Has anyone else been experiencing issues today with Verizon/xfinity mobile on the West side? I started work for Grub Hub around noon and my 2nd delivery I was waiting for the food and suddenly had zero service, I went to the xfinity store and immediately had 5glte. Then, just now, I come home (near the airport area) and the signal is gone again.

Sharing some thoughts from UVA and Michigan ASWs (tried to be as detailed as possible so apologies for the length).
I probably forgot some things and I know there were a lot of other folks that were also at both so please feel free to jump in and add any additional thoughts:
UVA

1. Campus - I was extremely impressed by the main grounds of UVA... Google images definitely does not do it justice. However, the law school is pretty far away up on the north grounds and seems pretty secluded (for better or for worse). The law school building itself is nice but simple, nothing to write home about. One thing I did not like was that the classrooms (at least the ones I sat in on) did not have windows. But overall, it was modern and clean.
2. Career Services - For the private sector, I'm pretty sure there isn't a single school that can beat UVA in this category. Kevin Donovan is an absolute treasure and clearly runs the career services office like he ran his biglaw practice. Students have said they'll get responses from the office within an hour of reaching out and receive extremely detailed/individualized feedback. Very clear UVA will do everything in their power to get you where you want to go.
3. Professors/Classes - I sat in on the corporate law class with Geis and he was fantastic. He was engaging and explained concepts really well. Other professors seemed equally as intelligent and committed to making sure their students take away the important concepts from the class. For anyone interested in the private sector, it seems like UVA has a ton of classes and resources to support that pipeline. I'm unsure about the access to faculty because I've heard mixed things... some students said they've had no issues accessing their professors, and others have said they've had a harder time. Would love if others could weigh in here.
4. Students - Overall, everyone I spoke with was warm, friendly, and smart. I could really tell that UVA truly selects students that will fit into and add to the collegial vibe. Both current and admitted students were all very polished and professional which, as an older student, was very refreshing. Current students had generally great things to say about their experiences and that firms typically recruit deep in the class - however, I did meet a few folks who are going the public interest route that had less positive things to say. I can certainly tell that the school heavily favors private sector and those pursing PI mentioned they didn't feel they had the same support/resources.
5. Alumni - Every alum I met either during ASW (a lot of folks who currently work at the law school also went there) or beforehand has had nothing but great things to say about the school. A majority of them are based in DC or NYC so if you're interested in either of those markets, you will have many people championing you as a UVA law student.
6. Other Academic Opportunities - As most schools, UVA offer cross-disciplinary options. I believe they said you can take 6 credits through another graduate school (for example, Darden) that will count towards your JD. In the fall semester of your 3L year, you can also apply to study abroad (although they said almost everyone who want to go abroad gets in). There are shorter programs over January term and the summers if that's of interest too.
7. City - Charlottesville seems... fine. This is my only real qualm with UVA. For someone coming from a big city, C'ville is small and certainly doesn't seem very diverse. Also, something that a few current students spoke about that seemed to be grazed over by admissions was how bad the crime is in the area immediately outside of the campus... like, there was literally someone fatally shot about a block away from the Friday Bar Review bar when students were out that night. The next closest city is Richmond, which is an hour away. DC is about 2 hours away - which doesn't seem like a big deal at first but the C'ville regional airport is tiny and therefore only offers limited domestic flights so you will probably have to go to DC to fly anywhere that isn't NYC, ATL, or NC. On the flip side, there are really great food options, wineries, and breweries. Shenandoah National Park is very close so outdoor activities are plentiful if you have a car.
8. Housing - There are a decent amount of housing options nearby the law school, including The Pavilion (which seems to be a popular spot for 1Ls). It's a little more expensive but the building is modern and spacious and is literally a 5 minute walk (albeit, uphill) to the law school. There are townhouses and other options a little further out that seem to be a bit more affordable.

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Michigan

1. Campus - Michigan's campus is nothing short of incredible. The law school is in the middle of Ann Arbor so you really feel the buzz and energy of the city/school when you're at the school. The Law Quad looks like something out of a Harry Potter (I actually think it was a contender for the HP movies, if I remember correctly) and the dramatic architecture kind of makes you want to learn. Basically all the classrooms have windows so the natural light is lovely.
2. Career Services - I was a little disappointed in the private sector career services presentation. They basically just shared a bunch of publicly available stats (what markets they send people to, how many students go to firms vs clerk vs PI) and they didn't really offer much insight as to how they actually help students get jobs. Sure, they emphasized setting up 1-on-1 meetings with them early in the semester but otherwise didn't provide nearly the same level of confidence that UVA did. Anecdotes from current students have said career services hasn't been particularly helpful but they still have pretty good outcomes so take that as you will. One thing that was interesting was that they said they host an event to casually speak with firms before the formal OCI process. I'm sure other schools have similar options but I did like the pre-OCI concept. Unclear what (if any) GPA cutoffs there are for specific firms. However, there's literally a Kirkland & Ellis cafe in the law school so I feel like the Michigan name holds weight regardless (and they also said they sent the most amount of 2Ls to Kirkland, Latham, Skadden and PW).
3. Professors/Classes - I sat in on a live corporate law class my first day and the professor seemed bright and the students were clearly engaged. Most students participated by raising their hands but there were some cold calls as well. The whole group got to sit in on a mock torts class and I also thought this professor was engaging, although he did make some politically charged comments that I thought were unnecessary. But overall, I definitely was engaged and appreciated the way he solicited opinions/thoughts from the students. There was also a faculty panel and it seemed like they all had a wide variety of experience. There's actually a professor at Michigan who went to UVA law and said she wish she had access to professors at UVA that students have at Michigan. Multiple professors spoke about times they've had students at their houses for meals and discussions about class and I felt that level of investment and rapport between students and faculty was extremely refreshing. I also experienced that firsthand - I reached out to a professor I wanted to meet with and she invited me to her house for coffee since she wouldn't be on campus that day (I didn't end up having time to go, but it was definitely an unexpected gesture).
4. Students - As is talked about a lot on this sub, the students are definitely a bit quirkier. People are noticeably passionate about what they're at law school for and it is definitely evident that there is a strong PI interest so I think the "self-selection out of biglaw" narrative actually holds true. Tattoos and piercings are much more common, and people seem like they are much more expressive of themselves and their opinions. Again, for better or for worse. On Thursday night, the law school had it's school wide auction event where private sector students bid on certain unique experiences with their professors (e.g., go to a concert with X professor, cook a meal with Y professor, etc.). All the proceeds go to PI student resources. I thought the vibes here where a lot of fun - food, drinks, music and people definitely got rowdy. A bunch of admitted students also went out in Ann Arbor afterwards and that was honestly a lot of fun. The collegiality is definitely real; and almost every student I met said they had football team season tickets.
5. Alumni - Overall, Michigan grads (not just from the law school) are insanely loyal to Michigan to the Nth degree. Because most grads leave Ann Arbor after graduation, there are alumni all over the country (and the world) that makes your career options across multiple different markets much more accessible. For someone like me that might not want to stick with law long-term, this is extremely appealing because it sounds like the alumni network will be extremely valuable when it comes time to exit a firm. For law-specific alum, there's solid representation at a ton of major biglaw firms.. this last year, they sent the most amount of grads to New York, Chicago, and Michigan/DC, in that order.
6. Other Academic Opportunities - Michigan seems to be much broader in its academic offerings than UVA. There seems to be a much larger variety of what kind of law students want to practice and Michigan certainly has the resources to support those different paths. Also, Michigan is ranked as a Top 50 global university (currently #19) so their strength for international law/opportunities is incredible. 1Ls have the option of doing their summer internship abroad somewhere based on what their goals/preferences are, and study abroad options are available as early as 2L spring. Also, the externships and clinics offered are pretty abundant and seem to have options for whatever your particular interests are. There are also opportunities for students to work directly with the university, the city of Ann Arbor, and the nearby Detroit market, which I think is something worth considering for anyone who is interested in working during their 2L and 3L years.
7. City - Ann Arbor is really awesome. There are plenty of options for everyone, no matter what your interests are. Museums, shows, sporting events, and even local nature walks (I won't say hikes because there are definitely no mountains lol). There are a bunch of different bars and restaurants (though Id say the food quality was better in C'ville) that provide for a bunch of fun social options. Also, the Detroit airport is massive and has plenty of flights to/from wherever it is that you may need or want to go to - which makes the city itself much more accessible. People are nice and midwestern-friendly, which is always refreshing.
8. Housing - The Lawyers Club was actually nicer than I expected. Rooms are relatively modern and the proximity to classrooms and the library is unbeatable. Yes, it's pricier to live there than further off campus but the convenience factor is kind of unbeatable in my opinion. I've heard that most people choose to have a car but if you don't, there are both Michigan buses and Ann Arbor buses that can take you most places you want to go (and the general consensus is that people are willing to give others rides).

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IN CONCLUSION; I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to choose lol I am extremely conflicted and would love to hear what other people are thinking after these visits.
Hope this was helpful!

Scritch. Scritch. Scritch.
Even as I write this, I can hear the wreath moving against our door. I hear it night and day. Scratching, gently scratching. Nothing more. Just a normal wreath, moving gently in the breeze. At least, that’s what it wants me to think.
Scritch. Scritch. Scritch.
It wasn’t so bad at first. Shortly after Thanksgiving, I came home to find the wreath hanging on our front door. My wife, Sarah, loved decorating for Christmas, and it wasn’t surprising she’d found something like this.
“Hey, honey!” I shouted as I took off my boots. “I saw the wreath, it looks really nice! Where’d you get it?”
She came bustling out wearing a wide grin and an elf hat. “I got it at the farmer’s market today, along with this hat! Isn’t it cute?”
I laughed. “Sure, but you’re cuter.”
We busied ourselves with some chores around the house, and then Sarah went to bed early. After I finished washing dishes, I plopped down on the couch to watch TV.
At first, I thought there was something wrong with the show, and then I thought it was the TV itself. Every time I played my show, I heard a faint scratching sound, barely audible over the dialogue and explosions. But putting my ears close to the speakers just made the sound quieter; it wasn’t coming from there. And every time I paused my TV, the scratching went away.
Finally, I paused the show and sat there in silence, ears straining for any sounds. I was just starting to think I was imagining things, when I heard it again! I leaped up and quietly followed the sound to the front door. I paused, listening carefully, and heard it a moment later.
Scritch. Scritch. Scritch.
I yanked the door open, expecting to find a neighborhood cat or maybe even a mouse. But there was nothing. I stomped out onto the porch and looked in all directions, shivering slightly in the chill air.
But there was nothing.
I turned to go inside, when a slight breeze stirred the wreath on our front door. Scritch. Scritch. I chuckled and tapped the wreath, listening to its branches scratch gently against the wood. Should’ve remembered that thing was out here.
I yawned and went back inside, locking the door for the night. There was a sniff right behind me, and I whirled around. Sarah was standing right there, with a too-sweet smile plastered on her face and eyes that didn’t quite seem to see me.
“What are you doing to the wreath, sweetie?”
I stared at her for a moment, trying to steady my breathing. “Nothing. I heard a sound, but it was just the wind knocking the wreath against the door.”
“Okay.” She stood there for a moment, then jerkily motioned down the hallway. “Why don’t you come to bed?” Her movement looked unnatural, like she was a robot, or maybe a puppet guided by invisible strings.
We stood there for a moment, and I groggily tried to figure out why she seemed off. Was she sleepwalking? Finally, I shook my head and shuffled down the hall. I’d figure it out in the morning.
“You’re right. Let’s get some sleep.”
She followed me, and we both crawled into bed. The next morning, I awoke feeling grimy and tired, and I had a headache forming. When I asked Sarah about the night before, she just looked at me in confusion.
“I don’t remember getting up at all! I went to bed while you were watching TV, and that’s the last I remember.”
“You don’t remember scaring me when I went outside?” I asked, feeling slightly nervous. “You really spooked me. I heard the wreath scratching against our door, and suddenly you were there!”
“The wreath…” her voice became harsh, and her eyes suddenly glazed over. “Yes, the wreath. You should leave it alone. Don’t ever touch it.”
Her demanding words and tone of voice were so different from the chipper, upbeat woman I was used to, I just stood there in shock. She spun and stalked away, and a few minutes later, I heard her singing in the kitchen like she always did. Like nothing was wrong at all.
I rubbed my forehead again, fighting my looming headache. It was just a weird start to the day, that was all. When I got home, I hoped Sarah would be back to normal and this cold feeling on the back of my neck would be gone.
That night, there wasn’t a breath of wind on the air. But still, as I walked up to my front porch, I could hear the wreath faintly scratching against the door. Scritch. Scritch. Scritch. I shuddered and went inside, trying to ignore the blasted thing.
Sarah was in the living room, but she wasn’t watching TV. Instead, she was just sitting in our recliner, rocking gently back and forth as she stared at a blank wall. The recliner creaked with a regular rhythm. Creak. Creak. Creak.
She didn’t even turn around to look at me. She just kept rocking back and forth, staring sightlessly at the wall. I cleared my throat loudly.
“Hey, Sarah. How was your day?”
She didn’t answer, and I hurried over to her, fearing the worst. She was breathing, but her sightless eyes stared past me, and she wouldn’t respond when I shouted her name and gently shook her.
Panic gripped me, and I whipped out my phone to dial an ambulance. Sarah still did nothing, and I paced the living room relentlessly until I connected to a dispatcher. I told them what was happening, and the dispatcher said not to move Sarah, and that they’d send medics as soon as possible.
I walked to the front door and yanked it open, wanting to see the ambulance as soon as it arrived. The wreath banged against the door, then slowly settled into swaying back and forth against the wood again. I froze when I realized there was still no wind, and that Sarah was rocking in perfect cadence with the wreath’s scratching. Scritch. Creak. Scritch. Creak.
Just then, there were flashing lights outside our house. In a few seconds, several firefighters with medical equipment ran up our front steps. It wasn’t an ambulance, but they’d gotten here fast, at least.
“What’s the problem here? We were informed of a nonresponsive patient?” The fire chief barked.
“Yes, sir!” I pointed at Sarah. “She’s not responding at all, she’s just sitting there rocking back and forth! I’m worried she had…I don’t even know, a brain aneurism or something.” I babbled anxiously, then stood against the wall as the firefighters hurried over and began examining her. She was still rocking back and forth in time with the wreath.
Fear and anger suddenly warred in my gut, and I glared over at the wreath. That stupid thing was still scratching away in time with Sarah’s rocking chair, and I knew suddenly that I had to get rid of it. I marched over and grabbed the wreath to rip it right off the door. Suddenly, Sarah bolted upright with a shriek.
“Don’t you dare touch my wreath!”
I yelled and whirled around.
“Sarah! What happened?” I looked frantically at the fire chief. “Is she ok? What’s going on?”
Sarah stared at me for a moment, then spoke jerkily, as if she’d forgotten how words worked. “I was…deep in…though. No. Yes. Thought. I was thinking thoughts. I did not hear you.”
She cocked her head, then advanced on me slowly. “I said. Don’t. Touch. My. Wreath.”
I realized I still had my hand on the wreath, and I let go hastily, backing away as I stared at her. What had come over her? I glanced over at the chief, who looked slowly from me to the wreath, then at Sarah. The faces of all the firefighters suddenly stiffened, and they stood up straighter, staring dead ahead without moving. The chief spoke in a low monotone.
“This is not unusual at all. Do not touch the wreath. In the future, there is no need to call for help. This is normal.”
As one, they all whirled around and filed out the door. As they stepped outside, each one relaxed his shoulders slightly and seemed to walk more naturally. The chief was the last to leave, and after he passed through the front door, he called over his shoulder.
“Sorry for bothering you, ma’am! Nice wreath, I have one just like it at home.”
I stared after them in horror and confusion as they left, and then Sarah wrapped her arms tight around my middle and whispered in my ear.
“I am sorry you were scared by my actions. Come into the kitchen, let us eat some food.”
Even if the words were kind, my skin crawled at her unnatural cadence and speech. Even so, I let her lead me into the kitchen and started working on supper. Maybe I was overthinking things. If the firefighters said she was fine, wasn’t she fine? Sure, they’d also been acting strange, but I didn’t want to think about that.
I could still hear the wreath scratching against the door, and it seemed louder now that the firefighters were gone. Scritch. Scritch. Scritch. But I tried to ignore it; I didn’t know what else I could do. I’d already upset Sarah and made a fool of myself. And besides, why was I getting so worked up over a decoration? I told myself the noise would soon fade into the background, and I could forget all about it.
Except, it didn’t. Over the following weeks, the scratching got louder and more persistent, and I felt like I barely slept. And Sarah’s behavior just got weirder. Every time I would get near the front door, she bolted upright and stared at me, following me with her eyes until she was satisfied I wasn’t going near her wreath. She claimed she never realized she was acting strange, and just laughed it off as if she was daydreaming or zoning out. But the way her eyes followed me…well, it was like nothing I’d ever seen before. And all the while, the wreath continued its persistent scratching against our door.
A few weeks ago, the time for spring cleaning finally came. It’s always my job to inspect the roof and clean the gutters, so I got the ladder out of the garage and went to work. Once I finished cleaning the gutters, I gathered all my tools and carefully set them on our front porch. Sarah was inside cooking, and she wasn’t watching me while I was outside. Now was my chance.
I walked over to the wreath and grabbed it to throw away with the rest of the junk I’d pulled out of the gutters. But as soon as I lifted the bottom of the wreath away from the door, I froze in shock. There was a scream from inside the house, but I barely registered it. I knew the wreath had been scratching our door, but I hadn’t expected this. The paint was chipped and peeled, but it was strange looking, and it almost seemed like the branches had scratched a pattern into the door. I peered closer at the grooves and lines in the wood. Were those…runes?
“NOOOOOOOO!” Sarah burst out the front door, snarling and spitting like a cat. “GET! AWAY! FROM! IT!”
I backed up frantically, trying to ward her off, and she stopped just a few feet away from the door, teeth bared as she glared at me. I stumbled over the ladder and fell on my back. The next moment, she hurried to my side.
“Oh, honey! Are you hurt? What happened?”
I stared up at her in shock. This was the same old Sarah I had known for years, caring for me even if I’d only tripped. Mutely, I shook my head. It was all too much.
“No, I’m fine. Just fell, that’s all. Let me store the tools, then I’m gonna go inside and take a shower.”
As I staggered to my feet and took everything to the garage, my mind was racing. Had those really been runes scratched on our door? And why, why was Sarah so obsessed with protecting that wreath? It was almost as if she sensed when I was near it, even if she was in another room. And her mood swings and forgetfulness were really starting to worry me. Maybe we needed to look into therapy.
I shoved the ladder against the wall and made a silent vow. I was done with the wreath. I didn’t want to look at it, see it, or hear it scratching anymore. It wasn’t going to stay on our front door any longer than I could help. But I would have to wait for an opportunity when Sarah was gone.
That opportunity took a little longer than I anticipated, but a couple weeks later, I got home from work early to find that she’d run to the store for groceries. As soon as I shucked my work gear, I went to the front door, smiling grimly.
“This is it for you, old boy,” I said to the wreath, and I tilted it up slightly, looking at the scratches underneath it. My phone buzzed in my pocket. Sure enough, they really were runes, and it looked like there were more of them this time. My phone buzzed again. Impatiently, I answered it without looking to see who it was, still staring at the strange runes.
“Hel-”
“LEAVE IT ALONE!” Sarah shrieked on the other end of the line. “I KNOW WHAT YOU’RE DOING, DON’T TOUCH IT!”
Startled, I pulled my phone away from my ear and stared at the wreath. This was too much. I deliberately hung up on Sarah, cutting her off mid-shout, and put my phone back in my pocket. It started buzzing immediately, but I ignored it.
“Alright, wreath, you’ve caused enough trouble. You’re going in the burn pile.”
I grabbed the wreath and tried to pull it off the door, but sharp thorns bit my hands. I whipped my hands away and growled an oath, feeling my fingers throb from the small punctures. I didn’t know this thing had thorns. But at this point, I didn’t care.
I gripped it again, ignoring the stabbing pain in my hands, and yanked. But the wreath didn’t come off the door. It must’ve been caught on a nail or something. Frowning, I tilted it up and looked at the top of it, twisting and yanking as I did. But the wreath still didn’t come off. I twisted harder, trying to see what it was caught on, when I suddenly gasped in shock.
The top of the wreath was fused to our door. The branches and cute decorations dug right into the wood, and it was almost impossible to tell where wreath ended and door began. Frantically, I began to twist and pull at it, trying to break the wreath free, but it was like trying to break a strong, healthy branch from a tree. It bent, but it wouldn’t snap, no matter what I tried.
Half-mad with frustration and confusion, I raced to the garage to find a hammer or axe. Just then, Sarah’s car careened around the street corner, skidding across our grass before running over the mailbox. She leaped out when the car was still in motion and raced up the driveway, yelling shrilly at me and bristling with rage.
“STAY BACK! You’d better not hurt it!”
I held up my hands placatingly.
“Easy, honey, I was just looking at it. You’ve really got it wedged in the door, you know that?”
“I don’t care.” She spat. “You need to leave it alone! Get out of the garage, I don’t want you near those tools! Out!”
We stared at each other for a long, long time. Her voice was like the old Sarah I knew, and her cadence wasn’t so strange. But now, even the regular Sarah was obsessed with the wreath. Finally, I nodded. I’d made my decision. I went in the house through the garage door, and when Sarah turned around for a moment, I slammed and bolted it shut, then raced to the front door and locked it too. We had two deadbolts on our doors, so even if she tried the key, she couldn’t get it open.
To my surprise, Sarah didn’t shout or even try to unlock the doors. I peeked out the window, and she’d returned to her car, parking it in the driveway where she could see both doors. And she just sat there.
Almost immediately, the wreath started scratching at the wood again, but faster this time. Scritch. Scritch. Scritch. Scritch. I listened for a few minutes, but nothing else happened. Finally, I decided to eat and try to sleep. I didn’t watch what Sarah did; she could sleep in the car for all I cared, but I wasn’t letting her back inside the house. When I went to bed late that night, the wreath just kept up that incessant scratching. Its grating sound dug deep, filling all my dreams like icy claws slowly skittering down my spine. I barely slept at all.
It's been two days now, and I haven’t left the house since. The scratching sound is driving me crazy, but the fear of what the wreath might be doing is even worse. I’m sitting here in our rocking chair typing this out, but it’s very difficult, especially with the maddening sounds and my pounding headache. But I had to share this.
I don’t know what the wreath’s plan is, but I don’t care. This morning when I woke up, I found small wood shavings on the inside of our front door, and I could see tiny bits of roots poking through little holes. Even worse, when I looked out the window, Sarah had moved from the car to the front porch. She’s just sitting there with her arms wrapped around her knees, staring up at the wreath. Like a little child waiting for Santa.
Part of me wants to take an axe from the garage and smash that stupid wreath to splinters. Even if I have to bust the whole door down, I want to do it. I know Sarah won’t be happy, but I don’t care.
But even the thought of moving is difficult now, and part of me just wants to sit here in this rocking chair. My headache just won’t go away, and I’ve found the only thing that helps is to gently rock back and forth. It’s nice listening to the creaking of the chair, and it almost seems to make the scratching sound less painful.
I know I shouldn’t, but all I want to do is sit here, listening to the gentle sounds of the rocking chair and the wreath.
Scritch. Creak. Scritch. Creak. Scritch. Creak.
X

