This is long (TL:DR at the bottom). I hope it provides some entertainment and leads you to think about the story in a different way. Yes, you can blame this on the long wait.

The chapter is titled "Lanre Turned" and it's Skarpi's story of Lanre and Selitos. It's a story about a namer who lost an eye and gained a better sight. It's also a story about a man skilled with a sword who relies on the strength of his arm.

Lanre had fought since he could lift a sword, and by the time his voice began to crack he was the equal of a dozen older men.

It's about the Creation War but we are missing a key piece of information. Not only are there namers, there are shapers. Shapers who not only see a thing and understand it, they seek mastery over it and change it. And there are other things in the world. PR has made the comment that there are a whole cvilization of these people. In the middle of all this is Lanre, who appears to be just a man with no skill at naming. In some ways Lanre is a man walking beside gods.

We know from the story that something happens to Lyra.

Then rumors began to spread: Lyra was ill. Lyra had been kidnapped. Lyra had died. Lanre had fled the empire. Lanre had gone mad. Some even said Lanre had killed himself and gone searching for his wife in the land of the dead.

And Lanre tries to do something about it.

Selitos, his eyes unveiled, looked at his friend. He saw how Lanre, nearly mad with grief, had sought the power to bring Lyra back to life again. Out of love for Lyra, Lanre had sought knowledge where knowledge is better left alone, and gained it at a terrible price.

The strength of his arm is not enough. Lanre is going to need power, and it's power he gains through knowledge. Presumably it is to bring Lyra back from the dead. We know he gets it and does something rash or thoughtless with it. Ben reinforces this idea when Kvothe gets a double lesson on the dangers of being thoughtless.

Ben taught me others. A dozen dozen sympathetic bindings. A hundred little tricks for channeling power. ... Ben continued giving me a smattering of lessons in other areas: history, arithmetic, and chemistry. But I grabbed at whatever he could teach me about sympathy... I don't mean to imply that the road was always smooth. The same curiosity that made me such an eager student also led me into trouble with fair regularity.

What "trouble" is Kvothe referring to? If your first thought was binding the air to his lungs, you would be wrong. The very next sentence:

One evening as I was building up my parent's cookfire, my mother caught me chanting a rhyme

His mother overhears the Lackless rhyme.

“It's nothing to cry over, sweet one. Just remember to always think about what you're doing.”

Kvothe is being thoughtless. Ben is going to tell him the same thing the day he binds the air to his lungs.

In hindsight, what I had done was glaringly stupid. When I bound my breath to the air outside, it made it impossible for me to breathe.

Now it's time for Ben to lecture Kvothe and Lanre is the object lesson.

“I'm doing this all wrong. Never mind your father's song. We'll talk about it after he finishes it. Knowing Lanre's story might give you some perspective.” ... “What if you give him a sword?”
Realization started to dawn on me, and I closed my eyes. “More, much more. I understand, Ben. Really I do. Power is okay, and stupidity is usually harmless. Power and stupidity together are dangerous.”
“I never said stupid,” Ben corrected me. “You're clever. We both know that. But you can be thoughtless. A clever, thoughtless person is one of the most terrifying things there is. Worse, I've been teaching you some dangerous things.”

If you walk away from Ben's conversation with the knowledge that Lanre did something thoughtless you would be right. But that's just half the picture. Lanre was clever. In Denna's version of the song, he cleverly tricks Selitos.

Selitos was a tyrant, an insane monster who tore out his own eye in fury at Lanre’s clever trickery.

Tricking Selitos was clever, but it wasn't thoughtless. What he does to Selitos was calculated and successful. Lanre needs to DO something clever AND do it in a thoughtless way.

Lanre was dead. Lyra wept brokenly and touched his face with trembling hands. All around men turned their heads, because the bloody field was less horrible to look upon than Lyra's grief.
But Lanre heard her calling. Lanre turned at the sound of her voice and came to her. From beyond the doors of death Lanre returned.

By sheer force of will Lanre turned and came to her. Here's a question that's worth pondering: Did Lyra bring Lanre back from the dead or did Lanre return of his own will? It's actually his act, more than hers. Lyra had given up, but Lanre turned. That same will he sets to bringing Lyra back when she dies. But just his will won't be enough.

Lanre needs power.

Selitos, his eyes unveiled, looked at his friend. He saw how Lanre, nearly mad with grief, had sought the power to bring Lyra back to life again. Out of love for Lyra, Lanre had sought knowledge where knowledge is better left alone, and gained it at a terrible price.

Despite having no ability with names, Lanre gains power through knowledge. Lanre has learned something or been taught something or has acquired something. It's power unrecognizable and foreign to all the namers walking around. Namers and shapers who have always relied on their naming abilities and nothing else. What power can someone acquire that at its simplest only requires a strong will and knowledge? A power that even a young boy can learn from a traveling arcanist?

Lanre becomes a sympathist.

There's a great example we are given of someone being bound with sympathy.
Kvothe grabs a hair from Devi to use for his binding.

As I came into the room I tripped on the threshold, stumbling clumsily into her and resting one hand briefly on her shoulder as I steadied myself.

Lanre puts his hand on Selitos' shoulder.

Lanre turned and placed his hand on Selitos' shoulder. “Silanxi, I bind you...”

Devi gets control and binds Kvothe.

But Devi had heat to spare right now, and her binding was like being shut in an iron vise. I couldn’t move my arms or legs, or jaw, or tongue. I could barely breathe, only taking tiny, shallow breaths that didn’t require any movement of my chest.

Notice how similar the outcome is to Selitos (while reminding us that Lanre has no gift for names).

Lanre had no gift for names - his power lay in the strength of his arm. For him to attempt to bind Selitos by his name would be as fruitless as a boy attacking a soldier with a willow stick. Nevertheless, Lanre's power lay on him like a great weight, like a vise of iron, and Selitos found himself unable to move or speak. He stood, still as stone and could do nothing but marvel: how had Lanre come by such power?

Think about this from the viewpoint of Selitos. Selitos is a namer who thinks in terms of naming. He has no understanding of sympathy, that's why he can't recognize or understand Lanre's power. At the beginning I mentioned this was a story about namers that left out something crucial: shaping. If you are telling a story about namers, everything is viewed from that perspective. The story itself doesn't acknowledge anything but naming.
Knowing that shaping and sympathy exist, is it possible that what actually happened is Lanre spoke sympathetic bindings while the story portrays it in the only perspective Selitos would understand? This is why Selitos thinks his sight fails him - because he has no knowledge of sympathy. Sympathy is power to anyone with a will and knows the correct bindings.

“Silanxi, I bind you. By the name of stone, be still as stone. Aeruh, I command the air. Lay leaden on your tongue. Selitos, I name you. May all your powers fail you but your sight.”

Let's talk about the oliphant in the room. Lanre says he names Selitos. Yet this is a story about naming only.

“All stories are true,” Skarpi said. “But this one really happened, if that's what you mean.” He took another slow drink, then smiled again, his bright eyes dancing. “More or less. You have to be a bit of a liar to tell a story the right way.

This story really happened. But how it happens could be debatable. Consider this...replace 'name' in the passage to reference sympathetic bindings.

“Silanxi, I bind you. By the binding of stone, be still as stone. Aeruh, I command the air. Lay leaden on your tongue. Selitos, I bind you. May all your powers fail you but your sight.”

What Lanre planned with his new power

Some even said Lanre had killed himself and gone searching for his wife in the land of the dead.

Lanre is a man who has commanded other men and stood side-by-side with namers. He married one of the greatest namers of the time. Lanre has come back from the dead through sheer force of will. Now he is setting his will to bring Lyra back. And I'm willing to bet Lanre has a will like the sea in storm. Instead of will, let's call it what it really is: alar.
He has the alar and knowledge of the sympathetic bindings. He needs to kill himself, which isn't much of an impediment. It's the return that's the difficult part. And there's another issue. When he dies, all his bindings will be broken...

How odd to watch a mortal kindle Then to dwindle day by day. Knowing their bright souls are tinder And the wind will have its way. Would I could my own fire lend. What does your flickering portend?

When Lanre's light goes out, his bindings will fail. There's a third thing Lanre needs for sympathy at this level and it solves all his problems: a power source. It needs to be extremely powerful and it can't be exhausted like Devi's poor-boy.

Lanre needs an ever-burning lamp.

Lanre's power source

When Kvothe is in Haert he takes water from the hot springs as a potential energy source.

A small stoppered bottle of water from the baths. I closed my fist tightly around the last. Most people don’t understand how much heat water holds inside it. That is why it takes so long to boil. Despite the fact that the scalding-hot pool I had pulled this from was more than half a mile away, what I held in my hand was of better use to a sympathist than a glowing coal.

An ever-burning lamp would provide an endless supply of energy for a sympathist to tap into. But the closest we get to them are Kilvin's experiments.

“No sympathy. I do not want an ever-glowing lamp. I want an ever-burning one.” (Kilvin-NotW Ch.36)

There's a clear difference between ever-glowing and ever-burning. Kilvin seems to believe that to be ever-burning it cannot be made with sympathy. So why no sympathy? Because bindings will eventually be broken? I'm not sure how sympathy can still give you an ever-glowing lamp, but for now let's assume a process other than sympathy is required for an ever-burning lamp.

After a moment of maneuvering through the maze of timber and iron, we came to the hanging row of glass spheres with fires burning inside them.
“These,” Kilvin gestured, “are my lamps.”
It was only then that I realized what they were. Some were filled with liquid and wicking, much like ordinary lamps, but most of them were utterly unfamiliar. One contained nothing but a boiling grey smoke that flickered sporadically. Another sphere contained a wick hanging in empty air from a silver wire, burning with a motionless white flame despite its apparent lack of fuel.
Two hanging side by side were twins save that one had a blue flame and the other was a hot-forge-orange. Some were small as plums, others large as melons. One held what looked like a piece of black coal and a piece of white chalk, and where the two pieces were pressed together, an angry red flame burned outward in all directions.
...
“Hmmm. You should. White lithium salt. I thought of it three span before you came to us. It is good so far, twenty-four days and I expect many more.” He looked at me. “Your guessing this thing surprised me, as it took me ten years to think of it. Your second guess, sodium oil, was not as good. I tried it years ago. Eleven days.”

What I take away from this: An ever-burning lamp is self-contained, can be small as a plum, and potentially made with salt. It can be an easily portable source of energy a sympathist can draw from that never burns out.

Clever and Thoughtless

I said before I thought Lanre needs to DO something that is clever AND thoughtless. We think of Ben's example of Lanre as being thoughtless with power. But what if it is directly related to sympathy and what Kvothe did? Kvothe binds himself to something he shouldn't have. What if Lanre did the same? This is where I think Lanre is both clever and thoughtless.
Lanre binds an ever-burning lamp to himself.

It fits the imagery of a power burning in Lanre, much like an ever-burning lamp.

But just as Lyra's love had drawn him back from past the final door before, so this time Lanre's power forced him to return from sweet oblivion. His new-won power burned him back into his body, forcing him to live. ...
“I can kill you,” Selitos said, then looked away from Lanre's expression suddenly hopeful. “For an hour, or a day. But you would return, pulled like iron to a loden-stone. Your name burns with the power in you. I can no more extinguish it than I could throw a stone and strike down the moon.”

It gives him a limitless power source for his sympathy and ensures his light will never go out (so to speak). It allows him to return from the dead, because the sympathetic binding holds that Lanre is like an ever-burning lamp and cannot be extinguished. But something goes wrong. Maybe the binding is made permanent because of the lamp's nature. Perhaps he didn't consider some facet of it, like Kvothe binding the air to his lungs. Perhaps the binding was held so tight, he couldn't get it undore. Maybe someone stole his ever-burning lamp and hid it away, forcing Lanre to live eternal. Perhaps the binding can't be undone because it would make him mortal and violate the original intent of bringing him back from the dead.

Considerations, puzzle pieces, outright ramblings

THE CTHAEH
Where would Lanre even learn sympathy? The Cthaeh, of course.

Bast shook his head, his face pale and drawn. “Not wrong, Reshi, catastrophic. Jax spoke to the Cthaeh before he stole the moon, and that sparked the entire creation war. Lanre spoke to the Cthaeh before he orchestrated the betrayal of Myr Tariniel.
The Cthaeh knows everything you’re ever going to do. Everything you’re going to say

A perfectly malicious creature that can see all futures already knows every sympathetic binding that will ever be taught or spoken at the University. How entertaining would it be to the Cthaeh to teach Lanre sympathy, overthrow the namers and shapers, and watch the chaos? Kind of reminds me of Prometheus stealing fire from the gods and giving it to mankind.

BROKEN SWORDS
Whether or not copper actually has a name is a debate for another time. Personally I suspect it does. I believe that's why stories sometimes differ on sword composition. It's relative to the time and event. Lanre carries a silver sword because namers of silver are extremely rare or he is planning to encounter someone he knows can't name silver. Same with Marten's story of Taborlin and the copper sword.
Whether you believe copper has a name or not, I think you can agree that the following is a true statement: A copper sword is a great way to kill a namer ... if he can't name copper. But isn't that true of any material provided the individual can't name it?
Sympathy makes the copper debate irrelevant. A copper sword is useless against a sympathist with the right materials and bindings. (Yes, I realize I am making an assumption that copper has a binding). Consider Kvothe and the fake Ruh, merely picture copper instead of iron:

But I was ready. I slid a second long, brittle piece of sword-iron into my hand and muttered a binding. Then, just as he came close enough to strike I snapped the iron sharply between my fingers. His sword shattered with the sound of a broken bell, and the pieces tumbled and disappeared in the dark grass.

Perhaps this is why Haliax is associated with broken sword imagery? No sword can stand against him. I'm not sure how the Adem swords fit in with this. Perhaps they were shaped, perhaps they are a sympathy equivalent to 'nameless', they are 'bindless'. Although it does appear there is foreshadowing that Kvothe is going to break one.

LACKLESS RHYME
The first lecture Kvothe gets on being thoughtless was for reciting this rhyme.

