Context: You’ve been so overworked that nightmares are commonplace for you. One night, you are suffering from a rather nasty nightmare when a dream demon suddenly appears?!
Words: 951
Monetization: It’s perfectly ok to monetize and record any of my scripts, you can change pronouns and stuff around too! Just please remember to credit me! However, YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO PAYWALL MY SCRIPTS!
Notes: Intermediate Script!
A/N: I’ve been in an awful slump for a while… hopefully I’ll get back on track soon!
[My Script Hub] [Nyan’s Sound Effects Drive]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
[ambient noise. Up to interpretation]
“Hello…? Hello….?”
“This dream is so chaotic… it’s like it was designed to overwhelm the senses.”
“Thankfully, I’ve seen dreams like this before.”
“Now, where are they…? They must be suffering.”
[rustling]
“... Hm…?”
“Oh, there’s the host.”
[echoey footsteps]
“You don’t look so good.”
[taps on the shoulder]
“Hey… hey… wakey wakey.”
“Or well– as awake you can be in this state.”
[rustling]
“... Hello.”
“Are you alright…? This dream around us… it’s so chaotic. I don’t blame you for sitting on the floor and covering your eyes and ears.”
[pause]
“Who am I?”
“Ah, right. Humans don’t see me very often.”
[clears throat]
“... I’m Somni. I’m a dream demon. I roam this world through the dreams of mortals.”
[pause]
“Relax. I’m not here to steal your soul or something like that. Us dream demons work differently.”
“... We eat dreams, you see… we aren’t harmful at all.”
[pause]
“That’s right. When you wake up and can’t remember your dream… that’s our doing.”
[pause]
“... Then why did I suddenly appear to you?”
“Hmmmm… well…”
[long pause]
“... You’ve been on my radar for a while now.”
“You dream so often… so sometimes, I stop by for a snack.”
“But… lately, all your dreams have been nightmares.”
“I don’t like the taste of nightmares… they’re so bitter. Or sour, depending on what the contents of it are. This nightmare… it’s so chaotic that I struggle to even pick out a single flavor.”
“And since I eat your dreams so often… I feel like the least I can do is help you through this nightmare.”
[pause]
“... Perhaps that is uncharacteristically nice of a dream demon. I wouldn’t know; I don’t talk to my kind very much. Sometimes, we’ll even fight over a particularly sweet dream.”
“Still… I wish to help you.”
[pause]
“Do I need any other motivation?”
“Well… then again, I suppose it would be difficult to trust a dream demon.”
“Hmm…”
[pause]
“In that case… my motivation is to eat your dream once your nightmare calms down and returns to a normal dream.”
“That way… not only will I get a nice meal… but you won’t even remember me once you wake up.”
[pause]
“How could I help?”
“Oh, you’d be surprised, little human.”
[rustling]
“There we go.”
[pause]
“Hm? Are you embarrassed about having your head on my lap?”
“Don’t worry. You won’t remember it in the morning, after all.”
“Now then…”
[they put their hands over your ears]
[all ambient noise is drowned out]
[pause]
“... You can hear me loud and clear, right…? Even though I have my hands over your ears?”
[pause]
“Don’t worry… I’m communicating directly with your mind.”
“I won’t do anything bad. You can relax.”
“Now then… close your eyes. Breathe deeply. In and out.”
[a few deep breaths]
“... Feeling calmer?”
“Good, good…”
“Now then… imagine a blanket. A nice, fluffy one. Maybe the blanket that’s over your physical self right now.”
[fabric rustles]
“There we go… and now we have a blanket in the dream world.”
“Ah-ah-ah! Don’t open your eyes. Keep them closed.”
[fabric rustles]
“There… all comfy under the blanket, right?”
[pause]
“Mhm, I bet it is.”
“Now… tell me about something nice in your life.”
“No matter how little it is, I want to hear it.”
[pause]
“Must you doubt my intentions at every turn?”
“Well, if I must have a motivation other than helping you relax… then it’s because I want to hear about the waking world.”
“Us dream demons very rarely get to see the waking world. We can only see it if we make a contract with a host. And it has been millions of years since the last time a mortal made a contract with a dream demon.”
“After all, what can we offer?”
“Compared to the powers of other demons, we dream demons barely have any powers at all. If anything… we’d be a burden.”
“So please… tell me every little thing. I want to hear about all the things that make you happy.”
“It doesn’t have to be big. Whatever comes to mind.”
[long pause]
“That sounds lovely.”
[long pause]
“Oh my… I didn’t know that could happen.”
[long pause]
“No… everything I know about the waking world comes from dreams I’ve traversed, which means that my knowledge is seldom reliable.”
[pause]
“Maybe it gets boring. But you get to see lots of things by traveling the Dream Highway.”
[pause]
“Sorry, I can’t tell you anymore. Your mortal mind could not comprehend it, and I’m trying to get you to relax, aren’t I?”
“Alright…”
[they slowly run their fingers through your hair]
“... Does that feel nice? I think humans like this sensation… the feeling of someone’s fingers combing their hair.”
“Is it the repetitive motion…? The feeling of comfort?”
“Humans are such strange creatures… you fascinate me at every turn.”
[pause]
“Yes… your dream has calmed down quite a lot.”
“It’s no longer quite as noisy, hm?”
“Come on, take a few more deep breaths.”
[deep breaths]
“There we go… well done.”
“You’re a lot calmer now… and your dream has settled.”
[pause]
“I’m glad I could help.”
“And… you can repay me by letting me eat your dream.”
[pause]
“Don’t worry, it’s painless… like I said, the only side effect is that you won’t remember anything once you wake up.”
“And it’s almost morning, anyways… your dream is going to come to an end soon.”
“So…”
[kiss]
[pause]
[voice slowly fading away]
“Yes, that’s how we eat dreams.”
“A kiss on the forehead. Some more aggressive dream demons bite, but they’re few and far between. We’re docile by nature.”
[pause]
“You’re welcome.”
“I’ll see you again… in another dream.”
[voice fades away]
~END~
Thanks for reading!