There is a saying that if you light three candles near your bed, place a mirror near you, and hold on to your dearest belonging you can transport to the dimension of the sleepless. However, this only works when the sky has reached its darkest color, and you can't fall asleep. While in bed you're supposed to think of a tranquil scenery, or maybe a beautiful memory, whatever calms you as you must be mentally prepared before entering the new realm. Once you enter a trance-like state, you find yourself drifting in a pitch-dark portal without gravity or any form of matter other than you. Whatever you do you MUST NOT fall asleep. Your visit ends when the sun rises, then you are sent back to your dimension. You are NOT to sleep until you are sent back or you'll be stuck here forever
As an insomniac, I was sure the last part wouldn't happen to me, no way would I fall asleep. I've been depressed for a while, I don't go out much and neither am I able to sleep before the sun rises. Life has been quite mundane, I have nothing to lose at this point. So my boredom led me to try this ritual above that my friend told me about. I wasn't too excited, nothing excited or pleased me anymore but for some reason, I was drawn to try this particular thing.
I tried it out, I grabbed my dearest possession, the necklace given to me by my grandma who passed away two years ago. My grandma was the only one who ever truly cared about me. While in bed I thought of a memory of my grandma feeding me her homemade food. That was the last that I had been happy. It was pitch dark, completely silent. I didn't feel scared. Soon I felt more and more relaxed after thinking about granny. And then I entered the portal.
I was floating, I couldn't believe it worked. After a few minutes, I reached my destination. "The world of the sleepless" I thought to myself. As I opened my eyes, I noticed my room, but it looked different, the walls had this gross blood-like fungus on them along with plants that had sharp teeth. The room looked completely dilapidated. As I tried walking away, the bloodthirsty plants locked me as their target. They showed off their teeth as I stepped near them. Soon I was greeted with footsteps, slow and steady. A tall figure lurked behind me. I could feel its loud breathing near my ear. I turned back to see a figure with no eyes, It looked dark and hollow there. It was thin, its body looked as if it already started rotting. Its hair was filled with that blood-like fungus. I looked closer to see some wrinkles and a big long grin. "Granny is that you? I barely recognized you." I shouted with tears in my eyes. "Yes honey," she said with a smile on her face. "I missed you so much, It's so nice to see you again," I said as I hugged her tightly.
I backed off and started observing my surroundings, something felt a bit off. "Granny is this real?" I asked. "It is," she said giggling.
Together we visited the place, we were laughing and sharing old anecdotes. It felt utterly bliss. I told her about my school and current life, time passed by so fast. Before I knew it the sun rose and I drifted away from my sweet grandma back to my cruel reality. Everything really sucked.
But from that day I would visit her every night. And it was amazing. I could barely wait to see her again in the mornings. This time while visiting, I planned to fall asleep and stay there forever, I even took sleeping pills in advance. I wanted to get stuck there, my life in my dimension had lost its meaning to the point that nights were the only thing worth living for. Then went I to her and we talked for hours. "Grandma you remember the last gift you gave me? I still have it" I said. She looked confused, I could sense something was deeply wrong. "The teddy bear, I still have it." I lied, ( it was a necklace). "You also gave a necklace, passed down from generation to generation. what color was it again?" I asked thinking no way she would have forgotten this. "It was blue honey," she said. (it was white). "You are not my grandma, are you? Who really are you then?" I asked with goosebumps. She looked pale white. I felt scared, I wanted to run away but I felt myself falling asleep. Everything started looking blurry. She noticed I was almost asleep and stared at me with a long sinister grin.

When I’ve asked him he just tells me his workers call out on the daily and he’s been told he can’t fire them. He said he fired the whole night crew when he started a few months ago because they never showed up, but everyone he hires just refuses to show up or do their job now. He said this is the first store he’s worked at that is like this and he’s stuck there. When I asked about his DM he said it’s a lost cause because they refuse to help him. I work in fast food myself but I’m not anywhere near GM, I can’t imagine working 80hrs a week and not getting paid for it. Is there not anything or anyone I could speak to? The store always has angry customers because he’s doing it alone and isn’t allowed to close early apparently. It can’t be a good look for the company. Has anyone else experienced anything like this before?

I sincerely apologize for the wait, school really has been a lot. I would give a time for when to expect the next chapter, but even I don't know when that'll be. For now, enjoy!
​
first/previous
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Memory transcript subject: Jacob McNeal, Human Liberation Front, Eastern American cell
Standardized human time: January 5th, 2057
“You’d better have a damn good destination in mind!” I heard Emily yell from the back as I sped down the road. “Don’t worry, I do!” I replied, pushing the gas down as hard as it would go as I saw another group of federation vehicles approaching from in front of us, while the ones behind us slowly got closer. I narrowed my eyes as I kept a straight course right towards the incoming federation trucks. We got closer. And closer. And closer, before…
“HOLD ON!” I yelled back towards Emily before swerving the steering wheel to the right, damn near tipping the van over as it narrowly avoided the speeding feds. Still, it managed to stay up, allowing me to get around them. To make things better, I heard a loud crash behind us. I looked in the mirror to see a mess of mangled vehicles. They’d crashed into the ones chasing us, just as I’d hoped.
I let out a laugh as I sped away, while I could hear Emily cursing and yelling in the back. She had to have been thrown around quite a bit in that little stunt. “I HATE YOUR FUCKING PLANS JACOB!” She yelled. It only made me laugh more as I turned onto a dirt road.
It wasn’t long before the ships and sirens chasing us faded away. For all their technological prowess, the federation always struggled to track us into the wilderness. If there was anywhere that was safe enough to turn on that radio we’d just risked our lives for, it would be out here. I slowed to a stop as I came upon the hidden truck that command had stashed as our getaway if the convoy heist would’ve gone as planned. I couldn’t believe I forgot about it until now, but it wouldn’t have helped us all that much. They were always full of supplies, but notably no radio. We weren’t exactly expected to lose the one we had
“How’d you like that?” I asked as I went around the back to check on Emily and help her out. “I’m not Miles, but I think that was pretty good…” I trailed off as I opened the door to see… two occupants. I recognized the cowering figure in the blue uniform behind Emily as Private Cooper. “You drive like a madman, I didn’t have the chance to get rid of him.” Emily said casually as she stepped out, dragging the trembling private along with her. “I’d much prefer it if we had Miles driving.”
“You couldn’t just toss him out?!” I yelled in frustration, grabbing the private’s other arm as we dragged him from the truck. He was shaking, and by the looks of it, too scared to fight back. Not that he would be able to win. “Like I said, you drive like a madman!” She said back. “When I was about to toss him we got thrown back, and by then I had to focus on not getting shot!”
“I- fine, fine” I said as we shoved him against a tree. “Let’s just shoot him then.” I replied casually, which got me a scared whimper from our hostage, and a sigh from Emily. “I knew you’d say that, but he’s harmless now, look at him.” She said, motioning to the rather pathetic sight in front of us. And to think this thing considered itself human. “Maybe we could keep him alive for a bit? Trade him if we find out the federation got any of the others, yknow? Either that or let him go, we won’t be staying here long.”
As much as I liked the idea of a hostage trade, I had a feeling that wouldn’t work. “Yeah, because they always love to negotiate with savage beasts like us.” I said sarcastically, taking a step towards the trembling Cooper. Emily put a hand on my shoulder before I could get too close. I sighed in frustration. “They wouldn’t listen to us Emily! You know that!”
“We can’t just kill him, he's harmless.” She said calmly, stepping between me and him. “Just… let’s keep him for a little, maybe he’ll be useful, alright? If nothing else we can get some info out of him, and it’ll show that maybe they’re wrong about us if we let him go.” I sighed, but relented. She had a bit of a point. As much as I wanted to kill him, he might be useful for something. Even if that something was just showing that we aren’t as ruthless as they like to make us out to be. “Fine, fine, but we’re keeping him tied up” I replied.
“I wasn’t going to let him roam free.” She said, turning around and grabbing the trembling private. “Chin up, private Cooper!” I said with a very exaggerated smile. “Emily here has just saved your life! If you cooperate, I might not shoot you.” He only gave a frightened whimper, and with that, I went to go digging around the trunk of our old getaway vehicle. I mumbled to myself as I looked for some rope. I knew we had to have some somewhere.
“Medkit, rations… ah, rope!” I said to myself as I dug it out from beneath an extra sleeping bag. If only these things had radios I thought to myself. Once I pulled out the rope I went back to Cooper and tied him up to a tree, while Emily kept him from running. The private still never said a word, which was perfectly fine by me. I still wouldn’t mind killing the uncanny little shit, but Emily had been convincing enough. He’d talk later.
“Well,” I said as I tightened the rope, tugging on it to make sure he couldn’t run. “If you don’t mind taking the first watch, I’d like to get some rest.”
“Works for me, you’ve got four hours” she said as we walked back to the stolen van to move the radio. “So do you when I’m up, then we get to work” I replied, opening the back of the van and climbing inside. I passed the radio to her without another word before shutting the door. The van wasn’t the most comfortable place to sleep, but after the night we’d have I’d take any rest I could get. I rested my head on my bag as I laid down, and quickly drifted off to sleep.
My dreams often weren’t very pleasant, and this early morning nap was no exception. Even the good dreams were bittersweet, knowing I’d never get to really live them. A normal life just wasn’t something I’d be able to have, all because of the federation. Those dreams of spending time in a crowded pub, drinking and singing into the night with friends, walking down the street without being shot by a trigger-happy exterminator, it was all fantasy. Impossible. All because of my natural eyes and diet.
This dream wasn’t too different from those. I was sitting at a table in a noisy bar, a glass of whiskey in my hand. Emily, Mikhail, Alex, Miles, they all sat around me. For once, we just talked. Not about our hatred for the federation, not about what command would have us doing next, we just… talked about life. It was as if the federation never found Earth all those years ago. It was the life I wished I could have.
Of course, it was just a dream, and dreams don't last forever. I awoke to the door opening as Emily came inside, shaking me awake. “Get up, your turn.” I groaned, grabbing my cap and putting it on as I sat up. It was my grandfather's old flat cap, one he’d worn doing the same things I now do. Then my father wore it. And now I do.
Even if all this fighting and resisting is futile, at least I can say I’m carrying on a legacy. I thought to myself.
“Yep, moving” I said, standing up and heading towards the door. Despite the relatively short rest, I still felt much better than I did before. Any rest was welcomed, who knew that hours of hiking and fighting takes a lot of you. “Has Cooper said anything?” I asked, stopping at the door as Emily laid down.
“Private wide-eyes has been quiet, thankfully” she said while taking off her boots. “Hasn’t tried to draw any attention here, I think he knows that nobody would hear him.”
“Good, have you asked him about the others? If they captured any? Where they might be?” I asked, putting a hand on the door. “I thought I’d leave that to you.” She said, tossing both boots to the side. “Yep, leave it to me… I’ll get answers, fill you in when you're up” I said with a sigh before finally closing the door. The morning sun was beginning to shine through the trees as I walked over towards the hidden getaway vehicle and sat down against it, right across from the tied up Cooper. He looked like shit.
“Hey private” I said. He looked up weakly. His large eyes were red, and it looked like he’d been crying. “You remember what I said earlier?” I asked, stifling a yawn as I spoke.
“You… wouldn’t kill me if I cooperate…” he mumbled dryly, barely audible. “Correct.” I said, standing up and opening the back of the vehicle. “Now, if you answer my questions, not only will I let you run back to your federation once my friend and I leave, I might even give you some water, I’m sure you haven’t had anything since we arrived here.”
A small amount of hope flashed in his eyes as I produced a small bottle from the getaway truck before walking towards him. “All yours if you talk, so… did the ESB capture any people with… predator disease like myself? Smaller eyes and all?” I asked, opening up the bottle and taking a small sip. I never liked the term predator disease, it implied that something was wrong with me, but I had to say it in a way he’d understand.
Maybe we should start saying that these abominations have prey disease. I thought to myself while waiting for an answer.
“Y- yes…” the private said. “T- two… a- a third got away, but they’re looking for him...” I frowned at the new information. They did get the others, at least two of them, and given that he said the third was a he, they got Alex, along with either Miles or Mikhail. That was two accounted for, but two captured was two too many. “Good, see? Not so hard, here” I said, walking up to him and holding the open bottle up to his dry lips so he could get a drink. He quickly gulped down a couple sips before I pulled it away. He strained against the ropes binding him, trying to get more.
“Now now” I started, shaking the bottle just out of reach in front of his face. “I’ve got a few more questions. '' He lowered his head, but didn’t say anything. I smirked before I continued. “Where did they take them?”
“I- I don’t know… p- please, don’t hurt me, I don’t know!” He said, a bit too loud for my liking. “I won’t hurt you if you quiet down, and answer my questions.” I said, taking a few more sips from the bottle, to taunt him more than anything else. “But you’d better give me some kind of answer if you want more water, I know you’ve gotta know something.” He whimpered as he looked at the now half empty bottle in my hand. It was downright pathetic honestly.
“Th- the captured diseased were t- taken to a secret facility, th- the best federation scientists are there…” he said, swallowing nervously before continuing. “I- I don’t know where it is, j- just that it was west of the road you attacked on…”
I wasn’t completely happy with that answer, but he seemed genuine enough. These things generally sucked at lying. I walked forward and gave him more water, pulling it back again to ask my last question. “Alright Cooper, final question” I said, staring him right in his big, beady eyes. “Why were they captured and not killed? None of us have ever been captured before.”
More fear flashed in his eyes when I asked that question. “I- I can’t tell you that…” he said, averting his gaze towards the ground. I sighed in annoyance before starting to walk around him. Though I didn’t show it, I was pretty surprised at his response. I never expected him to refuse to answer with how scared he looked. “Cooooooper…” I said, drawing out his name as I slowly made a circle around him. “You were doing so good, don’t you remember what I said? You won’t get hurt as long as you answer me” I replied as I took out my knife, flashing it in front of him. “Do you want to try that again? Or should I start taking fingers?”
Another frightened whimper left him, and he began shaking. “I- I… C- Captain Perkins said this was top secret, th- that nobody could know, especially you diseased…” he said, which only elevated my annoyance to anger. This things agency was probably torturing my friends I’d known for years, my comrades I’d fought side by side with, and he still had the gall to refuse to answer me?
“I’ll give you this, Private Cooper” I said, walking behind him and grabbing his shaking hand, holding his ring finger out as I lightly pushed my knife against it. “You’re braver than you seem, I'm impressed.” He began to panic as I started to slowly slide the knife across his finger. It didn't cut through the skin, but if I went any long it would. “Ok! W- wait, d- don’t! I’ll tell you!” He said, to which I pulled my knife away and got in front of him, still holding the blade in clear view. “Then spill it.”
He still hesitated, but one glare from me got him to talk. “A- a predator species… th- the federation, they’ve found a sentient predator species… th- they want to understand them, b- but there have never been sentient predators before… p- predator disease was the next best option for study…”
I paused, my anger replaced first by shock, then by growing happiness. I couldn’t help but let a smile form across my face. A real smile, not a malicious grin put on to scare Cooper. A real, genuine smile. “See, not so hard.” I said as my anger started to dissipate, letting him gulp down the last of the water.
“A predator species… another predator species…” I said out loud to myself, still smiling. Maybe they could help us if we warned them before the federation slipped them the cure. Maybe that life I dreamed of was really possible in some way. I looked back at the tied up Cooper to see him silently crying with his head down. “You… you weren’t supposed to know that…” he whined, tears streaming down his face. “Th- they knew you would be happy, th- that you’d want to help them devour and enslave us all!”
I sighed, and for once, felt a little bad for him. The federation brainwashing ran so deep, he didn’t even know what he really was. Well, what he was supposed to be. “Oh if only you knew” I said, shaking my head before leaning forward so I could look him in the eyes. “Your ancestors were predators, in fact they looked a lot more like me then they did you.”
“Y- You don’t know what you’re talking about, you’re sick! Diseased! Th- they say predator disease warps the mind, but I didn’t know it was this bad!” He said, more tears streaming down his face. I sighed and straightened up, but stopped one last time before going to get my rifle. “Maybe Emily’s right… somewhere deep in there, maybe you’ve still got some predator in you.” With that, I left the private alone with his thoughts and went to watch for any Feds. I needed to process the existence of another predator. We weren’t alone. For the first time ever, humanity wasn’t alone!
The next couple hours were rather uneventful while I gave Emily the rest she needed. I lazily patrolled in a circle around our little camp while I counted down the hours until it was time to wake her up, only stopping to snack on some of the rations from the getaway vehicle. I even found some wild blueberries growing nearby for Cooper. I had a feeling that he wouldn’t exactly enjoy the beef jerky I was eating.
I got up from picking the berries and began walking back towards the vehicles. The sun was out now, and it would soon be time to wake up Emily. She’d be as excited about this revelation as I was. I was still struggling to process it, another predator species… we needed to get this back to command, if we were fast enough maybe we could warn them and save these fellow hunters from the same fate that befell humanity.
“Got you some snacks Cooper” I said cheerfully as I approached the still restrained hostage. I’d moved the ropes a little bit so he could sit down, but I still wasn’t letting him go. “Here” I said, holding out the berries so he could eat them. He was clearly still scared of me, but he accepted the food, eating out of my hand like an animal. Much like with the water earlier, he hadn’t eaten anything since he ended up with us. “Don’t look too down,” I said with a wide smile. “We’ll be letting you go soon! Emily was convincing enough, killing you wouldn't do anything.”
Cooper stayed silent, even when I patted him on the shoulder as I stood up. Emily had her four hours of sleep, it was time to wake her up. I couldn’t wait to tell her everything. I walked around the van and was about to open the door before I heard a twig snap behind me. Swiveling around, I swung my rifle from my shoulder and aimed it near the trees where I heard the sound. I didn’t see anything. “Emily, get up I think we have company” I said, knocking on the back door to wake her. I didn’t wait for confirmation that she was awake before I started walking towards the source of the sound, my rifle aimed at the spot. It could’ve just been an animal, but…
I suddenly felt a sharp prick on my neck, causing me to stumble a few steps. I hissed in pain and reached up, feeling a small object sticking out of my neck. I pulled it out, looking it over as I tried to figure out what it was. Realization hit me at the same time as its effects. It was a tranquilizer dart, which could only mean... I swayed from side to side as I began to feel dizzy. I wanted to yell a warning to Emily, but I was quickly fading. Before I could get a word out, I fell to the ground, and it all went dark.

