#feel free to talk to me about urban legends of any sort

[pokedoll-haruka]

there's been a lot of talk around urban legends on my timeline.

i myself love urban legends! they're kind of a guilty pleasure for me.

[frameacloud]

September 2024

[Originally posted to Orion Scribner's Patreon blog on September 16, 2024.]

I've been thinking for a long time that I need to get back into posting regular updates to my Patreon about what I'm doing instead of assuming you all are following me on other sites where those things are happening. Here are some of those things, which are mostly writings from my original research about otherkin, therianthropes, and other alterhumans.

I have a store on itch.io now! My creations that I've put on it, available to read for free:

A Simple Introduction to Otherkin and Therianthropes, version 2.4.8. My two page long essay explains what we are, in a way that the average person can understand. Written in the limited vocabulary of Simple English, it doesn't use any special words. If you read this essay many years ago and found it sounded rather stilted, don't worry, I completely rewrote this version! It also cites primary sources for each idea. I'm working with volunteers to translate it into many languages. Thanks to them, it's in German, Dutch, Estonian, and Polish. Chinese, Croatian, and Spanish are in progress. On the page, I give links to the ko-fi accounts of the translators so you can tip them, if they chose to allow that.

The Otherkin Timeline. This is my community history book that helped make it possible for other researchers to write about us, so most academic papers on otherkin cite it. Version 2.1 is mostly the version that has been in circulation for more than a decade, plus a few small additions and corrections. The next update of the book will change and expand it considerably, because it will be a collaboration between my fellow community historian and partner system, the House of Chimeras.

I also curated and reviewed collections of other people's creations about alterhumans. Find out where you can play tabletop role-playing games where each of you are members of a plural system on a magical adventure; read 1990s-style punk zines about therianthropy; take your time with literature anthologies of otherkin; or play video games with animal protagonists.

Presentations that I've given in this past year:

While I was staff at this summer's OtherCon 2024, I presented the panel Phantom Limbs and Phantom Sensations, Human and Otherwise. (To watch the video, you need to be signed into Youtube so that you can say you're at least 18. It's an 18+ topic because of some health issues it talks about.) The first half of this is a review of the medical literature on phantom limb phenomena, plus some etiquette tips about how to be respectful of people who have limb differences. The second half summarizes my original research project, the results of my survey, with tons of help from my partner and statistical expert, Page Shepard. This inquired about people who feel sensations of nonhuman body parts, for example, of wings or tails. It was open to people whether or not they call themselves otherkin, therians, or some other sort of alterhuman. It received more than a thousand usable responses, making it the largest recorded survey focused on otherkin or therians. My presentation ended up being overambitious for the time slot, so sometime I want to re-record it with better pacing.

In March, I was staff at the first Centaurus Festival. Together with my partner systems Chimeras and Page, we did a presentation there: How to Run Surveys of the Alterhuman Communities.

Articles I've written for the Otherkin News blog:

I've been covering "anti-furry" bills in the US. These are laws that Republicans have been proposing against students who behave or identify as non-humans. The bills aren't based on based on anything that students are doing in real life. They're based on an urban legend that Republicans made up to satirize transgender students asking for gender-appropriate restrooms by claiming that children who identify as cats ask for litter boxes in classrooms.

Meanwhile, children in real life have been getting into a fad popularized on TikTok in which they exercise on all fours (quadrobics) and craft animal masks. Some of these self-described therians are familiar with therianthropy as a serious integral part of one's identity, whereas others of them only know it as a hobby. I collected a bunch of recent news articles about that from Finland: Therian quadrobics popular for children in Finland; two schools ban animal masks.

[sophieinwonderland]

genuinely wondering, why do you—someone who does not claim to have DID, OSDD(1-4) or any other dissociative disorder—speak on them so much?

you claim you're a tulpa. whatever. i'm not trying to argue the validity of that. i just want to point out that what you are saying you experience is so emphatically different from a CDD, and yet you still speak on CDDs/the possibility of an endogenic CDD experience. why is that?

forgive me if i'm wrong in what labels you claim. i skimmed your recent feed & your pinned post & didn't do a deep dive—if you are claiming DID, feel free to ignore this ask. however: all i see is you, sophie, saying that you are a tulpa. and then speaking about dissociative disorders. does that not seem a little iffy to you?

you may be plural, sure. i'm not arguing that you believe you are experiencing plurality. but why are you—someone who isn't claiming to have DID or any other CDD—discussing disordered systemhood with the level of toxicity that you're using?

idk i'm just confused. what authority do you have to tell pwDID that they need to accept anything—when you are not a pwDID or a doctor?

Because if I don't, then who will?

Actually, that question has a pretty clear answer. That being people who are less informed.

I am not an expert. I do not claim to be or present myself as such. All I am is somebody who has an interest in plurality of all sorts, a blog, a pretty good handling on how to use a search engine to find the information I'm looking for, and the free time to read academic papers and share them with others.

I don't have a dissociative disorder. I can't tell you what it's like to experience one firsthand. At the same time, I have at least taught myself enough to see that a lot of what the CDD community passes around as scientific facts are closer to urban legends. Especially among fakeclaimers and those perpetuating pluralphobia.

If I learn something in my research that can help people with dissociative disorders, then I think that I have a responsibility to share it. Regardless of whether I have that disorder or not.

Take for example the popular myth that internal communication requires years of therapy and minors won't know if they have alters.

In my research, I found an article comparing voice hearing in schizophrenia versus dissociative identity disorder, and what that study showed was that a majority of DID systems experience voice hearing before the age of 18. They might not have recognized it as DID at the time. But the symptoms were present since childhood.

That same article also talked about how other hallucinatory experiences were actually more common in dissociative identity disorder than in schizophrenia.

Studies like these aren't common knowledge. But by spreading the results around, I was able to help dispel myths about dissociative identity disorder with an actual source. Myths that have been used to fakeclaim and hurt systems.

What if I hadn't posted that? What if I knew that the study existed but chose to remain silent about it because I don't have a dissociative disorder myself and decided that I shouldn't speak on it?

Would that have been preferable?

I don't think so.

If somebody is fakeclaimed and they have read that study, they can know that the fakeclaimers are wrong. That the fakeclaimers are spreading misinformation and lies. If I said nothing, then maybe they would believe the fakeclaimers, and when they encountered those lies, it would send them into a derealization spiral, causing them to question their own system.

That's something that would have been preventable had I chosen to speak out about what I knew.

Maybe I'm not a psychologist or a psychiatrist. But the actual psychologists and psychiatrists don't really have the time to be spreading correct information to the public because they are actually doing the research and helping patients directly.

And in the absence of actual psychologists and psychiatrists who could the spread correct and accurate information, we have armchair experts who have never read a single study in their life.

Or, in the case of dissociative-misinfo... Have read exactly one study in their life, which they use to fakeclaim systems and spread the myth of this vast number of people who are faking dissociative identity disorder. While also making just the most ridiculous claims, like saying that people with OSDD are not systems.

And in the absence of truth, more people will believe the lies and spread them.

Finally, you mentioned endogenic CDDs.

To me, this is as much about encouraging a culture of questioning as it is about the CDDs specifically.

Most doctors will never say it's impossible to have a CDD without having trauma. They will say that a CDD is heavily associated with trauma. They will say that it is virtually always caused by trauma. They will use a lot of words while acknowledging that they can't know for certain if this is caused by trauma 100% of the time. Because they can't know that. Because actual scientists are aware that there are limitations on what they can study and what they can prove.

Upwards of 90% of DID cases are associated with trauma.

That's a lot. That's more than most other disorders. And it is definitely possible that the remaining percentage are just cases where people have forgotten their trauma. That's absolutely a valid position.

At least... Until you start treating that as objective fact.

Sometimes in life, there just isn't going to be an answer where you know for certain. There is just no way to confirm for a fact that the cases of DID where trauma isn't reported is actually because the trauma is forgotten as opposed to not being there at all.

Science isn't religion. It's not dogma. And those that treat it as such are dangerous. Those who will hear a statement about how dissociative identity disorder is currently understood as a post-traumatic response and interpret that as saying that it is 100% scientifically impossible for somebody to have a dissociative disorder without trauma are of deep concern to me.

Not just because of how they view the science on dissociative disorders, but how they view science in general. If there's one thing that I think that people need to take away from this blog, it's that science is ever-changing. Our understanding of the world around us is going to be different in a decade than it is today.

When my host was a child, Pluto was a planet and velociraptors didn't have feathers.

You have to be open to the fact that nothing about our understanding of science is set in stone. This is a hill that I will gladly die on.

And I think it's equally important to think critically about how much of what we believe has actually been tested. Because some things scientists believe haven't been.

I mentioned the association between DID and trauma, but let me also mention that there are no similar studies with Partial DID. It's too new of a diagnosis. There have also been no studies into the trauma association of OSDD-1 without amnesia to see if the trauma association would be just as high as DID.

Without that critical research, it's possible that the association is primarily related to DID's amnesia symptom, and CDDs without amnesia wouldn't be as heavily associated with trauma.

It's currently an assumption that OSDD-1 without amnesia would be just as associated with trauma, but that assumption hasn't been tested.

And I think it's important to drive home that people need to be really careful about trusting assumptions like this when the studies haven't actually been conducted.

This is, again, not just about CDDs. It's about how we, as a culture, view science as a whole. It's about fostering open-mindedness rather than accepting our current understanding of things as dogma set in stone.

[mythickind]

First Call For Folklore

I make this sound so official, but really it's just me deciding I've spent enough time Not Finishing the Page™️ and I probably ought to actually ask folks for stories so maybe I'll get off my rump and finish the damn page. So! If YOU have any sort of folkloric stories about your kintype/theriotype/kithtype/linktype/whatever, please feel free to come share them!

What do I mean by folkloric stories? That's a term that tends to puzzle folks. Mainly that's because folks tend to equate words like "folklore" and "myth" with things that are made up or false. That isn't quite accurate. Folklore consists of many sorts of knowledge, but the ones we'll likely focus most on here are myths, legends, folktales, urban legends, folk music, and possibly art. In the academic field of folklore, a myth is defined as a sacred story. We're talking otherkin and therians primarily here, so that could be the story of how Raven stole the light and in doing so created the sun and the moon and the stars or it could be the story of Noah and the dove at the end of the Great Flood. These are both sacred stories that are considered true by those who follow their respective religions. That's what we mean when we say myth. A legend is a story that isn't considered sacred and that has elements of it that may seem larger than life. They're often supernatural or extraordinary in nature. A couple of examples would be Babe the big blue ox here in the US or the black dogs of the British Isles. As to folktales, fairytales, fables, these often involve magic, talking animals, and perhaps some sort of message. For exmaple, there is the frog prince, a fairytale in which a prince is cursed to become a frog, or the three blind mice. The three blind mice also feature in a folksong. These are songs that are just sort of part of a culture with no clear composer and sometimes no clear origin. One of my favorites is the Twa Corbies, a ballad about a conversation overheard between two crows, who were discussing eating the body of a freshly dead knight. It dates back to at least the 1700s.

Folkart is a bit less clear. This is really any type of traditional art - anything from basket weaving to bingata dyework - that is passed down within a culture. This, I don't expect will come up as much. It's a little less clearly defined for our purposes. Beyond that, there's also things like folkdance and traditional foodways and all manner of things. And if you know of anything that fits that bill, please absolutely feel free to share! With any of this, it doesn't necessarily have to be something that originates in a culture you're part of. However, I do ask that you approach all of this - especially mythology - with the same sort of respect and consideration you would give the lore you yourself grew up with and hold dear. All of this means something to the folks from whom it comes. So respect is paramount in folkloristics.

But now that I've nattered on about academia and things most folks probably don't even realize are things, I'm going to make sure that the asks and submissions are turned on. Feel free to leave these anonymously as well. But it would be awesome to hear from you all!

[spacevixenmusic]

I for one would love to gear your shoujo recs 👀

Hell yeah, let's talk about shoujo anime instead of that other thing I posted earlier!

I'm only gonna list shows I've personally seen here, and I'm gonna skip most of the classics (except for the obvious one below), so your mileage may vary!

>>> Revolutionary Girl Utena

This is pretty much the pinnacle shoujo series to watch. Everyone who has seen it has something to say about it. Highly recommended for fans of Steven Universe, ballet, genderfuckery, rampant lesbianism, sword fights, and the ultimate in fucking around and finding out.

>>> Ah! My Goddess

Aww, I guess this is gonna spoil it, but I'm watching this one currently (posts to follow soon-ish)! A timeless rom-com classic about a goddess being roommates with Just Some Dude and learning to live life on earth as Heaven itself starts glitching out the longer she stays down there, causing all kinds of havoc in the lives of these otherwise mundane and melodramatic college kids!

>>> Princess Nine

Love sports anime but want one with a few more girls in it? Try Princess Nine: the baseball anime about nine girls gathering together to fight the forces of pig-headedness at their local school and demand to get funded as a legit baseball team! It's a great story about friendship and perseverance and all that fun stuff!

>>> Sugar Apple Fairy Tale (airing right now!)

In a world where fairies are captured and forced to work for greedy humans, a young sugar sculptor sets out to become a master of her craft in honor of her deceased mother. She "buys" a fairy and sets him free of captivity on the agreement that he accompany and protect her on the road to her destination. They eventually become friends (of a sort) and he becomes more of a knight in her service. Curious to see where this one goes!

>>> Otherside Picnic

An urban legend nerd and a gun-slinging beauty explore doorways between our world and a weird parallel dimension full of creepypasta spirits and glitches in the matrix in search of a missing friend. If you like supernatural-tinted sci-fi with some lovely gay overtones, you should really give this one a chance! One of my favorite underappreciated modern anime!

-

That's enough for now! Feel free to hit me up for more recs (in other genres too, if you like!) any time!

[estellamiraiauthor]

The Stars May Rise and Fall: The Annotated Re-read (Chapter 1)

Hey there Tumblr, long time no see! Let’s try something fun and new!

So, a few years ago, when The Stars May Rise and Fall was first published, I tried to do an “annotated copy” as a giveaway—i.e. a paperback with all my little “making of” notes in the margins. That lasted… about three pages, before I gave up on writing legibly enough for anyone else to read AND on cramming everything I wanted to say literally between the lines.

But I still really do like the IDEA of a sort of on-screen commentary, and it’s feeling like about time for a re-read anyway. (Yes, I read my own book. Why write the book you want to read if you’re not going to actually read it, amirite?) So… why not do it here?

Feel free to read along, if you like. If you haven’t read The Stars May Rise and Fall yet but are just generally interested in Phantom retellings or whatnot, this first one won’t spoil anything you can’t get in the “Look inside” preview on Amazon, although future ones might. So grab a copy and join me?

Regret is a pretty strong word, and not one I’m sure I want to use at all about this book, which is very much the book of my heart, the book I wrote because I wanted to read it and it didn’t exist. But if I regret anything about it, it’s that I decided to make the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical the first version of Phantom I paid homage to. Now, I definitely don’t regret including the ALW Phantom in the MANY versions I ultimately ended up giving little nods too. Like a lot of angsty kids in the 90s, it was the version that really got me interested in seeking out others, after all. But seeing reviews (and before that, rejections from literary agents) saying that they stopped reading after two or three chapters because “it followed the ALW musical too closely”… maybe I should have modelled the opening scenes after a different version, or just done something entirely new.

Still, it is what it is. And back in 2004 or whenever it was when I first had the idea for a visual kei Phantom retelling, I didn’t really consider opening with any other format than the tried and true “Phantom character hears Christine character singing, reaches out through the mirror to offer help” kind of formula.

A lot of it was also shaped by the venue itself. While “Rock Eden”, the live house where Teru and his band most often perform, doesn’t exist by that name, it’s basically Meguro Rock Maykan—which is a real venue, that at the time looked the way it’s described in the book and is still in the same location. And I knew from the start that that was where I wanted to set my Phantom. While most live houses are standing room only, or might have a few bar stools at the back, Rock Maykan apparently used to be an adult theater (it was certainly SOME kind of movie theater; the adult part could be an urban legend), and as of 2000, when the book is set, had these old-fashioned theatre seats (which have since been removed) and a balcony that’s off-limits to ticket holders but could be accessed by venue staff and anyone with a backstage pass. I’ve also been backstage there, and the dressing room is (or was at the time), practically wallpapered with old backstage passes and graffiti… perfect for a story that so deeply involves the ghosts of both people and dreams.

So, the mirror was that backstage mirror, and “Box Five” was going to be that balcony. Because of course no one has private dressing rooms in tiny little hole-in-the-wall venues like this, I couldn’t have Rei, my Phantom, talking to Teru directly through the mirror, but I wanted that basic formula for the opening… for better or worse. Sorry, one-star Amazon reviewer?

One of the things I always kind of imagined people would ask me once the book was a big hit (haha!) was how, exactly, Rei heard Teru singing and managed to contact him. At one point, I had written part of that scene in Rei’s point of view as well, but ended up dropping that point of view entirely (again, to the chagrin of several reviewers). Maybe someday I’ll be famous enough to get to do a Midnight Sun from his POV? XD

Anyway, if you’re interested. Teru has a backstage pass that gets him into the dressing room (and the balcony, if he wants, but he doesn’t have any reason to want to go up there until later). But Rei has access to EVERYTHING, including places where only the venue staff would be able to go, thanks to Chizuru, his assistant-slash-former hair and makeup artist, who now works part-time at Rock Eden. This is never really laid out on the page, but my sort of headcanon is that the owner/manager (who also never appears on-page) is one of the few people in the industry who knows that Rei survived the accident that disfigured him, and that Chizuru basically got the job (despite having income from elsewhere) so that she could secure access for Rei so that he could continue to scout talent. Now, I don’t ACTUALLY know what the venue-staff-only areas look like (I’ve been backstage, but as a staff member for a band, not the venue itself)… but that’s at Rock Maykan. This is Rock Eden, the fictional version, so we can go ahead and assume that there’s some kind of back hallway that can’t be accessed from the dressing room, but is separated from it by a thin wall, and that Rei heard Teru singing and talking to his bandmates from there.

These shows also used to have flyers for each band. (I’m not sure if they still do; musicals and things have definitely cut back on the amount of paper they pass out.) Fans would receive a pack of flyers when they entered the venue, and Chizuru, as staff, could easily take a pack from the pile. So Rei hears Teru singing to himself, thinks he’s got the right voice for his music, and then Yasu comes in, and they start talking. At some point, someone uses Teru’s name, and Rei asks Chizuru to get him a pack of flyers, which he uses to figure out which band Teru is in. There’s only one Teru playing that night, so he’s able to use the flyers to figure out that Teru is the drummer from La Rose Verboten, so he knows who Teru is when he comes onstage, despite having only heard his voice before.

And I think he kinda falls in love right there. He doesn’t WANT to… ohhh, there are SO many reasons he doesn’t want to, and he doesn’t dare to think that there’s any chance that ANYONE would ever love him back, but somewhere, buried deep under a lot of trauma and denial, he sees Teru onstage—and Teru LOVES being onstage, he loves music and it absolutely shines through—and Rei, despite himself, wants to talk to him.

I think there’s a lot of internal warring with himself over the course of Teru’s set, which would be maybe 20 minutes long. Rei knows he shouldn’t, it’s SUCH a bad idea to reach out to this guy who’s got this beautiful voice but also is just So Gorgeous… but he has to. And he has these business cards, because this was before you could just wave your phones at each other to exchange contact information and that was how you’d make connections, so he sucks up his fear and writes a note, and gives it to Chizuru before he can lose his nerve.

And Chizuru knew where to drop it because all of these bands are using the same dressing room, and a lot of them would have the same or similar equipment, so they write their names on electrical tape and stick it to their stuff, so she found the equipment that said Teru and La Rose Verboten and was able to leave it where he would find it. In case anyone was wondering.

The actual structure of the chapter itself… I’m still not sure if I love it. This opening was ROUGH for me to write, partially BECAUSE I knew that I was opening with kind of a cliché scene and needed to make it enough of a “hook” to make people want to read beyond that. There were literally maybe about 50 versions of it over the years, and I ended up with the current version, where the whole “hearing the beautiful voice through the mirror” thing has already happened and is being recounted as a memory in past-perfect, and the “present” of the story is Teru later that night, back in his apartment, going through the same kind of internal battle over whether he’s actually going to call this mystery number.

Of course, he does, and I think this kind of mirrors what Rei must have gone through earlier (so, maybe I should’ve kept that POV?). He KNOWS it can’t possibly be an actual talent scout or record producer… but Teru and Rei both, despite being pessimistic over a lot of things, always have a little spark of optimism buried somewhere in there, too. So he calls. And he falls in love just a little with Rei’s voice too, although he also buries that deep because he’s so firmly in denial about his sexuality at this point.

This is another point I get a LOT of flack about—how unrealistic it is that Teru would just agree to go to this guy’s apartment when they don’t know each other at all. And all I can say about that is… I definitely did similar things when I was Teru’s age (21). Was it the safest thing to do? Nope. Would I want my kids doing the same thing? Hell no, absolutely not. But do 21-year-olds do stupid things sometimes? You bet! So, yes, I have gone to the tiny Tokyo apartments of people I didn’t know very well. Including men. Including older men. And I was fine, not because that was a good decision—again, it is MOST EMPHATICALLY NOT—but because I was lucky. Like a lot of the people who do a few stupid things in their youth are.

As far as whether this fictitious character in a work of fiction is supposed to be a role model or whatever—it’s a novel for adults, about some pretty complicated and dark and occasionally messed-up stuff. (See also Rei’s struggle to accept his disabilities… is it the Best Possible Reaction™️ to the situation? Absolutely not. But you can’t say it’s not a reaction that a human being could feasibly have.) I think it’s pretty clear that I did NOT intend this to be some kind of morality lesson on how to have the perfect relationship and love yourself in the process. I understand that some readers want every bad decision to have negative consequences… in the case of Rei, I think a lot of the self-destructive behavior eventually does. But yeah, Teru does something stupid and dangerous and doesn’t suffer because of it… and that happens to real people too, every day.

I honestly think a big part of it, too, was my terrible-in-hindsight decision to list this as LGBT+ romance on Amazon. It’s a love story. It’s not a genre romance novel. These characters weren’t written to be “romantic heroes” and in the end, I do wish I had just listed it as general fiction, because I think I inadvertently set up certain stylistic, character, and plot expectations that the story was never intended to meet.

So. The beginning. I don’t really love it. But it’s certainly a hell of a lot better than the very very first draft from 2005, which was basically a shitty songfic of X Japan’s “Unfinished.” :P

[froggierboy]

Horror movie recs?

ohoohooho please don't regret asking, i'm gonna toss out some i really like in no particular order okay. but feel free to ask me to expand on any of these or why i like them or whatever, i like to talk about this

jordan peele's entire filmography but particularly us because it's the only horror movie to ever make me cry in the theater. the whole child's play series. scream. killer klowns from outer space. midsommar (not so much hereditary, although toni collette acted her ass off in it). eraserhead. skinamarink. mother! (controversial pick but i watched it at midnight in a strange house during a thunderstorm which is sort of the peak condition for any horror movie tbh). it (1990 and 2017 for different reasons). the first saw because it's genuinely good, the rest for the vibes. cronenberg's the fly. misery. urban legend for scaring me shitless when i was 12 and being the reason i still check under the car and in the closet. the lost boys bc it's fun and sexy. the boy for genuinely surprising me. brahms: the boy ii for fun. creep and creep 2 (and know that i hate found footage and i still loved these). fresh. house on haunted hill (the original not the remake). insidious (genuinely lives up to the hype). house of 1000 corpses. hell fest. the entire nightmare on elm street series but especially the original

and the honorable mention of pan's labyrinth because it's a must watch but i dont consider it a horror movie but it's always filed under horror so i guess everyone else does.

[stxleslyds]

NIGHTWING #81

UMM... HOW ABOUT NO. 

Ever since Tom Taylor took over Nightwing I have only made a post about one issue of his (I will leave it here Nightwing #78), that issue was beautiful, it was a solid start and the little things that made me feel a bit icky were not mentioned in the post because the issue was good.

Then the issues felt like connectors or just very bland story wise. I had problems with the book also feeling like a Nightwing and (fake) Oracle book instead of just Nightwing. There were many instances where Dick alone could have gotten himself out of situations without Barbara, but because she was there the opportunity to show that he can do things was taken from him. I guess what I am trying to say is that the book has disappointed me but I didn’t feel like making a post because it was too early and this is an ongoing book that Taylor said he planned on continuing for a while, but now I can’t not make a post.

A few days ago, I finally read the Red Hood story in Urban Legends (I have a review for that one too I will link it here Red Hood part 4) and I couldn’t stand how OOC and disappointing the story/characterization has been. I am saying this because I am only reading these two books at the moment, ONLY these two, and all I have gotten from them is shit.

I know it’s still early to say that the Nightwing book is bad but…I hated this issue, I hated it with all of my heart. But now that I am a bit calmer, I have come up with some ideas of what is truly going on with the Melinda situation.

Anyway, let me give you my thoughts.

There are big Wilson Fisk vibes coming from both Blockbuster and Melinda Zucco. Those two will lie, manipulate and be evil every chance they get. They are working together to make Nightwing disappear. I know it. The whole “make us all much wealthier and to extend your power beyond the city” idea does not include Nightwing.

Melinda might not want to burn anything down but she sure isn’t a hero. This woman accepted the position of Mayor after watching Blockbuster kill the former mayor. I understand that talking with the BHPD isn’t the best idea but this woman feels way too comfortable in the presence of a killer.

She is cunning and she has plans, I strongly believe that she might be a villain and that she will betray Blockbuster and take all the power (if it reaches that point) to herself.

Heartless is just another weirdo, he tricks both Nightwing and the reader into thinking that he has a soft spot for kids but surprise! He doesn’t. There isn’t much to say about him, he just has very complex gadgets and doesn’t know how to fight. I don’t even have any ideas about who he might be.

What I know though is that there was absolutely no need for Dick to think that he had “underestimated” Heartless, my love you threw your stick at him while he was looking directly at you, there was a 50/50 chance of him catching it. I swear I don’t understand the need to write him thinking that mostly because Taylor then has Dick swiping the floor with the guy, not only is it a simple fight (for Dick) but it’s also boring for him. Taylor’s writing is so annoying sometimes, he just loves to write extra things that are out of place like the “Tim Drake. Thought of by many as the best Robin” why the fuck did he put that there? Honestly, what was the point of having Dick say that, I don’t read a Nightwing book to have Tim Drake praise. If it doesn’t offer anything to the story that is being told then keep the thought to yourself Tom...

Moving forward the scene in the pier was quite nice, mostly because it’s Dick’s quick thinking that gets everyone to safety, he knows exactly what to do and how to contact the Maritime distress channel.

He has hope for his city, he knows there is good in it and he believes help will show up when lives are about to be lost. I loved that, just like Heartless said, Nightwing IS Bludhaven’s Guardian Angel. Once again, I am having Daredevil vibes from Dick (like from the show)

After the fight we get to see consequences of Dick not healing properly from a shot to the head. He loses his consciousness which is extremely dangerous but luckily Tim is at arm’s reach to help him out of the pier.

There are many things I want to talk about from the scenes that happen after Dick wakes up in his apartment so here we go.

First of all, Bitewing is adorable, she loves Dick the most and was happy to see him awake once more, what a good girl!

Secondly, Barbara, honey, you do not have three names, you aren’t Batgirl anymore, you are a grown woman that needs to move on from a mantle that has other people that can do something else/better with it. And we all know that this Oracle is just the ableist version of Oracle. So yeah…all I ask is for Barbara to move on from Batgirl, Cass and Stephanie are right there, enough is enough.

