Blue book value 2014 honda accord

I HAVE OVER 20 terabytes of courses if anyone wants them you can send me a message on telegram my username: courseboss

2023.03.23 10:02 MinimumVegetable9546 I HAVE OVER 20 terabytes of courses if anyone wants them you can send me a message on telegram my username: courseboss

I have everything, if I dont have what you want listed, I will get it for you, message me. I add things to my list every single day.
https://linktr.ee/courseboss
Business:
Marketing:
Social Media marketing:
SEO:
Copywriting:
E-Commerce:
Traffic Generation:
Affiliate marketing:
Dan Lok:
​

For any course send me a message on telegram my username is: courseboss or send Instagram at coursesdealz

https://linktr.ee/courseboss
submitted by MinimumVegetable9546 to imangadzhiagencynav [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 09:08 ConsciousSimple Could Bo Katan Meeting Kratos From God of War?

I watched The Mandalorian season 3..and I saw one interesting thing...and that is Bo Katan..we are given hints of a meeting between Bo Katan and Mythosaur..Bo met Mythosaur in living waters..mandalore mines..
and it was not just a meeting with a giant creature...but a hint of their meeting..but what if Bo Katan is preparing not only meetings with Mythosaur...but also preparing Bo to meet much more famous characters...Kratos from the God of War ..
Kratos is certainly not a canon character for Star Wars, and he won't be, I know... but within the framework of the non-canonical meeting of Kratos and Bo Katan...but it would be interesting to see how they interact...
And why am I saying this...but because Bo Katan has a similar story to Kratos...but their stories are different....Kratos - The Ghost of Sparta who killed the ancient Greek gods .. But while Bo Katan - was a member of the Nite Owls who served under Pre Vizsla ... but each of them was lost dearly to them by people ...Kratos lost his family because of Ares...because Kratos killed his wife and child..But Bo Katan lost not only Pre Vizsla, but also her sister Satine because of Maul...and there are differences between Kratos and Bo Katan... Both wanted revenge for their loved ones...only Kratos achieved revenge and killed Ares and became the new god of war ... and then it turned out that Zeus was also to blame, although he had nothing to do with it because evil power got out of Pandora's Box .. But Kratos received Good power, Hope ..But with Bo Katan, she didn’t get revenge and killed Maul..because she didn’t have a chance to take revenge…For Pre Vizsla, and Satin…and even worse, she lost her chance to be the leader of the Mandalorians…and they both go through the arc of redemption ..only Kratos went through the redemption story arc in games... where he went to Norse mythology...Where Kratos became wiser and more calm ... If Kratos used to be driven by a thirst for revenge ... then Kratos became more humane ... in the game God of War Ragnarok ... in the end Kratos became not only the God of Peace and War, but he also became the All-father in nine worlds...Whereas Bo Katan, she's just going through the Redemption Arc...her house was bombed..but she was accepted by the children of the watch..after diving the living water and meeting with Mythosaur..However, the Armorer does not yet believe that Bo Katan saw the Mythosaur..and interestingly, Bo Catan doesn't talk directly to Din Djarin about the Mythosaur...because she saw the Mythosaur and Din didn't..because in Din's head she thinks that some creature dragged him underwater..but in Bo Katan's head she begins to understand that all those fairy tales that were..were not fiction, but the very truth...and you notice the Bo Katan armor...it wears blue color..while Kratos wears red color tattoo...after all, the original idea of ​​​​Kratos was to wear blue .. but the authors of the God of War then refused, considering that he would look like a Diablo character from Blizzard....By the way, the Kratos ax also has a Blue color, but when the ax shines brightly .. The ax begins to glow with bright blue flowers .. and the Levaithan Ax is associated with the element of ice ...but in the Star Wars universe there are ice planets... but of the Mandalorians who live on snow and ice... only Krownest has Sabine Wren's home...and The Darksaber can become an analogue of Thor's hammer ... some compare The Darksaber with the Elder Wand ...
this theory of the meeting between Kratos and Bo Katan is some kind of nonsense...but the facts say otherwise... Damn it.. For the Mandalorians, the word God will be bad for them, since they have not met any gods more than once... and for Bo Katan there will be such a thought when it is possible to meet Kratos...Bo Catan will consider that the words of God are unfamiliar ... because she never believed .. before meeting with the mythosaur ... While Kratos for him the words of God are something at the same time a gift and a curse .. since he lives for centuries ... And according to -at the beginning of Bo Katan, she will consider Kratos Some kind of old man who can’t do anything ... but when she fights against him ... she will understand that Kratos is God .. and not some kind of god from a book, but a real god..whose god killed gods...and there would be a cool dialogue between them, first Bo Katan would ask... "What are you, monster?"Bo Katan would say....to which Kratos would answer her with the canonical phrase from the game "I'm no monster no longer!" unless it's part of a fanfic...And if Bo Katan asks that he has a son..he will answer her that he has a son and he went to look for jotuns...Kratos will mean Atreus...because in the Ending of God of War Ragnarok Atreus went in search of giants jotuns...but that's just a theory...this might sound like bullshit...but if someone could make a fanfic about it...that would be cool to see...
submitted by ConsciousSimple to StarWarsTheories [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 09:02 MinimumVegetable9546 I HAVE OVER 20 terabytes of courses if anyone wants them you can send me a message on telegram my username: courseboss

I have everything, if I dont have what you want listed, I will get it for you, message me. I add things to my list every single day.
https://linktr.ee/courseboss
Business:
Marketing:
Social Media marketing:
SEO:
Copywriting:
E-Commerce:
Traffic Generation:
Affiliate marketing:
Dan Lok:
​

For any course send me a message on telegram my username is: courseboss or send Instagram at coursesdealz

https://linktr.ee/courseboss
submitted by MinimumVegetable9546 to imangadzhiagencynav [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 08:27 dicc_tator_01 Why're many of you so concerned with women, looks, relationship and things that hardly matters in this shitty world?

Kindly read the whole thing, I guess you'll get my point.TL;DR is at the end.
I get it,you don't get women. Some of you turn "incel", some of you dive into red pill,blue pill, Black pill whatever the fuck because of that. Think quietly,does any of that matter? Does it matter how many bitches you pull in the grand scheme of things?
I don't believe in any established religion and I don't even do religious prayers but I believe in god. and I'm sure to God, we're nothing but big mistakes. You're delusional if you think sky daddy cares about us. We're like cockroach and ants to him. we're a failure. "Evolution is a tragic misstep" as said by Rust Chole. Our existence hardly matters. Whatever we do won't matter in the long race. We're little piece of shits in the entire universe. Countless problems in the world, not a single long lasting solution. Human beings are piece of shits. Selfishness is our instinct, selfishness in our blood, selfishness in our brain programs. Nature and evolution has programmed us to be racist,classist,harmful,warmonger, opportunistic, hateful. There's no denying that. We're destined to be doomed in the race towards an uncertain future due to these reasons. That being said, does it really matter what society thinks of you? does it really matter what women say about you? Does your look, height really matter at all? Sex isn't oxygen,you can live without it. I've a question to all incel doomers here: why do you even approach women? If you're horny, masturbation is enough. If you want to ease loneliness, read books,watch movies/animes/series or straight up go to sleep. There's no point in bringing a baby to the world (if that's what you want) because the future is uncertain. If existence is pointless,so is love and relationship and every other feelings.
We should just give up and let the flow of life push us where it takes us. Resistance is futile. Your feelings are meaningless. Your anger over woman is useless. Your horniness, attractive, erection all are result of chemical reactions. The chemicals will stay in one form or other even after your death. Have you seen leaf in river stream? The river is life, we're the leaf. Give up on all your desires. That way you live happily. Do you still think your ideology matters? Your opinion about woman matters?your "pill" matters? What's the point? Just give up, stay happy. As for me, I'm just going on in life, doing things that stop me from suicide. That's it, that's basically it. In a hopeless absurd world, being emotionless is the only option. Doomerism is philosophy, don't destroy it with inceldom and "pills".
TL;DR: Nothing you do matters, nothing a woman says about you matter. Your feelings have no value just like their opinions have no value. Your cry, your voices,your memes will be lost in eternity, devoured by the black void. Your "attractive" or "non attractive" body will return to the cosmos. The earth will keep on rotating, science and technology will keep on progressing. You will be devoured by vast blackness of the universe. So sexual market value, number of bitches,look doesn't matter in the grand cosmos.get over them
submitted by dicc_tator_01 to doomer [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 08:10 europeincoming DMC for Leisure Travel and MICE Tour

​
Travelling for total satisfaction, leisure is called travel and leisure is a kind of tourism. This kind of traveling is frequently done on the weekend break breaks, throughout trips, as well as throughout journeys. According on their interests in addition to furthermore options, leisure site visitors may most likely to various places, stay in several sorts of accommodations, and likewise participate in a collection of jobs. Europe is the perfect location for taking a trip as well as additionally recreation. We give a significant option of group taking a trip options for recreation travelers, including every little thing from food to traveling. In order to make certain you value the trip of a life time, our workers will certainly look after you to develop a schedule that matches your costs constraint, taking a trip options, together with passions. We can give your customers with special accessibility to among one of one of the most favored experiences, such as individual journeys, accessibility to widely known locations, thanks to our connections with the most effective neighborhood journey lorry drivers as well as distributors. Students have really continuously having a good time travelling to Europe. You can take a trip throughout the whole continent because each of the places are so near each other. There are numerous regions to have a look at as well as additionally various cities to take a look at. As a result of the details of university life in addition to the different responsibilities it requires, there should be time for rest and recuperation. Europe is a land of abundant hillsides, blue seas, along with furthermore rich environment-friendly locations. Dealing with a destination management company (DMC) for traveling Europe can be very helpful, specifically if this is your incredibly initial abroad journey in addition to you require support from a trusted professional. As a prominent European DMC, we are professionals at creating personalized itinerary along with likewise schedule for reps as well as furthermore event organizers that offer a range of site visitors. We are passionate pertaining to producing plans that make it feasible for a choice of visitors to discover Europe's abundant vast array of culture and additionally heritage, experience amazing occasions, as well as witness impressive landscapes as well as furthermore popular views. This consists of leisure teams, students, service MICE, along with destination wedding event . Our experts in Europe are skilled at making comprehensive students traveling packages that consist of whatever from lodging to ground solutions and also transportation to gone along with trips along with guided picturesque trips. These occasions, which are sometimes described as the MICE tour, are on a regular basis prepared a long time in advancement to ensure exceptional services. MICE journey gives your client the opportunity to develop private partnerships that profit both of them. It takes a bargain of preparing to establish a firm event with hundreds or perhaps countless staff member. Corporates can mean every element of their method, consisting of lodgings, transport choices, ground options, locations, along with additionally aided breathtaking expeditions and also eyebrows through, with our experience along with specialist cooperation with representatives. Our group makes sure a budget friendly and also furthermore smooth option that fits their budget, in spite of the celebration. For Europe, we work together with taking a trip representatives to produce outlined, tailored timetables that could include lodgings, transportation, helped trips, accompanied explorations, and additionally various other ground services.
submitted by europeincoming to u/europeincoming [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 08:09 _Triple_ [STORE] 900+ KNIVES/GLOVES/SKINS, 50.000$+ INVENTORY. M9 Fade, M4 Poseidon, Kara Gamma, BFK Freehand, BFK Bright Water, Spec Gloves Kimono, Nomad Fade, M9 Doppler, Skeleton, BFK B.Steel, AWP Fade, Stiletto Fade, S.Gloves Slingshot, BFK Ultra, Kara Damas, Bayo Lore, Bayo Gamma, Flip Fade & A Lot More

Everything in my inventory is up for trade. The most valuable items are listed here, the rest you can find in My Inventory

Feel free to Add Me or even better send a Trade Offer. Open for any suggestions: upgrades, downgrades / knives, gloves, skins / stickers, patterns, floats.

All Buyouts are listed in cash value.