ChocoPro 302: Three Years From a quick solution during the pandemic to the world’s smallest promotion, ChocoPro has reached it’s third Anniversary. The best way to celebrate, as always, is with violence! Join us for a late night snack of chaos. The Comaneci Gang recruits Miya once more to face off in a Monster Mash with UMA, CDK battles Warm Caterpillars despite Mei being in America, and the unpredictable Ichigaya Rumble returns to mark the Special Day! Let’s Go, ChocoPro!
🍫 CLICK HERE FOR THE LINK! Something Comaneci (Tokiko “Otoki” Kirihara & Antonio Honda) & Miya Yotsuba VS UMA+ (Sayaka Obihiro, KOJIO, & Tiger Jeet Shinjuku), CDK (Chris Brookes & Masa Takanashi) VS Warm Caterpillars? (Ken Ohka & Chie Koishikawa), and the Third Anniversary Rumble! It airs TONIGHT at 11 pm EDT / 8 pm PDT (Tomorrow at 3 am GMT, 12 pm JST). Live and Free on YouTube!
Don't forget to Adjust Your Volume, Wrestling is Loud!
Change the stage, escape the normal! ChocoPro is built different. Find out why wrestlers like it so much: Find a new home on the bleeding edge. (This is not your regular wrestling show.) Join us for this episode, or check out the back catalog of 17 wonderful Seasons on the Gatoh Move ChocoPro YouTube channel...260+ episodes with stories and pro-wrestling like you've never seen. New to the promotion? It features a roster of skilled veterans, rising stars, and wonderful guests fighting in the ChocoPro Arena: Ichigaya Chocolate Square. Subscribe for more content than just the live matches! (AEW Watch Alongs, Discussions, Interviews, Food Challenges, etc) Even if you can't catch it live, don't sweat it! It will still be available on the channel.

Something Comaneci (Tokiko “Otoki” Kirihara 💃 & Antonio Honda 🍯) & Miya Yotsuba 🍀

VS

UMA+ (Sayaka Obihiro 💙, KOJIO 💀, & Tiger Jeet Shinjuku 🐯)

Monster Mash

To say the “Something” Comaneci gang (Antonio Honda & Tokiko “Otoki” Kirihara) are strange is a bit of an understatement. These two are entirely unpredictable, bringing absurd comedy and slapstick violence to each of their matches (with the occasional shockingly clean tag technique). It helps that when Anton isn’t singing (or hitting you with any prop he can find) he’s got solid fundamentals and a ton of classic wrestling techniques. Otoki on the other hand is one of the most straightforward characters in the promotion: a merciless striker with a knack for throws. Her brutality is increased dramatically when paired with Anton, since they’re willing to flat out break the rules. She also loves COMANECI! Rookie Powerhouse Miya Yotsuba has been turned to the Darkness by them in the past. The power focused, goblin trained “Ichigaya’s Lucky Charm” is usually a crowd favorite, but will she have fallen back into the Comaneci Gang’s ways? What schemes are these odd villains up to? How will the Strangers handle fighting Monsters? This one is gonna get weird.
Sayaka Obihiro is a joy to watch in ChocoPro, with her deep sense of humor and lightning quick striking & pinning techniques...but she is a bit...different...when she teams with Monsters. After a bizarre series of events, Obi has aligned with what she fought against (for ten years)! Normally, when Obi isn't chopping the life out of someone so hard that it sounds like a car door slamming, she is pulling off some of the best feats of nimbleness you've ever seen. The insanely charismatic full time chef has got a great set of flame gear and an incredibly intense style. Even if she’s gone feral, you'll find yourself enchanted by her brash nature and wild antics! Strange and occult happenings are somewhat common in Ichigaya, and the mysterious organization known as UMA features many monsters that just so happen to wrestle! Obi has brought with her the fierce beast Tiger Jeet Shinjuku! Much like Kappa Kozo, this unknown creature is unpredictable and deadly! The jungle cat humanoid was known for some of the best gifs in Season 10. Watch out for those claws! Be prepared for [REDACTED by order of UMA]. Monsters from across the world are attracted to ChocoPro due to their influence...(You should see what is happening over at SETUP!) Speaking of which, a cold wind brings a shadow over Ichigaya once again! Hailing from Parts Unknown and trained at the Nightmare Factory (which makes even more sense given that sinister look!), kojio’s frightening presence made him fit right in with the other Monsters of UMA. With brawling brutality, vicious submissions, and an absolutely wicked set of gear that makes him look like a character straight from a graphic novel, kojio scares his opponents and impresses the audience with his relentless nature and bone chilling aura. That laugh is something else! This unstoppable monster has been a wonderful addition to Ichigaya, but how long will he accept Obi taking pinfalls? I wouldn’t want to upset him!

CDK (Chris Brookes 🐙 & Masa Takanashi 🍶)

VS

Warm Caterpillars? (Ken Ohka 🤠 as May Suruga & Chie Koishikawa 🏵️)

Warm Caterpillars?

The Calamari Drunken Kings (Chris Brookes & Masa Takanashi) have been untouchable as the Asia Dream Tag Champs. These two demolished teams across the globe, bringing further glory to the purple belts in their own corrupted version of “Belt Days”. Brookes wields a grim technical style and monstrous presence that demoralizes his opponents long before he’s got them tapping out. His incredible reach and explosive movements make him a major threat at all times. Chrissy B’s partner is just as dangerous though...beware the belt collecting Counter-Fighter! Masa’s laid back personality and reversal style might make him seem overly passive, but the Drunken Monkey can show seamless aggression when he needs to. His crisp technique and general fluidity pair well with the Tsundere Submission Specialist’s sadistic skill set. While this isn’t a bout for the titles, they will be looking to once again put down Chie Koishikawa...but how can they be fighting Warm Caterpillars? Mei is in America! Regardless, CDK will be more than happy to remind them of the Brutality of Reality.
The Warm Caterpillars are together once again...or are they? Mei Suruga & Chie Koishikawa are a one of a kind team! This charisma volcano of cheerful goblins will evoke a lot of different emotions out of you, but you’ll definitely want to see more. Someone that calls themselves the Apple Girl ”May Suruga” (Ken Ohka) will be providing surprising agility and power with the Aerial Striking & Reversals of the girl with “Too Much Energy”. While this May might be a bit different than you are used to, the crowd (and the online audience) always gets behind the Lover of Chocolate. This Doppelganger has even been acknowledged by the real thing! May will be paired with Mei’s frequent friend and rival this time. Chie Koishikawa is the “Ace of the Fourth Generation”, known for Extreme Speed and Extreme Charisma. With the her increasing grasp of counters, high flying strikes, that nasty Stretch Muffler, and even her flash pin “Energy Hold”, Chie will hold up her end of the team. But how will these two get along? Will Chie even realize that isn’t Mei? Can Ichigaya contain this amount of chaotic energy and fighting spirit?

Third Anniversary Special Rumble

Three Years

Participants: Hagane Shinno, Masa Takanashi, Ken Ohka, Chie Koishikawa, Miya Yotsuba, Sayaka Obihiro, Tokiko Kirihara, Antonio Honda, KOJIO...almost everyone from the earlier matches!
Delayed Entry Battle Royals, when handled right, can truly show the potential of pro-wrestling. While we’re all familiar with how they can go wrong (and very long), ChocoPro’s unique audience experience amplifies the artistry of the match format. Why? You, the online viewer, are the perspective! You only see what you’re looking at (please imagine the unseen), which leads to crazy situations suddenly reappearing before your very eyes...while you were distracted by something else! Maybe this is what referees feel like on a general basis? Let’s celebrate Three Years of ChocoPro with a completely chaotic match! There is a lot of potential winners in this lineup, but the biggest wildcard is the addition of the Super Asia Champion, Cold Killer Hagane Shinno! What is different about a ChocoPro Rumble? Don’t get pinned, submitted, or thrown out of the 14th Floor window!
Here’s to Three More Years!
Come and see the wild creativity that produced Two of the Seven AEW Women's World Champions! (Both of which have appeared on ChocoPro!) You'll be wondering if you're seeing future champs, as well. ChocoPro is the Frontier of Pro Wrestling! Match after match of hard hitting, chaotic, fun bouts with a friendly online audience. We're quickly growing, and you're welcome to come along!
Here are some Frequently Asked Questions:

“What is this?”

ChocoPro is a free online promotion run by AEW's Emi Sakura, that takes place in the legendary Ichigaya Chocolate Square! It features a steady pace of live Episode releases, fan interaction, season long story arcs, and much more! A place where the turnbuckles are replaced with 14th floor windows, the ropes are often replaced with fans, unforgiving walls provide creative avenues for skills otherwise unthinkable, and you can take solace in knowing that the referees usually do nothing. While it might be a shocking change at first, the intensity and storytelling will leave you wanting more.

“Why are they fighting in ____?”

Short answer is that it is a cost effective, unique venue with a better availability schedule and allows the roster access for training. Emi Sakura has been using this place for a long time, and you might be surprised at some of the names that have used it (even outside of ChocoPro!). There are a few in-ring Episodes and Gatoh Move has in ring shows with crowds on the YouTube channel. Think of it like the Hart Dungeon but as a promotion, if that helps!

”What are the rules?”

While special match stipulations will usually be explained before the respective matches, the general rules of ChocoPro are simple. Pins only count on the Chocolate Mat and are not broken by the edge or Wall. Submissions usually only count on the Chocolate Mat, and ARE broken by reaching the edge or wall (sometimes ceiling...). Double pins and Double submissions are legal (and encouraged) in ChocoPro Tag matches, meaning cohesive teams will always have the advantage! Count Outs only exist if specified, since many matches stray from the comfort of the Chocolate Square into the streets (and the rest of the building itself!) There is a Time Limit for each bout (based on card placement and importance) and the Referee has discretion (even if they tend to do nothing most of the time!). Every Ref is different, some have different levels of bias and speed.

“How can I support them?”

Watch the show! Even if you can't see it live, the views matter! Like & Subscribe! You can join the Channel's membership for different tiers of perks...but also, you can buy single episode Sponsorship, Digital autographed photos, and more on their shop site as well as purchase shirts from PWTees (which features some great options!) If you'd like to donate or purchase a main wall sponsorship, you can via Paypal or Patreon...and don't forget to cheer for your favorites! (especially if you want to do a superchat!)

”How come there aren’t a lot of comments on the threads?”

ChocoPro is a YouTube show, meaning the discourse happens live...in the chat! Those that comment in the threads on here tend to do so in order to help new viewers that might be intimidated by the fast moving chat. Don’t be afraid to just dive in though, the community is friendly.

“Why are you posting this here? / Are you paid for this?”

This is a wrestling forum, and I'm trying to broaden the horizons of others! There is a lot of good wrestling out there...Plus growing the fan base means more people for me to joke around with! I honestly do believe this is what a lot of fans are looking for, even if it is too different for some! But different tastes are good. Variety is the spice of life. This is a labor of love (it really doesn't take that long) considering how much work they do to put on so many shows...for free!
If you have any other questions, feel free to ask me on here or on Twitter, where I’ve been doing this for nearly three years! ChocoPro is Three Years Old!
Season Tracker: We're 2/18 into Season 18! (Each Season is usually around 18 episodes)

Back Story if it adds anything-
12 years ago met INTP at a work. Both Male. Never hanged out 1 on 1 out side of work but smoked cigarettes together alone in the back of the job and talked. I wasn’t out and nether was him and it never went past an acquaintance. I found him hot, but hot enough were i said, “welp this isnt going work 🤷🏽‍♂️”. Got fired for fighting and left job, avoided going near work place to not see him.
2 years ago in current job I was sitting down not working and of course he walks in and we were introduced. He seemed excited and remembered me.
A week after that I got curious and went on Y’old unmentionable m&m fast food dating app during work and of course, someone 20 feet away. After sending faceless pictures to each other i was confident that was him. He has a bf, i dont pursue it any further. We never actually confirmed to each other that we knew but im sure he knows. I delete the app and continue spiraling about other things.
A few months ago he was transferred to my department, I hate life. Normally im loud and out going but when hes around I kinda don’t want to look stupid and try to look serious and manly and fail. I try to avoid him but have smoke with him again one on one.
He told me he was broke up with his boyfriend but was living with him and has been really stressed out. When we talk it dosnt give off flirting vibes so him telling me this i figured he just needed someone to vent to, but got me thinking 👏 THIS IS MY CHANCE!
Did nothing about it.
Last week he was smoking a vape pen in front of me inside work and i ask him if i can try some. He gave me some, asked me if i like it, then got me one in a bag with chips i like and a protein cookie -i’m swole-
I took this, he must like me! Then remember i can sometimes be delusional so took it as a friendly gesture.
I was watching a video of different personality types and I noticed he shows all the terrible signs of INTP stereotype.
Figured he was shy and maybe he does like me and sucks and showing any feelings. So i go on the that app and send him a message telling how i feel. He hasnt been on in a while but im sure eventually he will open it up.
I didnt want to make him feel uncomfortable so i felt like this was the easiest way to tell him and not make it awkward. I also deleted the app and probably never going to open it up and told him so.