Sometimes a band gets so big that they somehow outshine themselves. They reach a point in their career where it does not matter if they release a new album or not; fans just want to see them tour. No one gave a damn that Led Zeppelin had not released a new album since the 1970’s; everyone just wanted to see them play again at the O2 Arena in 2007. When The Who played the Super Bowl halftime show in 2010 they had only released one new album in 28 years, and no one cared. And no one cares that Guns & Roses aren’t making new music. They still packed arenas to see how much cake Axl had packed into himself.
We’re going to take a dive into a blues power trio from down south who have zero need to release any new music, since their recording career stretches back over five decades. They had amazing and groundbreaking success in the ‘70s, the ‘80s, and the ‘90s before hitting the max level. Instead of playing to win, they now play for fun. Their sexually charged lyrics and videos inspired generations of teens to both dress better and worry about their fly. And you can bet that their fuzzy, bluesy tight sound had a huge impact on our very own desert dwellers.
It’s time for us to take a walk with That Little Ol’ Band from Texas. This week’s featured artist is the legendary ZZ TOP
About Them
The Power Trio is a tested and true format for a rock band. Lots of examples come to mind: Cream. Rush. The Police. Biffy Clyro. King Buffalo. Them Crooked Vultures. (Wait a sec. Just three members? Clearly, not everything is bigger in Texas.)
There is a member joke there somewhere, but I just can’t get it to come. Hmm. Perhaps it will come if you play with it a bit.
Hey! Stop that. Get your mind out of the gutter.
ZZ Top’s original and founding member was William Frederick Gibbons. Born in Houston in 1949, the front man was originally a drummer but, after studying with Tito Puente in New York City, picked up the guitar at age 13. His dad was a musician in show business, which allowed Billy to get an insider’s view of the industry. By the late ‘60s, he had been in and founded a number of bands and had even befriended the late great James Marshall Hendrix. One of his first bands, a psychedelic/art house band called The Moving Sidewalks, toured with the Jimi Hendrix Experience. This meant that Gibbons was actually mentored by Snagglepuss himself. They also toured with The Doors, where Gibbons saw the legendary self-destructive band somehow manage to rise above conflict and make music every night. The Moving Sidewalks generated a following all of its own with a couple of hit songs, and things seemed to be headed in the right direction.
Things were going absolutely great until bassist Don Summers and keyboard player Tom Moore were drafted into the army to fight in Vietnam. Don't you just love the ‘60s?
Gibbons and drummer Dan Mitchell added a new keyboard player, Lanier Greg, and tried to make another run at it. But the chemistry was all wrong. Gibbons rechristened the band as ZZ Top (an homage to BB King), and declared that he wanted more of a straight up rock approach than the art-house kaleidoscopic sound.
Gibbons, Mitchell, and Greg (isn’t it weird when last names are also first names too?) recorded the single Salt Lick in 1969. This generated a bunch of interest and a recording contract. Decisions over the direction of the band ensued and it quickly became clear that Mitchell and Greg did not agree with Gibbons’ hard rock approach. That ended up being a poor life decision for them, but a great one for a couple of other guys.
Clearly, Gibbons needed a new rhythm section.
Fortunately, he found a package deal.
Dusty Hill and Frank Beard - also both born in 1949 - had been playing together on the Dallas-Houston-Fort Worth circuit in a number of bands, including The Warlocks, The Cellar Dwellers, and a fake cover band called The Zombies. Both the Duster and the (then ironically) beardless Beard also heard the siren call of rock and roll. Hill was classically trained and was an accomplished cello player before moving to his signature bass. Frank ‘Rube’ Beard appears to have been born with drumsticks in his hands (which I imagine might have been uncomfortable for his mom).
Beard joined the band first, along with bassist Billy Ethridge, who had played with Stevie Ray Vaughn. Ethridge balked at signing a contract and so joined Mitchell and Greg on the list of ZZ Top’s former members. Their lineup was set. Hill and Beard anchored the band in a rock-solid, tight, bluesy fashion. Gibbons meshed perfectly with this duo, and his Hendrix-inspired guitar work was on another level. Hill provided backing vocals, and Gibbons’ low throaty growl was an impressive counterpoint to his soaring fretwork. The talent was all there; now they just needed to record some music.
But success was not instantaneous, not by a long shot.
Their first album - appropriately called ZZ Top’s First Album - gives insight into who the band were to become. In this 1971 release, you can hear their raw sound. The record peaked at 201 on the charts, and had only one single - (Somebody Else Been) Shaking Your Tree. It did give them material to go out and tour. The boys gelled on that tour and went back into the studio with renewed energy, and emerged with 1972’s Rio Grande Mud. The disc was a step forward in refining their sound. The album almost cracked the top 100, and the only single - Francine - went all the way to number 69.
Nice.
But the band knew that their third album, Tres Hombres, was something special. It is the epitome of Southern Rock: bluesy, fast paced, sexy, and irreverent, it is just over half an hour of pure magic. And while the album went gold and peaked at number 8 on the charts and is worth your time, it was one particular single that rocketed them to stardom. You know it and you love it, and a-how-how-how-how: La Grange. It is still in heavy rotation on classic rock stations today. And why not? The song is an absolute banger of boogie woogie blues, written about a visit to a whorehouse. What’s not to love?
La Grange propelled them to popularity. Tours sold out. Venues got bigger and bigger. 1975’s follow up album, Fandango!, was half live album (with some covers) and half new material - like an EP with bonus tracks. They covered the Elvis Presley classic Jailhouse Rock, Willie Dixon’s Mellow Down Easy, and John Lee Hooker’s Long Distance Boogie. The boys had rock and blues chops, and had 5 years of touring experience. These were bold statements that cemented their musicality as well as honoring their roots. But side two of the disc had another track that you’ve come to love. You ain’t asking for much: You’re just lookin’ for some Tush. Tush was the perfect sexually charged follow up to ensure that they were not one-hit wonders. It was written in a ten-minute spasm of creativity at a sound check, and has gone on to be one of their most popular songs.
While Tush topped the charts, ZZ Top went back into the studio to record their full length follow up, 1976’s Tejas. The name of the album means ‘friends’ in the Indigenous Caddo language, and was the basis for the name of the state. You know what that means? It means that the name of the state is ‘Friends’. Just like the ‘90s sitcom. Don’t mess with Friends. Anyways, this was an album of experimentation for the band, and unlike its predecessor it came out half baked at best. Billy Gibbons has called it a transition album. What actually happened is the band transitioned into a hiatus from touring and recording, taking some significant time off. They had recorded five albums in six years and spent virtually all their time on the road. The latest effort was just not up to their standards and was a step back. It also completed their recording contract.
What was the solution to this burn out?
Facial hair of course.
The boys took a few years off before landing another recording contract, this time with Warner. Over those months, both Gibbons and Hill grew what would become their signature long ‘Texas Goatee’ beards. Frank Beard did not grow a beard (though he did finally succumb to peer pressure from his bandmates in 2013, and his is much more neatly trimmed). So while they were resting/relaxing/getting their groove back/aligning their chakras or whatever, they also started to reinvent their signature sound as the world moved towards a decade of legendary excess.
The first step on this reinvention journey was 1979’s Degüello. The title literally means ‘decapitation’ but idiomatically refers to a fight to the death. Clearly, the band decided to tackle their transition head on. The album was not as successful as Tres Hombres or Fandango!, but it was not the flop that Tejas was. It did spawn a couple of singles - I Thank You (which was a cover) and the signature hit Cheap Sunglasses. Both are staples at ZZ Top concerts to this day. Degüello was quickly followed up in 1981 by the album El Loco. This was really the first time ZZ Top incorporated a synthesizer into their sound. As you know, the synth was THE new wave sound of the 1980s. Gods help us, keytars were once popular. But Gibbons, Hill, and Beard did not abandon their edge. The single Pearl Necklace was an immensely popular innuendo laced tune from this album. And no, I will not explain what a pearl necklace is to you.
Ask your mom.
Over the course of their first seven albums, ZZ Top had steadily grown in popularity and become a truly extraordinary live band. More than a decade of touring together meant that they had not just cut their teeth. They had found the Tooth Fairy, beaten her senseless, and added fangs to their jaws. They were ready to tackle whatever came their way.
Their huge breakthrough coincided with the birth of music videos and MTV. 1983’s Eliminator was an absolute monster of an album. ZZ Top were everywhere. They completely embraced the Music Video as a medium and became pioneers in this new genre. They branded their band with a 1933 fire-engine red Ford Coupe, which was on the cover of the album. They even had a signature hand gesture that they used as the car went by. The car belonged to Billy Gibbons and embodied his hot rod obsessions. It was featured in the videos for Gimme All Your Lovin’, Sharp Dressed Man, and Legs. Other singles from the album included Got me Under Pressure and TV Dinners. Eliminator is still the band’s most successful album. They were at the absolute height of their popularity with a massive audience. No doubt the 10-year-old Joshua Michael Homme watched those videos on a small screen in the California desert, little knowing that he would one day collaborate with Gibbons.
Seeking to capitalize on the popularity, the band went back into the studio and released Afterburner in 1985. It featured the signature hot rod on the cover and spawned two more singles - Sleeping Bag and Velcro Fly. Afterburner was not an innovative album by any stretch of the imagination. It simply built on the success of Eliminator and replicated the sound. If you blended the two albums together it would be very difficult for a novice fan to guess which song came from which disc. But hell, when you release the most popular album of your career and are earning millions of dollars for that sound, it is not time to mess with success. Or with Texas. Or with Friends (though Ross was a pain in the ass, IMHO).
That desire to not screw up a good thing was also evident in their next release, the retrospective re-release Six Pack. This was a great way to earn some bucks with a simple repackaging of existing tracks - I’m looking at you, K-Tel… - and introducing them to another generation of fans. This was not a bad thing at all - you gotta get that green whenever you can, because fame can be fleeting.
ZZ Top closed out the decade by going Back to the Future. Literally. They appeared in the third installment of the Michael J. Fox trilogy as the olde-timey house band (complete with rotating guitars) in the saloon scene. The single and signature song from the movie, Doubleback, appeared on their 1990 release Recycler. The album spawned two more singles: My Head’s in Mississippi and Concrete and Steel. Recycler was not as successful as its predecessors, but it did effectively max level the band. In the 1970’s they were a scuffling bar band that hit it big. In the 1980’s they were one of the most popular bands of the MTV generation. And in the 1990’s they achieved superstardom. They had hit the level where it truly no longer mattered if they ever released new material again. They could simply tour on their back catalogue alone and sell out stadiums.
It is clear that the band realized this as well. In the thirty years since Recycler came out, they have released five albums of new material: Antenna in 1994, Rhythmeen in 1996, XXX in 1999, Mescalero in 2003 and the critically acclaimed and Rick Rubin produced La Futura in 2012. This was equivalent to their output in their first six years.
In contrast, they have released no less than eight greatest hits albums, cover albums and live albums in the same time span. Greatest Hits came out in 1992. One Foot in the Blues was released in 1994. The massive compilation Chrome, Smoke & BBQ came out in 2003, and is a fantastic place to start if you are a new fan. Rancho Texicano was released in 2004, Live from Texas came out in 2008, and Double Down Live hit shelves in 2009. Live at Montreaux came out in 2013 and Tonite at Midnight: Live Greatest Hits from Around the World was released in 2016.
As recently as 2019, there were rumors that a new album was in the works for our Septuagenarian heroes. Lord knows the boys from Texas have nothing left to prove to anyone.
It was then that tragedy struck. Dusty Hill had to leave the band during a tour in 2021. The reason given was a hip injury. His guitar tech, Elwood Francis, filled in. Shockingly, Hill died at home at the age of 72 just five days after leaving the tour.
Fans were shocked and mourned the stalwart bassist. Per his wishes - and it seems he knew something wasn’t quite right - ZZ Top did not break up. Francis replaced Hill on bass, and the band soldiered on. In 2022, they released Raw, a soundtrack for a 2019 documentary about them. This was Hill’s final release.
You can still catch them on tour. They are going to be out there this summer, touring with Lynyrd Skynyrd, for something they are calling ‘The Sharp Dressed Simple Man’ Tour.
Go buy some tickets. Don’t miss your chance to see a truly iconic band before they are gone.
Links to QOTSA
The Reverend Billy F. Gibbons was a big part of the Lullabies to Paralyze album by our Desert Dwellers. He played guitar and provided backing vocals on Burn the Witch. He was co-lead vocalist and lead guitar on the QotSA cover of Precious and Grace, which he originally released as a ZZ Top tune on the Tres Hombres album. He also provided the guitar stylings for Like a Drug.
But the connections don't stop there. Billy sang the lead vocal track on the recent Desert Sessions tune Move Together, and he played guitar on Noses in Roses, Forever.
What may be most important to QotSA fans is that Gibbons was the first person, almost two years ago, who hinted that Queens were working on a new album.
And now we know he was right. Never doubt a Reverend.
Their Music
Salt Lick
(Somebody Else Been) Shaking your Tree
Francine
La Grange -- Live on Howard Stern
Jailhouse Rock
Tush -- a fan made video. It is not subtle.
Cheap Sunglasses
Pearl Necklace -- Live
Gimme All Your Lovin’
Sharp Dressed Man
Legs -- the ultimate makeover video
Got Me Under Pressure -- Live at Montreaux
Sleeping Bag -- Let’s go out to Egypt and check out some heads...
Velcro Fly -- also somehow in Egypt
My Head’s In Mississippi
Concrete and Steel -- vintage video
Doubleback
I Gotsta Get Paid -- from La Futura
Show Them Some Love
/zztop
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TWBS Next
-
---Esme’s perspective---
---Wednesday, 13th of September, 2682 Terran Calendar---
---Central Algeria---
“So, Mr Nasri… would you tell us about where the water comes from to irrigate these crops?” asks Ms Larch, a plump little half Denisovan woman with straight, dark hair and a limp that disqualified her from service.
She is a strong contender for the most boring woman alive… and is also my teacher.
“Of course…” smiles the tall, genial Amazigh man, in fluent (if heavily accented) standard English (as he can’t speak or understand Lallans Scots… which is fairly typical), gesturing at the fields around us “…the water comes from pipes, laid under the Mediterranean sea and Atlantic Ocean where they extend hundreds of kilometres off shore. It comes here, to the Sahara Agricultural band, and we use it to produce 45% of all Terra’s food!”
“And… could you tell us, why do the pipes need to be so long? Couldn’t the water just be collected at the coast?” asks the teacher, acting like she doesn’t already know.
The man smiles and laughs “Of course!… Mechanically, there wouldn’t be any problem with that! Ecologically, on the other hand, the problem would be that, with the enormous quantity of fresh water we need, we would be creating a huge plume of brine that would make the area around the collection point quite inhospitable to marine life… The desalination happens at the source, with only fresh water being let into the pipes and the salt being left in the ocean. The length of the pipes is necessary to… erm… what is the English word?…*snap* diffuse oversalinated water across a wide enough area not to be toxic to the marine ecosystem… Causing damage of that kind would be harmful to maintaining the habitability of our planet…”
“Fascinating, fascinating…” simpers Larch, seeming like she might have a bit of a crush on the agricultural engineer “…and, Mr Nasri…?”
“Please, call me Hassan!” smiles the good looking man.
“Well… err… Hassan, would you tell us a little about the role the Green Sahara played in the Reset?”
“I’d be honoured to!” he says, swelling with pride and turning to the class “You see, children… err… I mean… young ladies and gentlemen…” he corrects, obviously realising how ridiculous it is to refer to people almost old enough to serve as ‘children’!
