Jeffrey dahmer polaroid pictures he took
The Science of Deduction
2013.01.11 00:34 neowu The Science of Deduction
A place to practice your Sherlock like observation
2023.05.29 01:42 Wannabeitzay My brother is 16, has autism and OCD and isn't getting better.
Some background info: My parents work 9-5 jobs. My brother started showing signs (not listening when being called/ couldn't pronounce some words or letters) when he was 3-4 and my parents took him to the doctor who gave him a medicine that would make him sleep for hours. My parents got scared and stopped giving it to him and thought he'd be fine if he went to a normal school and grew up with normal kids. As he grew up he would scream and cry nonstop and throw tantrums and hit his siblings. My dad would hit him as a punishment for this.
After the age 14 my dad stopped hitting him after meeting with the doctors but he started hitting my parents, verbally abusing and shouting a LOTT. He HATED AND HATES his siblings esp me (his sister) and claims i always spit in his food, or go into his room and spit there? I have repeatedly told him i don't do that but he doesn't listen.
We took him to doctors but he WOULD NOT take the medicine they gave him saying "they were drugs" and "they erase his personality" and "there's nothing wrong w him and the doctors are frauds trying to make money". He used to debate about stuff endlessly and get so angry over small things and yell so much and hit everyone. Things got quite bad and he was sent to the hospital so that atleast he could be forced to take his medicine (Two tablets of flux and one tablet olanzia). He returned after 2 weeks and he was better and calmer.
Today his biggest problem is his food and aggression. He won't eat homecooked meal thinking its contaminated and that I spat in it. He orders from a hospital cuz he knows hospital food would be clean. He has lost weight due to such eating habits. He yells and yells if my parents refuse to pay for his food and tell him to eat what's cooked at home. He also yells if my parents refuse to pay for his grocery that he orders such as soap, toothpaste, toilet cleaner, mouthwash which costs a lot since he doesn't use a mouthwash bottle twice. He mostly stays inside his room on his phone. He doesn't have friends or a social life. He doesn't let anyone in his room except his parents sometimes. When he goes out of the house, which is rare, he locks the door and puts a tape on it and takes a picture of the knob so that i don't try to enter. When he sleeps he's worried ill come to his room to spit on his stuff even though he has locked the door from two sides. If my dad removes his lock so that he stops doing this, he yells endlessly again. He didn't go to school the last six months cuz every morning there he would SCREAM because he didnt want to go. We got him tuition instead but he didn't study, said he couldn't focus and didnt even go to give the exam.
Today, although he is a bit better, he's taking a slightly higher dosage of medicine. The thing is, we cant just keep increasing his medicine. He needs therapy and he refuses to take therapy and HATES his doctors and says there's nothing such as ocd or mental illness and its all bs. We book therapy appointments for him but he refuses to go saying he hasn't bathed, hasn't eaten or has other stuff to do.
Before I end, I want to talk about his claim that I spit on his food. This started when I was 14 and he was 12. He would hit me and annoy me and I knew I wasn't as strong as him so instead of hitting him back, I would threaten him that if he hits me, I will spit on him. Reality is to this day I have never spat on him or his food. In fact HE has spat on me 2x. I never ever thought that me threatening him would lead to this.
My parents and I are worried sick. Pls someone help if you have a similar story or any advice especially on trying to get him to attend his therapy sessions.
ps. the today in bold shows the CURRENT situation, not the past.
submitted by Wannabeitzay to Autism_Parenting [link] [comments]
After the age 14 my dad stopped hitting him after meeting with the doctors but he started hitting my parents, verbally abusing and shouting a LOTT. He HATED AND HATES his siblings esp me (his sister) and claims i always spit in his food, or go into his room and spit there? I have repeatedly told him i don't do that but he doesn't listen.
We took him to doctors but he WOULD NOT take the medicine they gave him saying "they were drugs" and "they erase his personality" and "there's nothing wrong w him and the doctors are frauds trying to make money". He used to debate about stuff endlessly and get so angry over small things and yell so much and hit everyone. Things got quite bad and he was sent to the hospital so that atleast he could be forced to take his medicine (Two tablets of flux and one tablet olanzia). He returned after 2 weeks and he was better and calmer.
Today his biggest problem is his food and aggression. He won't eat homecooked meal thinking its contaminated and that I spat in it. He orders from a hospital cuz he knows hospital food would be clean. He has lost weight due to such eating habits. He yells and yells if my parents refuse to pay for his food and tell him to eat what's cooked at home. He also yells if my parents refuse to pay for his grocery that he orders such as soap, toothpaste, toilet cleaner, mouthwash which costs a lot since he doesn't use a mouthwash bottle twice. He mostly stays inside his room on his phone. He doesn't have friends or a social life. He doesn't let anyone in his room except his parents sometimes. When he goes out of the house, which is rare, he locks the door and puts a tape on it and takes a picture of the knob so that i don't try to enter. When he sleeps he's worried ill come to his room to spit on his stuff even though he has locked the door from two sides. If my dad removes his lock so that he stops doing this, he yells endlessly again. He didn't go to school the last six months cuz every morning there he would SCREAM because he didnt want to go. We got him tuition instead but he didn't study, said he couldn't focus and didnt even go to give the exam.
Today, although he is a bit better, he's taking a slightly higher dosage of medicine. The thing is, we cant just keep increasing his medicine. He needs therapy and he refuses to take therapy and HATES his doctors and says there's nothing such as ocd or mental illness and its all bs. We book therapy appointments for him but he refuses to go saying he hasn't bathed, hasn't eaten or has other stuff to do.
Before I end, I want to talk about his claim that I spit on his food. This started when I was 14 and he was 12. He would hit me and annoy me and I knew I wasn't as strong as him so instead of hitting him back, I would threaten him that if he hits me, I will spit on him. Reality is to this day I have never spat on him or his food. In fact HE has spat on me 2x. I never ever thought that me threatening him would lead to this.
My parents and I are worried sick. Pls someone help if you have a similar story or any advice especially on trying to get him to attend his therapy sessions.
ps. the today in bold shows the CURRENT situation, not the past.
2023.05.29 01:42 Dumpaccount4959 Boyfriend 19 M is being controlling about my Instagram account 19 F
Tldr; my boyfriend made me deactivate my old Instagram account with 900 followers and my friends in it
At first I did it for us because he told me he had trust issues, I asked him if he wanted me to deactivate my main account to which he said yes, I thought he meant only for 2 months I didn’t know it was gonna to be a temporary thing. I made a new account where I’m only following him which is how he wanted it to be, it isn’t fair because he still has some friends in his account to clarify I’m very lonely and he moved 7 months ago so I can’t go out with him either he knows that but doesn’t want me to follow anyone but him. 2 months had past I went to Mexico with my family I took some picture I asked him if I can now activate my old main account because I wanted to upload pictures of myself to where he said yes but he gave an attitude and started being dry I asked why and he said “well because you did it for us” I told him I had no idea it was a temporary thing I meant only for a little while and I want to have a social life posting pictures to my page other than only having him I know it sounds harsh but I wanted to have social media too. He was still upset but he got over it or so I thought. We got a argument a week later about some childish things about me not apoglozing about an incident at the near end I was at fault and he told me “ if you want to prove to me you changed deactivate your account” I was confused because the argument wasn’t Related with deactivating my account in any way? I was straight forward with him and asked “ what does that have to do with anything? “ he told me he won’t believe I changed unless I deactivate my account which is dumb and stupid because I know he is just using that as an excuse for me to delete my main account again. He told me he won’t forgive me unless I do it he also said I can activate it again in the next 3 months which I am pissed off at I really have pictures I want to post there and I have some childhood friends on that account. I’m so sick of this. I want to convince him If I can activate it again but he’s just going to get sad and mad
submitted by Dumpaccount4959 to relationships [link] [comments]
At first I did it for us because he told me he had trust issues, I asked him if he wanted me to deactivate my main account to which he said yes, I thought he meant only for 2 months I didn’t know it was gonna to be a temporary thing. I made a new account where I’m only following him which is how he wanted it to be, it isn’t fair because he still has some friends in his account to clarify I’m very lonely and he moved 7 months ago so I can’t go out with him either he knows that but doesn’t want me to follow anyone but him. 2 months had past I went to Mexico with my family I took some picture I asked him if I can now activate my old main account because I wanted to upload pictures of myself to where he said yes but he gave an attitude and started being dry I asked why and he said “well because you did it for us” I told him I had no idea it was a temporary thing I meant only for a little while and I want to have a social life posting pictures to my page other than only having him I know it sounds harsh but I wanted to have social media too. He was still upset but he got over it or so I thought. We got a argument a week later about some childish things about me not apoglozing about an incident at the near end I was at fault and he told me “ if you want to prove to me you changed deactivate your account” I was confused because the argument wasn’t Related with deactivating my account in any way? I was straight forward with him and asked “ what does that have to do with anything? “ he told me he won’t believe I changed unless I deactivate my account which is dumb and stupid because I know he is just using that as an excuse for me to delete my main account again. He told me he won’t forgive me unless I do it he also said I can activate it again in the next 3 months which I am pissed off at I really have pictures I want to post there and I have some childhood friends on that account. I’m so sick of this. I want to convince him If I can activate it again but he’s just going to get sad and mad
2023.05.29 01:40 Wannabeitzay My brother is 16, has ocd and autism ,and isn't getting better.
Some background info: My parents work 9-5 jobs. My brother started showing signs (not listening when being called/ couldn't pronounce some words or letters) when he was 3-4 and my parents took him to the doctor who gave him a medicine that would make him sleep for hours. My parents got scared and stopped giving it to him and thought he'd be fine if he went to a normal school and grew up with normal kids. As he grew up he would scream and cry nonstop and throw tantrums and hit his siblings. My dad would hit him as a punishment for this.
After the age 14 my dad stopped hitting him after meeting with the doctors but he started hitting my parents, verbally abusing and shouting a LOTT. He HATED AND HATES his siblings esp me (his sister) and claims i always spit in his food, or go into his room and spit there? I have repeatedly told him i don't do that but he doesn't listen.
We took him to doctors but he WOULD NOT take the medicine they gave him saying "they were drugs" and "they erase his personality" and "there's nothing wrong w him and the doctors are frauds trying to make money". He used to debate about stuff endlessly and get so angry over small things and yell so much and hit everyone. Things got quite bad and he was sent to the hospital so that atleast he could be forced to take his medicine (Two tablets of flux and one tablet olanzia). He returned after 2 weeks and he was better and calmer.
Today his biggest problem is his food and aggression. He won't eat homecooked meal thinking its contaminated and that I spat in it. He orders from a hospital cuz he knows hospital food would be clean. He has lost weight due to such eating habits. He yells and yells if my parents refuse to pay for his food and tell him to eat what's cooked at home. He also yells if my parents refuse to pay for his grocery that he orders such as soap, toothpaste, toilet cleaner, mouthwash which costs a lot since he doesn't use a mouthwash bottle twice. He mostly stays inside his room on his phone. He doesn't have friends or a social life. He doesn't let anyone in his room except his parents sometimes. When he goes out of the house, which is rare, he locks the door and puts a tape on it and takes a picture of the knob so that i don't try to enter. When he sleeps he's worried ill come to his room to spit on his stuff even though he has locked the door from two sides. If my dad removes his lock so that he stops doing this, he yells endlessly again. He didn't go to school the last six months cuz every morning there he would SCREAM because he didnt want to go. We got him tuition instead but he didn't study, said he couldn't focus and didnt even go to give the exam.
Today, although he is a bit better, he's taking a slightly higher dosage of medicine. The thing is, we cant just keep increasing his medicine. He needs therapy and he refuses to take therapy and HATES his doctors and says there's nothing such as ocd or mental illness and its all bs. We book therapy appointments for him but he refuses to go saying he hasn't bathed, hasn't eaten or has other stuff to do.
Before I end, I want to talk about his claim that I spit on his food. This started when I was 14 and he was 12. He would hit me and annoy me and I knew I wasn't as strong as him so instead of hitting him back, I would threaten him that if he hits me, I will spit on him. Reality is to this day I have never spat on him or his food. In fact HE has spat on me 2x. I never ever thought that me threatening him would lead to this.
My parents and I are worried sick. Pls someone help if you have a similar story or any advice especially on trying to get him to attend his therapy sessions.
ps. the today in bold shows the CURRENT situation, not the past.
submitted by Wannabeitzay to AutisticAdults [link] [comments]
After the age 14 my dad stopped hitting him after meeting with the doctors but he started hitting my parents, verbally abusing and shouting a LOTT. He HATED AND HATES his siblings esp me (his sister) and claims i always spit in his food, or go into his room and spit there? I have repeatedly told him i don't do that but he doesn't listen.
We took him to doctors but he WOULD NOT take the medicine they gave him saying "they were drugs" and "they erase his personality" and "there's nothing wrong w him and the doctors are frauds trying to make money". He used to debate about stuff endlessly and get so angry over small things and yell so much and hit everyone. Things got quite bad and he was sent to the hospital so that atleast he could be forced to take his medicine (Two tablets of flux and one tablet olanzia). He returned after 2 weeks and he was better and calmer.
Today his biggest problem is his food and aggression. He won't eat homecooked meal thinking its contaminated and that I spat in it. He orders from a hospital cuz he knows hospital food would be clean. He has lost weight due to such eating habits. He yells and yells if my parents refuse to pay for his food and tell him to eat what's cooked at home. He also yells if my parents refuse to pay for his grocery that he orders such as soap, toothpaste, toilet cleaner, mouthwash which costs a lot since he doesn't use a mouthwash bottle twice. He mostly stays inside his room on his phone. He doesn't have friends or a social life. He doesn't let anyone in his room except his parents sometimes. When he goes out of the house, which is rare, he locks the door and puts a tape on it and takes a picture of the knob so that i don't try to enter. When he sleeps he's worried ill come to his room to spit on his stuff even though he has locked the door from two sides. If my dad removes his lock so that he stops doing this, he yells endlessly again. He didn't go to school the last six months cuz every morning there he would SCREAM because he didnt want to go. We got him tuition instead but he didn't study, said he couldn't focus and didnt even go to give the exam.
Today, although he is a bit better, he's taking a slightly higher dosage of medicine. The thing is, we cant just keep increasing his medicine. He needs therapy and he refuses to take therapy and HATES his doctors and says there's nothing such as ocd or mental illness and its all bs. We book therapy appointments for him but he refuses to go saying he hasn't bathed, hasn't eaten or has other stuff to do.
Before I end, I want to talk about his claim that I spit on his food. This started when I was 14 and he was 12. He would hit me and annoy me and I knew I wasn't as strong as him so instead of hitting him back, I would threaten him that if he hits me, I will spit on him. Reality is to this day I have never spat on him or his food. In fact HE has spat on me 2x. I never ever thought that me threatening him would lead to this.
My parents and I are worried sick. Pls someone help if you have a similar story or any advice especially on trying to get him to attend his therapy sessions.
ps. the today in bold shows the CURRENT situation, not the past.
2023.05.29 01:24 SirNioH Processor change that went wrong?
 | Good day, this post is completely unrelated to OC, but I know there are some pretty knowledgeable people here on the subject. submitted by SirNioH to overclocking [link] [comments] Long story short, I upgraded from the 3600X processor to the 5700X and sold the 3600 to a friend. I went to his house, took it to him and we installed the processor. He applied some liquid metal like thermal paste (as shown in the picture). Then I went home. The only strange thing I noticed was that while the PC was showing the BIOS screen due to the new processor, the core voltage (vcore) was at 1.4 something, which was a bit high for my taste. Two hours after I left, he wrote me telling me the following situation: He was on the browser and it started to smell burnt. The video stopped working, so he quickly unplugged the computer. He turned it back on, it no longer smelled burnt and the fans were spinning, but there was no video signal. He quickly checked to see if liquid metal had spilled or if there was a short circuit, but found nothing. He further stresses that the PC was lying down, so it could not have spilled. As for the last clarifications, obviously, being my friend, I didn't want to give him something damaged. I was using that processor in my rig as normal with auto boost disabled. I did the upgrade, cleaned up the paste and put it away to take it to him, but I am left with a bit of guilt if it was my processor that was the cause... (His previous processor was a 2400G). He put the 2400g back in anyway his PC wouldn't boot. https://preview.redd.it/9d8wosjl6p2b1.png?width=1600&format=png&auto=webp&s=6719d2a7fdceb941f66be074e8d7227db06c7ca1 |
2023.05.29 01:23 Flimsy_Leader1147 Does Scara deserve to be played ?
 | While pulling for Itto’s weapon when he had a rerun with Scara I ended up getting Scara’s weapon and his first constellation. I’m really struggling with my abyss (yeah I even come to think it’s a skill issue at this point..) and I was thinking about starting to play him but the problem is that neither Faruzan nor Yunjin are c6 (respectively c1 and c4). So I wanted to go for the first picture’s team but do y’all have any suggestions ? I also added pictures from my box in case. Thank you a lot if you took time to read and answer ! submitted by Flimsy_Leader1147 to ScaramoucheMains [link] [comments] |
2023.05.29 01:19 Olbaidon [Race Report] Coeur d'Alene Marathon - My First 26.2
Race Information
- Name: Coeur d'Alene Marathon
- Date: May 28th 2023
- Distance: 26.2 miles
- Location: Coeur d'Alene Idaho
- Website: https://runsignup.com/Race/ID/CoeurDAlene/nsplit
- Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/9158648279/overview
- Time: 3:58:17 (chip time)
Goals
| Goal | Description | Completed? |
|---|---|---|
| A | Sub 4:00:00 | Yes |
| B | Finish | Yes |
Splits
| Mile | Time |
|---|---|
| 1 | 9:01 |
| 2 | 8:58 |
| 3 | 9:00 |
| 4 | 8:40 |
| 5 | 8:47 |
| 6 | 9:05 |
| 7 | 8:38 |
| 8 | 8:52 |
| 9 | 8:51 |
| 10 | 9:16 |
| 11 | 8:38 |
| 12 | 9:39 |
| 13 | 8:35 |
| 14 | 8:53 |
| 15 | 9:00 |
| 16 | 9:11 |
| 17 | 9:10 |
| 18 | 9:14 |
| 19 | 9:13 |
| 20 | 9:06 |
| 21 | 9:28 |
| 22 | 9:10 |
| 23 | 9:28 |
| 24 | 9:34 |
| 25 | 9:15 |
| 26 | 9:15 |
| 27 | 9:36 (pace) |
Background
Feel free to skip this section if you don't want to read my sappy stuff.I began running in March of 2022. In December of 2021 I was in the ER for what I thought was quite possibly a heart attack, luckily that was not the case! It did open my eyes to my health though and my wife and I began seeing a personal trainer, and a few short months later I fell in love with running. I really began this journey because I have two young daughters (7 and 2 currently) and the thought of continuing to ignore my own health seemed extremely selfish as it could lead them down a similar lifestyle path, or without a dad earlier than they deserve, ultimately I want to be on this earth as long as I can for my kids.
I live in Spokane Washington which hosts Bloomsday, one of the biggest races in the world (4th in the US and 12th in the world I believe), so running Bloomsday became my goal. Since I started in March I didn't have much time to train so just finishing the virtual was my main goal, once I completed that I was hooked. I signed up for my first 10k (The Coeur d'Alene Marathon 10k nonetheless) and set my goal to finish in 1 hour. I missed that goal by 1 minute and 1 second! After that I kept training working further and faster through reading tons of posts here and following mostly LSD training methods. I made my goal to qualify for a Bloomsday "yellow bib" by 2023 in any race I could (essentially a 9:40 pace or better in any race 5 miles or more).
I ran many 5k races in the subsequent months while deciding to begin training for my first half marathon in October of that year. I followed Hal Higdon's beginner half marathon training plan, and low and behold I finished my first half in October of 2022, and under 2 hours which qualified me for my Bloomsday "yellow bib" for 2023 which I ran with a pace of 7:45/min last month! (a lot better than my 9:40 goal from the previous years, I thank my marathon training for that really).
During all of this I have lost 50lbs, and am resting solidly in a "normal" BMI range.
Training
Due to my success with Hal Higdon before I opted for the Intermediate Marathon plan. I followed it pretty dang closely with a few moved or missed runs due to vacation and other races.I knew CDA was hilly at around 1,300 ft of total gain and fall so I trained on lots of hills, luckily leaving my house in any direction is immediately met by hills, it just depends on how severe you want them to be. I also genuinely enjoy running hills, call me weird. Ther is a 800ft total elevation gain 8 mile route I take quite often near my house.
That was until 3 weeks ago Saturday. The day before Bloomsday I was getting my daughters some food and stubbed my toe on a bag of dog food...lol. I immediately knew I had broken and/or dislocated it because it didn't feel correct. If you have ever broken or dislocated a bone you know what I mean. I looked down and sure enough 4 of my toes we facing south like the rest of my body, and my left pinky toe was facing south-east. I put it back in it's place and headed to urgent care where xrays showed it was indeed broken. The doctor I saw advised me to skip Bloomsday and maybe even the marathon but he said "my wife is a marathon runner, 3x Boston runner, so I know you wont listen to me...just please listen to your body."
I decided to do Bloomsday the next day and use that for my basis on whether or not I would do the marathon. Luckily I had next to no pain during Bloomsday so I decided to do an extra extra hard and long taper and go for the marathon as well.
The last three weeks of my training consisted of no running for a week, 7 miles the next week, and 9 miles the week of the marathon. The goal being to just let my toe heal as best I could.
Pre-race
The week leading up to the race I began eating more carbs and attempting to drink more water (which I am notoriously bad at still), I did one medium length run, and two super short pace runs just to get my legs feeling right since it had been few weeks since I did any serious running.The night before we ate a pasta dinner and I attempted to go to bed early.
As life would have it my oldest daughter was coughing all through the night, which would wake my younger daughter up causing her to cry, my wife tried to do the best she could to quickly calm them, but this was an all-night ordeal and unfortunately I only ended up with about 5.5 hours of decent sleep total.
I woke up at 4:30, had a shot of coffee with a glass of water, and a couple of honey stinger waffles with some peanut butter before getting ready and making the 40 min drive to CDA.
Once arriving I used the restrooms one last time, checked my bag, and headed to the starting gate to find the 4:00 pacer.
Race
My goal was to stay near the 4:00 pace runner for the first half, then negative split my way to just under 4:00 hours. This didn't work at all for me, although in retrospect it probably still would have worked about the same given my finish time. I stayed somewhat close for the first 3 miles, but once we started hitting hills I was able to keep my pace fairly consistent with little rise in HR or effort, like I said I love hills.I honestly felt freaking fantastic for the first 15 miles, and don't have much to say, I was fairly consistent with my pace given the constant ups and downs, around mile 12 though I did cost myself 1 minute by stopping to pee, but you gotta do what you gotta do right. With the first half behind me it meant the three steepest climbs were too, and it was mostly jut rolling hills until mile 21ish.
Around mile 16 is when I started to really notice it getting tougher to keep a steady pace and I had to actually "work harder" to stay at a desired pace instead of running comfortably. The sun popped out for a couple of miles around this time too, but luckily dipped back behind the clouds. Again not really a whole lot to say from mile 16 to 22 either, I could definite tell I had to try harder, but I was still going strong, just a little slower.
Around mile 21/22 is when the last decent rise in elevation came and that's when I really had to start pushing, my mind started telling me "hey man, based on your pace you could slow it down to 10min/mile and happily finish right at 4:00:00." I tried to argue with myself "good call, after this mile we'll slow it down then." But I would tell myself this after each mile to try to keep going.