In these panels we have Dick, Tim and Barbara being kinda dismissive about the homeless kids, and it has been happening for so many issues, what is the point, Taylor? You made Dick a millionaire and you just can’t have him say or think for a second that he will monetarily help those kids and make sure they are put somewhere safe? You are really going to wait up until you have Dick running for Mayor or something to help the kids? I just don’t get it. Kids living on the streets and each time they are mentioned the three heroes of the book act like it’s normal and doesn’t need fixing. What the fuck.

Then we have the gang finding out that Melinda Zucco is the new mayor, the woman has an FBI file and a redacted one! This makes me think two things, either things are like I thought in the beginning of the post (she is evil and very good at it) or this woman is actually FBI and she is undercover (this one is less likely because of what happens at the end of the issue).

What we can see from the file that Barbara found is very little, but in these two pictures we can see that maybe she was put in foster care and x age? Also, she was apparently investigated in April of 20xx, the investigation must have been recent, why would the FBI investigate a minor or college student? What if these files were implanted by Melinda for someone to find them, and for her to have some sort of proof of her lies? If the file is about her being left in foster care or something while would the file be redacted? I don’t know, everything about her is shady and I don’t trust anything from or about her.

This could be a complex and very interesting character but Tom Taylor and DC really love to do stupid shit for shock value (more of this later).

All the new information (the Maroni, Blockbuster and now this very shady Mayor) has Dick saying that it is a bit too much for him and yeah, it is too much, you know who could help? Red Hood. I am of course not talking about current DC comics Red Hood, I am talking about the Red Hood that I would love to see, just yesterday I had an ask about who would I like to see working with Jason and I said Nightwing because Dick puts a lot of responsibility on his shoulders so it would be nice if they negotiated and each could work on different crime areas in Bludhaven, if only DC would hear me…

Anyway, now that we come to the end of the scene let’s talk about Barbara’s shirt.

That was unnecessary and not funny. That’s all it was. Yeah, I know it’s a meme and I know it was included for funny ha-ha purposes but I am not laughing. Bruce has been written as abusive towards his kids for so long, Jason, Tim and Dick have been physically harmed by Bruce and writers use it as just something that happens, there are never repercussions for the Bat. And this shirt sucks because Dick was Robin there and he was a kid, so having Barbara or anyone wearing a shirt with Batman hitting Robin!Dick right in front of Dick is just disgusting. What if someone wore a shirt that had Joker beating Jason with a crowbar in front of Jason, would that be a funny ha-ha too? What about Dick wearing a shirt with the Joker shooting Barbara, is that a funny ha-ha? The answer to those questions is no, it’s not funny.

The idea of that shirt shouldn’t have been pitched, drawn or included after the editor took a look at it.

The picture is a meme in our world, not in theirs. And the readers aren’t laughing.

 Back to the issue, Dick is left alone in his apartment to rest (seriously? You think the man that showed up to help Bruce in Gotham with a knee brace is going to rest?) but he can’t, he just found out that Mayor Zucco might be trouble for Bludhaven and might be working with not only Blockbuster but the Maroni family. He is not waiting one more second to have a chat with her.

Dick is obviously still concussed so of course he grabs a mask that has a camera that Oracle can view, and of course he enters yet another window without being careful.

Melinda and Audre were obviously waiting for him.

But here is where the real bullshit begins. Dick is unmasked.

I am so mad; it’s been four issues and Dick gets his ass in a trap and is unmasked by a villain? Are you kidding me right now?

But that’s not all, after Dick breaks free and accuses Melinda of being the daughter of the man that killed his parents, she pulls out a uno reverse card and says that her actual father is John Grayson, and that she is his sister.

How about no. Absolutely not. Go away.

Let’s re-visit Melinda’s appearances in the book so far so we can start theorizing about her real intentions or if she could be saying the truth.

Back in issue #78 where she is first introduced to us, after Melinda watches Blockbuster kill the mayor, she goes home and tells her Audre that she is now mayor because Blockbuster did what he does, so she knows that this guy is trash and a killer. But that’s not all, Audre asks her if she came across Dick Grayson to which Melinda answers “I am not ready for him yet”. Audre suggests she talks to him sooner rather than later because she might not have “another chance”, and the issue ends with Melinda agreeing with her while she is looking at a Flying Graysons poster with a red circle framing Dick’s face.

That whole thing? Shady. Melinda, obviously, wanted to talk to Dick Grayson, probably to tell him that she is his sister, but why is there a time limit, why is Audre telling Melinda that she can’t wait too long? Is it because her undercover work is ending soon? Is it because it’s not real at all and she needs to tell that lie in order to move forward with some sort of plan? I don’t know…

In issue #79 Melinda (and Audre) are out in the open with Maroni and they are talking about her becoming the next Mayor, Nightwing was watching from afar so this is his first contact with her. And it might be the first time that Melinda and her friend see Nightwing in action too. I cannot tell if she is aware that Nightwing/Dick Grayson are the same person here.

In #80 she doesn’t make an appearance.

But now in #81 she is taking her place as Mayor of Bludhaven, there Commissioner McClean takes her somewhere she didn’t expect to go (she is shown not knowing that Maroni and Blockbuster were in the next room over). Once in the room she refuses to take the cash from McClean but she will take the money as a transaction (for a second I thought she wouldn’t take the money but she did because she is very corrupt) and talks to Maroni once more. Before I talk about what happens with Blockbuster let me say this, she acts so distant to Maroni, she calls him Mr. Maroni every single time and she comes off as cold and feeling no type of way while talking with someone that is part of the family that actually raised her, and this is not because she is in a room full of other people, she did it too in #79. It seems weird that she acts that way with someone that took her under his wing since she was eight years old.

When she sits with Blockbuster he says “tell us your plan for my city” to which she says all of this: “My plan, Blockbuster, is to make us all much wealthier and to extend your power beyond the city. But to do so in a way that builds on the good work you’ve already done I have no interest in burning anything down.”

At the start of the post I said she gave me big Wilson Fisk vibes and that right there is why. She is shady, she has plans on top of plans, she calls Roland Desmond Blockbuster to his face but says that he has done good work for Bludhaven, which is weird because Blockbuster destroys Bludhaven a couple of times a year…

As I said before whatever she has planned does not include Nightwing, and here is where I kinda start theorizing a bit more, what if Blockbuster told Melinda Nightwing’s real name, he used to know who he was once upon a time…

Later in this issue when Nightwing is going to Melinda’s place Audre is already waiting for him right next to the window (with a sword), so, was he making an insane amount of noise or were they told to be ready for him?

Melinda traps him and takes his mask off, she barely seems surprised about Nightwing being Dick, she barely reacts when he jumps at her. She is in complete control of the situation and proves that by disarming Dick, as fast as he accuses her of being Zucco’s daughter she tells him that her real father is John Grayson.

She is in complete control. She has to be lying, she put a stop to whatever Dick had to say and do in seconds. This woman is trained and she is manipulative as fuck!

And if she isn’t lying then fuck DC and fuck Tom Taylor, this woman is either younger or the same age as Dick, John Grayson was not a cheater, the man is dead, has been dead for so long, don’t throw dirt on his name at this point. I refuse to believe this is true.

I honestly think that she is evil, and knows more than we are aware of, her first appearance was shady as fuck, let's suppose that she didn’t truly know that Dick was Nightwing, why on earth did she have a Flying Graysons poster with a red circle on top of Dick’s face? That doesn’t seem like something a sister would do! And why would this be information that is so important that she NEEDS to tell him in a certain amount of time?

It’s fucking insane. Tom Taylor, if she is actually Dick's sister then shame on you. Disgusting, what is with writers and cheating, what the hell is going on? Dick doesn’t need to think back to his parents and see a cheater in one of them. This better be Melinda being a cruel and vile human being that is trying to emotionally hurt Dick/Nightwing so she and Blockbuster can do whatever its they want to do.

That’s all I have to say.

[jaxsteamblog]

Bending Practice

Click here to read the entire fic on AO3

Katara sat in her office after breakfast, sorting through all of the correspondence that had flooded in for Thuy. It always surprised her how much obvious bribery went on and, as she sliced open a letter, she watched dispassionately as an ornate broach fell from the packet. Both broach and letter went into the donation pile, and Katara frowned at the growing number of thank you cards she was going to have to write with thinly veiled reproach. 

Before she could even make a dent, Zuko knocked lightly at the door. The others had gone out to watch Thuy at her earthbending practice.

“Come in.” Katara called from behind her desk, reaching for another letter.

“How’s it going?” Zuko asked.

“About the usual.” She replied.

Zuko put his hands on the desk, leaning over it so he could kiss her. She relished the soft pressure of his lips against hers and the brief scent of shampoo when his hair slid forward. 

“Want to go see Thuy?” He asked, still leaning toward her. Katara, angled forward herself, smiled and watched his mouth.

“I really should get through all this.” She said.

“But then how can I show off in front of my fiancee?” Zuko asked.

Katara kissed him again and then rose from her seat.

“Alright.” She said. “Let’s go.”

Large nets surrounded the training grounds, in anticipation of future inexperienced Avatars. Rohan and Ty Lee were outside of the nets, sitting on one of the few benches at the perimeter. Zuko, still feeling some sort of way about his sister’s friend, sat next to Rohan. Katara wandered closer to the next, watching Thuy and Toph spar.

“Welcome to the cage match!” Rohan said and Katara snorted.

“It does look a little bit like Toph’s arena.” She said, not turning around. 

“Could you imagine what other element arenas would look like?” Rohan asked. 

Katara tilted her head, thinking. 

“I mean, we all know what an Agni Kai is.” Zuko replied dryly.

“Okay, we’re not talking duels, but actual, like, bouts.” Rohan countered.

“I don’t think anyone dies at pro bending.” Ty Lee added. 

“I think it’d all be the same concept right? Like trying to knock the other person out of the ring. But maybe with more obstacles.” Katara said, finally turning.

“I like that idea actually.” Ty Lee said.

“What if you had to face off against a bender of another element?” Rohan asked.

“Well, then it’s not really a show of skill at all. The forms are different.” Zuko countered.

“Sure, but it’s like that one trading card game. You know, it was super popular with kids a decade ago. Aw nuts, I’m blanking on the name.” Rohan snapped their fingers, looking at Ty Lee.

“I know what you’re talking about. The one with the energy rat.” Zuko said.

“That’s it!” Rohan clapped their hands and turned back to Zuko. “So Thuy is going to have a hard time with airbending because it’s the most unlike her birth style. Earth is mildly frustrating, but fire should be a piece of cake.”

“I wouldn’t say that.” Zuko replied dryly.

“I’ve seen you move, you’re like a secret Waterbender.” Rohan stated.

“That’s not usual Rohan.” Ty Lee said. 

Rohan looked at her, confused. “No?”

Ty Lee shook her head and they turned back to Zuko.

“I knew we rubbed off on you, but I didn’t think it was that much.” They said.

“My uncle taught me other forms. He said it would make me more balanced.” Zuko said. 

“And? Are you balanced?” Katara asked.

“Want to see?” Zuko asked, sounding coy. The energy shifted and Katara felt her face warm.

“Yeah, let’s go, you and me.” She said, putting more confidence in her voice to cover how he had turned her spine into jelly. 

Zuko stood and started to unbutton his shirt as he walked to the fencing.

“Hey Beifong!” He called. 

The clattering earth stopped and Zuko waited, still carefully removing his shirt.

“Her feet are fine Lord Bunsen Burner!” Toph yelled back.

“I was more wondering if you’d let us use the field.” Zuko said. He fully removed his shirt, folding it over his arm. His undershirt was tight and Katara, aware of the audience, forced herself not to stare. 

Thuy and Toph conferred for a moment.

“Why?” Toph asked.

“Sparring match.”

“With Wet Wipe?”

“With Katara.”

“WITH MASTER KATARA?” Thuy shouted.

“Ditches and pits girl, lower your voice!” Toph snapped.

“Sorry Sifu.” Thuy replied. 

“Yeah, that’s fine. I’d like a chance to witness what it is you keep going on about.” Toph said, starting toward the door of the fencing. “Find out if all of Ty Lee’s hard work is for a purpose.” 

Zuko tossed his shirt over an empty bench as he and Katara walked to meet them. Thuy was nearly bouncing in excitement when they met at the door. 

“Water?” Toph asked, sounding more like a prompt.

“I’m fine Sifu.” Thuy chirped.

“No, I meant go and get your Master some water to work with, you walnut.” Toph retorted.

“Oh!” Thuy looked alarmed and then darted off. 

“You don’t have to be so hard on her.” Katara said.

“Why not? Everyone else is falling over themselves to kiss her backside.” Toph replied, shoving Katara lightly to the side. 

Zuko and Katara went into the caged field. Pausing to kiss her cheek, Zuko was quiet as he jogged to the middle and started stretching. He was clearly taking this seriously.

Thuy returned to the door of the fencing carrying two large and battered buckets filled with water. Katara wondered where on earth she had even found those.

“Thank you Thuy.” Katara said.

“Of course Auntie!” Thuy replied cheerfully and darted away before Katara could reprimand her. 

“Ready?” Zuko asked as Katara walked over. 

“Let’s go.” She said, dropping the buckets.

The moment the metal bottoms hit the ground, Katara pulled the water up around her. The force of it actually kept the buckets momentarily suspended, but fell with a dull clatter. 

Thinking back to their late night talk, Katara couldn’t help the wry smile as she watched him take a more traditional Firebender stance. 

Firebending always seemed more like fencing to her, and Katara pulled her water around Zuko’s sides playfully, testing his open sides. He was fast, though, and get under her attacks before she could refocus. He was taking it far too seriously.

Very quickly, they fell into step. Remembering their dance at her coronation, Katara smiled freely as they stepped in close. Zuko would feint and flicker, but Katara was patient. In a one on one battle, fire was meant to injure, so Zuko had little in the way of movement to test her. On the other hand, Katara was used to larger fights with multiple assailants, so finding a way to fine tune her approach took time. They danced together, testing for weaknesses and vulnerabilities. As they got in close, Zuko winked at her, and Katara faltered on her heel. 

“I’ve seen musk sloths move faster than you!” Toph yelled.

“You can’t see at all!” Katara yelled back. 

“Yeah but I can and this is BORING.” Rohan added.

A gust blew them back, with Katara immediately pulling a frozen shield across herself and Zuko. 

“A new challenger approaches!” Rohan stated, standing in front of them. 

“Shall we?” Zuko asked, holding out his hand.

Zuko relaxed and Katara found herself relying on his style in order to free her movements. Rohan seemed more interested in dodging, which was easier since they weren’t bound by any physical need to stay on the ground. 

And it was all fun and games, until the Earthbender attacked.

Toph jumped in, deciding that a sparring match had to actually involve sparring. When Rohan still wouldn’t get pinned down, Toph decided to change the game.

Avatar versus the four nations.

Thuy, having not even started Firebending or Airbending, was summarily chased around the fenced field. Katara, feeling for her bending kin, took her side, while Zuko ran interference.

Knowing she wasn’t getting anywhere, Toph called it and yanked Rohan out of the air after they made the mistake of bumping into one of the protruding earth columns. The two of them then called over Thuy, and they started planning something.

Zuko avoided the benches, and instead sat down against the fence as he watched the others. Katara groaned as she fell next to him, leaning against his shoulder. They were both sweating and smelled like dirt, both wet and charred. 

Throwing his arm over her shoulder, Zuko pulled her close and kissed her hair quickly. Hating the warmth of his skin against hers, Katara still relaxed against him, not wanting to move. 

“I am going to be so sore.” He said. 

“I can fix that.” Katara said. 

“Look at them, disgusting.” Zuko said, jokingly. 

Still, Katara looked at the trio in confusion.

“What?” She asked.

“This is all they have to do. No leaving to run a country, just playing tag with the Avatar.” 

“Oh, that.” Katara remarked. “Yeah, that does suck.”

“Doesn’t it?” Zuko rubbed her arm, but his fingers pressed into her skin in a familiar way.

“We can’t.” She whispered.

“Can’t…?” Zuko turned to her and, upon seeing her face, blushed deeply.

“Ah.” He added and cleared his throat. “Right.”

“I swear, every time you practice, you get like this.” Katara said, laughing. 

Still blushing, Zuko smiled and kept his gaze averted. 

“My blood’s hot, what can I say?” He replied. 

“That’s not where your bending comes from.” Katara countered. “It’s more here.”

She pressed the tips of her fingers against his abdomen and Zuko held her hand, pressing it against his chest. 

“And yours?” Zuko asked softly, leaning toward her.

“Would you two please get a room?” Toph shouted. “I can feel your weird vibes from here!” 

“I’m pretty sure Zuko’s gonna spontaneously combust if he has to wait much longer.” Rohan said.

“Does that happen?” Thuy gasped.

“According to some urban legends, yeah.” Ty Lee answered, moving to the fence to get closer. 

“Could that happen to me? I’m going to be a Firebender too.” Thuy asked.

Zuko grumbled as he stood up, but Katara snorted. 

“I don’t know, who are you dating, young lady?” Rohan asked.

“There’s a guy that keeps hanging around my school. I guess I know why now.” Toph said.

“Sifu!” Thuy shouted. 

Zuko held out his hand and Katara took it, standing as he pulled her up. 

“I need a shower.” He said.

“We both do.” Katara replied.

“Oh come on!” Toph yelled. “Just leave already!”

“Don’t have to tell me twice.” Zuko said, giving Katara’s hand a firm squeeze.

“They’ll probably be distracted for awhile.” Ty Lee said, as the pair came through the door. “It looks like Rohan is drawing diagrams in the dirt.”

“Hmm.” Zuko grunted, not looking at Ty Lee.

“Just make sure Thuy gets her acupuncture and I’m sure it’ll be fine.” Katara said lightly. 

Ty Lee patted the pouch clipped to her belt and Katara smiled. Then Zuko yanked her away, heading purposefully back to the house.

“Zuko? Your shirt?” She asked.

“I’ve got plenty.” Zuko said shortly.

“We don’t have to rush.”

“You owe me some healing.” Zuko said and glanced over his shoulder. His gold eyes glinted and the edge of his gaze was a razor in her lungs. 

She wondered if she would ever get used to him like this.

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[shadow-scenarios]

Hello~ may I ask for something slightly specific? I wanted to ask about a scenario in which the reader recently obtains the Meta-Nav but instead of the PT finding out first, Goro does. See, the reader and Goro have recently become acquaintances and reader thinks that the Meta-Nav is something related to illegal activity so she goes to consult their detective friend on this mysterious app! Haha, sorry if this is too specific ;-;

Hey there simulationone, this isn’t too specific!! I like creative ideas that change the plot & this has been my favourite request to write so far.

However, I did change the request slightly. I made it so that the Reader awakened to their Persona & gains the MetaNav!! I hope that’s alright with you. If not, feel free to message me again and I can rewrite it.

{ Post Writing Note: Well, I wrote way too much!! Sorry if there’s less Akechi content than you thought, I got hyperfixated on how it would affect the plot. I’d love to write a Part 2 full of angst with this, so feel free to request it!! }

- Nexus.

Dance with Justice | Goro Akechi

Life at Kosei High was predictable. Like a metronome. Constant pressure to be the best & high achievement boundaries, it was a wonder how she was ever accepted without some sort of moonlighting as a prodigy. These stories of mental shutdowns & psychotic breakdowns made the world look grim & everyone seemed desperate to escape it all.

Comfort was found in the Phantom Thieves and how they manipulated hearts. Dancing the line between immoral & illegal, it was a grey area where the who was less significant than the how. Society grasped onto them as miraculous saviours as they solved cases faster than regular forces ever could: Kamoshida, Madarame, Kaneshiro, Medjed. The world was taken by storm, these renegade rogues looking to change the world & it seemed they were no longer an urban legend.

Their downfall was unexpected, to say the least. Okumura was murdered in cold blood, his mental shutdown playing onscreen during an important meeting where he was about to reveal an important factor in solving this buck-wild case. A calling card was found at the residence, the sigil of their misdeeds. Just when the mystery was about to unravel, the threads gave way to a bigger problem: Did the Phantom Thieves cause the very shutdowns everyone was trying to escape?

Swiftly, the media capitalised. Labelling them as criminals, demanding their arrest. Everything shifted so quickly & she was caught up by the egregious claims of both sides. There was one thing for certain: The Phantoms Thieves had killed someone and regardless of their previous deeds, they needed to be brought to justice.

Naturally, the first viable suspect she found was Yusuke Kitagawa.

He was of the eccentric sort, gaining a scholarship through art. Everything the strange man did was usually for the sake of ‘ Finding true beauty! ’, which was slightly melodramatic. Before Madarame’s case, he was fixated on art singularly. Now? He seemed to have other priorities. Whenever someone would discuss the Phantom Thieves in an art lesson, there was a glimmer in his eye & the paintbrush that had been on the canvas stopped in order to listen in.

A victim of Madarame’s plagiarism, which gave a plausible motive. Despite this, nothing was concrete. She thought about her friend, Akechi. Was this how he solved crimes?

Obviously, the next step was to follow Yusuke around. Sneaking around was rather easy, all she had ever been known as by the student populace was ‘ the girl who was friends with Akechi! ’, so standing out was not much of a problem. There was not much abnormal. Despite being somewhat of a social outcast, he had a small circle of friends. Six in total.

Five of them were clearly wearing the Shujin Academy uniform on the day she spotted them. One was tall in stature with fluffy black hair & thick framed glasses. Reserved in nature but he always appeared to have some sort of witty comeback. Soon he became known as Akira.

Another one was a blonde, around the same height. He wore the uniform much like a delinquent alongside a yellow graphic tee. Obnoxiously loud, as it was never difficult to hear what he was saying even from far away. The person closest to him was Ann. She had platinum blonde hair tied back into pigtails & features of an American.

Makoto was next. Clearly more of a calculating type, she wore the uniform immaculately. Wearing her hair in a French-braid styled headband, she had maroon coloured eyes & was around average height. Most of the time, she was commenting on the boy’s behaviour.

Haru Okumura was someone recognisable due to the news about her father’s death, which was saddening. In her uniform, she wore a fluffy pink turtleneck alongside white tights with flower patterns.

Futaba was just as strange as Yusuke. She used a mixture of gamer jargon whenever she spoke and was never seen in a uniform. About middle school age, she carried around a set of headphones everywhere that regularly rested atop her maple coloured hair.

Stuffed inside of Akira’s bag was also a cat that they tried to hide. Key word: Tried. Six of them & a cat.

They frequented a local cafe in Shibuya, LeBlanc. It was a nice location & she had even gone in there once to listen in. Boss was kind, to say the least. He served coffee with a warm smile & the curry combined perfectly enough to encourage a smile out of her.

On a Friday, the cafe was busy. They had gathered at one table & chatted casually. Most of them looked forelorn. Akira eventually gestured for them to take the conversation outside, where they would disturb fewer people.

Following behind them, she paid Boss & followed, attempting to seem casual. They never noticed. Conspicuously trailing into an alleyway, Ryuji pulled out his phone. Listening in was difficult so she opted to pull out her own phone and record. One of them, presumably Akira, simply said “ Mementos. ”.

Mementos. That singular word triggered something & changed everything. As the world began to violently shift in a strange phenomena, hues of vermillion & mauve dotted her vision. It was hypnotic. Eventually, she snapped out of the trance.

Concealed by masks & flashy outfits were the suspicious group she had been following. It was blatantly obvious by their hair colours. However, the animated cat creature was a surprise. It was reminiscent of the cat Akira carried around but even stranger was that it talked. Then it turned into a bus. Which did not seem all that strange.

Inherently familiar with their environment, they sped off down the escalator, leaving her alone with her thoughts. There were so many reds & greys. Thick red veins ran through the sides in mangled forms. The wall behind her was dilapidated & the only way to proceed was the escalator in front of her.

A fatal mistake, really.

Recalling the details of the awakening are fuzzy at best. These lumbering creatures formed entirely out of shadow began to take notice of her unwanted presence. Cornered, desperate and alone. Insurmountable pain; the voice of someone almost familiar; then freedom & rebellion.

With the pact of her Persona, everything was clearer. Life had previously moved in rhetorical patterns, it was now a whimsical dance. Eliminating the so called enemies with a weapon in hand, she eventually found a way back to the surface. The door at the beginning looked to be a way out, so she threw caution to the wind & took the chance.

Fatigue came first in this dingy alleyway. Adrenaline had been fuelling the push to leave alongside her newly granted power and once that was gone, nothing would spare her from raw exhaustion. Checking her phone in the hopes of finding evidence, the video taken was still there, though it cut off as soon as anyone disappeared.

Even without evidence, she knew that this group was doing something illicit. So she texted the one person she trusted with this secret: Goro Akechi. He was a detective, surely he would have answers.

;; I must speak with you in person as soon as possible. It’s regarding the Phantom Thieves, I have some evidence for you. You’re investigating them, correct?

Knowing full well that Akechi lived a busy life, she did not expect a response for a while. After gathering the strength to stand once again, she headed home. It was the most exhausting experience ever, physically & emotionally. A few minutes after returning home, there was a response from Akechi.

I am indeed investigating them. If you have any evidence regarding them, would it not be more convenient for me to receive it via text? ;;

;; Yes, it would be, but I can barely even believe the evidence presented to me. It’s better for you to see it for yourself. Are you attending school tomorrow?

Indeed I am. Pulling away from the public eye has benefits. If you are free during lunch, we can meet on the rooftop and discuss the supposed evidence that you have found. Does that sound like a compromise? ;;

;; Alright. I’ll see you on the rooftop tomorrow.

The next day was filled with trepidation. Everyone seemed to be mulling about & with how slowly the clock was moving, it was if the school was in a state of chronostasis. Although she did not share many classes with Akechi, there had been a moment where she saw a mop of hazelnut brown hair amongst a crowd, so he was likely to be there.

Sitting on the rooftop alone was slightly boring but she understood why he was late. Every time lunch began, Akechi would be surrounded by people who wanted his attention. It must have been rather annoying.

5. 10. 15. Minutes ticked by. During the winter, it was exceptionally cold so not a single soul came up. The chilly winter breeze nipped at her skin & for a moment she wondered if it was Akechi that she had seen. The brown hair easily could have been mistaken—

The creak of the door announced his presence. With a formal apology, he recalled how his teachers were intent on swarming him with catch up work that he would inevitably never complete. Dismissing it all & moving along with the subject, Akechi got straight to the point:

“ What was it you wished to speak to me about? ”, he asked.

“ I believe I have ascertained the identities of the Phantom Thieves, ” was the only reply she gave.

Looking astounded, he shifted his glove via force of habit & looked directly at her.

“ That’s quite the bold claim, ” he returned to a neutral expression as the mask of the Detective Prince slipped back on, “ Do you have any evidence? ”.

Recalling the story to the best of her ability was tedious. From the suspicious behaviour Yusuke had been demonstrating to the video evidence taken from her phone. Throughout the entire story, he maintained a neutral expression so she was never quite sure what to think.

“ Usually, I would disregard such stories as a strange dream or a vision you had & declare your footage as edited. However, I have... also had an encounter in this strange phenomena as well. ”

Everything began to make more sense as it was explained. Akechi rattled off about the cognitive world, Palaces, Personas & even how ‘ stealing someone’s heart ’ was possible. He explained that his plan was to lend the Phantom Thieves a hand in their next assignment & catch them in the very act. Specifically, their leader.

“ That explains a lot. Let me help you. I have a Persona as well & I can fight in that other world. I want to bring the Phantom Thieves to justice. They killed Okumura & many others if they are the ones behind the mental shutdowns. Tampering with the heart of another is wrong... ”

“... Alright. I suppose it will make things easier if it is the two of us. I hope you are a very good actor,” Akechi extended a reluctant hand for her to shake. His gaze was calculated, cold. Much different from his tone of voice. However, she took his hand & shook it.

