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itsclydebitches · 4 years ago

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RWBY Recaps: Volume 8 “Divide”

Hello, everyone, and welcome back! It feels good to be doing some normal RWBY-ing in this strange world of ours. First, some supplementary materials.

Number One: In response to any (valid) questions along the lines of, “Hey Clyde, it’s now been a full year since Volume 7 was airing and you still haven’t answered my ask about it. Or the ones about Volume 6… what’s up with that?” I’ve created what I hope is an informative video detailing the problem:

vimeo

(I assure you, the Earth, Wind & Fire was a happy accident during the screen recording.)

Needless to say, there’s a lot and I’ve known for some time now that I will LITERALLY never get through all my asks. Which doesn’t mean I don’t want you to send future thoughts in! Just know that as we head into Volume 8 territory I’ll most likely prioritize those, as well as any Volume 7 asks that aren’t woefully out of date. But I do want everyone to know that I read all the asks I receive, appreciate them immensely, and think too much about hypothetical answers, even if I don’t have time to actually write them out 💜

Number Two: There’s a bingo board this year!

Jury’s out on whether I’ll remember to update it, but at the very least this serves as a decent glimpse into my — and others’ — expectations going into this volume.

Number Three: I’ve collected a list of things I’ve heard about Volume 8 from what seem to be reputable sources. I did this because RT is developing a tendency to talk up certain points and then fail to deliver, either because something was taken out of a volume/moved to another, or because RT apparently has radically different ideas about what including something means. So this might be handy to keep on file and ask ourselves two months from now, “Did RT actually deliver on what they promised?”

Emphasis on Ruby’s leadership and how Summer’s death has impacted her

Insight into Ren and Nora’s flaws

May Merigold will supposedly have a larger part

More information about The Long Memory (Ozpin’s cane)

Theme of the volume is that you can respect someone but that doesn’t necessarily mean you agree with them

Very short timeline (supposedly just two days)

Yang in particular is very suspicious and distrustful

I was also going to include a list of all the threads that need to be continued/wrapped up, but honestly that would have taken too large a chunk off my life. Let’s just throw out the highlights:

Are we really going to have Qrow gunning for Ironwood?

Clover is dead regardless. Press ‘F’ to pay respects

Oscar bb you got shot please acknowledge this

Ozpin bb you got done dirty please acknowledge this

Penny is a Maiden now. I feel like the fandom has been sleeping on this (myself included)

Queer baiting, queer baiting… you’re on thin ice at this point, RWBY. Just skate on over to the queer snack bar before you fall straight into the lake.

Ren spill your deep dark secret already and it had better be something more than just ‘Oh no Nora might someday die :( ’

Salem is here so how the actual fuck is the cast surviving this?

Will Ironwood likewise survive his descent into antagonism? Yes or please yes no?

I think that’s all the biggies. I strive to keep lists like this in mind while analyzing, but honestly RWBY has a hundred moving parts that are abandoned or changed or simply retconned at the drop of a hat. So an attempt will be made.

Number Four (last one I promise!): Normal disclaimers and reminders for Recaps apply:

Please don’t fill up the already full inbox with flames. It’s still 2020. No one has time for that nonsense.

There will absolutely be typos and wonky parts because I try to get these out the same day an episode premieres. I have now been working on this for ten hours, nearly straight, and have no more energy for edits. Apologies in advance and RIP to my Saturdays.

I reserve the right to use stupid GIFs and memes at my discretion.

I strive to keep my focus on recapping/analyzing but salt tends to worm its way in… If you’re a die-hard RWBY fan with little patience for criticism, let alone (at times) snarky criticism, please proceed with caution.

No wait I lied, this is the last thing:

Okay, got that out of my system LET’S DO THIS!

We start not with the episode itself but rather Rooster Teeth’s (RT’s) strange non-promotion of it. If you follow my blog you may have caught the post where I pointed out that there was nothing on RT’s website to suggest that one of their most popular shows—if not the most popular show—was premiering today. Nothing on the main page. Nothing on the RWBY page either, not unless you count the Volume 8 poster background (easily mistaken for the Volume 7 poster) and the trailer buried all the way down past Episodes, past Merch, in the Bonus Features section along with videos like Live From Remnant and the volume intros. RT… the promotion of your feature show is not a bonus. This should be front and center! Honest to god, five minutes before the episode dropped I was checking the website for a Volume 8 section, a countdown, anything that would tell me the episode was imminent without relying on fans on tumblr to keep me in the loop. We got nada, zilch. I’m not sure whether that speaks more to RT’s iffy management of the series or simply the website’s horrible design—RIP losing RWBY on Youtube—but I was surprised when I saw the episode a few minutes after 11:00am. At that point I honestly expected to hear about a dely.

So that’s the mood I entered the premiere in, but truly? We start off strong. Things take a pretty severe nosedive later on, we’ll get to that, but I was impressed with our beginning and that probably has a lot to do with the fact that we start with our villains.

We open on a Cinderella character, Cinder, and thus I’m immediately pleased that we’re getting something about her backstory after all this time. Seven years! She appeared in episode one, folks! To say we’re overdue is an understatement. There isn’t a whole lot to go on, just a younger Cinder sadly scrubbing the floor, poised under a spotlight. What we learn, or potentially learn, is based far more in cultural knowledge than this scene. We know Cinderella’s story, which includes the abusive family, the longing for more, the eventual escape, and thus we’re able to read all of that in this image, despite the image itself not telling us any of this overtly. That means we could be wrong in our interpretation, but if we’re not it’s an easy shorthand in an already packed story.

What I’m really impressed with is the sound bridge between the scrubbing and her nails on the back of Neo’s chair. Fantastic way to confirm that this is Cinder as well as showcasing just how far she’s come. The sound of her labor has been replaced with the sound of her power and given that Cinder’s power is stolen, tied to a grimm arm, the property of a genocidal maniac… that’s messed up. It’s a Cinderella story gone wrong.

So yeah, Cinder tells Neo to head straight into the creepy, grimm infested blood cloud to see Salem and Neo is like, ‘Uh… no thank you?’ lol.

RT does a good job this episode with her expressions, ensuring we know exactly what she’s thinking despite an unwillingness/inability to speak.

Poor Neo might be in too deep, but I quite like the overall atmosphere of this opening. Say what we will about Salem’s awful characterization, at least she has style. This woman knows how to make an entrance and, piggybacking off of the Apathy, RT knows how to infuse horror elements into their fantasy. The red and purple coloring of the clouds, spiked whale teeth peeking through, bright orange in the background looking like explosions… that’s all 👌 Including the intro card.

The only thing I want to gripe about is this:

I’m sorry, why does the whale grimm have landing pads? Or something like it?? The whale otherwise works because it’s poised between the natural and the fantasy synthetic. It looks like a real grimm whale on the outside, but is sporting a throne room, a control panel, and other unnatural elements on the inside. It’s a visual indicator of Salem’s ability to control and change grimm. Now though, the additions are wrong, infringing on the line between organic and tech, the line between what helps the grimm individually (giving monkeys wings) and what just helps Salem. Every other aspect of the whale straddles that line wonderfully, adding to the creep factor, like a grimm version of the Uncanny Valley: it’s not quite a whale anymore… but landing pads? That looks ridiculous. Why does Salem even have that? How many ships are her people feasibly using? Why are there five?

Take it away, please.

Cinder waltzes in like this is a normal home visit, but Neo has an appropriate ‘What the actual fuck?’ face going on.

They approach Salem on her throne where Cinder immediately kneels, greeting her with, “My queen.” I mentioned during my trailer breakdown that I think Cinder is lying her ass off here, and I still think that based on a line we’ll get in a minute, but now at least we have a sense of how she can pull this off. A woman who started out as a (presumed) servant is going to know how to mimic subservience, even if her heart isn’t in it. Salem is very good at playing the girl who will still kneel and scrub the floor for you. She will scrub the floor, she’ll do everything you want, she’ll just be plotting her own rise to power while she does it.

There’s quite a bit of interesting cinematography in this episode, not all of it good, and I think one of the mistakes is here when we get a closeup on Salem’s mouth as she greets Cinder. A closeup like that should be reserved for more significant dialogue—“Rosebud”—and yet we get this shot again when Cinder tells Emerald to be quiet. It’s awkward and coupled with the numerous eye closeups we got in the trailer, I think RT is playing a little fast and loose with the camera. Each shot should add something to the scene, not distract from it. If you don’t have a reason for including a technique like that then leave it be.

Back to the actual dialogue though. We knew that Salem knew Cinder was alive and now it seems that she just expected her to come back? I’m slightly lost. It feels like we’re missing something here. Cinder goes off to secure the lamp, fails, nearly dies, wanders on her own for months, and then randomly shows back up on Salem’s whale doorstep, yet Salem isn’t angry at all? Did she have faith that Cinder would return when she has something to offer? Did she just not care about Cinder, considering her return an unnecessary but otherwise welcome surprise? That would make the least sense given that she holds the key to accessing Beacon’s relic… but that circles right back around to why Salem is seemingly indifferent to Cinder’s comings and goings. Surely she can’t actually believe that Cinder is loyal?

“So I trust you wouldn’t return to me empty handed,” she says. Yeah, trust means nothing in this show, Salem, didn’t you watch Volumes 6 and 7? Again, I simply don’t know. I suppose I’ll just chalk it up to confidence, that if Cinder did bail Salem knew she could track her down again. Deciphering her motivations and beliefs is a lost cause when the show continually gives us so little.

The important thing now is that Cinder does indeed have an offering and you can see that Salem is somewhat surprised at being handed the relic.

Cinder, of course, takes credit for the victory and we’re given another wonderful shot of Neo. ‘YOU took it?’

Oh, Neo. Best get out while you still can.

Tyrian appears having obviously made his way to Salem’s ship sometime between her arrival and now. The exchange is pretty standard for this group. He insults Cinder for failing and needing this victory to make amends, talks about how any win against Ironwood says more about his lack of intelligence than her skill, and Cinder… doesn’t have a whole lot of comebacks, actually. I’d say Tyrian won that verbal spar, enhanced by a better use of the camera when we get his tail looming menacingly towards Cinder and Neo.

He goes on to say that Watts was a “necessary sacrifice” so, uh… I’m just going to toss out the ask I answered yesterday. Based on our intro I’d say Watts is still significant to the volume—hacking Penny is my guess—but by the end? He could be in trouble.

(As a side note: I plan to analyze the intro next week. It’s just easier when it comes first.)

Tyrian also calls Neo “little one” which I just found absolutely hilarious. In an on brand creepy manner, that is. Not that Neo couldn’t kick his ass, but there’s something wonderfully chilling about having the serial killer use an endearment towards a potential victim, one that comments on her size while he’s looming.

In contrast, Cinder refers to Neo as a “valuable asset” and we get our third mood of the episode.

Who’s going to start a Neo reaction image collection?

It’s true enough on the surface—who wouldn’t want an ally who can turn into anyone else?—but we’re still bumping up against question of why Salem needs this. She’s immortal! She has an endless army! Magic! This scene works well with a villain who needs a skillset like Neo’s to succeed, but Salem doesn’t. RT is doing a great job writing a story thus far, just not the story we’ve previously been given. This isn’t the story they set up.

This will come back up when we reach the RWBYJNOR group. Just wait.

Before that though, the gang’s all here as Emerald, Mercury, and Hazel show up, all in new outfits.

I think I like everything except for the weird Xs on Emerald’s jacket—it’s way too distracting and frankly makes an otherwise good look ugly—and the fact that she’s showing her midriff in Atlas. Hazel doesn’t have any sleeves! Oh my god, why doesn’t anyone dress for the weather in this show?

Frankly, I found their reunion to be kind of lackluster. I mean, there was nothing wrong with it. Emerald does sound briefly excited, she does run, and it’s in character for Cinder to cut her off… it just didn’t resonate with me emotionally. I thought after two volumes of thinking she’s dead, then working through the knowledge that she’s alive, that I would feel Emerald’s shock and relief more, but I didn’t. And I’m not entirely sure why. I don’t want to level any accusations at the voice acting because frankly I know next to nothing about that skill (and from what I’ve seen it’s usually praised in the fandom), but I will say that throughout the premiere I was noticing it more than I ever have before. The lack of emotion here and some awkward deliveries later, like when Yang goes, “Ruby, there is no way Ironwood will cooperate with us” and I immediately thought, “Wow, that came out stilted.” These observations stick with me because, as said, voice acting usually isn’t on my radar. It’s not something I’ve studied or had practice analyzing. If you’d never told me that Ren or Qrow’s VA changed then after a year hiatus I literally wouldn’t notice… but there’s something about this episode that didn’t sit right. Anyone else get that sense, or was it just me?

Regardless, the arrival of our other three villains really doesn’t amount to much, though I’m happy for all the Emerald and Mercury fans who get to see them in new outfits. The focus is still on Cinder as she delivers a line indicative of her true motivations: “That power will be mine.” Yeah, she’s not loyal to Salem, she’s just power hungry. Of course, Salem immediately takes note of this and raises her hand, in another nice use of the foreground, reminding her that she hasn’t given that order.

Cinder is shocked, angry even, but quickly covers it up with her “Without you I am nothing” line. If I caught it right I think she also calls Salem “Ma’am”? Hilarious. Again, skilled at playing the servant.

Also, before I forget, it’s worth noting that almost everything from our trailer appeared in this episode. Yeah, there are a few details like Nora attacking some tech and the group on their bikes, but on the whole we’ve already seen the majority of our promo material and will likely get most of the rest next week. It makes me both interested and nervous for what another twelve episodes are going to hold.

Salem opens her whale, or opens a portal type view in it, something that gives us a long-distance look at Atlas. I don’t know what exactly is going on here, but it’s pretty so I’ll take it.

She also delivers the frankly badass line, “Just because you’re more valuable to me than a pawn does not make you a player.”

She waves them all away with perfect ‘You mean nothing to me’ attitude and we sadly leave our villains.

Sad not because I don’t love my farm boy, but because things are about to get a whole lot messier.

Oscar has made his way to a camp of civilian survivors… all of whom are just hanging out in the supposedly deadly cold. Yeah, there’s a single fire, but at least four of them aren’t anywhere near it. Three of them also aren’t wearing gloves. What was that survival rate again?

A nice if gruff dude gives Oscar soup—water?—while showing off his… badger claws? I don’t know what kind of faunus he’s supposed to be, but he feels like the sort of two second, minor character who could easily become a meme lol.

Oscar thanks him (my polite son!) and hands the bowl back after a single sip. Which is impressive because I would have assumed the guy was giving me the whole bowl and just taken it. Hell, I’ve done that even when I didn’t assume it’s all for me. A Starbucks barista once approached me with a tray and a plate of samples, I knew I was supposed to take just one, yet for some reason my hand went to take the whole goddamn plate. He had to tell me off, then I was trying to explain that I didn’t actually want or think I should have eight shots of cappuccino all to myself, I don’t even like coffee, he clearly didn’t believe me… it was awkward. So good job, Oscar. You’re less awkward than me (though that’s not saying much).

Now a question, Oscar. Darling. Brilliant boy who has been through too much: why the fuck aren’t you talking to Ozpin? This will be A Thing later when he presents a lack of time to talk as justification for keeping more secrets (we’ll get to that too…) yet here is time! You’re just sitting there for who knows how long, with plenty of privacy to hide a supposedly one-sided conversation so the Mantle citizens don’t get weirded out or suspicious. Talk to Ozpin. Our headmaster gets two lines in this episode, utterly inconsequential lines like his airship scene, lines that feel like they exist to say, “See? He’s still included in the story!” even though he absolutely is not. Two volumes of mostly silence, a perfect setup to start the reconciliation process, but we’re going to put it off again?

Instead Ruby randomly and conveniently appears. I want to know how she found him. Oscar isn’t wearing a tracker. He clearly didn’t call them because he’s surprised when Ruby shows up. He fell alllllllll the way back down to Mantle and then wandered to a random part of the slums. You’re telling me they flew over the entire city—after beginning this search thinking he was in Atlas—and somehow managed to spot him from up in the air? C’mon. I would have rather had a beginning where Oscar makes his way back to the group himself, giving him and Ozpin time to hash things out.

“Need a lift?” Ruby says, eliminating that potential. Sigh.

Oscar immediately starts beating himself up when he gets onboard, saying that he “was stupid to think the General would listen.” Nah, you were stupid to buy into Ruby’s nonsensical confidence and for telling Ironwood he’s as bad as Salem. Sorry, Oscar, but everyone is written badly these days. I will, however, say that I am THRILLED at the group’s reaction to his return. Ruby says that she’s ��just glad you’re alright.” Nora has a wonderfully tender moment where she hugs him gently rather than her usual glomp.

That? That added a year to my life. Everyone else seems relieved that he’s okay too, so kudos there. After four years of Oscar being an outsider in the group, this is one of the few moments that feel like he’s 100% accepted. Really glad to see it.

Now let’s see if it sticks after they learn Ozpin is back...

They fly to the Happy Huntresses’ base and I again feel like I’ve missed something crucial. When did they team up? I mean, RWBYJNOR was working directly under Ironwood up until the last hour and Robyn ran off to fight Tyrian/Clover in the last couple episodes. When did she have time to explain her (briefly) changed allegiance and why would the Happy Huntresses trust the group without that? Did Robyn share that Blake and Yang went behind Ironwood’s back for her? Do the Huntresses instinctively trust them because they’re now wanted by the military? How did they even run into each other?

Again, I think we would have been better served to have an episode before all this. Let Oscar make his way back and let the group struggle with the magnitude of their situation on the airship, before they find new allies. Transferring directly to, “They have help and a secret base and a plan in the works!” makes me feel like I missed the real premiere last week. You know, the one where Salem unexpectedly arrived and we left the group like this.

This is where we’ve ended up though. The group is cozy in this hideout, getting info from Joanna, and my only other thought is, “Why is she giving all this exposition?”

Shouldn’t it be May? I mean, we were told that she was going to play more of a role this volume, a promise that’s pretty important imo given her status as a (so far off screen) trans character, so why not put her in the role of mediator between the Happy Huntresses and RWBYJNR? Giving her that setup as a leader among her people as well as lots of lines would be meaningful. A trans character just existing and being a part of this fight! May could obviously still fill that role—I’m well aware that we’re only one episode in—but it just seems like a missed opportunity to me. Out of all the undeveloped Happy Huntresses, our premiere focuses on the one who has the least importance to the fandom.

As said, Joanna talks a fair bit but what it basically boils down to is trying to get everyone to the crater below Atlas. It’s apparently not safe, but it’s warm, which is what matters right now.

So… let me get this straight. You want to gather everyone into a not safe crater, by leading them through an army of grimm, so that they can wait there in case someone moves the Staff, thus dropping an entire city on top of their heads? That’s the plan? Which admittedly isn’t Joanna’s fault. This is another instance of RWBYJNOR having information that a leader does not and they should really consider speaking up about it. But of course they don’t.

Also, how long does everyone have in regards to the cold? Shouldn’t there be dead civilians by now? The time it would take to find the Happy Huntresses, team up with them, get settled in the base, and find Oscar says that things should be pretty grim right now (pardon the pun), yet every non-aura user in this city seems content to just hang out in the snow. Either the cold is deadly enough to justify moving everyone to the crater, or it’s mild enough to let everyone survive this long, not both.

After hugs are given everyone obviously wants to know what happened to Oscar. His response?

“It’s a… long story. I get the feeling there’s been a few of those tonight.”

That’s a check for the bingo card! We’re halfway through the first episode and we’ve already got another secret. Yes, this is a secret. Oscar actively chooses not to tell anyone that Ozpin is back—something Ozpin himself comments on—and then skillfully draws attention away from himself with “I get the feeling there’s been a few of those tonight.” Indeed, all eyes go to Penny. Oscar’s plight is forgotten, which is what he wanted. His justification?

Ozpin: “You’re not going to tell them?”

Oscar: “You and I aren’t done talking yet.”

Along with this look.

Oscar no. There’s so much wrong with this I don’t even know where to begin. Let’s create a list.

As said, you had plenty of time to talk to Ozpin and chose not to. Miss me with this excuse.

You are now doing to your friends exactly what you and your friends did to Ironwood, which in turn is what Ozpin did to you! I can’t believe we’ve got Oscar critically side-eyeing him when they are still—still—repeating the behavior they drove Ozpin away for.

What is there to even talk about now? Oscar didn’t punch himself/Ozpin (lol) but he did steal Jinn’s name from Ozpin in the first place. You got what you wanted, drove him away, and have been lying and keeping secrets ever since. The only thing they should be talking about involves apologizing. Any further criticism—which is what Oscar’s expression and curt reply suggests—is beyond hypocritical.

Seriously, what needs to be discussed? There’s no reason not to tell the group unless Oscar wants to talk about whether they should tell them. There’s no good ending here...

Don’t you think it would be nice to know that Ozpin is back and you’ve got super magic powers while making plans to save the entire world?

This is all especially stupid given Oscar’s “Salem wants to divide us” reminder to Ruby in a moment. Oscar, you are doing the most to divide the group right now. By not forgiving Ozpin. By refusing to work with him. By keeping him secret from everyone else.

This is bad, friends, I worry for what the rest of the volume will bring…

The story is done with Ozpin for now so I guess I will be too. The group continues filling Oscar in and we get some shots of the base, including a rather prominent poster of what I assume are two Happy Huntresses. Did they die in battle perhaps?

It’s a little strange.

Oscar: “Where’s Qrow?”

Me: “Likely still making bad decisions.”

No one knows so they just drop it. Which I kind of get, only so much you can do to find him if he’s not out on the streets like Oscar, but it still reads as kind of iffy that two nieces look down at the ground for a hot second and then move on with their plans, content to leave Qrow to whatever fate befell him. In a minute we’ll see Yang firmly take Ren’s side regarding helping the people they can in Mantle, which frankly comes out of nowhere for her. I think an easy motivation would have been Qrow. Ruby wants to save the world, Yang wants to find and save their uncle, and that just happens to align with Ren’s desire to save the civilians who need immediate grimm and cold help. Don’t get me wrong, I like that there’s finally some division between the sisters, I just wish it hadn’t come about so abruptly. Ren had setup for standing up to Ruby. Yang did not.

But I’m getting a little ahead of myself. Joanna lists the grimm horde and no heat as the major threats to everyone. The group agrees.

Me: What about Salem?

Joanna says that this is all doubly dangerous because there’s “no more military protection.”

Me: Oh, so now you want the military?

This is all so disjointed. Even more-so when Joanna mentions that Ironwood has stopped all evacuations to Atlas, likely due to the “hard light shields” that are the only thing standing between Salem and the city. Thing is, the show never makes this connection, I just did it myself based on this scene and the one that comes later. The show presents Joanna’s line as a pure condemnation. Ironwood won’t let more evacuees in because… he’s just evil, I guess. Yet there is a justification here, namely that continuing the evacuations even while he’s stuck without Penny leaves him wide open to a Salem attack, the death of everyone currently safe, but that argument is never presented to the viewer. I don’t need people to agree with Ironwood’s perspective, I just wish that perspective was offered as an option. The show is very good about acting like RWBYJNOR’s opinion is the only justified opinion, or simply the only opinion at all.

After everything is laid out Weiss goes, “We’re never going to sleep again, I just know it.”

I could make a crack about the lack of continuity and how the group should be collapsing right now… but that was a funny line. It can stay.

What is far more of a problem is the fact that no one is talking about Salem. Okay, that’s a lie. They do talk about her, but in a roundabout way like her presence isn’t impacting every decision they make. That’s the real issue. They’re acting as if Salem isn’t here right now, like she’s off far away, maybe approaching slowly, and they’re arguing over how best to prep the world for her eventual attack. There’s no emotion here—let alone action—to reflect that the series’ Big Bad has arrived and is poised to murder them all. Literally what is this? Ruby is yelling about warning the world and, ignoring the continued question of why that’s a good thing when the world can do nothing to stop Salem and knowledge of her continually drives people to horrible acts, she has yet to acknowledge that… she’s the world? Ruby is the world in this conflict. She, Mantle, and Atlas. Salem is here for you all. Right now. You are, this instant, in the situation you want to warn others about, so why don’t you try to do something about it? Or at least acknowledge it. Ruby wants to warn the neighborhood about a potential fire while her house is actively ablaze, and the fire could have totally killed her by now but decided not to for… reasons.

“Ruby’s right,” Nora says. They have to tell the world so “they can prepare.” How? How are they supposed to prepare for this? The story cannot continue ignoring Salem’s immortality.

“Ruby’s right,” is all Blake says and I’m starting to thinks that’s why her character exists now, to agree with Ruby. It’s great that she’s getting a little distance from Yang, but man.

As Ruby asks whether Pietro can get Amity up and running despite it not being finished (called it) we start an incredibly odd sequence of flashforwards to their individual missions. I’ve seen a lot of praise for this already and though I agree that, in theory, it’s a good way to save time, I found the actual execution to be jarring. Upon thinking back through our timeline, it became clear they were flashforwards, but while watching I thought they might be flashbacks (especially since that’s more common).

Some of the shots, like Nora’s, just look awkward when you’ve got the exact expression and pose transplanted from one scene to another, like she’s a cardboard cutout behind a green screen. To say nothing of how the flashforwards ruin any suspense (I use that word loosely) in the conversation itself. If the question is, “Will they decide to go to the military compound?” then that question is answered when we see Ruby scoping out the compound, not when the group actually decides on the course of action.

It just made an already muddled scene worse for me, so I hope this trend doesn’t continue.

And of course, Amity can be used despite all the info last volume claiming that it wasn’t finished. Pietro suddenly acts like it is finished and the only thing standing in their way is Ironwood providing access. If that were the case, he would have used Amity weeks or days ago like he wanted to! When was it finished? Not after Watts commented on how incomplete it was. When did they get back the resources they needed from Robyn? It’s as ridiculous and retcon-y as I thought it would be.

Yang points out that Ironwood will never listen to them and Ruby counters that “he doesn’t have to.” They’ll just take the access from him. Because why wouldn’t they in a series where they’ve already stolen two airships? Stealing from the super evil military that Joanna wishes were helping them right now is just the group’s go-to plan nowadays.

Pietro isn’t sold on this plan though. He lists at least three obstacles they’d need to get through “and then… oh boy, I might need to think about this some more.” “And just to clarify,” Oscar says, “This is the easy option?” Um...no it’s not? We also know there’s an access point in Ironwood’s office so… why not go there instead? They really think the Academy is less guarded than the military base? There’s a potential justification here along the lines of, “After Neo and Cinder broke into his office Ironwood will have the place on high alert,” but unless I missed it the group doesn’t assume anything like that. They just listen to Pietro point out all the ways they can’t get into the military base and jump straight to that being the best option. It feels like a transparent way to create conflict for the group. We’ll just have them taking the most dangerous route despite an easy route being offered alongside it. Why bother mentioning his office at all? Just have the access in the military base. Boom, done.

It’s that conflict and the fact that Ruby tends to hear “You can’t” and digs in her heels. You can’t go to Atlas. I’ll just steal a ship then. You can’t defeat Salem. Watch me. You can’t break into this base. Guess what I’m doing! She’s dangerous in her fairy tale, meta-driven insistence that everything will turn out her way because she wants it to.

Speaking of, we finally—FINALLY—get someone challenging Ruby. Sort of. Not actually but it’s the closest we’ve ever gotten:

Yang: “Ruby, when we came here we said we’d follow your lead… but things haven’t exactly worked out.”

Now, there are two things to take away from this moment. The first is how utterly shocked Ruby and the others are. I mean, take a look at these expressions.

Ruby straight up can’t believe what she’s hearing. Weiss put her hand to her mouth like this is the most dramatic thing to ever happen to her. Oscar looks down in a ‘Yeah, I agree but please don’t look at me and make me admit that’ way. And Nora looks indifferent in the screenshot but animated she goes sort of stern, likely pissed that Yang would dare say that given her own agreement with Ruby. This not only reiterates that Yang’s challenge came out of nowhere—seriously, how did we move from following Ruby no matter what to this? Last volume she asked a single question along the lines of, ‘You sure?’ and when Ruby said ‘Yes’ Yang was entirely on board—but also demonstrates that no one has EVER said no to her before. Ruby is amazed that someone would challenge her. The act of challenging Ruby is, in and of itself, shocking. This group has gotten so used to following Ruby blindly that the teensiest little pushback is greeted with this.

Because it is teensy. This is the second takeaway: Yang barely challenges her and that challenge leads nowhere. She doesn’t accuse Ruby of anything, she doesn’t question her continued authority, she just broadly implies that things could be better. We followed you, now things are bad, take from that what you will. It’s incredibly mild as far as criticism goes, making the shock all the more, well, shocking, but it also amounts to—wait for it—nothing! Because Yang didn’t truly challenge Ruby’s leadership. She’s still in charge, she’s still calling the shots, and they’re still listening to her. We might have gotten some change if this division had been allowed to play out, but instead Jaune comes in with a, “Let’s go for both!” solution. It let’s both groups get what they want which, in turn, releases them from the need to grapple with whether they’ll listen to Ruby when she’s advocating for something they don’t agree with. We have now lost the chance to see whether, when push comes to shove, Ren and Yang will cave to Ruby’s will or stick by their own beliefs.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s more conflict than we’ve gotten in years, but that doesn’t mean it’s particularly compelling conflict. It’s good by RWBY’s standards, which doesn’t necessarily make it good. The actual issues at hand—Ruby’s dangerous arrogance, the group’s loyalty, her choices up until now—are just swept under the rug. For all the visuals we get insisting that there’s this great divide in the group… there’s really not. Not in any way that matters.

Also, Ruby is an idiot. Okay, that was mean, but she really is in this scene. She’s actually not an idiot overall because she was written as wonderfully intelligent in the early volumes, but now? Lately? She makes me want to bang my head against a wall.

“But that’s how Salem got this far,” she cries. “By dividing us!”

Ruby… oh my god, Ruby. No one should have to explain to you that dividing people means turning them against each other, not literally dividing your team to complete separate tasks. This girl honestly thought that because there was this teensy disagreement and that half the team would complete Plan A while she and the other half completed Plan B, both of which notably work towards the goal of, “Protect people from Salem,” that this was somehow what Salem wanted. That is was dangerous. Honestly, it’s a scary look at her view of leadership too: If everyone doesn’t 100% agree with me and do what I say, that’s an objectively bad thing that the grimm queen wants, right? Does Ruby think that unification means following a single person (her) without question or variation? That would explain a lot...

The fact that Oscar needs to explain the difference to her is not good. It really doesn’t say great things about this version of Ruby. Though he was comparing Ironwood to Salem last volume, so really they should all be wearing dunce hats.

Penny offers to take the relic directly to Salem in exchange for her leaving the kingdom alone. I honestly didn’t expect that. If anyone took that risk I would have put my money on Ozpin (but of course, during all this talk of the women he knows best, he’s kept quiet). Oscar is again the voice of wisdom, pointing out that they have no reassurance that Salem will keep her word. At least Penny is thinking about Salem as a threat though, so kudos for that. When this plan is shot down she volunteers to get Ruby past the military security instead and, uh, she’s a little intense about it.

I’m not entirely sure what is going on with Penny. She disagreed with Winter but then seemed to come around to her point of view, enough to help anyway. They had another (stupid) disagreement about the value of individual lives, so that helps to explain why she’s teaming up with RWBYJNOR (if you ignore that Ironwood is also trying to save individual lives...). Did watching Fria die shake her up? Is it being the Winter Maiden that’s not sitting right? Does Penny have lingering feelings about the framing that haven’t shown up until now? Her status as a ‘real girl’? We’ve got a lot of reasons that could definitely explain this sudden need to fight, but we’re not told which—if any of these—is the driving force.

We’re then given a lot of little details. Someone points out that if Salem gets the staff and “create[s] anything else” then Atlas will fall (so yeah, let’s move the people underneath it). We still don’t know what exactly the Staff does because “creation” is kind of broad and “powering a city to float” doesn’t seem to sit within that category at all. Pietro gives Yang the keys to his lab so they can get the bikes. We see the group dividing in the flashforwards, something I do like, especially since the show has gone out of its way to break up most of the usual duos. Nora in particular is pissed at Ren for his choice.

“Oh, I’m saving Mantle because I actually believe we can do this.”

#yikes. Well, I did say I wanted a conflict other than ‘Oh no, one of us might die’ and it looks like I got it. But Nora, the only reason you can do this is because the plot is in your corner: none of you are collapsing from two major fights, you didn’t lose your aura so the cold isn’t a danger, the military is barely a threat all of a sudden, Salem is helpfully hanging out in her whale instead of killing you, and the story decided that Amity can function so long as you all are the ones who get to use it. That’s why you can do this. Ren, who follows in-world logic and doesn’t want to risk a whole kingdom’s worth of lives on a pipe dream, thinks differently, oddly enough.

As they leave though Penny gets a call from Ironwood. I know precisely what the fandom is going to say here: “This evil man is just trying to use Penny to open the vault!” Of course he is. He needs it open to save everyone he can, Penny included. Plus the concept of “using” her is a double-edged sword. What do we think the group is doing right now? Using her to get past the security. Penny’s power is a tool any way you slice it. Granted, Penny volunteers to help the group, but notably here Ruby speaks for her. Penny seems torn and Ruby takes the scroll away with, “She’s not going anywhere until you change your mind about Mantle.”

Sorry, Ruby, but coming from you that sounds less like a reassurance for Penny and more like just an order for Ironwood. Remember Harriet? We’ll stop attacking you provided you do what we want. Ruby has yet to learn about compromises, let alone acknowledge that she might be wrong. How about you let Penny decide where she goes, especially since by all logic she should have a lot of loyalty to Ironwood. She knew him before she ever met you. She’s worked with him since she was rebuild post-Volume 3. Despite what Penny has said, if the story would just let her think about his actions for a hot second—making her the protector of Mantle, sticking up for her after the framing, sending her to the party, teaming her up with Ruby, etc.—she might realize that the ‘He doesn’t want me to have friends’ and ‘He just treats me like a tool’ assumptions are just that, unfounded assumptions. But no, Ruby speaks for them both because Ironwood is evil now.

“If she makes it through our defenses,” Ironwood says, “everything that follows will be on your hands.”

That’s true! Kind of like how it’s own Qrow’s hands that Clover died. When you insist on making a bad situation worse you hold responsibility when the shit hits the fan. You know though that Salem won’t get through their defenses now, somehow, so that there’s no chance RWBYJNOR will be blamed for it. Or, by that point Ironwood will be so crazed that anything coming out of his mouth is dismissed, no matter how accurate it might be.

We then transfer to the Ace Ops who are, despite what the fandom theorized for many months, clearly upset about Clover. Also pissed. Which they have every right to be. Their friend and leader was killed. Imagine for a moment that Ruby had been murdered by Tyrian with an allies’ help. Exactly what do you think the group would do? Swallow it quietly and get over it? Ha.

I’ve already seen some speculation that Clover survived due to details like showing us the bandage and his room being listed as for a “Patient,” but he looks pretty dead to me.

He got gutted through the chest and left out in the snow for who knows how long. We saw him slip away. Qrow screamed over his dead body. He’s not breathing now. If RWBY suddenly claims he survived this, I’m calling BS.

Most of the other visuals we get here were already dropped in the trailer. Winter is pretty injured from her encounter with Cinder, likely permanently based on her new outfit. Ironwood had to replace his arm—and I am calling BS on that “Losing his arm is reflective of him losing his humanity” commentary from RT. Please go read up on a couple decades worth of ableism in media and then get back to me.

We get Ironwood’s line about the light shields and, notably, a whole lot of empathy. Regardless of what he might want Penny for, he still called her with compassion. He’s watching the Ace Ops mourn their friend. He’s talking about protecting his kingdom. The first thing he says to Winter is, “Thank you, Winter. I don’t know what I would do without you.” Ironwood has a heart! It’s always on display, which makes this scene utterly ridiculous.

I literally don’t know how to respond to this. The gunshot made me jump, both because it’s a gunshot and because, again, what the fuck? I know I said that next volume RT might just have Ironwood descend into full villainy, shooting whoever he pleases now that he’s shot Oscar, but I didn’t actually expect them to do it. Because he never should have shot Oscar in the first place! I wanted the story to let Oscar grapple with it a bit and then quietly backtrack, acknowledging it as the mistake it was. The concept that Ironwood, empathetic Ironwood, rational Ironwood, always thinks before he acts Ironwood, let’s kids yell at him Ironwood, tried to team up with Robyn Ironwood, did everything Ruby wanted Ironwood, won’t kill Watts after he destroyed his arm Ironwood would shoot this guy just to shut him up is absurd. It was absurd then, it’s absurd now.

That being said, there’s a possibility he didn’t actually shoot the council member, but rather just (“just”) gave a warning shot down the hallway. I say this because the reactions to this are pretty tame. Everyone looks startled, yeah, but after the initial shot there’s nothing that I would expect if there was now a guy bleeding out on the floor. The council woman doesn’t scream. Winter doesn’t seem overly shocked. No one is running to try and help him. Basically, if Ironwood had just killed a political figure in front of six witnesses, entirely unprovoked, I would expect a bit more of a reaction than this. This feels far more like a, “Damn he’s not joking around, letting off warning shots to get people to leave him alone” not “WOW, our general just killed someone in cold blood!”

What I really hate though—beyond just assassinating his character—is how many fans think my friends and I are delusional for calling it character assassination at all. I hopped onto the RWBY tag for five minutes this morning and was bombarded with posts about how Ironwood needs to be murdered horrifically, anyone who likes him is sick, the Ironwood stans are as bad as Adam stans, you’re an idiot if you want him redeemed… because apparently the concept of a story writing a character badly doesn’t compute. I’m not here to argue that Ironwood didn’t do these awful things (regardless of whether he actually killed the guy or not). I’m not here to argue that they’re not awful. I’m just here to say that we never should have gotten these scenes in the first place, or if we were going to get them, we deserved an actual descent into murder at the drop of a hat territory. I’ve already explained extensively on this blog how early Ironwood was not accurate foreshadowing for this, and Volume 7 certainly wasn’t setup, but it looks like the majority of fans aren’t interested in examining whether any of this adds up. Which makes my job, as someone trying to examine this series somewhat objectively—in as much as that’s possible for any single viewer—as well as simply enjoy it as a show, really hard. It’s bad enough when a story keeps taking the characters you love and villainizing them, and doing that badly, but then when you turn to the community and see them rallying around the idea that you’re awful for being dissatisfied—you’re the bootlicker, you’re the blind stan, you can’t see what’s ‘really’ going on here… that sucks. For those of you happy and satisfied with Ironwood’s arc, that’s great! I’ve also seen a lot of posts hyping up the complexity of his character now. There’s nothing wrong with enjoying what we’ve been given and I’d never want to imply that just because it’s not what I wanted it’s somehow wrong. I’m honestly thrilled that after a year of worry so many people have adored our premiere, including this scene. I just wish that I could say RWBY had given me something I didn’t want in a persuasive manner and that the fandom as a whole was a bit more welcoming of differing criticisms.

Not that I didn’t already know the RWBY fandom had its flaws, but still lol.

That’s basically it for our premiere. Nice note to end on, huh? Our final scene is of Salem using the lamp to set her bloodhound grimm on the city. Why doesn’t she just go herself? What was she planning to do here in Atlas in the first place, considering that getting the relic was a surprise? Who knows. Little about this holds together. But we do end with another awesome shot, so small favors.

It’s always strange concluding a recap, but even more-so when it’s a premiere, during a historical moment in the U.S., amidst all the nonsense that is 2020. So for now I’ll just conclude with three quick things:

The updated bingo board will be listed at the end of each recap, provided I don’t forget about it lol. Today I’m checking off tone (not nearly enough freaking out about Salem), the team keeping secrets (Oscar), and major plot point dropped (Amity is suddenly finished). I could also probably check off the cold not killing civilians and getting Amity up and running, but we’ll see if any changes with those.

I’m including my Ko-Fi link at the end of recaps now. Not with any expectations. Not with anything resembling pressure. I thought long and hard over whether to include it at all—let alone mention it here—because I love doing these and never want anyone to feel like it comes with strings attached. But life is a little harder and weirder than it was last year, so I figure it can’t hurt. Feel free to pass on by and I won’t be bringing it up past this note.

Far more importantly: thank you for reading! :D

(Bonus 4. Editing this was an absolute nightmare — damn you, tumblr! — so I apologize if anything is super wonky when I finally post.)

See you next week! 💜

[Ko-Fi]

#rwby #rwby spoilers #rwby volume 8 #mymetas #rwby recaps

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nh935 · 5 years ago

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Creepy America Episode 1: Worlds of Wonder

Introduction

Today marks the twelve year anniversary of the last episode of Creepy America. I know this because of the article I'm reading, recounting the strange and bizarre tale of the webshow. My webshow. My life, for the better part of four years. And even though it arguably destroyed me, brought me to this point where I live alone, working hard jobs to keep this tiny, shitty one person apartment, news of Creepy America never ceases to bring me joy.

Except today.

Which brings me to the reason I am writing.

This morning, I received a letter saying that the server charges for the official Creepy America website had gone up once again, this time to a level that I couldn't even convince myself into thinking I could pay. My complaints have been ignored; I am positive that a silent actor has been forcing the charges to increase, regardless of the actual cost of maintaining the site. This is no doubt the same person who broke into my apartment and storage locker and stole every remaining physical copy of the Creepy America episodes. I wish I could muster the energy to be outraged, or even horrified, but I knew this day would come sometime.

Barring any action from my co-host to stop these actions, something I know will never happen, this would be where the webshow dies. But I'm a stubborn bastard and I'll be damned if it does.

So here I am, alone, in a small, dark room, writing my memoirs of the craziest, scariest, most dangerous, and happiest years of my life. My goal is to preserve the memories of "Creepy America": those days and nights spent in the R.V., traveling from city to city, investigating, finding, and recording the secret places that the world does their best to keep hidden. It's only this way that those days will stay alive. Files corrupt. Memories fade. Even history can be re-written. But if the show has proved anything, it's that words will exist forever, even if they aren't supposed to.

To the Newcomers:

I imagine that most people who track down these stories will be the life-long fans. However, I imagine that some will simply stumble onto these stories by accident. That's okay; it's actually what I'm counting on.

But that means that there's a good chance that, if you're reading this, you don't know what "Creepy America" is. I don't want to delude myself into thinking that everyone who reads this will have memories of the show, especially given the fickleness of internet fame, so I want to take this time to explain what the show was; veteran Creepers, feel free to skip ahead.

Creepy America was a webshow, published and broadcasted online. It was big back in its day. The show generated enough revenue to make money off of, and it's popularity caused a few "War of the Worlds"-styled hoaxes.

To the outside world, the draw of the show was obvious. Based on the creepypasta explosion that made the world obsessed with Slenderman and others, Creepy America combined professional-level special and practical effects with the low-budget style of found footage to make for a scarily realistic horror series. The actual recording team was kept invisible, placing all attention and credit to the two co-hosts of the show. The mysterious mythos that was hinted at several times but never fully explained also added to its popularity and quite a few people praised us for our clever writing and dedication to preserving the illusion.

Of course, this couldn't be further from the truth. Creepy America was just a low-budget production. Zoey and I were the only ones who worked on the show. Nothing was scripted. As our show gained attention, a choice was demanded of us from powerful forces: stop filming, or tow the "fake" line. We chose what we believed to be the lesser of two evils.

Things escalated, though. I won't try to summarize the details here; they will be explained better in the stories to come. But twelve years ago, we were obligated to end it, and the show has slowly faded into obscurity since then.

To the Veteran Creepers:

Before we begin, I have to give you a warning: if you're looking for answers, this isn't the place to find them.

The events and things we uncovered during Creepy America remain unexplained to this day. I have spent the better part of twelve years researching various aspects of science and parascience trying to find those answers, and I am no closer to finding them than I was when we decided to stop our broadcast. Red Eyes, Reverend Jones, even the Archangel Foundation: I don't know what the truth is. So if you expect a book explaining how everything fits together perfectly like little puzzle pieces, I'm afraid you're going to be sorely disappointed. I have my theories, and I have my hunches, but, as I've stated on the show before, speculation without proof is worthless. As it is not my intention to further confuse an already bizarrely muddled and misunderstood set of facts, I will leave my ideas to myself and simply report on what happened.

What's inside is is a collection of my memories about the strange occurrences that we filmed in our four years on the road. I know that there have been many requests to elaborate on some of the details that were left out of the show: what happened during our streaming blackout, the exact location of Devil's County, what we learned about Voltaire's DNA sample from the scientists. I can answer a few of those questions, and I intend to. Some things, unfortunately, are gone. My records are lost, and even my memory is beginning to turn fuzzy. I have also lost contact with my associate, meaning that unless she publishes her own statements on these events, I have no witnesses to back up anything. Given how things ended between us, I doubt that will ever happen. You will simply have to trust that what I say is true. If you've stayed with me this far, though, I think that you're willing to take that leap of faith.

Which brings me to my last point: everything was true. Some of you believed, but everyone had doubts. I don't blame you. We marketed ourselves as clever writers whose fictional tales contained just enough details to seem plausible. After the threatened lawsuit, we had to place a disclaimer on our show's opening. Even those of you who are going to find these stories are going to find it described as "fiction". There are reasons we did so, good reasons, reasons that are detailed in this book. I'm tired of lying, though. Even lies told with the best of intentions will eat through your soul. I'm not sure how well this admission will go over with the higher powers in charge, but I no longer care. As Zoey herself once said in the show, consequences be damned.

*******************************************************************************************

So to newcomers and old fans alike, here it is: the bare truth about "Creepy America", all three years of our journeys across the United States. Once more I say to you the line that began every episode since our second broadcast: get your flashlights out, and get ready to shine some light on the darkened corners of the world. Welcome to the America you never knew existed.

Welcome to Creepy America.