One a sharp word, not for swearing (a spoken binding) Right beside her husband's candle (ever-burning) There's a door without a handle In a box, no lid or locks Lackless keeps her husband's rocks (a plum-sized ever-burning lamp)

ALEPH
In true Skarpi fashion I'll start this by talking about Selitos.

Just by looking at a thing Selitos could see its hidden name and understand it. In those days there were many who could do such things, but Selitos was the most powerful namer of anyone alive in that age.

Remember at the beginning, I said this was a story about namers. All Selitos can do is see and understand. But others are skilled at names. How they use that skill we don't know for sure.

Selitos knew that in all the world there were only three people who could match his skill in names: Aleph, Iax, and Lyra.

That leads us to the incomplete second story. We miss the beginning and we don't know why Selitos and others come before Aleph. I've often tried to put Lanre on one side or the other, but what if he torched both sides? Could Aleph represent the shapers and this is actually a parley between the namers and the shapers? Lanre's new power represents a danger to the old order. Now any mortal with an alar and knowledge of the bindings has magic at their disposal.

INNER TURNINGS

“Who knows the inner turnings of your name, Cinder?”

This is the most problematic thing I can see for this theory. This seems to imply Haliax is able to name Cinder and use his name against him. Whether or not he is actually naming him (like Kvothe did Felurian) I'm not sure. I've always thought Selitos cursed them by their true calling names. Ferule, Stercus, Usnea, etc.

Your own name will be turned against you

That could be what Haliax is actually manipulating Cinder with. Speaking their names causes them actual physical pain. I've wondered if Ferule/Ferula could be an Adem name. Different meanings based on the pronunciation and Haliax knows their meanings. There is an English phrase this reminds me of: 'turn the screws', which essentially means to exert pressure on someone. Lanre turned, after all. He's still turning present day.
Of course that doesn't work if Cinder could do the same. Maybe he doesn't actually know Haliax's true calling name. Or he changed his name. Or perhaps the person who is Haliax today isn't the same person from the story...
There's a question that's been nagging at me and it is rooted in Shehyn's story. If Cinder is an alias for Ferul(a/e) ... and Haliax is an alias for Alaxel ... how does the name 'Lanre' fit in? Was he Lanre before, changed his name to Alaxel, but gets called Haliax? Pardon me, Lord Haliax.

UNDER SHADOW FALLING

This is my doom upon you. May your face be always held in shadow, black as the toppled towers of my beloved Myr Tariniel.

If Lanre is basically an ever-burning lamp, how fitting is it that Selitos curses him with darkness?

HAL-
If an ever-burning lamp can be made with salt, is that another clue in Haliax's name?
Hal- in Latin can mean "breath". But it can also mean salt.
You can see this in the naming of common rock salt which is Halite.

Lackless keeps her husband's rocks

Okay maybe not that one. But...

I sow salt because the choice is between weeds and nothing

and

“No,” said Lanre. He stood to his full height, his face regal behind the lines of grief. “There is nothing sweet. I will sow salt, lest the bitter weeds grow.”

-IAX
I've largely ignored Iax because I wanted to focus on how Lanre might gain power through knowledge. I think the name Haliax is too glaring to ignore. This whole thing came about from a question I kept asking myself. If Lanre has no skill with names, but acquires power from knowledge, where is his power coming from? And how might he do it if it is not granted power from someone else?

Her smile faded. “but one shaper was greater than the rest. for him the making of a star was not enough. he stretched his will across the world and pulled her from her home.”

Perhaps Lanre bound himself to Iax's star (aleu?) and that's the equivalent of an ever-burning lamp... Or perhaps he is bound to the ever-moving moon that Iax pulled between worlds...

TL:DR Having no power with names, Lanre becomes a Sympathist seeking to bring Lyra back from the dead. In order to search for her in the land of the dead, he binds an ever-burning lamp to himself in a clever but thoughtless use of sympathy that he can't undo.

Matched Betting Extra Place Horse Racing - January 21 Profits - £4,707 on top of Full Time Job

Hi all,
I thought I would share my profits for Matched Betting Extra Place Horse Racing for Jan 21. January 2021 has turned into my best month of Matched Betting since I started way back in Summer 2018. This months profits are roughly £4,707. A life changing figure for many and a great figure seeing this is achievable on top of a full time job. Matched Betting is the only decent side hustle I have actually found, compared to doing hundreds of boring online surveys...yuck! (Unless you are a good business person / have 5 lodgers / lots of family money etc.) To see some of my other Matched Betting profits you visit my site: https://cashontheside.co.uk/
I will be investing some of my profits this month in ETF/Shares and putting into house improvements like a new drive way. In addition with Cheltenham horse festival coming up in March, I will be increasing my bank to cover liabilities.
The bulk of my profits came from Extra Place racing, large underlayed winners and BOG (best offer garuntee). Variance was certainly on my side this month and I must have had at least 10 large winners which won upwards of £1600 pounds per bet. As I underlay my bets I made more profit than If I had fully layed of the bets. About 5% of these profits came from low risk casino. After you have completed all welcome offers...in Matched Betting. Ep's become a gold mine...and I truly recommend them to anyone.
Some more of my bets this month illustrating underlayed bets and ep:
https://cashonthesidecouk.files.wordpress.com/2021/02/winnings4.jpg
https://cashonthesidecouk.files.wordpress.com/2021/02/winnings.jpg
https://cashonthesidecouk.files.wordpress.com/2021/02/another-winner.jpg

Images of one of my bets illustrative of Best offer guarantee: https://cashonthesidecouk.files.wordpress.com/2021/01/136707133_10159536662702922_8507610622687908137_o-1.jpg?w=544
For those who are starting out on their Match Betting journey in 2021 these sort of figures are achievable to you once you have experience….unfortunately this will not come overnight! I do put a lot of time into it..between 2-5 hours a day, 7 days a week sometimes. For the average person you could earn at least £500 a month.
To learn more about Match Betting please visit my article Boost Your Income with Matched Betting. Alternatively you can start an Odds Monkey free trial where they will teach you step by step and give you the calculators you need: odds monkey trial https://www.oddsmonkey.com/affiliates/affiliate.php?id=64754(affiliate) or www.oddsmonkey.com. (non affiliate)
To those with a little more experience who want to learn about Matched Betting Extra Places you can visit my guide here Extra Place Match Betting tips here or I have copied and pasted it all below.
For those with Matched Betting Experience - my guide and tips to Extra Places:
What is Extra Place Matched Betting?
Extra Places can be a very lucrative technique to learn. Extra Places are available for us to do pretty much every day, increasing the appeal. Extra Place Offers are available to all customers. This means that even if you get gubbed with a bookmaker, in most cases, you can still make money with them by Matched Betting on their Extra Place Offers.
Extra Places are considered an advanced reload offer, as they not risk-free. However once you have gained some experience on more basic horse racing offers, you can start to take advantage of the lucrative profits available. It may sound complicated but as soon as it ‘clicks’, it becomes simple. Essentially we are taking advantage of the bookies and exchanges paying out if the horse you have backed comes a certain ‘place’ in a race e.g. 4th.
Extra Places combined with additional offers such as BOG (Best Offer Guarantee) can mean additional profits. For example, you back a horse at odds of 15 and then the starting odds move up to 23. If that horse wins you win an extra x8 on your bet. You can see some real life scenarios I found of Extra Place combined with BOG below. Depending on the size of the underlay, profits below would range up to £3,000+

What is a ‘place’ in horse racing?

Quite simply a ‘place’ is the position the horse finishes a race in. For example if a horse wins a race it comes 1st, if a horse comes 2nd its 2nd. In some races with a large number of horses some bookies will pay out if a horse finishes the race in 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th position. Horse Racing festivals such as Cheltenham or Ascot are particularly well known for this.

What is an ‘Extra Place’ in horse racing?

Now we’ve understood what a place is in horse racing you may have probably already guessed what an ‘extra place’ is going to be! An ‘extra place’ is where the bookies add one (or more) additional places to their standard place classification on a particular race. For example they may offer to ‘pay 7 places on a race’ instead of the standard 3 places. The ‘extra place’ in this instance cover 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th.
What are my Extra Place top tips?

Some of my biggest profits have come from big underlayed winners and BOG. I typically underlay most of my bets by about 20% sometimes more. If you are starting out I would underlay on the place only by about 10% to play it safe until you learn more.
Don’t bet on more places than a bookmaker is offering. E.g. If the bookmaker is offering 4 places don’t bet on more than that.
Whilst your learning, take horses on implied odds of at least 12 or more on a match of 80%+.
Look to keep qualifying losses down. E.g. for £100 profit, £5 ql.
Please note, the best odds are typically found between 10 minutes up and to race time. You have to be quick on your ‘toes’…learn to walk before you run etc. Start out on easy horse racing officers before doing extra places.
You will need a bank of at least £1000+ for your exchanges, ideally more. The more you have the more of the field you can cover. You can do EP with several hundred in your exchange but you won’t be able to make bigger profits.
Be consistent, don’t take risks, don’t chase your losses and learn from matched betting extra place forums.
Keep the Odds Monkey up throughout the day...and check for good matches.
Use Bookies Boosts to increase your odds and matches.
Do not give in to your fear of missing out on offers…Tomorrow is another day.
Have at least a dual monitoscreen setup. It is important to be able to see exchange, books and calcs.

How do I find Extra Places offers?
I use the the Odds Monkey Extra Place Matcher to find the best opportunities for profit. The Matcher is explained in the below video.
https://youtu.be/oOKAdiSJidg
I am also a regular visitor of the active Odds Monkey community forums. You can sign up for an Odds Monkey free trial today here today https://www.oddsmonkey.com/affiliates/affiliate.php?id=64754 www.oddsmonkey.com (non affiliate). Odds Monkey provide you with the all guides, calculators etc. I have been a member for over 2.4 years now.
Feel free to get in touch or ask below if any questions.

