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Synopsis:
Juliette Contzen is a lazy, good-for-nothing princess. Overshadowed by her siblings, she's left with little to do but nap, read … and occasionally cut the falling raindrops with her sword. Spotted one day by an astonished adventurer, he insists on grading Juliette's swordsmanship, then promptly has a mental breakdown at the result.
Soon after, Juliette is given the news that her kingdom is on the brink of bankruptcy. At threat of being married off, the lazy princess vows to do whatever it takes to maintain her current lifestyle, and taking matters into her own hands, escapes in the middle of the night in order to restore her kingdom's finances.
Tags: Comedy, Adventure, Action, Fantasy, Copious Ohohohohos.
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Chapter 14: Yearning For Stars
Rextros the Black Scar was, incredibly, a man noted for his black scar.
It was his symbol as a survivor. And more importantly, as a winner. He may have a scar, but the man he'd last fought had two broken arms and a big enough gap in his front teeth that he now whistled in between speaking.
Over the years, he'd fought with the best of the worst, turning bars inside out and alleys upside down. As a D-rank pugilist, he regularly left a reminder that of all the mean sods to ply their trade in this land, he was the meanest of them all.
And his reward? His own cozy little forest hideout, complete with a gambling table, a drinks bar and semi-loyal goons. It was everything a good little outlaw wanted. Except that he never wanted to be an outlaw in the first place.
He wanted to be a pianist.
“... Damn … !”
Rextros the Black Scar had no wish to lead his own group of bandits. A cold tent in a damp forest? A dirty camp filled with the stench of a dozen guys who didn't bathe, even though there's a river right next to them?
These weren't the dreams of a normal lad growing up on a farm. But he knew that working the land wasn't for him. His hands were made for more than sowing seeds and milking cows.
It was for playing nocturnes beneath the moonlight, his soul reaching out to gently sweep across the keys faster than his fingers did.
However, that dream wasn't to be.
Once he was old enough that he could no longer sneak his way into fancy bars and ply his budding skills on the pianos reserved for the famous, he knew he had to buy his own. It infuriated him that pianos were the playthings of the nobility. He couldn't even walk into a piano workshop before being tossed out. It was a closed circle for the rich and the few. And that lit a fire in his belly.
So what if the fancy lords and ladies couldn't stomach the thought of a mere peasant like him dirtying their favourite pastime? It wasn't them he'd play for.
Rextros the Black Scar would play for the people.
And he'd play a piano he could move with his heart as much as his hands—a St. Liane baby grand in mahogany red, rolled straight out of the Royal St. Liane Workshop in the middle of the royal capital and onto the bustling street outside.
That was the dream.
A dream which had slid further away with each passing day. The crowns he'd earned from his fights were barely worth the silver needed to hire a sister to stitch himself back up afterwards. And all the callouses on his hands were suddenly around his knuckles and not his fingertips.
Then, like a twisted angel summoned from the lowest abyss, that's when she appeared.
“Rextros the Black Scar. What a dreadfully dull name. It's as if you picked it out from a book of villains. Couldn't you have gone for something more original? The Black Etude, perhaps?”
“Hah? You picking a fight? And what's with that get-up? You hard selling for a casino? I don't gamble, so find someone else to fleece.”
“You say that, but isn't every day a gamble with the law to you? Honestly, however are you going to acquire the funds to buy a St. Liane of all things? You couldn't have picked a more expensive thing even if you tried. Greedy much?”
“... Who are you?! How do you know …”
“Hey, hey, hey. Wanna hear about a get rich quick scheme? Super reliable! Everyone's done it! And don't worry, it has nothing to do with gambling. Unless you want to?”
“D-Don't mess with me, woman! Who are you?! Keep away! I'm no fool—”
Rextros clenched his teeth as he recalled the memory.
He was no fool … Except that he was.
“... Damn … it … all! ...”
He crashed his fist down against his small table beneath his tent.
He'd stopped doing that lately. Firstly, he'd gotten used to the idiocy of his underlings. Secondly, it spilled his crowns everywhere and picking them up from the grass was a pain. If he ever wanted to buy that immaculate St. Liane, he'd need every last crown this rotten venture in poor decision making could get him.
So … how did it all go so wrong?
First it was the type of jobs. They'd started easy. Shaking down couriers and breaking into warehouses. Then they got harder. Not because the couriers got wiser or the warehouses tougher.
It was because he'd pieced together what he'd been stealing—and why.
He'd left in the middle of his last job and never looked back. Not because he had no regrets about running. But because he'd feared he'd see the face of that girl in her casino get-up looking right back at him.
The thought sent shivers running down his spine.
But maybe that was just because of the cold.
A forest. A cold, damp forest. This wasn't much better. But it was easier. Merchants used this road. He left the farmers alone. And the trolls. But the merchants? They took extortion as a business expense. And every now and again, a wandering nobleman and his family would come to hunt, forgetting that they were more likely to be found by the death beetles before they found a deer.
Was it kidnapping? Sure. But he was doing them a favour. The ransom reward was his just earnings. And what a reward they always were.
He was close. So close.
One last gig. One last merchant. One last idiot.
He knew this camp wouldn't last. But it didn't need to. He was so close. Then he could abandon this damp lifestyle and these stinking men and play ballades beneath the acoustic roof of the Reitzlake Grand Bridge.
That girl with a huge gob, haughty expression, fine clothes and dark hair without so much as an inkling of dirt on it was his ticket to freedom. That sword alone looked like it could be traded for any piano he wanted. He was even glad the idiots hadn't taken it from her. If they had, he likely would never have seen it.
Now he wished they'd just tried mugging her and suffered the consequences for it. Their dead bodies weren't likely going to reveal where he was.
“B-Boss … what was that? Who was she? Why did we have to give everything over?”
Rextros smashed his fist against the table again. This time, a cloud of dust came up as a crack appeared.
“Shut up! Shut up, all of you! I'm thinking!”
One by one, his underlings looked at each other with differing amounts of confusion and resentment. They didn't understand. They didn't know.
That girl, that ticket to freedom, was a poisoned bait. She'd come with one purpose and one alone. And that was to remind Rextros that so long as he lived, his obligations remained. He knew it. He'd dreamed it.
And now he feared the consequences of his flight.
But what could he do? That girl's message was clear. No matter where he ran, he would never be allowed to wander freely again. Every crown he stole wasn't his to keep. He wanted an out. But how could he? He'd seen too much. Not on purpose. But that didn't matter. He wasn't as blind as the rest.
And that was a problem.
“Boss! What's going on! That was everything! It was our pay, our weapons, you gave it all away! Who was she?!”