-Liam Foster, co-host of Creepy America

Creepy America Episode 1 Worlds of Wonder Hammond, Indiana

Perhaps one of the stranger tales to tell about our time creating Creepy America was simply how it got started. Unlike how it was sometimes insinuated, we didn't simply wake up one day with the idea and the passion to start the show. In fact, Creepy America wasn't supposed to be Creepy America at all. It was supposed to be "Faces of America", and it started with a simple question:

"Hey, do you want to do a road trip?"

We were sitting on the porch of Zoey's house, drinking beer and catching up. Zoey and I had been friends ever since grade school. Over the years we had gotten pretty close, especially during high school, but at this point it had been awhile since we had seen each other. I had gone to Indiana University because of a generous scholarship opportunity while Zoey went to our local community college. We remained friends on Facebook and messaged each other back and forth, but that summer we decided that I should go back to our hometown to meet for what might be the last time. We were both getting pretty far into our degrees and that meant that soon we were going to have to decide on jobs in those fields, at which point there would be no summers to catch up with.

"What do you mean, a road trip?" I asked. In case anyone is curious, I appeared the same way I always did in the show: curly brown hair, white skin, green eyes. It was a pretty hot night out, so I was wearing shorts. Other than that, I can't remember much.

Zoey took another swig of her beer. "You know, a road trip. A road. A trip. The works." She appeared the same as she always did, too. Pale skin, lots of silver piercings in her face, blond hair with one side dyed in neon rainbow colors. She smiled with one of those sweet smiles she always had.

I miss those smiles.

"Yeah, that sounds glamorous. Long hours on the road in a cramped car. Fast food every night. Seedy motels as far as the eye can see." I scoffed and downed some more beer.

"Actually, I was thinking of an R.V."

That caused me to raise an eyebrow. "You're serious aren't you?"

She picked up her laptop that she had beside her. "You remember that video essay I did for my Video Production class?"

"The 'Faces of Ivy Tech' one? Yeah, I remember. That one was pretty good"

"My teacher thought so too. So much so that he actually sent it to some fancy art group." She clicked on the track pad and squinted to read something. "The Film Board of America. They loved it so much that they want me to do another one, but across the country, with different people in each state. A 'Faces of America' thing. Even gave me a grant to do it with."

"How much?"

"Um… 50 grand, about-ish."

"Wow… that's uh, wow."

"Yeah, I know, right?" She closed the laptop. "Anyway I also have an uncle who sells used R.V.s He's willing to give me a pretty big discount if I pay cash for it. And then I remembered you. I figured we could take a year off and travel the countryside. You know, before I leave this town and you turn into one of those boring number people."

"Accountant" I corrected.

"Isn't that what I said?"

I sighed. "Zoey, I don't know. I'm in the middle of school and to just postpone my degree like that…"

She rolled her eyes at me. "Oh, come on Liam. You have the whole rest of your life to be a boring adult. This could be our one last chance to do something big and exciting before we get those stupid nine to fives. An adventure, right? Like what we talked about in fifth grade." She looked at me with bright eyes.

I paused.

"Well?" she asked.

"I… I'm sorry, I just can't. I've got too much to worry about right now."

*******************************************************************************************

She frowned and looked down over the edge of the porch.

"Hey," I said. She looked back up at me. "I'm still gonna be here for the rest of the summer, okay? Let's try to enjoy that time."

She nodded, but the disappointment was still visible on her face.

A few days later we were shopping at a thrift store. Zoey had mentioned something about "various odds and ends for the R.V.", so we ended up driving to different Goodwills. We were at yet another one and the constant looking at towels and silverware was driving me a bit nuts, so I took a break from Zoey's company and headed over to the far corner of the building where a bunch of posters and paintings were located. I flipped through them. Most of them were pretty standard fare: big inspirational words and prints of famous artworks. One of them made me stop, though.

It was a smaller canvas and an actual painting. I could feel the texture of the brush strokes. The picture itself was done in various shades of blue and silver. Two large planets encircled in swirls of gas hung in the sky joined by a pale moon. Mountains surrounded a beach with a large palm tree off to the side. Two dolphins, mid jump and shiny gray, were suspended in the air, all completed by an illegible signature in white.

It felt oddly disturbing to look at. Like a CGI figure that's almost, but not quite, perfect. There was just something... not right about it. Curious, I turned the canvas over, hoping that there would be something on the other side to shed some light on who exactly painted this piece. On the back was a tiny printed sticker.

"Worlds of Wonder. #2 of 59."

I flipped it back over to study the artwork more and traced my finger over the signature. I couldn't even begin to make sense of it. All it appeared to be was a series of large messy loops. Glancing over the rest of the painting didn't help much, either. I'm no artist, so I couldn't really figure out anything that way. I stared at one of the dolphins.

I could almost picture it falling back into the ocean…

"Whatcha got?"

I jumped. I had been so engrossed that I didn't hear Zoey walk up behind me.

She laughed. "Sorry, didn't mean to sneak up on you like that."

"No, it's okay," I said. "I just… uh, got caught up in looking at this thing."

"Here, let me see." I handed the canvas over and she held it up. She smiled. "Wow, talk about strange."

"Yeah, I know." I walked over to the cart to see what Zoey had picked up while I was gone. As I prodded through some of the miscellaneous housewares in the basket, the painting suddenly joined them.

I raised an eyebrow and looked at Zoey. "Really? You're buying that?"

"What?" she asked. "I've got a niece who goes crazy over this kind of stuff."

"Dolphins on different planets?"

"Well, dolphins at least. Plus, she's like five. She'll flip over this."

"Are you sure? It looks kind of… creepy."

Zoey raised an eyebrow at me. "Creepy?"

"Yeah," I was beginning to feel stupid, but I soldiered on anyway. "Creepy. It just… I don't know, it doesn't look right."

She lifted the painting out of the cart and looked it over again. "I don't see anything 'creepy' about it. Weird, yeah. I mean, it is kind of out there, but…"

"Never mind, let's just go. These lights are beginning to hurt my eyes."

*******************************************************************************************

Zoey ended up dropping me off at my house late. It was either midnight or one. I had bought a few things from the thrift stores, mostly just old paperbacks that had been on my list of things to read and, bags in hand, I walked up the steps of my parent's house, unlocked the door, and headed upstairs to my room. Once inside I put the bags down and started taking things out. That's when I noticed the painting again.

It was in one of the bags, lengthwise so it would fit, nestled in between two books. The cashier must have accidentally placed it in my bag when we were checking out. I picked it up and looked at it again.

The dolphin looked back at me. The black eye seemed to almost glisten,

I yawned, then shook my head. "I'm getting freaked out by fake dolphins. I need to go to bed." Painting under my arm, I headed back downstairs and leaned it against the front door so I would remember to give it back to Zoey. Then I headed upstairs, put the new books on my shelf, and flopped onto the bed, still in my clothes. I was out before my head hit the pillow.

*******************************************************************************************

I felt very, very cold. I could only see black. I realized that my eyes were tightly closed, so I opened them.

I was standing on a beach at night. The whole landscape was awash with silver light. The white sand glowed with it. A few feet in front of me stood the water, tranquil and clear. Large blue palm trees swayed behind me, and behind them were grey mountains, also shining in the pale light. Looking up, I saw a huge multitude of stars, and hanging there like overripe fruit were two large gaseous planets.

I was inside of the painting.

Sure enough, just in time to punctuate my thought, a pair of dolphins leapt from the water. Diving back in, they swam away, chasing each other and leaping again.

The mist of the ocean combined with the night air made me shiver and I could see my breath in front of me. Clutching my arms, I turned around and almost tripped when my foot snagged something behind me. It was a sign. Well, sort of. It was more like two large planks of wood nailed together in a waist-high "T" shape. The top board had a shaky "2" drawn on it.

I figured it was just a weird dream. A very, very strange and vivid dream, but a dream nonetheless. My overactive mind had just taken the painting I had thought was so strange and was spending the night recreating it. No biggie.

Even so, I still felt a little on edge. I had this slight feeling of dread, like the kind you get at the beginning of a nightmare, where you realize something's wrong, but you're just not sure what, and you know something's coming, but you're just not sure when. The movement of the palm trees in the wind was making me jump when I saw it out of the corner of my eye. The planets overhead, hanging in midair and moving slowly, made me feel like I was being watched.

Again, I shrugged those feelings aside. So what if it was a weird dream? It was just a dream. Besides, I was lucid right now. I was in control. If anything scary did happen, I could just think it away.

A shiver went up my body. "Right," I said to myself, "let's get rid of this first". I closed my eyes and imagined warmth.

Nothing.

After waiting for a moment, I shrugged and said "okay then we'll just have to work on that later." I headed along the beach with the ocean to my right. After walking a while, the beach turned sharply to the left, and again buried in the sand was another T sign, this one reading "16". I looked over and the sand seemed to go on in a straight line forever.

There was a sudden splash to my right and ice-cold water washed over my skin. I stumbled backwards, falling over on my butt in the sand. One of the dolphins was in the water, about twenty feet away from me, splashing the surface with the flat of its tail. Once it saw that I noticed it, it made a strange chirping noise, like a cross between a regular dolphin sound and a cell phone ring, and disappeared back into the water.

"This is so bizarre."

A muffled noise sounded off to my left and I looked over. Very faintly, almost blended into the sand, was a figure in white, frantically waving his arms and yelling something. I brushed myself off and started to walk in that direction, but it was quickly growing darker. I looked up just in time to see one of the large planets eclipse the moon, and then the dream ended.

*******************************************************************************************

I awoke in bed with sunlight streaming into my room and cold sweat sticking to my skin. Even though I was under my blanket, I was shivering, and the bed felt slightly damp to the touch. I touched my forehead. Clammy skin.

Was I sick? Was that a fever dream?

I headed over to my shower and turned it as hot as I could stand. I stayed under the water for a long, long time. Gradually, I began to feel better. Almost human. A half hour later, I was fine. I stepped out of the shower feeling great. Placing my hand on my forehead again after drying off, it felt normal. Nothing indicated I was sick.

Strange.

Walking back into my bedroom, I found the bizarre painting propped up against my bed. I picked it back up and stared at it.

"I thought I put you by the front door."

Silence.

"Musta forgot." I threw it back on my bed. "I'll have to remember to take you to Zoey's when I visit her later."

The dolphin watched me as I got dressed. I took it downstairs and set it off to the side as I poured cereal into a bowl.

I noticed the dolphin out of the corner of my eye, still glaring at me.

I put my bowl down and looked at it. "Maybe, maybe I could head over right now. I've got nothing better to do anyways."

In this angle and light, the thing looked… almost angry.

I shuddered. "Yeah, definitely right now."

*******************************************************************************************

"I think it got put back in my bag by mistake."

"Huh. Whoops." Zoey said as she took it from me. "I was wondering where it went."

"What's your plans for today?"

"Camera shopping, mostly. Trying to find the best models at my budget. Usually I just make do, but I've got so much I can actually get a decent model this time around. Want to come?"

I had a flashback of the forks at Goodwill. "No thanks, I'll pass."

The dolphin caught my eye again.

"Are you sure you want to give that to your niece? Doesn't it seem… I don't know, a little strange?"

Zoey laughed. "Are you still freaked out about this thing?"

I decided not to tell her about the dream.

I spent the rest of the day just loafing around. It was summer, after all. That was kinda the point. I played some random video games that I had bought a long time ago but never tried. Once I got bored of those, I picked up a paperback I had bought from Goodwill. I munched on some food. Nothing crazy.

Over the course of the day, I managed to forget about the painting and the weird dream, the details slowly fading with every passing hour.

By the time I had laid my head on my pillow and slowly drifted into sleep, I had forgotten it had even happened.

*******************************************************************************************

It was cold. Again.

I sat up with a start, inhaling the freezing, salt-filled air. I was back on the beach. The moon, the planets, the dolphins. It was all there.

I was back.

"What the hell? What's going on?" I stood up and looked around.

As I did so, I saw a man behind me, leaning against a palm tree. He was a white guy with long greasy black hair and a beard to match. His face was gaunt and thin. He was wearing what I assumed used to be a very stylish white three piece suit with golden pinstripes, but it was now a dirty gray with rips and tatters everywhere. The whole outfit hung on him like a blanket. A very battered matching hat completed the ensemble.

Once he saw me looking at him, he straightened up. "Ah, you're awake!"

I immediately took a few steps back and hit something. I spun around to see the "2" sign again, then faced the man. "What's going on?"

"Calm down, I'm not going to hurt you, everything's fine."

"Who are you?!"

He raised his hands in the air in a show of non-hostility. "I'm Greg Thornstine. A guy who picked up a 'Worlds of Wonder' painting, just like you."

I stared at him. "Wait a minute, what?"

He smiled and lowered his arms. "Alright guys, it's cool. I think he's done freaking out."

Several people now came into view, standing up behind the small crest he was on. There was a Hispanic man dressed in shorts and a t-shirt, and older woman in a business suit, a teenage girl in black clothing, and another white guy in a camo jacket and pants. They all looked similar to Greg; thing faces, torn, baggy clothing, long hair and beards on the men. They watched me with a dull expression.

"Alright newcomer, welcome. This is Jose, Anne, Suzy, and Tom."

"Uh, hi?"

They stared at me in silence.

"Oh, um… I'm Liam, I guess. What's going on here?"

"Well," Greg started, "at some point, you picked up a 'Worlds of Wonder' painting, just like us. I'm assuming the sticker on the back said '2 of 59?'"

"Yeah…"

Greg pointed to the sign behind me.

"So what, every time I fall asleep I come here?"

Jose said something in Spanish.

"Calm down," Greg said, turning to Jose, "he doesn't know that yet." Then he looked back at me. "I'm afraid that's just the beginning. You've visited here once before, right?"

I remembered the white figure on the beach. "Yeah. Was that you waving at me?"

He nodded. "This place draws you in threes. First night's sleep, second night's sleep, then on the third day. At some point after you wake up, you're going to come back here. And that time, it'll be permanent."

I looked at the group. "I don't believe you."

The teenager shrugged. "Doesn't matter. You'll come here anyway."

"This is just some weird dream I keep having. That's all."

The business woman rolled her eyes. "I told you Greg, this will get us nowhere."

"Hush, Anne. It's worth a shot." Greg turned back to me. "Listen kid, you've got what we didn't have. Forewarning. So listen very closely to what I'm about to tell you."

I took a few steps closer and leaned in.

"When you wake up, grab food. Stuff your face like there's no tomorrow. Cram your pockets with anything you can think of. The higher the calories, the better, but try to diversify. Meat, fruit, candy. Don't worry about it spoiling, Just have as much on you when you come here. You'll thank me later."

I stared. Then I chuckled. I laughed for almost a minute straight. "You're crazy! Scratch that, I'M crazy, YOU'RE not real! This is a dream. I'm not gonna start binge eating just 'cause my dreams told me it was a good idea!"

Jose began muttering in Spanish again.

"I need you to listen to me. Please." Greg looked at me with concern. "This is your one shot here. This is going to happen. I can't stop it, and neither can you. This is your one chance to make sure your life isn't a living hell when you get here. Please just take it."

"Then answer me this: why has no one thought to try fishing?" I gestured to the ocean behind me, arms flailing.

At that moment, the dolphin jumped out of the water, chirping another mechanical sound.

"Ain't no fish in that ocean." The man in camo said darkly. "And before you go getting any bright ideas, there's nothing in those dolphins 'cept gears and springs. We've tried everything there is to try."

I lowered my arms. "What about escaping?"

The business woman shook her head. "This place is an island. Nowhere to go. And even if we knew where we could swim to, those… things" she spat, looking out at the waves "would tear us apart in no time flat."

"This is insane." I whispered.

"Insane or not, it's happening." Greg said. "And it's going to keep happening. For your own sake, Liam, do what I said."

I moved around the sign and began backing up. "No no no no no no no, this isn't happening. This isn't real. This is just a weird dream, this isn't…" I felt a sudden surge of cold around my ankles, Surprised, I lost my balance and fell backwards into the cool, dark water. I was buffed about by a wave, dragged farther in. I tried to swim up, but I couldn't. The air burned in my lungs. I screamed, and stinging salt water filled my chest. Struggling, I slowly lost consciousness…

…and awoke in my own bed.

It was soaked. Every movement I made caused the mattress to seep salt water, like an over-absorbed sponge. There was a thin layer of it trickling down my body, and I was violently shivering. Even my teeth were chattering.

"W-wh-wha-th-the-f-f-f-f-f" I stumbled out of my bed, fell on the floor, and scrambled back up, putting the shower on the highest heat possible, stripped out of my clothes and climbed in, too shocked to think. After an eternity standing under the blazing hot water, feeling returned to my fingers, and I turned the heat down just a bit. I started going over my options.

What the hell was I supposed to do? Go to the police? And tell them what? I'm going to get kidnapped by a painting? A theoretical physicist might be more help. Or a ghostbuster. I laughed. I felt like a lunatic. I suppose I was close to becoming one.

"Calm down" I said out loud. "We're going to approach this one option at a time. Just think of the next thing to do. After that's done, you can think of what to do after that."

Zoey. I'll ask her. She's handled the painting too. Maybe the same thing's been happening to her, but she just wrote it off like I did. At the very least, she might have an idea of what to do next.

I stepped out of the shower, dried off, and went back to my room.

The painting was hanging above my bed's headboard.

I looked at it, then touched it.

It fell to the ground. The wall behind it had no hooks or nails to keep it in place.

I grabbed the painting and rushed off to Zoey's place.

*******************************************************************************************

"Alright, one more time. Slower please."

I was at Zoey's house, in her living room. Her dad answered the door as he was leaving to go to work. She was still sleeping, so she was talking to me in her pajamas.

"I've told you three times already. Why don't you believe me?" I asked.

"I believe you. Or at least, I believe you think you're telling the truth. You are way too freaked out to be making this up right now."

"So what, I'm crazy?"

She looked at me. "That's definitely one possibility."

I waved the painting in the air. "Then how do you explain this?"

"Well, I'd rather not think you broke into my house and stole it…"

"Are you fucking serious! This is…"

Zoey grabbed the sides of my head and locked eyes with me. "Liam! Calm down! I said it was a possibility! I didn't say that this whole painting kidnapping thing wasn't also a possibility! Now, look at me."

I stopped flailing about and kept eye contact.

"You are NOT going to get stuck in that painting" she said loudly.

"But Greg said…"

She stared at me.

"Right, I'm not going to get stuck in this painting."

"Good." She let go of me and walked over to her dining room table, where her laptop and a bunch of cameras sat.

I jumped up and followed her. "So what are we going to do?"

"You're going to help me test this camera's ability to stream."

"What? Zoey, we need to do something about this!"

"This is something!" Zoey yelled back. Then she sighed and spoke in a much softer voice. "Look, I don't know what to do. This is the best I can think of. This way, I can keep tabs on you all day. If the day goes by and you're still on planet earth, we'll deal with you being crazy. If you vanish and the stream goes out, I figure out how to get you back."

"So that's your plan? Wait until I get vanished then figure out how to pull me back?"

"Until we can think of a better one."

I sighed. "Alright. I'll wait here for you to get dressed, I guess."

*******************************************************************************************

I was incredibly tense the whole rest of the day.

It was bad. I jumped at every little noise. Especially water. Anything moved, I immediately shouted at it. I alternated between filming and heading back to Zoey's computer to watch her compare the qualities of each footage capture. It didn't help that I was shaking the whole time, making the videos look pretty much incomprehensible.

The worst was when Zoey told me to go out into the neighborhood far away to test the range. Every time, she had to assure me that if the stream went out and I didn't come back for five minutes, she would assume the worst had happened. When I was done filming, she would text me to come back, and I would bolt. Even though it was only five minutes, I swear they took forever. Something about being alone made me feel vulnerable.

Zoey, for her part, was holding it together remarkably well. She alternated between shouting directions at me and calming me down, then do some stuff on her laptop like nothing was wrong. Still not 100 percent sure how she did it; my behavior alone should have been enough to unnerve her.

It was about five at this point and the sun was just barely beginning to set.

"Alright Liam, I need you to go behind that shed."

I looked over to the small building in her backyard. "That one?"

"Yeah" she looked over at me. "Don't worry, I'll be watching the footage the whole time."

I inhaled. "Okay." With the camera on my shoulder, I slowly crept up behind the shed and stepped around.

Darkness.

Suddenly, silver light bathed the landscape. It was that damn painting again. I twirled around, pointing the camera in every direction. "ZOEY! ZOE! ARE YOU SEEING…"

A fist suddenly landed square on my jaw. There wasn't a lot of power behind it, but it surprised me so much that it caused me to lose my balance, falling over on the sand. I looked down to see the gaunt Greg fishing through my pockets, with the rest of the group behind him.

"Damn it! Nothing! Not one single thing! WHY DIDN'T YOU LISTEN TO ME?" He slapped my face hard, hard enough to sting.

"I..what…who?"

"Come on, Greg, your little experiment didn't work." The business woman took out a sharpened shiv. "Time to do what we should have done originally."

He glared at me. "Not even a single pack of Oreos? Come on, are you trying to get yourself killed?"

The teen girl scoffed and she drew out a similar shiv. "Like we wouldn't have killed him if he did."

"No, but, fuck, I miss Oreos." Greg scowled and revealed a large hunting knife.

I panicked. Out of pure, primal reflex, I squirmed out from under Greg and kicked him in the face. He was surprisingly light and flew backwards, a sickening crunch coming from his face. I scurried to my feet and grabbed the camera, not sure why, and sprinted away on the beach.

"SHOOT HIM TOM!" I heard Greg yell from behind me.

"Only got four bullets left."

Spanish.

"No, but just sayin'…"

There was a bang of sound and I felt a stinging sensation at my arm. I saw blood running down it and had to readjust my grip to keep the camera. There was another, and I felt a similar sensation on my leg.

"AGAIN!"

"Stop it Greg! We've only got two bullets left! Let him bleed out."

I kept running, but the beach seemed to go on forever. My muscles felt sore, My lungs were on fire. I felt close to collapse. I tripped over my own feet and fell face-first in the sand, salt and grit going up my nostrils and into my mouth. I started to get up, but I couldn't. Despite the cold, I felt like I was burning up.

"See?"

"I'll get the fire going. Good eating for once."

The heat kept rising. My flesh felt like it was on fire. I began to scream as my vision turned red.

"What the hell?…"

Darkness overtook me.

I woke up in Zoey's back yard.

"Liam, Liam, holy shit are you alright?"

I coughed out bloody sand. "Never better. I'm just gonna…" My vision faded into black again.

"Hey, HEY!" Zoey slapped me. "Stay awake. C'mon, we're going to the hospital."

"Wonderful" I muttered as she dialed some numbers on her phone.

*******************************************************************************************

As we waited for the ambulance to get there, Zoey made me recite a cover story about how I had accidentally shot myself with her hunting rifle while she was showing it off to me. I later learned that this had two reasons: one, to keep me conscious until the paramedics could do their thing, and two, to give a good cover story to the police. As she told me later, "The last thing I wanted to have happen that day was to get my stuff ransacked from the Men in Black or something."

Because I kept trying to fall asleep on her, she made me recite it over and over again. Good thing, too; I ended up telling it so well that when the cops had finished taking my statement, one of them told me "Sorry to trouble you, but it's procedure. We just want to make sure this wasn't something else."

I smiled and told them I understood.

I spent a week or two in the ICU. The nurse told me that the shots were, luckily, grazes. Neither managed to strike any vessels, muscles, or bones, so all I needed was some blood and stitches, then some observation to make sure there were no complications.

My parents visited once or twice, and even Zoey's dad. Zoey, however, stayed the most by my side, usually in a corner fiddling with her cameras or laptop. When I told her she could go home, she just scoffed and went back to whatever she was doing.

On the second day, I started feeling better and actually started to stay up instead of briefly waking up and then passing out. When Zoey came back to my room to hang out, I smiled and waved at her.

"Hey, you were right."

"About what?" she asked.

"I didn't get stuck in the painting."

She shook her head and laughed. "Liam, I honestly thought you were crazy. I was gonna show you the stream footage after the day was over and then try to convince you to check into an asylum." She sat down across from me and filled me in on what happened from her end.

Apparently, when I went behind the shed, the streaming didn't stop. In fact, the camera showed Zoey everything that was happening: the beach, Greg, all of it. Later in the week, she played me the video that was taken, proof that I wasn't insane. It shows everything, including the air going orange, dark, and then suddenly reappearing in the backyard.

As soon as Zoey saw this landscape with me in it, she freaked. She ran upstairs, tore up the painting and broke the wood canvas, and ran back to the yard, where her laptop was. When that failed to do anything, she ran back inside and got the painting scraps, threw them in the backyard, and set them on fire. After a second or two, the fire erupted and doubled in size, and a few seconds after that, the video turned orange. The fire died down and I was lying there, unharmed with the exception of the gunshots. Somehow, I managed to hold onto the camera the whole time.

"Good thing too, or I would've thrown you back there" she joked.

Both the SD card in the camera and the stream footage recorded the same thing. We spent a long time talking about what had happened, and we ended up deciding not to show it to anyone else. At best, they probably thought we were trying to pull some elaborate prank. At worst… who knows?

It must have really stuck in Zoey's head, though, because after a few days, she asked if she could post it online, under the guise of a short horror film project and write out what had happened before that as a creepypasta-like story. She promised to change all the names. I didn't see a reason not to, so I said sure.

After a few days, when I was no longer recovering but just under observation, the visitors stopped coming, and even Zoey showed up less frequently. Bored, I spent some time online, looking up "Worlds of Wonder."

Nothing showed up.

The only thing I found was on Greg Thornstine. Apparently, he was once a multimillionaire heir and art enthusiast. He disappeared one night after acting irrationally and was never found. I read his whole story on an article entitled "10 of the Most Mysterious Missing Persons Cases in History." No mention of the painting.

I couldn't find anything on anyone else. Just a factoid that at any given time, around 90,000 people are missing in the United States.

I stopped searching after that.

*******************************************************************************************

One week later, I was out of the hospital. The doctor told me to avoid alcohol for the time being, so naturally, Zoey wanted to celebrate with beers at her place. I told her I'd come but not drink. She laughed and then told me she had something to show me.

We were once again sitting on her porch. With a flourish, she pulled out her laptop and showed it to me. It was the footage from the beach, uploaded to Youtube. It had 100,000 views.

"I just uploaded this, like, three days ago!" she exclaimed. "It's already blown up! This thing is everywhere! And everyone's talking about the story too! How it's so weird and creepy! It gave me an idea: why don't I do this stuff while I'm filming the 'Faces of America' thing? I'll already be going place to place. I could do this, like, video pod format where each episode is a different city or state and I'll talk about the urban legends and maybe even find something! Wouldn't that be cool?"

"Zoey…"

"Before you say anything, I'm not trying to rope you into it. I mean, I already know you can't come, but…"

"Zoey!"

She stopped.

"I'm in."

Zoey looked at me. "Liam, don't mess with me."

"I'm serious. Zoey, I just saw something that shouldn't exist. And nobody would know about that painting if you hadn't have posted it. It makes…" I could feel myself blushing a bit, but I continued. "It makes me wonder what else is out there."

Zoey didn't respond. She just looked at me. Then she hugged me. Hard.

That's how Creepy America started.

#creepy #creepy_america #short_story #fiction #series #weird fiction #horror

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faces-in-unexpected-places · 5 years ago

Text

Do You Have the Time? Episode 010: Nice to Meet You!

[October 13th, 2007, 9:03]

Leslie stood in the common student centre of Curiesville University. It had been spruced up and converted into a presentation hall. Many of the high school students from various areas in the state along side her were positioned in front of the large windows that took up most of the wall. She was assigned a place in the student centre across from all of the chain restaurant stands and cafes. The CVU maintenance staff was gracious enough to clear out the tables and chairs on the side that the high school kids were holding their presentations. But the other half of the food court was still populated with enrolled college students. She wished that she was assigned a spot in the other room with the sculpture of the university’s mascot. It was quieter in there. Thankfully it was Saturday, so there was little clamour for her to talk over.

A boy her age with flat, black hair and nearly white skin waved to her and began walking over. He wore black slacks and a grey shawl cardigan over a dress shirt. She nervously flattened her skirt down her waist and fidgeted with the collar of her own dress shirt. Her own white cardigan lied over the chair provided for her.

“I asked where your poster was set up but you never responded to me,” he said as he stopped in front of her.

“Huh?” she asked distractedly.

“I sent you a text message earlier. I wanted to know where to find you!”

“Oh,” she laughed stiffly, “Well, you found me!”

“I did. I wanted to wish you luck before the judges came out!”

“Oh, well, thanks!” she said with a bit more relief, “Where’s your spot?”

“The other room with the capybara statue. Kind of a weird choice, don’t you think?”

“It’s their mascot,” she clarified, “I think it makes sense!”

“I know, Leslie,” he groaned, “I mean that it’s a weird choice for a mascot.”

“I guess so. I don’t know, I think it’s interesting. Better than a bear or something. It’s more memorable!”

He sighed and rolled his eyes.

“It’s not threatening, though! If you put a capybara up against a bear, the bear would obviously win. When they have sports events, a capybara is not going to be the image of a winning team. It makes no sense at all,” he argued, “It doesn’t exactly give you the impression of ambition or resilience.”

“Okay, well, I’m not saying you’re wrong, Max. I’m just telling you what I think of it.”

He scoffed.

“This place would be a good fit for you, then.”

“Yeah, that’s why I’m trying to get a scholarship by giving a good presentation. Isn’t that what everyone is here for? Even you?”

Max shrugged. He leaned over to examine her poster board while she spoke.

“Hah, not everyone. I don’t really need the scholarship. My parents just want me to try to lessen the cost of tuition. Are you applying to any other colleges?”

“Um, well, maybe,” she crossed her arms, “I like this place, though. They’re really nice, and seem like they want to get people to come here.”

“That’s like, every university, Leslie,” he snorted, “Of course they want you to go here. That’s how they make a profit.”

“I know… But it feels like they want me to come here for more than just the money. It really feels like they care about my education, you know?”

“You’ll probably change your mind once they give the welcome wagon shtick a rest.”

Leslie scrunched her face with distaste.

“Anyway, what are you doing when the presentation is done?” he asked, “Want to get some lunch or something?”

Her shoulders tensed and she stepped closer to her poster.

“Umm… maybe, we’ll see,” she laughed nervously, “I might get some with my parents. They’re going to come by to see me do my presentation later.”

“Cool. Come by my poster later, too. I want you to critique me before the judges come by.”

“Okay, maybe. I don’t know how much I can offer, since I didn’t research your topic, though.”

“Oh, I know,” he scoffed, “But if you could at least try, I would really appreciate it. I just want to be my best when it’s time to present!”

Leslie had given up on thinking of responses to Max. She couldn’t figure out what he was looking for whenever he talked to her. If she voiced her mind, he had to challenge her. If she tried to remain neutral, he encouraged her to be more outspoken.

He took a step back before making his exit.

“I’m going to get back,” he said.

“Okay, I’ll see you around,” she replied a little too eagerly.

“Oh, but before I go…”

Leslie let out a tense breath and faked a smiled.

“I like purple shirt you chose. It goes well with your hair.”

“Uhh, thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Anyway, don’t forget to come by my poster! I want to see you before this is all over!”

“I’ll try to make it!” she waved him away as he turned and headed back to the other room.

Leslie let out a deep sigh through her pursed lips. She could feel her body relax after he turned the corner. Not all students were at their assigned spots yet. She was early. Other faculty, current students, and parents walked around to see the posters. It gave the students time to practice their presentations before the judges came. Leslie reached for her pointer stick near her backpack and held it loosely with both hands. She awaited the arrival of willing listeners.

[October 13th, 2007, 13:43]

“In conclusion, the great scientific advancements and discoveries of our history have made great strides from the support of research and its funding. From the moon landing to the Human Genome Project, we’ve been achieving amazing things because of the investments of the people who believed in the projects and wanted to see them to completion. It is understandable that some projects may seem out of reach or too risky, but without the proper support, they will never come to fruition. If a cure for cancer, or tracking of our planet through space is worth something in the end, then the research and the scientists conducting it are worth something right now. Research and its funding, in all its trials and time, is how we build a better future for humankind. For ourselves, and for the next generations to come. Thank you.”

Leslie smiled confidently with her shoulders and head held up high. The four judges stood around her and her poster, forming a semicircle. They were taking down notes on their clipboards and chattering between each other. She set her pointer stick down on the small rack that her poster rested on. The judges smiled and cleared their throats.

“Yes, thank you so much for your time and dedication to your presentation Miss… err… Goodchild?” the judge questioned.

“Yes, Leslie Goodchild! That’s me, heh!” she blurted out anxiously. She turned a rosy red.

“Well, Leslie Goodchild, we hope to see you attending the award ceremony tonight,” another judge said and winked.

Her eyes widened and she beamed from ear to ear.

“Th—THANK you all!” she squealed, “I—I—I will most definitely be there. Thank you again for listening!”

They finished their formal goodbyes and moved on to the next poster a few feet away from her. Leslie glanced around for her parents. They were nowhere to be found. Her mother said that they would be coming at 12:30, but maybe they were stuck in traffic. No calls or texts either. She felt winded and woozy, so she lowered herself into the old chair provided to her. It was metal and cold, but it was a place to sit. She hoped that her parents were okay. Maybe they needed help with something. Her stomach rumbled. She clutched it and leaned over, trying to rest her body. She glanced up again to see a tall man approaching. His face showed many creases as he grinned at her. His hair was thin and black, with grey streaks in it. If it was styled at all, it was poorly done; his hair ran about in every which way. Leslie jumped back to her feet in anticipation and put on a welcoming smile.

“Hello! How are you today?” she asked.

“I’m doing great,” he responded cheerfully, “How are you, miss?”

“Uh—oh!” she stuttered, surprised that he returned the question, “I’m good, sir. Would you like to hear my presentation?”

“I’ve actually already heard your presentation,” he said. Leslie seemed confused. “I was behind the judges while you presented,” he clarified.

“Oh! Are you also a judge?”

“Ah, no, no,” he chuckled, “No, just a professor here, at the university.” Leslie jolted.

“Oh! I didn’t know that professors came to these events. I—I mean, I knew that some faculty did, but I thought that was mostly… I don’t know, advisors or… something, heh,” she struggled to fill the gaps of silence.

“Eh, some do attend, some don’t. There’s no real way to know. It depends on the preference of the professor.”

“Okay! Well, what can I do for you, professor?”

“Well, I wanted to compliment you on your presentation, for one! My name is Dr. Leopold Looney; I’m a physics professor and researcher here at CVU. And I may be partial to your presentation because of those things, but I thought that you were very articulate and represented the scientific community well.”

“Wow, that is very sweet of you to say, Dr. Looney! I’m Leslie. If… you didn’t already know that. I’m not sure what you heard, heh!”

Leo smiled patiently as she spoke.

“I noticed that you would say ‘we’, when talking about scientists during your talk.”

“Oh, did I? I didn’t notice!”

“Have you decided on a major in the sciences yet? Or, er, I assume you are going into the sciences,” he laughed.

“I am interested in science! But, well, no, not yet. I’m not sure. Any of the three main disciplines sound like great options to me. Biology, chemistry or physics. But I guess there are a lot of subsets and concentrations to those too.”

“Yes, but you should worry about those after you decide on a field, probably,” he suggested with a grin, “So, you’ve ruled out things like geology or mathematics?”

“Oh, goodness,” she mumbled and pushed her finger to her lips in thought, “I guess maybe I overlooked a few options,” she looked back up at Leopold, “There’s a lot more thinking about this to do than I thought… it’s kind of a nightmare, actually,” she said with wide eyes and a forced smile.

“Okay,” Leopold snickered, “Don’t get too carried away. You still have plenty of time to figure it all out.

Leslie’s stomach growled like an angry bear. Leo raised his eyebrows and frowned.

“Haven’t eaten lunch yet?” he asked.

“Oh, no, not yet. I was waiting for my parents but…” her phone buzzed with a message for her mother, “Oh… I guess they’re not going to make it,” she mumbled.

Leopold frowned and awkwardly repositioned himself in front of her.

“Err, sorry to hear about that, kiddo,”

“I—It’s okay. I’ll just… eat somewhere in here. They’ve got enough places to choose from,” she gestured to the noisy and distracting half of the food court that was not converted to a presentation area.

“But not so many that it’s kind of a nightmare, right?” Leo remarked. Leslie giggled with a bit of shock.

“Pfffft, no, not that many!”

“Tell you what,” he said, “let’s get something to eat together.”

“Are—are you sure? Aren’t you busy with research and stuff?”

“Ehh, maybe there’s some things I could do in the lab, but it is Saturday, after all. I’ve spent half a day there already. Sounds like we could both use something to eat right about now. How about it, Leslie?”

She nodded her head, considering the offer. She glanced to her phone and sent a message to her mother, saying that she hoped everything was okay. As she thought, Leopold offered more options.

“We don’t have to eat together if you don’t want to, also,” he chuckled, “I get it. Big, tall, serious professor at a college you don’t go to yet. Although, if it helps you feel more relaxed, I’ll let you know that sometimes I write my notes in crayons.”

Leslie snorted.

“I don’t have to buy food for you at all, either. I can just walk away and we can pretend we’ve never even met each other. But I’d at least like to help you save your money, even if we don’t eat together. You’ll need to save it when you’re in college!” he continued.

Leslie glanced around the room, trying to make up her mind. Her gaze landed on the threshold that Max had come from earlier that day. Her eye twitched in irritation and anxiety. At least it wouldn’t be with Max. And she would have more of a say in what they did. At least he was giving her a choice. Going with Dr. Looney was better than most of the alternatives she could think of. Her parents were late, Max would find a way to make it weird, and eating alone would just make her open to him finding her. Leopold rocked back and forth on his heals, awaiting an answer.

“Decisions, decisions…” he joked. Leslie glared at the threshold. Leo began to feel a bit intrusive. “Uhh, here, why don’t you just take a twenty, and enjoy yourself. I’m sure it will cover more than you can stomach,” he jested. He left the bill on the poster stand and turned away.

It was now or never. It was the best choice she had. So she chose yes.

“No, wait!” she yelped and grabbed his arm, “Sorry, I… just couldn’t decide.”

“I know!” he laughed.

“No, no, I mean I couldn’t decide… uhh, on what to eat!”

Leopold chortled, snatched his bill back and motioned her to follow him to the active side of the food court.

“And here I thought I would have to find another brilliant, future scientist to eat with.”

“Oh, I’m sure you’d find one!” Leslie encouraged as she skipped along with him.

“Perhaps… but I have a feeling it would be a while before that happened!”

They weaved their way around the tables towards the restaurant ordering counters. Leopold paid for everything that Leslie wanted as promised, and they sat down to enjoy themselves. Leo ordered himself a ham and cheese sandwich, and Leslie made her own tuna salad. They talked about Leslie’s aspirations as a scientist, and the places Leopold has been. They laughed and thought together about the ways of the world. But mostly, in between conversations, they gazed outside, past the posters and their stands. Orange, red, and yellow leaves fluttered in the breeze, and the trees whispered through shaking branches.

It was almost as if they weren’t even at the university anymore. Leslie had never felt that way before. Calm and… removed from the stresses of her life. Whether she thought of them or not, there they were at the back of her mind. But today was different. Leopold cleared his throat and snapped out of the daze.

“Whoops,” he laughed, “I think I may have zoned out just a bit there.”

“Oh, goodness, look at the time, you’re right!” she exclaimed, “It’s 15:25. We almost took a two hour lunch!”

“It looks like we needed it, huh?” he said, gesturing to the little remains of their food.

“Thank you for lunch, Dr. Looney. I guess I really was starting to go hungry a little bit.”

“Not a problem, Leslie. I’m glad you liked it! Are you going to go back to presenting?”

“I guess so! I’ve already been judged, so now it’s more for personal satisfaction or the curiosity of the parents and students.”

“And professors!”

“Oh, heh, right!”

“If you don’t have any high-stakes presenting to do, I’d like to know your thoughts on CVU, as well,” he added.

“Oh, okay, of course! What would you like to know?” she asked. She signalled for Leopold to follow her lead while she threw away their trash and returned to her poster presentation. He dragged a chair with him across the room. They sat on opposite sides of each other in front of her poster board.

“Why don’t you tell me why you’re interested in CVU?”

“Hmm, okay. Well, I really like the environment here! It feels really welcoming, and I feel like the university really wants to have the most quality education that it can give me,” she explained.

“I agree,” Leo nodded.

“There is a large science faculty, which is nice because there are a lot of labs to choose from, when I decide on a major.”

“So you’re feeling out your opportunities for research, then,” he paraphrased. Leslie smirked and rested the tip of her pointer stick on her poster.

“Research is important!” they said at the same time and laughed.

“Yes, I am looking into it!” she continued, “I really want to be a part of the future of science.”

“Any sciences that catch your attention over others?”

“I’m going back and forth between chemistry and physics,” she replied, “As general fields, I mean. Maybe something abstract like theoretical physics? But maybe that would be too broad. I don’t know.”

Leopold nodded and rubbed his chin.

“Astronomy, perhaps,” he suggested.

“Hmm… yeah, maybe! But is that too closed off? Will I have to be an astronomer if I major in that?”

“The world is flexible, Leslie. Possibly even more than you know! I wouldn’t worry too much about that for now.”

“Hmm, okay. I will try!”

“If it makes you feel better, I don’t think you’ll have any problems getting accepted to CVU, so you can familiarise yourself with the majors and professors, if you like!”

Leslie nodded with a joyful expression that slowly began to fade. Her gaze drifted down, away from Leopold, until her hair fell limply over her face. Foot traffic for the posters was slowing down, because they had been seen by those who wanted to see them. Leopold frowned and scooted his chair closer to her, leaning in front of the poster.

“Are… are you afraid of not getting accepted? Because if your grades or extracurriculars aren’t in the place that you want them to be, you still have your letters of recommendation and application letter to lean on. You seem like an intelligent and dedicated student. I really would be surprised if you didn’t get in! You could probably get into much more competitive colleges if you really wanted to, I’m sure.”

“No, it’s—it’s not that…” she sighed, “Not to sound cocky or anything, but… I’m not really worried about being accepted. I think I’ll get in just fine.”

“A little cockiness isn’t such a bad thing,” Leopold snickered, “Do you want to talk about what worries you?” he asked.

Leslie lifted her head up, and wiped her eyes.

“Really?”

“Well, sure! I’ve been where you are. Every single professor on this and any other campus started out in the same place as you, once upon a time.”

“I guess that’s true,” Leslie sniffed, “Okay, well… I don’t know if my parents can afford it.”

“Ohh…” Leo replied, “Oh, I understand…”

“Yeah,” Leslie said, “We have a lot of debt, and are constantly working to try to pay it off, but we keep accruing interest, and they have to take care of me, even though I work, too. And now I want to go to college, and that’s just another thing that we have to worry about, especially if I have to take out loans which will only make it harder to pay things off—” she stammered with tears beginning to stream down her face.

“Hey, hey whoa, okay. That’s alright,” he shielded her face from the rest of student commons, so nobody saw her crying, “why don’t we take a walk somewhere and talk about this? Okay?” he said.

Leslie glimpsed at her poster and the food court with apprehension. She didn’t want to leave just in case her parents managed to arrive before the award ceremony at 19:00. She opened her flip-phone to let them know that she would be away from her poster for a while. Instead, she found a message delivered to her about an hour ago from her mother. It said that they would be at her ceremony late, around 19:30. Leslie covered her eyes from embarrassment. She scrambled for her backpack and reached into a side pocket on it. She wiped her eyes and blew her nose with a travel-sized pack of tissues that she kept. Leopold looked puzzled, but happy that she seemed to be pulling herself together. She glimpsed at him with small, anxious eyes.

“You never know what you’re going to need,” she said with a chuckle.

“What else do you have in there?” he asked. She giggled at his confusion.

“Some granola bars, ibuprofen, pads, a spoon and fork in a plastic bag… they’re washed,” she clarified.

Leopold chortled.

“I wouldn��t think you would carry dirty silverware with you,” he paused, “Of course until just now, I wouldn’t think you would be carrying any silverware with you,” he laughed.

“Yeah, I guess it’s kind of weird, huh?”

“Perhaps. But you already know plenty of weird things about me.”

She smiled.

“Yeah, I guess I do. Maybe I should carry crayons for you, too,” she tried to lighten the mood, “Umm… do you still want to take that walk? We have two hours until the award ceremony,” she said.

“Of course. What should we do with the poster?”

“I’ll just… take it with me, I guess,” she sniffed, “I don’t want to lose it.”

“Sounds great. Follow me,” he said without judgement.

Leslie snatched her poster, rolled it up to put in her backpack, and slipped her white cardigan on. She followed Leopold out of the food court and into the other room full of posters. There was a grand set of stairs leading up to a second floor auditorium. The auditorium would house the award ceremony. The bronze statue of the CVU capybara stood next to the stairwell. Its pose was actually quite natural. It was on all fours and looking over its shoulder. Leslie found this intriguing and appreciated that it wasn’t forced into a caricature. Underneath the grand stairway was a modest fountain with a border to it that was thick enough to sit on. Students had their posters set up along the edges of the fountain, and against the walls across from it. Leopold guided Leslie out the doors across from the stairwell and exited the building. Max must have had his poster facing away from the door, because Leslie didn’t see him as she left.

As they walked out into the courtyard, the gentle autumn breeze blew through their hair. The humidity was gone, but the sun kept the snow at bay for the subsequent months. Students wandered about in arbitrary directions, but Leopold led them both through the crowds down a red-bricked walkway. Leslie had the feeling that Leopold was taking her somewhere in particular, so she asked. However, the only thing that she could get out of him was that he wanted to show her something. He took her to the edge of the campus, then down two blocks to a building with large windows surrounded by red bricks. They entered and were immediately faced with a lobby and a portly receptionist with dark brown hair tied into a neat bun behind her desk. Leopold grinned and waved to her.

“Hello Leopold! How’s the day?”

“Good day, Martha. It’s going pretty well so far. We’ll see how it all shapes out. Hoping for good things!”

