Fnf big brother death

Hi, I don't really post on reddit so this is a bit nerve-wracking. But to give a bit of background, I'm a 23 year old female and I've recently gotten back in contact with my 19 year old brother after not seeing each other in 10 years. We both haven't grown up together, but we used to see eachother alot as little children. Our mum was a crack and heroine addict and until 2 years old I was in Foster care until social services found my father and he fought to get full custody of me which the court finally did give him. So I was basically raised by my father. Well for my brother, no one really knew who his father was so he grew up in different foster homes. As a child I was allowed to visit him in his foster homes and we became really close. He would never leave my side and would get angry if I had to leave. My brother grew up with serious behavioural issues and first got arrested at 12 for trashing his foster home. We later found out he was being sexually and physically abused in his foster home. Things have got so bad that he's now facing a 4 year prison sentence for nearly beating another teenager to death. I'm now a mum myself to a 18 month old girl and have just got out of a abusive relationship. My daughter's father has been beating me and I was also sexually abused between the ages of 8 and 10 by my older cousin. Just to add, I'm also autistic and have schizoaffective disorder. My brother contacted me 2 weeks ago on Facebook and we've been talking on the phone everyday since. Sometimes we'll talk from 8pm in the evening to 4 am. We tell each other we love each other and we will never be separated again. He's so protective that he has even told me he's going to seriously hurt my daughters father for what he has done to me. He doesn't want to leave me and I don't want to leave him. My mental health support worker said our relationship is unhealthy and we are experiencing trauma bonding. Is she really right? We also have two younger sisters who are currently in Foster care.

In the new awakened hero storyline, we've been told there's a disaster involving falling meteors and Hypogean infestations. In the Bards' Tale quote from Oden, it's confirmed that this is somehow related to the Void Realm. But what is the Void Realm?
Before we begin: I'm mostly referencing the chinese lore, as much have been lost in the english translation regarding the Void Realm. I'll put a * to indicate where the lore will deviate from the english one due to mistranslation.
What is the Void Realm?
When the universe was born, so were two wills. These two wills would eventually substantiate and become the primordial gods Honas: god of life and order, and Lutos: god of chaos and extinction. Over an inconceivable amount of time Honas was crafting multiple worlds using the chaos and fog of the cosmos, one of them becoming Esperia. In the meantime, Lutos was looking into the fundamental truth of the universe and deepening his understanding of its laws and limitations. He came to discover a principle called "Entropy Increase", a state of inevitable movement towards chaos and extinction, a state natural to all existence. Believing that his embodiment of chaos was the essence of the universe, Lutos sought to accelerate this process towards the ultimate void. In order to stop this, Honas crafted a divine artifact called the Astral Key, an object capable of condensing and transmuting the holder's powers into a separate dimension. At the cost of significantly draining his power, Honas used this Astral Key and imprisoned Lutos within this dimension.
Despite being locked into another dimension, Lutos was able to influence the material world to some degree. While Esperia was a place of order under the oversight of the gods, and its Hypogeans were for the most part weak and scattered, the same could not be said about other worlds. In a world where the balance of order was disrupted, it would eventually be wrecked by chaos and a Hypogean infestation. It would then experience a sort of “death” and become pure, dark matter. Taking advantage of the dying worlds, Lutos would absorb these into his own dimension to bolster his power. From this, the dimension would become known as the “Void Realm”, or the “Star Cemetery”.
The Reclaimers
After sealing Lutos away, Honas had expended most of his energy. Having entrusted the safekeeping of the Astral Key to Dura, Honas then entered a deep sleep. Aware of the existence of the Astral Key, but with no knowledge of its whereabouts, Lutos condensed his powers and manifested a powerful and sophisticated intelligence into the world: the Reclaimers. Tasked with finding and retrieving the Astral Key, Lutos dispatched Reclaimers to all nebulas.
The Reclaimers are ineffable beings above the comprehension of mortals, and one such Reclaimer called Uemiss descended upon Esperia. Here he settled in Altor, commencing his plan to build his strength on faith and usurp the pantheon. To do so, he began imparting forbidden knowledge onto its indigenous population. Most listening to his whispers were driven mad, though there were some who survived with a fragment of knowledge. Using this knowledge, the inhabitants of Altor built an utopian civilization, effectively eradicating disease and hunger. This civilization became known as the Helme civilization.
When the gods realized Uemiss’ intentions, they waged war to defend their divine authority. While they won the war, it was not without heavy losses, and Uemiss was too powerful to be outright defeated. Being forced to retreat into the ocean, Uemiss lashed out in one final, devastating blow, dragging down half the land with him into a watery grave.
The remaining people of the Helme civilization were banished to the wilderness by the gods, and the remnants of the Helme civilization destroyed in a cultural genocide. Despite this, some few retained their faith through oral tradition, hoping that one day the true god would once again return in glory.
The Zohra Nebula is swallowed by the Void Realm
At the brink of being destroyed, the Zohra Nebula’s will to survive gave birth to two sisters: Morael and Audrae. Despite their best efforts, the sisters were unable to stop the Nebula’s inevitable path towards destruction, and it was consumed by the Void Realm. This celestial mutation caused a violent chain reaction, eclipsing the stars and darkening the sky, even affecting Esperia through global natural disasters. Being closely connected to nature, the Wilders realized that a powerful extraterrestrial force was interfering with the order of the universe. In order to monitor it, they established “The Star Gazers”.
After the death of the Nebula, the sister parted ways, unable to see eye to eye. While fulfilling her duties as a god, Morael came across a familiar scene: the death of the Mirrah Nebula. Trying to fight the strange, sentient beings (likely Reclaimers) residing there, both sides sustained heavy damage. Morael was left floating through the universe until Dura found her and healed her. After which she became an esperian god.
Meanwhile during her travels, Audrae was able to touch upon a tiny corner of the fundamental truth of the universe. A shadowy abyss where the balance had been thrown off, a planetary graveyard reigned by evil. When she reunited with Morael, she recounted all she’d learned about the Void Realm at that time.
After the first Hypogean War, Morael started her investigation into the Void Realm. Proposing that neither pure order or chaos was the guiding principle of the universe, Audrae suggested they work together, to which Morael agreed.
The First Hypogean War and the creation of the Barred Gate
In the face of a potential Hypogean-caused destruction of Esperia, and knowing that with the fear and evil present in the hearts of mortals would forever nourish them, Dura decided to use the Astral Key to imprison the Hypogeans in a dimensional rift. Despite knowing that this would alert Uemiss to its location. Working together with the mortal factions of Esperia, Dura was able to imprison the Hypogeans in a dimensional rift at the foot of the Oromouth mountains, later becoming known as “The Barred Gate”. Doing so, she was finally able to bring the First Hypogean War to an end. Having expended all her powers, Dura feared Uemiss’ inevitable return and the loss of the Astral Key. In a desperate attempt to prevent this, she worked together with the gods’ smith Ansiel, and sundered the key into seven divine artifacts. These artifacts were scattered among the mortals, their creation and whereabouts kept a secret from all but Ansiel and Dura herself. After divulging her mysterious prophecy, Dura left the mountain and found a place for her eternal rest.
The remaining gods swore an oath to Dura, and would watch over the Barred Gate to ensure nothing escaped.
Oden discovers the “Margin”.
The Order of the Sun, an organization of mages dedicated to researching the lost knowledge of the Era of Man Gods, had one outstanding mage amongst their ranks: the imperial archmage Oden. Through his obsessive research on dimensional magic, Oden one day stumbled upon the Void Realm. Losing himself in some ineffable search for the truth, Oden submitted and swore fealty to the great being within. While the Void Realm is completely separate from this dimension, Oden found a liminal space between he called the “Margin”, a realm formed by the lingering dark matter of destroyed worlds. He discovered that he could siphon energy from this realm to use for his own means. However this did not go unnoticed by the Lightbearers, and Oden was tracked down and executed by the Blademaster Nuns. As a result, The Order of the Sun created a secret sister organization called The Secret Society of the Crow. Receiving covert funding from the imperial family, the Society continued its research into Dark Magic.
* Urged by ambition to seize this forbidden power, scholars of the School of the Dead fervently researched all existing records on the subject, eventually coming upon Oden. Digging up his corpse and weapon, the researchers combined necromancy and black magic, using Oden’s weapon as a core to recall his soul and resurrect him. As the three eyes of the god opened, the researchers did not see the omen for what it was, and disaster followed. His humanity eroded from death and the exposure of the Void Realm, as well as his newfound powers as a Graveborn, marked Oden as a different sort of existence. Upon awakening, he immediately opened a portal to the Margin. A tremendous lightningstrike descended from above, dragging the hapless researchers into the realm beyond to never return. Alarmed by this event, the Eldricht Council dispatched their best to seal Oden away in the dungeons below the School of the Dead, where he still wanders to this day.
Uemiss’ plan and the breach of the Barred Gate
*Khazard, the elemental guardian of water and Seirus’ predecessor, was originally under the impression that he was a Chosen One with a sacred mission. However, while traveling the oceans he kept hearing whispers speaking a different “truth”. This “truth” told him that he was nothing but an insignificant ant, that all beings lived a false lie, and that the gods above the mountains were nothing but self-righteous false gods. No longer able to look upon the world in the same way, Khazards heart began to change, and he followed the guidance of the voice to the depths of the ocean. There, amongst submerged ruins, Khazard found Uemiss. Transforming one of his tentacles into an ice serpent, the serpent coiled around Khazard, changing him into his new form. Khazard then abandoned his duties and joined forces with the Hypogeans. He sought to free the great god he feared, and to get a glimpse of the truth within the Void Realm. The serpent followed him as a companion, in addition to being Uemiss’ eyes and ears on the surface world. A plan hatched, and Khazard was posted at the Barred Gate in wait for its reopening. As a result of the spiritual loss of the Elemental Guardian of water, Seirus was born.
After the war between the Lightbearers and the Maulers, Esperia was inundated with a miasma of negative emotions. The Hypogeans behind the gate, who had been persistent in their efforts to break the seal, were strengthened by the influx of fear, hatred and despair. Since Dura’s powers were not on par with Honas’, the Gate was ultimately not as stable as the Void Realm. Seizing the opportunity, Khazard sent word to Uemiss that the time was right, and Uemiss proceeded to send a horde of his underlings to the surface. While Seirus and Gorvo were able to withstand the initial waves, they were eventually outnumbered, and had no choice but to call on assistance. The gods, now turning their attention to Altor, neglected their vigilance upon the Gate, and with Khazard’s help the Hypogeans broke through. Having failed to uphold their divine vow to Dura, the gods were demoted to demi-gods, or “celestials”.
Present day, not set on the timeline
In a small town at the outskirts of the Lightbearer Empire, a dark force had been slowly eroding the very land. Disciples of this dark force intended to use a nefarious pentagram to break the fabric of reality and usher in a malevolence from the Void Realm. In order to stop this, Lucius and Belinda teamed up with Morael, who had been suppressing the darkness up until that point, though unable to completely destroy it on her own. Although the group was able to prevent disaster, Morael pointed out that underlings of the Void Realm were still numerous in this world.
Gouldos is the minion of Uemiss. While having the same origin, Uemiss is of higher rank and power than Gouldos. Roughly two years ago, Gouldos emerged in Altor, spreading his powers and influence. A maddening, abyssal mist slowly spread across the waters, and malevolent murmurs were carried by the wind.
The hazy noise of imminent disaster reached Lorsan’s ears, though he was unable to make sense of it. It was Arden who was able to see a fragmentary silhouette amongst the wails of fear and torment among all living things. He immediately set about to call upon all beings in Esperia, in an effort to work together to dispel and purify the Chasmic Altar. After finally defeating Gouldos, the Chasmic Altar became the Cleansed Realm. (In terms of the timeline, this event is rather awkward to place.)
Heroes possibly related to this storyline.
Some heroes in-game have a relationship to the Void Realm, and I wouldn't be surprised to see them make an appearance in the new story.

• Morael and Audrae: the Zohra Nebula in which the two sisters were born from was swallowed by the Void Realm. They've been looking into the Void Realm and its impact on this dimension. Interestingly enough, these two sisters are the characters that closest resemble Honas and Lutos themselves. One the cosmic embodiment of order, the other the cosmic embodiment of chaos.
• *Oden: the reason why the heresy inquisition executed Oden was due to his research regarding the Void Realm and its powers. When resurrected, Oden is a being not entirely Graveborn, as his soul is tied directly to the Void Realm and he serves the "dark master" within.
• *Safiya: Safiya, similar to Oden, draws her powers from the Margin. It was this power she used to enlist followers and usurp the throne.
• Framton: now this is the funniest of the bunch. Framton was created by none other than Lutos himself, which makes him a "brother" to the eldricht, world devouring being that is Uemiss.
• Khazard: Khazard was turned into a hypogean by Uemiss, and currently serves as his underling.
• Seirus and Gorvo: they've been guarding the seal that imprisons Uemiss, and were the first to respond to the onslaught of Uemiss’ minions.
• Salaki: while the Obsidian Obelisk and its curse isn't explicitly stated to be of Void Realm origins, the nature of the curse very closely resemble the powers of Uemiss and Gouldos, and the eldricht tentacle imagery as well.
• Mezoth: regarding his story and its resemblance to the madness and mist of Gouldos' powers, Mezoth is implied to be related to him in some way, which also ties him to the Void Realm.

Tldr:
The Void Realm is an alternative dimension where the primordial god of chaos and extinction; Lutos, is imprisoned. Using what limited influence he has on the material world, Lutos is absorbing dying worlds into his dimension to bolster his powers, and dispatching beings of great power and intelligence called Reclaimers, to all nebulas in search for the Astral Key that can free him. One such Reclaimer is Uemiss, who descended upon Esperia. Recovering his strength after the gods banished him to the depth of the ocean, Uemiss has been lying in wait in order to open the Barred Gate and seize the key, which Dura separated into seven divine artifacts right before her death.

