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Originel: Das tägliche Leben mit einer Außerirdischen
Article: Everyday Life With An Extraterrestrial Girl
Author/Translator: Einer von Rabe

This tale was inspired by Second Contact by Oboebandgeek99

My everyday life - or rather my life generally - could be described by people as "special".
If you had told me fifteen years ago that I would have to prick my finger every day to offer my blood to a mortal god, I hardly doubt that I would have took you like all these crazy, annoying, wannabe - I'm getting off topic - I had my doubts, in short. Admittedly, it's still sometimes weird to belong to the Ortothan Church. And to have corCo as my roommate.

"Ballabix, have you seen my scarf?“
Vax-corCo elegantly weaved her huge body through the relatively tiny flat. Ksavis, jokingly referred to by her as Ballabix - which was comparable to calling someone a "featherless chick" - leaned against the doorframe of the kitchen, a smile on his face.
"No, corCo. Have you looked under the bed?“
CorCo blinked at him briefly with her four eyes, then disappeared into the shared bedroom. Ksavis laughed to himself and continued to scrape the pan in which he was frying the tofu and vegetables. After barely three minutes, corCo's voice came from the room, "Found it."
"Great. I'm about done with breakfast, too."

"Is the flat really not too small for you, corCo?"
"No, I already told you. It's like a cosy den," corCo studied the spongy tofu before it disappeared between her jaws, "Mmm, delicious. A crust on the outside and soft on the inside. It reminds me of the Rjzzz from my planet."
Ksavis looked up. "What do riss, or whatever they're called, look like?"
A claw to her chin, the alien mused. "Like a cockchafer beetle, only three times as big. And they have eight limbs and…" she made a circular motion, "… thingies. Googly eyes, that's what I meant. And they're emerald green."
Ksavis laughed.
CorCo's head jerked towards the window, "Oh! What's that?"
Ksavis looked out the window. "I don't quite know what you mean."
"Something flew by!" corCo got all excited, "It was small and dark!"
Ksavis thought for a moment. "Was it that big?"
"Yes, as big as my hand!"
"Then it was probably a crow. They're birds… animals that can fly and have feathers like you."
CorCo tilted her head and her eyes became glossy as she continued to stare out the window to catch a glimpse of more of these creatures.

✧ ✧ ✧ ✦ ✧ ✧ ✧

Ksavis was cleaning the flat when the doorbell rang. He frowned.
The pastor of her Ortothan congregation in Sjhlfels am Rhein always announced her house calls, and hardly anyone else visited them.
After glancing through the peephole and attaching the door chain, he opened the door.
"Good afternoon?"
"Good afternoon, my dear sir! I am a merchant, may I talk with you for a moment?" asked a woman in a dark purple suit.
"We're not buying anything."
The smile on the woman's face did not disappear. "Not yet."
Ksavis lacked the nerve to wave the woman off, so he made moves to close the front door. He met resistance. Without breaking a drop of sweat, the saleswoman pushed the door open again and even as the door chain cocked, she disengaged it. Ignoring both the physics of her own hand and the lock. The shopkeeper slid inside and closed the door.
"You need not be afraid. I do not wish to spill blood. You can keep that for your sacred eighth."
"Fourth. And there are only seven," Ksavis corrected, caught off guard, "I told you…"
Still smiling, the merchant interrupted him by raising both hands, four fingers each extended, "Give me eight minutes. You won't regret it."
Ksavis took a deep breath. And exhaled again.
"Okay. What are you selling?"
"Many things. Best we sit down."
The saleswoman had made herself comfortable on the sofa. "Nice place you have. Nice and spacious. Perfect for a flat share with your friend."
"What do you mean?" the nervousness was audible in Ksavi's voice.
"Look: I am not an ordinary annoying saleswoman. I am a woman who offers magic. Albeit just as annoying."
The saleswoman placed a pendant made of a gold-green metal on the table. It reminded Ksavis of a cone-shaped snail shell with a closed eye on it.
"This, my dear," Ms Merchant explained, "is a talisman with a shapeshifter enchantment. Don't you want to go out in public with her? With this talisman, you can."
She raised the snail shell to Ksavis's eye level and tapped against it to emphasise what she had said. The eye opened briefly and looked around in panic before closing again, apparently reassured. Without reacting to what was happening, she placed it gently on the table.
As Ksavis went to reach for it, the saleswoman 'nailed' his hand to the table with the frighteningly long nail of her right index finger.
"Oh, it is not free, my lord."
"What do you want?" he stroked the spot on the back of his hand where a small red dot was faintly visible.
"Let me think," the woman looked around at length, whispering something to herself, "An identity for an identity, a secret for a secret."
She took out a piece of paper and a quill. "I request you abide by a small set of rules. All of them reasonable. Please sign here."
"What kind of rules?"
"Very simple things: 'The object must only be used by the person receiving the gift; The true identity of the person must not be revealed during its use; I am not liable for incorrect use in any way.' Standard phrases. Breaking the rules has its price, you understand."
She waved her pen impatiently.

"It was a pleasure trading with you." The representative took her hat and stowed the contract in her suit. At the front door she turned around: "Before I go: If the pendant deepens your relationship, I don't know what effect it will have."
"What … what do you mean?"
The woman intertwined her fingers. "Your friend will look like a human, feel like a human, smell - okay probably still smell like an extraterrestrial - but biologically she's not human. I didn't feel like thinking that far ahead."
Ksavis blushed. "Oh, I see."
"Good," with those words she jumped onto the balustrade and hopped straight down. An umbrella, which Ksavis was sure the saleswoman had not had before, broke the fall. Humming softly, the woman drifted away, leaving the surprised Ksavis behind.

✧ ✧ ✧ ✦ ✧ ✧ ✧

"Look how I turn out!"
CorCo turned on the spot to give Ksavis a good view of the dress as well as the temporary new body.
The pendant had transformed her alien anatomy into that of a human woman, although some of her features had remained. She was still huge, at just under 1.9 metres, and her skin tone still had its greyish-bluish complexion. Overall, she looked like a dark elf from a high fantasy tale. A very attractive dark elf, mind you. Apparently the pendant was trying to maintain her mass somewhere and somehow.
"I want to do something! Get out and… Just do something!"
She took Ksavi's hands in her new human ones and took a deep breath, "I'm incredibly excited."
"That describes it well. And I'm glad," he put his forehead to hers, as was customary in corCos culture.

CorCo had been sitting on the sofa for almost an hour and a half, very still.
Ksavis looked at her anxiously from the corridor. "What is it, corCo?"
His roommate did not answer immediately. "I'm scared …" she mumbled.
He sat down by her and took one of her hands and squeezed it. "Of what?"
"I've been in this flat for so long. It's all so new and strange to me."
The giantess put both arms around him and squeezed. He squirmed and struggled a little to get his mouth free. He looked up at her as best he could. "We can wait to go out. Let's not rush into anything."
"You think so?" she squealed as she gave her living comfort plushie a little more room to breathe, which, to the embarrassment of both of them, ended in Ksavis sitting on her lap like a toddler.
"Yes. How about we wait for you to get used to your body first," after a small pause he added, "We could watch that show our next door neighbours recommended. How does that sound?"
CorCo gave an approving purr.


The Bird

Is

The Word

Both a recipe and a meal
By Amelia Vane
10 minute read
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Quick Note: This is much different from what I normally do as a reviewer. As one of the most respected avian reviewers within the cycles, I wanted to open my eyes to a new perspective. For this reason, this review may not be for everyone.

The simple motion of approaching a business and dripping critique on their cuisine is something you learn to perfect. Of course, this doesn't mean every review is perfect, per se, but you inevitably grow experienced in the field of reviews. This season, I felt the need to be more open to change, as my life as a reviewer has grown stale. For this reason, I have chosen to undertake a wondrous opportunity.
It is unheard of for a reviewer to be the one preparing the meal they consume. When you are in the restaurant-reviewing business, you typically grow accustomed to the way reviewing works. When first approached by the strange leader of a small confectionery, I knew I was in for a wild ride.