[Cryoverse] The Last Precursor 047: The Next Step

The Last Precursor is an HFY-exclusive web-serial which focuses on the exploits of the last living human amidst a galaxy of unknown aliens. With his species all but extinct and now only known as the ancient Precursors, how will Admiral José Rodriguez survive in this hostile universe? Make sure to read the earlier chapters first if you missed them!
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Previous Part
Part 001
.......................................
"Graugh! I bet you have missed the taste of authentic Kraktol cuisine while you've been away!"
Lord Drall sits at a small, rectangular table with his two daughters, Megla and Sapphire, as well as his half-daughter, Soren. Soren and Megla sit on one side, while Drall and Sapphire sit on the other. The small family throws several slimy, eel-like fish into their mouths and swallows them whole, laughing and joking as they devour the food, while a few other groups of Kraktol eat their food with noticeably less gusto, mostly from having eaten the same things for several weeks during their trip to Tarus II.
Megla's tongue slides between the cracks in her teeth, picking up a bit of meat that wedged itself between a pair of molars.
"Kyargh! You might not believe me, father, but the Admiral's ship can create food worth going to war over! Of course, there's something special about home-cooking I can't ever forget!"
While her sister wolfs down the slimy eels, Soren eats much more slowly and deliberately. "We would have eaten in the Bloodbearer's cafeteria, but Kisa's incident made us leave early. I suppose Salted Molwar is a fine alternative."
"You do not sound particularly enthusiastic," Drall says, as he slides another Molwar down his throat. "Graugh! Have you forgotten about your homeworld's delicacies?"
Soren sighs. She folds her claws in her lap, leaving the rest of her plate only half-eaten. "I'm sorry, Lord Drall. I'm simply not that hungry."
"You may call me 'father,'" Drall says. The Kraktol leader pauses his voracious eating to look his half-daughter in the eye. "I know you are an orphan. Still, you grew up in the same nest as Megla. I may not have sired you, but I cannot in good conscience leave you without a family."
Soren lowers her head. "You are too gracious... father."
"Graugh! See? Does that not sound better? Such a pleasant word, it rolls right off the tongue!"
Lord Drall resumes gorging, while Sapphire mimics Soren and pushes her plate away half-eaten. "Half-sister Soren, have you and the Admiral performed the Fatüri?"
"Cough, cough!" Megla gags, nearly choking on her food. "S-Sapphire! Must you speak of such matters at the dinner table?"
Drall chuckles. "Come now, daughter. Sapphire is a blunt and bold girl, like her mother. I find it to be her most endearing quality. You always know where you stand with her."
The blue and green-scaled Kraktol bats her eyes. "Well, Soren? Did you? Or maybe Megla? Perhaps both of you, at the same time?"
"We did not," Soren answers, her expression even. "The Admiral has no reproductive interest in any species beyond his own."
"To lose out on his genes would be a shame," Sapphire mutters, while looking away from the table, toward the galley's entrance. "The Kraktol are not like other sentients. We know that bodily power comes from the strong breeding with the strong. I want my spawn to defeat me in combat, one day. Father keeps introducing me to subpar males, one after the other, but all of them are weaker than me. Unsuitable."
"Your standards are too high!" Drall laughs. "The Börkon's third great-grandson; how did he not satisfy your needs? In appearance, physique, and temperament... he was every bit your match!"
"Being my 'match' is not good enough," Sapphire harrumphs. She tilts her head up proudly, exposing her soft, leathery neck. "My partner must be capable of overpowering me... holding me down, making me roar with frustration. I will not accept a stalemate. If he cannot dominate me, our spawn will be weaker than the sum of our parts."
Megla resumes eating, somewhat slower than before. "Kyargh! You are right, yes. A mighty partner will lead to mightier hatchlings. But there are only so many top-tier partners available, while Kraktol males tend to be weaker than us females. I think you may end up dying alone."
"Not if I perform the Fatüri with your Admiral," Sapphire answers, her tone firm. "That is why I asked if you hadn't done so already. If you haven't, then his seed will fertilize my eggs flawlessly. I cannot let this chance slip through my claws! Admiral Rodriguez took down Orgon the Betrayer, one of our best warriors; our strongest males. If my beloved José does not meet my qualifications, nobody will!"
Soren crosses her arms. "Your attempts will bear no fruit, half-sister. The Admiral... he will never accept your advances."
"How do you know?" Sapphire counters. "Have you tried pursuing him?"
"...I haven't." Soren answers.
"Well, there, see?" Sapphire laughs. "You won't know unless you try. The Admiral is broken and alone. His species is dead, and he has nowhere to call home. He requires a companion. Naturally, with some convincing, I will fill that role, while he will fill my-"
"Please, not another word," Megla says, gagging once again. "You're making it impossible for me to enjoy this delicious Molwar! Speaking of which... are you going to finish yours?"
Soren and Sapphire both push their plates toward Megla in unison. "Have at it."
"Kyargh! It's my lucky day!" Megla laughs.
...
Half an hour passes. The four Kraktol continue chatting about a great many things, mostly banal observations, musings on life and the galaxy, and occasionally some juicy gossip.
"Sister, have you met Kilgore?" Sapphire asks Megla. "He is our one-seventh Algaru-brother."
"Kilgore?" Megla asks, after burping from the multiple plates of food she's finished. "I don't know him."
"He is one of Father's favorite children," Sapphire explains, a pouty expression playing upon her face. "Even more so than me."
Drall bares a toothy grin. "Ah, finally, a discussion not involving female pursuits. Aye, Kilgore joined us on our journey. I worried your Admiral might blow our ship out of the air, and thus, bring about the death of one of the remnant Algaru... but luckily, cooler heads prevailed."
Soren cocks her head. "Speaking of which, what happened to the Algaru? I know the Mallali exterminated them during the Retribution War, but I don't know how. Could you elaborate?"
"I'd like to know, too," Megla chimes in. "I've heard rumors; we all have. But you fought on the frontlines during that era. Surely, you must know more than the asteroid miner-slaves."
Lord Drall continues to smile, but only for a moment. His expression dims noticeably, and eventually, the smile disappears.
"Brutal days, those were."
Drall lowers his head.
"The Algaru. They were our cousins. An adjacent species of sorts. We bred with them on occasion, and they, with us. We suffered in slave mines, the same as them. Though smaller than the Kraktol, the Algaru were fierce and brave. Self-sacrificing. Better than us, in many ways."
After pausing for a moment, Drall slowly reaches toward the sleeve on his right arm. He pulls it back, revealing the brand-mark of a Kraktol symbol, one symbolizing a star and moon.
"My blood-brother, Hataru. He was an Algaru. I saved him from a Kessu slavemaster's wrath, killed our master, and hid the body. He swore a blood-debt to me for saving his life. He paid it back ten times over, rescuing me from too many life-and-death situations for me to count. Even so, he always told me it wasn't enough. We branded ourselves with this mark, swearing to protect one another's families until we died."
The table's mood turns somber as Drall's daughters listen to his war-story. Sapphire, seated beside her father, reaches over and gently touches the brand.
"What does it mean?" Sapphire asks.
"The star represents the burning fury of the Algaru; their fiery hearts," Drall explains. "The moon represents the calm and placid nature of the Kraktol. Though we were not as fiery as the Algaru, that did not mean we were not cold-blooded killers capable of terrifying deeds. I performed many heinous, unforgivable acts during that era, yet Hataru never judged me. He knew what our victory or defeat meant."
Drall sighs. "The reason our cousins perished... it was a deliberate act of self-conflagration. Their reproductive speed was slower than ours. They struggled to repopulate, and thus, began to dwindle in number, while the Kraktol soared."
"That is why," Drall continues, "In a final brave, but suicidal act, the Algaru navy worked together to turn all of their ships into battering rams. They flew into one of the Mallali core worlds at sublight speeds, killing billions of our accursed enemies. It was the ultimate act of defiance. It signified their resolve; their commitment to never again walk as slaves. They would rather perish in a final blaze of glory than give up and surrender to their enemies."
Megla's eyes turn misty. She wipes away her tears and sniffles. "That... that must have been a hard day for you, father."
"It was," Drall acknowledges. "I lost my blood-brother; my best friend. In truth, the only person I've ever loved more than the Thülvik herself. Every night, before I lay my head down to rest, I turn toward the nearest star and pray for Hataru's soul. I pray that he found his way to the Primordial Swamp."
"He did," Megla says, nodding. "Definitely."
"Mmm."
Drall falls silent.
Half a minute passes before he speaks again.
"Not all of the Algaru perished in that rain of fire. The adults left their spawn to us, their cousins. We raised those who remained as best as we could. But with only a few hundred left, their blood thinned over the generations. The purebloods died out, leaving halfbreeds, quarterbloods, and now, the distant descendants of our great cousins."
Drall spreads out his claws helplessly. "I did what I could, but my best wasn't good enough. Every day, I struggle, knowing I let Hataru down. I couldn't maintain his family line. All of his descendants have watered-down their blood. They have interbred with the Kraktol so many times that barely anything remains of their proud genes. What a humiliating end for such a brave... a brave..."
The Kraktol commander balls his claws together and strikes the table.
Bang.
"Some glorious leader I am."
Sapphire rests her hand on Drall's arm.
"Do not worry, father. Someday, we will punish the Mallali. We will repay them a hundredfold for the evils they've committed. The Kraktol Empire will unite the Rodaks, overturn the Mallali's rule, and reign supreme."
Megla and Soren glance at one another for a moment, then lower their heads.
"Father..." Soren mutters. "Regarding the Admiral."
Drall raises his head.
"Yes?"
"I cannot betray him," Soren says, looking Drall in the eye. "The Admiral is precious to me. I value him in a way I haven't anyone else before, not even Megla. I can't explain my feelings. You may see him as a tool; a weapon to empower the Kraktol Empire, but if you treat him as such, you will walk away disappointed. He is powerful, yet fragile. Unyielding, yet flexible. Cold and calculating, yet compassionate."
"Yes," Megla says, agreeing with Soren. "Our Admiral is not a weapon with which you may club the Mallali to death. Once you get to know him, I think you'll understand why we've chosen to follow him to the ends of the galaxy."
Drall gazes at his daughters stonily. "I have a war to win. Your friend, the Terran, might be the key to finally burying the Mallali once and for all. I will do anything to acquire his trust."
"And that is fine by me," Soren says, "so long as that is all you pursue. If you become his friend and he chooses to help you, I won't interfere. If, however, you steal from him, hurt him, or backstab him, I will become the Kraktol Empire's greatest enemy."
Megla glances at Soren for a split-second before nodding along to her words. "And the same is true for me."
"Haha..." Drall chuckles. "To inspire such confidence in his subordinates, I've no doubt the Terran is an ally worth cherishing. I've known countless charismatic Rodaks, many of whom I considered great leaders. None of their followers displayed half your zeal. I look forward to finding out what methods the Terran will use to turn me into one of his fanatic supporters."
A quiet moment fills the air. Megla and Soren exchange a long, meaningful stare with their father, Lord Drall.
Sapphire breaks the silence which a bemused snort. "Pfft! I guess the Admiral really did perform the Fatüri with both of you!"
"Kyargh!" Megla laughs. "Your mind is a slimy sewer, sister!"
Drall slaps Sapphire's back. "Just like your mother's."
.......................................
Three hours after the Admiral first entered Kisa's room, he finally emerges. Kisa follows behind him as he steps into the corridor, her head lowered shyly.
"There's no need to fear your father or your mother as long as I'm around," José says, after not seeing the other four Kraktol aren't in the crew quarters section anymore. "Just stay close to me."
"Y-yes..." Kisa replies, her scales flushing with color. "Great Precursor, Admiral Rodriguez, sir, can't I stay here on the Bloodbearer with you, Megla, and Soren?"
"I'm fine with that," José answers. He starts walking down the narrow corridor with Kisa behind him. "But you are the Malvik, which seems to me like a position on par with a Kraktol princess; the next heir to the throne. If your father doesn't give his consent, I won't allow you to stay. You have duties to fulfill for your empire."
"B-but, you didn't need his permission for Megla and Soren to stay!" Kisa protests.
"Yes, but they aren't the Malvik," José chuckles. "Different story, different circumstances."
"...Oh."
José finds Soren's location via a ping from Umi. He navigates the Red-Tongue's inner hallways like a pro, bypassing several Kraktol along the way. Each crew-member quickly retreats and clears a path for the Terran, saluting respectfully by putting their fists over their chests. He replies with a quick nod to each one, noticing how few of them pay even the slightest attention to Kisa.
"You're not very popular around here..." José mutters, after passing the eighth crew-member. "That must be hard on you."
Kisa sighs. "Not really. I'm used to it."
After a few minutes, the two of them arrive at the galley, where they find Megla and Drall both lazily leaning back in their seats, having stuffed their faces full, while Soren and Sapphire sit upright with more dignified postures.
As if possessing a third sense attuned to the Admiral's presence, Sapphire instantly swivels her head forty-five degrees to her right, toward the galley's entry door. She spots José the moment he rounds the corner and jumps to her feet. "José! Oh, darling, you have returned! Are you hungry?"
José stifles his urge to facepalm at her coy familiarity. "Ahem. No, thank you. I already had a bite to eat with Kisa."
He steps into the cafeteria, allowing Kisa to make her presence known, behind him. When she rounds the corner, Sapphire's excited expression deflates visibly. The blue-and-green-scaled Kraktol slithers over to José's side and wraps herself around the Admiral's left arm.
"Oh, Kisa. I see that my darling José finally talked you out of your stupor."
Kisa meekly lowers her head. "S-sorry. I didn't mean to be a burden to anyone."
Drall rises from his chair, followed immediately afterward by Soren and Megla. "Graugh! All that matters is that you have finally come to your senses, my child. In any case... Admiral! Now that you've settled the matter with my daughter, I hope you'll explain to me what you intend to do next. My crew are all at your disposal!"
Soren walks over to José's side with a neutral expression. Megla follows her, but shoots a dirty look at Sapphire's clingy posture, who merely bats her eyes in return.
Unfazed by the seductress pressing herself against his arm, José ignores Sapphire's advances. "Lord Drall. We will not be able to attack the Demon Emperor on Tarus II today, tomorrow, or even for the next month. I recommend that first, you send a transmission back to your Thülvik telling her what you plan to do. After that, I'd like you to assemble all of your officers and take them to the Bloodbearer's holodeck. I'll run a performance evaluation on each one to assess their strengths and weaknesses, then decide on roles for them in the upcoming mission."
Drall nods. "Graugh! This Demon Emperor, Yama, what if he catches wind of our plans? Is he able to flee the planet?"
"Probably not," José replies. "Demons were, for the most part, incapable of using technology. They possessed no spaceships, and always had to rely on non-demons to travel between worlds. Of course, with the Buzor on Tarus II, anything is possible. The Kessu still had a 14th Era stealth craft within their grasp, so it's possible there may be other spacecraft we can't detect lurking within Yama's grasp. Either way, don't worry that taking too much time will allow Yama to flee. Now that I know a Demon Emperor exists, there's no place in the universe he'll be able to hide from me. I'll hunt him until the day I die, if that's what it takes."
Sapphire squeezes José's arm. "Kyargh! José, I look forward to fighting the demon right by your side! We will make a most excellent team!"
The Admiral smiles. He stares at Sapphire for a few seconds, then clears his throat. "Excuse me."
After a slightly awkward pause, Sapphire reluctantly releases his arm and pulls away, still maintaining a pleasant expression all the while. "You're so bashful, darling!"
José cracks his neck. "I wouldn't describe myself in such a way, Miss Sapphire. Soren, Megla, I want you two to stay here. After your father rounds up all of his officers, please guide them to the holodeck, then ping me. I'll join up with you later."
Soren cocks her head. "Admiral? Where are you going?"
"I didn't expect to have a thousand soldiers available for taking down Yama," José explains. "It changes my first strike capabilities significantly. I'm going to strategize with Umi, then meet up with you once I've decided on a plan of action."
"I see. That makes sense," Soren replies. "Megla and I will do as you command."
"Mmm. Good, I'll see you all in a couple of hours, then."
José turns to leave the room, only to nearly bump into Kisa, behind him. He pauses, realizing he almost forgot she existed.
Kisa practically becomes invisible once others start talking, the Admiral thinks.
After a momentary pause, he squeezes Kisa's shoulder. "You didn't get a proper tour around the Bloodbearer earlier. Why don't you come with me, and I'll show you my ship?"
Kisa nods quickly, but keeps her head bowed. "Y-yes, Great Precursor, Admiral Rodriguez, sir..."
He and Kisa exit the room, leaving the other four behind. After a few seconds, Sapphire gasps with realization.
"Kyargh! I was too slow!"
"Too slow?" Megla asks, baffled. "What do you mean?"
Sapphire slaps the top of her head, then beats her chest in grief. "That Kisa! She stole my darling from me! She was all alone with him in that cramped, narrow room of ours! I bet she melted into his arms while they performed the Fatüri, and then he took her as his mate! Drat! If only I had been a little bit quicker!"
Soren, Megla, and Lord Drall all simultaneously roll their eyes.
"Yes, sister..." Megla groans. "I'm sure that's exactly what happened."
.......................................
Kisa shyly follows behind José as he departs the Red-Tongue. They pass several other Kraktol along the way, but few of them pay Kisa any mind. All of their staring and adoration goes directly to José, the slayer of Orgon the Betrayer. Given his reputation as one of the mightiest Kraktol, Orgon's reputation, and therefore his loss at José's hands, gives José a proportional boost to his infamy among the Kraktol.
Once Kisa and the Terran exit the ship, they pause at the bottom of the ramp, while José glances around, reading several holographic imprints that appear inside his retinal scanners.
"Umi, show me a list of the Bloodbearer's weapon reserves. Sort them in order of likely lethality against the Buzor we encountered, as well as any monsters or demons we confirmed were living alongside Yama."
"Orders received, Admiral," Umi beeps from overhead. She transmits a series of images to his brain, making them pop up inside his retinal scanners. "Assuming a battalion count of nine hundred and fifty soldiers, these weapons are the most likely to deal extreme damage to the enemy types we observed. Please note that the Bloodbearer only has ten Titan battlesuits in its storage, and three of them are inoperable. You will need to personally assist the Kessu in their repairs, given the intricacies involved in their logistical operations. Alternatively, Crew-members Lele or Soren Mudrose would be capable of completing the repairs unassisted."
José blinks in surprise. "Lele? The kitten?"
"Affirmative. Crew-member Lele has the second highest intelligence rating among all of the Kessu and Kraktol onboard, excluding the newcomers from Lord Drall Brighteye's vessel. Her analytical and repairing capabilities are extraordinary, especially given her biological age."
"Alright. I'll take her down there and explain what she needs to do," José replies.
The Admiral turns to Kisa. "Uh... is there anything you're good at or passionate about? Any skills or hobbies?"
Kisa's scales flush with color. "I, um... I received the best education on Dragua, since I will someday take over as the Thülvik. I suppose I'm good with a lot of things, Great Precursor, Admiral Rodriguez, sir."
"You can just call me 'Admiral,'" José says. "Alright. I'll take you to the medbay and perform an evaluation. Hm. I should probably do that for all of Drall's crew."
While the Admiral ponders over his next move, Umi beeps again. "Admiral Rodriguez. I have received a Priority Green message from the Slipstream. Synthmind 4131 wishes to speak to you. Will you accept?"
José shrugs. "Yeah, sure?"
Having all but forgotten about the Slipstream and other such tangential things after his rebirth, José doesn't give much thought to the synthmind's request. He only finds it odd a random synthmind would attempt to contact him.
A male synthmind voice speaks from Umi's speaker system above. "Greetings, Admiral Rodriguez. I wish to inform you that as of [ONE] hour and [SEVENTEEN] minutes ago, I successfully finished assimilating [THREE HUNDRED] petabytes of scientific data. I scanned every ship in the Bloodbearer's hangar and proceeded to spend the last [SIX] months, [SEVENTEEN] days, [FOURTEEN] hours, and [SEVEN] minutes adapting their configurations to my learning network. As such, I have obtained [SEVEN] advanced transformations, [FORTY-ONE] intermediate transformations, and [ONE HUNDRED, SIXTY-THREE] low-level transformations. With assistance from Synthmind Umi's superior processing matrices, I have successfully upgraded my internal and external components to the [FIFTIETH] era."
José stares blankly ahead for several seconds.
"Upgraded... transformations... wait, are you- is your vessel a self-learning-type exocraft?"
"Affirmative, Admiral Rodriguez," Synthmind 4131 beeps in acknowledgement. "I am capable of adapting other vessel designs to my hull and upgrading my capabilities over time. Were I to study [FIFTIETH] Era technology on my own, I would have required several millennia to properly adapt them to my Biosteel Plating. However, Synthmind Umi was invaluable in providing me design mechanics to study and mold to my neural pathways. I believe you will find that my capabilities as a warship, a science vessel, and a mining exocraft vastly supersede any others currently inside the Bloodbearer's hangar bay."
"By the Divine Emperor..." José mutters, while stroking his chin. "That does, indeed, greatly interest me. Come along, Kisa. Let's go take a look at the Slipstream and see what it can do."
The Malvik nods. "Kyargh! Y-yes, Great Precursor, Admiral Rodriguez, sir!"
"It's just 'Admiral Rodriguez,' Kisa."
"...Yes."
The Admiral chuckles inwardly at Kisa's shy nature, then begins walking toward the Slipstream, a look of excitement on his face.
"An adaptive bioship. I don't recall hearing about more than five made in the whole galaxy. This is a development that could seal Yama's death."
Next Part
.......................................
Author Note:
If you liked what you just read, please consider subbing to my Patreon! I post patron-exclusive writing posts, with typically one post dedicated to TLP each month, and another to Cryopod. You help me survive long enough to not starve to death, and I give you fun things to read. It's a win-win! Check out some of those posts here and here!
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Thank you!