There is a human expression, the candle that shines twice as bright burns for half as long. Perhaps the short lifespans of humans has something to do with this, but in the days following the Walker decision to abide by the wishes of both governments, the reality of the danger seemed to settle in over them all.
Not just because of the trip itself, and space travel was still not without its risks, pirates, accidents, natural disasters, many things could happen that would leave someone dying in the void to drift forever between the stars.
But also because the very success of our collective task might well be the axel on which the future peace of the galaxy. Everybody wanted to land on the Rogue World.
Everybody wanted the technological secrets that the scans from so long ago hinted might be there, nobody wanted anyone else to have it, and everybody was willing to kill everybody else to keep that from happening.
And with this rising danger came not a deep, dark depression, but a kind of strange celebration.
We had some months before the station could be completed, after which William would no longer need to do more than survey the final work and be briefed by the foreman of each section, a few days of tests and diagnostics at most.
And even when that was done, Bonny Red was six months away. True, Rebecca still had her role in the Methuselah Initiative, but she worked from home for the most part and then not every hour of every day.
So as a kind of send off, before the world itself was alerted to any dangers, William arranged for a family reunion. Rebecca, unfortunately, had no surviving family members on her side, which is unfortunate, but also perhaps explains her particular care for the one she shares a household with.
William Walker’s family tree however, is vast. Not just in his sisters, but also in his father’s brothers and sisters who in turn had wives, husbands, and children, and the same went for his father’s father, who had brothers and sisters who… well let it simply be said that a ‘family reunion’ for the Walker clan is an extensive one. On the unexpected upside, that did make it easy for Professor Sxlith to ensure every one of his chosen students had a Walker family branch to host them.
As a matter of necessity our collaboration was minimal and our professor, while available, kept himself distant unless we expressly sought out his advice, and I seldom had occasion to do so.
So it had been quite some time, actually years, now that I thought about it, since we’d been in the same room together and months since I had written anything other than progress notes to my professor and a request for his opinion on how the University would respond to my fighting league.
Arranging for the reunion took the better part of a month, and it had to be scheduled three months out and certain calls had to be made to ask certain people to call various supervisors, bosses, and so on, and ensure that they understood it was important that nothing interfere with their brief absences.
I think, for the sake of the historical record, that it’s important to say that William did not ask the government to do this for him. However modern Earth society puts a great deal of emphasis on general ‘wellness’ and having high morale in their work.
To put this in analogous terms, on Dlamias, if you recall my previous writings about my homeworld, we have a veritable army of surveyors who are always checking social trends in order to control for any potential issues. That process kept us stable for millenia, as we could identify shortfalls and dangerous elements, possible corruption, and more. I daresay our statisticians are some of the hardest working in the galaxy and we are the best documented people…anywhere.
By contrast, the humans of Earth kept experts on mental wellness, something my world never had, and their role was to ensure that demographics were not experiencing uncertainty, doubt, or struggle. The occasion of the Silent Civil War showed that, if anything, they were significantly underfunded and so their numbers rose. More than that, they were now tied to other social service and survey work, keeping closely tied to their own census offices to look for social trends that might pose a danger or identify a growing weakness.
Somebody involved in that office likely suggested that the Walkers would perform best if they gained a profoundly positive experience beforehand, and a large reunion seemed to fit the bill.
Or rather… fit the will.
William’s puns are rubbing off on me. I know it. It is a sickness and I cannot stop. May my readers forgive me.
Moving on… in the aftermath of that decision and having made arrangements for the family reunion, Fauve took the unusual step of buying tickets to Waterland Park.
I was at the table when the notification came in on my datapad.
Fauve was at the table munching on a crispy piece of bacon. I did not know there was a smug way to chew. But apparently I was wrong.
She sat there tinkering away on her datapad while eating her breakfast, steam rose from the eggs and while she waited for the biscuits to arrive, and a moment later Byron and Boatswain came into view as they passed through the library of the house.
The bullet holes in the wall were all patched and the blood was long since cleaned up, the whole place looked like new. I could still smell the faint odor of blood even years later, but on reflection I considered that more likely to be mental than real.
“Waterland Park? Isn’t that where…?” Byron didn’t finish the sentence. He may have been a brute of a soldier, but as a man, as someone who was virtually part of the family, he was very sensitive about anything to do with the Walker children. Even if that ‘child’ was now an adult in her own right.
I think if he had been there that day, he might have killed the one responsible. I won’t pretend I don’t sometimes wish I had. Now the park was under new management and it had a much better reputation.
But even so, I was surprised to see the purchase.
Rebecca set the tray of biscuits down and Fauve immediately snatched one up and began to make a bacon and egg biscuit out of the three components.
“Yes. It was. But the old bastard is who knows and who cares where now, and his trash son is rotting in a prison somewhere. Besides, it’s summer, we should go somewhere fun.” Fauve pointed out as her father entered the room after having dressed.
“But there? Is that really wise?” He asked.
“Yes.” Fauve said, considering it was now summer, her voice was cold as ice.
“We need something fun to do for the reunion, I mean, dad, I know how the rest of your side of the family gets.” She gave him a phony death stare and William, to his credit, sheepishly rubbed the back of his head.
“They are a… funny lot.” He acknowledged.
“Uh huh.” Fauve agreed, “But we can’t just have them hanging out here all day, the house has only so much space, and they’ve got a bunch of kids Michael’s age and younger. We should get everybody good and tired so they can really relax for the rest of the day.”
“But there?” Boatswain pointed out, “We could just as easily go to the local park and set up a barbecue and some games.”
Boatswain’s response was practical, it was true, but unironically we’d all still end up getting wet, I’d wager.
“True, but…” Fauve stopped and reached for the pot of coffee her mother set on the table, as she filled her cup she said, “Who knows if I’ll ever get to go there again, that’s the last thing, the last place where I ever felt weak. I want to go back and conquer it, before I go out into space…again, to go do something else. I can’t…” She breathed out a weighty sigh and began dumping spoonfuls of sugar into her coffee cup, the faint noise of the metal spoon ‘tinking’ against the mug before the scraping of it as she stirred was like a timer counting down the moments until she explained herself.
“I can’t just leave for months, or a year, or whatever, without going back there first, it’ll feel like running away again. It’s nobody else’s problem, everybody else will have fun, but I want to know that I can. I want to face that place and laugh and splash and get wet and go down slides like we were supposed to. You know? Besides, everybody will have fun and if I do struggle, I’m ten minutes from home.”
The table was quiet, Michael was yawning as he came down the stairs with his face buried in his datapad. “Are these… tickets?” He asked.
“Besides, I already bought them so now you have to go or your Fauve’s heart will just be utterly shattered.” She made a gasping noise, leaned back, and clutched melodramatically at her heart before winking at the rest of us.
“Well we don’t want that… so fine. It’s not like nobody can get a swimsuit.” William agreed.
Rebecca looked toward Michael and answered, “Yes, your big sister bought us all tickets to the waterpark for the reunion.”
“Hey, thanks Fauve!” He said and gave her a big hug, squeezing her around the upper arms when he leaned forward behind her.
“You’re welcome.” Fauve said, though I think not just to Michael, and took a big bite out of her bacon and egg biscuit, which she proceeded to chew quite slowly.
That, settled that.
And yes… she was definitely looking smug about it.

Tw gore I guess but I don't go into details.
Before, seeing blood or deaths would make me feel dissociative but nostalgic, like I was back at home. Although it's not that I ever wanted to go back. I used to watch things related to that, always with respect to the dead, but that wasn't doing good to my mental health, it made me go into bad loops, so I don't do it anymore.
Instead, I notice that stuff makes me kind of uncomfortable now. I was talking about this with a friend; that maybe I'm in the path of healing. I am happy I don't need to see those things, but I worried I was becoming weak and vulnerable. If I had to see a big open wound or something, would I be shocked now? I don't know.
I feel being ok with these things such as seeing wounds is a good thing because I never know when I'll have to deal with it. But my friend said it's ok to have boundaries too. Is this a boundary? I don't understand what a boundary is.
My parent said my body will move/react on its own if it's something important because its ingrained inside us, and certainly so far that's how my body acted in the past... So... I'm better now, maybe? I'm just confused I guess.
But there's something that is specially messing me up now, that is I used to have a problem where everything, the pain, the smells and images from back then would get together in my head and I would lose control and become a danger to myself and others.
Now I can't explode. I guess I'm becoming sane? Maybe it's the new meds? I think I should be happy, but it makes me angry. I don't know why. It hurts. I don't want to die, I don't want to hurt, I just want the pain, things that don't have a word, that can't be drawn, or written down, to be expressed, and it can't come outside anymore.

We started flirting after he messaged me saying he always found me attractive for years (he's one of my brothers old friends) and was "shooting his shot". We live in different states at the moment and originally he said if I was closer he would love to take me out. He said he thought we had tons in common after we talked and I thought so too.
A month and a half went by of radio silence (besides the fact he would look at my Instagram stories) and I decided to message him first - and see where his head was at as I started thinking a bit more about him. He seemed rather ecstatic, like "QueenCordelia it's sure an incredibly pleasant surprise to hear from you!" and we chatted a bit and finally in the context of our conversation, he said how he has a big crush on me. Me being flirty back, I wrote "well I maybe have a crush on you too."
Radio silence for hours after that. I figured he was “busy" as he said he was at the end of his late night work shift. Makes sense. When I checked to see if he texted me though for the final time, I see he put his phone on do not disturb, and obviously he had got off work, and went to bed. Now it’s the afternoon, I’m off from work myself soon and he still never texted me. I know his general schedule and he is working right now, too.
I feel like a fool for ever admitting how I felt. Put it this way, I’m not going out of my way to text him again.

Tw gore I guess but I don't go into details.
Before, seeing blood or deaths would make me feel dissociative but nostalgic, like I was back at home. Although it's not that I ever wanted to go back. I used to watch things related to that, always with respect to the dead, but that wasn't doing good to my mental health, it made me go into bad loops, so I don't do it anymore.
Instead, I notice that stuff makes me kind of uncomfortable now. I was talking about this with a friend; that maybe I'm in the path of healing. I am happy I don't need to see those things, but I worried I was becoming weak and vulnerable. If I had to see a big open wound or something, would I be shocked now? I don't know.
I feel being ok with these things such as seeing wounds is a good thing because I never know when I'll have to deal with it. But my friend said it's ok to have boundaries too. Is this a boundary? I don't understand what a boundary is.
My parent said my body will move/react on its own if it's something important because its ingrained inside us, and certainly so far that's how my body acted in the past... So... I'm better now, maybe? I'm just confused I guess.
But there's something that is specially messing me up now, that is I used to have a problem where everything, the pain, the smells and images from back then would get together in my head and I would lose control and become a danger to myself and others.
Now I can't explode. I guess I'm becoming sane? Maybe it's the new meds? I think I should be happy, but it makes me angry. I don't know why. It hurts. I don't want to die, I don't want to hurt, I just want the pain, things that don't have a word, that can't be drawn, or written down, to be expressed, and it can't come outside anymore.