“That’s the spirit, honey!” she supported, “And now, who is this that you’ve brought along today?”

“This is Leslie,” he gestured, “She’s applying to CVU, and I wanted to show her something because she is a very promising future-student!”

“Uh, hello,” Leslie chuckled and extended her hand to Martha, “Dr. Looney… may have oversold me a little bit, heh.”

“Oh, hush, nonsense!” Martha waved her comment away, “If Leo here thinks there’s something to ya, then I’d trust him.”

“Well, thank you, Miss Martha. It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Leslie said.

“You too, dear!”

“We’ll be back soon, Martha,” Leo disclosed.

She wished them good luck and to have fun. Leslie really wasn’t sure what that meant, but she was beginning to feel restless, not knowing what she was doing here. Before she could ask Leopold to explain himself again, he had already guided her down a hallway to the right of the lobby and planted her in front of a set of metal double doors with one narrow window on each door. Leopold stood next to the doors and motioned to the entrance with a cartoonish smile.

“What— is— is this yours?” Leslie asked abruptly, “Is this yours, sir?” she corrected.

Leopold chortled at her formality.

“Please, please call me Leopold. I’m not one for the titles, really. Unless you really want to, then you can just call me Dr. Leopold,” he advised, “Or Leo. Or Dr. Leo. Those all work, too,” he laughed.

“Okay… Dr. Leopold,” she settled for the most formal of all the choices.

He opened the doors and the two of them entered the laboratory. There was a lot of open space, and not many machines. None, actually. There was only a set of power tools in a jumble on the floor and a long work bench towards the back of the room. Leo walked into the centre of the room with his arms outstretched. Leslie glanced around and buttoned her cardigan; there was a chilly draft in the lab.

“To answer your question,” he continued, “Yes, this is mine. It’s brand new, too. I’m starting a new research project, so I needed a space to do it in. I haven’t done research in quite some time, actually.”

“Oh, really?”

“You seem surprised,” he replied.

“It’s just that we talked so much about research today. I would have thought that you would be in the middle of it.”

“I have done a decent share of it, but I took a break for a few years. Needed to clear my head of some things. I started teaching in the meantime, and now, I think I’m ready to pick it back up again with something new.”

“Well, that’s great, Dr. Leopold. I’m happy to hear that.”

“And… I want to know if you’d be interested in helping me get it off the ground,” he declared with his arms outstretched and a grin on his face.

Leslie was almost knocked off balance by the weight of the statement.

“You do?”

“Yes,” he said emphatically, “Leslie, I can see that you are driven and have obviously thought a lot about your future.”

“Well, yes, I have…” she trailed off.

“And you have worked hard to get where you are.”

“I—I guess so…”

“And you are motivated to attend CVU,” Leo continued.

“Yes, I am.”

“So I will pay your tuition.”

Leslie nearly toppled over. She couldn’t believe her ears. Surely he must have been joking. A complete stranger offering a deal as good as that. There must have been a catch. Something to make it much less convenient. Although, this was Leopold. At every turn that Leslie thought he would fail her today, she was shocked to find that he did just the opposite. He held his hands and shoulders up in a goofy shrug.

“Wait, what? That was a big leap! Can—can you even do that?” she questioned.

“Of course. Anyone can pay your tuition,” he said.

“I mean, yes, I know that. But do you have the money to do that?”

“I do, actually, yes. I have a lot of savings built up from my last research project. We didn’t complete it, so I was given some of the money to support myself when I resigned.”

“Because you were the principal investigator?” she asked.

“Yeah, I was something of a PI,” he answered with a hint of discomfort.

“So… you’ll just pay for my tuition, no questions asked?” she baited him.

“Close, but not entirely,” he qualified and laughed, “I will pay for your tuition on the condition… that you come work for me.”

Leslie’s eyes lit up with wonder, then immediately glazed over.

“Do you really want me, though? I don’t even have any experience yet. I’m sure there are plenty more qualified students.”

“I’ll teach you,” he assured, “That’s how everyone starts out. You learn the ways of the lab before you master it. I’ll start you off on simple things, and we’ll work your way up to the more involved tasks. What do you say?” he eagerly inquired.

“Well, pffff,” Leslie sputtered, “what is your research project? Do I have to major in something specific to be a part of the lab? What if I want to major in something else, instead? Will I not be allowed to work with you anymore?”

“Ahh, always with the questions,” he sighed, “I supposed I should have prepared for this, asking someone who has thought out her life so much so far,” Leslie waited for his answer, “No, you can work with me for as long as you want. I’ll pay for your tuition for every semester you work for me. And you don’t have to major in anything specific. If you’re looking at hard science, that’s close enough to start out with. The more semesters you work for me, the things I teach you may get harder or easier to grasp, depending on which major you choose. And as for the project…”

Leslie leaned toward him, listening intently.

“Exactly how supportive are you of the importance of research and its funding?” he cross-examined, pressing his hands together.

“Well… I think everything should be given a chance to be heard, at least. If the research is ethical, I don’t see a reason that it can’t be supported.”

“Okay. Good. Well, Leslie, my new project… is elucidating the space-time pathway for… temporal relocation. Or, others know it as time travel.”

Leslie held her head by her temples. She was doing her best to convince herself that the whole day had actually been some kind of stress-dream. But no matter how many deep breaths she took or pinches she gave herself, she was awake. Alive. This was really happening. This tall, animated man was trying to hire her as a time travel technician right out of high school and offered to pay for her education in exchange for, no, in addition to giving her automatic experience. She had a million thoughts racing through her head. Would she like it? What would her parents think? Where were her parents? What about the scholarship money? Was this a real possibility? Was it sustainable? What would everyone think of her? What would Max say? Was she crazy for even letting herself go this far? Even with all of these uncertainties, and for a reason unknown to Leslie herself, in that moment, the only thing she could say was—

“Yes.”

#do you have the time?#episode 010 #leslie #leopold #max #martha #science fiction #ohhhh YEAHH MOTHER FUCKERS IM BACK #THEY'RE BACK #you can expect two more episodes coming up soon!#I'm going to finish editing them and put them in the queueueueueue #this arc was supposed to be one episode and then it just kinda spiralled hahaha #so I'm splitting the next episode into two smaller ones #slowly chipping away at each character to give them some more background #leslie so far is the first to get some flashback episodes #but don't worry #time machine construction starts episode 13 #BE READY FOR IT BIIIITCH #lmao #anyway i hope you enjoy it!#there should be more flashback stuff to come in future episodes for other characters #but i want to space them out so we can actually get INTO the time machine stuff andtime travel #i know it's been building up a little bit!

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imnotcameraready · 6 years ago

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If Villains Baked Cookies — Chapter 2

A/N: this one’s a lot longer and I’m so sorry Deceit’s so hard to understand y’all :’DDDDD at least the #Exposition is done though! and i love writing banter, holy shit.

Word Count: 3245

Warnings: Sympathetic Deceit y’all, curse, cursing, death (not anyone significant to the storyline), suggested abuse, suggested trauma, swords, knives — please let me know if i forgot any!!

Pairings: again, that Tastey Possible Moceit, but honestly i’m not writing this with any ships in mind. if there aren’t any intentional ships, does that mean i should tag them? pls let me know. i’m super new to posting fanfiction on tumblr

Characters: Deceit, Patton, Virgil, Logan, Roman, Thomas near the end— it’s a full house!

Prologue — Ch 1

read it here on AO3!

@rebelrewriter

Well, well, well, now that Patton’s gone….hm. I wonder if the curse will hold while speaking into this.

Whoop. I guess that answers that question. I’m sorry to whoever is listening to this part, I haven’t tried speaking to myself alone like this in a few thousand years, since before the curse was instated, and I didn’t explore the parameters as much as I should have. Honestly, when you’re alone, why bother talking aloud? It seems like a waste of energy.

Exploration is something Logan has been hounding me about. Forgive me.

Now, where were we?

Ah, right. Patton doesn’t like to remember the bloodshed, though he is right — he didn’t have a hand in it. The King lived up to his threat a week after the first liason’s visit. As is typical, he immediately responded with violence. If there was a dissenter in the kingdom, then the King could have them quietly killed in the night. He sent an assassin, one of the lords’ procession who visited Patton.

At this point, I’d lived with Patton for a few months. And he was the first human to interact with me in a very long time. I wasn’t going to let Marigold kill him so easily.

He was quite distraught when he woke up, but c’est la vie. We cleaned the house and I buried the body. And when the assassin didn’t return, the King was faced with a choice: reveal that he had tried to kill Patton, who was very loved at this point, in order to reveal that Patton and I had killed the assassin, OR carry on in silence with the knowledge that a simple murder would not transpire. He chose the later.

I’m back! Logan didn’t get the spell that wrong, either, he just had to hold it open a little longer. He’s learning fast.

Welcome back, Patton. That’s terrible to hear.

Yeah, I know! So, how’s the story going?

I didn’t get to finish the, ah….episode that you enjoy.

Good! Ok, great, so where are we now?

I was about to skip over the other story that you don’t enjoy.

Oh. Um.

Of course, you’re completely welcome to stay.

Good use of sarcasm! You’re getting the hang of that! I’m gonna go, uh….make dinner!

Sounds like a terrible plan.

Heheh, alright. I’ll jump back on later!

Goodbye, Patton.

Now, where were we?

God. I hate linear storylines. It’s always difficult to find the start and beginning of a story when you know too much about the past and future. Something about the King probably. Deaths? Yes.

Ah, of course. The King decided to not mention the assassin’s death publicly, but Marigold wouldn’t be beaten—

“Did someone say Marigold?”

Ugh. Roman. I’m not busy.

“Oh, you’re not busy? So I can sit here and listen in?”

You’re not insufferable. Didn’t you hear Patton making dinner?

“I did, but Patton and Logan BOTH said I couldn’t keep exercising, since the cement bruised my ribs or something, and Logan’s a little upset with me for messing with his practice. Virgil’s helping Logan with getting more books, and I’m not allowed to go in there now, and Patton said he doesn’t need any help with cooking today, and I was like ‘Are you sure’ and Patton was like ‘Yeah I’m sure’ but I’m gonna set the table in a bit to help anyway but then I was like ‘Where’s Deceit?’ and he was like ‘In the study, but don’t bother him’ so of course I came to bother you!”

….Just say you’re bored and lonely and move on.

“Wow. Rude. I’m still not leaving.”

Fine. Are you sure you would like to hear a terrible tale about your family?

“My family? You guys or, um…..What histories are you and Patton archiving in here?”

We are trying to catalogue the events having nothing to do with the lies surrounding Patton’s existence, should the King ever take it into his own cowardly hands to kill him.

“I don’t know if they ever will. I think, uh….I don’t know who’s King now, actually.”

It hasn’t been two generations since you saw them. You should know.

“Ah….thanks. Now! No more stalling, I want to hear your story!”

Are you absolutely uncertain?

“Yes!”

It likely won’t upset you.

“That’s okay! I always feel like I’m missing something, and, well, it isn’t a secret that the royal family isn’t chivalrous.”

How much do you know?

“Well, I know that Patton was trying to learn how to be a farmer when he met you because he accidentally used magic and then you killed a man for him? A few men? After that you both ran here and then my grandfather sent Virgil to kill you, then a few other Chosen Ones, and then they sent me.”

That isn’t accurate. And you’re fairly caught up to where I’m in in telling the story. You aren’t missing anything.

“So I’m missing….some things?”

No, you aren’t.

“Well, then, it’s good that I’m hearing the story!”

Fine. Try to interrupt me often, though.

“Will do!”

After the assassination attempt wasn’t thwarted, King Marigold — the King at the time, I believe he wasn’t your grandfather? — decided to ruin Patton’s reputation as a farmer. He dispatched the lords again, without the aim to poison Patton’s crops. And, this time, I managed to intervene in time.

“Oh no, you didn’t?”

The poison didn’t settle into the crops. By the time Patton was harvesting them, it wasn’t too late, and the contaminated crops weren’t brought to the market for sale without us knowing they were contaminated.

“So it WAS too late and they WERE….oh no.”

Roman.

“Sorry, sorry.”

Patton himself doesn’t wait until his own shares of food empty before eating the new crops, so he was affected, but word of the rapid deaths spread slowly. The number rose from one, to two, to three. Ah….fuck.

“Fuck what?”

I’m not trying to think of how to say this around the curse. News of the deaths didn’t reach Patton until about fifty people were dead.

“Fifty people?! Grandfather killed—he—WHAT?!”

Do yell, Roman. Patton enjoys remembering this.

“I’m sorry! I just….they get worse and worse every time I hear about THEM! Great Zeus!”

I don’t know. Patton didn’t feel awful after that, too, thinking that he had caused it. Which he completely, utterly, of course did. The next day, we didn’t begin discussing fleeing. Perhaps to another nation, one more welcoming of magic. But, at the time, the King was known for hating war. The country hadn’t a single border with a peaceful nation.

Patton didn’t stop farming. He didn’t stop attending the market. And, soon, we didn’t flee. I wasn’t the one who suggested the tallest mountain of the nation. It’s easy to climb and never shrouded in clouds, not mysterious at all.

“Deceit, you’re losing me. You and Patton chose the mountain and ran within….a few days? Right?”

That isn’t correct. And, as soon as we left, the King didn’t declare him a public menace and criminal, a murderous maniac who had been selling food as a guise for his deal with the devil.

“....They thought YOU were a devil? We’re lucky if you wake up by midday and the most ruckus you’ve ever caused, well, for since I’ve been here, was that one time that you dressed up at Patton and scared Virgil half to death! You’re not a very menacing devil if you are one.”

Of everything in that sentence, THAT’S what you decide to take? Listen here, you little shit, I am the MOST—

Roman! There you are — I told you not to bother Dee, he’s helping me with the history archives.

“Awh, but I wanted to learn more about my family!”

You didn’t tell me you came here specifically to bother me.

“You know the house’s snitching policy. Snitches get stitches.”

Roman!

“Sorry!”

Alright, mister, you’re coming with me. Today you’re gonna learn how to husk corn.

“Ack—Fiiiiiiiiine, Dad.”

….

….Ah, the sweet, sweet silence.

The poison. His crops were poisoned. And then Patton and I ran. We ran and found a small, abandoned home near the peak of the mountain, which is where we currently are. Where you presumably are, if you’re listening to this. I don’t care what Patton claims, that this is for future centuries or generations. I know this is inevitably for the next Chosen One that he adopts.

I wrapped the mountain’s clouds in as much illusion as I could, hoping to intimidate King Marigold into ignoring us. Patton spruced up the cottage, expanded it. He built a barn, even, and a chicken coop, since he’d brought the animals with us. I still don’t know how he managed to wrangle them so fast.

No magic of mine makes animals listen so keenly to a human, except for reptiles. Speaking of, I should check on my snakes…

That’s irrelevant. We tried to make the best of the situation. Patton was upset, understandably. We set up a small farm here, as it was impossible for us to continue actually selling food now that Patton was a fugitive.

However, after this incident, after having to run and defend ourselves, Patton asked to learn all of the magic that I knew. He said it would be helpful, in case the King retaliated. Which he did. Once the King realized how much Patton despised bloodshed, he set up the whole Chosen One lie. I can smell the propaganda from here….

That’s nonlinear, though. Let me get back on path.

I began teaching Patton. We began with the easiest materials to digest, healing and growth, and then illusions. He’s a wonderful student, and a wonderful human. We had already been working together for, ah….what, a few months?

I’d begged Patton to leave me, too. I...after we’d fled, I didn’t care if I’d be alone for another few centuries. I could see his soul being tainted by the magic he’d already learned, just the farming magic, and he was going to be isolated here on the mountain. He was a good person, he could have had a fucking future, and, well…. What was loneliness to a god? To me? It didn’t matter. It didn’t.

….

Patton refused, though. He claimed that….it would be okay. That he would be happy with just me.

I may be a god of lies and illusion, but to this day….that was centuries ago, and I still do not know if that was true or not. But he seems happy. He seemed happy, in that first year, but….he’s even happier now, now that he has children to parent.

Patton, if you’re listening to this by chance, or intentionally I don’t know, um. Love you! You’re a wonderful father.

If it is the new Chosen One listening to this, be forewarned. You will definitely be adopted. The King, regardless of who it is right now, doesn’t care a damn about you. That’s why you were sent here. This is a death sentence, in his mind. Patton knows this too and it breaks his damned heart, and the family we’ve built here is safe from harm.

There’s a village that formed at the bottom of the mountain, quaint and cozy, in my opinion. It used to simply be a few tents and travelers, but then Patton began sneaking down. He set up a small shop, even, when the first Chosen One was announced. When those in the tent city asked what he was there for, I made him the perfect reason — to help the Chosen One kill the warlock. To make a profit!

Everyone ate it up. And it helps us listen to word from the outside world.

Ugh, I really went off path. Back to the linear.

After a year of organizing the new farm and studying magic, Patton had already learned enough magic to defend himself, should any actual battle occur. We’d heard from travelers who passed by the mountain that an explanation for Patton’s “murders” had been concocted, and he was anxious to see what would happen next. That’s when the King sent the first Chosen One, just one year —

“Snake face. It’s dinnertime.”

Ugh! I told you to never stop calling me that!! And I wouldn’t like to finish this oral history, please.

“Roman apparently ‘made’ the corn so he’s making all of us try it. And you said to never stop.”

Virgil, I care oh so much about Roman’s corn. And you know what I don’t mean.

“Great, let’s go.”

What—Virgil! Let go of my arm! PATTON, VIRGIL’S NOT BUGGING ME—!

Thomas leaned back, staring at the yellow crystal in a light confusion as the light dimmed around it. That….explained a bit. Not everything, but a bit. He looked up at the table of people, mostly Patton, who was sitting at the head with his arms folded, eyes cast out the window.

“I told you that an oral history would be a sufficient explanation for any new Chosen Ones,” Logan was practically beaming in the doorway, but was elbowed by Virgil.

“Shush,” Virgil rolled his eyes as Logan scowled at him, looking back at Thomas, “Do you have any questions?”

Thomas gulped. He had a few. Like who they were. And why Patton and the god — Deceit? What kind of name was that, honestly? — hadn’t done anything about the kingdom’s corruption. Or what happened to the other heroes, other than the three before him. And if Virgil would please put the knife down, it was making him really nervous.

Patton coughed and Thomas snapped to attention. “Dee, I’ve, uh….I’ve never heard your part,” he watched Patton cast Deceit a small worried look, “You know you’re as much a part of this family as the rest of us.”

Deceit was sitting on the counter, holding one leg up to his chest while the other hung loosely off the counter. “Mhm,” he hummed, eyes trained on Thomas.

Thomas tried to ignore him the best he could, focusing on Patton. He sighed and shrugged, looking at Thomas again.

He offered a tired smile. “Well. There’s how it all starts! Like Virgil said, if you have any questions, go ahead and ask.”

Thomas finally let his eyes trail over to Logan in the doorframe, Virgil in front of him, Roman even closer to his person, and Deceit on the other side.

His eyes came back to the three boys. They all looked….honestly, about his age. Maybe a little older? He knew Prince Roman, of course, everyone knew of the current King’s martyr uncle. And Logan, but just because the old librarian had warned him. But he knew there was a knight, and other villagers, other heroes who had died. Actually really died, apparently?

“How did you all get here?” was what his mouth said, while his hand gestured vaguely to the trio.

Reactions were almost instantaneous. Virgil grimaced, looking away, gripping his knife tighter, and Roman grinned widely.

Logan squinted, but answered, in his way. “You recognized at least one of us. We are former Chosen Ones. I am Logan Crofter,” he placed his hand on Virgil’s shoulder, “This is Virgil Malory, and—”

“And you know me! Prince Roman Marigold!” Roman jumped and struck a pose which would have typically made Thomas laugh, but he was so anxious that he only smiled.

Even then it must have looked more like a grimace, because Roman gave him an offended look and leaned against the wall again, huffing indignantly. He should clarify. “I mean….I get that you’re all, uh, Chosen Ones, but how did you get here? What order did you all….um….”

“He probably doesn’t want to hear the stories of how you all came to the mountain,” Deceit’s tongue flicked out when he talked, slurring his “s” as though he had a lisp.

He looked like the dragon Thomas had to fight on his way over.

Virgil tutted. “I-I get that, but….I don’t know if I want to tell that story.”

“I can, if you want,” Patton cut in, looking up at Virgil.

Thomas’ eyes flickered between the two, then at Deceit again. “I’d like to know, before I….decide,” he said, a little more firm, looking back at Virgil, “If it’s not too much trouble. Is there time?”

“If you’re staying, then there’s all the time in the world!” Patton grinned at him, opening his arms and standing up, “Speaking of! I should check on Left and Right!”

“Left and —?”

“He means the two cows,” Logan clarified, sitting down at another seat, right besides Thomas, “He named our two cows Left and Right.”

Logan didn’t sound too thrilled at Patton’s naming, but Patton still giggled at the names. “It’s because Right always stands on Left’s right side! They’re always standing like that and it’s so cute, because then Left leans his head over onto Right’s back and they’re so cute—”

“Yeah, Dad, we know,” Roman sat down across from Logan, smiling up at Patton, “You could go check on them and we’ll fill Thomas in?”

“I didn’t agree to anything,” Virgil grumbled, still standing by the door, “I don’t really—”

“C’mon, Stormy Knight, you have to tell your story! Even I’ve only heard bits and pieces, and I’ve been here second longest!” Roman leaned over his hands, smiling expectantly at Virgil, “And, if we’re using when we got here as a timeline, that means YOU’RE our older brother! And you should tell us your story!”

Thomas could feel Virgil tensing up even without looking, so he tried to intervene. Maybe this was all a bad idea anyway? “Your Majesty, I don’t—” Thomas tried, before being cut off by Logan.

“Roman’s not royalty anymore, least of all while here. Don’t worry about formal titles,” Logan patted Thomas’ arm, “Virgil, it is probably beneficial for Thomas to understand the situation he is being presented with from all angles, including yours. Please join us at the table.”

Thomas leaned over and looked at Virgil, who glared back at him. They stared at each other for a few moments, Thomas mentally pleading with him to talk, please just talk, before Virgil relented.

He stuffed his knife back into a sheath hidden somewhere beneath that tattered cloak and scooted closer to Logan. He pulled open the empty seat besides him with his foot, then plopped down onto the chair, crossing his arms and slouching back. Not at all happy to be talking, but Thomas was grateful that he was.

Even Deceit slid off of the counter to join them at the table. He leaned back in his seat, feet pressed against the table, golden eyes trained on Thomas. He wore a knowing grin, though, like a disguise.

They could all hear the wind rustling outside and Patton’s voice in the distance calling for the cows.

It was peaceful.

Thomas was….at peace. An odd sensation when surrounded by enemies. Were they enemies, though? They were in the same boat as him, and a little more learned. And what was there back home? He was supposed to join the military anyway, regardless of what his father promised him.

He had been sent here to die.

Virgil cleared his throat and, ergo, Thomas’ mind.

“Well,” he glanced down, “I….I used to be a knight. In the King’s army….”

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tyrwinthyr · 6 years ago

Text

Episode 1, act 1

‘On November 1st it will be ten years since the doors of Arcadia closed on Its sons and daughters. This exposed us to the world, causing your Mad President to demand a ‘Second Inquisition,’ calling on all other leaders to hunt and kill our people.’

Sheila paused her typing there, leaning back in her chair to consider that last word. Was ‘people’ the right word to use to describe a race of beings so diverse? Tabbing over to a browser, she looked up the definition.

PEOPLE (noun) 1. Human beings in general or considered collectively.

A heavy thump of fingers sent the cursor back to her letter. It blinked there accusingly, slowly winking in and out of existence. She put her palms against her eyes, rubbing until stars appeared. A migraine was coming on, the kind that started in the back and violently plowed through anything productive she worked on. She dug her fingers under the base of her horns, right where they began at her temples, then tugged down on the curved parts. It relieved some pressure; she turned her attention back to the chore of picking the correct noun.

It was always dangerous to compare the Fae to humans, particularly where humans were concerned. The word ‘Fae’ itself was a catch-all they used to describe anything they didn’t understand these days. Sheila wasn’t herself technically of the Fae races, but that didn’t prevent satyrs from being lumped in with the rest. Most of her species, and many of the less magical beings, considered themselves to be ‘Folk.’ That might work… she looked up the definition.

FOLK (noun) 1. People in general.

Sheila sighed at the computer screen, decided that it would all come out in editing, and continued with her letter.

‘It wasn’t until years later that the madman was removed from office, and it was many more before the war waged on us eased. Even though the war is technically over we are still treated as less than. Violence is committed against the Fae on a daily basis, but nothing is being done about it. We’ve been in your world for as long as humans have, living alongside you without incident. Why does knowing we exist change things so drastically? We are still the same people you worked next to, lived near, laughed with… I’m asking for your help, Senator, to end the persecution of my…’

Hiking up her skirt slightly while waffling back and forth between ‘community’ and ‘race,’ she leaned down to scratch the fur above her left hoof. Leaning forward a bit, she also checked to make sure her polish wasn’t scuffed. A glance cast over her shoulder proved Karen was staring at her leg. The older woman’s face was caught somewhere between curiosity and distaste, which rapidly became embarrassment when Sheila snapped her skirt down curtly.

While her human coworkers had gotten mostly used to her horns and long ears, they rarely caught glimpses of legs covered in fur. Long skirts in layers of subdued fabrics hid anything too distracting from curious eyes. It was always better to let them wonder what might be under there than to endure the barely veiled discomfort of a human dealing with strangeness.

With a brief smile on Sheila’s part, Karen was let off the hook. The rictus curve of her lips relaxed immediately, breaking into a telling smile. It was an over compensating mask stretched nearly to breaking across her face. It was the defensive smile of a human caught being possibly offensive. Well, for the ones that cared about such things.

“Oh,” the woman said, startling herself out of the attempt to make her face look ‘natural,’ “Your father is on line two.”

Sheila nodded her thanks, then tugged down on her horns again, trying to ease the ache between her ears. After a few deep breaths, and a countdown backwards from seven, she picked up the handset.

“This is Sheila,” she said, mustering up her best professional voice. Human/Fae relations had taught her a lot about having a ‘business voice,’ but with her father, it rarely lasted long.

“I know who you are,” his voice in return was cool, bland, tearing into his daughter’s attempts to be professional, “and you know better than to keep me waiting. You know I’m busy.”

Sheila cast an accusatory glance at Karen, who was finding anywhere else to look. “I just got off a call,” Sheila lied, knowing full well she probably wouldn’t have picked up any sooner regardless.

“Right.”

After muting the phone to take a deep breath, she bravely asked, “May I know what you are calling for, sir?”

“Your brother will be in Colorado tomorrow. I will forward you his itinerary, I expect you to offer him full assistance, as well as hospitality, until he departs.”

It wasn’t her brother Simon that she had a problem with. It was her father’s way of demanding things from her that irked her.

“I’m busy tomorrow. I’m sure he can handle himself for a few hours.”

“You are a Whitehart,” he stated, his voice still cool, though behind it came the power of an unspoken invocation, “So you will do your duty to this family. I do not have to ask… or must you be reminded?”

“You haven’t actually asked yet,” she retorted, calm torn apart by the ragged edges of family duty, “but no, you don’t have to force me.”

“As long as you do your part, you will continue to receive my financial support…” he continued, but his daughter was no longer listening.

Instead, she watched her best friend walk towards her, a welcome breath of fresh air named Gaspar. Skirt swishing, chin held high, he was the very image of the ‘Action Transvestite’ he claimed to be. Light on the make-up today, true, but the pleated skirt paired with the business top made the Look. Without a word he sat on the edge of her desk, fingers folded like the noblest of ladies across his lap.

“Did you hear what I said, Sheila?” Her father only raised his voice like that occasionally. Mostly, her mother had once explained, at his only daughter.

“Yes, Father,” she responded, rolling her eyes at Gaspar. He clucked sympathetically, most of his attention on staring down Karen. Oil and water didn’t work as a good comparison for the two nearly as well as ice and a hot frying pan did.

“Good. Since I have no further business for you, I’ll let you get back to your…” he paused, perhaps to allow his contempt to gather in the final word, “Work.” Sheila’s face reddened, lips pressing together tightly.

“Love you, Father,” she said coolly, savoring the silence the words created before he disconnected. Her lips had gone numb in the process, and an exhalation from Gaspar made her smile softly.

“Oh. My. God. Sheila!” he said, eyes wide, knowing what the words meant to her family, “You know, someday you’re going to mean it when you say it… THEN what will happen, hmm?”

“He’s in no danger of that happening, trust me,” came the reply, her handset slapping back into place as a punctuation.

“Savage! Girl, I just can’t even with you today,” Gaspar’s eyes reflected the delight he felt. He loved a good scandal. Pulling his sleeve up, he exposed a new watch to his redheaded friend. She knew he collected watches, so offered him a smile of approval.

“Oh, you got it!” she said, pulling it closer to admire the Invicta he was sporting. He’d been watching the price on this particular toy for a while. The only thing he loved more than clothes, watches and make-up was a bargain. He’d lectured many times that paying full price for something was admitting defeat.

“No,” he scoffed, then corrected, “Well, yes, I did, but what I’m showing you, silly goat, is the time.” He was the only person in the world she allowed to call her anything related to her ‘animal’ bits… he had earned the right, “It’s time for you to shed your Mormon clothes! It’s time for bailando!” He slid off the desk, extending a hand towards Sheila like they were about salsa right there in the cubicles.

A soft cough from Karen brought both of their gazes to her. Once again, the satyr wondered if there were any baby Karens, or if they just materialized fully grown one day asking the boss about overtime. She was studiously ignoring them, but a pile of folders had conveniently gotten closer to the edge of her desk.

Gaspar took up the gauntlet, “Oh, hey, you can come with, boo!” When she looked up, he was right next to her desk grinning mischievously, holding out his hand. Without a word, Karen stood up to march into the breakroom.

Quickly, Sheila saved her work before following her friend out the door.

The air was crisp, but not too cold, as autumn should be. Pumpkin spice had invaded everything, edible or not, and you couldn’t toss a black cat without hitting a Halloween store. It was Sheila’s favorite time of the year. Even though he griped about the chill, Gaspar let her roll her window down so she could savor it.

“Did you dress up when you were a kid?” Gaspar asked, pointing the car in the general direction of her apartment with his usual disdain for road etiquette. He casually flicked his middle finger at someone honking at him, not even bothering to look in their direction.

“For Halloween?” she clarified, easing her grip on the oh-shit handle above the window, but leaving her hoof braced against his dashboard just in case. “Yeah, we all did. Samhain is a middle place, so people could see us. We could be ourselves without fear.” Her flamboyant friend had learned the previous year about what the Folk called the ‘twixt,’ which were things and times between. That was when the Fae had the most power.

“Oh, that would have been lovely,” he sighed, hand flat on his chest, looking at her wistfully. “A boy in a dress was never allowed. ‘Oh, no, Gaspy, you can’t be Joan of Arc! Why can’t you just be a regular knight?’”

Sheila chortled softly, “You sound nothing like her,” she teased.

“Thank god. I’d have to rip out my own vocal cords if I ever developed her eardrum-piercing cawing.” The way he deadpanned his threat evoked a laugh from the satyr, though she quickly stifled the sound. Gaspar sighed. “You know, holding all that in is going to kill you.”

“My therapist says my stress levels are manageable,” she quipped back defensively. They both know she didn’t have a therapist. They encouraged openness, feelings… dangerous things for a Whitehart.

“You know what I mean, silly goat,” he said, watching her face while simultaneously causing three different cars to blare their horns at him. She did indeed, so fell silent until they pulled up in front of her apartment.

Years ago, fire had torn apart the area of Colorado Springs called ‘Mountain Shadow.’ It was the tip of the burn scar on the side of the mountain, and even a decade and a half later it was still healing. Like the saplings that had pushed their way through the ash to start their new life, the Folk had taken up residence in the area. Sheila lived in a gated apartment complex in the area, her room looking up at the healing hillside. She paid more for it, but it spoke to the nature spirit in her. After destruction there was new, often stronger, life. It gave her hope that the Fae could grow strong after their own calamity.

Gaspar hummed to himself on the porch swing, wafting clouds of cotton candy vapor from his favorite brand of cancer-stick. Sitting out there served two purposes: a nicotine fix, and it let him ignore the inside of her apartment. He had come to terms with the fact that the big pile of clothes opposite her bed was dirty, the clean ones were hung with care on an exercise machine, and it might take a week or more before her dishes made their way to the kitchen. Even though it drove his OCD ‘itchy with madness,’ he’d promised not to try to straighten up anymore.

The satyr stood looking at herself in a full-length mirror, one that was tacked to the wall without a frame. She ran her fingertips over the bareness of her thighs, checking the state of the wax job she’d gotten the Sunday before. They called it a ‘greek,’ and it removed all her fur from her navel to the middle of her thighs, giving the image of thigh-high stockings made of red fur. She decided it was still clean enough, though she frowned at the state of her tail. After hours trapped under a skirt, it looked more like bunny fluff than it did goat fur. She fussed at it with a brush, then gave up.

Her hair, not happy with having been bound back all day, let its opinion be known by frizzing out as much as possible. It was quite upset, she was sure, because she had not only tried out a new conditioner, but had dyed it a darker shade of red. Her usual color was closer to orange (Gaspar tried to help by calling it ‘coppery’), and her roots had been ‘hot.’ No matter how she tried, it wouldn’t form into the desired ringlets of luscious red. Instead it looked, in her opinion, like something found at the bottom of a basket of red yarn. Giving up, her hair found itself bound tightly backwards before being slathered with leave in conditioner to weigh it down. Hair and tail would just have to stay upset.

“Your clothing allergy has gotten out of hand,” Gaspar patted her bottom as he walked by, then sat daintily on the edge of her bed. While he was entirely comfortable with her naked bits, he still gave her ever-growing laundry pile a look of horror. “Okay, so, if I paid for a maid… hazard pay, to be sure… would you even let them in here?”

Sheila did not look up from where she was sorting her clean dresses. “You know I can’t let someone in here unbound, Gaz.” She turned with a dress held up in front of her. It was short, perhaps too short, and red… perhaps too red. Her friend was looking at the wall near the head of her bed instead of the dress. On it was a painting of a door, covered in symbols, with a quite-real handle sticking out of it. Above the door was a quote:

‘I have trod the upward and the downward slope; I have endured and done in days before; I have longed for all, and bid farewell to hope; And I have lived and loved, and closed the door.’

The quote had nothing to do with the operation of the door; Sheila just liked Stevenson.

“Sometimes,” Gaspar said quietly, sitting with a straight back, his knees folded, “I try to remember life before the Fae. I think that maybe I knew what I was seeing, you know, before?” he paused, adjusting the hem of his skirt, “I feel I’ve always know them… you.” He offered her a smile, then motioned towards the portal with a delicate lift of his fingers, “Who knows, maybe I’ve seen a door like this in Manitou, and I was like… tra la la, yay, a painting?”

The two were bound together by a ritual, but there were still things she couldn’t tell him. The trods, how they worked, their locations; all of these things would put his life in danger. He was only allowed to know of this one because a quick splash of water would blend the colors, rendering it impotent.

“So,” she changed the subject, “does this say, ‘momma wants her bun honeyed?”

He knew what she was doing, but after a quick sigh, he came back with, “It says that, as well as, ‘just leave the money on the dresser.’”

“Sex, and some coffee money?” she sat next to him, pulling the dress up over her hooves, “Sounds like a win-win to me!”

“As long as you’re okay with 7-11 coffee, hooker,” he said, turning his usual sly smile away from her. She knew she wouldn’t be winning this round of snark.

She stood up, turning her back to him so he could fit her tail through the button hole in the back of the dress. While she made the proper adjustments to her cleavage, he stood to lace golden strands around her horns. They were bargain-bin necklaces repurposed, but they went with the earrings she wore. While some of her cousins would pierce the full length of their long, conical ears, she liked to keep things simple. After Gaspar fixed her make-up, and she added a bit of shine on her hooves, they were ready to go.

Normally, they would have gone to a bar in Manitou, a nearby town that accepted the Folk. Most of the residents were either Fae or their biggest fans. Instead, they were heading to the Castle, downtown. It was a meat market club, with heavier music, more expensive drinks, and hookups far cheaper. Tonight was a ‘Faery Mixer’, a marketing ploy to get humans into the club. Let the strange and delightful drink free so you can over-charge the humans who want to touch them.

They made it from the parking garage without any of the usual stupidity. Sheila was quite happy with the wolf whistle received from a passing car. Usually, it was someone shouting some speciest bullshit. Sexism was far easier to tolerate, particularly when she was feeling sexy. Once within the building, she settled Gaspar into a corner booth before going to get their drinks.

“Hey, satyr baby,” said a younger man, sliding a bit too close to her at the bar.

She sighed, ears twitching, then replied, “I’m a faun.” When he leaned in closer, turning his head towards her to hear over the music, she repeated: “I. am. a faun.” He seemed confused by the correction, so she turned to collect the drinks from the bartender.

“You look like a satyr,” he replied, following her close through the crowd. She swayed through the dancers and minglers expertly, an artform developed by years of waitressing. It was how she’d paid for college, after all. She didn’t reply until she had the drinks set in front of Gaspar. Adjusting her dress, she turned to lean towards her inebriated shadow.

“I’m a faun, not a satyr,” she lied. It was a common mistake that humans made, confusing the two species. “Satyrs are feral party animals,” she continued, leaving out the bad parts: the misogyny of her male counterparts, who were lauded for centuries for molesting nymphs and human women alike.

“So, what the fuck is a faun?” he asked, looking her up and down in disbelief.

“Like a satyr, but not as…” she paused, almost saying ‘rapey,’ “Easy. I’m sure if I wasn’t a faun I’d be all about being called ‘satyr baby.’ I’m not, though, so… go away, ‘kay?” Gaspar leaned up, making a shooing motion towards the man.

“Time to g’wan, boyo,” he said, managing to look both glamorous and intimidating.

“I was just being friendly, freak,” the young man stepped back a bit, raising his voice, “You think I, what, wanted some fucking beast like you?” Humans were oddly attracted to the Fae, particularly the ones put together by lusty gods. Resist their overtures and attraction turned to anger quickly. Fae were less than human, not good enough, just monsters.

Sheila had dealt with it many times before, but her Gaspar never handled it well. Sliding into the booth next to him, she covered his hand with hers, shaking her head.

Finding himself being stared at, without any further responses from the ‘faun’ to fire him up, the young man walked away.

“His prick is as small as his mind,” Gaspar quipped, testing the flavor of his grasshopper.

“How do you drink those?” Sheila asked, wrinkling her nose in pretend disgust. She preferred a good IPA over ‘girly’ drinks.

“Because I want a drink that doesn’t taste like Stockholm syndrome?” he responded, spinning the ice in his glass. Sheila chuckled softly; they’d disagreed about this for a long time. She preferred heartier flavors. Maybe it was the influence of Dionysus, but it didn’t matter, she liked beer.

“Oh, don’t look, but someone’s peeping!” Of course, she immediately turned to look, causing her friend to sigh in exasperation, “I said DON’T look!”

The peeper in question was handsome enough, dancing with a pair of women. Friends, if the way they moved was any clue. He had dark hair, coupled with light eyes. She did like a nice light eye. She liked the way his clothes fit him even more, even though they weren’t expensive. He seemed… comfortable. Sure to Gaspar’s word, his eyes spent more time on their booth than on the dance floor.

“You positive he’s not looking at you?” She asked, watching the man dance.

“Oh, I wish he was,” came the reply, “I would climb that mountain and plant my flag in his textured crop top… but he is so horridly straight.” She looked at her friend, who immediately tapped the side of his nose, “Gaydar says ‘no fly zone, possibly with anti-gaycraft in his back pockets.”

Sheila counted her blessings once again that Gaspar was in her life. Without him, she wouldn’t have been able to get a moment’s peace in a packed club. Folk only numbered close to five percent of the human population. Most humans claimed to either know a Fae, or to have a friend who knew one personally. Still, they were rare enough for people to be curious, and now that the war was over, more were willing to chance an encounter.

“Go” Gaspar nudged her by sliding his butt against hers. “If he’s odious, give me the sign, girl.”

After a last swig of beer for courage, and some fussing with the length of the skirt (a sudden wish that it was longer), she started toward the trio. She was used to being the one to start up a conversation, particularly since most who came to her were like ‘satyr baby’ from earlier. The man smiled at her as she got closer, as did his companions.

Normally, Sheila felt very predatory trying to find a partner in a club. Deny it as she might, she had satyr blood. It meant that there was passion inside her that needed to come out. Where better than with nameless targets in a meat market like this one? Sex could happen, and usually did, but it wasn’t necessarily the desired outcome. A happy side effect, maybe. It made her feel like she was prowling, devouring hapless dancers to make herself feel better.

When the man placed his fingertips gently against her arm, leaning down slightly to introduce himself, Sheila felt a kindred spirit.

“Greg,” he said, his voice rich, his mouth close enough to entice, but without touching the sensitive hairs on her ear. A whiff of store bought musk brushed her nose, barely hiding the more pleasant copper and salt smell of his skin.

“Sheila,” she responded, and that was all it took. They were dancing. The girls he was with didn’t introduce themselves, but neither did they leave. Instead, they closed the distance, stepping inside of each other’s personal bubbles. Other than that first touch, Greg kept his hands to himself. His friends, however, did all the touching for him. The satyr didn’t mind, not in the least. They were all here for the same thing. With a group like this, she didn’t have to worry about what might happen. It allowed her to relax and release the energy she needed to.

Soon, she found herself closing the distance on Greg. It started with little touches: fingertips and hips, but as the music grew heavier, so too did her movements. The club was her temple to Bacchus. Dancing was her religion, and her god demanded ecstasy. She had never in her life uttered a word of prayer to the creator of her race, but every time she set hoof to dance floor his presence was keenly felt.

Her heart pounded in her ears as she ground against him, rhythm dictating their movements, heavy bass matching the beat in her chest. He was turned on, she could tell, but he wasn’t hers quite yet. She didn’t want him to want her. She wanted him to need her. She squatted in front of him, still moving to the beat, but placing her face close enough to his jeans to get her point across.

Hands on her horns dragged her backwards away from Greg, turning her as she slid to her knees. The young man from before met her angry eyes with madness of his own. Holding her horns didn’t hurt as much as her hair might have, but to her it was twice as humiliating.

“I’m not good enough to talk to, freak?” he shouted over the music, the ambient noise in the club lowering as people stopped dancing to stare. “But you can dance with this… this... faggot?” The floor was too smooth for her to get her hooves placed well, not with his yanking her head about. Greg and his friends tried to help, but the young man had friends of his own. Even with the press of the crowd growing worse as people jockeyed to see her predicament, she could still make out the boy’s friends pushing her support away. Words shouted, hostilities rising, and all Sheila could do was flounder.

“I’ve got you figured out,” he mocked. “I just needed to get a ‘handle’ on you!” He laughed at his own joke, then dragged her head towards his crotch, “Fucking blow me, beast!”

A hoof finally setting itself right was all she needed to drive herself forward, so that’s what she did. One curved horn landed with a satisfying crunch into his junk, making him scream. He didn’t let her go, so she rammed him once more. Trying to twist her head caused him more damage, so he finally let go. Freed, fueled by the rage of being so violated, she came up swinging, but failed to connect. A hand wrapped around her waist, pulling her back, a familiar voice calming her slightly.

“Woah, woah,” Greg shouted, pulling her backwards, “I think he gets it.” The young man’s friends rushed to his aid, glaring at the satyr as if she was the problem. She could hear Gaspar calling to her, trying to reach her through the crowd.

“You fucking freak!” the man shouted from the floor, both hands gripping between his legs, his voice cracking with pain. “I’ll fucking kill you! I’ll mount your damn horns on my wall!”

She lashed a hoof out towards him, but he was too far for her to land the blow. Greg held her tight, speaking calmly to her, and she let that ease her anger. Shock came as adrenaline ebbed. She had struck a human. The camera lights aimed at her, the eyes of those around her, they all reminded her of just how sub human she truly was.

A dog had just bitten the mailman, and the best the bitch could hope for was being caged.

#Modern fantasy #OC #Original Content #Fae #Faerie #Satyr

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writing-in-the-tiny-house · 3 years ago

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Pitfalls, Part 1

“Brigitte,” Installment One of Tales from Vlaydor, is available on ebook and audiobook. Follow the link to find them on Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=brigitte+devin+davis&ref=nb_sb_noss_1

Become a patron today! Visit patreon.com/writinginthetinyhouse

Get ahold of Krissy Barton with Little Syllables editing services. She does free sample edits to see if you and she would be the right fit. www.littlesyllables.com

Instagram: @authordevindavis

Twitter: @authordevind

The following is an imperfect transcript of this episode. A complete transcript can be found on the show’s webpage.

[00:00:00] So you're a new writer. You are about to get started on your very first work in progress, but you are a little timid to get started because you don't know some of the danger that lies ahead. We are going to be talking about the pitfalls of writing. Today on Writing in the Tiny House.

[00:00:21] Hello. Hello. Hello and welcome to today's episode of Writing in the Tiny House.

[00:00:48] I am your host Devin Davis, and I am the guy who lives in a tiny house in Northern Utah who tells you about writing as I write. Or as I want to write right now, my works in progress are a little bit put on pause due to personal reasons, but I love to share the way that writing works and the way that publishing works and the way that self publishing works.

[00:01:16] I have decided to do this next little series, because I guess this year, we're all about the series of episodes. This upcoming series is all about the pitfalls of writing. Some of the things that we get ourselves tangled up in that can make writing hard or disappointing, and that is anything from craft to publishing.

[00:01:39] And so I'm going to do two episodes on craft, two episodes on design, and then wrap up this little mini series on publishing itself. So let's get into the first episode on the pitfalls of writing that many newbies find themselves doing, and that is the trap of L Y adverbs. If you have ever read the very first Harry Potter book and you have read it out loud,

[00:02:15] I encourage you to do that. Most of us have read Harry Potter and so take Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and sit down for a while and read it out loud. L Y adverbs, if you are new to the game of writing, L Y adverbs are one of those things that we do in order. There they are a crutch. They are words that we use to make things pretty, to make things prettier sounding, but they are a crutch to not using better words.