A problem like losing the loyalty of his men.
Forget making back his losses. He'd lose his life if they all turned on him. And he knew for a fact that the knives and daggers they carried were still on them, hidden in their boots and their clothes.
As every pair of eyes turned black, Rextros clenched his fist.
There was only one thing he could do. It was … It was dangerous. But it was his only choice. Not just to make it out of here alive. But to escape with it tomorrow, too.
He had to silence that girl.
Before she could reach her mistress, she had to be dealt with.
That way, he'd have time. That casino girl had to only suspect. Otherwise, she'd be here herself. Despite his fears, he knew she wasn't truly omnipotent. More importantly, it'd mean he'd have the money to flee. Even with just the crowns, he'd have enough to survive. More than enough.
He had to deal with that girl … and yet, if she was anything near as strong as that monster ...
No.
He had no choice. Not if he wanted to survive. Even if she matched him as a fighter, he had to deal with her. Then, he'd get out. Lay low. Flee the kingdom. That St. Liane was beyond his reach. But there were others. A Zelronto, perhaps. Lacking in finishing and incomparable with the tonal brilliance of a St. Liane, but bearable nonetheless.
It was time to leave these idiots behind.
But not without using them one last time.
“Shut up! All of you!”
“But Boss—”
“That girl. She was here on behalf of the Adventurer's Guild.”
“What?!”
The looks of rebellion were quickly replaced by panic.
Rextros smiled internally to himself. It was every outlaw's worst nightmare. Those that weren't him, of course.
The Adventurer's Guild weren't like knights or soldiers, who'd make so much noise looking for them that they could pack up and leave without so much as leaving an empty bottle behind.
Adventurers were hunters. Hunters that got paid absolute jack for the work they did. And that meant they did their jobs for reasons other than crowns.
In short, the worst type of people.
“She wanted to cut me a deal. All our gains for a day to leave. Except that won't matter if she's dealt with first. Go get her. Now.”
A few of the men shifted. Most were just confused.
“B-But if she's an adventurer, why didn't we just jump her already?”
“Fool! I was watching the treeline! You guys can't stand sentry even if I peel your eyelids off! I had to make sure there was nobody else! Now you see why I'm the leader and you idiots are not!”
“B-Boss!! Then, then that means ...”
“She's alone. Probably thinks she's stronger than all of us. Some brat that just got promoted to E-rank and thinks they're hot stuff. You know what to do.”
“Yes, Boss!!”
Rextros sighed as the underlings shot off, their hidden daggers being pulled from whatever sorry part of their bodies they hid them in.
It was going to be close. That girl … the sword she had. Only an extremely capable swordswoman would dare wield such a weapon. To be anything less was to invite every rogue within spitting distance to try and steal it from her, alive or dead.
Even so, she was alone. She had to be. The way these people operated demanded it. He had fourteen men under his command. Idiots to the last, but idiots with brawn and no discipline. If they all hurled themselves at her, there was simply no way she would be able to defeat them all.
And if so few made it back that he could claim all the loot for himself, then so be it.
Rextros smiled. Perhaps this wasn't such an unfortunate meeting, after all. He'd been meaning to consider a way to leave his goons in the lurch. If someone could deal with them for him, then all the better.
He simply needed to be ready to make good on his escape.
BRRROOOOOWWMMM.
It was at the exact moment that Rextros the Black Scar thought this that his feet suddenly left the ground.
“Gwaaaahhhhhhhh!”
Letting out a scream, he flailed uselessly at the air as he was suddenly flung against the back of his tent, taking it and also a tree with him as he went hurtling down the mound he'd pitched his makeshift throne on.
An enormous, ear splitting explosion drowned out his scream. Or at least what sounded like an explosion. He couldn't be sure with the entire forest groaning in pain. Leaves, branches and trees bent wildly as though slapped by the force of a thousand hurricanes. And yet Rextros instinctively knew that it could have been worse.
The source of that explosion was further away. And it was not aimed towards him.
If it had, he wouldn't be in a position to feel breathless with shock.
Sweat ran down Rextros's face as he crawled up from the dirt. He was lucky. He'd narrowly missed impacting with the tree that now had its roots torn from the soil. Looking around, all he saw was carnage. Bits of the camp were everywhere. And the forest was groaning even louder than before, as though it now had to right itself after being struck by the hand of a god.
Or perhaps a goddess.
That girl … it couldn't be ...
His entire body shaking, Rextros thought about the idiots he'd sent after her. They'd only just left. They … They were probably okay. Even so, could it possibly be a coincidence that she'd set the entire forest on its knees the moment he'd decided on his treachery?
What … What kind of power was this?
That was not the power of some D-rank punk like him. It was beyond that. The sort of power that only named legends past the point of being human possessed.
Had that girl lived a warrior's life, in solitude, training her swordsmanship on some distant mountaintop to achieve that level of destruction?
Rextros now knew he couldn't stay. Not even if all the copper, silver and gold in the world was made available to him. It was time to flee. Right now. Away from this kingdom, filled with more monsters than anyone as insignificant as him had the right to know.
And then maybe, just maybe.
When enough time had passed—he'd be able to take over the farm, and go back to milking cows and tilling fields.
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Hi! This is the first post in what I hope to be (about) a 7 part series following the adventures of a human destroyer with a crew who was not trained for diplomacy becoming the last chance for peace between two alien species who aren’t very happy that their first contact with humanity is a purpose-built warship blundering into their space. Kida sorta. This is my first time writing anything like this, or really anything at all for public viewership, so feedback is welcome!
This is the prologue, the framing sequence is kinda vague here, this is mostly just to set up the main cast of this show and the titular gunboat, the UNS Crazy Train, so apologies if it drags a bit in a couple places, but I figured it’d be best to exposit now and focus on a more character driven story later (unless y'all really like exposition). Future chapters will probably use the memory transcription framing sequence, the next one will for sure, but I'm not great at writing in first person, so it depends after that. I’m aiming for one post a week, but IRL may have other plans for me.
Credit to u/SpacePaladin15 for his original series, The Nature of Predators, It is very good! Read it if you haven’t because, 1:why are you on the NoP subreddit without reading NoP? Silly. And 2:None of this will probably make sense unless you already know a good chunk of NoP’s plot.
I started working on this before part 98 came out, but this story is not set in the primary canon, so effectively that's about where it diverges from the normal timeline. I'll do my best to avoid contradicting lore from before 99 wherever possible!
That's enough introduction, on with the prologue!

Historical Record: July 12th, 2137
“Captain Krenshaw?”
