#and the explanation was oh no there are servers managed by the cloud provider

[raziraphale]

repeating the phrase "the cloud is just someone else's computer" to myself as I complete my mandatory work training lest I get sucked in by the marketing terms

[lockefanfic]

Business Trip: Pt 21 - Recovery

Yoo Jeongyeon wasn’t wearing pants.

That was the first thought that crossed your mind, and it was followed up very quickly by the realization that she probably had the most beautiful pair of legs you had ever seen.

Her entire lower body was perfectly sculpted, flaring nicely at hips that led to healthy, delicious looking thighs before leading to thin, slim knees and lower legs. She seemed to go on forever. That old cliche of having ‘legs for days’ came to mind, and as much as it disappointed you to have to use such a tired cliche, you could think of no other way to describe her. But instead of going on for days, Jeongyeon’s legs stretched out into weeks and months.

This was not to say that the rest of her, covered by the extremely short hem of her chauffeur’s jacket, was in any way unappealing. The jacket clung to her like a second skin, and did little to hide the modest but still healthy curves of her chest. The black driver’s cap topped a small face with features that could be beautifully demure one moment, and cute and sardonic the next.

Her features were currently covered in an adorable pink blush of embarrassment as she slowly appears from the bedroom hallway, taking small steps towards you as she nervously plays with her hands, her eyes glued to her fingers as though she had never seen them before. You rise from the sofa, trying in vain to pick up your jaw from the floor as you do so.

“The outfit didn’t have matching pants that fit me,” Jeongyeon says, as if to explain away the fact that, well, she wasn’t wearing pants at all.

Through the one way glass between the observation room and the interrogation room, you watch as, for the third time, Park Jihyo rises from her chair, a look of frustration clear on her face. Saying one last thing in Korean to Yoon Bora, she leaves the room, swinging open the door and slamming it behind her.

 “She won’t say a goddamn word,” Jihyo says seconds later when she enters the observation room. You watch as Bora continues to wear the expressionless mask she has for the past two days, wondering just how someone so outwardly beautiful could be so inwardly ugly. She was so pleasant when you first met, so seemingly innocent and passionate about her dance studio that it was difficult to believe that girl and the one you were looking at were the same person.

 “You’ve confirmed that she and Hyorin have connections to Irene?”

 “Yes,” Jihyo answers, “we were able to confiscate their cell phones when we arrested them, and we raided their apartments and have their computers and other personal devices.”

 “And? Anything that could lead us to Irene?”

 “No,” Jihyo replies with a sigh, “there’s enough evidence and records to tie them to Irene but all their communications to her are on cloud-based servers. As you can see, Bora here isn’t exactly being forthcoming with her login information. Hacking their accounts would take some time and require a court warrant, and even if we do receive it Irene has likely deleted anything useful by now.”

 You let a soft sigh escape your lips, the frustration of knowing that Irene has once again escaped your grasp quickly beginning to overwhelm you.

 “So she gets away again?”

 Jihyo frowns as she turns her attention to Bora, who has not moved an inch.

 “We’ll break Bora. She’ll talk eventually, or maybe Hyorin will. We’ll get Irene soon.”

 You turn your attention back to Bora and watch as she brushes away stray hairs back behind an ear. It’s the most she has done in the past hour, her eyes staring blankly ahead and her arms folded in front of her chest. She seemed like an almost completely different person.

 “That sorry about her dance studio, that was all bullshit?”

 Jihyo takes a moment to answer, and when she does her tone is slightly more empathetic towards the woman in the interrogation room.

 “Yes and no. From what we’ve gathered from the data on her computer and cell phone, she really did have a dance studio on property that SM bought. I’ve done some digging and it seems she was really active in Seoul’s dance community. Some of my contacts have told me she and Jay were really passionate about teaching neighborhood kids to dance, and that she did it because she didn’t want them to fall in with the gangs operating in that area.”

 “So what happened?”

 “SM happened. They bought out her dance studio, and although their two partners wanted to keep the studio going, Bora and Hyorin bullied them into selling the studio to SM. Maybe they were temporarily blinded by greed; SM probably threw a lot of money at them. Irene probably recruited them then.”

 “Hmm. She told me her partners were the ones that sold the studio. But wait, so that dance studio she took us too - that was all a front? Those students weren’t real?”

 “No, they were. That was a real dance studio. To be honest, we didn’t know it existed. Maybe there’s still a part of her that is passionate about teaching dance. Maybe she used the money she received from selling their original dance studio to open her new one - maybe out of guilt.”

 In the interrogation room, Bora glances towards the one way mirror, and though she cannot see you or Jihyo, she surely knew there was someone there watching her. The same blank look on her features, she turns away again - although this time her gaze falls downward, as though she is deep in thought.

 “What about Jay?”

 Jihyo’s mood turns dark, and you didn’t blame her. Jay had been Irene and SM’s mole in Seoul’s Police Department, and no one knew just how many cases he had impacted.

 “He’ll survive, but he’s damn lucky our pointman didn’t give him two in the chest and one in the head. Like I said, he and Bora appeared to be genuinely interested in teaching kids to dance, but I think maybe he fell a little further than Bora did.”

 You frown as you finally turn away from the one way glass, giving Bora one last look as you prepare to leave the room. The young dance instructor was gorgeous, almost breathtakingly so, and you found yourself wondering just what was going on beneath that expressionless mask she had on.

 But then you remember the role she played in kidnapping two of your staff, and suddenly you are happy to let her rot in that interrogation room.

 ---

The next thing on your agenda after leaving the Seoul police department was to meet with Choa and Jeongyeon to ensure they were okay following their ordeal. Momo and Seolhyun insisted on accompanying you, and decided to stay with Choa and have lunch with her. Choa appeared to be her ever-cheerful self, and satisfied that your strong, confident executive assistant was okay, you went on to meet with Jeongyeon alone.

Tracking her down was more difficult than you thought it would be, given that she didn’t answer her phone or your text messages after she sent you the address of your meeting place. Said meeting place provided an explanation as to why she wasn’t answering her phone, as it turned out to be a PC café in downtown Seoul. It being the middle of the day on weekday, the café was mostly empty.

After some searching amongst row after row of gaming desktops, you finally found her in a corner of the café, fully engrossed in whatever game she was playing. The large gaming headset she had on provided an explanation for all the calls and messages she was missing. It came a somewhat of a surprise to you that she was currently playing Starcraft – then again, it wasn’t really a surprise, given your location and her nationality.

“Oh, damn, sorry boss – I’ll be just a second,” she says as she realizes you had arrived. She doesn’t turn her attention away from the game, however, her hands working furiously on the keyboard and mouse as the Protoss Zealots and Immortals on her screen do battle with Terran marines and siege tanks. A few moments later those two magical letters – gg – flash in the game chat, and the official game announcement of her victory comes soon after.

Jeongyeon is dressed simply, in a simple light brown cardigan and skinny jeans. She removes her headset and the large round pair of glasses she is wearing (that apparently are just for show) and finally turns to face you, taking a moment to release her brown hair from her ponytail.

You didn’t have much of a relationship with Yoo Jeongyeon aside from seeing her occasionally in the hallways at work and the occasional mention from Choa, whom she was friends with. You knew she was a rising star in the IT department at JYP, but aside from that, you rarely, if ever, had any actual contact with her aside from the odd glance and awkward smile whenever you passed in the hallways.

That all changed when the conflict with Red Velvet and Irene came up, and the need for an experienced IT specialist came with it. Choa was quick to suggest Jeongyeon, and you were able to requisition her services from her manager. In planning meetings for the trip to Seoul you were quick to notice not only her immense technical expertise, but also her cute features and the allure of her tomboy, guy’s girl aura. The bright blue hair she sported at the time helped with that latter appeal, of course.

But lately she had let a little more of her feminine side show, growing her hair out, dyeing it in more natural colors and wearing more subdued clothing – not that you minded the punk rock esthetic she was so fond of previously. Her clothing changes and haircut revealed a new side of her, and it was a side that was made all the more attractive by the knowledge that it had always been there, hidden by her tough girl aura and dry, sarcastic wit.

And so you found yourself momentarily stricken with awe as her brown hair comes loose from her ponytail to fall in a chocolate waterfall down to her shoulders. She smiles at you – a shy, awkward smile, but one that still highlights her large, deep eyes and small, cute features.

“Sorry, boss, just had to kick some ass there for a second,” she says – it seems that geeky wit of hers didn’t change, even if her hair and clothing choices did.

“No worries, Jeongyeon. Gotta keep those Terran noobs in their place,” you agree as you take a seat in the booth next to hers.

“How can I help ya?”

“I just wanted to make sure you were okay,” you begin, “after what happened the other day. I know the doctors cleared you and Choa physically, but I just wanted to make sure you were doing alright. Y’know, mentally.”

“I’m fine, boss,” Jeongyeon answers, “truth be told it was kind of terrifying. But all is well that ends well, I guess. If anything, I’m just a little pissed off about the whole thing.”

“How so?”

“Irene literally hired people to kidnap Choa and I,” she answers, a little more passion in her voice, “and we were lucky that things turned out the way they did. Anything could have happened. They could have shot us, or something could have gone wrong when Jihyo’s SWAT team raided the place…”

“But nothing went wrong,” you quickly interrupt, eager to ensure that she didn’t start to walk down the dangerous path of asking what might have been, “you said it yourself – all’s well that ends well. The fact is, Jihyo’s team saved you guys and we have the people who did it. They’ll be in jail for a long time.”

“But we didn’t get all of them. Irene is still out there.”

“Yes, and we’ll find her. Soon. I promise.”

Jeongyeon seems only half satisfied by your declaration. There is a determination in her eyes that is bordering on anger – she really seemed fired up by what Irene did to her.

“I’ve been continuing my review of the data we retrieved from their servers,” she begins, turning back to her computer, “and I’ll let you know if I find anything. I want to make her pay for what she did to Choa and I.”

“Good. Because I’m going to request that you’re transferred to my team permanently.”

Jeongyeon turns back to you with a surprised look on her face.

“…Really?”

“Yes. It’s clear that we need someone with your skills on the team. Who better than you?”

The young IT specialist takes a moment to absorb your offer, and the small smile that appears on her lips tells you that was happy to receive it.

“Well, I would accept your offer, boss, but I feel like I’d be a little out of place in that little group of supermodels you’ve gathered around yourself.”

“…What?”

“Oh come on,” she starts exaggeratedly, “Tzuyu and Mina are walking pieces of art. Sana is cuter than any girl has any right to be. Seolhyun has more curves in her pinky finger than I do in my entire body. And Momo is pretty and beautiful and hot at the same time – it makes me angry just looking at her. They’re the Plastics from Mean Girls, except on top of being gorgeous they’re all also super smart and successful.”

The thought of Momo being compared to Rachel McAdams makes you smile a little bit.

“And what makes you think you don’t belong right up there with them?” you say, allowing a sly smile to appear on your lips.

Jeongyeon takes your flattery in stride, although the slight hint of blush and small smile that appear on her cheeks and lips as she returns her attention to her computer tells you that it didn’t go fully unaccepted. She lets out a snort of dismissal, but if her intention was to convince you she didn’t care, it failed at it.

“Besides,” you continue, “you’re attractive in a way none of those other girls is.”

“And what’s that?”

“You’re a giant fucking geek.”

Jeongyeon lets a genuine giggle escape her, and you are heartened by the way her face lights up when she laughs, her mouth opening up into a large smile and her eyes following suit.

“Flattery will get you nowhere. Only by defeating me on the field of battle will I join your team,” she says, motioning towards the open booth next to hers.

“Bring it. Name the game.”

“We’re in Korea at a PC café. What else would we play?”

-

On the screen in front of you, your last few Terran marines fight desperately in a last stand against the Zerg hordes, but their cause is lost, and you are forced to type those to magical letters – gg – into the game chat.