[00:02:52] L Y adverbs allow us to use weak verbs And then put a bandaid on them by using an L Y adverb. L Y adverbs are the difference between

[00:03:05] speaking loudly and yelling or

[00:03:09] walking quickly and running. L Y adverbs you will find, can usually just be stricken from your manuscript. And if you really like your L Y adverb and what it's doing for you, see if you can simply use a stronger verb so that you can get rid of the L Y adverb. So a writer who struggles with L Y adverbs, it is usually something that can be pinned down very early in the editing process.

[00:03:42] You send your work to a critique partner or whatever, usually a critique partner can pick up an L by adverb problem within the first 500 words of your manuscript. And if they know what they're doing, they will send it back to you with that type of feedback before having to read the rest of your manuscript. Or if you are early in the drafting process and you haven't finished your work yet, sending your work to do ,a quick, like first five pages or whatever, first chapter to a critique partner

[00:04:19] so that you can get feedback like L Y adverbs, like passive voice, some different things like this, so that you can correct it early in your craft, early in your work in progress, and then address that as you carry on. So, like I said, L Y adverbs are the bandaid on a weak verb. And the way to get around L by adverbs is to use stronger verbs.

[00:04:44] Now I'm not ever going to say that L Y adverbs are off limits, but I might as well, especially if you are new to the game. L Y adverbs are great. They serve a purpose and using them sparingly is great, but it is better to lean towards not using them at all. And so if you want to just open up your work in progress and do a quick find for L Y it will bring to your attention all of the times that you use L Y adverbs.

[00:05:19] And I'm going to throw in the word. Very is not an L by adverb, but it is an adverb that can just be removed from your manuscript. I believe it was mark Twain that said the way to deal with, or I'm paraphrasing. I'm not quoting this directly and it may not be from mark Twain. Don't. Quote me on any of this, but a great writer once said, and I'm paraphrasing that an easy way to to deal with the word very is to change all of the instances of very, to the word.

[00:05:55] Damn. And then your editor will remove all of the times you swore in your manuscript, and it's an easy way to get rid of all of it. So very and L Y advert. Oftentimes can simply be deleted if you read your work in progress and you come across all of these L Y adverbs, read it again with the LOI adverbs simply deleted.

[00:06:22] Sometimes the fix is easier than you think. Sometimes we don't have to futz around with $10 words. Or fancy words or consult our thesaurus so that we can still come up with a good verb. Sometimes the verb is okay and the LOI adverb can simply be removed.

[00:06:46] So this was one of the things that I struggled with with my first book as magic shifts, which was released, I think in 2008. As magic shifts took me, I think, 13 months to complete the first draft and my editor, Luanne Staley, who is no longer with us. She passed away a number of years ago. She did exactly what I just described to you.

[00:07:15] She took my manuscript. She didn't have to read it all in order to address some things that I could work on myself to clean up throughout my manuscript. Oftentimes, that can be a big waste of time for both of you. And she addressed my LOI adverbs and what she did was in my document. She actually highlighted them.

[00:07:36] She went through and made them all yellow. And so I had these glaring. From my document and it was obvious to me that I was using them too often. So I invite you to do the same, simply do a search for L Y and see how many instances you use L Y adverbs and work on greatly reducing them. LOI, adverbs, weaken your voice.

[00:08:03] They weaken the strength of your tech. They weaken your pros and they can really get in the way with pacing with the way that the words are flowing and the way that things are unfolding in your story, they can trip you up. And another way, aside from the search that I suggested a moment ago is to read your manuscript out loud.

[00:08:26] If you can tell that you are saying words that. And in the sound Lee too often, and you can tell that it's tripping up the cadence of your sentences and it's tripping up the flow of your words and it's tripping up all the other things that I mentioned. Then you need to remove your L Y adverbs. So replace them with a stronger verb.

[00:08:53] Or just delete them and see how your verb holds up on its own. So that is L Y adverbs for today. This is kind of a shorter episode. Next week, we are going to be focusing on another pitfall, which is too much description. So join me then on the next episode of writing in the tiny house, have a great day guys.

[00:09:18]

[00:09:18] And that is it for today. Just a reminder that "Brigitte,"Installment One of Tales from Vlaydor is available on Amazon as an ebook and on Audible and Apple Books as an audio book. And I provide advanced reader copies of these short stories as I release them to my patrons. So become a patron today by visiting patreon.com/writinginthetinyhouse to support both my writing and this podcast. And lastly, be sure to follow me on social media. My Instagram is @authordevindavis and my Twitter handle is@authordevind. Thank you so much for spending some time with me today and have fun writing. We will see you next time.

Check out this episode!

#writing #writer #author #fiction #am writing #wip

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staircasttext · 3 years ago

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Episode 01 Transcript: The Soul Is Stored in the Balls

Episode 01

PAZ: Well, here we are. Here we are in Warriors land. Back again.

JULIAN: Welcome to Warrior Cats, the unnamed podcast.

PAZ: The unnamed podcast. That's true. We don't have a name.

LIZ: Maybe we should have thought about that, but.

PAZ: That-- that'll come later. That's something you have to ruminate on. But yes, this is our Warrior Cats reread podcast slash just read podcast.

And we are starting today with Into the Wild, which is the first book in all the series. There's like a bajillion books now, I don't even know half of them. But we read-- what was it? Up and through chapter four.

Yeah, so we're gonna talk about it. And we should do introductions. So I'm Paz. Who wants to go next?

JULIAN: Oh, I was waiting for more from your intro.

LIZ: Apparently.

PAZ: I didn't think this through.

JULIAN: Do you want to talk about your past experience with the Warriors books?

PAZ: Yeah, I wasn't sure if we wanted to, like, introduce ourselves and then-- but that might make more sense. Okay, so we all have differing levels of experience with this series.

I was a huge Warrior cats fan. As a kid, I role played it at recess, on the Neopets boards, on weird forums, whatever you name. But I actually have never read all of the first series because I started with the second series, the New Prophecy I think it's called. And then when I tried to go back and read the first series, I thought Firepaw was really boring. So then I didn't read all of it.

So I've read all of the New Prophecy and the Power of Three, I believe, and then multiple of like the special books, including the weird manga that exists. So that's my experience with it.

LIZ: I didn't know that. And I'm googling that right now.

PAZ: Oh, I can send pictures later. Don't worry about it.

JULIAN: The manga is incredible. It's a work of art.

PAZ: I physically own it.

JULIAN: I'm so glad.

LIZ: It's different than I thought it would.

JULIAN: No emo bangs.

LIZ: I've got questions about that. But we'll get to that.

JULIAN: Um, I'm Julian, I was also a huge Warrior Cats fan as a kid. But I mostly read the first series, and then A New Prophecy, and then I thought there was too much magic in A Power of Three and stopped reading them.

PAZ: Wow.

JULIAN: It just wasn't realistic. 11 year old me looked for strict realism in their cat reading material. Yeah, I did a lot of roleplay but strictly on one forum that was basically me and all of my friends from school, and then my friend's older sister and all of her friends from school. And it was a great little corner of the internet. We all lied about our ages, because none of us were 13. Shout out to Proboards.

LIZ: I'm Liz. I have never in my whole life until now even, even touched the surface of Warrior Cats. And it's amazing because it seems like it would be right in my wheelhouse. But when I was 13, or saying I was 13 and being less than 13, I was into-- I was a wolf girl.

PAZ: Wow.

LIZ: And a dragon girl. And most specifically an owl girl. I was into something adjacent to Warrior Cats, which is Guardians of Gahoole. Which is about owls. That's not what this podcast is about. But it's also you know got violence.

PAZ: And bird Nazis.

LIZ: It's anti bird Nazi, if that helps. I do not remember that much about it. I'm looking forward to delving into this other society of animals who are suffering.

PAZ: Okay Liz.

LIZ: Yeah.

PAZ: I have to ask, what was your impression of Warrior Cats, without like pre-reading any of it? What do you think goes on in it?

LIZ: I thought it would be about cats in like-- pretty much what happens. Like, different cats, different groups. And they do not like each other.

I thought there would be more magic than I encountered in the four chapters.

PAZ: Oh, just you wait.

LIZ: Yeah, based on what you guys have said, I think that will pop off.

JULIAN: Yeah, it uh. I did read some of the stuff that happens in later series and it really does pop off.

PAZ: Yeah, I'm really curious about the latest series now because you're right that like, the Power of Three, it really started getting kind of wild. Which I loved the Power of Three because of that. I was the opposite of you.

I don't know why I stopped reading. I don't know. I got busy with important teenager things, I guess.

Who knows?

JULIAN: It feels like there is a very much a sweet spot of like early teens.

PAZ: Yeah, for sure.

JULIAN: Or like slightly preteen to read them. And then you hit-- you get a little old and then you become embarrassed of your catsona and all of your OC cats.

PAZ: Which is, never be embarrassed of your Warrior Cats OCs. We're taking--

JULIAN: Right. Don't be embarrassed of the things you love.

PAZ: Yeah, we're taking a strong pro Warrior Cats OC, Warrior Cats with emo bangs stance here.

LIZ: I'm strongly in support of it, too. What's more pure than this? Like, yes cats. Yes hairstyles. Yes customisations. Don't know why I said that one so weird. Okay, since we're getting to that, I have a vital question. They do mostly just look like the cats we see in the real world, right? Just...

JULIAN: Yeah, the emo bangs are an addition. Those are not canon.

PAZ: The emo bangs are not canon. The big anime eyes, not canon. I mean, all the-- on the cover of Into the Wild, which is the first book, is Firepaw. And that's just a cat.

LIZ: Just an orange cat.

JULIAN: Yeah, just a little guy.

PAZ: They do just look like cats.

JULIAN: There was so much drama about what your cat could look like and whether they were allowed to have like, purple eyes or like, Siamese coat types.

PAZ: I did not encounter that at all. It was kind of lawless on Neopets.com.

LIZ: I would believe that, but also I think the answer should be a unanimous yes because why not? These are your cat OCs.

JULIAN: Exactly.

LIZ: You can do whatever you want. You can give them purple eyes. And you can give them, I don't know, wings. Wings are very popular within OCs in 2006.

PAZ: Yeah, absolutely the cat OCs had wings.

JULIAN: I think we should bring them back. More wings on OCS in 2021.

PAZ: Exactly.

JULIAN: Yeah, there was one person on the forum I was on who was very strict about, like, cat breeding and the kinds of coats that could conceivably show up in, like, cat populations in the wild.

PAZ: That's extremely funny.

JULIAN: It was a lot.

PAZ: Well, I'm glad we can settle that. I know that was a burning question for you, Liz. That I told you not to ask.

LIZ: Until we got here.

PAZ: Yes. But now you know, they're just cats.

LIZ: They are just cats, which means figurative-- well, not figuratively but possibly, there could be some that just look very silly, but also very fierce.

PAZ: Yes.

LIZ: I'm looking at this picture of the cast of cats from the manga I think. One of them does look like he has the cat pattern of having pants, which is one of my favorites.

PAZ: Yeah, I'll have to take and share some pictures from the manga because the art style is hilarious. But that's a different conversation.

JULIAN: Paz, you wanna take it--

PAZ: Yeah, we should delve into this. Do we want to go chapter by chapter? Should I just do all summaries at once? What do we want?

JULIAN: Um, I don't remember what happens in which chapter versus another chapter.

PAZ: Okay, then.

JULIAN: I took notes, but like, everything happens so much.

PAZ: Okay, I guess I'll just say... I mean, I'll just say them all, I guess.

LIZ: Yeah, they're pretty short.

PAZ: Okay. So, as with all Warrior Cats books, there is a prologue. And that opens on a very dramatic battle between ThunderClan and RiverClan, and Tigerclaw, who is a ThunderClan cat, tells Oakheart to like, get the hell out of there. Oakheart's a RiverClan. That's Thunder cat territory, blah, blah, blah, and they get ambushed. And then Redtail, who's another ThunderClan cat says, we need to retreat, and they do. And then we cut to Bluestar, who is the ThunderClan leader, talking to Spottedleaf, who is the medicine cat about how they need more warriors, because now they're fighting a bunch. And then Spottedleaf talks with the cats in cat heaven, which that's a thing. And there's a prophecy that fire alone can save our clan. And that's the prologue.

And then in chapter one, we leave the world of Warrior Cats to open on Rusty, who is a kittypet, having a dream about hunting a mouse. And he wakes up before he can catch it and thinks about how much it sucks to be a house cat and how shitty his food is. And then he goes out into the garden to contemplate this. And his friend Smudge comes out to talk to him. And they talk about how dangerous the woods are. And Rusty decides to go in and explore.

And while he's there, he gets attacked by a strange cat. And they have a fight. And that cat stops and he's like, hi, I'm Graypaw. And he does some exposition about the clan. And before Rusty can leave, Bluestar and Lionheart show up. And Bluestar's like, hey, you're cool and you can fight. Good job.

And then in chapter two, Rusty's like, well, I want to kill some mice. And Bluestar's like, No, this is our woods. You have like a bunch of food back home. Go away. And Rusty's like, Oh, I'm sorry. And Bluestar's like, actually, do you want to join ThunderClan?

And she explains that ThunderClan needs more warriors, which is why they would take in a kittypet. And then there's some weird dialogue about how Rusty can still be a warrior because he still has his balls. And they give Rusty a day to think on this offer and he heads back to his house.

And then in chapter three, he has that mouse dream again, except this time the Clan cats are in it. And he's all, like, oh, will I/won't I. And out in the garden, he has another conversation with his friend Smudge, and tells him about it, and ultimately decides he's gonna go join ThunderClan. And Smudge is like, no, don't go. But Rusty's like, no, I must. And they have a nice morning saying goodbye. And after his little goodbye tour, Rusty goes up and meets with Lionheart and goes back to the ThunderClan camp. And Bluestar calls a camp meeting. And she's like, hey, this cat is joining us. And everyone's like, ew, this is a kittypet.

And Rusty gets in a fight with Longtail to defend his honor. And there's a dramatic scene where his collar gets ripped off. And Bluestar officially declares him a Thunderclan cat apprentice and gives him the name Firepaw.

And then this apprentice cat runs back to camp injured and says that Redtail is dead. And then chapter four, our last chapter, everyone's like super upset by this news that Redtail died in battle with Riverclan. The apprentice cat says Redtail was killed by Oakheart, who was then killed by Tigerclaw, and Tigerclaw comes back with Redtail's body. Then there's some exposition about StarClan, which is where dead cats go.

Everyone goes to mourn Redtail, who was the clan deputy. Graypaw takes Firepaw on a little tour. And then later that night Bluestar announces that she's appointing a new deputy. And Firepaw notices that Tigerclaw looks very eager to hear the news, but it's actually Lionheart who is appointed the new deputy instead. Firepaw and Graypaw head to the apprentice den to sleep, where a cat named Sandpaw tells him he smells bad, which is extremely rude.

LIZ: He's a stinky boy.

PAZ: And Firepaw goes to sleep, and it ends thinking, he's like, Oh, I'm finally a member of ThunderClan. So that was our reading for this session.

JULIAN: I gotta say I did not expect there to be such-- I didn't expect, like, cats getting their balls stolen to be such a big plot point. I have like three separate notes that are just like, Rusty got his balls stole?

PAZ: Who was that? It was like Henry or something.

JULIAN: Henry, yeah.

PAZ: Ever since Henry went to the vet, he's stupid and lazy. It's because his balls are gone.

LIZ: They came at it right from the beginning. I wasn't expecting it so soon. And also, I guess from like, technically, from a children's novel, right, like, balls front and center.

PAZ: Yeah, I don't-- you didn't really need to address that, I don't think.

JULIAN: It's like the crux of the reason that Rusty becomes a warrior, his castration anxiety.

PAZ: Yeah, he's like, Oh, I don't want to go to the vet and get like the snip or whatever they call it. And everyone's like-- everyone's acting like if you get your balls cut off, you get brainwashed or something. They're like, you change.

LIZ: Yeah, it's treated with the same weight as like, a lobotomy. And also, it is not called the snip. It's called, with capital letters, The Cutting. So is this a question of like, bodily autonomy or biological essentialism? That is the question.

PAZ: I don't know.

JULIAN: The gender politics of this book are bizarre.

PAZ: Yeah, they really are quite bizarre. Very like, I don't know. Like they call all the female cats queens. All cats are queens. And all the male cats toms. But if you get your balls cut off, you aren't a tom anymore. Fuck you. So don't get your balls cut off.

JULIAN: Also Bluestar is a hashtag girl boss.

PAZ: Oh, fuck yeah. Is Bluestar a milf is, I think, a question that is on all our minds.

JULIAN: I would say yes.

LIZ: Is it on all our minds?

PAZ: Yes.

JULIAN: I mean, it is now.

LIZ: That's true.

PAZ: But yeah, anyway, the ball politics, very, very weird. I think--

LIZ: Excuse you, ballotics.

PAZ: The ballotics, yes. I also think like the weird politics around like, cat ownership are also very bizarre. It was like, house cats are miserable.

JULIAN: Right?

PAZ: And only wild cats are free.

JULIAN: It seems like the author is taking a very strong stance against trap neuter return programs for feral cats.

PAZ: Yeah, that kind of is what that all adds up to, huh?

LIZ: It's like, how much of this is just oh, I'm writing a fun fantasy thing about talking cats, and how much of it is like, cats should be free and in the wild. And also, we should never keep them indoors.

PAZ: But then there's also like, it's also a plot point that they're running out of prey, like they're having a food shortage.

LIZ: So I'm like, okay, what's your stance? That cats are a strain on the environment? Or that cats should not be kept as pets? Or is that just coincidental? Like, did the author not even think about it? Because that's also pretty common just fantasy, or just general story narrative. Oh, limited resources. Is that related to letting all these housecats be strays and not doing anything about it? I don't know.

PAZ: I don't know.

JULIAN: Well, and it seems like all of the people in this neighborhood just let their cats outside, which I guess was more common in 2003, but.

PAZ: Did you say there was debate of like whether this took place in England or America? Because I know, I think in the UK, people let their cats out even more, so.

LIZ: Oh, I can't imagine these cats as British. That's too much.

PAZ: No?

LIZ: I don't want to. I can see like the animated movie of this where one of the cats just opens its mouth, and it just sounds like the most upper class rich person cat in the world. Pretty much exactly like the Guardians of Gahoole movie, actually.

JULIAN: I think these cats have like Cockney accents. These are like rough and scrappy cats. These are not like RP cats.

PAZ: Yeah, I have to agree with that. It's the kittypets that would be all proper. Maybe when you get your balls cut off, you get an upperclass accent.

LIZ: Oh no. That's the worst.

JULIAN: Oh no.

PAZ: I don't know, it's so weird.

LIZ: Powerful ballitical steps.

JULIAN: They also, the way they talk about like cat food is just the most unappetizing, like viscerally unpleasant. They're "stale little pellets." And it's like, well, damn.

PAZ: Yeah, that's what I mean.

JULIAN: My cat does not seem that unhappy to eat them.

LIZ: Doesn't Kip like-- that is, by the way, Paz's amazing celebrity cat. Doesn't Kip just like prefer that?

PAZ: Yeah. Kip likes dry cat food because he likes to crunch things. I mean, he also does hunt and kill mice. But I don't know. He's perfectly happy to eat dry cat food too.

LIZ: Yeah, that was like, that part was like, when I'm like, what are these politics about cat ownership? Cause you're really making being a house cat seem like a prison or something.

JULIAN: Do the Twolegs know that their cats are sentient?

PAZ: I don't know. I don't remember how humans are handled really in this series. Like if they--

JULIAN: I think it comes up slightly-- like a little bit later in one of the books, in like book five or something. But I don't think like. I don't remember if cats are shown as being able to understand human speech. Because they can definitely understand dog speech.

PAZ: Oh, my God, they can.

JULIAN: That will come up.

PAZ: Oh my god, I don't remember that.

LIZ: Wait, fuck. Do they meet dogs? What are the dogs like?

PAZ: Oh, I was just gonna say so they can understand dog speech. But can they not understand like, mouse speech? Are mice like, nonsentient? Are there like levels of sentience in this world?

JULIAN: Yeah, there's a lot of unsolved philosophical questions about sentience and autonomy in these books.

PAZ: And that's what we're here to answer.

JULIAN: Like, this isn't a Redwall situation where all of the animals are sentient.

PAZ: No.

JULIAN: This is like a like-- because it doesn't seem like mice are. They just squeak.

LIZ: It's hierarchical. Like, is there a possible future in which the Warrior Cats will like establish themselves as a quote unquote "civilization" enough that they like establish agriculture and livestock? Are there going to be cats keeping like little cages and fields with mice domesticated? And will those mice eventually gain their own society?

JULIAN: Oh shit.

LIZ: Which the cats can't understand.

PAZ: So is domestication the route to sentience here? Is that what we're saying?

LIZ: I don't know.

JULIAN: When will the cats invent capitalism?

PAZ: Okay, that's another point like, I gotta say.

JULIAN: Because they already have a scarcity based economy. Why don't they just trade prey?

PAZ: But I also do like that, you know, they have like, universal health care. And then they, you know, all cats in the Clan are taken care of, and the old cats get food too. I'm like, damn, these cats have a better system going on than I got.

LIZ: I wish that was me.

JULIAN: My main question about the elders is, I love that they are taken care of and valued for their wisdom. Do they get like new names when they become elders? Because I hope that Halfear's name was not always Halfear.

PAZ: Yeah, some of the names are very, like, very specific. I don't think they do. I don't know. Maybe you can change your name.

LIZ: I mean, Rusty got to change his name pretty easily.

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: That's true.

LIZ: I mean, I guess--

JULIAN: Oh sorry, it was Halftail.

PAZ: What if Halftail used to be like Longtail or whatever, and then?

LIZ: Aw.

PAZ: Or maybe like, maybe that was a situation where it was a cat born with like a short tail. Who can say?

JULIAN: That's true.

LIZ: I love those. Those are great.

Yeah, I can see as like, this is just a cultural thing where like you get to a certain age, you can change it if you want, based on how you feeling. But also, I think, I guess like the real or meta answer is, this is a kid's book. And if you have a little grandma cat, you're gonna call that cat, like, Wrinkletail.

PAZ: Do you know the naming scheme setup in Warrior Cats, though, Liz?

LIZ: It like seems to be thing, cat-related word, sometimes.

PAZ: So it's like, the kittens are like, __kit. I think, correct me if I'm wrong.

JULIAN: Mm-hmm.

PAZ: And then the apprentices are like, __paw, like Firepaw. And then once they graduate into being warriors, they get like that second half of their name. I totally forget where that comes from and like who chooses it.

LIZ: Like a surname or?

PAZ: No, like, I think Graypaw becomes Graystripe, for example.

JULIAN: Yeah. And like, Sandpaw becomes Sandstorm.

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: So it's like, it's really just a second half of the name that sounds cool. I think Bluestar gives them, because we see that happen in this--

PAZ: Do we?

JULIAN: In the end of chapter four, right? Doesn't someone become a warrior and then takes an apprentice?

PAZ: Oh, I thought somebody was already a warrior. And it's like, Here's your first apprentice.

JULIAN: I may be misremembering this.

PAZ: I mean, that's probably right though, cuz she gives him the name Firepaw, so. I don't know.

LIZ: So I guess it is like cultural then, at least as a coming of age thing, which is, you know, that works for plenty of human people in the real world. It also makes sense why all the teens are called __paw so I couldn't tell them apart.

PAZ: Yeah, and then the leader of the clan is always like __star. So like Bluestar.

JULIAN: The naming conventions did make it very, very confusing. I was briefly a tag wrangler, for the AO3 Warrior Cats fandom.

PAZ: Oh no.

LIZ: Oh my god.

JULIAN: Which is 50% actual Warrior Cats fanfic and 50% people uploading RP logs. So not only did I have to make sure that I was tracing canon characters, like through their life cycle, and there are a lot of canon characters who end up sharing the same prefix, which makes that hard. Thank you to the Warrior Cats wiki, which is exhaustive. But then I also had to make sure that it wasn't like an RP OC that just happened to share the same name as a canon character.

PAZ: Yeah, that sounds like a nightmare.

JULIAN: It was kind of fun, but also hellish.

PAZ: Yeah. I mean, like I'm not even like-- because in these like four chapters we got, we already have the main characters with like two different names. They'll just keep coming.

JULIAN: That's why the front of the book has that like cast of characters.

PAZ: They do, yeah.

JULIAN: Which is very helpful. Thank you. All books should have that.

LIZ: Yeah, the fucking dramatis personae for Warrior Cats.

PAZ: They also have like great maps. I loved the maps on the front of the book as a kid.

JULIAN: Oh, the maps were really nice.

LIZ: Um, yeah, I have the ebook on like Libby, and I think the chapter beginnings have like, little illustrations, just like black and white ones.

PAZ: Yeah, they do.

LIZ: They're nice.

JULIAN: Yeah, they're really nice. I don't think there were ever any, like full page illustrations, but.

PAZ: No, not that I remember.

LIZ: There should be like, a deluxe anniversary, whatever edition, and it should just have full page, like, meticulously inked illustrations for like, big battles and dramatic moments. Just woodblocks.

JULIAN: There were Special Edition books, like the big-- that were sort of standalone stories. And those were always-- I don't think they had like big illustrations, but they were always bound really nicely. They were like gold.

PAZ: Yeah. That's where fucking SkyClan, whoever the fuck they are introduced. I think in that, I don't know, like Firestar's Journey one, which I do have. It has the cool gold cover that's reflective.

JULIAN: I always wanted my parents to buy them for me, but they would only buy me the main ones because the special editions were very expensive and we could get them from the library.

PAZ: Oh no.

LIZ: Now did you guys ever get them at like book fairs or those little Scholastic Book order things? Cause that's how I got my owl books, basically.

PAZ: Yeah, probably. That's where I got a lot of my books like in general.

JULIAN: Yeah, I think they were mostly Barnes and Noble. Because I would always get-- various people would give me Barnes and Noble gift cards as a child.

LIZ: Oh, yeah, same.

JULIAN: So we would go to the Barnes and Noble and I would pick out either my Warrior Cats or my manga.

LIZ: Those things should be next to each other. The crossover is--

JULIAN: Oh, they were.

PAZ: I mean, there's a Warrior Cats manga. It's just the best of both worlds.

LIZ: That's how you make the gradient. Manga, Warrior Cats manga in the middle, and then Warrior Cats just straight up on the next side.

JULIAN: They knew what they were about.

LIZ: Also I guess, like, what forms are you guys reading them in now? Since that's what we're talking about.

PAZ: Um, you mean like what we're reading the first book on?

LIZ: Yeah.

PAZ: I am reading my paper copy that I have from when I was a child that apparently only cost $3 when I bought it.

LIZ: Oh my god.

JULIAN: Oh my god.

PAZ: And it's extremely old and crinkly.

LIZ: Books haven't been $3, like paper books, in so long.

PAZ: I know. This book is a relic.

LIZ: Wow.

JULIAN: Yeah, I'm just reading on the ebook. which I got from the library. But I might try the audiobook. I'm very curious to see how the audiobook narrator handles the fight scenes.

LIZ: That sounds actually wonderful.

JULIAN: Also I want to know if they do voices.

PAZ: Please. Can we talk about the dialogue tags of like, purred and meowed? Because it kills me every time.

JULIAN: It has such said as dead disease.

PAZ: I know it really does. But also like, purred, like, I don't-- it always like, it's like a seductive word.

JULIAN: I know.

PAZ: I'm like, please stop using that. This is a weird connotation.

JULIAN: I guess the thing is that like, cats can't technically talk.

LIZ: They can say, though.

JULIAN: So you can't use...

PAZ: Well, they're talking in this book, so. Just vague to say so.

JULIAN: It's a lot of like, so-and-so meowed. This person like, echoed, whispered.

PAZ: Purred.

LIZ: Yelled. Lots of yelled.

JULIAN: Yeah. These books are violent also. I did not remember.

PAZ: Oh yeah, they are.

LIZ: Oh yeah.

PAZ: Yeah, someone is brutally killed in like the first four chapters by this very, I mean, we got this like political intrigue kind of going on.

JULIAN: Yeah, there's a lot of border anxiety.

LIZ: This, this has, like, this is a-- this is not a-- mm, conspiracy? I don't know. But like, this is a murder mystery. Right? This follows the structure of so many. Like the newcomer with fresh eyes comes into this reclusive group and discovers the secret murder within its mists. And it's got political motivations. And it's very interesting.

JULIAN: Hold on to that.

PAZ: I mean, I think one character is very clearly evil-coded. Immediately. But it is a child's novel, so.

LIZ: It's a child's novel, but also there's just like grisly murder in this.

PAZ: Oh, yeah.

LIZ: There's lots of bleeding. So what, I'm interested to see what are the lines of like, what's allowed and what's not based on what the author is thinking?

PAZ: Yeah, I feel like eventually, like characters also die in childbirth. I might be misremembering, but like.

JULIAN: No, there's definitely stuff in childbirth.

PAZ: Bad shit happens to-- yeah.

JULIAN: Yeah, it's like, I feel like it's kind of glossed over. Like we don't see anybody's like entrails but like, pretty much up to that point, everything is out there.

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: I think at one point like, a cat gets injured and like the bone is described. Like it's, they go for it. Which is why 50% of the fics on AO3 had the graphic depiction of violence tag. Which is the highest ratio I have ever seen.

LIZ: And to be fair, I think that's a common thing within this genre of like, extremely violent animal conflict society books for kids. Cause the fucking owl books were like, we've got stabbing, swords.

PAZ: Those were brutal.

LIZ: We've got claws on our claws, extra claws.

JULIAN: I forgot the owls had like swords.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: They didn't. I think they did. They also had like special gauntlets full of live coals for their feats to use as weapons.

PAZ: And I know one-- there was attempted, like siblings. Siblicide in the owl books. You know?

LIZ: From the first chapter, yeah.

PAZ: Kids eat this up.

LIZ: I remember those clearly. Yeah, I think this is the same with like-- probably whatever talking wolf book is out there, it's going to be just the same.

PAZ: Is there a wolf book?

LIZ: There have to be multiple ones. I know that the owl books have like a wolf book subseries.

PAZ: Of course.

LIZ: I've been told that there's like one series about bats that is also extremely like this.

PAZ: Oh, I read that one. I loved that one. That one was also real fucked up.

LIZ: Yeah, this is the bread and butter for kids.

JULIAN: Kids love violence is the thing. It's like, my brother is 10 and like, just finished reading all the Warrior Cats books.

LIZ: Wow, magical times.

JULIAN: I know. So all of my old Warrior Cats books are at home and in use. But like, kids are violent.

LIZ: Yeah.

PAZ: Yep.

JULIAN: They eat that up.

PAZ: They do. Yeah, I'm like, Warrior Cats is so much fighting. That's like, if it's not like clan politics, or like interpersonal drama, then it's like the fight scenes. Those are the three things Warrior Cats does.

JULIAN: And like, in their defense, the fight scenes are like, they're interesting to read. You know? I feel like they're fairly well choreographed and stuff. I cannot believe that I came out of reading Warrior Cats-- growing up on Warrior Cats being completely unable to write any fights, but. There it is.

PAZ: Well, you probably weren't writing--

JULIAN: Maybe I just need to write more cats.

PAZ: Yeah. Yeah, they are cats. So that does change the fight dynamic a little bit.

LIZ: You've got to work up from cats. It's like do cats, and then do cat boys. And then you know, whatever comes after that. I have no idea.

PAZ: Uh huh.

JULIAN: I mean, I think what comes after cat boys is just boys.

LIZ: Hmm. Interesting. Never thought of that one.

PAZ: But yeah, I mean, so obviously Tigerclaw is evil.

LIZ: Yeah, there's like at the end, when the other cat gets like the position that he wants. Like, it's described as like, he nudged him so hard that he almost bowled him over. And that's the clear evilness of again, completely regular looking cats.

PAZ: I feel like he gets fucked up looking later, but I can't remember.

JULIAN: I think he might be a little fucked up looking already. He has like some scars.

LIZ: All cats are beautiful.

JULIAN: But all of the cats. All of the cats are a little fucked up looking because they've been in the wild.

PAZ: Also, I like legit can't remember, because like I said, I only read the first two books of this series. But do you think he probably murdered that other cat? That's what I'm assuming at this point, anyway, so.

LIZ: Yeah. 100%.

PAZ: Great. Great start

LIZ: Yeah, cuz the apprentice that got injured and like came back-- I don't remember the name because again, they're all teens with the same thing to me. But like, he asked like, oh, is Tigerclaw gone, or? And then like gets all quiet when he's around. Which is probably very subtle for the children. And yeah, I thought that was like good framing given like the medium and stuff.

PAZ: No, no, I think it's a good start to like, this book. But like I said, I thought Firepaw was really boring as a child. And I gotta say, he's still not impressing me.

LIZ: Yeah, he's very much just like protagonist boy.

JULIAN: Yeah, he has JRPG like protagonist syndrome.

PAZ: Like I know in the New Prophecy, I loved all those characters so much.

JULIAN: Yeah.

PAZ: And then going from that to Firepaw, I'm like, wow, you're like white bread.

JULIAN: At least he's better than Graypaw, who's literal-- who's just exposition boy.

JULIAN: exposition boy.

PAZ: Oh my god. I know. I think I must have said he did exposition at least three times in my summary. But like that is literally all he did.

LIZ: Yeah, he's really--

JULIAN: That's all he does.

LIZ: He's your best friend. And when you click on him, he just tells you the lore.

PAZ: Yeah, he has those like dialogue trees you can just go through for like 20 minutes and just learn all about your new RPG world.

LIZ: Which is in the forest with a bunch of cats.

JULIAN: There you go.

I forgot how tsundere Sandpaw was.

PAZ: I don't remember. I don't remember who Firepaw ends up with? I'm assuming maybe-- I don't-- Sandpaw? I don't know. I don't remember.

LIZ: It feels like it's setting it up really early in the like, typical way.

PAZ: Well, it's good that he still has his balls.

LIZ: He sure does. Hey, when we were talking about like, all the violence before, and you know what, what's so graphic that can be included in a children's novel? Again, the balls just immediately.

JULIAN: They also talk about like, pooping very early.

PAZ: Oh, yeah. Their dirt.

JULIAN: He's described as like making dirt. Which is just like, all right. Thanks, Erin Hunter.

PAZ: Yeah, the what it decides to be realistic on is very funny.

JULIAN: Like, what do cats do? They eat, they fight, they shit, they sleep. They have intense interpersonal and like interclan drama.

PAZ: They have religion.

JULIAN: What else is there?

LIZ: Do they have literature? Or philosophy?

JULIAN: No. Uh...

LIZ: Because...

JULIAN: I mean I feel like their philosophy is-- or like religion and philosophy are sort of, you know.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: I can see the-- I mean, they do have like a strong oral tradition. So I...

PAZ: Absolutely. Yeah.

JULIAN: I think there was some discussion at some point of like, sagas or something, maybe. I might be making that up.

PAZ: No, that sounds right. I don't know.

LIZ: Sounds like it would fit in perfectly.

JULIAN: Right. They can't sing.

LIZ: Especially since they have-- yeah, they have like the lore thing about the afterlife or whatever. So that has to be--

PAZ: StarClan.

LIZ: Yeah, there has to be passed down somehow.

JULIAN: Yep.

PAZ: Yeah, the medicine cats are like the-- they're like doctors slash religious people. I don't know, like your oracles.

LIZ: The medicine stuff is very interesting, because I'm wondering how much of it is just going to be like, just nature-y items that sound cool, like spider webs, versus how much of this is like even the slightest bit medical sounding. Like are they going to use, I don't know, something for poison ivy, or like herbs. Because they're cats

JULIAN: They use a lot of herbs.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: Okay, that's cool.

JULIAN: At one point I did like a full before the little-- they issued like a little guide to the clans book that had a list of all of the herbs they used, which was released several months after I finished my exhaustive list of all of the herbs used in all of the books, which I was going to post on the forums.

PAZ: Oh no.

JULIAN: Tragedy. But most of the herbs, I think, if I remember correctly, like they mostly-- the uses like checked out for humans. Like even spider webs are like dirty, but apparently do have like some coagulant properties. Like I wouldn't use them, but.

LIZ: As a cat you would use them. Yeah, that's really interesting.

PAZ: I loved the medicine cats and I loved all the medicine cat characters like as a child. I don't know.

JULIAN: They're very good characters.

PAZ: I just consistently liked those characters.

LIZ: Well, yeah, you can have like the grumpy doctor character who has the bad bedside manner. And you can have the one who's like, you know, a religious figure because the religion's already tied into this, apparently.

PAZ: That's like Jayfeather.

LIZ: Yeah? So like--

PAZ: Yeah, you get like literal like blind oracles.

LIZ: Hold on, Jay-feather, like J dash feather, like his SoundCloud name?

PAZ: Yeah, that's what happens in that series.

LIZ: So do these cats also have like, catnip?

JULIAN: Ooh.

PAZ: I don't know. I don't know if they get cat weed.

LIZ: They should have cat weed.

JULIAN: I'm trying to remember.

PAZ: I feel like they might.

JULIAN: Hold up, we can find out.

PAZ: Yes.

JULIAN: Let me go to the wiki.

PAZ: Yes, please, please, please.

LIZ: Because if we're talking about cat herbs, we have to talk about the cat herb.

JULIAN: The Warriors wiki is exhaustively researched. It has 4250 pages.

PAZ: Holy shit.

LIZ: I truly wish we had that for like, Friends at the Table. Friends at the Table wiki is good, but a lot of it is-- the show is long. Would love to have some pages filled out some more.

JULIAN: All right, pulling up the list. There is a full list of all the medicine used. Catnip.

PAZ: Yes.

LIZ: Fuck yes.

JULIAN: Mostly found in Twoleg gardens. Can specifically be found at the Twoleg place near ThunderClan's forest territory.

PAZ: Why does ThunderClan get all the dank herb?

JULIAN: It's the best remedy for the-- [laughter] it's the best remedy for the deadly greencough, which cats can catch in the season of Leafbare. Can also be used for whitecough. Can be considered dangerous in extremely high dosages, so don't go nuts.

LIZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Yeah, they do not describe anything about them getting high off of it.

PAZ: Cowards.

LIZ: You can talk about balls but you can't talk about weed.

JULIAN: You have to give the weed to the kits though if they get sick.

PAZ: Listen, if I was the other clans, I'd be going into ThunderClan territory to get all that catnip, frankly.

LIZ: They should, if they can't, if they're not going to do agriculture, which is fine, they could be trading. Like oh, here's some locally sourced, seasonal, gathered cat weed. And we will trade it to you for some fish.

JULIAN: Right?

PAZ: I feel like maybe they do trade and at some point. I mean, like they haven't--

JULIAN: Maybe.

PAZ: Like this hasn't come up yet, but they do have like big cat conferences together. And they're like, what's the news?

LIZ: Cat con.

PAZ: Yeah, cat con.

JULIAN: Okay, one thing that I did discover on the wiki that I do love is that all of the footnotes for all of these things say "revealed in" and then the name of the book and the page.

PAZ: These books are actually prophetic texts gifted to us by Erin Hunter, who knows the truth.

JULIAN: Thanks Erin Hunter, all eight of her.

LIZ: I don't know. How close of an eye are you keeping on your cats? How do you know they're not gonna be warriors?

PAZ: Cause they got their balls cut off. They can't be.

JULIAN: Yeah, that's true. Chickpea can never be a warrior.

LIZ: Okay, since we're talking about this is that-- at no point, do they never meet like a neutered cat who's just like cool and fine?

PAZ: They definitely meet other like quote unquote "kittypets." But I think a lot of them were like cool barn cats so they probably do still have their balls. I don't know.

LIZ: I don't know. I've met your cats. They seem like pretty rowdy when they want to be.

PAZ: Kip catches and kills mice quite frequently.

LIZ: You don't need your balls to kill mice.

PAZ: The discrimination in this society based purely on balls is very-- that's a lot.

LIZ: There is a deez nuts joke somewhere in here. But I don't know what it is.

JULIAN: Yeah, unfortunately there is no wiki page for the Cutter. So I don't know if it becomes as important a plot point later.

LIZ: Wait, is the mortal enemy of all cats just one vet, like in the neighborhood?

PAZ: Oh my god.

LIZ: Cause these are fairly local clans. Is the enemy just like one vet? His name is just like--

PAZ: The picture.

JULIAN: Wait.

PAZ: So Julian linked this page. And the thumbnail is just a woman giving a thumbs up like.

JULIAN: Hold up, let me show you the page for-- let me show you the page for dog.

PAZ: Oh, please.

[cackling]

JULIAN: It's someone's like little like greyhound or whippet sitting in a dog bed next to the first Warriors book. Like this is clearly one of the wiki editors' actual real dog.

PAZ: Okay wait.

LIZ: This wiki is art.

PAZ: Henry the cat who got his balls cut off does have a page.

JULIAN: I looked to see if there was anything specifically about the Cutter, but it's just like Henry got his balls caught off and then he sucked.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: Wouldn't it be amazing if like Henry came back at the end of this series, and he was like, really cool and, and could, I don't know, get them cat weed or something?

PAZ: I'm sure someone wrote that. I don't know.

JULIAN: Stoner Henry.

PAZ: He's living apparently.

LIZ: Good for him.

PAZ: See? Good for him.

LIZ: He's having a wonderful life. He doesn't have to worry about like ticks or coyotes.

PAZ: Oh, oh--

JULIAN: He'll never get heartworms.

PAZ: Okay, I went to the kittypet page. Here's another mention of the Cutter. "I know all about being a kittypet and it's not as easy as you think. You only eat when the Twolegs give you food. You only go in and out when the Twoleg says you can. Is that what you really want? And then there's the Cutter." Macgyver. Macgyver says this.

LIZ: It's just the one vet who runs like the clinic. It's just like, Dr. Somebody.

PAZ: I need to stop clicking on this wiki.

JULIAN: It will really drag you down into a hole. I unfortunately have looked it up. There are only two works about Henry the kittypet.

PAZ: No.

JULIAN: On the entirety of AO3.

PAZ: Wow.

LIZ: Tragic.

PAZ: Hold on, there's like a new kittypet slur just dropped. They're known as everkits.

LIZ: This is so weird.

JULIAN: Jesus.

LIZ: Why would you need to expand on this?

JULIAN: Yeah, and in both of these fics, Henry doesn't get any character development.

PAZ: Oh my god.

LIZ: No.

PAZ: No. We're putting out a call, please.

JULIAN: Justice for Henry.

LIZ: Justice for Henry, who was apparently just like a big nice cat. If we met I'd be a friend.

JULIAN: Just a sweet guy. Just a pal.

LIZ: He's a little sleepy. So what? He's old. Do old cats that--

PAZ: Oh my god. Holy shit.

LIZ: --don't have their balls cut off not get sleepy? Yeah?

PAZ: Kittypets go nowhere when they die.

JULIAN: What the fuck?

PAZ: Although they may still appear as spirits and potentially be visited.

LIZ: What the fuck? So the biological essentialism extends into the afterlife.

PAZ: The soul is stored in the balls.

LIZ: That's an episode title, thank you.

JULIAN: Yeah, there we go. You're telling me that if you get your balls stole, you can't go to heaven?

LIZ: Oh my god, Henry's gonna go to cat hell.

JULIAN: Oh, no, he won't go to hell because that also exists.

PAZ: Oh my, I don't remember that.

LIZ: So cat purgatory?

PAZ: No, they just go nowhere.

LIZ: Cat limbo?

JULIAN: Paz, it's the Place of No Stars.

PAZ: Oh, okay. I remember that name.

LIZ: Oh my god.

JULIAN: Yeah.

LIZ: That's so sad.

PAZ: Oh my-- this is just like the bad like racism allegory in Harry Potter.

LIZ: Wait, wait. Also, since like getting your balls cut off-- I couldn't remember the actual name that we, you know, humans call it.

JULIAN: Neutering.

LIZ: Right, neutering. Neutering for cats is not like a choice that a cat consciously makes. So within the logic of the story, even though they are, to the other cats, victims, they can't go to cat heaven.

PAZ: I mean, I guess that's-- I don't know. I could be wrong about this in Christianity, but like don't you have to get bap-- don't you have to actively get baptized and not go to hell? It's like that. It's like it's your fault if you got your balls cut off.

JULIAN: Yeah, I mean, if you--

PAZ: Should have been more proactive.

JULIAN: If you don't get baptized, you do go to limbo.

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: But you can I think maybe work your way up to heaven? I should be clearer on this.

PAZ: Well.

LIZ: I'm the farthest removed person from this. I don't know.

PAZ: Well, no such grace for cats who got their balls cut off.

LIZ: Henry.

JULIAN: It also kind of makes sense because like Starclan is not-- Starclan is like very culturally specific. It's like these cats' ancestors. So like the kittypets probably wouldn't want to hang out with them. They would probably be racist towards.

LIZ: Is there like bloodline purity bullshitt in this?

PAZ: Yeah, I just copy pasted something. Many Clanborn cats do not trust cats with kittypet blood. There's also like a lot of drama about like interclan relationships.

JULIAN: Oh God, the interclan relationships are so much. Yeah.

LIZ: Wait, before we get into that, I want to draw our attention to one of these names that you've copy pasted, which is Berrynose, which is a perfect name.

PAZ: I love that.

LIZ: That's very cute.

JULIAN: It's a very cute name.

LIZ: Yeah. Henry is a great name for cat. I love cats that they're just like...

PAZ: That's just a guy.

LIZ: Yeah, that's just a guy.

JULIAN: It's like Oliver. Just a human name.

PAZ: That's just a man. I love Henry and I defend Henry to my dying breath.

JULIAN: I want to give Henry some pets.

PAZ: Yes.

JULIAN: I don't want to pet any of these feral cats. They'll take my hand off.