The captain didn’t look up from his datapad, beckoning the visitor into his office. Probably just another new batch of paperwork for me to sign. While he was enthusiastic about captaining the UNS Crazy Train, the first in the UN’s new class of siege-breaker destroyers, he hadn’t anticipated the amount of documents he would have to sign and submit before. Liability waivers for every new piece of equipment on board, confirmations of deliveries of a dozen different ammo types, and signing the admittance documents for every one of the six hundred and thirty souls on board. Maybe the engineers have a new type of wrench they need approval to distribute to the workstations, he thought with a rueful smile.
The ship had been scheduled to launch five days prior, but the fueling shuttle had somehow brought fuel rods half again too long to fit in the reactor, and so the geniuses in engineering had figured out a way to cut them down to size. It was faster than waiting for replacements, but by no means a fast process, and some logistician had decided to take advantage of the ship sitting in dry dock above Mars and managed to add thirty tons of cargo to the manifest.
“The last of the ammunition has been loaded, we have one last matter to attend to before we are cleared for cast off.” The visitor said while handing him a clipboard.
The captain stood, recognizing the voice of Commander Wilson, his second in command and long time friend. If the commander was hand-delivering a hard copy, this must be an important piece of cargo. A cursory reading of the document proved him right, much to his consternation.
“We’re transporting war criminals now, Hanah? I thought four hundred incendiary bombs for the Fissan’s new “terraforming” project was a bit much, Lieutenant Kiref was already complaining about how he wouldn’t get any time to train with his marines with all this guard duty, and now he’s going to have to have to incorporate at least ten people into prisoner watch.”
Wilson shrugged. “I tried to argue with them, but apparently these criminals need to be delivered to the Venlil High Courts pronto. UN command wants any Arxur sympathetic to our cause to know that we don’t use exterminator tactics on defectors.”
Krenshaw sighed, “Great, just what I need to be worried about, racist pyromaniacs on a ship packed to the brim with napalm charges. I suppose I should go and talk to them before we set off, acceptable conduct and all that.” He rolled his eyes. “We’re ready to go other than that?”
Wilson nodded, and Krenshaw followed her out of his office, leaving her in the battle bridge to make final preparations, while the captain got in a lift down to the dock connecting them to the Martian Shipyards.
As he passed the levels, he again marveled at the warship he was now in command of. The Crazy Train was not a particularly large ship, coming in at just under half a klick long and a quarter of that in width and an eighth in height, but the armor made her literally second to none. While the lower half of her twin hulls were armored comparably to any other human warship, the top halves were covered and connected by a series of armor plates collectively thicker than the wingspan of Earth’s largest fighter, not even including spacing. In order to account for her massive weight, the four primary propulsion thrusters (one at the front and rear of each hull) could rotate to face straight down for atmospheric flight.
Her design had been the result of information gleaned during the UN Shadow Fleet’s marauding attack through Chief Hunter Shaza’s sector, notably the complete lack of any anti-capital ship weapons on the surface of any of the Arxur cattle worlds. A conversation with some of the Arxur sympathetic to humanity, and interrogation of one of the cattle farm overseers revealed the reason: apparently, about sixty years ago a cattle world had been drained of guards for another all-out attack, leaving just under one hundred Arxur in charge of roughly three thousand Mazics. One stampede later, and the Arxur had lost control of the farm and all of its anti-starship heavy plasma railguns. The facility was removed with antimatter bombs, but over a hundred bombers were lost in an operation that, had the guns not been operational, could have been handled by three or four. Rather than rework their entire military strategy to rely on smaller, more flexible forces that didn’t require reducing entire galactic sectors to skeleton crews, the Arxur just moved all the heavy guns to orbital installations.
As a result, the UN commissioned three new classes of warship under “Project Rustler,” with the objective of creating purpose-built warships for eliminating orbital defense platforms and liberating cattle farms. The designers of the Crazy Train had come up with the quintessentially human tactic of building a ship so heavily armored and with such powerful engines that she could hard burn past the platforms, dumping dozens of boarding torpedoes and enough countermeasures to cloak a small fleet in her wake, hover above the farm, drop the onboard detachment of marines to the surface, rescue as many cattle as possible, and escape virtually unharmed due to the upper armor plate being thick enough to take dozens of shots that would split a larger ship in two in stride.
Captain Krenshaw’s musings were interrupted by the bell indicating someone else was getting on the lift. The doors slid open, and the massive form of an Arxur blocked the doorway before quickly ducking inside the elevator.
“Mornin’ Captain” growled Lieutenant Kiref, crouching slightly to avoid whacking his head on the seven foot tall ceiling. “I’m heading down to the docks to take delivery of that batch of prisoners. Where are you headed?”
“Same place actually, I figured you might need some help.”
The Lieutenant waved his tail to indicate his skepticism. “Captain, I am more than capable of taking delivery of three Venlil, who are already cuffed. If they are that heavy, I can requisition some marines to help drag their bodies to their cells after they faint. Why are we hauling prisoners anyway? The version of the orders I got were blocked out.”
“Kiref, these are war criminals, exterminators deployed with the UN army on an Arxur scientific research base.”
Kiref cut in, “Well at least they should be accustomed to seeing sentient predator species then, shouldn’t that make them easier to handle?”---”Sir?” quickly correcting his mistake. Captain Krenshaw is tolerant of a lack of decorum, but I really need to get the hang of these human honorifics for the next time I have to justify my service to some admiral Kiref internally chastised himself.
“They were found by their commanding officer after having burned several defectors to death, so I think fainting is nowhere near the worst situation we could have.” Kiref’s yellow slitted eyes went wide, then narrowed with anger. “What’s more, there was another defector who was still on fire, and survived, so this will definitely go public. The UN wanted to try the exterminators at the Hague, make sure everybody else knows that’s not how humanity treats defectors and POWs, but Tarva insisted that they be tried on Venlil Prime. The UN wants to announce the trial before the story breaks, so the prisoners are taking the next ship to Venlil Prime, which is us.”
“Thanks for the heads up, and glad to know the ship’s leaving soon.” The captain nodded in agreement to the last sentiment, as the doors to the lift opened, revealing the ready deck, which was supposed to be kept clear for troops and equipment for planetary landings, but which was currently packed to the brim with shipping containers full of napalm and canned fruit. The pair made their way through the labyrinth to the airlock connecting the Crazy Train to the dock, Kiref taking note of the lack of any dropships within the hangar.
“Captain, has there been any word on when we will be taking on any landing vessels, and of what type they may be? I was hoping to run disembarkation drills with the landing party.”