“Geez, boss,” Jeongyeon quips, “that took five minutes. I even told you what I was going to do. And I still won.”

It was true – she did say she was going to six-pool you before the game even started. Not that it mattered.

“Clearly I can’t beat you in the national sport of your country. Is there any other way to get you to join my team?”

Jeongyeon childishly swirls around in her chair, an adorable thinking face on her features as she taps her chin with one finger.

“I guess you can get additional chances to beat me at something,” she says, a brightness appearing on her features that wasn’t there when you had arrived. Gathering her things and putting her faux glasses back on, she grabs you by the wrist and leads you out of the café.

-

The “additional chances” turned out to be a variety of games at the nearby amusement centre in one of Seoul’s large malls. The chances were many – various arcade games, the batting cage, even a few games of chance in the amusement park section – but Jeongyeon won them all; or at least, did so after you let her.

“C’mon, you let me win in the batting cages,” she quips after the two of you leave the amusement centre after a long afternoon of gaming and begin to idly wander through the attached shopping mall. There is a happiness to her that wasn’t present at the start of the day, and you had to admit the spending time with her made you feel happy as well. It turned out that behind the dry, laconic wit and heavy layers of sarcasm was a sweet, gentle girl that was happy to have some fun after what could have been a traumatic life event. The brightness her smile brought to the room was hard to ignore, and her casual nature and occasional tomboyishness made her easy to get along with.

“Maybe, but only because you gave me a head start for the drum game,” you answer, referring to the arcade game that involved you drumming a large taiko drum to the beat of the music, “not that it kept you from beating me by the end of it anyway.”

“I was feeling merciful. Clearly you are rhythmically-challenged. Either way, I do believe that you have yet to beat me at anything, and thus I still won’t be joining your-“

Jeongyeon stops mid-sentence, her attention suddenly captured by something in one of the stores you are passing. It takes you a moment to realize she is staring into the window of what appeared to be a costume store. In the window is the object of her attention – a green chauffeur outfit, comprising of a green suit jacket and matching pants, with a black driver’s cap.

“That’s gorgeous,” she says out loud, although her tone and volume imply to you that perhaps she didn’t mean to say it out loud.

“A chauffeur’s costume?” you ask, not quite knowing why or how someone like Jeongyeon could be interested in such a niche costume. Halloween was months away, at least…

Jeongyeon is surprised by your comment – she looked like she had momentarily forgotten you were even there - and a look of embarrassment appears on her face.

“Um, yeah… nevermind, boss. Let’s keep going.”

“Wait, wait,” you say, catching her by the upper arm as she attempts to keep walking away, “what do you want a chauffeur’s costume for?”

“Nothing, let’s just-“

“Jeongyeon, we’re not moving until you tell me. Don’t make me tell everyone at work how you put your batting helmet on backwards because you didn’t know which way it went on your head.”

Jeongyeon smirks at your mention of her faux-pas in the batting cages. A sheepish, shy look appears on her face as she turns back to the costume in the window. She plays nervously with her hands as she continues to admire it.

“I um.. I wouldn’t wear it out in public.”

“So when would you wear it? Halloween?”

The girl stares at her feet as though she’d never seen them before. She crosses her legs and plays with her toes, scratching at an imaginary stain on the floor with the tip of her shoe. She continues to play with her fingers, pinching her nails and running her digits over each other.

“I…. I’m kind of… well, I’m kind of into roleplaying.”

Jeongyeon was a shameless geek and the idea of her being into roleplaying games or something like cosplay or even LARPing didn’t come as much of a surprise.

“You mean, like Dungeons and Dragons? I was totally into that too. In high school, at least. I remember-“

“No, not that kind of roleplay,” Jeongyeon interrupts, a bright red blush appearing on her cheeks now as she stares down at the floor and awkwardly fidgets with her hands.

“Oh?”

“The kind of roleplay… that you do… in the bedroom.”

It takes you a second to fully digest what Jeongyeon says, and it doesn’t help that she turns away from you, nervously fidgeting with the zipper of her black puffy jacket. You take one look at her, one look at the chauffeur costume and suddenly feel an intense jealousy towards her boyfriend.

“I… wow. I’m jealous of your boyfriend.”

Jeongyeon lets out a snort of disbelief, followed by a nervous giggle.

“Oh, there’s no boyfriend,” she begins, “in fact there hasn’t been one for awhile.”

“I find that ridiculously hard to believe. I don’t know if you’re aware, Jeongyeon, but you’re kind of the shiny Charizard of girls. Pretty and a giant nerd? C’mon.”

Jeongyeon keeps her eyes on the chauffeur costume, afraid or unable to make eye contact with you. But the small blush that was on her cheeks is evident now, along with a smile creeping into the corners of her soft lips.

“Whatever, let’s go,” she says, eager to move on, if anything because it would allow her to get over the intense nervousness overtaking her entire being, “I won’t be wearing that thing anytime soon, anyway.”

Jeongyeon turns and takes a few steps away from the window. In that time you thank whatever gods may be for the ridiculous run of luck you’ve been having with women. Satisfied that your thankful prayers are safely on their way to the deities they were sent to, you open your mouth and say something before she is too far away to hear.

“You could wear it for me. Like, soon.”

Jeongyeon turns around mid-step, her eyes initially locked on the floor between you. When she finally gathers her wits enough to raise her gaze to match yours, you are momentarily stunned by what you see - gone is the awkward, nerdy, sarcastic IT specialist; in her place was a sly, sultry young woman.

“Wait here,” she says in a tone so dripping with allure that you would have refused to believe it was Yoo Jeongyeon speaking those words had you heard them yesterday. Jeongyeon bites her lip, a thin smile on her lips as she heads into the costume store. You follow her orders, standing  and waiting there in stunned silence.

---

The trip back to your hotel took longer than you thought it would, every second in the taxi ride filled with anticipation for what was about to come. Few words passed between you, but it wasn’t awkward; rather, it was a silence filled with intense anticipation, the both of you stealing loaded glances at each other, or smiling nervously when your hands grazed each other accidentally.

 When you finally reach her hotel room, Jeongyeon steps into the living room before turning and facing you.

 “Sit down,” she says, a sly smile on her lips as she watches you follow her orders before turning and sauntering towards the bedroom.

 It felt a little like an eternity sitting there, waiting for her to emerge from the bedroom, but when she does come out, you realize it was worth every second.

 Yoo Jeongyeon wasn’t wearing pants.

 That was the first thought that crossed your mind, and it was followed up very quickly by the realization that she probably had the most beautiful pair of legs you had ever seen.

 Her entire lower body was perfectly sculpted, flaring nicely at hips that led to healthy, delicious looking thighs before leading to thin, slim knees and lower legs. She seemed to go on forever. That old cliche of having ‘legs for days’ came to mind, and as much as it disappointed you to have to use such a tired cliche, you could think of no other way to describe her. But instead of going on for days, Jeongyeon’s legs stretched out into weeks and months.

 This was not to say that the rest of her, covered by the extremely short hem of her chauffeur’s jacket, was in any way unappealing. The jacket clung to her like a second skin, and did little to hide the modest but still healthy curves of her chest. The black driver’s cap topped a small face with features that could be beautifully demure one moment, and cute and sardonic the next.

 Her features were currently covered in an adorable pink blush of embarrassment as she slowly appears from the bedroom hallway, taking small steps towards you as she nervously plays with her hands, her eyes glued to her fingers as though she had never seen them before. You rise from the sofa, trying in vain to pick up your jaw from the floor as you do so.

 “The outfit didn’t have matching pants that fit me,” Jeongyeon says, as if to explain away the fact that, well, she wasn’t wearing pants at all.

 “I’m not complaining,” you say, matter-of-factly.

 “Good,” she replies, because your ride is ready, boss.”

 The use that title took on new meaning now - earlier in the morning it was merely an informal nickname, but now it meant something a little more.

 “Really? And where are we going, Jeongyeon?”

 “Wherever you want, boss,” she replies, crossing her legs while standing in place, her long, naked limbs intensely attractive in the low light of the hotel room, “you should know, though, that there is a fee attached to my transportation services. I insist that you pay a deposit immediately, followed by the rest of the fee once we arrive at our destination.”

 “And what might that deposit be?”

 The girl is quiet for a moment, and you lose contact with her eyes for a moment beneath the brim of her hat as she lowers her head as though she were deep in thought. She is still playing nervously with her fingers, and she is fidgeting with her long, naked legs, rubbing her thighs together in a way that is sublimely arousing.

 “You have to make me cum. Now. And when we arrive at the destination, you can pay the balance for the services rendered.”

 There is a split second, only a split second, of silence - the moments before the storm of passion breaks - while you stare into her eyes and find only lust and desire there.

 Your hand reaches up of its own free will and cups Jeongyeon’s cheek before you step forward and kiss her, softly at first but quickly becoming more passionate within moments. Your brain is alight with excitement at that first moment of intimacy with a new woman, and from the way Jeongyeon returns your kiss and wraps her arms around your neck and head you knew she felt similarly.

 Your hands are not idle, and while most of your attention is focused on her lips you find the wherewithal to snake your own arms around her small torso, delighting in the feel of her slim body pressed against yours. Your kiss deepens further, and you press your tongue softly against her lips before Jeongyeon accepts it into her mouth, pressing her own against it as you explore each others’ mouths for the first time.

 For a solid minute you are content to stand there and make out with the young woman, but soon you remember you had a price to pay for your travel.

 Breaking the kiss, you slowly trace a path down her jaw, placing soft, light kisses on her perfect, soft skin until you bury your mouth in the crook of her neck, satisfied to hear a light gasp of surprise emit from Jeongyeon’s lips; the first sound of yearning you had ever heard from her. As you kiss and explore her neck you can feel her breathing quicken as she fully submits to the desires and passion quickly overtaking her senses.

 You decide to take the next step, reaching your hands down her torso, pressing tightly against her tight, slim body until they reach and then eventually overtake the end of the short garment. You slide your hands up under her jacket until you are cupping both of her ass cheeks, relishing in the feel of her warm, full mounds of flesh beneath your palms.

 Jeongyeon lets a loud gasp escape her lips, one that convinces you that what she said earlier about not having a boyfriend was probably true - the way she was reacting to your advances made you think that perhaps it had been awhile since she was last intimate with someone.

 You caress her butt softly beneath the hem of her jacket, which was now hiked up around her waist. Your palms wander carefully around her ass, brushing up against what felt like a thin thong. You smile to yourself as you slowly slide your hands lower until they are mid thigh, before slowly and carefully picking her up.

 Jeongyeon gasps in surprise as you lift her easily - she certainly wasn’t heavy, and so you lift and deposit her on the extended portion of the sofa with ease. You step between her legs, and you are satisfied to find that she opens them easily for you as you drop to your knees. You take another look into her lust-laden eyes before you kiss her again, your lips crashing against each other with a little more passion than before.

 “I hope you don’t mind if I take off my uniform, boss?” she says, her voice low and full of lust,  “It’s getting a little hot in here.”

 With delicate fingers she undoes the buttons of her jacket, quickly sliding the green garment off her body once she has done so, leaving her in the white dress shirt and tie she wore beneath. There were few things sexier than a woman in a white dress shirt, but one of them was a woman in a white dress shirt that was undressing for you.

 Jeongyeon begins by undoing the small green tie around her neck, tossing it away once it is undone. Then, painfully slowly, she undoes each button of the white dress shirt, her eyes locked on yours the whole while. She is biting her lip again, the small action so extremely sexy.

 Her small hands reach for the top part of her shirt, playing with the thin fabric, her large, expressive eyes still holding your gaze. Satisfied that she held every ounce of your attention, she slowly pulls the garment open down her shoulders, the white fabric giving way to perfect, creamy vanilla skin as she reveals her chest to you. She doesn’t take the shirt completely off, allowing it instead just to fall down her back, her forearms still in its sleeves.

