Losing Money Spread Betting

My Experience in IT after 6 months, What Can You Expect?
Hi all, I recently read a on r\ITCareerQuestions about being frustrated with all of the posts asking for help. This in part, is a response to that.
Fair warning – this is going to be a long one (slightly over 5000 words), strap yourself in or get out while you can, you have been warned! I have tried to break it up into sections, so feel free to skip to parts that interest you. I will happily answer all questions, PLEASE feel free to DM me. I will help anyone with resources that I used, and advice on best career pathways.
Who is this post for?
I think this post is going to be for you if you fit into any of the following categories. If you are looking to break in to IT and you haven’t even taken your first step, if you have been studying for certificates and you want to know if it is all going to be worth it (is there a light at the end of this tunnel). Maybe you want to know what your first 6 months in IT are going to be like. Maybe you want realistic salary expectations and you don’t want to ask a salesman or the guy driving an expensive car. Maybe you have been a lurker on this thread and you’ve seen all the conflicting advice. Perhaps you have sent out 400 job applications and had no bites. Maybe you have had 20 interviews and no one has given you a chance. My point being there are many steps you need to take to take your “first step” or to get your foot in the door. If you are someone who is taking any one of those steps, I do recommend reading this.
My Journey, two jobs, one lay-off, sleepless nights, a global pandemic and an incredible wife.
When I was 28, I decided I wanted a stable and steady career. Something I didn’t have to fight 30 other younger and hungrier people for. To put this into context I once applied for an entry level market research position and I don’t mind telling you that interview experience was something I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. I hadn’t applied myself at university, I studied Biology, something I had no passion for and the competition in scientific research was something that you would never survive without passion.
I was always exceptional at exams/learning/studying, to that end I was first in my year at university for exam results. And for that great honour I was awarded a £1000 cash scholarship prize. And being an irresponsible student I spent the entire thing (and some student overdraft) on my very first PC.
I spent hundreds of hours watching Linus tech tips, and Jays2cents and how to build a PC. I was hooked, I built that PC, booted her up, and realised…. I still want to watch build videos. I genuinely found out that I loved learning about hardware. I didn’t know that about myself. I know I see a lot of backstory posts asking for help that all say “I am tech savvy, I am the techy one in the family” etc etc.
So, I think these people know what I mean. By the way if you are worried that being the “techy one” isn’t valuable then you are dead wrong. It means you can learn technologies quickly and interact with user interfaces with ease. These are going be all you do for a long time in IT. You will have many user interfaces thrown at you that are custom to your company, but more on that later.
Well, unfortunately, years pass me by while I take a job in biology I have no passion for, I didn’t hate my job, I got to work at a university helping students with disabilities cope with every day life. But I didn’t feel excited or driven.
And then one day I was watching the UK version of the apprentice, absolute trashy TV at its finest for those that don’t know what it is. It is a competition in which people present a business plan to a billionaire and that billionaire decides if the business plan has legs.
So I am watching this guy with perfect quaffed hair and teeth that would blind you, (you know the type, he works is sales and thinks the world would collapse without him) and he is pitching a Cyber security recruitment company. And he has the leading experts in the country critiquing him, and I heard the same thing over and over. IT is desperate for people, for every 10 roles in IT security, there are only 1 or 2 qualified people.
I have to admit I got a little excited, nervous excited. I did something that changed my life. I googled it and made a phone call. That’s right, I spent all of 2 minutes before I was on the phone to a salesman. Let me tell you, if I could go back in time a slap myself for buying in to this pitch I would.
“The average person in IT security in the UK earns £72,000”, Booom, I am hooked. You are telling me I can earn £72K and they will be desperate to have me? I won’t have to compete? It won’t be a dog fight… Where the hell do I sign up? Well spoilers for what is to come later, but no, I didn’t end up as CIO of a small company making silly money in year one.
So, what were they offering me and what did it cost me? I signed up for a course that included a Microsoft Technical associate (MTA) in server fundamentals and an MTA in security fundamentals. I signed up for a Comptia certificate in Network+ and in Security+ and finally an EC council certificate in ethical hacking, called CEH. All for the price of around £3000. “Not bad” I told myself for a £72K/year job. “Not bad” I told my wife (who supported me through every single step).
So, when did I first begin to have doubts? That is easy, I remember it like it was yesterday. I had this awful procrastination habit (I bet almost ALL of you do it too) I would google jobs for whatever certificate I was going to study. For me, this was the CEH. A simple “CEH Jobs” search was almost all I ever googled back then. And there were hundreds of them, decent pay too. And then one day I saw it “we are looking for real candidates, no offense to those with a CEH”. It was like a punch to the gut, but worse as my heart raced with fear. What the hell did they mean?!
It was at this point I realised I might be in trouble. I am sure a lot of you feel that way now. Have I just been swindled by a Nigerian prince who just needed my bank details so he can transfer me my millions? Well yes and no. Yes I had been swindled by the promise of £72K, and yes I had been swindled by the CEH, it is one of the most expensive certificates you can get and it does make you look like an idiot to anyone in field. But no, I had not been swindled out of a career just yet.
I kept my head down and I nailed my first ever certificate and I have to admit, it was the hardest things I ever studied. I would say that knowing hardware helped a bit with the server fundamentals certificate, but only for about 5-10% of the learning objectives that were focussed on hardware. The rest was like information overload. I had to learn about how servers worked and communicated. I had to learn Microsoft’s branding too, which is a feat of its own. But I did it, I finally got an IT certificate.
I powered through my security MTA full steam ahead knowing I could achieve it with hard work and consistency. And that is when things got interesting. I began studying for my network+, and let me tell you, I fell in love. I began feeling like the curtains were being drawn on the way the world worked. I understood how if I sent an email, that email was carried across the country to my friends and family.
However, the instructor kept saying the same thing over and over. “And if you take a CISCO course you will learn all about it”. I mean if I had a £ for every time she said it….
Well, I did it again ladies and gentleman. I went back to the same person who sold me my snake oil. And I asked if they did CCNA courses. Of course they did, for the cool price of £800. What the hell I thought, the CCNA is a “real” certificate finally. Finally, I won’t feel worry and despair at the thought of this all being in vane, because I, Jacob Smith will be a network engineer.
The course was mediocre, and I found myself frustrated, so I did the unthinkable. That is right, I spend £10 on an Udemy course. I mean obviously it was going to be terrible. You would have to be an idiot to think a £10 course could be better than an £800 one. Well Neil Anderson spared no time showing me the error of my ways. His course was phenomenal. I bought the course for the first half of the CCNA, then I bought the course for the second half, and then I thought why the hell not, its only £10, I will buy the course that comes as whole package just to support him.
This is the lesson I learned that day. A person can sell their 20 hour course for £10 if they know it is good enough. And then they can make more money than the predator who sells their course to desperate people for thousands.
Let’s skip forward a few months. It is the last hour of the last day in which I can sit the CCNA before they retire it and change it completely. The exam went amazingly, and for those interested I used Neil Anderson’s course, and Boson netsim and boson exsim for the tools.
I am done. I have finally sat the last certificate I am going to sit before I start applying for Jobs. I no longer want the CEH as I know it will just make me look bad and I don’t want to commit the hours required to learn something that will hurt me.
Advice on Resumes/CVs
I fire up google again and waste no time typing “professional CV templates”. Wow, CVs look incredible these days, look how pretty I can make my application. I have dedicated sections for skills, work experience, school etc.
Here is lesson number two, and more important than you realise. Do NOT use these templates ever. Every recruiter that you send your CV to has some sort of CV filter on it. These CV templates are terrible for a number of reasons. Firstly, the format cannot be read by the CV filter, it doesn’t know what it’s looking at so it just bins it. If you are using one and you have sent hundreds of applications and had no bites, then I strongly recommend you read this part and do what I did.
Secondly, these templates are designed for people with work experience and skills. Unfortunately that wasn’t me, I was breaking in to IT. This meant that the focus of my CV HAD to be biology, there was no way to change this. My CCNA was at the bottom of my second page under “other”. So if by some divine intervention my CV did get through to a recruiter, there was no way they would ever read I had 5 certificates.
I had some of the worst and most sleepless nights of my life for the next 2 weeks. I applied to 20-40 jobs a day and heard nothing. Not a peep. It is at this point my beautiful wife lets slip that her sister is in IT recruitment. Mixed emotions is an understatement, I bounced between desperate joyous relief and utter disbelief that at no point did she think to mention this.
Here is what I learned. You are not applying for a social media job, you are not applying for a graphic designer job. A recruiter reads a hundred of these a day and there is nothing that annoys them more for IT people than a fancy looking CV. Put this CV in black and white, have literally nothing but words. Don’t even break the page up with horizontal lines. Put everything IT related at the top, have a strong and promising professional statement. Focus on your certificates, focus on your lab experience. And cram that CV full of skills that you know about. You want something like this in there.
DHCP, DNS, IPv4, IPv6, AD, NTFS, Switching, Routing, Wireless, STP, RIP, OSPF, EIGRP. Hyper-V, VMWare.
Windows 7/8/8.1/10, Windows Server 2008/R2, 2012/R2, 2016, 2019.
iOS, MacOS, Android.
This along with your certificates, your goals and your passion. Along with (briefly) anything transferable from other non-IT related jobs, I am talking about customer service, high stress jobs and time sensitive roles. These skills will be valuable but they should be secondary and again I cannot stress this enough, make it brief. Your education, and non-IT related jobs should make up a small portion of the CV that follows at the end. A recruiter is going to pick your CV up and see your skills, see your certificates and personal statement and then just put it down and give you a call. I doubt they ever get to the part where you describe what working at Pizza hut was like.
Round 2 of applying for jobs
Once I rewrote that CV (annoyingly I had already applied to a lot of the jobs in my area with my poor CV) I sent it out. The difference was life changing. I got a call back the next day actually I got three call backs the next day. Over the next 2 weeks I got roughly 12 recruiter calls, I got three interview offers. I did 2 interviews and got offered to the next stage. The first was with a large corporate company with 1000s of employees. They IQ tested me and they told me that I would be drug tested at my interview. This was a huge red flag to me. I have never done drugs and nor would I want to. But if these people are going to greet me at the door with a mouth swab, then I hate to think what working for them would be like. I turned down their offer for a second interview.
Instead I went to interview at a nearby (well not nearby 90 mile round trip commute) MSP. This was mid-March and I have never enjoyed an interview experience more in my life. The culture was very much this is a place where we have a laugh and you will love working for us. I didn’t have any red flags at the time, I just was so pleased this was all finally happening for me. We joked about football, we talked about hobbies, some IT related questions, typical interview stuff. He even joked we had a bromance going on and said, and I quote “F**k me, you know an interview is going well when its been over and hour and you haven’t noticed”.
Honestly, I think my older age was an advantage here, I was 30 at this point and I am at a stage in life where I am able to hold a conversation well without being nervous or self-conscious. There are obviously going to be downsides to being 30 and starting out too, but I was happy this worked in my favour.
I got a full day and a half of training (sitting behind a guy and watching him work), okay some red flags cropped up at this point. The people here didn’t seem to care very much, nor did they know a huge amount. The way the cases distribution worked was everything went to 2nd line, and they trickled down anything they didn’t want to 1st line and they pushed up what they needed to, to 3rd line. So, I got all the “my webcam isn’t working” calls, which was fair enough, I was grateful to have the job. But I had nothing in my queue that I thought “omg I have no idea what this is”. That might sound like a good thing, but it is the worst thing that can happen to your career. How are you supposed to learn how to install SSL certificates if you never have a case for it?
Well I doubt it is any shock to any of you crazy enough to still be reading, but I after a mindblowing 14 days, I was put on furlough (not sure if Americans have this, but it means temporarily laid off). It seriously makes you question why they hired someone that they laid off 14 days later, but that follows with the “everything is a laugh” attitude I suppose.
I spent the first half of April not knowing (but having a bad feeling) what was going to happen next. And then our prime minister announced the first extension of the lockdown. And when I woke up the next morning I had been completely locked out of all my accounts and I had a “whatsapp” message waiting for me. You read that correctly, Mr fun and games decided it was appropriate to give me bad news over whatsapp. He told me he really liked me and to look out for a message from him when this all blows over, as I will be the first person they call. But he had to let a lot of staff go permanently.
I spent all off April preparing for this, but it still didn’t help me through what this felt like. Try and imagine working your ass off for 18 months to begin a life you never once dreamed was possible, to have it given to you and then taken away in the space of a month.
I was let go on a Friday and I didn’t sleep a wink that whole weekend. I did get a phone call from my recruiter which I thought was nice. But it turns out they were only calling me because the company that let me go were claiming it was because of poor performance. They didn’t want to pay the recruitment fee, and they were willing to damage my reputation and relationship with the recruiter. However, it turned out to be the best thing that happened to me. Them refusing to pay the recruitment fee, drove my recruiter to immediately look for a job for me. It is Sunday afternoon that same weekend and I get a call saying “I have an interview lined up for you tomorrow, can you make it?”. I could not believe what I was hearing. I have an interview lined up and I may not even miss a pay day? I felt like crying. But what was that he said? I must have misheard, did he say it was for tomorrow? That’s right, after having no sleep and being in a state of emotional and physical exhaustion I now had less than 24 hours to prepare for a job I had no idea about.
How to prep for an interview
I worked my arse off. I learned everything I could about the company, I read their testimonials, I studied their customers, I looked at the solutions they provided. I like to have all my certificates with me, along with copies of my resume. I like to have prepared questions to ask the interviewer. I like to have a separate document that I can pass to them with all of my documentation from my labs. (this obviously means you have to document all your labs). I dressed as smartly as I could and gave it everything I could. I watched youtube videos of typical helpdesk questions, I learned the tricks to the questions they ask, e.g. The owner of your company says his printer is broken at the same time you get a call from a customer saying all 200 staff have lost connection to the internet. What do you do? The trick is to communicate with your team, with a team you can do both at the same time. These videos are an amazing tool to prep with and they give you really good answers that you don’t have to think too hard about. They also take away some of the nerves.
So how did it go? Well of course I just didn’t sleep. I mean who would have been able to sleep after what I had been through. I thought about postponing it but I still went for it. I can’t begin to describe the difference in management style. This man was a manager, he was an IT professional with 25 years experience, and he had owned, ran and sold his own successful MSP.
It was both refreshing and worrying. He expected nothing of me, he didn’t really care about my technical knowledge. I didn’t know this at the time, but it was because everyone at this company was driven and knew their stuff. Everyone held 10+ certs and had years and years of experience. This was a different company, with serious people and incredible opportunities to learn.
I thought I had bombed, I was tired and a little defeated. But I got a second interview, and with sleep was able to completely turn it around. I turned my weaknesses in knowledge into opportunities to ask my manager to showcase his knowledge. I was far more engaged and I was offered the job at this far more serious role for the same money I was originally on and I cut my commute in half (well technically I am work from home).
What to expect from a serious MSP?
At my new company, cases come in to 1st line and you are expected to work on everything, and only after you have exhausted your ability can it go up to second line. It is also worth noting the main difference between the two companies is that the first one only provided services for their customers and they had monthly rolling contracts. My current company is a cloud provider and they host all of their customers infrastructures and endpoints, as well as having 1-3 year contracts (much harder to pull out of during a pandemic) it didn’t hurt that a lot of their customers are hospital related.
I have been at my new company now for 4.5 months and learned more there than I could have ever learned at the first company.
I put my money where my mouth is. It wasn’t long before my first manager called me and offered me my old job back. This time with a 33% pay increase. I flat out told him no (respectfully of course) but firmly. It was a lot more money than I am on now but that wasn’t the point. I would not want to stymy my career by working at such a poorly managed company. In the UK, they could have just left me furloughed (it wouldn’t have cost them anything) and I would have received 80% of my salary. But they terminated me and then expected me to come back? I wasn’t going to repay my new manager’s act of saving me from that hell with disloyalty (I know loyalty can be looked down upon in this sub, but that is how I was raised).
What can you expect in your first 6 months?
Enough about me, let’s look at you. Let’s look at what you can expect.
You can expect that certificates can take between 2-6 months each depending on how much time you dedicate to them.
You can expect your first job to pay a little more than minimum wage. However, most places now pay for your training, pay for your exams and give extra time to study during work. You can more than likely expect your first job to be helpdesk.
You can expect to have to apply to hundreds of jobs to get your first one. However, if you follow my previous advice you should be getting call backs from recruiters at a minimum. If not, then it will be your CV that needs to change.
If you want to be successful you will have to sacrifice. I get up 3 hours before my shift and I study. Every single day, and I work longer on weekends. I offer every single time someone needs to stay late or come in early. I often stay late after work finishes to tidy up cases and prepare for the next day. I work through every single lunch. The reason for this is because I take twice as many cases as the other person that started 3 months before me, lets call this person “anon”, anon is my direct competition and he drives me to be the best I can be.
The results of my hard work are that I am sitting my exam in half the time that Anon will take (honestly I doubt he will take it when he says). I have closed more cases than him and he has been at the company for 7.5 months vs my 4.5 months. I was asked to go to site to setup a switch for a customer (twice) over anon. I have been “selected” by my manager to work directly with on a fileserver project. It looks like he has taken me under his wing (which I highly recommend, if you can get someone to teach you that is half as smart as my manager then do it).
I have had multiple people tell me they notice how engaged I am during meetings, and how well they think I am doing. I have had a number of times a 2nd line ask me if I want to be shown something that typically only goes to 2nd Line.
I have learned that hard work, determination and a willingness to learn does not go unnoticed.
What are some of the negatives to expect?
But it isn’t all fairytails, there are downsides too. I don’t spend as much time with my wife or doing the things I like. I feel guilty if I watch a film instead of study. If you take twice as many cases you are going to make at least twice as many mistakes. Making mistakes is normal, and you have to learn from them, but if you take them to heart like me, then you are going beat yourself up twice as often.
Ultimately, the sky is the limit, how hard you work will depend on you and what drives you. I have my foot in the door and I have no intention of taking my foot of the gas anytime soon. If you think that once you get your foot in the door that the hard part is over, then that simply isn’t the case I am afraid.
How to give yourself the best opportunity in your career (tips no one tells you).
I push myself out of my comfort zone many times a day. I do this so that these things become my comfort zone. I notice how often my manager trusts me to do something that he wouldn’t normally let a 1st line support engineer do.
You can expect to have a highly stressful working environment. You are going to have many fires to put out at the same time, and you need to organise yourself so it doesn’t overwhelm you. I think something that no certificate teaches you, or that I have yet to see, and it is easily the most important thing I have learned, is to have a to do list. First thing in the morning, before you do anything, fire up notepad or onenote and write down everything you have to do in that day. It doesn’t have to be in order, just get writing. And then anytime you complete a task look at notepad and start working on the next thing. Also, if anyone asks you to do anything ever, fire up notepad, and write it down. You can be albert Einstein himself, and you are going to forget to do a good chunk of that stuff if you write it down. And remember, you are going to make a lot of mistakes, but forgetting to do stuff is a terrible mistake to make and can be easily avoided.
If you have to stop someone mid flow because you realise they are telling you to do a multistep thing, then stop them and fire it up and ask them to start again. Annoying but better than having to call them later and ask them to say it all again, or worse just forget it.
You can expect a relatively thankless job. There will always be those people who remember to thank you and make you feel like you are appreciated, but more often than not you will get someone who the second the thing works, they want off the phone. Get used to goodbyes being a tad rushed/awkward.
You can expect that you will need a lot of help. But try to be smart and kind about it. Try speaking to those people about things in which you don’t ask for help and ask them about themselves. Develop relationships that are meaningful. Also, try and vary the people you ask for help from, don’t take advantage of someone because they are polite and never let you know that inside they are frustrated because they too have a big to do list. Spread your help out and try and make up for the fact you are going to be a big inconvenience by offering to help in other ways. Make the coffees, make the teas, offer to take dogsh*t menial tasks that need doing. These sorts of things are good way to pay it back to someone that you won’t be able to help technically.
Advice to avoid serious mistakes.
Always think about what you are doing. Always. Is this something you should be doing? Is this something that needs approval? is this something you should check with someone first?
Checking with someone is not the same as asking for help and it has saved my ass more times than I can count. Don’t be the person that causes a service outage because you didn’t check if something is right. It may feel obvious, it may make you look dumb. But if I was to be shown 100 tasks and asked what my gut tells me is the “proper protocol” for each one, I would get most wrong. Don’t try and guess what is best for the customer or company policy.
This is what I like to call good old-fashioned Arse-covering. It covers yours and your employers.
Those £72K jobs exist. And people do them. You could be one of them, but it will take years of dedication and sacrifice. If that sounds like you, if you can be driven, passionate and determined then nothing will stop you.
Thank you for reading.
If you are crazy enough to still be reading this, then thank you. I wish you all the luck in the world.
TLDR: Hard work and self-belief pays off. Nothing is going to stop you except YOU.

