#driver fucking. speeded and drove on the wrong lane. both on the pedestrian lane and the car road

[silver-queen]

Bless my.cat he just put a paw on my shoe as iwas coming down from a panic attack

[wuh2k]

In Which my Dog is Smarter Than Humans......Again

Took both of the puppies to the shops in the evening recently. Luna’s on lead coz I don’t trust her as far as I can throw her, Mercury’s off because he’s the bestest boy in the whole world. Everything goes as normal, it’s Luna’s turn to press the button at the crossing and she manages to hit it this time (she’s getting better), and they both go into a sit, waiting to cross.

The lights change and the beep starts. Mercury stands up coz he recognises the beep, but still waits for the command coz again, he’s the bestest boy. The green man’s showing, it’s red for the cars. One’s already stopped coming from the right and there’s another approaching from the left. I give the command to “cross”.

And the car coming from the left doesn’t stop (we drive on the left in Ireland so the non-stopping car is in the far lane). Right now I’m gonna stress this. I gave the command to cross. I, a human being told my dog to cross because the light was green. I had started to cross too. If I’d been with a child I would have told them to cross.

The driver finally sees the red light, or sees Mercury and hits the brakes. Too late. The car carries forward into the pedestrian crossing before it comes to a stop. It all happened so fast I didn’t have time to call out to Mercury, no time for anything more than utter horror. But Mercury saw a car still moving at speed along the road and knew something was wrong. And Mercury stopped to look back at me. Because even with the beeping, even having received the command to cross, he knew this wasn’t normal.

He stopped just before crossing into the lane with the moving car. The car didn’t come to a halt until its front had passed the point where Mercury would have been if he hadn’t stopped. The car drove off and I took Mercury across the road and gave him tonnes and tonnes of cuddles. The car got stuck in traffic just a short distance past the lights so I made sure to follow and shout and curse the fuck out of them until traffic started moving again.

My colourblind dog has better road sense than human drivers.

[glitchinthesystemspiderbyte]

[3] Glitch in the System - Drive It Like You Stole It

By E.  A not-so-relaxing drive happens.

--

Sombra held back a panicked scream with practiced willpower as the sleek black sedan she was riding in nearly sideswiped a truck filled with chickens on the narrow Venetian street. Her window was open in an attempt to let the cool breeze distract her from Widowmaker’s chaotic driving, but instead it merely left her victim to the cloud of dirt and feathers that flew off the panicked animals as they passed.

“Hey, Widow? Darling?” she asked once she’d removed the grit from her eyes.

“Sombra.”

“Could you maybe, kindly, just for me,” she asked sweetly, voice tinged with uncharacteristic panic as she white-knuckled her seat, “consider driving the fucking speed limit for once.”

Widowmaker did not respond immediately, her attention diverted to the car before her, floating on a cushion of bright green thrusters and clearly not moving quickly enough for her tastes. Aggressing it with mere inches between their bumpers, she cut to the left as soon as she found the opportunity to pass, thrusters screaming as she pulled back into her lane just before an oncoming car nearly joined them in their back seat. The driver behind them flashed their lights at her; Widowmaker shoved her hand out the window and flipped them off.

“We have a deadline to make,” was her only response.

“No, we have a grocery store to get to because Gabe can’t be bothered to buy his own fucking corn flakes.” Sombra winced as they approached a new line of cars. They were cruising at a reasonable distance at the moment, but she didn’t expect that to be a lasting reality and steeled herself for their inevitable brush with death. “We could have walked, Widow. We could have walked.”

Widowmaker’s eyes were affixed to the road ahead, and she swerved around the cars with an expertise that didn’t do much to assuage Sombra’s horror at the gauntlet she was being forced to sit shotgun through. The sniper’s eyes flicked to the rear-view mirror, and Sombra caught their expression: determination, frustration, and no small amount of focus. It was the same expression she had when on a mission, which Sombra found curiously telling. At the same time, it was deeply disconcerting that a drive to the local market was the same as a high-stakes assassination in the sniper’s frustratingly complex mind.

“Cornflakes or not, there’s no reason to waste time,” Widowmaker snapped back. The brief moment in which she’d shifted her attention to Sombra nearly caused them to merge with the car ahead of them. “Despite your partiality for detours.”