He clears his throat and continues on his (obviously) heavily rehearsed spiel “…nearly a thousand years ago, back before the resurrecting of Homo Tshwane, Homo Longi, Homo Denisova or even Homo Neanderthalensis and before the creation of any uplifted or artificial sapients, when Homo sapiens were the only intelligent species living on Earth, our society experience the Industrial Revolution… which was a great thing for our technology and quality of life (generally) but not so great a thing for our planet!… By the late 21st Century, we were about to have a total collapse of Earth’s entire ecology!… It was at that time that Humanity United… Coming together to work to a solution to our dying world, we embarked on a grand project to terraform our own planet. This is known as the ‘Reset’… It took hundreds of years for us to fully undo the damage that had been done and the techniques we developed, here, were what allowed us to settle other planets so easily… The Green Sahara played three vital roles in preserving both our planet and our species: The first thing it did, was produce higher cloud cover, with the increased evaporation and transpiration happening here raising the planet’s overall humidity… This might not sound like much but, because the main problem we were facing was our planet’s increasing temperature, it helped in short term by increasing the albedo (the amount of light our planet reflects back into space). This bought us the precious time we needed to develop the technology that would rescue us from the calamity we had caused!… In medium to long term it made rebuilding the lost ice cover much easier by…”
Not really having the patience to listen (for the millionth time) to the story about how great we are for sorting out our own fuck ups, I lean in to Tommie and mutter “So it’s these guys’ fault that Stranraer is wetter than an otter’s pocket(!)”
Her whiskers swish up and down as she giggles at the joke.
“Is it just me or are you absolutely sweating your tits off out here too?” I ask.
“I’m… a little hot.” she breathes, hesitantly.
“I’ll bet! All that fur, you must be sweltering!... Is it…?”
“Ms Reid!” comes an angry voice.
“Yes, Ms Larch?” I respond, innocently.
“Is it too much to ask that you pay attention while Hassan hear is giving up his time to educate us about the history of his region?”
“No… Ms Larch…” I respond, abashed.
The rest of the class have a hearty giggle at my public shaming.
---later---
---Southwestern Scotland---
“The bitch has got it out for me!… Just ’cause she thinks I’m a ‘disruptive student’!” I grizzle, as I try and fail to skip a stone across the water toward the Man Peninsula, visible on the south horizon.
“You are a disruptive student, Mimi…” says Tommie from behind me.
I turn to stare daggers at her but find that she’s looking at her holopad.
“What’s the point in coming out hear to nature if you’re just gonna stare at your screen the whole time, Tommie?!” I challenge.
“It’s called homework, Esme(!) Not that you’d know anything about that(!)” she shoots back, coolly.
I scowl and turn back to the water.
“I just don’t really see the point of learning all this shit about history and ecology when I’m gonna be drafted soon!”
“You really want to come home with zero useful skills? Historically, it hasn’t ended well when societies have allowed there to be large numbers of unemployed people whose only talents are those related to killing folk…(!)”
“Easy for you to say… You get to stay here and raise an adorable little litter of kitten-puppy abominations-against-nature with Rex(!)” I tease.
“Actually… Mimi…” she starts, her tone serious.
I turn behind me, my eyes wide with disbelief.
“…I’ve been thinking I might try to… enlist…” she finishes, sheepishly.
I stand, frozen to the spot, for 3 long seconds, before I stride across the stony beach, my feet scattering pebbles with each footfall.
I reach the rock where she’s sitting and take her grey furred face between my hands, forcing her slitpupiled, amber eyes to meet mine.
She makes a silent whimper and folds her ears (more than normal) as I stare down at her, furiously.
“I forbid it!” I state, seething with anger.
“But…!”
“No buts, Tamsin Quinn!!!… I don’t get a choice about whether to fight… you do, but I’ll be bloody damned if I let you throw your life away for nothing!”
She stands up and bats my hands away with her paws “How is it fair that you have to fight and I don’t!?”
I give a slightly hysterical laugh as I answer “Fair?! Fair?!?!?!… Nothing about this stupid fucking War is fair!!!… Was it fair when it took my parents?! When it took your fosterdads?!… We spent our entire recorded history looking at the stars and imagining the people we could meet out there and, it turns out, to them, we’re the equivalent of the fucking xenomorphs!… On the 5th of February, 2679, fairness became an unaffordable luxury! So, you are going to thank your lucky stars that being an uplift means you don’t have to go to the same Hell that I do, you’re going to marry Rex (or maybe someone else, if things don’t work out with him) you’re going to have a million babies and, if I don’t make it back, you are gonna live my fucking share! Is that understood, Tamsin!?”
Looking extremely pained, she lets out a pathetic sob as she nods “OK, Esme…”
“Good!” I say, angrily, before pulling her into a heartfelt cuddle.
She holds me tight as I stroke my hands through the dark grey fur of her back.
I smile and joke “God, your fur is soft, Tommie!… If I make it back from the War and things don’t work out with Rex, how’s about you and me get married(?)”
She giggles as she says “We’re both straight, Mimi… Also, I’m not a muscular Neanderthal man and you aren’t a cute Canis boy!”
“So…(?!)” I grin “…did I say ‘lets get married and have wild, crazy sex every night’?”
“So your idea of marriage would be?”
“Simple(!) I go out to work and you stay home and keep the place clean, have a meal ready when I get home and then let me snuggle your fur(!)”
“It sounds like what you want is a live-in housekeeper more than a spouse(!)” she quips.
“Nah… I’d have to pay a housekeeper…(!) Plus, it’s generally considered harassment to make your employees snuggle with you(!)”
She gives a mirthful sigh as she says “You are incorrigible, Ms Reid!”
“I don’t know the meaning of the word(!)” I say (honestly) as I curl myself around her and sit her back down on the rock, cuddling her from behind now.
We look out to the south as the Sun gets low in the sky.
“I don’t only like muscly Neanderthal guys, you know…” I muse.
She snorts and answers “Oh, nooooo(!)… I’m sure you’re partial to a wide assortment of different types of man…(!) For instance, muscly Neanderthal hybrids, muscly Denisovans, muscly Denisovan hybrids and may even be persuaded to be attracted to a Sapiens or a Longi… if he was hench enough, of course(!)… I have to assume that even the most cut Tshwane would still be too skinny for your tastes.”
“Alright little Miss Only-Dates-Good-Boys(!)” I shoot back.
“Canis are fun and attentive, especially Rex!… I really don’t see the appeal of men who look like they’ve had their bodies carved out of marble and I don’t have the slightest inclination to Neanderthals!” she responds, resolutely.
“You don’t feel any sort of kinship with them… being a Scot?” I ask.
She gives a mirthful frown over her shoulder and demands “Explain exactly what it is that you think us and Neanderthals have in common, Mimi!”
“Well, to me it seems like we’re both proud races of intelligent folk (with lots of red hair) who, historically, got squashed under the bootheel of a more successful competitor, trying to erase our culture and identity and assimilate us into becoming them… Do you not agree?”
“You realise that, as a Sapiens, not only does that make you the Englishwoman of that little analogy but any hybrid kids you had with your lucky husband would also be part of the process of Neanderthal assimilation?”
“You call me an Englishwoman again, Tommie, and your gonna leave me with no choice but to wash your mouth out with soap(!)” I grin.
“I’m quivering(!)” she answers, dryly.
I give her a squeeze as we sit in silence, staring at the water for a while.
“Don’t you think it’s kinda bullshit that, right now, Terra considers me to be a wee baby, doing wee baby things, but, next month, they’re gonna press a gun into my hands and say ‘off to War with you!’” I say, eventually.
“You could always volunteer for Officer Training if you’re so keen to go off and die?” points out Tommie, dryly.
“I’m not…” I correct “…just commenting on the arbitrariness of it; Midnight strikes on my birthday and I magically transform from a poor little defenceless girl into a young body, ripe to be tossed into the meatgrinder, in the government’s eyes…”
She sighs and stays silent for a long time before saying “Promise me you’ll come back, Esme…”
I look to the ground and forlornly say “You know I can’t promise that, Tommie…”
“I know… I guess I just… wish you could!”
“I mean… who knows…? We’ve had the xenos on the run since we broke the Cordon… Maybe, by the time I finish Initial Training, they’ll’ve sued for peace!”
“Yeah… maybe…” she answers, letting me know with her tone exactly how likely she thinks that is!
“Do you think, if the situation was reversed, we’d’ve been any better?” I muse, idly.
“What d’you mean?”
“Like… if we’d discovered a planet with six billion xenomorphs living on it in Victorian conditions? Do you think we’d’ve been able to be all friendly with them, ignoring how absolutely lethal they were and how horrifying they looked to us.”
She shakes her head and answers “I think we’d’ve probably nuked the planet from orbit with someone saying ‘it’s the only way to be sure’… I am quite tickled by the image of a xenomorph wearing a tophat and reaching under his tailcoat to pull a pocketwatch out of his vestjacket, though!”
I giggle and the conversation ceases for another long moment.
Then my alarm sounds, letting me know it’s 6:59 and we’ve only got 40mins to make it back to the home before sunset and 1:01hrs to beat the curfew.
“Alright, Missus… you wanna call a capsule or shall we walk(?)”
“Oh, aye(!)” she smirks over her shoulder “Let’s trudge 50km home, over hill and glen(!)”
“Strathluce isn’t a glen, Tommie… It’s a strath!… Honestly, I thought you were meant to be the canny brainbox(!)” I say, smugly.
“We live in a glen, Mimi!” she retorts, calling a capsule on her holo.
“Glen Ryan doesn’t count! It’s all urbanised…”
We argue goodnaturedly, laughing until the capsule arrives to take us home.
---
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When I load in by clicking continue, I move my character in 3rd person and it does a T-pose. After a couple of seconds of moving around it returns to normal. Is this a normal occurence due to animations taking a while to load, and can this be fixed with faster storage? Thanks.
Mod List:
#Mod_Priority,#Mod_Status,#Mod_Name
"0000","+","DLC: HearthFires"
"0001","+","DLC: Dragonborn"
"0002","+","DLC: Dawnguard"
"0003","+","Project New Reign - Nemesis Unlimited Behavior Engine"
"0004","+","One Click Power Attack Modified"
"0005","+","Address Library for SKSE Plugins"
"0006","+","SkyUI"
"0007","+","MCM Helper"
"0008","+","Dynamic Animation Replacer"
"0009","+","Animation Motion Revolution"
"0010","+","IFrame Generator RE"
"0011","+","TrueHUD - HUD Additions"
"0012","+","Payload Interpreter"
"0013","+","Attack MCO-DXP"
"0014","+","SCAR - Skyrim Combos AI Revolution"
"0015","+","Enhanced Enemy AI SE"
"0016","+","No Recoil"
"0017","+","Vanguard"
"0018","+","Precision"
"0019","+","True Directional Movement - Modernized Third Person Gameplay"
"0020","+","Valhalla Combat"
"0021","+","Raven's Awareness - AC-Valhalla inspired TrueHud color preset"
"0022","+","SkyHUD"
"0023","+","NORDIC UI - Interface Overhaul"
"0024","+","Nordic...ish - A TrueHUD preset based on Nordic UI"
"0025","+","Behavior Data Injector"
"0026","+","MCO Universal Support"
"0027","+","Dodge MCO-DXP"
"0028","+","Alternate Conversation Camera"
"0029","+","Comprehensive First Person Animation Overhaul - CFPAO"
"0030","+","PapyrusUtil SE - Modders Scripting Utility Functions"
"0031","+","Customizable Camera"
"0032","+","RaceMenu"
"0033","+","XP32 Maximum Skeleton Special Extended"
"0034","+","EVG Conditional Idles"
"0035","+","EVG Animation Variance"
"0036","+","JContainers SE"
"0037","+","VioLens - A Killmove Mod SE"
"0038","+","Better Jumping SE"
"0039","+","Jump Behavior Overhaul SE"
"0040","+","Simple Dual Sheath"
"0041","+","Immersive Equipment Displays"
"0042","+","Cloaks of Skyrim SSE"
"0043","+","Cloaks Of Skyrim Retextured SE"
"0044","+","Cloaks Of Skyrim Retextured SE Female Mesh Patch"
"0045","+","HDT-SMP (Skinned Mesh Physics)"
"0046","+","Artesian Cloaks of Skyrim"
"0047","+","SSE Engine Fixes (skse64 plugin)"
"0048","+","Static Mesh Improvement Mod"
"0049","+","Ordinator - Perks of Skyrim"
"0050","+","Andromeda - Unique Standing Stones of Skyrim"
"0051","+","Apocalypse - Magic of Skyrim"
"0052","+","Apocalypse - Ordinator Compatibility Patch"
"0053","+","Convenient Horses"
"0054","+","Relationship Dialogue Overhaul - RDO SE"
"0055","+","Noble Skyrim Mod HD-2K"
"0056","+","NSM - SMIM Patch"
"0057","+","RUSTIC CLOTHING - Special Edition"
"0058","+","High Poly Project"
"0059","+","aMidianBorn Book of Silence SE"
"0060","+","aMidianBorn Blades Armor SSE Patch"
"0061","+","Believable weapons"
"0062","+","Interesting NPCs SE (3DNPC)"
"0063","+","Citizens of Tamriel SE"
"0064","+","Water for ENB"
"0065","+","Terre's 4K Fur Textures for CoverKhajiits"
"0066","+","CoverKhajiits - Face Textures 2K SE"
"0067","+","Male Dragonic Argonian Textures 4k - 2k (SOS and Vanilla)"
"0068","+","Caliente's Beautiful Bodies Enhancer -CBBE-"
"0069","+","Female Dragonic Argonian Textures 4k - 2k(CBBE and UNP)"
"0070","+","Expressive Facegen Morphs SE"
"0071","+","EFM SE - Racemenu plugin"
"0072","+","Expressive Facial Animation -Male Edition-"
"0073","+","Expressive Facial Animation -Female Edition-"
"0074","+","High Poly Vanilla Hair"
"0075","+","Vanilla hair remake"
"0076","+","Beards of Power"
"0077","+","Tempered Skins for Males - Dressed Version"
"0078","+","Tempered Skins for Females CBBE"
"0079","+","High Poly Head SE"
"0080","+","Lux"
"0081","+","Lux - Via"
"0082","+","Obsidian Weathers and Seasons"
"0083","+","Alternate Start - Live Another Life - SSE"
"0084","+","Andromeda Convenient Horses Patch SSE"
"0085","+","Mead Keg Backpack SE"
"0086","+","Immersive Sounds - Compendium"
"0087","+","Sound Record Distributor"
"0088","+","Audio Overhaul - Immersive Sounds Integration (AOS - ISC Compatibility Patch)"
"0089","+","Audio Overhaul for Skyrim (4.1.2)"
"0090","+","Acoustic Space Improvement Fixes"
"0091","+","JK's Skyrim"
"0092","+","JK's Skyrim No Lights Patch"
"0093","+","Simply Bigger Trees SE"
"0094","+","Landscape Fixes For Grass Mods"
"0095","+","Bears of the North"
"0096","+","Bellyaches Animal and Creature Pack"
"0097","+","No Spinning Death Animation SE"
"0098","+","Better Dialogue Controls"
"0099","+","Better MessageBox Controls"
"0100","+","No snow under the roof"
"0101","+","The Choice is Yours"
"0102","+","YOT - Your Own Thoughts SE"
"0103","+","RS Children Overhaul"
"0104","+","Wet and Cold SE"
"0105","+","Footprints"
"0106","+","Immersive Laundry"
"0107","+","Missives"
"0108","+","The Notice Board SE"
"0109","+","Falskaar"
"0110","+","Falskaar - Addons and Patches"
"0111","+","The Gray Cowl of Nocturnal SE"
"0112","+","The Gray Cowl of Nocturnal SE - Addons and Patches"
"0113","+","The Gray Cowl of Nocturnal SSE - HD pack"
"0114","+","Bruma and Other Patches for Convenient Horses"
"0115","+","Beyond Skyrim - Assets"
"0116","+","Ordinator Beyond Skyrim Patch"
"0117","+","Obsidian Weathers And Seasons - Beyond Skyrim Bruma Patch"
"0118","+","Unofficial Skyrim Special Edition Patch"
"0119","+","Wearable Lanterns"
"0120","+","Chesko's Wearable Lanterns - SE and VR Patch"
"0121","+","Enhanced Blood Textures"
"0122","+","Nordic Snow 3.4.3"
"0123","+","Reverb Interior Sounds Expansion"
"0124","+","Beyond Skyrim - DLC Integration Patch 1.6.2"
"0125","+","Beyond Skyrim - Bruma"
"0126","+","Embers XD"
"0127","+","Bears of the North Patches"
"0128","+","No snow under the roof - Bug fixes v1.4"
"0129","+","JK's Skyrim - No Snow Under the Roof"
"0130","+","Bug Fixes SSE"
"0131","+","RS Children Patch Compendium"
"0132","+","JK's Skyrim - Landscape Fixes for Grass Mods Patch"
"0133","+","Patches for Arthmoor's Town add-ons"
"0134","+","Interesting NPCs SE - Alternative Locations - Flagged ESL"
"0135","+","Skyrim Priority SE AE - skse plugin"
"0136","+","powerofthree's Tweaks"
"0137","+","eFPS - Exterior FPS boost"
"0138","+","eFPS - Official Patch Hub"
"0139","+","SSE Fixes"
"0140","+","Landscapes - Cathedral Concept"
"0141","+","Blended Roads"
"0142","+","ADXP I MCO elden rim moveset collection (SCAR)"
"0143","+","King's Pawns Armor Pack"
"0144","+","Immersive Armors"
"0145","+","Immersive Armours - SSE CBBE BodySlide"
"0146","+","Immersive Armors Retexture and Mesh Fixes SE"
"0147","+","Immersive Armors Retexture CBBE"
"0148","+","Lore Weapon Expansion SE"
"0149","+","Wet and Cold - HD textures SE"
"0150","+","Wet and Cold SSE HDT-SMP"
"0151","+","Regal Paladin Armor"
"0152","+","Immersive Interactions - Animated Actions"
"0153","+","Vanargand Animations - Sneak idle walk and run"
"0154","+","Vanargand Animations - Sneak Archery"
"0155","+","NPC Animation Remix (DAR)"
"0156","+","A Quality World Map"
"0157","+","Carriage and Ferry Travel Overhaul (Formerly Complete Fast Travel Overhaul)"
"0158","+","CFTO - Covered Carriages add-on"
"0159","+","CFTO - JK's Skyrim Patch"
"0160","+","powerofthree's Papyrus Extender"
"0161","+","50 percent More Perk Points"
"0162","+","Artifacts - The Ice Blade of the Monarch [SSE]"
"0163","+","Opulent Thieves Guild"
"0164","+","Opulent Thieves Guild ESL Patch"
"0165","+","No Thieves Guild Grind"
"0166","+","Immersive Jewelry SSE"
"0167","+","Rich Skyrim Merchants"
"0168","+","Opulent Thieves Guild Patch Collection"
"0169","+","Honed Metal -NPC Crafting and Enchanting Services-"
"0170","+","HonedMetal.ini - Ordinator"
"0171","+","Honed Metal Revoiced"
"0172","+","ARTFUL DODGER - Dynamic Pickpocket Cap"
"0173","+","Immersive Jewelry 1.06a Update"
"0174","+","Vindsvept Music Replacer"
"0175","+","Jawbone's Immersive Armor Fixes"
"0176","+","Immersive Equipment Displays - Mura Presets"
"0177","+","IED - Weapons Repositioner"
"0178","+","Improved Alternate Conversation Camera"
"0179","+","Armor of Intrigue SE"
"0180","+","The Lily - Armour Mashup"
"0181","+","The Lily - SSE CBBE BodySlide"
"0182","+","Skyrim Landscape and Water Fixes"
"0183","+","Lightened Skyrim"
"0184","+","Crash Logger SSE AE VR - PDB support"
"0185","+","Faster HDT-SMP"
"0186","+","Carriage and Ferry Travel Overhaul - Companions Radiant Quest FIx SSE"
"0187","+","Carriage and Ferry Travel Overhaul - Fixes and Winterhold"
"0188","+","Opulent Thieves Guild - FPS Fix"
"0189","+","INIGO"
"0190","+","High-Poly Inigo Replacer"
"0191","+","Ebonblade War Axe SE"
"0192","+","BodySlide and Outfit Studio"
"0193","+","Modern Horse Camera"
"0194","+","Better Third Person Selection - BTPS"
"0195","+","Better Third Person Selection - Nordic UI Activation Button Replacer"
"0196","+","Weapon Styles - Draw-Sheathe animations"
"0197","+","Smooth Random Sprint Animation"
"0198","+","Legacy of the Dragonborn"
"0199","+","Legacy of the Dragonborn - Interesting NPCs Patch"
"0200","+","Legacy of the Dragonborn Patches (Official)"

