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kangaroo-sniper-imagine · 4 years ago

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Unintimidating reader who’s a killa killa

-snipers is longer solely because ive had that idea in my head LONG before i got this request-

-also, little gorey so beware-

Medic

Ludwig is almost instantly enamoured with you once he got comfortable with you on base. He finds you sweet and calls you “kleine krankenschwester” (little nurse) whenever you insist on helping him in any way with his workload. You apologize when you bump into inanimate objects and try copying Archimedes’ cooing. You’re a cupcake!

And finally he gets a good eyeful of you on the field. You’re brutal and vicious and smiling the whole time as you bash in an enemy Heavy’s head with a sledgehammer. You take out an enemy Scout’s leg with your weapon and let him try and crawl away from you before you finish him off with a laugh. Ludwig is now convinced you’re his soulmate

Our dear doctor loves tenderness that hides ruthlessness. Loves that you are sweet as a bumble bee to your team but a beast to your opposers. He’s excited at the new possibilities between the two of you know that he knows that he no longer has to hide his own ferocity with his experiments in front of you

Sniper

Hell, Mick isn’t even convinced you should be on the field. You wore brightly colored clothes and skirts and for fuck’s sake you bake, all. The. time. You're like Holly Homemaker, why the hell are you hanging with a bunch of mercenaries? How were you even picked for this job? At your first match, he debated on whether he should watch you from his perch to protect you or do his job. He chose his job, duh. But only for a few matches. When he finally decides to track you,and oooooh boy.

An enemy Spy has his knife in your shoulder, pining you to a wall. Mick doesn’t have a clear shot to take out the spook without getting you too. It’s not fun watching a teammate die, even if they do come back. But right as he was about to shift his attention to the main battle he sees it. You. Pissed the fuck off.

Mick watches with interest as you grab the hand that’s stabbing you with one of your delicate hands as the other grabs the spook’s lapel and drag in the enemy, mouths crushing together. A shot of betrayal and shock freezes the hitman before he sees it. The red running down your chin; the struggle of the enemy Spy trying to thrash himself away from you; the look of manic rage in your eye. When you let the Spy go, Mick can see teeth but no lip and it hits him. You bit off the man’s mouth.

After you swiftly wretch the knife out of your shoulder and into the neck of your opponent, you wipe your mouth, you call for a medic and return to fighting. Mick is now a little scared of you, but now will no longer ever think again that you can’t handle yourself on the field. Never brings up what he saw but will sometimes watch you work now

Heavy

Mikhail already finds hardly anyone intimidating, you are no exception; especially with your short stature and demure demeanor. He worries about you honestly, watching you to make sure none of the other mercs try to take advantage of you because you give off the energy of a doormat. It’s his big brother senses in part, he thinks, also in part of because he has a leetle crush on tiny woman who will listen to him drone on about Sasha and Russian literature well into the night.

You do more protecting than defending during the fighting. You watch the case and keep people away from it as Misha mows down the enemies to keep them away from the intel (and you), so he hasn't had the pleasure of watching you work. But buddy, when he gets it. A chance of happenstance allows Heavy to finally see you operate, lets him see you sit pretty as the enemy steps on your hidden bombs and walk into the line of your automatic tracking weaponry and get mowed down in a hail of bullets as all you do is smile and hold the briefcase. So well covered by your own inventions you don’t even need to be worried as the blood of your enemy splashes up onto your clothes

Misha finds you even MORE endearing now. Man loves intelligent women and if you made all of those killing machines holy fuck, could you mod Sasha?? You’re in your element as you effortlessly kill the opponent, and Misha loves watching your inventions do what they do best (he feels a kinship with your weapons as he too, preforms extreme violence to protect you) (He’s still gonna watch your back at the base tho for sure)

Scout

You were like another Spy, except without all the European flair that Spy had. You were kinda bland, tired looking. Jeremy’s never seen you train or fight; you spent most of all your free time being “tutored” by Spy to become a better Infiltrator, and frankly, Jeremy is more afraid of bread than he is of you (and not just the tumor filled bread). Spy hasd insinuated that you were ready to finally be put on the field with the rest of the mercs for the next match, and now Jeremy is more excited to have another person to show off to rather than to see you in action

But of course, Jeremy fucks up. He’s hiding in an empty building, bleeding from a shot from an enemy Sniper, and staring at the wrong end of a Heavy’s gun, hating the feeling of defeat. The Heavy was rambling on about something but the wound in his side had more of Scout’s attention; that is, until, a figure slowly, silently descended from the rafters. It was you, dressed head to toe in black save for a sliver of your team’s color on your armband. You look at the monologuing Heavy before giving Jeremy a look that said “Man, he’s a wind bag, huh?” you gestured to the enemy, then drew your finger across your throat with a questioning look in your eye. Scout manages a weak nod, losing focus quickly.

Another long cord, similar to the one holding you to the ceiling, unraveled itself from around your arm, and very quickly you whipped it around the enemy’s neck, jumped onto his back, and wretched your arms back, almost instantly decapitating the Heavy. Even as the lumbering body fell down, you remained upright, hopping off the body gracefully. With swift efficiency, you kicked the head out of the way, grabbed the comically large gun, and aimed it at the door. Before Scour could even ask what the fuck was going on, an enemy Medic came in through the door. Before the German had a chance to yelp, you shot him dead.

“Yo, what the-!” You hastily toss a med-pack at him before melting into the shadow, Scout almost missing the darkening blush on your mostly covered face. After that little save, Jeremy now goes out of his way to be nice to you, and learns a lesson that looks are hella deceiving. It would pay to have someone watching his back on the field without all the unwanted french commentary (and you’re nicer to look at than Spy, let's be real)

Demo

You’re cheerful, but not in the sadistic, almost taunting way many of the other mercs are like. Not like the Doc or Spook. Nope, you were just happy. Not ditzy or stupid or anything, just a smiley little thing that had as much bite as a toothless alligator. The thought that someone could take you as a serious threat, some wee thing that eats rainbow colored cereal and wears bunny slippers throughout the base, was so hilarious that Tavish starts chuckling whenever it crosses his mind. The two of you don’t typically fight together, you sticking to high ground to pick off enemies as Demo gleefully stays in the thick of it all to implode the other team

Due to unfortunate circumstances, you're both pinned down together, shoulder to shoulder under a makeshift barrier as the enemy gets closer and closer; your bow at the ready with an arrow and his bombs prepared to go off at his command, but no opening to go up and take a shot/throw a bomb. You huff, looking around wildly before nodding decisively, looking to Tavish. “Gimme one of your sticky bombs.” He complies, half thinking that you’re gonna take the both of you out in a blaze of gory glory.

With a look of determination, you aim in front of you, not even at the enemy. Tavish prepares to die for the third time that day, but this time by his own creation, and you release your arrow. The projectile bounces off a scrap bit of metal on the ground, ricocheting the arrow up into hitting the lamppost, and then flying over their heads into the enemy’s ranks. Once the bomb went off, you instantaneously bounce out of the hiding place and opened fire on the stragglers who didn't get offed by the bomb. Tavish can only stare as you mow down the other team as a random stream of sunlight illuminates your figure. Demo catches feels in that moment

Pyro

Pryo liked that you were lowkey and sweet. The fact that you weren’t especially harsh or violent while relaxing initially made them flock to you just to hang out in their down time. Pyro loves to give you cute little toys and stuffies and see you smile! The only time Pyro really sees you on the battlefield is when they’re looking for you. They’re worried about you! You’re their favorite!

They catch you, mid-battle, covered head to toe in the blood of an enemy Scout, laying only a few feet away. They think you look so pretty! Like sparkles and rainbows are all around you and flower petals are floating in the air and surrounding you (it’s ash; pyro started a blaze not that far away and it was finally beginning to get to the two of you)

Pyro just sees this as more couple binding time, now that they know that you also tend to get a little too into the battle. It’s an excuse to spend even more time together

Engineer

This boy was so dang in love with you and he’s never even seen you fight. On the base, you were as sweet as a peach and harmless as a mouse. You spent most of your time in Dell’s workshop helping him with menial tasks like refilling his coffee mug or reorganizing his tools or alike. You got along well with all the other mercs and were quick to help others. Dell never really saw you while fighting because he had to stick near his machines while your job took you all over the battle field

He hears about you fighting from the others. Scout was retelling the group about you “friggin’ awesome fight” between you and an enemy Medic. You had, according to Scout (and Heavy, who nodded along in agreement) got into a fist fight with the enemy, physically beating them into submission. Dell wouldn’t believe it if you hadn’t walked right at the end of the tale with a black eye, bloodied knuckles, and a lopsided grin. Dell almost has a fucking heart attack seeing you in such a state. The Doctor heals you up back to normal like nothing ever happened but the fact that you relied on physical violence to fight made him anxious

He doesn't talk to you about fighting differently, he wants to know if there's anything he can do to help you fight, like making special gloves or armor of some type. Homeboy just wants to protect you, he gets hella worried.

Soldier

Jane, seemingly perpetually stuck in the 40’s and 50’s, believes most women shouldn't be on the battlefield at all. And even though you were there working with a bunch of other mercenaries, a lady is a lady and he, the old fashioned man he is, prioritizes keeping you “safe” (taking your kills before you get the chance to land the finishing blows). In his mind, he’s doing you a service. After all, you are far too soft spoken at the base to have any form of bite in you on the field.

Across the field though, one fight, Jane was just too far away to swoop in and “save” you like he normally would; not even his rocket launcher would get to you in time to stop the Spy from doing you in! The instant the enemy’s knife was about to pierce your back, though, Jane saw you turn around whip fast, your own machete thrusting forward to impale the enemy.

The soldier now thinks that your “womanly intuition” is far more superior and more finely tuned than his own, and will now generally leave you alone to fight and stops hovering over you. Will shout out encouragements from across the field whenever he sees that you hack someone apart and loudly brags that you have the “natural advantage” to sniffing out enemies.

Spy

-This is gonna be a drabble cus i dunno how to bullet point this-

Jacque didn’t think particularly much of you. You were a teammate, an asset to be used. On the base you were reserved, spending most of your time in the Doctor’s infirmary or discussing something with Mikhail about books or whatever. You stayed out of his way, not like it was hard for you, seeing as you were just some wisp of a thing, someone who if they sat still long enough would blend into the background like air. Spy never assumed that you would ever be of any use to him in a fight; you just didn’t have the look of a fighter in you.

So right now, his life being in your hands, made him uncomfortable in ways he couldn’t care to count.

The enemy Spy, who was almost as tricky as him, cleverly disguised himself as Jacque, and right as they were about to confront each other, you burst through the door, looking surprised at the two of them. Almost immediately, they started to accuse the other.

“He’s the enemy!”

“No, HE is!”

“The intruder is HIM!”

Jacque will give you some props, seeing as you drew your gun as soon as you saw the pair, but rather than aim it usefully at at least ONE of them, YOU aim it uselessly to the floor! Jacque would’ve scolded you for your unprofessionalism if the imminent threat of death wasn’t less than six feet away from him.

You looked wildly in between the two of them, your normally pleasant face now stricken with panic. Your eyes land solidly on the enemy Spy, and with a sharp intake of breath, you run to him, throwing your arms around him and burying your face into the falsely colored lapel.

Jacque felt disappointment bloom in his chest, along with dread when he watched your mistake.

The spy looked so damn smug as he wrapped his arms around you, throwing Jacque a satisfied look. The gun still was gripped in your hand, still aiming at the ground.

“Ma pauvre petite fille,” he crooned, “est-ce que le grand méchant espion t'a fait peur?”

You sniffle, and bring the gun up to the imposter’s head. “Je n'ai pas facilement peur.” Jacque didn’t think you could ever say something so coldly, and say it in french to boot. One shot rang out and the man in your arms fell to the floor, suit changing back to what it was meant to be, stained with red from the blood of his fatal wound.

After some deliberation with yourself, you shot him again, in the chest. You looked to Jacque, your face now once again passive.

With a sigh and a dramatic flourish, the living Spy fetched a cigarette out of his pocket and lit it quickly, taking a deep huff before addressing you.

“How did you know that he was not me?”

You holster your weapon back, mulling over your answer. “Few things, uh… you never speak French to me,” you stuck out one finger, “you wouldn’t ever hug me,” another finger, “you don’t stand with your feet that far apart,” one more, “and you smell completely different.” with all but your thumb sticking out, you nodded to yourself before jamming both hands into your pants pockets, tucking in your chin and turning heel back to the door, seemingly finished with your explanation and conversation.

Amused, Jacque took another slow drag of his cigarette, planning on paying more attention to you in the future, being sure never to underestimate you again.

-this, uuuuuhhh, took on a life of its own-

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fractallogic · 3 years ago

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Nausea/vomiting, loss of consciousness, incoherence means that there’s a limited set of likely things that could be happening

1) brain swelling (possibly she’s been mis-taking her decadron because bf is letting her be independent and the dosage/tapering is more complicated than “take one of these pills until they’re gone”; that’s the drug to keep her brain from swelling after the surgery and I think this is the most likely)

2) whatever was left of the tumor has regrown dramatically (this is apparently what was happening the first time he took her to the hospital a couple weeks ago; since no one fucking knows anything about the scans or biopsy, unclear how likely this is, but because of how tumors and cancer work, it’s definitely on the table)

3) some kind of bleed or block (stroke seems unlikely if they didn’t tell the bf right away that it was one, but possibly a bleed in the right place could cause this kind of thing to happen)

4) some other kind of damage (idk how fragile her head is with the stitches right now, but they’re not completely dissolved yet; she could have moved too suddenly or tripped or sth and wiggled her brain around too hard, causing other tissue to swell into the brain or, again, bleeding into the brain)

5) something else

I’m really hoping it’s option #1, in part because it should be easy to resolve if it’s a med thing, and also in part because option 2 feels the most likely after that and boy I really don’t feel great about a prognosis if that’s how quickly things are regrowing in there, and still! not really ready to deal with a parent’s death yet!

I think next week I need to call the counseling office where my psych is and inquire about their supposed sliding scale because my psych is also a therapist and at this point I absolutely need therapy like, now. I can’t do complicated mom feelings by myself (and friends) when maybe my mom is actively dying. I can’t wait another ?????? months and I also can’t afford something that is weekly and, I believe, $200 an hour. Like. Ffs.