Welcome to Camp Redwood!
Are you ready to fight to the death with age regressed forty year olds with the faces of adorable little kids?
How about coming to terms with your entire life, or at least five years of it, being one big fucking lie?
We are so excited to announce our 2018 group! Where you will undoubtedly FIND yourself here. Your true self.
The self you did not know existed.
SO, jump in that military bunker, grab that blunt object to fight against our little campers disembowelling our counselors, and get yourself down to CAMP REDWOOD. WHERE WE START EVERY DAY WITH A CAMP REDWOOD SMILE.
Apply now!
Application end date: 05/02/2018.
…
It’s been a tough few days.
So, I think I will be posting this update in two chunks so I can get everything down and clear my head. I am alone right now.
Yes. I am the last survivor of Camp Redwood 2023 (?). I’ve been unsure how to start this and end this because I really just want to get into the meat of what has been going on.
But… I must ask. I have to.
What year is it?
That doesn't matter right now. I'll continue where I left off.
Teddy did leave us alone in the end. But his screams were still haunting me hours after the thing with his voice had left. I don’t even think I could call it his voice.
It sounded like him but there were pieces of him missing. Like someone had reached into the boy’s mind and pulled out the skeleton of his consciousness, the bare bones of his being—and cruelly stuffed him into a metal shell.
That is what Teddy sounded like.
He sounded like a wounded animal, confused why he was alive. Terrified. I now know what he is the product of. Teddy is a victim of horrifying, unethical experiments our campers have been forcing on kidnapped counselors after taking over the camp. Have you ever heard of the sound of crying which isn’t human?
That is Teddy. He is the product of forcing life into the dead, and leaving it to suffer with its consciousness. Which, in my opinion, is a fate far worse than death.
You’re probably wondering where my two companions are.
Well, that is why I am writing this.
I want to tell you what happened so I can wrap my head around it myself, and choose between killing all of us and sending these psychopaths to hell, or coming to terms with our truth and fighting back. Well, it’s their truth. I wouldn’t say it’s mine. It took us three whole days to get the guts to risk leaving Allison’s secret bunker inside her cabin, and attempting to find a way out of this hell-hole. Harry and I were the ones to do it, leaving a still-not-completely-himself Rowan to guard our safehouse. I didn’t want to leave him alone for a multitude of reasons but due to Harry actually having a soul and a semblance of empathy, I was overruled.
Despite being heavily under the influence of age-regressing animal crackers which had mentally turned him into a toddler, Rowan was still himself to a degree. Which meant he was back to being our leader. I was sceptical at first, because no matter how many times he insisted he was in fact okay, I couldn’t seem to shake off the feeling that the childish parts of him, the warped parts of his mind which had turned him into a child, were still there.
Even if they were very subtle. I caught him doodling on his clipboard, and much later on, singing to himself with an odd smile on his face he had successfully gaslit Harry and I into believing it was just a coping mechanism. Say what you want about Rowan Atlas, he is damn good at swaying your opinion. Even when we were 100% sure Rowan was not his original self, the guy we had both met at the start of camp.
It was almost like him having two minds. The mind of a child, and the mind of a teenager.
For example, he still ordered us around and attempted to take back his role of leader— which had at least secured some normality back into our lives. But he also hated loud noises, and freaked out every time one of the littles tried to get in. There was also the incident we had agreed not to talk about, because talking about it meant facing the fact that our friend was no longer himself.
It was a hours after Teddy left us in peace. Harry was sleeping, and I was on the cusp of slumber, slipping through more files. Rowan had been oddly quiet. Which wasn’t a Rowan thing. Whether he was mentally a child or a teenager, he was still being loud and obnoxious. I sat up to find him cross-legged, playing with something.
I thought it was a worm at first, but no. It was exactly like what I found at the start of this, an eye attached to a nerve. But this time it was undoubtedly human, and now Rowan’s plaything. When I questioned him, he said he was “studying” it. Though there was definitely a difference between studying something and playing with it. The scary thing was, he saw no wrong in it, holding it in his hands and stripping off the metallic pieces cruelly attached to it.
In the end, I took it from him and stamped on it. Rowan didn’t have the reaction I was expecting. Because he was still hiding behind the façade that his mind hadn’t been warped by de-aging animal crackers.
If that wasn’t bad enough, Eleanor Summers had given me a 24 hour deadline to hand over the boys, and we were well over the limit so an ambush was likely imminent.
I still had so many questions. Why were Rowan, Harry and Carmel so important while the rest of us were seen as nothing but spare parts?
That is what the little bitch said. Now physically eleven years old with the mind of a deranged forty year old scientist, Eleanor told me I was nothing to them but spare parts. God, it’s so weird calling her what she is after looking after her kid self, her fake self, for weeks.
Little Eleanor with her golden pigtails and obsession with teddy bear picnics was in fact a complete fucking sociopath. That much of one in fact, that her and her equally psychotic colleagues who engaged in these experiments had been regressed into little kids inside a rehabilitation camp (Nicknamed: Project Spearhead) which was supposed to fix them and had failed spectacularly. Because they’ve taken over. And this time? We’re the fucking lab rats.
The counselors here at Redwood.
I had seen her adult self being interviewed by mysterious Agent Lemrac, a face behind Project Spearhead, the girl who was far too young to be an agent, and have that kind of authority. Also, someone with a soul—who had a clear biased opinion against the experiments.
Part of me wondered if Lemrac still existed. Maybe she was behind the odd phone calls we kept receiving on an old fashioned rotary phone. With Eleanor’s deadline in mind, the two of us made our journey quick. It wasn’t hard to leave the camp itself. There were guards in the form of Callen and Olive, brainwashed and turned into the kid’s muscle, but they were easy enough to get past as long as we distracted them with something shiny.
They were mentally six-years-old so literally anything grabbed their attention.
I quickly realized my mistake once we managed to escape the camp—Harry in front of me, with me lagging behind. We moved slowly, ducking behind trees and throwing ourselves into the dirt. Very cloak and dagger. It didn’t take us long to slip into the woods. Just past the lake were the exit gates to Redwood which led to a road.
Not exactly civilisation, but I would take it over having my body taken apart for “parts” in these so-called experiments.
When we got to the gate, however, I realized I had given the adults too much fucking credit.
Whoever was in charge of Spearhead clearly did not care about lingering survivors, as long as they were successfully cutting us out from the outside world. And that’s what the giant wall I found myself staring at was, an impossible foot monster towering over us and cementing my earlier thoughts. We were screwed. The woman on the phone had made it clear we were being abandoned, and yet some of me naively held onto them maybe still rescuing us.
“Fuck.” I didn’t know what to do, but kicking the damn thing felt like the right thing. I did, and then regretted it half a second later.
This thing was impenetrable. Impossible to climb unless we had a fucking death-wish.
Blinking at it through fraying sunlight blinding me, the thing almost resembled a mirage. It stood under the sun, a giant roadblock completely blocking us from any form of help.
The sun wasn’t helping, scorching through my shirt. I swiped at my sweaty forehead, unable to resist a frustrated scream I had to muffle-gag with my hand. I risked a look behind us. Thankfully, we were around ten minutes away from the main camp. The lake was nearby glittering under a late afternoon sun, and all I wanted to right then was to wade into the shallows and let the murky water swallow me up. The little shits couldn’t swim, maybe I’d be safe.
“Fuck!”
“This is bad.” Harry Carlisle broke the silence after my frustrated cry. With his eyes glued to the wall, he took off his hat and ran a hand through dark brown curls which were catching the light of the sun, setting strands alight across his forehead. None of us were in great shape after spending days hunkered down in a secret bunker. Harry was no exception.
His short sleeved camp Redwood shirt was still covered with vomit, discoloured with days’ worth of sweat stains and lack of showers.
He bent over, grasping hold of his knees. “What do we do?” I could tell by the tone of his voice he was freaking out, and I didn’t blame him. But Harry was still on my mind.
His signature was undoubtedly all over every Project Spearhead file, despite him repeatedly insisting he had nothing to do with it. At that moment, I could almost believe him. The boy looked exhausted and frustrated, pained.
He surprised me by slipping to his knees and burying his head in the dirt and screaming into rough soil. I was struck, then, by the sudden memory of flames. I had been sitting around campfires for weeks at Redwood, but this one didn’t feel like it took place at camp.
Instead, it felt more personal. I could almost see it, flickering orange sparking at the backs of my eyes and the sour taste of beer in my throat. Like the memory was trying to push itself to the surface. This moment felt nostalgic and yet close—as if it had happened yesterday. Like both the past and present had entangled in one.
If I concentrated I swore I could hear the murmur of voices, phantom laughter in my head and a cool night breeze grazing my cheeks.
“Earth to Josie?”
I snapped out of it quickly. “You’re asking me?” I kicked the dirt again. “I thought Rowan was our camp leader.”
Harry lifted his head after a moment, his eyes flicking to me. “You know he can’t make rash decisions right now.”
“Exactly.” I said. “We both know he’s not back to his normal self. He’s both right now. A little kid, and a teenager.” I shuddered. “I’m sorry, did I forget to mention our so-called head counsellor was playing with a human eye like a fucking cat?”
“Mm."
“Well, why aren’t you taking it seriously?”
Harry’s gaze skated the horizon, cotton candy colored clouds blurring into twilight. “Becauuuse the sun is going to your head.”
I could practically hear his eyes rolling. Rowan took three strides towards the wall and pressed his face into rough brick. “So, this is it, right?” He muffled into rough cement. “We are really going to die at fucking summer camp.”
“I’m going to die,” I corrected him. “They want you two and Carmel because apparently you’re special.”
Harry made a scoffing noise into the wall. I was starting to think he was setting up camp there, planning to tell all of his grievances to the cement. “Oh yeah, because that’s a good thing? You’ve seen—no—heard what they’ve done to Teddy and the others, and you think them wanting us for something else is special?” his voice broke a little. “I’d rather have your fate.”
The boy’s words made me realize how little I was compared to the others. While they and Carmel were part of some grand, psychotic scheme, I was just needed for extra bulk. “Why don’t you talk to your friends?” I said, after letting the boy throw several punches into the soil. I wasn’t going to comment on his hits being surprisingly strong enough to shake the ground.
Harry didn’t look at me after calming down, resorting to tracing the earth with the toes of his shoe. “Who?”
"The CIA."
I was surprised by his retort, even if it was equally sarcastic. “Oh, you think I’m in the CIA?” He stepped closer to me, his breath in my face. “In case you haven’t noticed, this is bigger than the CIA. Whoever is in charge of this project is way higher up.”
“So, you’re admitting you’re a sleeper.”
“No, that’s not what I—”
“Then what?” I demanded, cutting him off. “Why are your fingerprints quite literally all over this?”
Harry folded his arms, his expression darkening. "You're still talking about this?" He groaned. “Josie.” He planted his hands on my shoulders. “I am not a spy, okay? Yes, my writing being on those documents was weird, but we’re also dealing with animal crackers which turn us into littles.” His lips curved into the slightest of smirks. “I’m pretty sure it would be easy for a group of scientists to use my writing as some kind of red herring. They’re trying to turn us against each other, obviously. And that’s not going to happen.” He squeezed my shoulders and I felt momentary comfort. I was so tired.
I hadn’t slept properly in days in fear of Eleanor coming to smoke us out—and the urge to just sink into the boy’s chest was suddenly overwhelming. Luckily, I had self-control. I took a step back, and he dropped his arms. “That's sobering, yes,” I said. “But I’m still going to try waking you up with those trigger phrases we found.”
When he tried to speak, I shook my head.
“Like it or not, you’re our only way out.”
I had made it clear several times to the two of them that I had no intention to use the trigger phrases we found taped to the back of the door in the bunker, when searching for more intel. But the more I was really thinking about it, if there were sleeper agents capable of taking down a group of forty-year-old tweens, I had no choice but to at least try. Because it was either that, or I gave the littles what they wanted. The boy’s. Whatever they needed, Rowan, Carmel, and Harry were the keys to their plan.
We needed a miracle, and those trigger phrases were our best shot.
Harry, of course, was against this idea.
He did that thing he always did when he scrunched up his nose and curled his lip. It reminded me of a toddler not getting their way. I saw it exclusively when the littles were taking advantage of his piggybacking service. “Josie, I’m not a fucking spy!”
"You could be." I said stiffly. "And until we figure out what is going on with you, I don't trust you. You said it yourself. Your writing was all over the kid's files, so at some point, regardless of you remembering or not, you have been part of this project.”
“So, why did you bring me out here?” He inclined his head. “You don’t trust me and yet you bring me on your little mission to find an exit.”
I shrugged. “I was partly hoping we would be attacked and your natural instincts would kick in.”
“So, I’m your lab-rat?”
“Partially.”
Harry did the scrunchy-nose thing again. “What the fuck, dude?!”
He looked like he was going to argue before deciding against it. Instead, he slipped on his raybans and gestured behind me with a sigh.
"We should probably get going before those little freaks come looking for us and realize we’ve left our safehouse.” I didn’t know how to explain and put into words that to survive we had to try everything—and if there was a slither of a chance that Harry really was some kind of sleeper agent, I was going to take advantage of that. I hadn’t forgotten about Carmel, Callan, and Olive. Rowan too, no matter how screwed up he was. I was counting on getting all of us out. I turned on my heel and started to head back to camp. I didn’t look at him because doing that would make me weak.
“Right. Let’s go.”
There was something going at the camp when we got back. I was startled by an intense blue light illuminating from the lunch cabin, and I had half a mind to turn and run. Then the screams started. Just like Teddy, they sounded both human and not, a horrifying mix of man and machine wailing for death. I found myself paralysed, crouched behind Cassie’s cabin, their phantom screams rattling my skull sending my thoughts into overdrive. “Josie.” I felt warm fingers wrap around my elbow and pull me back. Harry was thankfully there, dragging me away before I could expose us. It was enough to snap me out of it. Enough to drive me into fight or flight.
When we made it back to Allison’s cabin, Rowan was sleeping. He had conked out halfway through a pack of gummy worms. I spent the next few hours going through each trigger phrase written on the yellow sticky note we found taped to the door. I figured if we were going to try and wake Harry up, he would have to be restrained in case he was triggered to hurt us or even himself. “Is this really necessary?”
“Yes.” I said, squinting at the third trigger phrase. The two of us were sitting cross-legged in front of each other. Harry, breathing heavily, and me, trying to make myself calm. Harry pulled gingerly at the jump-rope restraints we had managed to loop around his wrists. I was expecting something out of him, but all I got were his wide eyes staring back at me.
The latest phrase was twisting my brain. It sounded like a kid’s book. I took a deep breath.
“Green Tigers Do Not Live Independently.”
Harry didn’t move, making a deal of blinking rapidly back at me. “No, I mean,” he gestured to his arms pinned behind his back. “Why did you have to make them so tight?"
“Because you’re a spy, dude.” Rowan had woken up, intrigued by my attempts to wake up a possible sleeper. He was pretending to go through the Eleanor Summers footage again, but the boy was clearly invested in what we were doing. Sitting slumped in the spinning chair, he leaned his fist on his chin. There were various things about Rowan I wanted to point out, but I was too scared to. The tips of his fingers were still stained red, and I had no idea if it was new or old. Rowan Atlas used to be the one guy at camp I used to think looked older than he was—and acted older than he was.
Instead of taking part in camp activities, he chose to sit on a branch and read pretentious classics. Yeah. He was one of THOSE guys. The slight stubble on his chin would definitely get him served alcohol, and his intelligence and quick-thinking would easily sway you if you were sceptical. Now he was the complete opposite. Maybe I was imagining things, but he had definitely gotten younger in the face, even if it was just a year or two.
I am not talking about his appearance, however. Rowan’s mentality was drastically different from the guy who held crisis meetings and ordered all of us around like we were his own children. This guy had a certain childish twinkle in his eye when I happened to catch it, a twitch in his lips which was constantly a wide smile like he was constantly seeing butterflies. Before being force-fed animal crackers, the guy had maintained his hair and hygiene no matter what happened. Now, he looked like he’d been dragged through a forest. Literally. There was still grass and leaves caught in his sandy hair, his camp Redwood shirt torn in odd places.
He yawned, curling up on the chair, apparently getting comfy. “No hard feelings, but we gotta keep you under investigation. Like Josie said, your name was all over those shady documents.”
Even his voice was different. I couldn’t call it a squeak, but it was close enough to one.
“I’m not a spy,” Harry grumbled, ducking his head. “I think I would know if I was—what, some kind of government agent?”