I remember a reading about dedicating the last handful of miles to people in your life to keep yourself pushing so I decided to do this, mile 23 I dedicated to my dogs, mile 24 my wife (yes it was slower than my dogs, but there was a bit more hilliness okay!! And mile 23 was mostly down hill). Mile 25 was for my older daughter, and 26 was for my younger daughter (notice how they had the exact same pace, no favorites here). Once I hit mile 26 I was back in the park where the finish line was, I passed my boss who was cheering me on (she ran the half), and a short distance later I saw my wife and girls which elated me greatly and helped with the last push through the gate. My oldest daughter ran along the grass with me til the finish, and my youngest tried which was a great feeling to finish with.
Post-race
After I crossed the line I snagged my medal and immediate went to get a banana, Gatorade, and a slice of pizza. Over the course of the last year of running, I have found I need to eat immediately after finishing or I get terrible GI issues and the wrong kind of runs. I found my wife and kids we took pictures, I snagged a second slice of pizza and got my bag so we could go. Little did I know my wife wanted lunch, so we went to a little restaurant on the lake and got fish and chips, then walked to get icecream for the mall near by. Ultimately I was okay with this because walking felt better than sitting or standing still anyway. I made the drive back home (we took separate cars), took my socks and KT tape off for the first time to see an angry angry blood blister on the inside edge of my right foot (luckily not under my foot so not an issue, I am used to blisters on my right foot though...never get them on my left) I did some foam rolling and took a super hot shower, and here I am now writing this and deciding what I want for dinner.I told my wife before this started if I hit my 4 hour goal I would take a 2 year break from marathons and focus on halves...but I mean...I am already looking into fun ones in 2024...I gotta shoot for 3:45 or better now right?
Made with a new race report generator created by herumph.
2023.05.29 01:18 Olbaidon Race Report - First Marathon (Coeur d'Alene)
Race Information
- Name: Coeur d'Alene Marathon
- Date: May 28th 2023
- Distance: 26.2 miles
- Location: Coeur d'Alene Idaho
- Website: https://runsignup.com/Race/ID/CoeurDAlene/nsplit
- Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/9158648279/overview
- Time: 3:58:17 (chip time)
Goals
| Goal | Description | Completed? |
|---|---|---|
| A | Sub 4:00:00 | Yes |
| B | Finish | Yes |
Splits
| Mile | Time |
|---|---|
| 1 | 9:01 |
| 2 | 8:58 |
| 3 | 9:00 |
| 4 | 8:40 |
| 5 | 8:47 |
| 6 | 9:05 |
| 7 | 8:38 |
| 8 | 8:52 |
| 9 | 8:51 |
| 10 | 9:16 |
| 11 | 8:38 |
| 12 | 9:39 |
| 13 | 8:35 |
| 14 | 8:53 |
| 15 | 9:00 |
| 16 | 9:11 |
| 17 | 9:10 |
| 18 | 9:14 |
| 19 | 9:13 |
| 20 | 9:06 |
| 21 | 9:28 |
| 22 | 9:10 |
| 23 | 9:28 |
| 24 | 9:34 |
| 25 | 9:15 |
| 26 | 9:15 |
| 27 | 9:36 (pace) |
Background
Feel free to skip this section if you don't want to read my sappy stuff.I began running in March of 2022. In December of 2021 I was in the ER for what I thought was quite possibly a heart attack, luckily that was not the case! It did open my eyes to my health though and my wife and I began seeing a personal trainer, and a few short months later I fell in love with running. I really began this journey because I have two young daughters (7 and 2 currently) and the thought of continuing to ignore my own health seemed extremely selfish as it could lead them down a similar lifestyle path, or without a dad earlier than they deserve, ultimately I want to be on this earth as long as I can for my kids.
I live in Spokane Washington which hosts Bloomsday, one of the biggest races in the world (4th in the US and 12th in the world I believe), so running Bloomsday became my goal. Since I started in March I didn't have much time to train so just finishing the virtual was my main goal, once I completed that I was hooked. I signed up for my first 10k (The Coeur d'Alene Marathon 10k nonetheless) and set my goal to finish in 1 hour. I missed that goal by 1 minute and 1 second! After that I kept training working further and faster through reading tons of posts here and following mostly LSD training methods. I made my goal to qualify for a Bloomsday "yellow bib" by 2023 in any race I could (essentially a 9:40 pace or better in any race 5 miles or more).
I ran many 5k races in the subsequent months while deciding to begin training for my first half marathon in October of that year. I followed Hal Higdon's beginner half marathon training plan, and low and behold I finished my first half in October of 2022, and under 2 hours which qualified me for my Bloomsday "yellow bib" for 2023 which I ran with a pace of 7:45/min last month! (a lot better than my 9:40 goal from the previous years, I thank my marathon training for that really).
During all of this I have lost 50lbs, and am resting solidly in a "normal" BMI range.
Training
Due to my success with Hal Higdon before I opted for the Intermediate Marathon plan. I followed it pretty dang closely with a few moved or missed runs due to vacation and other races.I knew CDA was hilly at around 1,300 ft of total gain and fall so I trained on lots of hills, luckily leaving my house in any direction is immediately met by hills, it just depends on how severe you want them to be. I also genuinely enjoy running hills, call me weird. Ther is a 800ft total elevation gain 8 mile route I take quite often near my house.
That was until 3 weeks ago Saturday. The day before Bloomsday I was getting my daughters some food and stubbed my toe on a bag of dog food...lol. I immediately knew I had broken and/or dislocated it because it didn't feel correct. If you have ever broken or dislocated a bone you know what I mean. I looked down and sure enough 4 of my toes we facing south like the rest of my body, and my left pinky toe was facing south-east. I put it back in it's place and headed to urgent care where xrays showed it was indeed broken. The doctor I saw advised me to skip Bloomsday and maybe even the marathon but he said "my wife is a marathon runner, 3x Boston runner, so I know you wont listen to me...just please listen to your body."
I decided to do Bloomsday the next day and use that for my basis on whether or not I would do the marathon. Luckily I had next to no pain during Bloomsday so I decided to do an extra extra hard and long taper and go for the marathon as well.
The last three weeks of my training consisted of no running for a week, 7 miles the next week, and 9 miles the week of the marathon. The goal being to just let my toe heal as best I could.
Pre-race
The week leading up to the race I began eating more carbs and attempting to drink more water (which I am notoriously bad at still), I did one medium length run, and two super short pace runs just to get my legs feeling right since it had been few weeks since I did any serious running.The night before we ate a pasta dinner and I attempted to go to bed early.
As life would have it my oldest daughter was coughing all through the night, which would wake my younger daughter up causing her to cry, my wife tried to do the best she could to quickly calm them, but this was an all-night ordeal and unfortunately I only ended up with about 5.5 hours of decent sleep total.
I woke up at 4:30, had a shot of coffee with a glass of water, and a couple of honey stinger waffles with some peanut butter before getting ready and making the 40 min drive to CDA.
Once arriving I used the restrooms one last time, checked my bag, and headed to the starting gate to find the 4:00 pacer.
Race
My goal was to stay near the 4:00 pace runner for the first half, then negative split my way to just under 4:00 hours. This didn't work at all for me, although in retrospect it probably still would have worked about the same given my finish time. I stayed somewhat close for the first 3 miles, but once we started hitting hills I was able to keep my pace fairly consistent with little rise in HR or effort, like I said I love hills.I honestly felt freaking fantastic for the first 15 miles, and don't have much to say, I was fairly consistent with my pace given the constant ups and downs, around mile 12 though I did cost myself 1 minute by stopping to pee, but you gotta do what you gotta do right. With the first half behind me it meant the three steepest climbs were too, and it was mostly jut rolling hills until mile 21ish.
Around mile 16 is when I started to really notice it getting tougher to keep a steady pace and I had to actually "work harder" to stay at a desired pace instead of running comfortably. The sun popped out for a couple of miles around this time too, but luckily dipped back behind the clouds. Again not really a whole lot to say from mile 16 to 22 either, I could definite tell I had to try harder, but I was still going strong, just a little slower.
Around mile 21/22 is when the last decent rise in elevation came and that's when I really had to start pushing, my mind started telling me "hey man, based on your pace you could slow it down to 10min/mile and happily finish right at 4:00:00." I tried to argue with myself "good call, after this mile we'll slow it down then." But I would tell myself this after each mile to try to keep going.
I remember a reading about dedicating the last handful of miles to people in your life to keep yourself pushing so I decided to do this, mile 23 I dedicated to my dogs, mile 24 my wife (yes it was slower than my dogs, but there was a bit more hilliness okay!! And mile 23 was mostly down hill). Mile 25 was for my older daughter, and 26 was for my younger daughter (notice how they had the exact same pace, no favorites here). Once I hit mile 26 I was back in the park where the finish line was, I passed my boss who was cheering me on (she ran the half), and a short distance later I saw my wife and girls which elated me greatly and helped with the last push through the gate. My oldest daughter ran along the grass with me til the finish, and my youngest tried which was a great feeling to finish with.
Post-race
After I crossed the line I snagged my medal and immediate went to get a banana, Gatorade, and a slice of pizza. Over the course of the last year of running, I have found I need to eat immediately after finishing or I get terrible GI issues and the wrong kind of runs. I found my wife and kids we took pictures, I snagged a second slice of pizza and got my bag so we could go. Little did I know my wife wanted lunch, so we went to a little restaurant on the lake and got fish and chips, then walked to get icecream for the mall near by. Ultimately I was okay with this because walking felt better than sitting or standing still anyway. I made the drive back home (we took separate cars), took my socks and KT tape off for the first time to see an angry angry blood blister on the inside edge of my right foot (luckily not under my foot so not an issue, I am used to blisters on my right foot though...never get them on my left) I did some foam rolling and took a super hot shower, and here I am now writing this and deciding what I want for dinner.I told my wife before this started if I hit my 4 hour goal I would take a 2 year break from marathons and focus on halves...but I mean...I am already looking into fun ones in 2024...I gotta shoot for 3:45 or better now right?
Made with a new race report generator created by herumph.
2023.05.29 01:09 lumiesck I threw away all my merch, posters, etc
So… this has always been something I’ve had a hard time with and would like to get some insight. When I was 12 I discovered MCR- that was 19 years ago. My sister was 2 years younger than me and we both became obsessed with them. My youngest aunt who is just 10 years older than me introduced me at a younger age to her music- cradle of filth, smashing pumpkins, Alice In Chains, RHCP, evanescence, etc. I was already into all of that but when I discovered MCR, I felt like it was mine. like I had discovered something that was no one else’s and completely identified with their style, emotions, music, etc. We got the revenge CD and fell in love with every song, immediately we HAD to find out more about this band, so we went to Target and got the Bullets CD and fuck, that was even better. Went to our first concert in 2007, my mom was waiting for us in the car and their manager saw her, asked her ‘are you here for the concert?’ And she said ‘no I’m just waiting for my daughters’ she was wearing an MCR shirt and he said ‘do you wanna see the show?’ And of course she said yes, he weaseled her backstage, she took pictures of their instruments, bus, equipment, stage, and then they sat her in the audio/lights section and she enjoyed the show from there. She didn’t meet the guys but that was MORE THAN ENOUGH. We were enjoying the show without knowing any of this because we had flip phones and we couldn’t txt or send pictures without getting charged- we were just supposed to call her when the show was over. When we left, we met my mom at the car and when she showed us the pictures, we completely lost it- hugged, jumped around, and cried. How amazing and well deserved. Got the originally umbrella academy, every poster I saw at Walmart, FYE, hot topic, etc. plastered them in my room. Got band tee shirts from hot topic, My Chemical Romance was everything for us. Not only was the music the best music I’ve ever heard, but their messages in interviews shaped the way I am today still. Gerard saying they didn’t like groupies and to say FUCK YOU to anyone in a band that was trying to take advantage of you. They were/are always so unproblematic (although HUMAN duh) and kind. Bullets and Revenge shaped me, TBP came around and I recorded their MTV debut just in case I was gonna miss it, but of course I didn’t. Watching them perform TBP for the first time live at the VMAs on top of a building felt… weird. I was 14/15 at that time and I didn’t feel a connection with this song but it was still rad! I watched the performance and felt a little empty but still loved them. My sister was in middle school and I was in high school at this point- she shared such a nice story with me and how we gained a bestfriend. She was in PE and had a really sad face (she was also wearing H.I.M. shoes iykyk) a random girl came up to her and asked her what was wrong and why was she so sad? Her response ‘my favorite band is not the same’ and her friend said ‘are you talking about MCR’s performance last night?’ And there they became bestfriends. MCR was always a staple in the way I did everything. I won a statewide poetry contest because of them. We eventually got used to the black parade album and loved every song but especially the B side. Wow, what a beautiful feeling and whirlwind. Eventually I got married and started to do my own thing, Killjoys/CW came out and it wasn’t really my thing but still loved them. And then they announced their breakup in 2013… I was living with my husband already and my sister called me ‘hey, go to the MCR website, read everything’ I thought it was a new better album, or new merch. Was I wrong.. I read Gerard’s open letter to his fans and fucking lost it. Especially the last paragraph- to paraphrase ‘My Chemical Romance will always live inside all of you- because it’s not a band but an idea.’ WHAT??! Are you serious? You saved my life FFS. I drove to my parents’ house immediately and went to the ‘holy grail’ our closet that had everything MCR. Took out our posters, shirts, CDs, comic books (original umbrella academy), hats, etc. I gave things away to my friends that still liked them and the rest I sold at a yard sale. Other stuff I took to Goodwill. My sister CONVINCED me to keep the discography so I gave them to her and told her to keep it in a safe place where I couldn’t see it. Man.. why did it hurt so much? Why did a band make me feel so much pain? Thank God she saved the CDs because I hate myself for all of this. I stopped listening to them and kept it moving. Don’t know any of Gerard’s hesitant aliens songs or any dunes songs. I just ignored all the noise and moved through life as of MCR never existed. They got back together in 2019 and coincidentally I was going though my divorce, my sister called me and she was gonna buy tickets to see them but we weren’t lucky enough. Our bestfriend was living in LA and went and sent us videos. Wow how lucky! I got hooked again and eventually we bought tickets to 2 shows on the east coast and we saw them twice. They sand Vapore Will Never Hurt you… my favorite song on the world. I cannot descruce our emotions. I love my sister and this as more than I love anything else. I kicked myself over the merch and stuff I gave away for so long but idc anymore. I don’t even care if they don’t have a new album, if they are happy- I’m happy. I would hate for them to feel the pressure again to just pop a random album. I love MCE with every single one of my veins until the day I take my last breath.
submitted by lumiesck to MyChemicalRomance [link] [comments]
2023.05.29 01:04 Wannabeitzay my brother is 16, has ocd and autism and isnt getting better.
Some background info: My parents work 9-5 jobs. My brother started showing signs (not listening when being called/ couldn't pronounce some words or letters) when he was 3-4 and my parents took him to the doctor who gave him a medicine that would make him sleep for hours. My parents got scared and stopped giving it to him and thought he'd be fine if he went to a normal school and grew up with normal kids. As he grew up he would scream and cry nonstop and throw tantrums and hit his siblings. My dad would hit him as a punishment for this.
After the age 14 my dad stopped hitting him after meeting with the doctors but he started hitting my parents, verbally abusing and shouting a LOTT. He HATED AND HATES his siblings esp me (his sister) and claims i always spit in his food, or go into his room and spit there? I have repeatedly told him i don't do that but he doesn't listen.
We took him to doctors but he WOULD NOT take the medicine they gave him saying "they were drugs" and "they erase his personality" and "there's nothing wrong w him and the doctors are frauds trying to make money". He used to debate about stuff endlessly and get so angry over small things and yell so much and hit everyone. Things got quite bad and he was sent to the hospital so that atleast he could be forced to take his medicine (Two tablets of flux and one tablet olanzia). He returned after 2 weeks and he was better and calmer.
Today his biggest problem is his food and aggression. He won't eat homecooked meal thinking its contaminated and that I spat in it. He orders from a hospital cuz he knows hospital food would be clean. He has lost weight due to such eating habits. He yells and yells if my parents refuse to pay for his food and tell him to eat what's cooked at home. He also yells if my parents refuse to pay for his grocery that he orders such as soap, toothpaste, toilet cleaner, mouthwash which costs a lot since he doesn't use a mouthwash bottle twice. He mostly stays inside his room on his phone. He doesn't have friends or a social life. He doesn't let anyone in his room except his parents sometimes. When he goes out of the house, which is rare, he locks the door and puts a tape on it and takes a picture of the knob so that i don't try to enter. When he sleeps he's worried ill come to his room to spit on his stuff even though he has locked the door from two sides. If my dad removes his lock so that he stops doing this, he yells endlessly again. He didn't go to school the last six months cuz every morning there he would SCREAM because he didnt want to go. We got him tuition instead but he didn't study, said he couldn't focus and didnt even go to give the exam.
Today, although he is a bit better, he's taking a slightly higher dosage of medicine. The thing is, we cant just keep increasing his medicine. He needs therapy and he refuses to take therapy and HATES his doctors and says there's nothing such as ocd or mental illness and its all bs. We book therapy appointments for him but he refuses to go saying he hasn't bathed, hasn't eaten or has other stuff to do.
Before I end, I want to talk about his claim that I spit on his food. This started when I was 14 and he was 12. He would hit me and annoy me and I knew I wasn't as strong as him so instead of hitting him back, I would threaten him that if he hits me, I will spit on him. Reality is to this day I have never spat on him or his food. In fact HE has spat on me 2x. I never ever thought that me threatening him would lead to this.
My parents and I are worried sick. Pls someone help if you have a similar story or any advice especially on trying to get him to attend his therapy sessions.
ps. the today in bold shows the CURRENT situation, not the past.
submitted by Wannabeitzay to autism [link] [comments]
After the age 14 my dad stopped hitting him after meeting with the doctors but he started hitting my parents, verbally abusing and shouting a LOTT. He HATED AND HATES his siblings esp me (his sister) and claims i always spit in his food, or go into his room and spit there? I have repeatedly told him i don't do that but he doesn't listen.
We took him to doctors but he WOULD NOT take the medicine they gave him saying "they were drugs" and "they erase his personality" and "there's nothing wrong w him and the doctors are frauds trying to make money". He used to debate about stuff endlessly and get so angry over small things and yell so much and hit everyone. Things got quite bad and he was sent to the hospital so that atleast he could be forced to take his medicine (Two tablets of flux and one tablet olanzia). He returned after 2 weeks and he was better and calmer.
Today his biggest problem is his food and aggression. He won't eat homecooked meal thinking its contaminated and that I spat in it. He orders from a hospital cuz he knows hospital food would be clean. He has lost weight due to such eating habits. He yells and yells if my parents refuse to pay for his food and tell him to eat what's cooked at home. He also yells if my parents refuse to pay for his grocery that he orders such as soap, toothpaste, toilet cleaner, mouthwash which costs a lot since he doesn't use a mouthwash bottle twice. He mostly stays inside his room on his phone. He doesn't have friends or a social life. He doesn't let anyone in his room except his parents sometimes. When he goes out of the house, which is rare, he locks the door and puts a tape on it and takes a picture of the knob so that i don't try to enter. When he sleeps he's worried ill come to his room to spit on his stuff even though he has locked the door from two sides. If my dad removes his lock so that he stops doing this, he yells endlessly again. He didn't go to school the last six months cuz every morning there he would SCREAM because he didnt want to go. We got him tuition instead but he didn't study, said he couldn't focus and didnt even go to give the exam.
Today, although he is a bit better, he's taking a slightly higher dosage of medicine. The thing is, we cant just keep increasing his medicine. He needs therapy and he refuses to take therapy and HATES his doctors and says there's nothing such as ocd or mental illness and its all bs. We book therapy appointments for him but he refuses to go saying he hasn't bathed, hasn't eaten or has other stuff to do.
Before I end, I want to talk about his claim that I spit on his food. This started when I was 14 and he was 12. He would hit me and annoy me and I knew I wasn't as strong as him so instead of hitting him back, I would threaten him that if he hits me, I will spit on him. Reality is to this day I have never spat on him or his food. In fact HE has spat on me 2x. I never ever thought that me threatening him would lead to this.
My parents and I are worried sick. Pls someone help if you have a similar story or any advice especially on trying to get him to attend his therapy sessions.
ps. the today in bold shows the CURRENT situation, not the past.
2023.05.29 01:03 Wannabeitzay my brother is 16, has ocd and autism and isnt getting better.
Some background info: My parents work 9-5 jobs. My brother started showing signs (not listening when being called/ couldn't pronounce some words or letters) when he was 3-4 and my parents took him to the doctor who gave him a medicine that would make him sleep for hours. My parents got scared and stopped giving it to him and thought he'd be fine if he went to a normal school and grew up with normal kids. As he grew up he would scream nonstop and throw tantrums and hit his siblings.
After age 14, my dad stopped hitting him after meeting with the doctors but he started hitting my parents, verbally abusing and shouting a LOTT. He HATED AND HATES his siblings esp me (his sister) and claims i always spit in his food, or go into his room and spit there? I have repeatedly told him i don't do that but he doesn't listen.
We took him to doctors but he WOULD NOT take the medicine they gave him saying "they were drugs" and "they erase his personality" and "there's nothing wrong w him and the doctors are frauds trying to make money". He used to debate about stuff endlessly and get so angry over small things and yell so much and hit everyone. Things got quite bad and he was sent to the hospital so that atleast he could be forced to take his medicine (Two tablets of flux and one tablet olanzia). He returned after 2 weeks and he was better and calmer.
Today his biggest problem is his food and his aggression. He won't eat homecooked meal thinking its contaminated and that I spat in it. He orders from a hospital cuz he knows hospital food would be clean. He has lost weight due to such eating habits. He yells and yells if my parents refuse to pay for his food and tell him to eat what's cooked at home. He also yells if my parents refuse to pay for his grocery that he orders such as soap, toothpaste, toilet cleaner, mouthwash which costs a lot since he doesn't use a mouthwash bottle twice. He mostly stays inside his room on his phone. He doesn't have friends or a social life. He doesn't let anyone in his room except his parents sometimes. When he goes out of the house, which is rare, he locks the door and puts a tape on it and takes a picture of the knob so that i don't try to enter. When he sleeps he's worried ill come to his room to spit on his stuff even though he has locked the door from two sides. If my dad removes his lock so that he stops doing this, he yells endlessly again. He didn't go to school the last six months cuz every morning there he would SCREAM because he didnt want to go. We got him tuition instead but he didn't study, said he couldn't focus and didnt even go to give the exam.
Today, although he is a bit better, he;s taking a slightly higher dosage of medicine. The thing is, we cant just keep increasing his medicine. He needs therapy and he refuses to take therapy and HATES his doctors and says there's nothing such as ocd or mental illness and its all bs. We book therapy appointments for him but he refuses to go saying he hasn't bathed, hasn't eaten or has other stuff to do.
Before I end, i want to talk about his claim that I spit on his food. This started when I was 14 and he was 12. He would hit me and annoy me and I knew I wasn't as strong as him so instead of hitting him, I would threaten him that if he hits me, I will spit on him. Reality is to this day I have never spat on him or his food. In fact HE has spat on me 2x. I never ever thought that me threatening him would lead to this.
My parents and I are worried sick. Pls someone help if you have a similar story or any advice especially on trying to get him to attend his therapy sessions.
ps. the today in bold shows the CURRENT situation, not the past.
submitted by Wannabeitzay to Autism_Parenting [link] [comments]
After age 14, my dad stopped hitting him after meeting with the doctors but he started hitting my parents, verbally abusing and shouting a LOTT. He HATED AND HATES his siblings esp me (his sister) and claims i always spit in his food, or go into his room and spit there? I have repeatedly told him i don't do that but he doesn't listen.
We took him to doctors but he WOULD NOT take the medicine they gave him saying "they were drugs" and "they erase his personality" and "there's nothing wrong w him and the doctors are frauds trying to make money". He used to debate about stuff endlessly and get so angry over small things and yell so much and hit everyone. Things got quite bad and he was sent to the hospital so that atleast he could be forced to take his medicine (Two tablets of flux and one tablet olanzia). He returned after 2 weeks and he was better and calmer.
