautiously. "I mean…" The angel trailed off, trying to judge whether the look on the Being's face was a good one or a bad one. (1)
IT'S REALLY QUITE SIMPLE, Death stated. I HAVE ACCESS TO THE CAGE, WHERE SAM WINCHESTER'S SOUL RESIDES. MY OFFER IS TO FETCH IT FOR YOU.
Well. That _was_ a generous offer. Too generous, in fact, at least, too generous to be free. "And what would you want in return?" Aziraphale worked up the courage to ask.
Death laughed- a normal sounding chuckle, but the angel shivered in fear regardless. In his experience, it was never good when Death laughed. (2) NOTHING, REALLY, JUST A REASSURANCE. I JUST WANT YOU TO MAKE SURE THAT MR. WINCHESTER GOES BACK TO HIS BROTHER AND SAVES THE WORLD, AS HE'S SO GOOD AT DOING. He smiled wryly. WELL, WHAT HE'S GOOD AT DOING MOST OF THE TIME ANYWAY. WHEN HE'S NOT DOING THE EXACT OPPOSITE.
"I don't understand," Aziraphale replied honestly, ignoring the last comment. "Why would you ask something so trivial?" After all, why would Death retrieve a soul from the deepest pits of Hell in exchange for something that would likely have happened anyway? It didn't make sense.
YOU TRULY ARE UNAWARE OF WHAT'S BEEN HAPPENING, AREN'T YOU? THERE IS A WAR GOING ON, AZIRAPHALE, AND IF THE WRONG SIDE WINS, WE'LL HAVE TO DEAL WITH LUCIFER ALL OVER AGAIN.
"And… you don't want that? No offense, but last time we met, you seemed to be quite on board with the idea of the Apocalypse."
TIMES CHANGE.
"Apparently," Aziraphale muttered.
BESIDES, I HAPPEN TO BE ON GOOD TERMS WITH THE CURRENT KING OF HELL. I'D RATHER TALK TO HIM THAN SOMEONE ELSE. SO WOULD YOU, FOR THAT MATTER.
"Pardon?"
NOTHING. IF WE'RE AGREED, SHALL WE GET ON WITH THINGS?
"Yes, please," the angel happily grasped the opportunity to get back on track. He frankly had absolutely no idea what the fellow was going on about. He certainly hadn't heard of any wars, and as for the King of Hell? He never paid attention to the politics of Below. "So, ah, what do I do?"
Death lifted an eyebrow. WELL, I'M NOT TAKING YOU WITH ME. _YOU _CAN WAIT HERE. I'LL RETURN SHORTLY.
Then, he was gone.
xXx
Aziraphale lost track of time before too long. The seconds passed by in much the same way that minutes and hours did; it all blended together. There was nothing to do, after all. No one to talk to, nothing interesting to even look at. Indeed, the angel was currently sitting on the edge of Sam's bed staring at the wall. (3)
In his state of inactivity, he was ready, this time, for the Presence when it entered the room again.
Aziraphale stood immediately. "Did you get it?" he questioned eagerly.
Death lifted his briefcase. OF COURSE I DID. WHY WOULDN'T I? He glided across the room in a movement rather like that of a wraith (4) and stood next to the bed, the angel hovering nervously nearby.
"So, you've got his soul in there?" he asked. "In your… briefcase?"
ISN'T THAT WHAT I JUST SAID? Death pinned Aziraphale with a Look, and he stopped fidgeting. AZIRAPHALE, DO YOU UNDERSTAND HOW THIS WORKS?
"Uh-"
SAM'S SOUL HAS BEEN IN THE CAGE FOR MONTHS NOW, UNDERGOING UNSPEAKABLE TORMENT.
Aziraphale winced. "Yes, I know, and I was meaning to ask, is there any way you can take that from him?"
NO. AT THIS POINT, THERE IS ONLY ONE WHO CAN, AND HE'S CURRENTLY UNREACHABLE.
"Yes. Right." He stared down at the still-unconscious Winchester. He looked so peaceful now, as if he were truly sleeping, and in that moment, Aziraphale knew with absolute certainty that he didn't want to see what memories of Hell would do to him. "What _can _you do?" he inquired, voice quiet, but firm.
THERE ARE TWO OPTIONS. ONE IS FOR ME TO SIMPLY SUPPRESS THE MEMORIES AS BEST I CAN. BUT HE HAS BEEN IN THERE FOR QUITE A LONG TIME NOW, SO I CANNOT GUARANTEE IT WOULD HAVE MUCH OF ANY EFFECT. IF HE'D BEEN DOWN THERE ANY LONGER, I WOULD BE INCAPABLE OF DOING ANYTHING AT ALL.
The Being fell silent for a moment, and Aziraphale lifted an eyebrow. "And the second option?" he prompted.
THE SECOND OPTION WOULD BE TO PUT UP A WALL IN SAM'S MIND, A BLOCK OF SORTS BETWEEN HIM AND HIS MEMORIES. HE WOULD RECALL NOTHING OF HIS TIME WITH THE ARCHANGELS, BUT IF THAT WALL CAME DOWN… Death trailed off, regarding the angel solemnly.
"It would be worse than it was before," Aziraphale finished, eyes wide. And it would be. Far worse. Enough, perhaps, to drive Sam insane.
But the first option wasn't much better.
It all came down to one thing: would the wall hold? It would for a time, of that he was sure, but everything corrodes with time. And, knowing Sam, even as little as he did, the Winchester would poke and prod at it out of pure curiosity.
Eventually, the wall would fall. And Sam would be driven mad.
This only left one option.
Aziraphale swallowed hard, already hating himself for the choice he was about to make. "Suppress his memories as best you can," he croaked, "but don't put up a wall. It's far too risky for him."
Death inclined his head. SO BE IT. YOU MAY WANT TO CLOSE YOUR EYES.
The angel did so, hearing the lock on the briefcase slide open. The bright flash that followed left bright spots on the backs of his eyelids.
IT IS DONE.
Aziraphale opened his eyes cautiously, trying to blink the spots away, and viewed the man on the bed. "He doesn't look…" He trailed off, looking closer. Usually, he didn't make a point of looking at people's souls (5), but now that the complete absence of Sam's had been filled, it was easy to see the contrast. "Oh. Yes." He glanced at Death. "Thank you."
I'D SAY ANYTIME, BUT I THINK WE BOTH HOPE THAT THIS WON'T HAPPEN AGAIN, Death replied dryly.
"Quite," Aziraphale agreed, shuddering at the thought.
WELL, IF THAT'S ALL, I'LL BE OFF, PLACES TO GO AND DEAD PEOPLE TO SEE AND ALL THAT. I HOPE THE NEXT TIME WE MEET WILL BE UNDER HAPPIER CIRCUMSTANCES.
"Wait," Aziraphale called, a question entering his mind (and simultaneously distracting him from the thought that Death seemed to think they might be meeting again soon). "Do you… I don't suppose you know where Crowley is? He's not… is he…?" His voice faded away as he found that he simply couldn't force out the last word.
Death's reply, though, was enough to make him burst into tears.
CROWLEY IS ALIVE.
The angel's eyes widened. Alive. Crowley was _alive. _In that instant, the panic he'd been trying very hard not to think about diminished considerably. It was quite interesting, he reflected, how three words could make someone's day so much better. He lost no time in asking his next question. "Where is he?"
THAT, AZIRAPHALE, IS FOR ME TO KNOW, AND YOU TO FIND OUT. BUT BELIEVE ME WHEN I SAY THAT IT'S A _HELL_ OF AN INTERESTING STORY.
And before the angel could protest, or question that last, enigmatic statement, Death had left the building.
xXx
_Fire._
_Burning._
_Pain._
_Laughter._
_Blood- lots of it._
_He called Dean's name; why didn't he come?_
_Lucifer just laughed some more._
_Michael did nothing to stop it- stood by and watched._
_Where was Adam?_
_Where was _Dean_?_
_And then the pain started all over again, and all Sam could do was-_
Sam woke up with a scream, sitting bolt upright in bed. He looked around the room wildly, before regaining his bearings. He was fine. This wasn't Hell, this was his motel room. (6) He hadn't been in Hell for months… but then why did it seem like it had just been yesterday?
The memories of the past few hours rushed in on him, and he gasped. _Oh, God. _He'd been missing his _soul! _He'd just been walking around with _no friggin' soul! _He fought to keep the bile down at the thought of some of the actions he'd taken.
"Sam? Are you alright?" Sam's eyes shot to the source of the voice, and sure enough, there was Mr. Fell- _Aziraphale, _he reminded himself- perched on the edge of the bed and appearing extremely worried.
"Fine," he croaked out, but wasn't surprised when he received a skeptical glance. "Really," he pressed. "I-" He cut himself off, recalling what he'd said mere moments before it had all gone black. He'd actually told him he'd be better off without his soul! "Oh, God," he rasped. "I am so sorry."
Aziraphale waved a hand, brushing his apology aside. "There's nothing to feel sorry about, my boy. You weren't yourself." He paused, peering at him over the tops of his spectacles. (7) "You do feel better, right?" he inquired. "You do feel-"
"LIke I have a moral compass again?" Sam laughed, not even trying to hold back the bitterness and self-loathing in his voice. "Yeah, sure I feel great. You know, I'm in this town for a werewolf hunt, and I was going to finish it up tonight. Know what I was going to do?" He laughed again. "_I was going to use her cousin as bait._"
"I don't think that-"
"I was going to use an innocent woman as bait, and I didn't think there was anything wrong with that," he ploughed on. "Maybe you should have just-"
Aziraphale raised a hand, and the hunter stopped speaking. "I've only known you for a few hours, so I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but you, Sam Winchester," he said, matter-of-factly, "are an idiot. I would never have killed you, or whatever it was you were about to say, because it wasn't you. Understand?" Sam opened his mouth, but Aziraphale cut him off once again. "I can understand that you have low self-esteem, and I'm actually not all that surprised about it, based on what you told me in the diner this morning, but you need to realize that the part of you that was up here on Earth was your body and your brain, not your heart, not your soul, and not _who you are. _The sooner you accept that, the sooner we can all move on." The look on his face must have been something like a deer in the headlights, because Aziraphale's expression softened, and his next words were far more gentle. "You are not to blame, Sam."
Well. Alright then. _He, _Sam reflected absent-mindedly, _would make a great motivational speaker. _Because as much as he didn't want to admit it, he felt a little better. It felt good to have the apparent forgiveness of an angel. (8)
"So how did you get me up here, anyway?" he asked, deciding to change the subject. "Unless you actually did storm the Cage, in which case I take back what I said earlier."
Aziraphale shifted a bit, and the bed creaked. "Well," he began, "no, not really. I, ah, made a smallish deal. With Death."
"A deal," he repeated. "With Death." He blinked. "What… How did you…"
"Oh, it was nothing bad or anything," Aziraphale hurried to reassure him. "He just wanted to make sure you reunited with your brother. Something about saving the world?"
"Oh," Sam said, suddenly remembering something else. "Oh, damn. I walked away." He stared at the angel. "I was right there, at Lisa's, and I turned and walked away. He doesn't even know I'm alive. Crap."
"Well, that's easily fixable, isn't it? You can just go find him again."
"Yeah, well…" Sam hesitated. Somehow, that didn't feel right. "Or we could go to Bobby's first. Regroup and stuff."
"...If you think that's best. Oh, wait, what about that, ah, werewolf you were talking about?"
Sam winced. "I'll call in another hunter to take care of it." Because suddenly, he wanted to be on the road again, as far away from here as he could get. "Let's just get on the road." He swung out of bed and began to pack up his things.
"I'm coming too?"
Sam paused in his actions to look at him. "If you want to, that is." He grinned. "You got my soul out of Hell. I think that earns you a place on the team."
Aziraphale considered this for a moment, then nodded. "I would be glad to join you, Sam." He seemed to perk up. "Oh, by the way, I don't suppose you've ever encountered a demon like… ah… well, he's got golden eyes, like a snake, and he has a very nice car. Hisses from time to time."
"Your demon?" Sam asked, pulling open the door. (9)
Aziraphale followed him out to the parking lot. "Yes, it's just that Death told me that he was still alive, and, well…"
Sam shook his head, clambering into his car. Golden eyes? They'd never encountered any demons like that besides Azazel, and his eyes hadn't been like a snake. "No, I'm sorry."
The angel wilted slightly, but stepped into the passenger seat. "Oh, well, probably a good thing you haven't met him then," he sighed. "I doubt you'd get along."
Sam had to smile at that. No, he probably wouldn't. "So, to Bobby's then," he stated, turning the key in the ignition. Immediately, the radio began to play.
_I never meant to be so bad to you _
_One thing I said that I would never do _
_A look from you and I-_
He flinched violently. The radio was off in a matter of seconds. Sensing the look directed his way, he tried to explain. "That song's got some… negative connotations for me, is all. And now it seems to be following me." He laughed uneasily. "That's the second time today."
He kept his eyes on the road as they pulled out of the parking lot, and thus did not see Aziraphale's thoughtful glance.
xXx
(1)- It was a look of amusement, actually, but Aziraphale can perhaps be forgiven his ignorance. He wasn't all that accustomed to Death having facial expressions at all.
(2)- And yes, he did have experience regarding this. He'd met Death on several occasions before the Apocalypse, and well... suffice it to say that not all of said meetings were pleasant.
(3)- Which, under the close scrutiny of the Holy Being, was making a valiant effort not to be as moldy as usual. It was not entirely successful, but it's the thought that counts, right?
(4)- Though, something about the action didn't quite look right. Perhaps it was the suit, Aziraphale supposed. It _is_ much harder to glide in a suit than in a menacing black cloak, after all.
(5)- He'd always thought it was rather invasive.
(6)- Though, an argument could be made that the two weren't actually all that different.
(7)- And Sam really didn't understand why people did that. If you looked over your glasses and not through them, wouldn't that just make your vision worse?
(8)- One that truly seemed to be on the side of good, anyway. Sam really wished that a good angel wasn't such a surprising thought.
(9)- Because packing had conveniently only taken about two minutes. All of Sam's belongings had decided that they would outdo the wall in attempting to please Aziraphale, (9.5) and thus made their best efforts to get them get out of the motel room (and away from the competition).
(9.5)- He had that effect on inanimate objects.
**A/N: ...Sorry? I know, the wait was way too long on this one, but can you please not try to kill me? Saturday is my favorite day of the week, and I don't want to spoil it. And I really am sorry, it's just, this chapter wouldn't come out right. At all. I'm **_**still **_**not sure about it, but I figured if I waited any longer, I'd have to move to Antarctica to avoid you guys.**
**...Also, don't kill me for the fact that Aziraphale remains clueless in regards to Crowley. I mean, I had Death drop a few hints, but Az just wouldn't cooperate. I think Death ships A/C though. Huh.**
**...Also... don't yell at me because Sam, in all his angst, decided to shove Cas out of this chapter. (next one, I promise!)**
**Aaaaaaanyway, Next Chapter: In which the brothers have a heartfelt reunion, Dean tells everyone what Cas told him about the war, and Castiel himself makes deductions, my dear Watson.**
8. Chapter 8
SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
Driving always helped to calm Dean down. It didn't matter what the problem was; there was something about the open road that made him feel at peace. (1)
Somehow, though, this brand of therapy didn't seem to be working as well this time. Maybe there _were _some issues the Impala couldn't fix after all. Such as this one: Bobby had known. Dean gritted his teeth and stared at the steering wheel. Bobby had _known. _Bobby had known that Sam was alive, and he hadn't told him.
Oh, the old man could make all the excuses he wanted to ("We just wanted you to be safe… you got out of the life…"), but Dean couldn't possibly care less. Who cared if he'd gotten out of hunting? Who cared if he was living the apple pie life? He sure as hell didn't! Sure, Lisa and Ben were great, but they weren't home. Home was the feeling of saving someone's life and ganking the latest monster. Home was a six hour night's sleep at the end of a long drive.
Home was his brother.
And Sam was alive, he was back, and _he hadn't told him._
So, here he was, out on a drive to clear his head. And it wasn't working.
The loud blast of a horn jerked Dean out of his revery. Startled, he looked up from the steering wheel and swore, spinning the wheel to the right. Somehow, while he was thinking, he'd drifted over to the other lane, and another car was now headed straight at him!
They missed a collision by mere inches.
Dean tightened his grip on the wheel as he slowed to a stop, breathing heavily. _Idiot, _he berated himself. _Eyes on the road. _The admonishment sounded suspiciously like Sam. He winced, shaking his head and stepping out of the car. His mental health problems could wait: he had other things to deal with. Such as why someone was headed toward Bobby's with a car that sure didn't look as if it needed repairs. (2) "Hey," he called. "Sorry 'bout that. You okay?"
The passenger-side door opened, and a man stumbled out. He was blonde and a little on the short side, with glasses and a seemingly god-awful sense of style. "Oh, yes," he replied, putting a hand on the roof of the car, "we're fine." He smiled at him in a disconcertingly sincere way. "That _was _a close one though, wasn't it? Good thing we didn't collide. That would have been bad." His blue eyes drifted (and why did those eyes seem so familiar?) over to the Impala, and he let out a low whistle. "My, that is a beautiful piece of craftsmanship. Absolutely stunning. '67 is it? That was a fine year."
This guy was in Dean's good books already. _Smart,_ Dean decided. _Guy's British, smart, and most likely gay. Sure doesn't seem like a hunter at any rate._
The man's next statement dispelled that assessment.
"So, would you be Dean then?" he asked, beaming.
Dean frowned, immediately on guard. "Who's asking?" he demanded.
That's when the driver's-side door opened, and the second man stepped out. Dean's vision tunneled.
_Sam._
_It's Sam_
_Samsamsamsamsamsamsamsamsamsam._
Dean was barely aware of his movement as he walked forward a few steps, cutting the distance between them in half.
Sam. There he was, right in front of him, looking, for the life of him, like a guilty puppy. (3)
_He's alive. He's alive and he's right here. Sammy._
Dean punched him in the nose. (4)
"Ow!" Sam yelped, backing up against his hideous rental car. "Dude! Can't just say hello?"
"You've been alive," he accused, and damn it, his voice was _not _shaking! "You've been back for five friggin' months, Sam, and you didn't tell me, Bobby didn't tell me, and hell, _Cas _didn't tell me until friggin' yesterday. Why the _hell _did no one tell me?"
The guilt increased. "You were ha-"
"If you're about to say 'you were happy', you can take it and shove it up your ass," he threatened. "I was not _happy. _You friggin' _died._ You were in _Hell _with the friggin' archangels. What about that would make me _happy?_"
"I thought-"
"No, you didn't think. If you had, even for one second, you would have realized that I would rather have you alive than dead." He broke off, trying to wrap his emotions under control. "Damn it, Sam," he finally continued. "Why'd you walk away?"
Sam opened his mouth to reply, but at that point, the other guy interceded. "If I may," he began, and Sam turned to glare at him. The man stared back, uncowed. "Come now, Sam, he needs to know."
_Needs to know? Needs to know what? _If that didn't sound ominous, he didn't know what did.
Sam stayed silent, which the guy apparently took as permission to keep going. "Anyway, for the past few months, Sam hasn't exactly been… himself."
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"Dean interrupted.
"I'm getting to that, if you don't mind," the man stated, sending a deathly glare at him. (5) "Now then, as it turns out, whoever brought Sam back didn't… well… they didn't have enough power to do it properly. I'm sure they tried their hardest, but… well… they brought him back with a piece missing."
He was almost afraid to ask, but he did anyway. "What piece?" Adding silently, _Damn it, Cas, what did you do?_
The man winced. "His soul."
There was silence for a moment as Dean processed that information. He glanced at Sam's face to see his expression, but he was staring at the ground, the picture of dejection. So it was true then. "Damn it, Cas," he muttered.
Sam's head shot back up. "So it _was _Cas?" he asked, eyes wide.
"Yeah," Dean grimaced.
"I'm sure this, ah, Cas didn't mean to," the man repeated. "But it does, of course, mean that the Sam that was here for the past five months was just his body and not actually him, so he is _not to blame _for _any _of the actions he might have taken." The man stared hard at Sam as he said this. There was a story there, Dean could tell, but now probably wasn't the best time to ask.
There was silence for another moment, a moment in which Sam looked so miserable that Dean just couldn't stand it any longer. "Sam," he started, but that was all he said before he pulled his younger brother into a hug. "God, I missed you, Sammy," he murmured.
"Missed you too, Dean."
The hug lasted a full five seconds before Dean decided he needed to preserve his manliness and pulled away. Sam was smiling now, and he felt a warm glow at the accomplishment. The feeling faded somewhat, though, when he sensed another pair of eyes on him. Scowling slightly, he turned to face the other guy. "And where to you fall into all this?" he demanded. But it wasn't the man who answered.
"He's an angel, Dean," Sam told him quietly, and Dean instantly realized who the guy's eyes reminded him of. "His name is Aziraphale, and he got my soul back for me."
Any objections Dean might have had to his presence died in his throat. _Well. Okay then._
"He's also been to Bobby's, once," his brother pressed. "January 1990. You had the flu, remember?"
He did remember, sort of. The memories were mostly just about feeling absolutely terrible, but he could recall, at one point, hearing voices downstairs. Voices that hadn't belonged to Sam or Bobby.
"Uh, okay."
"Really?" Sam said skeptically. "You're okay with him being here?"
Dean shrugged. "He give you that copy of _Great Expectations _you were so over the moon about?"
Sam nodded.
He turned to face the man -Aziraphale- who was watching the proceedings with interest. "You save my brother, you appreciate Baby, you're alright by me." Dean paused, considering his next statement. "Betray us, and I kill you myself."
Aziraphale nodded eagerly. "Understood." He glanced at the Impala, rubbing his hands together. "So, should we, ah, get to Robert's then?" he inquired politely. "That _was _our original destination after all. And it's a bit… bracing out here."
Dean lifted an eyebrow. Honestly, he hadn't even noticed the cold. Little details like that seemed to slip away somehow when there were more important things to focus on. More important people. "Sounds like a good plan," he agreed, a pit forming in the center of his stomach even as the words came out. _They have no idea what's going on up there, _he realized. _Damn it. _He sighed heavily. "I've got a few things to tell you on the way there, though. And you're not going to like it."
And so, the three piled into the Impala and drove off in the direction of Bobby's house, Dean driving, Sam in the passenger seat, and Aziraphale in the back. Just as it was meant to be.
The rental car was left in the middle of the road, forgotten. (6)
xXx
THE RECORD HOUSE OF HEAVEN, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
Crowley had covered his tracks very well, Castiel had to admit that. Not well enough, to be sure, but well enough that no one would find out the truth if they didn't go looking, or didn't have the resources.
Unfortunately for the demon, Castiel had gone looking. And he most certainly had the resources. Heaven's Record House contained extensive information on nigh on everything in the universe, including the histories of Earth's more… colorful inhabitants.
The file on Crowley hadn't been hard to find. In fact, it looked as if it had been read quite recently, which wasn't surprising, considering that, until a few weeks ago, the Record House had been held by Raphael's forces, and Raphael was nothing if not thorough in his intelligence gathering. Castiel imagined that the archangel had been trying to figure out whether or not he could get Crowley on his side. The King of Hell would be a useful asset.
The file itself, however, had been anything but useful. Oh, it had plenty of information, but none of it was what Castiel wanted. It seemed that Crowley was a perfectly normal, if ambitious demon. As a human, he'd been a tailor, and had sold his soul to gain the attention of the woman he desired. He hadn't been a _horrible_ man, but he certainly hadn't been a nice one, either, and once the hounds had gotten him, nobody had missed him all that much. He didn't last long on the rack before giving in, and it didn't take long for him to become a demon after that. He'd gone into the crossroads division, but he'd only really become noticeable in late 1990 or so, when he began to rise to prominence. He became King of the Crossroads by '93.
To sum up, though Crowley wasn't exactly an average demon, he didn't come from remarkable stock, either.
But Castiel had refused to give up. There was something off about Crowley, he just knew it! The hissing in particular stuck in his mind. So, on a whim, he'd looked up major events of 1990, just to see if there was anything there to find.
And was there ever!
He'd almost overlooked it. The file had been pushed back behind several others and looked rather like it hadn't been touched since the day it was made. Nonetheless, he'd picked it up and thumbed through it, slowing down once he realized exactly what he held in his hands.
Here it was. The information he'd been looking for.
Apparently, the Apocalypse last year hadn't been the first attempt.
Castiel actually had to sit down as he read through everything, which frustrated him to no end, because he was an angel, and angels weren't supposed to have emotional reactions like this. But he couldn't help it. Did Heaven never learn? If the Apocalypse was meant to happen, it _would have happened already! _And it seemed that this first time, the event had been averted almost easily. The account wasn't particularly detailed (7), but it was quite clear in saying who'd been involved. According to this, the Antichrist, one Adam Young, had simply decided that he'd rather not go through with the whole thing. And an angel named Aziraphale, a demon named Crowley, and a small band of humans had stood with him. (8)
Castiel's eyes widened as he read Aziraphale's name. He'd known this angel, and though they hadn't been particularly close, he liked to think that they'd been friends. Of course, once the Principality had been reassigned to Earth, Castiel hadn't been able to see him anymore, but he still held affection for the former guard of Eden.
The execution order infuriated him. It was all he could do to not throw something at the wall. (9)
With difficulty, he tore his eyes away from that particular sheet of paper and sifted through the rest, searching for something on the Crowley mentioned here. When he found it, though, it wasn't exactly what he was expecting. His eyes flew across the page, seeking something, _anything_, that would link this demon with the one he knew. Something that would prove that his hunch had been right.
The words flashed through his mind:
_Serpent of Eden…_
_Original sin…_
_Tempter…_
_First Demon_
_Arrangement…_
When he came to that one, he slowed and went back, rereading the phrase.
_Upon further investigation, it would appear that the demon made some sort of Arrangement with the angel Aziraphale in which they co-existed in relative peace, and they may even have been romantically involved._
Well, that explained Crowley's aversion to the word, if Aziraphale had been killed. Castiel frowned and continued to read.
_After Aziraphale was eliminated in September of 1990, the Serpent disappeared, despite our best efforts to locate him. It is our belief that Hell took care of him._
The file ended there, and Castiel closed it with a snap. Late 1990. Well, that settled it, didn't it? Knowing Crowley, he'd probably had an alternate identity set up for a while before the events of the Apocalypse. After Aziraphale's death, he'd put it to good use, disappearing so far into the bureaucracy of Hell that no one could find him, not even Heaven.
The Crowleys were the same.
Castiel stood, carefully placing the file back where he found it. So, he had the information he wanted. But what to do with it now?
_That, _he thought, grimly, _is going to have to wait. _For now, he was needed on the battlefield. (10)
xXx
(1)- Except, you know, when he was being chased by possessed trucks. That was the exact opposite of peaceful.
(2)- Even if it _was_ an ugly piece of work.
(3)- Perhaps not the most apt comparison, as the majority of puppies have 'guilt' set as their default setting. It's why cats can get away with almost anything.
(4)- He heard the other guy go, "Oh, dear," in the background, but made an executive decision to ignore him.
(5)- Unnoticed by anyone, some grass by the side of the road straightened. The fact is, plants everywhere are incredibly lucky that Aziraphale has a kind, gentle heart. If he didn't, and he decided to take up gardening (5.5), he'd be worse than Crowley.
(5.5)- Not that he would. He's fairly certain that he's terrible at it. (And there's a long story there involving nuns, Nazis, and potted hydrangeas.)
(6)- About ten minutes later, a blue-box shaped spaceship landed beside the car, and a bow-tie wearing alien jumped out and stole all the engine parts, muttering about a pond and a Roman and their stupid vehicle the entire time. After he'd dismantled the motor, the alien then hopped back in his ship, and the box disappeared.
The car went on to blow up.
(7)- Which was a bit weird. Honestly, it almost seemed like Heaven had wanted to forget the whole thing happened.
(8)- And then, apparently, Heaven had decided to send down a Metatron impersonator to deal with them all. The idea, really, was laughable. The original Metatron wouldn't have been able to do anything, so why had they thought that a fake one would make a difference?
(9)- Heaven's Record House was located in someone's heaven after all, and she probably wouldn't take very kindly to it being damaged by a Seraph's temper tantrum.
(10)- The word 'field' being used in a very loose way. Heaven isn't all that much like a field, really.
**A/N: So, things are looking up, right? The brothers are back in business, and Castiel knows who Crowley is (and that's going to be a weird conversation, let me tell you). Of course, things are going to go horribly wrong in just a few chapters, so, enjoy the bliss while you can.**
**Next Chapter: In which solutions to Cas' Heavenly Problem are discussed, Aziraphale picks the worst possible time to step outside, and Cas decides to also ship A/C.**
**Or: In which Aziraphale and Crowley come face to face.**
**Yes, you read that right.**
**Too bad you have to wait a week for it.**
**(runs and hides with the penguins)**
9. Chapter 9
SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
"So, what the hell are we gonna do about it then?" Bobby asked, raising his eyebrows at the group.
They were a motley assortment, Sam observed, sitting in Bobby's living room. Dean sat by his side on the couch, as if he was going to disappear if they moved too far apart. Bobby leaned forward over his desk, apparently waiting for an answer to his question. And Aziraphale sat cross-legged on the floor, seemingly engrossed in some ancient text that no one had ever managed to decipher. (1)
"I honestly haven't the slightest," the angel finally stated, with an air of hopelessness. Indeed, when he glanced up, his blue eyes were dull. "I'm afraid I never really had to think about what could defeat an archangel. I haven't had contact with any of them in years, besides Gabriel, and he was never so annoying that we plotted to kill him." He turned his attention back to his book. "I'm just having a hard time imagining that Raphael would do such a thing in the first place." He sighed. "I mean, I knew that Heaven wanted the Apocalypse, but enough to start a civil war?"
Sam's question of, "You knew Gabriel?", and Bobby's of, "Who's _we_?", was overridden by Dean's, "Yeah, well, welcome to our world."
Aziraphale laughed, the sound hollow. "I don't like your world very much."
Sam winced in sympathy. _It must be hard on him, _he thought, _to be gone for two decades and then be put back into a world that's so..._different _from the one he left. _In a way, he could relate; though he certainly hadn't been dead for twenty years, he'd still come back to a changed world. The civil war in Heaven proved that. And speaking of..."Why don't we call Cas?" he voiced. "I mean, I'm sure he didn't give you every last detail, Dean, and it's hard to form a strategy if you don't know the enemy."
"We can try. I got the impression that he's pretty busy, but…" Dean trailed off, but Bobby gestured for him to continue, and even Aziraphale set aside his book. He frowned and raised his eyes skyward. "Fine, okay, I pray to Cas to get his angelic ass down here (2), because we need him and… yeah, guys, I really don't think he's-"
"Hello Dean."
Sam nearly jumped out of his seat at the angel's sudden entrance into the middle of the room. Beside him, his brother had the same reaction. "Geez, Cas!"
Cas cocked his head. "Did you not call for me?" Those piercing blue eyes turned toward Sam. "Oh, hello Sam," he greeted, sounding vaguely surprised.
Sam sighed. "Hey Cas," he stated. "How've-" That was as far as he got before he was interrupted.
"Castiel!" Aziraphale exclaimed, rising to his feet and sounding pleased as punch, which was, all things considered, a very nice turnabout from only a moment before. (3) "My goodness! I thought that maybe, when they were saying _Cas, _but… Well, it _has _been a long time, hasn't it?" To the surprise of everyone present (4), he neatly stepped over his book and wrapped Cas in a tight hug.
Also to the surprise of everyone present (5), the hug was instantly returned.
However, when the two finally stepped back from each other, Aziraphale was instantly subjected to Cas' I-Am-Confused™ look. "Aziraphale," he stated, his brow furrowed. "It _is _good to see you, but… I learned recently that you had been killed?"
Aziraphale nodded. "Well, yes, I was, nasty business, that, but apparently, Father thinks that I've still got work to do. Or something like that, anyway. We didn't really talk."
"I… well." Cas seemed to have no idea how to respond to that. Sam didn't either.
"I know. He's being even more cryptic than usual, isn't he?" Aziraphale beamed. "Really, though, it is absolutely brilliant to see you again. Six thousand years is just far too long."
Sam cleared his throat. "So, you two know each other then?"
"Oh, yes, I've actually known Castiel since he was a fledgling, and Gabriel took him to visit the Garden, and he-"
"Please, let's not go into that," Cas interrupted, looking for all the world like an embarrassed teenager. (6) He turned his attention to Dean. "I assume there is, in fact, a reason that you called for me? If we could discuss it, I do have an army to manage, and another battle seems to be looming."
"Right," Dean started. "We're trying to see if there was anything that we've got that we could use against your mutant turtle problem."
Cas furrowed his brow. "I don't have a problem involving mutated repti-"
"He means Raphael," Sam cut in. "And we want to know what we can do to help."
The blue-eyed angel shifted in place, looking uncomfortable. "There really isn't anything," he admitted, hands spread wide in defeat. "I… there's really no weapon that could permanently kill Raphael, except for an archangel blade, and obviously, there are none available."
"Well, what about Raphael's?" Bobby suggested. "Can't you try to get his offa him?"
It was Aziraphale who answered this one. "To attempt such a thing would be suicide," he informed the group gravely. "Raphael would crush him before he got the opportunity. Archangels guard their blades zealously."
"Exactly," Cas agreed. "And, obviously, we can't get to Michael's or Lucifer's, and Lucifer likely took Gabriel's blade with him, rather than leave it for someone else to claim."
Sam noted that at this, Aziraphale got a thoughtful look on his face. He decided not to comment, though. Whatever it was, the angel would share it in due time.
"So, what are you saying, we should just sit here?" Dean exploded. "Dude, there is no way that we're just leaving you out to dry!"
Cas stared at the man hesitantly. "Well, if you'd be willing, I believe that Cr-"
"No! No way! We are not bringing that slimy son of a bitch into this! It's bad enough that you made a deal with him, Cas, but we're not going to talk to him or summon him or whatever it is you want to do!"
Cas didn't take kindly to this.
As the pair stared each other down, Aziraphale turned to Sam. "Who are they talking about?" he murmured.
"You know how, on the way here, Dean said that Cas told him that he'd made a demon deal? With the King of Hell?" Sam trailed off, gesturing at the two. Aziraphale's eyes widened, and the expression on his face was funny enough that Sam couldn't help but chuckle. "Yeah. This is our life."
"I really don't think I like your life."
"I really don't like it either."
"Dean!" Cas finally broke the staring contest, and everyone in the room froze. Sam raised his eyebrows. Cas almost never lost his temper with his brother, the last memorable time being when Dean had tried to go and say yes to Michael. "I realize that you neither trust nor like him. _I don't either_. But thus far, he has been nothing but helpful to me, and there have been _no traps. _Believe me, I have been looking, and there are none!" Seeing the expression on Dean's face (7), he backed off a bit, folding his arms over his chest in a decidedly human gesture. "Besides, I recently discovered some information that I need to discuss with him." And was it Sam's imagination, or did his eyes slide over to Aziraphale as he said this?
"Fine," Dean gritted out. "But if he tries _anything…_" He left the threat hanging. After all, there was no need to continue. They all knew what would happen to the demon if he made a wrong move.
Aziraphale cleared his throat, scuffing his feet on the floor. "Pardon, but, ah… well, would you mind terribly if I waited outside for this bit?" he inquired. "It's just… ah, I'm not particularly eager to meet the King of Hell."
"Sure, go ahead. It's probably not a good idea for him to know about you anyway," Sam agreed. Though, as he said this, and as Aziraphale left to sit on the front porch, he observed that Cas seemed to want to object. Sam frowned. Why would he want Aziraphale to be anywhere near Crowley?
_What does he know that we don't?_
xXx
Devil's Traps. Crowley hated them.
Not, of course, that he couldn't escape from one if he _really _wanted to. It would take time, and more effort than was worth it, but as a Fallen Angel (8), only a circle of Holy Fire could properly contain him.
But still. The bloody things were annoying. Especially when he was summoned into one.
Especially when it was this fellow doing the summoning.
"Bobby Singer," he greeted, as cordially as he could force himself to be. "What a pleasant surprise. Pining for my company are we?" He lifted an eyebrow, taking in the others present: Moose, Squirrel, and The-Little-Angel-That-Could. None of them looked particularly happy, not that this was a shock. "This isn't about your soul, is it?" he asked. "Because I gave that back months ago."
"We need to know how to kill an archangel," Dean stated, blunt as ever.
So that was the way the wind was blowing, was it?
Crowley sighed. "Why am I not surprised? Look, Castiel," he said, focusing on the angel, "I know we said I'd look into it, but that was _yesterday! _These things take time!"
"I realize that," Castiel stated quietly. "That's not what I want to talk to you about."
Three pairs of eyebrows went up, and the demon guessed that he hadn't told his pet hunters that juicy little tidbit. "Oh, is that so," he drawled. "Well, do share. I really don't have all day. Kingdom to run and all that."
Castiel narrowed his eyes and stepped forward a bit. "You're going to want to listen to this," he promised.
"All ears, sweetheart."
"Crawly."
He could see the three humans exchanging bewildered looks in the background, but that didn't matter. The name that Castiel had just uttered echoed in his brain. _Crawly. _No one had called him that in… "How," he began, cursing the slight shake in his voice, "the _hell _do you know about that?" And how _much _did he know? If it was only the name, maybe his cover was still safe. Maybe there was something salvageable about the situation. Maybe…
"It wasn't very difficult," Castiel replied, and bless it all if the angel didn't look _smug!_ He hadn't even known that angels were _capable _of feeling smugness! "You dropped more than enough hints, even if you didn't realize you were doing it." The angel cocked his head. "You _hissed _at me," he stated, as if that explained everything.
Well. There went his hopes that he hadn't noticed it.
"You hissed at me," Castiel continued, "you don't like the word 'arrangement', and then there was that other Apocalypse you mentioned." In the background, an odd expression dawned on Sam's face, his mouth making a small 'o'. What was that about? "In fact, the fact that you wanted so vehemently to stop the Apocalypse at all was a bit odd. Enough to get me curious, anyway." He paused, as if waiting for Crowley to say something, but all the demon could do was stare. Bloody Manchester, this was not good. "So, I visited Heaven's Record House. It took a while, but I found what I was looking for."
In that moment, the demon revised every single opinion he'd ever had about Castiel. He was a cruel, vindictive _bastard._
It was Squirrel who broke the silence. "Cas, what the hell are you talking about?" Moose shushed him with a quiet, "Dean."
Castiel turned halfway to regard the three humans, his enjoyment of moment written all over his face. "Dean, Sam, Bobby, may I introduce Anthony Crowley, the Serpent of Eden, and Inventor of Original Sin." Crowley's eyes widened. He really should stop him, he knew, but somehow, he couldn't get a single sound to come out. "An Angel who did not so much Fall as Saunter Vaguely Downwards."
There was silence after that revelation, in which the demon fished for words that weren't there, the humans all gawked, and the angel looked entirely too pleased with himself.
The silence lasted a good minute, until the demon finally regained his voice. "You bastard," he breathed, ignoring the way the lights were suddenly flickering. "You absolute _bastard. _Do you have any idea how bloody _long _it took to build up an identity? And now you've gone and… you've… do you have any _idea _what you've-" At that point, the closest light bulb exploded, and a large crack rent itself in the paint on the ceiling. Crowley stood there, breathing heavily and trying to get a handle on himself. It would not do to show weakness, or fear, or any emotion at all, really. Not here. Hunters, just like realtors, were sharks.
Castiel regarded him coolly. "May I continue?" he inquired. Crowley gaped at him.
"Why the hell not?" he finally managed. "It's not as if it's possible to do any more damage than you've already done."
"After you helped stop the Apocalypse in 1990 (9), there were assassination attempts made on both you and your close… friend. The one on your friend was successful, and so you went into hiding, burying yourself so deep that no one would find you. Not Heaven, not Hell, not even those you still wouldn't mind being around. And here you are, King of Hell, in a perfect position to do whatever you want to." He cocked his head. "Did I get all of that right?"
Crowley stared at him. "You know damn well that you did," he forced out, teeth clenched together. "You know _damn well_." And how dare he? How _dare _he stand there and reveal his past to the _Winchesters_ of all people, how dare he even _mention _ Aziraphale? Didn't he realize the consequences this would have?
He had half a mind to kill all four of them right here and now. The secret would stay secret that way.
But he knew that he wouldn't. Not only did he need them to save the world, he knew that Aziraphale wouldn't have wanted him to. Aziraphale would have been _horrified _that he'd even considered it_. _And even now, after twenty years, he still couldn't bring himself to do anything that would have horrified his angel. After all, wasn't that why he'd gone into Crossroads in the first place? It honestly wasn't too different from what he once was. Technically, he was still tempting people, still bringing souls into Hell, and really, he wasn't hurting people to do it. Directly, anyway. He certainly wasn't killing!
The voice of the Moose brought him out of his thoughts. "Cas, doesn't that mean that he's…"
Castiel nodded. What were they on about now? "Yes, he is," he replied. He turned to regard Crowley. "There is someone on the front porch that I think you should meet." He tilted his head toward the ceiling. "The trap is broken, after all."
"And why," Crowley snapped, voice icy, "would I want to do that?"
It was Sam who answered. "You're going to want to," he stated. His eyes were wide, and he looked rather like a deer in the headlights. (10) Crowley scowled. Honestly, he wanted nothing more than to just snap away, but now, his curiosity was piqued. With a thought, he teleported to just outside of the front door, masking the sound of his wing beats out of habit.
xXx
"Do you think he'll actually…?"
"Yes, I believe so. He's curious now."
"Thank goodness. The way Aziraphale talked about him earlier was… I can't believe it's _Crowley_, though."
"I'm having a bit of trouble with it myself. Though, you didn't hear the hissing."
"Would somebody tell me what the _hell _is going on?"
Bobby ignored them all.
xXx
They stood on the front porch, face to face. It was a bit of an odd sight, for anyone who might have been watching. Two men, one dressed all in black, and the other much lighter, staring at each other, one looking as if he was facing Satan himself (11), and the other looking as if he was seeing a ghost.
He might as well have been.
"Oh, ah, hello there," the angel stated nervously. "You, ah, well, ah, I suppose that you're, ah, the King of Hell? Oh, dear."
Crowley could only stare.
"You're a bit shorter than I was expecting, I suppose," the angel rambled on, apparently encouraged by his silence. "No offense meant or anything. But, ah, most of the demons I've known are, well, a bit taller."
Crowley found his voice.
"I hope you don't mind."
"Oh, no, I don't-"
The angel cut himself off.
He blinked: once, twice.
He pinched himself.
Crowley couldn't bring himself to speak again, somehow afraid that the being in front of him would disappear if he did.
But he didn't have to.
"Crowley?" Aziraphale whispered, his voice small and tremulous. "Is that… Is that you?"
The King of Hell let out a shuddering breath. "Yeah, angel," he whispered. "It's me."
xXx
(1)- It was written in old Finnish, actually, though Aziraphale didn't actually have to translate any of it. He'd helped to write it, after all, and angels have very good memories.
(2)- Sam noted that at this point, Aziraphale looked as if he wanted to protest the wording of the prayer. He really couldn't blame him.
(3)- Even if Sam was vaguely certain that no one ever said 'pleased as punch' anymore. It was probably a good thing he didn't say it out loud; Dean never would've let him hear the end of it.
(4)- Including Cas.
(5)- Excluding Cas, but counting Dean twice.
(6)- As well he should have. The story involved a flaming sword, a flaming bush, a flaming archangel, and a doubled-over-laughing Serpent.
(7)- Somewhere between terrified and belligerent/angry.
(8)- Sauntered Angel, truthfully, but that just didn't have the same ring to it.
(9)- At this, several things went on in the background. Dean's resounding, "What the HELL?!" was most audible, Sam's "But that makes him..." considerably less so. Bobby, at this point, decided to put his head down on his desk and pretend that he was alone in his house.
(10)- Or a pedestrian realizing that maybe stepping out in front of the Bentley wasn't the best idea ever.
(11)- Which he'd done before.
**A/N: Okay, okay. (grimaces) I said that they'd be meeting in this chapter, but I never said that they'd be **_**talking**_ **in this chapter. I'm afraid that I may have given the wrong impression, thus the super early post to make up for it. (smiles hopefully) Truth is, that's really the best cut off point for this chapter- doing it after their talk makes the whole thing a little… awkward. Cos' that's when the action starts. So, that's my excuse, don't kill me, please.**
…
**Next Chapter (which should hopefully be sometime around this weekend, maybe a few days after): In which Crowley and Aziraphale talk for the first time in twenty years, Raphael makes a dick move, and Sam is stalked by a song.**
**Oh, and I've hit 50 reviews! When I first started this story, I had no idea if anyone was going to want to read it. I didn't know if **_**I **_**was going to want to read it. So thank you** _**so**_ **much for your support, it really means a lot to me.**
10. Chapter 10
SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
"_Crowley?" Aziraphale whispered, his voice small and tremulous. "Is that… Is that you?"_
_The King of Hell let out a shuddering breath. "Yeah, angel," he whispered. "It's me."_
xXx
Crowley was possessing someone.
Vaguely, Aziraphale knew that of all the things that he could choose to fix his thoughts on, this was the least significant. But he couldn't get it out of his head.
Oh, he'd seen Crowley possess people before. There had been one particularly memorable Incident back in the 14th century with… well, now was hardly the time for that. (1) But those occurrences had never lasted long, and were usually only born out of desperation. (2) The angel couldn't recall the last time that Crowley had abandoned his own body out of choice.
Yet, here he was, in flesh that clearly did not belong to him, even if it apparently no longer belonged to anyone else either. The question escaped him before he could think better of it. "Who else was in there with you?" he asked, and it sounded cold, far colder than he'd meant it to be.
Crowley's look of astonishment and disbelief (and joy?) swiftly melted away, only to be replaced with one of anger and hurt. "He was brain dead before I hopped in," he bit out, glaring. "And before you ask, no, he didn't have any family either. No one misses a moderately successful literary agent."
Aziraphale couldn't stop himself from bristling at the tone. "Well, pardon me, your _Majesty_," he stated, returning his stare with equal intensity. Crowley flinched back as if struck. "So it _is _you," the angel pressed. "_You're _the King of Hell. And here I thought I knew you." Anger bubbled up in him as he said the words, banishing the feelings of how _good _and _relieving _it was to see the demon again. Because the Crowley he'd once known, the Crowley that he'd been expecting to find, would never have been capable of the evil it surely took to gain that position. Now, though, he could practically feel the dark aura surrounding him, the horrible, unfamiliar power.
So arose the question: had he ever really known the demon at all?
He voiced it.
Crowley's eyes snapped to his, unfamiliar brown (he must have been suppressing their natural gold color for some reason) burning with an emotion that Aziraphale couldn't identify. "Of course you know me," he stated, his voice lower and raspier than the angel remembered it being. "We've known each other for thousands of years! We've-" The demon cut himself off, hands clenching and unclenching at his sides. "Angel," he began again, his tone almost pleading now, "I thought you were _dead._" The last word was said so quietly that Aziraphale nearly didn't catch it.
"I was," he replied, just as softly, but caught himself. He had to remember: This was the King of Hell that he was dealing with. The Crowley he once knew could very well be gone. "And tell me," he continued icily, "how long did you wait after my demise to make your power play? Or was it in the making even before then?"
Crowley opened and closed his mouth several times. "Angel-"
"_Don't_," he interrupted, "lie to me, Crowley."
It was a moment before Crowley spoke, and when he did, it wasn't what the angel had been expecting. "Are you seriously," he choked, "suggesting that your death meant nothing to me?" He laughed hysterically, and Aziraphale resisted the urge to put out a hand to steady him. "I… I _found _you in your bookshop, Aziraphale, I found your bloody, broken body under a bookshelf, and your wings were… they were…" He broke off, making a choking sound in the back of his throat. "Even your spectacles were broken," he went on, albeit with obvious difficulty. "I couldn't… I couldn't… I couldn't _stay _there any longer, angel. Without you, I had no reason to… to…" He stopped again, regarding Aziraphale with wide eyes. For once, his expression was completely open; Aziraphale hadn't seen him that vulnerable since before the events of the Apocalypse-That-Really-Wasn't. (3) "Did… Did you honestly think that I'd still be there? As if nothing had ever happened at all? What, was I just supposed to… to forget?"
Aziraphale's heart clenched at the raw tone in Crowley's voice, and he failed miserably in holding back the tide of guilt that swept through him. No, he hadn't thought of it like that, and it was beginning to look as if he might have misjudged the situation terribly. Maybe.
Crowley stepped forward. "Don't you dare," he said, pointing a trembling finger at him, "don't you dare think that I was… I mourned you every damn day for the past twenty years, Aziraphale. It that doesn't mean something, then I don't know what does." Two steps more, and he'd covered the distance between them. Aziraphale was frozen in place, though he knew that he should probably be stepping back. This was the _King of Hell, _for goodness sake! Evil incarnate! It wasn't Crowley anymore, it couldn't be! Crowley wouldn't…
And yet, Aziraphale had known for a long time that he was the force that tempered the demon. Without him, he wasn't sure what Crowley was and wasn't capable of. He certainly wouldn't put it past him to seek revenge on Heaven for his assassination, and ruling Hell happened to put him in the perfect decision to do so.
So… what conclusion was he supposed to draw here?
He was broken out of his thoughts as Crowley pressed something into his hand. His eyes widened fractionally as he realized what it was.
A feather. It was a feather.
It was his feather.
"Oh," he murmured faintly, bringing it to eye level, "yes. Hester tore this out. Yes." He turned the plume slowly. The afternoon light did not reflect off of it; in fact, it was so worn down that if he hadn't known that the original color was white, he wouldn't have been able to guess it. He lifted his gaze to meet Crowley's. "You kept this?" he asked, in awe. "You've kept this with you for twenty years?"
Cautiously, Crowley nodded.
Aziraphale didn't hesitate before reaching forward and pulling Crowley into a warm embrace.
Crowley didn't hesitate before hugging back.
"Oh, my dear," Aziraphale sobbed, and when had he started crying? He couldn't remember. "Oh, my dear, I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have… oh, do forgive me, I shouldn't have doubted you, Crowley."
" 'S okay, angel," Crowley muttered, voice somewhat muffled due to the fact that his face was buried in the angel's shoulder. "Just…" He pulled back, brown eyes scanning Aziraphale's face. "Just don't die again, alright?" he demanded with a sudden desperation.
And in that moment, with Crowley staring at him like he was the entire world, Aziraphale knew that this was how it was meant to be. This was still his Crowley, and perhaps he was different now, darker, but that didn't matter because he was _right here_. And the angel planned to keep it that way. So, really, there was only one thing to say. "I won't, I promise." He tried for a watery smile. "We make quite the pair, don't we? Bawling like small children."
"I have no idea what you're talking about," the demon sniffed, hurriedly swiping at his eyes. "I am _not _crying."
"Whatever you say, dear. I-" (4)
Aziraphale was interrupted by a resounding crash from inside the house.
xXx
Dean was more than a little bit frustrated.
Mostly, it was because things had been going so damn _well _for the past ten minutes. Relatively speaking anyway. He'd just gotten done telling Cas about why it is not cool to leave someone's soul in Hell, and Cas had just gotten done having a little freak-out session and apologizing to Sam, and Sam had just gotten done forgiving Cas, and Bobby had just gotten done informing them all that they were 'idgits'. As if this was news.
Things had been looking up. (5)
Then, an angel burst in, and it all went to hell.
This, Dean realized very quickly, was not one of the good guys. Within the span of a moment, he, Sam, and Bobby had been pushed up against a wall, and a lamp had been knocked over. The angel attempted to do the same to Cas, and for a terrifying moment, it looked like it might actually work, that this son of a bitch was stronger than Cas.
But Cas gritted his teeth and held his ground, and Dean would have been cheering if the force pushing him to the wall would just let him _breathe. _Beside him, he could tell that Bobby and Sam were having the same problem. _Come on, Cas. Take out this bastard, _he silently urged, and Cas' eyes darted to him, obviously hearing his sort-of prayer. He nodded at the hunter, and the angel blade dropped from his sleeve.
"Castiel," the other angel drawled. "I was not expecting to find you here." He held up his own blade and took on a threatening stance. The lack of air was the only thing that stopped Dean from making a comment on the fact that only douchebags say cliches like that.
"Then who _were_ you expecting to find?" Cas replied, slowly advancing. "You should not have been able to find the Winchesters. They are protected."
Yeah, how _had _that happened? The rib sigils should have stopped any angels besides Cas from finding them. Ever.
"This is not about your precious mud monkeys." The angel darted forward, and the two exchanged a series of rapid blows that left Dean's head spinning. Though, that might just have been the oxygen deprivation. "We seek the demon Crowley."
_Son of a bitch!_
If Crowley had led this dick here, there was going to be a problem. This problem would be resolved with the Colt. Dean tried to avoid thinking about the fact that if the bastard really was a fallen angel, or whatever, the bullets might not work, just like what happened with Lucifer.
And now he was going to stop thinking about that. The burning in his lungs was making it hard to concentrate anyway.
"What do you want with Crowley?" Cas demanded. "Or rather, what does Raphael want with Crowley?"
"The King of Hell would be a useful asset."
"I realize that. What makes you think he would help you?"
The angel smiled. "What makes you think he wouldn't? He will join our side, believe me. After all, what is the alternative?" Suddenly, in a move so fast that Dean couldn't make it out (6), the angel lunged forward and brought his blade down upon Cas'.
Cas' sword dropped to the floor with a clatter.
"Because it looks very much like you are about to lose," the angel finished, advancing on Castiel, who was rapidly backing up, but just as rapidly finding out that there was nowhere to back up to.
_No, no, no, no, no. C'mon, Cas, pull something out of your hat._
Blue eyes met Dean's. "But I do not have a-"
Several things happened at once.
The angel lunged.
Cas threw up his arms, as if that would do any good.
Dean's heart leapt into his throat. Cas could just teleport out of here, he knew, but he also knew that his friend wouldn't abandon them to the mercy of this angel, even if it meant his death. He opened his mouth in a silent… something. A scream? A shout? Yelled profanities? He wasn't sure. It was getting really, really hard to think coherently now.
Then: one second before the blade would have sliced open Cas' chest, the homicidal angel flew backward to hit the wall, and the pressure holding Dean finally relented. He collapsed to the floor; beside him, he could hear Sam and Bobby doing the same. Not that he really cared at the moment. He was too busy reveling in the fact that he could _breathe _again.
"I wouldn't go count on that yet, sweetheart." Crowley's voice sounded as if it was coming through a long tunnel. "Looks to me like he's doing a halfway decent job. Even if he does spend too much time with his boy toy."
That comment was enough to warrant his attention. He blinked the spots out of his vision, and Dean finally felt as if he could move without hacking up a lung. He stood up, taking in the scene in front of him.
Crowley stood in the center of the living room, his stance screaming casualness. But there was an underlying tension to him- it was obvious in the tightness of his eyes, and… damn. Was his suit actually rumpled? Regardless of that, though, he was holding the angel to the wall with apparent ease and staring him down, eyes narrowed.
"You…You are Crowley?" The angel trailed off (7), eyes flicking between Crowley and Cas and back to Crowley again. "You are working for Castiel?" He sounded shocked, as if he hadn't even considered this possibility. To be fair, Dean wouldn't have considered it possible either, if he hadn't heard it out of Cas' own mouth.
Mental note: remember to explain to Cas why demon deals aren't a good Plan A. Even if it seemed like this one wasn't turning out too badly.
"In tangent with," the demon corrected. "Slightly diagonal to." He sniffed, looking the angel up and down with disdain. "Even if I weren't, I wouldn't be caught dead in Raphael's vicinity. He's got this annoying habit of killing demons he doesn't like." He lifted an eyebrow. "And since he doesn't like anything, well, I'm staying away unless someone manages to get that stick out of his ass. I'm not an idiot."
"That's debatable," Aziraphale murmured. With a start, Dean realized that the angel was standing a few steps behind the demon. He seemed a bit nervous, eyes darting between Crowley and the captive angel, and perhaps he looked a bit affronted by Crowley's word choice, but in regards to the demon himself, he appeared to be completely comfortable. _Huh. Cas was actually right about those two, _he thought absently. _Weird._
"You're not helping," Crowley snapped back, though it lacked any real bite. "And it's really not."
At this, Aziraphale coughed something that sounded suspiciously like '_lost the Antichrist' ._ Crowley turned an interesting shade of purple.
"You are seriously not helping!" he snapped again, turning his attention back to the captive angel, who, Dean noted, had been watching the exchange with bemusement. He couldn't blame him; this whole new Crowley/Aziraphale dynamic was bizarre. Looking around, he noticed that Sam and Cas didn't seem confused at all, which didn't surprise him all that much, but Bobby's expression bordered on total bewilderment. Dean figured that as long as at least one other person had no idea what was going on, he'd be okay.
"You… who are you?" the angel asked, directing the question to Aziraphale, and bringing Dean's attention back to the conversation.
"_I'll _be asking the questions, if you don't mind," Crowley replied. "Now, how did you-"
"You're Aziraphale," the angel realized. "The Principality. I recognize your grace. But you are meant to be dead."
Crowley began to glare bloody murder, and Aziraphale's eyes widened. Dean was almost tempted to warn this angel to _just shut up. _Because getting Crowley pissed? Not a good idea.
"Any other clever little comments you'd like to add?" the demon snarked. "While you still can? Or maybe something useful?"
The angel narrowed his eyes. "I will never betray Raphael! Never! He will emerge victorious! His is the Way, the One Way, the Path that our Father decr-"
Suddenly, there was a bright flash of light, and the angel's wings became an interesting addition to the wallpaper. Dean blinked, watching as Crowley stepped back, pulling the blade (he must have picked it up from where Cas dropped it) back out of the angel's chest, the empty vessel slumping to the floor. All eyes were on him- the humans' gazes were mostly apathetic, and Cas' a bit disapproving, but Aziraphale's was just shocked. "What?" he snapped. "He was starting to monologue!"
Dean shrugged. "He's got a point."
"Dean." That was Sam. Apparently, he didn't see the point.
"He could have given us more information, Crowley," Cas muttered at the same time. "Such as how they tracked you."
"He was monologuing. That's not useful information. He probably didn't know anything anyway!" Crowley glared. "And it's really not all that hard to track a summoning spell. If you didn't want anyone to pick up on it, you _should have just called!_" The last few words were said in… well, not quite a shout, but something pretty close, and Dean guessed that he was only toning it down for Aziraphale's sake.
"We didn't know that it could be tracked," he started, stepping forward, "so why don't you just-"
"Did you have to kill him, though?" Aziraphale interrupted quietly. "Couldn't you just have…"
Dean fell silent, not wanting to touch that one with a ten foot pole. The fact was, he felt bad for the guy. He looked like he'd never had to see any real violence in his life, and while the hunter knew that that assumption probably wasn't all that accurate, he was sure that angels had never fought angels like this since Lucifer fell. It had to be a shock to come back to life and find a situation like this.
Crowley turned to face the angel, his expression softening a fraction of a degree. (8) "We're at war, Aziraphale," he told him, gentler than Dean would've thought possible. "I'm sorry, but in war, there are casualties. He wasn't on our side, angel, and he wasn't going to be."
"But-"
"It was a merciful death," Cas put in, though he avoided Aziraphale's eyes. "It wouldn't have ended in any better way."
Aziraphale didn't look very happy with this.
"Shaddup, all of you!" Bobby demanded suddenly. Dean glanced down; the older hunter still hadn't risen from his spot on the floor and was instead sitting crosslegged, face strained. "Do ya hear that?"
Everyone fell silent. Dean attempted to catch whatever it was that Bobby was listening to.
It was music.
Familiar music.
Beside him, Sam went pale. Slowly, as if in a trance, he pulled out his cell phone. The words UNKNOWN CALLER flashed in red letters on the screen, and the strains of the ringtone drifted through the air.
_It was the heat of the moment…_
xXx
(1)- Suffice it to say that in the centuries following this Incident, the demon had absolutely refused to discuss it, and in fact put his mind to hating the 14th century in general.
(2)- Or a rampaging herd of llamas. In Peru. _That_ had been interesting, though, to this day, Crowley claimed that this wasn't his fault.
(3)- A few weeks after it'd all happened, when it'd still been looking as if their Superiors had forgotten the whole thing, Aziraphale and Crowley had spent a whole afternoon getting completely plastered, then coming up with names for the event. Aziraphale's personal favorite was 'Armageddon't', as it was short, to the point, and easy to remember. Crowley took to calling it 'Adam's-Really-Big-But-Not-All-That-Important-In-The-End-Temper-Tantrum' .
It's probably worth restating that they were both really, really drunk at this point. If they'd been human, they would have died from alcohol poisoning.
(4)- To this day, no one knows what he was going to say, even him, because he has quite forgotten. It was likely nothing particularly profound, though, so it really doesn't matter.
(5)- If, of course, he was forgetting what Cas had just gotten done telling them about Crowley. _That_ was just weird, and he seriously didn't feel like working through all the implications of this new information.
(6)- Though, again, that might just have been the asphyxiation talking.
(7)- And here, Dean noted that _he_ didn't sound like he was having any trouble with breathing at all. That just wasn't right.
(8)- Okay, it was a little more than a fraction of a degree, but Dean thought that it was weird enough that his face was softening at all, so he was lucky to get any credit.
**A/N: Uhhh. Did I say… last weekend? Well… uhhhh…. heh heh heh. It's here now, though! Uhhh… don't kill me?**
**This one was a bear, though. I couldn't get the first scene right, then I couldn't get the second scene right, and it was just… uhg. And then I had an audition for chorus (which I made, yay!) and then it was my birthday (and, oddly enough, 14 doesn't feel all that different from 13), and everything was just all over the place.**
**Aaaaaaanyway, Next Chapter: In which we find out why Sam's been hearing this song everywhere (as if you haven't already figured it out), Team Free Will does research, and Raphael continues to be a dick.**
**Oh, and, by the way, did anyone catch my very small, subtle Mortal Instruments reference? Does anyone here **_**read**_ **Mortal Instruments? Anyone?**
11. Chapter 11
SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
Sam froze.
This, of course, was perfectly understandable. Even if he did look like a bit of an idiot to all those who were searching his face for some sort of reaction. (1)
What those watching him didn't see (2), though, was that his mind was running somewhere close to warp speed. The radio yesterday morning, that hadn't been anything to write home about. The car radio had been a weird coincidence, but nothing more than that. But this? This could no longer be considered normal.
Which, of course, meant that it was abnormal. Which, of course, also meant that it was supernatural. Of course.
And this song? It could only mean one being. As impossible as Sam had thought it was.
And it had been pretty impossible too. He and Dean had driven back to the motel to make sure that the archangel was actually dead. When they arrived, the motel had been ancient-looking, rotting and falling apart. Eventually, they'd found their way back to what was once the conference room, and, sure enough, they'd found him. Winged imprints and all.
They'd given him a hunter's burial. It had seemed only right, seeing as he'd given his life for them.
Now, though, it was starting to look as if that wasn't the case. Maybe it had never been the case at all.
"You gonna answer that, Sammy?" his brother finally prompted. Sam glanced at his face; it was impassive, but there was understanding in his eyes, and Sam felt a rush of gratitude. Even after knowing what he'd done, Dean still stuck by him. And he'd stick by him through this… whatever it turned out to be. Jerkily, Sam nodded, pressing his thumb to the blinking button.
Nothing happened. The song kept playing.
He tried again.
Same thing.
He looked up from the phone, his gaze desperately sweeping the room. Dean and Bobby both looked sympathetic, but puzzled, so they clearly had no idea what to do here. Cas and Crowley just looked confused, as neither of them knew what significance this song had. Then, his eyes fell on Aziraphale, who was staring at the phone hard enough to burn a hole in it. (3) "Sam," he said, voice low and urgent, "may I see that?" Sam handed it over without a word, glad to no longer be responsible for it, and hoping that the angel had some idea of what was going on.
Crowley forked an eyebrow. "Do you have _any _idea how to work that?" he questioned dryly, clearly expecting a negative answer.
Aziraphale shot him a look. "Yes, dear, I have figured out the basics." He turned his attention back to the object. "I haven't the slightest idea what this… Candy Crush thing is, but I know how to make a call. Though-" Another look was sent. "-I would very much like to have your number. I did not enjoy that horrible 'call failed' message I got."
"Wait, wh-"
"Ah ha!" the angel shouted. Sam peered at the phone in his hand. It didn't look much different, and the Song (4) continued to play. He raised an eyebrow, and Aziraphale hurried to explain. "I've been thinking on it ever since it played in the car," he began. "See, there was just something a bit… _off _I could sense about it." He raised a hand defensively at Sam's look of astonishment. "I didn't bring it up because from what you'd told me earlier, I didn't think that it was possible. But here it is again." He turned his attention back to the phone, which was starting to, oddly enough, glow, presumably as Aziraphale worked some angel mojo on it. "Listen."
Sam listened, at first, unable to discern exactly what he was supposed to be listening to. But then, between the slight gaps between the words, he heard it.
_-nights you sit -_ -lo? _-beside the phone -_ Pick up the- _What were the things_ -damn phone!- _you wanted for-_
Sam knew that voice, as staticky and Song-overridden as it was. He had very, very mixed feelings about that voice.
"Hang on," Aziraphale muttered. "Let me see if I can get a better connection." Slowly, the Song faded away into the background, leaving a paler, but pleased-looking Aziraphale, a brightly glowing smartphone, and a voice that Sam really hadn't expected to ever hear again.
"Y'know, it's rude to hold out on a guy like this. I mean, seriously, you don't pick up my calls, you don't answer my letters, you don't acknowledge my existence, or… Why am I even bothering? I mean, it's not like I've got the power to connect properly right now, so you can't hear me anyway-"
"I believe you underestimate the ingenuity of those present here, brother," Cas broke the silence. "We hear you… uh… loud and clear?" At this, he glanced over at Dean, as if to make sure he got the phrase right, and Sam smiled, despite the situation. Typical Cas.
There was silence on the other end of the line, and then: "It's about damn time, then! What took you so long?"
It was at this point that Sam found his voice. And his annoyance. Any grateful thoughts he may have been entertaining toward the archangel flew out the window. "How about the fact that instead of calling like a normal person, you stalked me with a friggin' song!"
Nothing but static replied to that. Aziraphale frowned, shaking the phone. (5) The glow encasing it intensified slightly, and Gabriel's voice filtered back through the white noise. "-don't exactly have my phone on me right now, and Holy Fire isn't helping the connection any, so you're lucky to get that much!"
Everyone exchanged worried glances, and with no small effort, Sam pushed back his irritation, opting instead to focus on the matter at hand. After all, the mention of Holy Fire could only mean one thing.
"Hello? You still there?" the archangel's voice came again, though he was becoming less and less audible by the second. "Hello?"
Aziraphale was the first to recover. "Yes, Gabriel, we're still here," he replied. "What's this about Holy Fire, then?"
There was silence on the other end of the line for a full three seconds. (6) "Wait a sec, Aziraphale?" He sounded completely flabbergasted, and Sam made a mental note of it, as it is generally difficult to surprise an ancient celestial being, and it was not likely to happen again anytime soon. "I thought you were dead, bro!"
"I was, and to be fair, we thought the same of you." Aziraphale sighed, and Sam got the distinct impression that he was accustomed to dealing with the archangel. "Now, Gabriel, is there any way that you can strengthen this connection? I'm beginning to have a bit of trouble holding it up at this end."
Gabriel laughed dryly, and Sam realized that it actually did sound _dry_, as if his throat was severely dehydrated. "That might be at my end, actually. It's taking a lot out of me to use any power at all right now."
"Ah. Holy Fire?"
"Yeah. Long story short, I met up with Raph, he got the drop on me, and… well, let's just say that he didn't approve of the side I took during the Apocalypse. Thus… am."
Sam's eyes widened at the break in the words, and he glanced at Aziraphale in alarm. "What? You're starting to break up," he cut in, brow furrowing. If they lost the connection now…
"...said… here I…" Suddenly, a bout of violent coughing was heard over the line, and then… nothing but static. Aziraphale passed the phone back to Sam, and he took it on instinct, his mind a million miles away, thoughts bouncing around in no particular order.
_We lost the connection._
_Geez, he sounded pretty bad at the end there._
_We don't know where he is._
_We should probably try to rescue him._
_But we don't know where he is!_
_How the _hell _is this even _remotely _helpful to the situation?_
"So…" Dean's voice broke him out of his thoughts. "What exactly just happened?"
"It's quite simple, really. There's this thing called a phone, which you may have heard of, and what it does is-"
"Shut up, Crowley."
"That was a distress call," Cas stated quietly, ignoring the demon. With a bit of surprise, Sam noticed that his face was drawn tight with worry. He hadn't thought that the angel had a close relationship with Gabriel, but that assumption was only based on their interactions during the T.V. Land fiasco, so now the Winchester wondered if he'd have to revise it.
"A rather urgent one, I think," Aziraphale added. "I don't like the sound of that cough at all."
"Great. That's great. Let's go rescue him." Dean crossed his arms, looking extremely put out. "Except, not only is he an asshole, but we have no clue where he is."
"Well, he can't be that hard to find, can he?" All eyes turned to him, and Sam immediately regretted opening his mouth. "I mean," he pushed through, "he's an _archangel._ Even contained, that's got to create some sort of… I don't know… trackable… thing," he finished weakly.
Everyone stared at him. Bobby muttered something that sounded like 'idgit' (7) and stood up, making his way over to his desk. "Trackable thing?" Dean finally asked. "Sam, you feeling okay?"
Sam shrugged defensively. "It's valid," he insisted.
"He's not wrong," Crowley agreed, a smirk on his face. "I can get some of my people on it. They'll be able to turn up something."
"I sincerely doubt that… your people will have much luck," Cas stated scathingly. "Raphael will have him well secured. We don't even know if he's on Earth."
"And we don't want demons anywhere near this," Dean added, and Sam couldn't help but concur. Somehow, he thought that sending demons to look for an archangel wasn't the best plan in the world.
"Then I'll help him," Aziraphale offered. "I'm sure that, between the two of us, we can find some trace." At this, Crowley looked very much like he wanted to object, but a steely glance from the angel clammed him up. "We'll come back and get you when he's been located."
"Okay then," Sam considered. "Right. You get on that, and we'll call you if we get anything."
A few moments later, the pair were gone, leaving Sam to hope that sending them off like that had been the right thing to do.
xXx
ELSEWHERE, AT THE SAME TIME (EXCEPT, IN ANOTHER TIME ZONE)
It was raining.
This, in of itself, was not unusual. It rained in places like these all the time.
However, the fact that someone was outside in this wet mess would have seemed unusual to anyone else who'd been outside to see it. Of course, there wasn't anyone else outside in this wet mess, because that would have been unusual, and what person would even want to be outside in this weather anyway?
The answer to that being: no person at all.
The figure shifted uncomfortably, leaning on the wall. He'd been standing here for far too long, in his opinion, and the being that he was supposed to be meeting was late.
He didn't appreciate tardiness.
"C'mon, you wanker," he muttered under his breath. "Where are you?"
"Right here," a voice stated from behind him. The figure turned, and, sure enough, there was a man there. The rain didn't touch him, and he almost seemed to be glowing. The expression on his face was one of distaste. The figure was well acquainted with expressions like that- he saw ones just like it nearly every day.
"So," he began, "you Raphael then?"
"Indeed I am," the archangel sniffed, turning up his nose. "And you are the demon, I presume. No one else would be lurking like that at this hour of the night."
The figure straightened. "You've got that right," he agreed. He was rather proud of his lurking skills.
"Fine. Then us discuss the reason for this meeting. I have other places to be, and beings far more important than you to talk to." The insult passed far over the figure's head, and he nodded eagerly.
"Right then." He grinned, revealing teeth that were sharper than could possibly be natural. "You said you needed my help."
"Need is too strong a word," Raphael corrected. "I would be interested in acquiring your services, but if you're not interested, I can always get someone else."
That sobered the figure up immediately. If there was one thing he could recognize, it was a threat. "No need for that," he told him. "Whatever you want. What is it you want?" The last bit came out a little bit higher pitched than he would have liked, but then again, this was an archangel, a being that could destroy him with a thought, so perhaps he could be excused his nervousness.
"I seek to walk the Path chosen for me by my Father. I seek to bring about Paradise," Raphael started. The figure stared at him blankly, and the archangel changed track. (8) "Your King is defying me," he explained slowly, as if to a three year old. "I do not like that. I want you to destroy him."
"Huh. Why can't you do that yourself?" the figure questioned, tilting his head as he tried to work it through.
"I am above matters such as this."
This time, the insult was obvious, and the figure bristled, forgetting for a moment who he was talking to. "Hey, now wait a second, why should I do anything for you if you're so-"
Raphael leaned in close, and the figure had to back up a step from the Holy Power that surrounded him. "I'll give you two very good reasons," he hissed, or said in as close to a hiss as an archangel can get. "One: if you don't, I'll kill you and find someone else. And two…" He paused, a small, menacing smile appearing on the face of his vessel. "Well, wouldn't you like to be in charge of Hell?"
The figure's eyes widened. Him? In charge of Hell? The very thought was ludicrous… or was it? Now that he thought of it, the current King, Crowley, wasn't doing a proper job of things. For the love of Satan, he'd converted most of the place into one big waiting line! Who did that? It reminded him of another demon by the same name, a demon that he was still waiting to get his revenge on.
If he was in charge of Hell, he could find the flash bastard for sure…
Oh, yes. This idea was sounding better and better by the second. He nodded eagerly, sticking out a hand for the archangel to shake. "You've got yourself a deal," he agreed. "Pleasure doing business with you, Raphael."
The archangel stared at the extended appendage as if it were covered with maggots. "I would say the same, Duke Hastur," he sniffed, "but dealing with filth like you is never a pleasure. Sometimes, though, the ends truly do justify the means."
xXx
(1)- To be fair, though, they looked like idiots too, gawking at him like that when there was no reaction forthcoming.
(2)- Except for those who could read minds. Meaning, everyone except Dean and Bobby.
(3)- And in fact, the phone was giving all it had just to keep itself together.
(4)- Sam decided in that moment to give it a capital letter. It wasn't as if there was any other song that was as actively involved in his life anyway.
(5)- Because the angel didn't know that shaking things never actually makes them work better, and can, in the case of soda, in fact make things a lot worse. Luckily for him, the phone wanted to please.
(6)- And Sam would know because he counted each blessed one.
(7)- It could also have been 'midget', but considering Sam's size, it probably wasn't.
(8)- He'd realized, at this point, that the being that he was dealing with was, for lack of a better word, a bit stupid. The archangel resolved to put this in simpler terms, using small words and conjuring up a few diagrams if it was necessary.
**A/N: And the plot thickens! Hastur really is kind of an idiot, isn't he? Sorry bout the lack of A/C interaction, but well… next chapter… maybe…. Anyway, hope you liked!**
**And a special thank you to Firefly070995, who made me some really awesome cover art!**
**Next Chapter: In which Aziraphale and Crowley try to track down Gabriel, and Dean and Sam have a good talk.**
**Oh, btw, if anyone was wondering about the Mortal Instruments reference last chapter, it was the whole stampede of llamas in Peru thing. It wasn't, in fact, Crowley who caused that. It was Magnus. :)**
12. Chapter 12
SOHO, ENGLAND, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
Crowley was walking on sunshine. And he didn't even like that song.
He was still expecting to wake up and find that this had all been a dream. A wonderful, fantastic dream. He had ones like it from time to time, of course. How could he not? The one thing he wanted most in this world was his angel back by his side, and that wish tended to bleed over into his sleep.
It was waking up from these dreams that was the hardest. And it was remembering that these dreams would never come true that sent him crying into a corner.
But now they _had_ come true. And he had no idea what to do next. Part of him wanted to take Aziraphale far, far away and lock him up so that no one would ever, _ever _hurt him again. Then, another part of him wanted to let him do whatever he wanted to, just because it was him, even if that meant putting up with the Winchesters.
And then, there was that third part. The part that whispered that the angel wouldn't stick around for long. That as soon as he discovered how far he'd truly fallen, the things he'd stooped to doing, he'd leave. For good.
"Erm, Crowley?" Aziraphale's voice broke him out of his thoughts. "I really don't think that we'll find him here."
The pair stood on the side of a road in Soho, cars rushing past them at whopping speeds of thirty miles an hour. Crowley grinned. "Of course he's not," he agreed, "but that can wait. I've got something to show you."
"I really don't think-" the angel started, but Crowley wasn't having it. He grabbed Aziraphale by the hand and pulled him along down the sidewalk, effectively cutting off any arguments the angel might have been about to say.
"Trust me," the demon stated, smirking. "I know what I'm doing."
"Well, alright, but… Oh my dear!"
This last exclamation was caused by the sight awaiting them just around a corner. Aziraphale gawked at it, and the demon's smirk widened. (1) To anyone else in the area, it was nothing special, especially now that it was never open, but Crowley knew that to Aziraphale, it meant the whole world.
The sign read Mr. Fell's Book Store (2), just as it always had, and the door stood straight and attached to its hinges, and the windows were clean, not shattered, and not blood-splattered. After his angel had died, Crowley couldn't bear to leave the shop in the condition that he'd found it in, so before he left for America, he'd tidied it up to the best of his ability. He'd never expected anything to come of it, but now it looked as if the work was about to pay off. "Well?" he prompted Aziraphale, who was still staring in shock. "You going in or not?"
"Yes," the angel mumbled distractedly, moving toward the door. "Yes." Hesitantly, as if he expected the whole building to vanish at any moment, he turned the handle and stepped inside.
"So, there'll probably be some organization problems," Crowley told him. "I wasn't sure where everything was supposed to go, but I… angel?"
Aziraphale was running his hand gently over the wooden counter top, and he was shaking, as if holding back tears. His eyes met Crowley's. "I didn't… I mean… After I heard I'd been gone for twenty years, I didn't… I didn't think it would still be here," he breathed.
Crowley lifted an eyebrow. "As if I could've gotten rid of it," he replied. "Selling it would've been far too much of a hassle. And just disposing of it would've been in bad taste. Where would I have put the books?" He shrugged, hoping that Aziraphale got the underlying message. _You're welcome._
"In your flat, I suppose," the angel answered, smiling and keeping up the game. "Assuming, of course, that you still have your flat. Although, you'd have to move a few of the plants to make room."
"The… plants. Right." (3)
Aziraphale lifted a knowing eyebrow, but chose to ignore the comment. "Really, though, thank you Crowley. This means a lot."
Crowley smiled back. "I know it does." He allowed the moment to stretch on for a full three seconds before he decided it was high time he make some sort of effort to rescue the shreds of his evil-demon reputation. "So!" he exclaimed, clapping his hands together. "You stay here, make some tea, comfort your poor dusty books- and yes, I know you talk to them, don't bother denying it- and I'll be back in a few."
Aziraphale cocked his head. "And where are you going?"
"Nowhere, really. I just need to go fetch something."
xXx
It took Crowley a total of 54 minutes and 37 seconds to return. Aziraphale knew because he counted every single one.
Oh, he tried not to. Crowley was, after all, perfectly capable of looking after himself, and the idea that something might happen to him as he ran a short errand was positively ludicrous. (4)
Yet, he couldn't shake the thought that the night he'd died had been completely normal too, right up until the angels burst into his shop.
So, as he made his tea and began rearranging his books (5), he counted down the seconds. And when he heard Crowley pull up outside in an all-too familiar sounding vehicle, he placed his tea gently on the counter and rushed out the door to meet him.
"So," the demon greeted, stepping out of the 1926 Bentley, which was still in perfect condition.(6) "Almost like old times, eh?" He gave a smirk and patted the roof of the car. " 'S been too long since I drove this."
Aziraphale frowned a bit, considering Crowley's first statement. "And whose fault is that?" he replied, deep in thought.
"Well, it's not as if many demons actually have cars! Would've made me stick out like a sore thumb!"
"I've never really understood that expression," the angel murmured absently. "In my experience, sore thumbs don't actually stick out all that much." Crowley started to protest this, but he wasn't really paying attention anymore. He was still caught up on Crowley's previous statement. Though it had likely been intended as a throwaway comment, Aziraphale thought it had some merit to it. _Were_ things like old times? Surely, some things were the same: he had his bookshop, Crowley had his car again, and here they were, about to go and save the world from the Apocalypse.
But things weren't the same. Crowley was darker now, much though he tried to hide it, and the angel knew that they'd be having a confrontation about that sooner or later. And he himself was different too. His once solid faith in Heaven had taken several heavy blows lately, and he didn't know if he'd ever be able to repair the cracks.
And yet…
As he halfway listened to Crowley ramble on about thumbs and how they really _could _stick out, Aziraphale knew that some things never changed, and he knew that their friendship was one of those things. No matter how much their relationship was strained, bent, or chipped at, he wouldn't give Crowley up for anything.
He just hoped that Crowley felt the same way. (7)
"Aziraphale?" The demon's concerned voice startled him out of his thoughts. "You alright there, angel?"
Aziraphale met his gaze, and though the brown eyes staring him down were unfamiliar, the expression behind them wasn't. "Yes," he finally managed. "Yes, I do believe so."
Crowley blinked and opened his mouth.
Whatever he was going to say was broken off by something leaping on top of the Bentley.
xXx
Dean didn't like books.
It had always been that way, really. Sam was the nerdy one, not him. He'd use his laptop for research, and then Dean would steal it and look at porn. That was the way things worked.
Of course, there were exceptions to that rule. So, when Sam had started nodding where he sat, Dean had practically forced him to go upstairs and get some shut eye. (8)
This action, though done with the best of intentions, left him with a pile of books to leaf through, and a grouchy trucker-hat wearing hunter to deal with. So maybe, he should have gone to bed when Sam did. He glanced up, meeting the gaze of the older hunter. "Got anything yet?" he asked wearily, not expecting a positive answer.
"What I've got is exactly the same thing I had when you asked five minutes ago," Bobby replied, annoyed. "Jack squat! Dean, there's just nothing in here on tracking down archangels. We've already figured out that that fancy spell of Cas' don't work, and I'm not sure there's anything else. What do you want me to tell you?"
"Just…" Dean sighed, staring back down at the page he was reading. "Just keep looking, I guess." Bobby grunted, and the Winchester frowned, rubbing at his eyes. The words were starting to do loop-de-loops on the paper, and he didn't know how much more of this he could stand. The fact was, he agreed with Bobby. They probably weren't going to find anything specific to their problem in these books, and with Cas off fighting in Heaven again and Aziraphale and Crowley who-knows-where, they were fresh out of experts on the subject.
"Damn it," he muttered, raising his head again. "Bobby, I think-"
Dean was cut off by his brother's scream.
Even as he leapt to his feet and made for the stairs, his blood ran cold. He'd never heard a sound like that out of Sammy, _never._ He'd seen the kid almost get ripped to shreds by poltergeists, he'd seen him attacked by wendigos and mauled by werewolves, but this was something else. This was a sound of pure terror. Something Dean had _never _wanted to hear from his little brother.
He didn't bother with the doorknob, opting to kick the door open instead, and the sight that greeted him almost made his heart stop. Sam was convulsing wildly in his bed, panting and grasping at the sheets. As Dean watched, he screamed again; this time it ended in a name.
"Dean!"
Dean knew what this was. He'd lived through this before. Immediately, he was at his brother's side, holding down his arms and shaking him. "Sam!" he shouted. "Sammy, wake up! It's a dream, Sam, wake up!"
Sam sat bolt upright with a gasp, latching on to Dean's arms with a deathly grip. "Dean," he breathed. "Dean don't let them… don't let them… Dean… don't…"
Dean wrapped his arms around his brother, who was obviously only partly awake. "I know, Sammy," he murmured. "I know. I'm not letting them do anything, I swear. You're safe now, you're not there anymore. They can't hurt you."
Sam tightened his grip even more. "Promise?" he whispered, already sounding less panicked.
Dean's throat tightened. "Yeah, Sammy, I promise." No reply came from his brother, and from the way he was suddenly sagging against him, Dean assumed that he'd fallen back asleep. Hopefully, the nightmares wouldn't follow him.
A shadow filled the doorway, and Dean glanced up. "He alright?" Bobby asked, nodding at Sam.
"He was dreaming about Hell, Bobby," Dean replied bitterly. "I should have remembered that this would happen." He swallowed, hoping to relieve some of the pressure in his throat. "God, Bobby, he was down there for two months longer than I was! I should have remembered. I should have been here. Just because he's been acting okay doesn't mean that he is. God. I should've-" He cut himself off, staring at his little brother.
"Looks to me that you're doing alright with it," Bobby finally offered, scrutinizing the both of them.
Dean clutched his brother tighter. "I hope so. God, I hope so."
He didn't leave Sam's side for the rest of that night. The nightmares did not return.
xXx
(1)- So that he rather resembled that green fellow from that one children's Christmas special (and the book that came before it, though, nowadays, most just watch the T.V.).
(2)- The ever-so-creative name for the shop had come from yet another drunken conversation between the two around the start of World War II. Aziraphale had commented on how he needed a place to put his growing book-collection, and Crowley had proceeded to not only suggest a book store, but also to suggest names for said book store, most of which being too inappropriate to name here. Aziraphale finally got fed up with it and snapped, saying that he might as well just call it Mr. Fell's Book Store and be done with it. To Crowley's everlasting displeasure, the name stuck.
(3)- Crowley decided that this was probably not the best time to tell Aziraphale that he hadn't been by his flat in twenty years, and that the plants were probably all dead. (3.5)
(3.5)- But if he had, Aziraphale would have very solemnly informed him that it was very kind of him to finally stop torturing the poor things and let them move on.
(4)- Although, now that he was thinking about it, there _was_ that incident back in 1975 with the large, heavy, and not very well-secured piano.
(5)- Which were shamefully mixed up, really. Even Crowley ought to have known that you can't put the Dickens right next to the Poe! Honestly!
(6)- Luckily for the owners of the storage place. If there had been so much as a scratch on Crowley's beloved car, they would have found themselves facing down a very teed off hellhound.
(7)- He did.
(8)- Doing this was no small feat- Dean had to resort to threatening his brother with Nair in the shampoo bottle.
**A/N: So sorry this is two days late, but it was my mom's birthday on Saturday, and well… I also discovered the amazingness that is X-Files, so you can picture what's been taking up most of my time lately. And it didn't help that I got a major case of writer's block, so… yeah, you're probably not interested in my excuses, so… anyway…**
**Please let me know what you think. I feel sorta like this one's a filler, so reassurances would be welcome!**
**Next Chapter: In which Aziraphale makes a friend, Crowley decides that he likes demons better than cats, and Cas finds someone Important (and I think we all know who that is, don't we? C'mon, you didn't **_**really**_ **think I was going to stretch it out very long, did you?)**
13. Chapter 13
SOHO, ENGLAND, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
"What… What the _hell _is that doing on my car?!"
"I think it's adorable."
"You… Of course you think it's adorable! You think everything with four legs is adorable!"
"I do not!"
"Oh, yes you do! Remember the zebra incident?"
"I…"
"It followed you around for days!"
"It wasn't my-"
"You even _named _it!"
"Fred was perfectly-"
"No, he really wasn't."
The angel and the demon glared at each other, both growing increasingly red in the face. To any passerby, the whole situation would have looked extremely odd: two men standing next to a vintage car arguing about _zebras _of all things. And the reason for their argument staring loftily at them. Luckily, there were no passerby in the immediate vicinity. (1)
The object of Crowley's irritation, and of Aziraphale's affection, sat innocently atop the Bentley, licking its paw as if it hadn't a care in the world. Aziraphale sighed.
"Crowley, he's not doing any harm," he stated. "Really, I think I might keep him. He _is _rather cute."
"You… _what?_" Crowley sputtered. "No! You're not… You can't be serious! You're not keeping that thing!"
"He," Aziraphale returned indignantly, "is not a thing. He is a kitten. And I _am_ keeping him."
"What? No! Since when?"
"Since now. His name is Whiskers."
"Now you're just being ridiculous."
"Am not."
"And _now _your comebacks are resembling those of a toddler."
Aziraphale kept silent, apparently choosing not to dignify that one with a response. (2) Stepping forward, and shooting a defiant look Crowley's way as he did so, he picked the kitten up off the roof of the Bentley and held it to his face. "Ignore him," he told the cat, quite somberly. "He's just jealous."
"What?!"
"But don't worry, Whiskers," the angel continued. "He'll warm up to you eventually. He's really quite a nice fellow."
"_What?!"_
Aziraphale continued to ignore Crowley. "Hmm. You could use some fattening up, couldn't you?" he asked Whiskers. (3) "You're all skin and bone, you poor dear."
"Would you _stop _talking to it like-" Crowley stiffened, chills running up and down the back of his spine. A cold wind rattled the windows of the shop, and suddenly, the street felt much emptier than it had before. "Angel," the demon muttered. "I think you ought to go back inside."
Aziraphale looked up from his kitten coddling. One glance around the area had him shuddering. "Yes, I think I agree." He took a few steps back toward the door, and Crowley exhaled sharply in relief. They both knew what the chill in the atmosphere meant: demons, and fairly powerful ones, too. And while Crowley had expected something like this- he had, after all, been away from his throne for a good while longer than he'd originally anticipated, so they were sure to come looking- he didn't want Aziraphale anywhere near it. He didn't want the angel anywhere near demons period. Something like that would have severe repercussions for both of them.
But with the angel about to head inside, into a shop that almost had more wards on it than books (4), Crowley didn't feel worried. These were his people, and in all likelihood, they just wanted to know what their King had been up to in the past few hours.
They emerged from the shadows in typical lurking demon fashion. There were three, but Crowley didn't recognize any of them, which was a bit odd. He hid the slight discomfort with his traditional smirk. "And what do you want?" he asked smoothly, raising an eyebrow. His expression screamed _you are beneath me, go bother someone else, you're wasting my time _and other things along the same line of thinking. This was typically very effective when dealing with his underlings.
These demons didn't even flinch, and that's when he first realized that something was wrong.
Then, there was the second thing.
"Crowley," Aziraphale whispered anxiously from behind him. "I can't open the door."
Crowley didn't react outwardly- to do so in front of these demons could have devastating results- but he indulged in a long, mental stream of profanity. The very fact that they were trying to block off escape routes meant that they weren't here on normal business. Far from it.
Which begged the question: who would dare attempt a coup like this?
"What do we want?" the lead demon shrugged, finally answering the original question. "Only what our Lord has promised us." At this, Crowley got the distinct impression that this 'Lord' was not him. "And if that means removing obstacles, then so be it."
"Obstacles?" he questioned, playing for time as he figured them out. He desperately hoped that Aziraphale would have the sense not to draw attention to himself. "I am your King, you moron!"
"That may be so now, but not for much longer."
Alright, so this one was the poetic, monologuing sort. Probably fairly easy to deal with.
"Yes!" one of the others cut in. "We're not going to stand for your pathetic leadership any longer!"
And this one was the angry, hot-headed one. Also fairly easy to deal with, though the fury might lend her strength.
The last one stayed silent, and, judging from his host, was probably just the muscle.
"Is that so?" Crowley questioned. "You honestly think that you could-"
At that moment, several things happened. The lead demon opened his mouth to dispense another ever-so-witty comment. Crowley subtly reached into his jacket for his angel blade. (5)
And Aziraphale's new cat meowed.
Crowley froze. The demons froze. Aziraphale froze. Even the kitten seemed to get the sense that it had done something wrong.
"Is that… is that a _cat?_" the lead demon finally managed.
Crowley sighed heavily. "Unfortunately," he confirmed. "It's extremely annoying."
"I hear you," the demon replied, nodding sagely. "I can't stand those things, all aloof in the way they are. And then there's the way they come at you sideways, like they want to be petted, but then they change direction at the last minute and stare at you like _you've _done something wrong." The demon shuddered. "I am definitely a dog person."
Crowley abruptly decided that he rather liked this demon. If he weren't here for an assassination attempt, he'd probably promote the fellow.
"I definitely agr-"
Sadly, his conversation was interrupted by Aziraphale stepping forward and smiting all three unsuspecting demons. (6)
Crowley gaped. "Wh-"
"Well, I assume that you were distracting them, weren't you?" The angel raised an eyebrow.
"I...sure."
"Thus, allowing me the time to smite them."
"Right." Crowley glanced at the dead meatsuits, then back at Aziraphale, deciding that it was high time to change the subject. "That one did have a point, you know. That cat's going to be nothing but trouble."
"Really, dear, you need to get used to the idea of him being around," Aziraphale returned. "He's not going anywhere."
Crowley shook his head. Fine. If the angel wanted to keep that furry little… _monstrosity, _then fine. Let him. The cat would show its true colors soon enough. (7)
"Anyway," Aziraphale stated heavily, "I think we ought to figure out who those demons were here for, if not for you. After all, shouldn't they _all _be working for you?"
Crowley nodded, expelling the thoughts of the cat for the time being. The fact that the demons had been working for someone else, and that that someone else seemed to want him off the throne, was extremely concerning. Though, it also seemed that this new enemy wasn't particularly smart; after all, who would send only three demons to take out the King of Hell?
Still, this situation wasn't to be underestimated. If there was one thing he knew, it was _never _to underestimate his enemies. No one was untouchable, and that included him. It was wise to always stay on guard.
"Yes," he finally replied. "Yes, they should be." He met Aziraphale's concerned gaze. "It seems I've got a snake in the grass."
xXx
ELSEWHERE
Castiel found Gabriel almost immediately after the battle.
It had been an alright battle, as much as battles can be alright, and his forces had come out victorious. Not without casualties, true, but what was war without casualties?
Castiel mourned every single one.
After it was over, he told his lieutenant that he needed some time alone. Technically, this was true; he certainly didn't intend to go rejoin the Winchesters just yet. The only company that he thought he could stand right now was that of someone who truly understood what this war meant. The Winchesters simply didn't fit that description, and he didn't want to go bother Aziraphale.
Thus, alone time.
Castiel touched down in an abandoned church out in the middle of nowhere. There were many such churches, he'd noticed in the past, and they were very useful in that there was no one to see him seemingly appear out of nowhere, thus making them excellent spots for private reflection.
This time, though, he was almost unable to avoid detection.
Castiel ducked behind a pew and cloaked his grace as well as he could on such short notice, cursing his own stupidity. (8) He should have made sure that there were no angels here _before _he landed, and now… now he might be stuck. There were at least seven here in the church, and possibly more outside, so escape could be almost impossible.
_Seven here, _he realized. _Seven._ Why would _seven _angels be milling about in an abandoned church? Unless they had something to hide. Cautiously, he peered over the top of the pew. There were no eyes in his direction, and in fact, now that he noticed it, the angels appeared to be guarding the doors. Keeping people out.
But why?
Castiel didn't see him right away. The flames burned low and not particularly bright, and they were in the very back of the church. Yet, now that he'd spotted the Holy Fire, the figure contained within was as plain as day.
He was crouching, elbows on his knees and chin on his fists. His eyes were closed tightly in concentration, and as Castiel watched, the Holy Fire flickered and died a little more. This seemed to take a lot out of the figure, though, and he coughed, face paling. Castiel frowned in sympathy; extended exposure to Holy Fire damaged any angel, even one so powerful as Gabriel. For Gabriel it was.
Suddenly, the archangel's eyes shot open, gold meeting blue. Gabriel's face immediately brightened, and he opened his mouth to say something. Castiel shook his head, putting a finger to his lips in warning and glancing toward the angelic guards. They hadn't noticed anything yet, which in of itself was a small miracle, but any noise would draw their attention. With Gabriel trapped in Holy Fire, Castiel couldn't hope to take them all.
Gabriel nodded in understanding, his face growing more serious. This was _not _a rescue mission. Castiel would need backup for that.
He'd need Sam and Dean.
He caught the archangel's gaze once more, and, hoping he understood, mouthed, _I'll be back. _He barely caught sight of Gabriel's quirked eyebrow before speeding off to Bobby Singer's house.
xXx
(1)- People tended not to walk around in that area, as they were afraid of the stories they'd been told about it. Most of these stories involved nearly getting hit by a car.
Most of these stories were true.
(2)- It was actually because he couldn't think of any comebacks that wouldn't prove the demon right.
(3)- Whiskers did not reply. Cats usually don't. (3.5)
(3.5)- There are varying theories as to why this is. The rational people out there say that it's because cats simply can't talk. The less rational people out there say that it's because cats are secretly plotting to take over the world. Crowley says that cats are stupid, and who would waste their time debating this anyway?
(4)- Though, the angel actually didn't know that said wards were there. After all, when he'd been alive, his mere presence in the store had been enough to keep most demons away. But after his death, Crowley had decided to add a few protections to the shop to make sure that nothing evil defiled it.(4.5) As these things go, a 'few' turned into a lot, and no, Crowley was not planning on telling the angel exactly how many wards he'd put up. Aziraphale would either call him paranoid or overprotective, and Crowley didn't much fancy either.
(4.5)- That included realtors.
(5)- And he was _so_ glad he'd gotten one of those. They were incredibly useful for something that looked like an over-sized toothpick..
(6)- Single handedly, in fact, as he was still holding Whiskers.
(7)- Crowley decided to refrain from acknowledging the fact that he _might_ be just a _little _bit jealous of the cat.
Aziraphale, on the other hand, decided to refrain from mentioning how he _could_, in fact, read Crowley's mind. He had a feeling it would only embarrass them both.
(8)- Which he really should get out of the habit of doing. Obviously, he was spending too much time around Dean.
**A/N: I… crap. So sorry that this is a week late! Stuff happened, and well… It won't happen again? (cringes at skeptical looks) Well, not on purpose, anyway...**
**Actually, I should probably let you know that the next update will in fact be a little late, 'cos I'm going out of town this weekend, and I probably won't have internet. Just letting you know!**
**So, as usual, reviews welcome (well, more than welcome, but I'm trying to avoid shameless begging), and… well, reactions to Whiskers would be great. He's kinda the result of too much caffeine when creating the character list, you know how it goes… :)**
**Next Chapter: A rescue mission is made, and hopes are raised and lowered. And the Winchesters meet Whiskers. Yay?**
14. Chapter 14
AN ABANDONED CHURCH IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
"I still can't believe you just happened to find him."
Sam smiled, unable to do anything but agree with his brother. The chances of Cas stumbling across Gabriel by accident were next to none, and yet, somehow, the angel had pulled it off. Honestly, the luck that seemed to follow the guy around was extraordinary. He shifted in place, glancing at the church through the foliage they were hiding behind.
"So, what's the plan? You said there were eight of them?" he asked.
Cas nodded. "Yes, there are eight," he confirmed. "I do not believe any of them to be of particularly high power, which is likely why Raphael thought he could spare them on this assignment."
"Great. Awesome. Still doesn't change the fact that they're _angels,_ and we're humans."
Once again, Sam found himself concurring with Dean. It was just him, Dean, and Cas on this one, as Aziraphale and Crowley were off doing who knows what, and Bobby was holding down the fort and continuing with the research. Three against eight weren't very good odds, even if they were the Winchesters.
Though, they did all have angel blades, Dean's from the one that had attacked them at Bobby's, and his from a misadventure while he was soulless. That evened the odds a little, though it still didn't change the fact that the angels could probably kill them before they got a chance to use them.
"Okay, how about this," he proposed. "Cas, you go around back and take out the ones there, and Dean and I will stay and lure the rest here, and then use a banishing sigil on them." Both Dean and Cas stared at him, and he shrugged defensively. "It's a good plan. Saves us from taking them on all at once."
"What? Yeah, the plan's fine, it's just… you sure you're up for this, Sammy?" Dean asked, concern in his eyes, and Sam scowled. Ever since his nightmare the previous night, Dean had been watching him like a guilty mother hen (1), no matter how many times he tried to insist that he was fine.
And he _was _fine. It had just been a nightmare, and he was dealing with it.
"Dean," he growled, and his brother raised his hands defensively.
"Alright, just checking. Let's do this."
Cas glanced between the two of them, obviously trying to figure out what he was missing here, but then just shook his head. "I agree. The sooner we rescue Gabriel, the better."
"Right, then I guess you should-" Dean cut off, as it became apparent that Cas had flown away already. "Damn it, I swear, I will get a bell on a collar for him." He looked at Sam. "Remind me to get him one of those, would you?"
"Uh… sure." Sam decided to refrain from pointing out that Cas wouldn't be caught dead wearing something like that. (2) "You want to get him a dog tag too? If found, return to Dean Winchester? Or maybe…" He smirked. "Property of Dean Winchester?"
Dean gaped at him, and he felt a rush of satisfaction. "The hell? No!" Sam raised an eyebrow, and his brother reddened. "Shut up, you bitch."
"Jerk," Sam supplied, though he couldn't help but add, "Though, I think you're the b-"
"Sam!"
xXx
Gabriel was not having a good time.
Sadly, this wasn't terribly unusual lately. After his return, he hadn't been able to get his head back in the game. The pagans were mad at him, the angels were mad at him, and he just wasn't able to focus on any of the pranks he was pulling. (3)
So, when he'd met up with Raphael, he hadn't been nearly as careful as he should have been.
In his defense, though, he hadn't expected his older brother to have gone bat-shit crazy since the last time he'd seen him. Admittedly, it'd been a while (4), but still! Honestly, thinking that Father was actually _dead. _
"Newsflash," he'd said. "You can't kill God."
Raphael hadn't taken too kindly to that.
Thus, here he was. In a circle of Holy Fire. And feeling like crap. Extended exposure to the stuff wasn't good for any angel, archangels included. He'd be fine in a matter of hours once he got out, but for now, his throat was burning, his vision was blurring, and he didn't have enough grace to make another phone call.
Luckily, Castiel had found him. He'd left shortly afterward, of course, which was understandable, considering the number of angels guarding him, but he _had _mouthed something along the lines of, _I'll be back, _which left him hopeful in regards to his eventual rescue.
With any luck, his backup would be Aziraphale and not the brothers Moron and Idiot. He knew whose company he'd prefer.
There was shouting coming from outside now, and Gabriel looked up to realize that there weren't any angels guarding the doors anymore. He grinned, though he winced at the pressure the action put on his chapped lips. "I guess the cavalry's here," he muttered, shifting in his crouching position.
His jovial mood faded somewhat as said cavalry entered through the front of the building. Not Aziraphale, then. "Oh, look," he stated. "My knights in shining armor." He cocked his head, glancing at the Sasquatch. "Or, you know, plaid, but same diff."
Dean Winchester raised an eyebrow, and Gabriel scowled inwardly at his slightly smug expression. "You," he said, slowly, "look like shit. How're you even alive, anyway?"
The archangel stood, ignoring the way his muscles protested. "My kid's queen of the Norse underworld," he dismissed. "She called in a few favors."
Dean blinked. "You have a-" Gabriel stopped paying attention at the fact that the Holy Fire had just been put out. His powers came back in a rush, and he sighed in relief, immediately putting some effort toward healing himself up.
"Thanks, little bro," he said, turning around. The angel standing there nodded gravely, and the archangel smirked. Apparently, spending more time around the Winchesters hadn't gotten the stick out of his ass yet. Well, he'd just have to do something about that, wouldn't he? "So," he started, stepping out of the ring of ashes, "what's the crisis? Besides, you know, Raphael going nuts. What's up with that anyway?"
"Raphael is attempting to restart the Apocalypse," Castiel stated. Gabriel nodded. He knew _that. _"I, and others, are attempting to stop him." Gabriel blinked. He hadn't been expecting _that. _And he certainly didn't like it.
"Civil war," he stated icily. "You've started a civil war." As if the first time hadn't been bad enough! Admittedly, it was probably necessary, as letting Raphael start the Apocalypse again would be bad to say the least, but Gabriel really wished that everyone would just get along for once. It was why he left Heaven in the first place: family fighting family. He couldn't stand it.
"Hey-" the older Winchester interjected, probably taking offense at his tone, but Cas overrode him. "Yes," he agreed, "and I need your help."
It took a moment for that to sink in. "You want me to help you," he repeated. "You want _me _to help _you. _You do realize that I don't get involved in this sort of stuff anymore, right?" He laughed grimly, his voice cracking a bit. "I like you, Castiel, really, I do, but I'm going to have to turn you down."
"You helped with Lucifer," Sam said softly, and Gabriel glanced at him, ignoring the puppy-dog eyes to the best of his ability.
"That was a one-time thing, and look what it got me."
"Gabriel," Cas started again. "Aziraphale would also like your help."
The archangel froze, narrowing his eyes at the mention of his apparently no-longer-dead brother. "That's…" He trailed off, getting the distinct feeling that he'd just been backed into a corner. He'd come to learn over the years that he'd known him that it was hard to deny Aziraphale anything.
"Furthermore, you don't have to get directly involved," Cas continued. "Just… help us find something that will end this." He paused, staring Gabriel down gravely. "Or loan us your archangel blade."
Gabriel frowned at that. "Yeah, no can do. See…"
xXx
SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
Crowley and Aziraphale looked as if they were in the middle of a very serious discussion when everyone arrived in Bobby's living room. (5)
Not that Dean cared much.
He was already annoyed that they had to use Angel Airlines to get there. The feeling of flying was not one that he enjoyed, whether it was by airplane or by Cas.
Then there was Gabriel. The son of a bitch was just being annoying.
"Jeez," he said. "Is side-along always this bad? Sucks for you guys."
"Shut up, will you?" Dean muttered. He was definitely not in the mood for this.
"Okay, okay, someone's grouchy." He raised his hands defensively and backed up a pace, directing his attention elsewhere (thankfully). He broke into a wide grin, and Dean resisted the urge to groan. "Aziraphale! You look good for a dead guy!"
Aziraphale smiled wryly and stood _and shit was that a kitten in his arms?_ "As do you, brother," he replied. "Though, you do look a bit pale. Are you feeling alright?"
"Oh, haha. Hilarious. You wouldn't be laughing if _you'd _been the one stuck in Holy Fire for a month."
"Serves you right for getting trapped in the first place, you idiot," Crowley grumbled, moving to stand by Aziraphale. Gabriel's face lit up like the fireworks at Disney (6), and Dean knew in that moment that rescuing him had been a big mistake.
"Crowley!" he exclaimed. "Nice to see you again after _twenty years._" He smiled in an extremely predatory way, and everyone backed up a step. "You know, next time you decide to go missing for two decades, you should call a guy _first_, don't you think?" As Crowley worked his jaw and sputtered (7), the archangel raised a fist and punched him in the jaw.
The expression on his face was absolutely priceless. Dean wished he had a camera on him.
"Nice to see you too, Gabriel," the demon finally managed. "I do hope you're not just here for comic relief."
Dean frowned, the statement reminding him of the conversation they'd had in that church. "That's actually about all he's good for," he muttered, "since he _lost _his archangel blade."
Aziraphale blinked. "Oh, dear."
"Hey, in my defense, I didn't _lose_ it, Raphael took it."
"He very likely put it in the armory with the rest of Heaven's weapons," Cas put in. "However, recently, the armory was… raided."
"What he's trying to say is that he's got no clue where any of these weapons are," Dean interjected, "so we're back to square zero."
"Oh, dear."
"Yeah." Dean snorted, shaking his head. "So, while we're asking life-threatening questions, what the _hell _are you doing with a _cat?_"
xXx
(1)- And in Dean, this was _not_ a good thing.
(2)- In fact, though Sam didn't know this, the last person to try to collar an angel was actually Crowley during the pre-Arrangement days, as he was fed up of being 'snuck up on all the blessed time'. Needless to say, the collar got incinerated, and the demon got discorporated.
(3)- That may have been a good thing, though, as dwelling on them probably would've bummed him out even more. They were... lack-luster at best. Once, he'd even stooped to itching powder, an all-time personal low.
(4)- Understatement.
(5)- They were, in fact, discussing the recent death of a prophet. They were both upset by the news. He'd been a very good man, and one that would be missed by many.
In memory of Terry Pratchett, 1948-2015.
(6)- Because yes, Dean had been to Disney. He _was_ a kid once, thank you very much.
(7)- Which was actually very funny.
**A/N: So… I'm not dead? Sorry, I don't really have a good excuse for the delay, besides major writer's block and a recent Batman obsession (and **_**that **_**I am blaming on Jason Todd). I can't help but feel that this chapter is pretty crappy, and I hope the multiple POV changes don't confuse anyone, but I figured that I needed to put **_**something **_**out there…**
**Anyway...**
**Next Chapter: Sam and Gabriel come to an understanding, and the Winchesters find an interesting case.**
15. Chapter 15
SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
_The problem, _Sam considered, _with finding some alone time is that I tend to use it to question my life choices._
This, unfortunately, was very true. He'd originally come out to the front porch to get away from all the bickering going on inside (1), but now he wished he hadn't. Being by himself with his own thoughts was worse than any annoyance being inside would cause.
Sam sighed, leaning against the porch railing. _When _did _my life get so bizarre? _He was beginning to miss the days when it had just been him and Dean on the road. No angels or Apocalypses. No dying at least once a year (and seriously, what was up with that?).
"Penny for 'em?"
Sam groaned, not having to turn around to know who it was. "Not in the mood," he shot back, hoping beyond hope that the archangel would take the hint.
He didn't.
"Aw, c'mon Samsquatch," Gabriel stated, coming to stand beside him.
Sam raised his eyebrows at the nickname and turned to look at the archangel. "Don't call me that," he told him. "Don't you have somewhere else to be?"
Gabriel shrugged. "Nah. It's getting annoying in there. I can only stand Crowley's company for so long before he starts getting irritating." He smirked, cocking his head. "Deano's using your laptop, by the way. Something about looking for cases, I wasn't really paying attention. I just thought I'd let you know that if you walk back in there, and it's broken, it wasn't me."
"Makes a change," Sam muttered.
Gabriel grinned, obviously catching the reference. "Those were the days, weren't they?" He sighed dramatically, and Sam rolled his eyes. "We used to have so much fun."
"Right, if you call making me watch Dean _die _over and over again fun," Sam snapped, his mood darkening immediately. Scratch his previous thoughts; he'd rather be alone than have to deal with the Archangel of Annoyingness.
Said archangel raised his hands defensively. "Hey, it seemed like a good idea at the time, okay? I thought we were past it."
Sam huffed. "You never did apologize for that," he muttered, just loud enough to be heard.
"Oh? And when was I supposed to do that? When you two were trying to kill me? Or maybe when my brother did? Sorry, but between one near death experience and the next, it kinda slipped my mind."
"Is this the part where I'm supposed to be sympathetic?" Sam questioned, raising an eyebrow. He turned to look fully at the archangel. "I get it, shit happened to you. But shit happened to all of us, alright? It's not an exclusive club."
He wasn't sure what he was expecting out of Gabriel then. Anger, maybe, but not laughter. "Damn straight," he snorted. "Your luck rubbed off on me." He sobered slightly then, sending Sam a look that he couldn't quite interpret. "You do get it now, though? What I was trying to do?"
Sam hesitated. He did, though he wasn't sure he wanted to admit it. Gabriel's methods had been sorely lacking, but in retrospect, if he had become more accustomed to the idea that Dean was going to die before it actually happened, he might not have run off with Ruby. In his own way, Gabriel had been trying to stop the Apocalypse before it started.
Sam could respect that.
It still didn't make his actions okay, though. Sam still refused to go anywhere near Broward County because of it, and he'd probably never be able to listen to Asia again.
With a start, he saw that Gabriel was smirking at him. "See!" the archangel exclaimed. "You _do _get me!"
Sam scowled, realizing that his mind was being read, maybe throughout the whole conversation. "Don't do that," he snapped. Though, he wouldn't mind terribly if the Archangel of Annoyingness comment had been overheard.
"Alright, alright. But seriously, are we cool?" Gabriel extended a hand, and Sam eyed it warily. Were they cool? Sam honestly didn't know. But his understanding the situation was probably the first step in that direction, and if they were going to be working together, he couldn't put old grudges before saving the world.
So, really, there was only one thing to do.
Sam sighed and shook Gabriel's hand. "Fine. We're cool."
"Great!" A grin spread across the archangel's face, and the hunter decided that he'd liked it better a few hours ago, when Gabriel was still feeling like crap. "So, what do you say we go prank the hell out of your brother, huh?" Gabriel began to tug him back inside, and Sam frowned.
"Wha-"
"I mean, think about the things we could pull! The beer bottle and the glue was nice, but imagine if…"
Sam decided to tune him out at this point. He really didn't want to know how he knew about that incident. He himself hadn't thought about it in years.
"Ooh! And maybe we can get Crowley on our side! That guy can get creative, believe me! (2) There was one time, where…"
Nope. He definitely didn't want to know.
xXx
It took a good two hours for Dean to find what he was looking for.
"Here," he said, turning the laptop toward Cas. "Could this be something?"
For once, Sam's laptop was not being used to find porn. As appealing as that sounded, there were other, slightly more important things to be working on. Such as saving the world. Or finding stolen Heavenly weapons.
And no, he still didn't understand how that sort of stuff happened. The (apparently) most heavily guarded place in all of Heaven, and someone just waltzed in and stole everything?
Cas looked over the digital newspaper article, his eyebrows furrowed. "Yes…" he agreed at length. "Yes, I do believe so. It looks like something the Staff of Moses would cause."
It took a moment for that to sink in. "Wait a second. The Staff of Moses?" Dean demanded. "Like, the Egyptian plagues, river into blood, actual _Staff of Moses?_"
Cas gestured at the screen, looking slightly more annoyed. "It fits the circumstances. One man was liquified into blood, another was covered in boils, and the most recent had locusts in his brain."
"And _that, _class, is why we don't leave things like that lying around!" Crowley added from the couch. Dean sent him a glare.
"Not helping," he snapped.
"Now, let's not get testy with one another. That won't help anything," Aziraphale put in, stroking his cat. (3) If anyone else had said that, Dean would probably take umbrage at the tone, but it was nearly impossible to get mad at Aziraphale.
"Angel, no one says 'testy' anymore," the demon replied. "And anyway, _I'm _not the one getting angry here."
A raised eyebrow from everyone in the room told Crowley exactly how stupid that argument was..
"Anyway," Dean stated, choosing to ignore the demon for as long as he possibly could (4), "we should at least check it out, right? Even if it's not the, uh, Staff of Moses."
Cas nodded immediately. "Yes, we should," he agreed. "I will accompany you, of course."
"Wait, what?" Sam asked, stepping into the room. Gabriel followed shortly behind him, which Dean wasn't that happy about, especially viewing the devious expression on his face. He made a mental note to make sure that he hadn't pulled anything while he'd been outside. (5)
"We've got something," Dean told him. "Could be the Staff of Moses, we're not sure, but get your stuff."
"Wait, the what?"
"I could fly us there," Cas suggested, and Dean shuddered.
"No can do," he said. "We're taking the car, and you can just meet us there."
Cas frowned, but nodded.
"What about the Staff of Moses?"
Dean smiled at his brother, though he doubted the expression looked at all reassuring. "I'll explain on the way. C'mon."
Luckily for Gabriel's wellbeing, the car seemed to be untouched as the brothers approached it. Dean just hoped that that meant that he wasn't going to attempt anything at all, and not that he was planning something for later. (6)
xXx
(1)- Honestly, he didn't think that the amount of arguing happening in there was possible. It had only taken a few minutes for everyone to be at everyone else's throats (well, except Aziraphale). Sam blamed Gabriel.
(2)- This was very true. Gabriel had lost a total of two prank wars, and both of them had been to Crowley. The archangel learned his lesson pretty quickly after that: don't prank the Serpent of Eden.
(3)- Who, the angel had explained earlier, was named Whiskers, and was here to stay, thank you very much. Dean wanted to argue, because him and a cat in the same room? Not a good idea. But the almost imperceptible head-shake Crowley sent him, coupled with the expression on Aziraphale's face, convinced him not to waste his time.
(4)- A valiant effort, though it's very hard to ignore Crowley when he has something to say.
(5)- Especially not to Baby. He still held a grudge for the _last_ time the Trickster messed with her. If the bastard had screwed with her in any way, Dean would not be responsible for his actions.
(6)- Unfortunately for the hunter, Gabriel was smarter than he was given credit for. He waited until Dean was inside the car to turn the exterior of the Impala a lovely shade of fuchsia. The color faded before they reached their destination, though, so Dean never did find out what prompted all the odd looks while on the road, and if Sam figured it out, he didn't say anything.
**A/N: I apologize for the shortness of this chapter. I've been suffering from horrible writer's block, and, well, this was the best I could do. It's kinda supposed to be a transition chapter anyway, so I hope it doesn't suck.**
**As for the lateness, well… I would have warned you before, but I didn't think it would get this bad. But apparently, my teachers have gone and decided, 'Oh! It's getting closer to the end of the year! Let's give our students as much work as is physically possible to carry in their backpacks!' Despite how we insist that we're too young to die, they're not relenting, and very likely won't until the school year is over, which for me is in the end of May. So, until then, I cannot guarantee fast or regular updates. I'll do my best, and rest assured, I'm not abandoning this story EVER, even if it may at some point look like it. Again, I apologize, and I hope you'll continue to bear with me.**
**In other news… uh, actually, I think that's about it! So…**
**Next Chapter: Team Free Will goes on a hunt, and several characters come into play, including a hunter, a sock puppet, and another British angel**
16. Chapter 16
A MANSION, EXACT LOCATION UNKNOWN, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
"So, this sigil we're using, where does it send them exactly?"
Dean sighed at what had to be the fiftieth question from the guy. "I'm not exactly sure. Heaven, probably. Why do you ask?"
"Well, it's just, if they get sent to Heaven, why can't they just come right back? Can't they pop in and out wherever they want to?"
Dean paused and glanced at his brother, who shrugged. _Some help you are, _he grumbled mentally, glaring at Sam's amused expression. Then out loud, "I guess. I don't know exactly how it works, Garth, I just know that it does, okay?"
Garth raised an eyebrow at him. "So, you've got this super powerful angel-banishing spell, and you've never asked your angel how it works?"
Dean bristled. "He's not _my _angel. (1) And no, I haven't."
"Hm."
"Hm? Hm what?"
"Oh, nothing."
Dean gritted his teeth and glared at the man. How this scrawny little guy was still alive was beyond him. (2)
They'd met up with the other hunter (or rather, Garth Fitzgerald IV, as he introduced himself) when trying to interview their suspect. He'd apparently been on the case for several days already, as no other hunters had seemed to be taking it.
And at first glance, he'd seemed to be normal, if a little on the small side. (3)
Then, he'd pulled out the sock puppet, and things had gone downhill from there.
Admittedly, it had gotten the information out of the kid, but still! What self-respecting hunter used a sock puppet? For _anything_? (4)
Whatever the method, though, it had gotten them here, so Dean really couldn't complain too much.
He shifted uncomfortably in place. _It would be nice, _he reflected, _to know where here _is. Cas hadn't exactly been forthcoming about much, including their location. All Dean knew at this point was that they were standing watch outside a luxurious-looking mansion while Cas talked to his presumed-dead-but-actually-oops-wait-no-not-really-dead angel buddy. (5)
_He better hurry the hell up, too,_ he mused, expression darkening. _God knows what Gabriel's doing to Bobby's. If it's still standing at this point._
xXx
ABOUT A HUNDRED METERS AWAY
Raphael and his lieutenants appeared in a crash of thunder. An unnecessary gesture, perhaps, but one that served to announce his presence well enough. He surveyed the human residence with distaste. That one of his kind would flee Heaven to come _here _disgusted him, though he wasn't particularly surprised, considering the angel in question. Balthazar had never been good at following the rules. Honestly, he was shocked that it had taken him this long to flee like the coward he was.
Not that any of that mattered. He'd be dead soon enough either way.
"Watch them," he ordered his underlings. "They're all snakes." His lieutenants nodded and moved toward the mansion, and he turned to the trees behind him, narrowing his eyes. "And you," he growled to the figure lurking in the shadows, "are not to send your people in until I am finished _unless _Crowley makes an appearance."
"Yeah, alright. I dunno that he would, though. Coming t' help an angel? Not likely."
The archangel resisted smiting this revolting fool where he stood. (6) "My spies have confirmed that he is working with Castiel," he spat, "and he is the type to protect his business interests. Now, have I made myself _clear?_" His tone spoke of all the things he would do if the other failed him, and it took an obvious effort for him to nod and respond.
"Crystal."
xXx
MANSION INTERIOR, A FEW MINUTES LATER
Dean watched the angel with no small amount of distaste. Technically, they had no idea whether or not he was actually releasing Aaron Birch's soul, and one thing was for sure: he didn't trust this guy at all. He'd would be more than willing to watch him go up in flames- both him _and _the stupid v-neck he was wearing.
The angel, Balthazar, exhaled sharply. "The boy's debt is cleared. His soul is his own," he stated, glancing at the assembled group.
"Why you buying up human souls, anyway?" Dean demanded, fingers twitching. Yeah, he definitely wanted to send him up in smoke. He was lucky that Sam was the one holding the Holy oil and not him.
"Because he's stupid, that's why," Gabriel said wryly, appearing out of nowhere. Dean jumped and stifled a curse. "Hi Balthy."
Balthazar's eyebrows rose. "Gabriel," he greeted, apparently ignoring the insult. "Word on the street is, you're dead."
Gabriel waved a hand in dismissal. "Word on the street is, _you're _dead. Don't believe everything you hear." He snapped his fingers, and the Holy Fire disappeared, along with Dean's fantasies.
"Okay," Dean cut in, now more than a little annoyed, "hate to interrupt, but what the hell are you doing here?"
The archangel turned to him, and he resisted the urge to punch the smug expression off his face. "I was bored." He shrugged. "And the old man's pissed off at me. Honestly, who doesn't like whoopee cushions?"
Dean decided not to answer that. (7)
"If we could get back to the matter at hand," Cas interrupted. "Balthazar, will you please reconsider?"
The angel laughed. "I believe I made my stance quite clear. No can do. I wish you the best of luck, really, but I've gotten out of this mess, and I plan on staying out."
Beside him, Sam raised the bottle of Holy Oil threateningly, and Dean glowered. Apparently, not all British angels were like Aziraphale. This guy was reminding him more of Crowley at this point, though if he thought about it, he was worse. At least Crowley was being vaguely helpful.
"Well, you know, that's great and all," Gabriel interjected, "but that was kinda my plan too, and look how that turned out. But hey, c'est la vie, right? And to be honest, I think they might actually have a shot."
"That so?"
"I know, I wasn't sure if I should believe it either. Apparently, though, they've got Dad in their ballpark, what with Aziraphale coming back to life and all."
"Aziraphale? The East Gate bloke? The 'oops I must have just misplaced my flaming sword' bloke? What a great help he must be."
"They've also got the King of Hell batting for them." (8)
Balthazar paused at that. "Really? Now that's interesting."
Gabriel nodded enthusiastically. "Right! And you don't even have to help all that much! Just give us a few things, including my archangel blade, and we'll leave you alone! Scout's honor!"
"I highly doubt you're a boy scout, Gabriel," Sam muttered.
"You don't know me."
"Yeah, well-"
And at that moment, everything started going to hell. (9)
Garth burst into the room, breathing heavily, and Dean blinked. He'd forgotten that they'd left him outside on guard duty; now, it was beginning to look as if they'd been wise in doing so.
"There are others here," he panted. "They're staying on the edge of the trees, in the shadows, so I can't make out who they are, but there's a lot of them. Nine, ten at least."
There was silence for a moment, before Sam ventured, "More angels, do you think?"
Cas shook his head. "No, it's unlikely that anymore would come now that Raphael is no longer here." He hesitated, exchanging a worried glance with Dean. "Unfortunately, this only leaves one other possibility."
Dean nodded. "Demons," he agreed grimly.
Silence fell over the room once more. Dean reached for the demon-killing knife, and hoped that Garth had miscounted.
Somehow, he didn't think so.
xXx
(1)- Oh, the lies we tell ourselves.
(2)- It was also beyond the rest of the hunting community. Theories about it ranged from it being an extremely long bout of beginner's luck to him secretly being an immortal god.
(3)- And Dean had learned long ago not to judge anyone based on height. Take Sam for instance. Practically six and a half feet tall and the girliest brother he could imagine having.
(4)- And apparently named it Mr. Fizzles. Which Dean refused to say out loud. Because it was just too damn weird.
(5)- Honestly, these days, no one ever seemed to be permanently dead. Dean didn't bother getting surprised anymore.
(6)- Barely. He was beginning to see that it might not have been a good idea to get this fool involved at all.
(7)- He had the feeling that if he engaged in any sort of conversation regarding whoopee cushions with the archangel, there would be several in the Impala as soon as they got done here.
(8)- Gabriel was extremely lucky that Crowley was not around to hear that comment, as he was the King of Hell, and thus did not 'bat' for anyone but himself, thank you very much. (8.5)
(8.5)- And Aziraphale, but he wasn't about to bring that up.
(9)- Which was lucky for Gabriel, as he actually didn't have a good comeback prepared for whatever Sam had been about to say.
**A/N: Well, here's the shortest chapter ever. (sets it down gently and waves) Not the best, I know, but hopefully it's enough to say: Hi! I'm back! the Months of Hell are over! There is no more school! No more tests! Smeagol is freeeeeeeeeeeeeee! So, hopefully, I should be back to my regular update schedule. Thank you all so much for your patience. :)**
**I hope the chapter wasn't confusing. I sat down to write it, then realized that I really didn't want to do a recap of the episode, so I just did the parts that I thought would be different. That's why it's so short. **
**By the way, if all goes well, we're getting to the final stretch of this story. I'm estimating around five more chapters, give or take a couple. Who's excited?**
**Next Chapter: There is a lengthy fight sequence, Crowley and Aziraphale come back into play, and Garth gets knocked out.**
17. Chapter 17
MANSION INTERIOR, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
It turned out that Garth _had _miscounted.
Nine or ten? Right, try fourteen or fifteen.
Sam gritted his teeth, trying to keep all of them within his view. With any luck, this wouldn't turn out terribly; Dean had the demon-killing knife, Cas had just handed him his blade, and the angels themselves could smite the demons easily. With three in the room, including Gabriel, who was an archangel (1), this could probably be handled with relative ease.
It was then that he noticed that Balthazar was gone.
He stifled a curse. He wasn't surprised; the guy hadn't exactly been giving off trustworthy vibes. But still, with all the weapons he had up his sleeve, he would have been very useful.
"Alright," Dean muttered, "here's the plan. Cas, Gabriel, you smite as many of these sons of bitches as you can get and Sam and I'll take care of the rest."
Garth cleared his throat, and Sam started. He'd almost forgotten about the other hunter's presence, and from the expression on his brother's face, he had too.
"Uh, right, Garth, uh, you don't have a…" Dean turned to Gabriel. "You have anything he can borrow?"
The archangel shrugged. "Balthy still has my blade, and he's flown the coop."
Sam kept a wary eye on the demons as the conversation ensued. They'd made no move to attack just yet, but that was bound to change at any moment, and truthfully, they were woefully unprepared. They'd come here ready to deal with a solitary angel, and possibly a few of Raphael's people, but the possibility of demonic interference hadn't really entered their minds, especially since Crowley was supposed to be on their side.
...The keywords being 'supposed to be.'
Sam narrowed his eyes. Crowley was the King of Hell, which meant that demons were supposed to listen to him, right? So… if demons were attacking them…
No, there had to be another explanation. And really, it would be simple to find out.
They needed the backup anyway.
"Aziraphale," he muttered, "if you could get down here, that would be great. We need some help."
Wingbeats sounded through the room, and both Aziraphale and Crowley appeared directly next to him, making him jump. "Yes, what seems to be…" The angel took in the situation and trailed off. "Ah, no, nevermind, I see."
"Brilliant," Crowley griped, and Sam noted with amusement that Aziraphale had a death grip on his arm. He'd obviously come under protest. "As if earlier wasn't enough."
"So, you had nothing to do with this?" Sam pressed.
The demon sent him a look. (2) Sam decided to backtrack.
"Right, right, just checking."
Crowley snorted. "You know, I didn't have to deal with things like this until I started helping you lot," he stated. "Nothing but trouble, I swear." He turned to face the demons, most of whose attentions were now focused on him. "Look, I know for a fact that I didn't order anything like this, so why don't you all just bugger off, and we'll forget it ever happened, eh?"
The demons exchanged glances, before rushing forward.
Crowley sighed. "Thought not," he said.
Then, Sam had to forget about carrying on any sort of conversation, as defending himself suddenly became a top priority.
Three rushed him at once, and he was thankful for the angel blade that Cas had loaned him. These demons, though there were a lot of them, obviously weren't all that powerful, and not all that smart either. It was child's play to ram his sword into the gut of one, and dodge the other two. The others seemed to be faring just as well; having Aziraphale and Crowley there certainly turned the tides in their favor.
Then, Sam found himself being slammed into a wall, the blade flying out of his hand.
Okay, correction: the other two were slightly more powerful than he'd thought.
"I wonder what everyone will say when I tell them I killed a Winchester," one snarled, the one holding him to the wall. It was in the body of a young girl no more than sixteen years old, but there was scarring on her face; the demon had obviously been using this meatsuit for a while.
"_We_ killed a Winchester," the one standing at her side corrected. This one was in the body of a man built like a linebacker, and Sam wondered if demons were going for brawn rather than brains lately.
Probably.
"Whatever," the female snapped, turning her attention back to her captive. She grinned. "Say goodnight, Sammy."
"No, you say goodnight, lady!" And then, she was slumping to the side, Garth pulling the rescued angel blade from her chest. "Sorry, that didn't sound as dramatic as I hoped it would-"
The hunter was cut off as the remaining demon slammed his fist into his head.
Unfortunately for said demon, however, Sam was now free. He plucked the blade out of Garth's hand and drove it into the demon's chest. The demon looked shocked for a moment, and then joined his companion on the floor.
Sam looked around. Everyone else seemed to be finishing up their respective fights as well. Cas and Dean had been working in tandem (3) to take out several, as had Aziraphale and Crowley. (4) Gabriel… well, Gabriel was standing next to several bodies and eating a lollipop, looking extremely pleased with himself, so Sam took that to mean that he'd been helping too.
Garth was still out for the count.
"Alright," Crowley began, and Sam looked over. The demon was crouching near a corpse on the floor, and… no, wait, it wasn't a corpse, yet, though from the look of it, it probably wished it was. "Now, you're going to tell me exactly why you were here and who sent you, or I am going to make your pathetic existence a thousand times worse, do you understand me?" His tone was low and almost pleasant-sounding, and Sam shivered. With how different Crowley acted around Aziraphale, he'd almost forgotten exactly who he was.
The King of Hell. And not one to be trifled with.
Sam almost felt sorry for the demon.
Aziraphale looked as if he might be feeling the same way.
The demon whimpered a bit and nodded. "It was… I was just following orders, sir, I swear! We all were!" he gasped.
"Not orders from me, though, so, really, that doesn't help your case at all," Crowley replied, a sharkish smile on his face. "Unless you've forgotten who's in charge here."
The demon was swift to answer with a negative.
"Good," Crowley continued. "Now, you're going to tell me exactly who ordered you here, and who exactly thinks they're capable of defying me."
The demon shuddered and cringed, but didn't reply.
"Have I not made myself clear enough?" Crowley hissed, leaning in closer. Sam had to strain to make out what he was saying. "Would you _like _to spend the next century or two on the rack?"
"No, no sir, I'll tell you," the demon sobbed, shaking his head fervently. "It was Hastur, Duke Hastur, I swear, and I don't know why, I was just doing what I was told, I swear, I'm not lying, please don't hurt me, please-"
He was cut off by Crowley's sword entering his heart.
"Alright then, I won't." The demon stood, brushing imaginary specks of dust off his suit. (5) "I'm afraid I'm off, then. Can't leave a loose end like Hastur around." He regarded everyone with a cold stare. "I trust you'll manage without me."
"Wait, I'm coming," Aziraphale put in, stepping forward. Sam noted that he still looked a little queasy, and he pointedly avoided glancing at the corpse of the demon. "If this is the same Hastur that was giving you so much trouble back in-"
"I can handle this myself, angel," Crowley cut him off. "Stay and help this lot, they'll need it." The tone was sharper than the words would imply, a fact that was evidently not lost on Aziraphale.
"I think they can handle themselves, Crowley, and so can I. I'm coming with you."
Sam exchanged an awkward look with Dean. The way the conversation was going, he wasn't sure if the two were aware of the others in the room anymore. He cleared his throat softly, but the sound was either ignored or unheard.
"No, you're not."
"You can't tell me what to do. I'd really rather you not go on your own."
"And I'd really rather I did."
And then, with no warning or dramatic effects, Crowley was gone.
Aziraphale gaped at the spot. "Well, I never!" he huffed. "Stupid, irresponsible demon! He can't tell me what to do!" He crossed his arms and glared at the floor. (6) "He's going to end up dead, but see if I care."
Sam cleared his throat again.
The angel looked up and at the other people in the room. A flush spread across his face. "Oh, right, sorry about that. I, ah, forgot you were there."
Gabriel shrugged. "I'd forget they were there too, if I could." Overriding Dean's, "Hey!" and ignoring Sam's glare, he shrugged and snapped up another lollipop. "Crowley's a bastard. You know it, I know it, we all know it. But he's a smart bastard, so he'll be back and annoying us all before we know it."
Aziraphale nodded, though he didn't look particularly reassured. "I wish that were the only thing I was worried about." He hesitated, and frowned. "And I also wish he'd stop mother-henning me."
Sam snorted. "I know exactly what you mean."
This pointed remark was lost on Dean, who seemed to be deep in thought.
"Well, not that this isn't a lovely conversation, but… well, actually, this conversation is boring as all hell." Balthazar smirked at the room's occupants, taking a sip from the bottle of beer in his hand. "So, butting in, I believe we were discussing something?"
It said something about the life they all led that the angel's sudden reappearance surprised no one.
"Son of a bitch, we could have used your help," Dean snapped, breaking out of his revery.
Balthazar flapped a hand dismissively. "You seemed like you had it under control. I must admit, though, I am slightly impressed. You really do have some heavy hitters." He paused. "I might actually be willing to believe you can pull this off."
Sam straightened, as did everyone else in the room. If this was leading where he thought this was leading...
"Are you saying you'll help?" Cas demanded.
The angel sighed. "I suppose. It's not like I want Raphael to win anyway." He spread his arm out and gestured to his surroundings. "What's mine is yours, Castiel. Mi casa es su casa, et cetera, and that includes the weapons." He eyed them all and folded his arms. "Just make sure you win, why don't you? I don't want an angry archangel on my arse once this is all said and done."
Sam grinned. Now they were getting somewhere. He stepped closer to his brother. "So, looking up, I guess," he murmured.
"Mmhmm," was the non-committal reply.
Sam frowned. "What's wrong?"
Dean's gaze snapped to him. "What? Oh, sorry. I was just thinking about how a few days ago, if anyone had said the words Crowley and mother hen in the same sentence, I would have shot them." He shook his head. "I wonder what Dad would say if he could see this mess."
Sam laughed. "We're probably incredibly lucky that he can't." (7)
And at that moment, across the room, Garth rose to his feet, swaying unsteadily. All gazes locked on him. "So," he said, "what'd I miss?"
xXx
(1)- Which meant... extra smiting power or something like that, right? Although, come to think of it, Sam had never actually _seen_ Gabriel smite a demon before...
(2)- A nearby potted plant immediately straightened up.
(3)- When did they not?
(4)- The latter looking extremely bored with the whole thing.
(5)- His suit was never, ever dusty. The dust was too afraid of him.
(6)- Which started to smoulder.
(7)- He could, actually. Ash was beginning to seriously consider kicking him out of the Roadhouse what with all the yelling he tended to do.
**A/N: So, another short one, but I think I've got my muses cooperating with me again! (And I don't think my fight scene was a total disaster, so, yay for me?)**
**Just to let you guys know, I **_**am **_**going out of town for a couple of weeks, and I likely won't have internet access (or time to access it anyway), so it will be a little while before my next update. It will come though, I promise!**
**Thanks again to all those who have stuck with me, and especially those who have reviewed. Nothing inspires me more than hearing from people who like what I'm doing! :) (hint hint)**
**Next chapter: Crowley confronts Hastur, Aziraphale seeks advice, and the angels plan the final assault. Also, Whiskers.**
18. Chapter 18
SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
Aziraphale was brooding.
He was trying not to, really, he was, but he couldn't help it.
It wasn't the first time he'd ever brooded, though it was the first time in a while. He didn't get into these sorts of moods often; though, when he did, he found that Crowley often had something to do with it.
And therein lied his problem.
He was, quite frankly, shocked at Crowley's behavior, and for the life of him, he couldn't figure out why. He'd always known his dear friend to be slightly protective of him, since the Arrangement began, anyway, and he was sure that those feelings must have increased since his return from the dead. So, really, he shouldn't feel as vexed as he was feeling about it.
But, if he was being honest with himself, was that really the bit he was angry about?
No, that wasn't it, or at least, not quite. It was the way Crowley had said it, and the way he looked at him as he did so. Both his expression and his voice had been cold, brooking no room for argument. It had been the bearing of someone that was used to being obeyed, and wouldn't hear of anything otherwise.
It had been the bearing of the King of Hell.
Again, Aziraphale wasn't sure why he was so surprised. Crowley _was _the King of Hell. He knew that, and he'd accepted it, no matter how much he didn't like it.
...Or so he'd thought.
The truth was, Aziraphale had been beginning to relax. Intellectually, yes, he'd known that Crowley wasn't the same demon he'd been twenty years ago. Yes, he'd known that he'd become darker and more powerful.
But up until now, he hadn't really shown it, not to this degree, and that was what was throwing Aziraphale for such a loop.
He sighed and shifted in place where he was sitting on the steps of Bobby's porch. Honestly, he just wasn't sure what to do now. Should he go after Crowley? Confront him? Help him? Both? Or should he just stay where he was? Neither option felt particularly appealing at the moment, though it was true that the second choice would accomplish next to nothing. The other angels were inside planning the assault on Raphael, something he knew he wouldn't be much help with.
He was just too distracted.
Beside him, Whiskers meowed, and the angel smiled at the kitten. At least he wasn't _completely_ alone out here, though that had more to do with the fact that Whiskers had been kicked out of the house than anything. (1)
"So, what do you think I should do?" the angel asked. Whiskers regarded him with rather large eyes, and Aziraphale sighed. "Don't be afraid to speak up," he berated. "I honestly don't have any idea how to handle this." He sighed again. "If only I'd actually talked to him," he muttered. "We really needed to have a conversation about everything, and I just kept on putting it off." He shook his head. "Stupid of me, really, to pretend that he'd be acting exactly the same. We really do need to talk about everything that's happened." He frowned. "There's just so much I don't know about him anymore."
His frown (2) deepened as he contemplated the sad truth in his words. Inside, he could vaguely make out an argument going on: something to do with Balthazar telling Castiel not to be such a "self-sacrificing idiot" (3) and that he "didn't join you lot for you to throw your life away you moron!" Somehow, he didn't much feel like going in and breaking up the fight.
Behind him, the door opened, and he turned to see Sam walking out onto the porch, an expression of relief on his face. "It's getting heated in there," the Winchester explained in response to a raised eyebrow. "They're too busy arguing to decide on anything."
"Hmm, I'm not surprised," he replied. "They all have rather… loud personalities. I'd be more shocked if they were actually getting along." He paused, shifting over on the step to make room for Sam to sit. "Do they… ah, do you think they need me in there?"
Sam smiled and shook his head slightly. "I don't think it would help much," he stated. "I'm getting the impression that those three don't work together often, though."
"Well, Gabriel certainly hasn't worked with any angel for a long time. Castiel and Balthazar are actually good friends, though I suppose Balthazar's little 'death' stunt would put a bit of a damper on that relationship." He broke himself off, realizing that the same could apply to his problems with Crowley. Unfortunately, Sam picked up on it.
"And you and Crowley?" he questioned. "How's _that _relationship going?"
Aziraphale grimaced. "I… honestly don't know," he admitted. "I thought it was alright, but it seems that wasn't meant to last long. I… I just don't think we understand each other anymore, and I'm not sure how to fix that."
Sam regarded him sympathetically, but motioned for him to go on. Aziraphale did so, grateful for the chance to finally vent.
"It's just, twenty years ago, Crowley's idea of being demonic was gluing coins to sidewalks to tempt people into greed, and things like that. And do you know, he actually _lost _the antichrist?"
Sam lifted an eyebrow. (4)
"Oh, it's true, I assure you. And, well, you get the point, right? But now…" Aziraphale faltered slightly. "Now, everything's different, and he's the King of Hell, and he's been trying to be the same as he was, he is, I can tell, but… the fact is, he's _not_ the same, and I just…" He swallowed, hard. "I don't how to reconcile with that."
He glanced at the man beside him, looking for… he wasn't quite sure what. Reassurance, perhaps?
"Well, I'm not sure how much help I can be with that," Sam began, slowly. "I mean, I didn't exactly know Crowley back then, so I don't have anything to compare him to. But as far as demons go, he's the most trustworthy one I've ever met, if that says anything. And in the past year, he's definitely been on our side more often than he hasn't."
Aziraphale nodded. "Right, helping with the Apocalypse."
"Yeah, and also making a deal to help Cas with the war. Stuff like that. And I guess, if someone had told me a year ago that he was actually a fallen angel who'd stopped yet another Apocalypse back in the nineties, I would have laughed in their face, but now that I know about it?" He shrugged. "It's really not so hard to believe." He paused and shook his head, smiling. "For me, anyway. I think Dean's still struggling with it."
The angel actually laughed at that. "Yes, I can tell. So, ah, what do you think I should do, then?"
"I'd talk to him. There's obviously some stuff you have to work through with each other, but after that?" He shrugged again. "From what I can tell, you two are pretty close. It's going to take more than twenty years to ruin a friendship that's lasted… uh, how long?"
Aziraphale smiled. "Quite a long time indeed. You're sure they don't need me in there, then?"
"Pretty sure, yeah."
"Then I suppose I have a demon to track down. Thank you for the advice, Sam." He stood and straightened his imaginary tie (5), and then he was off, leaving Sam to listen to the fading sound of his wing beats. (6)
xXx
Hastur hadn't been hard to find. He really should have chosen more durable minions.
He was hiding in an abandoned warehouse.
And while this was conveniently predictable, it really, really annoyed Crowley.
Because honestly, what does it take to get a little originality these days?
Crowley voiced this thought.
"Originality isn't going to matter after I kill you," came the distinctly not-so menacing and slightly cliché reply, a figure making its way out of the shadows.
_No, wait, not 'making its way', _Crowley corrected himself, _lurking its way. Hastur is actually 'lurking' his way toward me. For Go- Sa-... for someone's sake, is that the only thing he knows how to do?_
Luckily, he had the sense not to say this out loud, instead going with, "You? Kill me? Please. I'd like to see you try."
"Oh, I will," Hastur replied, attempting to sound intimidating (and failing just a little bit). "I've got my ways."
"Right. What, pray tell, are you planning to do? Lurk me to death?" Crowley snapped. "You know, you should have come a little more prepared if you were trying to commit treason of this scale. Now I'm afraid I'm just going to have to kill you. Sorry." He paused, considering his word choice. "No, actually, I'm not sorry at all. I probably should have done this a long time ago." He shrugged, slipping his blade into his hand. "Well, ces't la vie." He stepped forward, intending to catch him off guard and finish him quickly.
Instead, he found himself blasted across the warehouse and slammed into the wall.
_What the hell was…_ Crowley glanced up at the approaching figure and swore. "Angel warding?" he shouted, struggling to his feet. "You were _stupid_ enough to let an _angel_ ward you? That's going to kill you, you moron, if it's not too late already! Not that I care, but seriously, how stupid _are_ you?" Because now that he was paying attention, he could tell that Hastur's flesh was literally _rotting_, a tell-tale sign that there was something Holy at work on the demon.
"Raphael wanted to make sure I'd be able to kill you," Hastur replied. "He'll take 'em off once I'm done with that."
Crowley frowned, backing away. "I hate to break it to you, but Raphael's down one vessel at the moment. He's not going to be taking anything off of anyone anytime soon," he stated. "Not on this plane, at any rate. You're out of luck."
Hastur's face twisted, which was a truly horrible sight, due to his state of decomposition. (7) "You're lying," he growled. "Not that it matters, since I'm about to kill you."
"Right, no, let's take a rain check on that one. Maybe we can try again in a few days. After _you're_ dead. Be seeing you." With that, Crowley made his exit.
Or tried to.
It didn't work.
Hastur let out a menacing laugh. (8) "You can't escape, _your majesty_," he said, placing heavy sarcasm on the last two words (probably in an attempt to make it sound like an insult). Crowley furrowed his brow and glanced around, his gaze immediately falling on the floor.
He swore. Profusely.
The entire warehouse was a giant devil's trap.
Not, of course, that it could properly contain him, since he wasn't exactly a run-of-the-mill type of demon, and he still had access to the majority of his powers. The problem was, so did Hastur, him being a fallen angel as well, and Crowley couldn't actually _do _anything to him, because a) Hastur was warded, and b) Hastur apparently hadn't connected him with the demon he used to be, and he wasn't exactly keen on revealing himself, as he would if he proved himself to be anything more than a run-of-the-mill type of demon.
And he couldn't try to escape, either, because in the time it would take to do that, he'd be distracted, thus providing Hastur with an opening.
So, what to do, what to do?
He swore again. Profusely.
"You've been backed into a corner now, Crowley," Hastur cackled, advancing. "I'm going to kill you and rule Hell myself, since you're doing such a poor job of it!"
"Hey, wait a second, I'm not-"
"You know," the Duke continued, "I've never liked people named Crowley anyway."
"What does that have to do with anything?"
"So I'm really going to enjoy this!"
"Seriously, what does that have to do with anything?" Crowley repeated, desperately playing for time. A plan, he needed a plan, and he needed one now.
Either that, or time. Time would also be good.
_Oh...hang on a moment…_
He swore again. Mentally.
Casting a lazy smile onto his face, he allowed his eyes to turn gold for the first time in twenty years. Hastur stopped up short, stupefied. "You know," Crowley hissed, "this reminds me a bit of old times. How about you?"
"You… you…"
"You tried to kill me a few times right after the Apocalypse-That-Didn't-Actually-Happen, remember?" He snorted. "You didn't succeed then, so what makes you think you'll succeed now?"
"You… you're the… you're the same…"
"Of course, I can't say the same for Ligur, but I suppose that couldn't be-"
"_I'm going to kill you!_"
Crowley winced. Okay, so that had been the wrong thing to say. It seemed as if he wouldn't be getting that time after all.
"Ah, no, actually, I'd prefer it if you didn't do that."
But he did get something just as good. (9)
xXx
(1)- Because apparently, he'd made quite the mess while everyone was gone. Bobby had not been amused. And neither had Dean, as there was now cat hair all over the place, and he just couldn't stop sneezing. (1.5)
(1.5)- In defense of both Aziraphale and Whiskers, neither had had any idea that Dean was allergic to cats.
(2)- And we must be careful to note here that it was indeed a frown, not a scowl. As a rule, Aziraphale does not scowl, as he says that it's unbecoming of him. Of course, there are exceptions; he's been known to scowl at both realtors and sharks, if they try his patience too badly.
(3)- This was the only time Dean and Balthazar were ever in agreement on anything. It should have been marked for the history books, but unfortunately, no one thought of it.
(4)- Because _that_ sounded like a story worth hearing, if only to be able to hold something like that over Crowley's head. How the hell does someone _lose_ an antichrist anyway?
(5)- Because he'd really like to have one, though he's never gotten around to actually getting one. Though, he's tried several times to purchase a bow tie (he'd met a fellow that insisted they were 'cool'), but Crowley's always stopped him, insisting that, "You're a walking fashion disaster as it is, angel, there's no need to make it worse."
(6)- And thus, the work of Sam Winchester, Angel Psychologist Extraordinaire, was done.
(7)- And Crowley had to give him props for that, since it actually did make him look vaguely intimidating.
(8)- Though, it wasn't, actually, because it just made him sound congested.
(9)- Or maybe just a little bit better. (9.5)
(9.5)- Or maybe even a lot better. Not that he was ever going to say that out loud! (9.75)
(9.75)- Ever.
**A/N: Aaaand I'm back! With a cliffy! No one kill me, please. I actually had a lot of fun writing that… :)**
**So, Aziraphale to the rescue, anyone?**
**Thanks to all that have followed, faved, and/or reviewed. I value each and every one! :)**
**Next chapter: The angels finally come up with a working plan, and Aziraphale is a badass.**
19. Chapter 19
SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
After all was said and done, Bobby was probably going to need a new kitchen table. Unless, of course, he liked it the way it was now, complete with scorch marks and splintered edges. If the look on his face was anything to go by, though, he didn't like it at all. And Dean didn't blame him.
Sam had left the proceedings pretty early on, muttering something about checking on Aziraphale, so he'd been spared a lot of it. Dean really wished that he'd thought of an excuse to leave too, but unfortunately for him, he'd gotten the feeling that Cas would come up with something stupid.
No, 'stupid' didn't cover it. 'Completely boneheaded and moronic with a side dish of idiocy' was more like it.
Not that he was saying that Cas was a bad strategist. Cas was actually a very good strategist. The problem was that most of his strategies involved him sacrificing himself. (1)
Which was _not_ happening. At all. Ever. Not if Dean had anything to say about it.
And he did say something about it. Loudly.
Luckily, both Gabriel and Balthazar seemed to agree with him on this, and they backed him up accordingly. (2)
And so, the planning session went on for several hours, in which there was name-calling, hair-pulling, and table-scorching, until they came up with what seemed like a viable, if risky, course of action.
...That didn't mean that Dean had to like it.
xXx
Aziraphale was annoyed.
No, scratch that. Aziraphale was sodding pissed off.
He'd tried to avoid becoming this angry, really, he had, but he couldn't help it. In the end, few things could make him truly vexed. Crowley was one of them. Anyone threatening and/or attempting to cause bodily harm to Crowley was another. (3)
So, when he managed to track down his demon (which hadn't been all that hard in the end. He'd just followed the trail of mutilated bodies. (Which he was trying very, very hard not to think about right now.)) only to catch the tail end of the conversation-
"_I'm going to kill you!_"
-he'd become understandably… irritated.
"Ah, no, actually, I'd prefer it if you didn't do that," he stated in a cold voice, immediately looking to assess the situation. Crowley and Hastur were standing a few feet apart from each other on the warehouse floor, which, he noted, was painted in an expansive devil's trap. Well, that explained why Crowley hadn't gotten himself out of this mess already.
As for Crowley himself, he appeared relatively unharmed, to no small relief on Aziraphale's behalf. A little roughed up, perhaps, and slightly panicked, but he was doing fairly well, considering the situation.
Hastur, on the other hand, didn't look too well at all. His flesh was practically rotting off his body, and the angel could tell that the damage to the demon's essence was just as bad, if not worse. It only took a glance for Aziraphale to ascertain that Raphael had placed extensive wards on him.
Well, that also explained why Crowley hadn't gotten himself out of this mess already.
Both demons were staring at him in shock, albeit different kinds. Hastur's face showed a healthy amount of fear, while Crowley appeared to be simultaneously relieved and guilty.
_Well, good,_ Aziraphale thought. _He'd better be, after what he pulled._
"So," he began, "I don't suppose there's any chance we can end this in a way other than violence?" He directed the question toward Hastur, who finally seemed to realize just what was going on. His face twisted into an even more horrible expression of rage.
"Hey, you're that angel that he was always hanging around!" he yelped, making Aziraphale want to make a sarcastic comment about stating the obvious. (4) "I… I'll kill you too!" the demon finally decided, as if this wasn't the obvious course of action.
"Well, I rather didn't think we'd be sitting for tea," Aziraphale muttered. (5)
"Ah… angel?" Crowley asked hesitantly, obviously catching his none-too-pleased tone of voice.
Aziraphale sent him a glare. "Not now, dear. I'm busy."
Crowley subsided.
"Now, where was I?" the angel mused, staring hard at the other demon, who didn't have the good sense to retreat. "Oh, right. You said you were going to kill me, right?"
Hastur slowly nodded, unsure of where this was headed.
"Well, I'm afraid that if I can't change your mind about that, then I'll just have to kill you first, then." Aziraphale nodded to himself. It was a pity, too. It seemed that hanging around with the Winchesters was getting him into all sorts of violent situations. Not that he blamed them for any of it, of course, these circumstances were rather beyond anyone's control, but still, it seemed that the world was a much more brutal place than it had been when he left it.
Hastur frowned. "But… you're not even armed," he said.
Aziraphale rolled his eyes (6) and summoned his angel blade. It wasn't nearly as powerful as his old flaming one, of course, but every angel had a regular one, and it would serve his purposes just fine. "There," he declared, holding the short sword where the Duke could see. "Better? Shall we get on with things now? I do have something to do after this, so if we could hurry it up a bit…"
Hastur shrugged. "If you're that eager to die," he said. "Raphael himself gave me these wards, you know. You can't beat them."
And in ordinary circumstances, Hastur would have been quite right. Aziraphale, as a mere Principality, would have absolutely no chance against wards set by an archangel. But Hastur had forgotten to factor in two things.
One: he had messed with Crowley.
And two: no one was allowed to mess with Crowley. (7)
And thus, Aziraphale had worked up just enough righteous anger to cow Lucifer himself into writing a lengthy apology note and sending it to Michael. It wasn't obvious, but it was certainly there, simmering just beneath the calm facade.
So, really, Hastur didn't stand a chance.
The battle was brief. The Duke stood still under the initial onslaught, obviously expecting the wards to protect him. His expression when Aziraphale drew blood was nothing short of comical. "How in the blazes did you do that?" he yelped, backing away and clutching his arm.
Aziraphale didn't bother replying, instead choosing to advance again.
Crowley, for his part, was watching with nothing short of awe. It had been a very long time since he'd been able to see Aziraphale fight all-out, and he'd almost forgotten how good at it he was. This was no simple smiting, this was a battle, and the angel was clearly winning.
"Watch your left," the demon advised.
"Yes, thank you, Crowley, I know," Aziraphale gritted out.
Hastur saw the brief conversation as a sign that the angel was distracted and lunged forward. His nails raked across Aziraphale's side, eliciting a wince from both he and Crowley. "This is getting ridiculous," the angel muttered, directing some of his Grace to deal with the wound. Parrying another blow, he took a moment to have a closer look at the wards surrounding the Duke.
Ah. Now that was interesting.
It seemed that for all his professed wisdom, Raphael had overlooked something crucial. Hastur was warded heavily against demons, so much so that Crowley might not have even been able to land a blow, King of Hell or not. However, Hastur was not warded against high-powered angels. Which would make sense, as Raphael would want to ensure that he could deal with the demon if necessary.
Did he have the power to destroy the wards? He'd have to find out. He'd drawn blood already, though, so that couldn't be anything but a good sign. He narrowed his eyes, giving the creature in front of him his full concentration.
Hastur moved. Aziraphale moved to meet him.
Only, instead of meeting him, he sidestepped.
Hastur stumbled forward, eyes widening at the lack of resistance. Quickly, he tried to turn, but it was too late. Aziraphale plunged his sword into the Duke's back, eliciting a gasp from the demon. He held it there for one second, two, three, four before pulling it free. He glanced at in distaste, black blood coating it nearly up to the hilt.
He only hoped it would be enough.
Hastur turned, listing slightly to the side. "You…" he wheezed. "You bloody… sodding bastard…"
The wards shattered.
Aziraphale waited.
And Hastur stopped.
Frowned.
And collapsed into thousands of tiny white maggots, all of them writhing in their death throes. Crowley stood in the middle of them, bloody sword in hand, staring down at his shoes.
The angel nodded in grim satisfaction. "That's that, then," he stated, looking up at Crowley.
"Bloody hell," the demon grumbled. "Bloody Hastur. I'm never going to be able to wear these shoes again." He scowled at the maggot-covered footwear for another moment before meeting the angel's eyes.
Aziraphale directed him the same stare that he'd just sent Hastur, his smile small and chill. "You," he said, calmly, "have some explaining to do, dear."