“That’s the whole point of them,” Rowan, still with lingering childish traits, winked at him. “They don’t know either.” He raised his hand and mimed the finger guns, protruding them into his temples and pretending to pull the trigger. Adapting a storytelling tone, he lowered his voice to a whisper. Like he was talking to the kids.
“They can live their whole lives without realizing.” I could tell from his tone he was getting excited with the idea of sleeper agents. Maybe it was a kid thing. Rowan sat up straight with wide eyes. “Cruelly brainwashed by a secret organisation at a young age and turned into super soldiers, these guys have no family. No friends.” His gaze flicked to Harry, his lips twitching into a teasing grin. “Only the insatiable urge to kill and follow orders. They don’t have brains to feel or emotions. And that?”
He did a dramatic spin on the chair. I could tell he was revelling in the look of horror on Harry’s face. “That is the most dangerous thing about them. The inability to have free will. Because what happens when they come face to face with people they used to love? People from their old life?”
With both of us enthralled in his speech, the boy smirked. “They kill them. Family members and friends. With one simple order? BAM.” Harry jumped, and I am ashamed to say I did too. Rowan blew his imaginary finger guns. “With one single and yet perfect headshot, it’s allll over. There’s blood EVERYWHERE. There’s brains!” He giggled. “Brains! And it’s like, sooo gross.”
With the way he kept adding to his story, getting progressively more excited and practically vibrating in the chair, the boy was reminding me more and more of my little sister. Which terrified me. Because if this was him back to himself, was this his new normal?
“Rowan, stop.” It took every ounce of my being not to yell at him. “You’re acting like a fucking child.” I was frowning at a sign on the wall warning us to ‘mind our head’. It wasn’t even a low ceiling, and yet that was the fourth time I had seen that sign.
Harry looked mildly horrified. Usually, he was the one who told the ghost stories. I could tell even he was questioning his own identity at that moment, and I paused interrogating him with phrases. “I’m sorry, but who out of us ate our weight in animal crackers?”
“Against my will.” Rowan yawned again, doing another spin on the chair. I had to turn around and shoot him a glare. “That’s the second time you’ve thrown me being turned into a kid in my face. Which is not fair. Did I ask to be stuffed full of poison?"
“Well, you didn’t exactly fight against Eleanor.”
“I was tied up, asshole—and I’m pretty you were in la-la land at that point.”
“I’m allergic to peanut butter, so no,” Harry rolled his eyes. “I snapped out of it when my body reminded me.”
“That sounds like a you problem, dude.”
Harry groaned, tipping his head back. “Holy shit, Rowan. You used to be cool and now you’re like an annoying little brother.”
“Touché.”
“Shut up. Both of you.” I found my voice, grabbing a pen and scribbling out the first line of trigger phrases which were a no-go.
“Rowan, annoyingly, is right.” I said, ignoring the guy’s noise of glee. If he kept spinning around on that chair, I was going to kill him.
The blur of movement at the corner of my eye was driving me mad. Focusing on Harry, I took a break from the trigger phrases for a moment, poking him in the cheek. It was supposed to be light-hearted, but the guy looked offended.
“For the third time, we can’t ignore that at some point you have signed off on all of those files, which means you were part of Spearhead.” I shrugged. “I’m not saying you are, but we have to be smart if we’re going to survive against a group of deranged scientists.”
Rowan chuckled. “What she saiiiiiid.”
"Why aren't we paying attention to the guy who clearly has allegiance to those freaks?” Harry stuck out his tongue at Rowan, which was surprising on multiple levels. Wasn’t he supposed to be the normal one? “Aren't you their favorite counselor?"
"I was literally mind controlled by preservatives, asshole," Rowan shot back. "And I'm not the only one. You and Carmel are on their radar too."
"Yeah, but we’re not the ones playing with eyes.”
"I'm too tired to argue with you." The boy responded in a yawn, cuddling into the chair armrest like a cat. “Also… you’re a noodlehead.”
“Ignore him.” I told Harry. “Just focus on me, alright? You have to look at me.”
“I am!”
“It’s time to make the donuts.” I articulated it perfectly.
Harry surprised me with a laugh. “That one can’t be real.”
“It is. Shush.” I cleared my throat. “The strawberry moon will rise in July.” When nothing happened, I frowned. “Maybe I’m not saying them right.” I peered at the next one, mentally speaking it and then muttering it to myself to get an idea of the tone.
“Or,” Harry shrugged, pulling at his restraints. “I’m just spit-balling here, but maybe I’m NOT a secret government sleeper agent after all?”
“Be mindful of the deep ravine.” This time I practically shouted it in his face, only to get his wide smile in return.
“Josie, this isn’t working.”
“It will.” I was growing increasingly more frustrated. “Just try and listen to them, okay? Don’t push them out.”
I tried one more time, leaning close and scrunching up the sticky note in my hand. Harry’s expression stayed stoic, though from the contortions in his forehead and the twitch in his lips he was trying so hard not to laugh. “It looks like it will rain tonight.”
I was surprised, then, when Rowan jolted in the chair suddenly. He lifted his head, his eyes wide. I was seeing him back to his usual self for the flicker of a second, his expression contorted with fright, lips curling into a scowl. “Do you guys smell that?”
“Smell what?” I sniffed the air, but there was nothing which was out of the ordinary. I had grown used to the combined stink of our body odour.
Rowan wrinkled his nose. He sat up straighter. “That.” He whispered. “It smells like… burning.”
I opened my mouth to ask what he meant before Harry went stiff suddenly. I sensed his entire body seem to brace itself. His eyes hardened. “Untie me.” He said in a croak.
When my shaking hands went to the boy’s restraints, his were balled into fists. I glimpsed muscles bulging through the back of his shirt and forearms. His demeanour reminded me of an animal growing territorial. “Something is… wrong,” he said in a sharp breath. Harry’s frightened eyes found mine. “Wrong.” He said again, blinking rapidly. “Something is...wr–wrong. ” When I pulled the last of the rope from his arms, Rowan shocked me with a piercing cry which sent him tumbling off of the chair, his trembling hands planted over his ears, lips carved into an O.
His eyes were wide with terror, with agony I couldn't understand. Childish terror. Which catapulted him back to his real age.
Before I could hesitate, I was crawling over to him, attempting to snap the boy out of it. But he was inconsolable, his eyes almost unseeing, his body contorting with every shriek. It took me a moment to realize Harry was the same. But instead of a piercing shriek of a scream, he was wailing into his knees, as if to escape something.
His body seemed to jolt left and right, like he was being electrocuted. When I saw glimpses of sharp red pooling between his fingers and down the back of his neck, something sickly crept up my throat. Rowan was somehow worse, his whole face contorting like it was it's own separate being, rivulets of intense red dripping from his nose and mouth, and staining his hands desperately pressed over his ears.
It was a synchronised cry, I realized, after concluding that no matter what I did, I couldn't save them.
It was a sound only they could hear, a high-pitched screech like a dog-whistle which was only affecting them. It was the kids, I thought. Surely. If they could disembowel counselors, I was sure they would have no problem engineering a sound which would only affect certain people.
Stumbling back, I had two choices. I could either try and help them, try and block out this phantom noise slowly killing them-- or I could leave them and find a safer place. With that choice in my mind, I barely noticed the phone begin to ring under Allison's desk.
That same old fashioned trilling rang in my head, and I managed to reach under and grab the receiver, my heart in my throat. "Please." I managed to squeak out, trying to ignore Harry, who was trying to rip out his hair, his eyes rolling into the back of his head. I saw the whites, blood vessels popping one by one.
When he crumpled to the ground, I thought he was dead. But his wails continued into the floor, and I wanted them to stop. I wanted him to die because I couldn’t stand hearing him screaming for help which wasn’t coming. I couldn't help them, and it was killing me. The kids were clearly trying to smoke us out, this time targeting the boy’s. Still though, I had my secret weapon. The Spearhead project.
"There are three of us left," I panted down the phone. "You have to help us. I am at Camp Redwood. You need to get us out of here. Do you hear me? You need to get us out–"
“Attempts to fix the current situation have been unsuccessful, Miss Greenfield," the woman with the British accent's voice came through in a rush of static, cutting me off. Her voice was monotone, and I wondered if she was in fact a programmed bot.
"All efforts for manual activation have failed from the disaster zone. The signal appears to have been sabotaged. I repeat. The E.485 frequency has been sabotaged. Designated models 0115, 0116, and 0118 are now officiated as being faulty and are no longer needed for protocol 9AXC5. Please stand by for standard protocol deactivation. Thank you for your service. Agent Salta. Agent Elsilrac. Agent Lemrac.”
My grip loosened on the phone, and I felt my legs started to give-way. "You're the one doing this to them?”
When Rowan dropped to his knees, blood dripping from his nose, my stomach jumped into my throat. There was no way. I figured it was an attack from the kids, but I was wrong. Instead, this sound, this frequency, was coming from the phone.
I thought back to the video footage. Agent Lemrac interviewing Eleanor Summers. Harry's signature on the paperwork. “Can you… say that again?” I heard myself say in a breath. But the dead ringing tone was already clanging in my skull, a robotic countdown laced within the static. I grabbed the pen I had been writing with, scribbling those names down, my hands shaking.
“Preparing emergency shutdown protocol. Thank you for your service, Agent Salta, Elsilrac, Lemrac.” The voice continued, which was just another stab in the gut. I heard Salta before. I heard Lemrac. But writing them down, I realized what they meant.
Salta.
Elsilrac.
Lemrac.
I was a fucking idiot. No wonder the littles wanted them and Carmel— why they were so important to their plan. Slowly, I could feel myself start to crumble. The phone slipped from my clammy hands, but I could still hear the woman beginning an emergency shut down.
I didn’t feel the impact when my knees hit the ground, but I did start to sense something twisted and sour tickling the back of my nose and throat. By the time I had noticed it, it was already choking the bunker. But somehow, I didn’t care about the stars in my eyes or my own blood being projected onto my hands with every wet sounding cough exploding from my lungs. I could still hear their names, and every time I said each of them, more and more of me shattered.
Atlas.
Carlisle.
Carmel.
“18…”
“17…”
“16…”
“15…”
Laying on my back while my head spun, I was partially aware the boy’s screaming had cut off.
Instead, they were just sitting there, eyes wide and unseeing, the blankest I had ever seen them. There was so much blood running down their faces, and I imagined something rooted inside of them tearing their minds apart from the inside. Letting out another strangled cough, which was definitely biological warfare courtesy of the kids, my gaze flicked across the bunker, taking everything in. The paperwork we had been going through. The chair Rowan had been spinning around on. The ropes Harry’s arms had been entangled in. I was frowning at the walls, and then the ceiling.
“Please mind your head when you step down the stairs.”
Drinking in the words slowly, my cotton candy thoughts imploding into one blurry mess.
But then I was a little more awake, this time turning my gaze to the wall where the same sign had been taped to the wall. Please mind your head when you step down the stairs. And… there it was again, taped to the desk, and underneath the laptop. Hidden in plain sight. It had been there all along, and yet I only realised when I wasn't thinking about it, when my mind was being suffocated. Something seemed to snap inside of me, and I sat up, driven by pure adrenaline. With one hand pressed over my mouth and nose, I forced myself into a sitting position and dragged myself to Harry, whose head was lolled at an unnatural angle, his eyes closed.
Part of me wanted to smash up the phone, knowing what these bastards had done to their sleeper agents now they were no longer usable. The boy almost resembled a doll. Was this the so-called sleeper which had been planted inside Redwood? Empty eyes, empty everything. He was like a shell with a human face. No better than Eleanor's experiments.
When I grabbed hold of his arms, I had to hold him steady, his body cut from these puppet strings which had held him. “Harry.” I could barely speak, my voice more of a croak. I knew he was awake and aware, but a singeing, almost burning smell was coming from directly inside his head as blood ran from his nostrils in shades of red and pink. Now I knew what the burning was when I pressed my face against his and sucked in a lungful of poisoned air. It was him. He was a defect being set alight from the inside. “You need to look at me, okay?”
When he didn’t, instead crumbling in my arms, I struggled to hold him upright. Twisting my head to Rowan, he seemed in a better state—kind of. At least he was still sitting straight.
My last words were barely audible. “Please mind your head when you step down the—” no sooner had the words left my mouth before the sounds of footsteps coming from above, the unmistakable murmur of giggling getting closer and closer. Harry dropped to the ground like he had been severed from his puppet strings.
I wasn’t aware when I slipped to the floor, whatever had filled my lungs finally taking its toll. Through flickering eyes, I could see our barricade being blown through, the ground rumbling beneath me, throwing me into something warm.
Rowan.
His body was curled up against the wall, haemorrhaging from the ears.
It was only when I was truly taking in the stink curling in the back of my nose and throat as Eleanor Summer’s mechanical grin popped out of nowhere, when I realized I had smelled it before. I had choked on it before. The circle of kids looming above me let out a shrill squeak of, “Found you!” while I found the dark, and beyond that, a memory I thought was a dream.
Firelight flickered in the backs of my eyelids. The blur of orange and shadowy smoke was mesmerising. I stared real hard at the fire like I was told to, at smouldering shades of yellow and orange colliding, thick black smoke billowing into the air while our faces illuminated the circle. I tightened my grip on my beer, swallowing another mouthful. It was cheap shit, but had just enough burn to get me tipsy. I felt good at that moment. Relaxed.
My head was starting to spin, but it was the good spinning, like I was going round and around on a carousel. I wasn't sure why I felt apprehension at the moment.
It was just a game, right? So, why did I want to jump up and go home? Why did I want to squeeze my eyes shut? Milo's words rattled in my skull as I squinted into the fire. "Come forth, those who are no longer with us." Ghosts weren't real, I thought dizzily. They couldn't be.
Not when science and logic existed. However, when the flames began to grow increasingly more erratic, I couldn't resist leaning forward, and... there. Something warm crept its way up my throat.
There was a shadow twisted in the smoke, a very human-like thing stepping directly from the trees, from the hollowed darkness I had been too scared to fully take in-- finding solace in flickering and illuminated sparks spitting from the fire. The others started to murmur to each other as the thing took a step out of the trees. Clea shuffled back with a cry, and Milo and JJ turned twin shades of sickly pale. It was a guy.
Older, by maybe a year. Shaggy reddish hair tied into a loose ponytail. His clothes were a simple leather jacket and jeans, but looking at his face, he was bruised, every part of him exhausted and battered. His eyes, when I caught them, were nothing but twin pools of oblivion glaring back at us.
"Holy fuck." Milo hissed out. “I didn't think that would actually work!" Downing his beer, he whooped. "Alright! Name, age, occupation, and..."
His lips quirked into a grin. "How you died, man!”
The guy inclined his head, his mouth curling into the start of an amused smile. "I'm not a ghost, Jackass."
His British accent was jarring.
"And?" Milo leaned back, crossing his legs. "Play along, bro. Or I call the cops and tell 'em a grown ass man is fucking with some minors."
"But he looks our age," Clea hummed. "And he's kinda cute."
"I don't give a fuck," Milo's eyes were hard. "State your truth, or I get my dad on the line."
The guy rolled his eyes, raising both arms like he was surrendering. "Samuel Joseph Wilder," he surprised me by responding. Now that I looked at him, this guy definitely was not dead. Unless dead people carried a gun latched to their belt, and a cheap iPhone sticking from their jeans pocket. "Nineteen years old." He shrugged. "I guess you could say I'm an ex-student."
He paused, and I caught emotion flicker across his face, his hands balling into fists. "I was killed– no, murdered, by my town."
Milo leaned back, cracking open another beer and taking a sip. Clea leaned closer to him, her eyes wide. “Playing along, huh? I like it. State your truth."
The guy nodded, lowering his arms. His dark eyes flicked to each of us, drinking all of us in. “I just escaped from a secret government facility doubling as a summer camp which has converted half of my town’s kids into mindless super soldiers.”
There was a pause, before Clea burst into nervous giggles. Milo cocked his head. “I said state your truth, not plagiarise The Hunger Games.”
Ignoring Milo, the guy turned his eyes to me. "Josie Greenfield?" He took a step forward before seemingly deciding against it. I didn't move or speak, my heart in my throat. I didn't have to reply. This strange boy continued, his lips curling. "You're going to die tonight, Josie."
At that moment, I realized why I had been feeling nauseous all night. Why my mind had been anticipating something all day, and why, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't brush off his words. Maybe part of me was expecting this.
The stranger's tone was too cold to ignore, the state of him too real to brush off as a joke.
Suddenly, it was just me, him, and fate itself glaring down on us, my life as I knew it exploding into nothing in the charred remains of the dying fire.
His voice echoed in my head, collapsing into white noise, when I noticed how truly inhuman he looked. I fully took him in, illuminated in firelight. "If you don't get the fuck out of this town, you are going to have the same fate as me."
…
I’m going to go out on a whim and say it’s… not 2018 and I’ve been at Camp Redwood for way longer than I realized?
More tomorrow, I hope. I’ve got nothing else to do. I still need to tell you how I ended up here.