 You could now add a bra to the list of things she wasn’t wearing.

 Her breasts are small and humble, but perfectly shaped and in perfect scale with the rest of her slim, tight body. Her nipples are so enticing, so delicious, already erect with the promise of the pleasure that is to come. Her stomach is flat and slightly toned, but you found yourself unable to resist her breasts for much longer, and you find yourself staring lewdly at her naked chest, unable to move any further until she herself shakes you from your stupor. Jeongyeon leans back on the sofa until she is on her elbows, her long, slim torso laid out for you.

 “I’m ready to accept your payment, boss.”

 It’s your turn now to bite your lip, every word that leaves her mouth made so intensely erotic by the fact that you had no idea such a sexual, kinky creature was beneath the geeky, tomboyish exterior she displayed to the rest of the world. And here you were, standing between her spread legs as she sits on the desk in front of you with an open shirt, asking - pleading - to be devoured.

 With a hungry, devilish smile on your face, you bend to give her a quick kiss on the lips before quickly moving to her upper chest, planting soft kisses on her newly exposed skin, your hunger and desire for the young woman quickly becoming intolerable, unbearable. You had to have her - there was something about the way she had kept all her intense sexuality hidden all this time that only heightened your desire to have her, taste her, make her cum - and eventually, be inside her.

 Soon you reach her small, perfect breasts, and you waste no time in devouring her small, pink nipples, forgetting for a moment your earlier resolution to take your time given her likely inexperience. But you found yourself unable to resist the small mounds of flesh, savoring the taste of her hardened peaks in your mouth and the sharp, increasingly loud gasps and moans each lick and suck elicited from their owner.

 Her hands are entwined in your hair now, pressing your head against her chest as though imploring you to take more of her. You are happy to oblige, switching breasts, latching onto her left breast now as your left hand ensures her right breast is not unattended, gently squeezing and cupping her soft flesh and saliva-lathered nipple.

 It takes an extreme amount of discipline to tear yourself away from her chest, but you remind yourself of the task you had in front of you, and the “payment” you had yet to make. Regretfully - for both of you, if the moan of disappointment Jeongyeon lets out as you leave her breasts is any indication - you slowly begin to make your way downward, your lips leaving a trail of kisses on her flat stomach before you find yourself on your knees between her spread legs, the almost completely soaked thin cotton thong the only barrier between you and the delicious treat of her pussy.

 You reach up with both hands, grasping the thin string of her thong at her hips before you pull the garment off her, Jeongyeon lifting her butt off the desk and bringing her legs together momentarily to allow you to remove the garment completely. Her pussy is perfect, her lower lips soft and inviting and glistening with her wetness.

 Remembering for a moment your resolution to take things slowly, you turn and plant soft kisses on her spread thighs, the soft skin warm against your lips. In response Jeongyeon has closed her thighs around your head, her feet hanging over your shoulders and crossed somewhere on your back as she traps you between her legs; it was likely out of instinct, again likely because she was so inexperienced.

 It is a wonderful feeling, to say the least, being sandwiched by her soft, warm thighs, but you knew you needed full access to her body, and your mobility was limited somewhat with her legs wrapped around your head. Reaching up with your hands, you place them on the inside of her soft thighs before pulling them apart, spreading her legs again, allowing you more room to work.

 You look up for a moment, past the glistening lips of pink flesh in front of you, past her flat stomach and the heaving mounds of her breasts to her eyes, and you find a look full of lust, but also of yearning - the yearning to have you make her feel as good as you had always thought she looked - absolutely amazing.

 Unwilling and unable to wait even a second later, you finally allow your mouth to descend between her spread thighs, extending your tongue and licking her pussy lightly from bottom to top, just barely grazing her moist, soft flesh. Jeongyeon lets the loudest moan of the day escape her lips at the new sensations beginning to flood her body, and you take that as permission to continue.

 You continue to lick her most sensitive area, adding to the further build up of pleasure coursing through her veins, enjoying the sweet taste of her slick juices gathering on your tongue. Your hands, satisfied that she was going to keep her legs spread in their current position, move closer to your mouth, your left hand moving to the top of her mound and your right drifting downward toward her entrance.

 Once you feel she is ready - and the juices flowing freely from her body are a great indication - you take things to the next level, using your left hand to carefully spread apart the lips of her pussy, revealing the glistening pearl of her clit; simultaneously, you lightly penetrate her body with two fingertips of your right hand until you are two knuckles deep. Then, with utmost care, you give her clit a swipe with the tip of your tongue.

 “Oh, fuck!” the young woman exclaims, her hands buried in your hair as you feel her lower legs wrap around your shoulders, keeping your face pressed against her. Satisfied that you were on the right path, you move on, placing more, faster licks on her clit while pushing further inside her with your fingers. Soon you are licking her with a steady, passionate pace, and your fingers are almost completely inside her, curling upwards and finding that rough patch at the front of her pussy.

 Jeongyeon’s reaction to your first touches on her g-spot are ecstatic, and her hips rise off the surface of the table involuntarily, the young woman temporarily losing control of her body to the sparks of pleasure flaring out from her crotch. Her juices flow freely into your greedy tongue, and your fingers feel her slick, wet walls begin to tighten around them; she was getting close.

 “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god,” she exclaims as if chanting, “oh god, I’m gonna cum!”

 You want to tell her to cum, want to tell her to let go, but it was difficult to speak with your mouth full of her hot, wet flesh, and so you encourage her the only way you could - by increasing your pace ever so slightly with your tongue on her clit and your wet fingers thrusting in and out of her slick flesh.

 The effect is immediate, and the orgasm that courses through Yoo Jeongyeon’s body is unmistakable, her long, slim legs wrapping themselves tightly around your head, trapping your face between her wet pussy and warm thighs. She convulses slightly, her limbs and hips quivering of their own accord. But most delicious of all is the feel of her pussy tightening so stiffly against your fingers, and the warm, sweet juices that flow freely onto your greedy, wanton tongue.

 It takes awhile for her to recover, but when she finally does, and when she finally allows her legs to loosen their deathgrip on your head, she finds the strength to finally speak.

 “Fuck.”

 The single word causes you to giggle a little as you finally lift your face from between her thighs, licking your lips as you gather the oily juice on your tongue and savor its taste. Jeongyeon reaches down with her hand on your cheek and pulls you up, making you rise from your knees to kiss her, her tongue eagerly tasting her own nectar on yours.

 From this position the bulge in your pants presses up against her crotch, and she breaks the kiss to glance down at where your pelvises are touching.

 “Payment accepted. I think it’s time we get going - wouldn’t want you to be late to your destination.”

 You both smile slyly as Jeongyeon rises from the sofa and takes a few steps towards the bedroom. With a look over her shoulder at you, she slides the white dress shirt off her arms, finally leaving her entirely naked - aside from the black chauffeur’s hat.

 That such a downright gorgeous woman could have been near you for so long without you noticing was utterly mind boggling. Every square inch of her tall, slim body was dripping with sensuality, from those deep, dark eyes to her long, curvy legs. Her body was so unlike the other women you’d had recently, so tall and slim and seemingly going on forever.

 She reaches over and takes your hand. With one more sexy, wanton look, she turns and begins to saunter over to the bedroom, those slender legs and wide hips making sure you watched every step she took.

 “Looks like we’ve arrived, boss,” she says seconds later in the bedroom, “and I do believe you have to pay the balance of the transport fee.”

 “Gladly, Jeongyeon.”

 “Good,” she says, her voice all soft seduction, “then come fuck me.”

 Your patience is not infinite; and going by the way Jeongyeon presses herself against you and kisses you deeply, neither is hers. Arms quickly work at your belt, and you take the moment to divest yourself of the sweater you are wearing - soon you are as naked as she is, aside of course for the chauffeur’s hat. Jeongyeon reaches up to her head to remove it, but you grasp her wrist and smile. She takes the hint and leaves it on.

 Mouths still locked in a heated, passionate kiss, you slowly push her forward until you reach the edge of the bed, which thankfully is relatively elevated and thus perfect for what you had in mind. Jeongyeon hops onto the bed, those gorgeous legs spreading easily for you as you step between them. She reaches down with her left hand and wraps her thin fingers around your hard shaft, a sly smile appearing on her lips as she does so.

 Jeongyeon lies down on the bed, her slim body laid out for you.

 “Put it in me now, boss,” she says, every syllable dripping with arousal, as if her flushed skin and glistening, inviting pussy were not enough evidence of her desire.

 You are not one to disappoint her, and, gripping your firm shaft with your right hand, you press it against her opening, delighting in the feel of her hot flesh against yours, gathering a healthy amount of her slick juices on the tip of your cock. Jeongyeon lets a soft moan escape her lips, and her hand darts out to grasp your wrist.

 “Go slow,” she says, her tone suddenly different, as though she were breaking character for a moment, “it’s been awhile.”

 “I will, Jeongyeon. We’ll only go as fast as you want.”

 Her smile is all the reassurance you need, and you slowly press into her opening, her warm, hot flesh giving way slowly as you penetrate her for the first time, her body slowly giving way to your shaft as it spears into her pussy.

 Jeongyeon grimaces slightly, but soon feels some relief when you enter her fully for the first time, her silky embrace wrapping tightly around your shaft as you fully embed yourself inside her. Wanting to reassure her, you bend over on the bed and kiss her softly. She returns the kiss and presses onto your chest with one of her palms, pushing you back to your upright position.

 “Okay, I’m ready now, boss,” she says, “please… please fuck me.”

 Moving slowly, you withdraw your cock, enjoying the the feel of her tight pussy grasping every inch of your shaft as though afraid to let it go. Jeongyeon’s tightness was on another level, and you absentmindedly wonder if it was because she hadn’t had sex in awhile.

 Her hands grasp your forearms, her nails digging into your wrist, and for a moment you are afraid you are hurting her, but the small nod she gives you when you look at her with a look of concern convinces you that she is okay. The last few women you’d slept with were comfortable with their sexuality, and it was different to be with a woman who was a little more less experienced; not that it was a turn off, but quite the opposite - you wanted nothing more than to please her, make her feel the way you felt she deserved.

 You continue to penetrate her at a consistent pace, your shaft fully lathered now with her juices, making each entry and exit easier and easier. Jeongyeon seems to settle into things, now letting soft gasps and moans escape her lips with each thrust into her body. Her legs, once spread hesitantly, now wrap themselves around your hips, and you relish the feel of her long limbs wrapped around your torso as you continue to fuck her.

 “Oh god… god that feels so good. You feel so good inside me! Oh god!”

 You increase your pace ever so slightly - ever mindful of her request that you go slow. You delight in the sight of her small breasts rocking up and down with each thrust, and the cute features of her face warped and twisted slightly in a pleasurable way that is beautiful in its own way. Your gaze travels the length of her slim, long torso, until finally it settles between those spread, long, perfect legs of hers, and the drenched, slick lips of her pussy, wrapped tightly around your shaft as it enters and exits her body.

 “Faster, please,” she gasps, her words almost a demand, “please, boss. Please fuck me faster.”

 You bend over the bed and drop your hands to the bed to stabilize yourself as you increase your pace slightly, focusing on the depth and length of your thrusts, ensuring she feels each thrust of your cock in and out of her body.

 “Oh my god, oh my god,” Jeongyeon gasps, “just like that! You’re gonna make me cum!”

 You are surprised by how quickly she is nearing orgasm, and happy that yours is still some ways away - you want to savor every moment you are having with her, and want to make sure you last long enough to do so.