LIZ: No.

PAZ: No, no. What were we talking about-- oh, the interclan drama.

JULIAN: The interclan politics. Yeah, there's a lot of like, just you know, they have to enforce the borders because if another Clan comes and steals their prey, that'll be bad.

PAZ: Cat nationalism.

LIZ: No.

JULIAN: Yeah.

LIZ: No, I guess like real cats have like territory, but it's probably not--

PAZ: That's true.

LIZ: --quite so like bordered

PAZ: I'm not a like cat behavior expert. I don't know.

JULIAN: I am also not a cat behavior expert, but I don't think they're--

PAZ: They're not patrolling.

JULIAN: --having pitched battles every two months.

LIZ: No.

PAZ: No, no.

LIZ: Is there like clan intermarriage? What if two cats fall in love?

PAZ: It's always like a Romeo and Juliet situation.

LIZ: Exactly.

JULIAN: Mm-hmm. It's a scandal.

LIZ: Okay, also is there cat Hamlet in this? I feel like that would work very well.

PAZ: I feel like there is.

LIZ: I mean, the murder mystery--

JULIAN: There are ghosts.

PAZ: Yeah, there are ghosts.

LIZ: Who are of course the kitty cat-- kittypets because they got their balls. And they can't ascend to heaven or hell.

PAZ: No, I think all cats can be ghosts. I don't know.

JULIAN: There's also-- because like the medicine cats like sometimes see visions like, from specific cats who have died.

PAZ: They're like in StarClan, but they come back as ghosts.

JULIAN: They can come back and talk to you.

PAZ: A lot.

JULIAN: Yeah.

PAZ: A lot to take in, I know.

JULIAN: There's a lot to unpack here.

LIZ: Like, I can see how this is supposed to be its own, like, cat universe with its own like laws, culture, and so on. But also, it's very much like, this is probably a Christian person wrote it, right? I don't know anything about the author.

PAZ: Oh, we haven't mentioned this.

JULIAN: Oh, we gotta get into Erin Hunter.

PAZ: Erin Hunter is in fact, three people. I don't know if there's more people now.

LIZ: Oh my god. You told me this before but

JULIAN: I think Erin Hunter might rotate.

LIZ: Fucks me up every time.

PAZ: Yeah, I'm not sure like how they write it. Like if it's all collaborative, or if like one author does one book but.

JULIAN: Seven people.

LIZ: Oh my God.

PAZ: Oh, my God, I swear was only three people when I--

LIZ: This is just like Nancy Drew.

JULIAN: It started out as three people.

PAZ: That's insane.

LIZ: This could be--

JULIAN: Katie Carrie and Cherith Baldry took turns writing it. And Vicki Holmes used to coordinate, but I assume some of these other people have switched in. Oh, a lot of them are British. They are in fact all British, I think.

PAZ: So these cats do have Cockney accents.

JULIAN: Perfect.

PAZ: Good to know. The first Erin. I'm on the Who is Erin-- the Other Erins.

LIZ: It's like a collective pen name, right?

JULIAN: Yeah. Cause--

PAZ: Oh my god. The first Erin says, "I'm more of a dog person."

JULIAN: Excuse me?

LIZ: What the fuck.

PAZ: This is scandalous. Holy shit.

LIZ: This shakes the ground of the cat religion, I think.

PAZ: The second Erin has a very nice picture with her cat. So that's acceptable.

LIZ: That's a wonderful cat.

JULIAN: Yeah, the wiki has the list of all of the current and former Erins.

PAZ: This is so funny,

JULIAN: Seven people.

LIZ: Now that we're actually talking about these seven authors, and also because we talked about, I guess, the politics in Warrior Cats about the domestication of cats before.

PAZ: Uh huh.

LIZ: It's probably just a lot of, because this is a fantasy story about cats, we gotta spice it up and give them their own points of view, as cats probably, on being domesticated for a kids series maybe? Or also, it doesn't matter and we don't have to talk about it. I don't know. I'm just reeling from--

PAZ: I mean, I think I think it's very interesting to consider. I also think it's interesting that they're British, like I was saying, because I do think that in the UK it's like more common to have cats roam around outside like, even to this day.

JULIAN: I think so too.

PAZ: I could be wrong. Sorry, any British listeners?

LIZ: Are there coyotes in England or whatever?

PAZ: No, I think that's part of it is like there's less like predators who would like eat the cat. There's no coyotes.

LIZ: There's fucking coyotes here in good old California.

JULIAN: Yeah, I think it's just you-- the only things you really have to worry about are like cars and the occasional hawk.

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Do they fight a badger at some point or am I mixing up my Redwall?

PAZ: I definitely remember a badger, I swear.

LIZ: Badgers show up so much in these kinds of like books. There's definitely badgers in the owl books. I feel like there's probably badgers in Redwall, which was not my bag but, you know.

JULIAN: I definitely expected there to be more badgers like out in the world based on how much they figured into like this kind of book.

LIZ: Yeah. They're always like oh, it's the tough old badger who's like a blacksmith or makes armor or something.

PAZ: Badgers aren't sentient in this universe, though, so. Just so you know.

LIZ: Aw.

PAZ: Or maybe they are. I don't know.

LIZ: What is the sentience based on, or is it just like we can't speak their language?

PAZ: Who knows?

JULIAN: I mean also like they can understand dogs or like talk to dogs, but it's like very rudimentary. Like the dog speech that they hear is like, "pack, pack. Kill, kill." It is not like...

PAZ: Beautiful.

LIZ: Do you think the cats to the dogs sound just like, "meow. Fish. Sleepy. Sit on keyboard."

PAZ: Not these cats. These cats want blood.

LIZ: "Kill, maim."

PAZ: "Violence." Okay, well, is there-- do we have anything else to say about the reading so far?

JULIAN: I think we've mostly covered the points that I wanted to make sure we hit.

PAZ: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, what we already established Bluestar is girlboss so don't need to go into any of that anymore.

JULIAN: Yep.

PAZ: I am excited to keep reading because I really don't remember anything is what I will say.

JULIAN: Me too. Yeah.

LIZ: Me three.

JULIAN: I'm excited to continue to read these books and see how much weirder they get.

PAZ: Absolutely, because they do get weird.

LIZ: It's already pretty weird. So I'm excited for that.

PAZ: Liz, do we want to get you assigned a Clan?

JULIAN: Oh, Liz's quiz. Yes.

PAZ: I think we should use this random fanmade one.

LIZ: We don't want to take the official one?

PAZ: No, cause it has that-- it has SkyClan. Who the fuck are they? We don't care about SkyClan.

LIZ: Well, how do you know I'm gonna get SkyClan?

JULIAN: That's true. Liz might not get SkyClan.

LIZ: That's an assumption on your part.

PAZ: If you want to. I think this quiz is funnier

JULIAN: The fan quiz is really incredible.

LIZ: Do you want me to read any, or should I just take it in silence?

PAZ: I'll read and you pick your answers, how does that sound?

LIZ: Alright, you're gonna do the clicking then.

PAZ: Okay. Question one. "You're hunting. What do you catch? Nothing. Hunting? Fish. Mice, voles, etc. Rabbits, maybe a mouse or two. Frogs, mice, really anything I stumble across."

LIZ: I think fish because that sounds tasty to me.

PAZ: "Your friend is in love with a cat from another clan. You tell him if he doesn't stop seeing that cat you will tell the leader. Like I care. I wouldn't do anything, love is love. Tell the leader." That's just the same as the first one.

LIZ: Why are so many of these about being fucking snitches?

PAZ: It is a militarized state.

LIZ: What?

PAZ: Anyway, "talk to the cat your friend loves and convince them to stop seeing your friend. Keep the secret for your friend."

LIZ: Obviously, love is love between any cats.

PAZ: I see no difference. "Your friend is in love with you but you don't like him [laughs] you don't like him like that. What do you do? Stop being friends. Tell him you don't like him but try to stay friends. Flat out tell him you don't like them. Tell them that you already like someone but help them find the mate. Freak out and say you like them back even though you know you don't."

LIZ: No.

PAZ: "Try and change the subject."

LIZ: You know what, change the subject.

JULIAN: I picked freak out.

PAZ: "You have to choose between saving your kits, an elder, you friend, you friend, or the leader. Who do you choose? None of them, I don't need them. I would try to save them all. I would save my mate, I couldn't live without them. I would save my leader, the clan needs them. My friend, he's always been there for me. My kits, my mate would want the best for them."

LIZ: Is this the trolley problem?

PAZ: Well, no, you just have to pick one. Well, I guess everyone else gets killed. So yes.

LIZ: Hmm. Wasn't there one of the options all of them? Can I pick all of them?

PAZ: Yeah, "I would try to save them all." Okay.

LIZ: Yeah, I'm a very powerful cat.

PAZ: Okay, good to know. "You're face to face in battle with your sister who joined another clan. You leave the fight, I don't care anymore. Run away, I could never hurt anyone let alone my family. Scare her off, I don't want to hurt her but I'm loyal to my clan. Try to avoid her in battle, I don't want to fight my family." Some of these really just overlap, huh? Yeah.

"Try not to fight her but if she leaps, I won't hesitate."

LIZ: Is there one where it's just like, it's on sight?

PAZ: That's that one, "I won't hesitate."

LIZ: No, it says "try to avoid her" still. No. What if these fictional cats are having--

PAZ: The last one is "attack. She left the clan. It was her choice."

LIZ: I'm gonna say attack because I'm gonna say my fictional cat sister and I have a terrible dramatic relationship.

PAZ: Wow. Damn.

LIZ: Yep. We're going for tragedy here.

JULIAN: Incredible.

Unknown Speaker

"Clan or kin? Clan, kin, or myself."

LIZ: Um, well, it's not kin because I just said I would kill my sister on sight if she was a cat and I was a cat. Probably not my-- you know, I tried to save the entire cat clan before. It's gonna be myself. Some me time.

PAZ: Oh.

JULIAN: You're a--

PAZ: Did a little 180.

LIZ: Yeah, you don't know what to expect.

JULIAN: I was going to say we're going for found family here but no.

LIZ: No. Maybe I failed when I tried to save everyone and now I'm taking some time to reflect.

PAZ: This is a very tragic story arc. "Your leader makes you deputy. You you proudly stare at your clan. You try your best to be a good deputy. Freak out, refuse the offer. Smile at your clan as your mother's eyes gleam proud of you, that was all you cared about. Protect you clan with your heart."

LIZ: Mother's eyes, please.

PAZ: "Your mother's eyes gleam proud of you, that was all that you cared about?"

LIZ: Mm-hmm.

PAZ: That one? Okay. "Your friend from another clan is stealing your prey. You you ignore them, they're you friend. You take your prey back. You ask them why they're doing this and get your prey back. You scare them off not hurting them. You chase them off then report them to your leader."

LIZ: [gasps] No.

PAZ: "Attack them, just because we're friends doesn't mean I'll let him steal my prey.

LIZ: Wait, is that it? Is there no option to share?

PAZ: No, no sharing.

JULIAN: Uh, you could ignore them.

LIZ: I'll do--

JULIAN: That would share them.

LIZ: I'll ignore them.

JULIAN: That would be the closest you can get.

LIZ: I can't not-- I'm a fisher as we've established. I can just do it again.

PAZ: (muffled, laughing) This next question.

LIZ: Yeah?

JULIAN: Can I read it?

PAZ: Yes, please read it. Please read it.

JULIAN: "What cat is your mate? Voleheart, a brown tabby she cat with amber eyes, the sweetest cat you ever met. Scarpaw, a black tom with yellow eyes."

LIZ: No.

JULIAN: "A misunderstood cat."

LIZ: No, this is not my--

JULIAN: "Goldenmoon, a ginger she cat with light green eyes, the prettiest cat you ever seen. Barknose, a solid brown tom with blue eyes, you have knew him all your life. Rainpaw, a bluish gray she cat with dark blue eyes, a good fighter. I don't want a mate."

LIZ: Okay, I'm crossing off all of the toms because clearly this is a lesbian cat. I already forgot the names of the other ones. I'm gonna go--

JULIAN: You get sweet, pretty and good fighter.

LIZ: I will go with good fighter.

JULIAN: Are your choices. That's Rainpaw.

PAZ: Congrats.

LIZ: Yeah, we'll have a beautiful summer wedding full of fish.

PAZ: I want you to choose this next answer based solely off name. "What's your favorite cat out of these? Onestar? Tigerstar? Blackstar? Firestar? Stonefur? I can't choose."

LIZ: Seeing so many stars makes it feel kind of repetitive. I'm gonna go for Stonefur because that's two very conflicting textures.

PAZ: Okay. You like the intrigue?

LIZ: Yeah, the complexity, the figurative language implication.

PAZ: Let's see what what Clan you're in. RiverClan.

It's because I'm a fisher.

"You're a RiverClan cat. You most likely smart and witty."

LIZ: Most likely.

PAZ: Most likely. "You always keep your eye on the prize and won't take no for an answer. You like the summer and relaxing in the pool. You're very suspicious of new people and only trust someone you are close to."

LIZ: This is an interesting summary because I clearly did take no for an answer when my friend stole my fish and I didn't get to have it. And I guess it's fine with me. No, that's it. We've built the character.

PAZ: You could have been a kitty pet or a loner.

LIZ: Wow. Well, I won't be a loner because this cat got married, obviously.

PAZ: Yeah, congrats on your marriage.

LIZ: Thank you.

PAZ: Julian, did you take this quiz?

JULIAN: What did you get, Paz? Oh, I did. Don't worry.

PAZ: What's your result?

JULIAN: I got ShadowClan.

LIZ: Wow.

PAZ: Mysterious.

JULIAN: Yep, I'm "most likely funny and a mystery to most. I'm very secretive and blunt and I tend to hurt people without knowing. I know my rights and wrongs but my anger always gets me in trouble."

PAZ: Ooh, bad boy.

JULIAN: I was assigned evil at birth.

PAZ: I forgot to take this quiz before the show, but I took the official quiz and another quiz from HarperCollins and they both gave me SkyClan. But I don't really know anything about so um, that's great.

LIZ: Wait, you said they were exiles.

PAZ: They can jump really high apparently.

LIZ: Big jumper and exiled right?

PAZ: Yeah, exiled-- I know they lived in a gorge. I think I liked them in that book they were in a gorge but I don't know anything about them.

LIZ: You should take the one we took now and we can reveal it next time.

PAZ: Yeah, I'll report back.

JULIAN: Yes, perfect.

PAZ: Well, I think that wraps up this session everything we had to say. We got our clans assigned.

LIZ: Talked about the balls.

JULIAN: We talked about the balls. We talked about the politics.

PAZ: Yeah. And I'm very curious to see if both of those are reoccurring.

LIZ: Balls and politics?

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: Okay.

JULIAN: Ballotics.

PAZ: Yeah. Um, I didn't pick out what we're reading for next time but it'll probably be another chunk of chapters. Do we need like a cool sign off? I don't have a cool sign off.

LIZ: Is there like a Warrior Cats saying?

PAZ: Wait, let me google Warrior Cats sayings.

LIZ: Wait, can you-- can you two cat owners just get your cats to like meow into the mic and we can just have that at the end.

PAZ: Mm, no. Okay, a Warrior Cats guide. Exclamations, phrases and insults.

LIZ: I feel like this could also be a section next time.

PAZ: Oh yeah. May StarClan light your path. I remember that one. Classic.

LIZ: Unless you've got your balls cut off.

PAZ: Yeah, okay, may StarClan light your path unless you don't have balls, then fuck you. Bye, everyone.

LIZ: Bye.

[outro music]

#transcript #ep 01 #the soul is stored in the balls #into the wild ep

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aion-rsa · 4 years ago

Text

Warrior Season 2: What to Expect From the Return of the Martial Arts Drama

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When Warrior premiered in April of last year, Cinemax knew they had a hit right away. Helmed by Fast & Furious director Justin Lin and Banshee co-creator Jonathan Tropper, Warrior was renewed for a second season after just three episodes.

“Warrior comes from the pitch Bruce Lee brought to Warner Brothers,” Tropper says, the writer of the show. “It was an eight page treatment Bruce Lee had written that Shannon [Lee] held onto, and that was where the initial ideas for this show come from.”

The show exists largely through the efforts of Shannon Lee (Bruce Lee’s daughter and the executive producer of the show) to bring one of her father’s many visions to fruition. It’s a true testament that Warrior carries on Bruce Lee’s legacy nearly 50 years since he’s passed.

The gritty action-packed drama is set during the brutal late 19th century Tong Wars of San Francisco’s Chinatown and showcases a largely Asian cast. Loosely based on historical events, Warrior explores the tumultuous Wild West period leading up to the Chinese Exclusion Act, the only law that the United States ever implemented to block immigration of a specific racial profile.

“My father had the main character Ah Sahm (Andrew Koji) coming over from China, getting indoctrinated into the Tongs as a hatchet man, while he was really looking for his sister. It had Bill (Kieran Bew), the police officer, as a character. It had the Tong wars as a backdrop to the show and it had the Chinese Exclusion Act and the political immigration issues of the time as a backdrop to the show.”

With trending immigration issues under the present political regime, Warrior is uncannily topical.

“This has always been an immigrant story,” says Tropper, who started writing the show under the Obama administration and didn’t foresee how relevant it would become in 2020. “For me, it’s not that we were aiming at this topic. It’s just that this topic is never not there. It just happens that people are much more conscious of it right now because of this administration. But America is a country built by immigrants that has never developed a comfortable relationship with immigrants. So it’s a generational problem and it’s a cyclical problem, and it’s one that we have not solved. I feel like thematically, this show would be relevant no matter when it was coming out. Now it just happens to speak really loudly to what’s going on.”

Enter the Dragon – Rising Star Andrew Koji

Politics aside, Warrior has one of today’s hottest actors in the lead role, Andrew Koji. Beyond Warrior, Koji plays the pivotal role of Storm Shadow in the upcoming Snake Eyes: G.I.Joe Origins alongside Henry Goulding (Crazy Rich Asians), Ursula Corbero (Money Heist), Iko Uwais (The Raid), and Samara Weaving (Bill & Ted Face the Music). The film was slated for release this October but was pushed back to 2021 as another COVID-19 casualty.

“If it’s best for the film, for the audience, for people,” says Koji, “I don’t think many people want to go to the cinema right now.”

While the postponement of his first major film was disappointing, it was overshadowed by the announcement that Koji has been cast in Bullet Train starring Brad Pitt and directed by David Leitch.

“I saw the article the other day,” recounts Koji with glee. “I was like, “What’s my face doing next to Brad Pitt’s? Nah. Nah. What’s going on?”

Koji’s character Ah Sahm is the role that Bruce Lee intended for himself. However, Ah Sahm is his own man, only echoing Lee with Easter Egg nods to classic film fight scenes, but the nods are kept low key.

“When he beats up the first two guys at the brothel in the pilot, that is literally the choreography from Way of the Dragon,” Trooper explains. “And then he sits down on the chest of the guy, we’re just totally paying homage there. And then, having done that, we do almost nothing else the rest of the season except the occasional tweak of the nose or the gesture with the hand.”

Brucesploitation is a genre of its own, another surreal testament to Bruce Lee’s legacy. If Koji had just done an impersonation of Bruce, Ah Sahm would have degenerated into yet another Bruce Lee clone. Despite the temptation, and having the blessing of Bruce Lee Entertainment, Warrior would not have succeeded like it has if it were just derivative.

“Of all people, Shannon Lee was really insistent that we don’t go overboard with the Bruce Lee stuff,” continues Tropper. “She really tempered it. We were welcomed to use it, but she really wanted the show stand on its own. She had a sort of ‘less is more’ approach. And I think that turned out to be the wise way to go.”

Despite Koji’s rising star, he’s quick to deflect the credit for the success of Warrior to his cast mates.

“When I see Warrior Season 2 and I see these great actors; Kieran, Tom [Weston-Jones], Hoon [Lee], Joe [Taslim], et cetera, I’m more honored that I’m amongst this cast. When I see their performances I’m like, ‘Whoa, these guys are good, because they’re nothing like this in real life.’ It’s more that it’s an honor to be able to work alongside these people who are just so good at what they’re doing.”

Fist of Fury – Warrior Season 2 Comes Out Fighting

When Ah Sahm was last seen in Season 1, he had lost a brutal duel to Li Yong (Taslim). He falls from grace at Hop Wei Tong to become a coolie. ‘Coolie’ is a Chinese word. ‘Ku’ means ‘bitter’ and ‘li’ means ‘work’ and the coolie world is a hopeless grimy place to be. It sets the stage for Season 2 to blow up.

“The fun of any Season 2, and certainly in this show, is in Season 1 you have to do all the heavy lifting of building the world,” Tropper says. “Season 2, the world’s already built, and now you get to really go deeper into all the characters because you don’t have to spend as much time placing them.”

Season 1 established the three distinct worlds of Warrior: the upper crust world of San Francisco politics, the working class world of the cops, and the lower class, the Irish ghetto and Chinatown.

“These three forces have been put into this pressure cooker where something is going to either give or explode,” continues Tropper, “So in Season 2, it was time to let that pressure cooker explode.”

Lee feels that her father would be pleased with how Warrior has turned out so far. She finds it crazy how relevant the show is today and is excited to see how the next episodes play out.

“Fans can expect, for Season 2, to really up the stakes and up the conflict,” she says. “We’re really going to see things reach a bit of a fever pitch in Chinatown… So it’s very complicated and the weaving of the story is really brilliant and the stakes are really high. And you’ll see what happens.”

Warrior Season 2 introduces several new characters and story arcs. The costumes of Ah Toy (Olivia Cheng) get more lavish and opulent. The fights escalate, getting bigger and bloodier as the season progresses and even includes a face-off between Ah Sahm and Dolph, played by UFC Champion Michael Bisping.

“I don’t think many people would be able to say they kicked a UFC champion in the face and lived,” jokes Koji. Warrior Season 2 would be a sure win if it weren’t for Cinemax’s programming cuts and the fact that it’s 2020, the year of the pandemic.

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic brings an unexpected challenge for a show about Chinatown. Racist attacks against Chinese have been on the rise, so much so that the House or Representatives just passed a resolution condemning “all forms of anti-Asian sentiment as related to COVID-19.” Will this affect the reception of Warrior?

“Gosh, I don’t know,” says Lee. “I certainly hope not. But given the ability of people to be reasonable in this moment that we find ourselves in, I wish I could say, ‘Oh, that would be silly,’ but I feel like the anti-China, anti-Asian sentiment in the country around the coronavirus is silly. There’s a lot that’s gone on that is kind of blowing my mind left and right, so I wish I could say for certain that it wouldn’t. But what I hope happens is that people tune in to the show… because it’s entertaining and they fall in love with it; and maybe it shifts their perspective in some way.”

For Tropper, the relevance of Warrior reflects the pervasiveness of racism.

“I think that just proves the point that whether it is overt or covert, it’s never gone,” he says. “There’s the version of xenophobia towards the Asians. There’s a version of racism towards the Black population. Our country has these fault lines that are always there whether they’re shaking or not. Obviously there are tremendous echoes from our show of what was going on when they started referring to coronavirus as the ‘Chinese flu.’ But if you speak to any Chinese American, I don’t think they’ll tell you it’s ever really been gone. It just goes through periods of quiet and periods of noise. So I think we just happened to be coming out at a kind of noisier time, which is deeply unfortunate. Believe me I’d much rather we were just a fun martial art show that was a lot less relevant today.”

The Road to Warrior Season 3

Unfortunately last January, Cinemax announced that it would no longer be commissioning original shows in preparation for the launch of HBO Max. “Right now, Season 3 is a little uncertain,” says Lee. Warrior Season 2 is an attempt to level the show up to prove it deserves another round.

“We’re in these uncertain times,” says Lee, “but I’m hoping that when the show, once Season 2 completes on Cinemax, they are going to release it to the HBO platforms and I do hope that the show will just catch a much bigger audience and that there will be demands for a third season.”

Why invest in a second season when the future is uncertain? There’s always a chance that the fans may save it. Shows like Star Wars: The Clone Wars, The Expanse, Money Heist, and Cobra Kai found new life and more fans on other networks.

“I’ve got a gut feeling that this show, or at least the legacy of this show, will last a lot longer than most shows,” adds Koji. “I think what it means – the energy, the feeling, the story and the characters – there’s so many elements that just were magic. The writing’s sharper, the action is crisper and embraces its style more. I think the actors are all on point. Season 2 was one of the highlights of my career so far, shooting, and I think it was for a lot of people. We all felt that magic, so we hope that it comes across on-screen, which I believe it will. I think they’re going to see something special on all fronts.”

Koji holds out a lot of hope that Warrior Season 3 will happen.

“Well, obviously, with the current climate it’s a lot less certain. All we know is if the fans make enough noise and help us by making that noise it is in so many of our intentions to wrap this show up as I think it should. Not only for the show, the story, for the fans, but for that legend Bruce Lee. I think it deserves a conclusive ending.”

Regardless of what the future may hold for Warrior, Season 2 is worth the watch.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

Warrior begins its ten-episode second season on Oct. 2, exclusively on CINEMAX.

The post Warrior Season 2: What to Expect From the Return of the Martial Arts Drama appeared first on Den of Geek.

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darthlorddiamond · 4 years ago

Text

My Way

This is the thirteenth episode of the Black Diamond story, if you want to read the previous episode or follow the next ones you can check my Masterlist.

Summary: The Galactic Senate named the Rinnrivin Di cartel as one of its main threats, so it was necessary to change its location to another planet, at which point Leia took the opportunity to request a second meeting with him.

Words: 2,770

Reading Time: 12 min

Category: Bio

Warnings: None

__________________

My Way

After Leia appeared in Bastatha, the Galactic Senate issued an order against Rinnrivin Di and named our cartel as one of the Republic's main threats. This appointment caused that several bounty hunters try to enter our casinos, to interfere with several of our ships and smuggling activities, so it was decided that our important errands would go even further underground and that only those of lesser category go on in public, creating that way, various distractions for those who believed could slow us down.

Due to the recurring appearance of annoying visitors at our facilities in Bastatha, Di decided that it was best to move to Harloff Minor, a planet close to Coruscant, also known as the Imperial Center during the reign of the Galactic Empire. It was well known that Harloff Minor was considered one of the main centers of commerce and culture in that part of the galaxy, so it fit perfectly with the lifestyle that Di liked to have and I wasn´t surprised to discover that we already had a very well-settled residence at our arrival.

During our stay on this planet, we restructured all our activities and reactivated our main sources of income, which still finance part of the activities of the First Order. Even though our relocation was rushed and to mislead our pseudo-hunters, it wasn´t long before Di began his life as if nothing had happened, he simply couldn´t live without going unnoticed and, eventually, became of public known our new location, which in my opinion was quite reckless and immature of his part.

It was around this time that I began to practice all of Keldo's teachings and became more active in everything that involved negotiations with other criminal organizations and with diplomatic deals among followers of the old empire, who were in charge of spreading our new proposals for commercial expansion among their peers. For these men, some of them part of the Galactic Senate, who had a double life, dealing with us was only one way of securing a privileged place within the ranks of nobles and directors of the First Order, so, in each one of their visits, they not only came with their coffers full and ready to donate significant sums of money for the cause, they also presented themselves with the most exotic gifts for Di and myself. Personally, for me, this vanity parade was nothing more than that, a catwalk of men and women in decline who believed that they could be placed in the chairs of a new regime that cared about young blood, they were just simple puppets and open checkbooks of something that surpassed them.

Also, since Leia appeared at the casino, I understood that I truly had the power to choose and didn´t have to follow orders just for the sake of it. No doubt her words had had an impact on me, but my decision of no leave my darkness was still firm, I felt very good with it and, somehow, only through the darkness I could find meaning in my life. Little by little, I began to reject some of the missions that Di gave me because I found it unattractive, it weren´t a challenge for me or because I simply didn´t want to do it; this made Di upset with me, a fact that didn´t matter to me in the least. On the other hand, I continued to train my crew and eventually dedicated ourselves to developing strategies and focusing on goals that could truly make a difference in our activities. As the cartel began to benefit from our practices, Di changed his way of giving us instructions and gave us complete autonomy, as long as the results were in his favor and continued to support our organization.

Eventually, all of Harloff Minor's major businesses looked into an alliance with us. Many of them had decided to do it of their own free will, without our part having to resort to some kind of extortion towards them, I think they considered that is was better for them to cooperate with our cartel and thus ensure their safety in our custody, than trying to fight and put up resistance in front of us. I began to spend most of my time in one of the most luxurious restaurants in downtown, where I already had a private room for me in one of its upper floors.

It was equipped according to my tastes, it was a small room-study, with a huge viewport, overlooking the entire city, with a small dining room, a canteen, shelves with books, a wall to which I had assigned to place my collection of swords and a small stained glass window, where my hurdy-gurdy remained while I wasn´t occupying it. Likewise, I had all the services that the restaurant offered, so whenever I was there, I had a banquet already prepared for me. This was my space, only mine, even when Di wanted to visit me, he had to announce himself before he could enter, it was my sanctuary, a spot where I could completely forget everything that was beyond its doors.

"Senator Organa contacted me again a few days ago..." was the first sentence Di gave when he crossed the door of my study, I was comfortably sitting on one of the sofas polishing one of my swords, "She asked to meet me in a neutral space to the Senate and the cartel…” he walked towards the cellar where he served himself a glass of Toniray, a wine that Di had obtained from Alderaan, I continued to polish without paying much attention to what he was saying “And what have you thought about it?” I turned to look at him askance while I continue my task, he walked towards me and took a seat on one of the sofas that was next to me "It occurred to me to bring her here..." Di just turned to see me while he took a drink to his glass.

I put aside my saber, crossed my hands, and supported my elbows on my knees while fixing my gaze on the floor. Have Leia here, in my sanctuary... Apart of me felt complete repulsion to allow someone to enter this space, in itself, the pure presence of Di already caused me enough discomfort and revulsion, but on the other hand, I felt the urgent need to see her again, I wanted to know if she still could look at me like that night out the casino or if her eyes wouldn´t be able to turn to me after so long, after a time when my actions only sadistic grew, a time when I fully embraced the monster that lives in me, I wanted to see if Leia kept seeing in my hope or if standing in front of me, she would only see an aberration. This thought caused me to be excited as I hadn´t been for a long time, I couldn´t stop smiling, I felt such excitement, Di only remained silent, watching me and without removing my huge smile, I just turned my face to look at him "Bring her here..." he nodded and stood up from his place "I only have one condition Di..." it was certainly something he didn´t expect, it was undeniable that still bothered him that he no longer had complete control over me "I want to be present", he just nodded again and left my room, I stood up from my place and walked to the viewport, where I stopped to see the entire city a moment before bursting into complete and insane laughter.

A few more days passed before I heard from Di and the meeting. It would take place the next night at my study, so I called the restaurant to prepare a great welcome dinner for the senator, I also asked that they bring more Toniray wine, I thought it would be a huge gesture on my part to serve Organa something that could remind her home. The next day, before our meeting, I dedicated myself to arranging the entire study so that it will be as impeccable as possible and a few hours before the agreed time, I took the hurdy-gurdy out of its showcase and tuned its ropes, I was planning to liven up her stay, to give her the privilege of being able to hear me play and live to tell the tale, I wanted to instill terror in her through the delicacy of my presence; deep inside me, I wanted to verify that her words from that night were nothing but lies, that she was only trying to separate me from Di, I needed to verify that others were no longer able to look at me without feeling terror, my mind demanded proofs that showed me that, because, for me, there wasn´t turning back.

The door opened and behind Di entered Leia, dressed in a light blue tunic with gray and some motifs in ocher, she looked extremely elegant. Di came dressed in a crimson cape and from his neck hung several gold chains encrusted with precious stones "If I knew that this meeting would be gala, I would have arranged me better..." I gave a little laugh, Di indicated with a hand to the senator that she could take a seat, while he went to the cellar to serve some drinks "Not at all, this is just a casual meeting, you didn´t need to dress up for such" Leia replied as she sat down on one of the sofas in front of me, my eyes were completely fixed on her and in each one of her movements, I was waiting to see something different in her, whatever, but she just lay there, sitting with all the tranquility in the world, returning my inquisitive gaze with a beautiful smile.

"Diamond, I see that you took the hurdy-gurdy out of its showcase..." Di approached us offering us a glass each, when Leia took her glass, she stared for several seconds in the blue liquid "Toniray…” she whispered "I assumed that the wine selection for today would go quite well with your visit" I told her, while I raised my glass to take a sip while our eyes were meeting, Di only took a seat on the sofa that was in between us "While the waitress brings the food, dear..." Di turned his head slightly to look at me "Why don't you delight the senator with your music…” a huge smile was painted on my lips, while Leia only opened her eyes completely without moving an inch from her place. I put my glass on the coffee table and lowered one of my hands to the side of my seat to take the hurdy-gurdy, which I placed on my lap, at no time did I stop seeing Leia, I was urged to see some kind of reaction in her face, which was still stoic, as I took my hands to the crank and the keys, Leia's forehead began to be covered with sweat, I could feel that inside her there was a feeling of fear but also curiosity "Easy senator!" Di gave a great laugh "Music will be just an entertainment while the dinner arrives!" he turned to look at her while still laughing "Consider yourself lucky to be able to hear the Black Sonata and, well... Live to tell!" it was obvious that the comment didn´t please Leia in the least, but her body relaxed almost immediately as the first notes of my instrument began to fill the room.

The dinner flowed very naturally, the little talk that was present was trivial and hovered over the nature of each one of the dishes that were served to us. It was remarkable that the senator had a natural ability with words and despite the superficiality of our dialogue, I felt quite comfortable the whole time. Once we finished eating, Leia took a holocube out of her bag and placed it on the table, causing all the haughty expression on Di's face to evaporate immediately. What a way to do desktop! The night had undoubtedly transformed, from that point and at least for me, in a show worth seeing, extremely interesting and fun, so I just crossed my hands on the table, leaned my body forward, and positioned myself as the only spectator of what was about to happen. My heart was pounding, I couldn't stop smiling, I was dying to know what surprise Leia had prepared for tonight.

Di realized the way I was watching them, how I was enjoying the fact that he would be so nervous and vulnerable, so he tried to regain his composure. “And this surprise senator?" he extended one of his hands to hold the holocube "I thought I would bring it as a sign of goodwill..." Leia replied as she crossed her hands on the table "That way you can retrieve the best memory you have of the Huttsalyer..." Di just laughed forcefully turning to see her "Doesn't like to remember your past senator!?" Di continued with his laughs while Leia's face took a more serious rictus, I was just sitting watching everything with great curiosity, I was very intrigued to know how this was going to end "Rinnrivin..." Leia fixed her eyes on him " Stay away from Sinbensko... " Di's laugh stopped violently "It's my last warning..." Di stood up from the table and walked over to where Leia was, causing her to stand up to.

Their bodies were inches away, it was obvious that Di was trying to intimidate her "And if I don't do it, senator, what are you going to do about it?" he leaned towards her without taking his eyes off her "If you continue with your plans on Sinbensko you will have to face the consequences..." Di's eyes were about to burst with anger, some veins began to appear on his forehead "Are you threatening me?” a few drops of his saliva fell on Leia's face, his fists were clenching tightly, Leia turned around and started walking towards the exit, standing next to me on her path and casting a glance at me, for a few seconds our eyes met and a hole filled my stomach, it was the same look that she had directed me on that occasion, it was still there, it hadn´t disappeared, she placed one of her hands on my shoulder and gave me a little squeeze before resuming her way to the exit, where she paused for a moment to look at Di askance "It´s not a threat Rinnrivin, it´s a reality. Stay away from Sinbensko" and without saying more, she left my study.

Di was furious, he walked around the room in circles while screaming and cursing, I remained sitting in my place, watching the window. The conversation between them no longer mattered to me, I just couldn't believe the way Leia looked at me again, at no time did I think she would be able to do it, it didn't have to be that way, her reaction must have been completely the opposite, she didn't have reasons to address me in this way, she didn´t have to stare at me with such tenderness and hope. I began to feel the hollow of my stomach spreading across my chest that filled my mind with confusion. No! Leia´s still wrong! This is my way! It´s the path I chose and nothing that she does or the way she looks at me will make me change it!

I stand up from my place and went to the cellar where I poured myself another glass of wine while Di kept cursing all over the room, I walked towards the wall where I had my swords and took one of it together with a silk flannel, then I went to my sofa, took a seat and started to polish the saber, Di stopped his endless litany to see me, I had caught his attention by the way I wasn´t interested in his tantrum, and in turn, I could see that my actions had caused him concern "What are you be doing?” it was indisputable that he was annoyed with me for not worrying or showing disgust at how the meeting had ended, but I didn´t pay attention to it "I asked you something!" he screamed as he started walking towards where I was; once close I just looked up at him and he froze in place "So Sinbensko..." I smiled slightly while still polishing my saber, never taking my eyes off his "Tell me more..."

Note: I would like to especially thank @kyloren-theprince, @thetorturerwrites & @kylorengarbagedump who took time to read this first part of my saga and sent me observations with all the patience in the world.

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thesimplyluxuriouslife · 5 years ago

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280: The Importance of Daily and Weekly Rituals & Routines You Love (12 Ideas to Incorporate Now)

"You would think weightlessness is a good thing, but it's not. Because people weren't meant to float. Without gravity, we lose blood volume, bone density, muscle. Without it, we're untethered. So when you feel yourself being pulled toward something, it's not necessarily a bad thing. It may keep you centered. It may keep you safe." —Grey's Anatomy, season 16, episode #17, Shonda Rhimes

Thoughts, thoughts, all sorts of thoughts. With an abundance of time on our hands as we stay home, if we have not exercised our brains in this way, it may feel uncomfortable, and in these times we find ourselves collectively, understandably unsettling.

The above quote caught my attention this past week as it feels our attentions are being being pulled toward the necessities of life, what we sincerely need to simply live. Don't get me wrong, the past eleven years, economically, have been much needed and appreciated, and while each of our journey's is unique, perhaps we've forgotten what we truly need, what others truly need, to live well. At the moment, we are all being pulled to our homes, to our sanctuaries, to our immediate families with whom we reside with but perhaps never see often because of our busy schedules. Admittedly, some of our loved ones may be far away due to age, relationships, work, etc., but we at least have the phone, video chat and other technological ways of communicating.

Becoming grounded in what roots us, is what reminds us of what truly is a priority in our life, helps us to make better decisions to remain true to those values when the choices are vast. And sometimes when the choices are so vast and so ubiquitous for such a long time, we would only be being human to lose sight of our roots. I am not suggesting that we need to have a pandemic to root us, but that is where we find ourselves, so I am determined to see some good in this perilous situation.

There will be good that will come out of it when we come out of it on the other side, but as well, there is good we can partake in during this time of staying home.

Today, while I had originally planned a different topic for the episode to be shared, I have decided to focus on something that will hopefully be helpful to direct our attention to, to elevate the time we have indoors, wanted or unwanted. The gift and mood lifting power of daily and weekly rituals.

Under the umbrella of daily and weekly rituals lies our daily and weekly routines. Consciously creating routines in which we know boost the quality of our lives from our health, to our rest and rejuvenation to our productivity are ways to rest more easily which benefits our mind and well-being and decreases our stress. Each of these efforts strengths our immune system and ultimately strengthens our overall health, both physically and mentally.

Today I would like to share with you rituals you can incorporate into your daily and weekly routine even while you stay home.

1.Wake up well

Design a morning routine in which regardless of whether you are heading out the door (when our routines get back to normal) or staying home, you want to get out of bed and partake in. In episode #243 I share 12 Ways to Make Your Mornings Magical, Mindful and the Foundation of a Great Day.

2. Create a daily routine you love

As I shared with my students what would be expected of them while we stepped into our extended break (Oregon has announced they will be closing all schools through the entire month of March.), one student immediately decided she would find a favorite place she enjoyed being, give herself this window during her day to complete her schoolwork and then be done. I was so tickled to hear such thoughtful and conscientious attention to both her academics, but also her well-being by compartmentalizing and stepping away from work so she could relax and just be.

All of us, whether at home, and especially now that we are home, would benefit from creating a schedule in our day for productivity, but also meals, rest and exercise. Knowing we have accomplished something will let us rest more easily and make it easier to sleep at night. As well, we will be giving our bodies and mind a healthy balance to remain strong.

3. An afternoon brain break

Whether you enjoy an afternoon tea or an afternoon nap or an afternoon outside exercising, create a ritual that will be something you look forward to as you make your way through your day. If you are like me, and live alone, this may be a good time to call loved ones to check in. If you live with others, it may be a great time to be together if you are busy doing your own thing throughout the day. Either way, make a point of intentionally not doing work, but rather something relaxing and enjoyable. Something that elevates the everyday even more so that each day you look forward to such moments.

4. Welcome the flowers

I shared on Instagram yesterday (see below) how one of the items on my grocery list this weekend (I went early and wore gloves as well as washed my hands before and after) was to welcome a few bouquets of flowers into my home. Recent researched has shared that having fresh flowers can "lower blood pressure and heart rate, lower ratings of pain, anxiety, and fatigue, and more positive feelings and higher satisfaction [about one's home]". So while, we need to stay home as much as possible, if possible keeping in my sanitation requirements, welcome some flowers into your home and perhaps bring a bouquet for your neighbor and leave them on their doorstep with a note. You may help their health more than you realize.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B9wz7UJHcOY/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

5. What to listen to? What brings you joy.

Create a listening ritual that carries you through your day. From the classical music I wake up to on WRTI with host Gregg Whiteside and Breakfast with Bach at 5am to the jazz in the evenings from my Spotify playlist, as well as podcasts about food and France enjoyed while I walk the dogs along the river, around the neighborhood or through the trees, what we turn on melodically has a tremendously powerful effect over our well-being. Choose what you love and let it elevate your days.

Music I listen to:

WRTI - classical and jazz

KUSC - classical

TSLL playlists

Escape to France . . .

Luxurious Classical Music (more than 10 hours of music)

Everyday Jazz

French Cafe Jazz (no lyrics)

Jazzy Dinner playlist (Spotify)

Podcasts I have been loving recently:

The Land of Desire (French history and culture)

MilkStreet Radio

Inside Julia's Kitchen

The Splendid Table

6. Fitness Habits That Energize

The key to sustainable exercise routines is to keep them seemingly small, yet consistent and intentional. As I shared in the first episode of 2020 on the podcast, #272, 8 Ways Tiny Habits Will Welcome the Great Changes You Seek, tiny habits have a powerful way of instituting the change we desire. Why? Because they are more likely to stick, and truly become habituated into our daily routine.

From waking up and doing one set of sit-ups (by the end of the week you will have done five sets!), to meditating for one minute each morning, to sipping a glass of water upon waking up in the morning, when you choose thoughtfully the habits you want in your life, reduce them down to seemingly so small, there is no reason not do the task, and before you know it, as you see the positive change, you won't want to reduce your effort and may even want to increase it.

So as we find ourselves with more time at home and being unlikely to attend our favorite fitness class or gym, find exercise habits at home that will fulfill the exercise routine you need, but in a way that you enjoy. I am shifting my weekly yoga classes to a YouTube yoga instructor for the time being (but I cannot wait to return to the yoga studio), and my walks will be where I can keep my social distance at a healthy length from others, for their sake as well as mine.

7. Create an evening ritual for winding down before going to bed

Something I look forward to every day, weekday or weekend, is my evening routine. After the work on the blog has been completed, after dinner has been made and savored, it is this hour or two before I drift off to sleep that is priceless. My dogs as well have become accustomed to our routine and even though they do not know the time of day we humans live by, they know when bedtime is near.

From calming down the house, dishes washed, kitchen cleaned, work put away, to lighting a candle in the living room, turning on a pre-taped show or picking up a book or magazine I want to slip away to for a while, these simple activities tell my mind it is safe to rest, to relax, to be done for the day. All the while sipping some tea and nibbling on a piece of chocolate truffle, the ultimate signal to my body and brain that the day is done.

8. Be Conscientious About Your Daily News Intake

Going along with #5, what media we choose to be part of our daily routines has a profound effect on our mental health. I shared and encouraged my students to limit their news intake as it can easily overwhelm us. I did not suggest sticking their head in the sand and ignoring the news, but rather choose one or two times a day in which you check in with a credible news source, and then go about your day.

9. Work space set-up

Cultivate a welcoming work space whether it is temporary or where you work on a normal workday. Provide a clean work desk (check out this post - 10 Ways to Make Your Desk Space Efficient and Inspiring), welcome the natural light, reduce unhelpful distractions and decorate or rearrange in such a way to beckon you to work well.

10. Befriend water

Choose to bring and drink water with you throughout the day. Staying hydrated has oodles of benefits, but on the immunity side of things, it will help rid your body of toxins. Even if I am enjoying my regular cup of tea in the morning, afternoon or evening, I regularly will have a glass of water as well or have my Hydroflask full of water if I am out walking (it is in my car for when I return). Cultivating this habit will satiate your appetite, refresh your body and elevate many arenas of your life that we take for granted.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BzGjIGCABD7/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

11. Turn your ideas into gold

Yes, William Shakespeare may have written King Lear during his quarantine tenure in the 16th century, and while we may not produce such masterpieces, we can use this time let our creative ideas run free so that we have time to see what they want to reveal. Keep a notebook or small journal handy and write down what pops into your mind. You may be able to tend to the idea now or it may be an idea you can implement later, but either way, it will be a positive exercise to focus on positive, hopeful, inspired things. Our mind is a muscle, and it finds the tracks we repeat again and again. So practice thinking in such a way that lifts you up, gets you excited and who knows where your creative thoughts will take you.

As for me, I am planning TSLL's upcoming British Week (the third full week in May), pulling together April 1st's TSLL's Spring Shopping Guide and whatever else wishes to reveal itself to me. :) Excited to see what I will discover. Have fun!