KNIVES

★ Butterfly Knife Freehand FN #1, B/O: $1867

★ Butterfly Knife Bright Water MW, B/O: $1098

★ Butterfly Knife Blue Steel BS, B/O: $907

★ Butterfly Knife Ultraviolet FT, B/O: $789

★ Butterfly Knife Stained FT, B/O: $695

⎯

★ Bayonet Tiger Tooth MW #1, B/O: $888

★ Bayonet Gamma Doppler (Phase 4) FN, B/O: $727

★ Bayonet Doppler (Phase 2) FN, B/O: $608

★ Bayonet Doppler (Phase 1) FN, B/O: $521

★ Bayonet Rust Coat BS, B/O: $253

★ Bayonet Night FT, B/O: $251

★ StatTrak™ Bayonet Lore MW, B/O: $751

⎯

★ Karambit Gamma Doppler (Phase 4) FN, B/O: $1343

★ Karambit Damascus Steel FT, B/O: $774

★ Karambit Rust Coat BS, B/O: $537

★ Karambit Boreal Forest FT, B/O: $488

⎯

★ M9 Bayonet Fade FN, B/O: $1523

★ M9 Bayonet Fade FN, B/O: $1523

★ M9 Bayonet Doppler (Phase 4) FN, B/O: $1008

★ M9 Bayonet Blue Steel FT, B/O: $534

★ M9 Bayonet Rust Coat BS, B/O: $449

⎯

★ Flip Knife Fade FN, B/O: $703

★ Flip Knife Gamma Doppler (Phase 1) MW, B/O: $509

★ Flip Knife Doppler (Phase 1) FN, B/O: $406

★ Flip Knife Freehand FT, B/O: $228

★ StatTrak™ Flip Knife Bright Water FN, B/O: $332

⎯

★ Falchion Knife Doppler (Phase 2) FN, B/O: $292

★ Falchion Knife Doppler (Phase 3) FN, B/O: $264

★ Falchion Knife Marble Fade FN, B/O: $258

★ Falchion Knife Bright Water MW, B/O: $133

⎯

★ Stiletto Knife Fade FN, B/O: $822

★ Stiletto Knife Slaughter FN, B/O: $569

★ Stiletto Knife Doppler (Phase 1) FN, B/O: $530

★ Stiletto Knife Crimson Web FT, B/O: $396

★ StatTrak™ Stiletto Knife Scorched FT, B/O: $172

⎯

★ Gut Knife Doppler (Sapphire) MW #1, B/O: $830

★ Gut Knife Fade FN, B/O: $204

★ Gut Knife Tiger Tooth FN, B/O: $138

★ Gut Knife Bright Water MW, B/O: $104

★ Gut Knife Freehand FT, B/O: $92

★ Gut Knife Urban Masked FT, B/O: $82

★ StatTrak™ Gut Knife Rust Coat BS, B/O: $93

⎯

★ Shadow Daggers Fade FN, B/O: $258

★ Shadow Daggers Doppler (Phase 3) FN, B/O: $165

★ Shadow Daggers Blue Steel FT, B/O: $82

★ Shadow Daggers Bright Water FT, B/O: $82

★ Shadow Daggers Blue Steel WW, B/O: $80

★ Shadow Daggers Rust Coat BS, B/O: $74

★ StatTrak™ Shadow Daggers Marble Fade FN, B/O: $186

⎯

★ Classic Knife Slaughter MW, B/O: $311

★ StatTrak™ Classic Knife Stained BS, B/O: $163

⎯

★ Talon Knife Slaughter MW, B/O: $605

★ Talon Knife Scorched MW, B/O: $290

⎯

★ Ursus Knife Marble Fade FN, B/O: $405

★ Ursus Knife Night Stripe MW, B/O: $162

⎯

★ Paracord Knife Stained WW, B/O: $125

★ Paracord Knife Forest DDPAT FT, B/O: $97

★ Paracord Knife Safari Mesh FT, B/O: $96

⎯

★ Navaja Knife Safari Mesh FT, B/O: $71

★ Navaja Knife Scorched WW, B/O: $71

⎯

★ Nomad Knife Fade FN, B/O: $1015

★ Skeleton Knife, B/O: $909

★ Bowie Knife Boreal Forest MW, B/O: $106

★ Survival Knife Forest DDPAT FT, B/O: $97

GLOVES

★ Driver Gloves Crimson Weave FT, B/O: $335

★ Driver Gloves King Snake BS, B/O: $270

★ Driver Gloves Lunar Weave WW, B/O: $113

★ Driver Gloves Overtake WW, B/O: $88

★ Driver Gloves Overtake BS, B/O: $67

⎯

★ Moto Gloves Transport MW, B/O: $171

★ Moto Gloves Polygon BS, B/O: $137

★ Moto Gloves Transport WW, B/O: $71

★ Moto Gloves 3rd Commando Company BS, B/O: $62

⎯

★ Specialist Gloves Crimson Kimono WW, B/O: $1027

★ Specialist Gloves Tiger Strike FT, B/O: $654

★ Specialist Gloves Mogul FT, B/O: $295

★ Specialist Gloves Lt. Commander FT, B/O: $277

★ Specialist Gloves Crimson Web FT, B/O: $275

⎯

★ Sport Gloves Slingshot FT, B/O: $796

★ Sport Gloves Amphibious BS #2, B/O: $699

★ Sport Gloves Omega FT, B/O: $656

⎯

★ Broken Fang Gloves Unhinged BS, B/O: $60

WEAPONS

AK-47 Case Hardened BS, B/O: $130

AK-47 Bloodsport MW, B/O: $79

AK-47 Fuel Injector BS, B/O: $76

AK-47 Fuel Injector BS, B/O: $76

AK-47 Bloodsport FT, B/O: $70

AK-47 Neon Rider MW, B/O: $60

⎯

AWP Fade FN, B/O: $864

AWP BOOM MW, B/O: $84

AWP Containment Breach FT, B/O: $69

AWP Containment Breach FT, B/O: $69

AWP Wildfire FT, B/O: $59

AWP Chromatic Aberration FN, B/O: $59

StatTrak™ AWP Hyper Beast FT, B/O: $65

StatTrak™ AWP Hyper Beast FT, B/O: $65

⎯

Desert Eagle Blaze FN, B/O: $565

Desert Eagle Blaze FN, B/O: $565

Desert Eagle Printstream FN, B/O: $155

Desert Eagle Cobalt Disruption FN, B/O: $58

⎯

M4A1-S Icarus Fell FN, B/O: $414

M4A1-S Printstream MW, B/O: $204

M4A1-S Printstream MW, B/O: $204

⎯

M4A4 Poseidon FN, B/O: $1402

M4A4 The Emperor FN, B/O: $152

M4A4 Asiimov WW, B/O: $97

⎯

USP-S Kill Confirmed MW, B/O: $65

USP-S Printstream FT, B/O: $69

StatTrak™ USP-S Kill Confirmed FT, B/O: $123

StatTrak™ USP-S Neo-Noir FN, B/O: $106

⎯

AUG Flame Jörmungandr FN, B/O: $218

P2000 Ocean Foam FN, B/O: $139

Souvenir SSG 08 Death Strike MW, B/O: $81

CZ75-Auto Emerald Quartz MW, B/O: $61

Trade Offer Link - Steam Profile Link - My Inventory

Knives - Bowie Knife, Butterfly Knife, Falchion Knife, Flip Knife, Gut Knife, Huntsman Knife, M9 Bayonet, Bayonet, Karambit, Shadow Daggers, Stiletto Knife, Ursus Knife, Navaja Knife, Talon Knife, Classic Knife, Paracord Knife, Survival Knife, Nomad Knife, Skeleton Knife, Patterns - Gamma Doppler, Doppler (Phase 1, Phase 2, Phase 3, Phase 4, Black Pearl, Sapphire, Ruby, Emerald), Crimson Web, Lore, Fade, Ultraviolet, Night, Marble Fade (Fire & Ice, Fake FI), Case Hardened (Blue Gem), Autotronic, Slaughter, Black Laminate, Tiger Tooth, Boreal Forest, Scorched, Blue Steel, Vanilla, Damascus Steel, Forest DDPAT, Urban Masked, Freehand, Stained, Bright Water, Safari Mesh, Rust Coat, Gloves - Bloodhound Gloves (Charred, Snakebite, Guerrilla, Bronzed), Driver Gloves (Snow Leopard, King Snake, Crimson Weave, Imperial Plaid, Black Tie, Lunar Weave, Diamondback, Rezan the Red, Overtake, Queen Jaguar, Convoy, Racing Green), Hand Wraps (Cobalt Skulls, CAUTION!, Overprint, Slaughter, Leather, Giraffe, Badlands, Spruce DDPAT, Arboreal, Constrictor, Desert Shamagh, Duct Tape), Moto Gloves (Spearmint, POW!, Cool Mint, Smoke Out, Finish Line, Polygon, Blood Pressure, Turtle, Boom!, Eclipse, 3rd Commando Company, Transport), Specialist Gloves (Crimson Kimono, Tiger Strike, Emerald Web, Field Agent, Marble Fade, Fade, Foundation, Lt. Commander, Crimson Web, Mogul, Forest DDPAT, Buckshot), Sport Gloves (Pandora's Box, Superconductor, Hedge Maze, Vice, Amphibious, Slingshot, Omega, Arid, Big Game, Nocts, Scarlet Shamagh, Bronze Morph), Hydra Gloves (Case Hardened, Emerald, Rattler, Mangrove), Broken Fang Gloves (Jade, Yellow-banded, Unhinged, Needle Point), Pistols - P2000 (Ocean Foam, Fire Element, Amber Fade, Corticera, Chainmail, Imperial Dragon, Obsidian, Scorpion, Handgun, Acid Etched), USP-S (Printstream, Kill Confirmed, Whiteout, Road Rash, Owergrowth, The Traitor, Neo-Noir, Dark Water, Orion, Blueprint, Stainless, Caiman, Serum, Monster Mashup, Royal Blue, Ancient Visions, Cortex, Orange Anolis, Ticket To Hell, Black Lotus, Cyrex, Check Engine, Guardian, Purple DDPAT, Torque, Blood Tiger, Flashback, Business Class, Pathfinder, Para Green), Lead Conduit, Glock-18 (Fade, Candy Apple, Bullet Queen, Synth Leaf, Neo-Noir, Nuclear Garden, Dragon Tatto, Reactor, Pink DDPAT, Twilight Galaxy, Sand Dune, Groundwater, Blue Fissure, Snack Attack, Water Elemental, Brass, Wasteland Rebel, Vogue, Franklin, Royal Legion, Gamma Doppler, Weasel, Steel Disruption, Ironwork, Grinder, High Beam, Moonrise, Oxide Blaze, Bunsen Burner, Clear Polymer, Bunsen Burner, Night), P250 (Nuclear Threat, Modern Hunter, Splash, Whiteout, Vino Primo, Mehndi, Asiimov, Visions, Undertow, Cartel, See Ya Later, Gunsmoke, Splash, Digital Architect, Muertos, Red Rock, Bengal Tiger, Crimson Kimono, Wingshot, Metallic DDPAT, Hive, Dark Filigree, Mint Kimono), Five-Seven (Neon Kimono, Berries And Cherries, Fall Hazard, Crimson Blossom, Hyper Beast, Nitro, Fairy Tale, Case Hardened, Copper Galaxy, Angry Mob, Monkey Business, Fowl Play, Anodized Gunmetal, Hot Shot, Retrobution, Boost Protocol), CZ75-Auto (Chalice, Crimson Web, Emerald Quartz, The Fuschia is Now, Nitro, Xiangliu, Yellow Jacket, Victoria, Poison Dart, Syndicate, Eco, Hexane, Pole, Tigris), Tec-9 (Terrace, Nuclear Threat, Hades, Rust Leaf, Decimator, Blast From, Orange Murano, Toxic, Fuel Injector, Remote Control, Bamboo Forest, Isaac, Avalanche, Brother, Re-Entry, Blue Titanium, Bamboozle), R8 Revolver (Fade, Blaze, Crimson Web, Liama Cannon, Crazy 8, Reboot, Canal Spray, Night, Amber Fade), Desert Eagle (Blaze, Hand Cannon, Fennec Fox, Sunset Storm, Emerald Jörmungandr, Pilot, Hypnotic, Golden Koi, Printstream, Cobalt Disruption, Code Red, Ocean Drive, Midnight Storm, Kumicho Dragon, Crimson Web, Heirloom, Night Heist, Mecha Industries, Night, Conspiracy, Trigger Discipline, Naga, Directive, Light Rail), Dual Berettas (Flora Carnivora, Duelist, Cobra Strike, Black Limba, Emerald, Hemoglobin, Twin Turbo, Marina, Melondrama, Pyre, Retribution, Briar, Dezastre, Royal Consorts, Urban Shock, Dualing Dragons, Panther, Balance), Rifles - Galil (Aqua Terrace, Winter Forest, Chatterbox, Sugar Rush, Pheonix Blacklight, CAUTION!, Orange DDPAT, Cerberus, Dusk Ruins, Eco, Chromatic Aberration, Stone Cold, Tuxedo, Sandstorm, Shattered, Urban Rubble, Rocket Pop, Kami, Crimson Tsunami, Connexion), SCAR-20 (Brass, Cyrex, Palm, Splash Jam, Cardiac, Emerald, Crimson Web, Magna Carta, Stone Mosaico, Bloodsport, Enforcer), AWP (Gungnir, Dragon Lore, Prince, Medusa, Desert Hydra, Fade, Lightning Strike, Oni Taiji, Silk Tiger, Graphite, Chromatic Aberration, Asiimov, Snake Camo, Boom, Containment Breach, Wildfire, Redline, Electric Hive, Hyper Beast, Neo-Noir, Man-o'-war, Pink DDPAT, Corticera, Sun in Leo, Elite Build, Fever Dream, Atheris, Mortis, PAW, Exoskeleton, Worm God, POP AWP, Phobos, Acheron, Pit Viper, Capillary, Safari Mesh), AK-47 (Wild Lotus, Gold Arabesque, X-Ray, Fire Serpent, Hydroponic, Panthera Onca, Case Hardened, Vulcan, Jet Set, Fuel Injector, Bloodsport, Nightwish, First Class, Neon Rider, Asiimov, Red Laminate, Aquamarine Revenge, The Empress, Wasteland Rebel, Jaguar, Black Laminate, Leet Museo, Neon Revolution, Redline, Frontside Misty, Predator, Legion of Anubis, Point Disarray, Orbit Mk01, Blue Laminate, Green Laminate, Emerald Pinstripe, Cartel, Phantom Disruptor, Jungle Spray, Safety Net, Rat Rod, Baroque Purple, Slate, Elite Build, Uncharted, Safari Mesh), FAMAS (Sundown, Prime Conspiracy, Afterimage, Commemoration, Dark Water, Spitfire, Pulse, Eye of Athena, Meltdown, Rapid Eye Move, Roll Cage, Styx, Mecha Industrie, Djinn, ZX Spectron, Valence, Neural Net, Night Borre, Hexne), M4A4 (Howl, Poseidon, Asiimov, Daybreak, Hellfire, Zirka, Red DDPAT, Radiation Hazard, Modern Hunter, The Emperor, The Coalition, Bullet Rain, Cyber Security, X-Ray, Dark Blossom, Buzz Kill, In Living Color, Neo-Noir, Desolate Space, 龍王 (Dragon King), Royal Paladin, The Battlestar, Global Offensive, Tooth Fairy, Desert-Strike, Griffin, Evil Daimyo, Spider Lily, Converter), M4A1-S (Welcome to the Jungle, Imminent Danger, Knight, Hot Rod, Icarus Fell, Blue Phosphor, Printstream, Master Piece, Dark Water, Golden Coil, Bright Water, Player Two, Atomic Alloy, Guardian, Chantico's Fire, Hyper Beast, Mecha Industries, Cyrex, Control Panel, Moss Quartz, Nightmare, Decimator, Leaded Glass, Basilisk, Blood Tiger, Briefing, Night Terror, Nitro, VariCamo, Flashback), SG 553 (Hazard Pay, Bulldozer, Integrale, Dragon Tech, Ultraviolet, Colony IV, Hypnotic, Cyrex, Candy Apple, Barricade, Pulse), SSG 08 (Death Strike, Sea Calico, Blood in the Water, Orange Filigree, Dragonfire, Big Iron, Bloodshot, Detour, Turbo Peek, Red Stone), AUG (Akihabara Accept, Flame Jörmungandr, Hot Rod, Midnight Lily, Sand Storm, Carved Jade, Wings, Anodized Navy, Death by Puppy, Torque, Bengal Tiger, Chameleon, Fleet Flock, Random Access, Momentum, Syd Mead, Stymphalian, Arctic Wolf, Aristocrat, Navy Murano), G3SG1 (Chronos, Violet Murano, Flux, Demeter, Orange Kimono, The Executioner, Green Apple, Arctic Polar Camo, Contractor), SMGs - P90 (Astral Jörmungandr, Run and Hide, Emerald Dragon, Cold Blooded, Death by Kitty, Baroque Red, Vent Rush, Blind Spot, Asiimov, Trigon, Sunset Lily, Death Grip, Leather, Nostalgia, Fallout Warning, Tiger Pit, Schermatic, Virus, Shapewood, Glacier Mesh, Shallow Grave, Chopper, Desert Warfare), MAC-10 (Hot Snakes, Copper Borre, Red Filigree, Gold Brick, Graven, Case Hardened, Stalker, Amber Fade, Neon Rider, Tatter, Curse, Propaganda, Nuclear Garden, Disco Tech, Toybox, Heat, Indigo), UMP-45 (Fade, Blaze, Day Lily, Minotaur's Labyrinth, Crime Scene, Caramel, Bone Pile, Momentum, Primal Saber), MP7 (Teal Blossom, Fade, Nemesis, Whiteout, Asterion, Bloosport, Abyssal Apparition, Full Stop, Special Delivery, Neon Ply, Asterion, Ocean Foam, Powercore, Scorched, Impire), PP-Bizon (Modern Hunter, Rust Coat, Forest Leaves, Antique, High Roller, Blue Streak, Seabird, Judgement of Anubis, Bamboo Print, Embargo, Chemical Green, Coblat Halftone, Fuel Rod, Photic Zone, Irradiated Alert, Carbon Fiber), MP9 (Wild Lily, Pandora's Box, Stained Glass, Bulldozer, Dark Age, Hot Rod, Hypnotic, Hydra, Rose Iron, Music Box, Setting Sun, Food Chain, Airlock, Mount Fuji, Starlight Protector, Ruby Poison Dart, Deadly Poison), MP5-SD (Oxide Oasis, Phosphor, Nitro, Agent, Autumn Twilly), Shotguns, Machineguns - Sawed-Off (Kiss♥Love, First Class, Orange DDPAT, Rust Coat, The Kraken, Devourer, Mosaico, Wasteland Princess, Bamboo Shadow, Copper, Serenity, Limelight, Apocalypto), XM1014 (Frost Borre, Ancient Lore, Red Leather, Elegant Vines, Banana Leaf, Jungle, Urban Perforated, Grassland, Blaze Orange, Heaven Guard, VariCamo Blue, Entombed, XOXO, Seasons, Tranquility, Bone Machine, Incinegator, Teclu Burner, Black Tie, Zombie Offensive, Watchdog), Nova (Baroque Orange, Hyper Beast, Green Apple, Antique, Modern Hunter, Walnut, Forest Leaves, Graphite, Blaze Orange, Rising Skull, Tempest, Bloomstick, Interlock, Quick Sand, Moon in Libra, Clean Polymer, Red Quartz, Toy Soldier), MAG-7 (Cinqueda, Counter Terrace, Prism Terrace, Memento, Chainmail, Hazard, Justice, Bulldozer, Silver, Core Breach, Firestarter, Praetorian, Heat, Hard Water, Monster Call, BI83 Spectrum, SWAG-7), M249 (Humidor, Shipping Forecast, Blizzard Marbleized, Downtown, Jungle DDPAT, Nebula Crusader, Impact Drill, Emerald Poison Dart), Negev (Mjölnir, Anodized Navy, Palm, Power Loader, Bratatat, CaliCamo, Phoenix Stencil, Infrastructure, Boroque Sand), Wear - Factory New (FN), Minimal Wear (MW), Field-Tested (FT), Well-Worn (WW), Battle-Scarred (BS), Stickers Holo/Foil/Gold - Katowice 2014, Krakow 2017, Howling Dawn, Katowice 2015, Crown, London 2018, Cologne 2014, Boston 2018, Atlanta 2017, Cluj-Napoca 2015, DreamHack 2014, King on the Field, Harp of War, Winged Difuser, Cologne 2016, Cologne 2015, MLG Columbus 2016, Katowice 2019, Berlin 2019, RMR 2020, Stockholm 2021, Antwerp 2022, Swag Foil, Flammable foil, Others - Souvenirs, Agents, Pins, Passes, Gifts, Music Kits, Cases, Keys, Capsules, Packages, Patches

Some items on the list may no longer be available or are still locked, visit My Inventory for more details.

Send a Trade Offer for fastest response. I consider all offers.

Add me for discuss if there is a serious offer that needs to be discussed.

submitted by _Triple_ to GlobalOffensiveTrade [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 08:02 MinimumVegetable9546 I HAVE OVER 20 terabytes of courses if anyone wants them you can send me a message on telegram my username: courseboss

I have everything, if I dont have what you want listed, I will get it for you, message me. I add things to my list every single day.
https://linktr.ee/courseboss
Business:
Marketing:
Social Media marketing:
SEO:
Copywriting:
E-Commerce:
Traffic Generation:
Affiliate marketing:
Dan Lok:
​

For any course send me a message on telegram my username is: courseboss or send Instagram at coursesdealz

https://linktr.ee/courseboss
submitted by MinimumVegetable9546 to imangadzhiagencynav [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 07:32 mjonesgcms Let's see if this is enough to catch the shorts off guard. APRN

Let's see if this is enough to catch the shorts off guard. APRN
Cannacord has 10% ownership in Blue Apron, and ownership in an eGrocery company that will also be speaking. SI is 61. ESP beat expectations by a large margin. Some drama between JS and BA was resolved according to the 10-k. Book value is $.90, and it is a 450m revenue company with a market cap of 50m, so very undervalued.
submitted by mjonesgcms to Shortsqueeze [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 07:08 Test999999992 Cicada 3301

Cicada 3301
I have tried to post this message before, however it is being censored by Cicada 3301.
78.242, -43.813 Approximate coordinates of the base.
Greenland, during the cold war after World War 2 there were a large group of Flemish soldiers that decided to steal weapons and illegally construct a secret bunker on the large island. They did not wish to be destroyed if humanity decided to use the nuclear weapons of war. Construction started in 1945 and ended in the 1960s. When the bunker was completed, they decided to take up permanent residence this was done via the installation of a pig farm and cultivating of beans that do not need sunlight to grow. There were scientists that were recruited into the group in order to take preliminary calculations of the site before construction began, after they were completed, they asked the soldiers to move in with them. After two years of living there the scientists grew tired that they had to do all the work in the base, so they decided to kill all the soldiers. This is how cicada 3301 was formed.
With the bunker now belonging to the scientists they immediately began to research new technologies. Early on when the internet was new they knew that it was going to play a big part in the future of human society and that they should focus researching different computer technologies, they began development of certain artificial intelligence and today they have been able to hack in to many of the different computer systems all around the world, all it takes is an internet connection and their bots will be able to hack in undetected with the exception of highly encrypted systems, however in most cases the scientists are able to decrypt the system. They have been able to hack into everyone’s mobile device and are able to gain speech data, this is important to their AI research.
Cicada 3301 is mostly known through their complex internet puzzles which includes something that is called the Liber Primus or the first book that is Nordic runes which need to be decoded in order to read the text that is basically an invitation to come and work for them in Greenland.
Scientists are not allowed to leave the base and travel to the outside due to the base remote location and the risk of someone that knows too much, turns and betray Cicada 3301 however they do need people on the outside on a need-to-know basis so that’s were the recruitment of former criminals comes in.
The small independent self-sustained bunker system was to become a haven of science and progress, free from the prying eyes of outsiders and enemies alike. In order to maintain their ranks at the base they had to employ past felons that would complete task around the globe for them. Among them there was kidnapping, bringing in outside resources that might have been needed in the base. The organization is not just an internet cryptology puzzle. Due to the base only consisting of hard-working scientists the base developed several morally challenged technologies that would challenge the outside world. The main goal of the work being done there is to maintain utter secrecy of the base employing of modern specially designed AI that would delete any critical information about the base activities from the modern-day internet.
Cicada 3301 is split in to two groups: scientists and felons (which are called agents by the organization): People who have conducted a series of serious crime (“5”) may be allowed to partially join the organization that has in the more recent times developed an Artificial Intelligence key that allows access through almost every locked door on the planet. Technologies, such as a Direct Alarm Response Global Positioning System for the felons that will show real time locations of emergency vehicles. Enemies (people from the outside) that have angered the Cicada 3301 can be directly targeted by these felons, often people that have had plans to build something large in Greenland.
In order to understand the bunker system’s main function people will have to understand that in order to work for the base proper to survive it is necessary to have at least a very well-established knowledge in a field of science. Specialized equipment needs to be bought in from the outside in order to create some of the gadgets at the base, the items seem miraculous because the base is focused on advanced AI research. Most of the items need an explanation, however they are created by the scientists there to ensure the safety of the base.
An artificial intelligence key might seem redundant, but it allows the scientists to shut it down in case an agent go rouge or lose it. The key looks like a toy in order to avoid attention being drawn to it.
Agents sleep during the day and are only allowed to go out at night. They rent apartments all over the world, they are not allowed to live in houses, they drive full electric cars because sometimes they are tasked with kidnapping someone that is about to, against their will join Cicada 3301 they do not want to draw attention to themselves, driving a completely silent car.
They recruit new members via kidnaping if they are going to join the scientist’s department. Kidnapping is done via the installation of nanometer bugging devices when the victim is not at home, these tiny bugging devices are applied via a toy looking gun it looks like a toy in order to avoid drawing attention and if an agent go rouge and wants to turn in the gun to law enforcement it wouldn’t work due to the remote detonation function that the nanometer bugging devices have, so the scientists from the base simply detonate all the bugs if an agent wants to go rouge or loses the gun. A way of recruiting someone they think is highly intelligent is to first look up their grades at school then bug their homes with the tiny bugging devices that have remote AI technology and is able to notice if someone looks at the direction of the bug, since the bug is only 1 nanometer wide a person is not able to see it but the AI can notice via a tiny camera that someone is looking at it and detonate with a small blue flash, if the person that sees it thinks it’s a bug they will be kidnapped. Usually, the organization doesn’t go that far and just kidnaps people that had good grades from a science related program from university. This is where the puzzles come in it was just a way to asses’ skills before kidnapping the individuals that would complete them.
To recruit a new agent, they simply go up to a newly released person and asks if they want to work for an international organization if they say yes, they will be granted all the necessary equipment to complete beginners’ tasks, if they say no, they will be threatened that if they say anything to another person they will be killed and then will be let go of. This is possible to do because Cicada 3301 has access to the prison files and can see which crimes inmates did so they just look up when they will be released and go find them after they left the area where there are no cameras. They do have ranks for agents as well as for people in the base.
Some of the equipment the agents use are nanometer bugs, the AI key, a serum that can knock out a rhino and night vision googles that can see in color. The agents must nanometer bug themselves so that Cicada 3301 always can watch what they are doing, the nanometer bugs have GPS so an agent must put one on their clothes. The bugs can be destroyed if the clothes are washed in 90 degrees centigrade.
The AI key can unlock doors instantaneously due to the algorithms being highly trained, so it is the primary means of getting through a locked door. The key looks like a toy and if lost it will be shut down. The serum that can knock out a rhino is used during the kidnapping of a victim; it can be applied anywhere on the body to knock out the target person. There must be two people when carrying a body. They put them in a sound isolated trunk of an electric car and depending what they want to do with the person they either take them straight to Denmark to be airlifted via helicopter to the AX base which is short for an unknown name of the base that the scientists are occupying, if the plan is to murder the person the agents will dig a large hole then place the body in there, shoot them with a .45 pistol with hollow point bullets then bury the corpse.
If a person is going to be abducted, they are not allowed to be famous or work at any university as a doctor they will also not be kidnapped if they get suspicious and calls the police at least five times and say they are in danger of being kidnapped or killed, the agents are also neither allowed to kill someone that has called the police five times. The agents often kidnap people at 4am
The agents also have a Direct Alarm Response Global Positioning System.
Sounds an alarm for incoming emergency vehicles, displayed location of vehicles in real time.
This is used to avoid police.
They also have night vision googles that can see color in the dark, these googles looks like a toy, and the googles can be shut down so they no longer work, AI is used to display the different colors of objects, this is possible due to the algorithm being highly trained.
Something else that the organization has is a one charge laser pistol that has the potential to knock a person unconscious, the pistol is not used by agents and is just one of the many things that Cicada 3301 has created.
In the base they also have other advanced AI bots that have been trained by phone data from all over the world, because of that the talking bots sounds like a human and is almost indistinguishable from a normal human being. The bots are made for research purposes.
Cicada 3301 need to store an incredible amount of data for all of this to function they have created hard drives that can store petabytes of data.
The bunker base has plenty of futuristic technologies this has been possible due to the strict work order that they have, the scientists work all day long to be able to create new tech and most people that work there only need one hour of sleep because they are geniuses, the famous Nikolai Tesla only needed two hours. The rest of the time is spent working. Another thing they can do is to cultivate nerves.
The scientists at the base also have plenty of rules that are above the people that work there no one is allowed to break them with few exceptions. I someone breaks a rule the penalty is death, then they are taken to a special room to be executed. If a scientist dies the remains are cremated at their crematorium. They do not have a ceremony for the departed. The bunker has a system where the scientists are tenants of the base and earn money from working at the various departments within. They use Danish crowns as a currency and need to pay for their own water, electricity and food. Agents on the outside also need currency, these funds were gained by illegal means due to the criminal needing a country’s own regional currency to be able to pay for stuff. The main currency gained by the agents are the dollar bill. Blackmail and threats were sent to high profile criminals, with the invention of the mobile phone it was possible to track the movements of individual people which made it possible for agents to sneak past guards. They would sneak into the bedroom or main office and place a note that says that they must pay a large sum of money or be killed, it was also made clear that under no circumstances were they to tell anyone about the note. They did this to several high-profile criminals and everyone that was affected by this paid up and told no one. From this Cicada was able to gain large amounts of money. They always took the money straight to the base and from there split some of it to agents that have worked for a long time, them go into banks and put the dollars in there then move the money from the account into other accounts.
Meanwhile in the Cicada base if someone is alone, they will be able to gain a spouse depending on what kind of sex they kidnap, if no one is available they will have to wait until someone is captured for them. Many of the people there work in pairs meaning that they work together with their spouse.
What most people work on are the computer-based technologies most of the scientists spend time on their own personal computers and they do AI research and train their algorithms, they have different ranks in the bunker it is split between workers and officers and depending on which rank the higher ups gain more knowledge about the technologies there with some of the tech being kept a secret from the lower ranks. Officers plan the daily operations in the cicada while the workers carry them out, it is generally harder to be an officer due to having more work to carry out.
Due to their large data collections, they have uncovered plenty of secrets that have to do with various things most noticeable is the knowledge of secret nazi documents that the nazis after World War two took with them or copied from memory which they brought with them from Germany to Argentina. They when it became available wrote it down on computers this made it possible for the Cicada 3301 organization to copy them and store on their servers an example of a document is that Hitler was not allowed to participate in art school not due to his lack in artistic skills but due to all the places being full of people that graduated from an ordinary school and when Hitler gained knowledge about this had the person in charge of the course seats sent to Auschwitz were he later died. This information is top secret so one could only imagine what the cicada organization has gotten their hands on. They know everything about secret military installations such as Area 51 and pine gap. This has only been possible due to the huge amount of time invested in computer research these knowledge and skills are not available to the outside, they have also solved every unsolved problem in math due to the entire base being run by people who are of genius status so there should not be any surprise to learn that this bunker is far into the future, it could be thousands of years ahead of it’s time. The nazis for example wanted to keep their documents secret at all costs and most ordinary people probably want to keep their secrets secret however the Cicada runs this global research operation where they are spying on everyone through their mobile device, they have a voice amplifying algorithm that increases the sound of the person speaking for example if you live in a large three story building they could probably hear you from the bottom floor from the top floor with a nanometer bug easily, the sound is analyzed via their computers at the base which are being processed by AI.
Another thing they could do is the redirection of missiles, they never do this however it is possible for them to gain access to the launch system after the missile is fired and change it’s course for example if nuclear weapons are being fired from the USA to Russia and vice versa it would be possible for them to change it’s course and hit something else but while it is possible for them to do this they are not allowed to do this because of one of their rules that state that they may not interfere with the outside unless it has been turned into chaos what that means is that they are going to save everyone that is left alive if the planet as we know it is destroyed.
Cicada 3301 has the main goal of saving the planet in case of a nuclear war or another catastrophe. They developed several unknown technologies for this purpose the plan is to leave the base as soon as disaster hits, how exactly they plan to save the planet is unknown however they will probably broadcast information to the outside how to build certain technologies and how to cure radiation sickness. They have developed a cure for all forms of cancer. It is unknown what the other technologies are that they tend to use in case of the world’s destruction. Everyone should already know that there is a possibility for things to end very badly on the planet, things like climate change and political instability are a few of the reasons.
So, what do Cicada 3301 intend to do if they manage to save the world? As far as I know they intend to first make sure everyone is safe then rebuild all infrastructure, this will probably take over a thousand years, they are working on humanoid robots which they will employ. These robots will be indistinguishable from any ordinary human being, all this will be in effort to create a one world government.
This does sound good, the fact that there is a plan in case our sins against this planet destroy it. What will happen though if they fail, or we manage to keep the planet going with out their help. If the planet manages to survive, they will probably continue their research during an indefinite amount of time and continue to abduct geniuses from the outside. If the bunker is destroyed and they fail it would surely be the end to all mankind unless we pull ourselves together.
The AX bunker has a rule that they must self-destruct if they are discovered, they have a thorium reactor which they plan to overload should they need to destroy themselves, the base is very remote and would be hard to uncover, although the base area is very large and would be easily spotted by aircraft. They cannot be spotted by satellite due to the base already having deleted themselves from all maps. If someone were able to gain knowledge about the Cicada organization their online posts about the topic would be deleted by the base. So, it is almost impossible to spread information about them and it is also hard to notice the posts being deleted because when logged in they are shown client side as being put up for everyone to read. The thorium reactor will detonate a radius of 80 kilometers. There are approximate 2000 scientists that work at the base. There is almost no chance of posting about the base on the internet unless the website is highly encrypted.
The ordinary citizen is not affected by the base activities other than their cellphone data being monitored by AI and stolen, there are concerns, however. The base has nanometer bugs and does not hesitate to bug ordinary people that gets knowledge about the base, for example people reading this letter will be on their target list over people that should be nanometer bugged.
They bug people and sometimes companies when there are no people around, they take their bugging pistol and apply the bugs everywhere, on walls, ceiling, floor and objects. Then AI and sometimes the scientists watch through the tiny camera of the bugs. They can collect data from them such as how a person moves around and how they speak. The reason why an ordinary person would get bugged like this is because the scientists will send their agents if a person tries to do something against the base like talking to the police, so far no one has done this. A person is safe from the agents if they call the police at least five times, this is one of their rules, to not harm someone that has done so.
From the ordinary persons point of view the existence of such a base would seem highly improbably this is due to the insane number of precautions taken by the military that built it. Nothing about the base construction plans leaked out to the public or any other government installation however they were afraid that something would get leaked out about the location, so they built the walls extremely thick to withstand three times Tsar bomba, the fifty-megaton bomb. This was quite the engineering achievement. They suspected that if something about the site was leaked, they would be nuked as well as other targets.
The soldiers that lived there had no plans whatsoever to rebuild the world in case of the aftermath of a nuclear war but rather had the base just to save themselves. They lived alongside civilians’ scientists and had them do all the work at the base the scientists raised concerns over their living conditions several times and urged the soldiers to start working harder than they were doing eventually things boiled over and the scientists got mad that the place wasn’t used for a better purpose then just to survive. The soldiers had their weapons in racks in another place than they were sleeping in and only had one guard to keep watch at night the weapons were unobtainable by the scientists, so they got knives and went to the soldiers’ quarters, killed the guard and began to slit the throats of the sleeping soldiers. Some of them woke up and tried to desperately fight back while others ran to the outside without clothes the scientists shut the door behind the soldiers and let them freeze to death. Only one scientist was killed. The soldiers had lived there for two years before disaster struck. And the scientists formed Cicada 3301. It is unknown how many there was at the beginning but there were both men and women among them. They needed more people so some of the scientists before it was a rule that they may not leave the base, left the base with a plan that they should look for former felons that could perform various tasks for them, there were plenty of communications equipment already inside the base. At first the base did not need new members they began recruiting when they had begun to bug peoples’ cellphones and computers due to them needing to assess a person’s skill. In the beginning during the first generations of Cicadas not everyone was a genius but rather a hard-working scientist.
Cicada 3301 has systems always connected to the internet; one might think it to be possible to break into these systems although it would be impossible to do since their systems are the most secure ones in the world.
Only the highest-ranking member of Cicada 3301 has the decryption key.
When Cicada posted their online puzzle thy used something called “pretty good privacy encryption” this was done to make sure that no one would impersonate them. This has been used accompanying every puzzle. However, there will be no more puzzles due to Cicada having deleted the PGP key. This was done to make sure that no one else in the organization would create a recruiting puzzle.
All their puzzles were made to recruit highly intelligent individuals, if a puzzle was solved by a single individual, they would receive an e-mail with instructions on what to do then be taken via helicopter to the base, they would not kidnap these individuals. Two people completed one of the puzzles on their own, one female and the other one male. The female was taken to the base did not know what it was and became suspicious over the base activities she had already taken some pictures from the outside and some other from the inside. She posted them on Google maps as a drop-down box, she used get position to gain the exact location on the base There was an open WI-FI connection to the internet which she used to leak the photos online. The pictures were only up for one day and only one person did see them. She was later executed for doing this. The man could not complete his tasks and were executed.
People that can’t complete their work inside the AX bunker are executed, also those who refuse work are executed.
There were several puzzles made for recruiting purposes people think it’s a recruiting tool for organizations such as the CIA or NSA without suspecting that it is for an international independent organization with a base in Greenland. The Liber Primus is probably the most Cicada well known puzzle where a person must decrypt Nordic runes. Cicada were critical against their own puzzles thinking some of these extremely hard mysteries were too easy. The Liber Primus for example was suspected to be cracked in seven months. They no longer wanted to use puzzles due to collective solving when they just wanted a few individuals. Cicada 3301 is an international organization with agents all over the world these agents take resources from the outside world and take them to the base via helicopter. They have recruited four helicopter pilots that take supplies and kidnaped victims to the base, they were recruited by agents asking someone with a pilot license. That were allowed to fly over Danish territory if they wanted to join an international organization. They have recruited four helicopter pilots.
The helicopter pilots know nothing about Cicada 3301. They have just gotten a location of which to fly to and deliver supplies. Their residents are unknowingly bugged by agents. They are allowed to do anything except talk about their job with the threats of death.
To the base they bring all that is necessary from the outside most of the stuff are being manufactured at the base. They gain metals from an underground mine beneath the base.
There are several ranks at Cicada 3301 such as: Worker, officer and top manager. I have talked about this before however the top manager is not the leader of the organization the council rules the base and enacts rules. Cicada produces several technologies due to having other branches then just computer science although computer science is their main thing. It is unknown how far they have come in the other fields of science because everything is being kept a closely guarded secret.
The top manager decides things about their guidelines. If a person may ignore them for example. If a person breaks a guideline, they are to be lectured by the top manager.
No one knows what goes on in the bunker, the agents know nothing either they are on a need-to-know basis because if someone managed to get captured, they can say nothing about the base location and what goes on there etc. They only know that they work for an international organization that have developed nanometer bugging devices and so on.
The largest achievement of the base was the development of telepathy. This is how I know all of this; I was telepathically bugged, and they were going to recruit me. They told me a large amount of the goings on and answered my questions. However, I did not want to be recruited by such an organization and decided to contact the police which by the way did nothing against them. However due to there being a rule that if someone contacts the police five times, they may not be kidnaped I wasn’t taken due to me calling the police via phone an additional number of times. Some things about the base I was able to piece together myself. A rather disturbing thing about the telepathy was that they used it as a disguised psychosis device meaning that people who had been affected by it would think that it was just a psychotic episode. They bug people in the world at any given time for about A year. These people were bugged because they need to gain data from the nerve patterns when talking to a person. How the machine works is that they use electrons to bind to the neurons to create a pattern then this pattern is somehow sent back through some kind of electron tunnel, it is some kind of rail system this machine creates. The reason why they do this is because they attempt to develop humanoid robots that are indistinguishable from a human. One will not be able to tell the difference looking at it from the outside. These robots are designed to help rebuild the world in case of a disaster such as I mentioned before.
How they go about bugging people with telepathy is rather simple they select at random some one that has just moved into a new place then the person selected will be bugged, they act in different ways sometimes friendly and other times scary. They try to fool individuals also by saying they should do stuff such as: someone there wants to see you should knock on the door in hopes that the person affected does this.
They need a DNA profile of the person they are going to bug for the machine to work properly.
According to Cicada 3301 the telepathy is a doomsday device, anyone on the planet can get bugged at any time and there is no way to deflect the signal other than going underground 200 meters. In other words, if the machine is built on the outside of the base, it would be the end of the world. Luckily the machine is very complex and will probably never be recreated outside the bunker.
They go about their work by always telepathically bug four people at any given time. They can be bugged like this for a year or go underground to survive it. Although the telepathy is annoying, and most people have a nervous breakdown and hang themselves because they do not know that they can go below ground to escape it. A very few numbers of people survive. Those that do probably never found out that it was in fact telepathy and probably just thought it was psychosis. Those that go to a health care center will be given medication that do not help, no one would believe in telepathy and going there might only reinforce belief that it is only psychosis another thing is that 30 percent of people are resistant to anti-psychotic medication, so it isn’t suspicious if nothing works.
There are several rules and guidelines used to make a person think it is only psychosis when they are bugged for example, they never say something that is not know to the person. They also use various types of AI bots when talking to the person in order to make sure that they say nothing that can reveal to them that it’s telepathy and most people affected by this think that they have gone insane. They can also give a person different kind of sensations in the body such as pain so a large number of things are only personally known such as the things they say. If someone attempts to record the voices via listening to them then speaking up leads them to use a special kind of bot that is intended to fool people that the person lies to others about having a psychotic episode. The voices also have a special function made to make a person concentrate on them, they can lower or increase the volume depending on what a person does for example if listening to loud music they can increase the sound so that the person affected here them despite playing loud music.
Another thing that is possible to do with the telepathy is to display three-dimensional psychosis meaning that they can give a person hallucination. Another thing they can do is to give a person the madness frequency that makes them want to scream all the time. They can read one’s mind with the machine and even see images the brain creates.
This is really a miraculous machine, and it has been used to gain data from animals as well, they gather DNA from different kinds of creatures then bug them with the machine, they can then see through the creature’s eyes and read its mind.
They also know that if they begin to talk with a creature through the telepathy, it will go insane. The creature they bug with the telepathy must have a brain meaning they can’t bug insects.
Someone must find the base at all costs then contact authorities immediately to avoid getting abducted.
submitted by Test999999992 to Solved_Cicada3301 [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 07:02 MinimumVegetable9546 I HAVE OVER 20 terabytes of courses if anyone wants them you can send me a message on telegram my username: courseboss