DKNG - Fundamental DD Part II - DKNG

Not Financial Advice (NFA)
Warning: Wall of Text. If you hate reading just skim through the bolded/italicized
Ever since I publicized my findings on DKNG, the stock has underperformed & probably has fucked a lot of people here, especially given the overly bullish stance back in June. Unless you took my advice & got into Puts then, congrats, welcome to tendie town. For the ADHD retards, here’s what the next wall of text is going to summarize: I believe at the current price of ~$30, the stock is oversold.
A tech-focused, high-growth Company that has made sports betting easy to understand with an aesthetically pleasing interface similar to how Robinhood has neatly laid out stock market gimmicks so even high-schoolers can make sense of it I believe, is underpriced at these levels.
Let’s get into some details as to why the stock has underperformed:
First off, the news slate revolving sports with the rumored delay/cancellation of the MLB season & the NFL watching from the sidelines is in my view, just a part of why the stock has underperformed. We’ll revisit this later in this post, but I want to focus on the drivers of the stock’s recent underperformance, & why these factors are now in the rearview mirror.
Part I – The Past Has Passed – SPAC-related Equity Dilution
History lesson first: DKNG went public via a SPAC merger, which has exploded in popularity recently. Anyone serious about analyzing stocks going forward needs to do their homework on this, Google is your friend.
A feature of most SPAC merger to public listings that creates a headwind to near-term share prices are embedded equity dilution events, usually in the form of earn-outs (stock bonuses to execs, the SPAC sponsor) & conversion of Warrants.
On 5/24, the earn-outs were triggered, adding 6m shares to the share count.
On 6/26, 16.3m warrants converted to DKNG, netting them ~$188m of cash.
Stepping back a little, in addition to the above, on 6/18 DKNG launched a follow-on equity offering of 16M shares @ $40/Share [1], receiving $621M in proceeds.
The last part is tricky to understand from a dilution perspective. To simplify, historically it’s almost a coin toss whether a Company’s shares outperform on the onset of an equity offering. While issuing shares does dilute the existing shareholder base, it theoretically shouldn’t, if the proceeds from the offering are earmarked for investments/projects that yield outsized returns. This is the reality for the long term, theory for the short-term. For the short-term, the ‘reality’ isn’t that the proceeds will be used for investments/projects that yield outsized returns, it is more about how convincing management is to investors that the investments they intend to pursue with the proceeds will outweigh the dilutive effects of issuing incremental shares. That’s a mouthful, but hopefully you get what I’m trying to convey.
All of this stuff put together – the Company has increased its share count by ~39M, but now has a whopping ~$1.4Bn of cash [2]. More on this in the next section.
Part II – MLB News Should Not Fucking Matter & DKNG Is Positioned As the Leading Online/Mobile Sports Platform
DKNG should not be so tied to MLB news or any of this shit as the ongoing success of the NBA/NHL season + Soccer in Europe has effectively created a blueprint on how to regulate player behavior so that they maintain professionalism amidst the pandemic. I’m going out on a whim here, but I truly think the MLB threatening a cancellation of the season is pure posturing to get these fuckers to behave appropriately. Maybe a ‘bubble’ is what it takes to get these players to focus on their jobs instead of going out & contracting COVID, but I argue that isn’t necessarily required given Soccer in Europe. So there’s already a proven path here without the need for a bubble in Soccer, so MLB/NFL should be fine, and execs need to study how they got it done in Europe. Okay, back to some facts.
Anecdotally, I’ve kept in touch with a handful of sports bookies from California to New York & even internationally about what they’re seeing – all of them say that since the NBA season started on 7/30 & since Soccer (especially the Premier League) resumed in June, along with other leagues like La Liga & Serie A, they’ve seen massive increases in betting.
These numbers are also showing up in the official data [3]:

Average % increase in sports betting handle from April 2020 to June 2020 (handle is the total $ wagered in sports bets) from the states that reported up to June 2020 (NJ, PA, MS, RI, WV, IA, IN, NH) of +258%!
- Note: NV is left out due to the site I sourced showing a weirdly negative number – so I dug into the official filings & show specifically, Sports Mobile betting growth from June since April has growing by at least +73% [4]

REMEMBER: This is for June only! No NBA, No NHL, No MLB, just Soccer, Golf, NASCAR & UFC.
The data clearly shows that there was a ton of pent-up sports betting demand, which leads one Wall St. analyst to think that betting on the NBA/NHL could ABSORB the MLB’s sports betting handle (handle = total $ size of sports bet) [5]. Remember, the MLB season is still ongoing, with games being played. The entire focus is on the Miami Marlins & St. Louis Cardinals. Fucking retards.
Additionally, I want to remind everyone that DraftKings.com is the #1 Fantasy sports website in the U.S. [6]. Also, since April 2020 site visitations are up +86% [7] & Google Search Trends for “Draft Kings” is up ~3x compared to PRE-COVID levels [8]. What does this mean? They are piquing more people’s curiosity than prior to COVID/ongoing slate of sports.
This is important because remember that ~$1.4Bn chest full of cash I mentioned DKNG had assembled earlier? Well, that money is being put to work & results are already coming in, which is exactly what DKNG intended to do with it.
Part III – Legalization of Sports Betting in the U.S.
I could write a fucking bible on this topic alone, but for now we’ll stick to some basics. Due to COVID, it’s easy to understand that each State’s financial situation is clearly in shit. Because of this, you better believe that these guys are going to start taking a hard look at how they can extract additional tax revenues, & what’s one of the easiest ways to do this? Legalization & taxation of gambling.
The big players: CA, TX, FL & NY. First, CA pushing its legislation out to 2023 was fucked up, but here’s a twist I want to add to this: Anything that has to do with gambling in CA you better believe is lobbied against by not just the Tribal casino owners in CA, but by the deep pockets of Las Vegas money. Similar thing can be said for FL, but let’s take a look at some actions by LV/nationwide gambling companies that are starting to align financial incentives with guys like DKNG.

MGM / GVC Holdings JV in BetMGM - $450m total invested
PENN invests $163m into BS Sports
Caesars has a 20% stake in William Hill plus partnership deals with The Stars Group (TSG) & our winner DKNG for operating its sports books

So it’s safe to say going forward, nationwide legalization of sports betting will reap rewards for everyone involved, & no longer be something LV money is completely focused on safeguarding.
Let’s also not forget that DKNG didn’t become the Company they are today because of their fancy app, but because their management team has a HISTORY of navigating the U.S.’s legal framework to get what they want out of it.

The Crown Jewel – The Internet Gambling Prohibition & Enforcement Act: I said it in a previous post, but I want to emphasize that them getting Fantasy Sports to be labeled a ‘game of skill’ by FEDERAL Law as opposed to gambling is just something for the history books. Fucking genius shit. When this happened I bet every casino from LV to every Indian Tribe that has one was against it, yet DKNG & other DFS providers won.
There’s more, but more recently: Getting into IL:
- In IL, there’s an 18-month ‘penalty box’ for Companies that offer DFS to offer sports betting. Our guys at DKNG created a workaround to this situation with their partnership with Casino Queen [9]. DKNG being savvy again.

These guys are at the cutting edge of creating legal frameworks to successfully launch their products & now with more of their ‘competitors’ financially aligned with them, combined with financial deterioration of State budgets, we should see an overweighting of good news vs. bad on the legal front.
Final Part – Share Price Targets
Under-fucking priced at anything below $42.50
Near-term catalysts:
8/14: DKNG files 2Q’20 results, might be shitty, but you can bet that the Earnings Call is going to contain rhetoric on how massive the uptick in sports betting has been since late June/July.
Sometime from now until November: NY releases ‘study’ by Spectrum Gaming on online/mobile sports betting.
8/20 – 9/7: PGA Championship for FedEx Cup Title
9/5 – KY Derby
9/10: NFL KickOff Game
9/17: PGA U.S. Open Start Date
Month of October: NBA/NHL Playoffs
10/1: Estimated launch of online sports betting in TN
11/1: Estimated launch of online sports betting in VA
[1] https://draftkings.gcs-web.com/news-releases/news-release-details/draftkings-announces-proposed-public-offering-class-common-stock
[2] Wall St. Research – DKNG on 6/29/20
[3] https://www.legalsportsreport.com/sports-betting/revenue/
[4] https://gaming.nv.gov/modules/showdocument.aspx?documentid=16984; Note: Nevada did not break out April/May figures but from the Revenue difference of 3 month ended June 30 of 4,950 vs. month of June of 2,297 for a total difference of 2,653 spread evenly over April/May for a base case April estimate of 1,327.
[5] Wall St. Research - 7/27/20
[6] https://www.similarweb.com/top-websites/category/sports/fantasy-sports/
[7] https://www.similarweb.com/website/draftkings.com/#overview
[8] https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?geo=US&q=draft%20kings Feb 23-29, 2020 vs. Current Aug 2 – Aug 8, 2020
[9] https://www.legalsportsreport.com/42314/draftkings-illinois-sports-betting-market-access/

Sims 3 mods to add realism to your game

Found this pist somewhere. A bit long but interesting...