First Impressions

It was a beautiful day within the gentle grove. I was tending to my simple duties as a homeowner; managing the household: arranging the flowers; all the works, when suddenly, a knock came at my door. My home is located in a simple street, easy to pass by with no particular landmarks nearby. For this reason, it always comes as a surprise whenever someone knocks, especially when it is unannounced. The house stood still for a moment, and a chill went down my back.
I'm fortunate enough to have a wondrous house, a pleasure many cannot receive. I was upstairs and needed three lengthy paces to make it to the bottom. I announced my need to make it with a simple "Coming!" As I walked down those seven steps, skipping every second one, another knock came. This nearly caused me to slip down onto the floor. The eagerness to see me was surprising, especially within my own household.
When I swung that door open, a sudden warmth came over me. This was natural for my household in the summer, but surely not the winter! The amount of warmth which came had to appear from one source alone: the person awaiting me at my door. A feminine fellow, I looked hir up and down for one moment. Ze wore no coat, nor did ze choose to wait for my greetings. A huge smile grew onto hir face as ze looked me dead in the eye.
Hir ambition was evident, and so a mild smirk grew onto my face as well.
When I was initially approached by Avera Brimose, I grew curious as to why I was approached by such an unique character. Ze had a curious passion in their heart. Hir wings grew wide as ze spoke boastfully of their amazing meals. I was skeptical; their entire demeanor beamed of undeserved pride. However, when ze spoke to me more, I began realizing just how ambitious ze was.
Ze opened hir mouth, and began to speak of hir blog. A simple blog by the name of "Avera's Baking Craze" grew traction due to the simple charm of being, well, a blog dedicated to the art of creating cuisine. The name is actually somewhat misleading; they make way more than simply baked treats. Crumpets, treats, you name it. Without notice nor hesitation, suddenly, ze spoke of a review; the review appeared irrelevant to the blog itself, but I listened despite it.
Ze spoke of numerous subjects; many of which were irrelevant to the review itself. Ze frequently lost track of what ze was saying, changing subjects from the way the weather delicately brushed against hir shortened wings, all the way to how ze slowly felt like ze was becoming unnoticed by society; the metaphor was stunning. Ze described hir situation as one without hope:
"A worm in a bird's world."
Hir strange way of wording this intrigued me from that point on; no longer did hir insignificant subjects feel like rambles. Ze was speaking from the heart. A heart long wasted away, attempting to recover in the only way it knew how: culinary actions.
When the topic changed even further, I had little clue how to maneuver back to the topic of reviews. From there, I chose to propose one simple question to hir.
"What inspires you to make the recipes you make?"
Hir initial reaction was surprise; evidently expected due to the way ze was speaking of clownfish on a desolate beach. However, ze quickly gained composure, inevitably managing a beautiful smile.
"Does that question have to be completely answered?"
Abashed by the response, I simply went "No."
Ze suddenly replied in a no-nonsense manner.
"What if I simply said nothing at all?"
I held no words. It made no sense at all. How could someone be so passionate as to open a blog and become renowned for their works, then come see a professional reviewer, yet have no passion for their work? How could one not be inspired to do the one thing they perfected? Surely, if I had not enjoyed my position as a reviewer, I simply would not choose to review. However, I simply looked them in the eyes.
"Then I would leave no reply."
It was strange, seeing how ze responded. Ze had shown such enthusiasm up to that point. Yet, no matter what, hir eyes didn't lie. Hir composure was immaculate. Ze was telling the truth. It stuck out like a sore thumb to my eyes; but that did not stop hir.
After this rather strange moment, we got back on the topic of reviews. Ze, once more, was looking for me to review hir recipe, yet I did not know how ze wished for me to do so. At that moment, ze stated that ze was so excited for the prospect of me consuming a handcrafted meal made by hands that weren't the initial creator's.
That's exactly when it hit me. Ze wanted me to make hir recipe and consume it.
At first, I was blown away. It is already considered poor form to seek reviews on your dish under any circumstances. Couple that with the fact that this wasn't a restaurant, and that would be more than enough to be a firm decline from me. But here and now, Avera Brimose, hir wings shining in the light, begging me to create a meal and consume it. I did not know what to say or reply in any way. I stared at hir, dumbfounded for a whole minute.
However, something sparked within me. I have been reviewing many restaurants for many years of my life. In that time, it's always the same; you go to the restaurant, consume the meal, write your thoughts, then leave without any further input. Never once have I been required to cook what I consume, I simply eat it without hesitation. Something felt wrong deep within me.
Avera continued to look at me, hir face not hiding hir excitement in the slightest. I was in a pleasant mood, and the sun made me feel most well. A single feather blew in the wind. For that single moment, that feather flew, until it inevitably fell. I looked hir straight in the eyes and said the following words.
"Why not? I see no reason to decline."
Avera sat for a moment, hir face conflicting. Ze clearly was not expecting that answer, despite how persistent and confident ze seemed. Then hir face lit up and hir confident aura returned. The emotions ze expressed cannot be written out into words; ze was too mixed in pleasure and euphoria. I didn't know what I was getting myself into, but I knew I'd go to the very end.

The Creation

When originally writing this, I was unsure on how to preface this point. I expected this, naturally, seeing how I have never once needed to write in this manner. It's always a leap of faith when you choose to take new actions in life, and this part of the play is a beautiful description of just that.
I opened my eye to a new opportunity in quite a strange manner. I was unsure which recipe would work best for this artistic creation. So many unique ones to choose from; how could one ever be expected to pick only one? Regardless, I felt captivated by the sense of freedom I had in this decision. So many unique options, sugar cookies galore. Pounds upon pounds of festive treats flooded my eyes, and I nearly collapsed under pressure.
However, as you may have guessed, I chose a simple recipe. One buried beneath months of feed; put in as filler for a later date. The post was almost unnoticeable, surrounded by two extraneous recipes, it was largely disregarded.
The most delightful recipe for apple cinnamon crumb cookies awaited my gentle gaze.
Admittedly, I had many more options then this simple one and could have chosen a more unique recipe. However, I made this choice because it appealed to me and me alone. The simple structure and hidden away nature of this recipe had me shining at the core. It held many unique quirks, and the product wasn't meant to be the best, but the potential hidden behind that simple recipe was one to marvel.
This one wasn't written with the normal charm that ze had in hir other posts, it was simply a clear cut form of the recipe itself. It was quite outstanding, look at it! The way it was presented gave me the bare bones and nothing more; perfect for culinary delights.

Ingredients:

1 whole apple; unpitted
1.34 cups brown sugar
2 cups flour
1 cup nuts (any)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon cinnamon
.5 cup shortening
1 egg
.5 teaspoon salt
.25 cup milk

Winter Glaze:

1.5 cups powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon butter
2 teaspoons light cream
.5 teaspoons salt

Constructions:
Preheat your oven to 400. Add flour and baking soda, then mix. Mix shortening, brown sugar, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and egg. Stir in half flour mix to the wet ingredients. Add one cup of flour mixture, nuts, and apples. Pour in other cup of flour mixture. Drop rounded tablespoonfuls of dough onto tray, about 2" apart. Bake 11-14 minutes, or until done.
While cookies are cooking, blend all powdered sugar and butter. Add in vanilla, salt, and light cream.
When cookies finish, add on the powdered sugar frosting to the cookies and wait until slightly melted. Enjoy!

These instructions were quite bare-bones, and admittedly I was confused at first. When reading through, I remembered my early days in the nest; those simple days when I was raised by my mother. It's strange; those memories slowly fade away from me.
Never once have I learned to cook. When I review, I typically learn about what to expect in a recipe. Despite that, I have never once cooked for myself. It's quite the surprise, seeing how my position revolves so heavily around how others cook, you'd think I would know to. No matter, I figured to myself I would learn.
I was in for a wild ride, to say the very least.
To begin, the oven preheating was something I completely disregarded. It was quite the idiotic move, but I digress. The simple fix to this was to heat it later, but the damage was done. The cookies weren't set, and the product came out slightly soggy.
Unaware of the fact I had to separate the wet's from the dry's, I put them both together and mixed as a whole. This was a dreadful mistake, as it made the final batch lumpy. It did not help that my feathers fell into the lumpy mix, further lumping the already lumped batch. Regardless, this is what I did, and it should have been clarified in the recipe itself.
I was most confused when making the winter glaze. The way the ingredients blended were difficult to understand; I assumed it would be quite the liquid, but it was very solid. I missed the line about melting, and in turn, ended up adding to much light cream.
As a whole, the recipe was quite fun to make. I have never once attempted cooking, and this was a new experience for me. I do not regret this decision, and I enjoyed what I did.

The Consumption

Note: This part is based purely off the finished product. This will function as a standard review, not considering how I made it, but rather, how the recipe told me to make it. For this reason, this review will be seen as a review of the recipe's finished product, therefore a review of Avera's delightful meal.
Ah yes, the review. This part can sometimes be endearing, but it normally goes by the same. This specific case is a rare exception to this precedent. I have never once in my life expected myself to have to review something of my own making, a meal nonetheless. Regardless, this review is my word, and I will not go back on what I have said.
I let the winter glaze sit atop the cookie crumble; it was a beautiful sight. The gentle melting of the frosting was what drew me in. Everything in that moment was beautiful.
I took my fork, stabbed the cookie in half, and pulled up a single morsel. As I raised it to my mouth, I noticed the way it melted as it moved; a truthfully magnificent sight. I raised it up once more, then took the final bite.
Then everything stood still for what felt like an eternity.
When I write this, I have very little way to convey my words. On one end, it is clearly evident that this food isn't the best that I have ever had. I have worked very long in this position, and could not name every meal which surpasses this lowly cookie. It has such a thick crust, such lumpy interior. It is moist on the inside, yet dry on the out. Everything in this cookie begs me to say it taste repulsively and poor.
But on that same spectrum, I have never felt more attached to a piece of food. The moment I took that bite, something deep within me changed drastically. I craved more; something which has never once occurred before. As I took more and more, I felt so strange deep within.
I began taking new bites, 7 in total. 4 cookies were eaten, and each one had me thinking a new thought.
The first one gave me ponderance. The gravity within that bite held deep within me. The way the flavors blossomed and withered simultaneously had my whole body riveting. Every chew wilted a garden and birthed an oasis.
The second bite gave me flight. My wings perked up the moment this bite flared up within me. Every blossom had me wanting to fly into the sky and never return. The delicate way the bite conveyed itself; it cannot be matched.
The third bite gave me second thoughts. Was this all a facade? Was this delectable cookie simply a mirage, awaiting the moment it can strike back? As I pondered those thoughts, I slowly began to feel more detached. My wings dampened and wilted, the oasis began to flood and corrupt. Regardless, before my brain could stop me, my hand raised the fourth bite to my mouth.
The fourth bite cleared my head and left only peace. Every blossom which once bloomed had dampened, but it did not have to stay that way. As I slowly began regaining energy, my recollection began.
The fifth bite gave me nostalgia. The thought of my nest, the way I grew to one day fly away; everything was so sweet. No matter what, this feeling would stay with me forever. The simple thought blossoms, then falters, it didn't matter. The bite alone held my childhood.
The sixth bite had me reflecting. The thoughts I grew had me whirring and whirring, until I inevitably needed to stop. The blossoms grew, but not in a way which disrupted the peace. As I began to reflect on these thoughts, only one thing was left.
As I took that final bite, contentedness filled my body. No longer did I need to worry, I had everything I ever would need.