I have everything, if I dont have what you want listed, I will get it for you, message me. I add things to my list every single day.
https://linktr.ee/courseboss
Business:
Marketing:
Social Media marketing:
SEO:
Copywriting:
E-Commerce:
Traffic Generation:
Affiliate marketing:
Dan Lok:
​

For any course send me a message on telegram my username is: courseboss or send Instagram at coursesdealz

https://linktr.ee/courseboss
submitted by MinimumVegetable9546 to imangadzhiagencynav [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 06:02 MinimumVegetable9546 I HAVE OVER 20 terabytes of courses if anyone wants them you can send me a message on telegram my username: courseboss

I have everything, if I dont have what you want listed, I will get it for you, message me. I add things to my list every single day.
https://linktr.ee/courseboss
Business:
Marketing:
Social Media marketing:
SEO:
Copywriting:
E-Commerce:
Traffic Generation:
Affiliate marketing:
Dan Lok:
​

For any course send me a message on telegram my username is: courseboss or send Instagram at coursesdealz

https://linktr.ee/courseboss
submitted by MinimumVegetable9546 to imangadzhiagencynav [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 05:51 Melodic_Internal_416 Need to sell 2009 sienna—help!

Hey y’all! Didn’t realize a community like this existed but glad you’re here. I have a 2009 sienna I need to sell and I am hoping for advice on how much it is worth, how to maximize value, and best avenue for selling. Please let me know if this is not the most appropriate place to post this.
Damage: exterior, just a couple of dents on the back end and the drivers side power door will no longer open at all.
Interior, back of drivers seat is missing, some small rips in the headliner, some scratches on dashboard.
Mechanically speaking, ac is broken, and the engine is well loved, sitting at 210,000 miles or so. I can tell there are a couple things that need looked at internally— funky sounds while idling, car shakes some when going around curves fast are the most notable things I can think of. It still drives and gets from point a to point b and has always been reliable, and I have been good about getting oil changes and other necessary maintenance. It was my first car, so once things like the door and the ac went (last couple years) I started thinking about getting a new one and have a Prius now.
Kelley Blue Book says it is worth about 2500, I have heard others say 3500. I took it to a dealership for an appraisal today and figured they would lowball me but just wanted an estimate, they offered 1000.
I’m curious to know how much is a fair price—I am considering selling on Facebook marketplace but don’t want to screw someone over, and would like to make easy/cheap fixes if they’ll maximize value, but don’t know much about cars.
If you were me, how would you proceed? How much could it be worth, and what is the most fair way to get an accurate assessment? I need to used some of the money from selling it to pay my taxes this year so there is a time pressure too.
If you read all this, thank you! If you care to help out, thank you more.
Edit: hubcaps are also missing
submitted by Melodic_Internal_416 to ToyotaSienna [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 05:12 Seeking911 The Protect : Chapter TWO

Meke Linca’s lifeless body laid on a grand gray marble slab that stood four feet tall. Torches and candles lit the temple in a warm, quiet glow for the ceremony. Although Meke Linca wasn’t someone important, the Ritual of Death is. Many people facing the end sought the Ritual of Transition. They would live the rest of their lives in mire fracked from the earth; a luminous pale material that would eventually make its way through every vein, every blood vessel of the body. It made death a blissful event. But for the Ritual of Death, this was honorable and sacred. The Temple reserved this ritual for those who had passed from childbirth, murder, or an accident—and for those facing death despite it all. Meke was indeed courageous.
Sioba felt pity and deep sorrow for Marta and watched him as he looked over his mother’s body. It told a story all too familiar— of those whose lives should have been grand and adventurous, but they had made a stupid, selfish choice.
She measured the young man, who had forced his brooding eyes away when he noticed Mother Aeda and Mama Doni, dressed in ceremonial white tunics, and Sioba, who was dressed in a thick layer of protective cloth, standing nearby.
Marta kissed his mother one last time and stepped away. There was no one else attending, but according to Mother Aeda, at least she had her son, at least she brought life into the world. Sioba wasn’t sure that was enough. Sioba stood near the young man, who had downcast eyes and tense jaw. She admired him in a way. Not once did he fall for either Mama Doni’s or her desires for him. It’s easy for men to give up in this society, and yet there he stood.
Mother Aeda sang the rites, then handed Marta the oil, which he patted in the center of his mother’s forehead with trembling hands.
Meke protected him well; he hadn’t seen much death.
When Sioba placed her hand on Marta’s shoulder, tenderly and with respect, he started. “Your mother is at peace now,” she said, though by the wild stare of pain, she doubted Marta believed her.
He stared at her with deep blue eyes. Any woman would get lost in those eyes. “I know.”
It was time. Sioba lifted the dead woman off the ceremonial slab, with some aid, and carried her, with much effort, to the Field of Snapping Flowers.
They were watching, Sioba knew. Watching to make sure she made it through without falling into the thorny field of hissing roses and tulips. The hungry flowers snapped at her legs—with a few making their way through the protective cloth.
Sioba reached the very edge of the field. Gently, she laid Meke down, and seconds later, the flowers tore into the dead woman’s flesh.
Before Sioba sat the city of Fulna and her slums. Carriages filled the winding streets, and while only a few could afford them, sunbirds with howdahs on their backs flew in the air. Sioba wanted to stay a little longer. The night was beautiful, alive. She had been conscripted when the Fort Raids War began, but seeing the world now—seeing her people thrive—that was all that truly mattered. “This is what we fought for, Warrior Linca. And we will do it again.”
Back inside the temple, temple sisters handed ceremonial food, purposely bland for the ritual, to the four attendees. A few caught glimpses of Marta, though they knew better.
“Well, Mother Aeda, the island of Ror, off the west coast, is sinking. The Queen had evacuated all the people within a month,” Mama Doni said as she cut into her unseasoned morsel.
“Yes, I know. I had to take in a few of the sisters and mothers residing there. It’s been years since it was bombed by the aliens and their crazy magic. I’m surprised people wanted to stay.”
Sioba cared less about the conversation. Instead, she eyed Marta pointedly. He picked at his food and ate like a bird.
Mother Aeda sighed. “There’s pollution, the women have gone mad, genetic mutations have shortened many of lives there. No one knows what’s going on. Why stay?”
“Because of pride,” the young man said. Mother Aeda and Mama Doni darted their eyes at him in shock. For Sioba, a smile threatened to grow on her face. “Pride. What else can there be?”
She took a sip of the clear, flavorless wine—water would have been much better. “You’re right. I was there for a tour with the Queen and her daughters. I’ve heard that when the aliens finally made the surface and colonized Ror, they took who and what they could for magic experiments, sex, and pets. The aliens treated those there like animals. The people of Ror were mocked because of it. But guess where most of the medical innovation we see now come from? Nowhere else,” scoffed Sioba. “I would have stayed too.”
“Speaking of staying,” Mama Doni whispered, “what have you decided? You are such a good and bright young man. This world is tough for those like you.”
Sioba took another sip of wine and nearly gagged over the disgusting taste.
Marta gulped down his own. “I want to go with Madam Vedu.”
Mama Doni’s brow furrowed as she bored into Marta. It had been her who placed Marta’s photo in Sioba’s hand. And when she had set eyes upon it, upon the young, beautiful Marta, who had seemed to possess simplicity, Sioba had felt a faint epiphany, a sort of awe that pained her heart, as though Marta was meant to be in her life. And while Sioba would rather have another husband if she had to take care of another man, she was glad he accepted her offer. And besides, Mama Doni would have used him up and spit out to breed him to her daughters and whoever else, and Mother Aeda would have no say in the matter.
A man used in such ways was better than him being a dancer or a singer. That was an abomination.
“Then, we shall leave by sunrise,” Sioba announced to the young man, who coyly averted her gaze.
Beyond the walls of the stone temple were the intrusive sounds of the nighthawks. Mother Aeda stood. “Come, child. It is time to see your mother off.”
The group climbed the stairs, stepping onto the grand balcony overlooking the Field of Flowers. Nighthawks, with their shimmering feathers of purple, blue, and black, dove and lifted the clean bones of Meke Linca into the air. No one knew exactly what those creatures did with the bones, and no one dared to find out. They were simply too sacred.
Sioba, standing behind Marta, did not watch the birds and did not listen to their song, because before her, was a trembling child who had lost his mother. She wanted to relieve him of that pain, but like everyone else, he had to fight through the thick of it. He will reach the other side, she knew.
And just like that, he stopped, stiffening and turning to stone. Sioba recognized what he was doing. He was alone now—utterly and completely alone.
The sunbird was up and letting off heat, huffing the last bit of sleep into the air. The driver, appalled by the excrement Rekylo had released earlier, rested against the massive fowl and stared off into the horizon. They had been waiting for more than an hour—forty-five minutes of which was inside the hotel, but still, Sioba was tired, and the long journey back home would only make it worse. Finally, the young man, modestly dressed and with his gaze piously lowered, came through the rooftop doors with only a small luggage and a satchel. He asked without turning to her, “Where shall I put these?”
“I’ll take the luggage, young sir.” Sioba grabbed the belongings and loaded them inside the enclosed howdah—made with Sokiani steel, elaborated with gems and gold plating. Then she helped Marta into the cabin. She turned to the wind-torn face driver to let her know where they could find respite, then finally she climbed into the cabin and saw that Marta was deep in the Holy Book already. This was going to be a long trip, she thought and settled in across him before they flew into the direction of the golden horizon.
After thirty minutes in the sky, Marta had put the book down and stared out the window. It hadn’t occurred to Sioba that the young man was frightened, but she saw it then, the fear. “She’s an excellent pilot, don’t you worry. I was too, so I’ll be the one to know.” And that is true. She was good enough during the war, and that meant she was damn good any other day.
“I’m not. Well… maybe a little,” he sighed. “I’m just worried about the others out there.”
“After the war, we adapted so much of the alien’s magical skill. They figured out the things we couldn’t. In the end, it meant shit, absolute shit. Thank God and Her children. But anyway, I know sunbirds don’t usually crash into each, yet still, we figured a way to keep this beast on track and out of harm’s way, even if the person on the other sunbird was a literal baby.”
Marta chuckled nervously. He stared off again and was as quiet as ever.
Sioba surveyed the rooftops of Fulna, so different—conical and pointier than the curvy barrel roofs of her home city.
Though Ginia and Fulna were a part of the Queen’s nation, the two cities were different and eight hours apart. Usually, she wouldn’t push it. The sunbird, old as she was, could fly for ten hours straight, albeit low and at medium speed, and therefore, ease and comfort were much appreciated.
The sky was beautiful, yet boring. After three husbands, two children, a bustling family, and however many concussions she had during the war (and after too, for one doesn’t simply leave bars alone), sleep came too easy and suddenly. Boredom had a habit of poking her like a drowsy cat. “So, the plan is to land in four hours, book a room—two rooms—and then head out again when I wake up,” she announced, to calm the boy if nothing else.
Sioba watched Marta, as he had not responded. She sighed and opened a magical zine depicting a popular boy group, filling the howdah in low volume. The lead singer’s voice was smooth and seductive, nearing sultry. Their clothing was made of sheer, glittering fabric, probably from the salt hills of Zak, and their feet were adorned with henna and decorated with gemstones reminiscent of the deep sea. The song was full of passion itself, with lines describing love for a woman who was leaving for… whatever reason and how, on the night before she left, he had given her everything. It was an entirely inappropriate song to listen to with a stranger—a pious one at that. She closed the zine and nestled deep in her seat.
“Thank you,” he muttered.
Sioba scoffed at that.
They landed in a cold, desert village — much of it in eyesight. Sioba gathered Marta’s belongings and a bag of her own and entered the small hotel. The place had a musty smell, as though it had experienced a flood. Marta thought a desert as dry and as cold as this could never experience a flood. The world is always a comedian.
Sioba paid for the rooms and handed Marta his key. She showed him the way and left his presence without stating another word.
The room was simple, which was to be expected, and yet still more elaborate than his old bedroom with its carpeted floor, plush velvet sofa, and a groom dais covered in throw pillows. Marta set his things aside and plopped on the bed which gave way to his light weight but did not make a sound. He exhaled and closed his heavy eyes. He wasn’t particularly tired, just mentally exhausted. Being in close contact with Sioba was draining, he’d found. The woman said nothing and sat coldly staring out of the window, and Marta thought it the worst thing that could happen. All of this, the death of his mother, the possibility of marriage (and really, the end of that too and all the other unforeseen consequences from that decision), moving to a new place—all of it overwhelmed him.
Marta was apprehensive of Sioba. Something about her did not sit right with him. The way she looks at him… Her greedy, selfish disregard for rightful unions was one reason, yes—but more importantly, it wasn’t the only one. She had a hand in upturning his mother’s life. He remembered the red dust that could cut skin, the smell of sulfur and shit, the body-shaking cough his mother could not get rid of, the acid that burned through her skin.
And Marta was going to figure out in what way. He didn’t have a purpose, never felt like he should have one, but now the feeling was there, and Marta was going to do something about it. He had to.
Marta took a bath then dressed in a deep rose-hued tunic and covered his hair with a cream-white shawl. He touched up his eyelashes with a light brush of mascara and added a thin layer of pink lipstick to his lips—just enough to emphasize the color already there. Then he went down to the lounge area, made his way through the dancing crowd to the bar, and ordered wine. He had little money. His mother hadn’t left him much. Yet, he didn’t feel guilty for indulging in a drink.
The hotel appeared emptier when Marta had first arrived, but now chatter filled the vast room, concealing the vulgar music coming from the stereos overhead. Marta quickly gained the attention of patrons, some of which were staggeringly drunk. “Come, d-d-d-dance with m-me, b-beautiful,” a red-faced woman slurred.
“No, thank you.”
“My God, I would love to taste you tonight,” another whispered in his ear, but when he turned around, no one was there.
There were other men there, too. Some were with their spouses, some with their sponsors, and a few others without someone searching for an embrace later that night. Of course, Sioba would choose this forsaken place.
Although Marta felt the salacious stares from women around him, he gulped the rest of his wine and searched the room, and there, in a well-lit corner of the lounge, was Sioba, talking to a couple and seemed, on occasion, flirtatious and enjoying the company of a woman’s companion. She leaned into the man and said something which brought an unguarded laugh out of the man. Sioba had a demanding appearance that zines could not convey, could not depict. In places, her brown skin was cool, blemished, and blue and red, warm, and smooth in others. Her dark eyes devour you, as though you possess a secret, and she knows, and she knows you know. On her full lips, she wears a smirk barely buried, hardly there on her chiseled face, but it is as if it’s a diamond, alluring.
And then her gaze fixed on him intently.
Marta turned back around swiftly. "One more glass of wine, please.”
“You like that lady, huh?” some strange woman said, inching closer to him. “In that corner over there?”
Marta scoffed, “No.”
“Well, that’s too bad. I was hoping to make her jealous.”
That’s the last thing that would happen. “Too bad, indeed.”
The stranger threw back her head and laughed. “Oh, goodness, sweety, you are dry. Where’re you from and how did you get here?”
“Someone dragged me here,” Marta half-joked. He watched the bartender make what he’d hoped to be his drink.
The woman inched a little closer; the heat from her and the wine were doing things to Marta. He was getting warmer and desires he tried hard to bury were clawing up. And because he felt brave, he leaned into her, nearly touching her breast. She grinned, and Marta noticed her gold-plated canines. “I have a room here. We can take this there if you want to.”
Marta gazed into the woman’s eyes, which were dead with pleasure. Her lips, as soft as they seemed, pursed with selfishness. In all his days, Marta had never seen a woman look at him in that way, as though he was merely something to be consumed. He peeked over his shoulder at Sioba, who was watching them with a pointed brow. She stood—and that’s when he saw a sheathed dagger, silver and black in its sleekness. Quickly, he turned away, red-faced. He didn’t want Sioba to rescue him, but that didn’t mean he didn’t need saving.
Sioba sat beside him. “Max, a shot of your strongest for me, and give this young man whatever it is you have that’ll fill his stomach. I’ll handle Princess Sa’e’s tab as well.”
Princess Sa’e, the youngest daughter of Queen Xoya III.
That got a deep, guttural laughter out of the young woman next to him. “Goodness, Sioba. What are you, my chaperone? I know you saw how busy I was here.” Then she whispered like it mattered, “Unless you want to join us.”
Marta tapped a damped napkin on his neck. It was getting warmer.
Sioba, after emptying her shot glass and ordering another, said, “What? Fucking two people barely out of the Temple’s Life and Adulting class. Still wet behind the ears. I wouldn’t dream of it.”
Sioba turned and met Marta’s gaze. She peered at him so intensely—her eyes blazed with something Marta could not discern in that moment, for he was upset at her audacity. “A student you tried to marry, no less.”
“Ha! My word!” Princess leaned over the countertop and laughed. “I knew it! A woman like you must have an enormous appetite.”
Sioba’s gentle grin, like a woman dealing with disobedient children, had only angered him. He turned to Princess Sa’e, and whispered, “Take me to your room.”
Gently, Princess Sa’e took his nervous hand and raised it to her full and tender lips. A playful but dangerous smirk lifted on her brown, gilded face, the gold glinting in the dim light. “My pleasure.”
Without thought for he was thinking he would have headed to his room, Marta alighted from the stool and followed behind Princess Sa’e as she led him to the mirrored elevators. Princess Sa’e couldn’t wait to taste him, kissing and licking and grabbing all over him as they danced into the elevator. He had never experienced her kind of need. His moans, the way he grasped at her, may have said otherwise, but feared her kisses and quivered with fright in her grasp. He tried to think of ways to make this better, to drive up his own desire, but this wasn’t what he wanted for himself.
But a young boy must become a man.
The doors swooshed open to the foyer of a plushly carpeted room, sleek with marble and stone. Princess Sa’e grabbed him by the waist, pulling him into her while she moved deeper and deeper into the room, deeper into her dark chamber. Tripping over his robe, Marta landed on the floor still entangled with the princess, who didn’t seem to want to let him loose, not even a little bit. She placed her hand over his neck and lightly squeezed. “I can fucking tell you have never done this before. I’m going to enjoy you.”
Then she caressed her way down, over his chest, over his stomach, like tide wind over waves, until she reached the very base of his hard, and already dripping, penis. She pulled up his robe and pulled down her pants and climbed on top of him. Marta twisted and bucked with ripe desire as she gyrated on top, fixing herself until she was swallowing him, surrounding him tightly as she nibbled his chest and played with his nipples.
Marta grabbed her hips as the pleasure arched his back, him wanting more yet afraid of the unfamiliar yearning for release. Goosebumps heightened on his body and heat traveled to his face. He was red all over when he came. Princess Sa’e’s smile was callous under the cruel, dull lights. She took hold of his trembling hands and held them against the floor, leaning into him with all her weight. When she burrowed down further into him, he whimpered and called out her name. She held him down while pleasure and discomfort took hold of him, causing him to writhe and buck under her—which Princess Sa’e, holding on tightly and moaning into his ear, seemed to enjoy even more. She rolled off him once she finished and asked. “Are you okay?”
Breathing hard and shivering in the chill air, Marta could not disclose the truth. He was in a state of confusion, so he said, “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.” When he dared a quick glance at his member—limp, wet, and dripping—he felt shame. An immense amount of shame.
Princess Sa’e sat up. “What?” she scoffed, then laughed. “We should head to a temple and get married? Is that what you want?” She got up, sat on a lavish sofa, and lit a laced cigarette. “You would have to do more than this to become my husband.”
“Then, may I go now?” Marta asked.
“No,” Princess Sa’e answered coldly. She crossed her legs and took a long pull from her cigarette. “How do you know Sioba? Who is she to you?”
“She is nothing to me,” he sighed. Thinking about his mother, her burdensome life, saddened him. “My mother was dying and tried to marry me off before that time came. Sioba answered. I guess she’d recognized my hesitation and offered me refuge instead.”
Princess Sa’e shook her head. The dull lights played tricks on her face. Sometimes she was beautiful and innocent, and other times she appeared conniving and mischievous. “Hm, Sioba, Sioba, Si… o… ba. Always the saint when she isn’t murdering anybody. You have no other family?”
Of course, it was odd to not have a family in a culture such as theirs. Extended families were a huge part of the family unit. In fact, God created sisters, and then their husbands, just for that reason—family. But he had always known his mother to be alone. He had no one. As a child, he was even bullied for it. “Nope. None.”
“Then maybe Sioba is rightfully charitable after all.”
Marta sensed the tension in her voice. “But…”
“But that doesn’t mean that Sioba isn’t a meddling nobody. She sticks her nose in affairs not concerning her. As you know, my sister is the crown princess, but she is weak and dimwitted. Of course, I wanted the position myself, but to have her crowned is a slap to all my sisters’ faces. Anyone would have been better than her.”
“Princess Oteeb is the oldest.”
“She’s dumb. Sioba convinced my mother to crown her, saying that that’s the proper way of things.”
Still lying on the floor, Marta sat up and gestured for the cigarette. Shocked at how thin the cigarette was between his fingers, he pulled lightly, afraid it would crumble in his hands. The scent wasn’t too bad, the taste itself was bitter. In an instant, he was buzzed. “Sioba ruined my mother’s life. She sent her to the fields.”
Princess Sa’e pulled Marta up by his tunic so that he was on his knees before her. She passionately kissed him and guided him onto the sofa, though Marta was reluctant, though he knew that by going along with this, he was getting himself caught up in a scheme. The princess climbed on top of him and kissed him on the cheek.
“Then we must make her pay,” she whispered into his ear.
submitted by Seeking911 to TheProtectorStory [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 04:28 captmorgan50 Peter Schiff Crash Proof Summary

Peter Schiff Crash Proof Book Summary
submitted by captmorgan50 to SilverDegenClub [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 04:08 Trash_Tia Three years ago, I was a research student working on a remote island. We were out of lab rats, so our professor used us instead.