 Jeongyeon cums soon after, her entire body shaking and quivering, her legs wrapping even tighter around your hips as she does so, her heels digging into your butt as she struggles to maintain her composure for a few moments until she loses it entirely and a long, loud gasp of sheer pleasure escapes her mouth. Her pussy tightens and convulses tightly around you, tight enough to send shocks of pleasure coursing through your body as well.

 When her orgasm finally subsides, Jeongyeon is a writhing, quivering mess on the bed, a sheen sweat lending a glistening quality to her naked body. You let your eyes savor the sight of her there on the bed, and you wonder how the hell you overlooked this young woman for so long.

 “Fuck,” she says again. It must be her post-orgasm word, you realize with a smile. She squirms a little on the bed, her hips moving slowly from side to side, creating delicious friction on your hard shaft, still fully embedded inside her.

 Jeongyeon raises her torso from the bed until she is upright, her legs still wrapped around your hips. Your hands caress her thighs softly, enjoying the feel of her warm flesh beneath your palms.

 “Thanks for paying the rest of the balance, boss,” she says, “although I think I owe you some change.”

 Without letting you answer, Jeongyeon pushes forward on your chest with her right hand, until eventually your shaft slips out of her body. Hopping off the bed, she turns around so that her round, firm ass is facing you, her long legs lending her butt a delicious looking curve as she leans forward, resting her forearms back onto the bed.

 “Fuck me, boss,” she says, turning around to lock eyes with you, “fuck me until you cum.”

 You reach forward and caress her round cheeks with your hands, squeezing the firm flesh and delighting in the sight of her glistening pussy, just begging to be fucked. You are unable to resist the sight, and before you know it you are dragging the tip of your shaft up and down on her drenched pussy, gathering more and more of her juices on it.

 If Jeongyeon was tight on her back, she was even tighter from behind. The way her walls embrace you as you enter her is almost enough to make you cum on the spot - it takes every ounce of self control not to fuck her as hard as you really wanted to. Instead you relish the feel of her tightness, of her wet, slick walls embracing every inch of your shaft as you begin to fuck her.

 Jeongyeon quickly gets used to the feeling of you penetrating her from behind, if the gasps and moans that escape her lips in a steady stream is any indication.

 “Oh god… oh god, you’re so big inside me,” she gasps, “it feels so good… please… please fuck me, boss! Fuck me! Make me yours!”

 Jeongyeon turns, her eyes dripping with desire beneath the brim of the driver’s cap still on her head. What she lacked in experience she certainly made up for in sheer allure, that unmeasurable something that made her so sexy, so attractive, and so downright gorgeous. The other girls were downright sexy, or cute, but Jeongyeon had something special, something none of them had, and you had no idea what it was; but you wanted more than anything else to find out.

 Your hands leave her butt to grip her hips, her words and her tight, slim body bringing you closer and closer to orgasm. You feel that build up, that approach towards the point of no return, quickly approaching, and you feel no need to delay it any longer.

 “I’m gonna cum, Jeongyeon, fuck I’m gonna cum.”

 “Wherever… wherever you want, boss! Cum for me… cum for me!”

 Fucking her from behind was amazing, of course, but you wanted to watch those beautiful eyes, wanted to see them as you came, wanted them to watch as you spilled your cum on her body. And so you pull out of her grasping pussy, and turn her body around until she is lying on her back on the bed again, her legs spreading once more to allow you between them. Taking your slick shaft in your right palm, you jerk it quickly, and before you know it your orgasm is overtaking your senses.

 You force your eyes open to watch as thick, hot semen shoots from the tip of your shaft to land on Jeongyeon’s long, slim torso, on her small breasts and flat stomach, in long, hot streaks. Jeongyeon gasps at the feeling of each stream of cum as it lands on her naked body, the sexiness of her voice and her beautiful eyes and every inch of her naked body lending further power to your orgasm.

 When it finally ends and you stop pumping your shaft, you watch through half-lidded eyes as Jeongyeon’s chest heaves up and down, breathing heavily, stained with white streams of your hot semen. Her arms are splayed out carelessly on either side of her, completely drained of energy. The black driver’s cap has somehow managed to stay on her head this whole time.

 “I guess I finally beat you at something. So you’ll join the team?” you ask, still breathing heavily. Your wet shaft has come to a rest in that wonderful crook where her crotch meets her thighs, juices, both yours and hers, dripping off it and onto her warm skin.

 “Alright, I guess I can join up. But first I’m going to buy more costumes,” she says with a smile, “there was a schoolgirl one in that store I liked…”

 ---

 You are in the elevator on your way to your own hotel room when you receive a text from JYP.

 JYP says: Call me right now.

 Not wasting any time, you go to your directory and press on his name, steeling yourself for whatever might come next. So much has happened, so many trials and tribulations and outright dangers that you were almost unsurprised that yet another thing needed your urgent attention.

 But when you hang up the phone after a short conversation with your boss, there is nothing but a wide, genuinely happy smile on your face.

[nautilusopus]

The Number I

Chapter 4: Before We Do Anything Else Though Let’s Talk About Math For Forty-Five Minutes

Very nervous. The more I post, the more I box myself in with potentially bad unworkable ideas that I won't be able to back out on in the middle of chapter 20. Oh well!

Things are gonna start moving pretty quickly from this point on once the setup finally wraps up. Very nervous about that too.

God this thing’s probably ridden with typos again.

Thank you again to @cateringisalie, @fury-brand​, @limbostratus​, @auncyen​, and everyone else I bothered to write this dumb garbage.

Four years after meteor-fall and Cloud Strife still isn’t himself. The thing that haunts him comes always at the same time… and when it does, on a distant far-off world, a needle moves. Twisty AU. Warnings for future chapters.

The click of the door to the decontamination airlock opening up was what woke up Aeris, and she quickly gathered up the few possessions she had brought with her and nudged Tseng awake. Cissnei was already awake somehow, and had already proceeded through ahead of her. Aeris was quick to follow -- the room was cold and humid, and an automated notification from the intercom had notified her that the other half of the team were on approach and would be using it in an hour or so.

The last airlock on the way out led into a small antechamber that would open up into the main facility. Aeris stepped out through the door, and it clicked shut behind her. Aeris looked down the long hall that stretched out in front of her, and began to lead the way down it.

"It's hard to believe it's all real," said Cissnei from behind her. "I guess someone had to be the person that realised you could actually send people into space, but it's still..."

"I guess so," she replied, heading deeper into the compound and passing through the first ring, mostly containing supplies, and into the second, containing living quarters for the crew. "All the numbers check out in the simulations, anyway." Another luxury they had now that they didn't the first time around.

They branched off into their own rooms, laid out like the spokes of a wheel. There were ten in total, though only six would be occupied. Aeris dropped off her candies in one of the rooms, claiming it as her own, and quickly followed after Tseng and Cissnei.

The next ring in was the biology lab. Tseng was already unpacking his briefcase onto the desk provided. The whole thing seemed almost too big for just one, maybe two people, and this section of the building alone probably had as much money sunk into it as the next three rings combined. Who needed eight different kinds of microscopes? Tseng did, apparently.

It had several doors leading into the next innermost ring, the medical ward; close enough to the labs for quick response in case of accidents, deep enough into the facility to prevent more of them through potential biohazard leaks. Hopefully.

There were two more rings, increasingly smaller, both separated from the sections in front and behind them by airlocks, containing a veritable jungle of computers and machines and detectors that might not ever get used. The idea was to never have to outsource anything they might find outside the facility and have it all done in-house.

Aeris took a deep breath and steeled herself in front of the airlock door of the second-to-last ring of the building, glancing at Cissnei, who nodded, not entirely sure what to expect.

"Excited?" she asked.

"Yes. Nervous, too. My feet are tingling a little."

"That could also be because we're pretty much on top of the generator right now," said Aeris. The entire thing was buried underground and heavily insulated, but the sheer amount of power on tap still made the whole area slightly charged with static.

"...Is that safe?"

"Yes," said Aeris grimly. "They wouldn't have let us build this place without getting it reapproved sixteen times. See for yourself if you don't believe me." And with that, she pushed open the door.

It seemed an unimpressive enough space upon first glance -- several computers along the outer wall, a large screen built into the inner ring. Desks, a whiteboard, and a couple servers.

Slightly more unusual was the rack of towels, and the raised metal disc about two metres across, covered by a glass panel and wired up to one of the more formidable computers in the room.

And of course, the large tank in the centre of the room. That too.

Aeris ran a hand over the side of it, suppressing a thrill of giddiness. It came up to her chest in height and was twice as wide, with a lid that was presently closed over the top. There were ten times as many wires leading from this one as there were the metal disc, and in particular three thicker ones were linked to the screen mounted on the wall.

"Spooky," remarked Cissnei, also staring at the tank, unwilling to touch it. "You're not worried?"

"Even if I was, it wouldn't matter." Truth be told, she was immensely worried. The simulations guaranteed no risk, sure. The lab rats they'd used in the trials seemed to be doing okay, sure. There would be five other people in the room with her in case something as stupid as her flipping over and choking on neuroconductive fluids happened, sure. The medical wing was intentionally right next door, sure.

A wild thought crossed her mind as she considered just jumping in the tank right now before she got cold feet. She even went as far as tipping up the lid. It was empty at the moment, of course, the drain in the bottom clearly visible. That would change in a matter of days, or perhaps hours if they were fortunate enough.

"It's exciting, too," she said after a moment, closing the lid. "We may as well get started with setup. Have everything running for when everyone gets here."

"'We'?"

"You could help, I guess. Get everything switched on and running."

"I am not touching the devil tank, though."

Aeris put her hands on her hips and frowned. "It won't do anything, even if it were on. You aren't in it, and we haven't picked a signal to replicate."

"What if you're wrong?"

Aeris gave the tank a firm pat on the lid. "Then we learn a valuable science lesson. Come on, give me a hand with the contact disc."

They worked for several hours after that. While a good majority of the simpler functions were automated, the instruments themselves weren't. Most of it wound up being staring at loading screens, waiting for systems upon systems to boot up. At about six hours into prep, Tseng joined them, having finished his work in the biolabs.

"You seem busy," he said, glancing over the pair of them. Cissnei had been pacing in circles around the room's circumference and seemed to have somehow managed to annoy herself with it, and Aeris was staring at a monitor watching driver 56 of 1189 load, a thin stream of drool of going down her chin.

"We're sciencing. What have you been doing?" Aeris shot back defensively.

"Much of the same thing," he admitted. "You aren't accomplishing anything at the moment. Neither am I. We may as well retire for the time being."

"Isn't this important?" objected Aeris, as Cissnei all too willingly went right for the door.

"Yes, but we're not supposed to be doing much without half the staff present anyway," she said. "Eat something."

"Fine, but I'm staying here," said Aeris. "I'd like to get a head start on finding a good anchorpoint. If they like, they can tell me to pick a new one when they get here."

Their meals consisted of prepackaged rations. They could have been quite a bit worse, considered Aeris as she dug into some sort of precooked meat pie-esque thing. She had offered the gummy bears and allsorts again, and no one had been particularly interested.

After another half hour of waiting for the system to be fully online, the light beneath the glass-covered disc flickered on as Aeris sat at the computer next to it and began to enter in a string of numbers -- the data from the first bridging experiment.

Once it was determined that the planes of reality they had discovered more or less had atoms the way they were understood in their own, there came talk of visiting said planes using the same technology. The process was simple, in explanation anyway. Safely sending a remote-controlled drone through to another universe had been considered, but ultimately was impossible -- there would be no way know what was on the other side without observing it, and there was no way to observe it that didn't involve sending a billion dollar rover through and hoping it didn't come out on the other side miles underground, or in the vacuum of space. The method considered by the late Dr. Gainsborough involved energy signatures -- the human consciousness was really little more than electricity, and if there were a point of reference on the other side that they recognised and had already mapped, one could use that as a jumping-off point to send their own signal through.