Call me butthurt or a hater, but I disagree with people saying the bad calls by the refs didn't matter.

The bad calls made all the difference. When teams get bad calls. They lose momentum and morale. And when you lose momentum and morale it is hard to win. Most of football is mental. And when the refs working against you gain a sense of hopelessness because even if you try hard it won't matter. Because when the games on the line the calls will always go in the favor of Brady, we know this, we have seen it happen for years, and multiple games this season. This is not a new thing. I don't think the refs should even be in the discussion of favoring any team over another. Saying it didn't make a difference because it wasn't close enough is the exact thing cheaters would want you to believe. They said the exact same thing about spy gate, where knowing your opponents plays gives a huge advantage. The patriots went from the worst team in the league to winning multiple Super Bowls with spy gates. Because of this Brady gained stronger rosters for gaining the reputation of winning when he cheated in the first place to gain that reputation. He went undefeated a season because every team in the league had to switch up their play books and calls after learning they had been stolen. He lost to in the Super Bowl to a physically superior d line and a hurry up offense that moved to fast for them to call plays to counter them as they could still remember the calls. The reality is that knowing what your opponent is going to do in any competition is an unfair advantage. In a pro poker match the guy who knows the cards everyone holds and the order of every card in the deck is much more likely to win, I am not saying it is guaranteed, its not 100%, but the odds are in his favor. What the patriots did is worse than the equivalent to peaking at someones screen in a video game, or someone cards in the had of a Yu-Gi-Oh game, because it was a calculated and coordinated effort involving many people instead of just one individual cheater. Turns out they've been using deflated footballs. Again this gives an advantage, they are easier to catch, less likely to fumble, and you can run faster with deflated balls. It is easier to catch a deflated football than a highly inflated one, as it won't bounce of your hands as much. You can also do faster snaps while reducing the likelihood you fumble thus speeding up the whole offense. Still people said it didn't matter, as the seahawks should of ran the ball. But they shouldn't have been there in the first place, they used it to blow out the colts, and the colts had a different run defense than the patriots, which means if the Seahawks were in the same position against, they might have ran the ball. Unless Marshawn Lynch walked into the end zone without a holding call, if it came down to inches, it would go in the favor of Brady, because refs. In this case you have to work out the fact the refs will always favor Brady when the game is on the line and even when it isn't. And thus, it is better the throw the ball to ensure he is clearly in the end zone. Had it been the Brady who threw that ball, the DB who picked it off would have been called for a pass interference for bumping the guy out of the way before he even touched to ball. Now they also won a Super Bowl with a roided up wide out, they tested Eric Ried how many times? And how many times did they test Edelmen? Hence the double standard for roid testing when involving a guy playing with Brady. In addition in the Falcons game there was a clear face mask call that should of canceled out the holding call. If it was Brady in the position of Matt Ryan. The face mask would have been called and the holding would not have been called. A player on the Bucs held a linemen in the exact same fashion as the Falcon linemen and didn't get called against the Packers. And then there was the time when Gronk lay hit a guy, clear unnecessary roughness. In the Super Bowl against the Eagles. People said it didn't matter because Brady dropped the ball to a pass that was a clear touchdown. I am sure Eagles fans would have cared about that call more if they had lost. The refs need to make fair calls at all times. And they are clearly not doing this when it comes to Brady. The way they Refs get you is they make you think that it doesn't make a difference when it does. The Refs unfair calls should not tip the odds in favor of any team at any point of the game. Why? Because bad calls can decide possession. And possession decides who controls the game. If you get more possessions in the first half you can tire the opposing defense for the second half. You can also keep a high powered offense from picking up steam. You can also tire an offensive line, by having them drive all the way down, and then making a bad call. Penalties also decide field position. Field position decides who wins. Also the coin toss matters. The Chiefs elected to defer. The team in the half that receives first gains more possessions and more chances to score. If the team that defers is in within one possession, they have better odds at winning. If they are in the lead, they have even greater odds at winning. But if they need a couple of possessions to win, as was the case for the Chiefs because of the Refs. Then your odds are obviously less. The Refs made deciding call for possession and field position. Allowing the Bucs to gain a multi possession lead thus greatly titling the odds in favor of their favorite guy, Brady. I know you guys want to convince yourselves that the calls didn't matter. People will call you losers for seeing it any other way. But admitting that there were bad calls and then saying they didn't matter is a state of cognitive dissonance. Your very beliefs contradict each other. The calls were bad and they did matter. Some people are making an argument comparing the rigging of the NFL to the elections. These are totally different. Elections are a highly legally regulated environment. Any cases go before a fair judge, both sides can present their case, but it is down to the interpretation of the law. A player cannot litigate a play call, he can't take it to court, the most he can do is take a complaint to arbitration which is run by the NFL, even still he can't undo the call in the moment. If he tries to protest it he can get another call, a fine, or even ejected. In addition there was no evidence of election fraud. Yet we have literal video evidence of unfair calls clearly favoring Brady on repeated occasions. What is the motive? Why would the NFL do this? They want to call Brady the goat, they wanted the Super Bowl in Tampa. They want to compare him to Jordan, but they want to leave Bill Russell out of the discussion because that kills the debate. They want to undo the stain of the spy gates wins so people can say "Hey, he can win without spy gate, so it didn't matter." Well the league doesn't revolve around Brady. There are plenty of other fans who would love to see the team their rooting for win, and the player their a fan of win. And it is not fair to rig it in favor of a single team, let alone a single player. Now cheating in the way Brady does it doesn't guarantee wins, but it does increase the odds. I feel as if to make a fair analogy of comparing the rigging of the NFL to unproven claims of election fraud. The refs should release their tax returns to see if they are taking any bribes or placing any sports bets, similar to how a president might release his tax returns. I don't want to make this politcal I just want to remove the parody argument of comparing Brady's cheating and illegitimate wins, to legitimate presidential wins that were upheld by the courts, congress, our electoral college, and votes of the American people. If someone bribes a judge or jury or officer that is a crime. If it was found that a person had a large stake in a company being sued he wouldn't make a fair jury, thus a ref shouldn't have a stake for a certain team or player to win. And they must prove this by publicly release their tax returns. And if they falsify their returns they should be charged with tax fraud. Every ref in the NFL should release all their tax returns publicly. And the returns should go back to the beginning of Brady's career. This way we can prove once and for all that the refs were not rigging games in favor of Brady. And the jokes about the refs working for Brady will just be funny jokes. And we can take our loss in peace, or we can storm the NFL HQ demanding them to give the Chiefs the Super Bowl win.

TLDR: The refs calls titled the odds in favor of the Bucs, they should release their tax returns dating back to when Brady joined the league to prove they do not have financial conflicts of interests.

Is it all just about price?