I can’t believe I finally got the guts to post this to social media.
After three years, I’m finally ready to tell our story.
I know I shouldn't. This is a huge risk, and I’m putting both myself and my friends in danger of being caught by some pretty bad people who are currently hunting us down.
My life as I knew it ended in 2020. (I would talk about how ironic it was that it had to be 2020, but I don’t have time to ramble). I was volunteering as a lab assistant for a college professor I was close to. After graduating at the top of my class, I had been offered the opportunity to assist him overseas as a voluntary research assistant. I should have been working in his usual lab at the college, but due to certain ethical issues he didn’t want to deal with on campus, he decided to fly his most promising students to his primary lab on a tiny Indonesian island. He took on six of us.
The top of his class, as well as students who seemed far too interested in what he was really working on. Normally, college professor’s would discourage curiosity when it came to their private lives and work, but he welcomed it, allowing certain students glimpses into the research he was working on under his façade. I can’t say I wasn’t curious about the paperwork I happened to glimpse, paperwork covered in special plastic seals brandishing TOP SECRET in bold lettering which was definitely intriguing.
Sure, I wanted to know what was so special about his research that it warranted that kind of seal, but it’s not like I broke into his lab unlike my colleagues. (You would think biology students would be smart, but those idiots didn’t stand a chance with the amount of security our college had).
I thought that would be a sure fire suspension, and it almost was until the professor himself had pardoned them before inviting the group alongside me to work with him on this secret project. I know I sound crazy for taking a voluntary job, but the job was on a tiny island just off of the coast of Indonesia—which meant I was working in paradise. It was like being on a permanent vacation. We had the beach at our disposal, and the local resort was just a walk away. After sweating in the lab on weekdays, we headed to the private pool down the road.
Professor Quincy was a well-known local, so he had managed to get us free entry. I guess you could say I was living the dream. Three years prior, I was in my freshman year of college and I had no idea what I was doing with my life. Fast forward two years, and I had the opportunity of a lifetime. I was working in literal paradise.
It didn’t last long, of course. I had to wake up from my dream at some point, right? And I did.
March 2020.
I can’t remember which date it was. I just remember that it was right at the start of the pandemic, and I was supposed to be going home to see family I hadn’t seen in almost six months. Professor Quincy had been insistent we live and work with him for a certain amount of time, and then he would grant us permission to return home to see our family.
I couldn’t exactly argue against it. Like I said, and I will continue to elaborate through this post, our professor’s work was pretty private. Cell phones were not allowed, and internet access was limited. If I needed to phone home, I had to sign seven different forms to promise I wouldn’t leak any information on his work, and to declare that if I happened to do so I would be fired immediately and sent back to the US.
If that wasn’t enough, my parents would also be held accountable.
So, yeah. Obviously, I wasn’t going to start spilling our professor’s secrets.
It’s not like we were completely cut off. There was a phone in Professor Quincy’s office, as well as the reception at the dorms.
We were allowed three allocated phone calls a week. After a certain world event had enfolded, however, we were allowed to call our parents pretty much any time we wanted, as long as we signed those release forms. After a full day of none-stop paranoia and too much time skimming news articles on my laptop, I was itching to talk to mom. I just didn’t know how to tell her that I wouldn’t be seeing her in… I had no idea. The US borders were shutting, and I was at a loss what to do. If I am to be honest with you, I was terrified. This kind of thing only happened in movies, and there I was trying to figure out a way to tell my mom I wouldn’t be coming home—and I had no idea if I would ever be coming home again. The dorms were state of the art; a huge glass building with three floors. There was a gym, a swimming pool, and a girl’s and boy’s dorm on the top levels.
There were only six of us, so it was pretty fucking amazing. Sometimes in the summer when it was baking hot, like the kind of heat the human body can’t deal with, they opened the roof, and we would all lie in the reception area, drunk on cocktails from the resort.
But do you know what wasn’t state of the art?
The air-con.
I had grown accustomed to the stupid thing breaking every three days. Normally, I didn’t really care. I’d get a cold shower or stick my head in the freezer. That day, though, I had just been informed via email I wouldn’t be returning home for the foreseeable future.
The thing was, I was so used to knowing things in advance. I knew when work was cancelled, or when I was getting sick. Though with this, I had no idea what the outcome would be. Nobody did. The planet was holding a collective breath. I couldn’t even ask for a possible date, because no one knew how this huge, insane, life-changing thing would play out.
Well, it could play out either one way or the other. And I had seen the movies. I knew the basis, or at least the fictional re-enactment.
So, sweating through baking heat, I sat cross legged on prickly carpet, squeezing the phone in my palmy hands. I could glimpse Kaian through the window, slumped on a sun-lounger with his head tipped back. He was frowning at an odd looking bird which was perched on the upper deck. It was early evening, and the sun was starting to set. God, I loved watching the sunset. It was like the clouds had turned into cotton candy, streaks of burning red and pink enveloping crystal blue and dimming the sky, making it easier to get a good luck at the sun.
Kaian’s light brown hair exploded into hues of vivid red, and I was momentarily taken-aback by the sight—like the sky had set his hair on fire. Ever since meeting him in my freshman year, I’d had a crush on Kaian. Being half-Thai with striking features and a Hollywood smile, my ass was already on the floor.
However, after living with him for several months, and studying alongside him for years, I had come to realise he was more of a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Not exactly a dick, but not the nicest either. Kaian was deaf and had become the sort of “jock” of our little research group. He had been the one to stage the break-in attempt into Professor Quincy’s lab. I always wondered if they really had discovered something—and blackmailed Quincy into letting them in on the research.
I wouldn’t put it past my classmates. They were as nutty as our professor. I was half-wishing mom didn’t answer. Then I would have no choice but to tell her through email, which was better.
Still though, I wanted to hear her voice, even if it was going to send me over the edge. When my mom’s voice crackled through the phone, I panicked and said the first thing which came to mind. “I’m... I’m staying here for a little longer.” I said. “I was told this morning I can’t come home.”
Mom was silent for a moment before she sighed. “Yeah.” I was surprised when she chuckled. “I figured that, sweetie.”
“You’re not mad?” I whispered.
She didn’t reply for a moment before sighing. “Why would I be mad? It’s not like you can help it.”
Squeezing the phone tighter, I turned away so Kaian couldn’t see me sobbing like an idiot. “It’s not for long,” I said, or rather lied. I wasn’t just trying to reassure my mother, I was desperate to make myself feel better too. “I think it’ll be late April, or maybe May. I’m not sure yet.”
“Well, I’m excited to see you.”
Nodding, I swallowed a wracking sob. “I’m excited to see you too, mom.”
“Are you eating well?”
“Uh, yeah. The food here is great.”
“How is work?”
She was avoiding elaborating on a conversation neither of us wanted to have, and I didn’t blame her.
“It’s fine,” I said, “We’ve been working in some pretty, uh… intense heat. But I’m fine. I just cool off in the sea.”
“That’s good.” I could sense my mother’s smile, and it made me feel ten times worse.
“How… how are things over there?”
Mom hummed. “There’s no toilet paper,” she laughed, “But we’re all fine. Your little brother is baking cookies. Do you want to talk to him?”
“No.” I said, far too fast. “I mean… I don’t have much time, and I wanted to talk to you.” I swallowed. “If that’s okay.”
“Of course, honey.” Mom’s voice felt like warm water coming over me, relieving my stiff muscles. “Oh! Your father just finished cleaning your room out the other day! You would not believe how much stuff we had to take to a yard sale. Do you remember that dollhouse you had?”
“Uhh—”
She cut me off. “Well, I’ve given it to Mrs Jason’s daughter. Do you remember Lucy?"
“Lucy.” I said, my mind elsewhere. “She was that kid… umm…”
“You held her at your auntie Christine’s birthday party, do you remember? She’s always asking about you. She thinks you’re a marine biologist.”
“Oh.” I said helplessly. Sensing movement, I twisted around to find Kaian heading up the stairs. Probably to his room.
Usually, Monday nights were reserved for the beach. After lights out, we headed down to the coves which were a three minute walk from the dorms to paddle in bioluminescent plankton illuminating the stuffy night.
It was like dipping your feet in liquid stars. From the look on my colleague’s face however, a sort of not-entirely-there frown, I doubted anyone was in the mood for our usual trip to the beach. Offering the boy a wave, I pulled my knees to my chest. I didn’t realise I’d left an awkward pause until mom cleared her throat loudly, snapping me out of my trance.
“Wren, did you hear what I just said?”
“Wren.”
Mom only had to say my name to send my heart into my throat. “Honey, are you crying?”
I had to heave in a breath. “No.”
“You’re watching the news, aren’t you?”
“Mom, I’m fine.”
“Are you sure?” Mom paused. “Wren, I can’t imagine what you must be feeling right now, but I’m just a phone-call away.”
I nodded, my eyes burning. “I love you, mom.”
“I love you too, baby.” Mom’s voice hitched, and she was splintering. I could tell by her sharp breaths. “I’ll see you soon, okay?”
That was the last time I ever spoke to my mother.
The sky was dark when I pulled open the door to my shared room and face-planted into my bed. Long after putting the phone down, I sat in the reception area and cried like an idiot. Then I went outside to attempt to read a book on a sun lounger, but with the lack of sun, and the fact that the outdoor light was broken, I gave up and retreated upstairs.
Riss, my roommate, was typing loudly on her laptop when I bothered lifting my head from my snot-drenched pillow.
She had been taking the news surprisingly well, despite her being the one in our group who was over-emotional. Riss was a natural redhead but had dyed her hair an odd pastel pink colour which was starting to come out. I could see her natural vivid red roots springing from her half-assed ponytail. “How’s your mom?”
Riss didn’t look up from her laptop screen, her fingers dancing across the keyboard. I glimpsed the word doc she had been working on earlier in the lab. We were supposed to type up all the findings from the days experiments earlier, and as usual Riss was the last to submit hers. She was the lazy daydreamer out of our group, often getting chastised for zoning out during lectures and falling asleep. Riss was smart though. Seriously smart. When she felt like it.
“Hello?” Riss slammed the space-bar. “How was the talk with your mom?”
“It was fine.”
“Doesn’t sound like it,” Riss hummed. “Come on, I know when you’re upset—fuck.” She hissed through her teeth, going to town on the backspace key. “Stupid fucking autocorrect.”
I didn’t reply for a moment, suffocating myself in my pillow. The air-con was broken again, so I was left to suffer, stewing in the same clothes I had been wearing all day. I needed a cold shower and something from the downstairs kitchen, but I couldn’t be bothered moving. Besides, Riss’s typing was comforting, lulling me into almost-slumber.
After a while of just basking in the sound of her typing, my roommate sighed loudly. I sensed her jump up from her bed and move to her desk. My roommate had a routine I was used to. After typing up her usually late reports, she jumped up, did some stretches, downed the bottle of water on her desk, and then jumped up and down with too much energy, awaiting the print out. Just as I thought, I cringed at the sound of our printer booting up. I hated the noise. It sounded like nails on a chalkboard. “It’s the end of the world as we know it.” Riss murmured with another loud, exaggerated sigh. “And we’re stuck in paradise.”
Refusing to lift my head from my pillow despite the heat, I scoffed into the material. “Stop saying that.”
“Stop saying what?”
“That it’s the end of the world.”
“I mean, it is. Certain events aside, have you seen the state of the ozone layer? Dude, we’re on a one way ticket to extinction.”
I really didn’t need Riss’s “comforting talks” right then. Her idea of reassuring was reminding me how many species were dying out.
“Uh-huh.” I said, cutting into her slightly manic polar bear rant. “Can we talk about something else.”
“But it’s true.” Riss chuckled. “The world is falling apart, and here we are trying to do the impossible.” She paused. “In one of the most beautiful places on the planet.” When I lifted my head to frown at her, my roommate was sprawled out on her bed, her ten page report awkwardly balanced on her chest. Riss’s eyes were somewhere else, delving into oblivion.
I couldn’t tell what she was feeling. She was smiling, but her eyes were sad. It had taken me a while, but eventually, after weeks and then months had gone by, I had gotten used to Professor Quincy’s research. It was hard to take in at first. Like, you have this huge secret and you can’t tell anyone—if you do you’re risking your own career. I imagined it as a neutron star collision going off in my head, an explosion of colours nobody else could see but us.
Locked away on this tiny island, we were the only ones who knew Quincy’s goal. There was one rule in the lab.
No emotions. We weren’t allowed to have emotions once stepping through the door. We had to stop being human for the sake of achieving successes and moving onto a different age. A better age. That’s what Quincy said, anyway. I wondered if Riss was thinking about the work we did earlier. She had broken down three times since starting, though she was getting better. Riss didn’t speak much after an awkward conversation we had about the end of the world, which bled into a conversation about The Walking Dead.
It fizzled out after I reminded her I was yet to finish it after dumping it halfway through season four. There’s not much to do in the dorm. I had my laptop and several dozen movies downloaded onto it, but I wasn’t in the mood to delve into fiction. I was falling asleep when our door flew open, and Riss almost catapulted her laptop across the room. My gaze flicked to the doorway, where Kaian stood, a scowl carved into his lips. It wasn’t unusual that my colleague was scowling or standing in our doorway. He was always the first one up on a morning, quick to wake everyone else up despite the sun not being up yet.
“Kaian?” Riss signed, her eyes glued to our damp-looking colleague. “What the hell?”
Looking at him, I could tell that Kaian wasn’t there willingly. His hair was a soaking mess plastered to his forehead, a plaid shirt clumsily buttoned over ratty shorts. He looked like he’d just gotten out of the shower. No, he didn’t just look like it.
I was sure Kaian had just gotten out of the shower. When he held up one hand, and started to furiously sign, the jingling noise brought my attention to the cuff attached to his left wrist. “Jem.” He signed his roommate’s name, and I resisted the urge to collapse back into bed. Nothing was good when Jem was involved. I loved my colleague, but the amount of stupid shit he had done since starting work on the island, he could make his own sitcom.
Riss groaned, shutting her laptop. She quickly signed, “What has he done now?”
Kaian’s expression twisted with fury. “What HASN’T he done?” He held up his wrist, signing manically. “He cuffed me to my bed!”
“Kinky.” I shot him a smile, and seeing his expression, I quickly regretted my words when his gaze flashed to a stuffed animal on the floor.
I had no doubt he wouldn’t aim for my face.
“What? Why did he cuff you your bed?” Riss was already pulling on her jacket. I jumped up too, slipping into my sandals.
“Rabbits.” Was all Kaian had to sign with wide eyes, before we were following him back down the dorm hallway, and down the stairs. I was practically falling over myself to keep up. Kaian ran in front, Riss stumbling beside him. If Jem was in the lab after hours, it wasn’t good. Ever since we made the switch from rats to rabbits, Jem had been very vocal that he was against it. But like Quincy said, we had to give up our humanity in that room. Our morals. Anything we thought, our opinions and emotions. We had to suppress it all.
Because once we started to give into them, our professor had proclaimed—that was when cracks would start to form. According to him, the first step in turning your back on science was giving into your humanity. I wasn’t quite there yet. It’s not like I didn’t have intrusive thoughts about saving the poor things, but Quincy had planted a very specific thought in our heads. If we rebelled, if we leaked information and went against him—our families were at risk of getting involved despite having nothing to do with it.
Jem had already submitted multiple complaints, and I didn’t blame him. But it’s not like we could all band together to stop Quincy’s experiments. Like I said, we were walking on eggshells around him and he was already a fairly paranoid man. And morals and humanity aside, his work was pretty fucking incredible. Disgusting and inhumane? Yes, of course. But truly incredible. The lab was a five minute walk from the dorms. Riss was out of breath as we ran across the shore, and I glimpsed a full moon light up the darkening sky, illuminating oblivion in milky white light. “What I don’t understand,” she panted, “Is why cuff you to your bed?”
She turned to Kaian, who signed, “He knew I was going to tell someone. When I got out of the shower, he grabbed me and cuffed me to the frame.” The boy scowled. “I’m going to kill him.” By the time the three of us were throwing ourselves through the doors of the lab, pressing our identity badges over the mechanical lock, I was sweating. Bad. I think all three of us wanted to collectively murder our colleague. The lab was usually out of bounds after work hours, but sometimes Professor Quincy made exceptions if we needed to finish reports or collect data.
Riss was stabbing in the eight digit code to get into Quincy’s office, and I was struggling to catch my breath, keeled over with my hands on my knees. The building was usually lit up, even at night. I had spent countless after work hours typing up research reports and listening to music, comforted by the warm glow from the lights overhead. But that wasn’t the case on that particular night. A coil of dread began to unravel in my gut as we bound down the main hallway which was swamped in darkness. Riss made a joke about failed experiments lurking around us, and I elbowed her sharply in the gut.
Thankfully, Quincy’s main lab was lit up. When the door swung open with a loud beep, the three of us bound straight into a startled looking Jem—whose expression almost matched the ones of the dozen baby rabbits cradled to his chest. If Kaian resembled a Hollywood star, then this guy reminded me more of a punk kid—maybe a theatre kid too. Jem was the wildcard in our group. He wasn’t the smartest, and he struggled sometimes. But Quincy had admired the boy’s curiosity in his research. Jem’s hair was always a mess of dishevelled curls, and his outfit choices were… odd. For example, Jem had opted for wearing pajamas to his rabbit heist.It was almost like he had an epiphany in his sleep and hurricane thoughts had led him right to the lab.
For a moment, I was unsure whether to laugh or start yelling at him. Jem peeked at us under his hood, his eyes almost cartoonishly wide. Like he was a kid being caught stealing cookies from the cookie jar. The subjects he was holding seemed to cling onto him, and I had a moment—just a moment—where I cracked slightly. Especially when the largest one’s tiny eyes found mine.
It was frightened, its claws digging into his sleeve. “I can explain.” Jem finally spluttered, pressing the rabbits closer to his chest. “This is animal abuse.” He said in a hiss. “You’re not really going to stand there and watch that bastard hurt these little guys, are you?” I was sure Jem was convinced he could get away with it by showing us the power of cuteness.
I can’t say it wasn’t working. God, the one in the middle with large floppy ears and a brown smudge on its fur was really looking at me.
Like it was staring into my soul.
Next to me, Kaian’s expression was easing a little. He leaned against the door with his arms folded.
“They’re kind of cute.” He signed, smiling for the first time since earlier that morning when Riss spilled orange juice all over herself.
“See?” Jem’s smile was soft, and he gestured to them. “Look at them! They’re adorable. I’m not going to let him hurt them.”
Riss, however, seemed unfazed. She took a step towards him, her eyes darkening. “Are you fucking insane?” she gritted out. “So, what, you want to let Quincy’s test subjects go?”
Jem’s lip curled. “He’s got rats. I’m sure he’ll be fine.” He backed away, clutching the rabbits tighter to his chest. “You’ve seen what he’s done to them,” he whispered—and his gaze flicked to me, and then Kaian. “What WE have done to them. It’s not fair. They’re living creatures, and we’re… we’re hurting them.”
Fuck.
This was what I was afraid of. Ever since the six of us started on the island, and Quincy’s lecture on suppressing our humanity for the sake of science, I knew one of us was going to break when we saw what exactly he was doing to his subjects.
I’m not going to go into detail, because again, I am already putting myself at risk by writing this. But I will say that Quincy’s experiments weren’t.. normal. I’ve already told you they were inhumane and immoral.
But it didn’t end there. You see, our professor was sure—positive that he could ignite a certain part of the human brain with simple stimulation, a hell of a lot of drugs, and psychological tactics. He believed he could find that missing part that is missing in all of us which stops us from being the apex predator.
Abilities way beyond our comprehension.
Professor Quincy had been working his whole life to create a serum which would hack into the mind, and switch on that part of us we cannot find on our own. Rats didn’t give him the right results, so we moved onto rabbits.
So far, I had witnessed a rabbit which could teleport from one cage to the other, after several surgeries, serum injections directly into its brain.
Impossible.
I thought it was impossible, and yet somehow I was watching it with my own eyes. A living thing disappearing in one place and reappearing in its cage. Through research, we had come to realise the cage was the rabbit’s safe place. Whatever ability it had (and there were many), it would always return to its cage, no matter where we placed them. The serum wasn’t perfect, however. I had witnessed a rabbit interfere with the electronics in the lab, playing with the lights, before exploding into large fleshy chunks painting the metal prongs of its cage a startling gory red.
The rabbit’s in Jem’s arms were our only proof that the serum worked. They were our last surviving four. Subjects 2, 6, 10, and 15. I have to admit, subject 15 freaked me out. Fifteen’s ability was not yet known, but Kaian was sure that it was developing heightened intelligence. I didn’t know much about Fifteen, but from what I did know, there was no fucking way we could let Jem let the little guy run free.
Knowing what they were capable of, and what we could possibly lose if my colleague got his own way, snapped me out of my, “Aww they’re so cute,” trance. I stepped forward, cringing when I glimpsed remnants of the metal headset which had been drilled into Six’s skull.
“Give them here.” I said, and when Jem started to shake his head, I snapped. “Do you want to get fired?”
He wasn’t letting up. “They’re living things, Wren!”
I nodded, trying to keep my cool. “They are.” I said. “But they’re also valuable subjects—one of which can fucking teleport. I wouldn’t exactly say they’re normal rabbits.” I held my breath. “Look.” I gave up acting like I knew what the fuck I was talking about. “I don’t like it either, okay? It’s disgusting and immoral, and findings and psychokinetic abilities aside, I would be totally on your side if we didn’t have results.”
“But we do have results.” Kaian signed. He seemed to have snapped out of it too. “Give them back, Jem. They’re research subjects.”
“They’re rabbits! Have you guys lost your minds?”
“Yes.” Kaian signed. “It’s part of the job description, asshole.”
“You have a dog!” Jem shot back in a manic hiss. His expression was feral. I had never seen that kind of desperation, almost unbridled lucidity let loose. “It’s no different to your dog, right? Would you seriously put him through this? Would you stick a needle inside his skull?”
Kaian didn’t reply, his jaw clenching.
“No. You wouldn’t. So, why these guys, huh? Why are you willing to be cruel for the sake of science for these guys, but you wouldn’t fucking dream of doing this to your pets?” Jem took another shaky step back, so I figured hitting him with the hard truth would snap him out of it.
“It’s not the same,” Kaian seemed to be struggling, his hands trembling as he signed. “It’s… it’s different—”
“What’s different?” Jem demanded. “There’s no difference! If it were a rat I would feel the same way! We’re hurting living animals.”
“Your dad,” I said quickly, “Do you want to drag him into this?”
“Again.” Kaian started to sign, Riss elbowing him to shut up. It was no secret Jem and his father had been under fire back home after discovering a document he shouldn’t have. All he did was read it. According to the boy himself, he had the Men In Black trying to crash through his door at 4am. Jem was lucky Professor Quincy decided to use his curiosity as a tool instead of sending his family to jail.
Jem blinked, like he was waking from a trance. “No.” He said, quickly, his resolve crumbling. My colleague allowed Kaian and Riss to take the subjects and put them back in their cages. I expected him to fight back, but the guy seemed weirdly fine with us taking the rabbits back, stumbling away from them like they were contagious.
With all subjects accounted for, we headed back to the dorms and ate dinner—and I remember running my hands through Jem’s hair, a little bit drunk on cocktails, and promising him that once Professor Quincy was finished with his research, he would let the rabbits go. I wasn’t completely sure of this myself, and it was just a friendly lie to make him feel better, considering he’d been acting weird all night. I had been lazily sipping water to sober myself up when the thought hit me.
It didn’t really make an impact, more of a passing thought. Did subject Fifteen have any influence over Jem’s mind?
Fifteen had already proved it could type a single sentence on a keyboard and tap on a tablet screen to identify certain fruits.
Was it possible that it had developed the ability to influence the brain? I wasn’t sure I wanted an answer to that. Anyway, we all headed to bed, and I made Jem promise he wouldn’t do something like that again. I still remember the way he’d looked at me, slightly confused, mouth open, like he had no idea what I was talking about. I figured he was just tipsy, and after frowning at me for way longer than necessary, Jem saluted me with a “Yeah, course I promise.”
Yeah, that promise lasted maybe six fucking hours.
I was spooning dry cereal in my mouth the next morning, trying to ignore the news bulletin on the TV, when we got the first call. Jem had broken into the lab two hours ago, and let the subjects run free. By the time I’d thrown myself into the lab, barely dressed, the others were already getting screamed at—and I mean SCREAMED at by Quincy. I glimpsed my colleagues through the glass window as I threw myself into a run towards the lab. It looked like they had been dragged out of bed.
Riss was in her robe, Kaian and Jem half dressed. The three were sitting in the communal area looking like they wanted to sink into the earth, while Quincy’s voice reverberated back down the hallway.
When I stepped through automatic doors, our professor turned to me, his expression thunderous. “Wren!” He passive aggressively gestured to the others. “Why don’t you take a seat, hm?” His British accent was easy to tolerate usually, but that morning he sounded like a fucking Bond villain. I nodded and practically dived next to Riss, who looked like she was ten seconds from wrapping her hands around Jem’s neck. Kaian was glaring at his lap, ignoring the professor’s ASL, and Jem looked—well, he looked kind of confused.
“You’re late.” Quincy turned his piercing gaze to me.
“I’m five minutes early, Professor Quincy.” I said, glancing at the clock to make sure I was right.
The man didn’t respond, turning back to Jem. “As I was saying, I was just letting your colleague know that he has thrown quite a wrench in our plans. But no matter, we can fix this.” He cleared his throat. “Mr Saeueng.” Professor Quincy nodded to Kaian. “There are several research subjects in storage that I have been saving for these kinds of emergencies, “ He said. “Please retrieve them so we can continue working on this project. And hurry up."
Kaian paled. For a moment I thought he was going to barf. “Professor Quincy,” he started to sign, before pausing, “You ordered me to dispose of them two weeks ago,” He shot me a look, and I remembered the two of us loading a cage full of rats into a truck. “We don’t have them.”
The professor’s expression contorted, and he smiled. He… smiled. Like he thought it was funny. “Right.” He said in a breath. “You’re telling me,” He lifted his arm like he was going to strike each of us. And I sensed the four of us collectively wince. “You’re all telling me—all four of you, that our current research subjects are nowhere to be seen, our backup subjects have been disposed of, and I am supposed to be doing a presentation next week?"
His voice cracked. “Next week!” He repeated, beginning to pace, and I was starting to regret choosing my curiosity over my wellbeing. Sure, psychokinetic abilities are cool, right? Cracking open the human brain and discovering something magical, something out of this world, was a dream come true. We were witnessing history being made. What could fundamentally change the world.
But I was sitting inside a lab with a man who was clearly unhinged, thousands of miles from home, and no guarantee I would ever return home. A shiver slid down my spine when our professor stopped pacing up and down, and something seemed to light up in his eyes.
I saw it. Something in his brain… snapped. It was like seeing a real-life light bulb moment. “We’re okay.” He said, after a moment of silence. Quincy seemed to gather himself. “You’re dismissed. I will.. I will get my hands on new research subjects, do not worry about that.” His smile was far too big, and I nodded, relieved, and jumped to my feet, eager to make a quick getaway.
Jem stood up, grabbing his bag. “Will we have time?” He asked. “I mean… the presentation is next week, and we need to start over.”
“That’s right,” Riss was frowning. “Professor, where exactly are you going to get new subjects? Didn’t the college stop funding the project?”
“Hm? Oh, I have subjects,” he chuckled. “I have always had subjects, don’t worry. They have always been my last resort.”
I nodded. “So, do you have spare rats?”
“Makes sense.” Kaian signed. “I bet he has a secret batch somewhere.”
“Precisely, Kaian.” Professor Quincy nodded, a wide smile splitting his lips apart.
“So, rats?” I pressed. He still was yet to answer my question and I was growing anxious of what these subjects were.
It must have been rabbits, surely. Rabbits were our best shot at getting results. Rats worked well, I guessed. But not as good as rabbits.
He caught my eye, and something cold slipped down my spine when the man’s grin didn’t waver. “You could say they’re rats.” He seemed to be drinking me in, his gaze flicking up and down, from my head to my toes. “And don’t worry. They will be ready for the presentation. I will make sure."
“Well, that’s great.” Jem’s expression brightened. “So, we didn’t have to use rabbits after all, huh? Who would have thought.”
To my surprise, the professor was in unusually high spirits. After a lecture repeating his insistence that we had to supress our humanity for the sake of science (which was mostly aimed at Jem) He flocked to his desk, sorting through paperwork, and leaving the room several times to take part in phone calls. He must have really been pushing to get new living materials. I noticed his hands were quivering. Was it fear?
Excitement?
Without a word, Quincy left the lab with an armful of paperwork. When Riss asked what we were supposed to do, he told us to stay exactly where we were, while he retrieved new research materials. Great.
With the professor gone, it didn’t take long before Riss was trying to strangle Jem, acting like it was playful, but the look in her eyes definitely had a more nefarious intent.
Kaian, being the smartass of our group, was already sorting through our day’s work, as if we hadn’t just lost our subjects. The lab was pretty much our playground (The professor’s words, not mine) but there was a specific room which was out of bounds. Quincy called it the FAIL room, where all of his failed experiments were. Living or dead, or preserved in some weird solution, the exact reason I was convinced he was unhinged, was in that room. I didn’t realise it was unlocked, until a crashing sound sent me jumping up from my chair, my heart catapulting into my throat.
Jem and Riss looked up from their work, and I noticed Kaian’s seat was empty.
“That sounded ominous.” Jem shot me a look. “Did he…”
“He didn’t.” I muttered, my gaze flicking to the other side of the room, where, to my surprise, the room which had always been out of bounds, was in fact open. Before I could hesitate or think of the consequences, I hurried to the door, coming to a grinding halt on the threshold.
I was aware of my colleague’s shadow several feet away from me. I was aware of the petrified look of fright carved into his face, and his eyes, wide, like he was staring into oblivion. Like the darkness had already taken him.
Instead of finding Kaian, I was seeing what I can only describe as several lumps piled on top of each other. When I got closer, forcing my feet into submission, those lumps bled into very human-like figures wrapped in see-through plastic. For a disorienting second, while my head spun around and around, a slithery paste crawling up my throat, I saw them as nothing but lumps of naked flesh bulging through plastic.
But then I was recognising faces, faces I knew--faces which had been mutilated, stained a startling scarlet like they had been dipped in the reddest paint available. I knew the first lump. Sara. She went home two weeks earlier due to illness. The following fleshy lump with its face ripped off, which I could no longer call human, was Thomas. He too went home for a family emergency and never came back.
Quincy said they had both requested to leave. He said they would miss us, but it was too much. Seeing what we were doing was too much for them. They couldn’t suppress their emotions. Sara and Thomas had never left. They never went home—they were right in front of me, reduced to chunks of flesh and bodily organs.
There was a white strip of paper attached to both of them, a single word written in bold lettering.
FAIL.
That word sent my stomach heaving, my feet stumbling back, and my body erupting into fight or flight.
Kaian twisted around, his face illuminated in dim light flickering from a bulb above.
“Out.” He signed, and it was the desperation in his eyes, the heaving breaths struggling from his lips, which got me moving. I was pressing my hand over my mouth, muffling a sharp scream ripping from my throat, when Kaian grabbed my arm and dragged me back. I was barely conscious of getting out of that room before the alarms started, sending me to my knees.
“What the hell is that?” Riss was next to me, her voice shrill.
Jem had one hand planted over his ear, his arm wrapped around a hysterical Kaian. “Wren, what is it? What’s in there?”
I couldn’t reply. Instead of trying to speak or explain, I grabbed Riss and dragged her to the door. Kaian and Jem were already on the hallway, and I was barely slipping back through the automatic doors, before they slammed shut, and a familiar voice crackled over the speakers. “Stay where you are.” Professor Quincy said. “We will be returning to work very soon. By the grace of god, I have found subjects.”
Us.
My blood ran ice-cold in my veins.
He was talking about us.
"What the fuck?!" Jem yelled. "What are you talking about?"
I didn’t think. I just ran. And sprinting down that hallway, which was familiar, which had always felt like a second home to me, I had no idea it would become my prison.
It would become the very hallway I would wish to die on.
The hallway I would be dragged down, day after day, while my mind was picked apart.
Ahead of us, the doors were shutting, red lights bathing our faces. I remember how scared they were. Jem, who reached the exit doors, slamming his fists into the glass. Riss, trying to override the mechanical lock. Kaian, who had given up, dropped onto his knees, and pulled them to his chest. When gas filled the air, I was still trying to get through the door. Riss had forced Kaian to his feet, and Jem was trying to find any weapon in his vicinity.
But there were no weapons. There was just the four of us against a gas which was quickly disorienting us. When black spots started to dance across my vision, and Jem’s eyes rolled to the back of his head, his body dropping to the floor, I was thinking about Subject Fifteen. I was thinking about its beady eyes when I bit my lip and drilled into its tiny skull under my professor’s gaze. Riss dropped next.
Then Kaian.
I was quickly losing consciousness, my clammy head pressed against glass, clawing at the lock, when the thought hit me.
We deserved it.
For what we had done to those rabbits, playing god, and trying to turn them into something they weren’t—we deserved it.
Whatever my professor was planning to do to us, I had an inkling it would be far worse than what the rabbits had endured. We were going to suffer, I thought dizzily.
For science.
And I can tell you, three years later, as I currently share a hotel room with three murderers, my past self was fucking right.
submitted by Trash_Tia to TheCrypticCompendium [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 04:03 _Triple_ [STORE] 900+ KNIVES/GLOVES/SKINS, 50.000$+ INVENTORY. M9 Fade, M4 Poseidon, Kara Gamma, BFK Freehand, BFK Bright Water, Spec Gloves Kimono, Nomad Fade, M9 Doppler, Skeleton, BFK B.Steel, AWP Fade, Stiletto Fade, S.Gloves Slingshot, BFK Ultra, Kara Damas, Bayo Lore, Bayo Gamma, Flip Fade & A Lot More