The problem with that, however, was the same catch-22 with the drones; there was nothing for them in the other dimension to see if there was anything for them in the other dimension.

That, and the fact that it sounded ridiculous and essentially ended her mother's career.

Eventually, she and her husband (nee Dr. Gast) had decided someone would have to be the first one in the pool. The effort had been privately funded, unsupervised, and ultimately, fatal.

People had died for these numbers.

It wasn't until three years ago that Aeris realised that they must have succeeded directly prior to the whole thing quite literally blowing up in their faces. The data was garbled enough that it had nearly been discarded, but it was there, and she had worked through it all herself, filtering out distortion, correcting for bugs, and deciphering what she could from burnt papers.

They had their signature, and with it their waypoint.

The glass-covered disc flickered on a few moments later, and pinpricks of light began popping up on its surface. All of them were instances of the pattern they had identified. Some were steadier than others. Most of them didn't remain fixed for more than an instant, and were limited in scope. She sifted through the options, watching them flicker in and out of existence, until she zeroed in on the most consistent one she could find. Good scope, steady source, very few variations. Perfect.

She scooted over to another computer and began running the calculations for it. It would probably take a lot longer on her own, but a head start was still a head start, and Cissnei and Tseng probably had a limited understanding of particle physics and the numbers that went into it anyway.

She was about five hours deep into her work before she turned to look at the disc again and swore.

The waypoint she'd been setting up calibrations for had terminated, she realised. All of them had. She could continue, but the results would be skewed with the signal truncating as it had. Perhaps she could wait a while and see if it picked up anything else.

She got up to retrieve the container of allsorts, and noticed another waypoint. Very steady, decent scope, but not particularly strong -- it had barely registered at all.

It was better than nothing, though, and five hours wasted was still five hours wasted. She scrapped the work she'd done for the first point with a heavy sigh and began on the next one, this time frequently checking to see if it was still there.

She peeled her face off the desk sometime later, not having realised she had fallen asleep. At some point someone else had left another ration pack next to her. She picked it up and went back to the outer ring to the living quarters.

Cissnei was there waiting for her. "It's about time you left that room. They're getting out of decon in ten minutes."

"Who? Oh." Aeris wiped a drool stain off the side of her face and allowed Cissnei to lead her around to the other side of the ring. "Where's Tseng?"

"Asleep," said Cissnei. "He probably didn't want to admit he was still nauseous in front of the project's head."

"I'll get him. You can say hi for me," she said, and started off down the hallway again.

"Should you be here if you're in charge -- okay, goodbye," she heard Cissnei say behind her.

By the time she got back with a decidedly less-put-together Tseng, Cissnei already appeared to be having a conversation with the three men that had just arrived, and Aeris paused uncertainly for a moment.

The first was clearly who the Netherlands had sent, what with the blond hair and blue eyes and the significant height advantage he had on most of them. He seemed mostly content to watch the others. Perhaps this was because of the language barrier, as Cissnei was presently engaged in a conversation in German with the second man. He seemed to be the oldest of the three, a few years older than the blond man, his black hair streaked with grey in places, and Aeris was fairly sure she recognised him from the meetings. She could tell even through the reserved, formal way he carried himself that he had been dying to talk to someone all day.

Aeris was half convinced the third was an intern that had wandered in by mistake. He was significantly taller than all of them and oddly musclebound for a physicist, and looked about as young as she was. He hadn't stopped fidgeting with the sleeves of his scrubs and was clearly bored out of his mind. Her mind went back to the dossiers after another moment -- by process of elimination, the lab in Hawaii had sent him over.

Cissnei paused mid-conversation and turned to Aeris and Tseng, who quickly made an effort to straighten the collar of his shirt.

"Dr. Gainsborough aus dem Vereinigten Königreich Großbritannien und Dr. Tseng aus der Volksrepublik China," said Cissnei, gesturing to each of them as they exchanged handshakes. She turned to Aeris. "Dr. Angeal Hewley from the Federal Republic of Germany, Dr. Lazard Deusericus from the Kingdom of the Netherlands, and Dr. Zachary Fair from the United States of America."

They each gave a polite nod at the mention of their names. The blond man, Dr. Deusericus, smiled. "It's an honour to work with you on this project, Dr. Gainsborough."

"Likewise, and Aeris is fine," she replied. "It'll be too stuffy if we keep up the titles the whole time we're here." She turned on her heels again and began to move back towards the sleeping quarters. "Well, get yourselves in order. We've got a lot of work to do."

The tall one, Fair, blinked in surprise, but if he would have said anything she wouldn't have heard it, already on her way towards the fifth ring, unable to keep the grin off her face.

"So, uh... that went well, I guess?" Zack watched the project head disappear around the corner and went back to messing with the sleeves of his uniform.

"Swimmingly," came Lazard's voice behind him, sounding somewhat amused as Angeal heaved a heavy sigh behind him. Zack had decided almost immediately to be on a first-name basis with everyone he was in decon with. Lazard had tolerated it good-naturedly, more or less. Angeal had responded by looking at him exasperatedly and accidentally-on-purpose not hearing him on occasion.

"So... Ange. Can I call you Ange?"

Zack received another stern look.

"Angeal, then. It's unprofessional to ignore your coworkers, Angeal."

Angeal sighed and proceeded down the hall to the living quarters.

"This relationship's off to a great start," said Zack, heading after him.

"You can't blame us for wanting to maintain a professional environment," said Lazard.

"Yeah, but we're basically bunkmates now," said Zack, looking at one of the identical white doors Angeal had just disappeared into. "Can you imagine spending a month at a time living with someone you couldn't stand? Like a girlfriend, but you can't dump them, because it's her house, and also you've lost the keys, and there are no windows and neither one of you can leave without causing an international incident."

"That's... certainly colourful," said Lazard.

"Tell me about it," muttered Zack, and picked a room at random.

It was fairly minimalist -- a bed in the corner, with a couple pillows and some blankets. He'd have to see if there were any more pillows in the supply section.

He spent a full two minutes just sitting on his bed and staring at the mirror over the sink in front of him -- it was the first time in a month he hadn't had any cameras pointed in his face. His jaw ached from the constant need for a "winning smile". He scowled at the mirror over, which was immensely satisfying, which involuntarily made him smile again, which started the cycle over.

A knock on the door dragged his attention away from the mirror. "They're setting up for the first round," came Lazard's voice. "You're needed in the fifth ring."

Zack got to his feet and stepped outside. "What, already?"

Lazard began to lead him back. "Yes, already. Apparently they'd been taking care of the preliminary work over the last day or so. Nothing left to do but start."

Zack took his time making it through the facility -- he spent a few minutes watching Tseng and Lazard hurry around medical, and offered to feed the five rats they had available to them, until Tseng had to shoo him away when he tried to take one out to pet. He probably shouldn't be getting attached to something that he'd have to watch get dissected, but then that was why he wasn't a biologist.

Another two airlocks led him into the fifth ring, where Angeal and Aeris were already deep in conversation, with Cissnei mediating between the two. Aeris was the first to greet him.

"I don't recognise you from the meetings," she said eventually. "So you're... Zax?"

"It's Zack," he grumbled. "That's a typo. And... yeah. Cosmologist. I was kind of a last minute addition."

"How last minute?"

"Try three weeks. They briefed me on the way over."

Aeris frowned, and he quickly continued. "That big scary room one door over? That was my design." She continued watching him, which he took as a sign to continue. "Partially my design, anyway. They figured, y'know, since I built it, they might as well have me operate it too. So, I'm here!" He waved. "Hello!"

"So how's it work, then?" A test. He hoped it wouldn't be like this the entire time he was working.

"The last one just ripped a hole open in spacetime for stuff to be fed through. It was, uh... brilliant, I'm sure, but wound up with some... casualties," he said, crashing into every single elephant in the room on the way to his desk. "That one just tears the hole at you."

"That sounds lethal."

"Oh, it is," said Zack, shrugging. "But by then you're in another universe. Kills you and brings you back before the laws of physics have time to realise you're dead."

It finally got her to look away, at least. "Well, welcome to the project, Zack."

"You too," he replied, turning back to his own screen and hiding a grin. Test passed, first name basis achieved.

Everyone spoke very little during the first part of setup. Deusericus, after getting set up in the medical room, had joined Tseng in observing everyone else until they were needed. Hewley, thank god, was finally present to help fine tune the calculations she'd made in a hurry and without much sleep, with Cissnei helping to translate the occasional communication or two -- it seemed he understood some English, but spoke very little of it himself. That left Fair hovering over their shoulder, apparently making Angeal nervous.

After a while, Aeris spoke up again. "I'm still sort of surprised they have someone else this young on the project," she said. "I was involved from day one, and I recommended Cissnei. What's your story?"

"Maybe they thought it'd be good publicity or something if they sent someone from Mauna Kea." He shrugged, leaning on the desk. "Genius from a poor family, y'know. Makes a good Lifetime movie. I don't think it's bragging or anything to say I'm pretty photogenic, either."

Aeris frowned. "You're awfully up-front about it."

"Hey, I said that was one of the reasons," he said, looking mildly offended. "You don't think I got my doctorate off a basketball scholarship, did you?"

"Well, you can show me," she replied, and passed him a set of papers. "Help get the overlap signal set up."

Zack looked through them, still looking mildly stung. "What's this from? I thought we'd never done this before."

At this Angeal spoke up, and Cissnei began translating.

"'We've never done this with a human before. We have tested the process on rats, using a weak partial signal. We know it's nonlethal as long as one doesn't choke and drown, and we know some kind of connection has been made, but the rats can't tell us what they're experiencing, what they've seen, or what the process is like,'" she relayed. Angeal then addressed Zack directly. "Ten days, ten rats. All fine."

"How does that work out for you?" he asked Aeris. "You'll be comatose, right?"

"That's what this is for," chimed in Deusericus, gesturing to a large screen that seemed to be more heavily wired up to the tank than the others. "This will be the first test to make sure it works."

"...And if it doesn't?" asked Zack.

"It has to," said Aeris, tying her braid more closely to her head in a bun. "They didn't tell you much, did they?"

Zack shrugged. "They went over the math itself, and the work I'd be doing. And the gateroom. Y'know, making sure anyone that goes in there comes back out in one piece. Not so much about the hell tank."

Cissnei pointed, looking triumphant. Aeris quickly continued, cutting her off.

"How old are you?"

"Twenty-eight," said Zack. "You beat me by a year, looks like." He grinned, and Aeris again for a split second wondered if he mightn't have been an intern.

"Did you want to be here, or did they just send you over?" asked Aeris. "Why are you involved?"

"Well..." he scratched his neck. "I mean, of course I wanna be here. It's really exciting, you know? I wanted to be a part of it. That's why the rest of us joined, right Lazard?" he said, turning to Deusericus for support.

"Something like that," said Lazard, clearly amused at the familiarity. Zack had probably been doing that all through decon. "There are many reasons. The challenge, the honour for one's nation, having something nice on one's retainer..."

"And that's why you're here?" said Aeris, leaning away from the computer screen to let Angeal have a final look.

"More or less," he replied. "There's a suit for you on the examination chair. I'll meet you inside in five minutes for a physical before we start."

Cissnei flashed her another thumbs up as Aeris stood and left the room.

Lazard emerged ten minutes later following the physical, with Aeris behind him. After confirming she was in decent enough shape to not have a heart attack midway through the process, she had changed into what appeared to be a cream-coloured wetsuit, with silvery spots of conductive foil running down the spine. She'd tied her braid back up into a bun (showed them about her ribbon being work-inappropriate), and hauled herself up to sit on the ledge next to the lip of the tank as she watched it slowly fill.

