#they had to design new scenes to have the separate tracks go through they couldn't just use the California design

[krawdad]

I didn't know there was a (long defunct) different mr toad ride built for Disney world that I'd never heard of before

It's bizarre it manages to feel like an even cheaper version of an already dangerously archaic plywood-with-blacklight-paint-and-jumpscares type dark ride

[alexcaldownapier]

WCM - The Work

I'm completely and utterly burnt out at the end of this term and every other term I have done my blog posts throughout the term, but this term I haven't managed it at all.

I don't think my work on this film needs much explanation tbh, what you hear is what you get. So, for this post, I'm just going to list all the work I put into the film and the creative choices made.

Pre-Production

I spent the early days trying to expand the score I made for the test-shoot. However, once the script was done, I realised it was entirely incorrect for the new story which had moved away from Iris' insularity to focus more on the dynamic between the two characters. So, I brought in more drums and less synth-y instruments for a more natural, less spacy feeling. The score is mainly made up of the violin, which represents Iris' melancholy, leisurely existence; the rising brass arpeggios for Iris' growing curiosity; the guitar, which represents Kallie and her gentle drive; and finally the drums which push the rhythm forward and gives us the excitement that they both feel. The final track, called rising waves, was finished before we began filming. The idea was to create a full score for the ending of the film and then use smaller parts of it throughout the rest of the film to chart the emotional journey. We start with the violin and gently move through the different instruments before bringing them all together at the end.

Another part of conveying Iris' interior mind, was the underwater sounds that I had recorded last term and made a small sound library of. Iris has an attraction to the water, but keeps herself separated from it by her surfboard, only letting her hand trail through the water. This limited contact is then accentuated through sound and because a light splashing isn't very impactful, hydrophone sounds better reflected this movement and desire.

I attended the location recces, but found it hard to offer anything other than "these are the issues, which we can't get really get past". We were filming by a river, a road and the sea and that's what the script required. The river was at least a reasonably consistent tone, just a consistent tone with a wide range of frequencies therein. I decided to just roll with it and do my best with mic placement and dialogue editing, as there was nothing else to be done really. In hindsight, I should've advocated more for my department, as I was very much of the opinion that whatever was best for the rest of the departments would be best for the film and I would be able to work round it.

The shoot ran reasonably smoothly, in terms of sound-recording. I had Hazel George (the absolute boy) from 3rd year come up for a couple days to help me out as location mixer, but the rest I was running solo on. Due to all the water, I often couldn't have a lav mic on the actors, so was relying heavily on boom. I managed to get all the wildtracks on my list (plus some fun extras) which I had gone over with Bethany in pre-production. I also booked out a stereo recorder from the Film Cult to help capture some ambiences. This ended up being a god-send as one of the two boom mics I had booked out was bizarrely unsensitive and had a high noise floor. At the end of the shoot, I put all my recordings together in a lovely little sound library on my hard drive and I was ready for the sound design.

The sound design mainly consisted of a brutal, harrowing, humbling dialogue edit. Broughty ferry is so full of dogs, man. Every recording had some distant dog bark, making me have to cut the dialogue a lot closer than I would like. I initially went in quite hard with de-noisers and equalisers but after a notes session with Zoe, I ripped it all out and started again with a far more gentle approach, also using more environment sounds to mask the often dodgy dialogue recordings. Then in terms of the design, there was some fun stuff in the transitions between scenes and mixing in the score. However, I found it tough trying to chart the emotional journey of the film, as I think a lot of the initial ideas about the central character and the story as a whole didn't entirely materialise in the final cut so all the choices I planned on making felt disjointed from the new film that we were now making. I managed to communicate some of Iris' discomfort at the bus stop with a hard cut in the ambience sound and a harsh recording of some nail biting. hen again on the bridge, where I automated an EQ to change the feeling of the environment as Iris watches Kallie walk away. The main ways I was using the sound to help tell the story was through the score. I'm happy with the way the score develops through the film and it was fun to compose to picture.

My favourite part of my sound design is actually the end credits. Due to some issues with the final scene, we decided to cut it, leaving the film almost on a cliff-hanger, without a proper resolution. My idea was to continue the sound of Iris and Kallie through the credits as they run into the ocean and swim together, despite us not having the footage for it. Thankfully, I thought I would need the sound of running into the ocean as a transition between the two scenes, so I already had the correct wildtrack, I just had to layer in some dialogue between Iris and Kallie, which I took from the beginnings and ends of takes where the two actors were kidding around with each other and making each other laugh. I also added in the dialogue from the final scene that was cut to keep that beat in the film.