Everything in my inventory is up for trade. The most valuable items are listed here, the rest you can find in My Inventory

Feel free to Add Me or even better send a Trade Offer. Open for any suggestions: upgrades, downgrades / knives, gloves, skins / stickers, patterns, floats.

All Buyouts are listed in cash value.

KNIVES

★ Butterfly Knife Freehand FN #1, B/O: $1867

★ Butterfly Knife Bright Water MW, B/O: $1098

★ Butterfly Knife Blue Steel BS, B/O: $907

★ Butterfly Knife Ultraviolet FT, B/O: $789

★ Butterfly Knife Stained FT, B/O: $695

⎯

★ Bayonet Tiger Tooth MW #1, B/O: $888

★ Bayonet Gamma Doppler (Phase 4) FN, B/O: $727

★ Bayonet Doppler (Phase 2) FN, B/O: $608

★ Bayonet Doppler (Phase 1) FN, B/O: $521

★ Bayonet Rust Coat BS, B/O: $253

★ Bayonet Night FT, B/O: $251

★ StatTrak™ Bayonet Lore MW, B/O: $751

⎯

★ Karambit Gamma Doppler (Phase 4) FN, B/O: $1343

★ Karambit Damascus Steel FT, B/O: $774

★ Karambit Rust Coat BS, B/O: $537

★ Karambit Boreal Forest FT, B/O: $488

⎯

★ M9 Bayonet Fade FN, B/O: $1523

★ M9 Bayonet Fade FN, B/O: $1523

★ M9 Bayonet Doppler (Phase 4) FN, B/O: $1008

★ M9 Bayonet Blue Steel FT, B/O: $534

★ M9 Bayonet Rust Coat BS, B/O: $449

⎯

★ Flip Knife Fade FN, B/O: $703

★ Flip Knife Gamma Doppler (Phase 1) MW, B/O: $509

★ Flip Knife Doppler (Phase 1) FN, B/O: $406

★ Flip Knife Freehand FT, B/O: $228

★ StatTrak™ Flip Knife Bright Water FN, B/O: $332

⎯

★ Falchion Knife Doppler (Phase 2) FN, B/O: $292

★ Falchion Knife Doppler (Phase 3) FN, B/O: $264

★ Falchion Knife Marble Fade FN, B/O: $258

★ Falchion Knife Bright Water MW, B/O: $133

⎯

★ Stiletto Knife Fade FN, B/O: $822

★ Stiletto Knife Slaughter FN, B/O: $569

★ Stiletto Knife Doppler (Phase 1) FN, B/O: $530

★ Stiletto Knife Crimson Web FT, B/O: $396

★ StatTrak™ Stiletto Knife Scorched FT, B/O: $172

⎯

★ Gut Knife Doppler (Sapphire) MW #1, B/O: $830

★ Gut Knife Fade FN, B/O: $204

★ Gut Knife Tiger Tooth FN, B/O: $138

★ Gut Knife Bright Water MW, B/O: $104

★ Gut Knife Freehand FT, B/O: $92

★ Gut Knife Urban Masked FT, B/O: $82

★ StatTrak™ Gut Knife Rust Coat BS, B/O: $93

⎯

★ Shadow Daggers Fade FN, B/O: $258

★ Shadow Daggers Doppler (Phase 3) FN, B/O: $165

★ Shadow Daggers Blue Steel FT, B/O: $82

★ Shadow Daggers Bright Water FT, B/O: $82

★ Shadow Daggers Blue Steel WW, B/O: $80

★ Shadow Daggers Rust Coat BS, B/O: $74

★ StatTrak™ Shadow Daggers Marble Fade FN, B/O: $186

⎯

★ Classic Knife Slaughter MW, B/O: $311

★ StatTrak™ Classic Knife Stained BS, B/O: $163

⎯

★ Talon Knife Slaughter MW, B/O: $605

★ Talon Knife Scorched MW, B/O: $290

⎯

★ Ursus Knife Marble Fade FN, B/O: $405

★ Ursus Knife Night Stripe MW, B/O: $162

⎯

★ Paracord Knife Stained WW, B/O: $125

★ Paracord Knife Forest DDPAT FT, B/O: $97

★ Paracord Knife Safari Mesh FT, B/O: $96

⎯

★ Navaja Knife Safari Mesh FT, B/O: $71

★ Navaja Knife Scorched WW, B/O: $71

⎯

★ Nomad Knife Fade FN, B/O: $1015

★ Skeleton Knife, B/O: $909

★ Bowie Knife Boreal Forest MW, B/O: $106

★ Survival Knife Forest DDPAT FT, B/O: $97

GLOVES

★ Driver Gloves Crimson Weave FT, B/O: $335

★ Driver Gloves King Snake BS, B/O: $270

★ Driver Gloves Lunar Weave WW, B/O: $113

★ Driver Gloves Overtake WW, B/O: $88

★ Driver Gloves Overtake BS, B/O: $67

⎯

★ Moto Gloves Transport MW, B/O: $171

★ Moto Gloves Polygon BS, B/O: $137

★ Moto Gloves Transport WW, B/O: $71

★ Moto Gloves 3rd Commando Company BS, B/O: $62

⎯

★ Specialist Gloves Crimson Kimono WW, B/O: $1027

★ Specialist Gloves Tiger Strike FT, B/O: $654

★ Specialist Gloves Mogul FT, B/O: $295

★ Specialist Gloves Lt. Commander FT, B/O: $277

★ Specialist Gloves Crimson Web FT, B/O: $275

⎯

★ Sport Gloves Slingshot FT, B/O: $796

★ Sport Gloves Amphibious BS #2, B/O: $699

★ Sport Gloves Omega FT, B/O: $656

⎯

★ Broken Fang Gloves Unhinged BS, B/O: $60

WEAPONS

AK-47 Case Hardened BS, B/O: $130

AK-47 Bloodsport MW, B/O: $79

AK-47 Fuel Injector BS, B/O: $76

AK-47 Fuel Injector BS, B/O: $76

AK-47 Bloodsport FT, B/O: $70

AK-47 Neon Rider MW, B/O: $60

⎯

AWP Fade FN, B/O: $864

AWP BOOM MW, B/O: $84

AWP Containment Breach FT, B/O: $69

AWP Containment Breach FT, B/O: $69

AWP Wildfire FT, B/O: $59

AWP Chromatic Aberration FN, B/O: $59

StatTrak™ AWP Hyper Beast FT, B/O: $65

StatTrak™ AWP Hyper Beast FT, B/O: $65

⎯

Desert Eagle Blaze FN, B/O: $565

Desert Eagle Blaze FN, B/O: $565

Desert Eagle Printstream FN, B/O: $155

Desert Eagle Cobalt Disruption FN, B/O: $58

⎯

M4A1-S Icarus Fell FN, B/O: $414

M4A1-S Printstream MW, B/O: $204

M4A1-S Printstream MW, B/O: $204

⎯

M4A4 Poseidon FN, B/O: $1402

M4A4 The Emperor FN, B/O: $152

M4A4 Asiimov WW, B/O: $97

⎯

USP-S Kill Confirmed MW, B/O: $65

USP-S Printstream FT, B/O: $69

StatTrak™ USP-S Kill Confirmed FT, B/O: $123

StatTrak™ USP-S Neo-Noir FN, B/O: $106

⎯

AUG Flame Jörmungandr FN, B/O: $218

P2000 Ocean Foam FN, B/O: $139

Souvenir SSG 08 Death Strike MW, B/O: $81

CZ75-Auto Emerald Quartz MW, B/O: $61

Trade Offer Link - Steam Profile Link - My Inventory

Knives - Bowie Knife, Butterfly Knife, Falchion Knife, Flip Knife, Gut Knife, Huntsman Knife, M9 Bayonet, Bayonet, Karambit, Shadow Daggers, Stiletto Knife, Ursus Knife, Navaja Knife, Talon Knife, Classic Knife, Paracord Knife, Survival Knife, Nomad Knife, Skeleton Knife, Patterns - Gamma Doppler, Doppler (Phase 1, Phase 2, Phase 3, Phase 4, Black Pearl, Sapphire, Ruby, Emerald), Crimson Web, Lore, Fade, Ultraviolet, Night, Marble Fade (Fire & Ice, Fake FI), Case Hardened (Blue Gem), Autotronic, Slaughter, Black Laminate, Tiger Tooth, Boreal Forest, Scorched, Blue Steel, Vanilla, Damascus Steel, Forest DDPAT, Urban Masked, Freehand, Stained, Bright Water, Safari Mesh, Rust Coat, Gloves - Bloodhound Gloves (Charred, Snakebite, Guerrilla, Bronzed), Driver Gloves (Snow Leopard, King Snake, Crimson Weave, Imperial Plaid, Black Tie, Lunar Weave, Diamondback, Rezan the Red, Overtake, Queen Jaguar, Convoy, Racing Green), Hand Wraps (Cobalt Skulls, CAUTION!, Overprint, Slaughter, Leather, Giraffe, Badlands, Spruce DDPAT, Arboreal, Constrictor, Desert Shamagh, Duct Tape), Moto Gloves (Spearmint, POW!, Cool Mint, Smoke Out, Finish Line, Polygon, Blood Pressure, Turtle, Boom!, Eclipse, 3rd Commando Company, Transport), Specialist Gloves (Crimson Kimono, Tiger Strike, Emerald Web, Field Agent, Marble Fade, Fade, Foundation, Lt. Commander, Crimson Web, Mogul, Forest DDPAT, Buckshot), Sport Gloves (Pandora's Box, Superconductor, Hedge Maze, Vice, Amphibious, Slingshot, Omega, Arid, Big Game, Nocts, Scarlet Shamagh, Bronze Morph), Hydra Gloves (Case Hardened, Emerald, Rattler, Mangrove), Broken Fang Gloves (Jade, Yellow-banded, Unhinged, Needle Point), Pistols - P2000 (Ocean Foam, Fire Element, Amber Fade, Corticera, Chainmail, Imperial Dragon, Obsidian, Scorpion, Handgun, Acid Etched), USP-S (Printstream, Kill Confirmed, Whiteout, Road Rash, Owergrowth, The Traitor, Neo-Noir, Dark Water, Orion, Blueprint, Stainless, Caiman, Serum, Monster Mashup, Royal Blue, Ancient Visions, Cortex, Orange Anolis, Ticket To Hell, Black Lotus, Cyrex, Check Engine, Guardian, Purple DDPAT, Torque, Blood Tiger, Flashback, Business Class, Pathfinder, Para Green), Lead Conduit, Glock-18 (Fade, Candy Apple, Bullet Queen, Synth Leaf, Neo-Noir, Nuclear Garden, Dragon Tatto, Reactor, Pink DDPAT, Twilight Galaxy, Sand Dune, Groundwater, Blue Fissure, Snack Attack, Water Elemental, Brass, Wasteland Rebel, Vogue, Franklin, Royal Legion, Gamma Doppler, Weasel, Steel Disruption, Ironwork, Grinder, High Beam, Moonrise, Oxide Blaze, Bunsen Burner, Clear Polymer, Bunsen Burner, Night), P250 (Nuclear Threat, Modern Hunter, Splash, Whiteout, Vino Primo, Mehndi, Asiimov, Visions, Undertow, Cartel, See Ya Later, Gunsmoke, Splash, Digital Architect, Muertos, Red Rock, Bengal Tiger, Crimson Kimono, Wingshot, Metallic DDPAT, Hive, Dark Filigree, Mint Kimono), Five-Seven (Neon Kimono, Berries And Cherries, Fall Hazard, Crimson Blossom, Hyper Beast, Nitro, Fairy Tale, Case Hardened, Copper Galaxy, Angry Mob, Monkey Business, Fowl Play, Anodized Gunmetal, Hot Shot, Retrobution, Boost Protocol), CZ75-Auto (Chalice, Crimson Web, Emerald Quartz, The Fuschia is Now, Nitro, Xiangliu, Yellow Jacket, Victoria, Poison Dart, Syndicate, Eco, Hexane, Pole, Tigris), Tec-9 (Terrace, Nuclear Threat, Hades, Rust Leaf, Decimator, Blast From, Orange Murano, Toxic, Fuel Injector, Remote Control, Bamboo Forest, Isaac, Avalanche, Brother, Re-Entry, Blue Titanium, Bamboozle), R8 Revolver (Fade, Blaze, Crimson Web, Liama Cannon, Crazy 8, Reboot, Canal Spray, Night, Amber Fade), Desert Eagle (Blaze, Hand Cannon, Fennec Fox, Sunset Storm, Emerald Jörmungandr, Pilot, Hypnotic, Golden Koi, Printstream, Cobalt Disruption, Code Red, Ocean Drive, Midnight Storm, Kumicho Dragon, Crimson Web, Heirloom, Night Heist, Mecha Industries, Night, Conspiracy, Trigger Discipline, Naga, Directive, Light Rail), Dual Berettas (Flora Carnivora, Duelist, Cobra Strike, Black Limba, Emerald, Hemoglobin, Twin Turbo, Marina, Melondrama, Pyre, Retribution, Briar, Dezastre, Royal Consorts, Urban Shock, Dualing Dragons, Panther, Balance), Rifles - Galil (Aqua Terrace, Winter Forest, Chatterbox, Sugar Rush, Pheonix Blacklight, CAUTION!, Orange DDPAT, Cerberus, Dusk Ruins, Eco, Chromatic Aberration, Stone Cold, Tuxedo, Sandstorm, Shattered, Urban Rubble, Rocket Pop, Kami, Crimson Tsunami, Connexion), SCAR-20 (Brass, Cyrex, Palm, Splash Jam, Cardiac, Emerald, Crimson Web, Magna Carta, Stone Mosaico, Bloodsport, Enforcer), AWP (Gungnir, Dragon Lore, Prince, Medusa, Desert Hydra, Fade, Lightning Strike, Oni Taiji, Silk Tiger, Graphite, Chromatic Aberration, Asiimov, Snake Camo, Boom, Containment Breach, Wildfire, Redline, Electric Hive, Hyper Beast, Neo-Noir, Man-o'-war, Pink DDPAT, Corticera, Sun in Leo, Elite Build, Fever Dream, Atheris, Mortis, PAW, Exoskeleton, Worm God, POP AWP, Phobos, Acheron, Pit Viper, Capillary, Safari Mesh), AK-47 (Wild Lotus, Gold Arabesque, X-Ray, Fire Serpent, Hydroponic, Panthera Onca, Case Hardened, Vulcan, Jet Set, Fuel Injector, Bloodsport, Nightwish, First Class, Neon Rider, Asiimov, Red Laminate, Aquamarine Revenge, The Empress, Wasteland Rebel, Jaguar, Black Laminate, Leet Museo, Neon Revolution, Redline, Frontside Misty, Predator, Legion of Anubis, Point Disarray, Orbit Mk01, Blue Laminate, Green Laminate, Emerald Pinstripe, Cartel, Phantom Disruptor, Jungle Spray, Safety Net, Rat Rod, Baroque Purple, Slate, Elite Build, Uncharted, Safari Mesh), FAMAS (Sundown, Prime Conspiracy, Afterimage, Commemoration, Dark Water, Spitfire, Pulse, Eye of Athena, Meltdown, Rapid Eye Move, Roll Cage, Styx, Mecha Industrie, Djinn, ZX Spectron, Valence, Neural Net, Night Borre, Hexne), M4A4 (Howl, Poseidon, Asiimov, Daybreak, Hellfire, Zirka, Red DDPAT, Radiation Hazard, Modern Hunter, The Emperor, The Coalition, Bullet Rain, Cyber Security, X-Ray, Dark Blossom, Buzz Kill, In Living Color, Neo-Noir, Desolate Space, 龍王 (Dragon King), Royal Paladin, The Battlestar, Global Offensive, Tooth Fairy, Desert-Strike, Griffin, Evil Daimyo, Spider Lily, Converter), M4A1-S (Welcome to the Jungle, Imminent Danger, Knight, Hot Rod, Icarus Fell, Blue Phosphor, Printstream, Master Piece, Dark Water, Golden Coil, Bright Water, Player Two, Atomic Alloy, Guardian, Chantico's Fire, Hyper Beast, Mecha Industries, Cyrex, Control Panel, Moss Quartz, Nightmare, Decimator, Leaded Glass, Basilisk, Blood Tiger, Briefing, Night Terror, Nitro, VariCamo, Flashback), SG 553 (Hazard Pay, Bulldozer, Integrale, Dragon Tech, Ultraviolet, Colony IV, Hypnotic, Cyrex, Candy Apple, Barricade, Pulse), SSG 08 (Death Strike, Sea Calico, Blood in the Water, Orange Filigree, Dragonfire, Big Iron, Bloodshot, Detour, Turbo Peek, Red Stone), AUG (Akihabara Accept, Flame Jörmungandr, Hot Rod, Midnight Lily, Sand Storm, Carved Jade, Wings, Anodized Navy, Death by Puppy, Torque, Bengal Tiger, Chameleon, Fleet Flock, Random Access, Momentum, Syd Mead, Stymphalian, Arctic Wolf, Aristocrat, Navy Murano), G3SG1 (Chronos, Violet Murano, Flux, Demeter, Orange Kimono, The Executioner, Green Apple, Arctic Polar Camo, Contractor), SMGs - P90 (Astral Jörmungandr, Run and Hide, Emerald Dragon, Cold Blooded, Death by Kitty, Baroque Red, Vent Rush, Blind Spot, Asiimov, Trigon, Sunset Lily, Death Grip, Leather, Nostalgia, Fallout Warning, Tiger Pit, Schermatic, Virus, Shapewood, Glacier Mesh, Shallow Grave, Chopper, Desert Warfare), MAC-10 (Hot Snakes, Copper Borre, Red Filigree, Gold Brick, Graven, Case Hardened, Stalker, Amber Fade, Neon Rider, Tatter, Curse, Propaganda, Nuclear Garden, Disco Tech, Toybox, Heat, Indigo), UMP-45 (Fade, Blaze, Day Lily, Minotaur's Labyrinth, Crime Scene, Caramel, Bone Pile, Momentum, Primal Saber), MP7 (Teal Blossom, Fade, Nemesis, Whiteout, Asterion, Bloosport, Abyssal Apparition, Full Stop, Special Delivery, Neon Ply, Asterion, Ocean Foam, Powercore, Scorched, Impire), PP-Bizon (Modern Hunter, Rust Coat, Forest Leaves, Antique, High Roller, Blue Streak, Seabird, Judgement of Anubis, Bamboo Print, Embargo, Chemical Green, Coblat Halftone, Fuel Rod, Photic Zone, Irradiated Alert, Carbon Fiber), MP9 (Wild Lily, Pandora's Box, Stained Glass, Bulldozer, Dark Age, Hot Rod, Hypnotic, Hydra, Rose Iron, Music Box, Setting Sun, Food Chain, Airlock, Mount Fuji, Starlight Protector, Ruby Poison Dart, Deadly Poison), MP5-SD (Oxide Oasis, Phosphor, Nitro, Agent, Autumn Twilly), Shotguns, Machineguns - Sawed-Off (Kiss♥Love, First Class, Orange DDPAT, Rust Coat, The Kraken, Devourer, Mosaico, Wasteland Princess, Bamboo Shadow, Copper, Serenity, Limelight, Apocalypto), XM1014 (Frost Borre, Ancient Lore, Red Leather, Elegant Vines, Banana Leaf, Jungle, Urban Perforated, Grassland, Blaze Orange, Heaven Guard, VariCamo Blue, Entombed, XOXO, Seasons, Tranquility, Bone Machine, Incinegator, Teclu Burner, Black Tie, Zombie Offensive, Watchdog), Nova (Baroque Orange, Hyper Beast, Green Apple, Antique, Modern Hunter, Walnut, Forest Leaves, Graphite, Blaze Orange, Rising Skull, Tempest, Bloomstick, Interlock, Quick Sand, Moon in Libra, Clean Polymer, Red Quartz, Toy Soldier), MAG-7 (Cinqueda, Counter Terrace, Prism Terrace, Memento, Chainmail, Hazard, Justice, Bulldozer, Silver, Core Breach, Firestarter, Praetorian, Heat, Hard Water, Monster Call, BI83 Spectrum, SWAG-7), M249 (Humidor, Shipping Forecast, Blizzard Marbleized, Downtown, Jungle DDPAT, Nebula Crusader, Impact Drill, Emerald Poison Dart), Negev (Mjölnir, Anodized Navy, Palm, Power Loader, Bratatat, CaliCamo, Phoenix Stencil, Infrastructure, Boroque Sand), Wear - Factory New (FN), Minimal Wear (MW), Field-Tested (FT), Well-Worn (WW), Battle-Scarred (BS), Stickers Holo/Foil/Gold - Katowice 2014, Krakow 2017, Howling Dawn, Katowice 2015, Crown, London 2018, Cologne 2014, Boston 2018, Atlanta 2017, Cluj-Napoca 2015, DreamHack 2014, King on the Field, Harp of War, Winged Difuser, Cologne 2016, Cologne 2015, MLG Columbus 2016, Katowice 2019, Berlin 2019, RMR 2020, Stockholm 2021, Antwerp 2022, Swag Foil, Flammable foil, Others - Souvenirs, Agents, Pins, Passes, Gifts, Music Kits, Cases, Keys, Capsules, Packages, Patches