“Jeeze, no need to get ad hominem here. It’s not like we’re hacking a military base or trying to assassinate someone. We’re literally going to the store to get,” she paused, reaching into her pocket to check her list, “apples, milk, and cereal.” She frowned, giving Widowmaker a side-eyed glance. “And something called ‘Orangina’, which looks to be mysteriously scrawled in handwriting decidedly not similar to our great and powerful overlord’s.”

“Someone has to purchase actual food,” was her only reply.

“It’s carbonated orange juice, Widow.”

“Precisely.” The sniper swerved from the lane they were in, barely navigating without collateral damage into the side street they turned down.

“It’s a damn good thing you don’t wield your rifle with this desperate lack of finesse,” Sombra said, her voice squeezing its way through the utter terror gripping her entire body as the other woman heeded zero caution in their casual trip to the store.

Widowmaker didn’t respond to her goading; she simply accelerated toward their goal at speeds that should have gotten them arrested a mile back. How they’d end up explaining that to Gabe and Akande, Sombra still hadn’t worked out. Sorry, boss - Widow couldn’t keep her lead foot in check and I have an eyeful of chicken feathers. Can you wire some bail money?

They took the next turn with a squeal, barely making it and nearly running a small van off the road in the process. Sombra forced her jaw to shut and the muscles around her eyes to relax. Widowmaker’s hand was clenched on the drive shaft and her other hand was gripping the wheel as though it were a billy club. It reminded Sombra of the time she’d managed to convince her to go for a walk through downtown London after a particularly gruelling mission. She’d meant it as a way to get the sniper to finally relax - to let go of the desperate need for an objective for once and just enjoy having a moment of simple enjoyment.

It had failed of course, and nearly ended in a bar fight. Luckily for the hapless contender, Sombra had managed to knock him out before Widowmaker could get her cold talons around his neck. In an endless cycle of symbolism, Sombra yet again found value in leaving some targets alive while Widowmaker considered lasting breath a failure on her part. They’d left and Sombra had gotten drunk on her own, elsewhere.

“Are we there yet?” the hacker asked, trying to mask her racing thoughts with inane commentary.

“Does it appear as though we are?” Widowmaker replied as her straight shot down the street caused two pedestrians to jump away from the curb.

As she drove, Sombra watched the spider’s eyes again, reconsidering context. She wondered if, on a level she may not even understand herself, Widowmaker’s apparent attempts at killing the both of them was simply her trying to experience something other than the vague emotions Talon’s reprogramming had left her capable of feeling. Of course she knew Widowmaker could not feel empathy, or remorse; of course she knew that she thrived on the adrenaline of the chase, and the heady victory of the kill. It made her an excellent teammate and refreshingly predictable - two traits Sombra had found in short supply over the course of her career. They were traits she valued.

But Talon’s reprogramming was slipping - as a result of naturally-repaired neural networks or shoddy initial craftsmanship, Sombra couldn’t say for sure, but it was readily apparent if you knew what to look for. The periodic flash of emotional response; the apparent confusion over the simple spike of joy or anger that would take her at odd moments. Looked at under this particular light, her frantic driving seemed to be a desperate attempt at harnessing the thrill found in the rush of adrenaline more so than the simple inability to operate a moving vehicle.

Sombra was a professional social engineer. As such, she had made it her specialty long ago to not only be adept at finding the cracks in computer networks, but in people as well. Widowmaker was full of cracks, and they grew and spread with every day that went by. The real issue was that the sniper didn’t seem to have any idea that what she was feeling was unnatural. Sombra did not look forward to the day that the network of numbness constructed by Talon shattered completely and sent their weapon on a spree of vengeance, or simply spiraling into the depths of the emotions she hadn’t felt in years. She hoped, not for Talon’s sake, but for Widowmaker’s, that this did not happen for some time.

In the meantime, though, it would be nice if she could learn how to run errands without driving Sombra to drink.

When they finally reached the store, Widowmaker put the car into park with an abrupt stomp on the brake, turning the car off and looking at Sombra.

“What’s wrong?” she asked suspiciously at the hacker’s pale, thoughtful expression.

Sombra blinked and shook her head. “Nothing. Let’s go.” She grasped at the door handle ineffectively a few times before her fingers finally curled around it to push it open. “And let’s add some grappa to the list.”

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