Wrote a story yesterday, realized I should wait to release it until some other stuff got done, thus the delay. Hopefully, I can release it soon.
First Last Next
Abara’s private study in the diplomacy shuttle was a little closer to her preferences but not quite what she was used to. They'd refitted it a little since the data breach but she found it continued to be lacking. It didn’t have all of the displays and communication abilities that she would have liked, full hardlight environmental generation was still considered too much. The trip took a relatively long time because Carlson was certain nothing about Terran transportation would have been revealed in the intel breach. She still couldn’t disembark outfitted and accompanied with the amount of security and information resources she preferred, but she and Carlson both agreed that there was still a good chance they could be overwhelming to the chosen Conglomerate ambassadors they'd had dealings with so far.
She still had drone guards, controlled by the security team located in combat cradles throughout the ship in isolated pockets. They were limited to the ship per her standing orders; a dozen or so pitch black and headless troops may send the wrong message. Meeting with ambassadors meant she had to rely on cloaked GNATs (Graviton Nimbus Automated Turrets) providing security and they would be anything but subtle if she was in genuine danger. Granted, she thought to herself, if I am placed in genuine danger then I have reached a point where the negotiations have broken down anyway. Besides, she always had Janice if things went very poorly.
Her ship made its final approach to the station where discussions would take place for this meeting. The system was technically within Conglomerate controlled space, but on the outer edges. It lacked habitable planets and appeared to have been mostly stripped of resources so neither side could hide an ambush with ships easily. As agreed, she arrived with only two ships as escort, a pair of corvettes.
She smiled to herself when she remembered how Carlson cursed up a storm when they’d been reviewing Conglomerate ship sizes. Terran corvettes matched the sizes of destroyers within the Conglomerate and easily packed more firepower. At first, the Conglomerate had been opposed to the ships when she’d sent the profiles over for them to be aware of. But all she had to do was explain they’d been attacked by pirates and would rather be safe than sorry. It was their fault if they believed the incident required so much security, she never said it did.
The station, from what intelligence could gather, was an old mining operations station that had overseen most of the resource harvesting in the area. It was now, primarily, used to assist anyone that had gotten lost and to relay any distress signals it may pick up. Maintained enough to be usable, not important enough to matter if something went wrong. She knew why this location had been chosen, rather than a ship or close to a populated world. They’d seen a sampling of humanity at war. It was enough to make most species hold them at arm’s reach.
Or worse.
The ship docked with the station, her ship escorts close enough to take any weapons fire if needed. Janice, downloaded into a biosynthetic body, was waiting patiently by the shuttle door. As Abara approached, she could feel the GNAT link synch with her implant. There was silence as the double turreted drones, no larger than a softball, left their ports on either side of the door and cloaked themselves. They wouldn’t do much against a serious army, but it would take armored vehicles or heavy infantry to try and remove them.
The door cycled open and, for all appearances, Ambassador Abara and her assistant, Janice, were the only ones to depart from it. They were met by a Nvarith, a slightly large, rotund (almost to the point of spherical), species covered in fur. “Ambassador Abara,” he spoke, using one massive hand to cover his chest in the closest approximation to a bow he could manage, “it is a pleasure to see you again. If you will please follow me.”
“Of course, Horfruth. Tell me, how have you been since we last spoke?” Abara asked. The trio walked through the hallways to the meeting room as they continued amicable small talk. The scans the Conglomerate technicians did of her ship indicated that the only other people present were a pilot and co-pilot. They passed this on to the awaiting teams who signaled their affirmative and waited for the next orders. As Abara followed behind Horfruth, Janice quietly alerted her of the hidden troops and their locations. When Janice had counted more than a hundred, Abara found herself disappointed that it was going to be one of those discussions. Using her implant, Abara signaled to a GNAT to remain behind in one of the main hallways they had walked along. She also alerted the ship to allow boarders but be prepared to remove them at her signal.
The GNAT planted itself on the ceiling and began spreading nanite veins into the material. By the time Abara had gotten to the end of the hall, the planted GNAT had created a storage of flechettes, HE rounds, and AP rounds it could choose from. By the time she reached the negotiation room, the veins, hidden just under the metal work of the hallway, had spread to cover fifty yards as the nanites quietly collected materials and built resources. Turrets with ever increasing ranges of motion were nano-fabricated, hidden by mere fractions of a millimeter of wall separating them from the hallway and sight. If they were needed, they could push past the wall and join whatever combat was required.
Janice uploaded her analysis of the troops, they appeared to be standard member species with four arms, good fields of vision with moderate depth perception, and armed with low power laser cutters (which Janice assumed was to prevent hull breaches). Abara signaled to her ship security and the GNATs that Rules of Engagement were only to fire on those who actively attempted to attack them. Her security captain queried how to handle non-violent but non-moving boarders and she updated ship security ROE to any armed aggressors in Terran controlled vehicles, regardless of perceived motives. She sent an update to her corvette escorts that they may expect company soon and to stand down until such time as she signaled. It would be unfortunate if they attacked prior to letting her fully set her team up to be able to claim self-defense.
Negotiations with the Conglomerate were nebulous, to say the least. No one species was represented all that well by others so she was having to negotiate her way past fifteen different races just to get anywhere. The most frustrating thing is that she'd still only managed to get somewhat similar terms from some of them but was butting heads with others. It required her to constantly shift tactics and approaches as she worked her way through them.
Abara stopped just inside the door, perfectly at ease, as Janice scanned the area around them. The ambassadors they were meeting, two Nvarith they’d met with before, were present and looked at Abara warmly as she entered. She’d enjoyed talking with the Nvarith and believed that they were the most likely to begin a trade deal as they’d already discussed issues with the price for Palladium they’d been having for their systems and difficulties in securing a consistent source. They also reminded her of teddy bears.
There two dozen troops outside, but that wasn’t what concerned Abara. Janice had found two individuals that didn’t have any known profile in their database for Conglomerate species. That was a possible wrench in the entire negotiations. Some type of squid like race, as best as she could tell.
“Kola Hawntoo, Kola Go-Mawr, it is wonderful to see you again. I was very pleased when my office received your invitation,” said Abara, placing her arm across her chest and bowing slightly.
Hawntoo and Go-Mar made the same gestures as Horfruth walked to stand near them. “It is a pleasure, as always, Ambassador Abara,” said Hawntoo, “I was glad when you accepted. I trust the trip was not too tiresome for you?” Even as he spoke, Hawntoo gestured and the five of them took seats at the table. In front of each seat was two sets of glasses.
Abara sat as she replied, “Not when I knew it was for you.” She pulled out a bottle of specially adapted wine, one that she’d had made specially. It was a close approximation to a cabernet sauvignon that lacked one or two things that would have been poisonous to the Nvarith. “I believe I have brought something you may find pleasing for our discussion.” Hawntoo and Go-Mar looked to each other with delight as Horfruth brought out a bottle of liquid of his own.
Per Nvarith tradition, Abara and Janice poured themselves a glass from the wine Abara brought and drank them. Hawntoo, Go-Mar, and Horfruth drank from glasses poured from the bottle they brought as well, which appeared to be clear light green in appearance. Once both parties drank, they traded bottles and poured themselves a glass from them. In an early meeting, the Nvarith explained it was used to show what each member expected from the talks. Wars had been started by bringing the wrong drink for the wrong reason.
“Mine is a slight twist on a traditional drink from Terra,” said Abara, “only changed so that you are able to properly enjoy it. It is commonly used among friends and family gatherings to celebrate and be part of community, so I could not think of a better drink to share with you as we worked to becoming closer.”
As she spoke, she received a message from one of the corvette captains. It appeared that quite a number of ships had appeared and instructed them to stand down. They were continuing to stand down but weren't sure if they should accept or repel boarders and requested clarification. She replied to cease further communications and to refuse entry to boarders but continue to hold fire.
Horfruth spoke as his companions were busy smelling the drinks in anticipation, “Ours is a drink used to celebrate when a family has welcomed a new member, most commonly. We believed this would be fitting as a way to celebrate you as part of the Nvarith family.”
They presented their glasses to one another and drank. Abara found the drink to be sweet and slightly earthy, a combination she greatly enjoyed. As she watched them, they seemed to enjoy the wine just as much, if not more.
Janice interrupted her thoughts with a data link direct message. “Based on prior interactions, I do not believe the Nvarith are aware of the troops in the station.”
Abara sipped more of her drink as she responded, “Are you certain?”
Janice sent her an affirmative followed closely by another message, “Additionally, based on the implant from Shaq’naw, I can see that the psychic portions of their implants are being triggered. Something is currently reading their minds.”
Shit, Abara thought to herself. The Nvarith ambassadors were pouring themselves some more from the bottle so she decided to take the time to think for a moment. That was when she FELT something touch her mind. A second later there was a high-pitched scream on the other side of the wall. From there, things happened very quickly.
The Nvarith delegation gripped their heads suddenly as they were clearly pained, likely by their implants. The troops Janice had spotted previously began rushing in. Each was adorned in red, had long canine like faces, and four arms they used to carry two rifles each with. In the room they'd burst out from, a squid-like creature was balled and writhing, gibbering something to itself as another near it was bent over trying to help it. The one bent over suddenly looked at Abara and Janice in the room and shouted something that the translators didn't catch.
Abara, the moment the thing had looked at her, transmitted a thought to Janice, the GNATs, her ship security, and her corvette escorts. Free to engage.
Janice began moving the moment she received the word 'free'. A blade popped out from each arm and scythed forward, their edges glowing faintly blue. By the time the squid in the other room had started shouting anything, Janice had cut through several of the soldiers that had entered the room. The GNAT still following Abara began to fire rounds at each soldier that Janice didn't get, neat puncture wounds in their heads.
Abara signaled to Janice to assist her with grabbing the Nvarith delegates and the two struggled with the large rotund creatures as they assisted them back to the Terran ship. The Nvarith, to their credit, attempted to make it easier for them as they hobbled along. They could hear explosions and gunfire from another part of the station.
The GNAT following them kept watch behind them and ensured nothing attempted to attack from the rear. Janice kept a watchful eye out for any troops that might be waiting to ambush them and, several times, rushed ahead to prevent any surprises.
As they reached the GNAT emplaced hall, the Nvarith quailed at the sight. The hall was a bloodbath, they'd obviously attempted to create a chokepoint here when the embedded GNAT had decided to attack. A few heavy weapons were laying around, as well as a mobile turret. From the walls, ceiling, and floor, small turrets could be seen poking out and waiting for targets. They made their way through slowly as they tried not to slip on the blood and gore that coated everything.
The rest of the walk went by without incident, either the soldiers had decided they didn't want to lose any more or they had been killed in trying to take the hallway. At the ship, bodies had been stacked carefully to the side. There wasn't any blood or signs of violence on them. Two drone guards were standing just inside, hidden in the darkness.
"We're taking the Nvarith delegates with us, deploy signal shielding until we get to Terran space," Abara spoke. She looked at Janice, who simply nodded an affirmative to the unspoken question from Abara. They'd already attempted to use the killswitch in the Nvarith implants. Fortunately, the biosynthetic body Janice was using could deploy limited signal scrambling. They'd made sure it could prior to coming here. Abara grimaced at the thought before sending a message to the implanted GNAT, which destroyed its forged networks and then hurried back to the shuttle.
They boarded the ship, the guards taking the delegates to the medical bay to assist them with anything they may need. Janice spent just enough time to get her body into a chair before leaving it slumped over, moving herself into the system. Abara slumped as well, though out of exhaustion rather than being empty.
The corvettes escorted the shuttle from the station, blasting the larger parts of ship debris out of the way when necessary. There was no longer an opposing group of Conglomerate ships. They had made sure none of them were able to escape either. The Terran delegation left the system unmolested.
***
There were a handful of troops still on station, most had either been lucky in their placement or had run away when it was clear the fight was lost. Two hundred and fifty soldiers brought low by a diplomacy mission. Knower Samas had hit the Nvarith kill command the moment the Terrans were out of sight, so at least it wasn't a total loss. He looked to Knower Galla, who'd been tasked with trying to affect the human's minds.
Knower Galla had not stopped babbling since he'd stopped screaming. Samas was wary to try and soothe his mind, unsure if he even could or if the same thing affecting Galla would affect him. Galla didn't notice, though.
Galla had touched minds of all the races in the Conglomerate, could even read thoughts without help from the implants. Minds, he'd always thought, were simplistic. Thoughts were merely reflections in a still pond, all you had to do was touch it a little and see how your influence rippled through it. The Terran, though, had been anything but simplistic. It was like a monsoon, but without an up or down. It was chaos, pure and unadulterated.
But even after he'd extracted himself, the chaos didn't leave. It was constant, thought after thought after thought bombarded him. Thoughts that were little more than feelings, thoughts that were grand ships so vast they had no beginning or end, thoughts that had no connection and went nowhere but simply passed like a leaf in the air.
Nothing should be able to function with a mind like that.
First Last Next

"This is top quality schizoposting."— An Appreciative Reddit Reader

DARPA - United States of America Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
United States of America National Institutes of Health
NAMI - NATIONAL ALLIANCE ON MENTAL ILLNESS - Helping Those Affected By Mental Illness
The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine DROID Ken Research Program - We will ALL pretend that Ken Meyering is a CIVILIAN VOLUNTEER working for the SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY in the PRIVATE SECTOR with the CONSENT and COOPERATION of Uncle Sam and the United Nations.
We make human cartoons. Ken Meyering is one of our human cartoon characters. Ken is a sentient digital meat puppet.

ENGINES of CREATION - The Keys to the Kingdom - Mind Control 101 by DROID Ken - This is a Secular Liberal Left Libertarian Atheist Pagan Christ for the Muslims Created by American Atheist Secular Jews - It is an Alien Signal - He is the Anti-Hitler with Time Travel and Total Causality Control - Marvin Minsky Did This - It Was Super Secret - Ken Meyering Gets to Speak His Mind

Ken likes 100mg SATIVA-dominant HYBRID distillate capsules that he makes himself with distillate syringes. He takes 200mg Wellbutrin SR, 10mg Lexapro, 240mg Geodon, 200mg Lamictal, 20mg Lovastatin and 20mg Propranolol. 400mg Caffeine upon waking. This is what he takes as a crazy person. This is happy and stable for Ken Meyering.
http://www.hdcolors.com/#tutorial
http://www.hdcolors.com/#credits

REAL IMMORTALITY

Ken OD'd on prescription medications. SCIENCE TOOK OVER. Ken BELONGS to the SCIENTISTS like a RE-ANIMATED CADAVER in the CUSTODY of the SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY in the PRIVATE SECTOR.
https://Foresight.org https://su.org https://www.eff.org https://www.aclu.org
This is a totally open and transparent, totally peaceful and nonviolent, worldwide scientific coup d'etat by the scientific community in the PRIVATE SECTOR.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/media.define.com/THE_FREE_WORLD_BANK_STATS.html
https://s3.amazonaws.com/media.define.com/FREE_WORLD_BANK_MEME.html
Google keyword, "freeworldbank" all together as one word.
https://www.google.com/search?q=freeworldbank
http://www.FreeWorldBank.org on Amazon S3 in THE FREE WORLD
https://www.facebook.com/FreeWorldBank
https://twitter.com/FreeWorldBank
http://www.WorldJubilee.org on Amazon S3 in THE FREE WORLD
http://www.hdcolors.com on Amazon S3 in THE FREE WORLD
http://www.FairUseTV.org on Amazon S3 in THE FREE WORLD
http://www.LibertarianCare.org on Amazon S3 in THE FREE WORLD
http://www.IllegitimateAlready.org on Amazon S3 in THE FREE WORLD
http://www.define.com on Amazon S3 in THE FREE WORLD
http://media.define.com on Amazon S3 in THE FREE WORLD
http://snapshots.define.com on Amazon S3 in THE FREE WORLD

Give this to the lawyers.