Day 1:
Few of the tributes got much sleep that night. The parties all throughout the Capitol did not end until dawn, and the noise could be heard in the accommodation building. Vannery and Carton ate breakfast slowly, like zombies. They were subsequently taken to the holding rooms. Organza wished Carton good luck before accompanying Vannery in her cell. She kept trying to reassure her as she put on her beige shorts and t-shirt. The young girl attached her hair with a purple ribbon that had been provided and climbed into the glass tube. Organza hugged her one last time, feeling her tears soaking her shoulder.
It was Platonia Travers who accompanied Carton. She muttered to herself about the outfit choice for this year. She tried to be cold to the boy, but she accepted to help him tie the purple ribbon to his wrist. He gave her a sad smile : “I probably won’t come back, but it’s nice to know that everyone in the Capitol isn’t heartless.” Platonia stood, mute, as the boy’s platform started to rise. She couldn’t keep the tears in this time.
A few cells over, the atmosphere was as morose. Alexandra had finally deigned to discuss their strategy with Delta. She accepted his plan of staying on the sidelines while he ran to the cornucopia. Still, he looked at her suspiciously and hounded her about working together for the whole breakfast. Halifax gave Delta one last pill to combat the morphling withdrawal, assuring him that the only symptoms he would experience were a mild headache and maybe some stiffness. He subsequently accompanied him to his holding room while Sean Callahan went with Alexandra.
Halifax took advantage of being alone with his mentee : “You shouldn’t trust her. I know these kinds of girls. They look harmless, but they’ll stab you in the back as soon as you let down your guard.”
“But-but…”
“You like her, huh ? Too bad, she doesn’t. So, man up and move on !”
Delta did not know what else to say. He climbed into the glass tube in silence, his brows forming a single black line over his dark eyes.
In the next holding room, another conversation was happening. “You don’t plan on allying with Delta, do you ?” asked Sean Callahan. Alexandra looked away coyly. “ I have other plans… With Angelo, we have an agreement.”
The mentor sighed, but he did not criticize the girl. He just told her to be prudent. You couldn’t trust careers. Alexandra nodded then flinched as the glass tube started descending from the ceiling.
The first thing she noticed as she rose into the arena was the noise. She hadn’t even emerged that she could hear a cacophony of bird songs. It was almost deafening, and she covered her ears before protecting her eyes from the sunlight.
The racket made Delta’s headache intensify. He first looked to his sides ; Hattie (3) cowered on the left while Angelo (2), on the right, was focusing on the cornucopia. This year, it had been made out of a thin weave of golden metal, almost like a very shiny basket. After this zoom on the cornucopia, the cameras started moving around to show off the arena. The tributes stood in the clearing of a dense rainforest. The terrain was relatively flat, with a few creeks and an explosion of colorful flowers. The main attraction of it was the birds, however, as thousands of them fluttered about, sang, and screamed.
As Carton looked around for his allies, Head Gamemaker Vishwa welcomed the tributes and wished the odds to be ever in their favor before starting the 30 seconds countdown. With Borea (5) and the girl from 10 to his sides, he didn’t feel safe. He finally found what he was looking for, but he didn’t like that his allies were so spread out. He made eye contact with Rivage and Vannery but was unable to see Sardine, who stood on the opposite side of the cornucopia.
Vannery caught sight of her district partner, as well as Sardine. She gave them a small wave, but made the mistake of looking to her left, where Perfecto (1) was sneering at her. Georges (N), on the other side, was just as intimidating. Instead, she looked straight ahead. As the countdown reached ten, she spotted a coil of rope on the outside of the cornucopia.
Delta had been pondering, unsure if it was worth entering the bloodbath. Alexandra, who happened to be just two podiums over, winked at him. She then pointed to the cornucopia. He understood. At that moment, the countdown reached zero. He sprinted to the center of the clearing, expecting her to follow, but she stayed on her podium.
On later replays, it was shown that Alexandra was winking at Angelo and not her district partner. As the boy from 2 sprinted forth to the cornucopia, the girl waited for a few seconds. She moved only when most of the other tributes were too occupied and grabbed a knife as well as a small bag of food. Angelo acted like he helped the other career tributes in order to pick up weapons and supplies, but as soon as they were occupied, he joined Alexandra. The pair was actually one of the first to leave the clearing, not counting Circuit (3) and the pair from 10 who had run away immediately.
When Vannery realized that she was running side to side with Perfecto (1), she immediately changed course and ran to Carton. She had to give up on the rope but managed to pick a water bottle off of the corpse of the boy from 9, who had just been stabbed by Glare (9).
If the career pack didn’t notice the disappearance of one of theirs, it wasn’t the case for Delta. When he saw his district partner escape with Angelo, he became enraged. He tried to exit the cornucopia. Fraxen then attacked him to try and steal his backpack. Delta threw him to the ground and punched him so hard it broke his neck. Now he had lost trace of Alexandra. As the fighting started to die down, he ran in a random direction.
Carton had dodged one of Glare’s knives and grabbed a bag of food and an unwieldy lance before Vannery and Rivage joined him. The trio heard Sardine scream from the other side of the cornucopia. Carton wanted to go and help her, but a second gargled wail convinced him that they couldn’t do anything else, especially since Proserpina (2) had now retrieved her axe from Sardine’s chest. As they left, they could hear the crunching of Ora’s neck (12) at the hands of Georges (N).
Meanwhile, Alexandra and Angelo were already far away, giggling at each other. It was only after Perfecto had stabbed Hattie (3) to death that the career pack noticed Angelo’s absence, but they didn’t seem bothered by it.
Delta was halfway to the perimeter when the five bloodbath cannons sounded. He was still seething, and the running helped him calm down. Eventually, he collapsed on the side of and old mossy tree, out of breath. Once he was a little better, he explored his surroundings. The big tree had a hole in his roots where Delta could fit, although it was a squeeze. He decided to stay there for now and used moss to hide himself. He also put some in his ears, which helped with his headache.
Carton, Rivage and Vannery had been running in the opposite direction. They wanted to put the most distance between themselves and the other tributes. They stopped long after the bloodbath cannons had sounded. They set up camp a few hundred feet away from the Northern part of the perimeter, next to a creek. Carton helped Rivage to take inventory. He had the lance, Rivage had gotten a trident, and between the three of them they had enough food to last two days at most. The bottle Vannery had taken was only half full, but the water of the creek was clear and drinkable.
The trio decided to stay put. Vannery and Carton would work on a shelter while Rivage fished for their dinner, as they had agreed to during training. In the early afternoon, they heard hurried footsteps coming their way. The boys readied their weapon, protecting Vannery between the two of us. Circuit (3) came running into their little encampment, which took him by surprise. He skidded to a halt and turned around as quickly as he’d arrived, leaving the trio dumbfounded.
Angelo and Alexandra had quite enough supplies to last a while. He held a sword in his hand and an “emergency axe” strapped to his back, while Alexandra held two knives. At first, they wanted to get away from the careers, but Alexandra eventually convinced Angelo to follow them from afar. They weren’t really hard to track, their bickering could be heard over the constant chatter of the birds. The noise also covered them. Proserpina, Glare and Perfecto were circling around the central clearing, slowly moving away from it. In the late afternoon, they discovered Forger (12) who was lying unconscious. He had received a deep wound during the bloodbath and was now at the mercy of the other tributes. Proserpina killed him.
The subsequent cannon surprised Vannery. She had climbed on top of a tree to get a view of the arena, and the sudden sound almost made her loose her grip. She didn’t fall, but while reaching her hand for a hold, she grabbed something warm and spherical. It crumbled and a viscous liquid dripped onto her finger. She looked up. She had inadvertently grabbed an egg from a nest. She was silent a moment, and a bright purple starling looked at her. “Oh no !” she whispered to herself. The bird screamed louder than she thought possible. Then it attacked.
All the birds in a radius of 50 feet coalesced into a multicolored tornado. Vannery fell to the ground, fortunately not hurting herself on the way down, and a feathery mass started clawing and pecking at her. They also attacked Carton and Rivage, who had been chilling at a distance. They batted the volatiles away, trying not to get scratched. Vannery managed to get up and run to the makeshift tent they had built. She picked up Carton’s lance and swung it, hitting some of the birds. She swung a second time and hit the metallic water bottle with a resounding CLANG! It seemed to stun the birds, but Vannery was too busy keeping them out of her face. Carton, however, noticed their reaction to the noise. He shouted loudly and flailed his arms : “Make noise ! They don’t like noise !”. Just his screaming was enough though. Eventually, the three tributes managed to drive the mutts out by hitting their weapons against rocks and the water bottle and screaming as loud as they could.
Delta also had an encounter with some angry birds. Those were red, with a long curvy beak and fearsome talons, but he managed to kill them all with a big branch he used as a bat. He then ate them, cooked over a small fire. Argus berated him for building a fire that could alert the other tributes to his location. However, the “Aviary Jungle” as it had been baptized by Urania Whimsiwick herself, was way too dense for anyone to see the smoke.
As the sun started to set, Delta squeezed himself back into his root hole, being careful to camouflage himself with moss. He held his branch in front of him just in case. An hour later, two cannons sounded in quick succession. They belonged to the pair from 10, who had had the great idea of making an omelet. The flock did not appreciate that…
When the sun started to set, Angelo suggested he and Alexandra find a place to sleep, preferably away from the career pack. She agreed, so they stopped following. They looked for a safe spot in the light of the dusk, eventually settling on the middle of a tight thicket. It was complicated to get inside, but the small space was comfortable, and the pair even had a view of the darkening sky. They ate some food then laid down, hand in hand. “Your district partner doesn’t seem to mind that you ditched her” joked Alexandra.
“I don’t think she cares. Maybe they believe I’m dead. But they’re not looking for us at least.”
“I think Delta is, though. You should have seen his face when he saw us. I almost feel bad about leading him on.”
“Don’t worry, we’ll get rid of him if he isn’t dead yet.”
“I’m sure he’s feeling the same thing”, responded Alexandra before going to sleep. Angelo kept the first watch.
In another section of the arena, Carton took the first watch. He had spent the remaining hours of daylight cleaning his wounds, along with Rivage and Vannery. The two of them slept, hoping to feel better the next day.
A little before midnight, Rivage awoke. He came to sit next to Carton, and the boys talked about their families, their school. Suddenly, a cannon sounded. It belonged to Ulma (7), who had stumbled upon Quinoa’s (9) camp by accident. The younger girl had not hesitated to stab a pointy branch in Ulma’s throat. This cannon prompted Carton to go to sleep, Rivage taking second watch.
At midnight, the hymn of Panem resounded in the arena and the portraits of the 9 fallen appeared in the sky : Hattie (3), Sardine (4), Fraxen and Ulma (7), the boy (9), both (10), Ora and Forger (12). This left 17 tributes after an eventful and interesting day.
Day 2:
Delta didn’t sleep much that night. The uncomfortable position coupled with a strong headache meant that he was up before the sunrise. As the first hints of blue appeared to the east, Delta got up. He needed to occupy his mind. The moss had stuck to his clothes, and he decided to take advantage of it. He caked his face and hands in mud and used it to stick more moss to his clothes. Urania commented that he looked like a green Orang-utang, which prompted laughter in the Capitol. Once he was fully camouflaged, he started roaming the arena. Stealthily at first, but as the sun rose and the birds started their cacophony as well, he allowed himself to move a little faster.
Alexandra and her district partner had spent a restful night. As she awoke, she was surprised to be cuddling with Angelo. Her rousing awakened him, and he turned around to look at her, puzzled. “I guess you’re the little spoon”, she joked. They ate cereal bars in awkward silence. Soon, the voices of the career pack walking in their direction prompted the pair to hide. Proserpina and Perfecto were loudly arguing about someone stealing their water bottles. Unbeknownst to them, it had been Glare who had hidden them in her own bag.
As they moved away from her, Alexandra suggested they follow the trio like the day before. Angelo thought it was a safe strategy as long as they kept their distances. They made their way out of the thorny thicket and followed. A few minutes later, a scream warned them that something was going on. It was Glare (1). She’d walked into a trap laid by Georges the day before and was now hanging upside down from a rope. Perfecto started to help her, but the stolen bottles fell from her bag, along with a few hidden knives and more food. Instead of killing her, as Perfecto wanted to do, Proserpina convinced him to leave her there. She screamed and screamed. Proserpina and Perfecto left her there wiggling. Before Alexandra and Angelo could arrive, the thin rope holding up Glare by the ankle snapped. She fell headfirst on the ground and her cannon sounded. Alexandra winced, but Angelo told her that it was better this way, since you could survive for many hours hanging this way. Then another cannon sounded.
Delta had been unsuccessful for a few hours. He had avoided a couple of poorly made traps and fought off a flock of tiny yellow canaries but had been unable to find another tribute. Eventually, he decided to change tactics. He found a path that clearly looked like it was in use and hid in proximity. His ambush eventually worked. Lavandine (11) walked past him, clutching a meagre stick in her pale hands. She didn’t even notice him getting up and following her, his branch raised. Many viewers thought it looked cartoonish, the tiny girl, followed by a big man with a club, not noticing anything. Glare’s cannon gave him the signal he expected, and he swung at her head. Lavandine flew and crashed into a patch of ferns. Her head was bloody, but she was still alive. Delta walked up to her in order to finish what he had started. The cameras cut to another group of tributes.
For the whole morning, Vannery, Rivage and Carton had been staying put. They foraged, fished, and built rudimentary spears just in case. Vannery climbed trees, very carefully in order not to disturb any more birds, so she could spot any tributes. Eventually she did, a little after midday. The pair from district 5 was heading their way. They were armed.
Vannery transmitted the information to the boys, who debated leaving or fighting. “Let’s fight !” said Vannery. There were 3 of them against 2, and they had weapons. Carton had his lance, Rivage his trident, and her… a spear and a rock would do the trick. So, they waited for what felt like a century. As soon as Borea and Zapp entered their field of vision, they attacked. The pair was surprised, but not enough to let themselves be killed that easily. Borea shouted at Zapp to run while she fended of Rivage’s trident with her sword. She had wrapped metal coil all around her arms, as she had seen on one of the older games. They clashed for an instant, enough time for her to disarm him, and then she ran too. On the way, she threw an egg she’d hidden in her pocket to the group. A flock of angry sparrows was the distraction the pair from 5 needed to escape.