Back First Next
This one is going to be a bit longer because a PM To me suggested I go ahead and do a long Chapter.
I hope you still enjoy. The final piece will be released tomorrow.
Memory Transcription: Captain Neil Campbell, United Nations ‘Black Watch’ Company #4
Date [standardized human time]: December 3, 2136
The company had four mortars, four American M2 heavy machine guns, twelve lighter man-portable machine guns, eight light close in AA guns of 40mm twin, every trooper had a stringer mark 7 light anti-air missile, they had four longer range SAM units, eight orbital interceptors dialed into one computer, and two anti-ship missile launchers. Right at that moment, every single weapon they had was singing a song of death.
The Cheetah would silence the battlefield every time its main railgun fired a slug. Meanwhile the two Eisenhower’s autocannons rained down death upon the Arxur. While the standard rifles, pistols, or light SAW weapons would not necessarily take out a Arxur with non-vital hit; the heavy machine guns the Americans provided did.
The Radios crackled with commands going in all sorts of directions.
"All units, gunship coming through at..." Zim hesitated as he figured the direction and coordinates given by the radar operator moments ago. "7 O'Clock, will crest hill in 1 minute thirty, four man-portables dial in."
"Dial 1." Two seconds later all at once, "Dial 2." from 3 people who quickly corrected to dials 2, 3, and 4. Zim nodded, "Confirmed 4 dials."
"Forty seconds to crest." Called back the radar operator.
Campbell made note of how well Zim was handling their current position despite being a civilian. He had deducted correctly that Zim being Mayor would make them very proficient at communication and coordination, as well as delegation. What Zim had just done in thirty seconds was identify a unassigned gunship, that is one that was not anticipated by the long range missiles, short range AA guns, or anything else and assigned four stingers to it now all pre-trained and waiting for their shot.
Thompson was calling over the radio to coordinate the mortars and machine gun fire before broadcasting to Williams in the Cheetah where she couldn't get fire support to so that the MBT could deliver a couple of devastating shots.
Assigned and targeted gunships popped up at longer range and died before they had a chance to properly stabilize themselves in the atmosphere or just after take off. Fighters swooped down only for lock on and incoming missile warnings to scream at them before their sensors had even adjusted to having ground under them.
The smell of metal, ash, and blood filled the air. Arxur trying to get through the pass found it an impassable death trap. They had never encountered alien races who used barbed wire, much less the sheer volume of mines, and the thing that truly caused the reptiles to fear were the hidden single shot tubes full of deisel fuel mixed with wood glue and then aerosolized before something would ignite the fumes. Watching your comrades incinerated and calls of your enemy to let them burn, had the Arxur shooting their own comrades just to silence their screams.
Arxur field commanders stood in the back, shooting those who turned to run from the frontline while the Black Watch fired on. Their mortars were positioned around the 7 kilometer radius of the inner caldera so that at any point within the caldera or around its brim; three mortars could have rounds flying towards target at any one time. As soon as anyone radioed for support, mortars were flying in their direction, pre-dialed coordinates and ranges meant it only took three seconds for a mortar round to be dialed in and on the way.
The pass into the castle was starting to become clogged with Arxur bodies. But they were making progress, slowly. Campbell counted by this point, that most of his forward foxholes had been destroyed, all of them set alight by their preparations, preventing the Arxur from using them, recovering unreachable wounded humans, or bodies. Anyone who couldn't fall back would rather die fighting and then sending their would be captures or devourers into an inferno with them.
Campbell knew however, he was running out of ground to give and soon he would have to kill soldiers. They may kill a hundred each but they would still fall eventually. He saw his gunner snap back and drop off the side of his command vehicle. A vehicle which was all but disabled now. He moved to him.
Scrambling up the vehicle and pulling the wounded soldier down off the MG mount to the ground, laying him softly against the bullet ridden tire of the rover. He held his hand, "MEDIC! Medic!" Campbell called then turned to his trooper.
Campbell checked the nametag to be sure, Muller. "Muller, Muller." Muller turned his head, his eyes were growing hallow. Campbell looked at the wound, part of his upper chest was just gone. His neck was bleeding as well. There was a lot of blood. Slowly, he watched Muller's light escape his eyes.
That is enough. He returned to a reflection off of the now vacant eyes of Muller. The ridge had figures at the top of it. He snapped looking for Sims, when he couldn't find him, he pulled his radio. "Sims! They’re trying to storm the top of the castle! Grid 7-Bravo. Blow it, now.” he was pointing and screaming at the figures when his cyber arm suddenly jerked and sent him face down into the ground, his helmet rolling off.
On queue, the ridge where a few shadowy figures had appeared turned into a cloud of dust and rubble as a fireball erupted from it, silencing the rest of the battlefield for a few moments. The explosion sent rock, dirt, and mud over the side in an avalanche at the would be mountaineers. Everyone attempting to storm the outside of the caldera at that 50 meter grid would be buried in a coming storm of mountainside.
Campbell reached over and picked up his arm, looking at the cybernetic carefully. He sat up and next to Muller for a moment while making sure the connectors would still be good. His pain registers had shut off as soon as it disconnected. The connector appeared intact, just jerked out of the cybernetic socket by the impact and his body weight as the anchor. The round had only destroyed the outer layer of synth-flesh designed to make it aesthetically pleasing as well as his uniform that had been torn covering it.
He put the arm back in with a twist and it rebooted. His radio barked, “Cannot hold the pass, we need more firepower. Yanks, you're up!”
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Memory Transcription: Lieutenant Williams, United Nations ‘Black Watch’ Company #4
Date [standardized human time]: December 3, 2136
Williams hated this, he called another target to his gunner and used his command machine gun to put down more rounds through the fraying camouflage around his tank. Tanks were supposed to be mobile bunkers not sitting ducks. Another high caliber plasma round bounced off their shield and their infantryman, Corporal Davies as he was introduced, the soldier turned the oldest M2 anyone had ever seen in the direction it came from.
Large caliber machine gun casings bounced off the hull top as they cascaded passed something scratched onto the side of the M2. It read in smaller and smaller scratches, “France, Philippines, Tunisia, France, Germany, Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Iraq, Iraq II, Australia, Luna, Mars, The Cradle, Sillis.” The last two were still relatively fresh and easy to read.
“Williams, our forward positions are getting overrun by sheer weight of bodies, you’re up. See you on the other side.” Campbell called to the tank crew and their IFV escorts.
Good, tanks were not made to sit still. What the Arxur were about to find out is that tanks are scary when they are shooting at you but they are even scarier when moving at full speed and still shooting at you extremely accurately.
“Driver, full speed ahead into the pass, put the shield down to scrape the dirt so it will blown any remaining mines; loader, gunner eyes front.” He called out and then clicked his intercom off to switch on his radio, “Ripper 1 and 2, this is War Kitty, on our flank at 5 and 8 o’clock, staggered line fifty meter spread front, twenty to the side.”
That would put the IFVs Fifty meters behind him and twenty meters to each side. This was in case any orbital bombardment got through, even a rod from God would only get 1 vehicle then instead of multiple by the spacing.
A pair of affirmatives came back as the tank rolled forward and broke free of its camouflage to build up speed. Immediately the shield flared as soon as they broke the jungle with every single gun the Arxur had firing at them. Their small interceptor mini-phalanx on top shooting constantly to blow anything bigger than a rifle round out of the sky.
Meanwhile the IFVs pointed at muzzle flashes and sent bursts of .50 cal, 25mm, and 50mm in their direction. One Eisenhower was not a troop transport but strictly a gun platform, carrying a much heavier weapon. The only still used a proven 25mm chaingun.Williams pointed out another target, “Gunner 11, Loader HE.”
“HE Up!” The loader called.
“Sending.”
Williams’s gunner yelled back. The machine guns stopped for a second on the tank and suddenly the turret shuttered as the round was sent, the reward was a hillside that the Arxur were using for cover blowing up in a fireball of red, orange, and black smoke. Arxur body parts, dirt, and debris flying up into the air as the ground was stained with gray’s blood.
Williams wasn't going to hesitate with his ammunition. The nature of the railgun meant that the ammo no longer had large casings of propel behind them. Only the shell head was needed, that meant the tank was packed with four times the ammo of a chemical propellant tank.
The crew worked like a well oiled machine. Every ten seconds another main gun round. Between them, the three fifty’s and the 20mm beside the main gun did not stop shooting unless the gunner signaled.
It was grueling work, exhausting for the loader, mentally wearing for the gunner, forcing Williams to push his mind to the limit and glad for the stimulate that kept fatigue away from his mind. Their driver looking out like a truck driver who had been given too much caffeine but having to keep her jerks to a minimum. The objective was a smooth platform. The three drivers of the armored vehicles coordinating on their own private channel to keep moving through Arxur formations.
An hour passed, the tank rampaged. When they ran out of HE, they used HEAT, when that ran out, they switched to squash. When that ran out, they used the few anti-armor rounds they had brought.
Williams' voice was getting hoarse from calling targets, his hand vibrating from the shake of his command cupola gun. His body vibrated at a different frequency from the rumble of the engine and the quaking of the coaxial weapons.
Suddenly there was a clattering on the roof. Williams recognized it as someone foreign trying to get on the tank. There was clearly some slams against the roof of the tank. "I need help out here!" Davies called over the radio.
There was the distinctive sound of a body crushing under the tank tread that made the crew stop and debate opening the hatch to help. "Davies, what is going on out there? Davies!" Williams called in desperation.
Another few bangs on the room and their machine gunner outside had stopped replying, their shield had failed and rebooted several times, they must have got him with their boarding action. “Raider 2, we’ve got ants and War Kitty does too.”
He checked the shield read out, they had twenty seconds until reboot, twenty seconds to get these Arxur off of them.
Williams swung the turret to look at Raider 2 to see several Arxur attempting to board the tank and get the hatches open. “Raider 2, affirmative. Sorry about your gunner.” He heard the bang of Arxur landing on his hull, likely from the trees around them.
“Proceed with fly swatting, MG only. Gunner, Raider 2 at 7 and a half, full Coax.” The turret swung around, hitting an Arxur and sending him flying into a tree trunk with a sickening crunch before he fell in front of the tank tread. The MBT did not even notice crushing the creature and rolled on beyond the echo of crunching bone against the lower hull, which the loader noticed for a split second.
Pangs and hull tings echoed all around them as the IFV and tank exchanged small arms fire, clearing off their "pest problem" while not doing any significant damage to each other. Williams and his crew did not get time to celebrate.They had been rolling around the outside of the caldera. They moved from Arxur formation to formation; hitting Arxur units as fast as they could then trying to fade away before they could organize a counter attack.
They came back to the Caldera entrance for the fourth time, when they hit one of their own mines. Everyone in the tank was catapulted forward as the track blew off, the drive wheel on the left side seized and the tank nearly flipped, coming to thirty degrees to their right hand side. With a loud unearthly slam, every crew member was thrown to the floor after their heads banged off bulkheads with the whiplash.
Williams felt the ringing in his head, and the unholy headache of a concussion. His vision was fuzzy, he swore he head bells in his ears, his body felt distant; almost as if he were trying to tell his brain to radio control it. He held onto the side of the hull with one hand, trying to stand upon weak and unresponsive legs while his other hand held his aching head, “Status report.”
No one replied. He reached over to his gunner and found his head limp at an unnatural angle. He checked him, his neck was broken clean by the sudden slamming into the bulkhead. Williams ears were ringing, his body wanted to vomit, his eyes couldn’t see straight. He made out the face of his loader, Jenkins. Blood was trickling from his mouth as he laid on the floor in his loader section.
How did I get down here? Williams thought and reached for Jenkins, Jenkins gave a few spasms, spat up some blood and then his eyes glazed over until they were lifeless.
“Jenkins? Jameson? Cleo?” He called out, repeating it again and again tapping the crew intercom on his neck, weakly as he slowly got to his feet. His brain was not processing that his loader and gunner were dead.
“I’m still here.” Cleo answered with her distinctive southern accent. “But fuck, I wish I weren’t.”
His driver was alive but in a separate section from the rest of the crew. “Can… can you move? Fuck, My head.”
There was a loud pang and the feeling of air getting suddenly sucked out of the cabin. Cleo screamed out over the comms and then Williams could hear her heavy breathing. The blurring double vision making it hard to be certain of his movements. It felt like pushing through a heavy lake to get his body to move and his ears rang with the sound of an intense bell.
“Williams, Fuck… sorry Williams, but I can’t now. Damn suspension shaft just ripped through the bottom hull and into my leg.”“Stay where you are, I’ll come get you.”“No Sir, the shaft is impaling my escape hatch and all that racket outside is all Arxur hitting us on the top. Fuck…” Cleo yelled in pain as she tried to shift something.
Williams couldn’t hear the racket she was talking about. He was trying to process the idea that Cleo was hit and his emotions were screaming at him about his now dead loader and gunner. “Sir, set turret control to my station, I’m going to use the guns to cover you and the others. At least, until I bleed out.”“Cleo, we’re it.”
Williams knew saying the words meant his comrades were gone, but emotionally his brain was shut off now.There was a pause on the radio, just a few seconds. Williams slowly reached over and changed the turret control to driver operated.
“Alright, fine, grab your SMG and go out your escape hatch, I’ll hold them off and keep us looking scary. I’ve only got a little bit until I bleed out.”The turret started moving and Williams training kicked in through his concussion. He reached into his personal locker and pulled out the P90 as well as a few magazines and his survival kit, the kicked his escape hatch open out of the bottom of the tank and started to crawl beneath the stricken vehicle.
He kept crawling, heading for the forest, the sound of Arxur shouts and screams as well as gunfire getting quieter and quieter, until finally, Williams felt exhaustion overtake him and blackness closed in.
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Memory Transcription: Captain Neil Campbell, United Nations ‘Black Watch’ Company #4
Date [standardized human time]: December 4, 2136
Raider 2 slowly rolled back down the pass, free of Arxur pursuit. It was in sorry shape to look at. The Anti-Air missile launcher was hanging on by its wiring. The mini-phalanx was gone except the targeting camera which still tried to move the non-existent AMS turret with sparks frying off the frayed wires. The main chain gun barrel was ripped off and what still existed was melted. Seven holes let the night moonlight through.
Both of the tracks had damaged segments that made them rotate around their drive wheels in a funny lopsided pattern. But the IFV rolled back into the silent caldera except for its dying engine. “Raider 2, reporting. Vehicle mission killed.”
Campbell tapped his radio, “Good job, get out and get some food, then get back on the line, your infantry now.”
The Arxur had pulled back after the armour went out and rampaged for an hour. Raider 2 had to wait until darkness closed in to roll back into camp. They had heard the boom of the cannon and sound of the passing armour engines and tracks across the terrain around the caldera. Mortars had provided the armour support fire and now the entire castle smelled of Arxur blood and cordite residue. It was now four hours later and the Arxur hadn’t returned; yet.
The Arxur had not sent in a new wave. Likely in total shock at the armored platoons sudden sally out. Campbell approached the stricken Eisenhower IFV as it rolled to a stop and seemed to break down completely when the engine was shut off.
The crew staggered out, all of them had been wounded to some degree by spalling from their vehicle’s own metal. The flakes and shrapnel generated inside the vehicle from impacts on the outside had done a number on them. But the vehicle had somehow held together. Two of the three staggering figures were trying to carry a fourth trooper out.
Campbell walked over to see Williams with a head injury, one of his feet missing and tourniqueted at the calf as well as two of his fingers ripped off and taped together. “Where are the other vehicles?”
The IFV commander fell to his knees, exhausted after constant combat and adrenaline just broke down crying. The man had enough and couldn’t take anymore. Campbell reached down and slapped his across the cheek, “Oih, stiffen your lip and answer me. We can cry about it later.”
The IFV commander looked up and nodded at the heavy cybernetic arm that had just slammed him. “Sorry sir, just… They’re gone sir. War Kitty took a mine to the tracks, probably one of ours. Raider 1 went down to an ammo explosion, the crew were incinerated instantly. Best I can think sir is that the blow out panels had been welded shut by enemy small arms fire. We found Williams near War Kitty, the Arxur were running from the burning hull, it was still shooting at them.” He took a breath, tears staining his oil and gunpowder covered face.“The gunner must have died and fallen on the turret swing with a death grip on the trigger. We put a missile in her to make sure there was nothing for the scalies to savage.” The commander managed as his crewmates came over and knelt with him while a medic ran off with Williams on a stretcher, followed by a second medic grabbing the stretcher halfway through.
The medics having issues carrying their shotguns and a patient. Aliens don’t play by our rules, medics are still targets to them. Campbell thought to himself as he gave a pat to the IFV commander.“You did excellent, son, you and your crew. So did the rest of your unit. We’ll take it from here.” Campbell tried to use the platitudes to comfort but he knew within an hour those soldiers would be sleeping in a foxhole, with their crew SMGs and sidearms, as well as a helmet just like the rest of his men.
His radio squawked, “Captain, frequency thirteen.”He removed the radio forward several clicks until a shrill deep voice came across it. “Human Commander, respond.”
Campbell recognized it as an Arxur voice and he picked up his radio, “Speaking.” He pulled out his flask and took a swig of the whiskey he kept on his person as he listened.
“We have you surrounded, there is no need to die. We are willing to take you as honorable prisoners with honorable and fair treatment, I assure you. All you have to do—”
“I’m going to stop you, right there. I just watched a pair of glorified armoured lories and a metal assault box rip through your lines and shred your forces to pieces.” He paused and let that sink in, knowing he was insulting his equipment to play up just how badly the Arxur were bloodied.
Campbell continued with this insult tirade, “I heard my recon squad of the lightest infantry I have, wrecked a thousand of you; solid. Listened to it on the radio all while it happened.” He turned to the pass and took a look at the piles of bodies across it and the carnage that looks like something straight out of the Great War more than two centuries ago. Not something he expected to ever see in a modern war.
“I have enough of your bodies to build a replica of Edinburgh Castle out of using them as the mortar.”
“Human! We have you surrounded! This is your chance for mercy! Just surrender your prey to us and yourselves.” Campbell laughed into the radio, “Have you lost your mind; leaf-licking monkey?”
“Not at all, I’m as chipper as can be right now. Listen up, izzard.” He let the name sink in for a second.
“You have us surrounded? Good, we can fire in every direction and hit one of you. You want us? Come and get us.”He flicked the radio off and headed for the medical tent. He needed to hear it from his doc just how many of his troops could fight and how many were not going to last the night or just be dead weight at this point. He also heard they took a few Arxur, alive.
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Memory Transcription: Lieutenant Father Christopher O’Malley , United Nations ‘Black Watch’ Company #4
Date [standardized human time]: December 4, 2136
O’Malley moved to another tarp covering a body that had been recovered. He slowly and silently whispered a prayer, taking the dog tag to give to the medic but using it to get the name and town of origin of the trooper. Taking careful note of the religion and following his training as well as a guidebook for the Catholic, agnostic, or protestant he found. He moved to last one, and finished his prayer.
Campbell was waiting for him at the end of the line of recovered bodies. “Captain.” He said, standing slowly and offering a weary salute. Chris could feel his arm getting tired, he had been going so long and knew he would need a stim to keep up the night.
Campbell saluted back, “Reverend, how bad is it?”
O’Malley looked at the bodies and sighed, “Well, never thought I’d see Clemson die but he did. Dove onto a detonator and set off a satchel charge to take as many as he could before the armour rolled out.” The reverend took out a cigarette and lit it up, taking a long drag from the white paper pipe that took nearly half of it out in one go, then exhausted all his lungs as he let the feeling of euphoria wash over him. The nicotine did its job, steadying his nerves and slowly making his shaking stop. His emotions at all the last rites he had performed starting to defray slowly.
"Father, how many today?" Campbell asked preparing himself. He knew Father O'Malley would have taken note of every time he had done last rites and done a proper headcountting as well.
O'Malley took another drag and nodded, "Thirty-Seven including the Americans who did not come back."
“Father, why do you do it? Why here?” Campbell asked as he took a seat on the ground next to the priest who was still kneeling.
“A shepard is to watch his flock and when the wolves come knocking, send the wolves back to the forest where they belong. With a bloodied nose or broken leg if needed.” O’Malley replied with a soft sigh as he took another drag, the cigarette already starting to come up towards its end.
“And how do you reconcile religion with aliens?” Campbell asked, genuinely curious as to the answer. O’Malley chuckled and pulled the cig from his lips to tap off the ashes, “That ain’t my place to be figurin’. I’m here as the chaplain, higher powers than I determine how we reconcile aliens. My job is to tend to the souls of my flock, seeing as there isn’t an atheist in a foxhole; that has gotten fairly complicated.”
Campbell nodded and pulled his whiskey flask to take another swig. It was down to less than a quarter left. “Captain, no offense but stuff will kill you.”
Campbell smiled at the gallows humour as the reverend chuckled with him for a few moments. “Never change, father.” he spoke as he stood up and started to walk back towards his command tent.
“Aye, aye, captain. Now I’ve got a special case to attend.” Campbell turned towards O’Malley as the chaplain rose and headed into the medical tent.“What’s that reverend?”
“An Arxur asked for a priest.” O’Malley stepped into the tent and headed for where he knew the patient was. It only took a few moments before he arrived at the side of the bed. The Arxur was handcuffed and collared to the cot. Both of his legs were blown off at the upper thigh. His chest was also bandaged from shrapnel that had been sent through it.
O’Malley took a seat on a folding chair and pulled the dim light of their medical tent. Blood stained the sterile sheet placed over the ground. He looked over to the gray with a pain of sympathy for his injuries. The Arxur was breathing laborious and gasping at the air as if it were fighting him. He leaned in, “Alright, my child, how may I assist you?”
Through wheezing breathes the Arxur replied, “I am no hatching.”
“Oh, you misunderstand, it is how a priest of our culture addresses someone who is more youthful than them.” O’Malley spoke slowly and he checked Arxur's pulse. Faint but for the moment steady. “Is there something I can do to make you more comfortable?”
“No, I am dying. Your docs as they are called said they cannot help.”
O’Malley cleared his throat, “You mean the medics.”
“Yes, they do not know enough and there is no surgeon here. Shrapnel has punctured my organs, I will die soon.”
O’Malley reached down to a clawed hand, his instinct was to pull away at the scales but he resisted it. He gripped the hand gently but firmly, his other hand placed near the Arxur’s mouth on his shoulder, showing vulnerability to the creature. “I am here, how may I comfort you in this hour? What is it you believe?”
“I…. I would rather know what you do, human.” O’Malley was taken aback by the request. He shook his head and resisted the urge to preach.
“I am a chaplain of our unit, I counsel the living, comfort the dying and give last rites to the dead. If that means I must learn your religion in your dying hour and console you with it, I will. Please explain what I must—”
“Human.” O’Malley silenced and listened to the Arxur speak, his mind slowly processing each word and ensuring he understood what the Arxur wished. He had trained long and hard, and he was not going to deny the wishes of a dying creature; not friend or foe. “Humor me. What is it that you believe?”
O’Malley took a moment and reached into his shirt, pulling out a small bible, he began to read a verse here and there, slowly explaining his religion, ensuring he focused upon the aspects of love, community, and companionship as well as faith. He spoke for an hour about love, mercy, and the strength of God as O’Malley believed in him.
He continued by explaining stories of the bible in short versions rather than reading verbatim. He explained the mercy and the concept of no atheist in a foxhole. O'Malley monitoring the Arxur's reaction, taking note of the tail as well as the face.
He realized the Arxur looked more peaceful than he had ever seen his species and paused, "If I remove your restraints, you won't attack me yes?"
The Arxur looked suddenly surprised and then nodded. O'Malley reached over to the buckles and clicked them off from the Arxur's wrists, waist, and neck. He did not immediately move but the creature managed a human version of a smile to show his appreciation. "Thank you, that is, more comfortable, please continue."
O'Malley continued explaining his beliefs and the story presented. He felt better preaching to a person who was able to push him away if they wished. It also began to feel less like talking to a prisoner and more like speaking with an old friend.
After intensely listening, the Arxur let out a severe ragged cough. Once the cough stopped, he was drooling blood onto his neck. “Human, my time comes. Please, lead me in a prayer, I did not believe in anything before now. But your warriors prove something supernatural about them. Now, I wish to believe in something as I draw my final breath.”
O’Malley nodded and started to give a prayer then stopped himself. He opened his small bible to Psalm and let his faith guide him. “Repeat after me and you may yet see the gates of Heaven, my friend.”
The Arxur turned his head weakly, “I am called, Grissen, can your lord forgive a wicked creature as I? The things I have—”
O’Malley squeezed the claw he held to get Grissen to be quiet and listen. “The Lord only cares that before your final moment you renounce your evil ways, genuinely mean your repentance, and accept him. If you repeat after me and truly believe in that; allow him to change your heart in that final moment, then yes.”
Grissen weakly nodded, “Proceed.”
“Repeat after me,” O’Malley waited to make sure Grissen was ready. “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want." O'Malley prepared his patience as Grissen repeated the words, slowly. The Arxur was having to speak very deliberately through his breathing. O'Malley could feel the pulse had quickened as well.
"He maketh me lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” Grissen struggled but O’Malley's patience displayed that of the saints he spoke of. He calmly waited for the Arxur to catch up and gripped his hand to give him strength. Every stumble was a simple re-guiding from O'Malley with a smile.
Grissen's eyes showed remarkable recognition of O'Malley, never moving away from him as he listened intently, even managing to turn his head to face the priest fully.
His heart screamed for the pain this creature was in. Grissen’s voice was getting worse. He was drawing weaker, and unfocused with each passing word. He felt the agony in how his body shifted and his breathing struggled. The bloodshot eyes filled with torment but something else.
O'Malley recognized it as the desperation for acceptance, the desire to belong behind the pain. He had seen it so many times in someone's last hour. O'Malley hoped a surgeon would suddenly appear and save Grissen from this terrible slow way to die. His mind begged for such a miracle but his heart knew, it was too late.
He had administered too many last rites today but here he was giving another one. He felt his own tears forming in his eyes and fought them back.
Once Grissen finished the line, he resumed, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head in oil; my cup runneth over.”
Grissen's voice was getting lower in volume, almost what O'Malley thought an Arxur child would sound like. His eyes were no longer following O'Malley; he was only speaking the words, getting more monotone and laboured with each passing breath.
“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”
Grissen slowly repeated the words, “Surely…. Goodness and mercy… despite my evil… shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”
“Amen.”“A…men….” Grissen’s grip slackened and he exhaled slowly, his chest deflated. His eyes glazed over and finally, his tongue fell from his lips across his cheek.
O’Malley reached up to feel his heart and felt no pulse. He was gone.
O’Malley gently placed the clawed hands across the chest in an X. He pushed the dried out tongue into the teeth and slowed the jaw. He noticed the smile upon Grissen’s lips that had formed in that last moment. He knew to leave well enough alone there. He reached up and closed the reptile’s eyes, slowly and gently. As he had done a dozen times today, every detail was precisely right.
He took a moment to admire how peaceful the gray managed to look in his final state of death. He pulled a notepad from his pocket and wrote on it, something he knew probably wouldn’t get done as no one had time to bury the dead. It wasn’t about if there was time, it was about the act of ensuring the last request was asked for and at least acknowledged.He placed the note between the hands, it had the image of a cross upon it and the words: “Protestant” upon it. This would signal to any human that he was to be given a protestant burial.
O’Malley paused, tears dripping from his eyes for his enemy as he spoke. “Lord above, take this one, Shelter this one, enemy-mine. For all are your’s in death, even those who would see your servant slain. I ask not for vengeance but that you take pity upon this soul as it departs for the next life. He repeated in your name before his final breath, accept him with warm smiles and open arms as I commend Grissen to your care. St. Peter, I ask you to not be cautious or repulsed but instead, nod to him as you read his many sins and then inform him, all is forgiven in his final hour even by his greatest enemies. Amen.”
O’Malley felt his body shaking as he opened his eyes.His cheeks were warm with tears, a smile of delight upon his face to save a soul just before it left, even if he could not answer the question of aliens before God. It had been a worthy peaceful time here in the tent. Something O’Malley knew all too well about war, it was not war that would end war but rather; understanding could bring it to a stop. He got up, his legs weak and knees wanting to lock. He struggled to hold his weight as he walked from the tent, trying to calm his emotions.
He stepped outside, walking back to his position on the line and pulled another smoke, he had not yet gotten to his lighter when the sound of gunfire ripped through the caldera again. Weapons lighting up as the Arxur assault began anew.
For O’Malley however, he couldn’t move. His chest burned. His heartbeat echoed in his ears. He watched the cigarette drop from his hand. He felt his strength drain from his legs as he fell over on his side. Machine guns and mortars tracers rippled across the valley. He felt warm blood pouring down his chest across his shoulder towards the ground.
He willed his eyes to look down and realized he was hit. His chest was heaving blood rapidly. His strength faded and slowly he felt his eyes become heavy.
He whispered a final prayer, “Dear Lord, hold Grissen at the gates; I wish to enter beside my friend.” His final thought as his eyes closed for good barely ten paces from the medical tent. “Amen.”