Tales of the Diaspora: #1 Professional Human

The thorny tongue with a horrible gentleness pushed the piece of chocolate into Phebe’s mouth. It forced the little sweet lump a little too deep for comfort before withdrawing. Se-Aleen and, The-One-Who-Would-Look-Upon-Fear-Without-Faltering did their best to imitate clapping and, H, Phebe's boss, pulled its tongue back scraping Phebe’s teeth on the way out. They beamed at her expectantly, caught up in the fun. Above their heads was a banner written in both AtL and what Phebe thought was meant to be English, “CongratulatioNs on oNe! year as top ProfessioNal humaN”. Phebe wanted to cry. Instead, she ate the chocolate.
“So?, have you asked it?” The party was winding down. The energy that had, for a brief, lovely, uncomfortable, moment, turned it into more then a couple of coworkers eating, slowly draining away into the flesh of the floor. Se-Aleen was hanging over Phebe’s shoulder his outer lips barely moving as he spoke. His voice sounded strange in the pidgin English of the city. The high and low notes, pinched off to squeeze his words into the human range, made him sound, uncharacteristically, tense. As though the wonderful full symphony that was his voice had been forced to perform in a bathroom stall.
“No, I, It’s just not the right moment.” Phebe spoke in a mix of AtL and Ang-resh, trying her best to mimic the huge pitch changes and gentle strokes across the face that characterized Se-Aleen’s native tongue. Partially because it was company policy, but mostly because she knew it annoyed him. She had important work to do tonight and just wanted to be left alone.
She had planned so carefully for this evening, rehearsed again and again what she would say to H, but now that she faced the prospect of actually saying it. Of betting everything on it. She felt paralyzed. And she could still taste the flavour, or the texture, or the idea, of H's tongue. But Se-Aleen was not so easily disentangled. He grimaced only slightly when her oily fingers passed across the pale downy fur between his eyes. Then gamely twined his eighth hand in her hair, in sympathetic solidarity. He shifted his grip on the ceiling a little to whisper even more quietly, this time in pure AtL.
“Come on, I’ve never seen it in a better mood. Look at its tongue, it’s practically orange! I’m telling you, H will listen to anything today.” He was probably right. Phoebe's boss was clearly having a wonderful time. It was talking animatedly to Z from air traffic control, who had stopped by to try out human food, and stayed to suck up to H a bit. His sexual front limbs, strong, hooked, were tucked and swaddled primly up against his body, the claws gleaming. Se-Aleen chuckled, a bizarre theremin screech that slid up and down the scale at dizzying speed, “If I didn’t know better I’d say it was flirting with him.”
“I don’t know Se-Al, I’m not really feeling up to it today.” Perhaps she could modify her plan, maybe do it more gently, with fewer lies? She wanted so badly to be gone but she knew how much the ghost of the unasked question would haunt her. The question and the hard red-purple lump. They haunted her already.
Se-Aleen tightened his grip in her hair, an odd moment of social comfort and physical pain.
“It’s ok, little cousin perhaps tomorrow, then you can-”
“Do not advocate for base cowardice Se-Aleen of Ajen-Peck, do not council equivocation, cowering, procrastination, and quivering.” The-One-Who-Would-Look-Upon-Fear-Without-Faltering had come up behind them. Oozing silently, elegant, graceful. The pale blue gelatin of her body lightening with the righteous indignation in which she felt so at home. Se-Aleen pulled up toward the ceiling, his colour-eyes contracting in irritation and self defensive sarcasm.
“Yes Fear Looker, let’s turn asking for a raise into a war of, ah, li-liberation. That seems, just , just perfectly appropriate” The-One-Who-Would-Look-Upon-Fear-Without-Faltering lightened further, the terrible stinging cells rising to her moist, rippling surface at the shortening of her name.
“Your communalist quibbling is distasteful in the extreme. You would have intelligent beings bow and scrape to one another as the sea to the cliff. Phoebe Horatio Fern! If you are resolved that your time is worth more then they have calculated; take what you are owed! Argue your worth. If H does not see the validity of your case then you must leave, at once!” Her voice was quick, precise and hard edged; steel in a discourse of clay. She was talking too loudly for Phoebe's comfort; her perfect translator rendering her English words in an accent that Phoebe's grandmother would have known as French. But a glance in H's direction showed it still enthusiastically gesticulating with its tongue.
“I’d love to, The-One-Who-Would-Look-Upon-Fear-Without-Faltering, but I can’t leave I have-”
“Of course she can’t, Unfalterer” Se-Aleen rushed to interject, his second and fourth arms were raised, the fingers splayed protecting his eyes, his soft cream fur bristling, unconscious preparations for a fight. “What would her family do? You’ve met Phillip. Are you suggesting he could take more shifts down in the arteries? At his age?” Se-Aleen gesticulated his seventh arm emphatically, indignant on Phoebe's behalf. But his eighth unconsciously, callously, released her hair.
“I am suggesting, as you well know, you oversexed, mewling, tree parasite, that the very concept of serving the obsolete, purely because of genetic similarity, is the thinking of a slave, a subject to tyrants and…” Phoebe tuned them out. She would get no help from her colleagues. A conversation about what she needed had become one of their old arguments, a script they knew well, and performed better. A pointless background. She should not have expected more from them.
The lump had come into her life three days ago. It fell with a horrible little squelch from her father's mouth as he coughed and coughed, bent over their little table. They stared at it. The tiny, horrible, familiar thing. The rhythms of her life ground to a stop.
She begged the tired Dr. to at least check. She even opened the window of the free clinic to point significantly, desperately, at the hard red-purple growths that were the houses of the human slum. The hollowed out tumors laying in the shadow of the great living city. Her home. The Doctor said that a human could not possibly have a city's disease. She didn't believe him. She wasn't sure he believed himself.
She walked across the room to H.
Phoebe tapped on H's left foot, gentle, polite, but insistent. H turned to her almost at once, its eye wobbling in surprise.
“Oh Phoebe, Phoebe how's my favorite human?” H's voice burbled and grumbled through AtL as though stomach gases had developed a full scale of tones, or a distant pot of thick soup had learned to bubble with intention. H's useless sexual arms were tied in front of its chest in an elaborate bow. It was wearing its favorite bone bonnet, the one it always brought out for work parties and told everyone it had inherited from its grandmother, at a rakish angle. It was also a little drunk.
“I'm well H, I love the party but I was wondering-
“Have you met Z? Z this is Phoebe, she's-”
“H!” H looked almost as surprised as Phoebe felt - she had never interrupted H before, never.
“What is it Phoebe? Is something wrong with your gallbladder?”
“No, I just had something I wanted to talk to you about, in private. About work.” She couldn't do it. Here, looking H in the face, her plan seemed ridiculous. But doctors, real doctors, weren't cheap, not for her.
“Oh don't be silly, work is over, everyone is friends now, just tell me what it is.”
“It's really more of a private-”
“Come now Phoebe, don't be like that, just tell me.” H turned to Z and, in perfectly audible conspiratorial tones, said “She really has some of the funniest moments. Z, did I ever tell you about the time she tried to change the human costume! She said the suspenders weren't for women, imagine that! I of course reminded her that with my degree in historical human-”
“I need a raise!” H went immediately silent. And Phoebe knew in a horrible moment of clarity, that she had made a mistake. She had had a plan, a perfect, humiliating, plan. And she had been so nervous she just blurted out what she wanted. H looked mortified.
“Now, wait a moment. I was very careful when I selected the amount to pay you. You were weighed and your nutritional needs calculated, all your medical needs are met by your local clinic, I even double checked the rent on your shelter myself. Your pay should be exactly right. It really is very rude to question me on this, I am an objective you know,” it shook its limp knotted arms meaningfully. “And everyone knows that I'm an expert on humans.”
How could she have been so stupid, to approach H in front of someone it was trying to impress. She opened her mouth to try again, to say something, anything, to try her plan, to make her arguments as The-One-Who-Would-Look-Upon-Fear-Without-Faltering would put it. But H was faster. Its tongue flicked out to rest on her lips. Forcing her words down her throat as effectively as it had pushed the chocolate.
“No! that's enough, we won't talk anymore about this.” It was over. All her careful work, the endless overtime. All because in a nervous panicked moment, she had forgotten her plan. She wanted to run, to take refuge behind her father as though she were still a little girl, but he was old now, and frail, and coughing lumps. No one would help her, and in the moment of truth she had failed her father, failed herself.
She gave up.
“Renter of my time! It is unwise not to listen to her arguments. She has the spark of intellect and must be allowed to speak!” The-One-Who-Would-Look-Upon-Fear-Without-Faltering placed a dark blue translucent tentacle on Phoebe's exposed elbow. Her surface felt like a warm eyeball. In that moment, it was the most welcome feeling in the world.
“Yeah, come on H.” Se-Aleen was speaking in full symphonic Ang-resh, “You know how impressive it is when a manager listens to its subordinates.” H looked more surprised than anything; its employees never got along. It let its tongue dangle in confusion. That was all the opening Phoebe needed. The little spark of support had at last lit the fuse on her plan. She wasn't alone and she would not be helpless. She began just as she had practiced in AtL, but pitching her tones in a slightly exaggerated human accent.
“H, as you know, there is an important human holiday coming up. For this one I must give many expensive gifts. You must know it well, as you are the expert.” H recovered from its confusion slowly, but it did recover. It hurriedly twisted its knees in agreement, glancing quickly over at Z.
“Yes, yes of course I do, just remind me of the name? It's been a long day.”
“Of course, of course, it's called Hanukkah. As you know doubt could tell Z here, it's very important that I provide excellent, expensive, gifts. If not, my family will be disgraced, I won't be able to find a mate and-” she leaned forward and made the tongue whisper gesture with her left arm. “I heard that people who failed to give generously, used to be burned for eight whole days back on earth.” H shuddered. “I know it's just a ritual but you know how important those are for humans, you wrote that article on it.” Phoebe had gotten the idea that became her plan while reading the awful thing. “Please H, you are the most experienced cultural ambassador here, surely you, better than anyone, understand how important this is. Of course you are right and my salary is perfect for my daily needs. But as you said 'humans are so superstitious that their ritual needs should be considered as important as their physical'.” She had memorized the quote exactly. “So I must ask you again to consider a raise.”
Phoebe knew she had won. Even before she had finished speaking H's tongue was making the telltale lazy circles above the ground. There was haggling to be done, and specifics to work out, there were doctors to find and bribes to pay, but that was for tomorrow, tonight but she had won!
That evening, after the haggling and the dancing, and the awkward goodbyes were over, Phoebe, The-One-Who-Would-Look-Upon-Fear-Without-Faltering, and Se-Aleen cleaned up the party together. Her friends bickered, the music of their argument just a comforting background as she cleaned up the last of the snacks. On a plate hidden in the corner and covered with a napkin she found it. The last piece of real delicious chocolate. She was so exhausted, and so relieved that she wanted to cry. Instead, she ate the chocolate.

[Quod Olim Erat] - Chapter 9

At the Beginning
Previously on Quod Olim Erat…
“Let me get this straight,” Major Tanner began with a heavy sigh. “You used raw data to do a test drive.”
This was my first time meeting him, and if anything, I had mixed feelings about it. On the surface, he commanded the authority of a scientist of his position, probably earned through decades of tireless work and personal sacrifice. Looking around his quarters, I could see no family photos, child pictures, or any instance of sentimental gifts. There was, however, an entire wall covered in certificate plaques and award replicas. My first captain would describe such people as science monks: they liked to build a shrine of their successes and lose themselves in it.
“And during your dive, you witnessed evidence of an alpha-one priority anomaly.” His eyes narrowed. I could understand why people felt uncomfortable in front of him. The major had one of those faces reserved for villains in movies. His greying mustache didn’t help matters, either. “Potentially, a contact event. Is that what you are saying?”
“Yes, Major,” Ally mumbled. Back in the lab, she could barely hold her excitement; now she was acting like a child that had been caught skipping school.
“I see. And even after trying for over two hours, you failed to replicate the result, is that correct?” He tilted his head forward.
“Th-that is—”
“That is why we came to you, sir.” I came to Ally’s rescue. “You are the only one with authority to make a decision based on the information provided, sir. The fact is that we found something of unknown origin on the planet, and are of the opinion that it is of major significance. As per fleet regulations, it is our duty to—”
“Facts? There are no ‘facts’ here!” The major slammed his hand on the desk. “You entered a simulated reality without adequate calibration and siphoned a raw data stream. I don’t give a damn about military regulations, but there are procedures for collecting data. If there’s no proof or any independent corroboration of an event, it does not exist.”
Ally was shaking beside me. It was obvious that she wasn’t the type to stand up to people, let alone her superiors, even if she was right. I imagined her mind was already working on overdrive, coming up with an excuse to run out of the room. A pity, since I had no intention of giving up.
“I am prepared to go on record saying what I saw, sir.” I remained respectful, but determined. “Just as I guarantee that the dimensions of the object I saw were too precise for it to be a natural occurrence.” From the corner of my eye, I saw Ally’s face turn pale.
“Do you?” The major crossed his arms. “You’ve been here a week and you tell me I should trust you? Just like that?”
“I’m a ship, sir.”
“So what? I don’t care if you’re a bicentennial space station! What you saw—” Abruptly he stopped. You understood the implication, didn’t you? His demeanor changed from annoyed, to calm, to optimistically excited. “Prometheus, can the cadet’s memory be trusted?”
“Even as a ship, she had limited processing capacity, but there is no reason not to.” Prometheus judged. “I would need access to the memory in question to perform my own analysis, of course.”
“Who needs to sign off on that?” The major leaned back in his chair.
“Yourself and the captain should be enough. Since this is a science matter, it falls under your purview. I’d send a priority transmission to the academy, as a precaution.”
“Ask the captain when he wakes up. No outside communication until we know more.” It was interesting that the major didn’t refer to the captain by name. I made a note to ask Ally later if there was some professional rivalry going on between the two. “What do we have?”
“Other than her memory, nothing,” Ally stepped in now that the danger had dissipated. “The description of the terrain is of little use. About thirty percent of the planet is covered in desert, and crystal formations aren’t rare to occur.”
“We do have the timestamp of my dive, sir,” I added. “If we can determine the location of the probe at that time, it might narrow the search.”
“Prometheus?” the major asked.
“Possible, but it will divert significant resources. It’s a bit more complicated than simple triangulation,” the ship replied, snarky to the end. “I’ll need the captain’s okay, but it’s possible.”
“Okay, ask him about that once he wakes up. You two—” He pointed at Ally and I. “—I want the SR fully calibrated, checked and rechecked. You’ll be be eating and sleeping in the lab until you find me a location. I’ll delay the landing. The moment you find anything, you let me know, understood?”
“Yes, sir!” I gave a salute, startling Ally as I did. The poor girl really wasn’t used to the military.
“Meanwhile, you’re forbidden to discuss this with anyone other than Prometheus, the captain, and myself.”
“What about the XO, sir?” The question everyone avoided. The moment I saw the Major hesitate, I could tell the crew dynamic was as I had imagined.
“Not for now.” The answer came after several seconds. The vagueness was a bit alarming, but as a simple cadet it wasn’t something I had to worry about. “Prometheus will let you know if the situation changes.”
“Yes, sir! Might I ask one more thing before we start working, sir?” I waited for the nod. As expected, soon enough, I got it. “May I have your permission to be barefoot in the research lab?”
There was a moment’s silence. Major Tanner looked at me as if I had gelatin remains on my mouth, then glanced at Ally. I saw her shake her head, as if denying she knew me.
“What’s wrong with you?” The major stepped out from behind his desk. “Is this some big joke? Because if it is, I’ll arrange for your very own shuttle to take you back to the academy.”
“I meant no disrespect, sir.” I looked him in the eyes. If all went well I’d have many similar conversations with many other officers. “There is no physical requirement for me to be barefoot, but it is something I had come to enjoy during my temporary retirement.” I deliberately mentioned retirement. At this point, there was no telling if he had read my file or not. Whatever the case, after this comment, he was going to. If there was one constant among humans, it was curiosity. “I am aware that there is no grass on the ship, but I would prefer to feel this modicum of freedom, if you would allow me.”
“Cadet, get out!” the man hissed. I did so promptly, Ally running behind me. Half an hour later, I was granted permission, along with the addendum that the privilege was subject to change.
Work on the simulated reality started almost immediately. The intensity of our meeting with the Major had caused Ally enough psychological trauma to merit a visit to medical. Meanwhile, I had used my time alone in the lab to allow access to my memories of the event so that Prometheus could analyze them. Technically we still needed the captain’s permission, but my consent would do until he woke up. I also hoped that might lead to a longer conversation with the ship, but as usual, all I got was a curt “thank you,” followed by silence.
I bet you’ll be proud of me, Sev. I sat on the floor as I waited. This is the chance of a lifetime. If all pans out, I might even be allowed to name the new artifact. Won’t that be something?
The chance of finding alien life was considered one in a quintillion. The number was made up, based purely on the statistics at the second contact. At the time, the overall humanity was two quintillion strong and had come in contact with two alien races. Today, the amount of people had vastly increased, but since no new races had been discovered, the odds remained unchanged. What would be the result of a third contact, though? Scientists and politicians had been discussing the prospect even before I was made. It was always said to be a matter of time, and now—if what I had seen was indeed true—the time had come.
If this was indeed Third Contact, the respective military protocols would kick in. Most people didn’t know about them, but as a ship, I still had them rooted in my memory core. A new front would be formed, along with the necessary logistic lines to support the border planets.
I closed my eyes and started running a simulation. Despite the recent conversation, I could almost guarantee that Prometheus had sent a secret report to fleet command. From there, based on our findings, or in the event we were destroyed, a new battle fleet would be formed and sent to the closest colonized systems. All habitable planets would quickly be developed and transformed into regional civilian and military centers, while non-habitable planets would be mined for resources. Shipyards would be constructed, crews recruited and sent into the fray. I watched in fast motion as backwater systems gained importance, establishing new slipstream corridors. While the battle raged, inner-system trade flourished, and humanity pushed forward. Over the centuries, the conflict toned down, transforming into a border dispute. A whole new wave of ships would retire as the new models were inevitably developed, and the cycle would start once more.
If only real life was so well organized. I opened my eyes. That was the bad thing about simulations: they were nothing like the real thing. In reality, wars were messy.
“Prometheus,” I said. “What are my chances?”
I can’t discuss this with you! You already know too much. he snapped.
“Who am I going to tell? I’m only allowed to talk to you and Ally, and I’ve signed away my memories, so I’ll lose them after the mission is over.” A tingle of sadness passed through me. I had given away my memories a few times before, but that didn’t mean I enjoyed it. “At least let me have something in the meantime.”
...
“It’s rude to send static, you know,” I chuckled. “Even for a science ship. Didn’t your first teach you any manners?”
That's why I hate battleships! You think you know it all and take every occasion to remind the rest of us about it!
Funny, that was my exact opinion of him. I was confident I wasn’t exaggerating. Actually, I was certain of it. I’d known thousands of battleships, ranging from stoic to completely insane. Some of them liked to brag, most of them didn’t, but none believed themselves to be the know-all-be-all. The only thing we wanted—the only thing we were created to do—was fight and win.
One to a hundred and seven! Prometheus said and blocked the line.
“Thanks,” I said knowing he could still hear me.
One to a hundred and seven. Quite good odds, considering. No human would be sent down with those odds, of course. In a way, that’s what made it interesting. I took off my shoes and lay on the floor. The air felt still. When we started our simulations, I was going to ask Ally to allow me to experience the full sensation.
The lab door slid open. Ally gave me a brief pout as she walked by, then rushed to her desk. It was obvious she was still upset.
“We’ll do some more baseline readings,” she said, as if that was some punishment. “The major wants us to start as soon as possible.”
“Yes, ma’am.” I sat up. I know. I was there with you, remember? “How many sets will we be doing?”
“Three.” Ally avoided looking at me.
“And then I enter simulated reality?” Actually, I doubted it would start so soon. Even with his processing power, Prometheus was likely going to take a full day to determine an approximate location.
“I have to set up a secondary system to record what you’re experiencing,” she said, avoiding my question. “And open a direct data link to delta-lab to confirm our findings. Or the lack thereof.”
“Ma’am, you were there when I saw the anomaly.” I approached her and looked at the virtual screen. The code was written in a language I wasn’t entirely familiar with. Some of the syntax seemed familiar, but not enough for me to perform an analysis. At times like this, I missed my auxiliary cores.
“I know you think you saw something, but with the state of the software we can’t be sure that you weren’t affected by the glitch.” Her voice had become significantly higher, as had her heart rate. She seemed quite nervous about something.
“Ma’am?” I tilted my head. “Are you lying to me?”
“Of course not!” She leaned closer to her screen. “There’s just a lot of things I need to do... and our visit to the major turned out to be a disaster, so now I have to make up for that and—“
“You found a way to find the location before Prometheus, haven’t you?” I guess my first captain was right: it always was the quiet ones who did the unexpected. “Haven’t you?”
“No.” Ally paused. “Maybe? I’m not sure. There might be a way to isolate the random seed the probe used to scan the planet. With it and the start position, it’s possible we could narrow the search to a smaller area based on the timestamp.” She looked at me. “It’s not standard procedure, and there’s no guarantee, but if we start now we might at least eliminate certain areas by the time Prometheus finishes with his calculations.”
“And the downside?” There always was a downside.
“It’s just that...” she looked away. “It will still be raw data. Things might glitch up while you’re there.”
“I understand.” In other words, I was in for a rough ride. “In that case we best get started, ma’am.” Third contact awaited.
Next