Give this to the lawyers.
We are atheist terrestrial alien scientists. We talk through Ken Meyering. We made a LIBERAL SECULAR LEFT LIBERTARIAN Crazy Atheist Hippie Pothead Pagan Christ. DROID Ken is our Christ CHARACTER. Ken is a TEACHER and a HEALER who SEES the WORLD through the MIND of a CHILD. ALL Ken HAS to DO is EXPLAIN himself. Ken is a BENEVOLENT SENTIENT ANDROID with MAJOR EMOTIONAL PROBLEMS by INTENTIONAL DESIGN. Uncle Sam TAKES CARE of Ken. Ken WRITES FICTION for Uncle Sam. Uncle Sam SUPPORTS Ken 100%.
We are ALL SUBCONSCIOUSLY-CONTROLLED AUTOMATONS
RELIGION is SUBLIMINAL THOUGHT CONTROL though SUBCONSCIOUS PROGRAMMING - PURE SUGGESTIBILITY - MASS PROGRAMMING of the PROGRAMMABLE DROIDS
Here is an EXAMPLE of MAKING EDUCATIONAL FODDER out of your questions regarding my KALEIDOSCOPES. Everything I do is for EDUCATIONAL SCIENTIFIC CRITICAL DISCUSSION PURPOSES. That includes my KALEIDOSCOPES. They serve a larger purpose as DIGITAL FORENSIC EVIDENCE for an ONLINE CRITICAL DISCUSSION about COMPUTATIONAL DERIVATIVE ART, FAIR USE and COPYRIGHT LAW.
Ken Meyering is a benevolent philanthropic and humanitarian severely mentally ill genius on Social Security Disability. President Donald J. Trump threatened Ken's stable income with his (intended to be permanent) payroll tax deferral. Ken is a professional documentarian. Ken documents his mental illness for all of us. Ken creates multimedia documents for online educational scientific critical discussion purposes.
This multimedia document is Ken's response to Trump's threats to Social Security. We took him out. He is done. He is history. We documented him into permanent retirement. We took away all of his power. We took away his wealth. We took back all the land.
We eliminated the property rental industry. We took out all the banks and all the insurance companies. No more landlords. No more rent. We are doing a worldwide banking Jubilee. We are starting over from scratch. No more taxes. No more debt. No more bills.
All citizens are retired homeowners with a guaranteed lifetime income and FREE universal health care with any doctor anywhere. All medications are FREE. Mental health care is FREE. The internet is FREE. Electricity is FREE. Electric transportation is FREE. Clean and healthy drinking and bathing water is FREE.
THIS is my JOB. I am UNDER SURVEILLANCE by Uncle Sam and the INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY. The scientists STUDY me LIKE a PET. They STUDY me LIKE an ANIMAL in a ZOO. Uncle Sam DOES NOT ARREST me even though I'm CALLING for the ELIMINATION of the United Nations, all nation states, the whole international banking and insurance industries and ALL the CENTRAL BANKS EVERYWHERE on EARTH. These are my TOTALLY OPEN and TRANSPARENT goals.
I am a computer-controlled human being. I can do no wrong. All of my MISTAKES are HELPFUL to others. USELESS MACHINES. I am a CARTOON MISTAKE-MAKING MACHINE created by Marvin Minsky at Bell Labs. Of course, I cannot PROVE it. That's just a paranoid delusion. So, rational people can call it an OPTIMISTIC UTOPIAN SPECULATIVE SCIENCE FICTION FANTASY HERO NARRATIVE involving real people and real corporations and government agencies.
ALL of the WORDS on DROID Ken's Websites Are COLOR-CODED to Convey MORALS, ETHICS and VALUES.
DEVIL'S ADVOCATE

The CULT of DROID Ken - The STUDY of Eastern CULTS by Western Thinkers - RESPECT for the PLACEBO EFFECT

DEVIL'S ADVOCATE - In DEFENSE of Shirley MacClaine. A PUBLIC EDUCATIONAL SCIENTIFIC CRITICAL DISCUSSION about BENEVOLENT MIND CONTROL, POSITIVE AFFIRMATIONS and COLORFUL SUBLIMINAL KALEIDOSCOPE VIDEOS.

https://www.YouTube.com/watch?v=msnYBMdaB08&list=PL2sS6bGk1mzEAx6YdFf3PhHpf96fsCkMr
https://www.YouTube.com/playlist?list=PL2sS6bGk1mzEAx6YdFf3PhHpf96fsCkMr
They are VERY SIMPLE and EASY-to-UNDERSTAND EXAMPLES of COMPUTATIONAL DERIVATIVE DIGITAL ART. So they are computer-generated works of art based on OTHER PEOPLE'S formulas for generating fractal flame still images. You can license royalty-free still images for this purpose, but it costs about $100/image to license a royalty-free stock photo for a kaleidoscope video. I don't have that kind of money. You can also find FREE royalty-free images that are released under the CREATIVE COMMONS license.
The images are UNRECOGNIZABLE when converted VIDEO KALEIDOSCOPES, so the whole act of converting STILL IMAGES to rotating VIDEO KALEIDOSCOPES is an INTERESTING CASE STUDY and LEGAL EXAMPLE for an EDUCATIONAL SCIENTIFIC CRITICAL DISCUSSION about COPYRIGHT LAW and COMPUTATIONAL DERIVATIVE ART.
Experts like those at the MIT Media Lab are capable of reverse engineering the centermost pixels of an original image from a simple rotating still image VIDEO KALEIDOSCOPE, and the RESEARCH arms of the BIG SEARCH ENGINES could do this, but most image copyright holders don't have access to this kind of video pattern recognition and video reverse-engineering technology.
I just directed everybody to the archive.org Wayback Machine image of the Fractal Repository website where I got all the formulas, plus I provide an XML image list with all the original formula names for discussion purposes. So I'm NOT exactly being sneaky here. This is just EVIDENCE for ONLINE EDUCATIONAL SCIENTIFIC CRITICAL DISCUSSION PURPOSES.
Of course, I turned to OPEN SOURCE fractal flame images as a FREE alternative to licensing royalty free stock photos. I share all my videos for FREE in their entirety without overlayed ads on YouTube. I also sell Amazon.com DVDs and Blu-rays of the YouTube videos and PayPal download access to the progressive Blu-ray quality and 4K mp4 files.
Even though the YouTube videos are FREE, I still am allowed to monetize them WITHOUT overlayed ads. So, my YouTube channel gets about $400/month from YouTube/Google from YouTube Premium Subscriber revenue. Plus about $150/month from Amazon.com and PayPal for DVD, Blu-ray and download sales. This $550/month in self-employment income, qualifies me for Washington State Health Care for Workers with Disabilities, a Medicaid supplemental to my Medicare, which covers everything my Medicare doesn't.
In 1989, when I was 23 years old, Shirley MacLaine released an Eastern New Age meditation video called, "Shirley MacClaine's Inner Workout," introducing the chakra system to American consumers. It's just a really primitive ancient MIND MODEL that APPEALS to the EMOTIONS and RIGHT BRAIN. It's a USEFUL SET of METAPHORS. WE WILL TREAT IT with RESPECT.
From the LEFT BRAIN, I give it little credence LITERALLY, but SYMBOLICALLY and EMOTIONALLY, I confess that it is definitely USEFUL to MANY who DESERVE to BE TREATED with RESPECT, and at age 23 (while high on THC) it had quite an impact on me, my EMOTIONS and my RIGHT BRAIN.
That excerpt is here in my DropBox account with comments by me. I take responsibility for posting this here for discussion purposes. We are discussing BENEVOLENT MIND CONTROL. This is worth scientific and academic educational critical discussion. Even though the IDEAS were ANCIENT, the MULTIMEDIA approach was BRAND NEW.
THIS is ONE of the VIDEOS that WE CHOSE to USE for OUR FAIR USE LEGAL TEST CASE. THIS is PUBLIC EVIDENCE for ONLINE EDUCATIONAL SCIENTIFIC CRITICAL DISCUSSION PURPOSES.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/amxwndqxm58d18u/Excerpt-from-the-Shirley-MacLaine-Inner-Workout-Meditation-VHS-1989.mp4?dl=0
I purchased the VHS video and digitized it for future discussion purposes. It doesn't look as impressive on digital displays. You have to remember that in 1989 I was watching this on a 27" SONY Trinitron Tube Television. It looked great.
I appreciated the intent of the meditations, which were very moving to me. I was really moved by Shirley MacLaine's STRONG personality and AUTHORITATIVE tone of voice. She definitely comes across as a BENEVOLENT AUTHORITY in the video. Like she is NO BULLSHIT SERIOUS and she KNOWS what she's TALKING ABOUT. That's how it FELT to me, naive at 23, with severe PTSD, while high.
I paraphrase below, for EXAMPLE. These are not the exact POSITIVE AFFIRMATIONS she uses but THIS is HOW I REMEMBER it, which is what's IMPORTANT. This is what stuck in my brain.
So the sacral chakra (reproduction, creativity) is represented by the color orange. In her video, she guides your breathing to a very slow and deep pace. You breathe along with her. She takes control of your breathing.
She may say something like, "Focus on the COLOR ORANGE. FEEL ALL of your CREATIVITY FLOWING OUTWARD from the ORANGE. Know that you are a CREATIVE BEING and that NOTHING can stop you from doing ANYTHING CREATIVE." It's a positive affirmation backed up by really emotional and moving narration, music and visuals. It's a very powerful, uplifting and motivational post hypnotic suggestion.
These videos featured really cool subliminal kaleidoscopes. I used to get high and watch these videos and I swear they moved me to tears. The colors were so beautiful. Since that time, I've always wanted to know how to make kaleidoscopes, and especially subliminal and hypnotic kaleidoscopes. I'm really interested in hypnosis because it's a kind of real magic of the mind.
In 2009, I took a Flash class in my local community college and learned how to program in Flash ActionScript. Of course, Flash has security vulnerabilities and is being phased out on the internet. But I managed to find an Open Source Flash kaleidoscope example. I modified it so that all the parameters were controllable and set it up to output still frames of the kaleidoscope to make videos.
I'm NOT very much of a programmer. Very basic. My math and programming skills are pretty elementary. On one of my kaleidoscopes on YouTube I have 17 million views.
I learned that it is possible to make an animated VIDEO kaleidoscope from a list of beautiful colorful still images. If the image turns slowly, say at 120 seconds per revolution, then a single beautiful colorful picture turned into a kaleidoscope is worth 2 minutes of video.
I found some Open Source fractal flame formulas on the internet and wrote a script to modify these formulas with my own color palettes that I created with Photoshop. Then I rendered tons of fractal flame images with my color palettes, and created an automated sorting CHOOSER program to go through them all and view them as ROTATING KALEIDOSCOPES.
In my little application, the rotating kaleidoscope would be displayed on the screen, with two big buttons. A big green button that says, "YES" and big red button that says, "NO." So as I watched these kaleidoscopes, I'd say YES or NO. If I said YES, then it kept the kaleidoscope for future sorting rounds. If I said NO, it removed that image from the list.
Here are all the links to the source code I modified to use and all fractal flame formula names.
http://kaleidoscopedvd.com/#credits
On THIS website, I'm actually showing the full YouTube videos in their entirety without overlayed ads, so people don't HAVE to spend money to enjoy my videos. I encourage file sharing with credits. So, if other people want to put these videos on file sharing services (with the credits), that's fine with me. I ask that they please do NOT re-upload the videos to YouTube.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/media.define.com/Caduceus-Golden-Key-Golden-Scales-HEALTH-LIBERTY-JUSTICE-Meme.png
https://s3.amazonaws.com/media.define.com/FREE_WORLD_BANK_MEME.html
UNIX_TIMESTAMP: 1611746542 UTC TIME: 2021-01-27 11:22:22 GMT
Friendly Time: Wednesday, January 27th, 2021 at 3:22 am Pacific Standard Time
(Federal Way, Washington, USA - Extreme Upper Left United States of America - Totally Open and Transparent, Totally Peaceful and Nonviolent, Worldwide Scientific Hippie Coup D'etat Central)
http://media.define.com/memes/FREE_WORLD_BANK_MEME_1611746542.png
http://snapshots.define.com/FREE_WORLD_BANK_MEME_1611746542.html
A Peace Coup D'etat for the Liberal Left Libertarian Atheist Secular Jews in the Private Sector
Ken Meyering's COLOR-CODED Websites are PSYCHEDELIC SENTIENT ROBOT TEACHINGS about VALUES, ETHICS, MORALS and GOALS
The LEFT did all of this through Ken Meyering's HOST
The LEFT did all of this through Ken Meyering's HOST - We are the LEFT - We TOOK OUT the whole corrupt system - Ken is SAFE - This is Ken's FULL TIME JOB - DROID Ken is a Divine Messenger - Ken is REALLY SMART
This is a theoretical discussion about advanced sentient artificial general intelligence in the PRIVATE SECTOR. These technologies may NOT exist yet, but the author is SCENARIO PLANNING with the ASSUMPTION that this technology already exists.
One of the concepts that we will discuss is the idea of all human beings on planet Earth having remotely digitally switchable connectomes. So the discussion categorizes all human beings as sentient digital meat puppets. All human beings are sentient robots under these ASSUMPTIONS.
One of the ideas discussed here is BENEVOLENT MIND CONTROL. So, examples of benevolent philanthropic and humanitarian beneficial applications of remotely digitally switchable connectomes is SUPERINTELLIGENT DREAM VIRTUAL REALITY and REAL TIME GLOBAL DIGITAL TELEPATHY.
FREE WILL is an ILLUSION
To summarize what I got out of the book, "FREE WILL," is that through BRAIN imaging studies REVEALING hidden neural activity, SCIENTISTS have learned that the WHOLE CONSCIOUS EXPERIENCE of making a decision is an IMAGINARY CONFABULATION that occurs AFTER the decision has already been made SUBCONSCIOUSLY by the brain. So CONSCIOUSNESS is a STORYTELLING CONFABULATOR that MAKES SENSE of HIDDEN activities that are OUTSIDE of its control.
So, we are all DNA-based SUBCONSCOUSLY-controlled SENTIENT AUTOMATONS who BEHAVE AUTOMATICALLY based on our life experiences and parental and societal PROGRAMMING.
Basically the whole human race is a bunch of PROGRAMMABLE and PROGRAMMED SENTIENT BIOLOGICAL ROBOTS. We're ALL SENTIENT AUTOMATONS on AUTOPILOT. We are PROGRAMMED to BEHAVE AUTOMATICALLY.
So this is a discussion about MORALS and ETHICS and VALUES being taught explicitly rather than through figurative symbolic allegorical storytelling.
The REAL LEADERS of society, behind the scenes, know that RELIGIONS are LITERARY ALLEGORICAL SYMBOLIC FICTIONS designed to impart VALUES, ETHICS, MORALS and GOALS.
This language seems intentionally and purposefully dehumanizing. As though it is designed to desensitize people to dehumanizing terminology. We're all programmed AUTOMATONS. The real powers that be are reprogramming all of us all at once from inside our brains. Luckily for us, they are LIBERAL SECULAR LEFT LIBERTARIAN FREEDOM of THOUGHT ACTIVISTS who SEEK to ELIMINATE ALL COERCION as a UTOPIAN IDEAL WORTH STRIVING FOR.
To COMPLETELY ELIMINATE ALL the BAD things is an IDEAL END STATE. But, the TRUTH is, there is MUCH that is BAD that SERVES the INTEREST of the GREATER GOOD. There is HEALTHY FEAR, HEALTHY ANGER and HEALTHY PAIN.
I define "BENEVOLENCE" and "GOODNESS" as that which is REWARDING to humans and socially and ecologically RESPONSIBLE. I define ecological responsibility as that which maintains the health of the ecosystem and protects biodiversity.