Overall, I'm not incredibly happy with my work on this film. I made a few mistakes when recording - the worst one being the huge change of mic position from shot to shot by the riverside, which made each line sound very different. I also should have chimed in my opinions on the edit at some point as I think there are some points where a few more/less seconds on a moment would have helped me in the sound design. I don't think it sounds terrible, but the dialogue is still rough, even after all these days and these extra days' extension. At least I know how to do a MIDI now. I think I might want to keep making music in DAWs after graduation, I had lots of fun making Rising Waves, the main score for Where Currents Meet.

[echo-three-one]

Chapter 31

THE ROAD SO FAR

Chapter 30 Recap?

Roach was falling.

S.O.S.

"Alex"

1km behind the Victoria Cruise Ship, UK

"Can't this thing go any faster?!" he hissed against the loud revving of the motor he stole from the docks. He wasn't supposed to steal it, but when he realized no one was around at that time of day, he saw smoke plume from the ship and thought he'd "borrow" it for an emergency.

From the shore, he saw flashing lights signaling a rescue team, meaning that something happened on the ship. Alex's hands gripped on the control stick as he navigated the smooth waves toward the ship, stopping at the moment he saw someone get pushed off deck.

He didn't need to know who it was, so he immediately changed course to the direction where the person fell. Strangely enough, the person didn't emerge from the ripples. This meant that he didn't have the capacity to shake his limbs. Without hesitating about his metal leg, Alex stood up and dove toward the ripple, cold ocean water immediately surrounded his body. 

With all his effort, he swam downward until he caught up with the person, whom he soon realized to be Roach. He was squirming and holding his breath as Alex caught him and attempted to push them afloat. Of course he had a hard time doing it, as his hand held onto Roach and his metal leg couldn't make him swim better. So he grabbed his knife and sliced Roach free from the ropes, allowing him to freely swim upward, pulling Alex with him.

Emerging from the deep blue, Alex and Roach both gasped for air, caught up with their breaths and swam back to their stolen boat.

Roach hoisted himself up and assisted Alex, pulling him back to the boat.

"Whew, for a second I thought I was a goner." Gary coughed and wriggled his wrists, feeling the freedom.

"What happened out there?" Alex asked, salt water dripped from his hair and stache.

"It's a hostage situation, Shepherd's in need of funds and decides to target a gathering of rich people." Roach explained as Alex started the boat, the motor slowly sputtered to life.

"Let's crash the party." Alex invited and Roach nodded as they made their way into the slowly sinking cruise ship.

Stepping inside the cruise ship, Alex and Roach made their way through the corridors evading contact with Shadow Company. They are fully aware that without glowing beacons, they are a threat. 

"I think it's this way!" Gary pointed the left path and Alex followed, the way led to the Captain's quarters.

"Alex, Roach!" Soap grunted while fighting with one of the three big guys, his hand formed an X while deflecting a huge oar.

Roach and Alex surrounded the big guy and ducked the moment he swung his weapon, Roach quickly disabling him by kicking his foot making him lose balance and fall on his back.

"Thanks. That oar was annoying the hell out of me." Soap gasped and wiped off his tux, looking at how messed the room was. 

"So it was 1 versus 3?" Alex asked as he looked at the unconscious bodies on the floor.

"Pretty much. One tazed the other one and the rest is history." Soap chuckled and pointed to the door. 

"The rest of the team headed that way. They're trying to stop the Shadow Company while Price extracted 'Gold Bar'." Soap added and the three moved forward to the next area. 

Halfway through the halls, the ship hummed and tilted slightly, meaning that water hadl already made its way inside. They have to hurry before the ship sinks.

"911 was right behind me when I left off. We have to make sure every civilian gets saved." Alex suggested. Soap and Roach looked at each other and nodded.

"You go, Alex. We'll handle the rescue from here." Soap replied and Roach nodded again as they paced to where the civilians were.

"All right then." he muttered and made his way to the control room.

Gunshots were heard from the distance, echoing the narrow corridors of the ship. With a place this narrow, it's almost impossible to miss a shot. This actually worried the former CIA and he ran faster, his metal leg hoofed on the floor.