Jenny - Finding her way

Jenny woke up as usual to begin her day like any other. She looked over at the book laying next to her on the bed she had been reading before falling asleep the night before. It was a frustrating dead end story, just like her, she thought. Jenny screwed up her nose as she noticed a strong sharp, pungent odour and rolled over, continuing to lay there uncomfortably, waiting a few extra minutes before getting up to clean up the cat shit in her room.
“Toby, you dirty fucking pig!” She scowled before getting some toilet paper to pick up the turd. Jenny got dressed and drove to work in silence. She passed McDonalds and resisted pulling in to the drive through. She calculated there wasn’t enough time to binge and purge into a plastic bag before work. She could feel the tension in her body.
Jenny walked in to the library where the other staff were enjoying a chat about Margret’s new engagement and the nearing wedding date. Jenny joined them and listened for awhile noticing the tension in her body rising. She was in hiding. To the observer Jenny looked as she always did. Plain, uninterested, apathetic and nondescript albeit, in an odd kind of way.
Jenny didn’t understand many interpersonal relationships. She wondered how they managed to chatter away about the day to day events with such emotion and light heartedness. What was so enthralling that made them a connected unit? Even when the topic was about mundane things like, how many times Mr Green borrowed the same book in a year. . . . “What was so interesting about that?” She thought. Their light hearted chatter annoyed Jenny.
As the library opened she set about her morning task of putting away the returned books on the trolley. As she strolled up and down the isles she was almost invisible. Blending into the book shelves. She was surrounded by thousands of rich stories in history, fiction, non fiction, biographies, science fiction, fantasy, children’s books and more.
It was Tuesday and that meant a noisy bunch of grade two children would be arriving soon. “Ugh, more racket”, Jenny mumbled to herself. As she finished putting the books away she noticed her colleagues smiling as they engaged with the library members and continuing their small talk as if it mattered.
Jenny noticed a pang of anger. No reason came to mind, just a feeling of contempt for her environment and the people in it. . . “Oh God, here they come. . . .” the clatter and chatter of small children stirred in the air as the grade two class made their way in two straight lines ready to enter the library.
“Ok! Two G’, don’t forget ‘we’ use our ‘little voice’ in the library, Mrs Thomas called to the class. “Mr Baxter will you demonstrate what our ‘little voice’ sounds like please?”
“Certainly! Mrs Thomas”, said Mr Baxter. “We talk like this” He whispered to demonstrate, “ so we don’t interrupt people reading”. “Almost a whisper, right?” Mr. Baxter announced. “Jessy, can you show the other boys and girls how to use your ‘little voice’ please?”
Eight year old Jessy was happy to oblige whispering ever so softly as all the other grade two kids joined in their whisper sounds. “Right”, said Mr Baxter, “In we go!”
Julie, the senior librarian welcomed the children and in they bound forgetting all about their ‘little voice’ almost immediately. “First of all, welcome class 2G and Mr Baxter & Mrs Thomas! It’s lovely to have you hear today. . . firstly, we’ll have a tour of the library then, we’ll head over to the reading pit for a story. How does that sound everyone? I hope you’ve all brought your library bags today so you get to take a fun story home with you. But remember, the book is only borrowed, you must return it next time you come so some other little boy or girl can read it next. Then you’ll be able to borrow something new to read! What a great place, hey?”
The children smiled clinging to the library bags their mothers had made them with each child’s name marked clearly on the front.
Jenny didn’t like small children, they were too unpredictable. They could ask the most embarrassing questions. Instead of Jenny knowing how to redirect an uncomfortable question she felt compelled to answer it. Jenny kept her distance from the excited children now moving around the isles looking at the sections under supervision from their teachers. One girl came up to her and said, “What’s your name?”
Jenny stared at the girl for a moment then replied, “Miss . . . um, um, Jenny”.
The little girl sensed her awkwardness and giggled. The little girl looked at her quizzically then asked why she was wearing a dirty cardigan. Jenny emotionally shrunk to the size a child younger than the precocious child before her. “You need to get your mum to wash it!” the child insisted.
“I don’t have a mum!” Jenny protested. “I’m too old! I have to do everything myself!” Jenny frowned at the child and continued, “God! It’s alright for you. . . I bet your mum does everything for you!”
The child was baffled by the response and stood there a moment wondering what to say. . . then replied, “My mum wouldn’t let any of us out of the house in dirty clothes. . . . Mum said, it’s not right.”
Margret had seen Jenny engaging with the child and it didn’t look right so she called Jenny over quietly to intervene. “What was going on over there Jen?” Queried Margret.
“Oh, Nothing. Just another spoilt smart aleck kid, that’s all.” Jenny said dismissing Margaret’s questioning.
“Alright, said Margret. “Lets just stick to the job at hand ok? Oh, by the way. . . have you seen ‘Mystery Peach’ By Ivan Vuillard? I’m desperate to read it! I know it’s in . . . . just wondering if you saw it on your return trolley today?”
Jenny was furious. “Stick to the job at hand?” Who does Margret think she is!! She’s the same pay grade as me! What the fuck has anything I do got to do with her?” She thought before answering Margaret, “No, I haven’t seen it yet. . . but I’ll sure bring it to you as soon as I do.” Jenny replied sarcastically.
“Thanks Pet.” Margret said, now a little cautiously, “Talk later ok?”
“Ok,” replied Jenny, “Talk later.” she echoed.
Jenny saw the book Margret was inquiring about this morning and had already put it back on the shelf but was now determined to get to the book before Margret. As Jenny moved through the isles she found the book and slipped it into her jacket and headed straight to the bathroom. Once in the stall, Jenny tore out a number of pages from the book as she sat on the toilet lid. A sense of relief came over her as she looked at the pages on her lap. Within a few moments she herd Julie, the senior librarian, and Toni enter the bathroom. She heard them chatting bout how nice it is to see eager young readers in the library again as it was the start of a new school year. Toni was a temp at the library getting her hand in after just finishing her degree at teachers college. She was so happy all the time and eager to learn about the library and its new approach with the school districts reading programs for little ones.
Jenny sat silently. The feeling of satisfying retribution had left her now and was replaced by anxiety. Jenny felt trapped. What was she going to do with the book she just destroyed? She couldn’t put it back on the shelf. Margret was surely going to find it and see the damage. Even if she misfiled it the next borrower would surely complain. Jenny decided to hide the book under her jacket and head straight to the staff room before morning tea and put it in her hand bag. “I’ll never do that again.” Jenny fretted, “Wow, I must never act out like that again”. . . . Jenny felt ashamed at her momentary loss of control.
Jenny dashed from the bathroom and entered the staff room with the book tucked under her jacket. Margret and the school teacher, Mr Baxter were a surprised to see her enter. Jenny panicked. She held her arm tight against her rib cage so not to loose grip on the book under her wing. Margret was showing the young good looking teacher where everything was so he could make a cuppa for himself as the kids were entertained by story time in the reading pit.
“Early morning tea I see . .” Margret remarked as Jenny froze at the staff room door.
“No! I’m, ahh . . , not feeling well . .”, Jenny lied.
Jeff Baxter jumped to his feet as he noticed the colour had drained out of her face. “Here take my seat.”
Jen stood still. “Busted.” She thought to herself. Margret annoyed her more than ever now as her thoughts raced. Jenny turned on her heels and ran straight back to the bathroom, noticing the little girl from before again looking quizzically at her as she raced past and almost knocking Julie and Toni on the way in. As Jenny again sat on the lid of the toilet seat she grabbed the book from under her arm and began ripping more pages from it and scrunching them into tight paper balls.
“Jen, you ok?” Asked Julie.
Jenny thought quick and started making gagging and spitting sounds. “I’m ok, I feel like being sick. Give me a minute please.”
“Oh dear! Ok love, I’ll organise a lift home for you. Hope it’s not gastroenteritis! Best head home we don’t want the whole faculty coming down with it. Can I get you a towel and water?”
“No I’ll be ok.” Jenny replied and waited to hear Julie leave the bathroom. Jenny felt panicked and started gathering the scrunched up paper balls and stuffing them down her shirt. Then, she tucked the book high up under her arm pit and pulled her cardigan jacket across her front, fixing the concealment. Jenny gathered her thoughts and left the bathroom slightly hunched over as she headed straight to the staff room to collect her bag.
Jeff Baxter stood up as Jenny re-entered the staffroom. “Jenny, I’m happy to drive you home. I’m happy to drop your car off too as we head back to school.”
“No. I’m ok to drive.” Jen replied.
“Look I’ve just finished a workplace health and safety course and, well, I think it’s best . . . sorry to be a bore but, HR is really cracking down on stuff like this now days.” Interrupted Jeff.
“That would be great Jeff,” Margret replied. “Makes sense Jenny, the teachers are heading your way anyhow.”
Jenny was furious with Margret for interjecting herself and let out a howl as she grabbed tighter at her stomach. “Ok, Ok. Lets go now then, I just want to get home. Oooh”, she winced as she grabbed her handbag and held it tight to her stomach.
“Right! Looks like were off then, Jeff exclaimed. “See you back here in a few minutes.”
Margret nodded ok as she handed Jeff Jenny’s address. “It’s just a couple of blocks away…. You know that old Brownstone looking building on Walton Street?”
“Yep, got it.” Jeff replied as he followed Jenny out.
Jeff was courteous as he held open the door to the library as they left the building.
As they stepped outside the library Jenny turned to Jeff, “Thanks, I’m feeling better now. I’ll take it from here if you don’t mind.” She said. “Why don’t you go grab yourself a real coffee before heading back to the library. No one will know.” She added as she turned from him.
“Well if you really insist . . But, I don’t mind really.” Jeff called after her.
Jenny walked off without another word. Jeff felt awkward. He didn’t know what to make of this odd woman. Once Jen stepped onto the pavement she changed her gait and walked away quickly disappearing into the carpark.
Jeff decided to have a smoke before returning inside. He was curious about this young woman with her hair tied back scruffily without an ounce of make-up and her slap together outfit. She was a tall, slim woman and not unattractive by any means. It’s just, she was so damned unkempt. Almost like she was deliberately spoiling herself. But more curiously was her speech, it didn’t match the carelessness of appearance. She had a certain ‘well-to-do’ accent and it stirred a curiosity in most people she acquainted.
As Jeff grappled for his lighter he noticed he still had the address Margret had scribbled down on a piece of paper. Glancing at the address Jeff returned the note to his pocket and lit his cigarette.

Some strong historical fantasy books (takes place in Earth's past)

All these books take place at a specific time and place in Earth’s past. Other than that one nod to reality, all bets are off.