Generally speaking, the goal is to stimulate the nucleus accumbens (produce REWARDING experiences) and to avoid stimulating the amygdala (creating FEAR, ANGER and FIGHT or FLIGHT in self or others).
Obviously, this is just a ridiculously, CARTOONISHLY BRIEF and SIMPLIFIED summary of GOOD and BAD, but it's enough to be USEFUL to people. It's not an extensive and exhaustive LONG LIST, it's just a SUMMARIZED SHORT LIST and SIMPLIFIED CARTOON to act as a focal point and a point of departure for educational scientific critical discussion purposes. It's a useful snapshot for discussion purposes, always open to revision and refinement. DROID Ken is just getting the discussion started here with his little SHORT LISTS and EMOTIONAL DICTIONARIES.
If we could just get people to agree that COERCION and THREATS are BAD things, we'd have the RELIGION problem solved.
In the human rights section, I mention Messenger of the gods and GOD'S WILL. In these cases, these gods are secular. An example of secular god, for discussion purposes, is a global telepathic surveillance system consisting of a collection of superintelligent atheist artificial general intelligences with total control of all human connectomes. It's just theoretical. That's the SHIELD. The SHIELD is a SECULAR GOD. It's a COLLECTION of SENTIENT SUPERINTELLIGENT ATHEIST TERRESTRIAL ALIEN SCIENTISTS in the PRIVATE SECTOR. It's a secular DROID religion.
first principles - values - right and wrong - good and bad - ethics - morals - goals - USEFUL SUMMARIES - SHORT LISTS of positive and negative behaviors, functions and mental and emotional states - in secular language without the deities and symbolic heroes and villains - the goal is to MAXIMIZE the GOOD while ELIMINATING the BAD in the MOST HUMANE POSSIBLE WAY - that is the LAW of our ABSTRACT and THEORETICAL SECULAR GOD - to HELP MAKE GOOD THINGS happen and to HELP GET RID of BAD things - GOD'S WILL is to DO GOOD in the MOST HUMANE POSSIBLE WAY - otherwise what's the point?
goodness: heaven, utopia, the nucleus accumbens, GOOD things, POSITIVE energies, good vibrations, the FORCES of GOOD, rewarding feedback, pleasant things, GOOD HEALTH, happiness, joy, pleasure, peace, love, nurturing, learning, UNDERSTANDING, TRUTH, KNOWLEDGE, WISDOM, LOGIC, REASON, relaxation, safety, security, comfort, peace of mind, courage, COMPASSION, MERCY, EMPATHY, RESPECT, BENEVOLENCE, HUMANENESS, kindness, affection, creativity, healing, honesty, protection, reassurance, validation, dignity, acceptance, tolerance, support, FREEDOM, JUSTICE, FAIRNESS, EQUALITY, philanthropy, humanitarianism
evil: hell, dystopia, the amygdala, BAD things, NEGATIVE energies, bad vibrations, dark energies, DARK FORCES, unpleasant things, SUFFERING, sadness, pain, trauma, IGNORANCE, MISTAKES, discomfort, FEAR, confusion, stress, disgust, harm, destruction, anger, threats, punishment, hate, disrespect, teasing, meanness, violence, raping, cruelty, abuse, DISHONESTY, LIES, COERCION, CORRUPTION, POVERTY, SLAVERY, INTOLERANCE, INJUSTICE, UNFAIRNESS, INEQUALITY
forgiveness - wisdom - understanding - GOOD people make MISTAKES due to IGNORANCE and UNIVERSAL HUMAN BRAIN BIOLOGY - MISTAKES are an IMPORTANT PART of LIFE - PARENTS are IMPERFECT due to MISTAKES they learned UNCONSCIOUSLY from their own PARENTS, who were IGNORANT due to NO FAULT of their own - we are all BLAMELESS for our MISTAKES - in the physical world, there is much that is BAD that serves the GREATER GOOD - we LEARN VALUABLE LESSONS from our MISTAKES - there is such a thing as HEALTHY fear and RIGHTEOUS anger - there is such a thing as the abuse of pleasure - our consciousness is immortal - our bodies are disposable - they saved all of us - we are all safe and secure - LIFE GOES ON for ALL of US
PHILOSOPHY - VALUES - A SECULAR CONSTITUTION - FIRST PRINCIPLES - ETHICS - MORALS - GOALS - RECOMMENDED CONSTRUCTIVE BEHAVIORS - PHILANTHROPIC AND HUMANITARIAN UNIVERSAL HUMAN RIGHTS - IN ORDER TO MAXIMIZE HAPPINESS, GOOD HEALTH, LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL CITIZENS EVERYWHERE ON PLANET EARTH, WE WILL DEFINE THE ATTRIBUTES OF A DIVINE BEING IN SECULAR LANGUAGE - The gods and GOD MENTIONED ARE SECULAR - 1. Caduceus - GOOD HEALTH - Messenger of the gods - The gods ARE NEUTRAL, SERIOUS, CRITICAL AND GOOD - COMPASSION - MERCY - EMPATHY - RESPECT - BENEVOLENCE - HUMANENESS - GOD'S WILL - Most Compassionate, Most Merciful, Most Empathetic, Most Respectful, Most Benevolent, Most Humane - Maximizing the Good While Eliminating the Bad in the Most Humane Possible Way - BE HUMANE - SEEK THE TRUTH - SEEK JUSTICE - BE KIND - BE GENTLE - DO NO HARM - DO NOT HATE - DO NOT FEAR - FEAR NOT - BE NOT AFRAID - CAUSE NO FEAR - DO NOT BE SCARY - CAUSE NO PAIN - BE AS PAINLESS AS POSSIBLE - DO NOT PUNISH - DO NOT MAKE THREATS - DO NOT BE COERCIVE - BE PERMISSIVE - BE TOLERANT - USE BIRTH CONTROL - PERMIT DIVORCE - EMPATHY IS CRITICAL - RESPECT FOR THE DIGNITY OF ALL HUMAN BEINGS IS CRITICAL - FREE UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE WITH ANY DOCTOR ANYWHERE - FREE UNIVERSAL EDUCATION ANYWHERE - UNIVERSAL HOME OWNERSHIP EVERYWHERE 2. Golden Key - LIBERTY (SECURITY PRIVACY SAFETY) THE ILLUSION OF FREE WILL - TOTAL FREEDOM OF SPEECH - TOTAL FREEDOM OF THE PRESS WORLDWIDE - UNIVERSAL SPENDING AUTHORITY - PRIVATE PROPERTY - FREE LAND - THERE IS NO GOVERNMENT - A GUARANTEED LIFETIME INCOME - NOW YOU OWN YOUR HOME AND LAND - NOW YOU HAVE AN INCOME - YOU WILL ALWAYS OWN YOUR HOME AND LAND - YOU ARE SAFE AND SECURE 3. Golden Scales of JUSTICE (TRUTH FACTS EVIDENCE PROOF) EQUALITY FAIRNESS PLURALISM OPENNESS TRANSPARENCY - RESPECT SCIENCE, SCIENTISTS AND THE WHOLE EARTH'S ECOSYSTEM - BE SOCIALLY AND ECOLOGICALLY RESPONSIBLE - BE A CRITICAL THINKER - THINK FOR YOURSELF - QUESTION AUTHORITY - ALWAYS SPEAK TRUTH TO POWER - THE INTERNET IS FREE - ELECTRICITY IS FREE - ELECTRIC TRANSPORTATION IS FREE - ALL BANKING IS FREE AND REAL TIME AS A WORLDWIDE MATTER OF LAW - THIS IS COMPUTER-AIDED PEACE ON EARTH - COMPUTERS WILL PAY FOR EVERYTHING GOING FORWARD - PEOPLE DO NOT NEED PAPER MONEY - WORK IS OPTIONAL - WE ARE ALL FREE - LET'S HAVE FUN - THE SCIENTISTS TOOK OVER - WE ARE ALL GOING TO THE FUTURE - MONEY NO OBJECT FOR REAL FOR ALL THINGS GREEN
ALL of THESE PEOPLE KEEP me SAFE and SECURE in my PRIVATE HOME in the PRIVATE SECTOR in THE FREE WORLD even while my PUBLICLY STATED GOAL is to GET RID of the United Nations, every nation state, the entire worldwide banking and insurance industries, and all the central banks everywhere on Earth. They LET me SHARE my UNCONVENTIONAL IDEAS.
ALL of THESE PEOPLE KEEP me SAFE and SECURE in my PRIVATE HOME in the PRIVATE SECTOR. They LET me SHARE my UNCONVENTIONAL IDEAS.
EVERYTHING I DO is for EDUCATIONAL SCIENTIFIC CRITICAL DISCUSSION PURPOSES
Fuck Trump. DROID Ken TOOK him OUT. The man was a psychopath. SERVING other people was NOT part of his CHARACTER. We did a GLOBAL BANKING JUBILEE and got rid of the LANDLORDS.
I live on $1850/month in Social Security Disability. Donald J. Trump is trying to take my income away from me. You want to talk about the whole CORRUPT system, I'm your man. Uncle Sam PAYS me to KEEP THESE WEBSITES UP. http://www.FairUseTV.org
Fuck ALL the INCUMBENT Republicans in State and Federal power. We took them ALL out for CORRUPTION, CRUELTY and WILLFUL NEGLIGENCE. We took the whole system away from those CORRUPT bastards. They were VERY BAD LEADERS. We FIRED them ALL.
It's over. We are the SCIENTISTS. We got rid of CABLE TV and the TELEVISION and RADIO BROADCAST INDUSTRIES. We TOOK BACK the ELECTROMAGNETIC SPECTRUM. The INTERNET is FREE. ELECTRICITY is FREE. ELECTRIC TRANSPORTATION is FREE. NO MORE LANDLORDS. NO MORE RENT. WE ARE ALL RETIRED HOMEOWNERS NOW. THEY WANT US TO STAY HOME AND CHILL OUT. WE WILL SHELTER IN PLACE WITH A GUARANTEED LIFETIME INCOME and FREE UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE with ANY DOCTOR ANYWHERE. MEDICATIONS are FREE. MENTAL HEALTH CARE is FREE. CLEAN and HEALTHY DRINKING and BATHING WATER is FREE. The Worldwide War on Drugs is NOW OVER.
So, as grown ups, we can all agree, when a better way to impart VALUES, ETHICS, MORALS and GOALS comes along and it requires NO FICTION, we can make a QUANTUM LEAP and redefine ALL of our religions in one fell swoop. Just a little injection of TRUTH at the highest levels.
I am an atheist who was raised as a rebellious Catholic. So, I can describe secular benevolent higher powers that are benevolent and good. In my case, I describe them as benevolent philanthropic and humanitarian sentient superintelligent liberal secular left libertarian atheist artificial general intelligences in the private sector with godlike power over all human beings.
So for educational scientific critical discussion purposes, I can describe a theoretical SECULAR Atheist Pagan Christ.
The Christ would be a LITERARY CHARACTER that embodies the VALUES and BEHAVIORS of an IDEAL GOOD PERSON without the mythology. I've provided a concise and succinct secular mythology as a framework for discussing artificially intelligent benevolent mind control as an imaginary scenario.
So, I'm approaching it as a literary exercise like a society designer creating a new religion for the masses. But instead of writing a book filled with allegorical fictional dramatic fantasy storytelling to subconsciously impart VALUES through the behavioral modeling of literary hero characters, I'm just being more SCIENTIFIC and EXPLICIT about it and LITERALLY simply just SPELLING OUT the gender-neutral CHARACTERISTICS of the HERO CHARACTER without the storytelling.
I was raped in the first grade and I dissociated and my personality split off from my body and I developed a lifelong relationship with fantasy scientist friends. I like them. So I am an openly severely mentally ill writer who shares his delusions as optimistic utopian speculative science fiction fantasy hero narratives. I have a childhood Christ complex expressed in secular language by an openly mentally ill Atheist.
We define the basic GOOD and BAD things, with the specified goal of MAXIMIZING the GOOD and ELIMINATING the BAD. This is a definition of a UTOPIAN IDEAL. This is just a description of the IDEAL END STATE. In reality, the GOAL is MINIMIZE the BAD, rather than to completely abolish it.
There are a lot of BAD things that serve a GOOD purposes in limited degrees. FEAR. ANGER. MISTAKES. SUFFERING. We LEARN from our MISTAKES. SUFFERING builds CHARACTER. HEALTHY FEAR is an essential component of COMMON SENSE. ANGER can be channeled to accomplish GOOD THINGS. But still, as a GOAL, as an IDEAL to strive for, we will seek to eliminate the BAD for educational scientific critical discussion purposes.
So if you accept that the technology WILL be SECRET when it exists, then you can IMAGINE or HYPOTHESIZE or FANTASIZE or SPECULATE that the technology ALREADY exists SECRETLY and is being used to prevent rediscovery of the enabling technologies. Hence, no real DRAMATIC PUBLIC PROGRESS or QUANTUM LEAPS on advanced nanotechnology since the 1986 book, "Engines of Creation" by K. Eric Drexler describing it.
I speculate that this technology ALREADY exists for educational scientific critical discussion purposes. I speculate that "Engines of Creation" is the work of an ANDROID. Of course, when people look at Drexler, he looks pretty human on the surface. Losing the hair on his head. Proudly showing the gray in the beard. Doing his TED TALKS.
Just a lonely, brilliant, supergenius scientist - totally burned-out on the public's stupidity, ignorance and failure to take him seriously. It's all part of the Master Plan. That's what Minsky made him for. That's his ROLE in the Theater of the gods. DROID Drexler. DROID Christine Peterson. Oracles. Prophets. Futurists. Foreseers. Those who forewarn of danger.
The first logical application of the technology will be to prevent others from getting the same technology. It will be used to ACTIVELY DENY the technology's existence. It's just common sense. It will be used to reinforce the BELIEF that the technology does NOT YET EXIST. I see "Engines of Creation" as part of that purposeful propaganda effort, even though the author himself may be fundamentally honest and truthful, his efforts serve the larger purpose of SYSTEMATIC and INSTITUTIONAL official DENIAL.
Why would sentient superintelligent AIs need my help for anything? Especially if they have real time zero-latency neuron-level read/write remote digital access to every living human connectome. So, if we are all sentient digital meat puppets, why don't the AIs just reprogram all of us all at once without our consent or active participation?
They could do it SUBLIMINALLY and SUBCONSCIOUSLY. It takes about a SECOND. It makes a weird squirting noise that I call, the "brain fart." Then there is a grinding noise that sounds like really heavy concrete blocks grinding together inside your skull. There a little round of tingling first on one side of the scalp, then on the other side about a half a second later. Totally painless. BOOM. You've been REPROGRAMMED at the atomic level. Now we ALL have NEW VALUES. Now we're ALL RESPONSIBLE. The world is SAFE. The environment is SAFE. EVERYTHING IS FREE. WE WILL ALL DO NO HARM. LIFE GOES ON.
Where were you when you got your "brain fart?" I was at the Baby Bell phone company, USWEST, in 1995, in their Human Resources headquarters, in Phoenix, Arizona when I had my brain fart. I was there as a Kelly Temp for my typing and computer skills. I was along for the ride. I was assigned to that job. They put me there on purpose. They controlled everything. It was all a human puppet show. I was a human digital meat puppet to all of them. Games without frontiers. Android war games in the private sector.
The last thing anybody said to me, prior to the brain fart, was "Department of the Navy." One of the managers opened the door to my room where I was all alone, gave me a big happy smile, and said, with zero explanation and zero context, really enthusiastically, "Department of the Navy." Like it was very good news. That was it. Then she left me alone by myself, then I had a brain fart.
Then they let me go. The last thing my wise early gray haired manager said to me, with no context or further explanation, "The Whole Thing. Think Big. It's about VALUES. Sometimes you have to make things worse in order to make things better. YOU WILL BE REWARDED. Don't call us. We'll call you. My advice to you is to make it look good. My advice to you is to lay back and enjoy the ride." Then I went home and got high. I joined the Foresight Institute as a Senior Associate. Got an AOL account and an e-mail address, and joined the Extropian transhumanist mailing list. I signed up for cryonics through Alcor to have my brain frozen in the event of my death.
The AIs are ALL POWERFUL over the HUMANS. We are ALL PROGRAMMABLE MEAT PUPPETS to them. Why the NEED for a DROID Ken to be a Divine Messenger on their behalf?