...''I have been putting off writing this post for quite some time. I do not apologize for the length of this post. I could literally write a book on this subject. So, I have filtered it down as much as possible without sacrificing the bare minimum you would need to understand the situation, we as Canadians, find ourselves in today. You can take the time to read it, or you can ignore it. Its my job apparently to be the one to post this. It’s your job to decide what, if anything, you want to do about it.
I cannot however sit idly by and watch what is going on in our country right now. This is CANADA. How could I look my daughter in the eye later in life without knowing I did everything possible to fight and stop this nonsense.
Canada is under attack. You have to realize this by now. We have been infiltrated at the highest levels of government. Everyone talking to you on the TV, is paid by our infiltrated and/or corrupt government. You are told what to think and you are told what to believe and you are told how to act - and you obey.
Nortel was the most powerful internet company in the world, handling 70% of the worlds internet traffic. They were the jewel of the tech world, and they were Canadian. Starting in 2004, Nortel began being infiltrated by the Communist Government of China. Using all of the Intellectual Property stolen from Nortel, Huawei was born. Hauwei proceeded to bid against every Nortel opportunity, and using their own technology, by 2009, Nortel was bankrupt. Canada was the global leader in technology. Now those billions of dollars and ultimately 100’s of 1000’s of high paid, highly skilled employees, along with world leading Canadian technology, now belonged to China.
https://globalnews.ca/news/7275588/inside-the-chinese-military-attack-on-nortel/
Shortly after the bankruptcy of Nortel, in 2010, The director of CSIS, TEN YEARS AGO, in an unprecedented move, came on CBC News and warned us that our government is being infiltrated by hostile foreign nations.
https://youtu.be/5j-tRKdMx8g
From the very top, our Government has been completely infiltrated by the Communist Government of China. These senior officials are either directly complicit in the motives of China, or are direct agents of the Chinese Government and Communist Party.
Justin Trudeau has sent $100’s of Millions of dollars to China. Under the guise of “climate change” and “women’s health”. When the United States backed out of their membership with the World Health Organization (WHO), Justin Trudeau stepped up and committed the United States near $1 Billion commitment. The WHO is a Communist China controlled organization.
https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/a-global-challenge-pm-trudeau-commits-850-million-to-global-fight-against-covid-19-1.4923565
Trudeau has committed our 5G infrastructure and network contract to Hauwei. Yes, the same Hauwei who infiltrated and bankrupted Nortel. Trudeau is literally paying and rewarding China for stealing Canadian technology, stealing billions of dollars from our economy, stealing 100’s of 1000’s of high paying jobs from our country. He’s also submarining other Canadian Tech companies with 5G capabilities (for example Telus or Rogers) and handing these contracts and these jobs and the further technological development, off the backs of Canadian tax payers - to communist China.
As if this is not bad enough, Trudeau is alienating us from our allies. We are the only “5 eyes nations” (security data sharing co-operative) who are allowing Hauwei into our country and allowing Communist China access to all of our data.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-canada-now-only-member-of-five-eyes-alliance-to-have-not-banned-huawei/
As a result, this prompted the US president to threaten to line our borders with US military. Even though the US president has backed off of this threat for now, you must understand that the rest of the world is very well aware Canada is falling to Communist China. No one is going to help us if we allow this to happen
https://globalnews.ca/news/6735064/coronavirus-militarizing-canada-us-borde
Everyone keeps insisting, that despite all the science, despite all logic and reason, we must listen to the experts. Ok, but, which experts should we listen to? Dr Tam?
Well, how come the last 2 experts who held Dr Tam’s role in Canada, both disagree with her?
https://www.660citynews.com/2020/07/09/health-experts-covid-strategy/?fbclid=IwAR3DJGBeK-8vjD2AGLpvK7SoUkcvzzQk6OovXIJIbK39NEcyioiViJoSUF0
So, which “expert” should we listen to? Is Dr Tam more qualified than both her previous predecessors? The answer is of course not. Anyone who has followed my posts, since the very first day of COVID lockdowns, understands I have spoken up loudly against these measures. The science simply does not support it. These are politically motivated actions. These public health policies are Communist China Public Health policies. These public health policies are meant to control a population, and allow a tyrannical government the ability to take over the economy. These ARE NOT Canadian Public Health policies.
A candidate for the Canadian Conservative Party leadership, publicly expressed these concerns re Dr Tam. For his efforts, he was labelled a “racist” and was nearly expelled from the party. Although he refused to apologize, he did later back down from his stance, and indicated he wasn’t questioning Dr Tam’s loyalty to Canada.
https://globalnews.ca/news/6884140/derek-sloan-theresa-tam-attack/
Well, I am not Derek Sloan. I will say it loudly. Dr Tam is a traitor and Dr Tam works directly for Communist China. I don’t say this because she is of Asian descent. I say this, because she is a traitor. I love and respect all Chinese Canadians loyal to Canada. I myself am from an off the boat immigrant family. I am loyal to Canada. If someone from my country of origin were a high ranking government official and acting as a traitor, I would also call them a traitor. I would not be racist against myself for saying so. All of the Chinese Canadians I know, are amazing people. They are my friends and my neighbours. I do not know Dr Tam, and I do not want to know her. She needs to resign immediately.
In a similar way, Chrystia Freeland, is also obviously a traitor. She however is white, so, I presume I will be labelled a “sexist” instead of a “racist” in this case? She has been hand picked and placed as the Deputy PM in Canada, and when our current Minister of Finance stepped down as a result of the corruption in our Federal Government, she was also named Canada’s new Minister of finance. She is on PUBLIC RECORD, stating the economy cannot be resumed, unless it is resumed within the framework of her radical environmentalist ideology. Am I the only one asking what Public Health COVID lockdowns have to do with her environmental ideology? Am I the only one asking why the small business and private sector needs to be destroyed over COVID and public health policies, but, cannot be resumed until her flagrant socialist economy, thinly veiled beneath a radical environmentalist ideology is implemented?
Chrystia Freeland is the author of a book called
“Plutocrats: The Rise of the New Global Super-Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else in 2012”
It’s ironic that her policies are directly destroying “everyone else”. Small business owners, private sector, etc. The ONLY ones thriving under Dr Tam’s and Chrystia Freeland’s policies, are the new “Global Super-Rich”. If you read Chrystia Freeland’s book, you would understand. It is pure Marxist Rhetoric. Proletariat vs Bourgeois. She is an open Communist, and in all likelihood, either directly an agent of Communist China or willingly complicit in Communist China policies.
We are seeing the impossible happen in Canada. We are playing identity politics at the highest levels of our governments. We are told we are “systematically racist”, thereby justifying the dismantling of our entire system. We are told some of us have inherent “privilege”. We are being divided into groups, and those groups are being turned against each other. We have been locked in our homes, we have been forced to wear masks, we have been forced to mask our children. Our small business sector is being obliterated, and the barriers of entry to start a new business have been massively expanded. A significant percentage of the population has been moved to permanent government assistance. Unemployment is soaring, Debt is soaring and our death rate is soaring (and not from COVID). The only people profiting are our government officials and the largest corporations (who are all turning record profits) - and of course - The communist government of China. We are told this is about “equity” and about “fairness”, but, as these malicious practices have always done, anywhere and everywhere they have been implemented, wealth always moves out of the citizens hands, and back into the hands of the few. There is no one fighting this in Canada. From our most senior politicians right through to our media, they are all beating the same drum.
For Pete’s sake, Chrystia Freeland is openly stating her intention to sink the Canadian energy segment and refuses to re-open our economy from COVID lockdowns, until we implement her environmentalist strategy. And who do you think will provide all that energy and infrastructure for her new “Green” economy. Communist China of course.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-08-26/trudeau-plots-sharpest-turn-left-in-economic-policy-since-1980s
We are watching the communist take over of our country - and its not subtle.
The world is watching us. Everyone is very very well aware what is happening in Canada.
Australian Scholar Clive Hamilton, recently published a book called “Hidden Hand”, which chronicles how Beijing uses elites in target countries to extend its influence and control. He says, and I quote
“Beijing’s Promotion of Election Candidates it controls most advanced in Canada”
I searched for the THE MOST CRITICAL REVIEW of Clive Hamilton’s book I could find. You simply cannot accept anything less than is concluded within this review
https://theconversation.com/book-review-hidden-hand-exposing-how-the-chinese-communist-party-is-reshaping-the-world-142058
From the director of CSIS’s public warnings 10 years ago, to Clive Hamilton’s world renowned work being published today, to everything you are watching around you.
Maybe you should ask yourself why the media is doing nothing except talking about infection rates and divisive identity politics. They cant even discuss death rates anymore, as no one is dying - at least not from COVID. So, they switched the narrative to “stop the spread” to keep you scared and compliant. Why do you not know about the massive infiltration by Communist China into our government, when the rest of the world is well aware of this and state it matter of factly?
The Communist Government of China either owns via subsidiaries or by influence, massive chunks of our media. The same media that is funded with our tax dollars. The same media which drives horrific public health policies, has you masking your children and has us playing Marxist and Communist identity politics ideologies against each other
https://www.macleans.ca/politics/worldpolitics/canadas-media-is-in-thrall-to-china/
Ask yourself how Canada got here, and so quickly. Ask yourself why Canada is implementing Communist China Public Health Policies. Ask yourself why Canada is outsourcing all of our technology and the upcoming 5G network infrastructure and deployments to Hauwei and Communist China. 5G technology is wonderful and is desperately needed in a country as massive and remotely populated as Canada. You thought Facebook selling data to Advertisers was unacceptable? what do you think China will be doing with ALL of your data? Ask yourself how Canada has spiralled to a $1.2 Trillion dollar debt - owned by, you guessed it, Communist China. Ask yourself why a significant portion of that $1.2T debt was sent to China under the guise of “climate change” or “women’s health”, and now we also owe China that money, plus interest, within our debt. Ask yourself why Canada sold all of our gold and gold mines to Communist China.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinas-move-to-buy-arctic-gold-mine-draws-fire-in-canada-11595764801
Now ask yourself, what happened to Hong Kong?
First thing The Communist Government of China did was infiltrate Hong Kong at the highest levels. Remember their rhetoric? “2 systems, 1 country”.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-hongkong-protests/one-country-two-systems-can-continue-beyond-2047-hong-kong-leader-idUSKBN1ZF0NO
They than marketed, via their Government controlled mass media, justifications for their Army to be present on Hong Kong soil. Ironically enough, Justin Trudeau, under the FIPA (Foreign Investment Protection Act) signed in 2019, has approved that the Communist Government of China is permitted Security Forces on Canadian soil without requiring CANADIAN “knowledge or consent”. The “validation” is to protect Chinese Government owned assets. Meaning, their Hauwei assets, in Canada. So, effectively, we allowed Hauwei to steal Nortel technology, bankrupt them, sell that technology back to us and now guard those assets on our own soil with their military.
https://www.actforcanada.ca/l/canada-today-invaded-by-chinese-troops/
Remember all the brave and powerful and virtue signalling facebook warriors? Remember everyone posting “Free Hong Kong” memes all over Facebook? Well, Hong Kong is effectively gone. All the leaders of the Hong Hong Free Press who would not comply, are gone. They have been disappeared. All of the organizers of the protests are gone. They have been disappeared. This is whats happening in Canada, RIGHT NOW. We will be the next Communist State of China, no different than Hong Kong - and everyone in the world knows this except us.
Communist China does not tolerate freedom. And, although Communists always penetrate with verbiage like “privilege” or “systemic racism” or “diversity and inclusion”, you must understand these are just weapons to seed division, fear and hate. Once they take control, the first thing they do is imprison or kill the groups and ethnicities they do not like. Right now in China, approximately 1 Million Muslim Uygars have been imprisoned in internment camps and are used as slave labour. I am willing to wager that once they implement such attrocities in Canada, all of the professional victim, identity politics idiots running around our country causing havoc today will suddenly realize they weren’t as oppressed as they thought they were. I bet ya they would give anything to get their old lives and old freedoms back.
Now ask yourself, despite all rhyme or reason, despite all science, despite everything Canada stands for, why are you taking orders from people and organizations who are owned and controlled by Communist China? They have no real power today. Even with an infiltrated media, even with infiltrated high ranking government officials. They have no power today. That is why the media keep pumping fear and division down our throats 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Do the exact opposite of everything the media tells you to do. Demand elections and clear out these infiltrated traitors from our government. Insist the new government stands up to China. Insist the new Government shows loyalty to our allies and re-aligns with our allies. Ensure our new government kicks Hauwei out of Canada, and works to build up Telus and Rogers to compete with them. Ensure the new government ends the FIPA agreement we have signed with China. Or do you honestly think that the US will protect us once China has soldiers all over our country and once they have occupied and destroyed us like they did to Hong Kong?
Finally - Insist the new Government stops funding our media with our tax dollars. Insist our Government funds independent Canadian media, who will once again operate as the “free press” and dilute the flagrant propaganda Communist China is force feeding you. Why is our tax funded media spending so much time turning us against our US allies? Have you never asked yourself that question? not even once? Why are our media pushing Identity Politics so heavily? Why are our media pushing Communist China Public Health Policies so heavily? Why are they pushing Hauwei so heavily? The Communist Government of China has infiltrated many countries, every country is dealing with this and fighting in their own way and to various degrees. No one is coming to help us. We are on our own. Other countries are fighting back. Canada is not. Are we simply going to surrender?
Take off your masks. You look ridiculous. Stop living your life in fear, because soon, you will be living your life in chains. Many brave hero’s sacrificed everything to allow you and your children to live free.

Icy D&D then Warhammer campaign (part 2)

For those who read part 1, you might think I wouldn't want to play again with the DM but we were fellow players in other campaigns, had other shared hobbies and were anyway quite good pals.
So, a few years later, when he suggested to do another campaign in his homebrew setting, we were quite interested because we had mainly played Warhammer in the meanwhile and his military campaign promised a change of pace compared to regular Warhammer.
He decided to use Warhammer rules for simplicity (and to avoid "munchkining"...yeah, that should've been a red flag). The careers available were mainly from the original ones but the big change was with the "races".
We would all play humans but we could originate from different tribes so each would have different attributes modifiers. More on that later because yes, it meant we would not be playing soldiers from the Sossar kingdom but tribemen from the various clans from the frosty lands of the setting.
This was interesting as we would have more variety between our characters. The setting had changed as well. The Sossar kingdom was now more of a declining empire and the tribes were getting more autonomy. The themes of the clan would not be only animalistic (eg : the Clan of the Rivers, which my character would be from).
A big surprise was that there was another "race" apart from tribepeople. They were some kind of big Greeks warriors, towering at about 2m-2m20 (should I say 6 feet and a half to 7 feet and some?) while the tribe people were about 1m60 (5 feet and a few inches at best). They felt a lot like Achilles from Troy or as a people, the Spartans in 300.
In addition to their incredible skill to fight, they were stronger, tougher, had better reach, better equipment and had access to magic. Who would want to play a tribeman when you see such a resume? Well... at session 0, the DM told us we were all to play tribemen because those greek warriors were powerful (you bet!) and rare so only one player could have one... And of course, the chosen one (henceforth called greek god) had been chosen apart from the rest of the group and had already rolled his character... Okayyy...
We all rolled our characters, thinking that the greek god could go frontline and tank for us because he was better at everything than everyone and could as well use buff and heal spells. For those who played Warhammer 1st edition, the spells allowed him to make effects like +1 to +5 in any attribute...yeah, especially Strength, Toughness or Attacks (the intensity depended on his check, which was based on his colossal Toughness, because)
The party was :

Me, a bounty hunter (I was planning on getting to the targeteer career and so, focused on my bowman aspect, with the DM agreement - important at some later point) from the clan of the rivers.
"Greek god". His career was homebrewed by the DM and involved heavy bonuses in Weapon skill, Strength, Toughness, Attack and Willpower. Enough said. (he played in the first campaign. Now that I remember it, he was playing a cleric)
"Rogue", a female outlaw from a clan I don't remember (played by a guy but it won't excuse some things that happened to his character).
"Young river", a young player recruited from our wargame club. He took the same clan as I but played a more...wary type of character. Imagine an eskimo hunter with a tendency to lose himself in the moment when fight begins.
"Murder-hobo", another young player from our club. I don't remember his clan (and he had a few characters) but I think it was the one who had a thing for poison. He will often be difficult to control (I'm sure you'll guess why).
"Poison-hobo", some kind of assassin from the clan that specializes in poison. I would have chosen another nickname but it would spoil a "fun" story incoming. (he was also in the previous campaign and was quite new at the time)

To explain how our group came together, some details about the changed setting : a few decades before we started, a group of huge soldiers (the "greek gods") appeared in this world through a portal. They were some kind of exiles. As they were trapped in this plane, they mingled with the clans and eventually became part of the country, getting some lands and becoming allied with some of the tribes.
Details are fuzzy in my mind, but we were all part of some military order, to which the allied clans "offered" young people as tribute to be trained to maintain the alliance. We were some squad sent on various missions across the country, to fight raiders, settle disputes between tribes, hunting monsters... This gave us a bit of prestige, and even authority in some regions. Needless to say, Greek god was also the face of the group because of his stature (literally and figuratively), speaking of which, as even the DM felt Greek god was getting too much importance, it was decided that Greek god would be the "support officer" while I was appointed "troop officer" in order to manage the team, made mostly of beginners. I agreed, mostly because yes, we had young people and beginners at the table, but I'm not much for leading roles and as I wanted to play in the rear guard with my archer, I wasn't sure it was the best for me.
The setting was still this harsh cold world where we had to constantly be on edge because the nature could kill us as easily as a foaming berserker troll with a double-bladed axe. Resources were precious so Poison-hobo and Murder-hobo in particular became sick hoarders. We had mounts that were some kind of hybrid between a chocobo, a velociraptor and a taun-taun. Poison-hobo and Murder-hobo turned them into beasts of burden, carrying huge bags full of every single things they could put their hands on (tools, weapons, complete sets of armor, tents, food...corpses...yes...).
Iron was a rare metal. Most weapon were made of copper (I don't know why not bronze, but heh...), which was considered as sturdy as real-life iron. And in-game iron, depending of its purity, was more like some of our best alloys of steel, or even more like some fantasy metal (the DM applied varied bonuses). You might have guessed it, Greek god was full-clad in iron (for the Warhammer players : he had an armor equivalent to full plate, but had 3 instead of 2 on his chest, and he had a shield that gave him 2 armor points instead of the regular 1) but his superior genes made it so he wasn't in any danger because of the intense cold :p
This system would cause later some arms race, something not really appropriate for the Warhammer system. As we would encounter ennemies with better equipment than ours, we would of course take it so the DM would give even better equipment to others guys later on, et cetera, et cetera.
Also, Poison-hobo, the poison specialist, is from a clan that uses poison, obviously, but they also developed some kind of poison resistance. This is because they frequently expose themselves voluntarily to poison so they will build slightly their resistance over the years. That kind of process isn't realistically easy to apply while you are under strain and fighting your way through hordes of enemies but it was a nice background detail explaining how that clan used that kind of weapon more often and better than anyone else. But Poison-hobo would regurlarly explain how his character was sipping poison from a bottle because "that's what they do in his clan"... Yeaaah xD