Dad keeps telling me things that he’s planned for when he dies (in about 30 years, knock on wood, because he wants to live to see the middle of the 21st century) and prefaces this with “I know this might seem morbid, but you need to know this and I think you’re at the age where you can handle this information” and before I was like okay yeah it’s sad to think about you dying, but this is reasonable. Now I’m like thank god you have actually planned for this, you know how your medical bills and any caretaking or end-of-life stuff is going to be paid, I know that not only you have a will but that me and my aunts are going to be the executors of it, I know what you’re leaving to me, I know that you want to be cremated and where you want me to spread your ashes.

Do I know literally ANY of that for my mom? NO! It’s driving me insane. Maybe she has a will! Maybe she has insurance! Like just that basic info is a mystery. How has she been paying for anything on this big road trip, after they bought and renovated a house, and when she’s been working sporadically and mostly part-time for the last few years? Unclear. How the fuck am I supposed to know how to take care of her or what I need to do if she dies.

Stepdad has also been thinking about his own end-of-life stuff but obviously I’m less privy to that (because he has two grown children that he’s close with who are basically my mom’s age, so they’re presumably going to take care of all of his stuff). It’s going to be incredibly sad when he dies, but I feel less groping-into-the-unknown.

Crassly, morbidly, part of me is so frustrated that it’s the difficult parent who’s in this situation first. I don’t fucking know what to do and she’s still married to stepdad on paper; he and me and brother are her next of kin (is that how that works? ITS A FUCKING MYSTERY) (but I’m like 85% sure) AND WE DONT KNOW ANYTHING. With dad and stepdad it will be emotionally so much harder, but logistically so much less complicated. Mom has both complicated logistics AND complicated feelings.

I need to go to bed because it’s 1:30 and I would LIKE to enjoy the weekend I have with my dad here, and that means I need to actually wake up and like, exist, but. you know. what the fuck. goddammit. fuck. ugh. etc.

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lolathepeacocklord · 3 years ago

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Chapter 2 – Run Rabbit Run God… It was such an awful day. He was given the day off from work for feeling sick, and on his way to his dorm right around the corner to his hallway he stepped on something… Red. Blood. It looked fresh too. He just thought alright- maybe some girl was having a messy day, but there was more. Droplets were now little puddles of red. All the way to his room where it looked like some ketchup monster fell over against the door. And started… Crawling. All the way to the bathroom. Smith gently opened the door. He could remember it in so much detail. Most of it just being blood. Lots and lots of blood everywhere- all coming from his roommate who was bleeding to death in the bathtub. He literally looked like he was tossed into a cage full of angry tigers. And that’s only slightly exaggerating. It looked like something just out of a horror movie. After his friend got sent to the hospital for several days, he got asked a lot about what happened- always giving them the strangest response. He kept saying that a man did this to him. All these gashes and tears were caused by a… Human male. They weren’t sure if it was just the anesthetics when they first asked him, but he stuck to the story. He thought he saw this woman getting attacked, and he ran over to try and help. But when he got closer, then man who pinned her to the ground was… Eating her. Tearing her apart with his hands and teeth. And then he went for Hunter. Smith was really worried about his friend after he returned home. Almost immediately when he thought he was okay he returned and then they were both sick as hell. Then the emergency broadcast came on TV, and Smith was just suddenly in- immense amounts of pain. He couldn’t see right, and it literally felt like his insides were moving around in him. He tried to go get his friend. Tell him they were a lot sicker then they thought. Right in front of the door he collapsed on the ground, and everything went black from there. That was his last memory. The last moments in a normal world.

Common infected littered the streets- dead and alive. Most of them just wandering around aimlessly, sleeping in any place they found fit, and some just starting random baby fights over who would get to eat this person’s body. Being infected was at least handy in the aspect the commons didn’t pay much attention to you. Sometimes they’d try and attack you just because they’re brainless morons now. But a full on horde was never really a problem to him. Just crowded. He was one of them, they were one of him. He hated to think about that, but it was true. The rain let up on him finally, which was the first convenient thing that happened to him today. He wasn’t gonna get absolutely drenched anymore. But he still kept an eye out for anything that could be… Following him. From the few things he’s seen, he knew that special infected could be very efficient hunters. And they may not hesitate to attack their own kind- so he moved along swiftly down the street. Smith wandered out to a giant intersection in town, and took a moment to look around at the buildings surrounding him. He’s gone quite a distance from home. A thing or two here was ever so slightly familiar. But whatever it was It was now in shambles, and either on fire or it looked like it was about to collapse at any moment. He continued along, trying to stay concealed under the shadows of buildings. He already drew enough attention to himself with the occasional coughing and wheezing. At least from what he’s seen most smoker’s have a green mist around them. He was gifted enough to not have that, unless a tumor got popped open or punctured. Then there will be stink mist and weird goo dripping out of him. It was… Really gross. He hated it. There was still a lot to get used to with this mutation. But he felt like he was never going to get used to it. Who can just suddenly get used to a new body like this after living with a normal human one for 27 years? This session of moping was suddenly cut off when he heard something. Something small was flashing red in the distance, and… Beeping? It definitely got the attention of several common infected, and they all ran over to start hitting and attacking it. Then just like that the thing exploded- sending zombie part flying everywhere “WHOO! That was a BIG one!” Some dude ran over to the gorey aftermath and laughed about it. Four other people followed behind him- three girls and another guy it looked like. The boy who just threw that bomb looked pretty young- maybe in his last years of high school. He had messy brown hair and wore a torn up leather jacket. He seemed… A little too happy about there being zombie guts everywhere. One of the girls started scolding him for running over and laughing about the bomb explosion. “This isn’t a game you know!” She was a short blonde woman, looking like she may have been Asian. Her hair was in a bob cut and oddly neat for it being the end of the world. The other three people was a girl with light brown hair up in a ponytail, and seemed a lot sharper then the rest of the team. Seemed like she was maybe the leader? The other woman had shoulder length hair that was pitch black, with a little bit of purple faded into it. She looked like she could have been your junior high bully, or the biggest mcr fan you’ve ever met. She was a little gruff, but in more of a charismatic way. She also seemed to get along with the leader girl. The last man was taller then everyone else, had neat brown hair and glasses, and had a neat turtleneck sweater that was now covered with blood and other stains. He was trying to help lead around the rowdy boy, who was very disobedient and kept trying to screw around with the infected before he chopped their head off with an axe. “Look Ed- I know we’ve been in the safehouse for a few days, and you’re excited to be out! But you can’t just run off and be a reckless idi-” “Cram it, Goodman.” Ed shoved a pistol into a sleeping zombies mouth and fired. He snapped his head to the right real fast and stared blankly into the alleyway. “You coming?” The queen of emo asked him. Goodman had a map with them and they were trying to figure out where they were, and where they were gonna be heading. “Yeah sorry, I thought I saw something.” The boy shrugged and went back to the rest of the group. ‘Shit.’ Smith thought frantically- hiding behind a dumpster. If it wasn’t so damn dark here they may have saw him. Shit- He seemed to have… Misjudged how far away the survivors actually were. Good god- how could he get out of here. Should he just wait it out? They might go in the direction he wanted to go. But he also wasn’t going anywhere specifically. Just away from this place. He put his hand over his lumpy neck for a moment, feeling… Odd? And quickly he slapped both his hands over his mouth. God damn it- another coughing fit. At the worst possible time too. He tries to hard to make these stop, but he just… Can’t. It’s too difficult, and not to say painful as well. Ed looked down that same alley again, squinting a bit and only half listening to what the group was discussing. Sounded like something was… Wheezing? Crying? Coughing? He couldn’t really tell. “Where are you goi-” “Chill out pipsqueak, I just think I head something.” He readied a sniper rifle and cautiously approached the area. “Uh… Hello? Any zombies making love back here?” He asked, peeking around the corner. Smith’s heart almost stopped right there and then when he heard how close he was getting. He proceeded to press himself against the dumpster and think of what to do. He was gonna need to act fast if he wanted to live. He looked to the side very slowly and saw the tip of the gun… “Hey! What are you doing back there!?” The emo girl yelled over. Ed turned around and responded “Something back here smells like shit, I wanted to see wh-” Before he could finish that sentence he got socked in the face and someone’s knees slammed directly into the crotch. He fell on the ground writhing in pain, and Smith took the chance to grab his gun and start running off. “Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck-” Everyone was on him now, and there was a dead end. Wonderful. It was mostly covered by wooden planks, but more to the side he could see the fence was made of chains. He was probably gonna die right now anyways, but he may as well go down trying to save himself. The survivors ran over to see their injured friend, who had a bloody nose and probably no more balls. “What was that!? Did you see??” Goodman helped him up and watched the leader chase the attacker. “Megan’s going after it. I think it was a… Zombie? Pen, did you see him?” “Yeah, he looked like a zombie I’m pretty sure.” The short girl said. “Looks like he came to avenge his fallen comrades.” She looked at Ed with a small sneer. Megan chased the smoker down all the way to a dead end, where he just dropped the sniper rifle and started climbing the fence. Right as he got to the top she ran to snatch the gun, quickly took aim, and fired. With a shriek he fell off the fence on the other side, writing and pain. She got him in his left arm, and he was bleeding out fast. He was on the other side though, so he pushed himself back up and started booking it out of there. Megan sighed softly and returned to her friends. “I drove him off. Don’t worry, I don’t think he’ll be coming back.”

Smith had been running for a good long while- grasping his arm tightly and breathing heavily. The troubling thing now is that he was bleeding a lot, and things started to get… Blurry. He leaned against a wall real quick, trying to catch his breathe. Problem was it didn’t feel like he was catching his breathe. Ever. He wheezed loudly with each inhale and exhale, but it felt like almost no oxygen got into him. His legs were shaky, he felt weak… God, he was so tired. He glanced at his shoulder for a second and-

”SHIT!” He screamed and saw someone reaching over to him. Once more he socked them in the face- sending them onto the ground. They scrambled away for a moment, and then Smith pulled out his shotgun. ”DON’T FUCKING MOVE!” He screamed, wheezing loudly afterwards. ”Waitwaitwait don’t shoot don’t shoot!” The man shouted back, sounding terrified. He was holding his hands up, and neither of them moved for several moments. The guy was in a spot Smith couldn’t really see him. Damn it, the sun was about to set soon. Everything was dark. “Okay… I want you to stand on up, and walk over here slowly.” Smith sighed. He felt like he was gonna faint any moment now. “Okay-! Alright. Just… Don’t freak out, okay?” The man was a lot calmer now, and proceeded to stand up. He took each step forward with caution, and didn’t take his eye off Smith or the shotgun for even a second. And the smoker right there and then almost fainted from what he saw. “I’m sorry, you just looked… Wait, you’re injured.” Was what the man had to say. The guy had his brown hair in a small ponytail, he was terribly obese, he wore a blue coat with a white shirt underneath it, and he looked at Smith not with fear anymore. But with concern. “I heard gunshots not too far away. Were people trying to hurt you.” Still frozen in place, Smith just continued staring at the man. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing. The guy seemed completely normal, yeah. Except for the bulging tumor covering his right eye, and the two smaller ones visible on his neck.

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providencepeakrp · 3 years ago

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CALLIE HENDRICKS

age: 28.

gender & pronouns: cis female & she/her.

neighborhood: bighorn hills.

occupation: veterinarian at healthy tails.

fc: phoebe tonkin.

BIOGRAPHY

trigger warnings: medical, tumor, death, and miscarriage.

In Pasadena, Callie was brought into the world by Robin and Stella Hendricks. Her father was a renowned surgeon and her mother a hospital administrator, raising her alongside two siblings she was smack in the middle of. The siblings were close and the home was always a happy one despite the long hours each parent tended to work. Callie’s mother mostly made a set schedule so that she could be as present as possible in the upbringing of her children, denying her husband’s offer to hire help for her every single time he mentioned it. She didn’t believe in her children being raised by nannies nor did she want her children to become latchkey, which meant that she had to be passed up a few times when it came to promotions given that she needed to stick to a strict nine to five schedule. Stella wanted to be home every night to prepare dinner for her family and check on her children’s homework. The siblings couldn’t be any more different from each other; Callie’s older sister was very much the girly type that was a princess as a child and a popular cheerleader when she reached her teens, whereas her younger brother was adventurous and sporty. She, herself, was the nerdy type. Callie loved to read and had a knack for tech, she either had her nose in a book or was taking something apart and putting it back together often leaving things to run better once she was done messing with them. She was lucky in the fact that she received two great qualities from her parents, her organization from her mother and her precision from her father.

During her school years, Callie wasn’t the popular kid, she was either in the library or the science lab. But her lack of popularity wasn’t ever a problem for her, she was never a busy body like that and she was quite overshadowed by her siblings. Her older sister was very popular and her peers were generally nice to her for that reason, although it only made living in her older sister’s shadow that much more difficult. She was beautiful and had a figure enviable of every single girl in school, she had a charm about her that was effortless which only made her appearance that much more powerful and devastating. Callie would often look at herself in the mirror, stare at her boyish figure and wish to be a little something more, especially since it seemed to be what most people, especially in high school, seemed to put the most value into. Where Callie had no popularity when it came to dating opportunities she made up for when it came to her scholastic achievements. She was the girl that made honor roll every quarter, was in all AP classes as well as some classes she was taking advanced at the local college, and was in programs such as GATE.

Naturally she earned a few scholarships and chose to attend Providence Peak University and entered into the biology/zoology science program for her bachelor’s degree. Callie excelled immediately, most science and math courses by then were already second nature to her given her educational background and volunteer work that had already bloomed in her early teen years. Back in those days, before her life was consumed with coursework and internships at veterinary practices and rescue organizations that littered the valley, she made an independent living with a side hustle as a phlebotomist. Callie had taken then required course at the local community college and completed her required lab hours before she could be licensed and had used that skill as a step in for internships and also when she completed the next step in becoming a vet tech. She did so well that she passed her undergraduate with honors and was already onto her graduate and veterinary school when the call came from her family about what had been found in her mother’s regular health check-up at the doctor. It was frightening news learning that her mother had a brain tumor and was in need of surgery, but by then Callie also had support in the life she’d built around her in Providence Peak. During her senior year of university, she met Orion Williams, they were in the same course and his family owned the Wild Wolf Rescue, a place she’d always wanted to volunteer and/or work with yet hadn’t. The demands of her new job post bachelor’s degree was difficult to keep up with when also trying to balance out the remainder of her university education and knowing her mother wasn’t doing well back home.