“Some new Nevok design they don’t want to be sending the schematics over long range broadcast, probably a good idea given how poor the cybersecurity on those old Fed transmitters is.” The captain replied, with a chuckle at the last part. “You should have at least some time to train on the way to the rest of the fleet. I understand you had planned on using the ready deck to train for surface combat, but since that isn’t an option, I’ll set aside the living quarters and sickbay for the freed prisoners as a simulation for boarding actions.”
Kiref swung his tail in a gesture of appreciation. “I thank you for your consideration sir. I will make sure my men will be capable of securing any ship in the Dominion or Federation within less than a half an hour after boarding.”
Stepping through the airlock, the pair walked onto the dock, which was as large as a highway, and populated sparsely by crewmen loading the last few containers and a squad of marines who snapped to attention as the two officers walked passed. Sticking out like a sore thumb among all the sailors were three of the baldest looking Venlil either man had ever seen seated in benches a little way down the dock, flanked by four uncomfortable looking guards in UNMP uniforms. Upon seeing the alien’s strange haircuts, Kiref glanced quizzically at his commanding officer, who just muttered “exterminators” in response, causing Kiref to roll his eyes. The exterminators were wearing hand (or paw) cuffs clearly designed for someone much larger than them, and The lead exterminator, judging by the insignia pinned to his fire-resistant uniform, glared at Kiref with a look that betrayed not so much fear as anger and disgust.
As Captain Krenshaw began signing over custody of the prisoners, the lead exterminator let out a yell. “Hey human! You know you got a monster in your crew?” The captain put down his pen and turned to face the Venlil, a terrifying look in his eye that made the other two Venlil back down. The leader carried on, oblivious “We could take care of it for you! That thing’s a danger to anybody on board, at least get your chief of security to confine it to a cell!”
Lieutenant Kiref snapped his eyes over to the Venlil, and unsheathed his claws, causing the exterminator to take an involuntary step back. “I’m sorry prisoner,” said the Arxur, his every syllable dripping with venom “I didn’t quite hear you, would you care to repeat that?”
The captain jumped between the two aliens. “THAT’S ENOUGH!”
“Look, human, that thing-”
“I SAID ENOUGH. For future reference, his name is Lieutenant Kiref, not ‘it,’ mine is Captain Krenshaw, not ‘human,’ and as commander of my ship’s marine detachment, he is the security chief. You are under his charge for the duration of our voyage, so I suggest you treat him with the respect he is due.” The captain turned to the Lieutenant. “Take these war criminals to the brig. You know the handbook on prisoner transport inside and out, I trust you will have no problem keeping them confined?”
“None whatsoever” said Kiref, grinning at the now cowering Venlil. He motioned for two marines who were coming back from the interior of the shipyard, and the three of them escorted the cuffed Venlil into the bowels of the ship.
The captain sighed and turned back to the four military police officers, and finished filling out the clipboard before handing it back to the officer who had given it to him.
“Safe travels, captain, and good luck” The man said.
“Thanks, we’ll definitely need it.” Captain Krenshaw turned and began calling over his radio to the crew, “Alright, seal all airlocks, disconnect all umbilicals and prepare to release docking clamps, we will be underway within the hour.”
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The ship wasn’t under way for very long.
The UNS Crazy Train exited hyperdrive about four lightyears from the edge of the Sol system, just over a day and a half after departure in a patch of seemingly uninteresting space. Captain Krenshaw ran onto the bridge, disheveled but attempting to put on a professional face, buttoning the last button on his jacket. “What’s the status?” This was a charted area of space, if there had been an asteroid or large space rock,it should have been marked on the map, and the only other plausible option was an enemy fleet, which seemed absent.
Commander Wilson turned at his entrance, vacating the command chair “We’re not sure what it is, the automated navigator detected an absurdly large object in our path, but only picked it up at the last second, and was able to break us out of FTL within just forty klicks of the object. Scanner Officer Casey is investigating now, but we haven’t seen anything since going sunlight.”
The captain took a seat and looked over at the sensor station. “Any ideas yet Caysey?” Officer Casey was by far both the youngest and least experienced member of the Crazy Train’s bridge crew, but Krenshaw was somewhat concerned with the Dossur’s ability to perform his duties under stress. He had been diagnosed with “predator disease” which manifested as an extreme lack of fear response, which meant that he was capable of exchanging small talk over lunch with Kiref for three whole minutes before fainting. Krenshaw had been assured multiple times that the diminutive officer would be just fine in performing his duties as long as the enemies stayed on the other side of a screen, and the Dossur’s natural extremely fast reflexes proved Caysey was adept at identifying and distinguishing targets, so the captain was hopeful, if a bit cautious.
Caysey looked up from his screen, his field of view severely limited by his blinders. “Captain, the only thing that could have blipped into and immediately out of sensor range that fast was another ship passing dangerously close without announcing it’s heading, headed inbound for Earth.”
“An invasion fleet perhaps? Should we turn around?”
“I don’t think so, It would have skipped in front of us for a fraction of a second. The object was detected for over a second, at the speeds we’re talking about, in order to do that the ship would have to be literally light-seconds long, and wide too given the distance this thing seems to stretch on to the sides” The scanner officer looked back to his panel and took several deep breaths before continuing. “I think sensor error is the more likely option. Possibly also some sort of energy field orbiting a local sun at superluminal speeds, but that’s not supported by any scientific theories I know of,” Caysey hastily added.
“I think we’ll avoid examination of theoretical physics for now, drop a beacon and we’ll see if anyone wants to send out a science ship later, helm, continue at sunlight speeds until we clear this field.” The captain said, relaxing a bit. We were needed at the front weeks ago, every day we aren’t there, more people die in Arxur farms.
The ship slowly trundled forwards at sunlight speeds for a few minutes, all eyes were looking at their instruments. The bow punched into the zone, the bridge crew collectively taking deep breaths.
“We should be clear in twenty seconds” Wilson called out.
The whole ship was in the space where the disturbance had been now.
“Fifteen seconds…”
No objects on scanners within the collision warning perimeter
“Ten seconds…”
The bow had reached the far side.
“Five…”
With one and a half seconds to go, Caysey yelled out “WAIT-” but it was too late. Within half a second the entirety of the UNS Crazy Train was engulfed in a bizarre energy field. The standard lighting on the bridge cut out and the emergency bulbs burst from the power surge, plunging the ship into total darkness. The ship rocked violently as the engines gimbaled in random directions. Faster than even the Dossur could react, every electrical system on the ship was flooded with power levels dozens of times higher than what they had been designed to handle. The helmsman screamed as his hands were electrified by the absurd amperage traveling through the ship’s wheel. The ship's reactors tripped, dropping the control rods within another half second, triggering warnings on every panel on the engineering decks.