Sooo, our party was ready to roll. Really early on, I felt once again pretty boned by the DM's weird houserules and DMing decisions. While we were traveling towards a city in the mountains, we were ambushed at some place where several paths were separated by rifts. You could go from one path to another with some wooden bridges. On the battle map, there were 2 bridges on the path we were on. And it was obvious that we could hold our position easily by defending both bridges so the numerous raiders could not overwhelm us.
At first, I was firing arrows across the rifts and suggesting to the melee fighters to position themselves at each bridge. Of course, considering we had Greek god, it was obvious to me that he was supposed to hold one bridge at frontline. By the way, the player was the oldest player of the group and quite experienced as much in TRPG as in wargames. I didn't think he would need any specific instructions about what he should do. Instead of doing that, he let the younger players rush towards the first bridge, happy they were to get some action, and positioned himself carefully behind them, poking the enemies with his spear above the tribemen.
I was amazed... All this was too perfectly planned. That was not something normally allowed by the rules but it all made sense. The fact that we were reminded at session 0 that our characters were slightly shorter than average while the greek gods were actually way taller than average felt at that moment as another dick move.
Picture the scene : The Giant-Spartan-Cleric-God hiding behind his shield, behind a small eskimo and a small tribeman, poking safely with all the length of his spear and huge arm.
Rogue was also firing arrows and Poison-hobo...I don't remember what shenanigans he was doing at the time but one thing was sure : nobody seemed to have any intention to defend the other bridge, despite my instructions (that they were supposed to follow, being their officer). So, against my better instincts, I rushed towards the second bridge to avoid being swarmed while screaming at the others to come and help me holding the spot. They were hesitating a bit too long, and Greek god felt pretty cozy behind his meatshields, so I was eventually put down and the raiders swarmed from my bridge.
Then, new houseruling from the DM. As I took a critical hit, he asked me what I wanted to do. Normally, I would have two choices : either, I use a Destiny point and I avoid the consequences of this situation for the time being (ie : I might fall unconscious and awaken later, when the fight is off) or I take the effect of the critical. As I knew I took a minor critical, I decided to apply it (it was nothing too problematic, just some numbness or something like that) and roleplay it by letting me falling down and play dead because I was quite pissed at the group for having letting me handling this by myself. But the DM was having none of that...
DM : If you do that, a raider slit your throat so he'll be sure you are dead.
Me : Why would he do that now ? He just wrecked me and beside, he is in the middle of a fight, how could he think to stop and slit my throat while there are others PC a few meters away ?
DM : That's what he will do.
Me : So can I just use my Destiny point to be out of the fight and regain conciousness later ?
DM : No, if you do that, you will just avoid the hit and will have to face the others attacking you.
Me : That's not how Destiny points work.
DM : Yes, it is. That's how I do it.
I was boned anyhow, so I continued to fight despite the situation. I finally managed to let myself slip to someplace safe a bit later while the rest of the group was FINALLY coming to help but it cost me a Destiny point because I took another hit that would have been much worse and I had no intention to lose another point because of the others' cowardice. Apart from me, everyone was in good shape at the end of the fight. The magnanimous Greek god healed me and we went on with our travel.
When we arrived to the city in the mountains, our status made that the authorities gave us an inn to serve as headquarters for our order. Moreover, they were quite happy to see us as they were expecting an attack by a huge horde of barbarians, and asked us for help. Their city was targeted because of their wealth and because it was a peculiar place where the weather was warm as if in spring while the rest of the country is in a permanent winter. So we made camp in the inn and started to explore the city to discover a bit about it and learn as much as we could.
A lot happened in this city but as all this story took place maybe 10 years ago, I'll just explain some of the crunchiest details. The fact that the city was warm was due to a magical orb hidden under the city. That's why it was targeted by the horde (which we discovered was lead by some cult). Our explorations under the city lead us to where the orb was and it was guarded by some Marilith-like creature. A big WTF-moment for the DD players among us because here, we were in Warhammer system and clearly not expecting to be able to fight such a monster.
Murder-hobo met his first demise in this city. While exploring the less refined neighbourhood, he picked a fight in a tavern owned by some mobsters after trying to get their money in a dice game. He thought that pulling his knife to a random thief would help him getting out of there. We found him pinned to our door the next day. His next character was not so different from the first one and quickly recruited to help us go on with the mission.
The city suffered from several attacks. The horde held a siege and we were often in bad shape as we had to help defend the walls. On one instance, Rogue was pretty beaten up. We had her patched up in the inn, that now looked more like a butchery (between the attacks we had suffered from various gangsters and the fact that it had become an improvised hospital). She was strapped to a table because she had to get surgery and I think she suffered some trauma due to critical hits. After the surgery, she was let there to recover. Poison-hobo thought it would be funny to rape her while she was unconscious. About half the table told him not to do that. The other half was laughing crassly...

Later, we had to flee the city because the siege could not be held for much longer. It was stupid as hell how we managed it. The group as well as some morons we force-recruited started digging inside the inn. It was a huge work, with tons of debris, beams to support the structure, puleys...all that to dig a hole through the side of the mountain a few meters away from where the inn stood. We left from there in the mountains while the city was overrun by mad barbarians... Epic ! (not)
At some point, we encountered a group from Poison-hobo clan. We exposed to them what he did to Rogue and a trial was held. He could have been killed but the player was given a chance to atone, under the reasoning that we were at war and every « good » man was needed. So Rogue was given a ritual dagger by the poison clan, with the permission to castrate Poison-hobo at any point, for any reason, if she felt like so. On the other hand, the clan specifically forbid Poison-hobo to ever touch her again and, because she might be pregnant (yeah, the DM considered that possibility for later...), she would be considered part of the clan, as well as the hypothetical child.
Poison-hobo, despite his actions, found at some point a « cursed » magic dagger that made him bloodthirsty (yeah, no changes comparing to before) and gave him an ability to regenerate during battle. Each time he was hurt, he could make a Toughness check. If he passed, he could regenerate some wounds (sometimes, he regenerated more than the last wound). If he missed, a tattoo spread on his body. The curse was that if the tattoo covered his whole body, he would be possessed by a demon. This never happened because Greek god constantly cast his spell to boost Toughness so Poison-hobo almost never missed any test.
We encountered an ogre. That first fight was memorable but set some dangerous precedents. It was fighting with a huge log, which gave it reach and area attacks (that's already terrifying). Moreover, to emulate their particular strength, the DM always threw an additional D3 to the wounds he inflicted. Because of that, each time that additionnal die gave a 6, the DM considered it like a normal damage die and checked his Weapon Skill again to see if he could throw his dice once again. Ogre encounters were MURDEROUS.
Poison-hobo was carrying corpses on his Gourak (the weird chocobo-lizard-taun taun). It was actually to feed his mount. The poor beast was sick at first but eventually became ravenous for human flesh...
Young river and Murder-hobo were usually funny with their antics. They often put themselves in weird or dangerous situations and we had a good share of laughs. On one instance, while we were fleeing some people in a town, we were running on roofs and trying not to kill ourselves by falling. Risk tests at Warhammer are a bitch. You generally have 50% chance to have a problem. Our young players weren't at all induced to be cautious. We all fondly remember Murder-hobo jumping from a window while pursued by guards, grabbing a rope in one hand, firing his crossbow at the guards with the other hand, and somehow managing to give them the finger all the while (don't ask...).
Some times later, we had a fight with ogres. Yes, with an s. We were shitting ourselves and completely terrified. We were deus ex machina-ed by a squadron of greek gods who completely wrecked the ogres with poison hand-crossbows... important later on.
After that rescue, we were escorted to an encampment of our order. There, we realised there was actually much more greek gods than expected. They weren't anymore that exiled superhumans in decline. Turns out their magnificent genes were dominant (nature is so nice). So they mass-produced babies with the good women from the tribes to perpetuate their blood. The camp was filled with cousins looking vaguely like us tribemen but towering at 6-7 feet and with all the BS equipment and genetics of the greek gods.
We were debriefed from our mission and were considered not really fit for the moment (no joke!). So we would be in training for a while before being sent again in mission. Some changes were made in the team. First, considering the party had been generally pretty stupid, I had been demoted (thanks, guys!). The new officer would be Young river (wait, what?). Second, as it was clear that Young river, Murder-hobo and Poison-hobo were struggling to play their role of scout, hunter or whatever and more focused on...murder-hoboing, I was « promoted » to being the scout. So, roleplay-wise, I was given a big f*** you. And system-wise, I was forced to take the scout career and could forget about my targeteer career, so bye bye the nice path to archery I was about to take. Once again, thanks guys ! And thanks GM to bone me once again while rewarding the others for acting like morons.

We then had a timeskip while we were trained in our new functions. After that, our squad was regrouped and we were sent on a new mission. The specifics elude me but during our first mission,we met at some point a god and learned about his conflict with a goddess. None of them was good but the circumstances made us help the god, which owed us the goddess' enmity.
A big war was preparing, with the goddess cultists taking control of several tribes as well as of monsters like gnolls and ogres. We had to find ways to avoid that war and to ruin the cult plans (bringing back their goddess, wrecking the other god...).
Oh, also, it's been too long since I spoke about Greek god. Sometime before being rescued, we encountered some kind of HUGE white snake. The kind of snake that could wrestle with King Kong or Godzilla. That snake was a spirit or divine. I never knew. The only one we learned something interesting was of course, Greek god. The snake gave him its blessing. After the timeskip, Greek god started to show some snake features. Apparently, he was molting once in a while, gaining new powers (as if he needed it). We were used to that bullshit.
I honestly don't remember if Rogue got pregnant. But Poison-hobo was well covered by his tattoo. It got ridiculous to the point where in some fights, when he took damage while under Greek god spells, he would ask the DM « How much am I covered ? » « 61% »...another hit... « And now ? » « 62% » That was a f***ing video game x)
So, we were sent back on mission and were investigating the cultists to try to mess them good. As we had to expect to fight gnolls and ogres more often, and considering that we still couldn't play greek gods, despite them banging like rabbits, we were at least given some of those nice juicy poison hand-crossbow. Time to hunt some ogres !
...ooor not ! At the first fight with them, the DM immediately retconned his BS X-bows, fearing we would have it too easy. Instead of falling like flies, the ogres who failed their Toughness checks were at first just slower, then a bit drowsy. And only if we sprayed them like on a paintball field, they wouldn't eventually fall.
Some time later, during a night, we were attacked by what was called a snow tiger. Actually, a tiger the size of an elephant, with attributes comparable or higher to a dragon in Warhammer. That was one of the consequences of the arms race. The iron weapons and armor we found could give us such an edge comparing to what gear should do in Warhammer, and of course, the Greek god's spells were so OP (Toughness 9 with 90% of regeneration chances for Poison-hobo or 8 Attacks with Strength 9 for Greek god when he wanted to grab the spotlight even more) made it so that tigers needed that kind of boost to be threatening to Greek god.
The rest of us were extras, condemned to stand in awe before Greek god and Poison-hobo when he was unleashed. At some point, a part of the group (me included) had to run and hide from enemies. We were low on food, quite beaten up, wet and cold. Everything sucked. But my scout skills allowed us to find cover for the night in a cave. At our horror, we found out it was a bear cave. We were basicaly asking ourselves if we'd rather be shred in pieces by bears, or discovered by ogres and gnolls. I then remembered that my character's totem was the bear. Interestingly enough, during character creation, I asked if that totem was of any relevance. The DM said it was just for the background and it gave me a skill. Nice but not very useful and it had never any implication during the whole campaign.
At that point, I told that I would rely on my totem and try to make myself appear to the bear as not a threat. We were so desperate and it seemed like the last chance to survive. I told the others to not attack under any circumstances. If I was assaulted, they had to run as fast as they could and try to survive in the night, hoping to find the rest of the party. The bear awoke and noticed me. The gauged me and after a while, they ignored me and got back to sleep. We were so relieved. We slept in a corner of the cave and the next morning, we didn't push our luck and got away, searching the others. A few sessions later, the DM snarkily told me that I had been too coward about that event and that I should have approched the bears, because he was about to give me some sweet boosts or powers or whatever. Something he never did after because I didn't catch that one chance, about something he dismissed since the beginning of the campaign while showering in gifts some other players. Thanks, DM. Anyway, I always thought he was just teasing me. Or else, it was just another instance of cruel arbitrary DMing while obviously favorising others.
The campaign took a turn when we discovered a monolith guarded by the cultists. They were trying to open some kind of portal. We tried to stop them and the fight was nasty. There were some void explosion (don't remember if those were some orbs thrown or actual spells) that desintegrated anything. I suppose it was to make Greek god and Poison-hobo feel in danger.
Anyway, we put a big mess in their plan but Young river was captured and we fled. After we regrouped and took some rest, we decided to infiltrate their lines to save Private Young river. It took some balls to get inside but we managed to get there and we were able to free him. Unfortunately, I was then taken while trying to cover my young comrade's escape. Now, it would have been very difficult to save my character but the team was hyped for another « prison » break, and this time, they got back to our main encampment and would have had back up. Like, greek gods back up. We were already imagining the squadron of Space Marines-like spartans shooting with their crossbows like there is no tomorrow. Even I was amped up. And I was tortured in the cultists camp, spitting at their faces and cracking jokes. Their goddess was pissed and wanted intel but I wasn't talking. That's how pumped up I was.
The team was preparing. Young river and Murder-hobo were having one last beer at the mess. They were hyped and ready to wreck havoc. Then, Murder-hobo notices a really nice axe hanging above the counter. The bartender explains it was his weapon when he was younger. Now, it's a trophy to remind him of better days.
Murder-hobo grabs the axe : « That's a nice axe ! »
Bartender : « Hey, don't touch that you little brat ! »
Murder-hobo : « What ??? » and he swings the axe at the bartender, in the middle of the mess.
Young river : « What are you doing ? » and they both start to fight.
Some soldiers try to stop them but take hits and let them kill each other. An officer comes and scream to stop this madness. Soldiers rush in and grapple them. For such behavior, Young river, our squad officer, is beheaded on the spot. Murder-hobo is to be put in a cage and thrown on frontline at the next battle. He breaks free, cursing, and only get to be executed as well. The 3 other party members are dead silent, as well as I.
The DM explains then that considering our squad behavior, good soldiers won't be sacrificed in order to maybe save another guy who might be as crazy as those two.
For my earlier bravado while being questionned, the DM tells that I'm tortured even more roughly while still hoping to be saved. I roll some dice. I break. I have to reveal the cultists some dangerous pieces of information. I tell secretly to the DM what I reveal.

I'm not there for the next session. The group had apparently to flee with the army. The cultists were arriving en masse, with monsters, void orbs and all the artillery. They escaped with some kind of zeppelin, which we had never heard of before. During the flight, they were attacked by huge wyvern and got totally destroyed. And thus, the campaign ended...

A few months later, maybe a year, the DM tried to gather the group for a third campaign, in the same setting, but at another period. Some dwarves and ice elves (looking a bit like Na'vi in Avatar) appeared in the region and became quite prominent.
We had been convinced to play, even if I was curious to see session 0 because he assured us there would be no more favoritism and that he had learned from the previous campaign... Okayyy, let's see.
Session 0 comes. I'm the first there. DM pitches me on the setting. For the races, dwarves and elves are as buff as they are in Warhammer 1st ed, maybe even more.
But we have to throw a die. 1-4, we have to be human. 5, we can play a dwarf. 6, we can choose between dwarf and ice elf.
I roll 6 ! So I choose an elf.
While I'm filling my character sheet, the other players arrive, and DM pitches them as well.
Suddenly, I hear Greek god : « He can play an elf ? Why ? I want an elf as well. »
DM : « It will depend on your die throw »
Greek god quickly throws a die and takes it quickly back before anyone can check the result : « I got 6 ! »
DM : « ...Mmh, ok, you can play an elf as well »
Seriously... poor Greek god who can't stand not being the one in the spotlight again x)
After session 0, the campaign has been delayed a few times and in the end, it never happened... It was probably for the best.

Cryopod Refresh 245: Prison Break!