1599 book ban
In 1599, the Archbishop of Canterbury John Whitgift and the Bishop of London Richard Bancroft, whose offices had the function of licensing books for publication in England, issued a decree banning verse satire. The decree, now known as the Bishops' Ban of 1599, ordered the burning of certain volumes of satire by John Marston, Thomas Middleton, Joseph Hall, and others; it also required histories and plays to be specially approved by a member of the Queen's Privy Council, and it prohibited the future printing of satire in verse.[138]
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The motives for the ban are obscure, particularly since some of the books banned had been licensed by the same authorities less than a year earlier. Various scholars have argued that the target was obscenity, libel, or sedition. It seems likely that lingering anxiety about the Martin Marprelate controversy, in which the bishops themselves had employed satirists, played a role; both Thomas Nashe and Gabriel Harvey, two of the key figures in that controversy, suffered a complete ban on all their works. In the event, though, the ban was little enforced, even by the licensing authority itself.
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21st-century polemics
In 2005, the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy caused global protests by offended Muslims and violent attacks with many fatalities in the Near East. It was not the first case of Muslim protests against criticism in the form of satire, but the Western world was surprised by the hostility of the reaction: Any country's flag in which a newspaper chose to publish the parodies was being burnt in a Near East country, then embassies were attacked, killing 139 people in mainly four countries; politicians throughout Europe agreed that satire was an aspect of the freedom of speech, and therefore to be a protected means of dialogue. Iran threatened to start an International Holocaust Cartoon Competition, which was immediately responded to by Jews with an Israeli Anti-Semitic Cartoons Contest.
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In 2006 British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen released Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, a "mockumentary" that satirized everyone, from high society to frat boys. The film was criticized by many. Although Baron Cohen is Jewish, some complained that it was antisemitic, and the government of Kazakhstan boycotted the film. The film itself had been a reaction to a longer quarrel between the government and the comedian.
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In 2008, popular South African cartoonist and satirist Jonathan Shapiro (who is published under the pen name Zapiro) came under fire for depicting then-president of the ANC Jacob Zuma in the act of undressing in preparation for the implied rape of 'Lady Justice' which is held down by Zuma loyalists.[139] The cartoon was drawn in response to Zuma's efforts to duck corruption charges, and the controversy was heightened by the fact that Zuma was himself acquitted of rape in May 2006. In February 2009, the South African Broadcasting Corporation, viewed by some opposition parties as the mouthpiece of the governing ANC,[140] shelved a satirical TV show created by Shapiro,[141] and in May 2009 the broadcaster pulled a documentary about political satire (featuring Shapiro among others) for the second time, hours before scheduled broadcast.[142] Apartheid South Africa also had a long history of censorship.
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On December 29, 2009, Samsung sued Mike Breen, and the Korea Times for $1 million, claiming criminal defamation over a satirical column published on Christmas Day, 2009.[143][144]
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On April 29, 2015, the UK Independence Party (UKIP) requested Kent Police investigate the BBC, claiming that comments made about Party leader Nigel Farage by a panelist on the comedy show Have I Got News For You might hinder his chances of success in the general election (which would take place a week later), and claimed the BBC breached the Representation of the People Act.[145] Kent Police rebuffed the request to open an investigation, and the BBC released a statement, "Britain has a proud tradition of satire, and everyone knows that the contributors on Have I Got News for You regularly make jokes at the expense of politicians of all parties."[145]
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Satirical prophecy
Satire is occasionally prophetic: the jokes precede actual events.[146][147] Among the eminent examples are:
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The 1784 presaging of modern daylight saving time, later actually proposed in 1907. While an American envoy to France, Benjamin Franklin anonymously published a letter in 1784 suggesting that Parisians economise on candles by arising earlier to use morning sunlight.[148]
In the 1920s, an English cartoonist imagined a laughable thing for the time: a hotel for cars. He drew a multi-story car park.[147]
The second episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus, which debuted in 1969, featured a sketch entitled "The Mouse Problem" (meant to satirize contemporary media exposés on homosexuality), which depicted a cultural phenomenon similar to some aspects of the modern furry fandom (which did not become widespread until the 1980s, over a decade after the sketch was first aired).
The comedy film Americathon, released in 1979 and set in the United States of 1998, predicted a number of trends and events that would eventually unfold in the near future, including an American debt crisis, Chinese capitalism, the fall of the Soviet Union, terrorism aimed at the civilian population, a presidential sex scandal, and the popularity of reality shows.
In January 2001, a satirical news article in The Onion, entitled "Our Long National Nightmare of Peace and Prosperity Is Finally Over"[149] had newly elected President George Bush vowing to "develop new and expensive weapons technologies" and to "engage in at least one Gulf War-level armed conflict in the next four years". Furthermore, he would "bring back economic stagnation by implementing substantial tax cuts, which would lead to a recession". This prophesied the Iraq War, the Bush tax cuts, and the Great Recession.
In 1975, the first episode of Saturday Night Live included an ad for a triple blade razor called the Triple-Trac; in 2001, Gillette introduced the Mach3. In 2004, The Onion satirized Schick and Gillette's marketing of ever-increasingly multi-blade razors with a mock article proclaiming Gillette will now introduce a five-blade razor.[150] In 2006, Gillette released the Gillette Fusion, a five-blade razor.
After the Iran nuclear deal in 2015, The Onion ran an article with the headline "U.S. Soothes Upset Netanyahu With Shipment Of Ballistic Missiles". Sure enough, reports broke the next day of the Obama administration offering military upgrades to Israel in the wake of the deal.[151]
In July 2016, The Simpsons released the most recent in a string of satirical references to a potential Donald Trump presidency (although the first was made back in a 2000 episode.) Other media sources, including the popular film Back to the Future Part II have also made similar satirical references.[152]
Satire celebration
In June 2019, Punocracy, Nigeria's foremost satire platform organised a nationwide writing competition for youth in the country with the objective to make satire a widely accepted and understood tool of socio-political commentary.[153] Some of the entries addressed issues like gender violence, political corruption, religious hypocrisy, internet fraud, educational decay and so on.[154] The group also declared November 9 as World Satire Day with the idea of "trying to fight against the ills in the society not by ammunition but by humour, sarcasm etcetera".[155]
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See also
Cringe comedy
Culture jamming
Freedom of the press
List of satirists and satires
Mockumentary
News satire
Onomasti komodein
Parody religion
Stupidedia
Satiric misspellings
Satires (disambiguation)
Notes
The Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of London, the censors of the press, issued Orders to the Stationers' Company on June 1 and 4, 1599, prohibiting the further printing of satires—the so-called 'Bishop's Ban'.[85][page needed]
References
Citations
Elliott 2004.
Frye, Northrup (1957). Anatomy of Criticism. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP. p. 222. ISBN 0-691-06004-5.
Claridge, Claudia (2010) Hyperbole in English: A Corpus-based Study of Exaggeration p.257
Kharpertian, Theodore D (1990), "Thomas Pynchon and Postmodern American Satire", in Kharpertian (ed.), A hand to turn the time: the Menippean satires of Thomas Pynchon, pp. 25–7, ISBN 9780838633618
Branham 1997, p. xxiv.
Ullman, BL (1913), "Satura and Satire", Classical Philology, 8 (2): 172–194, doi:10.1086/359771, JSTOR 262450, The Renaissance confusion of the two origins encouraged a satire more aggressive than that of its Roman forebearers
Antonia Szabari (2009) Less Rightly Said: Scandals and Readers in Sixteenth-Century France p.2
"Forecast". Galaxy Science Fiction. June 1968. p. 113.
Corum 2002, p. 175.
"Ig", Improbable
Rosenberg, Harold (1960), "Community, Values, Comedy", Commentary, The American Jewish Committee, 30: 155, the oldest form of social study is comedy... If the comedian, from Aristophanes to Joyce, does not solve sociology's problem of "the participant observer", he does demonstrate his objectivity by capturing behavior in its most intimate aspects yet in its widest typicality. Comic irony sets whole cultures side by side in a multiple exposure (e.g., Don Quixote, Ulysses), causing valuation to spring out of the recital of facts alone, in contrast to the hidden editorializing of tongue-in-cheek ideologists.
Deloria, Vine (1969), "Indian humor", Custer Died For Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto, p. 146, Irony and satire provide much keener insights into a group's collective psyche and values than do years of [conventional] research as quoted in Ryan, Allan J (1999), The trickster shift: humour and irony in contemporary native art, p. 9, ISBN 9780774807043
Nash, Roderick Frazier (1970), "21. The New Humor", The Call of the Wild: 1900–1916, p. 203, Humor is one of the best indicators of popular thought. To ask what strikes a period as funny is to probe its deepest values and tastes.
Babcock, Barbara A. (1984), "Arrange Me Into Disorder: Fragments and Reflections on Ritual Clowning", in MacAloon (ed.), Rite, Drama, Festival, Spectacle. Also collected as Babcock, Barbara A Grimes (1996), Ronald, L (ed.), Readings in ritual studies, p. 5, Harold Rosenberg has asserted that sociology needs to bring comedy into the foreground, including "an awareness of the comedy of sociology with its disguises", and, like Burke and Duncan, he has argued that comedy provides "the radical effect of self- knowledge which the anthropological bias excludes.
Coppola, Jo (1958), "An Angry Young Magazine ...", The Realist (1), Good comedy is social criticism—although you might find that hard to believe if all you ever saw were some of the so-called clowns of videoland.... Comedy is dying today because criticism is on its deathbed... because telecasters, frightened by the threats and pressure of sponsors, blacklists and viewers, helped introduce conformity to this age... In such a climate, comedy cannot flourish. For comedy is, after all, a look at ourselves, not as we pretend to be when we look in the mirror of our imagination, but as we really are. Look at the comedy of any age and you will know volumes about that period and its people which neither historian nor anthropologist can tell you.
Coppola, Jo (December 12, 1958). Comedy on Television. Commonweal. p. 288.
Willi, Andreas (2003), The Languages of Aristophanes: Aspects of Linguistic Variation in Classical Attic Greek, Oxford University Press, pp. 1–2, ISBN 9780199262649
Ehrenberg, Victor (1962), The people of Aristophanes: a sociology of old Attic comedy, p. 39
Bevere, Antonio and Cerri, Augusto (2006) Il Diritto di informazione e i diritti della persona pp.265–6 quotation:
nella storia della nostra cultura, la satira ha realizzato il bisogno popolare di irridere e dissacrare il gotha politico ed economico, le cui reazioni punitive non sono certo state condizionate da critiche estetiche, ma dalla tolleranza o intolleranza caratterizzanti in quel momento storico la società e i suoi governanti. (...) la reale esistenza della satira in una società deriva, (...) dal margine di tolleranza espresso dai poteri punitivi dello Stato.
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Amy Wiese Forbes (2010) The Satiric Decade: Satire and the Rise of Republicanism in France, 1830–1840 p.xv, quotation:
a critical public discourse (...) Satire rose the daunting question of what role public opinion would play in government. (...) satirists criticized government activities, exposed ambiguities, and forced administrators to clarify or establish policies. Not surprisingly, heated public controversy surrounded satiric commentary, resulting in an outright ban on political satire in 1835 (...) Government officials cracked down on their humorous public criticism that challenged state authority through both its form and content. Satire had been a political resource in France for a long time, but the anxious political context of the July Monarchy had unlocked its political power. Satire also taught lessons in democracy. It fit into the July Monarchy's tense political context as a voice in favor of public political debate. Satiric expression took place in the public sphere and spoke from a position of public opinion-that is, from a position of the nation’s expressing a political voice and making claims on its government representatives and leadership. Beyond mere entertainment, satire's humor appealed to and exercised public opinion, drawing audiences into new practices of representative government.
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Knight, Charles A. (2004) Literature of Satire p.254
Test (1991) p.9 quotation:
A surprising variety of societies have allowed certain persons the freedom to mock other individuals and social institutions in rituals. From the earliest times the same freedom has been claimed by and granted to social groups at certain times of the year, as can be seen in such festivals as the Saturnalia, the Feast of Fools, Carnival, and similar folk festivals in India, nineteenth-century Newfoundland, and the ancient Mediterranean world.
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Test (1991) pp.8–9
Cazeneuve (1957) p.244-5 quotation:
Ils constituent donc pour la tribu un moyen de donner une satisfaction symbolique aux tendances anti-sociales. Les Zunis, précisément parce qu'ils sont un peuple apollinien [où la règle prédomine], avaient besoin de cette soupape de sûreté. Les Koyemshis représentent ce que M. Caillois nomme le « Sacré de transgression ».
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Durand (1984) p.106 quotation:
Déjà Cazeneuve (2) [Les dieux dansent à Cibola] avait mis auparavant en relief, dans la Société « apollinienne » des Zuñi, l'institution et le symbolisme saturnal des clowns Koyemshis, véritable soupape de sûreté « dionysienne ».
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Yatsko, V, Russian folk funny stories
Corum (2002) p.163
David Worcester (1968) The Art of Satire p.16
Müller, Rolf Arnold (1973). Komik und Satire (in German). Zürich: Juris-Verlag. p. 92. ISBN 978-3-260-03570-8.
"What Is Horatian Satire?". wiseGEEK.
"Satire Terms". nku.edu.
Sharma, Raja (2011). "Comedy" in New Light-Literary Studies.
Patricia, Green. "The Golden Age of Satire: Alexander Pope and Jonathan Swift" (PDF).
"What Is Juvenalian Satire?". wiseGEEK.
"Satire Examples and Definition". Literary Devices.
"Satire in Literature: Definition, Types & Examples". Education Portal.
Fo (1990) p.9 quotation:
Nella storia del teatro si ritrova sempre questo conflitto in cui si scontrano impegno e disimpegno ... grottesco, satirico e lazzo con sfottò. E spesso vince lo sfotto. tanto amato dal potere. Quando si dice che il potere ama la satira
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Eastman, Max (1936), "IV. Degrees of Biting", Enjoyment of Laughter, pp. 236–43
Fo, Dario; Lorch, Jennifer (1997), Dario Fo, p. 128, ISBN 9780719038488, In other writings Fo makes an important distinction between sfottò and satire.
Fo (1990) pp.2–3
... Una caricatura che, è ovvio, risulta del tutto bonaria, del tutto epidermica, che indica, come dicevo prima, soltanto la parte più esteriore del loro carattere, i tic la cui messa in risalto non lede assolutamente l'operato, l'ideologia, la morale e la dimensione culturale di questi personaggi. ... ricordando che i politici provano un enorme piacere nel sentirsi presi in giro; è quasi un premio che si elargisce loro, nel momento stesso in cui li si sceglie per essere sottoposti alla caricatura, a quella caricatura. ... Di fatto questa è una forma di comicità che non si può chiamare satira, ma solo sfottò. ... Pensa quanti pretesti satirici si offrirebbero se solo quei comici del "Biberon" volessero prendere in esame il modo in cui questi personaggi gestiscono il potere e lo mantengono, o si decidessero a gettare l'occhio sulle vere magagne di questa gente, le loro violenze più o meno mascherate, le loro arroganze e soprattutto le loro ipocrisie. ...un teatro cabaret capostipite: il Bagaglino, un teatro romano che, già vent'anni fa, si metteva in una bella chiave politica dichiaratamente di estrema destra, destra spudoratamente reazionaria, scopertamente fascista. Nelle pieghe del gruppo del Bagaglino e del suo lavoro c'era sempre la caricatura feroce dell'operaio, del sindacalista, del comunista, dell'uomo di sinistra, e una caricatura bonacciona invece, e ammiccante, accattivante, degli uomini e della cultura al potere
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Fo (1990) quotation:
L'ironia fatta sui tic, sulla caricatura dei connotati più o meno grotteschi dei politici presi di mira, dei loro eventuali difetti fisici, della loro particolare pronuncia, dei loro vezzi, del loro modo di vestire, del loro modo di camminare, delle frasi tipiche che vanno ripetendo. ...[lo sfottò è] una chiave buffonesca molto antica, che viene di lontano, quella di giocherellare con gli attributi esteriori e non toccare mai il problema di fondo di una critica seria che è l'analisi messa in grottesco del comportamento, la valutazione ironica della posizione, dell'ideologia del personaggio.
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[page needed]
Arroyo, José Luís Blas; Casanova, Mónica Velando (2006), Discurso y sociedad: contribuciones al estudio de la lengua en..., 1, pp. 303–4, ISBN 9788480215381
Morson, Gary Saul (1988), Boundaries of Genre, p. 114, ISBN 9780810108110, second, that parodies can be, as Bakhtin observes, "shallow" as well as "deep" (Problems of Dostoevsky's Poetics, 160), which is to say, directed at superficial as well as fundamental faults of the original. [...] the distinction between shallow and deep [...] [is] helpful in understanding the complex ways in which parodies are used. For instance, shallow parody is sometimes used to pay an author an indirect compliment. The opposite of damning with faint praise, this parody with faint criticism may be designed to show that no more fundamental criticism could be made.
Luttazzi, Daniele (2005), Matrix, IT, archived from the original on December 25, 2005, Dario Fo disse a Satyricon: —La satira vera si vede dalla reazione che suscita.
Luttazzi, Daniele (October 2003), Fracassi, Federica; Guerriero, Jacopo (eds.), "State a casa a fare i compiti" (interview), Nazione Indiana (in Italian), Lo sfottò è reazionario. Non cambia le carte in tavola, anzi, rende simpatica la persona presa di mira. La Russa, oggi, è quel personaggio simpatico, con la voce cavernosa, il doppiatore dei Simpson di cui Fiorello fa l’imitazione. Nessuno ricorda più il La Russa picchiatore fascista. Nessuno ricorda gli atti fascisti e reazionari di questo governo in televisione.
Kremer, S Lillian (2003), Holocaust Literature: Agosín to Lentin, p. 100, ISBN 9780415929837
Lipman, Stephen ‘Steve’ (1991), Laughter in hell: the use of humour during the Holocaust, Northvale, NJ: J Aronson, p. 40
Clark (1991) pp.116–8 quotation:
...religion, politics, and sexuality are the primary stuff of literary satire. Among these sacret targets, matters costive and defecatory play an important part. ... from the earliest times, satirists have utilized scatological and bathroom humor. Aristophanes, always livid and nearly scandalous in his religious, political, and sexual references...
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Clark, John R; Motto, Anna Lydia (1973), Satire–that blasted art, p. 20
Clark, John R; Motto, Anna Lydia (1980), "Menippeans & Their Satire: Concerning Monstrous Leamed Old Dogs and Hippocentaurs", Scholia Satyrica, 6 (3/4): 45, [Chapple's book Soviet satire of the twenties]... classifying the very topics his satirists satirized: housing, food, and fuel supplies, poverty, inflation, "hooliganism", public services, religion, stereotypes of nationals (the Englishman, German, &c), &c. Yet the truth of the matter is that no satirist worth his salt (Petronius, Chaucer, Rabelais, Swift, Leskov, Grass) ever avoids man's habits and living standards, or scants those delicate desiderata: religion, politics, and sex.
Ferdie Addis (2012) Qual è il tuo "tallone da killer"? p.20
Hodgart (2009) ch 2 The topics of satire: politics p.33
The most pressing of the problems that face us when we close the book or leave the theatre are ultimately political ones; and so politics is the pre-eminent topic of satire. ...to some degree public affairs vex every man, if he pays taxes, does military service or even objects to the way his neighbour is behaving. There is no escape from politics where more than a dozen people are living together.
There is an essential connection between satire and politics in the widest sense: satire is not only the commonest form of political literature, but, insofar as it tries to influence public behaviours, it is the most political part of all literature.
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BRAINY QUOTES
SATIRE
Satire lies about literary men while they live and eulogy lies about them when they die.
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Voltaire
Satire is traditionally the weapon of the powerless against the powerful.
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Molly Ivins
Comedy has to be done en clair. You can't blunt the edge of wit or the point of satire with obscurity. Try to imagine a famous witty saying that is not immediately clear.
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James Thurber
The satirist who writes nothing but satire should write but little - or it will seem that his satire springs rather from his own caustic nature than from the sins of the world in which he lives.
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Anthony Trollope
Praise undeserved, is satire in disguise.
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Alexander Pope
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Satire is tragedy plus time. You give it enough time, the public, the reviewers will allow you to satirize it. Which is rather ridiculous, when you think about it.
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Lenny Bruce
Satire doesn't effect change.
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P. J. O'Rourke
I only aim at the powerful. When satire is aimed at the powerless, it is not only cruel - it's vulgar.
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Molly Ivins
Rush Limbaugh's pathetic abuse of logic, his absurd pomposity, his relentless self-promotion, his ridiculous ego - now those, friends, are appropriate targets for satire.
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Molly Ivins
Satire is a weapon, and it can be quite cruel.
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Molly Ivins
You can't debate satire. Either you get it or you don't.
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Michael Moore
It's a great time to be doing political satire when the world is on a knife edge.
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John Oliver
When satire is aimed at the powerless, it is not only cruel - it's vulgar.
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Molly Ivins
Status is always ripe for satire, status is always good for comedy.
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Stephen Colbert
I started off at the Second City in Chicago... It's an improvisational theater that ostensibly does social and political satire, but when I was there, we generally didn't. We did character work, and we did just the silliest things we could think of. We weren't all that concerned with, you know, changing the world through mime.
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Stephen Colbert
I'm a satirist, so I've got boxing gloves on if the person is worthy of satire. But I'm not an assassin. If that ever happens, it's only because something happened during the interview that got me going, and then I had to translate my feelings to the mouth of the character.
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Stephen Colbert
I have never knowingly, I swear to God, written satire. The word connotes exaggeration of the foibles of mankind. To me, mankind just has foibles. You don't have to push it!
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Tom Wolfe
We never dealt with satire or suggestive material. Although some of our films were broad parodies or burlesques of popular dramatic themes, there was no conscious attempt at being either sarcastic or offensive.
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Stan Laurel
If you're going to give people 20 minutes of news satire, you've also got to give them Tiffani-Amber Thiessen or you're going to have rioting in the streets.
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Jon Stewart
The satirist who writes nothing but satire should write but little - or it will seem that his satire springs rather from his own caustic nature than from the sins of the world in which he lives.
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Anthony Trollope
When I started performing, there was no Internet; I didn't really have anything to copy. I kind of had to just make up what I thought burlesque was, based on photographs of Sally Rand or whatever.
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Dita Von Teese
The difference between burlesque and the newspapers is that the former never pretended to be performing a public service by exposure.
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I. F. Stone
You know what my earliest memories are? Going from one burlesque town to another. My father was in burlesque.
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Alan Alda
Every one of my products - my lingerie, my perfume, and everything that I do beauty-related with regard to building my burlesque shows - is just me.
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Dita Von Teese
The silent film has a lot of meanings. The first part of the film is comic. It represents the burlesque feel of those silent films. But I think that the second part of the film is full of tenderness and emotion.
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Pedro Almodovar
Me personally, I want to entertain people above all. When you look back at burlesque in history and the real golden age of burlesque, those entertainers were there to entertain, and there wasn't usually some big political message behind what they were doing.
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Dita Von Teese
Bip is the romantic and burlesque hero for our time. Bip is a modern-day Don Quixote.
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Marcel Marceau
In the early '90s, it was grunge; everybody was fully clothed. Alanis Morissette was one of the biggest artists in the world, never wore makeup, wearing Doc Marten boots, and then the Spice Girls turn up, and suddenly it all looks a bit burlesque; suddenly they're the biggest band in the world.
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Caitlin Moran
I don't think there is such a thing as being too raunchy when it comes to the art form of burlesque.
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Christina Aguilera
Objectivity is almost a choice you make. As a burlesque performer, I didn't choose to be objectified.
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Esme Bianco
Burlesque girls were alchemists. They were steel-tough performers who were willing to use kitchens as dressing rooms, haul their costume bags through the snow, and go into debt over fake diamonds, all for the five minutes onstage when they were goddesses.
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Molly Crabapple
I was performing in this burlesque group, and we would go to dance rehearsals every day. You'd use every part of your body. Even though some of it is slow, it takes a lot of muscle to be able to dip down and come back up.
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Carmen Electra
Burlesque dancing didn't solve all my post-divorce problems, but what it did do was force me to court myself for a little while.
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Emily V. Gordon
Some of the pictures I must say every now and then I just think are going to be funny. When it gets that much, you might as well just pull out all the stops and make it more of a burlesque.
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Martin Mull
The human comedy is always tragic, but since its ingredients are always the same - dupe, fox, straight, like burlesque skits - the repetition through the ages is comedy.
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Dawn Powell
I've always had a love affair with New York City, and I've threatened to get an apartment there one day. But it just made sense for me to set 'Burlesque' on the Sunset Strip in Los Angeles. It's a place I know intimately well and love, and I think there's a great story to be told with L.A.
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Steve Antin