Today his biggest problem is his food and his aggression. He won't eat homecooked meal thinking its contaminated and that I spat in it. He orders from a hospital cuz he knows hospital food would be clean. He has lost weight due to such eating habits. He yells and yells if my parents refuse to pay for his food and tell him to eat what's cooked at home. He also yells if my parents refuse to pay for his grocery that he orders such as soap, toothpaste, toilet cleaner, mouthwash which costs a lot since he doesn't use a mouthwash bottle twice. He mostly stays inside his room on his phone. He doesn't have friends or a social life. He doesn't let anyone in his room except his parents sometimes. When he goes out of the house, which is rare, he locks the door and puts a tape on it and takes a picture of the knob so that i don't try to enter. When he sleeps he's worried ill come to his room to spit on his stuff even though he has locked the door from two sides. If my dad removes his lock so that he stops doing this, he yells endlessly again. He didn't go to school the last six months cuz every morning there he would SCREAM because he didnt want to go. We got him tuition instead but he didn't study, said he couldn't focus and didnt even go to give the exam.
Today, although he is a bit better, he;s taking a slightly higher dosage of medicine. The thing is, we cant just keep increasing his medicine. He needs therapy and he refuses to take therapy and HATES his doctors and says there's nothing such as ocd or mental illness and its all bs. We book therapy appointments for him but he refuses to go saying he hasn't bathed, hasn't eaten or has other stuff to do.
Before I end, i want to talk about his claim that I spit on his food. This started when I was 14 and he was 12. He would hit me and annoy me and I knew I wasn't as strong as him so instead of hitting him, I would threaten him that if he hits me, I will spit on him. Reality is to this day I have never spat on him or his food. In fact HE has spat on me 2x. I never ever thought that me threatening him would lead to this.
My parents and I are worried sick. Pls someone help if you have a similar story or any advice especially on trying to get him to attend his therapy sessions.
ps. the today in bold shows the CURRENT situation, not the past.
2023.05.29 01:01 Ashamed_Mastodon_741 narcissistic abuse
I have videos of her eyes going black in 2 different psychotic episodes afterwards, then I told her that I knew she’d been bad mouthing me and lying to all of my people about me but I wasn’t worried my people know me well and they’d never buy that horse shi*, she slapped me then said “great now your gunna tell everyone that I’m physically abusive” and I said nah I’m not telling anybody anything about this because I’m ashamed I let you do that and I’m still sitting here tryna get you to work on yourself, and that whatever happened (arguments/disagreements) we had weren’t anybody else business and they shouldn’t be involved, you could tell that brutal honesty blew her mind, and shattered her methods bc she obviously told others about shid that I did that didn’t even happen. I told her prior to all this about what she told my people that you can play the victim in all your past relationships if you want to I wasn’t there, but your not a victim of me and I’m not gunna allow you pretend like you are. I’m not perfect but I’m not the cheater or the abuser, then for the next few days before I got all my stuff and went back to my house, she would start back with the accusations of cheating ect that never happened, I told her I’ve already explained all of this to you more than once I’m gunna step outside for 10 minutes and let you cool down so you don’t start a big fight over it again, (I knew she was purposely provoking me) to get a negative reaction to try to paint the picture of me as the abuser, and I told her she wins the game I’m no longer participating, she had a list of all the mean things I said to her so she could remember them (bc—Xanax)(wich on another note I can’t find any info on Xanax linking to NPD strangely bc I know I’ve witnessed Xanax make empaths heartless) I took her list and wrote over the top over the top of all the statements “-he said this back to me after I said this” bc that’s the truth example: she said, “your only good for one thing” I literally instantly repeated the same statement back to her. Then got to hear about me telling her that she was only good for one thing over and over periodically throughout the next few weeks and all I had to say was “I only said that back to you after you said it to me first,” it left her in silence every time, the truth also left her in silence after she tried to start arguments and I made a point she would repeat the words “your right over and over again in frustration as she ran off to sit in silence and for-fit trying to get me to lash out so she could justify in her own mind whatever sinister ish she was doing behind my back, I left she called and said -she could use a friend, and I told her okay but I’m not giving you any D without a title and loyalty to me I don’t want it if it ain’t all mine, I’m better than that.. Lol then she went back to her ex faithful supply : simp shreck, (huge downgrade) not to boast but fr. I think I sent her in to a state of absolute panic and to protect her ego she probably won’t ever aim this high again, and he’s gunna let her walk all over him over and over and over, and not force her to meet herself or stop validating her No matter what she does to him. It’s a crying shame and I still pray for her daily, she’s beautiful, and she’s covert, she lets some of her insecurities show but she won’t talk about her childhood, I don’t know who hurt her, but she knows that she hurts people, and I think she wants to change. I think she’s self aware (she would never admit it) , but it’s as if she can’t help herself because of how insecure she is it’s like she thinks being the player, protects her from being played, and the happier she gets the more she self sabotages like the next day, she hates herself so much. And I know it’s because of the things she has done to destroy people (her ex husband) , she can’t live with the guilt of any of it, so she makes herself believe this false reality, she thinks if anyone knew who she really was and saw the blood stains on her hands they’d never forgive her or love her. the truth would set her free, but the truth would make her the abuser, not the victim, and she feeds on empathy from the lies, I hope one day she beats her demons. I know she wants to tell the truth so badly but she doesn’t think the real her is worthy of anything good, so for now she’d rather her hollow words keep making shallow graves. It’s like nothing could convince her to turn back from the wrong road she went down even tho I can assure you no one would hate her,
(My prescription- of the truth )she says her ex husband was abusive, I really thought he was. He admitted to the PD of everything that she accused him of, But hear me out- she accused me of shoving her when I grabbed her phone to look at it when she started the devaluation phase, she ran at me dived at me and then fell on the floor i did not shove her, (I have 5 sisters and a baby mama that treated me worse than any girl including her ever would and they can attest that I would never physically hurt a female For any reason) after she accused me of this she kept bringing it up the following next few weeks saying that she could live with what I did if i would Just admit that I did it. I REFUSED TO ADMIT TO SOMTHING I DIDNT DO, but i know that she would have shut up about it and stoped asking me to confess to it if I said I did it anyways, but i would never , her ex husband was a simp for lack of a better term. And I believe she spent 7 years conditioning him, to admit to things he never did so that she would let them go and stop bringing them up, and then she’d probably love bomb so long as he did, I think when he went to the PD to admit to this it could have very possibly been an act of desperation to get her to let him come home, possibly he never thought she’d take it this far before she told the truth to keep him from going to prison over it. But his court case is coming up, and she’s showed no sign of changing her story. But what I’m pretty sure is the guilt and the shame is suffocating her to the point she can’t sleep she’s losing her mind and is in a state of psychosis thinking someone is stalking her she’s so paranoid about what she’s done. She can’t live with herself causing her to further self destruct/sabotage
-please pray that whatever the truth is it comes out I’m not interfering with something that I didn’t witness but no one deserves prison for a crime they didn’t commit. I’m only human and I could be wrong and he could be guilty. And she could just be self sabotaging because of what he did to her who knows. But somthing I do know of for sure is that she was cheating on him and he knew about it before he ever married her I think she married him out of spite because his parents told him to never talk to them again if he married her, and she was probably laughing the whole way through and married him because she just knew he would put up with anything she did to him, (him probably thinking that would make her see how much he loved her and change her one day)-ignorance at its peak.
I had to vent anonymously
submitted by Ashamed_Mastodon_741 to NarcissisticAbuse [link] [comments]
(My prescription- of the truth )she says her ex husband was abusive, I really thought he was. He admitted to the PD of everything that she accused him of, But hear me out- she accused me of shoving her when I grabbed her phone to look at it when she started the devaluation phase, she ran at me dived at me and then fell on the floor i did not shove her, (I have 5 sisters and a baby mama that treated me worse than any girl including her ever would and they can attest that I would never physically hurt a female For any reason) after she accused me of this she kept bringing it up the following next few weeks saying that she could live with what I did if i would Just admit that I did it. I REFUSED TO ADMIT TO SOMTHING I DIDNT DO, but i know that she would have shut up about it and stoped asking me to confess to it if I said I did it anyways, but i would never , her ex husband was a simp for lack of a better term. And I believe she spent 7 years conditioning him, to admit to things he never did so that she would let them go and stop bringing them up, and then she’d probably love bomb so long as he did, I think when he went to the PD to admit to this it could have very possibly been an act of desperation to get her to let him come home, possibly he never thought she’d take it this far before she told the truth to keep him from going to prison over it. But his court case is coming up, and she’s showed no sign of changing her story. But what I’m pretty sure is the guilt and the shame is suffocating her to the point she can’t sleep she’s losing her mind and is in a state of psychosis thinking someone is stalking her she’s so paranoid about what she’s done. She can’t live with herself causing her to further self destruct/sabotage
-please pray that whatever the truth is it comes out I’m not interfering with something that I didn’t witness but no one deserves prison for a crime they didn’t commit. I’m only human and I could be wrong and he could be guilty. And she could just be self sabotaging because of what he did to her who knows. But somthing I do know of for sure is that she was cheating on him and he knew about it before he ever married her I think she married him out of spite because his parents told him to never talk to them again if he married her, and she was probably laughing the whole way through and married him because she just knew he would put up with anything she did to him, (him probably thinking that would make her see how much he loved her and change her one day)-ignorance at its peak.
I had to vent anonymously
2023.05.29 00:58 TSMaynard1 [RF] ABP "Always Be Preparing"
Pine needles brushed across Paul's arms as he charged through the trees with his bugout bag slung over his shoulders. Weighing in at forty pounds, it hardly slowed him down as he’d practiced this hike many times. He flicked his wrist and checked his Garmin Solar 2 Tactical Watch. The timer read: 2:23.
“You can do this, Paul.” He increased the pace and gritted his teeth, the weight finally having an effect. Paul bounded over a small creek, up a rolling hill, and pushed through a row of baby birches into a clearing. He doubled over to catch his breath and looked at his watch one more time. Two hours and twenty-eight minutes. Paul pumped his fist in victory.
After a short break, he approached a thorny bush in the center of the clearing. Paul brushed aside sand at the bush’s trunk, revealing a yellow rope. He pulled it, which lifted a hidden door in the ground covered with dirt, shrubbery, and other camouflage on the top side, and drab gray iron on the other. Underneath, wooden stairs descended into darkness. Paul retrieved a flashlight from his pack, clicked on the beam, and disappeared into the earth.
At the bottom of the steps, Paul faced a steel door and a combination lock. With several quick swipes of the dial, he opened the lock and tugged the metal door, which creaked as it cracked open. Paul flashed the beam on the offending hinges and shook his head. Something to fix later. He stepped into the secret chamber and pulled a hanging aluminum chain that turned on a large halogen light, illuminating a twenty-foot by eight-foot metal rectangle. The exposed corrugated walls revealed the bunker was nothing more than a shipping container. Paul buried it two years ago and had divided the interior into three spaces. The entry had a shelf with four dozen gallon jugs of sealed water along with a portable toilet, stacks of toilet paper, and a wastebasket. The middle section was the main living area and contained a futon, a TV with a DVD player, and a neat collection of movies underneath. A nightstand housed a small library of books, including the Bible, The Art of Meditation, Buddhism for Dummies, and other spiritual tomes. The back area of the unit had two shelves filled with canned food—black beans, green beans, peaches, peas, carrots, beef, and chicken. There was also a stationary bike, which was Paul’s proudest accomplishment because he had rigged it to a giant battery that provided power to all the electronics.
Paul was a prepper, and this would be his home when the end of the world came, an event he believed was imminent. The global economy was a house of cards built on greed, corruption, and inflated asset prices, but worst of all, it was based on a faith in paper and digital money.
His fear was triggered four years ago when he attended a lecture by a professor who explained the fragility of the world’s financial system. If a few banks failed, it would rattle people’s confidence, causing a herd-like response. Thousands of people would rush to withdraw their cash, which the banks no longer had because they’d invested it. The banks would either fail, and everyday folks would lose their life savings, or the government would print new money to replace the missing money, making all money worth a lot less. Anyone holding dollars would attempt to convert them to other assets.
Just like dominoes, the banks would topple over one by one, and as they crashed, people’s faith in money would crater. After all, what was money? It was just paper with printed images and numbers that we’d all accepted as having value. More recently, money had become numbers displayed on a computer screen, something Paul knew firsthand as he spent the first seven years of his career working at a regional bank in Asheville, North Carolina. Paul could literally change someone’s net worth with a few keystrokes. He could turn a pauper into a millionaire, or he could bankrupt the richest account holder. Sure, there were safeguards, but all were built on faith, which Paul believed was misplaced. Most people didn’t realize that the Federal Reserve only required each bank to hold at least ten percent of its deposits as a reserve. Ten percent. That’s it. The rest of the money was invested in loans or other financial instruments. As the rich bank owners and executives pushed for bigger and bigger returns, they invested in riskier and riskier assets. The lessons from the financial crisis of 2008 had been forgotten.
Once the monetary system collapsed, the entire economy would become paralyzed. Without a means of exchange, transactions would halt. Think about it. If someone tried to give you a slip of paper that you thought was worthless, would you give them anything of value in return?
The doomsday scenario would escalate. Food and water prices would skyrocket, but with no way to purchase them, many would starve. But people don’t just roll over and die, they would riot and take what they need to survive. Marshall Law would be implemented, but citizens would revolt against the government they felt had cheated them.
As Paul listened to the lecturer that fateful day, a depressing epiphany struck. Everything he’d learned and everything he’d spent his life acquiring was worthless.
Growing up, Paul had been taught the value of money, saving, and planning for retirement. He internalized these lessons as a teen after his father got sick and lost his job. His mother had died when he was very young, but his father still managed to provide him with a stable childhood, even though they were barely middle class. When his father fell ill, Paul witnessed firsthand how fast a family could sink into financial trouble, which couldn’t have come at a worse time. He was applying to colleges, and instead of choosing the one he liked best, he chose the one that gave him the most financial aid, which turned out to be a small school half-way across the country. He also didn’t choose a major he was excited about; he chose the one that would offer the safest financial prospects—economics with an emphasis on banking.
The distance from home meant that Paul didn’t see the rapid deterioration of his father. It wasn’t until he returned for the funeral that family friends told him how the disease had spread. His father had refused to let anyone tell Paul because he didn’t want that to distract Paul from his studies.
After graduating, Paul accepted a job at a bank, and immediately signed up for the company’s 401K match. Most college graduates can't grasp retirement when they enter the workforce, but a 401K match was free money. Over the next several years, Paul worked diligently to advance his career while saving most of his salary. He’d mapped out his life on an excel spreadsheet and calculated that he’d be financially secure at 53.
Everything went according to plan until that damn lecturer came along and blew it up. Sifting through the rubble of his grand scheme, Paul realized that in the new world order, he possessed no skills to survive. The savings he’d so meticulously built up would have little to no value. When the economy collapsed, he'd be like a baby, unable to do anything for himself.
After a week of wallowing in despair, Paul rallied himself. “I can still fix this” became a daily mantra. To start, he threw himself into survival classes. The first was a basic camping course where he learned how to create shelters and start a fire. The next class was more advanced and focused on water purification and building snares for small game.
Paul continued working at the bank, because he needed to pay for the classes and survival equipment he began hoarding, but on his next vacation, he put his training to the test. He planned to camp for a week in the Appalachian Mountains, but the temperature swings, especially at night, were too much. Paul lasted three nights in the wild. The humbling experience forced him to admit that he wasn’t a bushman. His depression returned until he stumbled upon an article about “preppers”—individuals who prepare for end of world disasters. Suddenly, things made sense. He didn’t need to abandon all the comforts of modern society. He needed to prepare for the end of the world the way he had planned for retirement.
As Paul traveled down the rabbit hole of prepping, he uncovered an underground society of people like him who knew the truth about the world’s demise. Of course, not everyone believed it would end because of an economic collapse. Some thought a nuclear war would destroy civilization. Others feared electromagnetic pulses from the sun would wipe out all modern electricity. And still others worried a massive volcanic eruption would spew enough ash and soot into the air to blot out the sun. There was no shortage of theories about the world ending, but one thing was clear. The world would end. Did it matter how it happened?
Paul began his prepping quest by purchasing ten acres an hour and a half outside of Asheville. It had plenty of small animals and a creek running through the middle. He then transported an unused cargo container to the land and buried it. This was the toughest part of the plan because it required heavy equipment. Next, he dug out a staircase and installed a steel door at the entrance. Finally, he furnished it with a mix of modern comforts and survival essentials.
Almost every weekend, Paul trekked to his underground sanctuary and made improvements. He also planned his bugout strategy. When the end of the world hit, he figured he needed to be safely hidden in his home within two and a half hours, a time he had achieved with this latest trip. Everything was set, and Paul could finally relax. He was prepared.
Paul slumped down on his futon and considered playing a movie or cracking the bottle of Jim Beam whiskey he stored in a special cabinet, but he shook off the urge. Those things were the rewards and comforts he’d enjoy after the world ended. His fingers rubbed the top of the Bible, something he planned to read cover to cover once the global economy cratered. He’d have plenty of time then to discover his spiritual side, but not now. Something else needed to be done. Something he’d missed.
The biggest mistake a prepper can make is assuming he had everything covered. This was the lesson taught by Yannis, the guru of the prepping world. He was so well-known within the doomsday community; he only went by one name. The guy was sharp as a whip and could live off the land, if necessary, but he preferred a more sophisticated lifestyle, so he created a luxurious cave that contained backup systems for all his backups. Food, water, shelter, and electricity were all taken care of, and it was projected that Yannis could survive ten years comfortably after the apocalypse. His famous blog titled “ABP” stood for Always Be Preparing. It was a motto Yannis lived by and something Paul aspired to, but as he sat in his bunker after the relentless hike, fatigue set in. He didn’t want to think about prepping or his bugout strategy. He wanted to just be.
Paul tilted his head back onto the futon’s cushion, and a loneliness crept into his mind. All his prepping left little time for relationships. He dated off and on in college, but it was never anything serious. It wasn’t like his high school sweetheart, Kristin Summer. They dated junior and senior year, but then Paul broke it off when his father got sick. Paul couldn’t focus on romance, and he knew the relationship wouldn’t have worked when he left for school 1,500 miles away. It still hurt when he learned from a friend that Kristin started dating Derek Gorman, an old classmate Paul hated. It hurt even more when he found out they had gotten married.
After college, Paul joined a couple of dating sites, but he hadn’t used them in over two years. Most women wouldn’t understand his prepping lifestyle, at least that’s what he feared, so he rejected dating before anyone could reject him. But most wasn't all, and with eight billion people on the planet, there had to be someone for him. Almost without thinking, Paul pulled out his phone and opened “My Match,” the site where he’d had the most luck. His profile still had a photo from his early banking days. He was clean shaven with a naïve smile. The face staring back in the picture differed greatly from the bearded survivalist he’d become. Would anyone consider a relationship with the new Paul? Only one way to find out. He snapped a selfie, uploaded it, and then updated his hobbies with the first being “prepping” followed by “survival skills training.” He finished by pressing the button that showed he was actively looking for someone. All he had to do now was wait.
After spending the night in his bunker, Paul checked the dating site in the morning. No response. “It was a stupid idea,” he told himself, and stuffed his phone back into his pocket. He locked his container and returned home.
Over the next two weeks, Paul received zero requests for a date. He didn’t even receive a message from anyone to start a conversation and test the waters. “Shake it off, dumbass,” he said alone in the confines of his cottage-style home. “The world is going to end, anyway.” He clenched his jaw and did what he always did. He researched more ways to survive. Paul poured over blog posts and imagined worst-case scenarios. How could his water be contaminated? Maybe he should bury some caches of water. What if someone finds his shelter? Maybe security cameras were needed. What if he gets lonely in his shelter? No ideas came to mind.
After his eyes got tired from reading, Paul clicked out of his browser, and the list of all his apps stared at him. For reasons unknown to him, he opened Facebook, something he hadn’t done for months. There were a handful of notifications and a couple of friend requests sent weeks ago. His heart raced when he saw the name of one—Kristin Summer. When he accepted, he saw she was on-line right then.
Should he message her? Would that be weird right after accepting her request? But wasn’t it weird that he hadn’t responded for several weeks? He pulled up the messenger and typed. “Hey. Sorry for the delay in accepting your request. Hadn’t been on Facebook in a while. Been busy. Hope you and Derek are well.”
He curled his lip in disgust as he typed Derek’s name and considered deleting it, but he took the moral high ground and hit “send” with his message unaltered.
Kristin Summer. Just the thought of her name brought a smile to Paul’s face.
Bing.
The sound alerted Paul to a response, which he read out loud. “Hey Paul. Good to hear from you. Derek and I divorced a little over a year ago. It was rough at first, but it was for the best. How are you?”
Paul’s eyes widened with shock and excitement. He couldn’t believe Derek was so stupid to let Kristin go. Paul could at least blame their breakup on his father’s illness. His fingers prattled away on the keyboard. “Things are amazing.” He stopped typing. That was a lie. Should he pretend like things were great or should he be honest and tell her about his prepping and the end of the world? Neither option sounded appealing. He tapped the keys without writing until he settled on something uncontroversial.
“Working at Trinity Bank in Asheville. It pays the bills. Where are you?”
Within a minute, the sweet sound of the notification binged. “I’m not too far away in Durham. If you’re ever in town, let me know.”
If you’re ever in town, let me know.
Paul couldn’t believe his eyes. Was Kristin asking him out? He shook his head. Nah, she’s probably just being polite. But maybe. If there was any chance, he had to find out. He chewed his lip and deliberated his next response. Fortune favors the bold, he told himself. Then he remembered Matt Damon telling people that in the now infamous commercial for FTX months before its collapse. When that occurred, Paul thought it was the beginning of the end, and he lived in his bunker for two days before emerging and finding the world still intact.
Paul clenched his fist. It was still good advice, and he had to try. Almost involuntarily, he typed, “I’ll be there tomorrow afternoon. If you want to get together, let me know.” His finger hit send before he could talk himself out of it. There was no qualification in the message. No waffling or hedging. It was clear Paul wanted to see Kristin. The only question now was whether she wanted to see him.
The next ten minutes felt like ten days. Paul paced back and forth with his hands over his head, and he glanced at the monitor every few seconds, just in case his ears had missed the notification alert.
There was nothing.
A dark depression filled the room. Why had he gotten his hopes up? What was the point, anyway? The world was going to end.
Bing.
Paul leapt to the computer and his eyes widened with each word he read. “How about a lunch at The Fig Tree Restaurant on 7th?”
People overuse the word literally, but Paul at least felt like his jaw was literally on the floor. He had a date with Kristin Summer, the one woman he had loved. His hands rattled away at the keyboard. “See you at 1 tomorrow.”
“Holy crap,” he muttered to himself.
Panic replaced his excitement when he imagined sitting down and talking to Kristin. What would he say? “Hey Kristin, what have you been up to? Oh me? I’ve been working at a job I hate and planning for the end of the world.”
He drifted into the bathroom and stared at the scruffy character in the mirror. Paul could only cringe at the thought of Kristin’s reaction upon seeing him. She might not recognize the bearded loner who resembled Ted Kaczynski more than the short-haired, clean-shaven teen she last saw.
Only one thing to do.
Paul had to prepare. He opened a drawer and pulled out a pair of clippers. He began trimming his beard and mustache as short as the clippers would allow. Next, he applied a generous amount of cream and shaved all of it off. Paul smirked at the young man hiding under the shabby beard, but it still wasn’t enough. He set the guard on the clippers to a four and began shaving his head. In college, Paul cut his own hair to save money, and the skill came back to him quickly. He dropped to a three and worked in a fade on the sides and then finished with a two. Paul turned to the left, then to the right, and assessed his work. Not bad.