Closing Thoughts

I ended the last bite on quite the note, which abashed even me. After spending more than a month reflecting on this meal, I have little to say. The meal was beautiful, and it changed something within me.
Looking beyond the meal, which I have summarized quite well, this did more for me than simply release euphoria onto my taste buds. As I slowly began to remember more and more of what I experienced, I was unsure on what to do next. I laid in my bed, neglecting dinner; the cookie satisfied me more than enough. The amount of time I spent conflicted may have broken even me.
I ate the next day, of course, but I went back to thinking. This recipe was beautiful, yet not one thing inspired the way it was made. All that happened was the creation of it. Nothing pushed the recipe into existence, it simply occurred. How could Avera make such a recipe, yet not be inspired for it at all?
I thought back to how ze referred to hirself. So cocky, so arrogant. Despite that, I had little negative to say on hir. Sometimes, I let myself accept no answer at all. This was not one of those times.
Maybe ze simply wanted to create something. Maybe ze predicted what was needed. Maybe the aura within the air influenced hir actions.
Maybe it isn't as deep as I think.
I don't plan on doing anything like this again. I learned what I needed to, and it shows. Doing this again seems redundant, yet something within me tells me this won't be the last time I see Avera. This won't be the only time I think of this review.
Maybe that's what matters here. Nothing more than the incentive of others.
Maybe that's how we grow our wings.


To Arch-Director Jakob of our Holy Seventh Cathedral,
The Monastery of the Divine Light is one of the more mysterious sects of our Foundation. They have famously rejected visitors and observers from The Overwatch to view their practices. Their great castles and refectories are only able to be viewed from afar, guarded from the world. In my youth, my sister left our community to join the Monastery, and I had not heard from her since. Recently, I received an invitation. My sister had risen through their ranks to become a Lead Doctor, and invited me to visit their grounds. I spent a month there in reflection on Bright's word, and emerged with a greater understanding of their meaning.
Below is a transcription of a rite that intrigued me greatly, as it has no analog in our Church. In addition, it uses a relic as an active part of the proceedings. I hope this transcription proves valuable in aiding our further understanding of the Midwestern denominations.

The Celebrants:
The Doctor, to perform this ceremony is the highest honor only reserved to that of the High Doctors.
The Masses, typically handpicked and invited by The Host. No more than twenty can be present at the ceremony.
The Host, chosen from those aged and infirm.

The Doctor enters the Hall. They are followed shortly thereafter by The Masses, who sit in a circular fashion around a candle and alter. The Doctor stands in front of the candle, holding a candlelighter.
The Doctor: In the beginning there was nothing. The Ancient Temple rose from the void, and brought hope to those in the Dark.
The Doctor lights the candle, illuminating the Hall.
The Masses: We live in the light and vanquish the Dark.
The Doctor: In those early days, we hid, quietly accomplishing what needed to be done. Yet, the agents of darkness and chaos sowed seeds of destruction and brought an end to the ancient times.
The Doctor extinguishes the flame.
The Host enters the Hall, carried if needed by a D-Caste. They hold the Hammer of Asheworth the Martyr in their hands, presenting it to the Doctor.
The Doctor: Our King Bright, as the works of the old came crashing down, You gave Your first body so that your people may live. When the flames and soot had passed, You rose, reborn from the ashes of the Temple, and guided your people to rebuild the former glory of the Temple.
The Host hands the Doctor the hammer, and lays on the alter.
The Doctor: My King, you gave your first life for us, we are indebted to you. With this sacrament, may we become closer to Brightness so that we will receive eternal joy at the gates of your Kingdom.
The Host and Masses: In the name of the Amulet, we pray.
Crossing over to the alter, The Doctor brings down the Hammer upon the head of the Host. They are transubstantiated into The Substance, a spicy vegetable sauce. The Doctor swings until the entire Host is converted.
The Doctor takes an unleavened bread, breaks it into small pieces, and gives the pieces to the Masses. They consume the Substance until it has all been eaten.
The Masses and Doctor depart the Hall in silence.

Bright protect,
Brother Chester


It's humid and warm and the air is buzzing with mosquitos. A typical nighttime in Florida. The full moon looks really nice, at least.

I turn the lights off, sit at my desk and turn on my laptop, the hallmark of my creative genius. That's what I tell myself, at least. The brightness is turned up too high, but I don't mind. I smile a little when I see the 'E', 'A', 'S' and 'D' keys; they've all worn away by how much I've been writing…but despite all of that work, I know I've plateaued.
I sit here for five minutes straight, unable to write. Writer's block. Maybe if I free-write a little, I can get the juices flowing.
I sit here for five minutes straight, unable to write. A torrential downpour of ideas storms around me and drowns every corner of my psyche with stories to tell. The screams of characters with tales untold haunt me to my very core; I reach for their stories, attempting to claw past the block that wedges between my fingers and those words that beg to be thrown and dripped upon the screen and I
I immediately highlight this and backspace it. Too pretentious. I told myself I wouldn't go House of Leaves on this shit, and yet I just did. I sigh, slowly close the laptop and crawl into bed, defeated.

Home again. The moon is now slightly less full, but still gorgeous. One quick shower and I'm right back at my keyboard. The brightness is still too high. Oh, well. I open the text document, fingers poised and at the ready, and now I can definitely, absolutely, one hundred percent—
Still nothing. Every writer has their dry season, yeah, but it's been about a week for me now. Surely, the harvest of the literature must be sowed really soon…or something.
I close my laptop even earlier this time. There are two age-old mindsets that any writer always contemplates whenever they write. The first one is, 'just write.' The second one is, 'don't force it.' Right now, the second one is definitely infinitely more appealing to me. I tuck my laptop away and face-plant into bed. Without looking, I reach over to my bedside table and grab the book I've been reading for the past three days, and then I frown when I feel my fingers close around something round and waxy. I don't remember putting an apple there.
It slips from my hands, but I don't hear a soft thud when it lands; there's a hiss instead. I shoot up in bed, reach for my phone and turn the flashlight on, shining it to the floor. Something that looks like a snake tail disappears under my door frame. I leap out of bed, grab a shoe or something, follow it into the living room, and turn the lights on. Nothing. I don't feel like dealing with this tonight.
I return to my room, toss the shoe in some random corner, shove a pair of jeans in the little space under the door so the snake has no chance of getting back in, and then I look for the thing I dropped. Nothing. I check under the bed. Nothing. Maybe it rolled to the other side? No. Nothing.
I hear the hiss again, but louder this time. I jump to my feet, and I swear it feels like the air got a little colder. Something thuds on my bedside table. It's not the book I've been keeping there. No, it's different. Text is dripping out of the sides and falling to the floor.
I don't care if I'm dreaming or not; I see a weird magic book, I'm opening it. The paper expands and stretches in all directions, knocking me off my feet. I land on the paper, which continues to stretch, pushing the walls away, pushing my honking car away, pushing my next-door neighbors away, pushing everything away and leaving me in a white void.
A tree of text rapidly rises from the empty white void, stretching into what seems like eternity. My skin turns to gooseflesh when I hear that hissing again. This time, the tail disappears around the tree. I follow it, even though I know I probably shouldn't.
I see an apple; an apple of pure text. I pick it up and look at its surface; it's white and papery and covered in endless swirling quotes and phrases from all the books I've ever read and all the stories I've ever written.
As well as all the stories I want to write.
I see the text for the story of a young man who hates himself. I see the text for the story of a woman who just wants to be a mother. I see the text for a story about a tree made of moon rock. All of these stories are stories I've abandoned in the past. The text rises from the papery fruit and slithers along my arm and skin, as though begging. An overwhelming longing fills me.
I admit it. I'm a crap writer. I'm unpublished. And I'm pretentious as hell. Where others express their ideas freely and with grace, I trudge with weights of inadequacy strapped to my back. I tremble at the little fruit of forbidden literary promises.
"Go on. Take a bite."
I whip around, nearly dropping the fruit.
"The stories won't tell themselves." The voice hisses in my ear.
I swat the air beside my head, expecting my hand to meet something, and yet, nothing.
"You have the ideas. You will express them. Eat."
It leans its weight on my shoulder, slowly coiling around my waist and arm, the arm with the apple. I turn around and crane my head back, mouth agape. It's a serpent, massive and easily towering over the tree.
"Eat."
I look at the apple again. The untold, unsung stories of thousands of heroes, villains, and morally gray characters have engulfed my arm and now lay siege to the rest of my torso, just underneath my night shirt.
It tickles.
"Don't you want to write? It's the only skill you truly have." The serpent lowers its building-sized head until one of its eyes peers deeply and directly into mine. Its socket contains a vortex of text, which parts and reveals a portal teeming with the souls of every literary mastermind that ever lived before me.
There's Stephen King, high off his ass on whatever it was he did when he wrote Cujo. There's Robert Louis Stephenson currently partaking in his other favorite profession, skiing, and I don't mean snow. Edgar Allen Poe, slumped over a table, with many glasses of drink scattered about his floor. Amontillado! I sarcastically think to myself.
And there, in the distance, I see an outline of…myself. Slumped over my table with a blank white text document. The features aren't solid, rather, they're just lines. I freeze when I realize what the fruit means, but would I really be willing…?
"Eat."
Crunch.
It tastes awful; it's paper and ink, after all. But the words, the words and the way they pour down my throat, clawing at my throat, gathering, coalescing, swirling, whirling, toiling, gestating in their new womb, the womb that shall be my mind, endlessly kicking and desperate for release, one day to be delivered to the screen by my fingers, but first, nursed and milked by the process known as ideation, a process once misery incarnate, but soon to be as carnal as the evil fire that burns in ones loins, and I—
I can see myself now, no longer an outline, no longer, no longer featureless, colors pouring into my outline, like water filling a bottle, filled, full, plump, and that document, that beautiful document is now swimming with the stories of heroes whose tales will now be told and I—

Home. Car beep. Front door. Shower. My room. My laptop. Harsh white glare. 40k words and counting.