This post is an overview of the blackmail tactics used to control most of the influential people and governments around the world. Obviously I cannot cover everything in a single post, so as with my previous posts I highly encourage you to research further yourself. All sources and links are at the bottom of the post. An understanding of what trauma-based mind control programming (MKULTRA/MONARCH) is, and how it works, is again necessary to understanding much of this. My other posts here:

• Deep Underground Military Bases
  
• Alice in Wonderland Programming
  
• Overview of the Mind Control Running our World
  

The world is run on blackmail, mind control, and shame.
There exist many collections of videotapes of 'high-up' people engaging in some of the worst, sickest things imaginable. Drugs, torture, pedophilia, and murder are common themes to these videos. These tapes are in the hands of many different people, groups, and especially intelligence agencies. 'Honey-trap' operations are constantly being run to gather compromising and incriminating evidence on people of importance. Child slaves will be used to compromise people on video. Global leaders are often covertly videotaped doing perverted things with sex slaves sent to them by intelligence agencies, the Illuminati, or other groups, and this is then leveraged. Rape and murder of a child (forced or not), one of the most repulsive things possible, is many times filmed to ensure future compliance.
"Back in 1966, Rothstein became the first police detective assigned to investigate the prostitution industry. Almost immediately he discovered an underground sexual blackmail operation that compromised politicians with child prostitutes. ‘Human Compromise’ is what he labelled the honey-trap process. Rothstein and his colleagues found that approximately 70 percent of top US Government leaders were compromised in this way. Rothstein said, the CIA conducted the human compromise operation, while the FBI was tasked with covering up any leaks."

• Fiona Barnett [6]

"One of the things I found out over the last ten years of studying governments and listening to intelligence and counter-intelligence is that those in government are sexually compromised, and their sexual secrets are collected and then they are promoted into governments and into judiciaries and into all the positions of importance. Paedophilia is the preferred dirt as it is easily photographed, easily presented in a range of media, immensely shameful, and the public demands your resignation."

• Greg Hallett [12]

"Paul Bonacci, one of the victim-witnesses in the Franklin affair, also clearly stated Larry King used him in blackmail operations in New York and Washington. The latter was in connection with the activities of a close associate of Larry King, Craig Spence, who was involved in a prostitution ring consisting of underaged boys that were supplied to Washington's upper class, which went right up to the White House."

• The Reality of Protected Child Abuse Networks [11]

"Sexually bent politicians in denial of their sexuality to the public are a threat to their own country and policies. They are easily setup, photographed, politically bribed, toppled, and supported in the destruction of their country. This method of altering a country’s policies is epidemic and now endemic to politics."

• Greg Hallett [12]

"Bob (Hope) was politically connected and knew how to lure people in and insure they would work for him. He invited them to his parties and dangled various kinds of illegal or immoral perversions in their faces. Once their perversions were uncovered, he could blackmail or control them. That is how Bob worked. Bob was very good at this. I watched him do it to people over and over. He lured them in, detected their weaknesses, then used that knowledge in his favor, for his connections, and ultimately for his personal gain."

• Brice Taylor [5]

These blackmail 'practices' are often used in conjunction with trauma-based mind control. This mind control is an integral component of, and is deeply intertwined with child trafficking, sex slavery, Satanic ritual abuse, and many other horrific crimes. Many of the children used for blackmail are programmed, and many of the people being blackmailed (including (sometimes future) politicians, leaders, presidents, etc.) are also programmed themselves.
"My personal belief, based on my experiences, is that over the years, more leaders were under mind control."

• Brice Taylor [5]

"Fritz Springmeier notes that 'It is a standard tactic of the Illuminati, their New World Order and its various branches to use fear and blackmail to bring people into line.' Cheryl Beck had a 'sexy Sadie' program that was used to blackmail government and military people as a child prostitute seductress. Cathy O’Brien’s daughter Kelly was 'being prostituted to the CIA for blackmail purposes.' Svali notes that using child prostitutes to blackmail political leadership outside of the Illuminati was very common."

• Veronica Swift [10]

"Beryl-Green said Epstein knew about MKULTRA. He was into mind-controlling victims and satanic ritual abuse (SRA). Epstein was into DNA mixing, human cloning and he knew about New World Order plans."

• Hope Beryl-Green [17]

"This dirty game has been honed to a fine art, which is a standard feature of the Illuminati/intelligence groups. The CIA term for blackmail is an 'OK FIX.' When they use a person’s past sins to force someone to do something they refer to this as 'biographic leverage.' Any weak point in a person can and will be exploited. Sexual entrapment for blackmail is referred to as a 'HONEY TRAP'. Black widow alters are being trained and sent out for this purpose. In order to blackmail, or threaten, you have to have something to threaten the person with. Men are frequently entrapped by sexual behavior which is criminal. Sometimes they are also entrapped by murder. The Monarch slave will be allowed to have children so that they can be blackmailed into complying to save the children or grandchildren. The Monarch slave in turn may be used to blackmail others. Certain alters are trained in this. A Monarch Beta model is highly trained in seduction. Many politicians and ministers are operating under blackmail today. The extent that blackmail is being used by the NWO would boggle people’s minds. Porn films are taken of the Monarch victims, so that they can be used to blackmail the victim. Monarch victims are forced to commit ritual murders which are photographed and then used to blackmail the mind-controlled victim."

• Fritz Springmeier [15]

Intelligence agencies all over the world utilize blackmail, routinely employing and exploiting it as much as possible. It is an extremely important 'tool' of theirs. Operations are done to gather the incriminating evidence.
"Other 'neutralisations' verge on the bizarre. An individual who must remain nameless for a variety of reasons - but whose name is known to this writer - underwent an experience that is both horrific and chilling. I shall call this individual 'Mr. X' or, simply, 'X'. Mr. X was a leader of one of the largest CIA-backed Contra groups. He recently testified before the US Senate Intelligence Committee. Formerly, X was a senior executive in a South American subsidiary of a leading US soft drinks corporation. During his Senate testimony, he denied any knowledge of CIA involvement in the narcotics trade, adding that condoning such activity would have been foreign to his way of life. Not so, says Tatum. Mr. X had been recruited into the CIA by then-Director William Casey, with the assistance of Oliver North. In 1990, when Nicaraguan leader Daniel Ortega announced there would be 'free elections', X was ecstatic. He began jostling for position and asked President Bush to ensure he be given a prominent position in the new government - in return for his years of toil at the behest of the CIA and the Enterprise. The pressure came in a form that Bush could not ignore. Failure to help his friend would result in X's intimate knowledge of Bush's involvement in the dope trade being made public. His threat left Bush with a sour taste. A Pegasus team was assigned to 'neutralise' him in early 1990. Mr. X, Tatum states, 'fancied himself a lover of women. Tall, large-breasted blondes were his favourite. It was determined that, if effectively neutralised, [X] could be an asset. Therefore, it was decided that intimidation would be used to control [X].' They chose to use the drug Scopolamine, which also went by the nickname 'Burundanga' or 'the Voodoo drug'. The drug is extracted from the pods of a flowering shrub that grows in remote regions of South America. In its processed, powdered form, Scopolamine is 'void of smell, void of taste'. When properly administered 'it causes absolute obedience' without this being 'observable by others'. Importantly, the target will not recall any of the events that occurred during the period they were under the spell of the drug. Tatum states that X was invited to spend a relaxing weekend at a luxury hotel as a guest of his friend George Bush. His host for the weekend was a trusted 18-year veteran field-intelligence officer. The evening started with cocktails and was followed by a fine meal. ''Nothing but the best' were the orders.' Following the meal, he was ushered into the suite of a 'blonde bombshell' supplied by the CIA. Mr. X had already ingested a dose of Burundanga during pre-dinner cocktails. X was gallant with the blonde as they both moved into the bedroom where video cameras were already set up in one corner. In short order, the blonde had X standing naked in front of her and began to indulge his desires. All the while, the video cameras whirred. Slowly stripping off, the 'blonde' revealed his manhood in all its glory. Mr. X was instructed to reciprocate the favour and perform fellatio. He obliged, his intimate activities recorded at 24 frames a second on videotape. Tatum says the male prostitute was hired from a bar in New York and killed that same evening. Two weeks later, X - wholly unaware of the events of that evening - was visited in Nicaragua. He was presented with a copy of the video footage, along with instructions. Tatum says that X can never allow that video to be seen: 'Not only does it reveal his homosexuality, but it also reveals his bestiality and satanic worship rituals.' As frame after frame flicked by, X reportedly wept, forced to watch himself kill his homosexual 'lover' and then engage in the most grisly cannabalistic ritual imaginable. Neutralised, Mr. X became a leading member of the Nicaraguan government a few short weeks later."

• The Pegasus File [13]

"Check out the FBI records on Scarlett: What was his original HOOK that got him so deeply embedded into UK Illuminati culture? He murdered the nanny of Lord Lucan in the 1970's. Lucan wasn't actually involved. Scarlett got it wrong. He was under mind control at the time. How we all laughed on his training sessions when we heard that one. Not funny, really. We were all in the same boat. Each had something terrible attached to us, in our past. That is all part and parcel of the Illuminati contract. Young people forced under mind control to commit murder when young and then later on, picked up by British Intelligence to be used and abused as they wished - as loyal servants of the British Crown. One can only hope that by exposing these HOOKS, that some sort of amnesty can prevail. If these people are freed from the demonic Illuminati contract by exposing their HOOKS - one can only hope that they will come forward as a sizeable and influential body of political and public figures, in order to put an end to it. Here's hoping. Check out Rimington's hook to see what sort of mind ran MI5 for so long. It's a game called 'mafia' and it is ALL about blackmail."