Somewhere along the way Callie moved in with Orion and they began building a life together. He was everything she had ever dreamed of in a partner and pinched herself sometimes to make sure it was all real and she wasn’t dreaming. Especially with how supportive he was of her trying to do it all. Even though Callie was far away from her older sister there was a part of her that always overcompensated and was in competition. It was something they eventually put to rest when she made the tough decision to go back home to Pasadena and take care of her mother. Stella had put off surgery for long enough that she had begun to have motor function issues, and her siblings weren’t able to upend their lives as easily as Callie was. Not that sitting down with Rion and saying she had to leave Providence Peak and their home was easy, he just somehow made it that way. Wanting to keep their relationship steady despite the distance that would be between them. Post surgery she took care of her mother on a daily basis and balanced veterinary school demands, another thing Rion seemed to ease in all the stress she endured through that time. They exchanged texts, calls, FaceTimed as often as possible and kept to their plan of visiting each other once a month to keep as close to each other as the distance allowed.

It went on like that for years and Callie eventually fell into a rhythm with it all, but for a while it seemed as though hardship was going to take hold. Stella passed away, losing the battle with the tumors that infiltrated her brain, and shortly after Callie had a miscarriage. One loss after the other absolutely devastated her, but the baby maybe hurt a little more. It was a glimmer of light amidst enduring grey skies that had colored the last few years for her. She felt guilty, as though she’d done something wrong, despite the doctor telling her it was likely due to the amount of stress she’d been under. That her body simply couldn’t handle it all. Furthermore, having to share the loss with Rion was harder than Callie could have anticipated. Her guilt doubled when she looked at him, her pain seemed insurmountable when she realized how much she had failed at everything, but they eventually made it through by doing what they do best: sticking together and supporting one another. The loss is a wound Callie isn’t sure will ever fully heal, it simply got to a point where it’s not constantly bleeding. She found herself able to carry on and once she made peace with her mother’s death and helped her father pack up the family home, Callie looked to returning to what had become her home. Orion in Providence Peak. By then she’d finished her veterinarian school and was licensed, she accepted an offer to work at Healthy Tails and was far too eager to move back in with Orion. Soon after finding herself with a ring on her finger and herself engaged to her first and only love.

written by: christie.

#phoebe tonkin #callie hendricks #tw tumor #tw death #tw medical #tw miscarriage #bighorn hills

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nuricurry · 4 years ago

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Saint Seiya | Hyoga/Ikki; “don’t paint me black when i used to be golden” PG-13

He’s got a flat in Omsk that uses when he needs to run away. It’s small, above a little corner shop, selling liquor and cigarettes and stale chips. It’s where he buys his rolling papers, because the babushka that owns it never asks about his age. She just likes when he’s around, because he looks like her son who went off to die in the war, and he lifts heavy boxes for her and sweeps the stairs without her asking. The room smelled old, but that was mostly because of the books that filled it, crammed into the huge bulky bookcases that Hyoga managed to squeeze in until the shelves sagged and it looked as if they might tip over. Most of the books he’d never read; they were in languages he didn’t speak, Croatian and German and Gaelic and Italian, books about science and the stars and plants and trees, books that talked about wars he had never heard of and places most of the world long-since forgot existed. They were books he had run his fingers over hundreds of times in his life, books that he could remember seeing as a child, all neatly ordered and carefully arranged. In his house, they were fit where they could, shoved on top of each other and stacked on tables and chairs, none of them given the proper place they should. He brought Shun there once, when they were caught between figuring themselves out and needing company. He remembered what he looked like in that small room with it’s peeling blue floral wallpaper and water stained ceiling. His eyes had traveled around, taking it all in-- Hyoga’s unmade bed, his chipped china, the dusty lace curtains that hung in the window-- and he had smiled at him and said it was lovely. What was funny was that he knew he meant it; where Hyoga saw chaos and mess, Shun saw a home, filled with things that Hyoga wanted to hold on to, things that clearly meant something, if he bought a whole apartment to put them in, rather than let them be thrown away. They shared the bed at night, him and Shun, because there was only one and they were beyond a point of awkwardness or shame in being close to one another. They would lie on the mattress on their sides, face to face, and Shun would listen to him talk. He would tell him about how his mother gave birth to him in Moscow, but she grew up here in Omsk and he had come here hoping to find some family of his, only to learn they had all moved away or died. The house she lived in was gone, turned into a shopping center, and the only record to be found was of her was her name at the local church and the day of her baptism. They talked about the books, all collected from the cabin he lived in with Camus out in the wilderness for those eight years. He couldn’t read them all, and honestly, many of them he didn’t want to, because he was never as analytical as Camus was. He didn’t really need to know how the world worked and why it did. He just lived in the moment, he just had to make it through each day, and that was enough for him. Yet, even knowing so many of them would never be opened again, he couldn’t bear to throw any of them away. Camus had touched them at some point, his eyes had scanned them over, which meant Hyoga couldn’t get rid of a single one of them, in memory of him. That was what the apartment really was for, when it came down to it. Storing his memories, trying to hold onto them and make them last by locking them away, as if that would keep them fresh, keep them safe. Shun, as he knew he would be, was sympathetic. He didn’t discourage his hoarding, didn’t criticize or encourage him to put those sorts of things aside. He just held his hand when Hyoga spoke about how he liked when the old lady downstairs called him ‘Pasha’ because it was like having a grandmother for the first time, he offered to get him a drink when Hyoga would get a headache from crying, he wouldn’t say anything about the creaking floorboards and lumpy mattress and leaking pipes and paper-thin walls of Hyoga’s glorified memory box. He just told him it felt like home, and offered to bring him new sheets and maybe a nice rug and a plant to liven up the space. Shun said those things because Hyoga didn’t tell him the whole truth. Shun didn’t know about the box under the bed, the box of Camus’ clothes that he kept tucked away under lock and key. He didn’t tell him about keeping his coat, his shirts, his gloves, because they were things that Camus had worn and touched, they still held traces of his distinctive scent. He didn’t tell him that the chipped dishes they used at dinner used to be his mother’s rescued from the remains of her sunken ship years ago and hoarded in his room where no one could find them. He didn’t mention the book that had dog-eared pages about the Kraken and sirens and Leviathan, creased and folded over by what must have been a young Isaak’s hand. He didn’t tell him about how he kept those things because he believed that they might have even traces of those he lost, a bit of their smell, a strand of their hair, even fingerprints would have been enough, because it was physical proof that they had been alive, that they existed and that once, Hyoga had been able to love someone without being afraid of that love destroying them. It wasn’t like that anymore. Hyoga had learned his lesson, had learned it in the hardest way possible. The only person who knew about Camus’ clothes and his mother’s china and Isaak’s book was Ikki. He had found the box by accident, one time when he came to the flat broken and bleeding, uncovering it when he was left alone after Hyoga went downstairs to ask for a needle and thread to sew up the wound. Ikki claimed he had been trying to find bandages when he pulled out the box. He asked about it, because it was strange for Hyoga to have a box of clothes he never wore that would never fit him, delicate painted tea cups, and a tattered book of fairytales hidden away in a box under his bed. He didn’t know why he told him-- it was not as if Ikki was ever sensitive about those things, not like Shun was-- but maybe it was because he wasn’t Shun or Seiya that he told him. Ikki was not someone who would look at him with pity when he talked about imagining that the books paper had absorbed some of Isaak’s spit from licking his fingers to turn the page, or wanting to find even traces of his mother’s fingerprints on the teapot, or about wearing Camus’ coat because it was the closest he would ever get to being held in his arms again, now that the man himself was gone. Ikki just took in all that information, he just listened, his face impassive, his eyes unreadable, before he closed the chest, and put it back under the bed. The next time Ikki was in the flat was when Hyoga brought him there because they needed to get away from everything and everyone, because he had finally talked about the fire that burned under his skin every time he was within any proximity to Ikki and Ikki echoed those words back. He hadn’t been thinking about the chest, the memories, the mementos; he was thinking about finally trying to work this fever out, but before he could, Ikki asked to see the box, and Hyoga dragged it out for him, though he didn’t understand why. Ikki pulled something out of the inner pocket of his jacket, and placed it in the box, right on top of Hyoga’s things. It was a handkerchief, and when he gently pulled up the corner of it, he saw a dried, pressed flower tucked inside. Ikki put his past inside of Hyoga’s memory box, and he let him, because he knew how much it hurt to carry around the love he knew killed someone. Maybe he thought it would bring them closer. Maybe he just wanted Ikki to find some illusion of comfort and peace like he had, forcing himself to think that compartmentalizing something meant it no longer affected him, when in fact the opposite was true. Maybe he just liked knowing that part of Ikki would always be within his reach, even if that was a part of him he had cut out, like one cuts out a tumor and puts it in a jar to sit on a shelf, a reminder of how terrible life can go, and how short it all is, subjected to the whims and forces of fate. Ikki comes to his flat in Omsk more than anyone else, and it becomes a place that Hyoga defines as ‘for them’. Parts of Ikki’s life navigate their way there, from socks and spare shoes to keys to his bike, and a case of his favorite beer always available in the fridge. They stay there, in the winter, and sometimes in the summer, when they’re allowed to get away and no one is asking anything of them, when they’ve paid their dues and given all there is to give. They eat overpriced takeout at the rickety table, they fuck on Hyoga’s lumpy bed, they sleep side by side together, and when he wakes up in the morning, sometimes Ikki’s still there. They brush their teeth in the same sink and Ikki’s leather jacket hangs on a hook next to the doorway, but lingers there more often than it’s missing, and it feels fragile, like a snowflake made from spun glass, but he holds onto it, as one of the few things he has that he desperately, so badly, doesn’t want to break. But wanting things doesn’t mean they happen. Trying to be better, trying to forget that he has destroyed every person he’s ever loved, does not stop it from happening again.

They fight. They argue. Hyoga asks him for things that Ikki won’t give him-- things he says he can’t. Ikki snaps at him. He reaches his breaking point louder than Hyoga does. “Just sit here and rot in your fucking mausoleum, Hyoga,” he tells him before he leaves, and Hyoga knows he won’t come back. So he picks up his jacket, his fingers slipping easily over the familiar, creamy texture of the leather. He holds it, he smells it, he tries to find any traces of Ikki’s heat, of his hair or his skin, undeniable proof that this was his, that he lived and breathed in this jacket, and that he existed in a world that Hyoga lived in too, inside this flat. Then, he folds it, putting new creases in the jacket before he puts it in his box, tucking it under his bed with all the other things that belong to the people he destroyed simply by loving them.

#saint seiya #fanfiction #ikki/hyoga #implied past hyoga/shun #as always for kashaun #I HAVE TO FEED MYSELF HERE

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aion-rsa · 4 years ago

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How Double Dragon’s Abobo Became a Beat em up Legend

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In the late ’80s, video games started featuring over-the-top, meaty musclemen. Metro City had Mike Haggar, a shirtless former wrestler who became mayor and decided that being “tough on crime” meant ridding the streets of criminals with his bare hands, his girlfriend’s psycho boyfriend, and a ninja in Nikes. Circus strongman Karnov scoured the world for adventure and treasure, fighting all kinds of mythical monsters. Bald Bull was trying to dominate both the boxing ring and the arm-wrestling circuit. Gutsman was a jacked construction robot who was later rebuilt as a 40-foot-tall tank centaur.

And then there was Abobo, the gigantic antagonist from Double Dragon. He wasn’t THE antagonist. Hell, in the first game, you fight him within the first two minutes. Despite his low-level status, he’s still far more fondly remembered than the main Double Dragon bad guys like Willy and the Shadow Master. There’s just always been something about this random brute that’s made him special.

Abobo’s journey begins in the original Double Dragon, Technos’ 1987 arcade hit. The game’s story is very simple. A dystopian, lawless, post-nuclear war version of New York City has been overrun by a gang called the Black Warriors or Shadow Warriors or Black Shadow Warriors. (They kind of workshop that name from game to game.) Billy and Jimmy Lee are two martial arts brothers whose mutual friend Marian is captured by gang members. Off they go to lay out everyone in that gang with their bare fists and occasional barrel/whip/knife/baseball bat.

While the cannon fodder is mostly made up of normal-sized guys, out walks Abobo, who makes his entrance by punching his way through a brick wall. From the moment he appears on screen, it’s clear Abobo is meant to stand apart from the rest. He has longer reach, takes more hits, can’t be thrown, and is able to throw Billy and Jimmy like ragdolls. The only guy more dangerous than Abobo is Willy, the final boss, who brings a machine gun to a fist fight.

Weirdly, Abobo has various forms in the game. His initial form is as a bald, pale guy with a mustache. Soon after, we fight Jick, an Abobo clone who closely resembles Mr. T. Later, we face off against an Incredible Hulk version of Abobo. This is post-nuclear war, so I suppose this tracks.

But it was NES port that really delivered the ultimate form of Abobo, whose appearance was seriously altered for the 8-bit console. With orange-brown skin, Abobo is still bigger than everyone else, but also looks inhuman. He has a giant, bald head almost the size of his bulky torso, and a black arch on his face that is apparently a mustache merged with a frown! While the NES version had its own quasi-fighting game mode with everyone redrawn with a bigger and better sprite, Abobo looked exactly the same. You just can’t mess with perfection!

Abobo sort-of-but-not-really appeared in the sequel, 1988’s Double Dragon II: The Revenge. In a game filled with giant enemies, there was a guy named Bolo who looked exactly like Abobo, but with long, black hair. Actually, in retrospect, he looks a lot like Danny Trejo.

Huh.

Abobo sat out of the next few Double Dragon games, as the Lee brothers busied themselves fighting mummies and chubby clowns. But he returned in a very unexpected crossover: 1993’s Battletoads/Double Dragon: The Ultimate Team. The game featured a bizarre team-up between the Dark Queen from Battletoads and the Shadow Warriors. As Double Dragon didn’t have too many memorable boss characters that could stack up to the likes of a giant rat in a singlet, they went with what they could get.

As with the other bosses in the crossover gamer, Abobo was depicted as an absolute giant compared to the Lee Brothers and the Toads. He was also very generic-looking, appearing as a shirtless, bald guy with no ‘stache. Due to the sci-fi nature of the crossover, his storyline ended with him getting booted off a spaceship and sent spiraling through space itself.