The scene was Ghost and Alexandra hiding behind the wheel while Shadow Company soldiers, who were armed, were hiding by the next room. The two had pistols on their hands but judging from their gestures, it looked like they only had a few bullets left.

As soon as the enemy peeked its head on the door, Ghost swiftly shot his bullet square on the head as the enemy dropped down on the floor with a loud thud. His bullet clicked and he cursed as soon as he realized that that was his last shot.

Alexandra followed as another one peeked and had the same fate. Loud thundering footsteps echoed the halls as reinforcements arrived.

"This is Price. I found Alex's boat and the Gold Bar is here with me. Rescue Services are already in the building. Get out of there now!" He roared and Alex needed to find a way out.

Scanning the area, he charged toward the glass windows of the control room and broke it, rolling down the diagonal design of the ship, thudding on the floor. Alexandra and Ghost followed him and they ran to the back of the ship which was still too far from where they're at.

Dodging bullets and running for their lives, they caught up with Soap and Roach, who were also being chased by soldiers.

"What a mess this was, huh?" Alexandra commented as they all sprinted together, dodging flying bullets and finding a way off the ship.

"I guess it's Plan B." Ghost muttered and Alexandra nodded.

"Follow me." He added and everyone else obliged as they made their way to the middle of the ship.

Alex had no idea what plan B meant but as soon as they made it to the center, they were surrounded by the Shadow Company. Their stances were slightly tilted as the ship continued to sink slowly into the ocean.

"Bollocks! I did not see this coming!" Ghost cursed and Alex was clear that this wasn't part of the plan.

"How many of them are here?!" Soap complained as they slowly huddled into a circle. Alex noted that they did this part like the Avengers in New York, except they weren't superheroes and they were weaponless.

"I don't know. I just got out of a life threatening situation and here I am again with one." Roach complained, looking at his allies.

"On three, we head east."  Ghost whispered, Alex turned to the location smoothly as to not alert everyone that's pointing their weapons at them.

"Two.."

"One.." 

Ghost clicked his detonator and a huge explosion occurred in the east, sending most of the Shadow Company on their feet and distracted.

"Go! Go! Go!" Ghost roared and everyone scattered and ran toward the blast, using the destroyed debris that was once impassable.

Alex and the rest of the team ran as they approached the back of the ship where Price was supposed to be. It only took the Shadow Company a few minutes to recover and bullets began to fly toward their direction.

Ahead of him, Roach and Soap were already by the edge, Alex saw the two jumped away from the ship and into safety while behind him, Ghost and Alexandra were being pressured with bullets.

Alex held onto the rails before attempting to jump, making sure Ghost and Alexandra made it through. He saw Alexandra follow Ghost's six but she accidentally tripped and dropped on the floor. 

"Shit!" She squealed in pain as she got shot on the thigh, she forced herself to get up with Ghost's assistance. Alex pushed some tanning chairs toward the enemy as the tilted ship helped them slide to them, causing them to evade the falling chairs. But Shadow Company didn't give up, a few more soldiers emerged from the background.

"We have to go! Now!" Alex yelled as he ran ahead of Ghost making sure nothing's behind him. The enemies were still quite far but from the corner of his eye, a man with an RPG aimed his sights at them and before Alex could do anything, smoke already trailed from the weapon. It was already fired.

"Ghost! Behind you! RPG!" Alex yelled as the missile missed the three of them, and hit the floor quite far from them, tearing yet another hole on the ship's deck.

The warm heat of the blast slightly burned their skin as Alex and Ghost flew to the direction of their boat while Alexandra flew nearer to the Shadow Company, separating her from the rest of the team.

Alex's ears rang at the blast and he could hear Ghost's cry. Before he eventually fell on the ocean, the last thing he heard was Ghost calling out Alexandra's name.

S.O.S.

Simon "Ghost" Riley

Alex's stolen boat (S.S. Crossbones), 4 km from Port of Dover, UK

Just when he thought he found his sense of humanity back through Alexandra Ryder, the universe fucked up his life once again. He was conscious, but he didn't want to wake up. He didn't want to open his eyes and see that Alexandra wasn't with them. It was too much.

He could feel someone slapping on his cheek, and judging by the group, only Roach had the guts to do it.

"Should we do CPR? I can't hear him breathing." Roach asked, panic was in his voice.

"Check if his chest is rising or falling." Soap suggested. Ghost thought that he could pretend to be dead for a little more, but the team was worried about him and he had to face reality one way or another.