• Ex MI6 [2]

"...He had previously signed off on Epstein’s 'sweetheart deal' because Epstein 'had belonged to intelligence.' Acosta, then serving as US attorney for Southern Florida, had also been told by unspecified figures at the time that he needed to give Epstein a lenient sentence because of his links to 'intelligence.'"

• Whitney Webb [4]

"Detective Rothstein found that the CIA were behind a blackmail operation in which child prostitutes were used to honey-trap and compromise politicians, military brass, top businessmen, and key government officials. Rothstein, who arrested the key Watergate perpetrator, said Watergate solely concerned this human compromise racket, and specifically was an attempt to obtain a list of compromised pedophile VIPs and their proclivities that was held at the Democratic National Headquarters."

• Fiona Barnett [8]

"Michael Aquino was in the military. He had top Pentagon clearances. He was a pedophile. He was a Satanist. He founded the Temple of Set. And he was a close friend of Anton LaVey. The two of them were very active in ritualistic sexual abuse. And they deferred funding from this government program to use in this experimentation on children. Where they deliberately split off the personalities of these children into multiples, so that when they're questioned or put under oath or questioned under lie detector, that unless the operator knows how to question a multiple-personality disorder, they turn up with no evidence. They used these kids to sexually compromise politicians or anyone else they wish to have control of...they were taken to be used by professional pedophiles. People that have the money to buy what they want, take the kids wherever they want...and by splitting the children’s personalities they could then train each one of the personalities to do a different function. And the rest of the personalities within that host personality would not be aware of it or remember it."

• Noreen Gosch, Johnny Gosch's mother (of the 'Franklin Boys') [1]

"Vinson also told Nick Bryant that Spence and Larry King were 'partners' and 'hooked up with the CIA', stating specifically that 'King and Spence were in business together, and their business was pedophilic blackmail.' They were transporting children all over the country. They would arrange for children to be flown into Washington, DC and also arrange for influential people in DC to be flown out to the Midwest and meet these kids. Per Vinson, Larry King had confided in him that he had clients who liked to torture and even kill children: 'King said they had clients who actually liked having sex with kids as they tortured or killed the kid. I found that totally unbelievable.' After Vinson said this to Nick Bryant, he asked Bryant later on in the interview if King’s disclosure had indeed been true. He was unaware at the time that other evidence, including witness testimony, had suggested that it was."

• Whitney Webb [4]

"According to fugitive ex-CIA officer Frank Terpil, CIA-directed sexual blackmailing operations were intensive in Washington at about the time of the Watergate scandal. One of those operations, Terpil claims, was run by his former partner, Ed Wilson. Wilson's base of operations for arranging trysts for the politically powerful was, Terpil says, Korean agent Ton Sun Park’s George Town Club. In a letter to the author, Terpil explained that ‘Historically, one of Wilson’s Agency jobs was to subvert members of both houses [of Congress] by any means necessary. Certain people could be easily coerced by living out their sexual fantasies in the flesh...A remembrance of these occasions was permanently recorded via selected cameras...The technicians in charge of filming were TSD [Technical Services Division of the CIA]...The unwitting porno stars advanced in their political careers, some of whom may still be in office.'"

• The Reality of Protected Child Abuse Networks [11]

"Intelligence and counter intelligence ‘work’, and they ‘work together’ to create scenarios that are so unbelievable that they cannot be published in the mainstream media, and if they are, they will appear like a joke. The information to blackmail a country, to blackmail its politicians, to blackmail its Prime Ministers and Presidents, to blackmail its judges and lawyers is a very serious matter."

• Greg Hallett [12]

The Illuminati and other cults also engage in the same blackmail operations. There is a huge overlap between secret societies/cults and intelligence, with top intelligence usually being run by them. All of them do this.
"I was able to have first hand access to the Jeffrey Epstein case investigation documents. According to the documents, Epstein was the head of a global fraternity related to the Shriners called The Royal Order of Jesters. This order is covered with scandals and lawsuits related to human trafficking, but they are very protected because many members of the order are high-profile political figures and businessmen. It is crazy how these people manage to operate under the radar for so many years, decades...Now you may ask how they do this? Easy...By using blackmail tactics, they manage to have Judges and Law Enforcement licking their feet. That's how Jeffery Epstein got assassinated. After he was out of the game, the whole business is run by other people. Major names are involved and many high-profile people who are all bound to the order by means of blackmail. This is particularly disturbing when you find out that the cases of Catholic priests involved in sex scandals are events organized by The Order of Jesters. They run blackmail operations with the purpose of seducing people in power...With those videos in their power, the careers and the public image of many people are in the Jester's hands. They are free to do anything, they can turn even the President of the United States into a slave."
-- "Jeffrey Epstein Post" [7]
"Illuminati 'FROG ON A LILYPAD' programming: The FROG as a paedophile - with no 'tadpole tail/tale', as in no memory of what he/she has done until they get past 40 years old. It becomes clear that so many people were forced to be paedophiles and to abuse their children - only to wake up to all of this later on - post 40 years old. Then to have Stella Rimington on their doorstep with a videotape - telling them that she will send it to the police if they do not do precisely what she says. The ultimate blackmail weapons combined: A tape of you committing paedophilia - and even worse - incest with your own children. Guaranteed to 'silence' most people for life. The scope of this Illuminati blackmail project has been immense, in British society and it has to be exposed. There is safety in numbers."

• Ex MI6 [2]

"(Sue) Arrigo adds that the kids with the most smarts and/or looks, about 5% are skimmed off the top by the Luciferians in charge like the Bushes and used as either spies or corporate sex slaves or both. They’re typically pimped out on high priced loans to influential politicians as house boy and girls to ensure the puppets in Congress are happy and blackmail-able for control."

• Joachim Hagopian [14]

"The Masonic leadership of Freemasonry in a given area will have thousands of 'blackmail' files on essentially everyone of importance in their area. Upper echelon people such as judges, lawyers, and politicians are generally controlled via IRS infringements, and many of the lower echelon people are controlled through weird sexual items. This is where the Delta and Beta Monarch slaves are so helpful to the Illuminati. (This information comes from several witnesses who are informed about the blackmail files & their methods for blackmailing.)"

• Fritz Springmeier [16]

These people are already in power, and have set their system up so that nobody rises to a prominent, powerful, or influential position without being selected, extensively compromised, controllable, and usually under mind control. They are all 'in it together', and because of this they protect eachother. Most have 'insurance' on one another.
"The most common phrase associated with that one was ‘talk about the pot calling the kettle black’, meaning that each Illuminati slave had been caught on camera and from an early age – doing something terrible – as Rimington was fond of saying ‘we are all as bad as each other and all in it together.’"

• Ex MI6 [2]

"Oftentimes when I and others were prostituted to various government (New World Order) leaders, Dante had hidden cameras filming perverse sexual acts apparently for future blackmail leverage. These videos were scandalous in proportion and were usually ordered by Reagan. Dante turned the videos over to Reagan, and covertly kept copies to protect himself. Dante converted a small room of his Beverly Hills mansion into a security vault, where he kept his personal copies of the international blackmail porn tapes there. Blackmail was openly initiated to ensure that each criminal participant understood that if one fell, they all fell. Maintaining 'dirt' on each other through this Mafia-style method was seemingly the only way these criminals implementing the New World Order kept each other 'honest.'"

• Cathy O'Brien [3]

"The Watergate break-in was strictly based on one thing - the pedophile records that were being kept at the Democratic National Headquarters."

• Detective James Rothstein (NYPD, Retired) [6]

"In 1972, Rothstein arrested one of the five Watergate burglars, CIA operative Frank Sturgis. During a subsequent two-hour interrogation, Rothstein discovered the truth about Watergate (plus Sturgis’ and the CIA’s involvement in the Bay of Pigs incident, and the related assassination of JFK). Sturgis told Rothstein, the Watergate burglars sought something they nicknamed ‘The Book’ which listed the Democratic and Republican politicians who accessed child prostitutes, their sexual proclivities, the amounts they paid to rape kids, etc."

• Fiona Barnett [6]

There are certain places known for this, two famous examples being Little St. James island or Bohemian Grove (there are many, many others).
"For those of you who are interested in Bohemian Grove and the current list upon the Internet of those poor unsuspecting 'invitees' who will be pressganged into going (and subsequently blackmailed out of their minds afterwards, by the Illuminati)...the entrapment going on at Bohemian Grove is of an avaricious and esoteric nature - in relation to all of those unlucky 'invitees' who want to join this 'prestigious club' but then get videoed doing things that they wouldn't want anyone to know about - 'guests' who are then subsequently blackmailed out of their brains...and for the rest of their lives. But then that was what the Illuminati cult and their Sat B'hai contract has always been about...promising that you would get everything for nothing (if you agreed to be unquestioningly obedient to the Crown) and that you would now be part of an 'esoteric' prestigious Satanic club."

• Ex MI6 [2]

"Numerous videos are covertly produced at the supposedly secure political sex playground in northern California, Bohemian Grove. High tech undetectable cameras use fiber optics, and fish-eye lenses were in each of the elite club's numerous sexual perversion theme rooms. I was programmed and equipped to function in all rooms at Bohemian Grove in order to compromise specific government targets according to their personal perversions. 'Anything, anytime, anywhere with anyone' was my mode of operation at the Grove. My perception is that Bohemian Grove serves those ushering in the New World Order through mind control, and consists primarily of the highest Mafia and U.S. Government officials. Project Monarch mind controlled slaves were routinely abused there to fulfill the primary purpose of the club: purveying perversion. Bohemian Grove is reportedly intended to be used recreationally, providing a supposedly secure environment for politically affluent individuals to 'party' without restraint. The only business conducted there pertained to implementing the New World Order, through the proliferation of mind-control atrocities, giving the place an air of 'Masonic Secrecy'. The only room where business discussions were permitted was the small, dark lounge affectionately and appropriately referred to as the Underground. The wooden sign was carved to read: 'U.N.DERGROUND'. My purpose at the Grove was sexual in nature, and therefore my perceptions were limited to a sex slave's viewpoint. As an effective means of control to ensure undetected proliferation of their perverse indulgences, slaves such as myself were subjected to ritualistic trauma. Slaves of advancing age or with failing programming were sacrificially murdered 'at random' in the wooded grounds of Bohemian Grave, and I felt it was 'simply a matter of time until it would be me'. Rituals were held at a giant, concrete owl monument on the banks of the Russian River. These occultish sex rituals stemmed from the scientific belief that mind-controlled slaves required severe trauma to ensure compartmentalization of the memory. I witnessed the sacrificial death of a young, dark-haired victim at which time I was instructed to perform sexually 'as though my life depended upon it'. I was told, 'The next sacrifice victim could be you.' The club offered a 'Necrophilia' themed room to its members. I was so heavily drugged and programmed when used in the 'necrophilia' room, that the threat of actually 'slipping through death's door' and being sacrificed 'before I knew it' did not affect me. Other perversion theme rooms at the Bohemian Club included what I heard Ford refer to as the 'Dark Room'. When he not so cleverly said, 'Let's go to the Dark Room and see what develops,' I understood from experience that he was interested in indulging in his perverse obsession for pornography. In the Dark Room, members had sex with the same mind-controlled slave they were viewing in porn on a big screen television. There was a triangular glass display centered in a main through way where I was locked in with various trained animals, including snakes. Members walking by watched illicit sex acts of bestiality, women with women, mothers with daughters, kids with kids, or any other unlimited perverse visual display. I was once brutally assaulted by Dick Cheney in the Leather Room, which was designed like a dark, black leather-lined train berth. There was a room of shackles and tortures, black lights and strobes, an opium den, ritualistic sex altars, a chapel, group orgy rooms including poster beds, water beds, and 'kitten' houses. I was used as a 'rag doll' in the 'toy store,' and as a urinal in the 'golden arches' room. From the owl's roost to the necrophilia room, no memory of sexual abuse is as horrifying as the conversations overheard in the Underground pertaining to implementing the New World Order. I learned that perpetrators believed that controlling the masses through propaganda mind manipulation did not guarantee there would be a world left to dominate due to environmental and overpopulation problems. The solution being debated was not pollution/population control, but mass genocide of 'selected undesirables'."

• Cathy O'Brien [3]

News 'headlines' with hidden symbolic communication are also used by intelligence and other groups, many times referring to blackmail (among the many other varieties of covert operations).
"'Nuclear' is a comm used all over the world to symbolize extraordinarily explosive information, like blackmail. Which is why if we reconcile blackmail with news about nuclear, a secret truth will become clear. The two most powerful blackmailers ever? That would probably be Jeffrey Epstein and Hugh Hefner. And this is why the deaths of blackmailers like Hugh Hefner and Jeffrey Epstein both coincided with 'Nuclear Accidents':"
08/09/2019 Is Putin covering up a Nuclear disaster?