1993 also gave us the Double Dragon animated series. Somehow, this thing ran for two seasons (26 episodes) and Abobo was there from the beginning. The first episode was a weird Saturday morning-style retelling of the NES game’s plot, down to Billy Lee having to fight his “evil” brother at the end. Abobo acted as a henchman, alongside a very colorful take on Willy.

In the cartoon, Abobo was a bald muscleman with blue skin, meaning he has the same mysterious complexion situation as Captain N’s King Hippo. Abobo was also strangely competent on the show, all things considered, although the only fighting he ever did was throw oil drums at Billy and miss every single time. He spent more of his time annoyed at Willy, who was depicted as a psychotic cowboy with a laser gun — one-half Yosemite Sam and one-half the Interrupter from Late Night with Conan O’Brien.

The second episode introduced the Shadow Master, who immediately showed disgust at his underlings’ failure by magically bonding Willy to a giant mural of punished souls. Abobo tried to run for it, but succumbed to the same fate. The two would remain in that mural for the rest of the series.

While there was a fighting game released based off of the Double Dragon cartoon, Abobo wasn’t part of the roster. It was just as well. Double Dragon V: The Shadow Falls was a really bad game and Abobo had bigger things on the horizon.

Abobo was about to go Hollywood!

In 1994, Imperial Entertainment Group released the Double Dragon movie, a total cheesefest that couldn’t make back its $8 million budget. But Robert Patrick’s scenery-chewing main villain made the movie almost watchable. The story takes place in a version of Los Angeles that’s a cross between The Warriors and No Man’s Land from the Batman comics. Billy and Jimmy are teens who get roped into a plot that involves two dragon-shaped necklaces that form an all-power medallion when put together.

Initially, Nils Allen Stewart plays the gang leader Bo Abobo. As head of the Mohawk Gang, he’s there to act all intimidating in a goofy ’90s bully sort of way, but he really doesn’t actually do much. He takes part in a car chase and teases a fight scene, but nothing happens.

Then, the villain Koga Shuko transforms him into a literal steroid freak with some experimental machine. From there on out, Abobo is played by Henry Kingi in a bloated, rubber suit. Despite being a muscle golem at this point, Abobo STILL doesn’t actually fight anyone and is instead kidnapped by Power Corps.

Abobo eventually sees what he looks like in the mirror. Broken over what he’s been transformed into, he turns on Koga and…still doesn’t fight anyone. He just gives Power Corps some advice to help turn the tide against the bad guys. At the end of the movie, he asks the Lee Brothers if they could be buddies and recklessly drives their car.

Yeah, it’s…almost something. Not the awfulness of Super Mario Bros, but not the good-for-the-time quality of Mortal Kombat. It’s also not quite as fun-bad as the Street Fighter movie, but it does share one major similarity to it.

Much like Street Fighter, the Double Dragon movie had its own fighting game spinoff. Rather than a one-on-one fighter featuring digitized actors (which was the original idea until it wasn’t deemed viable for the deadline), Technos put together a Neo Geo animated fighter that isn’t so well-known these days due to how run-of-the-mill it was. It looked like your average SNK fighting game, with no real identity of its own. The game was released for arcade, Neo Geo CD, and PlayStation.

The 1995 fighting game was loosely based on the movie’s plot and featured some FMV clips. Showing up from the movie are Billy Lee, Jimmy Lee, Marian, Shuko, and Abobo. The rest of the roster is made up of original characters, though Technos did redesign Burnov, the Big Van Vader-looking boss character from Double Dragon II: The Revenge. Abobo more closely resembles his initial, more human-looking form from the movie, complete with mohawk, although he’s cartoonishly big in the game. Fortunately, he occasionally transforms into his blobby, tumor-like mutant form during certain moves and winposes.

His ending in the game features him eating a lot of meat at a restaurant, demanding to eat meat so rough that it’ll make his teeth bleed. Heh. And Roger Ebert said video games aren’t art.

Games

Double Dragon and Kunio-kun: Retro Bundle Coming Soon

By Rob Leane

Games

Double Dragon 4: Story & Multiplayer Modes Detailed

By Matthew Byrd

After the inexplicable crossover, animated series, failed movie, and fighting game tie-ins, Double Dragon as a franchise was finally spent. As the arcade scene died down in the late ’90s, the side-scrolling beat ‘em up disappeared for a time, and it would be a little while before nostalgia for it would kick in.

Fortunately, there was still some juice left in the fighting game genre, and in 2002 the Neo Geo had just enough time left before SNK’s hardware line was discontinued. The company Evoga developed what was, for a time, meant to be a Double Dragon fighting game, but ultimately the team wasn’t able to secure the rights and was forced to make the game with a knockoff cast of characters. The result was Rage of the Dragons, a tag-team fighting game featuring Billy Lewis, Jimmy Lewis, and Abubo…

Abubo does not have a tag partner and is instead a mid-boss so powerful that it takes two opponents to stop him. He’s depicted as a low-level mob boss with a ponytail, sunglasses, pink tank top, and overly-long, muscular arms. It’s a decent enough redesign of the original, but…Abubo? That’s the best they could come up with?

As for the official Double Dragon, it made its comeback a year later. Double Dragon Advance for the Game Boy Advance took the original arcade version, updated the graphics just enough, added more stages, enemies, and attacks, turning this installment into a souped-up take on the classic. This of course meant the return of the real Abobo!

2012 would be a banner year for the musclebound henchman. Since 2002, I-Mockery’s Roger Barr had been trying to develop an Abobo-based fangame, and in early 2012, the free-to-play masterpiece Abobo’s Big Adventure was released to the public and we were better for it.

Using 8-bit graphics, the game follows Abobo as he searches for his kidnapped son Aboboy. Each level is based on a different NES title and features a dizzying amount of Easter eggs. There’s a Double Dragon level, underwater Super Mario Bros. level, Urban Champ, Legend of Zelda, Balloon Fight, Pro Wrestling, Mega Man, Contra, and finally Punch-Out. The game is an absolute blast, especially for anyone who grew up with the NES and features such whacked out moments as:

Abobo mating with the mermaid from Goonies 2, which gives him a forcefield powerup made up of Abobo/mermaid hybrid babies, one of which begs for death!

An Abobo vs. Amazon wrestling match that includes the summoning of Hulk Hogan, Ultimate Warrior, Roddy Piper, and Undertaker assists in the form of Pro Wrestling sprites.

Taking on Krang’s giant robot body with Kirby in the abdominal area.

An incredibly long and over-the-top ending that gets extremely and laughably violent. If you’ve ever wanted to see a muscular child drink blood from the Shredder’s dismembered arm, this game is for you!

In terms of OFFICIAL nostalgia, 2012 also saw the release of Double Dragon Neon for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 (and later PC). Using 3D graphics, the game was a modern update of Double Dragon’s playstyle while playing up the 1980s aesthetic. It was a lot more ridiculous than the original series. In fact, it’s more in line with the Battletoads crossover since this game also lets you launch Abobo into the deep recesses of outer space to die.

This game also gave us the first – and, as of this writing, only – polygon Abobo. This time a towering, hunched over brute with lots of spiked armbands. All that AND the mustache!

But of those two 2012 releases, Abobo’s Big Adventure is surprisingly the better game in terms of its portrayal of the big man, as it solidified his status as nostalgic beat em up icon.

In 2017, Arc System Works put together Double Dragon IV for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC. Rather than emulate the arcade original’s aesthetic, the game took its art style from the NES games. That meant the return of the classic NES Abobo as not only a recurring enemy but an unlockable playable character. Double Dragon IV actually lets you play through the story mode as various enemy characters, but honestly, who else would you pick in that situation? Well, maybe Burnov.

Sadly, playing as Abobo in Double Dragon IV leads to a non-ending. I know you can’t improve on “Abobo punches Little Mac’s head off so hard it transcends time and space,” but at least TRY!

Around the same time, another game tried to play up Abobo’s ironic/iconic status. River City Ransom: Underground was released for the PC in early 2017. The River City Ransom series has always had ties to Double Dragon, but this high school brawler goes the extra mile by putting Abobo on a big pedestal. First off, he’s the school principal. If you attack any of your teachers, you’re sent to Principal Abobo’s office to suffer a serious slap on the wrist, shoulder, jaw, spine, etc. Sometimes he’ll even enter classrooms by punching holes through the brick walls, all while shirtless and talking like the Hulk.

Even better than that? Abobo’s not only the school principal but the Mayor of River City! No wonder everyone’s always kicking the shit out of each other! God bless Mayor Mike Haggar for being a true trendsetter.

The Double Dragon/River City connection only grew stronger when 2019 brought the absolutely must-play River City Girls. As the story goes, River City Ransom heroes Kunio and Riki have been kidnapped, so their badass girlfriends Misako and Kyoko go on a violent rampage to save them. Early in the game, while Misako and Kyoko fighting in a classroom, there’s a projector playing a short film about a boy learning about puberty.

It just so happens that the kid in the video is being taught by Abobo, who thanks puberty for his monstrous size and strength. This, my friends, is foreshadowing, as Abobo shows up later in the game as a boss.

Misako and Kyoko confront Abobo about their missing boyfriends, and Abobo admits that he isn’t sure whether or not he kidnapped them since he kidnaps a LOT of people. They throw down and we’re treated to the most powerful take on Abobo yet, considering the length of his life bar. Once defeated, Abobo admits that he has nothing to do with the missing boyfriends, but gives the heroes a lead by talking about his side job as security for an upcoming concert.

In 2020, Arc System Works released a collection for PS4 and Switch called Double Dragon & Kunio-Kun Retro Brawler Bundle. It collects 18 8-bit games, including the three NES Double Dragon games, River City Ransom, and all the old spinoffs from the River City Ransom universe. And who’s on the cover?

Yes, despite technically being in one game out of 18, and not even being the final boss of any of them, Abobo gets a major spot on the cover of this huge collection among the games’ hero characters. Finally, the world understands that Abobo is a star. Now we just need Abobo to appear in Guilty Gear Strive and then we’ll really be cooking.

The post How Double Dragon’s Abobo Became a Beat em up Legend appeared first on Den of Geek.

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queenofcats17 · 5 years ago

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If you may recall, I once asked what a BATIM-Cuphead genre swap would be like. You did have an idea for a BATIM version of Cuphead, but what about the other way around? (Assume there are no BATIM characters in the latter)

Hmm...Let’s see...

I wouldn’t want it to take place in an animation studio since that’s so integral to BATIM’s plot. So I think Cuphead in the style of BATIM would take place in an abandoned casino.

I think it would follow a similar structure of defeating bosses, but it would have the BATIM thing of delving deeper and deeper into the place they’re trapped. Instead of venturing deeper into an animation studio, it’s going deeper into an impossibly massive casino.

Like BATIM, this is gonna be pretty heavy on the body horror. I understand that you don’t really like that, but I think it would fit here.

The casino was once owned by King Dice (not his real name), and there are rumors that he made a deal with the Devil to ensure the success of his casino. It went out business years ago, although no one knows why. Cuphead and Mugman sneak in to satisfy their own curiosity and, in Cuphead’s case, get a thrill. Obviously, their names wouldn’t actually be Cuphead and Mugman, but...Well, they’ll be referred to that way.

So, Cuphead and Mugman sneak in and find the main lobby of the casino empty. It’s covered in dust and it doesn’t look like anyone’s been there for years. Cuphead immediately heads for Dice’s office, with Mugman trailing behind him. When they get to the office, they find it’s not empty. A man they recognize as Dice is seated at the desk, while another stands behind him, one hand on Dice’s chair. Dice greets the brothers warmly, asking what brings them to his humble casino. Both brothers find themselves unable to speak as Dice continues.

He tells them that he’s had a bit of trouble as of late with some of the casino patrons. They’ve been causing a ruckus and he needs someone to set them straight. He can’t do it himself because he has other things he needs to do.

“How’d you boys like a job?” The man behind Dice asks, and his voice sends shivers down Cuphead and Mugman’s spines. He pulls out two contracts from his huge fur coat, holding them out. Cuphead speaks for the two of them, trying to cover his fear with bravado by saying they’d be happy to do the job.

Mugman tries to stop his brother, but it’s too late. Cuphead is already signing the contract and Mugman’s hand is moving on its own, signing the contract too. Once the contracts are signed, they began to glow, and the man in the fur coat reveals himself to be the Devil. And since the brothers signed the contracts, their souls now belong to him.

With a snap of his fingers, the Devil transforms them into something resembling their Cuphead selves, (They’d previously been human) and it’s revealed that Dice looks like his Cuphead counterpart as well. Dice says that if the brothers don’t collect the boss’ souls, they’ll be stuck like this forever and added to the collection of souls trapped in the casino. The brothers are then booted out to take care of the bosses.

I think the bosses would still be grouped similarly to how they are in the original game. Like, each floor would have a collection of bosses that Cuphead and Mugman would need to defeat. To add to the survival horror element, perhaps certain bosses require certain items to defeat them and the brothers have to find the items on the floor before they can take down the boss. I figure each boss would be confined to their own room.

Each boss is someone who has sold their soul to the Devil at some point or another.

Here’s what I envision for each of the bosses.

Floor 1

The Root Pack: The three of them still look mostly human, but vegetables are growing out of their bodies like tumors. It looks as though their respective vegetables are trying to take them over. They’re dressed like farmers, although their clothes are ripped and torn by the vegetables. Like in the original Cuphead, their attacks involve sending vegetables after the brothers. The vegetables crawl after the brothers, screaming in pain as they do. The Root Pack can be defeated by burning them, using kerosene and matches found in the hallway. Their room is filled with dirt and vegetables.

Goopy Le Grande: He’s humanoid, but made entirely of blue goo. His body is constantly dripping, revealing the skeleton underneath. He’s not wearing any clothes, but it’s not like he has genitals or anything. He attacks by stretching parts of his goo body and trying to smash the brothers. I can’t think of how he’d be defeated, but I’d think it would involve removing his bones from the goo and destroying them. His room resembles a large boxing ring.

Ribby and Croaks: They look like some horrifying mix of human and frog. They wear their boxing gear from the original game. They fight like boxers, punching at the brothers and chasing them around the room. Their movements are just a little too frog-like to look natural. Their room resembles a bar, like the area you fight them in in the original game.