Next thing to prepare was his outfit. Paul slid the door of his closet open and evaluated his choices. A banker’s suit was too stuffy, and his mountain man denim was too hermit inspired. He yanked the clothes aside and climbed deeper into the recesses of his wardrobe until he found a nice buttoned-down shirt and a dark pair of slacks. It gave just the right vibe of successful and stable, while not trying too hard to impress, even though that was his precisely his goal. Paul laid the selection on the chair by his bed. Durham was a three-and-a-half-hour drive away, and he wanted to make sure he got there with time to find parking, and maybe use the restroom. He set the alarm on his iPhone for 6 a.m. That would give him plenty of time to take a shower, have breakfast, and get dressed.
There was no chance of falling asleep easily. His mind raced with thoughts, questions, and various scenarios about what the day would bring. To relax, he poured himself a double whiskey, which he downed with a single slurp. He poured another and sipped.
Kristin Summer. He shook his head, still in disbelief.
As the effect of alcohol set in, Paul laid down on his bed and shut his eyes. Tomorrow would be a good day.
Paul slipped into a deep, satisfying sleep until his mind jolted him awake. It was past 6 a.m. He didn’t know how he knew. He just knew. Paul had slept through his alarm. He snatched his phone off the nightstand, but it was out of battery. He checked his watch and saw it was 7 a.m. There was still time to get to Durham.
Paul jumped out of bed and into the bathroom. He flicked on the light switch, but nothing came on. Paul toggled it on and off, but the outlet was dead.
Police sirens wailed in the distance. Paul meandered out of his house and onto the front lawn. Aside from the sirens, there was an uneasy stillness. Paul’s neighbor Kurt ran out from his home with two suitcases that he flung into the trunk of his car.
“Kurt. What’s going on?” Paul asked.
“Fort Knox was bombed. All the gold was obliterated. And something happened to the electricity and the internet. They shut it down.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know, man, but it’s not good. No one has access to news, no money, nothing.”
“Where are you going?” Paul asked.
“I don’t know. Somewhere isolated. I’m just hoping there are no more bombings or other attacks.” Kurt jumped into his car and sped away.
This was it. The world was ending. All of his preps were about to pay off. But what about Kristin? Paul didn’t want the world to end. If he tried to get Kristin, there was no chance he could reach his shelter before things get hairy. Plus, there was no way he could find her. He didn’t have her address, and she might have already left Durham for somewhere safe.
Paul forced himself to focus on his plan. This was what he had prepared for. He dashed back inside and changed into his camouflage gear, grabbed his bugout bag, and then sprinted to his truck. He drove through his neighborhood and reached the main road. His shelter and plans were to the left. Kristin and the unknown were to the right. The whites of Paul’s knuckles flared as he gripped the steering wheel. Now was not the time to waffle. He turned left and hit the accelerator.
Paul gritted his teeth and raced down the street. Keep going. Keep going. He urged himself on. Almost involuntarily, his foot slammed on the brakes. Paul couldn’t do it. He’d planned for the worst all his life, and while he sat alone with the engine idling, he had to admit the truth. He’d lived all his life in fear.
Paul yanked the wheel and turned around toward Durham.
submitted by TSMaynard1 to shortstories [link] [comments]
“You can do this, Paul.” He increased the pace and gritted his teeth, the weight finally having an effect. Paul bounded over a small creek, up a rolling hill, and pushed through a row of baby birches into a clearing. He doubled over to catch his breath and looked at his watch one more time. Two hours and twenty-eight minutes. Paul pumped his fist in victory.
After a short break, he approached a thorny bush in the center of the clearing. Paul brushed aside sand at the bush’s trunk, revealing a yellow rope. He pulled it, which lifted a hidden door in the ground covered with dirt, shrubbery, and other camouflage on the top side, and drab gray iron on the other. Underneath, wooden stairs descended into darkness. Paul retrieved a flashlight from his pack, clicked on the beam, and disappeared into the earth.
At the bottom of the steps, Paul faced a steel door and a combination lock. With several quick swipes of the dial, he opened the lock and tugged the metal door, which creaked as it cracked open. Paul flashed the beam on the offending hinges and shook his head. Something to fix later. He stepped into the secret chamber and pulled a hanging aluminum chain that turned on a large halogen light, illuminating a twenty-foot by eight-foot metal rectangle. The exposed corrugated walls revealed the bunker was nothing more than a shipping container. Paul buried it two years ago and had divided the interior into three spaces. The entry had a shelf with four dozen gallon jugs of sealed water along with a portable toilet, stacks of toilet paper, and a wastebasket. The middle section was the main living area and contained a futon, a TV with a DVD player, and a neat collection of movies underneath. A nightstand housed a small library of books, including the Bible, The Art of Meditation, Buddhism for Dummies, and other spiritual tomes. The back area of the unit had two shelves filled with canned food—black beans, green beans, peaches, peas, carrots, beef, and chicken. There was also a stationary bike, which was Paul’s proudest accomplishment because he had rigged it to a giant battery that provided power to all the electronics.
Paul was a prepper, and this would be his home when the end of the world came, an event he believed was imminent. The global economy was a house of cards built on greed, corruption, and inflated asset prices, but worst of all, it was based on a faith in paper and digital money.
His fear was triggered four years ago when he attended a lecture by a professor who explained the fragility of the world’s financial system. If a few banks failed, it would rattle people’s confidence, causing a herd-like response. Thousands of people would rush to withdraw their cash, which the banks no longer had because they’d invested it. The banks would either fail, and everyday folks would lose their life savings, or the government would print new money to replace the missing money, making all money worth a lot less. Anyone holding dollars would attempt to convert them to other assets.
Just like dominoes, the banks would topple over one by one, and as they crashed, people’s faith in money would crater. After all, what was money? It was just paper with printed images and numbers that we’d all accepted as having value. More recently, money had become numbers displayed on a computer screen, something Paul knew firsthand as he spent the first seven years of his career working at a regional bank in Asheville, North Carolina. Paul could literally change someone’s net worth with a few keystrokes. He could turn a pauper into a millionaire, or he could bankrupt the richest account holder. Sure, there were safeguards, but all were built on faith, which Paul believed was misplaced. Most people didn’t realize that the Federal Reserve only required each bank to hold at least ten percent of its deposits as a reserve. Ten percent. That’s it. The rest of the money was invested in loans or other financial instruments. As the rich bank owners and executives pushed for bigger and bigger returns, they invested in riskier and riskier assets. The lessons from the financial crisis of 2008 had been forgotten.
Once the monetary system collapsed, the entire economy would become paralyzed. Without a means of exchange, transactions would halt. Think about it. If someone tried to give you a slip of paper that you thought was worthless, would you give them anything of value in return?
The doomsday scenario would escalate. Food and water prices would skyrocket, but with no way to purchase them, many would starve. But people don’t just roll over and die, they would riot and take what they need to survive. Marshall Law would be implemented, but citizens would revolt against the government they felt had cheated them.
As Paul listened to the lecturer that fateful day, a depressing epiphany struck. Everything he’d learned and everything he’d spent his life acquiring was worthless.
Growing up, Paul had been taught the value of money, saving, and planning for retirement. He internalized these lessons as a teen after his father got sick and lost his job. His mother had died when he was very young, but his father still managed to provide him with a stable childhood, even though they were barely middle class. When his father fell ill, Paul witnessed firsthand how fast a family could sink into financial trouble, which couldn’t have come at a worse time. He was applying to colleges, and instead of choosing the one he liked best, he chose the one that gave him the most financial aid, which turned out to be a small school half-way across the country. He also didn’t choose a major he was excited about; he chose the one that would offer the safest financial prospects—economics with an emphasis on banking.
The distance from home meant that Paul didn’t see the rapid deterioration of his father. It wasn’t until he returned for the funeral that family friends told him how the disease had spread. His father had refused to let anyone tell Paul because he didn’t want that to distract Paul from his studies.
After graduating, Paul accepted a job at a bank, and immediately signed up for the company’s 401K match. Most college graduates can't grasp retirement when they enter the workforce, but a 401K match was free money. Over the next several years, Paul worked diligently to advance his career while saving most of his salary. He’d mapped out his life on an excel spreadsheet and calculated that he’d be financially secure at 53.
Everything went according to plan until that damn lecturer came along and blew it up. Sifting through the rubble of his grand scheme, Paul realized that in the new world order, he possessed no skills to survive. The savings he’d so meticulously built up would have little to no value. When the economy collapsed, he'd be like a baby, unable to do anything for himself.
After a week of wallowing in despair, Paul rallied himself. “I can still fix this” became a daily mantra. To start, he threw himself into survival classes. The first was a basic camping course where he learned how to create shelters and start a fire. The next class was more advanced and focused on water purification and building snares for small game.
Paul continued working at the bank, because he needed to pay for the classes and survival equipment he began hoarding, but on his next vacation, he put his training to the test. He planned to camp for a week in the Appalachian Mountains, but the temperature swings, especially at night, were too much. Paul lasted three nights in the wild. The humbling experience forced him to admit that he wasn’t a bushman. His depression returned until he stumbled upon an article about “preppers”—individuals who prepare for end of world disasters. Suddenly, things made sense. He didn’t need to abandon all the comforts of modern society. He needed to prepare for the end of the world the way he had planned for retirement.
As Paul traveled down the rabbit hole of prepping, he uncovered an underground society of people like him who knew the truth about the world’s demise. Of course, not everyone believed it would end because of an economic collapse. Some thought a nuclear war would destroy civilization. Others feared electromagnetic pulses from the sun would wipe out all modern electricity. And still others worried a massive volcanic eruption would spew enough ash and soot into the air to blot out the sun. There was no shortage of theories about the world ending, but one thing was clear. The world would end. Did it matter how it happened?
Paul began his prepping quest by purchasing ten acres an hour and a half outside of Asheville. It had plenty of small animals and a creek running through the middle. He then transported an unused cargo container to the land and buried it. This was the toughest part of the plan because it required heavy equipment. Next, he dug out a staircase and installed a steel door at the entrance. Finally, he furnished it with a mix of modern comforts and survival essentials.
Almost every weekend, Paul trekked to his underground sanctuary and made improvements. He also planned his bugout strategy. When the end of the world hit, he figured he needed to be safely hidden in his home within two and a half hours, a time he had achieved with this latest trip. Everything was set, and Paul could finally relax. He was prepared.
Paul slumped down on his futon and considered playing a movie or cracking the bottle of Jim Beam whiskey he stored in a special cabinet, but he shook off the urge. Those things were the rewards and comforts he’d enjoy after the world ended. His fingers rubbed the top of the Bible, something he planned to read cover to cover once the global economy cratered. He’d have plenty of time then to discover his spiritual side, but not now. Something else needed to be done. Something he’d missed.
The biggest mistake a prepper can make is assuming he had everything covered. This was the lesson taught by Yannis, the guru of the prepping world. He was so well-known within the doomsday community; he only went by one name. The guy was sharp as a whip and could live off the land, if necessary, but he preferred a more sophisticated lifestyle, so he created a luxurious cave that contained backup systems for all his backups. Food, water, shelter, and electricity were all taken care of, and it was projected that Yannis could survive ten years comfortably after the apocalypse. His famous blog titled “ABP” stood for Always Be Preparing. It was a motto Yannis lived by and something Paul aspired to, but as he sat in his bunker after the relentless hike, fatigue set in. He didn’t want to think about prepping or his bugout strategy. He wanted to just be.
Paul tilted his head back onto the futon’s cushion, and a loneliness crept into his mind. All his prepping left little time for relationships. He dated off and on in college, but it was never anything serious. It wasn’t like his high school sweetheart, Kristin Summer. They dated junior and senior year, but then Paul broke it off when his father got sick. Paul couldn’t focus on romance, and he knew the relationship wouldn’t have worked when he left for school 1,500 miles away. It still hurt when he learned from a friend that Kristin started dating Derek Gorman, an old classmate Paul hated. It hurt even more when he found out they had gotten married.
After college, Paul joined a couple of dating sites, but he hadn’t used them in over two years. Most women wouldn’t understand his prepping lifestyle, at least that’s what he feared, so he rejected dating before anyone could reject him. But most wasn't all, and with eight billion people on the planet, there had to be someone for him. Almost without thinking, Paul pulled out his phone and opened “My Match,” the site where he’d had the most luck. His profile still had a photo from his early banking days. He was clean shaven with a naïve smile. The face staring back in the picture differed greatly from the bearded survivalist he’d become. Would anyone consider a relationship with the new Paul? Only one way to find out. He snapped a selfie, uploaded it, and then updated his hobbies with the first being “prepping” followed by “survival skills training.” He finished by pressing the button that showed he was actively looking for someone. All he had to do now was wait.
After spending the night in his bunker, Paul checked the dating site in the morning. No response. “It was a stupid idea,” he told himself, and stuffed his phone back into his pocket. He locked his container and returned home.
Over the next two weeks, Paul received zero requests for a date. He didn’t even receive a message from anyone to start a conversation and test the waters. “Shake it off, dumbass,” he said alone in the confines of his cottage-style home. “The world is going to end, anyway.” He clenched his jaw and did what he always did. He researched more ways to survive. Paul poured over blog posts and imagined worst-case scenarios. How could his water be contaminated? Maybe he should bury some caches of water. What if someone finds his shelter? Maybe security cameras were needed. What if he gets lonely in his shelter? No ideas came to mind.
After his eyes got tired from reading, Paul clicked out of his browser, and the list of all his apps stared at him. For reasons unknown to him, he opened Facebook, something he hadn’t done for months. There were a handful of notifications and a couple of friend requests sent weeks ago. His heart raced when he saw the name of one—Kristin Summer. When he accepted, he saw she was on-line right then.
Should he message her? Would that be weird right after accepting her request? But wasn’t it weird that he hadn’t responded for several weeks? He pulled up the messenger and typed. “Hey. Sorry for the delay in accepting your request. Hadn’t been on Facebook in a while. Been busy. Hope you and Derek are well.”
He curled his lip in disgust as he typed Derek’s name and considered deleting it, but he took the moral high ground and hit “send” with his message unaltered.
Kristin Summer. Just the thought of her name brought a smile to Paul’s face.
Bing.
The sound alerted Paul to a response, which he read out loud. “Hey Paul. Good to hear from you. Derek and I divorced a little over a year ago. It was rough at first, but it was for the best. How are you?”
Paul’s eyes widened with shock and excitement. He couldn’t believe Derek was so stupid to let Kristin go. Paul could at least blame their breakup on his father’s illness. His fingers prattled away on the keyboard. “Things are amazing.” He stopped typing. That was a lie. Should he pretend like things were great or should he be honest and tell her about his prepping and the end of the world? Neither option sounded appealing. He tapped the keys without writing until he settled on something uncontroversial.
“Working at Trinity Bank in Asheville. It pays the bills. Where are you?”
Within a minute, the sweet sound of the notification binged. “I’m not too far away in Durham. If you’re ever in town, let me know.”
If you’re ever in town, let me know.
Paul couldn’t believe his eyes. Was Kristin asking him out? He shook his head. Nah, she’s probably just being polite. But maybe. If there was any chance, he had to find out. He chewed his lip and deliberated his next response. Fortune favors the bold, he told himself. Then he remembered Matt Damon telling people that in the now infamous commercial for FTX months before its collapse. When that occurred, Paul thought it was the beginning of the end, and he lived in his bunker for two days before emerging and finding the world still intact.
Paul clenched his fist. It was still good advice, and he had to try. Almost involuntarily, he typed, “I’ll be there tomorrow afternoon. If you want to get together, let me know.” His finger hit send before he could talk himself out of it. There was no qualification in the message. No waffling or hedging. It was clear Paul wanted to see Kristin. The only question now was whether she wanted to see him.
The next ten minutes felt like ten days. Paul paced back and forth with his hands over his head, and he glanced at the monitor every few seconds, just in case his ears had missed the notification alert.
There was nothing.
A dark depression filled the room. Why had he gotten his hopes up? What was the point, anyway? The world was going to end.
Bing.
Paul leapt to the computer and his eyes widened with each word he read. “How about a lunch at The Fig Tree Restaurant on 7th?”
People overuse the word literally, but Paul at least felt like his jaw was literally on the floor. He had a date with Kristin Summer, the one woman he had loved. His hands rattled away at the keyboard. “See you at 1 tomorrow.”
“Holy crap,” he muttered to himself.
Panic replaced his excitement when he imagined sitting down and talking to Kristin. What would he say? “Hey Kristin, what have you been up to? Oh me? I’ve been working at a job I hate and planning for the end of the world.”
He drifted into the bathroom and stared at the scruffy character in the mirror. Paul could only cringe at the thought of Kristin’s reaction upon seeing him. She might not recognize the bearded loner who resembled Ted Kaczynski more than the short-haired, clean-shaven teen she last saw.
Only one thing to do.
Paul had to prepare. He opened a drawer and pulled out a pair of clippers. He began trimming his beard and mustache as short as the clippers would allow. Next, he applied a generous amount of cream and shaved all of it off. Paul smirked at the young man hiding under the shabby beard, but it still wasn’t enough. He set the guard on the clippers to a four and began shaving his head. In college, Paul cut his own hair to save money, and the skill came back to him quickly. He dropped to a three and worked in a fade on the sides and then finished with a two. Paul turned to the left, then to the right, and assessed his work. Not bad.
Next thing to prepare was his outfit. Paul slid the door of his closet open and evaluated his choices. A banker’s suit was too stuffy, and his mountain man denim was too hermit inspired. He yanked the clothes aside and climbed deeper into the recesses of his wardrobe until he found a nice buttoned-down shirt and a dark pair of slacks. It gave just the right vibe of successful and stable, while not trying too hard to impress, even though that was his precisely his goal. Paul laid the selection on the chair by his bed. Durham was a three-and-a-half-hour drive away, and he wanted to make sure he got there with time to find parking, and maybe use the restroom. He set the alarm on his iPhone for 6 a.m. That would give him plenty of time to take a shower, have breakfast, and get dressed.
There was no chance of falling asleep easily. His mind raced with thoughts, questions, and various scenarios about what the day would bring. To relax, he poured himself a double whiskey, which he downed with a single slurp. He poured another and sipped.
Kristin Summer. He shook his head, still in disbelief.
As the effect of alcohol set in, Paul laid down on his bed and shut his eyes. Tomorrow would be a good day.
Paul slipped into a deep, satisfying sleep until his mind jolted him awake. It was past 6 a.m. He didn’t know how he knew. He just knew. Paul had slept through his alarm. He snatched his phone off the nightstand, but it was out of battery. He checked his watch and saw it was 7 a.m. There was still time to get to Durham.
Paul jumped out of bed and into the bathroom. He flicked on the light switch, but nothing came on. Paul toggled it on and off, but the outlet was dead.
Police sirens wailed in the distance. Paul meandered out of his house and onto the front lawn. Aside from the sirens, there was an uneasy stillness. Paul’s neighbor Kurt ran out from his home with two suitcases that he flung into the trunk of his car.
“Kurt. What’s going on?” Paul asked.
“Fort Knox was bombed. All the gold was obliterated. And something happened to the electricity and the internet. They shut it down.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know, man, but it’s not good. No one has access to news, no money, nothing.”
“Where are you going?” Paul asked.
“I don’t know. Somewhere isolated. I’m just hoping there are no more bombings or other attacks.” Kurt jumped into his car and sped away.
This was it. The world was ending. All of his preps were about to pay off. But what about Kristin? Paul didn’t want the world to end. If he tried to get Kristin, there was no chance he could reach his shelter before things get hairy. Plus, there was no way he could find her. He didn’t have her address, and she might have already left Durham for somewhere safe.
Paul forced himself to focus on his plan. This was what he had prepared for. He dashed back inside and changed into his camouflage gear, grabbed his bugout bag, and then sprinted to his truck. He drove through his neighborhood and reached the main road. His shelter and plans were to the left. Kristin and the unknown were to the right. The whites of Paul’s knuckles flared as he gripped the steering wheel. Now was not the time to waffle. He turned left and hit the accelerator.
Paul gritted his teeth and raced down the street. Keep going. Keep going. He urged himself on. Almost involuntarily, his foot slammed on the brakes. Paul couldn’t do it. He’d planned for the worst all his life, and while he sat alone with the engine idling, he had to admit the truth. He’d lived all his life in fear.
Paul yanked the wheel and turned around toward Durham.
2023.05.29 00:51 Ok_Investigator_6587 Venom Theory.
 | Hi Guys, I was recently watching the first trailer for the sequel of the game & I realize that the one that’s talking is Kraven. He’s talking about finding someone that can give him a challenge. Then the trailer shows the alley where Venom is hidden in the shadows & he says: We will. submitted by Ok_Investigator_6587 to SpidermanPS4 [link] [comments] Then, I continue to watch the gameplay they released a couple of days ago & I noticed some things to create my theory.
https://preview.redd.it/kireax732p2b1.jpg?width=2732&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d4fcc67525132a8c7a6a6846e5b696424866e231 https://preview.redd.it/cwyepin12p2b1.jpg?width=1395&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4640450698aebd126955cb4d4fa5a67787d7daaa https://preview.redd.it/nukdsv802p2b1.jpg?width=1108&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d0709d6db12fffd1f646b204bae5cf19c19fc29e https://preview.redd.it/4849izbx1p2b1.jpg?width=1297&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=628f41a9bc99d63709bb3e394626d6f55f03eef8 |
2023.05.29 00:40 RandomAppalachian468 Don't fly over Barron County Ohio.
The whirring blades of my MD-902 throbbed against the warm evening air, and I smiled.
From 5,000 feet, the ground flew by in a carpet of dark forests and kelly-green fields. The sun hung low on the horizon in a picturesque array of dazzling orange and gold, and I could make out the narrow strip of the Ohio River to my left, glistening in the fading daylight. This time of year, the trees would be full of the sweet aroma of fresh blossoms, and the frequent rains kept small pockets of fluffy white mist hanging in the treetops. It was a beautiful view, one that reminded me of why being a helicopter pilot trumped flying in a jumbo jet far above the clouds every day of the week.
Fourteen more days, and I’m debt free.
That made me grin even more. I’d been working as a charter pilot ever since I obtained my license at age 19, and after years of keeping my nose to the grindstone, I was closing on the final payment for real-estate in western Pennsylvania. With no debt, a fixer-upper house on 30 rural acres all to myself, and a respectable wage for a 26-year-old pilot, I looked forward to the financial freedom I could now enjoy. Maybe I’d take a vacation, somewhere exotic like Venice Italy, or the Dominican Republic. Or perhaps I’d sock the money back for the day I started a family.
“Remember kleineun, a real man looks after his own.”
My elderly ouma’s voice came back from the depths of my memories, her proud, sun-tanned face rising from the darkness. She and my Rhodesian grandfather had emigrated to the US when they were newlyweds, as the violence against white Boer descendants in South Africa spiraled out of control. My mother and father both died in a car crash when I was six, and it had been my grandparents who raised me. Due to this, I’d grown up with a slight accent that many of my classmates found amusing, and I could speak both English, and Afrikaans, the Boer tongue of our former home.
I shifted in my seat, stretched my back muscles, and glanced at the picture taped to my console. Both my parents flanked a grinning, gap-toothed six-year-old me, at the last Christmas we’d spent together. My mother beamed, her dark hair and Italian features a sharp contrast to my father’s sandy blonde hair and blue eyes. Sometimes, I liked to imagine they were smiling at me with pride at how well I flew the old silver-colored bird my company had assigned to me, and that made the long, lonely flights easier to bear.
A flicker caught my eye, and I broke my gaze away from the photograph.
Perched in its small cradle above the controls, my little black Garmin fuzzed over for a few seconds, its screen shifting from brightly colored maps to a barrage of grey static.