• 08/09/2019 = Russia Hides a Nuclear Accident!
• 08/10/2019 = CIA Blackmailer Epstein Dead
• 09/26/2017 = Russia Hides a Nuclear Accident!
• 09/27/2017 = CIA Blackmailer Hefner Dead

09/26/2017 Nuclear explosion kept secret by Russia
"Why are CIA blackmailers dying the day after Russia declares nuclear accidents? The reason for the -1 day in Epstein’s case is they likely died before the official day, and these comms were to give agents a heads up on the upcoming BOOM before it hits papers. In Hefners case they had to signal people to move the blackmail. The point as stated is a lot of 'nuclear' is all about blackmail. Not all of it, but a lot of it."

• "Symbolic Communication" [9]

Blackmail is a worldwide 'practice', with all countries and their governments engaging in aquiring and utilizing it to the fullest.
"Just as the 1986 Mirano scandal, the X-Dossiers contain evidence that sexual blackmail operations, whoever is running them, are not limited to the United States. In 1996, X1 reported how the same activities had been going on in Brussels."
"As the bewildered Belgians tried to make sense of what was going on, incredible rumours began circulating that Dutroux might have been protected in some way, that he had friends in high places. Pornographic videos taken from his home were said to feature prominent individuals, one a senior member of the Roman Catholic church. It almost defied belief. Who would protect a psychopath, other than people with something truly terrible to hide?...'It is quite obvious,' said Katarin de Clercq, Belgian coordinator of the pressure group End Child Prostitution Abduction and Trafficking, 'that some people were protecting Dutroux. The government tried to convince us that he was a lone serial killer and psychopath, but now we hear stories about unnamed famous personalities being involved in sex orgies and blackmail and pornographic video tapes. People feel that something is completely wrong here and we have to show we will not tolerate it.'"

• The Reality of Protected Child Abuse Networks [11]

"I was unfortunate enough to attend the IHS Templar Castle rite in 2001. Amongst the people in attendence were: J. K. Rowling. Gordon Brown. David Miliband. Stephen Daldry. Stella Rimington (she was the Dr. Mengele of the organisation, organising the torture and murder of kidnapped children). Dr. Joanne Collie. Andrew Marr (he spent most of the time naked and screaming - off his head on some form of narcotic). John Scarlett (he was so drunk/drugged up that he had very little idea of what was going on around him). The Templars had captured a large amount of people whom they called the 'snakes' i.e. slaves in a large dungeon underneath the castle. One brave person managed to set them free and the result in the neighbouring village of Mons and other places nearby, ensured that the British Army had to move in. Thus began the most incredible cover-up in recent European history. It was like WACO, Guyana. I was one of the 'slaves' taken at that castle but subsequently freed by the British Army (who also know what happened - a MASSIVE cover-up). The British Army ordered those in the Castle to come out. They then sent a tank in to bulldoze the walls. Prince Philip and Prince William were in that Castle. Both of them had murdered countless tiny children in their rites. The British Army assembled watched as both walked out with large, dark, woven potato sacks over their heads. They were then bundled into a van and driven away. The name SPUDNIKS was coined because Prince Philip and Prince William had to exit the castle with potato sacks pulled down over their heads and bodies. The British Army present at the time - may or may not have had any idea who they were but the SIS general there, certainly did. They might have managed to cover it up regarding the ordinary soldiers there but the videotapes are now on sale worldwide. The whole event had been closely monitored for blackmail purposes."

• Ex MI6 [2]

The CIA also blackmails incestual/pedophilic parents for their children to use in trauma-based mind control slave projects like MONARCH.
"My Uncle Bob, also implicated in manufacturing the porn, out of apparent desperation informed my father of a U.S. Government Defense Intelligence Agency TOP SECRET Project to which he was privy. This was Project Monarch. Project Monarch was a mind-control operation which was 'recruiting' multigenerational incest abused children with Multiple Personality Disorder for its genetic mind-control studies. I was a prime 'candidate,' a 'chosen one'. My father seized the opportunity as it would provide him immunity from prosecution."

• Cathy O'Brien [3]

"The expendables are the children of parents who were blackmailed into turning their children over to the CIA. This is all hidden by the power of the National Security Act. These are children, who have been sold by pedophile fathers, or pornographic parents. The programmers/masters program them with the expectation that they will be "thrown from the freedom train" when they get to age 30. (Freedom Train is the code word for the Monarch trauma-based mind-control. To be thrown from the Freedom Train means to be killed.) The CIA and the Illuminati are skilled at blackmailing parents to give up their children. They would watch the mail for porn. Pedophile and murderers who abuse their children are warned that they will go to prison for long lengths of time if they do not cooperate by selling their children into mind-controlled slavery. In return for the parent’s cooperation, they provide rich financial rewards to the parent(s). It’s clearly a case of 'if you don’t cooperate you lose in life big time, if you do cooperate you win big time.'"

• Fritz Springmeier [15]

Blackmail is the glue holding together all of the sick people in charge, and is the one of the top methods of control. This is the truth: blackmail, pedophilia, and mind control are how this world is really run.
"Former CIA director William Colby giving advice to John DeCamp, urging him to quit his investigations into the Franklin child abuse affair:"
"'What you have to understand, John, is that sometimes there are forces and events too big, too powerful, with so much at stake for other people or institutions, that you cannot do anything about them, no matter how evil or wrong they are and no matter how dedicated or sincere you are or how much evidence you have. This is simply one of the hard facts of life you have to face.'"

• The Reality of Protected Child Abuse Networks [11]

"Again, it’s built in, entrenched foxes guarding the predatory henhouse that permeate all levels of government, military, courts, law enforcement, entertainment and news media, corporate global finance and education. With pedophile puppet masters controlling the pedophile puppet strings of blackmailed, compromised and controlled Western politicians, courts and law enforcement, their diabolical infrastructure has afforded them living above the law continuing to rape and kill our innocents for centuries."

• Joachim Hagopian [14]

Links and Sources
[1] - Noreen Gosch Speaks About - Jeff Gannon, Johnny Gosch And The Attempted Theft Of Her Book 'Why Johnny Can't Come Home'

• Noreen Gosch

[2] - Master List of Quotes and Comments

• Ex MI5/MI6 Agents and Royal Arch Illuminati slaves

[3] - Trance-Formation of America

• Cathy O'Brien

[4] - One Nation Under Blackmail

• Whitney Webb

[5] - Thanks for the Memories

• Brice Taylor

[6] - Eyes Wide Open

• Fiona Barnett

[7] - "I had access to classified documents about the Jeffrey Epstein case"
[8] - Child Trafficking, Ritual Sex Abuse & MK-ULTRA Are A Single Worldwide Operation, Run by the U.S., U.K. and AUS Secret Services

• Fiona Barnett

[9]- Symbolism Communication
[10] - An Illuminati Primer

• Veronica Swift, Jessie Czebotar

[11] - The Reality of Protected Child Abuse Networks
[12] - The Hallett Report No. 1

• Greg Hallett

[13] - The Pegasus File

• David G. Guyatt

[14] - Anatomy of the Luciferian Elite’s Global Child Sex Trafficking Pedophile Operations

