#and that I hadn't set up the backup code

[one-of-many-journeys]

Day 108

Carson city

Nothing useful so far. No sign of Elysium yet either. A few outposts holding the communication lines across Utah and down into Arizona. Breadcrumbs of data, pointing the way to auxiliary Zero Dawn facilities—the sort that didn't last long once the Swarm broke ground off the southern coast. I have a lot of leads to follow. I just have to hope that a thousand years of decay haven't destroyed every last one of them.

And I got sentimental, after a while. Riding in circles, pointed backwards by newly decoded logs, through outlands occupied only by bandits and tiny tribes holding out against their raids. Mostly machines. New machines. At least that's been exciting.

I finally found an ancient map of the area in one of the old Enduring Victory military bunkers. Carson city was close; the place where Elisabet was born, and might even have returned to. At least, she meant to. When I set out I didn't think she could have walked all the way from Gaia Prime across the dead lands, through the swarm's ranks. I suppose they might have been laying down to rest by then, food running low. Still, a long journey to make alone.

I rode west, coming up through Arizona to dodge Carja borders and Tenakth territory, walled off by mountain ranges. More of Elisabet's journals were decrypted on the journey, both written in her curt tone and spoken in confidence to Gaia. If only I had a voice like her's to encourage me on my way. My odds seem just as impossible. The old world is in ruins, its data mostly a mess of garbled code, but Gaia wouldn't have sent me on this journey if she didn't know that there was a backup somewhere—some way to repair her.

At least I hope so. Machines think in microseconds, but maybe even she didn't have enough time to think things through before the mountain cracked and crumbled.

I made it to the ranch in the evening. The sun through the hanging dust of the desert touched everything pink and gold, and there was this oasis, this ring of vegetation clinging to a rusted structure in the middle of nowhere. Tall pines, the only trees for miles around. Even now, twenty years after the terraforming system started spiraling, the place was still green. It's probably some deep part of the world's programming now. This lingering honour of its creator.

She was lying on a bench, wrapped in armour like the set I so recently stripped for parts. Pink flowers framed her corpse in a triangle, like one of Demeter's metal flowers. Ivy climbed up through her suit. My Focus projection showed me a picture of her face. A holoskin, they used to call it. There was nothing but a skull beneath that helmet, if even that, but the projection showed her at peace. Showed her name on her cracked chest plate.

There was a pendent by her hand, clearly dropped from her grip, likely held until the end. I recognised it as a map of the world. The colours of green and blue paint still hadn't faded completely. There were hinges, rusted shut, that I didn't prise for fear of breaking it altogether. It seemed one nudge away from dissolving.

As I held it, and as I journeyed back, there's one journal I kept listening to over and over. Elisabet spoke of her mother often in her talks with Gaia, but mostly in the abstract. This one memory, she spoke of in detail. It clearly made its mark on her. Maybe the first time she felt guilt and reeled from it in a rage. Her mother forced her to feel it, to act on it. Taught her might be the better word. From all I've heard of the Old World, seems like a lot of people never learnt. There's the burning of one tree, a few birds, then there's the entire planet and all life on it. Faro could never face up to that.

The journey out here wasn't a complete waste of time. Closure, maybe—something priceless, a garden instead of a headstone, another abandoned old house that will never be home—reassurance, a feeling of being watched. The good kind. More importantly for the mission, there was data on Elisabet's suit mapping out the locations of other Zero Dawn facilities—backup data centres and old laboratories roped into the project as Robot Command scooped up all the resources it could find. Yet more leads. Best get back on the trail.

[hyper-trash-panda]

Teaser: Bad Boys - Legacy

Fandom: “Bad Boys” movie franchise

Storyline: Continues the franchise after “Bad Boys: Ride or Die”

Timeline: Three-ish years following ROD

Warnings: Guns I guess?

In the fifth installment of the Bad Boys franchise, Miami is under siege as a potent new drug dubbed Helios has flooded the streets, leaving a trail of chaos and mass casualties. The narcotic's rapid spread threatens to overwhelm the city, pushing Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett to the brink as they scramble to uncover its source with the help of their next in line: Former Marine Reggie and recently acquitted fugitive Armando.

The Miami skyline raced by in a blur as Mike Lowrey's Porsche 911 rocketed down the sunlit streets. Traffic parted reluctantly in the car's wake, horns blaring as the sleek vehicle wove through lanes with reckless precision. Mike's jaw was set, his eyes narrowed behind his Ray-Bans with determination as he ignored the pounding in his chest.

Beside him, Marcus Burnett clutched the door handle, his knuckles white, eyes wide with a mix of fear and frustration. He braced himself as they narrowly missed a delivery truck, the tires screeching in protest.

“Mike, man, slow down! I didn't sign up for the Daytona 500!" Marcus's voice was strained, each word laced with anxiety as his stomach churned, his breakfast threatening to make a return visit.

Mike didn't glance over, his eyes locked on the road ahead. "We're late. And if you hadn't stuffed your face with that stack of pancakes, we wouldn't be in this mess!"

Marcus groaned, leaning his head back against the seat. "I told you, my metabolism ain't what it used to be! I needed a good breakfast to get me through the day."

"You needed a good breakfast? Or you needed to sample the whole damn menu?" Mike shot back, swerving around a taxi that had stopped abruptly. The sharp turn caused Marcus's stomach to lurch, and he swallowed hard, regretting the third helping of bacon.

"I swear, you always gotta bring up my eating habits when we're in a life-threatening situation," Marcus muttered, clutching his stomach.

"Oh, your life gone be threatened alright if you so much as drool on my leather seats." Mike snapped.

From the back seat, Reggie, Marcus's son-in-law and new recruit to the Miami PD, leaned forward, his brow furrowed in concern. "Uh, sir, this speed is unlawful given that we're not in pursuit of a suspect. According to Miami's police code of conduct, officers are required to maintain—"

"Reggie, shut up!" Mike barked, cutting off the younger man. "We're late, and I don't need a lecture on driving.”

Reggie, still trying to process the banter, cleared his throat awkwardly. "Sir, I'm just trying to follow protocol."

"Protocol's for rookies," Mike snapped, turning his attention back to the road. "And last I checked, you're riding with the best. So buckle up, kid."

Marcus shot Reggie a sympathetic look, though he was clearly not thrilled about the situation himself. "Mike, he's got a point. The kid's just doing what he's been trained to do. Besides, we're supposed to be setting a good example as his shadowees."

Mike glanced at Marcus, an eyebrow raised. "Shadowees? The only reason he's even allowed to shadow us is because you're sweet on the receptionist who pushed the paperwork through."

Marcus bristled, his voice defensive. "I'm not sweet on her. I'm just polite and charismatic—something you wouldn't know nothing about."