Did the power chord come loose?
I checked, ensuring the power-cable for the unit’s battery was plugged into the port on the control panel. It was a brand-new GPS unit, and I’d used it a few times already, so I knew it wasn’t defective. Granted, I could fly and navigate without it, but the Garmin made my time as a pilot so much easier that the thought of going blind was dreadful.
My fuel gauge danced, clicked to empty, then to full, in a bizarre jolt.
More of the gauges began to stutter, the entire panel seeming to develop terrets all at once, and my pulse began to race. Something was wrong, very wrong, and the sludge inside my bowels churned with sour fear.
“Come on, come on.” I flicked switches, turned dials, punched buttons, but nothing seemed to fix the spasming electronics. Every gauge failed, and without warning, I found myself plunged into inky darkness.
Outside, the sun surrendered to the pull of night, the sky darker than usual. A distant rumble of thunder reverberated above the roar of my helicopter’s engine, and I thought I glimpsed a streak of yellowish lightning on the far horizon to my left.
Calm down Chris. We’re still flying, so it must just be a blown fuse. Stay in control and find a place to set her down.
My sweaty palm slid on the cyclic stick, and both feet weighed heavy on the yaw pedals. The collective stuck to my other hand with a nervous vibration, and I squinted against the abyss outside.
Beep.
I jumped despite myself, as the little Garmin on my panel flared back to life, the static pulling aside to reveal a twitching display. Each time the screen glitched, it showed the colorful map detailing my flight path over the ground below, but I noticed that some of the lines changed, the names shifting, as if the device couldn’t decide between two different versions of the world.
One name jutted out at me, slate gray like most of the major county names, appearing with ghostly flickers from between two neighboring ones.
Barron County.
I stared, confused. I’d flown over this section of southeastern Ohio plenty of times, and I knew the counties by heart. At this point, I should have been over the southern end of Noble County, and maybe dipping lower into Washington. There was no Barron County in Ohio. I was sure of it.
And yet it shown back at me from the digital landscape, a strange, almost cigar-shaped chunk of terrain carved from the surrounding counties like a tumor, sometimes there, sometimes not, as my little Garmin struggled to find the correct map. Rain began to patter against my cockpit window, and the entire aircraft rattled from a strong gust of wind. Thick clouds closed over my field of vision like a sea of gray cotton.
The blood in my veins turned to ice, and I sucked in a nervous breath.
Land. I had to land. There was nothing else to do, my flight controls weren’t responding, and only my Garmin had managed to come back to life. Perhaps I’d been hit by lightning, and the electronics had been fried? Either way, it was too dark to tell, but a storm seemed to be brewing, and if I didn’t get my feet on the ground soon, I could be in real trouble.
“Better safe than sorry.” I pushed down on the collective to start my slow descent and clicked the talking button for my headset. “Any station, this is Douglass Three-One-Four-Foxtrot, over.”
Nothing.
“Any station, this is Douglass Three-One-Four-Foxtrot, requesting emergency assistance, over.”
Still nothing.
If the radio’s dead, I’m really up a creek.
With my hand shaking, I clicked on the mic one more time. “Any station, this is—”
Like a curtain pulling back, the fog cleared from around my window, and the words stuck in my throat.
Without my gauges, I couldn’t tell just how far I’d descended, but I was definitely very low. Thick trees poked up from the ground, and the hills rolled into high ridges with flat valley floors, fields and pastures pockmarking them. Rain fell all around in cold, silvery sheets, a normal feature for the mid spring in this part of Ohio.
What wasn’t normal, were the fires.
At first, I thought they were forest fires for the amount of smoke and flames that bellowed from each spot, but as I swooped lower, my eyes widened in horror.
They were houses.
Farms, cottages, little clusters that barely constituted villages, all of them belched orange flames and black pillars of sooty smoke. I couldn’t hear above the helicopter blades, but I could see the flashes on the ground, along the road, in between the trees, and even coming from the burning buildings, little jets of golden light that spat into the darkness with anger.
Gunfire. That’s rifle fire, a whole lot of it.
Tiny black figures darted through the shadows, barely discernable from where I sat, several hundred feet up. I couldn’t see much, but some were definitely running away, the streaks of yellow gunfire chasing them. A few dark gray vehicles rumbled down one of the gravel roads, and sprayed fire into the houses as it went. They were fighting, I realized, the people in the trucks and the locals. It was horrific, like something out of war-torn Afghanistan, but worse.
Then, I caught a glimpse of the others.
They didn’t move like the rest, who either fled from the dark vehicles, or fired back from behind cover. These skinny figures loped along with haphazard gaits, many running on all fours like animals, swarming from the trees by the dozens. They threw themselves into the gales of bullets without flinching, attacking anyone within range, and something about the way they moved, so fluid, so fearless, made my heart skip a beat.
What is that?
“Echo Four Actual to unknown caller, please respond, over.”
Choking back a cry of shock, I fumbled at the control panel with clumsy fingers, the man’s voice sharp and stern. I hadn’t realized that I’d let go of the talking button and clicked it down again. “Hello? Hello, this is Douglass Three-One-Four-Foxtrot out of Pittsburgh, over.”
An excruciating moment passed, and I continued to zoom over the trees, the fires falling away behind me as more silent forest took over.
“Roger that Douglass Three-One-Four-Foxtrot, we read you loud and clear. Please identify yourself and any passengers or cargo you might be carrying, over.”
Swallowing hard, I eyed the treetops, which looked much closer than they should have been. How far had I descended? “Echo Four Actual, my name is Christopher Dekker, and I am alone. I’m a charter flight from PA, carrying medical equipment for OSU in Columbus. My controls have been damaged, and I am unable to safely carry on due to the storm. Requesting permission to land, over.”
I watched the landscape slide by underneath me, once catching sight of what looked like a little white church surrounded by smaller huts, dozens of figures in the yard staring up at me as I flew over a nearby ridgeline.
“Solid copy on that Douglass Three-One-Four-Foxtrot. Be advised, your transponder shows you to be inside a restricted zone. Please cease all radio traffic, reduce your speed, climb to 3,000 feet and proceed north. We’ll talk you in from there. How copy, over?”
My heart jumped, and I let out a sigh of relief. “Roger that Echo Four Actual, my altimeter is down, but I’ll do my best to eyeball the altitude, over.”
With that, I pulled the collective upward, and tried my best to gauge how far I was by eyesight in the gathering night, rain still coming down all around me. This had to be some kind of disaster or riot, I decided. After all, the voice over the radio sounded like military, and those vehicles seemed to have heavy weapons. Maybe there was some kind of unrest going on here that I hadn’t heard about yet?
Kind of weird for it to happen in rural areas though. Spoiled college kids I get, but never saw farmers get so worked up before. They usually love the military.
Something moved in the corner of my eye, and I turned out of reflex.
My mouth fell open, and I froze, unable to scream.
In the sky beside me, a huge shadow glided along, and its leathery wings effortlessly carved through the gloom, flapping only on occasion to keep it aloft. It was too dark for me to see what color it was, but from the way it moved, I knew it wasn’t another helicopter. No, this thing was alive, easily the size of a small plane, and more than twice the length of my little McDonald Douglass. A long tail trailed behind it, and bore a distinct arrow-shaped snout, with twig-like spines fanned out around the back of its head. Whatever legs it had were drawn up under it like a bird, yet its skin appeared rough and knobby, almost resembling tree bark. Without pause, the gigantic bat-winged entity flew along beside me, as if my presence was on par with an annoying fly buzzing about its head.
Gripping the microphone switch so tight, I thought I’d crack the plastic, I whispered into my headset, forgetting all radio protocol. “T-There’s something up here.”
Static crackled.
“Douglas Three-One-Four-Foxtrot, say again your last, you’re coming in weak and unreadable, over.”
“There’s something up here.” I snarled into the headset, still glued to the controls of the helicopter, afraid to deviate even an inch from my course in case the monstrosity decided to turn on me. “A freaking huge thing, right beside me. I swear, it looks like a bat or . . . I don’t know.”
“Calm down.” The man on the other end of the radio broke his rigorous discipline as well, his voice deep, but level. “It won’t attack if you don’t move too fast. Slowly ease away from it and follow that course until you’re out of sight.”
I didn’t have time to think about how wrong that sounded, how the man’s strict tone had changed to one of knowledge, how he hadn’t been the least surprised by what I’d said. Instead, I slowly turned the helicopter away from the huge menace and edged the speed higher in tiny increments.
As soon as I was roughly two football fields away, I let myself relax, and clicked the mic switch. “It’s not following.”
“You’re sure?”
Eyeing the huge flapping wings, I nodded, then remembered he couldn’t see me. “Yeah, I’m well clear.”
“Good. Thank you, Mr. Dekker.”
Then, the radio went dead.
Something in my chest dropped, a weight that made my stomach roil. This wasn’t right, none of it. Who was that man? Why did he know about the thing I’d just seen? What was I supposed to—
A flash of light exploded from the trees to my right and shot into the air with a long finger of smoke.
What the . . .
On instinct, I jerked the cyclic stick to one side, and the helicopter swung to avoid the rocket.
Boom.
My world shook, metal screeched, and a dozen alarms began to go off inside the cockpit in a cacophony of beeps and sirens. Orange and red flames lit up the night sky just behind me, and the horizon started to spin wildly outside. Heat gushed from the cockpit door, and I smelled the greasy stench of burning oil. The safety belts dug into my shoulders, and with a final slip, the radio headset ripped free from my scalp.
I’m hit.
Desperate, I yanked on the controls, fought the bird even as she spun toward the ground in a wreath of flames, the inky black trees hurtling up to meet me. The helicopter went into full auto-rotation, the sky blurring past outside, and the alarms blared in a screech of doom. Panic slammed through my temples, I screamed at the top of my lungs, and for one brief second, my eyes locked on the little black Garmin still perched atop my control panel.
Its screen stopped twitching and settled on a map of the mysterious Barron County, with a little red arrow at the center of the screen, a few words popping up underneath it.
You are here.
Trees stabbed up into the sky, the belts crushed at my torso, glass shattered all around me, and the world went dark.
Copper, thick, warm, and tangy.
It filled my mouth, stank metallic in my nose, clogged my throat, choking me. In the murkiness, I fought for a surface, for a way out, blind and numb in the dark.
This way, kleineun.
My ouma’s voice echoed from somewhere in the shadows.
This way.
Both eyes flew open, and I gagged, spitting out a stream of red.
Pain throbbed in my ribs, and a heavy pressure sent a tingling numbness through my shoulders. Blood roared inside my temples, and stars danced before my eyes with a dizzying array. Humid night air kissed my skin, and something sticky coated my face, neck, and arms that hung straight up toward the ceiling.
Wait. Not up. Down.
I blinked at the wrinkled, torn ceiling of the cockpit, the glass all gone, the gray aluminum shredded like tissue paper. Just outside the broken windows, thick Appalachian bluegrass and stemmy underbrush swished in a feeble breeze, backlit by flashes of lightning from the thunderstorm overhead. Green and brown leaves covered everything in a wet carpet of triangles, and somewhere nearby, a cricket chirped.
Turning my head from side to side, I realized that I hung upside down inside the ruined helicopter, the top half burrowed into the mud. I could hear the hissing and crackling of flames, the pattering of rain falling on the hot aluminum, and the smaller brush fires around the downed aircraft sizzling out in the damp long grass. Charred steel and burning oil tainted the air, almost as strong as the metallic, coppery stench in my aching nose.
They shot me down. That military dude shot me out of the sky.
It didn’t make sense. I’d followed their orders, done everything they’d said, and yet the instant I veered safely away from whatever that thing in the sky had been, they’d fired, not at it, but at me.
Looking down (or rather, up) at my chest, I sucked in a gasp, which was harder to do that before.
The navy-blue shirt stuck to my torso with several big splotches of dark, rusty red. Most were clean slashes, but two held bits of glass sticking out of them, one alarmingly bigger than the other. They dripped cherry red blood onto my upturned face, and a wave of nausea hit me.
I gotta get down.
I flexed my arms to try and work some feeling back into them, praying nothing was broken. Half-numb from hanging so long, I palmed along my aching body until I felt the buckled for the seat belts.
“Okay.” I hissed between gritted teeth, in an effort to stave off my panic. “You can do this. Just hold on tight. Nice and tight. Here we go . . .”
Click.
Everything seemed to lurch, and I slid off the seat to plummet towards the muck-filled hole in the cockpit ceiling. My fingers were slick with blood and slipped over the smooth faux-leather pilot’s seat with ease. The shoulder belt snagged on the bits of glass that lay just under the left lowest rib, and a flare of white-hot pain ripped through me.
Wham.
I screamed, my right knee caught the edge of the aluminum ceiling, and both hands dove into a mound of leaf-covered glass shards on the opposite side of the hole. My head swam, being right-side-up again enough to make shadows gnaw at the corner of my eyes.
Forcing myself to breath slowly, I fought the urge to faint and slid back to sit on the smooth ceiling. I turned my hands over to see half a dozen bits of clear glass burrowed into my skin like greedy parasites, red blood weeping around the new cuts.
“Screw you.” I spat at the rubbish with angry tears in my eyes. “Screw you, screw you, screw you.”
The shards came out easy enough, and the cuts weren’t that deep, but that wasn’t what worried me. On my chest, the single piece of cockpit glass that remined was almost as big as my palm, and it really hurt. Just touching it felt like self-inflicted torture, but I knew it had to come out sooner or later.
Please don’t nick a vein.
Wiping my hands dry on my jeans, I gripped the shard with both hands, and jerked.
Fire roared over my ribs, and hot blood tickled my already grimy pale skin. I clapped a hand over the wound, pressing down hard, and grunted out a string of hateful expletives that my ouma would have slapped me for.
Lying on my back, I stared around me at the messy cargo compartment of the MD-902. Most of the medical supplies had been in cardboard boxes strapped down with heavy nylon tow-straps, but several cases had ruptured with the force of the impact, spraying bandages, syringes, and pill bottles all over the cluttered interior. Orange flames chewed at the crate furthest to the rear, the tail section long gone, but the foremost part of the hold was intact. Easily a million-dollar mess, it would have made me faint on any other trip, but today it was a godsend.
Half-blind in the darkness, I crawled along with only the firelight and lightning bolts to guide me, my right knee aching. Like a crippled raccoon, I collected things as I went, conscious of the two pallets of intact supplies weighing right over my head. I’d taken several different first-aid courses with some hunting buddies of mine, and the mental reflexes kicked in to help soothe my frazzled mind.
Check for bleeds, stop the worst, then move on.
Aside from my battered chest and stomach, the rest of me remained mostly unharmed. I had nasty bruises from the seatbelts, my right knee swelled, my nose slightly crooked and crusted in blood, but otherwise I was intact. Dowsing every scratch and cut with a bottle of isopropyl alcohol I found, I used butterfly closures on the smaller lacerations that peppered my skin. I wrapped soft white gauze over my abused palms and probed at the big cut where the last shard had been, only stopping when I was sure there were no pieces of glass wedged inside my flesh.
“Not too bad.” I grunted to myself, trying to sound impassive like a doctor might. “Rib must have stopped it. Gonna need stitches though. That’ll be fun.”
Pawing through the broken cases, I couldn’t find any suture chord, but just as I was about to give up, I noticed a small box that read ‘medical skin stapler’.
Bingo.
I tore the small white plastic stapler free from its packaging and eyeballed the device. I’d never done this before, only seen it in movies, and even though the cut in my skin hurt, I wondered if this wouldn’t be worse.
You’ve gotta do it. That bleeding needs to stop. Besides, no one’s coming to rescue you, not with those rocket-launching psychos out there.
Taking a deep breath, I pinched the skin around the gash together, and pressed the mouth of the stapler to it.
Click.
A sharp sting, like that of a needle bit at the skin, but it didn’t hurt nearly as bad as the cut itself. I worked my way across the two-inch laceration and gave out a sigh of relief when it was done.
“Not going to bleed to death today.” I daubed ointment around the staples before winding more bandages over the wound.
Popping a few low-grade painkillers that tumbled from the cargo, I crawled wriggled through the nearest shattered window into the wet grass.
Raindrops kissed my face, clean and cool on my sweaty skin. Despite the thick cloud cover, there was enough constant lightning strikes within the storm to let me get glimpses of the world around me. My helicopter lay on its back, the blades snapped like pencils, with bits and pieces of it burning in chunks all around the small break in the trees. Chest-high scrub brush grew all around the low-lying ground, with pockets of standing water in places. My ears still rang from the impact of the crash, but I could start to pick up more crickets, frogs, and even some nocturnal birds singing into the darkness, like they didn’t notice the huge the hulk of flaming metal that had fallen from the sky. Overhead, the thunder rumbled onward, the feeble wind whistling, and there were other flashes on the horizon, orange and red ones, with crackles that didn’t sound quite like lightning.
The guns. They’re still fighting.
Instinctively, I pulled out my cellphone, and tapped the screen.
It fluttered to life, but no matter how I tried, I couldn’t get through to anyone, not even with the emergency function designed to work around having no service. The complicated wonder of our modern world was little better than a glorified paperweight.
Stunned, I sat down with my back to the helicopter and rested my head against the aluminum skin of the craft. How I’d gone from a regular medical supply run to being marooned in this hellish parody of rural America, I didn’t know, but one thig was certain; I needed a plan. Whoever fired the missile could have already contacted my charter company and made up some excuse to keep them from coming to look for me. No one else knew I was here, and even though I now had six staples holding the worst of my injuries shut, I knew I needed proper medical attention. If I wanted to live, I’d have to rescue myself.
My bag. I need to get my go-bag, grab some gear and then . . . head somewhere else.
It took me a while to gather my green canvas paratrooper bag from its place behind the pilot’s seat and fill it with whatever supplies I could scrounge. My knee didn’t seem to be broken, but man did it hurt, and I dreaded the thought of walking on it for miles on end. I focused instead on inventorying my gear and trying to come up with a halfway intelligent plan of action.
I had a stainless-steel canteen with one of those detachable cups on the bottom, a little fishing kit, some duct tape, a lighter, a black LED flashlight with three spare batteries, a few tattered road maps with a compass, a spare pair of socks, medical supplies from the cargo, and a simple forest green plastic rain poncho. I also managed to unearth a functioning digital camcorder my ouma had gotten me for Christmas a few years back, though I wasn’t sure I wanted to do any filming in such a miserable state. Lastly, since it was a private supply run from a warehouse area near Pittsburgh to a direct hospital pad in Ohio, I’d been able to bring my K-Bar, a sturdy, and brutally simple knife designed for the Marine Corps that I used every time I went camping. It was pitiful in comparison to the rifle I wished I had with me, but that didn’t matter now. I had what I had, and I doubted my trusty Armalite would have alleviated my sore knee anyway.
Clicking on my flashlight, I huddled with the poncho around my shoulders inside the wreck of the chopper and peered at the dusty roadmaps. A small part of me hoped that a solution would jump out from the faded paper, but none came. These were all maps of western PA and eastern Ohio. None of them had a Barron County on them anywhere.
The man on the radio said to head north, right before they shot me down. That means they must be camped out to the north of here. South had that convoy and those burning houses, so that’s a no-go. Maybe I can backtrack eastward the way I came.
As if on cue, a soft pop echoed from over the eastern horizon, and I craned to look out the helicopter window, spotting more man-made flashes over the tree tops.
“Great.” I hissed between clenched teeth, aware of how the temperature dipped to a chilly 60 degrees, and how despite the conditions, my stomach had begun to growl. “Not going that way, are we? Westward it is.”
Walking away from my poor 902 proved to be harder than I’d anticipated. Despite the glass, the fizzling fires, and the darkness, it still held a familiar, human essence to it. Sitting inside it made me feel secure, safe, even calm about the situation. In any other circumstance, I would have just stayed with the downed aircraft to wait for help, but I knew the men who shot me down would likely find my crash site, and I didn’t want to be around when they did.
Unlike much of central and western Ohio, southeastern Ohio is hilly, brushy, and clogged with thick forests. Thorns snagged at my thin poncho and sliced at my pant legs. My knee throbbed, every step a form of self-inflicted torture. The rain never stopped, a steady drizzle from above just cold enough to be problematic as time went on, making me shiver. Mud slid under my tennis shoes, and every tree looked ten times bigger in the flickering beam of my cheap flashlight. Icy fear prickled at the back of my neck at some of the sounds that greeted me through the gloom. I’d been camping loads of times, both in Pennsylvania and elsewhere, but these noises were something otherworldly to me.
Strange howls, screeches, and calls permeated the rain-soaked sky, some almost roars, while others bordered on human in their intonation. The more I walked, the softer the distant gunfire became, and the more prevalent the odd sounds, until the shadows seemed to fill with them. I didn’t dare turn off my flashlight, or I’d been completely blind in the dark, but a little voice in the back of my head screamed that I was too visible, crunching through the gloomy forest with my long beam of light stabbing into the abyss. It felt as though a million eyes were on me, studying me, hunting me from the surrounding brush, and I bitterly recalled how much I’d loved the old Survivor Man TV series as a kid.
Not so fun being out in the woods at night. Especially alone.
A twig snapped somewhere behind me, and I whirled on the spot, one trembling hand resting on the hilt of my K-Bar.
Nothing. Nothing but trees, bushes, and rain dripping down in the darkness.
“This is stupid.” I whispered to myself to keep my nerves in check as I slowly spun on the spot. “I should have went eastward anyway. God knows how long I’m going to have to—”
Creak.
A groan of metal-on-metal echoed from somewhere to my right, and I spun to face it, yanking the knife on my belt free from its scabbard. It felt so small and useless in my hand, and I choked down a wave of nauseas fear.
Ka-whump. Creak. K-whump. Creak.
Underbrush cracked and crunched, a few smaller saplings thrashed, and from deep within the gloom, two yellow orbs flared to life. They poked through the mist in the trees, forming into slender fingers of golden light that swept back and forth in the dark.
The soldiers . . . they must be looking for me.
I swallowed hard and turned to slink away.
Ice jammed through my blood, and I froze on the spot, biting my tongue to stop the scream.
It stood not yards away, a huge form that towered a good twelve feet tall in the swirling shadows. Unpolished chrome blended with flash-rusted spots in the faded red paint, and grime-smeared glass shone with dull hues in the flashes of lightning. Where the wheels should have been, the rounded steel axels curved like some enormous hand had bent them, and the tires lay face-down on the muddy ground like big round feet, their hubcaps buried in the dirt. Dents, scrapes, and chips covered the battered thing, and its crooked little radio antenna pointed straight up from the old metal fender like a mast. I could barely make out the mud-coated VW on the rounded hood, and my mind reeled in shock.
Is . . . is that a car?
Both yellow headlights bathed me in a circle of bright, blinding light, and neither I nor the strange vehicle moved.
Seconds ticked by, the screech-thumping in the background only growing closer. I realized that I couldn’t hear any engine noises and had yet to see any soldiers or guns pointed my way. This car looked old, really old, like one of those classic Volkswagen Beetles that collectors fought over at auctions. Try as I might, I couldn’t see a driver inside the murky, mold-smeared windows.
Because there wasn’t one.
Lightning arched across the sky overhead, and the car standing in front of me blinked.
Its headlights slid shut, as if little metal shades had crawled over the bulbs for a moment and flicked open again. Something about that movement was so primal, so real, so lifelike, that every ounce of self-control I had melted in an instant.
Cursing under my breath, I lunged into the shrubs, and the world erupted around me.
Under my shoes, the ground shook, and the car surged after me in a cacophony of ka-thumps that made my already racing heart skip several beats. A weather-beaten brown tow truck from the 50’s charged through the thorns to my left, it’s headlights ablaze, and a dilapidated yellow school bus rose from its hiding place in the weeds to stand tall on four down-turned axel-legs. They all flicked their headlights on like giants waking from their slumber, and as I dodged past them, they each blared their horn into the night in alarm.