Proserpina and Perfecto seemed to have made up a little and were now actively hunting. Still, they weren’t aware of the couple _ the “double A couple” as they were now called in the Capitol _ following them from afar. They dared not speak, but the looks they shared meant a lot more. They say love makes you blind, and maybe that’s why Alexandra didn’t see the orange and turquoise pheasant she walked on. It screamed and ran away, catching the attention of Proserpina. She turned around and shouted, “I knew it !” before charging at Angelo and her ally. Her first axe hit a tree a few inches above Alexandra’s head. She was hesitant to fight a career, but Angelo had already jumped into the fray and was now battling his district partner. So, she ran at Perfecto, who was lagging behind. He quickly turned around and sprinted when Proserpina’s cannon sounded. Angelo had managed to stab her in the gut. The look of betrayal was still printed on her face as the hovercraft claw took her away.
The pair was unsure if they needed to pursue the boy from 1, as Angelo assured that he was an “ego-inflated wimp” . Instead, they rifled through the bag Proserpina had dropped and decided to rest a little. They could have stayed there longer if it hadn’t been for the fire…
After getting rid of the birds, the trio decided to keep following Zapp and Borea (5) in order to get their supplies. Vannery managed to track them thanks to their footprints and the trail of broken branches. They found them quite quickly. Indeed, the gamemakers had decided to trigger a forest fire in order to move the tributes around a little. This explained why they had seen so many birds flying away. The pair from 5, however, had found themselves cornered on three sides by the flames, and the last side was where Carton and his allies arrived from.
Rivage thrusted his trident straight into Borea’s back, sounding her cannon. Carton’s lance, however, flew past Zapp and into the fiery inferno. The boy from 4 barely had the time to pick up his trident before a tree fell, smashing into the boy from 5 and sounding his cannon. As other trees started to creak and groan, Vannery led the boys back to the creek, where she believed the water would keep them safe.
Delta ran as soon as he smelled smoke. He ended up in a small clearing in the Southern part of the arena. As the grass quickly burned, he jumped into the flames. Many viewers gasped, thinking he had just killed himself, but he just ran a few seconds then stopped. Argus explained that the fire had been controlled in a way that it burned quickly and extinguished itself just as fast. From his spot of scorched earth, Delta was safe for now. From the sky descended a small silver parachute bearing the number 6. It contained a water bottle and some aspirin. Delta was the only one to use this strategy successfully. A few minutes after him, Circuit (3), who was shorter and weaker, tried. He fell face first into the fire and did not get up, his cannon sounding a few moments later.
Angelo and Alexandra were some of the closest to the central clearing, so it was after the three cannons that the fire reached them. They ran. Angelo was practically flying but the fire was catching up to Alexandra. Another tree cracked. It crashed onto the girl, pinning her legs to the ground. Thankfully, it was a much younger tree, and it did not cause her much more damage. For an instant, Alexandra thought the boy from 2 would just keep running. That he would be glad to get rid of yet another opponent. But he turned around. He used his axe as a lever, bending it in the process, to get the girl free. Then he picked her up onto his back and ran again. Angelo was not a very muscular tribute, but he proved to be quite a strong one.
Neither Carton, nor his allies had suffered any injury thanks to Vannery’s quick thinking. The creek was wide enough to protect them from the flames, and they avoided any falling branch. Quinoa (9) had had the same idea. She internally debated reaching the small group, but eventually decided not to. In the late afternoon, it started to rain, revealing that many of the trees and plants of the forest were actually fireproof. It was much sparser now, but the rain cleaned off the soot and, soon enough, the forest was green again.
Rivage, Vannery and Carton huddled together. They stayed that way for the whole evening, until Carton took the first watch while the other two went to sleep.
Delta was almost unharmed too, apart from a few minor burns on his ankles. The aspirin had taken effect, and for once in a long time, he felt totally clear headed. He hoped his district partner had died today.
The fire had changed the landscape quite a lot. What used to be a lush jungle was now less green. The ground was visible in most places, and the humidity levels had gone down. The sky was more visible. It also meant that the traps set by Georges and Odette (N) on the first day were either destroyed or very conspicuous. The boy from 6 avoided them all.
Delta found a pond where he cleaned himself from the soot and the half-charred moss. The fresh water also soothed his burns. He ended up settling close by, between two fallen trees.
Angelo and Alexandra, however, had suffered many burns. Fortunately, as they were setting camp and trying to remove their singed clothes, a silver parachute descended over them. It contained two containers of oil, as well as a blanket and a note from Angelo’s mentors, which he did not show to Alexandra. It would later be revealed that it scolded him for keeping his plan of betraying the career pack secret. The oil was perfumed and designed to almost instantly heal burns. It worked a charm. As the massaging continued, the two tributes started to get more and more steamy. They were intimate that night.
While they were busy, the portraits of the fallen appeared in the sky. The second day of the games had seen the loss of Glare (1), Proserpina (2), Circuit (3), Borea and Zapp (5), and Lavandine (11). This left only 11 tributes for the third day, with better odds now that a few strong tributes were gone.
Day 3:
On the morning of the third day, an announcement was made by Head Gamemaker Vishwa. She informed the tributes that a feast would be held at noon, three hours from now. The 11 surviving boys and girls would find supplies they desperately needed there. She then wished everyone a glorious day and the dampened sound of the birdsongs came back in full force.
The announcement awoke Delta, but he decided not to go to the Feast. He still had food and a source of water nearby, as well as his heavy branch. A real weapon would have been nice, but he didn’t feel safe going to the central clearing. Instead, he decided to just sleep more. He only woke up again when the first cannon sounded.
As for the couple, they were lost in bliss. Their show from the previous night had to be censored, although it was available for those who had enough “connections”. Let’s just say that it was quite memorable, and cemented Angelo and Alexandra’s place as favorites. They got ready after a long cuddling session, grabbing their bags and their weapons and heading to the cornucopia. They arrived with minutes to spare. Actually, they were the last tributes to arrive.
Vannery had been the first on site, scouting for other tributes. Once she had been sure the coast was clear, she had signaled to Rivage and Carton that they could come. They hid in the bushes nearby; this area having been spared from the fires. Little by little, other tributes started to arrive. Kumquat (11) hid behind a tree, Perfecto (1) stood in the open, Odette and Georges (N) huddled together.
As Quinoa (9) and the “Double A couple” finally arrived, the cornucopia started receding into the ground. It reappeared at once, and a bell rang.
Vannery stayed behind. She watched all the tributes run to the center where laid 8 numbered bags, including Carton and Rivage. The fighting raged in the cornucopia. Her allies attacked Alexandra and Angelo, as Kumquat escaped with his bag. Quinoa (9) almost got out, but Perfecto (1) caught her by the ponytail and stabbed her in the throat, sounding her cannon. He then picked up her bag in addition to his.
Alexandra and Angelo fought side to side, covering each other. She scared Odette (N) away, while he pushed back against Rivage. The boy from 4 tried to hit Alexandra again, but her ally caught the trident and almost tore it out of Rivage’s hands. Instead of trying again, he attacked Georges. The trident hit him in the back and sounded his cannon a few seconds later. Angelo took advantage of this distraction to slash at Carton with his sword, causing the boy from 8 to bleed out.
Vannery screamed and ran out of her hiding place, almost colliding with Odette (N) on the way. Rivage grabbed the district 4 and district 8 bags in one hand, and Vannery’s arm in the other, and they ran away together. The young girl cried and struggled to keep up the pace. She wanted to go back, but Carton’s cannon sounded, ruining her hopes.
Angelo and Alexandra were the last tributes to get their bags. One of Perfecto’s knives punctured Alexandra’s. The pair turned back, giving Kumquat (11) enough time to flee. They chased Perfecto into the woods. He was quick, however, and they had a hard time gaining on him.
The following hours were very quiet, boring, even, so Urania and Argus invited a few guests to discuss the bloodbath and the tributes’ different strategies. It was only in the late afternoon that Delta deigned getting up. He was well rested. He ate what remained of his food and started camouflaging himself once again in order to hunt. The tributes were now very spread out, however, and it appeared that Delta was in an area devoid of them. He walked until it got too dark to continue, before letting out a scream of rage. His sudden outburst scared some resting birds. They flew away and hit Kumquat (11) square in the face as he was in the process of climbing up one of the taller trees. The surprise caused him to lose his grip and he fell to his death a few feet away from Delta, his Feast bag laying next to him. Suddenly, Delta laughed and thanked the birds. He emptied the contents of the bag, glad to find some fresh food and water. He settled right there for the night.
Angelo and Alexandra eventually gave up on hunting Perfecto. Every time they thought they heard him; it turned out to be another bird. He was nowhere to be found. The pair settled down near a creek, right where Carton and his allies had camped earlier, in order to clean themselves. It was another spectacle to behold. The couple played in the fresh water, wearing only their underwear, and at one point, Alexandra winked at one of the cameras. This resulted in the appearance of a sponsor gift a few seconds later. She caught it and opened it discreetly once she was dressed again. She checked that Angelo was busy with the campfire before peeking inside. There was a water bottle and a tiny, sheathed stiletto knife, about two inches long. There was also a note that said : “You will only get one chance” – S. She acted nonchalant, thanked her sponsor for the water, and hid the knife in her sock. She took the first watch, jumping when a cannon sounded.
Since they had come back from the Feast, Vannery felt that Rivage was acting strange. He kept pacing and muttering to himself and seemed unhappy even though they had received enough supplies to last five more days in the arena at least. They found another place to sleep, Vannery built a new shelter. As she was about to go to sleep, Rivage approached her, trident in hand. He didn’t speak, so she asked him what he wanted. “I’m sorr-“ he started. Vannery interrupted him : “Behind you !”.
He spun around and threw his trident. It caught Perfecto in the head, sounding his cannon before he had hit the ground. He had been sneaking up behind Rivage with a knife in both hands, but Vannery had a keen eye. Rivage seemed to deflate. He cleaned up his weapon and went to sleep. Vannery tried to ask him what he wanted to tell her, but he didn’t answer. Instead, she took the first watch.
At midnight, five portraits appeared in the sky : Perfecto (1), Carton (8), Quinoa (9), Kumquat (11) and Georges (N). The six remaining tributes were spread out around the arena : Rivage and Vannery to the East, Angelo and Alexandra to the North, Odette (N) in the South and Delta to the West.
Day 4:
The sound of a cannon startled Delta out of his slumber. He was feeling well rested and decided to head to the cornucopia with just his branch and a knife he had taken from Kumquat. With only 5 remaining tributes, he knew that the showdown was about to take place and was about as excited as the viewers in the Capitol for it to happen. On the way, he stumbled upon a suspicious mound of leaves. He almost let it be, until he saw two feet poking out of it. As he bent down to look at it, a sharp pain entered his shoulder blade. By pure reflex, he swung his club backwards, hitting a barefoot Odette (N) in the forehead. She stumbled backwards, clutching her knife, and tripped on a rock. Delta jumped onto her, planting his knee in her stomach, and stabbed her with her own knife. He added it to his “collection”.
The atmosphere between Alexandra and Angelo had been quite tense since they’d woken up. They hadn’t slept so well. When the first cannon sounded, they set out to get to the cornucopia, and by the time the second cannon echoed throughout the arena, they were in position. “We’ll fight together, right ?” asked Alexandra. Angelo nodded solemnly : “Until there’s no one else. I’m so glad I got to meet you.”
“Me too… Too bad one of us will have to die.”
As she said those words, a twig cracked in a nearby bush.
The first cannon had shocked the viewers quite a bit. As Rivage finished his watch, he looked at Vannery, asleep next to him. He murmured “I’m sorry”, so low that it had to be subtitled. Then he plunged his trident in her throat. Before leaving, Rivage let out the longest sigh of relief.
Alexandra climbed onto the cornucopia, hiding herself, a length of rope held tight between her hands. She waited as Rivage entered the clearing. He was focused on Angelo. Delta appeared a few seconds later, on the other side of the cornucopia. He walked under it, oblivious to the girl awaiting him. As Angelo charged Rivage with his sword, Alexandra lowered the rope. Delta let out a choked growl as she pulled. He was much stronger, however. With one labored step, he yanked her off the roof. The rope was still around his neck, but his hands were now around Alexandra’s. Nevertheless, she held on to the rope, using it to hold him at bay. Just before she fell unconscious, she kicked him in the groin. She let out a few coughs, before grabbing the two ends of the rope again and pulling Delta against one of the steel columns of the cornucopia. Delta tried to stab her, but she was behind him, and he was quickly loosing consciousness. With one last brutal pull, the rope crushed his windpipe.
Alexandra watched Angelo dispose of Rivage with one final feint of his sword, and his cannon sounded at the same time as Delta’s.
Silence fell on the clearing. Even the birds had shut up. The couple was breathing heavily. They hugged tight. Something glinted in Alexandra’s hand. She almost reached Angelo’s neck when he gripped her wrist. He smiled, but his eyes were full of sorrow. “I had to try at least !” she half-laughed, half-whimpered. He sat her down and hugged her once again. She told him that he deserved to win. That he was a good man. He took his swords and gently stabbed Alexandra in the heart. She barely cried as he looked into her eyes. A cannon sounded. The last one. Jahani Vishwa announced Angelo Clearfell, of district 2, as the victor of the 119th Hunger Games. He had to be forcefully removed form Alexandra’s corpse in order to be retrieved.
Aftermath:
The games took an immense toll on Angelo, who was unable to speak for more than a month. Even when he had gotten the use of his words back, he fell into a lengthy depression. His interview with Urania Whimsiwick and Argus Brown had to be cut short as soon as they mentioned Alexandra.
After that, he remained alone in his home of the Victor’s village. He received no guests and did not act as a mentor the following years. The other victors of his district described him as “disillusioned” and “a killjoy”. The situation stayed the same until his disappearance two years later.