With that, a contract was signed. Both herself & the detective would bring about the end of the Phantom Thieves.

Word Count: 1.9k

Publish Date: 27.09.20

[jumukus]

A3! Translation: Muku Sakisaka’s SSR [Mankai Glitter] - To Virgo: Muku

translation under the cut.

Muku: For this part, you've gotta do it like this…

...And done! I've finished making the cat doll!

Omi: Oh, it's come out pretty well. You've improved quite a lot on making a felt doll, Muku.

Muku: It's all thanks to your teaching, Omi-san. Besides, I'm still far from good…

But I want to be as good as you and Yuki-kun.

Omi: Hey, you're fine, all right? But hmm, so you want to become better at this, huh…

That's right. I know a handicraft cafe that can help you improve your skills in a relaxed way. Are you interested?

Muku: A handicraft cafe, you say!? That sounds really fun!

Omi: Why don't you invite all the Summer Troupe guys to go with you? You can make matching things there, after all.

Muku: Together with my Summer Troupe mates… Now that you mention it…

Since my birthday is fast approaching, they told me to think of a place that I want to go with them all.

I've decided where to go now! Thank you, Omi-san.

Omi: Haha, glad to hear that. Have fun there.

Muku: Yup!

I need to think of a wish after that…

Omi: A wish?

Muku: The one that we asked to the "Hello, Celestial Sphere."

Omi: Sorry, but… what's "Hello, Celestial Sphere"?

Muku: It's one of the troupe's urban legends that Kazu-kun and Misumi-san found in the warehouse.

If you wish for something to your constellation during your birthday month, it's said that your wish will come true for a day.

Omi: Heh, I didn't know there's such a thing.

Muku: I heard the old members used this as one of their party goods, so we decided to use that during our birthday parties as well.

It's sort of become the Summer Troupe's tradition to use this thing.

...Did Banri-san not tell you, though? I assumed all troupe leaders know about this…

Omi: Nope, he didn't tell me anything. But well, I feel like he's gonna tell us when the time comes.

Hello, Celestial Sphere, huh… I hope you can come up with something good.

Muku: Yup!

***

Muku: Thank you for clearing your schedules for today, guys.

Kazunari: No biggie~! We're gonna celebrate our beloved Mukkun's birthday, after all!

Kumon: Let's celebrate your birthday splendidly!

Izumi: Is it really okay for me to tag along, though?

Muku: Totally! Rather, I'm happy that you come along with us, Director-san.

Yuki: So where do you wanna go?

Muku: You'll know once we arrive there. Let's go!

Tenma: Handicraft cafe, huh?

Yuki: The interior is cute.

Kumon: Wow! We can make things like dolls and the likes here, right!?

Misumi: Sounds fun~!

Izumi: Ah, I've come here with Omi-kun before…!

Muku: Oh, really? To tell you the truth, Omi-san was the one who told me about this place.

I heard you can both improve your skill and have fun here, so I want to come here with the rest of Summer Troupe.

Kazunari: Since this is a cafe, they should have cakes and teas here.

Tenma: Yeah, let's order something before we do the handicraft. Here, the menu.

Misumi: Yup! We're here to celebrate Muku's birthday after all~!

Kumon: IKR!

Muku: You guys… Thanks!

***

Kazunari: Our orders are all here, rite? With that said…

Mukkun, happy birthday!

Summer Troupe: Happy birthday!!

Muku: Thanks! Ehehe. This made me happy…

I love acting with you all, hanging out with you all, and spending time together like this.

Thank you for everything. Let's stay good friends.

Misumi: I love spending time with you too~!

Kazunari: Same! I really, really, really love it!

Tenma: Let's keep doing our best together.

Izumi: (The Summer Troupe members sure are close with each other, huh. Muku-kun also looks really happy.)

***

Kazunari: Alrighty! Now that we've enjoyed the tasty cakes, it's time to make the felted dolls!

Yuki: Do you have any things you wanna make?

Muku: I want to make matching items with you all.

Misumi: Whoa, I like that idea~!

Kazunari: Ah! How about we make a rival for William!? We'd have six in total then!

Kumon: That means we'll make them battle over William's girlfriend Mari?

Muku: What!? But both of them already have a happy ending during the puppet show the other day. Making a rival would be kinda…

But love comes with many challenges…

Six powerful and charming rivals are appearing before William… However, later on, they all will become the best of friends.

Tenma: You're gonna make the story be more complicated at this rate, y'know.

Izumi: Fufu. I think it's a great story, though.

Yuki: Well, putting the rivals aside, it'd be nice to make something with the same size.

Kumon: Yup! Okay, let's go ahead and make it~!

Misumi: Yup~!

Waiter: Here are the kits that we have prepared. Please choose what you like. For those who have gotten used to this, naturally, you are allowed to make some arrangements.

Tenma: Which one should I choose?

Kazunari: Prick this one, and then…

Muku: I think it goes like this...

Kumon: This is so hard!

Misumi: What should I do, after this, Yuki~?

Yuki: This one goes like this. Then, for this part…

Izumi: (Despite struggling at some parts, they all look like they're having fun.)

***

Misumi: It's done!

Tenma: Alright, me too.

Kazunari: Good job! With that, now it's all done!

Izumi: Whoa, they're all cute! You guys went with different animals, huh.

Kumon: It was hard yet so fun~!

Muku: Right? I had a lot of fun too.

Yuki: Since they're all from the series, it's become a matching set. Isn't that great?

Kazunari: It's very cwute! If you line them up like this, we can see our own personalities in them!

Muku: Fufu, you're right.

OPTION 1: Your rabbit is adorable, Muku-kun.

Izumi: Your rabbit is adorable, Muku-kun. You're really good at this, huh.

Muku: You think so? Ehehe… Thank you.

Yuki: Yeah, I also think you did great. You paid attention to the details.

Misumi: The rabbit looks like Muku somehow~. It's fluffy and smiling so gently.

Kumon: I think so too!

Tenma: It does look like Muku.

Kazunari: Down to your healing vibes too!

Izumi: You're right.

Muku: R-Really? This kinda makes me shy, but… I'm happy.

OPTION 2: I tried making this, you see.

Izumi: I tried making this, you see.

Muku: Ah, a cake! Whoa, it's so cute…!

Izumi: I found this sweet series among the kits, so I decided to choose this. It's perfect for Muku-kun's birthday.

Kazunari: Oh, yeah! Hey, let's line up our animals together and put Director-chan's cake in the middle~.

Muku: Whoa…!

Misumi: It looks like the animals are celebrating Muku's birthday too~!

Kazunari: IKR!? It's very cwute~! I've gotta take a snap and post it on the blog! Captured!

Muku: So happy~. I'll print this picture and put it in the room.

Kazunari: Sounds great! Let's write some birthday wishes too after this, guys! I'll send the photo to y'all!

***

Kazunari: Once we're home, let's take a photo of them with William!

But hey, you see, I've actually come up with this idea when making these dolls. Say, don't you think having all 24 of us William's rivals is interesting!?

Kumon: A 24-way relationship!?

Izumi: If we include William, then 25…?

Tenma: That's too many!

Muku: Whoa…! I think I've read a shoujo manga with that kind of story before!

Yuki: 24-way relationship?

Muku: Yup! The boys are competing for one girl's heart!

Each of the boys have different personalities, and the one who is chosen by the heroine is beyond our expectations…!

Misumi: Is that so~?

Muku: I'm sure it'll be great if our company members reenact that manga and become the heroes…

Yuki: Well, there are also some of us who don't look like the type to date, though.

Kumon: Ah! Speaking of, Muku, have you decided on your wish to the Celestial Sphere?

Muku: Celestial Sphere…

That's it! I've decided on my wish!

Yuki: I feel like I know what it is.

Misumi: What is your wish~?

Muku: Umm…

Tenma: You've brought the Celestial Sphere, huh.

Kazunari: Oooh! Kumon also did this before. That's our cousins for ya!

Izumi: Feel free to say your wish, Muku-kun.

Muku: Yeah!

Hello, Lord Virgo…

I want our company members to reenact "Honey Concerto in Love!"

Muku: Nnggh….

(Hm…? I feel like someone is staring at me…)

Kazunari: Good morning, Mukumi. Seeing your face first thing in the morning is truly the happiest moment in my life.

Even your sleeping face is really cute today☆

Muku: ...Ka-Kazu-kun?

Kazunari: What is it? By the way, you look so cute even when spacing out… haaah, your beauty is truly a sin, Mukumi.

Muku: (Mukumi? Is he talking about me…?)

(While I do wish to have everyone reenact my favorite shoujo manga, I don't mean it like this…)

Kazunari: Come on, it's time for breakfast. Let's go, my sweet roommate☆

Muku: Y-Yeah.

***

Muku: Morning.

Yuki: Morning, Mukumi. Did you sleep well?

Misumi: Goodness. Do you have to be that cute from early in the morning, honey?

Tenma: Well now, let's begin our "Morning Appeal Time" to Mukumi.

Muku: Appeal Time!?

Misumi: I'm going first, then.

Take this, my triangle present for today. I also include my love for you.

Muku: Thank, Thank you…

Kazunari: You like this better, right, Mukumi?

This bittersweetness of citrus… reminds me of our heart-thumping meeting in that certain country.

Muku: U-Uh… I met Kazu-kun during the Summer Troupe audition, though.

Yuki: Mukumi, I saw you in my dream last night. To think that you even visited my dream…

You sure can't stand being alone, huh. You really are adorable, my angel.

Kumon: Nice weather today, huh….During summer like this, the sun is shining as bright as you.

You make my heart heat up so much I feel like it's burning… you know?

Tenma: A day like this makes me want to go to a private beach with you. Say, baby, let's have a samba dance as we match our passionate rhythm with each other.

Muku: (Whoaaa, I knew it! I'm the heroine!)

(Now that I think about it again, there's a scene like this in the manga…)

Tenma: Alright, now that the Appeal Time is over, let's have breakfast. Sit beside me, Mukumi.

Muku: Huh? Oh, okay--.

Banri: Hey, watta minute.

Juza: You're the one who should wait.

Muku: Ba, Banri-san…!? Even Juchan…!

Banri: Mukumi will sit beside me, of course. Right, Mukumi?

Juza: The heck? Since when did we ever decide on that, bastard? Come sit next to me, Mukumi.

Muku: Whoa, whoa, whoa…

Banri: Tch… Look, bastard, you made Mukumi troubled. Guess it's faster to just ask the person in question right away.

Juza: Yeah. Mukumi, who do you choose? ***

Muku: Huh!? Ummm…!

I-I'm sorry!!

Banri and Juza: Mukumi!

Muku: (I should have made my wish pretty clear and asked the Celestial Sphere to turn Director-san into the heroine...)

***

Muku: ...Ah!!

Huh…?

It, It was… a dream….

(That dream felt very real, though. It was a little bit different from what I hoped for, but the Celestial Sphere still made my wish come true…)

Kazunari: Mukkun?

Muku: Ka-Kazu-kun…

Kazunari: Morning! What's wrong, though? Jumping out of bed like that.

Muku: (Thank goodness. It's the usual Kazu-kun…)

It's nothing. Morning, Kazu-kun.

[tigerkirby215]

5e Graves, the Outlaw build (League of Legends)

(Artwork by Jason Chan. Made for Riot Games.)

Blam blam?

Honestly I made Twisted Fate awhile ago so Graves was on my To Do list. It does also help that he has become a bit of a main character in the Tales of Runeterra shorts, being featured in both the Bilgewater and Bandle City short. And his place in the League meta certainly helps too.

But truthfully most of the builds I make are rather spur of the moment. Graves was just one I had a sudden bit of inspiration to do, which is why he’s up now.

GOALS

Hope you weren't planning to die of natural causes - Two barrels of Destiny should be enough to blow the brains out of anyone who stands in your way, or any other squishy bits.

I ain't got time to bleed - Who has more armor? The woman riding a horse made of literal metal, or the guy with a shotgun who did a bunch of Wave Dashes?

Lights out - To keep foes in place you’re going to need to smoke them out... Smoke them in?

RACE

Because I’m sick of constantly making Variant Humans I’m still going for Eberron Dragonmarks. Nothing really makes sense for Graves except for the Mark of Passage. Your Dexterity increases by 2 and you can increase any ability of your choice by 1: bump up that Constitution for a bit more bulk in the jungle.

You have Courier’s Speed for 5 extra feet of movement and Intuitive Motion to drive land vehicles or make Acrobatics checks. But of course the main feature we’re here for is Magical Passage to cast Misty Step once per Long Rest. Since we won’t be getting Misty Step from elsewhere we’ll finally have an accurate cooldown for Flash!

If Dragonmarks aren’t an option: Variant Human with either the Crossbow Expert feat or the Fey Touched feat works fine.

ABILITY SCORES

15; DEXTERITY - DEX is the “shoot gun” stat, as well as your AC stat among other things. Turns out we’ll have to shoot our gun a lot.

14; CHARISMA - Graves has a gruff charm to him, and while Fate is the one who usually does the talking that doesn’t mean Graves is incapable of doing so.

13; CONSTITUTION - You’re deceptively tanky for a Markman, though that mostly comes from Grit.

12; STRENGTH - You’re also a fairly large man, and New Destiny is a heavy gun.

10; WISDOM - You can tell when folk are lying but you’re a little dense.

8; INTELLIGENCE - But if the Legends of Runeterra shorts have shown anything it’s that you’re only really getting by on dumb luck and determination.

BACKGROUND

LoL wiki says you’re a mercenary, but you tend to work alone (or sometimes with your partner Tobias) so Urban Bounty Hunter makes a lot more sense for finding the scum of Bilgewater. Insight is nice but I’d also grab Intimidation instead of Persuasion or Deception, because you don’t play nice. You also get some tool proficiencies: I’m sure your partner taught you how to play with Cards and Dice, if only to cheat you out of your money.

But what we’re mainly here for is the Ear to the Ground feature, letting you keep in contact with Bilgewater’s underbelly to know who needs a blasting. These connections can get you a contact for bounty work anywhere you may go.

(Artwork by Kelly Aleshire. Made for Riot Games.)

THE BUILD

LEVEL 1 - FIGHTER 1

If Fighter is the fastest way to learn how to shoot a gun then you must fight! Fighters get two proficiencies from the Fighter list: Athletics and Acrobatics will help you with all that “jungling” stuff.

You also get a Fighting Style and you may be surprised to hear but we’re going for Archery to shoot your gun better, and you also get Second Wind for some refillable potions.

Honestly the most interesting thing to talk about with Fighter levels is what you’re going to grab for a weapon. If you’ve got an Artificer who can give you a cool (Heavy) Crossbow then feel free to grab that, but for the most part we’ll be using Hand Crossbows to recreate the range limitations of Graves’ shotgun.

LEVEL 2 - FIGHTER 2

You’ve got two barrels on your gun so you should shoot both of them in a round thanks to Action Surge. Get another action on your turn! Yup that’s all she wrote chief.

LEVEL 3 - FIGHTER 3

Third level Fighters get to choose their Martial Archetype and Graves is simple, boring, but effective. Feel free to take something more fun (or just use the Dark Tides of Bilgewater Renegade subclass tbh) but it’s about time I crack out the good ol’ Champion Fighter! Buy a Collector for an Improved Critical range of either 19 or 20! That’s 10% crit chance! But any ADC main will tell you that 10% crit still isn’t much crit.

LEVEL 4 - FIGHTER 4

4th level Fighters get our first Ability Score Improvement but being able to shoot good is more important. Grab Crossbow Expert to shoot in melee, reload quickly in a fight, and shoot with your Bonus Action after shooting!

LEVEL 5 - FIGHTER 5

5th level Fighters get an Extra Attack to Blam and then Blam again. These two Blams are separate from your Crossbow Expert Blam which is also separate from Action Surge, allowing you to Blam another two times meaning by level 5 you can already Blam up to 5 times in one round!

(Artwork made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 6 - SORCERER 1

What? Did you really think that we wouldn’t have any spellcaster levels? Sorry to say it but there’s no easy way for a martial character to shoot out a smoke cloud or Wave Dash enough to survive a sniper rifle shot in the head.

We’ll be going for the Clockwork Soul since your gun is certainly mechanical in nature, and it’s certainly the soul of your character. As a Clockwork Sorcerer you can use your reaction to Restore Balance and negate either Advantage or Disadvantage a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, regaining all expended uses at the end of a Long Rest. I’d flavor this more as your skill from years in the business letting you steady your aim or dodge out of the way of a foe who thinks they have the upper hand.

You know what helps with getting the upper hand? Spellcasting, especially with extra spells from Clockwork Magic. The extra spells you can get can be from the Abjuration or Transmutation schools, and can be from the Wizard, Warlock, or Sorcerer spell list. This means you can grab Shield for some Grit AC, and Absorb Elements for some Magic Resistance as well. You also get 4 cantrips and 2 more leveled spells:

CANTRIPS

Mind Sliver will serve as your Challenging Smite, weakening enemies and damaging them.

Message will help you keep in team chat with TF.

Prestidigitation will let you do all sorts of minor tricks with your bullets and gas canisters.

Mending will help you fix up your outfit after getting in scuff.

SPELLS

Fog Cloud will serve as your Smoke Screen, obviously.

To shoot out some Galeforce projectiles, grab Magic Missile to execute! (Note: Magic Missile will not actually execute.)

LEVEL 7 - WARLOCK 1

I COULDN’T HELP IT I’M SORRY. Warlock levels give us an easy way to have spells ready with just a short rest. First level Warlocks can choose their Patron at level 1 and for a bit more lethality take the Genie Patron. You can choose your Genie Kind and a Djinni will give a couple of benefits: for one your Genie’s Vessel will let you do Thunder damage equal to your Proficiency bonus once per turn thanks to Genie’s Wrath. You also have Bottled Respite for a safe place to rest and store the two guns and three knives you are expected to stick onto your gun.

You also get Pact Magic which is like regular spell slots but they come back after a Short Rest. Thunderwave is a good way to give yourself some space with shotgun knockback, and is on your Warlock spell list since you took the Djinni patron! And Hex is just good to Smite a foe to do more damage to them.

LEVEL 8 - WARLOCK 2

Second level Warlocks get their second Pact Magic slot, which is the main reason we need at least 2 levels in Warlock. But you also get Eldritch Invocations: Devil’s Sight will let you see through the dark with your dumb human eyes. And to play dress up Mask of Many Faces will let you put on some skins!

You can also learn another first level spell from the Warlock list: honestly there isn’t much I want, so I guess you can grab Armor of Agathys for some Thornmail.

(Artwork by Bo “chenbowow” Chen. Made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 9 - FIGHTER 6

Back to Fighterman, take me by the hand for Ability Scores and, +2 to Dexterity man.

LEVEL 10 - FIGHTER 7

7th level Champions are Remarkable Athletes, letting them add half their proficiency bonus to any STR, DEX, or CON check made which you aren’t already proficient in. Unfortunately you have proficiency in Athletics and Acrobatics but at least this buffs your Slight of Hand and Stealth. And since Initiative is a DEX check, this ability improves that too!

Oh and you can also increase the distance of a running long jump by a number of feet equal to your Strength modifier. A whole extra foot of jumping distance!

LEVEL 11 - FIGHTER 8

Hey more Ability Score Improvements! Cap off that Dexterity, and also put 1 in Charisma for later.

LEVEL 12 - FIGHTER 9

9th level Fighters get a QSS for Indomitable, rerolling a failed save to potentially succeed! Are you going to succeed any mental saving throws? Probably not, but you’ve got a good chance for Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution. And you can use this for Death Saves too!

(Artwork made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 13 - FIGHTER 10

10th level Champions get a whole Additional Fighting Style! Wowie! Take Defense for a bit more Grit in a teamfight.

LEVEL 14 - FIGHTER 11

11th level Fighters get an extra Extra Attack, letting them attack 3 times in a round. This means 4 attacks with Crossbow Expert and 7 if you Action Surge!

LEVEL 15 - FIGHTER 12

12th level Fighters get another Ability Score Improvement, and you know what’s better than one Flash? Two Flashes! Grab the Fey Touched Feat to increase your Charisma by 1, get another once-per-day use of the Misty Step spell, and also grab the Heroism spell for a bit more grit that you can cast with your first level slots.

(Artwork made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 16 - FIGHTER 13

13th level Fighters get another use of Indomitable. That’s two rerolls on any failed save! Wow I know basic math!

LEVEL 17 - FIGHTER 14

14th level means another Ability Score Improvement: more Charisma means better Definitely-Not-Spells. But feel free to get something like Sharpshooter or another more practical feat, as the only spells you really have which rely on Charisma are Mind Sliver and Thunderwave.

LEVEL 18 - FIGHTER 15

15th level Champions finally grab their Infinity Edge for a Superior Critical on an 18, 19, or 20! 15% crit chance!

LEVEL 19 - FIGHTER 16

16th level means another Ability Score Improvement: either cap off your Charisma or grab some better feats. Build flexibility is important. "Got any bright ideas?"

LEVEL 20 - FIGHTER 17

Our last level is the 17th level of Fighter for one more use of Indomitable (making it 3 uses total) as well as an extra use of Action Surge! You can’t Action Surge twice in the same turn but you can Action Surge two turns in a row to really put the DPS out!

FINAL BUILD

PROS

I like my enemies two ways: dead, or about to be - Your shots are as reliable as they are deadly. 4 shots per turn thanks to Crossbow Expert’s Bonus Action, all of which have a whopping +13 to hit! Not to mention Genie’s Wrath giving you a flat +6 damage every turn and Superior Critical allowing you to crit 15% of the time.

Let's settle the score - A little bit of magic never hurt anyone. A few Misty Steps and a few more Shields can keep you out of danger, and spells like Hex can let you up your DPS. Even Fog Cloud (while admittedly situational) can still give you cover for either an attack or an escape.

Easy, partner - All that magic along with Fighter abilities and Fighter hit die means that you’re sturdier than most, with plenty of ways to shrug off attacks or boost yourself up after getting hit.

CONS

Who's in the dark now? - Making a specific point of dumping both Intelligence and Wisdom leaves you very lacking in social encounters. It also means that you’ll have a lot of trouble with spells. Even Hold Person can really hinder you.

Everyone's a hero... till you shoot off a leg or two - Champion isn’t exactly the most exciting class and this is well-known, but unfortunately Graves isn’t exactly the most exciting champion. Trust me I’d love to make him a Battle Master, Arcane Archer, Samurai, or Renegade (Dark Tides of Bilgewater.) But Graves is a big man with big crits and not much else.

Go ahead; I like moving targets - One more level in Warlock would’ve given you Misty Steps that come back after a Short Rest, as well as the Darkness spell which is arguably stronger than Fog Cloud. It would’ve also given you your Pact Boon, all of which are very strong. Honestly while the 17th level of Fighter is stronger if you know that you aren’t going to get to level 20 I’d definitely recommend a third Warlock level for the reasons I just said.

But of course anyone can win if they can just wave their hands around to send giant flaming rocks out of the sky. You prove that all you need to win a fight is a big gun, good aim, and a whole lotta grit. Put one between their eyes and a hundred more into their chest, and don’t mind any potential Collateral Damage. Just watch out for traps and stay clear of Yordles; wouldn’t want to be featured in another animated short.

(Artwork by Xu “Crow God” Cheng. Made for Riot Games.)

[mor-beck-more-problems]

Monsters of the Museum || Dakota and Morgan

TIMING: Current

PARTIES: @dakotasgrant & @mor-beck-more-problems

SUMMARY: Dakota and Morgan try to open up to one another. Some things are scarier than glass-cased monstrosities.

CONTAINS: Mentions of alcoholism, parental abuse, death, and car accident

Despite the weird shit that happened when she and Morgan hung out last, Dakota still felt as though she needed to water this seed, because when it came to everyone else in town so far… Well, this was the only one that was growing. She felt a little bad about getting defensive, and she had already planned on apologizing again once she saw Morgan at the museum, but… Well, technically what she’d said had been true. Morgan knew a sensitive detail about Dakota, but she didn’t really know her. And if she was going to take her only friend’s advice when it came to making more friends, then she needed to know more about Morgan first.

The museum had been her own idea, and even as she sat on the steps waiting patiently for her company to arrive, she still thought it would be fun with or without her. In an effort to be a nicer person, though, she did have two coffees set by her side, her hands in her pockets. She hoped Morgan liked hot bean water sans cream and sugar.

Morgan’s nerves prickled like needles as she pulled up to the museum. For all the effort they’d put into their pop up display during the carnival, the actual building was kind of dull looking, like a refurbished old train station no one had ever cared about. She steadied herself, trying to narrate a version of this visit to herself that both didn’t end with more attempted theft, or factual education, and had her leave with her conscience intact. She couldn’t exactly coax Dakota into making a scene while she smashed her way through reclaiming some supernatural artifacts to restore to their rightful communities, like she had with Deirdre. Nothing came to mind, so maybe she would just ignore everything in the museum and focus on the conversation around them. They were here to get to know each other. She didn’t need to worry about corpses being disrespected by being called creations and elaborate hoaxes, or photographs of supernaturals who hadn’t wanted to be seen dismissed, or magic relics categorized as superstition. She would be fine, and the afternoon with Dakota would be a good one.

Morgan finally got out of her Subaru and jogged up to meet her friend. “Hey! It’s a great day to be inside where it’s warm, huh? Let’s go, yeah?” She offered a hand to help Dakota up. “I tried to come up with some kind of random fact like they make you come up with in cheesy ice breakers on the way but--” I was too distracted by knowing how much wrongful nonsense you’re about to fall for in here. “--I just couldn’t. I’ve had some memorable shitty jobs in the past? I used to have an online crystal shop? My cat that’s been with me the longest, Anya, liked to be walked on a leash and harness?” She held open the door for them as they went in. “What I’m trying to say is, I will try to be as much of an open book as possible, okay?” And as long as they kept talking, how hard could that be?

She stepped onto the shiny tile floor and came face to face with half a dozen dull-eyed, incorporeal school children in their uniforms. She squealed, covering her mouth a second too late and jumped back close to Dakota. “Sorry! This place is just--” Haunted. Full to the brim and fucking haunted within an inch of its life. Morgan couldn’t look in any direction without catching sight of at least two spirits hovering near the display cases. Shit, shit, shit. “--so impressive! Like, way more than I thought it would be!”

Dakota was a little bit more excited than she wanted to admit, especially when Morgan showed up. She wasn’t the kind of person she ever thought she’d be friends with -- she was quirky, and weird, and confusing… But she was bright and bubbly and seemed to be this kind of oddly positive, always “chipper” sort of person. Which, as anyone could see, was the complete opposite of herself. But it made her happy to see that even if she was such a cynic, the people around her could still exist in this sort of.. Care-free innocence, it seemed. Of course, that was all her own perception, but she still firmly believed that Morgan did have some sort of sweet innocence to her, whether or not that was actually true. And she was also a firm believer that being friends with someone like Morgan was the closest she’d ever come to being that bright and bubbly and kind and sweet.

“Hey,” she greeted, but within a short amount of time she was bombarded with words. She forgot that Morgan did that, but this time it was slightly more endearing than the last. From a crystal shop to her cat, she did realize that all she was trying to do was tell her that she was going to be as genuine as possible. Whether or not Dakota chose to believe whatever she was about to say for the next few hours was up for discussion, but who would lie about a cat being walked on a harness? “Right, yeah -- Um. I guess I just wanted to know more about who you are as a person, you know?” she began, holding the door for the both of them to shuffle in. “So, let’s start with --” she began, but was quickly shut up by Morgan’s reaction to the museum.