My breaths came short and tight, my knee burned, and I crashed through thorns and briars without thought to how badly I was getting cut up.
The cheap poncho tore, and I ripped it away as it caught on a tree branch.
A purple 70’s Mustang shook off its blanket of creeping vines and bounded from a stand of trees just ahead, forcing me to swerve to avoid being run over, my adrenaline at all-time highs.
This can’t be happening, this can’t be happening, this can’t be happening.
Slipping and sliding, I pushed through a stand of multiflora rose, and stumbled out into a flat, dark expanse.
I almost skidded to a stop.
What had once been a rather large field stood no taller than my shoestrings, the grass charred, and burnt. The storm above illuminated huge pieces of wreckage that lay scattered over the nearly 40-acre plot, and I could just make out the fire-blackened hulk of a fuselage resting a hundred yards away. The plane had been brought down a while ago it seemed, as there weren’t any flames left burning, and I threw myself toward it in frenzied desperation.
Burned grass and greasy brown topsoil slushed underfoot, and I could hear the squelching of the cars pursing me. Rain soaked me to the bone, and my lungs ached from sucking down the damp night air. A painful stich crept into my side, and I cursed myself for not putting in more time for cardio at the gym.
Something caught my left shoelace, and I hurtled to the ground, tasting mud and blood in between my teeth.
They’ve got me now.
I clawed at the mud, rolled, and watched a tire slam down mere inches from where my head had been. The Mustang loomed over me and jostled for position with the red Volkswagen and brown tow truck, the school bus still a few yards behind them. They couldn’t seem to decide who would get the pleasure of stomping me to death, and like a herd of stampeding wildebeest, they locked bumpers in an epic shoving match.
On all fours, I scampered out from under the sparring brutes, and dashed for the crumpled airplane, a white-painted DC-3 that looked like it had been cut in half by a gargantuan knife blade. I passed a snapped wing section, the oily remains of a turbo-prop engine, and a mutilated wheel from the landing gear. Climbing over a heap of mud, I squeezed into the back of the ruined flight cabin and dropped down into the dark cargo hold.
Wham.
No sooner had my sneakers hit the cold metal floor, and the entire plane rocked from the impact of something heavy ramming it just outside. I tumbled to my knees, screaming in pain as, once again, I managed to bash the sore one off a bracket in the wall.
My hand smeared in something gooey, and I scrabbled for my flashlight.
It clicked on, a wavering ball of white light in the pitch darkness, and I fought the urge to gag. “Oh man . . .”
Three people, or what was left of them, lay strewn over the narrow cargo area. Claret red blood coated the walls, caked on the floor, and clotted under my mud-spattered shoes. Bits of flesh and viscera were stuck to everything, and tatters of cloth hung from exposed sections of broken bone. An eerie set of bloody handprints adorned the walls, and the only reason I could tell it had been three people were the shoes; all of them bore anklebones sticking out above blood-soaked socks. It smelled sickly sweet, a strange, nauseas odor that crept into my nose and settled on the back of my tongue like an alien parasite.
Something glinted in the beam of my flashlight, and my pulse quickened as I pried the object loose from the severed arm that still clung to it.
“Hail Mary full of Grace.” I would have grinned if it weren’t for the fact that the plane continued to buck and roll under the assault from the cars outside.
The pistol looked old, but well-maintained, aside from the light coating of dark blood that stained its round wooden handle. It felt heavy, but good in my hand, and I turned it over to read the words, Waffenfabrik Mauser stenciled into the frame, with a large red 9 carved into the grip. For some reason, it vaguely reminded me of the blasters from Star Wars.
I fumbled with a little switch that looked like a safety on the back of the gun and stumbled toward a gap in the plane’s dented fuselage to aim out at the surrounding headlights.
Bang.
The old gun bucked reliably in my hand, its long barrel spitting a little jet of flame into the night. I had no idea if I hit anything, but the attacking cars recoiled, their horns blaring in confusion.
They turned, and scuttled for the tree line as fast as their mechanical legs could go, the entire ordeal over as fast as it had begun.
Did I do that?
Perplexed, I stared down at the pistol in my hand.
Whoosh.
A large, inky black shadow glided down from the clouds, and the yellow school bus moved too slow to react in time.
With a crash, the kicking nightmarish vehicle was thrown onto its side, spraying glass and chrome trim across the muddy field. Its electro-synth horn blared with wails of mechanical agony, as two huge talon-like feet clamped down on it, and the enormous head of the flying creature lowered to rip open its engine compartment.
The horn cut out, and the enormous flying entity jerked its head back to gulp down a mass of what looked like sticky black vines from the interior of the shattered bus.
At this range, I could see now that the flying creature bore two legs and had its wings half-tucked like a vulture that had descended to feed on roadkill. Its head turned slightly, and in the glow of another lightning bolt, my jaw went slack at the realization of what it was.
A tree trunk. It’s a rotted tree trunk.
I couldn’t tell where the reptilian beast began, and where the organic tree components ended, the upper part of the head shaped like a log, while the lower jaw resembled something out of a dinosaur movie. Its skin looked identical to the outside of a shagbark hickory but flexed with a supple featheriness that denoted something closer to skin. Sharp branch-like spines ranged down its back, and out to the end of its tail, which bore a massive round club shaped like a diseased tree-knot. Crouched on both hind legs, it braced the hooked ends of its folded wings against the ground like a bat, towering higher than a semi-truck. Under the folds of its armored head, a bulging pair of chameleon-like eyes constantly spun in their sockets, probing the dark for threats while it ate.
One black pupil locked onto the window I peered through, and my heart stopped.
The beast regarded me for a moment, making a curious, sideways sniff.
With a proud, contemptful head-toss, the shadow from the sky parted rows of razor-sharp teeth to let out a roar that shook the earth beneath my feet. It was the triumphant war cry of a creature that sat at the very top of the food chain, one that felt no threat from the fragile two-legged beings that walked the earth all around it. It hunted whenever it wanted, ate whatever it wanted, and flew wherever it wanted. It didn’t need to rip the plane apart to devour me.
Like my hunter-gatherer ancestors from thousands of years ago, I wasn’t even worth the energy it would take to pounce.
I’m hiding in the remains of the cockpit now, which is half-buried under the mud of the field, enough to shield the light from my screen so that thing doesn’t see it. My service only now came back, and it’s been over an hour since the winged beast started in on the dead bus. I don’t know when, or how I’m going to get out of here. I don’t know when anyone will even see this post, or if it will upload at all. My phone battery is almost dead, and at this point, I’m probably going to have to sleep among the corpses until daylight comes.
A dead man sleeping amongst friends.
If you live in the Noble County area in southeastern Ohio, be careful where you drive, fly, and boat. I don’t know if it’s possible to stumble into this strange place by ground, but if so, then these things are definitely headed your way.
If that happens . . . pray that they don’t find you.
submitted by RandomAppalachian468 to nosleep [link] [comments]
From 5,000 feet, the ground flew by in a carpet of dark forests and kelly-green fields. The sun hung low on the horizon in a picturesque array of dazzling orange and gold, and I could make out the narrow strip of the Ohio River to my left, glistening in the fading daylight. This time of year, the trees would be full of the sweet aroma of fresh blossoms, and the frequent rains kept small pockets of fluffy white mist hanging in the treetops. It was a beautiful view, one that reminded me of why being a helicopter pilot trumped flying in a jumbo jet far above the clouds every day of the week.
Fourteen more days, and I’m debt free.
That made me grin even more. I’d been working as a charter pilot ever since I obtained my license at age 19, and after years of keeping my nose to the grindstone, I was closing on the final payment for real-estate in western Pennsylvania. With no debt, a fixer-upper house on 30 rural acres all to myself, and a respectable wage for a 26-year-old pilot, I looked forward to the financial freedom I could now enjoy. Maybe I’d take a vacation, somewhere exotic like Venice Italy, or the Dominican Republic. Or perhaps I’d sock the money back for the day I started a family.
“Remember kleineun, a real man looks after his own.”
My elderly ouma’s voice came back from the depths of my memories, her proud, sun-tanned face rising from the darkness. She and my Rhodesian grandfather had emigrated to the US when they were newlyweds, as the violence against white Boer descendants in South Africa spiraled out of control. My mother and father both died in a car crash when I was six, and it had been my grandparents who raised me. Due to this, I’d grown up with a slight accent that many of my classmates found amusing, and I could speak both English, and Afrikaans, the Boer tongue of our former home.
I shifted in my seat, stretched my back muscles, and glanced at the picture taped to my console. Both my parents flanked a grinning, gap-toothed six-year-old me, at the last Christmas we’d spent together. My mother beamed, her dark hair and Italian features a sharp contrast to my father’s sandy blonde hair and blue eyes. Sometimes, I liked to imagine they were smiling at me with pride at how well I flew the old silver-colored bird my company had assigned to me, and that made the long, lonely flights easier to bear.
A flicker caught my eye, and I broke my gaze away from the photograph.
Perched in its small cradle above the controls, my little black Garmin fuzzed over for a few seconds, its screen shifting from brightly colored maps to a barrage of grey static.
Did the power chord come loose?
I checked, ensuring the power-cable for the unit’s battery was plugged into the port on the control panel. It was a brand-new GPS unit, and I’d used it a few times already, so I knew it wasn’t defective. Granted, I could fly and navigate without it, but the Garmin made my time as a pilot so much easier that the thought of going blind was dreadful.
My fuel gauge danced, clicked to empty, then to full, in a bizarre jolt.
More of the gauges began to stutter, the entire panel seeming to develop terrets all at once, and my pulse began to race. Something was wrong, very wrong, and the sludge inside my bowels churned with sour fear.
“Come on, come on.” I flicked switches, turned dials, punched buttons, but nothing seemed to fix the spasming electronics. Every gauge failed, and without warning, I found myself plunged into inky darkness.
Outside, the sun surrendered to the pull of night, the sky darker than usual. A distant rumble of thunder reverberated above the roar of my helicopter’s engine, and I thought I glimpsed a streak of yellowish lightning on the far horizon to my left.
Calm down Chris. We’re still flying, so it must just be a blown fuse. Stay in control and find a place to set her down.
My sweaty palm slid on the cyclic stick, and both feet weighed heavy on the yaw pedals. The collective stuck to my other hand with a nervous vibration, and I squinted against the abyss outside.
Beep.
I jumped despite myself, as the little Garmin on my panel flared back to life, the static pulling aside to reveal a twitching display. Each time the screen glitched, it showed the colorful map detailing my flight path over the ground below, but I noticed that some of the lines changed, the names shifting, as if the device couldn’t decide between two different versions of the world.
One name jutted out at me, slate gray like most of the major county names, appearing with ghostly flickers from between two neighboring ones.
Barron County.
I stared, confused. I’d flown over this section of southeastern Ohio plenty of times, and I knew the counties by heart. At this point, I should have been over the southern end of Noble County, and maybe dipping lower into Washington. There was no Barron County in Ohio. I was sure of it.
And yet it shown back at me from the digital landscape, a strange, almost cigar-shaped chunk of terrain carved from the surrounding counties like a tumor, sometimes there, sometimes not, as my little Garmin struggled to find the correct map. Rain began to patter against my cockpit window, and the entire aircraft rattled from a strong gust of wind. Thick clouds closed over my field of vision like a sea of gray cotton.
The blood in my veins turned to ice, and I sucked in a nervous breath.
Land. I had to land. There was nothing else to do, my flight controls weren’t responding, and only my Garmin had managed to come back to life. Perhaps I’d been hit by lightning, and the electronics had been fried? Either way, it was too dark to tell, but a storm seemed to be brewing, and if I didn’t get my feet on the ground soon, I could be in real trouble.
“Better safe than sorry.” I pushed down on the collective to start my slow descent and clicked the talking button for my headset. “Any station, this is Douglass Three-One-Four-Foxtrot, over.”
Nothing.
“Any station, this is Douglass Three-One-Four-Foxtrot, requesting emergency assistance, over.”
Still nothing.
If the radio’s dead, I’m really up a creek.
With my hand shaking, I clicked on the mic one more time. “Any station, this is—”
Like a curtain pulling back, the fog cleared from around my window, and the words stuck in my throat.
Without my gauges, I couldn’t tell just how far I’d descended, but I was definitely very low. Thick trees poked up from the ground, and the hills rolled into high ridges with flat valley floors, fields and pastures pockmarking them. Rain fell all around in cold, silvery sheets, a normal feature for the mid spring in this part of Ohio.
What wasn’t normal, were the fires.
At first, I thought they were forest fires for the amount of smoke and flames that bellowed from each spot, but as I swooped lower, my eyes widened in horror.
They were houses.
Farms, cottages, little clusters that barely constituted villages, all of them belched orange flames and black pillars of sooty smoke. I couldn’t hear above the helicopter blades, but I could see the flashes on the ground, along the road, in between the trees, and even coming from the burning buildings, little jets of golden light that spat into the darkness with anger.
Gunfire. That’s rifle fire, a whole lot of it.
Tiny black figures darted through the shadows, barely discernable from where I sat, several hundred feet up. I couldn’t see much, but some were definitely running away, the streaks of yellow gunfire chasing them. A few dark gray vehicles rumbled down one of the gravel roads, and sprayed fire into the houses as it went. They were fighting, I realized, the people in the trucks and the locals. It was horrific, like something out of war-torn Afghanistan, but worse.
Then, I caught a glimpse of the others.
They didn’t move like the rest, who either fled from the dark vehicles, or fired back from behind cover. These skinny figures loped along with haphazard gaits, many running on all fours like animals, swarming from the trees by the dozens. They threw themselves into the gales of bullets without flinching, attacking anyone within range, and something about the way they moved, so fluid, so fearless, made my heart skip a beat.
What is that?
“Echo Four Actual to unknown caller, please respond, over.”
Choking back a cry of shock, I fumbled at the control panel with clumsy fingers, the man’s voice sharp and stern. I hadn’t realized that I’d let go of the talking button and clicked it down again. “Hello? Hello, this is Douglass Three-One-Four-Foxtrot out of Pittsburgh, over.”
An excruciating moment passed, and I continued to zoom over the trees, the fires falling away behind me as more silent forest took over.
“Roger that Douglass Three-One-Four-Foxtrot, we read you loud and clear. Please identify yourself and any passengers or cargo you might be carrying, over.”
Swallowing hard, I eyed the treetops, which looked much closer than they should have been. How far had I descended? “Echo Four Actual, my name is Christopher Dekker, and I am alone. I’m a charter flight from PA, carrying medical equipment for OSU in Columbus. My controls have been damaged, and I am unable to safely carry on due to the storm. Requesting permission to land, over.”
I watched the landscape slide by underneath me, once catching sight of what looked like a little white church surrounded by smaller huts, dozens of figures in the yard staring up at me as I flew over a nearby ridgeline.
“Solid copy on that Douglass Three-One-Four-Foxtrot. Be advised, your transponder shows you to be inside a restricted zone. Please cease all radio traffic, reduce your speed, climb to 3,000 feet and proceed north. We’ll talk you in from there. How copy, over?”
My heart jumped, and I let out a sigh of relief. “Roger that Echo Four Actual, my altimeter is down, but I’ll do my best to eyeball the altitude, over.”
With that, I pulled the collective upward, and tried my best to gauge how far I was by eyesight in the gathering night, rain still coming down all around me. This had to be some kind of disaster or riot, I decided. After all, the voice over the radio sounded like military, and those vehicles seemed to have heavy weapons. Maybe there was some kind of unrest going on here that I hadn’t heard about yet?
Kind of weird for it to happen in rural areas though. Spoiled college kids I get, but never saw farmers get so worked up before. They usually love the military.
Something moved in the corner of my eye, and I turned out of reflex.
My mouth fell open, and I froze, unable to scream.
In the sky beside me, a huge shadow glided along, and its leathery wings effortlessly carved through the gloom, flapping only on occasion to keep it aloft. It was too dark for me to see what color it was, but from the way it moved, I knew it wasn’t another helicopter. No, this thing was alive, easily the size of a small plane, and more than twice the length of my little McDonald Douglass. A long tail trailed behind it, and bore a distinct arrow-shaped snout, with twig-like spines fanned out around the back of its head. Whatever legs it had were drawn up under it like a bird, yet its skin appeared rough and knobby, almost resembling tree bark. Without pause, the gigantic bat-winged entity flew along beside me, as if my presence was on par with an annoying fly buzzing about its head.
Gripping the microphone switch so tight, I thought I’d crack the plastic, I whispered into my headset, forgetting all radio protocol. “T-There’s something up here.”
Static crackled.
“Douglas Three-One-Four-Foxtrot, say again your last, you’re coming in weak and unreadable, over.”
“There’s something up here.” I snarled into the headset, still glued to the controls of the helicopter, afraid to deviate even an inch from my course in case the monstrosity decided to turn on me. “A freaking huge thing, right beside me. I swear, it looks like a bat or . . . I don’t know.”
“Calm down.” The man on the other end of the radio broke his rigorous discipline as well, his voice deep, but level. “It won’t attack if you don’t move too fast. Slowly ease away from it and follow that course until you’re out of sight.”
I didn’t have time to think about how wrong that sounded, how the man’s strict tone had changed to one of knowledge, how he hadn’t been the least surprised by what I’d said. Instead, I slowly turned the helicopter away from the huge menace and edged the speed higher in tiny increments.
As soon as I was roughly two football fields away, I let myself relax, and clicked the mic switch. “It’s not following.”
“You’re sure?”
Eyeing the huge flapping wings, I nodded, then remembered he couldn’t see me. “Yeah, I’m well clear.”
“Good. Thank you, Mr. Dekker.”
Then, the radio went dead.
Something in my chest dropped, a weight that made my stomach roil. This wasn’t right, none of it. Who was that man? Why did he know about the thing I’d just seen? What was I supposed to—
A flash of light exploded from the trees to my right and shot into the air with a long finger of smoke.
What the . . .
On instinct, I jerked the cyclic stick to one side, and the helicopter swung to avoid the rocket.
Boom.
My world shook, metal screeched, and a dozen alarms began to go off inside the cockpit in a cacophony of beeps and sirens. Orange and red flames lit up the night sky just behind me, and the horizon started to spin wildly outside. Heat gushed from the cockpit door, and I smelled the greasy stench of burning oil. The safety belts dug into my shoulders, and with a final slip, the radio headset ripped free from my scalp.
I’m hit.
Desperate, I yanked on the controls, fought the bird even as she spun toward the ground in a wreath of flames, the inky black trees hurtling up to meet me. The helicopter went into full auto-rotation, the sky blurring past outside, and the alarms blared in a screech of doom. Panic slammed through my temples, I screamed at the top of my lungs, and for one brief second, my eyes locked on the little black Garmin still perched atop my control panel.
Its screen stopped twitching and settled on a map of the mysterious Barron County, with a little red arrow at the center of the screen, a few words popping up underneath it.
You are here.
Trees stabbed up into the sky, the belts crushed at my torso, glass shattered all around me, and the world went dark.
Copper, thick, warm, and tangy.
It filled my mouth, stank metallic in my nose, clogged my throat, choking me. In the murkiness, I fought for a surface, for a way out, blind and numb in the dark.
This way, kleineun.
My ouma’s voice echoed from somewhere in the shadows.
This way.
Both eyes flew open, and I gagged, spitting out a stream of red.
Pain throbbed in my ribs, and a heavy pressure sent a tingling numbness through my shoulders. Blood roared inside my temples, and stars danced before my eyes with a dizzying array. Humid night air kissed my skin, and something sticky coated my face, neck, and arms that hung straight up toward the ceiling.
Wait. Not up. Down.
I blinked at the wrinkled, torn ceiling of the cockpit, the glass all gone, the gray aluminum shredded like tissue paper. Just outside the broken windows, thick Appalachian bluegrass and stemmy underbrush swished in a feeble breeze, backlit by flashes of lightning from the thunderstorm overhead. Green and brown leaves covered everything in a wet carpet of triangles, and somewhere nearby, a cricket chirped.
Turning my head from side to side, I realized that I hung upside down inside the ruined helicopter, the top half burrowed into the mud. I could hear the hissing and crackling of flames, the pattering of rain falling on the hot aluminum, and the smaller brush fires around the downed aircraft sizzling out in the damp long grass. Charred steel and burning oil tainted the air, almost as strong as the metallic, coppery stench in my aching nose.
They shot me down. That military dude shot me out of the sky.
It didn’t make sense. I’d followed their orders, done everything they’d said, and yet the instant I veered safely away from whatever that thing in the sky had been, they’d fired, not at it, but at me.
Looking down (or rather, up) at my chest, I sucked in a gasp, which was harder to do that before.
The navy-blue shirt stuck to my torso with several big splotches of dark, rusty red. Most were clean slashes, but two held bits of glass sticking out of them, one alarmingly bigger than the other. They dripped cherry red blood onto my upturned face, and a wave of nausea hit me.
I gotta get down.
I flexed my arms to try and work some feeling back into them, praying nothing was broken. Half-numb from hanging so long, I palmed along my aching body until I felt the buckled for the seat belts.
“Okay.” I hissed between gritted teeth, in an effort to stave off my panic. “You can do this. Just hold on tight. Nice and tight. Here we go . . .”
Click.
Everything seemed to lurch, and I slid off the seat to plummet towards the muck-filled hole in the cockpit ceiling. My fingers were slick with blood and slipped over the smooth faux-leather pilot’s seat with ease. The shoulder belt snagged on the bits of glass that lay just under the left lowest rib, and a flare of white-hot pain ripped through me.
Wham.
I screamed, my right knee caught the edge of the aluminum ceiling, and both hands dove into a mound of leaf-covered glass shards on the opposite side of the hole. My head swam, being right-side-up again enough to make shadows gnaw at the corner of my eyes.
Forcing myself to breath slowly, I fought the urge to faint and slid back to sit on the smooth ceiling. I turned my hands over to see half a dozen bits of clear glass burrowed into my skin like greedy parasites, red blood weeping around the new cuts.
“Screw you.” I spat at the rubbish with angry tears in my eyes. “Screw you, screw you, screw you.”
The shards came out easy enough, and the cuts weren’t that deep, but that wasn’t what worried me. On my chest, the single piece of cockpit glass that remined was almost as big as my palm, and it really hurt. Just touching it felt like self-inflicted torture, but I knew it had to come out sooner or later.
Please don’t nick a vein.
Wiping my hands dry on my jeans, I gripped the shard with both hands, and jerked.
Fire roared over my ribs, and hot blood tickled my already grimy pale skin. I clapped a hand over the wound, pressing down hard, and grunted out a string of hateful expletives that my ouma would have slapped me for.
Lying on my back, I stared around me at the messy cargo compartment of the MD-902. Most of the medical supplies had been in cardboard boxes strapped down with heavy nylon tow-straps, but several cases had ruptured with the force of the impact, spraying bandages, syringes, and pill bottles all over the cluttered interior. Orange flames chewed at the crate furthest to the rear, the tail section long gone, but the foremost part of the hold was intact. Easily a million-dollar mess, it would have made me faint on any other trip, but today it was a godsend.
Half-blind in the darkness, I crawled along with only the firelight and lightning bolts to guide me, my right knee aching. Like a crippled raccoon, I collected things as I went, conscious of the two pallets of intact supplies weighing right over my head. I’d taken several different first-aid courses with some hunting buddies of mine, and the mental reflexes kicked in to help soothe my frazzled mind.
Check for bleeds, stop the worst, then move on.
Aside from my battered chest and stomach, the rest of me remained mostly unharmed. I had nasty bruises from the seatbelts, my right knee swelled, my nose slightly crooked and crusted in blood, but otherwise I was intact. Dowsing every scratch and cut with a bottle of isopropyl alcohol I found, I used butterfly closures on the smaller lacerations that peppered my skin. I wrapped soft white gauze over my abused palms and probed at the big cut where the last shard had been, only stopping when I was sure there were no pieces of glass wedged inside my flesh.