She sat patiently as Lazard enlisted Cissnei's help in attaching electrodes to spots on her head and neck, as well as several more sensors monitoring her vitals. She very slowly slid her feet in -- the fluid itself was slightly viscous, and had a silvery tint to it -- and felt them drag through it with a bit more resistance than water. It had been diluted somewhat, and gallium generally wasn't known for being poisonous, but Aeris couldn't help but think of pitcher plants.

They passed her sealed oxygen mask and helped her secure it to her face. Apart from air, there would also be a mild sedative mixed in, enough to keep her from unconsciously thrashing around and flipping herself over. She and Cissnei flashed another thumbs up, and Aeris carefully lowered herself into the tank. The fluid had been heated slightly, but she still shivered as she carefully positioned herself to float on her back.

"The first set's active," she heard Tseng say from somewhere to her right. "Count down from ten."

Aeris felt her thoughts skip a beat, and she felt as though they were sagging slightly, leaving a small space underneath them. The large screen flickered on.

The sedative began to kick in, and the sagging smoothed out, leaving the space within reach. Aeris focused on it, and began to count.

Numbers began appearing on the screen, neatly typed: 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.

"Spooky..." she heard Zack mutter. She was sure Cissnei would probably be inclined to agree. 

"Now up from twos," came Angeal's voice. On a new line below the first came 2-4-6-8-10. Ready.

"The screen's online. The main set's coming in two minutes," said Lazard. "Good luck." The lid was closed over her, leaving her in complete darkness.

The large screen was essential for two of reasons -- once she'd made contact, she'd essentially have no knowledge of her surroundings, and no way to communicate in the event of an emergency. There would be no way to take notes, either, lacking a presence any more physical than electrical signals, and vital information could be lost due to simple human forgetfulness. The screen doubled as both.

A microphone in the lid of the tank directly over her clicked on, and Zack's voice wafted through, echoing slightly in the confined space.

"We're sending a partial at first, to see how you handle that," he said. "Just keep talking to me until you can't."

"Shouldn't a doctor be doing this?" said Aeris. The sedative had fully set in, and the warm water (well, some of it was water) she was suspended in made it feel a bit like a hot tub.

"Lazard's looking over your vitals right now and Cissnei's on translation duty. Besides, I am a doctor," he replied, and she could still hear the toothy grin in his voice.

"So 'm I."

"Well, then we're fine. You've got twenty seconds. Can you count for me?"

"Nineteen, eighteen, seventeen, sixteen..." Spots of light began to appear in her vision. Minor hallucinations, something they'd expected. She made a note of it on the screen for them to go over later. The darkness in the tank suddenly seemed a lot bigger. Zack was saying something else to Tseng, and she could hear them all moving around her. The lights began flashing faster, and she shut her eyes.

"...four, three, two --"

Once, when she'd been four years old, Ifalna Gainsborough had taken her daughter to the zoo. It had been the height of summer, and while Aeris would have likely preferred to stay outside staring at the ostriches all day, her mother had successfully managed to corral her into the indoor deep sea exhibit after she started turning pink. One of her earliest memories was looking through those tanks, and coming across the informational video about dead fish, drifting to the abyssal zone at the bottom of the ocean, where there wasn't any light, until something much bigger and stranger than it snapped it up.

It was unimaginably deep here -- and at the same time, empty. It was absence, and yet she felt something incomprehensibly huge around her, and there was nothing around her at all, because here was nothing. She felt the nothing pass through her, and a low, deep noise began getting louder, like howling wind, even though there was no noise, and no wind.

Suddenly there was something, actually, and she was stunned she had missed it before. She was clearly seeing something, but for some reason her eyes didn't want to focus on it -- because of course, she had no eyes, and she was looking at nothing that existed, as far as her brain was concerned. Everything seemed distorted and distant and somewhat dreamlike.

She was in an enclosed space. That much she could make out. There was ground beneath her, and noises that she couldn't properly hear around her, because of course she wasn't hearing anything, there was nothing to hear.

She was here. She was looking at another world.

She began frantically taking stock of everything around her that she could see, which was not a lot. She wasn't entirely sure where the signal they'd overlapped with had come from, and she found she was unable to look around freely. Maybe an anchored point? That didn't make sense.

There was, at least, solid ground, or something that looked like it anyway -- that was already a promising start. She couldn't "see" particularly well, and every few seconds they plunged back into darkness, but the space around her seemed more or less Euclidean, though she would know for sure when she traversed it herself.

She was interrupted about thirty seconds later with the realisation that her chest hurt. That wasn't right, was it?

The pain got worse, and she made a note of it. Ten seconds later, she saw a tank lid slide open above her with a concerned Lazard leaning over her and offering her a towel. She tore off the mask and took deep breaths of air, even though she hadn't had any trouble breathing before.

She pulled herself out of the tank. Zack was still staring at the screen, looking gobsmacked, as was Angeal, whom Cissnei was translating for in a low, rushed voice. Tseng looked almost ready to express an emotion.

"You did it," said Zack. "You really, actually did it. Holy shit..."

"That's not workplace language," she said.

"We just discovered another planet in another universe," said Cissnei, also busy staring at her notes, "I think we deserve a 'holy shit' or two."

"Feedback," said Tseng brusquely. "We gave you two minutes. Tell us everything you can."

Aeris hesitated for a moment, wiping the accumulated moisture from her face with the towel, getting her words in order. "...It was a bit scary," she said. "I... saw something. Almost definitely objects and not hallucinations. Couldn't move for some reason. It sort of felt like I was choking."

Angeal turned around. "The partial?" he asked. Aeris shrugged.

"Can't think of any reason otherwise. Your head stayed above the surface the entire time," said Lazard.

"There's other issues we need to fine tune," said Zack, finally turning away from the note screen to look at Aeris, thumbing back towards it to direct her attention there. Prominently displayed was

minor hallucinations look like lights

very dark here, spatial distortion or limited human perception

amazing sol4igroundηdid232 lλわooks enclosed struχ24ure cave meれt maybe sign2αλわ111 yos1れ deの twowall 33tΘ1子14 metrρe供 unmer

hurtπ痛ain 6chest mine

Aeris frowned. "That's... not what I wrote."

"We figured as much," replied Lazard. "You're lucky we managed to parse the last bit. That's a safety concern we need cleared up before we try this out in full. Get cleaned up and meet us back here to disseminate our findings."

A couple hours later, they had discovered most of the difficulties had been due to it being a "test run" in the first place. The choking sensation had its roots in the same problem: higher brain functions had registered, leaving the more basic ones behind.

They'd been deemed unnecessary and a waste of power on a test run.

"Maybe you don't need to breathe, but your brain thought you did," explained Tseng. "Just as it had decided you had no nerves with which to move. Easily fixed."

Other issues lacked the necessary data for them to do much more than guess. Strangely enough, the pattern they'd used to get here seemed to be missing parts of it, snuffed out by Aeris's own, yet the signal had been more or less maintained. And there was the matter of her notes.

"I took measurements of what I saw," she explained. "Don't know how accurate they were. There shouldn't be that many numbers."

"We don't know what's making it do that," said Zack. "Shouldn't we -- "

"No" interrupted Aeris. "We're doing the next run tomorrow, and it'll probably clear up with the rest of the issues we had when we do it for real."

"And if it doesn't?" asked Tseng.

"Then we do it anyway. I'll just have to remember everything until we get it worked out." She was met with silence. "Think about it. Do we have any alternative? We've come this far."

Angeal said something else, and it took Cissnei a moment to tear her eyes away from the note screen, realise he was talking, and relay it to everyone else.

"'We keep going. We've made incredible progress, and we're about to make more. Would it be possible to do it with the lid off, and watch you directly?'"

"Probably. Maybe a bit of sensory bleed, but I can keep my eyes shut," she replied. "I'd say we do the next run today, but I don't know if I want to be drugged twice in one go."

Angeal said something else.

"'It's all about finding the path of least resistance. From our end, at least. We have a limited understanding of physics that --' I didn't translate that for you. How did..." Cissnei trailed off, looking between Aeris and Angeal, who sighed.

"I felt it would be prudent to allow you to continue translating. I assumed there was at least one other person in the group that would also require your skills," said Angeal curtly. "Clearly no one else thought the same."

"...You spoke English this entire time," said Cissnei slowly.

"Yes."

"Everyone here speaks English."

A chorus of affirmatives from the group.

"I -- why am I here, then?!" she sputtered.

"I assumed someone else would need the help," said Angeal.

"So did I," added Tseng.

"...If it helps, I know Spanish," offered Zack, scratching his neck. "If you wanna leave, the airlock's that way."

"Well, perhaps I don't!" she huffed. "Perhaps I am going to stay here anyway so you can all continue to spare my feelings!"

"Actually, maybe you have to!" said Aeris brightly. "You already went through decontamination. Going back out off schedule counts as an emergency. It could set off an investigation and stall the project for weeks. Maybe even months."

"...Thank... you?" said Cissnei after a moment, considering whether or not this was a good thing.

"You're welcome," replied Aeris. "The drugs have made me very tired, and I'm going to take a nap." Which is what she did.

The next two days were spent processing their findings and fine-tuning the tank for their first official launch. There unfortunately wasn't much data to go on about the other universe from the trial run, so most of the focus was on Aeris herself and the tank. Lazard had decided that the lid could be opened mid-process as necessary, but that the lights should remain dimmed. Cissnei would be watching the entire time ready to pull the plug at the first sign of distress, a position that she was determined to take very seriously out of resentment. Angeal and Zack would both be working with Aeris herself to focus on refining the overlap signal. Tseng had been largely quiet the entire time. Aeris walked up behind him and cleared her throat.

"Anything we should know about?" Aeris probed.

"Actually, yes," Tseng admitted. "It's not really concrete. More of a guess than a hypothesis, but... the reason we're able to recognise the signal as a familiar pattern is... I think, partially because it's organic in nature. That must have been what the late Dr. Gainsborough was identifying."

Aeris paused to consider this. "How do you know?" she asked.

"Brainwaves. Or something like them."

"...Is it intelligent?"

"That's difficult to say," said Tseng. "It could be an intelligence we lack the scientific knowledge to comprehend, but based off what we know about biology on Earth, no. Very little, if any brain activity. If there was, there would've been interference the entire time. Some sort of animal, most likely."

"Definitely bigger than a microbe, though?"

"Definitely bigger," agreed Tseng, and it was clear he was trying to downplay his excitement.

"How big did you feel?" asked Zack.

Aeris considered this as well. "I don't really know. It was hard to see, and everything was kind of numbed."

"Y'know, if you want someone else to go in for you --"

"You're volunteering?" she interjected, her eyes narrowing slightly. Zack held up his hands.

"Hell no. You wouldn't get me into that thing for a million dollars. Which is maybe how much they're paying you to do that anyway, so a billion. I thought maybe someone else could volunteer, though."

"It's really not that bad," she said. "A bit unsettling, maybe, but it passes quickly enough."

"You can swim in the hell bathtub all you like, then," returned Zack, turning his chair around to face her.

"I will," said Aeris, "and it'll be groundbreaking for everyone, I'm sure. Now come help me compile this. There's something here Angeal says might be a bug, and we'll need to do the next run perfectly or risk falling behind schedule." She opened the container on the counter to her left and tapped it with her pencil.

"Gummy bear?" she offered.

"Thought you'd never ask," interjected Angeal, reaching over the both of them. It was about time, she supposed.

[lateviews]

ARK: Survival Evolved

I feel this review is more pertinent than ever due to the new DLC coming out a few days ago. I worry that I lot of people will see the DLC drop and decide to buy into the franchise because they want to ride cool mech suits. Let me give you a spoiler, that's not happening, at least not for a while. I've actually been sitting on this review for a long time but I've always put it off because ARK: Survival Evolved is one heck of a big game. Anyway, here goes. For the purposes of most of this review I'm going to ignore all the DLC but I will mention it in it's own section.