• Joachim Hagopian on CathyFoxBlog

[15] - The Illuminati Formula Used To Create An Undetectable Mind Control Slave

• Fritz Springmeier and Cisco Wheeler

[16] - Deeper Insights Into the Illuminati Formula

• Fritz Springmeier and Cisco Wheeler

[17] - Hope Beryl-Green Article

I should start this by saying I'm not a detective anymore.
After the events at the warehouse, I was paged to visit my direct supervisor, Sgt. Langley. She was sitting behind a mahogany desk when I came in, gazing at some sort of file. She looked up at me. "What the hell was that, Jonathan?"
"We were underprepared, ma'am." I replied.
She glared at me from across the room. "We have a man missing, and a severe casualty! How underprepared were you? Did you not take any precautions at all?"
"With all due respect, you weren't there, ma'am." I said, upset. "Nothing could have prepared me for what I saw down there. How would you expect someone to perform at their peak, faced with . . . that."
She sighed and looked down at the file, eyes skimming over the words. "The brass is asking I let you go, for the moment."
"You can't seriously thi-" I began to say.
She held up a palm. "Look, the media is all over this. For everyone's sake, including you," she jabbed a finger at me, "it's best that you stay out of this for the time being."
I stared at her. She stared back, and raised an eyebrow. I considered my options, and begrudgingly decided to hand over my badge and gun. Langley smiled again. "Look. This will all blow over soon. Just take a rest for a while, hmm?"
I didn't respond.
I left her office. It was twelve, and I had nothing to do besides worry about all that was going on.. So I went home and slept. I was exhausted after the past few days, after all.
I awoke to my doorbell ringing. I was in that half-asleep state, so I covered my head with a pillow, hoping that whoever it was would go away. The doorbell rung again. I shifted position in my bed, and checked my watch. Four o'clock. I was more tired than I thought.
The doorbell rung again.
I slowly got up and made my way to the door, brushing the sleep from my eyes. The door opened to reveal a scruffy-haired, lanky teenage kid, who looked to be about eighteen. He nodded at me, while smiling politely.
"What do you want?" I said, not-so-politely.
"Uh, yeah. I'm meant to drive you to this place. I mean, that is if you want to go." He said.
I looked at him, trying to discern if he was serious or not. "And what's that supposed to mean?"
He shrugged. "I'm not really sure. Someone came up to me and offered five hundred bucks to ask you to come with me. But you don't have to come, either. I've been told to say the decision is up to you." A look of remembrance flashed across his face. "Oh, yeah. I'm supposed to give this to you as well."
He pulled a well-folded piece of paper out of his pocket and handed it to me. I opened it up, and read the words scrawled inside.
Heard you're out of work!
You should come join my zoo. We're always in need of more Zookeepers. :)
The boy peered at me from behind the paper. "So what is it then? Are you coming or not?"
I stared at him, blankly.
What do I say? How does whoever wrote this note know I lost my job anyways? It only just happened. This is obviously a trap anyways. The kid could even be on it. The last time I followed one of these notes, I lost a man, and almost got another killed. So what, then? Should I go or stay?
I looked back at the kid. "Yeah, I'm coming."
The kid drove with that careful rigidness that all first-year drivers seem to have. He drove for a while, slowly taking me out of town and into the rural back areas of my city. It took another thirty minutes of driving along long stretches of road the land becoming quieter and more desolate, before he pulled up onto a gravel pathway, which seemed to be the entrance of a much larger farm. I looked at the sign as he drove me in.
Winston's Family Orchard.
The gravel pathway diverted further up the track, and he took the right road. It ended up at what looked to be a farmhouse. There were lights on inside, and I heard the whir of machinery in the massive shed behind it. The kid stopped the car.
"This is your stop. Hope you have a great evening, sir." He cheerfully said, allowing me enough time to get out of the car before he drove back down the pathway.
I watched him until the headlights dipped below the horizon, before making my up the steps and onto the veranda. I could hear voices inside the house. Talking, laughing. It sounded like any house at dinnertime. Unsure of what to do, I knocked at the door.
The voices stopped.
I heard the soft pad of someone walking barefoot on hardwood towards me. The door opened. A man came out from behind it, he was of average height, cropped hair, and with three-day-stubble beginning to show. He stared at me with a faraway look in his eyes, before smiling, and gesturing for me to come in. "Glad you could make it! Dinner is just ready. Why don't you come join us?" His voice was deep and intoned, and familiar.
Very familiar.
"I . . . I know you." I said. More of an accusation than a fact. I thought back to the memories of the night I found my sister. The paramedic who passed me the note that started all of this. The paramedic who always seemed to be gazing of into the distance. No. No just gazing. Searching.
He tilted his head slightly. "Well, I'm happy to hear that! Makes acquaintances a bit more easier, then. Come on, you look hungry, let's eat!"
I didn't move. "I'm not going to fucking eat with you!" I yelled at him. "You killed my sister!"
He looked at me questioningly. "No. No. I didn't. I'm just a Keeper. You've got this all wrong. She-"
"I don't give a damn what you have to say!" I retorted.
"Hey, buddy. Let's calm down and talk this over a meal. I'm serious. Come and join us." And with that he walked back down the hallway. He turned left, into what I assumed was the dining room. I heard a couple of hushed voices, and scraping chairs. It seemed people were leaving.
I had two options. I could go in and find out what was going on. Or I could leave and forget about all of this. There was one problem, however. I would never be able to forget. The pain would never go away. The horrors of what I saw could not be forgotten.
I walked inside.
I entered the room I saw the paramedic go through. Inside there was a table, set like it was ready to feed a large family. There was a roast lamb in the middle, with a few cuts already sliced from it. Around it there was various side dishes and drinks. There was a man seated at the head of the table, directly opposite to where I was. It seemed everyone else had left.
The man spoke. His voice was rich and pronounced. "Isn't great that we can finally meet, Jonathan? I have so much that I would like to tell you."
". . . and who are you?" I asked.
He chuckled. "All in due time." He waved his hand at me. "Come. Sit. Eat. Anything you'd like. I do recommend the steamed asparagus, however. Bonnie really outdid herself there."
I remained standing.
He seemed unfazed, and continued to speak. "Now, I would like to remind you that you came here of your own accord, and you may leave whenever you feel like. We are not forcing you to stay here, but I so would enjoy your company." He leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his stomach. "Now, before I start waffling on. Is there any questions you would like to ask? Any burning thing you would like to know?"
It didn't take me long to think of a question. "Why'd you do it? Why did you kill all these people?"
He paused for a moment, seemingly disappointed. "Straight to those questions, are we?" He sighed. "Look around at the world, what do you see? All I see is death. You, of all people should know that. People die all the time. Hundreds a second. Thousands a minute. So what does it matter that I take a few more lives? It's just a drop in the bucket of death."
He stood up. "And when people die, it's useless. Everything that they've ever done amounts to nothing in the void of eternity. But it's not just that. As a species, we are bringing ourselves closer to death every day. We cannot make the right choices. Ever. So, on behalf of all of us, I'm choosing."
I shook my head in disbelief. "Choosing what? You're just torturing people to the point of death! How is that supposed to solve anything?"
"Do you still not yet understand?" His voice rose. "I am saving us all! I am leading the charge in the evolution of our species! In due time, I will be revered all around the world, as the one person who saw what was right, and had the guts to do it!" He turned around to face me. "The first few deaths were unfortunate, yes. But they have helped the cause beyond anything you can dream of! I am so close to creating the perfect being. The savior of our species!" He looked at me, jabbing a finger in my direction. "And you will join me! Become a Keeper and embrace the new world!"
I was silent for a while. This guy is insane. I thought. Join him? Who the hell does he think he is? I'm leaving the first chance I get. But I had one more question I wanted to ask him.
"Why me? Out of all the people you could have chosen, why me?"
He smiled widely, and let out a low laugh. "All of these smarts, and yet you couldn't figure that out? I didn't choose you. Look at you, quivering in a corner. There are so many more suitable prospect then you." He said with a hint of disgust. "Now tell me, what makes you think I choose you?"
"I don't know! The notes. . .my sister. You just seemed to be interested in me." I said.
He chuckled again. "You really don't know, do you? Tell me, how often would your sister go for a walk at midnight?"
". . .I'm not sure. Never, I suppose."
"Then what was she doing that night?"
The question struck me as odd. I had never thought about what she was doing, only about how it happened. I could never figure it out. The only way it seemed possible for her to disappear, was if she had let it happen. But I ruled that one out early. She wouldn't just let herself get kidnapped, right?
Right?
The man arched an eyebrow at my silence. "You deserve the truth. Everyone does. Some people like to hide their secrets behind shadows and dark corners, praying they don't see the light of the day. I am not one of them. I strive to be open and honest in all that I do. I long for a world with no lies because there is nothing to lie about. Everyone is accepted. Everyone is valued. If you need proof, have I not told you my exact location twice now?"
"That's hardly fair. You shot at us the first time." I said.
"I did not shoot at you. You were just there. Look, I will explain to you everything. But first, I require something of you." He picked up a mug and started sipping at it. "Your loyalty. Tell me, Jonathan, will you join me?"
"You're out of your mind if you think I want any part of this." I said, resolutely.
A smile curled at the edge of his lips. "A pity." His eyes traveled down my body, seemingly gazing in everything. "Look at you, always slithering into situations you shouldn't have to be in. I think you'll make a fine snake."
I heard a shuffle behind me, and turned around just in time to see a metal bar being swung at my face. It connected with my forehead with a loud crack, sending me flying backwards onto the ground.
Pain.
That was the first thing I remember from when I woke up. Hot, searing pain, burning throughout my body and culminating in my forehead.
Pain.
A throbbing sensation that shook my body with every strangely-prominent beat of my heart, blurring my vision and deafening my eardrums.
Pain.
The metal floor was cold beneath me, drenched in my sweat. My arms were held down by some sort of shackle on each side, limiting my movement.
I was trapped.
With a killer.
I panicked. I thrashed my arms against the shackles, on the blind hope that I'd be able to free myself. The pain on my arm increased, and probably caused a bruise. I yelled out in pain, but discovered I was gagged with a piece of cloth.
"Struggling's just going to make it worse, you know." A voice said behind me. The man's voice from the dinner table. "Like I said before, you are free to leave whenever you wish. But since you won't give me your loyalty, I'll have to settle with something else." He walked around into my line of vision, holding what looked to be a saw. "I'll make this quick, but I have to warn you, I don't like using anesthetic. The body should feel pain. It's natural. How else would it learn to heal?"
He walked around to the other side of me, and turned on a camera that was held up on a tripod facing me. The lights blinked to signify that it was recording. He came back to me, and placed the teeth of the saw on my left arm, in the pit on the opposite side of the elbow. "Now, snakes don't have arms. So, I'll start with that."
I struggled against the binds again. Adrenaline coursed through my veins from the fear, with no way to use it. Panic was setting in, and the human body's core instinct is self-preservation. And I was doing the best I could to get away from this.
"Don't struggle, Jonathan. It just makes it take longer. It'll be over soon. I promise." He said, in a calm, steady voice.
And with that he pushed the saw downwards. My body screamed with pain, and my visioned blackened. I could feel blood seep out of the incision across the arm.
He continued to bring the saw downwards. Pushing it forwards and backwards, cutting through veins and arteries. I felt him hit bone. He continued to cut, I could feel the vibrations of my humerus being split in two.
I lost consciousness for the second time that evening.
When I came to my gag was gone. And my arm. The remaining stump was wrapped up in a torniquet and bandaged at the end. Everything still hurt, but much worse than before. Much, much worse. The man was still standing there, behind the camera. He seemed happy to see me awake.
"Had a good nap, then?" He walked over to where I was laying down, and held my remaining hand in his. "Everyone deserves a choice. Free will is what defines us. So I'm going to give you a choice. You could get up and leave right now, and work for me, or have your other other arm removed and your legs stitched together. It's completely up to you!"
Work for a madman. Or die to a madman. Self-preservation is stronger than dignity. "I. . .want to work for you." I said, struggling between breaths.
"Very good! Let's get you out of those binds shall we?" He plucked a key from his pocket and swiftly unlocked them, I tried to sit up, and promptly fell back down, my head spinning.
The man started to walk away. "Now, I'm going to begin your induction, you may feel free to leave or explore the house whenever you feel like. If you're hungry there's leftovers in the fridge. As I said, we're not trapping you here." He turned and smiled at me. "You're going to enjoy this, Jonathan. Toodles!"
He left the room, and went up a few stairs that I hadn't noticed before.. I took my time getting up, waiting until the earth stopped spinning under my feet. Walking felt strange without an arm, the weight was gone from there and I felt lopsided and unbalanced. I took in my surroundings. It was some sort of basement under the house, with different types of surgical equipment scattered around.
Besides that there was recording equipment scattered around and placed at various places. A few were still on, but most were turned off. There was a door to my left, and the staircase directly in front of me. There was a placard on the door with a single word on it.
Elephant.
I opened the door. It was dimly lit inside. The air smelled of musk and human waste. There was a small machine in the corner, lit up and whirring, with various cables hooked up to a large mound in the middle. The door slammed shut behind me.
The mound moved.
I took a step back out of fear. My focus shifted, and the horrible realization that I was looking at a person dawned on me. The person was extremely large, covered in layers of fat that rolled across their body. The person laboriously shuffled around to face me. The tubes from the machine connected into a mask that covered their mouth. The tubes continuously pumped a soft, gray liquid into the person's mouth.
I had only seen something like this once before, when looking for a murderer who was hiding in an abandoned mental hospital. A force-feeder.
On either side of the mask, the person had two large metal spikes coming out of each nostril, and back out the side of their head. Judging by the scars surrounding them, the spikes were drilled inside the cranium, until they eventually came out the other side, through the nose.
I shuddered at the thought.
The person slowly made their way forwards, shoving themselves against the floor. The person looked up at me, directly into my eyes. I saw the pleading in them. The humanity. Asking to be set free. And I saw something else, a flicker of recognition. Of understanding. I looked closer, past what I didn't want to see, past everything I didn't want to think about and I saw a friend.
I saw Thompson.
He was battered and beaten, and larger than he used to be. But it was still him. I rested on his shoulder and cried. Long and hard. This, more than anything broke me. Thompson didn't deserve this. No one does.
I glanced behind me, at the saw that cut off my arm. I stood up and grabbed it off the table, with my remaining hand. I brought it over to Thompson and held it over his face. His eyes grew misty, but he nodded, a slow and deliberate movement. He knew what it meant.
It was going to be hard to cut with only one available hand, so I opted for a large swing and used momentum to get the job done. A clean cut that severed his jugular and removed his life from his body.
I dropped the saw on the ground next to Thompson.
I made my way up the stairs and out of the front door. I had no shoes on, and the gravel road was tough under my feet. But I walked forwards. I was leaving, and nothing would stop me. The man had said so himself. And so I left.
But not forever.
I will be back.
For Thompson. For Alice.
I've got nothing left to lose and everything to gain.
x

Merlyn Dayne, the Lord of High Hermitage

Discord Name: SunstriderAlar#7590
Character Name: Merlyn Dayne
Age: 20
Culture: Stone Dornish
Appearance: Merlyn has always been a man who stands out in a crowd, even in Dorne. His silver hair flows halfway down his back, with plaits and interwoven finery, often including components of steel and polished metal to mimic armour. He has unnervingly dark eyes, almost black, which forms a toxic contrast to his hair and Stony Dornish skin.
From his days being a squire, both on and off the battlefield he has a scar on his cheek driving from the bridge of his nose across his face towards his right ear. This scar makes a mockery of his youthful outward appearance though, and where once he may have been quite handsome, now he is something not quite beautiful to everyone.
He is lean for a knight, and perpetually clean shaven, which makes the painful smirk on his mouth all the clearer. Some would say he is petulant, others smarmy, but mostly he holds himself with confidence. He knows he is the finest swordsman around and isn't afraid to show it.
Traits: Strong
Skills: One handed swords (e), Footwork(e), Shields, Riding, Armoured
Talents: Singing, Lyre and Lute playing
Negative traits: None
Title: Knight of High Hermitage,
Starting Location: With Arthur Dayne, I think Starfall
----

Biography

Credit to Eagle for writing the bio, I have revised and edited his work to my own style.
Theme song - Benson Boon - In the Stars
Early Years
Merlyn Dayne's birth took place on a fateful night in 180AC and as the Maester recorded it, the constellation of the Ghost was in ascendance. His parents, Lord Arthur and Lady Ashara Dayne of High Hermitage, were delighted about the pregnancy. Lady Ashara, a fan of legends, myth and stories, decided to name their firstborn after a character from her favourite tales. Unfortunately for Lady Ashara, the portent of the Ghost was ominous and Merlyn's birth was complicated. It was part of nature, the Maester consoled, the Will of the Seven, provided the Maester, but in the end Arthur was left holding Merlyn alone and Ashara passed before the morning. Though a fire raged in the kitchen that evening and the servants called on their Lord to organise a water line, the Lord of High Hermitage was kept away by his new babe, and his deceased wife. There was no tragedy greater to him than the loss of his love, and the need to hold his new son.
House Dayne has a reputation for raising fierce warriors, many of them amongst the finest knights ever produced in Westeros let alone Dorne; each boy thinking he can of course become the next Sword of the Morning. Merlyn was no different, and as the last of the Dayne’s of High Hermitage he was protected within its walls. His father, having sworn off remarrying, took the boy as his single pride and joy and committed to raising him as the finest knight in Dayne history. Arthur, unable to deny his only son anything, acquiesced when Merlyn demanded to become a squire earlier than his cousins. When Merlyn turned seven, Arthur informed him that he would be fostered with their liege Lord Gerold Dayne, the Sword of the Morning. While this had been his wish Merlyn, a boy had not thought it through and on being told he was to leave High Hermitage grew despondent. Yet, through a friendship with Oberyn Sand, an orphan who Arthur had taken in as a companion, he found solace in the opportunity to learn from a knight who was also family.
Middle Years
In Starfall, Gerold took Merlyn first as a page and then shortly after as squire proper. This was no small feat, Gerold was the Sword of the Morning and had been since 158AC. He was a legendary figure and Lord Paramount of All Dorne, he had led the Crusades, and represented to many of the Faithful the true path of the Seven. He was also though a hard master on Merlyn, demanding, unimpeachably direct, stern to a fault, and consumed with the management of the Kingdom. What time he had for Merlyn was hard on the boy and the squire grew dour, his mood turned black and he was more often than not found wanting to be away from Starfall. In time, when he was ready Gerold knowing his squire could not continue explained the manifest issues at play. Merlyn with time found himself understanding of the pressure upon his Lord and the threat facing Dornish across the sands and the threat of the Red God, as he turned into his middle teens he grew to hate the threats to his people.
During his time as squire Merlyn grew exceptionally close to Gerold’s son, Arthur. Though there was an age difference of four years, the two children formed an unbreakable bond. Merlyn knew that one day Arthur would be the Lord of Starfall, and Lord Paramount of Dorne. He came to see that one day he would be the young Lord’s finest sword. Under Gerold's tutelage, and mind to the future, Merlyn came to be an exceptional student, adopting his uncle's disdain for the fire-worshipping fanatics who had ravaged Dorne and threatened to harm his cousin. In High Hermitage though not all was peaceful and in his fifteenth year, Merlyn came to know heartbreak.
Lord Arthur Dayne, having carried the name of the branch house of Dayne for nearly seventy years passed away in his sleep. Merlyn, emotionally broken and without any direct family, slipped into a deep hatred, angry at the world, and hidden behind a cocksure smile. He took the death personally, and donned black attire perpetually thereafter to mourn his loss.
Later Years
On his seventeenth nameday Gerold Dayne provided three gifts to Merlyn: a shield bearing a new coat of arms for the Lord of High Hermitage bearing the Dayne colours reversed, a new saddle for his horse stained black and lined with shadow cat fur, and finally his knightly spurs. He made him swear fealty to Starfall, and anointed him in oils, then called him to say his vows to the Seven and commit to the defence of the realm and all women, children, and the weak. Finally Gerold added a new line in his vows, to face the Red God with all zealousness, and to stand forever in the Light of the Seven. Merlyn rose to his feet more proud than he had ever been and committed himself to these vows.
With his squirehood finished, and his lord recognising him as the Lord of High Hermitage he was determined to showcase his prowess. He wanted to right the wrongs of Dorne, work with his liege and build High Hermitage of zealous fealty to the Starfall. His words were said, and while he disliked the Seven for what they had taken from him, he would do as his lord had commanded. In more recent years he has joined Gerold in his travels as Lord Paramount, and then on Gerold’s death, swore fealty to his de facto brother Arthur. While it stung to see his brother take Dawn and the title that went with it, he knew in his heart that one day Arthur would call on him to be the man and do the tasks he could not. He has also taken to representing House Dayne as best he can, in particular to Lady Marianna Toyne whom he met at a the Royal Feast of 200AC where he encouraged her to take up singing, and congratulated her on her upcoming wedding.