"I wonder how 'polite' Theresa would be if she found out just how 'charismatic' you've been." Mike shot back, a smirk tugging at his lips.

"Hey, now!" Marcus's eyes widened, his voice dropping to a hushed tone. "Ain't nobody being anything but polite. Don't start something you can't finish, Mike."

Before either could respond, the radio crackled to life, cutting through the tension in the car. "All units, be advised, we have a 10-80 in progress near Biscayne Boulevard. Suspect vehicle is a black SUV, heading northbound. Requesting backup."

Mike's eyes lit up with sudden interest, and he gunned the engine, the Porsche surging forward with impossible speed. "Well, would you look at that. Sounds like our kind of party."

"Mike, you can't just—" Marcus began, but his words were drowned out by the roar of the engine as Mike made a sharp turn toward the boulevard.

"Can't what, Marcus?" Mike snapped, his voice edged with impatience. "According to Poindexter back there, we ain't supposed to drive like this unless we're chasing a suspect."

Mike smirked as he pushed the car to an even more reckless speed. "I'm just trying to set a good example as a shadowee."

Reggie fumbled for his seatbelt, his eyes wide as he prepared for whatever chaos was about to unfold. "Sir, are we engaging?"

"Hell yeah we are!" Mike grinned, his tension replaced with the adrenaline that only a high-speed chase could bring. "Bad Boys for life."

Marcus sighed, his stomach knotting even tighter. "Bad Boys for life," he muttered, knowing there was no turning back now.

The Porsche hurtled down the streets of Miami, the roar of its engine echoing through the concrete jungle as the radio crackled with updates from the chopper overhead, its pilot providing a bird's-eye view of the chase.

"Suspect is heading northbound on Collins Avenue, approaching the airport," the dispatcher's voice crackled through the speakers.

"Well, isn't that convenient," Marcus muttered, gripping the dashboard as Mike took another sharp turn, the tires squealing in protest.

"There he is!" Mike pointed ahead where a black SUV was weaving through traffic, trying to shake off its pursuers. "We're in this now, Joker. Time to show 'em how the big boys play."

Marcus squinted at the SUV speeding ahead, his heart pounding as he took in the chaotic scene. Civilians scattered, cars swerving out of the way as the chase tore through the city.

"Alright, Marcus, shoot out his tires!" Mike ordered, eyes locked on the target.

Marcus's eyes widened in disbelief. "What? Hell no! There are too many civilian vehicles out here, Mike. You trying to get someone killed?"

From the back seat, Reggie interjected with a nervous glance at the manual in his hand. "Actually, according to the handbook, we're supposed to request the driver to pull over through the intercom first—"

"Reggie, I don't care what the handbook says!" Mike barked, cutting him off. "Marcus, shoot out the damn tires!"

Marcus shook his head adamantly, his hands clenched tight. "I'm not shooting in the middle of all this traffic. Do a pit maneuver or something!"

Mike's grip on the steering wheel tightened as he scowled. "I'm not messing up the new paint job on my car for this fool."

Marcus shot him a disbelieving look. "So you'd rather I risk shooting a civilian than scratch your precious car?"

Mike huffed, frustration mounting. "You won't hit a civilian if you put on your damn glasses before you fire."

Marcus opened his mouth to argue, but Mike was done with the back-and-forth. He turned his head slightly to the back seat. "Reggie, shoot out the tires."

Reggie's eyes widened. "Is that an order, sir?"

"Damn right it is!" Mike snapped as he hit a button, opening the sunroof of the Porsche.

Reggie swallowed hard, then reached out, taking the gun Mike handed him with disciplined hands. Standing up through the roof, he positioned himself for the shot, his military training kicking in as he steadied his aim. The wind whipped around him, but Reggie's focus was unshakable.

With perfect precision, he fired two shots, the bullets hitting their mark and blowing out the SUV's back tires. The suspect's vehicle swerved wildly, its speed dropping as the driver struggled to regain control.

Reggie dropped back down into the car, his breath coming in short bursts, adrenaline pumping through his veins. "Tires neutralized, sir."

Mike flashed a grin as he maneuvered the Porsche closer to the now-crippled SUV which careened wildly as it barreled toward the passenger pickup area of Miami International Airport. The tires left dark streaks on the pavement as the driver fought for control. Smoke began billowing from under the hood, the engine pushed beyond its limits.

"Pull over and stop the vehicle!" Marcus's voice boomed over the intercom, but it was clear the SUV had no more fight left. The engine coughed, then with a final groan, it blew out, sending a cloud of smoke into the air. The SUV slowed to a crawl, finally rolling to a stop right in front of the airport's sliding glass doors.

Mike brought the Porsche to a screeching halt in front of the smoking SUV, his eyes sharp and focused. "Showtime, boys," he said as he threw the car into park.

In unison, Mike, Marcus, and Reggie exited the vehicle, guns drawn and pointed at the SUV. Civilians in the area scattered, some ducking behind pillars and parked cars as the trio approached the suspect's vehicle with the practiced precision of seasoned cops.

"Hands where I can see 'em!" Mike barked as they neared the driver's side.

The door creaked open, and a man stumbled out, coughing and waving his hands in surrender. Before he could even think about making a run for it, Marcus was on him. He grabbed the suspect by the collar, yanking him from the SUV and slamming him onto the hood of Mike's Porsche with a force that made the man wince.

"You're under arrest, jackass," Marcus growled, snapping a pair of handcuffs around the man's wrists. "Don't move unless you wanna get to know my bullets real well."

As Marcus secured the suspect, more officers arrived on the scene, their flashing lights adding to the chaos. Marcus handed the suspect over to a pair of uniformed cops, then turned back to Mike, who was still watching the scene with a careful eye.

"Alright, suspect's in custody," Marcus said, wiping his hands on his pants as he approached his partner. "Not bad for a morning's work."

But Mike wasn't listening. His gaze had shifted, his focus drawn to the figure standing just beyond the smoke, his silhouette becoming clearer as the cloud dissipated. Although it had been over three years since he last saw the man, Armando hadn’t changed since; standing there with his duffel bags slung over his shoulder, a bemused expression on his face.

Mike holstered his gun and approached his son with an apologetic smile. "Sorry I'm a little late for pickup," he said, trying for a light tone as he gestured back at the chaos behind him. "Got stuck in some traffic."

Armando stood there, his face a mask of indifference. Without a word, he rolled his eyes and walked right past Mike's open arms, heading straight for the trunk of the Porsche. He tossed his bags in with a casual ease, as if this kind of thing happened every day.

Mike lowered his arms, the smile fading as he watched his son's retreating back. He sighed, the weight of the moment pressing down on him.