Crowley gulped.
xXx
Castiel gulped.
It was a very human response to the situation, but he thought it was understandable, given exactly what circumstances those were. He stared up and down the lines of his army. They stood straight-backed and stone-faced, prepared for whatever he was about to say to them. Fear did not enter their minds.
Fear was not an angelic response to any situation.
Not for the first time, Castiel wondered at the path that had led him here. How ironic was it, that one who was perhaps the least angelic angel of all should be commanding the rest?
He shook the thoughts off. Not was not the time for reflecting.
"We have a plan to defeat Raphael once and for all," he began, cutting right to the chase. A few murmurs spread through the assembled host, but otherwise, there was no reaction. Though, that was likely about to change. He continued: "This 'we' includes our brother Gabriel-" He held up his hand to forestall any questions. "-who is indeed alive and has joined us." _Though, not entirely willingly,_ he reflected. Indeed, Gabriel had not been happy about the situation. Not happy at all. But he'd agreed to the plan anyway. _Which is good,_ Castiel thought, _because we definitely need him._
Someone had to be in charge up here once it was all over, and Castiel was determined that it wouldn't be him. No, leading an army was bad enough. Leading all of Heaven? That would be a disaster. The position of leadership needed to go to another.
The only problem would be making sure that Gabriel stayed to take it.
But that was a problem for another time. The host had gone quiet again, and were looking at him expectantly. He closed his eyes, allowing himself a single moment of peace before, as Dean would put it, 'all hell broke loose.'
Then, he relayed the plan.
xXx
(1)- Which was a horrible habit, really. Dean couldn't imagine where he'd gotten it from.
(2)- And if, for this reason, his opinion of Balthazar improved slightly, he didn't say anything. His opinion on Gabriel, on the other hand, didn't change at all. In his mind, the archangel was, and always would be, an asshat.
(3)- Trying to take a cream bun from him was a third. Now _that_ is downright dangerous. (3.5)
(3.5)- Gabriel never tried it again.
(4)- He only held back because the desire to make sarcastic comments was something that he'd gotten from Crowley, and he was still rather annoyed with him.
(5)- ...Oops. So much for not being sarcastic.
(6)- Yet another habit he'd picked up from Crowley. He really needed to stop doing that. (6.5)
(6.5)- Though, of course, he never would.
(7)- This rule began as a subset of a footnote in the fine print of the Arrangement, strictly to ensure that there would be little Holy or Unholy interference with them, if it could be avoided. Somehow, though, this subset of a footnote became a lot more than a subset of a footnote. If they were to write up another draft of the Arrangement, Aziraphale could fill at least three pages with reasons why Crowley was his to mess with, and his alone. Crowley could do the same regarding him.
**A/N: I'm sorry. Life has been both crappy and busy. But it's here, I didn't give up on it, and I won't, no matter how long it takes, so expect another chapter… well, I'll try to make it sooner rather than later, though I can't guarantee anything. **
**(I also signed up for NaNoWriMo. That's it. I'm officially nuts.)**
**Next Chapter: Aziraphale and Crowley have a much needed Talk, and in Heaven, the Final Battle begins.**
20. Chapter 20
AN OLD, CLICHE-LOOKING WAREHOUSE, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
Aziraphale stared at Crowley, wondering where to start. There was too much that needed to be said, needed to be discussed. Too much laundry that needed to be aired.
Too many topics that they'd been avoiding.
He decided to begin with the obvious one.
"I don't appreciate," he stated, "you running off like that."
Crowley's gaze darkened, and the angel knew that they were in for a very lengthy conversation. "I don't appreciate," he mimicked, "you acting like my mother. There was a problem, I took care of it. I saw no reason to get you involved."
Aziraphale refrained from pointing out that Crowley did not actually have a mother. (1) Instead, he went with: "No reason to get involved?" he questioned. "No reason? Might I ask what you would have done if I hadn't arrived?"
Crowley's jaw tightened. "I don't need protecting, angel," he snapped.
"I'm not saying you do. I'm saying that sometimes, you need help. Sometimes, you can't do it all on your own. And sometimes, you shouldn't." He held the demon's gaze. "Tell me, Crowley, if I had come along, how many corpses would you have ended up leaving behind you on this endeavor? Don't try to deny it, I found you by following the body trail. If I had been with you, I could have saved the people those demons were wearing." He bit his lip at the stony expression on Crowley's face, but continued. "There was a time when you would have been smarter about this, Crowley, instead of going after Hastur with no regard for consequences."
This pronouncement seemed to hang in the air and echo across the warehouse in the silence that followed. Aziraphale shifted uncomfortably in place.
"That time was twenty years ago, Aziraphale. Maybe it seems like only a few days ago for you, but it was twenty. Years. Ago. Twenty years, and you weren't here." The deadly quiet statement buzzed like a swarm of wasps, and Aziraphale narrowed his eyes at the perceived accusation.
"Are you saying that was my fault?" he demanded.
"What? No, that's not what I-"
The angel's throat tightened. "Well, I'm sorry that you feel that way, but I'm not the one who made you decide to become the King of Hell. What on earth is that about, anyway?"
Crowley blinked - with golden eyes, Aziraphale noted, when had that happened? - and took a slight step forward. "You really couldn't guess?" he whispered harshly. "Really? You were gone, Aziraphale, and you were gone because Heaven killed you. I wanted revenge, and I wanted to be in a position to get that revenge." He spread his arms wide, with a grin that didn't reach the rest of his face. "And look at me now. Isn't this just the high life?" The tone was full of bitterness, and for a moment, Aziraphale was lost for words.
"But..." He hesitated, mentally stumbling over the words, words that just didn't want to form properly. "But… But I'm back now, aren't I?" he finally managed, knowing as he did so that this was going to come out all wrong. "There's no need for it anymore, Crowley. I'm back."
Crowley lifted an eyebrow. "Yes, you are," he agreed, and in his voice was none of the demon that Aziraphale had grown to love. This wasn't Crawly, the Serpent of Eden, the best friend that Aziraphale hadn't known he needed. This was Crowley, the King of Hell, the ruler of the damned, the demon who didn't let anyone or anything get in the way of what he wanted.
This Crowley was a stranger, and it frightened him.
"Yes, you are," Crowley continued. "You're back, after twenty years, and you just don't get it, do you? The world didn't stop spinning after you died, Aziraphale, and neither did I. I had to adapt, I had to change, I had to survive, and now you come waltzing back in and expect everything to be exactly the same?" His voice raised to a near shout. "That's not happening, Aziraphale. I'm sorry, but it's not! I can't…" He broke off, looking away and running a hand across his face.
Aziraphale closed his eyes. "You can't what, Crowley? Go on, you may as well finish."
Slowly, Crowley met his eyes, and the angry, defeated look in them made the angel want to simultaneously hug him and slap him. "I can't be who you want me to be, Aziraphale," he said. "I can't be who I used to be. I can't be who you expect." He laughed grimly. "What else you want me to say? I could write a book of all the terrible deeds I've done since you last saw me. I'm sure you could follow the trail of bodies through the last twenty years if you wanted to. And I can't erase that. I can't erase any of it, any more than I can suddenly revert back to who I was twenty years ago."
"You've been trying, though."
Crowley shrugged. "Sure I have. Even got the Bentley out again, for old times' sake. Not that it's helped much. I mean, I'll hardly get much of a chance to use it, if I want to avoid questions about why I have it."
"You can avoid those questions if you give it up," Aziraphale said, giving it one last try. "Crowley, I swear, I'm not going anywhere. You don't need to do this anymore."
Crowley eyed him. "And who would be King of Hell, if I were to step down?" he demanded. "The Knights are all dead or missing and Alastair's been dead for years, so it would be a power vacuum. I imagine it would be Belial who'd win in the end, him or Beezelbub." He shot the angel a look. "You want either of them in charge of Hell? Really?"
Aziraphale paused to consider that a moment. It was true. In Crowley's absence, someone far more unsavory would likely take charge. Who knew what would happen then? Yet… that wasn't the only reason why Crowley was staying in charge. "You like the power," he said.
Crowley stared at him for a moment. "Yes," he said at length. "I bloody well hate it down there, but yes, I like the perks. Did you honestly think I didn't?"
Aziraphale struggled with his response for a moment. _No, but I had hoped,_ he thought. It had been a vain hope, though, and he knew that. Yes, Crowley enjoyed that power. Of course he did. Why wouldn't he; it was in his very nature. "Sometimes," he said quietly, "I think I forget just what you are."
The demon stiffened for a moment before slumping. "Yeah," he replied. "So do I."
A silent acceptance stretched between them, and Aziraphale knew what had to happen next.
"We can't go on like this, Crowley," he said. "We've been doing this all wrong."
Crowley glanced away, nodding sharply. His hands were stuffed deeply into the pockets of his suit now, likely in an attempt to appear casual, though it wasn't working. (2)
"We… we need to figure this out," the angel continued. "I… I can't expect you to be the same as you used to be, and… I'm sorry for making you feel that you had to." He sighed and glanced down at his shoes. (3) "But you need to give me time, time and a little space."
Crowley nodded again. "Right. I get it." There was bitterness in his voice, and Aziraphale frowned. He was misinterpreting this, he could tell.
"Now, don't be like that, dear." He smiled gently and stepped forward. (4) "I didn't say a lot of time and a lot of space. It's just like you to jump to the worst possible scenario." He reached out and took his hand in his, gently. Crowley stared at it, then back at him.
And then they were kissing, and for a moment nothing else in all the world mattered. For a moment, everything was right.
xXx
SOUIX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
Cas was gone.
Dean knew that there were so many other things that needed worrying about right now. He knew that Aziraphale and Crowley were off doing God-knows-what, that Sam wasn't doing nearly as well as he claimed (5), that at any time, Raphael could send some of his forces after them, and he really, really needed to be on guard. But he couldn't bring himself to care.
Because Cas was gone. Cas was out there right now, fighting for all of them, and Dean couldn't do a thing about it.
For all he knew, Cas could be…
No. He wasn't going to think like that. No way in hell.
There was still a possibility, though, and as much as he hated to think about it, the thought wouldn't leave him alone.
"Quit that," Bobby said, and Dean jumped slightly, turning to see the other man beside him, leaning against the porch railing. Apparently, he was in such a state of mind that he hadn't heard his approach.
This did not help his mood.
"Quit what?" he snapped.
Bobby raised an incredulous eyebrow, and, okay, maybe he deserved that one. "Quit what?" the older man repeated, gesturing with a hand. "Quit this, Dean. Quit mopin'. It ain't gonna bring your angel back home any sooner."
Dean glared. _Yes, Bobby. Thank you. I'm not an idiot._ "I know that," he replied. "I'm not moping."
Bobby gave him a look that stated quite clearly what he thought of that sentence. Dean refused to relent.
"Seriously," he persisted. "I'm not. I'm…" He trailed off, seeking for a word that wasn't moping, angsting, brooding, or any synonym of the three. "...thinking," he decided. Yeah, that one was nice and neutral. No connotations. Except, when a Winchester was 'thinking', it never turned out well, and Bobby had caught on to that pretty quick after meeting them. (6) The man snorted.
"Yeah, I'm sure. Pining, more like it."
Dean bristled, because what the hell? "I'm not. Pining," he gritted out.
"Coulda fooled me," Bobby said, but sighed. "He'll be back soon enough. He's not gonna let some archangel get the drop on him."
Dean frowned and stared off at the salvage yard, his eyes tracing over the familiar outlines of the wrecked cars. The sun was just beginning to set, and he vaguely realized that today was the thirtieth. Tomorrow would be December, and about time, too. It seemed as if the month, and especially the past few days, had lasted for nearly a year. (7) "Right," he said at length. "I know." And he did, really. Cas could handle himself, he'd proved that on more than one occasion. But there were times when he looked at the angel and could only see him as he'd been after the whole Anna Incident: laid up on the motel bed, practically comatose and looking as vulnerable as a human would.
That was in the past. Dean was well aware of that. Cas wasn't falling anymore, and never would again, if he could help it.
But the angel still wasn't invulnerable. He could still die.
Dean closed his eyes, turned his head toward the setting sun, and prayed.
xXx
(1)- Though, the identity that he'd created for himself did. And that was just a complicated mess.
(2)- Aziraphale had learned a long time ago that when Crowley had his hands in his pockets, it was usually to prevent himself from doing something else with them. The 'something else' varied, but the results were typically the same.
(3)- They were covered in dead maggots. He looked up again very quickly.
(4)- Encroaching on the demon's personal space as he did so. Crowley didn't mind.
(5)- He hadn't said anything about the nightmare the other night, so Dean wasn't going to push him, but still. No way was Sam feeling as good as he was acting.
(6)- The vast majority of Bobby's conversations with John had started with the other man saying something along the lines of 'I've been thinking...' It got to the point where Bobby just took out his shotgun every time the man opened his mouth. Much safer that way, for him and for everyone else in the vicinity.
(7)- ...Occasionally, Dean could be uncannily accurate.
**A/N: Welp. That happened. Yep. (I apologize to non-shippers. Feel free to interpret that as perfectly platonic... if you can, that is. You're welcome to try. That's about the shippiest it'll get, though, I promise.)**
**We are indeed nearing the one-year anniversary of this fic. And if I keep my head on straight, it just might be finished by then. One more chapter to go, people. Yup, just one, and then an epilogue to wrap it all up.**
**(...And 149 reviews. Can we break 150 this go-round? Please? -insert puppy dog eyes here-)**
**(I also just so happened to have published a couple of oneshots. One's a kinda weird Destiel multiverse AU, and the other one's an angsty GO/SPN fic. If you wanted to check them out and leave a review, I would love you forever. (grins) )**
**Next Chapter: The actual Final Battle, in which Cas and Co. implement their plan, and someone dies.**
21. Chapter 21
**A/N: Yes, hello. I'm not usually up here, but I thought I should let you know to avoid confusion: the large chunks of italics in this chapter are what went on during the Big Planning/Arguing Session that I wrote **_**about**_ **but didn't actually write **_**out**_ **a few chapters ago. Just in case that needs clarification.**
HEAVEN, NOVEMBER 2010 A.D.
Every wingbeat hurt.
No, that was a bit of an understatement. Every wingbeat was agony, stabbing pains that shot from his wings straight to his core. He was losing Grace, he knew, and losing it fast.
Castiel gritted his teeth and propelled himself forward.
_Just one more,_ he told himself. _One more, and then I can rest._
He beat them once more, and repeated the process.
_Just one more time._
He'd become better at lying to himself lately, he thought. He lied to himself to keep himself from giving up. He lied to himself to make himself believe that there was actually a chance that they might win this. He lied to himself to allow himself hope that he might survive, that when all this was over, he'd be able to go back to earth, where Dean would reprimand him about personal space (1) and glare at him and insist on taking him out for a drink, despite the fact that he was no longer capable of becoming inebriated.
In that regard, he supposed that he'd lied to Dean as well, though he couldn't quite bring himself to regret it. Dean would never have allowed him to go if he knew exactly how low his chances of survival were.
A line of fire grazed the tip of his right wing, and he cried out, flapping more furiously than ever. He didn't dare look behind him, didn't dare lose any precious time, but he didn't need to. He knew what he would see.
"Cease your fleeing and stand your ground, Castiel!" the archangel shouted, using that tone that had leveled cities, once upon a time. "Have you become this much of a coward?"
Castiel gritted his teeth and did not reply.
xXx
"_Bait? You can't be serious," Dean snapped, glaring at the assembled angels. Castiel sighed._
"_It is the logical way to go about this, Dean," he replied. "There are few that Raphael would target himself, and thus few that would be able to lure him into a trap. I am one of those few."_
_Dean's glower deepened, if that was possible. Castiel glanced at the others. Balthazar and Gabriel were stone-faced; they probably liked the plan as much as Dean did, but recognized that it was their best shot. On Dean's right, Sam stared at the table, arms crossed, looking as if he was a million miles Dean's left, Bobby frowned at him, eyes concerned, but didn't comment._
"_Dean," he tried again. "It's alright. I am perfectly capable of doing this."_
_Dean stared at him for a moment, green eyes meeting blue, and then looked away, shoulders slumping in defeat. "Fine," he muttered. "Fine. What else have you got?"_
xXx
Castiel careened through heaven after heaven, disturbing numerous occupants. He would have to go back and apologize later, if he could. (2) He kept his eyes firmly in front of him, judging how long it would take to reach his destination.
_Just a bit farther,_ he thought. _A few more moments. If I can make it that far._
_No, I _can _make it. Dean would be very irritated with me if I didn't._
Dean Winchester's irritation was a sight to behold, and something to be avoided at all costs. With that in mind, Castiel beat his wings furiously, ignoring the aggravation to his wounds, flying as fast as he dared.
_There._
Almost too fast to be seen, he veered left and into yet another personal heaven. This one, however, was empty; he and the others had evacuated the soul that usually dwelled within. He landed, his wings sagging in relief and knees almost buckling.
Raphael landed shortly after.
"This is your chosen battlefield, then?" he questioned, looking around disdainfully. Castiel followed his gaze. It was a simple heaven, the interior of the house in which the soul had spent most of his life. Overall, it was quaint, with cozy furniture, hardwood floors, and bookshelves lining the walls. Not a typical place of battle, he thought, and he knew that Raphael agreed.
Good.
"It ends here, Raphael," he said, and the archangel scoffed.
"I agree," he replied, and started forward.
"So dramatic," Balthazar sighed, stepping into view. "Honestly, it's like a bad soap opera. Can't you think of something a little less cliché?"
Raphael paused and regarded the other angel. "You," he observed. "I thought the demons took care of you."
Balthazar shrugged. "Not so much," he stated, and with that, he lit the holy fire.
xXx
"_Holy fire," Bobby suggested, and everyone stopped bickering to stare at him. The man rolled his eyes. "Idgits. Holy fire'll hold even an archangel for a little while, and if you have the weapons to kill him, it won't need to take for that long."_
_Balthazar blinked. "I like you," he stated, raising an eyebrow. "You're intelligent."_
_Castiel nodded. "How then do we get him to stay in the circle long enough to light it?" he asked. "Raphael is many things, but stupid is not one of them. He may follow me to the trap, but if he sees through the ploy, all this planning will amount to nothing." _Nothing but our deaths, _he didn't say, though from the sharp glance that Dean sent him, the hunter caught the implied words._
_Sam looked up, a gleam in his eyes. "Mess him up," he suggested. "Annoy him. Do as much as possible to throw him off. I don't know… challenge him to single combat and fly away, or… attack him where he least expects it, or… hell, even do something that looks completely stupid. Anything that might throw him off balance will help."_
_Dean turned to glare at his brother. "Seriously?" he demanded. "That's your big plan? Hope that Cas can throw him off just enough that he won't be paying attention? You want him to bet his life on that?" At this, the table erupted into argument. Sam threw up his hands and pushed back from the table, muttering something about 'checking on Aziraphale' and 'let me know when you're going to discuss things instead of pulling each others' hair'._
_Castiel couldn't blame him. This was starting to get out of hand._
"_I think that he's right," he stated, his low voice cutting through the bickering like a knife. "Raphael has always had a temper. If I enrage him enough, he will focus on me and only me, not my surroundings." He looked at Balthazar and Gabriel. "We can prepare a heaven beforehand. I can lure him there and distract him, and from there, one of you can light the holy fire."_
xXx
"You can't possibly think that this will hold me for long," Raphael stated calmly, though his eyes held fiery anger. "Even with all the weapons of the armory, you cannot hope to kill me."
Balthazar sighed and walked around the circle of holy fire to stand by Castiel. "I've never like you all that much," he drawled, voice bored. "Even when you weren't such a fanatic, you always rubbed me the wrong way. I suppose I've always had a bit of trouble with authority."
Raphael narrowed his eyes, and the holy fire flickered and lowered. "I am going to kill you," he promised, "and your rebellion will become meaningless. The Apocalypse will happen as it was preordained."
"No, it won't. Not today."
Castiel breathed a sigh of relief as Gabriel stepped up beside him.
"Gabriel," the trapped archangel growled. "It has been some time."
The other archangel stepped forward again, until only the holy fire and a few inches separated the two. Castiel backed away slightly, and Balthazar did the same beside him. This was not the Gabriel he had become accustomed to of late, the Trickster, the pagan. This was the archangel Gabriel, in all his power, and every instinct Castiel had was screaming at him to run in the other direction.
xXx
"_Right, well, if that's the plan, it'll be simple from there," Balthazar said, leaning back in his chair. "I've got Gabriel's blade. All we'll have to do is get a good stab in."_
"_No," Gabriel interjected, an unreadable look on his face. Castiel realized that he had been oddly quiet throughout the planning session. "Let me talk to him first. It's been a long time since I've seen him. Maybe I can talk him down."_
_Castiel opened his mouth to tell him that he highly doubted that, but closed it again once he saw the look in the archangel's eyes. It was one of both anger and hope, and Castiel remembered what the archangel's reasons for fighting were in the first place. He never fought to win, he fought so that the fighting would stop, and if he could stop the war without having to kill the only other archangel there was, he would._
_Castiel nodded. "You can try," he said, and he didn't think he imagined the relief on Gabriel's face._
xXx
"Yes," Gabriel agreed, "too long." He sighed and looked Raphael up and down. "Jeez, Raphy, what happened to you? You used to be the kindest of all of us, the healer. I trusted you more than I trusted anyone else." His voice was remarkably steady, but Castiel could still hear the quaver in it.
"Things change, brother," Raphael replied. "You left, but Heaven did not stay the same in your absence."
"No, it didn't," Gabriel murmured. He met Raphael's eyes. "But seriously, Raphael, don't you think that if Dad actually wanted the Apocalypse, it would've happened last year? Or, hell, twenty years ago?"
"God is dead."
Gabriel laughed. "God's not dead. God is very much alive and kicking. Just a little while ago, he brought Aziraphale back to life! You remember him? Short, likes books, used to have a flaming sword?"
Raphael's eyes widened, and for the first time in years, he looked to be unsure of himself.
"C'mon, Raphy," Gabriel pressed. "Give it up. The Apocalypse will happen when Dad's good and ready for it, not before. Let it go." (3)
Raphael hesitated, and for a moment, Castiel dared to hope that he would listen, that this could end without further bloodshed. But then:
"No."
The holy fire dropped completely.
And everything happened at once.
xXx
"_You guys still need a plan," Dean insisted. "If shorty over here can't talk him down, what'll you do?"_
xXx
"Bloody hell!" someone shouted, and before Castiel knew it, something had slammed into him, knocking him to the hard flooring of the heaven. "Dammit, Cas, are you alright?"
Slowly, Castiel blinked, and the ringing cleared out of his ears. "Balthazar?" he questioned.
A grunt, and then: "Still alive. Damn, that deteriorated quickly."
Castiel sat up and winced; the impact with the floor hadn't done his wings any favors. Balthazar was a few feet to his left, presumably the one who had thrown him to the ground. Castiel frowned, taking in his scorched appearance and closed eyes. "Are you sure you're alright?"
The other angel's eyes cracked open and met his. "Bastard scorched me a bit, nothing that won't heal." With obvious effort, he propped himself up on his elbows and looked around. "Oh, bloody hell."
Castiel followed his gaze and resisted the urge to swear himself. The holy fire had indeed gone out, but it didn't seem like that was going to be a problem.
Gabriel sat in the middle of the floor, looking far more scorched than either of the other two. He didn't seem to notice, though; all of his attention was on the archangel he held in his arms, and the archangel blade that protruded from Raphael's stomach.
Castiel could tell that it was a fatal wound.
"Idiot," Gabriel scoffed. "You should've stopped when you had the chance, you stubborn bastard."
Raphael coughed, and blood and Grace bubbled up from between his lips. "Perhaps," he rasped. "Do you think…. I will see Father?"
Gabriel laughed miserably. "Yeah, Raphael, I'm sure you will."
Raphael nodded and coughed again. Then, there was an explosion of Grace and a desperate cry, the last cry. And silence.
Gabriel looked up and met Castiel's eyes, either not noticing the imprint of wings burnt into his arms or not caring. "It's over," he said, voice desolate, and Castiel nodded.
He didn't comment on the tear that was winding its way down the archangel's face. He could offer him that much dignity, at least.
xXx
_Castiel opened his mouth to reply to the Winchester, but Gabriel beat him to it._
"_Then I'll take care of it," he said flatly. No one wanted to meet his eyes after that, and Balthazar returned his blade to him without a word._
_Some things were better left unsaid._
xXx
(1)- Which he found far funnier than he ever let on, which was why he continued to do it.
(2)- Though he wasn't looking forward to it. Thomas Jefferson had, as Dean would say, a 'mean right hook'.
(3)- Not like the song. Not like the song at all. Even Gabriel was of the strong opinion that people needed to let Let It Go go.
**A/N: Hey, I said that someone was going to die. I never said that that someone was going to be a protagonist (though it was kinda funny to watch you guys freak out).**
**Late chapter is late, and lacking footnotes are lacking. Sorry. But just one more to go!**
**Finale: In which things get wrapped up, and everyone goes home.**
22. Epilogue
AFTER (DECEMBER 2010 A.D.)
In the end, night fell, as nights were wont to do, and the world continued to turn. The Apocalypse was averted with time to spare. Things finally began to fall back into place.
xXx
It only took a few hours after Raphael was killed for his followers to fall back into line. Balthazar couldn't say he was surprised. Gabriel was the only archangel left now, and when a pissed off archangel told you to do something, you did it, no questions asked. Not that the last bit was hard; most angels up here didn't ask questions, ever. He and Castiel were rare breeds.
"This is an absolute mess," he stated flatly, viewing the battlefields, the dead and the wounded.
"Yes," Castiel agreed sharply, and Balthazar grinned. Same old Cassy. Short and to the point. He'd actually missed him, these past few years. Not that he was ever going to tell him that. The bloke might get an inflated opinion of himself.
Speaking of egos…
"He's actually not doing so bad," he said, gesturing over at Gabriel. The archangel was talking to a few of the host's higher-ups, and apparently scaring the shit out of them. "Got a pretty good handle of the situation, for someone who hasn't been up here in over a thousand years."
Castiel nodded stiffly in agreement. "He's been a Trickster for a long time," he replied, "but he's always been an archangel, no matter how hard he tried to hide it, even from himself. He's back in his natural element now, even if he'll never admit it."
"Hm, wonder how long that'll last."
Castiel sent him a look, eyes flashing. "He won't run again," he growled. "I know that much. He feels guilty enough that he left the first time; he won't go now, especially not when the fighting is finally over."
Balthazar watched Gabriel for another moment and had to concede that Cassy was most likely right. There was a light in the archangel's eyes now, a different one from when he was playing the pagan, and one entirely different from his expression after killing Raphael. No, the look on his face was one of determination.
"Alright," he decided. "I suppose I'll believe that. Maybe I'll even stick around to help." A thought struck him, and he turned to face the other completely. "What about you, then? What's on your agenda?"
"I'll help, of course. There is that I had a hand in destroying, and much that needs to be fixed. I believe that… why are you looking at me like that?"
Balthazar snorted and withheld a comment about pots and kettles. "I absolutely _hate_ to be the one to break it to you, Cassy dearest, but you're not fooling anybody."
"What do you-"
"Oh, please. You know exactly what I'm talking about. Go see Winchester. Everyone knows you want to."
"I-"
It was Balthazar's turn to give a look. "God knows what it is that you see in him, Cassy, because I definitely don't, but we both know that you'll just be moping about it until you do get to visit, so you might as well just take off now."
Castiel frowned, but Balthazar could read him as easily as a book. "Go," he prodded. "We have things covered up here."
"I… I will return soon," Cassy finally relented. "Thank you, brother." And he was gone.
Balthazar tracked his flight until he was out of sight and shook his head. How Dean Winchester deserved someone like Castiel to be so devoted to him was beyond him. But then again, Cassy had always been the one with better sight, so he supposed he'd give the human a chance.
If he hurt Castiel in any way, though, he'd barely live long enough to regret it.
xXx
And so it was that on the first of December, 2010, Castiel returned to Dean Winchester, who gave him a hug for a beat longer than was perhaps necessary and demanded that the angel "-never do that again, alright? You scared me, man." To which Castiel replied with, "Yes, Dean."
Sam Winchester and Bobby Singer remained in the kitchen, unwilling to interrupt, and exchanged a knowing glance.
xXx
And, thousands of miles and an ocean away, an angel fed ducks, and the ducks promptly sank.
"Crowley, dear, you shouldn't do that, honestly," Aziraphale muttered, though he wasn't really all that annoyed.
The demon shrugged, peering over the rims of the sunglasses that he had once again taken to wearing. "Can't help it," he said. "Habit, I suppose."
Aziraphale sighed and shook his head, a smile tugging at his lips. Some things never changed. "There's a reason that brought you here, isn't there?" he asked, amusement coloring his voice.
"Does there have to be?"
The angel raised an eyebrow.
"Alright. Our table is open today, and I wondering if you might want to grab a bite to eat," Crowley relented. "Only if you're not busy, of course, I mean, if-"
Aziraphale smiled. "Dear, nothing would make me happier," he said, and the demon's face visibly brightened, though he tried to hide it. The angel, on the other hand, did nothing to conceal his emotions. Things were finally looking up. Theirs was a relationship based on thousands of years of complications, and they had overcome things worse than this. What was most important is that they wouldn't push or pull one another in ways that neither was ready for, but instead work this out together. It would be a long road, but one well worth traveling
And as the pair walked, Aziraphale thought, just for a moment, that he caught a bird's song above the mid-morning traffic. Its voice was rusty and croaked with disuse, but it was a beautiful sound all the same.
xXx
_All things end. That's just a fact. Everything that begins will have an end, but the thing to remember about that is that every ending is also a new beginning, another page, another story in the vast and ever-growing collection._
_It's important to remember that things begin and things begin. But it is also equally important to remember that some things, the most special and important and beautiful of things, linger long after they are gone._
_Some things are indeed eternal._
Chuck Shurley finished the sentence and frowned slightly. Eternal, indeed. No, that wasn't quite the right word to use, was it? He tore the paper from the typewriter and groped for a black pen. A few moments later, the word eternal was replaced with a far better one.
_Yes, ineffable really is a good word, _Chuck mused.
And then, He was gone.
Fin
xXx
**A/N: My God, it's done. Took me over a year, but it's done.**
**I'll start by saying thank you so, so very much to everyone who followed, faved, and especially reviewed. I started this fic on a whim, and I honestly didn't expect that anyone would be interested. You've all blown me away with your encouragement and support. This would never have gotten finished without you. So from the bottom of my heart, thank you.**
**Next, I'll answer a question I'm sure a few of you might have: sequel, anybody? Right now, the answer is tentatively no. However, that's not a definite answer, and if the mood strikes me, I'll revisit for sure (if that happens, would you like me to post something here to let you know?). I believe I'll at least want to come back and edit this at some point. But not now. I'm going to need a break before I embark on something like that (again, would you like me to post something to let you know when I start editing?).**
**Again, thank you all for sticking with me, even through my frequent hiatuses. It means more to me than I could ever say. I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing this.**
**Well, until next time, this is Cati, saying ciao!**
End file.
| fanfiction |
total hip replacement ( thr ) is most commonly performed for end - stage osteoarthritis , although this procedure is also performed for rarer conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis , avascular necrosis of the hip , and femoral neck fractures . despite its well - known propensity to generate wear debris and subsequent periprosthetic osteolysis , polyethylene bearing surfaces remain the gold standard for thr based on their consistent results and survivorship of ~85 % after 15 years , and the significant pitfalls of alternative articulation designs ( i.e. metal - on - metal and ceramic - on - ceramic ) [ 2 , 3 ] . thus , a major focus of ultra high molecular weight polyethylene ( uhmwpe ) research has been on formulations that minimize host response that leads to aseptic loosening .
one of the consequences of early uhmwpe devices , which are sterilized using high - dose gamma irradiation ( 25100 kgy ) , while exposed to air to also crosslink the polymer chains , is the formation of free radicals that become trapped in the final product .
these residual reactive oxygen species ( ros ) , left unaddressed , cause oxidative degradation as seen in uhmwpe components stored on the shelf for a long time in air - permeable packaging prior to implantation , leading to increased wear and decreased performance in vivo .
subsequent improvements in uhmwpe processes introduced temperature - driven manufacturing operations , specifically remelting and annealing , which increases the molecular mobility and facilitates recombination of the free radicals .
these additional processes are not without drawbacks , leading either to reduced mechanical properties or only giving a partial protection against oxidation due to ros [ 8 ] .
while annealing methods that heat the uhmwpe to temperatures just below their peak melting point have been adopted to reduce ros in the manufacturing process , the implants may still be sterilized with gamma irradiation after final packaging , exposing the devices to potentially significant oxidation [ 9 ] .
yet another approach to stabilizing uhmwpe is to provide oxidation resistance without decreasing uhmwpe fatigue strength , by means of the incorporation of antioxidants such as vitamin e into the resin , or by diffusing it into already consolidated and radiated uhmwpe [ 11 ] .
this advance adds yet another variable to the chemical composition and molecular response to the irradiation / annealing conditions that can be used to generate novel uhmwpe implants . since the in vivo
wear debris properties of each of these constructs will need to be empirically determined to define their effects on osteoclastic bone resorption ( osteolysis ) and coupled bone formation ( osteogenesis ) , there is a great need for cost - effective in vitro and in vivo models [ 12 , 13 ] , and the pros and cons of the current murine models have recently been reviewed .
our research , aimed at understanding the biological responses to wear debris particles , has relied heavily on the murine calvaria model , which was originally developed to study titanium and polymethylmethacrylate particles with histology [ 15 , 16 ] .
subsequently , this model has been used as a small animal surrogate to study novel interventions for wear debris - induced osteolysis including : bisphosphonates , cyclo - oxygenase inhibitors , tnf and rankl biologic antagonists , nf - kappa b inhibitors , jun kinase inhibitors , inhibitors of the nalp3 inflammasome , and adenosine receptor activators [ 1626 , 27 ] .
most recently , this murine calvaria model was modified to study uhmwpe particles , using volumetric micro - ct .
since osteolysis is the result of uncoupled bone resorption , an important component of the murine calvaria model is the robust bone formation that occurs on resorption surfaces within 2 weeks of wear debris implantation , which occurs in the complete absence of osteoclasts .
this allows for the analysis of both osteolysis and osteogenesis from longitudinal micro - ct data if a faithful 3d registration algorithm can be developed to quantify the wear debris - induced osteolysis ( day 0 calvaria bone volume
day 10 calvaria bone volume ) and osteogenesis ( day 10 osteoid and under - mineralized bone volume ) . here
, we describe these methods in a pilot study evaluating the effects of particles from three distinct uhmwpe materials ( marathon , xlk , and aox ) , versus sham surgery and hydrogel ( pva - paa ) particle controls ( table 1 ) , aimed at testing the hypothesis that uhmwpe particles of similar size distribution would illicit similar biological response , despite variations in the starting resin or the presence of the antioxidant.table 1parameters of uhmwpe composition , gamma irradiation , and annealingfactorsmarathonxlkaox(pva - paa hydrogel)resin ( gur)1,0501,0201,020 + aopoly ( vinyl alcohol ) and poly ( acrylic acid)gamma dose50 kgy50 kgy80 kgy50 kgyremeltyesyesnono parameters of uhmwpe composition , gamma irradiation , and annealing
particles from three different compositions of uhmwpe ( marathon , xlk , aox ) were generated from depuy production barstock lots using high speed cryomilling and cryopulverization ( bioengineering solutions , chicago , il , usa ) .
particle filtering was used to isolate particles in the 110 um range , and they were characterized using low angle laser light scattering ( microtrac - x100 , ) and scanning electron microscopy with eds to confirm particle size , shape , and composition .
particles were eto sterilized and verified free of endotoxins ( < 0.01 ue ; kinetic qcl).table 2physical characteristics of the uhmwpe particlesmarathonxlkaoxaveragerangeaveragerangeaveragerangeparticle size ( m)2.670.48 ~ 23.083.90.82 ~ 24.943.160.11 ~ 17.18aspect ratio1.731.1 ~ 4.631.861.04 ~ 8.111.751.07 ~ 16.94roundness0.620.22 ~ 0.910.590.12 ~ 0.970.640.06 ~ 0.94form
factor0.640.12 ~ 0.920.570.14 ~ 0.880.580.01 ~ 0.91perimeter ( m)11.481.78 ~ 138.2617.592.94 ~ 15.5014.470.43 ~ 194.87 physical characteristics of the uhmwpe particles
all animal studies were performed under protocols approved by the university of rochester committee for animal resources .
eight - week - old c57b/6 mice were shaved prior to calvaria surgery , and the area was sterilized with 70 % ethanol and iodine .
a 0.5 0.5-cm area of calvarial bone was exposed by making a midline sagittal incision over the calvaria , leaving the periosteum intact .
a low threshold dose of particles known to be required to induce osteolysis ( 2 mg ) or a high dose ( 5 mg ) of marathon , xlk , aox and hydrogel ( pva - paa ) control were spread over the area of each mouse and hydrogel were directly injected onto the calvaria surface ( n = 6 ) .
one assigned group consisting of an incision of only the skin served as a sham surgery control .
micro - ct scans were performed with a vivact40 ( scanco medical , basserdorf , switzerland ) using an isometric resolution of 15 um .
baseline calvaria volume was obtained from in vivo scans on day 0 ( before surgery ) , while the mice were anesthetized with 2 % isofluorine and 1 l / min oxygen .
the dicom micro - ct files were then transferred to amira v.5.4 ( visage imaging , san diego , ca , usa ) for quantitative analysis .
quantification of the osteolytic and osteogenic volume was performed as show fig . 1 .
briefly , in vivo micro - ct scans of the calvaria are performed prior to surgical implantation of the wear debris particles ( day 0 ) , and ex vivo scans of the calvaria are performed after tissue harvest on day 10 .
the dicom files are used to generate an initial 3d image of the calvaria at each time point , and these images are then imported into the amira program for volumetric registration and analyses .
three distinct tissues types were defined by this process based on their bone mineral density ( bmd ) . in the region of interest ( roi ) , the original calvarial bone , which has a high bmd ( zoom and data window = 1,0007,000 ; display and masking = 1,7007,000 ) , was initially identified .
then an under - mineralized tissue with a lower bmd ( zoom and data window = 1,0003,000 ; display and masking = 1,0002,500 ) , was identified within the roi , which we defined as new bone that formed in response to the wear debris - induced osteolysis .
finally , the unmineralized soft tissue , with a lower bmd , was identified within the roi between the original calvaria , and the new woven bone was defined as inflammatory tissue .
based on this tissue segmentation , we were able to calculate the volumes and determine the osteolytic versus osteogenic potential of the different particles via liner regression analysis ( fig .
1longitudinal micro - ct analysis and quantification of uhmwpe particle induced osteolysis and osteogenesis in vivo .
3d reconstructions of dicom images were generated from the micro - ct raw data of the region of interest ( roi ) ( circled bone ) obtained on day 0 and day 10 following surgical implantation of 2 mg of uhmwpe particles .
after roi confirmation via amira image analysis , the day 0 ( yellow bone ) and day 10 ( green bone ) rois are co - registered in 3d . the osteolytic volume is then determined by the bone void in the day 10 roi , and the osteogenic volume is calculated from the under calcified bone in the roi of the co - registered 3d images . to assess the relative osteolytic versus osteogenic potential of a particular uhmwpe particle , a linear regression analysis
is performed by plotting the osteolysis versus the osteogenic volume for each mouse ( n = 6 ) , in which slope = 1.0 signifies perfect coupling longitudinal micro - ct analysis and quantification of uhmwpe particle induced osteolysis and osteogenesis in vivo .
3d reconstructions of dicom images were generated from the micro - ct raw data of the region of interest ( roi ) ( circled bone ) obtained on day 0 and day 10 following surgical implantation of 2 mg of uhmwpe particles .
after roi confirmation via amira image analysis , the day 0 ( yellow bone ) and day 10 ( green bone ) rois are co - registered in 3d .
the osteolytic volume is then determined by the bone void in the day 10 roi , and the osteogenic volume is calculated from the under calcified bone in the roi of the co - registered 3d images . to assess the relative osteolytic versus osteogenic potential of a particular uhmwpe particle
, a linear regression analysis is performed by plotting the osteolysis versus the osteogenic volume for each mouse ( n = 6 ) , in which slope = 1.0 signifies perfect coupling the results from the sham and hydrogel - treated calvaria demonstrated minimal osteolysis and the lack of a significant osteogenesis response in these groups .
in contrast , all three particles displayed a significant osteolytic and osteogenic effect vs. sham controls ( p < 0.01 ) .
additionally , all three particles demonstrated a dose - dependent effect on both osteolysis and osteogenesis , in which the effects of the 5-mg dose appeared to saturate the host responses .
of note was that the marathon particles induced the smallest osteolytic response among the uhmwpe particles tested , suggesting that at low doses it elicits the best biological response .
however , when we analyzed the osteolytic versus osteogenic potential of the particles , the marathon particles appear to have uncoupled osteolysis and osteogenesis with a slope = 0.59 ( fig . 1 ) .
thus , this uncoupling highlights the importance of measuring both bone responses when evaluating uhmwpe particles for biocompatibility and toxicity .
in contrast , aox particles slightly favor osteogenesis over osteolysis ( slope = 1.27 ) .
this suggests that the presence of the antioxidant may produce a more favorable environment for bone formation following wear debris - induced bone resorption .
under non - pathologic conditions , wear debris - induced bone resorption is coupled to bone formation to prevent osteolysis .
this is why only a small fraction of joint replacement patients develop periprosthetic osteolysis and aseptic loosening , while most patients display a linear wear rate over time [ 3032 ] .
the theory that aseptic loosing may be due to an uncoupling of osteogenic / osteolytic processes rather than a specific negative wear debris responses is supported by longitudinal volumetric ct analysis of patients with varying degrees of periprosthetic bone loss [ 3133 ] .
it is for this reason that we have chosen micro - ct as the primary outcome measure in our preclinical studies , and aimed to develop faithful quantitative measures of coupled vs. uncoupled responses to wear debris . here
, we demonstrate that volumetric longitudinal micro - ct can be used to quantify these events using the murine calvaria model . using this model , we observed differences in the induced osteolysis .
material factors which may have contributed to these differences include the average molecular weight of the resin ( 5 vs. 2 million ) , the presence or absence of the antioxidant , but also the average particle size . in this experiment
, attempts were made to control for the particle size , but filtering still produces a distribution of particle sizes with significant overlap , which is an issue that requires attention in the future .
moreover , inclusion of anti - oxidants into the larger particles from lower molecular weight resin without remelting results in uhmwpe ( aox ) that has similar osteolytic and osteogenic properties to low dose marathon , suggesting a biological effect of the anti - oxidants that compensates for the lack of ros release from remelting .
one limitation of our pilot study is that the uhmwpe particles differed in more than one variable ( tables 1 and 2 ) .
thus , we are not able to make firm conclusions about the effects of anti - oxidant incorporation . however , it was interesting to see that the aox particles induced less osteolysis than the xlk particles , and significantly more osteogenesis than the marathon ( p < 0.05 ) .
formal studies are now planned to directly assess the potential effect of a free radical scavenging antioxidant presence on the overall osteolysis process . | pubmed |
Georgina Gent formerly Stoop, born 13 January 1988 is an English, AEGON Award-winning former professional tennis player who was coached by Damien Roberts. She won two ITF singles titles, two ITF doubles titles and reached a career-high singles ranking of world no. 178 in her career.
Personal life
Stoop's parents are named Angus and Tessa and she has three older siblings, Sam, Olly and Milly, who she used to play tennis against. Her mother, Tessa, an interior designer spent time with her children playing tennis during their childhood. Stoop first began playing tennis at the age of 5 but enjoys all other sports as well, particularly hockey. After attending St Faith's School, she was selected to be educated at The Leys School while being coached by national coaches, and left school when she was sixteen. In 2008, Stoop's mother remarried and in 2010 Stoop changed her surname to her mother's new married name, to be known as Georgie Gent.
Career
Junior 20032006
Stoop's first match on the ITF junior circuit was in February 2003. In only the second junior tournament of her career the Team Leschly Danish Junior Cup, she won two matches to qualify and then four more to reach the final; a marathon match which she eventually lost, 7611, 673, 57. She reached one more final over the course of her junior career in the Nottingham ITF tournament in August 2004 where she also lost. Her overall win-loss record in singles was 2719.
She had less success in doubles, only reaching two quarterfinals both with Laura Peterzan over the course of her career and never passing this stage. Her doubles win-loss record was 616. She reached a career-high combined singles and doubles ranking of world No.234 on 1 August 2005.
20052007
Stoop's first professional match win came in May 2005 in the $10,000 ITF tournament where she reached the final before losing to Gaëlle Widmer from Switzerland in straight sets, 36, 26. She played seven more ITF tournaments that year but won only two more matches. She finished the year with a ranking of No.903.
2006 started slowly for Stoop up until April when she reached the semi-finals of the ITF $10,000 tournament in Bath. She continued playing on the ITF tour, reaching two more quarter-finals, until June when she was awarded a wild card into the tier II International Women's Open qualifying event in Eastbourne, England. She was beaten without winning a single game by Japan's Akiko Morigami who was ranked 69 at the time, 553 places above Stoop. This wild card was followed by another, this time into the qualifying tournament of her home Grand Slam, Wimbledon, where she was beaten by Stéphanie Cohen-Aloro, 26, 26. After this her ranking rose steadily as she played out the rest of the year on the ITF tour. She reached one more semi-final and three more finals, losing in two of them but winning the last as a qualifier in the $25,000 event in Nuriootpa, Australia. She ended the 2006 season ranked No.412.
In her first tournament of 2007, Stoop reached the quarter-final of the $10,000 ITF event in Stuttgart, Germany. She reached the final of the $25,000 event in La Palma, Spain in March where she lost to María Emilia Salerni, 36, 36. She did not play again after this until October, after which she reached two more quarterfinals in $25,000 events held in Istanbul and Mount Gambier, losing to Monica Niculescu both times. Her year-end ranking for 2007 was world No.306.
2008
Stoop reached two more ITF quarter-finals in the first half of 2008 before being given a wild card into the tier II International Women's Open in Eastbourne where she came up against top-40 player Kaia Kanepi from Estonia in the first round. She put up a good fight, winning a first set tie break before losing the next two sets, 766, 16, 57. Her next wild card was into the qualifying tournament of Wimbledon where she also lost in the first round. Her third consecutive wild card was into the tier II Bank of the West Classic qualifying tournament and it proved more fruitful than her previous two. She won two matches in three sets before falling to Michelle Larcher De Brito in the final round of qualifying, 46, 06. After this she reached three more ITF quarterfinals one of them as a qualifier at the $75,000 event in Albuquerque, New Mexico and two more ITF finals in $25,000 Coimbra and $50,000 Troy where she was beaten by Nicole Thijssen from the Netherlands and Anna Tatishvili from Georgia respectively. In October, Stoop reached the quarter-finals of the $50,000 ITF tournament in Pittsburgh, USA where she lost to No.6 seed Varvara Lepchenko. Her final world ranking of 2008 was No.208.
2009
Stoop began her 2009 season by attempting to qualify for the Australian Open. She beat American Alexa Glatch in the first round before falling to Kathrin Wörle in a three-set battle, 36, 75, 1214. In February and March she reached two ITF quarterfinals and one semifinal before heading to Paris to attempt to qualify for the French Open. She was beaten by Petra Martić in the first round of qualifying, 57, 57. In June she received three consecutive wild cards into WTA tournaments, the first of which was into the main draw of the Aegon Classic in Birmingham where compatriot Elena Baltacha defeated her in two sets in the first round. She then competed in the qualifying draw for the Aegon International but again did not win a match, losing to Ekaterina Makarova, 46, 672. Her third of three consecutive wild cards allowed Stoop entry into the main draw of Wimbledon for the first time in her career. She came up against No.7 seed Vera Zvonareva in the first round. Stoop almost caused a huge upset by coming close to defeating the Russian, however she eventually lost, 670, 64, 46. However, she did team up with Laura Robson in the doubles to face Jade Curtis and Anna Smith, a match which they won in an epic three sets, 64, 36, 1311. Stoop and Robson went on to lose to Grand Slam champions Amélie Mauresmo and Svetlana Kuznetsova in the second round. After Wimbledon, Stoop reached one more ITF quarterfinal and won her second title, beating Katie O'Brien in an all-British final at the $25,000 event in Vigo, Spain.
ITF circuit finals
Singles: 8 26
Doubles: 6 24
Grand Slam performance timeline
References
External links
Category:1988 births
Category:Living people
Category:English female tennis players
Category:People educated at St Faith's School
Category:People educated at The Leys School
Category:Sportspeople from Cambridge
Category:People from Royston, Hertfordshire
Category:British female tennis players
Category:Tennis people from Cambridgeshire | wikipedia |
Pokémon POKWORLD INTERVIEWS 2!!!
INTERVIEW #15
CASSIDY, JESSIE, JAMES, MEOWTH
PROFESSOR IVY, PROFESSOR OAK,
ASH, MISTY, TRACEY, BROCK, MRS.KETCHUM
BUTCH,
Brian: HELLO AND THIS IS BRIAN WILLIS REPORTING FOR THE POKEWORLD INTERVIEWS.
CASSANDRA: THAT'S RIGHT, AND THIS IS CASSANDRA JADE TINNIKIS ALSO REPORTING FOR THE POKEWORLD INTERVIEWS. (CORNY MUSIC)
BRIAN: TODAY WE ARE TALKING WITH ALMOST ALL THE MEMBERS OF POKEMON. BRIAN: HEY! WHERE IS A'KIRA????
CASSANDRA: I DON'T KNOW BRIAN...MAYBE SHE IS LATE.
BRIAN: WELL WE WILL JUST HAVE TO CONTINUE WITHOUT HER. WELL TODAY IN-
CASSANDRA: HEY BRIAN.
BRIAN: YES CASSANDRA.
CASSANDRA: I WAS THINKING.
BRIAN: UMM UMMM
CASSANDRA: MAYBE IT WAS TO EARLY FOR US TO GET MARRIED... BUT I STILL LOVE YOU.
BRIAN: I LOVE YOU TOO!
CASSANDRA: OH BRIAN
BRIAN: OH CASSANDRA (ALL THE AUDIENCE GOES AAAAAAAWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!)
A'KIRA: WAIT.. HOLD ON, I'M BACK!!!!!
BRIAN: IT'S ABOUT TIME MISS GUY CHASER.
A'KIRA: I KNOW, I JUST CAN'T HELP KISSING WITH BROCK.
BRIAN: IF YOU WANT TO KISS, GET A DIFFERENT SHOW!!!!!!!!
CASSANDRA: CALM DOWN BRIAN, YOU HAVE VEINS POPING OUT OF YOUR HEAD.
BRIAN: (VERY ANGRY AND SLOW) WHERE... IS LAURANCE!!!
A'KIRA: SHE ACTUALLY FOUND A GIRL THAT WAS A LESBIAN TOO!
BRIAN: UMM UMM WHATEVER. (EVERYONE IN THE AUDIENCE... EEEEWWWW!!!!!!!!!!)
CASSANDRA: WELL PROFESSOR OAK FIRST QUESTION IS FOR YOU. SINCE YOU AND PROFESSOR IVY ARE POKEMON PROFESSORS WHY DON'T YOU GUYS JOIN FORCES. SO TO SPEAK
PROFESSOR OAK: (CRICKETS CHIRPING)
PROFESSOR IVY: WELL YOU SEE PROFESSOR OAK DOESN'T WANT TO BECAUSE WE BOTH HAVE A CHILD THAT WE PUT UP FOR ADOPTION.
BRIAN: THAT WAS JUST TO DEEP.
CASSANDRA: THAT'S A LOW DOWN DIRTY SHAME.
BRIAN: WELL LOOK AT THE TIME.. HEHEHE. GOT TO GO BYE THANKS FOR TUNING IN.
CASSANDRA: THAT WAS A DEEP STORY!!!!
BACK STAGE INTERVIEW #16
GARY, ASH, BROCK, MISTY, TRACEY,
TODD, RICHIE, MRS.KETCHUM, MR.MIME,
PROFESSOR OAK, PROFESSOR IVY
JESSIE, JAMES, MEOWTH, CASSIDY, BUTCH, GHOST OF MAIDEN, AND ALL GYM LEADERS.
BRIAN: HELLO THIS IS BRIAN AND ME AND MY FELLOW REPORTERS ARE BACK HERE WITH PROBABLY ALL THE MEMBERS OF POKEMON.
CASSANDRA: HEY BRIAN, WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO LAUREN. SHE WASN'T HERE FOR THE LAST INTERVIEW EITHER.
A'KIRA: I KNOW WHERE SHE IS.
CASSANDRA AND BRIAN: WHERE?!?!?!?!?
A'KIRA: SHE'S OUT WITH THIS NEW GIRL SHE PICKED UP FROM THAT BAR ACROSS THE STREET.
CASSANDRA AND BRIAN: (CRICKETS CHIRPING)
A'KIRA: WHAT?
BRIAN AND CASSANDRA: THAT'S THE BAR WITH THE KILLER DRAG QUEENS.
CASSANDRA AND BRIAN: OH ****
A'KIRA: SHUT UP. YOU CAN'T SAY THAT ON THE AIR.
BRIAN AND CASSANDRA: SORRY
A'KIRA: WE BETTER GO GET HER QUICK BEFORE... GOD KNOWS WHAT HAPPENS TO HER.
MAIDEN: WHAT ABOUT US. WE STILL HAVE TO BE INTERVIEWED.
BRIAN: GO HOME WOMAN!!!!
CASSANDRA: ALL OF YOU GO HOME AND DON'T COME BACK UNTIL TOMORROW.
CASSANDRA: THAT'S THE THING I HATE ABOUT GAY FOLKS.
BRIAN: YEAH... PLEASURE BEFORE RATINGS!!!!!!
INTERVIEW #16
GARY, ASH, BROCK, MISTY, TRACEY,
TODD, RICHIE, MRS.KETCHUM, MR.MIME,
PROFESSOR OAK, PROFESSOR IVY
JESSIE, JAMES, MEOWTH, CASSIDY, BUTCH, GHOST OF MAIDEN, AND ALL GYM LEADERS.
BRIAN: SORRY FOR THE DELAY FOLKS, BUT WE'RE BACK TO INTERROGATE THE MEMBERS OF POKEMON.
CASSANDRA: THAT'S RIGHT, SO LET'S GET STARTED. FIRST QUESTION IS FOR YOU CASSIDY.
WHEN WILL YOU EVER GET TOGETHER WITH BUTCH?
CASSIDY: WHAT ARE TALKING ABOUT YOU CRAZY *****.
BRIAN: UH-OH TIME TO GO.
CASSANDRA: (BIG LARGE VEIN POPS OUT OF HEAD) WHAT DID YOU CALL ME. (PUTS DAGGERS TO THROAT) DON'T MAKE ME HURT YOU WOMAN!!! NOW ANSWER THE QUESTION.
CASSANDRA: YOU CAN COME BACK IN NOW BRIAN. WHERE DID YOU GO ANYWAYS BRIAN?
BRIAN: I KNEW IT WOULD TAKE YOU A WHILE TO GET YOUR POINT ACROSS SO I GOT SOME SNACKS FOR ALL THE REPORTERS.
CASSANDRA AND A'KIRA: THANKS A WHOLE *****AND******BUNCH.
BRIAN: CASSANDRA... DON'T EVER SAY THAT KIND OF STUFF ON THE AIR, OR DRY TO KILL SOMEBODY.
CASSANDRA: BUT IT'S MY DESTINY BRIAN
BRIAN: WELL CHANGE YOUR DESTINY, THE PO POS MIGHT BE WATCHIN'. (AUTHOR'S NOTE: IN CASE YOU DON'T KNOW THE PO POS ARE COPS. THANK YOU.)
CASSANDRA: I HATE IT WHEN THOSE STUPID LITTLE AUTHOR NOTES COME UP. THEY ALWAYS INTERUPT OUR RATINGS!!!
BRIAN: BUT ANYWAYS AFTER THAT STUPID PERFORMANCE BY-
CASSANDRA: STUPID! IT WAS NOT STUPID YOU KNOW THAT I CAN'T CONTROL OUT BURSTS LIKE THAT. THAT'S THE WAY THE AUTHORS MADE ME.
BRIAN: WELL WE SHOULD JUST TRY AND CHANGE THAT SHOULDN'T WE CASSANDRA.
CASSANDRA: I REALLY WISH I HAD A MILKY WAY BAR.
BRIAN:WHAT?
CASSANDRA: WHO WHA- YES WE SHOULD TRY AND CHANGE THAT
BUT WE CAN'T DO IT WITH ALL THE PO POS AND KIDS.
BRIAN: OK THEN, THIS IS BRIAN WILLIS SIGNING OFF OF THE POKEWORLD INTERVIEW, GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK.
CASSANDRA: I WANT A MILKY WAY BAR!!!! OOO GOOD BYE NOW.
BRIAN: AS YOU CAN PLAINLY SEE CASSANDRA AND ME LIVE IN A WONDERFUL MANSION. BECAUSE I GET PAID 200,000 DOLLARS A YEAR.
DIANA: WELL THANK YOU FOR THAT WONDERFUL TOUR OF YOUR HOUSE, I REALLY LOVE THE FABRIC.
DIANA: NOW THAT WE ARE FINISHED WITH BRIAN AND CASSANDRA'S HOUSE, LET'S MOVE ON TO A'KIRA'S HOUSE.
A'KIRA: WELL THANKS FOR COMING TO MY HOUSE EVEN THOUGH IT'S A LITTLE DIRTY.
DIANA: A LITTLE DIRTY? GIRL, YO HOUSE LOOK'S LIKE THE WORLD'S LARGEST ROACH MOTEL.
A'KIRA: IF YOUR GONNA BE THIS DISRESPECTFUL IN MY HOUSE THEN YOU CAN GET OUT AND STAY OUT?
DIANA: GOOD BYE... OH DIRTY ONE.
DIANA: WELL, SINCE THAT PERSON WAS JUST SO RUDE, LET'S MOVE ON.
BRIAN: SORRY WE DON'T HAVE ENOUGH TIME.
DIANA: BUT I-
BRIAN: I'M SORRY BUT YOUR GOING TO HAVE TO LEAVE YOU DISCO REJECT MANIAC.
DIANA:WELL I NEVER IN MY LIVE:
BRIAN: WELL IT JUST HAPPENED.
DIANA: GOOD...
BRIAN: BYE!!!
BRIAN: AND THIS IS BRIAN MCKNIGHT SIGNING OFF OFF THE POKEWORLD INTERVIEWS. GOOD BYE AND...
CASSANDRA: GOOD LUCK
BRIAN: CASSANDRA!!!!
CASSANDRA: HEHEHE!!!
TO BE CONTINUED....
MWA HAHAHAHA
End file.
| fanfiction |
The discography of Dave Gahan, an English alternative music singer, consists of two studio albums, two live albums, one compilation album, six singles, and one video album. Gahan debuted in 1980 as lead singer of the electronic music band Depeche Mode see Depeche Mode discography. The group achieved worldwide success, producing fourteen top ten singles in the United Kingdom and selling over 100 million records worldwide.
Gahan released his solo debut album Paper Monsters in June 2003. The album, which was composed with Gahan's close friend Knox Chandler, reached number thirty-six on the UK albums chart. It reached number five on the German and Swedish album charts. The album produced three singles, all of which reached the top forty in the UK singles chart. Live Monsters, a live video album, and its companion album Soundtrack to Live Monsters were released the following year. His second studio album, Hourglass, was released in October 2007. It reached number fifty in the UK. In Germany, the album reached number two. The album's lead single, Kingdom, reached number one on the United States Billboard Hot Dance Club Play chart.
Albums
Studio albums
Live albums
Compilation albums
Singles
Notes
A ^ Released as a digital download through Gahan's official website
B ^ Also appears on the Lost Boys: The Tribe - Original Motion Picture Soundtrack released in 2008.
Video albums
Music videos
Other appearances
References
General
Releases. DaveGahan.com. Retrieved 16 July 2008.
[ Dave Gahan > Discography]. Allmusic. Retrieved 16 July 2008.
Specific
External links
Official website
Category:Discographies of British artists
Category:Pop music discographies | wikipedia |
maternal use of frusemide had been tried to induce fetal diuresis to help differentiating fetuses with non - functioning kidneys from those suffering from severe placental insufficiency .
maternal frusemide causes a transient increase in the fetal urine production and consequently a small increase in the amniotic fluid volume ( afv ) .
a 26-year - old unbooked primigravida , weighing 50 kg with a pre - pregnancy diagnosis of severe rheumatic mitral stenosis ( mitral valve area 1 cm ) and pulmonary artery hypertension , presented to us at 34 weeks of gestation with acute pulmonary edema .
she was managed with intravenous morphine , intravenous frusemide , digoxin , fluid restriction , oxygen by mask .
her cardio respiratory status improved over the next 48 h. during this period , she had received 80 mg frusemide intravenous loading dose and then was on 40 mg frusemide every 8 h. she had passed a total of 2000 ml of urine per day during these 2 days . on the 4 day of her admission , obstetric ultrasound was performed based on clinical suspicion of reduced liquor .
the biophysical profile was normal and hence it was decided to review the fetal status after 1 week .
meanwhile , her general condition improved and she had been switched over to 40 mg oral frusemide once daily .
the afi repeated after 1 week and 2 weeks from the first scan were 9 cm and 11 cm , respectively .
she continued the pregnancy till 38 weeks and had an outlet forceps delivery to cut short the second stage of labour .
post - natal period was complicated by episiotomy wound dehiscence , which required secondary suturing .
the bulk of amniotic fluid inflow is contributed by fetal urine production in the second half of pregnancy .
when placental perfusion is optimum , the functioning fetal kidneys produce urine at a rate of about 5 ml / h at 20 weeks increasing to about 51 ml / h by the third trimester .
placental perfusion is influenced by several factors , which include but not limited to maternal hydration status and intravascular volume , perfusion pressure in the uterine arteries and functional placental surface area .
maternal hydration therapy , orally as well as intravenously has been tried in cases of oligohydramnios to improve the liquor status , with some degree of success .
the increase in the afi is limited to parenteral hypotonic fluid infusions , suggesting a mechanism beyond simple expansion of intravascular volume .
it has been suggested that the maternal fluid compartment contributes significantly to the afv in the last trimester , possibly through the so - called transmembranous pathway .
maternal administration of frusemide had been shown to induce fetal diuresis in both normal and growth restricted fetuses .
this effect has also been studied to differentiate fetal non - functioning kidneys from severe placental insufficiency in pregnancies with anhydramnios .
in addition to bladder filling , a transient small increase in the afv is expected due to fetal diuresis . in our case ,
due to the prolonged administration of high dose loop diuretic and consequent maternal diuresis , maternal intravascular volume contraction transiently reduced the placental perfusion .
in addition , an increase in amniotic fluid outflow through the trans - membranous pathway in response to fall in the hydrostatic pressure on the maternal side is also possible .
the placental function was normal in this pregnancy as seen by the return of afi to normalcy with time , during which time the fluid shifts between extravascular and intravascular compartments would have been equilibrated .
the sequence of events suggests that the amniotic fluid space also behaves as an extension of maternal fluid spaces .
this case emphasizes the importance of taking the maternal status and potential effect of frusemide in interpreting the afi .
otherwise , the fetus would have been delivered prematurely on the grounds of placental insufficiency . | pubmed |
Is there a error at page 566 of Atkins Physical Chemistry? [closed]
**Closed**. This question needs [details or clarity](/help/closed-questions). It is not currently accepting answers.
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At page 556 I found this question being analyzed and the rate law is provided.
However, when I apply steady state approximation, I can't find the result without the factor 2.
Is it me being wrong?
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/DRxSB.jpg)
The factor of 2 originates from the definition of $k\_b$ (I thought it was an error, but it turns out IUPAC guidelines lead to its presence).
If $k\_\mathrm{a}' \gg k\_\mathrm{b}[\ce{O2}]$ and defining
$$K\_\mathrm{a} = \frac{k\_\mathrm{a}}{k\_\mathrm{a}'}$$
it follows from the equation posted in the OP that
$$\frac{\mathrm{d}[\ce{NO2}]}{\mathrm{d}t} = 2k\_\mathrm{b}K\_\mathrm{a}[\ce{NO}]^2[\ce{O2}]$$
However, starting from scratch we *could* write that
$$\frac{\mathrm{d}[\ce{NO2}]}{\mathrm{d}t} = k\_\mathrm{b}[\ce{N2O2}][\ce{O2}]$$
(this is not the standard IUPAC convention however).
Then, if
$$K\_\mathrm{a} = \frac{k\_\mathrm{a}}{k\_\mathrm{a}'} = \frac{[\ce{N2O2}]}{[\ce{NO}]^2}$$
it follows that
$$\frac{\mathrm{d}[\ce{NO2}]}{\mathrm{d}t} = k\_\mathrm{b}K\_\mathrm{a}[\ce{NO}]^2[\ce{O2}]$$
and the factor of $2$ is not there. In the fourth version of Atkins' book (which I parallel in this derivation from "scratch") the factor of 2 is missing, but in that book the analysis does not proceed by dissecting the full rate law before imposing the pre-equilibrium approximation. The OP presumably sources a later version of the book. As noted in a comment, IUPAC guidelines call for incorporation of that factor of 2. One should write
$$\frac{\mathrm{d}[\ce{NO2}]}{\mathrm{d}t} = 2k\_\mathrm{b}[\ce{N2O2}][\ce{O2}]$$ because that step of the reaction reads $$\ce{N2O2 + O2->2NO2}$$ The stoichiometric factor of 2 means two moles of
$\ce{NO2}$ are produced for every mole of reaction.
| stackexchange/chemistry |
What can this chemical be? (Qualitative Analysis)
I have an unknown white powder, which is an ionic solid, and I need to identify what it is by using qualitative analysis. I've run quite a few tests, but I am having a lot of trouble identifying the anion. The data I've collected is below.
**General Properties:**
* It is a white powder, and I know that it is an ionic solid.
* It's density is around $\pu{2g/mL}$ (this is not an exact number)
* It appears to be a hydrate (as it loses mass when heated over a bunsen burner)
* It is fairly soluble in water. It definitely isn't very insoluble, but I have to add a significant amount of water in order to get it to dissolve.
* The powder has a very strong smell (although it's hard to describe).
* A solution of the solid is colorless.
**Cation Test**
* A flame test produced a deep orange / orange-red flame
* Adding $\ce{Na2CO3}$ to a solution of the solid results in the formation of a white precipitate
* Adding a base, such as $\ce{NaOH}$ to a solution of the solid results in the formation of a white precipitate
Based on this data, I am fairly confident that the cation is calcium, but please correct me if there are any other metals that fit the pattern described above or if additional tests are necessary.
**Anion Test**
This is what has really been messing with me, because I can't seem to get a conclusive test for any anion.
* Adding $\ce{AgNO3}$, $\ce{BaCl2}$, or $\ce{Pb(NO3)2}$ to a solution of the solid did not result in the formation of any precipitate, regardless of how much I added.
* Adding $\ce{H2SO4}$ results in the formation of a white precipitate (and no bubbles or anything). However, I'm fairly sure that this precipitate is not related to the anion, but rather producing $\ce{CaSO4}$ (from the cation).
* Adding $\ce{HCl}$ or $\ce{HNO3}$ to a solution of the solid did not result in any bubbles (neither did adding $\ce{H2O}$ directly to the pure solid)
* Adding Ferric Nitrate to the solution just retained the orange color of the ferric nitrate. A dark red color or precipitate was not observed.
* Adding $\ce{HCl}$ did not result in the smell of vinegar.
* Adding $\ce{AgNO3}$ followed immediately by $\ce{HNO3}$ also did not result in a precipitate.
* Adding ammonium molybdate and nitric acid to the solution and heating it caused the solution to turn yellow, but did not yield a precipitate (even after centrifuging). This test was done twice with different ratios of ammonium molybdate to nitric acid, and the exact same result was observed both times.
* The brown ring test was conducted, and came back with a negative result. It is possible that this test was done wrong, because the acidified ferrous sulphate was added drop by drop on top of the solution, rather than by rolling it down the side of the test tubes, which may have interfered with test results.
Are there any tests for ions that I have missed? I've done almost every test I know trying to identify the anion, but no dice. The results for the ammonium molybdate test are also confusing to me, because I expected either a yellow precipitate (to confirm phosphate) or no reaction, but the test seems to have gone halfway by just turning yellow. Any guidance on what I should do next would be very much appreciated.
What about a possible $\ce{F-}$ anion? While the nature of the cation might be guessed based on the flame test, since the $\ce{AgNO3}$ test gave no precipitate, it might have produced $\ce{AgF}$ (soluble in water).
This said, by looking at the densities of $\ce{M-F}$ systems with a cation with orange flame and density around $\pu{2 g ml-1}$, I'd say it's probably $\ce{NaF}$.
You might test for fluoride with a selective electrode, if you have one.
Otherwise, here are listed some other analytical methods for the identification of fluoride anions:[PubChem: Sodium Fluoride-Analytical Methods](https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/sodium_fluoride#section=Analytic-Laboratory-Methods)
Calcium formate is a white-to-yellow or off-white crystalline powder, has a density of $\pu{2.02 g/ml}$, solubility of $\pu{\sim 17\%}$, decomposes at $\pu{300 ^\circ C}$ . It irritates eyes severely and has a stinging taste, therefore could have an "hard to describe odor" or effect on the nose. One mental conflict I have is that I would expect that measuring the density of a powder with a density of $\pu{2.02 g/ml}$ would actually give a value substantially lower than 2, but maybe the OP's experimental technique was exceptionally good.
When heated, calcium formate decomposes to calcium carbonate (Ref 1). The remainder $\pu{0.21 / 0.26}$ from the original heating is $\pu{80.7 \%}$; whereas the mw of $\ce{CaCO3 (100)}$ divided by the mw of calcium formate ($\pu{138}$) is $\pu{76.9 \%}$. Close enough: perhaps not all of the material decomposed. If not all decomposed, the heating was probably not severe. A test: acidify the burned product with $\ce{HCl}$, if it is $\ce{CaCO3}$, it will bubble. Another test: severely heat the burned product, see if it goes to $\ce{CaO}$ by checking pH ($\ce{-> 13}$) and seeing a further weight loss to $\pu{56\%}$ of the original.
A pH test on the original material could be informative: one SDS reported $\pu{7.5}$ for calcium formate, whereas an SDS for calcium acetate reported $\pu{7.6}$. The difference is small, but suggests that if the pH is closer to neutral than $\pu{7.6}$, the anion would be of a stronger acid than acetic (which formic is).
Ref 1: <http://www.geosc.com/Assets/Files/Products-Docs/P-C-Product-Docs/Trimet-Products/CAF-TDS-US-Format.pdf>
There are ways to quite reliably determine what this solid is. As mentioned above, the counter ion most probably should be $\ce{Ca^2+}$, however there are many organic or inorganic anions that still fit the criteria. The $\ce{AgNO3}$ tests provide insight that its a non-coordinating counter ion.
Ways to determine the anion - however this all takes infrastructure that may or may not be accessible:
* Most straightforward way would be to acquire NMR of the sample in $\ce{D2O}$. This will reliably tell you, if there are H atoms, C atoms (and their symmetry), 19-F NMR will reliably tell the presence of a fluoride atom or other fluoride containing counter ions (such as $\ce{BF4-}$ etc.)
* There are many ways to create adducts of organic anions for GCMS analysis.
* A HPLCMS or UPLCMS analysis will provide You with several pieces of information:
* UV-Vis spectra will provide insight whether aromatic structures are part of the counter ion, and the MS will provide the m/z of any anion that is heavier than 50. Fortunately almost every single weakly coordinating anion is fairly heavy and should show up.
These methods should reliably provide the answer for the question asked.
As for the simple answer, $\ce{Ca(BF4)2.xH2O}$ may be the answer:
1. Tetrafluoroborate salts are soluble and known to form hydrates.
2. Tetrafluoroborate salts are not the most stable and can actually release $\ce{HF}$ gas in low quantities resulting in *strong, irritating* odor.
3. This salts is more consistent with everything examined.
One idea is to retry the brown ring test with the proper procedure, as the question admits that this had not previously been used (acidified ferrous sulfate was added wrongly). The other evidence is consistent with calcium nitrate, so we need to get that test right.
Calcium nitrate also [decomposes at 500°C and above](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calcium_nitrate), releasing nitrogen dioxide leaving the solid oxide behind (only alkali metal nitrates, and not all of those, give the nitrite with this reaction). You would then see the brownish nitrogen dioxide gas.
| stackexchange/chemistry |
Uncertainty relation of energy and time in stationary states
The energy-time uncertainty tells us that if energy uncertainty is zero time uncertainty is infinite. Now for a higher energy stationary state energy spread is zero so accordingly its average life time i.e. time spread should be zero, but higher energy states are less stable than ground state. So its average life time is finite. My question is what is contradicting the time-energy uncertainty relation?
There are multiple reasons for the broadening of spectral lines.
The one you are referring to is what is called the natural width, and it varies for atomic spectra, for molecular spectra, and for nuclear. It is actually due to the fact that those energy states from and which they jump are not infinitely stable. The do have natural half life, so called lifetime, tau, which then through Planck's uncertainty principle determines their line widths. It is to be expected, higher energy levels will over time have a tendency to decay to lower levels. They are not perfectly stable.
There's other factors. They can also have their widths broadened by other effects, such as collisions and Doppler effects. Those can sometimes be much bigger effects.
You can google a lot of writings on this. I found a few, but keep loosing the links in my iPad. See one at <http://www-star.stand.ac.uk/~kw25/teaching/nebulae/lecture08_linewidths.pdf>
For spontaneous emission, i.e., the natural line width, you can not explain it from Schrodinger's equation and classical QM, which takes the nergy states as infinitely stable. You need to include the effect of the virtual photons around, in essence you need QED. See a little more in <https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spontaneous_emission>
| stackexchange/physics |
A Zoning Permit is required for the construction of structures that do not require building permits. The purpose of such a review is to ensure the improvement meets standard zoning requirements such as setbacks, hard surface coverage, structure height, etc.
Retaining walls less than four (4) feet in height.
NOTE: An inspection may be required to verify zoning compliance. A minimal fee will be required for inspections, if necessary.
Contact City Hall at (952) 227-1100 and ask to be directed to the appropriate staff member regarding your project. In some cases it may be necessary to meet with city staff in order to receive a thorough review. By submitting a survey and building plans, and simply speaking one-on-one with staff, it is possible to complete a Zoning Permit in a short time frame, usually within a matter of days. Any zoning permit application that fails to meet zoning ordinance requirements will be denied.
Once a Zoning Permit is complete AND approved, the documents will be placed in the property's building file. This will stand as proof that the property owner has done their due diligence by ensuring the improvement project complies with Chanhassen City Code.
By completing a Zoning Permit, you are protecting your interests as a property owner. | slim_pajama |
What is the bonding type in hydrides of group 2 elements?
In one of my MCQ questions, there was a statement saying all group 2 elements form covalent hydroxides. I know it is incorrect. I know that $\ce{BeH2}$ is a covalent hydride. What about the rest? Are all of them metallic hydrides? Is it true that metallic hydrides produce the hydroxide and give off $\ce{H2}$ with water?
There is a quite extensive chapter about hydrogen and its compounds in [Holleman and Wibereg's book "Inorganic Chemistry"](https://books.google.co.jp/books?id=Mtth5g59dEIC&dq=holleman%20wiberg). As I only have the german version, I will briefly summarise what I read.
You are of course right, hydrogen forms salt-like structures with alkaline and earth alkaline elements, except for beryllium. Compounds like $\ce{LiH}$, $\ce{NaH}$, $\ce{KH}$, $\ce{RbH}$ and $\ce{CsH}$ crystallise in a sodium chloride structure. Every cation is coordinated by six hydride ions and vice versa. The compounds $\ce{CaH2}$, $\ce{SrH2}$ and $\ce{BaH2}$ crystallise in a [fluorite](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluorite) structure. The hydride ions are tetrahedrally coordinated by four earth alkaline cations. The cations are cubically coordinated by eight hydride ions. This β-structure is persistent at higher temperatures. Below $780~^\circ\mathrm{C}$ ($\ce{CaH2}$), $855~^\circ\mathrm{C}$ ($\ce{SrH2}$), and $598~^\circ\mathrm{C}$ ($\ce{BaH2}$) it changes to the α-form, i.e. the [lead dichloride structure](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead%28II%29_chloride). The magnesium compound exists in a [rutile](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rutile) structure. Hydride ions are trigonally coordinated by magnesium ions. The cations are octahedrally coordinated by hydride ions.
However, according to the difference in the electronegativities, you would expect a predominant covalent character. The maximum is $1.3$ for $\ce{CaH2}$ and the minimum $1.0$ for $\ce{MgH2}$, which translates to a maximum $30\%$ and minimum $18\%$ ionic contribution. Maybe this is where the statement of the question originates from. Experimental findings rather support the more ionic nature of the compounds though, i.e. the found lattice energies were supported by calculations assuming a purely ionic structure.
The conclusion of this according to Holleman and Wiberg is that the elements are fused by ionic bonds with covalent contributions. The latter increases from $\ce{CsH}$ to $\ce{LiH}$ and from $\ce{BaH2}$ to $\ce{MgH2}$. The magnesium hydride is already borderline covalent.
The question about their reactivity towards water is mainly answered in the chapters for the elements itself. Magnesium reacts readily with water and releases hydrogen. Because of this it is sometimes used as a drying agent. $$\ce{MgH2 + 2H2O -> Mg(OH)2 + H2 ^ }$$
The other elements react similar. The reaction is highly exothermic, the reaction of calcium hydride releases $228~\mathrm{kJ/mol}$. It is often used as a drying agent for gasses because of this feature. Strontium and Barium also react exothermic, i.e. they release $177~\mathrm{kJ/mol}$ and $172~\mathrm{kJ/mol}$, respectively.
| stackexchange/chemistry |
PA N ’ S L A B Y R I N T H
( E l L a b er i n t o del F au n o )
B y
Gu i ll er m o de l T o r o
( PA N’ S L AB YR I NT H i s i n Spa ni s h w i t h E n g li s h s ub t i t l e s .
T hi s i s an E n g li s h t r an s l at i o n o f t h e sc r i pt . )
© P i c t u r e h o us e 2006 . A l l r i g ht s r e s e r v e d.DA R K NE SS .
A f e m a l e v o i ce h u m s a swe et l u l l a b y .
SUP E R I M POS I T I ON:
SP AI N, 1944 .
T HE CI VI L WAR IS OVE R.
HI DDE N I N T HE M OUNT AI NS, ARM E D M E N F I GHT T HE NEW
F ASCI ST RE GI M E . M I L I T ARY P OSTS ARE E STAB L I SHED T O
E XT E RM I NAT E T HE RESI STAN CE .
T h en : t h e r aw, ras p y SOUND o f a chil d s t r uggl i ng to b r ea t h e.
F A DE I N:
E X T . L A B Y R I NT H N I GHT
I n t h e f o r egro un d, OF E L I A 11 y ea r s o l d, s ki n w hi t e as
s n o w, r uby l i p s a n d eb o ny h a i r i s s pr aw l ed o n t h e gr o un d.
A t hi ck r i bb o n o f bl o o d r un s f r o m h er n o s e.
B u t t h e bl o o d i s f lo w ing back w ar d i n t o h er n o s t r i l . Dro p
by dr o p, t h e bl o o d l ea p s up an d d i s appe a r s .
Of e li a ' s pup il s d i l at e
NA R R A T OR
L o n g ago i n t h e Un dergr o un d R ea l m . . .
C A M E R A M OVES I NT O T HE DA R K PUP I L
B L A C K SCR E E N
NA R R A T OR
. . . wh ere t h ere are n o l i e s o r pai n , t h ere
l i ved a Pr i nce s s wh o dr ea m t o f t h e h u m a n
w o r l d.T h e s o un d o f m u f f l e d w i n d.
NA R R A T OR
Sh e dr ea m t o f bl ue sk i es , t h e so f t b r ee ze
an d s uns hi ne.. .
A dark C A ST L E t ake s s h ape . Here, a tower. . . t h ere, a
t ur r e t . . . an d l i g h t ed wi n do ws .
Fi n a lly , t h e da m p, m il dewe d wa ll s o f a wat er wel l co m e i n t o
f o cus .
NA R R A T OR
On e da y , e l ud i ng her kee pers , t h e
P r i n c es s es ca ped.
A wo m a n' s s il h o uet t e c r o s s es C A M E R A
NA R R A T OR
On ce o u t s i de, t h e b r i g h t n e s s bli n ded h er
an d eras ed h er m e m o r y . . .
A c i r cu l ar s t ai r ca s e l e ads up. . . to ward da yli g h t , wh ere t h e
i m age . . .
NA R R A T OR
Sh e f o r got wh o s h e was an d w h e r e sh e ca m e
f r o m . He r b o d y s u f f ered co l d, s i c kn e s s
an d pa i n . E v en t ua l ly , s h e d i ed.
F A DE S T O W HIT E :
E X T . B OM B E D C I T Y DA Y
C A M E R A T R AC K S pas t s ce n e s o f des t r uct i o n : b o m b edo ut
b u i l d i ngs . . . ca t h edra l s i n r u i ns .
NA R R A T OR
He r f at h er, t h e Ki n g, a l wa y s k n e w t h at
t h e P r i n ce s s wo u l d r et u r n , perh aps i n
an ot h er b o dy , i n a n o t h er pl ac e, at
an ot h er t i m e.
On h a l f de m o li s h ed wa ll s , F a l a n g i s t po s ters dec l are F r a n co 'st r i u m p h . Am o n g t h e r u i n s , s m a ll er, p o i g n a n t t r ac es o f war:
s h o es , b r o ken e y eg l a s s es . . .
NA R R A T OR
A n d h e wo ul d wa i t f o r h er, un t i l h e dr ew
hi s l as t b r ea t h , un t i l t h e wo r l d s t opped
t u r ni n g…
T h r o ugh t h e r ui n ed b u il d i ng s , a S M A L L C A R A V AN OF B L AC K
B E N T L E Y C A R S co m es i n t o vi ew.
T h e s hi n y c h r o m e f e n der s pas s d i r e ct l y by C A M E R A; t h e y bea r
al l t he F as c i s t i ns i g ni as a n d f l ags .
I N T . M A I N C A R SA M E
L ooki n g o ut t h e w i n do w: OF E L I A .
Sh e' s dr es s ed i n p l a i n , s li g h t l y f r a y ed c l o t hi n g. Not v er y
dai n t y . On h er l ap i s a b o o k o f f a i r y t a l es .
C A M E R A s t ud i es o n e o f t h e wat erc o l o r s t h at ad o r n t h e page s :
an i l l u s t r a t i o n o f a l i t t l e g i r l da n c i ng w i t h s ev era l
f a i r i e s f lyi ng aro un d h er.
A t h er s i de, a s m a l l p il e o f s imi l ar b o o ks i n a b o o k s t r ap.
C A R M E N
I d o n ' t un ders t an d why y o u had t o b r i n g
s o m a ny b o o ks , Of e li a.
Of e li a t ur n s h er gaz e t o ward t h e o pp o s i t e s ea t , wh ere h er
m o t h er, C A R M E N, 28, i s n app i ng, her en o r m o us s to m ac h
evi de n c e o f adva n ce d pr egn a nc y . She, too, h as bl ac k h a i r .
C A R M E N
W e' r e go i n g to t h e co un t r y . . . t h e
o u t d oor s . . . pl e n t y o f f r es h a i r .
Sh e t ake s t h e b oo k aw ay f r o m O f e li a.
C A R M E N
F a i r y t a l e s ? Yo u' r e t oo o l d to b e f illi ng
y o ur h ea d w i t h s uc h n o ns e ns e.Sh e paus es , f ee li ng n au s ea .
C A R M E N
A s k t h e m to s to p t h e car pl e as e
Of e li a kn o cks o n t h e par t i t i o n w i n do w of t h e se d a n . T h e
Dri v er s to ps .
E X T . W OOD S SA M E
T h e ca r av a n o f ca r s s t o ps . C arm e n h ur r i e d l y c l im bs do wn a n d
m o v es t o t h e f r o n t o f t h e m a i n ca r .
Ga s p i n g f o r ai r , s h e b at t l es t h e n au s ea . Of e li a t i mi d ly
appr o ac h es h er.
C A R M E N
Of e li a, wa i t up.
Sh e gr ab s h er pr egna n t ab do m e n .
C A R M E N
Y o ur b r ot h er' s n ot we l l .
Of e li a n o ds a n d m o v e s awa y . SE R R A N O, a m i li t ar y m a n , c l i m bs
o u t o f t h e ca r b e hi nd t h e m a n d appro ac h es C ar m e n s o l i c i t o us .
S E R R A NO
M ada m , are y o u f e e l i ng ill ?
C A R M E N
W at er j u s t a b i t o f wa t er
S E R R A NO
( to o n e o f hi s m e n )
W at er, b r i n g wa t er f o r t h e Capt ai n' s
wi f e.
Of e li a wa l ks a l o n gs i de t h e r o ad , m o vi ng i n t o t h e woo ds an d
f ur t h er aw a y f r o m t h e carav a n o f ca r s .
C A M E R A s ur ve y s t h e h e a vy f o r es t : a t a n g l ed t ape s t r y o f m o s s
an d f o g.T h e t r ee s , s wa y ed by t he w i n d, m ur m ur s o f t l y aro un d Of e l i a.
Sh e s t um bl es upo n a st r an ge sto n e by t h e s i de o f t h e r o ad.
R o ughl y t h e s i ze o f a f i s t ca r v ed o n i t , th e o ut l i ne o f a
h u m a n E YE .
F as c i nat ed, t h e y o un g g i r l p i cks i t up.
Sh e l o o ks ar o un d an d f i nds a m i d s t t h e sh r u b s an a n c i e n t
s to n e m o n o l i t h i n c i s ed w i t h C e l t i c l et t eri n g.
I t ' s cr o wn ed w i t h t h e gr ot es que f ac e o f a sa t y r m o ut h o pen
wi de.
A pi ec e o f t h e b r ut i s h f a ce i s m i s s i ng: an e y e.
Of e li a f i t s t h e p i e ce o f e n gr ave d s to n e i n t h e m i s s i ng area.
A perf ec t f i t .
F r o m i ns i de t h e st at ue a cl i ck i ng n o i s e e m erges . T h e w i nd
pi cks up a n d
o u t o f t h e s at y r ' s o pen m o ut h , a S T I C K I NSE C T l az ily craw l s
o u t. Of e li a s m il e s . T h e i ns ec t cl im bs at op t h e sto n e h ea d
an d s t udi e s t h e gi r l f o r a m o m e n t . T h e n
C A R M E N
Of e li a ??
T h e s o un d o f C ar m e n' s v o i ce s t ar t l e s t h e cr ea t u r e, whi c h f li es
o f f .
Of e li a r un s t o h er m ot h er's s i de.
OF E L I A
( en t h us i a s t i c)
A f a i r y I s aw a f a i r y ! !
C A R M E N
Oh l o o k a t y o ur s h o es ! ! T h e y 'r e co v ered
i n m ud !
T h e y h e ad b ac k t o t h e carav a n .
C A R M E NW h e n we get to t h e m ill I wa n t y o u to
gr ee t C apt ai n V i d a l .
T h at m a n h a s bee n v er y go o d to us ,
darl i ng. Yo u h ave n o i d ea
S o, I wa n t y o u to ca l l him " F at h e r . " D o
y o u h ea r m e ? " F at h er. . . "
I t ' s j u s t a w o r d , Of e l i a.
T h e S t i ck I ns ec t l a n d s i n a nea r by t r ee an d o b s er v es i nqu i s i t i ve ly
as M ot h er an d daugh t er cl im b i n t o t h e m a i n ca r an d h ea d o f f .
A b ea t l at er, t h e S t i ck I n s ec t f li e s a f t er t h e m .
C UT T O:
I N T . WA T E R M I L L DA Y
C L OSE UP: a g o l d po cke t wa t ch , o n a heavy c h a i n. T h e g l a s s
di a l i s crack ed.. .
A gl o ved T HUM B s n aps t h e co v er s h ut . A VOICE C A PT A I N VIDAL
m ut t ers i n i r r i t at i o n .
VIDA L
Fi f t ee n m i nut es l at e.
A NGL E W I DE NS to des cri be a d i l ap i da t ed W A T E R M I L L .
T h e s i t e c o n s i s t s o f a pa i r o f dark s to n e b u i l d i ngs w i t h
c o r r ugat ed r oo f s , co n n ec t ed t o t h e m ill by a s m a l l s t o n e
b r i dge. A l arge wa t er wh ee l h a n g s o v er th e dr y r i verb ed.
T h e w oo den b ea m s a n d co l u m ns b ea r s c u l pt ed Ce l t i c m o t i f s a n d
h ere an d t h ere, s m a l l , o dd, ca r v ed cr ea t u r es .
T h e wa l l s h a ve b ee n r e i nf o r ce d w i t h h u ndr eds o f s a n d b ag s
an d woo den p o n too n s , as i f pr epa r i n g f o r an att ac k.
C A PT A I N VIDAL an d a s m a ll gr o up o f SE R VA NT S an d SOL DIE R S
wa i t pat i e n t l y o ut s i de.SOL DIE R
C ap t ai n! ! T h e y 'r e h ere
T h e ca r av a n o f B e n t l e y s s t o ps i n f r o n t o f t h e b u il d i ng. V i da l
an d hi s gr o up m o v es i n . Ser v a n t s an d So l d i ers u nl o ad l uggage
wi t hy mil i t ar y e f f i c i e n c y . I n ch arge i s M E R C E DE S, a y o un g
b ut s tr i ct co un t r y wo m a n .
Vi da l gr ee t s C arm e n .
VIDA L
C arm e n W e l co m e
Wi t h a p l ea s a n t s m il e, h e t o uch es h er pr egn a n t b e lly a n d
t h en po i n t s at a w oo den wh ee l c h a i r pus hed t o C arm e n's s i de
by a s m a l l , nerv o us m a n SGT . GA R C É S. B y hi s s i de s t an d s
DOC T OR F E R R E I R O, a pl e as a n t , s ch o l ar l y m a n i n hi s mi d
f o r t i e s .
C A R M E N
I I d o n ' t n ee d i t I ca n wa l k by my s e l f .
VIDA L
D o c to r F err e i r o p r ef er s t h at y o u do n ' t
ex ert y o ur s e l f .
C A R M E N
Nn o. . .
Vi da l l ea n s t o wa r ds h er an d whi s pers e v er s o s o f t l y i n h er
ea r :
VIDA L
T h e n do i t f o r m e.. .
Sh e o b e y s . As s h e s i t s , O f e li a e xi t s t h e auto m o bil e, h o l d i n g
h er b oo ks cl o s e t o h er ch es t .
C A R M E N
Of e li a. Greet t h e Capt ai n .
Sh e i s whe e l ed awa y . An awkw ard s i l e n ce pas s e s b et wee n t h e
y o un g g i r l a n d t h e Capt ai n .
VIDA L
Of e li aT h e gi r l e x t en d s her h a n d. He gr ab s i t , f ir m b ut co l d. I t i s
h er l e f t ha n d.
VIDA L
I t ' s t h e ot h er h an d, O f e li a.
He t u r n s to t h e se r v a n t s .
VIDA L
M ercede s , t ake m y w if e 's l uggag e to h er
r oo m
M E R C E DE S
Ye s , s i r .
M ercede s g l a n ce s b a ck t o f i nd O f e li a cur i o us ly gaz i ng at
a pi l e o f s a n d b ags . Per ch ed o n to p
t h e bi g St i ck I ns ec t .
I t f a n s o ut i t s m u l t i p l e w i ngs . T w i ce . O f e li a r uns o v er an d
t r i es to ca t ch i t .
B u t t h e S t i ck I ns ec t t ake s o f f a n d es ca pe s . T h e g i r l dr o ps h er
b oo ks an d go es af t er i t .
E X T . GA R DE NS F UR T HE R C ONTI NUO US
Of e li a f o l l o ws t h e S t i ck I ns ec t to t h e edge o f a s m a ll r i s e.
Sh e f o l l o ws i t w i t h h er e y e s an d s ee s , abo u t 100 m et ers
aw ay , s ur r o un ded by t r ee s , t h e r ui n s o f a garden L A B YR I NT H.
T h e C A M E R A g l i d es up f o r a b ett er vi e w. T h e l a by r i n t h i s
ci r cu l ar, i t s pat h s o v ergr o wn an d part i a lly bl o cke d.
Of e li a e n t ers t h e l a by r i n t h t h r o ugh an arch wa y . Sh e v e n t ur es
d o wn o n e o f i t s pat h wa y s a n d s to ps
M E R C E DE S
I t ' s a l a by r i n t h Of e li a t ur n s t h e y o un g wo m a n s t an ds by her s i de. O f e li a 's
b oo ks i n h a n d.
M E R C E DE S
J us t a pi l e o f o l d s t o n es .
T h e y 've a l wa y s b ee n t h ere, ev e n b e f o r e
t h e m ill . B ett er y o u d o n ' t go n ea r i t
Y o u c o ul d get l o s t.
A r ay o f s unli g h t b r ea ks t h r o ugh t h e gr e y c l o uds a n d
i ll u m i nat es t h e o l d r u i ns . M ercede s ha n d s h er t h e b o o ks .
OF E L I A
T h a n k y o u.
M E R C E DE S
Ha v e y o u r ea d t h e m a l l?
Ga r cé s s h o ut s f r o m t h e m i ll :
GA R C É S
M ercede s !
( M ercede s r ea c t s )
T h e C apt a i n ’ s ca l li ng y o u.
M ercede s m ake s a s m a ll g es t ur e o f goo d by e t o Of e li a.
M E R C E DE S
Y o ur f at h er n e eds m e.
Sh e t ur n s an d wa l ks aw a y
OF E L I A
He ' s n o t m y f at h er.
M ercede s do es n ' t un ders t an d. T h e g i r l r u n s up to h er.
OF E L I A
T h e C apt a i n h e ' s n o t m y f at h er. M y
f at h er wa s a t ai l o r . He di ed i n t h e war.
The C aptain’ s not my f ather !
M ercede s ca n' t h e l p b ut s m il e at t h e gi r l ' s s udde n
v eh e m e nce .
M E R C E DE SW e l l , y o u'v e m ade t h at cl ea r e n o ugh .
T h e y wa l k awa y t o ge t h er.
OF E L I A
Di d y o u s ee m y m o t h er?
( M ercede s n o ds )
Sh e' s pr et t y i s n' t s h e ?
( M ercede s n o ds )
Y o u s aw h er b e l ly ? S h e ' s s i ck w i t h c hi l d.
A s t h e y go i n t o t h e h o us e, t h e S t i ck I n s e ct perch ed atop
t h e l a by r i n t h' s arc h wa y m o ni t o r s t h e i r ev er y m o v e.
C UT T O:
I N T . DINI NG R OOM NIGHT
VIDA L
T h e guer i ll as are s t i ck i ng to t h e woo ds
b ec aus e i t 's hard to t r ac k t h em do wn up
t h ere.
Vi da l i s s t an d i ng at an en o r m o us d i ni ng tabl e. Ser r an o ,
Ga r cé s an d a f e w l o we r r an k i n g o f f i c i a l s s ur r o un d hi m .
VIDA L
T h o s e pr i ck s kn o w t h e t err ai n bett er t h an
any o f us . We n ee d t o f o r ce t h e m d o wn
Vi da l s t i cks p i ns i n t o o n e o f t h e l arger m aps .
VIDA L
l et ' s bl o ck t h e i r ac ce s s to m ed i c in e a n d
s uppl i e s .
M ercede s en t ers b ea r i ng a t r ay o f o l i ve s , co l d cut s an d a
b ott l e o f Oru j o l i quo r .
VIDA L
W e'll s et up t h r ee co m m a n d po s ts . Here,
h ere an d h ere.
M ercede s g l a n ce s b r i e f ly at t h e m ap s , con ce a l i ng a vi di n t eres t .
Suddenl y , V i da l gr a bs M ercede s by t he ar m .
VIDA L
Ha v e Dr. F err ei r o c o m e s ee m e.
M E R C E DE S
Ye s , Si r . . .
T u r ni n g hi s att en t i o n b ac k t o hi s m aps , V i da l t ake s t w o
o l i ves a n d po ps t h e m i n t o hi s m o ut h .
VIDA L
( ch ew i n g)
T h o s e b as t ards are g o i n g t o s t a r v e.. .
y o u'll s ee . . .
I N T . UPP E R B E DR OOM DUSK
T h e d o c to r s t i r s s o m e dr o ps o f m ed i c i ne i n t o a gl as s o f
wa t er . C arm e n li es b ac k i n a m o n u m e n t a l ca r ved b ed. On h er
l ap t h ere are s ev era l p l a y i ng ca r ds .
DOC T OR
J us t f o ur dr o ps a t b edt i m e a n d y o u'll
s l e ep a l l ni g h t l o n g.
He gi v es h er t h e wat er an d t h e m ed i c i ne vi a l . C ar m e n dr i n k s
we akl y . O f e li a st an d s by h er s i d e.
DOC T OR
D o n ' t h es i t at e t o ca l l i f y o u n e ed
any t hi ng, M ada m e. Yo u o r y o ur li t t l e
n ur s e.
He g r i ns at Of e li a, t h en exi t s t h e r oo m . C ar m e n g i ves O f e l i a
t h e m ed i c i ne vi a l .
C A R M E N
G o . C l o s e t h e doo r s o I ca n s l ee p.I N T . F OYER/ST A I R WA Y NIGHT
I n t h e h a ll wa y , t h e do ctor f i n d s M ercede s wa i t i n g f o r hi m .
T h e y pr o ce ed i n s il e n ce do wn t h e h a ll wa y a n d l o o k d o wn i n t o
t h e f o y er: e m pt y .
M E R C E DE S
Y o u m us t c o m e up t h e m o un t a i n an d s e e hi m
t h e l eg wo un d i t s gett i n g wo r s e...
T h e d o c to r n o ds t i mi d ly a n d g i ves M ercede s a s m a l l P A C KA GE
wrapped i n dark pape r an d nea t l y t i ed i n s t r i n g.
DOC T OR
T hi s i s a l l I co ul d get . I 'm s o r r y .
M ercede s s i g hs , di s appo i n t ed.
M E R C E DE S
He ' s do wn s t a i r s do n ' t kee p hi m wa i t i n g.
T h e d o c to r m o v e s do wn s t a i r s . M ercede s g l a n ce s to ward t h e
Uppe r B edroo m an d
di s co v ers O f e li a, wa t chi n g h er att en t i v e ly ho w long has
s he bee n ther e?
T h e gi r l c l o s es t h e doo r qui et l y .
I N T . UPP E R B E DR OOM NIGH T
Of e li a t ake s o f f her s h o es an d c lim bs i n t o h er m o t h er' s bed.
A s s he cudd l e s c l o s e t o h er m o t h er
C A R M E N
J es us Yo u r f ee t t h e y ' r e f r o ze n .
Sh e ca r es s es O f e l i a 's h ea d. T h e w i n d p i c ks up an d t h e h o us e
t i m bers m o an a n d creak.
C A R M E N
A r e y o u s ca r ed ?OF E L I A
A l i t t l e bi t .
OF E L I A
W h at 's t h at n o i s e ?
C A R M E N
N ot hi n g, j us t t h e w i n d. N i g h t s h e r e ar e
di f f ere n t f r o m c i t y ni g h t s . T h ere, y o u
h ea r ca r s , tr a i n s . He r e t h e h o us es are
o l d a n d creak y .
T h e h o us e u tt ers a se r i es o f dee p, r um blin g n o i s es .
C A R M E N
Al m o s t l i k e t h e y ' r e spe ak i ng.
T o m o r r o w , I 'm go i n g to gi ve y o u s o m et hi ng
s pec i a l .
OF E L I A
A b o o k?
C A R M E N
N o , s o m et hi n g m uc h bett er.
A b ea t o f s il e n ce a n d t h e n
OF E L I A
W hy d i d y o u h a v e t o ge t m arr i ed ?
C A R M E N
W e we r e a l o n e t oo l o n g.
OF E L I A
Y o u we r en' t al o n e. Yo u were n eve r al o ne.
C A R M E N
W h e n y o u ' r e o l der y o u'll u n ders t an d. I t
h as n' t b ee n ea s y f o r m e.
Sh e wi nce s i n pa i n
C A R M E N
Y o ur b r ot h er' s h e 's ac t i n g up. T ell him
o n e o f y o ur s to r i es s o h e 'll ca l m do wn .Of e li a ge n t l y l ea ns o n h er m o t h er' s s t o m ac h a n d t aps i t w i t h
o n e f i nger, as i f i t we r e a t el egrap h ke y .
C A R M E N
M y b r ot h er, m y b r ot h er. . .
C arm e n c l o s e s her e y e s an d li s t en s t o h er daugh t er' s v o i c e
OF E L I A
… a l o n g, l o n g t i m e ago i n a gr e y , s ad
c o un t r y …
I NS I DE T H E S T OM A C H
Fl o at i n g i n a l im b o o f a m ni o t i c f l u i d, t h e BA B Y o pens hi s
ey e s an d li s t ens .
OF E L I A
T h ere wa s a m ag i c r o s e t h at m ad e wh o ev er
pl ucke d i t i mm o r t al .
E X T . M A GIC A L M O UNTA I N SUNSE T
A ga i ns t a s ca r l et s k y : a BL UE R OSE . I t s t h o r ny s t e m c l ut ch es
t h e dagger l i ke cr es t o f a bl a ck gr ani t e m o un t ai n .
T h e t h o r n s gr o w ar o un d t h e gr ani t e l i ke s u f f o ca t i n g
s erpen t s .
OF E L I A ( V. O. )
B u t n o o n e wo ul d dare go n ea r i t b ec aus e
i t s t h or n s we r e f u ll o f m o r t al po i s o n .
T h e S t i ck I ns ec t l a n d s o n o n e o f t h e t h o r n s a n d t h e n f li es o f f
i n t o t h e ni g h t s k y
OF E L I A ( V. O. )
S o am o n g s t t h e m e n t al e s o f pa i n an d
dea t h we r e to l d i n h us hed v o i ce s . B u t
t h ere wa s n o t al k o f et ern a l lif e.. .
b ec aus e m e n f ea r pa i n m o r e t h an t h e ywa n t i m m o r t a l i t y .
up , up an d t h en t h r o ugh
E X T . GA R DE NS T W I L I GHT
t h e W I NDO W o f t h e Upper B edr oo m .
T h r o ugh t h e gl a s s , t h e S t i ck I n s ec t o b s erv e s h o w Of e l i a h ug s h er
m o t h er.
OF E L I A
S o ev er y da y t he r o s e wi l t ed un a bl e t o
b eque at h hi s g i f t t o any o n e
T h e S t i ck I ns ec t cl i ck s i t s j aw s i n e x c i t e m e n t .
C UT T O:
I N T . VIDA L ' S ST UDY DA Y
T h e i m pr o vi s ed o f f i ce i s i n o n e o f t h e l o wer r oo m s , w h ere
t h e gi g a n t i c m ill w h e e l a n d t h e woo den gea r s l i e i n a h ea p.
OF E L I A ( V. O. )
Al o n e a n d f o r gott en a t t h e to p o f t h at
m o un t a i n . F o r g ott en un t i l t h e e n d o f
t i m e…
Sm a ll s t ee l gea r s s hi ne l i ke m et a l li c st ars o n a s m a ll
s wa t ch o f bl a ck v e l vet .
T we ez ers pi ck t h e m up a n d
pu t t h e m i n t o pl ac e w i t hi n t h e wo r ki n g s o f a wat ch .
Us i n g a j ew e l er ' s m ag ni f yi ng g l as s , V i da l o i l s a n d c l o s es up
hi s po cke t wa t ch whi l e h e l i s t e n s t o cupl é ( t r adi t i o n a l
Spani s h m us i c) o n a ph o n o gr aph .
T h e d o c to r co m es to t h e door . Vi da l m o t i o n s f o r hi m t o
en t er .VIDA L
C o m e i n
H o w i s s h e ?
DOC T OR
Ve r y we ak.
Vi da l c l o s e s t h e wat ch .
VIDA L
Sh e'll r e s t as m uc h as s h e n ee d s to. I 'l l
s l e ep do wn h ere.
A n d m y s o n?
DOC T OR
Y o ur ?
Ser r an o an d Ga r cé s en t er t h e r oo m .
GA R C É S
E x cus e us , C apt a i n . . .
Vi da l m o t i o ns f o r t h e m to b e s i l e n t . T h en he l o o ks a t t h e
D o c to r aga i n .
VIDA L
M y s o n . Ho w i s h e ?
DOC T OR
F or t h e m o m e n t , t h ere's n o r ea s on to b e
al ar m ed.
VIDA L
G oo d. T h at ’ s g oo d.
DOC T OR
C ap t ai n .
Y o ur wi f e s h e s h o u l d n' t h av e t r av e l ed
t hi s l at e i n t h e pr egn a n c y .
VIDA L
I s t h at y o ur o pi ni o n?DOC T OR
M y pr o f e s s i o n a l o p i ni o n , y es s i r .
VIDA L
W e l l , a b o y s h o u l d b e b o r n wh er ev er hi s
f at h er i s . An d t h at ' s t h at .
He h ea ds f o r t h e d oo r .
DOC T OR
C ap t ai n . . .
Vi da l s t o ps an d l o o ks a t hi m f i xed ly .
DOC T OR
On e m o r e t hi n g, s i r . Wh at m ake s y o u s o
s ur e i t ' s a b o y ?
VIDA L
D o n ' t f uck w i t h m e.
He exi t s t h e m ill .
C UT T O:
E X T . M I L L NIGH T
T h e m ill a n d t h e t en t s are s i l h o uet t es i n t h e ni g h t .
S o l d i ers pat r o l t h e gr av e l p at h s .
Vi da l , Ga r cé s an d Ser r an o wa l k t o wa r ds t h e o u t e r W at er
W h e e l . T h ere, a s m a ll gr o up o f s o l d i ers s ur r o un ds an O L D M A N
an d hi s y o un g SON.
GA R C É S
A t 8 o ' c l o ck, we de t ec t ed ac t i vi t y i n t h e
s o u t h ea s t ern s ec t o r . Gun f i r e. Ser gea n t
B ay o na ca pt ur ed a s us pec t . T h e ot h er
pr i s o n er i s hi s s o n , wh o 's here f r om
to wn .
SONC ap t ai n , m y f at h er i s a n h o n o r able m a n .
VIDA L
I ' l l dec i de t h at . T ake y o ur h at o f f wh e n
y o u t al k t o m e.
T h e S o n qui et l y o b e y s . B A YON A h a n ds t h e Capt a i n a s m a ll
gauge r i f l e a n d a l ea t h er po uch .
VIDA L
W e f o un d t hi s we apo n . I t ' s b ee n f i r ed.
SON
He wa s h un t i n g r abbi t s
VIDA L
Sh ut up, dam n i t .
Vi da l t ake s o pen s t h e l ea t h er po uch an d f i nds a f ar m er's
al m a n ac . He r ea ds an i ns cr i pt i o n pr i n t ed o n t h e b ac k page :
VIDA L
" . . . N o Go d , n or G o v ernm e n t , n or M as t er? "
GA R C É S
R ed pr o paga n da, s i r .
SON
I t ' s n ot p r o paga n da, S i r .
Vi da l , i m pat i e n t l y m o t i o n s f o r hi m t o b e s i l e n t .
OL D M A N
" I t ' s an o l d a lm a n ac ; we ' r e f ar m er s , s i r . "
VIDA L
G o o n .
OL D M A N
I wa s i n t h e f o r es t h un t i n g r a bbi t s f o r
m y d augh t ers . T h e y ' r e s i ck.
VIDA L
R ab bi t s , uh?
I n t h e po uch , Vi da l f i nds a h a l f e m pt y bott l e o f w i ne.SON
C ap t ai n , i f my f at h er s a y s s o h e wa s
h un t i n g r abbi t s .
Vi da l h a n ds Ga r cé s t h e po uch an d m o v e s to wards t h e b o y ,
b ott l e i n h a n d.
B A M ! ! Wi t h o ut wa r ni n g he f l at t en s t h e b o y ' s n o s e w i t h t h e
b ott l e b o tto m . T h e F at h er s crea m s , h o r r i f i ed, b ut wi t h o ut
t h e gu t s to i n t erv e n e.
Vi da l l if t s t h e S o n up, b as h e s hi s n o s e ag a i n a n d aga i n ,
l e v e li ng b o ne an d ca r t i l age .
F A T HE R
N o ! ! No ! ! Yo u ki ll ed hi m ! ! Yo u s o n o f a
bi t ch! !
Vi da l dr o ps t h e b o y , wh o f a ll s t o t h e gr oun d s p i t t i n g bl o o d.
He t u r n s to t h e F at h er an d s h o ot s hi m t wi ce i n co l d bl o o d,
t h en t ur n s to t h e S o n an d s h o ot s hi m o n c e, i n t h e h e ad.
T h en a l l i s s il e n ce . T h e d i s t an t whi s t l e o f a t r ai n ca n b e
h ea r d. Vi da l h ea ds b ac k t o wards Ga r cé s an d ca lmly s ea r c h e s
t h e po uch : I n s i de h e f i nds t wo s crawny r abbi t s .
VIDA L
L ea r n to f r i s k t h es e m o t h er f ucke r s b e f o r e
y o u co m e b o t h er i n g m e.
GA R C É S
Ye s , m y C apt a i n .
He m o v es awa y . A nd he takes the r abbit s w ith him.
C UT T O:
I N T . UPP E R B E DR OOM NIGH T
E y es w i de, O f e li a h e ars a dr y r att l e, f o l l o wed by a so f t
ul u l at i o n at t h e wi n do w, whi c h i s h a lf o pen . T h e cur t ai ns
bi ll o w.T h e m ill gr o ans . Of e li a i s r es t l es s .
T h en a dr y c li ck i ng n o i s e.
OF E L I A
M am a, wa ke up
C arm e n do es n' t m o v e. A s cut t l i ng n o i s e r ea ch e s her ea r s as
s o m et hi ng s m a ll a n d qu i ck sk i t t ers o v er th e f l o o r .
OF E L I A
M ot h er pl e as e ! T h ere ' s s om ething in the
r oom
I m po s s i bl e. O f e li a get s up an d ca r e f u lly put s o n h er s h o es .
S o m et hi ng s hi f t s i n t h e ce ili ng bea m s . Of e li a l o o ks up,
s ea r chi ng.
N ot hi n g. Suddenly , s o m et hi ng t h e s i ze of a h u m a n ha n d
s curr i es pa s t h er f ee t an d hi de s un d er t h e b ed.
T h en , pu l l i ng at t h e goo s e d o wn co m f o r ter, t h e S t i ck I ns ec t c l i m bs
up i n t o t h e b ed. Of e li a l ea ns o v er i t , s h o cke d.
OF E L I A
Hh e l l o D i d y o u f o l l o w m e her e? ?
T h e S t i ck I ns ec t cl i ck s i t s m a n d i b l e s .
OF E L I A
A r e y o u a f a i r y ??
T h e S t i ck I ns ec t r ega r ds h er wi t h cur i o s it y .
OF E L I A
L oo k T hi s i s a f a i r y
Sh e pi cks up o n e o f h er b o o ks an d o pen s i t to an
i ll us t r at i o n : a b ea ut i f u l f a i r y .
T h e S t i ck I ns ec t s cru t i ni z es t h e i ll us t r at i o n an d s i t s upr i g h t . I t
o pen s an d c l o s e s i t s w i n g s , tr an s f o r m i ng i n t o a GRE E N F A I R Y
a t i ny h u m a n f o r m w i t h s t r i p ed w i n g s .
T h e Green F a i r y f li e s to t h e f o ot o f t h e bed, p o i n t i n g tot h e w i n do w.
OF E L I A
Y o u wa n t m e t o g o wi t h y o u? Ou t s i de ?
W h ere ?
C UT T O:
E X T . GA R DE NS NIGH T
T h e Green F a i r y f li e s s w i f t ly , b ut Of e l i a f o l l o ws c l o s e
b ehi nd. Suddenly i t s t o ps !
T h e y ’ r e at t h e r ui ns o f t h e l a by r i n t h , whi ch i s b at h ed i n
m o o nl i g h t .
T r ee s an d r oot s c r o wd t h e b r o ken ni c h e s , as i f f u s ed w i t h
t h e sto n e. S o m e o f t h e pat h wa y s are bl o c ked by g n ar l ed t r ee s
t h at h a v e gr o wn t h r o ugh t h e r o ck .
L A B YR I NT H C ONTI NUOU S
Of e li a r un s t h r o ugh t h e n arr o w, s poo ky pat h wa y s , b ut s h e has
l o s t s i g h t o f t h e Gr ee n F a i r y .
Of e li a s t o ps an d l o o ks ar o un d un t i l s h e s pot s i t , wai t i n g
f o r h er a t
R OT UND A A T C E NT E R OF L A B Y R I NT H NIGHT
T h e Green F a i r y a li g h t s o n an an c i e n t m o n o l i t h at t h e edge o f an
em pt y s t o n e p oo l . I t ' s dec o r a t ed i n C e l t i c l ett eri n g, j us t
l i ke t h e o n e i n t h e f o r es t .
A n o t h er m o n o l i t h s t an ds at i t s ce n t er.
Of e li a nea r s t h e edge o f t h e p oo l .
OF E L I A
He l l o ?!T h e p oo l r et ur n s h er cr y , aga i n a n d aga i n . T h e t r ee tr un ks
creak an d a c l o ud c o v ers t h e m o o n .
OF E L I A
E ch o ! E ch o !
T h en , s h e h ea r s t h e so un d o f s o m et hi ng bi g c l att eri n g a b o ut
o n h oo v es , l i ke a h o r s e o r a b u l l .
VOICE
I t ' s y o u I t ' s y o u Y o u' v e r et ur n ed ! !
T h e VOICE i s co l d a n d f u ll o f s i b il a n ce . T h e c l o ud m o v es
as i de. . .
On i t s hi nd quart ers i n t h e s h ado ws i s t he t wi s t ed an d
s i ni s t er f i gur e o f a F AUN. He' s co v ered in r oot s an d m o s s .
Of e li a bac ks aw a y s pee c hl e s s .
F A U N
N o n o d o n ' t b e a f r a i d I b eg y o u! !
L oo k! !
He o pen s a s m a ll w i c ker b a s ket an d f r o m i t e m erge t w o m o r e
F A I R I E S: o n e BL UE , o n e RE D.
Of e li a s mi l e s .
OF E L I A
M y n a m e i s O f e li a. Wh o are y o u?
F A U N
M e? I 'v e h ad so m a ny n a m e s . O l d n a m es
t h at o nl y t h e w i n d a n d t h e t r ee s c an
pr o n o un ce .
T h e Green F a i r y f li e s to wa r d i t s co l o r f u l co m pa ni o ns .
F A U N
I am t h e m o un t a i n , t h e f o r es t an d t h e
ea r t h . I am . . . a f au n .
A s h e b o ws to h er, m o o nl i g h t dappl e s his b o d y . H i s co arse
h oo v es an d t h e st r an ge an g l e o f hi s l egs m ake hi s co ur t l ym a nn er c l u m s y y et o ddl y gr ac i o u s .
F A U N
Y o ur Hi g hn e s s
OF E L I A
N o , I 'm
F A U N
Y o u a r e Pr i nce s s M o ann a, daught er o f t h e
Ki n g o f t h e Un derwo r l d.
OF E L I A
N o M y f at h er wa s a t ai l o r .
F A U N
Y o u a r e n ot b o r n o f m a n . I t was th e m o o n
t h at b o r e y o u.
L oo k o n y o ur l e f t s h o u l der a n d y o u wi ll
f i n d a m ark t h at pr o v es i t .
Of e li a i ns t i nct i ve ly t o uch es h er s h o u l der, wi t h a st r an ge
ex pr es s i o n o n h er f ac e.
F A U N
Y o ur r ea l f at her h ad us o pen po r t a l s a l l
o v er t h e wo r l d to al l o w y o ur r et u r n . T hi s
i s t h e l a s t o f t h e m .
He o pen s hi s ar m a n d ges t ur es at t h e wel l aro un d t h e m .
F A U N
B u t we h a v e t o m ake s ur e t h at y o ur
es s en c e i s i n t ac t , t h at y o u h a v e not
b ec o m e a m o r t al .
T o i n s ur e y o ur r et u r n , y o u h a v e t h r ee
t as ks to f u l f ill b e f o r e t h e m o o n i s
f u l l .
T h e F aun s t eps b a ck a f ew pace s . He depo s i t s a l arge l e at h er
b o un d b oo k o n t h e gr o un d, as wel l as a l ea t h er b ag.
F A U N
T hi s i s t h e B oo k o f C r o s s r o ads . Open i twh en y o u ' r e a l o n e a n d i t w i ll s h o w y o u
y o ur f ut ur e s h o w y o u wh at m u s t b e do n e.
T h en h e a n d t h e F a i r i es f ade b a ck i n t o t h e sh ado ws .
Of e li a go es to t h e b oo k an d o pen s i t . N o m at t er h o w m a ny
page s s h e t ur n s
t h e y are a l l bl a n k.
OF E L I A
T h ere ' s n o t hi n g h ere
B u t s h e i s a l o n e. Ab s o l ut e l y a l o n e i n t h e we l l . M USI C s t ar t s
C UT T O:
I N T . VIDA L ' S ST UDY B A T HR OOM E A R L Y M OR NING
Vi da l , s hi r t l es s , s ha v es w i t h a s w i t chbl ad e whil e l i s t e ni n g
to m u s i c.
C UT T O:
I N T . DINI NG R OOM DA Y
N o w, al o n e i n t h e m as s i ve d i ni ng r oo m , V i da l s hi ne s hi s
b oot s . M et h o di ca lly .
T h i s i s o b vi o u s l y a da ily r i t ua l f o r him . B y hi s s i de: t h e
t w o s crawny r abbi t s h e im po un ded t h e ni g h t b e f o r e.
M ercede s b r i n g s him a cup o f co f f ee .
VIDA L
M ercede s , pr epa r e t h es e r abbi t s f o r
di nn er to ni g h t .
M ercede s e y e s t h e sc r aw ny a nim a l s
M E R C E DE S
T h e y are t oo y o un g.VIDA L
W e l l , s ee i f t he y 'll do f o r a s t ew.
M E R C E DE S
Ye s s i r .
Sh e t ur n s to l e a v e b ut V i da l s t o ps h er ge n t l y .
VIDA L
A n d T hi s co f f ee wa s b ur n t . T as t e i t
y o ur s e l f .
Sh e d o es . Vi da l p l ac e s a h a n d o n h er s h o u l der.
T h ere i s s o m et hi ng u n p l ea s a n t ab o u t t h i s s udden co n t ac t,
s o m et hi ng t oo f a mil i ar. Sh e b ea r s i t i n s il e n ce .
VIDA L
Y o u s h o ul d kee p an e y e o n i t .
M E R C E DE S
Ye s , s i r .
Sh e m o ves i n t o
I N T . K I T C HE N L A T E R
T h e ki t ch e n i s e n o r m o us . T h e o pen ch ar co al co o k s to v e i s t w o
m et ers hi g h by f i ve m et ers w i de.
M E R C E DE S
( h an d s o u t t h e r ab bi t s )
T ake t h e m t o t h e t abl e
T w o o l d, s to u t c oo ks , J A C I NT A an d P AZ , was h t h e g i ga n t i c
w o r k t abl e w i t h b o i li ng wat er.
M E R C E DE S
( to t h e ot h ers )
He di d n' t l i ke t h e co f f ee .
J A C I NT A
A gh He 's n o t hi n g b ut a f us s y da n d y . Adan d y !
M E R C E DE S pi ck s up a pai l o f h o t wa t er .
M E R C E DE S
W e' r e go i n g to n ee d s o m e b e e f a n d o n e
m o r e chi ck e n . W e ha v e m o r e gues t s
C o n chi t a, Pa l o m a a n d t wo ot h er GIRL S p l uck c hi cke n s , pee l
p ot a to es , e t c .
PA Z
W e l l , wh ere are we s uppo s ed to f i nd t h at ?
M E R C E DE S
T h e do c to r ' s w i f e an d t h e m a y o r 's , too .
J A C I NT A
W e l l , t h e y ea t m o r e t h an a p i g.
PA Z
A n d t h e y do n' t s h ut up
J A C I NT A
n ot ev en u n derwat er.
I N T . B A T HR OOM , UPP E R B E DR OOM DA Y
M ercede s an d C o n c hi t a e m pt y b ucke t s of h o t wa t er i n t o a
p o r ce l a i n bat h t ub .
I N T . UPP E R B E DR OOM B E DR OOM DA Y
C arm e n o pen s o n e o f h er t r av e l t r un ks .
C A R M E N
Of e li a. Yo ur f at h er i s g i v i ng a d i nn er
par t y to ni g h t … L oo k wh at I ' v e m ade y o u.
Sh e l if t s o ut a b ea ut i f u l gr ee n dr es s i n s hi n y s il k an d
i v o r y t u l l e.Of e li a s t ud i es t h e dr es s as i f i t were a str an ge ar t i f a ct
r a t h er t h an s o m et hi ng s h e m i g h t wea r . M ercede s e n t ers wi t h a
b r ea k f as t tr ay .
C A R M E N
D o y o u l i ke i t ? Wh at I w o ul d n' t h av e
gi v e n to h av e a dr es s as f i ne a s t h i s
wh en I wa s l i t t l e.
I n a r ev er i e, C ar m e n t ake s ou t a pai r o f new pat en t l ea t h er
s h o es an d a gr ee n s il k h a i r r i bb o n .
C A R M E N
( to Of e li a)
A n d l o o k a t t h es e s h o es ! Do y o u li ke
t h e m ?
Of e li a m ak es a n e f f o r t an d s m il es a wea k s m il e.
OF E L I A
Ye s , t h e y are v er y pr et t y .
B u t C arm e n i s n o t f oo l ed
C A R M E N
G o o n , n o w . T ake y o ur b at h . G o
Of e li a o b e y s Sh e e n t ers
I N T . B A T HR OOM , UPP E R B E DR OOM DA Y
Of e li a, a l o n e i n t h e b at h r oo m , o pen s t h e m ag i ca l b o o k . A t
f i r s t , t h e page i s bl a n k, b ut a w o n dr o us i m age t ake s s hape :
Of e li a a n d f i ve ches t n ut s . Squa tt i n g at h er s i d e, un der a
h uge tr ee : a m as s i ve T OA D.
T h en a K NO C K o n t h e d oo r
C A R M E N ' S VOICE
Of e li a
I N T . UPP E R B E DR OOM DA YAl o n e n o w, C arm e n r ea d i es t h e l i t t l e gr ee n dr es s .
C A R M E N
Hur r y up. I wa n t to s ee t h e dr es s o n y o u.
I wa n t y o u to b e b ea ut i f u l f o r t h e
C ap t ai n . . .
I N T . B A T HR OOM , UPP E R B E DR OOM DA Y
On h er r i g h t s h o u l der, O f e li a e x a mi nes , ex a ct l y as t h e F au n
s a i d, a bi r t hm ark i n t h e f o r m o f t h e cr es c en t m o o n . . .
C A R M E N’ S VOICE
Y o u'l l l o o k l i k e a pr i nce s s
Of e li a s mi l e s .
OF E L I A
( to h ers e l f )
. . . a pr i n ce s s . . .
C UT T O:
I N T . K I T C HE N L A T E R
M ercede s or gani ze s t h e k i t che n .
M E R C E DE S
M ake s ur e t h o s e chi ck e n s are c l e an ed
pr o pe r l y . . . an d t h e b ea n s . . .
M ercede s t ake s o u t a sm a l l , s h arp knif e f r o m t h e f o l d s i n
h er apr o n . Sh e sk i ll f u lly c h o ps an o ni o n .
T h e b us t l e s udde nly s to ps . E v er y o n e l o o ks to ward t h e door ,
wh ere, am o n g c hi cke n f e at h ers f l o at i n g l i ke co nf ett i , O f e li a
s t an ds , dr es s ed i n gr ee n s il k.
C ONC HIT A
Y o u l oo k m ar v e l o us , m y g i r l , j us t
g o r ge o us .J A C I NT A
W h at a dr es s ! !
M ercede s s m il e s . Sh e ' s p l ea s ed t oo, b ut s h e c l aps h er h a n d s
to ge t h er
M E R C E DE S
Ge t b ac k to w o r k , s to p was t i n g t i m e.
T h e y o b e y . M ercede s go es n ex t to Of e li a .
M E R C E DE S
D o wa n t s o m e m il k w i t h h o n e y ?
Of e li a n o ds ea ger l y .
I N T . ST A B L E L A T E R
M ercede s put s a b ucke t un der a h uge m i lk co w .
M E R C E DE S
S t ep b ac k, I d o n ' t wa n t y o u ge tt i ng m il k
o n y o ur dr es s , wi t h y o u l o o ki n g s o
pr e tt y .
M ercede s b eg i ns t o m il k t h e co w.
OF E L I A
M ercede s , d o y o u b e l i e ve i n f a i r ies ?
M E R C E DE S
N o . B u t wh en I wa s a l i t t l e g i r l , I d i d.
I b e l i e v ed i n a l o t o f t hi n g s t h at I
d o n ' t b e l i e ve any m o r e.
OF E L I A
W e l l , l a s t ni g h t , a f a i r y vi s i t ed m e. A n d
i t wa s n' t al o ne, t h ere we r e l ot s o f t h e m
an d a f au n , too .
M E R C E DE S
A f au n??M ercede s p i cks up t h e b ucke t an d f ill s a woo den b o w l w i t h
m il k.
OF E L I A
He wa s v er y o l d, v er y t al l a n d s me l l ed
l i ke d i r t .
M E R C E DE S
M y m o t h er wa r n ed m e t o b e war y o f f au ns
Suddenl y , V i da l a n d Ga r cé s appro ac h t h e m .
VIDA L
M ercede s , c o m e w i t h m e.
C UT T O:
E X T . S T OR A GE B UILD I NG M I L L DA Y
Vi da l a n d M ercede s wa l k t o ward t h e bodega , o r s tor age
b u i l d i ng, ad j o i ni n g t h e m ill .
Gua r ds unl o ad gi a n t s ac ks o f pr o vi s i o n s f r o m t r ucks . A C i vi l
Gua r d C A PI T A N s uper vi s e s t h e o pera t i o n an d gr ee t s Vi da l .
C A PI T A N
C ap t ai n , e v er y t hi ng i s h ere.
I N T . B ODEGA M I L L C ONT I NUO US
T h e m e n f ill t h e en o r m o us b o dega w i t h gr a i n , b o tt l es o f
wi n e, b arr e l s o f o i l , s a l t a n d s ugar, et c .
C A PI T A N
Fl o ur , s a l t , o i l , m ed i c i ne, o l i ves ,
b ac o n , to b ac co . . .
Vi da l gr abs a packe t o f to b ac co .
VIDA L
T o b ac co , h uh? R ea l t o b ac co !T h e C A PI T A N ha n ds o v er s o m e papers w i t h t h e F a l a n g i s t
l et t erh ea d.
C A PI T A N
A n d t h e r at i o n ca r ds .
M ercede s i s s t unn ed by t h e qua n t i t y o f f oo d an d s upp l i e s .
Vi da l c h ec k s t h e pad l o ck o n t h e d oo r .
VIDA L
M ercede s , t h e ke y
M E R C E DE S
Ye s , s i r .
M ercede s h a n ds o v er t h e ke y f r o m h er l a r ge ke y r i n g.
VIDA L
( to M ercede s )
I s t h i s t h e o nl y co p y ?
M E R C E DE S
T h e o nl y o n e.
Vi da l l o cks t h e pad l o ck. Yan ks o n i t : ni c e an d s t r o n g.
VIDA L
F r o m n o w o n , I 'l l c arr y i t .
F r o m o ut s i de, Ser r an o ca l l s him .
S E R R A NO
C ap t ai n! !
Vi da l h ur r i es o v er to Ser r an o wh o h an d s him a pa i r o f
bi n o cu l ars a n d po i n t s to s o m et hi ng o n t h e h o r i zo n
SE R R A NO
C ap t ai n , perh ap s i t 's n o t hi n g.
T h r o ugh t h e bi n o cu l ars , V i d a l s ee s a p l u m e o f SMO K E o n t h e
h o r i zo n .
VIDA LI t ' s t h e m .
E X T . F OR E ST DA Y
Ga r cé s , Vi da l a n d a f ew o f hi s m e n r i de t h r o ugh t h e f o r es t
o n h o r s eb ac k.
OF E L I A ( V. O. )
W h e n t h e f o r es t wa s y o un g, a f i g t r ee
too k r oot an d gr ew to c o l o s s a l s i z e.
C UT T O:
E X T . W OOD S DA Y
Of e li a wa l ks aw a y f r o m t h e m i ll a n d i n t o t h e woo ds .
OF E L I A ( V. O. )
W h e n t h e f o r es t wa s y o un g, i t wa s h o m e t o
crea t ur es wh o we r e f u l l o f m ag i c an d
w o n der. . .
E X T . W OOD S DA Y
Vi da l a n d hi s m e n r i de t h r o ugh t h e f o r es t.
OF E L I A ( V. O. )
A t t h e h ea r t o f t hi s f o r es t s too d a
c o l o s s a l f i g t r ee . T h e F o r es t F o l k s l ept
i n i t s s h ado w.
E X T . E DG E OF T HE F OR E ST DA Y
OF E L I A ( V. O. )
B u t n o w , t h e t r ee i s d y i ng. I t s b r an c h e s
are dr y , i t s tr un k o l d an d t w i s t ed.
Of e li a f i nds h ers e lf u n d er a h uge F I G T R E E t h at h as t wi s t edi n t o an arch r ea c hi ng to a n ea r by crag.
OF E L I A ( V. O. )
A m o ns t r o us to ad h as s ett l ed i n i t s r oot s
an d wo n ' t l et t h e t r ee t h r i v e.
Of e li a o pen s h er l ea t h er bag. I n s i d e t h ere are f i ve l arge
ch es t n ut s .
OF E L I A ( V. O. )
Y o u m us t pu t t h e t h r ee m ag i c r o c ks i n i t s
m o ut h an d r etri e ve a m ag i c ke y f r o m i t s
i n s i de s . Only t h e n w ill t h e f i g t r e e
f l o ur i s h aga i n.
T h e t r ee r oot s are pa r t l y e x po s ed. T h e t r ee i t s e l f i s
s ur r o un ded by a l arge m ud pudd l e.
Of e li a dec i des t o t ake o f f h er f a n c y s il k dr es s . Sh e
ca r ef u lly h a n g s eve r y t hi ng i n c l ud i n g h e r h a i r r i bb o n o n
t h e t r ee b r an c h e s . Fi n a lly s h e 's do wn to o nl y a s i m p l e
c otto n s l i p an d h er s h o es .
A s s he en t ers
T h e wi n d p i cks up an d m o v es h er h a n g i n g dr es s . T h en , a
s udden gus t s en ds t h e h a i r r i bb o n f lyi ng.
I N T . GA L L E R Y UND E R F I G T R E E R OOTS DA Y
Of e li a craw l s s l o w ly ; t h e gaps b et wee n t h e r oot s are n arr o w
an d c l aus t r o ph o bi c.
A f e w bi g, bl ac k p i ll b ugs are n e s t l ed i n t h e m ud.
Of e li a kee ps go i n g.
C UT T O:
I N T . C A M PS I T E I N T H E M I DDL E OF T HE F OR E ST DA Y
Vi da l a n d hi s m e n pr o b e a f o r es t ca v e. I n s i d e, t h e y f i nd t h er em a i ns o f a ca m p f i r e. V i da l r e m o ves a g l o v e a n d to uch es t h e
em b ers .
VIDA L
L es s t h an t we n t y m i nut es , t h e y l e f t i n a
h ur r y .
He f i n d s t h e r e m a i ns o f f o o d an d dr i n k.
VIDA L
A do ze n m e n , at m o s t . . .
I n t h e d i r t , h e d i s co v er s t h e r em a i ns o f t h e packa ge t h e
d o c to r gav e to M ercede s .
I n s i de h e f i nds e m pt y an t i bi o t i c s co n t ai ners .
VIDA L
A n t i bi o t i cs . . .
Ga r cé s c o m e s upo n a h a l f b ur n t l o tt ery t i cke t .
GA R C É S
( s h o w i n g him t h e l o t t e r y t i cke t )
Shi t T h e y f o r got t h i s l o tt ery t i ck et .
Vi da l m o t i o ns f o r s i l e nce .
VIDA L
T h e y ' r e h ere. T h o s e b as t ards are h ere a n d
t h e y are wa t chi n g us .
He s t an ds i n r apt s i l e n c e. T h e t r ee s s wa y gen t l y . He h e f t s
t h e e m pt y pac k age l i ke a t r o phy .
VIDA L
Y o u l e f t t h i s be hi n d ! An d t h e l o tt er y
t i cke t ! C o m e b ac k a n d get i t ! ! T hi s co u l d
b e y o ur l uck y d a y !
Si l e n ce .
T h en , t h e y m o un t up an d r i de o f f .
I n vi s i b l e un d er t h e t r ee s , s i x GUERR I L L A S are i n d ee d
wa t chi n g. Am o n g t h e m i s PE DR O, a t a l l an d s er i o us y o un g m a n .I n a f l as h , t h e y a ll d i s appe ar i n t o t h e un d erb r us h .
C UT T O:
I N T . GA L L E R Y UND E R F I G T R E E R OOTS DA Y
Of e li a ' s pr o gr es s i s s l o w. W at er oo ze s f r o m t h e surr o un d i n g
r oot s an d m ud.
B ugs crawl o n h er ar m s .
Sh e h ea r s a s udde n , s o ggy m o v e m e n t up ah ea d. Sh e t ake s o u t
t h e f i ve c h e s t n ut s whi c h are s o l arge t h e y b are ly f i t i n
h er h an d s an d wo r ks h er wa y to ward t h e n o i s e.
S oo n , s h e co m e s f ac e t o f ac e w i t h
an i mm e ns e T OA D, as bi g as a b o ar. Hi s go l de n e y es bli nk;
hi s c h ee k s pu f f r hy t hm i c a lly i n a n d o u t.
OF E L I A
Hi
T h e T o ad' s l o n g to n gue f li ck s o u t , t r appi n g a co upl e o f
b ee t l e s an d pu lli ng t h e m b ac k i n t o hi s m o u t h . T h e i r
chi t i n o us s h e ll s cru n c h n o i s ily i n i t s s li my j a ws .
Of e li a s h udders a n d t r i es t o s t an d up. A s s he spe aks , a
l arge r ed p i l l b ug c l i ng s to h er ch ee k.
OF E L I A
I am I 'm pr i nce s s M o ann a a n d I 'm n o t
af r a i d o f y o u
T h e T o ad o b s er v es h er, unm o v ed.
OF E L I A
A r en' t y o u as ha m ed ? L i v i ng do w n here,
ea t i n g a ll t h e p i ll b ugs a n d gett i ng f at
whi l e t h e t r ee di es !
F WA PP PP ! ! ! ! T h e T o ad se n ds o u t i t s s of t p i n k to n gue, whi c h
f l att en s aga i ns t h er f ac e, t h en s li de s o f f , tak i n g t h e p i ll
b ug an d l ea vi ng a ge l at i n o us g oo .T h r ee o f t h e ch e s t n ut s r o l l t o t h e gr o un d. Of e li a sp i t s i n
di s gu s t .
T h e T o ad h un k ers do wn , s h ak i ng vi o l e n t ly as i t cro aks .
Of e li a bac kpeda l s , f r i g h t en ed. T h e T o ad r es u m e s i t s r es t i n g
p o s i t i o n .
Of e li a s co o ps up t h e ch e s t n ut s . T w o f a ll b ac k i n t o t h e m ud.
Sh e kn ee l s t o ge t t h e m an d
def t l y pa lm s a j u i c y , f at pi ll b ug. I t curl s i t s e l f i n t o a
t i g h t b a l l . Sh e keeps i t i n t h e sa m e ha n d as t h e ch e s t n ut s .
T h e T o ad cr o aks aga i n , s h o ot s o u t i t s to n gue, whi c h wraps
ar o un d h er wri s t . Sh e st a y s ca lm . Wh e n th e t o n gue r e t r ac t s ,
c o v er i n g her h a n d w i t h vi s co us s p i t t l e, t h e p i l l b ug i s
g o n e.
A n d s o are t h e ch es t n ut s .
T h e T o ad cr o aks vi o l e n t l y a n d s udde nly b ur ps up a g i ga n t i c
pea r l y b u bbl e, w hi c h f l o at s i n t h e a i r , b ath ed i n bl o o d an d
s a l i va.
A n d w i t h t hi s , t h e T o ad sh r i v e l s aw a y , l ike a se r pen t
s h edd i n g i t s s k i n.
Of e li a p i ck s up t h e war t y , e m pt y s k i n a nd l o o ks a t t h e
b ubbl e.
I n i t s ce n t er: a GOL D K E Y.
Of e li a p l u n ge s her h a n ds i n t o t h e b u bbl e t o gr ab i t .
E X T . E DG E OF T HE F OR E ST T W I L I GHT
Of e li a e m erges f r o m un der t h e t r ee wi t h t h e go l de n ke y i n
h an d. Sh e 's f il t hy , s we at y a n d e xh aus t ed.
Sh e n ea r s t h e p l ac e w h ere s h e l e f t h er dr es s
b u t i t ' s n o t t h ere!Af t er a b r i e f s ea r c h , s h e f i nds h er h a i r r i bb o n . C o v ered i n
m ud.
A f e w m et ers aw a y , t h e dr es s co v ered i n wet , m o s s y m ud.
I t s t ar t s to r ai n .
C UT T O:
E X T . M I L L DUSK
A pa i r o f B E NT L E YS s wee ps i n t o t h e dr i vewa y . E l ega n t di nner
gues t s get o u t o f t h e cars: t h e MA YO R , hi s W I F E , an d a
pari s h PRIE ST .
Vi da l s t an d s at t h e f r o n t d oor to gr ee t t h em . He 's i n hi s
f o r m a l u ni f o r m .
I N T . DINI NG R OOM SA M E
C arm e n , i n a v e l vet m at erni t y dr es s an d in her wh ee l c ha i r ,
wri n gs h er h a n d s i n a n gu i s h . T h e d i ni ng r oo m i s l o o k i n g i t s
b es t , wi t h s p ark l i ng cr y s t a l an d c hi na at ea c h p l ac e
s ett i n g.
C A R M E N
( to M ercede s )
Ha v e y o u ch ec ked i n h er r oo m ?? An d t h e
garden ??
M E R C E DE S
Ye s , m ada m .
T h e VOICES o f t h e d i nn er gues t s get l o uder. A s V i da l e n t ers
VIDA L
M a y I i n t r o duce y o u to m y w i f e, C ar m e n .
C arm e n m a n age s a wan s mil e o f gr ee t i ng. T h e Ma y o r ' s w i f e
s m il e s b a ckM A YO R ' S W I F E
E n c h a n t ed.
M E R C E DE S
Pl ea s ur e t o m ee t y o u.
I N T . DINI NG R OOM NIGHT
A r a t i o n ca r d w i t h t h e F a l a n g i s t s t am p s on i t . T h e Ma y o r
ex a m i ne s i t .
VIDA L
F r o m n o w o n o n e r a t i o n ca r d pee r f a mily .
Sea t ed ar o un d t h e t abl e ar e: t h e d o c to r an d hi s W I F E , t h e m a y o r an d hi s
wi f e, Ga r cé s , Ser r an o , C arm e n , t h e Gua r d i a C i v il C ap i t a n , an d t h e P r i e s t .
C arm e n i s s t o ny f a ce d i n h er d i s t r ac t i o n .
M A YO R
On e? ? C apt a i n , I 'm n o t s ur e i t 'l l be
en o ugh .
PRI E ST
I f peo pl e are ca r e f u l , i t s h o u l d b e
pl e n t y .
He ea t s m o r e p ot a to es .
VIDA L
W h at we ca n' t al l o w i s f o r any o ne t o s en d
f o o d to t h e guer i ll as i n t h e m o u n ta i ns .
T h e y ' r e l o s i n g gr o un d an d o n e o f t h e m
i s wo un ded.
DOC T OR
E x cus e m e, C apt ai n , h o w ca n y o u b e so
s ur e?
VIDA L
W e a l m o s t got t h e m to da y . T h e y h ad t hi s .
Vi da l pu l l s o ut o n e o f t h e an t i bi o t i c vi a l s .
VIDA LA n t i bi o t i cs .
M ercede s b r i e f ly ca t ch e s t h e Do c to r ' s e y e.
PRI E ST
G o d h as a l r ea d y s a v ed t h e i r s o u l s . W h at
h appe ns to t h e i r b o d i es , we l l , i t hard l y
m at t ers to Hi m .
M A YO R
W e’ll h e l p y o u i n a ny w a y we ca n ,
C ap t ai n .
W e kn o w y o u’ r e n o t h ere by c h o i ce
Vi da l paus e s an d l o ck s e y e s w i t h hi m .
VIDA L
Y o u' r e wr o n g ab o ut t h at .
T h e gues t s g r o w s i l e n t .
VIDA L
I ch oo s e to b e h ere b ec aus e I want m y s o n
to b e b o r n i n a c l e a n , n ew S pa i n .
B ec aus e t h es e peo pl e h a v e t h e i d ea t h at
we ' r e a l l a li ke. B ut t h ere's a bi g
di f f ere n c e: T h e war i s o v er an d we wo n .
A n d i f we nee d to ki l l ea c h o f t h o s e
m o t h erf uck ers to ag r ee o n i t , t h en we’ll
ki ll t h e m a ll . An d t h at ’ s t h at.
He r ai s e s hi s g l as s a n d to as t s .
VIDA L
W e' r e a ll h ere by c h o i c e.
Al l t h e gue s t s r ai s e t h e i r g l a s s es .
A L L
B y c h o i ce .
M ercede s qu i ck ly l ea ves t h e d i ni ng r oom .I N T . K I T C HE N L A T E R
T h e ki t ch e n do or o pen s an d M erced es e nt ers , t r em bli ng. On
t h e v erge o f t ea r s , s h e gr ab s a l a n t ern a nd r ea di es to
l ea v e.
M E R C E DE S
Pu t t h e co f f e e o n . I 'm go i n g f o r m o r e
w oo d.
Sh e l ea v es t h e k i t che n .
E X T . M I L L B A C K NIGHT
T h e m ill r ec ed i ng i n t h e d i s t an c e, M ercede s h ur r i es uphill .
Sh e paus es n e x t to a l arge woo d pi l e a n d s ad l y gaz e s at t h e
f o r es t.
Us i n g h er h a n d t o s hi e l d t h e l a n t ern' s l i g h t s h e s i g n a l s t h e
w oo ds o n e, t w o, t h r ee t i m e s . T h en s h e t ur n s aro un d
Sh e s ee s
M E R C E DE S
Of e li a
Shi v er i n g, co v ered i n m ud, O f e li a c lim b s do wn hill a n d i n t o
M ercede s ’ s ar m s .
C UT T O:
I N T . DINI NG R OOM NIGHT
E v ery o ne ea t s wi t h r e l i s h , i m p ec ca bly at t en ded by t h e
ki t ch e n s t a f f .
M A YO R ' S W I F E
A n d Ho w di d y o u an d t h e Capt ai n m e et ?
Vi da l s ee m s u n co m f o r t abl e b ut C ar m e n gen t l y t o uch es hi sh an d.
C A R M E N
Of e li a ' s f at h er wa s a t ai l o r h e use d to
m ake t h e C apt a i n ’ s unif o r m s
M A YO R ' S W I F E
I s ee
C A R M E N
an d af t er h e d i ed, I we n t to w o r k at t h e
s h o p. A l i t t l e m o r e t h an a y ea r ago, t h e
C ap t ai n a n d I m et aga i n . . .
Vi da l m o ves hi s ha n d aw a y f r o m C ar m e n' s .
M A YO R ' S W I F E
C ur i o us , i s n' t i t ? Fi nd i ng ea c h oth er
af t er s uch a l o n g t i m e.
DOC T OR ' S W I F E
C ur i o us i n dee d v er y cur i o us . . .
VIDA L
Pl ea s e, f o r g i v e m y w if e. Sh e h a s n' t b ee n
ex po s ed to t h e w o r l d. Sh e t hi n k s t h es e
s i lly s t o r i es are i n t eres t i n g t o ot h ers .
C arm e n gr o ws s i l e n t . A s h a m e d.
M ercede s d i s creet l y co m es o v er to C arm en a n d s pea k s to h er.
C arm e n pus h e s b a ck f r o m t h e t abl e.
C A R M E N
Pl ea s e, ex cus e m e.
Al l t h e m e n get up as C arm e n l ea v es t h e d i ni ng r oo m . T h e
Gua r di a C i v i l C ap i t an s mil e s at Vi da l .
C A PI T A N
Ha v e I to l d y o u t h at I wa s ac qua i n t ed
wi t h y o ur f at h er, C apt a i n?
Vi da l ca n' t s uppr es s a b r i e f gr i m ac e.
VIDA LN o I h ad n o i d ea .
C A PI T A N
I n M or o cc o. I m et hi m o nly b r i e f ly , b ut
h e l e f t a gr ea t i m pr es s i o n .
Vi da l c h ew s hi s f o o d n erv o us l y .
VIDA L
A n e x ce ll e n t s o l d i er.
C A PI T A N
T h e m e n i n hi s b at t al i o n s a i d t h at wh e n
Ge n era l V i da l d i ed o n t h e b at t l e f ie l d, h e
s m a s h ed hi s wa t ch o n a r o ck s o th at hi s
s o n wo ul d kn o w t h e ex ac t h o ur a n d m i nut e
o f hi s dea t h .
S o h e wo ul d kn o w h o w a b r av e m a n d i es .
Al l e y es t ur n to Vi da l .
C A PI T A N
N o n s e n s e. He d i d n' t o wn a wat ch .
C UT T O:
I N T . UPP E R B E DR OOM / B A T HR OO M M OM E NT S L A T E R
Of e li a i s f l o at i n g o n t h e war m wat er o f th e t ub .
C A R M E N
W h at y o u'v e do n e h ur t s m e. Wh e n y o u get
o u t o f t h e t ub , y o u'll go to b ed w i t h o u t
di nn er.
Of e li a l i s t e n s i n s il e nce , h o l d i ng b ac k.
C A R M E N
A r e y o u l i s t eni ng ? So m et i m e s I thi nk
y o u'll n e ver l ea r n to b eh a v e.
Y o u' v e d i s appo i n t ed m e, an d y o ur f at h er,
too.OF E L I A
T h e C apt a i n?
C A R M E N
Ye s Hi m m o r e t h a n m e.
T h e f a i n t es t tr ac e o f s at i s f ac t i o n i s vi s i b le o n Of e li a 's
f ac e. C ar m e n l ea v e s .
T h e Green F a i r y f li e s i n t h r o ugh t h e o pen w i n do w. Of e l i a
gr ee t s i t .
OF E L I A
I ' v e got t h e key . T ake m e t o t h e
l a by r i n t h .
E X T . L A B Y R I NT H T HE W E L L NI GHT
Wi t h t h e b o o k an d t h e ke y i n h a n d, O f e lia s t eps to t h e
ce n t er o f t h e wel l . Sh e i s wea r i ng a st r i p ed r o b e.
Sh e ex a mi nes t h e en gr a vi ng s o n t h e m o no l i t h : t h e F au n ,
em b r ac i ng a g i r l a n d a ba by .
F A U N
T h at ' s m e an d t h e g i r l i s y o u.
F r o m o ut o f t h e sha do ws co m es t h e F au n. T h e Gr ee n F a i r y
h ur r i e s to hi m .
OF E L I A
A n d t h e b a by ?
T h e F aun co m es n ea r O f e li a c h ew i ng a c h u n k o f r aw m ea t .
F A U N
I s ee t h at y o u g ot t h e ke y
T h e Green F a i r y l a n ds o n hi s s h o u l der. He f ee ds h er s o m e m ea t .
F A U N
Sh e' s v er y g l ad y o u s ucc ee d ed. S h e 's
b e l i e v ed i n y o u f r o m t h e v er y s t art.K ee p t h e ke y . Yo u'l l b e n ee d i ng i t. A n d
t hi s a l s o
Ou t o f n o wh ere h e pr o duce s a pi ec e o f w hi t e c h a l k.
F A U N
a pi ec e o f c h a l k
Of e li a t ake s t h e cha l k.
F A U N
T h ere are s t i ll t wo t as ks l e f t an d t h e
m o o n i s a l m o s t f u l l . B e pat i e n t .
He ca r es s es h er f ac e w i t h hi s d i r t y h a n d s , whi c h are co v ered
wi t h creep i n g b ugs .
F A U N
W e'll s o o n b e st r o l li ng t h r o ugh t h e se ve n
ci r cu l ar gardens o f y o ur pal ac e.
OF E L I A
H o w d o I kn o w t h at wh at y o u s ay i s t r ue? ?
A s h e co m es c l o s er, t h e F au n' s f ac e aga in co m es i n t o t h e
l i g h t . A wi ck ed gr i n i s r e v ea l ed
F A U N
W hy wo u l d a poor l i t t l e f au n l i ke m e l i e
to y o u ?
Of e li a l e a v es t h e we l l .
C UT T O:
E X T . M I L L SUNR I S E
VIDA L o pen s t h e war eh o us e.
A l arge C R O W D OF PE OPL E l i nes up f o r r a t i o n s .
T h e s o l d i ers kee p o r der as Vi da l s uper vis es t h e d i s t r i b ut i o n
o f wh e at , coo ki n g o i l a n d t o b ac co .VIDA L
P r o ce ed.
S E R R A NO
Ha v e y o ur ca r ds i n ha n d an d r ea d y . L et ' s
g o. Y o ur n a m e ?
I n a l o gb o o k , h e m ak es n ot e o f eve r y h a n do ut.
M ercede s , C o n chi t a an d Paz co m e o u t o f t h e gr an ar y c arr y i ng
b as ket s o f b r ea d. E ac h p i ec e i s co n t a i n ed i n a b r o wn b ag
wi t h a l ege n d pr i n t ed. T h e Guar di a C i vil C ap i t an gr abs a
pi ec e a n d s t art s r ec i t i n g t h e pr i n t ed l ege nd.
C A PI T A N
T hi s i s o ur dai ly b r ea d i n F r a n co 's
Spai n ! Whi c h we kee p s a f e i n t his m ill .
T h e R eds l i e w h e n t h e y s a y t h ere 's h u n ger
i n Spa i n . B ec au s e i n a uni t ed S pa i n ,
t h ere' s n o t a s i n g l e h o m e w i t h o ut a war m
f i r e o r wi t h o ut b r ea d.
M ercede s l o o ks to wa r d t h e m o un t a i ns .
C UT T O:
I N T . NOR T H B E DR OOM DA W N
Of e li a wa kes up n e x t to h er m o t h er. Sh e qu i et l y s li ps o u t o f
b ed; h er m o t h er s l ee ps o n . A s O f e l i a r ea ch e s t h e m i dd l e o f
t h e r oo m , h er m o t h er m o a n s s o f t l y .
I N T . B A T HR OOM NOR T H B E DR OO M DA WN
Of e li a o pen s t h e spe c i a l b o o k. I m pat i e n t , s h e st art s t u r ni n g
t h e pages
NOTH I NG.
Sh e kee ps f li pp i ng t h r o ugh , l o o ki n g a n d l o o k i n g. B ut ea ch
page f ade s t o whi t e.Of e li a l o o ks a t a b ea m o f s u nli g h t c o m i n g i n f r o m t h e s m a l l
b at h r oo m w i n do w. Sh e r ea ch es o ut h er han d a n d p l a y s w i t h i t .
Sh e l o o ks d o wn at a page i n t h e b o o k . A s m a l l r ed st a i n h a s
appe ared. B l o o d .
I t s pr ea ds r api d ly , un t i l i t co v ers t h e wh o l e page.
F r i g h t ene d, Of e li a dr o ps t h e b o o k. T h e b l o o d f l o ws o n t o t h e
n ex t page an d co v ers i t , too.
Of e li a n o t i c es a bl o o ds t ai n o n her ni g h t go wn .
Sh e s t eps b ac k. Ope n s t h e doo r .
C A R M E N ( V. O. )
( we ak)
Of e li a. . .
I N T . NOR T H B E DR OOM M OR NING
Of e li a r et ur n s to h er m o t h er. Huge tor r en t s o f bl o o d f l o w
f r o m t h e b ed o n t o t h e f l o o r . C arm e n e x t en ds a bl o o d y h a n d
to wa r d t h e g i r l .
C A R M E N
( b arel y a w hi s per)
Of e li a. . . h e l p m e.. .
Sh e get s o u t o f b ed ; t h e l o wer h a l f o f h er b o dy i s
c o m p l et e l y bl o o dy .
Of e li a r un s t o h er. C arm e n d i s app ea r s f r o m her arm s .
E X T . M I L L E A R L Y M OR NING
Of e li a h ur r i es f r o m t h e b u il d i ng an d go es to Vi d a l , wh o
s upervi s es t h e f o o d r a t i o ni ng.
OF E L I A
C ap t ai n! C o m e qu i ck l y !C A M E R A pu l l s b ac k t o f o l l o w V i d a l a s h e r uns i ns i de t h e
m ill .
T h e day i s j us t b eg i nni ng.
C UT T O:
I N T . M I L L DA Y
I t ’ s r ai ni ng. V i da l a n d t h e Do ctor s t an d nea r t h e f r o n t
en t r an ce :
DOC T OR
Y o ur wi f e n ee ds a b s o l ut e b ed r es t. Sh e'll
b e se dat ed f r o m n o w o n . T h e gi r l s h o u l d
s l e ep s o m ew h ere e l s e. I 'l l s t a y h e r e
un t i l t h e bi r t h .
VIDA L
T ake ca r e o f h er. He a l h er. I d o n 't ca r e
wh at i t c o s t s o r wh at y o u n ee d, m ake h er
we l l .
I N T . A T T I C L A T E A F T E R NOO N
Of e li a s ur ve y s t h e f il t hy at t i c a n d t h e dar k, l o w ce i li ng,
f u l l o f h o l e s .
M ercede s an d C o n c hi t a m ake a b ed w i t h a l arge co m f o r t er an d
s ev era l f l u f f y p ill o w s .
C o n chi t a l ea v e s .
M E R C E DE S
D o n ' t worr y . Yo ur m o t h er wi ll g e t b ett er
s oo n , y o u'll s ee . Ha vi ng a b a by i s
c o m p li ca t ed.
Of e li a s h ake s h er hea d.
OF E L I AT h e n I 'll n e v er h a v e a o n e.
M ercede s s i t s by her s i de.
OF E L I A
Y o u a r e h e l p i ng t h e m e n i n t h e w oo ds ,
aren ' t y o u ?
T h i s co m es o u t o f t h e bl ue. M ercede s f r e ez es a n d a f t er a
l o n g bea t :
M E R C E DE S
Ha v e y o u to l d a ny o n e ?
OF E L I A
N o , I h ave n' t I d o n ' t wa n t any t hin g bad
h appe ni ng t o y o u.
M E R C E DE S
Or m e t o y o u
T h e y e m b r ac e so f t l y .
OF E L I A
D o y o u kn o w a l u ll a by ?
M E R C E DE S
Onl y o ne, b ut I d o n ' t r em e m ber t h e wo r ds .
OF E L I A
I d o n ' t ca r e. I s t i ll w a n t to h ea r i t .