Within another second the energy had passed, leaving the Crazy Train drifting lifeless in deep space. The turbines slowly winding down triggered the emergency batteries to connect to the ships power, keeping the remaining systems functional, for now. The backup computer activated, rerouting power through backup conduits wherever possible, and developing a list of what needed to be replaced.
Captain Krenshaw was the first to get to his feet. “Is anyone injured?”
“Helmsman Jones' hands are burned pretty badly, should I escort him to sickbay?” said Commander Wilson, helping the injured man to his feet.
“Please do, then help Dr. Mulvan get a triage going.” The captain replied. “Is there anything on scanners, Caysey?
“No s-sir” panted Caysey slowly getting to his fleet. “I should be able to check the beacon we dropped just before we entered the field.” The Dossur was quiet for several seconds. “Sir our comms and scanners may be more damaged than the computer says, I can’t even establish that the beacon is there. Should I launch another?”
“If we have that functionality, then do so. It seems your superluminal energy field hypothesis may have some merit after all” replied the captain, still a bit shaken.
Caysey punched a few buttons before frowning. “The next beacon is launched, and it’s meeting all expected readings. It’s like the other probe just disappeared.”
Krenshaw didn’t give it much thought, contacting engineering to see when the situation on damage control was. The damage turned out to have been mostly superficial or to redundant components, mainly to lighting systems and some CIWS targeting systems. All things that could be replaced in-flight or swapped out quickly at the next port. The only crucial component the ship was missing was the long range communications array, leading to the captain's decision to continue on towards Venlil Prime. At least they have an approach vector lined up for us, we would be cruising into extremely heavy traffic with no comms and dodgy sensors if we head back to Earth. So much for a peaceful maiden voyage, although at least it’s not the worst thing that could have happened...

Thanks for reading, it means a lot! Again, thanks to SpacePaladin15 as well! Hope to see y'all next time on Gunboat Diplomacy!
(also did anybody else know disembarkation was the proper word? I just kinda assumed it was disembarkment until google and spellcheck corrected me)

Throwaway because I'm a shy maybe-an-egg - Like the title says, I took the plunge and bought a skirt and ooo spinny - but well, breezy too, so I'd like some leggings or something to wear under for the confidence buff. I'm running into a few problems and could use some advice/links

• I need to shop in the plus sizes (38/40" waist atm)
• I was not blessed in the ass/hips department, so things fitted for those sizes don't stay where they should (I can't find my sewing tape measure anywhere to get actual dimensions lmao)
• I considered maybe looking at men's yoga pants as an alternative but they all have that "sporty" look of too many seams to be subtle (on top of being hard to find in my size)

I'd like something black-out black and with some thickness (I don't know if I'm ready for the commitment that is regular leg shaving yet - plus, northern latitudes, a bit of extra layers is always nice, might wear them as an underlayer out and about)
I had stumbled on a website like 2 years ago, bookmarked it immediately then lost it formatting windows - I thought it was cissy or something but that's giving no results, I know it started with a c and they were specialized in feminine clothing in male cuts, something like that would probably be best - if anyone has any idea I'd love to find it again. Otherwise, if you don't have specific product you'd like to suggest but have some online stores to share I'll take those too - even if they don't aid in the leggings quest they'll come in handy later

Hey everyone, this is chapter two, for more info on what this is and other chapters click the link down below :
Reddit - Dive into anything
The collective walks. It waltzes. The collective screams. The collective loves. The collective stands still for a moment, looking around, and then continues to walk. Years pass by, the collective continues to walk, continues to waltz and it continues to scream, and yet every now and again the collective stops and takes a glance. It looks at everything, the people, the weapons, the lives that are lost, and he continues. All of it again and again, every time he looks it’s all the same, and time continues to pass. Time is meaningless to the collective, as there is no time from where the collective is from. Moments exist and pass, but that isn’t time leaving him but space.
The collective waits, attracted to something long since past. A voice that echoes something inside that was long since dormant. The collective runs, runs to the voice, through the crowds and towards the source of it. And that is when the collective sees him. An old friend, but time doesn’t exist and they were never really friends. He’s shorter than the friend recalls, however what is memory but false?
There he stands, alongside a group of faces, some nostalgic others not, looking up towards the sky. Osmundowne. The collective stops walking, halts their waltzes, and forces back the screams. And that old love, the one thing long left behind, begins to grow. The collective smiles, and begins to think.
Dundis was rather large for a castle, it was a landmark one could see from miles away, as if it beckoned to travellers who dared approach it. Stone bricks and mortar were laid in this place, the number of which was exuberant to say the least. Spires creeped to the skies above, observing the carnage that had been displayed. Even from here Osmund could see the shattered windows in many parts of the castle, in as little as half an hour the Alizian’s had reached even the tops of the Vaunghe base, and the battle was sure to be a swift one.
The other thing that stood out to Osmund about Dundis was the decadence. Statues lined every surface, shrubs depicting the gods were everywhere, and there was a strange metal rod poking out of the ground besides a lectern. Osmund approached the objects, and marvelled at the copious amounts of food that lay on the ground. Food of every description, from apples to cattle, were strewn at the foot of the metal pole. On the lectern was a message, scrawled on a yellowed piece of paper.
For now is the time of deepest sorrow, our lord King Kivok has graciously offered food to the gods, and we can now pray for them to smite our foes. Even in hunger we shall fight, for we are the servants of the gods.
Osmund read the message a few times, before placing it back on the ground. Now was the time to enter the castle, explore the passages and support the troops. Osmund approached the gate, now wide open, and removed the map of Dundis, ensuring he’d have the right path.
The group followed suit, pushing the gates open fully and revealing the site of further bodies. They were inside the building’s inner wall now, the sun still bearing down upon them. This was the location home to many of the more important stables and areas for battle preparation. The ruins of a barricade lay around the door, alongside the copious number of trainee bodies who failed to protect themselves. While there was no evidence of the wall’s debris assaulting this place, there was still a large amount of destruction here.
The remains of statues greeted the group, once magnum opus now a disfigured remnant of what was. They were made of marble, and once depicted the Vaunghe gods, although who each one was could not be discerned, due to the broken faces and pieces they had been split into. The statues lined the walls of this castle, with a new statue lining the wall every five metres. If they weren’t destroyed they would likely be the most impressive feat Osmund had ever seen, standing at almost double his nine and a half foot frame.
Moving forward, Osmund looked to the north, where the entrance of the tunnel system began. According to the map the entrance was hidden below the royal stable, and gave passageway into the complex’s vast tunnel system that could lead to several strategic positions. Motioning for his group to follow, they moved slowly around the curved walls of the inner wall. The bodies gradually stopped appearing, prompting the drawing of Osmund and the other’s weapons, save for Balmun who still lacked anything to protect himself with.