Hilda Berg: She resembles a broken automaton, clockwork visible through the broken skin. Her room is larger than the others on the floor and much darker, illuminated by simulated stars on the ceiling. She does fly around and the brothers have to shoot her down and attack her from there. The more she’s attacked, the more her body breaks apart and the less human she appears.

Cagney Carnation: Similar to the Root Pack, he still looks mostly human, although instead of vegetables growing out of his body he had flowers and vines. Like the Root Pack, he too can be dispatched by burning. His room is a lot like the Root Pack’s in that it’s filled with dirt. But his has giant creeping roots and vines all over.

Floor 2

Baroness Von Bon Bon: She looks pretty much like she does in the original game with the exception that she holds her head in her hand. Her stump of a neck is constantly bleeding and she cries blood. Her area is similar to the original game in the sense that there’s candy everywhere. But here, the candy is broken and dirty. The way to defeat her is the destroy her head. She attacks with a shotgun or by sending rotting and broken candies after the brothers.

Djimmi the Great: His area looks like the inside of a pyramid and is literally covered in sand. Djimmi himself looks like a red cloud of smoke wrapped in rags and is rather hard to hit. He summons a lot of other enemies like in the original game. I think to defeat him you’d have to suck him into his lamp or something.

Beppi the Clown: It probably wouldn’t be that hard to make Beppi scary. I’d still want him to be made out of balloons, though, because it would be cool if he was defeated by popping him. His room looks like a run-down carnival or circus big top. He attacks by sending balloon animals and sentient amusement park rides after the brothers.

Wally Warbles: I’m honestly not sure how to make Wally terrifying. Maybe a huge sickly bird still halfway stuck in a birdhouse? Maybe he’s still trying to protect his son. His room would probably look like a nest. He’d attack by pecking at the brothers and swiping at them with his wings.

Grim Matchstick: He’s just a huge dragon. Because I love dragons and imagine how terrifying it would be to have to face a dragon when you’re like 12 and have been through everything the brothers have. To make this even sadder, the whole time they’re fighting, Grim is begging for mercy. He just wants to be left alone. But the brothers need to collect his soul to be freed.

Floor 3

Rumor Honeybottoms: Her room looks like a hive, covered in honey and swarming with giant bees. Giant realistic-looking bees. Rumor herself is a mix of bee and human features. Meaning parts of her are human and parts of her are bee. It’s not blended at all. Makes me shudder just thinking about it. The honey everywhere makes it hard for the brothers to move, which makes it easier for the huge bees to attack them.

Captain Brineybeard: I think it would be cool if he looked like the zombie pirates from Pirates Of The Carribean. His room looks a lot like the deck of a ship and is a good deal smaller than other rooms. Not a lot of room to run and/or hide. The brothers get swords to attack him with.

Cala Maria: Her room looks like a beach. When the brothers enter, she has her back to them as she cries on the sand. She looks normal from the back, but when they get closer, she turns around to reveal that she basically looks like a mix of Medusa and a very scary mermaid. Lots of sharp needle teeth, snakes for hair, slimy skin, and way too big eyes that look more suited to seeing in the darkness of the deep sea. The brothers have to avoid looking at her because she’ll turn them to stone. It would be cool if the brothers reflected her petrifying gaze back on her and broke her apart when she turned to stone.

Floor 4

Dr. Kahl’s Robot: A horrifying mix of machine and flesh so integrated it’s unclear whether he was first a machine or a man. He begs for death while the brothers are fighting him, his voice a mix of a mechanical voice box and a human voice. His area is a junkyard like in the original game, filled with trash and machine parts. He shoots lasers and stuff out of one of his arms as his body moves against his will to kill them.

Werner Werman: His room looks like a WWI trench and he looks like a WWI soldier. The brothers have to dodge constant gunfire from all directions as they attempt to make their way to Werner. Werner acts like there’s a war going on, thinking the brothers are enemy soldiers. He thanks them when they finally kill him.

Sally Stageplay: She looks like her game counterpart, except that she’s noticeably more bloody and disheveled, and she’s on strings. She’s puppeted around by some unseen force in the ceiling. I imagine her fight would be similar in that she’s performing a play in a theater. The brothers need to cut her strings to defeat her.

The Phantom Express isn’t a boss. They arrive to take the brothers to the bottom floor of the casino. They all look like living corpses who don’t talk much to the brothers.

(Sidenote, every time the brothers ‘die’, it gets harder for them to remember their human lives and more of their bodies turns into porcelain.)

Final floor

After beating all the bosses, Cuphead and Mugman reach the bottom of the casino, where Dice and the Devil are waiting for them. Dice commends them on a job well done and the brothers demand to be returned to normal. The Devil first demands the souls. The brothers refuse to hand over the souls until they’re returned to normal.

The Devil is frustrated by this and tells Dice to take care of it before vanishing. Which leads to the brothers fighting him and his casino mini-bosses. Some of the bosses would be scarier if they were humanized a bit. Like Pip and Dot could be sewn together. Mangosteen alone is nightmare fuel. Leave him how he is.

Upon defeating Dice, the brothers then have to go up against the Devil. I don’t think you’d have to do much work to make that boss fight scary. It’s already scary.

The brothers do eventually defeat him, forcing him to burn their contracts and release them. They then release the souls of those trapped in the casino and leave, vowing to never try something like this ever again.

It’s getting late and I ran out of steam near the end, but I hope you like it! :D

#cuphead #cuphead genre swap #body horror tw #violence tw #gore tw #blood w

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theblueskyphoenix · 5 years ago

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Grid Ghost Chapter 2: Down and Out

Obake was doing his best to keep himself from falling over. He only had another block or so to go before he reached his destination. He could taste copper in his mouth.

Never a good sign.

His steps were staggering, his vision flickering but he kept pushing till he was finally through a set of doors. Soon as he passed through, he let himself fall to the floor, his eyes sliding shut.

Before he blacked out entirely, he could hear people coming towards him. Their voices had a slight panic to them yet they were mostly calm.

The last thing he could hear clearly was someone shouting:

“Get him on a stretcher and have an OR on standby!”

I’ll leave the rest to you, now.

Please, don’t kill me.

oooooo

Dr. Shaylin Sky was used to crazy.

When you sign up to be a doctor, it was a given that anything could possibly go wrong and anything could possibly happen during a shift at a hospital and you just had to learn to roll with it and not question things.

Though sometimes she wished nights could be quieter. Especially when she was about to head home.

It had been a long day of appointments and assisting surgeons in surgery and trying to get the hospital back in proper working order after everything went to heck with concerns of the city being destroyed by a star that seemed to come out of nowhere.

And now… she had an unconscious man she was rushing to an OR after exams had revealed he was suffering massive amounts of internal bleeding in the abdominal region.

Along with something else that was definitely not normal but I don’t got time for that. Treat and stabilize now, ask questions later.

As soon as the man was in the OR she quickly scrubbed in before joining in on the procedure.

“Shouldn’t you be heading home?” The surgeon asked as he started to make incisions into the affected areas. “And is a blood transfusion on the way?”

“I would be, Leon, but I had a man pass out on the floor in front of me and you know I don’t like dropping a patient and running, even if I’m supposed to be gone by now and yes, I got the boys looking through our O- stash as we speak.

"Devoted as ever and good, because he’s losing a lot and fast.” Leon narrowed his eyes. “What the heck did he do to himself? Throw himself off a building?”

“Doubt it, considering the only broken bones I saw in the scans were a couple of ribs. If he had been thrown off a building there would be a lot more broken. Though with the bruises he’s got on him he certainly had something rough happen be it a landing or a fight. Just not sure what.”

“Questions we can ask him once he’s stable and awake. Clamps, please.”

Shaylin handed Leon on the tool in question.

“Oh, trust me, I got a LOT of questions for this guy once he’s conscious and lucid.”

“That’s an omen.” Leon looked to Shaylin with some concern. “See something of interest in your exam?”

“Nothing harmful… I think but it was… definitely of interest.”

“Wanna enlighten me?”

“Drain blood and fix injuries first, then I’ll tell you.”

“Very well.” Leon eyed the man’s face before getting back to work. “Though, gotta say, it’s a miracle he made it here on his own. You said he stumbled on in?”

“Yeah. Again, not sure what the story is but I’m sure we’ll find out soon.”

And I get the feeling it’s going to be a weird one.

oooooo

For Obake, it had only been a few minutes between when he had blacked out to when he was waking up again. He knew it had certainly been longer than a few minutes he just wasn’t sure how much longer.

As he opened his eyes, he could hear the faint sounds of a heart monitor beeping and the dripping of an IV bag.

Those are sounds that bring back memories…

“Just a little longer, Bob. You’re almost done.”

“Just a few more drops then we can go home and watch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles together like you promised, Daddy! You can do it!”

For a moment, he was back in that treatment bed again, his daughter holding his hand while his wife monitored his vitals. He could see a young Trina smiling at him, hopefulness in her light blue eyes as she helped keep him comfortable.

It all quickly faded as a voice broke the illusion, revealing he was in an ICU room with a woman he didn’t recognize.

The woman appeared to be of latina descent with tan skin and light brown hair that was pulled into a loose ponytail. She had a look of concern in her deep blue eyes. Judging from the lab coat and ID tag she had hanging around her neck, she was most likely a doctor.

He squinted his eyes to read the name on the ID tag.

“Dr. Shaylin Sky”

“With me?” she asked.

“More or less.” He said, practically whispered. He cringed, bringing a hand to his abdomen. “What happened…?”

“You collapsed in our ER bay. You were rushed in for emergency surgery after some quick tests. You had a couple of broken ribs and massive internal bleeding in the abdominal region due to damage done to various organs. All of it was treated and you’re stable now and are on strict bed rest till further notice.”

“I see… perfect.” Obake sighed, looking up at the ceiling. “Anything else I need to know about in regards to injuries?”

“No… More so I need to know about something.”

Obake looked to Shaylin, raising an eyebrow.

“What do you mean?”

Shaylin crossed her arms.

“You got an interesting looking implant on the left side of your skull… and a pretty nicely sized tumor to boot. I doubt those are things you don’t know about. Care to explain?”

Obake glanced to the side.

“… I have to ask a question before I can answer anything in regards to those two things. Are you associated with Sycorax or Liv Amara?”

Shaylin gave a disgusted look.

“The day I associate with that woman or her company is the day I resign from being a doctor. No offense to her and her work but I don’t like her attitude. She’s just…. condescending and sometimes has no regards for morality… It's… a long story. Either way, no, I am not associated with her, nor is this particular hospital. They’re not rich enough for her. Who wants to know?”

Obake let out another sigh.

“Bob Aken wants to know, that’s who.”

Shaylin’s eyes widened at this, though kept her composure.

“Go on.”

Obake closed his eyes.

“I’ve had this tumor in my head since I was 15 years old that manifested due to a rather unfortunate accident with an experiment. It was managed with chemo treatments for the longest time till around last year when someone came in, claiming they could help me. This someone being Liv Amara.” Obake opened his eyes, his implant letting off a glow for a second. “This implant was supposed to cure me… when it all it did was make things worse.” His eyes narrowed. “She took everything from me that day I entered her operating room doors… all with a simple series of shocks.”

“Your family is none of your concern anymore, Obake. Your concern is making your mark on San Fransokyo. To be remembered as a legend.”

Obake was panting, grabbing at the table as electricity pulsed through his mind.

“Ngh! No! Kim… Trina… I… Gck! I need to…”

“Shhhh…” Liv brought a hand to his cheek again, stroking it with her thumb. “They’re not here anymore… It’s just you, Obake. You’re alone. And there’s nothing wrong with that. Think of all you can do. No limits whatsoever. You can be the genius you longed to be. You can make great accomplishments. You can make Grace regret ever abandoning you in your time of need. You can make her wish she had never given up on you.”

“I… I….” Obake’s pupils dilated. “I could be… remembered by all…”

��That’s right.” Liv smiled. “You just have to do exactly as I tell you. There’s no Bob Aken anymore. There is only Obake. A ghost. But soon to be remembered and revered by all.”

“Remembered… and revered by all.”

Obake grabbed at the blankets of his bed, lowering his head.

“I haven’t been in my right mind for awhile now… and I want it to stop. And I only know one person I could trust with my head.” Obake looked at Shaylin. “Do you know Dr. Kim Aken?”

Shaylin nodded.

“I do. She’s a dear friend of mine… who has been dearly missing her husband who disappeared around last year.” Shaylin’s look turned gentle. “And it seems he’s finally been found.”

Obake nodded.

“Can you get me to her? And do you have my things? There’s some important equipment in that backpack I came in with along with the USB I had around my neck.”

“Yes and yes. I have your possessions in my office for safekeeping and I can contact Kim’s hospital right away and have you transferred.”

“Thank you… Where is she at, by the way?”

“Saga Regional Hospital.”

Home…

“Good… I want to get away from this city for a bit.” Obake leaned back into his pillow. “Too much crime and too much noise.”

Shaylin chuckled.

“Kim said the same thing.” She gave a small smile. “You know, she never stopped looking for you. Even came here for a bit with her daughter in hopes they’d find you. They’re going to be so happy when they see you.”

“Maybe… though I’m expecting irritation considering my current state.”

And telling them what I’ve been doing for the past year. That’s going to be fun.

“Possibly. Kim’s more level headed than I am. If you were my husband you would’ve gotten a slight pow pow.”

“And a sandal?”

“That’s la chancla to you, mister.”

“Nuance.”

Shaylin rolled her eyes, getting up from her chair.

“I’ll go make some calls then. Can I get you anything?”

Obake gave a small smirk.

“I have a blueberry scone in a tupperware in that backpack of mine. I’d like to eat it now, please.”

Shaylin smirked, shaking her head.

“You’re not gonna be able to enjoy it as you are so, patience on that one.”

“Oh, come now, I know how to eat slow.”

“Eat it when you don’t have a tumor the size of a ping pong ball suppressing your right from wrong junction.”

Shaylin left without another word.

Obake gave a flat look, plopping his head into his pillow.

It’s called the temporo-parietal junction, plebeian.

… And it’s not the size of a ping pong ball!