A s s he s i n g s we
C UT T O:
I N T . K I T C HE N NIGHT
M ercede s i s a l o n e i n t h e k i t ch e n . Sh e car r i es a ca nv as b ag.
T h ere i s a l o w f l a m e b ur ni ng o n t h e ch arco al r a n ge.
Sh e kn ee l s do wn an d r e m o v es a t i l e f r o m t h e f l o o r : s h e h as
hi dde n s o m e f o o d, a b ott l e o f Oru j o an d s o m e papers. Sh e
t r an s f ers e v er y t hi ng t o t h e canv a s bag. S o m eo n e co m es i n t ot h e ki t c h e n , s t ar t l i ng h er.
DOC T OR
D o n ’ t b e a f r a i d i t ’ s j us t m e
M ercede s exh a l e s , r el i e ved.
M E R C E DE S
A r e y o u r ea d y ?
DOC T OR
Ye s .
M E R C E DE S
W e l l , l et 's go .
E X T . F OR E ST / R I VE R NIGHT
C arr y i ng t h e b ag, M ercede s wa l ks t h r o u gh t h e r i v er w i t h t h e
D o c to r .
T h e y s t o p i n f r o n t o f a l arge, h a lf cut tr e e.
DOC T OR
T hi s i s s h ee r m ad n e s s . Whe n t h at m a n
f i n d s o u t ab o u t us , h e'll k ill u s a l l.
Ha v e y o u t h o ugh t ab o u t t h at ?
M E R C E DE S
A r e y o u t h at af r a i d o f hi m , Do c tor ?
Af t er a l o n g b ea t
DOC T OR
I t ' s n ot f ea r , at l ea s t n ot f o r m y s e lf .
A n o i s e. T h e n s il e n ce . T h e t r ee tr un ks s wa y a n d creak
s o f t l y . So m et hi n g m o v es a m o n g t h e t r ee s . . .
M ercede s t ake s a c o upl e st eps . . . an d s ud denly , s o m eo n e i s
t h ere: i t i s Pedr o , t h e y o un g guerr i ll a. He h ugs her.
M E R C E DE S
Pedr o, Pedr o M y b r o t h er.He ki s s es h er o n b ot h ch ee k s . T h e Do c tor l o o ks ar o un d wi t h
al ar m a s t we n t y m o r e m e n appe ar f r o m out o f t h e s h ado ws .
C UT T O:
I N T . A T T I C NIGHT
Of e li a i s l yi ng i n b ed.
F A U N
Y o u r ef us ed t h e t as k
Of e li a i s s t ar t l ed: t h e F au n i s perc h ed o n t h e f o ot r ai l o f h er
b ed, l i ke a bi g cro w.
OF E L I A
Nn o m y m o t h er i s s i ck.
F A U N
T h at ' s n o ex cus e f o r n eg l i ge nce .
T h e F aun l o o ks i n a t att e r ed b ag, t ake s out a t wi s t ed r oot
o f M A NDR AK E .
F A U N
L oo k, t hi s i s a m a n dr ake r oot. A p l a n t
t h at dr ea m t o f b e i ng h u m a n . Put i t un der
y o ur m o t h er' s b ed i n a b o w l o f f r es h
m il k. E ac h m o r ni n g g i ve i t t w o d r o ps o f
bl o o d .
Of e li a, r ev o l t ed, t ake s t h e r oot.
F A U N
N o w, we h av e n o t i m e t o was t e . T h e f u ll
m o o n wi ll b e upo n us .
L et m y p et s gui d e y o u t h r o ugh
He h an ds h er hi s b a s ket . T h e F a i r i es c hi t t er ch at t e r i n s i de
i t .
F A U N
Y o u' r e g o i n g t o a v er y dan g ero us pl ac e,s o b e ca r ef u l .
T h e t hi n g t h at s l u m bers t h ere, i t ' s n ot
h u m a n . . .
He h an ds h er a s m a ll , dark h o ur gl a s s .
F A U N
Y o u wi l l s e e a s u m pt uo us b an que t, b ut
d o n ' t ea t o r dr i n k any t hi ng.
Y o ur l if e depe n ds o n i t .
E X T . C A VE NIGH T
M ercede s , Pedr o an d t h e Do c tor ar r i ve at a l arge ca v e m o ut h .
GUERIL L A s e n t r i es a ll o w t h e m to pas s .
I N T . C A VE NIGH T
T h e wa l l s are co v ered w i t h s o ot .
A do ze n m o r e guer i ll a s s i t aro un d an o pe n f i r e i n t h e m i dd l e
o f t h e ca v e.
M ercede s o pen s up t h e canva s bag an d s t art s h an d i ng o u t
l et t ers , f o o d , to b ac co an d n ews pape r s .
M E R C E DE S
I ' v e b r o ugh t s o m e Or u j o , to b ac co, ch ee s e.
S o m e m a il f o r " T r i go " an d " P il o to. " .
T h e m e n d i v i de a n ew s pape r a m o n g t h e m s e l ves . On e page ea c h .
T h e d o c to r appr o ac h es a gr o up o f wo un ded m e n . On e o f t h e m ,
F R E NC HIE , i s v er y we ak. H i s l eg i s ba ndage d.
DOC T OR
L et « s s ee h o w t h at l eg i s do i n g, Fr en c hi e
F R E NC HIE
W e l l , h o w do y o u t h i n k i t ’ s do i ng?? I t ' sf ucke d up
S T UT T E R
. . . N o r t h Am er i ca n , B b b r i t i s h an d C c
ca n ad i a n T t tr oo ps di s e m b b b ar ked o n a
s m a ll b ea c h i n t h e No r t h o f F F f r an ce
S T UT T E R , a t hi n gu y i n hi s t hi r t i e s , r ea ds a r agge d
n ew s pape r .
T R I GO
Gi mm e t h at , y o u s t am m er i ng p i e ce o f s hi t !
M us c l e b o un d T R I GO gr ab s t h e n ew s pa per f r o m St u tt e r .
T R I GO
M o r e t h an 150, 000 s o l d i ers . . . un der t h e
c o m m a n d o f Ge n era l Dw i g h t D . E i s e nh o wer
wh o s ai d: " W e w ill n o t ac ce pt an y t hi ng
l es s t h a n co m p l et e vi ct or y o v er Ger m a ny . "
T h e D o c to r cu t s t h e b an dag es o f f F r e n c hi e 's l eg. I t l o o ks
h o r r i bl e.
F R E NC HIE
I s i t b ad, d o c to r ?
DOC T OR
L oo k, F r en c hi e T h ere 's n o wa y to s av e
i t .
E v ery o ne go es qui et
I N T . C A VE L A T E R
T h e D o c to r r ea di es a st a i nl es s s t ee l b o n e s aw.
DOC T OR
I ' l l t r y t o d o i t i n as f e w cut s as I
ca n .
T h e m e n g i ve F r e n c hi e t h e b o tt l e. He gu l ps do wn h a l f o f i t .
F R E NC HIE( s to i c a l ly )
W a i t a s ec o n d, d o c to r , j us t a se con d.
F r en c hi e l o o ks l o n g i ng ly at hi s l eg. On e l a s t t i m e T h e n , h e
t ake s h o l d o f T r i go an d R ubi o 's ar m s . M ercede s a n d Pedr o pu t
al l t he i r we i g h t o n t h e i nj ur ed l im b .
T h e D o c to r touch es hi s s aw t o t h e l eg
an d cu t s .
C UT T O:
I N T . A T T I C SUNR I S E
Of e li a t ake s t h e b o o k o u t f r o m u n der h er b ed. Openi ng i t ,
s h e s ee s h ers e lf ill u s t r a t ed i n a r oo m w i t h a l a vi s h t abl e
f u l l o f f o o d . I n t h e wa l l are t h r ee ni c h e s . An d at t h e f ar
en d o f t h e t abl e, a pal e h u m a n f i gur e.
OF E L I A ( V. O. )
Us e t h e ch a l k to tr ac e a d oo r anywh ere i n
y o ur r oo m . Ope n i t an d s t ar t t h e
h o ur gl as s l et y o ur s e l f b e gu i ded by t h e
F a i r i es
Of e li a dr aw s t h e o u t l i ne o f a doo r o n t h e wa l l . . . an d t h en
o pen s i t o n to a l o n g h a ll wa y . O f e li a go es t h r o ugh , wea r i n g
t h e w i cke r b a s ket ar o un d h er n ec k.
OF E L I A
D o n ' t ea t o r dr i n k a ny t hi ng a n d c o m e b ac k
b e f o r e t h e l as t gr ai n o f s a n d f a ll s
t h r o ugh . . .
I N T . HA L L WA Y L E A DING T O DINI NG HA L L SUNR I SE
T h e gi r l wa l k s do wn a cor r i do r wi t h a l o w ce i li ng an d a
m u l t i t ude o f arch e s . E ac h co l u m n r epres en t s a t r ee wi t h
f a nni ng b r a n c h e s . An e l a b o r a t e m o s a i c patt ern s pr ea ds o v er
t h e f l o o r ; t h e ce i li ng f r es co dep i ct s t h e l u n ar c y c l e.I N T . B A NQU E T HA L L SA M E
I n t h e n e x t r oo m , a l arge, w oo den t abl e o v er f l o w s w i t h a
c o r n uco pi a o f ca ke s , m ea t , f i s h , l i quo r , e x o t i c f r u i t s . . .
L i g h t an d wa r m t h po ur f o r t h f r o m a r o ari n g f i r ep l ac e.
A PA L E M A N w i t h a gaun t , f ea t ur e l e s s f ac e a n d s ke l et a l b o d y
s i t s s i l e n t l y at t h e f ar en d o f t h e t abl e.
He ' s o m i n o us ly s t i ll , hi s h ea d h a n g i ng at an o dd an g l e. I n
f r o n t o f him , a s m a ll m et a l li c p l at e di s p l a y s t w o h u m a n
ey e ba l l s .
I t ' s v er y h o t : b ea ds o f s wea t r o l l do wn Of e li a ' s f ac e. Her
h un gr y s to m ac h gr o wl s .
Sh e s pot s t h e t h r ee ni c h es .
Sh e t ake s o u t h er g o l de n ke y a n d co n s i d ers t h e d oo r s . E ac h
o n e c l ad i n s m o o t h go l d, wi t h i de n t i ca l lo cks .
T h e wi ck er b as k et s t ar t s to s h ake f ur i o us ly . O f e li a o pen s
i t . T h e F a i r i e s f ly o u t .
T h e y b uz z aro un d t h e t h r ee ni c hes , l i ke f li es aro un d h o n e y .
T h e y f a n t h e i r w i ngs r epe at ed l y , vi b r at i ng, c o m m u ni ca t i n g,
s ni f f i ng t h e go l d do o r s .
S t eppi n g b a ck t o l et t h e F a i r i e s i nv e s t i g a t e, Of e li a kn o cks
o v er a pl at t er o f gr ee n gr ape s .
Sh e pi cks t h e m up a n d put s t h e m bac k on t h e t abl e. One o f
t h e gr ape s r em a i ns o n t h e f l o o r .
T h e Green F a i r y s t o ps i n f r o n t o f t h e door i n t h e m i dd l e,
an n o un c i ng i t s dec i s i o n .
Of e li a go es to t h e d oo r an d pu t s t h e ke y i n t h e l o ck.
OF E L I A
N o I t ' s t hi s o n e
s h e go es to t h e ad j o i ni ng doo r , s t i ck s t h e ke y i n t h e l o ckan d t u r n s i t . C L A C K .
Sh e o pen s t h e doo r an d r ea ch e s t h r o ugh th e do or wa y to t ake
wh at ev er i s t h ere.
He r h a n d n ea r s a packa ge, ab o ut 16 ce n t i m et ers l o n g, wrapped
i n a d i r t y r ag.
Of e li a l o o ks ar o un d: n ot hi n g h as h appe ned. Al l i s ca lm . T h e
Pal e M a n i s i mm o bil e.
Of e li a r ea d i e s to exi t , b ut t h en s h e spo t s a p l at e f u ll o f
r i pe gr ape s : s o m a ny o f t h e m ! !
Sh e l o o ks b ac k at t h e eeri e, s i t t i n g f i gur e : i mm o bil e a n d
s ee m i ng l y li f e l e s s . T h e F a i r i e s wa r n h er r epe at edl y , t r y i ng
to pr ev en t h er f r o m ea t i n g a ny gr ape s . B ut t h e g i r l s nea k i ly
pi cks o n e up an d ea t s i t .
Un s ee n by h er T h e P a l e Ma n li f t s hi s h e ad an d gr abs t h e t w o
h u m a n e y e b a ll s f r o m t h e m et a l li c p l at e i n f r o n t o f him .
He i n t r o duce s t h e e y e ba l l s i n t o t wi n s t i g m at as i n hi s p a l m s
an d us es hi s h a n d s to l oo k ar o un d, s pl a yin g hi s f i ngers l i k e
ex c i t ed pea co ck f ea t h ers as h e d i s co v ers
Of e l i a ea t i n g y et an ot h er gr ape .
T h e Pal e M a n j erks to wa r d h er, i n s pas t i c, di s e m b o d i ed
s t eps . He cr o uch es l i ke a n anim a l r ea d y t o p o un ce .
Of e li a t ur n s j us t i n t i m e. T h e P a l e Ma n r o ars . T h e F a i r i e s
f ly at hi m a n d att ac k!
Fl a ili ng hi s ar m s , t h e m o ns t er t ur n s o v er t h e t abl e, du m p i n g
al l t he f o o d . Swatt i n g a n d s n app i ng, h e e at s t w o o f t h e
F a i r i es . T h e y HO WL as h e bi t e s do wn . . .
Of e li a r un s , ca r r y i ng t h e pr ec i o us pac ka ge. T h e Gr ee n F a i r y
f o l l o ws her.
T h e Pal e M a n co m e s a f t er h er.
I N T . L ONG HA L L WA YOf e li a get s to t h e en d o f t h e h a ll wa y . She po un ds t h e bl a n k
wa l l w h ere m o m e n t s ago t h ere was a d oo r .
I N T . A T T I C
Of e li a ' s t h u m p i n g i s b are ly aud i b l e.
I N T . HA L L WA Y L E A DING T O DINI NG HA L L
Of e li a s ee s t h e P a l e Ma n' s s il h o uet t e c omi ng up t h e h a l l w a y .
Of e li a s ea r c h e s h er po cke t s f o r t h e ch a l k . Fi n d i ng i t , s h e
s t an ds o n t i pt o e an d t r ac es t h e o u t l i n e o f a door !
Of e li a pus h es aga i ns t i t an d o pen s
I N T . A T T I C SUNR I S E
A t r apd oo r i n t h e att i c f l o o r .
I N T . HA L L WA Y L E A DING T O DINI NG HA L L
Of e li a craw l s o u t t h e n ew exi t . Her l egs dan g l e b r i e f ly .
T h e pal e m o n s t er l ea ps at t h e m , s n ar l i ng. Of e li a pu ll s
h ers e l f up a n d o ut j us t i n t i m e. T h e Gr ee n F a i r y f o l l o ws s h o r t l y
t h erea f t er.
I N T . A T T I C SUNR I S E
Of e li a s l a m s t h e doo r b e hi nd h er. T h e m arks o n t h e f l o o r
di s app ea r an d i t s ea l s i t s e lf s h ut .
Al l t h e w hil e, s o m et hi n g d i r e ct l y b e l o w b u m ps vi o l e n t l y ,
al m o s t b ur s t i n g t h r o ugh t h e f l o o r .W h e n a ll i s c a l m , O f e li a s i t s o n t h e b ed, exh au s t ed. Th e
Green F a i r y f l ut t ers an d chi r p s , ex c i t ed ly.
C UT T O:
E X T . R I VE R SUNR I S E
T h e D o c to r , M ercede s an d Pedr o s t ar t d own t h e m o un t a i n .
PE DR O
W e'll s o o n h a v e r e i nf o r ce m e n t s f r o m J ac a.
Fi f t y m e n o r m o r e. T h en we 'l l go h ea d to
h ea d w i t h V i da l .
DOC T OR
A n d t h e n wh at ? Yo u ki l l him , t h e y ' ll
s en d an o t h er j u s t l i ke hi m . An d
an ot h er. . .
L A T E R R I V E R B E D
T h e D o c to r wa s h es hi s bl o o d y h a n ds a n d hi s s ur g i ca l
i n s t r u m e n t s i n t h e st r ea m t h at r un s t h r o u gh t h e m o un t a i n s .
DOC T OR
Y o u' r e s crewe d, n o gun s , n o r oo f o v er
y o ur h ea ds . . . Y o u n ee d f o o d , m e d i c i ne.
Y o u s h o ul d t ake ca r e o f M ercede s . I f y o u
r ea l ly l o v ed h er, y o u w o ul d cro s s t h e
b o r de r wi t h h er. T hi s i s a l o s t ca u s e.
PE DR O
I ' m s t a y i ng h ere, Do c to r . T h ere’ s n o
ch o i ce .
He m o v es awa y , to wa r ds M ercede s , wh o awa i t s hi m n ea r by . S h e
h an d s him a co py o f t h e war e h o us e K E Y.
M E R C E DE S
He r e’ s t h e key b ut y o u ca n' t c om e do wn
n o w. I t ' s ex ac t l y w hat h e wan t s He ki s s es h er o n t h e ch e ek.
PE DR O
L ea v e i t to m e.
M E R C E DE S
I ' m a co wa r d.
PE DR O
N o , y o u' r e n o t .
M E R C E DE S
Ye s , I am a co wa r d f o r l i v i ng n e x t to
t h at s o n o f a bi t c h , m ak i ng hi s b ed, f e ed i n g
hi m . . .
W h at i f t h e Do c to r ' s r i g h t an d we cann o t
wi n?
Pedr o l o o ks a t M ercede s , h ugs h er f i erce ly .
PE DR O
W e l l A t l ea s t we 'll m ak e t hi n gs h arder
f o r t h at b as t ard.
A SONG s t a r t s up, f u ll o f goo d ch ee r .
I N T . VIDA L ' S ST UDY B A T HR OOM SUNR I S E
On ce m o r e, Vi da l , s hi r t l es s , i s s h a vi ng w i t h hi s s w i t c hbl ade
whi l e l i s t e ni ng to m us i c o n t h e V i ct r o l a.
On t h e s i n k: hi s f at h er's go l d a n d s il ver wa t ch .
Vi da l l o o ks a t i t an d t h en s t ud i es him s e lf i n t h e m i r r o r , as
i f s i z i ng up a n o l d e n e my . He p l ac es t h e st ee l bl ade o n hi s
o wn r ef l ec t i o n a n d
cu t s s wi f t ly .
C UT T O:I N T . UPP E R B E DR OOM DA Y
T h e m u s i c dr i f t s ups t a i r s i n t o t h e Upper b edro o m .
Of e li a appro ac h es h er m o t h er, wh o i s as lee p i n b ed, s wea t i n g
pr o f us e ly . S h e cares s es h er f ac e.
T h ere i s a b r ea k f a s t t r ay o n t h e ni g h t s t a n d.
Of e li a e m pt i e s a g l a s s o f m il k i n t o a b o w l a n d pu l l s t h e
m a n dr ake r oot o u t f r o m u n der h er c l o t hi n g. Sh e su bm erges i t
i n t h e m il k, t h e n s l i d es t h e b o w l u n der t h e b ed.
Sh e bi t es her f i nger u n t i l a s m a ll dr o p o f bl o o d appe ars. I t
f a ll s i n t o t h e m il k. . .
T h e m a n dr ake t w i t ch es , s uck i ng a vi d ly a t t h e p i n k l i qu i d.
T h e r oot un co i l s i n t o t h e f l o o r , s pi r a lli ng ar o un d t h e l eg s
o f t h e b ed f r a m e.
Of e li a hea r s F OOTS T E PS : s o m e b o d y 's co m i ng i n t o t h e b edroo m .
Of e li a s t a y s do wn : s h e ca n s ee a pa i r o f s h o es .
I t i s t h e Do ctor. He ch ec ks C ar m e n' s pu ls e an d t e m perat ur e.
DOC T OR
C ap t ai n V i da l !
Vi da l pac e s n er v o us l y , n e arby
DOC T OR
He r t em p erat ur e i s do wn . . .
VIDA L
B u t s h e s t i ll has a f e v er ?
DOC T OR
Ye s , b ut i t ' s a goo d s i g n her b o dy i s
r es p o n d i n g.
Vi da l s t ares at t h e Do c to r , n ot a tr ac e o f e m o t i o n i n hi s
ey e s .
DOC T ORL i s t en to m e. I f y o u h a ve t o ch o os e, s av e
t h e b a by . T h at b o y w i ll b ea r m y n a m e a n d
m y f at h er ' s n a m e, too.
Of e li a hea r s t hi s f r o m b e n ea t h t h e b ed.
Suddenl y a n ex p l o s i o n s hake s t h e r oo m . V i da l l o o ks o u t s i de,
t h en a n o t h er ex p l o s i o n r att l es t h e w i n do ws .
B i t s o f p l a s t er dr o p d o wn f r o m t h e ce i li n g o n to t h e gr o un d
n ea r Of e li a.
C ur s i n g, V i da l r us h e s f r o m t h e bedr oo m . T h e Do c to r f o l l o ws
E X T . GA R DE NS DA Y
Vi da l h ur r i es o ut to t h e gar den . T h e guar ds h a v e co m e o u t o f
t h e i r t en t s an d l o o k a t
a c o l o s s a l co l u m n o f s m o ke a n d f i r e i n th e d i s t an ce .
A n o t h er ex p l o s i o n s h ake s t h e gr o un d.
I N T . NOR T H B E DR OOM C ONT I NUOU S
Of e li a co m es o u t f r o m b e n ea t h t h e b ed. T en t at i v e ly , s h e n ea r s
h er m o t h er' s b e lly .
OF E L I A
B r ot h er, b r ot h er, i f y o u ca n hea r m e.. .
Sh e l ea n s h er h ea d ge n t l y o n i t .
OF E L I A
. . . t hi n g s o u t h ere aren ' t too g oo d . An d
s oo n y o u'll h a ve t o co m e o u t . M om i s n' t
d o i n g we l l .
Un ex pe ct ed l y , t h e g i r l t ea r s up.
OF E L I A
I ' m a s k i ng y o u f o r o n e t hi n g, j us t o n e:
d o n ' t h ur t h er.Sh e' s v er y pr et t y , y o u'll s ee . E v e n
t h o ugh s h e ' s s ad so m e o f t h e t i m e . Y o u'l l
s ee , wh en s h e s mil es y o u'll l o v e h er.
S o i f y o u do wh at I s ay , I 'll m ak e y o u a
P r i n c e i n m y k i ngdo m . . .
I pr o m i s e y o u a P r i n ce . . .
E X T . T R A I N T R A C K S I N C OUNTRYSIDE DA Y
S o m et hi ng h a s bl o w n a l arge crat er i n t o th e r ur a l r a i l r o ad
t r ac k . T i pped i n t o i t i s t h e s m o k i ng r u i n o f a l o co m o t i v e.
Vi da l i ns pec t s a co upl e o f c h arr ed BODIE S by t h e wr ec kage .
E NGIN E E R
I s o un ded t h e whi s t l e b ut t h e y wo ul d n' t
m o v e. I t r i ed t o s to p , b ut i t was too
l at e
T h e l o n g f r e i g h t t r ai n has dera i l e d i n t h e m i dd l e o f
n o wh ere. D o ze n s o f GUA R DI A S C I VIL pat r o l t h e d i s a s t er.
T h e en g i n e er an d t h e F I R E M A N wa l k am o n g t h e b ur n ed f r e i g h t
ca r s wi t h V i d a l a n d hi s m e n . So m e GU A R DIA S C I VIL r i de up an d
di s m o u n t .
VIDA L
W h at d i d t h e y s t ea l f r o m i ns i de t h e
f r e i g h t ca r s ?
F I R E M A N
N ot hi n g T h e y d i d n' t o pen a s i n g l e o n e.
VIDA L
W h at t h e h e l l are y o u t al k i ng ab o ut ?
F I R E M A N
T hi s wh o l e m e s s an d t h e y d i d n' t o pen any
o f t h e ca r s . T h e y d i d n' t t ake any t hi ng.
VIDA L
N ot hi n g, are y o u s ur e?F I R E M A N
N ot hi n g, wh o t h e h e ll k n o ws t h at t h e y
wa n t ed ot h er t h an to m ake us wa s t e o ur
t i m e.
A n d, j us t as V i da l r e a l i z es h e ' s b ee n t r i c ked. T h e so un d o f
DIS T A NT GUN F I R E r ea ch es hi s ea r s .
C UT T O:
E X T . M I L L DA Y
R ai n i s f a l li ng as V i da l 's B e n t l e y r o ars to a sto p i n f r o n t
o f t h e m i ll .
A gunf i g h t i s r ag i n g. St ay i ng l o w, t h e Capt ai n r uns o v er to
Ga r cé s . T h ere are s ev era l ca da v ers s t r ewn o n t h e gr o un d.
Gua r ds h av e t ake n co v er a m o n g t h e t r ee s . S o m e bl o o d y ,
w o un ded s o l d i ers co we r o n t h e gr o un d.
Ga r cé s i s bl ee d i ng f r o m a wo un d o n hi s f o r ehe ad.
GA R C É S
( p o i n t i n g)
C ap t ai n t h e y c a m e o u t o f n o wh e r e T h e y
h av e gr e n ade s . . .
Vi da l s ee s t h e o pen b o dega . I t h as b ee n t h o r o ughl y l o o t ed:
j ugs a n d e m pt y crat es are s ca tt ered ev er y wh ere.
He t ake s s pec i a l n o t e o f
t h e o pen l o ck, h an g i ng f r o m t h e door .
Ser r an o h ur r i e s up to hi m .
S E R R A NO
On e gr o up s t ay ed b e hi nd up o n t h e c l if f
wi t h r i f l e s . . . W e've s ur r o un ded t h e m E X T . DE E P F OR E ST DA Y
H o l d i ng hi s gu n , V i da l ad v a n ce s o n f o ot t h r o ugh t h e dr i pp i ng
f o r es t. He i s ac co m pa ni ed by a squa d o f guards .
GUN SHOT S . A pai r o f GUERR I L L A S j u m ps o ut f r o m a p i l e o f
b o ul ders , bl a s t i n g aw a y . A guard f a ll s do wn dea d at Vi da l 's
f ee t , t h r ee b u l l et s i n hi s che s t .
Vi da l , Ser r an o an d Ga r cé s t ake c o v er b ehi nd a cr agg y
o u t cr o ppi n g. B u l l et s ex p l o de o n to t h e sto n e.
E x c i t ed, Vi da l g l a n c es at hi s F at h er ' s wa t ch an d s m il e s .
VIDA L
C ’ m o n , Ser r an o , t hi s i s t h e o nl y dec e n t
wa y t o di e.
He l ea ps o ut, f i r i ng. T wo b u l l et s whi z by hi s hea d an d b ur y
t h e m s e l ves i n a t r ee .
Vi da l kee ps s h o ot i n g, wo un d i n g t wo o f th e guer r i ll as . Garcé s
f o l l o ws , a l s o f i r i ng.
Vi da l a n d Ga r cé s get to
t h e b o ul ders : k n ee li ng t h ere i s a YOUN G GUERR I L L A , pan t i n g,
to r n to pi e ce s by t h e gu nf i r e.
VIDA L
L et m e s ee C a n y o u t al k ??
T h e Y o un g Gue r r i ll a gas p s f o r ai r : a gapi ng wo un d o n hi s
n ec k bl ee d s pr o f us e ly .
VIDA L
Pi t y .
He em pt i es hi s p i s t o l i n t o t h e Yo un g Guerr i ll a. Garcé s i s
appa l l ed. V i da l r e l o ads a n d f i n i s h e s o f f t h e se co n d o n e w i t h
a sh ot to t h e t em p l e.
VIDA L
( to Ser r an o )
T hi s i s us e l es s we n ee d o n e a l i v e J us t
o n eGa r cé s s pot s s o m et hi ng nea r by .
L ur ki n g i n t h e b u s h e s i s a W OUND E D M A N, gas p i n g f o r a i r ,
w o un ded i n t h e l eg.
Hi s f ac e r e m a i ns hi dde n .
GA R C É S
C ap t ai n , t hi s o n e’ s s t i ll a l i ve. He 's got
a l eg wo un d.
C UT T O:
I N T . K I T C HE N L A T E A F T E R NOO N
M ercede s co m es do wn t h e se r vi c e st a i r s i n t o t h e k i t ch e n . Sh e
r un s to t h e w i n do w. Al l t h e k i t c h e n m a i d s are t h ere.
M E R C E DE S
W h at 's h app e n ed ?
C ONC HIT A
T h e y t oo k o n e o f t h e m a l i ve. And t h e y ' r e
t aki n g him t o t h e sto r e r oo m .
M ercede s dar t s o u t i n t o t h e r ai n .
E X T . M I L L L A T E A F T E R NOO N
C ONC HIT A
M ercede s !
M ercede s h ea d s to wa r d t h e o l d b o dega . Sh e se e s t h e guards
dr ag a m a n i ns i de.
E X T . B ODEGA L A T E A F T E R NOO N
M ercede s s t an ds , i n t h e m i dd l e o f t h e r ai n n o t kn o wi n g what
to d o wh ere to g o wh ere to r un Vi da l appro ac h es h er.
VIDA L
M ercede s ?
M E R C E DE S
I I n ee ded to ge t i n t h e b o dega
VIDA L
N ot n o w, M ercede s .
A guard c o m e s o u t. M ercede s ca n s ee
I N T . B ODEGA L A T E A F T E R NOO N
t h e pr i s o n er i s St u tt er .
S t u tt e r an d M ercede s l o o k ea ch ot h er i n th e e y e
T h ere i s a m i x t ur e o f r e l i e f a n d p i t y i n M ercede s ' e y es .
A guard cl o s es t h e doo r .
C UT T O:
I N T . K I T C HE N NIGHT
M ercede s t ake s t h e hi dd e n knif e f r o m h e r apr o n an d pee l s
v ege t abl e s . R ap i d ly a n d m e c h a ni ca lly . T h e k i t c h e n i s
b us t l i ng w i t h ac t i vi t y , b ut h er m i nd i s m il e s awa y .
Sh e pi cks up a d i nn er tr a y .
I N T . VE S T I B UL E M I L L NIGHT
Sh e ca r r i e s t h e t r ay ups t a i r s .I N T . NOR T H B E DR OOM N I GHT
Sh e pl ac es t h e t r ay o n t h e ni g h t s t an d. C ar m e n a n d O f e li a
pl a y ca r d ga m e s by t h e l i g h t o f t h e o i l l a m p.
T h e D o c to r r ea di es C ar m e n da i ly do ze of s l ee p i ng m ed i c at i o n
i n t o a gl as s o f wa t er f o r C arm e n .
DOC T OR
T hi s i s h a lf t h e do s e: o nl y o ne dr o p
A s O f e li a co m es t o t h e b eds i de, a weak b ut co n s c i o us C ar m e n
pus h es t h e m ed i c i ne awa y .
C A R M E N
I d o n ' t t hi n k I n ee d i t . I f ee l b et t e r .
DOC T OR
I d o n ' t un ders t an d i t . B u t I ’ m g l a d.
Of e li a s mi l e s .
C UT T O:
I N T . B ODEGA NIGHT
Vi da l f i n i s hes r o l li ng a c i garet t e. He' s s t an d i ng i n f r o n t
o f St u tt e r , wh o i s t i ed t o a co n cre t e p o s t .
VIDA L
Da m n! T hi s c i garet t e i s goo d. R ea l go o d
to b ac co
He o f f ers him a pu f f .
S T UT T E R
F f f f uck y o u
Ga r cé s en t ers an d s et s d o wn a t abl e an d s o m e ch a i r s .
VIDA L
W e ca t ch o n e an d h e t ur n s o u t to b e a
s t u tt erer . F uck! W e 'll b e h ere a ll ni g h t .GA R C É S
A s l o n g as h e t al k s , C apt ai n
VIDA L
Ga r cé s i s r i g h t Y o u b ett er t el l us
ev er y t hi ng. B ec aus e, to m ake i t happe n , I
b r o ugh t al o n g a f ew t oo l s . Not hi n g f a nc y
T hi n g s y o u p i ck up a l o n g t h e way .
He g o es o v er to a too l b o x an d t ake s o u t a h a mm er, s o m e
n ee d l e n o s e p l i ers a n d a l ea t h er wo r ki n g bl ade .
VIDA L
A t f i r s t I w o n ' t b e abl e t o tr us t y o u. .
B u t wh en I us e t hi s o n e
He l i f t s t h e h a mm er.
VIDA L
y o u'll o wn up to a f ew t hi n gs . . .
Ne x t , h e s h o ws o f f t h e p l i er s .
VIDA L
W h e n we get to t h i s o n e, we'll h a v e a
cl o s er r e l at i o n s hi p, a l m o s t l i k e
b r ot h ers . Y o u'l l s ee .
He pi cks up t h e bl ade .
VIDA L
A n d w h e n we get to t hi s o n e, I 'l l b e li e v e
ev er y t hi ng y o u t el l m e.
Vi da l p i cks up t h e h a mm er.
VIDA L
N o w I 'l l m ake y o u a dea l . I f y o u ca n
c o un t to t h r ee wi t h o ut s t t t u tt eri n g,
y o u ca n go .
He appr o ac h es t h e shi ver i ng m a n , wh o l oo ks ar o un d as i f i n
s ea r ch o f an a ns we r .
VIDA L
D o n ' t l o o k ar o un d, l o o k a t m e. T h ere ' s n oo n e ab o v e m e.
Ga r cé s I f I s ay t hi s as s h o l e ca n l ea ve
GA R C É S
T h e n h e ca n l ea v e, C apt a i n
VIDA L
S o, t h ere c o un t to t h r ee .
A n d St u tt er t r i es s we at i n g m ak i n g a s u pr e m e e f f o r t
S T UT T E R
On e
VIDA L
G oo d.
A ga i n , St u tt e r s t r uggl es a n d m a n age s a
S T UT T E R
T wo.
VIDA L
On e m o r e an d y o u wi ll be f r ee .
A n d h e go es f o r i t . B u t
S T UT T E R
T t t t
He l o o ks up a t Vi da l , i m p l o r i ng.
VIDA L
Pi t y .
Hi s ar m i s a bl ur as t h e h a m m er l a n ds a t err i bl e bl o w.
DIS SOL V E T O:
I N T . A T T I C NIGHT
T h un der, l i g h t ni ng, i t ' s r a i ni ng aga i n . O f e l i a i s as l ee p i n
h er b ed. A s h ado w pas s es o v er h er b o d y F A U N
Y o ur m o t h er i s m uc h b et t e r , Yo u r Hi g hn e s s
Y o u m us t b e r e l i e v ed ! !
Of e li a i s s t ar t l ed awak e. T h e F au n l o o m s o v er h er.
OF E L I A
Ye s , t h an k y o u. B u t t hi n gs h a v e n' t t ur n ed
o u t s o we l l .
F A U N
N o ? ?
Sh e gi ves him t h e packa ge. T h e F au n o pens i t : i ns i de t h ere
i s a l o n g, go l d dagge r . I t ' s b e aut i f u l . T he bl ade i s
en gr av ed w i t h C e l t i c l et t eri n g an d o n t h e h a n d l e i s t h e
f i gur e o f a s at y r h ugg i ng a g i r l w h o h o l d s a b a by .
OF E L I A
N o . I h ad an ac c i de n t .
F A U N
A n ac c i de n t ??
Sh e h a n ds hi m t h e F a i r y bas ket . Ou t o f i t co m es t h e da m age d
Green F a i r y , wh o i m m e d i at e l y perc h e s ato p hi s s h o u l der an d
s t ar t s ch att eri n g a n d po i n t i n g at t h e gi r l .
F A U N
Y o u b r o ke t h e r ul e s !
OF E L I A
I t wa s j u s t t w o gr ape s ! I t h o ugh t n o o n e
w o ul d n o t i c e
F A U N
W e m ade a m i s t ake ! !
OF E L I A
A m i s t ake ?
F A U N
Y o u f a i l ed. Yo u ca n n e v er go b ac k.
T h e m o o n w i l l b e f u ll i n t h r ee day s .Y o ur s p i r i t wi ll s t a y f o r ev er a m o n g
h u m a n s .
Y o u'l l li ve a m o n g t h e m , y o u'll ge t o l d
l i ke t h e m , y o u'll d i e l i ke t h e m a n d
y o ur m e m o r y o f us w i ll f ad e.
A n d we 'll v a ni s h a l o n g w i t h i t !
T h e F aun b ac ks i n t o t h e dar kes t c o r n er of t h e at t i c.
F A U N
Y o u wi l l n e v er, ev er s ee us aga i n .
A f l a s h o f l i g h t ni ng b r i e f ly ill u mi nat es th e co r n er: T h e
F aun i s go n e.
C UT T O :
E X T . B ODEGA SUNR I S E
Vi da l ca lml y s m o kes a c i garet t e un der a n u m b r e ll a. Garcé s
ar r i ves w i t h t h e Do ctor.
VIDA L
G oo d day , Do c to r . S o r r y to wake y o u s o
ea r l y , b ut I t hi n k we nee d s o m e he l p.
T h e D o c to r g o es i n s i de.
I N T . B ODEGA M I L L SUNR I S E
T h e D o c to r c o m es i n t o t h e b o dega . Vi da l s t a y s at t h e doo r .
S t u tt e r i s cur l ed up o n t h e gr o un d. Hi s no s e i s f l att en ed,
o n e e y e i s bl o o ds h o t an d a h ea d wo un d i s bl ee d i ng. Fli es
b uzz aro un d hi m .
DOC T OR
M y Go d, wh at h av e y o u do n e t o him ?
VIDA LN ot m u ch . B ut t hi n gs are gett i n g b et t er .
Vi da l s ur r ept i t i o us l y r e m o v es a vi a l o f an t i bi o t i cs f r o m t h e
D o c to r ' s m ed i ca l bag. He wraps i t i n a l in e n h a n dkerc hi e f .
VIDA L
I l i ke h a vi ng y o u n ea r , Do c tor . I t h a s
i t s adv a n t age s .
He m o v es awa y a l o n g w i t h Ga r cé s .
VIDA L
Ser r an o , s t ay here
On ce a l o n e, t h e Do c to r o pen s up hi s b ag an d t ake s o u t s o m e
al co h o l a n d gauz e t o cl ea n t h e wo un ds .
S T UT T E R
I s po ke . N ot m uc h b b b ut I di d
T h e D o c to r s ee s t h e m a n' s h a n d: i t 's a m es s o f b r o ken b o n e s
an d l ac erat i o n s .
DOC T OR
I ' m s o r r y
He gl a n ce s at Se r r an o , o u t s i d e s m o k i n g a c i garet t e .
S T UT T E R
N o . . . Ki ll m e, k i ll m e n o w.
T h e D o c to r l oo ks hi m i n t h e e y e, un s ur p r i s ed.
I N T . VIDA L ' S ST UDY DAW N
Vi da l b r i n g s o u t t h e packe t o f m ed i c i ne f r o m t h e cav e. He
t ake s o u t a vi a l o f a n t i bi o t i cs a n d co m p ares i t wi t h t h e o n e
f r o m t h e Do c to r ' s b ag.
T h e y are i de n t i ca l .
VIDA L
S o n o f a bi t c h I N T . B ODEGA SUNR I SE
T h e D o c to r p r epa r es an i nj ec t i o n .
DOC T OR
( to S t u tt e r , i n a whi s per)
I t wi ll b e o v er s o o n .
S t u tt e r g r a t ef u lly s quee ze s hi s h a n d. Af t er a b r i e f
h es i t at i o n , t h e Do c to r adm i n i s t ers t h e i njec t i o n .
T h e m e n s t are at o n e an o t h er. Sl o wl y , t h e l i f e e bb s f r o m
S t u tt e r ' s e y es .
I N T . M I L L VE ST I B UL E SA M E
Vi da l b r i s k l y l ea v e s hi s s t udy . Hea r i n g a d oo r cl i ck s h ut
s o m e w h ere ab o v e h e st o ps
VIDA L
( to Ga r cé s )
G o ch ec k o n D o c to r F err e i r o . I 'l l b e
t h ere s oo n .
GA R C É S
Ye s , C ap t ai n .
Vi da l go es ups t ai r s .
I N T . NOR T H B E DR OOM
Of e li a i s craw l i ng u n der t h e b ed
T h ere s h e f i nds t h e m a n dr ake r oot , bl o ate d an d i mm o bil e.
OF E L I A
Y o u' r e n ot m o vi ng are y o u i l l?
Suddenl y , V i da l y a nks h er o u t f r o m u n d er t h e b ed.B E DR OOM C ONT I NUOU S
VIDA L
W h at t h e h e l l are y o u do i n g do w n t h ere ?
Vi da l l o o ks un dern e at h t h e dust r uf f l e
E X T . B ODEGA DA Y
Ga r cé s wa l k s to t h e b o dega . Ser r an o s n uf f s o ut hi s
ci garet t e.
GA R C É S
W h ere i s he ? C a ll him o ut h ere
S E R R A NO
W h o ?
GA R C É S
W h o do y o u t hi n k, y o u i d i o t ? F er r e i r o !
He pus h es Ser r an o as i de, en t ers t h e b o dega
I N T . B ODEGA SA M E
T h e D o c to r h o l ds t h e d y i ng St u tt er i n hi s arm s . Garcé s s ee s
t h e s y r i n ge i n hi s h a n d s . He un ders t an ds i mm ed i at e l y .
I N T . NOR T H B E DR OOM DA Y
VIDA L dr ags o u t t h e m a n dr ake r oot f r o m u n d er t h e b ed. I t s
f o ul s m e ll m ake s him w i nc e.
VIDA L ( C ONT' D)
W h at t h e h e l l i s t hi s ?
He r i p s i t o f f t h e m il k p l at e.OF E L I A
N o ! N ooo !
Vi da l i s a b o u t to hi t t h e g i r l w h e n
C A R M E N
Pl ea s e, l ea v e h er b e !
Vi da l t ur n s : C ar m e n h as awa ke ned. Sh e m o t i o n s f o r hi m t o
s to p.
VIDA L
L oo k wh at s h e hi d un der y o ur b e d?!
W h at do y o u t h i n k o f t hi s ?
He h an ds C ar m e n t h e m a n dr ake r oot . A s h e n f ac ed a n d we ak,
C arm e n l o o ks at t h e d i s gus t i n g t hi ng, t r y i ng to m ake s e ns e
o f i t .
C A R M E N
Of e li a, wh at i s t hi s do i n g un d er th e b ed ?
OF E L I A
( m at t er o f f ac t )
I t ' s a m ag i c r oot t h e F aun ga v e me!
VIDA L
T hi s i s a l l b ec au s e o f t h at j u n k y o u l et
h er r ea d. L oo k wh at y o u'v e do n e
C A R M E N
L ea v e us a l o n e, I 'l l s pe ak t o h er,
Da r l i ng. . .
VIDA L
A s y o u wi s h .
Vi da l , f ur i o us , l ea v e s t h e r oo m .
OF E L I A
T h e F au n t o l d m e y o u wo ul d get b et t er
an d y o u di d !
C A R M E N
Y o u h av e to l i s t en to y o ur f at h er. Yo uh av e t o s to p al l t hi s .
Of e li a h ug s her m ot h er w i t h a l l h er m i g ht.
OF E L I A
N o I wa n t to l e a v e t hi s p l ac e! P l ea s e,
l et ' s j us t go
C A R M E N
T hi n g s are n o t t h at s i m p l e.
C arm e n pr i e s her o f f a n d l o o ks h er i n t h e e y e.
C A R M E N
A s y o u get o l der, y o u'll s ee t h at l if e
i s n' t l i k e y o ur f a i r y t a l e s . T h e wor l d i s
a c r ue l p l ac e.
Sh e m o ves awa y a n d n e ar t h e o pen chimn e y . T h e f i r e li g h t
ca s t s h ado ws o v er h er s wea t y f ac e.
C A R M E N
A n d y o u 'l l l ea r n t h at , ev e n i f i t hur t s .
Sh e t h r o ws t h e r oot i n to t h e f i r e ! !
OF E L I A
N oooo ! !
C A R M E N
Of e li a ! ! M ag i c do es n o t exi s t !
Sh e gr ab s t h e g i r l by t h e s h o u l ders , s h ak in g her.
C A R M E N
N ot f o r y o u, m e o r any o n e e l s e!
T h en a h o r r i bl e, i nh u m a n s quea l . T he dyi ng s h r i ek o f t h e
m a n dr ake ! ! ! O f e li a wat ch e s i n h o r r o r as t h e h u m a n o i d r oot
wri t h es a n d s quea l s i n t h e c him ne y f l a mes ! ! !
C arm e n gas p s an d do ubl e s o v er i n pa i n , c l ut chi ng h er
s to m a c h . Of e l i a h o l ds h er as b e s t as s h e ca n .
OF E L I A
He l p, h e l p, h e l p !I N T . B ODEGA SA M E
T h e Dd o c to r an d Vi da l s t ud y ea c h o t h er.
VIDA L
W hy d i d y o u d o i t ?
DOC T OR
I t wa s t h e o nl y t hi ng I co ul d do .
VIDA L
N o . Y o u c o ul d h a ve o b e y ed m e ?
DOC T OR
I c o ul d h a v e. B ut I di d n o t .
F r o m s o m ew here i n t h e h o us e, s o m eo n e C R I E S OUT . T h e y h e ar a
c o m m o t i o n a m o n g t h e se r v a n t s . T h e D octo r s t an ds up an d
c o l l ec t s hi s b ag.
VIDA L
B u t i t w o ul d ha v e b e e n b et t er f o r y o u
Vi da l gr i p s hi s ar m , s t o ppi n g him .
VIDA L
I d o n ' t un ders t an d W hy d i d n' t y o u o b e y
m e ??
A l o n g b ea t . T h e Do c tor kn o ws t h at hi s r es po n s e w ill s ea l
hi s f at e.
DOC T OR
T o o b e y w i t h o u t t hi n k i ng j us t l ike t h at
W e l l t h at ' s s o m et hi n g o nly p eo pl e l i k e
y o u ca n do C apt ai n
Vi da l t ake s o u t hi s gu n a n d s h o ot s t h e Do c to r , wh o dr o ps to
t h e gr o un d. Vi da l s t an d s o v er hi m a n d f ini s hes him o f f .
A s t un n ed Ga r cé s l o o ks o n . I t b eg i n s t o r a i n . J ac i n t a a n d
C o n chi t a appro ac h V i da l a n ur gen t m ur m ur .VIDA L
Ga r cé s ! ! Ha v e t h e t r oo p param ed i c co m e t o
m y w if e 's r oo m r i g h t aw a y ! !
C UT T O:
I N T . UPS T A I R S HAL L WAY M I L L L A T E AF T E R NOO N
A s t r ea m o f s er v a n t s h us t l e s up an d do w n t h e s t ai r s w i t h
s t ea m i n g b a s i ns a n d c l e a n to wel s . S o m e go i n a n d o u t o f t h e
b edroo m . T h e S OUN D o f C ar m e n' s s crea m s .
Vi da l a n d O f e li a wa i t i m pat i e n t l y o ut s i d e t h e b edroo m .
B ey o n d t h e h a l f o pen do or : ch ao s . M ercede s wash e s h er bl o o dy
h an d s i n a wa s h bas i n .
Of e li a l i s t e n s t o h er m o t h er' s cr i es .
C arm e n's s crea m s s t o p, r epl ac ed by a N E W B O R N ' S C R Y. T h e
PA R AM E DIC wa l k s to wards Vi da l a n d whi s p ers
PA R A M E DIC
Y o ur wi f e i s dea d
Vi da l h ur r i es i n t o t h e r oo m .
Of e li a i s n o w a l o n e i n t h e co r r i do r . T h ere's n o o n e ar o un d.
Sh e h ea r s t h e cr y i ng i nf a n t i n h er m o t h er' s b edro o m .
A PRIE S T ' s eu l o g y ca n b e heard.
DIS SOL V E T O:
E X T . C E M E T E R Y ON A HILL L A T E A F T E R NOO N
A b ea ut i f u l a f t ern o o n : t h e sun i s s hi n i ng, t h e sk y i s c l ea r .
Ga t h ered ar o un d a gr av e ar e t h e Ma y o r , hi s w i f e, t h e Pr i es t ,
al l T HE SE R VA NT S F R O M T HE M I L L , t h e guar ds an d V i da l i n a
ci vili a n bl a ck dr es s s u i t , w i t h hi s n ew b o r n s o n i n hi s ar m s .Of e li a we eps s il e n t l y . M ercede s put s h er h a n d o n Of e l i a 's
s h o ul der.
T h e y l o we r t h e co f f i n i n t o t h e gr av e.
I N T . NOR T H B E DR OOM DA Y
Of e li a c l o s e s t h e t r un k t h at h e l d h er m o th er ' s dr es s es . Sh e
pu t s aw ay h er m o t h er' s m ake up, l ett ers an d p h o to g r aph s .
Va r i o us m ed i c i nes a n d t h e b o tt l e o f s l ee p i n g dr o ps are o n
t h e ni g h t s t an d. Sh e put s ev er y t hi n g i n t o a s m a ll s u i t ca s e.
C UT T O:
I N T . VIDA L ' S ST UDY NIGHT
Vi da l w i pes a r ec o r d wi t h hi s s hi r t s l ee ve. He pl ac e s i t o n
t h e V i ct r o l a.
M ercede s l a y s t h e s l ee p i ng ba by i n a s i mp l e wo o den cradl e.
VIDA L
Y o u kn ew t h e Do c to r we l l , d i d n' t y o u
M ercede s ?
M E R C E DE S
W e a l l k n e w him , s i r . E v er y o n e a r o un d
h ere.
VIDA L
T h e s t u tt erer s po ke o f an i nf o r m a n t h ere
i n s i de t h e m ill . C a n y o u i m ag i ne t h at ?
R i g h t un der m y n o s e.
Vi da l p l ac es t h e n ee d l e o n t h e r ec or d.
VIDA L
M ercede s , pl e as e.
He p o i n t s at an e m pt y s ea t i n f r o n t o f hi s des k. T h e m u s i c
s t ar t s up .VIDA L
W h at m us t y o u t hi n k o f m e, m y dea r y o un g
w o m a n? Yo u m u s t t hi n k I 'm a m o n s t er.
M E R C E DE S
W h at s o m eo n e li ke m e t hi nks o f y o u
h ard l y m at t ers , Si r
He p o u r s hi m s e l f a g l as s o f Oru j o an d pour s o n e f o r h er as
we l l .
VIDA L
W o ul d y o u go to t h e b o dega , M e r ce des ? An d
b r i n g m e a n o t h er b ott l e o f l i quo r .
Pl ea s e.
He gl a n ce s at t h e b ott l e: a quar t er o f t h e l i quo r s t i ll
r em a i ns .
M E R C E DE S
Ye s , s i r r i g h t aw a y .
VIDA L
A r en' t y o u f o r gett i n g s o m et hi ng ?
M E R C E DE S
Si r ?
VIDA L
T h e ke y . I h a v e t h e o nl y co p y , don' t I ?
M E R C E DE S
Yy es .
VIDA L
Y o u kn o w? S o m et hi ng ' s b o t h er i ng m e. I t ' s
n ot i m po r t an t, a t i ny det a i l b ut th e da y
t h e y b r o ke i n t o t h e sto r eh o us e, wi t h a l l
t h o s e gr en ade s an d e x p l o s i ve s , t h e l o ck
i t s e l f wa s n e v er f o r ce d.
B u t as I s ai d I t ' s pr o b ably n o t
i m po r t an t .
He gi v es h er t h e ke y a n d h o v ers da n gero us l y .VIDA L
B e v er y ca r e f u l .
M E R C E DE S
G oo d n i g h t , s i r .
Vi da l wa t ch e s h er l e a v e as he s i p s hi s li q uo r .
I N T . K I T C HE N NIGHT
T h e m u s i c f r o m V i da l 's s t ud y ca r r i e s i n t o t h e k i t ch e n .
M ercede s pr i e s up t h e l o o s e f l o o r t i l e a nd f ill s h er ca nvas
b ag w i t h l et t ers an d gr o ce r i e s . Sh e h ea r s a n o i s e, an d
s to ps : n ot hi n g. . .
Sh e h ur r i ed ly ke eps pac k i ng.
I N T . A T T I C NIGHT
Of e li a, s o un d as l ee p. A s h ado w l o o m s ov er her. Sh e wake s up
M E R C E DE S
Sh h . Of e l i a I 'm l ea vi ng to ni g h t .
OF E L I A
W h ere are y o u go i n g ?
M E R C E DE S
I ca n ' t t el l y o u.
Of e li a put s h er arm s aro un d h er n ec k.
OF E L I A
T ake m e w i t h y o u, pl e as e.
M E R C E DE S
I ca n ' t , m y c hil d
OF E L I A
T ake m e w i t h y o u.C UT T O:
E X T . M I L L NIGH T
Of e li a a n d M ercede s ca ut i o us l y m o v e a wa y f r o m t h e m ill .
M ercede s us es a n o l d u m b r e ll a t o s h e l t er t h e g i r l f r o m t h e
r ai n .
I N T . R I VE R B E D NIGHT
T h e t w o w o m e n wa de t h e sha l l o w e n d o f t h e r i v er. Suddenl y a
n o i s e
M ercede s paus es , ag i t at ed.
M E R C E DE S
I h ea r d s o m et hi ng
Sh e l i s t e n s i n t e n t l y .
M E R C E DE S
N ot hi n g I t wa s n ot hi n g.
W h e n s h e t ur n s , s he ' s s ur pr i s ed t o di s co ver
Vi da l , Ser r an o an d h a l f a do ze n m e n s ur r o un d i n g t h e m . V i da l
n o ds a t t h e m , ge n t l e m a nly .
VIDA L
M ercede s
T h en h e gaz e s do wn at h i s s t epda ugh t er.
VIDA L
Of e li a. . .
C UT T O:
I N T . A T T I C NIGHTVi da l pus h e s O f e li a i n t o t h e a tt i c.
VIDA L
H o w l o n g h a v e y o u kn o wn a b o ut h er ?? Uh??
He s l ap s t h e g i r l t wi c e.
VIDA L
H o w y o u m us t h a v e l aug h ed at m e, y o u
l i t t l e bi t c h! !
He t u r n s to hi s m e n , aw a i t i n g o r ders by th e do or .
VIDA L
L o ck t h e door
K ee p an e y e o n h er an d if a ny o n e t r i e s to
ge t i n , k i ll h er f i r s t .
He exi t s . L ea vi ng t h e weep i n g g i r l a l o n e i n t h e e n o r m o us
a tt i c.
I N T . B ODEGA DA Y
Vi da l t ake s t h e canv as b ag f r o m M erced es . He o pen s i t an d
b r i n g s o u t a f ew m ea ger i t e m s .
VIDA L
Dry m ea t T o b ac co i f y o u h ad a s ked f o r
i t , I w o ul d ha v e g i v e n i t to y o u,
M ercede s
T h en , a s m a ll pa cke t o f l et t ers .
VIDA L
I wa n t t h e n a m es o f a ny o n e n a m e d i n t h es e
l et t ers an d I wa n t t h e m i n f r o n t o f m e
f i r s t t hi n g i n t h e m o r ni ng.
GA R C É S
Ye s , Si r !
Ga r cé s n o ds h e f i ni s hes r o pi n g M ercede s to t h e ex ac t s a m e
w oo den po s t wh ere S t u tt er was t i ed.VIDA L
Y o u ca n l e a v e, Ga r cé s .
GA R C É S
Y o u' r e s ur e, C ap t ai n?
VIDA L
F or G o d' s s ake , s h e 's j u s t a w o m a n .
Ga r cé s l e ers an d l ea v e s .
M E R C E DE S
T h at ' s w h at y o u a l wa y s t h o ugh t . T h at ' s
why I wa s abl e t o ge t aw ay w i t h it. I was
i nvi s i b l e t o y o u.
Vi da l r o l l s up hi s s l ee v e s an d u nb ut to n s hi s s hi r t c o l l ar.
VIDA L
Da m n . Yo u f o un d m y w ea k n es s : arr o gan ce .
H o w pe r ce pt i v e.
B u t we ’ r e h ere to f i n d y o ur we ak p o i n t s .
Vi da l b us i e s him s e lf w i t h hi s t oo l s : t h e ha m m er, p l i ers, et c.
VIDA L
I t ' s v er y s im p l e: y o u w i ll t a l k. . . a n d
I h av e t o kn o w t h at ev er y t hi ng yo u s a y i s
t h e t r u t h .
S tr ai ni ng aga i ns t t h e r o pes , M ercede s m an ag es r ea c h t h e
kni f e i n h er apro n .
VIDA L
A t f i r s t , I w o n ' t b e abl e t o t r us t
Suddenl y W H AC K ! ! !
Vi da l ’ s b o d y s h udders
h e pu t s hi s h a n d t o hi s l e f t s h o u l d er bl a de. He l o o ks a t
hi s bloody f inger s . He t ur n s ar o un d an d s t um bl es .
M ercede s h o l ds t h e kni f e. V i da l r ea c h es f o r hi s gu n .M ercede s s t ab s him aga i n , t hi s t i m e deep i n hi s upper ar m .
A s V i da l do ubl es o v er i n pa i n , s h e st i cks t h e kni f e i n hi s
m o ut h .
M E R C E DE S
A t f i r s t , I w o n ' t b e abl e t o t r us t
I ' m n o t s o m e o l d m a n ! Not a w o un ded
pr i s o n er ! So n o f a bi t c h s o n o f a bit ch
D o n ’ t y o u dare to uch t h e gi r l . . . Yo u wo n ' t
b e t h e f i r s t pi g I 'v e gut t ed !
Wi t h a b r ut a l t h r us t f r om the ins ide out s h e s li ce s o pen
hi s c h ee k. V i d a l co l l ap s es , gur g l i ng bl o o d. M ercede s us es
t h e kni f e t o cu t t h e r o pes as qui ck as s he can .
On ce f r ee , M ercede s r uns to ward t h e doo r .
E X T . B ODEGA NIGHT
Ou t s i de, n o o n e h as a ny i d ea o f what h as j u s t h appe n ed.
Ga r cé s , Se r r an o an d ot h er guards g o ab out t h e i r b u s i nes s .
Ga r cé s , i n f ac t , i s li s t eni ng to a r adi o , t un ed t o t h e
NA T I ONA L L OT T E R Y r es u l t s . He h o l ds i n hi s h a n d t h e
Gue r r i l l a 's a b a n do n ed t i ck et .
R A DIO A NNO UN C E R
. . . t h e w i nni ng n u m bers are. . .
M ercede s , s ur r ep t i t i o us , m o v e s awa y i n t o t h e woo ds . Ser r an o
s p ot s h er at t h e l as t m i n ut e.
S E R R A NO
( to Ga r cé s )
He l et h er go !
GA R C É S
Sh h
He l i s t ens to t h e r ad i o an d f i na l ly , gr un t i n g cru m p l e s t h e
l o tt e r y t i cke t an d m o v e s to wards Ser r an o.
GA R C É S
W h at t h e f uck ar e y o u t al k i n g a bo u t ? ?Ser r an o p o i n t s at M ercede s , a l r ea d y h a lf wa y i n t o t h e woo ds .
GA R C É S
He y ! !
Sh e s t ar t s to r un . Ga r cé s pu l l s o u t hi s gu n a n d r ea d i e s i t .
Vi da l s t u m bl es o ut o f t h e b o dega , bl e ed i n g a n d co v er i n g hi s
f ac e w i t h hi s r i g h t h a n d.
VIDA L
( to Ga r cé s )
Ge t h er! ! !
Ga r cé s i s s h o cke d an i nj ur ed V i da l ?? ?
GA R C É S
C ap t ai n! Wh at ??
VIDA L
B r i n g her to m e, Go ddam i t ! ! !
He un co v ers hi s s l a s h ed f ac e.
Ga r cé s , s t ar t l ed r un s t o co m p l y .
GA R C É S
( to a l l m e n )
M o un t up! ! !
E X T . DE E P F OR E ST NIGHT
M ercede s r un s t h r o ugh t h e t r ee s .
Suddenl y a r u m bl e m ake s her t u r n aro un d: A gr o up o f T E N M E N
o n h o r s es s ur ges i n t o vi ew.
Sh e s t um bl es , l o s i n g gr o un d.
M ercede s get s up , l i m p i ng n o w
Sh e get s to a cl ea r i ng. C l o s i n g i n , Garcé s di s m o u n t s . Si x
ot h er r i ders s ur r o un d h er. M ercede s f l a s h e s h er knif e. T h e
h o r s em e n t i g h t en t h e c i r c l e ar o un d h er.GA R C É S
I t ' l l b e bett er i f y o u co m e w i t h o ut
s t r uggl i ng. T h e Capt ai n
Sh e pu t s t h e bl ade t o h er o wn t h r o at.
GA R C É S
D o n ' t b e f o o l i s h , s we et h ea r t , i f a ny o n e
i s go i n g to ki l l y o u
He t ake s o u t hi s gun .
GA R C É S
I t ' l l b e m e
He wa l ks up to h er. Suddenl y , a guns h ot hi t s hi m i n t h e
ch es t , an d t h en a n o t h er an d an o t h er. He f a l l s t o t h e gr o un d,
dea d.
A s er i es o f gun s h o t s pi ck o f f t h e ot h er h o r s em e n .
T h e l a s t t h r ee s o l d i ers t r y to es ca pe. On e i s k i ll ed by a
f ur i o us h a il o f b u l l et s ; Ser r an o an d an o t h er o n e m a n age t o
ge t aw ay .
A bl o o d s patt e r ed Me r ce des s ee s m e n em erg i ng f r o m t h e
f o r es t : Pedr o n o w l ea d s F OR T Y A R M E D GUERR I L L A S.
B r ot h er an d s i s t er em b r ac e. T h e Guer i ll a s f i ni s h o f f t h e
i nj ur ed s o l d i er s o n t h e gr o un d.
C UT T O:
I N T . A T T I C NIGHT
Of e li a l i e s o n t h e f l o o r , m ot i o nl e s s , de f e at ed, wh e n t h e
Green F a i r y appe ars .
Of e li a s i t s up, an d t h e F au n i s t h ere.
F A U N
I ' v e dec i ded to gi ve y o u o n e l a s t ch a nce .M es m er i ze d, O f e li a n o ds .
F A U N
Y o u p r o m i s e t o l i s t e n , to d o ev ery t hi ng I
t el l y o u ? Wi t h o ut ques t i o n?
Of e li a n o ds aga i n .
F A U N
Ve r y we l l , t h e n : P i ck up y o ur b r ot h er an d
b r i n g him t o t h e l a by r i n t h as f as t as
y o u ca n . Yo ur Hi g hn e s s . . .
OF E L I A
M y b r ot h er?
F A U N
W e n ee d hi m .
OF E L I A
W hy
F A U N
( i r r i t at ed)
N o m o r e ques t i o ns .
OF E L I A
T h e doo r ' s l o cke d.
T h e F aun g i ves h er p i ec e o f ch a l k.
F A U N
T h e n , creat e y o ur o wn d oo r .
C UT T O:
E X T . M I L L NIGH T F AL L
Ser r an o an d t h e i nj ur ed so l d i er r et u r n to t h e m ill .
I N T . VIDA L ' S ST UDY NIGHTVi da l s ew s hi s s p l i t c h ee k a n d t h en wrap s a bl o o d s t ai n ed
b an dag e aro un d i t .
Of e li a s t ea l s i n , pas t t h e Capt ai n' s de s k.
I n t h e crad l e, t h e b a by s t art s cry i ng.
T h e b aby 's w a i l s gr o w l o uder. T h e Capt a i n t ur n s aro un d ;
Of e li a hi de s b ut l ea v e s h er m ag i c cha l k b e hi nd.
Vi da l go es to a sm a ll t abl e an d s erv e s him s e l f t h e l a s t o f
t h e Or uj o . He ' s t ake s a s i p. T h e b a n dage s o aks up i n bl o o d
an d a l co h o l . He gr un t s
and pour s hims elf another one .
He ' s ab o ut to t ake a si p w h e n h e s ee s t h e ch a l k o n hi s des k.
He i n s t i n ct i v e ly r ea d i e s hi s gu n . . . T h en
SE R GE A NT
C ap t ai n C apt a i n P l ea s e co m e, qu i ck ly
VIDA L
N o w wh at ?
SE R GE A NT
Ser r an o i s b ac k. He 's wo un ded.
VIDA L
W o un ded?
He l ea v e s t h e st udy . O f e li a co m es o ut f r o m hi d i ng a n d l o o ks
a t t h e cradl e, at t h e cr y i ng i nf a n t .
Sh e t ake s o u t h er m o t h er' s b o tt l e o f s l ee p i ng m ed i c i ne a n d
em pt i es i t i n t o Vi da l 's l i quo r .
E X T . M I L L NIGH T
A do ze n m e n gat h er ar o un d t h e W OUN DE D GUA R D.
VIDA L
W h at h appe n ed ?? Wh ere i s Garc és ??Ser r an o s h ake s hi s h ea d.
VIDA L
H o w m a ny w ere t h ere?
W OUN DE D GUA R D
I d o n ' t kn o w, s i r . T h e sh o t s ca m e f r o m
al l aro un d us . Fi f t y at l ea s t
SE R GE A NT
N o n e o f t h e wa t ch p o s t s a r e r es p o n d i n g,
Si r
VIDA L
H o w m a ny m e n h ere i n ca m p ?
S E R R A NO
T we n t y , m a y be l e s s , s i r
Vi da l do es t h e m at h .
I N T . VIDA L ' S ST UDY NIGHT
Of e li a l if t s h er b r o t h er f r o m t h e cr ad l e.
OF E L I A
W e' r e l ea vi ng. T o ge t h er. D o n ' t be a f r a i d.
N ot hi n g i s go i n g to h appe n t o y o u.
Sh e wraps hi m i n a bl a n ket an d t r i es to s oot h e hi m . Ha l f wa y
to t h e doo r , s h e h ea r s f o ot s t eps an d hi de s i n a n o o k .
VIDA L
Pu t t h e r em a i ni ng m e n o n p i cke t dut y at
t h e t r ee l i ne wh e n a n o t h er s quad get s
b ac k, h ave i t r ep o r t i mm ed i at e l y to m e.
Vi da l co m es b ac k i n , f o l l o wed by t h e S e r gea n t .
VIDA L
C al l f o r r ei nf o r ce m e n t s .
SE R GE A NT
Ye s , s i r .T h e Ser gea n t l ea v es , V i d a l go es to h i s dr i nk. B ut h e s to ps
to pi ck up hi s go l d a n d s il ver wat ch ; h e w i n ds i t an d s li p s
i t i n t o h i s po cke t.
Fi n a lly , h e dr i n ks hi s Oru j o .
I n t h e s h ado ws , O f e li a t ake s a f ew st eps to wards t h e d oo r .
Ou t s i de, t h e s o un d o f SHOUT I NG an d GUNF I R E . An ex p l o s i o n
i ll u m i nat es t h e r oo m , r ev ea li ng O f e li a a nd t h e b a by t o
Vi da l .
Vi da l t ake s o u t hi s gu n a n d t ake s a f ew f a l t er i n g s t eps .
VIDA L
Pu t hi m do wn
T h e gi r l edge s to wa r d t h e st udy doo r . Vi da l s t u m bl es t o ward
h er. Ou t s i de, a t er r i bl e e x p l o s i o n s h at t ers t h e w i n do w an d
s h ake s t h e wh o l e h o us e.
VIDA L
I ' m wa r ni ng y o u pu t hi m do wn
He tr i p s o n hi s des k, b are ly s t a y i ng o n his f ee t . Of e li a
r un s aw a y . V i da l t r i e s to s h ake him s e lf a wake an d go es a f t er
h er.
I N T . M I L L VE ST I B UL E N I GHT
T h e gi r l r u n s t o wa r d t h e ki t c h e n . An o t h er ex p l o s i o n l i g h t s
up t h e r oo m , a l l o w i ng V i da l to s ee h er. He h ea d s s t r ai g h t at
h er.
E X T . B E HIND T HE M I L L NIGH T
Of e li a r un s o ut s i de, h o l d i ng h er b r ot h er. Sh e l o o ks up. T h e
m o o n i s F U L L .
Sh e r un s to wa r d t h e l a by r i n t h .Vi da l s t agge r s o u t b ehi nd h er. I n t h e b ac kgr o un d, m o r e
ex p l o s i o ns , f l a m e s a n d b ur s t s o f f i r e. A batt l e r age s i n t h e
f o r es t.
S o m e b u ll et s whi z pas t V i da l , b ut h e keeps go i n g.
C UT T O:
I N T . ST A I R WA Y T O A T T I C
M ercede s wa l ks up t h e att i c st a i r s , f o l l o wed by Pedr o an d a
f ew o f hi s m e n .
I N T . A T T I C NIGHT
Sh e f i nds t h e att i c e m pt y . On a wa l l t h er e i s a chil d 's
ch a l k dr aw i ng o f a doo r way .
C UT T O:
E X T . L A B Y R I NT H N I GHT
Of e li a das h e s i n t o t h e l a by r i n t h . V i d a l i s n o t f ar be hi n d.
T h e s l ee p i ng m ed i c i ne m ake s him s t u m bl e a n d f a l t er. He
s l u m p s aga i ns t a wal l . O f e li a ga i ns o n him .
B u t r i g h t aw a y , s h e l o s es h er wa y , b ut t h e l ea f y wa ll s mov e
as ide to guide her !
f i r s t o n e, t h en a n ot h er
an d y et an o t h er.
Vi da l , m ea n w hil e, b u m p s i n t o o b s t ac l e s at ev er y t ur n . Hea d
s pi nni ng, h e paus es .
I N T . R OT UND A I N C E NT E R OF L AB YR I NT H NIGHTR ea chi ng t h e r ot un da, Of e li a s ee s t h e F a un wa i t i n g, ha l f wa y
up t h e s to n e s t ai r c as e.
Of e li a ca lm s t h e b a by a n d s t ar t s d o wn t h e st ai r s t o wa r d hi m .
F A U N
Qui ck ly , Yo ur M a j es t y , g i v e him to m e.
T h e f u ll m o o n i s a l m o s t h ere an d we n ee d
hi m t o o pen t h e por t al .
OF E L I A
( s ee i n g s o m et hi ng)
W h at 's t h at i n y o ur h an d ?
I t ' s t h e go l de n dagge r .
F A U N
T h e po r t al w i ll o nl y o pen i f we s h ed t h e
bl o o d o f a n i nn o ce n t . A p i n pr i ck T h at ' s
al l . J u s t a dr o p o f bl o o d
I t ' s t h e l a s t t as k! ! Hurr y ! !
T h e b as ket s h ake s f ur i o us ly . T h e Gr ee n F a i r y e s ca pe s an d
b uzz es f ur i o us ly aro un d O f e li a.
F A U N
Y o u p r o m i s ed t o d o i t , s o gi v e m e t h e
b o y . I wa n t to l ea ve t hi s p l ac e, I ca n' t
wa i t any l o n ger !
T h e F aun co m es c l o s er to t h e g i r l . H i s f a ce r ad i at es a
wi cke d h u n ger. Sh e st eps b ac k, h o r r i f i ed .
OF E L I A
N o . M y b r o t h er s t ay s w i t h m e.
F A U N
Y o u w o ul d g i v e up y o ur s ac r ed r i gh t s f o r
t hi s b r at ?
OF E L I A
Ye s , I w o ul d.
F A U NY o u wi l l g i ve up y o ur t h r o n e f o r him ? He
wh o h as ca us ed y o u s uch mi s er y , s uch
h u m il i at i o n?
Vi da l co m es i n t o t h e r ot un da. He se es Of e li a, a l o n e. He
ca n ' t s ee t h e F au n . Wi t h en o r m o us e f f o r t, Vi da l l if t s hi s
gun .
OF E L I A
I wi ll .
F A U N
A s y o u wi s h Yo ur Hi g hn e s s
A s h e r ec ede s i n t o t h e dar kn es s , V i da l s hoot s . T h e b u l l et
hi t s Of e l i a i n t he sto m a c h . Sh e f a ll s ge n t ly t o t h e gr o un d,
a t t h e edge o f t h e we l l , c l ut chi ng h er b a by b r o t h er.
T h e b oo k l a n ds n e x t to h er.
Vi da l p i cks up t h e i nf a n t . Of e li a r ea c h es o u t f o r h e l p,
t ea r s i n h er e y es . V i d a l i g n o r es h er, s p i t s o n t h e gr o un d
an d l ea v e s .
C A M E R A c l o s e s i n o n O f e li a ' s f ac e. A r i bb o n o f bl o o d s t r ea m s
f r o m h er n o s e.
I N T . L A B Y R I NT H N I GHT
Vi da l r uns do wn t h e l a s t pa t h o f t h e l a byr i n t h , l e ad i ng to
t h e exi t
E X T . L A B Y R I NT H N I GHT
wh ere Pedr o an d hi s m e n are wa i t i n g. I n t h e i r m i d s t :
M ercede s .
Wi t h a l o ud b a n g gun s h o t s t ea r i n t o Vi d a l . V i da l f a ll s t o
hi s k n ee s , h o i s t i n g hi s h o w l i ng s o n i n t he a i r .
VIDA L
M y s o n M ercede s wa l ks f o r wa r d. Vi da l a n d M er ce des l o o k a t ea ch
ot h er.
VIDA L
T e l l him a b o ut hi s f at her A b o ut t h e t i m e
hi s f at h er d i ed
M ercede s t ake s t h e b a by i n h er ar m s .
Vi da l u n ders t an ds t h e s i t uat i o n . He t ake s o u t hi s po cke t
wa t ch an d s m as hes i t o n t h e gr o un d.
VIDA L
T e l l him
M E R C E DE S
N o
Pedr o s t eps o v er to Vi da l , gun i n hi s h a nd.
M E R C E DE S
( to Vi da l )
He w o n ’ t ev en k n o w y o ur n a m e.
M ercede s ' wo r ds are Vi da l 's l a s t an d m o s t pai nf u l wo un d. H i s
f ac e go es pa l e
an d Pedr o s h oot s hi m i n t h e head.
Vi da l co l l aps e s , dea d.
I N T . R OT UND A I N C E NT E R OF L AB YR I NT H
M ercede s an d Pedr o r ea ch t h e r otun da. M ercede s k n ee l s n e x t
to t h e d y i ng g i r l . C r yi ng, M ercede s h u ms a swe et Gal i c i a n
l u ll a by .
Of e li a ' s pup il s d i l at e.
He r bl o o d r un s do wn i n t o t h e we l l , i n t o th e pudd l e at t h e
b otto m . T h e m o o n ' s r e f l ec t i o n s himm ers .
I n t h e b o o k , an i m age t ake s s h ape : O f e lia at a r o y a l co ur t,i n f r o n t o f a f a b u l o us b a n quet .
K I NG/FA T HE R ( O. S . )
A r i s e, m y daug h t er.
I N T . VA ST HA L L NIGHT
Of e li a s t an ds . T h e l a by r i n t h h as d i s appe ared.
T h i s i s an imm e n s e h a ll , i n a dar k, s u m pt uo us ca s t l e. A
s wa r m o f f a i r i e s f l o at s aro un d h er h ea d. B e f o r e h er, o n a
g o l de n t h r o n e s i t s t h e K I NG OF T HE U NDERW O R L D.
A t hi s s i de, an a l m o s t un r ec o gni z a bl e Ca r m e n r adi a n t an d
gi l ded, s he h a s t r an s f o r m ed i n t o a F A I R Y QUEE N . B e t wee n
t h e m , t h ere i s an o t h er t h r o n e, em pt y , wa i t i n g.
Of e li a l o o ks a t t h e Ki n g
OF E L I A
( a whi s per)
F at h er. . .
K I NG
I t wa s y o ur bl o o d an d n ot t h at o f an
i nn o ce n t t h at m ade y o u wo r t hy of t h e
t h r o n e. I t wa s t h e l as t t as k. T h e m o s t
i m po r t an t o n e...
A n d o u t f r o m b e hi nd a p i ll ar co m e s o u t th e F au n . Sm ili ng,
s ur r o un ded by t h e F a i r i e s .
F A U N
A n d y o u ch o s e we l l , Yo ur Hi g hnes s . . .
He b o ws d o wn .
QUEE N
S o, c o m e s i t by y o ur F at h er’ s s i d e, m y
chi l d ? He ’ s bee n wa i t i n g s o l o n g.
T h e Green F a i r y f li e s aro un d Of e l i a, ce l e b r at i n g h er r et ur n .
Of e li a i s che ered by a h u n dr ed v o i ce s .Of e li a s mi l e s
I N T . L A B Y R I NT H N I GHT
an d f i na lly d i es . I n her e y e: o n e f r o ze n t ea r . M ercede s
h ugs t h e dea d gi r l .
C A M E R A do l li e s b a ck. T h e m o o n i s r e f lec t ed a t t h e b otto m o f
t h e poo l . B uzz i n g i n t h e ni g h t a i r i s t h e S t i ck I ns ec t .
NA R R A T OR
A n d i t i s s a i d t h at t h e P r i n ce s s w en t
b ac k to h er f at h er 's k i n gdo m
A n d t h at s h e r e i g n ed w i t h j us t i ce an d a
ki n d hea r t f o r m a ny ce n t ur i e s . An d t h at
s h e wa s l o v ed by a l l h er s u bj ec t s . . .
E X T . E DG E OF F OR E ST SUNR I S E
T h e s unl i g h t e m a n at es gr adua l ly f r o m t h e dar kn es s an d s hi ne s
o n t h e s i l h o uet t e o f t h e f a ll e n f i g t r ee .
NA R R A T OR
A n d, l i ke m o s t o f us , s h e l e f t b e hi nd
s m a ll t r ac es o f h er t i m e o n ea r t h .
Vi s i b l e o nly t o t h o s e t h at kn o w wh ere t o
l o o k . . .
T h e f i g t r ee i s f l o we r i ng aga i n .
F A DE T O B L A C K . | screenplays |
D.Gray-Man Friend or Foe Hiatus
**_Well, I said that I was going to make an LavixOC.
I don't really know how make Lavi, so, if I do something wrong, please, tell me. ^-^
I hope you guys like it. =D
See ya. ^-^_**
**_
* * *
_**
The HQ is strange
_I was running through a large corridor, it never ended. Tears were falling down in my cheek and I just wanted sleep and never wake up, but not in here. Not in an ugly place like this. I looked around me, trying to find a window or something like that, but nothing was there, just blood and blood. _
_The corridor was being more closed, but I was passing in it without any difficulty, my little and thin body can pass anywhere._
_Finally the corridor ended, and a little door was located in a wall, without stop running I opened the door and a big flash of light illuminated the entire place._
A little girl waked up, she had fallen asleep while traveling, and an old man was sitting in front of her, looking out of the window. They were in a train.
"You finally woke up, Anne." The girl named Anne looked at the man and smiled, she was really small and her hair was black, like her eyes. She was using a black shirt with the slaves bigger than her arms and larger then her hands. And a black skirt. In her chest, the symbol of the Black Order was.
"Bad dream again, hm?" The old man said, his voice hasn't worried at all. "Yes, the same dream. It's getting boring." She smiled a little more openly. But deep in her heart, she was afraid of the dream, and the signification of it.
"We are getting close of the Black Order, remember we are their allied for now, just because it's convenient for us. They may die in this battle, so, don't get so close of them. A Bookmen, in your case, Bookwomen, doesn't need friends, just culture."
Anne really didn't mind that, she never had become friend of someone; everybody was going away, one after one. She didn't care about the people, just of herself and the things that she can learn.
"Let's go, for now, we go by walking." She nodded her head. She had never been in the QH of the Black Order. It was the only place in the world where she didn't have gone.
Both of them walked off the train and started walking to the mountains. The way was deep and confuse, but bookman's memories knew the way. Strangely, an elevator was standing there. In one minute, the door of the HQ opened and they walked in.
"Paaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaanda!!!" A male voice came of a dark corner and the Bookman kicked someone in the face, making Anne laugh a bit. "Voice of a girl?" The same person who called the Bookman 'Panda' asked a rhetoric question.
"This is Anne McDonald. She's from England. She'll be my apprentice too and your rival. Lavi. So, I take care or she can turn into the next Bookman." Anne got out of the dark, smiling like usual. "It's nice to meet you, Lavi-san."
The girl said, the Bookman apprentice looked at her, trying to see what she had of so special to make the old guy open an exception to her. "I have photographic memory, I can remember of smells, sounds, tastes and everything that I touch. Is nice to meet you. As the Bookman said, my name is Anne McDonald, and I was born in England, but I traveled around the world in the past ten years. I am 17 years old. He already told me about you and your ability of remember of things too, your name is Lavi, right? So, will be nice working with you. Let's do our better, ok?"
Seemed like she understood Lavi's question, he seemed fine with the fact that he had an opponent; he knew that he was going to win the competition, and without any problem. But the problem was: She talked too much. Annoying, like Kanda would say.
"Let's see who is better then." The boy smiled and stood his hand, so the girl could take it. And she did it, shaking his hand next. "The better wins." Their smile grew bigger.
"So, first mission!" A voice came from the dark again, it was Komui. "You guys look excited about the competition, and I want to help. I'll put you guys in the same mission, rescue an Innocence from akumas. You guys have to make the situation's analyze, but doesn't matter who brings the Innocence, we just want the analyze. You guys are going to the south of the Africa. In an old village, the people is extremely strong and tourists always says that a green shine cover the city every night. You just got in here, Anne, so you can rest for tonight. Tomorrow you guys can leave."
Komui finished his discourse and left. Anne didn't know if she must laugh or be serious, so she just smiled. After the scientist was far away, she turned to Lavi and said. "Who was him?"
_This place is so… strange. _Anne thought.
End file.
| fanfiction |
The National Dance Awards 2008, were organised and presented by The Critics' Circle, and were awarded to recognise excellence in professional dance in the United Kingdom. The ceremony was held at the Sadler's Wells Theatre, London, on 26 January 2009, with awards given for productions staged in the previous year.
Awards Presented
Outstanding Achievement in Dance - Richard Alston, choreographer and founder Richard Alston Dance Company
Best Male Dancer - Edward Watson of The Royal Ballet
Best Female Dancer - Agnes Oaks of the English National Ballet
Best Choreography Classical - Christopher Wheeldon for Electric Counterpoint for The Royal Ballet
Best Choreography Modern - Hofesh Shechter, for In Your Rooms for his own company
Best Foreign Dance Company - New York City Ballet, from United States of America
Female Artist Modern - Kate Coyne
Male Artist Modern - Anh Ngoc Nguyen of Wayne McGregor Random Dance
Female Artist Classical - Yuhui Choe of The Royal Ballet
Male Artist Classical - Martin Harvey of The Royal Ballet
Outstanding Company - English National Ballet
Patron's Award - Northern Ballet Theatre
Working Title Billy Elliot Award - Michael Guihot-Jouffray
Industry Award - Janet Smith, Artistic Director of Scottish Dance Theatre
Special awards
No special awards were presented for the 2008 season.
References
Category:National Dance Awards
Dance
Dance | wikipedia |
Why do some reactions require specific pressures to happen?
For example, carbon monoxide reacts with hydrogen to synthesize methanol in the presence of some catalysts, but the pressure needs to be $\pu{50 atm}$ and the temperature needs to be $\pu{523 K}$.
Why the pressure? What does the pressure adds to the reaction?
ChemGuide has a good introductory article [here](http://www.chemguide.co.uk/physical/basicrates/pressure.html).
The effects of increasing pressure and temperature are, to an extent, equivalent. Increased pressure leads to increased collisions and increased collision strength between molecules, allowing the (usually high) activation energy barrier to be overcome at a noticeable rate; at standard temperatures and pressures, for example, collisions between $\ce{CO}$ and $\ce{H2}$ are far too infrequent and involve far too little energy for the formation of $\ce{CH3OH}$.
---
*Remark.* How do we achieve high pressures and temperatures? We could pressurize a steel cylinder and use it as a reaction vessel, for one, but a novel approach involves [sonochemistry](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonochemistry). Ultrasound waves in solution lead to cavitation, the formation and rapid collapse of bubbles, which are highly pressurized and at high temperatures. The use of ultrasound can even open up new reaction pathways not usually available; for example, radical species are often transient, but the forcing conditions in these bubbles allow them to survive long enough to react.
The reaction you are talking about is an equilibrium. Pressure is added to shift equilibrium towards methanol.
CO+2H2 <-> MeOH
Consider an equilibrium pressure. In one second number of MeOH molecules dissociate = number of molecules formed. MeOH doesn't need a partner to dissociate. But CO heeds two partners (2 H2 molecules) to turn into MeOH. If you decrease the pressure MeOH will dissociate at the same rate. But collisions of CO with H2 will be less frequent. So less MeOH will form.
Here [Y] is the concentration of Y (in moles/L)
Let system be at equilibrium at given pressure:
K$\_{eq}$ = [CO]\*[H$\_2$]$^2$/[MeOH]
Increase pressure by a factor of two. What happens to concentration of MeOH?
K$\_{eq}$ = (2\*[CO])*(2*[H$\_2$])$^2$/(x\*[MeOH])
Left parts are equal, so right parts are equal too.
[CO]*[H$\_2$]$^2$/[MeOH] = (2*[CO])*(2*[H$\_2$])$^2$/(x\*[MeOH])
After dividing by [CO], [H2], [MeOH] we have 1=2\*2$^2$/x
X=8. We have 8 times more MeOH after increasing the pressure by a factor of 2. If there was no reaction the amount of MeOH would just increase by 2. So we have 4 times more MeOH produced by just doubling the pressure.
This was mostly the thermodynamics aspect (how much MeOH we have when the reaction finishes). There is also kinetics (how fast reaction goes initially). Kinetics increases as pressure$^3$. Temperature also increases the speed of the reaction.
Pressure is needed to use the Le Chatelier's principle. This is one of a dozen fundamental principles of chemistry that you should look into. The higher the concentration of the reagent the more product will be produced. If the pressure is low formation of gasses that will spread around is preferred. At higher pressures formation of gas doesn't increase entropy (measure of disorder) by much and enthalphy (measure of heat) starts playing a role.
Note that a lot of processes depend on pressure. Water can vaporize by decreasing pressure or condensed by increasing it. Human's breathing requires high (1 atmosphere or so) pressure.
For MeOH synthesis you have 4 limiting cases:
Low P, low T: no reaction and if you wait forever you have little product at equilibrium time
Low P, high T: reaction goes fast, but against you MeOH falls apart rapidly
High P, low T: very high yield of MeOH if you wait forever, but reaction is somewhat slow
High P, high T: reaction is fast, but how much product you get depends on ratio of P and T. P should grow faster than T to keep equilibrium favorable.
---
Equilibrium is dictated by Gibbs energy G. Gibbs energy is just G = H - TS here H is measure of heat produced/consumed (enthalpy) T is temperature and S is measure of chaos/disorder produced.
Crystal has high order, so it has low S (enthropy), but formation of crystals is exothermic (favorable enthalpy). Gas is different. It has a lot of entropy (S is big), but little enthalpy of formation (it takes energy to turn crystal into gas). If you have high T (lots of energy around) then S becomes important. If you have low T, then H becomes important. This is why at high temperature you have gas and at low temperature you have crystals.
Now, enthropy of gas increases as you increase the volume it can occupy (gas feels it has less freedom when it is locked in a tight cell, but more freedom in bigger volume. So, if pressure is low 1 molecule MeOH dissociates three molecules form, they fly away from each other oad hardly ever meet. S increased a lot.
At high pressure they have little space and don't gain much enthropy. At the same time coming together is allows then to release some heat H (enthalphy).
---
Pressure doesn't add enthalpy H. It takes away entropic benefit S for MeOH to fall apart. Pressure says "dear gases, I know you love freedom and don't want to marry each other. But I will push you so close to each other that you will hit each other with elbows all the time. So yo uhave no freedom to lose when you form MeOH".
This is old but I wanted to add a quantitative / physical perspective here.
As you know, increasing pressure has a similar effect on reactions as increasing pressure. Recalling the ideal gas law,
$$pV = nRT$$
We have that $p$ is proportional to $T$. In other words, if you hold all other variables constant, increase in $p$ leads to increase in $T$, and vice-versa.
Pressure can be expressed as *force per unit area*, or *energy per unit volume*:
$$ p = \frac{\vec{F}}{A} = \frac{E}{V}$$
So it follows that increasing pressure increases *force* on molecules. Force effects the acceleration of particles by $\vec{a} = \frac{\vec{F}}{m}$, and velocity follows: $\vec{v} = \int \vec{a} dt$.
Temperature can be expressed using the velocities of particles (by a classical Boltzmann distribution),
$$ T = \frac{\sum\_i^N m\_i\vec{v\_{i \alpha}}^2}{k\_b N}$$
(Note the numerator is kinetic energy). So you can see that increasing $p$ and $T$ have the same physical result: faster motion of particles. Faster particles means more collisions, and more collisions means faster reactions, or occurrence of a reaction where it could not happen otherwise, because an energy-barrier is overcome ($p \propto E$ and $T \propto E\_k$).
| stackexchange/chemistry |
The perfect tee to mix and match with jeans, pants or a beautiful skirt.
Raw edges and flat lock detailing at sleeve hem.
Flatlock seams at bottom body.
Season logo print at center back.
To take best care of your garment wash it with similar colours. Wash inside out. Do not iron on print. | slim_pajama |
self - efficacy is a functional concept in bandura 's social learning theory in relation to professional behavior .
self - efficacy reflects individual 's beliefs about the ability to perform behaviors with specific outcomes .
bandura opened a new approach to human behavior in which individuals trust is a key element in their control and action .
specialized self - efficacy is concerned with particular areas of behavior and function ( various aspects of health , academic success , professional success , and ) .
the concept of self - efficacy has been widely studied and used in different areas . in many studies ,
self - efficacy predicts the success in activities such as academic performance results , mathematics and professional practice in the clinical .
self - efficacy plays an important role in nurses professional functioning , and it is an important predictor of their behavior . self - efficacy is expected to be the most influential among factors affecting nurses function .
high level of self - efficacy improves the quality of care and ultimately leads to improved personal and organizational performance .
self - efficacy resembles a structure affecting one 's motivation , learning , skill development , and professional progress .
high self - efficacy leads to effective utilization of cognitive , metacognitive , and other performances in many areas .
nursing studies indicate that self - efficacy and acquisition of clinical skills are correlated , and an increase in self - efficacy decreases the gap between theory and practice . with an estimated 1.8 million hospitalized children each year
, it is essential to determine the efficacy of nurses with various roles in pediatric care .
nurses are considered as the largest and most important human resource for health care organizations .
children hospitalized due to the development of physical , mental and emotional , and their lack of power to control the functions for which they are very vulnerable .
goals for resource nurse programs may include improving patient outcomes , developing nurse knowledge , skills , and confidence . to work and progress in the health care setting , nurses also need new skills to complex and need to feel empowered and proud of their abilities and their skills .
professional self - efficacy is the best structure that encompasses the feeling of satisfaction , benefit , and honor to the profession . in recent years ,
the need for attention to the issue of professional self - efficacy of nurses has increasingly been felt , and due to increased awareness and expectations of the community in relation to receiving quality services , inevitably , and healthcare providers have had to enhance professional efficacy of their employees .
the individuals identify their capabilities by knowing more aspects of them and are considered a great help by overcoming psychological pressures by meeting individual and organizational objectives .
considering the fact that self - efficacy is a personal and context - based issue . the first step to improve the efficacy of bandura 's view is recognizing the concept of self - efficacy in the same position and forming a specialized task . therefore ,
understanding and explaining the concept of self - efficacy in specialty especially in the realm of pediatric care is valuable . also according to the importance of the religious context of iran , especially in the nursing profession , recognizing the value of this concept is necessary . considering that benchmarking aspects of caring self - efficacy , especially in specialized areas such as pediatric care will be helpful in determining criteria and standards of self - efficacy assessment , and naturally in evaluation of pediatric nurses and quality of care they provide ,
this research was conducted to introduce altruism as one of the main aspects of caring self - efficacy from pediatric nurses perspective in this paper .
this paper is part of the nursing doctorate thesis conducted in the year 20132014 in iran to clarify the caring self - efficiency concept in pediatric nurses .
the study was conducted through qualitative content analysis . considering the significance of detailed review of individuals experiences , 27 pediatric nurses and clinical directors of isfahan hospital and clinical nursing professors of pediatric faculty of nursing and midwifery college of isfahan were selected through purposive sampling .
the inclusion criteria included having bs or a higher degree in nursing , having clinical experience for at least 1-year , and willingness to share one 's experience .
data were collected through semi - structured interviews with individuals and field notes .
the interviews commenced by the interviewer introducing himself / herself and a short description on the objectives of the study .
the interview manual contained several questions such as what does self - efficacy means in caring for children ?
, at the beginning of every interview , before asking questions about self - efficacy , participants were asked to describe a day at work .
along with data collection , the data were analyzed through the conventional content analysis method .
the recorded interviews were transcribed verbatim . as an in - depth analysis is required in such qualitative research works , the researcher listened to the interviews several times and reviewed the transcripts word by word and line by line to extract the words containing the key concepts or units of meaning , and to extract the primary codes from statements made by the interviewees and participants .
then the codes were reviewed in a continuous process from the extraction to naming step .
then , the similar codes were merged and categorized . then based on the ideas contained in the categories , the naming , and subcategories emerged .
the extracted subcategories were then compared with one another . in case of similarity , they were merged if possible .
the interviews with the participants and analyzed simultaneously lasted about 14 months . also , to increase the reliability of the study , adequate time was dedicated by the researcher for providing information to participants , maintaining contact with participants for gaining their trust , reviewing the data continuously , reviewing the extracted codes with some of the participants , peer - reviewing the findings , and using their views for amendments .
interviews and coding were conducted by the first researcher , and two expert professors of qualitative research supervised and audited the entire research procedure .
utilization of several data collection methods and consideration of maximal variation ( with regard to age , work experience , different social , and economic status ) in the selection of participants made data transferability possible .
explanations were provided to the participants with regard to the study objectives , interview method , data confidentiality , and optional participation in the study . written consent was then obtained from participants .
participants consent was obtained prior to interview commencement . the raw data including the interviews are stored in a safe place accessible only to the research team .
the demographic properties of participants were 27 participants , 19 pediatric nurses , 4 pediatric directors , one supervisor , and three pediatric nursing instructors aging between 27 and 49-year - old and with a work experience of 325 years .
twenty - one of participants had bs degree , five had ms degree , and one had a phd degree in nursing .
theme was one of the main extracted themes in the recent study that was of two main categories : humanistic care and caring attitude . in participants views
, a self - efficient pediatric nurse tries to meet the child 's and family 's needs and to empathize and understand the suffering of children and their families with humanistic care .
this theme comprised two subcategories of maternal care , family - centered care .
one of the important subcategories that emerged in interviews with children nurses , sympathetic tendencies , and humanistic care through the maternal care of the hospitalized child . in this respect ,
participant four stated : a nurse that has maternal feelings toward children she cares for feels every child is her own , and compares them with her own children , and talks to them the way she talks to her own children , and does what she should in nursing terms .
sometimes , i feel so sorry for some of them that i pray for them to get well .
participant 22 said : i think , pediatric nurses should provide mother - like care , understand the child , understand suffering of mother whose child has fallen ill , to understand what the child is going through , be a mother to understand what the mother feels , be sympathetic and a good nurse , and care for children as her own .
innocent baby is who is now hospitalized , can not take care of itself , do not need to tell , i pity for its powerless and helpless .
in fact , like being captured . the pediatric nurse has to have this innocent child like her own children 's care in participants perspectives , understand the child hospitalized family problems and their participation in the process of child care , plays an important role in the acceptance of nurses and nurses self - efficacy in the care of children . in this area ,
participant seven stated : in pediatric ward , care does not end with the child , and it is not just medical care . in my view , it also involves emotional care .
alas , when a child is admitted , it is not just the child ; it is his family and their problems as well .
concerns they have about their sick child , and what is going to happen to the family . all these are part of care , and care should be family - oriented , not individual . in this respect , participant 23 argued :
the nurse should encourage parental cooperation in caring for the child , and be able to calm the mother .
for instance , when taking the intravenous ( iv ) line , most mothers are unhappy and frightened .
we should train them and make them aware . give them a peace of mind .
when i explain , parents cooperate . in this area , participant one stated :
self - efficient nurse understands that in pediatric ward his account of the family and children .
really see the family 's problems , for example , when taking iv line is never normal for us .
however , the child families have the right to be discomfort and feel that his baby suffers .
according to the participants , a positive attitude for care played an important role in accepting the role of pediatric nurses and their self - efficacy in caring for children .
the participants explained that the children interest and loving child , made nurses attempt to become self - efficient in the area of child care . in this
regard , participant 17 pointed out : nurses that love children and are interested in caring for children , i think , have more self - confidence . because the tasks related to children are more special
the care given in pediatric wards is more special than that in other more general wards . because the mother stands with her child and always worries and has much more expectations of nurses than other wards .
participant 15 also explained : some of my colleagues say we hate the pediatric ward , children 's cries and screams , and this causes the feeling of inefficacy in caring for children .
if you love them , you act , you look at the kid , you care for him or her in time , and you enjoy all these . in participants views , having religious beliefs is one of the things that makes nurses motivated to do their work and trusted to their capability and resistance up to their problems .
the nurse 's statements showed that although they experience many difficulties in the workplace , but religious beliefs as a powerful force and internal control change their attitudes and finding meaning and value of the care work .
religious beliefs as a shield and protection against their problems and they maintain their mental energy to care .
participant eight stated in this regard that : i think nurses should be aware of the value of their profession and caring .
it sometimes gets difficult ; there are lots of pressures , but a mother 's prayer or child 's smile makes us forget all these difficulties and pressures .
it is sweet to us and gives us the good feeling that we have done something positive for the kid .
participant 15 said in this regard that : a self - efficient pediatric nurse would work with great passion , love , and enthusiasm .
the nurse would take care of the children without any pressure . to please god do his duty .
participant 24 believes : unfortunately , in nursing , because of job dissatisfaction and low wages , many issues such as tiredness , heavy shifts , and dissatisfactions can affect function and attitude of nurses , and thus they do not feel very committed , which is very dangerous , especially in pediatric ward , it is a huge hazard .
however , a self - efficient nurse is committed to her work , and it is highly important for her to do her job properly .
in participants views , a self - efficient pediatric nurse tries to meet the child 's and family 's needs and to empathize and understand the suffering of children and their families with humanistic care .
this theme comprised two subcategories of maternal care , family - centered care .
one of the important subcategories that emerged in interviews with children nurses , sympathetic tendencies , and humanistic care through the maternal care of the hospitalized child . in this respect ,
participant four stated : a nurse that has maternal feelings toward children she cares for feels every child is her own , and compares them with her own children , and talks to them the way she talks to her own children , and does what she should in nursing terms .
sometimes , i feel so sorry for some of them that i pray for them to get well .
participant 22 said : i think , pediatric nurses should provide mother - like care , understand the child , understand suffering of mother whose child has fallen ill , to understand what the child is going through , be a mother to understand what the mother feels , be sympathetic and a good nurse , and care for children as her own .
innocent baby is who is now hospitalized , can not take care of itself , do not need to tell , i pity for its powerless and helpless .
in fact , like being captured . the pediatric nurse has to have this innocent child like her own children 's care in participants perspectives , understand the child hospitalized family problems and their participation in the process of child care , plays an important role in the acceptance of nurses and nurses self - efficacy in the care of children . in this area ,
participant seven stated : in pediatric ward , care does not end with the child , and it is not just medical care . in my view
, it is not just the child ; it is his family and their problems as well .
concerns they have about their sick child , and what is going to happen to the family . all these are part of care , and care should be family - oriented , not individual . in this respect , participant 23 argued :
a nurse should empathize with the child and his family . during care , the child can not defend himself , and is victimized . the nurse should encourage parental cooperation in caring for the child , and be able to calm the mother .
when taking the intravenous ( iv ) line , most mothers are unhappy and frightened .
we should train them and make them aware . give them a peace of mind .
when i explain , parents cooperate . in this area , participant one stated :
self - efficient nurse understands that in pediatric ward his account of the family and children .
really see the family 's problems , for example , when taking iv line is never normal for us . however , the child families have the right to be discomfort and feel that his baby suffers .
one of the important subcategories that emerged in interviews with children nurses , sympathetic tendencies , and humanistic care through the maternal care of the hospitalized child . in this respect , participant four stated : a nurse that has maternal feelings toward children she cares for feels every child is her own , and compares them with her own children , and talks to them the way she talks to her own children , and does what she should in nursing terms .
sometimes , i feel so sorry for some of them that i pray for them to get well .
participant 22 said : i think , pediatric nurses should provide mother - like care , understand the child , understand suffering of mother whose child has fallen ill , to understand what the child is going through , be a mother to understand what the mother feels , be sympathetic and a good nurse , and care for children as her own .
innocent baby is who is now hospitalized , can not take care of itself , do not need to tell , i pity for its powerless and helpless .
in fact , like being captured . the pediatric nurse has to have this innocent child like her own children 's care
in participants perspectives , understand the child hospitalized family problems and their participation in the process of child care , plays an important role in the acceptance of nurses and nurses self - efficacy in the care of children .
in this area , participant seven stated : in pediatric ward , care does not end with the child , and it is not just medical care . in my view
, it also involves emotional care . alas , when a child is admitted , it is not just the child ; it is his family and their problems as well .
concerns they have about their sick child , and what is going to happen to the family . all these are part of care , and care should be family - oriented , not individual . in this respect , participant 23 argued : a nurse should empathize with the child and his family . during care ,
the nurse should encourage parental cooperation in caring for the child , and be able to calm the mother .
for instance , when taking the intravenous ( iv ) line , most mothers are unhappy and frightened .
we should train them and make them aware . give them a peace of mind .
when i explain , parents cooperate . in this area , participant one stated :
self - efficient nurse understands that in pediatric ward his account of the family and children .
really see the family 's problems , for example , when taking iv line is never normal for us . however , the child families have the right to be discomfort and feel that his baby suffers .
according to the participants , a positive attitude for care played an important role in accepting the role of pediatric nurses and their self - efficacy in caring for children .
the participants explained that the children interest and loving child , made nurses attempt to become self - efficient in the area of child care . in this
regard , participant 17 pointed out : nurses that love children and are interested in caring for children , i think , have more self - confidence . because the tasks related to children are more special .
the care given in pediatric wards is more special than that in other more general wards . because the mother stands with her child and always worries and has much more expectations of nurses than other wards .
participant 15 also explained : some of my colleagues say we hate the pediatric ward , children 's cries and screams , and this causes the feeling of inefficacy in caring for children .
if you love them , you act , you look at the kid , you care for him or her in time , and you enjoy all these . in participants views , having religious beliefs is one of the things that makes nurses motivated to do their work and trusted to their capability and resistance up to their problems .
the nurse 's statements showed that although they experience many difficulties in the workplace , but religious beliefs as a powerful force and internal control change their attitudes and finding meaning and value of the care work .
religious beliefs as a shield and protection against their problems and they maintain their mental energy to care .
participant eight stated in this regard that : i think nurses should be aware of the value of their profession and caring .
it sometimes gets difficult ; there are lots of pressures , but a mother 's prayer or child 's smile makes us forget all these difficulties and pressures .
it is sweet to us and gives us the good feeling that we have done something positive for the kid .
participant 15 said in this regard that : a self - efficient pediatric nurse would work with great passion , love , and enthusiasm .
the nurse would take care of the children without any pressure . to please god do his duty .
participant 24 believes : unfortunately , in nursing , because of job dissatisfaction and low wages , many issues such as tiredness , heavy shifts , and dissatisfactions can affect function and attitude of nurses , and thus they do not feel very committed , which is very dangerous , especially in pediatric ward , it is a huge hazard .
however , a self - efficient nurse is committed to her work , and it is highly important for her to do her job properly .
the participants explained that the children interest and loving child , made nurses attempt to become self - efficient in the area of child care . in this
regard , participant 17 pointed out : nurses that love children and are interested in caring for children , i think , have more self - confidence . because the tasks related to children are more special .
the care given in pediatric wards is more special than that in other more general wards . because the mother stands with her child and always worries and has much more expectations of nurses than other wards .
participant 15 also explained : some of my colleagues say we hate the pediatric ward , children 's cries and screams , and this causes the feeling of inefficacy in caring for children .
if you love them , you act , you look at the kid , you care for him or her in time , and you enjoy all these .
in participants views , having religious beliefs is one of the things that makes nurses motivated to do their work and trusted to their capability and resistance up to their problems .
the nurse 's statements showed that although they experience many difficulties in the workplace , but religious beliefs as a powerful force and internal control change their attitudes and finding meaning and value of the care work .
religious beliefs as a shield and protection against their problems and they maintain their mental energy to care .
participant eight stated in this regard that : i think nurses should be aware of the value of their profession and caring .
it sometimes gets difficult ; there are lots of pressures , but a mother 's prayer or child 's smile makes us forget all these difficulties and pressures .
it is sweet to us and gives us the good feeling that we have done something positive for the kid .
participant 15 said in this regard that : a self - efficient pediatric nurse would work with great passion , love , and enthusiasm .
the nurse would take care of the children without any pressure . to please god do his duty .
participant 24 believes : unfortunately , in nursing , because of job dissatisfaction and low wages , many issues such as tiredness , heavy shifts , and dissatisfactions can affect function and attitude of nurses , and thus they do not feel very committed , which is very dangerous , especially in pediatric ward , it is a huge hazard .
however , a self - efficient nurse is committed to her work , and it is highly important for her to do her job properly .
this is first study conducted in iran on the concept of self - efficacy in nursing care , aiming to introduce altruism as one of the main aspects of caring self - efficacy from perspective of care providers ( nurses ) in specialized area of pediatrics .
this concept with the features of the humanistic care , maternal care by providing family - centered care and caring attitude of religious beliefs and loving children was introduced from the perspective of the participants in this study .
altruism means supporting patients and nurses concern about the well - being of patients within their professional capacity .
in fact , altruism is described as an engagement in caring acts toward others without expecting something in return .
altruistic behavior motivated by concern for others or by internalized values , goals , and self - rewards rather than by the expectation on concrete or social rewards or the desire to avoid punishment .
researches in other countries also report that , altruism is the most commonly reported motivation by people that have chosen nursing as their profession .
it is often proposed that nursing has an altruistic nature , and people interested in helping patients are attracted to this profession .
humanistic care and altruism is related to empathy in that , after understanding another situation , one has a propensity to engage in an act to help the person and would experience happiness as a result .
, one must be able to empathize with another before engaging in a helpful action . according to watson ( 1988 )
caring is a moral ideal in nursing that in the end to preserve and promote the status and human dignity . in watson 's views ,
one of the carative factors is human values and altruistic motivation . according to watson ,
human care with regard to humanitarian values is a fit model for nursing care in children and neonatal wards .
given participants statements , expressing that children are among patients that are unable to state their care needs and can not defend their own rights , it can be concluded that altruistic motivation is more emphasized in pediatric nurses , compared to other nurses .
furthermore , providing support for children and their families is an important aspect of pediatric nursing .
family - centered care defines the focus of pediatric care because it is not possible to care for children without accounting for the whole family as guardians . in family - centered care philosophy , the family is a constant phenomenon in child 's life .
the primary role of a pediatric nurse is to provide direct care for the child and his parents , and involves support and defense of child and family through recognizing their needs , making them aware of their rights , helping them in decision making , and providing training and counseling for them .
abbaszadeh in a qualitative study from the perspective of mothers of children showed that ignoring the needs of mothers is one part of the hospitalized mother 's grievances and a part of nurses ineffectively in pediatric wards . from our study participants perspective , the ability to meet the needs of the family , and support them especially mothers of hospitalized children is one thing that will be in a self - efficient nurses when caring for children .
results of a study by morsy showed that providing support for parents of hospitalized children by nurses reduces parents stress and increases their adjustment with hospitalization of children , affecting the quality of life and care outcomes .
some religions promote caring for others as loving one 's neighbor in addition to showing love to god .
the study findings of taylor also suggest that nurses religious beliefs will affect the job motivation and views to the patient and nursing services . also ,
research in iran confirms that religious orientation plays a major role in coping nurses with the job problems . the ravari study with the aim to examine the concept of spiritual job satisfaction among nurses reveals that nurses religious orientation plays an important role in tackling employment problems .
altruism and maintaining a positive caring approach and humanistic willingness for taking care of others makes nurses to care for the patients willingly .
nurses with personal trait such religious beliefs seem to have changed their approach and have given sense to their duties against environmental problems and have gained a psychological immunity and exhibit their capabilities with greater confidence act .
it seems that , despite the fact the purpose of the nursing profession is helping the invalids , a positive attitude , and personal willingness is required as personal characteristics for the pediatric caring profession .
motivation will cause a person to achieve the goal of maximum power use and continue to achieve a high level of self - efficacy .
the positive evaluation nurse of yours arising from religious beliefs and believing care as a sacred activity will be increased their confidence and motivation and promote their self - efficacy perception .
although one must be aware not to generalize the results of qualitative studies , one can identify and understand the different aspects contributing to self - efficacy , as well as altruism , and then help with improving the quality of care services as nurses should view themselves as competent so that they can help others .
altruism acted as the driving force , and the duty of care is considered significant and important .
these feelings are so clean , strong , and valuable , despite the problems and the stress of the workplace nurses to continue to work and serve .
participants in the study acknowledged having empathic tendencies and attitudes of care ; nurses can ignore their workers problems and prefer well - being of patients and can achieve in a type of self - sacrifice , self - worth , and self - esteem . in this case nurse engagement in caring acts toward children without expecting something in return .
in the perspective of the participants , self - efficient nurse in the pediatric ward , provide a more meaningful and humane care .
in fact , positive attitude and humanistic willingness are required as self - efficacy perception for the pediatric caring profession . | pubmed |
Dr. Michael Avi-Yonah September 26, 1904 March 26, 1974 was an Israeli archaeologist and historian. During his career he was a Professor of Archaeology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and served as secretary of the Department of Antiquities as well.
Biography
Born in Lemberg, Austria-Hungary today Lviv, Ukraine, Avi-Yonah moved to the Land of Israel with his parents in 1919 during the Third Aliyah. He first studied at Gymnasia Rehavia in Jerusalem, then he went to England and studied history and archeology at the University of London. Upon his return to the Land of Israel, he studied at the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem. His first archaeological excavations were at Tel el-Ajjul, near Gaza, and Jerusalem Ophel. At the end of his studies, he joined the Department of Antiquities of the British government of Palestine. He worked as a librarian and archivist. After the independence of the state of Israel, he became secretary of the Department of Antiquities.
In 1949, he conducted excavations at Givat Ram in Jerusalem during the construction of the International Convention Center, where he was the first to discover a brick factory of the Legio X Fretensis. He participated in the first survey that preceded the Masada excavations, and conducted a limited excavation north of Caesarea Maritima where he discovered an ancient synagogue.
He was awarded the Bialik Prize in 1955 for his book Antiquities of our land. Avi-Yonah died in Jerusalem in 1974.
Partial works
Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land
Jerusalem the Holy
The Art of Mosaics cowritten with Richard L. Currier
Holy Land
Ancient Scrolls
History of Israel and the Holy Land
Views of the Biblical World. Jerusalem: International Publishing Company J-m Ltd, 1959.
Macmillan Bible Atlas with Yohanan Aharoni 1993
See also
Holyland Model of Jerusalem
References
Category:Ukrainian archaeologists
Category:Israeli archaeologists
Category:1904 births
Category:1974 deaths
Category:Alumni of the University of London
Category:People from Lviv
Category:Ukrainian Jews
Category:Historical geography | wikipedia |
in 1989 , godrche and luck @xcite introduced a ( locally ) randomised extension of the well - studied fibonacci substitution .
they presented first results concerning the topological entropy and the spectral type of the diffraction measure . in this context , it is most remarkable that the dynamical hull features positive entropy but at the same time is regular enough to contain only meyer sets .
the arguments applied in ( * ? ? ?
5.1 ) for the computation of the topological entropy rely on the fact that it is sufficient to merely control the growth behaviour of exact random fibonacci words .
this is a non - trivial assertion and has only recently been proved by nilsson @xcite via intricate combinatorial arguments .
furthermore , godrche and luck argued via a concrete calculation that the diffraction measure comprises a continuous part .
there , they implicitly assumed the existence of an ergodic measure on the randomised hull without proof or other evidence . in this paper , we will generalise the random fibonacci substitution to the one - parameter family of random noble means substitutions and substantiate the results of godrche and luck with mathematical rigour .
let us start with a brief summary of the essential notation that will be used throughout the text .
we will loosely complement this list as we continue .
a more detailed introduction can be found in standard textbooks ; see @xcite . the finite _ alphabet _ on @xmath0 letters is denoted by @xmath1 and we refer to @xmath2 as the free monoid over @xmath3 .
the latter is the set of finite words over @xmath3 together with the empty word @xmath4 and endowed with the concatenation of words as multiplication .
let @xmath5 , @xmath6 and @xmath5 be a connected substring of @xmath7 .
then , we call @xmath5 a _ subword _ of @xmath7 and write @xmath8 in this case . if a more precise emphasis on the location of a subword is needed , we will write @xmath9 } { \mathrel{\mathop:\!\!=}}w_{j}^ { } \cdots w_{k}^ { } { \vartriangleleft}w$ ] where @xmath9 } { \mathrel{\mathop:\!\!=}}\varepsilon$ ] if @xmath10 . the _ length _ of some word @xmath6
will be written as @xmath11 and @xmath12 } \ }
\rvert$ ] is the _ occurrence number _ of the word @xmath13 in @xmath7 as a subword .
the set @xmath14 of bi - infinite sequences over @xmath3 is equipped with the product topology that is assumed to be generated by the class @xmath15 of cylinder sets @xmath16}^ { } = v \bigr\},\ ] ] for any @xmath17 and @xmath18 , and for the purpose of our considerations it will be convenient to regard @xmath2 as being embedded into @xmath14 . a _ substitution rule _
@xmath19 is any non - erasing endomorphism on @xmath2 that can and will be extended to @xmath14 via concatenation .
for the rest of the treatment , we fix the binary alphabet @xmath20 , an arbitrary @xmath21 and define for each @xmath22 a _ noble means substitution ( nms ) _ @xmath23 on @xmath24 via @xmath25 is its primitive and unimodular substitution matrix that is independent of @xmath26 .
its perron frobenius ( pf ) eigenvalue @xcite is the pisot
vijayaraghavan ( pv ) number @xmath27 which has algebraic conjugate @xmath28 .
the discrete hull @xmath29 of each @xmath23 is defined as the orbit closure of some fixed point of a suitable power of @xmath23 , with respect to the shift @xmath30 , in the product topology .
now , one convenient property of the noble means family @xmath31 is that all these hulls coincide individually which is a direct consequence of the primitivity of each @xmath23 and the fact that all @xmath23 are pairwise conjugate ( * ? ? ?
4.6 ) . as our final goal is the local mixture of all members of @xmath32
, this constitutes a substantial technical simplification over the more general situation .
several important properties of the nms family can be summarised as follows ; compare ( * ? ? ?
[ lem : det_noble_means ] for an arbitrary but fixed @xmath21 , each member of @xmath32 is a primitive and aperiodic pisot substitution with unimodular substitution matrix .
its two - sided discrete hulls @xmath29 are uncountable and reflection symmetric , and the @xmath29 coincide for @xmath22 . we proceed with the general notion of a random substitution rule .
note that the mixture is performed on a local level i.e. the image of each letter of some word under the substitution rule is chosen seperately and independently . in
the noble means case the locality leads to a significant enlargement of the according discrete hull whereas the hull would stay the same when studying global mixtures of the substitutions in @xmath32 .
this is an immediate consequence of lemma [ lem : det_noble_means ] .
[ def : random_subst ] a substitution @xmath33 is called _ stochastic _ or a _ random substitution _ if there are @xmath34 and probability vectors @xmath35^{k_{i } } \text { and } \sum_{j=1}^{k_{i } } p_{ij}^ { } = 1 , \ , 1 { \leqslant}i { \leqslant}n \bigr\},\ ] ] such that @xmath36 for @xmath37 where each @xmath38 .
the _ substitution matrix _ is defined by @xmath39 in the stochastic situation we agree on a slightly modified notion of the subword relation . for any @xmath5 , @xmath6 , by @xmath40 we mean that @xmath5 is a subword of _ at least _
one image of @xmath7 under @xmath41 for any @xmath42 .
similarly , by @xmath43 we mean that there is _ at least _ one image of @xmath7 under @xmath41 that coincides with @xmath5 .
a random substitution @xmath33 is _ irreducible _ if for each pair @xmath44 with @xmath45 , there is a power @xmath42 such that @xmath46 .
the substitution @xmath19 is _ primitive _ if there is a @xmath42 such that @xmath46 for all @xmath47 .
now , let @xmath21 and @xmath48 be a probability vector that are both assumed to be fixed .
that means @xmath49^{m+1}$ ] and @xmath50 .
the random substitution @xmath51 is defined by @xmath52 and the one - parameter family @xmath53 is called the family of _ random noble means substitutions ( rnms)_. we refer to the @xmath54 as the _ choosing probabilities _ and call @xmath55 for any @xmath56 an _ image _ of @xmath7 under @xmath57 . of course , the deterministic cases of the family @xmath32 ( choose the corresponding @xmath58 ) and _ incomplete _ mixtures , with several @xmath59 , are included here but we are mainly interested in the generic cases where @xmath60 .
this is a standing assumption for the rest of the treatment , where we occasionally comment on the disregarded cases if this seems appropriate .
the substitution matrix of @xmath57 in the sense of definition [ def : random_subst ] is given by @xmath61 due to the fact that there is no direct analogue to a bi - infinite fixed point in the randomised case , we have to slightly modify the notion of the discrete hull here . for
an arbitrary but fixed @xmath21 , define @xmath62 the _ two - sided discrete stochastic hull _
@xmath63 is defined as the smallest closed and shift - invariant subset of @xmath64 with @xmath65 .
elements of @xmath66 are called _ generating random noble means words .
_ a word @xmath56 is called _ legal _ ( or @xmath57-_legal _ ) if there is a @xmath42 such that @xmath67 . for @xmath68
, we define @xmath69 if @xmath70 for some @xmath71 , we refer to @xmath7 as an _ exact substitution word _ and define for any @xmath72 the set of exact substitution words ( of order @xmath73 ) as @xmath74 a convenient approach to the set of exact rnms words is the following concatenation rule . for @xmath75 ,
let @xmath76 where @xmath77 denotes the _
kronecker function_. the product in eq .
@xmath78 is understood via the concatenation of words and each word @xmath79 is of length @xmath80 with @xmath81 .
obviously , not all legal words of length @xmath82 are exact ( e.g. @xmath83 , @xmath84 ) . for @xmath85 . ]
the set of exact rnms words facilitates a convenient method for the computation of the topological entropy . applying a theorem of nilsson (
* thm . 3 ) and carrying out a short calculation , concerning the cardinalities of exact rnms sets , yields the following result ( * ? ? ?
3.2 ) for the topological entropy @xmath86 in the rnms case .
@xmath87 which is strictly positive .
this is in contrast to the deterministic cases of @xmath32 where each element of @xmath29 is a _
sturmian sequence _
3.2 ) which means that the topological entropy vanishes here .
in this section , we define a shift - invariant probability measure on the discrete rnms hull @xmath88 and prove its ergodicity .
the result is somewhat weaker as in all deterministic cases of @xmath32 , because it is known that the hulls of primitive substitutions are _ minimal _ and that there is a _
uniquely _ ergodic probability measure @xcite .
as @xmath89 ( * ? ? ?
2.22 ) , one directly observes the non - minimality of @xmath88 and the non - uniqueness of the measure can be expected immediately and will be proved explicitly later .
[ def : induced_subst ] let @xmath90 and @xmath51 be a random noble means substitution for some fixed @xmath91 .
then , we refer to @xmath92 as the _ induced substitution _ defined by @xmath93 } \bigr)_{0 { \leqslant}k { \leqslant}\lvert \zeta_{m}^{}(w_{0}^{(i ) } ) \rvert - 1 } , & \text{with prob . }
p_{i1}^ { } , \\ \vdots & \vdots \\
u^{(i , n_{i } ) } { \mathrel{\mathop:\!\!=}}\bigl ( v^{(i , n_i)}_{[k , k + \ell - 1 ] } \bigr)_{0 { \leqslant}k { \leqslant}\lvert \zeta_{m}^{}(w_{0}^{(i ) } ) \rvert - 1 } , & \text{with prob . }
p_{in_{i}^{}}^ { } , \\
\end{array } \right.\ ] ] where @xmath94 and @xmath95 is an image of @xmath96 under @xmath57 with probability @xmath97 .
one can show that the induced substitution matrix @xmath98 of @xmath99 is primitive ( * ? ? ?
4.7 ) which enables the reapplication of perron
frobenius theory .
note that @xmath100 and therefore @xmath101 . in the case of @xmath102
, one can explicitly work out @xmath103 for arbitrary @xmath21 ( * ? ? ?
* prop . 4.10 ) and proceed recursively for the generalisation to any word length @xmath90 ( * ? ? ?
* cor . 4.13 ) .
one finds @xmath104 with statistically normalised right pf eigenvector @xmath105 now , let @xmath106 be any @xmath57-legal word .
then , we define the measure @xmath107 on the cylinder sets @xmath108 by @xmath109 for any @xmath17 , where @xmath110 is the entry of the statistically normalised right pf eigenvector of @xmath98 with respect to the word @xmath7 . according to (
5.4 ) , this is a consistent definition of a measure on @xmath111 and there is an extension of @xmath107 to the borel @xmath112-algebra @xmath113 ( * ? ? ? * cor .
2.4.9 ) generated by the cylinder sets .
due to ( * ? ? ?
2.5.1 ) , this extension is unique and we will denote it again as @xmath107 .
note that eq .
@xmath114 indicates that @xmath107 depends on the choice of @xmath115 , whereas the hull @xmath88 is invariant under alterations of the choosing probabilities as long as @xmath60 .
the same is true for any @xmath90 which means that there are infinitely many possibilities to construct a probability measure for the very same @xmath88 in the above way .
we proceed with an important ingredient for the proof of the ergodicity of @xmath107 .
[ thm : slln ] let @xmath116 be a family of pairwise independent , identically distributed , complex random variables with common distribution @xmath117 , subject to the integrability condition @xmath118 .
then , @xmath119{n \to \infty}\ ; { \mathbb{e}}_{\mu}^{}(x_{1}^ { } ) = \int_{{\mathbb{r } } } x { \mathop{}\!\mathrm{d}}\mu(x ) .
\tag*{\qed}\ ] ] here , @xmath120 denotes the _ mean _ of the random variable @xmath121 with respect to the distribution @xmath117 . [
pro : ergodic ] for an arbitrary but fixed @xmath21 , let @xmath122 be the two - sided discrete stochastic hull of the random noble means substitution and @xmath107 be the @xmath30-invariant probability measure on @xmath88 introduced in eq . @xmath123 . for any @xmath124 and for an arbitrary but fixed @xmath125 , the identity @xmath126 holds for @xmath107-almost every @xmath127 .
let @xmath127 be an arbitrary element of the stochastic hull .
the idea is to consider the characteristic function @xmath128 of some cylinder set @xmath129 and to interpret @xmath130 as a family of @xmath107-distributed random variables in order to invoke theorem [ thm : slln ] . for this purpose
, we have to deal with the pairwise independence of elements in @xmath121 .
one can show that there is at least one element @xmath131 with @xmath132 ( * ? ? ?
* rem . 2.25 ) which means that we can study the structure of @xmath133 that is induced by the action of @xmath57 on some element of @xmath88 .
for two finite subwords @xmath134 , @xmath135 of @xmath133 , we denote by @xmath136 the overlap of @xmath134 and @xmath5 in @xmath133 and by @xmath137 its number of letters .
certainly , @xmath134 and @xmath5 can not be independent if @xmath138 , but we have to take more into account .
possibly , @xmath134 and @xmath5 may contain parts of the image of the same letter under @xmath57 . as @xmath139 , it is sufficient to ensure that at most one of the overlaps @xmath140 and @xmath141 is non - empty for the very same letter @xmath142 , as illustrated in figure [ fig : independence_overlap ] .
\(1 ) at ( -5.0 , 1.6 ) ; ( 2 ) at ( 5.0 , 2.0 ) ; ( 3 ) at ( -1.0 , 1.6 ) ; ( 4 ) at ( -1.0 , 2.0 ) ; ( 5 ) at ( 0.0 , 2.0 ) ; ( 6 ) at ( 0.0 , 1.6 ) ; ( 7 ) at ( -5.0 , 0.0 ) ; ( 8) at ( 5.0 , 0.4 ) ; ( 9 ) at ( -4.0 , 0.0 ) ; ( 10 ) at ( -4.0 , 0.4 ) ; ( 11 ) at ( -1.0 , 0.4 ) ; ( 12 ) at ( -1.0 , 0.0 ) ; ( 13 ) at ( 1.0 , 0.0 ) ; ( 14 ) at ( 1.0 , 0.4 ) ; ( 15 ) at ( 4.0 , 0.0 ) ; ( 16 ) at ( 4.0 , 0.4 ) ; ( 18 ) at ( -5.5 , 1.8 ) @xmath143 ; ( 19 ) at ( -5.5 , 0.2 ) @xmath143 ; ( 20 ) at ( 5.5 , 1.8 ) @xmath143 ; ( 21 ) at ( 5.5 , 0.2 ) @xmath143 ; ( 1 ) rectangle ( 2 ) ; ( 1 ) rectangle ( 4 ) ; ( 6 ) rectangle ( 2 ) ; ( 7 ) rectangle ( 8) ; ( 7 ) rectangle ( 10 ) ; ( 12 ) rectangle ( 14 ) ; ( 15 ) rectangle ( 8) ; ( -1.0 , 1.6 )
( -1.5 , 0.4 ) ( 0.5 , 0.4 ) ( 0.0 , 1.6 ) ( -1.0 , 1.6 ) ; ( 22 ) at ( -0.5 , 1.8 ) @xmath144 ; ( 23 ) at ( -6.5 , 1.8 ) ; ( 24 ) at ( -6.5 , 0.2 ) ; ( 25 ) at ( -2.5 , 0.2 ) @xmath134 ; ( 25 ) at ( 2.5 , 0.2 ) @xmath5 ; ( 26 ) at ( 0.0,-0.7 ) @xmath145 ; ( 27 ) at ( 6.45 , 1.85 ) @xmath146 ; ( 27 ) at ( 6.6 , 0.2 ) @xmath147 ; ( 1.0,-0.1 ) ( -1.0 , -0.1 ) ; ( 23 ) edge node[left ] @xmath57 ( 24 ) ; now , define for any @xmath148 , @xmath90 and a fixed @xmath149 , the family @xmath150 } \bigr)_{k \in { \mathbb{n}}_{0}^{}}^{}.\ ] ] then , each @xmath151 consists of pairwise independent words in the sense pointed out above .
furthermore , for any @xmath135 , we consider the characteristic function of the cylinder set @xmath152 , defined by @xmath153}^ { } = v , \\ 0 , & \text{otherwise .
} \end{array } \right.\ ] ] this leads to @xmath154 note that the penultimate equality is implied by the perron frobenius theorem and the uniqueness of @xmath155 stated therein .
to finish the proof , we need to extend the presented arguments to an arbitrary function in @xmath156 .
we define @xmath157 as the set of simple functions on the measure space @xmath158 . by linearity ,
the validity of eq .
@xmath159 for @xmath160 extends to an arbitrary function in @xmath161 . due to the stone
weierstra theorem ( * ? ? ?
1.4 ) , @xmath161 is dense in @xmath162 and thus also in @xmath156 ( * ? ? ?
this implies the assertion .
the measure @xmath107 is ergodic .
this is an immediate consequence of proposition [ pro : ergodic ] . via an application of birkhoff s ergodic theorem .
the geometric realisation of fixed points of elements in @xmath32 is derived from the left pf eigenvector @xmath163 of @xmath164 via the identification of @xmath144 and @xmath165 with intervals of lengths @xmath166 and @xmath167 and using the left endpoints as coordinates .
each of these realisations is called a _
noble means set _ and is denoted by @xmath168
. it can be shown ( * ? ? ?
* cor . 5.17 and cor . 5.18 ) that all @xmath168 can be identified as so - called _ model sets _
@xmath169 with _ windows _
@xmath170 within the cut and project scheme @xmath171 ; see figure [ fig : nms_cps ] for a compact representation and we refer to ( * ? ? ?
* cha . 7 ) for a general introduction .
the underlying lattice @xmath172 \}$ ] is independent of @xmath26 .
note that , for the generic cases @xmath173 , we find the windows @xmath174
\quad \text{with } \quad \tau_{m}^ { } { \mathrel{\mathop:\!\!=}}-\frac{1}{m } ( \lambda_{m}^{\prime } + 1).\ ] ] in the singular cases @xmath175 , we get @xmath176 , \label{equ : window_2 } \\ \quad w_{m , m\vphantom{0}}^{({\mathtt{a}}|{\mathtt{a } } ) } & { \mathrel{\mathop:\!\!=}}(-1,-\lambda_{m}^{\prime } ] , & \quad w_{m , m\vphantom{0}}^{({\mathtt{b}}|{\mathtt{a } } ) } & { \mathrel{\mathop:\!\!=}}[-1,-\lambda_{m}^{\prime } ) , \label{equ : window_3 } \end{aligned}\ ] ] distinguished according to the legal two - letter seeds . in the randomised situation , we consider the geometric realisation of generating random noble means words and study the same cut and project scheme @xmath177 as in the deterministic cases . in this context , we find the following result .
\(d ) [ matrix of math nodes , row sep=2em , column sep=4.5em , text height=1.5ex , text depth=0.2ex , minimum width=2em , nodes in empty cells ] & & + & & + & & + ; ( d-1 - 2 ) edge node[above ] @xmath178 ( d-1 - 1 ) ( d-1 - 2 ) edge node[above ] @xmath179 ( d-1 - 3 ) ( d-2 - 2 ) edge node[above ] @xmath180 ( d-2 - 1 ) ( d-2 - 2 ) edge node[above ] @xmath180 ( d-2 - 3 ) ( d-3 - 1 ) edge node[above ] @xmath181 ( d-3 - 3 ) ; ( d-3 - 1 ) edge[double ] ( d-2 - 1 ) ( d-3 - 3 ) edge[double ] ( d-2 - 3 ) ; ( d-2 - 1 ) edge node[description ] ( d-1 - 1 ) ( d-2 - 2 ) edge node[description ] ( d-1 - 2 ) ( d-2 - 3 ) edge node[description ] ( d-1 - 3 ) ; ( 1 ) at ( 3.8,0.7 ) dense ; ( 2 ) at ( -3.8,0.7 ) dense ; [ pro : windows_random ] let @xmath182 be a generating random noble means set . then , @xmath183 with @xmath184 $ ] .
assume there is a set @xmath185 in the internal space with the property @xmath186 . here
, the sets @xmath187 and @xmath188 denote the left endpoints of intervals generated by the letters @xmath144 and @xmath165 , respectively .
if @xmath182 is a generating random noble means set , the same is true for @xmath189 , and the sought - after sets @xmath187 and @xmath188 are invariant under @xmath57 .
now , consider @xmath190 and note that the interval @xmath191 $ ] is always mapped to the interval @xmath192 $ ] .
the sets @xmath187 and @xmath188 are consequently invariant under @xmath57 if and only if for all @xmath193 the inclusions @xmath194 hold . as conditions in the physical space
, we get for @xmath22 the @xmath195 systems @xmath196 and in the internal space the corresponding conjugate systems @xmath197 as only affine maps appear in eq .
@xmath198 , it suffices to investigate the extremal cases @xmath199 and @xmath200 .
furthermore , we can assume that @xmath201 and @xmath202 are closed intervals , because if @xmath203 satisfies all conditions of eq .
@xmath198 and is no interval , then define @xmath204 $ ] . as all involved maps are affine , @xmath205 also meets these conditions and we may define @xmath206 $ ] and @xmath207 $ ] . among the remaining conditions of eq .
@xmath198 , only the following six are not redundant : @xmath208 because of eqs .
@xmath209 to @xmath210 , we may assert the relative position @xmath211 of @xmath201 to @xmath202 .
this appears to be a linear optimisation problem , which is not uniquely solvable in general .
consequently , we additionally demand that the interval @xmath212 $ ] be minimal , which leads to the condition @xmath213 .
this equation describes the largest translation to the left and if @xmath214 , the length of @xmath215 was not minimal .
by solving the linear optimisation problem of eq .
@xmath198 under consideration of all given boundary conditions , we get the intervals @xmath216 , \quad b = [ \lambda_{m}^{\prime}-1,-\lambda_{m}^{\prime } ] \quad \text{and } \quad w_{m}^ { } = [ \lambda_{m}^{\prime}-1,1-\lambda_{m}^{\prime}].\ ] ] these intervals actually satisfy eq .
@xmath198 , because for @xmath200 we get @xmath217 \\ & \qquad\cup [ -1-m\lambda_{m}^{\prime},1+(m-1)\lambda_{m}^{\prime } ] \\ & = [ -1,-\lambda_{m}^{\prime } ] \cup [ -1-m\lambda_{m}^{\prime},1+(m-1)\lambda_{m}^{\prime } ] \\ & \subset [ -1,1-\lambda_{m}^{\prime } ] = a \intertext{and } \lambda_{m}^{\prime}a + m\lambda_{m}^{\prime } & = [ -(\lambda_{m}^{\prime})^2 + ( m+1)\lambda_{m}^{\prime},(m-1)\lambda_{m}^{\prime } ] \\ & = [ \lambda_{m}^{\prime}-1,(m-1)\lambda_{m}^{\prime } ] \\ & \subset [ \lambda_{m}^{\prime}-1,-\lambda_{m}^{\prime } ] = b. \end{aligned}\ ] ] analogously , we get the corresponding inclusions for @xmath199 .
furthermore , the minimality condition of @xmath215 is fulfilled because @xmath218 henceforth , we indicate the _ continuous random noble means hull _ by @xmath219 and denote any element in @xmath219 as a _ random noble means set_. we refer to ( * ? ? ?
5 ) for a broader overview in this regard .
[ thm : meyer ] each random noble means set @xmath220 is meyer .
let @xmath182 be a generating random noble means set .
evidently , @xmath182 is relatively dense in @xmath221 with covering radius @xmath222 and , by proposition [ pro : windows_random ] , it is a subset of the model set @xmath223 \bigr)$ ] .
the meyer property of @xmath182 then follows from ( * ? ? ?
we know that there is a generating random noble means set whose orbit is dense , @xmath182 say .
now , choose an arbitrary random noble means set @xmath220 and a converging sequence @xmath224 with limit @xmath225 . for any @xmath226
, we find @xmath227 and therefore @xmath228 which means that @xmath225 is uniformly discrete .
as the relative denseness of @xmath225 is clear , this proves the assertion .
in this last section , we present some results concerning the spectral nature of the diffraction measure of typical random noble means sets .
we refer to ( * ? ? ?
* chs . 8 and 9 ) for a detailed and readable introduction to diffraction theory of model sets ;
compare @xcite . to begin with , we briefly discuss the deterministic cases of @xmath32 that can be treated with results from the general theory .
[ cor : diffr_det ] for an arbitrary but fixed @xmath21 and @xmath22 , the diffraction measure of @xmath168 is a positive and positive definite , translation bounded , pure point measure .
it is explicitly given by @xmath229 with the amplitudes @xmath230 to begin with , we note that the fourier transform of the characteristic function of an interval @xmath231 \subset { \mathbb{r}}$ ] can be represented as @xmath232}^{}}(x ) = ( b - a ) \operatorname{e}^{-\pi{{\hspace{0.5pt}}\mathrm{i}{\hspace{0.5pt}}}x(a+b ) } \operatorname{sinc}\bigl ( \pi x ( b - a ) \bigr),\ ] ] where @xmath233 . a short calculation based on ( * ? ? ?
1 ) yields @xmath234 . combining this with ( * ? ? ?
9.4 ) and eqs .
@xmath209 to @xmath210 , we find @xmath235 by an application of eq .
@xmath236 . in the stochastic situation , we first have to take a closer look at the _ autocorrelation _ @xmath237 of any @xmath220 , which is defined by @xmath238 via regularisation of @xmath239 and an application of the ergodic theorem for continuous functions ( * ? ? ?
2.14z ) , we find that @xmath240 with @xmath241 the measure induced by _ suspension _ ( ( * ? ? ?
11 ) and ( * ? ? ?
6.1 ) ) of @xmath107 . here
, @xmath237 is positive definite by construction and its fourier transform exists due to ( * ? ? ?
* sec . 4 ) .
we find @xmath242 where @xmath243 is the variance of @xmath244 provided that all limits exist .
the idea of breaking up @xmath245 according to first and second moments will result in @xmath246 containing the pure point part and @xmath247 being the absolutely continuous part of @xmath245 . in the following
, we will restrict to the special case of @xmath248 and consider suitable subsequences to ensure the convergence in eq .
the general case of @xmath21 can be treated similarly . for @xmath250
, we define the sequence @xmath251 that possesses the closed form @xmath252 for any @xmath253 and furthermore , we set @xmath254 where @xmath255 and @xmath256
. moreover , we define the sequences @xmath257 and derive results on the convergence of @xmath258 and @xmath259 . we proceed with the derivation of recursion formulas for @xmath260 and @xmath261 . for the sake of readability , we introduce the following abbreviations .
@xmath262 for any @xmath253 and @xmath263 . using the definition of @xmath264 in eq .
@xmath265 , it is immediate that for @xmath250 , we have @xmath266 where @xmath267 and @xmath268 .
firstly , we consider the sequence @xmath259 .
applying eq .
@xmath269 for any @xmath250 , we find @xmath270 \bigr\ } \\ & \qquad + 2\operatorname{re}\bigl [ \bigl(p_{0}^ { } \operatorname{e}_{n-2}^ { } + p_{1}^ { } \overline{\operatorname{e}_{n-1}^ { } } \bigr ) \bigl ( { \mathbb{e}}(x_{n-1}^ { } \overline{x_{n-2}^ { } } ) - { \mathbb{e}}_{n-1}^ { } \overline{{\mathbb{e}}_{n-2}^ { } } \bigr ) \bigr ] \tag{$\ast$ } \label{hin : indep}\\ & = { \mathbb{v}}_{n-1}^ { } + { \mathbb{v}}_{n-2}^ { } + 2p_{0}^{}p_{1}^ { } \psi_{n}^ { } , \end{aligned}\ ] ] with @xmath271 and @xmath272 \notag\\ & = \frac{1}{2}\bigl\lvert ( 1-\operatorname{e}_{n-2}^ { } ) { \mathbb{e}}_{n-1}^ { } - ( 1-\operatorname{e}_{n-1}^ { } ) { \mathbb{e}}_{n-2}^ { } \bigr\rvert^{2 } { \geqslant}0 , \label{equ : delta_quad } \end{aligned}\ ] ] for any @xmath250 .
we have used that @xmath273 in ( @xmath274 ) which is a consequence of the independence of the random variables @xmath264 ( * ? ? ?
* rem . 6.16 ) .
our study of the sequence @xmath275 proceeds with some preparing notes on the sequence @xmath276 ; see also figure [ fig : deltadiff ] . [
lem : delta_func ] for all @xmath250 , the function @xmath277 is real analytic .
moreover , one has @xmath278 and @xmath279 for all @xmath263 . the representation of eq .
@xmath280 immediately shows the analyticity of @xmath277 because sums and products of trigonometric functions are real analytic .
next , we observe that @xmath281 now , for @xmath250 we define @xmath282 .
applying the recursion for @xmath283 once on the first summand and using the recursion @xmath284 implies @xmath285 this yields the monotonicity of @xmath277 because @xmath286 and therefore @xmath287 for @xmath288 ( grey ) , @xmath289 ( dark grey ) and @xmath290 ( light grey ) . ]
[ pro : radon_niko_density ] for any @xmath291 , consider the function @xmath292 , defined by @xmath293 on @xmath221 , the sequence @xmath294 converges uniformly to the continuous function @xmath295 , with @xmath296 from the recursion relation @xmath297 , we conclude the representation @xmath298 where @xmath299 denotes the @xmath0th fibonacci number as introduced after eq .
@xmath78 on page .
next , we observe that @xmath300 is convergent because an application of lemma [ lem : delta_func ] yields @xmath301 thus , @xmath300 is bounded and the sum consists of non - negative elements only .
the uniformity of the convergence is implied by the following short calculation @xmath302 and both summands in the last line converge to zero , as @xmath303 .
this means that @xmath304 which at the same time implies the continuity of @xmath300 .
the roots of @xmath300 are precisely the roots of @xmath305 , and they are given by all integer multiples of @xmath306 . with @xmath307 . ] for @xmath308 , the recursion formula for @xmath309 in eq .
@xmath310 can be rewritten as @xmath311 considering each factor of the product in eq .
@xmath312 separately and including @xmath313 for any @xmath314 , we explore the function @xmath315 that is defined as @xmath316 here , for all @xmath317 , the set of roots of @xmath318 reads @xmath319 moreover , the expression @xmath320 vanishes on all @xmath321 .
this implies that @xmath322 is the set of roots of @xmath323 for all @xmath308 . because of lemma [ lem : delta_func ] and the representation of @xmath300 in eq .
@xmath324 , this implies that @xmath325 is the set of roots of @xmath300 .
with @xmath326 , based on the recursion of eq .
@xmath265 with @xmath327 . ] finally , proposition [ pro : radon_niko_density ] implies the vague convergence of the sequence @xmath259 and the existence of @xmath328 immediately yields the vague convergence of @xmath258 .
therefore , we almost surely find that @xmath329 where the precise nature of @xmath330 stays an open question and needs further study in the future
. following hof ( * ? ? ?
3.2 ) , we find @xmath331 and a sketch of @xmath332 and @xmath328 is illustrated in figures [ fig : pp_gl ] and [ fig : fulldiffr ] , respectively .
this paper establishes a first systematic step into the realm of local mixtures of substitution rules .
the choice of the noble means example promised some technical simplifications because all members of @xmath32 define the same two - sided discrete hull .
one obvious extension of the rnms case can be found in the local mixture of families that do no longer share this property . concerning the computation of the topological entropy ,
this has recently been done for some case by nilsson @xcite .
more generally , one may raise the question which properties a family of substitutions must have in order to preserve the features that were derived in this treatment . leaving the realm of symbolic dynamics and one - dimensional inflation rules , one significant enhancement of the theory
would be a two or three - dimensional example .
the ( locally ) random penrose tiling was already discussed by godrche and luck ( * ? ? ?
5.2 ) , although a deeper mathematical analysis is desirable here , too .
the author wishes to thank michael baake , tobias jakobi and johan nilsson for helpful discussions .
this work is supported by the german research foundation ( dfg ) via the collaborative research centre ( crc 701 ) through the faculty of mathematics of bielefeld university .
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Kluski singular: klusek or kluska; from German klöße is a generic Polish name for all kinds of soft, mushy dumplings, usually without a filling. At times the word also refers to noodles and pasta as well, especially when they are served in soup.
There are many different types of kluski, differing in basic ingredients and preparation method. Kluski are distinct from pierogi and stand-alone pasta dishes.
Varieties
Kopytka little hooves are prepared from mashed potatoes, flour, and eggs. They are similar to Italian gnocchi, differing mostly in shape, as they are supposed to resemble animal hooves.
Kluski leniwe lazy dumplings are sometimes called pierogi leniwe despite being a type of kluski rather than pierogi. They are made from fresh cheese twaróg, flour, and eggs, and often sweetened with sugar. The name refers to easy and quick preparation from scratch, ideal for a lazy cook. The traditional shape is flat, cut diagonally into diamonds, with a slight check pattern on top. These are one of the few sweet varieties, especially when served to children, although there are savory recipes as well.
Kluski śląskie Silesian dumplings are round, flattened dumplings with the size ranging from 3 centimeters to 5 centimeters, made from mashed potatoes, potato flour, and eggs. Usually served with gravy, their distinctive feature is a small hole or dimple in the middle. Kluski czarne black dumplings, also known as kluski żelazne iron dumplings or kluski szare gray dumplings, is a variety of kluski śląskie popular in Upper Silesia. In addition to mashed potatoes and flour, grated potatoes are added to the dough, giving it a distinctive color. In regions where these are popular, both white and black dumplings are served at the same meal.
Kluski lane poured noodles, a very thin variety formed by pouring watery batter made from eggs and flour into boiling water or directly into soup.
Kluski kładzione laid dumplings, a variety made from eggs, milk and flour, formed into a crescent-shaped forms by scraping the thick dough with the tip of a tablespoon and then laying the chunk onto boiling water. Soda water is sometimes added to the dough.
Pampuchy, also known as pyzy drożdżowe yeast pyzy, kluski drożdżowe yeast dumplings, kluski na parze steamed dumplings, or regionally kluchy z łacha dumplings from a rag or in Silesia buchty not to be confused with a kind rolls of the same name, a variety popular mainly in Greater Poland, distantly related to Czech knedliky from German Knödel. They differ from other varieties in being prepared from leavened, yeast dough and steamed rather than boiled. Often served with sweet toppings, such as melted butter and sugar, or a sauce from strawberries or plum powidła.
Pyzy ziemniaczane potato pyzy, the only variety of kluski with a filling, made from raw or mashed potatoes, flour and eggs. These are usually larger than other kluski, round, with either savory or sweet filling. When sweet, they are also called knedle, while savory ones vary wildly by the region and can be similar to Lithuanian cepelinai.
Kluchy połom bite
See also
Knedle, a variety of sweet, stuffed dumplings
Pierogi, a Polish variety of stuffed dumplings
Klöße, a similar German dish
Halušky, a similar dish popular in Central and Eastern Europe
Gnocchi, a similar Italian dish
Nokedli, a similar Hungarian dish
References
Category:Dumplings
Category:Polish cuisine
Category:Silesian cuisine | wikipedia |
Sailor Moon 1. Chapter 1
**Rating:** PG-13
**Disclaimer: **I don't own them. If I did, there would have been even more angst in Sailor Stars.
**Summary:** In episode 65, Usagi and her friends entered a charm shop. The charms were designed to turn the wishes made into the opposite and intensify these emotions. What would have happened if Usagi had made her wish? Chaos and insanity, of course!
**AN: **This is all for Antigone2. It started out as a drabble, but she gave me an idea that sparked this story to its completion. It is crackfic at its finest, yet with little characterization murder. Personalities have been exaggerated somewhat, of course, and great liberties were taken. Also, thanks to Jessi for a few suggestions. I do have this written to the end. The only reason I am not posting it all at once is because I have no idea if I'll get any more insane ideas from this. Any suggestions would be nice. But remember, no serious maiming allowed.
Also important to remember while reading this is that Mamoru _is_ my favorite character. I just enjoy picking on him at times.
* * *
"I wish Mamo-chan will love me forever again."
It was a wish made on a charm. It was supposed to make everything okay again, turn things back to as they once were.
As Minako and Makoto fought behind her, Usagi felt something shift and change inside her. What was once pure and never ending tilted and warped in her chest to the point that she thought maybe it had always been there.
Events, past emotions, and everything in between came clear. Usagi realized now what she should have from the beginning. She could step back and analyze the situation without the foolish blinders of love obscuring her view.
"Of course, there's only Mamoru for Usagi."
His name seared through her gut. It was not the pain she had slowly been growing accustomed to over the past few weeks. Instead it coiled and stretched throughout her limbs and wrapped around her heart until she was heavy with it. It gave her a strength she never knew she had.
It was an unfamiliar feeling, one that sizzled along the nerves and made her fingers twitch. It was similar to the love she knew she once felt, but where before she had been light and care free, now she was heavy and everything was all too clear.
Then the atmosphere charged and she could almost taste him on the air. She turned and saw as he pushed his way into the curtained room. As his shocked eyes locked with hers, Usagi recognized the intensifying feeling trying to claw its way out of her throat.
Hate.
Usagi could not hear him speak. If he so much as opened his mouth, she knew she would not be responsible for her actions.
Then he opened his mouth.
And called her Usako.
How dare he.
_How dare he?_
Before she knew what she was even doing, Usagi lunged.
Xo
Mamoru had not expected to run into Usagi at the charm shop, despite the fact that he knew it would offer charms to broken hearted girls who wished for the return of love in their lives. Why would Usagi come here, anyway? The idea was preposterous!
What was even more preposterous was what was happening now. He was used to her tackling and bone crushing hugs, but that was always the worst of it. Now, she was clawing and kicking and, if he didn't know any better, hissing.
"What is wrong with you?" he asked.
"I hate your face!" she exclaimed.
Ouch. That hurt like pain.
He rolled them over so that she was beneath him as his hands held down her wrists. He was, of course, too preoccupied by her intents at maiming and inflicting bodily harm to consider the precarious position they were now in, or how her obvious temper caused her to squirm.
Nope.
Not one bit.
He was quite proud of himself for this, too.
In fact, he was so _not_ occupied with the fact that her cute little self was pressing and shifting against him that his brain blanked out for the first time in his life. All he could do was stare dumbly down at her as incoherent noises shoved their way through his throat.
So he was shocked, really, when she managed to push him off and transform into Sailor Moon.
"Gasp! Sailor Moon, where did you come from?" Petz asked from behind him. "And what did you do with that girl who bears no resemblance to you aside from hair style, stature, and demeanor?"
Sailor Moon paid no attention to Petz as her eyes zeroed in on Mamoru. She raised her wand and called out her attack cry. Fortunately for him, it took long enough that he could duck out of the way. Unfortunately for the enemy, they still had yet to learn the art of tactical retreat.
"My merchandise! My minion! You shall pay for this!" Petz declared as she and her sister disappeared from view.
Maybe if he appeased her somehow, all would be right in the world. "Good work, Sailor Moon, you have dispatched of the enemy!"
"Gosh darn dang nabbit, I missed! Would you hold still, Mamoru? I must defeat you!"
_Mamoru._
She called him _Mamoru._
His heart sank to beneath the floorboards as he staggered, clutching his chest at the physical pain her word inflicted. Even after he broke up with her, she still insisted on calling him Mamo-chan, a familiarity he could never ask her not to use. But now. Oh, now.
"I don't get it," he heard Makoto speak behind her. "The enemy is defeated. Why is she still acting like this?"
"Maybe she really does hate Mamoru now?" Minako offered.
Ouch. That idea almost hurt as much as Usagi calling him Mamoru did.
He sat there, prepared to take whatever Usagi through his way. He would gladly accept it, as surely it would be better than this turmoil.
Apparently, her friends had other ideas.
"Um, Sailor Moon, why don't you go ahead and detransform now? There's a sale on plushies just down the street," Makoto suggested.
Usagi's eyes lit up, just as they once did for him but now never would again. "Plushies!" Once again, she turned from guardian of love and justice and into the girl he loved once more. "We shall continue this another time!"
And with that, she was gone, taking the shattered and tattered remains of his heart with her.
Xo
"Usagi, don't you think you are taking things a bit far?" Luna cast a wary eye at her charge who was busy cackling over a pink notebook and scribbling away with a fluffy tipped pen.
"I can never take things too far with this, Luna!" Usagi exclaimed as she slammed her pen down. Standing up, the young girl shoved up the sleeves of her pink striped shirt. "Operation Get Mamoru Where It Hurts Most is now underway!"
"And just what is it you plan to do, Usagi?" Luna did not want to know. Really, she did not. However, curiosity killed the cat, and she had at least six lives left.
"You shall see, Luna! You shall see!" Usagi managed to reign in her maniacal laughter a split second before picking up the phone.
Xo
Mamoru jumped at the sound of his phone ringing. He eyed the appliance in apprehension, wondering if maybe it was just work calling in to ask him to do a double shift that night. He hoped so. Usako did not know where his current place of employment was, and he hoped to keep it that way.
Swallowing, he picked up the phone. "Chiba residence." _Please let it be work, please let it be work._
"Mamoru! It is I!" His heart plummeted at the sound of Usako's voice, and even more so at the increasingly familiar sound of maniacal glee.
He braced himself with a sigh. First, it had been her sudden attack at the charm shop. Then there had been the unfortunate incident with the faux chocolate. (Who would make fake chocolate, anyway? It just wasn't natural!) And who could forget what happened with the bottle of glue and his chemistry notebook?
And also, when did she start calling him Mamoru? What happened to Mamo-chan? It was like an arrow thrown at his already bleeding heart.
"Usako, don't you think you've taken things far enough?"
"Silence! You no longer have the right to call me that!" Instead of hurt and angry, her tone was imperious and demanding. It did not suit her.
"Um, right. So why are you calling?" Please let it be about bunnies. Or rainbows. Or any of the other countless topics she used to call him to discuss at length.
"Oh ho ho ho, Mamoru. I know you're a very reliable patient when it comes to doctor appointments!"
"Why yes, actually, I believe it is important to maintain one's health. Don't you?" If he kept calm, tried to talk to her as though nothing was wrong, maybe then things would return to normal.
"Well, you should know, Mamoru! I have made a few calls to your doctor!" Was that even legal? "And you shall be happy to know that you have an appointment next Tuesday for…" Her dramatic pause was very effective. "_Twenty years' worth of shots seeing as how all of your shot records have been mysteriously misplaced! OH HO HO HO!"_
There was a click. And then the dial tone rung in his ears, though he did not hear it.
Shots.
Those involved needles.
That girl was _dangerous!_
In a fit of panicked fervor, he quickly wondered just how much a plane ticket to Tazmania would cost.
2. Chapter 2
Chapter Two
**Rating:** PG-13
**Disclaimer: **I don't own them. If I did, there would have been even more angst in Sailor Stars.
**Summary:** In episode 65, Usagi and her friends entered a charm shop. The charms were designed to turn the wishes made into the opposite and intensify these emotions. What would have happened if Usagi had made her wish? Chaos and insanity, of course!
**AN:** Unless I get some more ideas for this, which is unlikely, this story is finished. However, any suggestions on what you wanna see would be welcome.
* * *
Usagi cackled at her prize. It had taken a dose of distraction, an ounce of determination, two-parts grit and three parts nerve, but she had done it.
She tucked the notebook in her school satchel as she raced from the Crown, planning on being long gone by the time he even suspected something was amiss.
"Usagi, what are you up to?"
The girl whipped around to see Makoto lingering on the sidewalk.
"Absolutely nothing! I did not steal Mamoru's English midterm essay and replace it with an X-Files crackfic hentai about Mulder and Scully's mother!" She clutched her satchel tightly to her chest as she eyed her friend up and down.
"I…wasn't asking about that. But while we're on the subject, I think you're taking this revenge thing a bit too far, don't you?"
Usagi thought long and hard. Were her plots to bring ruin on the man who was once her beloved going too far? Was she getting too entangled in revenge that she could see nothing else? Was this just a cover up for how she truly felt, deep down, and was in all actuality a lonely girl crying into an emptying pack of Pocky sticks? The answer was so obvious that she was surprised she had not seen it before! "No."
"Usako, what did you take?"
Mamoru sounded out of breath as he limped their way. Usagi had seen the numerous bandages on his arms, and even knew of the shot that she herself had received on her posterior when she had only been but ten years old, too young to know the pains and brutalities that a visit to the physician could bring.
"Nothing!" she declared.
"Come on, Usako, I don't have time for this," he implored.
"Silence, you!" she screamed as she pointed her finger at him. "I shall not be swayed by your exquisitely handsome face that is made up of such sheer perfection it brings a banana split with all the fixings to shame!"