“Not too bad.” I grunted to myself, trying to sound impassive like a doctor might. “Rib must have stopped it. Gonna need stitches though. That’ll be fun.”
Pawing through the broken cases, I couldn’t find any suture chord, but just as I was about to give up, I noticed a small box that read ‘medical skin stapler’.
Bingo.
I tore the small white plastic stapler free from its packaging and eyeballed the device. I’d never done this before, only seen it in movies, and even though the cut in my skin hurt, I wondered if this wouldn’t be worse.
You’ve gotta do it. That bleeding needs to stop. Besides, no one’s coming to rescue you, not with those rocket-launching psychos out there.
Taking a deep breath, I pinched the skin around the gash together, and pressed the mouth of the stapler to it.
Click.
A sharp sting, like that of a needle bit at the skin, but it didn’t hurt nearly as bad as the cut itself. I worked my way across the two-inch laceration and gave out a sigh of relief when it was done.
“Not going to bleed to death today.” I daubed ointment around the staples before winding more bandages over the wound.
Popping a few low-grade painkillers that tumbled from the cargo, I crawled wriggled through the nearest shattered window into the wet grass.
Raindrops kissed my face, clean and cool on my sweaty skin. Despite the thick cloud cover, there was enough constant lightning strikes within the storm to let me get glimpses of the world around me. My helicopter lay on its back, the blades snapped like pencils, with bits and pieces of it burning in chunks all around the small break in the trees. Chest-high scrub brush grew all around the low-lying ground, with pockets of standing water in places. My ears still rang from the impact of the crash, but I could start to pick up more crickets, frogs, and even some nocturnal birds singing into the darkness, like they didn’t notice the huge the hulk of flaming metal that had fallen from the sky. Overhead, the thunder rumbled onward, the feeble wind whistling, and there were other flashes on the horizon, orange and red ones, with crackles that didn’t sound quite like lightning.
The guns. They’re still fighting.
Instinctively, I pulled out my cellphone, and tapped the screen.
It fluttered to life, but no matter how I tried, I couldn’t get through to anyone, not even with the emergency function designed to work around having no service. The complicated wonder of our modern world was little better than a glorified paperweight.
Stunned, I sat down with my back to the helicopter and rested my head against the aluminum skin of the craft. How I’d gone from a regular medical supply run to being marooned in this hellish parody of rural America, I didn’t know, but one thig was certain; I needed a plan. Whoever fired the missile could have already contacted my charter company and made up some excuse to keep them from coming to look for me. No one else knew I was here, and even though I now had six staples holding the worst of my injuries shut, I knew I needed proper medical attention. If I wanted to live, I’d have to rescue myself.
My bag. I need to get my go-bag, grab some gear and then . . . head somewhere else.
It took me a while to gather my green canvas paratrooper bag from its place behind the pilot’s seat and fill it with whatever supplies I could scrounge. My knee didn’t seem to be broken, but man did it hurt, and I dreaded the thought of walking on it for miles on end. I focused instead on inventorying my gear and trying to come up with a halfway intelligent plan of action.
I had a stainless-steel canteen with one of those detachable cups on the bottom, a little fishing kit, some duct tape, a lighter, a black LED flashlight with three spare batteries, a few tattered road maps with a compass, a spare pair of socks, medical supplies from the cargo, and a simple forest green plastic rain poncho. I also managed to unearth a functioning digital camcorder my ouma had gotten me for Christmas a few years back, though I wasn’t sure I wanted to do any filming in such a miserable state. Lastly, since it was a private supply run from a warehouse area near Pittsburgh to a direct hospital pad in Ohio, I’d been able to bring my K-Bar, a sturdy, and brutally simple knife designed for the Marine Corps that I used every time I went camping. It was pitiful in comparison to the rifle I wished I had with me, but that didn’t matter now. I had what I had, and I doubted my trusty Armalite would have alleviated my sore knee anyway.
Clicking on my flashlight, I huddled with the poncho around my shoulders inside the wreck of the chopper and peered at the dusty roadmaps. A small part of me hoped that a solution would jump out from the faded paper, but none came. These were all maps of western PA and eastern Ohio. None of them had a Barron County on them anywhere.
The man on the radio said to head north, right before they shot me down. That means they must be camped out to the north of here. South had that convoy and those burning houses, so that’s a no-go. Maybe I can backtrack eastward the way I came.
As if on cue, a soft pop echoed from over the eastern horizon, and I craned to look out the helicopter window, spotting more man-made flashes over the tree tops.
“Great.” I hissed between clenched teeth, aware of how the temperature dipped to a chilly 60 degrees, and how despite the conditions, my stomach had begun to growl. “Not going that way, are we? Westward it is.”
Walking away from my poor 902 proved to be harder than I’d anticipated. Despite the glass, the fizzling fires, and the darkness, it still held a familiar, human essence to it. Sitting inside it made me feel secure, safe, even calm about the situation. In any other circumstance, I would have just stayed with the downed aircraft to wait for help, but I knew the men who shot me down would likely find my crash site, and I didn’t want to be around when they did.
Unlike much of central and western Ohio, southeastern Ohio is hilly, brushy, and clogged with thick forests. Thorns snagged at my thin poncho and sliced at my pant legs. My knee throbbed, every step a form of self-inflicted torture. The rain never stopped, a steady drizzle from above just cold enough to be problematic as time went on, making me shiver. Mud slid under my tennis shoes, and every tree looked ten times bigger in the flickering beam of my cheap flashlight. Icy fear prickled at the back of my neck at some of the sounds that greeted me through the gloom. I’d been camping loads of times, both in Pennsylvania and elsewhere, but these noises were something otherworldly to me.
Strange howls, screeches, and calls permeated the rain-soaked sky, some almost roars, while others bordered on human in their intonation. The more I walked, the softer the distant gunfire became, and the more prevalent the odd sounds, until the shadows seemed to fill with them. I didn’t dare turn off my flashlight, or I’d been completely blind in the dark, but a little voice in the back of my head screamed that I was too visible, crunching through the gloomy forest with my long beam of light stabbing into the abyss. It felt as though a million eyes were on me, studying me, hunting me from the surrounding brush, and I bitterly recalled how much I’d loved the old Survivor Man TV series as a kid.
Not so fun being out in the woods at night. Especially alone.
A twig snapped somewhere behind me, and I whirled on the spot, one trembling hand resting on the hilt of my K-Bar.
Nothing. Nothing but trees, bushes, and rain dripping down in the darkness.
“This is stupid.” I whispered to myself to keep my nerves in check as I slowly spun on the spot. “I should have went eastward anyway. God knows how long I’m going to have to—”
Creak.
A groan of metal-on-metal echoed from somewhere to my right, and I spun to face it, yanking the knife on my belt free from its scabbard. It felt so small and useless in my hand, and I choked down a wave of nauseas fear.
Ka-whump. Creak. K-whump. Creak.
Underbrush cracked and crunched, a few smaller saplings thrashed, and from deep within the gloom, two yellow orbs flared to life. They poked through the mist in the trees, forming into slender fingers of golden light that swept back and forth in the dark.
The soldiers . . . they must be looking for me.
I swallowed hard and turned to slink away.
Ice jammed through my blood, and I froze on the spot, biting my tongue to stop the scream.
It stood not yards away, a huge form that towered a good twelve feet tall in the swirling shadows. Unpolished chrome blended with flash-rusted spots in the faded red paint, and grime-smeared glass shone with dull hues in the flashes of lightning. Where the wheels should have been, the rounded steel axels curved like some enormous hand had bent them, and the tires lay face-down on the muddy ground like big round feet, their hubcaps buried in the dirt. Dents, scrapes, and chips covered the battered thing, and its crooked little radio antenna pointed straight up from the old metal fender like a mast. I could barely make out the mud-coated VW on the rounded hood, and my mind reeled in shock.
Is . . . is that a car?
Both yellow headlights bathed me in a circle of bright, blinding light, and neither I nor the strange vehicle moved.
Seconds ticked by, the screech-thumping in the background only growing closer. I realized that I couldn’t hear any engine noises and had yet to see any soldiers or guns pointed my way. This car looked old, really old, like one of those classic Volkswagen Beetles that collectors fought over at auctions. Try as I might, I couldn’t see a driver inside the murky, mold-smeared windows.
Because there wasn’t one.
Lightning arched across the sky overhead, and the car standing in front of me blinked.
Its headlights slid shut, as if little metal shades had crawled over the bulbs for a moment and flicked open again. Something about that movement was so primal, so real, so lifelike, that every ounce of self-control I had melted in an instant.
Cursing under my breath, I lunged into the shrubs, and the world erupted around me.
Under my shoes, the ground shook, and the car surged after me in a cacophony of ka-thumps that made my already racing heart skip several beats. A weather-beaten brown tow truck from the 50’s charged through the thorns to my left, it’s headlights ablaze, and a dilapidated yellow school bus rose from its hiding place in the weeds to stand tall on four down-turned axel-legs. They all flicked their headlights on like giants waking from their slumber, and as I dodged past them, they each blared their horn into the night in alarm.
My breaths came short and tight, my knee burned, and I crashed through thorns and briars without thought to how badly I was getting cut up.
The cheap poncho tore, and I ripped it away as it caught on a tree branch.
A purple 70’s Mustang shook off its blanket of creeping vines and bounded from a stand of trees just ahead, forcing me to swerve to avoid being run over, my adrenaline at all-time highs.
This can’t be happening, this can’t be happening, this can’t be happening.
Slipping and sliding, I pushed through a stand of multiflora rose, and stumbled out into a flat, dark expanse.
I almost skidded to a stop.
What had once been a rather large field stood no taller than my shoestrings, the grass charred, and burnt. The storm above illuminated huge pieces of wreckage that lay scattered over the nearly 40-acre plot, and I could just make out the fire-blackened hulk of a fuselage resting a hundred yards away. The plane had been brought down a while ago it seemed, as there weren’t any flames left burning, and I threw myself toward it in frenzied desperation.
Burned grass and greasy brown topsoil slushed underfoot, and I could hear the squelching of the cars pursing me. Rain soaked me to the bone, and my lungs ached from sucking down the damp night air. A painful stich crept into my side, and I cursed myself for not putting in more time for cardio at the gym.
Something caught my left shoelace, and I hurtled to the ground, tasting mud and blood in between my teeth.
They’ve got me now.
I clawed at the mud, rolled, and watched a tire slam down mere inches from where my head had been. The Mustang loomed over me and jostled for position with the red Volkswagen and brown tow truck, the school bus still a few yards behind them. They couldn’t seem to decide who would get the pleasure of stomping me to death, and like a herd of stampeding wildebeest, they locked bumpers in an epic shoving match.
On all fours, I scampered out from under the sparring brutes, and dashed for the crumpled airplane, a white-painted DC-3 that looked like it had been cut in half by a gargantuan knife blade. I passed a snapped wing section, the oily remains of a turbo-prop engine, and a mutilated wheel from the landing gear. Climbing over a heap of mud, I squeezed into the back of the ruined flight cabin and dropped down into the dark cargo hold.
Wham.
No sooner had my sneakers hit the cold metal floor, and the entire plane rocked from the impact of something heavy ramming it just outside. I tumbled to my knees, screaming in pain as, once again, I managed to bash the sore one off a bracket in the wall.
My hand smeared in something gooey, and I scrabbled for my flashlight.
It clicked on, a wavering ball of white light in the pitch darkness, and I fought the urge to gag. “Oh man . . .”
Three people, or what was left of them, lay strewn over the narrow cargo area. Claret red blood coated the walls, caked on the floor, and clotted under my mud-spattered shoes. Bits of flesh and viscera were stuck to everything, and tatters of cloth hung from exposed sections of broken bone. An eerie set of bloody handprints adorned the walls, and the only reason I could tell it had been three people were the shoes; all of them bore anklebones sticking out above blood-soaked socks. It smelled sickly sweet, a strange, nauseas odor that crept into my nose and settled on the back of my tongue like an alien parasite.
Something glinted in the beam of my flashlight, and my pulse quickened as I pried the object loose from the severed arm that still clung to it.
“Hail Mary full of Grace.” I would have grinned if it weren’t for the fact that the plane continued to buck and roll under the assault from the cars outside.
The pistol looked old, but well-maintained, aside from the light coating of dark blood that stained its round wooden handle. It felt heavy, but good in my hand, and I turned it over to read the words, Waffenfabrik Mauser stenciled into the frame, with a large red 9 carved into the grip. For some reason, it vaguely reminded me of the blasters from Star Wars.
I fumbled with a little switch that looked like a safety on the back of the gun and stumbled toward a gap in the plane’s dented fuselage to aim out at the surrounding headlights.
Bang.
The old gun bucked reliably in my hand, its long barrel spitting a little jet of flame into the night. I had no idea if I hit anything, but the attacking cars recoiled, their horns blaring in confusion.
They turned, and scuttled for the tree line as fast as their mechanical legs could go, the entire ordeal over as fast as it had begun.
Did I do that?
Perplexed, I stared down at the pistol in my hand.
Whoosh.
A large, inky black shadow glided down from the clouds, and the yellow school bus moved too slow to react in time.
With a crash, the kicking nightmarish vehicle was thrown onto its side, spraying glass and chrome trim across the muddy field. Its electro-synth horn blared with wails of mechanical agony, as two huge talon-like feet clamped down on it, and the enormous head of the flying creature lowered to rip open its engine compartment.
The horn cut out, and the enormous flying entity jerked its head back to gulp down a mass of what looked like sticky black vines from the interior of the shattered bus.
At this range, I could see now that the flying creature bore two legs and had its wings half-tucked like a vulture that had descended to feed on roadkill. Its head turned slightly, and in the glow of another lightning bolt, my jaw went slack at the realization of what it was.
A tree trunk. It’s a rotted tree trunk.
I couldn’t tell where the reptilian beast began, and where the organic tree components ended, the upper part of the head shaped like a log, while the lower jaw resembled something out of a dinosaur movie. Its skin looked identical to the outside of a shagbark hickory but flexed with a supple featheriness that denoted something closer to skin. Sharp branch-like spines ranged down its back, and out to the end of its tail, which bore a massive round club shaped like a diseased tree-knot. Crouched on both hind legs, it braced the hooked ends of its folded wings against the ground like a bat, towering higher than a semi-truck. Under the folds of its armored head, a bulging pair of chameleon-like eyes constantly spun in their sockets, probing the dark for threats while it ate.
One black pupil locked onto the window I peered through, and my heart stopped.
The beast regarded me for a moment, making a curious, sideways sniff.
With a proud, contemptful head-toss, the shadow from the sky parted rows of razor-sharp teeth to let out a roar that shook the earth beneath my feet. It was the triumphant war cry of a creature that sat at the very top of the food chain, one that felt no threat from the fragile two-legged beings that walked the earth all around it. It hunted whenever it wanted, ate whatever it wanted, and flew wherever it wanted. It didn’t need to rip the plane apart to devour me.
Like my hunter-gatherer ancestors from thousands of years ago, I wasn’t even worth the energy it would take to pounce.
I’m hiding in the remains of the cockpit now, which is half-buried under the mud of the field, enough to shield the light from my screen so that thing doesn’t see it. My service only now came back, and it’s been over an hour since the winged beast started in on the dead bus. I don’t know when, or how I’m going to get out of here. I don’t know when anyone will even see this post, or if it will upload at all. My phone battery is almost dead, and at this point, I’m probably going to have to sleep among the corpses until daylight comes.
A dead man sleeping amongst friends.
If you live in the Noble County area in southeastern Ohio, be careful where you drive, fly, and boat. I don’t know if it’s possible to stumble into this strange place by ground, but if so, then these things are definitely headed your way.
If that happens . . . pray that they don’t find you.
2023.05.29 00:38 _Bootlegmeg Found an old roll of film.
Hey there, this is my first time ever posting in Reddit so please bare with me. I was chatting with my Granda recently about photography and he gave me my other Granda’s old Topcon Re Super. I have no idea how old it is / what year it was made but I thought this was really cool. When I took a look I saw that it still has an old half used roll of film in it. The camera hasn’t been used in 22 years so I’m really eager to get the pictures developed but I have no idea where to do this. Any advice? I live in the uk. Any help is greatly appreciated!
submitted by _Bootlegmeg to filmphotography [link] [comments]
2023.05.29 00:36 _Bootlegmeg Found an old roll of film
Hey there, this is my first time ever posting in Reddit so please bare with me. I was chatting with my Granda recently about photography and he gave me my other Granda’s old Topcon Re Super. I have no idea how old it is / what year it was made but I thought this was really cool. When I took a look I saw that it still has an old half used roll of film in it. The camera hasn’t been used in 22 years so I’m really eager to get the pictures developed but I have no idea where to do this. Any advice? I live in the uk. Any help is greatly appreciated!
submitted by _Bootlegmeg to Darkroom [link] [comments]
2023.05.29 00:34 Amy_Hearts I pass enough for creepy men to secretly take pics of me..
TW//misogny, creepy men and cis men
This weird middle aged white guy withj a rolling stones shirt with like the logo licking a blunt ot something was asking questions the kind boomers would ask at my place of work and then he asked if he could take w picture of me and my sister. We both were wearing tank tops and today I thought I would dress up nice like fishnets cute top and some accessories. We told him out right no and he walked away..
1 Minute later and I see him with his expensive red phone pointed right at is from the distance through the crowd. Once I pointed him out to my sister he slowly panned the camera away like he was doing a video. We both decided to confront him and I grabbed a tiny bat just to hopefully scare him off if he tried anything cause he was bigger than us. We asked him what he was doing and he denied taking pictures of us and said he was taking a video of the place.
He said he was going to post the pics online and when we asked where he ignored the question we asked to see his camera roll and he refused and said "this is a free country you can't just be threatening me" and I said it's a free country but not freedom from consequences and he just took his phone out and started recording us and after that was walked away flipping him off.. I spent like 40 minutes walking trying to find security and they were kind of useless honestly... they said they will check it out but yeah it was very vague and sounded like bullshit to me. The army guys were really nice they heard my story and helped me try to find an officer or security, shout out to them they're nice.
Since then I've just been crying and scared... I'm worried he will post the pics he took somewhere gross online or he will worst post the video and it will goo viral on tik tok or viral freak out and I will just endlessly get harassed for it online...
But after that whole situation I covered up so my shoulders weren't exposed and changed into long pants and a long t short even tho it was like 80 degrees out. I was too scared to dress like a hot bitch. It's hot girl summer I wanted to own it but in that moment I felt vulnerable and sexualized. I love how I look and this is proof I do pass but im scared to wear anything too exposing now. I know that what you wear doesn't stop predators and stuff but I can't feel confident in public atleast in my cute hot girl clothing.. and idk...
submitted by Amy_Hearts to MtF [link] [comments]
This weird middle aged white guy withj a rolling stones shirt with like the logo licking a blunt ot something was asking questions the kind boomers would ask at my place of work and then he asked if he could take w picture of me and my sister. We both were wearing tank tops and today I thought I would dress up nice like fishnets cute top and some accessories. We told him out right no and he walked away..
1 Minute later and I see him with his expensive red phone pointed right at is from the distance through the crowd. Once I pointed him out to my sister he slowly panned the camera away like he was doing a video. We both decided to confront him and I grabbed a tiny bat just to hopefully scare him off if he tried anything cause he was bigger than us. We asked him what he was doing and he denied taking pictures of us and said he was taking a video of the place.
He said he was going to post the pics online and when we asked where he ignored the question we asked to see his camera roll and he refused and said "this is a free country you can't just be threatening me" and I said it's a free country but not freedom from consequences and he just took his phone out and started recording us and after that was walked away flipping him off.. I spent like 40 minutes walking trying to find security and they were kind of useless honestly... they said they will check it out but yeah it was very vague and sounded like bullshit to me. The army guys were really nice they heard my story and helped me try to find an officer or security, shout out to them they're nice.
Since then I've just been crying and scared... I'm worried he will post the pics he took somewhere gross online or he will worst post the video and it will goo viral on tik tok or viral freak out and I will just endlessly get harassed for it online...
But after that whole situation I covered up so my shoulders weren't exposed and changed into long pants and a long t short even tho it was like 80 degrees out. I was too scared to dress like a hot bitch. It's hot girl summer I wanted to own it but in that moment I felt vulnerable and sexualized. I love how I look and this is proof I do pass but im scared to wear anything too exposing now. I know that what you wear doesn't stop predators and stuff but I can't feel confident in public atleast in my cute hot girl clothing.. and idk...
2023.05.29 00:26 babygator24 Ghoster finally said something
I recently made a post asking for advice regarding a ghoster (which has since been deleted). Basically, I was really worried about said-ghoster, because he really didn’t seem like the type to ghost, and I was genuinely worried about his well-being since he works in a somewhat dangerous trade. If you read that post, I decided to take the general advice and NOT reach out to his friends and family to check-in on him. Instead, I waited a few days and then sent him a message basically saying that I hoped he was okay, but that I was going to assume he was ghosting. In this message, I also told him nicely that I understood if he was no longer interested in me but that the least I deserved was a text saying so, especially after he brought up ghosting once, went on an on about how much he hated it, and then made me promise never to ghost him. Anyway, immediately after sending this message, I deleted our chat and his number. I should’ve left it at that, but I was just too curious, so a few days later, I redownloaded the app where we met, and the man had updated his entire profile and put pictures that I took of him on a weekend trip we took together. I was fuming, so I sent him a message through the app calling him out for his behavior, encouraging him to do some self-reflection, and ending with something along the lines of I don’t need a response because your silence/cowardliness speak volumes. That last line was perhaps the meanest thing I wrote, the rest were just rhetorical questions. I’m not the type to really attack/belittle people even when I’m angry. Anyway, a few days later he sends me a reply. And that’s when it all clicked. For context, during that last week we talked before he ghosted: on Tuesday night, I had shared a silly story about something back in high school. It was something trivial yet petty. I have certainly matured and wouldn’t do anything like that again, but it’s a story I share that often makes people laugh. After I shared this story, he left me on read and didn’t text me until the next night (Wednesday). I assumed he was tired the night before and busy during the day, so I didn’t think much of it. However, Wednesday morning I got some terrible news and was a bit on edge. When he texted me Wednesday night, I told him what happened. He seemed a bit dry, but I also wasn’t in the mood to talk much. So, I told him I would text him the next day (Thursday). Thursday and Friday were both extremely busy days and I was just exhausted and still processing the terrible news that I had received on Wednesday, so I didn’t actually get around to texting him until Friday night. I’m pretty sure I had called him Friday morning too, and he never returned my calls. I know he’s never really busy on the weekends, so I found it odd when I hadn’t received a reply by Saturday night. I sent another message then asking if everything was okay. No answer. And then on Monday, I finally assumed he was ghosting and sent him the text I mentioned earlier. Now back to what he replied to me on the app. He told me that the story I had told him gave him the ick and that I play childish games, because I told him I would text him the next day on Wednesday but didn’t remember to text him until Friday night. He then said, and I quote “you’re a good girl i just think you arnt mature… Love doesn’t always pick you and ik it’s not easy to accept but it’s apart of growing. it’s you not me.” My jaw just dropped. I’m not saying I’m the most mature person ever, but getting “the ick” like that after talking such a big game and then proceeding to ghost me, because I didn’t text him in two days is not what I would call mature. I also think that if he got the ick over something so dumb, he probably wasn’t all that into me in the first place, which is fine, I just wish he hadn’t led me on and got me excited, because I didn’t even want a relationship in the first place! I just feel so used and disrespected. Also, I think it’s funny how he put all the blame on me and acts like he did nothing wrong, when 1) he could’ve called me out on the story I shared if he didn’t like it instead of ignoring me for a whole day, and 2) he just assumed I was playing games and then ghosted me. If he had replied to me just telling me he had an issue with this I would’ve apologized, explained myself, and made it a priority to touch base more often. I was just so caught up with personal issues, and we once had a conversation about how we liked not having to feel like we need to text 24/7, so I didn’t think it would be a problem. At this point, I’m not really sad about it, because I see he’s too immature for the type of relationship I would even consider being in, and I’ve lost all attraction, but I just don’t get how people can be so one-sided, unaware of themselves, and flat-out fake. Additionally, he tried so much, he seemed to really care, said I checked all the boxes and called me wifey material. So, I also don’t understand how people expect to find someone to date seriously and marry if an “ick” scares them off. Everyone will give you the ick at some point in my opinion. No one’s perfect, and I know there are certain things I could’ve done differently here, but am I not justified in my angedisillusionment with humans? I have a lot of trauma from a previous relationship and seeing my dad be a manipulative, emotional abusive cheater to my mom. I really thought this guy was different. Makes me not want to date again.
submitted by babygator24 to ghosting [link] [comments]
2023.05.29 00:13 kittyy172 Should I go for an official autism diagnosis?