While Dakota was impressed by the tile and artwork, Morgan seemed to have jumped back only a few moments after being inside -- as if she’d just seen a scary bug. This forced Dakota’s brows to knit together, looking at her in pure confusion. “Uh.. Yeah, I guess so..” It’s not that impressive. “I mean, it’s just a museum -- in my opinion. Have you been to the MET? I heard it’s crazy nice in there.”

“Uh…” Morgan winced with genuine embarrassment. “Sorry. I think my bar was just set really low. I mean, stars, they even have headsets! Not that I want one, you can’t really be with someone when you’re doing that.” Another nervous smile. She glared at the school children floating in front of them in a way that she hoped said, get lost. But they only glanced at Dakota with their cataract eyes and floated, dripping, back to the display case they seemed bound to. Morgan side stepped them carefully as she started down the nearest open corridor. “I did go to the MET actually! It’s so incredible, I didn’t even get to see half of it. It was just a few hours, when I took that trip to New York City with my girlfriend. We wanted our second day to be more chill and get back to our room before Times Square got too crowded, so we just walked the parts of the MET together that we could, popped out and found a bakery, and walked to a historical cemetery after. But here was this great collection of Dutch and German renaissance art and some pottery from indigenous tribes from the southwest. You should go, if you ever get the chance. I just, you know, didn’t think it would be this nice or roomy here.” She cleared her throat, hiding the impulse to seize up at the sight of a headless woman drifting up and down the corridor with them, phasing through half the patrons as she did.

“I’m not really sure how to define what kind of person I am,” she admitted, lowering her gaze to gather herself better. “I feel like I’m in a state of flux. I’m afraid you really will just have to play detective on that one.”

In the spirit of trying to make friends, Dakota tried her best to ignore the way Morgan was acting at the moment. If she’d been to the MET, she shouldn’t have been this surprised by the roominess of the museum… But, of course, she had to remind herself of Morgan’s excitability, and simply dismissed the issue. You can’t dismiss everything entirely, though can you? She didn’t want to think about that. The Nordica was weeks ago, and she hadn’t seen anything other than a big open showfloor with a few intrigued patrons wandering. All who seemed normal, all who seemed human, and no sign of anything with horns, so.. Maybe that’s just how Morgan was. Excitable. A little strange. Definitely weird. All true statements, sure, but she was also a friend.

“Everyone’s always in flux, Morgan. That’s sort of what life does to people. So tell me about your stages, and… I guess I’ll tell you mine.” she stated -- not in a malicious or rude manner, because to Dakota, she was just stating facts. If she listed all the changes she’s been through in the last 30 years of her life, she was sure she could come up with a way she was changing even now, approaching 40 in the next three years. Ooh, don’t think about that, either. They started at the Mutated Dog Remains exhibit, which was really just a bunch of old bones reassembled that showed minor mutations, but she had to admit they all looked rather large. The plaque below a particularly strange looking resemblance of a creature that must have died a while ago mentioned the word hellhound, but debunked the term by stating it was an urban legend, a made-up story, folklore.

“I know that you’re a lesbian, and a wiccan, and that you like deathly stuff. I know you had a best friend when you were younger that made you realize you were gay, and I know you have a girlfriend, and I know you’ve been to New York City. I also know that you have a cat. I guess the reason we’re here is because -- I mean, if you want to talk to me about letting people get to know me, least of all Marley Stryder, then I think it’s fair that I get to know the person who’s giving this crazy advice. So what’s the stuff you never tell anybody? Or were your parents like, happy when you were a kid?”

“Well, I flux more or harder than most people,” Morgan said with a low laugh. “And that’s three cats, total. I got Anya in Houston, and my girlfriend and I got Moira together, and we took in Niamh when her owner, a friend of ours, died suddenly late last year.” She couldn’t help but laugh again, shaking her head ruefully now as the suggestion that her parents were happy. “Oh, stars above, no. I mean, we tried. They tried. And we had moments, like most families, and that’s what I try to focus on but…” Another dry laugh. How did you explain, ‘well my mom was magically cursed with true suffering and shared that curse with me when I was born, so!’ “It was really complicated. My mother was…a really hurt woman. She did what she thought was best, but by the time she had me, her perception of ‘best’ had been warped by a lot of fear and bad experiences. She was really accepting of me when I came out, but that didn't really make all the times she dragged me screaming to my room and locked me in for awhile go away, you know?” Morgan winced, wondering if this was already oversharing. “I’m okay now, obviously,” she hastened to say. “I was just raised under some really specific circumstances that are hard for a lot of people to understand.”

“More or harder than most people?” Dakota repeated, trying her best not to sound judgmental. Lord knows she was the last person to judge, but.. It still came somewhat natural to her. Gotta work on that. She listened, though, about the cats -- reading plaque after plaque of random artifacts that didn’t look more or less interesting than what she could find at Pottery Barn. The place was probably filled with hoaxes, but she wasn’t about to comment, because.. God, wasn’t she so tired of being cynical all the time? Despite her overall standoffishness, Dakota really did care about what Morgan had to say. She could relate in a lot of ways to the story she told -- the half truths she was narrating. She’d been locked in her room before, but probably not for too long, because she always found a way out. And the more she thought about it, it was probably because dad was angry, and nobody wanted to be around when he started yelling. He never hit, though. If she loved him for anything other than ABBA, it was because he never hit. But she wasn’t going to tell Morgan any of that. Fucking hypocrite, she thought to herself. Asking this woman to bare her deepest darkest secrets while you can’t even tell her the truth. If there was one good intention of Dakota’s, though, it was that she cared about Morgan, and if she wanted to get any closer than an arm’s length, she’d need to read the footnotes. “Kind of sounds like Sparknotes there, Beck.” she said, tucking her hands into the pockets of the coat she was wearing while they aimlessly strolled the museum. “You don’t have to go any deeper than that if you don’t want. I’m just.. Saying that you can. If that’s what you want.”

“Wow,” Morgan said, laughing unsteadily. “And here I thought I was oversharing.” She shifted a little closer to Dakota, dodging the spectre of a man with burnt, twisted limbs. He glowered at her, condemning her denial of him. “I’m sorry,” she hissed under her breath. And she was. But smashing glass and striking up conversation with the air in a room full of normies wasn’t going to fix anything. “Um, if you pick a number that’s a multiple of three I can give you the Nightline Edition of some quality trauma. We can pull up one of those number generators on my phone if we really want to play with fate.” She laughed at her own bad joke. No one knew better than her that fate didn’t let you play when she’d made up her mind. It had only been, what, fifteen minutes from the banshee scream on her life to the rebar pole skewering her insides? “Last year counts too,” she added. “I’m not trying to be cagey on purpose. Shockingly, I am actually trying not to scare you off by dumping too much all at once.”

She stopped in front of a framed photograph of the Bachman House, now a pile of rubble in the bend. The placard mentioned the number of unusual deaths on the property, with the usual highlights of trampled by own horse, impaled by own farm tools, unlucky trip down stairs, and those were just the ones that could be ruled by accidents. On the other balcony, she could see teeth in glass boxes and a singular framed wing. “Can I ask you something first?” Morgan asked, her eyes settling into an empty middle distance where there was nothing to see, nothing to hide, no problem. “Where do you think all this stuff comes from? The stories, the pain around it all. What do you believe about it?”

“A multiple of three, huh?” Dakota inquired, mainly just to amuse her. If she was going to be friends with Morgan, it was quite obvious that she was going to have to play by her rules -- meaning that she probably would have to settle for the goofiness, or the kindness, or the sunshine and rainbows of it all. Weirdest part about all of that was the fact that Dakota usually scoffed at people who seemed to be full of so much joy. What the fuck was there to be joyful about, ever? You’re born, you live, you work for fifty years or so, and you die. The monotony of life… The mundanity of it all. So what the fuck was Morgan Beck even smiling about, even if she did have a Nightlife Edition highlight reel of her trauma ready to share? Jesus, dude, go to therapy.

Morgan caught her off guard, just a tad, with her next question. Where did she think all of this stuff came from? What does she believe about all of it? Dakota simply shrugged, unsure of how to put her thoughts into words, which was a first. “I.. Guess the bones come from a bunch of different animals. Some of the artifacts have to be mass produced or ordered off, like, Etsy. The pictures and stuff? Well, anyone can go up to a creepy looking house that hasn’t had any tender love and care for a few decades and make up a story.” Dakota paused, bringing her attention back to the Bachman house. “I guess that’s what it is, in a nutshell. People wanting to believe things bad enough. People wanting other people to believe them bad enough. But the key is in making up the story -- because you can’t spell believe without L-I-E.”

Dakota let a lull in the conversation pass, tucking her hands back into her pockets, wandering off from the picture.“I pick 27, by the way. For the multiples thing.” she tossed over her shoulder.

Morgan nodded along. She couldn’t fault Dakota for speaking so callously without knowing how it all tied to Morgan. And there was some kind of awful experience sitting under her stiffness, something  that made her mistrust goodness and acceptance. “I’ll give you a two for one special,” she said quietly. “The house in that picture is mine. And everything in that placard is true. I have the documents from the town archives to prove it. And there’s a few more deaths that happened off the property tied to my family. There was a servant girl named Constance who wanted to run away with one of the Bachman daughters, Agnes. They were found out by  Agnes’ mother, Hannah Bachman, and the story suddenly went from a desperate romantic getaway to coercion. Constance didn’t have any family or friends to stick up for her, so word of her preying upon the innocent Bachman daughter spread, and she spent about a month living in the woods like an animal until she finally died.” Died because she surrendered her form to power a generational curse, but Morgan didn’t feel like arguing those particulars with a skeptic. “There are some truly horrible, inexplicable things that happen here that are just as real as the morning weather.”

She turned to Dakota, smiling sadly. “When I was twenty-seven, I was supposed to be finishing up my Masters’ in literature. I was living in this nice apartment with some other students and one of them was in my program. And she was so beautiful, and I would’ve done anything for her except say I liked her. One day I’m making sun tea and she pulls me aside about something, how behind on my share of the rent I am, and it’s going okay, but I decide to start opening up about--” The curse. Stupidly, she’d tried to tell her about the curse. “Some of the smaller crises that were going on, and she didn’t believe me and got really upset. And...okay, so the super swore later on that he had replaced all the windows so they were double insulated. This one windowpane had been missed. So when the girl threw one of my plants at the window, the whole thing shattered. I went to pick up the glass and she wanted me to stay away from her, and she pushed me, but because of the glass around her, she also cut herself and slipped and she went backwards just right out the window and fell through what was left of it. We were on the fourth floor, so…” Morgan winced. “Everyone heard us screaming before then, and my standing over the window-- I mean, it was so fast I was too late before I even tried to get close enough to catch her-- it didn’t look good, and they made me re-hash everything we’d been talking about and they didn’t like or believe it either, so I spent the evening answering questions from the authorities, and being yelled at by my roommates, and packing up my stuff. Then came the psych evaluation, which I was too anxious and scared to refuse, and that was pretty scary. And by that time it was eight o’clock or something, so I holed up in a Whataburger for a little bit and then drove around our college town trying to figure out where I was supposed to go next. I got a shitty little Motel 6 place for a few months before I could get leave of absence paperwork going and do depressed 20-something shit until I could start back again with a cohort that didn’t know me.” She thought back on that day, shivering at the memory of the body ragdolled on the gravel, the blood framing her and soaking her hair, the glare of the sun on her empty face… “Sometimes things just happen.” Sometimes they happened because the neutrality of the universe could hurt, and sometimes they happened because you were cursed to carry your great-great grandmother’s crimes on your shoulders.

Dakota had fully intended on continuing to browse the museum, already halfway to the next display whenever Morgan spoke up about the Bachman house. She listened, of course, but part of her didn’t believe a word coming out of her mouth. But she remembered something Erin had said a few weeks ago, something about how she herself had nothing to gain from lying to her, and Dakota couldn’t help but wonder if the same was true for Morgan. What would she have gained by lying to her? What would she get out of a story like that? Unless the woman standing before her was severely mentally ill, suffering from some sort of psychosis or a personality disorder, then what was Morgan getting out of lying about a picture of a house? She stopped in her path, turned back to look at her, and just as she was about to grill her for the evidence, she started talking about grad school.

Morgan shared, and after she’d finished, the exhibit they’d been standing in had been emptied of all people, most of whom had gone on to go see whatever else this place had to offer. Dakota didn’t mean to stare, but she was looking at Morgan for what felt like forever, and suddenly, deciding on whether or not the Bachman story was true wasn’t exactly the most pressing issue anymore. “Jesus Christ,” she murmured, because it was the only thing she really knew to say. She almost wanted to give Morgan a hug, but she wasn’t a touchy person, and she wasn’t even sure if they were close enough for that anyways, so she refrained. “Not sure I can follow that. You win on the trauma stories.”

“It’s not a contest,” Morgan said softly. “Honestly, it’s…” She exhaled slowly. It had been awful, yes. And it had taken her longer than usual to bounce back, to make friends without wanting to run or panic. She didn’t bother telling anyone about the curse at all after that, at least until White Crest. It was the kind of hurt you didn’t think about too much. Besides, there was always another one three years ahead. On and on until the day she died. “I’ve had worse. And it was over ten years ago. I don’t really, you know, think about it that much in the grand scheme of things. I have other, bigger things to worry about.” She did her best to brush it off as no big deal, but in the wake of the confession, she mostly felt bewilderment at her forming any attachments in White Crest at all. “Why don’t you tell me something about yourself, huh? I mean, I know you’ve shared a lot already, and I don’t mind talking more, I just don’t want to take all the air in here, either.” She looked sidelong at Dakota, unsure at how she was really taking all this. Did she think she was making this up? Did she think she was crazy?

Morgan was right. It wasn’t a competition. But if you did compare the two stories -- Dakota’s entire life and then the one incident that happened to Morgan when she was 27 -- Dakota would look like a spoiled goddamned brat. Of course, she could tell her about The Nordica… But she was still in denial about the events that unfolded that night. Erin was the only one she trusted enough to talk about that with because she was the only one she knew that had seen the event take place. She was the only one she really felt safe enough with to talk about the possibility that maybe that thing wasn’t just some rare animal, and maybe it was a monster. Regardless of that, though, it didn’t matter how many times Dakota showed up at Erin’s place to talk about it, because denial was more than just a river in Egypt. Dakota took the opportunity to lean against the railing that blocked museum goers from getting too close to any artifacts that weren’t held behind plexiglass, folded her arms over her chest and let out a little sigh. “I don’t feel like going by multiples of any particular number, so I’m just going to tell you everything, so try to keep up.” Here goes nothing. Or everything.

“I was born and raised in Detroit, but you knew that. It wasn’t the nice part of Detroit because we were really fucking poor. My mom worked at Valentino’s Diner on 8 Mile Road and I never saw her because she was always working -- double shifts, almost every day. I literally remember being a kid and dipping into the drug store to buy her cigarettes and dropping them off on my way home from school. My dad was an alcoholic. I still don’t really know much about him, but I know that he fell asleep in his recliner every night with old ass tv shows on with usually some type of scotch or brandy at his side. One time our house almost burnt down because he blacked out with a lit cigar in his hand -- he must’ve dropped it, because there was a huge cinched patch in our living room that we had to cut out of the carpet.” You’re really going for it, huh? “They fought… A lot. Because mom was doing the double shifts I told you about, and Dad bled their savings dry for booze, and they were always yelling at each other about money. When I was younger I remember asking my mom who “Bill” was. I used to think that we must have just had a lot of thunderstorms because the power kept going out, but really the power just kept getting shut off. Dad referred to her as a “ball and chain” to his buddies, but I think it was the other way around, because my mom was smart. And really fucking brave. And he knew that if he ever hit her, he’d be a dead man, because she wasn’t afraid to fight back. So I know what it’s like to be locked in your room. I didn’t understand then, but I know now that really she was just trying to protect me from seeing things I didn’t need to see, but must’ve forgot that I had ears. When I got older, I started sneaking out of my bedroom window when shit like that happened. Went and rode my bike, that sort of thing. I remember always being so pissed that I never knew what was going on, which is probably why I do what I do. I hate it when nobody knows what’s going on. All that misinformation..” she trailed off. Yeah, you’re one to talk. “Anyways, I was the poor kid with really greasy hair and hand-me-down clothes, and people talked. Kids are fucking assholes. But I took after my mom, because I’m pretty smart, too, and I worked my ass off and got to college. Chris -- my, uh, ex that I told you about -- he followed me. He was going to be a big businessman or whatever the fuck, and really I just wanted the stability, so.. I stayed. For a while. Then I ended up here. And you’d think that the bullshit would’ve stopped, but I know what it feels like to see someone die now, so.. I guess we’re on the same page there.”

“Oh, Dakota…” Morgan pulled her into her arms as best she could. “That’s not something you should have to know. Sorry doesn’t change anything, but… I am. And I don’t--I don’t think it’s too late for you to leave, if that’s what you want. This place is violent. Whatever, whoever you saw die...it’s just a lot more common here than it is in some other places. This place is violent and cruel and you have definitely suffered enough.” From Dakota’s expression, the same could maybe be said for her, but there was too much here. She felt bound to it, or maybe she was just mired and didn’t realize. “I know you’re just starting to find your way, but no one would blame you if you went.”

She pulled back, still touching the woman’s arm, lingering there. “Listen...if you…” Morgan hesitated. Dakota had made herself so vulnerable and Morgan knew exactly what she really wanted to know about her, and who was she to push Dakota to be more vulnerable and open with new people if she couldn’t even try to offer this? “Do you still really want to know what’s...why my body is the way that it is? Because I can tell you, or I can try to. But we should probably find somewhere to sit first.”

Can’t leave yet. “Yeah, but if I skipped town now, who would I cry to about personal shit in the middle of a museum full of hoaxes? Seriously, this is invaluable.” Dakota sounded a bit sarcastic, but she did mean it -- if she were to get the next plane ticket outta this place, she would most definitely be losing one of the only relationships she ever cared about in her life and leaving it behind. Even if White Crest was a cursed place, she’d still feel bad for leaving Morgan.

After she had pulled back from the hug -- which was accepted but not necessarily invited -- something was offered that had piqued her interest. An actual explanation as to why Morgan was the way that Morgan was. At least… Why her blood looked like tar and her skin healed at a superhuman speed. She was ready for the vegan preaching, and now a little more prepared for a cyborg arm than she had been before. If you can see Krampus in a movie theater, I’m sure doctors can create a superhuman arm. “I mean, I’d love to know, but you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” she offered politely, even though she was practically crawling out of her skin with anticipation. “I think there’s a cafe near the entrance, if you wanna..?

Morgan glanced quickly at the cafe area and thought better of it. Too many people. If this went badly, she didn’t want to be the center of a scene. She looked around the gallery and found a relatively empty bench. Well, empty of living people. There was a rather large group of ghost pirates floating around a piece of a ship encased in glass. Morgan made her way toward them, making a face she hoped indicated that she wanted some privacy. The pirates, however, had been dead long enough to not care and just cleared the bench so no one would be sitting through their ghostly bodies.

Morgan shouldered off her jacket and sat very close to Dakota, who she pulled down with her. “So, last April I was kind of in an accident. There was this light malfunction and that caused this huge wreck and it was so fast there was debris everywhere. And I was um…” She winced, remembering. “I was on the sidewalk. I was supposed to go home after work, but I stopped for ice cream with my friend, at this little stand. And it was just some terrible Final Destination bullshit, but my foot was caught and I couldn’t run and then I was on the ground, and there was this…” That pole. That fucking pole of rebar. Morgan had seen it almost every night during those magic nightmares. She couldn’t talk about that, not without knowing how Dakota would take the truth. “It was really bad,” she said. “I don’t know what the best way to explain is, but you can track the….change in my pulse, my heartbeat.” She rolled up her sleeve and held out her wrist. “Will you see? Please?” Her voice trembled with trepidation. Already, she was scrambling to brace herself for the worst; trouble was, she didn’t really know what ‘worst’ looked like yet.

As Morgan ushered them over to a nearby bench, Dakota started to realize that maybe this was a bigger deal than just some blood disorder or bionic arm thing. Whatever it was, she still thought that Morgan would be a friend regardless, because you’re not friends with people just because their bodies function normally. Besides, even if it freaked her out, Morgan was the closest thing to a friend Dakota had ever had -- and she didn’t mean that lightly. Not when she’d grown up the outcast, and not when fitting in always felt like jamming a puzzle piece where it didn’t fit. As far as she was concerned, Morgan could admit she’d committed several murders and partook in some shady drug lord businesses and she’d probably still be her friend.

As they sat, and Morgan spoke about an accident, Dakota just listened. She was good at listening, but it was more of the “getting it” part she hadn’t mastered -- at least...not when it came to people. The accident she’d described seemed horrific enough. Something Dakota prayed to a God she didn’t believe in that would never happen to her. At first, she was confused as to why she needed to feel her pulse, but her voice trembled, and she could tell this was important to her, so.. She gave it a shot, even though she didn’t quite understand. Placing two fingers on her wrist, Dakota searched for her pulse. She tried several different spots, but she didn’t feel a single beat, and her skin was still ice cold. “So… You have a weak pulse? Because of the accident?” she asked.

“You have to hold it for longer than that,” Morgan hissed. “Here.” She took Dakota by the sleeve and pressed her hand over her heart, firmly, where it would’ve been easy for anyone to feel at least a faint impression of a heartbeat. Morgan held it, and held it, and held it. “I’m trying to tell you I don’t have one anymore,” she whispered. “But I’m trying to prove it to you first. You need to understand that this is real.” She drew in a deep breath (In. Hold. Out.) and made sure Dakota felt it. Her chest expanded, the air flowed, but only because she willed it consciously. There was nothing in her that regulated her existence, no internal rhythm to keep up. Her will and her steady feeding were the only things maintaining her existence. “You can try checking on my neck, you can ask me to hold my breath, whatever you feel like you need to do, but I am trying, very hard, to show you the truth.”

Maybe laughing was a knee-jerk response. Actually, she knew exactly why she started to laugh -- because people laugh when they need to project dignity and control during times of stress and anxiety. In situations like this one, right here and right now, when Dakota was confused on all fronts, and anxious because she knew the truth was that Morgan didn’t have a pulse, or a heartbeat, nor was there even the faintest thumb against the palm of her hand through her chest, her response was to laugh. If there was no pulse -- if there was no beat, no rhythm rattling around in her ribcage, then she must have been… She had to be… Dead. Right? People usually laugh in a subconscious attempt to reduce stress and calm down. However, for Dakota, it often works otherwise.

It took a few moments, but she retracted her hand as if recoiling from a hot flame, and stood up immediately. She didn’t know what to say, much less what to do. She could make a break for it and get the hell out of there, but that depended solely on whether or not her legs would move, because they felt made of lead at the moment. She could continue the awkward, anxious laughter that had first bubbled up but has since dissipated to breathing somewhat shallow, quick breaths. Her thoughts raced, so much so that her words wouldn’t come out, and when they finally did, she sputtered. “Am I -- Am I fucking crazy?”

Morgan let Dakota withdraw her hand and grabbed her jacket, started double checking her pockets and bags to make sure she wouldn’t leave anything behind when she made her hasty exit.

“Them’s the breaks,” One of the pirates said. “Head empty as prawns, these humans.”

“Yes, thank you,” Morgan hissed. He was trying to be comforting, but she didn’t want to hear any of it.

She didn’t meet Dakota’s eyes or look in her vicinity as the woman continued to laugh (laugh) deliriously at what she was being shown. “No, you’re not fucking crazy. What’s fucking crazy is having to spend most of my daylight hours pretending to be alive when I’m not. We don’t have to keep doing this. I can go. You can stay and enjoy the--whatever.”

Dakota realized Morgan was moving quickly, like she was ready to flee the scene of a terrible accident. Pun most definitely not intended. She swallowed thickly, trying to think of something to say, but nothing came, not for a few moments that felt like an eternity when Morgan was getting ready to run. “Morgan, wait, I --” she cut herself off, because she didn’t know what she was asking her to wait for. It was like her mind had shutdown, only functioning on the essentials. “I didn’t mean to -- I just -- I don’t -- It’s not possible, which means you’re a -- You’re dead, but that.. You’re...” she was probably sounding like a basket case at this point, and she decided at that moment to stand up a little straighter, brush the hair out of her eyes. “I… I’ve got to go.” And with that, she practically ran to her car, fired up the engine, and got the hell out of there.

“The word you’re looking for is ‘zombie’,” Morgan said, grumbled between Dakota’s desperate stutters for understanding. She was ready to run right there, but Dakota beat her to it, and she had just enough pride not to race her out of this stupid, stupid idea of an afternoon. Slowly, she pulled on her jacket and arranged her hair over the collar just so, and put on her scarf. There was no need to rush anymore and no one curious enough to see her furiously blink back the sting in her eyes and swallow the lump forming in her throat. “Fucking humans, am I right?” She rasped.

The ghosts agreed, but only in silence.

[theabandonmentissues]

EPISODE ONE TRANSCRIPT

Warning: The following podcast is for entertainment purposes only. Trespassing is not only illegal, but often incredibly dangerous. The hosts do not condone any activities that could put their listeners in harms way, and encourage you to proceed with caution and do your research before exploring the unknown. We cannot be held liable for any accidents, injury, or hauntings that may occur. Listener discretion is advised. 

(full transcript under the cut.)

E:Alright I think this is right.

Z: Is it?

E: Yeah, yeah that's right, okay.

Z: Beautiful.

E: Let me find this tweet. The first thing in my drafts, is (laughs)-

Z: I'm scared.

E: (laughs)...I remember typing this out at like 2 o'clock in the morning when I had to be up for work at five. I put, “I love not learning new pop culture terms. Love being blissfully unaware. I still am not sure what poggers means. I do not care. I am free.”

Z: (laughs)

E: And I was so tired I thought that was profound. Let's see.

Z: (continues laughing)

E & Z: (laugh)

Z: Damn. That's like our declaration of independence.

E: (laughs) I'm going to print that out on the wall.

Z: That's Gen Z's declaration.

E: Let's see, where is it? There's one about Jack Black being sexy.

Z: Yeah, and it's in the drafts, why?

E: (laughs) This one says, this one all it says, no capitalization, no punctuation is, “I want Ellen Ripley to knock me out cold.”

E: (laughs)

Z: (laughs)

E: And I live by that.

Z: That's your truth and you should speak it.

E: Okay, here it is. “Sometimes, facing your fears means letting out that earth-shattering fart in the public restroom, even if there are other occupants. Speak loud, even when your voice shakes, babes.”

Z: (laughs) Shut the fuck up.

E: (laughs)

Z: No!

E: Yeah, that one...uh, that one is in the drafts. Alright, well. You asked about an intro, and I had something that was work shopping.

Z: Oooooo...

E: Do you wanna hear it?

Z: Yes, please. Please, please.

E: Alright. Hello, welcome to The Abandonment Issues, a periodical podcast about the past, the paranormal, and the just plain perplexing. I'm your host, Em.

Z: And I'm Zack.

E: How'd you feel-

Z: The other host. (laughs)

E: How'd you feel about that alliteration?

Z: You know I love alliteration.

E: I do too, I got really excited about it.

Z: (laughs)

E: I was like dead asleep, well, I wasn't dead asleep. I was very close to being though.

Z: Right.

E: And I had that thought, and I was like “Fuck, I gotta wake up and type that.” So...

Z: It was worth it though.

E: Thank you.

Z: I like it.

E: I don't know if that'll stick, but I think-

Z: I don't know, it's a start

E: It's a good start. Yeah.

Z: Yeah. Well..

E: So.

Z: Howdy doody, how ya doing.

E: Oh god, well um, I just whacked my headphones against my mic and I think it's still vibrating. But otherwise, I'm doing great.

Z: (laughs) Well, that's good.

E: How ya been?