"Commander Hiro! Are you alright?"
Phoebe awakens to find a pair of exosuit-wearing soldiers standing over her. One of them props up the back of her head, allowing her to cough out a few words.
"Kah! Ugh... yeah. I don't know. Maybe. What happened?"
"Your ship got shot down, Commander," The soldier on her right says. Unable to see his face, she hasn't a clue regarding his identity. "We were worried you might have... well, you lived, so that's all that matters. I'm going to transport you to the hospital at once!"
The other soldier, a female, nods at him. "Commander Hiro's pulse is stable. Her exosuit activated at the last moment and absorbed most of the damage, but it looks like her leg got pierced by debris."
Phoebe winces. A dull sense of pain rings in her ear as she blinks her eyes to take in the scene around her. No longer inside the Esther, her subordinates dragged her outside, away from its burning wreckage. In the distance, the sound of gunfire from the southern wall reaches her ears.
"Cough! How long was I out? What's the battle situation?"
"Only ten minutes, ma'am," The male trooper says. "As for the battle situation... well, the tide is turning, but General Chadwick and the lieutenants have the situation under control."
The trooper wraps one arm under Phoebe's neck and the other beneath the underside of her knees, then easily lifts her with the support of his exosuit.
"Give me more details." Phoebe says, as her head clears up. "What attacked me?"
"A pair of unknown demons," The female trooper says, as she hefts her gun and runs beside the male trooper to protect him.
Both troopers quickly explain the situation to Phoebe, making her grimace.
"Two Barons? That's it? Esther should have had more than enough external armor to tank a few hits from Bael himself, let alone a pair of Barons. These newcomers must have special skills."
Phoebe taps her T-REX's activator button four times, summoning it in helmet-only mode. A series of viewscreens appears before her, allowing her to see through the eyes of a half-dozen field troopers.
"Switch visual, Red Brigade. Switch visual, Blue Brigade. Show me the Northern defenders. Show me an aerial composite. Switch to satellite feed."
Phoebe continually fires off orders to Centurion, while the AI switches scenes one by one as she requests. It doesn't take Phoebe long to discover Mephisto's expanding Dark Mist, as well as the two previously unknown Barons at the eastern front. Already, they've cut through over a hundred exosuit-wearing troopers.
"Heavens. These monsters can't be mere Barons. No Baron I've met ever had this much power. Could they be reinforcements from one of the Hidden Hells?"
Phoebe chews on her lip. While her two subordinates rush her into an awaiting armored personnel carrier to drive her to the backlines, she focuses all of her attention on the battlefield and forcibly ignores the agony ripping through her right leg's broken fibula.
"Commander Hiro speaking," Phoebe says, pulling herself into one of the side seats. She buckles herself in and glances out the armored glass outside. "Rear Hospital, what is General Kar's status? We need backup on the frontlines."
The soldiers who carried Phoebe close the rear entry point for Phoebe's APC, and the vehicle takes off, pulling her with a strong inertial force for a moment.
A few seconds pass before a female voice replies. "Um, Blinker here! Is this thing on? Hello?"
"It's on," Phoebe says. "How is Kar?"
"Samantha's takin' care of him," Blinker says. "He won't be out just yet, but don't worry! I'll fly over to help out."
Phoebe's heart jumps. "Wait, that's dangerous, Blinker. The two demons who just appeared are extremely powerful! If you go out there alone, I worry you'll be needlessly risking your life."
Blinker hesitates. "Two demons? Tell me about them? What do they look like? What are their powers?"
Phoebe transmits several images taken from the frontline troopers, then briefly explains their powers. As she does, Blinker falls eerily silent.
"...I see. Don't worry, Phoebe. I can take them on. You get back to the hospital and fix your leg right up!"
Phoebe blinks. "I just told you, those two demons are a high-level threat-"
"I know," Blinker says, cutting Phoebe off. "Don't worry. I'm not a helpless little tagalong. I'll show those two worthless plum-pickers what happens when they show up on my turf."
After a momentary pause, Blinker adds, "Besides. I owe them a beating."
Her words contain a significant amount of hostility, making Phoebe frown. "Do you know them?"
"I do," Blinker says. "They're the Battle Brothers."
"The Battle Brothers?!"
Phoebe's heart skips a beat. Several recent memories pop up, making her face turn white. "That means... they're the ones who killed...?"
"Yes."
Blinker's voice becomes eerily calm.
"Don't worry, Phoebe. I'll take care of them. Blinker, out."
"Wait, don't just-"
Commander Hiro hears a faint clicking noise as the voice communication cuts off, leaving her grasping at straws.
"Dammit. Don't tell me Blinker's going to fly in there all by herself! If she gets hurt, I'll never forgive myself!"
Phoebe glances around the APC the troopers placed her in. Aside from the driver, nobody else sits in the backseat with her.
"Commander Hiro to Blinker. Please answer. Commander Hiro to Blinker!"
Centurion blares a reply. "THE RECIPIENT DOES NOT CURRENTLY HAVE A COMLINK CONNECTED TO THE CENTURION DATABASE. WOULD YOU LIKE TO LEAVE A MESSAGE?"
"No, dammit! Shit! Driver, turn around! Go to the eastern front!"
The vehicle driver glances back at Phoebe. "Commander, isn't your leg injured? I need to get you to the succubus's hospital ASAP."
"My leg will be fine! Drive me to the eastern front, soldier. That's an order."
"Yes, Commander!"
As the driver turns to the left, the distant flashes of muzzles exploding in the night become more and more visible through the APC's armored side-windows.
Phoebe grits her teeth. "Blinker, why must you and Kar both be so bloody stubborn?"
She activates her exosuit, but only materializes it on her right arm. A ruby-red attachment appears on top of her gauntlet, which she promptly taps to summon a holographic image of several items. A moment later, Phoebe selects one, creating a medical nanite syringe.
"...Didn't get to test it yet, but like they say, no time's better than the present."
Phoebe presses the syringe against her upper right thigh and groans as she pushes the plunger, causing a goopy grey liquid to pour into her veins and spread throughout her leg, repairing its broken bones.
"Augh, damn.... damn! That burns like hell!"
.......................................
Mephisto's undead, shrouded by his Dark Mist, travel to all four sides of the battlefield. Between the zombies, skeletons, ghouls, wraiths, mummies, Dullahans, and countless other undying creatures, his mixed forces prove impossible to suppress. Slowly but surely, they begin expanding outside the warpgate encampment's walls.
Whenever the King Cannons fire a barrage of iron rods, Mephisto uses the cover of the Dark Mist to yank his strongest minions fifteen feet underground, thus preventing them from dying. After the rods impale a few hundred monsters, Mephisto shoves his minions back to the surface to resume their progress.
"Kekeke... my Dark Missst isss too much for thessse flessshbagsss to handle. The Battle Brothersss are annihilating the eastern forcccesss, while I take out the othersss. Now isss the ideal time to change up my ssstrategy!"
With a glint in his eye, Mephisto departs the battlefield and flies through the portal. He desummons the two Death Gates inside the Labyrinth Core and flies out to where hundreds of thousands of demons and monsters await.
"Come quickly, little onesss! I have the flessshbagsss on the run! Now isss the perfect time to ssstrike!"
Two dozen Demon Lords and a small handful of Barons jump to their feet upon hearing Mephisto's words. "You do?! Wow, Mephisto, you're awesome!"
Orias, Baron of the Stars, strides out of the group of demon elites. "I'm ready to fight, if not eager. Let's get this over with."
Thanks to the dozens of valuable gems stuck inside his skin, Orias appears almost like a divine god, someone from beyond the mortal realm. However, despite his grandiose, majestic appearance, several of the other demons roll their eyes.
"Your heart is never in the right place, Orias."
"Yeah! We've got fleshbags to gut! Why can't you show a little more enthusiasm, eh?"
"Sheesh, all you do is sit around hammering rocks. Can't you step out in the fresh air and have a little fun once in a while?"
Waves of criticism hit Orias's back, but he ignores them. Instead, he strides toward the doorway where Mephisto awaits and cracks his knuckles. "Killing humans isn't fun. Mining jewels is. I'm only doing this because I must. The rest of you can shut up, or put up."
Mephisto, seeing Orias and the other demons coming, rubs his boney fingers together. "Kekeke! Ssso long asss you help me kill flessshbagsss, I care not about your persssonal opinionsss. Let'sss go!"
Along with the demon elites, two dozen Warpers follow along, including Ying-Ying.
The young demoness jumps over to Mephisto's side. "What happened to my sister? Where has Mara gone?"
"Ssshe wasss captured by the humansss," Mephisto says, giving the Warper only a quick glance. Her status matters little to him. "Ssshe, along with Artorias and Beelzebub, ended up behind enemy linesss. We will have to find time to ressscue them, at sssome point."
Without another word, Mephisto flies forward and disappears through the Tarus II warpgate. Ying-Ying breathes a sigh of relief. "Alright! As long as my sister is alive, I'll definitely save her!"
The crowd of demons charges through the portal. They emerge into Mephisto's lingering Dark Mist and receive his blessing, allowing them to peer through the darkness.
...
Unseen by the demons, a small gathering of shadows slips through the warpgate, emerging onto Tarus II's surface with the rest.
Shades, agents of Yama, the Emperor of Shadows, flicker to the north and huddle together in a small, empty area, their bodies hidden by the darkness of night.
Malice, the most cunning of Yama's shades, takes the lead.
"We've arrived, sisters. Remember, Master wants his new toys alive and well. We must bring him females of appropriate beauty. The Hero's wife and daughter; those are our most important targets. Anyone else will merely be a bonus."
Demise, the biggest of the Shades, stands behind Malice, using its intimidating presence to back up her words. "We will follow."
Vicious, a shade known for her skullduggery, materializes in a half-demon, half-hellhound body wreathed in shadow. Her dog-like face drips drool from the corner of her mouth. "But what about the Wordsmiths?! Master won't be happy! Neither of them are here! Ehehehe!"
"So long as we snatch the wife and daughter," Malice says, "we will have a method to capture the Hero. His family is his weakness."
A fourth shade, a muscular female named Greed, materializes a clenched fist. "The traitorous succubus protects them. Leave her to me. I'll take Demise for backup."
"Heh. Good thinking! You're so smart!" Vicious laughs. "I'll go for the little girl, then! Ehehehe! I like them young, and so does Yama! The little ones always scream the loudest!!"
Demise glances at Vicious. "Leave the child intact. Should you harm her, I'll break you."
Malice nods. "That's right. We have to leave the women unblemished for Yama. Alright. Let's go. When we get there, I'll leave with Vicious to grab the girl. We'll seize the Hero's wife if and when we get the chance."
The Shade's leader waves her hand. "Go!"
All four of them disperse like the wind, morphing into their most compact and mobile forms as they slither along the ground like snakes in the grass.
.......................................
Elsewhere, on the southern side of Hero City, deep underground, within a hidden prison.
Three demons, Mara, Beelzebub, and Artorias, lay inside of separated cells, each one protected by a half-dozen exosuit-wearing guards. In total, eighteen humans and monsters pace back and forth down the hallway, their idle chatter contained inside of their helmets without any leakage. They keep half of their attention on the prisoners, a quarter on their conversations, and the rest on the battle happening at the Warpgate. Thanks to Centurion's network, they get delayed video signals indicating what's happening some twenty miles away.
Inside Mara's cell...
The unconscious Baron of Games rests immobile, her arms bound tightly behind her back, her body encased in nanite-hardening agent, and an oxygen-removing helmet affixed to her head. She lays face-up on a small prison bed, her room only ten by ten feet, big enough for her to stretch out and lay down, but little else.
As Mara lays comatose on her cot, a faint sparkling of golden light ignites on her forehead, its radiance muted by the metallic helmet suppressing her breathing.
The tiny ball of light condenses for a moment before pulling away, forming a second golden sphere that hovers in midair. It travels through the metal helmet without issue and emerges into the prison cell, with a wispy-thin tendril of mana connecting it to Mara's brain.
Inside the ball of light, Mara's soul coalesces, bringing her innermost thoughts into the real world.
Ugh... where am I? What happened?
Mara's soul, now contained within the pebble-sized dot of light, floats in the air while attached to her metal-bound body. Her consciousness grows more aware, allowing her to perceive the room around her.
A... a prison? Damn. That's right! I remember now! I fought the Sphinx, but he defeated me. He must have given me to the humans.
Mara's soul sighs.
At least he didn't kill me. Anyone else would. I bet the humans have something devious planned for me, like some sort of awful interrogation.
The Baron's soul hovers a few feet away from her head. She moves toward the lower half of her body and mentally frowns.
What sort of outlandish outfit is this? What have the humans wrapped my body inside? It reminds me of those full-body latex outfits the succubi sometimes wear, except... it's made of metal! Disgusting. To think the humans would treat their prisoners in such a debauched manner!
After examining herself for a minute, Mara's soul scowls, inwardly.
Since my soul has detached from my body, I must have activated the Soul Encapsulation Firefly when the trap card's criteria were met. I stayed motionless for one hour, nobody moved in the same room as me, and I couldn't move on my own. I should be relatively safe and undisturbed, if that's the case. Unfortunately, the Soul Encapsulation Firefly is a consumable trap card. I don't have any others. Once it activates, if I don't free myself from this ridiculous prisoner outfit, the Firefly will die and I'll end up forever trapped, unconscious, and at the mercy of the humans!
I'd sooner die than suffer such a humiliation.
Mara's soul-orb begins to move around the room, looking for weaknesses she can exploit. All the while, the strand of mana tethering her Soul Firefly to her brain doesn't let her travel more than three feet in any direction.
After a minute or two, Mara's memories recall an important piece of information.
That's right. Ose told me once that human-created nanites are weak to electricity. It's likely my captors bound me with nanites, and that's why this silly outfit looks like someone crafted it from metal. Hmm. Electricity...
The Soul Firefly flies toward Mara's head. It skips past the helmet shrouding her face and enters her brain, intending to access the mana droplets representing her Tarot Cards. Almost two hundred cards float around in Mara's Mind Realm, and she begins sorting through them one by one.
Hmm. I could use Shadow Tendril to melt out of the suit, but I don't know if the nanites would stick to my shadow-form. Flames won't be much use, so the Golden Fire-Rhino is out of the question. Perhaps one of these Illuminating Death Moths? No, they'll give me great offensive power, but only against the humans. It wouldn't do anything to their nanite-armor.
Mara begins to grow anxious as she flips through her Tarot cards.
I can only activate one card. Once I do that, the Soul Encapsulation Firefly will break apart. I need something that will get me out of here and defeat my captors in one go!
A few lightning-type cards catch Mara's attention, but she crosses them off her list.
Too weak. Too much backfire potential. This one's attacks will only hurt the nanites, not the humans outside. Damn! Why do I have so many useless Tarot cards?
Eventually, Mara's eyes settle on one Silver Aspect card, its face imbued with the image of a howling wolf.
Little Wolf. It's not the strongest card, but it possesses potent lightning power. It has a lot of speed, decent power, and excellent self-regeneration. I'd prefer a Golden or Platinum Aspect card... but this Silver Aspect won't have excessive risks. If I transform into the Little Wolf, my card might immediately break. I think a Summoning is best, here. I can allow my summon to break me free of my bonds, while I assist it from the background.
Mara quickly strategizes with herself, all while keeping an eye on how much longer her Soul Firefly will last. As its life begins to fade, Mara nods internally.
I don't have much time left. This plan will have to do. Even if the humans are heavily armed, I think I can take them out. I just hope the crocodile doesn't show up, or I'll end up right back where I started; totally helpless!
Inhaling hard, Mara's Soul Firefly sucks the essence of the Little Wolf inside itself and begins to glow.
Within the prison cell's confines, Mara's voice speaks from her Soul Firefly.
"Little Wolf, Summon!"
A bolt of mana fires out of Mara's body into the air above her head and breaks apart, destroying the remnants of Mara's Soul Firefly. Her soul immediately returns to her comatose body, while the Little Wolf materializes in the air above her cot.
...
Alarms blare inside the prison complex. An automated warning sounds above, informing all of the guards inside about an unauthorized use of demonic mana.
Frantic footsteps sound outside Mara's cell. The guards yank open the door just in time to see Mara jump to her feet, electricity crackling off her body. Dust scatters around her face, torso, and limbs; the remains of the nanites which previously encased her.
At Mara's feet, a ferocious white wolf, standing less than three feet tall, chuffs angrily as it spots the half-dozen commandos rushing inside to suppress its master. Lightning crackles off the animal's fur, resembling quick bursts of static electricity.
"Woooo!!" The wolf howls. It pounces at the troopers while blasting them with energy, giving Mara time to activate another Tarot card.
Mara grits her teeth.
"And now, to make my great escape!"
.......................................
FOR RETURNING READERS FROM CLASSIC: Please use spoiler tags when commenting on anything that might ruin the story for new readers, especially if that information is based on your knowledge of Classic!
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The Cryopod to Hell 245: Prison Break!