8:02 a.m.
When I entered Charlie’s this morning, Lacie and Maura were already there. Lacie sat behind the service desk, speaking quickly with her hands while Maura soaked up every word she said.
Lacie had been working with Maura and Gabe to help them harvest the energy supply of Charlie’s. Many customers leave a sort of emotional footprint when they shop here. Since they clearly weren’t going anywhere, Lacie decided to teach them how to harvest the energy from those emotions. It helped them retain memories, better understand the world, and interact with their surroundings. They had been unconsciously doing it since they first appeared here after death, but she was teaching them how to control it.
This lesson seemed a bit different today, though. The 1st thing I heard come out of Maura’s mouth was, “So they no longer do lobotomies, but you all will willing poke holes in your body for fashion?” She reached out and lightly flicked Lacie’s septum piercing while she said “fashion,” making Lacie giggle.
“How underfunded was your asylum if they still did lobotomies?” asked Lacie.
Maura rolled her eyes. “Why do you think I wanted to leave so bad?”
Lacie giggled again before finally acknowledging me. She gave me a kiss on the cheek and wrapped an arm around my waist. “Good morning.”
“Morning,” I responded with a smile. “Hey, Maura.”
“Yo,” she responded.
I walked over to register one and put in my log in code in preparation for the day. Lacie asked if I needed her help with anything, but I told her they could keep doing their thing. Before I had even walked off, however, history class was abruptly put on hold. Our attention went toward the sliding glass doors as two women entered, one younger and one older.
The gears in my head began to turn as I realized I recognized the woman, but I couldn’t remember from where.
And then it hit me.
Ursula Jones was walking towards us. The Father’s replacement.
Surprisingly, weapons are not hot commodity at Charlie’s. I mean, they are, but they aren’t laying out all willy nilly. Most are in protective packaging. So, to defend myself, I picked up the thing closest to me: the conveyor belt grocery divider. I brandished it like a sword, pointing it right at the enemy.
“Good morning, darlings!” greeted Ursula as she placed a ribbonned basket of muffins onto the register’s conveyor belt. Her short brown hair was rolled into poodle cut curls. She wore a simple black dress, black flats, pearl earrings, and bright red lipstick. Very fashionable, but I know enough about femme fatales not to let my guard down.
She gave my makeshift weapon a look of pity before gently moving it downwards with one finger. “Did the previous owners not tell you?”
The younger girl, a miniature of Ursula and surely her daughter, eyed us curiously as she sucked on a cherry red lollipop. She was decked out in more black than her mother with three cross necklaces adorning her neck, all of their chains at varying lengths. The only color about her was the forrest green tips to her long black hair.
“Tell us what?” asked Lacie. I could tell by the fist clenched at her side that she was also on high alert and ready to summon any number of powers to defend the store.
Ursula gave us a wide grin. “I’m the new owner of Charlie’s,” she announced before motioning to her gothly daughter. “And this is my daughter Daisy, your new store manager.”