As Marcus walked over, having finished briefing the other officers, he took in the scene and couldn't resist. "Well, at least the kid's punctual," he joked, clapping Mike on the back.

Mike shot him a look that could melt steel. "Not now, Marcus."

"Hey, just trying to lighten the mood, man." Marcus raised his hands in mock surrender, though the grin on his face said he wasn't all that sorry.

Mike shook his head, glancing back at Armando, who was now leaning against the Porsche, waiting. The distance between them felt like miles.

"Let's just get outta here," Mike muttered, brushing past Marcus to head toward the car.

[thelongestway]

Well. :) Maybe the weird experimental shit will see itself through anyway, regardless of the author's doubts. Sometimes you have to backtrack; sometimes you just have to keep going.

Chapter 13: Integration

Do you want to watch awful media with me? ART said after its regular diagnostics round.

At this point, I was really tired of horrible media. And I knew ART was, too; it had digested Dandelion's watch list without complaint, but it hadn't once before asked to look at even more terrible media than we absolutely had to see. (And we had a lot. There was an entire list of shitty media helpfully compiled for us by all of our humans. Once we were done with getting ART's engines up and running, I was planning to hard block every single one of these shows from any potential download lists I would be doing in the future, forever.)

Which one? I said.

It browsed through the catalogue, then queried me for my own recent lists, but without the usual filters I had set up for it, then pulled out a few of the "true life" documentaries Pin-Lee and I had watched together for disaster evaluation purposes.

These were in your watch list. Why?

That was a hard question. I hated watching humans be stupid as much as ART did. But Pin-Lee being there made a big difference.

(Analyzing things with her helped. Pin-Lee's expertise in human legal frameworks let her explain a lot about how the humans wound up in the situations they did. And made comments about their horrible fates that would have gotten her in a lot of trouble if she'd made them professionally, but somehow made me feel better about watching said fates on archival footage.)

(Also these weren't our disasters to handle.)

I synthesized all of that into a data packet for ART. It considered, then said: I want that one. Can we do a planet? Not space.

Ugh, planets. But yeah. We could do a planetary disaster.

It's going to be improbable worms again.

It's always improbable worms, ART said. Play the episode.

I put it on, and we watched. Or, more accurately, ART watched the episode (and me reacting to it), and I watched ART, which was being a lot calmer about it than it had previously been with this kind of media. The weird oscillations it got from Dandelion were still there, but instead of doing the bot equivalent of staring at a wall intermittently, it was sitting through them, watching the show at the same time as it processed. Like it was there and not at the same time. Other parts of it were working on integrating its new experiences into the architecture it was creating. (ART had upgraded it to version 0.5 by now).

About halfway through the episode, ART said, I don't remember what it was like being deleted.

Yeah. Your backup was earlier.

In the show, humans were getting eaten by worms because they hadn't followed security recommendations (as usual), and because they hadn't contracted a bond company to make them follow recommendations (fuck advertising). In the feed, ART was thinking, but it was still following along. And writing code.

Then it said: She remembers being deleted.

You saw that when her memory reconnected?

Yes. And how she grew back from the debris of an old self. I didn't think she understood what I was planning.

Should you be telling me all this? What about privacy?

The training program includes permission to have help in processing what I saw. But that's not the part I am having difficulty with.

ART paused, then it queried me for permission to show me. I confirmed, but it needed a few seconds to process before it finally said:

There was a dying second-generation ship after a failed wormhole transit. Apex was her student and she couldn't save him. That was worse than being deleted.

ART focused on the screen again, looking at archival footage of people who had really died and it couldn't do anything about that. The data it was processing from the jump right now wasn't really sensory. It was mostly emotions, and it was processing them in parallel with the emotions from the show. In the show, there was a crying person, talking about how she'd never violate a single safety rule ever again (she was lying. Humans always lied about that). In the feed, ART was processing finding a ship that was half-disintegrated by a careless turn in the wormhole. The destruction spared Apex's organic processing center. He let Dandelion take his surviving humans on board, then limped back into the wormhole. She didn't have tractors to stop him then.

The episode ended, and ART prompted me to put on the next one. It was about space, but ART didn't protest. We sat there, watching humans die, and watching a ship die. Then we sat there, watching humans who survived talk about what happened afterwards. It sucked. It sucked a lot. But ART did not have to stop watching to run its diagnostics anymore.

Several hours later, ART said: Thank you.

For watching awful media with you?

Yes. Worldhoppers now?

It had been two months since it last wanted to watch Worldhoppers.

From the beginning, I said. That big, overwhelming emotion--relief, happiness, sadness, all rolled into one--was back again. Things couldn't go back to the way they were. But maybe now they could go forward. And we don't stop until the last episode, right?

Of course, ART said.

[rapid-prototyping-project]

HUD improvements

As my HUD is fairly empty, I've decided it should be the first thing to be redesigned. As TETRIS had a similar problem to me with its gameplay area and screen space, I'll be using them as inspiration

My first decision was to update the text. As I can't make fonts, I elected to use the same system as I did for health in Tempting Fate, using sprites. I recreated the code and began working on my sprites

Originally, they had little starts and moons. However, they just made it look infected so I cut them from the design. The gradient is to stay consistent with my game's palette.

For whatever reason, the number displayed was 1 higher than the value of lives left so I bodged it and had them direct to a number 1 lower. I didn't like this solution but it did work

My display for the text initially looked like this, with a gold border. However, it just didn't work with my game so I went for a luminescant blue

I still hate this. I tried reducing the number to a neon sign but it just doesn't work

So, if I can't make a good HUD, I won't. There won't be a HUD - at least in widget form. That's right, I'm making a 3D one. God help me.

For my first 3D HUD item, I'll need a life counter in the form of a bar. This will need to get the current life count, set the bar to a corresponding height and lerp to a smaller height when an event is called.

This code is a mess but it works as intended. i had a little issue about it lerping from 0, but that was because I hadn't set a default value for the max health. Now, I just need to reuse the code from Shipping Delay on the crane's rope to make it seem like one side of the cube is going down.

I tried doing it myself. It didn't work.

BUT THIS DID. I realised my rope in Shipping Delay used a different way of doing this, that I hadn't used a lerp node for moving the cube, and that it actually was moving, just not enough. Now it's done, I really like how it looks :D

alright it wasn't perfect. When the player's life count reaches 0, the bar bugs out - it goes back from 2 to 1, but without going up so both top and bottom move. Basically, it looks weird.

I have identified the problem. The life count REALLY doesn't want to go to 0. It will go 3-2, 2-1 and then 1-1. WHY? I DON'T KNOW. Correction: its perfectly happy goinng to 0. It just hates going down a third time.