Pre-school, early reader suggestions welcome. Here are some of mine:
The Rock that Fell From the Sky by Jon Klassen
Moody sardonic animals narrowly escape death by meteorite and a creature that follows them back from a daydream about the future. Reminiscent of Tarkovsky’s Stalker.
Go Dog Go by PD Eastman
A classic about dogs of all sorts going. Boy dog successfully negs girl dog over her hats and they eventually go home together after a big dog party in a tree.
Infinity and Me by Gabi Swiatkowska
The struggle of trying to understand abstract concepts, and getting stuck inside your head. She is saved from existential ennui when her grandma re-establishes an emotional connection.
McGelligot’s Pool by Seuss
It’s possible that Eskimo fish have made their way into your fishing hole. Heartfelt imagination can justify a sunny day of fishing.
Animals are Delicious
Foldout books about 3 different food chains. A small step towards establishing basic ancestral knowledge of nature. Baby’s first Phaidon.

I'm looking for a pretty early Harry Potter fanfic. I can't remember the name and several google searches haven't turned it up, but I'm hoping the community here can point me to it.

• I read it in maybe 2002 or 2003, but it was pre OotP so likely from a bit earlier
• It was set post-Hogwarts
• Harry was an intelligence agent, though most of his friends didn't know this at the beginning of the fic
• It eventually shipped Harry/Hermione but they took awhile to get together
• Harry, Hermione, and a few of their friends lived together in a big house
• It was three or maybe four "books", the last of which was never finished
• Ron was believed to be dead, though they later found out his death was faked and rescued him
• Harry had a son with another woman and that son ended up being the big bad of the series.
• Towards the end it turned out Hermione was also hiding a huge secret and she was the keeper of some sort of artifact that could turn off all magic

That's about all I can remember. I'm interested in going back and reading it for nostalgia sake.

Note: I'm only going to post a summary.
The episode starts with Jim, and Randal questioning if the whole thing is a government experiment. Randal believe that it could be a government, and he doesn't believe that people actually died. Jim mentioned Tom, and Brick's death, and that Sara killed her brother Nathan. Randal tells Jim that he didn't see it happen so how does he know it's real? He asked have he seen one once of proof that anyone here has actually died. Jim tells him about Nathan, and how Sara slit his throat. Randal tells him that could mean one of 2 things. They push Sara so far that she actually killed someone, or like everything else, the whole thing with Nathan, him arriving just in time to save your kid, what if that's all for show?
Cut to Boyd talk to Sara: Sara wants to go back, and live in the woods. She tells Boyd that there's no place for her here. At least out there she could do some good,and find some answers. Boyd tell her she just running away. They can find her something to do here so she can be useful.
Cut to Tabitha &Jade:
Tabitha tells Jade she saw him symbols down in the tunnel where the monster live. Jade ask if she ever heard of the chaos theory. He explained that two events appear entirely unrelated, but in reality there is an intricate set of connections. He tells her that they need more information. Jade & Tabitha wants to talk to Victor.
Victor goes to see Ethan. Victor brought him a warm Jacket to wear that use to be his . He tells him that he needs a coat because it will be cold soon. He tells him that the cost use to be his. Ethan gives Victor a picture he drew. Victor doesn't want the picture. He said that picture are for things that are gone.
Boyd visit Ellis at colony house. Ellis is doing fine. He feels great. Donna ask Boyd was he looking for her. Boyd say yes. He wants Donna to find something to do for Sara. Donna agree to do it. Meanwhile she tells him that she about Elgin almost drown,and his nightmare. Boyd talk to Elgin about his nightmare.
Jade & Tabitha confront Victor:
Jade ask Victor why he didn't tell him about the symbols in the tunnel. Victor doesn't want to talk about it. But Jade not letting up.
Jim& Randal talking to Sara.
They started asking her all kinds of questions. Than they ask if her brother still alive. They get Sara upset for she doesn't know what they talking about. Donna see this and kick them both out. Than Randal goes in on Donna. He tells her she has a little power, a little pul but she's nothing but a toll booth operators. They leave. Jim ask Randal what that's all about? Jim tells him that he saw the look on Sara's face. She didn't know anything. Randal says, but Donna might. Jim tells him we shouldn't go accusing everyone. Jim tells they need to watch. See what happens at night. He tells Randal to go back to the bus ,and go about his normal day. When it gets close to dark , you sneak out and meet me at the Rv . Maybe see some things that they don't want us to see. Jim goes home Ethan & Julie tells Him that Tabitha went to check on Victor. Jim tells Julie that he's going to spending the night in the RV. He has a talisman, and ask her to tell her mom.
Boyd comfort Jim about what happened with Sara. He warns Him about Randal being a power keg.
Tabitha & Victor:
Tabitha talks to Victor about what happened. Victor said that people shouldn't go looking for answers because they do come back. Tabitha tells him that bad things happen no matter what. Victor tells her that his mother said that they were going home. Tabitha ask him what did she say. Victor doesn't remember, but he say pictures might. He said he put the pictures some places where he doesn't have to look at them. So no one else will die.
Cut to Boyd:
Mari was down in the basement. There some bugs/ cicadas crawling out of the body. She tells Boyd about her dream. She said when the music box started playing one of them jump out at her and burn her. Are you honestly saying that our dreams can hurt us?
Donna finds out that Boyd killed a monster. Donna tells them they need to burn the body. But not let people see them do it. (Note: Donna been complaining about having a headache)
Victor & Tabitha:
Victor tell Tabitha that his mom told him that she need him to be brave , and look after his little sister. She told him to stay there , and don't leave no matter what happenes . You stay there all night , and when I come back we're gonna go home . His sister, Eloise ran after her mom. Victor call after her, but he didn't go after her. He was so scared. He stayed until morning. Tabitha point to a picture and ask what this. Victor tells her that Eloise that's where my mother went at night. She went to save the children locked in the tower.
Boyd: Boyd hear screaming. Help me , please! Help
Randall? Jim? Randal , what the fuck.
End
Souce:
https://www.opensubtitles.org/en/ssearch/sublanguageid-all/idmovie-1110760

We started flirting after he messaged me saying he always found me attractive for years (he's one of my brothers old friends) and was "shooting his shot". We live in different states at the moment and originally he said if I was closer he would love to take me out. He said he thought we had tons in common after we talked and I thought so too.
A month and a half went by of radio silence (besides the fact he would look at my Instagram stories) and I decided to message him first - and see where his head was at as I started thinking a bit more about him. He seemed rather ecstatic, like "QueenCordelia it's sure an incredibly pleasant surprise to hear from you!" and we chatted a bit and finally in the context of our conversation, he said how he has a big crush on me. Me being flirty back, I wrote "well I maybe have a crush on you too."
Radio silence for hours after that. I figured he was “busy" as he said he was at the end of his late night work shift. Makes sense. When I checked to see if he texted me though for the final time, I see he put his phone on do not disturb, and obviously he had got off work, and went to bed. Now it’s the afternoon, I’m off from work myself soon and he still never texted me. I feel like a fool for ever admitting how I felt.

IGS Rep: https://www.reddit.com/IGSRep/comments/12qvwmq/henjindayos_igs_rep_page/
In case you have already checked my list before:
No new keys added since 2023-05-17
So, I [h]ave
Jan 2022 Humble choice

• Rustler
• Retrowave
• Midnight Protocol

October 2021 Humble Choice

• Amnesia: Rebirth
• 112 Operator
• Guts and Glory
• Ring of Pain (Region lock info)
• GARAGE: Bad Trip
• Hiveswap Friendsim
• Syberia 3

September 2021 Humble Choice

• Röki (Region lock info)
• Narita Boy
• Swag and Sorcery
• Fort Triumph (Region lock info)
• FRAMED Collection

August 2021 Humble Choice

• Out of Space

July 2021 Humble Choice

• Nimbatus - The Space Drone Constructor
• S.W.I.N.E. HD Remaster

June 2021 Humble Choice

• Stubbs the Zombie in Rebel Without a Pulse (Region lock info)
• Worms Rumble + Legends Pack DLC (Region lock info)
• Panzer Paladin
• Milky Way Prince - The Vampire Star
• Ikenfell (Region lock info)
• Paw Paw Paw
• Effie

April 2021 Humble Choice

• Main Assembly (Region lock info)
• Remothered: Broken Porcelain
• SIMULACRA + SIMULACRA 2
• Colt Canyon
• Skully

March 2021 Humble Choice

• WWE 2K BATTLEGROUNDS (Region lock info)
• Hotshot Racing
• Peaky Blinders: Mastermind
• Cyber Hook
• Pesterquest
• Boreal Blade
• Ageless (Region lock info)

December 2018 Humble Monthly

• Purrfect Date - Visual Novel/Dating Simulator

August 2018 Humble Monthly

• Forged Battalion (Region lock info)

July 2018 Humble Monthly

• Serial Cleaner
• Titan Quest: Anniversary Edition + Titan Quest: Ragnarok DLC

June 2018 Humble Monthly

• Acceleration of SUGURI 2
• Cook, Serve, Delicious! 2!!

May 2018 Humble Monthly

• Crazy Machines 3

April 2018 Humble Monthly

• Laser League (Region lock info)

Keys from old Humble Bundles

• Amnesia Fortnight 2012 The Series
• And Yet It Moves
• Aura: Fate of the Ages
• Beatbuddy: Tale of the Guardians
• Canabalt
• Containment: The Zombie Puzzler
• Crayon Physics Deluxe
• Deadlight
• Deponia
• Draw a Stickman: EPIC
• Eufloria Steam Key
• Galactic Civilizations II: Ultimate Edition
• Gunpoint
• Hard Reset Extended Edition
• Knights of Pen & Paper +1 Edition
• Memoria
• Mutant Mudds Deluxe
• Nuclear Dawn
• One Finger Death Punch
• PixelJunk Eden
• Safecracker: The Ultimate Puzzle Adventure
• Spy Chameleon - RGB Agent
• Super House of the Dead Ninjas
• Swords & Soldiers HD Steam Key
• Toto Temple Deluxe
• Two Brothers
• VVVVVV

Keys from Fanatical bundles

• Ballpoint Universe - Infinite
• Castaway Paradise - Town Building Sim
• Codex of Victory
• Heavy Burger
• Lichdom: Battlemage
• Lucius
• POSTAL Redux
• Sir, You Are Being Hunted
• Star Wolves 3: Civil War
• Super 3-D Noah's Ark
• The Keep
• Crash Drive 3
• Fell Seal: Arbiter's Mark
• Tacoma
• Tannenberg
• The Battle of Polytopia
• The Battle of Polytopia - Aquarion Tribe
• The Battle of Polytopia - Cymanti Tribe
• The Battle of Polytopia - Elyrion Tribe
• The Battle of Polytopia - Polaris Tribe

and I [w]ould like to get

• Honey I Joined a Cult
• Ghostwire Tokyo
• Curse of the Dead Gods
• Lost Ruins
• Tainted Grail: Conquest
• Gordian Quest
• Hidden Through Time
• Call of Cthulhu (this one)
• Coffee Talk
• LOST EMBER
• I'm also interested in GOG/EA/Uplay keys

I bought all games/bundles myself.
All keys are from EU region.
Keys only - sorry, I won't do gift links because of the whole banning thingy.

Hi, we got 2 kittens in February when they were about 3 months old. One of them seems to be growing at a pretty normal rate for the breed (Russian Blue). The other, however, seems to be significantly larger. He is definitely a chonk. I don’t know that I would say he’s truly overweight, but he’s definitely heading that way. He definitely eats more and is generally more laid back and lazy than his brother. I mean, this cat is getting huge. RBs tend to be sleek and on the smaller side, they are mixed with domestic shorthair, but even so he is a big boy! He weighs about 10.6 lbs according to my bathroom scale(his brother is about 8lbs)—He seems to be fully grown, despite being only about 7 months old, and I’m starting to be a bit concerned that he’s overeating, especially since he doesn’t tend to get as much exercise.
Right now we feed them a mix of Nutrish inner health and purina live clear (my husband and son have allergies and they’re low allergen cats, but the food seems to pretty much eliminate any issues they have, we mix it with the nutrish because the live clear seems to cause some gas, and really stinky poops, but the nutrish seems to fix that). We have auto feeders and allow food to be available to them all day. I’m wondering if I should do something to limit his intake.

My narc grandmother who helped raise me and is a big source of my c-ptsd from how badly she psychologically and verbally abused me, is in the ICU with 25% of her heart working and it’s apparently not looking good for her.
I went no contact with her a few years ago, and I told myself I’d never talk to her again even on her death bed. But my dad (who’s always been her biggest flying monkey) is asking me to text her that I love her before it’s too late. And maybe I should since it’s just a text. I don’t think I have any love for her, but I do feel bad that she’s dying. Maybe if I text, I’ll have less guilt when it’s over, and my family will be less angry with me. They’ve been so angry with me for going NC with her, so ignoring her on her death bed definitely won’t go over well. My dad got super angry just because I said I was going to to think it over. My grandmother is about to be gone but I have to keep my dad happy, so I feel like I need to.
But it feels so wrong. It’s like saying all she put me through is okay. And what if she survives and she and everyone else thinks this means the NC is over? And I know this is pathetic but the idea of talking to her again (even just through text) makes me so anxious that I feel like I’m going to have a panic attack.

I’ll try to make this straightforward, so a list!
1) Prefer queer books, but not exclusively! I read and really liked Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute and I just started My Best Friend’s Exorcism, both enjoyable although someone told me the latter is sad so I’m feeling wary of it now 😂
2) the big qualifier: NOT HEARTBREAKING. If you tell me “you’ll cry reading this” it instantly turns me off from the book. It’s not like I don’t ever read books like that but right now I am specifically looking for something I have the emotional bandwidth to consume. This means no major character deaths, no gut-wrenching backstories, no bad endings.
3) Preferable if it’s available on audible! These days I consume most books through audible on my daily walks with the kiddo I nanny for, so if I can consume them that way it’s great for me.
4) Adult characters—recently I’ve seen quite a few YA books that look great but I’m just not in the mood for high school/teenagers at this precise moment, I’m 26 so if the characters were college age/older that would be cool.
Some books I love (I know some of these go against the above requirements, reading moods change!):
Mo Dao Zu Shi/Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation
I’m Glad My Mom Died
Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute
Warrior Cats (listen, don’t come for me, whatever you’re going to say, I know)
Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda and Leah on the Offbeat
I was recommended The Song of Achilles but didn’t finish it because it just wasn’t my thing! Nothing against it, I just personally couldn’t get into it.