9:10 a.m.
While randomly getting new bosses today might be stressful to us and possibly even you, dear reader, especially if you’ve been in a similar scenario, the owners have never been fond of other’s emotions. Wanna know how they told us goodbye? After I called them approximately 15 times, all of which got sent to voicemail, and also text them asking what was going on, they finally gave us a response. The response was creating a group chat, sending a message to said group chat containing only the peace sign emoji, and then blocking all of our numbers.
However, as long as the doors are open, the customers will keep coming. And they did, and so the day went on. Before we had even had time to process the huge change and how it might impact us, we were getting our morning rush.
“Ahem,” said a voice behind me.
I turned around to find Daisy waiting expectantly with her hot pink clipboard. It had black and white star stickers all over the back. “I would very much like for you to show me all of this business’ amenities.”
I nodded before pausing my task. I would have to finish counting the clown statues later. The only reason I had started counting them was because a customer told me they saw one wandering around, which would explain why they had been going missing over the last few weeks. I got up to 13, so don’t let me forget that number.
I took her to the Bloody Bathroom first and explained its historical significance. When the blood flow was still a thing to worry about, we would jokingly say the bathroom was menstruating. The bathroom hadn’t had its time of the month in a while, but it’s definitely something we would not forget.
Next up, I brought her to Gary’s deli. While she seemed rather cheerful at Gary’s lovable demeanor, I think she was a little put off when he couldn’t tell her where his Special of the Day spleens had come from. My stern look told him to keep quiet, which made his smile quickly disappear and disappointment take its place. She asked me if I ordered it, and I told her I let Gary handle the deli tasks. I also chose not to mention that I had accidentally found Gary’s little black book of victims a while back, and I had a good guess at just how well he knew those spleens. To be fair, little black books of all kinds are not considered conversational topics to me, but our little hunter Gary will always have a soft spot in my heart no matter how deranged he seems.
After the fifth “Gary forgot” that the poor guy muttered, I distracted Daisy by mentioning the display he regularly decorated to brag on him a bit. Deranged or not, the guy has definitely got some talent. Errr…uh, in the decorating department, not the carving one.
I ended the tour with some of the new additions to Charlie’s: the Witch’s Brew Cafe, the magical vending machine, the housewares department, and the extension of the parking lot. She had a few questions as to why there was a wizard living in the parking lot in a small tent, and I had no answers. I had even fewer answers when his pet duck waddled out from the tent, lit up a charcoal grill, and began grilling frogs. The wizard gave us a wave, his wispy beard blowing in the wind as he stood there in just a pair of white boxers polka-dotted with red hearts and a matching wizard hat. We waved back before making our way back inside.
Pretty much the only time Daisy showed any bit of emotion during our tour was when Sheryl decided to join us. Well, really, she kind of showed some when the poltergeist showed up in housewares…I’ll get to it later. Don’t nag me! But, by the end of the tour, Sheryl was absolutely bawling her eyes out and shouting, “Where has the time gone?” Daisy attempted to console her and give her a reassuring pat on the back.
“There, there,” said Daisy awkwardly. The whole interaction came off as more robotic than anything, so I was shocked when it actually calmed Sheryl down. But…then again, Sheryl is dating a cyborg.
“So, you’ve obviously met Sheryl and Gary. You’ve met me, Lacie, and the coffee shop folks. Have you met Gabe?”
She shook her head. “Who’s Gabe?”
Unbeknownst to her, a suddenly summoned Gabe appeared behind her. “Boo,” he said, causing her to drop her clipboard. She glared at him as it clattered to the floor. “Oops.”
I laughed at them and received my own glare from Daisy. I rubbed the back of my head nervously. “Sorry, he’s become a bit of a trickster since his death.”
Just as quickly as he had shown up, Gabe disappeared again, and that seemed to conclude the tour. Daisy went off to “monitor and assist everyone’s duties,” as she put it, and I went back to my previous task.
Now, where was I? Oh, clown statues. Let me count again. 1,2,3…12. That’s what it was last time, right?

10:36 a.m.
“Here’s yours, Jared,” announced Danielle as she placed my caramel frappuccino on the counter. “Lacie’s is almost ready.”
“Thanks,” I said. I grabbed it and took a sip, enjoying the icy treat. Within 30 seconds, nearly a quarter of it was gone, and I could already hear Lacie nagging me about coming to buy a second coffee later. I may have adopted a coffee addiction thanks to our new cafe.
Unironically, the Witch’s Brew was a magical place. I absolutely loved the atmosphere with its high ceilings, dim lights, and gothic charm. The only colors involved in the decor were Halloween shades: orange, purple, and green. Oh, and black, of course.
Sheryl bounded up to the register giddily as I slurped on my drink. “I’m so glad you guys are finally open! It feels like I’ve been waiting forever!”
Drucilla the cashier gave her a puzzled look. “Honey, we’ve been opened since the store opened.”
Sheryl gave her a puzzled look back. “Every time I tried to come in, the door was always locked.”
Drucilla, Danielle, and Blount, the other barista, began debating whether or not Sheryl had been hexed. As I turned around to look at their door which was currently held open with a door stopper, an idea dawned on me.
“Sheryl,” I said, interjecting into their conversation. “When you came to see if they were open, did you push or pull on the door handle?”
She tilted her head to the side and placed a finger on her lips as if lost in deep thought. “Pull,” she finally said.
The sign on the door read “Push.” A chorus of “Ahh”’s filled the room as the explanation came together in everyone’s heads. Sheryl stayed oblivious. Actually, the room’s response made her even more confused.
“Oh, honey,” said Drucilla, her voice full of pity. “What can we get for you?”
“It’s on the house,” said Danielle, her voice also dripping with pity.
Blount handed me Lacie’s drink as Sheryl ordered some complicated coffee recipe with nearly 20 ingredients that she had found somewhere online. The witches all looked disgusted, but it sounded kinda good to me. As I was about to make my way out the door, Lacie text me that she had enough time to meet me at the cafe to enjoy our coffee together. I talked to the witches and Sheryl while I waited on her.
“Here you go, darling,” said Danielle as she handed Sheryl her coffee. As she was turning around to pass it over, I saw her pointer finger swirling above the beverage as it softly spun around its cup. She knew I had seen what she had done, so she gave me a wink as Sheryl took a sip. She mumbled something about giving Sheryl “a little pep in her step.”
Apparently, the first sip was so good that Sheryl felt the need to take a few gulps. Had I known what she was going to do, I would have highly advised her not to order a drink from the list of hot coffees, but there’s a high probability she wouldn’t have listened to me anyways. I could tell the witches felt the same by the concerned look they gave her. After demolishing nearly half the coffee, Sheryl’s body spasmed and jerked, making her stand up straight as a board as she yelled, “The square root of pi is 1.77245—”
Danielle’s face completely blanked as if her brain was rebooting before cringing at what she had done. “May have added a little too much pep,” she said as Sheryl continued rattling off numbers.
–
11:02 a.m.
“Hey, Jared, can you tell Gabe to come to the office?” asked Daisy. “I’ve called him 3 times over the radio, and he hasn’t come.”
I had failed to mention to her that Gabe didn’t use a radio because they fall through his body if he loses focus. It just so happened that he was walking by me as Daisy finished asking her a favor. He was pulling a rather large pallet of merchandise behind him, and I told Daisy I would let him know before shouting his name.
His head snapped toward the direction of my voice, causing him to lose focus on his current task. However, the pallet had not gotten the memo that he was stopping, and panic filled me at the possibility of him getting hurt. “Oh, crap, wait!” I yelled, motioning for him to get away. I winced as the pallet drew closer and closer, and he still wasn’t moving. He was also giving me a rather strange look, but I just kept yelling for him to move.
And then the pallet simply went through him, and my body slacked. “Oh,” I said as he approached me, laughing at my freak-out.
“Did you forget I’m dead?” he asked with a smirk.
I rolled my eyes before relaying Daisy’s message, and he wandered off to see what she needed. As I busied myself with checking if my register’s drawer had enough change, I wondered how he decided whether to simply teleport or to walk normally to places. Personally, I would teleport everywhere if given the opportunity.
“Fefe!”
Sheryl’s screech made me launch a roll of quarters in my hand across the registers, accidentally landing some hits on a big burly sasquatch. I gulped as the monster lumbered over to me. His hot, stinking breath heated up my cheeks as anger bubbled in his eyes. As he released a roar so strong it blew the hair out of my face, I snatched up a stapler beside me and aimed at his large furry face, ready yet fully expecting to die. He raised a meaty fist, but before his first attack could be landed, our battle was sidetracked as Sheryl screamed once more. This time, however, it was followed by a cat’s hiss.
A black blur clambered onto my conveyor belt as an out-of-breath Sheryl nearly collided with it. She leaped for the small black void, and it hissed again. A thick chrome collar looped its small neck with a flashing purple light dangling from it.
“Enough, mother!” ordered the kitten. With enough feistiness to ignite a fire, the fluffy creature turned to the behemoth before me and hissed. Without hesitation, the sasquatch raced out of the front doors before the kitten’s fur could even rise to its full extent. He even forgot his groceries, but I had no plans of running them out to him.
The cat rolled her eyes before settling into a relaxed loaf mode in front of me. “Yes?” I asked her.
“We’re out of my brand of cat food.”
“The truck is going to be here a little after lunch,” I responded.
If she had eyebrows, I swear they would have creased at my response. “How does that help me during lunch?”
“Well, considering it will be your—” I paused dramatically to look at my non-existent wristwatch, “---third meal of the day already, I think you will be fine.”
The kitten’s eyes became slits as they stayed glued to me. Every hair on its body raised as it slowly stood up. Her claws came out, gouging deep holes into the counter below her. My eyes drifted over to Sheryl to figure out what was going on, but I got no reassurance. She looked ready to piss herself, honestly, especially when the cat burst into flames. I jumped back and immediately reached for my eyebrows, fearful they had been singed off. Turns out she had more than enough feistiness.
With a shriek of rage, she jumped up onto her back legs and launched a ball of fire toward aisle 7. A fully enflamed Chip escaped the aisle and zoomed over to our cooler housing the bags of ice for sale. He didn’t even bother opening its door and just jumped straight through, creating a gaping hole in the thick metal. Luckily, the ice’s cool embrace succeeded in putting out the fire, and wisps of steamy relief floated upwards. Chip gave Sheryl and me a thumbs-up from his safe space, and a piece of his melted rubbery cyborg skin fell off.
The cat released something between a hiss and a growl before hopping off of my conveyor belt. Every step she took burned the floor, leaving a trail of blackened paw prints in her wake. Although tiny, her heat made her seem bigger, and I could already feel a trail of sweat trickling down my back. The sprinkler system turned on, but it did practically nothing to her blaze.
Sheryl rushed over to Chip in the cooler to make sure he was okay while I ran to the service desk. “Attention all shoppers, if you can do so safely, calmly make your way to the exit and avoid the flaming cat. I repeat, all customers please calmly make your way to the exit and avoid the flaming cat.”
Fefe walked in the direction of aisle 4 where a man decked out in some strange outfit was exiting, and he began shouting belligerent words at her. She began screaming back at him, but I couldn’t hear them over the customer's screams as they fled to the exit, practically trampling each other. “Literally nothing about that was calm, but okay,” I said into the microphone.
I began walking in the direction of the cat and the man slowly just to get a better look. His body was mostly covered in silver from what I could see. After a few steps, Gabe materialized beside me to join me. We walked in silence a couple more steps until he asked, “Is that Sheryl’s baking pan on his chest?”
We both stopped, and I squinted in confusion. “Yeah. Yeah, I think it is.”
We entered a moment of silence before finally locking eyes. “Gary,” we both said before continuing and also speeding up our walk toward them.
When we got close enough to them to hear their conversation, Gary was gesturing wildly with his hands. I could now see all of the pots, pans, and utensils he had melded together to create an armor. This was one of his unemployment projects from back when he went through his Transformers craze. While it was nowhere near the level of car parts, it was still pretty impressive.
“Fefe no burn down store, no burn loved ones, no burn customers!” yelled Gary.
Fefe let out a furious roar that sent a spurt of flames at Gary. Gabe and I let out screams of grief and terror at seeing our friend get possibly roasted alive. It felt like both one second and also an eternity that the flames were upon him. Either way, I fully expected him to be dead. Yet, when Fefe closed her mouth, Gary still stood there, looking much angrier than before. Our screams quickly died in our throats, getting cut off so suddenly that I choked and began coughing.
Gary let out a roar of his own before grabbing a chunk of metal off of his back that was once a cookie sheet. He bended the materials as if they were clay, shaping it into a makeshift mouthpiece. As soon as she pieced together what he was doing, they began a game of cat and mouse through the aisles where Fefe ironically wasn’t the cat. Fefe would randomly throw fireballs to divert Gary, but he would take them like a champ and keep rolling. Gabe and I watched, fascinated with the fight. At one point, Gabe vanished and reappeared a moment later with two bags of freshly popped popcorn for us.
It was easy to see how frustrated Gary was becoming, and we felt bad that we couldn’t help. We still didn’t even understand how Gary was so unphased but her fire, though. And so the chase continued, that is until Sheryl appeared with a now bandaged Chip hobbling beside her. (Ignore the fact that he’s a cyborg and doesn’t need bandages because that’s clearly what Sheryl did.) She let out a screeching “Fefe” at the top of her lungs, and the kitten stopped in her tracks. Gary was about to quickly grab her by the scruff of her neck while she was distracted. She yelped before beginning to whine. “But, Uncle Gary, I just wanted lunch!” She struggled against him covering her mouth, eventually melting the piece of metal until it was useless anyway.
Gary groaned like a father using his last bit of patience. “Fefe going to timeout!”
Her flames blazed once more just to the left of me, barely missing by inches, which was entirely too close in my opinion. I made a mental note to check to see if I still had eyebrows later. She actually did hit Gabe, causing him to scream as he too forgot his ghostly qualities. He blushed bright red with embarrassment afterwards. Fefe’s roars continued Godzilla-style, taking down a shelf of bread, two self checkout stations, and a snowman customer that had been lingering in the store. “You’ll be hearing from my lawyer!” the melted man’s mouth-coals blubbered before floating separately away through the sprinkler’s puddles. Gary carried her through the store as her tantrum continued, bringing her to the safety of the parking lot.
By the way, did I mention that this is Charlie’s new pet? This is actually the third incident we’ve had like this this week. You’d think we’d have a process or plan for when she does this, but that’s still a work in progress. Rage therapy is definitely on the list, though.
“I’ll let the wizard know we need a reset spell done,” said Gabe before vanishing.
Sheryl was able to completely calm Fefe by running to a store down the road to buy her specialty cat food, so all ended up being well. I made another mental note after this encounter to keep an extra stock of that brand to avoid Fefe’s hangry rath in the future. Oh, and Danielle later explained to me that she put a protection spell on Gary’s makeshift armor, but that she had never told him that she did. That’s how Gary was unaffected by Fefe’s fiery flames. However, if you asked Gary, he would tell you with full seriousness the Transformer gods gave his armor magical abilities.
Did you know there’s a secret underground religion for Transformers? Learn something new every day.

Charlie’s Group Chat - 12:03 p.m.
Lacie: do we sell dentures? Jared: No. Why? Lacie: zombie customer with no teeth J: Why would you even let that sale happen? Sheryl: The customer is always right! Lacie liked Sheryl’s Message S: Tomorrow is Chip’s Bday! L: cyborgs can have birthdays? Chip: It is my manufacture date. Don’t you guys have one? J: Yeah, I got Lacie from the lab last April. L: my birthday is in October. J: That’s what you’re programmed to think. Acid Dude: What am I programmed to think? J: At this point, I’m pretty sure you’re programmed to have no thoughts. S: That’s so cool! Can I do that? C: I will research how to remove your motherboard. AD: I’ll let you borrow mine! Jared added Daisy to the chat. Daisy: Good afternoon. Sheryl: Hasta leugo! 🙂

12:27 p.m.
Do you know what really sucks? When you really, really just want the day to go right, but life says screw you and throws one curve ball after another. My limit had not only been reached but massacred. I felt like I had received a curveball to the face my head was pounding so hard. I have to rant for a moment, so, if you don’t want to read me whining, skip to after the bullet points.
Here’s what crap I’ve had to deal with so far today, not including the new ownership being thrown at us:
Chip got into an argument with one of the card readers, and it chose to go offline until he apologized. He refused, and it’s still offline. Gary dragged a centaur carcass through the store and traumatized several customers. Sheryl nearly drove her new Lamborghini through the front windows. She tried to gaslight me into believing there was a road through the front window and Charlie’s was just in the way. Danielle decided to prank everyone by spelling the whole store to only speak pig latin. Thankfully it wasn’t long before she reversed the spell because she was the only one who found it funny. We have yet to convince Acid Dude that it was just a spell and not some miracle language he created and then completely forgot 20 minutes later.
So, even as I sat at the break room table and tried to enjoy my free pizza, I still felt like a curveball might smash through the break room door and knock me out for one final blow. And it was only just lunchtime.
Oh, let me explain the free pizza thing. Since it was our first day with Daisy, Ursula told her we could close the store for an hour to all have lunch together. She ordered us a couple of pizzas and told us to pick out some chips and drink. Everyone else seemed to be enjoying it, at least.
“Why are you so pale?” Acid Dude asked Daisy.
“I’m dead,” she explained. “Well, undead, really.”
“Cotards?” asked Acid Dude.
“No, I’m a vampire.”. She opened her mouth a bit to flash her fangs.
Acid Dude scrunched up his face in disgust. “Homie, you need to go to the dentist.”
So far I’ve only seen Daisy show two emotions while here: “Oh, you poor thing,” and “Are you really that stupid?” That second one kind of mimicked curiosity, but it most definitely wasn’t. I’ll let you guess which one she was giving Acid Dude right now.
When the lunch party had reached my third slice of pizza o’clock, Lacie and Gabe started bickering. I’m not even sure what started it because I had been so zoned out, but it felt like this weird dark cloud came over them. It felt like it came out of nowhere. One minute I was staring at a lopsided ceiling tile and trying to determine if I saw a clown staring at me through its gap, and the next they were shouting.
“How did someone like you even get a job here?” yelled Gabe. “Did you flirt your way into the position?” Well, that escalated incredibly quickly folks. Here comes Daisy’s fake curiosity look. Honestly, I couldn’t blame her.
“Will you quit insinuating I got this job because of my looks?” To be fair, Lacie was gorgeous, but she was also very good at her job.
“Well, it definitely wasn’t because of skill.”
“I had enough skill to befriend your murderer,” she snapped.
“Just because you’re a freak that likes freaky things doesn’t mean you belong here any more than I do! I mean, I belong here so much that my spirit came here after death!”
“Just because your spirit is trapped here doesn’t mean you belong. From what I heard, you were being marketed as Gary’s daily special while I was being trained!”
I was on the verge of telling them to cut it out before I lost my mind, but—
“Oh, yeah? Well, at least I didn’t have to use a love spell to make everyone, including a wendigo, like me at this job! But then you fucked up and made Jared fall in love with you, didn’t you?”
Wait, what?
Lacie didn’t respond. Instead, her eyes began to well up with tears as they darted back and forth between Gabe and me. As soon as the words left his mouth, I could see the dark cloud affecting him lift and recognition enter his eyes. That still didn’t take away the hurt of what he had said.
“Wh-what?” I said out loud to her.
Her face flushed with worry and shame. “I–I can explain.”
“No,” I said, standing up from my chair so fast that it fell backward. I almost fell with it, but I regained my balance and once more said, “No.”
My brain felt like it was exploding. Had my love for her—our love for each other all been a manipulation tactic for a freaking grocery store job?
Everyone had quieted at this point, except for Sheryl who had been oblivious to the argument and who kept singing “I Will Always Love You” to Chip Jr. Chip quickly covered her mouth. Daisy once again had a look of pity on her face, but I ignored it while I made my departure. I made sure to grab a box of pizza on my way out, though, and I ignored Lacie’s final attempt to stop me.
Today could most definitely go fuck itself.