"Usako-"
"Silence, I say! And be gone, for you have that English midterm essay due today, and I would very much like for you to do well!"
Mamoru blinked, then turned and walked away.
"Victory shall be mine, Chiba!"
Xo
Fortunately for Mamoru, he had printed out an extra copy of his essay. Unfortunately for him, he had left it at home.
With a sigh, he crumpled up the badly written X-Files pornographic material and tossed it in a recycle bin.
He was going to be so late for class.
Xo
"Next for my dastardly plans," Usagi began as she twirled her handle bar mustache. "I have set in motion a series of events which will _ensure_ his downfall!"
Luna blinked at her. "Seriously, Usagi, I'm beginning to think that maybe there's something wrong with you."
"Wrong? How can there be anything wrong?" Usagi asked as she shrugged. "All I'm doing is trying to bring down the one person I used to love more than life itself in a series of events that would ensure his sanity is never the same again. Whatever could be wrong with that?"
Luna groaned and buried her head under the pillow. "There was a reason why Queen Serenity remained single…"
"What? What did you say?"
"Oh, nothing." Luna sighed as she came back from under her pillow. "So do tell, Usagi, what is this glorious plan of yours?"
"Well you see, my cavorting cat of corruption," Usagi began as she picked Luna up, sat on the edge of her bed, and stroked the fur in a way that could only be described as diabolical plotting in some lines of profession. Luna was not ashamed to admit she purred. "I have purchased on my way home a marker."
"A marker. Don't you already have seventeen packs of unused strawberry scented markers somewhere in here?"
"Those were on sale, Luna, and obviously I would stock up!" Usagi cackled. "But no. This marker is different. This marker is…_black permanent marker!"_
Luna gasped. Not from shock of the bland revelation, but because in order to brandish her new purchase, Usagi had abruptly stood and unceremoniously dumped the feline to the floor.
"Very nice marker, Usagi. What do you plan to do with it?"
"Oh, you shall see, Luna. You shall see!"
Luna sighed and hopped up on the bed. "Before you go, come down here a second, would you?"
Usagi leaned closer, and Luna snagged her claw on one handle of mustache. "Take this ridiculous thing off!"
Usagi yelped as she jerked back, hand clasping up to her upper lip. "Luna! Those were glued on!"
"They looked ridiculous."
Xo
Usagi, now red lipped and nursing a wounded pride, snuck around in the back of the Crown Parlor. Her plan was perfect, figured out down to the last detail. She found a box she was looking for and cackled as she upended the contents into the large basin sink.
Then she pulled out her new black permanent marker. Uncapping it, she took a delicate whiff before scrunching up her nose. "Oh, that smells like victory and death."
Then she sneezed.
Trying to muffle her maniacal laughter, for it would do her no good to be caught now, she found the other boxed she was looking for. Decaf.
Stifling her giggles, she looked all around her to make certain no one was looking. Then she scribbled out the 'de.'
"Yes, Mamoru, soon you shall have no reprieve! You will be forced to drink decaf! And with that 'present' I gave to Chibi-Usa to deliver to you, who is now an unwitting accomplice to my dastardly plans, you shall have no escape! What she does not realize is that the contents in the bag of gourmet coffee have actually been switched with the grounds of a cheap store brand decaf coffee!"
She could not help herself then. Throwing her head back, she let forth her most maniacal and dastardly laugh.
Just as Motoki poked his head in to see if she had found her fuzzy pink pen, another evil thought of retribution crossed her mind. She fingered the charm she had made her wish on, for she always kept it on her person. It seemed to fuel her hate and instill even more insidious ideas.
Yes. Oh yes.
Mamoru was doomed!
Xo
The world seemed to hate him just as much as Usagi did. His head pounded and felt as though it would cave, even after his fourth cup of coffee. It did nothing but make him need to use the restroom more.
The counter at the Crown was offering little relief to his pounding head when he felt the familiar tug of Sailor Moon's transformation.
With a sigh, he stood from the counter and stagger out onto the sidewalk and for the nearest alley. While she was certainly plotting his demise, he could not just leave her to her distress.
He felt the familiar flutter of the cape around him as he hopped off into the night.
He found them, Sailor Moon pinned against the wall as Petz made her attack. Reaching in his pocket, he threw his trusty rose at their enemy. It made a sloppy wet 'ploit' noise on impact just as always.
Wait. Ploit?
Petz shrieked at the slimy substance on her face. "Sardines! Who dares to throw sardines!"
Sardines? Where did those come from?
Reaching into his coat pocket, he pulled out a fistful of the tiny salty fish. He could hear the sounds of Sailor Moon's maniacal laughter below as he took in the slimy little dead creatures.
"And who is that man up there? Kaito Kid?"
It was then he realized that his once black as night tuxedo had been bleached to a near perfect white! How could he not have realized this before?
"No, Kaito has a monocle. Besides, that's a different anime altogether," Rubeus pointed out over the ever rising sounds of Sailor Moon's glee. "Though I must admit, there's something about that Detective Takagi I quite admire."
"No one cares about your obscure comments that few people will get, Rubeus," Koan pointed out. "However, I admit. White after Labor Day, for shame!"
"That's the wrong country, you twit!" Rubeus roared.
"Sardines! On my face! Until we meet again!" With that, the Dark Moon Clan disappeared.
The fight finished, and he hadn't even been able to use the witty retort he had planned the whole way there, Mamoru hopped off into the night and detransformed. Something felt off, however, and he was not long to discover that his beautiful purple slacks had been replaced by perfectly comfortable and functional pair of jeans.
His very identity! That which he had spent years cultivating and fine tuning to a precise art! Oh, that girl was a demon!
3. Chapter 3
Chapter Three
**Rating:** PG-13
**Disclaimer: **I don't own them. If I did, there would have been even more angst in Sailor Stars.
**Summary:** In episode 65, Usagi and her friends entered a charm shop. The charms were designed to turn the wishes made into the opposite and intensify these emotions. What would have happened if Usagi had made her wish? Chaos and insanity, of course!
**AN: **All done! It's complete! Yay!
* * *
Usagi had never felt such glee as she raced home after the evening's fight. The look on his face! Priceless!
She needed more dastardly deeds to inflict on her now nemesis. Well, he used to be her nemesis, then they were entangled in a timeless romance, then he forgot her, then they got back together, then he dumped her. The fiend! But she would have her revenge!
And she knew the perfect way!
"Usagi, I think this has gone on far enough," Luna admitted when she leaped on the bed. "I fear you may escalate to murder, the rate you're going."
Usagi gasped at the implication. "Luna, just because I want his perfect body harmed does not mean I would stoop so low as to murder him! Besides, his pride is much more important than his life, you know."
"I just think you've done enough. Revenge has been sought, found, and beat into the ground."
"Hardly! I hate him with a fiery passion! Why, it burns so intensely that were it love, which it is not, we would be frolicking in the meadows toward one another for a romantic embrace!" She sat next to the cat and gave a haughty sniff. "Besides, I have barely begun to revengerize!"
"I don't think that's a word. It gets a red squiggle in spell-check."
"As does my name, but it is still a word! " Usagi leaped from her bed once more as a plan struck her. "I have a plan!"
"Oh dear goodness…"
Usagi rummaged through countless bags on her floor before removing a bottle and a package. She turned from Luna and prepared a concoction so great that she wondered why she had not thought of it before.
"All I need is my unwitting partner in crime to place this bottle of body wash in his apartment!"
Xo
Mamoru slid into his regular stool at the Arcade and gave Motoki a withering glare. "Not one word."
Motoki gaped like a gaping fish at his friend, but thought better of it.
"Why, Mamoru, we're looking a bit…_blue_ today!"
He winced at the sound of her sweet voice, once full of love and adoration. Her time fighting bad guys had paid off, for now she sounded just as diabolical as the best of them.
"Imagine that, Usako. I wonder how that happened." His head still pounded and ached. He hoped if he upped the amount of coffee he drank it would get better.
"How many times must I tell you not to call me by that name anymore!" She stormed to his peripheral vision. "You shall not sway me by such a sweet name being uttered by your perfect mouth, you fiend!"
Mamoru blinked at Usagi. "And what will you do if I stop calling you Usako, Usako?"
It was her turn to blink. "What I won't do is sit up in my room and cry like a girl!"
"You are a girl."
"Well, a really whiny aardvark, then!"
He took a sip of his acrid beverage. The stuff was becoming more and more awful, but he was desperate for a bit of caffeine. Maybe his brain receptors, after years of abuse, finally decided to stop accepting the potent and wonderful drug. It was something he would need to look into.
"So tell me how you managed this scheme," he said. "It's rather quite ingenious."
He could feel her preen beside him. "I merely added some blue dye to body wash and had Chibi-Usa replace it in your shower when she last visited."
Mamoru choked on his coffee. "You mean Chibi-Usa is in on this, as well?"
"Oh ho ho ho, don't be silly! She still thinks the sun rises and sets on your glorious and wonderful persona, and still dreams of you at night despite her obvious hate- I mean, no. She just thought it was a present."
"You're devious, you know that?"
"Of course I do! So tell me, Mamoru. How long before you discovered the dye?"
"When I got out of the shower," he admitted, not wanting to admit that he was the walking embodiment of more than one figure of speech involving the color blue and body parts. "Fortunately for you, I have a presentation to give today."
"Oh happy day! I promise to bask in your abject humiliation!" She then turned and skipped out of the Arcade, him watching all the while. Her plans were becoming more and more troublesome. Sure, he could put a stop to them, but he just could not bring himself to do it.
Xo
"Ami, I have a favor to ask!" Usagi asked as she sat next to her friend.
Her friend looked up from her homework, and extra credit, and side projects, and research for a grant, and anything else she decided to accomplish that afternoon. "No."
"Oh please, you don't even know what it is!"
Ami resumed her reading. "I know it will involve Mamoru."
"Yes! It will! You're so smart!"
"I'm not doing anything to him."
"Please?" Usagi implored. However, Ami would not budge. Usagi thought for a moment before her eyes lit up. "I promise I'll study for an hour!"
Ami paused in her reading. "No slipping Manga between the pages this time?"
Usagi slumped. Gosh, Ami was good! But this was for a good cause! "Fine, I promise."
Ami closed her book. "I'm listening."
Xo
9:00 PM
Sleep. Glorious sleep. He had a test tomorrow, and had prepared for it all week. His bed was warm and inviting.
Just as he was about to fall into blissful oblivion, the phone rang. Grumbling, he got up and answered the phone.
"Hello?"
The response was a song the sent instant dread through his veins.
"No…" He slammed the phone down and scurried off to bed. She wouldn't have!
Would she?
10:00 PM
He was dreaming of a picnic with a certain girl who despised him. Only instead of hate, there was love. At least, he liked to believe.
The phone rang.
Before he could think, he staggered out of bed and answered the phone. "'Ello?"
The same song pounded through his ear drums.
Slamming the receiver down, he scurried off to bed and his under his pillow.
11:00 PM
The phone rang again.
It was the same song!
12:00, 1:00, 2:00, 3:00, 3:15, 4:07, 4:30, 5:00, 6:00, 9:00 AM
The answering machine was full. The song played through his dreams all night until he dreamed of nothing but it. Hamsters danced through his brain as he poured what he believed to be coffee into a mug.
It was luke warm soda.
Getting dressed took two hours.
He was late for his test. He was sure he drooled through half of it.
At the Crown, after missing his mark the first time and ending on the floor, he slumped in his stool and nearly fell asleep in his mug of coffee.
"What's wrong, Mamoru?" Motoki asked.
"That song…it won't get out of my head!"
"Which song?"
"The Hamster Dance!" Mamoru banged his head on the counter. Every hour on the hour. And at 4:07! Who does that at such an unusual time? She's trying to kill me, Motoki! Kill me!"
"Who is?"
Mamoru yelped at the sound of her voice, and he found himself on the counter. "Usako. Hi."
"Mamoru, we're planning a game of Frisbee in the park. You wanna join us?"
He eyed her. "What's the catch?"
"Oh, no catch! What harm could I possibly do? I am terrible at sports!"
This was true. It was very true! But still. "I don't think that would be a good idea."
"Please?" How could he resist when she did that? And he was so far into sleep deprivation that his nerves were frazzled and his defenses low.
"I guess one game wouldn't hurt."
Half an hour later, the last thing he heard before getting a chest full of Frisbee was "Moon Tiara Magic!"
It wasn't the blow to the chest that hurt, of course it stung a little. It wasn't even the fall into unconsciousness as he finally found some sleep in the damp grass. No, what hurt was that when he drifted off, he saw hundreds of Usakos dancing around, each one singing the Hamster Dance Song.
Xo
Usagi hummed a happy tune as she skipped down the sidewalk. Up ahead was her arch nemesis, sun casting a glow about his perfectly perfect hair, bringing out the different fibers of his green jacket, and the wind blew his scent her way. Oh, how she loathed him with every fiber of her being and longed to run her fingers through his hair once more. Before yanking really hard and making him go 'ow' of course. Because she loathed him. Yes. Wonderously so.
Her next plan was so brilliant that she wondered why she never thought of it before.
Her skipping pace notched up a bit so that she caught up with him quite easily. "Hello, Mamoru! I have something delicious planned for you today."
"Oh really?" he asked, trepidation obvious in his tone. "What would that be?"
"You'll have to wait and find out!"
Then she skipped merrily ahead, leaving him to stew and ponder.
She had nothing planned, of course, but his brain would take care of him no problem.
Usagi was so preoccupied with her own deviousness that she ran into a pole. Her charm fell to the sidewalk and was shattered by countless pedestrians strolling past.
Her mind altered and shift in an instant as hate turned once again to love.
Xo
Every moment was agony as he waited for her next plan to strike. Each noise made him jump while every gust of wind nearly had him shrieking and scurrying up a light pole.
Devious woman.
He caught sight of her familiar hair up ahead. Unable to take it anymore, he raced to catch up. "Usako!"
She stopped and turned and just stared at him.
"I need to know what you're planning next."
Her eyes grew large, and were he not aware of her current dislike of him, he would have recognized it for what it once was. "Mamo-chan, does this mean you're talking to me again?"
What? No! His heart soared at her nickname for him, though he knew it was some sort of trick! "I won't be fooled by you!"
Her nose crinkled, it was so adorable that he almost swayed in his resolve. "What do you mean?"
"Your tricks will not get passed me! I know you've been plotting something, but I don't know what it is!"
Usako blinked and tilted her head and reached for him. "Whatever it is, you know we can work it out."
He knew how he must look. Wild eyed, frantic, nearly insane with worry. But he did not care. If she touched him once, it would all be over.
That's it! That was her plan! She finally uprooted the one thing that would break him! She was even more devious than he thought! "No!" he shrieked, stepping well out of her range of reach. "I will not let you!"
Her eyes welled up with tears. Curses, she was good! She knew his weakness all too well! He stumbled over the sidewalk as he tried to get away. "You…you won't succeed in this. I'll resist it! I won't fall for this! I won't believe what isn't there!"
With that, he ran away from her and to the only sanctuary he could think of.
Motoki stood behind the counter and ignored his disheveled appearance. "Oh hey, I have something to confess. Somehow, the regular coffee was switched with decaf."
Mamoru's eyes widened as realization poured through his mind.
That woman!
She would be the death of him!
Xo
Usagi moped all the way home. The last few weeks had been a blur. She knew Mamo-chan had been there, and a lot, but that was about all she remembered.
She reached her bed and plopped down face first.
"So, what are you planning today, Usagi?"
Usagi lifted her head from her pillow and glared at Luna. "What is with that question? First Mamo-chan, now you?"
The cat blinked. "Well, I just figured you had something else in store for poor Mamoru. What is it this time? Are you going to call his school and say he moonlights as a male stripper?"
Usagi's face turned ten shades of red. "I would never do that to him!"
Luna's eyes lit up. "Usagi! You're back to normal?"
"Of course! When was I not normal?" Usagi eyed her cat companion. "Can you tell me what's been going on?"
As Luna gave a detailed account of the past few weeks, Usagi felt mortification well up inside her. Then she thought about their recent encounter and felt hope flutter its way awkwardly into her chest.
"Oh! Then he meant! And so that means! Oh my goodness, Luna!"
"What? What is it? What's wrong?"
The way he looked when he believed her to be fooling him! The fear! The abject terror in his eyes! There was still something he felt for her! "There's still hope!"
"Well, that's good to hear."
"Now all I have to do is plot a way to get him back!" Then she cackled in a way that she never had before, yet somehow felt familiar.
-end
End file.
| fanfiction |
the logistics and health economics that surround the provision of intensive care services in the developed world are as complex and fast moving as critical care medicine itself .
nowhere else will issues of funding and delivery be felt more acutely and be more politically visible than when the transfer of critically ill patients is needed because of lack of local resources .
transfer of critically ill patients is an integral part of the health care system in both developing and developed countries . in taiwan , which has a rapidly developing critical care network ,
it is the transfer of sick patients that has proved to be the achilles ' heel of the service .
one study showed that 55% of transfers fell below the standard required by law . in australia transfer of patients from distant rural locations to city centre
tertiary referral hospitals produces beneficial outcomes in only some diagnostic categories . for example , patients who had suffered a cardiac arrest had higher than predicted mortality after transfer . when the physician accompanied transport system was assessed in canada
there was serious morbidity in 7% of transfers , with mortality figures approaching 1% . even in well - developed european countries without the problems associated with large land mass , inadequacies in intensive care transfers
there are 6000 transfers per year , but when analysed these were found to have been undertaken with inadequate monitoring and arbitrary planning .
although there are many different forces that drive the transfer of critically ill patients , it is clear that minimization and organization of such journeys should become a priority .
nowhere is this more clear than in the uk , where there are fewer critical care beds per person than in other comparative european countries .
this has led to large numbers of critically ill patients being transported between hospitals , predominantly by road . in 1995 a junior hospital doctor could not find a bed for a road traffic accident victim in london .
the patient was eventually flown to leeds general infirmary , but died during the journey . in an attempt to address this problem , a national intensive care unit ( icu )
this system is currently run by the emergency bed service ( ebs ) , a system that is based on telephone survey of available critical care beds .
ebs statistics ( h salihson , personal communication , 2001 ) show that the number of enquiries for icu beds in england did not change between december 1996 and august 2000 .
one audit found that half of all transport of critically ill individuals is needed because of lack of beds or staff ; indeed , ebs figures reveal that only approximately 25% of transfers in england are currently for specialist services .
although the latter is not the bulk of the workload , numbers of such transfers will only rise with the increasing trend to centralize such services . in december 1999 ,
when there were over 1200 enquiries to the ebs , resulting in almost 1000 transfers , it issued its first ever warning that icu beds were in short supply .
the problem remains so common that the uk department of health has issued guidelines regarding which critically ill patients should be transferred .
such transfers , even when possible , are not benign . during the napoleonic wars ,
baron jean larrey was the first to describe the benefits of rapid transfer of patients .
the time taken , quality of transfer and distance travelled are now known to impact on subsequent patient outcome .
indeed , at a time when acute resuscitation of an individual should take priority , efforts are instead being spent on attempting to find an icu bed for that individual .
first , because there are only three telephone enquiries per day , there is a considerable lag time on bed availability .
many units also retain beds for ' internal ' or ' specialist ' use only , some of which may not be declared , whereas others transfer without using the ebs .
there is also no record of available high - dependency unit ( hdu ) beds .
although complex issues that surround the prolongation of life by artificial means are of little relevance in many countries where preventable infectious diseases kill 10 million people per year , we paradoxically may be able to learn from their nonpolitical and not - for - profit use of the internet for the organization of internet services .
the program for monitoring emerging diseases ( promed ) , an electronic mail conferencing initiative that acts as an early warning system for infectious disease outbreaks , is one such example . in 1998
it reported a cholera outbreak affecting 64,000 persons in bangladesh a fact that the bangladeshi government could not publish via the world health organization through fear of provoking a ban on shrimp exports . in an attempt to transfer such a strategy to address the problems associated with intensive care transfers in the uk
, an internet - based site has been developed to augment and possibly replace the current ebs system .
icunet ( located at ) seeks to provide a simple , up - to - date view of available critical care services , overcoming many of the difficulties referred to above .
this service has been launched in its pilot phase and will go fully live early in 2002 .
the system has been designed to allow simple access and encourage rapid updating of data by user units .
users of the system can either log - on as a specific icu or as a guest .
units are required to use a password and are then able to submit the bed state of their icu to the system .
the following bed state options are available : able to accept a transfer ; self - sufficient ; would need to transfer a new patient ; and have a patient to transfer . initially , the ' self - sufficient ' category would encompass units retaining a bed for ' in - house ' use , units able to discharge a patient to accept a new admission , and units with only hdu - level space available . even in this simple form , it would enable someone searching for an icu bed in a region experiencing an acute shortage of beds to access units that would be invisible under the current system , and thereby prevent the enforced transfer of critically ill patients over long distances .
guests are only able to view the state of icus , without being able to make changes .
they log on by providing their postcode ; this allows the system to provide information regarding the units closest to them .
data collection and display will be deliberately non - threatening to individual units , and will not encourage any culture of ' naming and shaming ' .
in the future , however , it could allow potent analysis of transfers of critically ill patients and direct distribution and allocation of resources .
more sophisticated systems could be developed to allow movement of children , patients requiring specialist services , or patients requiring hdu - level care .
there are well over 100,000 health - related sites on the internet and the latest healtheon survey ( april , 1999 ) estimated that 85% of us physicians are internet users . in 1996 , 16 billion dollars was spent on information / technology in the american health care system .
we in the uk should at least be able to provide rapid practical help to doctors and nurses seeking an icu bed for our sickest patients , and to deliver accurate and transparent data for audit and resource bed allocation .
ebs = emergency bed service ; hdu = high - dependency unit ; icu = intensive care unit . | pubmed |
Grey's Anatomy 1. Chapter 1
**Disclaimer: Well, its no surprise that I don't own Grey's Anatomy, but lets not dwell on that fact, I wish I owned it. Actually, I wish I owned Patrick Dempsey.**
**Hello, this isn't my first story, even though it might appear that way. I have another account but I have a couple unfinished stories and I felt that I wanted to write a better story, so I deemed it necessary to make a new account. So hello, thanks for reading. Please review, reviews help. This story is probably going to be pretty typical...and I know that, don't remind me!**
**Its called What I Wouldn't Give and in it, we lose a character. Just warning you, keep your brains open! Thanks.**
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Meredith slowly opened her eyes, but immediately regretted the action. She could feel the blood flowing steadily down her cheek, frowning she reached up to wipe it off, but her arm wouldn't budge.
"Iz?" she called next to her, "Iz, are you awake?" Gathering the strength to open her eyes again, she saw Izzie's lifeless body slumped forward against the dashboard. Everything had happened in a flash, one moment the two had been crossing an intersection, and the next moment they were upside down.
It hadn't been Meredith's fault, the light had obviously been green. The person that had caused the accident had been flying through the intersection, oblivious to the fact that his light was red. Izzie had sworn at the top of her lungs to get Meredith's attention, but Meredith knew that all she could do was keep driving, and hope for the best. Now one of her closest friends was unconsious, bleeding next to her.
Meredith sighed, trying to move. Izzie wasn't moving, Izzie wasn't awake. "Izzie?" she called again, her voice sounding weaker. She could hear the sirens approaching from the distance, and she knew that the paramedics would help Izzie, but Meredith wanted to know for herself if her friend was going to be okay. As the sirens came closer, Meredith finally gave in and let the darkness take over her body.
* * *
"Where is Stevens?" Callie asked the rest of the residents angrily, she didn't tolerate it when people were tardy, especially Izzie.
"I don't know," George shrugged, "I came in early, she was riding with Grey."
"Well in that case..." Callie began, suddenly noticing the absence of Meredith, "Where is Grey? Do they think that they can just come and go as they please? Is saving lives just not important enough for them?"
"Do you want me to - " Cristina was cut-off by the pure anger rising in Callie's voice. The past week had been extremely rough for Callie and her temper had fluctuated to an all-time high.
"No!" Callie barked, "I want you to go to the pit help with any incomings," Callie shrugged, "Karev - you can scrub in with me."
"The pit?" Cristina asked, "Why can't I go with Hahn? Izzie and Meredith are late, they can help in the pit."
"Do not," Callie stared Cristina down, "Just do not cross me today, not today. I have too much on my plate to deal with the 'I'm Cristina Yang and I'm better than you' bullshit. Take your interns with you."
"Yes mam," Cristina hung her head and headed towards the elevators.
* * *
"We have two incoming ambulances," Cristina confirmed to her interns, tying on her yellow smock, "One and two, you take the first ambulance, three, four, and five - you take the second ambulance."
"Do we have any idea what to expect?" Lexie asked, the pit was her least favorite place to help at the hospital.
"Hopefully blood, lots of blood, and guts," Cristina smiled, watching the ambulances pull towards them.
The doors of the first ambulance swung open, and Cristina noticed blood on the paramedic.
"28 year old female, driver t-boned at an intersection, lacerations all over the body, obvious injuries to both legs and arms, possible spinal injuries and head injuries, stomach bruising," the paramedic told Cristina as the two interns helped get the stretcher down from the ambulance.
"Okay people let's - " Cristina paused as she looked at her best friend laying on the stretcher, "Shit...Meredith!" Cristina's head began to spin, she was frantic. It seemed that every bit of medicine she knew had vanished.
Cristina couldn't move, she was frozen to where she was standing. Too many times had Cristina stood in the same position, preoccupied by the fact that Meredith was about to die. Two other times had Cristina cried tears of joy when she found out that her friend would make it to see another day. For once, Cristina had little faith that Meredith would make it.
"Take her into Trauma Room 1 and page the chief!" Cristina commanded, wondering if Izzie was going to be in the next ambulance. Cristina couldn't think straight, frankly, she didn't know what to think.
"Three, four, five, what have you got?" Cristina asked, trying to forget how her best friend had looked coming into the hospital on a stretcher.
The three interns turned around, looking shaken. With a sympathetic glance towards their superior, who they knew was friends with the victim, Lexie was the first to announce, "It's Dr. Stevens...she, she didn't make it."
Once again, Cristina found her feet frozen to the ground. Most people would instantly break down, but all Cristina could do was turn and run towards the building. Ignoring the fact that Izzie was dead and Meredith was unstable in a trauma room, Cristina paused, leaned against a wall, and slid down to the floor, throwing her head in her hands.
* * *
Cristina hadn't been able to move from where she was seated. Leaning back against the wall of the hallway, she watched as people whizzed past her. She hadn't even thought to page anyone, she could only think about the life that was lost and the life that was fighting.
"Hi," she looked over as Lexie Grey sat down awkwardly next to her, "You know - Bailey, Torres, and the Chief are all in there fighting for Meredith's life...I think she'll -"
"Okay," Cristina began, turning towards her intern, "I don't know what made you think that you could talk to me. First, my best friend and my sister, who is closer to me than you could ever hope to get with her, is in that room fighting for her life. My other friend, Dr. Stevens, she DIED this morning, and right now I'm dealing, and to me dealing involves NO INTERNS BUGGING ME. If you want to do something useful, page Dr. Karev and O'Malley, tell them to come here."
"Yes mam," Lexie frowned, standing up and heading towards the waiting room. Cristina was angry, no one had bothered to come tell her anything, and the only person she had to sympathize with her pain was a lowly intern who talked too much too often.
Five minutes later, Alex came strolling towards Cristina, looking extremely pleased.
"Dude, Callie's surgery later is going to be - "
"Shut up," Cristina cut him off, "Just..." Looking at one of her 'family members' made the tears finally rush to her eyes. She and the chief were the only people who knew about Izzie so far, and she needed to tell someone else, "Sit down."
"Cristina, whats the problem? You looked freaked," Alex sat down, looking puzzled.
"I was on pit duty, as I'm sure you remember and...I went out to the first ambulance, and...it was Meredith. She was bleeding, a lot. Izzie was...Izzie was in the second...Alex, Izzie is...Izzie didn't, Izzie..."
"What?" Alex cried, jumping up from his seat, "Izzie...no, is she...?" Alex felt his knees shaking, Cristina hadn't been straight forward, but her point had been made obviously clear.
"Yes, Alex," the tears finally reached Cristina's eyes. Alex froze and sank into the chair again.
"No," his eyes began welling up with tears, "No...please don't...no."
"How am I supposed to tell George?" Cristina asked, notcing Dr. Bailey and George walking towards her at the same time.
"Cristina - what did you need?" George questioned, looking concerned at their faces.
"Cristina - I'm here to give you an update," Dr. Bailey sighed, taking a seat across from Cristina.
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**Well, sorry about that. Please review, it would make my day!**
2. Chapter 2
**Disclaimer: Well, its no surprise that I don't own Grey's Anatomy, but lets not dwell on that fact, I wish I owned it. Actually, I wish I owned Patrick Dempsey.**
**Thanks for all of the positive feedback, its encouraging and helpful. The more positive feedback, the more updates. Obviously, this isn't supposed to be an extremely happy story, so just hold onto your seats.**
**I'm updating a lot at the beginning just to get the story rolling, but trust me...they'll get more sporadic.**
* * *
"What's going on?" George asked, looking back and forth between Alex, Cristina, and Bailey, "What's happening?"
"George, Dr. Bailey," Cristina began, taking a deep breath, "George...Izzie and Meredith were in an accident on their way to work this morning."
George froze where he was standing, trying to process what Cristina had told him. Just hours before he had been laying in bed with Izzie in a perfect bliss, finally being able to have the girl of his dreams.
"They are okay aren't they?" he asked, "Well of course they are, they're Izzie and Meredith, they're always okay...Cristina, they are okay, aren't they?"
"Meredith is..." Bailey whispered, she had been running on pure adrenaline for the past few hours, and now she could finally think about the days events.
"Cristina...tell me where Izzie is," George demanded, feeling tears stinging the backs of his eyeballs.
"George," Bailey answered before Cristina could, "George, Izzie didn't...Izzie is...Izzie didn't make it."
George froze, his eyes locked with Bailey's. His legs began to quiver as he took in what she said.
"I..." he began, "I have to...go." Turning abruptly, George began running towards the doors of the hospital.
"George!" Alex croaked out, standing up weakly, "I'll make sure he's okay."
"Okay?" Cristina asked sadly, "How do you think he could be okay? His puppy didn't die, Alex...his girlfriend did."
"I'm going to go keep an eye on him, something...get some...fresh air," Alex choked, walking towards the doors, "Tell me about Meredith later."
"How is she?" Cristina questioned, pulling her knees to her chest and laying her forehead on her knees, "Is she going to be okay?"
"As far as we can tell right now, she is going to live," Bailey responded, as Cristina let out a deep sigh, "BUT her injuries are substantial. Her left knee was completely dislocated, it tore her ACL, MCL, miniscus, and two other ligaments, she shattered her left ankle, also fractured her tibia, and fibula, she also has a hairline fracture on her knee-cap. She also fractured her right ankle. Her left collarbone was shattered and her shoulder was dislocated, her wrist was broken as well. She cracked four ribs, and we had to crack two others to get to her chest, she tore her aorta and is in surgery now with Hahn. As for her head, her scans showed two small bleeders and Dr. Gonzalez is in there with her now, Derek was in another surgery and still hasn't found out. We also discovered bleeding into the stomach."
Cristina frowned, "Shepherd doesn't know about this yet? He is going to freak out. I...you...probably should tell him."
"Cristina...maybe you should go home and change and come back as a visitor, you aren't going to get any work done today," Bailey put a reassuring hand on Cristina's back, "Hell...I'm not either."
"I've...I can't...I..." Cristina stuttered, just as she had been doing all day. Meredith was going to be in so much pain when she woke up, and Cristina didn't think that she could deal with it. Slowly rising from her seat, Cristina walked back into the hospital, towards the OR.
* * *
Alex slowly opened the doors of Joe's Emerald City Bar only to find George sitting on a barstool, sobbing into his arm. Joe stood at the bar, looking puzzled, watching as Alex sat down next to George and put an arm around him.
"Fuck," George muttered, "Fuck, fuck, FUCK!"
"George..." Alex cleared his throat, "She loved you George, you know that she loved you...you got the chance to love her, and thats all that counts."
"Its my fault," George slowly lifted his head, "I told her that I had to leave early for work, and we argued about it for five minutes, then we made up and Izzie still had to get ready, causing Meredith to have to wait for her. Its my fault, had I not been so stupid, they would both be..."
"Dude," Alex looked George in the eyes, "In no way, shape, or form is this your fault...you loved them both, but if we go back to the hospital we can find out how Mer is doing."
"Alex," George wiped his eyes, "I was in love with Izzie, we were in love, and everything I've lived for since my dad died has been pulled away from me."
"I know man, I know..." Alex felt tears stinging his eyes as he slowly stood up to head back to the hospital.
* * *
"Shit," Callie jumped back as she opened the door to the linen closet to find a sobbing Cristina, "Sorry."
"You were in the OR, weren't you? I couldn't quite tell...the chief saw me before I could get closer," Cristina asked, wiping her eyes and sitting up.
"Yes," Callie walked into the closet and took a seat next to Cristina, "Do you want me to tell you the blunt truth?"
Cristina nodded, grabbing a pillowcase to wipe off her face.
"It wasn't pretty...her left leg is out of commission for a long time, and she's going to have to fight. Fight a lot. But I have faith that she's going to pull through," Callie put a reassuring hand on Cristina's knee, "All you need is a little faith."
* * *
"You paged?" Dr. Shepherd walked up to Dr. Bailey, immediately taking in the distraught look on her face, "What's going on?"
"I know that you and Meredith aren't - "
"What's wrong with Meredith?" he asked, the color in his face draining, "Is she okay? What's happening?"
"Meredith and Izzie Stevens were in a car accident this morning on the way to work-"
Derek cut off Bailey once again, "Is she okay? Is Stevens okay? Is she hurt?"
"Stevens..." Bailey stifled a sob, she had been holding it in all day and it was fighting to come out, "Stevens didn't make it. Grey is okay, she's really, really beat up and in surgery, but I have faith that she'll make it."
"Stevens is..." Derek paused and looked at Bailey, straight in the eyes, "Oh my god."
"Do you want to tell me about Grey's injuries?" Bailey asked, and Derek nodded, "She's in surgery right now with Hahn, Gonzalez, Torres, and a few others. Her left leg - shattered ankle, tore all the ligaments in her knee, all kinds of fractures. Fractured right ankle, dislocated left shoulder, shattered left collarbone, broken wrist, cracked ribs, bleeding in the heart, head and stomach."
Derek put his head in his hands as he slowly sat down, "You know, I took her for granted. I know that she..."
"Save your love life right now," Bailey sighed, "I just...I can't hear about it right now. I lost one of my interns, they are like my children, I lost one of my children, and there was nothing I could...nothing I could do for her." Derek slowly stood up and moved to put her arm around her.
"And she loved you," Derek shrugged, "Just like a child would love a mother. Even though this is a work environment, those interns...they loved you with all of their hearts."
"Thanks Shepherd," she smiled, looking up at him, "I was going to go wait in Grey's room...care to join me?"
"Of course," he smiled sadly, following Bailey down the halls.
* * *
Hours later Meredith had been moved into a room in the ICU, after a successful but long surgery. There had been more than one complication and all of the doctors were exhausted.
Bailey, Derek, Alex, George, Cristina, Callie, Mark, and Hahn were all scattered around the room, waiting for any signs of life from Meredith. Throughout the room the noise of muffled cries could be heard as the group avoided the elephant in the room, Izzie.
"I called her mother," Callie finally spoke up, "I got the phone number from her emergency contact sheet...her mom is going to come out here tomorrow, then she'll plan the funeral."
"Thanks," George looked up and met Callie's eyes, who immediately stared at the floor, "That was...thanks."
Cristina sat against the wall on the floor, trying not to look at Meredith's lifeless body. Somehow the day had not gone as anyone had planned, but there was nothing more she wanted than to be the one in the bed in Meredith's place.
"I called Addison," Mark piped up from his corner, "She's going to come up tomorrow if she can find a flight, she is a part of this family."
"Izzie looked up to Addison," Alex shrugged, "She always thought that she was amazing. She'd be happy to know that Addison came up here in her honor and memory."
"I..." Bailey tried not to look at Cristina as she spit out her words, "I called Burke to tell him and he wants to come to the funeral..."
"You called Burke?" Cristina looked up, slowly meeting Bailey's eyes, "As in...how is...did he sound okay?"
"He's doing fine, Yang," Bailey gave her a sympathetic stare.
It was without warning that Meredith's heart monitor began to go crazy, causing Cristina to jolt forward.
"Code Blue!" Bailey screamed, punching in the button on the wall, making everyone in the room jump to their feet.
"Meredith, don't do this to me Mer," Cristina muttered under her breath, running from the room
* * *
**Cliffhanger, oh man, oh man.**
3. Chapter 3
**Disclaimer: Well, its no surprise that I don't own Grey's Anatomy, but lets not dwell on that fact, I wish I owned it. Actually, I wish I owned Patrick Dempsey.**
**I'm back. Again. This is the best I've ever done with updating...be proud. Please continue the reviews and I'll continue doing my thing.**
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"Cristina?" Bailey opened the door to another on-call room; as she had been searching for at least a half hour, "Yang?"
"What?" Cristina sat up from the bed, her eyes swollen and red from crying, "Please, please...if it's...just, I can't hear it right now...I can't hear that I've lost the only person I have left to honestly and truely live for."
"You haven't," Bailey walked closer to the bed and sat next to Cristina, "Meredith, she is going to be okay. I think you should go sit in her room in case she wakes up soon, I'm willing to bet she will."
"Then what was wrong? Why was she coding?" Cristina asked, obviously still traumatized.
"Those type of things happen, and we don't know why," Bailey shrugged, "Now get back to Grey's room, that girl is gonna need to see you the second she wakes up."
"Yes ma'am," Cristina sighed, pulling herself out of the bed and standing up. The past month had been brutal for Cristina. First, she was left at the alter, then her mentor, also her ex-fiance, left the hospital, leaving nothing to remember him by behind. It seemed as soon as that was getting better, a whole new problem was open, the problem that Izzie was dead and Meredith was struggling not to die.
* * *
As a precaution, there was a tube down Meredith's throat. It wasn't unusual for patients to have breathing tubes while recovering from major surgery. She wasn't comatose, and for that Cristina was thankful, but until she woke up, the tube was to remain.
Scooting closer to Meredith's bed, Cristina began speaking, "Mer...I know you're asleep, and I know that you are in extreme amounts of pain, but I need you to wake up, I...we lost Izzie, Mer. We lost her and I don't know what to do so I need you to wake up. Right now."
For three hours, Cristina sat in the stiff hospital chair, wondering what was going to happen without Izzie around. George and Alex had gone home to change and Bailey had forced Derek into an on-call room to take a brief nap. Bailey herself was trying to keep the hospital running, as it seemed everyone else had gone off the deep-end. First they would all have to heal, and then they would have to deal with her being gone in the workplace. As Cristina sat, deeply saddened in her thoughts, Meredith began coughing.
"Hold on Mer," Cristina jumped out of her seat and grabbed hold of the tube. It was obvious that Meredith was trying to breath on her own and struggling. Hitting the nurse 'call' button, Cristina began to slide the tube out of her friends throat, "This is going to feel uncomfortable." With one last giant cough from Meredith, the tube was out of her throat and Meredith sat in bed coughing more.
"Oh my God, oh my God...you're awake!" Cristina's eyes teared up as Meredith began to catch her breath. Cristina had never been so relieved to see her friend's gray eyes open and alert.
"Cr...Cristina," Meredith coughed lightly as Cristina inconspicuously paged Bailey, Derek, George and Alex, "Cristina."
"Hi," Cristina smiled at her friend, putting a hand on her bandaged head, "How are you feeling?"
"Like..." Meredith began, suddenly remembering what had happened, "Where...wheres...Izzie? Is she...okay?" Meredith was still struggling to make out her words, due to the fact her throat was a little bit swollen.
"Mer..." Cristina didn't want to do this, not in that moment, and luckily she was saved by Bailey, who was practically sprinting to get in the room.
"Meredith Grey," Bailey smiled, "It is great to see those pretty eyes open. How are you feeling?"
"Where is Izzie?" Meredith's eyes began welling up with tears as she realized that her friend was not there, "Where is she?"
"Meredith," Bailey looked at the young resident sadly. Before she could stop them, memories of Meredith's intern year began flooding her head, from the first day when she showed up late, to the time she died and came back to life, "Meredith...Izzie didn't make it."
Meredith froze. Everything on her body was aching. They aches were deep and painful, and breathing hurt. She knew that she was preventing Bailey from doing her job, but she needed to hear about Izzie, now she regretted remember.
"No!" Meredith's eyes welled up with more tears, "No, no, no! She can't...she can't be gone." Meredith stopped talking and took a deep breath, trying to control the pains in her body.
"I know its a lot to digest," Bailey sighed, "But I really need to check you out and explain your injuries to you." Bailey began doing her exam on Meredith as Derek and the chief entered the room.
"Mer..." Derek felt tears spring to his eyes, but he suddenly felt the tension in the room; Meredith knew.
"Hi," she looked over to him and then to the chief, "Umm..."
"I'm sorry," Derek groaned, moving closer to her bed, "I know its going to hurt for a while...but Izzie didn't feel any pain, don't worry. You know she loved you a lot."
"Don't," Meredith breathed, flinching at the pains shooting up her left leg at Bailey adjusted her traction, "Not right now. Don't. Everyone, except you Cristina, everyone else out."
"But..." Derek began to protest, suddenly stopping as he felt Bailey's eyes burning his skull.
"I'll talk to you later," the chief put a reassuring hand on Meredith's shoulder and continued out of the room. The second her fan-club left, the sobs began.
"Cristina," she choked between sobs, "What am I going to do? I killed one of my best friends. She can't be...she isn't...she..."
"Mer," Cristina bit her lip, trying to contain her own tears, "Someone ran a red light, it wasn't your fault - you didn't kill her. I know its going to hurt a while for all of us, and especially you, but right now you have to focus on your own health. Your body has been through a lot of stress."
"I know," Meredith yawned, "And I'm just so tired, and I don't want to see Derek because then it reminds me of yet another situation I have to deal with."
As Meredith almost settled into sleep, Callie knocked on the door and interrupted the bonding between the two younger residents.
"Well," Callie smiled, walking to the side of Meredith's bed, "You are one lucky chick, Grey. Your ankle, knee, and collarbone are all being held together with pins and screws. As soon as your right ankle heals you'll be able to consider using crutches but it will be a long time before you're walking. Your collarbone also has to heal. You broke a lot of bones, is the morphine working?"
"Technically," Meredith frowned, "Physically its working, but there doesn't seem to be a cure for emotional pain."
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4. Chapter 4
**Disclaimer: Well, its no surprise that I don't own Grey's Anatomy, but lets not dwell on that fact, I wish I owned it. Actually, I wish I owned Patrick Dempsey.**
**I'm back...and as much as I love your reviews, I would love more. What can I say...I'm greedy!**
* * *
Anne Stevens stepped out of her old, battered car into the rain of Seattle. It wasn't much different from her home two hours south, the weather was about the same, but the hospital was large and intimidating. She wondered it she would fit in. She was wearing faded jeans and a plaid button down shirt, she had come in a hurry. On the other hand, she didn't care what people thought of her, she just needed to see her daughter's friends that she had heard so much about.
Anne walked up to the front desk of the hospital timidly, feeling ridiculously out of place with the large glass windows and the somber nurses and doctors, "Hi, I'm Anne Stevens, I'm looking for Meredith Grey?"
The nurse immediately knew who Anne Stevens was, she had known who Izzie Stevens was. It showed on her face that she was suffering through hardship.
"Normally, I wouldn't allow people to visit ICU patients at this time, but I can make an exception," the nurse smiled sadly, "Third floor - room 303."
"Thank you," Anne half-smiled sadly, walking towards the elevators. She wondered if this was the path that her daughter had taken into work on a daily basis. She thought of her daughter in high-school, and then thought about who she had become. Izzie had completely changed her life to be the person that anyone would aspire to be.
She finally reached the door, nervously reaching up her hand to knock. She saw a brunette laying in bed, she knew it was Meredith. She had heard all about Izzie's friends.
As far as Elizabeth knew, Meredith was the ringleader. She was strong, driven, and had been modeled to be a surgeon from the moment she came into the world. She was loving, but had so many problems of her own to deal with that sometimes she couldn't be of much help. She was also Izzie's room-mate, and Izzie's closest girlfriend. She kept their group of friends together and helped Izzie when she had faced personal tragedy.
Sitting next to the bed, she saw a dark-haired girl with crazy curls, who she knew was Cristina. Cristina was the one that Izzie didn't get along with very well, but she knew they were close. Cristina was going to become the greatest surgeon out of any of them, she was extremely focused and driven, yet sometimes cold. Cristina and Meredith had a bond that Izzie hadn't been able to break.
Finally, Anne brought herself to knock on the door. Cristina immediately turned around, and she must have instantly known who she was. Her slim eyes softened, and she clutched Meredith's hand.
"Hi," Anne said awkwardly, taking one step into the room, "I'm...I'm Izzie's mom."
Meredith felt tears spring to her eyes, she had never met Izzie's mother, but she had heard a lot about her. She remembered the day that she threatened to call Izzie's mom, and she remembered the times that Izzie would secretly call her mom in the middle of the night. A wave of guilt flew through Meredith's body as she looked at the older woman's sunken eyes.
"I'm Meredith," she croaked from the bed, feeling a surge of pain shoot through her body. She was only about a day away from being put into a normal room but she knew that the pain would persist for a long time. She also knew that she wouldn't be walking for a very long time.
"How are you dear?" Anne asked, "I'm sorry about everything, but I've heard so much about you."
"I'm...I'm the one who should be sorry," Meredith choked out, finally allowing the tears to fall down her cheeks, "I...I was driving. I should've looked, but the light was green. I...I'm sorry. We were late..."
"Mer, shut up," Cristina looked at her, squeezing her hand lightly, "None of us are blaming this on you."
"I just thought..." Elizabeth finally started silently crying, "I need help with the arrangements, I thought since you are her roommate you might want to...help."
Meredith froze, she hadn't thought about a funeral, "I don't even know if I'll be well enough to go to her funeral, I don't know whether I can be taken off of these machines."
"We can wait about a week, but I know that Izzie would want you at her funeral," Anne told Meredith. Cristina sat in the chair, turning pale. She absolutely loathed funerals, but she would be at Izzies, supporting her friends in any way that she could.
"Sure we'll help," Cristina smiled tightly, trying to be strong for her person, "What do you need?"
* * *
Derek looked up as someone knocked on his door, interrupting him from his thoughts. He knew that he shouldn't have been surprised to find Addison standing in his doorway, but the sight of her vibrant red hair caught him off-guard.
"Addie..." he smiled sadly, walking over to give her a friendly hug, "How are you?"
"I've been better," she sighed, taking a seat on his couch, "Why aren't you hovering over Meredith?"
"She doesn't want me hovering," he shrugged, pacing around the office, "A lot has changed around here since you left."
"Like what?" she asked, learning her cheek against her hand.
"Burke left...Hahn came. George and Callie broke up. George went after Iz...Izzie. Meredith and I quasi broke-up but are still sleeping together; her sister is an intern, and she just isn't ready for a relationship," he took one deep sigh and sat down next to Addison, "I really want to hear about LA but so much is going on right now..."
"I know, I understand," she took his hand and gave it a friendly squeeze, "Do you know where Karev is?"
"Bailey forced him to go with George back to the house to get themselves cleaned up," Derek explained, "Meredith doesn't need a million people standing around her right now, shes in a lot of pain."
"I know this is tough on everyone," Addison sighed, "Is there anything that I can do?"
"I don't know," Derek shrugged, "You could go to Meredith's room and see if she needs anything. I feel like I'm just a nuisance right now. Besides, you might find Bailey or Callie in there, I know how much you love those two."
"It's good to see you Derek," Addison smiled softly, planting a kiss on his cheek.
* * *
Addison slowly walked into the hospital room, not sure what to expect. Meredith Grey was half-awake, her brow furrowed, a look of pain spread across her face. Her left leg was elevated in the air and her left arm was in a sling. She had a large bald spot on her head covered by bandages.
"Hi," Addison said awkwardly, walking into the room.
"Addison!" Callie exclaimed, running over to her friend, she had never been more excited to see her in her life.
"Hey Dr. Mont -" Meredith began.
"Call me Addison," she smiled, walking over to Meredith's bedside. Meredith Grey had always been someone hard to hate. She was sweet, she tried to act like a bad-ass but really she was just sweet. She had good intentions and followed medical protocol like no other, "How are you doing, Meredith?"
"I'm on a lot of morphine," she half-smiled, one of Meredith's signature looks, "But otherwise I suck."
"I'm sorry about Izzie," Addison said slowly, she didn't want to upset Meredith.
"You know," Meredith began, she still felt awkward around Callie and Cristina had left reluctantly with Izzie's mom, "Izzie's mom came in here this morning and asked Cristina and I for help planning the funeral." Tears began rushing towards Meredith's eyes, "I don't think I'm strong enough for something like that. I killed -"
"You did not kill her," Callie corrected, "How many times do I have to tell you that, Grey?!"
"I just feel so...I feel so sad," Meredith sighed, slowly leaning her head towards Addison's shoulder, it was possibly one of the weirdest situations she had found herself in recently but she just needed a shoulder to cry on, "I killed my friend, killed my relationship with my father, my half-sister is here as a doctor, and I can't even accept the fact that I'm in love with Derek."
"Shh," Addison stroked her hair, "I know that feeling."
* * *
**Sorry this took so long, the next one should come sooner.**
End file.
| fanfiction |
I am obsessed with Paul's Pel'meni. I mean, obsessed. That place is so delicious! I could eat pel'menis everyday! So, one day I made my own version - not to take anything away from the downtown dumpling shop - because there's just no replacing that!
But, here's my homemade and quick version of a PP. Frozen pierogies would be great, too, but my grocery store doesn't carry them. So, I'll have to go somewhere else to buy them OR buy the frozen bags at the restaurant.
The flavors work really well with potatoes and ravioli. I'm sure any starch would work well!
I used Hyvee's store brand mushroom ravioli. I parboiled it and then pan fried it with a pat of real butter. When it was done, I added a dab of yellow curry powder, a squeeze-or-two of sriracha sauce, and a bunch of cilantro. We really like cilantro, so we put a lot on.
Then, we used a dollop of sour cream!
Super easy! But, again, it's hard to beat the restaurant's version of those potato dumplings. They are just too good! | slim_pajama |
the spin transfer effect ( ste ) states that when the spin - polarized electrons flow from one ferromagnet ( fm ) layer into another fm layer with magnetization aligned by a relative angle , they may transfer transverse spin angular momenta to the local spins of the second fm layer , thereby exerting a torque on the magnetic moments that is usually coined as the spin transfer torque ( stt ) .
this important phenomenon was predicted independently by berger and slonczeski @xcite in 1996 and soon confirmed by experiments . because the ste can be utilized to switch the magnetic state of the free fm layer in a magnetic tunneling junction ( mtj ) or a spin valve by applying an electrical current instead of a magnetic field
, it may be even more useful in writing heads for magnetic random access memory ( mram ) or hard disk drivers than the conventional tunnel magnetoresistance ( tmr ) and giant magnetoresistance ( gmr ) effects . in view of the potentially wide applications in nanospintronic devices ,
a number of works on the ste have been done for different systems both theoretically and experimentally zhu , mu1,mu2,ioannis , z.z.sun , g.d , levy , j.a , z.li , k.xia , g.d2,s.zhang , m.d , k.ando . on the other hand ,
the quantum dot ( qd ) has received much attention in the past decades , and a lot of advances have been made in this particular field ( e.g. refs .
@xcite ) . for a semiconductor qd , as the spin - orbit ( so )
interaction is usually not negligible , some interesting phenomena related to the so interactions , such as the bias - controllable intrinsic spin polarization in a qd @xcite and the interplay of fano and rashba effect @xcite , can be observed .
almost twenty years ago , datta and das predicted a spin transistor based on the rashba so @xcite , showing that the so interactions may be important in the semiconductor spintronics .
however , the effect of the rashba so interaction on the ste is still sparsely studied . in this paper
, we shall take the fm - qd ( insulator , i)-fm aharonov - bohm ( ab ) ring system as an example to investigate how both the so interaction and the magnetic flux affect the spin - dependent properties of the system by means of the nonequilibrium green function method .
we have found that the magnitude and direction of the stt can be easily controlled by changing the gate voltage @xmath0 on the qd or the magnetic flux @xmath1 through the ring if both the so and electron - electron ( e - e ) interactions in the qd are considered , which might be useful in information storage .
the other parts of this paper are organized as follows . in sec .
ii , a model is proposed , and the relevant green functions are obtained in terms of the nonequilibrium green function method . in sec .
iii , the spin - dependent properties of stt in the system under interest are numerically investigated , and some discussions are presented . finally , a brief summary is given in sec .
the system under interest is depicted in fig . 1 .
two fm leads spreading along the @xmath2 axis are weakly coupled to an insulating ( i ) barrier and a semiconducting qd , forming an ab ring .
the left ( l ) fm electrode with the magnetization along the @xmath2 axis is applied by a bias voltage @xmath3 , while the right ( r ) electrode with the magnetization along the @xmath4 axis that deviates by an angle @xmath5 from the @xmath2 axis is applied by a bias voltage @xmath6 .
assume that the qd is made of a two - dimensional electron gas in which the electrons are strongly confined in the @xmath7 direction by a potential @xmath8 .
due to @xmath9 and @xmath10 , we have @xmath11 , where @xmath12 is the unit vector along the @xmath7 axis . if @xmath8 is asymmetric to @xmath13 , both rashba so and e - e interactions on the qd should be considered . since the electronic transport of the device along the @xmath2 axis is much more dominant than that along other two dimensions , the device under interest can be treated as a quasi one - dimensional system .
et al_. @xcitehave carefully analyzed the so rashba interaction and found that ( i ) the rashba so interaction can be separated into two parts , @xmath14 and @xmath15 , namely @xmath16=h_{r_{1}}+h_{r_{2 } } , \\
h_{r_{1 } } & = & \frac{1}{2\hbar } [ \alpha ( x)\sigma _ { z}p_{x}+\sigma _ { z}p_{x}\alpha ( x ) ] , \\ h_{r_{2 } } & = & -\frac{\alpha ( x)\sigma _ { x}p_{z}}{\hbar } ; \end{aligned}\]](ii ) by choosing a suitable unitary transformation , @xmath14 can give rise to a spin - dependent phase factor in the tunneling matrix element between the leads and the qd , while eq .
( 3 ) can be written in the second - quantization form as @xcite : @xmath17 , that causes a spin - flip term with strength @xmath18 in the qd , where @xmath19 and @xmath20 are quantum numbers for the eigenstates of electrons in qd ; ( iii ) since the time - reversal invariance is maintained by the rashba so interaction , @xmath21 and @xmath22 , which suggests that the spin - flip scatterings only occur between different levels in the qd . in the present work , for simplicity
, we shall consider the case with a single - level qd as in some previous works @xcite , where no interlevel spin - flip scattering happens in the qd .
thus , @xmath23 equals to zero .
suppose that @xmath24 is independent of the coordinates in the scattering region , and a magnetic flux penetrates into the ab ring .
the hamiltonian of the present system is given by @xmath25 @xmath26 @xmath27 @xmath28 \notag \\ & & + \sum\limits_{k,\sigma } [ t_{ld}a_{lk\sigma } ^{+}d_{\sigma } + h.c . ]
\notag \\ & & + \sum\limits_{k,\sigma } [ t_{lr}(\cos \frac{\theta _ { \beta } } { 2}a_{rk\sigma } ^{+}-\sigma \sin \frac{\theta _ { \beta } } { 2}a_{rk\overline{\sigma } % } ^{+})a_{lk\sigma } + h.c.],\end{aligned}\ ] ] where @xmath29 and @xmath30 are annihilation operators of electrons with momentum @xmath31 and spin @xmath32 @xmath33 in the @xmath34 @xmath35 electrode and in the qd , respectively , @xmath36 is the single - electron energy for the wave vector @xmath31 with the molecular field @xmath37 in the electrode @xmath34 , @xmath38 is the single - electron energy in the qd , @xmath39 represents the on - site coulomb interaction between electrons in the qd , @xmath40 is the tunneling matrix element of electrons between the @xmath34 electrode and the qd , @xmath41 is the tunneling matrix element of electrons between @xmath42 and @xmath43 electrodes through the insulating barrier , @xmath44 , and @xmath45 @xmath46 with @xmath47 , @xmath48 , @xmath49 the effective mass of electrons and @xmath50 the thickness of the middle region .
the magnetic flux @xmath51 threading the ab ring is related to the phase factor by @xmath52 , where @xmath53 is the flux quantum .
it should be noted that the magnetic flux threading the ab ring generally includes two contributions , one generated by the fm leads that may be small and constant , and the other from the external magnetic field that can be varied to adjust the phase factor @xmath1 . the transverse component of the total spin in the right fm lead can be written as @xcite @xmath54where @xmath55 is written in the @xmath56 coordinate frame . the spin torque , namely , the time evolution rate of the transverse component of the total spin of the right fm lead , can be obtained by @xmath57\rangle $ ] .
according to refs .
@xcite , the right fm layer gains two types of torques : one is the equilibrium torque caused by the spin - dependent potential , and another is from the tunneling of electrons that is in what we are interested .
after cautiously separating the current - induced torque from the equilibrium one , the stt is given by @xmath58 from eq .
( 9 ) , it is clear that the current - induced stt can be obtained as long as we get the lesser green functions @xmath59 .
in what follows we shall use keldysh s nonequilibrium green function technique to determine all lesser green functions @xcite .
these functions are closely related to the retarded green functions defined by @xmath60 where @xmath61 denotes the anticommutation relations , and @xmath62 stands for the thermal average . by using the equation of motion , the retarded green functions can be obtained by dyson equation @xmath63 , where @xmath64 is the retarded green function for decoupled systems , and @xmath65 is the self - energy of electrons . to obtain @xmath66 , the decoupling approximations similar to those in refs
@xcite for the equations of motion of green functions should be made .
as the associated equations for green functions are quite lengthy , we shall not repeat them here for conciseness .
the lesser green function @xmath59 can be calculated straightforwardly from the keldysh equation@xmath67 in the present case , @xmath68 , and @xmath69 is diagonal @xmath70 the electrical current is given by @xmath71 the spin current is defined by a difference between the electrical currents of spin up and down , @xmath72to get the physical quantities of interest , the above - mentioned equations will be solved numerically in a self - consistent manner .
it has been shown that when the incident electrical current is larger than a critical value , the stt can switch the direction of the magnetization of the free fm layer clockwise or anticlockwise depending on the direction of the incident electrical current @xcite . in the present case , the positive stt tends to push the spins in the right fm electrode aligning antiparallel with the magnetization of the left fm electrode , while the negative stt may cause a reverse orientation of the magnetization in the free fm layer . in order to properly incorporate the ste into a functionalized spintronic device
, both the direction and magnitude of the stt should be taken into account .
for simplicity , in the following parts we will assume that in most cases the left and right fm electrodes have the same spin polarization @xmath73 , and the angle @xmath5 between @xmath74 and @xmath4 axes is @xmath75 throughout the paper unless specified .
we take @xmath76 and @xmath77 as scales for the electrical and spin currents as well as the stt and energy , respectively , where @xmath78 . in accordance with refs .
@xcite , we assume that the rashba so interaction constant is @xmath79 , @xmath80 for @xmath81 , the typical length of qd is @xmath82 @xmath83 , @xmath84 , and @xmath85 can be @xmath86 or larger .
dependence of ( a ) the spin transfer torque @xmath87 , ( b ) the electrical current @xmath88 , and ( c ) the spin current @xmath89 for different magnetic flux @xmath90 .
the @xmath91 dependence of ( d ) the spin transfer torque @xmath87 , ( e ) the electrical current @xmath88 , and ( f ) the spin current @xmath89 for different rashba so interaction @xmath92 . ] as the ste only exists in the noncollinear case , in contrast to previous works where the electrical and spin currents were discussed only in collinear cases ( @xmath93 or @xmath94 ) ( e.g. @xcite ) , let us first look at the angular dependences of the stt , the electrical current and spin current for different magnetic flux @xmath1 and rashba so interaction @xmath95 .
the results are given in fig .
2 , where @xmath96 and @xmath97 in figs .
2(a)-(c ) , and @xmath98 and @xmath99 in figs .
2(d)-(f ) .
it can be observed that the stt has a sine - like relationship with the relative angle @xmath5 , and the direction and magnitude of the stt are clearly influenced by both the magnetic flux @xmath1 and rashba so interaction @xmath85 . in the absence of either @xmath1 or @xmath95 , the stt remains negative ( anticlockwise ) . for the simultaneous presence of @xmath1 and @xmath85 ( greater than @xmath100 )
, the stt becomes positive ( clockwise ) .
this fact reminds us that we may apply the magnetic flux to change the direction of the stt , thereby being capable of manipulating the magnetic state of the free fm layer , which might be useful for information storage and for designing the memory element . the electrical current @xmath88 decreases with increasing @xmath5 in the absence of either @xmath101 or @xmath85 , indicating a spin - valve effect , while it increases with @xmath5 in the presence of both @xmath1 and @xmath85 ( greater than @xmath102 ) , giving an anti - spin - valve effect [ e.g. @xmath1 or @xmath96 in figs .
2(b ) and ( e ) ] .
this property differs obviously from the conventional fm - i - fm or fm - qd - fm systems without considering the so interactions where the electrical current always decreases with increasing @xmath5 .
the spin current shows a feature similar to the electrical current . from these calculated results presented in fig .
2 , we can find that for a given rashba so interaction @xmath85 ( magnetic flux @xmath1 ) , the angular dependent stt , electrical current and spin current exhibit distinct behaviors for different magnetic flux ( rashba so interaction ) .
, ( b ) electrical current @xmath88 , and ( c ) spin current @xmath103 for different rashba so interaction @xmath92 , where @xmath104 , and @xmath105 . ] figure 3 shows the magnetic flux @xmath1 dependence of the stt , electrical current and spin current for different rashba so interactions .
we can see that with increasing @xmath1 , the stt , electrical current and spin current oscillate differently for various rashba so interactions @xmath85 .
the larger the so interaction @xmath85 is , the more complex the oscillations are .
for the qd energy level @xmath106 and @xmath96 , the stt shows a maximum around @xmath107 , while the electrical current exhibits minima around the same @xmath1 .
therefore , we may be able to use a lower current to change the magnetic state of the free fm by adjusting the magnetic flux penetrating into the ab ring .
it is favorable for the spintronic devices , because a larger current may cause more heating , while the heating should be reduced as small as possible for better functions of the device .
in addition , it can be found that the stt is closely related to the spin current , as the dips and peaks of figs .
3(a ) and ( c ) appear almost at the same positions .
, ( b ) the electrical current @xmath88 , and ( c ) the spin current @xmath89 for different energy levels @xmath108 , where @xmath105 , and @xmath109 . ] the energy level @xmath38 of electrons in the qd , that offers resonant tunneling channels for spin - polarized electrons from the left fm electrode to the right fm one , has also effects on the magnetic flux @xmath1 dependence of the stt , electrical current and spin current .
the results are presented in fig . 4 for @xmath96 .
it is unclosed that for different @xmath110 , @xmath111 , @xmath88 and @xmath89 exhibit different features , and oscillate with @xmath1 in general . when @xmath112 @xmath111 , @xmath88 , and @xmath89 are mirror symmetrical to @xmath113 , and @xmath111 is always negative . for positive and negative @xmath38 ,
@xmath111 and @xmath89 have just opposite properties : the peaks at @xmath98 ( dips at @xmath114 ) for @xmath115 correspond to the dips ( peaks ) for @xmath116 at the same @xmath1 , but the curves for positive and negative @xmath38 intersect at @xmath113 , as shown in figs .
4(a ) and ( c ) .
it hints us that by changing the gate voltage that is usually utilized to alter the energy levels @xmath38 in the qd , one can adjust the stt .
for example , when @xmath98 , if we change @xmath117 from @xmath118 to @xmath119 , the stt changes from @xmath120 anticlockwise to @xmath121 clockwise .
as the gate voltage is easier than the magnetic flux to control , the present observation may offer a useful way to manipulate the magnetic state of the free fm layer .
the electrical current also displays quite different oscillating behaviors for @xmath115 and @xmath118 , which is shown in fig .
. why can the stt be controlled by changing the magnetic flux and gate voltage ? because the transmission probability of the spin - up electrons is proportional to @xmath122 and that of spin - down electrons is proportional to @xmath123 @xcite .
the spin - up and spin - down electrons have different transmission probabilities if @xmath85 is nonzero , leading to oscillations of the stt with magnetic flux @xmath1 .
on the other hand , the stt is intimately related to the electrical current @xmath124 @xcite , and the magnitude of @xmath88 depends on the energy level @xmath110 of qd , so it is reasonable that the stt can be manipulated by adjusting the gate voltage . @xmath125 and @xmath126 give rise to opposite stt on the right fm layer .
since @xmath125 and @xmath127 oscillate for various combination of @xmath1 and @xmath85 in different ways , the stt may reach the maximum while @xmath88 is in its minimum when @xmath1 and @xmath85 take proper values . , and @xmath109 .
] in addition , the spin polarization @xmath128 of the fm electrodes has also effects on the magnetic flux dependence of the stt , as shown in fig .
5 . generally , with increasing @xmath128
, the stt shows qualitatively similar behaviors for positive and negative @xmath38 . when @xmath129 , as shown in figs .
5(a ) and ( b ) , the larger the polarization @xmath130 , the smaller the peaks of the stt . for different @xmath130 , @xmath111 has obvious changes when @xmath131 for @xmath115 , and when @xmath132 for @xmath106 .
when @xmath133 and @xmath134 are different , e.g. @xmath135 and @xmath136 , @xmath137 , @xmath138 , the larger @xmath134 is , the more downward the curves move , as indicated in figs .
5(c ) and ( d ) .
it is interesting that even the left electrode becomes spin unpolarized ( @xmath136 ) , the stt as a function of @xmath1 still behaves a sine - like curve and retains almost intact for different spin polarizations @xmath133 [ figs .
5(e ) and ( f ) ] .
the existence of the stt at @xmath136 demonstrates that even if the left electrode is a normal metal ( nm ) , the unpolarized electrons from the left nm lead flowing into the ab ring system with an qd encompassed by a magnetic flux @xmath1 can become spin - polarized before entering into the right fm electrode .
it is apprehensible , because owing to the rashba effect , the spin - up and spin - down electrons pass through the ab ring system at different transmission probabilities , as discussed above .
when these spin - polarized electrons flow into the right fm layer , they may transfer some spin angular momenta to the local spins of the right fm electrode , thereby giving rise to the stt . in this case , if @xmath139 , the stt becomes negligibly small . in the above analysis
, we have presumed that the spin relaxation time of electrons is greater than that of the tunneling time .
thus , to ensure the feasibility of experimental observation , one must choose proper materials as fm electrodes and qd , and design a viable ring system to meet with the above requirements .
it is interesting to note that a similar mesoscopic ring system was proposed , where some material parameters were discussed for possible experimental implementation @xcite that may be insightful for choosing proper materials for designing the present ring system . the effect of rashba so interaction @xmath85 on the stt
, electrical current and spin current is shown in fig . 6 for different magnetic flux @xmath1 . with increasing @xmath85 ,
when @xmath140 the stt is always negative and goes down non - monotonously .
when @xmath141 or @xmath86 , @xmath111 goes up from negative to positive , reaches a round maximum , and then decreases , as depicted in figs .
this result implies that the stt can be enhanced remarkably by matching @xmath1 with proper @xmath85 .
the @xmath85 dependences of the electrical current and spin current show different behaviors for various @xmath1 , as presented in figs .
6(b ) and ( c ) . with increasing @xmath85 , for @xmath139 , both @xmath88 and @xmath89 increase
; for @xmath142 , @xmath88 first decreases to a round minimum , and then goes up , while @xmath89 declines slowly ; for @xmath98 , the situation becomes reverse , i.e. , @xmath88 decreases dramatically , while @xmath89 first declines and then goes up . in a word , the rashba so interactions have various effects on the stt , electrical current and spin current .
dependence of ( a ) the spin transfer torque @xmath87 , ( b ) the electrical current @xmath88 , and ( c ) the spin current @xmath89 for different magnetic flux @xmath90 , where @xmath105 , and @xmath143 . ] finally , the bias voltage dependences of the stt , electrical current and spin current are studied for different @xmath85 and @xmath1 , as shown in fig .
7 . in the simultaneous presence of @xmath85 and @xmath1 , e.g. @xmath144 , with increasing the voltage ,
the stt first increases almost linearly , reaches a peak , and then decreases slowly . after reaching zero
, it starts to increase again in a different direction . in the absence of either @xmath95 or @xmath1 or both , @xmath111 is negative , and decreases non - monotonously with increasing the bias voltage , as indicated in fig .
7(a ) . for various combinations of @xmath85 and @xmath1 , the electrical current @xmath88 exhibits
qualitatively similar behaviors , which increases overall in a non - ohmic way with increasing the bias [ fig .
7(b ) ] . for @xmath145
, @xmath89 remains almost constant at a small bias .
when the bias passes a threshold , it increases linearly with the increase of @xmath146 . for @xmath147
, @xmath89 grows up almost linearly despite of small shoulders at a low bias , as displayed in fig .
7(c ) . from figs .
7(a ) and ( c ) , we can see that the shoulder structure of the stt and the threshold of the spin current appear around @xmath148 , where the resonant tunneling happens .
it is not surprising that the resonant tunneling has influences on the spin - dependent transport of the system .
however , it is more important when @xmath149 , while it is negligible when @xmath150 . , ( b ) the electrical current @xmath88 , and ( c ) the spin current @xmath89 for different @xmath92 and @xmath90 . ]
by means of the keldysh nonequilibrium green function method , we have investigated the ste in the fm - qd(i)-fm ring system with rashba so interactions .
it has been found that both the direction and magnitude of the stt are affected by the magnetic flux and the rashba so interactions .
when the so interaction is strong enough , the stt acting on the spins of the right fm electrode can be remarkably enhanced by matching the magnetic flux through the ab ring , which makes it is possible to readily manipulate the magnetic state of the free fm layer at a cost of lower electrical current .
this property is quite expected for nanospintronic devices where the excessive heating generated by the electrical current should be avoided as much as possible .
it has also been uncovered that by adjusting the gate voltage acting on the qd , both the magnitude and the direction the stt can be changed , which gives an alternative way to manipulate the magnetic state of the free fm layer .
in addition , it is interesting to observe that the stt can also be increased by the magnetic flux through the ring or the gate voltage on the qd even if the left fm lead is changed to a nm .
we would like to mention that the results presented in this paper provide useful information for designing practical spintronic devices based on the ste .
such a ring layout can be used either as a memory element with a low driving current or as a magnetometer to measure weak magnetic fields , because the tunnel current depends sensitively on the magnetic flux threaded the ring . on the other hand , the tunnel current or the magnetic state of the free fm layer
are affected by the rashba so interaction , and one may inversely enable to estimate the magnitude of the rashba so interaction on the qd by means of such a ring apparatus .
we expect that the present theoretical findings could be tested experimentally in future .
we are grateful to s. s. gong , w. li , x. l. sheng , z. c. wang , z. xu , q. b. yan , l. z. zhang and g. q. zhong for helpful discussions .
this work is supported in part by the national science fund for distinguished young scholars of china ( grant no .
10625419 ) , nsfc ( grant nos . 10934008 , 90922033 ) , the most of china ( grant no .
2006cb601102 ) , and the chinese academy of sciences . | arxiv |
the term hemangioma incorporates heterogeneous group of clinical benign vascular lesions with similar histologic characters .
though the lesion usually develops in children , older age individuals may also occasionally be affected .
although there are conflicting reports regarding its gender predilection , but many clinicians observed that this lesion has higher incidences in female subjects than in male subjects .
hemangiomas are classified into capillary and cavernous types on the basis of the size of vascular spaces and histology .
the capillary hemangiomas have numerous proliferating small thin walled blood filled vessels composed of single layer of flattened or plump endothelial cells , surrounded by discontinuous layer of pericytes and reticular fibers .
the cavernous hemangiomas on other hand consists of deep , irregular , dermal tangles of large thin walled vessels or sinusoids separated by scanty connective tissue and surrounded by discontinuous layer of endothelial cell .
capillary hemangioma ( ch ) as a term has been commonly practiced to describe a large number of vasoformative tumors ( vft ) .
ch exhibits both , a proliferative phase and an involution phase , where as vascular malformations are more stable and fail to regress .
hemangiomas have been described to be presenting clinically as a soft tissue mass , smooth or lobulated , sessile or pedunculated and with variable size .
sometimes ch may be confused with vascular appearing lesions of face or oral cavity similar to sturge - weber syndrome .
most true ch involute with time , but certain small percentage does not , and may present with complication that require surgical management . although the literature suggests ch as a common soft tissue tumor of head and neck , but contrarily it is observed as a relatively rare and uncommon pathologic entity in the oral cavity .
these tumors are mostly seen on face , fingers , and occasionally on oral mucosa .
periodontally , these growths often appear to arise from the gingival papilla and spread laterally to involve adjacent tissues .
this paper describes the case of a patient who had a growth similarly arising from gingival papilla between maxillary left first and second molars on palatal side , which was successfully managed by periodontal widman 's flap surgery , with two years uneventful follow - up for observing any recurrence .
a 30-year - old female reported with a gradually increasing , painless swelling in the upper left posterior palatal region since childhood .
there was history of frequent bleeding from the lesion , and difficulty in swallowing and speaking .
extra - oral examination including the lymph nodes was insignificant . intra - oral examination revealed a 22.5 cm growth which was red in color with bluish hue and with slightly pale periphery , arising from the buccal attached gingiva of maxillary left first and second molar , which extended palatally [ figure 1 ] .
although two surface ulcerations were noticed , probably due to trauma during mastication , the remaining entire surface was smooth with several visible small vessels .
the growth was gently soft to palpate and showed blanching on application of pressure , and was pulsatile but not reducible [ figure 2 ] .
intra - oral periapical radiograph of the region exhibited a horizontal pattern of bone loss due to chronic periodontitis [ figure 2 ] .
carotid angiogram could not be possible because of under - privileged socio - economic status .
bluish hue colored growth in the maxillary left posterior region , occupying space in the posterior region of oral cavity blanched palatal extension of the growth with heavy calculus on adjacent molars a provisional diagnosis hemangioma was laid down due to clinical appearance and characteristics of the growth .
widman 's periodontal flap of maxillary left quadrant was carefully raised under local anesthesia ( posterior superior alveolar block ) and the growth was excised [ figure 3 ] .
the excised growth [ figure 4 ] was sent for histo - pathological examination ( hpe ) and patient was given necessary hygiene instructions for home care of wound .
satisfactory uneventful healing occurred and follow - up was done for two years to monitor any recurrence .
hp section under low magnification , showing multiple vessels the excised soft tissue mass was subjected to routine processing and several sections were obtained .
hpe of the sections obtained from the lesion showed numerous capillaries filled with rbc in a delicate fibrillar connective tissue which was predominantly full of proliferating endothelial cells .
the connective tissue component was covered by parakeratinized stratified squamous epithelium which showed ulceration at few places .
areas of ulceration were covered with fibrin meshwork and were infiltrated by rbcs and mixed inflammatory cells .
correlating the microscopic features with the clinical picture , hpe confirmed the diagnosis as capillary hemangioma [ figures 57 ] .
periodontal flap reflected and curetted micro - photograph of the capillary hemangioma , showing multiple vessels with rbcs occluding the lumen and inflammatory cells uniformly distributed in the stroma .
( h and e 100 ) higher magnification showing proliferating endothelial cells and dense distribution of plasma cells and lymphocytes .
the term hemangioma has been used traditionally to describe a variety of developmental vascular anomalies , and may often be referred by terms like hamartoma , malformations , or true benign neoplasm / tumors .
it is necessary to distinguish it from inflammatory growths ( reactive hyperplasia ) which have excessive proliferation of reparative tissue .
the hemangiomas ( both solitary or when found with other anomalies / angiomatosis syndromes ) are true hamartomas .
the hamartomas are tumor - like malformations characterized by the presence of cellular proliferation that is native to the part but that manifests growth cessation without potential for further growth .
hamartomas are usually congenital and simultaneously grow along the growth of rest of the body .
once they achieve their adult size , they do not extend to involve more tissue unless there is trauma , infection , edema , inflammation , or filling of new vascular channels .
, extra digits ) in which excessive tissue is present in its usual histological relationship with almost no growth potential . on the other hand , true benign neoplasm /
tumors have a relatively unlimited capacity for expansive growth which may continue even after the stimulus has ceased to operate .
the term - vft , encompasses the hemangiomas and the vascular malformations and the difference between them are elaborated in the table 1 . in 1982 , mulliken and glowacki described classification scheme that is ubiquitously accepted [ table 2 ] .
comparison of hemangiomas and vascular malformations types of hemangiomas and vascular malformations although , the etiology of vfts is unclear , a hypothesis had been postulated that the placental cells such as trophoblasts may be the cell of origin of hemangiomas , and therefore , they arise secondary to some event in utero . it has been suggested that the endothelial cells of hemangiomas are derived from a distant population of endothelial precursors carried by existing vascular pathways to a receptive environment , and its potential sources include bone marrow and placenta .
a small embolic nidus of placental endothelial cells could reach fetal tissues through the permissive right - to - left fetal shunt of fetal circulation .
possibly , local placental injury may predispose the shedding of cells into the fetal circulation . however , further investigations are required to confirm this hypothesis .
the pathogenesis of the common capillary hemangioma involves three stages of development similar to development of any other vft .
it represents an arrest in the development of mesenchymal primordia which is being nourished by an interlacing system of blood spaces without distinguishable arterial and venous channels .
as the development progresses to the second stage i.e. , the retiform developmental stage , the primitive vessels penetrate deeper into the subcutaneous layers ( to muscle or bone ) and gives rise to capillary hemangiomas . as this stage ends ,
an arterial , venous , and capillary system is established . finally in the third stage ,
i.e. , the final developmental stage there is gradual replacement of the immature plexiform network of vessels by the mature vascular channels . during the early proliferative phase ch
can be shown immunohistochemical expression of proliferating cell nuclear antigen and vascular endothelial growth factor ( vegf ) , localized to endothelium and pericytes , while type iv collagenase only along endothelium .
all these three are required for growth and proliferation of the vessels and are reduced during involution phase .
contrarily , the tissue inhibitors of metalloproteinases ( timp ) , and anti - angiogenic factors are markedly increased .
a number of growth factors , including vegf , basic fibroblast growth factor ( bfgf ) , transforming growth factor - beta ( tgf - beta ) , and interleukin-6 ( il- 6 ) , have been demonstrated as regulators of angiogenesis .
takahashi et al . outlined a number of cellular markers that distinguish the phases of hemangiomas ; these markers include metalloproteinase ( timp-1 ) , bfgf , proliferating cell nuclear antigen , type iv collagenase , vegf , and urokinase .
lack of estradiol receptors in the stable or involuted lesions have supported this theory ; therefore , steroid treatment has become a first line of treatment for proliferating lesions .
hemangiomas are common tumors of infancy , affecting as many as 12% whites , but it rarely occurs in dark - skinned individuals .
hemangiomas can occur at any age , but the incidences are more among infants and children .
they occur in 5 - 10% of 1-year - old children and their incidence increases to 23% in premature infants with birth weight less than 1000 grams .
barette and speight observed 35 oral vascular malformations over a 48 years period at their institution .
the peak incidence of central vascular malformation of the jaws is in the second decade of life .
although 80% of hemangiomas occur as single lesions , about 20% of affected patients have multiple tumors .
the most common location for occurrence of hemangiomas is head and neck region , and it accounts for almost 60% of all cases . despite this , intraoral hemangiomas are not common pathologic entities .
furthermore , if at all ch are found , the bones , muscles , mucosa , and the skin are affected , and the most frequent site of occurrence of intraoral hemangiomas are lips , tongue , buccal mucosa , and palate .
it is very rare to find hemangiomas on attached gingiva as has been observed in the present case discussed here .
when found , the hemangiomas of gingiva are often covered by rugose epithelium and may be connecting to central hemangiomas / lesions .
the incidence of intra - osseous hemangiomas varies from 0.5 - 1.0% of all intra - osseous neoplasms .
the most commonly affected facial bones are the mandible and the maxilla , with a ratio of 2:1 reported in the study .
intramuscular hemangiomas in the oral region are most commonly seen in the masseter , comprising 5% of all intramuscular hemangiomas .
the location of the lesion does not generally influence its behavior , but lesions of the lip are less favorable .
occasionally , ch may be accompanied by other deformities at other sites on the body .
patient 's sex and size of the hemangioma does not influence the speed or the completeness of the involution .
histologically , the early hemangiomas are characterized by numerous plump endothelial cells and often in distinct vascular lumina .
as the lesions mature , the endothelial cells become flattened . finally , small capillary sized vascular spaces lined by single layer of endothelial cells supported by a connective tissue stroma of varying density become evident . mast cells and factor - viii- positive interstitial cells
mast cells are important producer of angiogenic factors that regulate the growth of these tumors .
it is identical to some cases of pyogenic granuloma which in fact , histopathologically is a lobulated capillary hemangioma more aptly .
then , a slow spontaneous involution often begins in the center of the lesion with darkening of color followed by numerous fibrous septa within the lesion .
capillary hemangiomas are not common in this age group people as discussed in this our case and specifically hemangioma arising on attached gingival is extremely rare entity .
clinical findings in correlation with histo - pathologic picture supported the diagnosis of capillary hemangioma .
the surgical management of this case was preferred therefore widman 's periodontal flap surgery was performed .
spontaneous and profuse bleeding as well as possibility of post operative recurrence , regular clinical observation of the affected site should be mandatory for certain time and for this patient follow - up for clinical evaluation of site was done for two years with satisfaction . | pubmed |
Walking Dead 1. Shoot the Runner
Author's Note
I know, I know, I should be concentrating on my Final Fantasy XII fanfiction but I've been on a bit of a The Walking Dead binge lately and the growing temptation to do a Daryl/OC story was starting to distract me! I know this has been done to death already but he's just so damn cool!
For those of you who aren't familiar with my writing style I will warn you I tend to jump from 1st to 3rd POV at times and it takes a very _long_ time for my OCs to become romantically involved with the chosen character because I love building sexual tension.
Prologue takes place before the Dixons join the Atlanta camp.
Disclaimer
I don't own The Walking Dead. I do own Billie-Jo, my OC.
* * *
**Walking A Line**
_'Ain't no turning back 'cause I'm walking the line.'- Walking A Line, Foo Fighters_
_'Stolen friends and disease, operator please can you patch me back to my mind?'- Little Black Submarines, The Black Keys. _
**Prologue: Shoot the Runner**.
"Fuck! Come on." The words curled from my lips in a muted hiss.
I shifted my weight slightly to alleviate the steady burning ache that gnawed at my legs. It suggested I had been crouched behind the charred husk that had previously been a car for too long now. Lifting my head slightly to peek over the puckered car hood it seemed not much was moving in the little town of Crowlby. Its once idyllic setting had been reduced to dusty, litter strewed streets, abandoned cars and broken windowpanes.
The firework should have gone off by now. I huffed an irritated sigh and pulled myself to my feet. There was no breeze gracing the soupy summer heat today, the cigarette I had fashioned into a slow fuse must have burnt out because of this. This wasn't the first time Georgia's heat-wave had hindered me. I moved to step around the car when something stirring further down the street caused me to cut my actions short. It was the familiar awkward shuffle of one of _them_. I gasped and hurriedly sunk to squat behind the car again, heart hammering out a faster beat against my ribcage. They had been around for weeks now but that didn't mean they still didn't scare the shit out of me. Bellamy was always referring to them as _Rotters_, _Dead Heads_ or _Coffin Dodgers_ instead of their true name in hope to lessen their now never-ending, threatening presence. Bellamy…
The distant whoosh of a firework rocket soaring into the stretch of blue overhead jerked me from my worry. It burst into a bright bloom of orange and reds before just as quickly fizzling out leaving behind a rapidly fading plume of smoke. The blast was almost heart juddering in the sinister silence that masked the town. I inched my head up so I could once again snatch a sight of the street. The Rotter that had been meandering around some of the domestic debris sluggishly turned its head in the direction of the noise before lumbering off to investigate further. I blew air out of my cheeks in relief. The only good thing about them was that they were predictable.
I waited a few minutes more to see if any others followed suit but the street was still once more. Content it was safe I slipped out from my hiding place and briskly walked down the street. Reaching a hand back, my fingers groped for the crowbar that was jutting awkwardly from my backpack. I tugged it free. I must have been on Crowlby's main street as all the usual establishments were dotted either side of its road. I hurriedly looked them over until I found the one I was after- the pharmacy.
Its brickwork and hand-painted sign matched the quant charm of the neighbouring shops yet as I neared I saw the spider web-like crack that was decorating the bottom of the pane of glass in its door. I curled my fingers loosely around the door's handle as I squinted past the glass at the gloom lurking at the back end of the shop, behind the counter. Nothing moved. I pushed the door open to be greeted by the pleasant chime of a bell. My eyes darted up to see the small bell still swaying slightly overhead. Well, I guess if there was anything back there I definitely had its attention now. My hand strayed from the door handle to grip the crowbar. I hovered in the entrance, weapon clutched tightly in both hands, bated breath. Nothing moved. I entered and quickly paced towards the rear of the shop, my footsteps sounding too loud in the lull. Slipping behind the counter, I shrugged off one of the backpack's straps and unzipped it whilst scanning the shelves for things I was in need of.
The pharmacy hadn't been cleaned out which was a pleasant surprise. As soon as people figured that looting superfluous items such as plasma TVs and designer jeans wasn't going to get them far in this new world, they began to hit supermarkets, pharmacies, camping supply shops and gun shops. Crowlby was small, more of a hamlet than a town and slap bang in the middle of nowhere so it must have been overlooked by other survivors. Despite my luck I wasn't going to celebrate just yet. Uncharted territory never went undiscovered for long and the firework I had set off as a distraction for the Coffin Dodgers could just as easily ensnare the attention of others. I began to stuff items into the bag. Hydrogen peroxide, gauze, surgical tape, iodine, antiseptic cream, ibuprofen, gentamicin, rifaximin, meropenem, amoxicillin, ciprofloxacin-any antibiotics I could get my hands on.
By the time I had raided the shelves the backpack was brimming with boxes, blister packs and plastic bottles full of pills. I slung it on and marched out back onto the main street again, glancing around for any sign of Rotters. There were none. Instead there were three guys further down the street checking out a shop window. Their heads snapped round when the cheery chime of the pharmacy's bell rang out upon my exit. I froze.
We stood there for a beat or two dumbly staring at each other and then my mind jerked out of its shock of seeing living, breathing people. I hastily grasped the grip of the Colt M1911 that was stuffed in the waistband of my jeans and yanked it free before pointing it at the group with a flick of my hand. They flinched, quickly dropping down behind a car that was haphazardly parked across the pavement. Turning on my heel my feet took flight as I dashed away from them and out of Crowlby hoping my bluff had bought me enough time to put some distance between us. I fumbled and attempted to shove the gun back in my jeans. I wished it were loaded.
Running was hard work in this heat and not to mention I hadn't had a proper meal in days. It wasn't long before my chest heaved, legs burned and dots began to blemish my vision. I pushed on, not stopping until I reached my bike that I had left on the outskirts of town. I shoved the crowbar back into the backpack and swung my leg over the Triumph Bonneville. It rasped and spluttered a few times before finally starting up with a roar. I chanced a glance behind me to see if they were in pursuit. They were. I took off.
Roads were no longer easy to navigate due to them being bogged down with cars, vans and the occasional decomposing corpse. It made sense to travel by motorbike but the Triumph was heavy and cumbersome. I needed to check it over, it was taking too long to fire up lately. I snaked round an over turned car.
They had to be the same group. All guys, all armed. This wasn't good. Either they were branching out to explore new territory and our meeting was pure chance or they were looking for us probably to finish what they started. We'd have to run again but with hardly any supplies, no ammo, me with my crowbar, Bellamy with his hammer we weren't going to make it far especially with the state that Bellamy was in. The niggling worry that had been budding since my little jaunt into Crowlby suddenly exploded into full blown panic at our chances. This wasn't good. We were in trouble.
I turned my head to snatch a glimpse of the road behind me, it showed no signs of anyone following me. I returned my attention back to the terrain ahead of me in time to see a Rotter lazily lurch from the car it had been propped up against and attempt to grab at me. I swerved, a yelp coming from my lips. I clipped the bumper of an adjacent car and quickly attempted to outmanoeuvre another that was blocking my route. The bike quickly spun out of control under my amateurish attempts at driving and before I knew it I was on the ground. Dust kicked up from the crash masked the air but it was clear I had run the Triumph off the road and was now sprawled out on the grassy slope that lined its edge. The bike's engine was still rumbling as it lay a few feet away from me on its side. It soon choked and died. My leg felt like it was on fire. I lifted my head to see that the denim of my jeans had been rubbed away along with a few layers of skin. Road rash. I groaned and allowed my head to drop once more, hoping to catch my breath.
A groan rang out in response. My head jerked up to see the Rotter that had caused my crash was slowly stumbling his way down the bank to me. I yelped and attempted to put some distance between us by scrambling back. My limbs were sluggish and stung with each endeavour at moving them. He advanced, a hand already outstretched and swiping. I fumbled for the crowbar to see it was over by the Triumph amongst the supplies that littered the crash site. I hadn't even noticed that the backpack was no longer on my back but sat gaping beside the bike, one of the straps ripped off. The Rotter groaned louder now as if the anticipation of sinking its teeth into my flesh was becoming overwhelming. My fingers went to my belt and attempted to grab the hilt of the knife that was sheath there. After a couple of tugs it came free from its leather sheath. I clumsily repositioned my fingers so that I held it with a firmer grip before attempting to pull my battered body up. He was closer now and sagged to his knees so he could get at me. I shrieked and kicked at him but his putrid hands were on me. I continued to squirm and kick before summoning the strength needed to spring up so that we were face to face, on our knees. His hands tightened their grip, one hand at my throat, the other seizing my free arm. How could something so decrepit be so strong?
I lurched forward and slammed the knife into its head. He suddenly went still and slumped forwards. I sat back and I took in quick snatches or air, my hand still holding the knife's grip. There was no blood. There never was any blood when you stabbed an older Rotter, just a gloopy brown tar. My eyes flickered from my knife to the head it was still embedded in. Brittle, blond hair was sparsely covering its skull. I was just thankful it had bowed its head so I didn't have to look at its eyes. I yanked the knife free, gagging at the gore covering its blade and the smell of the now unmoving corpse. The Rotter swayed and fell to its side, its tongue lolling out of its mouth, cloudy eyes open and vacant. I swallowed some air in hope to still the churning in my stomach. It didn't work. The merge contents of my stomach vaulted up. I always puked after killing them, Bellamy never failed to find it funny.
I dragged the back of my hand across my mouth when I heard it. The far away hum of a car. Suddenly the reason why I was fleeing in the first place flashed in my mind. Despite my injuries, I clambered up and hobbled about stuffing the broken rucksack with supplies. I bent over the Triumph stripped it of its saddlebags before limping off into the woods as far as I could and collapsed behind a tree.
* * *
"Hold up." Merle barked.
Daryl complied and slammed on the breaks causing the pick-up truck to jerk to a stop. He turned his head to see his older brother was leaning out of the open window, his attention to something on the roadside.
"What?" He grunted.
It was bad enough they had been chugging along in the battered truck with no air conditioning and the radio only singing out a grim public broadcast on loop but at this current slower pace the journey was becoming unbearable.
"Don't remember those being there when we came through this way the other day." He swung the door open and got out.
Daryl craned his neck to see what he was talking about. Skid marks marred the asphalt. He sighed and killed the engine. Supplies were running low and Merle stopping to investigate every potential lead was costing them gas.
"Jackpot!" He heard him holler from further down the bank.
He climbed out of the truck and paced to the lip of the road, adjusting the strap of his crossbow so it hung more comfortably against his back. The grassy slope that snaked down from the road showed that marks had been caused by a motorbike.
"That a Triumph?" He made his way down the slope with quick steps, passing his brother who was nudging a Walker with a hole in its head with his boot. He sunk to his haunches as he looked the bike over. "Same model. This is the first bit a luck we've had all week. It's kinda banged up but I bet I could strip it down." He placed his hand on the bike's black tank where some of the paint had been scraped off. His brow furrowed. He looked over his shoulder at his companion who was currently observing him.
"Bet that thing's still warm." Merle said.
"How'd ya know?"
"This fella's just been done in and looks like whoever stuck him didn't have a strong stomach."
Daryl rose and approached the corpse at his brother's feet. There was puke splattered on the grass next to it. He shrugged the crossbow strap off his back and approached the fringe of the woods. Sure enough it looked like someone had slunk off into the trees and judging from their tracks they were injured.
"Wanna go after 'em?"
"They ain't gone far." Merle strolled past and entered the woods, dry leaves crunching underfoot.
"You think they're the one behind that shot we heard earlier?" He followed, crossbow raised.
"I told you it weren't no shot. Sounded like a firework."
"Whatever." He sullenly mumbled his eyes still darting about the woodland floor for tracks.
Merle suddenly stopped and gestured at a distant tree. He saw it straight away, a shoulder peeking out from behind the tree's thick trunk. Whoever they were they were sat with their back against the tree.
"Ain't much point in hiding. We found your bike, you gotta be in pretty bad shape." His brother called out.
Silence gripped the air, the odd bird call breaking up the void of voices.
"I'm armed." Called out a girlish squeak.
"Well then, better ditch the gun and come out with your hands were we can see 'em. My brother here is quite the sharp shooter. You ain't gonna be much of a match for him."
She didn't answer. She didn't move. Merle turned his head to look back at him and nodded in the direction of the girl. Quickly understanding what his brother was implying he do, Daryl hissed,
"Come on, man. You know chicks can't shoot for shit."
"She's gotta know we mean business."
"Bitch probably ain't even packing." He muttered before taking aim on the tree that neighboured the one she was cowering behind.
It was slightly further ahead than her so the bolt would go whistling past her. He fired and the bolt hit its target with a satisfying 'thunk'. A startled gasp rasped out from behind the nearby tree.
"You gonna come on out or is my brother gonna start aiming for closer targets?"
Daryl loaded another bolt onto the crossbow, pulling the weapon's string back until it was taut. He shouldered the crossbow again and waited.
"Okay, okay! I'm coming out."
She pulled herself up and limped into view, her hands held up. One loosely held a crowbar. She hadn't been lying about the gun. Its grip was poking out from the waistband of her jeans, it looked to be a Colt M1911. The only other visible weapon on her was a USMA KA-BAR knife that hung from her belt. That was probably what had caused the hole in the Walker's head.
"You packing a lot of heat for a lil'one." Merle smirked.
She continued to shuffle forward. As she neared Daryl noticed the extent of her injuries. The jeans she wore were torn and ripped all the way up to the knee on one leg, revealing a sizable dirt encrusted scrape. Skin was also missing on her elbow and cheek on the same side.
"Far enough. Drop the crowbar and put your hands on your head."
She did as she was ordered, her eyes flickering back and forth between the two of them. She was shaking. Merle stepped up to her and plucked the pistol from her jeans. He skilfully ejected the clip. He turned to look back at him, a smug smile tugging at his lips.
"Shit ain't even loaded." He replaced the clip and shoved the gun into the back of his own jeans before bending to pick up the crowbar. He looked it over with indifference and quickly shifted his focus to the KA-BAR on her belt. He moved to remove the sheath from her belt but she ducked back a few steps.
"No, please... It was my Pa's."
"Finders, keepers. Now it's mine." He yanked the sheath off her belt before she had chance to evade him again. "Got me the inkling that you're holding out on us here, missy. You got any other supplies back behind that tree?"
"Don't have anything else. I was just on a run looking for supplies but everywhere's been raided."
"You the one that set that firework off?" Daryl asked.
"What firework?" She didn't even miss a beat but her eyes were wide, a sure fire way of knowing she was bullshitting them.
"Seems to me that if you're that tooled up just for a run you got stuff worth scrapping for." Merle loped off to where she had previously been hiding.
Daryl noticed her face fall before she turned to watch the older man duck behind the tree.
"Well lookey what we have here!" He called. He plucked the used crossbow bolt from the tree trunk it was currently embedded in and quickly returned with a torn up backpack and a saddle bag for the Triumph. He dumped them on the ground, tossed Daryl his bolt back before beginning to undo the buckle of the saddlebag. It was full of spare pieces for the bike, wrenches and tools to fit them. "Guess you don't have to strip the bike after all. We got everything we need right here." He delved into the backpack to pull out medical supplies.
"Take anything you want- take the parts, my weapons but please, I'm begging you, I need those." She pleaded in a thin voice. She looked on the verge of tears.
"Finders, keepers. 'Sides I don't take well to being lied to."
"Let her have 'em. We don't need 'em."
"Better to be prepared." He shrugged as he continued to rummage through the contents.
"Please. I _need_ them." She choked back a sob.
She was so scrawny and with those pleading, brown doe-eyes of hers she reminded Daryl of one of those stray dogs he used to see scuttling round the back of the local diner in search of scraps.
"Merle." He drawled in a low tone. He was attempting to sound warning but it came off more like whining.
"Quit your bitching both of y'all." Merle snapped. He shoved the supplies back into the backpack and slung it over his shoulder. He cast off the crowbar with a swoop of his hand. It clattered to the floor a few feet away. He then bent to snatch up the saddle bag. "I ain't leaving you with nothin'. You can keep your water and your crowbar. And I'm no longer interested in your bike so consider yourself lucky. "
He stalked off back out towards the road. Consumed by despair the girl sank to her knees. Daryl lingered for a moment before lowering his crossbow and turning to head after his brother.
"That wasn't cool." Daryl muttered as he started up the pick-up truck.
"Pussy." Merle snorted.
2. Skin and Bones
Author's Notes
Zombie Apocalypses do not look fun. I probably wouldn't last five minutes in one! This chapter jumps around a bit as I was just trying to show time passing before Billie comes across the Atlanta camp.
Thanks for reading! :)
Disclaimer
I don't own The Walking Dead. I do own my OC, Billie-Jo.
* * *
**Chapter 1: Skin and Bones**
I stayed kneeling on the woodland's carpet of rotting leaves for a while, tears blurring my vision and cutting tracks through the blood and dirt that was smeared on my face. The distant growl of a car starting up stirred me from my stupor. They were leaving. I hastily pulled myself up and limped back out towards the road on unsteady feet. I squinted against the shift in light as I gazed up at the road. A blue-grey, battered pick-up truck steadily rolled by. Standing proud in the truck-bed with the sun rolling off its black and chrome body work was a customized Triumph Bonnieville on some form of chopper frame with ape hanger handlebars and a Schutzstaffel insignia decorating its tank. I stumbled up the slope to the roadside. The truck leisurely made its way along the country road, carefully weaving around stationary cars and other junk that cluttered its path. I remained there, hand shielding my eyes from the afternoon sun until its form disappeared over the horizon.
They hadn't been a part of that other group. They would have snatched me like they had Caitlyn or killed me if they had been in their ranks. No, they were just a couple of hicks who had been after supplies also. They were thieves, opportunists, assholes but not killers. I dropped my hand to my side and turned to look back down at the slope. I motioned my heavy limbs to move. The adrenaline from the crash, the Rotter stabbing and my encounter with the hicks was now seeping away, allowing the pain of my injuries to flare up in a brighter burn of agony. I staggered past the Triumph and back to the spot in the woods to retrieve what was left of my belongings.
With crowbar in one hand, half empty bottle of water in the other, I returned to the motorcycle and looked it over. It was trashed. One of the spokes was bent and oil was bleeding out onto the dry grass in a glossy black puddle. It didn't matter, there would be no possible way I'd be able to get it upright on my own as its solid mass often proved a problem for someone as brawny as Bellamy. I was going to have to hike back. My eyes once again screwed up against the sun. It was late afternoon, I was pretty sure I wouldn't make it back before nightfall but I couldn't just stay here out in the open with the Coffin Dodgers and the other group probably still searching for me.
I began to walk back in the direction of our temporary safe haven- a rundown cabin in the woods. My leg throbbed with each step and my arms were stiff as if the jolt of hitting the ground had jarred my very bones. My injured elbow was beginning to swell up and my cheekbone and jaw ached as if I had taken a crack to the face. As I made my way shuffling along the roadside looking and feeling much like one of the Dead Heads I mulled over my situation with a sour demeanour.
I knew I should have considered myself lucky that it were just some rednecks in a pick-up that had chanced across me and not the other group yet the whole encounter now began to irk me. Those bastards saw I was injured, alone and without a ride yet they robbed me blind anyway. Now, I was certain such a thing as chivalry had long died out before the populace began to croak and come back as Rotters but surely humility and compassion for your fellow man still existed? I paused by a mashed up car to catch my breath. I poured the tepid water from the bottle past my lips which were set into a grim line. Who was I fooling? With all the shit that had gone down these past couple of weeks many were favouring the 'every-man-for-himself' mentality.
The sun was slowly sinking, its descent urging me on. Being out in the open at night was just a bad idea. I had no flashlight and I sure as hell wasn't up for bumping into a lurking Rotter in my current sorry state. There were a few prowling the road. Some were even still buckled up in the seat of their cars, stirring to life as I stumbled past, their jaws snapping, arms outstretched and fingers grasping. I had to stay quiet and still, crouching behind a car whenever the mobile ones came shuffling along which only seemed to drag out my already slow journey further. As I slunk behind a van to hide from an approaching Rotter I suddenly recognised the vehicle's familiar markings, the red and white paint job- an ambulance!
I waited for the Dead Head to get a safe enough distance away before I slipped around to the van's back doors. I tugged at the handle, a quick glance around to see if the noise of my opening the door had caught any unwanted attention. The road was still, the dying sunlight diming reflecting off grimy car windshields and the constant grating song of the cicadas was all that greeted me. I pulled the door back slowly, crowbar lifted and ready if anything attempted to lurch out at me. My pulse ground out a faster beat and sweat began to prick at my hairline. The dim bowels of the ambulance were motionless. I clambered in and tugged the door shut.
It was hard to see thanks to what was left of the day's light only filtering through the van's windscreen. I rummaged about as quietly as I could, searching for the paramedic's penlight. There was stuff everywhere as if the place had already been ransacked but judging by the abundance of medical items littering the floor and that unnerving tell-tale scent of old blood and death it seemed unlikely. I finally found what I was looking for. Its small beam fluttered along the walls of the ambulance's cabin in an unsteady trail thanks to my trembling from exhaustion. My hunch had been right, dark smears decorated the blankets on the gurney as well as the doors.
I began to sift through the medical supplies. There were all kinds of useful things- adhesive bandages, scalpels, butterfly closure strips, saline, antiseptic wipes and burn dressings. There was a wide range of drugs, some of which were preloaded into syringes yet out of the long and complicated names I only recognised a few. I quickly bagged codeine, aspirin, diazepam and morphine before searching to see if there were any antibiotics to only find a few vials of ampicillin. I loaded up what had once been a paramedic's kit bag with all the things I would need to take back to Bellamy before turning my attention to my own wounds, penlight held between my teeth as I worked so both hands were free. My teeth bit down on the plastic harder whilst I cleanse what was left of the skin on my right leg and scrubbed the dirt and grit from the weeping flesh.
When I had finally finished patching myself up my t-shirt was damp with sweat and my shaking from fatigue and pain was all the stronger now. A niggling headache was grating at my mind and I took another sip of water in hope to lessen it. I was going nowhere in this state. I settled down the best I could on the gurney, crowbar clutched in both hands, medic bag at my feet and attempted to snatch a few hours of rest.
* * *
. . .
I trudged on, boots crunching on the forest's floor. The right boot was held together with surgical tape. My fall from the Triumph had caused the leather to split and my trek through the rough terrain had only caused it to tear further. My injured leg throbbed dully with ache in protest at being used. I would have to change the dressings again when I got back.
I paused, hand grasping at a tree trunk so I could let some of my weight off my bad leg. My breathing was laboured and my t-shirt was clinging to me like a second skin. I shrugged off the hiker's backpack and pulled out a few needed items from it. Unscrewing the cap to my water bottle with fumbling fingers, I then wet my lips hoping it would sooth my growing headache. I needed water. I had been searching for a stream, river, lake- anything- since sunrise but my map reading skills were non-existent and my knowledge of the wilderness amateur at best. I flipped the map out attempting to figure out where I was in the vast expanse of woodland that snaked around Atlanta. I took another sip of water before giving up with a growl and stuffing the items back into the near empty bag. The only other things in it were empty bottles to fill up with water if I did actually find what I was looking for.
There was one thing I had quickly learnt in my past few ventures out into the forest, which was that silence was never a good thing. The birdsong abruptly stopped, the hiss of the cicadas faded, even the whisper of leaves in branches above stirring at the occasional welcomed breeze paused. It was as if nature was holding its breath, very much aware of the presence of something sinister in its midst. My eyes darted about the forest, scanning the area in hurried snatches in want to locate the threat before it shambled upon me. I tugged at the crowbar that I had hooked to my belt and tried my best to push out my breath in a more regular rhythm. I wished I still had my old kit- my fireworks and cigarettes- so I could use them to distract the Dead Heads.
A dry growl came from behind me. I reeled round to see what had once been a woman walking towards me in that unsteady shuffle that they all did. She had once been young and slim but now her skin was blemished with deep, blackened wounds at her neck and shoulder. The material of her flowery summer dress stained the colour of rust with old blood. A whine flew from my throat. I wasn't healed from the crash yet and was weak from lack of water so even a walking bag of bones like this one could easily get the better of me. My mind flitted between standing my ground and fleeing, both would use up what little energy I had left. I tightened my grip on my weapon and gritted my teeth. I might as well fight now instead of further down the line when I'd been too tired from running.
Fighting a Rotter wasn't like getting in a punch-up with a regular person, they just didn't back off. They favoured to claw at you so they can draw you closer and then let their teeth do the rest. I waited for it to come nearer, weight on the balls of my feet, ignoring the grounding pain that was shooting along my injured leg. She lurched forward, hands seeking to grab fist-fulls of my t-shirt. I shifted to the side and brought up the crowbar to collide with its head. The blow hit though it was nowhere near enough to cave in the Rotter's skull. She whirled round, arms flailing, mouth open to release another of those rattling hisses. She was too close. I whipped the crowbar round, holding it horizontally to shove her back. She came at me again and I repeated my attack, the curved end of the crowbar raking along her cheekbone with a stomach turning crunch. The hit caused her head to jerk back but she still clumsily advanced.
I attempted to shove her again but my strength was failing fast and she only stumbled back a few paces. I backed up a couple of steps and swung. The Rotter still surged forward, her hands securing a grip on my t-shirt. In a flash of panic I attempted to evade her and shuffle back. My footing faltered on the uneven ground and we both tumbled to the dirt. The only thing warding off her snapping teeth was the crowbar that I had horizontally shoved up against the curve of her neck. Her hands were still at me, her fingers beginning to tear the cotton material with their tugging. I shoved and kicked at her but she was smothering me. Her weight, as slight as it was, was beginning to restrict my chest. I drew in breaths in hope to gather my strength. My nose drew in earthy scents of the dirt at my back and the stink of decay radiating off the Rotter pinning me.
I heaved with all my remaining might, using the crowbar and my legs to roll her off me with a sharp jerk. I followed through with the motion so I rolled with her. Scrambling on top so I was straddling her, I ignored the hands that were still clawing at my clothes and raised the crowbar above my head. It came down on her with a heavy thump again and again until the metal was wet with what had once been blood. Convinced she wasn't going to spring back up at me I dropped the crowbar and tried to get a good grip on my breathing. Trembling fingers tugged up my ripped t-shirt to check myself over. Despite my skin being dirty it wasn't scathed with any scratches. My eyes moved to scan the cluster of trees checking to see if our little scuffle had ensnared the attention of other Dead Heads. All was still. I moved to get off her, attempting to ignore the unease in my stomach at the smell and sight of what remained of her head. I lolled to the side, rolling off her to lie on my back at her side, looking up at the sunlight filtering through a canopy of green leaves overhead.
A long time passed before I managed to recover. I eventually dragged myself up only to fall forward once more thanks to a raging dizzy spell assaulting my already frazzled mind. I fought hard to keep whatever was left in my stomach from rushing up with steady gulps of air. I slowly rose, groping for the crowbar before beginning to walk again, meandering through the trees.
How long I had gone at this aimless pace I couldn't say but suddenly something jerked me out of my trance and halted my steps. It was the trickling sound of flowing water. I headed in its direction, my faster pace fuelled by the frantic want to quench my thirst. Snaking through the throng of pine trees was a fast flowing stream framed by slippery rocks. I sank to my knees at its edge and scooped up the water with cupped hands, sipping at it with cracked lips. I drank until my insides felt heavy before dipping each empty bottle into the flow to fill them.
I had found a source of water. I would have to mark my route back to the cabin. I would move my camp here. I could survive here. The other group would never come across me in the forest's heart. I would be ok.
Two weeks my plans were delayed thanks my constant throwing up and diarrheal because my dehydration had drove me to stupidly drink water that hadn't been purified.
* * *
. . .
I stepped back, a critical eye raking over the camouflage job I had done on the two-man tent. Its navy blue shade had been darkened further with mud and branches still heavy with foliage were laid against its sloping walls. Dry sprigs of moss that I had gathered from the rocks by the stream further blanketed any exposed flashes of blue. It would do for now. I guess I had plenty of time to improve it. My attempt at masking the structure wasn't to fool Rotters as they didn't seem to need sight to locate you. It was to hide my little haven from any curious passers-by.
I decided to spend the rest of the day focusing on strengthening the perimeter of my tiny campsite. The tent was nestled in the curve of a craggy slope, meaning with the rock at my back I didn't have to worry about being ambushed from behind. The perimeter was a slapdash attempt at building a barrier that looked inconspicuous. Large fallen branches were wedged slantways between neighbouring trees, bridging the gap in a make-shift fence. It wouldn't hold if any Coffin Dodgers did attempt to push up against it, but it would definitely slow them down enough for me to gather my things and flee.
I worked until the sky was blushing pink and the sunlight grew sparse before settling down to pick at a my dwindling supplies for today's meal. I ate half a tin of canned peaches and gnawed on the last strip of beef jerky. My water and shelter problems were fixed, now all I needed was food.
* * *
. . .
I was so fucking hungry. My stomach twisted in a sharp jab of pain as if spurring me on to find something to eat. The only thing I had come across was questionable berries and mushrooms. The memory of the mistake I had made with not purifying my water caused me to quickly push aside any temptations at playing Russian roulette with the plant life here. I wasn't geared up for this woodsman, hunter crap. I had no knowledge of what was safe to eat or even how to hunt. I doubted very much that my crowbar would make for a good hunting tool anyhow.
I trudged on, my stomach somersaulting in a sickening jolt. I had been trying to trick it by filling it with clean water but the past few times I had chugged enough to stop its grumbling it had vengefully pushed me to vomit up a mixture of water and bile. I slogged on, my legs unsteady. I knew living in forest was going to be tough but with that other group about venturing into towns was too much of a risk, especially now I was alone.
Pa, Matt, Caitlyn, Bellamy- all of them, gone and dead. How was it I was the only one left to survive this shit? The outbreak of the epidemic, people coming to grips with the harsh reality of the infection, the bombing of Atlanta- everything. Thanks to the others I was still alive. I had to try and continue. It made their deaths seem all the less pointless that way. A bubbled of bitter laughter spilled from my lips. It quickly morphed into a sob. What was the point? My foot slipped on a rock masked by the dead leaves and I crashed to my knees my hands quickly shoving against the ground so I didn't smack my head.
I slowly pulled myself up to sit back on my heels. I frowned hard. My eyes ran over the small form a couple of times before I actually spurred my body to scramble up and go investigate. It wasn't moving. A thin noose of wire was biting tightly into its neck. My fingers slowly outstretched and stroked the brown-grey fur of the rabbit. It didn't move much but its nose flared and back legs flinched.
"Shit." I muttered.
I pulled the crowbar from my belt and took a firm grasp of it. Poor bastard, I wondered how long it had been fighting against that snare. I brought the curved end of the weapon down on its head with as much might as I could muster so I didn't have to repeatedly whack it. I guess this death would have been quicker than if a Rotter had got it. I fiddled for a few long minutes attempting loosen the wire from its neck. After spitting curses at it, I managed to get the rabbit free. I quickly snatched it up and headed back to my camp. Coming across that snare was lucky but it didn't calm any growing doubts I had about the location of my camp. A snare meant people were nearby.
* * *
. . .
The forest may have shielded me from the sun but the growing humid warmth was still turning the air into a thick smog. I continued on, swatting at the occasional bug that would attempt to land on any exposed skin, the crowbar held casually in my other hand. The wound on my leg had finally healed. The only evidence that it had been there was the pink blotch of new skin mottling my usual skin tone. I still walked with a slight limp, proving my tumble from the bike must have knocked the limb pretty damn hard. I favoured my left leg for the time being hoping in time that too would heal.
I was settling into a routine, which hadn't been interrupted by any wandering Rotters for many days now. I guess the majority of them were still in the city. I was doing what I did every couple of days, checking the snare I had come across not long ago to see if it had caught anything. My attempts at butchery were getting better. The first time I had gutted and skinned a rabbit was horrendous. I had made such a mess of it looked like a Dead Head had been gnawing on it.
I strolled on, pausing occasionally to get my bearings and make sure there were no lurking threats. A low groan rasped out. My hands flinched into fists around the length of my weapon as my eyes flitted about my surroundings. It came again, softer this time. I moved in its direction, slowly, carefully, seems as I still couldn't see the Rotter making the noise. As I passed a thick trunk of a pine tree I caught a glimpse in my peripheral vision. Two bodies locked together. A woman was on her back, leaves tangled in her long dark hair. However my attention snapped to the Rotter upon her, his face buried into her pubic bone.
The woman's hands where at his head, his shoulders, weakly grasping. Panic flared up in me. I charged forward, crowbar raised, a frightened yelp my war cry. To my shock the two jerked apart and the Rotter quickly pulled a pistol on me. I slammed to a stop, losing my footing and falling back on my butt, crowbar clattering to the dirt. Some cavalry I was. My eyes flickered back and forth between the two. The guy looked pissed, the woman mortified as she moved to hurriedly rearrange her jeans.
"Jesus Christ! What you think you're doin' running up like that? I almost shot you!" He growled finally lowering the gun.
"I- I thought you were one of those things." I stammered. I turned to the flustered woman hoping she'd be easier to convince. "I thought he was eating you."
I cringed at my choice of words as she got to her feet, brushing dirt from her shirt in hope to hide her humiliation. I scrambled up, opting to leave my weapon on the floor to show I wasn't a threat. I must have scared the shit out of them, but then anyone dumb enough to be going at it in woods with Coffin Dodgers about was pretty much was asking for trouble.
"'The hell did you come from?" The guy asked. Though he no longer had his gun aimed at me it was still in hand, safety off. He was big, well-built with dark hair and dark eyes which were narrowed in suspicion. "We've had some of our group up and down this wood and they ain't come across anyone."
"My camp's a fair ways back, over there." I gestured behind me with a vague flick of my hand. "I'm out hunting, trying to find food."
"With a crowbar?" He snorted before locking eyes with me again "You alone?"
"Naw, there's a few of us." I lied, attempting to hold his stare. I could feel sweat begin to bead on my upper lip. I needed to get out of this situation and quick. He was asking too many questions. I probably would have had less hassle if he actually had been a Rotter chewing on some unlucky woman. "I should really head back." My movements were slow and deliberate as I bowed down to pick up my crowbar not wanting to give him reason to take aim again.
"Judging by the looks of you, ya group can't be doing too good." He holstered the gun and crossed his arms.
"We're managing. It's not exactly Disneyland out here." I shrugged.
"How many of you are there?" He took a step closer causing me to instinctively take a few back, my fingers curling tighter around the metal weapon in my mitts.
"That's enough, Shane." The woman stepped forward, placing a hand on one of his thick arms. He turned his head from me to look down at her. She glanced over at me. "Sorry, we just haven't seen any other people since this whole thing started. I was beginning to think we were all that was left." She drifted a few steps from the guy's side towards me, hands calmly held up to show she meant no harm. "Look, I know times are tough right 'bout now so why don't you come on back to our camp and we talk some, get you sorted out."
"What-? Lori!" He shushed.
She turned back and in a quick hushed burst in hope I wouldn't catch snatches of it, she said:
"Shane, look at her. You and I both know she's lyin' through her teeth, she's scared."
He glanced up and over her head at me. His eyes wandered over my form taking in the ripped and stained clothes, unwashed hair, sallow complexion and dark ringed eyes. I probably looked as bad as a Rotter. Nerves urged me to shift my weight slightly onto my left leg so I could get away quicker if I needed bolt.
"So, what? we just take her back to camp- after she saw us together! How we know we can trust her?" He hissed in reply.
"I don't wanna join you guys. Like I said, I got my own group." I interrupted, moving to leave.
"Wait. We've got a big camp, not far from here, near a quarry."
"Goddamn it!" Muttered the guy, a hand raking through his hair in annoyance at her for giving away their location. She shot him a sharp glare before continuing on.
"There's plenty of us, we all pull together. There's families, women, children. We're good people. Come with us."
"Can't. I gotta get back." I took another step back, shaking my head.
"You're the one stealing from our snares." The man said shifting the topic onto dicer grounds seems as I had bluntly declined her invitation. "The guy who checks them reckons someone had been tampering with 'em, stealing the kill and trying to reset the trap. Gotta be you if there ain't anyone else round here."
"We're not mad." The woman was quick to smooth over any glimmer of a threat in his words, "Think on it some if you have to. We'll be at the quarry if you change your mind."
I backed up a little more before turning on my heel and scuttling off, casting the occasional glance over my should to be sure they wouldn't follow.
End file.
| fanfiction |
one of the outstanding conceptual features of general relativity ( gr ) is that the geometry of space - time itself is a dynamical object .
this opens the possibility that there may exist more than three space dimensions which are not observable because they may be compactified to a very small scale .
this idea was implemented the first time by kaluza @xcite and klein @xcite assuming one extra space dimensions in order to attempt to unify gravity with electromagnetism .
this idea can be extended to include non - abelian gauge fields by introducing more extra dimensions .
moreover the existence of extra dimensions is also predicted by string theory .
the low energy sector of some string theories is not described by general relativity but by a generalization of it known in literature as einstein - gauss - bonnet gravity ( see e.g. @xcite ) .
the action of this theory is the sum of three terms two of which are the familiar @xmath5-term and the einstein - hilbert term whereas the third term is the gauss - bonnet term which is quadratic in the curvature and reads @xmath6 . in four dimension
the gauss - bonnet term is topological and does not affect the equations of motion . in dimension
higher than four however this term leads to a non - trivial contribution to equation of motion .
as this non - trivial contribution is still of second order in the derivatives of the metric , einstein - gauss - bonnet gravity can be considered as a natural extension of general relativity to higher dimensions as its action is constructed according to the same principles as the einstein hilbert action in four dimensions .
einstein - gauss - bonnet gravity is actually a particular case of a more general gravity theory known as lovelock gravity @xcite . in the same way as the gauss - bonnet term , which is topological in four dimensions but gives a non - trivial contribution to the equations of motion in higher dimension in every odd dimension it is possible to add a new higher power term in the curvature which is topological in the lower even dimension ( this means for example that in seven dimensions the most generic lovelock theory is sum of four terms namely the three terms of einstein - gauss - bonnet gravity and a new term which is cubic the curvature ) .
all these higher power terms again lead to a non - trivial contribution to the equations of motion which is of second order in the derivatives . even if lovelock gravity is constructed according to the same principles as general relativity it has some features which are absent in general relativity .
for example in the first order formalism the equation of motion do not imply the vanishing of torsion @xcite which therefore becomes a new propagating degree of freedom .
exact solution with non - trivial vacuum torsion have been found in @xcite . in this paper
however we will consider the zero torsion sector .
perhaps one of the most new feature of lovelock gravity is that the `` lambda term '' in the action is not directly related to the cosmological constant in the sense that it does not measure the curvature of the maximally symmetric solution . actually for a @xmath3th order lovelock theory there can exist up to to @xmath3 different maximally symmetric solutions where the curvature radii are function of all lovelock couplings .
a very peculiar case happens when the highest lovelock term in the action is of even power in the curvature as there may exist no maximally symmetric solution at all so that the vacuum state must be necessarily a less symmetric space - time .
this situation can be interpreted as a case of `` geometric frustration '' ( see e.g. @xcite ) . in order to recover physics in four space - time dimensions
it is necessary to check if the equations of motion of lovelock gravity admit compactified solutions known in literature as `` spontaneous compactification '' .
exact static solutions where the metric is a cross product of a ( 3 + 1)-dimensional manifold and a constant curvature `` inner space '' , were discussed for the first time in @xcite , but with ( 3 + 1)-dimensional manifold being actually minkowski ( the generalization for a constant curvature lorentzian manifold was done in @xcite ) .
it was shown in @xcite that in order to recover four dimensional general relativity with arbitrarily small cosmological constant and with arbitrarily small static extra dimensions it is necessary to have a lovelock theory which includes also at least a cubic term so that the minimal space - time dimension where such a spontaneous compactification can happen is seven . in the context of cosmology
it is of course of fundamental interest to consider a spontaneous compactification where the four dimensional part is given by a friedmann - robertson - walker metric . in this case
it is then completely natural to consider also the size of the extra dimensions as time dependent rather then static . indeed in @xcite it was explicitly shown that in order to have a more realistic model one needs to consider the dynamical evolution of the extra dimensional scale factor as well . in @xcite the equations of motion for compactification with both time dependent scale factors were written for arbitrary lovelock order in the special case that both factors are flat .
the results of @xcite were reanalyzed for the special case of 10 space - time dimensions in @xcite . in @xcite
the existence of dynamical compactification solutions was studied with the use of hamiltonian formalism .
more recently efforts in finding spontaneous compactifications have been done in @xcite where the dynamical compactification of ( 5 + 1 ) einstein - gauss - bonnet ( egb ) model was considered , in @xcite with different metric _
ansatz _ for scale factors corresponding to ( 3 + 1)- and extra dimensional parts , and in @xcite where general ( e.g. without any _ ansatz _ ) scale factors and curved manifolds were considered .
also , apart from cosmology recent analysis focuses on properties of black holes in gauss - bonnet @xcite and lovelock @xcite gravities , features of gravitational collapse in these theories @xcite , general features of spherical - symmetric solutions @xcite and many others .
the most common ansatz used to find exact solutions for the functional form of the scale factor were exponentials or power laws . exact solutions with exponential functions for both the ( 3 + 1)- and extra dimensional scale factors were studied the first time in @xcite and exponentially increasing ( 3 + 1)-dimensional scale factor and exponentially shrinking extra dimensional scale factor were described .
power - law solutions have been analyzed in @xcite and more recently @xcite so that there is an almost complete description ( see also @xcite for useful comments regarding physical branches of the solutions ) .
more recently solutions with exponential scale factors @xcite have been studied in detail namely models with both variable @xcite and constant @xcite volume developing a general scheme for constructing solutions in egb ; recently @xcite this scheme was generalized for general lovelock gravity of any order and in any dimensions as well .
also , the stability of the solutions was addressed in @xcite , where it was demonstrated that only a handful of the solutions could be called `` stable '' while the remaining are either unstable or have neutral / marginal stability and so additional investigation is required . in order to find all possible regimes of einstein - gauss - bonnet cosmology
it is necessary to go beyond an exponential or power law ansatz and keep the functional form of the scale factor generic . in this case
the equations of motion are too difficult to be solved analytically and so a numerical analysis must be performed . in @xcite
it was found that there exist a phenomenologically sensible regime in the case that the curvature of the extra dimensions is negative and the einstein - gauss - bonnet theory does not admit a maximally symmetric solution
. in this case the three dimensional hubble parameter and the extra dimensional scale factor tend to constant values asymptotically .
due to the fact that the theory does not admit maximally symmetric solution the compactification was interpreted as geometric frustration .
the reduced symmetry vacua of a lovelock theory without maximally symmetric solution have been explored in @xcite . in @xcite
a detailed analysis of the cosmological dynamics of einstein - gauss - bonnet gravity with generic couplings was performed . in most cases it turned out that there exist non - physical features like a finite time future singularity or isotropization .
the only situation where a realistic dynamics could be achieved turned out to be the case when the theory does not admit maximally symmetric solutions ( and with negative curvature of the extra dimensions ) . a further benefit to use two different scale factors for the three `` macroscopic '' dimensions and the @xmath2 extra - dimensions is that it allows to disclose a clear `` large @xmath3 pattern '' in the dependence of relevant physical observables on the number of extra - dimensions . in gauge theories the large @xmath3 expansions introduced by t hooft in @xcite(and generalized by veneziano in @xcite to take into account the presence of matter fields in the fundamental )
provides with a very clever small parameter suitable to generate an alternative perturbative expansion ( namely @xmath4 ) which does not necessarily require the theory to be weakly coupled .
a crucial step to achieve this goal is to separate in a very clear way the dependence on internal indices from the dependence on `` space - time '' indices of all relevant quantities ( for two nice reviews see @xcite ) .
such large @xmath3 expansion is very closely related to the semi - classical or wkb expansion and is a very powerful non - perturbative tool in field theory . in ( 3 + 1 ) dimensional general relativity
the situation is complicated by the fact that it is not easy to distinguish `` internal '' from `` space - time '' indices in the second order formalism ( in the first order formalism the results in @xcite suggest that the t hooft expansion in gravity in ( 3 + 1 ) dimensions has many features absent in the yang - mills case ) .
however , in the case of kaluza - klein theories , there is a parameter which is clearly analogous to the t hooft parameter @xmath3 : the number of extra dimensions @xcite .
the results of the present paper clearly suggest that the same is true for egb theory . for this reason ,
the field equations have been written in order to display explicitly the dependence on @xmath2 .
the present analysis shows that the dependence of many relevant quantities on the number of extra dimensions exhibit a wkb - like pattern . of course in cosmology
it is also crucial to study the effect of a matter source on the cosmological dynamics .
for this reason the purpose of this paper is to explore the effect of a perfect fluid on einstein - gauss - bonnet cosmology in the geometric frustration regime .
especially the emergence of new subregimes is studied .
it is found that there exist a new subregime where both scale factors tend to constant values by performing damped oscillations so that the friedmann dynamics can be recovered asymptotically .
it is also worth to point out that the dependence of the relevant physical quantities on the number of the extra - dimensions reminds very closely what one would expect from a large @xmath3 expansion in gauge theories in which the number of extra - dimensions plays the role of @xmath3 in the t hooft expansion . in particular
, the present analysis discloses a clear eikonal - like pattern
. the structure of the paper will be the following : in section 2 , some analytic considerations are given of why it is necessary to consider the geometric frustration regime . in section 3 , the subregime which can recover @xmath0-dimensional friedmann model is introduced . in section 4 matter is added and the numerical analysis is performed .
section 5 is dedicated to the conclusions .
lovelock gravity @xcite has the following structure : its lagrangian is constructed from terms @xmath7 where @xmath8 is the generalized kronecker delta of the order @xmath9 .
one can verify that @xmath10 is euler invariant in @xmath11 spatial dimensions and so it would not give nontrivial contribution into the equations of motion . so that the lagrangian density for any given @xmath2 spatial dimensions is sum of all lovelock invariants ( [ lov_lagr ] ) upto @xmath12 $ ] which give nontrivial contributions into equations of motion : @xmath13 where @xmath14 is the determinant of metric tensor , @xmath15 is a coupling constant of the order of planck length in @xmath9 dimensions and summation over all @xmath16 in consideration is assumed .
the _ ansatz _ for the metric is @xmath17 where @xmath18 and @xmath19 stand for the metric of two constant curvature manifolds @xmath20 and @xmath21 is a friedmann - robertson - walker manifold with scale factor @xmath22 whereas @xmath23 is a @xmath2-dimensional euclidean compact and constant curvature manifold with scale factor @xmath24 . ] .
it is worth to point out that even a negative constant curvature space can be compactified by making the quotient of the space by a freely acting discrete subgroup of @xmath25 @xcite .
the complete derivation of the equations of motion could be found in our previous papers , dedicated to the description of the particular regime which appears in this model @xcite . for simplicity
we consider the case with @xmath26 ( zero spatial curvature for `` our '' ( 3 + 1)-dimensional world ; nonzero @xmath27 does not affect the presence of the dynamical compactification regime , as discussed in @xcite ) .
for the moment the non - zero curvature for extra dimensions can be normalized as @xmath28 .
since there is no curvature term for @xmath22 , it is useful to rewrite the equations of motion in terms of the hubble parameter @xmath29 ; the equations will take a form @xmath30 + \\ \\
+ \dac{(d-1)(d-2)(d-3)}{6}c_2 \ [ \dac{(\gammaterm)^2}{\bb^4 } + \dac{12\hh^2(\gammaterm)}{\bb^2(d-2)(d-3 ) } + \dac{24\hh^2\db^2}{\bb^2(d-2)(d-3 ) } + \right . \\ \\ \left .
+ \dac{12(\gammaterm)\hh\db}{\bb^3(d-3 ) } + \dac{24\hh^3\db}{\bb(d-1)(d-2)(d-3 ) } \]=0 , \end{array}\label{eq_my_1}\ ] ] @xmath31 + \dac{(d-1)(d-2)(d-3)}{6}c_2 \ [ \dac{(\gammaterm)^2}{\bb^4 } + \right . \\ \\ \left .
+ \dac{16(\dh+\hh^2)\hh\db}{\bb(d-1)(d-2)(d-3 ) } + \dac{8(\gammaterm)\hh\db}{\bb^3(d-3 ) } + \dac{8(\dh+\hh^2)(\gammaterm)}{\bb^2(d-2)(d-3 ) } + \right . \\ \\ \left .
+ \dac{8\hh^2\ddb}{\bb(d-1)(d-2)(d-3 ) } + \dac{16\ddb\hh\db}{\bb^2(d-2)(d-3 ) } + \dac{4\ddb(\gammaterm)}{\bb^3(d-3 ) } + \right . \\ \\ \left .
+ \dac{4\hh^2 ( \gammaterm)}{\bb^2(d-2)(d-3 ) } + \dac{8\hh^2\db^2}{\bb^2(d-2)(d-3 ) } \]=0 , \end{array}\label{eq_my_2}\ ] ] @xmath32 + \dac{(d-1)(d-2)(d-3)}{6}c_2 \times \\ \\ \times \ [ \dac{(\gammaterm)^2}{\bb^4}(d-4 ) + \dac{48(\dh+\hh^2)\hh\db}{\bb(d-2)(d-3 ) } + \dac{12(\gammaterm)\hh\db}{\bb^3 } + \right . \\
+ \dac{24\hh^2\db^2}{\bb^2(d-3 ) } + \dac{12(\dh+\hh^2)(\gammaterm)}{\bb^2(d-3 ) } + \dac{24\hh^2\ddb}{\bb(d-2)(d-3 ) } + \dac{24\ddb\hh\db}{\bb^2(d-3 ) } + \right . \\ \\ \left .
+ \dac{4\ddb(\gammaterm)}{\bb^3 } + \dac{12\hh^2 ( \gammaterm)}{\bb^2(d-3 ) } + \dac{24\hh^3\db}{\bb(d-2)(d-3 ) } + \dac{24(\dh+\hh^2)\hh^2}{(d-1)(d-2)(d-3 ) } \]=0 , \end{array}\label{eq_my_3}\ ] ] as @xmath33 equation ( [ eq_my_1 ] ) , @xmath34 ( [ eq_my_2 ] ) , and @xmath35 ( [ eq_my_3 ] ) . in
@xcite we described a regime which naturally appear if a choice for coupling constants forbids existence of maximally - symmetric solutions .
a maximally symmetric space - time has curvature two form given by @xmath36 which inserted in the equations of motion gives a quadratic equation for @xmath37 : @xmath38 which admits as solutions @xmath39 we can clearly see that if radicand in ( [ leff ] ) is negative , then effective @xmath40-dimensional cosmological constant is imaginary and there are no maximally - symmetric solutions this is one prerequisites for the existence of our regime .
the other requirement is that the spatial curvature of the extra dimensions should be negative .
the importance of the non - existence of a maximally symmetric solution for the cosmological dynamics in einstein - gauss - bonnet gravity was found numerically in @xcite .
however it is possible to make some analytic considerations of why this regime is relevant .
indeed it is interesting to explore the situation where the two scale factors are constant . substituting @xmath41 and @xmath42 as well as usual requirements for our regime ( @xmath43 , @xmath44 , @xmath45 ) into ( [ eq_my_1])([eq_my_3 ] )
, we get @xmath46 it should be noted that despite the gauss - bonnet contribution is dynamically important starting from four spatial dimensions ( i.e. @xmath47 in our notations ) , the regime under consideration requires bigger number of dimensions . indeed , we can see from eqs .
( [ eq_my_1])([eq_my_3 ] ) that for @xmath48 all terms in equations of motion originating from the gb term in the lagrangian vanish if @xmath49 , @xmath50 .
this means that the equations of motion reduce to those of gr where this regime is absent ( it is easy to see that gr equations have no solutions with @xmath49 and @xmath50 ) . as a result ,
the minimum possible value of compactified space is @xmath51 , so as full space - time is at least seven dimensional . by eliminating last terms from both equations in ( [ sys1 ] )
we can find @xmath52 @xmath53 and then by constitution it back to ( [ sys1 ] ) we can find a relation between couplings : @xmath54 from ( [ b0 ] ) we can clearly see that @xmath55 and @xmath56 should have same sign while from ( [ coup ] ) that @xmath56 and @xmath57 should have the same property , so that all couplings should have the same sign for this regime to occur .
additionally , if we substitute ( [ coup ] ) into the equation for effective @xmath40 lambda - term we can verify that its discriminant is always negative : @xmath58 so that this regime always occurs `` inside '' our compactification scheme .
the condition ( [ coup ] ) is therefore a subregime of the regime where no maximally symmetric vacuum exist .
this is of special interest in the case that for asymptotic time one wants to recover the friedmann dynamics of four dimensions .
it is worth to emphasize that , at leading order in the large @xmath2 expansion , the discriminant @xmath59 vanishes so that we would be on the boundary of the region allowing our compactification scheme .
however , the sub - leading large @xmath2 corrections make @xmath59 more and more negative .
thus the large @xmath2 expansion clearly favors our compactification scheme .
it is worth to stress here that in order to recover gr asymptotic from the constraint equation ( 4 ) it is enough to set the three dimensional hubble parameter to constant rather than the scale factor namely if we substitute @xmath60 , @xmath61 into constraint equation ( 4 ) , it takes a friedmann - like form : @xmath62 this regime have been studied numerically in @xcite , and it leads to monotonic behavior of both hubble parameters when @xmath5 is of the order of unity in natural units . on the contrary , here we will see that very small @xmath63 in natural units ( which is necessary to describe the universe we live in ) is reached through an oscillatory regime .
our numerical studies confirm that ( [ b0 ] ) is holding and @xmath64 in oscillatory regime ( see fig .
[ fig1matter](d)(f ) ) . at this point
it sounds useful to address linear stability of this solution .
we perturb full system of equations of motion ( [ eq_my_1])([eq_my_3 ] ) with small perturbations @xmath65 , @xmath66 and perturbations equation take the form @xmath67 where first two equations correspond to dynamical equations and the last to constraint equation .
generally all the coefficients @xmath68 , @xmath69 and @xmath70 are nonzero , but as we seek for perturbations around our special solution , we apply @xmath71 , @xmath72 , as well as keep ( [ b0 ] ) and ( [ coup ] ) in mind , so @xmath73 now if we substitute ( [ pert2 ] ) into ( [ pert1 ] ) and solve it , the solution takes harmonic form and its frequency @xmath74 is the following : @xmath75 the above dependence of the frequency on the number of extra dimensions clearly shows a wkb - eikonal pattern .
namely , the frequency grows with the number of extra dimensions ( as one would expect in a eikonal scheme ) .
thus , the larger is @xmath2 , the closer we are to a genuine eikonal behavior .
if we substitute ( [ b0 ] ) and the subregime condition ( [ coup ] ) into ( [ friedmann1 ] ) and we choose @xmath76 as normalization , we obtain the following expressions : @xmath77 obviously this regime is trivial , but if we add a matter in form of perfect fluid with linear equation of state @xmath78 , we can hope to recover regular @xmath0-dimensional friedmann regime .
so we numerically integrate equations of motion which are ( [ eq_my_1])([eq_my_3 ] ) considering the subregime ( [ coup ] ) introduced in the previous section .
also we added continuity equation for matter in the form @xmath79 one can clearly see that for regime with @xmath80 the second term in first brackets in nullified and so standard @xmath0-dimensional density scaling is recovered .
also , friedmann constraint is also modified in presence of matter : @xmath81 as we said , we solved numerically system under consideration to see the future and past behavior .
the results are presented in fig .
[ fig1matter ] .
there the first row ( ( a ) , ( b ) , ( c ) and ( d ) panels ) presents the hubble parameters associated with @xmath0 ( in black ) and extra dimensions ( in grey ) , the second row ( ( e ) , ( f ) , ( g ) and ( h ) panels ) shows us the size of extra dimensions @xmath24 , the third row ( ( i ) , ( j ) , ( k ) and ( l ) panels ) visualizes @xmath82 ( we comment on it later ) while fourth ( ( m ) , ( n ) , ( o ) and ( p ) panels ) row demonstrate effective newtonian constant @xmath83 from ( [ friedmann2 ] ) . all rows have four columns which correspond to four cases first column ( ( a ) , ( e ) , ( i ) and ( m ) panels ) corresponds to @xmath84 , @xmath85 case , second column ( ( b ) , ( f ) , ( j ) and ( n ) panels ) corresponds to @xmath84 , @xmath86 case , third column ( ( c ) , ( g ) , ( k ) and ( o ) panels ) corresponds to @xmath84 , @xmath87 case while the last column ( ( d ) , ( h ) , ( l ) and ( p ) panels ) corresponds to @xmath88 , @xmath89 case .
this way if we compare the results between first , second and third columns , we can derive the influence of the equation of state on the dynamics while comparison of the first and fourth gives us effect of the number of extra dimensions .
then , by comparing first three columns we can decide that the effect of the equation of state demonstrates only in the @xmath82 ratio ( third row , ( i ) , ( j ) , ( k ) and ( l ) panels ) .
we can see that the influence of matter on the dynamics is diminished for @xmath90 and significant for @xmath91 .
we comment more about it in discussions section .
in contrary the effect of the number of extra dimensions is visible for all cases first of all , the period of oscillations is decreased for all variables ( hubble parameters , size of extra dimensions , etc ) while its amplitude seems to decrease for all cases except hubble parameters , where it increases instead .
but in the vicinity of @xmath92 ( see text for details).,scaledwidth=92.0% ] also at that point it is necessary to note that @xmath24 is reaching its predicted value ( [ b0 ] ) and the period of oscillations is in agreement with ( [ pert3 ] ) . this way we ensure that our model is reached indeed in our numerical study .
similar to the general compactification from geometric frustration regime @xcite , this regime is also achieved on all initial conditions which lead to the former regime with an additional ( [ coup ] ) relation between couplings taken into account . regarding the influence of the equation of state
, there is one more important point for strongly negative equations of state ( @xmath93 ) we detected qualitative change in behavior of main variables .
this change is quantitatively demonstrated in fig .
[ fig2matter ] .
in there we presented hubble parameters ( first row , ( a)(d ) panels ) , size of extra dimensions @xmath24 ( second row , ( e)(h ) panels ) , @xmath94 value ( third row , ( i)(l ) panels ) , friedmann constraint ( [ friedmann2 ] ) ( fourth row , ( m)(p ) panels ) , effective @xmath5-term ( fifth row , ( q)(t ) panels ) and effective newtonian constant ( sixth row , ( u)(x ) panels ) .
these parameters are presented for four consecutive values for the equation of state : @xmath87 ( first column , ( a ) , ( e ) , ( i ) , ( m ) , ( q ) and ( u ) panels ) , @xmath95 ( second column , ( b ) , ( f ) , ( j ) , ( n ) , ( r ) and ( v ) panels ) , @xmath96 ( third column , ( c ) , ( g ) , ( k ) , ( o ) , ( s ) and ( w ) panels ) and @xmath97 ( fourth column , ( d ) , ( h ) , ( l ) , ( p ) , ( t ) and ( x ) panels ) .
one can see that the first column resemble typical behavior of fig .
[ fig1matter ] but with further decrease of the equation of state the behavior differ more and more .
it looks like the oscillations , widely presented in fig .
[ fig1matter ] , decaying for strongly negative equations of state in fig .
[ fig2matter ] .
if we can make mechanical analogy , the friction in fig . [ fig2matter ] is so high that it prevents oscillations from occurring and we have analogue of `` slow - roll '' instead .
the analysis of the previous section explains oscillatory behavior , but from numerical investigation ( see figs [ fig1matter ] and [ fig2matter ] ) we can see that the oscillations are damped .
the explanation for this lies in the fact that we perturb equations around exact solution @xmath98 , @xmath99 plus ( [ b0 ] ) and ( [ coup ] ) .
but in reality this asymptotic regime is achieved pretty slowly so that instead of ( [ pert2 ] ) we should use full system which is very complicated for exact analytical analysis but has exponential damping , which is clearly seen from figs .
[ fig1matter ] and [ fig2matter ] .
let us note an interesting thing formally we do not bound amplitude of described oscillations , but from figs .
[ fig1matter ] and [ fig2matter ] one can see that @xmath100 oscillate in a way that @xmath101 always .
it is easy to see why is that if one substitute @xmath102 into ( [ eq_my_1 ] ) with ( [ coup ] ) taken into account , the resulting equation links @xmath103 with @xmath104 .
if we further substitute this resulting relation into ( [ eq_my_3 ] ) with ( [ coup ] ) and @xmath105 , we arrive to @xmath106 .
this way one can see that @xmath100 can not cross zero and since we put @xmath101 from the beginning it always remains non - negative .
in this paper we investigated the dynamical compactification in einstein - gauss - bonnet gravity with arbitrary number of extra dimensions in the presence of a perfect fluid matter source .
a detailed analysis was performed for the case where the theory does not admit a maximally symmetric solution . for a manifold which is a warped product of a four dimensional frw manifold times a constant ( negative ) curvature compact euclidean manifold
it was found that there exists a subregime which leads to @xmath107 and @xmath108 via damped oscillations and so standard @xmath0-dimensional friedmann cosmology with perfect fluid is asymptotically recovered at least at the level of the background equations .
this regime appears to be sensitive to the equation of state of the matter , and the situation here is similar to the gr limit in the @xmath109 gravity . in the latter theory
there are two additional degrees of freedom connected with higher derivatives of the scale factor , so they ( in contrast to gauss - bonnet gravity ) are present in the isotropic ( 3 + 1 ) dimension case .
they oscillate harmonically in the low - curvature limit ( this is the feature of quadratic gravity , for higher order corrections the oscillation are anharmonic , see @xcite ) . and can be expressed in the form of a massive scalar field .
the effective equation of state for such field during oscillation is known to be @xmath110 , so any matter with negative pressure would decay less rapidly , and , as a result , dominates for late time . on the contrary , a matter with a positive pressure should be subdominant in the low - curvature regime , and universe becomes dominated by gravitational degrees of freedom . in our model
the situation is quite similar .
we have to additional degrees of freedom the scale factor of `` inner '' dimensions and its derivative .
they oscillate harmonically in the first approximation .
our numerical results show that matter content of the universe become dominant for @xmath111 while for @xmath112 influence of the `` inner '' degrees of freedom may be important at later time since it decays slowly than the matter .
another interesting numerical effect of the equation of state is the fact that for @xmath93 an oscillatory behavior , presented in fig
. [ fig1matter ] , is replaced with monotonic one , presented in fig .
[ fig2matter ] .
change in the behavior could be treated with the following mechanical interpretation the friction is increased and through this oscillations which are clearly seen in fig .
[ fig1matter ] are almost decayed by the last column of fig .
[ fig2matter ] . as for the influence of the number of extra dimensions , it manifests itself in the growing of frequency of oscillations for fixed coupling constants , which is also clear from the analytical estimation . from the technical point of view
, the field equations have been written down in order to display explicitly the dependence on the number of extra dimensions .
the reason is that many of the relevant physical quantities analyzed here depend on the number of extra dimensions in the same way as one would expect from a large @xmath3 expansion in gauge theory ( in which @xmath2 plays the role of @xmath3 ) .
in particular , a clear `` eikonal - like '' pattern emerges .
thus , the present results strongly suggest the importance to develop a systematic @xmath1 expansion in egb cosmology .
we hope to come back on this interesting issue in a future publication . to conclude , the aims of this paper were reached
we described new regime which is part of previously described model which allows natural and viable dynamical compactification .
we demonstrated that our described regime has viable friedmann asymptotic behavior so that at late time it can not be distinguished from `` standard '' ( 3 + 1)-dimensional friedmann model . additionally , effective @xmath5-term for this model has geometrical nature which could potentially solve `` cosmological constant problem '' without involving any additional physics , though suffering from the fine tuning problem the equation ( [ coup ] ) which is exact for zero four - dimensional @xmath113 should be almost exactly satisfied
. a.g . was supported by fondecyt grant no 1150246 .
f.c . was supported by fondecyt grant no 1160137 .
the centro de estudios cientificos ( cecs ) is funded by the chilean government through the centers of excellence base financing program of conicyt .
the work of s.a.p . was supported by fapema .
the work of a.t . is supported by rfbr grant 14 - 02 - 00894 , and partially supported by the russian government program of competitive growth of kazan federal university .
thanks universidad austral de chile ( valdivia ) . where this work was initiated , for hospitality .
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y. makeenko , _ large - n gauge theories _ , lectures at the 1999 nato - asi on quantum geometry in akureyri , iceland [ hep - th/0001047 ] ; a. v. manohar , _ large n qcd _ , les houches lectures ( 1997 ) [ hep - ph/9802419 ] . | arxiv |
atopic dermatitis ( ad ) , which is characterized by dermatitis with pruritus , is a chronic disease that exhibits repeated periods of remission and deterioration .
this disease is caused by hypersensitivity to dry skin , a predisposing atopic factor in which ige antibodies related to the allergy are readily produced , and various environmental factors .
in fact , specific ige antibodies against environmental allergens such as mites and various food allergens are detectable in the sera of patients with ad .
since the human body is covered with an enormous number of microorganisms of a plethora of types , some may exacerbate the symptoms of ad .
staphylococcus aureus is an exacerbating factor in ad , and staphylococcal superantigen - specific ige is found in the serum of patients with ad , but not healthy individuals [ 2 , 3 ] . normally , s. aureus does not colonize healthy skin .
the skin ph of patients with ad is neutral while that of healthy individuals is weakly acidic , and s. aureus does not grow well on healthy skin because it prefers a neutral ph . with respect to skin fungi , approximately 50 species
colonize the skin of patients with ad , although the predominant fungus on the skin is the lipophilic yeast malassezia .
these microorganisms colonize sebum - rich areas such as the head , face , and neck rather than the limbs or trunk because malassezia requires lipids for growth . during the last two decades
, malassezia has been considered to be an exacerbating factor in ad because anti - malassezia - specific ige is present in the serum of patients with ad , but not healthy individuals [ 57 ] .
in addition , clinical investigations with antifungal agents ( ketoconazole or itraconazole ) showed improvements in ad symptoms , particularly atopic dermatitis of the head and neck ( hnad ) [ 812 ] .
the presence of anti - malassezia ige has been demonstrated in patients with hnad [ 7 , 1315 ] .
the detection frequency of anti - malassezia - specific ige in serum was higher in patients with hnad than in those without .
. found ige against malassezia antigen in 100% of 106 patients with hanad , but in only 28% of 25 patients who had ad without head and neck involvement .
a significant correlation was also observed between the level of malassezia - specific ige and clinical severity criteria , as reflected by the scorad index .
currently , 14 species are recognized within the genus malassezia . of them , both m. globosa and m. restricta were detected in all scale samples of patients with ad when the malassezia microbiota was analyzed by molecular - based culture - independent methods .
the colonization level of m. restricta was approximately 1.6 times greater than that of m. globosa .
m. sympodialis was the third most predominant species , with a detection rate of 58% .
other species , such as m. dermatitis , m. furfur , m. obtusa , or m. slooffiae , were detected in less than 30% of the cases . in this study
, we investigated the relationships between specific ige and the colonization frequency of the eight most predominant malassezia species and clinical severity levels in patients with hnad to determine the factors that were correlated with clinical severity .
outpatients with hnad ( n = 61 ) at tokyo medical university hospital were enrolled .
the study involved patients comprising 26 mild ( 17 men and 9 women ; mean age 34.7 10.5 years ; range , 2063 ) , 24 moderate ( 16 men and 8 women ; mean age 33.2 9.7 years ; range , 2064 ) , and 11 severe ( 7 men and 4 women ; mean age 32.7 10.4 years ; range 2151 ) cases .
the study protocol was approved by the institutional review board , and informed consent was obtained from all subjects .
antigens from each of eight malassezia species were prepared ( m. dermatitis jcm 11469 , m. furfur cbs 1878 , m. globosa cbs 7966 , m. japonica cbs 9432 , m. obtusa cbs 7876 , m. restricta cbs 7877 , m. sympodialis cbs 7222 , and m. slooffiae cbs 7956 ) according to the method of kato et al . .
ige levels against these antigens were determined using the alastat microplate system ( diagnostic products corporation , los angeles , ca , usa ) with slight modifications according to the method of kato et al . .
briefly , the wells of a microtiter plate were coated with 100 l of each malassezia antigen in phosphate - buffered saline ( pbs ) .
serum ( 50 l ) was then added , followed by peroxidase - labeled anti - ige antibodies . after adding tmb (
3,3,5,5-tetramethylbenzidine dissolved in hydrogen peroxide ) substrate solution , the absorbance at 650 nm was measured at 1 s intervals for 5 min
. ige levels ( units / ml ) in the samples were calculated using a standard curve , and ige levels greater than 0.35 u / ml were defined as a positive reaction .
scale samples were obtained from lesions by stripping with opsite , which is a transparent dressing ( smith & nephew , hull , uk ) , and malassezia dna was extracted directly from the dressing according to the method of sugita et al . .
briefly , the collected dressing was placed in 1 ml of lysing solution ( 100 mm tris hcl ( ph 8.0 ) , 30 mm edta ( ph 8.0 ) , 0.5% sodium dodecyl sulfate ) and incubated at 100c for 15 min .
after deproteinization , dna was precipitated with ethanol and ethachinmate ( nippon gene , toyama , japan ) .
the dna pellet was resuspended in 30 l of te buffer ( 10 mm tris hcl ( ph 8.0 ) , 1 mm edta ( ph 8.0 ) ) and stored at 20c until required . the malassezia species diversity was investigated using nested pcr with species - specific primers , following the method of sugita et al . and morishita et al . .
briefly , the malassezia internal transcribed spacer or intergenic spacer region of the rrna gene was amplified by pcr with malassezia universal primers .
the product of this first amplification ( 1 l ) was used in the nested pcr step with species - specific primers .
malassezia - specific ige antibody levels against eight species in each clinical severity group ( mild , moderate , and severe ) are shown in table 1 . as clinical severity increased , ige antibody levels against all eight malassezia species were also increased . in patients with mild ad , the level of specific ige against m. restricta was the highest ( 1.13 2.50 u / ml ) , followed by m. dermatitis ( 0.74 1.56 u / ml ) . specific ige for these two species was also present at high levels in patients with moderate ad ( 7.78 8.84 u / ml for m. restricta and 6.13 8.09 u / ml for m. dermatitis ) . in severe patients , with the exceptions of m. slooffiae and m. obtusa , ige antibody levels against the remaining six malassezia species
the detection frequencies of specific ige antibody are also shown in table 1 ; greater than 0.35 u / ml was defined as a positive reaction .
specific ige antibodies against m. restricta and m. dermatitis were detected in 42.3% of mild ad cases .
specific ige antibodies against six malassezia species , with the exceptions of m. slooffiae and m. obtusa , were detected in greater than 70% of moderate ad cases .
specific ige antibodies against all eight malassezia species were detected in more than 80% of severe cases .
malassezia dna in scale samples was detected by nested pcr using species - specific primers .
the colonization frequencies of eight malassezia species among the three clinical severity groups were similar ( table 1 ) .
the average number of species detected in each patient was similar among the three clinical severity groups ( 3.7 1.6 , 3.7 1.6 , and 3.5 1.4 species in mild , moderate , and severe ad cases , resp . ) .
the number of species detected in each severity group was compared with the total ige antibody levels against malassezia species .
as the number of detected species increased , total level ige antibody levels against malassezia species also increased ( table 2 ) .
in this study , we investigated the relationships between specific ige levels and the colonization frequency of the eight predominant malassezia species and clinical severity in patients with hnad to elucidate the factors correlated with clinical severity .
some studies have reported that the frequency of anti - malassezia - specific ige antibodies in serum was higher in patients with hnad than in those without . however , the detection frequency of anti - malassezia - specific ige antibodies in patients with hnad was different in each report : 100% , 68% , 55% , 55% , and 35% .
these aforementioned studies had prepared malassezia antigens from m. furfur or m. sympodialis to detect specific ige antibodies from patients ' sera .
unfortunately , these microorganisms are not the predominant species on the skin of patients with ad .
m. globosa and m. restricta were detected in all patients , while m. furfur and m. sympodialis were observed in 15.429.2% and 54.561.5% of the patients , respectively .
in addition to detection frequency , colonization levels of m. globosa and m. restricta accounted for greater than 90% of the entire malassezia microbiota .
based on this result , kato et al . quantified specific ige against eight malassezia species , m. dermatitis , m. furfur , m. globosa , m. obtusa , m. pachydermatitis , m. slooffiae , m. sympodialis , and m. restricta , in sera from patients with ad by enzyme - linked immunosorbent assay ( elisa )
the level of specific ige antibodies for m. restricta was greater than that against other malassezia species .
competitive elisa inhibition tests revealed that m. restricta contained species - specific as well as shared antigens .
the colonization level of malassezia in scale samples from patients with ad also differed according to clinical severity .
the extent of malassezia colonization between patients with mild and moderate ad was similar . however , colonization in severe patients was two- to fivefold higher than that of mild and moderate patients .
in addition , the proportions of the two predominant species , m. globosa and m. restricta , differed according to the clinical severity . in patients with mild and moderate ad ,
m. restricta predominated over m. globosa , whereas the proportions of m. globosa and m. restricta were almost identical in patients with severe ad .
ad severity had no effect on malassezia species diversity in patients with 3.453.71 species colonizing the skin ; however , the number of species detected ranged from two to seven of a total of eight . the number of species detected in each case correlated with the total level of specific ige antibodies against malassezia species in each severity group ( table 2 ) .
therefore , to elucidate the factors associated with the clinical severity of ad , the relationships between specific ige levels and colonization levels with the eight most predominant malassezia species should be investigated .
the clinical severity of hnad was correlated with total levels of ige antibodies against malassezia species and the number of malassezia species detected in each case . | pubmed |
Cinygmula is a genus of flatheaded mayflies in the family Heptageniidae. There are at least 30 described species in Cinygmula.