Ghost coughed the salty seawater clogging his breathing and panted heavily as he got up. His vision slowly got clearer as he visualized the whole team looking at him.

"Thank God, you're alive!" Roach cheered and everyone else nodded him welcome. He wanted to thank each of them but there was still something bothering him.

"Alexandra…" he muttered as he quickly got up, Alex's hands stopped him on his tracks.

"They tried circling around the ship before it sank. There was no sign of her." He frowned along with the rest of the team. Ghost hasn't cried in a while, but this time tears involuntarily trickled on his cheeks.

"NOOOOO!!" He yelled, his voice pierced through the open sea as Gary huddled near him and gave him a hug.

"I'm sorry." Roach whispered. He wasn't there to help him and he always tries to absorb some of the blame.

Ghost wanted to tell him that it isn't his fault, but his throat was still recovering from his screams. Everyone around him fell silent as he slowly stood up and pulled his mask.

He silently tossed it into the ocean as it slowly sank as soon as it got soaked with water. It was sad to think that Alexandra lost her life at the cost of no lead toward Shepherd or Nero, but Ghost looked straight into Gold Bar's eyes.

"I want you to live your life to the fullest. She sacrificed hers so you could live on. Don't you dare waste the second chance he gave you." He muttered causing Derek to nod and slowly sob as he sat on his knees.

"I will…" he whimpered through the croaking of his voice.

"Looks like the engine's back up." Soap announced, pulling his oily hands from the engine as Price started the machine as it revved to life.

For the whole duration of the trip, Ghost just stared at the remains of the cruise ship. He wanted to ask Alexandra to take their awkward arrangement to the next level, but the world looked like it had other plans for him.

"I will avenge you, Alexandra Ryder. I'll do whatever it takes to put your loss to justice." he whispered, tightening his grip on the boat, looking angrily at the ocean in front of him.

Next Chapter : Mr. and Mrs. MacTavish

Notification Squad my Beloved

@enderio @whimsywispsblog @samatedeansbroccoli @smokeywhalee @beemybee @ricinbach

[maneaterwithtail]

A lot of people were acquainted with him through his prolific participation in News & Politics, but to me Aaron was always an author, one half of the team behind Hybrid Theory. That fic was a bastion of creativity, drama, and wry humor; a ludicrous and ambitious premise, played gloriously straight. It provided me with much-needed hope and entertainment in years past. His death comes as a punch in the gut, and takes the wind of optimism out of my sails.

I never knew him well, and now I never will. Rest in peace, Aaron. The world is lessened by your absence from it.

-orm Ember

I didn't want to write this. 

Not just for the obvious reasons, that nobody likes to say goodbye to a friend like this. I didn't want to make this about me, because it isn't about me. I wanted to say something about him, to tell his story, to express the tiniest part of the loss I feel in a way others could understand. 

But I came to realise that it wasn't for me to tell his story. I can't. That story was for him to tell, and unfortunately, he cannot. The only story I have to tell is the story of us. So that's what I'll do. 

I met Aaron Peori when we were both new in high school, about twenty-five years ago. Glace Bay High was the tenth of the eleven schools that I attended in my eleven years of schooling, and so by then I was almost as well-practiced in "meet new friends" as I was in "meet the new local pack of bullies". Walking home, I noticed one guy about my age that always walked alone, reading a book. In other words, a fellow nerd, a weirdo, an outcast. Like me. After a couple of days of spotting this lone reading fellow, he happened to be reading a book by Christopher Pike, an author I also had books by. That was, as the saying goes, an opening.

"Hey, isn't that a Christopher Pike book?" I asked this stranger, casually, as if I hadn't already known.

He looked up at me, not even showing any surprise that some weirdo had walked up and asked about the book his nose was in. "Yes," he said, peering at me owlishly from behind his glasses, then after a moment added, "He's a good author."

By the time we reached home that day, we were already good friends. From that point on, in fact, we were virtually inseparable, aided by the fact that he lived almost literally in my backyard.

From the very beginning, we were creative collaborators. At first, we were using GI Joes and a few other toys in elaborate setpiece dioramas that spanned his house's enclosed front porch, and sometimes spilled out to occupy part of the year as well. Factions, sacrifices, betrayals, and no doubt embarassing-in-retrospect dialogue were all a part of those first afternoons and weekends.