My time in ARK was mostly spent solo or with a singular friend I have. This is important to note because ARK is actually an MMORPG. Yeah, like World of Warcraft or Guild Wars 2, this is a game designed around having a large open world with other players in it that remains constantly alive so that things are happening even when you're not around. I do recommend you play with a small tribe though because I personally find the online servers to be a waste of time. This game has been out for so long now that every server is covered in forts and settlements that cover vast swaths of the map. If you're looking to start out by yourself, at best, large walls prohibit your movement and block access to areas while simultaneously tanking your frames due to the HUNDREDS of dinosaurs stored within. At worst, these forts kill you on site with unmanned laser turrets from a distance equal to 20 times the range of your wooden spear. If you want to play online, start in your internet browser. Find a tribe's website, ask to join and if you convince them you can successfully skip playing the game. You'll now probably find yourself with end game gear, dinosaurs and weapons and you can now stop playing because you win the game. I'm getting ahead of myself, let's pretend you're not using the online maps. What is ARK? Well it markets itself as a survival game and at least in the beginning it is. You start by picking up rocks and punching trees to make tools to help you pick up rocks and bash trees more effectively. Each time you level up you get a skill point to put into one of your stats and some points to put into “buying” engrams (crafting schematics). Now that you've unlocked an engram, you'll probably want to craft it. As you work on crafting that, you'll probably level up again. This opens up more engrams. More engrams means more things for you to craft. This is a very effective feedback loop and will keep you busy for hours. One of the big reasons it'll keep you busy is that one of the items you'll end up crafting is a saddle. Saddles can be used to ride dinosaurs. Now, not all dinosaurs can be ridden but all dinosaurs can be tamed so each time you unlock the ability to make a saddle, you'll now have two jobs to do: Craft the saddle, tame the dino it goes on. This gives the game an almost pokemon feel as you knock out Dodo's and convince them to be your friend by feeding them berries. Dodo's are as useless as you might think but other animals are actually exceptionally helpful and will expedite your progression. An early example of this is the Parasaur. Parasaur's are herbivorous animals that will harmlessly roam around the starting areas of the island and once you've learned how to craft a club and a bolas, you can stun and club one until it's unconscious (the majority of dinosaurs are tamed by knocking them out and feeding them). With the parasaurs saddle, you can now ride it. It provides you with portable storage and although it's run speed is slower than yours, it can run for much, much longer. It also can harvest berries for you. En masse! It can also harvest thatch and wood from trees although it's not very efficient at doing so but it does all this without using up any tool durability or consuming your stamina. The usefulness only goes up from there with some dinosaurs being able to uproot entire forests in seconds and others able to crush rocks in a single swing, spewing out many more resources than you would have been able to mine by hand. It's safe to say that taming is a huge part of ARK and it's one of the more enjoyable parts.

The “crafting, taming, levelling up” loop will last you quite some time but survival games need more than just surviving to be good. Eventually you'll be asking what's next. Now, you will notice foreboding alien pillars rising high into the clouds all across the island and you might think that this is where you need to go and indeed going there is a challenge but arriving is not as rewarding as you want it to be. Here is where the game falls down in terms of conveyance. So far the game hasn't needed to spell things out to you. There is no tutorial message telling you to punch dodo's or to make a house. You just did those things because they made sense. Same as you went to investigate the pillars because it made sense to go see them. When you arrive though you'll receive no instructions. The console in the middle of the obelisk will cryptically mention something about a broodmother and a dragon and offer no explanation. You'll return to your house lost and in a daze. What is your purpose? Well, you need to go to the wikipedia for the game. Turns out you've just started the dungeon grind and nobody told you. This isn't bad in and of itself but I would have enjoyed some booming alien voice telling me to seek the dungeons out. Anyway yes, the game has dungeons (remember, it's an MMO) and you will need to be prepared for them. The majority of caves (caves = dungeons) on the island will result in your death the first time you go in them. Some of them are especially unfair like the poison cave which will, well, poison you. But it doesn't say this it just makes your health go down and again, it won't tell you why so you google it and find out you need a gas mask. An item I still haven't unlocked after 360 hours of play. With heavy dose of googling, the dungeons are a fine challenge. They provide you with the drive to escape your manufactured comfort zone that all survival games need. Still though, what's after that? When does the game end? Well after doing a few dungeons and some more googling you'll find that completion of the island involves defeating every dungeon multiple times in order to farm the artifacts needed to summon boss fights who's items are needed to open the dungeon of the final boss atop a volcano at the centre of the map. Again, none of this is spelled out or explained in-game.

So let's move right along into the first of the negatives about the game. The fact that it's designed to be an MMO. In an MMO, when you go to bed for the day or while you're at work, people in your tribe across the world are waking up and logging on for a session. It doesn't even matter what they do, the point is that they'll be progressing your tribe in some way. The game is balanced around the fact that multiple people, 24/7, will be working on these goals. It's just such a bizarre and disheartening change because up until this point you have felt like you're progressing at a normal rate. Imagine any other RPG you know, and then imagine that at what should be the halfway point of your progression, the game suddenly multiplies the amount of time it'll take for you to achieve your next goals. You will go from needing 50 metal to make an axe to 200 metal to make a gun and 1000 metal to make a more advanced gun. Once you complete a few dungeons and start eyeing a boss, the progression hits a ramp that's so steep it feels like a wall. You might log on and play for an hour and only make a dent in the task that's in front of you.

The other big problem with this game is how buggy it is. On the low end is predators being able to climb walls and cliffs that should be completely impassable. Also on the low end is how predators aren't smart enough to go around walls and cliffs that are completely impassable. On the high end, dying inside a cave will cause you to lose all your items permanently unless you know a very specific method for breaking the game. Skip this paragraph if you don't care for the example: I believe it has to do with the fact that the game will unload the cave once you die (because nobody is inside it) and since there is no more cave, your dead body will fall into the void below the kill plane. Even if you turn on the hax and noclip down to the void, the kill plane will respawn you above ground. You need to combine console commands to turn off the kill plane just to get your stuff, and now you'll fall forever if you don't teleport yourself above ground. Oh, but the ground doesn't exist for you anymore and you need to log out of the game and log back in just for physics to resume working again. All of this was because you died in one of the hardest parts of the game.

Alright, here's my bit about the DLC. The three paid maps are Scorched Earth, Aberration and Extinction. These are all fine additions. I haven't played extinction yet but both Scorched Earth and Aberration add many new engrams and entirely new worlds to explore. Aberration in particular has a whole new set of rules that you need to follow and I feel safe in saying, do not attempt to play these before putting a lot of hours into the island. Aberration will chew you up and spit you back out, again and again. It was kind enough to include a “starter” area but there's no water source in that area so... whoops? Scorched Earth would feel mostly normal if it weren't for the fact that you'll be dying of dehydration in seconds. Let me put it this way, I played Aberration with a new character and it was really hard and not entirely enjoyable for a long time. Do you remember everything that I mentioned above about dodo's, taming and a general sense of progression brought about naturally by the levelling system? Yeah that doesn't really apply in Aberration. The game asks you to have items you don't have yet constantly and if you do manage to get yourself set up you feel trapped because your safe space only goes so far and the area outside of that is so hostile that you feel you'll never be able to go out there. For Scorched Earth me and my friend tried something different. We ported our characters over from the island (this is a mechanic of the game. You can port dinosaurs over too) and thus while we still had no items we at least had enough stats to survive and the engrams to make the tools to survive. Even when I ported my character back across I could then start a new character to inherit all the equipment and the shelter my high level character had made and it made the game so much more enjoyable. In short, the DLC should be treated like an expansion pack. Something to do AFTER the island. This is why I mentioned that you shouldn't expect to play Extinction right away. Ideally, you'd want to have completely finished the island, Scorched Earth and Aberration before attempting Extinction but if you're impatient you'll still want to spend a few hours on the island to get some experience. One quick thing to mention, even if you don't buy the DLC, the game will install it for you in case another player does (remember, MMO). At least on my PC the game is now a whopping 150gb. Just something to keep in mind.

So why do people play ARK? I've been very negative in this review thus far and with 360 hours there must be some reason why I'm still going. I spoke about hitting that wall when you attempt to fight a boss but, up until that point the game is engrossing to no end. Everyone I've talked to who has played it has either given up very quickly or not wanted to stop playing for many hours. When you're not frustrated at a glitch the game is a joy to play. The sheer amount of different activities you'll be doing ensures that you'll never be bored. At any point in time, you could go mining, wood-chopping, hunting. What about fishing instead? How about heading off on an expedition to the next dungeon? What about trying to tame a particular dinosaur you once saw? Or maybe you want to set up an outpost in a strategic area so you'll have a safe place to go? Why not just go out exploring, try to find some encyclopedia pages left behind by survivors who were here long ago? Or you can head out to the ocean because you heard that there's a rare material that spawns there. So many possibilities await you. The world is a playground and you have your best mate and your pet dinosaur to take along with you. ARK has a retail price of $60 for just the base game which I think is a lot to ask for a game, even one with this much content. That said it's on sale right now (until 5th of Novement 2018) for $20 ($30 with DLC) so go buy it, that's an amazing price.

[avishek429]

Oracle Access Manager Online Training By MaxMunus With Industry Experts.

Hi, We Are Starting Online Training Batches On " ORACLE ACCESS MANAGER" By Industrial Expert ORACLE ACCESS MANAGER Training:

Oracle Access Manager 11g is Oracle Identity Management’s solution for web access management and user identity administration. It’s designed to support complex, heterogeneous enterprise environments. As a key component of Oracle Fusion Middleware, it ensures ready support for Oracle’s current and future ERP, CRM, and Collaboration suite applications. It generally consists of the Access System and the Identity System.

MaxMunus’s Oracle Access Manager Online Training:

This Oracle Access Manager (OAM) Training will teach you to install and configure Oracle Access Manager. This will also teach you how to provide authentication, single sign-on, and authorization services for protected resources & more.

Prerequisites For Oracle Access Manager Online Training:

Oracle OAM Admin, Fusion Architect, Security Consultants, IT Security Administrators.

Approach to the Oracle Access Manager Online Training Course:

1.The complete practical approach of installation, configuration, and OAM administration task.

2. Below material will be shared on Google drive:

Oracle reference documents.

Pre-developed codes/applications used in deployment.

Scripts and commands.

All software and tools used in the training program.

3. Topic Explanation followed by practical demonstration.

4.Complete Suite Implementation (OAM, OUD), DB, RCU, Weblogic using custom JDK, OHS, WebGate, Custom Applications (HTML, J2EE) to demonstrate SSO as well as for OAM Audit report generation.

The backend repository for the Access Manager is an LDAP-based directory service that can be a combination of multiple directory servers, which is leveraged for two main purposes:

As the store for policy, configuration and Workflow related data, which is used and managed by the Access and Identity Systems

As the identity store, containing the user, group and organization data that is managed through the Identity System and is used by the Access System to evaluate access policies.

Feature of Oracle Access Manager:

Comprehensive Web Access Management, Web Single Sign-On, Identity Propagation, and Federation.

Mobile and Social Sign-On

Real-time External Authorization

Adaptive Access and Fraud Detection

Advantages of Oracle Access Manager Training:

Provides centralized, policy-based authentication and single sign-on for Web applications, Web services, and data and cloud services

Delivers seamless single sign-on to enterprise resources from any device including desktops, laptops, and mobile devices

Enables on-boarding of partners and service providers faster using industry security standards

Provides standards-based secure propagation of identity across applications and Web services

Delivers seamless single sign-on across native and Web applications on mobile devices

Enables low-value enterprise and consumer-facing applications to consume identities from social networks and other third-party identity providers using popular user-centric identity standards

Provides real-time external authorization for applications, middleware, and databases with enterprise-class scalability and granular security

Enables you to add sophisticated security to basic authentication flows in a few easy steps.