Species
These 33 species belong to the genus Cinygmula:
Cinygmula adusta Imanishi, 1935 c g
Cinygmula brunnea Tiunova, 1990 c g
Cinygmula cava Ulmer, 1927 c g
Cinygmula dorsalis Imanishi, 1935 c g
Cinygmula gartrelli McDunnough, 1934 i c g
Cinygmula hirasana Imanishi, 1935 c g
Cinygmula hutchinsoni Traver, 1939 c g
Cinygmula inermis Braasch, 1983 c g
Cinygmula irina Tshernova & Belov, 1982 c g
Cinygmula joosti Braasch, 1977 c g
Cinygmula kootenai McDunnough, 1943 i c g
Cinygmula kurenzovi Bajkova, 1965 c g
Cinygmula levanidovi Tshernova & Belov, 1982 c g
Cinygmula malaisei Ulmer, 1927 c g
Cinygmula mimus Eaton, 1885 i c g
Cinygmula minuta Braasch, 1980 c g
Cinygmula oreophila Kustareva, 1978 c g
Cinygmula par Eaton, 1885 i c g
Cinygmula picta Braasch & Soldán, 1979 c g
Cinygmula putoranica Kluge, 1980 c g
Cinygmula quadripunctata Braasch & Soldán, 1980 c g
Cinygmula ramaleyi Dodds, 1923 i c g
Cinygmula reticulata McDunnough, 1934 i c g
Cinygmula rougemonti Braasch & Soldán, 1987 c g
Cinygmula sapporensis Matsumura, 1904 c g
Cinygmula subaequalis Banks, 1914 i c g b
Cinygmula tarda McDunnough, 1929 i c g
Cinygmula tetramera g
Cinygmula tioga Mayo, 1952 i c g
Cinygmula unicolorata Tshernova, 1979 c g
Cinygmula uniformis McDunnough, 1934 i c g
Cinygmula vernalis Imanishi, 1935 c g
Cinygmula zimmermanni Braasch, 1977 c g
Data sources: i = ITIS, c = Catalogue of Life, g = GBIF, b = Bugguide.net
References
Further reading
Category:Mayfly genera | wikipedia |
radiographic examination revealed a bilateral pleural effusion , which was diagnosed as pyothorax based on cytological examination .
exploratory sternotomy , under general anaesthesia , allowed the removal of approximately 100 ml of purulent fluid and debridement of a partially walled - off abscess and necrotic material from the pleural cavity .
intensive postoperative care , including intensive continuous monitoring , thoracostomy tube drainage and lavage of the pleural cavity and oesophagostomy tube feeding , was performed .
clinical or radiographic abnormalities were not detected at a follow - up examination one year after surgery .
pyothorax is the accumulation of a septic inflammatory effusion within the pleural cavity and is a serious life - threatening condition in the cat .
common clinical signs include inappetance or anorexia , lethargy , dyspnoea , weight loss , pyrexia , hypersalivation and muffled heart sounds .
the source of the bacterial contamination of the pleural cavity is unknown in most cases ; however , thoracic bite wounds are frequently implicated in the cat .
diagnosis is usually straightforward , being based on clinical signs , thoracic radiography , thoracocentesis and cytology .
this case report describes a cat with advanced pyothorax treated with aggressive medical and surgical management , which required the use of postoperative ventilatory support to achieve a successful result .
a two - year - old 2.7 kg outdoor - indoor female neutered domesticlonghair cat from a multi - cat household presented to the university veterinary hospital , university college dublin , with a history of lethargy , weakness and laboured breathing of 12 hours duration .
the cat was reported to be inappetant and to have lost weight over the previous four to five days .
amoxycillinclavulanate ( synulox ; pfizer , 50 mg ) had been administered orally 12 hours before presentation .
the cat had been in the owners possession since three months of age and had been vaccinated annually against feline panleukopenia , feline calicivirus and feline herpesvirus . on clinical examination
an intravenous catheter was placed in the left cephalic vein and lactated ringer 's solution ( compound sodium lactate ; ivex pharmaceuticals ) was administered at a rate of 40 ml / kg / h .
thoracic radiographs ( figure 1 , p211 ) were taken without sedation and revealed a fluid / soft tissue opacity in the ventral thorax obscuring the cardiac silhouette and ventral diaphragmatic margin .
the lungs were separated from the thoracic wall at the costodiaphragmatic recess and right hemithorax , indicating the presence of a pleural effusion .
ultrasound - guided thoracocentesis was performed using a 5/8 inch 21-gauge needle at the costochondral junction of the right seventh intercostal space .
cytological examination of the fluid revealed large amounts of necrotic debris with few intact inflammatory cells and massive numbers of mixed bacteria .
large numbers of gram - positive filamentous organisms and gram - negative organisms were present on gram - stained smears .
the cat was administered amoxcillin - clavulanate ( augmentin ; glaxosmithkline : 25 mg / kg ) intravenously and enrofloxacin ( baytril ; bayer : 5 mg / kg ) subcutaneously . the pasteurella and actinomyces spp . were sensitive to both these antibiotics on subsequent antimicrobial sensitivity testing .
haematological examination revealed a leukopenia [ total white blood cell count 5.7 10/l ; reference range 8 to 20 10/l ] , which was characterised by a severe mature neutropenia [ 0.7 10/l ; reference range 2.8 to 15 10/l ] , a moderate immature neutrophilia [ 3.7 10/l ; reference range 0 to 0.7 10/l and a severe lymphopenia [ 0.1 10/l ; reference range 0.2 to 2 10/l ] . serum biochemical analysis revealed hypoproteinaemia [ 41.1
there was a marked elevation in creatine kinase [ 423 u / l ; reference range 10 to 70 u / l ] , severe hyperchloraemia [ 118 mmol / l ; reference range 99 to 110 mmol / l ] and severe hypoglycaemia [ 1.7 mmol / l ; reference range 3.3 to 5 mmol / l ] . the intravenous rate 40 ml / kg / h of lactated ringer 's solution was continued and an 18-gauge central line ( leaderflex ; vygon ) was placed under local anaesthesia in the right jugular vein to monitor central venous pressure and the response to fluid therapy .
pre - oxygenation via facemask was carried out prior to the administration of intravenous midazolam ( hypnovel ; roche ) at 0.3 mg / kg and ketamine ( vetalar ; pharmacia ) 4.8 mg / kg for premedication and induction of anaesthesia , respectively .
after endotracheal intubation , ketamine at 30 g / kg / minute was administered on a continuous intravenous infusion supplemented with isoflurane ( forane ; abbott ) at an end - tidal 0.2% in 100% oxygen .
systolic blood pressure was too low to be measured ; therefore , intravenous infusions of dopamine hydrochloride ( dopamine hydrochloride solution bp ; antigen pharmaceuticals : 5 g / kg / minute ) and colloids ( gelofuscine ; braun : 20 ml / kg ) were commenced .
morphine sulphate ( morphine sulphate injection bp ; antigen pharmaceuticals : 0.2 mg / kg ) was administered intravenously for intraoperative analgesia .
forty minutes after induction of anaesthesia , venous blood gas analysis ( i - stat analyser ; i - stat corporation ) revealed a severe metabolic acidosis and moderate respiratory acidosis [ ph 7.064 , normal venous ph 7.376 ] . an intravenous bicarbonate infusion ( 8.4% sodium bicarbonate ; braun )
was started ( 1 mmol over 30 minutes and 3 mmol over the next two hours ) to improve the metabolic acidosis .
in addition , tidal volume was increased to decrease end - tidal carbon dioxide and compensate for the excess of carbon dioxide produced by the bicarbonate infusion .
a ventral sternotomy was commenced caudal to the xiphisternum , extending cranially through two - thirds of the sternum .
the muscles overlying the sternum were reflected using a combination of sharp incision , periosteal elevation and diathermy .
the sternebrae were partly incised with a scalpel blade and the sternotomy was completed with scissors exposing both pleural spaces .
approximately 100 ml of yellow - grey purulent material was aspirated from the pleural cavity .
necrotic mediastinal tissue was resected , including what appeared to be a walled - off abscess in the caudal central part of the thorax ( figure 2 , p212 ) .
complete debridement was not possible without lung trauma ; therefore , necrotic adhesions to the visceral pleura were not removed .
thoracic drains ( thoracic trocar and drain ; vygon : 14 ch ) were inserted into both pleural cavities , entering the thorax at the right and left eight intercostal spaces and extending cranially on the thoracic floor .
the sternotomy was closed with figure - of - eight sutures of 4 metric polypropylene ( prolene ; ethicon ) .
a light dressing was placed around the thorax to secure the thoracic drains in place .
the cat was transferred to the intensive care unit for recovery from the surgical procedure . at this stage
positive - pressure ventilation was necessary following the end of anaesthesia due to the increased work of breathing caused by restrictive pulmonary disease and drug - induced respiratory depression .
ventilatory support was continued for six hours on 100% oxygen until the cat could maintain adequate endtidal carbon dioxide and oxygen saturation on spontaneous ventilation and supplemental 40% oxygen .
for the first 24 hours after surgery , temperature , heart rate , respiratory rate and oxygen saturation were monitored hourly , and were then monitored every four hours for the following 72 hours .
2.5% glucose added was administered intravenously at a rate of 5 ml / kg / h and the infusion of dopamine was maintained for 24 hours postoperatively to ensure adequate urine production .
effective analgesia was maintained with morphine sulphate ( 0.2 mg / kg intramuscularly every six hours ) and fentanyl ( durogesic ; janssen - cilag , 2.5 mg transdermal patch ) .
eighteen hours after the end of anaesthesia , the cat had regained bilateral palpebral and pupillary light reflexes .
the thoracic cavity was lavaged with 20 ml / kg of warm sterile physiological saline solution four times daily for six days .
cytological analysis of the lavage fluid seven days post - surgery revealed a moderate purulent inflammatory exudate without evidence of bacteria .
thoracic lavage was continued once daily for a further two days and then the thoracic drains were removed . by this stage the cat was breathing normally and the thoracic lavage fluid had a clear physical appearance .
this was continued at four to six hour intervals until the seventh day post - surgery , at which stage the cat was spontaneously eating adequate quantities of food .
the cat was maintained on amoxicillin - clavulanate ( synulox ; pfizer : 20 mg / kg orally twice daily ) and enrofloxacin ( baytril ; bayer : 5
thoracic radiographs were taken 15 days post - surgery and showed a complete resolution of the pleural effusion .
the lungs were fully inflated and the thoracic structures were clearly visible ( figure 3 , p213 ) .
no clinical or radiographic abnormalities were detected at a follow - up examination one year after surgery .
possible causes of pyothorax in cats include thoracic trauma , extension from bacterial pneumonia , oesophageal perforation , migrating foreign bodies , haematogenous and iatrogenic from thoracocentesis or thoracotomy .
the cat in this report displayed the characteristic signalment and presenting clinical signs , including hypersalivation , which has been associated with a lower survival rate .
bilateral pleural effusion , as found in this case , is the most common radiographic finding in cats with pyothorax .
thoracic ultrasonography revealed extensive changes within the thoracic cavity indicative of loculation and this strongly aided the decision to perform surgery .
haematological examination in this case revealed a leucopenia with a neutropenia and a degenerative left shift .
waddell et al . found a correlation between these findings and a lower survival rate , and concluded that these cases had the more severe pyothorax .
treatment for pyothorax can be medical and/or surgical , although the most appropriate treatment protocol has not been determined .
medical treatment involves administration of intravenous fluid , broad - spectrum antimicrobial therapy and thoracic drainage with or without thoracic lavage .
recently demetriou et al . reported faster recovery times with lavage than without lavage , although their criteria for the discontinuation of lavage are not clear .
pyothorax in the cat is a serious life - threatening condition , with a reported survival rate of 43% to 92% for either medically or surgically treated cases . in two reports ,
seven of 16 cats and 21 of 80 cats presented dead or were euthanised within the first 24 hours of examination .
waddell et al . noted that the most severely affected cats may have been euthanised on presentation , resulting in a higher than expected survival rate in the treated cats .
previously , surgical management has been recommended in cases where there had been no response to medical management and in cases with an intrathoracic mass or lung lobe abscess was diagnosed on thoracic ultrasonography .
the survival rate for surgically managed cats ( five of five cats survived ) was recently reported to be significantly higher than medically managed cats ( 34 of 54 cats survived ) .
this must be weighed against the risk of a longer general anaesthetic in a compromised patient , an increased cost and length of hospital stay , and the pain associated with surgery . in this case , the decision for surgical management was based upon the very low volume of viscous flocculent pleural fluid aspirated on thoracocentesis and the ultrasonographic appearance of extensive loculations within the caudal thoracic cavity . due to the severity of the cat 's clinical condition , it was felt that early aggressive surgical management was preferable to prolonged medical management .
exploratory sternotomy allowed debridement of a partially walled - off abscess and the removal of purulent and necrotic material from the pleural cavity .
the anaesthetic management of this case was complex and demanding due to severe restrictive pulmonary disease caused by the pyothorax , sepsis , metabolic and respiratory acidosis , low systolic blood pressure and the depressed mental state .
it is characterised by decreased lung compliance so that lung volumes are typically reduced leading to increased work of breathing .
restrictive pulmonary disease along with pulmonary parenchymal disease ( for example , pneumonia ) may lead to persistent hypoxia , which may require positive - pressure ventilation .
the recommended ventilation pattern should aim to maintain low tidal volumes ( 10 ml / kg ) , a low peak proximal airway pressure ( 10 to 20 cm h2o ) and a respiratory rate of about 15 times per minute .
ventilation was essential in this case in the management of the severe acidosis and to ensure adequate oxygenation .
mechanical ventilation often requires sedation or anaesthesia , but this was not necessary due to the depressed mental state of the cat in the post - operative period .
only short - term ventilation was required , until the acidosis was no longer life - threatening and oxygenation could be maintained by spontaneous ventilation and intranasal oxygen supplementation .
positive - pressure ventilation for pulmonary parenchymal disease in dogs and cats has been reported to have a survival rate of 20% ; hypotension has been associated with a poorer prognosis . instituting early enteral nutrition in critically - ill patients
malnutrition is associated with higher complication rates and causes anaemia , hypoproteinaemia , delayed wound healing and decreased immune function .
oesophagostomy tube placement and feeding is straightforward , well tolerated by the patient and associated with a low complication rate . in this case , the cat presented with clinical parameters associated with a poor outcome
. however , intrathoracic debridement with postoperative ventilatory support and intensive supportive care led to a successful outcome . | pubmed |
Harpalus vereschaginae is a species of ground beetle in the subfamily Harpalinae. It was described by Kataev in 1988.
References
vereschaginae
Category:Beetles described in 1988 | wikipedia |
Closing bars at 10 p.m.? 'This has taken a fun business and made it not so fun'
Mully's bar in Syracuse's Armory Square posted this sign back in March when the first coronavirus shutdown order went into effect. Now bars are required to close by 10 p.m. each night. Rick Moriarty | [email protected]
By Don Cazentre | [email protected]
Syracuse, N.Y. — Not every bar in downtown Syracuse is a late night hot spot — or at least many haven't been during the coronavirus pandemic.
But for some, like Mully's tavern and Benjamin's on Franklin nightclub in Armory Square, things often don't get rolling until 10 p.m. or later.
"That's when most people are showing up at our doors," said Joe Rainone, who operates both Mully's at 239 W. Fayette St. and Benjamin's at 314 S. Franklin St. Since September, both have been open only on Fridays and Saturdays.
"We're not making a lot of money right now," Rainone said, "but if we can make money, that's when we do it."
Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced today that, starting Friday, all bars, restaurants and other venues with liquor licenses statewide must close no later than 10 p.m. The rule is part of a new effort to control the spiking number of coronavirus cases in the state.
Cuomo's new order, which also limits household gatherings to 10 people or less, comes two days after Syracuse and other parts of Onondaga County were placed in a restrictive "yellow zone" due to high coronavirus cases.
In the yellow zone, bars and restaurants had to close no later than midnight (they must also limit tables to no more than four people).
So the closing time for Mully's and Benjamin's has suddenly dropped from 2 a.m. to midnight and now to 10 p.m.
"I honestly don't know if it makes sense to keep going," Rainone said. "I'm thinking about just closing up."
If he does try to live with the new rules, Rainone may have to get creative.
"Maybe a 5-to-10 (p.m.) happy hour?" he said. "I really don't know if that would even work. This has taken a fun business and made it not so fun."
The new rules may not have such a great impact on other places that don't depend on late-night crowds.
At the Scotch 'n Sirloin restaurant on Erie Boulevard in DeWitt, seatings are mostly by reservation and end at 8:30 even on Fridays and Saturdays. The "bar" business, once a key feature at the Scotch, has been essentially shut down since the restaurant reopened in June.
The only issue, owner Tom Tiffany said, would be for parties that like to linger after dinner.
"With all the other adjustments we've made, this one, for us, is not going to change much," he said. "But we are just hanging on by a thread."
The new closing time means everyone must be out of of the bar or restaurant by 10 p.m. Restaurants may serve food (but not drinks) to go after 10 p.m.
Several bar owners reached earlier this week about the yellow zone rules and the midnight closing told syracuse.com that late night crowds have been decreasing since the pandemic.
"It's been dead down here at night," said Randy Beach, owner of the Ale 'n Angus pub on Harrison Street downtown. That's what prompted him to close at 4 p.m. each day even when he could reopen. (The Ale 'n Angus is temporarily closed as a precaution this week after a potential coronavirus exposure).
That's true in other spots around the area, too.
"From what I can see in Baldwinsville there was almost never anyone out past 10 o'clock any nights," said Dennis Sick, owner of Mohegan Manor in the village's downtown.
Cuomo imposed the new rules as coronavirus cases continue to rise across New York. Hospitalizations are at their highest level since June and the state is confirming new cases at a rate not seen since the spring.
MORE ON CORONAVIRUS
Coronavirus in NY: Cases, maps, charts and resources
'Yellow zone' rules rattle Syracuse, other schools; in-person learning in jeopardy
Coronavirus update: Positive test rate over 8% in Onondaga County yellow zone
Customers of The Evergreen, Swallow's or Brooklyn Pickle may have been exposed to coronavirus
Complete coronavirus coverage on syracuse.com
Don Cazentre writes for NYup.com, syracuse.com and The Post-Standard. Reach him at [email protected], or follow him at NYup.com, on Twitter or Facebook. | slim_pajama |
glucokinase ( gk ) ( ec 2.7.1.1 ) is expressed in glucosensitive cells of the pancreas , liver , hypothalamus , anterior pituitary gland , and enteroendocrine k and l cells [ 13 ] .
gk has a prominent role as a glucose sensor because of its specific kinetic properties , including an affinity for glucose that is within the physiological plasma concentration range ( half - saturation level for glucose [ s0.5 ] of ~8 mmol / l ) , positive cooperativity , and lack of inhibition by glucose-6-phosphate . in liver and brain , gk is controlled by an endogenous inhibitor , the glucokinase regulatory protein ( gkrp ) [ 4 , 5 ] . during starvation , the enzyme
after refeeding , glucose mediates the dissociation of the gk - gkrp complex and gk translocates to the cytoplasm .
also , several naturally occurring activating mutations have been described that induce a conformational change in gk , which results in higher affinity for glucose , and reduce the interaction between gk and gkrp [ 6 , 7 ] .
similarly , synthetic gk activators ( gkas ) enhance gk activity and induce its translocation to the cytosol .
there is evidence that a defect in gkrp regulation of gk , resulting in increased liver gk activity probably as a result of increased cytosolic translocation , has consequences on glucose and triglyceride homeostasis in humans , even though these patients have reduced risk to type 2 diabetes [ 13 , 14 ] .
we aimed to study the metabolic consequences of gk - gkrp deregulation by overexpressing a gk activating mutant ( gka456v ) in the liver of insulin - deficient mice ( lacking endogenous gk ) .
transfected gk456v is maintained in the cytosol of hepatocytes in vivo leading to improved glycemia in the absence of dyslipidemia .
these data provide novel insights into the consequences of gk - gkrp derangement and widen the scope for gka research in the liver .
site - directed mutagenesis to generate gk - a456v cdna was performed using the quickchange site - directed mutagenesis kit ( strategene ) , and specific primers containing the desired mutation ( 3ctggtctctgcggcggcctgcaagaag5 and 5gaccagagacgccgccggtgcaagaacg3 ) from dharmacon .
the cdnas for gk and gk - a456v were cloned into ecori - bglii of a pcaggs vector which contains the cag ( cytomegalovirus immediate - early enhancer - chicken -actin hybrid ) promoter .
the resulting plasmids pgk and pgka456v were amplified in e. coli jm109 cells and extracted using nucleobond pc 2000 ef mega prep kit ( macherey - nagel ) .
dna for animal injection was digested with sali and hindiii which cut on both sides of the expression cassette [ 16 , 17 ] in order to extend expression in vivo .
expression plasmids were transfected in huh7 cells for kinetic analysis ( supplementary figure 1 available at doi : 10.1155/2011/707928 ) .
male icr mice purchased from harlan interfarma iberica s.l were maintained in a constant 12-hour light - dark cycle and fed standard rodent chow and water ad libitum .
all animal protocols were approved by the ethics committee at the university of barcelona . to obtain diabetic animals ,
mice weighing approximately 22 g were injected i.p . with a single dose of streptozotocin ( stz ) ( 200 mg / kg ) dissolved in 100 mm citric / citrate buffer , ph 4.5 .
digested plasmid dna was introduced into murine livers using a hydrodynamic - based gene transfer technique via rapid injection of a large volume of dna solution through the tail vein .
briefly , 60 g / mouse dna was diluted in 2.0 to 2.5 ml of apyrogenic ringer - lactate solution ( fresenius kabi ) ( 0.1 ml / g body weight ) and injected into the tail vein using a 27-gauge needle and syringe within 5 to 10 seconds .
typically , the mice recovered from the injection within 2 to 10 min . at the end of the experiment , animals were sacrificed under xylazine / ketamine anesthesia .
blood samples were taken by inferior cava vein puncture and serum was obtained by centrifugation at 700 g at 4c for 15 min .
liver was dissected , snap frozen in liquid nitrogen , and subsequently stored at 80c until analysis . for gk immunodetection ,
livers from 5-hour fasted animals were fixed in a 4% pfa solution and frozen in oct compound .
7 m cryosections were obtained in a cryostat and immunostained with a 1 : 50 dilution of gk antibody ( ap7901c , abgen ) followed by an anti - rabbit antibody alexa fluor 488 ( molecular probes ) .
blood glucose levels were measured using a glucocard memory 2 apparatus ( menarini ) from a blood drop collected from the tail tip .
the veterinarian clinical biochemistry service from the veterinary hospital of the universitat autnoma de barcelona , bellaterra , spain , measured serum metabolites .
cdna synthesis was performed using ready - to - go you - prime first strand beads ( amersham biosciences ) with random hexamers .
mrna levels of the transgenic rat gk ( r - gk ) were quantified with specie - specific primers ( applied biosystems ) and normalized using -2-microglobulin as an internal control in an ht7700 real time - pcr system ( applied biosystems ) .
mrna levels of selected genes of interest were measured running a low density array ( applied biosystems ) in an ht7900 real time - pcr system ( applied biosystems ) .
frozen liver samples were homogenized in ice - cold homogenization buffer ( hepes 50 mm ph 7.4 , kcl 100 mm , edta 1 mm , mgcl2 5 mm , dtt 2.5 mm ) using a polytron pt 3000 and centrifuged at 100,000 g for 1 hour at 4c .
supernatants were used for the determination of gk activity following the spectrophotometric method described by davidson and arion .
briefly , the assays were carried out in a solution containing hepes 50 mm ph 7.4 , kcl 100 mm , mgcl2 7.5 mm , nad 1 mm , atp 5 mm , bsa 1% and indicated amounts of glucose .
the reactions were initiated by adding 5 u / ml of glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase ( g6pdh ) from leuconostoc mesenteroides ( roche ) and the rate of increase in absorbance at 340 nm was measured .
the gk activity was calculated as the difference between the kinase activities measured at different glucose concentrations and 0.5 mm glucose ( hexokinase activity ) , and was expressed as munits / mg liver .
frozen liver samples were homogenized in ice - cold buffer , which contained hepes 50 mm ph 7.4 , kcl 100 mm , edta 1 mm , mgcl2 5 mm , dtt 2.5 mm , and 1% pluronic f-127 ( calbiochem ) , and centrifuged at 20,000 g for 20 min at 4c .
g6pdh activity was assayed by measuring the rate of nadph production from nadp 0.5 mm and glucose-6-phosphate 2 mm , at ph 7.6 .
frozen tissue was homogenized in radioimmunoprecipitation assay buffer ( ripa ) supplemented with protease and phosphatase inhibitors and centrifuged at 15,000 g for 15 min at 4c .
30 g of tissue extract was resolved by sds - page ( 812% gel ) and electrotransferred onto a hybond - p membrane ( amersham biosciences ) .
/ fructose-2,6-biphosphatase ( ub - pfk2 ) and l - pyruvate kinase ( l - pk ) ( gifts from ramon bartrons , barcelona university ) , and carbohydrate response element binding protein ( chrebp ) ( novus biologicals ) . acc and acc - p ser-79 ( upstate ) were used at 1/2000 .
sheep anti - pepck - c antiserum ( a gift from daryl granner , vandervilt university , usa ) was used at 1 : 20,000 dilution .
all membranes were normalized using monoclonal anti--tubulin ( sigma ) at 1 : 10,000 dilution .
horseradish peroxidase activity linked to secondary antibody was detected with ecl substrate ( pierce ) in a fujifilm las 300 intelligent dark box iv imaging system .
densitometry was performed using multi gauge software . to measure hepatic free glucose , glucose-6-phosphate ( g6p ) , and lactate
briefly , perchloric acid 10% was added to frozen pieces of liver ( 5 : 1 v : w ) and the mixture was homogenized in a potter elvehjem apparatus at 1,500 rpm .
the homogenate was then centrifuged at 20,000 g for 10 min at 4c .
the supernatant was brought to ph 7 with k2co3 4 n and centrifuged again to remove the kclo4 formed during neutralization .
g6p was measured following the spectrofluorometric method described by lang & michal , which is based in the reaction catalyzed by g6pdh .
briefly , the assay solution contained triethanolamine 0.2 m ph 7.6 , nadp 0.2 m , mgcl2 5 mm , and g6pdh 0.17 u / ml .
lactate was determined by a spectrophotometric method based on the reaction catalyzed by lactate dehydrogenase , following gutmann & wahlefeld . briefly , the reaction cuvette contained hydrazine / glycine buffer 0.25 m/0.7 m , ph 9.3 , edta 0.15 mm , nad 2 mm , and 35 u / ml of lactate dehydrogenase . for fructose-2,6-bisphosphatase ( f2,6bp ) determination , frozen livers were homogenized in 0.1 m naoh , heated to 80c for 15 min , and centrifuged at 12,000 g for 5 min .
f2,6bp was determined in supernatants by its ability to activate pyrophosphate - dependent 6-phosphofructo-1-kinase from potato tubers , as described by van schaftingen et al . .
the hepatic triacylglyceride ( tag ) content was measured in 3 m koh , 65% ethanol extracts using a tag kit ( sigma ) , based on the method of salmon and flatt for liver saponification .
a solution of u - c - glucose and glucose was intraperitoneally injected into 5-hour fasted stz - diabetic mice ( 0.2 mg glucose , 10 ci per animal ) .
blood , liver , brain , and muscle were obtained 30 minutes after injection and dissolved into solvable ( perkin elmer ) .
blood samples were bleached with edta 0.1 m and h2o2 ( 30% ) , and liver and brain samples were bleached with h2o2 ( 30% ) alone .
radioactivity was quantified by adding scintillation liquid ( ecoscint h ) and counted in a wallac 1409 - 001 counter .
pgka456v , wild - type gk ( pgk ) and an empty vector ( pcontrol ) , were introduced into the liver of streptozotocin ( stz- ) treated mice .
hydrodynamic - based delivery of plasmid dna led to specific transfection of hepatocytes around the central vein [ 23 , 24 ] , reproducing the physiologic distribution of gk in the liver acinus .
this technique induces a transient release of liver enzymes that returns to control values by the second day after injection .
consistently , transaminase levels were low at the end - point of analysis , and similar in all treatment groups ( pcontrol 207.5 29.88 u / l , pgk 121.0 48.43
u / l , pgka456v 117.5 40.35 u / l ; n = 49 ) . at the time of injection mice were hyperglycemic ( > 350 mg / dl ) and their insulin level was undetectable ( < 0.1
forty - eight hours postinjection the expression of transfected rat gk and gka456v was detected by rt - pcr ( data not shown ) .
further confirmation of gk overexpression was obtained by western blot from liver extracts ( figure 1(a ) ) and gk activity assay ( figure 1(b ) ) .
gk activity was undetectable in pcontrol transfected livers irrespective of glucose concentration , as expected in long - term stz diabetic animals .
in contrast , both pgk and pgka456v transfected groups had similar gk activity at 100 mm glucose ( mu / g fresh ) , demonstrating that both treatment groups had similar amounts of gk protein .
consistent with the s0.5 for glucose of gka456v , liver extracts from pgka456v - injected animals had twice the gk activity of livers from pgk - injected animals at physiological glucose concentrations ( 5 mm ) ( figure 1(b ) ) .
gkrp retains gk in the nucleus at low glucose concentrations and releases gk when insulin , high glucose , or fructose-1p are present [ 26 , 27 ] .
different studies have suggested that the a456v mutation impairs gkrp regulation in vitro [ 6 , 28 ] .
therefore , we assessed gkrp - dependent nuclear sequestration in primary hepatocytes from stz - treated rats transfected with pgk and pgka456v , in the presence or absence of pgkrp .
densitometry analysis of western blots from nuclear and cytosolic fractions showed that cellular gka456v distribution was not affected by the presence of gkrp ( data not shown ) .
pgk - treated mice showed gk immunoreactivity throughout the liver , especially in nuclei ( figure 2 ) .
these data demonstrates , that impaired gkrp binding to gka456v changes its compartmentalization in vivo .
the impact of both gk enzymes on glucose metabolism was first evaluated in fed animals .
both gk and gka456v slightly reduced glycemia ( figure 3(a ) ) . to explore the fate of glucose in the liver
fed pgk - treated mice showed significantly higher f2,6bp and glycogen contents ( figure 4(a ) ) , together with a rise in lactate , indicating a higher glycolytic flux .
gka456v - expressing livers also showed higher hepatic free glucose than both control and gk groups , even though the content of g6p was similar in all three groups .
glycogen content was significantly higher than control but similar to pgk - treated group ( figure 4(a ) ) .
pgka456v - treated animals showed a marked reduction of glycemia after a 5-hour fast ( figure 3(a ) ) .
lactate was only increased after pgk treatment ( pcontrol , 7.296 0.772 mm ; pgka456v , 8.778 0.649 mm ; pgk , 10.62 0.608 mm
hepatic free glucose content was low in the pgka456v treatment group ( table 1 ) .
g6p levels were reduced to the same extent in control and gka456v groups , whereas gk - expressing animals showed similar g6p and atp concentrations to well - fed animals .
glycogen content in gk - expressing animals was significantly higher than control and gka456v - expressing groups .
fed - to - fast transition produced a marked reduction of glycogen stores in pgka456v - treated animals as compared to pcontrol and pgk , suggesting an increased rate of glycogenolysis in gka456v - expressing animals ( figure 4(b ) ) . in order to clarify whether glucose distribution in vivo favored the liver , we quantitated c radioactivity derived from uptake and metabolism of uc - glucose in various tissues 30 minutes after injection .
c label was increased exclusively in the liver of both pgk and pgka456v treatment groups ( control , 100 7.88% ; gk , 138.73 14.63% ; gka456v 144.1
8.99% ; p = 0.037 gk versus control and p = 0.003 pgka456v versus control ) . to assess whether pgka456v expression would affect glucose clearance in healthy mice
, we performed a glucose tolerance test 1 week after transfection ( figure 3(b ) ) .
consistently , our data demonstrates a significant increase in serum tag ( pcontrol 33.5 7.72 mg / dl , pgka456v 38.13 7.66 mg / dl , pgk 74.00 14.76 mg / dl , p < 0.05 versus pcontrol and pgka456v ) and nefa ( pcontrol 0.325 0.09 mm , pgka456v 0.4013 0.05 mm , pgk 0.66 0.10 mm p < 0.05 versus pcontrol ) only in the postabsorptive state .
besides , gk overexpressing mice showed a tendency to increase hepatic tag content , which is consistent with the literature [ 30 , 31 ] .
in contrast , gka456v overexpression did not promote dislipemia , as evidenced by maintained levels of circulating nefa and tag .
there was a significant increase in -hydroxybutyrate levels in the pgka456v group ( pcontrol , 0.18 0.03 mm ; pgka456v , 0.27 0.03 mm
in order to elucidate the mechanism responsible for the metabolic profile observed , we analyzed protein and mrna levels for key enzymes and transcription factors . both gk and gka456v treatments
were accompanied by increases in l - pk protein ( figures 5(a ) and 5(b ) ) .
pgk - treatment resulted in higher levels of ubiquitous pfk2 ( pfkfb3 ) protein ( figures 5(a ) and 5(b ) ) , but not mrna ( table 2 ) , consistent with elevated f2,6bp observed in this treatment group ( table 1 ) . also , endogenous
, mouse gk mrna expression was induced in the livers of pgk - injected mice , as detected by species - specific qrt - pcr .
correlating with the induction of the expression of endogenous gk , cmyc mrna was only increased in pgk - treated animals .
other regulatory factors implicated in the regulation of endogenous gk expression , such as srebp and lxr , were not affected by treatment with pgk and pgka456v ( table 2 ) . as an increment in gk expression in the liver
is commonly associated with increased lipogenesis [ 32 , 33 ] , enzymes and transcription factors involved in de novo lipogenesis were analyzed .
gk- and pgka456v - expressing groups presented increased mrna content for fasn and mod1 that were more pronounced in pgk - treated animals .
also , acc1 and chrebp were more induced by the overexpression of gk than by gka456v .
gk , through the production of xylulose-5p , mediates the inhibition of gluconeogenesis by glucose [ 34 , 35 ] .
f2,6bp has also been associated with the inhibitory effect of glucose metabolism on gluconeogenesis .
consistently , we observed a reduction of pepck at the protein level in both pgk- and pgka456v - treated mice .
similarly , pgc-1 and hnf4 mrnas were reduced in pgk - injected mice , whereas gka456v - overexpressing livers only showed reduced pgc-1 mrna . in contrast , the level of mrna for the catalytic subunit of glucose-6-phosphatase ( glc6pase ) were strikingly higher in gka456v - overexpressing animals , consistent with more glycogen breakdown observed after a 5-hour fast .
similar results were observed in healthy mice overexpressing pgka456v after a short fast ( data not shown ) .
to evaluate the consequences of gk activation and deregulation by gkrp in the liver , we hydrodynamically injected pgka456v in the liver of stz - diabetic mice .
this strategy allowed us to obtain a mouse model where the effects of exogenous gks are isolated from those of endogenous gk ( undetectable levels of mouse gk mrna and activity in pcontrol - treated animals ) and insulin action ( insulin levels
in addition , the use of hydrodynamic gene transfer provides proper zonal expression of gk and gka456v in perivenous hepatocytes [ 23 , 25 ] .
therefore , only animals that were positive for exogenous expression of gk as determined by qrt - pcr ( 3x sd of controls ) were selected for further analysis ( data not shown ) .
after selection , both gk - overexpressing groups had identical protein levels and maximal activity ( 100 mm glucose ) figures 1(a)1(b ) . these results are not in agreement with the reported instability of liver gk protein in a phhi - gka456v transgenic mouse and the gkrp knock - out model [ 37 , 38 ] , probably because of the lack of endogenous transcriptional control in pgka456v . also , gka456v activity at 5 mm glucose was higher in liver extracts , as expected from the kinetic changes associated with the mutation .
the gka456v mutation resides on a hinge of the enzyme responsible for the conformational changes associated with gkrp interaction and allosteric activation .
gkrp regulates gk action in hepatocytes by retaining the enzyme in the nucleus at low glucose concentrations and liberating gk when insulin , high glucose levels , or fructose-1p is present [ 26 , 27 ] .
we show here that gka456v is predominantly cytosolic in the liver of transfected animals , contrary to the expected nuclear compartmentalization of wild - type gk .
in addition , gka456v was not appropriately translocated to the nucleus of diabetic primary hepatocytes in the presence of excess gkrp ( data not shown ) .
lack of gkrp binding to gka456v has been shown by heredia et al . in vitro and inferred from the structural characterization of gk bound to synthetic activators [ 12 , 39 ] .
recent reports on the p446l mutation in gkrp also suggest that a decrease in gk inhibition results in increased gk activity , suggesting that gk localizes to the cytosol .
an analysis of gk and gka456v overexpression in well - fed animals demonstrated small but significant changes in glycemia , together with increased hepatic glucose metabolism , as suggested by higher f2,6bp and glycogen content , in the absence of alterations to lipid serum metabolites .
no changes were observed in enzymes or regulatory proteins involved in gluconeogenesis in fed animals ( data not shown ) .
[ 31 , 33 , 40 ] , who used a low dose of gk - expressing adenovirus ( expressed largely in periportal hepatocytes , [ 41 , 42 ] ) but differ from those obtained using high doses of adenovirus , indicating that dose and/or zonal expression of gk influences the metabolic impact of gk overexpression . when animals were examined after a short fast ( postabsorptive ) , marked differences were observed among groups .
( 1 ) gk overexpression reduced glycemia ~15% , consistent with enhanced glucose metabolism in the liver , as shown by increased g6p , f2,6bp , glycogen content , and glycolytic and lipogenic enzymes together with higher serum lactate , nefa and tag concentrations .
have shown that a fed - to - fast transition in stz - diabetic mice results in increased gluconeogenic potential and fatty acid oxidation in the liver , consistent with results obtained in pcontrol - treated animals in the present study .
conversely , pgk treatment resulted in reduced pepck and pgc1 mrna , supporting the view that gk overexpression indirectly inhibits gluconeogenesis and fatty - acid oxidation . consistently , we measured higher nefa and tag serum levels in the postabsorptive state although no changes in -hydroxybutyrate were observed .
these results indicate that enhanced glucose metabolism resulting from gk overexpression had a small effect on glycemia , possibly because pgk dose was low .
( 2 ) gka456v overexpression led to a significant reduction of serum glucose of ~60% that was consistent with higher glucose clearance on a glucose tolerance test in fasting , healthy mice .
fasting hypoglycemia is also observed in human carriers of the p446l gkrp mutation [ 14 , 44 ] .
gka456v overexpression did not impact the concentration of serum lipids whereas -hydroxybutyrate was increased , contrary to the dyslipidemia observed in gk overexpressing animals in this and earlier studies , including human carriers of the p446l gkrp mutation [ 14 , 44 ] .
hepatic levels of f2,6bp and l - pk protein were increased but other indicators ( g6p , fasn mrna , chrebp protein , and mrna and glycogen content ) of glucose utilization were lower than in gk - expressing livers .
importantly , glycogen balance ( fed - to - fast ) was significantly lower in gka456v - expressing animals , indicating an important net loss of glycogen .
g6pase expression was also higher in this group of animals , providing an explanation for increased glycogen loss observed in gka456v - containing livers .
the involvement of g6pase in the positive regulation of glycogenolysis has been shown in several animal models overexpressing p36 or p46 components of the g6pase system , resulting in decreased glycogen levels in the hepatocyte [ 4548 ] . moreover
, a lack of g6pase system activity observed in glycogen storage disease type 1a , or in a g6pase ko promotes glycogen accumulation .
activation of the nonoxidative branch of the pentose phosphate pathway , as a result of high exogenous glucose , transiently upmodulates g6pase mrna levels and stability in an insulin - independent manner [ 34 , 35 ] .
gka456v - expressing livers showed higher g6pdh activity and gsh / gssg ratio during the fed - to - fast transition than control or gk groups ( figures 4(c)-4(d ) and table 1 ) .
increased g6pase mrna and protein in the presence of gka456v would suggest an induction of glucose cycling .
it is , however , clear that this counter regulation shall have consequential effects on glucose homeostasis if persistent , as occurs in the gka456v model .
all in all , the present data confirms that pgk overexpression in the liver results in relatively small changes in glycemia but overt dislypidemia .
the present model represents the first attempt to overexpress pgk in perivenous hepatocytes , and confirms previous observations using adenovirus .
in contrast to the work of scott et al . and morral et al .
, gk overexpression in perivenous hepatocytes does not significantly affect glc6pase expression , suggesting that zonation is an important experimental variable not sufficiently addressed to date in the field .
in addition , we have demonstrated that gka456v overexpression reduces blood glucose to a great extent , probably due to its capacity to induce glc6pase .
we conclude that impaired gkrp regulation and gka456v altered kinetics greatly influence liver metabolism , in line with results obtained in humans with a mutant gkrp .
besides , it suggests that activating gk exclusively in the liver could be a feasible strategy for diabetes , widening the scope for gka research .
similar conclusions , based on its potent induction of glucose clearance by the liver , have been obtained after liver - specific gk activation in chicken in a recent study by rideau et al . .
studies on animal models of type 2 diabetes are under way in our laboratory in order to evaluate the metabolic impact in the context of insulin resistance and obesity . | pubmed |
dermatophytes are the most common organisms infecting keratinized structures such as skin , hair , and nails , and their ability to degrade keratin is believed to be a major virulence factor . a correlation between keratinolytic activity and pathogenesis has been proposed because dermatophytes secrete a battery of endo- and exo - proteases during infection that degrade keratinized structures into oligopeptides and free amino acids for use as nutrients .
it is likely that proteases with optimal activity at both acidic and alkaline phs are important virulence factors in dermatophytes , and that their regulation during infection is crucial . in the early stages , and in response to the acidic ph of human skin , the pathogen de - represses the synthesis of non - specific keratinases and proteases that have optimal activity at acidic ph .
they act on skin proteins , producing peptides that are hydrolyzed into amino acids , which are then used by the fungus as sources of carbon , nitrogen , and sulfur .
the metabolism of some amino acids promotes the alkalinization of the host microenvironment , making it suitable for the action of keratinases with optimal activity at alkaline ph .
the dermatophyte trichophyton rubrum rapidly responds to ph changes by modulating the expression of genes , allowing the use of skin proteins over a wide ph range , thereby enabling the development of infection and persistence of the dermatophyte in host tissues moreover , inactivation of the pacc gene , a component of the ph signalling pathway in t. rubrum , reduces the activity of secreted keratinases , indicating that the pacc gene is somehow involved in the regulation of keratinolytic activity , and consequently in the virulence and pathogenicity of this organism .
protein secretion from a eukaryotic cell requires movement through the endoplasmic reticulum ( er ) and the golgi apparatus .
in the course of trafficking , the secreted proteins undergo glycosylation , which is the major post - translational molecular event [ 814 ] . in secreted proteins ,
the glycosyl groups are usually attached to either an amide group ( n - glycosylation ) or a hydroxyl residue ( o - glycosylation ) , which are mainly found on serine and threonine residues . during glycosylation
, the oligosaccharide glcnac2man9glc3 is transferred to an asn residue within the sequence asn - xser / thr by an oligosaccharyltransferase ) , where x represents any amino acid except proline .
the main pathway utilizes sugar nucleotides and is located in the golgi apparatus . in yeasts ,
o - mannosylation begins in the er lumen and , like n - glycosylation , it requires dolichol phosphate - activated sugar residues .
the initial reaction is catalyzed by proteins from the evolutionarily conserved mannosyltransferase ( pmt ) family .
proteins secreted from yeast cells are usually heavily n- and/or o - glycosylated . in proteins that are glycosylated at both sites , it is not known whether n - glycosylation precedes o - mannosylation , or vice versa .
it is also unknown whether the o - mannosylation that takes place in the er prevents n - glycosylation ; however , there is some evidence for the opposite situation .
altered glycosylation may affect the stability and half - life of proteins , thus changing their activities or affinities towards substrates . delineating the mechanisms underlying fungal adaptability to ambient variation
is fundamental to an understanding of the mechanisms of pathogenicity and resistance to inhibitors in pathogenic organisms .
this work was aimed at investigating the expression of genes encoding dolichyl - p - man : man(5)glcnac(2)-pp - dolichyl mannosyltransferase and an o - mannosyltransferase ( referred to as the n - man and o - man genes , respectively ) in the dermatophyte t. rubrum in response to nutrients , ambient ph , and disruption of the pacc gene .
our findings revealed a relationship between the expression of these two mannosyltransferase genes and the pacc gene in response to ambient ph and carbon source .
t. rubrum clinical isolate h6 ( atcc mya-3108 ) and a pacc-1 mutant that carries a disrupted pacc gene , which were used throughout this study , were selected as previously described .
the h6 and pacc-1 strains were cultivated on sabouraud glucose agar for 15 days at 28 c , and pacc-1 cultures were supplemented with 450 g / ml hygromycin .
mycelia were collected with a sterile spatula , vortexed in saline solution [ 0.9% ( w / v ) nacl ] with 0.01% ( v / v ) tween , filtered through fiberglass to remove mycelial debris , and then centrifuged to recover the conidia .
then , 10 conidia were transferred to 50 ml of sabouraud broth , and germination was carried out at 28 c for 72 h on an orbital shaker at 180 rpm ( control ) .
after incubation , the final ph of the culture medium was measured with a ph meter , and the resulting mycelia were harvested by filtration through sterilized whatman paper ( whatman international , maidstone , uk ) , washed with sterilized water , and transferred to minimal medium ( mm ) at ph 5.0 or ph 8.0 , which was , in some cases ( as indicated ) , buffered with 50 mm sodium citrate or 50 mm tris hcl , respectively .
mm was supplemented with glucose ( 50 mm ) or glucose plus glycine ( 50 mm each ) and sodium nitrate ( 70 mm ) .
all cultures were incubated at 28 c for 3 , 6 , and 24 h with agitation .
mycelia obtained from each culture were harvested by filtration , and total rna was extracted from approximately 100 mg of frozen mycelium using trizol reagent , and treated with rnase - free dnase i ( invitrogen , carlsbad , ca ) , following the manufacturer 's instructions .
one microgram of dnase - treated rna was reverse transcribed into cdna using the high capacity cdna reverse transcription kit ( applied biosystems , foster city , ca ) according to the manufacturer 's instructions .
the cdna from 3 independent biological experiments was quantified spectrophotometrically , and stored at 80 c until pcr amplification . for quantitative real - time pcr analyses ,
the genes encoding dolichyl - p - man : man(5)glcnac(2)-pp - dolichyl mannosyltransferase ( n - man , terg_06338 ; genbank : xm_003233297 ) and o - mannosyltransferase ( o - man , terg_06465 ; genbank : xm_003233430 ) were amplified from cdna using the following primers ( 53 ) : taaacgacagtggtatgccg ( n - manfwd ) and tgtagcctgttgggttctct ( n - manrev ) ; ccatgggacgtgtatactc ( o - manfwd ) and cgtcatcatagcaacattcag ( o - manrev ) .
reactions were performed in three independent experiments using sybr green pcr master mix ( applied biosystems , foster city , ca ) , in the stepone plus real - time pcr system .
a 12.5-l reaction was set up using 50 ng of cdna and 300 nm of each primer , and the pcr cycle was as follows : 95 c for 10 min , followed by 40 cycles of 95 c for 15 s and 60 c for 1 min .
melting curve analyses were performed after each cycling to exclude primer dimers and nonspecific pcr products .
relative transcript quantities were calculated using the ct method using the experimental condition that yielded the lowest ct value ( n - man , non - buffered h6 cultures in keratin , 6 h incubation ) .
the t. rubrum -actin ( terg_06637 ) and -tubulin ( terg_07904 ) genes , which were used as endogenous reference genes , were amplified using the following oligonucleotides ( sequence 53 ) : aacgccatcatgaagtgt ( actinfwd ) and tccttctgcatacggtcaga ( actinrev ) ; ccgtatgatggccacttt ( tubulinfwd ) and ctgacctgggaaacgaagac ( tubulinrev ) .
data normalization and analyses were performed using the genex 5 multid analyses ab ( www.multid.se ) . to confirm the identity of the genes analyzed in this work , as well as the endogenous reference genes , the pcr products were sequenced and analyzed by alignment with sequences retrieved from the broad institute dermatophyte comparative database ( http://www.broadinstitute.org/annotation/genome/dermatophyte_comparative/multihome.html ) .
t. rubrum clinical isolate h6 ( atcc mya-3108 ) and a pacc-1 mutant that carries a disrupted pacc gene , which were used throughout this study , were selected as previously described .
the h6 and pacc-1 strains were cultivated on sabouraud glucose agar for 15 days at 28 c , and pacc-1 cultures were supplemented with 450 g / ml hygromycin .
mycelia were collected with a sterile spatula , vortexed in saline solution [ 0.9% ( w / v ) nacl ] with 0.01% ( v / v ) tween , filtered through fiberglass to remove mycelial debris , and then centrifuged to recover the conidia .
then , 10 conidia were transferred to 50 ml of sabouraud broth , and germination was carried out at 28 c for 72 h on an orbital shaker at 180 rpm ( control ) .
after incubation , the final ph of the culture medium was measured with a ph meter , and the resulting mycelia were harvested by filtration through sterilized whatman paper ( whatman international , maidstone , uk ) , washed with sterilized water , and transferred to minimal medium ( mm ) at ph 5.0 or ph 8.0 , which was , in some cases ( as indicated ) , buffered with 50 mm sodium citrate or 50 mm tris hcl , respectively .
mm was supplemented with glucose ( 50 mm ) or glucose plus glycine ( 50 mm each ) and sodium nitrate ( 70 mm ) .
all cultures were incubated at 28 c for 3 , 6 , and 24 h with agitation .
mycelia obtained from each culture were harvested by filtration , and total rna was extracted from approximately 100 mg of frozen mycelium using trizol reagent , and treated with rnase - free dnase i ( invitrogen , carlsbad , ca ) , following the manufacturer 's instructions .
one microgram of dnase - treated rna was reverse transcribed into cdna using the high capacity cdna reverse transcription kit ( applied biosystems , foster city , ca ) according to the manufacturer 's instructions .
the cdna from 3 independent biological experiments was quantified spectrophotometrically , and stored at 80 c until pcr amplification .
for quantitative real - time pcr analyses , the genes encoding dolichyl - p - man : man(5)glcnac(2)-pp - dolichyl mannosyltransferase ( n - man , terg_06338 ; genbank : xm_003233297 ) and o - mannosyltransferase ( o - man , terg_06465 ; genbank : xm_003233430 ) were amplified from cdna using the following primers ( 53 ) : taaacgacagtggtatgccg ( n - manfwd ) and tgtagcctgttgggttctct ( n - manrev ) ; ccatgggacgtgtatactc ( o - manfwd ) and cgtcatcatagcaacattcag ( o - manrev ) .
reactions were performed in three independent experiments using sybr green pcr master mix ( applied biosystems , foster city , ca ) , in the stepone plus real - time pcr system .
a 12.5-l reaction was set up using 50 ng of cdna and 300 nm of each primer , and the pcr cycle was as follows : 95 c for 10 min , followed by 40 cycles of 95 c for 15 s and 60 c for 1 min . melting curve analyses were performed after each cycling to exclude primer dimers and nonspecific pcr products .
relative transcript quantities were calculated using the ct method using the experimental condition that yielded the lowest ct value ( n - man , non - buffered h6 cultures in keratin , 6 h incubation ) .
the t. rubrum -actin ( terg_06637 ) and -tubulin ( terg_07904 ) genes , which were used as endogenous reference genes , were amplified using the following oligonucleotides ( sequence 53 ) : aacgccatcatgaagtgt ( actinfwd ) and tccttctgcatacggtcaga ( actinrev ) ; ccgtatgatggccacttt ( tubulinfwd ) and ctgacctgggaaacgaagac ( tubulinrev ) .
data normalization and analyses were performed using the genex 5 multid analyses ab ( www.multid.se ) . to confirm the identity of the genes analyzed in this work , as well as the endogenous reference genes , the pcr products were sequenced and analyzed by alignment with sequences retrieved from the broad institute dermatophyte comparative database ( http://www.broadinstitute.org/annotation/genome/dermatophyte_comparative/multihome.html ) .
in vitro growth of the dermatophyte t. rubrum is dependent on the initial culture ph , with apparent optimal growth at ph 4.05.0 , irrespective of carbon source ( glucose , glycine , or protein ) .
the initial ph of the t. rubrum cultures increased from 5.0 to a ph that ranged from 8.3 to 8.9 after 7296 h of incubation in glycine or keratin .
this effect was not observed when the fungus was cultivated with glucose as the carbon source , and the ph was maintained at approximately 5.0 .
hydrolysis of keratin and other proteins releases amino acids , such as glycine , whose metabolism leads to the secretion of ammonia , thereby shifting the ph of the culture from acidic to alkaline .
therefore , the metabolism of both glycine and keratin at ph 5.0 were alkalinizing events , even though the culture ph was still acidic after 24 h of incubation in glycine or keratin ( fig .
disruption of the pacc gene in t. rubrum neither affects this ph shift ( fig .
however , a marked decrease in the conidiation on sabouraud solid medium and in the secretion of keratinolytic activity by the pacc-1 mutant , which correlated with its reduced capacity to infect human nails in vitro , were observed as compared to the control strain .
no ambient ph changes were observed when the fungus was cultured in buffered media ( data not shown ) .
t. rubrum grows poorly in culture medium with a starting ph of 8.0 , even though the culture becomes acidified after incubation with glucose as a carbon source ( fig .
1 ) . growth in glycine or keratin dropped the ph of the culture to approximately 7 after the first 36 h of incubation , which increased to approximately ph 7.5 after 24 h of incubation ( fig .
an attractive hypothesis is that t. rubrum senses the alkaline environment and then acidifies the culture medium to an ambient ph at which its growth is stimulated .
metabolism of glycine or keratin leads to the secretion of ammonia , which shifts the culture ph to alkaline ph values .
therefore , to better understand the transcription of both the o - man and n - man genes during the first 24 h of incubation , when the ph of the medium was still acidic in non - buffered cultures ( fig .
1 ) , we estimated the expression of both genes by qrt - pcr in different culture conditions .
transcription of the o - man and n - man genes in both the h6 and pacc-1 mutant strains was affected differently by the carbon source , the culture ph , and the time of incubation ( fig .
o - man was preferentially transcribed in both buffered and non - buffered keratin cultures , whereas n - man was apparently preferentially transcribed in non - buffered glucose cultures .
the expression of n - man decreased as incubation time increased at ph 5.0 , but the expression decreased more consistently in buffered glucose cultures ( fig .
disruption of the pacc gene decreased transcription of o - man in both glucose and keratin at ph 5.0 ; however , o - man expression was enhanced in glucose plus glycine .
interestingly , the transcription of n - man in keratin cultures was enhanced in the pacc-1 mutant at ph 5.0 .
therefore , at acidic ph , transcription of the o - man and n - man genes was positively and negatively affected , respectively , by the pacc gene in keratine cultures ( fig .
2 ) . moreover , transcription of the o - man and n - man genes in buffered cultures indicated that the o - man gene was preferentially transcribed at acidic ph in the presence of keratin compared to glucose or glucose plus glycine as the carbon sources , whereas transcription of the n - man gene was almost the same in both acidic and alkaline ph in the presence of keratin , and these properties were affected by disruption of the pacc gene ( fig .
it is also worth noting that while the disruption of the pacc gene resulted in changed transcription of the o - man gene in the different conditions at ph 5.0 , it also resulted in the opposite changes for growth in glucose and glucose plus glycine at ph 8.0 .
thus , our results suggest that the product of the pacc gene negatively affect both the transcription of the n - man gene in keratin at ph 5.0 and the o - man gene at ph 8.0 in the presence of different nutrients ( fig .
2 ) i.e. , the pacc gene is functional irrespective of the culture conditions assayed .
it has been well documented that the dermatophyte t. rubrum , as well as other filamentous fungi , acidifies the culture medium and represses the secretion of proteases during growth in glucose as the sole carbon source . moreover , during growth in glycine or keratin , the culture medium is alkalinized ; however , this change is dependent on the initial ph of the culture , with an apparent optimum at ph 4.05.0 .
interestingly , glycine utilization is apparently not repressed by glucose , because alkalinization of the culture medium occurs with glucose and glycine as carbon sources .
however , it is worth noting that during the first 24 h of cultivation , the ph of the medium is still acidic ( fig .
1 ) , implying that the metabolism of glycine or keratin , an alkalinizing event , occurs during the first 24 h of cultivation , exclusively in an acidic environment . in the model fungi
neurospora crassa and aspergillus nidulans , one of the metabolic responses to the ph of the culture medium is the ph - dependent glycosylation of secreted enzymes [ 3437 ] . for example , the level of glycosylation of the pho-2 alkaline phosphatase synthesized by n. crassa at alkaline ph differs from that synthesized at acidic ph , which is approximately 13% and 21% for the pho-2 enzyme purified from mycelium grown at ph 5.4 and 7.8 , respectively .
the loss of enzymatic activity observed for the pi - repressible alkaline phosphatase secreted at acidic ph is probably because the glycosylation of this enzyme is lower than that secreted at alkaline ph .
we have also provided evidence that glycosylation of secreted enzymes , as documented for the pi - repressible phosphatases in n. crassa and a. nidulans , is pacc - dependent . in t.
rubrum , disruption of the pacc gene , as in the pacc-1 mutant strain , resulted in decreased growth on human nails and decreased secretion of keratinolytic proteases in liquid medium when supplemented with keratin , which suggests that the keratinases secreted by t. rubrum are somehow regulated by the pacc protein .
pacc might be involved in the glycosylation of these keratinases through transcriptional modulation of o- and n - linked mannosyltransferases , a hypothesis supported by the results described here .
transcriptional profiling of both the o - man and n - man genes revealed a high level of complexity , because transcription of these genes was affected by nutrients , culture ph , and the functioning of the pacc gene .
disruption of the pacc gene increased the expression of n - man at ph 5.0 in keratin cultures .
moreover , if o - mannosylation precedes n - glycosylation in t. rubrum , as demonstrated in yeast , this physiological effect is dependent on the function of the pacc gene at acidic ph . in conclusion ,
the genes encoding the o- and n - mannosyltransferases had different expression profiles , and the o - man gene was preferentially expressed at acidic ph when t. rubrum was grown on medium containing keratin .
the balance between n - man and o - man expression levels in cultures at acidic ph may be under the control of the pacc transcription factor ( in response to different carbon sources ) .
therefore , the product of the pacc gene of t. rubrum is functional at acidic ph .
moreover , transcription of the n - man and o - man genes might be required at different culture phs for the glycosylation of transported proteins , according to the stage of infection , which suggests a possible role in cell adhesion and activation of signalling pathways regulating the production of enzymes that enable nutrient uptake for fungal development and maintenance in the host [ 3941 ] . | pubmed |
Skins 1. Chapter 1
**Ok so I had this idea floating around in my head for a while and I have started writing it so I thought I would post the first chapter. I have a plan for this story, well I do so far anyway then anything could happen :-) **
**Anyway here it is. **
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Chapter One
Naomi
_I finished work at the office late as usual but that was what happened when you were a journalist and had an editor breathing down your neck for the story you were writing. It was then I heard the music coming from the car driving down the road and knew it was Tamara coming to pick me up with my dress to change into. I quickly changed in the back of the car before climbing back through and putting my seatbelt on. Driving along the road the laughter ringing out around the car as I travelled with my best friend to a party, we were singing along to the radio that she had turned up when all of a sudden I heard brakes squeaking as she slammed hard down on them and then the bang as we hit the back of the truck that had stopped in front of us and everything went black…_
* * *
I woke with a jump and screamed out, it took me a minute to remember where I was, it really felt like I was back there again but as the nurse came rushing in to check I was ok I remembered I was in hospital and the knowledge of my injuries came crashing down around me again. It has been nearly a month since the car crash and I was still here in hospital and still in a lot of pain. Thankfully I was in a side room on my own I think I would have given up a long time ago if I had been on a ward with other people. Sometimes I still wonder about giving up but then I see my mums face and see how thankful she is that I made it through. I was in intensive care unconscious for about a week if not more they have told me but sometimes I forget the details, one thing I will never forget is the day the doctor told me the extent of my injuries. He started off gently by telling me the my body was covered in cuts and bruises but they would slowly heal in time and as they healed the pain would ease, it was only when he continued that my world came crashing down around me, it was like he was telling me in slow motion when he explained that I had a spinal injury and that could mean that I never walked again. I had drifted off somewhere as he continued to speak not wanting to hear anything more, in that moment all I could think was that I wish I had died. When the doctor had left the room I looked across to see my mum the tears running down her cheeks, she rushed over to me and enveloped me in a hug, I felt the pain rush through my body but at the same time everything felt numb, she kept kissing my cheek telling me that everything would be ok that we would get through this together, I just wanted to scream out at her that nothing would ever be right again, that my life just isn't worth living anymore but I knew it would only hurt her and I didn't want to do that, I couldn't shatter the positivity she had built up after knowing what she went through at the thought of losing her only daughter. I knew I was being selfish, I knew I should be grateful that I was alive that was more than Tamara and her family had. I was really struggling with my injuries and the fact that I would never see my best friend again, I didn't even get to go to her funeral, I didn't get to say goodbye and I knew that would be something that would haunt me forever.
A tear rolled down my cheek as the nurse gave me some more pain relief; they all knew me on this ward now I had been here for a couple of weeks. She rested her hand on my shoulder "It will get easier Naomi, it just takes time, you're physiotherapist is going to stop by tomorrow and have a chat with you, I think you will like her she is brilliant at her job. Now I want you to settle down again and try and get some sleep."
* * *
The following morning I woke up, mum was by my bedside as usual, she always came in first thing in the morning and stayed until last thing at night. She smiled as I opened my eyes I know she always tried to stay positive to try and get me to be positive about things "Morning love, how did you sleep last night?"
I shut my eyes briefly again before looking at her "I had another nightmare Mum, it was horrible it felt like I was right back there again, like it was all happening again. When is all this going to stop?"
A tear rolled down my cheek as mum enveloped me in a hug, it is really strange but the accident really seems to have brought us closer together. We never had the best relationship when I was growing up, we constantly fought about the strangers she had staying in the house and it was only when I started my second year at college that she realised how much it was bothering me and she stopped it from happening and we slowly grew closer and now the accident has really made me realise just how much my mum is there for me. As usual mum sat and read a chapter of my book to me, I struggled to focus for long periods of time on the text and I hated not being able to read whenever I wanted to. Mum always managed to make me relax a little more when she read to me, in a way it took me back to when I was little and mum used to tuck me up in bed and read me a story until I fell asleep. I drift in and out of sleep as mum reads to me but she is used to it. As I open my eyes once again mum smiles and pauses her reading "You ok love?"
I nod my head slowly "Yeah just tired as usual." I paused a second "Mum will you do something for me, I really really want a coffee from Starbucks, you know what I am like, would you get me one?"
She laughed "Are you sure you are ok if I leave you?"
I nodded "Yeah I will probably just sleep a bit more."
She smiled and kissed my cheek softly "Ok darling I won't be long I promise."
I smiled and felt the tiredness overcome me again "Ok mum."
* * *
I only woke up again when there was a light tap on my door; I slowly opened my eyes adjusting them to the light. A young women stepped into the room and I instantly noticed her eyes, they were a gorgeous chocolate brown with a slight twinkle deep within them. She stepped to the side of the bed and realised I had been asleep "I'm sorry would you like me to come back later?"
I shook my head "No its ok."
The young women smiled and it really lit up her face "Ok well let me introduce myself", she held out her hand to me but I didn't take it I guess I couldn't be bothered, she didn't look too surprised "I am Emily and I am going to be your physiotherapist."
If I am completely honest I don't know what came over me, the anger just seemed to rise within me again at the thought of needing physio in the first place, it brought the accident back to the forefront of my mind not that it was ever far away "I don't want physio, what can you fucking do for me, what is the fucking point of even being alive I want to be dead, I don't see the point of being alive if I may never walk again, if I can't get back to being normal."
I felt a tear roll down my cheek again, why couldn't I stop fucking crying, I wasn't the type of person that cried. Emily placed her hand gently on my shoulder, she didn't seem bothered by my outburst, I guess she was probably used to it from frustrated patients "Naomi I am not going to make you any false promises but what I can promise you is that I will work as hard as I can to have you back to being your normal self. It will take time and it will take patience from both of us, it will also take a lot of work. My main aim is to make sure you can walk again but Naomi you need to come to our sessions with a positive attitude, you have to put the effort in as much as I do if you want to get anywhere. I will come back and see you later and see if you have had a change of heart once you have had the chance to think over what I have just said."
I watched as she left the room closing the door quietly behind her, I threw my head back against the pillow the anger still coursing through my veins. Mum slowly opened my door coming in with my coffee, she handed it to me and I knew she could sense how angry I was. She sat down beside my bed as I took a sip of my coffee "Who was that darling that just left your room?"
I rolled my eyes "The Physiotherapist, she came in spouting some shit about helping me."
Mum took my hand "Love you have to try, I hate seeing you just giving up like this, you have always been such a fighter."
I opened my mouth to argue but mum cut me off, I could instantly tell that she was cross and finally getting fed up of me "Naomi I can't sit here and watch you throw your life down the drain, you are my only daughter and I love you so much it is killing me to see you like this, yes you have been through a terrible accident and you will have to do a lot of work to rebuild your life, do you really honestly think that Tamara would like to see you lying in your bed angry all the time and giving up on everything?"
I watched as mum walked out the room banging the door shut behind her, the tears began rolling down my cheeks again, I quickly wiped them away from my eyes I was so frustrated with myself for crying again. I buried my head deeply into my pillow and let everything that Emily and Mum had said to me run through my mind. It took me a while but I began to realise that I was being a complete cow to everyone around me. I realised that I needed to change my attitude, I really hate seeing mum this upset, she is really struggling with everything but she keeps her spirits up for me, to keep me going and to keep me focussed on life. I now knew that I needed to make some effort into making the changes I needed to make.
* * *
I must have fallen asleep again as I woke up and looked at the clock, it was a couple of hours since mum had left me after we had words. I was beginning to wonder if I had really pushed her too far this time when the door slowly opened and she poked her head around the side "Is it ok to come in?"
I nodded and she came and sat down next to me once more "I'm sorry Naomi, I should never…"
I cut her off "No mum it is me that should be sorry, I should stop being such a bitch all of the time, I have you and so many other people trying to help me and I keep throwing it back in everyone's faces. It is time I started to make the effort and help myself to get better. When Emily comes back later I will apologise to her and I will make sure she knows I will fully commit myself to the physio she is going to do with me and I promise I will be nicer to you and the staff. It is time to help myself now mum and I'm only sorry it took you to lose your temper with me to make me realise that."
She hugged me tightly "You don't know how good it is to hear you saying that, I just want my little girl back again."
Mum pulled back when there was a knock on the door, she smiled as Emily stepped into the room and held out her hand to shake it "Hi, you must be Emily."
Emily smiled "Yeah, you seem a lot friendlier than your daughter."
Mum laughed "Yeah I must apologise for her she can be a grumpy little cow when she wants to be but I think she has something she would like to say to you."
I felt my cheek flush red slightly as Emily laughed a little, I cleared my throat "Emily I'm sorry I shouldn't have spoken to you like I did earlier, both you and mum have said things to me today that have made me realise I shouldn't be letting this anger swallow me up and should be trying to be positive about my life so I will make a promise to you now and that is that I will make every effort I possibly can during any session I have with you, I know I need to work hard if I want to get my life back."
Emily smiled and I couldn't help but notice that it lit up her whole face "That is good to hear Naomi; it will be good to work with you." She turned to leave "I will stop by again tomorrow and run through some of the work we will be doing together."
I nodded "Ok, thanks Emily."
As Emily left mum smiled "She seems nice I think she will really put the effort in to help you, please try not to be too rude to her."
I reached over and playfully slapped her on the arm "I am not a complete monster you know."
She raised her eyebrows and I just laughed, I can honestly say I think I can see a little bit of happiness back in my mum's eyes, something I haven't seen since before the accident.
2. Chapter 2
**I am part way through writing chapter 6 of this story so I thought I would post chapter 2 tonight. More thoughts from Naomi and a little more interaction between the two girls, the interaction between the pair will increase over the further chapters. It's a bit of a filler chapter really before we start moving on.
**
**I would like to thank everyone for the reviews and adding this to your story alerts and story favourites, I am really enjoying writing this. **
* * *
Chapter Two
The Following Day
Naomi
I was lying in bed really beginning to regret agreeing to the physio, I know I needed it and I know I needed to get my fucking act together and pull my life back onto the track it should be on. Mum had been pretty chirpy since yesterday, I think she was just pleased that I seemed to be starting to look forward in relation to my future again but there was still one thing stopping me from completely being able to move on, I couldn't get the accident out of my head, every time I close my eyes I hear the screeching brakes and the bang all over again and it always made the pain of losing my best friend even worse than it already was. I was so tired as I tried to avoid closing my eyes, trying to stop the thoughts creeping back into the forefront of my mind, in a way I guess I thought it would stop me thinking about it all, I was wrong.
I was pulled from my thoughts when mum walked into the room still with her smile plastered across her face, I could see she was happy but at the same time I could see that she was smiling more to try keep me feeling positive "Morning Love, how you feeling this morning?"
I smiled half-heartedly "Same old."
She moved a strand of hair away from my face "It will get better love; I know it might not seem like that now but it will slowly."
I nodded my head slightly "Yeah I guess, it all just feels so hard."
She hugged me "I know love, I know."
She held up a couple of bags full of stuff "I brought you some bits from home I thought it might help you feel a little better."
I smiled "Thanks mum, what have you brought?"
She smiled "Oh just some more of your books so you can do some reading if you're not too tired or I thought maybe I could read to you for a bit more if you like, some of your own clothes I know how much you hate being in that hospital gown and I know you will feel more comfortable in your own clothes and I also brought a couple of your photos from your room you know the ones of you and I just so it feels a bit more like your room."
I started to look through the photos and loved that mum had done this for me; I froze though when I saw the photo of Tamara and I from a night out about a year ago, I love that photo so much. Mum watched as I froze "You ok love?"
I couldn't speak, I couldn't move, a tear slipped down my cheek as mum moved to look at what had upset me, she quickly wrapped her arms around me and enveloped me close to her body "I'm so sorry love, I didn't know it was there, it must have got caught up with the others when I grabbed them. I will take it back home again for you, you don't need this at the moment."
I shook my head against her body before pulling away and looking at the photo again "No, no its ok mum I want to keep it, I want to be able to remember the good times not just this horrific bad time. You never know maybe it will help."
She kissed the top of my head and I could tell she was happy that I was looking at it that way, I just wasn't sure if I was really feeling like this for myself or just to keep mum happy, I knew it was something only time would tell, I needed the time to grieve for my friend and I needed the time to sort my own life out, I knew deep down that Tamara would be fuming if she could see me acting like this. Mum broke my thoughts "Would you like me to read to you for a bit, you used to love it when I read to you as a child."
I rolled my eyes "I am not a child anymore mum."
She smiled "You will always be my little girl whether you like it or not."
I rolled my eyes again but I knew I was smiling slightly at the same time "I would love it if you read to me, I am too tired to do it myself and it is driving me insane not doing anything."
* * *
A while later mum was still reading, I kept drifting off but in a way it felt so good to be listening to her reading to me again and it really was distracting me from what was going on in my own head. I was only distracted when there was a light tap on my door and I saw Emily put her head around "Sorry to disturb you, am I ok to come in or shall I come back later?"
I was seriously thinking about putting her off I still wasn't sure I was ready for any of this but mum obviously had other ideas as she smiled in Emily's direction "You're not disturbing anything, you come in I will make myself useful and go get my daughter a proper coffee as she calls it."
Emily laughed and I couldn't help but notice that she had a gorgeous smile. Mum offered Emily her chair and she took it as mum left "I'll be back in a bit love." I could have thrown something at her if I had it as she shot me a look and added "Be nice."
I couldn't help but notice as Emily smiled once again as mum finally closed the door behind her. She turned her attention back to me "So Naomi I just thought I would come and have a chat with you about the work I will be doing with you."
I nodded slowly and tried to be positive in front of her about it all "Ok, hit me with it."
She laughed "It won't be that bad Naomi, I promise I will start gently but I cannot promise I will stay gentle, we have a lot of hard work to do if we are going to get you walking again."
I bit back "If I am ever going to walk again."
She looked directly at me "That is something I can't promise Naomi but if you put the work in there is a lot more chance your injury will heal and you will walk again. I can promise I will work my hardest and do my best to give you the best possible chance but you have to remember what I said yesterday you have to have a positive attitude. Positivity and hard work are going to mean everything that is going to be the key."
I nodded "Ok, what sort of stuff will we be doing?"
She smiled and I could tell she was pleased I was actually taking an interest "I will be trying a range of different techniques and exercises with you including leg exercises which will help with strengthening your legs, we will work on spinal positioning and making sure your spine is in the best possible position for healing in the best way, we will also work on building up on your upper body strength so you have got the strength to support yourself when we get further into your exercises."
It all sounded good but there was one thing that was worrying me, I was already in pain and it all sounded like it would cause more pain, Emily must have guessed there was something bothering me "Is everything ok Naomi?"
I nodded slowly "Yeah, there is just one thing." I paused for a second "It's just, will it cause much more pain, I'm not sure I can cope with much more."
She smiled slightly "It's a worry that most patients have and it probably will cause a bit more pain but if it gets too much and is causing huge problems I will be using ice therapy that will help with any pain, that just involves using ice on the areas that are causing the pain and it should reduce it."
I felt slightly better about it all now I had spoken to Emily. She smiled "Is there anything else you would like to know?"
I shook my head "No I don't think so at the moment."
She stood up "Ok well I need to go but if you have any questions about anything you just need to ask one of the nurses and they will get me for you. At the moment the doctors are saying we can begin work next week so all being well I will see you then."
I smiled "Ok thank you."
* * *
A few minutes after she had left mum came bouncing back into the room "She seems like a nice young lady, is everything ok?"
I laughed trust mum to comment on her being nice, she always thought everyone was nice "Yes mum everything is ok, Emily was just telling me about the work she would be doing with me and I feel a bit better about it all now. It sounds like it is going to be a lot of hard work but if it means I could walk again it will all be worth it, and yes mum she does seem nice, very caring."
Mum hugged me "Good and I am glad you are feeling a little more positive about things."
I smiled "Well after seeing that photo I realised that Tamara wouldn't want me to wish my life away like I was."
Mum smiled "Good old Tamara, she can still talk some sense into you when she's not here."
I couldn't help but laugh "Yeah she was always good at that."
3. Chapter 3
**I have been writing this tonight whilst watching the Eurovision song contest and have been getting on pretty well with some future chapters but anyway here is chapter three and this one is from Emily's point of view and introduces another favourite from the series. **
**Thanks for the reviews and for adding this to your favourites and alerts :-)**
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Chapter Three
One Week Later
Emily
I was sitting in the physio office staring into space, I was beginning physio with Naomi today, the doctor had assessed her and given her the all clear to begin. I couldn't seem to get Naomi out of my mind since our chat last week; she had the most gorgeous blue eyes that have a sparkle to them. I knew I couldn't think like this she was just another patient that I was going to do my best to get moving again. I took a deep breath and pushed any thoughts to the back of my mind thinking that they would go away.
* * *
I wandered down the corridor towards Naomi's room and softly knocked on the door, she smiled in my direction as I asked "You all ready to do some work?"
Her smile turned into laughter "As ready as I'll ever be."
I couldn't help but laugh with her, she looked even more beautiful when she smiled, I really couldn't help but think that it was a shame she didn't smile more often "Ok well let me track down my helper so we can get you moving from this bed, he will be off flirting with one of the nurses somewhere."
She nodded "Ok, I'll be here."
I smiled before putting my head around the door and spotted him instantly leaning over the nurses desk "Cook, I need you down here not flirting up there, I have work to do."
He spun around and flashed me his cheeky smile that I'm sure he thought would get him out of any kind of trouble, he should know by now that it won't work on here "Keep your knickers on I'm on my way."
I slapped him on the arm as he finally reached my side, he pretended to be wounded until I threatened to do it again and he quickly slipped into the room, I quickly followed him in before he started cracking on to Naomi, I smiled as Naomi looked past him towards me "Naomi, this is Cook he is one of the porters that works here and now he has stopped flirting with the nurses he is going to help me transfer you into the wheelchair so we can go to the physio room and start putting you through your paces."
Naomi laughed "Well I will put my faith in the pair of you."
We eventually made it to where we needed to be and Cook supported me to lay Naomi on the mat in the centre of the room, I could see his eyes wandering over her body the whole time we were together with her, he looked in my direction "Now then little red I think you will be needing me to stick around for this one."
I rolled my eyes and couldn't help but notice Naomi smile "Cook I will say this politely as we have a patient in the room but I'm sure you can imagine the words circling my head right now but no I do not require your assistance during the session, be back in an hour and not before."
* * *
He pretended to sulk but he forgets I know him to well now and he slowly left the room as I turned to Naomi "Ok now he has gone let's get to work, we are going to start really slowly and build it up gradually so today I am just going to work on your leg strength and kick start those muscles again. Does that sound ok?"
She nodded her head slowly "Yeah I think so."
I smiled "Good, now I know you are going to feel some pain, I wouldn't be doing my job properly if you didn't but I need you to promise me that if the pain gets too much you have to tell me, there are ways I can manage it but I can't if I don't know. So do we have a deal?"
She smiled and spoke quietly "Yeah."
I returned her smile "You don't need to look so worried, I will take good care of you."
* * *
I couldn't believe it when Cook returned an hour later, I have never had a session go so fast, I know this was only the first session with Naomi but I could already tell I was going to enjoy working with this girl, yes she had an attitude and could be sulky and a little madam but it wasn't anything that I couldn't handle I knew underneath it all somewhere there would be a softer side to her, a side I was determined to expose at some point along the line. I smiled at Naomi "Well looks like that is it for today we will increase your hours over time but as I said we are starting slow, how you feeling after today?"
I could see the pain in her eyes as she replied "Sore but I am determined to get back to where I was before the accident and I know that pain is a part of that."
I looked directly at her "Just sore?"
She grimaced "No I'm in fucking agony but it's not too bad that I can't cope with it."
I smiled slightly "Well let's get you back to your bed and I shall sort you out some pain relief."
She smiled as Cook stepped up beside us "Ok then let the Cookie Monster and Little Red get to work and make you comfortable again."
Her smiled once again turned into laughter as she rolled her eyes at Cook "Seriously the Cookie Monster I'm not even going to ask but I am slightly confused as to why you are calling Emily little red."
I laughed as I listened to Cook explain this one "Well Naomikins I have known Emily here since college, she helped me get the job here and get my life back on the straight and narrow, anyway back in her college days she had the brightest red hair and as you can see she is pretty short so I came up with little red but then when she finished uni and was a professional physiotherapist applying for jobs she decided she should go back to her natural brown."
Naomi laughed "Well I guess you have a good reason for the nickname then." She turned to me "I bet you looked good with red hair, not that you don't with brown." She stumbled a little "Sorry, sorry I didn't mean anything by that."
I laughed "Don't worry about it, I know you didn't." I was conscious that Cook was watching the interaction between us and I was doing my best not to let my mind wander with thoughts of Naomi just because she commented on my appearance "Maybe I'll show you a picture one of these days."
She smiled "That would be nice, might as well know a bit about you sounds like we are going to be spending a lot of time together."
I laughed "Aren't you the lucky one."
* * *
Within fifth teen minutes Cook and I had Naomi back on her bed and I arranged for her to have some pain relief with the nurse on duty, as soon as she had it I saw her relax slightly and I could tell she was tired "I will see you tomorrow then and we will take things a little bit further, make sure you get plenty of rest now."
She smiled weakly and her eyes closed once again "Yeah will do."
I walked towards the door as her mum came in; I smiled and quietly spoke "She's just nodded off."
I couldn't help but notice that Naomi had her mums smile "Ok love, I will sit and read one of her books until she wakes again. How is she doing?"
I smiled "I can't say too much without Naomi's permission but I can say she is doing pretty well, she is a strong girl and I think with some hard work we will have her back to her normal self."
I noticed her mums smile grow a little "That is good news, I have been pretty worried about my girl, she has taken all of this pretty badly which is understandable but I've never seen her like this before."
I smiled "I've seen things like this before and I can see that Naomi will get through it. I saw some determination from her today."
Her smile remained "That is one of the best things I've heard since I was told my girl had woken up."
I couldn't help but continue to smile "Well I aim to please."
She laughed "Thanks, Emily isn't it?" I nodded and she smiled "Well thanks Emily I really appreciate you sticking with her I know she can be a grumpy cow at times."
I laughed as I walked away leaving Naomi with her mum.
* * *
A few minutes later I was sitting at the desk again writing the notes on Naomi's file from today's session and I couldn't help daydreaming as thoughts of Naomi returned to my mind. I knew I needed to stop thinking like this, she was my patient.
4. Chapter 4
**Here is chapter four of this story, I have actually just finished writing chapter 11 so I am doing pretty well with writing this, ideas keep popping into my head so I am really enjoying writing this at the moment. i would like to thank marsupial1974 for all her lovely reviews and thanks to everyone that has added this to their alerts and favourites. **
**I know the physio sessions aren't going into too much detail at the moment but details will come throughout the story, I have plans for it to come into it but some of it will be through flashbacks and conversations between the two girls in future chapters and some of it will be when Naomi is still in hospital. Anyway here is chapter four and Naomi's feelings are beginning to come to light... **
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Chapter Four
Two Weeks Later
Naomi
I had been having physio with Emily five days a week for two weeks now, she had gradually been increasing the hours she worked with me as I continued to gain strength and we have quite a bit of fun together during our sessions, I know we weren't there to have fun but Emily always says a little fun makes things seem just that little bit better. Usually I am a pretty closed off person but for some reason I find it easy to talk to Emily, it's weird as I always prided myself in keeping my feelings hidden but Emily always seemed to know when something was bothering me.
I was lying on the mat on the floor again with Emily doing something with my legs, I wasn't always sure what she was doing but I knew she would be doing what needed to be done. The pain seemed to be stronger today; I don't know why I just knew everything was hurting more. After a few minutes a tear rolled down my cheek, it took me a moment to realise. As soon as Emily noticed she stopped what she was doing "Naomi what is it?"
I shook my head "Nothing, everything is fine."
She shook her head "No it's not Naomi, when someone has tears falling from their eyes it shows me that not everything is ok, talk to me."
I took a deep breath "I just keep remembering why I am here, why I am spending time with you in the first place."
I knew she was trying to make me feel a little better as she said "Is my company really that bad?"
I couldn't help but smile slightly "I think your company is one of the only things that is getting me through this at the moment. If you tell anyone this I may have to hurt you as it would ruin my reputation but I really look forward to our sessions."
I noticed her smile, I couldn't help it, it lit up her whole face "That's nice to hear Naomi I enjoy our sessions too even if you can be sarcastic most the time, seriously though I want you to talk to me, I know you won't believe this but talking does help."
I laughed and I knew she was right in a way but there was always something stopping me "I'll keep that in mind."
She smiled "Come on the let's get back to it."
We went back to whatever she was doing to me before and the pain kicked in again, I couldn't help but scream out a little, Emily stopped what she was doing instantly "Naomi are you in pain?"
I nodded slowly "Yeah." I snapped slightly "And yes I know before you say anything I should have told you."
Her face dropped slightly and I immediately felt guilty "Yes you should have. Anyway let's do something to help you."
I smiled slightly "Thanks, and Emily I'm sorry for snapping."
She returned my smile "It's ok Naomi, now I want you to try relax slightly, and I have to warn you this will be cold. I need you to tell me what hurts?"
I pointed to the base of my spine and Emily nodded "Ok I need you on your front."
She helped me turn over and I felt a slight tingle as her skin touched mine but soon gasped when she pressed an ice pack against my skin "That's fucking freezing Emily."
She laughed "Yeah that's the whole point of ice therapy; it will help your muscles and hopefully reduce the pain."
I got used to the cold temperature after a while although it was still fucking freezing, I couldn't help but shiver but it wasn't because of the ice. I heard Emily chuckle behind me "Stop being such a wimp Naomi."
I smiled to myself before replying "Well you shouldn't put such fucking cold things on my skin then."
She laughed again and I knew I had just lied to her, it wasn't the cold that had made me shiver it was the soft brush of Emily's fingers against my skin as she adjusted the ice pack. I don't know why her touch was making me feel like this, it was so confusing; I couldn't like a girl, could I? No there was no way it must just be because we have been spending so much time together. Emily's soft voice broke me out of my thoughts "How's the pain now?"
I nodded "Yeah it's a bit better, I think you can take that fucking cold thing back off me now."
Emily removed the ice pack and she helped me move so I was lying back on my back, she looked at her watch; I scowled but was smiling at the same time "You wishing our time away?"
She smiled and I felt my heart beat a little quicker than usual "Would I do such a thing and to put your mind at rest I was just looking to see how much time we have left to see what I can do to you next."
I couldn't help but laugh "And what do you have planned?"
Her smile widened "How about some more leg exercises, the sooner we get these legs stronger the better but you have to promise me you will tell me if the pain gets too much again."
I rolled my eyes "Yes."
I could see she was trying not to smile but it wasn't working well "There is no need for the sarcasm young lady."
I laughed "You sound so much like my mum when you say things like that."
She laughed "Well shouldn't that tell you something."
She started moving my legs around again and I couldn't help but watch as her expressions changed on her face as she worked. It was only when the door burst open that I was distracted, Emily rolled her eyes as Cook sauntered over "Now how are my two favourite ladies getting on."
I smiled "We were getting on fine. I could think of worse people to spend my time with."
Cook smiled "You're not wrong there Blondie, little red here is excellent company."
Emily glared at him "Stop flirting Cook."
He pretended to look offended as I laughed "Don't worry Emily he's not my type so I'm not paying any attention."
I was beginning to wonder if Emily had a thing for Cook and just hadn't told him, she laughed at my comment as Cook once again pretended to be wounded, he sighed "I don't know neither of you want me."
Emily walked away for a moment to put something away and I couldn't help it as my eyes followed her to where she was walking, I felt my cheeks flush slightly when I realised Cook had noticed. He smiled "She's pretty hot isn't she."
Now I was beginning to wonder if Cook also liked Emily but didn't dare tell her either "Yeah she is a very pretty girl she will make some guy very happy if she hasn't already."
I noticed Cook's face change slightly "You know I tried to crack onto her back in college."
I smiled and thought that maybe I was wrong after all "Did she turn you down."
He laughed "Yeah and then told me that I really wasn't her type and then later at the pub I found her snogging the face off this random girl, turned out she plays for the other team."
I didn't really know how to react and my face must have shown that as I looked to Emily and then back to Cook, he had a slight look of panic in his eyes "Don't tell her I told you, she doesn't tell her patients really, I think she is worried they will change their attitude towards her."
I looked surprised "Why would they do that?"
He shook his head "I don't know Blondie; I guess there are some fucking homophobic people out there."
I shook my head "Well I can assure you I am not one of them."
He smiled "Good."
We quickly changed the conversation as Emily walked back over to us "What you two plotting behind my back."
I laughed "Oh Cook was just trying to chat me up again."
Emily rolled her eyes "That sounds about right." She turned to him "Come on you do what you are paid for and help me get Naomi back into this chair and back to her bed she must be tired."
* * *
15 minutes later I was back on my bed, Emily made sure I was comfortable and I tried to keep her talking for as long as possible, there was something about her that made me just want her around but eventually she had to leave. I couldn't help but smile when she popped her head back around the door "I will see you tomorrow."
She smiled when I nodded "I will be ready and waiting."
I threw my head back against the pillow with thoughts of Emily at the front of my mind and couldn't help but think 'what the fuck is up with me, why do I feel like this, I am straight.'
5. Chapter 5
**Here is chapter five and we have skipped a bit of time but we get a little more insight into what is going on with Emily's thoughts and feelings and Naomi's moody, bitchy side is on it's way, look out Emily. **
**Thanks for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites :-)**
**Here goes...**
* * *
Chapter Five
One month later
Emily
I walked into work this morning, I usually come in on my moped but today I needed to clear my head before I started, Naomi was my first patient this morning and I just couldn't get her out of my head. She really was a stunning young lady and I always looked forward to our sessions just so I could spend more time with her, last night she even managed to creep into my dreams hence the reason I needed to clear my head this morning… _Naomi was lying on the mat in the physio room whilst I continued with some leg exercises, I couldn't help but glance down at her to check she was ok as I worked and noticed her gazing up at me, I smiled down at her and couldn't help but notice the blue twinkle in her eyes. I was about to pull my gaze away when Naomi reached up and softly stroked my cheek before pulling my lips down to hers. As our lips met it felt like there were fireworks exploding in my chest I had wanted this for what felt like so long now but couldn't risk my job, I knew I couldn't get involved with a patient. I was about to pull away and tell Naomi that this couldn't happen when she whispered softly "Fuck me Emily; I can't hide my feelings any longer I just want you to fuck me." I could see the desire, the want deep within her eyes and I just couldn't resist, she pulled my lips onto hers again and I completely forgot where we were I just allowed myself to get lost in Naomi. Her hands were roaming all over my body making me feel so alive something I hadn't felt in such a long time, her touch was magical. I wanted to make Naomi feel just as good as she was making me feel as I ran my hands over her body and brushed my fingers over her inner thigh enjoying listening to the moans escaping her lips "Emily fuck, oh fuck I need you inside me." _
_I wasted no time in pushing one finger followed by another inside of her making her gasp louder as I pushed hard and deep inside of her. She pulled my lips onto hers once again and kissed me hard as I continued to thrust my fingers. I could feel her muscles beginning to tighten as I curled my fingers inside of her. I slipped my lips down to her neck and sucked on her pulse point as her body began to tremble beneath me. I returned my lips to hers once more as her orgasm ripped through her body, we both knew she couldn't scream out loudly as it would bring people to the room. As her body began to relax under me she wrapped her arms around me "That was fucking amazing." _
_I couldn't help but smile "I wouldn't want to disappoint you."_
_She smirked "You certainly didn't; now how about I make you feel as good as you just made me feel."_
_I couldn't help but smile as Naomi ran her hands all over my body once more._
I had woken up sweating this morning with Naomi at the forefront of my mind. I had closed my eyes and threw my head as far back as I could into my pillows as I groaned; I seriously needed to stop thinking about Naomi like this, there were so many reasons that it couldn't happen, number one, Naomi was probably straight, number two Naomi was my patient and I couldn't get involved with a patient, it could put my job in jeopardy, a job I love and number three, even if we could be together Naomi wouldn't want me anyway.
* * *
I walked slowly down the corridor towards Naomi's room wondering what I was about to face today when Cook sprung up from somewhere beside me "Everything ok little red, you look a little troubled."
I turned to look at him "Yeah everything is fine, just had a bit of a difficult session with Naomi yesterday so not sure what I am about to face."
He put his arm around my shoulder "You'll be fine, you are used to angry, annoyed patients, everyone struggles at some point during their time with you."
I smiled slightly I had told him the truth but I hadn't told him the complete truth "Yeah hazard of the job I guess."
He laughed "You love it."
I laughed a little before rounding the corner and knocking on Naomi's door doing my best to push my thoughts and feelings right to the back of my mind.
* * *
Naomi
I woke up this morning still feeling guilty about the way I was with Emily yesterday; I still couldn't get over how patient she was with me. I knew she would be along in a while for today's session and I knew I needed to get over what happened yesterday so we could move forward with my recovery, I really couldn't get how much of a bitch I was out of my head.
_Emily had decided I was ready to try standing up a couple of days ago after I had had a scan and the doctor had advised that things were showing a slight improvement to the injury I had sustained and that the work Emily was doing really was helping me. I had managed, it hurt like hell but I had stood up and I was fucking ecstatic about it, I couldn't help but think that maybe, just maybe I would get better. I also had the thoughts in the back of my mind which kept pushing further and further forward as the session went on that I shouldn't get my hopes up and yesterday those feelings got the better of me._
_Emily had me standing again and wanted me to try take a few steps with my hands on the rails at all times and she had promised me she would be stood behind me at all times in case she was needed, so I had agreed to try because I really did trust Emily and I knew she would never let me cause any further damage to myself. I also knew I was putting a lot of pressure on myself even though Emily kept telling me to take it slowly. The more she kept telling me to slow down the more my anger increased. Emily had suggested we took a break and I had snapped at her "I don't fucking need a break, just let me fucking get on with this and then I can get out of here and you don't have to put up with me anymore."_
_I regretted it as soon as I said it as Emily's face fell and I saw the hurt flash through her eyes, how she managed to keep her tone professional I have no idea but I could hear the hurt within her voice "Let's take five minutes and I will not have any arguing, you need a break and even if you don't think you do I need a break."_
_She helped me sit down again before walking away from me "Emily, please, I, I didn't mean to snap."_
_She turned round to me "Forget it Naomi I am used to it."_
_15 minutes later Emily came back to me "Ok are you ready to start work again?"_
_I nodded "Yeah."_
_She helped me to stand again using the rails as support this time she was standing in front of me taking one step backwards every time she wanted me to take a step forwards. I could feel the pain creeping up my legs and into the base of my spine but I wasn't going to tell Emily as I knew she would stop the exercise and I wanted to continue, I wanted to be walking again and I wanted it as soon as possible. It was only when I stumbled due to the pain I really lost my temper, all the pressure I had been putting on myself finally came spilling over as I started throwing everything I could hold off across the room as I shouted and screamed, tears rolling down my cheeks "Fuck this, fuck everything, what is the fucking point of all of this you may as well give up on me now, I just wish I was fucking dead again rather than putting up with all of this shit. I can't take any more of this." _
_After a bit more ranting I fell to the floor even more tears rolling down my cheeks. Emily quickly dropped to my side "Naomi are you ok, where does it hurt?" _
_I snapped back "It fucking hurts everywhere just leave me alone."_
_She went to help me up and I pulled my arm away as I screamed "Just fucking leave me alone." _
_I think she was getting a little fed up of me but I knew she wouldn't lose her temper, I knew she wouldn't snap back at me and I knew she was relieved when Cook walked in "Now not ladies what is going on in here?"_
_Emily looked to him and then back to me "Naomi fell and she has let her temper get the better of her."_
_I snapped again "I am still fucking here you know."_
_Cook looked to Emily "You ok?" _
_She nodded "Yeah will just help me get her up and back to her bed, I am calling it a day for today."_
_He nodded "Yeah of course." He looked to me "Now you are going to let Emily and I help you and you are not going to snap at her any more than you already have, she may be too nice to tell you this but she is very good at her job and I know she will be doing everything she can to help you and can do without any extra stress."_
_I was going to snap back at him but I looked to Emily and could still see the hurt deep within her eyes and kept my mouth closed as I nodded. _
_They helped me up from the floor and supported me back to my bed, mum was there waiting for me to come back and she obviously picked up on the tension as they made me comfortable on the bed again. Emily turned to walk out of the room as I quietly spoke "Emily wait."_
_She turned round to me "Not today Naomi, I will see you tomorrow for our session as usual."_
_Cook put his arm around Emily's shoulder as they walked away. Mum turned to me "What was all that about?"_
_I shook my head "Nothing, it doesn't matter."_
_She glared at me "You could cut the tension in this room with a knife young lady; I hope you haven't been a complete bitch to that young lass today."_
_My guilty look must have given away how horrible I had been as mum rolled her eyes and also walked away from me with the door banging behind her. I could hear her outside the door speaking to Emily "Emily love I just want to apologise for my daughter, I can only imagine what she has been like today and I am not going to make any excuses for her being a grumpy bitch, I just hope you can move past it and still work with her."_
_I could imagine Emily smiling as I heard her soft tone "It's ok Mrs Campbell, you don't need to apologise for her, I guess she is just frustrated and that is what today was all about, I have seen it all before and I am sure I will see it all again in the future but I can promise you I am not going to give up on Naomi, she is a great girl. I will see her tomorrow and hopefully she will be in a better mood and frame of mind."_
_I heard mum laugh "Well I can't promise anything but I will be giving her a good talking to and Emily thank you for everything you have done so far and for what you will continue to do."_
_I knew Emily would still be smiling "Thank you."_
_I then took a deep breath as I saw the door handle moving again and I knew mum was coming back my way and I knew I was about to get a piece of her mind. _
* * *
I took another deep breath now as well as I heard the light knock on the door knowing it would be Emily, she poked her head around the door "Is it safe to come in?"
I smiled "Yes."
I was pleased when I saw her smile as she came into the room "How are you feeling this morning?"
I smiled once more "Yeah a little better." I paused "Listen Emily I want to apologise for yesterday, I shouldn't have taken my anger out on you like that and I promise I will try not to do it again."
She nodded and I knew she had accepted my apology "Let's forget about yesterday and focus on today, we are going to do something slightly different today, so when Cook stops flirting as usual we will make our way to the physio room and start work for today."
I nodded "Sounds good to me."
6. Chapter 6
**Well here is chapter Six, sorry it's been taking a while work is just crazy at the moment and I am hardly finding myself at home. Anyway the girls are getting to know one another a bit more, well Emily is learning more about Naomi and we are about to learn a bit more about Naomi's feelings for her physio.**
**I just want to say I don't know anything about what physiotherapists do, the information I have used has come from the internet, anyway what happens in the future might not be how it happens but it is just the story how I would like it to be and how it was buzzing around in my head when the idea came up. I would also like to thank everyone for their reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites. I am seriously enjoying writing this. **
* * *
Chapter Six
Emily
I was lying next to Naomi on the floor in the physio room and I knew Naomi was confused "Emily what's going on?"
I laughed a little "Well today I thought we could spend some time talking, I know it is not physio as such but I am hoping it will possibly help you move on a little more than you already have and then I think we will see some real progress with your physical state."
I could tell she was a little worried as talking really wasn't her strong point, I could also tell she was a closed off person and did her very best to keep herself to herself. I smiled and lightly touched her arm doing my best to ignore the feelings that shot through my body as my fingers met Naomi's soft skin. I quickly pulled my arm back and Naomi scowled slightly "Is everything ok with you Emily?"
I smiled "Yeah, just got a lot to think about, anyway I am here for you so today is about you so I want you to talk. You had a bit of a breakdown yesterday Naomi, you were so angry and so upset at the same time and I was worried about you, you can't bottle everything up like that Naomi I know you may not believe it now but it will slowly eat away at you and you will never completely move on."
She looked a little sad and spoke softly "Yeah I know, it's just hard."
I nodded "I know, I will lie here for as long as you need me to today."
* * *
Naomi
I panicked slightly when Emily said we were going to be talking today but she had a point when she said if I didn't talk about it, it would eat away at me, in a way it already was and yesterday kind of proved that to me and mum really did give me a good talking to and it made a hell of a lot of sense.
Although I was a pretty closed off person that kept myself to myself there was another side of me that felt so comfortable around Emily, it was still so confusing but there were so many times I just couldn't get her from my mind and now with her lying so close to me my mind was working in overdrive but I tried to push those thoughts away, I couldn't let on to Emily some of the things I had been thinking about her recently.
We lay in silence for quite a while and I couldn't help but listen to Emily's breathing, after a while my thoughts were really driving me crazy and I suddenly blurted out "I still have nightmares about the crash most nights." I paused waiting to see if Emily said anything but I knew that she was just waiting for me to continue, I took a deep breath "Every time I close my eyes I hear the brakes squealing as she tried to stop, I hear the crunching as the car hit the back of the truck and I see her when I look across to the driver's seat before I fell unconscious." A tear rolled down my cheek "That is the last time I saw her Emily, the last time I will ever see her."
Emily propped herself up on her elbow and wiped my tears away with her other hand "Who was she Naomi?"
I took another deep breath, this was the first I had spoken about her to anyone other than mum "She was my best friend, her name was Tamara, we went through school and college together and did everything together. When I went off to uni I would either come back to see her at the weekend or she would come over to see me. Mum always used to joke about us being joined at the hip, I guess she was more like the sister I never had. You might have realised I am a bit of closed off person but I would share everything with Tamara, she was the one person I really really trusted." A few more tears slipped down my cheeks "I will miss her so fucking much Emily, I really don't know what I am going to do without her."
She wiped another tear from my cheek and I felt a tingle through my body "I can't even begin to imagine what you have been through Naomi."
There was a bit of a silence between us and I found myself looking up into Emily's eyes, she held my gaze for a while before shifting her body so she was lying back on her back "Emily thank you for listening, I think it has helped to talk about with someone other than my mum and I would like to really apologise to you for yesterday, I shouldn't have got so angry with you like that everything just got to me, I really felt like I was struggling, the pain got too much, I couldn't stop thinking about what my life used to be like and I wanted that life back, I wanted my friend back but I knew it could never happen and everything just got the better of me. You know at first I didn't want to have physio I just wanted to lie in bed and forget about everything, well I just didn't want to be here but then mum accidently brought in a photo of Tamara and I and it made me realise that she wouldn't want me wasting my life like that, I know she will want me to move on and try and piece things together again and keep her memory alive."
Emily sat up "You don't need to apologise Naomi, yes it upset me yesterday but I am used to patients becoming upset and frustrated, it is a normal reaction to the trauma you have been through. I am glad my plan worked and it is helped you talking to me about things, I know I said I am used to my patients reacting like you yesterday I would much prefer it if you talked to me instead like you have just done."
I moved my head to look at her "Ok, I will do my best to remember that, I can be a moody cow at times though."
She laughed "I would never have guessed."
I playfully smacked her on the arm "Cheeky."
* * *
Later that night I lay on my bed, mum had gone home for the night and now I was on my own I just couldn't get Emily out of my head. I closed my eyes and all I could see was Emily _we were at my house sitting on the sofa curled up together watching a film, I was watching Emily more than the film though and eventually I gave in to what I was feeling, I pressed my lips against Emily's and she responded immediately running her tongue over my lips begging for entry which I quickly granted. It felt so magical as our tongues crashed together and Emily moaned into my mouth as I shifted my body so I was lying on top of her, I pushed my body against hers as Emily ran her hands over my back sending shivers down my spine, I slipped my legs between hers as we rocked our bodies together. Emily groaned as I pulled my lips from hers, I looked down into her eyes and could see they were almost black; I smiled down at her "I want you so fucking much."_
_She smiled back as she stroked my cheek "You can have me Naomi, I'm all yours."_
_I untangled myself from Emily's body and put my feet on the floor, I spun around and reached out my hand to Emily's which she took straight away and I pulled her up from the sofa pulling her towards the stairs. We reached my bedroom having left a trail of clothes behind us. I pushed Emily backwards onto my bed and raked my eyes over her body before lowering my body so I was covering hers, I pushed my lips to hers again quickly resuming the passion from downstairs, my whole body felt like it was on fire, I fucking wanted Emily so much, I moved my lips from Emily's and quickly pressed them to her neck loving listening to her moan as I sucked on her pulse point, she dug her finger nails into the skin on my back only spurring me on and I trailed a line of kisses down her neck, and over her collar bone until I reached her breasts. I covered the soft skin with tiny kisses only making Emily moan louder as I sucked her nipple into my mouth and bit down slightly instantly making the small bud harden. Emily pushed her hips towards my body as I alternated between her breasts. She groaned "Fuck Naomi, I need you so fucking much."_
_I dropped her nipple and looked deep into her eyes which were now black, she pulled my lips down onto hers and I kissed her hard as I ran my fingers over her body and slipped them between her legs instantly feeling how wet she was, I lightly stroked her clit making Emily moan loudly "Now Naomi, fuck now."_
_I wasted no time in pushing one finger followed by another inside of her making her moan even louder. She pulled her lips onto mine once more as I pushed hard and deep inside of her at the same time as using my thumb to brush against her clit. She dug her nails deeper into my skin as I continued to push deep inside of her. I trailed a line of kisses from her lips to her neck once more as Emily pushed her hips against my body harder as I pushed harder. I could feel her muscles becoming tighter around my fingers as I pushed loving it as Emily continued to moan at my touch. I curled my fingers inside of her pushing her over the edge her orgasm rushing through her body as she screamed out my name. Her whole body was trembling beneath me as wave after wave flooded her body. She began to relax a little when she gasped "Fucking kiss me Naomi."_
_I smiled as I looked into her eyes before crashing my lips to hers kissing her so hard and I knew I could do this over and over. _
* * *
I woke up sweating and sat up in bed but for once it wasn't because of the accident, it was because of Emily, I seriously could not stop thinking about her and I seriously couldn't understand why I was having these feelings for her, I have never felt so confused as I have never had feelings for a girl before and I can't figure out why I was now, what was it about Emily that was making me feel like this. I threw my head back on my pillow, who was I kidding I knew why Emily was making me feel like this, she was gorgeous, sexy, sweet, caring, and she could put up with my mood swings. I couldn't help but think back over some of my physio sessions with Emily trying to see where these feelings had come from_ she had been so nice to me from day one however hard I was on her, she put up with my anger, she listened to me even though sometimes I was being a complete an utter bitch to her. She was doing all she could to help me walk again, putting in so many hours with me and never getting fed up with me, well she may well have been fed up with me but she never showed it, she always remained positive. She always helped me when I was in pain and in a way I enjoyed being in pain as it was those occasional touches from Emily that sent shivers through my body as she adjusted the ice pack on the areas that were causing the initial problem. Emily would always hold me so close when she had me on my feet, promising me that she would never leave my side for as long as she needed me. I used these moments to my advantage making sure I could hold onto her and feel as close to her as I possibly could. _
The nurse came in bringing me back to this world "Is everything ok Naomi, are you in any pain?"
I smiled "I am a little bit but nothing I can't handle."
She looked at my chart "Well it's been a while since you had any pain relief so I think you will be due some more before the pain increases."
I nodded "Ok."
I watched as she walked away to sort out my pain relief and Emily came back into my mind, not that she had ever really left. I needed to find out more about Emily and I needed to do it soon, I need to see if that would help me with this confusion.
7. Chapter 7
**Well here is chapter 7 of this, I know it seems to be progressing slowly but we are getting nearer and nearer to things happening, I won't say what as I don't want to spoil it. I would like to say thanks again for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites, it really does mean a lot. **
**This one is for marsupial1974 for being with this from the beginning, and having more than one Emily would be absolutely amazing lol, I have always been slightly more of an Emily fan and I am sure Naomi will realise what these feelings mean, and it might be sooner than people think. **
**Anyway here it is...**
* * *
Chapter Seven
The following evening
Emily
I was sitting in the local pub that Cook and I often went to when we wanted a drink after work; I found a table in the corner not wanting to be around too many people tonight. Cook went to the bar and soon returned with a large glass of wine for me and a pint for him "So how has your day been gorgeous?"
I rolled my eyes but smiled at the same time, I knew Cook would never give up trying even though he knew he would never get anywhere "It was alright I guess, just another day."
He looked concerned "What is it Emily, you seem a little distracted today."
I looked down "I just have a lot to think about that's all."
He reached across the table and took my hand "Talk to me Emily, you are always telling people that it is good to talk about your problems, now it is time for you to take your own advice."
I looked at him "You will only laugh."
He shook his head "I know I can be an insensitive prick when I want to be but I won't laugh Emily, well I can at least say I will do my best not to."
I hesitated I wasn't sure whether to talk to him or not but I knew I wouldn't get anything better than him saying he would try not to laugh "It's stupid really, it's Naomi, I think I am falling for her and I mean seriously falling for her, she is gorgeous Cook and I really enjoy all the time I spend with her, I keep having dreams about her where we are, well I will leave that one to your imagination. I just can't stop thinking about her and I don't know what to do about it."
He looked surprised "Wow, seriously, I mean seriously, you like Blondie. Does she feel the same about you?"
I shook my head "I don't know Cook and it is something I can't find out, she can never know about any of this. Nothing can happen anyway, you know the rules about relationships with patients."
He rolled his eyes "There are ways round these rules little red and if you and Naomi are meant to be then you can make it happen."
It was my turn to roll my eyes "Naomi doesn't even like me like that so there is no need to talk about that. I really think I might need to pass her case onto another physio if I can't forget about these stupid feelings."
He looked concerned again "Do you really need to go that far, you two work so well together."
I smiled slightly "Yeah I know and I will seriously miss her and she is making so much progress but it really seems like the only option to consider at the moment."
He smiled "You will work it all out, I know you will just don't do anything rash."
* * *
Naomi
I had another amazing session with Emily earlier, she was always there by my side and I really was beginning to feel like I was making some real progress now and I knew that was all down to Emily. Well Emily kept saying that I couldn't have done it without putting the effort in myself but I knew I wouldn't have put the effort in if it hadn't been for her keeping me going and keeping up the encouragement not to wish my life away. She had me up on my feet again today but I didn't manage to get any further than that, Emily had expected me to lose my temper again like last time but I didn't, I knew I could trust her now and I knew she was working as hard as she can to get me back on my feet.
The session however had done nothing to control the feelings I was having for Emily especially after I had got her talking a little so felt like I knew a little more about her now. I smiled as I thought back to our conversation. _I had started it and I could tell Emily was going to try stop me in my tracks "So Emily, you know quite a bit about me I think it's time I knew a bit more about you."_
_She shook her head "These sessions aren't about me, they are about you."_
_I smiled cheekily and I could see she was trying not to laugh "Well if they are about me we can do what I would like to do."_
_She did break into a smile "Well you have got me there."_
_I laughed "So then tell me a bit about yourself."_
_She smiled and continued with my leg exercises "There isn't much to tell really, what do you want to know?"_
_I smiled "How about with your family."_
_She smiled slightly "Well I have a twin sister called Katie, we aren't much alike though, well personality wise I guess we do look quite alike. I also have a younger brother called James who is still at home with mum and dad." _
_I nodded "So you don't live at home anymore then?"_
_She shook her head "No I live with Katie, let's just say mum and I don't get on too well, we haven't since I told her I was gay." She stopped suddenly "Sorry I shouldn't have said that."_
_I smiled "Its ok Emily I already knew and I know you don't tell your patients but I promise you it doesn't bother me so you have nothing to worry about."_
_She smiled "Bloody Cook I will kill him, he knows not to tell people."_
_I smiled "How did you guess it was Cook that told me."_
_She laughed "I just know these things."_
_It was my turn to laugh "Well please don't kill him I am really glad he did tell me and not so I could judge you it just made me feel a bit closer to you."_
_She smiled "Ok I won't kill him just for you."_
_I smiled "So do you have a girlfriend?"_
_She rolled her eyes a little "You really meant it when you said you wanted to know more about me."_
_I laughed "Well what can I say as well as being a moody bitch I can also be a nosy bitch."_
_She smiled "I can tell and no I don't." she held my gaze for a while which made my heartbeat increase "I guess I haven't found the right girl yet."_
_I smiled "Well there is still time."_
_She nodded "Yeah, now come on let's get some work done." _
* * *
Emily had got me settled back into bed and as she was just about to leave mum walked into the room "You two look happy."
I smiled "Yeah we had a really good session today mum."
Mum smiled "That's amazing love, is she doing ok Emily?"
Emily looked to me for permission to talk to mum about my care, permission I granted her "She is doing brilliantly Mrs Campbell, you should be very proud of your daughter; I really think if she keeps up the hard work she will make a fantastic recovery."
Mums smile widened "That is excellent news and I am very proud of her, I would also like to thank you for putting up with her, I know how difficult she can be."
Emily laughed "I have noticed that but she really is a pleasure to work with, well most of the time anyway."
Mum laughed "I can just imagine."
Emily left the room after flashing me a smile and mum turned and walked towards the bed and sat on the chair, she was talking to me about something but I wasn't really listening I couldn't tear my eyes away from Emily who was standing just outside my door talking to one of the nurses on the ward. I only snapped out of it when mum clapped in front of my eyes "What's going on Naomi, you were just staring out into the corridor."
I gulped "Oh nothing, sorry I just got distracted."
Mum turned to look out into the corridor and she must have spotted Emily standing there, there was no way she couldn't have done, she turned back to me smiling "She is a lovely girl isn't she."
I nodded "Yeah she really is."
Mum just smiled but she said nothing more to me, I couldn't tell her about these feelings I was having, it was confusing enough for me without adding mums opinion to the situation and anyway I was never going to do anything about it as I knew they would disappear eventually, I wasn't into girls in that way.
8. Chapter 8
**Sorry I know it has been a few days since I updated this I have been so so so busy with work and have hardly been home. Anyway here is the next chapter of this and things are beginning to move on in the next couple of chapters. **
**Thanks again for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites, I know I keep saying it but it really does mean a lot :-)**
* * *
Chapter Eight
One Week Later
Emily
I was finding it harder and harder in physio sessions with Naomi, as hard as I tried to push my feelings to the back of my mind it just didn't work, I was beginning to hurt myself with my own feelings, the pain I felt as my feelings grew stronger but I knew I couldn't act on them at all. Naomi had had a scan last week and it had been good news, there were some small signs that her injury was beginning to heal thanks to the physio, she had been so excited when she had told me and I had been so pleased for her. It was so good to see that she could really focus on her recovery now she knew the physio was doing her some good. I had just wanted to hug and kiss her but somehow I stopped myself but it was getting harder and harder. Due to the results of her scan I pushed her slightly harder in her sessions in the past week and we were working on her standing up for longer periods of time so she could get used to standing before we tried walking a little bit further down the line. However because of this it meant I was supporting her more which meant more touches and every time I felt Naomi's touch my skin tingled, it made my body feel so alive and I was seriously seriously beginning to struggle with everything, I just couldn't think straight with her around me. All of this had led to make a very difficult decision, one that had taken me a while to make as it will affect Naomi as well as me.
* * *
I knocked on the door to my boss's office, I knew if I didn't do this now I probably never would, I opened the door when I heard her invite me in. I smiled as I sat down opposite her, she looked a little concerned it wasn't often I went to see her "Is everything ok Emily?"
I shook my head "No not really."
She put her pen down and gave me her full attention "Ok, what is it?"
I took a deep breath "I need to be taken off Naomi Campbells case." I paused and I knew she would be waiting for an explanation; I took another deep breath before continuing "I have developed feelings for her, she has no idea and I have not made any attempt to act on them. I have tried to push them to the back of my mind but I just can't do it, I spend so much time with her it is just too hard, I am hurting myself and before you ask I have spent a lot of time thinking about this because I know it is going to impact on Naomi as well but I think I am doing the right thing."
She nodded "You are doing the right thing Emily and I want to thank you for being honest with me, you are one of my best physiotherapists so I am glad you haven't done anything stupid. I will take you off the case straight away and swap you with someone else."
A tear slipped down my cheek I knew nothing could happen between Naomi and I but not seeing her every day will slowly kill me "I will tell Naomi, I will think of something to tell her."
She shook her head "No Emily, I will go and tell her, it is probably better that you stay away from her and I don't want to make anything harder for you than it already is."
I nodded slowly "Ok thank you."
I stood up to leave and was just about to open the door when I was stopped "Emily, can you try and stay away from Naomi for the time being she needs time to adjust to working with someone knew, I know she was making a lot of progress with you."
* * *
Half an hour later I was standing outside Naomi's room, I was hidden so she couldn't see me I just had to hear what was going on, the tears were falling down my cheeks now as I heard exactly how Naomi reacted "Fucking Hell I am not working with anyone new, I want to work with Emily, why can I not fucking work with Emily, will someone just bloody tell me what is fucking going on."
Cook came down the corridor and must have heard the shouting and then seen my tears, he wrapped his arm around me and tried to guide me away but I refused to move, I shook my head "No Cook, I have done the damage so I need to hear this even if she doesn't know I can."
He held me in his arms whilst I continued to listen to the conversation, my boss managed to get a few words in between Naomi's swearing "I can't go into details Naomi but I have my reasons for taking Emily off your case, I can assure you that someone will be taking over and picking up where Emily left off."
I could hear Naomi shouting again, she sounded so upset "You can shove your physio where the sun doesn't shine; if I can't have Emily I won't fucking have anyone."
I could hear Gina trying to calm Naomi down; I know she will be worried about her daughter. The tears were falling faster now and Cook must have decided that I wasn't listening to anymore as he forced me to move away. He said something to one of the nurses as he took me into the staff room and sat me down. He made me a coffee, I smiled slightly as he handed me it "You got anything stronger."
He laughed "Sorry Red, coffee is as strong as it gets here."
I took a sip as he sat down next to me and put his arm around my shoulder, I leant my head so it was resting on him "Cook, why do I always mess everything up, I wish a huge black hole would just open up and swallow me."
He squeezed me closer "You don't mess everything up babe, but I have to ask what was all that about?"
I took a deep breath "I told my boss I wanted off Naomi's case, I can't fucking stop thinking about her and how I want to hold her and kiss her and I won't go into what else I want to be doing with her."
I didn't look up but I knew Cook would have been grinning "I will just imagine then."
I smacked him on the arm "It's not funny Cook, I really have fallen for her."
He hugged me tight again "I know but you have done the right thing, you couldn't carry on working with her the way you feel now, hopefully the space will help you clear your head and you will be able to move on."
I nodded slightly against his shoulder "I know, it just hurts so fucking much and to hear her giving up back there made it all so much fucking worse, I was really getting somewhere with her Cook, getting her to open up, you know talk to me. She was less angry and really wanted to make some progress. I took all the anger from her during our sessions, I wiped away her tears and now it all seems like such a fucking waste just because I can't control my fucking feelings."
He rubbed his hand up and down my arm "It will all work out, Naomi will come round and she will start work with a new physio, she will realise that she does want carry on, she was just upset back there because the news had just been broken."
I nodded slowly "Yeah I guess."
He pulled me up onto my feet "Why don't you go home, you are not in any fit state to be here for the rest of today and before you try and argue I will sort it with that boss of yours."
I laughed "I can just imagine." I kissed his cheek "Thanks Cook you are the best."
He smiled cheekily "I know and I won't be letting you forget it anytime soon."
I laughed a little "I'm sure you won't."
He took my cup from me and I quickly went to grab my stuff from my locker, I wanted to get out of here as quickly as possible, I didn't want to run the risk of bumping into Naomi or Gina and them asking me for an explanation as if I was completely honest I wouldn't fucking know what to say to either of them right now, I couldn't help but feel guilty about turning the poor young woman's life upside down all over again.
* * *
Naomi
I was lying back on my bed after another brilliant days work with Emily, after last week I was on cloud nine, my scan had shown I was making progress, yes only slight progress but it was some progress and it really meant that the time I was spending with Emily was working and I seriously was enjoying spending time with her as well. I couldn't wait for tomorrow when we could do it all again. Mum walked into the room with another coffee from starbucks for me "You look happy."
I smiled "I am, I just had another really good session with Emily."
Mum smiled "That is good to hear and it is really good to see you smiling so much again."
* * *
It was then there was a light tap on the door and an older women came in "Naomi, is it ok if we have a bit of a chat. I believe you have been making some excellent progress with Emily, one of the physiotherapists that I manage."
I nodded unsure what I was about to be told "Is everything ok with Emily?"
The women nodded "Yes everything is fine; I just have some news regarding your care. I am afraid I have had to remove Emily from your case, she has been to see me and has explained her reasons to me as to why she cannot continue to work on your case and I am pleased that she did. I am going to assign a new physiotherapist to your case to carry on the great work that Emily started."
I was trying to hold the tears back but I couldn't, the anger forced them from my eyes "Fucking Hell I am not working with anyone new, I want to work with Emily, why can I not fucking work with Emily, will someone just bloody tell me what is fucking going on."
The lady standing in front of me started talking again but I wasn't really listening, the upset and the anger mixed together and I just couldn't think straight right now "You can shove your physio where the sun doesn't shine; if I can't have Emily I won't fucking have anyone."
Mum was trying to calm me down but I wasn't in the mood to listen to anything anyone had to say, I just wanted everyone to go away and leave me alone. I just wanted to know why Emily was deserting me now I couldn't get my head round it and I certainly couldn't begin to understand it.
* * *
Once everyone had left mum put her hand on my shoulder "It will all be ok love, I'm sure Emily has her reasons and her boss obviously thinks they are good reasons or she wouldn't have made the change."
I turned my anger on my mum as I just couldn't listen to that right now "Just fucking leave me alone, I don't want to hear any more of that fucking crap about Emily having her reasons, I meant what I said I will not be working with anyone fucking new, I trusted Emily and I won't be trusting anyone else."
I saw a tear fall from mum's eye and I knew I had hurt her but I couldn't bring myself to care in that moment. She gathered her stuff and walked away and I knew I wouldn't see her again tonight, I knew I had pushed her far enough for one night.
9. Chapter 9
**Here is the next chapter, it is only a short one to fill in until the next chapter and looks a bit more at how both the girls are feeling. **
**Thank you again for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites, I am still really enjoying writing this and have lots of ideas for the future of this story. **
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Chapter Nine
The Following Day
Emily
I had made it into work this morning but I really didn't want to be there, I had a new patient to work with but I couldn't find the strength to prepare myself for it at all, I had about an hour left to work up that strength. I sat on the bench in the corridor when I saw Gina walking down the corridor, I really considered getting up and walking away I wasn't sure I could face this now but I knew she had seen me and I knew I needed to face up to the damage I had caused. She smiled as she approached "Can I sit for a bit Emily?"
I nodded as I tried to hide my upset "Yeah of course."
She looked at me "You look tired love."
I nodded again "Probably because I didn't sleep to well last night but never mind, I still have a day to get through."
She smiled slightly "Yeah." She paused a minute "Emily I don't mean to pry but you look like you have been crying, is everything ok?"
I could feel the tears forming behind my eyes once again but I somehow managed to hold them back "I'm ok Gina, really I am."
She looked concerned "That's good, it's a shame I can't say the same for Naomi."
A tear fell from my eye and I couldn't look at her "I'm sorry Gina, I really am sorry."
She smiled slightly "It's ok love I am sure you have your reasons I just wish it didn't have to destroy Naomi in the process, she was doing so well she really seemed to be making some real progress, she was back on her feet and due to be discharged soon, she was only going to have to come in to see you each day. She reacted so badly when she was told yesterday, she is refusing to work with anyone new."
I nodded slightly "I know." I paused "I was outside her room when she was told, I wanted to tell her myself but I was told not to, I wanted to run in and explain to her so badly but I think it would have just made the whole situation so much worse."
She took my hand "It's ok love, she will come round at some point, well it might be a while but she will come round eventually."
I smiled "I did have my reasons Gina I really did."
She nodded "I know and I am listening if you want to talk."
I took a deep breath "I am not sure I would know where to start."
She laughed a little "How about at the beginning."
I smiled as I took another deep breath and was really hoping that Gina wouldn't hate me for what I was about to tell her "Ok, well here goes, I don't know if Naomi told you but I am gay, it came up in conversation one session and she was completely ok with it unlike some of my other patients. Anyway I started to have feelings for her and I tried to ignore them but the more time I spent with Naomi the more I fell for her, I could see past the moodiness, I could see past the flashes of anger she always directed at me, I could see past the frustration and all I could see was the most gorgeous girl I think I have ever laid my eyes upon. Don't worry I know Naomi won't ever feel the same and she doesn't know anything about how I feel and I am so sorry if I put her progress back at all but I also couldn't ignore the pain I was feeling myself knowing that I could never be with her and I couldn't put my job at risk if anything got out so I made sure I was the one to get everything out in the open with my boss so the steps could be put in place to protect me, to protect Naomi, and to protect the job I love."
She surprised me when she wrapped her arm around me and I buried my head into her and just let my tears fall, everything felt so much better now I had explained it to someone "First off Emily I don't care that you are gay and second off I can fully understand why you had to put the distance between yourself and Naomi and the only other thing I really want to say is don't ever think that something will definitely not happen you never know what might happen in the future. One of my favourite sayings is never say never."
I wasn't really sure what she was trying to say to me but I wasn't going to think too much about it for the moment. Gina kissed the top of my head "I better go see my moody young daughter; we parted on bad terms last night."
I smiled and sarcastically replied "That doesn't sound like Naomi."
Gina laughed "I will hopefully see you around Emily and remember never say never."
I watched as she walked away and I couldn't help but wonder what she was trying to tell me, did I have any kind of a chance with Naomi.
* * *
Naomi
I glanced at the door as mum came in before burying my head back into my pillows. I heard her sigh "Naomi will you just turn around and look at me."
I couldn't be bothered "Just leave me alone, I don't want to talk to anyone."
She dropped her bag on the floor "Well you are going to talk to me, I am not about to let you waste your life away like this. I have just had an interesting chat with young Emily out in the corridor."
Just hearing her name felt like a dagger was being plunged through my heart but I did roll over and face my mum, I suddenly felt guilty for the way I spoke to her last night, she looked upset "Mum before you give me any kind of lecture I am sorry for the way I spoke to you last night, I know it's no excuse but everything just got to me, it's only been one day and I miss her already, I really enjoyed my sessions with her, I enjoyed spending my time with her."
Mum nodded "I am not going to give you a lecture Naomi but I think there is something I think you need to know, I know why Emily asked to be taken off your case."
I nodded "I'm listening."
Mum smiled slightly "Ok but you have to promise not to freak out."
I nodded "Just tell me mum."
She took a deep breath "Here goes then, Now I know you know Emily is gay, well she asked to be taken from your case because she has fallen for you, she has tried to ignore her feelings but in the end she just couldn't bury them anymore so she took the steps she needed to take. She feels terrible about letting you down and I found her out in the corridor in tears over it all earlier, I really think she is struggling with this as much as you are."
I didn't know what to say, a tear slipped down my cheek and I couldn't help but notice that my heart beat had increased as mum told me that Emily had feelings for me, maybe there was a point to the feelings I was having for her. Mum stood up and sat on the edge of my bed as she wrapped her arm around me, she kissed my cheek "You don't need to say anything love but can I make a suggestion?"
I nodded "Yeah what is it?"
She took another deep breath and it made me wonder what she was about to say "Well why don't you admit to yourself the feelings you also have for Emily."
She really took me by surprise "How did you know?"
Mum smiled "A mother can sense these things and don't think I haven't noticed the way you have been looking at her when she walks in or out of the room, the way you never want her to leave when she brings you back at the end of your sessions and the way she always makes you smile when she is around. You are like a completely different person when she is around Naomi. I'm not wrong about it am I?"
I knew there was no point lying to her "In a way I am glad you have worked it out, I was struggling with my feelings, I have been so confused for weeks now, I don't know what any of it means I always thought I was straight I never thought I could have feelings for a girl and I just don't know what to do."
She hugged me tighter to her "I would like you to listen very carefully to what I am about to say." I nodded as she continued "I know it might not be love but who knows what it could be in the future. Love is love whoever you fall for, it doesn't matter if it is a man or a women. If you really like Emily and you think you could have something with one another you need to admit your feelings before it is too late."
I couldn't help but notice that mum smiled when for once I didn't argue with her. I smiled and snuggled close to her "You wouldn't mind then."
She looked shocked "Of course I wouldn't mind, all I want is for you to be happy and if it is Emily that makes you happy that is all that matters."
I smiled "Thanks Mum."
She smiled "Anytime, you just make sure you think about what I have said."
I nodded "I will, I promise." I paused "Mum was Emily ok when you saw her?
She shook her head "No not really, she looked terrible, the sparkle had disappeared from her eyes and she looked so tired. She hadn't slept at all and she just felt so guilty about letting you down."
I felt bad I really didn't want Emily to be feeling like that but I also couldn't ignore how I was feeling, why were we both so miserable because of everything and I still couldn't completely erase my anger.
10. Chapter 10
**As I have the weekend off work I thought I would make some time to post this next chapter. I would just like to say I don't really know what the actual rules are within this situation but I have my own rules within this story lol, anyway you will see how I have decided to do it within this story and I hope people are happy with it. **
**I would like to thank everyone for your reviews, I can't believe all the nice comments. I have to agree that Gina is awesome and she will keep cropping up in this story, sometimes she is just needed to make Naomi see sense. Anyway all your reviews mean a lot :-) I will let you read it now :-)**
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Chapter Ten
One Week Later
Emily
I was worried about Naomi, it has been a week since I had asked to be taken off Naomi's case and she was still refusing to work with a new physio, I was really beginning to think it would start to affect her progress if she didn't get out of bed soon. I was deep in thought when Cook bounced along the corridor, he had been keeping me up to date with what Naomi had been doing so I didn't have to try and get the information elsewhere. "How's things little un?"
I jumped slightly before turning round to him "Same old."
He pulled me into a hug "You still worrying about Blondie?"
I nodded and snapped back "Yeah, I can't just turn my feelings off and all of this is my fucking fault." He tightened his hold around me and I instantly felt guilty "Sorry Cook, I shouldn't have snapped."
He kissed the top of my head "It's ok little red, everything will all work out."
I pulled away from him "I have to do something Cook, I have to talk to her and persuade her to work with someone else."
He look concerned "I don't want you hurting yourself any more than you are already hurting."
I smiled knowing he was only looking out for me "I have to think about her at the moment I don't have any choice, at the moment I couldn't care less whether I get hurt anymore. I am going to go talk to Emma so she knows what is going on."
He hugged me "Ok but be careful."
* * *
I knocked on the office door and took a deep breath as Emma answered, I took the seat opposite her once again "Is everything ok Emily, you look terrible."
I nodded "Yeah, sorry just got a lot on my mind that is kind of why I am here really."
She smiled slightly "Ok, what is it?"
I took another deep breath "I have to go and talk to Naomi; I know she is still refusing to work with someone new and I would like to try and persuade her to move on with her life."
She shook her head "I don't think so Emily, you look awful as it is and I don't want to put any more pressure on you and I don't want to make things any worse for Naomi than they already seem to be."
I closed my eyes for a moment trying to think of a way to get her to see I needed to do this; I opened my eyes again and looked directly at her "This is all my fault I am the one that stupidly developed feelings for my patient, I am the one that has requested to be taken off her case so I am the one that needs to do whatever I can to sort out this whole mess, please just give me the chance to talk her round and if I can't I promise I will not have anything more to do with any of it."
I could see her thinking it over, she nodded "Ok I will give you the chance as I trust you Emily, I only ask one thing and that is to be careful, don't cause yourself any more hurt."
I nodded "Ok."
* * *
I left the room and leant against the wall for a minute before slowly beginning my walk down the corridor towards Naomi's room, I knocked on the door and went in; I knew I had to be strong. She turned to look at me before turning away again, I took a deep breath and held back my tears, the bright blue had been replaced with anger and I knew it was all down to me "Naomi please."
She turned round again "Please what Emily." I could hear the anger in her voice as she continued "I haven't seen you for just over a week you couldn't even be bothered to come and tell me yourself you were having me transferred, you just fucking dumped me on someone else and now you fucking want me to listen to you."
I felt a tear slip down my cheek "I had my reasons for what I did Naomi and I had to follow what I was being told by my boss."
She bit back quickly "Go on then what were those fucking reasons."
I shook my head "I can't go into that Naomi."
She shook her head angrily "Well then we have nothing to say to one another."
Another tear slipped down my cheek "Naomi you may not want anything to do with me anymore and that is something I will just have to put up with but I don't want you throwing your own life away, will you please just work with the new physio that has been assigned to you, you deserve the chance to move on and get your life back regardless of what is going on here."
She turned back to me "I am not going to work with someone new, not until you tell me why you dumped me on someone else."
I shook my head "I can't Naomi, I'm sorry."
I turned to walk away knowing I wasn't going to get anywhere with this at the moment when Naomi quickly bit back "Fuck you then Emily, I blame you for this and I am not going to give in."
Another tear slipped down my cheek and I snapped, I spun round to face her again "Fine, fine if that is how you are going to fucking be I will tell you why and then you will probably be pleased I dumped you onto someone else."
I paused as she spat back "Well go on then."
I had no idea if I was doing the right thing but suddenly blurted it out "I am falling for you, there you have it I am fucking falling for you so that meant I was hurting myself working with you and hurting you as I probably wasn't concentrating fully and I couldn't lose my job Naomi and I could have faced that if I had continued working with you."
I could tell she was surprised by my confession and I turned to walk away again feeling even more hurt than ever before. I stopped when I heard Naomi's voice "Emily wait."
I took another step forward not wanting to face her again "For fucks sake Emily will you just fucking stop and hear me out."
I turned round and stepped back into her room "Naomi I can't face any more hurt so please just leave it."
She shook her head "No I won't just fucking leave it, you have just told me something huge and well, well mum and I had a chat last week and she really made me think about things, I have been so confused about things for a while, confused about my feelings and I was struggling to understand what was going on in my fucking head."
I stopped her for a second "Naomi does this rambling have a point?"
She smiled slightly "Yeah just hear me out."
I nodded "Ok."
She took a deep breath "I think I am falling for you too, I mean I have never had feelings for a girl before and it has really been doing my head in but something mum said to me made me realise that I couldn't just forget about it because you were a girl."
She pointed to the chair next to her bed "Will you sit so we can talk properly."
I walked over to the chair and sat down "I'm not really sure what to say now."
She laughed "No me neither."
There was a slightly awkward silence between us until Naomi broke it "Where do we go from here Emily?"
I shook my head "I honestly don't know, I really didn't ever imagine you would feel the same about me. I mean do you think you might you know like to go on a date with me sometime."
She smiled shyly "Yeah I would." She paused "But I, I don't want you to lose your job."
I smiled "That's very caring, I think we might be ok though as I am not your physio anymore, I need to talk to my boss."
She shifted her body slightly "Can I talk to her with you, I want her to know I feel the same."
I nodded "I'm sure you can, I will go and see what she is doing now and get back to you."
* * *
I felt lighter as I walked back along the corridor and I can honestly say I wasn't fucking expecting that, Naomi actually liked me back. I knocked on Emma's door once again and walked in when she once again answered "Come in."
She smiled "Emily, twice in one day, to what do I owe this pleasure."
I smiled "I know I'm sorry I keep disturbing you, it's just I have just spoken to Naomi and I think she will start working with someone new but there is something else."
She nodded "Ok go on."
I looked down before looking back up at her "Naomi was really angry with me and I ended up blurting out why I had asked to be off her case and she just told me that she feels the same, anyway she would like to talk to you as well."
She looked shocked "I think it is good that you asked to be taken off her case before any of this came to light. Are you planning on taking this any further between the two of you?"
I nodded "Yeah, I hope so but obviously I don't want to lose my job."
She nodded "Ok, well I can't see it coming to that as you took the steps to avoid you breaking the rules, let's go and see Naomi now and then I can make a decision about things."
* * *
I was nervous as we walked back towards Naomi's room, I could see Cook looking at me from the nurse's station and I knew he would be dying to ask what was going on but I couldn't think about that now. We walked into Naomi's room and closed the door, Emma shook her hand "Hi Naomi, I am Emma and I oversee the work Emily does."
Naomi smiled "Well you have one damn good physio in Emily."
Emma smiled "I know." She paused "Emily has told me about the conversation the pair of you have just had."
Naomi looked to me before looking back to Emma "Yeah, I hope that doesn't mean she is going to lose her job, I really like her and I want to see if we have a chance to be together."
Emma turned to me "Emily do you think I could have a minute with Naomi alone?"
I nodded before looking to Naomi "I'll just be outside."
* * *
I closed the door behind me and leant against the wall just hoping that everything would work out ok. I closed my eyes but suddenly jumped as Cook appeared next to me "What's going on Red?"
I smiled "Well Naomi and I had a bit of an argument but in the end I blurted out how I felt and it turns out that she feels the same about me and we want to give things a go."
So what's going on now "Well Emma is in there talking to her now and then she will make a decision about what happens next."
Cook smiled "She will just be finding out whether Naomi has been influenced or not, it's the usual drill."
I laughed "You seem to know a bit about these things."
He grinned cheekily "Well you know me I like to know what's going on just in case the knowledge is needed in the future."
I slapped him playfully on the arm just as the door to Naomi's room opened again "Emily can you come back in a second?"
I took a deep breath and turned to walk in the room as I heard Cook utter under his breath "Go get your girl little red."
I closed the door again and Naomi smiled at me that made my heart beat increase rapidly, Emma looked to me "I have spoken to Naomi about things and I am happy that she has not been influenced by you at all, not that I thought she would have been but I have to show I have been through the motions and have everything in place."
Naomi looked at me before speaking once again "Can I see Emily or is it going to affect her job?"
Emma nodded "I don't see why the two of you can't see one another but I will have to write a report and consult my superiors and will get back to you both, there is one condition though."
We both nodded and Naomi looked towards her "What is it?"
Emma looked between the two of us "You have to keep it out of the hospital whilst Naomi is still a patient." She turned to Naomi "You can't have Emily back as a physio now all of this is out in the open so I really need you to agree to work with somebody new."
Naomi looked to me and I nodded, she turned back to Emma "I will agree to that if it means I can see Emily once I am discharged."
Emma smiled "Good, I will make sure you get back to work tomorrow, I don't want your progress to go downhill after this last week."
Naomi smiled "Ok."
Emma looked to me "I will get back to you when a final decision about things has been made." She rested her hand on my shoulder "You have nothing to worry about though."
* * *
I sat down with Naomi once more for a few minutes once Emma had left, I smiled at her "Well that is good news."
Naomi laughed "It certainly is."
I smiled once more "I better go; we better stick to the one rule that is in place."
Naomi nodded "I will still see you around."
I laughed "You will indeed."
I was just about to leave when Naomi stopped me once again "Emily"
I turned around and smiled "Yeah."
She blushed "Do you think I could have your number so I can at least text you until I am out."
I smiled and walked over to the table in her room and scribbled my number down on a piece of paper, I handed it to her and held onto her hand for longer than I probably should have sending shivers running through my body. I turned and smirked as I eventually stepped out the door "You better work hard and get yourself discharged quickly."
Cook was waiting for me as I left the room, he draped his arm over my shoulder "Well judging by that smile little red things went well."
I smiled "You could say that Cook, you could fucking say that."
He smiled "Well spill then girl."
I laughed "Let's just say Naomi and I are going to go on a date when she is discharged, as for the job Emma is pretty sure everything will be ok she just has to put the paperwork in place and consult her bosses and then get back to me."
He slapped me on the back, a little harder than I might have liked but in that moment I couldn't seem to care "Well that is fucking good news, we will have to celebrate tonight."
I laughed "Any excuse, Cook you can't go round telling everyone here though, we want to keep it quiet around here."
Thankfully he agreed, I was distracted then when my phone beeped, I couldn't help but blush as I read the message "Nice arse by the way. X"
I text back "Been having a good look then have you?"
I quickly saved Naomi's number in my phone as Cook grinned "Was that Blondie?"
I smiled "Yes and no you are not reading the message."
He pretended to sulk "Spoil sport."
I laughed "Some things are for my eyes only."
Cook wandered off into the staff room and I couldn't help but keep smiling, finally something good seemed to be coming from this whole mess from the last week.
* * *
**Naomi's POV in the next chapter!**
11. Chapter 11
**So here is Naomi's POV, there are parts that are similar to the last chapter obviously but instead we are getting inside Naomi's head. **
**Thank you again for the reviews and adding this to your alerts and favourites, I love reading what you think and I am still really enjoying writing this and am quite a few chapters ahead. **
* * *
Chapter Eleven
Naomi
I really thought about what mum had said to me last week and I had finally admitted to myself that I liked Emily, it still really scared me that I had feelings for a girl but mum was right you can't help who you fall for. Emily was smart, sexy, and gorgeous and she is so much fun to be around, she made me feel like life could be worth living again. Now though I was angry, I was so angry with her and I just couldn't bring myself to work with anyone new, mum had been trying to persuade me that I couldn't just give up because it wasn't Emily anymore especially as mum put it 'Emily had good reasons.' She may well have fucking good reasons but that still didn't stop me from being angry and it certainly didn't help me. I had been so moody for the last week and mum hadn't been in to see me as much as she had been so far, I guess she was finally getting fed up of me being such a moody bitch.
Today I was lying on my bed again refusing to move once more however much anyone tried to persuade me, I was surprised when Emily came into my room and I was pleased to see her but my anger soon took over once more. I couldn't help but notice that she looked tired and her eyes weren't the usual bright brown. I turned away from her but she spoke softly "Please Naomi."
I quickly turned back round again "Please what Emily, I haven't seen you for just over a week you couldn't even be bothered to come and tell me yourself you were having me transferred, you just fucking dumped me on someone else and now you fucking want me to listen to you."
I noticed a tear slip down her cheek but I couldn't give in this easily I needed her to know how angry was, how upset I was, she spoke quietly "I had my reasons for what I did Naomi and I had to follow what I was being told by my boss."
I snapped and still asked even though I knew the answer; I wanted to hear it from her own mouth "Go on then what were those fucking reasons."
She tried to tell me that she couldn't go in to them and I just shook my head at her angrily "Well then we have nothing to say to one another."
Another tear slipped down her cheek as she tried to do what everyone else had been trying to do all week "Naomi you may not want anything to do with me anymore and that is something I will just have to put up with but I don't want you throwing your own life away, will you please just work with the new physio that has been assigned to you, you deserve the chance to move on and get your life back regardless of what is going on here."
I didn't really feel like listening even though I could hear the hurt in her voice and I could hear that she was just trying to do her best for me but I still wasn't going to give in to her "I am not going to work with someone new, not until you tell me why you dumped me on someone else."
She shook her head and another tear slipped down her cheek as she turned to walk away from me and I snapped once more "Fuck you then Emily, I blame you for this and I am not going to give in."
I think then something must have snapped inside of her as she spun around to face me "Fine, fine if that is how you are going to fucking be I will tell you why and then you will probably be pleased I dumped you onto someone else."
I spat back at her when she stopped talking "Well go on then."
I watched her take a deep breath and then it all came pouring out "I am falling for you, there you have it I am fucking falling for you so that meant I was hurting myself working with you and hurting you as I probably wasn't concentrating fully and I couldn't lose my job Naomi and I could have faced that if I had continued working with you."
I couldn't believe what I was hearing, to say I was surprised was an understatement, I needed to think fast as she started to walk away "Emily wait." She carried on walking and I thought I was losing her all over again "For fucks sake Emily will you just fucking stop and hear me out."
Finally she turned around and came back into my room, I couldn't help but notice her tear stained cheeks, she spoke quietly trying to avoid looking into my eyes "Naomi I can't face any more hurt so please just leave it."
I shook my head at her "No I won't just fucking leave it, you have just told me something huge and well, well mum and I had a chat last week and she really made me think about things, I have been so confused about things for a while, confused about my feelings and I was struggling to understand what was going on in my fucking head."
She stopped me for a second I think she was a little confused "Naomi does this rambling have a point?"
I couldn't help but smile "Yeah just hear me out."
She nodded "Ok."
I took a deep breath "I think I am falling for you too, I mean I have never had feelings for a girl before and it has really been doing my head in but something mum said to me made me realise that I couldn't just forget about it because you were a girl." I stopped and indicated to the chair mum usually sat on "Will you sit so we can talk properly."
Neither of really knew what to say next but it was me that finally broke the silence between us "Where do we go from here Emily?"
She shook her head "I honestly don't know, I really didn't ever imagine you would feel the same about me. I mean do you think you might you know like to go on a date with me sometime."
I smiled shyly but inside my heart beat was skipping "Yeah I would." I paused for a second as I hesitated "But I, I don't want you to lose your job."
She smiled and it melted my heart "That's very caring; I think we might be ok though as I am not your physio anymore, I need to talk to my boss."
I still worried that Emily might be in trouble, I didn't want her boss to think I had been influenced "Can I talk to her with you; I want her to know I feel the same."
* * *
I couldn't help but smile as Emily walked away, I had finally admitted to her how I felt and if we could convince her boss I actually had a shot of a date with her. What she saw in me I don't know as she mostly sees my moody side and I know I have been a complete bitch to her during some of our previous sessions. I picked up my phone and text mum "I have finally told Emily how I feel."
She text back almost instantly "I will be in to see you within the hour, I want all the details."
I chuckled to myself and decided there was no need to reply, I knew I would get 101 questions later. I kept looking at the clock on the wall wondering how long it would take for Emily to return.
Every time I heard footsteps along the corridor I looked up to the door to see if it was going to open, finally after 20 minutes it did and Emily came back in followed by the person I guessed was her boss. It wasn't long before she introduced herself "Hi Naomi, I am Emma and I oversee the work Emily does."
I smiled wanting to be polite "Well you have one damn good physio in Emily."
She smiled "I know." She then paused for a second "Emily has told me about the conversation the pair of you have just had."
I looked at Emily before looking back to Emma "Yeah, I hope that doesn't mean she is going to lose her job, I really like her and I want to see if we have a chance to be together."
It was then that Emma turned to Emily and asked her if she could talk to me alone, Emily agreed and went to wait outside, I could tell she was worried about it all and it was only now that I realised just how much she had on the line with all of this. As the door closed behind her Emma turned back to me "Naomi I just need to have a quick chat with you to see how all of this happened."
I nodded "Ok, well I can tell you how it happened for me. I enjoyed spending the time with Emily, she was professional at all times but it was Emily that made me realise that I needed to focus on me and get my life back on track, she really talks sense and she actually made me see what a selfish bitch I was being. You know she has taken so much crap from me during our sessions but she stuck with me. I have had feelings for her for a while now, I mean who wouldn't, she is gorgeous, she has a beautiful smile and a fucking good personality, anyway it took me a while to admit my feelings but my mum made me see sense and I just want to have the chance to see if I can have something real with her because I really think I could have a future with that gorgeous girl out there."
Emma smiled "She really is a great girl and she deserves some happiness, I can tell from the way you have just spoken to me about her that you haven't been influenced at all, I can see that Emily has remained professional throughout your sessions."
I smiled "Does that mean we can have a chance?"
She laughed "Let me get Emily back in here a minute."
I nodded and she went off to get Emily back. She came back in and I flashed her a smile, I could tell she was nervous. Emma looked to her "I have spoken to Naomi about things and I am happy that she has not been influenced by you at all, not that I thought she would have been but I have to show I have been through the motions and have everything in place."
I looked to Emily before turning back to Emma "Can I see Emily or is it going to affect her job?"
Emma nodded "I don't see why the two of you can't see one another but I will have to write a report and consult my superiors and will get back to you both, there is one condition though."
My heart skipped a beat and I didn't really care what the condition was, I was just happy I was going to get the chance with Emily but I still asked the question as I knew we would have to agree to it "What is it?"
Emma looked between the two of us "You have to keep it out of the hospital whilst Naomi is still a patient in the hospital." She turned to me "You can't have Emily back as a physio now all of this is out in the open so I really need you to agree to work with somebody new."
I smiled and nodded "I will agree to that if it means I can see Emily once I am discharged."
Emma smiled "Good, I will make sure you get back to work tomorrow, I don't want your progress to go downhill after this last week."
I agreed quickly "Ok."
* * *
We sat together for a few minutes before Emily got up to leave, she was right when she said we needed to stick to the one rule that had been put in place. As she was leaving though I plucked up the courage to ask her for her number, as she handed me the piece of paper with the number written on it our fingers brushed together and it felt like a bolt of electricity rushed through my body. Just before Emily left she turned and smirked at me and she looked so fucking sexy "You better work hard and get yourself discharged quickly."
I smiled and I knew I would be working as hard as I could, the sooner I got out of this hospital the sooner I could have my date with Emily and get to know my gorgeous girl a bit better than I already did. After a few minutes I picked up my phone and sent her a text "Nice arse by the way. X"
I couldn't help but smile as my phone beeped indicating that she had replied "Been having a good look then have you?"
My smile grew and I was about to reply with something else when mum burst in through the door "Well you look happy, I want all the gossip."
Usually I would put her off but right now I was so happy her nosiness didn't really bother me "Emily and I are going on a date when I am discharged."
Mum smiled "That is brilliant news darling but I want to know the story from the beginning."
I laughed, this was typical Gina Campbell "Well I will cut it short, Emily came to talk me into working with a new physiotherapist and we ended up having an argument and she blurted out to me about her feelings, she then turned to walk away but I managed to get her to stop and I finally admitted my feelings to myself and to her and she asked me on a date."
Mum smiled but I could tell there was something on her mind "Is this going to affect her job?"
I shook my head "No she has spoken to her boss, her boss has spoken to me and has seen that I haven't been influenced by Emily so she has given us the go ahead to be together, she has some paperwork to do and has to discuss it with her bosses and will get back to Emily but we have to keep it out of the hospital so I am going to make sure I work so fucking hard to get myself discharged."
Mum smiled widely "Well that is the best thing I have heard come out of your mouth in the past week, I am so happy to hear you being so positive again."
I smiled "I feel so much more positive now, I mean I know Emily and I haven't really talked about things properly but that will have to wait until I am out of here as I don't want her to get into trouble, we have to stay apart for now." I paused a minute "I'm sorry I have been such a bitch this last week mum, I have agreed to begin physio again tomorrow with someone new."
She hugged me "That's excellent love, I am very proud of you and I know you and Emily will work things out when you are discharged."
I smiled "Thanks mum, I love you."
She hugged me tighter "I love you too."
As mum hugged me close to her I really began to feel that my life was coming together again, I knew there would always be a gap where Tamara would always be missing but I think she would love Emily and I know she would be happy for me. I knew now was the time to really focus on moving on and rebuilding my life.
12. Chapter 12
**Here is the next chapter of this, it is kind of a filler chapter in a way building things up between the girls also an insight on Naomi with her new physio. I would like to say thanks for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites. **
**I am going away to Majorca for 2 weeks on Saturday so won't be updating this but I will do my very very very best to get another update up on either Thursday or Friday if not it will be when I get back. **
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Chapter Twelve
Two Weeks Later
Naomi
I had my first session with my new physio two weeks ago, her name is Effy, if I am completely honest she is a bit of a mysterious character, she doesn't really give much away but she also doesn't take any of my shit, take that first day for example _I had gone to the session in a bad mood, yes I had agreed to work with someone new but it didn't mean I was happy about it. I did however know I needed to get on with it so I could get myself out of here and spend some time with Emily. Effy had started doing some warm up exercises with my legs to get me back into it after my week off and even though it hurt a little it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. It was only when Effy wanted me up on my feet the session went downhill. I hadn't worked with Effy enough yet to trust her so I of course argued "I'm not doing it."_
_She just looked at me "I thought you wanted to get out of here."_
_I snapped back "I do."_
_She quickly replied "So what are you waiting for?"_
_I was a little taken aback "It's just that I trusted Emily and I knew she was always there behind me in case I fell. I just knew she wouldn't let anything happen to me."_
_Her face softened "You can trust me as well Naomi, I am not going to let you fall, I want you out of here as much as you want to go as well. Will it help if I tell you that Emily and I are good friends and she has told me that I am not allowed to let anything happen to you on pain of death and as far as wanting you out of here that is because all I have heard from Emily since yesterday is how she can't wait for you to be discharged so she can take you on your date."_
_I looked surprised "Really?"_
_She laughed "Yes really, now are you going to get up on those feet so we can make some progress."_
_I smiled "Well come on then help me up."_
_She shot me a look "You really are hard work aren't you. I guess I can't say I wasn't warned."_
_I looked a little confused "What has Emily been saying?"_
_She chuckled "Just that you can be hard work, argumentative and moody at times, she did also go on to say you are gorgeous, sexy, beautiful, funny, smart and I am not going to go any further as we don't want you too big headed." _
_I smiled "I honestly don't know why she put up with me sometimes." _
_She smiled "Emily has a heart of gold plus she really likes you. She has definitely seen something good in you so I wouldn't worry too much about that."_
_I laughed "Well that makes me the lucky one then doesn't it, now come on help me up I have some work to get through."_
_Later that night I text Emily "Evening sexy, you could have warned me about Effy. X"_
_My phone beeped seconds later "Haha sorry I decided it was best for you to have the surprise. What do you think of her? X"_
_I quickly typed my reply "She is a little mysterious, doesn't bloody say much but I guess what she does say makes sense and she certainly doesn't take any of my shit. X"_
_My phone beeped again "I didn't think she would, she will be good for you. She is a good friend and I know she will do her best for you. X" _
_I smiled as I replied "Yeah we had a chat today about things I promise I won't give her too much shit, just enough to keep her on her toes. X"_
_I knew she would be laughing as she replied "That sounds just like you, just don't be falling for her. X"_
_I bit my bottom lip smirking as I replied "There is only one physio for me and let's just say her name begins with E but it's not Effy. X" _
_My phone beeped within seconds "You are so cute sometimes. X"_
_I smiled "Only sometimes? X"_
_She replied quickly again "Stop fishing for compliments young lady. X"_
_I laughed "Well a girls got to try. X"_
_My phone beeped once again "That is always true. Now as nice as this is get some sleep I have seen what Eff has got in store for you tomorrow. X"_
_I replied quickly "I don't think I even want to know, wish you were lying next to me though. X"_
_She replied quickly "Me too, hopefully it won't be too long before we can be together. X"_
_I smiled once more "It won't be if I have anything to do with it. Night. X"_
_My phone beeped one last time "Night beautiful. X"_
* * *
Today I was lying in bed after another days physio, I had been working so hard for the past two weeks and was aching so much but I was really making some progress, they were even talking about possibly discharging me in a week if I continued to make the progress I was. I am having another scan tomorrow to see how the injuring was healing since the last scan. I was even taking a few steps now with help; I had to have rails either side of me and Effy behind me holding onto my hips when I needed that extra support. As I was taking the steps and Effy was holding me I couldn't help but imagine what it would be like if I had still been working with Emily, I could imagine the bolts of electricity that would be running through my body, the way I would wish I could spin around and kiss her before continuing the work we were doing, and I couldn't help but think about the way her soft touch would make me feel so fucking alive. Emily had heard from her boss about the two of us and they had decided that because of the steps Emily took before telling me about her feelings and the fact I had been asked loads of questions by some bigwig in a suit, they even spoke to mum about it all and could see by the end of it all that Emily had been nothing but professional.
I hadn't seen much of Emily, well to talk to anyway, I think she has been deliberately teasing me though as whenever she was around my room either working with other patients walking up and down the corridors or talking with colleagues she always made sure I could see her and especially made sure I could see her bum and I am sure she has started wearing tighter jeans with her physios tunic, which really showed the curves of her upper body, I couldn't help but be drawn to the outline of her breasts when I could see the front of her. She has continued to tease me for the past two weeks and I can tell she knows exactly what she is doing as she always flashes me a cheeky smile before she walks away. I got my own back most evenings though and tonight was going to be no different, as soon as mum said goodnight and went home I grabbed my phone from my table "Evening beautiful, looking extremely sexy today. X"
As usual I got a reply straight away "You are making me blush. X"
I smiled to myself "My plan is working then, you can call it payback. X"
My phone beeped once more and I laughed as I read her message "I can't even begin to imagine what you are talking about. X"
I knew she was joking as I typed my reply "Oh yeah I am sure :-p, I have noticed the change in your trousers in the past two weeks, I must say you bum looks mightily fine in those jeans by the way. X"
I got another quick reply "Well I aim to please plus I have to keep you interested whilst I can't really see you. X"
I smiled to myself "Oh trust me my interest is not going to fade, I can't wait until I am discharged. X"
I only let my phone beep once before reading her reply "Neither can I, I have been planning our date. X"
My heart fluttered "Details? X"
I could imagine her shaking her head as she replied "My lips are zipped, I want it to be a surprise for you. X"
I pretended to sulk but couldn't help but smile "L spoil sport but still can't wait. X"
She replied quickly "Any news on your discharge? X"
I smiled "A week has been mentioned, I have another scan tomorrow to see what is going on, I wish you could be there. X"
Her reply bounced back "I wish I could be there too, you have to make sure you tell me what they say. How are things going with Effy? X"
I smiled "I will text you as soon as I am told the news, I promise and yeah ok, she is not you though, miss you so much. I have been working so hard though so I can get out. X"
It took a minute for her to reply "Sorry Katie was shouting me; you'll understand when you meet her. Please don't push yourself too hard, I will be waiting for you as long as it takes. X"
My smile grew "She sounds like a character. I won't I promise and I know you will J X"
She text me back quickly this time "That is one way to describe Katie. Anyway you need to get some sleep, I don't want you to end up exhausted, I know how hard you are working. X"
I smiled and replied one last time "You are so cute, I will see you around and about tomorrow. Night Night beautiful. X"
My phone beeped once more "You're the cute one and you definitely will I will make sure of it. Night gorgeous. X"
I put my phone back on the table and settled myself under the covers, I couldn't help but smile as all I could think about as I closed my eyes was Emily.