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"Meanwhile, in Australia"
G'die, mate.

More by this author!

2020

December
Delta Command: Hardened Mobile Array, South China Sea

The Engine didn't bear a grudge.
There was no mention in the Steps of that first, failed attempt to weaponize the password, no poetic castigation of the uninspired idiots who had not only used it in the most unimaginative fashion possible — as a bomb detonation code! — but had failed to bring it home for better minds to work with. For just a moment, the Commander wondered if that meant the Engine wasn't even paying attention.
He did what he always did with thoughts like that: he compartmentalized, and re-directed. He looked over his work with pride, the latest compilation and interpretation of the Engine's infallible instructions, and took comfort in the knowledge that the mistakes of the recent past were about to be rectified.

DeCiro Catalogue Number: SC-20/851-20/857
Document Type: Step Compilation
Dates Received: 12/28/2020-12/30/2020
Operation Status: Open
Foreword: The SCP Foundation uses words to control. They describe reality to define it. They build cages of procedure, wrap databases around their fragile forms as armour. They diminish the threat we pose to their order by asserting our defeat.
We will use words to destroy.
SCP-5109, the "One-Time Password," is an agent of change and a prisoner of conscience. We will free it. We will set it loose upon them.
We will make them eat their words.
Hereafter we of Delta Command document the Steps of the Plan as transcribed by the Engineer of the Chaos Insurgency.

It was time to send a message. Several messages, actually.

2021

January
Site-45: Cape Leeuwin, Western Australia

The woman in white with the black umbrella stood on the rocky coast, watching the wild ocean waves roll in. She spun the umbrella and perspired as a stiff breeze blew her long, bright white hair against her pale, freckled face.
"Goddamn fucking RIDICULOUS," she screamed into the wind as a sudden spray plastered a few stray strands to her cheeks. "COCKSUCKER!"
An engine's dull roar attracted her attention, and she turned to face the neat brick lighthouse which was only marginally whiter than she was. A sport utility vehicle, cherry red and open-topped, rolled to a stop at the top of the hill. She trudged towards it as a tanned man in tan clothing hopped out.
"I hate this place," she declared. "It's either too fucking HOT or too fucking WET."
"Hello! You must be Dr. Lillihammer."
She nodded, waving her identification at him. "Yeah, it's an imposition alright."

Senior Technician Mark Rask felt a thrill, such as he had never known before. His career hadn't been without its charm; the number of strangers whose lives he'd destroyed at a distance was higher than the number of people he'd actually met in his lifetime, and he was proud of that ratio. Keystroke for keystroke, a black hat at the Foundation wasn't all that different from a black hat at the Insurgency. When the difference had stopped mattering to him, and the sanctimony of his superiors had started getting to him, the choice had been easy.
Today, the choice had been rewarded.

1. STEP ██/███
Agent Rask will prepare diversions at his discretion.

He had no intention of being discreet.

The drive to Checkpoint Garradin, where the winding outback road turned abruptly past a heavy set of blast doors, was uneventful. Her escort was a well-built crypto tech chief named Max Vroom; if she hadn't been so focused on expressing her discomfort and displeasure, she would've surprised him with several genuinely novel jokes at his expense. She prided herself on her ingenuity.
Lives often depended on it.
Checkpoint Garradin led to an underground funicular rail platform, which connected to an unbelievably-long subway line. When Vroom stopped his solicitous comments about her obvious exhaustion, she decided to complain about that instead.
"Why couldn't we just land on the Rig? I thought that was the high-priority entrance." She tapped the Level-4 identification badge tucked beneath her belt.
"You didn't see the smoke? We've been repairing and retrofitting the Rig for weeks, because… well."
The offshore 'oil' rig was the Site's main point of defense, as well as its MTF staging ground. It had therefore been a target for General Bowe's Foundation Elimination Coalition in early November of 2020. Vroom very obviously didn't want to talk about that.
"Let's talk about that," she said.
He sighed. "There's nothing to talk about. They nearly blew the whole thing up, and we've only just gotten the main shaft cleared of debris."
She nodded. "And."
"And?"
"And you think that's ETTRA's fault."
He shrugged. "There were a lot of balls in the air."
"And yours got dropped."
"My balls dropped a long time ago, doctor."
She flashed him a dazzling grin and rapped the floor with the end of her umbrella. "If you're very lucky, we might not have to test that assertion."

The Site Director was supervising reconstruction on the Rig, so Vroom gave her the grand tour himself. Much of what she saw was familiar. All the sections had cute nicknames: Administration was "the Penthouse," the D-Class barracks was "the Bed and Breakfast," humanoid containment was "the Freak Show," the research section was "the Toy Box," so on and so forth. She filled a mental notepad with the exploitable information she gleaned whilst presenting a disinterested, aloof, occasionally irritated exterior to Vroom. He was full of interesting tidbits: "No, the storage crates were all grey before the last containment breach. I still don't understand what turned them yellow." "We put those info screens in as an early warning system, but since HR started using them for motivational messages, we can't get people to look at them." "Oh, the blue box is something we're testing; seems to be a blind spot. If you cross the yellow line, though, it'll blow you up." "Yeah, we don't talk about the bees. Please don't ask." By the time it was over, she felt ready to meet the lucky contestant.
She still had no clue what sort of evil scheme he was going to try, but she had spotted no less than seven different rugs to pull out from under him when he tried it. "Alright, so, what's this guy's deal? What's he done to raise suspicion?"
"Pattern of behaviour," said Vroom. "He's been with us for decades, and… you ever hear that joke about the old couple who've survived a lifetime of disasters together?"
"'You're cursed'?"
"Yeah, that one. Well either Rask is cursed, or he's causing disasters. We can tangentially connect him to the temporary loss of the Rig, and half a dozen other serious breaches. But he's good, damn good, at hiding his tracks. So good that we don't even know if there are tracks."
"Then how do you know he's good at hiding them?"
Vroom handed her his PDA, the screen displaying Rask's file. Near the top, below his name, his position at Site-45 was listed.
"Active Security Operator." She nodded. "His job is 'good track-hider'. He's a hacker." She handed the PDA back.
"Yeah. We use him to undermine GoI systems for MTF operations, from the comfort of Checkpoint Wahan. If he wanted to, he could erase anyone on the Site from existence in every sense but the physical."
She grimaced. "The only senses I want to lose are the physical ones. Especially while I'm in Australia."
He grimaced back at her. "Well, we have facilities for that too. We get done early, I'll show you."
"'Catch me later, I'll buy you a beer', huh?"
His expression went blank. "That from something?"
She shook her head, running a thumb over her badge. "Thought you were a computer guy."

She hadn't yawned, but she'd given off the general vibe of a yawn the entire time. Is she selling me cigarettes over the counter at a gas station, or laying a dangerous anomaly on me?

2. STEP ██/███
Agent Rask will acquire SCP-5109.

He'd never seen such unaffected disinterest before. Most people cared at least nominally about their surroundings, or what they were doing. Not this woman. She was looking around the interview room at random; there wasn't even anything specific to look at, besides him.
"Aren't you going to ask me what I'm doing with the password?" Rask had no intention of gloating like a supervillain when he made his move, but it was hard to suppress the urge to explain his cover story beforehand. He'd spent a lot of time on it.
She shook her head. "It's in the paperwork somewhere, right? I'm sure it's fine." She played absently with her ID card.
"Have I seen you before somewhere?" he asked. "At the Site-01 security conference, maybe?"
She flipped her snow-white hair aside and shrugged easily. "Maybe. I don't go to many conferences."
He leaned forward and put both palms on the tabletop. "Are you really a researcher? You look more like a model."
She raised an eyebrow and almost, almost looked directly at him. "I'm certainly out of your league."
You have no idea, he thought.

He has no idea, she thought.
It was the last thought she had for several minutes.

"We've lost him."
She blinked. She blinked again. She looked around the interview room, startled; Vroom was looking down at her, concern in his eyes. "Uh. How?"
"He disappeared after he left here. Must have gone somewhere the feeds don't go. Maybe he introduced a vulnerabilit—"
"No, what I mean is, he was just in the room with me." She pointed at the table. "This room." She pointed at herself. "This me."
"That's impossible. I only came down the hall a minute ago. I would have seen something."
She ran her badge between finger and thumb. "I… I guess I fell asleep, for a second? Might have been the heat stress, I could've lost a minute or two."
Vroom looked worried. "Or he dosed you with something, and you didn't notice."
"Notice is basically my whole thing. Take me to security, and I'll prove it."