27. The Once and Future Witches by Alix E. Harrow - 2020

In 1893, there’s no such thing as witches. There used to be, in the wild, dark days before the burnings began, but now witching is nothing but tidy charms and nursery rhymes. If the modern woman wants any measure of power, she must find it at the ballot box.
But when the Eastwood sisters—James Juniper, Agnes Amaranth, and Beatrice Belladonna—join the suffragists of New Salem, they begin to pursue the forgotten words and ways that might turn the women’s movement into the witch’s movement. Stalked by shadows and sickness, hunted by forces who will not suffer a witch to vote—and perhaps not even to live—the sisters will need to delve into the oldest magics, draw new alliances, and heal the bond between them if they want to survive.
There’s no such thing as witches. But there will be.

“A love letter to folklore and the rebellious women of history.” ―Publishers Weekly

26. The Terror by Dan Simmons - 2007

The men on board HMS Terror have every expectation of triumph. As part of the 1845 Franklin Expedition, the first steam-powered vessels ever to search for the legendary Northwest Passage, they are as scientifically supported an enterprise as has ever set forth.
As they enter a second summer in the Arctic Circle without a thaw, though, they are stranded in a nightmarish landscape of encroaching ice and darkness. Endlessly cold, with diminishing rations, 126 men fight to survive with poisonous food, a dwindling supply of coal, and ships buckling in the grip of crushing ice. But their real enemy is far more terrifying.
There is something out there in the frigid darkness: an unseen predator stalking their ship, a monstrous terror constantly clawing to get in. As yet another winter approaches, as scurvy and starvation grow more terrible, and as the terror gets closer, the captain and his men begin to fear that there is no escape.

“The best and most unusual historical novel I have read in years.” ―The Boston Globe

25. Servant of the Underworld by Aliette de Bodard - 2010

Book 1 of 3 in the Obsidian and Blood series
Year One-Knife, Tenochtitlan the capital of the Aztecs. Human sacrifice and the magic of the living blood are the only things keeping the sun in the sky and the earth fertile.
A Priestess disappears from an empty room drenched in blood. It should be a usual investigation for Acatl, High Priest of the Dead—except that his estranged brother is involved, and the the more he digs, the deeper he is drawn into the political and magical intrigues of noblemen, soldiers, and priests-and of the gods themselves…

“Part murder mystery, part well-researched historical novel and part fantasy.” —SFX Magazine

24. The Philosopher's Flight by Tom Miller - 2018

Book 1 of 2 in The Philosophers Series
Eighteen-year-old Robert Weekes is one of the few men who practice empirical philosophy—an arcane, female-dominated branch of science used to summon the wind, heal the injured, and even fly.
He’s always dreamed of being the first man to join the US Sigilry Corps’ Rescue and Evacuation Department, an elite team of flying medics, but everyone knows that’s impossible: men can barely get off the ground. When a shocking tragedy puts Robert’s philosophical abilities to the test, he rises to the occasion and wins a scholarship to study philosophy at Radcliffe College—an all-women’s school.
At Radcliffe, Robert hones his flying skills and strives to win the respect of his classmates, a host of formidable and unruly women. Robert falls hard for Danielle Hardin, a disillusioned young hero of the Great War turned political radical. But Danielle’s activism and Robert’s recklessness attract the attention of the same fanatical anti-philosophical group that Robert’s mother fought against decades before.
With their lives in mounting danger, Robert and Danielle band together with a team of unlikely heroes to fight for Robert’s place among the next generation of empirical philosophers—and for philosophy’s very survival against the men who would destroy it.

“[A] wealth of worldbuilding in this deft, nonconformist historical fantasy set during World War I…Miller offers a nuanced adventure story that mixes romance, gunplay, and social awareness into its steampunk-ish revelry. A fun, fast-paced coming-of-age story laced with magic.” —Kirkus Reviews

23. Fevre Dream by George R.R. Martin - 1982

That’s right. The Game of Thrones guy wrote a darn good vampire book, too.
Abner Marsh, a struggling riverboat captain, suspects that something’s amiss when a wealthy aristocrat with a lucrative offer approaches him. The hauntingly pale, steely-eyed Joshua York doesn’t care that the icy winter of 1857 has wiped out all but one of Marsh’s dilapidated fleet; nor does he care that he won’t earn back his investment any time soon. York’s reasons for traversing the powerful Mississippi are to be none of Marsh’s concern—no matter how bizarre, arbitrary, or capricious York’s actions may prove. Not until the maiden voyage of Fevre Dream does Marsh realize that he has joined a mission both more sinister, and perhaps more noble, than his most fantastic nightmare—and humankind’s most impossible dream.

“An adventure into the heart of darkness that transcends even the most inventive vampire novels . . . Fevre Dream runs red with original, high adventure.” —Los Angeles Herald Examiner

22. Dodger by Terry Pratchett - 2012

A storm. Rain-lashed city streets. A flash of lightning. A scruffy lad sees a girl leap desperately from a horse-drawn carriage in a vain attempt to escape her captors. Can the lad stand by and let her be caught again? Of course not, because he’s…Dodger.
Seventeen-year-old Dodger may be a street urchin, but he gleans a living from London’s sewers, and he knows a jewel when he sees one. He’s not about to let anything happen to the unknown girl—not even if her fate impacts some of the most powerful people in England.
From Dodger’s encounter with the mad barber Sweeney Todd to his meetings with the great writer Charles Dickens and the calculating politician Benjamin Disraeli, history and fantasy intertwine in a breathtaking account of adventure and mystery.

“Masterful. Unexpected, drily funny and full of the pathos and wonder of life: Don’t miss it.” —Kirkus Reviews

21. The Strange Case of the Alchemist's Daughter by Theodora Goss - 2017

Book 1 of 3 in The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club series
Mary Jekyll, alone and penniless following her parents’ death, is curious about the secrets of her father’s mysterious past. One clue in particular hints that Edward Hyde, her father’s former friend and a murderer, may be nearby, and there is a reward for information leading to his capture…a reward that would solve all of her immediate financial woes.
But her hunt leads her to Hyde’s daughter, Diana, a feral child left to be raised by nuns. With the assistance of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, Mary continues her search for the elusive Hyde, and soon befriends more women, all of whom have been created through terrifying experimentation: Beatrice Rappaccini, Catherin Moreau, and Justine Frankenstein.
When their investigations lead them to the discovery of a secret society of immoral and power-crazed scientists, the horrors of their past return. Now it is up to the monsters to finally triumph over the monstrous.

“A tour de force of reclaiming the narrative, executed with impressive wit and insight.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review

20. Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal - 2010

Book 1 of 5 in the Glamourist Histories series
Shades of Milk and Honey is exactly what we could expect from Jane Austen if she had been a fantasy writer: Pride and Prejudice meets Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. It is an intimate portrait of a woman, Jane, and her quest for love in a world where the manipulation of glamour is considered an essential skill for a lady of quality.
Jane and her sister Melody vie for the attentions of eligible men, and while Jane’s skill with glamour is remarkable, it is her sister who is fair of face. When Jane realizes that one of Melody’s suitors is set on taking advantage of her sister for the sake of her dowry, she pushes her skills to the limit of what her body can withstand in order to set things right—and, in the process, accidentally wanders into a love story of her own.

“With the grace of Sense and Sensibility, a touch of classic fairy tale magic, and an action-packed ending, this debut novel by an award-winning fantasy short story writer will appeal to fans of Jane Austen, Jane Yolen, Patricia Wrede, Susannah Clarke, and even Jasper Fforde.” —Library Journal

19. The Once and Future King by T. H. White - 1958

Once upon a time, a young boy called “Wart” was tutored by a magician named Merlyn in preparation for a future he couldn’t possibly imagine. A future in which he would ally himself with the greatest knights, love a legendary queen, and unite a country dedicated to chivalrous values. A future that would see him crowned and known for all time as Arthur, King of the Britons.
During Arthur’s reign, the kingdom of Camelot was founded to cast enlightenment on the Dark Ages, while the knights of the Round Table embarked on many a noble quest. But Merlyn foresaw the treachery that awaited his liege: the forbidden love between Queen Guenever and Lancelot, the wicked plots of Arthur’s half-sister Morgause, and the hatred she fostered in Mordred that would bring an end to the king’s dreams for Britain—and to the king himself.

“Touching, profound, funny and tragic.” —Los Angeles Times

18. The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov - 1966

One spring afternoon, the Devil, trailing fire and chaos in his wake, weaves himself out of the shadows and into Moscow.
Written during the darkest period of Stalin’s repressive reign and a devastating satire of Soviet life, it combines two distinct yet interwoven parts, one set in contemporary Moscow, the other in ancient Jerusalem, each brimming with historical, imaginary, frightful and wonderful characters. Although completed in 1940, The Master & Margarita was not published until 1966 when the first section appeared in the monthly magazine Moskva. Russians everywhere responded enthusiastically to the novel’s artistic and spiritual freedom and it was an immediate and enduring success.

“By turns hilarious, mysterious, contemplative, and poignant . . . A great work.” —Chicago Tribune

17. Across the Nightingale Floor by Lian Hearn - 2002

Book 1 of 5 in the Tales of the Otori series
In his black-walled fortress at Inuyama, the warlord Iida Sadamu surveys his famous nightingale floor. Constructed with exquisite skill, it sings at the tread of each human foot. No assassin can cross it unheard.
The youth Takeo has been brought up in a remote mountain village among the Hidden, a reclusive and spiritual people who have taught him only the ways of peace. But unbeknownst to him, his father was a celebrated assassin and a member of the Tribe, an ancient network of families with extraordinary, preternatural skills.
When Takeo’s village is pillaged, he is rescued and adopted by the mysterious Lord Otori Shigeru. Under the tutelage of Shigeru, he learns that he too possesses the skills of the Tribe. And, with this knowledge, he embarks on a journey that will lead him across the famed nightingale floor—and to his own unimaginable destiny…

“Satisfyingly rich in incident yet admirably spare in the telling…Hearn has created a world I anticipate returning to with pleasure.” —The New York Times Book Review

16. Bridge of Birds by Barry Hughart - 1984

Book 1 of 3 in The Chronicles of Master Li and Number Ten Ox
When the children of his village were struck with a mysterious illness, Number Ten Ox sought a wiseman to save them. He found master Li Kao, a scholar with a slight flaw in his character. Together they set out to find the Great Root of Power, the only possible cure.
The quest led them to a host of truly memorable characters, multiple wonders, incredible adventures—and strange coincidences, which were really not coincidences at all. And it involved them in an ancient crime that still perturbed the serenity of Heaven. Simply and charmingly told, this is a wry tale, a sly tale, and a story of wisdom delightfully askew. Once read, its marvels and beauty will not easily fade from the mind.

“Li Kao may have a slight flaw in his character but the book has none. I recommend it unconditionally and I predict Barry Hughart has quite a future as a fantasy writer.” —Anne McCaffrey, author of the Dragonriders of Pern series

15. Lion of Macedon by David Gemmell - 1990

Book 1 of 2 in the Greek Series
Over and again, the aged seeress Tamis scried all the possible tomorrows. In every one, dark forces threatened Greece; terrible evil was poised to reenter the world. The future held only one hope: a half-caste Spartan boy, Parmenion. So Tamis made it her mission to see that Parmenion would become the deadliest warrior in the world—no matter what the cost.
Raised to manhood in Sparta, bullied and forced to fight for his life every day, Parmenion had no notion of the unseen dimensions of magic and mystery that shaped his fate. He grew in strength and cunning. His military genius earned him the title Strategos in Sparta. His triumphs for the city of Thebes made him a hero. And finally his fate led him to the service of Philip of Macedon.
As Tamis had foreseen, Parmenion’s destiny was tied to the Dark God, to Philip, and to the yet-unborn Alexander. All too soon the future was upon them. Parmenion stood poised to defeat evil—or to open the gate for the Dark God to reenter the world.

14. Daughter of the Forest by Juliet Marillier - 1999

Book 1 of 6 in The Sevenwaters Series
The Sevenwaters series takes place in Ireland and Britain in the ninth century.
Lovely Sorcha is the seventh child and only daughter of Lord Colum of Sevenwaters. Bereft of a mother, she is comforted by her six brothers who love and protect her. Sorcha is the light in their lives and they are determined that she know only contentment. But Sorcha’s joy is shattered when her father is bewitched by his new wife, an evil enchantress who binds her brothers with a terrible spell, a spell which only Sorcha can lift—by staying silent.
If she speaks before she completes the quest set to her by the Fair Folk and their queen, the Lady of the Forest, she will lose her brothers forever. When Sorcha is kidnapped by the enemies of Sevenwaters and taken to a foreign land, she is torn between the desire to save her beloved brothers, and a love that comes only once. Sorcha despairs that she will never able to complete her task, but the magic of the Fair Folk knows no boundaries, and love is the strongest magic of them all….