Z: I mean, I've been alright.

E: That's good.

Z: We haven't seen each other, I mean, we haven't like recorded-recorded in two weeks?

E: Yeah.

Z: It's been like two weeks, so.

E: Yeah, I think so.

Z: It's been a second, but yeah.

E: Oh?

Z: So.

E: This is our first official, like official recording, the other ones were just tests, so.

Z: So, it's a little different, yeah. Like Em said, we did a couple recordings, so we kind of like, dipped our toes in the water of what it's like to just get behind the mics and stuff, but again this is our first episode, and we kinda just wanted to, lean in and kind of explain why we are here.

E: Yeah.

Z: What we are going to be doing, things we are going to talk about et cetera, et cetera.

E: Yeah.

Z: So. Do you want to-let's start with the-we have a couple ice breaker questions.

E: I'm so excited.

Z: Because, okay, so, you have a college degree.

E: I do.

Z: I have college credits. So we both went to college. (laughs)

E: Yes.

Z: You know, it's fun to do the ice breaker questions when you start a class.

E: Yeah.

Z: Because, even if you don't pay attention to anything that anybody else says-

E: Someone is going to change something that changes your life.

Z: Every single time-

E: Especially, I'm sorry to interrupt.

Z: No, you're good.

E: But, especially if you are playing two truths and a lie. I have found that that is the ice breaker game that I come away changed forever, like I've learned some things about some people playing that game. Are you okay?

Z: There's a burp coming.

E: (laughs)

E: Just let 'er out.

Z: (burps) There it is. (laughs)

E: Wow, that was lovely.

Z: Not to derail, real quick, but-

E: Go for it.

Z: Have you ever used Bumble?

E: Very briefly.

Z: One of my favorite things about Bumble, is that you can do like questions or whatever-

E: And that's one of 'em.

Z: That's one of them! It really, it's really telling. And I love, cause one of my truths is always so bizarre. You know which one I am talking about, but no one ever goes for it.

E: I honestly can't-

Z: The car. *laughs*

E: Oh! Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that one is pretty unbelievable. But-

Z: Yeah, we'll save that for another time.

E: I've seen that one, uh, I've seen the repercussions of that one in real time.

Z: Anyway.

Z: (laugh)

E: Alright, well...

Z: Episode one, we are going to expose my entire past.

E: Yeah.

Z: Okay, so. When we first kind of, started talking about the idea for this podcast, which really was just bred, I think just kind of like a joke text that I sent. Or that you sent.

E: I honestly don't even remember.

Z: It was, I mean just the, the very cliché, “We should start a podcast!” and then it just kind of went from there. Just I mean, 2020.

E: Yeah.

Z: It's nothing but boredom. When when we first started talking about, what we wanted to do with our podcast. It really just stemmed from, for me anyway, just really wanting to bring light to the history that exists here in the south.

E: Yeah we didn't really say that, we-

Z: No. (laughs)

E:...we are in the south, we are some good 'ol southern boys.

Z: Just a couple of southern boys.

E: Yea!

Z: We grew up very close to each other, as far as, location.

E: Yeah.

Z: And you know, our high schools probably taught around the same genre and path of like history.

E: Yeah.

Z: It's all white washed and gross. Bleh. But-

E: It's only getting worse, did you hear that Tennessee is like, passing laws to, how did they put it, it's so, it's such bullshit. Basically erasing any history of slavery or discrimination. I think that call it something like Radical Race Theory.

Z: Well, that's great. Welcome to our podcast where we are gonna nip all that in the butt.

E: Yeah.

Z: Because truly, like Em just stated, it's only getting worse, apparently. Jesus Christ, I hate Tennessee.

E: Yeah, I found out like a week ago.

E: Hi guys this is Em, I'm doing the editing, and I just wanted to clarify something really quick. When we were recording this episode, I misspoke and I said that this concept was called Radical Race Theory, but that is incorrect. The correct term is Critical Race Theory. So, I am sorry for that error. If you don't know what a ban like this would mean, the short version is basically, is that American lawmakers are trying to dictate and restrict what can and can't be taught in public schools about the history of systemic racism and slavery in the United States. I'm going to include some links in our resources for the episode where you can learn more about this and we really encourage you to check those out and do your research, because this is obviously an important part of American history for everyone. To erase these topics from lesson plans, really presents a biased and skewed version of events. Anyway, I'm sorry for that error and I hope you enjoy the rest of the episode .

Z: There's just so much history and just stories that are just passed down even by even just word of mouth-

E: Mmhmm

Z:...down here in the south. That literally no one knows about.

E: Yeah.

Z: I think that's, that really is what piqued our interest. When we were throwing around the idea of this podcast to begin with, it really was just like, “We're gonna find an abandoned building, we're going to dig into the research of it, and we're going to talk about this abandoned place.” And from what we are now, it's really expanded to literally just like a history lesson.

E: History, I think it's important to not only to cover the actual facts, but also, I think, not necessarily, like fiction and urban legends and that kind of thing. I think that sort of thing has a lot to do with like story telling, and the culture of the area like-

Z: Right.

E:..like there are, you know, you have things from like, the stories that your grandmother would tell you to keep you from being a little shit when you were a kid.

Z: (laughs)

E: Or, you know, why if there's like an anecdote for why is the sky blue, how did this mountain range be formed. Y'know I think stuff like that is really interesting. When you're driving along some random ass back road and you see an old house, and you think, “Huh, I wanna know the history of that place.” That is the kind of, the kind of thing, that I think really inspires me, is like. Seeing something, not knowing anything about it, wanting to learn about it.

Z: Exactly. And-

E: (laughs)

Z:...we had created like a little baby list of questions that we wanted to ask. When we first started kind of throwing around the idea of what we wanted to do. We kind of already covered a couple of them. But I guess I'll just kind of go down the list again.

E: Okay, sure.

Z: Just to kind of like, ya know, put the nail in the coffin, so to speak.

E: Yeah.

Z: So, the first question that we have, is who or what are our inspirations?

E: Okay.

Z: So I would say, for me personally, like I said, just growing up, and like I can't think of anything off the top of my head. But like growing up and learning that an event happened. Or someone did this thing and, you come to realize later on in life that what you were taught, wasn't necessarily the truth. The whole truth, anyway.

E: Yeah.

Z: So for me, I guess, it's not so much a who, as so much as a what. For me it's just really like uncovering what is real.

E: Okay, yeah.

Z: So.

E: I think, I think that's a good way to put it. And I feel like, y'know, disclaimer, we are not perfect, we are probably not always going to do perfect research. You know, we're not exposing all the facts, in their, 100% true form, 'cause you know. We're just taking the information that we can find and putting that to use. But I agree, I think that that's a big part of it for me is like. I can remember several times when I was younger, like having a teacher, do a lesson and be like, “Oh well this thing happened,” and then being like well, “Okay I want to know more about that but I don't know how.” And now, you know, I'm an adult, and I have better research skills, so.

Z: Right.

E: I think it's a far more entertaining use of my time, that what I was doing previously. Which was just, laying on the floor and looking at TikTok.

Z: Right. (laughs)

E: (laughs)

Z: TikTok truly, worms in my brain.

E: Yeah.

Z: But, it truly, this is just, even, I mean, we've been batting around the idea of this podcast for a couple months.

E: Mmhmm.

Z: And just getting started, and doing the research and like looking into these stories, has been so much fun.

E: Oh yeah.

Z: And, I know the story that you're going to cover today has been one.

E: Yes.

Z: And I know that I've heard bits and pieces throughout our friendship, pretty much.

E: Mmhmm.

Z: And we've known each other for awhile.

E: Mmhmm.

Z: So I'm excited to get, like the full, like get in there.

E: Yeah, I'm excited about yours too, because like,it-it's, I mean, I think, I feel like maybe comparatively I might know just a tiny bit more about yours than you might know about mine.

Z: Right.

E: Just because I've been to this location.

Z: Right.

E: And I've like snooped around there.

Z: Everyone has in this area.

E: Yeah.

Z: Well, goals for the podcast. Do you have any goals in mind?

E: I want a Lamborghini.

Z: I want to be Mr. Beast.

E: I thought you were *laughs* I thought you were gonna say Mr. Bean.

E&Z: *laugh*

E: Oh my god, which actually-

Z: That too.

E:...derailed, for a second, but this is relevant considering what I just said, um, did you know-do you listen...I know you like Gracie Helbig and Mamrie Hart.

Z: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

E: Do you listen to their podcast?

Z: Oh yeah.

E: Have you heard the one where they talk about how Mr. Bean has wrecked two McLarens?

Z: YES!

E: Apparently the man has like a 170 IQ and a passion, a deep burning passion for sports cars. And he has-I don't know if he has if he has wrecked two different ones or if it's the same one that he's wrecked twice. But he is currently trying to sell it for like 12 million dollars. And that, I have thought about that fact all fucking week. All week. They were talking about cars at work yesterday and I had to just like clench my fists and hold in the fact that I wanted to yell across the expo station, “MR. BEAN HAS WRECKED TWO MCLARENS!” Anyway.

Z: Truly it's a-

E: So sorry, but I had to get that off my chest

Z: Oh my god.

E: Rowan Atkincenter, what is his name? Ronan? Rowan Atkinson?

Z: Mr. Bean?

E: Yeah.

Z: I don't know his-the only thing I know about Mr. Bean is that he has wrecked two McLarens.

E&Z: *laughs*

E: Oh my god..

Z: Um, jesus. Goals for the podcast for me um. Yeah, a Lamborghini would be nice.

E: It would be nice, wouldn't it?

Z: No, truthfully, and I feel like I've said this like 50 times already. It's just getting the information out there. Letting people be in the know about what's going on in the south. Because I feel like *clears throat* excuse me. There's like this weird stigma against the south.

E: For sure.

Z: And it's just poor and dirty...

E: And ignorant.

Z: And ignorant. And like, there's so much that goes on down here that no one really knows about because it is so outside of “normal society?”

E: Yeah.

Z: I guess in other people's eyes? And that's even just like in the United States, even outside of the United States I'm sure that...The south is just like a cesspool of jokes.

E: Yeah.

Z: But-

E: Well I agree with that. I think that it's very much, uh there's a disconnect between like, people who actually live here and people that have never been here. And just like how it's, you know portrayed in the media. There's so. I think there's something like, I don't know the exact statistics, but I'm pretty sure that if you actually look at the numbers there is so much more diversity than in a good deal of the United States. Like, um I was reading something the other day that said that the south, like the American south is one of the most diverse places in terms of like LGBT folks and I'm not sure if that's true. But honestly, I would believe it. But yeah, I think that that's very much, getting the information out there, but also, it's a desire, personally, it's you know, a desire for more information in general.

Z: True.

E: Because-

Z: Yeah.

E: You know, I've lived here my whole life and I feel like I know a lot of cool little bits and pieces about stuff but you can always learn more.

Z: Oh yeah.

E: That is my motto.

Z: 100%.

E: You can always, always find something else out. Even if it's something that you think that you know everything about it, you can always dig deeper and find out more. So.

Z: 100%.

E: For sure, for sure.

Z: This next question is past exploration stories. I'm about to tell one of mine.

E: Okay.

Z: That's my whole story. So, do you have any that you would like to share?

E: Hm...

Z: I mean, I've done like geocaching, that sort of thing, but like.

E: Yeah,

Z: Other than that, like.

E: Yeah. I have been geocaching, I actually, I have been to the location you're going to cover today. And I thought I was going to get in big trouble, because the owner pulled up in his pickup truck and I was so afraid. I was there with my sister and, Vivian, I don't know if you'll hear this. But um, my friend Vivian, and we were walking around. We climbed the steps. We like went-I was too chicken shit to go all the way up to the top because it's a very tall structure and the stairs are very old. And I was like “nope, Imma go halfway but this step is broken, I'm not going any farther.” And then we came back down and this guy pulled up and I was like “Oh god, he's gonna get so mad at us.” He pulled up and we had Vivian's puppy with us and he rolled the window of his truck down, and he was like, “Can I give the dog a biscuit?!” And we were like, “Yes sir you can!” And he just stood there and talked to us for a little while, it was very cool.

Z: Yeah.

E: But yeah, I can't think of anything other than that, not offhand. I would like to make some more.

Z: Yeah. Same.

E: I have not been in an old building in a cool minute. Um, actually, I'm sorry, I did think of one.

Z: No, you're good.

E: Uh, we were walking around, I don't want to triangulate our location. *laughs*

Z: Right.

E: But we were, a couple of my friends and I, were walking around in this, kind of like, like uh small back road I guess you would say near one of their houses. And there was this old kind of a house? I don't know if it was actually a house at one point or if it was just like a shed. But we uh, hiked back a little off the road and went in there, and there was just like all these old bottles. Like, from the '50s all over the floor and that's something that I collect, and I was like “Oh shit, this is private property, I know we're probably trespassing. Imma take some of these bottles.” And I had a coat on with big pockets. So I put a couple of them in my pocket.

Z: *laughs*

E: And we hiked back out, and my mom called me, and I was probably like, I don't know sixteen, seventeen maybe?

Z: Sure.

E: She was like, “Hey where are you?” And I was like “We went for a walk, we're walking back to so and so's house.” and she was like “ Okay well, we'll meet you up there, I have something to give you,” and I was like “okay.” And when she pulled up I was like, “I have something to give YOU.” And she was like “What?” and I pulled out this crusty ass bottle of like vanilla extract from the 1960s, and was like, “Here ya go!” And my mom of course, I get that fascination from her, she also collects that stuff. So she was like, “Wow! This is so cool, where did you get it?” And I was like, “Well...-

Z: *laughs* That spooky building! As the thunder claps.

E:...we went in that spooky house.” And she was like, “Oh my god that's dangerous!!” And I was like, “Well, we already did it.”

Z: Yeah.

E: So yeah, that was fun. I love doing shit like that.

Z: God, me too. Is this trespassing? I love trespassing.

E: (laughs) I do, I do.

Z: Oh my god.

E: Yeah.

Z: Any topics that you wanna cover, discuss, why?

E: I think we both have a list of stuff that we would like to cover in the future.

Z: Right.

E: I will say, I don't want this to be like specifically true crime. Like I don't want to have all my stories be in one genre. I will say that some of them are paranormal related, some of them are true crime related, some of them are just general history.

Z: Same yeah.

E: I am always, I have very much a morbid curiosity.

Z: Same.

E: I will do my best to treat those with respect and there is one in particular that I am very interested to cover, because I have never heard of it, and it happened, like, in the town that I grew up in, which is very small.

Z: Right.

E: Not a whole lot of reported murders, but his name is Joe Shepherd and he was a killer in that area in the 70s I believe? And I was having a conversation with a friend of mine one day, when we were, like, first work shopping this. I don't think we'd even bought our mics yet-

Z: I don't think so either

E:...and we were talking about it, and she was just like, “Oh you know about Joe Shepherd right?” And I said, “No?” And she was like, “ Yeah, he murdered somebody and put her in the wood pile.” And I was like, “EXCUSE ME, how have I never heard this?!” So I uh, I have to, have to know more about that. I gotta know whats going on.

Z: Right. For me it's kind of in the same vein of, I mean my stories are kind of gonna be everywhere, but I'm really excited for my story for the next podcast that we're gonna do. Because it was right around the time where we started really figuring out what we wanted to do for sure with this podcast. And we went to just like a couple of used bookstores just to look for some, just some paper sources. And I found a book that was super cool, very interesting. Loved it, I've read it like twice already.

E: Oh really the whole thing?

Z: It's not very long, but I've read it like twice already, just reading through. The first story in that book is truly whacko-

E: Yeah?

Z:..so I'm going to cover that the next time we record

E: That's exciting.

Z: And I'm really excited for it. It's a missing persons. We won't say true crime, but I'll say it's a missing persons.

E: Yeah, 'cause we're not really sure if a crime was committed. Like I don't really know the whole story obviously but you've told me bits and pieces, and you know, there's several theories right? Of what actually happened?

Z: Oh yeah, I've got a couple theories that I have that I wanna, but we'll get to that.

E: We'll get to that next time.

Z: Alright, so full disclosure, this whole operation, it's just us, it's me and Em and Em and me. We do have an assistant.

E: Vanessa.

Z: Her name is Linda and we love her.

E: We love Tracy with all our hearts

Z: Veronica, she really gets it done. We asked our lovely assistant, Carly, to get some normal ice breaker questions outside of the podcast because it's really, like we said before it's really telling of someone's character to have these questions answered and we just told. We told Carol to go nuts, so.

E: I'm excited for this, because you've had a little bit of a look at these, I don't know anything.

Z: I've read like the first two, and was like okay, I can see the direction that Sharon's going. Okay, so you haven't looked at these, I've read a couple so I'm just gonna go for it.

E: Let's go.

Z: The first one is if you could be on any reality/game show what would you choose?

E: Wheel of Fortune.

Z: Wheel of Fortune?

E: I always loved Wheel of Fortune. Or Jeopardy. I'm not smart enough to be on Jeopardy, but I love Jeopardy. I miss Alex Trebek, rest in peace.

Z: Rest in peace.

E: That man, god fucking bless.

Z: God bless. For me, and you'll know this, here lately, I've been really into discord, like, essentially role play survivor games. They're so much fun. I've applied to play my first one, but they're so much fun to watch. So I would say maybe that, or if it had to be a game show, I'm going to go with either Press Your Luck-

E: Okay.

Z: Or Shop Till You Drop.

E: I don't know what either of those are

Z: Really? Press your-

E: What is press your luck?

Z: Press your luck is the no whammies, no whammies, that one?

E: I don't know what that is.

Z: You don't know that one? I will show you a clip of.

E: I feel like I've heard someone say that.

Z: So well, here's the tea, my grandma would wake up in the mornings and she would watch us before we went to school. She would wake up in the morning, she would make my grandpa food. She would sit her butt in her recliner and turn on game show network, until her husband came home from work, and then she would make him dinner and then she would watch more game shows until she went to bed. That's all this woman did.

E: I love that.

Z: So, this brain-

E: It's in your brain forever.

Z:..is a rolodex of game show trivia, but that one's a fun one. Shop Till You Drop was essentially, I don't know which one came first, but Supermarket Sweep.

E: Okay.

Z: Have you ever seen that?

E: Like guys grocery game?

Z: Kind of, but they don't like cook, so they'll have like a list, like you'll get carrots on aisle five, and tuna on aisle six, and baby formula on aisle 12, and they just, they go for it. And the first to do it wins or whatever.

E: That sounds like a lot of fun. I do love to grocery shop. I think that would be a fun one too.

Z: So number 2, if you could eliminate one food, so that no one ever ate it again, what would you pick to destroy?

E: My gut instinct says tomatoes, because I hate tomatoes.

Z: *whispers* Same.

E: But I do, it's only, like. I like tomato based sauces and I like tomato soup, so I feel like I would regret that choice.

Z: Ketchup.

E: I don't know if you're for or against ketchup.

Z: I like ketchup but I hate tomatoes. I was adding to tomatoes' cause.

E: Yeah. That's a tough one.

Z: I'm gonna go with green beans.

E: I don't think I can agree with you on that one, I'm sorry.

Z: That's fine, you're entitled to your opinion, but I'm destroying green beans.

E: Okay, okay, um, god, that's really hard. I don't, I don't like tomatoes at all. I hate touching them, I hate dealing with them. I work in food service. I could also say mushrooms 'cause I really hate mushrooms.

Z: I love mushrooms.

E: That is something I find so interesting about you.

Z: That I like mushrooms?

E: Yeah, you know. You're kind of a-I don't know much about. I don't know, you're-in my eyes you're kind of a picky eater. Cause you don't like, like lettuce.

Z: I don't like lettuce.

E: What about like a good arugula? Do you like arugula?

Z: What's arugula?

E: Okay, we're gonna get you some arugula. It's a leafy green. You'll probably like, well no okay. I should-I take that back. You like Spinach.

Z: I do like Spinach.

E: Okay.

Z: Baby kale.

E: Do you like kale?

Z: I like baby kale.

E: Oh, okay.

Z: I don't like that-

E: I don't know that I've ever had the baby-

Z: It's just like spinach.

E: I mean it's-okay. Yeah that's fair.

Z: But.

E: Yeah, I'm gonna hard answer, I'm gonna say mushrooms 'cause I really fucking hate mushrooms.

Z: Valid.

E: Alright question 3.

Z: What is your favorite restaurant? In parenthesis, Zack, you cannot say McDonald's.

E&Z: *laugh*

E: Oh.

Z: Well.

E: Oh, Clarice. She's roasting ya.

Z: She really is. Shoot. I'm just going to go with fast food because-

E: Okay.

Z: Restaurants can mean any-

E: Fast food/fast casual, I think that's good.

Z: Sure. Dang, I really like. Well fast casual, I'm going to say Chili's.

E: Ooh yes.

Z: That street corn, honey chipotle tenders.

E: Those honey chipotle tenders, if I ever get married, that's what I want at my wedding.

Z: Catered?

E: Yeah, catered.

Z: Remember when I went to a-if you're hearing this Morgan, I'm sorry, remember when I went to a wedding that was catered by Cracker Barrel?

E: Yes!

Z: Morgan, I love you but, a choice was made. Okay, favorite restaurant?

E: The first thing that popped into my head was Olive Garden.

Z: *gasps*

E: I unironically, unashamedly, unabashedly. I love Olive Garden. I am-

Z: I'm white.

E: Very. Yeah, I am-I think like I don't wanna go all 23 & me, given that I haven't even taken one of those fucking tests. As far ass my family has told me I am like an 8th or a 16th Sicilian or something, so that Italian blood, it makes be crave Olive Garden like nobody's business.

Z: The breadsticks.

E: I see like the sign in the sky and it's like a werewolf to a full moon. And I go crazy.

Z: *laughs* I love Olive Garden.

E: The tiramisu? The chicken gnocchi soup with breadsticks?

Z: Gnocchi!

E: The Tour of Italy? Ah.

Z: The five dollar, to go entrees? You have lunch tomorrow.

E: That is a brilliant business plan.

Z: True.

E: You know what I want? What I desperately desperately want one. The unlimited pasta pass. I have wanted one of those since the day. Justin McElroy did an unboxxing and he got one.

Z: Olive Garden.

E: I really wanted one ever since.

Z: *whispers* Same.

E: Olive Garden sponsor us?

Z: Please god, I know this is our first episode but please.

E: I had an idea for another sponsor. Oh, Subway! Subway should sponsor us.

Z: Truly.

E: I can't believe that neither of us said Subway, actually. We-fun little BTS, behind the scenes, not the K-Pop group, sorry.

Z: Why did my brain go there first?

E: We know why.

Z: Not today. That's a song.

E: LITERALLY every time we've gotten together to brainstorm, put together anything for this show, with the exception of maybe once or twice, that I can't even recall, it's subway every single time, so.

Z: We gotta eat fresh.

E: Somebody, at Subway headquarters, say, “Hey, sponsor The Abandonment Issues-”

Z: Sponsor these people.

E: Plead our case, please.

Z: Please, please, we'll send you merch if we ever

get any.

E: I'll figure it out. I'll use my art degree. Alright. Question four!

Z: If you could take a trip anywhere in the world, where would you go?

E: Hm.

Z: Forks, Washington.

E: Oh my god.

Z: Final answer.

E: Oh my god. That's a good one, shit.

Z: (laughs) 'Cause genuinely, I don't know 'cause there's so many places to go.

E: Yeah, yeah it's very hard. I always did-okay, well on the topic of my Italian heritage.

Z: Oh Jesus.

E: I was supposed to go to Italy my junior year of college and, the trip got canceled because we didn't have enough people to go. And I was very excited for it, and I would still really enjoy it. I would love to go make that trip, because we were going to stay at a farm in Tuscany that's been there for like, I don't even know. Since like 700 A.D. Or some shit.

Z: That is crazy.

E: It's called Spannocchia if you want to look it up. There's this incredible little-they have this website with like a video that you can check it out. You get to eat like all the food that they give you and all the wine that they have is like made on site. We were going-they have like the original wood kiln-

Z: Wow.

E:...on site, and you could make things in their ceramics studio and you fire it in the kiln at the end of the trip. But they also do like chefs and like butchers internships there where you can go over there and learn how to do things the way they do them and I think that's fascinating.

Z: That's really cool.

E: One day I would love to go there.

Z: Oh yeah, 100%.

Z: Get the swear jar ready.

E: Oh god.

Z: What game or movie universe would you most like to live in? Kingdom Hearts.

E: *Did you bring a roll of quarters?

Z: I'm just gonna leave it at that. Kingdom hearts.

E: I know you said game or movie-

Z: Book?

E:...but can I fudge it a little bit and say podcast?

Z: Sure!

E: I would love to be a citizen of the town of Nightvale. I know you don't know anything about Welcome to Nightvale, but boy lemme tell ya. I would live there in a heartbeat. I love it. It's so weird. I know that that's maybe not some people want because it's kind of fucked up. Bad things happen to people there all the time.

Z: Right.

E: But it's that cosmic horror, but in a fun lighthearted way.

Z: Right.

E: That's the best way I can explain it. I just love it so much. Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Kramer.

Z: God bless.

E: God bless you. You two really do some amazing work. I'm literally looking at a signed photograph of Symphony Sanders and Cecil Baldwin right now. They watch over our podcast. But yeah, I would love that. I think that the aesthetic is immaculate. There's deserts, there's glowing lights in the sky above the Arby's.

Z: There's an Arby's in this Universe?

E: Yes bitch! They're just regular people like you and me. There's literally, I wanna say in episode one, there's this beautiful passage where Cecil is like “Lights, blinking in the sky above the Arby's. Not the glowing sign of the Arby's, but something higher.

Z: Did I write this? Did I ghost write this?

E: You could have. I have all the books behind me, I'm very much a fan.

Z: If you could be any mythical creature, what would you be?

E: Hypogriff.

Z: That was a fast but good answer. I would probably be a gnome.

E: (laughs) Oh fuck! Yeah.

Z: I spend my entire life-

E: Yeah.

Z:..being 6 foot tall, I just wanna live a little down there.

E: That's a good one.

Z: Yeah. What small, insignificant thing gives you joy?

E: Thrift store knick knacks.

Z: Sure.

E: That's pretty much the biggest one. I go into Amvets like once a week. And I'll get-I don't have my Keith Urban mug in here. But I get so many tiny dingy things and they always bring me such joy. That tiny little frog that I got at the antique store the last time you and I went, that thing? I'm still riding the high.

Z: For me, I would say it's like when you, complete a book series, and you get that final one and you put it up on the shelf, and you see it on the shelf together. That's my-and it doesn't have to be like, for me it's like books, video games, manga, whatever.

E: Yeah.

Z: Just seeing it complete on the shelf just does it for me.

E: I love that. That's a very good feeling.

E: Yeah.

Z: What is the dumbest purchase you have ever made?

E: Oh Zack, oh Zack, this is a hard question, cause I really-

Z: I don't know! Because I make a lot of dumb purchases.

E: I know exactly what mine is, I'm afraid to say.

Z: Can you say it? What is it?

E: You know what it pertains to.

Z: Do I? Why are you blinking? You don't have to say it if you don't want to.

E: No, I'm gonna say it.

Z: Thank god.

E: So, what was the year? I wanna say 2011/2013.

Z: Uh-oh. I know where we're going!

E: God, I made you promise not to mention this, to not drag me about any of this but i'm going to go ahead and out myself in episode one.

Z: Oh no.

E: I was a backer of the-

Z: Ahaaahaahaaaaa!!!!