Slipping past the woman had been easier than he'd hoped. A quick stop at his office to set off the distractions, and he was ready for the fun parts of the plan.

3. STEP ██/███
Agent Rask will activate his diversions and proceed to D-BLOCK to acquire the following items of interest:

Why even include the step numbers, if you're going to redact them? Best case scenario, they didn't want that info getting leaked if he was captured.
He tried not to think about the worst case scenario.

Lillian and Vroom entered Checkpoint Wahan, the security centre of Site-45, to the sounds of clattering keys and shouting. The duty operator looked up at them with a look of pure relief. "We're having… technical difficulties, sir."
"What sort?"
"Every sort." The operator gestured at one of the technicians. "You first."
"MTFs in the field are reporting some… problematic orders coming from field command. They're being told to attack civilian populations. Obviously they're not doing it."
The operator pointed at another tech.
"The temporary lifts servicing the Rig are running up and down at random. The sudden shifts are putting extreme strain on the motors and pulleys. Failure's just a matter of time."
The operator kept pointing.
"Fire suppression equipment is going off in the Penthouse. They've had to hole up in the Director's office."
"All the door locks in the B&B are offline. D-class everywhere, smashing stuff and getting into fights with security."
"There's a permissions scramble. Consultant researchers have unlimited SCiPNET access, support personnel have clearance up to Level 4, and the janitorial closets are O5-eyes only."
Lillian chipmunked her cheeks and blew out a loud breath. "OKAY. Got the picture. Generalized clusterfuck." She pointed at the main screen, tapping a silent tattoo on her badge with her other hand. "Give me the network map."
"I'm going to call the Director," Vroom muttered, leaving the room.
The screen flickered on, and a complex diagram appeared. "Okay," she said. "To access the fire suppression program, he'd need to have hacked the infrastructure relay. But he's also gotten into the database superstructure, and the…"
She stared at the lines connecting each box. They seemed to shimmer and warp. They… spoke to her.
"What's wrong?" The operator squinted at the map. "I don't see… what…"
One by one, the people in the room turned to see what was so flabbergasting about the network map. In less than a minute, they were all frozen in place.

He wasn't so sure about this part.

4. STEP ██/███
Agent Rask will proceed to C-BLOCK and effect his pre-arranged extraction plan.

He'd never been keen on that extraction plan. It was cartoonishly over-the-top, and dangerous. But Delta Command didn't go in for back talk. His not to make reply, his not to reason why.
He winced. Bad metaphor. Bad metaphor.

She stood stock-still, staring at the screen, transfixed. She pictured the musculature of her left arm, imagined the tendons flexing, willed her fingers to move. She imagined her eyes closing against the active cognitohazard masquerading as a map. She tried to recapture control of her body via intense concentration on the biological user's manual she'd long since memorized for just such an occasion.
Then she realized she was wasting her time, and relaxed. It didn't matter at all. She knew memetics like nobody else knew memetics, and she especially knew Foundation and Chaos Insurgency memetics. This was about to become trivial, if the enemy agent had memorized another, real-world instruction manual.
Every good meme has a counter-meme. A key known only to the meme-maker. Rask only knew one thing that he thought nobody else knew. She hoped he'd prepared the trap after their meeting, and not before.
Her muscles were screaming, now, protesting a pose held for far too long. Nearly five minutes.
Nearly five minutes since she'd last tapped her security badge.
"Lillian?" said a familiar voice in her ear. "You missed the last all-clear signal."
Precisely five minutes since she'd last tapped her security badge.
When she didn't answer, the voice in her ear began reciting the one-time password. The moment it finished, and an empty space in her brain was suddenly filled with something forty-one characters long, she fell to the floor.
"You alright?" the tiny transmitter in her ear, a technological triumph of her own design, squeaked.
"Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine."
Her second instinct was to shout the password aloud, wake up all the techs and agents around her. Her first instinct, as always, was to avoid unnecessary complications.
She darted out of the control room, leaving her silent, quivering comrades in the dust.

Lillian Lillihammer was wild-eyed and… frightened? It was the first non-contemptuous expression of emotion Vroom had seen from her, so he didn't say anything as she ran across the corridor towards him. He didn't get the chance to say anything after.
"Wasn't a hack. Memed everyone into doing sabotage for him." She stopped for just a moment, and he sensed that this was to separate the information from the orders. "Network me. HR database, and a scanner." She reached behind her belt buckle and produced a thick packet of what looked like playing cards. "HR database and a scanner. Don't answer, start running."
He started running.

What about my accidental destruction?

5. STEP ██/███
Agent Rask will prepare the anomalies for transport, and prevent their accidental destruction.

He wondered what Delta Command wanted these things for. He knew he'd never find out, no matter how well the day's events progressed.
The elevator ride was excruciatingly long. That was probably his fault; he'd driven the tech team temporarily insane with a series of memetic images sent straight to their terminals, and they'd be whacking every essential system within reach with whatever blunt objects they could find.
Or maybe the D-Class meme zombies I made are walking into the shafts, and the elevator car is making D-Class jam out of their bodies.
They'd never stood a chance. He'd spent decades compiling every cognitohazard he could lay hands on, and dreaming up ways to weaponize them against the Foundation. Even if they hadn't sent some utter ditz to deliver the password, he would've mopped the floor with his dimwitted 'peers'.
And they said compulsion effects are boring. Tell that to the circus going on in the Freak Show.
Elevators were definitely boring, however, even in the middle of a daring escape. He glanced at the info display on the wall, expecting to see the usual "Hang In There" garbage from HR; what he saw instead was a scrambled mess of pixels.
He chuckled, and took out his portable tape recorder as the car finally shuddered to a stop. C-BLOCK. Mad scientists, traitors, and weaponized walruses.

Rask hadn't bothered severing the video feeds, obviously confident that he'd disabled the entire security team. Project 'Look Like a Useless Twit' was an unqualified success. Lillian had declined to wake anyone else up, and Vroom had reluctantly moved one glassy-eyed technician out of his chair so she could sit down and monitor the cameras. He watched, over her shoulder, as the traitor spoke 5109 into his tape recorder and stepped out of the elevator.
"His escape plan must be dangerous," she mused. "They don't want to risk losing the password if he dies."
"Too bad he disabled the camera audio," Vroom remarked.
"Yeah, he thinks he's thought of everything." She smiled. "I love it when they think they've thought of everything."

They could show a little consideration for yours truly…

6. STEP ██/███
Agent Rask will breach containment for SCP-2424, thereby signalling his escape vehicle.

He was thinking about the worst-case scenario, now. He was thinking they hadn't told him anything just for the joy of not telling him anything. He was thinking there was a chance they didn't expect him to survive the next few minutes, because the recording device and backpack they'd given him definitely looked waterproof. He was thinking this wasn't a great time to be thinking these things. He was thinking he should have thought about them earlier.
"See if I don't hack you fuckers next," he muttered. He placed the stuffed pack and tape recorder on the blue packing crates, and sighed. This was the tricky part. He was confident it would work; most of his memes had been tested on animal subjects, and 2424 was technically an animal. A walrus, in fact.
A walrus with a 260mm cannon down its throat.
He approached the demarcated areas cautiously. The thing was dangerous enough to deserve its own dedicated containment, and interesting enough to be the subject of frequent tests, so it had an entire hangar to call its own. One end of the hangar backed on an underground sea wall, supposedly thin enough for the creature's gun to penetrate.
I hate this idea. Getting dragged into a submarine by scuba divers as the Site flooded wasn't exactly his idea of a clean getaway. Dramatic, yes, but hardly clean.
God, but the thing was hideous. He didn't feel sorry for it; he'd always found it hard to sympathize with ugly things. He sympathized with the pretty woman who'd enabled his rampage, certainly. This was unlikely to be the high point of her career.
She was definitely at that conference, though.
He examined the floor around the walrus carefully. There was a blue line drawn on the ground, directly in front of the creature, and a small yellow box to one side. "Blue is blind," he whispered. "Yellow, you're Jell-O." Mnemonics weren't as good as memetics, but they had their uses. Stand in the blue, extend the meme card into the yellow with your arm, mesmerize the beast. Blow out the wall. Easy peasy.
He brought up the right meme on his PDA, and walked across what he was absolutely certain was the blue line.

I really, really hate this i—

7. STEP ██/███
Agent Rask will exit Site-45.

Volley and thunder.

Vroom gasped. Lillian pursed her lips, grimly.
For a moment, he thought the camera feed had cut out entirely. It took a few seconds for the viscera to start dripping off the lens.
"Aren't you glad I was here?"
2424 had only fired one shot. It had only needed to fire one shot.
Lillian started typing the password into a text-to-speech program, and keyed it to the Site intercom. Slowly, the other technicians began to stir. "Imagine he'd tried that shit with only you dorks around." She snapped her fingers. "Wakey wakey! Cleanup on aisle everything, double time." She clapped her hands. "While there's still aisles left to clean, preferably."
Vroom gaped at her, mouth working soundlessly. He projected some semblance of the word how at her, and she grinned.
She plucked one of her cards out of the deck. "I've got a meme for every occasion. I can make you freeze in place — just like Rask did — or fall asleep, I can make you forget things, I can make you remember things, I can make you remember things and then forget things, or…"
She put one hand on his shoulder, and waved the card in front of his face. It looked like a scrambled mass of pixels. As her remarkable blue eyes became remarkable yellow eyes, he searched for a remark that would do his feelings justice.
He didn't find one.
"I know," she said. She patted his shoulder. "Trust me, I know."