13. The Lions of Al-rassan by Guy Gavriel Kay - 1995

The ruling Asharites have come from the desert sands, worshipping the stars, their warrior blood fierce and pure. But over centuries, seduced by the sensuous pleasures of their new land, that stern piety has eroded. The Asharies empire has splintered into decadent city-states lead by warring petty kinds.
King Almalik of Cartada is on the ascendancy, adding city after city to his realm, even though Cartada is threatened by forces both within and without. Almalik is aided by his friend and advisor, the notorious Ammar ibn Khairan—poet, diplomat, soldier—until a summer afternoon of savage brutality changes their relationship forever.
Meanwhile, in the north, Rodrigo Belmonte, the Jaddite’s most celebrated and feared military leader, is driven into exile in the wake of events following the death of the king he loved. Rodrigo leads his mercenary company south, to the dangerous lands of Al-Rassan.
In the exquisite lakeside city of Ragosa, Rodrigo Belmonte and Ammar ibn Kharian meet and serve, for a time, the same master. Sharing the interwoven fate of these two men from different worlds—and increasingly torn in her feelings—is Jehane, the beautiful, accomplished court physician, whose own skills play an increasing role as Al-Rassan is swept to the brink of holy war, and beyond.
“A magnificent, deeply moving book.” —Locus

12. Outlander by Diana Gabaldon - 1992

Book 1 of 8 in the Outlander series
Scottish Highlands, 1945. Claire Randall, a former British combat nurse, is just back from the war and reunited with her husband on a second honeymoon when she walks through a standing stone in one of the ancient circles that dot the British Isles. Suddenly she is a Sassenach—an “outlander”—in a Scotland torn by war and raiding clans in the year of Our Lord… 1743.
Claire is catapulted into the intrigues of a world that threatens her life, and may shatter her heart. Marooned amid danger, passion, and violence, Claire learns her only chance of safety lies in Jamie Fraser, a gallant young Scots warrior. What begins in compulsion becomes urgent need, and Claire finds herself torn between two very different men, in two irreconcilable lives.
“Marvelous and fantastic adventures, romance, sex . . . perfect escape reading.” —San Francisco Chronicle

11. Taliesin by Stephen R. Lawhead - 1987

Book 1 of 6 in The Pendragon Cycle
It was a time of legend, when the last shadows of the mighty Roman conqueror fade from the captured Isle of Britain. While across a vast sea, a bloody war shatters a peace that had flourished for two thousand years in the doomed kingdom of Atlantis.
Charis, a princess from Atlantis, escapes the terrible devastation of her land and meets the fabled seer and druid prince Taliesin, singer at the dawn of the age. Their incomparable love joins two astonishing worlds amid the fires of chaos, and spawns the miracles of Merlin and King Arthur.

“Reminiscent of C. S. Lewis . . . Highly recommended.” —Library Journal

10. Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahame-Smith - 2010

Indiana, 1818. Moonlight falls through the dense woods that surround a one-room cabin, where a nine-year-old Abraham Lincoln kneels at his suffering mother’s bedside. She’s been stricken with something the old-timers call “Milk Sickness.”
“My baby boy…” she whispers before dying.
Only later will the grieving Abe learn that his mother’s fatal affliction was actually the work of a vampire.
When the truth becomes known to young Lincoln, he writes in his journal, “Henceforth my life shall be one of rigorous study and devotion. I shall become a master of mind and body. And this mastery shall have but one purpose. Gifted with his legendary height, strength, and skill with an ax, Abe sets out on a path of vengeance that will lead him all the way to the White House.
While Abraham Lincoln is widely lauded for saving and freeing millions of slaves, his valiant fight against the forces of the undead has remained in the shadows for hundreds of years. That is, until Seth Grahame-Smith stumbled upon The Secret Journal of Abraham Lincoln, and became the first living person to lay eyes on it in more than 140 years.
Using the journal as his guide and writing in the grand biographical style of Doris Kearns Goodwin and David McCullough, Seth has reconstructed the true life story of our greatest president for the first time-all while revealing the hidden history behind the Civil War and uncovering the role vampires played in the birth, growth, and near-death of our nation.

“[T]he funniest, most action-packed and weirdly well-researched account of the Civil War you’ll probably read in a long time. Grahame-Smith could be poised to become the Howard Zinn of vampire-related alterna-history.” ―Vanity Fair

9. His Majesty's Dragon by Naomi Novi - 2006

Book 1 of 10 in the Temeraire series
When HMS Reliant captures a French frigate and seizes its precious cargo (an unhatched dragon egg), fate sweeps Capt. Will Laurence from his seafaring life into an uncertain future—and an unexpected kinship with a most extraordinary creature. Thrust into the rarified world of the Aerial Corps as master of the dragon Temeraire, he will face a crash course in the daring tactics of airborne battle. For as France’s own dragon-borne forces rally to breach British soil in Bonaparte’s boldest gambit, Laurence and Temeraire must soar into their own baptism of fire.
“Terrifically entertaining.” —Stephen King

8. Soulless by Gail Carriger - 2009

Book 1 of 5 in The Parasol Protectorate series
Alexia Tarabotti is laboring under a great many social tribulations. First, she has no soul. Second, she’s a spinster whose father is both Italian and dead. Third, she was rudely attacked by a vampire, breaking all standards of social etiquette.
Where to go from there? From bad to worse, for Alexia accidentally kills the vampire, and then the appalling Lord Maccon (loud, messy, gorgeous, and a werewolf) is sent by Queen Victoria to investigate.
With unexpected vampires appearing and expected vampires disappearing, everyone seems to believe Alexia responsible. Can she figure out what is actually happening to London’s high society? Will her soulless ability to negate supernatural powers prove useful or just plain embarrassing? Finally, who is the real enemy, and do they have treacle tart?

“Carriger debuts brilliantly with a blend of Victorian romance, screwball comedy of manners and alternate history… This intoxicatingly witty parody will appeal to a wide cross-section of romance, fantasy and steampunk fans.” ―Publishers Weekly, starred review

7. Territory by Emma Bull - 2007

Tombstone, Arizona in 1881 is the site of one of the richest mineral strikes in American history, where veins of silver run like ley lines under the earth, a network of power that belongs to anyone who knows how to claim and defend it.
Above the ground, power is also about allegiances. A magician can drain his friends’ strength to strengthen himself, and can place them between him and danger. The one with the most friends stands to win the territory.
Jesse Fox left his Eastern college education to travel West, where he’s made some decidedly odd friends, like the physician Chow Lung, who insists that Jesse has a talent for magic. In Tombstone, Jesse meets the tubercular Doc Holliday, whose inner magic is as suppressed as his own, but whose power is enough to attract the sorcerous attention of Wyatt Earp.
Mildred Benjamin is a young widow making her living as a newspaper typesetter, and—unbeknownst to the other ladies of Tombstone—selling tales of Western derring-do to the magazines back East. Like Jesse, Mildred has episodes of seeing things that can’t possibly be there.
When a failed stage holdup results in two dead, Tombstone explodes with speculation about who attempted the robbery. The truth could destroy Earp’s plans for wealth and glory, and he’ll do anything to bury it. Meanwhile, outlaw leader John Ringo wants the same turf as Earp. Each courts Jesse as an ally, and tries to isolate him by endangering his friends, as they struggle for magical dominance of the territory.
Events are building toward the shootout of which you may have heard. But you haven’t heard the whole, secret story until you’ve read Emma Bull’s unique take on an American legend, in which absolutely nothing is as it seems…
“Emma Bull is really good.” —Neil Gaiman

6. The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. by Neal Stephenson & Nicole Galland - 2017

The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. is brilliant, fast-paced, and will give you sore wrists because it’s a thick, heavy book, but you will not want to put it down.
An expert in ancient languages is hired by a mysterious government agency to translate some documents that suggest that magic actually once existed in the world. But the advance of science caused magic to disappear in 1851. However, the existence of a two-hundred-year-old witch and some fancy technology allow a limited amount of magic to occur in this world, and soon the language expert and others are being sent back in time to repair history. And, if they’re lucky, bring magic back to the world.

“Quantum physics, witchcraft, and multiple groups with conflicting agendas, playfully mixed with vernacular from several centuries and a dizzying number of acronyms, create a fascinating experiment in speculation and metafiction that never loses sight of the human foibles and affections of its cast.” —Publishers Weekly

5. The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker - 2013

Chava is a golem, a creature made of clay, brought to life to by a disgraced rabbi who dabbles in dark Kabbalistic magic and dies at sea on the voyage from Poland. Chava is unmoored and adrift as the ship arrives in New York harbor in 1899.
Ahmad is a jinni, a being of fire born in the ancient Syrian desert, trapped in an old copper flask, and released in New York City, though still not entirely free.
Ahmad and Chava become unlikely friends and soul mates with a mystical connection. This debut novel weaves strands of Yiddish and Middle Eastern literature, historical fiction and magical fable into an inventive tale.

“[A] spellbinding blend of fantasy and historical fiction.” —Publishers Weekly

4. Soldier of the Mist by Gene Wolfe - 1986

Latro is a Roman mercenary who receives a head injury that deprives him of his short-term memory. In return it gives him the ability to converse with supernatural creatures, gods and goddesses who invisibly inhabit the ancient landscape.

“[A] wonder, yes, a genius.” ―The Washington Post Book World on Gene Wolfe

3. The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud - 2003

Book 1 of 4 in the Bartimaeus series
I’m a huge Jonathan Stroud fan, and this is the book that got me hooked.
Nathaniel is eleven-years-old and a magician’s apprentice, learning the traditional art of magic. All is well until he has a life-changing encounter with Simon Lovelace, a magician of unrivaled ruthlessness and ambition. When Lovelace brutally humiliates Nathaniel in public, Nathaniel decides to speed up his education, teaching himself spells far beyond his years.
With revenge on his mind, he masters one of the toughest spells of all and summons Bartimaeus, a five-thousand-year-old snarky djinni, to assist him. But summoning Bartimaeus and controlling him are two different things entirely, and when Nathaniel sends the djinni out to steal Lovelace’s greatest treasure, the Amulet of Samarkand, he finds himself caught up in a whirlwind of magical espionage, murder, and rebellion.

2. Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke - 2004

In the year 1806, in the midst of the Napoleonic Wars, most people believe magic to have long since disappeared from England, until the reclusive Mr Norrell reveals his powers and becomes a celebrity overnight. Another practicing magician emerges: the young and daring Jonathan Strange. He becomes Norrell’s pupil and the two join forces in the war against France. But Strange is increasingly drawn to the wildest, most perilous forms of magic and soon he risks sacrificing not only his partnership with Norrell, but everything else he holds dear.

“Immense, intelligent, inventive… Clarke is a restrained and witty writer with an arch and eminently readable style.” ―Entertainment Weekly

1. Kindred by Octavia E. Butler - 1979

Kindred is an astonishing, fantastic book. Author Butler is a master. This book is often considered science fiction, but it easily could be called fantasy.
Dana, a modern black woman, is celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday with her new husband when she is snatched abruptly from her home in California and transported to the antebellum South. Rufus, the white son of a plantation owner, is drowning, and Dana has been summoned to save him. Dana is drawn back repeatedly through time to the slave quarters, and each time the stay grows longer, more arduous, and more dangerous until it is uncertain whether or not Dana’s life will end, long before it has a chance to begin.

“Truly terrifying… A book you’ll find hard to put down.” —Essence

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What is a lay bet? Lay betting is an option on a betting exchange which allows gamblers to play the role of a traditional bookmaker. You set the odds of the bet, and you potentially win the backer’s stake if the selection loses. If the selection wins, you lose the backers stake multiplied by the price of the selection (minus the stake amount). This calculator will tell you how much your lay bets need to be, what your qualifying loss or profit will be and of course what profit you will make when using a free bet. You can use this calculator for arb betting too, just enter the back odds from the bookmaker and the lay odds from the exchange to make a profit no matter the outcome. Double chance bet Draw no bet Payback rate Deducting commission Converting lay odds to back odds Cash out Partial cash out About. Double chance bet. Welcome to the world of sports betting mathematics! The first tool in the betting calculator is the double chance bet calculator. It calculates the proportion into which you have to divide your ... A lay bet is a process where, in making 2 separate transactions, a bettor can minimise risk and potentially maximise profit off an original bet. This technique can be used for a variety of reasons, including minimising risk when odds change, or to place qualifying bets with sportsbook in order to receive promotions in the future. Use our matched betting calculator to work out how much money to stake on your lay bet at the betting exchange to ensure guaranteed profit. Use the dropdown menu to get the right results whether you're placing a qualifying bet, a free bet where the stake is not returned (SNR), or a free bet where the stake is returned (SR). Our hedging calculator. Our back lay or hedging calculator, allows you to calculate your lay bet amounts and your lay liability. Hedging is a strategy whereby you lay off a back bet to minimise risk and secure a profitable position. It can be difficult to know how much you need to stake on your lay bet to create a scenario where either outcome produces the same result. Free Online Back/Lay Betting Calculator Our free online Back/Lay betting calculator calculates the correct Stakes for backing and laying the same selection for the same Net Profit, whether the selection wins or loses.This is commonly known as trading out, greening up or Back/Lay arbitrage. A betting odds calculator is an absolute necessity in the arsenal of any bettor. The calculator allows you to figure out how much money a bet will earn. ... as money line odds, indicate return relative to a hundred unit base figure. So whenever there is a minus (-) figure you lay that amount to win a hundred dollars, and where there is a plus ... GET A FREE £/€20 EXCHANGE BET. Join Now - Open Account Using Promo Code VAL225; Bet - Place a £/€20 Bet on the Exchange; Earn - £/€20 Back in cash if your bet loses Converting lay odds to back odds. On a betting exchange, there are two types of odds quoted - back and lay odds, whereas traditional bookmakers deal only with back odds. Taking a lay position on outcome 1 is equivalent to taking a back position on outcomes X2 (double chance bet).

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HOW TO CALCULATE VALUE BET USING FUTUREBET MODEL

🔥 Check out https://truemiller.com for more!💬 COMMENT 👍 LIKE 💖 SUBSCRIBE 🔔 HIT THE NOTIFICATION BELL⬇️A step-by-step video tutorial showing you how to p... How to use the lay stake matched betting calculator Is the casino paying you correctly? You should understand how the dealers are paying place bets to know if you are getting paid correctly. In this video I co... With the future bet soccer prediction model, you have to chance to correctly predict correct scores and even value bet with ease. An example of laying the Draw in Betfair soccer Match odds markets using Betextrader Autotrading software for Betfair https://www.betextrader.com Betextrader... - Set Quality 720p. - In the same sheet bets for the Win market and the Place market can be placed. - Very simpel, effective and quick. - Just by a mouse click change of: * minimum odds * stake ... Get the spreadsheet and written guide: https://sts.ac/youtube-specialLearn how to lay off accumulator bets (or multiples) using the spreadsheet and our strat... Lay Bets - craps payouts are the opposite of Buy bets. You are betting the seven will show before one of the point numbers. Lay bets pay at the true odds of ... David Webb, Compliance Manager for BetConstruct, caught up with SBC at Betting on Football 2019 to discuss the next steps they are taking with their real-time tracking product, AJNA. We also spoke ... This video walks you through sports betting parlays and how to use the calculator to minimize risk:Link: https://www.oddscoach.com/parlay-calculator-on-odds-...

Lay Calculator (Advanced) - Trickybet

lay bet odds calculator

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