E: Stop screaming and just let me get the words out. I was a higher tier backer of the Homestuck Hiveswap Kickstarter in 2013. And that haunts me to this day. To this day I will never-I will never recover from the amount of money that I spent on that when I was god-I was not a legal adult. I spoke to my mother, and I said, “Listen, I need to get this money out of my savings and I need it now.” And she was like, “Are you sure you wanna do that?” and I said, “Yes please.” and then she let me do it. And I respect that she gave me that freedom but I wish that she had just told me no.

Z: That's fair.

E: It was not worth it, and the worst part. It's been like a long time. I still have not played that game.

Z: That's just how the cookie crumbles.

E: Yeah.

Z: Dumbest purchase, my mind just scrambled. Because me and Em just shared a very panicked glance at one another before this story was told and it just jumbled everything I had lined up. I make very-

E: I'm like sweaty.

Z: (laughs)

E: That really stressed me out that I had to admit that. Feel my hand.

Z: Oh, you're clammy!

E: I am disgusting right now.

Z: You're a whole seafood buffet with them clammy hands.

E: I am.

Z: Oh my god. What was the question? Dumbest purchase. I don't know man. I make a lot of dumb purchases. I'm probably, most recently, I'm going to say my book drug dealer.

E: Oh yeah.

Z: Robert. I feel, like I feel obligated at this point to meet up with this man to buy antique books and some of them aren't really the best.

E: But still it's a cool hook-up.

Z: Yeah, I buy them anyway. So, the last time I saw this man, I bought this falling apart copy of Orwell or something.

E: That's pretty dope though.

Z: I mean it's cool, it's got a bunch of his novels and shit. It was pretty cool, but it not in the condition that he said it was in.

E: Aw, that sad.

Z: It's fine. Sorry Robert if you are listening. I'm just going to say that because literally my coworkers put me on a Facebook Marketplace timeout, and I wasn't allowed to buy from Facebook Marketplace.

E: I didn't know about that, oh my god.

Z: They were like, you have to take off two weeks. And I was like, “Fine, that's fine, we get paid in two weeks it's fine.” So, I'm just gonna say that. (laughs)

E: Oh wow.

Z: Question number 9 is what is the longest you have gone without sleep and why? I know mine.

E: Oh man.

Z: I know mine.

E: I mean, the why really for me is-it's one of two answers. College or the pandemic. And I'm leaning more towards the pandemic because I was basically only sleeping like once every other night. Over when I got furloughed from my job last spring. I remember a couple of times I was like, “I'm gonna start a craft project!” and was just cracked out on Monster Energy at 6:00 in the morning, ironing patches onto a denim jacket and shaking my ass to Glass Animals. But yeah, I wanna say the longest amount of time was like three days, but I know you got me beat, I think.

Z: You know mine.

E: Do I?

Z: You know mine. When I was in high school and I watched Men in Black.

E: Yeahhhh.

Z: So I didn't watch Men in Black when I was a child. Probably watched the first one when I was in high school and then I watched the second one, and then there's that whole subplot that there's a universe wrapped around a cat's collar or whatever.

E: It's in his little tag.

Z: It sent me down a rabbit hole. I did not sleep for four days because I was deep in infinite space theory because I just drove myself crazy. Because I was like, “If a cat collar can hold a universe, what if we're the universe inside the cat collar? Which I feel like was the entire point. But it drove me up the walls. I couldn't sleep, I just stayed up for four days straight in front of my computer just googling infinite space theory, and learning more and digging into it, and then I crashed, obviously after four days, and I woke up and was like, “Never again.”

E: Well.

Z: So.

E: I bought a book not long ago, it's called Time Warps. And I opened it and the first two pages this guy starts talking about time travel and the secrets of the universe and everything and reincarnation and physics are all connected and that really reminded me of that. So, maybe I'll read you a little passage of that after this and see if it-

Z: I can't wait.

E:..jogs anything in your brain.

Z: I'll see ya next week and I will still be awake.

E: (laughs) Oh my god.

Z: Last question, who is the most intelligent

person you know?

E: Brownie.

Z: Where is he?

E: He just walked right behind you.

Z: Oh.

E: He's not a person. He's very smart.

Z: That's a tough question.

E: Yeah, that is a really tough question.

Z: I'm gonna say it's our assistant Becky.

E: Yeah, yeah. Trisha, she really, she's probably. What even is her IQ it's gotta be in the 170s?

Z: It's probably at least a thousand.

E: The smartest person that I know of is Mr. Bean. I genuinely can't believe he has an IQ that high. Not anything against that man, I don't know him personally, but the fact that that is the kind of movie that he makes.

Z: Oh my god, and apparently there's only like 12 episodes of that show.

E: 13 I think.

Z: Yeah, so he really stretched it out.

E: Yeah.

Z: I don't know. Welp.

E: Well yeah.

Z: Thank you to Veronica for all those icebreaker questions. Really eye opening.

E: It was great. You really did the damn thing.

Z: Well. I guess that now everyone knows our deepest darkest secrets since we exposed them in episode one, I guess we can kind of get into our topics a little bit?

E: Yeah.

Z: So I feel as if you're gonna go hard.

E: Perhaps, perhaps.

Z: So if you don't mind I'm gonna go first.

E: Okay.

Z: I'm not gonna go as hard as I could. With mine, mostly just because I wanna leave it open for a return, if I want to cover it again maybe later on. My first topic is going to be about the Roundhouse that exists in Tellico Plains, TN.

E: Nice.

Z: Fairly local, kind of close to us for the most part. Here's the issue with this, is that it was a silo for a local mining company and dating back to even before the civil war, this thing was operational. So there's a lot of stuff that has gone on-

E:Okay.

Z:...in this big old building. Another problem is that there's not a plot of information online.

E: Yeah, that was a problem I ran into mine too actually.

Z: Unfortunately, the person who posted this, the beginning of this is going to be a lot from Reddit.

E: Oh, okay.

Z: The person who posted this is a local urban explorer. I've seen some of their stuff, all of their stuff is really cool, their photographs are amazing. They do posts on Facebook and stuff here and there. All of their stuff is really well researched and really good, but I don't want to set a trend of making Reddit a, you know.

E: For sure, it's not like a primary source. So do you want to-did you make note of who that person was though.

Z: Yeah, the post that was made thearcherofred on Reddit. That is their username. When we post all of our sources I will give a link to this specific person I am talking about.

E: Excellant.

Z: Yeah, that's the problem I ran into and I guess that's probably why I didn't get as into it. Mostly because I wanted to leave it open so I could share a little bit about my own experience when I went.

E: Cool, okay.

Z: I am going to give a little bit of a backstory about the area, the place, what all happened. Like I said this was a post made by thearcherofred on Reddit, all one word. About 30 years after the Civil War, Southern Slate Works purchased the land where the Roundhouse exists now. This land before used the be part of the Tellico Iron Works Company. The Iron Works Company basically mined iron and other ores during the Civil War. It was demolished during the war, and really from what I can tell, nothing really happened in this area where the Roundhouse exists now up until it was purchased on December 7th of 1893.

E: Okay.

Z: In June of 1920, J.B. Preston bought 300 acres of land from another citizen of Tellico named Cyril Herford with the intent to mine the area. It is unknown if this was part of the Southern Slate Company or a solo kind of gig. Preston had plans of making a fully working mine complete with machinery, houses for the mine workers, storage facilities, and other stuff you'd need to run a mine. He also was-he was also given permission to construct a railroad system to the mine and the quarry was set to open on January 1st 1921. He then leased this area out to Tennessee Rocks Products Company and it was operational from 1921-1928. In '22 Cyril then sued the rock company because some of the debris had gotten into the creek that ran through his property and it polluted the water. There was another lawsuit that same year against the rock company. This lawsuit came from a local farmer named Henry Fritts. He was suing for very similar reasons as Herford, because the dust coming from the mines and quarry had killed crops and vegetation. That lawsuit was settled for 600-I'm assuming there's no information about the 1st lawsuit, because there was no information on this post about it. From what I can tell, nothing really happened after that, company shut down until 1928-er shut down in 1928, that is until the mid to late 50s.

E: Okay, that's kind of a long time.

Z: Yeah, it's a minute. At this point, a man named Dr. William Alfred Rogers purchased the property in the 50s, and he was a local practicing doctor. A little bit about Mr. Rogers, he was born in Violet, NC. During the late 50s he was one of 6 doctors that lived in the Tellico Plains area during that time. He had a small stone house, that stood in downtown but eventually he built a large three story home on Unicoi Mountain.

E: Oh, okay.

Z: He thought that the high altitude would help his more chronic patients, so that's why he wanted his house to be so far up in the mountains. Rodgers and his wife ran the practice out of their home for about six years before the couple had the idea of turning the silo into a hotel/Air BnB. Not Air BnB. Sorry, that's the Gen Z in me speaking. Just a B&B. Just a normal B&B.

E: A 1950s Air BnB.

Z: Beautiful, ahead of their time, truly.

E: You get a telegraph after and they're like, “How was your stay? Please rate us.”

Z: God. So he essentially divided the space inside the silo into multiple floors and created small apartment like rooms on each story. Supposedly, right when it was set to open, a fire marshal came to inspect it and it was deemed unsafe as there needed to be two clear exits from each room, but there was only one considering that it's a large tall vertical-

E: It's just a tube.

Z: It's literally, quite literally a tube. I will. I will post some pictures and some links to some pictures so you can kind of see. But truly, it's an old silo, it's a big stone, round silo. Cylinder, and on the outside there's a staircase that leads into the first floor but there's essentially just a round staircase that-

E: It's like a fire escape.

Z: It just wraps around the outside of it and that's how you would go up there and get into your little hotel room or whatever. The fire marshal said it was no good so they couldn't really open it as a hotel.

E: So did it ever have guests like that? Or did he just kind of kill that immediately?

Z: It's hard to really pin down what really happened after that. Some sites claim that Mr. Rogers and his moved into the Roundhouse after this and they continued the practice there. Other sites claim that they went back to the house at Unicoi and ran the practice out of it. I also read somewhere, and I couldn't really pin it down again, now that I started doing the research on it again but there were some rumors about someone running a restaurant out of it.

E: I think I've heard that one actually.

Z: And it was just on the first floor, it wasn't on any of the other floors, I think there's 5 stories in that thing. I couldn't really find that again, so I don't really have any information on it. The doctor passed away 10 years after this ordeal in '67, and it has just kinda sat dormant since then, aside from the possible restaurant owner being in there, but there's not really a whole lot to go off of on that route. Unfortunately as of now, the inside of the roundhouse has been completely destroyed by vandals. The walls are covered in graffiti and there was a house that was right next to it, and again, I can't really pinpoint what that was really for. I would assume that it was probably just another house that was-

E: Yeah, I heard from somewhere that that was something to do with the hotel aspect of it.

Z: Sure, I mean. I wouldn't doubt it, but that house is all but rotted to the ground. I've been inside, and the floor is rotted to the ground. There's no foundation, there was also a large fire that happened inside the roundhouse. Can't really pinpoint a date or time. Because it sat, it was just out in the middle of nowhere.

E: Not necessarily keeping track or reporting that to-

Z: Right.

E:...anyone.

Z: It basically made everything from the bottom floor to the top floor inaccessible. I've been on the top floor. Probably wasn't that smart of a move.

E: Prolly not.

Z: I was like 17, and you're invincible at 17, nothing matters. We went up there and just kind of hung around, and I'll talk about that in a second. But that basically made all the other floors inbetween inaccessible. That's really, literally all I could find online about it. I definitely have tried to join the local library to get some book sources or something about it, but I'm currently fighting with our local library. It's so shrouded in mystery that no one really knows what's going on in there. We've got a couple reports about the lawsuits and the early 20s. Nothing until the 50s, and then this random guy wants to build a hotel there, and someone says no and it just sits there again.

E: Do you know-I know when we first started doing the research, we were talking about how it was for sale. Do you know if it still is or did it get bought?

Z: I looked at it yesterday before I was putting the finishing touches on everything. It is currently off the market, it was not sold, but it is off the market. It was going for upwards of like $500,000.

E: I would love to buy it.

Z: Same I would also-Subway?!

E: Subway sponsor us!!

Z: Please.

E: Subway just buy us The Roundhouse.

Z: We will put a Subway in the bottom floor.

E: (laughs) Like the food court in a mall.

Z: Truly. That's all the information that I have on it.

E: Well tell us your story.

Z: Well, when I was like 17/18, I worked at a local grocery store and one of my cashiers, the current at the time, the caretaker now is a new guy, but at the time she was friends with-the caretaker was a family friend. And she basically reached out to him and was like, “Hey we wanna explore after work one night. Do you think it would be cool if we went up there?” And he was like, “Yeah, sure no problem, let me know and I'll leave the gate unlocked for you guys.”

E: Cool.

Z: We went up there after work and it was probably like 10/11 o'clock and we were just gonna check it out and then leave, but I was just very curious and very fascinated so we went into the first floor and I will try to dig up photos because I took photos. The test of time has not been kind to them-

E: Absolutely not.

Z:...with phones and just everything, I think they're on my twitter somewhere so I have to really dig and find them, but like I said, the first floor there was a fire. You can look up and see the damage has been done to this place. It's covered in graffiti. We kind of poked around a little bit, there's not really much to see. There's old appliances, wood here and there, debris, vandalism, that sort of thing. We found the beginning of the staircase that leads up around the side of the Roundhouse and we climbed up to inspect it, about halfway up, it's broken-

E: Yeah that was-

Z: Very teetery.

E: Yeah.

Z: Once you get over that step it's solid again, bolted into the side of that wall or whatever, and you just keep on trucking. We went up to the top and we sat down on the floor up there, we pulled out a Ouija board.

E: Oh my god Zack.

Z: (laughs) Not my finest moment.

E: (laughs)

Z: It wasn't even a good Ouija board, it was obviously, very much produced by Hasbro, and it had the glow in the dark light in it, to where if you pushed down on the planchette it would glow.

E: Oh my god.

Z: Obviously, we got nothing because nothing happened in that building.

E: I can't believe it.

Z: Then we went back down the stairs and then we went into the house that's next to it. Like I said, there was very few places where I was comfortable standing. Floors rotted, walls punched in, knocked in, burned. We were able to go up-there's an attic.

E: Oh really?

Z: Yeah, there's an attic in there. I wasn't able to go-I didn't go up in it because I didn't really trust it. I stood at the top of the staircase and peered in a took a picture or two.

E: Cool, I never knew that.

Z: Then, we discovered a basement.

E: Oh god! Under that same house?

Z: Yeah. Here's the deal. You didn't know this did you? About the basement?

E:About the basement, no.

Z: So there's a basement, and the stairs have rotted off, so you kinda had to hop in that hole and-

E: Love it.

Z: We got down there, and it was trash.

E: Yeah.

Z: Broken glass, beer bottles, cans, old screen doors, anything that you could think of, old appliances everything, underneath that house. Then I saw a little filter of light off in the distance, so I was like, I'm gonna go in that direction. There was a tunnel.

E: I know you were going to say a tunnel and I was so afraid.

Z: A tunnel that lead directly underneath the roundhouse.

E: Bro!

Z: It's crazy.

E: That's really cool. Very scary.

Z: Very scary. I was like, “This is some-,” have you every seen House of Wax?

E: No but I think I know what you're talking about.

Z: Very House of Wax. Secret-

E: Like trap doors and stuff.

Z: Was not a fan. So then after that we kinda booked it outta there. 'Cause I was like, “Who's idea was it, to build a tunnel-,” I don't even want to know. I'm sure there was a reason.

E: I wonder if was with the intent of it being a hotel, if it was a service hallway or something like that?

Z: I mean, has to be. Has to be. Otherwise-

E: It's the only non-creepy answer.

Z: It's what's gonna let me sleep at night.

E: Oof.

Z: After that we kinda hightailed it out. I have since reached out to that cashier, and obviously neither of us work there anymore. I've since reached out, and asked if she knew who the current caretaker was and unfortunately that caretaker had passed away. There's currently a new one.

E: I wonder if that was the guy I met that gave us a dog biscuit.

Z: Might've been if he was nice.

E: He was just a nice old man.

Z: I never met him, but I'm assuming if he let a group of teenagers go wild out at the Roundhouse he probably didn't care and was a nice guy.

E: That's sad.

Z: Like I said a minute ago, it's not on the market, but when it does come on the market, I will be very eager to see if it sells this time. Hopefully, to me.

E: Maybe by then we'll get some sponsorship cash.

Z: Olive Garden please.

E: Can I trade an unlimited pasta pass for this house?

Z: Truly.

E: It's worth it's weight in gold.

Z: Truly, 'cause you think about it. We go to Olive Garden three times a day, lunch, dinner, second dinner. We don't eat breakfast anymore.

E: Oh my god, well I don't eat breakfast to begin with. Who has time for that nonsense?

Z: I do, but only because I'm at work.

E: Eating a banana. You're being very healthy.

Z: I'm eating a banana, having a monster.

E: Alright, well.

Z: Well, that's it for the Roundhouse. Like I said, thearcherofred on Reddit, thank you so much for that post. They're a couple more that they have made about the Roundhouse. I've only used the one, so feel free to look into it yourself. I'll be posting a couple links to some pictures, and hopefully I will be able to find the pictures that I took when I went. We'll post all those.

E: Thank you very much for that story. Today-

Z: Please, go off.

E:...I'm very excited about this story, because this is a story that has fascinated me literally since my childhood. I remember my teacher telling me about it when I was in, I wanna say 5th grade. Then, it turned out that there was a book about this guy, and I had the book because it was my dad's copy, and that's actually the copy that I used today for all my research. I am about to tell you the story of Mason Kershaw Evans-

Z: Yeeesss!

E:...the Hermit of Chilhowee Mountain.

Z: Yes.

E: Basically, my sources-I did have a couple, just for a little bit of fleshing out about the area and a couple facts about the specific region, but everything about Mason himself came from the book. As I discovered, the man doesn't even have a Wikipedia page.

Z: Right.

E: Which isn't really that surprising to me. 'Cause the area that he was from was a very tiny place, it was in the early 19th century. There wasn't a whole lot.

Z: Right.

E: So, let's get into it! Our story takes place in the area surrounding Chilhowee Mountain, which is more commonly known today as Star Mountain, but it was named that because of a plantation owner named Caleb Star, who back in the day, he basically owned the entire mountain. Chilhowee Mountain is located partly in the southwest corner of Monroe County, TN and in Polk County. It is in the Cherokee National Forest. The flat, plateau like mountain is about halfway between Tellico Plains and Etowah and it's elevation ranges from 750 to 2,290 ft. This mountain was a favorite hunting ground for deer. So that's actually how it got it's name, because Chilhowee means cold deer in Cherokee. During the 19th century, this area was the home to Mason Evans. As I said before, it's kind of hard to find anything about him on the internet, he doesn't have a Wikipedia page, so everything I know about him I pulled from this book, Torment in the Knobs by R. Frank. McKinney. To quote the book, “This book was written give it's readers the highlights of the main events from the early advent of the early white settlers in the area during the early 20s, during the Hiwassee purchase of 1817, the removal of the Indians in 1838, the great American Conflict, The Civil War of the 60s, the building and operation the fabulous White Springs Hotel atop Star Mountain, the coming of the railroads into McMinn County, and many other events of that century. So it's not just about Mason's life, it kind of encapsulates basically everything that was going on in this area at the time. Because there was a lot of stuff going on, there was a lot of conflict, it was the time of the Civil War. It was a lot. It is a very interesting read, it's one of the more detailed accounts of this area, however, it's not without it's flaws. It was published in 1976. R. Frank McKinney was an old white man living in a very rural area of the south. He had some prejudices. I'm not really going to talk about that a whole lot, but if you do decide to-if this story does interest you and you do decide to get a copy of this book and read it, just go into it knowing that. There is also a lot of dramatization and speculation. That is explained by, another quote from the book that said, “Torment in the Knobs is a historical novel but throughout the author was at many times forced to draw his own conclusions to what was said in the conversations or dialogues between the people. This he believed was actually said, but not verified. The pages of the book are mostly written in the newspaper reporting style, but not all in together for into the phraseology of fiction writers. In many places, it combines the two. There would have been no need to write this book, Torment in the Knobs had there been a printed history of the east side of McMinn County and the lower regions of Monroe during the 19th century. What little had been printed in the newspapers and periodicals was wildly scattered and never compiled into a comprehensive history of the area. This book is not intended to be a history of either McMinn or Monroe counties, although the events mentioned took place in one or the other. The book was inspired by this pamphlet and was written in 1890 by W. F. McCarron, who was the founder and editor of The Athenian newspaper. The pamphlet was called-this is a hell of a title. I thought The Abandoment Issues was kind of a long name. This pamphlet was titled The Wild Man of Chilhowee: the True Story of Mason Evans the Hermit, 40 Years in the Wilderness, the Most Wonderful Creature of Modern Times Lives in a Cave in this County, Subsists on Raw Meats and Stolen Food. That's the whole ass title of a pamphlet.

Z: A pam-that's the whole pamphlet!

E: Yeah, literally. The book also says the great many people thought was a legend was unfolded as fact as 90 years later when a house in east Etowah was being raised to the ground. An 1890 issue of The Athenian was found in a chimney and brought to me, the author R. Frank Mckinney, who was then the editor of The Etowah Enterprise. Mickinney also did extensive research and interviews with local folks who's parents and grandparents has either met Mason, or had seen them visit their homesteads. Okay, so, there's this hermit..

Z: (laughs) I was waiting for it! Oh my god.

E: So there's this hermit..R. Frank Mckinney is the king of the fucking run-on sentence. This man could ramble. I think he's dead now? Probably. He had a lot to say, and not a whole lot of punctuation to put in it.

Z: He had a lot to say and no comma, period, comma splice was gonna get in his way.

E: Lots of question marks though. That is evidenced by his introduction to the story of what happened to Mason Evans. He said, “What happens to a man when his sweetheart suddenly jilts him? Does he take it in stride, or does his brain snap and he resort to unearthly things? What really did happen that day in 1848 in that little school house in Monroe County, TN, that caused a brilliant teacher to suddenly walk out of the school room, head to the mountains, never to say another intelligent word? And live there on snakes, rabbits, or other raw meat and whatever he could forage from mountaineers' chicken houses or gardens, and for forty years? Let's find out.

Z: Let's. Find. Out.

E: Mason was born May 10, 1824 in a log cabin at the base of the Chilhowee Mountain. At the time, the Chilhowee Mountain region was occupied primarily by the Cherokee Trible of the Native Americans. The capital of their nation, Chota, was only a few miles from the Evans's home. Mason's parents were names Robert, I'm sorry if I pronounce this wrong, I believe it's Hebrew. Her name is Karen-Happuch. That is K A R E N – H A P P U C H. I think Karen-Happuch.

Z: Okay.

E: I'm not sure though. They immigrated to Greene county in 1820, but they moved to Monroe after the Hiwassee purchase of 1817. The Evans' family was of Quaker faith, and their family consisted of Robert and Karen-Happuch, and their four boys and five girls: Moses, Robert, Mason, Samuel, Abigail, Sophia, Demaris, Caroline, and Octavia. Don't you just love that name? I love an Octavia.

Z: It's so out of left field though.

E: It is. I wonder-is that like a biblical name?

Z: I don't think so.

E: I've never thought of it as such but maybe it is.

Z: I don't think so, but go off, Imma google.

E: Mason was said to be the most talented of those children. I don't know how I'd feel about that as a Sophia or an Octavia in that family. Mason-that's kinda not fair, you don't get to be the best. Anyway, art seemed to come naturally to him. His penmanship was the talk of the settlement. Men in the region would commonly come to him to solve medical problems. In his youth, Mason was good friends with many of the Cherokee children of his age. He was 14 when the Native American Removal began, and it impacted him for the rest of his life. I mentioned Caleb Starr before, he's the one that lived on this mountain and basically gave it its current name. I had never heard anyone call it Chilhowee, fun fact, until recently. One of his son's named James was very active in Cherokee politics and he actually worked to negotiate the treaty that would result in the Trail of Tears.

Z: Ah.

E: Because of his native ancestry, eventually forced him and his own family to leave home and move westward, and he was accused-rightfully fucking so-of selling out the Natives to the white man. Eventually he was killed because of this. James, come the fuck on, what did you expect?

Z: Truly. Hello? Okay.

E: I don't want to make light of that obviously, because it was this horrible thing. At one point I had the numbers written down here, but I must have moved them. Thousands and thousands of people lost their lives on the Trail of Tears and this man basically was just-

Z: Didn't help!

E: Yeah, I don't know what he was-what he thought was going to happen. His whole family had to leave and give up their land. Hundreds of other families had to, too. Caleb Starr, as I said was a slave plantation owner and he had many 100 slaves. This is another really grim part of the story, because the way it is written, it kind of makes it sounds very praisy? They basically kind of put him on a pedestal a little bit, and they talk about about how-they talk about how much the people Caleb Starr literally bought and sold adored him and how much pride they took in their work they took for him. It is said when he left on the Trail of Tears some grieved themselves to death and were buried alongside the waters of Conasauga Creek. And that may have been true, they were grief stricken but it really grossed me out that a book written in like the 20th century was like, “Yes, this man was great, he owned 100s of people.”

Z: Yeah.

E: Anyways, but that's just-I only included that to highlight the way that it is kind of a biased telling of the story, but again it was pretty much the only source I had. Within a year the treaty was signed and the removal began in 1838. What at one time had been 50,000 square miles of native territory were reduced to only a few hundred. Until he saw them driven from their homes to an unwanted territory in the west, Mason Evans pleaded the case of the white settlers. After 1838, he formed a different opinion but kept it to himself, is what the book says.

Z: Okay.

E: I would imagine that was a pretty traumatic experience. Having all these friends and then seeing them be forced to move away.

Z: Right, yeah.

E: Anyways, so Mason went on to become a captain of a militia commissioned as such by the governor in 1841. He was 17 years old. Then, in his adulthood, instead of-I think he was supposed to go on to be a general or something. Initially thought he would have a career with the military, but he was so smart we would really rather you be a teacher, so he accepted a job as a teacher at a local school. Now we get into 'The Heartbreak' is what I have titled this chapter.

Z: Yay.

E: Essentially, the cause that is attributed to Mason deciding to go off into the wilderness forever is that he had his heart broken by his sweetheart. No one knows her true identity. What is known about her, is that she was the daughter of a prominent doctor in the area. “She was the apple of his eye, an only child whom he love more than life.No one would say, nor was it in print who the prominent doctor was, or what was his daughter's name. Was it because people wanted to protect the girl? Or was it because the doctor was so influential in Monroe County, that no one would even think to breathe a scandal such as the Mason Kershaw Evans affair.” It's all written very dramatically.

Z: Right.

E: Like a tabloid, but she was a co-teacher with Mason at the same school. They spent a lot of time together in the schoolhouse, but they would also go out together and roam around in the forest. They would ride their horses together. Mason would paint pictures for her, and draw for her. They just had a great time together. When he proposed to her, and she accepted. Mason didn't really wanna tell anybody, but she insisted that she had to tell her daughter, and he was like, “Okay, well, you tell your father, and I'll tell my mother and that'll be the only people that we tell.” Earlier, before we got started this was one of those where you could tell I was getting tired of their bullshit and just tired in general. Despite her anonymity, the author of the book gave her a name, that I quite honestly to be fucking hilarious. Dawn O'Day, and I put here, “Like bitch what is she, a leprechaun?”

E&Z: (laughs)

E: The whole that there was, there's this very dramatic story of her birth because Mason's mom a midwife, and though her father was a doctor, he decided it was bad luck to deliver your own baby, so he called for Mason's mother because she was an experienced midwife, and she was actually pregnant with Mason at the time. He and Dawn are only a few months apart in age, so she was born at the brink of day, and so the author was like, her name is Dawn O'Day.

Z: Oh-

E: Yeah

Z:...my god. What's his name again? The author?

E: R. Frank McKinney.