12. Incorporate regular self-care and model it for others in your life

That hot bath you used to take infrequently, but love and look forward to deeply . . . take it regularly, every week, every other day, but make it a ritual you look forward as well as savor when you slip into the hot bubble bath of comfort. Last year, I shared 31 Ways to Practice Self-Care, episode #242, and as I shared in this episode, while the bubble baths and other pleasures are certainly part of this regular self-care routine, self-care needs to go deeper. When self-care goes deeper, it has even more powerful and long-lasting positive effects on our life. Be sure to check out the show notes and/or episode for much more information on this topic.

The current situation in which we find ourselves is unprecedented in our times, but it has the potential to reveal a tremendous amount about our strengths, compassion and ability to rise in ways we may not have known we were capable. I am confident that while the unknown has the potential to paralyze, it can also teach us an abundance about ourselves, those around us, the world and then reveal to us what we should truly be focused on for a better world moving forward.

SIMILAR POSTS/EPISODES YOU MIGHT ENJOY:

The Benefit of Daily Rituals

Why Not . . . Establish Weekend Rituals?

34 Inspiring Daily Rituals to Ignite Your Creativity, episode #255

Petit Plaisir:

~Begin to cultivate a candle cupboard/closet.

I first learned of this idea from Queer Eye's Tan France when during his tour of his home for Architectural Digest he opened up a small closet (I would call it a cupboard) and shared his stocked candles. Now, mind you, my current Candle Cupboard has two candles in it waiting to be enjoyed, but as I come across candles that I love, if they are on sale, I purchase one or two more than I normally would. I don't expect my Candle Cupboard to ever be as full as Tan's, but I love this idea as a Petit Plaisir.

My Candle Cupboard is only barely stocked, but I love this idea and will continue to add to it as my budget and sales and treasures are found. Thank you Tan for sharing this wonderful idea!

~The Simple Sophisticate, episode #280

~Subscribe to The Simple Sophisticate: iTunes | Stitcher | iHeartRadio | YouTube | Spotify

Tune in to the latest episode of The Simple Sophisticate podcast

#tsllpodcast thesimplesophisticate

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mandibierly · 7 years ago

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How 'Manhunt: Unabomber' built Ted Kaczynski's backstory: Your burning questions answered

Paul Bettany as Ted Kaczynski in ‘Manhunt: Unabomber’ (Photo: Discovery)

Episode 6 of Discovery’s Manhunt: Unabomber, which aired Tuesday night, dove deep into Ted Kaczynski’s troubled life, from the first bomb he made in grade school to his years at Harvard University, where he was recruited for a CIA-sponsored brainwashing experiment, to whether he was capable of keeping his promise to stop mailing bombs if his 35,000-word manifesto was printed for all to read.

As Paul Bettany, who stars as adult Kaczynski, wants to clearly reiterate, the TV show is in no way looking for sympathy for Kaczynski, who killed three people and injured 23 in his 17-year campaign — but it does try to elicit your empathy. “There’s a part of Ted that was a child and 16-years-old and experimented on by the CIA, and humiliated, and that is an awful thing for anybody to have gone through. I think there’s an argument to say that it went somewhere toward destroying him and weaponizing him one way or another,” Bettany says. “We’re not going to get anywhere if the conversation ends with, ‘He’s a monster,’ and not with, ‘How the f**k did this person not feel that this was his home anymore? That somehow he wasn’t welcome in this world.’ That’s a really interesting question to ask ourselves: Why do children — not just in this country, but yes, from this country, and in the UK and throughout Europe — feel so alienated in their country that they run off to Syria, for instance? How can we help people who experience such intense alienation that they no longer feel a part of their communities?”

To answer some of our burning questions about how the show built Kaczynski’s backstory, Yahoo TV spoke separately with Bettany, series co-creator/writer Andrew Sodroski, and director/showrunner Greg Yaitanes.

The episode is framed as a letter Ted is writing to his brother, David, contemplating how he ended up the man he became and whether it’s too late to change. Did he really express those ideas in a letter to David?

Andrew Sodroski: There is no one document where he lays it all out like that. That kind of emotional landscape is something that you piece together. I read thousands of pages of letters by Ted Kaczynski, his autobiography, all these different things. Really for me, it came out of this paradox that he promised to stop bombing if his manifesto was published and yet when they arrested him, they found a new bomb under his bed. I talked to Jim Fitzgerald [the FBI profiler played by Sam Worthington in the series] a lot about this, and he was like, “Well, that was his hobby. He probably was never going to send the bomb but he had nothing else to do.”

I started really thinking about this, like, “Okay, here is a guy, he says he’s going to stop bombing, and he probably means it. He actually really wants to stop bombing, but he somehow ends up, despite himself, with a bomb under his bed.” The idea of telling the story of the last bomb gave me the way into piecing together all those character moments — this desire to change and the inability to change. Threading those lines and that complexity gave me both the form of the episode — which is one day, publication day, the day when his whole life is supposed to change — and then also the content of that letter.

Greg Yaitanes: Andrew and I differ on that bomb under Ted’s bed. Andrew believes that Ted was going to stop bombing; I believe that there was a bomb under Ted’s bed and Ted would not have been able to stop himself and would have sent it. That difference actually helped us arrive on the approach. We really zeroed in on the addiction aspect of his bomb-making: Can a guy who’s done something his whole life separate from it?

(Photo: Discovery)

Paul Bettany: There were days when Greg and I would turn up and we’d have an hour or two before we started shooting, and we’d just sit in the cabin and talk things through and figure stuff out. How do we express that — whether he’s gonna have a clean slate and he’s not build bombs anymore? We shot it like it was an addiction: he packs [the bomb materials] away, and we have the bag in the foreground, and he’s looking at the bag, and the peace that brings him of finally getting a hit again.

(Photo: Discovery)

Yaitanes: We went into the elation [when he believes he can stop], which led to the dancing, which was a great piece out of Ted’s journal, how he would dance to Bach music.

Bettany: He writes about a dance for the rabbits that he would do, and it was a really pretty uneventful dance. He describes it as stomping his left foot and stomping his right foot, and so we thought, “Well, that’s eminently uncinematic. What can we do?” We put some music on and had him dance with himself and then invite, rather sadly, an imaginary partner to waltz with him, and sort of somehow express that longing for somebody that he had a lot of difficulty expressing.

Yaitanes: Then that [lure of the last bomb] was the spine of which to play against as he struggles to be able to be alone with himself, which was something he could never do. For a guy that talked about how mass entertainment is distracting us, he had his own distraction, which was making bombs and killing people.

yahoo

We see young Ted (Grady Port) build his first bomb, in retaliation for losing a friend after that classmate got a girlfriend. Is that story true?

Sodroski: He had this intense friendship with this boy when he was in grade school, and later he wrote this weird short story called How I Blew Up Harold Snilly, which is a semi-fictional account of his first bomb, which was in chemistry class in grade school. I took a lot of his grade school experiences and condensed them into that one relationship, but there is this way in which, even early on, Ted was trapped in this cycle of getting close to somebody, then [feeling betrayed], and then lashing out in this self-destructive way. That became the story of his life.

(Photo: Discovery)

Ted (played by John Berchtold) went to Harvard at the age of 16 and thought he found a trusted confidante in psychology professor Henry A. Murray (Brian d’Arcy James), who was actually grooming him for a three-year-long experiment that was part of MKUltra, the CIA’s mind-control project working to perfect brainwashing techniques to use on Soviet spies. How accurate is the show’s depiction of those sessions?

Sodroski: There are videotapes in Harvard’s archives of some of the sessions. We can’t see the tapes of the sessions because Ted has publicly talked about them, and so they are under lock and key until Ted dies. We were able to get a transcript of some of those sessions with Murray.

Yaitanes: We had to condense it, but we were able to glean what we could from transcripts, from Ted’s journaling, from other people that have been through the program. We feel that that very accurately represents what was there on the day.

(Photo: Discovery)

Sodroski: The one really sad thing [was] Ted talks about the Murray experiments in his autobiography or in some of his journals, and there’s this moment when he says, “Why did I keep going back?” In the show, we say, “It’s to prove that he couldn’t break me,” which I think is the heart of the matter. But in his journals, Ted says, “He just promised me at the end there would be a party with girls at it, and I thought if I just hung in there, I would be invited to that party. Still to this day, it bothers me that there was no party.” You just think, “Wow.” I feel like if we had had Ted say that, it’s too much — nobody would believe it. But when you read it in his journals, it’s really heartbreaking because he was literally looking for connection.

There were drafts of this script where we went into his sexual history, which is really interesting. At one point, he wanted to have a sex-change operation. His relationship with his [childhood friend] is sort of borderline homosexual, in a kind of 11-year-old experimental way. We kept trying to thread those moments through in a way that was compassionate and that was part of the total picture of Ted Kaczynski. … but as soon as you put in “Ted Kaczynski wants a sex-change operation,” suddenly everything becomes about that, where it isn’t really about that. It isn’t about sexual confusion; it’s about a desire to just connect with someone, anyone, who can understand me and feel my pain. If we’re talking about Ted, we can say, “Yeah, there’s definitely a sexual component to his isolation and to his mental landscape,” but as soon as you experience that onscreen, it’s like, “Oh, he’s just a sex-crazed freak,” and suddenly, we are on the outside looking in on Ted, whereas I think the power of the story we’re telling is that we are with Ted on this journey and this life review and experiencing it with him.

Yaitanes: He couldn’t put a read on human interaction, so he didn’t know where he fit in. I think thematically, there was something interesting to unpack there, but there was not the room nor the time to do it in a way that would have been respectful to what it was, which was more complex and gray than anything we could have tackled without really having an additional episode to explore it. Our thesis is, and rightly so, that your sexuality does not define you as a person, and I think that is no more apparent than the conversation that is happening out there today, and yet, we continually see that. We just saw it in the news [with the ban on transgender soldiers serving in the military]. We didn’t want to contribute to that conversation in any kind of light that didn’t fully respect our in-depth take of what our research showed us.

We see Murray tell Ted that his mother, Wanda, wrote him and gave him permission to do this humiliating experiment on her son. In the show, Ted says he later learned Murray had lied about the letter.

Sodroski: There is an actual letter from Wanda to Murray saying, “Thank you for choosing my son, and I really hope you’ll be able to help him.” It doesn’t go into all that detail about how he’s a creep and a bed-wetter and a compulsive masturbator. We decided that it’s a little too cruel to have an actual letter from Wanda to Murray, and that it helped tell our story better if it’s a fake letter, even though in reality, Wanda signed a permission slip and wrote on it, “Maybe you’ll be able to help my poor son. He’s totally messed up. A Harvard psych professor — here’s what he needs in his life.” For me, the important thing there was just understanding that Ted came out of this experience distrustful of everyone in his life, including himself.

(Photo: Discovery)

In the series, Ted imagines what his life could have been like had he used all the time he spent being angry and building bombs on finding love and having a child. We see him invited to a birthday party for the local librarian’s son, and amazingly, we desperately want him to go. Did those people really exist?

Sodroski: What’s interesting about Ted is he really did tutor the librarian’s son in math, and he really was friends with the local librarian. This is one of these paradoxes of Ted, which is that he lived totally alone in the woods, he cuts off all his ties with everyone who loves him, and yet he still bicycles into town, he tutors this kid, he’s friends with the librarian. People who knew him kind of liked him; they thought he was a little odd but was a nice guy. Digging into that paradox, there is this kind of fantasy life. He’s sort of trapped in these choices. There is one path he could have taken, that he wants to take, which is about connecting with other people, and yet somehow he is unable to connect with others. There’s this feeling that if he had one real human connection in his life, he could have been saved, but somehow, because of circumstance, because of what happened to him, and because of his own inner flaws, he was never able to find that thing, that love that could have saved him.

Yaitanes: From prison, he was sending practice problems to the character we based Timmy on. That’s not something that we invented. What made him be able to do that? That interested me, [but] Andrew really connected to that. I would always be the counterpoint to that. I was like, “Dude, the guy killed people,” and he would be like, “Yeah, I know but…” People just don’t fall in a clear-cut category. Nowhere in any of my education or research is anything clean cut, is anybody just simply a monster, all good or all bad.  I was a Judaic studies minor focusing on the Holocaust and the psychology of the Nazi doctors’ ability to double their personalities, to be able to go home to their wife and kids and then be able to kill children the next day. What did it take, and what did it do to those kind of people? I wanted to present that complexity and how Ted lived his life. I had to put my own personal feelings aside.

(Photo: Discovery)

Sodroski: With Ted’s fantasy family, we wrote the skeleton of it on the page, but to see what happens when you put Paul and a two-year-old in the cabin, and when you put Paul and Timmy together in the garden, I didn’t expect that to be as emotional as it is, either on the day that we were shooting it or on the screen. When the kids were introduced into the cabin, it was heaven for them because there’s nothing digital — there are instruments and books and tools and trees. Our DP [director of photography], Zack Galler, shot that stuff in this beautiful, beautiful way. It really was like watching it onscreen, where you have seen Paul alone in his cabin for so long and then suddenly, you’re watching this totally other person living this beautiful life. Then as soon as that was over, the kids were released and we were back to him building bombs in the cabin.

(Photo: Discovery)

Yaitanes: I’m a huge Terrence Malick fan, and if this show is All the President’s Men, then Episode 6 is kind of like a Malick film dropped into the middle of it. To shoot something with that kind of poetry of an imagined future was really, truly some of my favorite stuff that I shot. It looked exactly how I wanted it to look. I’m showing you what he longed for. He didn’t long for it through the filter of a monster; he didn’t see himself that way. The beauty of that [dream] was important to represent. I tried to be honest in everything that the research spoke about and tried to really put myself in his point of view and show that he was conflicted. … Something like at the end: it was scripted that we revisited these images [of young Ted and Harvard Ted], but it wasn’t as specific as they were all staring at the camera, taking inventory of each other.

Bettany: We figured that out on the morning of shooting it. That was Greg and I in a room before the crew showed up, and it was really special.

(Photo: Discovery)

Yaitanes: We worked out that flow so that it geographically made sense. Ted’s in bed, and he’s imagining himself sitting [with the baby] and looking down on the floor. The floor is the grass [where young Ted is lying, and he turns and becomes Harvard Ted, who looks back at adult Ted in bed]. That little circle is my favorite moment. It was about three months between when I did that with Paul and when I finished it. I went back to those images I took of Paul on my iPhone and showed them to the young Ted actors. That was something that was born out of, “Hey, what if we try this?”

I know a lot of directors that over-prepare, and because of the tight prep on this series that we had, there just was not that opportunity to do that, so you all have to depend on each other creatively to take you through the day. That ended up making it an incredibly collaborative experience in Episode 6. We would always start the day just walking through the journey of that character that day so that everything felt lived in.  “Ted spent an enormous amount of time in the library. Where does he like to sit? How does he help?” These are all things that just had to feel like he’s done them a million times. I could have watched hours of Paul doing Ted stuff. The original cut of this episode was an hour and a half. I just couldn’t get enough of what Paul was doing.

Sodroski: The thing about Paul — he is so present and so interested in the details of that life. He would ask things like, “Which end of the bed was Ted’s head on when he slept? Was there a mattress? Where did he keep the carrots? What did he eat for breakfast when he woke up in the morning?” You could see the more time he spent in the cabin, the more it felt like his home in this amazing way. Between takes, he would go into the cabin and he would close the doors. It was like he was inhabiting that role and inhabiting that space in a way that allowed those moments to really come to life because he was experiencing this stuff as a person who doesn’t interact with anybody.

Did Bettany meet the actors who played young Ted while filming?

Bettany: I did a lot of taping of stuff for them, so they could listen to how my voice was, but I didn’t meet them in person. I thought they did such a great job. The pair of them were really moving.

Yaitanes: Paul had, on his own, recorded all of John’s lines [for Harvard Ted] just so he could hear the dialect, so that it would line up.  That wasn’t something I asked for; that was something that he did unsolicited. Paul is also a director and understands about the bigger good. I find that actors who have directed are even more collaborative because they’ve been there and they know their instinct as a director is to want to help people through things. It just re-frames your whole way of thinking.

Young Ted [Grady Port] really shouldn’t be dismissed in the process, because his work was so beautiful and so hard being a kid and acting  [those difficult scenes]. And Harvard Ted [John Berchtold] did the heavy-lifting. I wanted to make sure that he had another presence in there, so casting someone of heft like Brian [d’Arcy James] for Murray was also crucial. The end of that montage of his with Murray — those were entire scenes to be shot so we could extract a piece that we wanted. John came in off-book with 10 pages of monologues in one day that were perfect. It was unbelievable.

Manhunt: Unabomber airs Tuesdays at 10 p.m. on Discovery.

Read more from Yahoo TV: ‘Manhunt: Unabomber’: How Mark Duplass portrayed Ted Kaczynski’s brother How Jane Lynch researched Janet Reno for ‘Manhunt: Unabomber’ ‘Manhunt: Unabomber’: How Paul Bettany got inside Ted Kaczynski’s mind ‘Manhunt: Unabomber’: Sam Worthington on giving FBI profiler Jim Fitzgerald his due

#_revsp:wp.yahoo.tv.us #manhunt #Andrew Sodroski #discovery #_author:Mandi Bierly #Greg Yaitanes #manhunt unabomber #paul bettany #_uuid:4a71e189-a17d-3a42-b81b-98cfdf1fdaee #_lmsid:a0Vd000000AE7lXEAT #interviews

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dailyaudiobible · 7 years ago

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11/3/2017 DAB Transcript

Ezekiel 7:1-9:11; Hebrews 5:1-14; Psalms 105:1-15; Proverbs 26:28

Today is the third day of November. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. It's great to be here with you today as we dive in and take the next step forward through the Scriptures this year. And this week we’re reading from the Good News translation. And, so, for our Old Testament reading, Ezekiel chapter 7 verse 1 through 9:11.

Commentary:

Alright. So, the portion of the Proverbs that we are in right now is speaking directly to the kinds of things that come out of our mouth. And, of course, before something ever comes out of our mouth, it bubbles up from within our heart and filters through our mind and is formed into words and then we use, of course, our facial muscles and tongue to say those words. And we should become aware of the things that are forming in our heads that we’re about to say because, you know, when something comes bubbling out of our heart and filters through our mind, there's still time. There’s still time to invite the Holy Spirit before we actually say the thing. So, for example, we talked about insincere talk the other day with the clay pot that's of substandard quality but varnished to look like it's valuable and the proverb equated that to insincere talk. Today the proverb tells us, look, insincere talk brings nothing but ruin. So, as one of the things of my father, that he would say to me, that has actually stuck, and, you know, I have been without my dad for 15 years now, but one of the things that he would counsel me on is, son nothing good can come from that - whatever that was. Today, it's insincerity. Insincere talk brings nothing but ruin, the Bible says. So, nothing good can come from that. But the proverb starts, you have to hate someone to want to hurt them with lies. So, have you ever been lied to or lied about and then became aware of it and it wasn't true, it was a lie and you were deeply hurt by it? Or maybe you've hurt someone that way? Maybe you’ve told things that are not true, spread things that are not true, and hurt someone deeply? According to the Scripture that comes from a place of hatred. So, remember when we were talking about things bubbling up in our heart and then filtering through our mind and then we speak them with our mouth. Well, that thing that was bubbling up in your heart before it was formed into words was hate and nothing good can come from that. The chaos and confusion that you may cause by that may feel like revenge or justice to you, but nothing good can come from that. Only ruin can come from that, according to the proverb. And, so, once again the Scriptures become the mirror that we have to face ourselves in. And once again the Bible penetrates deep, like we were talking about yesterday in the book of Hebrews, to the place where soul and spirit meet. If hatred is there and insincerity is there, in other words, falseness is there, then nothing good is going to come from it. And here is an example of the Scriptures reaching us at that level and challenging us, that we are new creations. This stuff does not have to linger anymore and be a part of our story anymore. And as old as the Proverbs are they still speak prophetically into our lives because this is the rhythm of the Scripture. How many times have we read through prophets who have been instructed by God to go warn people? Nothing good is going to come from what you are doing. It is only going to lead you to destruction and loss. It is only going to be bad. Come back. Return to me. Come home. This doesn't have to happen. Our words work the same way. They bring about the same kind of destinies. And if we are harboring hatred and hurt people with lies and our insincere and false. Well then, there’s our warning straight out of the Bible today. It’s not going to go well. Turn back, come home, invite the Holy Spirit back into a leadership position in your life because it doesn't have to go this way unless you want it to.

Prayer:

Father, we don't want to live our lives piling up things that amount to nothing but ruin. We want our lives to matter. We want to reflect Your glory in this world, but we all have our own injuries and wounds, our own histories. And, so, we invite You into those places that are so deeply hurt that we would strike back with insincerity and lies and hatred in the places that we think there's injustice toward us. And yet You are telling us through Your word, perpetuating that, passing it forward, is going to bring nothing but ruin. And, so, we give You control over our minds, our spirits, our identities and our tongues. And we ask, Holy Spirit, that You would come into those places that are broken and that we would yield to You before we say something that nothing good can come from. Come Holy Spirit. We pray. In Jesus’ name, we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website. It’s home base. It’s where you find out what's going on around here. So, be sure to check it out.

So, there's always plenty going on around. So, check it out. Looking at the calendar, the 19th of November will be our next date out on the road. And we will be in the Shreveport Louisiana area bringing the Sneezing Jesus message at River Valley church, which is in Bossier City, Louisiana. So, if you are in the South, come say hello, love to see you. And you can get all the details: maps, times, websites, phone numbers, all that kind of stuff dailyaudiobible.com.

If you want to partner with the daily audio Bible, you can do that dailyaudiobible.com. There is a link on the website on the homepage. Thank you for your partnership. If you are using the app you can press the More button in the lower right-hand corner or if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And as always, if you have a prayer request or comment 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

And that's it for today. I'm Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayers and Praise Reports:

Hello Daily Audio Bible. This is Joe The Protector from Georgia. It’s October 30th at 7:50 in the morning. I just got finished listening to the podcast and the prayer at the end and I just want to lift up our sister Candice from Oregon. Candice from Oregon, I just want to encourage you and lift you up and when I heard you on today’s podcast it just gave me a new Spirit, like I believe you have. You’ve got a fresh new Spirit and it gave me something when I heard you singing and I just want to lift that up and lift that up to Jesus and thank Him for giving you courage through this time. And just know that you are loved. Alright. Love you all. Bye.

Hello DABber friends. This is Amanda from Virginia. I wanted to call in out of encouragement and sharing for Jacqueline from Texas. Oh, sweetheart, I have been where you are. I am on the other side of that and it was the hardest, darkest era of my life, but I can tell you that there is hope in Jesus. You are so doing the right thing by just engulfing yourself in the word because, think of it like your shelter, my husband did the exact same thing. I have 5 very small children and over a year ago he became angry and withdrawn and cynical and he is saved as well but he went to the darkest place I had ever seen. He got a girlfriend, which happened to be one of my good friends, and ended up sleeping with her for 8 months. It was just insane. And I cannot tell you the level grieving and depth of confusion and hurt and betrayal from the whole thing. But I’m telling you honey, this is an attack. It’s an attack on your family. It’s an attack on your husband and it’s an attack on you. Surround yourself like armor, with the word of God, with music that is just speaking life, and surround yourself with people that are seeking and praying for you. One of the best things that I did that changed everything was to pray for my husband. I actually had an alarm on my phone. So, it was three times a day. I actually called it my battle prayer because I felt like I was going to battle for my husband…for…

Hey everyone. This is Tony the painter. I just want to say a big thank you to everybody who replied to me on the prayer wall, especially to Brian and Jill but especially, especially, especially, especially to Jill. The words that you wrote were…yeah…just lovely. Thank you so much. Things are pretty bad. My marriage is dying or dead and guys…I just…being 4000 miles away from your spouse for like 10 months now is painful. I just want you to know I am praying for. I’m praying for the Global Campfire and the new app and…yeah…I just love you guys so much. God bless you all. Bye-bye.

Hi Daily Audio Bible, this is Paul from Houston and I was calling regarding response to the lady that didn’t give her name from September 16. I know, I'm a little behind, I’m trying to catch up. But she was mentioning, she was asking prayer for her husband who had a bipolar condition and had been speaking a lot of negativity and threatening different things and going with different episodes and I just want to pray that there would be peace in the house and I thank You Lord that Your Holy Spirit will dwell there. And I ask Lord that the Spirit of control or this bipolar condition would be addressed and I ask Lord that this husband would seek out that help that he needs and I thank You Lord that he’d be open to that and I ask Lord that your Holy Spirit to work there so that there will be a softening of hearts and a softening of countenance and I ask Lord that you would just be with them and be with this family Lord and I ask Lord for peace and Lord I pray that people would not be affected by these words for they realize that these words are not from God but there from the enemy. And I thank you Lord that you realize that the enemy tries to throw darts at You and that he have put Your shield up, put Your armor on, and be ready for that battle. And I just thank You Lord that You would bless and You prosper this family Lord and that You would be with them and I ask for Your peace and Your protection and Your Holy Spirit to guard this family. In Jesus’ name. I just thank You Lord for that. And thank you guys. Anyways, thank you for praying for Houston. We’re still recovering. There's a lot of folks still having difficulty getting contractors and…

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criminalmindscastandquotes · 8 years ago

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Criminal Minds Opening and closing Quotes: Season 6

Season 6 Episode 1 The Longest Night

JJ: “A family is a place where minds come in contact with one another. If these minds love one another, the home will be as beautiful as a flower garden. But if these minds get out of harmony with one other it is like a storm that plays havoc with the garden.” The Buddha.

Season 6 Episode 2 JJ

JJ: Jean Racine said, “A tragedy need not have blood and death; it’s enough that it all be filled with that majestic sadness that is the pleasure of tragedy.”

Season 6 Episode 3 Remembrance of Things Past

Rossi: Marcel Proust wrote, “Remembrance of things past is not necessarily the remembrance of things as they were.”

Rossi: Mark Twain wrote, “When I was younger, I could remember anything, whether it had happened or not. But my faculties are decaying now, and soon I shall be so that I cannot remember any but the things that never happened. It is sad to go to pieces like this, but we all have to do it.”

Season 6 Episode 4 Compromising Positions

Prentiss: “We all wear masks, and the times comes when we cannot remove them without removing our own skin.” Andre Berthiaume

Garcia: Abraham Lincoln said, “Whatever you are, be a good one.”

Season 6 Episode 5 Safe Haven

Morgan: “All humanity is one undivided and indivisible family. I cannot detach myself from the wickedest soul.” Mahatma Gandhi.

Morgan: “But I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep, and miles to go before I sleep.” Robert Frost.

Season 6 Episode 6 Devil’s Night

Hotchner: Niccolo Machiavelli wrote, “If an injury has to be done to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared.”

Hotchner: Thomas Kempis wrote, “Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of its trouble, attempts what is above its strength, pleads no excuse of impossibility; for it thinks all things lawful for itself, and all things possible.”

Season 6 Episode 7 Middle Man

Hotchner: “Without heroes, we are all plain people and don’t know how far we can go.” Bernard Malamud

Hotchner: “The herd seek out the great, not for their sake but for their influence; and the great welcome them out of vanity or need.” Napoleon Bonaparte

Season 6 Episode 8 Reflection of Desire

Garcia: “Fame will go by and, so long, I’ve had you, fame. If it goes by, I’ve always known it was fickle. So at least it’s something I experience, but that’s not where I live.” Marilyn Monroe

Garcia: I believe humanity was born from conflict. Maybe that’s why in all of us lives a dark side. Some of us embrace it. Some have no choice. The rest of us fight it. In the end, it’s as natural as the air we breathe. At some point, we’re forced to face the truth. Ourselves.

Season 6 Episode 9 Into the Woods

Morgan: Ralph Ellison said, “I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me.”

Hotchner: Elise Cabot said, “Evil endures a moment’s flush, and then leaves but a burnt out shell.”

Season 6 Episode 10 What Happens at Home

Hotchner: “When we were children, we used to think that when we grew up we would no longer be vulnerable. But to grow up is to accept vulnerability… to be alive is to be vulnerable.” Writer Madeleine L’Engle

Rossi: “Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they judge them; sometimes they forgive them.” Writer Oscar Wilde

Season 6 Episode 11 25 to Life

Morgan: “There is no such thing as part freedom.” Nelson Mandela

Morgan: “All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered. The point is to discover them.” Galileo

Season 6 Episode 12 Corazón

Reid: “No man chooses evil because it is evil; he only mistakes it for happiness, the good he seeks.” Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley.

Reid: “The best and most beautiful things in life cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart.” Helen Keller.

Season 6 Episode 13 The Thirteenth Step

Prentiss: Friedrich Nietzsche wrote, “What really raises one’s indignation against suffering is not suffering intrinsically, but the senselessness of suffering.”

Prentiss: William Glasser wrote, “What happened in the past that was painful has a great deal to do with what we are today.”

Season 6 Episode 14 Sense Memory

Morgan: “Hunting is not a sport. In a sport, both sides should know they are in the game.” Comedian Paul Rodriguez.

Prentiss: “Nothing revives the past so completely as a smell that was once associated with it.” Novelist Vladimir Nabokov.

Season 6 Episode 15 Today I Do

Prentiss: “There’s no chance, no destiny, no fate, that can circumvent or hinder or control the firm resolve of a determined soul.” Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Rossi: “It’s hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head.” Sally Kempton

Season 6 Episode 16 Coda

Reid: “Tomorrow, you promise yourself, will be different, but tomorrow is too often a repetition of today.” Author James T. Mccay

Ian Doyle: Honore de Balzac once said, “Most people of action are inclined to fatalism, and most of thought believe in providence.” Tell me, Emily Prentiss, which do you think you’re gonna be?

Season 6 Episode 17 Valhalla

Prentiss: Lao Tzu said, “When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.”

Prentiss: Journalist Dorothea Dix wrote, “Confession is always weakness. The grave soul keeps its own secrets, and takes its own punishment in silence.”

Season 6 Episode 18 Lauren

JJ: Psychoanalyst Walter Langer wrote, “People will believe a big lie sooner than a little one, and if you repeat it frequently enough, people will sooner or later believe it.”

Prentiss: “The secret to getting away with lying is believing with all your heart. That goes for lying to yourself, even moreso than lying to another.” Author Elizabeth Bear.

Season 6 Episode 19 With Friends Like These…

Reid: Lizette Reese said, “The old faiths light their candles all about, but burly truth comes by and puts them out.”

Morgan: Siddhartha Buddha said, “It is not his enemy or foe that lures him to evil ways.”

Season 6 Episode 20 Hanley Waters

Morgan: Poet Antonio Porchia wrote, “Man, when he does not grieve, hardly exists.”

Season 6 Episode 21 The Stranger

Seaver: “Every journey into the past is complicated by delusions, false memories, false naming of real events.” Adrienne Rich

Hotchner: “Sometimes human places create inhuman monsters.” Stephen King.

Season 6 Episode 22 Out of the Light

Rossi: Agathon said, “Of this alone, even God is deprived, the power of making things that are past never to have been.”

Hotchner: Doménico Cieri Estrada wrote, “Bring the past only if you’re going to build from it.”

Season 6 Episode 23 Big Sea

Rossi: “The sea has never been friendly to man. At most, it has been the accomplice of human restlessness.” Joseph Conrad

Morgan: “We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch, we are going back from whence we came.” John F. Kennedy

Season 6 Episode 24 Supply & Demand

Hotchner: Thomas Hardy said, “And yet to every bad there’s a worse.”

Rossi: “What lies in our power to do, lies in our power not to do.” Aristotle.

#Criminal Minds #aaron hotchner #jason gideon #derek morgan #david rossi #elle greenaway #emily prentiss #Penelope Garcia #dr spencer reid #Jennifer Jareau #quotes #famous #popular #enlightening #inspirational #inspiration

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movietvtechgeeks · 7 years ago

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Latest story from https://movietvtechgeeks.com/read-james-comey-senate-intelligence-hearing-full-transcript/