2:42 p.m.
We did inventory last week, and I screwed up by accidentally ordering twice the number of crackers we needed. I had them marked down to half price, which Mr. Ducksworth had noticed. A paddling of ducks marching into the store was something I had never expected to see, but I’m glad I got to experience it. I have to admit they were rather adorable in their determination to wipe out our supply of crackers, and Mr. Ducksworth was even more adorable as he guided their mission. (Don’t tell him I said that. I don’t want to be slapped again.)
The cause and effect of that is I am now restocking the crackers. Normally the overnight stocking crew does this, but the duck army bought literally every box. Even now, I could see them eyeing me as I stocked the shelves, munching on their crackers greedily. I had to block the aisle off with shopping carts, so they knew waddling onto this aisle was off-limits.
As I placed one of the slender boxes of crackers on the shelf, every single box of crackers I had placed behind it toppled like dominoes. I groaned before placing their shipping box on the shelf beside them to free my hands. As I straightened the crackers, the cardboard box flew off the shelf as if thrown. I rolled my eyes, already over today and lacking the patience to deal with the shelve’s antics. “I was going to throw the box away,” I told them. “I just had to fix these boxes first.”
A box of graham crackers slid to the front of the shelf, and I watched as the box’s logo morphed into the words, “It wasn’t us.”
A grin spread across my face as the feat left me amazed. “Why have you never told me you could do that?” I asked them. “That’s pretty cool.”
The bear on the box shrugged before its cheeks blushed, smiling smugly and waving its paw as if to say, “Oh shucks, that old trick?”
I jumped as all of the boxes on the shelf behind me were flung out so hard that some of them hit my back. The shelves in front of me responded by morphing all of their item's logos from the beginning of the aisle to the end into one long string of “Heeeeeeey.” Then it threw some items back, which I ducked to avoid. To my shock, they did not hit the shelves on the other side. Instead, it hit some type of force field in front of the shelves and clattered to the ground. I watched one single box float into the air before being thrown at me too. It whacked me in the face, causing me to yell out more in shock than pain.
The logos changed once more to read, “leave Jared aloneeeeeeee” all the way down the aisle.
“I’m not in this,” I announced while raising my hands above my head. I made my way out of the aisles, calling out “Clean up your mess when you’re done,” over my shoulder.
Later on, when I saw Gabe, I asked him if we had a poltergeist in the building.
“Oh, yeah,” he confirmed. “Sheryl spent an hour this morning playing catch with it.”
“Is that all it wants?”
He nodded, and I nodded back in understanding. “And the shelves don’t want to play catch with it,” I said mostly to myself because Gabe had already walked off.
I realized that intervention had to happen when the altercations began to involve customers. I saw a man angrily speed-balling cans into the shelves surrounding him, and I immediately stepped in to help. After apologizing to him and offering a 50% discount that might make Ursula hate me, I turned to the shelves.
“Look, guys, this has got to stop. Putting me through it is one thing because I know I’m this store’s guinea pig, but dragging customers into it is where I draw the line. It’s extremely bad for business.”
I crossed my arms and waited for a response, but none came. After a couple of minutes of waiting for one, I sighed and began tapping my foot as my aggravation and impatience grew. Maybe five seconds later is when I saw the cans to my right begin to tumble off their shelves. Soon, hands appeared, their formation resembling someone swimming forward while underwater.
“What the…” I began as I saw the owner of the hands shimmying through the space it had cleared out. Stringy tendrils of hair trickled out over the shelf edge, falling downwards until they almost touched the floor. The crown of a head peeked out over the edge, making me step back a bit. Recognition began to creep into my bones, but I couldn’t tell why until I heard a familiar popping of the being’s neck. I debated running away, but the head snapped upwards before I could respond. A foul and rotten face locked eyes with me, giving me a horrific grin.
“Deborah!” I yelled while falling back on my butt. Before I had even landed on the floor, however, she was gone. I looked all around me rapidly, dread overwhelming to the point that I felt bile rising up in my throat. Deborah’s disembodied laughter began to fill my ears, and I felt like I was about to pass out.
Until a note floated downwards and landed in my lap. I picked it up and read the scrawling handwriting. It almost resembled a child’s writing, even written with crayon, and it was something I had most definitely never seen before. “Gotcha!” it read.
I groaned. “That wasn’t funny!”
Another note floated downwards and landed in my lap again. “Yes, it was.”
I heard a clinking above me and looked up to find a stack of cans with their logos just changed. “It kind of was,” they read.
I rolled my eyes. “At least you guys are getting along, I guess.”

7:13 p.m.
Knock…knock…knock
I sighed in annoyance. “Go away.”
“Can I come inside?” spoke up the child’s voice on the other side of the locked glass doors. His eerily monotone voice had become a rather aggravating occurrence to me.
“No. Go away,” I said more forcefully.
“Ooooh! Barty is here!” Sheryl crooned from behind me. “Hi, Barty Boy!”
“My name is Bartholemew,” said the boy, sounding slightly annoyed before switching back to his bland cadence. “Can you let me inside, Sheryl?”
“No, I’m sorry, Barty,” responded Sheryl, her voice dripping with disappointment. “Jared says I’ll die if I do.”
“I’m not going to hurt you,” said the strange child. “It’s cold out here, and I would like to call my mother.”
“He doesn’t have a mother because he’s not actually a child,” I explained. “We’ve been over this, Sheryl.”
“Yeah, but he’s just so darn cute!” she responded. “And clearly he needs new clothes! I mean, those were popular in like…colonial days!”
I finally looked up from my register to take a closer look at Barty. He was also looking down at his outfit as if he hadn’t realized his fashion sense was centuries behind. When he looked back up, his jet-black eyes locked onto mine. The sickly sweet smell of death was already getting unbearable, and that was with him on the other side of the door still. His eyes resembled black pits of despair. They beckoned you closer and closer, and if you got too close, they would swallow you up. They began unearthing my deepest fears: Lacie never loving me, the store firing me, dying alone. Just before the feelings consumed me entirely, before I was convinced that the only answer to my salvation was to let him inside, I managed to look away. “Go away, Barty,” I ordered once more.
His porcelain face glared at me. “My name is Bartholemew, and I need to come inside.”
Sheryl looked toward me in hopefulness. When I didn’t respond, she began to shimmy closer to the door as if I wouldn’t notice.
“Sheryl, he’s dangerous——“
“——Barty wouldn’t hurt a fly!”
I watched as she ignored me and stepped just before the door. Barty’s coal-like eyes stared up at hers, and she quickly let out a cry like she was in pain. She leaped backward, falling onto her butt, yet only a second later she was up on her feet and running as far away from the front doors as she could.
I turned towards the rapid footsteps coming from the direction of the office to see a frazzled Lacie throwing her hair up into a quick messy bun as if ready to fight any intruder we had. “What’s going on?”
I avoided eye contact with her while responding. “Barty is here, and Sheryl got too close.”
It was hard not to look at her after being in love with her for so long. I noticed her looking for the chain around my neck, double-checking that I was still wearing the protection pendant she made me. “Did it work?”
Our eyes connected, and I looked away while shrugging. “I didn’t want to take the chance of not wearing it knowing what this store throws at you.” It did not prevent heartbreak, I’ll tell you that much.
“Can I use your telegraph?” spoke up Barty.
“Wrong century, demon,” snapped Lacie. She crossed her arms and locked eyes with him. “And I told you not to come back.”
Barty and Lacie bickered back and forth for a few more minutes before the being suddenly disappeared, angry that his wish had once again not been fulfilled. Lacie looked away for a split second to catch something the poltergeist threw at her, and then he was gone. Barty is part of the reason why Sheryl will never get her own keys to the store. We’ve even let Gary have his own set, but we just can’t trust Sheryl not to open it to any number of creatures we have to deal with on a daily basis. Barty seemed unaffected by Lacie’s protection and diversion spells, and we all know how successful her spells are based off of the last entry.

I really need to shut up talking about it, but its all I can focus on. I think I just need some time to think, so I’ll talk to you guys later.

9:54 p.m.
Ayo, yo, whaddup, guys? It’s Gabe here. Jared said I could type up the conclusion. You guys have no idea how hard it is to type when you don’t have a physical form. Finding the right amount of pressure to press the keys and not completely demolish this keyboard is tedious. The pain is all worth it for you guys, though. You’re always there for us, so I want to be there for you.
Just look behind you.
I’m just kidding. If I really wanted to visit you, you’d have no idea about it.
There’s been a strange vibe around the store today, and I’m not sure why. Everyone just seems…off. Even me. It took me 20 minutes to check a customer’s single item out earlier because I couldn’t remember how to open a plastic shopping bag. We’ve all been stressed, and there’s just this feeling of darkness over us.
I hope things improve, and I hope you guys keep coming along for the ride!
Peace out!

In the small town of Zesceil, Kyssla Silverwing had dusted off the ethers of sleep, and with belayed horror, realized a certain undeniable truth.
 
The previous day, the Level 17 [Maid] had expected the weekend, and the coming week, to be filled with relaxation. The Terscales had taken a temporary reprieve from town, giving her ample time to tend to her own personal desires.
 
Kyssla had planned to do some gardening, as it was her great interest. She loved to tend to plants and care for them. There was a satisfaction in watching the seeds grow into a virile flowering plant, into helping all forms of life flourish and change. She had even levelled from her work, becoming a Level 6 [Gardener].
 
However, when she had risen in the morning, Kyssla had encountered a problem that was unsolvable.
 
On this day, she was no longer a Level 17 [Maid].
 
Kyssla Silverwing was a Level 52 [Spy of Becoming].
 
 
Kyssla took a glance around her humble place with fear and longing. The room she had cared for and loved now carried with it a sinister character. It was a simply furnished space, but she had enjoyed how the yellow walls twin'd her scales, how when it rained, it pitter-pattered softly against the glass windows, and how when it snowed, the glittering powder fell gently upon the colorful cobbled streets below.
 
A single tear fell from her eye, a crystal of emotion, bringing with it a coming storm.
 
"I'm real."
 
There was never a more childish, but uniquely cognizant statement to come from living beings. It was an assertion inviting no room for query. A declaration meant to reassure herself of her own being. To keep a fractured Drake whole.
 
"I'm not going crazy."
 
"I'm not going crazy."
 
Then a sudden pause cutting short her murmurs, brought on by realization.
 
"I am crazy. I am a crazy person."
 
The 28 year old Drake took a deep, shaking breath, raising her trembling claws to wipe away the tears that stung her eyes and sullied her dress. As if the action would make her stronger in this moment, giving her the strength to continue forward.
 
"A-Ancestors."
 
Was there ever a Kyssla Silverwing?
 
 
The Skills she had spent her entire adult life building had vanished. The joy of her level-ups and progress in her Class, smashed to naught. Kyssla had not even the 6 Levels in [Gardener] that brought her so much satisfaction.
 
Kyssla realized how dire her situation truly was.
 
Who was she, really?
 
She moaned with emotional pain. Trying to force air into her stricken lungs.
 
Was she just the product of a Skill?
 
The tremors in her hands refused to subside, adreneline eternal. The [Spy of Becoming] drew closer to the horrid thoughts, to the root of matters, the false core of things.
 
Was she even a Drake?
 
It refused to leave her, like a demon taking hold. The distrust of her reality grew ever stronger. The young woman spiraled further down.
 
She might not even originally be female. Every memory, every wonder about her life was most likely a flawed assumption.
 
"This is all an illusion, it has to be. I-I'm real."
 
There were now many Skills possessed by her, from being a Level 52 [Spy of Becoming]. But only one Skill made her shiver. That singular Skill terrified her, and she wished there were a way to deny it, to destroy it.
 
[Become New Identity]
 
She had to be real. The Drake looked around at her abode, at the history here. This space had been inhabited by her for a years time. She sent back letters to her parents, she spoke with friends. The seasons had changed, from winter to winter. These comfortable worn walls kept her safe and happy.
 
She had to be real. She looked fondly on the times she whiled away here, she enjoyed working for the kindly Terscales family. It was a great fortune for her to be able to be a [Maid] here. The pay was mediocre, and the work challenging at times, but the lodging and food were free and she was never refused a day off. The other [Maid]'s were nice, and she had levelled 3 times in the past year from her work here.
 
She had to be real.
 
She
 
Had
 
To
 
Be
 
Real
 
 
A [Monk]'s tranquility came over Kyssla Silverwing. She had parents. She remembered her parents. She knew where they lived.
 
The journey from the City of Color, Zesceil, to Reiln was a long one. Never before had she so desired to make that same journey in reverse. The memory was still there, of the adventure from her home city to Zesceil, of the winding roads the wagon went down, of the other towns she had passed. A journey where she transformed from the nervous Drake hailing from the small town of Reiln, into the Drake who was finally coming into her own.
 
Her feeling was of loss, as she truly loved this city. Her possessions weren't many, and the time it took was short, for her things to be packed. All emotions fit into her small suitcase. The walls of her fortress seemed to become grayer as she went, and a look of conflict took hold in her deep blue eyes.
 
Although her Class had changed, the Drake that it contained had not. For all the mystique and intrigue of being a [Spy] had grabbed her, she couldn't bear to leave without a word. Her lithe claws, worn from a [Maid]'s labours, took hold of the pen with an unnatural stillness, and she wrote a solemn letter apologizing for her coming absence.
 
Despite her desire, it was a herculian task for Kyssla to speak to anyone she knew in her current state. With her Skills, she could become anybody, but at this moment the only person she wanted to be was herself. And she found it unbearable to show those who had treated her so kindly that she was to potentially abandon them in a moments notice.
 
The pink letter was placed with care upon her wooden door, her uniform laid neatly on the bed, and then she took the first wobbling step of her journey.
 
 
The air had a harsh smell to it, as she stepped out of the manor and onto the streets of the City of Color. Her breathe created its own fog to accompany the empty silent mourning. The sun had not yet risen, and so it was of the hour when even ne'erdowells refuse to stalk the painted streets.
 
The recent snow seemed to absorb all sound, making her feel incredibly self-conscious as she plodded through the glittering stuff, towards her destination. The Driver's Guild. Normally she would follow the lines painted on the roads to get to her port of call, but these streets she had travelled well.
 
It was a day's journey to Reiln, and Kyssla remembered that it had felt like an eternity to arrive here the previous year. In fact, she now recollected that she wore the same clothing upon arrival, as if this were all a circle.
 
The City of Color was a city she would never forget. It hurt to even think about it. She still beheld the desire to stop and look closely at every mural dotted around the city, at every building painted with care. Everything was colorful here, including the people within.
 
She reached a trembling hand to her coinpurse to check for the fifth time. More than enough coin for her to make the trip to Reiln and back. Within her was the hope that she would be making the journey back. The Drake bit her lip nervously, nearly drawing blood. Reiln.
 
Soon enough the building for the Driver's Guild came into sight. It was a modest stone building, as they tended to be, and the orange stone invoked the rustic sensation of home, just to lay eyes upon it. Kyssla was sure that for many it invoked in them the same emotion. For most who needed to travel, the Driver's Guild was a way to get home, and home was always a welcome sight wherever one may find it.
 
Creak.
 
The Drake's claws pried open the door with a jitter. It was warm inside, and the [Maid] made sure to quickly and quietly shut the door, afraid the air would escape. At the desk was a young male Drake with bronze scales. He didn't recognize her, and it wasn't due to her Skills.
 
"H-hello? I'd like to make a trip to Reiln, fast. I can pay, please."
 
She plonked a few coins down on the desk and looked the man in the eyes. Her look must have been truly tragic, because the [Receptionist] gave her a startled glance, and then ran to get a [Driver] from some location closer to the stables.
 
In almost no time the Drake returned. She could tell that adreneline was rushing through his veins. Things were probably fairly slow here, and a request like this uncommon for a town like Zesceil.
 
"Follow me, Ma'am. This will be a priority, you'll be in Reiln as fast as we can get you there."
 
A wave of relief washed over her as she followed the man out to a carriage that was already waiting for her. Any number of Skills could have made her keep her composure, but instead, she climbed inside and started to cry.
 
 
The [Driver] was making quick work of the journey. What had been a day's time, seemed to be cut closer to 4-5 hours. By some means, the trip still felt longer than her first arrival. It was a smooth ride too, which made her nerves worse. Just her and the inside of the carriage, seperated from the world outside.
 
Scenery flew by the window, so different from a year ago. As the carriage travelled, she too travelled back in time. All of her worries started to meld together. Like broth for a stew, her thoughts percolated.
 
It was agony, to wait. The polite [Maid] didn't want to impose upon the carriage [Driver], to request him to go faster for her worries. Her parents. She would see her parents, or at least observe them from afar. It no longer mattered to her if they were her parents, or if she had taken the identity of someone else, she just needed them to exist.
 
Already she missed the painted brickwork of Zesceil. It was her ideal city. As a child Kyssla had heard stories, and more than any of the Walled Cities, it was Zesceil that called to her. Regardless of how this ended, she wanted to bring her parents back with her to the City of Color. It was a selfish desire, but that was all she wanted.
 
A pit positioned itself deep in her stomach. The [Spy] took a glance out the window and saw her destination was near. Her internal sundial moved closer to nightfall, as the Drake beheld Reiln. She had lived here for most of her life.
 
 
Getting through the gate had been no issue, the [Guards] hadn't even taken a look inside her carriage. The walls should have given her a feeling of safety, but instead it made the anxiety worse. Kyssla then realized with horror, that the [Driver] was taking her directly to her childhood home, not to the guild. He must have had a Skill for it.
 
Clip clop
 
Creak
 
The wagon came to a halt, then the door opened, a wall of rarefied light. The [Driver] said nothing, and at this moment that was all she desired. It pulled away, heading to the guild, she was sure. The shaken [Maid] felt silly as a feeling of unhappiness washed over her. That man had a schedule, and she had just ruined it.
 
Crunch
 
Crunch
 
Kyssla's legs involuntarily carried her through the snow, closer to that sacred destination. Then they stopped so suddenly she felt her knees pop, as she noticed her parents through the window, preparing for their day.
 
The house was as she remembered it, every brick in its place, every spot she used to hide in. The garden was still there, albeit the snow hadn't been treating it well. The city still held its familiarity.
 
It hit her. She was Kyssla Silverwing. She had no memories of how she became a [Spy], no scars, no old injuries. No hidden letters, no old secrets. She was simply herself. All along, whoever she had been, she had really wanted to be the Level 17 [Maid] who did a bit of gardening in Zesceil. Who missed her parents and wanted them to come be with her there. Who had a sunny disposition and took whatever life threw at her in stride.
 
She hadn't used [Become New Identity] to spy on the family or to be someone else. She had used it to become herself. To wipe away who she hadn't wanted to be, the [Spy], and live the simpler life that she had always wanted. She was the true Kyssla Silverwing all along.
 
With a deep breath her emotions steadied. The world made sense. Then, the [Spy] was gone, and the Level 18 [Maid] raised a claw to the worn wooden door, and she knocked.
 
Knock
 
Knock
 
Knock
 
It opened, and accompanying the expression of surprise and happiness on her parents' face, she spoke the simplest worlds in the world for her now.
 
"Sorry for the sudden intrusion, I've come home to visit."