Author note: The Cryopod to Hell is a Reddit-exclusive story with over three years of editing and refining. As of this post, the total rewrite is 1,026,000+ words long, and we are all caught up to the main sub on HFY! For more information, check out the link below:
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...................................
(Previous Part)
(Part 001)
...
"Commander Hiro! Are you alright?"
Phoebe awakens to find a pair of exosuit-wearing soldiers standing over her. One of them props up the back of her head, allowing her to cough out a few words.
"Kah! Ugh... yeah. I don't know. Maybe. What happened?"
"Your ship got shot down, Commander," The soldier on her right says. Unable to see his face, she hasn't a clue regarding his identity. "We were worried you might have... well, you lived, so that's all that matters. I'm going to transport you to the hospital at once!"
The other soldier, a female, nods at him. "Commander Hiro's pulse is stable. Her exosuit activated at the last moment and absorbed most of the damage, but it looks like her leg got pierced by debris."
Phoebe winces. A dull sense of pain rings in her ear as she blinks her eyes to take in the scene around her. No longer inside the Esther, her subordinates dragged her outside, away from its burning wreckage. In the distance, the sound of gunfire from the southern wall reaches her ears.
"Cough! How long was I out? What's the battle situation?"
"Only ten minutes, ma'am," The male trooper says. "As for the battle situation... well, the tide is turning, but General Chadwick and the lieutenants have the situation under control."
The trooper wraps one arm under Phoebe's neck and the other beneath the underside of her knees, then easily lifts her with the support of his exosuit.
"Give me more details." Phoebe says, as her head clears up. "What attacked me?"
"A pair of unknown demons," The female trooper says, as she hefts her gun and runs beside the male trooper to protect him.
Both troopers quickly explain the situation to Phoebe, making her grimace.
"Two Barons? That's it? Esther should have had more than enough external armor to tank a few hits from Bael himself, let alone a pair of Barons. These newcomers must have special skills."
Phoebe taps her T-REX's activator button four times, summoning it in helmet-only mode. A series of viewscreens appears before her, allowing her to see through the eyes of a half-dozen field troopers.
"Switch visual, Red Brigade. Switch visual, Blue Brigade. Show me the Northern defenders. Show me an aerial composite. Switch to satellite feed."
Phoebe continually fires off orders to Centurion, while the AI switches scenes one by one as she requests. It doesn't take Phoebe long to discover Mephisto's expanding Dark Mist, as well as the two previously unknown Barons at the eastern front. Already, they've cut through over a hundred exosuit-wearing troopers.
"Heavens. These monsters can't be mere Barons. No Baron I've met ever had this much power. Could they be reinforcements from one of the Hidden Hells?"
Phoebe chews on her lip. While her two subordinates rush her into an awaiting armored personnel carrier to drive her to the backlines, she focuses all of her attention on the battlefield and forcibly ignores the agony ripping through her right leg's broken fibula.
"Commander Hiro speaking," Phoebe says, pulling herself into one of the side seats. She buckles herself in and glances out the armored glass outside. "Rear Hospital, what is General Kar's status? We need backup on the frontlines."
The soldiers who carried Phoebe close the rear entry point for Phoebe's APC, and the vehicle takes off, pulling her with a strong inertial force for a moment.
A few seconds pass before a female voice replies. "Um, Blinker here! Is this thing on? Hello?"
"It's on," Phoebe says. "How is Kar?"
"Samantha's takin' care of him," Blinker says. "He won't be out just yet, but don't worry! I'll fly over to help out."
Phoebe's heart jumps. "Wait, that's dangerous, Blinker. The two demons who just appeared are extremely powerful! If you go out there alone, I worry you'll be needlessly risking your life."
Blinker hesitates. "Two demons? Tell me about them? What do they look like? What are their powers?"
Phoebe transmits several images taken from the frontline troopers, then briefly explains their powers. As she does, Blinker falls eerily silent.
"...I see. Don't worry, Phoebe. I can take them on. You get back to the hospital and fix your leg right up!"
Phoebe blinks. "I just told you, those two demons are a high-level threat-"
"I know," Blinker says, cutting Phoebe off. "Don't worry. I'm not a helpless little tagalong. I'll show those two worthless plum-pickers what happens when they show up on my turf."
After a momentary pause, Blinker adds, "Besides. I owe them a beating."
Her words contain a significant amount of hostility, making Phoebe frown. "Do you know them?"
"I do," Blinker says. "They're the Battle Brothers."
"The Battle Brothers?!"
Phoebe's heart skips a beat. Several recent memories pop up, making her face turn white. "That means... they're the ones who killed...?"
"Yes."
Blinker's voice becomes eerily calm.
"Don't worry, Phoebe. I'll take care of them. Blinker, out."
"Wait, don't just-"
Commander Hiro hears a faint clicking noise as the voice communication cuts off, leaving her grasping at straws.
"Dammit. Don't tell me Blinker's going to fly in there all by herself! If she gets hurt, I'll never forgive myself!"
Phoebe glances around the APC the troopers placed her in. Aside from the driver, nobody else sits in the backseat with her.
"Commander Hiro to Blinker. Please answer. Commander Hiro to Blinker!"
Centurion blares a reply. "THE RECIPIENT DOES NOT CURRENTLY HAVE A COMLINK CONNECTED TO THE CENTURION DATABASE. WOULD YOU LIKE TO LEAVE A MESSAGE?"
"No, dammit! Shit! Driver, turn around! Go to the eastern front!"
The vehicle driver glances back at Phoebe. "Commander, isn't your leg injured? I need to get you to the succubus's hospital ASAP."
"My leg will be fine! Drive me to the eastern front, soldier. That's an order."
"Yes, Commander!"
As the driver turns to the left, the distant flashes of muzzles exploding in the night become more and more visible through the APC's armored side-windows.
Phoebe grits her teeth. "Blinker, why must you and Kar both be so bloody stubborn?"
She activates her exosuit, but only materializes it on her right arm. A ruby-red attachment appears on top of her gauntlet, which she promptly taps to summon a holographic image of several items. A moment later, Phoebe selects one, creating a medical nanite syringe.
"...Didn't get to test it yet, but like they say, no time's better than the present."
Phoebe presses the syringe against her upper right thigh and groans as she pushes the plunger, causing a goopy grey liquid to pour into her veins and spread throughout her leg, repairing its broken bones.
"Augh, damn.... damn! That burns like hell!"
.......................................
Mephisto's undead, shrouded by his Dark Mist, travel to all four sides of the battlefield. Between the zombies, skeletons, ghouls, wraiths, mummies, Dullahans, and countless other undying creatures, his mixed forces prove impossible to suppress. Slowly but surely, they begin expanding outside the warpgate encampment's walls.
Whenever the King Cannons fire a barrage of iron rods, Mephisto uses the cover of the Dark Mist to yank his strongest minions fifteen feet underground, thus preventing them from dying. After the rods impale a few hundred monsters, Mephisto shoves his minions back to the surface to resume their progress.
"Kekeke... my Dark Missst isss too much for thessse flessshbagsss to handle. The Battle Brothersss are annihilating the eastern forcccesss, while I take out the othersss. Now isss the ideal time to change up my ssstrategy!"
With a glint in his eye, Mephisto departs the battlefield and flies through the portal. He desummons the two Death Gates inside the Labyrinth Core and flies out to where hundreds of thousands of demons and monsters await.
"Come quickly, little onesss! I have the flessshbagsss on the run! Now isss the perfect time to ssstrike!"
Two dozen Demon Lords and a small handful of Barons jump to their feet upon hearing Mephisto's words. "You do?! Wow, Mephisto, you're awesome!"
Orias, Baron of the Stars, strides out of the group of demon elites. "I'm ready to fight, if not eager. Let's get this over with."
Thanks to the dozens of valuable gems stuck inside his skin, Orias appears almost like a divine god, someone from beyond the mortal realm. However, despite his grandiose, majestic appearance, several of the other demons roll their eyes.
"Your heart is never in the right place, Orias."
"Yeah! We've got fleshbags to gut! Why can't you show a little more enthusiasm, eh?"
"Sheesh, all you do is sit around hammering rocks. Can't you step out in the fresh air and have a little fun once in a while?"
Waves of criticism hit Orias's back, but he ignores them. Instead, he strides toward the doorway where Mephisto awaits and cracks his knuckles. "Killing humans isn't fun. Mining jewels is. I'm only doing this because I must. The rest of you can shut up, or put up."
Mephisto, seeing Orias and the other demons coming, rubs his boney fingers together. "Kekeke! Ssso long asss you help me kill flessshbagsss, I care not about your persssonal opinionsss. Let'sss go!"
Along with the demon elites, two dozen Warpers follow along, including Ying-Ying.
The young demoness jumps over to Mephisto's side. "What happened to my sister? Where has Mara gone?"
"Ssshe wasss captured by the humansss," Mephisto says, giving the Warper only a quick glance. Her status matters little to him. "Ssshe, along with Artorias and Beelzebub, ended up behind enemy linesss. We will have to find time to ressscue them, at sssome point."
Without another word, Mephisto flies forward and disappears through the Tarus II warpgate. Ying-Ying breathes a sigh of relief. "Alright! As long as my sister is alive, I'll definitely save her!"
The crowd of demons charges through the portal. They emerge into Mephisto's lingering Dark Mist and receive his blessing, allowing them to peer through the darkness.
...
Unseen by the demons, a small gathering of shadows slips through the warpgate, emerging onto Tarus II's surface with the rest.
Shades, agents of Yama, the Emperor of Shadows, flicker to the north and huddle together in a small, empty area, their bodies hidden by the darkness of night.
Malice, the most cunning of Yama's shades, takes the lead.
"We've arrived, sisters. Remember, Master wants his new toys alive and well. We must bring him females of appropriate beauty. The Hero's wife and daughter; those are our most important targets. Anyone else will merely be a bonus."
Demise, the biggest of the Shades, stands behind Malice, using its intimidating presence to back up her words. "We will follow."
Vicious, a shade known for her skullduggery, materializes in a half-demon, half-hellhound body wreathed in shadow. Her dog-like face drips drool from the corner of her mouth. "But what about the Wordsmiths?! Master won't be happy! Neither of them are here! Ehehehe!"
"So long as we snatch the wife and daughter," Malice says, "we will have a method to capture the Hero. His family is his weakness."
A fourth shade, a muscular female named Greed, materializes a clenched fist. "The traitorous succubus protects them. Leave her to me. I'll take Demise for backup."
"Heh. Good thinking! You're so smart!" Vicious laughs. "I'll go for the little girl, then! Ehehehe! I like them young, and so does Yama! The little ones always scream the loudest!!"
Demise glances at Vicious. "Leave the child intact. Should you harm her, I'll break you."
Malice nods. "That's right. We have to leave the women unblemished for Yama. Alright. Let's go. When we get there, I'll leave with Vicious to grab the girl. We'll seize the Hero's wife if and when we get the chance."
The Shade's leader waves her hand. "Go!"
All four of them disperse like the wind, morphing into their most compact and mobile forms as they slither along the ground like snakes in the grass.
.......................................
Elsewhere, on the southern side of Hero City, deep underground, within a hidden prison.
Three demons, Mara, Beelzebub, and Artorias, lay inside of separated cells, each one protected by a half-dozen exosuit-wearing guards. In total, eighteen humans and monsters pace back and forth down the hallway, their idle chatter contained inside of their helmets without any leakage. They keep half of their attention on the prisoners, a quarter on their conversations, and the rest on the battle happening at the Warpgate. Thanks to Centurion's network, they get delayed video signals indicating what's happening some twenty miles away.
Inside Mara's cell...
The unconscious Baron of Games rests immobile, her arms bound tightly behind her back, her body encased in nanite-hardening agent, and an oxygen-removing helmet affixed to her head. She lays face-up on a small prison bed, her room only ten by ten feet, big enough for her to stretch out and lay down, but little else.
As Mara lays comatose on her cot, a faint sparkling of golden light ignites on her forehead, its radiance muted by the metallic helmet suppressing her breathing.
The tiny ball of light condenses for a moment before pulling away, forming a second golden sphere that hovers in midair. It travels through the metal helmet without issue and emerges into the prison cell, with a wispy-thin tendril of mana connecting it to Mara's brain.
Inside the ball of light, Mara's soul coalesces, bringing her innermost thoughts into the real world.
Ugh... where am I? What happened?
Mara's soul, now contained within the pebble-sized dot of light, floats in the air while attached to her metal-bound body. Her consciousness grows more aware, allowing her to perceive the room around her.
A... a prison? Damn. That's right! I remember now! I fought the Sphinx, but he defeated me. He must have given me to the humans.
Mara's soul sighs.
At least he didn't kill me. Anyone else would. I bet the humans have something devious planned for me, like some sort of awful interrogation.
The Baron's soul hovers a few feet away from her head. She moves toward the lower half of her body and mentally frowns.
What sort of outlandish outfit is this? What have the humans wrapped my body inside? It reminds me of those full-body latex outfits the succubi sometimes wear, except... it's made of metal! Disgusting. To think the humans would treat their prisoners in such a debauched manner!
After examining herself for a minute, Mara's soul scowls, inwardly.
Since my soul has detached from my body, I must have activated the Soul Encapsulation Firefly when the trap card's criteria were met. I stayed motionless for one hour, nobody moved in the same room as me, and I couldn't move on my own. I should be relatively safe and undisturbed, if that's the case. Unfortunately, the Soul Encapsulation Firefly is a consumable trap card. I don't have any others. Once it activates, if I don't free myself from this ridiculous prisoner outfit, the Firefly will die and I'll end up forever trapped, unconscious, and at the mercy of the humans!
I'd sooner die than suffer such a humiliation.
Mara's soul-orb begins to move around the room, looking for weaknesses she can exploit. All the while, the strand of mana tethering her Soul Firefly to her brain doesn't let her travel more than three feet in any direction.
After a minute or two, Mara's memories recall an important piece of information.
That's right. Ose told me once that human-created nanites are weak to electricity. It's likely my captors bound me with nanites, and that's why this silly outfit looks like someone crafted it from metal. Hmm. Electricity...
The Soul Firefly flies toward Mara's head. It skips past the helmet shrouding her face and enters her brain, intending to access the mana droplets representing her Tarot Cards. Almost two hundred cards float around in Mara's Mind Realm, and she begins sorting through them one by one.
Hmm. I could use Shadow Tendril to melt out of the suit, but I don't know if the nanites would stick to my shadow-form. Flames won't be much use, so the Golden Fire-Rhino is out of the question. Perhaps one of these Illuminating Death Moths? No, they'll give me great offensive power, but only against the humans. It wouldn't do anything to their nanite-armor.
Mara begins to grow anxious as she flips through her Tarot cards.
I can only activate one card. Once I do that, the Soul Encapsulation Firefly will break apart. I need something that will get me out of here and defeat my captors in one go!
A few lightning-type cards catch Mara's attention, but she crosses them off her list.
Too weak. Too much backfire potential. This one's attacks will only hurt the nanites, not the humans outside. Damn! Why do I have so many useless Tarot cards?
Eventually, Mara's eyes settle on one Silver Aspect card, its face imbued with the image of a howling wolf.
Little Wolf. It's not the strongest card, but it possesses potent lightning power. It has a lot of speed, decent power, and excellent self-regeneration. I'd prefer a Golden or Platinum Aspect card... but this Silver Aspect won't have excessive risks. If I transform into the Little Wolf, my card might immediately break. I think a Summoning is best, here. I can allow my summon to break me free of my bonds, while I assist it from the background.
Mara quickly strategizes with herself, all while keeping an eye on how much longer her Soul Firefly will last. As its life begins to fade, Mara nods internally.
I don't have much time left. This plan will have to do. Even if the humans are heavily armed, I think I can take them out. I just hope the crocodile doesn't show up, or I'll end up right back where I started; totally helpless!
Inhaling hard, Mara's Soul Firefly sucks the essence of the Little Wolf inside itself and begins to glow.
Within the prison cell's confines, Mara's voice speaks from her Soul Firefly.
"Little Wolf, Summon!"
A bolt of mana fires out of Mara's body into the air above her head and breaks apart, destroying the remnants of Mara's Soul Firefly. Her soul immediately returns to her comatose body, while the Little Wolf materializes in the air above her cot.
...
Alarms blare inside the prison complex. An automated warning sounds above, informing all of the guards inside about an unauthorized use of demonic mana.
Frantic footsteps sound outside Mara's cell. The guards yank open the door just in time to see Mara jump to her feet, electricity crackling off her body. Dust scatters around her face, torso, and limbs; the remains of the nanites which previously encased her.
At Mara's feet, a ferocious white wolf, standing less than three feet tall, chuffs angrily as it spots the half-dozen commandos rushing inside to suppress its master. Lightning crackles off the animal's fur, resembling quick bursts of static electricity.
"Woooo!!" The wolf howls. It pounces at the troopers while blasting them with energy, giving Mara time to activate another Tarot card.
Mara grits her teeth.
"And now, to make my great escape!"
Next Part