Timeline

180 AC - Merlyn is born
187 AC - Merlyn becomes fascinated with becoming the Sword of the Morning
190 AC - Merlyn is sent to foster at Starfall, where he is squire to Lord Gerold Dayne 196 AC - Arthur Dayne dies in his sleep, Merlyn slips into deep emotional distance and commences wearing black.
197 AC - Merlyn is knighted by Gerold swearing to uphold the tenants of the Faith of the Seven

Family Tree

Arthur Dayne of High Hermitage - Deceased aged sixty and nine.
Ashara “Stars” Sand - Deceased aged forty and three

NPCs

1. NPC Marksman - Oberyn Sand - 19 - Merlyn's childhood friend and resident Captain of High Hermitage Guard. He has a typically Stone Dornish look with dark brown hair, and daring eyes. He is not handsome or comely but he is more than capable of charming the pants of barkeep.
2. NPC Scholar - Maester Rickard - 57 - The Maester of High Hermitage has a fascination for astrology. He has served the Dayne's of the Mountains since he first left the Citadel, and remembers delivering Merlyn as a babe. He is from the Riverlands, and has flaming red hair that curls tightly.
3. NPC Castellan - Ser Daemon - 60 - The aged Castellan of High Hermitage who has seen more battles than he cares to admit. He is relentless in his pursuit of order in the keep.
4. NPC Warrior (2H Swords) - Ser Gerrold of High Hermitage - 43 - One of the finer knights from the Hermitage. He won a tournament more than two dozen years ago as a young man and has served the Daynes ever since. He has blonde hair and green eyes, rare in the Dornlands and many suspect that his mother may not have been entirely truthful with who his father was.
5. NPC Warrior (1H Swords) - Quentin of High Hermitage - 10 - Squire to Ser Gerrold, he's young at only 10 years old though he is enthusiastic at just starting his tutoring. He is Ser Daemon's son who has been taken on after a friendly bet by his father and the knight.
6. NPC Medic - Ashara the Sand Witch - 79 - A wild woman who came out of the dessert well before anyone in High Hermitage can remember. She claims to have delivered Lord Arthur from his mother's womb. She has deep set wrinkles in her dark skin and hair that is frazzled and silver.
7. NPC Questioner - Nymeria of Seeing Stars - 33 - A brothel owner who swindled the last owner out of his ownership. The Seeing Stars is the only brothel in High Hermitage on account of the semi-pious nature of the place, and markets itself more as a house of recovering drunks, homeless, and war weary. It just so happens that the now ludicrously beautiful Nymeria likes to pry information from her patrons.

So, for years now, I've had horrible flickering in a handful of games: WoW (a specific fog effect in one of the new dungeons), New World (in one of the dungeons and a specific area, video at the bottom), League of Legends (when hextech rift spawns, several large square areas, like a tile, start flickering, this is the longest running issue). Many games don't have any issues or flickering of any kind, even in foggy areas, but then some games are just horrible.
What happens is that certain fog effects seem to cause flickering in the shadow, causing the brightness of said shadow to go from super dark to super bright super quickly. It's like a strobe light. It's significant enough that it gives me a headache, and makes me feel sick in some games like League or New World. It's not random, and doesn't happen all over the game, only in specific spots, and very reliably.
In WoW I can turn off "compute effects" and the flickering will mostly go away, though there's still some small artifacting whenever one of the now invisible fog clouds blows past.
In League, I can get "Environment Quality" to low or very low, and the flickering goes away entirely, though I can still see the "seams" of the tiles that flicker, and if I have some kind of lighting effect near me, like Milio's backpack, the flickering happens in said lighting -- it's sort of a glow effect, like a torch, for those who don't know what I'm talking about.
In New World, there's nothing I've done that fixes it.
I've tried all sorts of things to try and fix it, including:

• Cleaning and reseating all my cables and hardware
• Using DDU to uninstall and reinstall drivers, with and without Adrenalin
• Using SFC and DISM to check for problems with Windows itself.
• Turning off hardware acceleration in Windows
• Turning everything off in Adrenalin, or setting to "use application settings" (I tried turning everything ON too)
• Turning off variable refresh rates, variable FPS, variable everything.
• Capping FPS to my monitor's refresh rate.
• Reinstalling Windows (at one point I even got a totally new HDD, and partitioned it and installed Windows totally fresh
• Changing games to run in older DX modes
• Running games in admin, changing compatibility modes, etc.
• Stress tested hardware to find no issues.
• Disabled MPO
• ...

The only thing I haven't tried is rolling back to a much older driver (some people say they're more stable), as I'm not sure how to do that and I'm not sure which driver is the oldest that will work for my card.
Since the issue has started happening, I've replaced every piece of hardware in my PC, even the PSU. The only piece I haven't replaced is the motherboard, and at the moment I don't have the money to do so since I would also have to buy a copy of Windows (using an old prebuilt that I've upgraded over the years, so my Windows is built into my motherboard and will not follow to new hardware).
Running on: B350M Bazooka (using latest BIOS), Ryzen 5 5600, Radeon RX 6600, 32GB of DDR4 at 2667MHz, 1000W PSU.
Below I'll attach some screenshots and a couple videos.

• https://imgur.com/a/VRI5tLL - If you look at the texture of the floor (League), you can see the top half has a weird grid pattern on it. When I move around in the game, the grid pattern will sometimes clip through the normal texture and back out, which seems to be what causes the flicker (though I don't know for sure). If I stand still, there's no flicker, but this weird artifacting is present.
• https://www.reddit.com/newworldgame/comments/z22hrh/recorded_a_video_of_the_fun_flickering_that/ - This is a video from New World several months back, where the flickering is the worst. It only happens in two spots in the game, and it happens very reliably.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuOQeIVr8_I - This is a video from League, where the issue has been going on the longest. If you look at the floor as I walk around, you can see the shadows in the texture flickering like crazy (make sure to set the video to HD, or you can't see it at all). If I stop moving, or move out of the square "tile" then there's no flickering at all. There are a handful of tiles that flicker, and also the steps leading into each team's base (dark shadows, maybe that's part of it). This only happens when the hextech rift (changes the map a bit, adds particle and light effects) triggers. Other map changes have no issues at all, only this one.

Anyone have any ideas? It's really obnoxious.

Hi PubTips! Longtime redditor here (including a fresh 12-year trophy in my case!), but I’m using an alt account for all querying-related posts. I’ve been a big fan of this community for a long time.
Following a constructive and encouraging beta round, I’ve just completed a 3rd draft of my novel and am excited to begin querying agents soon. I’m including both my query letter draft and the first 300 words of the manuscript below. All feedback is extremely helpful and appreciated at this point. I do have some specific questions that I’ll save for the end.
Thanks in advance!
​
Query Letter:
No stranger to healthcare software, Orion Marsh is not alarmed to learn he’s been working on a database filled with death records—until he realizes that many of the deaths are in the future.
Having sidelined a busy software career to pursue a fuller life in tropical Roatan, Orion thinks he’s found an ideal part-time gig helping a small, tight-lipped organization untangle a large healthcare database. When the future-dated death records implicate his new employer in bizarre, premeditated murders, Orion convinces himself it’s all some big mistake—but then the people in the database start getting killed, right on schedule.
After realizing too late how entangled he’s become in some inexplicable, deadly business, shadowy figures appear on the island and begin hunting Orion. The ensuing flight for his life leads him on a twisting journey through choice, chance, and fate, as he tries to unravel the mystery of the deadly database and stop the killings, before reaching the last name on the list: his own. But as Orion experiences the wonders of life along the way—beauty, dancing, love, and the unknowable beyond—he realizes that life is far bigger than he knew, and that death, maybe, is not all it’s cracked up to be.
The Dancing Dead is a standalone novel that sets the foundation for a planned series of connected but self-contained Dancing novels that revolve around a central theme of celebrating the unknown. The Dancing Dead combines the rising peril of a scientific advancement gone very wrong from Blake Crouch’s Recursion, with the captivating theories about the relationship between our minds and reality featured in Nancy Kress and Robert Lanza’s Observer. Adding color throughout is a touch of the mysticism, amateur sleuthing, and adventure seen in Andy Siara’s TV series The Resort.
As a former engineering director at a large Medicaid software company, Orion’s journey to reshape a busy life around personal values mirrors my own recent leap into the world of fiction writing. And as someone who has helped produce many morbid healthcare reports while chatting with coworkers about advances in quantum computing, I feel equally close to the idea that powers the story: that, in a quantum world, an observation of a thing can change the nature of that thing—even the observation of a database full of death records.
​
First 300 words:
Many technological marvels had faded into the backdrop of Orion Marsh’s life, but commercial air travel still managed to slap some childlike wonder into him. The brim of his baseball hat rested above his small window’s fat frame as they taxied. White lines and strands of lights slid in and out of view. The hulking aircraft reached a lane of runway streaked with burnt rubber, held motionless for a beat, and then the jet engines screamed to life.
Orion was pushed to the back of his seat while two giant fans blew the house-sized vehicle forward. His hat caught on the window frame as the plane lurched, freeing a flop of long brown hair. Fixing hat and hair, he chanced a sideways glance, hoping the older woman who’d settled next to him hadn’t seen.
Blinking into the hard cabin light—Orion was one of the first fliers to lift their shade—he found her staring at him. Thick glasses revealed alarm in her wide eyes, but she regained herself with a wink. “Are you okay, dear?”
As the cabin shook and the roaring around them grew, the question landed differently than it might have on a normal day. Orion had a one-way ticket to Roatan, Honduras. He was uprooting his life for a half-baked idea.
Was he okay?
He laughed and patted his resecured hat, raising his voice above the jets. “Glad you saw that.”
The woman smiled. “Me too.”
The smile brought a warmth that Orion hadn’t been aware he craved. He wanted to say more, but that wasn’t something that came naturally to him. Plus, now was not the time for chit-chat. With a familiar rush, Orion felt the downward tug join the backward push as they were drawn up into the sky.
​
Questions:
The hook: is this effective as-is? I’d considered appending something with more punch, such as: “—until he realizes that many of the deaths are in the future, and one of the names is his own”, but that doesn’t align with the actual flow of the story (this plot point is hinted at early on, but only revealed in the pivot into the final act), and also takes away from the impact of that reveal later in the pitch.
Comps: always looking for advice here … my biggest concern right now is that Recursion may be too popular and lead to eyerolls from agents (seeing that Shonda Rhimes is now adapting it as a movie and TV series). Also, I’m on the fence about including a third comp in The Resort, but I wanted to see what you all thought before cutting it.
Genre: I keep going back and forth here, too. I believe “thriller” is the correct primary genre (but let me know if anyone knows of required thriller ingredients I’m missing), but I’m torn between augmenting with “sci-fi” or “speculative” to cover the sci-fi elements. These elements are introduced halfway through the story, so I’m leaning towards “speculative,” as “sci-fi” felt too heavy given the fact that these sci-fi elements arrive late. Thoughts?
Thanks again!!