Side by side, we continued on our path, skirting through the lower section of the factory. After my initial shock, my heart rate had slowed to a healthier pace again. Frankie had assured me that his old boss most likely hadn’t heard us (“She used to have her earbuds in all the time with the volume cranked way up—you couldn’t have gotten her attention if you’d tried”), but we still considered it prude to move forward at a more hurried pace.
We soon came to the conclusion that we would have to go up one of the outside staircases. Frankie admitted in humiliation that his memories of the factory weren’t as accurate as he’d thought—either that or FunFlair had made a few changes to the building. The upper floor containers all had glass doors, presenting us with a sticky problem. If we were to go up there directly, we’d probably be spotted immediately.
“This warrants a change of plans,” I declared soberly, keeping my voice low. “We’ll have to knock her out, then.”
Frankie whimpered.
“Wouldn’t you like that?” I prompted. “I’d be the one to do it, of course.”
“Ye-es.” He shuddered. “It’d be satisfactory for sure, but that’s only assuming nothing goes wrong.”
“She can hardly be stronger than I am.”
“No. I guess not. She, uh… yeah.”
“Let’s go, then.” I offered an encouraging smile as I started leading the way back outside.
We rounded the container with the lights on inside, ascending the metal grate staircase connected to it. Every step carried us closer towards the light. Just before the door fully came into view, I turned to Frankie one last time. “Are you alright? This’ll be it in a moment.”
He made another chew-toy sound.
“Fran, what is it? If you know something I don’t about what might happen in there…”
“She shouldn’t see me,” he squeaked out. “I can’t control myself around her.”
“I don’t understand; did you two use to be an item?”
“No! No, no, no. I can’t explain it any other way. She can make me do things I don’t want,” he told me, his tone growing in desperation.
“How?”
“It’d take too long to explain now, it’s… it’s really very complicated. Please, can you do it without me? I can’t go up there after all, I’m so sorry but I can’t…”
I sighed, leaning in to put my arms around him. “It’s okay,” I whispered into his hair. “I’ll do it. Wait here.”
“I’m so, so sorry, Eva. I swear I’ll make it up to you. This is the last time I’ll ask something like this of you.”
“I doubt it,” I replied. “But it’s okay.” I drew back, reluctantly letting go of him. “For now, it’s okay.” I continued marching up the stairs. Behind the glass door, a feminine figure in a black rubber apron came into view. She seemed to be nimbly skirting around another operating table, this one occupied by a fully formed, petite doll. Now or never. I reached for the doorhandle, pushed it down and crossed the threshold in a single, large step. I slammed the door shut behind my back, drawing the attention of the woman.
She looked up at me, her eyes widening in shock behind her thick glasses. With a swipe of her slender fingers, she removed her earbuds, dropping them into her pocket.
“Are you Philomena Wallis?” I asked.
For a split second, she appeared to be too stunned to speak. Her pale face was framed by messy strands of jet-black hair that had worked their way out of her long ponytail. When she broke from her silence, she spoke with an irritatingly pearly voice. “Who’s asking?”
“A former delivery girl. Well, are you?”
“I am. I don’t understand; I-I’ve never seen you before… How did you end up here? What do you want?”
I took in a deep breath. I glanced over at the door, inwardly cursing myself for what I was about to ask her. “I need to know what you did to Frankie Preston.”
For a couple seconds, silence reigned. The other woman was staring at me with knotted brows. “I don’t know who you’re talking about,” she said finally.
“About yay high—,” I raised my hand above my head, “slightly built, blond curly hair, dreamy smile…”
Philomena narrowed her eyes. I cleared my throat, holding her gaze. Then a look of cold comprehension settled on her features. “Oh my god,” she muttered. “Holy shit… hold on.” She turned around, pulling up a photo on her computer. “Is that him?”
I cautiously stepped closer to get a better look, only to shrink back slightly. It was, indeed, a picture of Fran. He was entirely naked in it, lying on a table similar to the one I was standing in front of now, his wrists and ankles locked in restraints. His neck was craned, his face averted. The camera had caught him mid-motion, a blur around his head visually conveying a kind of violence in the movement. I couldn’t bear to look at it any longer. Instead, I moved closer to the doll on Philomena’s table, taking her in fully. Another blonde—her hair was straight, though. Her body was exaggeratedly curvy, her face delicate and fawn. Speechless, I locked eyes with Philomena from across the room again. She gave me a light shrug. “You look like you need some time for this to sink in,” she remarked, drawing out the words. “I take it you didn’t have all the information previously.”
“That’s okay,” I replied. “I think I get it now.” My head felt empty, my own voice seemingly echoing back and forth between my ears.
“So, you know my prototype,” she stated, confusion and disbelief mixing in her tone. “He told you how to get here, then?”
“In a way.”
“And you came here to find out,” she concluded. “There’s not much I can tell you that you haven’t figured out by now. We wanted to create the most detailed doll there was. He was our first attempt. I started developing him back in the late nineties as just a hopeful pet project. I kept adding more functions as time went on, though, and he turned into an insanely lucrative prospect. I wanted him to be able to move and dance and mimic an airflow, and it worked out better than I’d ever expected. So he can do a lot of things, but I never intended for him to have any sensory awareness or to talk… I have no idea how that happened. It just did. One day, I turned him on and he simply looked at me. There was something different about his eyes, and I knew right away he wasn’t the same as before. And then of course he spoke.”
A shudder ran through her entire upper body at the memory. “I have no idea how. None of us did at the time. He had no recorded voice lines or anything of the sort. And yet, he opened up his mouth and there was just… words coming out, like.” She shook her head in bewilderment at the memory. “After I got over the initial shock, I realized how big of a problem this was. He was telling me to stay away from him; he wouldn’t do a thing I told him anymore. There was my best invention in the entire field yet, rebelling like a teenager. When I tried to get him back in line, he got physical, too. Thrashed around like crazy. One of my assistants ended up concussed because that thing threw him down a flight of stairs. So we had to put an end to that, as well.”
A faint feeling of nausea seeped into the pit of my stomach, strengthening by the second. “What did you do?”
“Well, we had to take him apart, of course! And put him back together. Wash, rinse, repeat. We kept trying to figure out what was wrong with him, or at least to find a way to stop his babbling and hitting people. We didn’t, though. We managed to control his outbursts, though. He was made to react to voice commands, but obviously, that wasn’t working anymore. So after the umpteenth time we rebuilt him, we managed to make it so he couldn’t physically attack people. Don’t ask me about the finer details of his programming; the process was beyond tedious. Anyways, he kept talking and moving around on his own even afterwards. He’d only listen to what we told him occasionally and even then, he’d mouth off. We didn’t want to discard all the progress we’d made, though. He was still an incredibly well-made doll, even if he was… apparently possessed and sentient.
“We built two more like him. We tried harder with their faces seeing as that of the prototype had fallen very far into the uncanny valley. They turned out great, perfectly shaped and working smoothly. Their development took a lot less time than that of the prototype. Once we were sure they were all good, we started talking about destroying the first one. We’d kept him locked up in the meantime, but the little fucker kept on breaking out. We’d literally cuff him to the wall and moments later, he’d come up behind me and scare me half to death. He was becoming a bigger nuisance every day. We were set on taking him apart a final time, but before we could, he disappeared. He’d destroyed all our equipment he’d gotten his hands on, stolen unnameable sums from our online banking accounts—Lord knows how he did that—and worst of all, he somehow managed to… activate the two new builds. He destroyed most of the cameras, but the footage that was left clearly showed them walking around with him. And that’s that.” She palmed her forehead. “How did he get away from the people I sent after him?”
“Largely with my help.”
“Huh. So who are you?”
“Still just a former delivery girl.” Shrugging off my jacket, I made room for my extra limbs to breach my skin, simultaneously opening my mouth as my teeth morphed into fangs.
Philomena watched my transformation almost disaffectedly. Her steps as she carried herself over to her operating table however nearly faltered. Before I could advance on her, she’d cupped the sleeping dolls cheeks, causing the limp body to spring to life. The mannequin’s head jerked up along with her torso. In several clipped, mechanical movements, she slid off the surface, placing her naked feet on the floor. Her eyes flew open, fixing me with an empty glare.
“I don’t know what the fuck you are or what you want from me,” Philomena began, “but I’ve got weak nerd arms. So have fun dealing with this instead.”
I shrank back a step, the memory of Frankie picking me up like I weighed nothing fresh in my mind. Phil pressed her lips to the side of the puppet’s face, whispering something I couldn’t make out before quickly drawing aside. Before I could do so much as blink, the doll was upon me, crossing the distance between us in one impressive leap. She toppled me over, instantly reaching for my throat. I batted her cold, rubbery hands away, then pried her off of me with all my might. Using two of my tentacles, I flung her aside, sending her crashing into a shelf in the corner. Not wasting another second, I lunged at Wallis, delivering a blow to her head that sent her staggering. She sank back against her desk and I lashed out at her once more, briefly shutting my eyes to spare myself the sight of her face connecting squarely with the wooden surface as I bashed her down on against it.
She fell limp, and while I wasn’t sure if she was still breathing or not, I didn’t take the time to check. Her puppet was rising to her feet again, striding towards me in a vacantly determined fashion. I whirled around, bursting through the door and taking two steps at once. Frankie was waiting for me at the bottom of the metal staircase, his face falling when he caught my expression.
“Knocked her out,” I gasped. “We have a problem, though.”
Fran looked up at the glass door, the hinges of which were already groaning under the pressure of the mannequin throwing herself against it from the inside. With a sharp crack, a tear began to grow on the thick pane, and Frankie cursed loudly. “Get away from here!” he hollered, nudging me into the general direction of the woods. “I doused everything I could find down here,” he explained quickly. “If Phil’s out, I’ll do her room, too.”
“What about the—”
“Never you mind that! I can hold her off no problem.”
“I won’t—”
“You literally took out the one thing holding me back,” he insisted. “I’m not letting you get hurt out here. Just wait for me over by the trees.”
I still wouldn’t budge, so he grabbed a bunch of my tentacles and used them to turn me around. “Get your cute-ass face out of here, Sunshine!”
I started running, albeit reluctantly. A loud crashing noise rang out from behind me as the door burst under Phil’s puppet’s onslaught, but I forced myself to keep from turning around. Ignoring the searing hot feeling of panic raging inside my chest, I carried myself further and further away from the scene, only stopping when I reached the treeline. There, pressing myself up against the rough bark of the nearest trunk just to ground myself, I resigned to staring at the containers. I couldn’t see the waiter from where I was standing, but my eyes remained trained on the factory. They were gradually drying out, but despite the pain, I kept them wide open. I didn’t dare to blink.
For several minutes, all was still. The only sound I could hear was the frantic beating of my own heart and my pulse thrumming in my ears. Then, all of a sudden, inferno broke loose. Bright flames started to spread from around the sides of the building, quickly rising high into the sky. Crackling and roaring, they soon enveloped the entire site, lighting up the rooms behind the formerly dark windows. And emerging from the fire like a bird of myth came Frankie Preston. He was running, but with a light spring in his step that almost made it look like he was dancing.
He came to a halt in front of me, lifting his head to meet my gaze. His expression was difficult to read. It still looked empty, but in a different way. In a good way. “Hi,” he began.
“Hi.”
The firelight was bouncing off his curls and playing on his thick lashes, putting a reddish glint into his eyes. “You’re beautiful,” I added.
He drew in a little closer. No gasp preceded his smile. “Thanks.”
“How are you feeling?”
“I, uh… I don’t know yet.” He glanced between me and the burning containers.
“Okay. Take your time.” I stretched my arms and rolled my shoulders, shrugging my additional limbs back into the inside of my body.
“Say, where do they go when you don’t have them out?” Frankie asked with a raised brow.
“I never know.”
“Hm.” He turned to stand at my side. At first, his knuckles merely grazed mine, then he flipped his hand to link his fingers with mine. I briefly smiled at his profile, then went back to admiring the flames.
“Do you think the whole woods are gonna burn down?”
“Probably not,” he replied, shrugging. “Though that would be pretty cool…” He trailed off when I shot him a reprimanding look. “Yeah, yeah, we can call the fire fighters or whatever. Later, though, alright?”
I rested my head against the side of his arm. “Sure. Later.”
For a couple minutes, neither of us spoke. The only sound was the steady crackling and occasional thump as bit by bit, the structure collapsed. “So, um… this is pretty amazing,” Fran said in a low voice. “I mean, it’s not like I’ve never been happy before; my life’s kind of had its ups and downs, it’s just that this is better than any up there’s been so far. I guess I’m just really grateful and you ought to know that.”
“Don’t worry, I know.” I paused. “Can we get out of here? The place is starting to stink.”
He nodded agreeably and we turned our backs on the scene, only for our retreat to be abruptly stopped by a garbled, drawn-out screech. We spun around in perfect synchronicity. I couldn’t stop myself from letting out a sharp cry of shock. From the burning wreckage, a figure dragged itself forth on her hands. Philomena’s puppet had suffered immense damage in the fire. Her skin, obviously not made to withstand extreme heat, was melting off her face like molten candle wax. The wires that were bared beneath gave off angry sparks. She couldn’t seem to get up anymore, her legs were beyond repair and her movements overall were getting more and more arduous. She dug her fingers into the ground, pulling her body across the forest floor in slow, pained jerks.
“What the fuck? I thought I switched her off,” Frankie uttered beside me, sounding just as terrified as I felt.
“What do we do?” I exhaled the words in a single quick breath, unable to take my eyes off the doll.
“I got no idea… I-I don’t wanna deal with this…”
“We need to help her or something, she’s—she’s awake!” Before I could say anything else, the doll had emerged from the blaze. Rolling around, she managed to quench the remaining flames, pressing the dirt and leaves into her own dripping, melting body. Finally, she started trying to push herself up into a sitting position, only to fail miserably. I took a slow, tentative step towards her twitching form. Her face was contorted into a nightmarish grimace, and she let out an incomprehensible gurgle upon noticing me approaching. She reached out a mangled hand and I stumbled backwards before she could grab my ankle.
Despite the heat, beads of cold, fearful sweat were running down my face. I had no idea what to do. “We can’t leave her,” I said, my throat bone-dry. “There’s something in there, she’s not like before.”
Fran let out an exasperated, long-suffering sigh. “Is there any use in arguing?”
“Don’t be so cold.”
“Aren’t you used to it by now?”
I turned to look at him over my shoulder. He met my gaze and I could see something in his features change or perhaps even soften. He threw his head back, then pulled out his phone. “This is gonna ruin my night, but fine. I’m calling that insufferable news lady.”
X
1
2: deadbeat roommate
3: creepy crush
4: relocation
5: beach concert
6: First date
7: Temp work
8: roommate talk
9: a dismal worldview
10: warehouse
11: staircase
12: explanation
13: hurt
14: hospital
15: ocean
16: diner
17: government work
18: something in the caves
19: shopping cart
20: olms and Jewels
21: long hair
22: recruitment
23: waitresses
24: dollhouse