#big hero 6 #big hero six #bh6 #big hero 6 the series #big hero six the series #bh6 the series #big hero 6 obake #big hero six obake #bh6 obake #big hero 6 oc #big hero six oc #bh6 oc #shaylin sky #grid ghost #fanfic #fanfiction

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liddellwittelsbach-blog · 6 years ago

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braindamageforbeginners · 6 years ago

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Neuralgia/ADA/GOP-On-The-Run

Cycle 7, Day 19

First of all, next week’s my “week off,” which is usually just a blood-draw, however, because it also marks Dad’s birthday, which he’s intimated is supposed to be A Party of Special Magnificence, so I’ll be in the greater SoCal area during my “off week,” and, with my brother at hand in a festive mood, there’s a chance I won’t come to my senses until November. So, unless something goes spectacularly wrong at next week’s blood-draw, there’s a chance I’ll only update/write about random goings-on, or Dad’s giant, dragon-shaped firework (that isn’t a euphemism, I’ve been explicit that I want to see wizards, halflings, the whole deal).

Today, however, I’d like to draw some attention to my own physical disabilities (such as they are), why large chunks of the country aren’t ADA-compliant (I don’t even mean in a paved sense), and your very corrupt, local congressman, if you’re from a rural area (almost guaranteed).

So, even though I am automatically, federally-qualified as disabled (look it up under “compassionate allowances”). However, 80% of applicants eventually get disability coverage because - here’s a shocker - when people can’t do their jobs or survive normally, that tends to be noticeable, unless you have an extremely advanced neurodegenerative disease (in which case, you get to be president). And when I applied for disability, no one was, shall I say, directly unpleasant, but I got the very distinct impression that everyone would rather be doing something else. It wasn’t until I actually wrote my own condition down and told the social security rep to call their boss and give them that diagnosis that I got a bit of an attitude change. So, most disabled folks tend to be somewhat sensitive about it, because it is a pain in the ass (sometimes literally) and society is very much stacked against us. I actually wouldn’t even have given it much thought unless I had to fill out and file paperwork on it. Again, be kind and patient (that’s the general message), and don’t assume. I prefer to be called “crippled,” because I feel that word accurately captures both what happened to me, and and how it’s effected me.

To that, I also get passing privilege, because I can walk (though steep stairs and long sprints are out), and you’d only tell my left side is off if you were familiar with me. So, a neurologically-mangling injury usually occurs in one of two ways, externally (or externally-derived), which is usually what you associate with disabled vets, or internally (either due to clot, stroke, or cancer/tumor).. In the former type, you’d see nerve damage below the injury point. In the latter type, it’s a little harder. Everything in the brain is integrated - physically - it’s a little harder to keep track of the higher-order, Wile E. Coyote (Super Genius) functions, especially since you develop new neural pathways throughout your life. But, just for the physical functions, damage to the brain occurs on the opposite side of the body, and it’s a half-body thing (most of my left-side is unreliable in the right circumstances, but for day-to-day use, it’s just the lower leg and lower arm). And these can be anything from noticeable motor impairments to, in my case, “diminished sensation.” Again, I’m just speaking for myself, but neuralgia - the reduced/lost sensations and/or pain of nerve damage - is a killer for folks like me. In my own case, if you’ve ever had minor oral surgery or a filling where the dentist got a little careless injecting the novocaine, you’ll be familiar with the numbness issue. Your muscles worked just fine, but without sensation, it’s hard to orient them enough to get them to work. That’s a rather extreme example, and it’s not terribly accurate for me, but it’ll give you an idea of what I’m talking about. Again, unless you know me, it’s kind of hard to spot me (I only hobble on inclines). Unless you knew I’d been trained as a pianist for a number of years when I was much younger, you’d have a tough time guessing my left hand has trouble with buttons. And, fortunately, the legal definition of disabilities isn’t limited to “patient is mostly-functional, but severely reduced by previous-standards.” (I also really do spend an hour or two in the gym every day, if only because I want a body capable of absorbing and metabolizing every last damned drop of marizomib they can pump into me)(which, come to it, is probably some sort of admission of addiction). I am, however, going to start referring to my left arm as “my Grendel arm,” because, if I’m attacked by Vikings, I intend to let that side take the damage (again, it won’t be as painful because of that “reduced sensation” problem I run into when I’m very tired)(and, hopefully, when I’m on fire and being attacked by Norsemen seeking retribution for

Speaking of legal issues, now’s a good time as any to point out that vast swathes of the country are near-impossible to live in if you’re, let’s say, medically-compromised. Now, I realize that I’m a very special, special-needs patient/citizen in that my existence is dependent on technology that’s beyond the ragged, bleeding edge of most hospitals - most states, as it turns out. But that’s going to be true of just being able to access decent care in most places, even for something relatively simple, like the heart disease currently building up in the Boomers. And I bring that up because, in most places, your elected federal officials are actually working against your best interest. Frequently with your consent. And these are, in my experience, always in rural districts. The party of your representative isn’t an issue, I’d bet; the issue is whether you live in a zip code with a population density closer to Los Angeles, or Maine. Americans (or, health-industry lobbyists) made a hullabaloo about Obamacare (or, as it’s formally known, the Affordable Care Act - the ACA). However, for people like me, it did help knock down things that will kill Grandma and Granpa, like lifetime limits (I’ve reached and exceeded those probably ten years ago), and - this is big - prior conditions. These are both weasel terms used by insurance companies to reduce patient numbers. Again that wasn’t a major issue for me until an orange-haired idiot came into office, promising to change all that. At the time - these were in the intertumor years - I was living in Utah. Here’s an important thing to understand when someone is actively working to undermine your life expectancy; they’re not going to be honest about it. And, in my experience, elected officials from rural areas tend to have more in common with Boss Hogg than they do Mr. Smith, but that could be because the first Congressman I met “representing” me was Jerry Lewis (that was his nom de guerre)(but not his real name)(also not his real hair), who was almost hilariously sleazy, and consistently plagued by corruption accusations. Which, uh, I think, describes almost all of the Congressmen who represented that district. So, you can imagine my complete lack of interest at being pushed and prodded and shoved in front of a congressional underling at the sitting Congressman’s office (this was Chris Stewart - or his local office, BTW).

We will ignore the odd decorating decision to include a large photo of a bomber with an explosion on it - I guess it’d been made by a constituent. We were met by - as expected - an office underling. The hiring and firing and promoting of office staff in small districts is usually pretty sordid. That’s not some sort of slanderous accusation; all professional politicians are legally prohibited from directly employing their companies or family members. Most, like Ron Paul, figure out a workaround until those pesky Congressional Ethics reports come out. The assistant in front of us assured us - in the wake of GOP populism that’d swung in just a few weeks earlier, that the Congressman didn’t like his job, only did it because no one else was stepping up, and was all in favor of term limits and revolving door policies - basically, the sort of pep-talk I always look for in the medical industry when looking for a well-qualified specialist (”Yeah, he’s great at his job, but he dislikes it and is only waiting for an opportunity to get out.”). The assistant was not the Congressman’s chief adviser on health care (I can only assume that was some wildly unqualified lobbyist from Pfizer, but that’s pure speculation). You know what really sends out a message of professionalism and receptiveness to constituent needs? When a constituent calls to schedule an appointment to voice concerns regarding health legislation, and the person qualified to answer such things isn’t in the office. Anyway, even though the assistant didn’t have any answers to most of my questions, he assured us that the congressman didn’t want to cut anyone’s insurance, but thought that a free market - the standard BS filler that comes from someone who has never been thrown out of a hospital (yes, this happens, folks, it made headlines in Baltimore a few years ago). Upon later checking, the assistant had actually actively lied about both issues, based on the Congressman’s actual voting record. Again, I don’t think he’s alone, I just think rural Congressman who coast on for a career based on name recognition aren’t used to an informed, angry public making proper inquiries. At least have the guts to tell me it’s more immediately profitable to kill me than to keep me alive; we’ll have to agree to disagree, but I get it. To make a long story short, because of Utah’s combination of hilariously inadequate insurance coverage for people like me, and my stubborn refusal to settle for less-than-best when seeing neurology specialists, I’m no longer a constituent. Thank you, sir, you ran me off your land, kudos. But I’m certainly not alone. Again, the Boomers are at an age where they’re going to be dropping dead of heart disease, cancer, etc. That’s not some dire, emo warning, either, it’s just that they’re all in their 60′s or above, and, until 2013, almost half of the US was either uninsured or disastrously uninsured. I think the HMO system will last two dozen cases of wheeling grandma and grandpa into the cold street before it comes to an end. But what the hell do I know? I’m just a sick person who’s had to learn insane amounts.about the health insurance industry and pharmaceutical companies to make it this far.

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drshaileshjain-blog · 4 years ago

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Best doctor for headache in rohini - types of headache and trigger factors

3) Hormone Headache 2) Hemicrania Continua 5) Sinus Headache

Many people face different types of headaches every day. Sometimes painkillers do not help and your headache worsens. Due to this headache you feel sick, nauseous and feel light or noisy and painful. Headaches can be more complicated than most people realize. Different types of headaches can have their own set of symptoms, have unique causes, and require different treatments.

Types of Headache

According to Dr. Shailesh Jain AIIMS Neurosurgeon, There are over 150 types of headaches, but the most common types include:

Common Type of Headaches:

1) Tension Headache

Tension headaches cause mild, moderate, or intense pain behind your eyes and in your head and neck. This tension headache feels like a tight band around their forehead. These tension headaches occur one or two times per month on average. Tension headache caused by muscle contractions (Types of contractions: Foods, Activities, Stressors) in the head and neck regions, Cold Temperature and staring at a computer/ Laptop screen for a long time.

2) Migraine Headache

A migraine headache causes moderate to severe pain. The pain is often described as throbbing or quivering and usually begins on one side of the head. Migraine headache worsens with physical activity, light, sound, or physical movements. The pain usually lasts 4 hours to 3 days. You can be sensitive to light, sound and even smell. And you may also experience nausea and / or vomiting. If left untreated, the headache will be moderate to severe.

3) Cluster Headache

Cluster headaches, which occur in cyclical patterns and one of the most painful Headache. A cluster headache usually wakes up in the middle of the night with intense pain on one side of your head or around one eye. Cluster headache is rare and not life-threatening. Treatments can make cluster headache attacks less severe. Medications can reduce the cluster headaches you have. Cluster headache symptoms include One-sided pain, Restlessness, Excessive tearing, Redness of your eye on the affected side, Stuffy nose on the affected side, Forehead or facial sweating on the affected side, Pale skin (pallor) or flushing on your face, Swelling around your eye on the affected side, Drooping eyelid on the affected side, etc.

4) Chronic Daily Headache

If you have a headache from time to time, you might have chronic daily headaches.It refers to how often the headaches occur and how long the condition lasts. Chronic daily headaches occur 15 days or more a month, for longer than three months. There are short-lasting and long-lasting chronic daily headaches and it includes Chronic migraine, Chronic tension-type headache, New daily persistent headache, Hemicrania continua etc.

5) Sinus Headache

Your sinuses are air-filled spaces inside your forehead, cheekbones, and behind the bridge of your nose. usually it happens because of an allergic reaction or an infection - they swell, make more mucus, and the channels that drain them can get blocked. Sinus Headache includes a runny and stuffy nose, feeling of fullness in your eyes, fever, swelling in your face.

6) Post Traumatic Headaches

Post Traumatic Headache is defined as a secondary headache that develops within 7 days after head trauma. Post traumatic headaches include a dull ache that gets worse from time to time, Trouble concentrating, Memory problems, Lightheadedness, Irritability, etc.

Less Common Headache

1) Exercise Headache

Exercise headache occurs during or after a strenuous exercise. Some of the activities associated with exercise headaches include running, rowing, tennis, swimming and weight lifting. Exercise headaches are divided into two categories, Primary Exercise Headache ( Harmless and can often be prevented with medication) and Secondary Exercise Headache ( Severe, can be caused by bleeding or a tumor and coronary artery disease). Primary exercise headaches typically last between five minutes and 48 hours, while secondary exercise headaches usually last for at least one day and sometimes for several days or longer.

2) Hemicrania Continua

Hemicrania continua causes pain on one side of your face or head and women seem to get it more often than men. People with hemicrania continua describe a dull ache or throb that’s interrupted by pain that is jolting, sharp and stabbing. HC usually happens three to five times a day or months or years. HC causes vomiting, throbbing pain, sensitivity to noise or light.

3) Hormone Headache

Hormone Headaches can be caused by many factors, including genetics and dietary triggers. In women, unstable hormone levels are a major contributing factor in chronic headaches and menstrual migraines. A variety of medications and other treatments are used to relieve headaches. Women who experience hormonal headaches often get relief during pregnancy or when they reach menopause. Hormone levels change for a variety of reasons, including Menstrual cycle, Pregnancy, Perimenopause, menopause, Oral contraceptives and hormone replacement therapy, etc.

4) New Daily Persistent Headache

The new daily persistent headache (NDPH) is a chronic headache that is developing as a person who has no previous history of headache. The headache starts intensely and reaches its peak within 3 days. NDPS is similar to migraine, Hemicrania Continua and chronic tension type headache. It's usually either throbbing like a migraine or tightening like a tension headache, Vomiting, Nausea, etc.

5) Rebound Headache

Rebound headache happens because of medication overuse and caused by the excessive use of pain-relieving and/or antimigraine drugs to treat headache attacks that are already in progress. Rebound headache symptoms can include nausea, vomiting, light sensitivity, sound sensitivity, irritability, difficulty concentrating, insomnia, restlessness, and constipation.

Rare Headache

1) Ice Pick Headache

Ice pick headaches are throbbing, severe headaches that come on suddenly. They’re often described as feeling like a stabbing blast, or a series of stabs, from an ice pick. This type of headache gives no warning before striking, and can be excruciating and debilitating and typically lasting no longer than a minute.

2) Spinal Headache

Spinal headache is a fairly common complication in people who undergo a spinal tap (lumbar puncture) or spinal anesthesia. Spinal headache symptoms include Dull, throbbing pain and pain that typically gets worse when you sit up or stand and decreases or goes away when you lie down.

3) Thunderclap Headache

These severe headache pain occurs within 60 seconds. Thunderclap Headache is the worst headache because it Strikes suddenly and severely and Can be accompanied by nausea or vomiting. Thunderclap headache causes by bleeding between the brain and membranes covering the brain, a rupture of a blood vessel in the brain, a tear in the lining of an artery that supplies blood to the brain, Leaking of cerebrospinal fluid, Death of tissue or bleeding in the pituitary gland, Ischemic stroke, etc

Trigger factors of Headache by Dr. Shailesh Jain

We have already covered some of the triggering factors of headache in "Headache factors and its management". Therefore, in today's blog we are discussing some environmental and other triggering factors of headaches, including:

Menstruation - Studies suggest that Headache can be triggered by a drop in oestrogen levels such as those which naturally occur in the time just before your period.