Z: R. Frankly, I don't like it.

E: (laughs) As I said, Mason's mother was the midwife who delivered his eventual sweetheart. What?

Z: Another thing.

E: What?

Z: I wouldn't care about bad luck. Well, I guess this was a different time period. But-

E: Yeah.

Z:...just, it's free. Just have the baby, you ain't gotta worry about it.

E: That's free real estate.

Z: That's free real estate, truly, but I mean, as soon as I said it, I was like “They didn't really have hospital bills.” But!

E: Well here's the thing that bothers me too about this whole debacle in the-I had a lot more of this whole birth scene when I initially was doing my notes because it was just. It's so hard to tell what of this was actually true, and what of it was speculation because everything seems like it was speculation the way that it was written.

Z: Right.

E: Basically there's this whole scene Dawn's mother is obviously in distress, she's in labor, she's in pain, and he just fucking backhands her and tells her to quiet down, and then she dies. Yeah, she fucking dies. She dies in childbirth. Okay first of all, he smacked the hell out of her, she falls back quote, “whimpering onto the pillow,” he drugs her to keep her calmer, and when she does deliver the baby, she dies. And he's like “Oh my god, my wife died, and I slapped her.” Like no shit. First, you shouldn't be slapping your wife in the first place, what the hell? That really-I'm sorry I just got real loud.

Z: No you're fine, speechless.

E: Oh, it frustrated the hell out of me. I could really go on about this book. He slaps the mother of his child, until she literally falls back on the bed, she dies, and that is part of why he was so protective of his daughter. Ironically, in turn, when Mason was born the doctor was the one that they called on to deliver him. This family structure, this community, they're all very tight nit, it's a very small place, they all know each other. As they got older, Dawn was very drawn to Mason because of his skills in the arts. She quickly became friends with him. She was allowed to spend some of her free time hanging out with Mason, but her father said, “Mason Evans is a bright chap, but I just don't have any use for soldiers.” It was speculated that he felt this way because he maybe had something in his past that made him kind of resent the military. A lot of people in this story in particular were draft dodgers for the Revolutionary War, which is a really weird thing to think about.

Z: 100%

E: I don't know why, I never really thought about the Revoutionary War having been-having had a draft. I guess that makes sense?

Z: Yeah.

E: It's possible that that's why he felt that way. He in general was very possessive and protective of his daughter. So she never really brought up the topic of her having any sort of affection for Mason until he proposed to her, and she said, “Well, I have to tell my dad.” She went home, and when she told him that she had intended to marry Mason, they had this massive argument and he forbade her to marry him. As incentive for her to not marry him, he promised her the farm and $1,000.00 in gold if she would turn Mason down. Now, I didn't google how much $1000.00 would have been in 1820 whatever, actually no that was later. I think this is like 1840. This is also one, in your story you had said there aren't a lot of really exact dates. There are very few exact dates in this too. Basically, I have his birth date and his death date and anything pertaining to the Civil War that was recorded by the government, but nothing specific in between. So, he promised her the farm and $1000.00 in gold, and he said, “Compare that to tending babies, scrubbing floors, tilling the ground, never having money of your own, your own husband being gone from home, soldiering, leaving you with all the chores to do. If you're in your right mind, you'll never do it.” And I have here, which, this guy was a raging shithead, but he did make some valid points. I would take that money.

Z: (whispers) Same. And a farm?!

E: A farm?! Yes.

Z: Cottagecore!

E: Yes, exactly.

Z: I don't mean to scream.

E: It's fine. That's how you feel about cottagecore.

Z: I love it, I love it.

E: Dawn didn't go to school the following morning. Mason received a note from her father's gardener, informing him that she would not be in school that day, and her students were to be sent home and return the day following. Mason accepted that, but he was acting very strangely after that. He was very anxious, and his students were taking notice. “At times he would lose his train of thought, stop his teaching, stare into space, and after a moment of silence, would again gain his pupils attention by frequently running his fingers through his hair, laughing foolishly, and whispering to himself.” Students feared that he had been bewitched because they had seen him act similarly at religious camp meetings, writhing, wringing his hands and crying. There's another quote here, “This was the first time anything had happened to him since the time he fell sick at his brother's home in Mississippi several years back.” He had gotten really ill. I don't think they ever said exactly what he had, but he had a very high fever. This is kind of where they think things started to really effect him, because he was kind of-It was a a high enough fever to where it was starting to effect his brain function, and they think that that may have permanently damaged his brain. His brother had actually said he had congestion of the brain, but Mason said, “But I wasn't crazy.” This is another-basically, any quote that I'm gonna say is certainly written by R. Frank McKinney, not by the actual people that said them. It says, “But I wasn't crazy, it was the high fever that caused me to go out of my mind,” he rationalized with himself. Mason had studied enough medicine to know something about fever. If he hadn't became a teacher, he would certainly have became a doctor, as he had said many times before. He wrote all of this behavior off of his anxiety and he told himself that he would see Dawn after class. The gardener came back, and brought him another note, telling him not to leave until Dawn showed up. Which I think is kind of funny, because why send this poor man to the schoolhouse, when you could have just said “She ain't coming to school today, also Mason, hang out for a little bit after.”

Z: Yeah.

E: Put it in the same note!

Z: Yeah.

E: I digress. So Dawn comes up, and they have this fight, she breaks it off with him. She basically does that whole thing of, even though she didn't actually hate him, she played it up like she really hated him, just to make it a cleaner break, which I get, I guess.

Z: Been there.

E: Yeah, it happens. Doesn't make it hurt any less, but that's what happened. He was devastated, and he got on his horse and he rode away into the forest to be alone. After that, he eventually went home, but Mason didn't come inside to get his food like he always did. His mom looked outside and she saw him run into the barn, grab a coat of a hook, and run back into the woods, leaving his horse behind. She said to his brother Milton, “Mason's gone off without his supper, wonder where he's headed for?” Milton replied, “To Panther Cave, I guess.” That's where he's gone a lot lately to write poetry and compose songs for that female school teacher. He said that Panther Cave is the quietest place in the Knobbs for when you wanna meditate.” Now what we'll learn here is that Mason is a douche. Oh, not Mason, sorry, Milton. Milton very much hated this girl. He, the whole time is portrayed as just thinking she has the worst of intentions. He literally calls her a witch at one point. That's another thing about this, all the exaggeration I've talked about before, instead of portraying as what I believe it to be, and what I think most people that would read this in modern times to believe, is that Mason was sick, he had some underlying illness and his behaviors after this point were possibly inflamed by trauma. To me it all reads as very much this man had undiagnosed mental illness in the 1840s. However, they demonize the shit out of Ms. Dawn O'Day.

Z: Great.

E: Constantly talking about Mason is wandering around in the woods just thinking about how he misses her, thinking about how she destroyed his life. Milton is constantly quoted as saying she ruined everything for him, and destroyed his future. It's fucked. Literally, all she did was break up with him.

Z: Right.

E: That really is another beef I have with this book. Panther Cave. Panther Cave is this cave on the western side of Chilhowee Mountain that was as the name implies known for being a hiding place for panthers and it became Mason's primary hide out in the years following this event. His family went looking for him there after he ran away, but they didn't find him because he had already left, and he was on his way back to the house. That evening, they heard someone in the barn and they thought that someone had broken in. When his father went in to investigate, he found Mason sitting on the floor in his horse's stall hugging his legs. Which, they say, this is a great horse, but I would not wanna be down there.

Z: No.

E: A horse could kill you straight up with one kick.

Z: Oh yeah.

E: Not the point.

Z: Mason's crying, he's sitting on the floor hugging his horses legs. He keeps repeating to his family, “I had to see my horse, I had to see my horse, he's the only one that would understand me.” And same, Mason I get it. Listen I understand you. I was a horse kid, okay? My mom still has horses. They're good animals. You still coulda got kicked in the head. His family convinced him to stay and have a meal with them. His mother told him to sit down at the table but he wouldn't. “Instead he began pacing the floor with bodily agitations and jerks. He ran his hands through his hair, jerking his head back and forth, then letting his body fall on the floor, writhing as if in extreme pain. Robert and Milton tried to get him off the floor but he fought them off. Finally, Mason righted himself, began to sing in words never heard before, singing most melodiously, not from the mouth or nose, but but entirely from the breast. I don't-that still boggles my mind, I have no idea. He would run from one end of the kitchen to the other and back again, often barking and grunting with each stroke of his head. His family basically thought what was happening to him was “a spell,” similar to behavior that they had seen people exhibit at Methodist camp meetings. Such as like speaking in tongues, that kinda thing. Mason was obviously in distress and they didn't know what to do. One of his parents said, “Mason's just like the man in the Bible that was possessed by demons, full of unclean spirits, until Jesus sent them into a heard of swine. But what could have caused such a thing? That was another point in which Milton was like, “It's all that woman's fault.” called her a witch. Like I said, they didn't have any idea what was happening because they had no understanding of mental illness or any kind of brain injury, knowledge or anything like that.

Z: Right.

E: So they just tried to make him comfortable and placate him. They finally fed him, and it said, “Mason ate his meal ravenously, with his hands rather than any other utensils. He ate everything they put in front of him and downed two quarts of coffee.” Which sounds like a great day. I would love for that to be me.

Z: Same.

E: I wanna do that.

Z: Same.

E: They tried to convince him to explain what had happened, but he jumped up from the table, grabbed a knapsack from a hook on the wall, and ran back into the woods. His brother Milton was a medical student and he insisted that one day he would become a doctor and he would fix Mason's problems. We're gonna time skip a little bit.

Z: Sure.

E: In July of 1850, there was a 10 day stretch of near constant rain. It brought widespread flooding to the region. Many people were forced out of their homes, and dead animals, human waste, and debris were washing up in massive quantities on the farmland. I feel like I should specify, in this area where this is all taking place. It's a lot of flood planes between mountains, so when it rains, even now, it's really easily flooded. Ten straight days of rain is bad. It was very bad. Mason, at this point, had been living in the wilderness about two years. His father had sold off his horse because Mason wasn't around to care for him. He gave him the money from the sale, he was paid $100.00, and he told Mason that he needed to take it and use it, but Mason didn't want it. He put it in his backpack, and just let this $100 bill get shredded up in his backpack.

Z: Mason.

E: Yeah. He didn't have any use for money, he was out in the woods-

Z: Fair.

E:...and at this point he had become an expert at chicken snatching, taking food from gardens in the middle of the night, anything that he could find, he could eat. He was an expert forager, he knew all the berries and roots and stuff he could eat. He did eat all his meat raw, but he didn't really have anything to cook with in a cave.

Z: You gotta do whatcha gotta do.

E: Yeah, although it's not like he didn't know how to light a fire, it's just he apparently didn't cook his food. That didn't kill him, so I guess it's okay. Disclaimer, if you're listening to this, and you're considering the Mason Evans Diet, don't.

Z: Don't.

E: Don't. Cook your chicken thoroughly. At this point, he'd lived out there for two years. Dogs would bark and chase him up trees and hunters had to come and call them off to rescue him, because they would tree him like a bear. Overall, he was adapting to his new life. He was learning how to function out in the wilderness, but things were about to take a turn because the Evans family was victim to a lot of the flooding damage. They lived right on the banks of the creek and they had to clean up a lot after the storms. By this point, all of Mason's siblings had grown up and moved away and gotten married, so his parents were all alone to deal with this. This is topical, unfortunately, the flooding brought with it something much worse than just property damage, it brought illness. There was an epidemic of typhoid fever, and people just started dropping like flies. Entire families were dead in days. Milton had gone to Knoxville to go to medical school. He was called home, not because they were enlisting all the doctors in the region to care for people, but because both of his parents died like (snaps fingers) immediately.

Z: Jesus.

E: It was horrible. He said, “I wonder how many people thought to boil the water before drinking it.” 'Cause they wouldn't have known.

Z: Right.

E: That was a lot of what was killing people was they were drinking unclean drinking water. The Evans family all came together to make arrangements for their parents, and the question came up, “What do we do about Mason?” Milton, always the spokesman of the group, decided he was going to track his brother down, but when he did find him, he decided to just yell at him. He told him that he was disgusting and that he looked like a wild animal, that he didn't look like a person at all anymore. He told him, “If you'll come and get cleaned up you can go with me, but not before. You can't see Ma and Pa looking like that.” He was just now finding out that his parents had died, he's already traumatized by a number of other things. Mason of course, didn't want to hear it and he ran off into the woods again. He didn't do what Milton told him to do, however he did attend their funeral. He followed the procession of, there was like a wagon with matching white horses that carried their caskets. It's described in this very beautiful and flowery way that honestly, genuinely very sad, and his parents were buried at Hickory Grove Cemetery, while Mason watched from the woods. After that, this is where things are getting up into the Civil War, because we are coming up on the 1860s. At this time, the construction was finishing up on the White Cliff Springs Hotel. It is a very important location in Mason's life, in his history. The owner, Harvey McGill, and instructed Jonas and Betsy Jefferson, the couple that ran the hotel kitchen, to attend to all of Mason's needs. They would feed him, and often, Mr. McGill would come to the kitchen while Mason was there and he would talk to him and kind of give him the scoop on what was going on. I also feel like I should mention at this point, Mason basically went non-verbal. He didn't really speak very much, if at all. At lot of time in the book they describe him as kind of communicating in grunts and hand gestures, but it wasn't that he didn't understand things that people were saying to him. A lot of things in the book kind of-at the same time they're like, “yes, he was brilliant,” there was kind of this air of, “well he didn't talk anymore so he was stupid.” I just want to say, that's not how it works.

Z: Right.

E: You can be nonverbal and understand things, you know.

Z: Yeah.

E: Anyway, that's a whole other spiel for another time. So he would come in, and he would get the hot goss, and he would find out what was going on. He basically learned, at the White Cliffs Hotel, that the war was coming. He learned all about states seceding from the Union and that sort of thing. He was like, “Well, I am of the age of the draft,” he would be draft-able, so he was like, “I gotta hide.” He hunkered down Panther Cave for a little while, a long time, several months I guess? While he was still in hiding there was an accident. He decided that he was afraid of being caught by the authorities, he wasn't even gonna go to the hotel, he was just kinda gonna stockpile supplies, stay in his cave. One night while he was out foraging, he sees this light in the sky. He followed it, and the hotel was on fire. Burning to the ground. He shows up, and the fire marshal is there, and they're like, “Well, there's your fire bug,” and they basically threatened to arrest him. He is very upset, he ends up-they describe him as kind of having a fit. He started convulsing, he was very upset, he didn't know how to communicate that he hadn't been the one to do it because people were basically just accusing him already.

Z: Right.

E: Fortunately, at the same time that this was happening, this woman came forward, and was like, “My daughter knocked a candle over into a laundry basket, and that's what happened.” He was exonerated and he got up and ran away. The hotel burned to the ground. Mason went back to Panther Cave. This is another one of those points in the story where the author speculates that Mason spent much of his time lost in the memory of his ill-fated love affair.

Z: I don't think so.

E: I have here, “Like come on bro, it wasn't that serious.” After that he visited his sister Demaris and her husband Horner Coltharp, and to his surprise, he learned that his brother, Milton, had become a doctor, like he said he would. Instead of doing anything to help Mason, he filed paperwork with the court system in Monroe County to declare Mason a lunatic and subject to the confinement of a lunatic asylum. Milton also sold the land that was willed to Mason, without his consent, and basically was like, “Okay cops, go get him. Lock him up.” Very helpful. So-

Z: I don't like Milton.

E:...yeah, Milton is a shithead!

Z: Truly.

E: Demaris and Horner explained to Mason that Milton had moved away, but he had alerted local authorities to be on the lookout for him. Demaris requested that her husband build a shelter for him, where he could be supervised and he could be safe. Horner Coltharp did what he was asked. He constructed an 8x10 shanty for him, supplied him with food. They implored him not to wander off. He did, of course, try to leave to go back to the forest, and he was captured and chained to the floor. Which was great, because when people heard about this, people would come and just stare at him like he was a fucking zoo animal.

Z: Great.

E: Yeah, but there is a silver lining to this because this group of women heard what was happening to him. They were sympathetic so they came to see him and they brought him some supplies. They asked him if he could make use of a file, and he was like, “Yes, fuck yes, I can use a file. I can get out of here if I have a file.” So they baked him a loaf of bread with a file hidden in it.

Z: (gasps)

E: He was able to eat the bread, get the file out, and escape. How cool is that?

Z: I love that.

E: I know! These vigilante southern mamas are just like, “Nah this is not okay, you can't be doing this. This is a grown man, let him live his life. Let him out, here's a file, go be free!” I have so much respect for that. That's probably my favorite part of this whole story.

Z: I love that.

E: Yeah, so he escaped and he basically-he vowed never to return to his sister's property again because even though they had tried to help him, he didn't wanna get captured again. He continued to wander. He did go back occasionally and visit the White Cliff Hotel because they were constructing a second one, or rebuilding it. But he felt really uncomfortable being around there. He set up a number of outposts throughout the knobs with supplies and shelters where he could hide, should the authorities come to hunt him down again. A lot of people had complained about him raiding their gardens, and stealing their animals. The police never really caught him. Four years passed from the night of the fire and Mason showed up and he was very surprised to find that there was another hermit living there. Well, he wasn't living there, but he was a visitor, and they were treating him the way they were treating Mason, where they would feed him and give him whatever he wanted. His name is Gabriel North, and he'd had a very hard life. He had been fending for himself since childhood due to a strained relationship with his family. The book also implied that he had some mental illness as well and that that might have been effecting the way that his family treated him, so he was on his own. He did, however, have two dogs and Mason did not like dogs. When Harvey McGill was like, “I don't want you two at my hotel at the same time, I think you both should leave, go show him Panther Cave.” Mason was like “Cool, let's go,” Gabriel was like, “Okay well here's my dogs, and the dogs immediately attacked him. Immediately attacked Mason. They get into a fight, he hits the dog, because the dog is trying to attack him, and Gabriel was like “If you ever hit my dog again, you'll regret it Mason.” He kind of explained, “I have a checkered past with dogs, they do not like me,” and Gabriel basically was like, “Okay, cool that's fine. Just don't do it again,” and they became friends. But, another epidemic of illness hit the region. Yellow fever this time, and Gabriel was like, “I don't wanna be around for that. I'm afraid, I don't wanna get sick, I'm leaving.” So he left, and Mason was left alone again. That was in 1878. At this point, the book talks about what Mason had done for companionship previously. Allegedly, he had a couple of different animals for companionship. He had a rooster that he stole from a farm, like a prize rooster. This rooster and him were like BFFs. He kept it in a hollow oak tree that he called his rooster house. It road in his pocket until the action of squeezing in and out of his pocket caused it to loose all it's feathers. So he had a naked chicken that-

Z: (laughs)

E:..that was his best friend.

Z: (still laughing) I love that.

E: I know!

Z: Oh my god!

E: He also befriended a very large yellow tomcat, which followed him around for a long period of time. Now, here's the thing that's kind of icky. The rooster eventually died, and Mason ate it. Which, yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and say, I get it because he, you know. You gotta do what you gotta do to survive, and he was already catching and killing chickens before that.

Z: Sure.

E: The thing that bothers me about this, is that people were very into the speculation that he ate the cat too.

Z: I was afraid you were gonna say that.

E: I don't know that that happened. That's another thing that is in there just for shock value I think.

Z: I think so too. I feel like he was smart enough to know not to eat the cat.

E: I don't know, and honestly who the hell am I to judge him if he did.

Z: I've never had cat, who knows maybe it's good.

E: Living in a cave in the woods, you forage for all your food. Honor every part of them right.

Z: Yeah...

E: I know that's kind of fucked up to say about a cat but yeah. I just thought that that was-it was just randomly tossed in there between, “Here's a story of the Civil War,” “Mason Evans may have eaten his cat.” Like what??

Z: (laughs)

E: What are you talking about??

Z: Written. Like. A. Tabloid.

E: It must have been a slow news day.

Z: Truly.

E: Anyway, we're finally winding down. In the 1880s, a lot of things began to change. Lumber became a big industry in the Monroe County area, therefore, railroad started moving in. It was also at this time, that The Athenian, the newspaper that printed the pamphlet that I mentioned in the beginning, began it's operation. The publisher was a man named Wilbur F. McCarron. McCarron had promised the people of McMinn County “a newspaper of prestige, one whose literary content would be the best in the nation. There, the people who subscribed to the newspaper could be assured of many interesting features about McMinn, Meigs, and Monroe Counties.” The funny thing about this, is that people were not about this happening because they were like, “We wanna know about politics, we don't give a shit about whatever literature you're trying to bring us.” They also didn't like him because this was in the time period where Democrats and Republicans were flipped values wise-

Z: Right.

E:...and he was a Republican, and I thought it was really funny because they were like, “We don't like republicans around here.” And I was like “Boy you better fast forward 200 years.

Z: You better buckle up!

E: That's all we got. Within a month of the publication's beginning, McCarron came to visit the White Cliff Hotel and he told Mr. McGill that he wanted to know about Mason and eventually write a piece about him. Mr. McGill basically told him that the best person to talk to would be Horner Colthrop, his brother-in-law. When he returned to Athens, McCarron immediately published a series of articles in his paper about quote, “The Wild Man of the Chilhowee.” He recounted the stories of the people who had encountered him through direct interviews. The article stirred up a lot of controversy, and on January 9, 1886, ,the sheriff captured Mason and brought him to the Athens County Jail, and yet again, his capture drew in a lot of spectators. A lot of people came to watch them, arrest him basically and put him in prison. They took his photo on the steps of the courthouse, gave him a change of clothes and sentenced him to an insane asylum in Nashville. Very, for context, Monroe County is like the bottom eastern corner of Tennessee. Nashville is 4 hours away?

Z: Yeah, like three of four.

E: Three or four hours away, so that's very far from anything he's every known. In The Athenian, Mr. McCarron wrote, “Till a short time ago, Mason Evans kept with regularity the date of his birth, the day of the week, the month, and the year, and when urged to do so, would write a few sentences and solve problems with as much exactness as the days of yore. But age is creeping upon him. His eyesight is failing, and the little spark of passion and the reason that should have never left him is gradually being extinguished. It was only by the exercise of strategy and urgent persuasion he was induced without using force to come down from his mountain home and get into a wagon waiting to convey him into town, a distance of some 15-20 miles.” Mason did not want-whether they forced him or not, he did not want what they took him to do. He attempted to escape several times. So far as to get the start of his guards, several 100s of yards going at full speed toward the mountains. Mostly reports said that he was harmless, but a few people had said that in his older age he would get confused, he would lash out a little bit. What it actually said was, “attacks of raving lunacy.” Which, yikes. A few weeks later, McCarron wrote that Mason was taken the McMinn County Poorhouse. Once he arrived there, he very quickly made his escape. He walked a distance of around 20 miles back to his brother-in-law's house. Horner Colthrop provided him a shelter to stay in at night and he was free to roam during the day. Which is kind of what the situation was before, but this time there wasn't really much of an issue with it. He actually used the shelter he was given, the cops didn't try to come take him away, they all kind of came to an agreement. At this point, things were really, finally starting to calm down for him. During the winter of 1891-1892, Mason stayed in the cabin intermittently. He continued to visit the White Cliff kitchens and he was very grateful for the services that they gave him, because he was 68 years old, and his health was beginning to decline. Any food that they could give him, any warmth, he was grateful for. Unfortunately, on the morning of January 11, 1892, Mason's body was found frozen sitting under a tree. His brother-in-law claimed his remains, and Mason was buried in a simple wooden casket near his parents at Hickory Grove Cemetery. For 40 years, he had lived alone in the wilderness, kept himself alive. I think that that is fucking crazy.

Z: Truly.

E: Obviously, if you threw me out there now, given that I am of the-I'm on the millenial/gen z cusp. I've basically always had a cell phone in my hand. I would not last a day.

Z: I can't even poop in the woods.

E: Exactly! Thank you! I know it was a different time but wow. 40 years, completely alone.

Z: Yeah.

E: Didn't have a house, lived in a cave. Finally I have a quote here from Harvey McGill, the owner of the White Cliff Hotel who said, “Mason Evans is much better off dead than alive and Hickory Grove is a much better place than the shack he lived in. The final resting place of his soul is with God, I am sure.” That is-

Z: That's sweet.

E:...the story of Mason Evans.

Z: Oh my god. I am still shook about those women.

E: I know.

Z: The loaf of bread.

E: It's so cool. It's so cool.

Z: Oh my god.

E: That just goes to show you. That's the definition of southern hospitality.

Z: Truly.

E: Truly.

Z: Well, thank god I finally know all about Mason.

E: I'm sorry that was so long-

Z: Nah.

E:...for our first run, but I really just needed to

get that one off my chest. Fortunately, it had given me kind of a branching off of some other topics that I want to cover too. I definitely want to talk more about the White Cliff Hotel and I am actually planning on doing an episode on sinkholes.

Z:OOooo.

E: Caves and sinkholes are all kind of connected. So that's that. Thank you for listening.

Z: Of course.

E: What's your issue this week?

Z: My issue this week, and-okay there is a side of TikTok-

E: I'm afraid now.

Z:...currently, and again, brain worms. My issue this week is cleantok. Cleaning TikTok.

E: Ooo, that sounds nice.

Z: I'm gonna do a little bit of a trigger warning here-

E: Oh, okay.

Z:...for child abuse.

E: Okay...

Z: Because skip ahead like 2 minutes, if you don't want to hear about this, but-

E: I was not expecting this.

Z:...have you ever read the book A Child Called It?

E: No, but I know about it. I know like the general plot.

Z: There's a scene where household chemicals are mixed and it's supposed to be-

E: Oh.

Z: Okay.

E: Like the mustard gas?

Z: Yeah, pretty much.

E: I think I know where this is going.

Z: There's this side of TikTok now where people are like, “We're on cleantok, we're gonna clean.” and they'll dump half a container of AJAX, Clorox, Dawn, literally everything under the-

E: Ammonia.

Z: Ammonia, everything and that's just where my brain goes is mixing chemicals together and making deadly toxic gases and I'm just waiting, because there's livestreams of people that'll just go live and dump-

E: Yeah, I've seen a couple of those videos where people are just throwing in 4 different kinds of powder and dumping multiple liquids on top of it.

Z: Yeah!

E: How are you not dead? Someone's gonna get hurt.

Z: Truly, and that's where my brain went. I was like, someone is going to not realize it. 'Cause it's science, they're chemicals. You're mixing shit together, you don't know what you're mixing. Somethings going to happen, someone is going to get hurt, because these people on TikTok are like “Oh I'm going to make a rainbow in my toilet today.”

E: Can I say, I feel like a lot of that we don't have home-ec in schools anymore.

Z: Yeah.

E: Because I learned, my mom was the one that told me, don't mix ammonia and bleach cause you'll make mustard gas, but I don't know if that's actually true. I know that it makes something that is very dangerous, but that is kind of where you would learn about these household things. Schools are so underfunded that you don't have that anymore.

Z: Yep.

E: That's just sad.

Z: Well, that was my issue. Sorry to get a little dark there for a second but truly I saw just one video, and you know how TikTok is, they'll be one here or there, and it really made me mad.

E: Well, hey, PSA don't do that. Don't mix things.

Z: Please.

E: Do your research if you're going to use multiple chemicals because, because holy shit you could literally gas yourself to death.

Z: Here's the tea. One is enough.

E: Yeah, most of the time.

Z: Scrubbing bubbles? Fine.

E: Yeah.

Z: Dawn Dishwashing Liquid? Fine. Don't start mixing shit. You don't need to. That's what they're there for.

E: Yes, yes. Please be safe. Please don't get hurt.

Z: What's your issue now that I'm all worked up?