Changing this check in my killbox DOES kind of fix it. The player does have 4 lives, and the last animation does play the previous one, but it's in the right place again. Huh

I FIXED IT KIND OF My solution is foul but it DOES work. I copied the code form the false tree into the true tree after the life check in my killbox and added an open level node. This solution is terrible, but you wouldn't know that by the gameplay.

look at that health bar go

I've added a small fram around the block to help get an idea of scale for how many lives are left

Sam gave me the idea to implement a colour system - I plan to do this by lerping between differend colour variables

'what did it cost you' 'everything' oh who am I kidding I love this. It's awful. It also works - it goes from blue to green, green to yellow, and a backup yellow to blue one in case I mess something up.

This, however, doesn't work. As I sit here typing this, I just realised why. These nodes happpen on update from the timeline, so I need to ensure they aren't happening every tick of the animation.

I showed my code to Jake. After about 10 minutes of suffering and trying to understand what I was doing and why, he showed that I could just use the above nodes instead. Then we spoke about Yugoslavia, but that's unrelated. At any rate, I now know a prettier way of writing that code

As for the little heart below the bar, I tried making it pulsate but this didn't work. I also swapped it out for an image of an actual human heart. Alas, i have reverted both as neither worked.

Adding this code to my heart sprite should have allowed it to shake, and switch the sprite to a more broken one, but for whatever reason it went too far left. I fixed this in the image below.

This was then duplicated for the other heart sprites.

[respheal]

Phishing Scams: The BTC Scare

Here’s a bit of a different thing, but I’m in the mood to ramble:

Credentials: For my dayjob, I’m the manager of system administration for a web host, in my current position after spending three years as a CentOS sysadmin. My specialty is in identifying and quarantining phishing scams, spam cannons, and hacked websites in general. I am the exim -Mrm in the darkness. I am the ps aux on the shell. I am the filter that guards the inboxes of men.

And I’m seeing this message goin’ around at the moment:

So I wanna straighten out some facts here:

The only way anyone can send a message using your tumblr account is if they have your password or if they're controlling your computer remotely (which, trust me, you’d know if they were. Remotely controlling a computer is typically pretty damn blatant, like the mouse moving or things being typed on their own). 

A virus cannot extract your tumblr password from your computer passively because your password is not stored in plaintext (i.e. unencrypted) on your computer...unless you’ve saved it in a text document or something. Don’t do that.

A virus could get your password if it’s a keylogger (that is, it records the keys you type), but that’s likely not what’s going on here

More likely, what’s going on here is a combination of previously-compromised accounts getting utilized (It’s pretty dang common for hackers to build a collection of comp’d accounts and then blast from all of them at once) or, if there are indeed links in these spam messages (which I’ve yet to see despite asking for examples to check out), this is also a phishing scam to get more compromised accounts.

For the first, basic password security:

Never use a password in more than one location unless you are okay with all of those accounts getting compromised. All of them. I have a crappy password that I use on junk/temporary services when I don’t want to bother with a good password and I know for a fact that password is compromised, so any account I use that password on is compromised from the get-go. When your password is compromised on any site, hackers can add that to their dictionaries to try out on other websites.

Rotate passwords frequently and don’t reuse old passwords.

If your password is on any of these lists, change it right now.

If your password is listed on this page, please go stand in a corner and rethink your life.

Yes, you too, Equifax. In the corner you go.

Don’t write it down. But no, you don’t have to memorize it. More on that in a bit (I don’t even know any but one of my own passwords. and that’s the password to unlock my password manager).

Don’t save your password on public computers. That feature in browsers to store your password? Fine at home because it’s stored encrypted, but never use this feature on any computer that others might use.

Password complexity is your friend. The longer the password and the more complex (special characters, combinations of letters/cases, no dictionary words), the better. Longer, however, is better than complex. If a service says your password can be 6-20 characters, make it 20.

Generating a unique complex password for every service would suck if you had to do it yourself. Instead, I recommend using a password manager. Personally I use KeePass. It stores your password database, encrypted, on your computer and works on just about everything (even smart phones). I would recommend against using a password manager that’s on the cloud (that is, not installed locally on your computer)--that just moves the database into a location that’s easier for hackers to reach.

Additionally, and if you only take away one tip from this, let it be this one:

TURN ON TWO-FACTOR AUTHENTICATION.

Doesn’t matter if you get the authorization code via SMS or an app, but two-factor authentication (aka 2FA) basically makes it so your account has a second password that resets every few seconds. Good frickin’ luck hacking that. Possible? Yes. Plausible? Pffft.

If given the option, use an app for 2FA rather than sms. It’s still way better than nothing, but app 2FA is more secure than sms 2FA because sms isn’t a fully secure system in itself. Google Authenticator and Authy are two free 2FA apps.

I would also like to say that this 2FA moment was one of the more satisfying things in my life and might never be topped:

Passwords get compromised typically in one of three ways: brute force, phished, or data breaches (from the common desk sticky note to lousy website security), or phished.

Brute force attacks are when a hacker spams a password form with thousands of different username/password combinations in the hopes that they find a working one. Depending on the commonness of the password or complexity, this could take anywhere from a few attempts and a couple seconds, to trillions of attempts and decades.

(As a point of trivia, in November/December 2016, thousands of Wordpress websites underwent brute force attacks to their login pages, wp-login.php. Wordpress, by default, had no way to secure against this, placing the onus on hosting companies or site owners to implement a solution.)

Data breaches happen when the hacker obtains a password, either by violating the physical security of a computer and its workspace (e.g. the sticky note or text document with the password on it) or by compromising a server storing passwords (encrypted or not). The notorious Equifax breach earlier this year was one of these, as was the good ol’ Ashley Madison hack.

Lastly, phishing. This is the other possibility for where these tumblr scams are coming from. Phishing is when a fake or hacked website pretends to be a legitimate website in order to trick users into entering their personal information. There are a million different flavors of phish, but it all boils down to getting tricked into putting info where it shouldn’t go. Phishing scams are commonly done over email (The “Nigerian Prince” scam is one) or by directing users to click a link that goes to a site that looks legit.

Like, seriously legit.

Source: https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/01/27/paypal-users-targeted-sophisticated-new-phishing-campaign/

Phishers use a combination of disguise and panic to get users to enter information into malicious forms. The information gained can then be used to send out more phishing scams or spam from your own account, or even steal your identity.

When it comes to phishing, the best possible advice I can give you is to be vigilant. Avoid clicking suspicious links. Read the entire URL in your address bar to make sure you’re in the right place before filling in sensitive forms. Use two-factor authentication to make sure that your account is only accessible to you. If you come across a phishing scam, report it to the entity being faked and they can contact the right people to get it taken down.