* * *
Emily
These past two weeks have been so hard, I have really missed working with Naomi, no I have missed Naomi full stop, talking to her, being around her, seeing her smile even though that didn't happen very often but when it did her whole face lit up making my heart skip a beat. I have been teasing her though by making sure I was standing in the right places so she got the perfect view of what I wanted her to, I know that might sound mean but it was payback for the saucy texts she kept sending me to get me hot under the collar. On the plus side I knew for sure my job was safe, poor Naomi and Gina had been asked hundreds of questions but they had proved I had been professional at all times.
She had been texting me as usual tonight and there was a possibility of her being discharged in a week, she was doing amazingly in physio, Effy didn't really talk about it and I am glad she didn't but she did occasionally drop hints in my direction at how Naomi was doing and Naomi always told what she had been during her sessions via text and I could piece together how well she was doing from the activities she was achieving now.
I put my phone on the side after telling Naomi to get some sleep and picked up my laptop, I had a date to finish planning, I wanted to make it really special for Naomi after these months in hospital, plus I wanted to impress her. I had the TV on but wasn't really paying much attention to it but I must have been humming to myself though as Katie walked into the room "What the fuck is going on with you at the moment, you have been too happy for the past few weeks."
I looked up "Good evening to you too Katie, always a pleasure."
She rolled her eyes "Yeah whatever."
She wandered off into the kitchen and I thought I had got away with it until she came back with a bottle of wine and two glasses and plonked herself on the chair opposite me "So come on then spill, I know there is something going on."
I looked up "There's nothing, is it a crime to be happy these days?"
She rolled her eyes at me again "There is something, I am your twin I know these things plus there is the fact that there was that one week where you were so miserable, you came home crying or with blotchy eyes, you weren't eating and were spending all your spare time in bed and now you are smiling, you are walking round with a spring in your step, you are singing to yourself and you are being sociable again, oh and you are always texting on the bloody phone of yours so I shall ask you again what is going on with you?"
I couldn't help but smile, I should have known that Katie would pick up on something; she never missed a trick "Ok, ok you've got me, I am kind of seeing someone."
She smiled slightly "What do you mean kind of seeing someone."
I didn't really know how to explain this one to Katie "It's complicated."
She laughed "Well I have one bottle here and there are more in the fridge so start talking."
I laughed "Ok, ok, we are going on a date as soon as we can."
She looked confused "Why can't you do it now?"
I grimaced slightly, I didn't know how this was going to go down with Katie "She is one of my patients, well she isn't my patient anymore but she was. I asked Emma to take me off her case as I was falling for her, I tried to stay away from her and things got a bit ugly for a while but eventually told her how I felt and it turned out she felt the same so we talked it all through with Emma and she said we could be together if we kept it out of the hospital so now we have to communicate via text until she is discharged."
Katie smiled "Only you could fall for one of your patients, I'm happy for you though Emily, you deserve some happiness. What's this girl's name then?"
I smiled "Thanks Katie and for your information I have never fallen for a patient before. Her name is Naomi and she is drop dead gorgeous."
She pretended to throw up "Too much information for your sister."
I threw a cushion at her "Well I could always be a bit more like you when you are with your boyfriends; I have lost count the amount of times I have walked in on you with different people down here."
She threw the cushion back "I'm not that bad, I am the perfect sister to live with."
I laughed "Well I wouldn't go as far as saying perfect but I will always love you Katie."
She smiled "Love you too sis. Now how about another glass of wine and we watch a DVD together, it seems like forever since we spent some proper time together."
It was my turn to smile "That sounds good to me, I'll make some popcorn."
She jumped up "I'll pick the DVD."
I smiled as I wandered into the kitchen I have to admit Katie and I don't always get on brilliantly but she was my twin sister and I really do love her and she is right it has been ages since we spent some proper time together.
* * *
**Marsupial1974 your review of the last chapter got me thinking and I changed this chapter after reading it and then changed further chapters as well. I hadn't originally planned to have Effy as Naomi's new physio, she was going to pop up later on in the story but I liked your idea so I made it happen lol.**
13. Chapter 13
**So I promised I would try and here it is, chapter thirteen. This will be the last chapter I post before I go on Holiday, cannot wait for two weeks in the sun :-) Anyway things are building up between our girls and it's only two chapters until their first date.**
**Thanks again for the reviews and adding this to your alerts and favourites. I have a lot of ideas for this story and there will be chapters full of happiness and chapters full of drama to keep you on your toes. Marsupial1974 hope your mum wasn't too scary lol **
**Anyway I shall get this chapter posted and will post the next chapter when I am back in a couple of weeks. **
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Chapter Thirteen
Two Weeks Later
Naomi
I was finally getting out of hospital, I had my scan two weeks ago and once again I received good news from the doctor, I had texted Emily as soon as I was back on my bed "Great fucking news Em, the scan has shown my injury is really beginning to heal thanks to the physio."
She must have had her phone on her as my phone beeped almost straight away "That is fantastic Naoms, wish I could give you a great big hug right now. X"
I smiled as I replied "I wish you could too, can't wait to spend time with you properly. X"
A reply came through quickly once more "I can't either; I miss you so fucking much. X"
My smile grew "Miss you so fucking much too. X"
I had worked so hard during my physio for the past two weeks, even harder than usual and I know I was probably pushing myself far too hard but I was just so determined to get out of here, I had been in for so long now I just wanted to be back in my own bed and I wanted to be able to see Emily's face properly, to hold Emily in my arms and to get to know her better. I just wanted to be able to be with her without these restrictions. Effy had tried to get me to slow down a bit but I was so determined to get out of here. Unfortunately I had ended up staying in another week more than had been expected as the doctor just felt I wasn't quite ready and however upset and annoyed I was I had to believe the doctor was doing what was best for me. I didn't however see this straight away as he found out when a serious amount of verbal abuse was thrown in his direction. He had wanted me to be managing fully on crutches before he let me go and he still felt I was a little wobbly and Effy agreed. Anyway they finally set my discharge date for today and I would only have to come back in everyday for now for my physio appointments. I was managing well on my crutches and in the past week I had been walking further and further each day, I have been able to get myself in and out of bed by myself for a while now and I really felt like everything in life was coming together for me again. I was so excited about going home, mum was coming to get me in about an hour and I was so looking forward to lying on my own bed and sitting on the sofa but the best thing about going home was that Emily had promised to come round and see me when she finished work tonight and she was going to have dinner with mum and I.
* * *
Two hours later I was at home, fuck it felt so good, I was sitting on the sofa with the TV on, mum was in the kitchen putting all my pain medication in the cupboard in case I needed it and making me a coffee. I kept looking at the clock just wanting it to be the time that Emily was coming round but time just seemed to be going so fucking slowly. I pulled my phone out of my pocket and quickly typed a message "Hurry up and finish work, I seriously need to see you. X"
My phone beeped within the minute "Want to see you too; the time is going so bloody slowly. I will be there as soon as I can I promise. X"
Mum came in with my coffee as I put my phone on the table in front of me "If you stop clock watching the time will go faster."
I nodded "I know, I just want to see her so badly."
Mum smiled "I know darling, I'm sure she wants to see you too."
Mum sat with me as I drank my coffee and we chatted about things for a while before she went off to sort out my bedroom and check that everything was where I would need it to be when I was up there. I tried to focus on the TV but all I could think about was Emily.
* * *
About an hour later the doorbell rang, I heard mum shout from the top of the stairs "I'll get it darling, don't you get up. It'll just be one of the neighbours coming to see how you are doing."
I knew she was only looking out for me but I couldn't sit all the time I needed to keep moving around but I know she was only trying to help me adjust to being back home again. I didn't hear the voice at the door it was too quiet but I did hear mum say "She's in the lounge, go on through."
I wasn't sure I wanted any visitors right now, the only person I wanted here was Emily but I knew I had to be polite to whoever it was. I turned around as the lounge door opened and my eyes nearly popped out my head when I saw it was Emily standing in the doorway. I stood up as quickly as I could manage and she quickly walked over to me, I flung my arms around her and hugged her tight. She wrapped her arms around me and we stayed like that for a few minutes, I breathed in her scent and knew I could stay in that moment forever. She pulled back after a couple of minutes "Let's have you sitting back down again."
I smiled and sat back on the sofa and Emily sat next to me, I gazed at her and fuck she really was gorgeous "You're earlier than I thought you would be."
She laughed and my heart skipped a beat "Yeah, Emma let me leave, apparently I was distracted, she is going to work with my patients this afternoon and she told me get off and come see you."
I smiled "That was nice of her."
She returned my smile "Yeah, I think she is feeling bad about keeping us apart but I know she was only doing it to protect me."
I nodded "Yeah and none of that matters now, you are here and that is all that matters."
Mum walked into the room then "Emily can I get you anything to drink?"
She smiled "I would love a cup of tea please Mrs Campbell."
Mum laughed "Emily please call me Gina and one cup of tea coming up, Naomi do you want another coffee."
I nodded "Please mum."
She smiled and walked off into the kitchen and I turned back to Emily "You really are so fucking gorgeous."
She smiled "You are the gorgeous one and I cannot wait to take you on our date."
I smirked "Well you can now I am seriously fucking looking forward to it."
She laughed "You need time to adjust to being out first."
I pretended to be upset "Tomorrow night then."
Emily laughed once more and I really did love her laugh, it was so cute and sexy "I am being serious, please at least spend tonight and tomorrow night at home and then we shall see about the day after if you really want to do it that quickly."
I nodded "I want to do it as soon as possible; I seriously can't wait to spend some time alone with you."
She smiled "I can't either I just don't want you to push yourself too soon."
It was my turn to smile and I know she was only worried about me "I promise I won't but I just want to be able to get on with my life and move on with you in my life."
She gazed into my eyes as mum walked back into the room "Here you go girls."
Emily smiled as she tore her eyes away from me "Thanks Gina."
Mum handed me my coffee "I will just be in the kitchen starting to prepare dinner if you need me for anything."
Emily smiled once more before mum left the room "Gina how would you feel about me taking your daughter out on our first date the day after tomorrow."
Mum smiled "I think that would be brilliant love, I know she will be well looked after with you and you deserve some time together after all this time not being able to see one another."
I smiled "Thanks mum." I then turned and flung my arms around Emily whispering in her ear "I can't wait."
As I pulled back she smiled "I can't either, I really can't."
* * *
I snuggled with Emily on the sofa and we watched a DVD, I know mum kept poking her head around the door to check we were ok but she never disturbed us which I was thankful for, it felt so fucking good to just be here this close to Emily, to be able to hold her in my arms, everything just felt so comfortable.
When the film finished Emily must have known there was something on my mind, she softly stroked my cheek "You ok?"
I smiled slightly "Yeah, it's just, well we never really talked about us properly after the argument we revealed our feelings to one another. I guess we just haven't had the chance."
She smiled "We can talk now if you like."
I nodded and I took the lead, I needed to get out what I wanted to say "I really like you Emily as you may have already guessed, I guess I am just scared, I have never had feelings for a girl before and no one has ever made my heart skip like you do and it all fucking terrifies me. I don't want to hurt you, I don't want to be a disappointment to you and I sometimes wonder if I am even suitable relationship material, it's not as if I have ever been any good at them in the past."
She hugged me closer to her "The past is the past Naomi, what we have to focus on is what we have between us. I really like you too and I am going to work as hard as I can to make this work between us. Trust me I am scared too, I have been in relationships with girls before but not one of them has made me feel the way you make me feel and let me tell you, you will not be a disappointment to me, you will never be a disappointment to me and I want you to completely get that idea out of your head."
I smiled a little as I snuggled into her more "I am going to make sure I work fucking hard to make this work as well, I am determined not to screw this up."
She smiled "That is all I can ask for Naomi and I promise that I will not push you, I am going to let you set the pace for this relationship. We will start and continue as slowly as you want to."
I kissed her cheek "You're the best. Now I have got that off my mind do you fancy watching another film?"
She nodded "Yeah, my turn to choose this time."
I laughed "Ok."
* * *
A couple of hours later we moved into the kitchen and sat round the dining table enjoying the dinner mum had cooked, she had cooked one of my favourites, roast chicken dinner and it tasted so good after what I had been eating for the past however many months. I couldn't help but keep glancing over to Emily as we ate; I really was finding it hard to keep my eyes off her.
As we finished dinner mum cleared up, Emily and I offered to do it but she wouldn't let us. Suddenly I was overcome with tiredness and I was trying to hide my yawns as I didn't want Emily to go home but she didn't miss anything when it came to me "I think it is time for someone to go to bed."
I shook my head "No, I don't want you to go."
She smiled "You have had a long day Naoms, you need to get some sleep. I promise I will come over and see you again tomorrow."
Mum turned round and smiled "Would you like to come for dinner again tomorrow love?"
Emily looked to me and I nodded, she smiled and turned to mum "I would love to if it's no trouble for you."
Mum shook her head "It is not trouble for me at all."
Emily smiled "That's settled then." She turned to me "Come on you I will tuck you in if you would like."
I smiled "Now that sounds good to me."
I made my way to the bottom of the stairs using my crutches and then very slowly used them to make my way up the stairs, thankfully that was something Effy had worked on with me before I had been discharged, I guess this was why, I hadn't really thought about it when we had been doing it but now it all made sense. Emily climbed up behind me, I could feel her eyes burning into the skin on my bum which only made me smile, and we went into my room, she smiled as she looked around "Nice room."
I smiled "Yeah I like it."
I grabbed my pyjamas and went off into the bathroom leaving Emily sitting on my bed. I quickly had a wash and got changed before making my way back to my room. Emily stood up straight away and I got myself into bed. Emily pulled the duvet over me and sat down beside me for a minute "I have had a lovely time with you today Naomi."
I smiled "I have had a lovely time too, I can't wait to do it all again tomorrow and I seriously can't wait to go out with you on Saturday."
She smiled "I can't either; I just hope you enjoy what I have planned."
I laughed "I will because whatever it is will be with you."
She smiled and stood up, she turned round and leant over kissing my cheek softly "Sleep well and I will see you tomorrow."
I smiled "Looking forward to it already."
I couldn't help but steal a cheeky glance at her bum as she walked away; she popped her head around the door as she left "I could feel your eyes burning into me."
I smirked "You shouldn't be so fucking sexy then and just getting you back for earlier."
She blew me a kiss before closing the door behind her. I couldn't help but keep smiling before turning onto my side ready to fall asleep hoping my dreams would feature Emily tonight and hoping they weren't sweet.
14. Chapter 14
**Ok so I am back from my holiday unfortunately as it means back to reality tomorrow. Anyway here is the next chapter of this, another bit of a filler chapter again really but also moving on with things a bit between the girls. I would like to thank people for their reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites, it really means a lot and I am still seriously enjoying writing this and have lots of ideas floating around my head for it, I have even written a few bits on my phone whilst lying around by the pool for future chapters. **
**I watched Skins Fire when I got back yesterday and it had me in tears, I can't say I was too happy with the ending but like someone else has said on here and probably other people I don't know about I am just going to see it as another ending written by someone like the way people write different paths for our girls on here. They will always live on in people's hearts and they will always be Naomi and Emily. I will also add that Lily and Kat were absolutely amazing in their performances. **
**Anyway here it is...**
* * *
Chapter Fourteen
The Following Day
Naomi
I woke up around lunchtime today and immediately Emily popped into my mind, I couldn't wait to see her again tonight; it was so good to actually be able to spend time with her last night and know we could just be ourselves. I picked up my phone and quickly typed out a text "Morning gorgeous, thinking about you, hope you are having a good day at work. Can't wait to see you later. X"
I pulled on some clothes and slowly made my way downstairs, my phone beeped when I reached the bottom "Work is work, missing you loads. Don't push yourself too hard at physio this afternoon. Can't wait to see you either. X"
I slowly made my way into the kitchen and mum placed a sandwich in front of me, I smiled "Thanks Mum."
She returned my smile "Your welcome love."
* * *
Half an hour later I was with mum on the bus going to the hospital for my physio session with Effy. As I arrived I walked as quickly as I could on crutches to where I needed to be, I wanted this over and done with as soon as possible as I had something else I wanted to do this afternoon, something I hadn't yet discussed with mum.
Effy had me walking between the rails again today as usual, each day she asked me to walk a little further and every day I could feel myself getting stronger and the pain was definitely decreasing, I was really beginning to feel like me again and I knew I had Emily to thank for a lot of that. After about 30 minutes Effy stopped me with what I was doing "Ok Naomi, I want to try something different today, I want you to try take a couple of steps without holding onto the rails."
I shook my head "I don't think I am ready."
She smiled slightly "You are Naomi, you really are and we need to start building your strength up so we can get you off those crutches."
I thought for a minute before nodding "Ok, I will try." I knew it was pointless arguing with Effy about it anyway as she really didn't take any of my shit, we had another argument about it not so long ago where she once again reminded me that she wouldn't be taking any shit from me and also asked me if I was this bad with Emily to which I had shaken my head and smiled cheekily "No because Emily is way hotter than you."
She just laughed and replied "Everyone has their own opinion now get back to work."
* * *
Half an hour later I was sitting on a chair in the corner of the room feeling seriously tired but I was also pretty fucking happy, I had managed to take 5 steps without having to hold on, Effy was really pleased with my progress but all I wanted to do was tell Emily. I grabbed my phone out of my pocket "Em, guess what? I walked 5 steps without holding on today. X"
She replied almost instantly "That's fantastic Naoms, really proud of you. X"
I smiled as mum came in to find me after receiving an update from Effy "Well done for today love, you ready to go home now?"
I looked up at her and shook my head "Actually mum there is something I want to do before we go home."
She looked concerned "What is it love?"
I took a deep breath unsure how she was going to react to this request "I want to go and visit Tamara's grave."
Her concerned look didn't disappear "I'm not sure love, is it not a bit soon?"
I shook my head "No, this is something I need to do mum, I need to say goodbye to her properly I haven't had a chance yet, I want to be able to move on properly mum, I know I will never forget Tamara, she will always be there in my heart but I need to get past this and move on and let myself be happy again."
Mum nodded and hugged me "Ok love, we will get some flowers on the way."
I smiled "Thanks mum."
* * *
A Few Hours Later
I was up in my room lying on my bed trying to control my tears; I wanted to get myself under control before Emily came round. There was a light tap on my door and I just assumed it was mum "Go away; I just want to be on my own mum."
Emily cleared her throat "It's me Naoms, can I come in?"
I didn't make any attempt to move "Yeah."
She came in and sat on the bed next to me and rested her hand on my shoulder "What's happened gorgeous, you sounded so happy in your text earlier."
I shifted my body slightly so I could look at her "I went to visit Tamara's grave, I needed to say goodbye."
She looked concerned "How was it?"
I snapped "I don't want to talk about it."
She quietly replied "Ok. I might just go then and leave you alone for a while. I will see you tomorrow."
I immediately felt guilty "No Em I'm sorry don't go, I don't know why you bother with me I am such a moody cow."
She smiled slightly "I bother because I like you Naoms, I really like you." She paused a minute "So why don't you budge over and then I can sit with you and you can tell me all about it, well if you want to."
I smiled as I moved my body across the bed and sat up as Emily sat beside me, I rested my head on her shoulder as she put an arm around me "It was horrible but nice at the same time, it made me remember everything that had happened and it brought it home to me that she really was gone and that I would never see her again but it was also nice to have the chance to say goodbye, to leave her some flowers and to sit there and talk to her about everything." I paused unsure whether to tell Emily the next bit "I even told her about you."
Emily smiled "You did, did you and what did you tell her?"
I smirked "Oh just how gorgeous you were, and sexy and smart and how you have helped me get my life together again."
She kissed the top of my head "You're not so bad yourself. Will you tell me a bit more about her?"
I took a deep breath and took hold of her hand "She was beautiful, you know that natural beauty people have with long brown hair and brown eyes, she was always the life and soul of the party. As you know I can be a little moody at times but Tamara was the one that would always come round to mine and drag me out saying I needed to lighten up and enjoy myself rather than take myself so seriously all of the time and you know what once I was out I always had a good time with her, she always made sure I did and we always without fail got drunk and then stagger back to either mine or hers and collapse into bed in a fit of giggles and then not wake up again until about lunchtime if not later the next day. We had been friends for years and we always had that brilliant connection, we were inseparable at college and were always getting up to all sorts of mischief. I will add it was always Tamara that started it though I was always far too serious." I paused and she waited for me to continue, she waited until I was ready "You know the night of the accident was no different, she had rung me at work and all she had said was we are going out tonight. I of course had tried to protest I really didn't feel like it I just wanted to go home after work and take a bath and then curl up on the sofa and watch crappy TV with a bottle of wine, she wouldn't take no for an answer though. She came to pick me up after work with clothes for me to change into and when I saw her driving down the road to pick me up I actually started to look forward to our night out but I think the most of it was that I was going to spend the time with her and that always meant fun. She always attracted all the boys as well, there was never a shortage surrounding her on the dance floor." I stopped as a tear slipped down my cheek "I miss her so fucking much Emily."
She hugged me closer to her and kissed the top of my head once more "I would be worried if you didn't Naoms and I want you to know you can talk to me about her at any time you want."
I nodded against her shoulder and couldn't help but think about how much I loved the nickname she had given me "I know and I will, I promise, I think I just need more time."
She kissed the top of my head once more "You take as much time as you need gorgeous."
Just then mum called up the stairs "Dinners ready girls."
I called back "Thanks mum, we're on our way."
Emily went down the stairs first and I slowly followed behind her and we walked into the dining room, I couldn't wait to be off these crutches so I could hold Emily's hand as we walked around. Emily sat down as mum handed us both a plate of lasagne with some garlic bread, Emily smiled "Thanks Gina, I love lasagne."
Mum smiled "Your welcome love."
I made a mental note to remember that Emily loves lasagne in case I needed this reference for a future date.
* * *
An hour later I was standing in the doorway with Emily, she was on her way home even though I didn't really want her to go, she wanted me to have a rest and relax so I was ready for tomorrow. I was so excited about tomorrow I know I get to see her most evenings at the moment but tomorrow was our first proper date. I smiled as Emily kissed my cheek "I'll pick you up at 10 tomorrow morning."
I smiled "Sounds good to me, I'll see you tomorrow."
She nodded "I'm looking forward to it already."
I smiled "Me too." I then watched as she walked down the garden bath and hopped onto her moped, I couldn't help but notice how sexy she looked with her helmet on as she pulled away. I walked back inside and popped my head round the lounge door "I'm going for a shower mum and then I'm going to bed, I want to be fresh for tomorrow."
She smiled back at me "Ok love, sleep well and I'll see you before you leave."
I smiled to myself as I climbed the stairs with only thoughts of Emily swirling around my head.
15. Chapter 15
**I thought I would be nice and post this tonight as I disappeared for two weeks, it is date time, I have just read through this and I am not so sure if I am sure about it anymore but I am going to post it anyway because I keep changing my mind each time I read it through. I am about 8 chapters ahead with writing this and things are moving forward with our two girls. **
**I would like to say thanks again for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites, it really means a lot. **
**I had a brilliant holiday thank you, if I am honest I really didn't want to come back but I guess reality has to hit again at some point. **
**Anyway here it is...**
* * *
Chapter Fifth teen
The Following Day
Emily
I was so nervous, I have been awake for hours and it was still at least an hour until I was going to pick Naomi up. I know we have spent the last couple of evenings together but today was our first proper date and I really wanted to make it special for her. She deserved something special after everything she had been through. I was dressed and downstairs with everything packed up against the front door ready to go. I was pacing the lounge as I kept watching the clock when Katie sauntered slowly down the stairs "What's the matter with you, you'll wear the carpet out at this rate."
I turned round "Morning to you too."
She smiled slightly "Yeah morning, anyway spill, what's fucking going on?"
I glanced at the clock again before looking back to Katie "It's my first date with Naomi today; remember I did tell you as you also said I could borrow your car."
She looked confused for a minute "Oh yeah, your big date with Blondie. How long until you need to leave?"
I rolled my eyes "I wish you wouldn't call her that, you haven't even met her yet and about an hour."
She smiled "Well you have time to make your favourite twin sister a coffee and we will have a chat and hopefully save that carpet of ours."
I rolled my eyes once again and started walking towards the kitchen "You're my only twin sister and come on then anything to distract me for the next hour."
* * *
An hour later I was on my way to Naomi's still as nervous as before but Katie had managed to distract me for a while which I was thankful for. I pulled up outside her house and walked up the path my heart beating quickly as I rang the doorbell. Naomi opened the door and completely took my breath away; she looked stunning in a pair of jeans that were tight to her skin and a gorgeous pink top that accentuated her assets. My eyes were drawn to her breasts and I could see her smirking "You see something you like."
I looked up as I blushed slightly "Sorry I couldn't help it, you look absolutely amazing, so fucking gorgeous."
She smiled as she raked her eyes up and down my body "You look fucking gorgeous yourself."
I blushed "Thanks, I did my best as I am taking a gorgeous girl out today. Is she ready to go by any chance?"
She smirked "I think she might be." She turned around for a second "Mum I'm going, I will see you when I get back."
I heard Gina call back from the kitchen "Ok love have fun, both of you have fun."
Naomi followed me down the path with her crutches and I opened the car door for her, it was only when Naomi froze that I realised what I had done "Oh shit, fuck, Naomi I am so sorry, I should have thought."
She stopped me as she put her hand on my shoulder "Its ok Emily don't worry about it."
I looked up into her eyes "No its not alright I should have thought about it, I was so worried about planning such a perfect day and I knew you couldn't manage the moped but now I have realised what an insensitive bitch I am and I really should have fucking thought about it all."
She put her arms around me and hugged me, it should have been me fucking hugging her "Emily listen to me, its ok I promise. Yes I froze but I have to get in a car again sometime and I want that time to be with you and I want it to be today, so let me get in and you can tell me where we are going."
I pulled away from her and smiled slightly "You are amazing you know that."
She smiled "I know and don't you forget it."
I laughed and helped Naomi into the front seat, I slid her crutches onto the back seat before jumping into the driver's seat, she looked across at me and smiled "So where we going then?"
I smirked "That would be telling. I want it to be a surprise."
* * *
I drove carefully to the coast with the radio on quietly; I wanted Naomi to be as comfortable as possible. I could tell she was worried by the look in her eyes however much she tried to hide it. I kept my eyes fixed on the road "Are you ok Naomi?"
She nodded slowly as she took a deep breath "Yeah, sorry I'm a bit quiet it's just hard not to remember what happened last time I was in a car."
I felt so bad for her "Do you want me to stop?"
She shook her head "No, I need to do this and the more I do it the easier it will become."
I smiled as I continued to drive and after another couple of miles we arrived. I pulled up and parked and helped Naomi out of the car "I love the coast."
I smiled "Yeah I know."
She laughed "Let me guess, mum."
I laughed "Yeah, I just wanted to make today special for you Naoms."
She kissed my cheek "Today will be special Em because I am with you."
I couldn't help but smile as I held up the picnic basket "You hungry?"
She nodded "Starving, I couldn't eat breakfast as I was so nervous."
I laughed "Same, I'm glad I wasn't the only one that was nervous."
We started walking towards the sand, Naomi glanced at me "I wish I could hold your hand."
I smiled "It will come with time, you are doing so well, we will just have these moments to look forward to on future dates."
She laughed "You want to take me out again then?"
I smiled "Of course I do, I am seriously falling for you Naomi."
She smiled "Good because I know I can be a moody bitch but I am seriously falling for you too."
I couldn't help but smile at hearing Naomi's words as we continued to make our way onto the sand. I ran ahead and dumped the bags before running back to Naomi who was struggling slightly with the crutches on the sand. "You ok beautiful?"
She smiled "Yeah it's just sand isn't that easy to walk on with crutches."
I smiled "You are doing brilliantly, do you want to stop here and I'll go get the bags back here instead."
She shook her head "No I want to do this; I'm not going to let anything like this spoil today."
As we reached the bags I spread the blanket out and helped Naomi to sit down. We ate the picnic I had put together as we chatted and enjoyed our time together watching the waves gently lapping at the sand. Naomi lay back as we finished eating "That was lovely Em thank you."
I smiled as joined her by laying on my back "Your welcome. I am having a great time."
She shifted her body slightly and looked into my eyes "Me too."
I really wanted to pull her down to me and kiss her but I resisted I didn't want to push her too quickly, I was comfortable with my feelings for Naomi but I knew she was probably still struggling with her feelings, I know it was a big change for her. I broke the moment "You fancy a paddle?"
She smiled "Yeah, you'll have to help me up though."
* * *
Within ten minutes we were ankle deep in the water, I could see a sparkle in Naomi's eyes but I wasn't sure what she was planning, that was until I felt the cold water hit my clothes, I couldn't help but squeal "That's fucking freezing."
She grinned "I know I just couldn't help myself though."
I smirked and quickly kicked some water in her direction and laughed as I listened to her squeal this time, I knew I needed to be careful, however much progress Naomi was making one stupid slip or fall would put her back about 100 steps and I didn't want that for her but I also didn't want to stop her living her life, I didn't want to stop her having fun, I wanted to be her girlfriend not her physiotherapist. She broke my thoughts "You don't need to worry about me so much you know."
I smiled "I know I just can't help it sometimes, I was just thinking though I am not your physio anymore and I don't want to be." I took a deep breath "I want to be your girlfriend."
This time it was her turn to smile "Girlfriend huh."
I nodded but tried to avoid meeting her eyes unsure of how she might react; I felt her fingers on my chin as she lifted my head up "Emily you don't have to be nervous I want to be your girlfriend too."
I couldn't help but smile as she took my hand for a minute "Come on girlfriend let's go to the amusements for a while."
I nodded "Yeah we have a while before my next plan for today."
She dropped my hand and we made our way back up towards our stuff, I gathered it together and carried it back to the car before running back down the sand to where Naomi had got to, we then headed in the direction of the amusements.
* * *
I have not laughed so much in a long time as we played on the different games trying to beat one another's scores; we even went on the dodgems at the back of the arcades before squeezing into the photo machine together and taking loads of pictures of the two of us together pulling silly faces. We printed them off and kept some each to remind us of the day, I put mine in my purse so I could see Naomi every time I got my purse out and Naomi did the same saying "This is a perfect reminder of a perfect day."
I smiled "The day isn't over yet." I looked at my watch "In fact we need to head back to the beach."
She looked at me "I bet you're not going to let me in on the secret are you."
I smiled "You've got that one right."
* * *
We headed slowly back to the beach, I could tell Naomi was getting tired even though I knew she wouldn't tell me, it's hard work moving about on crutches all the time. I helped Naomi sit down; I had picked a spot which allowed us to lean against the wall so we could be more comfortable. I wrapped my arm around her shoulder and she rested her head on my shoulder as we sat looking out to the sea as the sun began to set creating some amazing colours across the sky. Naomi whispered softly "This is amazing Emily, amazingly beautiful."
I kissed the top of her head "I was hoping you would like it."
We stayed like this for ages and I knew I could stay like this for forever with Naomi by my side, I felt so drawn to her and the urge to kiss her came flooding back quickly. As the sun disappeared from the sky and darkness slowly began creeping in Naomi shifted her head and I found myself gazing into her eyes, she held my gaze for a minute before her eyes flickered towards my lips and I couldn't help but notice she licked her lips. I knew it was now or never and I leant forward and softly captured her lips with mine before pulling away again my heart beating so fast and the only word going through my head was 'wow'. Naomi smiled before putting her hand on the back of my head and pulling me back to her, this time she pressed her lips to mine starting softly but soon the pressure increased as we shared our first proper kiss, a kiss that was shooting fireworks inside my body. I ran my tongue along her lips asking for entry, entry that she quickly granted and our tongues crashed together and Naomi pulled me even closer to her. I wrapped my arms around her neck wanting her to be as close to me as possible and I knew this was a moment I never wanted to end.
Eventually we had to pull apart; I rested my forehead against Naomi's as we both gasped for breath. She smiled and broke the silence between us "That was fucking magical; I have wanted you to do that for so long."
I moved my head so I could gaze into her eyes "It really really was. I have wanted to do it for so long, that is a first kiss I will never forget."
She smiled "Me neither and I can't believe that was my first kiss with a girl."
I couldn't help but smile "Well I guess that makes me the luckiest girl on this planet."
Her smile widened "No that would be me having you as my girlfriend."
I kissed her cheek softly "I guess we are both lucky then."
She laughed "Yeah."
* * *
Half an hour later we were back in the car, I turned to Naomi "Are you ready for this?"
She nodded "After today I think I am ready for anything."
I smiled as I started the engine and began the journey home and I couldn't help but think about how amazing today had been, I couldn't believe how nervous I had been this morning when the day had been such a success.
As I pulled up outside Naomi's house I walked round to help her out and walked her to the door, she smiled "You are such a romantic."
I smiled "I do my best; anyway I wanted to make sure you get home safely."
She smiled and it completely melted my heart all over again "I have had a great time today Emily, it really has been magical."
I couldn't help but return her smile "It has."
She leant forward and captured my lips with hers again as she dropped her crutches and wrapped her arms around me pulling me in to her as the kiss deepened quickly. After a couple of minutes we pulled apart again both gasping for air, Naomi smiled once she caught her breath a little "That is a second kiss I will never forget."
I smiled "Well I shall look forward to the third but right now we have an audience."
She turned round to the front window to see Gina peering out at us with a huge smile on her face. She turned back to me "That's mum as nosy as ever. I better get in before she comes out here."
I smiled "Can I see you tomorrow?"
She returned my smile "I better had see you or I might go crazy."
I laughed "Just what I was thinking. I'll text you when I get home."
I softly kissed her lips once more before walking back to the car.
* * *
Once I got home I was thankful Katie wasn't there as I knew she would have 101 questions and I didn't want to answer them now I just wanted to be able to remember this amazing day. I pulled out my phone "Hey gorgeous, I'm home, had a really amazing day today and can't wait to see you tomorrow. X"
I got a reply almost instantly "I had an amazing day too; it was really special Em, thank you. Can't wait to see you tomorrow either. X"
I smiled as I replied "I will let you get some sleep now. Sweet dreams. X"
She replied quickly again "I don't know about sweet but they will definitely be about you. X"
I couldn't help but laugh "Mine will definitely be the same. Night. X"
She replied once more "Night gorgeous. X"
I put my phone back in my pocket and took myself off upstairs to have a shower and go to bed myself before Katie came home.
16. Chapter 16
**Thanks once again for your reviews and adding this to your alerts and favourites. Here is the next chapter of this, it is a bit of a filler chapter again as I want to move the story along a little**
* * *
Chapter Sixteen
One Month Later
Naomi
I have been continuing with my physio every day for the past month, I would like to say it was getting easier but there were still days where everything still felt so hard and I was in pain and feeling so stiff by the end of the session. Now don't get me wrong I like Effy and she is good at her job and she puts me through my paces which is why I am still making progress but I seriously miss working with Emily and I mean seriously fucking miss working with her, I felt like I could be myself with Emily even if that meant me being a complete moody bitch. Anyway there was a plus side to not having Em as my physio anymore and that was being able to have her as my girlfriend and let me tell you there are some perks to having a physio as your girlfriend. Take last week for instance _I had just come home from physio and I had gone up to my room to have a lie down as I felt so stiff and just felt absolutely exhausted. I must have fallen asleep as a couple of hours had passed when I woke up, but I was happy as I woke as my eyes met chocolate brown. I smiled "Were you watching me sleep?"_
_She returned my smile "Yeah you looked so peaceful and may I add extremely cute."_
_I felt myself blush slightly at her comment but couldn't help but smile "I'm sorry I fell asleep, I didn't want to as I knew you were coming but I just felt so out of it today, so tired and achy." I lifted the cover up slightly "Come and have a cuddle to make up for it."_
_She smiled and stood up "I have a better idea but I will need you to lie on your front. I will be back in a minute."_
_She wandered off out of the room and I couldn't help but sneak a look at her bum as she went. I could tell she was smiling as she said "I can feel your eyes burning into my skin Naoms."_
_I smiled to myself, I don't think she realised how sexy she was and that was so cute. She came back a couple of minutes later with some bottles of massage oil "I knew your mum would have some somewhere. Now let's have you on your front." _
_I turned over and Emily gently climbed onto the bed and sat just below my bum with one leg either side of my legs. I felt my heartbeat increase just at having her so close to me but this was nothing to the way my heartbeat raced when she began gently massaging my shoulders before slowly her hands travelled down my back and I gradually felt all the aches and pains from earlier disappear. I couldn't help but groan as Emily's fingers worked their magic and I could seriously feel the heat spreading through my body as she remained so close to me. After about half an hour Emily shifted her body so she was lying next to me, my body felt so relaxed. I wrapped my arms around her and kissed her softly; smiling only when we pulled apart and I could see her eyes were slightly darker than usual. I ran my finger over her cheek knowing how much I was teasing her "You know I used to imagine you massaging me like that during our physio sessions."_
_She smiled "Trust me I was tempted on a few occasions but I somehow managed to stop myself. I still to this day don't know how I managed it especially when I was so close during ice therapy."_
_I smirked "Well ice therapy just isn't the same without your hands."_
_She laughed "Well aren't you the lucky one that has access to my hands now whenever you want or need them."_
_I couldn't help but smile as I pulled her closer to me and captured her lips with mine really enjoying just being with her. _
As usual that kiss deepened quickly, this had been happening a lot in the past couple of weeks, I just couldn't get enough of kissing this gorgeous girl who I got to call my girlfriend. We never took it any further though however heated things got, we had talked about it a couple of weeks ago and had decided together that we wanted our first time together to be special and we wanted it to be at the right time for both of us and I have to admit I am slightly worried about it, I have never been with a girl before and I didn't want to disappoint Emily, I wanted it all to be special for her.
* * *
After our first date Emily had been coming round to mine almost every night, she did keep telling me she wasn't coming round on some nights as she wanted me to get some proper rest but I always talked her round and she always gave in to me, I mean who could resist my charms. That first week after our date we were still a bit shy around one another, I think that's the right way to describe it. I knew Emily didn't want to push me, I knew she was letting me set the pace but on the other hand I was nervous about pushing things to fast with her, it kind of felt like we were going round in circles. Anyway we started to get to know one another better as we spent so much time together and we became so comfortable with each other, we started being caught in more compromising moments by mum on the sofa, there is one particular moment that I think will always be etched in my mind _Mum was out somewhere, probably shopping, she will have told me but I will have been so wrapped up in Emily I won't have been listening properly. Em and I had a film on, I can't remember which one as we weren't watching it at all, the kiss had started off slowly but quickly built in passion as she ran her tongue along my lips begging me for entry which I quickly granted and it felt amazing all over again as our tongues duelled for control. I felt so alive and somehow I ended up on top of Emily on the sofa, our hands were wandering everywhere, my hand slipped up inside her top and brushed her skin as I trailed my fingers up over her stomach towards her breasts. She gasped as I gently massaged her skin through her bra. All the time I could feel her hands sliding my top over my skin, I broke our kiss so she could slip it over my head but quickly pressed my lips to hers again, I slipped my leg between hers as the heat between us continued to increase rapidly. After staying like this for a few minutes I broke our kiss again and pulled Emily up quickly pulling her top over her head before pushing her back down against the sofa and resumed our kiss. Neither of us heard mum come in until she wandered into the lounge and cleared her throat. Emily and I sprung apart and I we both flushed mum just laughed "Looks like you two were having some fun."_
_Emily quickly pulled her top over her head again and chucked mine at me, I turned to mum "Well we were." _
_Emily grabbed my hand and literally dragged me upstairs, I knew she just wanted to get out of that room; she flopped down on to my bed obviously still embarrassed "I can't believe she just walked in on us like that. I don't know if I will ever be able to face her again."_
_I was embarrassed to but I also knew mum had been trying to wind us up. I sat next to her "You will, she was just playing with us."_
It was after that moment with mum that we had the conversation about the pace of our relationship and we were both so thankful we hadn't gone any further whilst downstairs. Thankfully mum made sure Emily knew she was happy for us when we went down for dinner later on that day.
She had caught us on other occasions but again she just laughed at us and kept telling us how happy she was to see us happy together. We spent a few nights together watching films and munching our way through mum's supply of popcorn.
* * *
Emily
This past month has been amazing, I have spent so much time with Naomi, I have tried to get her to have a couple of evenings rest but she didn't like it and always managed to talk me into going round to see her. We have spent time watching films snuggled up together on the sofa and have often been caught by Gina in half a state of undress on the sofa, I was finding it harder to control myself around Naomi and I am pretty sure she is the same with me but we decided together that we would wait until the time is right between us as we both it want it to be special.
We have spent time talking as well as kissing; Katie seems to come in conversation frequently. _Naomi smiled softly at the end of the film and I snuggled closer to her "So how's things with Katie these days, I know she was doing your head in the other day."_
_I kissed her cheek "Oh did I not tell you about the latest developments and she is still doing my head in." I laughed before continuing "Well you know I said that Katie and Cook liked one another and were always flirting with each other at every chance they got."_
_She nodded as I continued "Well let's just say that I caught them in the lounge the other day with less clothes on than Gina caught us with, I didn't even get chance to say anything before they disappeared upstairs quickly and I then had to sit through and listen to them until I came round to see you." _
_She kissed me softly "You should have come round to mine earlier."_
_I smiled "I thought about it but I wanted to talk to Katie so I was hoping I would see her before I left, unfortunately though I didn't and I didn't get chance to talk to her until I got home that night."_
_Naomi tightened her hold on me and pulled me closer to her "What did she say about it all?"_
_I laughed "Well let's just say they are sleeping together and have admitted there is something between them but still won't admit it properly and say they are officially in a relationship, so I guess I am just going to have to put up with listening to them."_
_She kissed me softly "You can stay here anytime you want."_
_I smiled "Thanks but you need your rest at the moment which means sleeping in a bed on your own without me taking up space next to you."_
_She laughed "I love having you lying next to me."_
_I kissed her softly "And I love lying next to you, holding you, kissing you, just being with you in general."_
It was nice to have Naomi to talk to about Katie it stopped me driving myself insane with it all, don't get me wrong I love my sister but she can be a right pain in the arse and she can be such high maintenance. I was looking forward to the day Naomi met her but I was also dreading it, I really like Naomi and I don't want Katie scaring her away and I know exactly what Katie can be like.
I couldn't help but think back to that same evening _after our chat about Katie we spent the evening cuddled together on the sofa and Naomi was reading one of her favourite books to me, I loved listening to her read to me, it was something we did quite often and I could listen to her all day, it also meant I got to read more books than I usually had time for and Naomi was opening my eyes to lots of different books. A week later though I decided to take one of my favourite books round to read to Naomi, I wasn't sure what she would think about it but soon found out. I passed her the book to look at before starting reading and she smiled "The Fault In Our Stars by John Green."_
_I nodded "Yeah I love it, I think it is my favourite book to date."_
_She smiled "You want me to read it to you?"_
_I shook my head "No I thought I might read it to you for a change."_
_She smiled once more "I like the sound of that."_
_We snuggled as close as possible without squashing one another and I began reading, we must have been there for a good couple of hours as before I knew it we were at the end of the book. I smiled softly as I gently wiped a tear from Naomi's cheek, she smiled "That was an amazing book Em, so emotional, it makes you laugh and makes you cry and it really makes you want to read the whole book all over again. It raises so many questions that I think everyone asks themselves at some point in their lives." _
_I smiled "Yeah I think that is why I love it so much, it really makes you think about your own life." _
_She kissed me softly "Yeah it does and it makes me realise just how lucky I am to have you."_
_I smiled "Yeah me too."_
_She kissed me softly once more "And if I might add you have such a sexy voice when reading."_
_I started tickling her knowing that I still needed to be careful "Are you saying I don't normally."_
_She squealed "Noooo, Emily stop." She squirmed underneath me and after a few minutes I stopped and she caught her breath "You have a sexy voice all the time just more so when you are reading like that."_
_I laughed and leant down to kiss her softly before pulling back and gazing into her eyes "I will let you off then." _
* * *
I couldn't believe how much I loved spending time with Naomi and we were spending more and more time with one another, I was staying later on a night as Naomi was feeling less and less tired, there were obviously still days where she was tired but that just depends on what she has been doing in physio on those particular days. The more time I spent with Naomi also meant that we got more comments from Gina about how cute we were always being together; I always had to laugh when Naomi pulled faces about being told she was being cute, which takes me back to another conversation with Naomi _there was one day after physio when I had gone round to see Naoms and she was a little grumpy about something, I never did really get to the bottom of that one but I did manage to make her laugh "I'm not even going to ask you what is making you so grumpy this time but what I will say is you are extremely cute when you are annoyed." _
_She threw a cushion at me "I am grumpy enough without you making me even grumpier."_
_I smiled cheekily "You know I used to always think you were cute when you would be shouting and screaming at me during our physio sessions."_
_I saw her look up at me and I think I saw a slight smile "I can't even believe you let me get away with being like that with you."_
_I smiled "Well I guess I let some people get away with stuff I wouldn't normally, my mind must have been clouded by other thoughts at those times." _
_Her smile grew "Must be natural charm."_
_I laughed I couldn't help it "Or something like that." I walked over to where she was siting and kissed her softly "You feeling less grumpy now?"_
_She groaned as I pulled away "May need a few more kisses first."_
_I knew I was teasing her "Oh you do, do you?"_
_I suddenly found myself being pulled off my feet and I straddled Naomi as our lips crashed together. We only pulled apart when Gina wandered in and rolled her eyes as usual "Do you two ever come up for air?"_
_Naomi shot her a look "Emily was just cheering me up a little, I was being grumpy apparently."_
_Gina laughed "Well there is no surprise there either then."_
_I couldn't help but laugh as Naomi threw a cushion at her mum before pulling me back to her and resuming the kiss. _
* * *
Tomorrow I am going round to see her again and we are going out this time, Naomi is making so much progress with her physio and we both decided it would be nice to get out of the house for a while and get out from under Gina's feet. I knew Naomi was beginning to drive her insane.
I was deep in thought about tomorrow when I realised Katie was standing directly in front of me "Earth to Emily."
I looked up and smiled "Oh hey, you had a good day?"
She nodded "Yeah. What you so deep in thought about?"
I smiled "Just thinking about tomorrow and seeing Naomi again."
Katie rolled her eyes "Don't you like see her every night anyway?"
I laughed "Yeah, she is so amazing though Katie, she is cute, she is funny, she is a fucking amazing kisser and I really think I am falling for her."
She sat down beside me "Have you told her that?"
I shook my head "No, it's too soon I don't want to scare her off and everything is going so well at the moment between us."
Katie smiled "I know you Emily and I know you will know when is the right time but let me tell you something you may not think I notice things around here that don't involve me but I have noticed that you have been so happy these past however many weeks and it is nice to see, really nice to see and you deserve some happiness in your life."
I hugged her "Thanks Katie, love you."
She smiled "Love you too." She pulled out of the hug "How about we have a glass of wine and watch a DVD before bed."
I nodded "Yeah that sounds nice." I watched as Katie walked off into the kitchen and soon Naomi crept back into my thoughts and I couldn't help but smile.
17. Chapter 17
**I wasn't going to post this tonight but then decided what the heck lol I am still quite a few chapters ahead with this. This chapter moves the story along a little and moves things along between our two girls. **
**Marsupial1974 this ones for you, thank you for sticking with this from the beginning and you don't have to wait much longer for that meeting...**
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Chapter Seventeen
One Month Later
Naomi
I have had another great month with Emily; we have really started to get to know one another. I was surprised to learn that she didn't have much contact with her family other than Katie; she got on ok with her dad but didn't see him much as it meant she had to see her mum. Her mum had reacted badly when she told her family she was gay and their relationship had gone downhill from there and from what she said it wasn't that brilliant in the first place, it really sounded like her mum has always favoured Katie as she was more of a girly girl. She had thought she was going to lose Katie at the same time when she decided to move out but Katie finally stood up for her and told them she was moving out with Emily, and now they are really close and generally enjoy living with one another. I didn't push her for any more information than she wanted to give as I knew she would tell me in her own time when she was ready. We had also had plenty of make out sessions, most of them ended up getting very heated but they never went any further than hot make out sessions, she really knew how to get me hot under the collar though and always left me wanting more, however there was always something in the back of my mind that stopped me taking things any further, I just don't know what I did know I needed to realise what it was soon or I was going to burst.
* * *
Today though I have my own surprise for Emily, it is my turn to give something back to her. She was due to come round to mine in about an hour but I was currently on my way to hers, I knew she would be there as she always went home first to get changed and see what Katie was up to. As I approached I felt a little nervous for some reason but I made my way up the path and pressed my finger to the doorbell, it wasn't long before it was opened and I came face to face with Katie Fitch, Katie was beautiful in her own way but I definitely had fallen for the most beautiful twin. I smiled "Hi is Emily in?"
Katie spun around and shouted "Emily it's for you."
I smiled as Emily ran down the stairs a little surprised that it was someone for her and she looked even more surprised when she saw me standing there especially when she saw I didn't have my crutches "Hey you." She smiled and my heartbeat started to race "I was just getting ready to come round to yours but Naoms where are your crutches?"
I couldn't help but smile "I don't need them anymore, I have been walking in my sessions for the past couple of weeks but I wanted to surprise you, that's why I didn't tell you about my progress."
She flung her arms around me "I'm so proud of you and so pleased for you, you have done amazingly."
I kissed her softly before pulling back and meeting her chocolate brown eyes "I couldn't have done it without you." I paused a minute "Anyway I have come to take my gorgeous girlfriend out for dinner."
She smiled "That sounds lovely. Would you like to come in for a bit?"
I nodded "Yeah."
She led me into the lounge and we sat together on the sofa, our lips finding one another's again. We only broke apart when Katie waltzed into the lounge and pretended to vomit "So I'm guessing this is the new girlfriend that has been making you so happy these past weeks."
Emily smiled "Yeah, Katie this is Naomi." She turned back to me "Naomi, this is my twin sister Katie."
I smiled "Nice to finally meet you Katie, I've heard a lot about you."
Katie looked me up and down before turning to Emily "I guess she is pretty in her own way."
Emily threw a cushion at her "Give over Katie and be nice, I really like her."
Katie looked at me "And do you really like her too?"
I smiled as I looked to Emily before turning back to Katie and nodded "Yeah I really like her too."
There was a small silence before Katie finally broke into a smile "Well that is good enough for me then but Naomi you have to look after my sister she deserves to be happy so if you hurt her I will hurt you."
I nodded "I won't hurt her."
Katie smiled once more "Well I will look forward to seeing you around this place then, fully dressed though I might add. Now can I get anyone a coffee?"
Emily laughed "That would be great thanks Katie."
I smiled "I would love one." Katie smiled "How do you take it?" I smiled "Milk and two sugars please."
Katie wandered off into the kitchen and I turned my attention back to Emily our lips crashing together again over and over, neither of us wanting to part. We were tangled together on the sofa when Katie walked back in with the coffees, she cleared her throat again "If you two can tear yourselves apart for a minute I have your coffees."
Emily laughed as we pulled apart "Look at her Katie, how do you expect me to resist?"
Katie just rolled her eyes and we sat chatting a bit as we drank our drinks, Emily had one hand resting on the top of my leg and she was innocently rubbing her thumb across my jeans making my whole body tingle, I don't think she was even aware of what she was doing to me. Katie took our cups back into the kitchen and I quickly took the opportunity to pin Em to the sofa again, I pressed my lips to hers hard and she groaned into my mouth as our tongues crashed together. I heard Katie wander back through and I could almost hear her eyes rolling as she walked past us pretending to vomit "I am out of here and I will be staying at Cook's tonight."
As we heard the front door bang shut I broke away from Emily gasping for breath, we both started laughing as Emily spoke softly "That's what I call payback."
I laughed "I'm guessing you've caught her in a few compromising positions."
She laughed again "Just a few, anyway what did I do to deserve that, not that I am complaining."
I smiled "You were driving me crazy with you thumb, my whole body was tingling and it took all my energy to wait until we had finished our drinks."
She smirked "I didn't even realise but I'm not going to complain if I have that effect on you. Now somebody said something about dinner, I'm starving."
I laughed "Me too."
She smiled "I'll just quickly get changed then I feel a little under dressed compared to you and might I add you look fucking drop dead gorgeous."
I smiled "Thanks." I kissed her softly before she ran off upstairs to get changed."
* * *
Half an hour later we were strolling down the road hand in hand. It took all my strength to leave the house as Emily took my breath away when she came back down the stairs, I had all sorts of images running through my head about what I would like to do to her but I had promised her dinner and I was also absolutely starving. I was taking her to my favourite Italian and had organised it all earlier, mum was good friends with the owner who greeted us on arrival. She led us to a cosy table in the corner that was sprinkled lightly with rose petals and softly lit with candlelight. I pulled out the chair for Emily to sit down before sitting down opposite her. Carmela smiled at me as I took my own seat and mouthed "She's beautiful."
I blushed slightly as I nodded and turned my attention back to Emily, I took her hand across the table as we looked at the menus. I was a little surprised when Carmella came over to take our order "Good evening ladies I have come to take your order for the evening."
Emily smiled at me as I laughed "What's going on Carmella, it's not like you to be waitressing tables?"
She laughed "Well you are not just ordinary guests."
I laughed "Mums put you up to this hasn't she?"
Carmella laughed once again "She may have said tonight was special for you so I just want to do my bit."
I couldn't help but smile as we placed our orders and Carmella left us alone once again.
I couldn't help but gaze into Emily's eyes, the candlelight flickering in her pupils making the chocolate brown look even cuter than usual. I couldn't tear my eyes away from her and I knew I was seriously falling for this girl, I didn't know where any of these feelings had come from but they had crept up on me, I would even go as far as to say I was falling in love with her it was way too soon to tell her though I couldn't scare her off. She smiled at me and brought me away from my thoughts "What you thinking about, I can see your brain working in overdrive."
I smiled in return "Oh just about how perfect everything is tonight, how perfect you are and how lucky I am having you in my life."
She brushed the back of my hand with her thumb "Tonight is perfect; thank you for this and I am the lucky one having you, I wasn't sure it was possible to love someone like I love you."
Her face fell a little and she tried to pull her hand away from mine but I kept hold of it, she spoke quietly "I'm sorry I shouldn't have said that I don't want to scare you away."
She trailed off and I held onto her hand tighter "I love you too Emily."
She looked up at me quickly and I could see the surprise in her eyes "Really, you mean I haven't ruined this."
I laughed "Really, I love you Emily, I thought I would scare you off if I told you but hearing those words from you makes tonight even more special."
We were only interrupted when Carmella brought our meals over but I still couldn't tear my eyes away from her and I was intending on eating my dinner with one hand as I really didn't want to leave go of Emily.
* * *
A couple of hours later we were walking hand in hand along the road again dinner had been lovely. Everything felt different between Em and I now in a way I felt lighter now I had finally told her exactly how I felt and it felt like our relationship could really move forward and only grow even stronger now we both knew we felt the same. As we walked and talked Emily laughed and smiled and occasionally stopped to pull me close to her for a soft kiss. She pulled me over again as we approached the bottom of her garden path and pressed her lips to mine, as she pulled away she looked into my eyes and smiled "Would you like to stay here tonight?"
I was quiet for a second and Emily panicked "Shit I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that I just, just didn't want you to have to worry about going home as it's late and dark."
I cut her off with a searing kiss, all my feelings for her rushing together at once as I pressed harder and harder against her lips, we broke apart gasping for air, my heart was beating so quickly as I looked deep into her eyes "I don't mind if you meant it like that, I'm ready if you are."
There was a sparkle in her eyes that instantly told me she was ready. She slipped her hand into mine and we quickly walked up the path, Emily slid her key into the lock and pulled me in the door leading me upstairs to her bedroom.
I pulled her to me and wrapped my arms tightly around her as my lips found hers all over again. Emily wrapped her arms around me pulling me as close to her as she possibly could as she guided me towards the bed. She pushed me back onto the bed only breaking our kiss for a second as she climbed on top of me, the passion soon increasing all over again. Emily pulled away and softly stroked my cheek "Are you sure?"
I smiled as I ran my fingers through her hair "I have never been so sure about anything in my life." I pulled her back down to my lips and held her close to me all the passion resurfacing from a minute ago. My whole body felt so alive as the weight of her body pressed down against me, I gasped softly as I granted Emily's wish and opened my mouth for her our tongues battling for supremacy as I knew I needed Emily more than I had ever needed anyone before.
Her hands moved over my body, my breath caught in my throat as they crept up inside my top, stroking there way over my skin making my whole body tremble beneath her. I moved my own hands over her body and slipped them under her clothes, my breath catching once again as I found her soft warm skin. Emily's breathing hitched at my touch and I pulled her tighter to me my hand gripping the small of her back as our kiss continued to get heated. I wanted her so badly it was driving me insane, I couldn't believe I had held out for so long. I groaned as Emily broke our kiss, she sat up so she was straddling me and pulled me up to her, she gripped the hem of my top and lifted it over my head and tossed it aside. She moaned as I moved my hands over her body, I lifted her top slowly wanting to draw this out however much I wanted her, I tossed it onto the carpet and turned my attention to the lacy black bra covering Emily's breasts. I swallowed hard and felt my heart racing as I gazed at my sexy girlfriend. She returned my gaze and I could see how dark her eyes were becoming.
Within minutes we had undressed one another and Emily pushed me back onto the mattress, I trembled as she ran her hands down my body until she covered my breasts, softly massaging my nipples making them instantly hard. My breath caught in my throat and I lifted my own hands to cup her breasts, I loved the feeling of them in my hands as I softly kneaded them. Our lips met again and I surrendered myself to her kisses all over again feeling myself drowning in her.
I gasped "Emily" as she pulled away for a second "You are so fucking beautiful, how have we waited so long to do this."
I reached out for her again as she ran her eyes over my face "I'm not sure how I did."
Our lips crashed together once more and I closed my eyes briefly as her body pressed hard against mine, I could feel her body trembling just as mine was. Her mouth opened against mine and I felt her tongue enter my mouth sending shivers down my spine. I couldn't help but groan as her breasts pressed against mine and the feeling of her naked body against mine was leaving me feeling light headed and breathless. I knew this was it, there was no going back now and I knew I wanted Emily, I would always want Emily. I whispered "I love you."
She smiled down at me "I love you too."
We kissed desperately and I moved my arms to grip Emily's skin not sure how much more I could stand. I felt her hand move across my skin and snake its way down my body until she found my most intimate spot. I moaned and arched my body towards her slightly needing her there so badly. Her fingers soon found the burning fire making me moan, which only spurred Emily on. She stroked me gently as I trembled beneath her, her lips on mine, her tongue in my mouth. The feeling of her body on mine, her lips on mine and her fingers were enough to make me lose some control. She pushed one finger followed by another inside of me a moment later making me cry out. I kissed her hard gripping onto her body as she pushed her fingers inside of me. I moved my body against her and could feel the passion really taking over. Nobody had ever made me feel like this before, Emily was the first girl I had slept with and there really was no going back now, I could never imagine being with anyone else. Emily was making me feel things I had never thought were possible. She pressed her lips to mine once more as she continued to push her fingers inside of me, my eyes closed as I began to feel myself losing control of my senses. I could feel my body trembling hard and my muscles tightening around her fingers. She continued to push before curling her fingers inside of me bringing me to the climax I needed. I moaned her name over and over as the waves rushed through my body from head to toe, my head was spinning with the pleasure and my breathing was laboured as Emily continued to move her fingers inside of me bringing me down from my high. I pulled her lips to mine when I had some breath back wrapping my arms around her pulling her close and kissing her hard. After a few minutes Emily pulled away and smiled down at me, I could see the sparkle deep within her eyes as she whispered "You are amazing and I love you so much."
I quickly flipped our bodies so I was pressing down on her, I smiled softly "You are the amazing one and I love you so fucking much."
I wanted her so much right now; I wanted to make her feel as good as she had just made me. I pressed my lips to hers as I moved my hand down her body and parted her thighs slowly before slowly stoking her. She moaned softly into my mouth as I pushed two fingers inside of her, I never thought doing this to another girl would feel so fucking good as I pushed deep inside of her. I felt her arch beneath me and she continued to moan. I moved my lips from hers and moved them slowly over her body planting soft kisses over her neck and shoulders before reaching her breasts. I knew she was slowly losing control as I sucked a nipple between my teeth as I pumped my fingers inside of her. Her body was really trembling beneath me and I knew she was so close; I bit down on her nipple, wanting to make her lose control, needing to hear her lose control. She whispered "Naoms."
I dropped her nipple and pushed my lips back against hers, she moaned against my lips and I curled my fingers inside of her finally pushing her over the edge. She arched her body up towards mine as constant moans escaped her mouth as her orgasm ripped through her body. She threw her head back deep into the pillows as she called out my name over and over. I left my fingers inside of her as her chest heaved.
As she caught her breath she wrapped her arms tightly around me and kissed me hard. I lifted my head a while later and she smiled "Fucking amazing, just fucking amazing."
I smiled and kissed her softly again before resting my head on her chest whispering softly "You're mine Emily."
I knew she was smiling "I am Naomi, I am yours."
We moved so we were under the covers and lay in bed together my arms around her and hers around me. Neither of us were in a hurry to leave this bed as we lay together planting soft kisses over each other's skin. We were both quiet, nothing needed to be said between us, we both knew exactly how we felt as we lay close beside one another. I closed my eyes loving the feeling of her against me and I knew I could never get enough of this.
18. Chapter 18
**There isn't much to say about this chapter really lol I just hope you enjoy it. **
**Thanks again for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites, it really means a lot as I am seriously enjoying writing this still. **
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Chapter Eighteen
Emily
The following morning I woke snuggled in Naomi's arms, she was still sleeping peacefully. I lay watching her for a few minutes before she stirred and her eyes flickered open. I shifted my weight as I propped myself up on my elbow "Morning."
She smiled softly "Morning yourself." She reached out and ran her fingers over my cheek sending shivers down my spine "Have you been watching me sleep?"
I blushed slightly "Yeah, creepy I know but I couldn't resist, you are so beautiful."
She laughed "It's not creepy; it's actually kind of cute. You must love me or something."
I smiled "I must."
She shifted her body a little so she was covering mine slightly as she pressed her lips softly to mine, we were both still completely naked and I couldn't think of anywhere else I would rather be right now. She smiled as she pulled away from me "Last night was the best night of my life Em."
I stroked her cheek "It was mine to, it was so special and magical, I can honestly say it is a night I will never forget."
She kissed me softly once more "Do you mind if I take a shower?"
I smirked "Only if I can come with you."
She returned my smirk "Well I wasn't planning on going alone."
She almost dragged me out of bed, neither of us bothered to throw any clothes on as we knew we were home alone Katie was still at Cook's which I couldn't be more thankful for right now. She pulled open the shower door and turned on the water jet before stepping under the steaming water and pulling me in with her.
The door swung shut behind me and Naomi pulled me to her kissing me hard as the water beat down on us. Her hair was soaked and was clinging to her face making her look even cuter than usual; the water ran over our bodies as she gripped my thighs and lifted my legs allowing me to wrap my legs around her waist.
She pressed me against the wall tiles and I couldn't help but moan as she pressed her body against mine our breasts sliding against one another as she moved her body against mine. I knew just how much she wanted me, and I wrapped my arms around her neck capturing her lips for a deep kiss, our tongues crashing together in a passionate duel.
I whispered completely breathless as we pulled apart "Naomi."
She pushed her body closer to me still moving against me as her hands roamed over my body. I felt her run them over my thighs making me moan before she moved to caress my bum. I responded by arching my body against hers wanting to be as close to her as I could be. Naomi lowered her lips from mine and trailed a line of kisses over my wet skin taking a nipple into her mouth as her weight help me up against her. I groaned as she sucked and kissed my breast, I very nearly screamed as she flicked her tongue over my nipple. I needed her so fucking much right now.
Her hand moved between us once more and I groaned as she reached the fire between my legs and slowly began stroking me. She pushed two fingers inside me making me moan loudly. I threw my head back against the tiles as she pushed her fingers inside me feeling them getting deeper and deeper. I was so wet and it wasn't just the water pouring over us from the shower and I could feel my muscles tightening around her fingers.
She looked deep into my eyes as she drove her fingers deeper inside of me, I could feel my legs trembling as Naomi pushed her lips to mine as she quickened the pace of her fingers inside of me, I knew I was losing control and losing control quickly.
A few moments later I cried out Naomi's name as my body stiffened in her arms, my muscles contracting around her fingers as my orgasm washed over me. I clung desperately to Naomi digging my fingers nails into the skin on her back. She held me to her, her fingers still inside me as I rode out the waves.
Finally I relaxed and she stepped back from me, my feet touching the shower floor once again. I stepped to her and our mouths met in a passionate kiss, our arms wrapping around one another and we pulled each other as close as possible.
After a few minutes a gripped her waist and turned her quickly to press her back to the tiles feeling her legs quickly wrap around me. My heart was still racing from what she had just done to me and all I knew was that I wanted to make her feel the same way; I needed her to feel as good as she made me. I gripped her skin as she wrapped herself tighter around me. She moaned into my mouth as I thrust my tongue inside of hers and I could feel her hands gripping my skin. She groaned when I broke the kiss a minute later but was soon moaning my name as I sucked a nipple into my mouth; I sucked gently but soon increased the pressure using my tongue to flick gently, I could feel Naomi trembling against me.
I pressed my weight against her holding her up against the wall; I could see she was struggling to keep her eyes open as I continued to pleasure her body. Naomi dug her nails into the skin on my back but this only spurred me on, I heard her softly whisper "Ems."
I could hear the want in her tone and I knew instantly where she needed me, where she wanted me. I kissed around her nipples before slowly slipping down her body leaving a trail of kisses until I was resting on my knees the water from the shower still pouring down over us. Naomi's feet hit the floor and her hands found the back of my head "Shit Em, I need you, I fucking need you."
Her fingers tangled into my hair and I finally put my lips where she wanted them, I flicked my way through the folds and stroked her centre with my tongue. I could hear Naomi moaning above me as she pulled on my wet hair; I pushed my tongue inside of her making her scream out as she thrust her body towards me. I felt her whole body begin to tremble as I pushed a finger inside to join my tongue. I pushed hard and fast wanting to make Naomi feel so alive. I could feel her muscles beginning to tighten as her body stiffened above me. Her muscles tightened around my fingers and she cried out my name as her orgasm took complete control of her body.
She screamed out my name as her whole body shook, I kept my finger and tongue inside of her stroking softly as I brought her down from her high. As she began to relax a little her body slid down the tiles on the wall until she was resting in front of me, the water still beating down on both of us. I looked deep into her eyes before kissing her softly. When I pulled back I smiled and whispered softly "Fucking amazing."
She nodded and I knew she was still unable to utter any words. I kissed her softly once more "I love you."
She gasped and caught a breath "I love you too."
* * *
An hour later I was dressed in the kitchen, Naomi was upstairs looking through my clothes for something that might fit her. I had the radio on and was cooking us some breakfast, both of us were starving after the appetite we had worked up last night and this morning. I was in a world of my own, well a world of my own full of thoughts of Naomi when I felt arms snake around my waist, she pressed her lips to my neck making my moan, she rested her chin on my shoulder after a few minutes "Something smells good gorgeous."
I smiled and let myself mould against Naomi's body "I thought I would make pancakes."
I could feel her smiling behind me "Mmmm I love pancakes and I am starving."
I laughed "Me too."
I finished cooking the pancakes as Naomi set the table, I had to find her something to do or I think we would have ended up making love on the kitchen floor and then eating burnt pancakes, she had been driving me insane with the kisses on my neck and as much as I loved it my stomach really was crying out for some food. We did however only use one chair around the table in the kitchen, I had fully been intending sitting next to Naoms but she had pulled me onto her lap instead and began feeding me pancakes, I think I can honestly say I have never eaten breakfast like that but it was one of the best things I have ever experienced. Just knowing I could be this close to Naomi and being so intimate all the time was something amazing and something I had always dreamed about having in a relationship.
The radio was still on in the background and when I heard the song summer of 69 by Brian Adams come on I jumped up and pulled Naomi up from her chair and we began crazily dancing around the kitchen both of us laughing so much as we were seriously enjoying this time we had together.
As the song drew to a close I pulled Naomi into my arms and pressed my lips to hers in a passionate kiss, we were so engrossed with one another that neither of us heard the front door shut. We only pulled apart when Katie waltzed into the kitchen "Seriously do you two ever stop."
I turned in the direction of her voice "Look at her Katie, what do you think?"
She pretended to vomit once again "You do have a bedroom upstairs you know."
I shot her a look "You are a fine one to talk."
She laughed "Cook and I aren't that bad."
I didn't need to say anything, the look I shot Katie told her everything I needed to say and she didn't say any more about it.
Naomi pulled me close to her and kissed me once more, my hands were roaming all over her body and we almost forgot Katie was there again in that moment.
She cleared her throat to remind us she was there "You two are worse than yesterday."
I looked at Naomi and we both started laughing, I turned to Katie "Sorry."
She shook her head "No you're not, what the…" she trailed off "Hang on, what is Naomi doing here at this time in the morning."
I looked at Naomi once again and couldn't help but smile "She stayed over last night, we got back late and I didn't want her trying to get home in the dark."
She continued shaking her head "No there is more to this, you are acting too sickly sweet and cute. You two slept together didn't you?"
Naomi blushed which gave Katie the answer she was looking for. I smiled "Well as you have worked it out yes we did and it was magical and so amazingly special so please don't start fucking taking the piss."
Katie smiled "I'm pleased for you, it's about time you were fucking getting some, it's been so long."
I rolled my eyes "Fuck you Katie nothing is going to bring me down from this high, I love Naomi so much."
Naomi smiled "And I love Emily so much too Katie, I'm not going to hurt her, nobody has ever made me feel as special as Em made me feel last night and I will never forget last night." She turned and winked at me "Or this morning."
Katie pretended to vomit once more "I don't need any more details and Emily seriously I know I wind you up but I am happy for you, you deserve to be happy for a change and I can see that Blondie here makes you happy." She turned to Naomi "And if you do hurt her I will fucking kill you."
I chuckled and knew I needed to lighten the situation again, I know Katie was just looking out for me but I didn't want her making Naomi feeling bad "You have been spending too much time with Cook if you're calling Naoms Blondie."
Katie rolled her eyes "I don't see him that much he's just a fuck buddy."
This time I rolled my eyes "Whatever Katie, you keep telling yourself that if it makes you happy."
She shot me a look "It's the truth."
Once more I rolled me eyes "As I said whatever, anyway I don't have the time to argue this out with you I have some washing up to do and then a day to spend with my gorgeous girlfriend here."
Katie rolled her eyes this time "So sickly sweet, anyway I'm putting the kettle on, coffee anyone?"
Both Naomi and I said yes and I gathered the dishes and began the washing up. Naomi had been sitting at the table and I could feel her eyes burning into my skin but suddenly I felt arms snake around my waist again, I spun around in her arms and kissed her softly, as we pulled apart she smiled "I couldn't resist you any longer."
I smiled softly "I could feel your eyes burning through my clothes."
She smirked "I could think of somewhere I would prefer your clothes to be other than on your body."
I tried to look innocent and was playing with her "Oh and where would that be."
She smirked once again "I think you can guess."
Katie voice came from the other side of the room "Will you two get a room and just fuck one another again."
Naomi laughed "Now your sister gets it."
I laughed "Oh I knew full well what you were talking about now let's see if we can make it happen. I'm thinking a pile of clothes on the floor."
Naomi's eyes glazed over and I grabbed her hand and pulled her upstairs as Katie turned the radio up loudly.
19. Chapter 19
**Here is the next chapter, sorry it has taken a while work has been crazy this week and I've barely been at home :-( and then was going to post it last night but was so tired I didn't even turn my laptop on, anyway here it is now. They are still happy and loved up for this chapter and the next couple but there is more drama along the way... **
**Thanks once again for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites :-)**
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Chapter Nineteen
One month later
Emily
Two weeks ago Naomi was fully discharged from the hospital, she had a scan and the injury had healed so she no longer needed to work with Effy. Naomi had come rushing to find me as soon as she had been given the news and had broken down with the relief. I pulled her so close to me and hugged her tightly as her tears fell. Once she calmed down I took a break and took her for a coffee, she wrapped her hands around the coffee cup and smiled weakly in my direction "I'm sorry about that I shouldn't have broken down I was just so relieved, when I first woke up after the accident and was told by the doctor that I might never walk again I believed that that was going to be my life but now my injury has healed and I am walking again and no longer need physiotherapy. I honestly never thought this day would happen and to be told now that I am being fully discharged I can get my life back to normal."
I took her hand across the table "I am so proud of you gorgeous, you have worked so hard to get where you are today and you deserve this happiness."
She smiled and stroked her thumb across the back of my hand "I couldn't have done any of this without you and I know you are going to argue with me but honestly I wouldn't be where I am today without you, I would still be lying in that bed wishing I was dead, you were the one that talked me into the physio and without the physio I wouldn't be walking today and I also wouldn't have the most gorgeous girlfriend in the world that puts up with me."
I laughed "I have faith that you would have got there in the end without me but thank you, I am glad to have been a part of it."
* * *
Tonight I was taking her out for dinner to celebrate everything, to celebrate Naomi's freedom and celebrate her going back to work tomorrow. It is a huge step for her and as much as I know she is looking forward to going back I also know she is nervous, we had a good talk last night as I was a little worried she was pushing herself too fast but she assured me that she needed this and that she needed to try as it was one of the first steps to getting her life completely back to normal.
I made my way home from work and walked through the door to be greeted by Katie "Are you going to be home tonight?"
I shook my head "No I am taking Naomi out for dinner to celebrate her going back to work tomorrow, I have just come home to have a shower and get changed."
She smiled "Ok, good."
I laughed "Thanks Katie, it's nice to know you enjoy having me around."
She rolled her eyes "I didn't mean it like that and you know it. It just means I can have Cook round here tonight instead of at his."
I looked at her "Cook can stay whenever you want him to."
She smiled "Yeah I know, I just always find it easier to stay at his when you are here, it saves all the sarcastic comments the following morning."
I laughed "You mean like the ones I get when Naomi stays."
She chuckled "Yeah something like that."
I turned to run up the stairs "Love you too sis."
Katie shouted from the bottom of the stairs "You know I love you."
I couldn't help but smile as I rushed into the bathroom to take my shower my thoughts quickly turning to Naomi as they usually did.
* * *
A while later I wandered into my bedroom with my towel wrapped around me to find Katie standing in front of my wardrobe sifting through my clothes, I rolled my eyes behind her as she was still completing unaware that I was there "Can I help you with something?"
She spun around "Oh I was just trying to pick out an outfit for you, you know make you look good for your girlfriend."
I laughed "I am quite capable of choosing my own outfit you know."
She shot me a look "Hmmm well we have always known our opinions differ when it comes to clothes." I decided it was best not to even say anything to that comment as she spun back around and started rifling through my clothes again. After a couple of minutes she pulled something out "How about this?"
I was actually surprised when I saw what she was holding up in front of me, it was a little black dress that I normally feel very comfortable in and I know Naomi loves me in it "Wow we are actually going to agree on something."
Katie smiled as she dived back into my wardrobe and pulled out a pair of shoes "And these will be perfect to go with it. Do you want some help with your make up?"
Now I was getting confused "What are you after Katie?"
She turned back to me "I don't want anything I just thought I would help my sister out."
I smiled slightly "As much as I enjoy the time with you and the help you are not usually so helpful, you must really want me out the house tonight."
Her face fell a little and now I knew there was something else going on "Katie what is it, what's going on?"
She moved to sit on the bed and wouldn't meet me gaze "I'm sorry Emily I really am sorry."
I moved to sit next to her "What have you got to be sorry about Katie?"
She fidgeted slightly "Please don't be mad at me, it's just I may have let slip to Dad about you and Naomi. I know you don't like them knowing much about your life but he caught me off guard, you know he always asks about you, he misses you."
I took hold of her hand "It's ok, I don't mind dad knowing, I will go see him at the gym one of these days, I miss him too."
Her face fell again "Well, it's just that, well, oh fuck I don't know how to tell you this, when I was talking to Dad Mum overheard us so she knows as well and let's just say she wasn't very happy."
I squeezed Katie's hand "I'm not mad at you Katie, it's not your fault she was listening in to be honest she was probably doing it on purpose because she knows you wouldn't tell her anything about me and as far as her not being happy I couldn't give a fuck, she lost me a long time ago when she rejected me for being gay. I am happy with Naomi, I love Naomi and she is not going to ruin that."
Katie smiled "Are you sure you're not mad?"
I laughed "I am definitely not mad, now are you still going to help me with that make-up or are you not so bothered now you have told me the truth."
She laughed "No you need all the help you can get."
I smacked her playfully on the arm "You really are a bitch at times."
She smiled as she walked over to the side where my make-up was "You love me though."
I laughed "Yes I do."
An hour later I was ready to go, I hugged Katie "Thanks Katie, it's been nice spending this time with you and honestly don't worry about anything."
She smiled "It has been nice; now go spoil that girl of yours."
I returned her smile "I will and have fun with Cook please don't make too much mess."
She hit my arm as I ran out the door "Cheeky bitch."
I smirked "You love me though."
She laughed "Yes I do."
* * *
I walked to Naomi's; I didn't want to take the moped or Katie's car I didn't want to have anything to worry about tonight I just wanted to go out and have a nice meal and a couple of drinks with my gorgeous girl. She took my breath away when she opened the door; I raked my eyes over her body taking in her short black dress with cute little pump shoes. She smirked "See anything you like?"
It took a few seconds for me to reply "Oh yeah."
She grabbed her bag from the stairs "We better go before we don't make it anywhere, the way you are looking at me is turning me right on."
I laughed "Save that thought for later."
She slipped her hand into mine and we strolled down the street towards the restaurant.
I couldn't tear my eyes away from Naomi as we ate; we were having a seriously relaxing evening and were having fun talking. As we finished our main course I slid my hand over the table and took Naomi's in mine "How you feeling about tomorrow?"
She smiled slightly "A mix of being nervous, terrified and excited at the same time. I am excited about being back and seeing everyone again and generally getting my professional life back on track but then I am nervous and terrified as I haven't been in for months, maybe they don't want me back, maybe I will have lost my touch and just well, what happens if I'm just not ready to cope properly yet."
I stroked the back of her hand with my thumb "I can see exactly where you are coming from but I want you to know that I will be thinking of you all day tomorrow, well that's no change from usual but you know what I mean and I know you will be absolutely fine, in fact I know you will be absolutely brilliant and you will fit back into it all."
She smiled "You're the best you know that."
I laughed "Well I do try."
I topped up our glasses from the bottle at the edge of the table before lifting my glass with my spare hand "I want to raise a toast, I am so proud of you Naomi you have turned your life around and I am proud to now be a part of it."
We clinked our glasses as Naomi smiled "You know I still don't know why you put up with me, now and back in the days you were my physio."
I smiled "Because from the moment I saw you I knew you were something special even when you were being a moody cow, you know Effy used to ask me sometimes how I could fall for you especially when you were at your moody best during her sessions."
She laughed "To be honest I was probably way worse with Effy."
I stroked the back of her hand again "Why's that?"
She looked directly at me "Because she wasn't you, I loved my sessions with you, it gave me something to really look forward to mainly because I got to see you and it just wasn't the same with Effy, you will be pleased to know I did grow to like her though and she is a good physio, not as good as you but good, she really has helped me and she really has pushed me, at first I didn't want to trust her but I soon realised I had no choice plus she told me about you being friends and that she had been warned that nothing was to happen to me on pain of death."
I laughed "Oh yeah I remember saying that to her now, she promised me she would look after you and she made good on that like I knew she would. She's a good friend and we often have nights out together. You know she actually likes you as well, well when you're not being a bitch with her."
She smirked "Well I will do my best to only be nice in the future. It will be different now though as she's not my physio anymore."
I smiled "Yeah hopefully we can all be friends together, although there can be some friction between her and Katie."
She looked surprised "Oh why's that?"
I looked across at her "Oh it's something to do with Cook, apparently he flirts with her, she can't get it into her head that Cook only really wants her. Well as you know neither of them will accept it. The three of them will sort it out one of these days; I try stay out of it."
She laughed "Sounds like the best idea."
I couldn't take my eyes off Naomi as we continued chatting, it was only when the waitress came over and asked if we would like desert that I was drawn away. Naomi had turned to the young girl "We are fine thanks, could we just have the bill please?"
I looked back to Naomi a little confused "It's not like you not to want desert."
She smirked "Oh I never said I didn't want desert I just have other ideas and it means getting out of here."
I suddenly twigged on to what she was saying and paid the bill as soon as it came. Naomi then quickly grabbed my hand and literally dragged me back to hers our lips crashing together as soon as she pushed me back onto her bed.
20. Chapter 20
**Ahhhh sorry it's been nearly a week again, I seem to have spent most my time at work again this week but thankfully I am ahead with writing this story so I have a chapter written ready to post. This is a bit of a mixed chapter. **
**Thanks again for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites. **
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Chapter Twenty
Two Days Later
Naomi
I have been back at work for a couple of days now, I was surprised at the response I got when I went back, I thought everyone would have forgotten about me but I got such a warm welcome back. It really felt like I had never been away. I jumped straight back into it just wanting to get everything here right back to normal and I didn't want anyone thinking I wasn't up to the job anymore because I most certainly was. I had also spent quite a lot of my time texting Em, she wanted to know I was ok and just wanted to check that I was settling back in alright and most importantly checking that I was enjoying being back. This might sound a bit stupid as I never really did see Emily during the day but I was seriously missing her during the day, I couldn't wait to get to the end of my working days and fall into her arms and breathe in her sweet scent.
Today I was sitting at my desk with my laptop in front of me, I had been working on a story all morning and there was something about it that just didn't seem right and I couldn't put my finger on it. I looked up when there was a soft knock on my office door and couldn't help but smile when I saw Emily; she smiled "Hey you, the young lady on reception told me where I could find you."
I beckoned her in "What you doing here, oh shit sorry I didn't mean it to come out like that, it is so good to see you."
She cut me off "It's ok Naoms I know what you meant." She held up a carrier bag "I just thought I would bring you some lunch plus I wanted to see you." She sat on the chair opposite me and unpacked the carrier bag allowing us to eat. We chatted as we ate and caught up on our mornings and once we had finished she gazed at me across the desk "It's pretty quiet around here at the moment."
I smiled "Yeah everyone tends to go out at lunchtime."
Em smirked "Hmmmmm." She turned to look at the window of my office at all the empty space and spoke softly "Nobody about."
I was getting a little confused but everything became clear when she turned back to face me "You ever had sex on a desk?"
I moved my laptop quickly and in one sweep of my arm knocked everything else from my desk "I have always wanted to do that and no I haven't."
Within seconds Emily had me pinned onto the desk her lips crashing against mine sending shivers down my spine, her fingers ran up and down the side of my body making me tremble. She ran her tongue along my lips begging me for entry, which I quickly granted, bolts of electricity shooting through my body as our tongues duelled. I felt her hands snake up inside my top and her fingers brushed over my breasts through the fabric of my bra sending a shiver down my spine. I groaned into her mouth, she pulled away a little gasping for breath and I whispered softly "Fuck Emily, I need you so much right now."
She smirked and slowly ran her fingers over my body, she crashed her lips against mine once more as she slipped her hand inside my trousers teasing me with her fingers through the fabric of my underwear, I could feel the puddle forming between my legs as I moaned against Emily's mouth "Now, fuck Em now."
She pushed her tongue in my mouth as the same time she pushed one finger followed by another inside of me, it was like sensory overload as every feeling I could possibly feel rushed through my body all together as Emily pushed hard and deep inside of me, I arched my body towards hers wanting to feel as close to her as possible, wanting to feel her body pressing against mine. She moved her lips from mine and trailed a line of kisses over my face until she reached my neck where she sucked and bit on my pulse point making me moan loudly, I knew I should probably be quiet in case anyone came back to the office early but I couldn't help it Emily always made me feel so alive. I knew I was close as Emily continued to work her magic with her fingers, I shouted out as she brushed my clit with her thumb as she curled her fingers inside me pushing me over the edge. I screamed out her name over and over the waves rushing through my body. Emily was planting soft kisses all over my face as she brought me down from my high.
I kissed her softly "You know I will never be able to stop thinking about you in this office now."
She smiled cheekily "As if you can anyway."
I laughed "Well true but even more so now."
She kissed me "My plan succeeded then."
I playfully smacked her "Just so cheeky but it is always so fucking good to see you and be with you. I can never get enough of you, you have turned my life upside down, upside down for the better, I honestly never thought I could feel like this about another person but my whole heart belongs to you Emily Fitch."
She smiled before kissing me softly "You are my world Naomi Campbell and I always dreamt that love like this was possible but I never thought it would happen to me." She stroked my cheek "It has though and I love you so fucking much."
I wanted her so much in that moment I wanted to make her feel the way she just made me feel, I whispered "I love you so fucking much too" before gripping her waist and pushing her up off me, I stood up and pulled her to me our lips crashing together once more in a heated kiss. I lifted her up and she wrapped her legs around my waist as our tongues duelled frantically. I slammed her up against the wall and pushed my body against hers, my weight holding her up. We pushed against one another neither of us wanting to be gentle as we grabbed at one another, I wanted her so fucking much, I needed her so fucking much. Her hands found their way to my bum as I quickly ran my fingers down the side of her body feeling her shiver at the touch. I had no idea what time it was but I really didn't care right now all I cared about was hearing Emily scream my name. She parted her legs as I slipped my hand between teasing her through the fabric of her jeans. She groaned loudly "Oh fuck, fuck Naomi, fuck me now."
I gazed into her eyes and couldn't help but notice they were almost black. I walked my fingers up her legs before slipping them inside the denim material and into her underwear. I could instantly feel how wet she was as I slipped two fingers inside of her, pushing deep as she moaned loudly "Fucking kiss me."
I wasted no time in pushing my lips against hers once more as I continued to push deep inside of her. She moaned into my mouth and I could feel her muscles tightening around my fingers as she rocked her body against mine. I felt her lock her hands around the back of my neck pulling me even closer to her. She was so wet and I could feel her muscles tightening further around my fingers and I knew she was close. I curled my fingers inside of her and she screamed out my name as her body shook against mine the waves rushing through her body. Her hand locked around my neck again as she pulled me my mouth to hers again kissing me hard as the waves rushing through her body slowly began to subside.
A moment later her body was relaxed and I shifted my body allowing Emily to slide down to the floor with me our bodies landing in a tangled mass of arms and legs. I gathered her in my arms as we snuggled together on the floor.
She kissed me softly "You are so fucking amazing."
I smiled as I stroked her cheek "You are the fucking amazing one."
She kissed me softly but passionately until we sprung apart upon hearing voices and footsteps as people began returning for an afternoons work. Emily groaned "That must mean I need to get back to the hospital."
This time I groaned "Let's just hope this afternoon goes quickly so I can see you again."
She smiled "You coming over after work?"
I smiled "Yeah if you want me to."
She slapped me playfully "Of course I want you to; I want to be with you all the time I possibly can be."
I kissed her softly "Same." I stood up from the floor and helped Emily up; she kissed me softly "See you later then."
I smiled as I reluctantly let go of her hand "Yeah looking forward to it already."
She smirked "Good, me too."
* * *
Emily
A few hours later I was at home waiting for Naomi, I couldn't wait to see her. The doorbell rang and I leapt up from the chair to open the door, I quickly pulled Naomi into my arms and kissed her hard before pulling back and letting her in "I really must get you a key cut it is stupid you ringing the doorbell."
She smiled as she walked into the lounge and dumped her bag down; I followed her in and sat down with her "You had a good day?"
She laughed "I had a fucking ace day especially lunchtime."
I couldn't help but smirk "Yeah I had a pretty ace lunchtime too. I got a fair few comments from Cook when I got back to the hospital."
She laughed "How could he tell?"
I laughed "Cook can always tell when someone has been having sex but also my lip gloss was a little smudged."
She raised her eyebrows "I think it could do with a little more smudging."
I wasted no time in pulling Naomi down on top of me as she kissed me hard her body quickly covering mine as we lay back on the sofa. I didn't even hear the front door open so the first thing we knew about Katie being home was when she walked into the lounge "Fucking hell you two, there is a bedroom upstairs for that."
I laughed "That is rich coming from you."
She blushed slightly and ignored me "I am going upstairs then I really don't want to sit through you two being all lovey dovey."
I laughed "I am getting up to cook dinner now anyway, you want some?"
She nodded "Yeah, give us a shout when it's ready, I'm sure you will be all over one another in the kitchen."
I laughed again as Katie made her way upstairs and Naomi followed me into the kitchen, I really felt so happy right now.
* * *
After about 15 minutes of cooking the doorbell rang once again, I was hoping Katie would answer it but I should have known better so Naomi went off to answer it for me. I turned the stove off and walked into the lounge as I heard Naomi say "Well come in then why don't you."
I couldn't think who would just barge in past her but as soon as I saw who it was it all stood to reason "Mum what are you doing here?"
She completely ignored me as she spun round to Naomi "So you must be the fucking women brainwashing my daughter."
I wasn't having her talk to Naomi like that so I pulled her round to face me "You do not talk to my girlfriend like that just fucking leave her alone."
Mum scowled at me "I will talk to her exactly how I want to, she is ruining your life and I will not stand for it."
I raised my voice further my anger was really rising to the surface now "I was gay before I met Naomi for fucks sake so you will fucking leave her alone, I love her, in fact I think she is the love of my life and I am planning on spending the rest of my life with her and I couldn't care less whether you like it or not."
This time mum was shouting "You don't know who you are; you are too young to make decisions like that. No daughter of mine will be seen going out with another girl."
Now I was seriously pissed off "I have known I was gay since I was about 12 mum and now I'm 24 fucking years old and I can stand here and tell you that I love Naomi so so so fucking much." I then decided to stick the knife in a little further as I stepped over towards Naomi and pulled her to me and pressed my lips hard to hers in a passionate kiss. Naomi wrapped her arms tightly around me as she groaned into my mouth.
Mum then tried to pull Naomi away from me but Naomi pulled her arm away from her as she rounded on my mum "Emily is your daughter and you should love her however she decides to live her life. I will tell you right now that I love your daughter so fucking much and I plan on spending the rest of my life with her whether you like it or not."
I pulled Naomi to me again and kissed her hard, I think I fell even more in love with her in that moment. Mum pulled us apart again and slapped Naomi; I could see the red mark on her cheek straight away. My anger really bubbled to the surface now and I slapped my mum round the face "Get out of here now, you don't fucking hit my girlfriend and expect me to be ok with it."
Mum tried to argue but I was in no mood to listen as I continued to scream in her face "Just get the fuck out of here now but I do something that I will really regret. As far as I am concerned I do not have a mother any more so get the fuck out of here now."
Katie came running into the room "What all the shouting about?" it was then she must have seen mum there, she turned to her "What are you doing here?"
She looked at Katie "I am trying to talk some sense into your sister."
Katie rolled her eyes "When are you going to stop this mum, Emily loves Naomi and Naomi loves Emily, you should see them together they are so happy and they are so in love. I have never seen Emily this happy with anyone she is like a completely different person and I for one am fucking pleased to see her this happy."
Mum turned on Katie "So she has brainwashed you as well then, when did you start sticking up for your sister's lifestyle."
Katie looked pissed off "Since I realised I needed to grow up, that is why we moved out mum to get away from you and prejudices, I realised that Emily being gay doesn't change who she is, she is still Emily and she is my sister who I love so I think you should do as she says now and get the fuck out of here."
Mum looked between Katie and I "You heard her get the fuck out of here and never come back and I meant what I said earlier I do not need you in my life, I no longer need a mother."
When she refused to move Katie grabbed her arm and literally dragged her out slamming the door shut behind her. I collapsed back on the sofa the tears flowing from my eyes as the situation hit me. I felt like the walls were closing in around me and suddenly knew I needed to get out of here, I quickly bolted for the door and took off down the road, I knew I was being unfair to Naomi, I was always telling she had to talk to me about stuff rather than shutting me out and now I was doing the same to her. I reached the end of the road when I realised I couldn't run any further, I slumped down onto the bench and my tears began falling once again. After a few minutes Naomi sat on the bench next to me and wrapped her arms around me "Sorry I would have been here sooner but my running isn't what it used to be."
I buried my head in her chest and mumbled "I'm sorry I shouldn't have run I am doing what I always tell you not to."
She kissed the top of my head "It's ok Emily, just talk to me, I want to help."
I looked up at her and smiled softly "I know I have told you I don't really get on with my mum but now you can see why, she has never been ok with me being gay I don't really know what her problem is but she can't seem to get her head round it at all, she can't seem to see that I am happy with who I am. That is why I decided to move out, I couldn't take any more of it, the constant remarks, the constant times she tried to set me up with boys from college that she knew through friends and at that point Katie wasn't much use either but then when I said I was going it was almost as if Katie released what a cow she had been and she said she was coming with me and that was when we managed to rent this place. We both had savings and both had part time jobs at dads gym and dad helped us well, mum still doesn't know about that to this day but he could understand why I needed to leave and he would rather have Katie with me so I had some support, he was so upset that it had come to us moving out but he was also supportive as he knew it was our only choice."
Naomi pulled me closer to her and I snuggled up, she whispered softly "I'm sorry Em I didn't know things had been that bad for you with her."
I kissed her chest lightly "I don't really talk about it, I am happy now and that is all that matters to me, that is the past and you are my future."
She kissed the top of my head "Come on let's get you home I know Katie is really worried about you."
I sat up "Oh shit Katie; she will be beating herself up back at home."
Naomi looked confused "Why it's not her fault."
I turned to look at her "Katie is the reason that mum knows about you and I, she had been talking to dad and she overheard or something. I told her not to worry about it but I know that she will be blaming herself now for all of this."
Naomi stood up and took my hand pulling me up. We walked slowly back to the house and saw Katie pacing up and down the garden path. As soon as she saw us she rushed over "Emily are you ok, I am so sorry so fucking sorry, this is all my fault."
I shook my head "Katie listen to me this is not your fault at all, you know what mum is like, she is a complete cow who cannot accept me for who I am and it doesn't bother me anymore. I have just been talking to Naomi and as I told her what it used to be like at home I came to realise that I don't need her at all I have Naomi and I have you and I have my friends, you are all my family now."
Naomi pulled me to her "If it helps mum sees you as another daughter to her."
I smiled and kissed her softly "Gina is more of a mum to me than mine has ever been." I turned back to Katie "I want you to stop beating yourself up about this I am glad today happened in a way because now I can really begin to forget about her and get on with my life without trying to hope that she might come round because I don't care if she comes round to it now, I am done with her."
Katie smiled slightly as she pulled me into a hug "I love you."
I smiled "I love you too."
After a few seconds she pulled back "Now how about I go out and get some takeaway I don't think anyone feels like finishing off that cooking and it will give you two a bit of time alone."
I smiled "Thanks Katie."
She smiled at me again "You really are better off without her, we both are."
I nodded "Yeah."
She grabbed her bag and made her way to the front door before spinning back around "I won't be that long guys so just bare that in mind as I would like you fully clothed when I return."
I threw a cushion after her as she ran out the door but turning my attention back to Naomi as we fell back onto the sofa our lips firmly attached to one another's.
21. Chapter 21
**Here is the next chapter of this, I have just read through it and it felt rather strange as I am about 9 chapters ahead with this and the stuff I am writing at the moment is a lot further on from what I am posting at the moment. This is another chapter looking a bit more at Katie and Emily's relationship as well as them as a group of friends.**
**Thanks for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites **
* * *
Chapter Twenty One
Two Weeks Later
Emily
I was at home sitting on the sofa with the TV on when Katie came home; she wandered into the lounge "You still up for clubbing later."
I looked up "Yeah I'm going for a shower in a bit and then I'll get ready."
She continued looking at me a little confused so I broke away from the TV again "Is there anything else I can help you with."
She looked around "Well I was just wondering where Naomi is, she is usually attached to you somewhere."
I rolled my eyes but smiled at the same time "She has just gone home to get showered and changed for tonight."
Katie laughed "I was half expecting to come home and find you in the shower together."
I rolled my eyes once more "We aren't that bad."
Katie just looked at me and I laughed "Ok well maybe we are but I can't help it my girlfriend is hot."
She wandered into the kitchen and came back with a bottle of wine and a couple of glasses "Well as I have you alone for a while let's have a catch up."
I smiled "That sounds good."
She poured us both a glass as she plonked herself next to me, I turned the TV off and turned my attention to her "Katie I know you joke a lot about Naomi and I always being attached to one another but you don't mind her being here so much do you?"
She smiled "No of course not I know I joke about it but really I am happy for you, you are so happy when you are with her, you are always laughing or smiling and you always look so comfortable around her and if the sounds coming from your bedroom most nights are anything to go by you definitely have a lot of fun and pleasure together in the bedroom."
I blushed slightly and Katie laughed "She makes me feel so alive Katie, I love her so much and I mean so fucking much, I know I keep saying it but she has really changed my life for the better. I seriously seriously hate being apart from her hence the reason I was trying to distract myself with the TV before you came home."
Katie smiled "Can I ask you something Emily?"
I smiled "Well as you would ask even if I said no I may as well just agree."
She laughed "You wouldn't have me any other way, anyway if you hate being apart from her so much and I can imagine she feels the same when away from you why don't you just ask her to move in."
I was a little surprised "You wouldn't mind?"
She smiled "No of course not, she is here most nights anyway she might as well have her stuff here."
I smiled "I have thought about asking her but I am worried that it is too soon, I know we have been together a couple of months now but it still worries me that I would scare her off by asking her now."
Katie smiled "I don't think you would scare her off I think she would jump at the chance to live you but you will know when the time is right to ask, I just want you to know you have my blessing to ask her."
I hugged her "Thanks Katie." I pulled back "You know you can be pretty nice when you want to be."
She laughed "Yeah every once in a while, don't be spreading the word though I have a reputation to uphold, we don't want everyone thinking I am going fucking soft now do we."
I laughed "Talking of you being a bitch how are things going between you and Cook?"
She shrugged her shoulders "Things with Cook are the same as always, it's just sex between us, we both know the score and it's fun for the both of us."
I was a little concerned "Are you really sure it is just sex you want from him I sometimes get the impression you want something more, I've seen the two of you together, the way you look at one another when you think the other isn't watching and just general stuff like that."
Katie laughed but I could tell she was still trying to hide something from me "Trust me it is just sex and it is fucking fantastic sex at that." She finished her wine "Now are you showering first or me?"
I knew not to push it with her at the moment "You can you always take much longer to get ready than I do."
She smacked me playfully "Cheeky bitch." She got up to go upstairs "What time is Effy coming over?"
I looked at the clock "About 8ish, I thought we could all have something to eat together before we go out."
She smiled "Yeah we can order pizza or something, when is Naomi coming back?"
I smiled "As soon as she is ready, as you can guess we didn't want to be apart for long."
She laughed "That sounds about right, well Cook will turn up when he turns up, you know what he is like."
I laughed "Yeah I sure do, he was pretty pumped about tonight earlier at work."
She rolled her eyes "When isn't Cook pumped about a night out."
I laughed again "Yeah that is also true."
Katie turned to walk up the stairs and I decided I may as well follow, I might as well choose my outfit whilst waiting for the shower at least then it would save time later giving me more time to spend with Naoms.
* * *
An hour later I was in my room after my shower with my towel wrapped around me. I couldn't help but laugh as Katie sang along to the radio very out of tune as usual. I looked at the outfit laid out on my bed and was suddenly undecided about it. I was still wondering when I was distracted by a knock on my door, I smiled when I heard Naomi's voice "I hope you're not decent."
She came in as I laughed, I finally got her the key I had been promising her last week so she could let herself in. she walked over to me and pulled the towel away before quickly raking her eyes over my body "Wow now that is a great view."
I kissed her softly "Like what you see do you?"
She gazed into my eyes "Oh yeah."
She pulled me closer to her and pressed her lips to mine again before I pulled back "As much as I am enjoying this I really need to get dressed Effy and Cook will be here soon."
She groaned "You spoil all my fun."
I smirked "Is that so."
She laughed "Yep."
I continued to smirk "Well in that case you won't want to know what I have in store for you later when we get back here then."
She gazed at me "Sounds interesting, now you are going to have to tell me."
I laughed and stepped up to her and whispered in her ear. When I stepped back I looked at her and couldn't help but notice that the blue of her eyes was considerably darker. She playfully slapped me "You are such a tease that has just made me want you even more now."
I kissed her softly "Waiting will make it all more special later."
She returned my kiss "It is always special with you now get dressed before my resolve completely disappears."
A while later I was dressed and had applied my make-up, Naomi and I were sitting on my bed giggling as we teased one another when there was a bang on my door "Come on muff munchers, we have take away to order and Effy will be here in a minute."
I walked over to the door pulling Naomi with me and opened it "It's always a pleasure to live in the same house as you Katie."
She smiled "You know you love it really."
We all went downstairs and Katie went into the kitchen and ordered some pizzas as I stood in the lounge with Naomi's lips attached to mine when the doorbell rang. Reluctantly I broke apart from Naomi and went to answer it, I smiled as I saw Effy with a bottle of wine and Cook stood behind her. Cook winked "Looking good red, looking fucking good."
I stood aside letting them in "Good to see you as always Cook."
He grinned as he walked into the lounge "Wow Blondie you look hot."
I looked at Effy and we both laughed "He will never give up will he; you wouldn't think his girlfriend was in there as well."
I heard him shout back "I heard that Red and for the record girlfriend is a strong word."
Effy looked at me and rolled her eyes "When will those two get their fucking act together and just admit they want to be together."
Now it was my turn to roll my eyes "Tell me about it, I tried to talk to Katie about it earlier but it was obvious she wasn't going to admit anything."
We made our way back into the lounge and I snuggled close to Naomi on the sofa sharing soft kisses all the time whilst ignoring the comments being thrown in our direction from the others. I didn't care I only had eyes for Naomi and I knew everyone was aware of that and I also knew they were all happy for us.
* * *
A couple of hours later we had all eaten and were heading out to the club, I was walking down the road hand in hand with Naomi with Cook, Effy and Katie walking behind us chatting. We found a table when we arrived and drank a number of drinks before hitting the dance floor, Naomi and I were tipsy and it felt so fucking good to be dancing so closely with her. This is the first time I have been clubbing with Naomi due to her recovery. After a while Naomi whispered in my ear "I'm just going to the ladies I'll be back in a minute."
I nodded and watched as she walked away before dancing with Eff. After about 20 minutes I began to wonder where Naomi was, I knew toilet queues could be long but I knew she wouldn't be this long. I shouted to Effy "I'm just going to check Naomi is ok."
She smiled "Ok."
I was surprised when I walked into the toilets to find it was nearly empty, I spoke softly "Naoms."
She didn't reply but I could hear light sobbing "Naoms is that you?"
The toilet door opened and I could see the tear stains on her cheeks; I rushed over to her and enveloped her in my arms "What is it gorgeous?"
She pulled back and leant against the wall "It's just, well the last time I was in here I was with Tamara and now I am in here having fun without her and it suddenly hit me."
I felt really guilty "Shit, shit, shit I should have thought, I am so sorry, I am a fucking shit girlfriend."
She pulled me close to her "No you are not, I never want you to say that again, I needed to come here again sometime and I couldn't think of anyone better to be here with."
I smiled slightly and kissed her softly "She would be happy for you though wouldn't she."
She returned my smile "Yeah she would be, you know she would have loved you."
I laughed "Everybody loves me."
She kissed me once more "Nobody more than me now come on let's get back out on that dance floor and show everyone how it is done."
I grabbed her hand and pulled her back out there and we spent the next hour grinding our bodies together not wanting to be apart our lips meeting over and over again and it honestly felt like it was just Naomi and I in the room as for that hour nobody else mattered I only had eyes for my girl.
We only pulled apart when Katie and Effy started arguing, I walked over and pulled them away from one another and we went to the corner of the room "What the fuck is going on here between you two?"
Katie glared at Effy "Ask her."
Effy looked a little surprised "I haven't fucking done anything."
Katie shot her another look "You have been flirting with Cook all fucking night right in front of my face."
Effy looked pissed off "I think you will actually find he was the one flirting with me, I wouldn't touch him with a barge pole and I have told him that time and time again."
I looked at Katie "It's true Katie, Effy doesn't want Cook, she never has done and you know what he is like but this brings that age old question back to the surface doesn't it and I think you really need to think about what you want because from this reaction tonight I think you want more from Cook than you have at the moment."
Katie was quiet for a minute before walking away. I followed her with my eyes and watched as she grabbed Cook over to us "Why have you been flirting with Effy all night?"
He looked surprised "I flirt with everyone I thought that was how you fucking wanted things."
She glared at him "Any fucking excuse and I have fucking had enough of this, whatever was between us is over."
I could see the hurt in his eyes and it was something I had never seen before, I looked directly at him and mouthed "Just tell her."
He looked between Katie and I before finally fixing his gaze on Katie "You are the only one I want Katiekins, I don't know what but you have done something to me, it is like you have some kind of power over me and I only flirt with others to make you jealous and tonight it worked."
Katie glared at him and I shoved her "Come on you idiot this is what you want, go get your guy."
She looked at me before turning back to Cook and grabbed him pulling his lips to hers and kissing him hard. Effy rolled her eyes "Fucking finally."
I laughed and pulled Naomi to my side "And they say we are bad with our public displays of affection."
She wrapped her arms around me and kissed me hard before pulling back "We better show them how it's done then."
I pulled her lips back to mine hating the lack of contact between us only breaking apart when we needed oxygen. Effy rolled her eyes "I am going to find someone to fuck I'll see you guys later."
I laughed "Just be careful."
I watched as she walked away but I wasn't worried I knew Effy could look after herself, I pulled Naomi back into my arms "Let's get out of here I have other plans for you."
She smiled as she grabbed my hand and pulled me outside and we made our way back to mine so quickly.
22. Chapter 22
**Here is the next chapter of this and Naomi's moodiness is about to reappear. **
**Thanks for the reviews and adding this to your alerts and favourites.**
* * *
Chapter Twenty Two
One Month Later
Naomi
I woke up early today and instantly knew what day it was, I had been dreading it for a few weeks now as I had no idea how I would feel on the actual day. Now it was here everything just felt numb and the world appeared black. All I wanted to do was keep my light off, keep my curtains drawn and bury myself under my duvet. Wanting to do something was completely different to reality though and the reality of today was that I had to get up and go to work. I had only been back a few weeks, I know they would have let me have the day off but I felt like I had to prove I was fit enough to be back. After a deep breath I dragged myself out of bed and went for a shower, I could sense mum hovering around downstairs wanting to check I was ok but I just wanted to get on, if I had to be up I needed to get on with it. I wandered back to my room and stared into my wardrobe trying to decide what to wear to face the day ahead. I only turned around when there was a light tap on the door and it slowly creaked open. Emily smiled slightly "Hey."
I wanted to be happy, I was glad she was here but it was my other feelings that took charge, the feelings that told me I didn't want to see anyone "What are you doing here?"
I could tell she was taken aback as a hurt look crossed her face "I just wanted to see if you were ok. I know what day it is Naoms and I want you to know I am here for you."
I snapped back "I'm fucking fine I just want to get on with my day."
There was a sadness deep within her eyes "Naomi please, just talk to me don't bottle everything up."
I snapped again "I told you I'm fucking fine so can I just get on and get ready for work."
I don't know what I was expecting Emily to do but she surprised me when she snapped back "Fine, just fucking fine. I'm out of here; I'm just not sure I can cope with anymore of your fucking moodiness and snapping when you don't want to fucking talk about something."
A tear fell from her eye as she turned and left slamming the bedroom door behind her. I felt bad but I had told her I was fine. I turned my attention back to my wardrobe when my door burst open once more, I spun around "What the fuck don't you understand about the fact I want to be left alone."
I found myself face to face with mum and she looked cross "I don't care what you want young lady, I know what day it is but that is no reason to treat your girlfriend like something you have just stood in." I tried to cut in but she cut me off "I haven't finished, that poor girl puts up with so much shit from you with your moodiness and sometimes I honestly have no idea why. Just bear this in mind though Naomi if you carry on like this every time you don't want to talk about something you will lose her and I honestly think she is the best thing to have come into your life."
She turned and left just as quickly as she came in and suddenly everything overwhelmed me, thoughts of Tamara, thoughts of Emily and thoughts about everything mum just said to me. I sat on my bed and my tears flowed uncontrollably down my cheeks. I couldn't believe I had been so horrible to Emily, yes it was Tamara's birthday and it reminded me of everything that happened and brought back all the emotional pain out on Emily, my gorgeous Emily who had taken time out of her busy day to come and see if I was ok. Mum was right I would lose her if I carried on like this with her, if I were her I wouldn't want to put up with it. I needed to pull myself together and make it up to her and just hope and pray I hadn't already done too much damage that couldn't be undone.
* * *
Emily
I have been distracted at work all morning; I know I haven't been concentrating properly but thankfully I still seemed to have enough professionalism to carry out work with all my patients properly, it wasn't fair that they should suffer because I had an argument with Naomi. I was now sitting in the staff room eating my lunch; well I say eating it's more like sitting pushing a salad around with a fork because I really don't feel like eating. I looked up as Cook walked in grinning, his face fell a little when he saw me "What's up little red, you look fucking miserable."
I looked at him as he plonked himself down next to me "I had an argument with Naomi this morning."
He looked a little surprised "Really I thought you two were going strong."
I sighed deeply "We are, we were, oh I just don't know Cook."
He took hold of my hand "Why don't you start at the beginning."
I took a deep breath "She keeps shutting me out, I feel like such a bitch for snapping at her this morning but I just couldn't cope with it anymore." I paused and he waited for me to continue "I popped round to see her this morning, it's Tamara's birthday so I wanted to check she was ok, I wanted her to know I was there for her but she just snapped at me, she didn't even say hello just turned to me and spat 'what are you doing here' in my direction and it went downhill from there and I just snapped, I am so fed up of her being moody with me like that as soon as she decides she doesn't want to talk about something."
He stroked his thumb across the back of my hand "I'm guessing you told her that."
I nodded "Yeah and then walked out, she's been trying to call me all morning but I've been ignoring the calls and now I feel like a complete bitch."
He laughed "You are far from being a bitch, we'll leave that trait to your sister as fucking hot as she is, she is a first class bitch. As far as Blondie goes let her stew for a while, I know it's not a good day for her but it might just make her think a bit and then you can make up later."
I could see him drift off with his mental images as I slapped him on the arm "Stop fucking imagining me having make up sex with my girlfriend."
He grinned "But it's so fucking fun."
I rolled my eyes but couldn't help but smile a little "Yeah for me but there is no fucking way you will ever have a part in it."
He continued to grin "I made you smile though, and don't worry too much babe you and Blondie will be ok."
I stood up and put my salad back in the fridge before turning back to Cook. I hugged him "Thanks Cook, I best get back now though."
He grinned as I opened the door "It's what I'm here for red, that and shagging your sister of course."
I shot him a look "Now that's just too much information for my ears." I closed the door behind me feeling slightly better about things but my head was still full of Naomi. I love her, I really do love her so much but I still stood by what I said this morning, I can't cope with much more of her moodiness like this.
* * *
Naomi
I walked home from work, all in all it had been a horrible day but I had kept my head down and got on. I couldn't stop thinking about Tamara but I also couldn't get Emily out of my head, I had been trying to call her all day but she wouldn't pick up and she hadn't acknowledged any of my texts. I was seriously wondering if I had completely screwed up.
I took a deep breath as I opened the front door; I knew mum was mad with me as well. She appeared as I closed the door again but she didn't have a go instead she smiled slightly "Did you have a good day love?"
As soon as she asked the question all my feelings flooded together and I burst into tears. Mum quickly enveloped me in a tight hug and I blurted everything out "I've ruined everything mum, she won't answer my calls or my texts. What am I going to do if I've fucking managed to screw up and lose her."
She kissed the top of my head "You haven't lost her; she will just have needed time to calm down. She will be home from work now so why don't you go round and talk to her face to face. She is probably feeling as bad as you are right now."
I pulled out of our hug and wiped away my tears "Thanks mum, and sorry for this morning."
She smiled "It's ok love today was always going to be a hard day, just remember in the future let Emily in, don't automatically flick the moody switch and shut her out."
I nodded "I'll try. I'm just going to go get changed and then see if I can make this right."
She kissed my forehead "Everything will be fine darling call it mothers intuition."
I couldn't help but laugh as I ran up the stairs.
* * *
15 minutes later I shot out the front door only calling out behind me "I'll see you later mum."
Thankfully Emily didn't live too far away and it wasn't long before I was standing outside. I took a deep breath as I walked up the path and was silently praying that Katie wasn't in. I could do without her having a go at the moment however much I might deserve it. I smiled slightly when I saw Emily open the door but my heart ached when I saw how upset she had obviously been. I spoke quietly "Hi."
She moved to the side "Come in."
I walked into the lounge and she followed. As I turned to face her I looked straight into her chocolate brown eyes. Immediately I could see she was battling with her feelings and all I could do was hope she wasn't about to dump me. I was surprised though when she suddenly moved towards me and her lips were upon mine in a hard passionate kiss. My whole body felt like it was on fire just from that one kiss. Her hands moved over my body before settling on my hips as our tongues teased one another making us both tremble. Emily broke our kiss making me moan, she gripped my shirt and began undoing the buttons one at a time until she could peel the garment away from my body and let it fall to the floor.
She moved her hands up over my soft skin until she was cupping my breasts; a moan escaped my lips as she stroked my nipple with her thumb through my bra. It grew hard instantly and I pulled her lips to mine once again in a passionate kiss. Her lips were insistent as she moved her arm around my back unclipping my bra with one hand. It fell to the floor and with my breasts now exposed she wasted no time in moving her lips down and drawing a nipple into her mouth, licking and flicking her tongue against it making me feel so fucking good.
I struggled to control myself as Emily's lips continued their assault on my breasts. My legs were starting to feel like jelly they were trembling so hard. I knew I wouldn't be able to keep myself upright for much longer so pushed Emily backwards crashing her against the nearest possible wall, I pressed her against it and gripped the top that was clinging to her skin. In one swift movement the top was tossed aside and her bra quickly followed. I moved my hands to her breasts as I pressed my lips to her soft neck. Emily moaned softly as she tilted her head slightly allowing me to trail a line of kisses to my lips. Our lips touched in a hungry, urgent kiss. She flipped our bodies and pushed me hand against the wall. My hands started to wander all over her body until she slipped out of reach.
She dropped to her knees and peeled my jeans down my legs kissing my inner thighs as she did. My breathing was erratic and my body was trembling hard as I moved my feet stepping out of them before kicking them away. My underwear soon followed and it didn't take long for her lips to return to my skin, teasing and gently biting their way to my centre.
I moaned as I struggled to stop myself from losing control as her lips touched my most intimate spot, my knees almost gave way once again, I grabbed the top of Emily's head twisting my fingers around her strands of hair as her tongue pushed deep inside of me.
I was screaming inside my head as Emily's tongue drove me to a mind blowing orgasm. I cried out unable to control myself any longer, my whole body was shaking as Emily's tongue flickered softly inside me my moans still escaping as she brought me down from my high.
I collapsed back against the wall as Emily climbed back up my naked body, teasing my already erect nipples before her lips crashed against mine again. She moaned against my lips as I roughly pulled her closer to me, I could taste myself on her tongue and it felt amazing.
I gripped her waist and quickly flipped our bodies again so she pressed against the wall. I ran my hands over her body, unbuckling the belt on her jeans before unfastening the button. I whispered softly "These need to go."
She smiled softly as I made quick work of removing her clothes. I stepped back for a minute allowing myself to rake my eyes over her naked body. I gulped and couldn't believe how lucky I was to be able to call her my girlfriend. She ran her hand over my cheek making me gasp before I whispered "You are so unbelievably sexy."
I couldn't take anymore as I pinned her back against the wall pressing my own body against hers as I pressed my lips to hers again starting a trail on her chin and kissing my way down her neck until I reached her breasts. She groaned as I pulled a nipple into her mouth and her body thrust towards mine. Her nipple grew erect instantly at the contact. She gripped my skin as my lips explored her upper body slowly moving my way down biting and kissing my way until my head was resting between her legs.
Emily sucked in her breath as I softly placed kisses over her inner thighs her whole body trembling as I began my assault with my tongue. Constant moans were escaping her lips as her body pushed towards mine as I pushed harder and deeper inside of her. Before long her body shuddered against mine as her orgasm rushed through her from head to toe. She cried out her body trembling against mine. She gripped the skin on my back as I continued to flick my tongue inside of her bringing her down from her high. Her knees gave way and I made no attempt to hold her up, I allowed my body to slide to the floor with hers.
As her breathing slowed we lay tangled together on the floor as I planted soft kisses over her face, Emily wrapped her arms around me as our lips met in a loving kiss.
After a few minutes I shifted my body and propped myself up on my elbow beside her and looked down "Well I wasn't expecting that."
She smiled slightly "Me neither, I just couldn't resist you when I saw you. We need to talk though Naoms."
I began to panic a little but I also knew this was my one chance to make things right "I'm sorry Emily, I really am so sorry I shouldn't have snapped at you like that this morning. I know you only came to support me and I threw it back in your face."
She smiled slightly "It's ok, well kind of ok, I know you were hurting and I can accept that and I am sorry for snapping back at you like I did although I meant what I said Naoms we can't keep going like this you can't just be moody and snappy with me whenever you don't want to talk about things. We are in a relationship Naomi and that is going to involve talking to me and letting me in."
I kissed her softly "I promise you Emily that from now on I will make every effort to let you in. I love you so much and I really thought I had screwed everything up. I can't lose you Emily, I really can't."
She pulled me down to her again and kissed me softly "You're not going to lose me; I love you too much to let you go."
I kissed her once more "Shall we go upstairs before Katie walks in on us."
She shook her head "No you need to get dressed properly, we are going somewhere."
I was a little confused "Where?"
She laughed "You'll have to wait and see."
We both jumped up as we heard the key in the lock and quickly scrambled to put on our missing clothes before Emily disappeared into the kitchen. Katie walked into the room and was a little surprised to see me "Oh hi, where's Emily?"
Emily walked back in from the kitchen with a bag "I'm here I just had to grab something before we went out."
Katie smirked as Emily grabbed my hand. I could tell she knew what we had been up to and it was confirmed as we moved towards the door "Emily you may want to turn your top around before you leave."
I blushed as Emily chuckled and quickly turned her top around. Katie laughed "All I can say is I am glad I didn't come home any earlier."
Emily shot her a look before grabbing my hand and pulling me out the door. We walked down the road hand in hand both of us now seeing the funny side of what had just happened. I planted a soft kiss on Emily's cheek; she smiled "What did I do to deserve that?"
I smiled "Just for being you. Where we going anyway?"
She laughed "Like I said you will have to wait and see."
I smiled "You are such a tease."
She smirked "I've got to keep you on your toes."
We continued to walk until Emily stopped me at the entrance gate to the graveyard. She kissed me softly "There is someone you need to introduce to me."
I smiled slightly and slowly led Emily to Tamara's grave. I dropped her hand as I placed it on the grave stone "Hi Tam, Happy Birthday, hope you are still living it up wherever you are. I miss you so much." I paused for a second "Anyway I have someone with me that I want you to meet."
I reached behind me and took Emily's hand once again and she stepped up next to me. I kissed her cheek "Emily meet Tamara."
I turned back to the stone "Tamara meet Emily, the girl that has stolen my heart."
Emily put her hand on top of mine "Nice to finally meet you Tamara, I've heard a lot about you. There is something I want you to know." She paused and glanced at me before turning back "I promise I will look after Naomi for you."
A tear slipped down my cheek and Emily quickly enveloped me in a hug "If this is too hard we can go."
I shook my head "No it's good."
She smiled and released me from the hug; she reached into the bag and pulled out a bottle of sparkling wine and two plastic cups "How about a birthday drink for your best friend."
I smiled "I love you."
She returned my smile "I love you too."
Emily poured two cups out before pouring some on the grass next to the grave stone. I chuckled before taking hold of Emily's hand once more. We sat quietly for a few minutes and I knew Emily was giving me the time I needed. I broke the silence "Thanks for this Em, it was just what I needed."
She smiled and squeezed my hand gently "Your welcome I just want you to be happy."
I kissed the back of her hand "I am happy with you, very happy."
She kissed me softly "You want to stay at mine tonight?"
I nodded "Yeah definitely."
She smiled "Ok well let me know when you're ready and we'll get takeaway on the way home I'm starving plus I may need the energy tonight."
I smirked "You will definitely need the energy tonight." I pulled my phone out my pocket to text mum "Staying at Em's tonight I'll see you tomorrow sometime x."
She text back straight away "Well done love, have a good night x"
I smiled to myself as I read the message I knew what she meant and I knew she was proud of me for working things out with Emily. I was kind of proud of myself too, in the past I would have run a mile but Emily was different, Emily is a keeper and she is changing my life, changing it for the better and I couldn't be happier.
23. Chapter 23
**So here is the next chapter, I would like to thank everyone once again for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites, it really means a lot and dubbs901 don't worry, you haven't missed it. This chapter starts to move the story along with what I have planned next.**
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Chapter Twenty Three
The Following Day
Emily
I was round at Naomi's with Gina, Naomi had text me about half an hour ago saying she was going to be a bit late home and that she would text me when she got home so I knew when to go round but I had other ideas, there was something I wanted to ask Gina.
She wandered into the lounge with two cups of coffee and smiled as she passed one to me before sitting down on the chair opposite "What is it I can help you with Emily?"
I looked down at my coffee trying to avoid talking about this now, I knew I wanted to do it but I wasn't sure how Gina was going to take it "It's, well, it's…"
Gina smiled "It can't be that bad Emily just come out with it."
I smiled slightly "I just don't want to upset you; I know how much you and Naomi have been through together." I paused and Gina moved over to sit next to me taking my hand in hers as I continued "I want to ask Naomi to move in with me, I know people might think it is too soon but I love her so much and absolutely hate being apart from her, she spends so much time at mine anyway it just seems like the perfect solution."
Gina's smile grew and she flung her arms around me, I was a little surprised when she released me from the hug "You don't mind then?"
She took my hand in hers again "Emily all I want is for my daughter to be happy and I have never seen her happier than when she is with you. You have really changed her life Emily and I have seen a change in her that I never thought I would see, I used to wonder whether she would ever love someone like she loves you, when she was younger, well not even younger as she still did it just before the accident and meeting you, she used to shut everybody out she never showed anyone her true self and let me tell you it is nice to see my daughter being herself around the young lady that she loves."
A tear slipped from my eye "Why can't my own mum be that nice to me?"
Gina hugged me once more "If she can't see what a wonderful person you are then she does not deserve to have you in her life."
I smiled slightly "Thanks Gina." I looked down a minute before looking back at her "Do you think she will say yes, you know when I ask her."
She laughed but nodded "I am certain she will say yes, she loves you Emily."
* * *
It was then we heard the front door open and Gina and I changed the subject, Naomi walked through into the lounge looking down at her phone "Hi mum, I just need to text Em and let her know I am home, can't wait to fucking see her."
Gina laughed as I stood up and walked over to her and wrapped my arms around her "You don't need to text me."
Naomi jumped before looking up and seeing me, she kissed me softly "What you doing here?"
I scowled a little "Well that's a nice welcome for your gorgeous loving girlfriend."
She kissed me again "That's not what I meant; I just thought I was going to let you know when I got home."
I smiled "I wanted to talk to your mum about something so I came over as we had originally planned."
She looked a little confused "What about, is there something wrong?"
Gina cleared her throat "I will leave you two to talk; I'll be in the kitchen making dinner."
I smiled in her direction "Thanks Gina."
I pulled Naomi onto the sofa and sat so I was facing her, I could see her brain was working overtime "Emily what is it, you've got me worried now, you're not going to break up with me are you, I always worry that you are going to get fed up of me and my moodiness and decide that this just isn't worth it."
I stopped her with a kiss before she continued ranting "I'm not going to break up with you, I love you Naoms."
She smiled slightly "I love you too Ems but what is it then, I can tell you are nervous about something and you are really scaring me, I have all sorts running through my mind right now."
I took a deep breath "I want to ask." I paused and Naomi looked into my eyes pleading with me to continue which I soon did as I blurted out what I wanted to say "Will you move in with me Naomi, I love you and hate being apart from you and I just want to know that I can come home to you every night, I know we haven't been together for that long and I was worried about…"
She cut me off with a hard kiss pushing me backwards so I was lying on the sofa her whole body covering mine before she pulled back, she gazed into my eyes "I would love to move in with you, I want exactly the same that you do."
I pulled her down to me again allowing us to share one passionate kiss after another until Naomi pulled back once more "There is something else bothering you I can tell."
I smiled "You never miss a thing do you."
She kissed me softly "What is it?"
I smiled again "Well I was also wondering how you would feel about being my next of kin, you know at work, it is Katie at the moment but I would like it to be you, I mean hopefully nothing would ever happen so it would be needed but if it ever did I want it to be you they call."
She smiled "Of course I will be. Can I ask the same question of you?"
I nodded "Of course and yes I would like nothing more than to be your next of kin."
She laughed "Good, I will change the paperwork at the office tomorrow."
I kissed her softly "Me too, well I will pass the relevant information on to Emma for her to change on the system."
She lowered her head once more and softly captured my lips with hers "Things really are getting serious between us now aren't they."
I wasn't really sure how to take her comment "Yeah, I like it." My heart was beating rapidly as I worried she was having second thoughts about things moving pretty quickly.
She smiled softly "I never thought I would say this to anyone but I like it too."
I wrapped my arms around her neck again and pulled her hard down on to me kissing her hard wanting to show her just how much I love her and how happy she has just made me through our kiss. Things quickly got heated as hands began roaming everywhere and Naomi slipped her leg between mine making me groan as she sent a bolt of electricity racing through my whole body. It was as if we had both forgotten where we were as our bodies ground together, the friction from our clothing as it rubbed over our skin only making things even more heated. I could feel the fire burning out of control between my legs and could feel the large puddle forming in my underwear. We only sprung apart when Gina popped her head round the door "Anyone would think I had gone out the way you two are behaving on that sofa."
I was thankful my face was out of view as Naomi's cheeks flushed pink; she grabbed a cushion and threw it in her mum's direction. I heard Gina chuckle "I only wanted to let you know your dinner is ready."
Naomi rolled off me making me moan once more at the lack of contact, we straightened our clothes and made our way into the kitchen to find Gina sitting at the table waiting for us smirking. We both sat trying to ignore her and I think she finally realised we weren't going to bite and gave up trying to embarrass us she did however ask "So when are you moving out then daughter of mine?"
Naomi looked to me before turning back "Oh I don't know we didn't get round to talking about that."
I smiled "Well tomorrow is Friday so how about we say tomorrow, we can move some of your stuff and then gradually move everything else over the weekend. I just want you with me."
Gina smiled "You will both stay here tonight then as its Naomi's last night."
I turned to her and smiled "Of course we will."
* * *
Later that night I was lying cuddled up to Naomi in her bed, she was kissing my face softly as I text Katie "Hi sis, Naoms is moving in tomorrow any help would be gratefully accepted. X"
Katie replied almost instantly "As happy as I am for you I think I will make myself scarce and go to Cook's I have nails to think about, plus I don't fucking fancy listening to you christening every room in the house over the weekend. X"
I smiled to myself as I replied "Always a pleasure Katie, always a pleasure. I'm staying at Naomi's tonight so I will see you at some point. X"
She replied quickly again "Ok have fun, see you later. X"
I put my phone on the side and turned my attention back to Naomi quickly shifting my body so I was straddling her, I looked down at her and smiled cheekily "How about we give Gina something to tease us about in the morning as it's our last night here."
She smirked "Well you won't hear me complaining."
I lowered my lips to her feeling extremely thankful that we usually slept naked as I pressed my body to hers; I kissed her hungrily, the desire for her rising within me as she pushed her tongue into my mouth the passion completely taking over. I was breathless but didn't want to part from my gorgeous girlfriend. She moaned into my mouth as I slipped my thigh between her legs, I moaned as she pushed herself against me rubbing me with her thigh. I was so wet and I knew she could feel that. I ran my hand over her body stopping briefly to massage her breasts making her moan loudly until I continued down reaching between us and between her folds of skin, she moaned into my mouth once again as I began to stroke her. She was as wet as I was and it only spurred me on. She moaned "Oh fuck Em."
I broke away from her lips and took a second to gaze down into her eyes loving the dark blue colour they had turned, I pressed my breasts harder against hers as Naomi gripped my shoulders my fingers increasing their pace as I continued to slowly stroke her, her moans grew louder as I increased my pace. I couldn't take much more I needed to hear my girl screaming my name. She dug her nails into the skin on my shoulder as I thrust my fingers inside her, moving in and out. Naomi cried out before kissing me desperately, our tongues dancing against one another's as I pushed deeper inside her. I was so turned on by her and all I wanted to do was make her feel good. She moaned against my lips as I moved my fingers faster inside of her. I pushed my tongue into her mouth as our bodies moved together and I soon began to feel her body trembling beneath me. I moved my lips over her face whispering in her ear, telling her how sexy she was and how much I like knowing what I was doing to her.
Naomi's breathing quickened and I could feel her muscles clenching, she moaned "Oh fuck."
I pressed my lips to hers again sucking and biting on her bottom lips as she dug her nails deeper into my skin, her body began to shake uncontrollably until she screamed out, her body arching towards mine as she cried out my name over and over.
My own heart was beating so fast as I helped her down from her high, as her body relaxed I held her close to me. She kissed me softly before rolling us over allowing her to press her body into mine "I love you Em."
I whispered back "I love you Naoms."
She kissed me parting my lips as she slipped her tongue into my mouth making me moan. She slowly ran her fingers over my body teasing me with her soft touches; she brushed her fingers over my breasts causing me to gasp as my nipples hardened at her insistent touch. I groaned "Oh fuck."
She broke our kiss and gazed into my eyes before slowly sliding down my body leaving a trail of soft kisses over my stomach. She slowly parted my legs before dipping her head down and kisses me between the folds of skin, I moaned loudly; how the fuck did she always make me feel this good. She moved her tongue inside of me and started sucking, waves and waves of pleasure shot through me and I completely surrendered to her tongue. She sucked and licked me, her tongue pushing hard inside of me. I knew it wouldn't be long as she continued to work her magic. I cried out as she curled her tongue inside of me, I gripped the bed sheet as my body convulsed beneath Naoms. She continued to thrust her tongue inside as I cried her name over and over my orgasm washing over my whole body. I closed my eyes as Naomi began a trail back up my trembling body; she placed tiny kisses over my face as I finally began to relax. I wrapped my arms tightly around her and pulled her lips to mine before breaking apart gasping for air "You are fucking amazing."
She smiled "That was one fucking amazing way to say goodbye to my bed."
I kissed her softly "I can't wait to wake up with you every morning and go to bed with you every night."
She smiled "Exactly what I was thinking. I love you Emily Fitch."
I stroked her cheek "And I love you Naomi Campbell."
24. Chapter 24
**So here is the next chapter of this and we are moving along with the story now. It is only a short one this time. **
**Thanks for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites. **
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Chapter Twenty Four
One Month Later
Naomi
I was sitting at my desk trying to concentrate on my work but finding it very difficult as thoughts of Emily keep drifting through my mind, I know this is usual but today was different, today she had woken me up and basically fucked my brains out this morning…
* * *
_I could feel the soft kisses being placed over my body as I stirred from my sleep. As soon as Emily knew I was awake she shifted her body so she was straddling me before pressing her lips hard to mine. I couldn't help but moan against her lips as she set my whole body on fire. When she pulled back she smiled "Morning sexy."_
_I returned her smile "Morning."_
_This time she smirked and I knew I was going to completely surrender to everything she was about to do to me._
_She pressed her lips to mine and I immediately let myself get lost in it reaching up automatically to thread my fingers through her soft hair pulling her closer as her tongue begged for entry, entry that I quickly granted. I moaned "Mmmmm." My eyes closed for a second but shot open once again when Emily pulled away, she looked so fucking sexy as I gazed into her eyes. Emily smirked before lowering her head and sucking on my neck biting and sucking her way over my body my hips bucking forward slightly wanting to be as close to her as possible. She circled my nipples with her fingers knowingly teasing me my nipples instantly going hard. A moment later her mouth enveloped my nipple sending shivers down my spine, I arched my body pushing ever closer to Emily wanting and needing her touch so much, I moaned "Fuck Ems."_
_Emily dropped my nipple and laughed sexily "You like that, don't you?"_
_She bit my nipple softly making me moan louder "I fucking like everything you do to me."_
_She continued to torture me for a minute licking and sucking my nipples making me squirm beneath her, I could feel the puddle forming between my legs as she made me so wet. She began to kiss her way down my body, kissing under my breast down to my stomach before she paused to glance up at me with a wicked grin on her face as her fingers followed her lips, my god she made me feel so fucking good. I met Emily's gaze and I could tell she knew just how much I needed her. _
_She continued to move down my body slowly parting my legs as she dipped her head down kissing me between the folds of my skin. Her fingers were tracing soft circles over the soft skin on my thighs as she continued to tease me, I couldn't take much more "Oh fuck, just fuck me Ems."_
_She glanced up at me and smirked before dipping her head down once again and thrust her tongue inside of me. I gasped "Oh fuck" as she pushed hard and deep inside of me flicking against my inner walls. I twisted my fingers up in her hair tugging slightly as Emily continued to work her magic. After a few seconds she added one finger followed by another inside pushing me even closer to the edge "Oh fuck, fuck, fuck."_
_She was driving me crazy as she continued to thrust her fingers inside of me as her tongue stroked my clit. I knew I was so close now as I thrust my body towards hers wanting to feel as close to her as I fucking could. I tugged harder on her hair as she curled her fingers inside of me tipping me over the edge my orgasm ripping through my body. Emily continued to slowly move her fingers inside me as I came down from my high. I tugged her hair indicating where I wanted her now and she moved her way back up my body with a trail of kisses until she pressed her lips to my neck once more. She pulled away and looked down at me smiling; I stroked her cheek still a little breathless "You are amazing." _
_She smiled and was about to say something until I crashed our lips together and flipped our bodies so I was lying on top of her "You're turn."_
_I pressed my lips to hers, my tongue quickly finding its way into her mouth as our tongues battled. Emily moaned at the lack of contact but soon groaned with pleasure as I continued my assault on her neck slowly making my way down her body until I reached her breasts. I bit her nipple between my teeth and sucked making her shout out loudly as her hips bucked towards me. She dug her nails into the skin on my shoulders as she continued to move her body against mine. After a few more minutes I felt her gently pushing me down "Fuck Naomi I fucking need you now." _
_I gazed into her eyes and could see they were almost black before continuing the trail of kisses over her body moving my head between her legs, I could instantly feel how wet she was as I slipped two fingers inside of her, her breathing hitched as I pushed hard and deep inside of her, she pushed her hips against my body as I pushed harder inside of her. She gripped my shoulders only spurring me on as I pressed my tongue to her clit flicking gently as I thrust inside her. Emily screamed out as I curled my fingers inside her wave after wave rushing through her body. _
_As Emily lay on the bed her chest heaving as she closed her eyes her body slowly beginning to relax I began showering her face with tiny soft kisses my body completely covering hers. After a few minutes she opened her eyes and smiled as she wrapped her arms around my back holding me close to her. She smiled widely "That was fucking amazing."_
_I smiled down at her as I gazed into her eyes "It is definitely top of my list of ways to wake up right now, what did I do to deserve that this morning?"_
_She laughed "I woke early and was watching you sleep and all I wanted to do was wake you up and have my wicked way with you so I did."_
_It was my turn to laugh "Well I am not going to argue with that. Have I told you lately just how much I fucking love you?"_
_She brought one of her hands round to stroke my cheek "Everyday but I will never get tired of hearing it, and just for the record I love you so fucking much too."_
_I kissed her softly "As much as I hate to say this I have to shower and get ready for work."_
_She smirked "How much time have you got?"_
_I grabbed her hand and pulled her up with me "Enough time for you to join me."_
* * *
I continued to stare at the screen on my laptop trying to concentrate on the work I needed to get done but it wasn't really working so I picked up my phone and text Emily instead "Hi sexy can't stop thinking about you. Hope you're having a good day, can't wait to see you later. Love u xxx"
After a couple of minutes my phone beeped and I picked it up immediately "Hey gorgeous, can't stop thinking about you either or what we did this morning, just want to be doing it all over again. Will call you at lunchtime as just going into a session with a young lad and just want to hear your voice. Love u xxx"
I put my phone down on my desk and made more of an effort to concentrate on the piece I was writing and I actually got a lot of it done but now I was back to thinking about Emily, now though it was worry as it was nearly 2pm and she hasn't called, I know she can look after herself but I also know that if she said she would call me she would as she wouldn't want my worrying about her.
I was in a bit of a daze when a few minutes later my phone rang, I picked it up so quickly I didn't even look at the caller ID and was even more alarmed to hear it was Katie's voice at the other end of the line not Emily's "Katie what's up, where's Emily she was meant to call me a few hours ago I am really worried now."
I heard Katie take a deep breath at the other end of the phone "Something has happened to her at work, they called me but haven't given me any details, they just told me to get down there as soon as possible, I'm on my way but I wanted to check you had been told."
I felt the tears forming in my eyes "No I haven't heard anything, I'm on my way."
Katie spoke softly, I know she was trying to keep me calm "I'll see you down there and Naomi be careful I don't want anything happening to you as well, she will be ok if there is one thing I know about my sister it is that she is a fighter and can get through anything."
My heart was beating so fast "Thanks Katie I will see you soon."
I hung up the phone fast and grabbed my bag leaving my laptop and everything I just didn't care I needed to get to Emily. I rushed to my bosses office and told him I needed to go and thankfully he told me to take all the time I needed and to keep him up to date because if he hadn't I think I would have quit on the spot, Emily was the most important thing in my life and nothing was going to change that.
* * *
Within half an hour I rushed into the hospital to find Katie waiting for me in the entrance, she hugged me and I could see she had been crying, I never thought I would see the day Katie Fitch hugged me but I guess today wasn't an ordinary day. As I pulled back my own tears were rolling down my cheeks "What's happened to her Katie, is she ok?"
She shook her head slightly "She's in A&E at the moment but it's not good, she's been stabbed by the dad of the young lad she was working with. I haven't really seen her and that is all I know for the moment but there was blood everywhere, it was horrible."
Just then a trolley came rushing past and I instantly noticed Emily lying there and I could see what Katie meant about blood being everywhere. I suddenly felt very sick and made no attempt to hold it down as the contents of my stomach emptied onto the floor as Emily disappeared out of sight. I felt Katie's hand on my shoulder "Are you ok?"
I shook my head "She looked terrible, where the fuck are they taking her?"
Another tear slipped from Katie's eye "Theatre, they quickly said as they rushed past, they have to stop the bleeding or…" she trailed off and I knew exactly what she was telling me, I didn't want to think about it, Emily had to make it through she just had to.
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**Ok so I am going to go and hide now...**
25. Chapter 25
**I have come out of hiding to post this next chapter and may well go back into hiding after posting this one lol. I would like to thank everyone for their reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites. **
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Chapter Twenty Five
Naomi
Katie and I had been directed to a room to sit in whilst we waited for news of Emily, every minute seemed to drag and I couldn't sit still, I was pacing the room biting my finger nails down so there was hardly any nail. I knew Emily would go mad with me when she was back with us; she hates it when I bite my finger nails but as I always tell her I only do it when I am stressed or worried about something. Katie grabbed my hand as I walked past her once again "Will you fucking sit down."
She pulled me down onto the chair next to her "You are doing my head in pacing up and down like that."
I snapped "Well it's doing my fucking head in not knowing what is going on with my fucking girlfriend." Katie's face fell and I suddenly felt guilty "Sorry Katie I know you are worried too I shouldn't be snapping at you I am just terrified, so fucking terrified that I could lose her, she is my fucking life and I love her so so so much."
She took hold of one of my hands and looked me directly in the eye "I know you do Naomi and I also know that Emily is going to be ok, she will get through this because I know she isn't ready to leave you, your life together is only just beginning so you need to hold onto that Naomi."
I smiled ever so slightly as I knew she was only trying to calm me down "Thanks Katie."
A few minutes later the door burst open and both Katie and I jumped as we turned to see who it was, a sharp Scottish voice filled the room "So it didn't take you long to make a move on my other daughter then."
I was about to jump up I could really do without this now as Jenna Fitch banged the door shut but Katie pushed me back as she stood up herself "If you really believe that you are more fucking deluded than I thought now what the fuck are you doing here?"
She rounded on Katie "I have more right to be here than she does I am Emily's mother, she is just her latest phase now what happened?"
I could see the anger in Katie's eyes "You don't have any right to be here, Emily told you weeks ago that she didn't want anything more to do with you, Naomi is her life, Naomi is the person that Emily will want here so I think you should just fuck right off, who even told you about this?"
Jenna spat back "I saw the text you sent your brother, you didn't even have the decency to tell your mother about this."
Katie shook her head "I didn't fucking tell you because I know Emily won't fucking want you here so I want you to fucking leave."
I could see Jenna wasn't going to go anywhere so I stood up next to Katie and made sure I was right up in her face "I want you to fucking get out of here, I love Emily with all my heart which is more than I can say for you, you can't even fucking see her for who she is let alone love her for who she is. Your daughter is one of the most amazing people I have ever met, she has seriously fucking changed my life for the better and I am telling you now I am planning on being with her for the rest of my life, so I am going to tell you this once more and you are going to listen, get the fuck out of here and I don't want to see you back here again."
After a standoff for about a minute Jenna turned on her heels and walked out the door slamming it behind her. I collapsed back onto the chair I had stood from as Katie sat next to me my heart beating so fast. Katie smiled "Nobody has ever stood up to her like that before."
I smiled slightly "I did it for Emily, she wouldn't want her here I have seen how hurt she has been by her in the past and she has told me she doesn't want anything more to do with her."
Katie hugged me and surprised me again for the second time in the day and softly said "Thank you for loving my sister Naomi."
I smiled "It's my pleasure and I will tell you now it is not hard to love her."
Katie smiled "She really has got an amazing heart."
I nodded and was about to say something when the door opened again, we both looked up expecting it to be Jenna again but both stood as the doctor walked in "Is one of you Katie Fitch?"
Katie nodded "Yeah me."
He looked in her direction "Can we have a word for a minute."
Katie looked at me and I could tell she was as confused as I was "Yeah but whatever you have to say can be said to Naomi too, she is Emily's girlfriend."
He looked to me and then nodded "Ok, would you like to take a seat a minute."
I shook my head "Can you please just tell us how Emily is."
He nodded again "Ok, Emily has just come out of theatre, she lost a lot of blood but we have managed to repair the damage, she is still in a critical condition and remains unconscious but we are hopeful of a full recovery when she does wake up but that is obviously going to depend on how long she remains unconscious."
I nodded "Ok, can we see her?"
He looked to Katie again "I can let you see her as you are her next of kin and her family but that is all for the moment."
Katie shook her head "It is Naomi Emily will want by her side and anyway Naomi is her next of kin."
The Doctor shook his head "According to our records her next of kin is Katie Fitch and we have to go on that."
I could see Katie was getting annoyed as I fell back onto the chair behind me, I wanted to fight but it was as if my body had completely given up on me, I couldn't even find the words to argue and that just wasn't me "I am telling you now that Naomi is her next of kin, Emily told me she had changed the paperwork a good couple of weeks ago as she wanted Naomi to be the first to know if anything happened to her but that hasn't been changed on your system has it so you will go off and find Emma, Emily's boss and see what she did with the paperwork Emily gave her and get it all changed whilst Naomi and I go and visit my sister and her girlfriend, this is your screw up not Naomi's and certainly not Emily's."
I could see the Doctor was a little surprised by Katie's outburst but he agreed to let me in to see Emily with Katie. He had said to be prepared for the tubes as they wouldn't be able to come out until Emily wakes up but I really didn't care about that I just wanted to see my girl and hold her hand. The tears started falling from my eyes as soon as I entered the room, there were tubes everywhere but Emily looked peaceful. I rushed over to her and took her hand in mine "Oh Emily." I didn't know if she could hear me or not but I continued anyway "You have to wake up gorgeous, you have to come back to me, we have a life to live together and so many plans to make together. I love you so fucking much."
Katie rested her hand on my shoulder "She's strong Naomi; she will pull through this however scary all of this looks."
I looked round at her and smiled slightly "Yeah." I paused "Katie, I just want to thank you for putting up with me today I know I have been a cow."
She laughed a little "Now I wouldn't normally let you get away with it but in this instance I will let you off I know it's only because you are worried about Emily."
I turned back to Emily and kissed her cheek as Katie pushed a chair up behind me so I could sit down. I lowered myself slowly and rested my head on Emily's chest just wanting to feel as close to her as I could. Katie went and sat round the other side of her and we sat in silence only the sound of the machines in the background. I must have drifted off slightly as I jumped when the door to Emily's room opened. Emma smiled slightly "Hi Katie, Naomi."
Katie looked directly at her "Have you sorted the whole mess out I can't believe Emily's wishes haven't been respected you of all people know how she feels about Naomi."
She stepped further into the room "All I can do is apologise about that, Emily gave the papers weeks ago and I passed them on to the relevant people and it seems they neglected to update the computer systems." She looked to me "I can assure you now Naomi that everyone involved with Emily's care knows that you are her next of kin. You will be kept up to date with everything."
I smiled slightly "Thank you."
Emma smiled "I know how much you mean to one another. I will leave you with her now; the doctors are going to keep me up to date with her progress."
She was about to leave when I suddenly thought about Cook and Effy "Emma can you let Effy and Cook know what has happened I just don't have the strength."
She smiled once more "Effy knows, she is covering Emily's patients today and coming up as soon as she has finished, but I will make sure I let Cook know if he doesn't already."
I smiled "Thanks Emma."
She turned to leave "Look after her Naomi."
I nodded "I will do."
An hour or so later Cook came bursting through the door followed by Effy "How is she Blondie?"
I lifted my head and the tears started falling all over again, I couldn't seem to stop them "They are hoping for a full recovery and are confident of it but it depends how long it takes for her to wake up." He wrapped his arms around me "I just want her to wake up Cook."
He kissed the top of my head "I know and she will do." He looked over to Katie who I could see was trying to be strong but wasn't doing a very good job of it, Cook hugged me once more "I will just be with Katie for a bit."
I nodded "Ok."
I rested my head back on Emily's chest as Effy pulled up a chair next to me "She will come round Naomi I know she will."
I smiled weakly but didn't move me head from Emily. I drifted off again only to wake a while later to find Cook and Effy had gone. Katie looked across at me "They have gone to give us some space with her." She stood up "I am going to go home and get Emily some stuff, would you like me to get some for you I know you won't want to leave her."
I nodded "I am staying with her until she is coming home; I am not leaving her side."
She smiled "I had a feeling you would say that. I will be back later."
As Katie left I turned back to Emily and sat talking to her for a while, I was aware of the constant traffic in the corridor but wasn't really paying any attention to it, nurses kept coming in to check on how Emily was doing and administering medication via her cannula so I thought nothing of it when someone else came in. I only looked around when whoever it was this time loitered in the corner, I turned around "Can I help you?"
He didn't say anything so I spoke again "Do you know Emily?"
He walked a little closer and it was then I saw the knife in his hand, I stood and moved so I was protecting Emily "Get out of here, you have done enough damage."
He shook his head "Obviously I haven't as she is still alive so I have come to finish the job."
I shook my head I was trying to stay strong but inside I was trembling "You are not going anywhere near my girlfriend, she didn't deserve this you fucking pyscho."
He laughed and took a step closer to me "I suggest you move out the way she deserved it earlier and she deserves it again now, she was meant to helping my son not making him worse."
I shook my head "Emily is fucking good at her job she would never do anything to hurt any of her patients."
He shook his head "She made him fall and had made his injuries even worse so no she is not good at her job."
I could feel myself getting angrier as this guy slated my girl "Emily would never do that, she loves her job, she loves her patients and she always does her best, she goes the extra mile for her patients so they can progress to the best of their ability."
He laughed again "She seems to have brainwashed you as well then."
I shook my head "I am not brainwashed I am telling the fucking truth and I know Emily is good at her job because I have had first-hand experience. I was a complete bitch to her during my physio sessions but she always stuck by me, all she ever wanted to do was help me and that is what she did. I will tell you now that if it wasn't for Emily I probably wouldn't be here anymore. She never gave up on me and now I am going to spend the rest of my life with her."
He stepped closer to me but I wasn't worried, I had seen Katie arrive back with Cook. He opened the door quietly and walked up behind the guy as he took another step closer to me "Say goodbye to your little girlfriend."
Cook grabbed him from behind "I don't think so mate, I don't fucking think so." He twisted his wrist until the pain made him drop the knife in his hand. I watched as it fell to the floor relieved that this was over, Cook always did have a knack of turning up just when you needed him.
Katie rushed over to me and hugged me "Are you ok?"
I nodded "I am now."
She kept hold of me as Cook handed the guy over to security, as they led him out of the room Cook growled "I don't want to fucking see you anywhere near any of us ever again, you can go and rot somewhere for all I fucking care. Red is one of my best friends and nobody hurts my friends and gets away with it, nobody."
I smiled as the door closed "Thanks Cook."
He smiled "Anytime Blondie just call me your personal bodyguard."
I smacked him playfully before turning me attention back to Emily, I kissed her cheek softly "I will never let anything happen to you again beautiful, never." I settled myself back on the chair with Emily's hand in mine wanting to be as close to her as possible and silently praying that she wakes up and wakes up soon.
26. Chapter 26
**Thank you again for the reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites.**
**Anyway here is the next chapter of this, I'm not so sure about this one but maybe that is just me. **
* * *
Chapter Twenty Six
2 Days Later
Naomi
It was first thing in the morning and I was sat with my head buried in Emily's chest, it is two days since she was stabbed and she still hadn't woken up, I know people would probably think I am silly but I kept talking to her, I have no idea if she could hear me but I would rather keep talking in case she could, I wanted her to know I was with her and that I wasn't going to leave her.
I looked up when the door opened and I heard the brisk Scottish voice I hated "Get away from my daughter you bitch."
I stood up but remained by Emily's side ignoring her comment "Get the fuck out of this room now; you know you are not welcome and you know Emily won't want you hear."
She glared at me "She is my daughter, she is nothing to you."
I could feel my anger bubbling to the surface "She is the fucking love of my life now get the fuck out."
Katie came into the room and grabbed Jenna's arm pulling her back towards the door "You have heard it from Naomi and now you will hear it from me get the fuck out of here and don't come back. I will be making sure security know not to let you anywhere near from now on."
Jenna went to speak again but Katie slammed the door in her face and turned to me "You ok?"
I nodded as I sat back down "Yeah, thanks for that."
She smiled and held up the bag in her hand "I brought you some more clothes and I also brought you something to eat."
I looked up and smiled slightly "Thanks I will change in a bit but I'm not hungry."
Katie looked concerned "You need to eat Naomi, you haven't eaten since this happened, you need your strength."
I snapped "I'm not hungry." Katie looked a little upset and I immediately felt guilty "I'm sorry Katie I shouldn't have snapped, none of this is your fault."
She smiled slightly "It's ok I know you are worried, we all are but I am also worried about you, you need to look after yourself as well and if you're not bothered about yourself do it for Emily, you know she would be saying the same as me."
I smiled weakly at her "You can be nice sometimes can't you?"
She laughed "Occasionally but as I have to tell Emily at times don't be telling everyone I have a reputation to uphold."
I laughed a little "My lips are zipped."
She walked over and gave me the bag "Try and eat it later, even if it is just a little bit."
I took the bag from her "I'll try, I promise."
She went to sit round the other side of Emily and we sat quietly for about half an hour when suddenly Emily's machines started beeping. I was terrified my heart was beating so fast as the doctors and nurses came bursting in. Katie pulled me away from Emily and I completely broke down "She can't leave me Katie, she just can't leave me."
My tears were streaming down my cheeks as everyone worked on my girl, Katie kept a tight hold on me trying to calm me down a little and as grateful as I was to her I knew I wouldn't be calm until I knew my Emily was going to be ok.
* * *
Emily
_Everything was so bright but nothing looked familiar, I had no idea where I was as I put one foot in front of another walking into the distance, walking towards where the light was I was hoping that was where I would find Naomi as she wasn't anywhere to be seen around here and she was the only person I wanted to see right now, I could hear her voice so why couldn't I see her. I called out her name "Naomi." _
_She didn't reply and I was beginning to worry about where everyone was now and really beginning to wonder where the hell I actually was. I continued to walk towards the light when a young lady stepped out from somewhere, I jumped as I hadn't seen her and couldn't see where she could have come from anyway, she spoke softly "You look a little lost."_
_I nodded "I am looking for Naomi, have you seen anyone, she has blonde hair down to about her shoulders and the most gorgeous blue eyes you have ever seen." _
_She shook her head "She's not here Emily."_
_I was a little taken aback "Do I know you?"_
_She shook her head again "No we never met but I know Naomi."_
_I looked around before turning back to her "Where am I? Who are you? What the fuck is going on here?"_
_She held out her hand to me and shook my hand "It is hard to describe where you are, it is kind of an in-between place and you have a choice to make now. I am Tamara by the way."_
_I was shocked "Hang on did you just say Tamara, Tamara as in Naomi's dead best friend." She nodded slowly before I asked my next question "What choice do I have to make?" _
_She smiled slightly "You have to decide whether to live or die Emily, I know that might sound harsh, like I said you at a kind of crossroads right now, your body is lying in a hospital bed hooked up to machines with Naomi by your side holding your hand after being stabbed. I am hoping to stop you walking into the light Emily, you can't die you have your whole life ahead of you, a life with Naomi. There is something I want you to know Emily I have seen Naomi love before, well kind of love but I have never seen her love someone the way she loves you."_
_I smiled as I thought of Naomi "I love her too, I love her so fucking much it hurts to be without her. I just want to see her, to hold her and kiss her." _
_She smiled "Well I think you have made your decision."_
_I smiled again "Well if my decision is to be with Naomi or be without it will absolutely be to be with her, I can't bear to be without her."_
_Tamara's smile grew "That is what I wanted to hear." She paused "Emily before you go back to her I want to thank you."_
_I frowned a little "What for?"_
_She smiled "For helping Naomi, I love her pieces, she was my best friend but I know how difficult she can be but you stuck with her and you put her life back together and I can honestly say she is happy, probably happier than I have ever seen her."_
_I smiled "I promise you I will look after her, she is the love of my life and I plan on spending my life with her." I paused again "You know you are just as beautiful as Naomi described, she misses you, you know."_
_She looked a little sad "I miss her too but knowing she is happy and knowing she has someone to love her and make her happy makes everything a bit better. Now go back to her and give her, her belief back, let her know that you are still with her."_
_I hugged Tamara "What will you do now?"_
_She pulled back "I will follow my light now, I will move on to the life that is now meant for me but I will always be there with Naomi and you now."_
_I hugged her once more before turning round and walking back the other way "It was nice to finally meet you Tamara."_
_She smiled "And you Emily."_
_I continued walking until I could no longer see her, I wasn't entirely sure where I was going but I knew Tamara would be guiding me in the right direction, the way back to my Naomi."_
* * *
Naomi
It was touch and go there for a while but finally they got Emily's heart going again, I can honestly say I have never been so scared in my life as I was in that moment not even when I was told about my own injuries before I had met Emily. I was sat beside her bed again with my head in her chest wanting to be as close to her as possible all over again. Katie had gone to get some air and to update Cook and Effy on what was going on and I think she wanted to give me some space to be alone with Emily. I lifted my head a little and kissed her cheek "Emily please wake up, please just wake up I am begging you. I can't live without you I just can't, you are my life, you make me complete."