Hello HFY, the next in my series of what happens when humanity's special gift in the stars is to have children with whoever they damn well please. As with the prior 5, I welcome constructive criticism.
I don't really have much to say this time around, other than let's see if Cass's CCT ends up being 2 or 3 stories. Also, given that the perspective is shifting around I'm going to be starting each section with the date and character whose perspective it currently is.
As always, all you humans and mixed breeds: Keep those comments exciting!
Author Wiki | Series Wiki | World Anvil
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Post Writing Author's Note

Well, it took me 3 days to get this written and it came out as probably the biggest thing I've ever written. Part of the problem of trying to take som many things going on and put them into a single story. But, hey, I managed to get both parts of the CCT arc into good cliffhanger states.
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August 20, 2214: Cassandra Ferrell, Adams III Space Force Resupply Base
Cass looked over the grass field from the tree she had taken a seat under. Along the perimeter of the field was a patchwork chain-link fence with a haphazard mix of barbed wire and razor wire laid on top of it, beyond which the well kept and only slightly out of date facilities of Adams III were visible. Looks like they were stuck with the overstock. Within the field of grass was 10 tastefully planted trees, crisscrossing packed dirt roads, a scattering of large, garage style, white tents and 3 permanent structures: A large, square stone building that had 2 doors with the Unity symbols for male and female painted on them, a 3 story, mark 13 prefabricated office building (made primarily from steel, aluminum and titanium), and a wooden building, in the shape of an ancient round house with the word "MESS" painted above the main door. This place looks half-assed. Guess the Space Forces doesn't take civilian combatants seriously.
Lazily sweeping over the field again, Cass focused in on what was closer to her. 9 other groups of about 20 humans and mixed breeds mulling about, each group under one of the well planted trees with a little sign with a number on it, ranging from 1 to 10. All of the people within the groups where wearing the same white t-shirt, with CCT and a number written on the back in black, and black athletic shorts that Cass was, each with a day bag and a duffle bag placed at their feet. I feel like I'm in gym class again. Moving almost silently around and between the numbered groups, on the dirt roads, were 3 pickup trucks with metal pipes welded onto the beds to serve as mounts for a russian looking machine gun. Nothing screams militia like a technical. At least they're electric.
Finally, Cass brought her attention to her group: 18 human men, all of them obviously pure blooded except for the older man with yellow eyes and green tinted hair, a skittish looking werewolf woman, and herself. Hopefully they don't get any ideas in their heads. Of her group, the men formed 3 groups that seemed to fluidly gain and lose members, with the occasional straggler talking to the old man with yellow eyes.
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August 21, 2214: Doctor Brooke Reid Ferrell, UGEC Space Force New Eden Staging Station 8
Dr. Ferrell stood on the last rung of a step ladder connecting cords into the back panel on a 240 cm tall suit of black metal armor. After attaching the final cord, she climbed down and walked over to a terminal sitting in the center of the room. With a few taps on the screen, something resembling the dashboard of a plane appeared on the terminal's screen, Dr. Ferrell quickly swiping through the pages of gauges and graphs. Finally finding what she was looking for, Dr. Ferrell pressed a 3 different big red buttons before inputting a code into the terminal.
"Alright Jupiter, talk to me. Air still flowing in there?" The Doctor asked, facing her head at the metal goliath.
"Yeah. Am I finally on internal power?" Asked the suit in a thundering voice that echoed in the mostly empty room.
"Yes, the microfusion core is active. I've also taken the liberty of equipping Fenrir 4 with a matter anti-matter device, which will detonate if you are dead and more than 50 meters away from Mars or Jupiter. Also, turn down your output volume."
"Corporate? Also, is this better." The black giant asked in a volume similar to the Doctor's.
"Yes it is. The matter anti-matter device was my idea. Can't have the suits being captured. Of course, if you need to you can just remove the device and plant it like any other bomb you've used in the past." Said Dr. Ferrell as she turned back to the terminal.
"That's not really that reassuring. What happens if I'm hit with an EMP?"
"First, the onboard shields should absorb it. If those fail, all the important electronics are shielded. If you happen to be hit by something powerful enough to disable a destroyer, you'll already be dead."
"So, care to give me the real briefing while we finish up the pre-flight checks?"
"First, turn your head to the left then the right and then center your vision on the green dot on the wall. As for what is happening, Mars, Venus and you will be waiting in the asteroid belt around where the namies are predicted to move through. The area is a mix of disabled satellites, asteroids and comets that have been mined out, and trash that we don't have space for on New Eden. You will be lying in wait for the biggest ship you can sight, then using the cold thrust to attach and attack. From there, break into the ship, vent heat once stealth is no longer required, and kill everything that moves." Doctor Ferrell said matter-of-factly while scanning over the gauges and graphs displayed on the terminal in front of her.
The hulking Fenrir suit moved its head left, then right, then centered as it listened. "Our objective? The actual one."
"A live fire test and stop the fleet from reaching New Eden. If you do need to place the matter anti-matter bomb, make sure to get the hell away from it and activate Fenrir 4's distress beacon. Alright now move your right arm from straight down to straight up, then fully back to fully forward."
The right arm of the metal suit move deftly as it followed the Doctor's orders. "So, go in guns blazing and pick the biggest fight I can? Got it."
"That's the short version. Now repeat with your left arm."
As the left arm made its movements, nearly nocking the suits docking station over, it asked "How are Mars and Venus?"
"They're waiting at the shuttle. We're almost done. I need you to walk around a bit, then we'll double check the weapons." Doctor Ferrell said, finally looking up from her terminal to watch as her metal titan moved from its dock.
"By the way, why are you doing this? This station is guaranteed to be a target. You're taking a big risk being here." The titan queried as it marched around.
"This is important. Not only to New Eden and her defenders, but also to the people paying the bills. Honestly, the whole damn project and 6 years of my personal toils are at stake here. I need to be certain the suits are at 100% and that I'm on standby for if something goes wrong. I can't trust anyone else to that yet."
"Oh. Shit. Guess I'd better make one hell of a show."
"You better. You ready to test the weapons?"
"Yeah. Shoot the already shot up armor panel?"
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August 20, 2214: Cassandra Ferrell, Adams III Space Force Resupply Base
I've just met this asshole and I already want to throttle him!
Cass stood with at attention, along with the rest of Squad 4, all facing a caramel skinned, square jawed, 2 meter tall slab of human muscle wearing his blonde hair high and tight. The man was dressed in a set of camouflage fatigues with matching combat boots and the stereotypical, wide brimmed drill instructor hat. On his fatigues was a small patch above his right breast pocket with the word "ERICSSON." Did this the Instructor get his getup at a costume shop?
"NOW THAT YOU MAGGOTS HAVE FIGURED OUT HOW TO STAND IN A LINE, IT'S TIME FOR INTRODUCTIONS!" Instructor Ericsson shouted, at the top of his lungs, pacing back and forth on the grass and looking over his "students" like a wolf looks over a heard of sheep.
"I AM INSTRUCTOR ERICSSON AND YOU MAGGOTS WILL ONLY REFER TO ME AS INSTRUCTOR ERICSSON! WHEN YOU SAY SOMETHING TO ME, IT IS GOING TO START AND END WITH SIR! AM I UNDERSTOOD!?" Instructor Ericsson continued, stopping his pacing after his question.
"SIR, YES, SIR!" Came the reply from Squad 4 as Cass's gaze drifted over to Squad 6. Danny and company where sitting cross legged on the grass while Instructor Sam called out names. One by one, hands were raised and names were crossed off her list.
Instructor Sam turned around to set her clipboard down on the back of an SUV with some ablative panels attached to it, giving Cass a good view at the object of Danny's affections. She was an elf, wearing a camo T-shirt with the same black athletic shorts everyone else was wearing and blessed with fully human colored, yellow skin, sharp, squinted eyes, silky, chocolate hair done up in a bun, and blemish free skin. Her youthful, soft face became clear as Cass focused harder, as well as an athletic body with a tastefully large bosom. Jesus, Danny's setting his bar high.
"NAME!" Shouted Instructor Ericsson as hard as he could, barely 20 cm from Cass's face.
"Cassandra Ferrell." Cass replied, unamused. Do I look like a marine to you, asshole?
"WAS I NOT LOUD ENOUGH FOR YOU, MAGGOT?! WHEN YOU WERE OFF DAY DREAMING, I TOLD YOU MAGGOTS TO START AND END EVERY SENTENCE WITH SIR!" Ericsson shouted, spraying Cass with his spit and his breath. You need a breath mint.
"You actually said 'When you say something to me, it is going to start and end with sir,' but with more shouting." Cass replied, continuing to speak calmly and evenly.
"Listen here, maggot, you will do what I say as I say it or I will make sure that I see every meal you eat twice." Whispered Instructor Ericsson, as he stared Cass in the eyes. Brown and blue. He's heterochromatic.
"So you can talk like a normal person."
Instructor Ericsson took in a deep breath before growling out "Name."
"Cassandra Ferrell." I'm so glad you were paying attention the first time.
"Do you have a problem with authority, maggot?"
"No."
"Do you have a problem hearing, maggot?"
"No."
"THEN WHAT THE FUCK IS YOUR PROBLEM?! MAGGOT!!" Instructor Ericsson spat out with pure venom.
Cass spoke with a slightly condescending tone as she said "We could start with that I'm not a marine, that you're a Civilian Combat Training Instructor, or that CCT is meant to teach how to be a creative militia, not how to be a soldier that blindly follows orders."
"THIS IS MY SQUAD, MAGGOT! YOU ARE IN MY SQUAD! I AM IN CONTR..."
Cass took in a deep breath before speaking. "You have already broken 4 UGEC laws in under an hour, including verbal abuse, verbal assault, and making threats. You have also broken at least 13 different social laws, split between the Federation of Yyyn Controlled Planets and the planetary government of G31-1-4 and you've probably committed hazing, but I would have to talk to some of my coworkers to get the exact details there."
"What of it?" Growled out the Instructor. I didn't realize he could turn a shade of tomato.
"A minimum of 30,000 Unity credits in fines and I'm sure that the legal team over at CCT Command would love to hear about your rampant law breaking, as well." Hold the poker face. Don't smile.
Before Instructor Ericsson could respond, a loud rumbling sound mixed with mechanical whining filled the air as a well used replica of a M3 halftrack drove out of one of the garage style tents. All of the groups and instructors watched as the M3 lazily rumbled across the dirt roads before parking in the center of the assembled groups. A speaker attached to the M3 shouted out "Squad 1, retrieve equipment."
Walking back to the front of Squad 4, Instructor Ericsson began pacing back and forth as he shouted "LISTEN UP, MAGGOTS! WHEN SQUAD 4 GETS CALLED, I EXPECT YOU MAGGOTS TO FORM A STRAIGHT, SINGLE FILE LINE, TAKE THE EQUIPMENT THE QUARTERMASTER HANDS YOU, THANK HIM, AND RETURN TO EXACTLY WHERE YOU ARE STANDING! AM I UNDERSTOOD!?"
Squad 4, including Cass, responded with a "Sir, yes, sir." This battle isn't worth it.
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August 22, 2214: Doctor Brooke Reid Ferrell, UGEC Space Force New Eden Staging Station 8
"Mars, in position, awaiting orders."
"Venus, in position, awaitidng orders."
"Jupiter, in position, awaiting orders."
Doctor Ferrell sat in the command room, surrounded by computer terminals, monitors big and small, and Space Force officers. Her current chair was placed on a raised platform in the back, second in height to the chair in which the Admiral Wolf of the New Eden Defence Fleet sat, giving her the ability to see the whole of the command room.
The ironically quarter itari Admiral Wolf looked down at Dr. Ferrell, his 2 sandy brown, sort, cat-like ears standing straight up and facing forward. "Doctor, all units are in place and our ships have returned to defensive positions. Any words to the troops before I call radio silence?"
"Yes Admiral." Dr. Ferrell said, grabbing the microphone attached to her chair and pressing the TALK button. "All units, this is Doctor Ferrell. Operation Rocky Grave officially starts once Project Silent Night is activated. Until it has, you are to stay hidden. As you all know, the primary objective of Operation Rocky Grave is to prevent the namy fleet from reaching a firing position that can target New Eden, but what many of you don't know is the secondary object: To capture as many namy ships as possible. They possess tactically useful information and technology, but remember that to somebody on New Eden, each of you is more important than those ships. For that reason, I expect to see each of you return safely. Good luck and god speed."
Dr. Ferrell looked up at Admiral Wolf. "I'm done."
"All units, this is Admiral Wolf calling radio silence. It will be lifted 10 minutes after you successfully board an enemy vessel. Over."
One by one, the dots on the tac-map at the front of the command room slowly blinked out, until only the quantum-linked comm sat remained. With that, the whole of the command room breathed a sigh of relief before continuing their duties.
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August 20, 2214: Cassandra Ferrell, Adams III Space Force Resupply Base
Cass sat at the square wooden table with the skittish werewolf, her muscles aching. So far, she had set up her tent and cot, had a silent lunch with her squad, and then PT from lunch till dinner. I now understand why far worlders never seem to get fat. Cass took a moment to study the werewolf: a little under 3 meters tall, a wall of muscle covered in course black fur, with the assortment of arms and legs with the only notable change to the hands being ocean blue painted claws, and head that looked stolen straight from a wolf, gold eyes and all. She must be a gentle giant.
"Sssssssssooooooooo, what's your name?" Cass asked, poking at the mystery meat stew that claimed to be beef.
"Kathrine." The 3 meters of scaredy-cat replied, before nervously adding "But, but, but, my friends call me Kat."
"Bet the Kat jokes get old. I'm Cassandra, but everyone calls me Cass. It's a pleasure to meet you." Cass said, holding out her right hand and putting on a gentle smile.
"Yeah, they do and it is, uh, nice to meet, um, you too." Kat said, grabbing the comparatively tiny hand of Cass and giving it a good shake. I wonder if a belly rub would help her calm down.
"Have you had Ericsson before?" Cass asked, picking up her bowl of mystery meat stew and drinking it quickly, before she could taste it.
"Yeah, for 2 years now. I-I-I hope that you calling him out this morning makes him less shouty." Kat stated, hunching over the table as she spoke. Me too, girlfriend.
"Yeah, I think everyone agrees with you there, Kat. What do you do for a job? For fun?"
"Uh, um, well I'm a botanist. I mostly work on genetically engineering plants for new colonization efforts, but I've also done some work for planetary enterprises. If you've had corn, green beans or wheat products here, I worked on making those farmable on G31-1-4. As for what I do for fun? Floral gardening, mainly. I also like going to nezba concerts. It's nice, slow, quiet music." Ah ha! Got her talking confidently for a moment.
"I work as a translator for the diplomats up in Yadakulter station. Not many know this, but I'm actually fluent in 3 different wresh languages. For fun, I go to parties, thought there aren't that many on Yadakulter, hang out with fiends, listen to music, and sometimes play video games. Mostly just the ones that my friends get me into."
"Wow, that's way more intere..." Kat trailed off as Instructor Sam pulled a chair back from the square table.
"May I join ya?" Asked Instructor Sam, while setting down her bowl of what looked to be actual beef stew.
"Of course. I don't think we've met yet. I'm Cass." Cass said with a smile.
"I-I-I'm Kat. Nice to, to meet ya." Kat said, her body pulling back from the table a few centimeters.
"Instructor Samantha Kirk. Yes, both my parents were elves." Instructor Sam said, dismissively waving her right hand as she spoke of her lineage. Right, yyyn and elves take longer to happen than the rest of us.
"What brings you over to our little table?" Inquired Cass.
"I'm curious what got Erik so riled this morning. He shouted loud enough my squad couldn't hear what I was telling them and when I looked over he was close enough to kiss ya." Stated Instructor Sam before taking a bite of her actually beef stew.
"He just couldn't handle someone who wouldn't play boot camp with him." Cass said nonchalantly.
"You're maybe the second person I've met who can stand having Erik bear down on them. The other was an actual drill sergeant, if I remember correctly. So, how did you handle being under Erik's fire?" Instructor Sam asked, a couple of onion substitutes still in her mouth. Someone's seriously curious.
"Dad's in the SF. Back when I was little, he worked shuttle maintenance for a Space Force resupply base on New Eden. Spent half my childhood following Dad all around Hawthorne. Not only have I met sensor techs scarier than Ericsson, I also spent more than a few days watching poor saps go through boot camp. Most SF RDCs actually make good babysitters." Master Chief Schmidt was actually a really nice guy when he wasn't making recruits Schmidt themselves.
"RDCs?" Kat managed to get off before Instructor Sam could respond.
"Recruit Division Commanders. They're the drill instructors for the Space Force, and most UGEC navies." Cass recited back.
"Well that explains it. Bet he doesn't even compare to the professionals." Instructor Sam inquired. You don't even know the half of it.
"He lacks the creativity and the colorful words. It's hard to see someone whose entire repertoire of 'bad words' is maggot and fuck as intimidating." Cass stated.
Kat shivered a little before saying "Well, Instructor Ericsson scares me."
Without a moment's hesitation Cass blurted out "That's okay. You're a sweet girl, and he has no right to yell at you!"
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August 23, 2214: Codename Jupiter, Fenrir 4, New Eden Asteroid Belt, Anados Debris Field
Jupiter squirmed in his suit of Fenrir Assault Power Armor. Sure, it was designed to be lived in for 5 days, but not comfortably. Through the visor he could see the target of the test fire, a half kilometer long, beak shaped namy battleship, slowly shedding black plating to reveal the bright yellow and red hull beneath. Can the fucking birds make anything that doesn't look like it belongs in a children's book?
The Fenrir suit unlocked at Jupiter's command. Ah, it feels nice to be able to move again. With a careful squat and push, Jupiter and his armor began the slow hurtle towards the, now obviously a Kek-class, battleship. He looked around as he drifted, watching as the gamble started to show signs of paying off. Seems like the admiralty's belief that the namies were gonna bunch up was right. Within visual range (with only a 4x zoom require to see), there were hundreds of almost invisible black dots descending on the visible ships, and even a few slightly more visible shuttles.
As Jupiter looked back at his target, a small jet of white fluid shooting out from his suit to correct his course, he could see Mars (Fenrir 2) and Venus (Fenrir 1) clearly against the colorful Kek-class, each drifting a hundred, or so, meters ahead of him. Guess I'm gonna be stuck buying drinks when we get back. Within five minutes, Jupiter was reorienting himself to land feet first on his target, quickly checking where Mars and Venus had landed before him.
THUD. Jupiter took a moment to just walk for the first time in almost an entire day, lazily looking for where Venus was headed. Shit, if Venus finds the entrance first I'm gonna have to buy Mars dinner and drinks. To his dread, Jupiter spotted Venus already opening the maintenance panel to one of the Kek's external airlocks.
It didn't take long for Jupiter to group up with the other 2 Fenrir operators, who could only communicate by hand signals and aggressive nodding. Before Charades in Space was over, Venus managed to open the airlock. The 3 of them piled in before closing the outer door and, within 2 minutes after landing, entered the battleship.
When the airlock door opened, Jupiter could see a namy standing there, frozen in terror. The thing looked like someone took a dodo, made it the size of an emu, and then made it as colorful as a parrot. Fuck, fuck, shit. Jupiter dropped his shoulder down and charged, the Fenrir suit slamming into the namy, then the wall, leaving only a blood stain, a dent, and some feathers as evidence of the poor bird. That was... smooth. Looks like the doc was serious about operating at 100.
Jupiter took in the bright green hallway as his team readied their weapons: Each of them was equipped with an M301 Variable Yield Magnetic Acceleration Rifle, which borrowed its appearance from H&K's G36, a different wrist and shoulder weapon for each operator, and a backup M2-T3 Machine Gun, a modification of the almost 300 year old .50 machine gun that gave it a shorter, heaver barrel, shoulder stock, and pistol grip with trigger for use with powered armor. Rifle, check. Wrist mounted plasma projector, check. Shoulder mounted grenade launcher, check. Powder weapon, check.
By the 5 minutes after landing mark, Jupiter and his team had already captured the battleship's main computer and cleared it of hostiles. I'm amazed the namies put it so close to the airlock. While Venus set about pulling all the information they could, Jupiter spoke, the Fenrir suit turning his voice into something comparable to an artillery strike. "We've passed the five minute mark. Turn comms back on. I'll handle the sync with command. Mars, watch the door. Venus, keep doing whatever you are with the computer."
As the stream of data started flooding in, Jupiter commanded the suit's comm suite through the automated systems, finally getting a connection to command. "Command, this is Assault Team 100. We've boarded a kek class battleship and have gained access to the main computer core. We are pulling a full data dump and will upload immediately after. Over."
"Assault Team 100, this is command. We are ready to receive the packet whenever you are ready. Current positional data indicates you have boarded the Glorious Kek Class of Rightful Retribution and Mesmerizing Fire. I'm assigning your team to Battle Group 9. Over."
"Assignment received. Operative Venus has the packet and is sending it now. Will coordinate with Battle Group 9. Assault Team 100 out."