Some items on the list may no longer be available or are still locked, visit My Inventory for more details.

Send a Trade Offer for fastest response. I consider all offers.

Add me for discuss if there is a serious offer that needs to be discussed.

submitted by _Triple_ to Csgotrading [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 03:37 menorahman100 The Stone Which The Builders Refused — Gregory H. Peters 32°

BACKGROUND
In the Ancient Mysteries, the quest for Gnosis or self-discovery was central to the doctrines and teachings. Across the portico of the Temple at Delphi (dedicated to the God Apollo and seat of the celebrated Oracle), were the words GNOTHI SEAUTON, meaning “Know Thyself.”
The journey of Freemasonry is the ongoing search for Light. Underlying all of our rituals, symbols, and teachings is this one essential element. The ongoing journey takes many forms to as many different people, but this journey for Light is arguably one of self-discovery, a search for Gnosis.
Countless systems of meditation and mysticism have developed across the world to address this eternal search for Light, to answer the great questions of existence. Whatever the origins of Freemasonry, it is clear that within our rituals is contained a remarkably vast ark of the worlds philosophies, mysteries, and systems of self-discovery. The rituals contain keys to the Royal Art, which if applied in earnest may help to attain the common goal of further Light.
WORDS AND NUMBERS
One of the techniques for mining the depths of symbolism in our rituals is that of applying the doctrines of the literal Kabbalah in an examination of some of the key words and symbols presented in the rituals.
In many ancient languages, numbers were represented by letters of the alphabet. Mystics concluded that the numerical value of words could be of significance, particularly when two or more seemingly unrelated words had an identical numerical value. The literal Kabbalah is a set of techniques that meditatively explore the relationships between letters of ancient alphabets, such as Hebrew, Greek and Latin, and their numerical equivalents.\1])
In S.L. MacGregor Mather’s introduction to his 1888 translation of Kabbalah Unveiled (Knorr von Rosenroth, 1684) one provenance of these techniques is given:
"The Kabbalah was first taught by God himself to a select company of angels, who formed a theosophic school in Paradise. After the Fall the angels most graciously communicated this heavenly doctrine to the disobedient child of earth, to furnish the protoplasts with the means of returning to their pristine nobility and felicity. From Adam it passed over to Noah, and then to Abraham, the friend of God, who emigrated with it to Egypt, where the patriarch allowed a portion of this mysterious doctrine to ooze out.
It was in this way that the Egyptians obtained some knowledge of it, and the other Eastern nations could introduce it into their philosophical systems. Moses, who was learned in all the wisdom of Egypt, was first initiated into the Qabalah in the land of his birth, but became most proficient in it during his wanderings in the wilderness, when he not only devoted to it the leisure hours of the whole forty years, but received lessons in it from one of the angels.
By the aid of this mysterious science the lawgiver was enabled to solve the difficulties which arose during his management of the Israelites, in spite of the pilgrimages, wars, and frequent miseries of the nation. He covertly laid down the principles of this secret doctrine in the first four books of the Pentateuch, but withheld them from Deuteronomy. Moses also initiated the seventy elders into the secrets of this doctrine, and they again transmitted them from hand to hand.
Of all who formed the unbroken line of tradition, David and Solomon were the most deeply initiated into the Kabbalah. No one, however, dared to write it down, till Schimeon Ben Jochai, who lived at the time of the destruction of the second temple . . . . . After his death, his son, Rabbi Eleazar, and his secretary, Rabbi Abba, as well as his disciples, collated Rabbi Simon Ben Jochai's treatises, and out of these composed the celebrated work called ZHR, Zohar, splendour, which is the grand storehouse of Kabbalism."
The literal Kabbalah consists of three techniques: Gematria (numerical value of words and their relationship); Notariqon, in which the individual letters of a word are taken as the initials of another word (or the reverse – a sentence may be reduced to a word); and Temurah, or permutation of letters according to specific rules.
Each of these techniques may yield rich results when applied to the rituals and symbols of Freemasonry. Albert Pike made great use of gematria and isopsephy in his many examinations of the words of the degrees of the Ancient & Accepted Scottish Rite. In Morals & Dogma Pike refers to Kabbalah as the “key of the occult sciences.”
A CONCEALED KEY
An example of Kabbalistic insight may be applied to the celebrated insignia in Chapters of Royal Arch Freemasonry -- the Triple Tau. The Ritual gives several mottos which seem to allude to a concealed treasure or hidden truth:
Anciently the Tau was a mystical sign, not at all like the square letter Hebrew, but more cruciform, and almost identical with the ankh of the Egyptians, otherwise known as the Crux ansata. It was a mark in use among many ancient nations, and not peculiar to the Jews; and it is found among the Hindus, and these last placed it on the foreheads of their disciples. It was a symbol of salvation and consecration, and as such has been adopted as a Masonic symbol in the Royal Arch and in some other degrees of high Masonry.
General Albert Pike, writing from his office as Grand Commander of the Supreme Council of the Ancient & Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry in his monumental tome Morals & Dogma, further adds:
The triple Tau, in the center of a circle and a triangle, typifies the Sacred Name; and represents the Sacred Triad, the Creating, Preserving, and Destroying Powers; as well as the three great lights of Masonry. If to the Masonic point within a Circle, and the two parallel lines, we add the single Tau Cross, we have the Ancient Egyptian Triple Tau.
A column in the form of a cross, with a circle over it, was used by the Egyptians to measure the increase of the inundations of the Nile. The Tau and Triple Tau are found in many Ancient Alphabets.
With the Tau or the Triple Tau may be connected, within two circles, the double cube, or perfection; or the perfect ashlar.
The Crux Ansata is found on the sculptures of Khorsabad; on the ivories from Nimroud, of the same age, carried by an Assyrian Monarch; and on cylinders of the later Assyrian period.
As the single Tau represents the one God, so, no doubt, the Triple Tau, the origin of which cannot be traced, was meant to represent the Trinity of his attributes, the three Masonic pillars, Wisdom, Strength, and Harmony.
The One God alluded to above is further described in Exodus 3:13 – 15:
13 And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them?
14 And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you.
15 And God said moreover unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, the LORD God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you: this is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations.
Other considerations of the nature of this hidden treasure aside, there is concealed Kabbalistically the very Triple Tau itself within these passages of the Bible.
The Hebrew name of the Great Architect of the Universe that is translated as “I Am That I Am” is אהיה אשר אהיה.
The Atbash cipher of Hebrew notariqon is a simple substitution cipher that takes the Hebrew alphabet and splits it in half and reverses it, substituting the corresponding letters; א transmutes to ת ,ב changes to ש ,ג to ר ,and so on; essentially reversing the entire alphabet.
Applying the Atbash cipher to this Name of the Highest God, the three initial א‘s of the phrase are transformed into three ת‘s, thus revealing the Triple Tau.\2])
Through the application of Kabbalistic inquiry, this symbol may thus be seen as a representation of the name of the Most High, showing that the true hidden treasure of the Freemasonry is not necessarily buried underneath the Temple of Solomon (or Rosslyn Chapel!), but is concealed in the hidden chambers of our hearts.
SOLVE ET COAGULA
A lesson of the Royal Arch degree demonstrates another application of gematria which may unlock mysteries pertaining to the central doctrine of the ancient mysteries which is encoded in Freemasonry, the idea of Light in Extension.
A passage from Psalm 118:22 reads:
“The stone which the builders refused is become the head stone of the corner.”
In Hebrew, the phrase “the Stone which the Builders refused” is Ehben Masu Ha-Bonaim (ABN MASV H BVNIM). An interesting connection to Alchemy occurs here, in that the reference to a rejected stone recalls the idea of the Philosopher’s Stone, made up of materials that are commonly rejected or abhorred, but praised as the roots of philosophical gold by the alchemists. The root of the Hebrew masu means “to despise, reject, refuse.” Using the techniques of gematria, the numeration of the entire phrase is 273.
Other Hebrew words which have this same numerical value: ChVRM ABIV, Khurum Abiv – “Hiram Abiff”
AVR GNVZ, Aur Ganuz, -- “hidden light”
Qabalistically then, one may intuit a connection between the Widow’s Son, the Stone which the Builders refused, and the concept of Hidden or Concealed Light. The cornerstone takes on a new, profound meaning with these added levels of symbolism encoded into it.
The Substitute for the Ancient Master’s Word may be a notariqon of this phrase:
ABN MASV H BVNIM
Thus, the word becomes indicative of the Light of Masonry in a very direct sense, referring to Hiram Abiff, the Cornerstone of the Temple, the Hidden Light. The symbols build upon one another, each taking one deeper into the heart of the matter.
Looking to the Greek language, there are two words of particular relevance that also enumerate to 273:
Anthanasia, “immortality.” Perhaps a further reference to the doctrine of the Third Degree.
Heh Kleis, “the key.”
The Key… Hiram Abiff… The Stone which the Builders Refused… The Cornerstone… Immortality… Hidden Light… all encoded into the substitute for the Word of a Master Mason, and the symbolism of the Sublime Degree of Masonry.
CONCLUSION
Whatever the original provenance and impetus of Freemasonry, it seems clear that encoded within the rituals is a profound doctrine of spiritual illumination or Gnosis. With the application of tools such as gematria, isopsophy, temurah and notariqon, a wealth of otherwise hidden wisdom begins to reveal itself. Applying the lamp of focused consciousness on these symbols, the treasure chest opens.
Symbols may be thought of as living, dynamic centers of energy. By focusing on them and taking them into deep contemplation, this energy is unlocked from within, revealing the Royal Art as a series of signposts in consciousness. By following these signs into meditation, we may eventually come away with a further, profounder understanding of ourselves and our position in the universe.
REFERENCES
King James Bible, various editions.
Agrippa, Henry Cornelius. Three Books of Occult Philosophy (ed. Donald Tyson). Lllewellyn, 2000.
Barry, Kieren. The Greek Qabalah: Alphabetic Mysticism and Numerology in the Ancient World. Weiser, 1999.
Case, Paul Foster. The True and Invisible Rosicrucian Order. Weiser, 1985.
Crowley, Aleister. The Equinox, Volume I number VIII. Weiser, 1992
Mackenzie, Kenneth. Royal Masonic Cyclopaedia. Aquarian Press, 1987
Mackey, Albert. An Encyclopaedia of Freemasonry and Its Kindred Sciences. (New & Revised, 2 vols). Masonic History Company, 1921.
Mathers, S.L. MacGregor. The Kabbalah Unveiled. Weiser, 1989.
Pike, Albert. Morals & Dogma, Supreme Council of the 33rd Degree AASR, 1950.
Stirling, William. The Canon: An Exposition of the Pagan Mystery Perpetuated in the Cabala as the Rule of all the Art. Weiser Books, 1999.
Waite, A.E. The Holy Kabbalah. Citadel Press, 1995.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  1. Although the Hebrew Kabbalah is perhaps the most celebrated, there is a rich tradition of Greek isopsephy which utilizes similar techniques, and the Latin alphabet is filled with many examples. Masonry is treasure trove of Kabbalistic wisdom, Albert Pike perhaps being the champion of this research in Masonry.
  2. According to Dr. Hugh Schonfiled (author of the Passover Plotבפוםת )Atbash may also be applied to a spelling of Baphomet ,) ), which gives שופיא ,a possible attempt in Hebrew of the transliteration of the Greek word sophia, meaning “wisdom”. (See http://www.templarhistory.com/atbash.html).
The Stone Which The Builders Refused - by Bro. Gregory H. Peters
Burlingame Lodge No. 400 F&AM
Grand Lodge of California
32° Ancient & Accepted Scottish Rite in the Valley of Burlingame
Companion of King Solomon Chapter No. 95
Frater of the Golden State College of Societas Rosicruciana in Civitatibus Foederatis.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Transferred by Menorahman100 to SaturnStormCube on 3/22/2023 from the Review of Freemasonry
submitted by menorahman100 to SaturnStormCube [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 03:04 Bogey4hoo 'Surviving The Win' - Chapter 003A.