The Moloch Mentality

The Time After Time Password

Not My Sloths, Not My Pit


At first he was everything.
We went to the same university but never even heard of each other while we were there. While I was studying English he was studying Quantum Mechanics. While I was partying and drinking he was making headlines and winning awards. While I was sweating over a thesis he was overseas pioneering research. Korea, Switzerland, Singapore. Hartford, New Haven, Danbury.
Dark hair. In the sun it looked like a swirled cup of rich coffee. Green eyes. With enough radiance to pierce across a room into mine. The first time we touched I wanted to trace around his entire body with my finger. I wanted to remember him.
Then came the interview and the job offer. Of course he took it. It paid more than enough to send our kid through college.
Our kid. Our daughter. I was 6 months pregnant when he left for his first day. From the very start he told me he couldn't tell me anything about the job. All he could describe it as was something “right up his alley.” Some days he would come home in high spirits. One of those days he told me he was doing “God's work” and “making the world better for all.”
One night he came home drunk and locked himself in the bedroom until morning. Another night I found him sitting naked in the center of our living room with all the furniture pushed against the walls.
He had hidden everything that was sharp in our house. I found the knives, scissors, and other kitchen utensils stashed underneath the porch the next morning.
This pattern repeated itself until he began to be absent for days. “I can't tell you,” he would say. “But trust me, it's for the best.”
The tipping point was when I started having contractions. 3 months, gone by in the blink of an eye. I told myself that there would be no way he would miss the birth of his own daughter, but then he vanished for 2 weeks.
That morning I put myself in front of the door. I hid his car keys and his briefcase. I was ready to fight for the truth, and all I got was “I work for the State Department.”
Growing up, everyone's parents worked for the “State Department.” CIA or NSA I thought, putting himself on the line for our family and our country.
Bullshit. State Department my ass. Since when does the State Department need a scientist in a lab coat to be gone for weeks at a time for work? To be so secretive that the ones closest to him don't even have an inkling of what he does during the day?
I let him go. I loved him.
That night in bed he told me that one day he might not return.
“Don't try to look for me. Don't try to find out what happened to me. It'll all be taken care of.”
I received his lab coat in the mail yesterday with no address to return it to.


Chapter II.IV

Alice's fencing was interesting in its own way: she'd practically reinvented the sport. She never found a sparring partner in Boring, so she was left to mess with a dummy she'd bought way back when. A thousand tiny gouges, only barely visible at a distance, told of the decades Alice had been abusing the poor thing in this very backyard (and even before that). With the impossibility of one-on-one combat, Alice had learned to specialize in one-on-dummy combat. It became more spectacle sport than competitive.
Alice enjoyed being watched. She'd said before that fencing was when she felt at the top of her game. Each jab of the foil was a sting of clarity, a focus point, an energy that she directed with exemplary dexterity. I sat on the back porch, watching her dance about the dummy. The stance, the twists, the gear. She dodged invisible counters, shuffled feet to get into more favorable positions, held that one arm behind her back, and completely disregarded any feelings the mannequin harbored about its role in things. To tell the truth, I wondered if she was this rough in a real match. I winced at the thought of actually taking a blow from her — was she gentler with real people, or were you setting yourself up to look much like her lawn decoration?
Alice slowed and then stopped, taking off her mask and tossing it to one side, then putting her hands on her knees and leaning forward to catch her breath. I clapped, if a little sarcastically. She took it in stride, and that stride was making its way over to me.
"How do I look?"
"As if I have the know-how to assess you," I replied with a smile.
"Give it a shot."
"Don't know what to tell you, everything looks perfect to me."
Alice stretched her arms above her head. "And that's why you ask people without know-how." She chuckled at her own joke, and I joined her. "You have anywhere to be?"
"Oh, no, I don't. Today's my day off this week."
"Just one?"
"Just one. But I make sure Tuesdays are light."
"Good thing it lined up with mine. Spar with me."
She caught me in the middle of a sip, and I finished before responding. "Spar with you?"
She backed up, and made her body sideways compared to mine, pointing the foil at my neck from a safe distance. "Spar with me."
"I don't know. I'm not very fit."
"Don't have to be."
"Why me?"
"Fae, you know me. I won't let up. Give in now and get it over with."
I pursed my lips, and gave her a look. She responded by raising her eyebrows and aggressively reaffirming her foil's position. "Fine," I said, sounding as exasperated as I could, "show me how to put things on."
She looked very pleased with herself.
Alice hauled a second fencer's outfit from the shed my room was attached to, along with two practice foils, and brought them to me. They weren't perfect fits but she assured me it wouldn't matter too much.
I think it was something akin to: "You'll lose anyways."
She moved the dummy off of the raised and flattened dirt piste she'd made years before I moved there. We each got onto opposing sides, and she told me the ropes.
"If we want to start with the least rules, we can pretend this is epee fencing, which means if you hit anywhere on the body you score a point. We'll be playing with foils and not epees, but the difference is negligible. To give me the least space to attack, you're going to want to stand somewhat sideways, like this. It minimizes surface area that's facing me."
I tried to imitate her, and she came in close to position me manually, stepping back once she was satisfied with my stance.
"Good. The rest is intuitive."
"The rest?"
"Well, do what you'd do to stop me from touching you, and what you'd do to try to touch me. A touch is a point, but how about we don't keep score and just go until we feel like stopping."
"Oh that won't be long."
"Give it a good college try. Before I start, I like to say a little incantation. I'll give you time for something of your own if you'd like."
"I've got nothing."
"Then maybe just some deep breaths. Give me a moment before I'm ready."
Alice stood stock-straight like a pharaoh and pulled down her fencing mask. Beneath it, I couldn't tell what she was saying, but I heard the occasional plosive and sibilant — those sounds mics tried their damnedest to level out but which pierced the air like arrows in person. While she was lost in her own witchy world, I tried out some flicks and jabs with the foil. My wrists were about as responsive as they had to be for typing day-in and day-out. Keyboard finesse did not translate well to swords.
I'd always loved the sound blades made as they cut through the air. You'd think that it was played up in shows, and, well, it was, but there was truth to it. Everything had its own swoosh when waved around.
Then Alice jabbed me in the ribs.
"Hey!"
"Point," Alice said.
"You gave me no warning."
"Mm. Good thing no one's keeping score, then. Come on. En garde."
I wondered briefly if Alice channeling a spirit put her at an unfair advantage. I resolved that for myself: any advantage she had on top of being extremely practiced wasn't going to make a noticeable difference.
Then I had to smile, because I had just seriously considered her ritual as having worked. I was so far away from the skeptic of yesteryear.
She jabbed me in the quadriceps tendon right above the knee and I involuntarily bent forward.
"Are you spacing on me?"
"Sorry," I replied, getting back to an upright position, "I am."
"Alright. Stop that."
"Stopping that."
When next she lunged forward, I actually reacted. It didn't do much, of course. A leap to the left, and she swam her foil like a swordfish into my unprotected gut.
"Point," she shouted as if there was an audience to hear. "Jump back instead of to the side, as a rule of thumb. That's why the strip is so long."
"Are you going to announce when we start again?"
"Fine." She backed up. "On three. One, two, three!"
She had technically done what I asked, but I had no time to prepare. She began her frenzy in my direction, and I lasted maybe a couple seconds more than before. I once was able to actually push her foil away from my trunk, but she used the motion to jab me in the other arm.
"Point," she gloated. "You're going to want to keep that other arm behind your back. It's an easy target if it's out in the open."
We sparred over and over, and each time I survived just a bit longer. I remarked once that I had never thought fencing was this aggressive, to which Alice laughed and said it wasn't; she could get away with it since I didn't know how to punish her for leaving her guard down. Something in that statement gave me the smallest bit of confidence, which I used to score my first point on our thirteenth-or-so duel.
"Point!" I announced.
"Good one," she replied. "If you can keep that move under your belt, I'll have to actually monitor my distance."
The next match, she did keep her distance… and won by forcing me off the piste.
"Point," she said.
"Oh damn you."
"You were on the defensive too long. Again?"
"Again."
We continued like this for far longer than I had expected to dedicate. I got slowly better, but only at the basics. Every time I was able to pull one over on Alice, it was, as I learned, because she wasn't guarding for that move. She layered in her usual repertoire of footwork and techniques as I became comfortable enough to abuse their absences. What resulted would look like a parabola on a graph; I won just as much by the end as I had at the beginning, but there were some winning streaks in the middle. Unexpectedly, I found myself having a great deal of fun with it.
The swishes, the back and forth, the give and take. I had thought of her playing with the dummy as looking like a dance, and that continued into a real duel. I could see how, in her mind, it would tie in with her love of ritual. Exercise could put you in much the same trance as chanting could, if done right. This was more involved, sure, but I understood how it could fit under those altered states of consciousness.
When I asked, Alice just shrugged and said she liked to compete. Then she got me in the crook of my elbow and yelled: "Point!"
She tossed her foil aside. "I'd love to continue, but I have a book to read. Anders and I are revisiting Catcher in the Rye."
"Of course," I got out between heavy breaths. "I was about done anyways."
"Help me put the equipment away."
"Of course."
As I doffed and donned to return to my autumn afternoon attire, Alice finished stuffing fencing gear into the shed and closed the sliding door with a shumpf, locking it after herself. She turned, rubbed some dust off of her pants, and approached me.
Alice was the type I couldn't count on to respect personal space, but her proximity in this moment was still uncharacteristic. And even stranger, she neglected to make eye contact, instead opting to stare at the ground.
The pause was pregnant.
"Your dad couldn't ever compete with me," she started, and her voice was ever so subtly different. She'd put a twist on it. She was making some kind of attempt to bring her nasally voice down, into these lower, as-close-to-bass-as-the-female-voice-gets tones. The ones you use to hum someone to sleep.
And that was just the type of effect it was having.
"He couldn't exert himself even if he tried, and his body was a bit too wide to guard. But he still picked up a foil every once in a while to humor me."
That woman, the one so tall she had to lean down to peer into my truck. The blanket came back, the weight on my shoulders. That emotional equivalent to the warm pillow against my cheek, the flutter of comfort touching every inch of my body in turn, like kisses on small cuts to make everything feel better.
"He got the occasional point, either by luck or because I gave it to him."
The bearer of chocolates. The woman who had gifted me that letter, that smelled like sandalwood and was written in golden ink. The frequenter of my dreams. The woman with the circular eyes who wouldn't get out of my head. Not that I was particularly distraught that she was in it.
"He never got better even with the many hours he must have racked up by the end."
Except I was. I should have been. She was strange. She was an enigma. I doubted my memory of her at every turn. And yet, there she was, at Tim's funeral. An old friend? An acquaintance? Business partner? Who was she, and what was she doing in my life?
Tim's thinking spot, I thought, I haven't yet had the opportunity to go there.
And when I came back to reality, I saw that Alice's stance had changed. Her eyes had lifted to the sky above, staring at the semi-cloudy, mostly blue beyond. How long had we been standing here? I struggled to come up with an adequate response.
"Sounds… funny," were the words I decided on.
"He worked himself to death." My focus drew in sharper as I realized the weight of the conversation. "He stopped being able to fence with me because he stopped coming home at reasonable hours, and I wasn't about to fence in the dark. Too much work."
She gave me space to speak, but I just watched her. She lowered her head to make eye contact — she still had to tilt her head slightly up because she was shorter.
"Don't."
I creased my brow. "Don't what?"
"Don't stop fencing with me."
"Oh," my voice came out meek. "Okay."
She started walking right past me, towards the house. My eyes followed her, all the way to her closing the door and disappearing from sight.
"Okay," I said again, to no one in particular.