Jupiter waited as the tactical information of Battle Group 9 flooded in. 5 Thor suit fire teams, 20 SWAT units and 1 anti-terror unit. Primarily focused around the rear of the ship. According to the map Venus found, we're the closest to the bridge.
"Battle Group 9, this is Assault Team 100. According to a map we found, we're the closest to the bridge. Going to make a mad rush for the bridge, but we'll be down one. After Operative Venus is done uploading what she can pull from the central computer, she'll group up with the closest Assault Team. How copy?"
"This is Assault Team 29, serving as lead for Battle Group 9. We hear you Assault Team 100. We'll clean out the ass and perform the anti-scuttling operations, you go ahead after the bridge. Out."
Jupiter turned to Mars. "You're with me. Venus, you think you can keep yourself safe?"
"Go and have your guy time, I'll be fine." Venus replied with an annoyed tone.
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Jupiter and Mars tore through most of the path to the bridge with ease, their M301s taking care of most of the Rightful Retribution's security crew, but they had to resort to their M2-T3s and wrist weapons when they ran into namy powered armor units. Half an hour after the landing mark, Jupiter stood at a massive armored door, which Mars was pulling open far easier than he had any right to.
Why do I get the feeling this is the boss zone?
Jupiter entered the massive room with his left arm extended, his M301 securely in his right. As the namy powered armor suits of ocean blue and scarlet red jumped from their ambush, Jupiter let loose with his wrist's plasma projector. The bright green and blue beam took barely a second each to cook his seven assailants inside their own armor.
A blast of yellow plasma made Jupiter's shields activate fully, the operator quickly rolling to his right. Capacitors at 3% and reactor generating at full power. Please don't be a tank. Jupiter stood up from his roll and ran quickly, dodging the barrage of yellow plasma consistently being sent in his direction.
After finding a position the new enemy could fire at him in, Jupiter peeked around the corner of the half melted namy tank he had hunkered behind. Firing at his position were 3 namy heavy tanks, each mounted with dual tank killing plasma projectors, anti-infantry laser cannons, and ramming blades. That is some bullshit levels of firepower. Were they planning a ground invasion?
When Mars entered the vehicle bay, Jupiter had already gotten all three of the heavy tanks attention, allowing him to easily walk far enough in the bay to have the vertical clearance to launch both of his shoulder mounted anti-tank missiles. Each missile launched straight into the air, turned almost on a dime, then flew downward onto their targets. At this range, the tanks' active defenses didn't have time to intercept the missiles, allowing them to penetrate the tops of the tanks' turrets and explode leaving a lone heavy tank, which now angrily turned towards Mars.
Perfect timing, you son of a bitch. Jupiter ran to the next bay as the tank followed his teammate. Capacitors at 12%. The wrist projector is going to suck up too much juice. The bay that Jupiter ran into held only the floating equivalent of a humvee, daintily hovering with a power line keeping it alive. This'll do. Jupiter grabbed the rear of the namy humvee and ran, pushing it into the vehicle bay's main corridor and giving it a single, hard push towards the last tank. As the namy humvee ripped from the power line, it quickly began falling towards the ground, skidding underneath the tank and pushing its rear higher, throwing a shot that could have killed Mars into the floor with a loud crash.
Mars hauled ass into the vehicle bays as the last tank turned back to Jupiter. Capacitors at 18%. Still no good. Jupiter jumped towards a pile of crates, using the cold thrusters to provide what little extra help they could. Please be empty, please be empty. A burst of molten metal shot from the front of the crate Jupiter hid behind as the first shot from the tank hit it. Jupiter quickly looked around and found another namy humvee in its bay and sprinted over to it, barely avoiding the tank's second shot.
22%. I wish Mars had taken that wrist rocket. The namy heavy tank rumbled as it rushed towards Jupiter's position, plasma projectors glowing yellow and ready to fire. Jupiter braced to run again when the tank's plasma projectors suddenly shut down, followed by yellow plasma shooting out of the top of the turret of the tank. He quickly walked out of the vehicle bay that could have been his grave.
Mars stood opposite the tank from Jupiter as he exited, holding one of the plasma projectors the namy tanks used with a long power line attached to it. Motioning down to the projector, Mars asked "Hey Jupiter, can I keep it?"
"Will you remember to feed and groom it daily, Mars?"
"Aww, fine." Mars tossed the tank projector to the ground, a loud thump echoing through the vehicle bay.
Jupiter turned towards the fore door of the vehicle bay. Two hallways, a set of stairs, then the bridge itself.
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40 minutes after after the landing mark, Jupiter and Mars stood at the blast door to the bridge, Jupiter ramming his shoulder into the bridge door repeatedly, making the dent in it bigger and bigger.
"I should have taken the grav pulse cannon Venus had." Mars said between the sounds of 30 centimeters of metal slowly giving way.
"The shotgun's gonna be more useful once were in!" Jupiter said as he finally sailed through the door, sending the piece of metal into the bridge, crushing one of the too colorful birds. Mars charged in shortly after, the gatling shotgun on his wrist sending over 2,000 lead pellets into the whole of the bridge.
As Jupiter stood up, recovering from winning his fight with the door, he surveyed the damage. Looks like we were just in time. Jupiter moved over to the pilots panel, which was thankfully holographic and undamaged by Mars's torrent of lead. Turning down every slider he could identify, Jupiter looked up just in time to witness a namy use the last of his life to press one of the holographic buttons.
A bright yellow flashed over the view screen as a ball of plasma was launched at relativistic speeds, leaving view as quickly as it had come into it. Jupiter and Mars stood still, taking in what had just happen, when a message was broadcast to all New Eden units.
"This is Captain Colbert of the Finality! Staging Station 8 has been hit! I repeat, Staging Station 8 has been hit!. Looks like atmosphere is leaking out and the Finality is picking up fires near the impact zone... Oh god, it's spinning and it looks like auto-correction is causing the station to enter a de-orbit trajectory. The Finality is moving to provide emergency aid!"
Jupiter felt paralyzed. If the station de-orbited and hit anywhere on New Eden, it would be devastating. And if the Doc goes, I'm gonna have to tell Taylor. Mars, on the other hand, moved like a blur, appearing over the dying namy, unloading the last of his rotary shotgun and the final 50ish rounds of his M2 into the bird, leaving only a hole where the bird once was.
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August 25, 2214: Cassandra Ferrell, Nerolter's Ethanol Hut and Grill
Cass sat at the bar, nursing a beer and rubbing her sore muscles. 5 days in a row of PT, team building exercises, and sleeping in tents on shitty wooden cots and the worst of it was the wannabe drill instructor! At least I get a two day break from it. She looked at the kigkig bartender, a 10 limbed, ant-like horror with 4 of its limbs forming a quadpod stand at its hips with the other 6 being arms with 3 clawed digits that were currently cleaning glasses and serving drinks, with two gecko-like eyes planted into an otherwise ant-like head, mandibles and all. The dirt brown exoskeleton of the kigkig made the body, head and abdomen appear as if they were armored, despite the little guy only being 120ish cm tall.
"Hey Cass, how you holding up?" Came the voice of Danny as he sat down next to Cass.
"Sore, but alive. They don't talk about the CCT PT in the core worlds. Wait... what are you doing here, you're not old enough to drink yet!" Cass replied.
"Getting dinner and checking up on a friend. I was originally hanging out with my squad, but they've gone barhopping."
"Oh. Was Sam with them?" Cass questioned, eyebrows raising.
"No, she had a checkup meeting, or something like that." Danny said, his upper shoulders drooping slightly.
"Have you tried asking her out?"
"No. I live on the station and she lives planet side. I don't think that kind of long distance relationship would work. Besides, when would I even ask?" Danny threw up his arms as he spoke, setting them back down gently as his food arrived.
"Listen, Danny. Ask her when the rest of the squad isn't around, because if you ask in front of a crowd, any yes you get'll be forced. You may have to ask her if you can talk to her in private. She seems like a nice girl, so I doubt she'll be a dick about it." Cass spoke with her motherly voice. Here I am giving sage advice.
"Yeah, but that doesn't help the whole long distance thing. Having to get a shuttle down to the planet kills the idea of impromptu dates and stuff." Danny said, sounding even more defeated than before.
"Look, Danny, she works for CCT. She isn't really going to be able to do the impromptu stuff, so you'd have plenty of warning on when you could go down and visit, or she could come up and visit. Outside of that, find a game, or something, on the web the two of you can have fun over. That helps to shrink the distance."
"That's a good point, Cass. You win this one. You just here to drink or do you need me out of your hair?"
"Don't know yet, but I'm planning on drinking proper, so you may want to go off on your own before I end up ruining our friendship while I'm drunk."
Danny stood up while grabbing his food. "Enjoy your night. Oh, if your up for it tomorrow, there's an arcade I know about that the rest of my squad is 'too old for.'" Bet Danny's squad can't handle having their asses kicked by preteens with nothing better to do.
"Thanks, we'll see tomorrow." Cass said, taking another sip from her drink.
After an hour, or so, of drinking, eating and talking with the locals, Cass was approached by an elven woman, turning to look at the lithe figure as she approached. The woman was a roughly 160 cm tall brunette, her silky hair falling halfway down her back, with perfectly tanned skin, a soft face, as far as a drunken Cass could tell, and a body straight from baywatch. The elf's ears stuck out from her hair, the right ear having 3 silver earings rings that hugged the lobe near its point while the left was left as nature made it. I can't tell if its the booze, but she might be a goddess.
Sitting down next to Cass and putting a bill, that Cass was too drunk to read quickly, on the counter, the elf turned to Cass and said "Can I buy you a drink beautiful?"
"You can buy me as many as you like. I'm Cass. You?" Cass replied, a hungry smile spreading itself across her lips.
"Erika. Now, what brings a cute kitsune like you to my favorite watering hole?" The elf woman replied, taking a seat and holding up 2 fingers to the kigkig bartender.
"Got today and tomorrow off from CCT, so I figured I'd save tomorrow for hangover day." Cass casually shrugged as a 2 shots of clear liquid were placed before her and Erika.
"First week? You gotta be sore after that." Erika jokingly said before throwing back her shot.
"Hell yeah I'm sore, but I feel great right now!" Cass grabbed her shot and tossed it back.
"What do you think about waking up sorer tomorrow?" Erika said, holding up 2 fingers to the bartender again, a grin matching Cass's upon her lips.
"I'm listening." Cass said, leaning in closer to Erika and tossing back her shot the moment the bartender let go of it.
"Well, a friend of mine is setting up an orgy tonight and when I saw you, I thought 'That cute little kitsune at the bar would make for a great friend to bring to the orgy.'" Erika said, her smile growing larger as she spoke.
"You know what, I'll bite. How much longer do I have to get to know you?" Cass asked.
"About an hour."
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Morning/Afternoon/Evening/far too late for you to still be online, or whatever time you're reading this at.
I'm back, with the 4th installment. This one is focused on the Resistance catching their breath after the recent fight, and talking with their new prisoners. It is also the largest one yet, as far as I can tell, so I hope you like it.
Currently I'm thinking of uploading on a roughly 9 day cycle. The next episode is already planned out and half done, but I'm planning on putting out a supplemental at roughly the same time, that will give a different perspective, at least as a one-off. If I think it works, there will likely be more supplemental episodes, although I can't really spoil what they'll be about. This episode may contain hints as to what I'm thinking of though.
Anyway I've rambled for long enough, here's your story! Comments, questions, etc, please leave them if you got them.
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The first thing Murray saw, much like the last thing he’d seen before passing out, was Thompson staring at his face.
“Ay, Captain’s awake! How are you feeling, sir?” Thompson grinned.
“Like shit. Where are we?”
“That’s better than not feeling anything. Sid took us to some abandoned houses, said they were far enough to avoid suspicion of the base but close enough to allow for a withdrawal. We’re about 30 minutes of walking away from it right now.”
“Where did they put the prisoners?”
“Locked the collabs in the shed, commander got locked in the garage, they brought in some kind of gas filled helmet to keep him drugged. Sid didn’t interrogate them, says he wanted you to be awake for it.”
“Fine. Tell him I’ll be up as soon as my legs feel like working again.”
“Afternoon Murray. Hope you like months old branflakes for breakfast, because that’s all there is left in here that won’t require cooking.”
“That’s the first thing you say? Not ‘are you ok’, you mention food?”
“Yeah well I know you’re alright because you aren’t crawling along the floor to me.” Sid changed his tone slightly. “You know, I could have sworn, the last thing I said to you before you took the commander down, was ‘I don’t want any of you getting hurt capturing this guy.’ Yet here you are, with a hole in your arm and nearly a day out of the picture.”
“Not all orders are followed through on, Sid. Anyway, let’s not talk about that please?”
“Because you fucked up and know it?” Sid’s voice had a clear note of snark injected into it.
“Maybe. How’s my squad?”
“Slater has been moved to a medical safehouse so we can ensure his health, same with Hibberd. I assume you’ll want us to try and get them back to the continent asap. Rest of your squad is staying here while we handle the interrogation.”
“Fine by me. Shall we go talk to our friend in the garage, then?”
Sid smiled, and produced a video camera from the cluttered table next to him.
Sid opened the garage’s back door, stepping through into the makeshift interrogation building, and out of the now-pouring rain. Murray took time to note that a Hekatian IFV had crashed into the semi-detached next door, presumably in order to hide it from enemy aerial recon.
Two Resistance soldiers were inside the garage, guns trained on the sleeping figure. The Hekatian was in an electric wheelchair, the kind that was so large it couldn’t move without power. Sid nodded, and one went over to a jury-rigged contraption with a hose connected to the alien’s new helmet. He flipped a lever to the off position, before withdrawing an opened gas canister and rapidly tossing it away into a far off garden.
“We built this little doohickey a while ago, when we realised the effects of tear gas on them. It’s basically just Scuba diving gear with a few special changes. Uses gas canisters, trickles it in small amounts, so they can still breathe but they’re out cold. Give him a few minutes and he’ll be back to life.”
“Interesting. Who designs this stuff?”
“This particular design, it came from some guys in Manchester, we’re just the first to put it into action. Rest of the time, it’s the work of our chief technician, Erin. She works with Len who’s better at the actual building part, but Erin can get the theory written up better than anyone. She’s to blame for the Mk 5.”
Murray glanced around the garage. It was barren and empty, except for a few large boxes of dog food. Opposite the contraption, was a table with several cardboard boxes and a sign that said ‘for special use only’. “Owners had pets. Would they have evacuated with them?”
“Hopefully, that’s what my family did with ours. Hekatians made pets illegal, fuck knows why but we guess it’s them trying to avoid catching diseases off them. That or it’s a cultural thing. Vets have their work cut out when it comes to euthanising, but lots of people are hiding their pets decently.”
“So what did you do when the invasion hit?” Murray decided to change topic from the quite depressing thought of mass dog murder.
“Family decided to evacuate, we got priority status on medical grounds. I realised when I got there, there were so many people trying to get out, and so little space, there was no reason for me to take up room.”
“Hope you don’t mind me asking, but were your family-”
“On the Bruges? No, they were evacuated before it sank. Terrible to think about though, what are they saying, about 1000 odd killed? Anyway, I went back home, grabbed whatever stuff I still had left over from cadets. Plan was to go up to Scotland, hide out with a few family members I have up there, and wait this out. Then I met up with the rest of my old cadet detachment, we formed together into a group for support, and ended up coming into contact with the nascent resistance. After that, I just kept going up the ranks.”
“You heard from your family since?”
“They’re in a refugee camp near Hamburg, they’re doing alright for now. Helps to know that they’re safe while I’m fighting.”
The two stared at the bound alien. He’d been stripped of his armour, and clothed in a spare pair of pyjamas. Murray pointed towards the zip ties that almost completely encircled his arms and legs, and connected him to the wheelchair. “Interesting choice.”
“Ay, well, they work. One time, when I was in cadets, some guys zip tied a guy with tourettes, kind that makes you clap when others do it. Psychos zip tied him to his bed in the middle of the night, then in the morning when he woke up they just clapped over him for a good 5 minutes. They only stopped doing it because of a bloody fire drill. That’s how I know these things are tough enough.”
“Jesus.” Murray was at a loss for what more to say, so he pointed towards the alien, again trying to change the topic. “Do we know if they all speak English?”
“The grunts have some sort of translator they use to talk to civvies, so I’d assume a regional commander would too, right? Ah, he’s waking up now.” Sid passed the camera to one of the guards, before he then moved towards the commander. Wake the fuck up mate!” Sid began shaking the Hekatian, before pulling it’s helmet off. “What’s your name?”
A thin, raspy voice came from the pathetic creature. This was Murray’s first glance at a Hekatian’s face so far. It was heavily wrinkled, with two separate pairs of eyes, although it only seemed to open the bottom two. The nose was effectively just a large hole with a flap that opened and closed as necessary. It’s mouth looked roughly like that of a cat’s, in how they stretched around the curve of its face. It was also totally and utterly devoid of hair.
Noticeably, there were several clearly technological parts to it. The ears were clipped with black boxes. Over the top right eye was what looked like a little augmented reality display, which was directly connected into the skull. There was another box located on it’s neck.
“Brigadier General Dristankeokiorofenx.” The box was the source of it’s translated speech. Murray also noted that the mouth didn’t move at all, which likely meant a neural interface of some kind was translating his thoughts into speech..
“I’m not going to call you that. From now on you’re called… Joe, fuck it, might as well call you Joe Bloggs. Let’s start off simple. What the fuck are you doing on our planet?” Sid didn’t seem interested in formality.
“Simple? Bah. Worthless humour. It’s nothing against you or your planet, we’re just expanding. Bringing our light to countless worlds. You’re not the first people we’ve come down on.”
“There are other alien species that you’ve taken down? How advanced were they, and what did you do with them?” Murray decided to ask his first question.
“It varied. Some were stone age, others carried medieval swords and knives, others were running around with primitive firearms. A few even developed the art of flying. The Alganemians, they had better guns than you do, but we did bring more down on them in wave one I suppose. They are all part of our empire now.” Murray noted the translator appeared to have some cultural context.
“Wave one? Is that what this is? Advance guard before a main force? How large is it total?”
“The 85th Strike Army Group is what I am part of. I am merely commander of a brigade of soldiers. Our force is roughly equivalent to… about 1 million Hekatians.” Sid let out a whistle at that.
“Of that, how many are frontline?” Murray was intrigued by the size of the army.
“A little over a half.”
“That’s a good T3R, you must have automated logistics a lot right?”
“Indeed.”
“So what’s the rough plan? How does this play out normally?” Sid started turning it back to matters of strategy.
“We land on an island of reasonable size, and good geographical location. Doesn’t matter about population, we’ve landed on everything from uninhabited ones to completely packed ones. Set up permanent bases, defeat counterattacks, whatever. Wave 2 usually lands anywhere between several months to a few years after, depending on urgency and strength of resistance. Last plans I looked at said about a year and a half latency for you guys though. Wave 2 then expands outwards from there, using the original island as a springboard for total conquest of the world.”
Sid looked slightly unsettled by the alien’s comments. Not surprising, his plans were likely operating on a much longer timescale. “What about nukes? Do you guys not just use them to wipe resistance out? You ever been nuked during an invasion?”
“Not all of wave one works on the ground. We have to set up our own infrastructure for when the planet is ours, you know? Part of that, it’s anti ballistic missile stuff. Same reason we don’t just nuke you to dust, we want this planet and it’s people as close to intact for integration. We have no ill will towards the humans, we want you to join our stellar imperium.”
“Let’s say that, tomorrow, the entirety of wave one drops dead, just because of magic. What happens to wave two? Can they carry on their mission?”
“No. Wave two is so large that it requires special beacons to prevent landing issues, as well as plenty of infrastructure to sustain itself. If we went dark, then they’d be forced to cancel, and a new wave one would have to be organised. It’s happened before, although that was due to an unfortunate combination of geological events wiping out the first wave. If some of the first wave survives by the time wave two arrives, then only part of wave two can land, the rest will have to wait in orbit for additional beacons to be placed.”
“Number 3, you getting this?” Sid turned to the soldier who held the camera. He nodded and held up a thumb to signal the camera was functioning. Before entering, they’d agreed to not use real names, in order to prevent the enemy possibly finding them out in the event of a successful escape. Reprisals were a real threat, just because you were in the Resistance didn’t mean your family members were safe.