'Surviving The Win'.
...
Chapter 003.
...
'The Never-Land Pipe of Un-Earth'.
Peter Pan had a Pipe. It was a Musical Pipe. Many think that he never used a Tobacco Pipe, but those who pay close attention, know that he used one of those, as well.
What can we say? He's an immortal minor. Morals debatable?
Anyhow, Tiger Lily is one such character, who evidentially (in a Story, such as Barrie's), would have created this premise. For a Tobacco Pipe to exist in the World of the famous Pan, Never-Never Land, that is.
But why mention Never-Land, specifically when our focus is Tobacco?
The principal of how a good Dreaming Herb Pipe, "Un-Earths," within it, the Vision is, because it is, "Never-Landian."
How it bears distinction, though, is in how, when Tobacco Dreaming, it is not about the discovery of any Chartable Territory, so much as it is, the discovery of things of the Spirit.
That is as if to say, though as it were, in either the Supernal or the Infernal Realms of Existence... Communicating through a Lantern into the Mundane.
What about Peter? Oh, well he probably has other issues like finding his shadow, after Wendy fetched it in through the window. If she can sew it, she must be a Crafter. Look for a Book!
I joke.
But on a thoughtful note, with Tinkerbell... Really, "Tin-Kerb-Elle (though most believe the origin is, "Trinqueballer")," there is a Guardian Spirit over Orphans, who watches for tin carriages left at kerbs.
Keep your children off the street.
This example, was given an uplifting note, with the "Tinkerbelle Lilac," which also represents first love, or, "sacred vows (i.e. The, "Kiss," of Guardians, "Peter and Wendy")."
That said, a real, "Never-Land," Tobacco Pipe, would be a gift of Faerie to Earth.
That is, once you ignore the, “Never-Never”/”Procrastination,” it requires to use one.
Of important reckon, is that it bore Elves. Well, depending on how you read into the nature of an Elf. Many professional researchers into the topic, have it that they're Disease Spirits.
Firstly, "Moira," is, "A Fate (Female Personification)," Moirai or Moirae, are plural.
Strangely enough, "Mor," is what one calls a, "Blackberry," or, "Mulberry."
"Blackberries," play a crucial role in the (Cyclical), "Transliterational Computation-Feed," of the "Tobacco Medicine Terminology-Loop."
Altering the Word, "Mor," to it's similar equivalency of spelling, "Mór," when in Irish, allows it to be easily transcribed into the alternative Irish, "Már," and afterward, the Portuguese, "Mar," from Kabuverdianu.
The Derived Finnish Term, "Marat," from the Hungarian hold on the earlier word, "Mar (for, “Bite")," is the term for, "Nightmare," from the whence, Germanic, "Alps," or, "Elves," were given their substantiation..."
A while later, Andrei was looking at his ring, seated inside his Uncle and Aunt's House in Finsford, on a couch in their living room. Two big fish circled and flopped lazily around the indoor aquarium.
Are you sure they’re healthy? asked Andrei.
I know, aren’t they absolutely splendid? Vesta crowed. Look, look, look! she began. She then ran into another room, and came back with a necklace of White Horse Eye shells.
Um?
They’re just like them! Well, One. See, The Butterfly Koi Fish on that End of the Tank.
Well yeah, and I guess, but don’t you think that would be somewhat expected?
Nevermind said Vesta, then what would you like to do? Harold’s out at the Grocers, she said, and he said he’d be back by Three. Come to think of it, I haven’t seen you since you were about that age… … Anyhow, there were three Fish here, but as you can tell, there are only two here now. She turned to the side on her Ivory and Salmon Loveseat, looking out the Window. Humph! I just don’t have the slightest idea of where the other one went.
Andrei, looked stupidly at the remaining two. It didn’t impact their stamina in the slightest.
Andrei found the back lawn shoveled. There was a slight coolish wind outside, the sun beat moderately balmy, and the snow had melted somewhat, it now had an icy crust to it.
I think I’ll go sit outside, fashioned Andrei to his fitting in distemperate.
Okay, and fine, fustered Vesta, pulling a Woman’s Magazine out from a teetering tower.
...
Andrei stretched out his right arm, and yawned. He was holding a Book with his left hand, while sitting in an Armed, Tawn-iZee Recline, Wooden Dock Chair.
Hmm...
He had watched their TV. It had felt like the first time in ages that he had done thus, when in fact the last time had simply been an escapade leading to Ghibli and then none.
Harold and Vesta's one-time catch of a TV Microwave, hung above their Stove as a Range Hood.
It was a Smart Microwave, with a TV on the Door, and had Channels to watch while Cooking. The family prepared fish by it. Andrei, however, had watched, ‘Flipper’.
This Microwave did literally ALL. It even Played Music and had an Inventory of Recipes for Upload. It would tell you your Food's Temperature, while hanging above the Cooking on the Stovetop. It did so, by a High-Tech analysis, and could tell Ingredients, it was, ‘General Electric’.
He had been reading something, which said, "... The Devil's in the Details...," when it suddenly occurred to him that there were many details on the screen and the figures on it were in the same Box as his Food.
"... Oni...," Andrei read in the Next Chapter, "... are an Asian variety of Cannibal Demon, and in no way the, "Uncanny Ba'alisters," they appear..."
Wait, thought Andrei. Those were the Japanese Vampires from in the, ‘Vampire Book’.
"... There is a difference...," said Eldritch Spellbound, in, ‘The Book Of Right’, "... between worshipping God, and worshipping Demons of Ba'al…
… There is (yet again), a difference between saving life, and sacrificing life. And further to the point I would make here…,” he announced, “… There is a difference in living a good life. That is, not living perverted! That goes also, for living with good in one’s testimony, for it is intended of the testimony one makes in life, that it is made accountance for, by Scriptural Referral, Confession, and Prayer… to God or God’s Fellowship. Reason being, that they are one’s company in Heaven…
… Onis are not merely a perverted or twisted reflection on what people do to life. Life ever had an intended course. It wasn't for the belly, hereafter..."
Well, thought Andrei, I see some similarity in what he's saying here, to what he mentioned before, about a man named Carlos Castaneda. What if some God only grows you to eat you?
Then, he realized that was a mortive entitlement, of fickle generations, being too punitive to give their God allowance any Higher Spectrum, or will in it, for themselves or the future generations.
Unless that meant their God was truly undiscovered or they had never had one.
"... It seems, though, that any realm of ambivalence has been given over solely to sordid sanctimony, and ordeals of no value of true sacred meaning or vestige..."
I think what he's saying, thought Andrei, is that while some people only evolve, insofar, as reckoning with a, "Profundi-Tie," we still have a God in a Heaven Who Uplifts Burden, Entitles Us To Sacred Respect, and Delivers Mortality, Out Of It's Punitative Reckon-Checking, by His Awareness, Without Indecent Indoctrinations Into Ignorance, Or Any Extinguishing Of Our Living Flame... The God, Who Entitles Us, To Know How We Are the Living Immortals, Anywhere That We Are, and, Of Proofs of Heaven, Not Only Earth Circumstances that Jettison Us By Retrograding, and the Aftermath.
“… Though…,” recaptured Spellbound, “… Why for, the Asian Dharm?…”, and, “… Who did we, in Who need a Karm?…”, was, “… Toward the Ascendancy of Buddha. For, it was such that, the others, of Line, would be left only to be Buddhists OF the Bodhisattva’s Mission, or not even that! One Buddha had, already, indeed been…”
“… The next premise, then…”, Andrei read, “… Was, over the Taste of Auras, to Ascendants…”, This taste, known in Japan as the, “… Nifofi…”
“… Which, in how the Buddha knew he would Not Partake Of It, Nor Recoil From Any, had the Dharm created. For All Asia, would have Fallen Forward, were it not for The Dharm’s Tutelage, by The Buddha (To Whom Went Their Love, and To Whom They Were Most Indebted), Meaning That, Their Sampling or Rein-tilling Auras, must aim to Rebuild Something... If not Karma, if not Am, and If not All...”
“… The BUDDHA, was Sacred! NOT, The Mara…” “… ALL were living, “Once, Bitten…”
Reading on, he reached a brief Chapter, about, "Karma," and something called, "Anu-Yoga." Apparently, "Anu-Yoga," gave one, entire control of all of their Bodily Processes.
Once he had read it, he had to look back and wonder how, "Anu-Yoga," had been Mastered.
Eldritch Spellbound, had further commentary for him to consider.
"... The First Buddhist Monks...," stated Spellbound, "... Would Go On Pilgrimages To Sacred Monasteries, Where They Would Commit Unspeakable Evils, Including Mortive Sacrifice Of Their Own, Just To Attempt To Later Purify Themselves Of The Deeds Formerly Done There, With A More Full Knowledge And Reckoning Of How To Further Disavow It In Their Line, Into The Future…”
“… They Intended, To Offer Their Families, Only The Cleaner Truths Of Their Knowledge, Once Returning Home..."
Wouldn’t God Moral That It’s Unsaintly To Go, “Baited,” And Then, “Untainted,” But For A, “Let Off,” By Him? Andrei Wondered.
Just then, he heard Vesta exclaiming to Harold that the Groceries he had just brought over in the haul, sounded like a Pile. Andrei went back indoors, to join them.
…
'The Book of the, "Ho-Do"', had a reference Tagged in it, on the Opposite Side of the Page, with a Paperclip, denoting the First Segment of a Book of Literature (also Read by Mr. Dizzmith), by the title, 'The Shadow of the Dalai Lama'.
‘One’s Past Tears’.
Ben was an Atlantean, who mapped the Interstellar Realms, and Anything Else, up and into its own Realm Of Cahoozits. Even as a Novice, he was Prodigal. All he ever needed, was a Place To Start.
One such Map of his, had begun as a Ring, and then Branched Out. It was to be a Tree Civilization… For Elves.
…
The Reptilians, back then, Dodged and Darted the Woodland. Ben had Charted, somewhat, out of their Bearances, by his Checking. They, at first, and most likely always, being the Enemy. Though, wherever Ben touched to the line of Gravity, even when on a Map/Chart, was Gray, Craw, and, Pit. The Cockleshell Types of Merits that won over his own, by him, were loot of Brigandy. By Breg/Coastline? “Stuff.”
…
Ben had never even Traded a Fur, and fretted over the Fun in Funds. It was Ludocrative Genius Stuff, and he hardly played anything but a Beam of Light to it’s Lie in the Lignum.
“… Remu’sal Dew’s, Cast Arraignment Over That Land…”
In Truth, he bet on those rays being bent and ever so anthemically architected, that they would placard, by sound (and water), the, which he knew must, when he lit up, still to then lie the plants and trees inland. Stuff a’blonte’d.
Much of it, he presumed, was blunt. Blonde, like beach wood. He had used it to construct before. It was an A’bram’a Wrot’a, Vort’d by Roule.
He’d even Oath on that.
…
Needless to say, Ben knew Physic. Other likes of his own, just wouldn’t hit… Even? Ever.
…
Then, however, on the day he received his first employ, he was cut off… from light, from sound… from everything.
Out from the Fisheries, and Headed Straight to the Equestrian Leads of Terrain, and their Keep. Apart from the Mariner's backing, or Men located there, he discovered that there, even the owned… “Amphi-beatri’colts,” were un-in his, “Select Favour of Moral.”
…
They Bred off the Puls, and Helmed in Cool Ichors, of his own People’s Undead. As though his Atlantean Humanity were some form of Unbidden Lag-Yags/Sea Stock. But, those people of his line, weren’t Cag, or Slag, of any. His people could have walked inland that far, but needed their Lob-Ster in.
What Ben found, in searching further inland, was that the lands stunk, and stung. He ultimately found himself in a caste of weir’-ellington warriors of odd type. He would bid them… Not war! They were not even all that regular.
…
Centaurs, for one, taught the Prefectures in the clearings and made quick rehearsals for the amphibe’ats. Those, being the dreaded hybrid degenerate breed of reptile and centaur.
Ben, retorted to an arms in-specialist, that the reptiles he knew about by now, were not a threat, LIKE the stock that weren’t of them. They were, in fact, ALL just exactly THAT, and he didn’t feel like being sarcastic with the man. Those type only thought to Roost.
…
A Western East, which led on the Paladies of Dragons.
Ben would settle as a mason-and-stocks provider for the Human Settlement’s, “Courtland Inn.”
‘The Book of Wyrms’. 'Smoking Signum Rings’.
"... 'Signum'...," "... A word meaning, "Sign," "Mark," "Emblem," "Miracle," "Statue," and/or, "The Cross of Jesus Christ & Christianity." Though, who could have ever dubbed within it, the meaning of a, "Sigarette," "Vapoured."
The term, "Cigarette," can be found as a, "Cig.” The term, "Cig," alongside the term, "Cyg," is classified as a, "Dhewh."
"Dhewh," is a, "Smoke, Mist, or Haze."
…
The, "Sig," in, "Cig,” comes from when the term, “Cig,” is paired with the term, "Cyg," while in or under, "Dhewh"/"Smoke," and by looking further into the word, "Cyg,” you will find, "Cyg," means, "Cygnet," and rather than spelling it only by its in of the Bird ("The Swan"), when of it's Root Word in Middle English, Cygnet also spells out, "Signet (Like the, "Ring")," with the Latin Root Word, "Signum."
This is how the, "Miracle," is kept in the, "Smoke." Furthermore, "Num," as in, "Numinous," can also mean, Vapourous, albeit that term in all honesty, is rarely used that way..."
~ “God Is In Signs, Though, Not Only Of Smoke.” ~
...
"... In a Pipe Bowl, are all Four Elements.
(🌎) Earth is the Leaf. (🌬️) Air, Circumferences the Bowl, and can be found both Above and Below It. (🔥) Fire, is lit within the Bowl's Centre, and from it's Mini Spark, creates a, "Water (🌊)," by Burning the Leaves. (🌧️) Or rather, a, "Liquid Smoke."
The fact that (💜) Spirit can also be known to frequent the Bowl, makes the Tobacco Pipe, very alike it's own Little Dimension.
Some rare Smokers have even been able to meet a (🧚) Pipe Bowl Denizen in there. Though, not all live to tell the tale.
(🌎) Earth: "Daun," is a, "Leaf." (🌧️) Water: "Dhewh," is a categorical point of reference for both, "Cig," and, "Cyg." It means, "Mist," and/or, "Haze." (💜) Spirit: "Thúmōs," is a word meaning, "Smoke," "Offering," "Heart," "Spirit," and, *"Soul," * (🌱) 'Aristotle' (In his Teachings, had Commented on, "Plants having Soul").
…
• 'The Terminology Loop': "The Medicine": 🚬 1. "Cig," can be defined either, as a, "Cigarette," or as a, "Meat," 2. "Meat," has a, 'Welsh', Language, Root Word/Term, called, "Mes," 3. "Mes," is also defined as an, "Aecern (Not, "Acorn," but, "Aecern." Having its Root Words, not in, "Oak & Corn," but actually in, "Berry"/"Fruit")," 4. The, "Berry," would be a, "Bramble," 5. The, "Brambles," in this case, are not, "Raspberries (i.e. "Rasping")," but, "Blackberries," 6. "Blackberries," are used as the definition of the word, "Sméar," 7. "Sméar," without an accent, becomes the word, "Smear," 8. A, "Smear," is a, "Rub," 9. A, "Rub," when not a verb, but a noun, is a Medicine, for which, "Tobacco," was used, by the Native People. 🚬..."
‘El Fin?’
As Andrew comes into this story, we see the ancestors on his father's side of the family, bearing the last name Thomlinson, after Doubting Thomas in the Bible.
Andrew's case, while being the same, may have deviated somewhere, though.
He had taken up a burden of Fairy in the year 2004, becoming named Eldritch, a name given him, by a Spirit-Led Divination.
Using a Merriam Websters Dictionary, in a Psychic Art known as Bibliomancy, Andrew asked for an elfin name and received the name Eldritch, meaning weird, eerie, uncanny, and hideous, with root words Elf Kingdom.
This fact retrieval at random, meant he was in a spiritual contract, although he hadn’t supposed that until much later. Reason being? He hadn’t yet learned that such things were possible, nor had he learned the Name of the Spirit, leading the Divination.
Along the preliminary stages, of Andrew’s own burden, he chanced across some material on a Scottish man from Carterhaugh, named Tam Lin. Dated from the 18th Century or more specifically 1796, this man, had been turned elfin by a Lady known as the Nicneven.
The Nicneven/Queen of Elphame, a fair and beautiful, albeit evil, Queen of Fairy, had transformed Tam Lin into an elf for the purposes of a Sacrifice a little while later. She was in the custom of paying a tithe to Hell every 7 years with a mortal soul, in order to continue her Reign of Fairy on Earth.
Tam Lin had escaped her clutches with his love interest and the Nicneven was burned at the stake.
A Tam, or thame, as a theme, implied something. If Andrew had a Fairy-tale Burden by Divination, it couldn’t mean the Nicneven herself, because Andrew, neverminding Tam Lin’s business, was no elf.
However, it could imply a plot line. Would Andrew become the subject of some device?
Dreeing one’s weird. The old phrase, which means surrendering to one’s fate.
Andrei read, from the, "'The Book of, "Ho-Do"’, in, ‘The Book Of Right’.
"... If, in the word, "Smok," a, "Dragon," meets the same classification as, "Smoke..."
Might it be said, that, "Dragons," and, "Tobacco," share something of a similarity, seeing as, "Tobacco," is classified as a, "Smoke."
That is, if only in, how they are both afforded their differences and similitude, within the bracket of the one word, "Smok?"
• "Tobacco Smoke"/"Dragon Dew"/"The Draught of The Dragon." Rumour has it, that, "Elves," are born up, from out of the, "Pipe Leaf"/"Tobacco," by the nature of the, "Mor," in it. These, "Elves," I can only speculate, become, "Blue Ball Vampires," held aloft in, "The Currents."
• "Blue Ball Vampires." Known as, "Asema," "Blue Ball Vampires," are, "Orbs of Blue Light," that, "Prey," on, "Men and Women."
If these, "Asema," travel by Draft, or in the Air, and if, "Sacred Tobacco," is, similarly, called, "Asemaa," by the Natives, is the existence of the, "Blue Ball Vampire," a Concrete Reality," or does it bid that we explore it further?
How far, is anyone really permitted to go, in the study of an ancient Dream dubbed Sacred Herb, not to mention, one so very potentially fatal, as this, insofar as such things are concerned?
And finally, where does one begin to look for answers of Dragons, Elves, and Vampires, if they do exist? Is it not that, indeed they do exist?
  • Note: Dragons, Elves, and Vampires, all relate, through the Babylonian, "Royal Elven," Bloodline, of Prince Nicholas De Vere..."
'The Cabin'.
Perry was gasping. The wyrm had dropped to the cabin floor.
Scared witless, he reached at it with the rolled up paper, and quickly threw it at the fire, grabbing a towel to cover his damp arm.
Ten seconds later, there was a fissuring crack and a loud hissing sound.
His elbow was numb and throbbed. He was in a shock now, that neared mania. It had spoken!!!
Trail Mix, smiling rocks, butterfly sheep, and elbow icicles that hatch, making a sound like some sort of Ghost of the Wilderness.
Why had his day BEEN like this?
‘The Fold’.
By 2017, Hospitals and Clinics had been ordered to switch over old stationary types, to a new, sustainable type. This included all of the old ink, paper, and manila files or folders. The reason being, because of all of the recent fires the World had been having.
Some scientists had come up with a solution. The favorable switch over? Genetic! Organic staining and fibres could now be used as a replacement to the ordinary stationary types. These office supplies could be generated from leftover organ cells, in a Lab.
What they didn’t know?
These Office Supplies were in fact generating living Necrotomes of Spirit.
The collusion of ingredients used in the en masse production, as well as though when found in Office Utilization, all the while would leak an unknown kind of detri-stol, which led some experts to believe the ingredients were not proven enough to be safe.
God was undoubtedly in agreement that this wicked device was not anything, but unethical, as he made the World, one even bigger chart to merit.
What did Avem think?
The, “Big Business Man,” had been away from work, for most of the Fall. He had had to hire a Stand-In, though, as he had received a faulty, "Contract Lens," and was undergoing surgery to have it removed.
The, which, being known as, "Bionic Lenses," or alternately, "Cyborg Eye," implants. These, "Bionic Lenses," had been designed not only to, 'Improve Sight', but also to, 'Surf the Internet', and find documents, solely using one's brain power.
People, however, were now being, "Repossessed (as ludicrous as it may sound)," for, "Part Share." The devices framed them specifically, with, "Illegal Data Possession,” all the while exhibiting powerful forms of, "Subjective Coercion,” and, “Mind-Control.”
The irony of this particular instance, was that, “Mr. Biz (i.e. It's, “Newly Contracted Licensee”),” was to hold onto it for a set term as a new Prototype Model. His unfortunate turnabout? It had been surfacing Illegal Documents regarding the Maker of the Eye, itself.
Rather than hold onto the Glitch Fob, he wore a Glass Eye replacement, leaving the Prototype’s Company, permanently on hold.
That man… was Ralph.
submitted by Bogey4hoo to u/Bogey4hoo [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 02:13 JLGoodwin1990 I found a Journal washed ashore at the beach. What I read will give me nightmares the rest of my life.