The royal stable was just as grand as Osmund expected, long silver poles supporting a twenty metre stable. Beside each pillar was another statue of a god, albeit these gods were untouched and in their full glory. First was the god of thought, Merculd, a figure of 19 ft who sat upon a throne of gold. Adorned with jewels and royal fabrics, the bearded man watched down upon those that approached, beckoning them inside. The man himself was crafted out of intricate copper and glass, an architectural marvel that Osmund couldn’t comprehend its creation.
Beside the father of thought was the mother of art Freya, whose statue was in opposition to the metals of Merculd. Freya was a wood carving, an intricate and detailed depiction of the woman who was 15 ft tall, standing up with beckoning hands towards any visitors. Her face was carved to the smallest detail, with each individual tooth lovingly crafted on her mouth. In contrast to the first statue Freya’s was carved alongside her body, a tight fitting tunic layered over hard to know pants, due to the lack of colour or texture upon them.
The last of the three statues was Zid, the proposed god of the wall, a 19 ft tall mass of flesh and muscle. There was nothing to this god but his muscles, they were the only trait he has, a blank, general male face looming over the entryway. It was made out of stone, likely being the oldest statue here and thus the simplest. That is not to say the statue wasn’t a work of its own, every detail to Zid’s veins had been lovingly placed, it’s just compared to the other two Zid felt… irrelevant to Osmund, past its time.
The stable was enclosed in intricately carved stone, helixes intersecting each other granting slimmers of light into the stable. There was no damage here, no bodies, no other people, this was Vaunghe architecture at its finest, and all of this hard work was spent on a singular, slightly inconveniently placed barn. The oddities of the Vaunghe never failed to surprise Osmund, and he braced to enter the barn.
Straw floors and hay bales greeted him, alongside a single lone steed. A fine horse, certainly of nobility, awaited patiently for its master to return. It had been alone for time unknown, and yet Osmund noticed it was still being fed quite well, a decent number of carrots awaiting on a plate. Osmund opened the gate to the horse and approached the fine steed. He slapped it on the behind, sending it out of the stable and into the inner wall.
“Sir, I’ve stepped into horse dung. May I have another pair of shoes?” Balmun’s voice rang through the room, echoing slightly. Osmund responded by throwing a carrot at his head. Balmun dodged with less than a second to spare, and the armed man behind him was hit dead on.
Reeling back from shock and surprise, the armed soldier moved his sword to his front, trying to shield any further blows. The man was tall, 8’5 ft to be exact, and dirty. His armour was coated in dirt and remnants of the smoke from the wall. Osmund could see the desperation in his eyes, and now charged the man.
Osmund met the man’s blade with his own, parrying immediately. A foot swept the enemy to the ground and Osmund stood above him sword raised. The man went for the blade only to find his hand was removed, spouting blood everywhere. Osmund grabbed the man and pushed him to his feet.
“There is a base for any injured troops at the entrance to Dundis, go now before you bleed to death.” The man’s face flashed in surprise, and he quickly scrambled out of the room, hand stump spouting blood.
“Hey sir?”
“What is it Balmun?”
“Can I have his sword now that he’s not using it?” Osmund proceeded to throw a washbucket at Balmun, this one doing a much better job at hitting him.
Osmund glanced at his surroundings, noting the strange way the straw seemed to be above the ground in one location. Sweeping it away Osmund found the small door, built directly into the floor since the creation of the stable. A rusted latch made way for the opening of the door, and the entrance of the tunnels.
A black, unlit expanse greeted them, stretching for length unknown. Gazing down into the tunnel the light from behind Osmund illuminated the ground slightly. Paved floors and stone walls made for a pathway that would likely be uncomfortable to say the least. Osmund could feel the coldness emanate from the expanse, and longed to stay in the warm outside of the world. But faced with no other option Osmund moved down the stairs swiftly, entering the darkness at a swift pace.
The others followed him inside, although with much more apprehension as to the contents of the black tunnel. Balmun briefly tried to leave, however he was penned in by the Enick twins.
Dark. Footsteps echo down the long and unseen halls. Dark. There was no light in this place, only the inky murk of nothingness. Dark. The blackness blanketed Osmund and the party, freezing them to their core. Dark. There was no warmth here, only the coldness that began to take over Osmund’s heart. Dark. Osmund reached a turn, he was meant to take a left, and he knocked on the wall to signal the party’s direction. Dark. The rasp was responded with by Balmun’s incessant questions of why no one was talking. Dark. The Enick twins muttered about breaking Balmun’s hands. Dark. The group continued their advance, confidence at an all time low. Dark. It was hard to gauge how much time had passed, however Osmund was sure it had been only a few minutes. Dark. Someone tripped, prompting the use of the word ‘fuck’. Dark. Everything was blackness, there was nothing, only the advancing. Dark. Osmund felt himself fading into the blackness, becoming one with it. Dark. Osmund kicked his iron plated boot onto the first step. Dark. Osmund trips on the stairs, feeling someone fall behind him, prompting further use of the word ‘fuck’ and its frequently used companion ‘shit’. Dark. Osmund regained his composure and slowly began his ascent. Dark. Hugging the wall the party ascended, occasionally tripping slightly until finally-
Light. It was slight, but Osmund slowly became aware of vague shadows playing before him. As he ascended there was more light, those shadows began to take form, and his sight slowly returned to him. There weren’t many stairs, although as the group came to a plateau he became aware of a second staircase, this one a wide spiral. They were likely just on level with the ground floor here, and the short staircase above was likely to the room directly above the tower’s entrance.
Osmund turned to his team, motioning for them to unsheathe their weapons, to which they swiftly obliged. Now advancing above the staircase Osmund saw the opening. A loose wall panel was all that barred Osmund from the enemy congregation. He could hear them now, active panic in their voices as a few steady voices spout commands from above.
Whatever forces left in this tower were evidently inexperienced, as anyone with a high enough rank would understand and evacuate via the tunnel, and yet there was no sign of knowledge as to its presence. That made it likely the stern commanding voice belonged to a trainer of some sort, and these were his pupils, now thrust into a bloody conflict they lie unprepared for.
Beyond the gap Osmund saw the shadows flicker and pass through, rushing between one place and the other. The sound of something being pushed signalled that the Alizian’s had somehow broken the initial barricade and this was the next front to be defended. Listening closer Osmund could hear the banging of his soldiers on the door, much to the fear of the panicking trainees.