I apologize for any inconvenience I bring here. I would like to underline that my goal is not to make fun of autism diagnoses, nor of autistic people because I took these online tests instead of directly going for a private diagnosis. As I’d love to take things very seriously, I would like to talk with other people – mainly those who have got experiences of some kind – to see if it is necessary for me to go and, eventually, get diagnosed.
Please, read my story. It’s a bit long, so I divided it into paragraphs.
MY LIFE IN A NUTSHELL
I have always felt different from other people, in some ways. Of course, when I was a kid, I did not use to pay particular attention to what other people said to me. Like every kid, I was carefree, so I might not remember in precise detail the things I used to feel or think about. Despite this initial consideration, I vividly remember one thing: I was passionate about a few things: Nintendo videogames, cartoons, and drawing. Things I have NEVER abandoned as I grew up. I would spend literal hours playing Sonic Advance or Super Mario Advance 4 on my GBA SP, watching cartoons, and drawing silly characters on my various notebooks. When elementary school started, I remember not having any particular difficulty at socializing, even though I felt myself to be more drawn to male friendships than female ones, mainly because I wanted to talk about videogames and cartoons all the time, and also because I preferred to dress comfortable, rather than all girly and trendy. I do remember, however, a faint sense of “feeling not as good as the other girls”, or “feeling not the same as them”. As if I was aware that I was not like the others, and wanted to fit in so I could feel “more normal”.
It was middle school that destroyed me. At that time, I was utterly obsessed by the Sonic franchise, apart from the other things I previously liked, to the point in which I enjoyed reading fanfictions, making up stories with my avatar… (that is embarrassing to read, I know). My classmates knew and mocked me for being kind of “nerdish”, always around “that Sonic thing”, or “those Nintendo stuff”, “drawing those silly Japanese things”. I was desperately trying to fit in, but I didn’t want to leave what I loved most, and that costed me my reputation. I didn’t make many friends throughout the year, and I often found myself being shut in my room playing with my 3DS, making friends across the Internet that shared the same interest in Nintendo games. I also remember being very clumsy, gullible and awkwardly shy, with a low self-esteem and prone to crying and getting bullied. I was always getting quite high grades, especially in English and Spanish classes (studied as foreign languages).
High school was kind of the same, except I was aware that people would’ve eventually disliked me if I “showed my true, nerdish self”, which turned out to be inevitable. During the 5th and last year, I remember shutting myself completely from my classmates because I knew what would have happened if I desperately tried to fit in like I tried to do in middle school. And again, I found myself isolating in my room the majority of the time drawing, playing videogames, watching animated movies (I <3 Pixar!!!!) … same thing as before. Even though, this time, my social skills did manage to get me some chill friendships. But not in large groups. That was a big no-no.
As of now, university made me realize I can actually make friends, because I don’t have to be in a fixed classroom anymore! That was a relief. I bring my Switch every time I go there, so that some people might ask me “Hey, whatcha playin’?” (still waiting for that to happen). And I made friends with quite a few boys who share my same interests through the official social network accounts of the uni.
THE START
So, what does all this rant has to do with me asking for a discussion about autism?
I recently made friends with a boy. We instantly became close friends. We share a lot of interests regarding videogames and memes. He is on the spectrum, and one day we were talking about our childhood (so, the paragraphs above this one), and he said to me “People saw you as weird, you’ve got unique interests and you’ve had only a few friends throughout your life? I don’t want to assume anything, but you might be on the spectrum too”. In addition to that, I was thinking about old friendships I had during that period and, by looking around on social media, I found one person I used to talk to all the time. We eventually lost contact and had our lives, but I managed to find one of their accounts, and soon found out they are on the spectrum too. I have always sensed some “weirdness” in them, but I absolutely loved and enjoyed it. I loved how we managed to talk for hours about videogames, Nintendo, drawing and anime. Wish they didn’t go away, though, but everyone needs to find their own path, eventually. I then realized I tended – and still tend – to “click” more with unusual people (not saying they are all autistic, but they still quite stand out from the ordinary, let’s say it like this) than with “normal” individuals.
Anyway, I may have taken my friend’s statement a bit too seriously, and I started to look out for tests on the internet. I stumbled across the “Aspie Quiz” one. The first time I did it, my score was about 109 out of 200 for the broader autism cluster, and 125 out of 200 for the neurotypical one. I completed it a few other times in these months, getting similar results with little changes towards the ND cluster. I recently realized there was an extended version of the quiz if you signed up, so I did that, and got quite a different result from the first take: 142 out of 200 for the broader autism cluster, and 94 out of 200 for the neurotypical one (it’s the first picture of the post). I couldn’t believe I had got such a different result from the previous attempt, so I completed other tests. As you can see from the pictures, they all seem to give me average scores, like “You have evidence for neurodivergent traits, but you also have evidence for neurotypical traits”. The score never picked one side, and it honestly made me feel even worse than before. Some of the questions contained in those questionnaires (which I don’t precisely remember right now) were extremely accurate, and that made me feel quite surprised, and this is what raised my interest in the subject so much I felt obliged to write this post. But then, if some questions do feel accurate, why is my score so broad? How should I feel about the “range” of my scores? Do I have to trust all these tests, then? Or are they just false and am I being excessively paranoid about something I might, or might not have? And then, why do other tests give me “very neurotypical results”?
CONCLUSION (I SWEAR I’M GONNA GO AWAY, I PROMISE)
Before you (rightfully) start laughing at me because I am believing some random online tests way too much, the reason I decided to take these online tests is because, unfortunately, my household and most of the people around me do not fully understand that autism is not always related to that stereotypical image of a “nonverbal weird kid”. So, in order to get a diagnosis, I will need to rely only on myself and the few people around me who are actually open to these discussions. I do think online tests are a way of “starting out”. It’s the official step the thing I am afraid to take, for some reason. I have never been open about my weirdness, how I behaved, my perception of the world, and seeing those details that somewhat appealed to me – or to my past self – made me think I might embrace them through a scientific denomination, if there is any. I am relieved to learn that many other people feel the world “more intensely” than the others, just like I did and am doing, as I gradually approach adult life (I am twenty years old), and have felt awkward around groups of people, or felt like they were misfits.
I am sorry for the length of this discussion. And I am sorry if I offended anyone because of my paranoia. One day I may go for it and not get anything, thus having mocked those who actually are on the spectrum and making a fool of myself for what I’ve written up until now. I am extremely sorry if you felt offended by what I have written. If you somehow did not feel offended by the essay I have written, I absolutely accept comments and direct messages on the matter. Maybe you could help me think about this a bit.
Thank you. Have a nice day.
Side note: Apart from the Aspie Test result, which has been crucial for the development of this discussion, I do not want to expose all of my scorings here, as they would be uninteresting and/or annoying, so if you are interested in them, I suggest you send me a direct message. But only if you want to seriously discuss about it.
submitted by kittyy172 to mentalhealth [link] [comments]
Please, read my story. It’s a bit long, so I divided it into paragraphs.
MY LIFE IN A NUTSHELL
I have always felt different from other people, in some ways. Of course, when I was a kid, I did not use to pay particular attention to what other people said to me. Like every kid, I was carefree, so I might not remember in precise detail the things I used to feel or think about. Despite this initial consideration, I vividly remember one thing: I was passionate about a few things: Nintendo videogames, cartoons, and drawing. Things I have NEVER abandoned as I grew up. I would spend literal hours playing Sonic Advance or Super Mario Advance 4 on my GBA SP, watching cartoons, and drawing silly characters on my various notebooks. When elementary school started, I remember not having any particular difficulty at socializing, even though I felt myself to be more drawn to male friendships than female ones, mainly because I wanted to talk about videogames and cartoons all the time, and also because I preferred to dress comfortable, rather than all girly and trendy. I do remember, however, a faint sense of “feeling not as good as the other girls”, or “feeling not the same as them”. As if I was aware that I was not like the others, and wanted to fit in so I could feel “more normal”.
It was middle school that destroyed me. At that time, I was utterly obsessed by the Sonic franchise, apart from the other things I previously liked, to the point in which I enjoyed reading fanfictions, making up stories with my avatar… (that is embarrassing to read, I know). My classmates knew and mocked me for being kind of “nerdish”, always around “that Sonic thing”, or “those Nintendo stuff”, “drawing those silly Japanese things”. I was desperately trying to fit in, but I didn’t want to leave what I loved most, and that costed me my reputation. I didn’t make many friends throughout the year, and I often found myself being shut in my room playing with my 3DS, making friends across the Internet that shared the same interest in Nintendo games. I also remember being very clumsy, gullible and awkwardly shy, with a low self-esteem and prone to crying and getting bullied. I was always getting quite high grades, especially in English and Spanish classes (studied as foreign languages).
High school was kind of the same, except I was aware that people would’ve eventually disliked me if I “showed my true, nerdish self”, which turned out to be inevitable. During the 5th and last year, I remember shutting myself completely from my classmates because I knew what would have happened if I desperately tried to fit in like I tried to do in middle school. And again, I found myself isolating in my room the majority of the time drawing, playing videogames, watching animated movies (I <3 Pixar!!!!) … same thing as before. Even though, this time, my social skills did manage to get me some chill friendships. But not in large groups. That was a big no-no.
As of now, university made me realize I can actually make friends, because I don’t have to be in a fixed classroom anymore! That was a relief. I bring my Switch every time I go there, so that some people might ask me “Hey, whatcha playin’?” (still waiting for that to happen). And I made friends with quite a few boys who share my same interests through the official social network accounts of the uni.
THE START
So, what does all this rant has to do with me asking for a discussion about autism?
I recently made friends with a boy. We instantly became close friends. We share a lot of interests regarding videogames and memes. He is on the spectrum, and one day we were talking about our childhood (so, the paragraphs above this one), and he said to me “People saw you as weird, you’ve got unique interests and you’ve had only a few friends throughout your life? I don’t want to assume anything, but you might be on the spectrum too”. In addition to that, I was thinking about old friendships I had during that period and, by looking around on social media, I found one person I used to talk to all the time. We eventually lost contact and had our lives, but I managed to find one of their accounts, and soon found out they are on the spectrum too. I have always sensed some “weirdness” in them, but I absolutely loved and enjoyed it. I loved how we managed to talk for hours about videogames, Nintendo, drawing and anime. Wish they didn’t go away, though, but everyone needs to find their own path, eventually. I then realized I tended – and still tend – to “click” more with unusual people (not saying they are all autistic, but they still quite stand out from the ordinary, let’s say it like this) than with “normal” individuals.
Anyway, I may have taken my friend’s statement a bit too seriously, and I started to look out for tests on the internet. I stumbled across the “Aspie Quiz” one. The first time I did it, my score was about 109 out of 200 for the broader autism cluster, and 125 out of 200 for the neurotypical one. I completed it a few other times in these months, getting similar results with little changes towards the ND cluster. I recently realized there was an extended version of the quiz if you signed up, so I did that, and got quite a different result from the first take: 142 out of 200 for the broader autism cluster, and 94 out of 200 for the neurotypical one (it’s the first picture of the post). I couldn’t believe I had got such a different result from the previous attempt, so I completed other tests. As you can see from the pictures, they all seem to give me average scores, like “You have evidence for neurodivergent traits, but you also have evidence for neurotypical traits”. The score never picked one side, and it honestly made me feel even worse than before. Some of the questions contained in those questionnaires (which I don’t precisely remember right now) were extremely accurate, and that made me feel quite surprised, and this is what raised my interest in the subject so much I felt obliged to write this post. But then, if some questions do feel accurate, why is my score so broad? How should I feel about the “range” of my scores? Do I have to trust all these tests, then? Or are they just false and am I being excessively paranoid about something I might, or might not have? And then, why do other tests give me “very neurotypical results”?
CONCLUSION (I SWEAR I’M GONNA GO AWAY, I PROMISE)
Before you (rightfully) start laughing at me because I am believing some random online tests way too much, the reason I decided to take these online tests is because, unfortunately, my household and most of the people around me do not fully understand that autism is not always related to that stereotypical image of a “nonverbal weird kid”. So, in order to get a diagnosis, I will need to rely only on myself and the few people around me who are actually open to these discussions. I do think online tests are a way of “starting out”. It’s the official step the thing I am afraid to take, for some reason. I have never been open about my weirdness, how I behaved, my perception of the world, and seeing those details that somewhat appealed to me – or to my past self – made me think I might embrace them through a scientific denomination, if there is any. I am relieved to learn that many other people feel the world “more intensely” than the others, just like I did and am doing, as I gradually approach adult life (I am twenty years old), and have felt awkward around groups of people, or felt like they were misfits.
I am sorry for the length of this discussion. And I am sorry if I offended anyone because of my paranoia. One day I may go for it and not get anything, thus having mocked those who actually are on the spectrum and making a fool of myself for what I’ve written up until now. I am extremely sorry if you felt offended by what I have written. If you somehow did not feel offended by the essay I have written, I absolutely accept comments and direct messages on the matter. Maybe you could help me think about this a bit.
Thank you. Have a nice day.
Side note: Apart from the Aspie Test result, which has been crucial for the development of this discussion, I do not want to expose all of my scorings here, as they would be uninteresting and/or annoying, so if you are interested in them, I suggest you send me a direct message. But only if you want to seriously discuss about it.
2023.05.29 00:11 Plus_Adagio_5588 My Story
Hello guys ! I wish to share my story with you. I believe now it’s the right time to do it and I hope it will help you stay positive no matter what is thrown at you, keep moving forward. First of all, things are looking good now and I am on remission. It all started in September, 2021. That was when I discovered that one of my testicles was harder than another. Ultrasound was done immediately and sadly the news were worse than I would imagine. Not one, but both testicles would need to be removed. That was hard to take but somehow since it all started, I managed to stay positive and calm (this forum and your stories guys really are godsent). So, I was thinking to myself, “alright I am happily married, we have one beautiful boy, getting ride of my testes it’s not an end of the world. If this is what it takes to win this fight, let’s go! “First surgery was easy to take and there is nothing really to add to it. I was back home the same day. However, after my first surgery, me and my wife decided to try for another baby (I used sperm bank option, but to be honest we would never really used that anyway). Our hopes that she will get pregnant were really small. She was 40 at that time, me, with one cojones and very low sperm count, with few weeks until I will be ball-less..We really needed a miracle.
I recovered from my first surgery very swiftly, then after few weeks they removed my second testicle. Again, surgery was super easy. I was on my feet and out of the hospital the same day. I remember very well; my wife came to pick me up. And that was when she told me, that she was pregnant. I started crying. I just couldn’t believe.. So now there is no way I am not coming out of this! I am beating shit out of this cancer.
My biopsy results were, non-seminoma on the left, and seminoma on the right. I never really want to get too much into medical details of what kind of tumor I have. I was focused on getting through the day, on my family... I always wanted to keepy myself busy, so that stupid thoughts wont come to my head (of course there were days that I was really down..like really down) but I never really allowed, this negative to take over for too long, I was thinking “I have testicular cancer, one of the most treatable cancers, everything will be fine”. And that’s true. That’s a fact. Keep that fact in your head.
After both surgeries they told me that my tumor markers are still elevated so they decided the best treatment would be chemotherapy, BEP x3 (pretty standard procedure). First 2 rounds were pretty easy, the real shit started with round number 3. I mean, it was hard. I was vomiting in one room because of chemo drugs and my wife in another room with her hyperemesis. Anyway, chemo was working, markers were going down, however after the last round the markers were still not normalized so they added one more round. Taking 3 was hard, so 4..I wont lie if I say it was the hardest thing I ever done in my life. Chemotherapy did the job, my markers were normalized. Sadly, CT scan showed some enlarged lymph nodes on the back of my tummy. Decision – RPLND. Surgery was hard, but nothing compares to chemo. Recover took me a while, I think about 5-6 till I was back to my normal activities. Another CT scan and it turned out that the picture they took last time didn’t cover the area in my neck where I had one more enlarge lymph node. So, another surgery. At that point going into surgical table felt pretty normal. There was no fear or anxiety. I knew at some point this will come to an end and in my head, it was always happy end. So here I am guys, after my last oncology appointment I am officially clear and on remission. Next follow up appointment in 4 months. Please don’t stop to share your stories, because even though I don’t know any of you I felt really connected every time I read your comments. They helped me to stay strong and believe things will get better. And they are! Btw, our second child is a boy. We named him Matteo, which means “gift of God”. He will be one in month 😊
Please pm me if you have any questions I will be more then happy to answer.
submitted by Plus_Adagio_5588 to testicularcancer [link] [comments]
I recovered from my first surgery very swiftly, then after few weeks they removed my second testicle. Again, surgery was super easy. I was on my feet and out of the hospital the same day. I remember very well; my wife came to pick me up. And that was when she told me, that she was pregnant. I started crying. I just couldn’t believe.. So now there is no way I am not coming out of this! I am beating shit out of this cancer.
My biopsy results were, non-seminoma on the left, and seminoma on the right. I never really want to get too much into medical details of what kind of tumor I have. I was focused on getting through the day, on my family... I always wanted to keepy myself busy, so that stupid thoughts wont come to my head (of course there were days that I was really down..like really down) but I never really allowed, this negative to take over for too long, I was thinking “I have testicular cancer, one of the most treatable cancers, everything will be fine”. And that’s true. That’s a fact. Keep that fact in your head.
After both surgeries they told me that my tumor markers are still elevated so they decided the best treatment would be chemotherapy, BEP x3 (pretty standard procedure). First 2 rounds were pretty easy, the real shit started with round number 3. I mean, it was hard. I was vomiting in one room because of chemo drugs and my wife in another room with her hyperemesis. Anyway, chemo was working, markers were going down, however after the last round the markers were still not normalized so they added one more round. Taking 3 was hard, so 4..I wont lie if I say it was the hardest thing I ever done in my life. Chemotherapy did the job, my markers were normalized. Sadly, CT scan showed some enlarged lymph nodes on the back of my tummy. Decision – RPLND. Surgery was hard, but nothing compares to chemo. Recover took me a while, I think about 5-6 till I was back to my normal activities. Another CT scan and it turned out that the picture they took last time didn’t cover the area in my neck where I had one more enlarge lymph node. So, another surgery. At that point going into surgical table felt pretty normal. There was no fear or anxiety. I knew at some point this will come to an end and in my head, it was always happy end. So here I am guys, after my last oncology appointment I am officially clear and on remission. Next follow up appointment in 4 months. Please don’t stop to share your stories, because even though I don’t know any of you I felt really connected every time I read your comments. They helped me to stay strong and believe things will get better. And they are! Btw, our second child is a boy. We named him Matteo, which means “gift of God”. He will be one in month 😊
Please pm me if you have any questions I will be more then happy to answer.
2023.05.29 00:10 toystory2wasokay_ Skateboarder at Holland Park threatens to kick my dog
Just got home from walking my dog and im still heated. As im walking by Holland Park with my leashed tiny white maltese, this caucasian man carrying a skateboard yells in a distance about how he's going to kick my dog. I yelled back and he was already gone to join his buddies in the skate park.
I just cant believe the lowlife piece of garbage you have to be to threaten to hurt a complete stranger's dog. Has anybody else had a run in with this guy with a skateboard? Now I wish I followed him and took a picture.
submitted by toystory2wasokay_ to SurreyBC [link] [comments]
I just cant believe the lowlife piece of garbage you have to be to threaten to hurt a complete stranger's dog. Has anybody else had a run in with this guy with a skateboard? Now I wish I followed him and took a picture.
2023.05.29 00:09 Forward_Present3511 Terrified with rhinoplasty swelling
TLDR; PLEASE comment how long it took for your rhinoplasty swelling to decrease / if you hated your swollen nose and then ended up loving the final result! Specifically the front profile
I’m hoping someone can ease my anxiety about rhinoplasty post-op swelling! I’m 12 days post-op right now. What was done: tip de-projected by 4mm, tip narrowed, bridge nasal bones broken & narrowed. Super easy recovery. I LOVED my nose right when the cast came off, even though i could still feel some swelling. My surgeon told me to tape my nose every night for swelling reduction. After 3 days of using the tape, I developed an allergic reaction & had to stop using it. I’ve been using hydrocortisone cream per my surgeon’s instructions, and he said the rash & the redness will clear up over the next few days. But, my nose is SO swollen. I’m feeling really anxious and discouraged because I loved the look of my nose right when I got the cast off. Now, I just feel like a blob! And the swelling comes and goes. The tip looks and feels so bulbous right now, which terrifies me. On my side profile, the 9th day pic (attached below) looked smooth and the tip was more swollen than after the initial cast removal, but it was still pretty narrow. The 12th day pic it has almost doubled in size! The 7th day front picture I loved, it looked so smooth and the tip was pretty narrow (again, even that pic was still fairly swollen but I loved the look regardless). 11th and 12th day, the bridge & the tip looks MASSIVE! Is this normal?! Will it return to the smaller size? I know I need to be patient with recovery, but it’s such a difficult process & I definitely have the rhinoplasty blues! Has anyone else experienced major swelling like this? How long after surgery was your nose super swollen for? If you had a similar experience with liking your nose after cast removal and then it becoming swollen, did it eventually return to that initial small size?
submitted by Forward_Present3511 to PlasticSurgery [link] [comments]
I’m hoping someone can ease my anxiety about rhinoplasty post-op swelling! I’m 12 days post-op right now. What was done: tip de-projected by 4mm, tip narrowed, bridge nasal bones broken & narrowed. Super easy recovery. I LOVED my nose right when the cast came off, even though i could still feel some swelling. My surgeon told me to tape my nose every night for swelling reduction. After 3 days of using the tape, I developed an allergic reaction & had to stop using it. I’ve been using hydrocortisone cream per my surgeon’s instructions, and he said the rash & the redness will clear up over the next few days. But, my nose is SO swollen. I’m feeling really anxious and discouraged because I loved the look of my nose right when I got the cast off. Now, I just feel like a blob! And the swelling comes and goes. The tip looks and feels so bulbous right now, which terrifies me. On my side profile, the 9th day pic (attached below) looked smooth and the tip was more swollen than after the initial cast removal, but it was still pretty narrow. The 12th day pic it has almost doubled in size! The 7th day front picture I loved, it looked so smooth and the tip was pretty narrow (again, even that pic was still fairly swollen but I loved the look regardless). 11th and 12th day, the bridge & the tip looks MASSIVE! Is this normal?! Will it return to the smaller size? I know I need to be patient with recovery, but it’s such a difficult process & I definitely have the rhinoplasty blues! Has anyone else experienced major swelling like this? How long after surgery was your nose super swollen for? If you had a similar experience with liking your nose after cast removal and then it becoming swollen, did it eventually return to that initial small size?