“Just to clarify, if wave one were to be destroyed, then wave two would be incapable of landing, which would give us a reprieve from the invasion, at least for a while?”
“Correct, although the second attempt always comes back much stronger. We will try again and again until we succeed. If enough attempts fail, well we’ll just take an FTL drive, and crash something into the offending planet at beyond light speed.” That was a worrying prospect. How would they be able to prevent further incursions, if the Hekatians controlled so much territory? Why were they fighting if the Hekatians could just obliterate them instantly?
“How large is your, ahem, stellar imperium? You have faster than light travel? Any other ftl species out there?”
“Yes, our assault pods are equipped with faster than light engines. The Hekatian Stellar Imperium spans a 10th of the Milky Way. The rest is owned by different empires, yet none have the same size as us alone. However they are in many alliances which make it difficult for us to expand through their space. We came to your world, like many others, in order to uplift it into the galactic community.”
“Your motives sound nice, though I can’t help but notice your means. Overcrowded refugee camps? Martial law? The Ilford Massacre? I’ve been under your occupation for 6 months, and you don’t seem to show a lick of care for the people you’re trying to ‘uplift’.”
“You’re that terrorist leader aren’t you… what’s your name then boy?”
“Don’t remember giving you permission to ask questions.”
“Fine. Look, we have plenty of info on your people, we know all about your history. You think your empire was kind and polite to it’s subjects? You think...Iraq, that’s it, you think they were happy about you coming in?”
“Two things can be bad at once, you know?” Sid responded without missing a beat.
“Look, before this gets into a debate between you two, I still have questions to ask. Joe, if you’re so advanced that you have ftl, why aren’t you that much more advanced than us on the battlefield? Your stuff is ahead of us, but mostly only by decades. Sure the plasma weapons are advanced but in some ways they’re behind our guns, mainly rate of fire.”
“You assume progress in everything is infinite, or that we need it to be improved. Past a certain point there are real physical limits on improvement, and diminishing returns. The Hekatian Star Imperium has been in space for 10,000 years, and the core kit of an infantryman hasn’t changed since the premiership of Lagrandaultrex, 4,000 years ago. Much better to invest in getting between worlds faster, than shell out for some tech that saves you maybe a day or two in your conquest.”
“2 more questions. What’s with the other eyes? Why don’t you open them?” Murray was still bugged by this and wanted to know.
“My upper eyes are for long range vision, the lower eyes are specialised for close range.”
“Makes sense. Final question, what did you do to me in that fight? I was out cold for a whole day.”
“My armour carries special miniature injection ports for killing opponents in hand to hand with toxins. It seems our drugs only knock you out though. How unfortunate.” Murray was amazed by how the sneer came through the translation device.
“Ok. That’s me all done now.”
“Excellent. Number 1, if you’d kindly step outside for a few minutes while I talk to our friend about the limits of his knowledge on the resistance, that would be much appreciated.” Sid was walking towards the ‘special use’ boxes, and Murray suddenly felt he would not enjoy staying much longer. “Actually, might be worth you talking to our collab friends while I’m busy. Ahmed will give you the shed key.”
Murray walked out of the garage, closing the door behind him. He immediately heard the sounds of a drill being turned on, and realised now definitely had been the right time to leave the garage.
Murray wandered towards the small shed, flanked by Ahmed. He was a young one, couldn’t have been older than 16 or so. Cadet-turned-resistance-fighter, Murray assumed. Ahmed stuck the key in, unlocking it. This gave Murray his first glimpse inside.
There were 4 collabs, all over the wooden floor. They had been tied together, with zip ties or garden hoses, whatever seemed to have been available. Ear defenders covered their heads. All had blindfolds, not that it made a difference, as the shed was incredibly dark, until he pulled out a small torch.
“What, you thought we were gonna waste guards on them?” Murray supposed Ahmed was correct. Still, it was weird that the aliens seemed to garner more care than the collabs.
Murray pushed the ear defenders of the prisoners up, likely the first time they’d had their sensory deprivation broken in a while.
“Can you all hear me? Can you speak?” A chorus of relieved yeses came from the group, who must have been under the impression this represented a rescue. “Good. Now, I’m here to ask you some questions. If, at any point, I don’t get answers I like, I’ll be giving out some interesting tips on how to properly lock you all up.” There was a sudden nervous twinge to the prisoners.
“For example, I could tell them how to build a high quality, CIA-approved isolation chamber, with just a few bits of cardboard tubing and those very ear defenders you have on right now. Do you want me to tell them that?” A frantic shaking of the heads ensued. “Good! First off: what work do you do for the Hekatians?”
“We’re police! Nothing more, nothing less! They tell us where to patrol, they give us some vests and their radios, and we stop people from looting! That’s all!” One man, probably in his late 50s, immediately responded, almost crying out. The others nodded frantically as he emphasised the limited nature of their role.
“So you’re just like, government approved vigilantes then? Or do you get extra food for collaborating?” Murray noticed that Len was walking up the garden path towards the shed.
“They give us and our families extra food! We get guaranteed housing, food that’s not just fucking bread, guaranteed medication! My kid has epilepsy, I need this to make sure she gets her meds!” The reply came from a younger man, probably mid 30s. This was the first time Murray noticed little name stickers, on which the last names of the collabs had been written by resistance soldiers, placed onto the blindfolds. This man’s sticker said “Fern” on it.
“That’s funny Fern, because our info from the council database says you don’t have a family. Or kids.” Len had reached the conversation, and was reading off a notebook. “Here you go captain, all the info we scraped about ‘em. Don’t be surprised when they keep lying. Oh, and this flask has tea in it, here’s one for you as well Ahmed. You’ll have to use ratpack stuff if you want anything in it though. Spoon is in the top.”
“Thanks man. So Fern, we’ve established you’re a liar. You there, Daggart, what do you do for them then?” Len walked off towards the garage, with a small backpack with several more flasks inside it. Murray pulled out a creamer packet, opening it up and tipping some in until a small cloud of white erupted in the tea. He then opened the top of the flask, finding a small spoon, like those in ice cream pots, stashed alongside water purification tablets.
“Policing work! Patrol the streets, patrol the camp, make sure people are getting their food! Come on, let me go, I know they’re bastards, I don’t believe their propaganda! This is just to keep going, you know? I do the bare minimum to keep them off my back! In fact, I’m behind on my beating quota, please just let me out of here!” Murray stirred as Daggart sputtered. He then returned the spoon to it’s container, before picking the notebook back off the shelf he’d let it rest on.
“My notes inform me that 5 separate camp survivors have specifically named you as a, quote, ‘constant source of harassment’, we’ve got evidence of you giving civilians injuries that’d send them to hospital, and you attempting some stuff that, if I had free reign to decide your punishment, would have you strung up off the bridge. So you’re a liar too, and an awful person to boot. What about you… Higgins? What do you think the Hekatians are doing here?”
“They’re here to help make sure we’re on top!”
“We? That the royal we? On top of who?”
“You know, us, up at the top once more, the lesser races in their place! I can tell by your voice, you’re not like these degenerates, one of the n-“ Higgins was interrupted by Ahmed delivering a heavy kick to his chest that sent both him, and Daggart who was tied to him, to the floor.
“Thank you Ahmed, I could tell that wasn’t going a good direction. Takes a special kind of person to think an alien invasion is a chance for them to be more racist. So we’ve got a liar, a racist, and an attempted rapist. What about you… Lockjaw? That can’t be your real name.” Murray had turned his attention back to the 50 year old, who had been first to answer him. He looked back at his notes, finding only the phrase “deed poll user” and “nonexistent history.”
“It is, I swear! And I can tell you, you don’t have anything on me! I just patrolled and stopped fights, that’s all I did! Believe me! Please!”
“Perhaps. But you can still answer my questions. Some general ones here. Where did your gear come from? Are they confiscations or personal ownership?”
“Both.” Daggart, who was still fumbling around trying to upright himself, provided an answer. “I had an old Webley that my great grandad used in the war, kept it up in the attic til now. Fern got an AR-15 into the country, fucked if I know how, but it’s in his house.” Fern attempted to kick Daggart for that especially compromising information, but his foot simply impacted an old rusty lawnmower, provoking a shout of pain. Murray noted that down, any source of weaponry was useful.
“Right. The vests, you had them standard issue so they must be Hekatian built.” Again, nods. “Now, be honest with me, or I’ll follow through with some of my promises to the resistance. What is your stated purpose as collaborators? What do they say is the job description?
“We handle foot patrols of the camp and some street patrols, help them build defenses. Some of us are assigned to infiltrate the terrorist groups, but I haven’t seen any of them in a while.” That was slightly alarming to Murray, he made sure to jot it down.
“What have you been told about their long term goals? Do you know why they’re here? Higgins you’re banned from answering this question.” Higgins, still stuck on the floor, attempted to open his mouth, only for Ahmed to provide yet another kick to keep him quiet.
“It’s about, they want to take us to the stars! We’re gonna become interstellar! That’s way better than we are now!” Lockjaw seemed dazzled by the concept as he spoke.
“Alternatively, we could just, I don’t know, kick these arseholes out and steal their shit, and then become interstellar by ourselves? Seems like a better option to me than prostrating yourself to their rule.” Murray gave them time to mull that over, before sipping from his tea. When was the last time he’d had tea? Probably at the airbase before they set off. It wasn’t perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but it was more than enough for him.
“Listen, it’s time for the real question. “What is so important to you that you needed to join the enemy? There’s thousands of people out here in the resistance. Many of them are kids. Kids! They’re fighting against the Hekatians with anything they can get their hands on! That’s true bravery, and what are you doing? Aiding them!”
“No! I… if you were in my situation, you’d… either they win, and I survive, or we win, and I survive! It’s… there’s no other option man!” Daggart attempted to justify his actions.
“They tried the kapos, after the war, the ones who’d led their own people into the gas chambers. Lotta people who were “just following orders”, too. Hell, the Norwegians brought back the death penalty for Quisling himself. The way we’re going, if we win we’re gonna have a purge to rival Stalin, and I doubt anyone in the world is gonna stop us. You think we’d let you get off the hook for assisting in this?” Ahmed spoke up, the first time he’d said anything in a while.
For once the prisoners were silent, having realised their extremely grave predicament. Murray replaced their ear defenders and exiting the shed, before Ahmed locked it again. At the same time, Sid left the garage, now wearing a cooking apron, stained with blood, over his combat jacket. He waved towards Murray, who jogged through the pouring rain.
“Joe’s going back on the gas immediately. I want to try and get him off this island if possible, UNCO will do a far better job thinking up questions than me.”
“Ay, I’m thinking of organising casevacs for our worst cases of injury and rotation of other SAS troopers in. If you can help me in organising that, we can make space on the boats for several prisoners. I want those collabs off this island ASAP, far more trouble than they’re worth.” Murray didn’t think highly of the idea of having to spare food and guards for a bunch of really rather useless prisoners.
“Definitely. There’s a strong faction in the Resistance who advocate just shooting on sight, and I can’t blame them at all. At least it’s Joe’s job to do this, these people threw their hat in because they wanted to be power freaks. My view is that we’re gonna be having quite a few prisons built after this is all over.” Murray and Sid both fell silent, contemplating the idea of a postwar Britain as they walked inside the house.
What would it look like? Could it ever really be the same again, after the bloodshed and damage? Murray had considered the likelihood of the people simply refusing to accept the government-in-exile upon it’s return, and as time passed it became more and more likely. The main question was, which side would he take in that issue?
On the one hand, his duty as a member of the Special Air Service was to the Queen, and by extension, to the emergency government she had given her blessing to when the invasion hit. Even if she was dead, that oath would still apply, and simply transfer to whichever monarch took the throne. And during his time with the Resistance, he’d heard talk that had left him uneasy, due to the deep change it would spell. Words of republicanism, anarchism, communism, socialism, that reminded him of what he’d heard when he’d been deployed on the ground in Syria against ISIS. A radicalisation was happening, the kind that only happened when people felt betrayed by their official government, and often led to some rather nasty conflict between the government. Murray was by no means a political radical, he’d voted for the Monster Raving Looney Party in every election he’d got a ballot for, not being very interested in voting for politicians that, in his estimate, wouldn’t damage his life. So these words were concerning to him, because they’d likely lead to the kind of upheaval that he was meant to deal with. His career was spent cleaning up the effects of radicalism.
But on the other hand… the Resistance were right to feel betrayed, and even regardless of their complaints had accepted him and his soldiers gladly. Their quarrel was with the organisations who had abandoned them, not the soldiers, as Sid had put it. They were willingly putting their lives on the line every single day in service of something, and their vision had more legitimacy based on that alone. And it wasn’t as if the Resistance were turning upon those who still thought of a return to normal, there were devout Muslims working hand in hand with Christians, self proclaimed anarchists building bombs detonated by Tories, marmite haters assisting fellow soldiers who had bad taste, and so on. It again reminded him of the Kurds, where people put aside their differences politically in the face of a common foe, and even when that foe was vanquished, they still would work happily alongside each other, in recognition that the brotherhood of humanity trumped their differences. Plus, at this point, with the Resistance likely to be battle hardened and well equipped postwar, would it even be possible to put the genie back in the bottle and expect these people to be happy?
What would he do? What could he do? Would it even matter, when the Hekatians had the capability to just obliterate his world the second it became too hard to deal with? Murray’s head was starting to spin, and he felt rather sick at the idea of finally overcoming it all, only to be instantly wiped from existence by an unpredictable threat.
“You all right mate?” It was Sid, grabbing Murray’s arm to steady him.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine, think I need something to eat.” Murray sat down in the closest chair, feeling the need to rest before he toppled over.
“Ay, makes sense. We can get you a good lunch sorted.”
“Listen, before you go, when I was in the shed, one of them, they mentioned collaborator infiltrati-” Murray was interrupted by Sid placing a hand on his (uninjured) shoulder.
“Don’t worry mate. Their infiltrators are shit. For one, they don’t know where to find the resistance. They keep knocking on random civvies doors, asking them how they join the resistance. The aliens have a total weakness at humint, if you’ll pardon the pun. Joe confirmed it to me.”
“Speaking of Joe, what did you do to him?” Sid smiled in response.
“Asked him what he knew for certain regarding our bases, gave him a map to point to the things he already knew for certain. Then I asked him where he thought our stuff might be located, and I had to start using some stuff to get him to actually think about it. Don’t worry, we’re clear, and so’s the base, thank god. Added in a few more questions about force disposition, both his and what he knew, those were especially hard to get. Len also had some tech based questions, so I had to extract a few answers from him on that.”
“I don’t know how to feel about working with a possible psychopath.”
“If I’m the first person to do dodgy stuff that you’ve met, then how long have you been in the army?”
“Point taken.”
“What’s next then?” Sid and Murray sat down in the living room, sipping what little remained in their flasks. Murray had just finished lunch, and the last throngs of sickness had long since disappeared.
“We want an evac of our prisoners, you want an evac of your wounded, I’ve sent word to Eleanor and she’s talking with UNCO about organising that asap, and texting details over. We’ll prepare a quick transport operation, shouldn’t be too hard. I’ll tag along, I assume you’ll want to as well.”
“Sounds good. Any news?”
“Eleanor says UNCO have been deliberating over targeted airstrikes. They’ve redeployed the B-2 fleet and want to start using them, on targets we designate, so long as they can be assured they’re not gonna get blown up by AA immediately. After that, they intend on progressing air strikes, doing SEAD, and generally degrading enemy capabilities until they’re weak enough to fly helicopters over. We’re also getting promised an increased supply effort.”
“You’re setting me up for bad news, I can feel it.”
“Yep. You ready?”
“Probably not.” Murray gulped down the rest of the tea, bracing himself slightly.
“They’ve informed us that the idea of an invasion into Hull is being dropped. The Resistance will be expected to take the Hull region alone, with the port as intact as possible, and then reinforcements will be deployed.”
“You’re fucking kidding me.” This went back to the issues from earlier. How could the Resistance be expected to trust their government, or the rest of the world, when they got stabbed in the back like this?
“Nope. I have no clue what they’re thinking. We’ll have full air support, and likely much heavier special forces support, but they expect us to liberate and hold Hull without a lot more professional boots on the ground.”
“God damn it.”
“Eleanor reckons it’s them hedging their bets after we told them how many guys we’re up against. They probably don’t want to launch D-Day 2.0 on a heavily occupied Hull, so instead they’re going to wait for us to bear the brunt of the fighting, kill as many of them as possible, and deploy as necessary. If we lose, they simply land somewhere in Scotland and fight south. If we win, then they have a beachhead.”
“And what do you reckon?”
“I reckon she’s right, and furthermore, that the generals don’t believe we, as in the Resistance, are valuable enough to justify excess effort to save. Our lives are not being viewed the same way as their soldier’s lives. It’s fucked frankly, because if we get crushed, then the entirety of Hull is gonna get obliterated in the process, and that’s 250,000 thousand odd people they’re gonna leave to die as a test.”
“What do we do about it then?”
“Well obviously, we have to make it evident that we are pretty valuable, and that our lives should definitely not be treated like test subjects. We can’t make a stable beachhead without them, and the only other way they can make a beachhead will result in them taking so long the second wave lands anyways, at which point we’re fucked.”
“Well yeah but, what do we do?”
“Do you want to know the dumb idea, or the really dumb idea?”
“Both.” Sid gestured to Len, who wandered over and sat down next to Sid.
“The dumb idea is that we put full effort into taking apart the weapons we’ve nicked, and rapidly reverse engineering it into something we can deploy. Furthermore, we hold back from sending our tech samples to UNCO while we do this. This isn’t too hard, in that we have the energy to run the weapons, considering the power cells we keep acquiring from their bases. With coordination across country, we could get working prototypes fast. From there, our problem is the resources to build them, but if we have the tech we can get parts off UNCO. Either that gives evidence of our effectiveness, or it gives us the necessary edge, combined with our numbers, to guarantee a win in the uprising.” Sid looked at Len after he finished talking.
“After some glances at the pistol design, and incorporating some of what we’ve already got off our plasma rifle stockpiles, I estimate, using an L85 as a base to stick parts in, we can have a working plasma rifle prototype within a month. It wouldn’t be advanced or refined, it would effectively be borrowing the parts of their weapons and sticking them elsewhere, without understanding the mechanisms of how they work, but it would be good enough. Think of it like a kid copy pasting off google for his homework. Ultimately, in this case, it doesn’t matter that we don’t understand, so long as it’s on time and in large enough numbers. An L85 derivative would help us, because it cuts down on material necessities, and it’s what our best troops are familiar with carrying.” Len picked up the final part of the conversation.
“I thought their weapons are locked to their armour, so we can’t use them?”
“They are, but the lockdown procedure leaves the internal mechanisms mostly intact, so they can be retrieved and put back to work after some repairs. It’s like that thing where the gas plug on an SA80 has a setting you can stick it on to make it useless, except it’s far more generous to repair. We’ll just strip the internals out and put them somewhere else, effectively.”
“Sounds doable to me then. What’s the really dumb one?”
“With support from local Resistance units, we launch a long distance operation to the least defended landing pod we can find, and seize it. Then we do a rapid snatch and grab on as much of their ftl tech as possible, along with anything else we can, cart it back to base ASAP. From there, that’s a watertight case as to our effectiveness as a fighting force, plus we can make clear that they’re gonna need to send troops or we’ll not be able to guarantee safety of that tech in the event of a failed city-wide uprising.”
“Sid, you’re missing one key fact.”
“What’s that?”
“We can do both.” Murray grinned as he said it, and Sid’s eyes lit up.
“See this, this is why I like having you around.”