Osmund readied his sword, placing it in front of him, and awaited a shadow that moved just close enough, just slowly enough for movement. The first shadow was close but too fast, however the next was just right. Osmund kicked through the wall, plunging his blade into the enemy. Blood burst before anyone could understand what happened, and the man’s head flew across the room.
The force of the head flying was so great it hit a comrade in the foot, prompting a loss of balance. For a brief moment nobody moved, just gazing down at Osmund, the headless Vaunghe, and then down to his head. One man raised his finger, pointing at the now emerging Alizian’s, and proceeded to scream.
This prompted panic from every Vaunghe in the room, every single one of these fresh faced troops was filled with a sense of fear and shock, sending some bumbling up the second entrance to the spiralling stairs. Osmund looked around, quickly noting the cleaning supplies and beds, and concluded that this room was in fact the maid’s quarters.
The men were barely armed, with one or two swords being dwarfed by the number of Vaunghe holding mops and glass objects. Osmund and the others all revealed their weapons to the group, and prepared to fight. The trainee’s swarmed the group, glass going everywhere, comrades hitting comrades and an entire clump of people together. The room was too small for so many people to use weapons, and as such the fight was a chaotic mess.
Osmund punched a young man in the face, sending teeth flying through the air. He pushed the man against his friends, who collapsed in a heap. Another man threw something at Osmund, and was dispatched with a kick to the side. More people appeared, with the room’s capacity doubling as people descended the stairs, ready for carnage. Osmund kicked, someone flew across the room knocking over even more, which in turn hit Balmun on the floor also.
As Osmund punched and dodged, swerving away from any injury, the rest of his party were slightly less proficient. Jumun had been hit in the head by a mop, sending her barrelling through a group of people. The Enick twins were throwing glass back at their enemies. Edmun still had the flail out, swinging it against his enemies, proceeding to hit Josmu in the arm and sending him to the ground.
Jab. Return. Sword. Dodge. Mop. Catch. Snap. Osmund’s mind raced, sending the Vaunghe to the ground in their tens. They crowded him, trying desperately to overwhelm him to no avail. Osmund had his back pressed to the wall, using it as a springboard against anyone trying to attack him. Osmund grabbed a Vaunghe and bowled the crowd to the ground using him as a makeshift battering ram.
Osmund kicked a Vaunghe to the ground, blood splattering across the room from a broken knee. The ground was covered in the Vaunghe trainees, sputtering blood and mumbling on the ground. And yet more still poured down the stairs, until finally it happened, a perpetual cycle of tripping.
For a brief few moments everyone was falling, Osmund, the party, the Vaunghe soldiers, everyone was tripping over everyone else, breaking bones and fracturing the body everywhere. Someone was just yelling perpetually, everytime he slowed down they just started back up again.
And it was as Osmund flew across this room, it was now that he remembered the gift of the gods. It had been about three days since it was gifted to him, a weapon to use in an emergency. It was a small handheld device, with a large pin sticking out of it. Upon removing the pin the device would combust, destroying everything around it. The one thing Osmund was told was to never be in a situation that risks removing the pin, or else he would explode.
Osmund had completely forgotten about the device, what he called god’s gift, until now. He scrambled into his pocket, feeling only two of the three gifts in his pocket, apparently the third had fallen out somewhere. Now beginning to sweat, Osmund called out to his soldiers around the room.
“Everyone, one of the gifts is missing! Move now!” The party began to panic, and now the squirming ocean of people became even harder to navigate.
Everywhere were bodies, Osmund attempting to wade through the field of people. He was halfway through strangling an obese man to death when he saw it. The god’s gift was lying on the floor between the mass of flesh this room had become. Osmund released the fat man and forced his way through the wide group of people, hand reaching for the gift. The string of Vaunghe had ended at this point, however it was at this point the Alizian military finally broke through into the room.
Flooding the room the force of their entry threw another Vaunghe into Osmund sending the gift flying directly towards Balmun, who appeared to be trying to climb the wall and escape the flood. Balmun unexpectedly caught the gift, and looked down at it in surprise.
“Hey Osmund, I have a very cunning plan!”
“No Gods be damned you idiot do not pull that pin!” Doubt came across Balmun’s face as he looked at the object, and then at the pin in his other hand.
Osmund then saw something fly through the air and back into the hole the group had entered from. Osmund looked back towards Balmun, who shrugged and raised the pin, embarrassment high on his face.
And then there was a loud bang, an explosion filled the room. Osmund was thrown against the wall alongside everyone else in the room, and for a brief second no one did anything. Reeling Osmund slowly clambered out of the mass of bodies he was now trapped inside of, looking around for survivors. There was a larger hole where the entrance used to be, alongside large bloody chunks of some poor sod who attempted to escape.
The Alizian’s reappeared in the doorway, noticing Osmund and approaching him with support. Everyone in the room was now bloody and beaten, save for Balmun who was for some reason running up the stairs, sword raised, issuing a battle cry. Osmund sighed, a loud ringing in his left ear silencing everything, and proceeded to follow the idiot upstairs. He was followed by one of the Enick twins and Jumun, with the other members of the party being unconscious amongst the heaps of flesh the room had become.
The group kicked in the top door of the tower, greeting the last few of the army. These men were older, and armed with real weapons. Osmund pushed Balmun forward with great force, stopping him from being hit by a sword and sending him tumbling into two of the soldiers.
Osmund dodged a sword swing, sending a gut punch in turn. The snap of bone and another Vaunghe was forced to the floor, blood spurting. Osmund’s hard rock fist shattered a man’s face in two, sending another Vaunghe down. Two more were taken out by Osmund’s party, with Balmun still on the floor.
A tall man, one of around 9 ft, charged Osmund to the floor, the impact deep on Osmund’s back. Osmund rolled, forcing the man to the ground and began pummeling him. Punching Osmund slammed through the man’s cheap armour, then his face, and Osmund kept punching until the man’s insides now coated Osmund’s outsides. Moving back, Osmund failed to see the man from behind him. By the time Osmund realised it was too late.
Something hard and metallic rasped off of Osmund’s head, sending him flying onto the ground, and as Osmund sweeped his feet he felt someone fall behind him. Blood rushed through Osmund’s nose and ear onto the floor, feeling the damage overwhelm him briefly. For a brief second Osmund forgot who he was, felt nothing but existence itself, and then his inner self focused on the pain, and came back to his senses.
Osmund turned, looking down at the man he’d tripped, now on the floor, and the item in his hands. It was silver, and oddly shaped, although Osmund felt he’d seen it before somewhere, although from where he knew it escaped him. Osmund crawled onto the man, pressing his hands against the man’s throat, and began to squeeze. The man’s resistance was futile, he spun around, kicking back at Osmund to no avail, until finally his windpipe gave way and caved in.