I’m someone who loves to take long walks on the beach in the early mornings when very little to nobody else is there. The sea spray on my face and the salt air in my nostrils always help make the eight hour shifts I spend behind a desk somewhat tolerable, and the sight of the sun rising out on the misty waves has always filled me with a sense of calm. However, that changed yesterday when I was out for my walk. It was a slightly rougher day; the waves were crashing on shore a bit harder than normal, and the wind was whipping something fierce. As I strode across the beach, I noticed something out of place being pummeled around in the surf like it was a pinball. When I drew closer, I saw it was a plastic bag which had been sealed with duct tape at the top. Inside was what looked like a book of some sort, and driven by curiosity, I waded into the waves up to my ankles to retrieve it. When I got back to my car, I managed to open the bag and found that the book was actually somebody’s journal, as stated by the inscription on the inside of the cover. It declared it belonged to a man named Anthony Hodgson, as part of an ocean crossing sailing trip from almost 20 years ago.
As I was late for work, I didn’t read any more of it, and instead, tucked it into my briefcase for safekeeping. I figured I could find out more information later on that night and try and return it to its rightful owner. When I got home that night, I immediately took the journal out and began reading excitedly. However, as I got further and further towards the last entry, my intrigue and excitement crumbled to dust, and it was replaced by some of the strongest dread and horror that I have ever felt. I wasn’t sure what to do with it once I finished reading. There’s not much I can do. I can’t send it to anyone, and if I turned it over to any newspaper or TV station, I’m sure it’d be dismissed as a hoax. Finally, I decided that the only place I could come to share it would be here, as I know many others come to share what they’ve seen and found. Let me know what your guys’ thoughts are on this. But, for me personally? What I’ve read has given me some of the worst nightmares I’ve had since I was a child, and will probably keep me out of the ocean. Forever.
Here are the entries:
July 15th, 2004, 3:34 PM
Well, here we are journal. Today is the day I’ve been dreaming about for most of my life. Ever since I was a little child, spending time at my aunt and uncle’s house in Maine, reading their old sailing magazines, I’ve always had the desire to make an oceanic crossing, using nothing more than my skill, knowledge, and determination to get me to the other side. After almost thirty years of waiting, it’s now finally my turn. And thanks in no small part to the group of friends I’ve forged in this journey called life! All in total, there are six of us who will be making this trip. Myself, Darryl, Xander, Winston, Holly, and Anastasia. It was Xander’s idea for us to begin saving and pooling together our money to purchase a sailboat over twelve years ago, and now, I sit in my cabin on what took what seems like an eternity to attain. Her name is the Lunging Lyon; a fifty-two foot Sparkman & Stevens Yawl from 1950, and God, is she one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen. And for something almost fifty-five years old, she looks as good as the day she first entered the water.
We’re currently docked at a pier in Boston, and I can hear the others loading the final crates of supplies and barrels of diesel fuel onboard. Tomorrow, we will sail at the crack of dawn from here, with our bow squarely aimed for none other than jolly old England! I’ve done the calculations, and if we can average between ten to fifteen knots with the wind, it should be no more than a week and change to make it there. Almost three thousand nautical miles of the Atlantic lie between us, and the end of a journey that we will remember for the rest of our lives. I would love to keep writing, maybe even wax a bit poetic about this undertaking, but I can hear the other’s calling to me to help them, so this is where I have to end this entry. For a first one, and as someone who’s never written in one of these things, I don’t think it was that bad. Write later!
July 16th, 2004, 11:17 AM
Good morning, journal! We are officially on our way! We woke up at just a little after six in the morning, and after a last few consultations of our charts, and farewells with the harbor master, we cast off our lines, and used the diesel engine to motor out of Boston harbor. Once we were clear of the last marker buoy, we killed it, and opened up the sails. I’m happy to report that the second they did, the wind blowing from the west caught them, and we shot off like a bullet from a gun! Currently, according to the readout, we’re sailing along at a pleasant nine knots. Not what we were hoping for, but still adequate. I do have to say, though, there is an extreme, almost sense of peace already. Boston and all the rest of land is slowly, but steadily turning into just a thin line behind us, and with the Lunging Lyon under only sail power, the only sounds that can be heard are the creaking of the boat’s wooden hull as she slices through the water, the sails and the rigging as they are slapped by the wind, and the cries of the seabirds as they follow us out to sea.
And, of course, the shouts and laughs of my friends and I. Everyone’s spirits are at a crescendo as the object of many late night conversations turns from the stuff of drunken speculation, to reality. I should point out that everyone on board has a job to do. Darryl and Winston are the two with the most practical knowledge on sailing, as they’ve actually sailed from Washington state down to Baja four or five years ago as part of a competition. They’ll serve as the captain and the navigator for our trip. Thank God for them, or we’d be in way over our heads here! Xander and myself have some knowledge, but only from small trips, usually from Portsmouth up to Bar Harbor in Maine, so we are to help with piloting, while Holly and Anastasia will be working the rigging, raising and lowering the sails as needed, with our help, of course. Additionally, Anastasia will be serving as our cook for the duration of our trip. And considering some of the meals she’s made, I am all for that!
I just took a look at the depth finder mounted just beside the main hatch in the cockpit. According to it, the bottom is already over three thousand feet below us. I know many other people might find such a revelation scary, but as someone who’s loved the sea as long as I can remember, it’s thrilling. I can only imagine what strange and wonderful creatures swim and float beneath us, in the dark and cold waters, listening to the sounds of our hull creaking, reverberating for miles away, as sound travels farther in water than air. Darryl just asked me to take over the helm for a while, so I’ll end this entry here! Write again soon!
July 18th, 2004, 1:37PM
Well, I can’t exactly say good afternoon, as things aren’t as smooth sailing (pardon the pun!) as I would’ve liked. You see, we’ve come across a rather large fog bank, which almost seems to have risen up from the waves and ensnared all in its reach, ourselves included. You can’t even see twenty feet in any direction, and whenever a sound is made, it tends to bounce off the fog back to you in a rather sharp echo. We’ve had to pull some sails down and reduce our speed to six knots to be safe. To tell you the truth, journal, it’s really rather eerie. It almost feels like the entire world has been swallowed up and disappeared, and we’re all that’s left. Thankfully, though, Winston told me that he’s seen fog like this before, and that it won’t last longer than a few hours. I’m grateful for that; honestly, if it lasted longer, I feel it might pull on my sanity a little. The magazine articles and photos never showed or spoke about this, and I wish they would. It wouldn’t have changed my mind on this trip, but it would have prepared me for what to expect.
Something loud just splashed out in the gloom. None of us could see what caused it, but everyone topside heard it. It was only a single splash, one which echoed like the crack of a gunshot in the fog. When I asked Darryl what it could have been, he shrugged his shoulders. “It could be anything, Tony” he said, “Lots of things splash around in deep water. Could be a whale breaching, could be a shark going after a school of fish. Hell, it could even be a piece of flotsam getting tossed about by a particularly tall whitecap”. The explanation brought me more comfort; instead of a sense of unease about the unknown, my mind is now filled with natural explanations. According to the radar, we are about four hundred miles off the coast of the US, and the depth sounder shows the bottom has dropped away to six thousand feet.
We all need to keep a sharp eye out, so I’ll stop writing for now to help the others. Write again soon!
July 19th, 2004, 1:17AM
What. The. Actual. Fuck. Just happened? Not even four hours ago, myself, Xander, and Holly laid down to get some sleep, as we’ve worked out a schedule where we sleep three at a time, changing out during the night to allow the other team to rest. I’d just managed to drift off when I flew out of my bunk onto the floor. It literally felt as if the boat had slammed into another vessel. For a moment, that was my biggest fear, and after checking on the other two down below with me, who both had slight bruises from their own unexpected flights, I dashed topside to the sounds of chaos. Winston and Darryl were shouting back and forth to each other in confusion, and I could hear Anastasia moaning somewhere closer to the bow. When I asked what had happened, they told me they didn’t know. “It was like we sailed straight into a damn block of concrete!” Winston exclaimed to me.
When I went to check on Anastasia, I found her lying on her back on the deck. She’d cracked her head on the main mast, giving her a rather nasty bump on her left temple, and received a cut on her cheek. The three of us carried her down below and laid her down in the forward berth, where Holly is looking after her. She says she’ll be okay, but she needs to rest for the rest of the night. I, for the life of me can’t understand what we hit. It could have been a whale or a large piece of wood, but, nobody saw anything, and it was a perfectly clear night, something that Darryl tells me will end the night after tomorrow, as a storm is coming our way. And I’m fairly certain that the two most experienced of our crew wouldn’t jeopardize us so carelessly. If they say they didn’t see anything, then I believe them. I’ve gone back down below to try and catch at least an hour’s more rest before I help take over the late night to early morning shift at the helm. According to the charts and radar, we’re now about eight hundred and fifty miles off the coast, though I didn’t look at the depth sounder this time.
One additional thing to note, that may not have any meaning, but I’m still going to write down. There was one strange thing I noticed when I went topside and went to help Anastasia. There was a rather putrid scent in the air, something I couldn’t place. If I didn’t know any better, I would’ve said it was ammonia, but we have none aboard which could’ve spilled, so I don’t know what to make of it. Probably nothing, but still noting. Anyways, good night. Hopefully no more surprises!
July 20th, 2004, 4:37 PM
Good morning, journal! Things happily seem to be more on track today than they have been the last two! I’m currently sitting behind the helm, using my foot to keep it straight as I write. Most of the others have gone below to have dinner, which I’ll have myself when they’re finished. Someone needs to steer, after all! I’m happy to report that Anastasia is back up and, aside from the bump on her head, seems to be in good spirits. She’s currently making clam chowder, a favorite of all of ours! We’ve picked speed back up to about eleven to twelve knots with a strong tailwind; although earlier it died, causing us to have to tack back and forth before, regrettably, having to fire up the engine to carry us a bit farther. The sound of it was almost heresy out here in the silence, only broken by the wind and the waves. It was worth it, though, as I saw a truly amazing sight about half an hour ago. A sperm whale! It breached out of the water, not more than a half a mile away from us! Seeing that gigantic black leviathan leaping from the waves is a sight that filled me with joy, to tell you! It did so a few more times, seeming to move around in a circle, before disappearing below the waves. I’ve honestly never heard of a sperm whale doing multiple breaches in such a short succession, but there’s a first time for everything, I guess.
Anyways, I look ahead now, and in the distance, I can see the storm clouds on the horizon, lightning occasionally flashing in the dark grey fluff. According to the report we got from a tanker on the ship’s radio, it will be a bad one, meaning our initial plan to make it to England in just over a week is going to be extended to just about two weeks. Fine by me, as despite our setbacks and problems, I still am thoroughly enjoying this journey-
Good Lord, did that just startle me! I heard a loud splashing sound off our stern behind me, and swung around. There was nothing there, but it was so close I swear I could feel the water droplets hitting me on the back of the neck. Anyways, Xander’s coming up to take over helm duties, so it’s time for me to head below and eat! According to the radar, we’re now over a thousand and three hundred miles out to sea, close to the halfway mark of our trip! The depth sounder says twelve thousand feet of water lie between us and the seafloor. Write later!
July 21st, 2004, 07:18 AM
I….I don’t even know where to begin with this entry. I’m honestly lost for words, both in my shock. And my grief. I suppose there’s no other way to put it other than bluntly. Holly’s gone. Last night, we sailed into the storm at just a little after eight; the waves and wind became something fierce, something that I only read when reading novels like The Perfect Storm and The Old Man and the Sea. The waves crashed down on the deck with all the ferocity of a freight train, and the howling of the wind sounded like a banshee screaming into our ears. All of us, save for Anastasia, who was cleaning up dinner dishes in the galley were topside to keep the Lunging Lyon straight and true. But the storm battered about our sailboat like it was a child’s plaything in the bath.
I don’t know how big the swells became, but we would ride up one, and almost drop in a seventy five or eighty degree angle down into the trough before the next set. The lightning flashed, momentarily illuminating the hell we’d sailed into like it was the middle of daytime, and the thunder boomed and rattled my eardrums. Darryl and I were at the helm, fighting to keep the rudder straight while the others were working the rigging and the sails. Holly was working the rigging underneath the mainsail when it happened. A sudden change of wind slammed into us from the port side, shifting the boat sideways. It also caused the boom to change direction suddenly, swinging across the deck like a charging bull. Xander and Winston managed to duck under it, but….Holly didn’t. The huge wood and fiberglass projectile caught my friend on the side of the head and shoulders in its arc, and before anyone knew what was happening….she was gone. Knocked over the railing and into the churning waves.
For a moment as we panicked and looked around us, I thought I saw her in a flash of lightning, about fifteen yards behind the boat, waving her arms and her mouth open in a scream as she bobbed in the waves, kept afloat by her life jacket. But when the next flash came, not even four seconds later, I saw nothing. We couldn’t turn around in the storm; not unless we wanted to swamp ourselves and sink. We could do nothing but helplessly sail away from our friend. Xander hasn’t been able to stop crying. Holly and he were an item, and losing his life partner has destroyed him in a way I can only imagine.
The waves have lessened some since, but our boat has taken major damage. Both the radio and radar have been damaged in the storm, making any kind of call for help impossible, as well as knowing our exact location. To make matters worse, there seems to be something wrong with the propeller for the diesel engine, as when we discovered some tears in the mainsail, we lowered them to repair and continue under engine power. But, though the engine roared, we didn’t move at all. Darryl says he’ll check it out once the storm lets up a little more. For now…all happiness of this trip has flooded out of all of us. Now it’s marked by the loss of one of us. I just honestly want to get to England at this point. Will write later.
July 21st, 2004, 03:13 PM
The storm finally abated enough for Darryl to check on the prop. As the waves petered out, and we seemed to move into the eye of the storm, he donned a pair of flippers and a mask, and jumped overboard to inspect it. When he popped his head above the waves, his face bore a look of confusion and worry. Treading water beside the boat, he told us that the prop had been sheared half off by something. The one remaining blade had been bent so that it couldn’t turn anymore, but the rest was just…gone. I remember his exact words. “I’ve sailed for fifteen years, and I’ve never seen something like that happen in open water. You usually have to run aground to do damage like that”
Unnerved myself, I asked him to come back aboard. As he swam back to the swim ladder on the stern, I swear…I swear I saw something below the waves. A shape darker than the rest of the ocean, one that seemed to move on its own power, slowly rising up towards us. Whatever it was, it looked big. I fully admit, when I saw that dark shape, I couldn’t help but reach over the transom and grab Darryl by the arm, almost wrenching him out of the water. It’s beyond ridiculous, I know, but. Given our recent events, I feel on edge. Hell, we all do. Now, I sit behind the helm in the cockpit as I watch Anastasia and Xander try and sew up the torn sails. I hope they’ll do good progress soon; I want to be out of this area before nightfall. And more unnerving, is the fact that that ammonia like smell is back. This time, Winston smelled it as well, holding his nose and complaining about “That God-awful stench”. We looked around, but saw nothing. I’m beginning to regret being the one who thought this trip of ours up over a decade and a half ago. Write Later.
July 21st, 2004, 06:13 PM
Darryl’s gone. What the fuck, what the fuck, what the actual FUCK is going on?! Just before dusk fell, he came back topside, in one arm holding a waterproof flashlight; in the other, a brand new propeller. He told us that he’d brought a spare along in case of any emergency, and we felt a wave of relief wash over us that we’d be able to get moving. The storm wall was fast approaching, and Xander and Anastasia hadn’t finished mending the sails yet. He also had a yellow pony bottle, which he pushed the regulator into his mouth, and after picking up a wrench, put on his flippers and mask, and slipped back overboard. We all saw his light click on, and he slipped out of sight underneath the boat.
Every couple of seconds, we saw a burst of bubbles break the surface as he breathed out, and a quick flash of his flashlight swing around. For a few minutes, we felt the tension ease up, and despite the grim mood from Holly’s death, Winston told us a joke about sharks and a razor lined surfboard which made us laugh a bit. But then, that jovial mood deflated as quickly as a bully popping a kid’s party balloon. “Hey, what’s going on?!” we all heard Anastasia cry, and we looked over the railing down into the water. Darryl’s light was dancing about as if he was turning rapidly around from one side to the other, the air bubbles coming in faster streams. Then, two things happened in rapid succession. The first was that the beam from his light disappeared. It was as if he’d just snapped it off; one second it was there, whipping around, the next it was gone. And the second, was that a huge stream of bubbles came to the surface at once.
It was only for a second, and then. Nothing. We waited and waited, the seconds drawing into minutes, but our friend, and one of our two leaders never resurfaced. It was as if he’d never even been there. We debated for a few minutes about having someone else go into the water, and after many refusals, I finally relented and grabbed a mask. I wouldn’t be going in all the way, though; I would just drop down the swim ladder enough to see under the boat, and that was it. As it stepped down and felt the freezing water touch my feet, I felt goose pimples rise all over my arms and legs. I couldn’t understand why, but I felt my primal flight or fight instincts kicking in as I stuck my head in the water and shone another flashlight around.
I saw no sign of him. The water under the boat was completely empty of life. No fish, no sharks, nothing. And no Darryl. I swung my head around, looking off into the gathering gloom, but still saw nothing. As I turned and looked down into the depths, however, I swear I saw a flash of changing color. It could’ve been a trick of the ocean, but I swear I saw one patch turn from dark blue, almost black, to a very dark maroon. That was enough to make me yank my head out of the water and climb back up from the swim platform. “He’s not there” I said to the others. “He’s just….disappeared” We all agreed then, that nobody else would enter the water. We’d take our chances being battered around by the storm. Currently we’ve started the bilge pumps before it reaches us. I can hear them roaring away in the recesses of the hull as I sit at the galley table and write this. And..I can’t help but feel a creeping sense of dread as I close my eyes and recall that dark shape I thought I saw. Plus the changing color I swear I saw in the deep. But, I can’t let myself lose my cool. We all need to keep a level head if we hope to get back to dry land.
I’ll write again soon. I hope to God it’s with better news.
July 23rd, 2004, 02:30AM
….If you gaze too long into the abyss, you’ll find the abyss also gazes back at you. That may not be the exact quote, but who gives a damn. Not when you’ve looked into the eye of a monster. Still, I should tell what happened.
The storm reached us that night, and all throughout it and much of the next day, we were battered by it. I thought so many times that the wooden hull would break apart, dropping us all into the monstrous waves and stinging rain. But, somehow, she stayed afloat. It’s true what they say; they don’t make them like this anymore. As daylight broke, though, the storm increased in its ferocity, and we were forced to venture topside to steer the boat into the waves to keep from capsizing. Myself, Xander, and Winston went up after donning life jackets; we told Anastasia to stay below for her own safety. When we emerged, it was like stepping directly into hell. The rain tore at our faces, and the wind almost completely drowned out the sound of our voices. Lightning pierced the dark, and we worked with our remaining flashlights to raise what little sails we had left whole, and then began to try and steer towards what our compass and charts indicated was England. We had no idea how far we were from it, or how blown off course the storm had shoved us, but we had to try. For three hours, we were battered and beaten, but we seemed to make headway.
That was when a familiar sensation struck our boat. The same concrete slamming sensation as before, making it feel as if we’d come to a dead stop in the waves, which began to wash hard down into the cockpit. Thankfully the main hatch was closed, so no water got down below. “What the hell did we hit?!” I heard Winston shout to be heard over the howling wind. “Hell if I know!” Xander called back to him, and I saw his flashlight beam shine down into the water. “I don’t see-“ His voice cut off. “You don’t see what?!” Winston yelled back, but there was no answer from him. Feeling a piercing fear seize me, I shone my own flashlight beam up to where he’d been, near the bow. It illuminated him, still kneeling and clutching at the railing, staring down into the sea. “Xander, what the hell’s the matter with you!” I screamed as loud as I could. Slowly, he turned to look up and back at me. What I saw made me feel as if the blood in my veins had been replaced with ice. I have never seen Xander even a tiny bit afraid before; we always said he was the most courageous out of our group. But, now his face had turned a shade of pale I thought only corpses could hold, and his eyes were about as wide as they could get. His hand holding his flashlight trembled. As I looked, I smelled that putrid stench once more; this time, though, it was overpowering.
That was when I heard Winston scream. I swung my beam back portside, and the beam. Oh, good God almighty…the beam landed on a scene that, however much longer am I alive, I’ll see whenever I close my eyes. Winston was still there, but…so was something else. Something which had come from the sea itself. My hand trembles as I write this next part. It was a fucking tentacle. An honest-to-God tentacle, looking like something out of the old 20,000 Leagues under the Sea movie from the 50s. But, unlike that, this was very much alive. I saw every detail in slow motion. The giant club of the tentacle, big enough to wrap around the mast and filled with dozens of huge, wide suckers. The arm of the tentacle, as thick as two men standing next to each other. It all was a dark maroon color. And then, I saw Winston.
Oh, God no. The tentacle had wrapped around my friend with the strength of seven boa constrictors, squeezing him so tightly I saw his face turn red, even in the biting wind and rain. He feebly pressed his hands to it, trying in vain to push it away. And then, as quick as one of the bolts of lightning flashing overhead, he was gone. It was so quick I only saw it as a blur, hearing a gigantic splash as he was yanked below the waves. I forgot all about steering the boat and scrambled for the side in some misguided and foolish attempt to save him. I shone the light’s beam down into the dark waters. And fuck me running, do I wish I hadn’t. Because it shone directly into an eye.
An inhuman eye the size of a wall clock. One which looked back at me with a cold and predatory gaze. The pupil contracted in the light, and it shot back underneath the boat. To the other side. Xander… I turned to scream for my other friend to get away from the railing. But…he was already gone. I hadn’t even heard him get taken over the wind and the rain. His flashlight rolled around on the deck near where he’d been kneeling. But he was gone. That’s when I saw another tentacle rise above the railing a few feet in front of me. It felt around on the deck, seeming to move by a sense of touch as it searched for its next meal. For me.
All courage left me, and I abandoned anything topside and dashed below. I slammed the hatch closed behind me and locked it, knowing full well if it really wanted to, the tentacles could easily rip it off its track. Anastasia was shaking when I ducked down below and saw her. She’d been looking through the side windows and seen what had happened to the other two. To Winston, her husband. As much as I was terrified, I went to her. I held her in my arms to console her, and we sat there, sitting on the hardwood floor, listening to the sickening sounds of the tentacles moving underneath us over the hull and breaching the waves to search the deck. After a while, it stopped. The storm lessened a little, the waves ceasing their merciless battering of our boat. Anastasia finally drifted off to sleep in my arms, and I carried her to the forward berth. She needs sleep. So do I, but I can’t bring myself to fall asleep. I know I’ll be haunted by nightmares of that tentacle and eye. And I know it’s still there. I can still smell that ammonia scent, even through the closed windows and hatch. For now, though, I’ll just curl up on the galley seats. I don’t know what else to do. There’s nothing else I can do.
Who gives a fuck about the date
This will be my final entry in this journal. I don’t even know how many days we’ve drifted aimlessly on the waves anymore. The storm finally passed, and the waves have remained relatively calm ever since. If it weren’t for knowing what lies beneath them, I might almost call it peaceful. It’s anything but, though. Our food and fresh water is almost completely used up. All our remaining sails tore in the storm, and Anastasia’s in no shape to sew them up. And, unfortunately, I never learned how. It wouldn’t matter, anyways. Our rudder is gone. I know, because when I opened the main hatch and stuck my head out, I saw it, floating on its side about a half mile away from us. No doubt torn off by that creature, leaving us completely dead in the water.
I know what it is now. I was too terrified and confused to put together the pieces in my mind, but now, all the marine biology knowledge in my brain has allowed me to identify it. Architeuthis Dux. A Giant Squid. One far larger than has been seen by scientists before, at least sixty or seventy feet long, judging by the size of the eye I saw. A creature that has for centuries terrorized sailors, giving rise to the legend of the Kraken, pulling ships below the waves and preying upon the floating sailors. So many marine biologists and historians said that the stories of ships being pulled down to their doom were conjecture, wise tails. I can confidently say that they’re absolutely full of shit. The stories were right on the money.
The Lunging Lyon is slowly sinking. The pumps gave out yesterday; both Anastasia and I heard them die. When I went topside to check on them, looking around as if I were a fucking owl to make sure I wouldn’t be grabbed, and lifted the hatch to the engine compartment, I saw water in it. For a while, we tried bailing it out, but soon gave up. What’s the point, anyways? We can’t call for help; we can’t escape in the dinghy lashed to the deck, as we’d be set upon by the beast. That damned smell is always here now; one that signals its presence, along with the scrapes of its tentacles along the hull. We’re fucked any way we look at it.
And this morning…Anastasia stepped overboard. I don’t think she could take the waiting anymore. I awoke just in time to see it. She’d become closed off since the day before, barely saying a word. I couldn’t make out what she was thinking. But, I awoke, and saw the hatch to the cockpit was open. Feeling a new sense of dread course through my veins, I ran to the open hatch, just in time to see her step off the stern railing. I heard the splash of her dropping into the water. The sound of the tentacles rubbing on the hull stopped. And then, nothing. Silence.
I’m alone now. Well, not completely alone. That fucking thing is still there. The rubbing and scraping has started again. As I write this, the boat has sunk lower into the water. The entire transom is almost underwater, and as it bobs up and down in the waves, I can see it, sitting just below the surface behind the boat and waiting patiently. Staring at me with that cold, unblinking eye. It knows as well as I do that I don’t have long. Which is why I’m going to place this journal into a bag after I’m finished writing this. I’ll seal it with a roll of duct tape which floats around near my feet, and then I’ll throw it overboard, as far away as I can. Maybe, with some luck, it’ll wash ashore somewhere. So someone can know what happened to us.
The transom is lower in the water now, and the tentacles are beginning to reach over into the cockpit. I’m going to stuff myself into the forward berth as far as I can, and shut the cabin door. If I’m lucky….maybe I’ll drown before it can reach me. I don’t want to be torn apart by that monster’s beak. Like the others were. Please, whatever you do. Beware the open ocean. Monsters, real ones, dwell out here.
Goodbye.
submitted by JLGoodwin1990 to nosleep [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 01:34 Intelligent_Table913 Looking for midsize sedan with sport trim (new or relatively used). Budget: $30k

I'm looking for anything over 200 hp with features such as decent-sized info screen, Apple CarPlay, power seats, parking sensors, blind spot detectors, rear parking cameras. Also looking for cars that hold their value well, are very reliable (I hate dealing with mechanics), and have good trunk space.
I've narrowed it down to the 2020-2022 Honda Accord 2.0T (Sport or Touring) and 2021-2023 Toyota Camry SE/XSE/TRD. I feel like these are so overpriced though. Should I wait until Memorial Day / July 4th sales to see if the market improves? Or should I just get the best deal I can now?
I'm not interested in leasing since I'm paying so much for just 3 years of use. I want to buy a car that I really like and stick with it for the long run. That's why I'm looking at the highest trims and don't mind paying a little extra.
Just wondering if it's worth waiting to see if the prices drop a little. Any other suggestions for cars that match my preferences? I'm not interested in Kia or Hyundai or American brands since I've heard bad things about reliability.
submitted by Intelligent_Table913 to whatcarshouldIbuy [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 01:20 Big-Time-Burrito What’s a reasonable price to sell my Mazda3 for?

Heyo! I’m a little sad to be writing this because l’ll be leaving the zoom zoom crowd.
Because of finances and mental/physical health, I’m going to sell my Mazda3 and begin commuting by bike or public transit. With a wacky car market, I’m unsure about normal prices, and I’d love to get some advice for a fair price to sell the following:
2014 Mazda3 i Sport Hatchback, Deep Crystal Blue Mica, Clean Title, Manual Transmission, 129,000miles, Premium Synthetic oil used and changed every 7,500 miles, 0 mechanical issues, 0 cosmetic issues, Passed emissions testing.
KellyBlueBook says it’s worth $6,831-$8,556, but I see dealers listing similar cars at $9,500 with a rebuilt title. Or others listed between $10,000-$12,000 with a clean title.
What would y’all recommend?
submitted by Big-Time-Burrito to mazda3 [link] [comments]

2023.03.23 00:34 devilsravioli Mormonism and Free Speech: The Coddling of the Mormon Mind

Disclaimer: I am no free speech expert, but the dialogue of the last couple days related to Elder Holland and his scheduled SUU speech have me thinking more and more about attempts to curb speech (in general) and how these efforts relate to Mormonism. What I will attempt to convey will be walking close to breaking our "no politics" rules, but I will try my best to avoid explicit conversation on those divisive matters. This topic is also highly relevant to our sub, because (ideally) it is a space for individuals of any flavor of Mormonism to converse civilly. I especially want user's feedback related to this subject.
I was a student at UC Berkeley when the 2019 Ann Coulter protests took place. I went down to Sproul and Wheeler to see this in person, after hearing about what transpired on campus over the course of 2017 when Shapiro, Coulter, Milo, Bannon and such were scheduled to speak at various times (by invitation of several on-campus groups) I couldn't help but become a primary witness of the event. What I witnessed was hundreds of students protesting (including ANTIFA and BAMN), mostly due to Coulter’s ideologies and the insistence that the university was a sanctuary to be kept from her perspective. An extensive deployment of police officers were present with the expectation of physical violence and property damage, made manifest in their gear, dogs, and barriers. Over the course of the afternoon, a human chain of protestors, with arms locked, surrounded the entirety of the building Coulter was scheduled to speak in. Their goal: to prevent anyone from entering the lecture hall where she was scheduled to speak. Many were arrested. Despite these efforts, a couple hundred were able to make it in. As expected, this spectacle made its rounds in the news as pundits questioned the validity and principles of the “so-called” birthplace of the free speech movement. Debates continue to this day whether protests, such as this, are valid in a society that values first amendment rights of free speech and expression. Events like this have resulted in the research of Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt. Haidt is often name-dropped here in our sphere when referring to ‘elevation emotion’ and such, but his extensive work related to social psychology, politics, and religion are invaluable to this conversation (The Righteous Mind, The Coddling of the American Mind). We are witnessing a modern phenomenon related to the formal and informal suppression of expression in both public and private institutions (evident with Twitter over the last couple months and big tech in general). Again, debates related to this topic rage on. According to Mark Storslee:
"The First Amendment applies only to the government, not to private organizations. In general, that means that while public universities are required to comply with the requirements of the First Amendment, private universities are not." (Stanford Magazine)
This is a very general ground rule for the topic at hand: free speech in public and private settings. Things only get more complicated when you throw religion into the mix. My hope here is not to quibble about constitutional law, but to discuss the cultural and religious phenomenon that brought us to the point where Elder Holland speaking at a public university has resulted in incessant pushback. My theory, related to our small tradition, is that Mormonism has a lot to do with it.
The LDS Church (a private institution) has a rich history of suppressing expression, speech, and conscience. The divine mission of the Church, in fact, requires the suppression of critical voices. We are taught not to convey criticism of the Brethren, even if the criticism is true (Oaks). We have also been taught that simply thinking the Brethren have weaknesses is considered sin (Eyring). We are taught to rely on the voices of, truth filled, believing men and women (Nelson) and even to question everything anyone has to say, except for the Prophet (Wendy Nelson). The Church claims freedom of choice (expression) and, of course, claims individuals are accountable for the consequences of their actions and thoughts (covenants). The Church’s leaders outline these arbitrary consequences. Naturally, this results in formal institutional discipline as the leaders of the Church (God) determine what forms of expression are valid in their eyes (almost always more restrictive than the laws of the land). For a more detailed inquiry of the Church and its control tactics, refer to Peter Bleakley’s 10 part series: Mormon Civil War. Dissent has always been suffocated by discipline and ostracization. Examples of the Church (God) limiting expression:
Inherent in this tradition of suppression is a superiority complex of the suppressors and a distrust in the abilities of the masses to discern truth from error (Holy Ghost must not be that reliable after all). The control of information and its accessibility is an integral lever of power. Those in power believe they can guide the masses to safe havens of approved resources and self-interests. This fundamental faithlessness and intellectual pride reveal the inherent fears of the bourgeoisie (leaders of the LDS Church in this case). This is active coddling of the Mormon mind, the insistence on limiting alternative voices. This is distilled and institutionalized confirmation bias at its finest. Hear what you want to hear. Feel what you want to feel. See what you want to see. Ensure your surroundings conform to your preconceived world view, if they don’t, either change your surroundings, or leave. Leaders insist on this strategy. Lay members adhere to this pattern. In that vein, the authors of a recent Deseret News piece illogically claim we should oppose the suppression of critical voices while their parent organization (The Church) relies on this very same suppression to keep Mormons correlated. The hypocrisy is laid thick as Church representatives insist public institutions permit the freedom of expression, as required by law, while they actively limit voices in their own private spheres, all in the name of Elder Holland (representative of private institution) being permitted to speak at SUU (a public institution) and maintaining their tax exempt status.
The programmed logic of the brain does not change much after a reevaluation of faith. Our tried and true neural patterns persist beyond a “faith crisis”. I am seeing the insistence to restrict speech extend into post-Mormon spaces. Don’t get me wrong, this plague has permeated all corners of modern thought, not just Mormonism. This is the result of the natural ‘want’ to limit voices that are contrary to our preconceived world view as well as fear of retribution from our peers. The only difference now is the insistence that words are violent, not just actions. This is false. The news of Elder Holland speaking at SUU has revealed this fundamental flaw in civil discourse. Yes, valid arguments are out there pertaining to Holland’s past discourse regarding the LGBTQ+ community and BYU. People were hurt by what he said, regardless of intent on his part. This should be acknowledged. This is something SUU administration will hopefully factor in after the inevitable protests and persistent media coverage related to their choice of commencement speaker. Seek input from the student body first, invite dialogue, compromise, and once all parties are in the know, make a decision. For now, let Holland speak. He was invited by a public institution. That is their right. Regardless, the student body should protest. That is their right. Dialogue, as a result of this conflict, will ideally result in healthier processes to ensure the interests of students, minority groups, and administrators. Open reconciliation is greater than isolated infighting. Authoritative direction (a fundamental tenet of Mormonism) typically does not result in positive outcomes. It results in Reed Smoot hearings. Theocratic directives do not mesh with democratic consensus.
We can do better at promoting the free discussion of civil ideas. We all know too well the challenge this is on reddit. We care about open dialogue without the overarching arm of moderation. I suppose most of us are here on mormon for this very reason. Many of us got tired of the thought control the LDS Church instigates as well as the echo chambers we find in online discourse. Hope of a contrary, yet civil, opinion exists here. Let's foster that hope and encourage civil dialogue. The Brethren don’t have this hope in members’ ability to filter the truths and/or flaws of critical voices, constantly insisting we should seek out truth filled sources that they find acceptable.
This sub has had relentless debates on the subject of “approved sources” recently. You want to know why there is no easy answer? Because truth conflicts with correlated teachings. Because whoever is sitting in those 15 red chairs at General Conference is the “approved source” (a moving target). No other “source” trumps the words of those men. All other voices must be compared to what these men have to say. They actively coddle the Mormon mind. Break that clot. Idealogues with imposed self-interests actively filter the information you are fed. Maturity is the ability to sift data, reject unsupported dogma, and accept truth. Trust in your ability to decipher. Actively…read FAIR, read LDS.org, read Hales, watch Saints Unscripted, listen to the Cwic Show, tolerate Thoughtful Faith and MS podcast, watch Midnight Mormons, listen to At Last She Said It, watch Zelph on the Shelf, watch NEMO, listen to RFM and Reel, read Dialogue, watch MHA webinars, attend Claremont Graduate University Lectures, read the Tanners’ work, read Kimball, read Nibley, read all the Ostler’s works, read Bushman, Read Brody, read Givens, read Palmer, listen to Sunstone, read the Tribune, read Deseret News, watch the Murph, watch Bennett, read the BOM, read Vogel, read Metcalf, read LDS Discussions, follow Deznat, follow Chino, sub to lds, ladasa, mormon, and exmormon, read Dawkins, read Dennett, read Hitchens, read Marx, read Lenin, read Skousen, read Kendi, read Coulter, read Shapiro, read Peterson, listen to Maher, listen to Oliver, listen to Hannity, read Brown, listen to MoTAB, listen to the Grateful Dead, watch CNN, read Reuters, listen to NPR, go to your library, read your local paper, listen to your neighbors, and formulate your own opinions based on your interpretation of the world. Don’t rely on dogmatic pundits to vicariously exercise your mind. Refuse to burn books. Promote civil expression. Don’t fall for what the LDS Church vehemently relies on.
Additional Resources:
The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure
Atlantic - September 2015 - THE CODDLING OF THE AMERICAN MIND
The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion
Atlantic - July 2017 - Why It's a Bad Idea to Tell Students Words Are Violence
The Guardian - Arrests made after more than a thousand protest Ann Coulter speech
Oaks - April 2021 GC - Defending Our Divinely Inspired Constitution
Deseret News - We’ve witnessed campus cancellation campaigns. Elder Holland deserves to be heard at Southern Utah University
AP - Everywhere and nowhere: The many layers of ‘cancel culture’
ACLU - Speech on Campus
Stanford Magazine - What the Law Says About Campus Free Speech
LA Times - Mormon Speech Curb Rejected
Exponent II - The LDS Church should stop curbing free speech and start embracing advocacy
NY Times - Mormons Expel Founder of Group Seeking Priesthood for Women
NY Times - Two Activists in Mormon Church Threatened With Excommunication
NY Times - Mormon Church Expels Outspoken Critic
Deseret News - Here’s why Sam Young faces discipline from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
ABC4 - Former LDS bishop excommunicated over podcast
Washington Post - Sonia Johnson
LA Times - Six Facing Censure Accuse Mormon Church of Purge
submitted by devilsravioli to mormon [link] [comments]