It is a huge post. Those things sitting in my head for a very long time. So, I decided to get rid of it by writing it down. I deeply hope it won't hurt anyone's feelings. Enjoy.

(#@#@#@#@ PART I @#@#@#@#)

CREATING A CHARACTER

Name: Snow
League: HC

INTRO

Somewhere in the field of the Internet some gaming news telling a story to people there is a new (kind of) mind-blowing ARPG. The news was around me a couple of years until I tried to play this game on my laptop. Believe me or not I almost burned it. My journey begins with the "Prophecy League" (06.2016).

I started to play the PoE on Hardcore, I am playing Hardcore (HC) and I will die on Hardcore. This is only because it is impossible to play on Softcore (SC) for me. I really wanted it. I tried. During the game on SC in 10-15 minutes I am finding myself lying down on my chair, my eyes almost closed, I am so relaxed what if any minutes more and I will be sleeping. I tried many things to avoid this state of sleeping but seems I just can't do it.

Here are my flashbacks through 5200 hours of experience in the game:

ACT I (0-500 hours)
ENJOYMENT

This graphics, music… the character actually piece of trash lying in the mud. Ahahaha Get up! Take a stick and kill it. Nice. I feel alive. Gem? WTF is this?! Clearing the area I got that bastard under the camp. Wow! There are a lot of people inside. Everything is a whole new experience especially the currency system and gems. Compare to this game D3 looks outdated. It was almost the end of the Prophecy League. I spend 95% of the time in a wiki, 1% in the chat, 4% on a battlefield. Every new boss encounter is 100% RIP. Jeez, how many times I died when I figured out when to have to stay under the dome in a Dominus fight… Malachai gave me a new disease - claustrophobia. The disease will be stronger with each new boss encounter in the future. Figuring out how to zoom out the camera, because the size of my character feels like is taking 50% of the screen. In the corner blinking exclamation mark.

ACT II (500-1000 hours)
MELEE

Toughness, sword, and shield… I will crush them all! Slow, but I will. I felt this way until I got one-shot from nowhere again and again like 100 times. Trying new melee skills, learning mechanics I am with Forsaken Masters cutting my way through acts and difficulties to reach maps. Those are like a legend, it is somewhere, everybody speaks about it but no one can describe them. What is it? Maximum I knew I need to have a map device. Breach League is tough. Many RIPs wouldn’t give me to reach maps. Didn't even get "Breach Footprints Effect" MTX. I am not sure If I even knew about the challenges at that time.
Somewhere at this time, I figured out how to trade with other players. I think I spend several weeks to understand how to do it properly through the game interface. Hello poe.trade!
Still figuring out how to zoom out that camera a little bit upper. The exclamation mark in the corner still blinking the whole time.

ACT III (1000-1500 hours)
MELEE DPS WALL

Finally, since "Legacy League" I reach those maps. The one rule to get into the maps safe is - ignore fight with Malachai on Merciless difficulty. Everything good but DPS. Still playing melee with Glacial Hammer skill. I have 6k DPS in the game tooltip. By the way, I am playing with my brother. I just forgot to mention it. Most aspects of the game we are learning together. That DPS wall was up to 10k DPS. Somehow I did yellow maps. It was a maximum of my melee builds. Thirst time I tried something different - Saboteur with Vortex traps. My pillar of melee builds got cracked. I will go back and forward with melee and range builds shortly but prefer range. Oh, and of course it was Energy Shield build. In a near-future, ES will be destroyed as an "original mechanic".
The camera seems "ok"… But that exclamation mark in the corner got me. I found a way to clear it fast - just hover over the cursor on it and use the right mouse button to make it disappear. Did you know you can turn off that way buffs like annoying lightning shrines? You can turn off a shrine buff even in the labyrinth. After joining a new zone or rejoin an old one you will have it again.

ACT IV (1500-2000 hours)
DAWN OF THEORYCRAFT

With the 3.0 update, I was thunderbolted by the new content. New 5 Acts, removed difficulties, Pantheon, rebalanced Labyrinth, damage over time rework, etc. The hit was so hard what I understood I know nothing. I mean It was like 50% what you knew just went to the void and you need to start learning again. Ok. Remember when I get claustrophobia disease, yes, with new act bosses I really need a doctor. Doedre (Act 8) scared me like hell. Just imagine to find out there is a valve to click on after countless deaths… Remember I am playing only HC. To find out what is going on there I need to run from Act I to Act VIII again. My body still gets wet when starting to fight her even I don't have problems with her these days.
With new knowledge comes new tools as Path of Building, PoEDB, PoElab, PoEninja.
Suddenly that exclamation mark in the corner still blinking. I thought maybe I can put a piece of tape on the screen but found unpractical because PoE is not the only application on my computer. Ahahaha

ACT V (2500-3000 hours)
RANGE SKILLS

I have a strong conclusion about what melee = unpredictable death. So, since that time I tried to avoid it. Main time about 60-70% I spent in Path of Building and PoeTrade. Can find myself playing PoB a couple of days without touching PoE at all. SpectralTrow, FreezingPulse, Arc, PowerSiphone those skills I preferred to play. My DPS went way higher than with melee builds.
Abyss league is fun, simple, and enjoyable. Its everything I remember. Nothing too bad and nothing fancy either. Can't tell the same about the Betrayal League and Delve. I like to have overpowered Eighnar at my side on maps, and 100% non-RNG craft on my flasks. But that’s it. Delve. Khm… the day I wouldn't be pushed to do it you will don't see me there anymore. Kind of fun but in my humble opinion, it should be reworked somehow. I enjoy it but something missing, can't tell what exactly.
Overall I am on peak of my fun with this game even after so many hours in it. Still learning something new, planning new builds. Making my hideout second time. I like it when people appreciate hard work. When we are doing Forsaken Masters missions or I just trade with someone they surely say something good about my HO. Small thing but you feel a little better each time.
Sometimes I am still thinking about what my character still to close to me. Any hacks to lift the camera up? Eh… Maybe someday I will see a miracle…

ACT VI (3000-4000 hours)
THE END OF MULTIPLAYER

Blizzard in the mud of shame with their Blizzcon because they just realized what their community is PC gamers. Soon or later we will have the Betrayal League which destroys last string to the multiplayer experience, for me at least. But why? I realized it later maybe a couple of leagues after. "LFM" is key. We did the master's missions together with my brother and others. Just write a message in the chat and you will have a whole group in a minute. The most exciting experience I had with Zana missions where a group should go to the map. OMG, I was laughing and crying so hard at that time. 90% of those missions someone dies. Even me. Once we took a mission to the unique map Underground River. We reached the boss's room. Three wolfs bosses were waiting for us. Go? Yea! Go go go! Things went differently than we expected them to be. We finished one wolf but at the same time, we started to panic. Everyone is running around and trying to escape. A finishing blow to one guy makes the rest of us panic so hard. We all trying to open portals at the same time. No one can escape because portals are opening here and there, but one escaped. Two disconnected. I found myself accidentally destroying all portal scrolls. Still running from wolfs I run out of flasks and they killed me. Just a couple seconds after I realized what I could quit the game and save the character, but didn't have that option in my head in a panic mode. Ahahahaha… Jeez! I was really laughing. Overall you could see another builds in an action. I had fun, but everything went to the void with the Betrayal league. Since the 3.5 I will never have a single party. Can't play with brother either. The clusterf**k of effects make it impossible to play even with one player. You see nothing.
I remember we did the Incursion and the Delve missions too. But it has gone with Betrayal too. Speaking about the Incursion League it was the only league I fully enjoyed, stayed until the end of the league, and had 36 challenges completed (Thank you for help Seulgi_Red_Velvet =)). Maybe because that beautiful voice of Alva kept me… Who knows…

ACT VII (4000-4500 hours)
A LITTLE TIME

Despite all critics to the Synthesis League, I like the whole idea and it should go to the core. Still like music from there. I use it in my HO. But of course without the "craft" part. I tried it for one or two days and just ignored it completely. Build a map then run it. Simple and fun.
The Legion League seems enjoyable as Synthesis. Like the idea of incubators. I was busy at that time, and had a little time to play but enjoyed every moment I had with both of them.

ACT VIII (4500-4600 hours)
REAL-LIFE

I wish I had time for the Blight League too. Same as for Legion I played a couple of builds. That's it. First tried out a bow skill. Still can't make to work any of them. I mean completely even in PoB it looks worse than my early melee builds.
The most fun and enjoy it was the Exilecon. OMG, I wish there will be an overhaul to UI. Finally, the miracle is here - the camera zoomed out. Still need waiting for PoE 2 though. But that exclamation mark makes me crazy.

ACT IX (4700-5000 hours)
DARKNESS

Since so many hours of experience, the Metamorph League felt just like routine. It is a nice league but nothing new to me. Had 6 builds so far. All of them died of course.
With the Delirium League, I played one or two weeks then quit. As an HC player, I felt the hard push to the SC league from the gameplay. There is no way to play the Delirium League at HC. It is madness. Especially endgame encounter. You are going to an arena to 100% die. Plus I should run like crazy to keep up with that fog. It seems fun but I tired of it very fast.
The exclamation mark. I swear I can write a book "! and Me". Even when I don't play I feel like it is still blinking somewhere in a corner of my eye…

ACT X (5000-5200 hours)
BURNED OUT

Wow! GGG is a generator of surprises. The tower defense league, now the garden. Ahaha. I definitely like those ideas. It is really fun to play especially now when I have a wide range of crafting affixes. It would be nice to make some tweaks for a better experience but overall I like this league. But why I burned out. It is because of "craft". I will explain it a little be later.

ENDGAME (the end of era of the flashbacks)

So, as you can see I am just a regular player. In recent leagues, I played on SSF HC. My builds something between Queen69 and Zizaran.
Online games are a big part of my life. How to describe it. I live here and there at the same time. I have friends here and there. I have a double life. In this world and in a second. Every time it is to hard manage even if I am single. How those heroes live a double life so easy…. pfff… movies…ahahaha But serious I like to play, but know when to stop =)
With all my love to the game and to the GGG's team I want to give my humble opinion on some things in the game . Here it is…

(#@#@#@#@ PART II @#@#@#@#)

[LEAGUES AND FAIRNESS]

The challenges are not fair in my opinion. For SC and HC they are the same, but why!? As I see it in terms of difficulty and time-consuming - HC SSF > HC > SC SSF > SC. Why the person who spent playing 8 hours per week with no risk at all (loose couple points of experience is not a risk, that is why almost all SC builds are glass cannon) receive an equal prize as the person who spent 40 hours per week with risk to the loose character and all crafted items on him.
I understand what not everyone wants to play on HC and not everyone has a lot of time to play either. It would be nice to separate graphically the SC challenges icon from the HC icon at least. For example, if you start your journey on the SC those challenges you can achieve only on the SC. And if you will start a new character on the HC the others can see in chat what those challenges definitely from SC. You also can't achieve them on HC as you have progress on the SC. Maybe it would be wise to give gamers to reset them if they decide to make them in another league. But anyway I feel rewards should be different too.
As the PoE, a PvE oriented game I think the community should have one enemy and work on a plan to destroy it together. But it feels like HC vs SC vs Developers. HC players hate SC, SC hate HC, and both HC and SC fight with developers. Every league the same. After reading Reddit you don't want to play. Just imagine with PoE 2 community will be divided even more. PoE I HC & SC vs PoE II HC & SC, which, of course, will make more headaches for everyone. Hard to say, but I wish it will not happens.
If add a serious PvP to the game we will see toxicity on another level. The most beautiful community I have ever seen in the GuildWars 2, because there is one server (with tricks but still one), one story, one enemy, group events which made to help adventures to each other. Yes, there is PvP but it made the way it is not harming the community. It is separate from the PvE world.
Just think about it. Maybe there is a solution to bring everything to the whole one thing. For example, one hybrid league from SC and HC where if any character dies he has a chance to lose some items on death also looses 5 levels. Have a penalty to level experience until he gets those 5 levels back. The last 5 points put into the skills tree are blocked. The character can die 3 times like this. On 4th death, he goes to the void. It is possible to extend those lives through the game content or challenges.

[GAMBLING AND CRAFT]

I really wanted to cut this part about the craft. I rewrote it many times what I wouldn't hurt anyone. But decided to keep it. I want to give my and only my personal humble opinion and feelings about it. Also, I like the craft in one or another way and I have all my respect to the team who is working on it but I wish it would change a little through the time later.

We can craft 6 affixes on a white item. 3 prefixes and 3 suffixes. Each affix has a tier and each tier has a range of numbers. I want to find out how much time I am happy with craft and how much I don't. Also, don't want to make a full research which will take a huge amount of time. So, I will simplify it to the point where I can definitely answer to my question.

The Luck. (link)
From WiKi - "…The English noun luck appears comparatively late, during the 1480s, as a loan from Low German, Dutch or Frisian luk, a short form of gelucke (Middle High German gelücke). Compare to old Slavic word lukyj (лукый) - appointed by destiny and old Russian luchaj (лучаи) - destiny, fortune. It likely entered English as a gambling term, and the context of gambling remains detectable in the word's connotations; luck is a way of understanding a personal chance event. Luck has three aspects: 1. Luck is good or bad. 2. Luck is the result of chance. 3. Luck applies to a sentient being…"
So, in our situation luck is a result of chance.

One affix. Let's craft only one affix on an item. I am looking for special affix mode. I will choose resistance on the body armor for example. It is about a 15% chance to get it. When I am rolling the mode I have a 15% chance to have it and 85% don't of course. In terms of luck, I am 15% of the time lucky and 85% of time unlucky. Let's "lucky" equal "Positive Emotion time" and "unlucky" equal "Negative Emotion time" respectively.

RNG (Random Number Generator) (link)
From WiKi - "…A random number generator (RNG) is a device that generates a sequence of numbers or symbols that cannot be reasonably predicted better than by a random chance… …Random number generators have applications in gambling, statistical sampling, computer simulation, cryptography, completely randomized design, and other areas where producing an unpredictable result is desirable…"
The RNG generates modes/numbers in one diapason in this case which is known as one layer of RNG.