Tears started rolling again as Emily remained still, I lowered my head to her chest again and closed my eyes hoping that if I closed them she might be awake when I opened them again, I tried this a few times but nothing changed so I resigned myself to just sitting with her. I looked round when the door opened and smiled weakly when I saw my mum "How is she doing today love?"
Another tear fell from my eye "I don't really know mum, she crashed earlier and it took a few minutes to get her heart going again, I was so scared, I honestly thought I was going to lose her."
More tears began falling as mum enveloped me in her arms "Just give her time love, she will come back to you, she loves you too much to leave you."
I took a deep breath "That's what everybody keeps telling me so why won't she wake up."
Mum kissed the top of my head "She will."
She went to sit round the other side of Emily as I rested my head on her chest again. I could hear the clock ticking in the background as I closed my eyes again.
* * *
I opened my eyes a couple of hours later and could have sworn I heard a voice but as I lifted my head I saw the room was empty, Mum must have gone and Katie must have been elsewhere still. I looked at Emily and could see that her eyes were still closed so I rested my head again, I lay thinking for a couple of minutes when I heard a soft whisper again, I lifted my head so quickly as I held my breath, my heart was beating so quickly and I didn't quite dare turn around until I heard her voice, as croaky as it was I knew it was her "Naomi."
My head shot round and I have never been so pleased to see the chocolate brown colour of her eyes as I was then. I flung my arms around her "Oh my god Emily, you're awake, you're fucking awake."
She smiled slightly "Water."
I rushed over to the table in the corner of the room and grabbed the jug of water and poured a small amount out into the cup and put the straw in before taking it over to Em. I held the cup up to her mouth and she took a couple of small sips before smiling "Thank you."
I smiled "Anything for you. I am just so glad you are awake."
She took hold of my hand "I'm sorry."
I stroked the back of her hand "You have nothing to be sorry about none of this is your fault."
She squeezed my hand "How long have I been out?"
I leant over and kissed her softly "A couple of days." I moved back a little "I better go and tell the doctor you're awake and I think there are a few other people that will want to know."
She kissed the back of my hand "Ok but come back quickly."
I smiled before kissing her softly once more "I will be very quick, I haven't left you since this happened and I am not planning on leaving you until you are discharged."
She laughed but grimaced at the same time as I walked towards the door "I love you."
I spun around and smiled "I love you too. I'll be right back."
27. Chapter 27
**Here is the next chapter of this, sorry it has been a few days work has been crazy and I seem to have been on so many late shifts this week. **
**Thank you again for the reviews you left and for adding this to your alerts and favourites :D**
* * *
Chapter Twenty Seven
Emily
The doctor had been in to talk me through what had happened and the surgery I had, had, he checked me over and has taken blood to check everything out but as far as he can say for now I am going to make a full recovery. Naomi had been sat beside me holding my hand the whole time. Once the doctor had left I turned to look at her, she smiled "You ok?"
I shook my head "No this bed is a rather cold."
She laughed "Oh it is is it."
I smirked "Yeah so get your backside under these covers with me."
She didn't need to be asked twice as I lifted the covers and she climbed in next to me being as careful as she could not to hurt me in any way. She snuggled close to me as I wrapped my arms around her, she murmured into my chest "I've fucking missed this, missed being so close to you, missed breathing in your scent and just generally fucking missed you in every way."
I kissed the top of her head "I'm sorry Naoms, I'm really sorry I put you through this."
She lifted her head and stoked my cheek "You have got to stop apologising none of this is your fault it is that stupid guy's fault that stabbed you in the first place. He is the one that should be sorry."
I kissed her cheek "He was just worried about his son, how is Luke?"
She shook her head "He might have been worried about his son but he didn't need to stab you. I don't know, I've been with you and I'm not planning on going anywhere anytime soon. I was so scared when Katie called me to say something had happened to you. I seriously thought I was going to lose you and I couldn't even begin to imagine what my life would be like without you; I don't think I would even want to live if you weren't around."
A tear rolled down my cheek "I would have been the same if it had been you lying here. I don't ever want a life without you in it."
She wiped the tear from my cheek "Well that's that sorted then, neither of us are going anywhere."
I laughed "That is that definitely sorted."
She rested her head on my chest again and I kissed the top of her head "Naoms I want you do something for me."
She nodded "Anything."
I smiled slightly knowing she probably wasn't going to like this "Will you go and see Luke and see how he is for me."
She lifted her head quickly "No Em, I'm not leaving you, I can't leave you, you've only just woken up."
I smiled and captured her lips softly "You don't have to go now I want you here for a bit longer first but soon Naoms, I need to know how he is doing."
She smiled slightly "Ok, you know I'll do anything for you."
I laughed "It must be my charm."
She laughed "Yeah and maybe because I love you so much."
I kissed her softly again "Love you too."
* * *
She snuggled close to me again and we lay just holding one another until Katie came bursting in "Fuck it's good to see you awake."
I laughed "You took you're time I've been awake a while."
She looked between Naomi and I "I thought I would give you two some space, she has been an absolute nightmare."
Naomi laughed "And now we have the real Katie back."
I couldn't help but laugh but soon stopped as pain rushed through me, I winced and Naomi noticed instantly "You ok?"
I nodded "Yeah just a bit of pain, I'll be ok."
Katie looked as concerned as Naomi did "I'll go speak to the doctor."
I shook my head "I'm fine honestly."
Katie shook her head "No Emily you are in pain and I'm not having it."
* * *
Half an hour later I was in considerable less pain but feeling incredibly sleepy "Naoms, you know what I asked you earlier, why don't you go now."
She shook her head "I don't want to leave you Ems."
I smiled slightly "It's ok I have Katie here with me and I am just going to sleep for a bit."
She smiled slightly before kissing me softly "Ok I won't be long, I'll miss you."
I returned her kiss "I'll miss you too."
* * *
Naomi
I quickly made my way to the children's ward not wanting to be away from Emily for long but she wanted me to do this and I didn't want to let her down. I suddenly felt nervous though as I walked down the corridor to the nurses' station, I couldn't help but wonder whether any family would be sitting with him, any family that might also be blaming Emily for what had happened. A nurse looked up as I paused at the desk "Can I help you love?"
I nodded "Yeah I'm looking for Luke Smith."
She smiled "Are you a relative?"
I shook my head "No." I paused unsure what to say "I have come on behalf of Emily Fitch, Luke's physio, she has asked me to come and see him."
The nurse smiled slightly "How is Emily doing, we heard what happened. Luke has been asking about her since he got back on the ward."
It was my turn to smile slightly "She is awake and they are expecting a full recovery."
The nurse smiled "That is brilliant news; Emily is well loved around here by staff and patients. Now you will find Luke in the first bay on your right just down the corridor, go and put his mind at ease, he really loves Emily."
I smiled "He's not the only one."
The nurse laughed "You must be Naomi, we've heard a lot about you."
I laughed "All good I hope."
She nodded "Oh yes, Emily has seriously fallen for you."
I smiled "I've seriously fallen for her too."
I chatted with her for a while before making my way to Luke's cubicle; he was sitting up in bed playing on his Nintendo DS, I couldn't help but notice he could only be about 10 years old. I cleared my throat "Luke?"
He lifted his head and instantly smiled "You're Naomi!"
I was a little confused "Yeah."
He must have spotted my confusion "Emily is always talking about you, she loves you so much."
I felt my heart rate increase as happiness flooded my body "I love her too."
His smile grew "Good." He paused "Naomi is she ok?"
I nodded "She woke up this morning and will be ok."
I could see the sadness in his eyes as he smiled slightly "I'm sorry for what dad did, it was all my fault I fell, Emily told me not to push myself too hard but I ignored her and fell. Dad came in shouting at her and I saw the knife in his hand, I tried to stop him but he wouldn't listen to me." A tear fell from his eye; I took hold of his hand as he started talking again "There was blood coming from Emily's tummy but she still came to help me until she fell on the floor. I was so scared. Dad was still screaming and shouting and then he ran when the nurses came in to help."
I squeezed his hand "What happened to Emily is not your fault, Emily won't want you blaming yourself, in fact she sent me down here to see if you are ok."
He smiled "Emily is so nice. Will you tell her I'm ok, the nurse said I haven't hurt myself anymore."
I smiled "She is and I will make sure that is the first thing I tell her."
He smiled again "Naomi how did you meet Emily?"
I laughed but he was so sweet I didn't mind answering his questions "She used to be my physiotherapist as well."
He continued to smile "I like physio with Emily, she makes it really fun."
I nodded "She does, I used to be a bit horrible to her at first but she never gave up on me, she was always really patient with me."
He laughed "She always makes me laugh."
I smiled "She always makes me laugh too."
His smile grew "Did she give you lollies at the end of your session?"
I put my bottom lip out pretending to be sad "No."
He laughed "Uh oh Emily's going to be in trouble."
I nodded "Big big trouble."
He laughed again and I joined in. I stayed chatting with him for a few more minutes but I could see he was getting tired "I am going to go see Emily again now Luke."
He nodded "Ok." He paused as I stood up "Naomi will you come and see me again?"
I smiled "Of course I will if you want me to."
He nodded again "I do and Naomi don't be too cross with Emily."
I smiled "I promise I won't."
He smiled "See you soon Naomi."
I waved at him as I walked away I couldn't help but think about what a cute kid he was, I could see why Emily liked him. I walked quietly back into Emily's room in case she was asleep, Katie looked up at me and smiled before whispering "She's been asleep since you left."
I smiled and sat on the chair next to the bed just watching her sleep, she looked so peaceful. Katie stood up and walked round to me "I'm just going to go for a walk and see Cook and get some fresh air."
I nodded and whispered "Ok."
A few minutes after Katie left Emily's eyes flicked open "Naomi."
I stood up so she could see me "I'm here gorgeous, I'm here."
She smiled "How's Luke."
I smiled "He is ok, he hasn't got any further injuries, he is a cute kid and he loves you, he has been really worried about you but he did also land you in some trouble."
She looked confused as I smirked "I would like to know where my lollies were at the end of my sessions."
She patted the bed next to her "Come here."
I pretended to pout but climbed up on the bed next to her; she wrapped her arms around me and captured my lips with her softly before pulling back and looking into my eyes "Does that make it better?"
I smiled slightly "Hmmm a little."
She captured my lips again a little harder this time "How about now?"
I decided to milk this for a minute "I think I need a few more and then I might just be able to forgive you."
She smirked but her lips soon found mine again. We shared a few more kisses until Emily winced slightly in pain, I couldn't hide my concern "Are you ok Em? I don't want to hurt you."
She smiled slightly "You're not, it's just when I move it's to be expected after surgery."
I kissed her softly "You promise to tell me if it gets too much."
She returned my soft kiss before resting her head on my chest, I ran my fingers through her hair as I listened to her soft breathing "You didn't tell me you worked with some cute patients."
I could feel her smiling "Well one of those cute patients is now my girlfriend."
It was my turn to smile now "Oh she is, is she?"
She nodded against my chest "She is and I love her very much."
I kissed the top of her head "That's good because I love you very much too. Anyway I was talking about Luke."
She laughed "I know you were, I just thought I would tease you for a while."
I laughed along with her "Naoms, was he really ok?"
I nodded "Yeah he was great, I didn't have to tell him who I was for some reason he already knew. He was blaming himself for what happened to you but I made sure he knew it wasn't his fault, he even told me how you tried to help him until you collapsed."
I felt a tear land on my top "Please don't be mad at me Naoms, I had to help him I couldn't just leave him."
I kissed the top of her head "I'm not mad at you Ems I would have done the same I am so proud of you."
She lifted her head to look at me "You don't mind me talking about you do you, it's just you are always on my mind and I love you so much."
I kissed her softly "No I don't mind and I love you so much too."
She yawned as she rested her head on my chest again. I ran my fingers through her hair again "Why don't you get some more sleep?"
She shook her head "I want to spend some more time with you."
I smiled "I will still be hear when you wake up, you need to look after yourself."
She kissed my chest softly and soon after her breathing became shallower and I knew she had fallen asleep. I lay quietly with her just holding her in my arms.
28. Chapter 28
**I thought I had better update this, all I can say is it has been a busy week at work and I've not been at home much. Thanks again for the reviews, I always love reading them and thanks to everyone that has added this to your alerts and favourites. **
* * *
Chapter Twenty Eight
Two Days Later
Naomi
Emily had been pretty sleepy the past couple of days, the doctors said it was due to the high dose of pain killers she was on and that it was nothing to worry about. All her blood tests had come back normal and everything was looking good. I have been a little concerned though as when Emily has been awake she has been a little distracted, almost as if something has been bothering her. I had decided not to press her about it as I had put it down to the pain but now I was not so sure. She was lying in my arms again asleep but stirred a little, I kissed the top of her head as she opened her eyes "Sorry Naoms, I keep falling asleep on you."
I kissed her head softly again "I've told you not to worry about it."
I felt her smile "You're the best."
I laughed "I know." I paused a second "Em can I ask you something?"
She lifted her head to look at me "Yeah, what is it?
I smiled slightly "It's just you seem a bit distracted, as if something is bothering you."
Her face fell slightly but I knew she was hoping I hadn't noticed "I'm fine Naoms, it's probably just the pain."
I decided I wasn't going to give up I needed to know that she was ok ""Em I saw your facial expression change, please just tell me what is going on I am worried about you."
She looked away from me "You will just think I am stupid."
I shook my head "I won't think you are stupid at all Em, please just tell me what it is."
She nodded slowly "Ok but please don't be mad with me."
I smiled slightly "I don't think I could ever be mad with you."
She took a deep breath "When I was unconscious and wherever the hell I was, I have no idea where it was all I know is that everything was all white and there was a bright light, anyway when I was there I met Tamara, it was as if she was waiting there for me. She knew who I was and everything." She paused "She was there to stop me leaving, well I guess there to stop me dying, she told me I had a choice to make and that was between being with you or leaving you for good and of course I knew there was no decision to make I needed to be with you. She's happy for you Naomi all she wants is for you to be happy and she knows that you are."
A tear slipped down my cheek as Emily finally told me what was bothering her, she tensed a little when I didn't say anything to her "Naoms please don't be mad at me, I knew I shouldn't have fucking told you."
I grabbed hold of her hand "I'm not mad Emily, I'm not mad at all please don't think that. I'm happy, happy that you got to meet my best friend and happy that I know Tam is watching over us and that she is happy for me. I knew she would like you."
She wrapped her arms around me both of us crying a little as I also wrapped my arms around her just wanting us to be as close as we could. I know this might sound a little crazy but it really felt like Tamara was watching over us and I would always be thankful to her for sending Emily back to me.
* * *
A few hours later Emily was asleep on my chest again, there was a light tap on the door and the nurse I had spoken to a couple of days on the other ward popped her head round "Is it ok to come in, I have a little someone that wants to see Emily."
I nodded "She's asleep but bring him in."
She wheeled Luke in and I could instantly see the cute wide smile across his face "How is she Naomi?"
I smiled "She's very tired, she's asleep at the moment."
Emily shifted slightly and I heard her mumble softly "Who's asleep."
Luke beamed "Emily, Emily it's me. I wanted to see you."
She lifted her head and smiled "And how is my favourite patient this afternoon."
He continued to smile "I am ok. I miss you Emily."
She smiled again but I could tell she was in pain "I miss you too."
He put his hand up to Emily's bed and she reached to take him "Emily when are you coming back to work?"
Her face dropped a little "I don't know mister but I don't think it will be for a while. I still have a lot of pain and I need that to go first."
He looked sad "Ok."
I could see Emily was upset but she held it together "How about I ask Effy to work with you until I am better, you remember Effy don't you?"
He didn't seem very happy but nodded "But Emily Effy is grumpy."
Emily laughed "She can be but what if I promise you I will tell Effy she can't be grumpy with you, she can be fun as well."
He smiled a little "Ok but you have to promise."
Emily smiled and linked her little finger with his "Pinky promise."
He laughed "Pinky promise."
The nurse with him smiled "Come on Luke let's take you to see the nurses outside I just want to talk to Emily a minute."
He smiled "Bye Emily, Bye Naomi."
I smiled "Bye Luke."
Emily waved "Bye Luke, see you soon."
* * *
A few minutes later the nurse came back in, Emily tried to sit up a little but didn't get very far until the pain shot through her "Claire is everything ok?"
She smiled "Yeah he is doing well, he just wanted to see you, he hasn't really got anyone else anymore, it was just him and his dad and well you know what happened with that."
Emily's face fell "What's going to happen to him?"
Claire shrugged "I don't know, I mean he is going to be in hospital for a while longer yet but after that I guess it will be foster care and possibly adoption."
I held Emily's hand "Does he know?"
She shook her head "I don't think he knows everything but he's not daft he will know things aren't right."
Emily smiled slightly "He is definitely a bright kid, Claire will you keep me updated, I know it's not professional but I kind of feel responsible."
She shook her head again "You are in no way responsible Emily but yeah I will keep you updated, he really looks up to you and technically he is still your patient but that is on one condition."
Emily nodded "Ok, go on."
She smiled "You don't worry too much; you have to look after yourself and get yourself better."
Emily smiled "Ok you have yourself a deal, anyway there is no way Naomi will let me do anything else."
I laughed "Too right."
Claire laughed "I will leave you two alone now."
Emily smiled "Come and see me again soon, it's doing my head in being stuck in here."
I playfully slapped her arm "You have me here."
She smiled again "That is the only thing keeping me sane right now."
I kissed her softly "That's what I like to hear."
Claire rolled her eyes "I see what Effy means about you two being sickly cute together."
Emily laughed "Only because I love her so much."
I smiled "And because I love her so much."
* * *
The Following Day
Emily had slept most of the time after her visitors yesterday, Katie, Cook and Effy all popped up to see her but didn't disturb her. I enjoyed being snuggled up close to her even if it was still in a single bed in a hospital room, I couldn't wait to get Emily home so she could sleep in her own bed and so I knew she was comfortable and also so I could wait on her hand and foot until she was fully better.
She stirred in my arms as the sun began to brighten up the room through the window; I kissed her cheek softly "Morning beautiful."
She smiled "Morning."
I hugged her close "How are you feeling this morning?"
She smiled slightly "Same old really, I just want to be able to go home." She paused a moment "Naoms talking of home you should go and get some proper rest. I feel bad you being here all the time squashing up into this bed with me; I can see how tired you are. I don't want you making yourself ill."
I shook my head "I'm not going anywhere, I am not leaving your side I will go home when you are discharged and as for squashing up in this bed with you I am not going to complain as it just means I get to be close to you."
She kissed me softly "You are the best you know that?"
I smiled "I have been told a few times."
She laughed "Not modest with it though, I mean it though I don't want you making yourself ill."
I kissed her softly once more "I won't I promise."
I pulled her as close to me as I could and she snuggled herself into my chest, we stayed like that in silence for a few minutes until one of the nurses came in "Morning Emily, I've got your pain relief for you."
I went to move but Emily stopped me whispering "Don't move." She sat up a little and I could see it hurt but she swallowed the tablets down. The young nurse checked her notes at the bottom of her bed before turning to leave "I'll be back later."
Emily smiled "Ok." She paused "Marie I don't suppose you know when they might discharge me, I just want to go home."
Marie smiled slightly "I'm not sure Emily but I will try and find out for you."
She looked disappointed "Ok thank you."
As Marie left I hugged Emily close "They will discharge you soon."
She smiled slightly "I hope so; I know this might sound stupid as I work here but I am so sick of the place."
I laughed and kissed her cheek softly "It doesn't sound stupid, this situation is completely different to you coming to work."
She sighed "Yeah I guess, I just want our lives to be back to normal. You have a job to get back to as well I don't want this to ruin things in your life."
I cut her off with a kiss "I am not worried about my job, I have all the time off I need but even if I didn't it wouldn't make any difference as you are the most important person in my life."
She kissed me softly "I love you."
I held her in my arms "I love you too."
* * *
Emily drifted back off to sleep for a few hours, I knew she kept beating herself up about falling asleep on me all of the time but as I kept telling her she needs her rest and I would be here whether she was asleep or not. She only woke up when Effy came in "How's the patient this morning?"
I smiled "She's asleep."
I felt Emily stir in my arms "She's awake now and the patient just wants to go home."
Effy laughed "That sounds about right, have they said when you can go?"
Emily shook her head "No. Anyway come and sit down and distract us with something else other than me."
Effy pulled up a chair "Well I think you will be interested to know I have a new patient."
Emily smiled "Luke by any chance?"
Effy nodded "Yeah, just had my first session with him and all he did was talk about you."
I laughed "I'm not surprised he seems to really love Emily. He came to see her last night and it was lovely to see how he looks up to her."
Effy smiled "Well she is a fucking good physiotherapist."
Emily smiled "You are too Eff, anyway I have promised Luke that I will tell you that you are not allowed to be grumpy with him."
Effy pretended to look shocked "Me grumpy!"
I laughed "Yes you grumpy."
She spun to look at me "You are a fine one to talk; I have never had such a fucking grumpy patient."
Emily laughed "She's got a point gorgeous."
I finally joined in the laughter "Ok I admit I can be grumpy but Eff you have your moments to and you have to promise that you won't be grumpy with Luke, he is vulnerable at the moment and it took some persuasion to get him to work with you, he wanted Emily back."
She smiled "Ok I promise I won't be grumpy with him."
Emily smiled "Thanks Eff."
We all looked towards the door as it opened and Emily's doctor came in "Morning Ladies, can I have a moment with Emily?"
Emily smiled "Morning Doctor, its ok you can say whatever in front of Effy."
Effy spun and smiled in his direction "Morning Doctor."
He smiled "Morning Effy" before turning back to me "I hear you have been asking when you can go home."
Emily nodded "Yeah I just want to go home and sleep in my own bed with my gorgeous girlfriend."
He looked at her charts "You are doing well, can I have a look at your wound?"
She nodded and lifted her gown and he peeled back the dressing, I could see Emily was in pain when he pressed around the general area, she squeezed my hand a little. He fixed the dressing back in place "You're wound is healing well Emily but I can see you are still in pain but that can be expected after the trauma you have been through. I think we can look at discharging you in the next couple of days."
She smiled "That's brilliant."
He smiled "I will start putting the discharge plans together and organise any pain relief you are going to need to take home with you. I am assuming you will have someone to look after you."
She smiled "Yeah definitely."
I looked at the doctor "I will be with her 24 hours a day."
He looked to Emily who smiled "She will, I think you can be sure of that as she hasn't left my side since I've been here."
He smiled "Very well, I will go set the wheels in motion."
He turned to leave and I couldn't help but notice Effy almost burning a hole through his trousers with her eyes "Something you would like to tell us Effy?"
She just smirked "You can't blame a girl he is hot."
Emily laughed "Eff has had her sights set on him for a while, she will get him eventually."
I raised my eyebrows "If it was anyone else I would be doubtful but as it's Effy I can actually imagine it happening."
Effy laughed "Anyway guys I best get back to it; I have another session with young Luke this afternoon."
Emily smiled "Say hi to him from me."
Effy nodded "I will do and you look after yourself, I'll be up to see you at some point."
Emily snuggled back into me as we once again found ourselves alone, I could tell she was worried about something "You ok Em?"
She sighed "Yeah, I'm just worried about Luke, what do you think will happen to him Naoms?"
I wrapped my arms tighter around her "I don't know Em but he is a strong young lad I'm sure he will be ok."
She kissed my chest "Yeah." She paused "Thanks for sticking with me Naoms."
I kissed the top of her head "I wouldn't be anywhere else; you are stuck with me for good."
I felt her smile "Love you always."
I smiled "Love you always."
29. Chapter 29
**Sorry I have been a bit slack at updating this, I've been a bit slack at writing it as well to be honest but anyway here is the next chapter. I would like to thank everyone for their reviews and for adding this to your alerts and favourites :-)**
**I am going away for a week on Monday to London and not taking my laptop with me so this will be the last update until I am back. **
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Chapter Twenty Nine
Two Weeks Later
Emily
I was finally discharged from hospital a week ago; it was so good to be back home with Naoms, to be snuggled up with her in our own bed. I haven't been much of a girlfriend to her though as I have remained in a lot of pain especially when I move and have just slept so much due to the pain relief making me tired. In the last week though I have been feeling a little more like myself, I have been awake more and have made the most of my time with my gorgeous girlfriend. I seriously know how fucking lucky I am to have her, she has taken more time of work to stay with me even though I told her I would be ok, I don't think I will ever forget what she said to me "I believe that you would be ok Emily but I want to be with you, I want to be able to take care of you like you took care of me."
She was so sweet with me and it only made me fall in love with her even more than I already was. She has spent so much time just lying on our bed with me whilst I slept, cuddling me close to her and just generally made me feel so fucking relaxed and so loved. In the past I have often thought I would never have the opportunity to be happy in life, everything in past relationships always seemed to go wrong and I had just about given up until I met Naomi and she made me think about everything all over again, I finally let myself fall in love and most of all I finally let someone in and gave her my heart, my whole heart.
Naomi is downstairs at the moment making us some lunch she had told me to stay where I was but I had other ideas, as comfortable as our bed was I wanted to spend some time out of it. I slowly stood up ever thankful the pain was easing significantly and made my down the stairs as quietly as I could not wanting to alarm Naomi before I got anywhere. I slowly wandered into the kitchen and snaked my arms around Naomi's waist and kissed her shoulder softly. She spun carefully in my arms "What are you doing down here, you should be resting."
I kissed her lips softly "I needed to get out of that bed for a bit and I need to get moving again, I just want out lives to go back to normal which means I need to speed up my recovery."
She pulled me close to her in a hug and kissed the top of my head "I don't want you to hurt yourself by pushing too hard."
I pulled back a little and smiled softly "I promise you I won't do anything I don't feel up to."
She smiled and kissed me softly "Ok, why don't you go and sit in the lounge then and I will bring lunch through and we can watch a film or something."
I smiled "Sounds good."
She kissed my forehead again before I slowly made my way into the lounge. Naomi followed me through about 5 minutes later with a lovely looking lunch; she always did know how to spoil me. She passed me my sandwich and put hers on the table "What film do you fancy watching?"
I thought for a minute "How about we watch the two Bridget Jones films, I feel like watching something funny."
She smiled "Me too."
She put the first DVD in before picking up her sandwich and sitting close next to me. Once we had finished eating Naomi put the plates on the table and I shifted so I was lying with my head in her lap loving the feeling as she softly ran her fingers through my hair as we both continued to enjoy the film.
* * *
A few days later Katie came home after work to find Naomi and I cuddled up on the sofa once again with Naomi reading to me "Alright lezza's how's things?"
I couldn't help but smile, I was used to Katie's nickname for us now and it didn't bother either of us "Alright bitch and things are good. How's Cook?"
Katie smiled "He's good, I've just come to get some stuff as I'm going to stay there again tonight."
I grinned "You may as well just move in."
She shot me a look "We are not at that stage yet but I will let you get away with that comment as you are still recovering. Anyway you should be pleased as it gives you two more time alone together."
I sighed "It's not as if we would be getting up to anything anyway."
Katie raised her eyebrows "Yeah yeah."
I couldn't help but laugh as Katie flounced out the room up the stairs, a couple of minutes later she came thumping back down and stuck her head around the door "Later bitches."
I rolled my eyes as Naomi did the same both of us replying "Bye Katie."
* * *
2 Weeks Later
Naomi
Emily was doing so much better, she was hardly in any pain and her life was really getting back to normal. She had been in talks with Emma about returning to work soon even if it was for a few days to begin with to get her back into it slowly which only meant I was going to have to go back to work, don't get me wrong I love my job but I love Emily more and I was seriously going to fucking miss spending so much time with her, well every day with her in fact. I know I will get to come home to her every night but it just won't be the same. I heard Emily come down stairs as I threw myself on the sofa, she came into the lounge and kissed me softly "I'm going to make a coffee, you want one?"
I pulled her down on top of me "I would rather lie here kissing you."
She smirked as she covered my body with hers and pressed her lips to mine, I wrapped my arms tightly around her holding her close to me, she pulled away after a few minutes gasping for air and I just smiled before pulling her head down once again, I had missed kissing her like this so much, in fact I had missed feeling her body against mine full stop but Emily still seemed reluctant to go there even though everything was almost back to normal. I would still love Emily and want to be with her if she never wanted to have sex again but fuck I wanted her so badly right now, we had been sharing these heavy kissing sessions for a couple of weeks now and it was making me so hot under the collar but they never went any further as Emily always pulled back and went off to do something else. After 15 minutes of being on the sofa like this Emily did as she always did, she stood up and I groaned at the lack of contact but she just smiled "I'm off to make that coffee now I'm gasping."
I sighed and Emily knew instantly there was something wrong "What is it?"
I shook my head "Nothing just go and make your coffee. I'm fine."
She shook her head "No Naomi I can tell there is something wrong, talk to me."
I took a deep breath as I debated with myself whether or not to bring it up with her or just to wait until it just happened naturally, in the end I decided to just come out with it "Have you gone off me or something?"
She looked surprised "No." she sat next to me again "No of course I haven't."
I looked at her briefly "What is the problem then, every time things get heated you pull away from me. I get it if you're not ready or don't feel up to it I just wish you would tell me where you are at. As you know I was so fucking scared when I got the call to say something had happened to you, I really thought I was going to lose you and I never want to have to feel like that again but now Emily, now I feel like I am loosing you all over again."
She stroked my cheek softly "I want to more than anything, do you know how hard it is to pull myself away from you every time like I have been, it's like I am torturing myself. You are not losing me Naoms, I could never let you go."
I turned to look at her and found myself getting lost in her chocolate brown eyes "Why then Em, what is the problem?"
She looked down "It's just" she trailed off before looking up at me again "It's just, oh this is going to sound stupid, I am worried about my scar."
I was confused "What about your scar Em?"
A tear fell from her eye "You used to spend ages kissing my stomach as you made your way down my body and you always say you enjoy kissing my smooth skin and now, now I have a huge fucking ugly scar and what if it's just not the same anymore, what if everything has changed Naoms?" She suddenly went quiet "I couldn't bare it if it has."
I quickly enveloped her in a hug showering the top of her head with soft kisses "You will always be beautiful and gorgeous and sexy to me however many scars you have covering your body, I will always love you and always want to be with you so much. I want to be able to kiss every inch of your skin including your scar and of course make your whole body tremble as you scream out my name."
She cut me off with a searing kiss completely taking my breath away "What the fuck are you waiting for then?"
I stood up quickly and grabbed Emily's hand before pulling her up the stairs to our bedroom.
As we stood at the bottom of the bed I suddenly found myself feeling nervous, I know this was nothing new for Emily and I but I wanted to make her feel so fucking special, I wanted her to know how serious I was when I said she was beautiful to me whatever scars she had. Emily broke me from my thoughts, her fingers caressing my cheeks before she slowly kissed me, her fingers now tangled in my hair. After a minute Emily pulled back a little and smiled softly "I want you so much Naomi."
Just hearing the tone in her voice as she said those words set my whole body alight and I pulled her to me slamming our lips together wanting her so much, my whole body ached for her touch as I slowly brushed my lips against hers, followed by her chin before trailing my lips down her neck reaching her shoulders. Emily's hands were wandering over my body as she moaned softly, I suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to look into her eyes and I was not disappointed as I looked deep into chocolate brown, she smiled making my heart beat faster than it already was as she tangled her fingers further through my blond locks. I moved my hand tracing my fingers over her cheeks reaching her lips watching as the brown of her eyes darkened. I couldn't help but smirk a little as she took a sharp intake of breath before softly kissing the tips of my fingers.
I wanted to take things slowly, to savour every kiss and every touch, I wanted to make this special for Emily, I wanted her to know just how much I loved her. I gripped her waist and pulled me as close to her as I could, my lips claiming hers with mine once more, both of us moaning at the much needed contact. Emily parted her lips inviting me inside; I cupped her head in my hand and held her close to me are tongues battling one another and teasing one another.
A few minutes later I gripped the shirt she was wearing undoing the buttons one at a time until I could peel the garment away, she helped me by pushing my arms out of the sleeves letting it fall to the floor by our feet. I broke our kiss and smirked "I do like you in that shirt."
She returned my smirk "I had better put it back on again then."
I raked my eyes over my chest "Right now I prefer you out of it, much prefer you out of it."
I reached up cupping her breasts loving the sounds that escaped her mouth as I stroked her nipple through her bra. I felt it grow hard instantly as she pressed her lips against mine once more, her lips more insistent this time. I snaked my arm around her back unclipping her bra, pulling it away from her body and throwing it to the side out of the way. I trailed a line of kisses over her chest until I reached her breasts sucking a nipple into my mouth, licking and flicking against it wanting to make her feel good. I could feel Emily's body trembling against mine as I continued my assault on her body, I didn't know how much longer she would be able to hold herself up so I slammed her against the wall unable to take this slowly anymore. Her hands were wandering everywhere again and I quickly found myself topless with my bra quickly following my top. I couldn't help but groan as she pressed her hands to my breasts caressing them softly. I pushed my lips against hers again just needing to feel her against me in every way, this time the kiss was urgent and we both knew exactly what we wanted in that moment. I broke my lips from hers and slid down her body to my knees, I made quick work of the button on her jeans tugging them down her legs her underwear quickly following as Emily kicked them away before I began trailing a line of kisses up her inner thighs. Emily took a sharp intake of breath as I kissed my way to her centre, she moaned loudly as I pushed my tongue between her folds flicking inside of her. She pulled on my hair as I pushed deep inside of her, she groaned loudly "Oh fuck Naoms."
As she pulled harder on my hair, her hips thrusting towards me as I pushed harder and deeper inside of her, I could feel her muscles tightening letting me know she was close. I flicked my tongue making her moan even louder only spurring me on. I curled my tongue inside pushing her over the edge, she cried out her whole body shaking as I continued softly flicking my tongue inside of her as she slowly came down from her high.
Emily collapsed back against the wall as I climbed back up her naked body planting soft kisses everywhere on her body paying special attention to her scar before softly planting a single kiss on her lips. She quickly wrapped her arms around me and pulled me roughly against her kissing me passionately, she pushed her body against mine shifting me backwards until I felt the edge of the bed behind my knees. She looked deep into my eyes and smirked before pushing me backwards, I shuffled backwards and she climbed over my body only pausing to undo the button on my jeans, she smiled cheekily "You have way to many clothes on."
I smiled and lifted my hips as we made quick work of removing my remaining clothes. I could see in her eyes just how much she wanted me. She lay her body on top of mine pressing against me her lips claiming mine before she began moving her way down my body kissing my neck and over my collar bone until she reached my breasts. She bit one nipple between her teeth making me moan loudly. I moved my body towards hers loving the feeling of her on top of me, the fire flooding my body as she made me feel so fucking alive. My nipples became hard instantly as she circled her tongue licking and sucking. I groaned as she slipped her knee between my thighs. I gripped the sheet on the bed as she slowly slid her way down my body kissing every inch of my skin making my whole body tremble. She slowly parted my legs softly kissing my inner thigh. I took a sharp intake of breath as Joey snaked her tongue through my folds of skin pushing deep inside of me, I couldn't help but moan loudly as she made me feel so amazing. I pushed my hips against her mouth wanting to be as close to her as possible. I gripped the sheet harder feeling it scrunch within my hands. I knew I was close as Emily flicked her tongue inside of me. She brushed her thumb over my clit as she curled her tongue inside of me pushing me over the edge. I cried out as wave after wave rushed through my body, my whole body was trembling as I screamed out her name over and over.
After a few minutes Emily slowly made her way up my body showering me with soft kisses until she reached my lips kissing me softly but full of passion as I wrapped my arms tightly around her enjoying the feel of her body still pressed against mine.
We lay tangled on the bed together showering one another with soft kisses before Emily stroked my cheek "I have waited so long to do that, I have missed being with you like that so fucking much."
I smirked "Well we had better make up for it then." I shifted my body so I was straddling Emily again before pinning her arms to the bed my lips pressing to hers once more.
End file.
| fanfiction |
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* ; * ? ? ?
alternative formalisms , such as that of @xcite , treat the physical processes very differently .
particular emphasis is often placed on the treatment of meridional circulation . while those models based on zahn s ( 1992 ) treat meridional circulation as an advective process , @xcite treat it as a diffusive process .
this leads to fundamentally different behaviour .
this is just one feature of the model which may lead to significantly different results .
even so , both treatments are used and frequently quoted in the literature for their predictions of the effect of rotation on stellar evolution .
one of the most poorly explored features of stellar rotation is the treatment of angular momentum transport within convective zones .
current 1d models , treat convective zones as rotating solid bodies .
this is not necessarily correct and there are strong reasons to explore alternatives such as uniform specific angular momentum ( e.g. * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
this potentially has dramatic consequences for the evolution because a star with uniform specific angular momentum through its convective core has much more angular momentum for a given surface rotation velocity .
it also has a strong shear layer at the convective boundary that can drive additional transport of chemical elements .
different models for stellar rotation have not been compared directly on a common numerical platform alongside otherwise identical input physics before . from the cambridge stellar evolution code
@xcite we have produced a code capable of modelling rotating stars in 1d under the shellular rotation hypothesis of @xcite .
the code , rose ( rotating stellar evolution ) , can be easily programmed to run with different physics for stellar rotation and can model both radiative and convective zones under a range of different assumptions .
this allows us to compare a variety of models for stellar rotation and determine what , if any , observable traits could be used to distinguish between them .
we foresee two possibilities ; either we can identify clear observational tests to eliminate certain models or the models show no testable difference in which case a simplified model could be formulated to provide the same results .
in section 2 we outline the physical ingredients to rose and the different models already implemented . in section 3
we present a comparison of the evolutionary predictions for each model . in section 4
we present our summary and conclusions .
here we present the physical ingredients of the numerical code , rose , used to implement the models of stellar rotation .
rose is based on the cambridge stellar evolution code , stars .
originally written by @xcite , the code has been modified many times over the past thirty years . for details of the last significant update see @xcite .
we now solve the four structure equations , seven chemical equations and now the angular velocity equation in a single , implicit , newton - raphson iterative step .
we calculate @xmath0h , @xmath1he , @xmath2he , @xmath3c , @xmath4n , @xmath5o and @xmath6ne implicitly and 39 other isotopic abundances can be calculated explicitly .
the nuclear reaction rates were updated by @xcite and @xcite and are based on the reaction rates of @xcite .
the opacities were last updated by @xcite and are based on the opal opacities @xcite at high temperatures and @xcite at low temperatures . also included are further corrections for major molecular opacities @xcite .
the equation of state is that of @xcite , convection is treated by mixing - length theory @xcite and a model for convective overshooting @xcite is included . whilst the code has a number of models for mass loss programmed , we restrict ourselves to the mass - loss rates of @xcite for massive stars .
these rates apply to non - rotating stars and are modified as explained in section [ massloss ] .
the centrifugal force caused by rotation affects the hydrostatic balance of the star , effectively reducing the local gravity . on a surface of constant radius
the centrifugal force acts more strongly at the equator than the poles so the distortion of the star depends on co - latitude and our assumption of spherical symmetry is no longer valid .
@xcite showed that , except for stars that are close to critical rotation , the effect of rotational deformation remains axially symmetric .
enhanced mass loss from the surface because of rotation generally keeps stars rotating sufficiently below critical . even when this is not the case it is only the outer most layers that are affected . in models where the angular momentum distribution in convective regions is uniform
the rotation rate may approach critical there but because convective turbulence is already considered to be fully asymmetric , we do not need to consider further non - axial instabilities owing to the rotation .
we adopt similar adjustments to the stellar structure equations to those described by @xcite and @xcite .
first we define @xmath7 to be a surface of constant pressure , @xmath8 .
@xmath9 is the volume contained within @xmath7 and @xmath10 is the radius of a sphere with volume @xmath11 .
the equation of continuity is then preserved in its non rotating form , @xmath12 where @xmath13 is the mass enclosed within @xmath7 and @xmath14 is the density on the isobar which is assumed to be uniform .
as we discuss in section [ rotation ] we expect variables and chemical abundances to be uniform across isobars owing to the strong horizontal turbulence caused by the strong density stratification present in stars @xcite .
the local gravity vector is @xmath15 where @xmath16 is the local angular velocity . to proceed
further we define the average of a quantity over @xmath7 as @xmath17 where @xmath18 is a surface element of @xmath7 . using this notation
the equation of hydrostatic equilibrium becomes @xmath19 where @xmath20 and @xmath21 .
hence with the new definition of variables we can retain the same 1d hydrostatic equilibrium equation modified by a factor of @xmath22 which tends to unity for no rotation . the equation for radiative equilibrium is similarly modified to @xmath23 where @xmath24 is the total energy flux through @xmath7
, @xmath8 is the pressure , @xmath25 is the temperature , @xmath26 is the opacity , @xmath27 is the radiation constant , @xmath28 is the speed of light , @xmath29 is the gravitational constant and @xmath30 again , the non - rotating equation for stellar evolution has been preserved except for the multiplication by @xmath31 .
of the two factors , @xmath22 deviates further from unity for a given rotation than @xmath32 .
additional secondary effects of the reduced gravity must be taken into account when calculating quantities such as the pressure scale height and brunt visl frequency .
for the remainder of the paper we drop the subscript @xmath8 .
the amount of thermal flux , @xmath33 through a point in a star behaves as @xmath34 . as in equation ( [ geff ] ) , @xmath35 is strongly dependent on co - latitude and so the radiative flux is greater at the poles than at the equator .
this leads to a global thermal imbalance that drives a meridional circulation .
the presence of meridional circulation has been considered for nearly a century since @xcite . in the past
it has commonly been approximated by eddington - sweet circulation @xcite .
@xcite proposed an alternative but similar treatment of the meridional circulation based on energy conservation along isobars and this is the formulation we are currently using .
in spherical polar coordinates the circulation takes the form @xmath36 where @xmath37 and @xmath38 are linked by the continuity equation @xmath39 and @xmath40 is the second legendre polynomial @xmath41 .
we currently use an approximate form for the meridional circulation by @xcite @xmath42 where @xmath43 , @xmath44 , the total local energy emission , @xmath45 , @xmath46 is the specific heat capacity at constant pressure , @xmath47 is the radiative temperature gradient , @xmath48 is the adiabatic temperature gradient and @xmath49 is the mean molecular weight gradient . for simplicity ,
the thermodynamic ratio @xmath50 used by @xcite is set to unity .
this is the correct for a perfect gas .
we have also approximated the factor @xmath51 of @xcite by @xmath52 .
this is a suitable approximation throughout most of the star .
the constant @xmath53 is included for aid of calibration and is discussed further in section [ testmodels ] .
the same formulation for the meridional circulation is used in all the test models except those that use the formalism of @xcite where the circulation is treated as a diffusive rather than an advective process and the characteristic circulation velocity is calculated from eddington - sweet circulation .
observational evidence for enhanced mass loss is mixed ( see * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
* ) but theoretically near - critical rotation must drive additional mass loss to remove angular momentum and prevent the surface of the star from rotating super - critically @xcite .
we use the enhanced mass - loss rate of @xcite @xmath54 where we take @xmath55 and @xmath56 . a more complete discussion of the critical rotation rates of stars is given by @xcite and @xcite .
current 1d models of stellar evolution generally assume that convective zones are kept in solid body rotation .
this may be caused by strong magnetic fields induced by dynamo action @xcite but there is no conclusive evidence that real fields generated by this mechanism are strong enough to enforce solid body rotation .
certainly in the sun we see latitudinal variations in the angular velocity throughout the outer convective layer @xcite .
standard mixing length theory suggests that a rising fluid parcel should conserve its angular momentum before mixing it with the surrounding material after rising a certain distance .
this would lead to uniform specific angular momentum rather than solid body rotation .
this is supported by a recent mlt - based closure model for rotating stars @xcite and by 3d hydrodynamic simulations @xcite . in reality magnetic fields are likely to play some part in the transport of angular momentum but it is uncertain whether these are strong enough to affect the hydrodynamics .
the asymptotic behaviour of the rotation profile in convective zones could have a profound effect on the evolution of the star , first because the total angular momentum content of a star for a given surface rotation increases dramatically for uniform specific angular momentum and secondly because uniform angular momentum in the convective zone produces a layer of strong shear at the boundary with the radiative zone and this drives additional chemical mixing . to explore the different possible behaviours we have introduced , in rose , the capacity to vary the distribution of angular momentum in convective zones as discussed in section [ rotation ] .
differential rotation is expected to arise in stars because of hydrostatic structural evolution , mass loss and meridional circulation .
because of this stars are subject to a number of local hydrodynamic instabilities .
these are expected to cause diffusion of radial and latitudinal variations in the angular velocity in order to bring the star back to solid body rotation , its lowest energy state .
this occurs with characteristic diffusion coefficients @xmath57 and @xmath58 respectively .
@xcite proposed that , because of the strong stratification present in massive stars , the turbulent mixing caused by these instabilities is much stronger horizontally than vertically ( @xmath59 ) .
this leads to a situation where the angular velocity variations along isobars are negligible compared to vertical variations .
furthermore , all other state variables are assumed to be roughly constant over isobars and the mixing produces horizontal chemical homogeneity .
this is referred to as shellular rotation , where we describe the angular velocity by @xmath60 .
taking into account all of the processes described in section [ code ] we use the evolution equation for the angular velocity @xcite @xmath61 and for the chemical evolution @xmath62 where @xmath63 is the abundance of species @xmath64 .
the diffusion coefficient @xmath65 is non - zero only in convective zones and the @xmath57 and @xmath66 are non - zero only in radiative zones .
the parameter @xmath67 sets the steady state specific angular momentum distribution in convective zones , @xmath68 corresponds to solid body rotation and @xmath69 corresponds to uniform specific angular momentum .
the coefficient @xmath66 describes the effective diffusion of chemical elements because of the interaction between horizontal diffusion and meridional circulation so @xmath70 the main differences between models ( * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
* e.g. ) are the treatment of the meridional circulation , @xmath37 , the diffusion coefficients , @xmath57 , @xmath66 and @xmath65 , and the steady power - law distribution of angular momentum in convective zones determined by @xmath67 .
we describe many of these models which we have implemented with rose in section [ testmodels ] .
in this paper we consider a number of common models for comparison .
the details of the models are summarized in table [ modeltable ] .
unless otherwise stated , the metallicity is taken to be solar ( @xmath71 ) .
for each model we compute the stellar evolution for a range of masses between @xmath72@xmath73 and @xmath74@xmath73 and initial equatorial surface rotation velocities between @xmath75 and @xmath76 , except where the initial surface rotation rate would be super - critical . [ cols="^,^,^,^,^",options="header " , ] here we use the formulation for @xmath57 of @xcite , @xmath77 where @xmath78 is the critical richardson number which we have taken to be the same as did @xcite .
@xmath79 and @xmath80 following @xcite we take @xmath81\right)^{\frac{1}{3}}{,}\ ] ] where @xmath82 the differential equations derived by @xcite are fourth order in space .
our model differs in that third order derivatives and above can not be reliably computed and must be ignored .
the constant @xmath53 is included as a means of calibrating the model in light of this difference . because our ultimate intention is to compare these models to data from the vlt - flames survey of massive stars , we have chosen @xmath53 so that we reproduce the terminal - age main - sequence ( tams ) nitrogen enrichment of a @xmath83@xmath73@xmath84 star initially rotating at @xmath85 with galactic composition given by @xcite .
this gives @xmath86 .
whilst this is admittedly quite small , it is important to note that the non - linearity of the angular momentum transport equation means that a small change in the amount of diffusion corresponds to quite a large change in @xmath53 .
we could have similarly adjusted the magnitude of @xmath57 in case 1 to give the desired degree of nitrogen enrichment . however , attempting to reduce the diffusion coefficient results in more shear which drives the diffusion back up so @xmath57 would need to be reduced by a large factor to give the desired effect .
this would have the further consequence that the meridional circulation would have a much stronger effect on the system and produce stars with a very high degree of differential rotation between the core and the envelope .
hence we have chosen to adopt this method of calibration as the most physically reasonable .
the diffusion of angular momentum in convective zones is determined by the characteristic eddy viscosity from mixing length theory such that @xmath87 .
this model takes @xmath68 .
this is the model of @xcite . in this case
we set @xmath88 because circulation is treated as a diffusive process .
the details of the various diffusion coefficients are extensive so we refer the reader to the original paper . with their notation
the diffusion coefficients are @xmath89 and @xmath90 where each of the @xmath91 corresponds to a different hydrodynamical instability .
we note that our notation differs slightly from the original paper .
the diffusion coefficients @xmath92 and @xmath93 used by @xcite are equivalent to @xmath57 and @xmath94 respectively . @xcite
take @xmath95 which is what we use here .
the parameter @xmath96 used in @xcite is taken to be zero .
mean molecular weight gradients play an important part in chemical mixing near the core however we have performed a number of test runs with @xmath97 .
although there were some differences , they were not significant and could be largely masked by modifying the other free parameters associated with this case .
the model differs from the original formulation of @xcite in that we are unable to use _ stars _ to consistently compute non - local quantities such as the spatial extent of instability regions used in some of the expressions for the various diffusion coefficients .
we do not expect this to have a significant effect on the results since @xmath98 dominates the total diffusion coefficient and its limiting length scale is the pressure scale height rather than the extent of the unstable region .
this model is calibrated by modifying the dominant diffusion coefficient for transport owing to meridional circulation , @xmath98 , by a constant of order unity to give the same tams nitrogen enrichment as case 1 for a @xmath99@xmath73 star with initial surface angular velocity of @xmath100 .
this model has @xmath68 and @xmath101 .
this is a reproduction of the original model of @xcite and is included as a baseline to highlight the differences in predictions of stellar rotation from the original model . in this model
@xmath102 where @xmath103 @xmath104 @xmath105 is the thermal diffusivity and @xmath106 is the same as in case 1 . in this model @xmath107 and @xmath108 and @xmath109
are constants used for calibration .
we constrain @xmath108 and @xmath109 by matching as closely as possible the tams nitrogen enrichment and luminosity of a @xmath99@xmath73@xmath84 case-1 star with initial surface rotation of @xmath100 .
we find that @xmath110 which is surprisingly small .
this is because this model does not take into account mean molecular weight gradients and this leads to far more mixing between the convective core and the radiative envelope than in case 1 .
the tams luminosity is always greater than case 1 and so we minimize it with respect to @xmath109 so @xmath111 .
this is realised by setting @xmath112 and is the case when the horizontal diffusion completely dominates over the meridional circulation and so is consistent with our assumption of shellular rotation .
apart from ignoring mean molecular weight gradients , the main objection to this model is that in the formulation of @xmath58 we assume that , if the horizontal variation in the angular velocity along isobars takes the form @xmath113 , then @xmath114 is constant and this is not physically justified .
again we set @xmath68 and @xmath101 .
for these cases we use the same @xmath57 and @xmath58 as in case 1 but we set @xmath69 to produce uniform specific angular momentum through the convective zones and test the effect of varying the convective diffusion coefficient @xmath65 .
@xmath115 we have also calculated the evolution in cases 1 , 2 and 3 for the same masses and velocities but with @xmath116 .
we shall represent these cases with a superscript _ z _ ( e.g. case @xmath117 is the low metallicity analogue of case 1 ) .
whilst there are many potential observables which may be used to distinguish between different models , it is important to choose the ones that are most easily compared with observational data . from our stellar evolution calculations we find a number of important differences between the test cases .
first it is helpful to briefly examine the internal evolution that occurs .
we consider here the main - sequence evolution of a @xmath99@xmath73 star with initial surface rotation of @xmath100 for cases 1 , 2 and 3 .
although the centrifugal force causes some change in a star s structure , its evolution is strongly affected by changes in the chemical composition .
fig [ abundances ] shows how the composition of the rotating @xmath99@xmath73
case-1 star differs from a non - rotating @xmath99@xmath73 star at the end of the main sequence .
the difference in the rotation - induced mixing produces the variation in results between the various cases .
[ diff ] shows the angular velocity profile and the diffusion coefficient for vertical angular momentum transport in radiative zones predicted by each of cases 1 , 2 and 3 at the zero - age main sequence ( zams ) .
note that , even though the stars have the same surface rotation , their core rotation and hence total angular momentum content can vary significantly between models despite their similar treatments , cases 1 and 3 have quite different initial rotation profiles .
this is largely due to our choice of calibration .
because in case 3 we ignore mean molecular weight gradients , the overall efficiency of mixing must be reduced to match our calibration criterion ( section [ testmodels ] ) .
this means that shear diffusion is much weaker relative to advection and so a profile with more differential rotation results .
had we chosen to calibrate the mixing by reducing @xmath53 instead of @xmath108 we would have found the opposite effect .
this highlights one possible pitfall of including multiple free parameters within a given system .
case 2 is dominated by diffusion because of the diffusive treatment of meridional circulation .
recall that meridional circulation is treated advectively in cases 1 and 3 so is not included in the diffusion coefficient .
in fact it is responsible for production of the shear at the zams despite turbulence trying to restore solid body rotation . because there is no perturbation to the rotation at the start of the main sequence , the star in case 2 rotates as a solid body . as the star evolves and mass is lost from its surface the solid body rotation is disturbed .
even so , because of the strong diffusion , case 2 stars never deviate far from solid body rotation as can be seen in fig .
[ diff2 ] .
we note that case-1 stars reach the end of the main sequence with a higher mass than those in case 2 or case 3 .
this is because case-2 and case-3 stars have a longer main - sequence life owing to more efficient mixing at the core
envelope boundary .
this allows hydrogen to be mixed into the core more rapidly than in case 1 .
this also leads to larger core masses in cases 2 and 3 compared to case 1 .
we see in fig .
[ diff ] that the predicted diffusion coefficients for cases 1 and 2 are similar throughout most of the envelope . by the tams ,
the diffusion predicted by case 2 is significantly lower than the other two cases .
this is possibly because rising shear owing to rapid hydrostatic evolution at the tams causes the diffusion in cases 1 and 3 to increase while in case 2 diffusion is dominated instead by the circulation .
unsurprisingly , the diffusion coefficient in case 3 is similar in form to case 1 but significantly smaller , a result of our choice of @xmath108 .
we note however that the diffusion coefficient predicted by the two cases is very similar by the end of the main sequence .
also , the diffusion coefficient at the core - envelope boundary at the end of the main sequence in case 1 is around an order of magnitude lower than in case 3 .
this is partially due to the core of the case-3 star rotating faster than in case 1 but is mostly due to the inclusion of the mean molecular weight gradient in the formulation for case 1 .
@xcite ( who use a model very similar to our case 1 ) predict a much greater decline in the mixing near the core but we have been unable to reproduce this .
it is likely that the difference is a result of the inhibiting effect of the mean molecular weight gradient on the rotational mixing .
whilst it is included in our models , the results of @xcite suggest that towards the end of the main - sequence its effect covers a much larger proportion of the radiative envelope than in our models .
as expected , the effects of rotation on the structure and chemical evolution of each star are significant across the hr diagram .
we have plotted the case 1 models in fig [ hr ] .
centrifugal forces cause the star to expand making it dimmer and redder .
however , because of the additional chemical mixing , more hydrogen is made available during the main sequence so , by the main - sequence turn off , rotating stars are generally more luminous than similar mass non - rotating stars . this effect becomes more pronounced at higher rotation rates and is most apparent for stars with masses up to @xmath99@xmath73 .
there are clear differences between the predicted evolution of rotating stars in each of the three cases .
[ hrrad1 ] shows the evolution of five different stellar masses in the hr diagram for cases 1 , 2 and 3 with an initial surface rotation of @xmath118 .
these cases are the three different models of rotational mixing in radiative zones at solar metallicity .
rotating case-1 stars appear to be the most luminous at low masses but least luminous at high masses .
case-2 stars are also consistently cooler than their case-1 and case-3 equivalents except below @xmath119@xmath73 .
this is because the strength of rotation - induced mixing increases rapidly with mass in case-2 stars unlike in cases 1 and 3 where the difference is more modest .
although there is apparently a large difference between the three models in the hr diagram , to distinguish between them from stellar populations requires either a very large sample or accurate independent measurements of stellar masses and rotation velocities .
both of these are very challenging but , with the advent of large scale surveys , the former is quickly becoming a possibility .
currently the key test for any model of stellar rotation is how well it reproduces the spread of data in a hunter diagram @xcite .
hunter plotted nitrogen enrichment against surface rotation .
large scale surveys , such as the vlt - flames tarantula survey @xcite , will greatly increase the data available for surface rotation velocities and surface abundances over the coming decade .
thus , if different models can be distinguished in a hunter diagram , this would form a key test for stellar rotation models . in fig .
[ nsol ] we plot our theoretical hunter diagram for @xmath119@xmath73 and @xmath120@xmath73 stars at different initial surface rotation velocities with the different radiative - zone models at solar metallicity .
each star begins at the bottom of the plot with the same nitrogen abundance but different initial surface velocities .
there is an initial period where the star spins down before any enrichment has occurred . during this time the star moves straight to the left of the plot .
eventually the surface nitrogen abundance begins to increase because of rotation induced mixing from the burning region . at the same time the star continues to spin down because of mass loss and structural evolution .
the net effect is that the star moves towards the upper left - hand region of the plot . at the end of the main sequence the star expands and rapidly spins down .
this appears as a near - horizontal line as the star moves rapidly towards the left - hand edge of the plot .
some further enrichment may occur during the giant phase .
the evolution of the surface abundances is very model dependent .
case 3 , which is based on the early model of @xcite , gives more nitrogen enrichment than case 1 at high masses ( @xmath121@xmath73 ) but significantly less at low masses ( @xmath122@xmath73 ) .
most notably though , the case-3 stars spin down to a far greater degree before enrichment occurs .
we attribute this to the neglect of mean molecular weight gradients . mixing near
the core is more efficient in case 3 but , due to the overall calibration , is weaker near the surface . for case 2
the amount of mixing in lower - mass stars is much less than for both cases 1 and 3
. by comparison the enrichment of case-2 @xmath120@xmath73 stars is greater than in the other two cases , particularly for slower rotators .
this mass dependent behaviour of the rotating models could provide important clues to distinguish between the models . at solar metallicity , owing to the enhanced mass loss , massive stars spin down before the end of the main sequence so , in this case , we would not observe the absence of the moderately rotating , highly enriched stars seen at low metallicity @xcite .
observations of multiple clusters at different ages at this metallicity would be a good test for rotating stellar models because the evolution across the hunter diagram is significantly different in each case even when they are calibrated to give the same level of enrichment at the end of the main sequence .
apart from the enrichment of nitrogen , rotation can have a large effect on the evolution of other elements .
changes in the carbon and oxygen abundances in rotating stars predicted from models have been considered but the accuracy of the data prohibits any strong conclusions from being made .
@xcite discuss the effect rotation may have on the surface abundances of light elements .
we consider here the evolution of the surface abundance of @xmath2he .
a similar analysis could be performed for other elements such as lithium and boron .
the changes in the overall abundance of @xmath2he because of rotation could partially explain the discrepancy between the predicted abundances produced by stars and the lack of enrichment of the ism compared to levels predicted by primordial nucleosynthesis @xcite .
this has been explained in the past by thermohaline mixing @xcite but , as our results show , the surface @xmath2he abundance is strongly affected by rotation and so it is likely to make at least some contribution to this effect .
we leave the issue of whether the total production increases or decreases over the stellar lifetime to future work . in either case ,
the evolution of helium-3 with respect to the surface rotation is very different between alternative models and so , as for nitrogen enrichment , this would form a useful means to compare stellar rotation models . unlike nitrogen , helium-3 enrichment is stronger at low masses and so provides a greater number of candidate stars for observations .
[ he3sol ] shows the helium-3 enrichment for @xmath119@xmath73 and @xmath120@xmath73 stars of varying initial surface velocities for each of the different radiative zone models at solar metallicity . as for nitrogen ,
all three cases show comparable amounts of enrichment in high - mass stars . the amount of enrichment at the end of the main sequence is the same in each case but
case-3 stars are slightly more enriched at all rotation rates .
case-3 stars spin down much more before enrichment occurs so the paths for these stars lie to the left of case 1 and case 2 stars but the amount of enrichment at the end of the main sequence is comparable , though slightly higher than , the other two cases .
the difference between the test cases is far greater at lower masses .
both case-2 and case-3 stars show substantially less enrichment during the main sequence especially for slow rotators and case-3 stars have much slower surface rotation at the end of the main sequence than in the other two cases .
both of these contribute to very different evolution which should be distinguishable observationally .
indeed , whilst the models may produce similar results for full population synthesis calculations , it has been found that there is often far less agreement when different mass ranges are considered separately @xcite . in order to compare stellar rotation models with data
it is important to distinguish which effects are observable at different metallicities .
low - metallicity stars are particularly useful because they have significantly lower mass - loss rates @xcite . for stars of metallicity @xmath116
the mass - loss rate is roughly ten times lower than at solar metallicity .
this allows us to rule out effects on the models produced by our prescription for mass loss .
the low - metallicity cases show similar distinctions in the hr diagram to those at solar metallicity , although high - mass , rapidly rotating , case-2 stars are sufficiently well mixed to undergo quasi - homogeneous evolution .
there are also significant differences in the nitrogen enrichment between the different models .
because the mass - loss rate is lower in low - metallicity stars they retain their surface rotation for much longer so the main sequence appears much more vertical in a hunter diagram . unlike the solar metallicity cases ,
case 2@xmath123 exhibits significantly more mixing than case 1@xmath123 particularly for slow and moderately rotating stars ( fig .
[ nz1 ] ) .
this is the complete opposite of the results at solar metallicity and highlights the importance of testing different stellar environments to discover clues to distinguish between different models .
in contrast , the enrichment of helium-3 in case 2@xmath123 stars is less than in case 1@xmath123 . as a consequence of increasing stellar radius and angular momentum conservation all models for stellar rotation predict a rapid decay in the surface rotation velocity after the end of the main sequence .
observations suggest that , even for rotating stars , there is a sharp cut - off in the effective gravity at @xmath124 when a star leaves the main sequence and moves over to the giant branch @xcite .
this effect depends on stars reaching the tams without spinning down too rapidly during the main sequence .
therefore it is more easily seen at lower metallicities where the mass - loss rate is lower .
the observed value for the tams gravity can be enforced in rotating models by including a degree of overshooting .
however this simply introduces an additional free parameter into the models . in fig .
[ gravz ] we show the different cut - offs in the effective gravity predicted by cases 1@xmath123 , 2@xmath123 and 3@xmath123 .
the end of the main sequence is indicated by a distinct cusp in the path of the star in the range @xmath125 .
note that the expected number of stars with significant rotation after the main - sequence cut - off is low because the evolution to a very slowly rotating giant is extremely rapid compared to the rest of the main sequence . for higher - mass stars
there is a sharp cut - off in the surface gravity at the end of the main sequence that is the same regardless of the model used although the tams surface rotation is somewhat higher in case 2 . the mixing in low - metallicity , high - mass , rapidly rotating , case-2 stars is very efficient and so they evolve almost homogeneously and thus they appear differently in the plot . for lower - mass stars
the change in surface gravity at the end of the main sequence is still clear but varies by around an order of magnitude across all rotation rates and test cases . case-2 and case-3 stars have lower terminal - age main - sequence surface gravities than case-1 stars and show a tendency towards lower tams surface gravities for more rapid rotators .
case-3 stars generally have lower rotation rates at the end of the main sequence for low - mass stars .
this distinguishes them from case 2 .
once again we see that the difference in stellar properties predicted by each model is strongly dependent on rotation rate , mass and metallicity suggesting that it is essential to explore populations covering as wide a range as possible in order to test rotating models . in order to compare the difference in the evolution of a star owing to the details of the model for convective angular momentum transport we now focus on cases 1 , 4 , 5 and 6 .
uniform specific angular momentum in the core causes more shear mixing near the core - envelope boundary than when the core is solid body rotating as shown in fig .
[ convdist ] .
this results in higher luminosity stars with similar temperatures .
there is almost no difference between cases 4 , 5 and 6 in the hr diagram .
when we compare the different models for convection in a hunter diagram we see that cases 4 , 5 and 6 , which have uniform specific angular momentum throughout their convective zones , have significantly more enrichment for all masses and rotation rates than case 1 .
the difference is more pronounced for higher - mass rapid rotators ( fig .
[ nsol2 ] ) . however , we note that it is more difficult to distinguish between cases 4 , 5 and 6 . for the highest mass stars we do find some difference in the enrichment of nitrogen and helium-3 between the models but recall that there is a difference in @xmath65 of four orders of magnitude between cases 5 and 6 . .
[ nsol2 ] given the small magnitude of the change in enrichment and structure over such a range of diffusion coefficients it seems unlikely that these tests can adequately distinguish between convective models .
in addition , adjusting the calibration of case 1 could produce a very similar effect making it difficult even to distinguish between @xmath69 and @xmath68 models from observations . at the same time
though , it is interesting to note the significant change that modifying the core angular momentum distribution has had on the evolution of the surface composition .
rotation in stars has a number of profound effects on their evolution .
not only are there significant changes in the hydrostatic structure @xcite but this causes a thermal imbalance that can lead to a strong meridional circulation current @xcite .
meridional circulation leads to additional shear which induces a number of instabilities .
the resulting turbulence leads to strong mixing of both angular momentum and chemical composition .
although most modellers include all of these effects , the exact implementation of stellar rotation can vary dramatically .
for example @xcite use a model where meridional circulation is treated diffusively .
the diffusion owing to shear is the linear combination of a number of coefficients based on different possible instabilities . on the other hand , models such as those of @xcite , @xcite and @xcite
treat the circulation as advective and use a single diffusion coefficient based on the magnitude of kelvin - helmholtz instabilities induced by shear . in these models
it is also necessary to define the magnitude of diffusion along isobars and this too varies between different models .
we have shown that different models generally give rise to similar qualitative conclusions but there are significant differences in the results based on mass , rotation rate and metallicity .
there are also open questions about how angular momentum transport occurs in convective zones . comparing the models based on @xcite and @xcite , case 1 , and that based on @xcite , case 2
, we find that case 1 gives higher luminosity stars for masses less massive than @xmath119@xmath73@xmath84 and more luminous , hotter stars at higher masses than case 2 .
high - mass stars give similar levels of nitrogen enrichment in each case but case 2 produces far less enrichment for low - mass and intermediate - mass stars than case 1 .
the situation is similar for their helium-3 enrichment .
the predicted effects of rotation appear to be highly dependent on the metallicity .
this is one of the clearest tests for different stellar rotation models . at metallicity of @xmath116 ,
case 2 actually produces significantly more nitrogen enrichment in high - mass stars although the degree of helium-3 enrichment is still lower in case 2 than case 1 .
additional effects are seen in lower - metallicity stars where the mass - loss rate is lower such as the variation of the surface gravity with respect to surface rotation velocity .
we see a sharp cut - off in the effective gravity at the end of the main sequence but the tams rotation rates are very different between different models .
case-2 stars reach the end of the main sequence with higher rotation rates than the other two cases for both low and high - mass stars .
case-1 stars reach the end of the main sequence with higher surface gravity than the other two cases but only for lower - mass stars .
all current models treat convective zones as rotating solid bodies .
this may be justified if convective zones can generate sufficiently strong magnetic fields ( e.g. * ? ? ?
* ) but , if not , hydrodynamic models and calculations suggest that convective zones should tend towards uniform specific angular momentum @xcite . identifying whether this is the case or not is difficult from surface observations .
there is no significant change in the paths of stars across the hr diagram between cases 4 , 5 and 6 .
in fact , there is no test we have found that would adequately differentiate between these three cases even though the diffusion coefficient in convective zones varies by four orders of magnitude .
there are some minor differences in the amount of enrichment for massive stars but these would be hard to test with existing data .
the models with uniform specific angular momentum generally produce slightly more luminous stars and higher surface chemical enrichment than those models with solid body rotating cores . however , slightly less efficient mixing in the radiative zone could mask this difference .
we have thus far not included magnetic fields in the models .
it has been suggested that the strong turbulence generated by rotation could result in a radiative magnetic dynamo @xcite . a sufficiently strong magnetic field can effectively suppress the meridional circulation and reduce the overall shear @xcite .
it could also result in additional mass and angular momentum loss ( e.g. * ? ? ?
as with rotation , there is little consensus on the details of magnetic field generation but it is generally accepted that the effects of rotation and magnetic fields can not be considered in isolation . in the future we plan to include magnetic fields in rose in a similar manner in order to better explore this important feature of stellar evolution . owing to the range of available models
, it is an extremely challenging problem to try to identify the one which best fits observed stellar populations .
now that large scale surveys are starting to produce data for many stars in different regions it is becoming possible to make progress and isolate which effects dominate . the key to distinguishing the relevant physics seems to be taking measurements of groups of stars at different masses , ages and metallicities . in individual clusters , models should be able to match not only the full distribution of observed stars but also the expected distribution in each mass range . whilst most of the models can be calibrated to fit the data for a single cluster
, we have shown that the behaviour of each model is highly dependent on mass and metallicity and so being able to fit data for a range of stellar environments is the true test for any model . using our new rotating stellar evolution code rose
combined with population synthesis codes ( e.g. * ? ? ?
* ; * ? ? ?
* ) we plan on making a detailed comparison of these models with the available data to identify how best to model stellar rotation .
the authors would like to acknowledge raphael hirschi for his helpful comments on the manuscript and urs frischknecht for compiling the data for comparison with our group s calculations .
atp thanks the stfc for his studentship and cat thanks churchill college for his fellowship .
jje is supported by the ioa s theory rolling grant .
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higher - curvature corrections to the einstein - hilbert ( eh ) action appear in any sensible theory of quantum gravity as next - to - leading orders in the effective action .
quadratic terms , for instance , such as the lanczos - gauss - bonnet ( lgb ) action @xcite , appear in _ bona fide _ realizations of string theory @xcite and m - theory @xcite .
interesting implications of these terms within the context of the ads / cft correspondence has been recently the focus of thorough investigation ( see , _
e.g. _ , @xcite ) .
they allow for the holographic description of a broad family of quantum field theories ( like 4d superconformal field theories with unequal central charges @xcite ) , as well as for the study of the fluid / gravity correspondence beyond the eh gravitational sector .
a remarkable example of higher - curvature gravity is lovelock theory @xcite , the natural extension of general relativity to higher dimensions . more precisely , it is the most general theory of gravity yielding second - order field equations .
general relativity and chern - simons gravity @xcite are particular cases of lovelock theories .
although quantum corrections are not generally of the lovelock type , these theories provide a tractable playground that captures many important features that are rather generic . among them , the existence of new branches of black hole solutions corresponding to vacua with different cosmological constants that pop out as soon as higher - curvature terms are brought into place .
the main motivation of the present work is that of studying transitions between the different vacua of the theory .
this is important to investigate whether a new type of instability involving non - perturbative solutions occurs in the theory .
studying such transitions may uncover a mechanism that eventually leads to a built - in mechanism to reduce the ( absolute ) value of the effective cosmological constant .
it is a well - known fact that black holes in ads display the so - called hawking - page ( hp ) transition @xcite , _
i.e. _ , the semiclassical phase transition between thermal ads space at finite temperature and a black hole in ads with the same hawking temperature
. this has been further interpreted as a confinement / deconfinement phase transition in the dual cft @xcite .
a natural question arises regarding the role of the different black hole branches and would be transitions among them . at first glance
it might seem that such phase transitions are forbidden since distinct branches exhibit a different asymptotic behavior . in this article , however , we report on a new type of phase transition taking place in higher - curvature gravities , which can be thought of as a sophisticated version of the hp transition involving different branches .
we work out the simplest example given by lgb gravity whose ordinary hp transition was studied in @xcite , since it is enough to realize that these phase transitions occur in lovelock theory as well @xcite , and possibly in a larger class of higher - curvature theories .
we consider the theory at finite temperature and observe that , above a critical temperature , @xmath0 , the higher - curvature vacuum decays producing a bubble which hosts a black hole in its interior .
this phase transition is analogous to the _ thermalon _ transition discussed in @xcite , where the materialization of an electrically charged bubble induces the decay of a de sitter vacuum into another with a smaller cosmological constant , but containing a black hole . in the present case ,
however , the bubble is not made from matter , but from the gravitational field itself .
it separates two regions having a different effective cosmological constant and ultimately changes its value throughout the whole space , thus changing the asymptotics . in the canonical ensemble ,
whether or not the transition takes place can be decided by evaluating the euclidean action on two well - defined classical configurations . according to our free energy computation ,
the phase transition actually occurs , the preferable static configuration above @xmath0 being a black hole surrounded by a bubble . in lorentzian
signature we can analyze its subsequent dynamics . we see that the bubble eventually expand in such a way that it swallows up the whole spacetime in finite proper time , thus changing the asymptotics . the lovelock action can be written in terms of the vierbein 1-form , @xmath1 , and the curvature 2-form , @xmath2 , @xmath3 being the ( torsion - free ) spin connection , @xmath4 with the _ bulk _ contributions , @xmath5 where @xmath6 , @xmath7 being the antisymmetric symbol , while @xmath8 is a positive integer , @xmath9 $ ] , and @xmath10 refers to boundary terms to be discussed below . the coefficients @xmath11 are coupling constants with length dimensions @xmath12 .
the @xmath13 term in the lagrangian corresponds to the extension of the euler characteristic in @xmath14 dimensions .
the zero@xmath15 contribution is the cosmological constant term ( we set @xmath16 , _
i.e. _ , @xmath17 ) , the first term is the eh action ( we normalize the newton constant to @xmath18 , _
i.e. _ , @xmath19 ) , and the second term , quadratic in the riemann curvature , is the lgb action ( we take @xmath20 , and call @xmath21 the lgb _ coupling _ ) .
although lovelock theory yields second order equations of motion , they are non - linear in the curvature . as a result ,
the theory admits more than one maximally symmetric solution ; it has up to @xmath8 different ( a)ds vacua with effective cosmological constants @xmath22 ,
they are the solutions of the @xmath24 order polynomial @xcite @xmath25 \equiv \sum_{k=0}^{k}c_{k}\,\lambda^{k } = c_{k}\prod_{i=1}^{k}\left ( \lambda -\lambda _ { i}\right ) = 0 ~. \label{cc - algebraic}\ ] ] the theory exhibits degenerate behavior whenever two or more of these effective cosmological constants coincide .
we are interested in the non - degenerate case .
the first ingredient in our discussion is the black hole solution of the theory .
consider the ansatz @xmath26 where @xmath27 is the round metric on a @xmath28-dimensional sphere .
the equations of motion reduce to a single first order differential equation for @xmath29 , that can be easily solved in terms of @xmath30 as @xcite @xmath31=\sum_{k=0}^{k}c_{k}\,g^{k}=\frac{\kappa } { r^{d-1 } } ~ , \label{eqg}\ ] ] an implicit polynomial solution with up to @xmath8 branches where @xmath32 is an integration constant related to the mass of the black hole @xcite , @xmath33 ~ , \label{mass}\ ] ] @xmath34 being the location of the horizon .
we focus on the quadratic theory which is enough to illustrate the phenomenon reported in this article .
the solutions take the form @xcite @xmath35 each of the two branches in ( [ gbbranches ] ) is associated with a different value of the effective cosmological constant , @xmath36 notice that @xmath37 is needed in order to have real non - degenerate values . while @xmath38 has a well defined horizon
, @xmath39 displays a naked singularity at the origin provided @xmath40 .
this latter branch is also unstable @xcite ; the graviton propagator is proportional to @xmath41<0 $ ] , thus having the wrong sign with respect to the eh case . in the dual cft
this amounts to non - unitarity @xcite .
the stable solution @xmath42 also happens to be the one that is continuously connected to the schwarzschild - tangherlini solution of general relativity in the @xmath43 limit ; namely @xmath44 these features are also manifest for generic black holes in lovelock theory @xcite .
the existence of a second vacuum of effective cosmological constant @xmath45 in the higher - curvature theory was referred to , in @xcite , as the theory having `` its own cosmological constant problem '' . moreover , for small lgb coupling , the curvature of such vacuum becomes very large , @xmath46 .
one may thereby argue that considering such a background in the quadratic theory does not make sense because higher - curvature terms can not be neglected .
however , far from removing this second vacuum , adding higher - order terms further produce a plethora of highly - curved vacua . with the purpose of understanding the implications of considering one such vacuum in the theory
, we consider spaces that asymptote ads of typical radius @xmath47 .
let us now discuss the role of the boundary terms , @xmath10 .
their contribution is necessary for the variational principle to be well defined .
this is analogous to the gibbons - hawking term in general relativity @xcite , which in the first order formalism can be written as @xmath48 where @xmath49 is the second fundamental form associated to the extrinsic curvature .
similarly , the boundary term associated to the lgb contribution reads @xcite @xmath50 in the same way as bulk terms are the dimensional extension of the @xmath14-dimensional euler characteristic for closed manifolds , the corresponding boundary terms are needed in the extension of the gauss - bonnet theorem to manifolds with boundaries .
the boundary action is then given by @xmath51 .
we want to explore configurations consisting of a spherical _ bubble _ dividing the spacetime in two regions , the outer being taken to asymptote ads with effective cosmological constant @xmath52 .
solutions consisting of a spherically symmetric surface separating regions with different vacua are known to exist @xcite .
they have been recently considered to explore instanton transitions , @xmath53 , via bubble nucleation @xcite . in the present case
we are interested in thermodynamic phase transitions .
it is convenient to break the action in three pieces , @xmath54 the first term is integrated inside the bubble , while the last term is integrated outside and includes all the boundary terms at infinity necessary to both have a well defined variational principle and to regularize the infinities .
the term in the middle is integrated on a small region around the bubble .
we consider the limit when its width goes to zero .
proceeding in this way , we deal with terms at the boundaries of each region , which give rise to a finite @xmath55 in the thick - less limit @xcite .
the variation of @xmath55 with respect to the vierbein gives the junction conditions on the bubble @xcite .
these generalize the israel conditions of general relativity .
the configuration we will be concerned with is a _ bubble _ , whose outer region asymptotes ads with a cosmological constant @xmath52 , while the inner region hosts a black hole with mass @xmath56 , and an effective cosmological constant @xmath57 .
the opposite situation does not possess a smooth euclidean section . across the junction ,
the vierbein has to be continuous .
sticking to spherical symmetry , the two bulk regions are described by a solution of the form ( [ gbbranches ] ) with euclidean signature , @xmath58 where the @xmath59 signs denote the outer / inner regions .
the notation is consistent with the respective branches .
we start by considering arbitrary branch solutions with undetermined mass parameters on each region .
the junction conditions then fully constrain the allowed possibilities . the junction is conveniently described by the parametric equations @xmath60 with an induced metric of the form @xmath61 , which has to be the same from both sides .
this yields @xmath62 where the dot stands for derivatives with respect to the proper time @xmath63 .
the function @xmath64 appears explicitly in the induced metric , so the radius has to be continuous across the surface .
this condition allows us to write all the expressions in terms of @xmath65 and its derivatives and eventually find a dynamical equation for the bubble itself @xcite .
we are interested in static configurations which , in view of ( [ rtcond ] ) , translates into @xmath66 this means that the physical length of the euclidean time circle is the same as seen from both sides of the junction .
this matching condition will let us determine the temperature .
once the periodicity of the inner solution is fixed by demanding regularity at the black hole horizon , that of the outer solution gets fully determined , @xmath67 such that there is a _ unique _
free parameter , the temperature .
while @xmath68 is the inverse of the hawking temperature of the inner black hole solution , @xmath69 is the inverse of the temperature measured by an observer at infinity . by resorting to the usual euclidean time formalism
, we can compute the free energy associated to the bubble configuration that hosts a black hole , and then compare it with that of thermal ads at the same temperature . as we show in what follows , the computation indicates that the phase transition occurs above a critical temperature , @xmath70 .
the canonical ensemble at temperature @xmath71 is defined by the path integral over all metrics which asymptote ads identified in euclidean time with period @xmath72 , @xmath73 } } ~ , \label{path}\ ] ] where @xmath74 .
the dominant contributions come from the saddle points .
we have then to evaluate the euclidean action on a classical solution , @xmath75 which therefore gives the free energy , @xmath76 . in the present case ,
this basically amounts to computing the difference between the euclidean action of the bubble configuration and that of ads space identified with the same period in imaginary time .
the euclidean action is in general divergent due to the infinite volume of ads ; nevertheless , it can be suitably regularized by background subtraction , meaning that the free energy is actually measured with respect to the maximally symmetric solution .
the periodicity at infinity is fixed by demanding regularity of the black hole solution at the horizon , @xmath77 , supplemented by the gluing condition ( [ tglue ] ) , that determines in turn the outer periodicity . in order to simplify the discussion
, we calculate the on - shell action in terms of two parameters , the position of the bubble , @xmath65 , and the temperature , even though they are not independent from each other . unlike the computation of the hp effect in general relativity
, here we have to consider the contribution @xmath78 arising on the bubble , when writing the euclidean action in the form ( [ pieces ] ) . the boundary term in @xmath79 regularizes its divergence by subtracting the background @xmath80 with the same periodicity at infinity .
the term @xmath81 , in turn , is integrated from the horizon to the location of the bubble .
finally , @xmath78 is given by @xmath82 where the periodicity in euclidean time is inherited from the bulk regions , @xmath83 .
we can collect all contributions depending upon the location of the bubble , @xmath84 , the rest being consequently called @xmath85 . remarkably enough , a neat result comes out after a quite lengthy calculation that nicely carries on to the generic lovelock theory @xcite , once the junction conditions are imposed , @xmath86 which is the exact value needed to correct the on - shell bulk action such that the thermodynamic interpretation is safely preserved .
in fact , due to this contribution , the total action takes the form @xmath87 that is , the bubble contributes as mass carrying the mass difference between the two solutions but does not contribute to the entropy . from the hamiltonian point of view
this is naturally understood as follows .
the canonical action vanishes in this case , the only possible contributions coming from boundary terms both at infinity and at the horizon , yielding respectively @xmath88 and the entropy , which are nothing but the total charges of the solution .
the junction conditions simply imply the continuity of canonical momenta @xcite .
equation ( [ treintaytres ] ) shows that the junction conditions are important to guarantee the consistency of the thermodynamic picture .
they also imply @xmath89 so that the first law of thermodynamics holds both for the whole configuration ( @xmath90 and @xmath91 ) as well as for the black hole ( @xmath92 and @xmath56 ) .
having proven the consistency of the thermodynamic picture in the case of the bubble configuration by deriving ( [ treintaytres ] ) and ( [ new1law ] ) , we are ready to address the question of global thermodynamic stability .
this amounts to analyzing the free energy associated to the bubble configuration .
the free energy , @xmath76 , as a function of the temperature @xmath93 displays a critical temperature above which it becomes negative and , thus , the phase transition occurs ( see fig.[ceggfig2 ] ) .
( positivity bound ) , @xmath94 ( maximal @xmath95 ) , and @xmath96 ( from right to left ) .
the @xmath21 dependence of the critical temperature is displayed in a separate box.,scaledwidth=39.0% ] if the free energy is positive , however , the system is metastable .
it decays by nucleating bubbles with a probability given , in the semiclassical approximation by @xmath97 .
therefore , after enough time , the system will alway end up in the stable , black hole solution .
this is reminiscent of the hp transition , except for the fact that , here , the thermal ads vacuum decays into a black hole _ belonging to a different branch_. @xmath70 is monotonically decreasing , the phase transition becoming increasingly unlikely the more we come closer to the eh _ classical _ limit . in this sense , it is a quantum mechanical phenomenon . these high temperature configurations , or _
thermalons _ , correspond to a black hole and a bubble in equilibrium , connecting inner and outer solutions of different branches @xmath42 and @xmath98 .
such solutions exist just for positive values of @xmath21 .
the infinite temperature limit corresponds to planar black holes , in which the junction conditions lead to a remarkably simple relation that is valid also for general lovelock gravity @xcite , @xmath99 .
the corresponding free energy is always negative , @xmath100 this implying that the preferable classical solution is always the thermalon and the transition always occurs for high enough temperature .
the junction conditions considered above determine not only the equilibrium configuration but also , in lorentzian signature , the effective potential felt by the bubble and , consequently , its subsequent dynamics .
the scalar field @xmath64 specifying the location of the bubble sits at the top of a potential barrier .
it will therefore either collapse or eventually expand in such a way that it engulfs the whole spacetime in finite proper time , thus changing its asymptotic behavior @xcite .
we presented a novel mechanism for phase transitions that is a distinctive feature of higher curvature theories of gravity .
these theories have several branches of asymptotically ( a)ds solutions that might admit an interpretation as different phases of the dual field theory .
phase transitions among these are driven by the mechanism described in the present article . mimicking the thermalon configuration @xcite
, a bubble separating two regions of different cosmological constants pops out , generically hosting a black hole .
this configuration is thermodynamically preferred above some critical temperature .
the corresponding phase transition can be interpreted as a generalized hp transition for the high - curvature branches , driving the system towards the eh branch . from the holographic point of view
this looks like a confinement - deconfinement phase transition in a dual cft , involving an effective change in the t hooft coupling , both phases being strongly coupled . whether a phenomenon like this takes place in a 4d cft , particularly within the framework of the fluid / gravity correspondence where both phases might be characterized by different transport coefficients , or it is overtaken by higher curvature corrections , is an open question at this point . the bubble configuration , being unstable , dynamically changes the asymptotic cosmological constant , transitioning towards the stable horizonful branch of solutions , the only one usually considered as relevant .
this is then a natural mechanism for the system to select the general relativistic vacuum among all possible ones .
we are aware of the fact that the vacuum @xmath45 in the lgb theory exhibits ghosts .
the phenomenon presented in this article , however , takes place in the lovelock theory as well , where there are further healthy vacua than the one connected to the eh action @xcite .
we wish to thank stanley deser , juan maldacena , carlos nez and josep m. pons for their interesting comments .
thanks ceci garraffo , elias gravanis , and steve willison for previous collaborations in the subject . the work of x.o.c . and j.d.e .
was supported in part by micinn and feder ( grant fpa2011 - 22594 ) , by xunta de galicia ( consellera de educacin and grant pgidit10pxib206075pr ) , and by the spanish consolider - ingenio 2010 programme cpan ( csd2007 - 00042 ) .
the work of g.g . was supported by nsf - conicet , pip , and pict grants from conicet and anpcyt .
the work of a.g . was partially supported by fondecyt ( chile ) grant @xmath1011090753 .
x.o.c . and j.d.e .
would like to thank the fcen - uba and unab for hospitality during part of this project .
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d * 75 * , 084025 ( 2007 ) . c. garraffo , g. giribet , e. gravanis and s. willison , j. math .
phys . * 49 * , 042502 ( 2008 ) . c. charmousis and a. padilla , jhep
* 0812 * , 038 ( 2008 )
. s. c. davis , phys .
d * 67 * , 024030 ( 2003 ) .
e. gravanis and s. willison , phys .
b * 562 * , 118 ( 2003 ) .
m. baados , c. teitelboim and j. zanelli , phys .
lett . * 72 * , 957 ( 1994 ) . | arxiv |
Hybridisation of carbon atom in cyclopentadienyl anion
How do I figure out the hybridisation of the carbon with the negative charge?
One logic is that it is an $\mathrm{sp^3}$ carbon because there are 3 sigma bonds and 1 lone pair around it.
Another reasoning, though, is that it is $\mathrm{sp^2}$; we don't count the lone pair, because it is in conjugation with the double bonds.
What is the correct explanation?
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/viytr.jpg)
It entirely depends on what that electron pair is doing.
If the lone pair is hanging out by itself in its own orbital, then the carbon is probably sp3 hybridized, as greater hybridization is typically more stable. This is what you'll see on an alcohol or an amine lone pair. Those lone pairs aren't really interacting with anything else in the molecule, hence the "standard" logic of the rule you invoke.
However, in certain compounds you're able to stabilize the system further by delocalizing the electron pair. In this sort of case, the sp3 hybridized lone pair orbital is not able to participate in the delocalization, and thus will be *higher* in energy than an electron pair that is in the remaining p orbital of an sp2 hybridized carbon. This is the sort of thing you see with amide groups, where the "lone pair" on the nitrogen is [sp2-like](https://instruct.uwo.ca/chemistry/283g/Nifty%20Stuff/amides%20are%20flat%20B.htm), which allows the electron pair to delocalize into the carbonyl, allowing for resonance stabilization.
Note that delocalization is not always going to happen. You can potentially draw up examples where delocalization would *decrease* the stability of the compound. For example, [1,4-Dihydropyrazines](http://www.chemspider.com/Chemical-Structure.127795.html) would be anti-aromatic if both lone pairs from each nitrogen were to participate in the ring system. This is highly disfavorable, and the molecule [contorts itself](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/anie.198105991/abstract) to avoid it, putting the nitrogens into [sp3 (pyramidal) hybridization](http://cccc.uochb.cas.cz/64/4/0633/), except where it needs to be planar to conjugate with an exocyclic double bond.
In this particular case - the one of the cyclopentadienyl anion - you would be able to form an aromatic system if the lone pair were to delocalize into the ring - much like pyrrole does. The lowered energy obtained from this aromatic delocalization more than makes up for the small amount of energy gained by going from sp2 to sp3, so the carbon should be sp2 hybridized.
The important thing here is not simply to invoke rote-memorized rules to determine hybridization states, but think about what the electrons are doing and what the comparative stability of the various options are. The hybridization will change to be the most stable (lowest energy) state. -- To be perfectly honest, neither sp2 nor sp3 is the "true" answer. The actual answer to these sorts of questions lies more toward Molecular Orbital Theory, where the molecule is taken as a whole. Per-atom hybridization is a convenient shorthand, but still one which ultimately rests on the basis of the true molecular stability.
| stackexchange/chemistry |
until recently , the assessment of the endometrial - myometrial junctional zone ( emj ) was mainly used on magnetic resonance images ( mri ) for the diagnosis of adenomyosis ( hricak et al.,1983 ) .
. however , on ultrasound the emj is not always easy to display and there are currently no strict guidelines on how to analyse the emj . only few studies on 3d imaging of the emj have been published ( alcazar et al . , 2009 ; exacoustos et al . , 2011 ; naftalin et al . , 2012 ) . a proper visualization of the emj is deemed to be important in the diagnosis of adenomyosis ( bromley et al . , 2000 ;
dueholm , 2006 ) , myometrial invasion in endometrial cancer , the extension of submucous fibroids and the exact character of congenital uterine anomalies ( naftalin et al . , 2009 ) .
a standardized sonographic evaluation of the emj is therefore important in order to study its relevance in such endometrial and myometrial diseases .
volume contrast imaging ( vci ) is a technology based on a volume acquisition technique that leads to contrast enhancement and speckle suppression in the two - dimensional ultrasound image .
the use of vci improves the contrast in ultrasound images ( henrich and stupin , 2011 ; jantarasaengaram et al . , 2014 ) and may offer a better assessment of size , margins and aspect of emj .
the aim of this study was to evaluate which 3d reconstruction technique allows for optimal visualization of the emj on 3d stored images .
3d volumes from 183 consecutive patients who presented at the leuven university hospital bleeding clinic were selected in decreasing chronological order from 2009 - 2010 database .
the protocol was approved by the local ethics committee of the university hospitals leuven and patients had given informed consent .
the 3d volumes were collected using a voluson e8 ( ge healthcare ultrasound , milwaukee , wi , usa ) with a 6 - 12 mhz transvaginal probe . out of the 183 cases , 65 cases with incomplete data were excluded . of the remaining 118 3d volumes
, the first author scored the image quality of the emj , for each reconstructed image without the use of vci , as good ( the emj is clearly visible and can be evaluated on the fundal , right lateral and left lateral borders ) , moderate ( one border is not clearly visible ) , poor ( two borders are not clearly visible ) or insufficient ( none of the borders are clearly visible ) .
after exclusion of 38 cases because of insufficient image quality , 80 patients ( study group ) were selected for further analysis .
for each 3d volume , the uterus was examined in the sagittal plane to identify the cervical canal and the uterine cavity , and after complete rotation of 360 , the first author reconstructed the best image on 2d midcoronal plane without vci , with vci set at 4 mm and with vci set at 2 mm .
the coronal view was obtained by placing the dot into the endometrial stripe on the sagittal and transverse views ( plane a and b of the multiplanar view ) .
the multiplanar view was then adjusted until a satisfactory coronal image was obtained of both the endometrial cavity and the external uterine contour .
the gradient light and sepia settings were used to optimize the view of the emj , which was visualized as a hypoechoic area surrounding the endometrial cavity . for each 3d volume ,
3 images in the coronal plane were reconstructed ( 2d coronal plane without vci , with vci 4 mm and vci 2 mm ) , resulting in 240 images .
together with a questionnaire pertaining to these images , they were integrated into the web - based electronic data capture software clinical data miner ( cdm ) ( install et al . , 2014 )
five gynaecologists with experience in gynaecological ultrasound used cdm to evaluate the questionnaire for all images , which were shown in random order to each examiner .
the questionnaire comprised two questions . in the first question , examiners reported image quality as good , moderate , poor , or insufficient , encoded as 4 , 3 , 2 , and 1 , respectively .
significance of differences in reported quality for the different technologies were assessed using paired t - tests . in the second question
, examiners assessed the emj of these images using ieta terminology ( leone et al . , 2010 ) , as regular , irregular , interrupted , or not defined , with one examiner ( cvp ) re - evaluating the same set of images after 12 days .
these evaluations were used to calculate both inter- and intra - rater agreement , by means of fleiss kappa coefficient ( fleiss et al . , 1971 ) .
compared to the coronal view without vci , the use of both 4 mm and 2 mm vci improved subjective image quality reported by participants ( p < 0.001 ) . the fleiss
kappa coefficient for evaluating the inter - rater agreement of the emj description using coronal view without vci , with vci at 4 mm and vci at 2 mm were 0.36 0.05 , 0.34 0.05 and 0.42 0.05 , respectively .
the corresponding figures for the intra - rater agreement for emj were 0.58 0.08 , 0.36 0.08 and 0.68 0.07 , respectively .
the use of vci 2 mm improved inter - rater and intra - rater agreement of emj description ( p < 0.001 ) , while vci 4 mm did not .
this study demonstrates that the visualization of the emj in the coronal plane using vci 2 mm outperforms vci 4 mm and 2d coronal plane without vci .
if 3d - rendering is used , the best images of the emj will be obtained using a thin region of interest ( roi ) box ( fig .
exacoustos et al . , 2011 ) proposed the use of vci 2 and 4 mm in the evaluation of the emj .
additionally , we have shown that the image quality of vci 2 mm is superior to that of vci 4 mm .
naftalin et al . , 2012 ) studied the inter- and intra - rater agreement in three - dimensional ultrasound assessment of the emj .
they scored the quality of visualization of the emj by coronal view obtained using render mode as optimal , satisfactory or unsatisfactory .
their results showed good inter- and intra - rater variability with kappa values of 0.77 and 0.83 respectively . in our study
the results using vci 2 mm were 0.42 and 0.68 , respectively . these differences may be explained by the fact naftalin et al
moreover our study addressed the issue of the clinical relevance by evaluating the inter- and intra - rater agreement in reporting the emj according to the ieta terminology ( leone et al . , 2010 ) .
the use of a standardized technique facilitates the dialogue between different observers and allows to evaluate the diagnostic relevance of ultrasound images of the emj , e.g. in the evaluation of adenomyosis , endometrial cancer , fibroids and congenital uterine anomalies . | pubmed |
Damped Simple Harmonic Motion Proof? [closed]
**Closed.** This question is [off-topic](/help/closed-questions). It is not currently accepting answers.
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Homework-like questions should **ask about a specific physics concept** and **show some effort** to work through the problem. We want our questions to be useful to the broader community, and to future users. See [our meta site](https://physics.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/714/) for more guidance on how to edit your question to make it better
Closed 7 years ago.
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I was reading about damped simple harmonic motion but then I saw this equation:
$$-bv - kx = ma$$
$b$ is the damping constant. Then it said by substituting $dx/dt$ for $v$ and $d^2x/dt^2$ for $a$ we will have:
$$
m\frac{\mathrm d^2x}{\mathrm dt^2}+b\frac{\mathrm dx}{\mathrm dt}+kx=0
$$
Then it says the solution of the equation is: (this is my problem)
$$
x(t)=x\_m \mathrm e^{-bt/2m}\cos(\omega't+\phi)
$$
I don't understand the last part. How can we reach the $x(t)$?
I know very little of calculus can you please explain how to solve this?
The differential equation you quote is fairly standard in university physics/engineering course but definitely requires some calculus to solve. As a first step, if you know how to differentiate products and chains, you can substitute the given solution into the differential equation and verify that it is indeed a solution. It contains two arbitrary constants (here $x\_m$ and $\phi$) as you would expect of a second order differential equation (DE).
If you wanted to solve it, you still need some kind of guess as to what the function might look like; here the trial function would be:
$$
x(t) = Ae^{\lambda t}
$$
and then substitute this parametrised solution into the original DE to obtain a quadratic in $\lambda$.
$$
x(t) = Ae^{\lambda t} \implies {dx\over dt} = \lambda Ae^{\lambda t} = \lambda x(t)
$$
and
$$
{d^2x\over dt^2} = \lambda^2 Ae^{\lambda t} = \lambda ^2x(t)
$$
so that
$$
m\lambda^2 + b\lambda+k = 0.
$$
as $x(t), A\neq 0$
Depending on the relative values of $m$, $k$ and $b$, you will get a quadratic with two, one or no real (i.e. one or two complex) solutions.
Given that you have two solutions $\lambda\_1$ and $\lambda\_2$, the intermediate result for $x(t)$ will be then
$$
x(t) = Ae^{\lambda\_1 t} + Be^{\lambda\_2 t}
$$
For the solution you have been given, the corresponding quadratic in $\lambda$ will have no real solutions, and so the $\lambda$s will be complex, and the real part of the solution will give you the damped exponential at the front of the solution, and the imaginary parts will give you a wave-like term. $x\_m$ and $\phi$ will be related to $A$ and $B$ and are determined by boundary conditions.
This is a linear and homogeneous differential equation. That means you can produce new solutions by adding other solutions together and multiplying solutions by a constant. That means they form a vector space. I'll try to avoid over complicating things for you, but the idea is that there is an infinite number of solutions, you can make new solutions out of the old ones, but usually you are also given boundary conditions, certain values of your function at certain points. They restrict possible solutions, and usually, out of an infinite number of possible solutions, you are left with one single solution that satisfies them.
But the point is that if you can guess the most general form of the solution, see that it works and incorporates all the possible forms of solutions in it and all the possible boundary conditions, you can then say that you have the solution to the D.E. There they already give you the form of the solution, so no need guessing it. You could go through a some mental gymnastics to arrive at that solution for yourself (and danimal outlines the idea in his post pretty well), but if they have already told you the solution, which has constants $x\_m$ and $\phi$ and thus incorporates boundary conditions into it, just plug it in and see for yourself that it works.
P.S. Have you looked at first order differential equations and some simpler examples first?
| stackexchange/physics |
Category: Tips for Beginner Writers Keywords: writing mistakes,common writing errors,new novelist mistakes,rookie mistakes
1. Too many adverbs
Overuse of adverbs will scream amateur louder than anything else. Many creative writing tutors say any use at all is overuse.
In case you don't know, adverbs are words that modify a verb to describe the way the action is done. If you don't know what modify means, you should probably consider switching to photography. Adverbs often end in 'ly'.
He said, knowingly.
She dropped the knife, meaningfully.
The problem with adverbs is that they are often redundant, re-stating something that is obvious from the dialogue or verb. And if it's not obvious in the dialogue or verb - why isn't it?
Adverbs are also a key indicator for weak verbs. You can think of the ly as a crutch.
He walked weakly to the door
Might be replaced by:
He stumbled to the door
Adverbs are often a marker of lazy description, and showing, not telling
(see next mistake).
http://www.users.qwest.net/~yarnspnr/writing/adverbs/adverbs.htm
2. Telling not showing
If you haven't heard this yet, brace yourself. You'll be sick of it within months. It's very common for new writers to try to explain things to their readers, as a kind of omnipotent narrator, rather than allowing the reader to experience everything themselves through the protagonist's senses.
For example, if you tell me that:
Martin Cousins was furious and so he went into the shed to calm down.
I'll be yawning before you get to the next sentence. So what? And anyway, so you say.
However, if you say that:
Martin slammed the back door and stormed down to the shed. He punched the wooden door aside and kicked it shut behind him. He waited in the darkness, forcing himself to take a few slow, deep breaths as the dust settled.
Here the point is made vividly and at no point did you need to be told Martin was angry. You can feel it. We can observe the cold, hard facts with our own eyes.
http://www.writing-world.com/basics/dawn02.shtml
3. Overly formal dialogue
The main problem with natural dialogue in fiction is that it's nothing like natural dialogue in real life. If an author did put genuinely genuine sounding dialogue into their work, readers would be bored silly, because normal speech is full of half finished sentences, interruption, meandering and assumed knowledge.
So fictional dialogue needs to be much more succinct, with clear direction and eloquence, but to still give the impression of being natural.
One tip to make speech sound less formal is to use fillers (well, umm, I guess), pauses, interruptions and contractions (do not = don't, I will = I'll).
http://www.sfwriter.com/ow08.htm
4. As you know, Bob
This is the common phenomena of writers using a character to explain a plot point to another character who already knows it.
To take an unlikely example - let's say knowing the ingredients of the common Screwdriver cocktail is critical to the story. The amateur writer might decide to have two barmen, one of whom says something along the lines of:
'Well, as you know Nick, a screwdriver is a mix of vodka and orange juice.'
Clearly, Nick already knows it. Why is his colleague telling him something so obvious? This just doesn't ring true, and your characters are suddenly mannequins dancing to your plot rather than real people the reader cares about. It's just a sneaky way of telling (see above).
Characters should never say anything that the person they're talking to obviously knows already. This isn't to say a character can never explain a plot point, just make sure they are telling it to someone who genuinely wants and needs to know.
http://blog.nathanbransford.com/2010/09/seven-keys-to-writing-good-dialogue.html
5. Lack of Conflict
Put simply, if there's no conflict, there's no story, and by conflict, we don't mean violence. Take these two alternatives:
Boy meets girl, they fall in love and live happily ever after.
Boys meets girl, girl despises boy, girl gets a terminal illness, boy searches the world for a cure to save girl and win her love.
If you could ask a single question about either of these premises, what would it be?
Would it be 'In number one, what precise way did they live happily ever after?' or would it be 'In number two, does the boy find a cure of not?'
Knock me down with a feather if I'm wrong, but I'm guessing it's going to be the second, which means you're engaged and intrigued. That's because there's conflict.
http://menwithpens.ca/fiction-writing-conflicts-and-characters/
http://www.fictionfactor.com/articles/conflict.html
6. Ego-writing
Lots of people decide to write based on actual experiences because they realise that real life is stranger and infinitely more fascinating and complex than anything a single human mind could dream up. This is all well and good.
What is not well and good, is thinking that your life is interesting enough to be committed to paper and inflicted upon innocent readers. Unless your life has involved bringing down a massive corporation, starting a revolution, overcoming a debilitating disability to spectacular effect or saving a boatload of people - it's unlikely to be interesting enough to be worthy of novelisation.
The same kind of principle applies to peppering your work with your opinion.
As the great William Strunk, Jr. says:
'To air one's views gratuitously, is to imply that the demand for them is brisk.'
7. Procrastination
This is a big one. In fact, if you're reading this, there's a good chance you're procrastinating now.
Procrastination is a huge enemy to success, as you can hardly get to the exciting stage of having your novel rejected if you haven't even written it yet.
Ultimately, the only answer to procrastination is will power and inner strength - however, there are plenty of tips and tricks to help overcome it.
Two favourite 'reasons' and answers:
'I'm not inspired' - If you want to be a writer, it's your job to be inspired. If you have to sit around staring at the wall, waiting for the muse to belly dance in front of your nose, you'll starve long before your first draft is even begun.
'I don't know how to get started' - Make and follow a plan (such as the Snowflake method) which has small, achievable goals.
Further reading (not without irony):
http://the90daynovel.com/writing-your-first-novel-end-procrastination-now
http://www.creative-writing-now.com/writers-block.html
8. Meandering Plot
Stories need to go somewhere. Unless you're CS Lewis, you're unlikely to be able to get away with having your character randomly wandering around an abstract world, encountering characters that apparently have no relation to each other.
Your protagonist needs to have a goal, and while that can change over time, there needs to be some consistency. Your reader wants to root for your characters and feel clever if they guess what's coming. If you randomly change direction and the first five chapters describe a man trying to clear his wife's name when she's accused of murder, but then by chapter seven he's trekking through the rainforest and the story ends with him bringing down a terrorist plot, your readers are going to feel cheated. And headachy.
The Ultimate Novel Writing Software
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multifractality [ 1 - 4 ] is rather a new concept when applied to financial time series .
it may be considered as the higher order extension of the monofractal analysis used successfully e.g. in analysis of persistency level in data particularly in econophysics .
so far it is not very clear what practical applications of multifractality in financial time series might be .
however , some preliminary directions in this topic have already been shown ( see e.g. [ 5 ] ) . in monofractal approach ,
one usually looks for the probabilistic ( stochastic ) behavior of some geometrical or topological properties of signal fluctuations around the local trend in given time series .
one expects power - law relation between the quantity describing such fluctuations ( e.g. variance ) and the length of time window @xmath2 along which the fluctuation is being measured .
a good example of such relation is the one provided in detrended fluctuation analysis ( dfa ) [ 6 - 11 ] where the power law relation between the variance of detrended signal @xmath3 and the width of time window @xmath2 reads @xmath4 with the hurst scaling exponent @xmath5 ( @xmath6 ) [ 12,13 ] .
if @xmath7 the signal is said to be antipersistent , if @xmath8 the signal is persistent , while the case @xmath9 corresponds to no memory present in signal increments ( brownian motion ) .
+ the relation given by eq.(1 ) is usually understood as independence of scaling properties of a system from the scale
thus @xmath5 is constant .
however , in many cases it might not be so .
there might be a finite or infinite number of crossover points @xmath10 such that for time scales @xmath11 the fractal properties differ from these for @xmath12 . in this case
, the fractal structure will be described by the whole set of @xmath5 exponents instead of just one , thus revealing the multiple scaling rules . using the standard dfa procedure
one calculates only the leading scaling rule linked to major or more frequent fluctuations .
moreover , distortion of the signal from the leading pattern before or below the crossover point @xmath10 may be very weak , so in order to extract them , one is forced to use more sophisticated technique based on the artificial amplification of weak ( with respect to the average ones ) fluctuations .
such philosophy makes the background of the modified dfa proposed by kantelhardt et .
al . and called multifractal dfa ( mf - dfa ) [ 14 ] .
one replaces in this method the `` ordinary '' fluctuation function @xmath3 from eq.(1 ) by its q - th moment @xmath13 defined as follows @xmath14^{q/2}\}^{1/q}\ ] ] for @xmath15 , and @xmath16\}\ ] ] for @xmath17 , where @xmath18 counts the number of non - overlapping boxes of size @xmath2 each for which detrendization procedure is performed .
+ one obtains in this manner the whole continuous set of hurst exponents @xmath19 labeled by different @xmath20 .
they are related to different level of amplification of small fluctuation in data .
the @xmath19 dependence is decreasing monotonic function of @xmath21 for stationary signal what basically reflects the fact that relatively small fluctuations happen more often in this signal than relatively big ones do [ 14 ] .
if so , the so called hlder spectrum or singularity spectrum @xmath0 [ 4 ] of the hlder exponent @xmath22 ca be used where @xmath23 and @xmath24 while @xmath0 is determined by legendre transform [ 16,17 ] @xmath25 the latter approach makes a useful representation of multifractality .
the singularity spectrum in this case should have rather regular form of inverse parabolic shape as shown in fig.2 .
the width of @xmath0 spectrum measures the multifractality level of the signal . for the pure monofractal signal this width converges to one point @xmath26 and @xmath27 , while if the bigger amount of multifractality is present in the signal , the width of @xmath0 spectrum becomes wider .
+ we will analyze in this paper multifractal properties of real financial time series using @xmath0 representation and mf - dfa method argued as working better than other approaches [ 15 ] .
our main task is to investigate how multifractal properties of stocks change with variety of `` surgeries '' done on the initial real financial time series .
we shall do this in following chapters .
our aim is to see what phenomena on the market influence its multifractal dynamics in the first place .
in particular , we will focus on examining how multifractal picture of real time series is changed when one cuts off extreme events like crashes or rupture points , and how established trends or their absence influence the multifractal behavior of developed and developing markets .
all statistical methods determining the fractal properties of time series give an exact result only for series of infinite length .
since this applies also to the mf - dfa scheme , one should know how the length of series is an important factor in discovering its multifractal structure .
in fact , finite signals assumed by their construction to be monofractals , reveal some artificial multifractal structure .
this is because big fluctuations in finite time series , measured within mf - dfa , seem to be more rare than for longer or infinite time series .
it leads to smaller @xmath19 value for @xmath28 in finite series than for infinite ones , and finally , to some artificial multifractal structure of finite time series .
this kind of multifractal noise should be subtracted first as a background influencing any real property of monofractal or multifractal time series of finite length . + to explore this issue we must have a
test series `` with known fractal characteristic .
we will use monofractal series generated by the random midpoint displacement ( rmd ) algorithm [ 22 ] .
the resulting h(q ) functions calculated within mf - dfa for three series of length @xmath29 generated with input hurst exponent values @xmath30 respectively are presented in fig .
1 . + one may notice a small degree of multifractality ( short span of @xmath19 ) for all three series .
the series with higher @xmath5 show a bigger deviation from monofractality .
the non - monotonic behaviour of @xmath19 is reflected by the ' ' twist on top of the singularity spectrum ( see fig .
2 ) . this effect will be also observed in following chapters where real financial data are analyzed .
+ one can also see that the maxima positions of the spectra reflect the assumed hurst exponents values .
+ it is essential to find the influence of series length on the width of multifractal spectrum . to observe this
, one has to calculate the highest and lowest value of @xmath22 , as well as the position of the @xmath0 peak .
this was done on a sample of 20 series each for four lengths @xmath31 and for different @xmath5 values .
the width of @xmath0 spectrum was rapidly changing with @xmath32 and seemed to be weakly dependent on @xmath5 .
table 1 presents results found for @xmath33 .
@xmath34 & peak position + @xmath35 & 0.73 & 0.56 + @xmath36 & 0.28 & 0.50 + @xmath37 & 0.21 & 0.50 + @xmath38 & 0.22 & 0.51 + + they confirm the significant narrowing of @xmath34 spectrum width when the length @xmath32 of time series is increasing .
since we will deal later on with series lengths around @xmath39 , we may assume that the finite size effects should be around @xmath40 . + before analyzing real data we also need to observe the scaling range of the @xmath41 relation . for the artificial data , this range spans almost the entire available time window lengths ( see fig .
3 ) . however , for the entire set of real data ( later sections will also discuss parts of these data ) , the scaling range becomes shorter and decreases with increasing @xmath42 values .
+ the corresponding effect for the s&p500 is visible in fig .
it is even more significant for positive and larger @xmath21 what is shown in fig .
5 ( compare with fig .
4 ) . to solve this problem a careful separate study of all @xmath41 relations and manual selection of the scaling range is needed .
it was done in analysis of all financial data presented below .
the first and most obvious approach is to make the long - term data analysis , i.e. , to calculate the multifractal structure of the stock market indices in the whole available time horizon .
our analysis focuses on two indices : * wig ( warsaw stock exchange ) ) - from april 16@xmath43 1991 till october 10@xmath43 2008 * s&p500 ( nyse & nasdaq ) - from december 30@xmath43 1927 till september 3@xmath44 2008 they are examples of developing ( poland ) and developed ( usa ) markets respectively .
+ all time series were created from daily closing values of each index .
the s&p 500 data were downloaded from the financial web - site of yahoo.com [ 18 ] and wig data from a stock market web - site of wirtualna polska [ 19 ] . + the singularity spectra @xmath0 and @xmath19 plots of all discussed time series ( as well as their shuffles ) are presented in figs 6 , 7 .
surprisingly , all markets show unexpected non - monotonic @xmath19 behavior .
this phenomenon , in addition to the problems with short scaling ranges ( mentioned in the previous section ) , strongly suggests a disturbance in the multifractal structure of the series .
spectra of all three shuffled data sets are positioned around the expected location @xmath45 .
these sets of data also show a monotonic behavior of the @xmath19 function , contrary to originally ordered data .
the spectra width for original as well for shuffled data are much wider than those of the corresponding rmd spectra and hence indicate the multifractal content in dynamics of long - term market data .
simultaneously , the non - monotonic @xmath19 behavior seems to indicate non - stationary effects in these data .
the latter case needs more detailed study partly provided below .
it has been shown by a number of authors ( see e.g.[5,20,21 ] ) that positive and negative fluctuations in time series have different fractal properties .
owicimka et .
al . has shown in ref.[5 ] that dax data in increasing and decreasing trends has different multifractal properties for particular choice of periods dec.1997-dec.1999 and may 2004-may 2006 .
it is quite natural to investigate whether these properties are general and if so , in what extent they are general for other markets .
in particular , it is interesting to know how multifractal properties of established trends depend on the internal structure of these trends . we were interested in the beginning in positive ( negative ) long - lasting trends with no sub - trends in opposite direction .
we tried to exactly repeat this way the analysis made for dax in ref.[5 ] .
such trends turned out to be very rare for s&p 500 and wig indices .
the selected fragments of both indices with required properties are shown in fig .
they have both long - lasting positive trend ( bullish phase ) followed by a long negative trend ( bearish phase ) and no astonishing internal events .
+ the resulting singularity spectra ( see fig.9 ) show the expected shift of the bearish phase spectra towards higher values of @xmath22 .
since these results were obtained from data with a much wider scaling range , they should be considered as much more reliable then previous ones presented for entire indices .
it is also worth noting that the spectra are now much wider , which suggest a more complex multifractal structure . in the case of wig
this effect might be amplified by the short data set , nevertheless the spectra width of a rmd series with similar length is still narrower . + this improvement of singularity spectra for well determined trends in both indices ( i.e. quasi quadratic dependence @xmath0 from @xmath22 ) with respect to spectra obtained for
the entire indices might suggest that the multifractality is strongly affected by non - stationarity of financial time series . to verify such hypothesis we checked what
multifractal properties are hidden in subparts of entire index .
the s&p500 index is particularly good for this search because it is long enough comparing with wig , thus containing much more amount of data . if one divides the entire s&p500 history into two regimes - one with small fluctuations ( small volatility ) and the second one with high fluctuations ( high volatility ) as shown in fig .
10 , a very intriguing result for singularity spectra is found in both regimes .
results of this search are plotted in figs.11 , 12 , where a comparison of singularity spectra and @xmath19 dependence for both regimes with @xmath0 and @xmath19 behavior for the entire index is provided .
it is clear that both regimes show separately a monotonic @xmath19 dependence leading to reversed parabolic shape of @xmath0 .
it is not the case of the entire index .
+ however , both spectra for two regimes are slightly different the width of multifractal spectrum ( and the width of @xmath19 dependence ) is larger for the first regime characterized by lower volatility and no opposite sub - trends inside .
we checked the same happened for other , even shorter trends , whenever they are affected by well formed sub - trends of opposite direction or by extreme events like crashes , etc .
this phenomena is shown on example of s&p500 time series without and with internal structure ( see figs.13 , 14 ) .
fig.13 presents an example of increasing trend with no visible distortion inside .
we called it `` good '' data .
its dynamics is associated with nice multifractal properties - well established quadratic @xmath0 dependence and the monotonic @xmath19 behaviour .
simultaneously , time series of the same length , but collecting data from the very next period , has some extreme events inside and it contains opposite sub - trends connected with these events ( see fig.14 ) .
we call them `` bad '' data .
the scaling @xmath46 is worse here and the presence of `` twist '' in singularity spectrum @xmath0 confirms the non - monotonic character of @xmath19 function and leads also to non - quadratic @xmath0 dependence .
the multifractal character of time series is here very much affected by the presence of abrupt events , i.e. crashes or data with respectively large fluctuations .
the sub - trends containing abrupt events can be artificially removed to see if such removal would improve the multiscaling properties of the new trend constructed after such `` surgery '' .
the applied procedure is simple .
first , the time series with abrupt events is differentiated . then ,
at the level of returns , these events are removed and the time series of remaining returns is integrated to get the new artificial evolution of financial index .
examples of such modification are visible for variety of events for both s&p 500 and wig indices in figs.15 , 16 and 17 respectively .
it is remarkable , how much such surgery significantly improves multi - scaling properties of financial time series and restores the monotonic character of decreasing @xmath19 function .
the width of singularity spectrum has also noticeably increased when abrupt events had been removed .
we presented a comparative analysis of multifractal properties of financial time series built from stock indices of developing ( wig ) and emergent ( s&p500 ) markets using mf - dfa technique .
we found that financial time series in a very long time horizon show in both cases very short multiscaling ranges and in turn , their multifractal image is somehow obscured .
therefore we analyzed in shorter time horizon the selected parts of financial data chosen due to their specific properties .
+ the most important result is that division of time series into regimes of distinctly different ( large or small ) fluctuations around the main trend , as well as removal of abrupt events like crashes or significant opposite sub - trends , radically improves the multiscaling ranges and restores the monotonic behavior of @xmath19 dependence as well as the reversed parabolic shape of multifractal singularity spectrum @xmath0 .
the width of singularity spectrum also increases noticeably in these cases . this leads us to conclusion that non - stationarity of financial time series significantly influences their multifractal character leading to behavior beyond our expectation for multifractal spectrum shape known from studies with artificially created mono- and multifractal signals .
+ it is clear that further research of length effects as well as the effects of non - stationarity in real time series influencing multiscaling and multifractality is needed with hope for further practical applications .
+ j.w .
kantelhardt , arxiv : 0804.0747v1 [ physics.data-an ] z. eisler , j. kertsz , physica a 343 ( 2004 ) 603 h.g.e .
hentschel , i. procaccia , physica d 8 ( 1983 ) 435 t.c halsey , m.h .
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a33 ( 1983 ) 1141 p. owicimka , j. kwapie , s. drod , a.z .
grski , r. rak , acta phys . pol . a 114 ( 2008 ) 547 j.w .
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rego , s. havlin , a. bunde , physica a 295 ( 2001 ) 441 c .- k .
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( 1951 ) 770 b.b .
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grski , r. rak , acta phys . pol .
b 36 ( 2005 ) 2447 f. feder , fractals ( plenum press , new york 1988 ) h .- o .
peitgen , h. jrgens , d. saupe , chaos and fractal ( springer , berlin , 2004 ) http://finance.yahoo.com/ http://gielda.wp.pl/ k. ohashi , l.a.n amaral , b.h .
natelson , y. yamamoto , phys .
e 68 ( 2003 ) 065204(r ) n.b .
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voss , random fractal forgeries , in : r.a .
earnshaw ( ed . ) , fundamental algorithm for computer graphics , nato asi series , vol .
f17 , springer , berlin , heidelberg , 1985 scaling for this data is presented .
it shows much poorer scaling properties than one in fig.13 .
the bottom right figure shows the `` twisted '' singularity spectrum , a result of a non - monotonic @xmath19 dependence . ] | arxiv |
The Innocent is a thriller novel by American writer David Baldacci. This is the first book to feature Will Robie, a highly skilled U.S. government assassin. The book was initially published on October 9, 2012 by Grand Central Publishing.
References
External links
Official website
Category:2012 American novels
Category:Novels by David Baldacci | wikipedia |
The Treaty of London 1913 was signed on 30 May following the London Conference of 191213. It dealt with the territorial adjustments arising out of the conclusion of the First Balkan War. The London Conference had ended on 23 January 1913, when the 1913 Ottoman coup d'état took place and Ottoman Grand Vizier Kâmil Pasha was forced to resign. Coup leader Enver Pasha withdrew the Ottoman Empire from the Conference, and the Treaty of London was signed without the presence of the Ottoman delegation.
History
The combatants were the victorious Balkan League Serbia, Greece, Kingdom of Bulgaria, and Montenegro and the defeated Ottoman Empire. Representing the Great Powers were the United Kingdom, Germany, Russia, Austria-Hungary, and Italy.
Hostilities had officially ceased on 2 December 1912, except for Greece that had not participated in the first truce. Three principal points were in dispute:
the status of the territory of present-day Albania, the vast majority of which had been conquered especially by Serbia, but also small regions by Montenegro, and Greece
the status of the Sanjak of Novi Pazar formally under the protection of Austria-Hungary since the Treaty of Berlin in 1878
the status of the other territories taken by the Allies: Kosovo; Macedonia; and Thrace
The Treaty was negotiated in London at an international conference which had opened there in December 1912, following the declaration of independence by Albania on 28 November 1912.
Austria-Hungary and Italy strongly supported the creation of an independent Albania. In part, this was consistent with Austria-Hungary's previous policy of resisting Serb expansion to the Adriatic; Italy had designs on the territory, manifested in 1939. Russia supported Serbia and Montenegro. Germany and Britain remained neutral. The balance of power struck between the members of the Balkan League had been on the assumption that no Albanian polity would be formed and Albanian territory would be split between them.
Terms
The terms enforced by the Great Powers were:
All European territory of the Ottoman Empire west of the line between Enos on the Aegean Sea and Midia on the Black Sea was ceded to the Balkan League, except Albania.
The Ottoman island of Crete was ceded to Greece, while it was left to the Great Powers to determine the fate of the other islands in the Aegean Sea.
The borders of Albania and all other questions concerning Albania were to be settled by the Great Powers.
However, the division of the territories ceded to the Balkan League was not addressed in the Treaty, and Serbia refused to carry out the division agreed with Bulgaria in their treaty of March 1912. As a result of Bulgarian dissatisfaction with the de facto military division of Macedonia, the Second Balkan War broke out between the combatants on 16 June 1913. The Bulgarians were defeated, and the Ottomans made some gains west of the Enos-Midia line. A final peace was agreed at the Treaty of Bucharest on 12 August 1913. A separate treaty, the Treaty of Constantinople, was concluded between the Bulgarians and Turks, largely defining the modern-day borders between the two countries.
Perceptions
The delineation of the exact boundaries of the Albanian state under the Protocol of Florence 17 December 1913 was highly unpopular among the local Greek population of Southern Albania or Northern Epirus for Greeks, who, after their revolt managed to declare the Autonomous Republic of Northern Epirus, was internationally recognised as an autonomous region inside Albania under the terms of the Protocol of Corfu.
Albanians have tended to regard the Treaty as an injustice imposed by the Great Powers, as roughly half of the predominantly Albanian territories and 40 of the population were left outside the new country's borders.
See also
Treaties of London
References
Further reading
External links
Chronology of the 1913 London Peace Conference
Category:1913 in Austria-Hungary
Category:1913 in Europe
Category:1913 in the Ottoman Empire
Category:1913 in London
Category:First Balkan War
Category:Modern history of Albania
Category:Peace treaties of Bulgaria
Category:Peace treaties of Serbia
Category:Treaties concluded in 1913
London 1913
London 1913
Category:Treaties of the Kingdom of Bulgaria
London 1913
Category:Treaties of the Kingdom of Montenegro
Category:Treaties of the Kingdom of Serbia
London 1913
London 1913
Category:Treaties of the Kingdom of Greece
Category:Peace treaties of Greece
Category:May 1913 events
Category:1910s in the City of Westminster
London | wikipedia |
Days of Our Lives Memories
**Sorry for a long absence... but here is another one shot. As always, I look forward to your reviews, they always get me inspired!**
**For this story Will is still living in his dorm and Sonny is living in his studio apartment. I hope you all enjoy it!**
**Will POV**
My eyes are slowly turning dark blue and my stomach seems to turn around:
"You what?"
"It's brilliant Will... it's..."
"YOU WHAT?"
His eyes widen when he hears the tone in my voice. I feel I am trembling now and my emotions must be painted on my face, and I know Sonny will be able to read them all. His eyes tell me that he is surprised by my response, but I just cannot help it. We stare at each other, each waiting for the other to speak first. He takes a deep breath and with a questioning voice he says:
"Why are you like this..."
I immediately feel irritation come up and I shrug my shoulders:
"Why am I like this Sonny?"
"Will common..."
I turn around and can't help but take in the sight of his perfect but small studio apartment, and I shake my head. His voice is soft and slightly insecure:
"I just thought... I don't know... we were ready for the next step... or something."
I softly mumble, repeating his words:
"Or something..."
When he responds to me I know he is angry and he wants a more complete explanation of why I am like this. When I look at him I can't help feeling slightly turned on by the dark fire in his beautiful brown eyes. His lips are thin lines and for a moment I consider to just pull him close and kiss him until his lips are relaxed and soft again. But his words tell me he wants an explanation.
"Will... I thought we were ready for this... I bought this nice two bedroom apartment for us to start out together, we have spoken about it several times... we said that this here is my apartment and how we would love to have something that is ours... so your whole attitude now... I'm sorry Will, but I don't get it."
I bite my bottom lip and try to gather my thoughts. My eyes wonder through the room again and I take a deep breath. Then I walk towards my boyfriend and I smile apologetically:
"You're right babe... I just..."
I stop mid sentence, trying to find the right words to explain why I am not as happy as he hoped me to be about moving to another bigger apartment. I try to understand myself and suddenly do:
"Sonny..."
My hand grabs his and I pull him next to me on his bed. We sit close and I hold his hand in both my hands while I play with his fingers:
"Sonny... it's not the new apartment... I actually would love a place that's ours...it's this studio apartment... I hate leaving this place..."
I am not looking into his eyes anymore because I feel emotions blockings my throat. My voice becomes softer and his sweet face leans closer to mine to hear what I am trying to say. I continue:
"This apartment... your apartment has been the first place I felt safe... and loved and wanted... I love this place."
I feel his arm slide around my shoulders and I lean my head against his neck. He pulls me close and he whispers softly in my hair:
"It's OK honey... and I agree... we made some great memories in this apartment... great memories."
He pulls me up and drags me to his desk:
"Remember the one time you had to study, and I saw you in glasses for the first time?"
We both smile and I feel a light blush coming up when my mind goes back to that sweet memory.
_I sit at Sonny's desk and try to concentrate while he is just a few feet away, stretched out on the couch reading one of his 'young entrepreneurs' magazines. We have been dating for two months and I love how comfortable we are around each other... as though we are meant to be. I love studying here, even though it takes me longer because I am distracted regularly, mainly because Sonny is so close to me and my mind is going places, which are not useful places to visit when you try to understand biology and economics. But today I am delayed by something else as I forgot my contact lenses this morning and I have trouble reading the text in front of me. I feel myself squinting often and a headache is slowly but surely coming up. _
"_Babe... why are you squinting all the time..."_
_I turn around and see my boyfriend's worried face while he walks over to me. I smile and shrug my shoulders:_
"_It's nothing, just a bit tired I guess..."_
_The expression on his face tells me that he is not believing me and I smile when his eyes meet mine. I look away immediately, so he sits on his knees before me. His hands rest on my knees and his eyes search for mine, and when they find them they don't let go. _
"_Will.. common... why are you squinting..."_
_I decide to be honest:_
"_I forgot my contact lenses this morning so I have some trouble reading today..."_
_He seems happy with that explanation because he nods understandingly and while he stands up his lips meet mine for a firm kiss. _
"_OK honey... just don't overdo the studying now... rest your eyes if they need it."_
_I nod and smile while he turns away to get started on some paperwork for the coffee house. After a while he asks softly:_
"_Do you have a calculator?"_
_I nod my agreement and say:_
"_It's in my bag."_
_He reaches and starts searching my bag for the calculator. I focus on my studies and am surprised when I hear his voice again:_
"_Will...?"_
_I turn around and hold my breath the moment I see my glasses in his hand. His face is one big question mark and he just waits for my explanation. I try to think fast, but eventually just the truth comes out:_
"_I don't want you to see me in those..."_
"_What? Are you kidding? You're squinting, you forgot your contact lenses and now you are too stubborn to just wear your glasses?"_
"_You'll think I am a nerd... or that I am just ugly... or... I don't know... uncool or something..."_
_He just smiles and shakes his head while he walks towards me. He puts the glasses on my nose very carefully and I stare at his face intently to see his reaction. His eyes are tender and soft when he looks at me wearing my glasses and his hands cup my face. I feel how his lips brush mine and when he pulls back slightly we can look into each other's eyes, and I listen to him say:_
"_Just hurry up studying... you wearing glasses makes my mind a bit foggy..."_
_His lips are on mine again and he moans softly against my lips. Then he pulls back and returns to his paper work and just before I bury myself into my studies once again, he says:_
"_I'm not kidding Will... just hurry up."_
We both smile and I feel how he pushes me to sit on the desk. I spread my legs and he stands between them and I lock mine behind him. He smiles with his face close to mine:
"You in glasses is still a major turn on for me... you're so cute and hot at the same time when you wear them."
My elbows rest on his shoulders and my hands are buried in his dark silky hair. I look into his brown eyes when I say:
"We'll just find a nice place in our new apartment for the desk."
"Definitely... just as we will for the key board..."
My eyes wonder to the keyboard that is standing against the wall. And I smile when I recall a very fond memory involving the keyboard.
"_Will... just knock this time OK? Don't use your key..."_
"_Why not Sonny... do I have to be worried?"_
"_No, no need to worry... just knock."_
_We hang up the phone and even though he said I shouldn't worry I can't help to worry anyway. I don't understand why I suddenly have to knock when I have the key to his apartment. I grab my bag and rush over to his place where we were to meet for dinner, and where I was planning on spending the night. When I stand in front of the door I am not sure what to do and I grab my key and stare at it. But then I decide to trust Sonny and I knock softly on his door. Instead of opening the door wide, he slips through a small opening and pulls the door closer towards him, without closing is, when he stands in front of me. I frown my eyebrows and shake my head, not understanding what he is doing and why he is doing it. His smile is blindingly bright though, and I let him lean in and kiss me hello. _
"_Sonny, can we go in... I don't know what this is about, and I just want to go inside..."_
"_Close your eyes..."_
"_What?"_
"_Just do it Will, close your eyes..."_
_I am sceptical, but when I see a sweet deep fire in his eyes I feel how much he loves me. I close my eyes and feel his hands grabbing mine while he pulls us forward in slow tiny steps. I hear the door fall shut behind me and suddenly he stops. I bump into him slightly and my hands grab his hips and stay there when he cups my face and whispers:_
"_OK, you can open them..."_
_I do and I see his brown eyes right before me . I lean in and kiss him deeply and when we pull back I pull him into a close hug. And as soon as we do, and my eyes roam the room I freeze... _
"_Sonny?"_
"_Yeah?"_
_I pull myself from our hug and walk towards a brand new keyboard._
"_What is this?"_
"_A keyboard..."_
"_Sonny... I know that, but what is it doing here..."_
_When I turn around because his answer is taking some time, I see his beautiful smile again. His voice is tender:_
"_It's a present... I know you love playing and singing... and I love you... so..."_
_I can't belief this. I shake my head and softly touch the instrument as though I am afraid to break it. I try to find the words to thank him, to tell him what this does to me and I finally whisper:_
"_This is the sweetest thing anyone has ever done for me... thank you Sonny... thank you so much."_
_Suddenly I am back in his arms, squeezing his body against mine. I whisper my thank you's against his chest, in his neck and in his ear. I feel him laugh against me and my heart seem to burst from love and happiness._
"Yeah, the keyboard deserves a prominent place."
He nods and I lean in to kiss him again. My tongue finds his and they dance together in a familiar rhythm that we both enjoy so much. Feeling his body leaning into mine, having my legs locked around his butt makes my heart beat faster. I try to calm myself down by taking deep breaths, but the feeling of his warmth against me makes me want to take all his clothes off and drag him to his bed. I smile against his neck and whisper with a deep and husky voice:
"And let us not forget about your bed..."
His arms seem to pull me in even closer and I smile when I feel how I am not the only one who is in the mood for some action in that bed. When I feel his lips nibble my skin I remember a particular moment I will never forget involving Sonny's bed.
_How can anyone be so clumsy. I fell down the stairs this morning and am now listening to doctor Jonas telling me that I have a concussion. He looks at me and asks:_
"_Is there anyone who can wake you up tonight?"_
"_Why..."_
"_Because someone has to wake you up every two hours to check if you're OK..."_
"_Uhm...OK... I'll make sure someone will wake me up..."_
_The doctor nods and starts telling me about specific symptoms I should look for and about being careful and taking it easy. When I leave his office I am not sure what to do. I don't want to bother Sonny, since due to our busy days we decided I would sleep at the dorm tonight instead of at Sonny's place. And I don't want him to be interrupted tonight, when he has a busy day tomorrow. Just when I decide to ring my mum I have an incoming call... it's Sonny._
"_Hi."_
"_Hi, why didn't you call me..."_
"_What?"_
"_Jason, your dorm neighbour just called me to tell me you fell down the stairs and went to the hospital..."_
"_Yeah... "_
"_So? Should I be worried..."_
"_No... I'm sort of OK."_
"_Sort of OK? Sorry Will, that is not making me less worried at all... are you still at the hospital?"_
"_Yeah... I am just about to leave."_
"_Stay put, I'll be right there."_
_He hangs up the phone and I decide to just do as he says. I wait in front of the main entrance and it only takes him 20 minutes to pick me up. When I am sitting next to him I softly say:_
"_Can you take me to my mum's place?"_
"_Why..."_
_I hesitate, but decide to be honest since he is so earnestly caring and sweet:_
"_I have a concussion and I need to take it easy... and I need to be woken up every two hours to see if I am not losing my mind..."_
"_Will... you seriously think I am taking you to your mum's place?"_
"_Sonny..."_
"_No Will, I am taking you home... with me... I am going to wake you up every two hours, I will take care of you and I will make sure you are alright."_
_I can't help but smile when I hear the determination in his voice. I know arguing is not going to change his mind so I lean back in the chair and let my left hand stroke his thigh. When we come home I immediately lay myself down on Sonny's bed and before I know it he is undressing me. When I am only wearing my boxers he covers me up with the duvet and seconds later I am asleep. _
"_Will... wake up..."_
_I try to open my eyes. His voice is so close and I suddenly realise I feel his breath on my cheek. When I see his brown eyes all worried I smile and whisper with my sleepy voice:_
"_I'm fine Sonny... It's Thursday today... Queen Elizabeth is ruling England, and you are Sonny Kiriakis, my sweet and very hot boyfriend with the most beautiful eyes in the whole world."_
_His lips brush my cheek and I hear the smile in his voice when he says:_
"_OK then mister... go back to sleep... I love you."_
_I hum the last three words back to him and fall asleep soon after he walks away again. We do this routine every two hours and every time I tell Sonny his eyes are perfect , and every time he kisses my cheek and whispers his 'I love you' in my ear. And then suddenly, after our umpteenth time, instead of walking away, I feel his body next to mine. His leg is being draped over mine and his arm is put around my stomach. His head is on my chest and I smile when I hear him say softly:_
"_I love you when you're sleepy..."_
"_I love you always..."_
_I feel his lips curl up into a smile and I open my eyes to see his face shine like the sun. _
"_I set the alarm for two, four and six o'clock."_
_I protest a little by saying I feel fine. But Sonny is not budging and the alarm remains active. When we wake up at two o'clock his sleepy voice softly asks:_
"_Will... you OK?"_
_I stir and realise he is still curled up against me and I am able to hold him close in my arms as though he is my personal teddy bear. The feeling of being all warm and sleepy with Sonny makes me smile when I answer:_
"_I am better than OK... this position is perfect..."_
"_Will, common, tell me about the queen..."_
"_OK, The Queen's name is Elizabeth and you are Sonny... my hot boyfriend."_
_He stirs slightly and seems to push himself even further against me and then he says:_
"_OK, go back to sleep babe..."_
_When we wake up at four he is draped over me like a duvet and I feel warm and safe under my personal heater. His voice is groggy when he says:_
"_Will?"_
_My arms lock around his waist and I kiss his shoulder. _
"_Hmmmm."_
_I moan softly when I nibble and lick his skin, but I have to let go and answer him when he asks:_
"_How are you doing?"_
"_I'm fine babe... the queen is still called Elizabeth and you... you are perfect."_
_His body is completely relaxed and I stroke his back slowly. He moans softly and says:_
"_Stop that Will... you need your rest the doctor said... let's not get things started here."_
_I hold my hands still and before we drift off to sleep again I whisper in his ear:_
"_Perhaps you'll change your mind the coming two hours and I can get things started at six o'clock."_
_When we wake up at six o'clock, we are both lying on our sides, facing each other. Our hands are locked together and our legs are intertwined and though we are one person. When the alarm wakes us both up we look straight into each other's eyes and I smile when I see his sleepy eyes and rosy warm cheeks. He whispers:_
"_You OK?"_
"_I don't know..."_
_I smile and my hand pull away from his grip and finds its way down. When I reach between his legs and feel his usual morning hard-on I smile and whisper:_
"_Yes...I am fine..."_
"_Will?"_
"_Sonny... I am fine... the fact that I can remember that two hours ago I wanted to make love to you and you said no, and that I said I would wait two hours, means my head is fine... Now about this..."_
_My fingers squeeze slightly and I lean forward so he rolls on his back and I am leaning over him. He moans and I swallow it with a deep kiss. I feel how he opens his legs a bit more and I know he does not need any more persuading. I settle between his legs and let nature take over, using my body to show this gorgeous man, who is writhing underneath me, how much I love him. _
We both lose control after I bring up that memory. I lock my legs a little bit tighter around his hips and he lifts me up without hesitation. He carries me to his bed and before I know it his naked skin is touching mine. I cup his face when he comes up to kiss me. Softly I say:
"I love moving to a bigger apartment with you... but I am going to miss this apartment... so many memories."
He nods and with a soft voice, which is clearly not made for singing, he sings to me:
"And I'm gonna love you like nobody loves you
And I'll earn your trust making memories of us"
I roll him over and lean over so our faces touch and we breath in the same air. My voice is deep with want and passion:
"Let's make one more memory..."
End file.
| fanfiction |
fasting plasma glucose ( fpg ) should be measured for the screening or diagnosis of impaired fasting glucose and diabetes ( hyperglycemic states ) .
the standard guidelines for blood sample handling indicate that plasma or serum must be separated from cells as soon as possible and within a maximum of 2 hours .
therefore , the serum glucose concentrations are often measured with automatic analyzers in health examinations , and these are used as a screening test for glycemic states
. this may be one of the main reasons for the diagnosis of hyperglycemic states to be underestimated in korea .
it is well known that the glucose concentrations decrease over time in whole blood ex vivo as a result of glycolysis .
however , no recent reports have addressed the level of the difference between the fasting serum glucose and fpg in korea .
the purpose of this study was to compare the fasting serum glucose level with the fpg for diagnosing hyperglycemic states in real - life clinical situations .
we also evaluated an ordinary time delay in sample processing using our clinical laboratory tests to assess health examinations at the national health insurance corp .
for a period of a month to determine how time delays impact the diagnoses of hyperglycemic states .
we recruited 1,254 participants who were diagnosed with normoglycemia or ifg using the serum blood glucose level ; these were from 2,028 participants enrolled in hallym university sacred heart hospital and kangbuk samsung hospital for evaluating metabolic abnormalities , including ifg or dyslipidemia according to health examinations performed by the national health insurance corp . or by personal medical checkup between 2006 and 2009 .
fasting blood samples were collected from all 1,254 participants at our centers in the morning after a 12-hour overnight fast . in two consecutive samples ,
3 ml of blood was drawn and placed in common tubes for the glucose measurement .
the fasting serum glucose level was measured within 2 hours with an automated analyzer using the hexokinase / glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase method ( modular dpe ; hitachi hitechnologies , tokyo , japan ) .
the plasma samples were immediately centrifuged and the fpg was measured with an enzymatic assay ( biosen c - line ; ekf diagnostics gmbh , berlin , germany ) within 15 minutes .
we also investigated a time delay from blood sampling to glycemic testing using the order communication system ( refomax , seoul , korea ) at hallym university sacred heart hospital as part of health examinations performed by the national health insurance corp . for a period of month because we could not directly measure the real serum - clot contact time for clinical chemistry laboratory results .
we conducted a cross - sectional study , which was approved by the institutional review board of hallym university sacred heart hospital .
a total of 2,028 participants were initially included in this study . of these , 717 with newly diagnosed diabetes and 57 with no biochemical data were excluded ; as a result , 1,254 subjects were finally included in this analysis .
their mean glucose concentrations were 119.49.9 mg / dl for plasma and 108.56.5 mg / dl for serum ( mean difference , 10.97.4 mg / dl ) .
overall , 1,254 subjects were diagnosed with normoglycemia ( n=169 , 13.5% ) or ifg ( n=1,085 , 86.5% ) through measuring the fasting serum glucose at our centers . in this study population ( n=1,254 ) , 20.9% had newly diagnosed diabetes according to their fpg levels . of the participants with normoglycemia ( n=169 ) , 105 ( 62.1% ) and 24 ( 14.2% ) were newly diagnosed with ifg and diabetes , respectively , based on their fpg levels ( table 2 ) . the time delay from blood sampling to glycemic testing at our clinical laboratory for health examinations of the national health insurance corp . averaged 7852 minutes for 729 subjects for the fasting serum glucose level of the 844 subjects who were examined over a period of 1 month .
the results of this study showed that the serum glucose measurement and ordinary time delay in the sample processing before getting the result of that measurement may underestimate the diagnosis of hyperglycemic states in real - life clinical situations .
decreases in the glucose concentrations in whole blood ex vivo have been reported to average 5% to 7% ( 10 mg / dl ) per hour .
we performed a preliminary study of the serum - clot contact effect in 33 tests .
the blood samples were kept at room temperature before serum - clot separation , and glucose concentrations were measured for 3 hours at 30-minute intervals . the serum glucose level with each processing delay of 30 minutes decreased by an average of 7.42.2 mg / dl per hour , and the largest decrease ( 4.21.1 mg / dl ) occurred in the first 30 minutes .
this decrease in the glucose concentration may result in the missed diagnosis of hyperglycemic states for a large proportion of the population with glucose levels near the cutoffs for these diagnoses .
the importance of early diagnosis for diabetes , which facilitates prevention of diabetic complications , has been emphasized in korea because its rate of diabetes - related deaths is highest among the organization for economic co - operation and development ( oecd ) nations even though significant progress has been made in reducing the cardiovascular risk factors of korean patients with diagnosed diabetes .
several studies have demonstrated that the glucose concentrations are slightly higher in plasma than in serum , while others have found no significant difference between these levels .
however , these results do not seem to reflect the real clinical settings because the studies were conducted according to study protocols .
we have confirmed that time delays ( average of 7852 minutes ) occurred in the process of measuring the serum glucose level at our clinical laboratory for national health examinations , and this delay is considered to be one of the important reasons for the diagnosis of hyperglycemic states to be underestimated in korea .
a previous study from the korea national health and nutrition examination survey also showed that serum separation and refrigeration within 30 minutes of venous sampling is recommended over the naf ( non - adjacent form ) method to minimize the pre - analytical impact on diabetes detection .
first , because all of our recruited subjects had visited hospitals , there may have been a selection bias toward higher risk factors for diabetes .
second , our cross - sectional study results may be somewhat limited due to the lack of prospective follow - up data , limiting the clinical implications of our findings . despite these limitations ,
the present study , to the best of our knowledge , is the first report to show the direct comparison between the fasting serum glucose and fpg levels measured at approximately the same time when diagnosing hyperglycemic states .
glucose concentrations should be measured in plasma or serum immediately after sample separation ( or within a maximum of 30 minutes ) for early diagnosis and timely intervention in hyperglycemic states .
further prospective studies are also necessary to compare the fasting serum glucose level with the fpg to diagnose hyperglycemic states and evaluate the ordinary delay in sample processing in the korean population . | pubmed |
the radio relative to their bolometric luminosity in quasars is one of the greatest variance in the quasar s spectral energy distribution ( sed , elvis et al .
the distribution of the radio loudness , the ratio of radio flux to the optical one , appears bimodal with about 90% being radio quiet and 10% radio loud ( kellermann et al .
1989 ; falcke et al . 1996a ; ivezi ' c et al .
2002 , 2004 ; c.f . , hooper et al . 1995 ;
white et al .
2000 ; cirasuodo et al .
2003 ) . the confirmation and the origin of this radio dichotomy is one of the major issues in agn study .
several scenarios were proposed to explain the large range of radio strengths .
the basic assumptions fall into two main categories : ( 1 ) the central engines in the two types are assumed fundamentally different .
for example , the formation of radio jets is associated with the spin of black hole ( blandford 1990 and reference therein ) or with very low mass accretion rate onto the supermassive black hole ( smbh ; boroson 2002 ) .
( 2 ) the weak of radio emission in the radio quiet is attributed to the rapid deceleration of relativistic jets on parsec scales , such as caused by the strong interaction with either gas in the inner nucleus ( e.g. , falcke et al .
1996b ) or the strong radiation produced by the quasars ( ghissellini et al .
2004 ) .
the close related question is whether radio jets in radio quiet quasars are relativistic as in radio loud objects .
however , the measurement of proper motion is very difficult in general due to their weak radio emission and in particular due to the small size of the radio source . even at the vlbi resolution ,
the radio sources in most low redshift radio quiet and radio intermediate quasars remain un - resolved or at best are marginally resolved ( falcke et al .
1996b ; blundell & beasley 1998 ; ulvestad et al .
2005 ) . the brightness temperatures or their lower limits are in the range of 10@xmath1 k , consistent with being the nucleus origin .
superluminal motion at sub - parsec scale has been detected in two radio intermediate quasars iii zw 2 ( brunthaler et al .
2002 , 2005 ) and pg 1407 + 263 ( blundell , beasley & bicknell 2003 ) , suggesting that the radio jets in those sources be relativistic .
radio intermediate quasars ( @xmath2 for flat spectrum radio sources , falcke et al .
1996a ) were proposed to be the boosted radio quiet quasars based on the statistical properties of the [ oiii ] luminosity , their flat radio spectra , the high brightness temperature and the large amplitude variability ( miller et al . 1993 ; falcke et al . 1996b ; c.f .
, barvainis et al . 2005 ) . as for the radio loud quasars
, variability is a useful method to address whether a relativistic jet is present .
the brightness temperature derived from variability is usually larger than that derived from the vlbi imaging in radio loud quasars ( valtaoja et al .
2003 ) . in this paper
, we present a detailed study of radio variability of the sdss quasars by using the two epoch radio data derived from the faint image of radio sky at twenty centimeters ( first , becker et al .
1995 ) and nrao vla sky survey ( nvss , condon et al .
1997 ) . throughout this paper , we assume @xmath3 km s@xmath4 mpc@xmath4 , @xmath5 and @xmath6 .
the sample was selected by cross - correlating the third data release of sdss quasar catalog ( schneider et al .
2005 ) with the first catalog ( version 03apr11 , becker et al .
1995 ) and nvss catalog ( condon et al .
1998 ) . since we are interested in radio variable sources , which should contain a compact core on arcsec scales , we adopt a cutoff of two arcsecs in the position offset as the true match . as discussed in detail by several authors
, this selection has chance coincidence of 0.1% , and is likely complete to 95% for point sources ( e.g. , gregg et al . 1996 ) .
it will miss about 7% quasars with complex radio morphology or lobe dominated objects ( ivezi ' c et al . 2002 ; lu et al .
, in preparation ) . for nvss sources ,
we adopt a cutoff of 15 arcsecs in the position offset between the sdss quasar and the radio source .
this will lead a completeness of 90% , while the false rate remains to be very low ( 4% ) . since the nvss covers the entire sky north of -40 declination , thus encompasses all sky covered by first survey . to ensure a high significance of detection in nvss
, we use a threshold of 5 mjy for the first survey .
therefore , 2010 quasars with first flux larger than 5 mjy were searched for their nvss countparts . to complement with possible complex morphology , e.g. , the bright lobes ,
the offset was increased up to 45 `` , the beam size of the nvss survey .
all of the 2010 quasars have at least one nvss countpart with 45 '' . due to the different beam sizes used by nvss and first
, one must be cautious while comparing their fluxes .
we adopt a conservative approach in which only sources with the first peak flux larger than the integrated flux of nvss are considered as possible variable sources .
since the integrated nvss flux may include diffuse emission or weak nearby radio sources , sources with nvss flux larger than first may well be due to such contaminations . in the next step ,
significance of the variation between the two epochs for each quasar is estimated as follows : @xmath7 where @xmath8 is the peak flux during the first survey , and @xmath9 the integrated nvss flux , @xmath10 and @xmath11 the uncertainties in the correspondent first and nvss fluxes .
the first fluxes are subject to additional systematic uncertainties at 5% level , which is not included in the @xmath10 ( becker et al .
note the 3% systematic uncertainty of nvss flux has already been included in @xmath11 .
we use @xmath12 as a threshold for the source variability .
images of nvss and first are then visually examined for possible contamination due to nearby bright sources , and three of them were removed for this reason from the sample .
sdss j094420.44 + 613550.1 was eliminated from the sample because of nvss catalog gives a wrong flux for this object .
this gives a sample of 89 variable radio quasars with @xmath13 in the range of 1.2 to 2.6 .
we expect that three out of them are spurious with this 3@xmath14 limits .
radio loudness is calculated using the first radio flux and the psf magnitudes derived from the sdss survey as follows : @xmath15 @xmath16-corrections to the optical flux is derived using the five sdss magnitudes , corrected for the galactic reddening . while we assume @xmath17 for the @xmath16 correction of the radio flux of radio variable sources since they are likely flat spectral radio sources ( see below ) .
apparently , 67% of radio variable sources are radio intermediate or radio quiet ( fig 1 ) according to the definition of falcke et al .
( 1996a ) . for the sources with significant flux variation , we compute the the lower limit of the brightness temperature by assuming the variable part of radio flux is emitted in a region of which the light - crossing time is equal to the separation of the two observations @xmath18 where @xmath19 is the variable part of the radio power computed from the difference between the first and nvss fluxes , @xmath20 the timescale of the radio flux variability estimated from the difference of the observation time of first and nvss in the source rest frame , and @xmath21 is the boltzmann constant .
since @xmath22 is lorentz invariant , we simply use the observe frequency ( 1.4 ghz ) and the separation of nvss and first observation dates . in cases where the first observation date is only accurate to month ,
we use the day that makes the separation maximum to give a conservative estimate .
the brightness temperatures inferred in this way are all larger than 10@xmath23 k except for two low redshift quasars ( see also table 1 ) . the upper limit of the brightness temperature from the synchrotron radiation of a stationary source due to inverse compton process is approximately @xmath24 k ( kellermann & pauliny - toth 1969 ) .
this temperature may be greatly exceeded if the emission region moves relativistically towards the observer or if a coherent radiation process is responsible for the radio emission . in the former case ,
the apparent brightness temperature is boosted by a factor of @xmath25 where @xmath26^{-1}$ ] is the doppler factor , @xmath27 , @xmath28 , and @xmath29 is the angle between the line of sight and the velocity of the jet .
however , it was shown that real radio sources may emit at equi - partition brightness temperature around 10@xmath30 k in most circumstance ( e.g. , readhead 1994 ) . in this paper
, we adopt the inverse compton limit as a secure upper limit to estimate the lower limit of the doppler factor for the sources with brightness temperatures greater than this limit .
the lower limits of the doppler factors we derived are in the range of 0.6 - 25 with a median around 4 . for these radio variable sources , the maximum brightness attained ( @xmath31 10@xmath32 k )
are similar for radio loud , radio intermediate quasars ( @xcite ) .
note that the lack of sources with high rl and low brightness temperature t@xmath33 in the figure is due to a selection effect that sources with higher rl tend to be brighter in radio , thus have much higher radio power variation @xmath34p based on similar fractional variation amplitudes .
the fraction of variable sources varies with the radio power and radio loudness ( @xcite ) .
the probability for a constant fraction at different radio power is only 2@xmath35 ( @xmath36 ) using two sided kolmogorov - smornov test for two unbined distributions if an average radio spectral index @xmath37 for the parent sample of radio loud quasars .
it increases to 2% if @xmath38 is used .
sources appears most - variable for radio powers in the range of @xmath39 w hz@xmath4 and least variable in @xmath40 w hz@xmath4 .
quasars are more likely variable at radio loudness @xmath41 than above this value .
the radio loudness distributions for variable and parent samples are drawn from the same population at a probability of only @xmath42 ( 1% ) using two - sided kolmogorov - smornov test for two unbinned distributions if @xmath43=0.0 ( 0.5 ) is used for @xmath16-correction in radio flux . excluding radio sources with deconvolved major axis of the first image larger than 3 arcsecs has little effect on these results .
the detection rate does not change with the separation of the two epoches , which is in the range of 0.4 to 5 years in the source rest frame ( @xcite ) .
this is a possible indication that the variability is dominated by flares , similar to what observed in iii zw 2 , but rather than long term smooth variations . with the doppler factor
, we estimate the maximum viewing angle between the line of sight and the jet assuming an intrinsic narrow jet as follows , @xmath44/\beta ) \;\;\ ; { \mathrm for\ ; all \ ; \beta \le 1 } \ ] ] the inferred maximum viewing angles are quite small ( usually , @xmath4515@xmath46 ) for most radio variable sources .
and in some extreme objects , this angle is even smaller than the opening angle of jets on parsec scales or kpc scales in nearby radio galaxies ( typical of 5@xmath46 , e.g. , ly , walker & wrobel 2004 ) .
four quasars showed variations of a factor more than two between nvss and first surveys .
three of them are radio intermediate even at their peak radio flux during the first survey .
their radio powers at 20 cm are moderate ( @xmath47 ) .
the fastest variation among them is a factor of 2.5 in 20 cm flux within eight months for sdss j073938.85 + 305951.2 .
we examined the optical spectra for possible evidence of blazar - like feature but fails to find any .
in particular , the line and continuum spectra appear similar to the composite quasar spectra ( vanden berk et al .
2001 ) .
some interesting objects are noted .
this sample contains several radio loud bal qsos , which were analyzed in detail in zhou et al .
sdss 094857.31 + 002225.5 is an extremely radio loud nls1 with prominent optical feii emission and inverted radio spectrum .
it was studied in detail by zhou et al .
they proposed a relativisitic jet in this object based on the flux variability between the first and nvss data .
it was observed by vlba in 2 and 8.4ghz , and remains unresolved ( beasley et al .
2002 ) , consistent with the conclusion reached by zhou et al .. with an inferred doppler factor of @xmath484.3 , the intrinsic radio loudness of this object is in the radio intermediate range if most of the radio flux is contributed by the beaming component . for 10 radio variable objects that the non - simultaneous multi - wavelength radio observations are available ,
the radio spectral indices are in the range of @xmath49 ( @xmath50 ) with a median of 0.2 .
this is also consistent with boosted radio emission .
among 2010 quasars with first flux larger than 5 mjy , we identified 89 radio variable ones . for strong sources
, the systematic uncertainty limits any variation detectable to @xmath5120% at 3@xmath14 levels ( 5% systematic uncertainty in the first flux and 3% in the nvss flux ) . at lower radio flux ,
the statistical fluctuation is significant , the limit increases to @xmath52% at flux limit of 5 mjy . considering that we counted only sources with @xmath53 , about 9% quasars with radio flux larger than 5 mjy show variations in 20 cm radio flux at 20 - 30% level on time scale of years .
we have found strong evidence for relativistic beaming in 87 of these 89 radio variable quasars . among them , two are radio quiet ( @xmath54 ) and 29 are radio loud ( @xmath55 ) , while the majority ( 56 ) are radio intermediate . since radio powers of most ( 70% ) these radio intermediate quasars are above the break power between fr i and fr ii division ( @xmath56 ) , one may question whether they are true radio intermediate quasars . however , radio powers of most these quasars are boosted by relativistic effect and as such represent only upper limits
. the intrinsic radio power may be much lower .
for example , if we use the lower limits of doppler factor derived from the radio variability to de - boost the radio flux , the radio powers for these sources would be a factor of 10 - 1000 lower , for an optically thin jet model and @xmath57 for isotropic emission model .