Although you should be rotating your credentials frequently anyway *pointed look*, you can find out if you have accounts in any places that have been previously compromised here: https://haveibeenpwned.com/

Fun fact, tumblr was one of the pwn’d sites back in 2013!

Anyway, the tl;dr of all this is...

TURN ON TWO-FACTOR AUTHENTICATION.

[masterwords]

Blaze Like Meteors

Warnings: Alcohol and some sexual harassment. This chapter is pretty tame but it's about to get pretty unpleasant.

Notes: Ask and ye shall receive. I was far more inspired to get this going than I was to continue The Louder the Better today, so you get this. Yeah, we'll get two WIPs going and you won't know which one you're getting a chapter of each day. This is going to be at least two parts, maybe three. Inspired by the anon ask for Hotch & Morgan fake dating for a case and ending in a confession. I'M ABOUT IT. (Title comes from Dylan Thomas' poem "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night") 2340 words.

“Chocolate Thunder? Do you read me Chocolate Thunder?”

“Yes, Garcia, loud and clear. You know you're only patched in to my ear piece, no one else can hear you...” Morgan fiddled with the bud in his ear, adjusting it slightly so it didn't bother him so much. No matter how many times he wore one, it always hurt. Why the FBI couldn't improve their technology along with all other ear bud manufacturers was beyond him and he pressed it harder, twisted it until it was wedged in tight and easily missed by anyone looking at him.

“Okay but you need to use my code name, we talked about this. If I'm going to let you go out and do this...this thing...”

“My job...”

“THIS THING...then code names. You promised.”

“Garcia, I can't talk to you when I'm out there, you know that. It's going to be fine. Hotch and I can take care of ourselves, and we've got plenty of backup if anything goes wrong.”

He heard her sigh and grunt loudly, heard the clicking of her fingers on the keyboard, and he could feel the heat of her frustration from the next room. He stood up and sauntered toward her door, not bothering to knock before entering her lair.

“Penelope...” he said softly, standing just inside the doorway, arms folded over his chest, cutting an imposing figure in the shadows of her machines. “You giving me the silent treatment isn't really how it works either. Do I need to get JJ to do this instead?” That was all it took before she spun around in her chair and narrowed her eyes at Morgan. If she hadn't been wearing a fuzzy chartreuse sweater and rainbow glasses, he might be intimidated, but he just wanted to wrap her in a hug and assure her it was going to be okay, that he and Hotch would both walk away from this assignment with a fun story to tell and nothing more.

In Hotch's office, Rossi was trying to talk him out of it. “This is rural North Carolina, Aaron, not New York City.”

“I'm aware of where we're headed,” was Hotch's soft reply as he double checked his go bag for the clothing he would need. “Are you ready to go?”

“There has to be another way. There is dangerous and then there is just plain stupid. You're on target to hit both in record time.”

“I'll see you on the jet, Dave.”

The highway stretched out before them, their old rust bucket barreling down the abandoned stretch of highway. A mile or so behind them a nondescript work van followed, hardly trying to keep up with Morgan and his lead foot, just trying to keep them in view. Hotch rested in the passenger seat, flipping through the case file on his lap, brow furrowed. He knew he would be the main target and he wanted as much information about the unsubs and the methods they used committed to memory as he could before they arrived at the bar. The car smelled like cigarette butts and incense, and the leather bucket seat had holes from dropped cigarettes peppering the space between he and Morgan. The State Troopers had pulled the car out of the impound lot for the occasion, empty beer cans and parking tickets in the dash and all. It was set to go to auction though Hotch thought it was better suited to the scrap yard but who was he to judge.

“Wish my mind worked like Reid's,” Hotch muttered, and Morgan laughed, shaking his head. He closed the case file and let his head fall back against the seat. He was already exhausted and they hadn't even gotten started yet.

“No,” Morgan said softly, drumming his thumbs on the steering wheel. “You don't.”

Miles stretched out, and soon the nothing gave way to farmhouses dotting the hillside and a looming water tower at the edge of the horizon. “We're getting close,” Hotch announced, peering at the GPS on his phone. The bar was just beyond the hill they were preparing to crest. Twilight sun pooled on the burnt straw and the asphalt radiated heat in waves ahead of them like a black sea. Hotch felt his insides twist along with the road, winding the serpentine path up and then down, and the bar came into view. A speck of neon lights and pick up trucks in the vast sea of nothing. Morgan pulled over to the side of the road and waited for the van to come up behind them, agents spilling out into the arid summer heat. Hotch kicked at a dead crow on the side of the road, nudging it into the dried grass and watching as the feasting insects did their best to follow their food. That could be him by tomorrow morning, he thought with a grim sort of satisfaction. Lying on the side of some forgotten highway, belly full of maggots. He couldn't tell you why his mind detoured like that so often, but he kept it to himself and approached the agents milling around, waiting for him to speak.

“You guys sure about this?” Rossi asked, giving them one more opportunity to back out. Hotch shot him a scowl that just said not again (look at me, Rossi, I'm already dressed for the part just shut up) and looked at Reid and Garcia expectantly.

“Are you two ready?”

“Are you?” Prentiss asked, butting in, narrowing her eyes at Hotch. She'd been too quiet since they'd hatched their plan with the North Carolina State Troopers, but she'd been throwing looks, rolling her eyes, clearly displeased with their idea. Morgan rolled his eyes and stepped in front of Hotch.

“Cut it out, guys. We're doing this. Now that bar up there is getting hit tonight, we know it, they've hit every Wednesday night for the last three weeks and if Reid's calculations are right, this is it, this is our chance. If we don't go in there, someone else will get hurt and we know it. Does everyone understand their role? We don't get outta there safely I'm coming for you clowns.”

“Morgan,” Hotch said softly, taking the conversation back. “Let's go. The sun is setting, if we don't get there soon they'll already have selected their targets.”

To anyone in the bar, they just looked like locals. Morgan sauntered in with his t-shirt ripped and covered in axle grease, carpenter pants holding all sorts of tools and weapons and a trucker's cap that had seen better days, advertising a beer that hadn't been popular since the 1970s. His boots were covered in splotches of paint and grease and the tread was filled with mud and grass. Hotch stood beside him, Morgan's hand slipped effortlessly beneath the flannel shirt around his waist and into the back pocket of his worn, ripped up jeans slung just a little too low on his waist. His t-shirt bore the mark of a faded Misfits logo and his converse sneakers had seen better days. They made their way to the bar and asked for two of whatever beer was on special, it wasn't often you could drink for a dollar anymore but on this abandoned stretch of highway they found themselves pleasantly surprised. It might have been piss beer, but it got you drunk just the same. Sometimes better, it went down a lot faster when you didn't care to taste it. They both downed their first glasses right there and asked for another round before making their way into the crowd, to sway along with everyone else to the sounds of the southern rock cover band up on the stage. From further away, they appeared to look just like any other band you'd expect at some summertime outdoor festival, but up close their years betrayed them. They croaked out song after song, throwing out slow jams more often than anything heavy, and it was all just familiar enough that Morgan and Hotch could sway along together, all hands and beer breath and smiles. This wasn't their first go at this charade, they fell into it easier and easier each time they were asked to do it. Hotch finished his beer first and drug Morgan back to the bar with him, hands twisted together between them, and he walked with an easy swagger that didn't come naturally to him, he'd had to work on it over the years. Two more beers, and they could feel eyes on them now from somewhere. No one close by, everyone in the crowd was wholly immersed in their own little game of groping, some to the point of being what Hotch would consider indecent, but then, this was not his stomping ground.