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15 Unheard Ways To Achieve Greater GAMING

Gaming Grabs The High Score On Twitter

We've as soon as once again teamed up with our mates at Dire Wolf Digital Studios to bring this incredible game to your gaming table. Hi Frags, it all comes down to the high-quality of guests you get. Promoting stuff by means of your web site is difficult when there are only basic content material on it, but if you target a precise group of gamers and make a loyal following, recommending items gets simpler. It will also depend on the form of merchandise you sell, there are in the end a lot of variables contributing to having a thriving gaming weblog. Actually glad you liked the report! I will definitely verify out your weblog.

Definitely glad that my blog inspired you to get started your personal. Yes it really is difficult perform and it requires some time to develop, but if you do it correctly you can have a terrific on the web brand. Beginning the weblog is only the starting, so make certain to read the rest of my articles in the Gaming Weblog Series which will take you by means of all the steps. If you have any queries never hesitate to ask me, I'm content to support where I can.

Oh dear lord, to answer this query I had to cease myself from cheating and counting one particular of the stories I wrote in the past. My largest hobby, apart from gaming and acting, is writing. Ahead of I started writing this weblog, I employed to write a lot of fantasy stories on paper. I have a couple of binders complete with story tips and pitches for really interesting stories.

Paul: In 2009, the thought for Green Man Gaming came about when we have been contemplating where the games market place was going to go and what was going to take place subsequent. There was a powerful company model in trading in games in the sector and there was the start off of the move to a completely digital marketplace. The coupling of these two marketplace mechanisms have been supported by investigation from London Business School showing that a customer's propensity to buy is heightened when provided the option to trade-in a item or recoup some of its value. So the significant idea” was to combine digital and trade-in into the similar platform, properly becoming a retailer and a marketplace on 1 worldwide digital platform.

Individuals are gaming on tablets, smartphones, smartwatches, consoles and lots of other devices. This is the right time to take a plunge into the gaming industry. If you are not a game developer it doesn't imply you can not make some profit from it. All round, developers are searching into much more methods on how to promote their games and this is where you can turn into the next massive player.

Microsoft — with our almost 40 years of gaming encounter starting with Pc, as effectively as our breadth and depth of capabilities from software program to hardware and deep encounter of being a platform enterprise — is effectively equipped to address the complex challenge pc video games jaluzeleverticale.info of cloud game-streaming. With datacenters in 54 Azure regions and services readily available in 140 countries, Azure has the scale to deliver a excellent gaming encounter for players worldwide, regardless of their location.

15 Tips For ENTERTAINMENT Success

Paul: Our enterprise model is development focused and we cover 3 key locations in the gaming industry. Firstly, we're a global e-Commerce retailer selling over 7,500 games from 450 publishers in more than 190 nations to millions of gamers. Secondly, Green Man Gaming has a thriving neighborhood who go over and track their game achievements on our community platform. This data combined with the industrial information of the store gives Green Man Gaming a important depth of understanding of our prospects. Ultimately, we have a publishing arm that aids developers publish their personal games and bring them to market, supporting them every single step of the way. The fusion of Green Man Gaming's e-Commerce shop, a sturdy community producing billions of information points and publisher support sets us apart from our competition.

Developed for creating social networking web pages for gaming communities, Blackfyre offers a wide variety of functions to support you build exclusive clan sites, gaming groups, content material sharing web sites, discussion channels and a lot more. Alongside a hugely effective user account creation and management technique, Blackfyre also supports Clan creation to assistance your customers to make several plans for their games.

An additional of our leading gaming influencers for 2018 is The Rad Brad We had to involve this channel mainly because The Rad Brad is a specifically effectively identified YouTube gamer. He produces an unbelievable amount of very-high quality, enjoyable content material. It's no wonder he's known for creating the ideal video game walkthroughs on social media. The Rad Brad has helped to make a quantity of influencer advertising and marketing campaigns a real good results.

Gaming content material remains 1 of best ways to attain young men. Tubular Labs reports that amongst millennial males, gaming— especially, gameplay— ranks in the leading 3 categories for each 18—24-year-olds (#1) and 25—34-year-olds (#2). But what about females? As it turns out, adult women have lately unseated teenage boys as the largest video game— playing demographic, according to the Entertainment Software program Association YouTube trends reflect this: Viewership among females has doubled year more than year, and women more than the age of 25 are the fastest-increasing demographic for gaming content material.

So, to assist you monitor and fix these problems, we've chosen some astounding WordPress Gaming themes we can personally recommend. They are extremely accommodating to a wide range of purposes for your internet sites. For your convenience, we've highlighted all their core capabilities, regions of usages and important things for these awesome gaming themes. In addition, the list also consists of excellent absolutely free WordPress gaming themes so you can commence your gaming site with minimal expenses. So without having additional ado, let's take a appear at our list of each premium WordPress Gaming Themes and free of charge Gaming WordPress themes.

Ask yourself why you happen to be considering starting a gaming weblog or youtube channel? If it is mainly because you consider you have what it takes to be the next PewDiePie or DanTDM (or TheTechieGuy ), then you happen to be not alone. On the other hand, your primary explanation should really be that you have an overwhelming really like for gaming. It does not hurt to have a excellent voice and some thing to contribute to the gaming network. (Of course, the perks ain't terrible when they commence rolling in, either).

The gaming business saw a number of thrilling developments in 2016 touching on distinct elements of the sector. Gaming technologies is creating in really thrilling approaches. The extended promised revolution of virtual and augmented reality moved closer to realization. The mania around Pokémon GO with its mass market appeal and utilization of mobile phones introduced untold millions to the possible of augmented reality. With its launch in India and South Asia it has grow to be the poster kid for the potential of mobile games offered its advanced technologies and the enormous international smartphone penetration.

Typically used to refer to games that are produced by key studios with a substantial budget, requiring a high sales volume and substantial application expansions to keep profitability. Like hollywood, these games have a tendency to rely on fairly low-risk sequels over larger-risk artistic projects, so count on to see your operate all more than billboards and Television advertisements. You'll be focused mostly on Pc, Playstation and Xbox gaming for AAA titles.

We use our GeForce Experience servers to decide the very best excellent settings based on the user's CPU and GPU, and target higher frame prices than 'normal' optimal settings to make certain the lowest latency gaming knowledge. These settings are automatically applied when the game is launched so gamers do not have to be concerned about configuring these settings themselves.

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80% off #All about NodeJS – $10

Create & Deploy High Performance NodeJS Apps on the Cloud and More !

All Levels,  – 15.5 hours,  133 lectures 

Average rating 4.6/5 (4.6 (725 ratings) Instead of using a simple lifetime average, Udemy calculates a course’s star rating by considering a number of different factors such as the number of ratings, the age of ratings, and the likelihood of fraudulent ratings.)

Course requirements:

Working knowledge of HTML, CSS and Javascript Basic Working knowledge of an image editing application such as Adobe Photoshop would also help, but is not necessarily needed.

Course description:

*** Course Updated on 25th August, 2016 ***

An all new and thoroughly revised ChatCAT section is now live! Featuring ES6 and a more comprehensive deep dive into building a practical NodeJS app using the Express framework.

About this Course

NodeJS is a platform that allows developers to write server side high performance and networked applications. And that too using good old Javascript. But wait ! Isn’t Javascript meant to be used for forms and stuff on web pages ?

Well that was 10 years ago. The world has gone from ‘Oops! You’ve not filled up the form properly !’ days to today’s modern web apps and social media sites that rely heavily on Javascript. Google Apps, Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and LinkedIn, being handful examples of this movement. And to think that this quantum leap would not have been possible without Javascript is not an overstatement. Today, when you socialize with your friends on Facebook, or use your Gmail inbox, you’re running thousands of lines of code written in Javascript, in your browser.

With NodeJS, you can take this knowledge back on the server, where usually you would expect to see the likes of PHP, Ruby, ASP dot NET etc. But that’s only a small portion of the reason why NodeJS is so cool. The fact that you can write full blown networked applications (think chat servers, collaborative tools, real-time data visualization apps) with just a few lines of code is more than reason enough to not only look at NodeJS, but deep dive into it !

But I know PHP ? Why should I learn NodeJS ? Well, for starters, learning something new never hurts. But most importantly, learning NodeJS is great because :

Node allows you to write highly scalable networked apps deployed on the cloud ! You’re working at a different level of application design per se with Node and that means that you’re not writing an app that sits on top of a stack, you design the stack from the server up. And while that may sound daunting, it really is not and you’ll see why. You code in the same language, both on the server and on the front end ! We’re all polyglots (we use multiple programming languages and syntax in most of our projects), but managing code in the same language on the back-end and the front-end never hurts and in-fact can be a huge time saver when debugging. NodeJS is used by the likes of LinkedIn, Yahoo and Microsoft to name a few. Its pretty new and consequently you gain advantage from the exponentially growing community of NodeJS & Javascript developers and that’s great fun, really ! If you’ve been coding in Javascript, you can leverage your existing knowledge and skills and take it to a whole new level !

The Real Problem

So, NodeJS sounds pretty interesting so far, but what really hit me in the face when I was learning all about Node was the fact that, with any new platform, framework or technology, you need to take baby steps, all the way through, to making real world examples, if you have to get to the grips of it. And that leads us to why you’re here.

In this course, we’ll go from absolute scratch, all the way up to building and deploying full blown NodeJS app on the Cloud !

Project Oriented Learning

With NodeJS, we will build two full blown apps. We will go all the from concept creation, UI/UX design to coding and deploying our app on the cloud.

A. ChatCAT – One of the fun things that you can do with NodeJS is build realtime apps that allow a high number of concurrent users to interact with each other. Examples of this kind include Chat Servers, Gaming Servers, Collaborative Tools etc. We will build a multi-room chat server that allows users to login via Facebook, Create Chatrooms of their choice and Chat in realtime. We will not only create this app, but also deploy it on Heroku and Digital Ocean !

You will learn all about using Websockets, Structuring your App in an efficient manner, creating and using development & production configurations, Authentication using Facebook, S

Reviews:

“Really a good learning experience even for intermediate nodeJS developer. Touch on key parts of nodeJs fundamentals and some advance stuff as well. One of the best nodeJS course in udemy.” (Winson)

“Incredibly detailed explanation to make sure you understand what’s going on at all times. I’ve completed over 7 Udemy courses and I’ve never seen this level of detail in a Udemy course before. Wish more courses like this!” (Clement Oh)

“Sachin is incredibly clear and informative- I feel like I’m really learning information relevant to my field; the HOWs and WHYs of the intricacies, not only the WHATS” (David Tamrazov)

  About Instructor:

Sachin Bhatnagar

Sachin began dabbling with Computer Programming & Graphics at the age of 14 on a Sinclair Spectrum Home Computer using the BASIC language. During the early 2000s, Sachin was instrumental in crafting web based CRM solutions for a prominent Internet Service Provider in India. In 2001, Sachin ventured into Computer Graphics & Visual Effects training and production. From developing world class curriculum to imparting training to over 1000 students over a course of 10 years, Sachin has been instrumental in fueling innovation, creating brand identities and crafting world class software solutions for corporate companies and individuals alike. Sachin has also supervised award winning animation and visual effects short films and is currently working with one of India’s top most Media & Entertainment Education brands as a Vice President. Sachin’s first love is coding and he strongly emphasizes its importance to all students. With a strong background in design and programming, Sachin is also a budding writer and a world cuisine connoisseur. With over 12+ years of Industry experience in industries as diverse as Software Development, Animation, Visual Effects, Film Making, Education & Brand Management behind him, Sachin strongly believes in perseverance, attention to detail and logic as mantras to a successful professional life.

Instructor Other Courses:

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