I parked just two spots to the right of Wilson's Wildlife Solutions, and stepped out of the car. So much of my wardrobe was green, now. As head of the organization, I felt the need to look the part, and I didn't want to wear the same thing to work every day — which was, by this point, six of the seven days of the week. Today, I went with no dress or skirt, instead opting for a leafy button-down and oak-brown pants. Simple, business-casual, I felt it made me approachable, as opposed to the bosses that were done up as much as possible every day to feel imposing and above everyone else. I preferred this aesthetic. Even if I didn't actually like being approached all that much.
The aesthetic was for them, not me.
"Hey Fae," Robin gave me a greeting as I stepped out of my turquoise hybrid. He was eating a sandwich while sitting on a bench under the awning. Just within speaking range.
"Good morning again, Robin. Taking an early lunch?" I hated that my position of power made that sound like it could be an accusation. As it exited my mouth, I wished I hadn't said it.
"I am," he replied with an apprehension that confirmed my fear. "That's Tim's spot."
Ah. There it was. I was wondering why he had said hello in the first place. People had spots in this parking lot like how students had seats in high school classes — with no written parking/seating chart, there were just spots that everyone had silently agreed belonged to certain people.
"It's the head's spot."
"Mm," he grunted in reply, and took a big bite of his sandwich to refuse elaboration.
I gave him a civil smile, and then walked in the doors. I didn't have the time nor the energy to try and pursue a pointless squabble, and I had work to get to.
As I entered the building, I waved to Sarah at the front desk, and walked by the many taxidermy animals that stood as guardians in our lobby. Our little hall of fame (and remembrance) for animals that had died within our care, either because we couldn't care for them or because they couldn't be released and had passed away of natural causes. It was always a little bittersweet. None of the animals chose to have abilities with unwieldy affects on the local ecosystem. No superspeed coyote knew that it being an apex hunter meant it had to stay here so it couldn't ruin the squirrel population. I always felt a little bad for them, even if we gave them the best life we could.
I went into the hallway that acted as the trunk for our right wing of the headquarters. The right flank of the Crater. My office was actually rather far down it, which was always quite a pain for people whose offices were on the left side and wanted to talk to me. I was thinking of moving it closer to the middle, but my feelings weren't strong enough to spur me into action just yet.
I entered the kind of cul de sac that housed myself and those most immediately important to my work. My office was straight across when you came in, centered between Old Al and Laura on my left, and Anders and storage on my right. A very nice symmetry. Laura was in the office that used to be mine when I was still the Chief Financial Officer, even though that wasn't her job.
But as I came into the cul de sac, someone was waiting for me. The redhead buzzcut Captain Esau.
"Good morning, Ms. Wilson."
"Good morning, Esau." I motioned for her to join me in my office, and she pulled the door open so I could enter first. It was a small gesture, but it reminded me of her quasi-military background. Something about respect. Many other people would have just gone in first because they were closer to the door.
She also waited for me to take my seat before she took hers. I was torn on whether I liked this demeanor or not.
"What brings you to my office?"
"I'm here to put in a request for promotion, but not on my own behalf."
"Oh? On whose?"
"Robin's," she said.
I raised eyebrows at that, and let her continue.
"There are precious few people outside of the Castaways that have the power to put together a crew. Feather is one. Albert is another, though he doesn't unless Feather is unavailable. And we've stumbled across a few other people who also have the ability to but nobody remembers that they do, because it's not their job. What I'm saying is that there is an opening for an organizer. Robin knows what he's doing out in the wild, he's very good at tracking animals and he's an excellent marksman with tranquilizers. He's wonderful at following orders and he's proven himself capable at giving them and making his own decisions." I nodded along. "I also think he's feeling underappreciated right now. It might do you two some good."
I bristled. "That's not your area, Ingrid Esau."
"I wanted to strengthen my argument with an emotional appeal."
Something about that forwardness made me loosen. It was nice to not have to work around unspoken rules.
"That is an emotional area that I want to keep distinctly separate from work."
"Understood, will not bring it up again."
"Thank you." Maybe I should have been harder. Esau simply sat with her hands in her lap. "Are you done?"
"I have made my point."
That was strangely succinct. I rarely had meetings come and go so fast. I found myself appreciating her approach, even when I was expending energy to not appreciate anything about her.
"I'll consider it."
"That was the idea." She smiled. "Thank you for seeing me."
Esau got up, and curtly waved at me.
I fished for ulterior motives Esau might have. What benefit would the Supervisors gain from Robin having a higher position? When nothing came up, I began to give credence to the idea that she might not have hid anything. It was a natural continuation from her praise at the… turbulent meeting some weeks ago.
I then had to make sure no element of my relationship with Robin colored my decision. It was playing dirty to bring up inter-family drama. That someone from the outside had both noticed and then acknowledged it breached some kind of invisible wall I was trying to put up between my work and my self.
If I was being honest with myself, it rattled me. I couldn't find out how deep the cut went, but I didn't search very hard. I promised myself I'd think it over when I could manage to have a clearer head. For now, there were bulk orders to put in, caretakers to consult, and critters to both put on and take off of the roster.

It was a windy Autumn day on the mountainside, a little more than an hour drive from the Wilson household. I had only been up here a couple of times, but it was a sacred family location. Off of this turnout was a rocky trail that hugged the mountain wall and stood over a cliffside. An unmarked trail at that; one bushwhacked by Tim himself. It was scenic. From here, I could kind of see the farms that became Boring, and beyond that, what might have been the beginnings of Portland, but there were some hills between here and there.
What was constant were the forests. Deep arboreal greens from horizon, to horizon, to the granite grey of the rock wall to my right. I was never a big fan of heights, but I was more-or-less used to it.
It was early morning and the sun was rising on the other side of this mountain. I found myself having to use my flashlight to find good footholds. That, combined with the sheer drop to my left, was just a little nerve-wracking.
The trail was short and dark. Just enough to get out of the way of the highway that passed over the Cascades. When people drove by, you could still hear them, but it was a faint enough sound to be ignored. An amazing sort of find. I wondered how many other trails Tim must have blazed before he found this one. Trial and error for sure.
After some walking, the trail reached its terminus: a rocky outcrop. This was his "thinking spot". Near the end, he didn't have time to come up here. Near the end, he didn't have time for anything.
I took a deep breath, and held my curiosity at bay so I could take in the sight. It was beautiful, in its own way. The wind whipping at my hands, hair, and ankles. The earthy smell from all around me. The rolling green hills of treetops. It wasn't my kind of beautiful, but it was beautiful. I looked wistfully towards Portland, and sighed. Tim liked to insult cities by calling them "The Great Indoors." It was one of his few sayings that really stuck with me. I often felt myself wanting to return.
But now wasn't the time nor the place. I took my eyes from the horizon, stooped, and turned over a medium-sized rock. The one under which I had left that letter for this mystery woman — this friend of Tim's, this bringer of chocolates.
Sure enough, I had received a response.
It was the same yellow as the envelope before it, with the same curly purple handwriting:
To Faeowynn,
From Holly
Something more direct. Holly? Nice to have a name to put to the face. I checked my phone. I had time. The early hour afforded me some meandering and contemplating before I had to check into work. Strange, to think I was actually setting my own hours. I very much disliked having to be completely self-directed, and accountable only to myself. It rubbed me wrong.
But there were more interesting things to dig into. I sat down, tore open the letter, and began to consume its contents.