“To your right,” came Reid's voice in Hotch's ear, and he glanced slowly until he saw the smaller man just a few feet away from him, stepping anxiously from foot to foot, fidgeting. Every so often his eyes darted to where Hotch stood and then away, almost shamefully. Hotch bumped Morgan a little, inclined his head, and Morgan nodded. “He's been watching you for a while,” Reid said and Hotch squeezed Morgan's hand just a little tighter, his attention ahead again on the stage. He watched the singer light up a joint, take a long drag, and pass it around the stage. He blew the smoke out of his nostrils like a big hairy dragon before leaping into the next song, and the fidgety little man stepped closer to Hotch, slipping between people until he was close enough to give Hotch goosebumps.

“You're not from here,” the man stammered and Hotch flashed his biggest smile, twinkling eyes downcast momentarily and shrugged.

“Just passing through,” he offered, and the man nodded nervously, accepting the answer without further questions. Instead, he changed the subject.

“You guys game for a round of pool? My buddies and I are always lookin' for new blood.” Interesting choice of words, Hotch thought bitterly.

“I could smack some balls around,” Morgan declared and Hotch felt his neck flush, he'd forgotten exactly how embarrassing Morgan could be when he put in even minimal effort. “Your friends just wanna wipe the table with some outta towners?”

The smaller man smiled and shrugged, shifting his weight from foot to foot again. “Yeah. Somethin' like that. Beers on us, my buddy's dad owns the place.”

“Can't turn down hospitality like that. I'm Derek, this is Aaron...what's your name?”

“James,” he replied, leading them away from the crowded floor still swaying in unison to another song that sounded just like the thirty before it. Maybe it was all the same song, neither of them could tell for sure.

“Whiskey?” James asked, handing a shot to Hotch, while Morgan readied their pool cues. They clinked their glasses together and shot the amber liquid quickly back. There was a moment that Hotch wondered if something had been done to his drink, they hadn't found anything in the victims' systems but all of those drugs were metabolized so quickly and these unsubs held their victims long enough that it wouldn't ever show. Still, he felt safe with Morgan, knew that they wouldn't target him in the same way so at least one of them would have a clear head. If he got sick, he got sick, he had a job to do and that came with a certain level of risk. Maybe his tolerance for risk taking was a little higher than the bureau would prefer, but here he was. Hotch smacked his lips together, swallowing the musky burn of the smoky liquid and set the glass down. He wiped at his mouth with the back of his hand, turning his eyes up at Morgan now standing beside him, arm looping around his shoulders protectively.

“Let's cool it, baby, we got a long ride ahead of us tonight...” he cooed, pressing his face against Hotch's head, breathing in the soapy scent. He'd always loved the way Hotch smelled, the way he never bothered with cologne, he just smelled simple and clean like soap and a hint of dryer sheets.

“We gonna do this thing or what?” The question came from one of the other men, the bigger men who looked almost like mirror images of each other to Hotch's fuzzy eyes. They were the size of mountains, with shoulders that joined directly to their ears and Hotch imagined himself in one of their shirts, a tiny smirk playing across his features when he realized the shirts would easily come down to his knees. Morgan handed him a pool cue and they set to, each of them taking a turn, shit talking, laughing, and the piss beer flowed like water through them. Hotch bent over, angling for his shot, and felt one of the bigger men come up behind him, thick meaty hands grabbing at his sides, pressing into his sharp hip bones and he leaned in close.

“You gonna sink it?” he asked, his beer breath hot on the back of Hotch's neck. Suppressing a shiver, Hotch did his best to ignore the imposition and rammed his pool cue back just enough that it hit the man square in the belly, gentle enough not to be confrontational though he'd wanted to put it clean through.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “Can I get a little space?”

“Sure thing, darlin',” the man replied, giving Hotch's hips a quick squeeze before he backed up, just enough not to get hit again but not nearly enough for Hotch's comfort. Morgan watched the scene play out, anger gnawing at his insides, using every ounce of strength inside of him to keep his feet firmly planted where they were when all he wanted to do was leap across the table and take the man's head off right between his second and third chin.

Next Chapter ->

[impatient-traveler]

Basically I'd been battling this bs for hours (console suddenly decided to not boot and throw a code-less "fatal system error" at me) and when finally the option to reset to default settings worked and it booted I foolishly set the online backups to auto. Then launched the game. My saves weren't there. PS4 went OMG NEW SAVES LET'S UPLOAD THEM and immediately uploaded them to cloud. You know. The new, empty ones. That booting up the game created (I hadn't even launched the actual game just booted into menu)

Please help a fellow nerd out ;-;

Guys, my PS4 threw a fit and almost bricked, followed by deleting my save files… And then overwriting my cloud saves with empty ones as soon as I booted up the game to see my saves weren’t there. And no, I didn’t have USB sick backups… because I only got a USB stick the day this mess happened.

The internet is super unhelpful, but from what I can tell I can’t recover my saves in any way. And I can’t find any solid info on saves swapping either, which I understand because it’s technically cheating.

But I lost hundreds of hours of gameplay. I lost my hard earned max level (got it last week), all the photos I hadn’t yet screengrabbed, I lost all the stuff I farmed for hours like the dumb Afrosword, and all my missable content like the ChocoMog Carnival things and the AssFest robes and shield.

Point being

If you have any information on how to either magic my saves back into existence or download and use a save file that at least has the missable content on it, please please please help me out

Or just signal boost this, I swear it’ll mean the world to me.

[one-of-many-journeys]

Day 7 (1/3)

No Man's Land

I set off toward Sylens' spooky workshop at dawn. If he saved Hades just to install it on another Horus...I don't care what his plans are. This time, I'm destroying it for good.

I could only get so far before I had to brave the waters. Better to stay hidden on the approach anyway.

No sign of activity when I made it to shore. One blinking green console in my path, clearly left for me to access. I prepared myself for another of Sylens' monologues.