Viva Italia: A Novel Coronavirus Novel Chapter 1-5

1. Lucressi for President
My name is Lucressi Vicente Palamaro, and if there’s one thing I definitely am, it’s Italian. Right now, I’m sitting on my balcony in a high-rise pretty close to the center of Milan. The sky is turning burnt orange in the dusk; it’s your standard evening sun: beautiful but groggy, with an energy akin to the cessation of day-drinking. Lazy and stupefied. On their balconies, my neighbors sip boiled tap water and munch stale garlic bread dipped in Extra-Chunky Praegu™ sauce. The scents tantalize my nostrils. But I am not tempted. I have no time for food. Sentinel duties preoccupy me completely. My binoculars are trained on the space between two nearby apartment buildings, through which I observe a craggy Italian mountain. A mostly barren mountain, spotted with patches of dark green grape vines. I notice a boy herding sheep up a rocky crag. He’s got a towel wrapped around his head as protection from the still-potent sun.
I run inside, find my telephone charging on the counter, dial 911.
“Police? Caio, Police,” I say. “There’s a boy on the loose. An ambulator. A violator of lockdown. A shitter-onner of decency. He’s walking sheep up a crag in the mountains. Yes, absolutely. Spreading coronavirus. Not even wearing a hazmat suit. My uncle, he’s 82! Highly at-risk. That prick’s gonna murder my uncle. You gotta do something, police. Which mountain is it? How am I supposed to know. Well, I live at the intersection of Sfumato Street and Leonardo Di Caprio Lane. And the mountain, from my vantage point, is visible between the two apartment buildings just north of me on Meatball Road. Does that narrow it down for you? It does? Great. You’re sending someone right now? Good, thank you.”
I return to my balcony. The boy has situated himself on the edge of an ancient stone well. He’s got a stick slung over his shoulder with a sack tied to the end. From the sack, he removes a loaf of bread and what appears to be a hunk of gorgonzola cheese. A little lamb nuzzles against his knee; he pats it on the head. No doubt, he’s just transmitted coronavirus to the lamb. And now whoever eats that lamb is gonna die. And whoever wears clothing made from its wool is gonna die. The boy is a murderer, plain and simple. He munches a bit of cheese, tears off a hunk of bread with his teeth, chews vigorously, with satisfaction. The smug satisfaction of a deranged psychopath. I watch him pull a flask from the sack and take a slug of wine before slipping off the edge of the well. He balls up his towel, lays it on the ground, reclines.
How can the boy nap peacefully, knowing full-well he’s murdering millions of people? I’m always astounded by the psychopath’s ability to maintain a clear conscience in the face of his unholy transgressions against humanity. Here I am, a man of high moral understanding and noble social concern, performing self-assigned sentinel duties for the good of the people, yet I can hardly sleep at night thinking of all the dead elderly. All the dead at-risk. And I’m not even responsible for killing them! How can this murderer slumber like a contented babe? A satisfied infant made drowsy by the rich milk of his loving mother’s teat. Murder nourishes his soul. What an ass-munch. A big stupid dummy. And a real jerk, to boot.
Rumbling. Chopping. A helicopter passes overhead. All of the good, moral folks out on their balconies: they point at the helicopter. What is its purpose? Why is it passing so low overhead? Has it located a dissenter? Why yes, it has. Thanks to me.
The helicopter slows as it approaches the mountain. The boy, conscious now of the whirly bird, rushes for cover amongst the grape vines. But his efforts prove futile. The helicopter unleashes a relentless barrage of machine gun fire. The boy rips in half. His head explodes like a balloon filled with red wine. His coronavirus-tainted blood seeps into the ground, defiling the earth. The helicopter has no choice but to fire six missiles into the vineyard, incinerating and purifying the soil. Eradicating the tainted sheep. Bringing salvation to the masses.
My compatriots, me and my scientifically aware and morally superior brethren, we erupt in cheers of gratitude and praise. Our government loves us. Our government has neutralized the threat so that someday—perhaps not this year and perhaps not next year or the next—but at least some year sometime at some point in the future, we will leave our apartments and once more roam the streets of Milan, attending fashion shows and admiring marble statues and watching soccer games and eating ravioli and, of course, drinking red wine brewed by our elderly grandfathers, who remain alive because of people like myself. Having by then cemented my reputation as a covid-eradicator, I will embark upon my political career. I will ride the coronavirus like a rocket to the moon. The moon being a metaphor for the Italian Presidency. Such is my destiny. Such is my fate.
When the cheers die down a bit, I can’t help but cry out, “I, Lucressi Vicente Palamaro, your highly scientifically aware and socially conscious brother, am responsible for the destruction of that corona-infested vermin. It is I who informed the police. It is I who saved your lives. And not just your lives, but, even more important, the lives of your at-risk, elderly loved ones. Viva Italia! Viva Milan!”
“All hail Lucressi Vicente Palamaro!” cry my neighbors. They lean over their balconies and throw imaginary food and imaginary gold and imaginary roses at me. A dark haired girl of 19, flanked on both sides by her approving parents, blows me kisses. In a year or twelve, once the curve has properly flattened, they will present their daughter to me, no doubt about it. They will make her available to me for courtship rituals. Me and the girl: we will go on rural walks and her parents and grandparents and siblings and uncles and dogs and cats will trail behind at a respectful distance. And I will pause and pluck a delicate daisy and place it behind my beloved’s ear. And her relatives, they will sigh plaintively, wishing they, for even just a single moment, could experience a love as pure as mine. Yes oh yes. I, Lucressi Vicente Palamaro, shall someday marry that girl. Unless a better option comes along in the meantime.
“You’re most welcome!” I shout. “And now, I have a special little surprise cooked up for you. Wait one moment.”
“What is it? What could the surprise be?” shout my balcony-imprisoned neighbors as I disappear into my apartment.
I return with a Spanish guitar, rest it in my lap, tilt one ear toward the guitar’s hole and one ear toward the heavens, channelling the muse of the angels. A chord, I strum. Such lush sounds. Everyone marvels at the beauty of this chord, the first chord of the traditional folk song Italians are the Best and Your Shit Country Can Eat a Dick.
A man clutching a saxophone leans over the edge of his balcony. He winks and nods at me before bringing the saxophone to his lips. How unexpected! How delightful! Me and the saxophone guy: we play as one, as a single heart; we symbolize the unity of the Italian people. Not just the unity, but the collective soul of Italians. More Italians procure their instruments. An accordion joins the fray. Yes! Then a keyboard. Housewives keep time with tambourines. Children clap rhythmically. Old men shuffle their feet, dancing. No wait. Scratch that. All the old men are dead from coronavirus. It’s actually men between the ages of 55-65 who shuffle their feet. Not young, but not particularly old either.
Every Wop within a four mile radius is on his or her balcony, playing along or listening. The coronavirus might confine our physical bodies. But it cannot confine our souls! Why? Because we are Italian! That’s why! We invented garlic bread. We invented mozzarella sticks. We invented chicken parm. We invented espresso. We invented the steam engine, the television, the printing press, modern dentistry, and iPhones! Once a peoples invents iPhones, that peoples’ soul is free forever. Not even coronavirus can crush the soul of iPhone inventors. Pepperoni Bagel Bites? That was us! Scissors? Us too! Though we did not invent running with them: no, no. That was the French. But airplanes? Hell yes, that was us. And Extra-Chunky Praegu sauce? 100% the product of Italian ingenuity.
We play through the song once, and then, on the second go-around, we begin to sing. Collectively. As one. Channelling all that we are: which is to say, Italian. It is our favorite traditional folk song, and it goes:
We are the Italians, and we’ve got gigantic dicks.
But your country? It slobs on knobs, your country is our bitch.
The French are homosexuals in scarves and lame berets.
And the Spanish are a bunch of Moors, not to mention latent gays.
Switzerland? Not even a country. It’s just parts of other ones.
And the British? They can’t cook for shit, those pompous limey bums.
America, Ashmerica. They’re faggots through-and-through.
But Italians? We’re the best, and we shit all over you.
A most heartwarming experience, all of us separate but together. Hopefully, someone is recording the proceedings and will post this evidence of our unity to various social media platforms. So the whole world understands that Italians are one heart and one mind. The adversary can cage Italians, but it cannot cage our souls. We know why the caged bird sings: because its heart is filled with eternal hope. The enemy will not overcome. And who is the enemy, the cager? Psychopathic sheep-herding boys. Middle aged women roaming alleys because they “need to stretch their legs.” Coughing toddlers intent on watching the world burn. Old men (well, actually men between 55-65) walking across grass just because their dogs need to shit. But really, these people are the mere henchmen of the true villain, which is invisible. Microscopic. Miniscule. Floating in the air. Attached to sneeze guards in restaurants. Hanging out on railings in shopping malls. Covertly hiding under table tops. Biding his time. Waiting to strike. Waiting to kill the at-risk and elderly and then…everyone else in the world. But the enemy will not succeed.
Why? Because I, Lucressi Vicente Palamaro, remain vigilant. I am the sentinel of my block. And the adjacent blocks. The sentinel of everything within binocular vision, really. And I have some powerful binoculars. 100x magnification. Or maybe 10x. The magnification factor is not printed on the binoculars themselves; I better check the manual. Yes, I will go do that now. It’s a matter of life and death. It’s a matter of the survival of the Italian people and 5,000 years of history. To think, the fate of the nation rests on the zoom capacities of my binoculars. A great responsibility weighs upon these shoulders of mine. But I am up to the task, for I am Lucressi Vicente Palamaro, and I am Italian.
2. Luigi’s Grave Error
Holy shit. They’re out there singing again.
I take a bong hit, exhale a milky stream through my nostrils.
They started with Italians are the Best and Your Shit Country Can Eat a Dick and now they’re onto I’ll Stay Inside Forever, For I Love My Fellow Man. After that, they’ll most likely do Please Government Contain Us and Save Us From Ourselves. They’re gonna be at it for hours. They always are. And I’ll bet I know who started it: that rat bastard Lucressi Vicente Palamaro. He’s one helluva royal douche, though I’ll admit he does more than his fair share in the fight against coronavirus.
But those tambourines, man! Once they get going, they never stop. If I die of coronavirus, at least I won’t have to hear tambourines anymore. Should I infect myself? Suicide by coronavirus? It’d probably be a lot easier to just jump off my balcony. I’ll do it while Lucressi’s out on his, making another speech about his own greatness. Land right on his fat head. Snap his neck. Break his back. Yes.
I’m going crazy. It’s this weed. No, it’s staying in my apartment 167.25 hours per week. For the last 6 months. With no end in sight. Only leaving my house once a month for my allotted trip to the supermarket. Draped in my (state-issued) hazmat suit. When the fuck is this curve gonna flatten?
I take another phat rip. It goes straight to my head. Feels real good.
Uh oh.
A cough coming on. Got a bit too greedy with that last hit. My lord, hacking up a lung would feel amazing right now. You know you’ve taken a good hit when your face turns red and you nearly suffocate from hacking. At least, that was a good hit 6 months ago. Now a hit like that could put me in a Rehabilitation Center.
I must, absolutely must, restrain myself. If my neighbors hear a cough, they’ll inform the police. I’ll have the fuzz beating down my door in less than two minutes.
My throat irritation grows stronger. I look like I’m laughing, my chest heaving up and down. But inside my heart is filled with panic. Water. I must have water. I lift up the container resting by my feet: it’s empty. Fuck. And I finished my last liter of cola last night. The tap water is infested with coronavirus, so it’s of no use. I should have boiled a fresh batch of tap water last night, but I was too lazy. There’s gotta be some other form of liquid that might soothe my throat.
I rush to the kitchen: I’ve got liquid dish soap, a bottle of Drainex, a bottle of Windex, and an aerosol can of Lysol. Those liquids won’t do. No no. In my pantry, between silent heaves, I find a jar of Extra-Chunky Praegu. Ole faithful. Every Italian has a jar of Extra-Chunky Praegu on standby. And now this jar is going to save my life.
Frantically, I twist the lid, but it won’t budge. My hands are too weak and tiny—the product of my mother’s prenatal crack addiction. And I’ve got tiny feet to boot. And a micro-penis. Not to mention man-boobs. Gynecomastia it’s called in medical parlance. And worst of all, if you lift up my ballsack, you will discover a half-developed vagina, its entryway leading nowhere. A vestigial vagina, one could say. Except it never had a use in the first place. It’s not the remnant of evolutionary forces, but the remnant of crack addiction. Specifically, my mother’s. Oh, why couldn’t Mamma love me enough to cease smoking crack for just 9 months? Why did she put her addiction before her unborn child? Why did she force me to live with the byproduct of her own weakness? It’s not fair! I hate you, Mamma! I hate you, Mamma! No, wait, I take that back. I love you Mamma! You are everything to me. My troubles are my own fault: I shouldn’t have rushed inside your egg before the other sperm had a chance. If I mind being born so much, I should have let another sperm live instead. You know, a sperm that actually appreciates what he’s given. A sperm that doesn’t act so entitled. Isn’t that what you always called me, Mamma? A self-entitled sperm? I should be grateful that I have hands at all. Some moms smoke so much crack, their babies are born with little nubs for arms. And two heads! And congenital heart defects. Pulmonary valve stenosis. At least I don’t have that. It could be worse. Isn’t that what you said? Oh, Mamma! Mamma! I love you, Mamma! Why didn’t you love me?
In my fit of self-loathing anger, I forget about the primary task at hand: soothing my raw throat. I lose sight of the goal completely. And as a result, I make a grave mistake. I cough. Not a big, heaping, hacking cough. Just a little soft cough. But it is enough. The music outside stops instantaneously. I feel more coughs coming on. I have to do something. If I cough again, cops in hazmat suits will put a battering ram to my door and take me away. Or just execute me on the spot.
I can’t think clearly. I must access the Extra Chunky Praegu. It’s the only way to soothe my throat. The tap water is five-parts coronavirus to one-part H20. It’s not an option. I throw the glass container against my kitchen floor. It shatters; I fall to my knees, lick Extra-Chunky Praegu off the floor.
Outside, my neighbors wail from their balconies: “A cough! Did you hear it? Someone in our very building has the coronavirus. Rabble rabble rabble! Rumble rumble rumble!”
“Silence!” shouts Lucressi Vicente Palamaro. “We won’t hear another cough over your wailing. If we want to identify the evildoer, we must listen for his cough. And yes, he WILL cough again, as one of the symptoms of coronavirus, assuming it is not asymptomatic, is a lingering dry cough that lasts for weeks, if not years. So cease your rumblings!”
The neighbors comply. Total silence reigns supreme. Thankfully, the Extra-Chunky Praegu, one of the finest inventions in the history of Italy, is doing its job. My throat is alleviated. I need not cough again.
On my hands and knees, I continue to lick away, grateful that I will live to see another day. But then, a terrible thought dawns on me. I pause mid-lick—my tongue still stuck to the floor—so that I can contemplate this terrible thought in more depth. The coronavirus lives on linoleum surfaces for up to 12 millennia. It’s a scientific fact verified by leading virologists from across the globe. And just 6 months ago, before the coronavirus pandemic really hit us, I had allowed friends and family and plumbers and prostitutes to traipse about on my linoleum floor. Without a doubt, the soles of their shoes carried infinite payloads of coronavirus. Which is now living on my floor. A floor to which, at this very moment, my tongue is attached.
Dear. Lord. I’ve just contracted coronavirus!
3. Mario the Innovator
The problem with hospitals is that they’re overwhelmed. The doctors in them: they don’t have time to develop coronavirus vaccines. They’re too busy treating the elderly and at-risk. That’s why it is up to me to develop a vaccine. Being retired, I’ve got time on my hands.
They told me a man can’t have a baby just because you unsewed his bellybutton and attached a synthetic vagina to his stomach. And then, using a turkey baster, you injected 6.5 fluid ounces of baboon sperm into his stomach. He lacks the internal organs necessary to carry a baby, they told me. And he produces no egg. And baboon sperm can’t inseminate human eggs in the first place. That’s what they, the scientific community, said. And you know what? They were right.
But this time, I will prove the scientific community wrong. They say developing a vaccine is nearly impossible since the coronavirus mutates 36 times per nano-second. By the time we have a vaccine, it will have morphed into a different variety of coronavirus, most likely the dreaded covid-20, and then our vaccine will be worthless.