E: My issue, maybe this is dark, my issue is honestly that I had to take Brownie to the emergency vet.

Z: Yeah.

E: 'Cause that was a nightmare.

Z: Yeah.

E: I had to take my sweet little boy to the vet because I came home from work and he had poopied blood and I was terrified and I thought he was gonna die. It turns out that he just had a mild infection, and he's had his antibiotics. He's good to go now. We did his follow up, and the vet said he looked fine. His issue this week is probably the fact that they shaved that funky chunk out of the side of his neck, because they had to give him fluids, so he has this wonky ass-it looks like the state of South Carolina.

Z: Have you ever seen that episode of Bob's Burgers where he gets the stitch in his finger-

E: Yes!

Z:...and he's like, “Why did you shave my arm?”

E: That is exactly it, yeah. God that's such-I love Bob's Burgers.

Z: Same.

E: But yeah, that's my issue. He's fine. I'm still-I don't think I'm ever gonna recover from that. That was so stressful. He's okay and he's standing here staring at me because it's been two hours, and he probably needs to poop.

Z: He probably needs to poop.

(dog shaking his head noises)

E: Yeah.

Z: We'll take that as a yes.

E: Alright, well, thanks for listening.

Z: Of course, thanks for listening to me ramble, thanks for listening to Em ramble.

E: Thanks for really listening to me ramble.

E&Z: (laughs)

Z: Well we'll hopefully see you next time, hopefully we'll see you next time, I'm really excited for my topic next week.

Z: Hi guys.

E: Hey.

Z: How's it going? So when we initially recorded this episode, we didn't have all of our social media set up completely. There were a couple that had different usernames or whatever, just rookie mistakes that we had made, but we just wanted to rerecord the ending here. Kinda touch base with you, so you know exactly where to find us so there's no confusion, and we're all on the same page. So Twitter, TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube @issues-podcast. Our Tumblr is @theabandonmentissues. Or you can simply go to our LinkTree whick is linktr.ee/issues_podcast. And all of this will be linked in the description below. But that's got all of our relevant links including our cited sourced, social media, and our Patreon can be found there as well.

E: We also have an email for listener story submissions now. So if you have any places nearby you that you think are relevant to the topics that we cover, we would like to hear from you. You can send those to us at tellusyourissue@gmail.com, and we might read it out on the air.

Z: You never know what could happen.

E: You never know. You can also send whatever you want to that email. Anything you want us to know. Anything relevant.

Z: Send us memes. We'll print them out, and we'll hand them to Gertrude.

E: Exactly. Yeah.

Z: No problem.

E: That should pretty much cover everything, contact wise.

Z: We appreciate you guys understanding that we're fools.

E&Z: (laughs)

E: We're just some fresh faced youngsters.

Z: Listen, we're little rookies, we gotta figure it out as we go, and unfortunately this is one of them.

E: If you need anything from us, that's were you can find us.

Z: Please, send me memes.

E: (laughs) Please. It's what keeps him going.

Z: It's all I got left in this world.

E: Yeah.

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #343

“i slither like a viper and get you by the neck  /  i know a thousand ways to help you forget about her”

What's your favorite kind of bear? I don't really know. I just like bears. Have you ever sent a FWD because you were afraid? Ha, yup, as a little kid. Would you ever date more than one person at a time? Nooooo sir. Have you ever rebounded... or been someone's rebound? No. What’s the biggest argument you’ve ever had with a family member? Did things ever go back to how they were beforehand? My grandmother cursed me the fuuuuck out one night as a kid because I was in a mood and didn't tell my mother goodnight. I still remember being called an ungrateful bitch with her like an inch from my face, and admittedly, I was being rude because I wanted to go home, but it kinda scarred me for life. For the remainder of her life, I was always sort of on edge around her and was convinced she didn't like me. Have you ever experienced some kind of natural disaster? I've been through lots of hurricanes. None that massively affected my life, though. If you have pets, do you feed them human food or do they just get regular pet food? If they do get human food, what’s their favorite thing to have? Venus is a snake, so she obviously doesn't get food meant for humans. Roman is very well-trained to not beg or make a move for people's food; he tried once as a kitten, and giving him a pop taught him right away. Have you ever been in a physical fight? Who won? No. What’s the mode of transport that you take or use the most? The car. Mom's, specifically. Have you ever had a zoo keeper experience or anything where you’ve been able to go behind the scenes and look after/feed the animals? No, but I wish. :( Would you ever want the responsibility of being a politician or a similar position of power? NOOOOOOO. What’s something your parents do that really annoys you? Mom is *always* right, pretty much indisputably. And she WILL have the last word. Dad, meanwhile, can be pretty rude to people. I don't think he realizes it half the time, but still. It's not an excuse. What is your main source of anxiety? Social interactions. What’s your favorite 90s cartoon? Pokemon. Describe the moment you realized you were falling in love with someone. I'd rather not. What’s your favorite sparkling water brand/flavor? I've never tried sparkling water. What’s your favorite makeup brand/brands? I don't have a favorite, considering I don't wear it nearly enough and have never even bought my own. I just use whatever Mom buys. What are some female names you would name a baby? Alessandra is my favorite for sure. I also love Anneliese, Justine, Evelyn, Chloe, Evangeline, Quinn... There's a lot. What about male? Severin is my favorite, and I also like Damien, Vincent, Victor, and Luther. Do you have any subscription boxes? No. What fictional creature would you like as a pet? I want a dragon, goddammit. Idc if it can breathe fire ok I want a dragon. Ewoks are also the one and only thing I enjoy from Star Wars. What kind of dwelling do you live in? Just a one-story house. Is there anyone you work with that you don't get along with? Why? N/A Do you have an opinion on adopting/purchasing a pet? PLEASE adopt, especially with cats and dogs, given the number of strays. Purebreds tend to have so many underlying issues, and besides, it's just a LOT of money for an animal that probably wouldn't outlive a mutt. Don't feed the machine if you can. What's your favorite chain restaurant? The Cheesecake Factory or Olive Garden. Why were you last pulled over? I’ve never been pulled over before. What was the last thing you've done on the water? Just kinda swam around a bit in the ocean. It was so warm, totally like a bath. I do NOT miss that sun poisoning, though. Are you cool with swimming in a lake? I think I'd do it if someone invited me to, and the lake didn't look filthy, of course. Do you have a drone? No. What's your favorite hole-in-the-wall restaurant? We have this tiny, local Mexican place that's really good. I don't know the name of it, and I wouldn't share it for obvious reasons. What do you order from there? Chips and salsa of course, along with a shrimp and cheese quesadilla, and finally their cheesy rice. What's your favorite ice-cream flavor? Depending on my mood, it bounces between vanilla with chocolate syrup or just plain chocolate. Do you have any t-shirts from any local businesses? No. Do you listen to any talk shows or podcasts? I used to listen to Mark, Bob, and Wade's podcast, but I'm like... ten months behind, haha. What's something someone calls you that you find endearing? I like "love" a lot. What's your favorite children's book? I loved books like The Rainbow Fish, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Stellaluna, 10 Minutes 'til Midnight, What Makes a Rainbow?, Chrysanthemum, etc. Is there a new season for a series you're excited to come out? Meerkat Manor comes back this summer, and I am fucking HYPED. How old are you? I'm 25. What is something unique you enjoy about the one you like/love? I tease her about it all the time, but it's really cute that she keeps all of her snakes' good sheds in her room. Proud reptile mom. Are you more liberal or conservative? I'm close to the middle, but I lean towards being more liberal, and I seem to go more that way with time. Do you watch American Horror Story? I used to. I saw the entire first season and really liked it, and then I almost finished the second, but I lost interest. The story got a bit stupid imo. I'd be willing to watch other seasons, though. Does your hometown have any urban legends/scary stories? None that I’m aware of. The people there are scary enough. What's the scariest nightmare you remember having? Let's not talk about it. Are you medicated? Uh very. Are there any apps you're addicted to? Nah. Did you have a favorite stuffed animal as a child? It was initially a bunny holding a polka-dotted blanket, then it become a moose I got from Cabela's when in Ohio. Do you still collect stuffed animals? Only meerkat ones. Have you ever stolen/borrowed clothes from an ex? Haha I've worn Jason's pj pants before and they just kinda... became mine, lol. What's the last movie you watched at home? The Shining, I believe. What's the last movie you watched in theaters? The CGI remake of The Lion King. I still don't get why it was received so badly. Have you ever had eggs cooked over a campfire? I don't think so, no. If you do drink, what's your favorite alcoholic beverage? Margaritas, generally. However, Sara's dad made me this absofuckinglutely incredible chocolate drink before that tasted like a milkshake. It had like, no alcohol flavor, which worked out well for me considering I very much dislike that taste. Are there any songs you've been listening to repetitively lately? There's a new one every day lately, haha. Today it's Halocene's cover of "Love Bites (So Do I)." Cereal, granola, or oatmeal? Cereal. What TV shows did you grow up watching? You gotta gimme an age group... but I'd say the typical stuff for kids of that time. What does your phone case look like? It's just a boring purple that came with it. What were your favorite toys to play with as a child? I looooved playing with my "family" of a father crocodile, a mother deer, their two "children" (a fawn and smaller croc), and "friends" that were little Pokemon figurines. Then there was an evil t-rex with two stupid sidekicks, haha. I can't remember what dinosaurs they were. What's the most embarrassing thing you can ever remember doing? Hold on, lemme find my book. Do you remember what you dreamt about last night? I only very faintly recall dreaming about my cat Roman. Have you ever done anything embarrassing in a dream? Thank FUCK they're just dreams. Do you vape? Nah. What was a song you loved as a child? So uh. Apparently. I loved "Dookie" by Green Day. It's an undying story from Mom about how it came on once at a putt-putt place and I apparently started yelling "dookie!" and dancing. Do you enjoy the Arctic Monkeys? Yeah, I love some of their songs. Are you going to see Finding Dory? You bet your sweet ass I saw it. I've cried everytime I've watched it. Have you ever been horseback-riding? I have not, but I would love to. When was your last piercing? Whenever I got my tragus done, which I can't remember. What did your first crush look like? I don't remember my puppydog love first crush, but I can talk about my first REAL crush, Sebastian. He's a skinny dude with short, brown hair and a lip piercing... I can't remember which kind. He dressed in an emo style, and Facebook pictures at least suggest he still kind of does, I think. Is your body more curvy or flat? Well, I'm not at all skinny, so... What's your least favorite holiday? Probably Christopher Colombus Day, honestly. You didn't discover shit. Don't pretend to me it's worth celebrating in a clean conscience. if you’re having a boring day what do you usually do? If I'm rock-bottom bored, quite honestly, I normally nap, even though I know I shouldn't. Do you turn to food when you're upset? Ugh, I'm admittedly an emotional eater. I got way better about it, and then I started up again. Is your bf/gf good with your parents? I don't have an s/o. Do you think soda should be served at school? Vending machines are fine I suppose, as I don't believe they should be free seeing as they're nothing but sugar content, and I feel schools shouldn't just hand that out to kids at lunch or something. Do dogs have feelings? They sure do. Are you afraid of snakes? Oh no! I adore them. I respect snakes and am going to give wild ones their space for sure considering I don't recognize every native venomous one, but nevertheless, I'm not afraid of them. They are so vital to the ecosystem and are incredibly fascinating animals that deserve our protection. On that note, PLEASE do not kill any snake you come across in your shed or whatever. Call someone to relocate the terrified thing. Favorite snack? It depends on what I'm in the mood for, really. Ever seen The Notebook? Read the book, seen the movie plenty of times. Do you think cussing is trashy? No. Who is the most famous person you’ve met, if any? Nobody. Do you own any animals that aren’t domestic? No. Have you ever feared that you would lose a body part? No. Do you like gore? Yeah, generally. Do you like to drink water? Ugh, I really don't. I wish I did. Have you ever had a wax? I used to get my eyebrows waxed. Do you have any sets of matching bras and underwear? No. Are you any good at improv? Not at ALL.

[runawaymarbles]

Good omens fic rec

A Letter from “Crawly” to Azirapil by mostlydeadlanguages | 500 Words | G

This remarkable letter of unknown provenance surfaced recently in the cuneiform collection of the University of West Wessex. Addressed to Azirapil from a Mr. “Crawly,” it appears to be begging for the other’s return to Ur from a western journey with another individual, Abiraham. The relationship between the two (brothers? business partners? friends?) is unknown.

404 Email Not Found by Dacelin | 700 words | G

The first the Metatron knew about Armageddon was when Aziraphale contacted him to beg for it to be called off. Being a professional, the Metatron murmured soothing things about it all being part of the plan and rerouted the call elsewhere instead of admitting he had no idea what the principality was talking about.

my black eye casts no shadow by gyzym | 1.5k | Not Rated, probably M 

If you cut humanity to the quick, split it open, found its soul, it would have dark red hair and bright wild eyes.

So You Need To Get Into A.Z. Fell & Co.; Now What? (A Guide For Unfortunate Bookworms) by arkhamcycle | 1.8k | G

London’s antique enthusiasts and rare lit nerds alike know that if you’re looking for a specific vintage or antique book, you have a good chance of ending up in A.Z. Fell & Co. as a last resort. And if you’ve ever been in (or are currently in) this predicament, you know how much of an absolute nightmare it is trying to even get in the door. Luckily, this handy guide, the fruit of a months-long collaborative effort to create the perfect formula for gaming the A.Z. Fell system, will tell you everything you need to know, complete with a comprehensive breakdown of what, exactly, the opening hours are. Compiled by pageknight and inky of the Rare Antique Forums.

Quiet Light by drawlight | 2k | T |

There are rules. The trouble with hearts is that they play by none of them.

between the shadow and the soul by absopositivelutely | 2k | NR

(alternatively: it takes 6000 years for crowley to realize that aziraphale could love him too.)

i just happen to like apples (i am not afraid of snakes) by gyzym | 2k | Not Rated

Written for the following prompt: "Someone write me Crowley the bitter lesbian who only gave Eve the apple because she thought feminism should be there from day one." As such, please be warned that this story contains some fairly radical reinterpretations of Biblical stories and themes; if that sort of thing is not for you, please give this tale a pass.

Secret Agent Man by Emamel | 2.3k | G | 

Edward was very good at two things: noticing things, and not being noticed in return. It was the sort of qualities that made you a good spy. These two never got the memo.

Ten Fathoms Deep On the Road to Hell by BuggreAlleThis | 2.5k | G

Aziraphale is given an assignment as a Captain in the Royal Navy and finds life at sea miserable. Crowley, on the other hand, is having plenty of fun as the Captain of a motley pirate crew.

Untitled Goose Fic by rattatatosk | 3k | T

It's a lovely week in the South Downs, and Crowley is at war with a Horrible Goose.

Anthony J. Crowley, Retired Demon and Airbnb Superhost by TheOldAquarian | 3k | G 

What are you supposed to do when you've been fired from your sweet job in Hell for thwarting the schemes of Satan, you've got a swanky flat in Mayfair, and you're looking for an excuse to spend all your time in someone else's bookshop? Obviously, you turn to the dubious world of short-term vacation rentals. The resulting Airbnb property has been variously described as "an instagram trap," "a vampire den but make it botanical," and "the weirdest bed and breakfast in the shared history of beds and breakfasting."

Salinity (And Other Measurements of Brackish Water) by drawlight | 3k | T | 

It's an odd thing, getting on after the End of the World. Crowley takes to sea-watching.

Stopgap by RC_McLachlan | 3k | T | 

"Can you imagine ruining something so frustratingly perfect just to get a leg up with Management?" Crowley then remembers who he's talking to and why he's here in the first place. "Sorry, bad example, of course you can." A missing scene from Episode 6.

Wednesdays Are for This by magpiespirit | 3k | T

"D'you think we should have sex," he asks idly, pressing post on his addition to the exclusive How to Summon and Bind Demons forum. This one, he's sure, will both give Hell several annoying headaches and make a dent in the problem of demonology rising in the incel community. Bless, he loves having free time. "I think," Aziraphale replies frankly, giving Crowley a really, now look over the rims of his stupid glasses and the top of a first edition of something that probably uses a hundred words to say what could be said in five, "that should is a word best left to Heaven and Hell." And Crowley, who was only looking to fluster the angel a little, belatedly remembers that he's gotten commendations for Aziraphale's temptations.

build me a city, call it jerusalem by gyzym | 3.5k | T | 

Man begets man begets The Tales of Men, and there's nothing godly in that; Those Above and Them Below haven't any need for the stories humans have been hungry for since the snake and the Angel with the flaming sword.

The Plantom Menace by theinkwell33 | 3.6k | G 

There is an urban legend well known in this area regarding The Plant Man. Footage exists, blurry and ill-lit, of the trespassing fiend, but it never provides a good look at his face. He exists only as a rumor; a giggled whisper in someone’s ear at the pub, an inside joke at uni, and a viral sensation. None of these things mean he is not real. That being said, the only person who can corroborate the truth about the Plant Man is the man himself. And unfortunately, Anthony J. Crowley has no idea that it’s him.

get religion quick (cause you're looking divine) by brinnanza | 4k | G |

So it was fine. Even if Crowley couldn’t love him, he clearly liked him well enough, and that was almost the same thing. It no doubt would have continued to be fine, or at least fine-adjacent, were it not for a narrowly averted apocalypse and several bottles of a really quite nice Riesling Aziraphale had found in the back room of his newly restored bookshop.

to carthage then i came by Lvslie | 4k | T | 

‘You’re difficult to follow sometimes.’ ‘Difficult?’ Crowley echoes, feeling hollow. ‘Am I too fast? Am I going—’ And just like that, there’s something new in the silence between them, a tightening. The glass almost slips from his grasp, sliding from between languid fingers. His vision clouds. —too fast for you?’

Snakes and Stones (Never Broke My Bones) by DeerstalkerDeathFrisbee | 4.5k | G

No one wants to say it, but the residents of Dorm A, floor 3, are collectively convinced Aziraphale Fell’s boyfriend does not exist. This is their story.

as the poets say by nikkiRA | 4.6k | T

Crowley takes a long drink of his wine and then says, before he can chicken out, “Aziraphale, I have always been sure about you.”

Re-Recalled by Jennistar | 5k | T |

Halfway through an argument, Aziraphale gets accidentally discorporated and doesn't come back. Crowley does the sensible thing and panics.

the bookshop nemesis witch by FlipSpring | 5k | G

The life and times of Nicole Percival Castings, Witch. Featuring: her ongoing love/rivalry with a particular magical bookstore, an Eccentric(TM) shopkeeper who keeps a huge snake in aforementioned bookstore, finding oneself and one's magical power, the cyclicality of life.

your smile speaks books to me by laiqualaurelote | 5k | T 

Aziraphale's bookshop becomes accidentally famous on Instagram, to his great distress. Since Crowley invented Instagram, it's also his problem.

it's a new craze by attheborder | 5.5k | G | 

CROWLEY: I try not to make a habit of gratitude, but I must give our appreciation to everyone out there who’s been listening and subscribing to The Ineffable Plan. AZIRAPHALE: Ooh, yes, we’ve become quite popular, haven’t we?CROWLEY: Yeah, just hit number eight on the advice charts … No advertising at all.  AZIRAPHALE: Mm. How … miraculous. CROWLEY: … Aziraphale. You did not.

your apple-eating heathen by katarzi | G | 5.7k

History is written without them, and Crowley’s no lady.

the blues have run the game by indigostohelit | 6k | NC-17 (more of an M)

Halfway between the Beginning and the Apocalypse, Crowley visits the court of King Saul, and runs into a prince, a war camp, and a songbook. 

the earth has never felt this old by brawlite | 6k | T

Crowley has a long history with holy places.

TwoFish by Grindylowe | 6k | T | 

A love story about angels and demons. Also, fish

A Nice and Accurate Lesbian Herstory Archive by badwig | T | 6.6k

More or less just the opening montage from 'Hard Times' but they're lesbians - a series of vignettes from the Garden to now.

parable of shepherds by Lvslie | 6k | T |

‘Aziraphale, you need to stop telling that goddamned story to everyone we stumble upon,’ she hisses. ‘I’m serious. You keep it up much longer, everyone’s gonna think we’ve gone and murdered that alleged husband of mine. ‘Crowley,’ Aziraphale says blithely, a serene smile plastered to her face as a familiar-looking man passes by, ‘Dear. That’s what I want them to think.’

Nothing Like The Sun by mirawonderfulstar | 6k | T |

One tended to go through a number bodies in six thousand years, even if one was as cautious or sturdy as Aziraphale. Crowley, who was neither cautious nor sturdy, had gone through a large number. He’d changed appearance so many times that in Aziraphale’s memory he was often just his eyes, for no matter if Crowley was tall or short, lithe or stocky, blond or raven-haired, his eyes stayed the same. 

Blessed/Cursed Retirement by DictionaryWrites | 7k | T

Liam Buttersby, a very normal, nine-year-old boy, makes a friend in the retiree who has recently moved to his village in the South Downs. The retiree in question claims to hate it, and is a liar.

the technology is neutral by Deputychairman | 7k | NC-17 | 

“Stand up?” he echoed, incredulous but too undone by sensation to express the full force of his disbelief. “I can barely even remember my own name after that, and you want me to stand up?” “Your name is Anthony J Crowley, apparently, although you never did tell me what the J stood for so I can’t help you there,” he said, not hiding his smile. “Do stand up, I promise you’ll like it.”

Part of the Plan by HardlyFair | 7k | T |

In which things do not return to the exact way they were Before.

Where Thou Art by Mottlemoth | 7.5k | M | 

A late-night bus to London, a few human comforts, and a long overdue confession... nothing will ever be the same for an angel and his demon.

The Ark by rfsmiley | 7k | T 

We’ve all been assuming that it takes them 6,000 years to figure it out, but what if it takes 6,300?

Or: the ineffable husbands evacuate a dying Earth.

Ad Astra by drawlight | 8K | NC-17

Some things can only be said in the dark.

except you enthrall me, never shall be free by curtaincall | 8k | T

It's a classic story: Angel meets knight. Angel volunteers to get beheaded by knight. Knight turns out to be angel's demon frenemy. Somehow, there is kissing. Based on the Middle English ballad Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.

Falling Rain by Aria | 8k | T |

Once upon a time, an angel and a demon hitched a ride on the Ark.

such surpassing brightness by Handful_of_Silence | 8k | G | 

The revelation that Aziraphale might have been in love with him for thousands of years is surprising. The fact that literal books have been written on the subject comes as even more of a shock.

Without Creativity by htebazytook | 8k | NC-17 |

Another Crowley and Aziraphale through the ages fic, with some heavy symbolism thrown in for good measure.

Exit Wounds by racketghost | 8k | T

“At least they were together for a time,” Crowley says, staring at the lit end of his cigarette, “maybe that’s enough.”

On The Matter Of Touch by Somedrunkpirate | 9k | T

“On the matter of touch,” Crowley begins, waving his teaspoon in what he hopes passes for idle curiosity. “Thoughts?”

and, so on by PaintedVanilla | 9k | M | 

Crowley doesn’t remember heaven, but Aziraphale remembers him.

Going Home by Daegaer | 9k | G | 

Aziraphale is recalled to Heaven, Crowley isn't impressed.

The future's going to break through by nieded | 10k | T

My take on South Downs: Aziraphale and Crowley decide to become professors. This is inspired by the headcanon that Crowley has 20 different degrees. He is the Serpent of the Tree of Knowledge after all.

Wings and How to Hide Them by triedunture | M | 10k 

Crowley's been annoyingly in love for six thousand years. What's another lifetime between friends? Or: Aziraphale definitely fucks and isn't that just perfect?

The Gospel of Crowley by gutterandthestars | 10k | T

Crowley tempts Jesus in the wilderness! Turns out Jesus gives as good as he gets. Also Crowley pines over Aziraphale and has Big Gay Angsty Feelings because, well. Because Crowley.

A Nanny? In MY Summoning Circle? by pukner | 10k | Not Rated

(it's more likely than you think) Warlock "Lockie" Dowling summons a demon. Or, he buys a book off a suspiciously familiar bookseller and is convinced into demon summoning. It goes about as well as you'd expect.

damn.nation, now available on itunes by antistar_e (kaikamahine) | 10k | T

When lowly tempt-pusher Amphora (formerly of Stairwell 7B North, before she Fell,) gets the notice that end times are nigh, she gleefully quits her job and cancels her Netflix subscription and takes her place among the legions of hell. This, it turns out, was a bad plan.

Lie Back And Think Of Dinner by jessthereckless | 11k | M |

"Crowley, this is a disaster. This is everything I ever wanted. We’re in love. And there’s a picnic. And we don’t seem to be able to get…amorous without causing earthquakes.” Aziraphale attempts subterfuge. Crowley sees right through him.

Something to do with these sacred words by Solshine | 11k | T

Crowley confesses early, and Crowley confesses often. Aziraphale never knows quite what to say.

A Resurrection of Whales, and Other Omens of Varying Goodness by Margo_Kim | 11k | WIP | T

After the end of the world doesn't end anything, Heaven and Hell send replacements to Earth while the old representatives try to figure out their new normal.

Serpentine by sergeant_smudge | 11k | G |

Five ways in which Crowley is a snake. *And one more thing.

what's to come by PepperPrints, restlesslikeme | 11k | T 

Post-Apocalyptic AU. Even without the Antichrist, both Heaven and Hell insist on Armageddon. Aziraphale is missing and Crowley sets out to find him, driving through a scorched Earth with a witch in his passenger seat.

Basking by bomberqueen17 | 15k | NC-17

Crowley is extremely confused about how or whether celestial beings can experience physical sexual desire. He's also not fantastic at using his words. Things go all... snake-shaped.

Nanny Knows Best by DictionaryWrites | 17k | M

Being a nanny, that should be simple. Simple. Easy as pie. Crowley wished that were true.

One Night In Bangor (And the World's Your Oyster) by Atalan | 17k | NC-17

"All right, I know I'm going to regret asking this," Aziraphale says. "What exactly does this wager entail?” Crowley grins like the cat that not only got the cream but has absconded with the entire cow. He grabs the bottle and swigs straight from it despite Aziraphale's tut of disapproval. "The pot goes to whichever demon can get an angel into bed by the end of the evening."

Soft (A Love Story in Three Bites) by mia_ugly | 18.3k | NC-17

Crowley was an angel, once. Before she fell. Aziraphale was a warrior (she fell too. It just took a little longer.)

The Persephone Clause by Zetared | 20k | T |

When Crowley is forcibly recalled to home office, Aziraphale conspires with a denounced saint and strikes a deal with the agents of Hell to get him back.

in search of the wind by drawlight | 27k | NC-17

After the World Doesn't End, Aziraphale is not returned to his body. Crowley tries to find a way to get to Heaven's fast-shut gates. Aziraphale tries to find his way back from the sky (and back in time).

And So We Come Full Circle by Hekateras | 30k | T | 

"Angel. You know it's gonna be really bad, this time around," Crowley says slowly. "When the times comes, I want you to-"

Mirror, Mirror by ImprobableDreams900 | 44k | T

Adam, Eve, and Crawly flee Eden through the Western Gate, and it turns out that that simple decision makes all the difference in the world...

Slow Show by mia_ugly | 90k | NC-17

In which temptations are accomplished, grand romantic gestures are made, and two ineffable co-stars only take four seasons of an award-winning television program to realize they’re on their own side (at last, at last.)

Demonology and the Tri-Phasic Model of Trauma: An Integrative Approach by Nnm | 100k | T

What Aubrey Thyme, a professional, thought, upon first seeing her new client was: you’re going to be a fun one, aren’t you?

Eden!verse by ImprobableDreams900 | 550k | T-M

When Crowley gets captured by angels and dragged up to Heaven, Aziraphale knows he has to rescue him—no matter the consequences.