I think he first got a copy of the Marvel Super Heroes RPG from his cousin. Before I'd met him, Aaron and his cousin had both been drawing their own comics about a space-based superhero team called Sonis. Now, with a tool that you could use tell stories about superheroes, and rules to arbitrate - our new great dioramas were ones made of words, not toys. I quickly made my own "expanded universe", about a group of mercenary superheroes called Heroes For Hire. 

At that point, what turned out to be a very long-lasting pattern was set. Aaron was the GM, and I was the player. Aaron created the worlds, and I lived the characters in them. He did want me to be the GM sometimes (it's more fun being the player!), but I was always uncomfortably aware how much better at it he was than me, and so I felt intimidated to pit my own lesser stories against the epics he created.

As time went on, another pattern that would be long-lasting emerged: Aaron and I's stories became vastly greater in scope. He rewrote the resolution system of the game to account for much higher power levels than the original design used (Ochre feats!), and eventually we dispensed with the rules altogether, playing completely free-form with no set rules and only the occasional dice roll. I learned to handle multiple characters at once, and bored at the success easily reached by my insanely overpowered characters, learned to find more fun in getting them in trouble instead. Aaron learned to handle the narrative challenges faced by trying to craft stories about protagonists who had literal "I win" powers, and weren't very likeable to boot.

Very little of Heroes For Hire would be something I wouldn't be embarassed to show off today, but my former internet nom de guerre "Blade" comes from the most central and overpowered character of those days.

About a year before I left Cape Breton, Aaron and I discovered two things of lasting consequence: anime, via his having a comic adaptation of the movie "Project A-ko" in his huge box of comics that I would regularly raid, and fanfiction, which I had been introduced to via USENET by another friend of mine, Mark MacIsaac. After I left, Aaron had more free time, and thus he started writing a story that combined two of his favourite things: the then-popular anime Ranma 1/2, and Star Wars. 

Aaron wrote prolifically, longhand on sheaths of paper, in his inscrutable and typo-laden scrawl. My role in those first stories, for all they were credited under both our names, was just to type these up and edit them - but that wasn't a small task, to be fair. I can type 60wpm despite still pecking with two fingers instead of touch-typing, a skill that dates to those early manuscripts. 

That level of collaboration, though, wasn't enough. Soon we took to role-playing games again, and I took on various Ranma characters in lengthy phone conversations where he was once again the DM. Those games formed several of the plots for Ranma: Curse of Darkness, and the entirety of the plot of Kyoto Chronicles (sadly never actually finished), along with other stories both Ranma and non that never made it to the internet. Again, he would write the scripts and I would type them up, now with more creative control and editing. 

The time came when we once again lived in the same city, able to really collaborate with both of us writing scenes. All of this finally culminated in Hybrid Theory, our longer-than-Lord-of-the-Rings magnum opus, and something we were both pretty proud of despite the various flaws and that we totally botched poor Rei's character arc.

After writing something like that, we were sure, it would be easy to write something for professional publication. But unfortunately, it never came to be. Circumstances separated us again, several promising projects got stalled after a few chapters, and then the grinding workload he faced at his job hurt his ability to write consistently.

But Aaron never stopped writing fanfiction. His mind never stopped working. Most of what he wrote was "junk" in his words, and he wouldn't even show it to me, but he was still thinking up stories and worlds and his favourite thing of all: elaborate fight scenes. He once told me he could write in any series, no matter how crappy or derivative, "as long as the main characters can run up walls".

It frustrates me that I cannot prove to anyone here how brilliant Aaron was, because that brilliance was hidden behind the various flaws in his prose style. His prospensity for typos never did much improve, though he could at least spellcheck stuff he wrote on a computer rather than longhand. He never got hung up like me searching for the exact right word, and so he often just used the same words over and over. For those that read his last work, I can only explain that I took out a ton of "snaps" - "snapped her head back", "snapped his wrist forward", "the snake snapped out" and yet there are STILL that many in there. I was going to do a much more thorough editing pass when it was finished. 

But that is all surface-level. Where Aaron excelled was in his vision for a setting and story. He could take the ridiculous and make it somehow sublime - indeed, he often challenged himself with making ridiculous or cliche concepts work. He could keep track of a million dancing pieces and know precisely which should enter the stage, and from where. It's not that I didn't contribute meaningfully to our collaborative efforts, but I often felt like a child with crayons colouring in the lines of a sketch by Da Vinci. Even if my colouring was good, it wasn't the masterpiece.