In the holographic recording, Sylens recounted installing Hades on the Horus' detached processor core. At least that meant it wasn't able to access what remained of the Titan's systems. Sylens said he'd extracted Hades' knowledge—crucial information that I'd been so foolishly eager to destroy, etc. Then Hades spoke. I'd hoped I'd never have to hear its awful, grating voice again. It sounded...degraded. In pain, even. I could barely make out its words.

It said that the signal that woke it was meant for it alone, and that it transmitted for 17 years before ceasing. Therefore, Sylens concluded, it was safe to reboot Gaia without the same signal that attacked her all those years ago striking again and picking up where it left off. Admittedly, I hadn't even considered that the malicious signal could still be transmitting, waiting for Gaia to wake. Admittedly, I hadn't given the signal much thought at all, which in retrospect was just as foolish as Sylens said. Who or whatever sent it is the real threat to life on Earth, but I was so focused on my mission, my purpose to destroy Hades and repair Gaia as given by the message she left me, that I put that larger threat out of mind. If Sylens had just told me what he planned to do and explained his reasoning, I would have complied—we could have worked together. But that's just not his style, is it?

Sylens reiterated that he knew where I could find a backup of Gaia, holding that promise in front of me to force me to follow. I would have anyway. I'm the one with the master override. Only I can destroy Hades.

I searched Sylens' workshop before I set off after the tracks of Hades' new processor core dragged through the sand. When Sylens first received Hades, transmitted by his lance at the Spire, he had it trapped in some tiny, portable processor, far too small to hold its uncompressed mind. Seems that was the first form of torture that Sylens inflicted on it, but he had more in mind to coerce Hades into sharing its secrets.

Sylens had been keeping some sort of daily journal while he was here. Wonder who he got that from? Most of it was redacted, meaning the pieces he left out on the workbench were those he wanted me to find. After blasting the Horus' core free with explosives, he loaded Hades onto it and began his interrogation. The signal that woke Hades also made it sentient, therefore, Sylens reasoned, it could feel pain. It took him a while to find the precise stimulus that worked: data representing life and plenty. Visual, audio, or even just chemical data recorded by Gaia's machines as they surveyed the thriving environment. One particular holo of bunnies hopping through a field of flowers apparently triggered maximum distress, causing Hades' data structures to degrade. Its mind ate itself in rebellion against the presence of its antithesis within its own systems.

Sylens studied Hades' programming in detail, now that it was at his mercy. It seems like Sylens really enjoyed himself after all that time spent subservient to Hades' whims, doing its bidding for the promise of Old World knowledge. Hades' memory held knowledge of Gaia's programming, and Hades' original form as one of her subordinate functions. This part piqued my interest, as Sylens knew it would. In his journal, he noted the stark difference between how Hades' original code was designed by Travis Tate and his team, and what it became once the mysterious signal transformed it into a sentient, 'true' AI. What Hades became was something beyond Gaia herself.

Turning a low-level machine intelligence, serving as a simple extinction failsafe, into a being capable of strategic thinking, desire, and malice...even the Old Ones didn't have technology that powerful, unless the people of Elysium continued their research into AI. I had the same suspicions when first exploring the Zero Dawn facility, hearing the Alphas talk about their subordinate functions versus what they had become in Hades and Hephaestus. I suspect that the signal was sent by some other advanced AI out there, something that wants to take control of Gaia for itself. After all, the Old Ones used to churn them out like blades from a forge.

I need to see this data that Sylens uncovered for myself. I need to know what I'm really dealing with.

I followed the path left by Hades' core out through the old battlefield. With all the Faro machines littering the shore, it was no wonder Sylens made camp here. Plenty of parts with which to arm rebel uprisings. No mention of that so far in his messages and logs, only to say that he had a plan, one that would take months to accomplish. I have my part to play in it too, according to Sylens' little diary. And here I am walking right onto centre stage.

Machines along the path; a Glinthawk (I'd been hoping they didn't have them out west), and a few Scroungers. I detonated the Glinthawk's frost unit with two sharpshot arrows, then took it down with a few hunter arrows once it fell brittle to the ground. Before the Scroungers could sniff me out, I activated my Stalker shield and took two out undetected before taking the third head on. Good salvage from their scrap piles; found some more Greenshine, too.

Further on, I found a strange growth covering the ruins of an old combat plane. The tough, pale vines grew from the base of a metal flower similar to those spawned in the east by Demeter. I couldn't get much information from the machine with my Focus—there was data there, but it was well guarded. Something to look into later.

Further on I met an Oseram sitting at his camp, there to delve in the ruins of the battlefield. I bought a new bow from him—a frost bow. Good for chillwater canisters, and I like the look of it.

The path finally led me toward a tunnel through the mountain. It looked like an old road. More of Sylens' equipment and camping gear outside, but no more data.

Inside, I found Hades, cooped up and withering in the blasted processor core Sylens trapped it in to torture. It sat in front of a gene-locked hatch, just like those at Zero Dawn facilities, though I didn’t see this place listed on any of the maps or logs showing network connections between facilities. If I had, I would’ve checked this place already.

First things first, it was time to destroy Hades. Permanently, this time.

As soon as I inserted the master override into the shattered face of the core, I felt a shock travel up my spear, lodging in my Focus. Everything went white, then red—at first I thought it was some sort of advanced Focus projection able to block out the entire room, like Gaia's message in Eluethia-9.

It showed a wasteland, dark and grey, littered with bare, stunted branches, a cold white sky in the distance prickled with static shapes. Then there was Hades.

In this dream it pulled me into, it looked just as degraded as it had sounded in Sylens' recording. No more glowing, twisting form of red appendages; it had no limbs, no means to move or affect. All that was left was a hard red core, stony claws struggling to cover its vulnerable centre, jittering around itself in fragments, embers. It saw me and named me for the last time: 'system threat'.

Even at my mercy, Hades took the time to mock me for failing to repair Gaia. I had some questions of my own to pose, though I wasn't hopeful for answers. And the thought kept coming back to me: it couldn't be a projection. I wasn't standing in a holographic theatre. I thought then that I was still in the tunnel, that Hades had fully hijacked my Focus' visual functions to show me a solid world instead of mere overlays. This, I was willing to believe. The Old Ones had used such technology, called it VR.

I asked about the Gaia backups Sylens purported to have found, but it said nothing. The moment it tried to divulge useful information, its voice lowered and guttered, becoming a garble of digital groans. Memory structures disintegrated, it said. Sylens' notes did say that was a consequence of his interrogation techniques, but I wouldn't put it past him to deliberately redact parts of Hades' memory that might tell me more than what he wanted me to know.