] well in the range for fr i galaxies .
of course this correction is oversimplified considering the contribution from lower velocity part of the jet and extended lobes , and the true powers may lie in between . by noting that the radio powers of most objects are not too far from the break power , even if substantial correction by the boosting effect is introduced , most of these quasars would be in the fr i regime .
therefore , we believe that most of objects with @xmath2 are radio intermediate as proposed by fackle et al .. this is hitherto the largest sample of radio intermediate quasars with beamed radio emission . among 2010
radio quasars with 20 cm flux above 5 mjy , 724 objects show radio loudness @xmath2 . since radio spectral indexes are not available for all these sources , we can only set an upper limit on the number of radio intermediate quasars in the sample to 724 . among them
we detected 58 quasars with relativistic jets beaming toward us .
this leads to an apparent fraction to @xmath518.0% .
however , a number of serious corrections must be applied in order to estimate the fraction of quasars with relativistic jets .
first , because of large inferred doppler factor for these 58 radio intermediate / quiet quasars , they must be observed very close to the direction of jet .
we estimate that the line of sight is within 15@xmath46 of the jet direction for most variable objects ( eq .
2 ) , thus the probability of detecting such a source is small .
this implies that their parent population may be large .
second , since the quasars in the variable sample are relativistically boosted , the flux limit of the parent population may be well below 5 mjy , which is used to select the sample .
both effects depends on the doppler factor : sources with a larger doppler factor are seen at a small solid angle around the jet direction , and their fluxes are boosted by a larger factors . using the maximum extending angles estimated in the last section , we estimate that the minimum size of parent quasar population at an opening angle less than @xmath29 ( or with a given @xmath58 ) using : @xmath59 where @xmath60 is the @xmath61 for doppler factor @xmath58 ( @xmath62 5 ) . the result is plotted in @xcite .
the number of parent sources increases with the doppler factor .
this is in fact fully consistent with the assumption that the radio flux in these variable sources are boosted greatly by relativistic effect , as such objects with larger doppler factor trace a larger parent population with a lower flux limit . at doppler factor
larger than 5 , the radio variable sources traces a parent population @xmath63 1500 - 2000 .
the number should be doubled since we consider only these sources with first flux larger than the nvss one .
this number is a factor of 4 larger than all radio intermediate quasars at flux limit of 5 mjy even we relax the radio loudness of radio intermediate quasars to @xmath2 for all quasars .
the ratio of jet component at its comoving frame to the isotropic component is needed to determine the flux limit of parent population with a given doppler factor , which is required to estimate the number of parent population . however , this is not constrained even for the best studied radio intermediate quasar , iii zw 2 . in that case , the observed flux for extended lobe is 10 - 20% of the core component , and apparent velocity is 2.6c . since we do not know the angle between the line sight to the jet , it doppler factor can not be determined .
fortunately , a meanful conclusion can still be reached with the current data .
if the radio emission of quasars with @xmath64 have been boosted by a factor of 10 , then the flux limit of parent population is 0.5 mjy for our sample .
note that to the first flux limit ( 1 mjy ) , 4124 ( 5313 ) among 44984 quasars in sdss dr3 are detected in the first with 3 arcsec offset in the flux limit of @xmath31 1 mjy ( @xmath310.7 mjy ) ( de vries , becker & white 2005 ) .
most of them are radio intermediate ( see iveciz et al .
2003 ) . extrapolating to 0.5mjy
will predict the number of radio detectable quasars to 6751 . with this assumption
, the parent population of the radio variable sources would be as large as half of quasars with radio flux larger than 0.5 mjy .
alternatively , if the isotropic component ( lobes ) is very weak for these radio intermediate quasars , then the flux limit of the parent population is even lower , we will detect a small fraction of relativistic jets but intrinsically radio even weak quasars .
note this number is likely a conservative lower limit because not all quasars with relativistic jets shows radio variations at amplitude greater than our detection limits during the epoch of two radio observations .
thus we believe that relativistic jets present in most radio intermediate quasars .
our results imply that jets in a large fraction of radio intermediate sources are relativistic , but the size of emission region is smaller than in classical radio loud quasars .
a substantial fraction of 20 cm radio flux is emitted on the scales of several to tens parsecs as suggested by the variability time scale .
the peak brightness or the lorentz factor of the most compact component is similar for both radio loud and radio intermediate quasars
. the typical size of radio loud objects , however , appears larger given their large radio powers . as a result ,
the 20 cm radio emission in the classical radio sources is less variable on time scales of years .
this is consistent with our results that the fraction of radio variable source is small at very large radio loudness .
the presence of relativistic jets on parsec scales in a substantial fraction of radio intermediate quasars has several implications for agn models .
if the radio emission has been boosted by relativistic effect and the emission from extended lobes are weak as of iii zw 2 , many flat spectral intermediate radio quasars might be boosted radio - quiet quasars .
if the broad band spectrum of jet component is similar to that of low peak bl lacs while the disk emission component is similar to that of other quasars , we estimate that the jet emission will dominate the sed at sub - mm wavelength , and contribute significantly to the hard x - ray spectrum of those beamed objects .
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lu , y. , yuan , w. , apj , in press rrrrlrlrrr [email protected] & 1.6825 & [email protected] & 8.35@xmath66 0.15 & 1997 - 02- & 5.70@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 09 - 20 & 1.54 & 13.91 & 4.34 + [email protected] & 1.6512 & [email protected] & 5.47@xmath66 0.15 & 1997 - 02- & 3.00@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 09 - 20 & 1.82 & 13.86 & 4.17 + [email protected] & 1.9950 & [email protected] & 12.14@xmath66 0.15 & 1995 - 11 - 14 & 9.20@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 1.52 & 14.59 & 7.31 + 073938.85 + 305951.2 & 3.3994 & [email protected] & 7.26@xmath66 0.37 & 1993 - 04 - 12 & 2.80@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 2.31 & 16.27 & 26.58 + 074033.54 + 285247.1 & 0.7111 & [email protected] & 77.57@xmath66 0.15 & 1993 - 04 - 29 & 63.30@xmath66 1.90 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 3.15 & 15.18 & 11.44 + 074815.44 + 220059.5 & 1.0595 & [email protected] & 9.86@xmath66 0.13 & 1998 - 08- & 7.00@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 01 & 0.98 & 13.15 & 2.42 + 074823.85 + 332051.2 & 2.9888 & [email protected] & 8.14@xmath66 0.14 & 1995 - 10- & 5.90@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 1.94 & 14.99 & 9.95 + 075535.41 + 292047.3 & 0.5064 & [email protected] & 7.19@xmath66 0.15 & 1993 - 05 - 04 & 5.40@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 1.77 & 13.94 & 4.42 + 075849.47 + 305452.8 & 2.7967 & [email protected] & 5.92@xmath66 0.14 & 1993 - 04 - 13 & 4.20@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 1.92 & 15.66 & 16.60 + 080945.16 + 453918.0 & 2.0395 & [email protected] & 20.59@xmath66 0.13 & 1997 - 03 - 18 & 15.10@xmath66 0.60 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.85 & 14.44 & 6.51 + 081352.87 + 352035.4 & 1.8981 & [email protected] & 8.01@xmath66 0.13 & 1994 - 07 - 03 & 4.70@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 2.08 & 15.71 & 17.30 + 081415.05 + 412323.4 & 1.2969 & [email protected] & 5.15@xmath66 0.13 & 1994 - 09 - 02 & 3.40@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 1.44 & 14.80 & 8.57 + 081655.28 + 475611.5 & 2.2337 & [email protected] & 9.01@xmath66 0.47 & 1997 - 04 - 05 & 4.90@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.27 & 14.40 & 6.30 + 082817.25 + 371853.7 & 1.3530 & [email protected] & 21.18@xmath66 0.13 & 1994 - 07 - 23 & 14.80@xmath66 0.60 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 2.97 & 15.55 & 15.30 + 083225.34 + 370736.2 & 0.0919 & [email protected] & 11.78@xmath66 0.17 & 1994 - 07 - 23 & 8.20@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 0.93 & 12.59 & 1.57 + 083655.73 + 342335.4 & 0.7905 & [email protected] & 10.32@xmath66 0.13 & 1994 - 07 - 01 & 6.30@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 2.60 & 14.87 & 9.04 + 083658.91 + 442602.3 & 0.2544 & [email protected] & 9.39@xmath66 0.15 & 1997 - 02 - 28 & 6.60@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 0.67 & 11.97 & 0.98 + 083744.01 + 420643.9 & 2.1301 & [email protected] & 18.12@xmath66 0.13 & 1995 - 12 - 19 & 13.50@xmath66 0.60 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.20 & 14.82 & 8.69 + 083951.00 + 333630.9 & 1.7528 & [email protected] & 5.60@xmath66 0.14 & 1994 - 06 - 19 & 4.00@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 2.07 & 15.38 & 13.35 + 084955.28 + 005305.5 & 1.0345 & [email protected] & 6.20@xmath66 0.15 & 1998 - 08 & 4.00@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 1.65 & 13.02 & 2.18 + 084957.97 + 510829.0 & 0.5837 & [email protected] & 344.09@xmath66 0.14 & 1997 - 04 - 25 & 266.30@xmath66 8.00 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 3.79 & 14.23 & 5.53 + 085001.17 + 462600.5 & 0.5238 & [email protected] & 20.90@xmath66 0.13 & 1997 - 03 - 22 & 16.00@xmath66 0.60 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.61 & 12.94 & 2.05 + 085217.84 + 054027.8 & 0.8520 & [email protected] & 5.45@xmath66 0.15 & 2000 - 02- & 3.30@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.58 & 12.56 & 1.54 + 085958.69 + 455237.9 & 0.4400 & [email protected] & 30.74@xmath66 0.14 & 1997 - 03 - 22 & 19.60@xmath66 0.70 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.53 & 13.11 & 2.35 + 090111.86 + 044858.8 & 1.8626 & [email protected] & 133.57@xmath66 0.15 & 2000 - 02- & 94.30@xmath66 2.90 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 3.18 & 14.66 & 7.70 + 090155.15 + 425404.4 & 1.7350 & [email protected] & 14.23@xmath66 0.14 & 1997 - 02 - 17 & 9.90@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.32 & 14.19 & 5.35 + 090412.87 + 060326.5 & 0.9360 & [email protected] & 8.01@xmath66 0.15 & 2000 - 02- & 6.20@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 1.62 & 12.58 & 1.57 + 090743.66 + 551512.4 & 0.6448 & [email protected] & 22.58@xmath66 0.14 & 1997 - 03- & 16.80@xmath66 0.60 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 1.79 & 13.25 & 2.61 + 091641.76 + 024252.8 & 1.1025 & [email protected] & 99.39@xmath66 0.14 & 1998 - 07- & 72.50@xmath66 2.20 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 3.06 & 14.19 & 5.36 + 093215.14 + 432738.4 & 0.9564 & [email protected] & 20.43@xmath66 0.13 & 1997 - 02 - 20 & 12.30@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.04 & 13.82 & 4.04 + [email protected] & 0.7949 & [email protected] & 101.36@xmath66 0.15 & 1998 - 08- & 66.80@xmath66 2.00 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.92 & 14.21 & 5.44 + 093818.35 + 390809.8 & 1.3049 & [email protected] & 7.43@xmath66 0.13 & 1994 - 08 - 13 & 5.50@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 12 - 15 & 2.35 & 14.92 & 9.38 + 094857.31 + 002225.5 & 0.5846 & [email protected] & 107.53@xmath66 0.15 & 1998 - 09- & 69.50@xmath66 2.10 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 3.01 & 13.90 & 4.30 + 095046.47 + 584113.0 & 2.3648 & [email protected] & 6.54@xmath66 0.14 & 2002 - 06- & 4.80@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 2.40 & 13.28 & 2.68 + 095147.86 + 020235.5 & 0.6053 & [email protected] & 6.14@xmath66 0.15 & 1998 - 07- & 4.20@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 1.73 & 12.69 & 1.70 + 095227.30 + 504850.6 & 1.0909 & [email protected] & 104.85@xmath66 0.15 & 1997 - 04 - 25 & 85.80@xmath66 3.00 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.57 & 14.28 & 5.77 + 095618.17 + 542628.2 & 1.7147 & [email protected] & 8.72@xmath66 0.14 & 1997 - 05- & 6.40@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 2.08 & 13.86 & 4.16 + 095739.92 + 074047.9 & 1.6688 & [email protected] & 73.56@xmath66 0.15 & 2000 - 01- & 54.70@xmath66 1.70 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.94 & 14.44 & 6.50 + 095819.66 + 472507.8 & 1.8818 & [email protected] & 763.01@xmath66 0.15 & 1997 - 03 - 31 & [email protected] & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 3.62 & 15.81 & 18.59 + 101609.48 + 002810.5 & 1.0131 & [email protected] & 22.47@xmath66 0.15 & 1998 - 08- & 18.10@xmath66 0.70 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.68 & 13.57 & 3.34 + 103424.41 + 493221.0 & 1.6163 & [email protected] & 12.42@xmath66 0.13 & 1997 - 04 - 17 & 9.70@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.41 & 13.87 & 4.19 + 104901.71 + 005534.0 & 1.1633 & [email protected] & 5.73@xmath66 0.15 & 1998 - 08- & 3.20@xmath66 0.40 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 1.52 & 13.48 & 3.12 + [email protected] & 4.3032 & [email protected] & 13.31@xmath66 0.15 & 1998 - 08- & 9.30@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.12 & 15.06 & 10.49 + 110845.28 + 594137.9 & 0.7476 & [email protected] & 8.95@xmath66 0.14 & 2002 - 07- & 5.20@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 1.83 & 12.38 & 1.34 + 110859.29 + 031127.9 & 3.4587 & [email protected] & 10.36@xmath66 0.15 & 1998 - 09- & 7.40@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 1.99 & 14.68 & 7.84 + 111030.44 + 034833.3 & 1.8653 & [email protected] & 15.37@xmath66 0.13 & 1998 - 07- & 11.20@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.28 & 14.23 & 5.52 + 111221.82 + 003028.5 & 0.5234 & [email protected] & 8.88@xmath66 0.14 & 1998 - 08- & 6.70@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.25 & 12.57 & 1.54 + 114856.79 + 555827.3 & 0.9616 & [email protected] & 21.88@xmath66 0.14 & 1997 - 05- & 15.10@xmath66 0.90 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 2.49 & 13.70 & 3.69 + [email protected] & 1.8316 & [email protected] & 11.84@xmath66 0.14 & 1998 - 08- & 8.10@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 1.69 & 14.14 & 5.16 + 121143.52 + 013011.2 & 2.5902 & [email protected] & 18.36@xmath66 0.15 & 1998 - 07- & 14.40@xmath66 0.60 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 1.91 & 14.55 & 7.08 + 121440.07 + 600330.9 & 1.4863 & [email protected] & 34.02@xmath66 0.14 & 2002 - 07- & 17.50@xmath66 0.70 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 2.29 & 13.76 & 3.86 + 121446.06 + 532023.5 & 2.1472 & [email protected] & 13.02@xmath66 0.22 & 1997 - 05 - 05 & 8.90@xmath66 0.90 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.04 & 14.34 & 6.01 + 121729.29 + 060750.8 & 2.0945 & [email protected] & 24.49@xmath66 0.17 & 2000 - 02- & 13.50@xmath66 0.60 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.44 & 14.43 & 6.46 + [email protected] & 1.3371 & [email protected] & 18.83@xmath66 0.14 & 1998 - 08- & 14.80@xmath66 0.60 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.71 & 13.83 & 4.08 + 121916.76 + 623026.1 & 3.0559 & [email protected] & 8.40@xmath66 0.14 & 2002 - 07- & 6.40@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 2.00 & 13.61 & 3.43 + 122400.78 + 005919.9 & 1.4956 & [email protected] & 5.52@xmath66 0.14 & 1998 - 08- & 2.40@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 1.80 & 13.84 & 4.11 + 122705.72 + 631533.2 & 1.5937 & [email protected] & 5.02@xmath66 0.13 & 2002 - 08- & 3.20@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 1.97 & 12.87 & 1.95 + 122757.23 + 101410.7 & 1.2924 & [email protected] & [email protected] & 200001 & [email protected] & 1995 - 02 - 07 & 1.40 & 13.53 & 4.33 + 122819.25 + 023229.3 & 3.1479 & [email protected] & 111.11@xmath66 1.72 & 1998 - 09- & 60.00@xmath66 1.80 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 3.19 & 15.82 & 18.80 + [email protected] & 0.9991 & [email protected] & 6.55@xmath66 0.15 & 1998 - 08- & 4.50@xmath66 0.40 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.11 & 13.23 & 2.56 + 123132.37 + 013814.0 & 3.2286 & [email protected] & 11.51@xmath66 0.81 & 1998 - 07- & 6.30@xmath66 0.40 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 1.85 & 14.90 & 9.26 + 123628.79 + 565156.4 & 2.5105 & [email protected] & 8.36@xmath66 0.14 & 1997 - 05- & 6.40@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 2.30 & 14.19 & 5.36 + 123932.75 + 044305.3 & 1.7621 & [email protected] & 426.95@xmath66 0.14 & 2000 - 02- & [email protected] & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 4.14 & 15.07 & 10.56 + 125014.30 + 621032.4 & 1.9053 & [email protected] & 11.54@xmath66 0.15 & 2002 - 07 - 26 & 9.10@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 2.16 & 13.19 & 2.49 + 125414.27 + 024117.5 & 1.8405 & [email protected] & 6.42@xmath66 0.14 & 1998 - 07- & 4.40@xmath66 0.40 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 1.62 & 13.90 & 4.29 + 131728.65 + 060046.5 & 2.6095 & [email protected] & 76.59@xmath66 0.14 & 2000 - 02- & 37.40@xmath66 1.20 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.92 & 15.22 & 11.80 + 131906.47 + 493152.9 & 1.9322 & [email protected] & 13.65@xmath66 0.13 & 1997 - 04 - 17 & 10.20@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 03 - 12 & 2.03 & 14.58 & 7.27 + 135213.31 + 581536.8 & 3.1136 & [email protected] & 13.54@xmath66 0.13 & 2001 - 03- & 9.60@xmath66 0.50 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 2.09 & 14.07 & 4.88 + 135341.72 + 431052.5 & 1.1136 & [email protected] & 23.15@xmath66 0.14 & 1997 - 02 - 20 & 18.50@xmath66 0.70 & 1995 - 03 - 12 & 1.70 & 14.19 & 5.37 + 142730.43 + 545601.6 & 1.7533 & [email protected] & 32.85@xmath66 0.15 & 1997 - 03- & 24.10@xmath66 0.80 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 1.96 & 14.50 & 6.81 + 143540.20 + 024226.4 & 2.1812 & [email protected] & 57.82@xmath66 0.14 & 1998 - 07- & 45.30@xmath66 1.40 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 3.15 & 14.87 & 9.04 + 143623.97 + 031155.5 & 1.7979 & [email protected] & 16.63@xmath66 0.33 & 1998 - 07- & 10.50@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.14 & 14.35 & 6.09 + 145002.45 + 001629.4 & 0.9573 & [email protected] & 13.82@xmath66 0.17 & 1998 - 07- & 9.40@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.24 & 13.54 & 3.25 + 145207.94 + 025019.4 & 2.4330 & [email protected] & 11.17@xmath66 0.13 & 1998 - 07- & 6.30@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 02 - 27 & 2.26 & 14.57 & 7.21 + 150205.38 + 604534.3 & 1.2986 & [email protected] & 44.89@xmath66 0.15 & 2002 - 07- & 35.20@xmath66 1.10 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 2.81 & 13.38 & 2.89 + 151002.93 + 570243.3 & 4.3087 & [email protected] & 248.07@xmath66 0.13 & 1997 - 05- & 202.00@xmath66 6.10 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 3.72 & 16.12 & 23.64 + 153559.67 + 583430.9 & 2.1813 & [email protected] & 6.70@xmath66 0.13 & 2002 - 06- & 4.10@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 23 & 1.65 & 13.37 & 2.87 + 153703.94 + 533219.9 & 2.4035 & [email protected] & 9.28@xmath66 0.14 & 1997 - 05- & 7.10@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 1.50 & 14.18 & 5.34 + 162548.79 + 264658.7 & 2.5177 & [email protected] & 10.12@xmath66 0.13 & 1995 - 12 - 17 & 6.10@xmath66 0.40 & 1995 - 04 - 16 & 1.33 & 15.92 & 20.29 + 162816.95 + 351023.6 & 0.7151 & [email protected] & 15.91@xmath66 0.14 & 1994 - 07 - 03 & 9.40@xmath66 0.50 & 1995 - 04 - 16 & 2.23 & 14.65 & 7.64 + 163915.80 + 412833.7 & 0.6900 & [email protected] & 89.23@xmath66 0.16 & 1994 - 09 - 02 & 73.80@xmath66 2.30 & 1995 - 04 - 16 & 3.10 & 15.19 & 11.60 + 164602.25 + 432156.3 & 2.9102 & [email protected] & 6.21@xmath66 0.14 & 1997 - 02 - 20 & 3.80@xmath66 0.40 & 1995 - 03 - 12 & 2.20 & 14.93 & 9.45 + 164952.90 + 325815.1 & 0.7109 & [email protected] & 43.58@xmath66 0.12 & 1995 - 10 - 14 & 33.60@xmath66 1.10 & 1995 - 04 - 16 & 2.55 & 15.23 & 11.91 + 171535.96 + 632336.0 & 2.1818 & [email protected] & 52.48@xmath66 0.14 & 2002 - 08- & 35.90@xmath66 1.10 & 1995 - 04 - 02 & 2.33 & 14.31 & 5.88 + [email protected] & 0.6456 & [email protected] & 19.21@xmath66 0.14 & 1997 - 02- & 12.40@xmath66 0.60 & 1993 - 09 - 20 & 1.86 & 13.30 & 2.70 + 230845.85 + 011201.3 & 3.0559 & [email protected] & 8.06@xmath66 0.13 & 1995 - 10 - 16 & 5.50@xmath66 0.40 & 1993 - 11 - 15 & 2.33 & 15.02 & 10.13 + | arxiv |
Tag Archives: Sam Worthington
January 27, 2010 by contextualhealing - 2 Comments
You may have won the last 500 years, but you'll never colonize Space!!!
Just as District 9 indicated that there are enough realistic big-budget blockbuster movies about the horrors of apartheid in South Africa, there are apparently enough realistic big-budget blockbuster movies about the American genocide, according to Avatar. Just kidding. I know the value of a sci-fi satire as well as anybody. But these are actual historical events, the repercussions of which persist today and are largely unrecognized by the cultural mainstream that Cameron is playing with, so heavy on the "real 3D" and CGI and lite on the story and context.
I would love to see a realistic epic historical blockbuster movie about people of color battling invaders and oppressors. Hollywood does epic European versus European very well (see Braveheart) but notably Mel Gibson's Apocalypto faded to black just before Jaguar Paw and his folks' impending struggle against the arriving Europeans; the villians in that flick were Mayans. Danny Glover's plans to create an epic film about the Haitian Revolution and Toussaint L'Overture have been stalled more than a decade, as financing has been a real problem.
Cameron's recycling a trusty myth that's been kicking around the U.S. from James Fenimore Cooper to Dances With Wolves (as many others have pointed out, including David Brooks in the New York Times) of white man goes Native and finds his soul in the indigenous culture, which he then goes on to not only be accepted into, but to master, exemplify and then lead to (SPOILER ALERT) victory. In Avatar, anyway. Stay tuned for the real updated score for the Black people of South Africa and the original people of the Americas on your nightly news. Oh, wait…
Akin to the fishiness pointed out by comedian Paul Mooney of a couple blockbusters of the early 2000's ["First you had The Last Samurai starring Tom Cruise. Then you had The Mexican starring Brad Pitt"], like authorities terming Zapotec Mexicans aliens for setting foot in Arizona, the indigenous people of Avatar also happen to be aliens. Writer, director and producer Cameron tells a story of plundering land and attempting to destroy a people who were living in harmony with nature in the name of a outrageously coveted mineral (actually called "unobtanium") – IN SPACE.
But wait a minute. Leaving aside the Dances With Wolves plotline, isn't there value to the themes of Avatar? What about the kids – they're hearing the lessons of live in harmony with nature, don't take what you don't need, honor your ancestors and (ahem) paint with all the glow-in-the-dark colors of the wind. The story that emerges has many touching moments, as the Na'vi culture (aesthetically like a glow-in-the-dark combination of Lakota and Masai – only the people are massive, catlike and blue) believes that all energy is enduring and that they can communicate with their ancestors through nature – cool, right? It's not often that you hear those sentiments expressed on the screen – big or small.
And the $500 million spectacle that unfolds on the screen is not to believed. Thanks to the "real 3D" that I saw it in, even things like the foreground edges of desks seemed real enough to touch.
But the creation of an indigenous culture from whole cloth by Cameron is a little weird. Though the Na'vi are grounded in nature, there is also something subtly high tech about them – their natural world glows neon like a Tokyo nightclub and they can "upload and download" ancestral memories from fiber-optic trees and communicate with animals by literally plugging in their long braids (as emphatically pointed out by Sigourney Weaver's scientist, still game to tromp around a space ship in cargo shorts and an undershirt). Also, when hero Jake Sully's Na'vi avatar appears, they don't seem to question how a "sky person" could inhabit the body of one of their own, but then are horrified when he turns out to be an avatar. This is just one part of the eerie blue pall of condescension that Cameron casts over the people of his imagination.
And there is even precendent for Cameron allegedly co-opting the artistic expression of people of color before. A lawsuit filed by African American author Sophia Stewart claims that Terminator 2 is lifted from her sci-fi epic novel The Third Eye. Stewart's lawsuit also names The Matrix creators the Wachowski brothers. According to Stewart, in her book, the young boy character of Terminator 2 grows up to become the Neo character of the events of The Matrix (which in The Third Eye is a deeper allegory of slavery and colonization than appears in that film, also produced by Terminator and Avatar studio Fox). After a judge ruled that the muti-million dollar lawsuit could go forward, it was thrown out when Stewart failed to appear at a hearing. (Check out this interview with Stewart for more details.)
Leaving aside all of that, Avatar provides an intriguing parallel universe story of victory of people and nature over colonization and exploitation. The film has been endorsed by President Evo Morales of Bolivia (after he saw it in his third ever trip to the movies) and condemned by the Vatican, which is offended at the suggestion that nature can replace religion (sort of like they were during the 15th Century). But $500 million could probably finance five epic historical blockbusters of actual battles between indigenous people and colonizers (lite on the CGI, heavy on the story and context). Which ones would you like to see?
Let me know:
June 24, 2009 by contextualhealing - 0 comments
Did you leave the webcam on?
by Lauren Pabst, Contextual Healing
Many of this Summer's blockbuster fantasy movies pit humans against machines, even as Americans find our government on the robotic side of the real thing in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
i, Autobot
"I got you a webcam so we can chat 24/7" says a college-bound Shia LaBeouf, ever so cooly, to love interest Megan Fox via cell phone early on in the trailer for Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen, which opens today in theaters nationwide.
"Sounds cute, I can't wait," Fox replies cutely, flatly.
This little digital commercial is slipped prominently into the promo, just before clips of car chases and robot behemoths firebombing aircraft carriers, walking all over famous landmarks (Brooklyn Bridge! Pyramids of Giza!), busting up freeways and placing our visually pleasing heroes into jeopardy.
The flirty little exchange fits perfectly with the overall tone of Transformers, a fantasy action adventure based on the animated series from the 1980s, in which two squads of alien robots – one good, one evil – duke it out on battlefield Earth.
Though LeBoeuf and company will spend most of the movie along with the good Autobots fighting the evil Deceptecons, this little suggestive exchange aimed at the teenaged, digital device-consuming, YouTubing generation puts all of that robot-blasting in context. Technology (of the type that rumbles out of a tractor-trailer disguise to snatch your car off the highway) can be the enemy… but (in real life, now) before anything else, it is our trusted sidekick – our little digital friend. It's what allows us to keep in touch with our sexy girl/boyfriends.
Since many of the summer blockbusters deal with the fantasy theme of man versus machine, it seems an appropriate time to take a look at our everyday relationship to robots. While Terminator: Salvation imagines malevolent killer robots programmed by an evil, autonomous, human-hunting computer program the Transformers series offers two sides of the coin – there are evil Deceptecons, but there are also helpful, righteous Autobots. And through our shared righteousness, humanity is on the side of the Autobots.
The friendship of Shia LaBeouf's Sam Witwicky and Optimus Prime in Transformers is one more entry in the lovable-robot canon of American cinema. As evidenced by last summer's WALL-E, as well as R2D2 and C3PO from Star Wars, Haley Joel Osment in A.I., Johnny 5 and the little guy from Batteries Not Included, the friendly robot is well established in our pop-culture consciousness. And let's face it, friendly robots populate our life – from our trusty cell phone to our colorful, cute iPod, our indispensable laptop computer, our efficient microwave oven, and yes the webcam that allows us to chat with our significant other "24/7." Robots today provide unparalleled amounts of stimulation – mentally and in some cases even physically.
But in the Summer of 2009, the theme of man vs. machine is too significant and evocative for us to ignore. Certain other real-life battles are playing out right now, around the world. And like the heroic Autobots, we owe it to ourselves to transform a bit – our point of view, that is. There is definitely more than meets the eye.
The Terminator was the 1984 action movie hit, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger as a humanoid killer robot from the year 2029, sent back in time to the Reagan era to kill the mother of the as-yet unborn John Connor. Connor would grow up to lead a rebellion against the evil machines that would take over Earth – an Air Force computer program called Skynet had become self-aware somewhere around the turn of the 21st Century, and was now bent on destroying the human race.
In Terminator 2 (1991), Schwarzenegger was back, this time as a benevolent bodyguard-bot, reprogrammed by the future John Connor and sent back to 1995 to protect his mom and his young self.
Now, twenty-five years after the original, there is a new Terminator movie, the actor who embodied the original killing machine has been "reprogrammed" yet again as the Governor of California, and Terminator-like killer robots zoom around blowing up people. But just like Arnold, these robots work for us.
I felt a bit of cognitive dissonance watching the new Terminator: Salvation in a half-full darkened, cold theater on a hot June afternoon. The scenes of the nightmarish Terminator robots hunting the brave humans of the Resistance were for us images to eat popcorn to, while the real thing is taking place half a world away.
The machines formerly known as Predator Drones are unmanned flying vehicles capable of bombing targets in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq with Hellfire missiles as they are operated remotely by pilots in an air-conditioned room on an Army base in places like Nevada. The U.S. Defense Department first admitted to arming these unmanned drones on October 25, 2002; they previously had been known to be used only for surveillance purposes.
The first intended targets of these Predator Drones were suspected al-Qaeda members. The drones have since been used in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia and Pakistan. From just a handful seven years ago, the U.S. now has over 5,300 drones in operation – some as small as insects. Aerial drones also patrol the U.S.-Mexico border in the name of surveillance – these are currently unarmed.
In the words of one senior Bush administration official, as quoted by P.W. Singer, author of Wired for War, "The unmanning of war plays to our strength. The thing that scares people is our technology."
Leaving aside the question of fear, the use of killer drone technology in the nebulous, seemingly unending "War on Terror" has many furious.
There has been an outcry by civilians in Pakistan, where over 250 people have been killed by the drones over the past year. A popular hit song in Pakistan last summer, as Singer explained on the TV and radio program Democracy Now! had lyrics charging that Americans look at them as insects. There are outspoken critics of the drones within the U.S. Defense establishment like David Kilcullen, an architect of General Petreus' Iraq war surge, who claims that the unmanned robot killers are serving to further infuriate and radicalize the population of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq creating new enemies of the U.S. with each strike.
Some decry the attacks as a violation of Pakistan's sovereignty, and point to their illegitimacy, due to the fact that the U.S. has not declared war on Pakistan. But the U.S.' position is that the authorization of the use of force grated after the attacks of September 11, 2001 applies to all nations, if there are any suspected anti-American militants within their borders. But the use of the unmanned drones has provided the U.S. with a way to launch attacks, while avoiding an overt on-the-ground invasion of Pakistan. Recently, according to Micah Zenko of the Council on Foreign Relations, the motive waters have been muddied, as the drone attacks in Pakistan have not focused on al Qaeda operatives, but members of the network led by Baitullah Mehsud – opponents of the Zardari government with an alleged role in the assassination of Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.
All those who wondered if the drone attacks would end with the changing of the administrations didn't have to wait long for their answer. In the early hours of January 23th 2009, three days after President Obama took office, a drone struck two targets in Pakistan's tribal Waziristan region. Fifteen people suspected of being supporters of the Taliban and their families were killed, including three children.
In the tribal regions of Pakistan can be found people living a rural, non-urbanized or globalized, traditional lifestyle. Three days earlier, in his inaugural speech, President Obama had referred to tribes:
"…because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace."
Do the "lines of tribe" have to dissolve for people to live in peace? That is a loaded statement to make when we consider the context of American treatment of the indigenous tribes of our own country. In fact, the U.S. government carried out one of the first instances of "ethnic cleansing" of an area with the Cherokee Removal Act of 1838, which culminated with a forced march of civilians known now as the Trail of Tears. In fact, Adolf Hitler studied the U.S. treatment of Native Americans (which reads more like a dark library than a "dark chapter"- see the recent PBS series "We Shall Remain") and admired it as a model of genocide.
Whatever Obama meant by that, the drone attacks have had a major affect on the tribal areas: The Sunday Times of the UK reported in April that up to 1 million civilians have fled the tribal regions of Pakistan to try to avoid these drone attacks, as well bombings by the Pakistani army.
What are the advantages of deploying advanced technology against people? Steven Cohen of the Foreign Policy study program at the Brookings Institute defends the drones on the basis of their being a surgical-like warfare application. "What they do is allow any country that possesses them to pinpoint without much collateral damage," Cohen says. "The drone, in essence, while it conjures up images of a mechanical monster is in fact far more effective and more humane than dropping tons of bombs on an area."
How accurate the drones are, however, has been called into serious question. According to the Times of Pakistan, there have been 60 drone attacks by the United States on the tribal regions of Pakistan between January 14th, 2006 and April 8th, 2009. Horrifyingly, the Times reports, of these 60 attacks, only ten hit their intended targets, killing 14 alleged al-Qaeda leaders. An estimated 687 Pakistani civilians were killed in the drone attacks; unintended casualties, the aforementioned "collateral damage" (incidentally, also the title of an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie from 2002).
However, most of the people who will sit in multiplexes this summer watching Christian Bale's John Connor fight the evil Skynet computer system and its robotic minions, or Shia LaBeouf and the gallant Autobots battle the evil alien robotic Decepticons, blissfully unaware or only muddily informed of the real-world drone attacks, will find themselves cheering on American humans as they face malevolent robots. In the blockbuster movies, like Terminator and Transformers, our (American) heroes are tasked with the burden of being the representatives of humanity that fight against the cold, brutality of an unfeeling robot programmed to murder cooly, indiscriminately.
The irony is so blatant that it would be funny if it wasn't so sad.
Some are very aware of what the drones are doing, namely, their operators – many of them 18 and 19 year-olds literally assigned to this post because of their Playstation skills. As with their colleagues deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, the drone pilots –working on Army bases in the U.S. – though they may never physically experience the battlefield, have been known to develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) due to the jarring nature of their work. According to an August, 2008 story by the Associated Press, "Remote control warriors suffer war stress," the pilots must guide the drones back to the attack site after the damage has been done, using the drones' built-in surveillance equipment to gather high-resolution imagery of the casualties. Unlike Air Force pilots who can drop tons of bombs and never face the consequences of their work, the drone pilots cannot avoid seeing the dead bodies their mission has resulted in. A mission that resembles nothing so much as a live video game – with deadly real results.
Like a lot of action movies these days, Terminator: Salvation plays just a bit like a recruiting film for the Army. Set in a nightmare scape of 2018 (whoa! not much time, gang), it's a watery by-the-numbers adventure where the carbon-based good guys scamper around the Western deserts (hmm) of a post-Apocalyptic United States wearing the official Resistance long olive trench coats oddly reminiscent of another time.
From a character's pointed obsession with earning the right to wear the natty coats of the Resistance and an uncomfortable parable of redemption and self-sacrifice, Terminator Salvation is a embarrassingly earnest, bleak blow-up affair. Christian Bale's John Connor (the fully grown charismatic alterna-leader within the corrupt bureaucracy of the Resistance) is brooding and glum. There's little of the fantasy-rebel glee that characterized the earlier entries in the series, or the first Star Wars movies.
Then there's the journey of Marcus Wright (Australian actor Sam Worthington), which makes up most of the film, a death row inmate from 2003 (he has committed some vague murders, never really explained) who, after having donated his body to science, emerges fully alive in the sand shitstorm of '18 as a robot-human hybrid. Connor and company must decide whether the G.I. Joe-looking Wright can be trusted. For his part, Wright proves his loyalty to the human side via heroic self-sacrifice (a theme of the Terminator movies, to be sure, but one made more queasy given Worthington's striking resemblance to an uber-soldier from one of those Army of One commercials).
In the midst of it all, the movie also offers a small vignette of resistance that could have been written by Sophocles; a bit of American Empire Greek Tragedy-style catharsis:
Connor refuses to follow the orders of the Rebellion's leaders when they tell him to blow up Skynet's command central, where thousands of human prisoners are kept. In the movie, it is the fact that he is unwilling to destroy innocent people (AKA collateral damage) that makes Connor a great leader. But what happens next is remarkable. The soldiers of the Resistance, inspired by Connor, actually refuses to follow the orders to bomb Skynet. Not so far-fetched, according to the conclusions of the 2005 documentary Sir No Sir, which retraces a large-scale resistance and its spread throughout the entire armed forces, during the Vietnam war. Connor is then able to save the human hostages, by engaging in the heroic hand-to-hand (or in this case, hand to bot) personal combat most highly prized by action movies.
In Terminator: Salvation, it almost seems like the plot has been designed as a rebellion lightning rod for an impressionable audience. Rebellion is painted in fantastical terms, awesome and escapist within the Hollywood-devised movie scenario. For much of the audience, the movie may be more relevant than the goings-on in the War on Terror. the real robot war being waged in our name, instead of merely identifying with fake cinematic versions.
Do our Summer blockbusters decontextualize current events, further desensitizing us to the effects of the real robot wars being being waged in our name? That all depends if these images of shadow cinematic rebellion remain entirely divorced from substance.
"If you are listening to this – you are the Resistance" John Connor intones breathily over pirate radio waves.
Ditto that. | slim_pajama |
leber 's hereditary optic neuropathy ( lhon ) is a debilitating , blinding mitochondrial disease with subacute onset and rapid progression at a young age .
the 3 most common mutations of lhon , including those at mtdna positions 11778 , 3460 and 14484 , account for approximately 95% of cases worldwide , and affect different subunits of complex i , the first complex of the electron transport chain .
dysfunction of the complex i molecule may inhibit specific cellular mechanisms , including the generation of adenosine triphosphate via oxidative phosphorylation , the biosynthesis of amino acids and the reduction of cytotoxic reactive oxygen species .
these deficits appear to preferentially reduce the viability of retinal ganglion cells , thereby leading to the clinical findings of retinal nerve fiber layer thinning , although the precise mechanism of this phenomenon remains an area of contention .
carriers of a known mtdna mutation may never express symptoms of the disease , as factors affecting penetrance include heteroplasmy , environmental influences , the mitochondrial background as well as nuclear modifying genes . in the pathogenesis of down syndrome ( ds ) , valenti et al .
described mitochondrial dysfunction as a result of a defect in the oxidative phosphorylation machinery , specifically related to a defect in the complex i molecule .
indeed , recent investigations have demonstrated that reduced visual acuity and retinopathy are frequent in ds . in this case , a patient with concomitant ds expressed a low - penetrance familial mutation , the 11778/nd4 genotype , raising the possibility that underlying mitochondrial dysfunction in ds lowers the threshold for expression of the lhon phenotype .
prior to visiting our clinic , a 19-year - old female with a history of ds presented to an outside ophthalmology clinic for the evaluation of reduced visual acuity . based on the observations by her family members , the patient had a 1-year history of a marked decrease in
visual activities. the patient 's past medical history was significant for ds and sensorineural hearing loss .
one unaffected member of the extended family had previously undergone documented genetic testing for the lhon mutation , which revealed that a sister of the patient 's grandmother was a carrier of the 11778 mutation . additionally , several maternal relatives of the patient reported positivity for the mutation , although evidence from previous genetic analysis could not be found .
given that all maternal offspring would be expected to be carriers of the disease , there were 25 unaffected carriers of the mutation , of which 9 were male heirs ( fig .
the patient was referred to our clinic approximately 1 year after her diagnosis . on examination ,
there was no relative afferent pupillary defect , though amsler grid testing revealed bilateral central scotomata .
the patient had 10 diopters of esotropia on straight gaze with full ductions , and the intraocular pressures were 17 and 19 mm / hg , respectively .
dilated fundus examination demonstrated pale optic nerves and bilateral cup - to - disc ratios of 0.8 ( fig .
six months prior to her visit , the patient had undergone an mri of the head and orbits for evaluation of compressive , ischemic or demyelinating disease .
mri had revealed an increased t2 signal within the optic chiasm and the optic nerves bilaterally , suggestive of a metabolic or mitochondrial disorder .
subsequent mitochondrial genetic testing was performed via pyrosequencing , and the lhon g11778a mutation was confirmed . in our clinic ,
the patient was unable to complete a humphrey visual field examination or tangent field testing ; therefore , a goldmann visual field was administered in order to confirm the presence of central field defects ( fig .
subsequent optical coherence tomography of the optic nerve head demonstrated a mild thinning of the retinal nerve fiber layer , with an average retinal nerve fiber layer thickness measuring 81 m od and 77 m os .
the average cup - to - disc ratio was noted to be 0.81 od and 0.75 os .
prior to her visit at our clinic , the patient had been started on idebenone 150 mg t.i.d .
idebenone is a short - chain benzoquinone that acts on the mitochondrial electron transport chain to improve cellular respiration .
it has been proposed that idebenone allows electrons to bypass complex i , effectively maintaining the production of atp despite an alteration of complex i .
recent studies have demonstrated the therapeutic efficacy of idebenone in treating lhon ; therefore , treatment with this agent was continued .
results of a recent trial of idebenone 900 mg / day in patients with lhon demonstrated safety and tolerability at this dose , and the dose for the patient was increased from 150 mg t.i.d . to 150 mg q.i.d . to account for her recent increase in body mass index .
she was asked to return to the clinic every 4 months for ongoing neuro - ophthalmology assessment .
lhon is a disease of the mitochondria in which a mutation in mtdna leads to a phenotype of optic nerve atrophy secondary to the attrition of the retinal ganglion cell layer of the retina .
lhon presents as subacute painless vision loss , usually in young men , and has a reported prevalence of 3.2 in 100,000 , though there appears to be variability between populations .
though the disease is acquired via maternal inheritance , women who harbor one of the primary mutations have an approximately 10% risk of developing optic nerve atrophy , while men have a risk as high as 50% .
this sex bias suggests that environmental and gender - specific genetic factors are superimposed on the penetrance of the mutation . in the above case ,
the patient 's family history was notable for having a single male relative who was affected by an lhon 11778 mutation .
there were 26 family members who were unaffected carriers of the mutation and who did not express the disease phenotype , indicative of a low - penetrance mutation .
acquired causes of mitochondrial dysfunction have been shown to trigger the development of lhon , including pharmacologic agents such as chloramphenicol and ethambutol . similarly , it is a reasonable hypothesis that the patient 's co - expression of the ds phenotype , with superimposed dysfunction of the oxidative phosphorylation pathway , led to the predisposition for developing signs and symptoms of lhon .
the chief clinical features of ds ( or trisomy 21 ) are neurological and cognitive deficiencies , but there is also a predisposition for neoplastic disease and sequelae of accelerated aging , such as dementia and osteoporosis .
although the partial or complete triplicate of chromosome 21 constitutes the etiology of ds , some of the pleiotropic phenotypes of the syndrome have been attributed to oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction . in 1998 , mitochondrial structural abnormalities in a mouse model of ds were found to include abnormally shaped mitochondria , abnormal filaments and microtubule deficiency .
deficiencies of mitochondrial enzymes involved in oxidative phosphorylation , including monoamine oxidase , cytochrome oxidase and isocitrate dehydrogenase , were found in platelets of patients with ds , suggesting that mitochondria in ds were susceptible to oxidative damage .
. showed that mitochondria in ds are indeed more vulnerable to oxidative damage as a result of the aberrant expression of cuzn superoxide dismutase , perhaps leading to the accelerated development of phenotypes associated with aging . in a mouse model of ds ,
superoxide formation was increased by more than 50% when compared to controls , indicating an increased mitochondrial oxidative burden in ds .
it is therefore possible that otherwise low - penetrance mutations of lhon may be more easily expressed when coupled with an underlying progeroid syndrome , such as ds , and concomitant mitochondrial dysfunction .
it is possible that heteroplasmy , or the unequal distribution of mutated mitochondrial dna amongst cells , played a role in the penetrance of the mutation .
however , the patient 's family reported that 3 maternal relatives had undergone genetic testing , revealing positivity for the mitochondrial mutation .
although the status of these individuals as carriers could not be confirmed , it is likely that they were indeed positive for the 11778 mutation .
furthermore , the 11778 mutation tends to progress toward homoplasmy in successive generations ; yet , the aforementioned pedigree did not reflect an increased incidence of conversion .
this case demonstrates the possibility of a two - hit hypothesis in the expression of a low - penetrance lhon mutation when coupled with a pre - existing mitochondrial dysfunction . in considering the differential diagnosis of subacute vision loss in patients with ds and other genetic diseases with mitochondrial dysfunction , a high clinical suspicion for lhon | pubmed |
Which has maximum entropy
Which state has a higher entropy — the
liquid–gas equilibrium or the gaseous state? I have learned that at equilibrium the entropy is maximised. But I also learned that the gaseous state has the highest disorder (entropy), if the latter is true then why does the equilibrium exist, why doesn’t the liquid transform into the gaseous state at equilibrium completely? What factor is responsible for this?
Whatever one observes (whether it is a liquid, a gas, or a mixture thereof) is the **state of maximum entropy for the particular values of the internal energy and volume** the system currently has. As OP noted, this is a consequence of the second law of thermodynamics. According to this law, **a system with a fixed internal energy self-adjusts its free parameters in such a way that the entropy is maximized**. The free parameter in OP's example is the fraction of molecules in the liquid (or gaseous) phase.
When we say that the entropy of the gaseous phase is larger than that of the liquid phase, we are referring to the **specific entropies (i.e., entropy per mole) of these phases when they coexist**. When the two phases coexist, they have a common temperature $T$ and a common pressure $P$. Furthermore, their specific Gibbs free energies are the same, that is,
\begin{equation}
0 = \Delta g (T,P) = g\_{\mathrm{gas}} (T,P) - g\_{\mathrm{liquid}} (T,P) = \Delta u(T,P) + P \Delta v(T,P) - T \Delta s(T,P).
\end{equation}
The gaseous phase has a higher specific internal energy ($\Delta u>0$) and a larger specific volume ($\Delta v>0$) as well as a higher specific entropy ($\Delta s >0$) in such a way that the effects of the three terms ($\Delta u$, $P\Delta v$, and $T\Delta s$) cancel out.
One may still wonder why liquid-gas coexistence is ever possible. As the gaseous phase has a higher specific entropy, why doesn't the system self-adjust to have all its molecules in the gaseous phase? The Answer: What we know for sure is that if the evaporation took place under a constant temperature and pressure, the entropy would increase (because $\Delta s >0$). But this process would also increase the internal energy and the volume ($\Delta u >0$ and $\Delta v >0$). Therefore, to have more molecules in the gaseous phase but stay at the same internal energy and volume, the system has to lower its temperature and raise its pressure. This results in a decrease in the entropy,1 which counteracts its increase that would have happened if the evaporation had taken place at constant temperature and pressure. Therefore, **evaporation at fixed internal energy and volume doesn't necessarily lead to the increase of the total entropy.** As stated in the first paragraph, if one observes liquid-gas coexistence, this should correspond to the state of maximum entropy for the given values of internal energy and volume.
---
1 For any (stable) thermodynamics system, the entropy decreases as the temperature is lowered. On the other hand, no such strict rule exists for the relation between the entropy and the pressure. Still, for most systems, entropy decreases as pressure is raised. [Notice the Maxwell relation $(\partial S/\partial P)\_{T} = -(\partial V/\partial T)\_{P}$, meaning that the entropy decreasing with increasing pressure is equivalent to the volume increasing with increasing temperature.]
| stackexchange/chemistry |
As a consultant for multiple organizations, why do I see Recently Viewed accounts from another database?
If you are a consultant that works with multiple organizations that use eTapestry, you may need to log into multiple databases on a daily basis. Upon logging in, you may see Recently Viewed accounts from a different database. However, these accounts are not accessible when you click the name.
It is not recommended to sign into multiple databases in the same browser. You must log out of one database before logging into another, or use a different browser. For example, if you're using Firefox to log into Organization A's database but do not want to log out, you could log into Organization B's database using Chrome instead. This will also help make sure you do not inadvertently mix up the databases when working in both of them at the same time.
Important note: These steps are not a recommended way to use eTapestry. | slim_pajama |
Almagor (hebreiska: אלמגור) är en ort i Israel. Den ligger i distriktet Norra distriktet, i den nordöstra delen av landet. Antalet invånare är .
Terrängen runt Almagor är huvudsakligen kuperad, men söderut är den platt. Den högsta punkten i närheten är meter över havet, km nordväst om Almagor. Runt Almagor är det tätbefolkat, med invånare per kvadratkilometer. Närmaste större samhälle är Tiberias, km söder om Almagor.
Medelhavsklimat råder i trakten. Årsmedeltemperaturen i trakten är °C. Den varmaste månaden är augusti, då medeltemperaturen är °C, och den kallaste är januari, med °C. Genomsnittlig årsnederbörd är millimeter. Den regnigaste månaden är januari, med i genomsnitt mm nederbörd, och den torraste är juli, med mm nederbörd.
Kommentarer
Källor
Orter i Norra distriktet | slim_pajama |
Keep Your Friends Close and Your Enemies Closer
**Keep Your Friends Close and Your Enemies Closer**
Bolin's in the middle of storing belongings into boxes and half listening to one of Mako's remember the time rambles; he's even got the soft nostalgic voice going on, curling his hands around socks that Bolin outgrew two years ago and staring at them like they're Bolin's baby blanket; it's a tiny bit creepy and sad, that's all he saying. They're just small socks after all, complete with the odd holes in the toes and everything, when Korra knocks three times on the door before letting herself into the attic.
"Hey," she says, leaning against the doorway, one arm curled tight at her side and looking like she's about to fall over.
Bolin knows that she spent the morning going through last night's details over and over with Chief Bei Fong and Tenzin. Just as he and Mako had done earlier, forgoing breakfast to sit in the police headquarters offices recounting every minute detail that they could and could not remember, and if there's one thing to be said for the both of them: Bei Fong and Tenzin are extremely thorough.
"I had no idea it was this bad," she says, "I mean…" her eyes sweep around the room as she grows silent.
The whole back window's broken and been half boarded up with the majority of glass swept up last night, Pabu's feet and all, but it still looks like it got ambushed by a police airship, and to be fair the attic got off lightly compared to the rest of the arena.
"Nah, it's not that bad," Bolin goes, jumping up off the floor and taking Pabu with him, he keeps pawing at everything Bolin's trying in vain to keep tidy, getting his claws snagged in every blanket and old top he can get his paws on. "You should see what the equalist's place looks like, oh, wait a minute, I think you were the one that kicked Amon's ass in the first place?" That gets a smile out of Korra, reluctant and shy, but Bolin will take whatever positive reaction he can get at this point. He's spent all morning with one grumpy Mako.
"Still," she says, "this is your home, where you live. Are you packing?"
Mako comes over, dumping a box of what looks like cooking utensils, pans and woks; a fat 'keep me' written on the side of it, and sighs. "We've not got much option." He collapses down on the beat up sofa. "The arena's unstable right now and with no matches and no odd jobs to pay the rent, Toza just can't afford to keep us. Every last yuan he owns is going on fixing this place in time for next year's tournament."
"Right," says Korra, eyes looking anywhere but at the two brothers. "I can see how that would be a problem."
Bolin tuts, "It's only going to be temporary, just while the place gets a makeover, right?" He looks to Mako who shrugs in reply, ever the optimist, and Bolin gets it, he does, this place was home for them, shabby as it may have been, and he knows that Mako wants that, needs it; to come home at the end of the day to a place that's theirs, somewhere that they can just relax and feel comfortable in. A place that doesn't feel like it can be taken away from them at any moment, any second. "Just temporary," he finishes, nuzzling Pabu's ears as he skitters up and curls around his shoulders.
Korra's gaze snaps back to him, "And in the meantime?" There's a beat but she doesn't wait for an answer, hand curling at the bottom of her chin as she gets excited, "I'm sure Tenzin wouldn't mind, in fact it's practically his motto, airbender and all," her eyes brightening as she continues, "Why don't you move in with us and the acolytes?"
"Ah, well - -"
"Thanks, Korra, but Asami's already offered to let us stay with her." Mako interrupts him, his voice soft and genuine as Bolin's still sputtering over excuses. "She's coming over later tonight to help us move our stuff over to her place."
"Great," Korra deadpans, stretching the word out so that it doesn't sound great in the slightest, and Bolin catches the disgruntled wrinkle in her nose that she probably has no intention of trying to hide from them, "Well at least you have somewhere to stay in the meantime."
"Exactly," Bolin continues, moving over to wrap his arm around his brother. They've practically finished packing up their belongings, the past few years packed away snug into just a few boxes that it's kind of depressing, but having spent the majority of their childhood moving around and keeping only what could be carried away in a hurry, they've learnt to live light, still with that ingrained sense in case they ever need to make a run for it. "I hear she even has her own swimming pool."
"Well the temple is surrounded by water," Korra whispers, "fresh and everything, none of that chlorine tainted business, but you know..." She sighs, looking back up at the broken window, "It could have been a lot worse, I guess."
"We could have been the Wolf-bats." Mako goes and Bolin feels a shudder run straight through him.
"We saw Ming as we were walking out of the council," Bolin shakes his head, "I mean I hated those guys, they were so pompous, but I wouldn't wish that on anyone. He looked; he looked so dead inside, you know, like Amon had ripped out his being."
Korra nods, "I'm kind of glad you said that."
"Yeah, wait, what? You are?"
"Yeah, you see, after my interview, when I was waiting to speak to Tenzin, I ran into Tahno."
"Tahno? I hope he didn't give you any grief." Bolin pounds his fist into his hand, "If he said anything - -"
"What? No," Korra laughs, "Well, I mean yes he said something, but not like that, in fact he was kind of the opposite."
"You mean he wasn't a jerk?" Mako snorts.
"It was so sad. I mean I felt really sorry for him. In fact we sat and talked for a bit after and he's actually not a bad guy once you get to know him."
"Well we'll have to take your word- -"
"You see I knew you'd see it my way," Korra talks right over him, Mako's voice drifting silent, "So I invited him over here. I thought, I don't know, that we could all go out and just try and forget everything that's happened, just for the afternoon or something? It looks like you've finished your packing."
Bolin and Mako look at each other, and it's not often that Bolin feels speechless, like he doesn't know how to react, but, "Wait, wait a second," Pabu runs down his arm, jumping off the sofa arm and straight into an open box where he starts kneading at one of Bolin's good sleeping shirts. "You invited our mortal enemy in the pro-bending arena over for what sounds like afternoon tea? The guy who cheated his way to winning our match and paid off the refs so that he could beat us all to oblivion using dirty, nasty, what I'd have to describe as downright low, cheap tricks against us?"
"Are you going to stop that?" Korra winces, pointing down at Pabu who's nicely made a new hole in Bolin's shirt, cotton threads dangling from his paws again. "And yes, I do think you have the gist of what I'm saying."
"Pabu, no!" He bends down to scoop the ferret up, bringing them face to face with each other, "This is why we don't get nice things, Pabu. Mako?"
Mako looks unsure, looking back and forth between the two of them and burying his head in his hands before groaning, "Korra, look, as much as I'm sure you're trying to do the right thing here, I just don't think it's a good idea to be playing nice with that guy all of a sudden. A couple of minutes of pity won't change the year or so of bad blood between us. This wasn't our first tournament."
Korra bites her cheek, clasping her hands together in front of her, "Look at what you said earlier guys, things could be a lot worse, and you saw Ming, you saw what it did to him. Bending meant everything to these guys, just like it does to me, to you two, imagine if it was us in his position. The least we can do is be nice to him for the afternoon, get him out of his house and be a few pairs of ears to listen to him. Can you do that for me, please?"
Bolin sniffs, not happy, the hardest part is that she's asking them to do this for her, not Tahno, and it's a lot harder to say no to Korra when she's asking something of him than a jerk who cheated, and just one look at Mako, as hard as his brother can be, Bolin knows he's already caving.
"One afternoon," Mako says, "That's all we're giving."
"Yes!" Korra shouts, scooping the both of them up into a tight bear hug, and Bolin will never get over just how strong she is, lifting the both of them off of their feet for a second. "I knew I could count on you two to help me."
"Yeah well, you're lucky you asked us to do this for you," Bolin mutters, "We certainly aren't doing it for Tahno. Where are we supposed to be meeting him anyway?"
"He's right outside, I'll go get him."
* * *
Okay, Bolin has to admit that Tahno looks miserable; in fact it's a little uncomfortable to look at, the way that this guy used to dress himself up and be aware of every single piece of hair on his head and if it ever shifted. The way that he was so aware of his appearance and the way that he acted in front of other people, the stupid façade that had an effect on everyone around him, and now, well now he's sat across from Mako and Bolin looking downright dejected, hair hanging limp and down to his shoulders, big bags under his eyes from what Bolin figures is the lack of sleep he's getting, (and Bolin remembers that first hand, waking up screaming, Amon's hand coming down for him in every single one of his nightmares) his skin grey and ashen, looking like something that the old Tahno wouldn't even deign to scrape off his fashionable bootstraps.
"So, um," Bolin clears his throat, "this is awkward."
Korra, who is sat next to Tahno and looks like her cheeks might be about to crack from keeping up the pretence of smiling, lets her eyes widen, mouthing the word sympathetic at Bolin and tapping her fingers roughly on the table.
"No, he's right," Tahno reassures her, "I didn't think I'd ever be sat here with the avatar and the sad excuse of the fire ferrets."
"Well you can always sit at your own table," Mako goes, clearly ruffled, "if it's that much of a bother to you."
Bolin's seen his brother riled up, pushed to the point that a single spark from him can cause a lot of damage, and ever the peacemaker, plus he really likes this place to come and eat at and doesn't want to get banned for the foreseeable future, Bolin interrupts him, "I don't think Tahno meant it like that, right? You didn't mean it?"
Tahno waves his hand at him, "Right," shrugging up his shoulders before collapsing in on himself, and thankfully that's the time that the food comes out, four steaming plates of greasy food that takes the worry right out of Bolin, his mouth watering. Both he and Korra have gone for the steamed sea prunes, classic, Tahno choosing a noodle dish with fried crab-shrimps, a strong vinegar smell coming from the noodles that they swim in and Mako's gone for a firey pig chicken rib dish, the spices so strong that if he sniffs it, Bolin's sure he can feel them at the back of his throat, burning. It's a dish Bolin's tried maybe once or twice, back when the two of them could start to afford eating out, once they started making a bit of money, and Mako swears it's just like their Mother used to make, hot enough to give a good kick and still with a sweet and syrupy aftertaste, not that Bolin remembers the dish from back then, he just knows that it's far too hot for his tastes and better suited to his brother.
"Man, this is so good," Bolin says and Korra nods her head vigorously.
"Can you believe my past self was a vegetarian? He never got to taste anything this good in his life; I don't know how Tenzin does it." Which is probably why Korra loves her meat so much, making up for her past life's absence of it; and a lifetime's worth of meat is a whole lot of meat to get through.
In fact the only one that doesn't appear to be enjoying his meal is Tahno, picking at his crab-shrimps and moving them about from one side of the plate to the other. "I'm not really that hungry," he answers to the side-eye looks he sees the three of them throwing at each other. "I guess my bending was where I used the majority of my energy. Not a lot of need for that now, I figure."
Bolin thinks back to how close he was to losing his own bending, twice now if you want to have nightmares for the rest of your life thinking about it, just how easily the tables could have been flipped and it turn out to be him sat slumped across the table looking for all the world as if his life wasn't worth living.
"Have you been to see anyone?" He ventures, "To see if there's anything anyone can do about it?"
Tahno looks up, eyes skimming between the three of them and Bolin kind of wishes he'd never asked the question, but it's Korra that answers for him. "He's been to all the best healers in the city."
"And there's nothing they can do?" Mako asks.
"Absolutely nothing." Tahno confirms, pushing away the plate of food that's hardly even been touched, let alone eaten. "I almost wish we hadn't even won that stupid tournament, but then I guess it would be you guys sitting here where I am."
The reality shocks the three of them into silence; the knowledge of what Tahno's saying spreading awkwardly around the table. The pity they feel for him almost palatable, Tahno bristling. And of course, of course it's Korra that asks him, "How did you get away with cheating?"
Tahno leans back and for a second it looks like he has an ounce of his old swagger, "Please, like we needed to cheat against the likes of you guys. The fire ferrets weren't even in the same league as the wolf-bats, we shouldn't have even been competing."
"He's kidding, right?" Mako looks from Tahno to Korra, who looks a little like her own face has a tick in it she's barely able to keep control of.
"Of course he's kidding," Bolin answers, but his own voice sounds unsure, barely capable of stopping the tension he can feel rising.
"The fire ferrets would have had a knockout in round one if you guys hadn't played so downright dirty!"
"Now, Mako."
"I've got to agree with Mako here," Korra says, leaning forwards, elbows on the table, "I seem to remember our fight one on one and you going down in about, what? Three seconds?"
"Pfft," Tahno smirks, "I had to let you win at least one round, what kind of a final would it be if we'd taken you down in the first second. Hardly worth buying a ticket for if you'd paid to see that disaster."
"You have some serious attitude," Mako grinds out. "And it isn't a good thing."
As Bolin squeaks out that, "Maybe we should all settle down a bit," wary of the stares and whispers that are starting to bubble up around them, "just calm down everybody." And he knows they're going to be chucked out any second if this continues. Two hot heads and one self-obsessed one, with one genuine guy who is just trying to get everyone to be civil to each other. It's always the nice guy who loses out by losing one of his favourite places to dine out in.
"The fire ferrets had that tournament in the bag and you paid somebody to let you win." Mako's standing now, fists half an inch off the table, hurling a finger straight into the middle of Tahno's face, "and you know it!"
"Korra, do something!" Bolin frets.
But Korra leans back, crossing her arms one over the other, "No, you know I actually want to hear this. He hit me in the face with rock loaded water."
"The ferrets couldn't have won that competition and you all know it." He stands up, nothing between Mako and Tahno but the table. "Once a loser always a loser."
"That's it," and before Bolin can blink his brother's hitting out at what looks to be one severely pissed off wolf-bat.
He's asking for it though, he is, the tournament's over and there's no rules now, no reason to stop your emotions doing anything, just one bender against - - "Wait a second!" In the fastest bit of bending he's ever done in his life, Bolin moves the ground beneath his feet, pushing out with his foot and spring boarding a chunk of rock to come up between his brother's fist and Tahno's smug face that now looks anything but smug and more like accepting and wow, the three of them are such idiots.
Mako's fist smacks the rock, sending it cracking into pieces and a large chunk of it reverberating right into Tahno's jaw line, knocking his head back and sending his eyes rolling into the back of his head, out cold.
"Out, out of here now!" Yells the restaurant owner, eying the mess of rock and broken plates, the half out of it Tahno on the floor in front of him and scattered, shocked looking customers that are now half out of their seats and shouting. "Banned the lot of you!" And Bolin sighs, he knew this was coming.
Korra looks at him wide eyed and slack jawed and Bolin can't think of anything to do accept shrug at her as she very quietly says, "Bolin's got some moves," grinning.
* * *
They're outside by the lake, Tahno brought back around again after some dragging and Mako nursing his fist with some ice that Korra's knocked up for him, whilst in the meantime she works on bringing the swelling down in Tahno's jaw line.
"Nothing's broken," Bolin tries to argue, out of the earshot of Korra and Tahno as Mako grizzles at him, wincing as he moves the ice around, his knuckles an angry red and swollen.
"A little warning next time, maybe, then I could avoid smacking my fist into a rock wall you've conducted."
"You were going to hit him."
"That was the point." Mako seethes, biting his lip and Bolin knows that he's trying to calm down, trying to keep his anger in check, still mad at his brother.
"You didn't see his face," Bolin continues.
"He was asking for it."
"Exactly," He moves his hand to stop Mako's arm, fingers resting on his elbow. "He was asking for it. He wanted you to hit him, send him into oblivion."
"That's what I - - oh." And that's the point where it clicks in. "I'm an idiot." He winces, shifting his hand over so that he can turn to look at Korra and Tahno. "Does Korra know?"
"I'm guessing so or I doubt she'd be trying to heal him."
"Right," and Mako sighs, pushing himself up off the floor to walk over. "Let's get this over with then." Bolin follows suit, walking one step behind and feeling a pang of guilt with every twitch of pain that takes over Mako's face.
Korra's laughing when they get there, pushing lightly at Tahno's elbow, she's even styled his hair a little bit, not quite the arrogant style that Bolin's used to seeing, but at least it's up off his face, swept back in that usual swagger. They grow silent when Mako approaches, clearing his throat and looking off to the side until Bolin steps in for him.
"So," he says, "Mako wanted to say something to you." He elbows his brother, pushing him a step forward.
He clears his throat again, wincing as he starts to lift the wrong hand up to his face. "Listen, I'm sorry I tried to hit you. I shouldn't have done that." Korra beams at him and Tahno coughs, twisting his lips, the back of his neck colouring.
"I guess I shouldn't have wound you into it. So, sorry."
Korra beams, clapping her hands together. "I knew the two of you could be friends, I knew it. What was I just saying, hmm?" She pokes Tahno in the ribs and Bolin feels a ridiculous urge to get in between them.
"Well I wouldn't go that far," Mako nods, "but I'm willing to start again if you are?"
Tahno's lazy smile takes over his face, "Reluctant acquaintances it is then For all of us." Bolin bounces up between them, smiling and Mako looks down at Korra, cradling his hand as she beckons him to come over, his turn for healing.
"You know," Tahno goes, "We really didn't pay off the refs to win the tournament." Three sets of eyes narrow and fly over to him. "I'm not saying somebody didn't, but it wasn't the wolf-bats, we just got told right before the match to make sure we won at any cost. That everything would be smoothed over, if you know what I mean." One eye winking as he lets his arm fly out, hand aimed right at the water that no matter how hard he's trying deep inside, refuses to obey him. "Almost like somebody knew what was going to happen."
"Almost like somebody planned it even," Mako says.
Korra looks at Bolin and Mako, nodding at them, grim determination lining every inch of her body. "I'll find some way to stop him," she asserts, "Amon has a fight coming for him."
And she whirls a whip of water straight out of the lake, rounding it into a ball and smoothing it over Mako's knuckles, a little too roughly. "Oops, sorry."
Mako laughs, shaking his head, Bolin coming to sit down beside them.
"I'm counting on the three of you," Tahno says laughing, "Who'd have thought it, the whole of the bending world counting on the likes of the fire ferrets."
"You know I still have one good fist that can hit you."
"And I have two," Korra says. Bolin holding up his hands between them.
"He's joking, right. Tahno, you're just joking?"
End file.
| fanfiction |
the alignment of the extended optical continuum and emission - line radiation with the radio axis in powerful radio galaxies at high redshifts ( chambers , miley , & van breugel 1987 ; mccarthy et al .
1987 ) continues to be a vexing issue in our understanding of the nature and evolution of such objects . in spite of strong evidence that a significant portion of this alignment effect in some objects stems from scattering of radiation from a hidden quasar nucleus into our line of sight ( di serego aligheri , cimatti , & fosbury 1994 ; dickinson , dey , & spinrad 1996 )
, there is also evidence that such scattering is by no means the whole story ( longair , best , & rttgering 1995 ; stockton , ridgway , & kellogg 1996 ) .
we report elsewhere ( ridgway & stockton 1997 ; hereafter paper 1 ) the results of an hst and ground - based imaging survey of a complete sample of @xmath4 3cr quasars and radio galaxies , including some of the first clear examples of the alignment effect seen in quasars ( in fact , all 5 of the quasars in our sample show some form of alignment between the optical and radio structure ) .
however , instead of clarifying the nature of the alignment effect , these quasars actually complicate the picture somewhat , in that at least 3 of them show examples of aligned optical structure that has such close and detailed correspondence with the radio structure that it almost certainly is due to optical synchrotron radiation .
we do not see similar types of alignment in our radio - galaxy sample , presumably because the aligned synchrotron emission is strongly beamed and the radio jets in the quasars are closer to our line of sight .
one of the quasars showing this type of alignment is 3c212 .
figure [ colorimg]@xmath5 shows our hst wfpc2 image with 3.6-cm vla contours superposed ( see also fig .
6 and fig . 15 of paper 1 ) .
there is excellent agreement between the 3 nearly stellar optical peaks ( @xmath6 , @xmath7 , and @xmath8 ) just nw of the quasar nucleus and the three peaks in the radio jet .
however , additional apparently aligned structure lies just _ beyond _ both radio lobes , with some morphological evidence for association : the optical component @xmath9 about 3 beyond the nw radio lobe appears to mimic the latter s structure , and the object @xmath10 just beyond the se radio lobe has faint wisps that seem to parallel the radio contours .
we have previously discussed some possible interpretations of these two objects and their relation to 3c212 ( paper 1 ) ; here we revisit this discussion to include the results of spectroscopy of these features and of a sample of other faint objects in the field of 3c212 .
we obtained spectroscopic observations of the 3c212 field with the low - resolution imaging spectrometer ( lris ) and the keck i telescope on 1995 october 19 and 20 ( ut ) and 1996 february 14 and 15 ( ut ) .
we used the 600 groove mm@xmath11 , 7500 blaze grating for all observations .
the 1995 observations used a 1slit and obtained good spectral coverage from 6670 to 9300 .
unresolved spectral features have fwhm = 4.8 , and the fwhm of the recorded quasar continuum ranged from 086 to 098 .
the slit was centered on the quasar at pa @xmath12 ; this angle places all of the aligned features on the slit ( see fig .
[ colorimg]@xmath5 ) .
we obtained three 1200 s integrations on 1995 oct 19 ( ut ) through intermittent thin clouds ; the first of these was significantly worse than the remaining two ( which appear to have suffered negligible extinction ) and was subsequently discarded .
the following night , we obtained an additional four 1200 s integrations under photometric conditions .
the objects were moved @xmath13 along the slit between successive exposures .
the 1996 observations were similar , except that most were obtained with 14-wide slitlets punched in an aperture plate , which also targeted faint galaxies in the field .
we obtained twelve 1200 s integrations with this configuration at a position angle of @xmath14 .
we also obtained three 1200 s integrations with a 07-wide standard slit at position angle @xmath15 , aimed specifically at the bluer portion of the nw component , as well as three 1200 s integrations in each of two additional aperture plates covering additional galaxies in the field .
the reduction of the ccd frames followed standard procedures , using flat - field frames from an internal halogen lamp illuminating the spectrograph cover plate .
airglow lines were dealt with by first using the multiple dithered exposures at each configuration to construct a model of the airglow spectrum , which was then scaled and subtracted from the individual exposures .
the long - slit spectra were rectified in the wavelength coordinate from measurements of the spectrum of an internal ne source .
small corrections to the wavelength zero point were derived from measurements of positions of airglow oh lines . after this rectification ,
any remaining residual from the airglow spectrum was removed with the iraf _ background _ task , generally using either a simple median or a linear fit along the columns .
we next scanned the spectrum with a series of contiguous 1-pixel - wide apertures covering the region of interest , using tasks in the iraf _ apextract _ package .
the scanning parameters were transferred from a trace of the quasar continuum , for which a 6-pixel - wide ( 13 ) aperture was used .
this procedure effectively rectifies the spectra in the spatial direction and results in a set of spectra that are aligned with each other in both the spatial and wavelength coordinates .
these spectra were calibrated using observations of the spectrophotometric standard star g191b2b ( massey et al .
1988 ; massey & gronwall 1990 ) .
these same observations allowed us to correct for the atmospheric - absorption a and b bands .
the multiaperture spectra were treated similarly .
individual regions corresponding to each slitlet were extracted and reduced independently .
the wavelength scale and distortion were determined from oh airglow lines . except for the slitlet covering 3c212 itself and
objects @xmath9 and @xmath10 , we did not attempt to rectify these multiaperture spectra in the spatial coordinate .
instead , we used the iraf _ apextract _ suite of tasks to trace and extract one - dimensional spectra of the objects .
the flux calibration is only approximate , having been derived from the longslit observations of the spectrophotometric standards ; however , because we kept our targets close to the centerline of the aperture plate , our spectral region is similar to that of the longslit spectra , and the calibration should be fairly accurate .
sections of various two - dimensional spectra covering 3c212 with slits placed along the radio axis are shown in fig .
[ colorimg]@xmath16@xmath17 .
there is an emission feature near 7190 in the nw aligned component ( @xmath9 in fig .
[ colorimg]@xmath5 ) ; this is by far the strongest feature in this object over the observed wavelength range .
the feature is clearly a close doublet , and deconvolution into two gaussian components not only gives the correct wavelength separation for [ ] @xmath183726,3729 at a redshift of 0.9284 , but it also gives an intensity ratio of 1.5 , which is the expected ratio at low densities .
this identification is confirmed by the presence of a much weaker line at 8373 , the expected position of h@xmath19 ( fig .
[ colorimg]@xmath17 ) .
figure [ onedspec ] shows traces of the spectra of the nw and se aligned components beyond the radio lobes ( @xmath9 and @xmath10 ) .
in addition to the emission features mentioned above , @xmath9 shows apparent stellar absorption features .
both the strength of the features and the continuum shape over the observed wavelength range are well matched by a single stellar population with an age of 1 gyr and solar metallicity ( bruzual & charlot 1997 ) .
however , our hst and groundbased ir images ( paper 1 ) show that @xmath9 encompasses a considerable range in color , so a single unreddened stellar population is clearly an oversimplification .
the se component @xmath10 also shows stellar absorption features , but no detectible emission lines .
the redshift is well determined from the h and k lines to be 1.053 , close to the quasar redshift of 1.0489 .
the continuum color of our spectrum is somewhat redder even than a 10-gyr - old bruzual & charlot ( 1997 ) model ( such an age would be unrealistic at this redshift ) , but on an object this faint , we may be susceptible to small zero - point uncertainties . taking into account both the absorption features and our ( restframe ) 0.331.0 @xmath20 m spectral index from paper 1 , we obtain the best overall agreement with a 4-gyr stellar population model having near - solar metallicity .
the galaxies observed with the aperture plates were selected from a magnitude - limited ( @xmath21[7000 ]@xmath22 ) sample from a deep image obtained in good seeing with the university of hawaii 88-inch telescope .
the choice of galaxies was controlled partly by our need to obtain deep spectroscopy of the aligned components near 3c212 itself .
the axis of our long - exposure aperture plate was at position angle @xmath2341.4 , and we chose galaxies in the available field ( 7 in the direction perpendicular to the dispersion ) that lay as close as possible to the centerline of the aperture plate , subject to obtaining efficient packing of slitlets , each of which was at least 15 long .
we also tried to place the fainter galaxies on this aperture plate , reserving slightly brighter objects for two additional aperture plates for which we planned shorter total exposures .
one of these short - exposure aperture plates was aligned close to the same angle as the long - exposure plate , and the other was at roughly 90 to it ( in both cases , after we had chosen the galaxies , we reoptimized the axes , ending up with position angles of @xmath23424 and 532 ) .
while our sample of observed galaxies is neither complete nor unbiased , it should give a reasonable idea of the redshifts of major concentrations of galaxies along the line of sight .
table [ table1 ] shows our results for the 82 different objects ( besides the quasar ) for which we attempted to obtain spectra .
we have firm or probable redshifts for 66 of the objects .
redshifts given in parentheses are mostly objects for which only one emission line is detected , and in most cases the line has been identified as h@xmath24 . in these cases , we require that the line be both strong and too narrow to be the [ ] @xmath253726,3729 doublet , and that the continuum show no evidence for a discontinuity towards lower levels shortward of the line ( so that it is unlikely to be ly@xmath24 at high redshift ; see related discussion in [ hiigal ] ) .
figure [ zhist ] shows a histogram of the redshift distribution .
we have previously discussed in paper 1 the problem of the nature of the apparently aligned components @xmath9 and @xmath10 , which lie beyond the radio lobes of 3c212 , and we will only briefly summarize the main points of that discussion here before considering the new data .
the morphological similarity between the optical component @xmath9 and the nw radio lobe of 3c212 is truly remarkable ( in fact , the initial reaction of some colleagues to whom we showed these data was that we had obviously gotten the scales wrong ! ) .
while @xmath10 shows less obvious structure , it does show faint wisps that appear to extend parallel to the radio contours , and it lies only about 1 beyond the sw radio hotspot .
the crux of the matter is that , while there appears to be nearly compelling morphological evidence for association rather than chance projection , it is very difficult to understand how any plausible alignment mechanism can produce strong _ continuum _ sources beyond the radio lobes .
furthermore , the radial velocity difference of @xmath26 km s@xmath11 between the quasar and @xmath9 ( particularly coupled with the low internal velocity dispersion of the ionized gas in @xmath9 ) adds another constraint on possible models for association .
the options for @xmath9 mentioned in paper 1 were ( 1 ) that it was an unassociated foreground object , ( 2 ) that its continuum was dominated by optical synchrotron emission associated with undetected radio synchrotron emission ( implying a very flat radio optical spectral index ) , ( 3 ) that its continuum was dominated by inverse compton scattering of microwave background photons associated with undetected or relic radio radiation ( requiring a large total energy in low - energy relativistic electrons ) , and ( 4 ) that the continuum was due to jet - induced star formation marking a previous position of the radio jet or a previous outburst . for @xmath10 , which is only slightly beyond the se radio lobe
, we considered in paper 1 the possibility that the faint wisps extending from it could be thermal emission from a bow shock in the ambient medium beyond the radio lobe itself .
however , even if this explanation were correct , it can not explain the bulk of the emission from @xmath10 , for which both the morphology and the extremely red color are inconsistent with those expected from shock - heated gas .
the new observations we have that are relevant to these questions are ( 1 ) the deeper spectroscopy of @xmath9 and @xmath10 , which now show stellar absorption lines in both objects , and ( 2 ) the multiaperture spectroscopy of a large number of field galaxies .
our detection of stellar absorption lines in @xmath9 , at the same redshift as the emission lines , effectively eliminates any option in which the continuum is dominated by optical synchrotron or inverse compton radiation .
it also eliminates the possibility that we might have been seeing a combination of emission lines from an intervening object superposed by chance on some form of continuum at or near the quasar redshift .
the absorption lines in @xmath10 finally give us a redshift for this object ; the radial velocity difference of @xmath27 km s@xmath11 in the quasar frame strengthens the case for association .
in the redshift distribution of galaxies in the 3c212 field ( fig.[zhist ] ) , there is clear concentration near @xmath28 , with three objects besides @xmath9 ( b32 , c23 , and c25 ) falling within about 600 km s@xmath11 of this value and one additional object ( c05 ) at @xmath29 .
this clustering in redshift supports the view that @xmath9 is simply a projected intervening galaxy and that the morphological suggestions of a connection between the radio and optical structure are fortuitious . on the other hand ,
we have found only two additional galaxies besides @xmath10 ( c17 and c26 ) having redshifts close to that of the quasar ; while these galaxies provide evidence for a group around the quasar , there is no evidence for a major cluster .
the redshift distribution we observe may be biased by two principal factors : firstly , we selected galaxies with brighter magnitudes for our two shorter - exposure aperture plates than for our long - exposure aperture plate , so we do not have a consistent magnitude limit for the whole sample ; secondly , our restricted observed wavelength region and differences in the system efficiency within this region mean that we will be more sensitive to some redshift ranges than to others . here
we estimate the effects of these biases and discuss the likely nature of the galaxies for which we were not able to obtain redshifts .
we first take the ratio of the number of galaxies in our observed sample in each one - magnitude interval to that of our total magnitude - limited sample in the same magnitude interval .
we can then look at the observed redshift distribution for galaxies in each magnitude interval and make a correction to the total redshift distribution , based on normalizing the distribution of observed galaxies in the magnitude interval to the number in the same interval in the total sample .
we then renormalize the resulting distribution back to the total number of our observed sample , rounding to the nearest unit in each bin .
figure [ zcomp]@xmath6 shows the observed and corrected distributions for @xmath30 bins ; the two distributions are statistically virtually identical .
we now wish to compare our redshift distribution with that found for field galaxies in a large , deep , essentially complete , spectroscopic survey .
the published survey best suited for this comparison is that of the 22@xmath31 field of cowie ( 1996 ; hereinafter `` cshc22 sample '' ) , which is nearly complete to @xmath32 .
our survey limit of @xmath33 corresponds to @xmath34 , assuming spectra that are roughly flat in @xmath35 ; but the redshift distribution of our fainter sources is not significantly different from that at @xmath36 , so we can use our whole sample in the comparison .
figure [ zcomp]@xmath7 shows the redshift distribution for the cshc22 sample .
this sample comprises 167 galaxies , all but 18 of which have firm redshifts .
the most obvious difference ( aside from expected clustering peaks ) in the distributions is the presence of galaxies with redshifts nearly up to 2.5 in the cshc22 sample , whereas no redshifts higher than @xmath37 are seen in our 3c212 field redshift distribution .
this result is also indicated by a mann - whitney @xmath38 test of the two samples : when the 3c212 field observed sample is compared with the whole cshc22 sample , the probability that the two are drawn from the same population is about 8% , whereas , if we delete galaxies with @xmath39 from the latter , the probability rises to @xmath40% .
this difference has a natural explanation in terms of the restricted wavelength coverage of our observing configuration . while the wavelength range of our aperture - plate spectra varied somewhat , depending on the exact position of the aperture , both the rapid decline of the ccd response and the increasing strength of the oh airglow emission work to decrease our detection efficiency at longer wavelengths . in only one case
did we identify a line beyond 9200 ( h@xmath24 in b31 ) . a galaxy for which [ ] @xmath41 falls at 9200 has @xmath42 .
the next reasonably strong expected emission feature is ] @xmath43 , which falls below our short - wavelength cutoff for @xmath44 .
this insensitivity to galaxies with redshifts between @xmath45 and @xmath46 means that it is quite likely that a significant fraction of the objects for which we were unable to determine redshifts lie within this range .
galaxies with @xmath39 constitute 10% of the cshc22 sample for which redshifts have been determined ; in our sample , we lack redshifts for 20% of our total , so roughly half ( and perhaps more ) of these are likely to be high - redshift objects
. one of our faint field galaxies , b08 , shows a spectrum dominated by a single strong emission line at 8567 on a very weak continuum .
the observed equivalent width ( ew ) of the emission line is @xmath47 , and no other features having fluxes greater than @xmath48% of this line are detected over an observed wavelength range from 6855 to 9455 . when a single strong emission line is seen in a low - resolution , wide - bandwidth , optical spectrum of an extragalactic object , it is almost certainly likely to be one of [ ] @xmath253727 , ly@xmath24 , or possibly h@xmath24 .
other potential identifications either will normally show other nearby lines of reasonable strength or are unlikely to have large equivalent widths . in our spectrum of b08 , the line is sufficiently narrow and our resolution sufficiently high that we can eliminate [ ] @xmath253727 as a possibility : we would have resolved the doublet quite easily .
if the observed line were ly@xmath24 , the redshift would be 6.05 .
however , quite aside from the unprecedented redshift , there is a serious problem with such an identification .
although the observed continuum is very weak , careful measurements in wavelength intervals free of strong airglow emission shows that there is no significant drop in the continuum flux density on the shortward side of the line , as would be expected from ly@xmath24 forest absorption .
one can not avoid the problem by supposing that many of the clouds might be essentially wholly ionized at @xmath49 , as the flux density ( @xmath50 ) is still at close to the same level at a wavelength where ly@xmath24 has @xmath51 .
this almost insurmountable difficulty with an identification with ly@xmath24 leads us to consider more closely the possibility that the line is h@xmath24 . while our use of a moderately high dispersion helped us eliminate [ ] as a viable identification , here we are hurt by the fact that our restricted wavelength coverage does not include the expected h@xmath52 region .
the line s large equivalent width ( 490 in the rest frame , if h@xmath24 ) and an upper limit to [ ] of @xmath53% of the strength of h@xmath24 would seem , at first sight , to argue against this identification .
the [ ] @xmath256716,6731 lines would lie in a region of strong airglow oh emission , so the upper limit on their strengths is @xmath48% that of the putative h@xmath24 .
nevertheless , models for starbursts ( leitherer & heckman 1995 ) , which have been found to be generally consistent with observations ( stasi ' nska & leitherer 1996 ) , indicate that h@xmath24 ews can be as high as 3000 for ages up to @xmath54 years and can remain above @xmath55 up to ages of @xmath56 years ( these models assume continuous star formation with a saltpeter luminosity function over a mass range from 0.1 to 100 @xmath57 ) . furthermore , there are examples of extreme hii galaxies in which metal abundances are low and very hot stars ( @xmath5860000 k ) are present , suppressing low - ionization species like [ ] and [ ] ( tol 1214@xmath23277 ; _ cf . _
4o in terlevich 1991 ) .
such galaxies tend to show weak emission in @xmath255876 .
this line would fall within our bandpass , and we have a marginal detection , which appears to be confirmed by a careful examination of the two - dimensional spectrum , at about 2% of the strength of the strong line at 8567 .
we are therefore fairly confident that the latter actually is h@xmath24 , and this confidence is increased by the presence of another object , d12 , in our sample , which also has a very weak continuum and strong lines ; it would have caused similar problems of identification had it not had a sufficiently high redshift that the [ ] lines fall within our bandpass . because such dwarfs dominated by very young , metal - poor populations and showing high ionizations appear not to be too uncommon , it is clear that seeing a single , strong line with a large equivalent width is not sufficient for an identification with ly@xmath24 .
fortunately , most spectroscopic surveys of faint galaxies have wider wavelength coverage than we had and will normally observe the expected [ ] region for any lines that might be h@xmath24 candidates . the strongest evidence in favor of ly@xmath24 for lines in this region of the spectrum ( redward of @xmath59 ) would be a clear indication of a continuum discontinuity across the emission line .
we have obtained deep spectroscopy of the two objects @xmath9 and @xmath10 , which lie respectively just beyond the nw and se radio lobes of 3c212 .
object @xmath9 shows both emission lines and absorption lines from a moderately - young stellar population at a redshift of 0.9284 , blueshifted by some 18,000 km s@xmath11 relative to the quasar .
object @xmath10 has the spectrum of an old ( @xmath60 gyr ) stellar population at a redshift close to that of the quasar and is likely associated with it .
our multiaperture spectroscopy of 82 objects in the 3c212 field has turned up 2 additional galaxies with redshifts close to that of 3c212 , both at fairly large angular separations from the quasar , as well as 3 galaxies having redshifts close to that of @xmath9 . at both of these redshifts ,
the galaxies all lie within a projected distance of about 1 mpc of 3c212 and of @xmath9 ( @xmath61 km s@xmath11 mpc@xmath11 , @xmath62 ) .
thus , it appears that both 3c212 and @xmath9 are members of rather loose groups ; more importantly , in spite its morphological similarity to the nw radio lobe of 3c212 and its precise alignment with the radio jet , @xmath9 is probably an unrelated foreground object .
the redshift distribution of faint galaxies in the 3c212 field agrees well with that of the cowie ( 1996 ) 22@xmath31 field except for a lack of galaxies with @xmath63 in the former .
this difference is readily understood in terms of our lack of coverage of wavelength regions in which any strong emission lines will fall for @xmath64 , and it suggests that a large fraction of our objects without redshifts lie within this range .
the presence of two young dwarf starburst galaxies with high ionizations among the fainter members of our sample indicates that such objects are likely to be fairly common in field - galaxy samples at @xmath65 .
we thank len cowie and esther hu for discussions and for providing a machine - readable version of table 1 from cowie ( 1996 ) .
we have enjoyed discussions of the alignment effect in 3c212 with many people , including neil trentham , mark lacy , and ken chambers .
we thank zachery ortogero for helping with some of the figures .
this research was partially supported by nasa through grant no .
go-05401.01 - 93a from the space telescope science institute , which is operated by aura , inc .
, under nasa contract no . nas 5 - 26555 , and by nsf under grant ast95 - 29078 .
ser was supported by a pparc postdoctoral fellowship .
bruzual , g. , & charlot , s. 1997 , in preparation chambers , k.c . ,
miley , g. , & van breugel , w. 1987 , nature , 329 , 609 cowie , l.l . ,
songaila , a. , hu , e.m . , & cohen , j.g .
1996 , , 112 , 839 dickinson , m. , dey , a. , & spinrad , h. 1995 , in `` galaxies in the young universe '' , ed . h. hippelein , k. meisenheimer , & rser , h .- j . , springer - verlag , p. 164 di serego alighieri , s. , cimatti , a. , & fosbury , r.a.e .
1994 , , 431 , 123 leitherer , c. , & heckman , t.m .
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rttgering , h.j.a .
1995 , mnras , 275 , l47 .
massey , p. , strobel , k. , barnes , j.v .
, & anderson , e. 1988 , apj , 328 , 315 .
massey , p. & gronwall , c. 1990 , apj , 358 , 344 .
mccarthy , p.j . ,
van breugel , w. , spinrad , h. , & djorgovski , s. 1987 , , 321 , l29 ridgway , s.e , & stockton , a. 1997 , aj , 114 , 511 ( paper 1 ) stani ' nska , g. & leitherer , c. 1996 , , 107 , 661 stockton , a. , ridgway , s.e . , & kellogg , m. 1996 , , 112 , 902 terlevich , r. , melnick , j. , masegosa , j. , moles , m. , & copetti , m.v.f .
1991 , 91 , 285 b02 & @xmath231095 & 1059 & 24.8 & 1.311 & , , cn b03 & @xmath23887 & 1082 & 24.5 & 0.6671 & , b04 & @xmath23948 & 833 & 25.2 & & fbc b05 & @xmath23750 & 798 & 24.6 & 1.1386 & , b06 & @xmath23638 & 689 & 24.6 & & ndc b07 & @xmath23647 & 540 & 24.2 & & fbc b08 & @xmath23409 & 578 & 24.9 & 0.3053 & , hei @xmath255876 b09 & @xmath23305 & 496 & 24.9 & 1.402 & , b10 & @xmath23301 & 352 & 24.8 & 0.6052 & , b11 & @xmath23135 & 293 & 23.7 & & em . line at 9170.1 b12 & @xmath2376 & 189 & 23.6 & 0.3380 & , b13 & @xmath2352 & 63 & 22.6 & 0.9284 & @xmath9 ; , h@xmath19 ( see text ) b14 & 00 & 00 & 19.0 & 1.0489 & 3c212 b15 & 39 & @xmath2342 & 25.3 & 1.053 & @xmath10 ; ( see text ) b16 & 333 & 23 & 24.6 & 1.293 & b17 & 13 & @xmath23353 & 24.1 & & fbc b18 & 574 & @xmath2384 & 24.8 & & ndc b19 & 564 & @xmath23370 & 23.8 & & continuum contaminated by star b20 & 755 & @xmath23378 & 24.9 & 0.4881 & , b21 & 890 & @xmath23418 & 24.9 & ( 0.1347 ) & b22 & 780 & @xmath23675 & 25.3 & 0.4880 & b23 & 777 & @xmath23827 & 24.5 & 0.7144 & , b24 & 937 & @xmath23892 & 23.8 & 1.195 & , balmer abs .
b25 & 865 & @xmath231150 & 24.8 & 0.4307 & , b26 & 1104 & @xmath231022 & 23.4 & 0.6842 & , , h@xmath19 b27 & 1120 & @xmath231043 & 24.4 & 0.6831 & , h@xmath19 b28 & 1146 & @xmath231075 & 23.3 & 0.6841 & , , h@xmath19 b29 & 1321 & @xmath231091 & 24.2 & 0.7569 & , b30 & 1136 & @xmath231442 & 23.7 & 0.2995 & , b31 & 1485 & @xmath231376 & 24.3 & 0.442 & , b32 & 1207 & @xmath231804 & 23.1 & 0.9290 & b33 & 1388 &
@xmath231878 & 24.9 & & fbc b34 & 1347 & @xmath232031 & 24.8 & 0.6434 & , b35 & 1856 & @xmath231790 & 23.8 & ( 0.2267 ) & c02 & 1069 & 986 & 23.6 & & fbc c03 & 1111 & 632 & 22.9 & & fbc c04 & 1037 & 574 & 23.9 & ( 0.3150 ) & , poss .
c05 & 529 & 877 & 22.9 & 0.9435 & , c06 & 740 & 358 & 23.8 & 0.7614 & , c07 & 441 & 364 & 22.3 & 0.3136 & , c08 & 339 & 279 & 22.8 & 0.3323 & , c09 & 316 & 139 & 22.9 & 0.7032 & , c10 & 211 & 33 & 23.1 & 0.4921 & , c11 & @xmath2352 & 63 & 22.6 & 0.9283 & @xmath9 ( same as b13 ) ; c12 & @xmath23138 & @xmath2345 & 23.0 & & fbc c13 & @xmath23329 & @xmath23145 & 23.0 & 0.5167 & c14 & @xmath23534 & @xmath23219 & 22.0 & 0.4884 & , c15 & @xmath23618 & @xmath23343 & 23.3 & 0.4201 & c16 & @xmath23563 & @xmath23585 & 23.0 & & fbc c17 & @xmath23806 & @xmath23541 & 22.9 & 1.0505 & , g - band c18 & @xmath23797 & @xmath23799 & 21.2 & 0.3056 & , , c19 & @xmath231145 & @xmath23528 & 22.2 & 0.5100 & , c20 & @xmath231143 & @xmath23867 & 22.6 & 0.8070 & c21 & @xmath231281 & @xmath23895 & 23.7 & 1.397 & c22 & @xmath231350 & @xmath231210 & 22.7 & 0.8318 & , c23 & @xmath231414 & @xmath231255 & 22.1 & 0.9221 & c24 & @xmath231566 & @xmath231224 & 22.5 & 0.7575 & , c25 & @xmath231683 & @xmath231238 & 21.4 & 0.924 : & 4000 break c26 & @xmath231751 & @xmath231542 & 22.3 & 1.043 & , , poss .
c27 & @xmath232029 & @xmath231449 & 22.6 & 0.7108 & , d01 & @xmath231235 & 884 & 23.2 & ( 0.1790 ) & d02 & @xmath23654 & 1116 & 22.8 & & fbc d03 & @xmath23782 & 771 & 22.9 & ( 0.6256 ) & , poss . ,
h@xmath19 d04 & @xmath23748 & 603 & 23.5 & & fbc d05 & @xmath23647 & 415 & 20.3 & 0.3294 & , , na d d06 & @xmath23729 & 119 & 22.7 & 0.000 & m4 dwarf star d07 & @xmath23337 & 263 & 23.0 & 0.3051 & , d08 & @xmath2344 & 374 & 21.2 & 0.3301 & , d09 & @xmath23281 & @xmath2341 & 21.1 & 0.3331 & , d10 & @xmath23151 & @xmath23125 & 23.8 & ( 0.136 ) & d11 & @xmath23112 & @xmath23168 & 22.5 & 0.8091 & h@xmath66 and higher balmer abs .
d12 & 111 & @xmath23213 & 23.8 & 0.4139 & , d13 & 502 & @xmath23224 & 22.0 & 0.5365 & , d14 & 716 & @xmath23395 & 22.4 & 0.5086 & , d15 & 691 & @xmath23730 & 22.6 & 0.1140 & , d16 & 1008 & @xmath23695 & 22.7 & 0.7147 & , d17 & 864 & @xmath23986 & 23.8 & ( 0.3179 ) & d18 & 903 & @xmath231115 & 21.6 & 0.6834 & , h@xmath19 d19 & 1140 & @xmath231136 & 22.7 & 0.6837 & , h@xmath19 d20 & 999 & @xmath231423 & 23.4 & & fbc d21 & 1054 & @xmath231505 & 23.1 & & poss .
line at 8302.4 d22 & 1433 & @xmath231370 & 22.8 & 0.3560 & , d23 & 1693 & @xmath231425 & 22.6 & ( 0.6439 ) & d24 & 1338 & @xmath231889 & 23.4 & 0.6819 & , , h@xmath19 d25 & 1401 & @xmath231951 & 23.0 & 0.7545 & , [ table1 ] | arxiv |
N-fluorosuccinimide: any scope?
All halogen derivatives (**except fluorine**) of succinimide exist and are used in various chemical processes. What makes N-fluorosuccinimde difficult to prepare? Still chemists have not been able to figure out the preparation of N-fluorosuccinimde and don't even bother to synthesize it since [electrophilic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrophilic_fluorination)/[radical](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_fluorination) fluorination is accomplished by N-fluoro-o-benzenedisulfonimide (NFOBS), N-fluorobenzenesulfonimide (NFSI), and Selectfluor. Moreover, even if NFS is successfully synthesized, can it be used as a fluorinating agent in electrophilic/radical fluorination?
[According to Wikipedia, NBS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N-Bromosuccinimide) is made by reacting sodium hydroxide and bromine in an ice-water solution of succinimide. The NBS product precipitates and is collected by filtration. I am assuming that [NCS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N-Chlorosuccinimide) and [NIS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N-Iodosuccinimide) are made in the similar fashion (using appropriate halogens). But, why NFS has still not been made through a similar way (using fluorine)? Is the reaction condition unsuitable for fluorine or is there any other reason?
I was reading a [forum discussing the scope of NFS as a fluorinating agent](http://www.chemicalforums.com/index.php?topic=76226.0). It says:
>
>
> >
> > Does anyone know why is N-fluorosuccinimide (201281-58-5) such
> > uncommon reagent for fluorination? I checked some major suppliers and
> > none of them sells it.
> >
> >
> >
>
>
> In my knowledge, N-Halogenesuccinimide are obtained by reacting of Succinimide with the halogen itself. This is valid for Chlorine, Bromine, and Iodine. Fluorine is too reactive. For the fluorine derivative, iodinesuccinimide is treated with silver fluoride to exchange the halogen.
>
>
> The other option is to treat N-Hydroxysuccinimide with Thionyl
> fluoride or Phosphorous trifluoride.
>
>
>
Is this true? I couldn't find any source confirming the above synthesis and I am skeptical about the preparation process. Can NFS be made through the above process?
Maybe NFS doesn't work well? Bear in mind that bonds from a second-period element to fluorine are generally stronger and less labile than the corresponding bonds to heavier halogens. If that's true, getting fluorine off a nitrogen-fluorine bond requires more work than, say, getting bromine off a nitrogen-bromine bond.
In <https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrophilic_fluorination#Mechanism_and_stereochemistry> several common fluorinating reagents are given, these being the compounds mentioned by the OP. The listed compounds all withdraw electrons from the nitrogen-fluorine bond more strongly than the carbonyl groups would in NFS (they use sulfonyl groups or a cationic function), so it seems this attribute is necessary to get the fluorination to go.
The synthesis of NBS and NIS involve adding succinimide, the relevant halogen and NaOH (and AgNO3 in the case of NIS) in water. Fluorine reacts very violently with both oxygen and water forming HOF and FOOF, both highly toxic and explosive compounds. Water is thus an incompatible solvent for running fluorinations, you need a polar aprotic solvent such as MeCN. Secondly, in the presence of base, fluorine could undergo alpha-fluorinations to the carbonyl depending on the pKa of the C-3 and C-4 hydrogens.
| stackexchange/chemistry |
Swingeing Government cuts have led a Midland council to warn that it is on the verge of insolvency.
Cabinet members at Labour-run Wolverhampton City Council will be told tomorrow (Wednesday) that borough spending will have to be slashed even further after it had found the £98 million of savings originally demanded by the Coalition.
The council's assistant director of finance Mark Taylor said an extra £25 million would now have to be cut from the budget – after the Government's recent announcement on local authority funding for the next two financial years left the borough facing a cash crisis.
Mr Taylor will tell councillors the proposed funding reduction would mean grants will have reduced by £147 million in real terms compared with 2010-11 – a cut of 52 per cent.
Borough finance chief Coun Andrew Johnson said: "When the Government made this announcement just before Christmas, I warned that it put this council in a position where we could struggle to provide essential services such as caring for the elderly or emptying bins.
"Regrettably, now that our finance people have had time to analyse the impact of the Government's December 18 announcement in detail, I have not changed my view.
"We are now realistically looking at the prospect of becoming insolvent unless we make very deep and very fast cuts to address this enormous budget deficit which has been forced upon us by Government.
City MP Emma Reynolds (Lab, Wolverhampton North East) waded into the debate, claiming: "When the Prime Minister came to Wolverhampton in October, he claimed, referring to the council's spending cuts, that 'it's a smaller cut than the average'.
"It is obvious that this claim was highly misleading. | slim_pajama |
the study of the process @xmath3 and the related form factors when two virtual photons produce a neutral pion provides a simple , interesting and clean test of qcd .
in contrast to the pion electromagnetic form factor it is not asymptotically supressed by being multplied by the strong coupling constant @xmath4 . in the lowest order in @xmath4 ,
perturbative qcd predicts that @xcite @xmath5 where @xmath6 is the phenomenological pion distribution amplitude and @xmath7 are the fractions of the pion light cone momenta carried by the quarks in the region where both photon virtualities @xmath8 and @xmath9 are large . the most experimentally favourable situation is when one of the photons is real , @xmath10 and this has led to the measurement of the form factor @xmath11 by the cello @xcite and clio @xcite groups .
recently , radyushkin and ruskov @xcite have undertaken to obtain the transition form factor @xmath12 independently of the specific form of the pion distribution amplitude .
they have rather first evaluated the perturbative and non - perturbative contributions to the amplitude @xmath13 in the deep euclidean region and have the extrapolated to the mass - shell of one of the photons in a qcd sum rule @xcite approach .
it is the purpose of this note to undertake this extrapolation in a more straightforward and much less model dependant way .
the task of extrapolating qcd prodictions from the deep asymptotic region to low energies is not a trivial one , an effective way is the use of qcdsum rules @xcite in which use is made of the analyticity properties of an amplitude to write dispersion integrals the low energy part of which is saturated by known resonances and where qcd is employed to evaluate the asymptotic part .
it is in general hard to assess the quality of the approximations made as resonance saturation should not be expected to hold over too large an interval and deviations from qcd could become important far away from the euclidean region .
a simple model independant method of extrapolation is proposed in this note in which the integration kernel in the dispersion integral is modified by adding to it polynomials of low order @xmath14 .
the polynomials are chosen such as to annihilate the kernel as well as its derivatives up to order @xmath14 in the region where both resonance saturation and qcd are least reliable .
the method is applied to obtain the form factor @xmath15 .
it is shown that extrapolation of the qcd expression of radyushkin and ruskov @xcite with the values they use for the damping parameters , which they deduce from stability considerations , as well as the values commonly used for the qcd non - perturbative vacuum condensates lead to values of @xmath12 in good agreement with the experimental data .
another application of the method is to the anomaly relation @xcite @xmath16 , where @xmath17 is the pion decay constant , which holds when both photons are on their mass - shell .
in particular we evaluate corrections to the value of the @xmath18 coupling constant given by vector meson dominance .
the effectiveness and stability of the method is finally demonstrated by calculating the charge and charge radius of the pion from the asymptotic behaviour of the pion s electromagnetic form factor obtained some time ago by ioffe and smilga @xcite and by nesterenko and radyushkin @xcite .
agreement with experiment is good in all cases .
the electroproduction of a neutral pion in the reaction @xmath20 is experimentally accessible @xcite , @xcite .
the corresponding form factor is defined when both photons are off their mass - shell .
@xmath21 where @xmath22 is the electromagnetic current of light quarks divided by the unit charge @xmath23 radyushkin and ruskov @xcite calculate the qcd expression of the form factor which is valid when both @xmath24 and @xmath9 are in the deep euclidean region @xmath25 with the perturbative part @xmath26 ^{3 } } \tag{2.3 } \label{2.3}\ ] ] @xmath27 is the borel damping mass and @xmath28 is the duality radius in the axial - vector channel . both are determined by stability considerations @xcite , @xcite , the values @xmath29 and @xmath30 are used .
the coefficients @xmath31 \notag \\
c_{2 } & = & -\left [ \frac{\pi ^{2}}{9}\langle \frac{\alpha _ { s}gg}{\pi } \rangle \left ( \frac{1}{2m^{2}}-\frac{1}{q^{2}}\right ) + \frac{64}{27}\pi ^{3}\alpha _ { s}\langle ( qq)^{2}\rangle \left ( \frac{1}{2m^{4}}-\frac{1}{q^{4}}\right ) % \right ] \notag \\ c_{4 } & = & \frac{64\pi ^{3}}{243}\alpha _ { s}\langle ( qq)^{2}\rangle \left ( \frac{q^{2}}{m^{4}}+\frac{q}{q^{2}}\right ) \tcitag{2.4 } \label{2.4}\end{aligned}\ ] ] are expressed in terms of the qcd gluon and 4-quark condansates .
there is no consensus on the value of the 4-quark condensate , in particular the vacuum saturation approximation @xmath32 is likely to be badly violated @xcite .
fortunately the contribution of the non - perturbative condensates to our sum rules is quite small which renders our results insensitive to their exact values .
as stated in the introduction , our purpose is to extrapolate expression ( [ 2.2 ] ) to @xmath33 and compare with the experiemtal measurment of @xmath34 done by cello @xcite and clio @xcite . at low values of @xmath35
, @xmath36 is dominated by the @xmath37meson pole @xmath38 furthermore , @xmath36 is an analytic function in the complex @xmath39plane with a cut on the positive real axis running from threshold @xmath40 to infinity .
consider the integral @xmath41 where @xmath42 is the contour consisting of a circle of large radius @xmath43 and two straight lines parallel to and lying just above and just below the cut .
@xmath44 and the coefficients @xmath45 are up to now arbitrary constants . if @xmath43 is large enough , the qcd expression ( [ 2.2 ] )
is expected to hold on the circle except in the region close to the positive real axis . on the cut and for low values of @xmath35 , @xmath37pole dominance , expressed by eq .
( [ 2.5 ] ) adequatly represents the amplitude .
we now choose the coefficients @xmath45 defining the kernel eq .
( [ 2.7 ] ) such that @xmath46 as well as its derivatives up to order @xmath14 vanish at @xmath47 in order to annihilate the integrand in the integration region not covered by vector meson dominance and where the qcd expression can not be trusted .
this is achieved by taking @xmath48 to coincide with the taylor expansion of @xmath49 about @xmath47 truncated at @xmath14 .
the integral ( [ 2.6 ] ) then yields @xmath50 the duality radius in the @xmath37meson channel @xmath43 is taken to be @xmath51 @xcite . in order to determine @xmath34 we take @xmath52 and @xmath53 successively in eq .
( [ 2.8 ] ) and perform the integral over the circle of radius @xmath43 in the complex @xmath39plane .
the result is shown in fig.1 and agreement with the data is seen to be quite good .
the deep inelastic limit @xmath54 is readily obtained , in this limit the pole of @xmath55 lies outside the integration contour and only the @xmath56 term in @xmath46 contributes so that @xmath57 the fact that the r.h.s . above
should not depend on @xmath14 implies that @xmath58 as expected and that @xmath59 the above result can be compared to values obtained from eq .
( [ 1.1 ] ) if one uses asymptotic forms of the pion distribution amplitude as given by brodsky and lepage @xcite and by chernyak and zhitnitsky @xcite @xmath60 the limiting value given by eq . (
[ 2.10 ] ) , together with the bound at @xmath61 imposed by the anomaly relation @xmath62 can be accomodated by the interpolation formula @xmath63 with @xmath64 expression ( [ 2.12 ] ) yields values of the form factor very close to the ones obtained analytically from eq . [
the anomaly relation @xcite determines the form factor when both photons are on their mass - shell @xmath66 for the symmetric case @xmath67 , the asymptotic expression of radyushkin and ruskov @xcite takes the form @xmath68 with @xmath69 \notag \\
c_{4}(m^{2 } ) & = & -\frac{\pi ^{2}}{9}\langle \frac{\alpha _ { s}gg}{\pi } \rangle \notag \\ c_{6}(m^{2 } ) & = & -\frac{128}{27}\pi ^{2}\alpha _ { s}\langle ( \bar{q}% q)^{2}\rangle \tcitag{3.3 } \label{3.3}\end{aligned}\ ] ] as before we start from the integral @xmath70 with @xmath46 defined by eq . [ 2.7 ] . in this case
, the amplitude @xmath71 possesses a double as well as a single pole at @xmath72 because the @xmath73 and @xmath74 mesons are degenerate in mass , i.e. in the low energy region @xmath75 one obtains then @xmath76 with the perturbative part @xmath77 given by the first term in the r.h.s .
( [ 3.2 ] ) .
the residue @xmath78 which describes the transition @xmath79vector meson@xmath80continuum is unknown .
the residue @xmath81 is related to @xmath82 , the @xmath83 coupling constant , @xmath84 where @xmath85 denote the coupling of the vector currents to the corresponding vector mesons .
taking @xmath86 and @xmath87 in eq .
[ 3.5 ] with @xmath88 eliminates @xmath78 and yields @xmath89 a value close to the one given by vector meson dominance @xmath90 .
a check of the stability of the method is provided by the taking @xmath53 with the values obtained for @xmath81 and @xmath78 inserted in the r.h.s . of eq . [ 3.5 ] to evaluate @xmath91 , this yields .
the case @xmath92 , e.g. , yields @xmath93 . ]
in this paragraph the effectiveness and stability of the method used above is tested in the calculation of the pion charge and charge radius .
the electromagnetic form factor of the pion is @xmath95 and @xmath96 is the charge of the pion .
the asymptotic behaviour of @xmath71 was obtained some time ago by ioffe and smilga @xcite and by nesterenko and radyushkin @xcite @xmath97 the first term is asymptotically leading @xcite and @xmath98 \tag{4.4 } \label{4.4}\ ] ] @xmath99 @xmath100 have been obtained from stability considerations .
the derivative @xmath103 yields the charge radius @xmath104 where now @xmath105 and once more the @xmath45 s are chosen so as to annihilate @xmath106 and it s derivatives up to order @xmath14 at @xmath47 . @xmath107
the result is @xmath108 corresponding to a charge radius @xmath109 which compares quite well with the experimental value @xmath110 . . | arxiv |
Savannah Jordan born January 24, 1995 is a retired American soccer forward who last played for the Houston Dash in the National Women's Soccer League NWSL. She also played for Glasgow City in the Scottish Women's Premier League SWPL and Portland Thorns FC in the NWSL. Jordan played collegiate soccer for the Florida Gators women's soccer team and was the first player in the history of the Southeastern Conference to be named SEC Offensive Player of the Year as a freshman. Jordan has a background in martial arts and is a three-time U.S. Junior Olympic gold medalist in sparring.
Early life
Raised in Fayetteville, Georgia, Jordan attended Whitewater High School where she played soccer during her junior year. She did not play for the school during the other high school years due to commitments with the Georgia Olympic Development Program ODP where she captained the state team for five years. During her season with the school's team, she led the team to runners-up of the 2012 Georgia High School Association GHSA Class AAAA and was named most valuable player MVP of the final match. After scoring 26 goals and recording 21 assists during the season, she was named to the all-state and all-region teams and was a finalist for Gatorade Player of the Year for the state of Georgia.
Jordan played club soccer for Concorde Fire South 95 Elite and captained the team for five seasons. She was named to the Elite Clubs National League ECNL national and ECNL All-Event teams five times.
Around the age of ten, Jordan began training in martial arts, fighting against boys. She earned a second-degree black belt in Korean style taekwondo and won three gold medals at the U.S. Junior Olympics in sparring. Jordan attributes her aggressive playing style to her martial arts background.
University of Florida
Jordan attended the University of Florida where she played for the Florida Gators from 20132016. During her freshman season, she was the team's top scorer with 22 goals and tied for the lead in the Southeastern Conference. Her goals tied for third nationwide and ranked second all-time for Gator freshmen behind Abby Wambach. Jordan was named SEC Freshman of the Week three times and earned All-SEC first team and SEC All-Freshman team honors. Jordan was named National Freshman of the Year Soccer America and TopDrawerSoccer.com. She was the first player in the history of the conference to be named SEC Offensive Player of the Year as a freshman.
During her sophomore season, Jordan's 19 goals ranked eighth in NCAA Division 1. She scored four braces two games in a match and her 46 points ranked seventh in the NCAA. Named a semifinalist for the Hermann Trophy, she was named SEC Offensive Player of the Week three times.
As a junior in 2015, Jordan scored 24 goals ranking second in the nation and leading the Southeastern Conference. Jordan's goals through her first three seasons matched that of former Gator Abby Wambach. She was named to the NSCAA All-America first team and earned NSCAA All-South Region first team, All-SEC first team, and SEC All-Tournament team honors. Jordan was named SEC Offensive Player of the Year for the second time as well as Hero Sports National Offensive Player of the Year. She was named Soccer Player of the Week by ESPN. She was named a MAC Hermann Trophy semifinalist for the second time.
During her senior season, Jordan scored 16 goals and ranked second in the Southeastern Conference in goals and points. She was named SEC Offensive Player of the Week twice. Jordan was named to the All-Southeastern Conference first team for fourth consecutive year joining Abby Wambach as the only other player at Florida to have done so. She was the first Gator in the program's history to be named NSCAA All-American for four consecutive years.
Club career
Portland Thorns, 2017
In January 2017, Jordan was selected as the eighteenth pick of the 2017 NWSL College Draft by Portland Thorns FC although she had confirmed she would first be playing in Europe. Thorns head coach Mark Parsons said of the signing, Savannah is a very hard-working forward with the ability to create and score goals in many ways. We are excited to bring her to Portland and look forward to seeing Savannahs development and impact in the Rose City. Later that month, she signed with Glasgow City F.C. for the 2017 Scottish Women's Premier League season. During her debut with Glasgow, she scored a hat-trick. She scored another hat-trick during her second match.
Jordan joined the Thorns in August during the second half of the 2017 National Women's Soccer League season after recovering from an injury. Jordan made two appearances for the Thorns during the regular season. The Thorns finished in second place during the regular season with record and won the league championship after defeating first place club North Carolina Courage.
Houston Dash, 2018
On January 12, 2018 Jordan was traded to the Houston Dash in exchange for Andressinha. Jordan made 10 appearances for the Dash in 2018. On March 4, 2019 Houston announced that Jordan had retired from professional soccer.
International career
Jordan has represented the United States on the under-17, under-20, and under-23 national teams. She competed at the 2014 CONCACAF Women's U-20 Championship in the Cayman Islands and helped lead the team to win the championship and earn a spot at the 2014 FIFA U-20 Women's World Cup. During the CONCACAF championship, Jordan scored once in each of the five matches and ranked second on the team in goals. She was subsequently named to the tournaments' Best XI team.
In 2015, Jordan competed with the under-23 team at the Four Nations Tournament in Norway. The following year, she played in every match at the Nordic Tournament in England and scored three goals.
Honors
2013 Soccer National Freshman of the Year
2015 SEC Offensive Player of the Year
References
External links
U.S. Soccer player profile
Houston Dash player profile
Portland Thorns player profile
Category:1995 births
Category:Living people
Category:Portland Thorns FC players
Category:National Women's Soccer League players
Category:Glasgow City F.C. players
Category:American women's soccer players
Category:Scottish Women's Premier League players
Category:Florida Gators women's soccer players
Category:Portland Thorns FC draft picks
Category:Houston Dash players
Category:United States women's under-20 international soccer players
Category:Soccer players from Georgia U.S. state
Category:People from Fayetteville, Georgia
Category:Women's association football forwards | wikipedia |
protein motion plays an important role in biological function at a range of scales . starting from the single - protein level
, enzyme motion has been shown to accelerate in vitro when substrate concentration is higher ( riedel et al . , 2015 ) .
on the pathway level , substrate motion affects the likelihood of enzyme binding ( gabison et al . , 2006 , takahashi et al . , 2010 ) ,
which , in turn , affects pathway efficiency ( castellana et al . , 2014 ) .
finally , on the cellular level , protein motion changes under global cellular perturbations , including hyperosmotic stress ( miermont et al . , 2013 ) ,
unfolded - protein stress ( lai et al . , 2010 ) , and heat shock ( english et al . , 2011 ) .
unlike the simple motion of proteins in buffer , protein motion in the cell cytoplasm is complexly modulated by interactions with cellular components . in buffer , protein motion is driven by thermal fluctuations delivered through interaction with water molecules .
this motion is accurately described by the fickian diffusion equation , whose only parameter is the diffusion coefficient .
in contrast , proteins in the cell cytoplasm interact not only with water molecules , but also with various biomolecules and cellular structures that densely populate the cytoplasm ( luby - phelps , 2000 ) .
these interactions significantly affect protein motion : binding to large complexes may transiently trap proteins , slowing them down ( saxton , 1996 ) , while interacting with atp - driven components such as molecular motors and fluctuating cytoskeletal fibers may speed proteins up or constrain their motion to specific directions ( guo et al . , 2014a ) .
the complex nature of protein motion in the cytoplasm is not easily captured by simple models .
fickian diffusion , reaction - diffusion equations ( engelke et al . , 2009 ) , and anomalous diffusion ( saxton , 2012 , weiss et al . , 2004 )
have all been used to describe effective parameters of protein motion , such as diffusion coefficients , binding and unbinding rates , and anomalous exponents , but none of these models is regarded as adequately describing protein motion ( saxton , 2012 ) . to test models of cytoplasmic protein motion against experimental data ,
researchers have developed quantitative fluorescence microscopy methods , including correlation - based and perturbation - based methods ( see table 1 ) .
correlation - based methods , such as fluorescence correlation spectroscopy ( fcs ) , extract information about protein motion from the autocorrelation of the fluorescence signal .
the autocorrelation can be analytically calculated given the model of motion , and doing so enables users to test the model by fitting the calculated expression to the imaging data .
correlation - based methods have been used in vitro to measure reduced diffusion of biomolecules due to molecular crowding ( engelke et al . , 2009 ) .
these methods have also been used extensively in vivo , for example , in characterizing the dynamics of human islet amyloid polyprotein interaction with the cell membrane ( guo et al . , 2014c ) , in measuring diffusion of paxillin near focal adhesions ( digman et al . , 2008 ) and in determining the interactions of the polyprotein gag with cytoplasmic complexes ( larson et al . , 2003 ) .
in comparison with correlation - based methods , perturbation - based methods implement a more active approach , using a laser pulse to perturb the fluorescent sample and image it as diffusion smooths out the perturbation .
usually , the laser pulse depletes fluorescence from the perturbed region through photo - bleaching , and the observable analyzed is either the recovery of fluorescence at the bleached region ( as in fluorescence recovery after photo - bleaching [ frap ] ) or the loss of fluorescence outside that region . in samples containing photo - convertible fluorophores , the laser pulse generates a fluorescence signal rather than depleting it , and the observable analyzed is the subsequent decay of fluorescence at the photo - converted region ( calvert et al . , 2007 ,
ehrlicher et al . , 2011 , mazza et al . , 2008 ) .
in all of these cases , models can be tested by fitting the measured observable to a predicted analytical expression .
perturbation - based methods are convenient to apply to cytoplasmic proteins , because these methods work well with high protein concentrations , which usually characterize cytoplasmic proteins .
first , each of the methods requires either a calibration of the excitation beam width or a careful measurement of the microscope point - spread function ( petrek and schwille , 2008 ) .
second , users find it challenging to assess the accuracy of the methods in a given instance .
for example , frap results may be skewed by reversible photo - bleaching , i.e. , spontaneous turning on of photo - bleached fluorophores within the pulsed region .
most users can not assess whether reversible photo - bleaching skews a particular instance of their frap analysis merely by looking at the results .
frap presents users with a single fluorescence recovery curve and a model that was fitted to it .
since the model consists of a complex expression , it is hard to judge the quality of the fit and , in turn , the accuracy of the analysis . in other words ,
frap functions as a black box , in that it does not offer tools to assess the quality of its output .
single - particle tracking ( spt ) offers an alternative to these methods . rather than measuring an indirect observable and fitting it to a model to infer the underlying motion , spt directly measures the trajectories of individual proteins , which allows a phenomenological description of their motion .
examples include distinguishing directed from non - directed trajectories ( monnier et al . , 2015 ) , identifying trajectory symmetry with respect to organelles ( jaqaman et al . , 2011 ) , and
characterizing the temporal scaling of the trajectory mean - square displacement ( msd ) ( bronstein et al .
spt requires imaging thousands of trajectories , many of which end prematurely due to photo - bleaching , blinking , or exiting the field of view .
moreover , the typical speed of monomeric proteins in the cytoplasm renders spt even harder to use ( compared to cases such as membrane proteins and large organelles or beads ) , since distinguishing individual trajectories requires a low concentration of tagged proteins , which results in fewer trajectories per movie and thus in more imaging work ( english et al . , 2011 ) .
some of these challenges are resolved in fluorescence speckle microscopy ( fsm ) , which tracks fluorophores incorporated into macromolecular structures ( waterman - storer et al . , 1998 , cameron et al . , 2011 ) . as part of large structures , these fluorophores move more slowly compared to monomeric fluorophores in the cytoplasm . thus , fsm can correctly identify each speckle from frame to frame , even when speckles densely populate the field of view .
in addition , fsm is less sensitive to photo - bleaching and blinking than spt , because speckles often consist of a few fluorophores , which bleach more slowly than single fluorophores and rarely blink simultaneously .
fsm has been primarily used to investigate the dynamics of polymers , such as microtubules ( waterman - storer et al . , 1998 ) , meiotic spindles ( yang et al . , 2007 ) , and
f - actin ( ponti et al . , 2003 ) and has also been used to analyze membrane receptor motion ( jaqaman et al . , 2011 ) . however , fsm is not suitable for studying monomeric proteins in the cytoplasm , as they move quickly and do not form stable speckles . here , we propose photo - converted intensity profile expansion ( pipe ) as a method for direct measurement of rapid protein motion in the cytoplasm .
pipe works by applying a laser pulse to a sample of photo - convertible fluorophores , generating a peaked fluorescence signal at the pulsed region and imaging the signal expanding as the photo - converted fluorophores move away from that region .
this expansion shows proteins moving in different directions and through different parts of the cytoplasm . to make the measurement useful for cell biologists ,
the data are processed to a single number , the effective diffusion coefficient ( edc ) .
this number allows users to compare the rate of expansion of different proteins or of the same proteins under different conditions . rather than claiming that protein motion obeys a simplified diffusion model , the edc provides a phenomenological description of the imaging data .
pipe shares the advantages of other methods and avoids their drawbacks ( see table 1 ) . like spt , pipe images protein motion directly , rather than inferring it from indirect observables . unlike spt
pipe is similar to frap in its applicability to high protein concentrations but differs from frap in user accessibility : pipe uses simple fitting functions and presents data at several stages of the analysis , helping users assess the output quality .
finally , pipe is robust against some forms of photo - bleaching , which can skew frap results . to further demonstrate pipe s usefulness in generating biological insight ,
we applied pipe to questions about proteins anomalous diffusion . whether or not anomalous diffusion of biomolecules takes place in the cell has been much debated among biologists ( hihara et al .
anomalous subdiffusion is characterized by slower motion to long distances compared to brownian motion , and anomalous subdiffusion in the cell may reflect the spatial organization within cellular compartments , which has implications to chromatin accessibility ( hihara et al . , 2012 ) , directional motion along the mitotic spindle ( pawar et al . , 2014 ) , and search efficiency of binding sites ( guigas and weiss , 2008 ) .
while microscopy methods like fcs have been used to measure anomalous diffusion in the cell , some claim that these results originate from artifacts in the data analysis ( reviewed in saxton , 2012 ) .
unlike most existing methods , pipe directly accesses the property of motion that defines anomalous diffusion , i.e. , the mean - square displacement of the protein ensemble and how it scales with time .
to test how well pipe analyzes data in non - ideal yet controlled environments , we applied pipe to computer simulations that imitate photo - conversion experiments and explored how the output of pipe changes with various perturbations modeled in these simulations ( figure 1 ) .
we found that pipe extracted the correct diffusion coefficient at an average error of 3% , under a wide range of values of different parameters , including the random walk step size distribution ( which determines the diffusion coefficient ) , shot noise , and background noise .
we further found that the extracted diffusion coefficients changed by less than 4% under a wide range of photo - bleaching rates ( 0.01%1% bleaching probability per fluorophores per time step ) , except under a very high rate ( 10% probability ) that depleted much of the signal before the end of the simulation .
in addition , since the theory behind pipe assumes that the initial intensity profile has a gaussian shape , we tested pipe against a rectangular initial profile with width of 3 m and found that the diffusion coefficient changed by less than 6% on average for high diffusion coefficients ( 10100 m / s ) , although the change went up to 30% for low diffusion coefficients ( 0.11 m / s ) .
one interesting parameter that did affect pipe s output was the initial width of the protein ensemble , relative to the width of the field of view .
the greater this parameter was , the wider the confidence intervals for the diffusion coefficient became ( although the mean diffusion coefficient remained within the aforementioned 3% error bound ) .
this insight aided us in designing real photo - conversion experiments , since this ratio of widths can be controlled by the microscope zoom and by the power and duration of the photo - conversion pulse . to test the capability of pipe
to extract correct diffusion coefficients from real microscopy data , we conducted and analyzed photo - conversion experiments in solution .
for these experiments , we purified the photo - convertible fluorescent protein dendra2 ( ddr ) from bacteria transformed with a ddr - encoding plasmid . to assess the robustness of pipe against fluctuating system variables , we repeated the measurements under a range of photo - bleaching rates ( 1%100% laser power ) , ddr concentrations ( 0.440 m ) , and durations of the photo - conversion pulse ( 50500 ms ) .
as the theory behind pipe suggests , we found no dependence of the diffusion coefficients on either of these variables ( data not shown ) .
we then turned to measure the accuracy of pipe in confirming a known dependence of the diffusion coefficient on media viscosity .
in dilute media , protein diffusion obeys the stokes - einstein relation d=(kbt/6rh ) , where kb is boltzmann s constant , rh is the stokes radius of the particle , and t and are the temperature and viscosity of the media , respectively .
we changed the media viscosity by titrating glycerol into the ddr solution , measured the diffusion coefficients using pipe , and fitted them to a linear function of 1 .
the model fit the data well ( r = 0.98 ) , passing close to the origin , as predicted by the stokes - einstein relation ( figure 2c ) . plugging the slope of the fitted line into the stokes - einstein relation
, we calculated the stokes radius of ddr to be 2.4 0.2 nm .
this result agrees with the geometric radius of ddr , r = 2.25 nm , which we extracted from the crystal structure 2vzx ( adam et al . , 2009
, pdb file was downloaded from http://www.rcsb.org/pdb/home/home.do , and r was extracted by calculating the longest distance in each coordinate ( x , y , z ) between -carbons atoms within each monomer in the pdb file and averaging over these distances ) . finally , we compared our results to previously reported diffusion coefficients . since we were not familiar with reports on the diffusion coefficient of ddr , we focused on gfp , which resembles ddr in size and structure ( adam et al . ,
the reported diffusion coefficient of gfp ( see table 2 ) had been measured in water at room temperature , i.e. , at viscosity 0.89 cp .
since our purification media contained glycerol , which increased the viscosity , we obtained the diffusion coefficient of ddr at 0.89 cp by extrapolating from the fitted stokes - einstein model and got dddr0.89 cp = 115 11 m / s , in agreement with the overall set of previously measured diffusion coefficients of gfp .
taken together , these results demonstrate that pipe is capable of measuring diffusion coefficients of proteins in dilute solutions .
having demonstrated the capability of pipe to measure protein diffusion in solution , we turned to using it to measure protein motion in the cytoplasm of living cells . while in dilute media
the diffusion coefficient is determined mainly by the viscosity and the protein size , in the crowded cytoplasm the edc may reflect additional factors , including binding to and unbinding from other proteins , complexes , and intracellular structures . to probe the scaling of the edc with protein size , we applied pipe to photo - conversion experiments of ddr repeats of variable length ( denoted as nxddr , where n = 1 , 3 , 6 ) , which we transiently expressed in cos7 cells .
the edcs we obtained from different cells for each protein spanned a wide range of values ( figure 3e ) , with a coefficient of variation of 0.3 .
the edc range of 1xddr included published diffusion coefficients of gfp in the cytoplasm of mammalian cells ( table 3 ) .
the average edcs ( denoted d for convenience ) of nxddr decreased with increasing n , which is consistent with the prediction that larger proteins move more slowly .
for the rest of this report , we will use dnxddr as a rough baseline for edcs at different protein sizes , to which we can compare edcs of other proteins with similar sizes .
having used pipe to measure baseline edcs for ddr repeats , we continued by measuring edcs of ddr - tagged native proteins and compared the results to the baseline .
we focused on proteins from the mammalian protein - folding quality - control system : the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis ( als)-associated protein sod1wt and its aggregation - prone mutants sod1g93a and sod1g85r , the molecular chaperone hsp70 , and the short degradation signal cl1 ( gilon et al . , 1998 ) , which has been shown to convert gfp to an aggregation prone protein .
the measured d for these proteins and for nxddr are shown in figure 3d .
we first applied pipe to measure the motion of sod1 variants and found that sod1 mutants stimulate the protein - folding quality - control system and move more slowly than wild - type sod1 .
sod1 is known to form tight homodimers , which stay associated even when tagged with a fluorescent protein ( grad et al . , 2014 ) .
our results supported this finding , as dsod1 lay much closer to the nxddr baseline if plotted against the size of two sod1-ddrs compared with the size of one sod1-ddr ( figure 3d ) . to compare the aggregation propensity of sod1 variants , we compared their edcs and counted the number the cells that formed a juxtanuclear inclusion , which demonstrates the large number of misfolded proteins in these cells .
24 hr after the cells began expressing sod1g85r or sod1g93a , we found that inclusions formed in 40% 11% of the cells expressing sod1g85r , but only in 14% 1% of the cells expressing sod1g93a .
moreover , sod1g93a inclusions appeared much smaller and dimmer compared to sod1g85r inclusions ( figure 3f ) .
interestingly , both mutants had decreased mobility compared to sod1wt ( dsod1g93a=242m2/s,dsod1g85r=222m2/s,dsod1wt=292m2/s ) , a claim we supported with a t test that enabled us to reject the null hypothesis that each of the mutant edc samples and the wild - type edc sample were drawn from the same underlying distribution ( p value = 0.0007 for comparing sod1wt and sod1g85r , and p value = 0.046 for comparing sod1wt and sod1g93a ) .
we interpret this result to mean that the aggregation of the sod1 mutants slows down the motion of the entire sod1 ensemble in the cytoplasm , and this effect is detectable by pipe .
our next result showed that the degradation signal cl1 fused to ddr had an edc similar to 3xddr , dcl1=313m2/s , while the number of amino acids in ddr - cl1 is much smaller than in 3xddr .
this result suggests that the effective size of ddr - cl1 is bigger than what one would expect based on the number of amino acids in ddr - cl1 .
this hypothesis is compatible with the observation that cl1 expression promotes the formation of large perinuclear fluorescent aggregates in the cell cytoplasm ( data not shown ) .
last , we found that hsp70 diffuses much more slowly than the baseline , with dhsp70=131m2/s , while for the similar - sized 3xddr d3xddr=323m2/s .
this result can be explained by the fact that hsp70 frequently binds other proteins , either misfolded substrates as part of its chaperone activity , or non - substrate molecules , including other hsp70 units . to test the former hypothesis , we compared the edc of wild - type hsp70 with two hsp70 mutants : hsp70 substrate binding domain mutant ( hsp70-sbd ) and hsp70 atpase domain mutant ( hsp70-atpase ) .
hsp70-sbd is a truncated 543 amino acids hsp70 where the last 98 amino acids of the sbd containing the helical lid subdomain ( hls ) have been removed .
hls has been shown to play a crucial key role in substrate binding ( aprile et al . , 2013 ) , and hsp70-sbd was measured , using frap , to move faster than wild - type hsp70 ( kim et al . , 2002 ) .
unlike kim et al . , we did not measure faster motion of hsp70-sbd compared to wild - type ( dhsp70sbd=111m2/s , and t test comparing the hsp70wt and hsp70-sbd edc samples returned p value = 0.37 ) .
atp is crucial for hsp70 activity and allows hsp70 to rapidly bind and release substrates .
if the deviation of hsp70 from the nxddr baseline was due to its substrate binding , we should expect to measure different edcs for hsp70-atpase , either higher edcs if the mutant can not bind substrate or lower edcs if the mutant can not release substrate .
we concluded that the deviation of hsp70 from the nxddr baseline is not due to its interaction with misfolded substrate , but perhaps due to interaction with non - substrate proteins , like other hsp70 units ( aprile et al . , 2013 ) .
to further demonstrate pipe s usefulness in generating new biological insight , we applied pipe to assessing whether protein diffusion in the cytoplasm is normal or anomalous and found that the diffusion of the native cellular proteins is more anomalous than the diffusion of the ddr repeats . to test the capability of pipe
to distinguish normal from anomalous diffusion , we applied it to control data in silico and in vitro .
first , we simulated data of classic random walk ( see supplemental information ) and continuous time random walk ( ctrw ) , which is an anomalous subdiffusion model that requires less computational resources to simulate compared with other models .
pipe extracted different anomalous exponents from the two types of simulations , demonstrating success in distinguishing normal from anomalous diffusion in silico . from classical random walk simulations
, we obtained an anomalous exponent of =1.000.01 , as expected . from ctrw data , we obtained <1 , also as expected .
however , the values of calculated from ctrw data deviated from the simulated values sim , and depended on the distribution of step sizes ( figure 4c , and see supplemental information for discussion of this result ) .
we then applied pipe to photo - conversion experiments on purified ddr in buffer . in this dilute media
however , we measured =0.870.01 ( figure 4d ) . this downward shift in measured anomalous exponents may be explained by protein oligomerization or non - linearity in fluorescence detection , which we explore in the supplemental information ( figure s3 ) .
even with this downward shift , can be used to distinguish between diffusion anomality of different proteins ; importantly , we observed no dependence of on the photo - bleaching rate , ddr concentration , or the edc ( which we modulated by changing media viscosity , as in figure 2c ) .
we then used pipe to discover differences in the diffusion anomality of different proteins in the cytoplasm .
we reanalyzed the microscopy movies showing motion of nxddr and ddr - tagged proteins in the cytoplasm and measured the values that describe this motion ( figures 4e and 4f ) . for nxddr , we observed slightly sublinear scaling , similar to the results we obtained in vitro : 1xddr=0.860.03 , 3xddr=0.850.06 and 6xddr=0.960.02 . for the ddr - tagged quality - control proteins , we obtained lower exponents : hsp70=0.670.03 , sod1wt=0.730.03 , sod1g93a=0.830.03 , and (scp)cl1=0.720.05 . to test
whether the two protein groups differ in their mean , we executed a two - sample t test .
the test resulted in p value = 0.013 , which allowed us to reject the hypothesis that the two groups are described using the same distribution of . to check for a possible artifact of data sampling ( since different proteins have different edcs but for all the proteins we only analyzed the first ten to 15 frames of each movie ) , we calculated the correlation between and the edcs .
the correlation was 0.13 , which has a probability of 0.78 to occur at random ( 0.13 or higher and 0.13 or lower ) for the same number of points sampled from the same plotted value range , which suggests that differences in data sampling do not artifactually distinguish between the ddr repeats and the native cellular proteins .
these results suggest that the native cellular proteins diffuse with a greater degree of anomality compared to the free fluorescent probes .
pipe is not the first technique to use photo - convertible proteins ( calvert et al .
, 2007 , ehrlicher et al . , 2011 , mazza et al . , 2008 ) or to analyze the time evolution of spatial intensity profiles ( berk et al . , 1993 , tardy et al . , 1995 ) .
rather , pipe s distinctiveness lies in the synthesis that it implements between a direct measurement of protein motion in the cytoplasm and an intuitive and detailed output that aids the users in assessing the measurement s quality . in principle
, pipe analysis can be applied to photo - bleaching experiments that are normally analyzed using frap . however , doing so would effectively mean quantifying the expansion of the lack of fluorophores , rather than the fluorophores themselves .
such a measurement would miss the advantage of directly quantifying the motion of the tagged proteins and would instead provide an indirect description of how the tagged proteins flow into the bleached area .
moreover , applying pipe to photo - bleaching data tends to yield inaccurate results , because the fitted signal is inverted , where the point of maximal depletion lies at the peak of the gaussian , and points of higher fluorescence lie at the tail .
while this inversion may seem like a minor issue , it significantly changes the noise distribution along the intensity profile ; since photon shot noise scales with the number of fluorophores , the tails of the intensity profile are much noisier in photo - bleaching experiments , where they consist of many fluorophores , compared to photo - conversion experiments , where the tails consists of a few fluorophores . therefore , despite the theoretical possibility of applying pipe to photo - bleaching data , doing so in practice is less favorable from both a conceptual and a technical point of view . in most existing methods , assessing the quality of output can be challenging .
while method developers are aware of the assumptions that each method makes about the imaging system and underlying biological processes and use each method in the appropriate setup , other users may be less meticulous when they use a method as a part of a larger body of work .
this situation can lead to ambiguous output being misinterpreted , especially if the method does not provide tools to assess output quality . with this challenge in mind
this capability is enabled largely due to the use of advanced imaging technology and photo - convertible proteins .
second , the computational analysis of pipe merely makes a quantitative measurement of an effect that is already qualitatively visible in the microscopy images .
third , pipe calculates the edc from a single movie , which obviates the need for calibration of the beam width or the point spread function .
last , pipe presents its output to the users at several stages of the analysis , allowing the users to examine the shapes of the intensity profiles and the fitting quality and to rerun the analysis with different parameters if needed . expanding beyond the framework of the edc , we used pipe to find out whether proteins in the cytoplasm undergo normal or anomalous diffusion .
we measured significantly lower values for native cellular proteins compared with nxddr , which suggests that the former are more subdiffusive than the latter , and therefore that the native cellular proteins we examined are subdiffusive .
there may be several objections to this interpretation:1.does the downward shift in undermine the distinction between the different protein groups ?
when testing pipe , we only obtained the expected values from simulations of normal diffusion , while we obtained lower values than expected from simulations of anomalous diffusion and from in vitro microscopy data .
nevertheless , we did obtain significantly lower values for anomalous diffusion compared to normal diffusion in silico .
this suggests that downward shift in does not undermine pipe s ability to measure differences in diffusion anomality between different protein groups.2.could nxddr be superdiffusive in the cytoplasm , in which case the native proteins lower values would not necessarily mean that they are subdiffusive ? it is unlikely that nxddr is superdiffusive , because ( 1 ) no mechanisms are currently known to cause such motion of small proteins in the cell , and ( 2 ) nxddr shared similar values with purified ddr in vitro , which is likely to undergo normal diffusion , and not superdiffusion .
therefore , nxddr most probably undergoes either normal diffusion or subdiffusion , which leads us to interpret the lower values of the native cellular proteins as subdiffusive.3.are measured values dominated by artifacts , so a lower does not necessarily mean a lower anomalous exponent ?
while our measured might be lower than the anomalous exponent , it is still a meaningful characteristic of the analyzed motion , because ( 1 ) different movies with the same protein and under the same conditions give similar values , and ( 2 ) even movies under different conditions ( ddr in buffers of different viscosities ) or of different proteins ( 1xddr and 3xddr ) share similar values .
the similarity in under different conditions shows that it is unlikely that values are dominated by artifacts .
. does the downward shift in undermine the distinction between the different protein groups ? when testing pipe , we only obtained the expected values from simulations of normal diffusion , while we obtained lower values than expected from simulations of anomalous diffusion and from in vitro microscopy data .
nevertheless , we did obtain significantly lower values for anomalous diffusion compared to normal diffusion in silico .
this suggests that downward shift in does not undermine pipe s ability to measure differences in diffusion anomality between different protein groups .
could nxddr be superdiffusive in the cytoplasm , in which case the native proteins lower values would not necessarily mean that they are subdiffusive ? it is unlikely that nxddr is superdiffusive , because ( 1 ) no mechanisms are currently known to cause such motion of small proteins in the cell , and ( 2 ) nxddr shared similar values with purified ddr in vitro , which is likely to undergo normal diffusion , and not superdiffusion .
therefore , nxddr most probably undergoes either normal diffusion or subdiffusion , which leads us to interpret the lower values of the native cellular proteins as subdiffusive .
are measured values dominated by artifacts , so a lower does not necessarily mean a lower anomalous exponent ?
while our measured might be lower than the anomalous exponent , it is still a meaningful characteristic of the analyzed motion , because ( 1 ) different movies with the same protein and under the same conditions give similar values , and ( 2 ) even movies under different conditions ( ddr in buffers of different viscosities ) or of different proteins ( 1xddr and 3xddr ) share similar values .
the similarity in under different conditions shows that it is unlikely that values are dominated by artifacts .
cos7 cells were cultured in dmem high glucose ( sigma ) supplemented with 10% certified fetal bovine serum ( biological industries ) , and 10 ml / l penicillin - streptomycin ( p4333 sigma ) .
cells were maintained and imaged at 37c in a humidified incubator with 5% carbon dioxide .
cos7 cells were transiently transfected by seeding cells in 35-mm glass - bottom plates ( greiner bio one ) 2448 hr before imaging . for transfections ,
50%-confluent cells were incubated for 1218 hr with 12 l polyethylenimine ( pei ) 0.1% ( w / v ) and 1 g of plasmid dna for each plasmid construct . following pei incubation ,
a cmv - driven expression plasmid , pdendra2-n , was used to fuse wild - type hsp70 , hsp70 substrate binding domain deletion mutant ( hsp70-sbd ) , hsp70 atpase domain mutant ( hsp70-atpase ) , sod1 , sod1g85r , and sod1g93a to the n terminus of the photo - convertible fluorescent protein ddr .
constructs containing hsp70-sbd and hsp70-atpase sequences were kindly provided by richard morimoto s lab ( northwestern university ) .
cl1 sequence was fused to the c terminus of ddr vector pdendra2-c , and the cmv promoter of pdendra2-c was exchanged for the stronger scp3 promoter ( even et al . , 2016 ) , which enhanced expression by 2- to 4-fold compared to cmv ( figure s2 ) .
in addition , using pdendra2-c , three constructs with a variable number of ddr repeats ( 1 , 3 , and 6 , denoted 1xddr , 3xddr , and 6xddr ) were cloned .
a trc - driven expression plasmid containing 6x his tag and protein biotinylation tag fused to ddr was kindly provided by carlos bustamante s lab ( uc - berkeley ) for the purpose of ddr purification .
for in vitro experiments , ddr was purified from bacteria by transformation of the his - tag ddr plasmid dna into dh5 bacterial cells .
the transformed bacteria were seeded in suspension media and incubated for 1224 hr at 37c before 0.5 mm isopropyl -d-1-thiogalactopyranoside ( iptg ) was added to induce ddr expression . the suspension media with ddr - expressing bacteria was then left overnight and centrifuged the next day to extract a pellet .
the pellet was resuspended in lysis buffer ( 50 mm sodium phosphate [ ph 7.4 ] , 300 mm nacl , 10 mm imidazole , 5% glycerol ) and lysed using a microfluidizer device ( microfluidics ) .
the lysate was then centrifuged to separate soluble proteins ( supernatant ) from insoluble proteins .
the supernatant was loaded into a nisephb column and eluted by an elution buffer ( 50 mm sodium phosphate [ ph 7.4 ] , 300 mm nacl , 300 mm imidazole , 5% glycerol ) .
the eluted protein was then dialyzed against a dialysis buffer ( 50 mm sodium phosphate [ ph 7.4 ] , 300 mm nacl ) .
protein concentration was quantified by absorption at 488 nm , where the extinction coefficient of ddr is known ( mckinney et al . , 2009 ) .
the eluted ddr was then used to prepare working solutions of different viscosity by titrating in glycerol .
time - lapse images were acquired with a nikon a1 confocal microscope . a cfi plan
apo lambda 60 oil objective was used in all in vivo experiments . in in vitro experiments , either the oil objective or a cfi plan apo ir sr 60wi water objective was used . while using oil objectives in an aqueous environment
may lead to optical aberrations caused by mismatched refractive indices , we found no significant change when comparing diffusion coefficients between oil and water objectives ( < 10% , data not shown ) .
imaging was performed using a 488-nm laser ( coherent , 50 mw ) prior to photo - conversion and using a 561-nm laser ( coherent , 50 mw ) for excitation of the photo - converted ddr .
fluorescence emission was detected through a 525/50- and 595/50-nm band - pass filters , respectively .
while we developed pipe using a specific confocal imaging system , pipe is usable with any commercial confocal , total internal reflection fluorescence ( tirf ) , or epifluorescence microscope with a capability to apply localized photo - conversion pulses .
the resonant scan mode , combined with bi - directional scanning and an roi of 512 512 pixels , allowed for an imaging rate up to 30 frames per second . in theory , this imaging rate enables measuring diffusion coefficients up to 10 m / s , which is well above the diffusion coefficients of biomolecules . for other systems , the frame rate should allow for at least ten time points to be acquired between the end of the photo - conversion pulse and when the signal is no longer visible .
photo - conversion was executed using a 406-nm laser ( coherent , 50 mw ) , a 488-nm laser ( coherent , 50 mw ) , or both lasers simultaneously .
depending on the efficiency of photo - conversion , the percentage of photo - converted molecules is expected to be significantly smaller than that of the fluorescent molecules prior to photo - conversion . therefore , as a rule of thumb , the power settings for the 561-nm excitation laser , which was used to image to photo - converted ddr , was set to be two to three times greater than that of the 488-nm excitation laser , which was used to image the cell prior to photo - conversion .
this allowed the pulse to be imaged for relatively long time intervals after the initial pulse without saturating the acquired image .
the photo - conversion pulse was directed at a single spot , without scanning , and was stopped after 100 or 300 ms , depending on the concentration of ddr .
the point of photo - conversion was selected at the center of the cells cytoplasm such that the signal expansion time will be maximized before reaching the outer bilayer membrane and nucleus .
about 100 frames were acquired prior to the photo - conversion pulse to measure the baseline fluorescence .
immediately after photo - conversion ten to 100 frames were typically acquired , which corresponds to 3003,000 ms in our system . the photo - conversion time lapse analysis is performed using homemade software written in matlab ( mathworks )
. to test the consistency and evenness of illumination of the excitation laser , an autofluorescent plastic slide ( chroma ) was used .
we found slight variations in the imaging intensity , which were mostly pronounced around the edges of the imaging field . far away from these edges ,
we recommend that users test their imaging systems this way , since non - uniform illumination may lead to an asymmetric intensity profile , resulting in changes to the gaussian distribution signal that are unrelated to the underlying protein diffusion .
correcting for non - uniform illumination post - acquisition may eliminate the distortions that arise due to non - uniformity of photon emission rate .
however , it will not eliminate distortions due to bleaching in a non - uniform excitation light , which leads to parts of the imaging field bleaching faster than others , therefore distorting accordingly the distribution of fluorescent proteins .
consequently , if a certain imaging system has severely non - uniform illumination , we recommend that the excitation laser power be kept low to avoid rapid bleaching . in such cases , the rate of bleaching can be estimated by measuring the average intensity in the time interval required for the gaussian distribution to reach the edge of the image plane .
alternatively , a reference with similar diffusion coefficient can be used to test the validity of applying pipe in such cases . immediately after photo - conversion , one - dimensional intensity profiles at different time points were fitted to gaussian functional forms . the square width of these gaussians as a function of time was then fitted using linear regression , and the edc was extracted from the slope of the linear fit .
this is one way out of many possible ways to quantify the expansion of the intensity profiles , but this is a useful way in that it provides means to validate the accuracy of pipe in vitro , where protein motion obeys fickian diffusion , and the edc is the actual diffusion coefficient , and is related to the media viscosity by the stokes - einstein relation . calculating the diffusion coefficient considers the fluorophore concentration c(x,t ) as a solution to the diffusion equationc(x,t)t = d2c(x,t),where c is the fluorophore concentration and d is the fluorophore s diffusion coefficient .
the photo - conversion pulse generates a perturbed red fluorescence concentration field , whose profile can be approximated as a gaussian localized at point x0 with width s0 and amplitude c0 . plugging this initial condition into the diffusion equation above , we derived the time evolution of this perturbation according to the diffusion equation : c(x,t)=c0[s2(t)]d2exp[(xx0)2s2(t)],where d is the number of spatial dimensions and s2(t)=s02 + 4dt .
thinking about the above solution as the time evolution of the spatial fluorescence profile c(x ) , we can calculate the msd of this profile . when c(x)/c0 is treated as a probability distribution ( which is justified because it is just a normalized gaussian , where +(c(x,t)/c0)dxd=1 ) , the definition of the msd ismsd(t)=1c0+(xx)2c(x,t)dxd .
it follows that by measuring the width of the profile ( s ) we directly measure its msd .
importantly , as seen from the expression of s2(t ) above , this quantity scales linearly in t regardless of the dimensionality d. this means that measuring c along as little as a single spatial dimension is sufficient to obtain the edc .
based on this analytical prediction , the intensity profile at each time point was fitted to the gaussian function aexp[((xx0)/s)]+ , where x is the index of the pixel in the intensity profile and a , x0,s, are fitting parameters , which generally change with time .
last , the square of the parameter s was fitted as a function of time using linear regression to the function s2(t)=s02 + 4dt , extracting the diffusion coefficient d. in movies where diffusion time was short ( l2/dim , where l is the frame size and im is the time to acquire one image ) , the gaussian amplitude decreased quickly , and data points at late times were dominated by noise . only the first 15 frames after t=0 were analyzed .
this was done in most of the in vivo data , whenever plots of s2(t ) showed an initial monotonous increase and low error bars followed by flattening of the s2 values or by values with high error bars .
to check how analyzing only 15 frames affects the results , we analyzed in vitro movies both at full length and limited to 15 frames .
we found that the edcs increased by 20% when only the first 15 frames were analyzed , compared with cases where the whole movie was analyzed .
more information about this procedure and about differences between in vitro and in vivo data is provided in the supplemental information .
expanding beyond the edc , when measuring diffusion anomality , the width as a function of time was fitted to a power law instead of a straight line , and the anomalous exponent was extracted from the power law .
an anomalous exponent < 1 indicates subdiffusive motion , while = 1 means that diffusion is not anomalous , as the msd grows linearly with time .
incorporating spatial information into the analysis makes pipe robust against photo - bleaching and blinking , given that the illumination of the microscope excitation laser is spatially uniform . under such illumination ,
rates of blinking , reversible photo - bleaching , and irreversible photo - bleaching of a single fluorophore are usually independent of fluorophore concentration , and therefore these processes are modeled as time - dependent functions f(t ) . thus , the diffusion - bleaching solution is f(t)c(x,t ) , which only affects the amplitude of the gaussian and not the width s2(t ) .
since the edc is calculated solely from s2(t ) , the edc is not affected by blinking and bleaching .
in contrast , other perturbation - based methods , including frap , do not use spatial information and are therefore more sensitive to photo - bleaching .
first , microscopy movies that depict the expansion of a photo - conversion profile are analyzable only until the photo - converted proteins approach the cell boundaries .
therefore , if users try to analyze the expansion past that moment , the resulting edc would be smaller compared to the edc of the same protein whose expansion was not confined by the cell boundaries . to avoid such inaccuracy in our work , we chose to image only big cells , whose boundaries lay at least 10 m away from the edge of the field of view .
( the entire field of view defined an area of 30 30 m . ) as a rule of thumb , we recommend that users analyze data up to the point when the width of the gaussian profile is equal to the distance between the peak of the gaussian and the nearest boundary in the imaged plane .
second , the concentration of photo - convertible protein should be high enough so that enough protein is photo - converted to be detected .
we tested pipe in vitro at ddr concentrations that range from about 100 nm to 40 m with no effect on the edc ( data not shown ) .
we note that much higher concentrations may promote aggregation and can also cause quenching between colliding ddr molecules , which can lead to error in the measured edc .
however , for fluorescent proteins in which access to the chromophore is protected by a cylindrical beta barrel structure , this effect can be neglected for submillimolar concentration ( gather and yun , 2014 ) , which is often the case for transient or stable transfection in mammalian cells . to test how pipe s accuracy is affected by various types of noise and potential artifacts , we imitated imaging data by simulating diffusion starting from a gaussian initial condition , which approximates the shape of the imaged protein distribution in our experiments immediately after photo - conversion .
conceptualization , all authors ; methodology , all authors ; software , r.g.s . ; validation , r.g.s . and s.b .
; formal analysis , r.g.s . ; investigation , r.g.s . and s.b . ; resources , d.k . and j.l.e .
writing review and editing , r.g.s . and s.b . ; visualization , r.g.s . and s.b . | pubmed |
The HP Officejet Pro 7730 is a printer with an A3 sized flatbed that can also scan, copy and fax documents. The size of it makes it the right style for commercial use, and it has the sort of features that make it suited to this purpose. The USB 2.0 port is coupled with the wireless capability to offer numerous ways in which to connect.
The HP Officejet Pro 7730 is a large machine with dimensions of approximately 23 x 15.19 x 17.51 inches which is capable of handling the volume of work that would be required of it in a commercial environment. It is made easier to use with an efficient document feeder, which can hold up to 500 sheets of plain paper in two equal batches and 35 ADF. This means that the paper tray does not require routine replenishing, making it a time-effective printer. The colour LCD touchscreen measures 2.65 inches and offers an easy way to operate all the functions.
The rate at which the HP Officejet Pro 7730 prints is 22 pages per minute in mono and 18 pages per minute in colour when using A4. The high print resolution of the 4800 x 1200 dpi ensures that there will continue to be precision in the images and text no matter what the quantity. The choice in respect of how to connect extends to include the availability of AirPrint and Mobile Print.
The position of the LCD screen on the HP Officejet Pro 7730 can prove to be a little awkward as it means checking the front of the printer whilst operating the top. For such a large device, it is arguable that there should be more than four ink colours. The size of the printer is proportionate to the amount of power it requires. | slim_pajama |
Akkaraipatti is a village panchayat in Vennandur block of Namakkal District in Tamil Nadu.
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Category:Vennandur block | wikipedia |
Orobanche corymbosa is a species of broomrape known by the common name flat-top broomrape. It is native to western North America where it is a parasite growing attached to the roots of other plants, usually sagebrush Artemisia tridentata. It produces a cluster of thick, glandular stems with enlarged bases and stout roots, the hairy stems pale whitish or yellowish, often purple-tinged, and up to tall. As a parasite taking its nutrients from a host plant, it lacks leaves and chlorophyll. The inflorescence is a wide array of a few tubular flowers. Each is or long, coated in glandular hairs, and dark-veined pink or purple in color.
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corymbosa
Category:Flora of the Western United States
Category:Flora of British Columbia
Category:Flora of California
Category:Flora of the Cascade Range
Category:Flora of the Rocky Mountains
Category:Least concern flora of the United States | wikipedia |
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