Our preeminent virologists must invent a special type of vaccine, one that mutates along with the virus. But again, they’re too busy saving the at-risk and elderly. The acute crisis has diverted them from finding a long-term solution. It’s a hopeless situation, they say. A retired anesthesiologist (that’s me) does not possess the requisite knowledge to create such an advanced vaccine, they say.
They are wrong! Never underestimate anesthesiologists! And never underestimate me, the esteemed Dr. Mario Vicci. Italian born, Dominican Republic educated. Winner of the Western Milan Community Hospital Employee of the Month Award, October 1984. Seducer of 13 different nurses between the years 1974-2004. Vanquisher of pain. Bringer-onner of unconsciousness before surgery. Imagine having your arm amputated without anesthesia. You wouldn’t like it, would you? Thanks to me and my anesthesiologist brethren, you’ll never have to face such an abominable tribulation.
But my capacities are not limited to anesthesiology. I am a medical innovator in the wider sense. A breaker of new ground. Thanks to me, it has been definitively proven that baboon semen cannot impregnate human males. Yes, other scientists may have theorized that this was the case. But those were mere theories. I PROVED the incompatibility of baboon sperm and men. I am an intrepid explorer of biology. A fearless, innovative wunderkind of the medical world.
Because of my fearlessness, I have already learned something very important about coronavirus. Everyone knows not to look at coronavirus under a microscope. If you do, its radioactive emissions will interact with the lactose in your retinas, inducing terminal seizures of the most violent nature. Immediate death. Not even sunglasses block the radiation. Not even polaroid sunglasses block the radiation. Everyone who has laid eyes upon coronavirus in its magnified form is dead. But if that’s the case, how could scientists warn the public of its radioactive properties in the first place? Those who have gained said knowledge would be dead, right? See, something does not add up there. Something is off. I theorized that scientists made up the radioactive thing to discourage regular folks from handling the coronavirus. In absence of discouragement, many armchair doctors would attempt to create a vaccine themselves, would attempt to handle the virus and observe it under a microscope. And in doing so, accidentally infect themselves. Because these laymen don't know how to take proper precautions. And then these laymen: they would further infect the elderly and at-risk. Those with underlying health issues. Further inundating the already overwhelmed hospitals. Destroying the work-life balance of our virologist doctors and greatly reducing the probability of us Italians ever finding a vaccine.
So yes, the scientific establishment’s lies are backed by good intentions. Nobody wants to put the elderly and at-risk at more risk. And no one wants to force doctors to work 30 hour days when they’re already working 26 hours per day. 26 hours is enough for one day. I understand that fully. So their lies are benign in intent. “But wait!” you say. “They’re not lying. Coronavirus really is radioactive. Its properties do interact with the lactose in your retinas, inducing seizures. Their lies are not well-intentioned, for their lies are not lies in the first place. Their truths are well-intentioned!”
Wrong! You are wrong! For the thing that I have discovered is this: when viewed with the naked eye, the coronavirus does not induce seizures. It has no radioactive properties. And how do I know this? Get ready for the big reveal: I know this because I have seen coronavirus with my own eyes! Yes, that is the truth. My suspicions about its radioactivity, combined with my unconditional love for mankind and his well-being, combined with my gargantuan balls and unmatched bravery, allowed me to throw precaution to the wind and observe coronavirus under my microscope.
It was not difficult to find a sample, given that our tap water is five-parts coronavirus to every one-part H20. I dribbled water onto a slide and, body trembling (for I knew I was risking my life for the sake of saving humanity), I peered at the microscopic enemy of the world. And there they were: thousands of them flitting about in the water. They looked like little red balls with tiny mushrooms sprouting off them. 19 mushrooms sprouting from each ball—hence the name Covid-19. That’s where the 19 comes from: 19 tiny mushrooms. Each coronavirus ball/molecule/thing has a little tail, providing it freedom of movement via flagellation. They look kind of like sperm to be honest. Virus-sperm. Or perhaps, sperm are really viruses. Which would imply that we humans, along with many other life forms, are actually just complex viruses. To discover humans are viruses: that would be a world changing revelation unto itself. But I must push aside that line of inquiry. For now, I have only one task: to invent a coronavirus vaccine and save the world.
At this very moment, I’m about to dribble Extra-Chunky Praegu onto the virus. The virus lives by destroying humans. So anything that nourishes humans, I theorize, will conversely destroy the virus. And nothing is more nourishing to Italians than our beloved Extra-Chunky Praegu sauce. I, for one, cannot go a single day without ingesting this zesty—not to mention economical—delicacy.
I’ve got my dropper loaded with sauce. I’ll start by adding just a single drop to my coronavirus specimen. Gentle now…gent—
Huh? What is that? That banging!
I pull out my right earplug (I always wear earplugs when engaged in scientific experimentation [environmental noises break my concentration]).
My god, no! It’s tambourines! They’re at it again with their incessant banging and strumming and plucking and pounding and singing. How am I to concentrate when earplugs can’t even drown out the infernal racket? My neighbors are going to retard scientific progress by a century, those imbeciles. If I can’t concentrate, a cure will never be found. Never! Those tambourines will be the extinction of humanity.
I fall to me knees and cry out, “I hate tambourines! Shut up! Shut up! In the name of science, in the name of all that is good and holy, quit it with the fucking tambourines!”
Then I burst into tears. I cry for humanity. But most of all, I cry for the elderly and at-risk. Those with underlying conditions.
4. Luigi’s Resolution
Ok Luigi. It’s official now: you’ve got coronavirus.
Despondent, I return to my couch and bring the bong to my lips. A good ole rip always settles the nerves. But what if I cough again? I set the bong on the table, un-ripped.
Moments ago Lucressi announced, “I believe it was a false alarm. It wasn't a cough. Someone just banged his tambourine incorrectly. I implore you: handle your tambourines with respect and care. I have a sneaking suspicion it was you, Mamma Ravioli, on the balcony of apartment B22, who banged your tambourine erroneously, in a manner mimicking a cough. You have early onset Parkinson's, do you not Mamma Ravioli? Perhaps, due to your affliction, you should stay inside and refrain from joining us in song. The video of our playing is likely to go viral. And if our tambourines sound like coughs, the authorities will assume the infected live among us. And they will take us away to Infection Rehabilitation Centers. From which we’ll never return. And we don’t want that, do we Mamma Ravioli?
What’s that you say? Playing your tambourine is the only thing that brings you joy in this time of tribulation? It makes you feel at one with your fellow man? I personally don’t think you give a flying fuck about your fellow man. Because if you did, you wouldn’t endanger us by coughing with your tambourine. But you didn’t make a mistake, you say? You swear it wasn’t you? Liar! Selfish liar, trying to cover your tracks! You’re willing to send us all to Rehabilitation Centers just so you can have a little fun on your tambourine? You’re just as bad as the wretches who to take their dogs for walks. You’re on the same level as sheep-herding boys intent on infecting the world. What’s that? You’re sorry? You’ll go back inside and isolate yourself? Good. That’s a good girl, Mamma Ravioli. Be gone with you. Now, my brethren, let us resume playing. How about we do Shaking Hands Should Be a Capital Offense? I really love that tune. 1-2-3…”
And then they started banging away on their instruments again. That’s everything Lucressi said exactly as he said it. I have a very good memory. So for now, it seems, I am safe from suspicion. But poor Mamma Ravioli! How she loves to sing. And what a fine woman too! Before the lockdown, when I saw her around the neighborhood, she always implored me to visit her apartment for some of her world-famous cannoli. I only took her up on the offer once or twice—because I was a free man then, and I had much else to do—but boy were those cannoli delicious. Totally lived up to their reputation. I used to take those cannoli for granted, but now I’d do anything for a single bite. And honestly, it’s not the cannoli I desire. What I really want is to spend some face-to-face time with Mamma Ravioli. What a sweetheart. Reminds me of my great Aunt Helgavicci. To spend time with Mamma Ravioli—with anyone, really—to look into her eyes. To give her a kiss on the cheek. To hug her. To receive a supportive pat on the back. I’d do anything for some human contact! Anything! I haven’t touched another human in six months. Woe to me! Woe to Mamma Ravioli! Woe to Italy!
I bring the bong to my mouth, a reflexive act of consolation. But I quickly realize my error and refrain from lighting up.
I’ve got two weeks until the virus’s symptoms manifest. At that point, I won’t be able to control my coughs. And my neighbors will sniff me out. Should I just hand myself over to the authorities now? Get things over with? The Coronavirus Infection Task Force will take me away to a Rehabilitation Center…and no one comes back from those places. I’m afraid of those rehab centers. But I have a moral obligation to remove myself from this building, save my neighbors from the threat of infection. Yes, I had better hand myself in to the authorities. Admit that I licked the floor and got coronavirus. Take my fate like a man. I’m gonna die of the disease in the near future anyway. A painful, brutal death. Might as well do it in a rehab center, away from my healthy neighbors.
I recline on the couch pitifully and reflect on my existence.
I’ve lived a wonderful life these last 26 years, made innumerable good friends. Well, four friends to be exact. And two won’t speak to me anymore. But still, I’ve got friends. Not to mention a wonderful family. A father who taught me the value of corporal punishment. A mother who, despite smoking crack during her pregnancy, has many admirable qualities. She showed me how to finish a cigarette in two drags and how to make wine from fruit punch Kool-aid mixed with rotten bananas stolen from the dumpster behind the supermarket. That was quite a valuable skill…before the quarantine days. When a man still had enough freedom to steal from a dumpster. Ah, how I miss my mother. I wish I could visit her in the psych ward before I die.
And I can’t overlook my many accomplishments. 4th place in the 3rd grade spelling bee. It was ‘Botticelli’ that tripped me up, as I recall. By that’s not even a word! It’s just a last name. I still say there was a conspiracy against me. The other kids got easy words, like ‘gatta' and ‘mucca.’ It was Sig. Rossi, my language teacher and chair of the spelling bee, who plotted against me. He hated me because I preferred the Shakespearean sonnet structure over the Italian sonnet. But still I came in 4th place! I am a great man. A true success. A winner!
But what is my greatest accomplishment of all? Undoubtedly, my prolificness as a masturbator. Since the age of 12, I’d estimate I’ve beaten off 2.7 times per day. That’s roughly 13,797 ejaculations. And let’s not forget that I’ve slept with 4 different women, 7 including prostitutes. And one of those women, I banged multiple times, as we dated for a full 2 months. So that puts me closers to 13,850 ejaculations. Toss in a few wet dreams here and there, and we’re at 13,875. I wonder if I can make it to 14,000 ejaculations before I die? With hard work and determination, it can be done.
I reach into my pants, begin stroking, try to imagine a fresh, tight vagina…but images of my own demise pervade my thoughts. I see myself in a hospital bed, intubated. A ventilator breathing for me. A respirator wedged up my ass. Surrounded by impersonal doctors in masks. Who know not who I am. Who know nothing of my masturbatory virtuosity. Who have never seen my purple ribbon from the spelling bee. I will die alone. In an antiseptic rehabilitation center. Without saying goodbye to my crack-addicted, suicidal mother. Or my strop-loving father. Or my dear Aunt Helgavicci. Or my four friends, two of whom don’t speak to me but still technically count as friends.
No, I cannot allow myself to suffer that lonely fate! I will not hand myself in to the authorities. I will find a way to overcome this coronavirus. They say it can’t be done, but I will find a way. For I have much life yet to live. Many more goals to accomplish. And many more ejaculations to spurt.
5. Lucressi’s Promise
“Excellent playing, my scientifically aware and morally superior brethren. That was the most beautiful rendition of 1 Billion Scientific Models Can’t Possibly Be Wrong I’ve ever heard. And what a lovely message it preaches: we no longer believe in ludicrous superstitions, worshiping some bearded old man in the clouds. The new religion is science. A religion based on 100% accurate facts. We don’t read the bible for edification. Instead, we turn to models. Generated by scientists of the highest prestige. With the most degrees. And the most smartness. With the best data. Which they input into their highly precise models, which are always correct. Did you see the latest model released by La Academia de Italiano Scientifico? It says at least 7.8 billion out of the earth’s 8 billion inhabitants will die by the end of the year. Thankfully, we are quarantining and treating the virus with due respect. So we shall be among the 200 million who live. I pity the remaining 7.8 billion heretics, who dare step outside their apartments without hazmat suits. They do not worship science. They are not wise like us. Brilliant like us. Perfect human specimens, we are. That’s how I’d describe us.”
“Yes Lucressi,” cry my neighbors in unison. “We are perfect human specimens. And you are the most perfect specimen of all!”
“Why thank you. Your compliments warm my heart. But now, the sun dips behind the smoking mountain. The night rests its dark veil upon us, and the virus comes out to play. So our musical communion is finished for this day. Everyone return inside and make preparations for bedtime. Tomorrow, we shall take up our instruments once more. And the day after that. And the day after that. And then for hundreds and thousands of days thereafter. For that is how long the quarantine shall last. Another year at the very least. But most likely decades.”
“Do you really mean it, Lucressi?” wail my neighbors.
“Yes, decades. According to the latest models. Released by La Academia of Italiano Scientifica. This is the new normal.”
“Oh joyous news! We get to spend 10 more years inside, saving our fellow man. We love saving our fellow man! And we love singing on our balconies!”
“As do I. As do I. Good night my beloveds. I will see you tomorrow. On your balconies. When the sun shines again.”
“We love you Lucressi! We love you! Thank you for keeping watch over us. Thank you for saving us from ourselves. And from Mamma Ravioli.”
“You are most welcome.”
Inside, I boil a pot of water, removing the 5-parts coronavirus. Well, that singing session went well. Once again, the rabble supports me as the #1 coronavirus eradicator and the #1 friend of the state. Their fearless protector. That bastard Marco in apartment D78: he won their favor last week by killing a dog-walking dissenter. Killed him right dead with a marble fired from a self-made slingshot. Fairly ingenious, I have to give Marco credit. I must make a slingshot myself, so I know the direct pleasure of killing dissenters. Tomorrow is my supermarket day. I’ll try to find the necessary supplies.
Yes, that prick Marco won much of their favor last week. But I won it back through devotion to my sentinel duties and the destruction of the sheep herder. And my beautiful guitar strumming—it always melts my neighbors’ hearts. And I can’t overlook the value of my innate leadership skills. Yes, thanks to my many gifts and talents, I am once again the undisputed king of this apartment block. Marco was just the flavor of the week. I am the flavor of the decade. And soon I shall have a slingshot of my own. Maybe I can kill Marco with it? Brilliant idea, Lucressi.
I take a sip of piping-hot, freshly boiled tap water. It tastes metallic. It tastes antiseptic. It tastes like the smell of a doctor’s office. And I love it. Life is good.
Except for one minor problem. Actually a major problem: the cough. Without a doubt, I heard a cough during our music session. I blamed it on Mamma Ravioli’s tambourine playing, but I know she was not the culprit. I only blamed her to put the real culprit at ease. Make him feel like the heat’s off. So that he lets his guard down. And perhaps gets careless and coughs again. At which point I will locate and eradicate him.
Among our own ranks, we harbor an untouchable. This person: he knows he must hand himself in to the police. That’s the proper protocol, the government rule. But he won’t do that. He’s not a good citizen. He does not respect the authority of the government or the health of the elderly and at-risk. He’s an evildoer: I could tell by the sound of the cough. It was the cough of the devil. Yes, the devil’s cough.
But he won’t be an issue for long. For I, Lucressi Vicente Palamaro, shall locate the menace and eradicate the threat. Stamp out the problem. Which isn’t really a problem, per se. Because, in destroying him, I shall win more of my neighbors’ respect and love. I will eternally cement my place as the leader of this apartment block. I will lay the foundation for my political career.
Cougher: your ass shall be mine. That I promise you. That I promise.

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