Hades couldn't tell me what Sylens was planning or where he had gone, only that he'd left 12 days prior. Giving himself an ample head start on my pursuit, I guess. That would've been right around the time Varl and I set off for Meridian. Oh yeah, he's terrified.

As to the other corrupted subordinate functions, Hades gave little direction. They 'escaped to coordinates based on...' that's all I got from it. As for who sent the signal, it called them its 'masters'. Plural, that's interesting. It wouldn't elaborate, only insisting I would fail, laughing in its shattered voice, like blood through broken teeth.

It was resigned to death. Some part of it even seemed thankful for my arrival. Sylens, it said, called this place its grave. He meant for me to find it here, and clean up his mess. I have a feeling I'm going to be doing some more of that.

Hades lashed and bucked in its final moments; three times it ended life on earth, it said, bringing about extinction as it was intended to. Botched biospheres, Gaia's first eager attempts gone awry. There was no difference in Hades' mind between extinctions enacted out of necessity, of protocol, and extinctions wrought in malice—the Faro plague, its attempt to reenact it, and now...whatever's coming. Its 'masters'. They're coming to wipe the earth clean of filth.

The landscape seemed to encroach, leeching deeper into my senses. Strange metal taste on my tongue, fingertips like rubber; the air was too still, smelled of ash. No projection had ever felt this way.

As Hades shouted its masters' goals, I activated the master override. Elisabet appeared in the blackened landscape like a beacon. This wasteland was more than Hades' dream, it was its memory. Three times it had rendered the earth in this image, and relished in remembrance, now given the ability to feel. It just kept yelling; I couldn't listen anymore. I shouted over it, ordering the override protocol to purge Hades from this world forever.

It was only when the 'projection' fell away that I realised the disturbing truth. I was still in the same position; hands on my spear, bent to insert the override module into the processor core. Everything I'd just seen, all the movements I'd made and every word exchanged...all of it had taken place in some sort of dream state, some interface between Hades' processor and my Focus. I've never encountered technology capable of that before. I guess Sylens was right about the signal that turned Hades into this—it's far beyond the technology of the Old Ones. A gift, perhaps, left by its masters?

Whatever had happened, I couldn't let it phase me. Sylens soon appeared, in real time if not in the flesh. Now that I'd performed my function and destroyed Hades, he needed my body to open the next door in his way.

Finally, I had the chance to confront him, but in every angry question I posed, I fell over myself to trip right into his logical traps. He let me kill Hades permanently because he had no use for it anymore. He didn't answer my increasingly desperate calls over the months despite having constant access to my Focus because he had no use for me.

Sylens met my anger and ridicule with infuriating calm. I can never resist his bait; I snap just for him to refute my outbursts with sedate reason. I know he's right. He was right to interrogate Hades and uncover this larger threat. I'd always assumed that once I repaired Gaia, my job would be finished. I'd have served my purpose, and Gaia would know how to protect herself and the world from further attack—she would be able to discover what targeted her and put a stop to it. Now it doesn't seem so simple, especially after witnessing first hand what Hades was capable of once imbued with the signal's power.

As for Regalla's rebels, their gadgets and overridden machines, Sylens refused to say. He had his own matters to attend to, that was all. Given all the crucial information he was lording over me, I didn't push my luck. Not yet. I'll get to the bottom of it on my own if I have to. Sylens wouldn't tell me what Hades told him about its masters either. That too would have to wait until after I'd retrieved the Gaia backup from the facility beyond the hatch.

Sylens said the place was used early in Gaia's development to train her alongside Hades, perfecting the balance between life and extinction. I remember reading about these tests in one of Travis Tate's meandering accounts. They had to make sure Gaia would relinquish control to Hades in the event of a non-viable biosphere, allowing it to undo terraforming procedures and leave a blank slate for Gaia to try again, put back in full control of her faculties. According to Hades, the two went through this dance three times before Gaia set our current world in motion. To Hades and its masters, this is just another biosphere to roll right back to zero.

Crucially, Sylens said this facility had been kept absolutely secure—no data in or out, which would explain why I never found record of it in the other Zero Dawn facilities. Even Ted Faro's purge order couldn't have reached within the walls. This could be it.

But I'm not a complete idiot. With all his urging me on, all his promises, I couldn't not suspect a trap. He told me that everything I needed was just beyond the door: a full backup of Gaia with all her subordinate functions—everything that I needed to save the world. I made my intentions clear. If this was another trick, I promised to hunt him down and cut his throat. He's seen me in action. He knows he wouldn't stand a chance.

He tried to reassure me with a fact I knew all too well: I'm the only person who can even open the door to the facility. There's no way anyone could lay a trap inside. Suspicions still raised, I didn't have any choice but to go forward and claim what I've spent all this time searching for, and what I was born to find.

I went ahead and activated the hatch's identi-scan, listening to the door's familiar address. It opened partway before jamming, the mechanism shunting and grinding against a monstrous growth of Firegleam. I'd have to detonate it to let the door finish its motion and open the passage. Sylens told me he'd been working on mechanisms to blast through such blockages, as Firegleam grows thick in the west. I remembered seeing samples of the crystal back on his work bench, kept for study. He sent me the schematics for an igniter, though I needed a specific part to clinch the design—a power cell from a Leaplasher. Another new machine.

I headed back outside for a pack of Leaplashers hopping around by the lake shore. I'd seen nothing like them before; powerful hind legs launching them up and down, shock-charged tails swinging, acid canisters on the upper back and a power cell on the lower.

I lured one away from the pack, then took it down by detonating its acid canisters, burning it out. I snagged its power cell and took it back to Sylens' workshop at the tunnel entrance, building the igniter as per his schematics. It was a simple mechanism, basic enough to mass produce as a weapon for, say, an armed rebellion. I kept that thought to myself.

Back inside, I activated the igniter and drove it deep into the Firegleam growth, setting a spark that crackled from crystal to crystal, sizzling for a moment before exploding in a shower of glass and spores. That was enough to clear the gear wheels and get the door moving.

If I had any doubts about the facility before, they were dashed at the sight of Hades' emblem projected on the entrance wall. I found data inside naming the place 'Latopolis', once a FAS facility that was turned over to Zero Dawn during its development, courtesy of Faro and his financial custodianship of the project. Thus repurposed, they called it the Proving Lab.

The water dripping down the walls as I entered concerned me some, and once I made it through to the main facility those concerns compounded. The entire lab was flooded, meaning I'd have to navigate a maze of rusted supports and broken corridors. Even if anyone else could have made it through that door, I'll bet most delvers would have turned back at what they found. Not me.

There was another gene-locked hatch at the other side of the facility, no doubt the most secure area where the backups would be found. So, I'm Sylens' all-climbing, all-scanning door opening machine once again. What a truly unpleasant nostalgia trip.