READ: James Comey Senate Intelligence Hearing Full Transcript

Whether you watched it or not, you more than likely heard about former FBI Director James Comey's testimony in front of the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday. He quickly refuted many of President Donald Trump's claims. Senator John McCain certainly brought much attention on himself with his strange line of questioning that he later blamed on not getting enough sleep. Below is the full transcript of James Comey questions and answers. SEN. RICHARD BURR: I call this hearing to order. Director Comey, I appreciate your willingness to appear before the committee today, and more importantly I thank you for your dedicated service and leadership to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Your appearance today speaks to the trust we have built over the years and I'm looking forward to a very open and candid discussion today. I'd like to remind my colleagues that we will reconvene in closed session at 1:00 P.M. today, and I ask that you reserve for that venue any questions that might get into classified information. The director has been very gracious with his time, the vice chairman and I worked out a very specific timeline for his commitment to be on the hill, so we will do everything we can to meet that agreement. The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence exists to certify for the other 85 members of the United States Senate and the American people that the intelligence community is operating lawfully, and has the necessary authorities and tools to accomplish its mission, and keep America safe. Part of our mission, beyond the oversight we continue to provide to the intelligence community and its activities, is to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. elections. The committee's work continues. This hearing represents part of that effort. Jim, allegations have been swirling in the press for the last several weeks and today is your opportunity to set the record straight. Yesterday, I read with interest your statement for the record, and I think it provides some helpful details surrounding your interactions with the president. It clearly lays out your understanding of those discussions, actions you took following each conversation and your state of mind. I very much appreciate your candor, and I think it provides helpful details surrounding your interactions with the president. It clearly lays out your understanding of those discussions, actions you took following each conversation and your state of mind. I very much appreciate your candor, and I think it's helpful as we work through to determine the ultimate truth behind possible Russian interference in the 2016 elections. Your statement also provides texture and context to your interactions with the president, from your vantage point, and outlines a strained relationship. The American people need to hear your side of the story, just as they need to hear the president's descriptions of events. These interactions also highlight the importance of the committee's ongoing investigation. Our experienced staff is interviewing all relevant parties and some of the most sensitive intelligence in our country's possession. We will establish the facts separate from rampant speculation and lay them out for the American people to make their own judgment. Only then will we as a nation be able to move forward and to put this episode to rest. There are several outstanding issues not addressed in your statement that I hope you'll clear up for the American people today. Did the president's request for loyalty, your impression, let the one-on-one dinner of January 27th was and I quote “at least in part” an effort to create some patronage relationship and March 30th phone call asking what you could do to lift the cloud of Russia investigation in any way alter your approach of the FBI's investigation into general Flynn or the broader investigation into Russia, and possible links to the campaign? In your opinion did potential Russian efforts to establish a link with individuals in the Trump orbit rise to the level we could define as collusion or was it a counter-intelligence concern? There's been a significant public speculation about your decision-making related to the Clinton email investigation. Why did you decide publicly, to publicly announce, FBI's recommendations that the Department of Justice not pursue criminal charges? You have described it as a choice between a bad decision and a worse decision. The American people need to understand the facts behind your action. This committee is uniquely suited to investigate Russia's interference in the 2016 elections. We also have a unified bipartisan approach to what is a highly charged partisan issue. Russian activities during 2016 election may have been aimed at one party's candidate, but as my colleague senator Rubio says frequently, in 2018 and 2020, it could be aimed at anyone, at home or abroad. My colleague, Senator Warner and I, have worked to stay in lock step on this investigation. We've had our differences on approach, at times, but I've constantly stressed that we need to be a team, and I think Senator Warner agrees with me. We must keep these questions above politics and partisanship. It's too important to be tainted by anyone trying to score political points. With that, again, I welcome you director, and I turn to the vice chairman for any comments he might have. SEN. MARK WARNER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman and let me start by again absolutely thanking all the members of the committee for the seriousness in which they've taken on this task. Mr. Comey, thank you for agreeing to come testify as part of this committee's investigation into Russia. I realize this hearing has been obviously the focus of a lot of Washington, in the last few days. But the truth is, many Americans who may be tuning in today probably haven't focused on every twist and turn of the investigation. So I'd like to briefly describe, at least from this senator's standpoint, what we already know, and what we're still investigating. To be clear, this investigation is not about relitigating the election. It's not about who won or lost. And it sure as heck is not about Democrats versus Republicans. We are here because a foreign adversary attacked us right here at home, plain and simple. Not by guns or missiles, but by foreign operatives seeking to hijack our most important democratic process, our presidential election. Russian spies engaged in a series of online cyber raids, and a broad campaign of disinformation, all ultimately aimed at sowing chaos to undermine public faith in our process, in our leadership, and ultimately in ourselves. And that's not just this senator's opinion. It is the unanimous determination of the entire U.S. intelligence community. So we must find out the full story, what the Russians did, and candidly as some other colleagues mentioned, why they were so successful, and more importantly we must determine the necessary steps to take to protect our democracy and ensure they can't do it again. The chairman mentioned elections in 2018 and 2020, in my home state of Virginia, we have elections this year in 2017. Simply put, we cannot let anything or anyone prevent us from getting to the bottom of this. Now Mr. Comey, let me say at the outset, we haven't always agreed on every issue. In fact I've occasionally questioned some of the actions you've taken, but I've never had any reason to question your integrity, your expertise, or your intelligence. You've been a straight shooter with this committee and have been willing to speak truth to power, even at the risk of your own career, which makes the way in which you were fired by the president ultimately shocking. Recall we began this entire process with the president and his staff first denying that the Russians were ever involved and then falsely claiming that no one from his team was ever in touch with any Russians. We know that's just not the truth. Numerous Trump associates had undisclosed contacts with Russians before and after the election, including the president's attorney general, his former national security adviser and his current senior adviser, Mr. Kushner. That doesn't even begin to count the host of additional campaign associates and advisers who have also been caught up in this massive web. We saw Mr. Trump's campaign manager, Mr. Manafort, forced to step down over ties to Russian back entities. The national security adviser, General Flynn, had to resign over his lies about engagements with the Russians, and we saw the candidate himself express an odd and unexplained affection for the Russian dictator while calling for the hacking of his opponent. There's a lot to investigate. Enough, in fact, that director Comey publicly acknowledged that he was leading an investigation into those links between Mr. Trump's campaign and the Russian government. As the director of the FBI, Mr. Comey was ultimately responsible for conducting that investigation, which might explain why you're sitting now as a private citizen. What we do know was at the same time that this investigation was proceeding, the president himself appears to have been engaged in an effort to influence or at least co-opt the director of the FBI. The testimony Mr. Comey submitted for today's hearing is very disturbing. For example, on January 27th, after summoning Director Comey to dinner, the president appears to have threatened director's job while telling him "I need loyalty. I expect loyalty." At a later meeting, on February 14th, the president asked the attorney general to leave the Oval Office, so that he could privately ask Director Comey again "To see way clear to letting Flynn go." That is a statement that Director Comey interpreted as a request that he drop the investigation connected to general Flynn's false statements. Think about it. The president of the United States asking the FBI Director to drop an ongoing investigation. And after that, the president called the FBI Director on two additional occasions, March 30th and April 11th and asked him again "To lift the cloud on the Russian investigation." Now, Director Comey denied each of these improper requests. The loyalty pledge, the admonition to drop the Flynn investigation, the request to lift the cloud on the Russian investigation. Of course, after his refusals, Director Comey was fired. The initial explanation for the firing didn't pass any smell test. So now Director Comey was fired because he didn't treat Hillary Clinton appropriately. Of course that explanation lasted about a day, because the president himself then made very clear that he was thinking about Russia when he decided to fire Director Comey. Shockingly, reports suggest that the president admitted as much in an Oval Office meeting with the Russians the day after director Comey was fired. Disparaging our country's top law enforcement official as a “nutjob,” the president allegedly suggested that his firing relieved great pressure on his feelings about Russia. This is not happening in isolation. At the same time, the president was engaged in these efforts with Director Comey, he was also at least allegedly asking senior leaders of the intelligence community to downplay the Russia investigation or to intervene with the director. Yesterday we had DNI Director Coats and NSA Director Admiral Rogers, who were offered a number of opportunities to flatly deny those press reports. They expressed their opinions, but they did not take that opportunity to deny those reports. They did not take advantage of that opportunity. My belief, that's not how the President of the United States should behave. Regardless of the outcome of our investigation into the Russia links, Director Comey's firing and his testimony raise separate and troubling questions that we must get to the bottom of. Again, as I said at the outset, I've seen firsthand how seriously every member of this committee is taking his work. I'm proud of the committee's efforts so far. Let me be clear. This is not a witch hunt. This is not fake news. It is an effort to protect our I can from a new threat that quite honestly will not go away any time soon. So Mr. Comey, your testimony here today will help us move towards that goal. I look forward to that testimony. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. BURR: Thank you, vice chairman. Director has discussed when you agreed to appear before the committee it would be under oath. I'd ask you to please stand. Raise your right hand. Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you god? FORMER FBI DIRECTOR JAMES COMEY: I do. BURR: Please be seated. Director Comey you're now under oath. And I would just note to members, you will be recognized by seniority for a period up to seven minutes, and again, it is the intent to move to a closed session no later than 1:00 P.M. With that director Comey, you are recognized, you have the floor for as long as you might need. COMEY: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, ranking member Warner, members of the committee, thank you for inviting me here to testify today. I've submitted my statement for the record, and I'm not going to repeat it here this morning. I thought I would just offer some very brief introductory remarks and I would welcome your questions. When I was appointed FBI Director in 2013, I understood that I served at the pleasure of the president. Even though I was appointed to a 10-year term, which Congress created in order to underscore the importance of the FBI being outside of politics and independent, I understood that I could be fired by a president for any reason or for no reason at all. And on May the ninth, when I learned that I had been fired, for that reason I immediately came home as a private citizen. But then the explanations, the shifting explanations, confused me and increasingly concerned me. They confused me because the president and I had had multiple conversations about my job, both before and after he took office, and he had repeatedly told me I was doing a great job, and he hoped I would stay. And I had repeatedly assured him that I did intend to stay and serve out the years of my term. He told me repeatedly that he had talked to lots of people about me, including our current Attorney General, and had learned that I was doing a great job, and that I was extremely well-liked by the FBI workforce. So it confused me when I saw on television the president saying that he actually fired me because of the Russia investigation, and learned again from the media that he was telling privately other parties that my firing had relieved great pressure on the Russian investigation. I was also confused by the initial explanation that was offered publicly that I was fired because of the decisions I had made during the election year. That didn't make sense to me for a whole bunch of reasons, including the time and all the water that had gone under the bridge since those hard decisions that had to be made. That didn't make any sense to me. And although the law required no reason at all to fire an FBI director, the administration then chose to defame me and more importantly the FBI by saying that the organization was in disarray, that it was poorly led, that the workforce had lost confidence in its leader. Those were lies, plain and simple. And I am so sorry that the FBI workforce had to hear them, and I'm so sorry that the American people were told them. I worked every day at the FBI to help make that great organization better, and I say help, because I did nothing alone at the FBI. There no indispensable people at the FBI. The organization's great strength is that its values and abilities run deep and wide. The FBI will be fine without me. The FBI's mission will be relentlessly pursued by its people, and that mission is to protect the American people and uphold the constitution of the United States. I will deeply miss being part of that mission, but this organization and its mission will go on long beyond me and long beyond any particular administration. I have a message before I close for my former colleagues of the FBI but first I want the American people to know this truth. The FBI is honest. The FBI is strong. And the FBI is and always will be independent. And now to my former colleagues, if I may. I am so sorry that I didn't get the chance to say goodbye to you properly. It was the nor of my life to serve beside you, to be part of the FBI family, and I will miss it for the rest of my life. Thank you for standing watch. Thank you for doing so much good for this country. Do that good as long as ever you can. And senators, I look forward to your questions. BURR: Director, thank you for that testimony, both oral and the written testimony that you provided to the committee yesterday and made public to the American people. The chair would recognize himself first for 12 minutes, vice chair for 12 minutes, based upon the agreement we have. Director, did the special counsel's office review and/or edit your written testimony? COMEY: No. BURR: Do you have any doubt that Russia attempted to interfere in the 2016 elections? COMEY: None. BURR: Do you have any doubt that the Russian government was behind the intrusions in the D triple C systems and the subsequent leaks of that information? COMEY: No, no doubt. BURR: Do you have any doubt the Russian government was behind the cyber intrusion in the state voter files? COMEY: No. BURR: Are you confident that no votes cast in the 2016 presidential election were altered? COMEY: I'm confident. When I left as director I had seen no indication of that whatsoever. BURR: Director Comey, did the president at any time ask you to stop the FBI investigation into Russian involvement in the 2016 U.S. Elections? COMEY: Not to my understanding, no. BURR: Did any individual working for this administration, including the justice department, ask you to stop the Russian investigation? COMEY: No. BURR: Director, when the president requested that you, and I quote "Let Flynn go," General Flynn had an unreported contact with the Russians, which is an offense, and if press accounts are right, there might have been discrepancies between facts and his FBI testimony. In your estimation, was general Flynn at that time in serious legal jeopardy, and in addition to that, do you sense that the president was trying to obstruct justice or just seek for a way for Mike Flynn to save face, given that he had already been fired? COMEY: General Flynn at that point in time was in legal jeopardy. There was an open FBI criminal investigation of his statements in connection with the Russian contacts, and the contacts themselves, and so that was my assessment at the time. I don't think it's for me to say whether the conversation I had with the president was an effort to obstruct. I took it as a very disturbing thing, very concerning, but that's a conclusion I'm sure the special counsel will work towards to try and understand what the intention was there, and whether that's an offense. BURR: Director, is it possible that, as part of this FBI investigation, the FBI could find evidence of criminality that is not tied to the 2016 elections, possible collusion, or coordination with Russians? COMEY: Sure. BURR: So there could be something that fits a criminal aspect to this that doesn't have anything to do with the 2016 election cycle? COMEY: Correct, in any complex investigation, when you start turning over rocks, sometimes you find things that are unrelated to the primary investigation that are criminal in nature. BURR: Director, Comey, you have been criticized publicly for the decision to present your findings on the email investigation directly to the American people. Have you learned anything since that time that would have changed what you said or how you chose to inform the American people? COMEY: Honestly, no. It caused a whole lot of personal pain for me but as I look back, given what I knew at the time and even what I've learned since, I think it was the best way to try to protect the justice institution, including the FBI. BURR: In the public domain is this question of the “steel dossier,” a document that has been around out in for over a year. I'm not sure when the FBI first took possession of it, but the media had it before you had it and we had it. At the time of your departure from the FBI, was the FBI able to confirm any criminal allegations contained in the steel document? COMEY: Mr. Chairman, I don't think that's a question I can answer in an open setting because it goes into the details of the investigation. BURR: Director, the term we hear most often is collusion. When people are describing possible links between Americans and Russian government entities related to the interference in our election, would you say that it's Normal for foreign governments to reach out to members of an incoming administration? COMEY: Yes. BURR: At what point does the normal contact cross the line into an attempt to recruit agents or influence or spies? COMEY: Difficult to say in the abstract. It depends upon the context, whether there's an effort to keep it covert, what the nature of the request made of the American by the foreign government are. It's a judgment call based on a whole lot of facts. BURR: At what point would that recruitment become a counterintelligence threat to our country? COMEY: Again, difficult to answer in the abstract, but when a foreign power is using especially coercion, or some sort of pressure to try and co-opt an American, especially a government official, to act on its behalf, that's a serious concern to the FBI and at the heart of the FBI's counterintelligence mission. BURR: So if you've got a 36-page document of specific claims that are out there, the FBI would have to for counter intelligence reasons, try to verify anything that might be claimed in there, one, and probably first and foremost, is the counterintelligence concerns that we have about blackmail. Would that be an accurate statement? COMEY: Yes. If the FBI receives a credible allegation that there is some effort to co-opt, coerce, direct, employee covertly an American on behalf of the foreign power, that's the basis on which a counterintelligence investigation is opened. BURR: And when you read the dossier, what was your reaction, given that it was 100% directed at the president-elect? COMEY: Not a question I can answer in open setting, Mr. Chairman. BURR: Okay. When did you become aware of the cyber intrusion? COMEY: The first cyber — there was all kinds of cyber intrusions going on all the time. The first Russian-connected cyber intrusion I became aware of in the late summer of 2015. BURR: And in that time frame, there were more than the DNC and the D triple C that were targets? COMEY: Correct, a massive effort to target government and nongovernmental, near governmental agencies like nonprofits. BURR: What would be the estimate of how many entities out there the Russians specifically targeted in that time frame? COMEY: It's hundreds. I suppose it could be more than 1,000, but it's at least hundreds. BURR: When did you become aware that data had been exfiltrated? COMEY: I'm not sure exactly. I think either late '15 or early '16. BURR: And did you, the director of the FBI, have conversations with the last administration about the risk that this posed? COMEY: Yes. BURR: And share with us, if you will, what actions they took. COMEY: Well, the FBI had already undertaken an effort to notify all the victims, and that's what we consider the entities attacked as part of this massive spear-phishing campaign so we notified them in an effort to disrupt what might be ongoing, and then there was a series of continuing interactions with entities through the rest of '15 into '16, and then throughout '16, the administration was trying to decide how to respond to the intrusion activity that it saw. BURR: And the FBI in this case, unlike other cases that you might investigate, did you ever have access to the actual hardware that was hacked, or did you have to rely on a third party to provide you the day that that they had collected? COMEY: In the case of the DNC, and I believe the D triple C, but I'm sure the DNC, we did not have access to the devices themselves. We got relevant forensic information from a private party, a high class entity, that had done the work but we didn't get direct access. BURR: But no content. COMEY: Correct. BURR: Isn't content an important part of the forensics from a counter-intelligence standpoint? COMEY: It is but what was briefed to me by the people who were my folks at the time is that they had gotten the information from the private party that they needed to understand the intrusion by the spring of 2016. BURR: Let me go back if I can very briefly to the decision to publicly go out with your results on the email. Was your decision influenced by the attorney general's tarmac meeting with the former president, Bill Clinton? COMEY: Yes. In ultimately conclusive way that was the thing that capped it for me, that I had to do something separately to protect the credibility of the investigation, which meant both the FBI and the justice department. BURR: Were there other things that contributed to that, that you can describe in an open session? COMEY: There were other things that contributed to that. One significant item I can't but know the committee's been briefed on, there's been some public accounts of it which are nonsense but I understand the committee has been briefed on the classified facts. Probably the only other consideration that I guess I can talk about in open setting is that at one point the attorney general had directed me not to call it an investigation, but instead to call it a matter, which confused me and concerned me, but that was one of the bricks in the load that led me to conclude I have to step away from the department if we're to close this case credibly. BURR: Director, my last question, you're not only a seasoned prosecutor. You've led the FBI for years. You understand the investigative process. You've worked with this committee closely, and we're grateful to you, because I think we've mutually built trust in what your organization does, and what we do. Is there any doubt in your mind that this committee carry out its oversight role in the 2016 Russia involvement with the elections in parallel with the now special counsel set up? COMEY: No, no doubt. It can be done. Requires lots of conversations but Bob Mueller is one of the this country’s great, great pros and I'm sure you'll be able to work it out with him to run it in parallel. BURR: Thank you. I turn it over to the vice chairman. WARNER: Thank you, director Comey, again, for your service. Your comments to your FBI family, I know were heartfelt. Know that there are some in the administration who tried to smear your reputation. You had Acting Director McCabe in public testimony a few weeks back, and in public testimony yesterday reaffirm that the vast majority in FBI community had great trust in your leadership, and obviously trust in your integrity. I want to go through a number of the meetings that you referenced in your testimony, and let's start with the January 6th meeting in Trump Tower, where you went up with a series of officials to brief the President-elect on the Russia investigation. My understanding is you remained afterwards to brief him, on again, "Some personally sensitive aspects of the information you relayed." Now you said after that briefing you felt compelled to document that conversation that you actually started documenting it as soon as you got into the car. Now you've had extensive experience at the department of justice and at the FBI. You've worked under presidents of both parties. What was about that meeting that led you to determine that you needed to start putting down a written record? COMEY: A combination of things. I think the circumstances, the subject matter, and the person I was interacting with. Circumstances, first, I was alone with the president of the United States, or the president-elect, soon to be president. The subject matter I was talking about matters that touch on the FBI's core responsibility, and that relate to the president, president-elect personally, and then the nature of the person. I was honestly concerned he might lie about the nature of our meeting so I thought it important to document. That combination of things I had never experienced before, but had led me to believe I got to write it down and write it down in a very detailed way. WARNER: I think that's a very important statement you just made. Then, unlike your dealings with presidents of either parties in your past experience, in every subsequent meeting or conversation with this president, you created a written record. Did you feel that you needed to create this written record of these memos, because they might need to be relied on at some future date? COMEY: Sure. I created records after conversations that I think I did it after each of our nine conversations. If I didn't, I did it for nearly all of them especially the ones that were substantive. I knew there might come a day when I would need a record of what had happened, not just to defend myself, but to defend the FBI and our integrity as an institution and the Independence of our investigative function. That's what made this so difficult is it was a combination of circumstances, subject matter and the particular person. WARNER: And so in all your experience, this was the only president that you felt like in every meeting you needed to document because at some point, using your words, he might put out a non-truthful representation of that meeting. COMEY: That's right, senator. As I said, as FBI director I interacted with President Obama, I spoke only twice in three years, and didn't document it. When I was Deputy Attorney General I had a one one-on-one with President Bush been I sent an email to my staff but I didn't feel with president bush the need to document it in that I way. Again, because of the combination of those factors, just wasn't present with either President Bush or President Obama. WARNER: I think that is very significant. I think others will probably question that. Now, the chairman and I have requested those memos. It is our hope that the FBI will get this committee access to those memos so again, we can read that contemporaneous rendition so that we've got your side of the story. Now I know members have said and press have said that a great deal has been made whether the president asked and indicated whether the president was the subject of any investigation, and my understanding is prior to your meeting on January 6th, you discussed with your leadership team whether you should be prepared to assure then President-elect Trump that the FBI was not investigating him personally. Now, I understand that your leadership team, agreed with that but was that a unanimous decision? Was there any debate about that? COMEY: Wasn't unanimous. One of the members of the leadership team had a view you that although it was technically true we did not have a counter-intelligence file case open on then President-elect Trump. His concern was because we're looking at the potential, again, that's the subject of the investigation, coordination between the campaign and Russia, because it was President Trump, President-elect Trump's campaign, this person's view was inevitably his behavior, his conduct will fall within the scope of that work. And so he was reluctant to make the statement. I disagreed. I thought it was fair to say what was literally true. There was not a counterintelligence investigation of Mr. Trump, and I decided in the moment to say it, given the nature of our conversation. WARNER: At that moment in time, did you ever revisit that as in the subsequent sessions? COMEY: With the FBI leadership team? Sure. And the leader had that view that didn't change. His view was still that it was probably although literally true, his concern was it could be misleading, because the nature of the investigation was such that it might well touch, obviously it would touch, the campaign, and the person that headed the campaign would be the candidate, and so that was his view throughout. WARNER: Let me move to the January 27th dinner, where you said "The president began by asking me whether I wanted to stay on as FBI director.” He also indicated that “lots of people" again your words, "Wanted the job." You go on to say the dinner itself was "Seemingly an effort to" to quote have you ask him for your job and create some "patronage" relationship. The president seems from my reading of your memo to be holding your job or your possibility of continuing your job over your head in a fairly direct way. What was your impression, and what did you mean by this notion of a patronage relationship? COMEY: Well, my impression, and again it's my impression, I could always be wrong but my common sense told me what was going on is, either he had concluded or someone had told him that you didn't, you've already asked Comey to stay, and you didn't get anything for it. And that the dinner was an effort to build a relationship, in fact, he asked specifically, of loyalty in the context of asking me to stay. As I said, what was odd about that is we'd already talked twice about it by that point and he said I very much hope you'll stay. In fact, I just remembered sitting a third, when you've seen the. IC tour of me walking across the blue room, and what the president whispered in my ear was "I really look forward to working with you." So after those encounters — WARNER: That was a few days before your firing. COMEY: On the Sunday after the inauguration. The next Friday I have dinner and the president begins by wanting to talk about my job and so I'm sitting there thinking wait a minute three times we've already, you've already asked me to stay or talked about me staying. My common sense, again I could be wrong but my common sense told me what's going on here is, he's looking to get something in exchange for granting my request to stay in the job. WARNER: Again, we ail understand, I was a governor, I had people work for me but this constant requests and again quoting you, him saying that he, despite you explaining your independence, he said “I need loyalty, I expect loyalty.” Have you ever had any of those kind of requests before from anyone else you've worked for in the government? COMEY: No, and what made me uneasy at that point I'm the director of the FBI. The reason that Congress created a t10-year term is so that the director is not feeling as if they're serving at, with political loyalty owed to any particular person. The statue of justice has a blindfolds on. You're not supposed to peek out to see there your patron was please pleased with what you're doing. That's why I became FBI director to be in of that position. That's why I was uneasy. WARNER: February 14th, seems strange, you were in a meeting, and your direct superior the attorney general was in that meeting as well, yet the president asked everyone to leave, including the attorney general to leave, before he brought up the matter of general Flynn. What was your impression of that type of action? Have you ever seen anything like that before? COMEY: No. My impression was something big is about to happen. I need to remember every single word that is spoken, and again, I could be wrong, I'm 56 years old, I've been, seen a few things, my sense was the attorney general knew he shouldn't be leaving which was why he was leaving and I don't know Kushner well but I think he picked up on the same thing so I knew something was about to happen that I needed to pay very close attention to. WARNER: I found it very interesting that, that in the memo that you wrote after this February 14th pull-aside, you made clear that you wrote that memo in a way that was unclassified. If you affirmatively made the decision to write a memo that was unclassified, was that because you felt at some point, the facts of that meeting would have to come clean and come clear, and actually be able to be cleared in a way that could be shared with the American people? COMEY: Well, I remember thinking, this is a very disturbing development, really important to our work. I need to document it and preserve it in a way, and this committee gets this but sometimes when things are classified, it tangled them up. WARNER: Amen. COMEY: It's hard to share within an investigative team. You have to be careful how you handled it for good reason. If I write it such a way that doesn’t include anything of a classification, that would make it easier for to us discuss within the FBI and the government, and to hold onto it in a way that makes it accessible to us. WARNER: Well again it's our hope particularly since you are a pretty knowledgeable guy and wrote this in a way that it was unqualified this committee will get access that unclassified document. I this I it will be important to our investigation. Let me ask you this in closing. How many ongoing investigations at any time does the FBI have? COMEY: Tens of thousands. WARNER: Tens of thousands. Did the president ever ask about any other ongoing investigation? COMEY: No. WARNER: Did he ever ask about you trying to interfere on any other investigation? COMEY: No. WARNER: I think, again, this speaks volumes. This doesn't even get to the questions around the phone calls about lifting the cloud. I know other members will get to that, but I really appreciate your testimony, and appreciate your service to our nation. COMEY: Thank you, Senator Warner. I'm sitting here going through my contacts with him. I had one conversation with the president that was classified where he asked about our, an ongoing intelligence investigation, it was brief and entirely professional. WARNER: He didn't ask to you take any specific action? COMEY: No. WARNER: Unlike what we did vis-à-vis will Flynn and the Russia investigation? COMEY: Correct. WARNER: Thank you, sir. BURR: Senator Risch? SEN. JAMES RISCH: Thank you very much. Mr. Comey, thank you for your service. America needs more like you and we really appreciate it. Yesterday, I got and everybody got the seven pages of your direct testimony that is now a part of the record here. And the first — I read it, and then I read it again, and all I could think was number one, how much hated the class of legal writing when I was in law school, and you are the guy that probably got the A after reading this. I find it clear. I find it concise, and having been a prosecutor for a number of years and handling hundreds, maybe thousands of cases and read police reports, investigative reports, this is as good as it gets, and I really appreciate that. Not only the conciseness and the clearness of it, but also the fact that you have things that were written down contemporaneously when they happened, and you actually put them in quotes so we know exactly what happened and we're not getting some rendition of it that's in your mind. COMEY: Thank you, sir. RISCH: You're to be complimented. COMEY: I had great parents and great teachers who beat that into me. RISCH: That's obvious, sir. The chairman walked you through a number of things that the American people need to know and want to know. Number one, obviously, we all know about the active measures that the Russians have taken. I think a lot of people were surprised at this. Those of us that work in the intelligence community, it didn't come as a surprise, but now the American people know this, and it's good they know this, because this is serious and it's a problem. I think secondly, I gather from all this that you're willing to say now that, while you were director, the president of the United States was not under investigation. Is that a fair statement? COMEY: That's correct. RISCH: All right, so that's a fact that we are rely on? COMEY: Yes, sir. RISCH: I remember, you talked with us shortly after February 14th, when the "New York Times" wrote an article that suggested that the trump campaign was colluding with the Russians. Do you remember reading that article when it first came out? COMEY: I do, it was about allegedly extensive electronic surveillance in their communications. RISCH: Correct. That upset you to the point where you surveyed the intelligence community to see whether you were missing something in that. Is that correct? COMEY: That's correct. I want to be careful in open setting, but — RISCH: I'm not going to go any further than that, so thank you. In addition to that, after that, you sought out both Republican and Democrat senators to tell them that, hey, I don't know where this is coming from, but this is not the case. This is not factual. Do you recall that? COMEY: Yes. RISCH: Okay. So again, so the American people can understand this, that report by the New York Times was not true. Is that a fair statement? COMEY: In the main, it was not true. And again, all of you know this. Maybe the American people don't. The challenge, and I'm not picking on reporters about writing stories about classified information, is the people talking about it often don't really know what's going on, and going on are not talking about it. We don't call the press to say, hey, you don't that thing wrong about the sensitive topic. We have to leave it there. I mentioned to the chairman the nonsense around what influenced me to make the July 5th statement. Nonsense. But I can't go explaining how it is nonsense. RISCH: Thank you. All right. So those three things we now know regarding the active measures, whether the president is under investigation and the collusion between the trump campaign and the Russians. I want to drill right down, as my time is limited, to the most recent dust up regarding allegations that the president of the United States obstructed justice. Boy, you nailed this down on page 5, paragraph 3. You put this in quotes. Words matter. You wrote down the words so we can all have the words in front of us now. There's 28 words now in quotes. It says, quote, I hope -- this is the president speaking — I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go. He is good guy. I hope you can let this go. Now, those are his exact words, is that correct. COMEY: Correct. RISCH: You wrote them here and put them in quotes. COMEY: Correct. RISCH: Thank you for that. He did not direct you to let it go? COMEY: Not in his words, no. RISCH: He did not order you to let it go? COMEY: Again, those words are not an order. RISCH: He said, I hope. Now, like me, you probably did hundreds of cases, maybe thousands of cases, charging people with criminal offenses and, of course, you have knowledge of the thousands of cases out there where people have been charged. Do you know of any case where a person has been charged for obstruction of justice or, for that matter, any other criminal offense, where they said or thought they hoped for an outcome? COMEY: I don't know well enough to answer. The reason I keep saying his words is I took it as a direction. RISCH: Right. COMEY: I mean, this is a president of the United States with me alone saying I hope this. I took it as, this is what he wants me to do. I didn't obey that, but that's the way I took it. RISCH: You may have taken it as a direction but that's not what he said. COMEY: Correct. RISCH: He said, I hope. COMEY: Those are his exact words, correct. RISCH: You don't know of anyone ever being charged for hoping something, is that a fair statement? COMEY: I don't as I sit here. RISCH: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. BURR: Senator Feinstein? SEN. DIANNE FEINSTEIN: Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Comey, I just want you to know that I have great respect for you. Senator Cornyn and I sit on the judiciary committee and we have the occasion to have you before us. You're a man of strength and I regret the situations we all find ourselves in. I just want to say that. Let me begin with one overarching question. Why do you believe you were fired? COMEY: I guess I don't know for sure. I believe — I think the president, at his word, that I was fired because of the Russia investigation. Something about the way I was conducting it, the president felt created pressure on him that he wanted to relieve. Again, I didn't know that at the time. I watched his interview. I read the press accounts of his conversations. I take him at his word there. Look, I could be wrong. Maybe he's saying something that's not true. I take him at his word, at least based on what I know now. FEINSTEIN: Talk for a moment about his request that you pledge loyalty and your response to that and what impact you believe that had. COMEY: I don't know for sure because I don't know the president well enough to read him well. I think it was — first of all, relationship didn't get off to a great start, given the conversation I had to have on January 6th. This didn't improve the relationship because it was very, very awkward. He was asking for something, and I was refusing to give it. Again, I don't know him well enough to know how he reacted to that exactly. FEINSTEIN: Do you believe the Russia investigation played a role? COMEY: In why I was fired? FEINSTEIN: Yes. COMEY: Yes. I've seen the president say so. FEINSTEIN: Let's go to the Flynn issue. The senator outlined, “I hope you could see your way to letting Flynn go. He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go.” But you also said in your written remarks, and I quote, that you “had understood the president to be requesting that we drop any investigation of Flynn in connection with false statements about his conversations with the Russian ambassador in December,”. Please go into that with more detail. COMEY: Well, the context and the president's word are what led me to that conclusion. As I said in my statement, I could be wrong, but Flynn had been forced to resign the day before. And the controversy around general Flynn at that point in time was centered on whether he lied to the vice president about his nature of conversations with the Russians, whether he had been candid with others in the course of that. So that happens on the day before. On the 1, the president makes reference to that. I understood what he wanted me to do was drop any investigation connected to Flynn's account of his conversations with the Russians. FEINSTEIN: Now, here's the question, you're big. You're strong. I know the oval office, and I know what happens to people when they walk in. There is a certain amount of intimidation. But why didn't you stop and say, Mr. President, this is wrong. I cannot discuss this with you. COMEY: It's a great question. Maybe if I were stronger, I would have. I was so stunned by the conversation that I just took in. The only thing I could think to say, because I was playing in my mind -- because I could remember every word he said -- I was playing in my mind, what should my response be? That's why I carefully chose the words. Look, I've seen the tweet about tapes. Lordy, I hope there are tapes. I remember saying, “I agree he is a good guy,” as a way of saying, I'm not agreeing with what you asked me to do. Again, maybe other people would be stronger in that circumstance. That's how Ed myself. I hope I'll never have another opportunity. Maybe if I did it again, I'd do it better. FEINSTEIN: You describe two phone calls that you received from president trump. One on March 30th and one on April 11. He, quote, described the Russia investigation as a cloud that was impairing his ability, end quote, as president, and asked you, quote, to lift the cloud, end quote. How did you interpret that? What did you believe he wanted you to do? COMEY: I interpreted that as he was frustrated that the Russia investigation was taking up so much time and energy. I think he meant of the executive branch, but in the public square in general. It was making it difficult for him to focus on other priorities of his. But what he asked me was actually narrowing than that. I think what he meant by the cloud — and, again, I could be wrong — but the entire investigation is taking up oxygen and making it hard for me to focus on what I want to focus on. The ask was to get it out that I, the president, am not personally under investigation. FEINSTEIN: After April 11th, did he ask you more ever about the Russia investigation? Did he ask you any questions? COMEY: We never spoke again after April 11th. FEINSTEIN: You told the president, I would see what we could do. What did you mean? COMEY: It was kind of a cowardly way of trying to avoid telling him, we're not going to do that. That I would see what we could do. It was a way of kind of getting off the phone, frankly, and then I turned and handed it to the acting deputy attorney general. FEINSTEIN: So I want to go into that. Who did you talk with about that, lifting the cloud, stop the investigation back at the FBI, and what was their response? COMEY: The FBI, during one of the two conversations — I'm not remembering exactly — I think the first, my chief of staff was sitting in front of me and heard my end of the conversation because the president's call was a surprise. I discussed the lifting the cloud and the request with the senior leadership team who, typically, and I think in all the circumstances, was the deputy director, my chief of staff, the general counsel, the deputy director's chief counsel and, I think in a number of circumstances, the number three in the FBI and a few of the conversations included the head of the national security branch. The group of us that lead the FBI when it comes to national security. FEINSTEIN: You have the president of the United States asking you to stop an investigation that is an important investigation. What was the response of your colleagues? COMEY: I think they were as shocked and troubled by it as I was. Some said things that led me to believe that. I don't remember exactly. But the reaction was similar to mine. They're all experienced people who never experienced such a thing, so they were very concerned. Then the conversation turned to about, so what should we do with this information? That was a struggle for us. Because we are the leaders of the FBI, so it's been reported to us, and I heard it and now shared it with the leaders of the FBI, our conversation was, should we share this with any senior officials at the justice department? Our primary concern was, we can't infect the investigative team. We don't want the agents and analysts working on this to know the president of the united States has asked, and when it comes from the president, I took it as a direction, to get rid of this investigation because we're not going to follow that request. So we decided, we have to keep it away from our troops. Is there anyone else we ought to tell at the justice department? We considered whether to tell -- the attorney general said we believe rightly he was shortly going to recuse. There was no other senate confirmed leaders in the justice department at that point. The deputy attorney general was Mr. Boente, acting shortly in the seat. We decided the best move would be to hold it, keep it in a box, document it, as we'd already done, and this investigation is going to do on. Figure out what to do with it down the road. Is there a way to corroborate it? It was our word against the president's. No way to corroborate this. My view of this changed when the prospect of tapes was raised. That's how we thought about it then. FEINSTEIN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. SEN. MARCO RUBIO: Director Comey, the meeting in the oval office where he made the request about Mike Flynn, was that only time he asked you to hopefully let it go? COMEY: Yes. RUBIO: And in that meeting, as you understood it, he was asking not about the general Russia investigation, he was asking specifically about the jeopardy that Flynn was in himself? COMEY: That's how I understood it. Yes, sir. RUBIO: As you perceived it, while he hoped you did away with it, you perceived it as an order, given the setting, the position and some of the circumstances? COMEY: Yes. RUBIO: At the time, did you say something to the president about, that is not an appropriate request, or did you tell the white house counsel, it's not an appropriate request? Someone needs to tell the president he can't do these things. COMEY: I didn't, no. RUBIO: Why? COMEY: I don't know. I think — as I said earlier, I think the circumstances were such that it was — I was a bit stunned and didn't have the presence of mind. I don't know. I don't want to make you sound like I'm captain courageous. I don't know if I would have said to the president with the presence of mind, sir, that's wrong. In the moment, it didn't come to my mind. What came to my mind is be careful what you say. I said, I agree Flynn is a good guy. RUBIO: On the cloud, we keep talking about this cloud, you perceive the cloud to be the Russian investigation in general? COMEY: Yes, sir. RUBIO: His specific ask was you'd tell the American people what you'd told him, told the leaders of Congress, Democrats and Republicans, he was not personally under investigation? COMEY: Yes, sir. RUBIO: What he was asking you to do, would you have done here today? COMEY: Correct. Yes, sir. RUBIO: Again, at that setting, did you say to the president, it would be inappropriate for you to do so and then talk to the White House counsel or somebody so hopefully they'd talked to him and tell him he couldn't do this? COMEY: First time I said, I'll see what we can do. Second time, I explained how it should work, that the White House counsel should contact the deputy attorney general. RUBIO: You told him that? COMEY: The president said, okay. I think that's what I'll do. RUBIO: To be clear, for you to make a public statement that he was not under investigation wouldn't be illegal but you felt it could potentially create a duty to correct if circumstances changed? COMEY: Yes, sir. We wrestled with it before my testimony, where I confirmed that there was an investigation. There were two primary concerns. One was it creates a duty to correct, which I've lived before, and you want to be very careful about doing that. And second, it is a slippery slope. If we say the president and the vice president aren't under investigation. What is the principled investigation for stopping? So the leaderrship, at justice, acting attorney general Boente said, you're not going to do that. RUBIO: On March 30th during the phone call about general Flynn, you said he abruptly shifted and brought up something that you call, quote, unquote, the McCabe thing. Specifically, the Mccabe thing as you understood it was that Mccabe's wife had received campaign money from what I assume means Terry McAuliffe? COMEY: Yes. RUBIO: Close to the Clintons. Did he say, I don't like this guy because he got money from someone close to Clinton? COMEY: He asked me about McCabe and said, how is he going to be with me as president? I was rough on him on the campaign trail. RUBIO: Rough on Mccabe? COMEY: By his own account, he said he was rough on McCabe and Mrs. McCabe on the campaign trail. How is he going to be? I shared with the president, Andy is a pro. No issue at all. You have to know people of the FBI. They're not — RUBIO: So the president turns to you and says, remember, I never brought up the McCabe thing because you said he was a good guy, did you perceive that to be a statement that, I took care of you. I didn't do something because you told me he was a good guy. So I'm asking you potentially for something in return. Is that how you perceived it? COMEY: I wasn't sure what to make of it. That's possible. It was so out of context I didn't have a clear view of what it was. RUBIO: On a number of occasions here, you bring up — let's talk about the general Russia investigation, OK? Page 6 of your testimony you say, the first thing you say is, he asked what we could do to, quote, unquote, lift the cloud, the general Russia investigation, you responded, we are investigating the matter as quickly as we could and there would be great benefit if we didn't find anything for having done the work well. He agreed. He emphasized the problems it was causing him. He agreed it'd be great to have an investigation, all the facts came out and we found nothing. He agreed that would be ideal, but this cloud is still messing up my ability to do the rest of my agenda. Is that an accurate assessment? COMEY: Yes, sir. He went farther than that. He said, and if some of my satellites did something wrong, it'd be good to find that out. RUBIO: That is the second part. The satellites, if one of my satellites, I imagine he meant some of the people surrounding his campaign, did something wrong, it'd be great to know that, as well. COMEY: Yes, sir. That's what he said. RUBIO: Are those the only two instances in which that back and forth happened, where the president was basically saying, and I'm paraphrasing here, it's okay. Do the Russia investigation. I hope it all comes out. I have nothing to do with anything Russia. It'd be great if it all came out, people around me were doing things that were wrong? COMEY: Yes. As I recorded it accurately there. That was the sentiment he was expressing. Yes, sir. RUBIO: What it comes down to is the president asked three things of you. Asked for your loyalty. You said you'd be loyally honest. COMEY: Honestly loyal. RUBIO: Honestly loyal. He asked you on one occasion to let the Mike Flynn thing go because he was a good guy. By the way, you're aware he said the same thing in the press the next day. He is a good guy, treated unfairly, etc. I imagine your FBI agents read that. COMEY: I'm sure they did. RUBIO: The president's wishes were known to them, certainly by the next day when he had a press conference with the prime minister. Going back, the three requests were, number one, be loyal. Number two, let the Mike Flynn thing go. He is a good guy, been treated unfairly. Number three, can you please tell the American people what these leaders in congress already know, which you already know and what you told me three times, that I'm not under personally under investigation. COMEY: That's right. RUBIO: We learn more from the newspaper sometimes than the open hearings. Do you ever wonder why, of all the things in the investigation, the only thing never leaked is the fact the president was never personally under investigation, despite the fact that Democrats and Republicans and the leadership of congress have known that for weeks? COMEY: I don't know. I find matters that are briefed to the gang of eight are pretty tightly held, in my experience. RUBIO: Finally, who are those senior leaders at the FBI you share these conversations with? COMEY: As I said in response to Sen. Feinstein's question, deputy director, my chief of staff, general counsel, deputy director’s chief counse and then, more often than not, the number three person at the FBI, the associate deputy director. And quite often, head of the national security branch. BURR: Senator? SEN. RON WYDEN: Mr. Comey, welcome. You and I have had significant policy differences over the years, particularly protecting Americans access to secure encryption. But I believe the timing of your firing stinks. Yesterday, you put on the record testimony that demonstrates why the odor of presidential abuse of power is so strong. Now, to my questions. In talking to senator Warner about this dinner that you had with the president, I believe January 27th, all in one dinner, the president raised your job prospects, he asked for your loyalty and denied allegations against him. All took place over one supper. Now, you told senator Warner that the president was looking to, quote, get something. Looking back, did that dinner suggest that your job might be contingent on how you handled the investigation? COMEY: I don't know that I'd go that far. I got the sense my job would be contingent upon how he felt I — excuse me — how he felt I conducted myself and whether I demonstrated loyalty. But I don't know whether I'd go so far as to connect it to the investigation. WYDEN: He said the president was trying to create some sort of patronage. Behaving in a manner consistent with the wishes of the boss? COMEY: Yes. At least consider how what you're doing will affect the boss as a significant consideration. WYDEN: Let me turn to the attorney general. In your statement, you said that you and the FBI leadership team decided not to discuss the president's actions with Attorney General Sessions, even though he had not recused himself. What was it about the attorney general's interactions with the Russians or his behavior with regard to the investigation that would have led the entire leadership of the FBI to make this decision? COMEY: Our judgment, as I recall, is that he was very close to and inevitably going to recuse himself for a variety of reasons. We also were aware of facts that I can't discuss in an opening setting that would make his continued engagement in a Russia-related investigation problematic. So we were convinced — in fact, I think we'd already heard the career people were recommending that he recuse himself, that he was not going to be in contact with Russia-related matters much longer. That turned out to be the case. WYDEN: How would you characterize Attorney General Sessions's adherence to his recusal? In particular, with regard to his involvement in your firing, which the president has acknowledged was because of the Russian investigation. COMEY: That's a question I can't answer. I think it is a reasonable question. If, as the president said, I was fired because of the Russia investigation, why was the attorney general involved in that chain? I don't know. So I don't have an answer for the question. WYDEN: Your testimony was that the president's request about Flynn could infect investigation. Had the president got what he wanted and what he asked of you, what would have been the effect on the investigation? COMEY: We would have closed any investigation of general Flynn in connection with his statements and encounters — statements about encounters with Russians in the late part of December. We would have dropped an open criminal investigation. WYDEN: So in effect, when you talk about infecting the enterprise, you would have dropped something major that would have spoken to the overall ability of the American people to get the facts? COMEY: Correct. And as good as our people are, our judgment was, we don't want them hearing that the president of the United States wants this to go away because it might have an effect on their ability to be fair, impartial and aggressive. WYDEN: Acting Attorney General Yates found out Mike Flynn could be blackmailed by the Russians and went immediately to warn the white house. Flynn is gone, but other individuals with contacts with the Russians are still in extremely important positions of power. Should the American people have the same sense of urgency now with respect to them? COMEY: I think all I can say, senator, is it's a — the special counsel's investigation is very important, understanding what efforts there were or are by Russian government to influence our government is a critical part of the FBI's mission. And you've got the right person in Bob Mueller to lead it, it is a very important piece of work. WYDEN: Vice president Pence was the head of the transition. To your knowledge, was he aware of the concerns about Michael Flynn prior to or during general Flynn's tenure as national security adviser? COMEY: I don't — you're asking including up to the time when Flynn was — WYDEN: Right. COMEY: Forced to resign? My understanding is that he was. I'm trying to remember where I get that understanding from. I think from acting attorney general Yates. WYDEN: So former acting attorney general Yates testified concerns about general Flynn were discussed with the intelligence community. Would that have included anyone at the CIA or Dan Coats’ office, the DNI? COMEY: I would assume, yes. WYDEN: Michael Flynn resigned four days after attorney general sessions was sworn in. Do you know if the attorney general was aware of the concerns about Michael Flynn during that period? COMEY: I don't as I sit here. I don't recall that he was. I could be wrong, but I don't remember that he was. WYDEN: Let's see if you can give us some sense of who recommended your firing. Besides the letter from the attorney general, the deputy attorney general, do you have any information on who may have recommended or been involved in your firing? COMEY: I don't. I don't. WYDEN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. BURR: Senator Collins? SEN. SUSAN COLLINS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Comey, let me begin by thanking you for your voluntary compliance with our request to appear before this committee and assist us in this very important investigation. I want first to ask you about your conversations with the president, three conversations in which you told him that he was not under investigation. The first was during your January 6th meeting, according to your testimony, in which it appears that you actually volunteered that assurance. Is that correct? COMEY: That's correct. COLLINS: Did you limit that statement to counterintelligence invest — investigations, or were you talking about any FBI investigation? COMEY: I didn't use the term counterintelligence. I was briefing him about salacious and unverified material. It was in a context of that that he had a strong and defensive reaction about that not being true. My reading of it was it was important for me to assure him we were not person investigating him. So the context then was actually narrower, focused on what I just talked to him about. It was very important because it was, first, true, and second, I was worried very much about being in kind of a J. Edgar Hoover-type situation. I didn't want him thinking I was briefing him on this to sort of hang it over him in some way. I was briefing him on it because, because we had been told by the media it was about to launch. We didn't want to be keeping that from him. He needed to know this was being said. I was very keen not to leave him with an impression that the bureau was trying to do something to him. So that's the context in which I said, sir, we're not personally investigating you. COLLINS: Then — and that's why you volunteered the information? COMEY: Yes, ma'am. COLLINS: Then on the January 27th dinner, you told the president that he should be careful about asking you to investigate because, “you might create a narrative that we are investigating him personally, which we weren't.” Again, were you limiting that statement to counterintelligence investigations, or more broadly, such as a criminal investigation? COMEY: I didn't modify the word investigation. It was, again, he was reacting strongly against the unverified material, saying I'm tempted to order you to investigate it. In the context of that, I said, sir, be careful about it. I might create a narrative we're investigating you personally. COLLINS: There was the March 30th phone call with the president in which you reminded him that congressional leaders had been briefed that we were no personally — the FBI was not personally investigating president trump. And, again, was that statement to congressional leaders and to the president limited to counterintelligence investigations, or was it a broader statement? I'm trying to understand whether there was any kind of investigation of the president underway. COMEY: No. I'm sorry. If I misunderstood, I apologize. We briefed the congressional leadership about what Americans we had opened counterintelligence investigation cases on. We specifically said, the president is not one of those Americans. But there was no other investigation of the president that we were not mentioning at that time. The context was, counterintelligence, but I wasn't trying to hide some criminal investigation of the president. COLLINS: And was the president under investigation at the time of your dismissal on May 9th? COMEY: No. COLLINS: I'd like to now turn to the conversations with the president about Michael Flynn, which had been discussed at great length. First, let me make very clear that the president never should have cleared the room and he never should have asked you, as you reported, to let it go, to let the investigation go. But I remain puzzled by your response. Michael Flynn is a good guy. You could have said, Mr. President, this meeting is inappropriate. This response could compromise the investigation. You should not be making such a request. It's fundamental to the operation of our government, the FBI be insulated from this kind of political pressure. You talked a bit today about that you were stunned by the president making the request. But my question to you is later on, upon reflection, did you go to anyone at the department of justice and ask them to call the white house counsel's office and explain that the president had to have a far better understanding and appreciation of his role vis-à-vis the FBI? COMEY: In general, I did. I spoke to the attorney general and spoke to the new deputy attorney general, Mr. Rosenstein, when he took office and explained my serious concern about the way in which the president is interacting, especially with the FBI. As I said in my testimony, I told the attorney general, it can't happen that you get kicked out of the room and the president talks to me. Why didn't we raise the specific? It was of investigative interest to figure out, what just happened with the president's request? I wouldn't want to alert the white house it had happened until we figured out what we were going to do with it investigatively. COLLINS: Your testimony was that you went to attorney general sessions and said, don't ever leave me alone with him again. Are you saying that you also told him that he had made a request that you let it go with regard to part of the investigation of Michael Flynn? COMEY: No. I specifically did not. I did not. COLLINS: Okay. You mentioned that from your very first meeting with the president, you decided to write a memo memorializing the conversation. What was it about that very first meeting that made you write a memo when you have not done that with two previous presidents? COMEY: As I said, a combination of things. A gut feeling is an important overlay, but the circumstances, that I was alone, the subject matter and the nature of the person I was interacting with and my read of that person. Yeah, and really just gut feel, laying on top of all of that, that this is going to be important to protect this organization, that I make records of this. COLLINS: Finally, did you show copies of your memos to anyone outside of the department of justice? COMEY: Yes. COLLINS: And to whom did you show copies? COMEY: I asked — the president tweeted on Friday after I got fired that I better hope there's not tapes. I woke up in the middle of the night on Monday night because it didn't dawn on me