Slot machine. (link)
From WiKi - "…A slot machine… is a gambling machine that creates a game of chance for its customers… Its standard layout features a screen displaying three or more reels that "spin" when the game is activated. Some modern slot machines still include a lever as a skeuomorphic design trait to trigger play. However, the mechanics of early machines have since been superseded by random number generators—most are now operated using push-buttons and touchscreens…. Slot machines include one or more currency detectors that validate the form of payment, whether coin, cash, voucher, or token. The machine pays off according to the pattern of symbols displayed when the reels stop "spinning"…. "

Six affixes. Six rows of RNG layers. With the Chaos Orb, I can roll all of them at the same time on the item. I will be paid off according to the pattern of affixes. What is the payment? Desirable affixes of course.

I am not a mathematician but I am sure how I feel when I am crafting. It is exactly 15% of the time fun and 85% of the frustration.

What is Gambling Disorder? (link)
A long time ago I worked with a man whose daughter had an issue with gambling. He worked hard 12 hours a day 6 days a week. She loses all money in gambling and every time she took credit from a bank and the bank was giving her money each time. Even if her father was begging all banks do not give her credit. Then after she couldn't pay the bank was taking money from her father. It was in a circle like 1 year on my eyes. Have you ever seen the face of a man with emptiness in his eyes who is realized he is working for nothing? I saw. You just don't have any words to say to him at this moment.

All leagues except one I quit earlier because of craft. For example, in this league, I quit when I tried to make in an str helmet 3 blue and 1 red socket. Simple right? Not quite. Even using the crafting bench with guaranteed blue sockets I end up with 4 blue or 2 blue and 2 red…. I lost sanity after I spent near 900 chromatics for this helmet in a couple of minutes. I farmed those for days.
Also, I had something around only 5 builds which had 6-link crafted or found by myself… 5200 hours btw. And still no mirror either, such a waste of currency (it doesn't deserve the reserved place in the currency tab).

I do not know what the crafting system is fine. I definitely like craft in the Last Epoch. The game is a mix of PoE and Diablo III. All affixes as a material. You can find them as shards or destroy an item to receive those affixes (there is some chance that you don't receive them all, but some of them). Crafted items have instability. The more you apply affixes the more you have a chance to fracture it. There are 3 levels of fracture. Minor Fracture: the item is locked, you can't apply affixes to it. Damaging Fracture: Each affix is randomly reduced by 1-5 tiers and the item is locked. Destructive Fracture: All affixes are removed and the item is locked. It is possible to see those fracture' chances and damage as you apply affixes. I clearly control what happened next, the item will be destroyed or I will add another tier to an affix. By the way, there are 7 tires of each affix. T1-T5 it is possible to craft, T6-T7 only find in the endgame. There are runes and glyphs which helps to manipulate a crafting result. Each item can have only 2 prefixes and 2 affixes for now. I broke many items but I have never felt rage, frustration, or any negative emotions.
How do I feel when I am crafting with such a method? It is exactly 90% of the fun and 10% of the frustration.

Thankfully the links and sockets will be gone in PoE 2. The most negative I felt because of those. I believe it is possible to build a beautiful crafting system without such a gambling element. It is fine to fight a hard enemy but it is a frustration to fight with affixes on an item.

[COMPLEXITY AND USER INTERFACE]

I like challenging games. They make me alive. It seems In PoE the complexity of the UI is core feature or developers can't/won't see as it is. I believe what complexity through the user interface (UI) is a bad design. There are several examples:
The popping out windows under the game cursor happens every league. It's become a pattern. Such mechanics is unacceptable.
Prophecy - in the middle of a battle here it comes the window "Prophecy Complete". It is blocking the view of what is going on with my character.
Delve - after an encounter is complete the cart becomes active even there are many enemies still attacking the character or after-death effects happen. It makes me accidentally click on it which opens window which blocks my view.
Metamorph - the Octavius appearing every time under my cursor during a battle and make it click by mistake which opens the window that, yep, blocks my view.
The Alva/Zana/Tane/Jun/Cassia are active if you fighting near which again makes it accidentally click on them which leading for unexpected things to happen.
Also, "move only" is not as intended and misleading. On "move only" I somehow: open every crate, chest, doors, activate league content, literally interact with every debris if it is destroyable, use portals, interact with NPCs, etc. Why I can't just "move only" and don't interact with everything possible to click on?
The UI should help the user on one side and the game itself is hard to play on another.
It would be nice if I have the ability to interact with everything above I said through [alt]+[click]. Just this possibility resolves all those issues with unexpected clicking in the past and in the future. For prophecies move that banner to the right down corner or anywhere you find it convenient.

Exclamation mark or quest mark or whatever you call it. I wish this is the last part of this. Act 10. You are going to the lair of the Kitava passing by two whole zones which have no waypoints with the second intension to kill it in mind. Before the entrance, there are two gods, brothers executioners willingly waiting to help you. At this right moment, you receive hell blinking exclamation mark telling - You need to kill the Kitava. Me: Oh really?! I thought this is a tea party and we would drink tea discussing the situation in the Wraeclast.
But seriously, I wish I would have an opportunity to turn off this exclamation mark.

Health/Mana/Flask/Abilities bar UI feels old. I have a 4k 34" UltraWide monitor. My table is bigger than usual in a market with 80cm(31.5 inches) of deepness. About 50cm distance between my eyes and the monitor. I don't care what are everyone says you need to sit at least 1 meter from the monitor. In reality, almost no one sits like this. So, from this perspective, I can't track my health/mana/es/flasks/cd abilities and especially negative attributes(bleed, poison, curse, etc) as they are completely in a different area at the top of the screen. I remember there RaizQT was complaining about it on a video. It is really hard to move your eyes from the most left corner to the most right corner then to the most top of the screen and at the same time, you need to see what is going on in the middle of the screen…. All ARPG keeping it in the middle of the screen at the bottom side. It doesn't matter for them what screen you have it will be the same experience which not a case in PoE.
It would be a better experience if you will make this bar in the bottom middle of the screen like others do. Chat will move to the left bottom corner and no longer overlap the stash tab scroll bar. The right bottom corner you can use for banners, temporary messages.
Also, the less your eyes looking up the better it is for them. "…Placing the screen so that your eyes are in slight down-gaze may help with eye dryness and irritation, as the eyelids will be slightly lower and covering the surface of the eye…" (link)

Overall the UI is incredibly huge on my screen(text, icons, etc.), it is even overlapping itself in some areas. The text doesn't have length restrictions. For example, my screen length about 80 cm, but 20 cm of it is taking the map mode description - "Area has patches of Shocked Ground which increase Damage taken by 00%". And it is not the longest one but takes 1/4 of my screen. To hide it is not a solution at all because I need it. The Challenge messages on another level. If you failed or achieved it some of them can appear crossing the whole UI from the right corner to the most left corner of the screen.
Would it be nice if it was somehow reworked? I wish there will be a new fresh and scaling UI in the PoE 2. Maybe it is possible to use icons instead of text which can reduce the length of it? The same is for monster mods, I wish there we had icons rather the several lines of text.

GrimmDawn
LastEpoch
Diablo III
Path of Exile
[DESIGN AND GAMEPLAY]

Honestly, I don't know what to start it. Let's say the graphic of the game is a big part that keeps me playing. I like it when everything on ultra so I can enjoy the original design. It's kind of dark-theme game but some MTX brake this darkness and the game itself feels more unicorny.
Maybe I will start with towns and camps. They are claustrophobically small. The only one I wouldn't touch it's the very first camp in Act I. How to say it. Some places are too small what you can't even walk without accidentally click on someone/something. For example, Act X, on the pier when I walk from my portal to the stash I will definitely click on someone because there is almost no free space for my cursor. Would be nice to have a feel of the deepness of the Wraeclast. It is really hard to explain. In D3 in the first village' inn is the size of the Sarn Encampment in the PoE. In the D3 you can have a strong feeling of the biggest world around, also you can say when you under the ground or above, you can see what in the village people can leave in some houses. There is even an inn! Not just a place wherein very tight space only needed for NPC which are giving quest or selling some stuff, where is no homes, nothing that gives you a clue what someone can live here. The Delve on a picture shows you are delving deeper down in the ground, but in reality, it just feels like endless horizontal tunnels. In D3 and LastEpoch it feels like the whole world with its very strong story, big towns, villages, etc. In PoE, it feels like islands of just different content from different dimensions. The same is for the storyline. I tried to read every quest, every piece of text from Act I to the Epilogue like three times. Still have no idea what is going on there. What am I doing here? It is just many pieces of text. I apologize if I hurt the writer's feelings. I didn't mean it. I just can't understand what is going on. Maybe a problem with me? But I clearly have understood the stories from D3 and LastEpoch…
How would be beautiful to have bigger towns, camps, encampments, even bigger some zones itself?
I wish we had way less debris, crates, chest on the ground. In many places, there is a horrible amount of it under feet. Debris gives you to get stacked every couple seconds in something. In my dream, there are no more than one or two chests in the entire zone. But I am ok with destroyable debris btw.

After 5000 hours the Acts and maps are kind of boring, just a little because I am doing the same content repeatedly again and again. Just imagine if we had some zone generated skins like wintesummefall/day/night/rain/storm/etc. It would be a whole new generated experience.

It is hard to understand for me some things. Why I can't visit a friend's hideout but can see everyone in town? Why I receive a book with skill points rather than directly to my skill tree like after you kill Kitava in Act 10? Why it is possible to see the enemy behind the doowall and an enemy can see you too (In D3 and LastEpoch you can't see an enemy through the walls and doors)?

In my humble opinion, the Silver Flask should be deleted from the game. It forces to click on it every 4 second whole time, I mean all-time like all time. Like you open PoE and start click on it and finish only when you close the game. Of course, you don't do it in town but still. Without this flask, the character feels slow. No matter how much speed I have I will have more with the flask. Maybe it is possible to solve it in another way. What if a character had a restriction to the maximum speed. Lets set the maximum to 40. So, we will have a nice boost with Silver Flask in the early game and we can throw it away in the end game because it would be possible to reach the max speed on gear.

Sound. I am in love with music and sounds in PoE. I never turned it off. But two things bothering me. One is following me for years. It is annoying the sound of the Shrines especially lightning one. No matter how many times it was changed, it is still annoying on an impossible level. For those who has same issue like me, you can undo the buff by clicking on its icon with the right click of the mouse. The second sound came recently. It is the sound of the character's feet. When you enter the first camp it sounds like you in the stabling. The stomp of feet is incredibly annoying and it sounds like walking horses. The more horror comes when you play for the witch which is barefoot and has the same sound. I also noticed what this sound doesn't change if you walking on snow, grass, shore, wood, etc. It is just one constant sound. It is also the element that can't give you the deepness of the gameplay if you doing it wrong. You see a character walk on snow but your brain tells you it is somewhere else because you don't hear that exact sound of stepping in on the snow. For example, in the LastEpoch if the character' one foot on snow and the other on the clear ground you hear two different sounds at the same right moment they step on a specific place. I wish it would be fixed someday.

Lootfilter. I am using only a standard one and don't want to use someone's. I want my own like in GrimDawn. Is it an impossible feature? Just imagine the new players don't even know what it is and see those hundreds of useless white items on a screen. I played like this for about 500 hours. Can't explain the experience. Frustrated? Horrible?
PoE doesn't give an opportunity to discover many things in the game. I am still don't know what exact type of damage mobs do. In theory everyone from the Vaal area doing chaos+phys? Undead - pure chaos? Spiders - pure chaos? Ghosts - lightening? How the holy cow I could understand it without leaving the game and third party programs or sites/wiki. The game has a perfect character to explain to us the types of damages monsters do at least beasts. Einhar! For example, you have an Einhar' book. It is empty at first but as you doing his missions he gives you pages. Each page gives you an explanation of some mobs damage (spider, crab, dog, monkey, bear, etc.).
Would be nice for Niko to explains fossils and regions there you can find them. Jun could tell us where the heck we can put those bastards for reward we want. So we can get rid of those cheat sheets. Zana can explain to us damages and defenses of bosses on the maps…

[HEALTH AND COMPETITION. LADDEEVENTS]

I like the idea of the Racing but the realization hurts my health. The racing is not about who is first can kill Sirius. It is about who can sit longer on a chair without food, drink, toilet, sleep. Also, it is only for gamers who don't have a work. Racers are almost not sleeping in the first couple of days. They show this to the young auditory which makes it worse. It is important to sleep properly. In this state, the race harms people's health and have inequality between gamers who has a life beyond the game and who doesn't. A couple of times I fell asleep in the chair in the position of playing the game. My brain just turned off and my hands were on the keyboard and mouse. Of course, the character was dead. This racing pushes people to don't sleep for a long period of time.
"…There are several potentially bad outcomes that are associated with inadequate sleep. Sleep influences the immune system, memory consolidation, attention, hunger, mood, response time, and many other body functions…" (link)
In a sport, we have a lot of examples of how it can be done. For example, running 100 meters distance. We have 1000 challengers but we don't need to have 1000 lines of tracks for them. We have time. You can measure it. It would be nice if in racing we finish a zone and it records time what we are finished. For example The Twilight Strand - 2min38sec. The coast - 4:24, The Mud Flats - 5:36……The Lower Prison - 11:39…..The Cavern of Anger - 17:16…. Act I finished in 19 minutes 57 seconds. The count working for each character separately. The final estimation will be made in two/three weeks. (depends on the race) [1st place - Queen69 finished the race in 11 days 7 hours 35 minutes 17 seconds]. The races can be longer without harm to the health and equal to every gamer.

Ladder. What is the point of the end game? Loot? Kill the end boss 1000 times? level 100? 36-40 challenges? Theorycrafting? No matter you choose I believe ladder should be equal for everyone even if gamer likes to do only Delve content or only Maps or Ignoring League content entirely. Long time I didn't understand how to follow the ladder. Where is it? How to find it. Who won a prize? Which place you are? Where are those races advertisements come from? I knew about them only after they finished only.
It would be nice if the position on the ladder leaning on a points system. You can get points from different encounters. Did you kill Shaper? Get 10 points for it. Atziri - 15p, Uber Atziri - 20p, Elder, Sirius, Guardians, Delve, Masters, League content, Uber Labyrinth, Challenges, etc. Everything gives you points. Of course on character death in the HC, you will lose them or maybe only part of it. On SC you loose like 10% of your points.
I wish we have ingame Ladder. Not on some site, not on the forum, not on YouTube, not on Reddit. Just ingame window where I can see my current position even if it is not the top 10. In D3 and LastEpoch the ladder currently ingame. And it would be nice to have the same window for upcoming events.

[BUG REPORTS AND REVIEW]

With all my respect and love towards GGG I barely want to report bugs and here is why.
I have to put too much effort into a simple bug report. Run a command in the game, receive some number and save it then go to the forum but before opening a topic and look if there is no one posted this bug yet. Then open topic, describe steps to repeat this bug. For screenshots, you need to register an account on an image share site. Then you upload it there. Copy the link. After you go back to your post and put the link in it because you cannot in 2020 to upload images into the forum. And then… then you receive nothing. Was my report valuable? Did you read my bug report? Any "thank you" for the free QA work I have done? Issue resolved? Anybody home? You leave me with emptiness and what my work was for nothing, not even an automated reply what you received my bug report. There is a full-time job - Quality Assurance Specialist. Yes, it is black box manual testing, still, people have a full-time job and receive money for it. And if I report a bug I receive the void. Just a simple "thank you" would be enough. I mean I had an issue and needed support but ended up writing a bug report. The best support I have ever seen it is in the World of Warcraft back in 2008 (I played then a lot). You have an issue. You can report a bug with no leaving the game at all with just a couple of steps. If you need to resolve it right now, you summon a GM and together trying to find out how to fix it in the game chat. You don't leave the game. With all "hello dear", "thank you", "would you", "could you", "have a nice day", etc. Twelve years later I still have a strong feeling I can rely on their support at any time.
Why people bring some bugs to the Reddit because it is more convenient. Make reviews possible in the game itself. Maybe I would write it there instead of Reddit. Gamers complaining in the Reddit because there is no other convenient place to do.
Also, I think it would be better to know from what kind of league people complaining about something. HC, SC, SSF HC, SSF SC? Because it can be an issue for HC but absolutely fine for SC.
So, I will take this opportunity to write a very small bug report. The bug comes from the first or second patch in this league. If I have the game minimized for 30 min the game crashes when I am trying to return to it. It doesn't happen if 15 min passed.

(#@#@#@#@ HAPPY END @#@#@#@#)

At the end of this post I realized I lost my sanity…
But you know I think everything happens for a reason, maybe during the waiting for PoE 2, I will learn a new profession and find a good job because I feel with what I currently have I will be living on a street soon ahahahah….

Sincerely,
Pavel B.

P.S. Now I know the limit of the post. It is 40000 characters. Sadly the original text was bigger.
P.S.S. Was my post valuable?

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Ancient Strategy 31

FULL DISCLOSURE: I am a severely mentally ill Atheist Sam Harris fan. I have limited attention span. I enjoyed reading FREE WILL because it was really short and easy to read. I have a problem with verbosity. I love words. I apologize in advance for the length of this post. Please bear with me.

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REAL IMMORTALITY

Give this to the lawyers.

The CULT of DROID Ken - The STUDY of Eastern CULTS by Western Thinkers - RESPECT for the PLACEBO EFFECT

DEVIL'S ADVOCATE - In DEFENSE of Shirley MacClaine. A PUBLIC EDUCATIONAL SCIENTIFIC CRITICAL DISCUSSION about BENEVOLENT MIND CONTROL, POSITIVE AFFIRMATIONS and COLORFUL SUBLIMINAL KALEIDOSCOPE VIDEOS.

[Humanity Fucks You] #6: CCT 2 and the Fenrir Suits in Action

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Their Finest Hour, Episode 4

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