His players knew, though. Another habit Aaron kept for the rest of his life was GMing (though he enjoyed playing, when the opportunity was afforded to him), even if he couldn't do it as much in recent years. Aaron was a masterful GM, able to coax out strong story arcs and dramatic moments from players of any skill level, able to make NPCs that the players hated or loved or both, able to coax rambunctious player parties into dramatic clashes and events that never felt railroaded. But perhaps even more than that, he was a master of making game rules work for him instead of against him. Aaron loved role playing game rules: one of his primary hobbies and uses of his spare cash was to buy new gamebooks, even if he never planned to use them for a game. He'd devour them, expertly analyse their strengths and flaws, modify and house-rule them to his liking, and even a notoriously tricky game to GM like Exalted flowed smoothly in his hands.

His set of replacement Dragonblooded charms are still the best and most flavourful charmset ever made for them. And he always maintained that the best game system to run Star Wars with was the pulp action game Adventure! - which was the very last game I'd play with him. He was, as always on these matters, completely correct.

In another world, even with the problems we had, I'm sure Aaron could have been a published author. The problem, if problem it was, was that Aaron's prolificness stemmed from his own joy in writing and creating. Ultimately, if he was more interested in writing about a magical self-insert Sakura than he was in something "professional", then that's what he did. He took note of criticism and changed things if he got it, but ultimately the only critic whose opinion he internalised was himself. He wrote because he enjoyed writing. If somebody else enjoyed what he did, great. If nobody did, he'd write anyway.

Aaron and I were so close that my father asked me if we were gay once. We weren't - I'm straight, and he was (unknowingly at the time) asexual. But we loved each other anyway. We had the kind of easy camraderie and understanding where we could nostalge and talk for hours upon hours, week upon week, and never get bored even when we didn't have really anything to talk about. We were never bored of each other's company. From that very first day we met, we understood each other in ways that nobody else ever did, or ever would. I never pictured my life without Aaron in it. I was going to be a writer, I knew at 15 years old, with Aaron. I was going to move back to Canada someday - and live near Aaron. 

There is a hole, and it cannot be filled. It hurts, and it will always hurt. And yet I am greater for having it. It is unthinkable to wish that I didn't have it. My life without Aaron is unthinkable. I'll have to think of it, maybe another day, but not yet.

Aaron's last few years were difficult in some ways. He stuck in a predatory, horrible job that left him perpetually sick and exhausted, the only thing in the 25 years I knew him that actually forced him to stop writing and GMing for any length of time. He was too proud to take help, too tired to look for an alternative. He nearly died of a perforated ulcer a few years ago, and that added "chronic pain" to his ailments, and being him, he would only take painkillers when it became unbearable. It was unsustainable, we knew it, but he was always reaching for that promotion that would finally bring the shorter hours he had been asking for. In the meantime, he'd always say "Don't worry about me, I'm fine." I wish he had been right.

And yet.

In those same years, Aaron discovered himself. He discovered that he wasn't the strange not-wanting-sex freak he had grown up thinking he was, that there were many people like him out there. He got in touch with the emotions he had suppressed within himself due to a traumatic childhood experience, and while he sometimes had difficulty handling his newfound sadness (he was striken by grief like I'd never seen over the death of his grandfather) or anger (political topics were verboten in our conversations over the last few years), I believe that for all the pain and overwork and lack of creative output he was still in some ways never happier than he was these last few years.

He told me once that he wanted to find a partner of either gender, who didn't need or didn't want sex, but could be with him and hold him close when he needed it. I cried, and told him I knew he could find someone once he was out of that job. He deserved it. He deserved that happiness too.

This forum (although not solely) had a lot to do with him discovering himself, and that is why I felt I had to post about him here. You meant more to him than you know, and to some of you, though I don't know your names, I owe a debt I can never repay. Whoever you are, thank you so much. You helped him in a way I couldn't. The joy and hope of his last years came from the help you gave him.

And that's the end of the story of us. Aaron was exhausted, pushing himself beyond what he ever should have - now, at least, he can rest. Aaron was in pain, but now the pain is gone. There was nothing good or right or kind or acceptable about it, but it can't be changed, it can't be helped. 

Goodbye, Aaron. I love you. Thank you for writing stories with me.

-Chris Mcneil addressing sufficient velocity forums