Cigarette - Both smoking and inhaling secondhand smoke can trigger a headache. Nicotine is a vasoactive substance in cigarettes. That means it changes the size of blood vessels in your brain, and that can cause headache.

Weather - Weather changes may cause imbalances in brain chemicals, including serotonin, which can prompt a headache.

Crying - The stress that the body releases, which causes crying, can also trigger a headache to occur in a person prone to them. Mostly emotional crying can trigger Headache.

Odour - Strong or unusual smells trigger their headaches. Clinical studies report that anywhere between 25 and 50 percent of sufferers experience a heightened sensitivity to odors during their headaches.

Eye strain - When your eyes work too hard, your eye muscles can shrink a lot. These contractions can trigger an eye strain headache. Often, these headaches cause pain and discomfort behind your eyes. After focusing on a task for a very long time, you may get a headache in the eye.

Cold - When you suffer from a cold or flu, a headache can occur thanks to infection-fighting molecules known as "cytokines". These small molecules are released by your immune system. While their primary function is to fight infection, they can bring on inflammation which in turn can cause headaches in some people.

Sun - Sunlight is also constantly reported as a trigger for Headache. In fact, as many as 67% of people with headache cite bright light as a trigger, according to a recent survey.

Not eating - Fasting, eating high-sugar foods, eating too vigorously, and skipping meals can all be trigger factors, or people may be more likely to have headaches.

Noise - Extremely loud or prolonged sounds can trigger headaches. Any loud noise such as a rock concert, parties can set off head pain.

Sleep - Missing sleep, getting too much sleep can trigger Headache. Insufficient sleep is often cited as a trigger for acute headache attacks. Excessive sleep is a frequently reported trigger as well. Researchers have reported that between 20 percent of people say stress triggers their headaches.

Stress - Physical or physiological stress at work and home can cause Headache. Researchers have reported that between 50 and 80 percent of people say stress triggers their headaches.

About Dr. Shailesh Jain - Best Neurologist in Rohini

Dr. Shailesh Jain AIIMS Neurosurgeon is the Best doctor for headache in Rohini. He is a Reputed Doctor, he gives his undivided attention to all his patients. He treats his patients in his own neurology center at Arihant Neurospine Clinic at Pitampura and Rohini as well as Max Super Speciality Hospital, Shalimar Bagh Branch.

You can Book an appointment for any kind of spinal cord Treatment as well as Brain Treatment.

#Best neurologist in rohini #Top Neurosurgeon in rohini #Best doctor for back pain in rohini #Best doctor for headache in rohini #Arihant neuro spine clinic

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acesgroupchat · 7 years ago

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Specialties

Remember that post I made a while ago about Aaron’s eventual medical specialty? I decided it needed a fic so here we are.

Everyone in their year assumes Aaron is going to pick radiology. Everyone. Before they even start rotations people are making jokes about it. To Katelyn even. Last year they just thought he was a grumpy internist (last year most of them were grumpy internists). This year everyone is sure that radiology will be Aaron’s true calling and they won’t stop telling him this. Every time he turns around some asshole is grinning at him with a dumb comment ready.

“Wow Minyard, looks like you won’t need to work on your bedside manner after all!”

“No more patients bothering you anymore huh?”

“Man you’re going to be out of debt before any of us. Lucky.”

“Hey! You could be a B reader! You’ll never have to talk to anyone.”

It is day three of the rotation. Radiology is. So. Boring. He’s sitting in the dark staring at picture after picture. The radiologist he’s supposed to be shadowing mumbles softly about the image on the screen. A lung. Apparently it has calcifications. He feels like he’s calcifying. He wonders what Katelyn is up to (Neurology rotation. Not bad so far apparently). He wonders what Nicki is up to (planning his wedding in excruciating detail and texting them all every five minutes). He wonders what Andrew is up to (who knows, but it’s definitely more fun than this). He wonders whether Andrew has ever had fun in his life (again, who knows, but he’s definitely still having more fun than Aaron right now). He wonders what Neil is up to and that is a very bad sign. He wonders whether an MRI of Andrew’s brain would be noticeably different from his own. Probably. He wonders how much longer he has to spend in this room staring at these pictures (two more hours today, two more days this week, and three more weeks after that). He wonders whether death would be preferable.

The department secretary creeps into the room and grabs a basket from a shelf by the door. It has a cheery sign on it proclaiming that dosimeters should be turned in on the first of the month for processing. The basket is apparently empty, and her shoulders slump. Aaron feels a moment of kinship with her. He wonders whether the rest of her day has been less disappointing, more interesting than his own. She catches his eye as she turns to leave and he concludes that it probably has not.

---

There was a time in Aaron’s life where he would have considered this much peace a treasure. He’s keenly aware, in fact, that his younger self probably would have seen Radiology as an ideal setup for a tolerable life. No one to bother him, quiet, safety, and enough money to keep Tilda happy, high, and far away from him. It still catches him by surprise some days, to realize how much his standards have been raised since then. Nothing about his college years could be described as easy or comfortable, so it’s a shock to realize that those years have left him with a vague idea of what makes him happy, and enough ambition to go after those things.

He attempts to blink the CT scan in front of him back into focus. Three weeks into the rotation he now has a vague idea what he’s looking at (a very unfortunate looking tumor), which does make this process slightly more engaging. Only slightly though. Apparently his college years have also left him with a compromised sense of urgency, and a much lower threshold for boredom. Unless someone is dying right now, things are probably fine. Life with the foxes had been mostly about urgency, running and bleeding and screaming and trying not to kill each other, jumping from crisis to triumph and back again and never pausing to look back. He’s a little disgusted to realize he misses that. Of all of this rotation’s unpleasant side effects, the fact that it’s made him introspective is by far his least favorite.

A very lost looking old couple wander into the reading room. They glance around, increasingly unsure, and since Aaron makes eye contact, they walk over. “I have an appointment with Dr. Matheson?” the old man says. “I’m supposed to be starting my treatments today.” Aaron doesn’t know any Dr. Matheson in this department. He takes them across the hall. The secretary appears to be arranging her pens by ink level on her desk, and is only too happy to help. Her spreadsheet lists no Dr. Matheson in the department, and after a moment of googling she offers to walk them down to the oncology wing. Aaron heads back to the hush of the reading room. He wonders if his tumor patient is anywhere in this building. They move on to another image and he settles in for the afternoon.

(part 2 coming... eventually. Idk)

#aftg #aaron minyard #character study #i wrote a thing #coming also to an AO3 near you #I have never attended medical school and did a minimum of research for this fic #so I have no idea if this is an accurate depiction of a med school residency rotation or not

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unsettlingshortstories · 4 years ago

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Magdala Amygdala

Lucy A. Snyder (2012)

I was bound, though I have not bound. I was not recognized. But I have recognized that the All is being dissolved, both the earthly and the heavenly.

—The Gospel of Mary Magdalene

“So how are you feeling?” Dr. Shapiro’s pencil hovers over the CDC risk evaluation form clamped to her clipboard.

“Pretty good.” When I talk, I make sure my tongue stays tucked out of sight. I smile at her in a way that I hope looks friendly, and not like I’m baring my teeth. The exam-room mirror reflects the back of the good doctor’s head. Part of me wishes the silvered glass were angled so I could check my expression; the rest of me is relieved that I can’t see myself.

Nothing existed before this. The present and recent past keep blurring together in my mind, but I’ve learned to take a moment before I reply to questions, speak a little more slowly to give myself the chance to sort things out before I utter something that might sound abnormal. My waking world seems to have been taken apart and put back together so that everything is just slightly off, the geometries of reality deranged.

Most of my memories before the virus are as insubstantial as dreams; the strongest of them feel like borrowed clothing. The sweet snap of peas fresh from my garden. The crush of hot perfumed bodies against mine at the club and the thud of the bass from the huge speakers. The pleasant twin burns of the sun on my shoulders and the exertion in my legs as I pedal my bike up the mountainside.

The life I had in those memories is gone forever. I don’t know why this is happening to humanity. To me. I’d like to think there’s some greater purpose, some meaning in all this, but God help me, I just can’t see it.

“So is the new job going well? Are you able to sleep?” My doctor shines a penlight in my eyes and nostrils and marks off a couple of boxes. Thankfully, she doesn’t ask to see my tongue. It’s the same set of questions every week; I’d have to be pretty far gone to answer badly and get myself quarantined. The endless doctor-visits wear down other Type Threes, but I hang onto the belief that someday there might be actual help for me here.

I nod. “It’s fine. I have blackout curtains; sleep’s not a problem. They seem pretty happy with my work.”

My new supervisor is a friendly guy, but he always has an excuse for why he can’t meet with me in person, preferring to call me on his cell phone for our weekly chats. I used to bounce from building to building, repairing computers, spending equal amounts of time swapping gossip and hardware. After I got out of the hospital, I went on the graveyard shift in the company’s cold network operations center. These nights, I’m mostly raising processes from the dead, watching endless scrolling green text on cryptic black screens. I’m pretty sure the company discreetly advised my quiet coworkers to carry tasers and mace just in case.

“Do you feel that you’re able to see your old friends and family often enough?” Dr. Shapiro asks.

“Sure,” I lie. “We meet online for games and we talk in Vent. It’s fun.”

For the sake of his own health, my boyfriend took a job and apartment in another state; we speak less and less on the phone. What is there to say to him now? We can’t even chat about anything as simple as food or wine; I must subsist on bananas, rice, apple juice, and my meager allotment of six Bovellum capsules per day. The law says I can’t go to crowded places like theaters and concerts. I only glimpse the sun when I’m hurrying from the shelter of my car’s darkly tinted windows to monthly 8:00 a.m. appointments with my court-ordered physician.

So I’m striding up the street to Dr. Shapiro’s office, my head down, squinting behind sunglasses, when suddenly I hear a man in the park across the street shouting violent nonsense. Or he used to be a man, anyhow; he’s wearing construction boots, ragged Carhartt work overalls, and a dirty gray T-shirt, all freshly spattered with the blood of the woman whose head he is enthusiastically cracking open against the curb. He howls at the sky, and I can see he’s missing some teeth. Probably whatever he did for a living didn’t pay him enough to see a dentist. But his skin looks flush and smooth, so much healthier than mine, and for a moment I envy him.

He stops howling and meets my shadowed stare, breaking into a gory, gap-toothed smile. The kind of grin you give an old, dear friend. I’ve never laid eyes on this wreck before, and the woman beneath him is beyond anyone’s help. They both are. I don’t want to be outed, not here, not like this, so I pretend I don’t even see him and stride on.

A few seconds later, I hear the spat of rifle fire and the thud of a meaty body hitting the pavement, and I know that the SWAT team just took out Ragged Carhartts. They’re never far away, not in this part of town. And once they’ve taken out one Type Three, they don’t need much excuse to kill another, even if you’re just trying to see your doctor like a good citizen.

“Oh, God,” a lady says. She and another fortyish woman are standing in the doorway of an art gallery, staring horrified at the scene behind me. They’re both wearing batik dresses and lots of handmade jewelry. “That’s the third one this month.”

“If this keeps up, we’ll have to close.” The other woman shakes her head, looking gray-faced. “Nobody will want to come here. The whole downtown will die. Not just us. The theaters, the museums, churches—everything.”

“I heard something on NPR about a new kind of gel to keep the virus from spreading,” the first woman replies, sounding hopeful.

I keep moving. Her voice fades away. People still talk about contagion control as if it matters, as if masks and sanitizers and prayers can stop the future.

The truth is, unless you’ve been living in some isolated Tibetan monastery, you’ve already been exposed to Polymorphic Viral Gastroencephalitis. Maybe it gave you a bit of a headache and some nausea, but after a few days’ bed rest you were going out for Thai again. Congratulations! You’re Type One and you probably don’t even know it.

But maybe the headache turned into the worst you’ve ever had, and you started vomiting up blood and then your stomach lining, and when you came out of the hospital you’d lost the ability to digest most foods and to make certain proteins. And in the absence of those proteins, your body has trouble growing and healing. The enzymes your DNA uses to repair itself don’t work very well anymore.

Sunlight is no longer your friend. Neither are x-rays. Even if you quit smoking and keep yourself covered up like a virgin in the Rub’ Al Khali, your skin cracks and your body sprouts tumors. Your brain begins to degenerate; you start talking to yourself in second person. Sooner or later, you develop lesions on your frontal lobe and hippocampus that cause a variety of behaviors which will lead to your friendly neighborhood SWAT team putting a .308 bullet through your skull. That means you’re a Type Two, or maybe a Type Three, like me.

If you’re Type Four, we aren’t having this conversation. Unless you’re a ghost. You aren’t a ghost, are you? I don’t think I believe in them. But if you were a Type Four, your whole GI tract got stripped. I hope you were lucky and had a massive brain bleed right when it got really bad, and you never woke up.

I’m pretty sure I woke up.

“Do you find yourself having any unwanted thoughts or violent fantasies?” Dr. Shapiro asks.

“Of course not.” I try to sound mildly indignant.

There’s one upside, if it can be called that. If you lived past all the pain and vomiting, the symptoms of your chronic disease can be alleviated, if you consume sufficient daily quantities of one of a couple of raw protein sources.

If the best protein source for you is fresh human blood, congratulations, you are a Type Two! Provided you have a fat bank account, or decent health insurance, or are quick with a razor and fast on your feet, you can resume puberty or your athletic career. Watch out for HIV; it’s a killer.

If, however, the best source for you comes from sweet, custard-like brains . . . you are a Type Three. Your situation is much more problematic. And expensive. You better have a wealthy family or truly excellent insurance. Or mob connections. Otherwise, sooner or later, you’ll end up trying to crack open someone’s skull in public. The only question then is if you’ll get that one moment of true gustatory bliss right before you die.

I have excellent health insurance. There’s no bliss for me. What I and every other upstanding, gainfully-employed, fully-covered Type Three citizen gets is an allotment of refrigerated capsules containing an unappetizing gray paste. Mostly it’s cow brains and antioxidant vitamins with just the barest hint of pureed cadaver white matter. It’s enough to keep your skin and brains from ulcerating. It’s enough to keep your nose from rotting off. It’s enough to help you think clearly enough to function at your average white-collar job.