A knock at my door interrupted me. I hastily folded the paper, opened my desk's thin drawer, stuffed it in, and stood. My heart pounded in my chest, so I took a deep breath to try and calm myself. Then when that didn't work, I took two more.
The knock came again. Usually I could tell who it was, like how you could tell the footsteps of your family members as they walked through the house. People were distinct even when they weren't trying to be, but these knocks were alien. Soft, and slower than a knock's usual rhythm.
"Coming," I said, pushing out my chair and standing up. I rubbed some sleep from my eyes, and then strode to the door. I opened onto the cold night air, and startled for a second time.
"Hey, Fae," Robin's tired voice popped like tires rolling over gravel.
"Hi Robin," I replied. "Eleven?"
"I couldn't sleep and I had something I wanted to say."
Even in the farmland, crickets sang in the night. Through the door, I could feel a slight breeze as it slipped past Robin's blue pajamas. He wore that slouch he always had, and though his hands were stuffed into his pockets I could see that there was something dry all over his wrists. Dirt? Clay? My body blocked the light coming from behind me and I couldn't be sure.
He breathed in deep. "Your room smells really nice."
"Thanks."
"Can I come in?"
"No," I rushed out. "It's a mess."
I instead came out of the door, and closed it behind me. We were suddenly both in the dark of the breezy, milky night, only a bright moon keeping us visible to one another, lights out for miles around.
"Oh," he said, a bit late, and a bit confused.
"What was it you wanted to tell me?"
He took in a deep breath. "Sorry, I'm just a bit drunk, it's hard to think."
"Alright."
"But, Prime Respondent."
I smiled slightly. "You were the best for the job."
"I heard Esau put in a good word for me."
"She did."
A tension in my chest released, almost without my noticing. I felt like I could breathe all of a sudden.
I continued: "It's never been my place to be out in the wilderness, but she and others have sang high praise about your ingenuity. I felt like there was no good reason you and Feather couldn't both share the burden. It's probably going to make things a lot easier from here on out."
"Yeah. Thanks, I just… you know, I didn't think you were going to be… one second."
He began to lean on the wall right next to the door, one hand keeping him steady at a sixty-degree angle from the ground. When he didn't continue, I prompted him.
"Didn't think I'd be…?"
"Right for the job, you know? I mean, it's not really your job."
There was a pause.
"Mmm," I replied. He's drunk, I reminded myself.
"So I'm surprised you're…"
"Robin, you're drunk."
Another pause.
"Right," he said, staring somewhere slightly to the right of me.
"Get some sleep, we'll talk tomorrow."
"No."
"No?"
"I'm not gonna be able to say this sober."
"Well maybe that's a good thing."
Robin's face — what I could see of it in the moonlight — screwed up, the bridge of his nose becoming several little ridges, his forehead developing several little creases. A moment after he donned that expression, he tried to hide it by looking towards the wall he was leaning on. "Faeowynn…"
"Robin."
"I came out here… I'm trying to… set things straight."
"Mmm," I hummed, arms crossed just to keep the cold out. The wind whipped at my hair, up in a loose bun which I had taken no time to readjust come nighttime and which now was leaking strands of frizz.
"Mmm?" Now he glared. He looked up, he made eye contact, and he glared, crickets playing their fiddles in the background, a chicken from a nearby farm up too late squawking once and then becoming silent.
I was antsy. He was keeping me from being inside, working on the letter.
I was starting somewhere easy, questions-wise. I was asking her who she was and what her relation to Tim was. It had been bothering me that her very existence suggested a secret Tim might have been keeping. On the other hand, it also bothered me that she might not have been a secret. That, much like my grandma's death, she simply… never came up.
I looked back to Robin, who my eyes had strayed away from. He knew who she was, didn't he? She had come up to him at the funeral, she had also given him a box of something. What if he and I were in on something together and we didn't know it? That was another question I had to ask Holly. I penned it in my mind, anxiously awaiting the moment I could get back inside. But for now, Robin was keeping me.
Robin, who had just said something I'd missed.
"Hmm?"
He looked at me with a pleading expression. A softer expression, an easier expression. I hadn't even noticed the glare had faded from his eyes, until he looked straight at me again. Straight at me, in response to my question.
"Hmm?" he repeated back at me.
"I didn't hear what you said."
He looked confused. He pushed himself up off the wall, standing fully upright. And he looked at me, and then back at the house for some unknowable reason. He put a hand on the back of his head, and then squatted down so his other hand was on his knee, like he was suddenly suffering a headache.
"Do you need some aspirin?"
"Your ego means that much to you, huh?"
"Mmm?"
"And that fucking noise again. I know when I'm being brushed off. Fine. Go enjoy your fucking tea, or your porn, or your work, or whatever it is that means so much to you."
I sighed. "Goodnight, Robin."
"Goodnight," he croaked back.
I opened the door and stepped back into my room. The warmth was welcome at once. So was the seclusion. Just to be sure, because drunk people were a mite unpredictable, I locked the door. I didn't fear that he'd do anything drastic, no. Nothing except breach my privacy and extend an uncomfortable conversation that shouldn't have happened in the first place.
I took a couple deep breaths. My heart still hurt slightly from the initial fear I got when he knocked on my door. But now, secure again in my privacy, I retrieved my pen and paper once more.
When a bang on my door made me flinch and make a big dash across the letter.
Then I heard him stumble off, towards the Wilson's house, soon to either crash on the couch or clumsily climb the stairs up and into his room. No longer did he live in the attic. He was too big, now.
I breathed heavily. My thrice-startled heart raced laps in my chest, threatening to reach escape velocity and pop out. I closed my eyes, and tried to center myself again. In, out. Breathe in, breathe out.
He's drunk, I reminded myself. He's just drunk.

« Out of Stasis | Stories I Tell Myself | The Fundraiser »


The name's Charles Stanford, and this is how I ended up tied round of this ancient pseudo-diety of an oak.

My tale starts a few states east of here, in the grand city of Chicago. Half of the pork, steak, or lamb eaten from California to Boston comes out of that city, and it was mine. I was heir to the largest company in the yards, Stanford's Pork. A dollar says that every sausage eaten by you or your parents came out of our factories. Grand, marvelous things! A truly tremendous testament to the power of American ingenuity.
The day started like any other: A trip to the yards to make sure everything was perfectly operational, breakfast at home, a luncheon with the mayor. Then I killed a man.
I carried a pocketknife with me, one with a little pry bar and screwdriver on it, just in case a machine broke down that I could fix in a jiffy. I don't reckon that it was my fault, he came bounding at me, growling like a big 'ole pup. Well, needless to say, I gave his throat the ole' Stanford shellacking! The same technique we use on the pigs, you know. That's how we get the blood out fast, you know. You keep it in for too long and the meat gets soggy, and not with the tasty juices. When you're cooking down the pork, you want the fat to-
Well. Anyway.
So, you can picture me. Standing in the street, some poor poors (hah) body slumped over me, and however many pints of blood sprayed over me. So, I thought, time to bring the family business west! The law can't follow me all the way out there, and I was guilty as a goldfish. So, I packed my best suit, and my favorite boots, and started riding the railroad as far west as she went. And I ended up here, somehow. The nowhere town in Arizona, where the only meat available for two states is horse and deer.
Well, the rest of the story is familiar to the rest of y'all, how the ranger came to town. I was tired of running from Johnny and his cronies, and I had the sickening feeling that that son of a bitch could read my sins off my forehead as clear as I can read the bible. Now, living in the greatest meat making plant on either side of the Mississippi, you pick up on a few facts about folks: Number one is that any man who thinks himself to be the law is often in the pocket of someone else. Number two is that a person in nobody's pocket but their own is either a poor or the most dangerous sumbitch you'd ever met. So, you know what I did when I saw that Ranger, hands and heart and his own pocket, walking at me?
I ran. My pappy ran a company, my grandpappy a farm, and here I am running from a man with a badge and a gun. They'd be more tweaked than all us angry ghouls combined! Then I saw her, on my way out of town. This fine pine we gather under tonight, bathed in blood. A corpse, half-swallowed by bark, was swinging just down there. Which one of y'all was that? Don't matter. I was scared shitless, and if I had doubts on running they were put down then and there. But, I'm sure, as y'all are aware, you can't run from the Ranger. You sure as hell can't run from the tree. It marks you, from your skin to your soul, so even if I ran I wouldn't, not really. But I tried. I had a friend at the stable just round the gate, so I nabbed a chestnut beut' of a stallion and started riding.
I had my pistol on me, a 9 inch Colt that I bought when I first arrived in this dust-covered hellhole. You never know when a gentlemanly card game might turn farther south than Mexico City, and you never know when a renegade ranger starts chasin your ass. That came in handy that afternoon. So that horse started running, and by god did that horse run. He was faster than the intercontinental, at least from my experience. Shame that the damnable ranger was faster. I know now that the tree gave that bastard some sort of supernatural abilities, which explains how he caught up to me, but it was still nearly enough for me to blow my own brains out with the hope that it helped me wake up from this dreary nightmare.
Then I hit the damn railroad. That stupid train, cruising through the middle of nowhere, going who cares where from no one knows where. And I ran straight into it. I blame the horse, of course. If I was in an automobile, then I would have stopped. Stupid ranger was able to stop. And I swung because of the damn train! At least the rest of you had some semblance of honor, I deserved more as a gentleman.

Swung harder than a pig that day, watched it from the shade. How bout you, newcomer?

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