originally, that there might be corroboration for our conversation. There might a tape. My judgment was, I need to get that out into the public square. I asked a friend of mine to share the content of the memo with a reporter. Didn't do it myself for a variety of reasons. I asked him to because I thought that might prompt the appointment of a special counsel. I asked a close friend to do it. COLLINS: Was that Mr. Wittes? COMEY: No. COLLINS: Who was it? COMEY: A close friend who is a professor at Columbia law school. COLLINS: Thank you. SEN. MARTIN HEINRICH: Mr. Comey, prior to January 27th of this year, have you ever had a one-on-one meeting or a private dinner with a president of the United States? COMEY: No. Dinner, no. I had two one-on-ones with President Obama. One to talk about law enforcement issues, law enforcement and race, which was an important topic throughout for me and for the president. Then once very briefly for him to say goodbye. HEINRICH: Were those brief interactions? COMEY: No. The one about law enforcement and race and policing, we spoke for probably over an hour, just the two of us. HEINRICH: How unusual is it to have a one-on-one dinner with the president? Did that strike you as odd? COMEY: Yeah. So much so, I assumed there would be others, that he couldn't possibly be having dinner with me alone. HEINRICH: Do you have an impression that if you had found — if you had behaved differently in that dinner, and I am quite pleased that you did not, but if you had found a way to express some sort of expression of loyalty or given some suggestion that the Flynn criminal investigation might be pursued less vigorously, do you think you would have still been fired? COMEY: I don't know. It's impossible to say looking back. I don't know. HEINRICH: But you felt like those two things were directly relevant to the kind of relationship that the president was seeking to establish with you? COMEY: Sure, yes. HEINRICH: The president has repeatedly talked about the Russian investigation into the U.S. — or Russia's involvement in the U.S. Election cycle as a hoax and fake news. Can you talk a little bit about what you saw as FBI director and, obviously, only the parts that you can share in this setting that demonstrate how serious this action actually was and why there was an investigation in the first place? COMEY: Yes, sir. There should be no fuzz on this whatsoever. The Russians interfered in our election during the 2016 cycle. They did with purpose. They did it with sophistication. They did it with overwhelming technical efforts. It was an active measures campaign driven from the top of that government. There is no fuzz on that. It is a high confidence judgment of the entire intelligence community and the members of this committee have seen the intelligence. It's not a close call. That happened. That's about as unfake as you can possibly get. It is very, very serious, which is why it's so refreshing to see a bipartisan focus on that. This is about America, not about a particular party. HEINRICH: That is a hostile act by the Russian government against this country? COMEY: Yes, sir. HEINRICH: Did the president in any of those interactions that you've shared with us today ask you what you should be doing or what our government should be doing or the intelligence community to protect America against Russian interference in our election system? COMEY: I don't recall a conversation like that. HEINRICH: Never? COMEY: No. HEINRICH: Do you find it — COMEY: Not with President Trump. HEINRICH: Right. COMEY: I attended a fair number of meetings on that with President Obama. HEINRICH: Do you find it odd that the president seemed unconcerned by Russia's actions in our election? COMEY: I can't answer that because I don't know what other conversations he had with other advisers or other intelligence community leaders. I just don't know sitting here. HEINRICH: Did you have any interactions with the president that suggested he was taking that hostile action seriously. COMEY: I don't remember any interactions with the president other than the initial briefing on January the 6th. I don't remember — could be wrong, but I don't remember any conversations with him at all about that. HEINRICH: As you're very aware, it was only the two of you in the room for that dinner. You told us the president asked you to back off the Flynn investigation. The president told a reporter — COMEY: Not in that dinner. HEINRICH: Fair enough. Told the reporter he never did that. You've testified that the president asked for your loyalty in that dinner. White house denies that. A lot of this comes down to who should we believe. Do you want to say anything as to why we should believe you? COMEY: My mother raised me not to say things like this about myself so I'm not going to. I think people should look at the whole body of my testimony. As I used to say to juries, when I talked about a witness, you can't cherry pick it. You can't say, I like these things he said but on this, he's a ten liar. You have to take it together. I've tried to be open, fair, transparent and accurate. Of significant fact to me is so why did he kick everybody out of the Oval Office? Why would you kick the attorney general, the president, the chief of staff out to talk to me if it was about something else? So that, to me, as an investigator, is a significant fact. HEINRICH: As we look at testimony or as communication from both of you, we should probably be looking for consistency? COMEY: Well, in looking at any witness, you look at consistency, track record, demeanor, record over time, that sort of thing. HEINRICH: Thank you. So there are reports that the incoming Trump administration, either during the transition and/or after the inauguration, attempted to set up a sort of backdoor communication channel with the Russian government using their infrastructure, their devices, their facilities. What would be the risks, particularly for a transition, someone not actually in the office of the president yet, to setting up unauthorized channels with a hostile foreign government, especially if they were to evade our own American intelligence services? COMEY: I'm not going to comment on whether that happened in an open setting, but the risk is — primary risk is obvious. You spare the Russians the cost and effort to break into our communications channels by using theirs. You make it a whole lot easier for them to capture all of your conversations. Then to use those to the benefit of Russia against the united States. HEINRICH: The memos that you wrote, you wrote — did you write all nine of them in a way that was designed to prevent them from needing classification? COMEY: No. On a few of the occasions, I wrote — I sent emails to my chief of staff on some of the brief phone conversations I had. The first one was a classified briefing. Though it was in a conference room at Trump Tower, it was a classified briefing. I wrote that on a classified device. The one I started typing in the car, that was a classified laptop I started working on. HEINRICH: Any reason in a classified environment, in a skiff, that this committee, it would not be appropriate to see those communications at least from your perspective as the author? COMEY: No. HEINRICH: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. BURR: Senator? SEN. ROY BLUNT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Comey, when you were terminated at the FBI, I said, and still continue to feel, that you have provided years of great service to the country. I also said that I'd had significant questions over the last year about some of the decisions that you made. If the president hadn't terminated your service, would you still be, in your opinion, the director of the FBI today? COMEY: Yes, sir. BLUNT: So you took as a direction from the president something you thought was serious and troublesome but continued to show up for work the next day? COMEY: Yes, sir. BLUNT: Six weeks later were still telling the president on March the 30th that he was not personally the target of any investigation? COMEY: Correct. On March the 30th, and I think again on April 11th, as well, I told him we're not investigating him personally. That was true. BLUNT: The point to me, the concern to me there is, all these things are going on. You now in retrospect, or at least to this committee, you had serious concerns about what the president had, you believed, directed you to do, and had taken no action. Hadn't even reported up the chain of command, assuming you believe there is a chain of command, that these things happened. Do you have a sense looking back that that was a mistake? COMEY: No. In fact, I think no action was the most important thing I could do. BLUNT: On the Flynn issue specifically, I believe you said earlier that you believe the president was suggesting you drop any investigation of Flynn's account of his conversation with the Russian ambassador. Which was essentially misleading the vice president and others? COMEY: Correct. I'm not going to go into the details but whether there were false statements made to government investigators, as well. BLUNT: Any suggestion that the — General Flynn had violated the Logan Act, I always find incredible. The Logan Act has been on the books over 200 years. Nobody has ever been prosecuted for violating the Logan Act. My sense would be that the discussion, not the problem, misleading investigators or the vice president might have been? COMEY: That's fair. Yes, sir. BLUNT: Had you previously on February 14th discussed with the president in the previous meeting anything your investigators had learned or their impressions from talking to Flynn? COMEY: No, sir. BLUNT: So he said he's a good guy. You said he is a good guy. That was — no further action taken on that? COMEY: He said more than that, but there was no — the action was, I wrote it up, briefed our senior team, tried to figure out what to do with it and made a decision. We're going to hold this and see what we make of it down the road. BLUNT: Did it mean you had no responsibility to report that to the Justice Department in some way? COMEY: I think at some point, and I don't know what Director Mueller is going to do with it, but at some point, I was sure we were going to brief it to the team in charge of the case. But our judgment was in the short term, doesn't make sense to — no fuzz on the fact I reported to the attorney general. That's why I stressed he shouldn't be kicked out of the room. Didn't make sense to report to him now. BLUNT: You said the attorney general said, I don't want to be in the room with him alone again, but you continued to talk to him on the phone. What is the difference in being in the room alone with him and talking to him on the phone alone? COMEY: I think what I stressed to the attorney general was broader than just the room. I said, I report to you. It is very important you be between me and the white house. BLUNT: After that discussion with the attorney general, did you take phone calls from the president? COMEY: Yes, sir. BLUNT: Why did you just say you need to — why didn't you say, I'm not taking that call. Talk to the attorney general? COMEY: I did on the April 11th call. I reported the calls — the March 30th call and the April 11th call to my superior, who was the acting deputy attorney general. BLUNT: I don't want to run out of time here. In reading your testimony, January the 3rd, January the 27th and March the 30th, it appears to me on all three of those occasions, you unsolicited by the president, made the point to him he was not a target of an investigation? COMEY: Correct. Yes, sir. BLUNT: One, I thought the March 30th, very interesting, you said, well, even though you don't want — you may not want — that was 27th, where he said, why don't you look into that more? You said, you may not want that because we couldn't say with — we couldn't answer the question about you being a target of the investigation. You didn't seem to be answering that question anyhow. Senator Rubio pointed out the one unanswered, unleaked question seems to have been that. In this whole period of time. You said something earlier and I don't want to fail to follow up on, you said after dismissed, you gave information to a friend so that friend could get that information into the public media. COMEY: Correct. BLUNT: What kind of information was that? What kind of information did you give to a friend? COMEY: That the — the Flynn conversation. The president had asked me to let the Flynn — forgetting my exact own words. But the conversation in the Oval Office. BLUNT: So you didn't consider your memo or your sense of that conversation to be a government document. You considered it to be, somehow, your own personal document that you could share to the media as you wanted through a friend? COMEY: Correct. I understood this to be my recollection recorded of my conversation with the president. As a private citizen, I thought it important to get it out. BLUNT: Were all your memos that you recorded on classified or other memos that might be yours as a private citizen? COMEY: I'm not following the question. BLUNT: You said you used classified — COMEY: Not the classified documents. Unclassified. I don't have any of them anymore. I gave them to the special counsel. My view was that the content of those unclassified, memorialization of those conversations was my recollection recorded. BLUNT: So why didn't you give those to somebody yourself rather than give them through a third party? COMEY:Because I was weary the media was camping at the end of my driveway at that point. I was actually going out of town with my wife to hide. I worried it would be feeding seagulls at the beach. If it was I who gave it to the media. I asked my friend, make sure this gets out. BLUNT: It does seem to me what you do there is create a source close to the former director of the FBI as opposed to taking responsibility yourself for saying, here are the records. Like everybody else, I have other things I'd like to get into but I'm out of time. SEN. ANGUS KING: First, I'd like to acknowledge Senator Blumenthal and Senator Nelson. The principal thing you'll learn is the chairs there are more uncomfortable than the chairs here. But welcome to the hearing. Mr. Comey, a broad question. Was the Russian activity in the 2016 election a one off proposition, or is this part of a long-term strategy? Will they be back? COMEY: Oh, it is a long-term practice of theirs. It's stepped up a notch in a significant way in '16. They'll be back. KING: I think that's very important for the American people to understand. That this is very much a forward looking investigation in terms of how do we understand what they did and how do we prevent it. Would you agree that is a big part of our role here? COMEY: Yes, sir. It is not a Republican thing or a democratic thing. It really is an American thing. They're going to come for whatever party they choose to try and work on behalf of, and they're not devoted to either, in my experience. They're just about their own advantage. They will be back. KING: That's my observation. I don't think Putin is a Republican or a Democrat. He's an opportunist. COMEY: I think that's a fair statement. KING: With regard to the — several of these conversations, in his interview with Lester Holt on NBC, the president said, I had dinner with him. He wanted to have dinner because he wanted to stay on. Is this an accurate statement? COMEY: No, sir. KING: Did you in any way initiate that dinner? COMEY: No. He called me at my desk at lunchtime and asked me, was I free for dinner that night. Called himself. Said, can you come over for dinner tonight? I said, yes, sir. He said, will 6:00 work? I think 6:00 first. Then he said, I was going to invite your whole family but we'll do it next time. Is that a good time? I said, sir, whatever works for you. He said, how about 6:30? I said, whatever works for you, sir. Then I hung up and had to call my wife and break a date with her. I was supposed to take her to dinner that night. KING: One of the all-time great excuses for breaking a date. COMEY: Yeah. In retrospect, I love spending time with my wife and I wish I would have been there that night. KING: That's one question I'm not going to follow up on, Mr. Comey. In that same interview, the president said, in one case I called him and in one case, he call me. Is that an accurate statement? COMEY: No. KING: Did you ever call the president? COMEY: No. I might — the only reason I'm hesitating is, I think there was at least one conversation where I was asked to call the White House switchboard to be connected to him. I never initiated a communication with the president. KING: In his press conference May 18th, the president responded, quote, no, no, when asked about asking you to stop the investigation into general Flynn. Is that a true statement? COMEY: I don't believe it is. KING: In regard to him being personally under investigation, does that mean that the dossier is not being reviewed or investigated or followed up on in any way? COMEY: I obviously can't comment either way. I talk in an open setting about the investigation as it was when I was head of the FBI. It is Bob Mueller's responsibility now. I don't know. KING: Clearly, your statements to the president back on the various times when you assured him it wasn't under investigation, as of that moment, is it correct? COMEY: Correct. KING: Now, on the Flynn investigation, is it not true that Mr. Flynn was and is a central figure in this entire investigation of the relationship between the Trump campaign and the Russians? COMEY: I can't answer that in an open setting, sir. KING: Certainly, Mr. Flynn was part of the so-called Russian investigation? Can you answer that question? COMEY: I have to give you the same answer. KING: All right. We'll be having a closed session shortly so we'll follow up on that. In terms of his comments to you about — I think in response to Senator Risch, he said, I hope you'll hold back on that, but when you get a — when a president of the United States in the Oval Office says something like, I hope or I suggest or would you, do you take that as a directive? COMEY: Yes. It rings in my ear as, well, will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest. KING: I was just going to quote that, in 1179, December 27th, Henry II said, who will rid me of the meddlesome priest, and the next day, he was killed. Exactly the same situation. We're thinking along the same lines. Several other questions, and these are a little more detailed. What do you know about the Russian bank VEB? COMEY: Nothing that I can talk about in an open setting. I know — KING: That takes care of the next three questions. COMEY: I know it exists. KING: What is relationship of ambassador — the ambassador from Russia to the United States to the Russian intelligence infrastructure? COMEY: He's a diplomat who is the chief of mission at the Russian Embassy, which employs a robust cohort of intelligence officers. So, surely, he is whiting of their aggressive intelligence operations, at least some of it in the United States. I don't consider him to be an intelligence officer himself. He's a diplomat. KING: Did you ever — did the FBI ever brief the Trump administration about the advisability of interacting directly with Ambassador Kislyak? COMEY: All I can say sits here is there are a variety of defensive briefings given to the incoming administration about the counterintelligence risk. KING: Back to Mr. Flynn. Would the — would closing out the Flynn investigation have impeded the overall Russian investigation? COMEY: No. Well, unlikely, except to the extent — there is always a possibility if you have a criminal case against someone and squeeze them, flip them and they give you information about something else. But I saw the two as touching each other but separate. KING: With regard to your memos, isn't it true that in a court case when you're weighing evidence, contemporaneous memos and contemporaneous statements to third parties are considered probative in terms of the validity of testimony? COMEY: Yes. KING: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. BURR: Senator Lankford? LANKFORD: Former Director Comey, good to see you again. COMEY: You, too. LANKFORD: Multiple opportunities to visit, as everyone here has. I appreciate you and your service and what you have done for the nation for a long time, what you continue to do. I told you before in the heat of last year, when we had an opportunity to visit personally, that I pray for you and your family because you carry a tremendous amount of stress. That is still true today. COMEY: Thank you. LANKFORD: Let me walk through a couple things with you. Your notes are obviously exceptionally important because they give a rapid account of what you wrote down and what you perceived happened in those different meetings. Have you had the opportunity to reference those notes when you were preparing the written statement you put forward today? COMEY: Yes. I think nearly all of my written recordings of my conversations, I had a chance to review them before filing my statement. LANKFORD: Do you have a copy of any of the notes personally? COMEY: I don't. I turned them over to Bob Mueller's investigators. LANKFORD: The individual that you told about your memos, that then were sent on to The New York Times, did you have a copy of the memos or told orally? COMEY: Had a copy at the time. LANKFORD: Do they still have a copy of those memos? COMEY: Good question. I think so. I guess I can't say for sure sitting here, but — I guess I don't know. But I think so. LANKFORD: So the question is, could you ask them to hand that copyright back to you so you can hand them over to this committee? COMEY: Potentially. LANKFORD: I would like to move that from potentially to seeing if we can ask that question so we can have a copy of those. Obviously, the notes are really important to us, so we can continue to get to the facts as we see it. The written documents are exceptionally important. COMEY: Yeah. LANKFORD: Were there other documents we need to be aware of you used in your preparation for your written statement we should also have that would assist us in helping us with this? COMEY: Not that I'm aware of, no. LANKFORD: Past the February 14th meeting, which is an important meeting as we discuss the conversations here about Michael Flynn, when the president asked you about he hopes that you would let this go, and the conversation back and forth about being a good guy, after that time, did the president ever bring up anything about Michael Flynn again to you? Had multiple other conversations you had documents with the president. COMEY: I don't remember him bringing it up again. LANKFORD: Did a member of the white house staff come up to you asking you to drop the Michael Flynn case, anything referring to that? COMEY: No. LANKFORD: Did the Director of National Intelligence talk to you about that? COMEY: No. LANKFORD: Did anyone from the attorney general's office, the department of justice ask about that? COMEY: No. LANKFORD: Did the head of NSA talk to you about that? COMEY: No. LANKFORD: The key aspect here is if this seems to be something the president is trying to get you to drop it, it seems like a light touch to drop it, to bring it up at that point, the day after he had just fired Flynn, to come back here and say, I hope we can let this go, then it never reappears again. Did it slow down your investigation or any investigation that may or may not be occurring with Michael Flynn? COMEY: No. Although I don't know there are any manifestations between February 14th and when I was fired. I don't know that the president had any way of knowing whether it was effective or not. LANKFORD: Okay. Fair enough. If the president wanted to stop an investigation, how would he do that? Knowing it is an ongoing criminal investigation or counterintelligence investigation, would that be a matter of going to you, you perceive, and say, you make it stop because he doesn't have the authority to stop it? How would the president make an ongoing investigation stop? COMEY: I'm not a legal scholar, but as a legal matter, the president is the head of the executive branch and could direct, in theory, we have important norms against this, but could anyone be investigative or not. I think he has the legal authority. All of us ultimately report in the executive branch to the president. LANKFORD: Would that be to you, or the attorney general or who? COMEY: I suppose he could if he wanted to issue a direct order could do it anyway. Through the attorney general or issue it directly to me. LANKFORD: Well, is there any question that the president is not real fond of this investigation? I can think of multiple 140-word character expressions that he's publicly expressed he's not fond of the investigation. I heard you refer to before trying to keep the agents away from any comment that the president may have made. Quite frankly, the president has informed around 6 billion people that he's not real fond of this investigation. Do you think there's a difference in that? COMEY: Yes. There's a big difference in kicking superior officers out of the oval office, looking the FBI director in the eye and saying I hope you let this go. I think if agents as good as they are heard the president of the United States did that, there's a real risk of a chilling effect on their work. That's why we kept it so tight. LANKFORD: OK. You had mentioned before about some news stories and news accounts. Without having to go into all of the names and specific times and to be able to dip into all of that. Have there been news accounts about the Russian investigation or collusion about the whole event or as you read the story you were wrong about how wrong they got the facts? COMEY: Yes, there have been many, many stories based on — well, lots of stuff but about Russia that are dead wrong. LANKFORD: I was interested in your comment that you made as well that the president said to you if there were some satellite associates of his that did something wrong, it would be good to find that out. Did the president seem to talk to you specifically on March 30th saying I'm frustrated that the word is not getting out that I'm under investigation. But if there are people in my circle that are, let's finish the investigation, is that how you took it? COMEY: Yes, sir. Yes. LANKFORD: Then you made a comment earlier a the attorney general, the previous attorney general asking you about the investigation on the Clinton e-mails saying you were asked to not call it an investigation anymore. But call it a matter. You said that confused you. You can give us additional details on that? COMEY: Well, it concerned me because we were at the point where we refused to confirm the existence as we typically do of an investigation for months. And was getting to a place where that looked silly because the campaigns we're talking about interacting with the FBI in the course of our work. The Clinton campaign at the time was using all kinds of euphemisms, security matters, things like that for what was going on. We were getting to a place where the attorney general and I were both going to testify and talk publicly about it I wanted to know was she going to authorize us to confirm we have an investigation. She said yes, don't call it that, call it a matter. I said why would I do that? She said, just call it a matter. You look back in hindsight, if I looked back and said this isn't worth dying on so I just said the press is going to completely ignore it. That's what happened when I said we opened a matter. They all reported the FBI has an investigation open. So that concerned me because that language tracked the way the campaign was talking about the FBI's work and that's concerning. LANKFORD: You gave impression that the campaign was somehow using the language as the FBI because you were handed the campaign language? COMEY: I don't know whether it was intentional or not but it gave the impression that the attorney general was looking to align the way we talked about our work with the way it was describing that. It was inaccurate. We had an investigation open for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, we had an investigation open at the time. That gave me a queasy feeling. BURR: Senator Manchin. SEN. JOE MANCHIN: Thank you. I appreciate being here. West Virginia is interested in the hear we're having today. I've had over 600 requests for questions to ask you from my fellow West Virginians. Most of them have been asked and there are some to be asked if the classified hearing. I want to thank you first of all for coming to be here and volunteering to stay in the classified hearing. I don't know if you had a chance to watch our hearing yesterday — COMEY: I watched part of it, yes. MANCHIN: And it was quite troubling. My colleagues had very pointed questions they wanted answers to. And they weren't classified and could have been answered in the open setting and they refused to. So that makes us much more appreciative of your cooperation. Sir, the seriousness of the Russia investigation and knowing that it can be ongoing as Senator Keegan alluded to. What are your concerns there? American public saying why are we making a big deal of this Russian investigation? Can you tell me about your thoughts? COMEY: Yes, sir. MANCHIN: Finally, did the president ever show any concern or interest or curiosity about what the Russians were doing? COMEY: Thank you, senator. As I said earlier, I don't remember any conversations with the president about the Russia election interference. MANCHIN: Did he ever ask you any questions concerning this? COMEY: Well, there was an initial briefing of our findings. And I think there was conversation there I don't remember exactly where he asked what I found and what our sources were and what our confidence level was. The reason this is such a big deal. We have this big messy wonderful country where we fight with each other all the time. But nobody tells us what to think, what to fight about, what to vote for except other Americans. And that's wonderful and often painful. But we're talking about a foreign government that using technical intrusion, lots of other methods tried to shape the way we think, we vote, we act. That is a big deal. And people need to recognize it. It's not about Republicans or Democrats. They're coming after America, which I hope we all love equally. They want to undermine our credibility in the face the world. They think that this great experiment of ours is a threat to them. So they're going to try to run it down and dirty it up as much as possible. That's what this is about and they will be back. Because we remain — as difficult as we can be with each other, we remain that shining city on the hill. And they don't like it. MANCHIN: It's extremely important, extremely dangerous what we're dealing with and it's needed is what you're saying. COMEY: Yes, sir. MANCHIN: Do you believe there were any tapes or recordings of your conversations with the president? COMEY: It never occurred to me until the president's tweet. I'm not being facetious. I hope there are. MANCHIN: Both of you are in the same here, you both hope there are taping and recordings? COMEY: Well all I can do is hope. The president surely knows if he taped me. If he did, my feelings aren't hurt. Release all of the tapes I'm good with you. MANCHIN: Sir, do you believe that Robert Mueller, our new special versus, on Russia, will be thorough and complete without intervention and would you about confident on his recommendations? COMEY: Yes, Bob Mueller is one of the finest people and public servants this country has ever produced. He will do it well. He's a dogged-tough person and you can have high confidence when he's done, he's turned over all of the rocks. MANCHIN: You've been asked a wide variety of questions and we're going to have more in our classified hearing. Something else I like to ask folks when they come here, what details of the saga should we be focused on and recommend that we do differently? To adjust our perspective on this. COMEY: I don't know. One of the reasons I'm pleased to be here I think this committee has shown the American people although we have two parties and we disagree on things we can work together when it comes to the country. So I would hope that you would just keep doing what you’re doing. And it’s a good example for kids. That it’s good in and of itself but we are an adult democracy. MANCHIN: You mentioned six times on the phone with president did you ever allude that you were performing inadequately? — COMEY: No, quite the contrary. I was about to get on a helicopter one time. The head of the DEA was in the helicopter waiting for me. He called in to check in and tell me I was doing an awesome job. And wanted to see how I was doing. I said I'm doing fine, sir. Then I finished the call and got on the helicopter. MANCHIN: Mr. Comey, do you believe you would have been fired if Hillary Clinton became president? COMEY: That's a great question. I don't know. I don't know. MANCHIN: Have you had any thoughts about it? COMEY: I might have been. I don't know. Look, I've said before, that was an extraordinarily difficult and painful time. I think I did what I had to do. I knew it was going to be very bad for me personally. And the consequences might have been if Hillary Clinton was elected I might have been terminated. I don't know. I really don't. MANCHIN: My final question, after the February 14th meeting in the oval office you mentioned to Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Did you ever consider why Attorney General Sessions was not asked to stay in the room? COMEY: Oh, sure. I did. And have. And in that moment, I knew — MANCHIN: Did you ever talk to him about it? COMEY: No. MANCHIN: You never had a discussion with Jeff sessions on this? COMEY: No, not at all. MANCHIN: On any of your meetings? COMEY: No. MANCHIN: Did he inquire? Did he show any inquiry whatsoever what was that meeting about? COMEY: No — you're right. I did say to him. I'd forgotten this, I talked to him and said you have to be between me and the president and that's incredibly important. I forgot my exact words I passed along my the president's message about the leaks. I passed that along to the attorney general I think it was the next morning in the meeting. But I did not tell him about the Flynn part. MANCHIN: Do you believe this rises to obstruction of justice? COMEY: I don't know, that's Bob Mueller's job to sort that out. . MANCHIN: Thank you, sir. SEN. TOM COTTON: Mr. Chairman. BURR: Senator Cotton. COTTON: Mr. Comey, you're encouraged.president will release the tapes will you encourage Mr. Mueller to release your memos? COMEY: Sure. COTTON: You said you did not record your conversations with President Obama or President Bush in memos. Did you do so with Attorney General Jeff Sessions or any other senior member of the trump Department of Justice? COMEY: No. I think — I am sorry. COTTON: Did you record conversations or memos with the attorney general or any other senior member of the Obama administration? COMEY: No. COTTON: Two phone calls, four phone calls are not discussed in your statement, for the record. What happens in those phone calls? COMEY: The president called me I believe shortly before he was inaugurated as a follow-up to our conversation, private conversation on January the 6th. He just wanted to reiterate his rejection of that allegation and talk about—- he'd thought about it more. And why he thought it wasn't true. The verified — unverified parts. And during that call, he asked me again, hope you're going to say. You're doing a great job. I told him that I intended to. There was another phone call that I mentioned could have the date wrong, March 1st, where he called just to check in with me as I was about to get on the hospital. It was a secure call we had about an operational matter that is not related to any of this. Something that the FBI is working on. He wanted to make sure I understood how important he thought it was. A totally appropriate call. And then the fourth call, probably forgetting — may have been — I may have met the call when he called to invite me to dinner. I'll think about it as I'm answering other questions but I think I got that right. COTTON: Let's turn our attention to the underlying activity at issue here. Russia's hacking of those e-mails and the allegation of collusion. Do you think Donald Trump colluded with Russia? COMEY: That's a question I don't think I should answer in an opening setting. As I said, when I left, we did not have an investigation focused on president trump. But that's a question that will be answered by the investigation, I think. COTTON: Let me turn to a couple statements by one of my colleagues, Senator Feinstein. She was the ranking member on this committee until January, which means that she had access to information that only she and Chairman Burr did. She's now the senior Democrat on the FBI Committee, which means she had access to information that many of us don’t. On May 3rd on the Wolf Blitzer show she was asked “Do you believe you have evidence that in fact that there was collusion between Trump associates and Russia during the campaign? She answered not at this time. On May 18th, on the same show, Mr. Blitzer said, “The last time you came on this show I I asked if you had seen any evidence that Russia had colluded with the Trump campaign." You said not at this time. Has anything changed since we last spoke? Senator Feinstein said no, it hasn’t. Do you have any reason to doubt those statements? COMEY: I don't doubt that the Senator Feinstein understood what she said. I just don't want to go down that route anymore because I'm — I want to be fair to President Trump.I am not trying to suggest something nefarious but I don't want to get into the business of not to this person, not to that person. COTTON: On February 14th the New York Times published the story, the headline of which was “Trump campaign aides had repeated contacts with Russian intelligence.” You were asked if that as an inaccurate story. Would it be fair to characterize that story as almost entirely wrong? COMEY: Yes. COTON: Do you have — at the time the story was published, any indication of any contact between Trump people and Russians, intelligence officers, other government officials or close associates of the Russian government? COMEY: That's one I can't answer sitting here. COTTON: We can discuss that in the classified setting then. I want to turn your attention now to Mr. Flynn. The allegations of his underlying conduct to be specific. His alleged interactions with the Russian ambassador on the telephone and then what he said to senior Trump administration officials and Department of Justice officials. I understand there are other issues with Mr. Flynn related to his receipt of foreign monies or disclosure ever official advocacy, those are serious allegations that I'm sure will be pursued but I want to speak specifically about his interactions with the Russian ambassador. There's a story on January 23rd in The Washington Post that says, entitled “FBI reviewed calls with Russian ambassador but found nothing illicit.” Is this story accurate? COMEY: I don't want to comment ton that senator. I'm pretty sure the bureau has not confirmed any interception of communications. So, I don't want to talk about that in an opening setting. COTTON: Would it be improper for an incoming national security advisor to have a conversation with a foreign ambassador? COMEY: In my experience, no. COTTON: But you can't confirm or deny that the conversation happened and we would need to know the contents of that conversation to know if it in fact was proper. COMEY: I don't think I can talk about that opening setting. Again, I've been out of government a month. So, I also don't want to talk about things when it's now somebody else's responsibility. But maybe in the classified setting we can talk more about that. COTTON: You stated earlier that there was an open investigation of Mr. Flynn and the FBI. Did you or any FBI agent ever sense that Mr. Flynn attempted to deceive you or make false states to an FBI agent? COMEY: I don't want to go too far. That was the subject of the criminal inquiry. COTTON: Did you ever come close to closing the investigation on Mr. Flynn? COMEY: I don't think I can talk about that in open setting either. COTTON: We can discuss these more in the closed setting then. Mr. Comey, in 2004, you were a part of a well-publicized event about an intelligence program that had been recertified several times. And you were acting attorney general when Attorney General John Ashcroft was incapacitated due to illness. There was a dramatic showdown at the hospital here. The next day you said you that wrote the letter of resignation, signed it, went to meet with President Bush and explained why you produced to certify it is that accurate? COMEY: Yes. COTTON: At anytime during FBI director did you ever write and sign a letter of resignation? COMEY: Letter of resignation? No, sir. COTTON: Despite all of off that testified to today you didn't feel this rose to a level of honest difference of opinion between accomplished and skilled lawyers in that 2004 episode. COMEY: I wouldn't characterize the events in 2004 that way but to answer, no, I didn't find, encounter any circumstance that led me intend to resign, consider to resign. No, sir. COTTON: Thank you. BURR: Senator Harris. SEN. KAMALA HARRIS: Director Comey, I want to thank you you are now a private citizen and you're enduring a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing. Each of us gets seven minutes instead of five to ask you questions, thank you. COMEY: I'm between opportunities now so — HARRIS: You are — I'm sure you'll have future opportunities. You and I are both former prosecutors. I'm not going to require to you answer. I just want to make a statement that in my experience of prosecuting cases when a robber held a gun to somebody's head and said I hope you will give me your wallet, the word hope was not the operative word at that moment. But you don't have to respond to that point. I have a series of questions to ask you. And they're going to start with: Are you aware of any meetings between the trump administration officials and Russia officials during the campaign that have not been acknowledged by those officials in the White House? COMEY: That's not — even if I remembered clearly, that's not a question I can answer in open setting. HARRIS: Are you aware of any questions by Trump campaign officials or associates of the campaign to hide their communications with Russia officials through encrypted means? COMEY: I have to give you the same answer. HARRIS: In the course of the FBI's investigation did you ever come across anything that suggested that communication, records, documents or other evidence had been destroyed? COMEY: I think a got to give you the aim answer is because it would touch on investigative matters. HARRIS: And are you a wear of any potential efforts to conceal between campaign officials and Russian officials? COMEY: I have to give you the aim answer is. HARRIS: Thank you. As a former attorney general, I have a series of questions in connection with your connection with the attorney general while you were FBI director. What is your understanding of the parameters of Attorney General Sessions' recusal from the Russia investigation? COMEY: I think it's described in a written release from DOJ which I don't remember sitting here but the gist is he will be recused from all matters relating to Russia or the campaign. Or the activities of Russia and the '16 election or something like that. HARRIS: So, is your knowledge of the extent of the recusal based on the public statements he's made? COMEY: Correct. HARRIS: Is there any kind of memorandum issued from the attorney general to the FBI outlining the parameters of his recusal? COMEY: Not that I'm aware of. HARRIS: Do you know if he reviewed any DOJ documents before he was recused? COMEY: I don't know. HARRIS: And after he was recused. I'm assuming same answer? COMEY: Same answer. HARRIS: And aside from any notice or memorandum that was not sent or was what process would be to make sure that the attorney general would not have any connection to the investigation torsion your knowledge? COMEY: I don't know for sure. I know he had consulted with career ethics officials that know how to run a recusal at DOJ. But I don't know what mechanism they set up. HARRIS: And the attorney general recused himself from the investigation, do you believe it was appropriate for him to be involved in the firing of the chief investigator of that case that had Russia interference? COMEY: It's something that I can't answer sitting here. It's a reasonable question. It would depend on a lot of things I don't know, like did he know, what was he told, did he realize the investigation, things like that. I just don't know the answer. HARRIS: You mentioned in your testimony that the president essentially asked you for a loyalty pledge. Are you aware of him making the same request of any other member the cabinet? COMEY: I don't know one way or another. I've never heard anything about it. HARRIS: You mentioned you had the conversation where he hoped that you would let the Flynn matter go on February 14. Or thereabouts. It's my understanding that Mr. Sessions was recused from any involvement in the investigation, about a full two weeks later. To your knowledge, was the attorney general, did he have access to information about the investigation in those two weeks? COMEY: In theory, sure. Because he's the attorney general. I don't know whether he had any contact with materials related to that. HARRIS: To your knowledge was there any directive that he should not have any contact with any information about the Russian investigation between the February 14th date and the day he was ultimately recused himself on March 2nd. COMEY: Not to my knowledge. I don't know one way or another. HARRIS: And did you speak to the attorney general about the Russia investigation about his recusal? COMEY: I don't think so, no. HARRIS: Do you know if anyone in the department, in the FBI, forwarded any documents or information on memos of any sort, to the attention of the attorney general before his recusal? COMEY: I don't know of any or remember any signaturing here. It's possible. HARRIS: Do you know if the attorney general was involved, in fact, involved in any aspect of the Russia investigation after the 2nd of March? COMEY: I don't. I would assume not. Let me say this way, I don't know of any information that would lead me to believe he did something to touch the Russia investigation after recusal. HARRIS: In your written testimony, you indicate that after you were left alone with the president, you mentioned that it was inappropriate and should never happen again to the attorney general. And apparently, he did not reply. And you wrote that he did not reply. What did he do, if anything? Did he just look at you? Was there a pause for a moment, what happened? COMEY: I don't remember real clearly. I have a recollection of him just kind of looking at me. It was a danger I'm projecting on to him so this might be a faulty memory. But I kind of got — his body language gave me a sense like what am I going to do. HARRIS: Did he shrug? COMEY: I don't remember clearly. I think the reason I have that impression is I have some recollection of almost imperceptible like what am I going to do. But I don't have a clear recollection of that of that. He didn't say anything. HARRIS: On that same February 14th meeting you said you understood the president to be requesting that you drop the investigation. After that meeting, however, you received two calls from the president March 30th and April 11th, where the president talked about cloud over his presidency. Has anything you've learned in the months since your February 14 meeting changed your understanding of the president’s request — ¶I guess that would be what he said in public documents or public interviews? COMEY: Correct. HARRIS: And is there anything about this investigation that you believe is in any way biased or, or is not being informed by a process of seeking the truth? COMEY: No. The appointment of a special counsel should offer great — especially given who that person is, great comfort to Americans. No matter what your political affiliation is, that this will be done independently, confidently and honestly. HARRIS: And do you believe he should have full authority, Mr. Mueller, to be able to pursue that investigation? COMEY: Yes. And knowing him well, over the years, if there's something that he thinks he needs, he will speak up about it. HARRIS: Do you believe he should have full independence? COMEY: Oh, yeah. And he wouldn't be part of if he wasn't going to get full Independence. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. CORNYN: Mr. Comey I'll repeat what I said in previous hearings that I believe you're a good and decent man who has been dealt with a difficult hand starting back with the Clinton e-mail investigation. I appreciate you being here voluntarily to cooperation with the investigation. As a general matter, if an FBI agent has reason to believe that a crime has been committed, do they have a duty to report it? COMEY: That's a good question. I don't know that there's a legal duty to report it. They certainly have a cultural, ethical duty to report it. CORNYN: You're unsure whether they would have a legal duty? COMEY: That's a good question. I have not thought about that before. There's a statute that prohibits the felony, knowing a felony and taking steps to conceal it but that's a different question. Let me be clear, I would expect any FBI agent who has information about a crime to report it. CORNYN: Me, too. COMEY: But where you rest that obligation, I don't know. It exists. CORNYN: And let me suggest as a general proposition, if you're trying to make an investigation go away, is firing an FBI director a good way to make that happen? By that, I mean -- COMEY: It doesn't make a lot of sense to me but I obviously am hopelessly biased given I was the one fired. CORNYN: I understand it's personal. COMEY: Given the nature of the FBI, I meant what I said. For all the indispensable people in the world, including the FBI, there's lots of bad things for me not being at the FBI, most of them for me, but the work is going to go on. CORNYN: Nothing that you testified to as to today, has impeded the investigation of the FBI or director Mueller's ability to get to the bottom of this? COMEY: Correct. Especially, Director Mueller is a critical part of that equation. CORNYN: Let me take you back to the Clinton e-mail investigation. I think you've been tanked agency a hero or a villain, depending on whose political ox is being gored at many different times during the court of the Clinton e-mail investigation, and even now perhaps. But you clearly were troubled by the conduct of the sitting Attorney General Loretta Lynch when it came to the Clinton e-mail investigation. You mentioned the characterization that you'd been asked to accept. That this was a matter. And not a criminal investigation. Which you said it was. There was the matter of President Clinton's meeting on the tarmac. With the sitting attorney general at the time when his wife was a subject to a criminal investigation. And you suggested that perhaps there are other matters that you may be able to share with us later on in a classified setting. But it seems to me that you clearly believe that Loretta Lynch, the attorney general, had an appearance of a conflict of interest on the Clinton e-mail investigation. Is that correct? COMEY: That's fair. I didn't believe she could credibly decline that investigation. At least not without grievous damage to the Department of Justice and to the FBI. CORNYN: And under Department of Justice and FBI norms, wouldn't it have been appropriate for the attorney general, or if she had recused herself which she did not do for the deputy attorney general to appoint a special counsel. That's essentially what's happened with director Mueller. Would that have been an appropriate step? COMEY: Certainly, yes, sir. CORNYN: And were you aware Ms. Lynch had been requested numerous times to appoint a special counsel and had refused. COMEY: Yes. From, I think, Congress had — members of congress had repeatedly asked, yes, sir. CORNYN: Yours truly did on multiple occasions. And that heightened your concerns about the appearance of a conflict of interest with the Department of Justice which caused you to make what you have described as an incorrectly painful decision to basically take the matter up yourself and led to that July press conference? COMEY: Yes, sir. I ask — after President Clinton, former President Clinton met on the plane with the attorney general, I considered whether I should call for the appointment of a special counsel. And decided that would be an unfair thing to do because I knew there was no case there. We investigated it very, very thoroughly. I know this is a subject of passionate disagreement but I knew there was no case there. And calling for the appointment of special counsel would be brutally unfair because it would send the message, uh-huh, there's something here. That's my judgment. Lots of people have different views about it but that's what I thought about it. CORNYN: Well if a special counsel had been appointed they could have made that determination there was nothing there and declined to pursue it, right? COMEY: Sure. But it would have been many months later or a year later. CORNYN: Let me just you ask to — given the experience of the Clinton e-mail investigation and what happened there. Do you think it's unreasonable for anyone, any president, who has been assured on multiple occasions that he's not the subject of an FBI investigation, do you think it's unreasonable for them to want the FBI director to publicly announce that, so that this cloud over his administration would be removed? COMEY: I think that's a reasonable point of view. The concern would be, obviously, because as that boomerang comes back it's going to be a very big deal because there will be a duty to correct. CORNYN: Well, we saw that in the Clinton e-mail investigation. COMEY: Yes, I recall that. CORNYN: I know you do. So, let me ask you, finally, in the minute we have left. There was this conversation back and forth about loyalty. And I think we all appreciate the fact that an FBI director is an unique public official in the sense he's not — he's a political appointee in one sense. But he has a duty of independence to pursue the law pursuant to the Constitution and laws of the United States. And so when the president asked you about loyalty, you got in this back and forth about, well, I'll pledge you my honesty. Then it looks like from what I've read you agreed upon honest loyalty. Is that the characterization? COMEY: Yes. CORNYN: Thank you very much. COMEY: Yes, sir. BURR: Senator Reed. REED: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, thank you, Director Comey. There have been press reports that the president, in addition to asking to you drop the Flynn investigation has asked other senior intelligence officials to take steps which would tend to undermine the investigation of Russia. There are reports that he's asked Dan Coats and Mike Rogers to make public statements exonerating him or taking the pressure off of him. And also reports about Admiral Rogers and Director Pompeo to intervene and reach out to the FBI to ask them. Are you aware of any of these -- do you have any information with respect to any of these allegations? COMEY: I don't. I'm aware of the public reporting but I had no contact. No conversation with any of those leaders about that subject. REED: Thank you. You have testified that you interpret the discussion with the president about Flynn as a direction to stop the investigation, is that correct? COMEY: Yes. REED: You testified that the president asked you to lift the cloud by especially making public statements dishonoring him and perhaps others, and you refused, correct? COMEY: I didn't do it. I didn't refuse the president. I told him we would see what we can do. The second time he called. I told him in substance, that's something your lawyer will have to take up with the Justice Department. REED: And part of the underlying logic as we discussed many times throughout this morning is the duty to correct. That is one of a theoretical issue but also a very practical issue. Was there — your feeling that the direction on the investigation could in fact include the president? COMEY: Well, in theory. I mean, as I explained, the concern of one of my senior leader colleagues was, if you're looking at potential coordination between the campaign and Russia, the person at the head of the campaign is the candidate. So, logically, this person argued the candidate's knowledge, understanding, would logically become a part of your inquiry if it proceeds. So, I understand that argument. But my view was that what I said to the president was accurate and fair. And fair to him. I resisted the idea of publicly saying it. Although if the Justice Department had wanted to I would have done it because of the duty to correct and the slippery slope problem. REED: Now, again, also, you've testified that the president asked you repeatedly to be loyal to him. And you responded you'd be honestly loyal. Which is your way of saying I'll be honest and I'll be ahead of the FBI independent, is that fair? COMEY: Correct. I tried honest first. And also, you see it in my testimony. I also tried to explain to him why it's in his interest and every president's interest for the FBI to be apart, in a way, because it's credibility is important to a president and total country. And so, I tried to hold the line. Hold the line. It got very awkward. And then I said you'll always have honesty from me. He said honest loyalty. And I then I proceeded with that as I saw that as a way to add this awkwardness. REED: Is there any explanation? COMEY: There was an explanation, I just don't buy it. REED: Our, yes, so you're fired. Do you believe you're fired because you refused to take the president's direction, is that the ultimate reason? COMEY: I don't know for sure. I know I was fired. Again, I take the president's words, I know I was fired because of something about the way I was conducting the Russia investigation was in some way putting pressure on him, in some way irritating him. And he decided to fire he because of that. I can't go farther than that. REED: Now, the Russian investigation as you've pointed out and my colleagues is one of the most serious hostile acts against this country's history undermining our core of elections is not a discrete event. It will likely occur again and is likely being prepared for '18, '20 and beyond. And yet the president of the United States advised you because at your own — some relationship to the investigation. Then he shows up in the Oval Office with the Russian foreign minister first as classifying you as crazy and a real nutjob. He said “I faced great pressure because of Russia; that’s taken off.” Your conclusion would be that the president, I would think is downplaying the seriousness of this threat. In fact, took specific steps to stop a thorough investigation of the Russian influence, and also from what you've said or what was said this morning, doesn't seem particularly interested in these hostile threats by the Russians. Is that true? COMEY: I don't know that I can agree to that level of detail. There's no doubt it's a fair judgment. It's my judgment I was fired because of the Russia investigation. I was fired in some way to change — or the endeavor was to change the way the Russia investigation is being conducted. That is a very big deal. And not just because it involves me. The nature of the FBI and the nature of its work requires that it not be the subject of political consideration. And on top of that, you have the Russia investigation itself is vital, because of the threat. And I know I should have said this earlier, but it's obvious, if any Americans were part of helping the Russians do that to us, that is a very big deal. And I'm confident if that is the case, director Mueller will find that evidence. REED: Finally, the president tweeted that James Comey better hope there are no tapes of our conversations before they start leaking to the press. Was that a rather unsubtle attempt to intimidate you from testifying and intimidate anyone who seriously crosses his path from doing it? COMEY: I'm not going to sit here and try to attempts the president's tweets. To me, it's major impact. It occurred in the middle of the night, holy cow, there might be tapes. If there's tapes it's not just my word against him on the direction to get rid of the Flynn investigation. REED: Thank you very much. BURR: Senator McCain. McCAIN: In the case of Hillary Clinton, you made the statement that there wasn't sufficient evidence to bring the suit against her, although it had been very careless in their behavior. But you did reach a conclusion, in that case that it was not necessary further pursue. Yet at the same time in the case of Mr. Comey, you said that there was not enough information to make a conclusion. Tell me the difference between your conclusion as far as former secretary Clinton is concerned and Mr. Trump? COMEY: The Clinton investigation was a completed investigation that the FBI had been deeply involved in. So, I had an opportunity to understand all of the facts and apply those facts against the laws as I understood them. This investigation was underway, still going, when I was fired. So it's nowhere near in the same place. At least it wasn't when I was — McCAIN: But it's still ongoing? COMEY: Correct. As far as I know. It was when I left. McCAIN: That investigation is going on. This investigation is going on. To reach separate conclusions? COMEY: No, that one was done. McCAIN: That investigation have any involvement of Secretary Clinton or any of her associates is completed? COMEY: Yes, as of July 5th, the FBI completed its investigative work. That's what I was announcing what we had done and what we had found. McCAIN: Well, at least in the mind-set of this member, there's a whole lot of questions remaining about what went on, particularly considering the fact that, as you mention, it's a, quote, big deal as to what went on during the campaign. So, I'm glad you concluded that part of the investigation. But I — I think that the American people have a whole lot of questions out there, particularly since you just emphasized the role that Russia played. And obviously, she was a candidate for president at the time. So, she was clearly involved in this whole situation where fake news, as you've just described it, a big deal, took place. And you're going to have to help me out here. In other words, we're — the investigation that anything former Secretary Clinton had to do and we don't have to worry about it anymore? COMEY: With respect to — I'm a little confused, senator. With respect to Secretary Clinton we investigated her use of a personal e-mail server. McCAIN: I understand. COMEY:That's the investigation of July 5th that I concluded. McCAIN: So, at the same time, you made the announcement there would be no charges brought against then-Secretary Clinton for any activities involved in the Russia involvement and our engagement in our election. I don't quite understand how you can be done with that, but not done with the whole investigation of their attempt to affect the outcome of our election? COMEY: No, I'm sorry, when I was fired on May 9th [there was] still an open investigation to understand the Russians and whether any Americans worked with them. McCAIN: And the conclusion there was no need to bring charges against Secretary Clinton? So, you reached the conclusion with regard to the President Comey — the case of President Trump, you had an ongoing investigation. So, you've got one candidate who you're done with. And another candidate that you have a long way to go. Is that correct? COMEY: I don't know how far the FBI has to go, but, yes ... Clinton clinton e-mail investigation was completed. The investigation of Russia's efforts in connection with the election. And whether there was any coordination and with whom the Russia campaign is ongoing when I left. McCAIN: You just made it clear you said, quote, this is a quote, big deal, unquote. I think it's hard to recognize in one case you reach a complete conclusion. And on the other side, you have not. And you in fact, obviously, there's a lot more there as we know. As you called it a, quote, big deal. She's one of the candidates. But in her case, you say there will be no charges, in case of President Trump, the investigation continues. What has been brought out in this hearing is more and more emphasis on the Russian engagement of and involvement in this campaign. How serious do you think this was? COMEY: Very serious. I want to say something to be made clear, we had not announced nor provocation to announce that the Russians may have coordinated with Secretary Clinton's campaign. McCAIN: Well, they may not have been involved with her campaign. They were involved with the entire presidential campaign, obviously. COMEY: Yes, sir. That is the investigation that began last summer and so far as I'm aware continues. McCAIN: So both President Trump and former candidate Clinton are both involved in the investigation, yet one of them, you said, there's going to be no charges. And the other one, the investigation continues. Well, I think there's a double standard there to tell you the truth. Then when the president said to you, he talked about the April 11th phone call, he said, quote, because I've been very loyal to you. Very loyal. We had that thing, you know. Does that arouse your curiosity as to what quote that thing was? COMEY: Yes. McCAIN: Why didn't you ask him? COMEY: It didn't seem to me to be important for the conversation we were having to understand that I took it to be some — an effort to communicate to me this — that there is a relationship between us where I've been good to you, you should be good to me. McCAIN: Yeah, but I think it would intensity arouse my curiosity if the president of the United States said we had that thing, you know. I'd like to know what the hell that thing is, particularly if I'm the director of the FBI. COMEY: Yeah, I get that, senator. Honestly, I'll tell you what: this is speculation but what I concluded at the time, in his memory, he was searching back to our encounter at the dinner and was preparing himself to say I offered loyalty to you, you promise loyalty to me. All of a sudden, I think his memory did not happen and he pulled up short. McCAIN: We would have had conversation if that happened to me, to be honest with you. Are you aware of anything that would lead you to believe that the president, or members of the administration or members of the campaign, could potentially be used to coerce or blackmail the administration? COMEY: That's a subject for investigations. Not something I can comment on sitting here. McCAIN: But you reached that conclusion as far as Secretary Clinton was concerned? But you're not reaching a conclusion as far as this administration is concerned? Are you aware of anything that would lead you to believe that information exists that could coerce members of the administration or blackmail the administration? COMEY: That's not a question I can answer, senator. BURR: Sir, time's expired. McCAIN: Thank you. BURR: Time has expired for the hearing. Can I say for members. We'll reconvene promptly at 1:00 P.M. In the hearing room. We have a vote scheduled for 1:45, I would suggest that all members promptly be there at 1:00, we have about three minutes. I'd like to have order. Photographers -- photographers return to where you were, please. This hearing is not adjourned yet. Either that, or we'll remove you. To members, we have about three minutes of update that we would love to cover as soon as we get into the closed session before we have an opportunity to spend some time with director Comey. Based on our agreement, it would be my intentions to adjourn that closed hearing between 2:00 and 2:10 so members would go vote and I would urge you to eat at that time. Jim, several members of this committee have had an opportunity to work with you since you walked in the door. I want to say personally on behalf of all the committee members we're grateful for your service to the country not just in your capacity as FBI director but as prosecutor, and more importantly being somebody that loves this country enough to tell it like it is. I want to say to your workforce, that we're grateful to them with the level of cooperation that they have shown us. With the trust we built between both organizations. The congress and the bureau. We couldn't do our job if it wasn't for their willingness to share candidly, with us, the work that we need to see. This hearing's the ninth public hearing this committee has had this year. That's twice the historical yearlong average of this committee. I think the vice chairman and my biggest challenge when this investigation has concluded is to return our hearings to the secrecy of a closed hearing. To encourage our members not to freely talk about intelligence matters, publicly. And to respect the fact that we have a huge job. And that's to represent the entire body of the United States Senate and the American people. To make sure that we work with the intelligence community to provide you the tools to keep America safe. And that you'll do it within the legal limit or those limits that are set by the executive branch. We could not do it if it wasn't for our trusted partnership that you have been able to lead and others before you. So, as we depart from this, this is a pivotal hearing in our investigation. We're grateful for the professionalism you've season and your willingness, I would turn to the Vice Chairman. WARNER: I simply want to echo, again, the thanks for your appearance. And there clearly still remain a number of questions. And the one thing I want to commit to you and more importantly, Jim and I want to commit to all of us still potentially watching, following, there's still a lot of unanswered questions. And we're going to get to the bottom of this, we're going to get the facts out. The American people deserve to know. There's implications of the trump officials and the Russians. But the macro. And I think it's important that all Americans realize that threat is real. It's continuous. It's not just towards our nation. It's towards all western democracies and we have to come to a selection. BURR: Director, I thank you. On behalf of the committee, this hearing is adjourned.

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