It is not enough to keep you from constantly wishing you could taste the real thing.

“I was wondering about something,” I say, as Dr. Shapiro begins to copy the contents of her survey into the exam room computer.

She stops typing and gives me a wary smile. “Yes, what is it?”

“My medication. I feel okay, you know? But I think I could feel . . . better. If I could have a little more?” I’m choosing my words as carefully as possible. My tongue feels thick, twitchy.

I can’t talk about the cravings I’m feeling. I can’t mention wanting more energy, because nobody in charge wants someone like me feeling energetic.

I wonder if there’s a sniper watching from behind the mirror on the wall; has he tightened his grip on his rifle? Are gas canisters waiting to blow in the air conditioner vent above me? My skin itches in dread anticipation.

Dr. Shapiro hedges. “Well, I know there’s been a shortage of raw materials these days.”

I swallow down my impatience and worry. The capsules are ninety-eight percent cow brains, for God’s sake. Probably they can squeeze a single human brain for thousands of doses. I can’t imagine the pharmaceutical companies are running short of anything.

“Could you check, just the same? Could you ask for me?” I sound meek. Pathetic. The opposite of hostile. That’s good.

She gives me a pitying look and sighs. The mirror doesn’t explode in gunfire. Gas doesn’t burst from the vents.

“I’ll see what I can do,” my doctor says.

I try to believe she’ll come through for me.

• • • •

I go home. I take my capsules with some Mott’s apple juice. I rinse my mouth out with peroxide and don’t look at my tongue. I rub salve on the places my clothes have rubbed raw, and I climb naked into my bed. Sometime later, the alarm goes off, and I rise, shower, dress, and drive to work in darkness.

My shift is dull-clockwork, until just after gray drizzling dawn, when one of the new tech leads comes in to talk to my coworker George about some of the emergency server protocols. I haven’t seen this young man before; he’s wearing snug jeans and the sleeves of his black polo shirt are tight over biceps tattooed with angels and devils. His blond hair is cut close over a smooth, high-browed skull. He starts talking about database errors, but he’s thinking about a gig he has with his band on Friday night, and it suddenly hits me not just that I know what he’s thinking but that I know because I can smell the sweet chemicals shifting inside his brain. The chemicals tell me his name is Devin.

I am filled with Want in the marrow of my bones. I am filled with Need from eyeballs to soles. I excuse myself and hurry out into the mutagenic morning and punch Betty’s number into my cell. Soon after we met, she made me promise not to save her details in my phone, just in case anything went wrong.

It’s early for her. But she answers on the third ring. Speaking in the casual code we’ve used since we met online, we agree to meet that evening. It’s her turn to host.

I sleep fitfully. When my alarm goes off, I call in sick, shower, dress, and check my phone. Betty’s texted a cryptic string of letters and numbers for my directions. And so I drive out to a hotel we’ve never visited before, drinking Aquafinas the whole way. It’s a dark old place, once grand, now crumbling away in a forgotten corner of downtown. I wonder if she’s running short of money or if the extra anonymity of the place was crucial to her.

Still, as I get out my car and double-check my locks in the pouring rain, I can’t help but peer out into the oppressive black spaces in the parking lot, trying to figure out if any of the shadows between the other vehicles could be lurking cops or CDC agents. The darkness doesn’t move, so I hurry to the front door, head down, hands jammed in my raincoat pockets, my stomach roiling with worry and anticipation. I avoid making eye contact with any of the damp, tired-looking prostitutes smoking outside the hotel’s front doors. None of them pay any attention to me.

My phone chimes as Betty texts me the room number. I take the creaking, urine-stinking elevator up four floors. My pace slows as I walk down the stained hallway carpet, and I pause for a moment before I knock on the door of Room 512. What if the watchers tapped Betty’s phone? What if she’s not here at all? My poised hand quivers as my heart seems to pound out “A trap—a trap—a trap.”

I swallow. Knock twice. Step back. A moment later, Betty answers the door, wearing her Audrey Hepburn wig and a black cocktail dress that hangs limply from her skeletal shoulders. It’s appalling how much weight she’s lost; her eyes have turned entirely black, the whites permanently stained by repeated hemorrhages.

But she smiles at me, and I find myself smiling back, warmed by the first spark of real human feeling I’ve had in months. I have to believe that we’re still human. I have to.

“You ready?” Her question creaks like the hinge of a forgotten gate.

“Absolutely.” My own voice is the dry fluttering of moth wings.

She locks the door behind me. “I’m sorry this place is such a pit, but the guy at the Holiday Inn started asking all kinds of questions, and this was the best I could do on short notice.”

“It’s okay.” The room isn’t as seedy as the lobby and exterior led me to expect it to be, and it’s got a couch in addition to the queen-sized bed. Betty has already covered the couch and the carpet in front of it with a green plastic tarpaulin. Her stainless steel spritzer bottle leans against a couch arm.

“Want some wine?” She gestures toward an unopened bottle of Yellow Tail shiraz on the dresser.

“Thanks, but no . . . I couldn’t drink it right now. Maybe after.”

She nods. “There’s a really good Italian restaurant around the corner. Kind of a Goodfellas hangout, but everything’s homemade. Great garlic bread.”

Betty pulls off the wig. Before she got the virus, she could grow her thick chestnut hair clear down to her waist. I’ve never seen it except in pictures; her bare scalp gleams pale in the yellow light from the chandelier.

The scar circumscribing her skull looks red, inflamed; I wonder if she’s been seeing other Type Threes. I quickly tamp down my pang of jealousy. We never agreed to an exclusive arrangement. And maybe she just had to go to the hospital instead; she told me she’s got some kind of massive tumor on her pituitary.

She looks so frail. I can’t possibly begrudge her what comfort she can get. I should just be grateful that she agrees to see me when I need her.

And, oh sweet Lord, do I need her tonight.

Betty pulls me down to her for a kiss. Her hands are icy, but her lips are warm. She slips her tongue into my mouth, and I can taste sweet cerebrospinal fluid mingled in her saliva. The tumor must have cracked the bony barriers in her skull. Before I have a chance to try to pull away, my own tongue is swelling, toothed pores opening and nipping at her slippery flesh.

She squeaks in pain and we separate.

“Sorry,” I try to whisper. But my tongue is continuing to engorge and lengthen, curling back on itself and slithering down my own throat; I can feel the tiny maws rasping against my adenoids.

“It’s okay.” Her wan smile is smeared with blood. “We better get started.”

She kisses the palm of my hand and begins to take my clothes off. I stare up at the tawdry chandelier, watching a fly buzz among the dusty baubles and bulbs. When I’m naked, she slips off her cocktail dress and leads me to the tarp-covered couch.

“Be gentle.” She presses a short oyster knife into my hand and sits me down, the plastic crackling beneath me. I nod, barely keeping my lips closed over my shuddering tongue, and spread my legs.

With slow exhalation, Betty settles between my thighs, her back to me. She’s a tiny woman, her head barely clearing my chin when we’re seated, so this position works best. Her skin is already covered in goose bumps. The anticipation is killing both of us.

I carefully run the tip of the sharp oyster knife through the red scar around her skull; there’s relatively little blood as I cut through the tissue. Betty gives a little gasp and grips my knees, her whole body tensed. The bone has only stitched back together in a few places; I use the side-to-side motion she showed me to gently pry the lid of her skull free.

She moans when I expose her brain; it’s the most beautiful thing I could hope to see. Her dura mater glistens with a half-inch slick of golden jelly. Brain honey. When I breathe in the smell of her, I feel my blood pressure rise hard and fast.

I set the bowl of skin and bone aside and present the knife to her in my outstretched left hand. With a flick of her wrist, she slits the vein in the crook of my arm and presses her mouth against my bleeding flesh. I wrap my cut arm around her head and pull her tight to my breast.

I open my mouth and let my tongue unwind like an eel into her brainpan. It wriggles there, purple and gnarled, the tiny maw sucking down her golden jelly. It’s delicious, better than caviar, better than ice cream, better than anything I’ve had in my mouth before. Sweet and salty and tangy and perfect.

The jelly gives me flashes of her memories and dreams; she’s been with other Type Threes. She’s helped them murder people. I don’t care. I keep drinking her in, my tongue probing all the corners of her skull and sheathed wrinkles of her brain to get every last gooey drop.

I can control my tongue, but just barely. It’s hard to keep it from doing the one thing I’d dearly love, which is to drive it through her membrane deep between her slippery lobes. But that would be the end of her. The end of us. No more, all over, bye bye.

A little of what my body and soul craves is better than nothing at all. Isn’t it?

My arm aches, and I’m starting to feel lightheaded on top of the high. We’re both running dry. I release her, spritz her brain with saline and carefully put the top of her head back into place. She’s full of my blood, and already her scalp is sealing back together. We’ve done well; we spilled hardly anything on the tarp this time. But my face feels sticky, and I’ve probably even gotten her in my hair.

She daintily wipes my blood from the corners of her mouth and smiles at me. Her skin is pink and practically glowing, and her boniness seems chic rather than diseased. “Want to go to that Italian place after we get cleaned up?”

“Sure.” I’m probably glowing, too. My stomach feels strong enough for pepperoncinis.

I head to the bathroom to wash my face, but when I push open the door—

—I find myself in Dr. Shapiro’s office. She’s staring down at an MRI scan of somebody’s chest. The monochrome bones look strange, distorted.

“There’s definitely a mass behind your ribs and spine. It’s growing fast, but I can’t definitely say it’s cancer.”

I’m dizzy with terror. How did I get here? What mass? How long have I had a mass?

“What should we do?” I stammer.

She looks up at me with eyes as solidly black as Betty’s. “I think we should wait and see.”

I back away, turn, push through her office door—

—and I’m back in a rented room. But not the downtown dive with the dusty chandelier. It’s a suburban motel someplace. Have I been here before?

The green tarp on the king-sized bed is covered in blood and bits of skull. There’s a body wrapped in black trash bags, stuffed between the bed and the writing desk. Did I do that? What have I done?

Oh, God, please make this stop. I have to lean against the wall to keep myself from tumbling backward.

Betty comes out of the bathroom, dressed in a spattered silk negligee. I think it used to be white. There’s gore in her wig. Her eyes go wide.

“I told you not to come here!” She grabs me by my arm, surprising me with her strength. In the distance, I can hear sirens. “They’ll be here any minute—get away from here, fast as you can!”

She presses a set of rental car keys into my palm, hauls me to the door and pushes me out into the hallway—

—and I’m stepping into the elevator at work.

Handsome blond Devin is in there. A look of surprised fear crosses his face, and I know the very sight of me repels him. His hand goes to his jeans pocket. I see the outline of something that’s probably a canister of pepper spray. It’s too small to be a taser.

But then he pauses, smiles at me. “Hey, you going up to that training class?”

I nod mechanically, and try to say “Sure,” but my lungs spasm and suddenly I’m doubled over, coughing into my hands. When did simply breathing start hurting this much?

“You okay?” Devin asks.

I try to nod, but there’s bright blood on my palms. A long-forgotten Bible verse surfaces in the swamp of my memory: Behold, I am vile; what shall I answer thee? I will lay mine hand upon my mouth.

I look up and see my reflection in the chromed elevator walls—my face is gaunt, but my body is grotesquely swollen. I’ve turned into some kind of hunchback. How long have I had the mass?

Instead of the pepper spray, Devin’s pulled his cell phone out. I can smell his mind. He’s torn between wanting to run away and wanting to help. “Should I call someone? Should I call 911?”

The elevator is filled with the scent of him. Despite my pain and sickness, the Want returns with a vengeance. Adrenaline rises along with my blood pressure. My tongue is twitching, and something in my back, too. I can feel it tearing my ribs away from my spine. It hurts more than I can remember anything ever hurting. Maybe childbirth would be like this.

Betty. I need Betty. How long has it been since I’ve seen her? Oh God.

“Call 911,” I try to say, but I can’t take a breath, can’t speak around the tongue writhing backward down my throat.

“What can I do?” Devin touches my shoulder.

And the feel of his hand against my bony flesh is far too much for me to bear.

I rise up under him, grab him by the sides of his head, kissing him. My tongue goes straight down his throat, choking him. He hits me, trying to shake me off, but as strong as he is, my Want is stronger.

When he’s unconscious, I let him fall and hit the emergency stop button. The Want has me wrapped tightly in its ardor, burning away all my human qualms. The alarm is an annoyance, and I know I don’t have as much time as I want. Still. As I lift his left eyelid, I take a moment to admire his perfect bluebonnet iris.

And then I plunge my tongue into his eye. The ball squirts off to the side as my organ drills deeper, the tiny mouths rasping through the thin socket bone into his sweet frontal lobe. After the first wash of cerebral fluid I’m into the creamy white meat of him, and—

—Oh, God. This is more beautiful than I imagined.

I’m devouring his will. Devouring his memories. Living him, through and through. His first taste of wine. His first taste of a woman. The first time he stood onstage. He’s at the prime of his life, and oh, it’s been a wonderful life, and I am memorizing every second of it as I swallow down the contents of his lovely skull.

When he’s empty, I rise from his shell and feel my new wings break free from the cage of my back. As I spread them wide in the elevator, I realize I can hear the old gods whispering to me from their thrones in the dark spaces between the stars.

I smile at myself in the distorted chrome walls. Everything is clear to me now. I have been chosen. I have a purpose. Through the virus, the old gods tested me, and deemed me worthy of this holiest of duties. There are others like me; I can hear them gathering in the caves outside the city. Some died, yes, like the ragged man, but my Becoming is almost complete. Nothing as simple as a bullet will stop me then.

The Earth is ripe, human civilization at its peak. I and the other archivists will preserve the memories of the best and brightest as we devour them. We will use the blood of this world to write dark, beautiful poetry across the walls of the universe.

For the first time in my life, I don’t need faith. I know what I am supposed to do in every atom in every cell of my body. I will record thousands of souls before my masters allow me to join them in the star-shadows, and I will love every moment of my mission.

I can hear the SWAT team rush into the foyer three stories below. Angry ants. I can hear Betty and the others calling to me from the hollow hills. Smiling, I open the hatch in the top of the elevator and prepare to fly.

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