Slowly Osmund began to rise, the blood pouring out of him at an alarming rate. Covered in the blood and filth of himself and others, Osmund rose up and finally realised what hit him. The metal object was a bedpan, although hopefully not a used one, and Osmund picked it up, remarking at the dent his head had left on it. A lesser man may have been killed by such a weapon, however Osmund is by no means lesser.
He looked around to see the last Vaunghe soldier standing alone, surrounded by his allies. However there was something by the soldier’s feet that made Osmund freeze. The second gift of God was lying there, right beside the soldier’s foot. As the soldier moved for a valiant last fight he slipped on the gift, and Osmund heard the pin shoot out.
As Osmund moved to the stairs he grabbed anyone he could, two shapes clutched to his body, and jumped out of the room and down the stairs. The explosion rocked the tower, and as Osmund rolled down the stairs he took out a great number of Alizian’s trying to join the fight. As he rolled he also noticed the tower itself was also coming down, although Osmund knew he’d be dead by the time it hit the ground.
As Osmund and the two beside him hurtled to the ground Osmund’s vision began to fade, his eyes glossed over, and everything was black.

Hi everyone, this is the first chapter of my debut novel. For information and links to other chapters click the link down below :
Reddit - Dive into anything
The Great One sat on his throne, gazing longingly into the hearts of man. Something was coming and he could feel it. Destiny riding on a white steed, like the tales of man long ago, coming to uncover his secrets. He could see it all, the wall, the castle, and the so-called gods that built it all. The ego of these creatures was laughable, if only the Great One could still laugh. He could still speak sure, but only through means not of man’s common means. Vocal cords were a commodity long since lost in this place.
As the Great One observed the coming destiny he could feel the approaching storm, in a hail of flesh and blood, the only things that the Great One lacked. He would never give up, never retreat to these things as they approached, for this was the Great One. He looked back to the castle, viewing the scene in its entirety, and he felt something like happiness enter him.
Divinity. That is what connected the walls surrounding Dundis castle, not stone or metal, this was not a mere wall but a divine gift from ones above. Divinity sealed the wall, made it whole, the walls sealed together without mark or blemish, something no man could ever replicate. The wall had stood for a century, and would likely last ten more, there was no weakness, no flaw in design. 50 metres tall the wall was unscalable, unbreakable. No man could break the wall, it was the Vaunghe empire’s crowning gift, their wonder of the world. Those that were hired to clean the wall’s dirt and grime were heralded as the truly faithful, and all longed to help the gift of the gods. And yet despite this the Alizian’s watched, standing with armies around the great wall, waiting to breach its crust and destroy the core.
The Vaunghe had watched their foes throw everything they had, hundreds of men attacking the steel doors of the wall to no avail, an attempted archer attack quickly squashed by the wall's height. The Alizian military was strong, a blend of the Alizian warriors and Strolim blacksmiths made for a truly terrifying army. The army was so terrifying that the Vaunghe inside the castle doubted there were any more Vaunghe troops left, this was the end to a long battle between man and man. Even the soldiers left weren’t particularly important, just those lucky enough to guard the king and a few trainees. But the Vaunghe felt their luck running out.
The food supplies had run low, even if the nobles weren’t in the castle there was no chance of resupply. The few men who had eaten in the past few days stood alert, gazing down from the ramparts at the enemy. The soldiers knew they had to either surrender or fight, but the Vaunghe were passionate people, they could never leave behind their identity in favour of life. So the men waited, bows and arrows at the ready, for the next attack. Heavy items such as ingots and chairs lined the rampart, ready to be thrown off at a moments notice.
They had waited in this position for many cycles, and as day turned to night, and night turned to day the Vaunghe were exhausted, finished with whatever feeble attacks these barbarians had planned. They could throw whatever armies and arrows they wanted at the wall but it would remain unphased, forevermore. When the Alizian’s next attacked they would be met with the last strength of the Vaunghe, and it would be a story remembered for milenia by man and the gods.
As the morning sun rose over the wall, the enemy was revealed in all their glory. Even from so high above the Vaunghe could see the glint of silver from the Alizian military. The bright greens of the Alizian armour created a dazzling sensation that they were one with the grass, which blended in so perfectly with their clothes. They stood in their thousands, armed with whatever they could find, and even on the wall the men could see him.
The slaughterer, the murderer, the man, the myth and the legend Osmund stood alone on an overlooking hill. The fiend was well known by the Vaunghe, he was likely the greatest foe that had come from the opposing sides. Vaunghe generals often fled at his coming, or surrendered first, but rumour had it that Osmund gave no mercy. Overseeing his army to destroy everything that was left, the Vaunghe soldiers knew today really was the end. The figure on the hill moved closer to his army and screamed. The battle-cry of the Alizian’s shook fear into each of the Vaunghe atop the rampart, being so loud that it even reached so high.
The hundreds of troops began to move in sync, forming three individual groups of soldiers, with 10 metre spaces between each. Each contingent comprised six hundred men, easily dwarfing the 82 Vaunghe soldiers that were left. But the Vaunghe were not afraid, at least not afraid of a breach anytime soon. These walls were built to withstand any damage, no man could breakthrough one.
Between the troops was movement, indeed there seemed to be movement down all three rows of men in blue. The Strolime empire had finally revealed themselves, with their short stature and mental prowess the Strolime were gifted inventors not expected to appear on the battlefield. And yet here they were, almost one hundred of them hauling forth three large metallic objects. The sun bounced off of these objects into the Vaunghe’s eyes.
None of the men had ever seen objects like these, seemingly composed of pure metals and on wheels. Some thought they were a testament to the gods, some holy objects, others believed it to be some new invention from the Strolime, however none of them could say anything for certain as they were pushed closer and closer to the wall. The Strolomites stopped in their advance, approximately 20 metres away from the wall. The purpose of these objects had yet to dawn on the men, although one of the younger men on the rampart claimed he could see small objects poking through the metal, which was now aimed at a forty-five degree angle towards the wall.
As the Strolimites halted their advance many began to move away into the safety of the Alizian wall, likely afraid of any precautionary Vaunghe archers. One of them, a rather short and plump soldier, stayed with the object, placing a hand on it and turning to the wall. It was a fleeting moment, but for a second it seemed the man was gazing at the Vaunghe soldiers in shame. One last condemnation to the ones that began this war, before it would all come crashing down. But then the moment passed, and the short man moved as the rest did, doing a slight zig zag to avoid arrows.
And now, just as quickly they had come, the Strolomite’s were gone in the ranks of the Alizians, still waiting in their groups for something, and then they came. Three figures, two women and a man, moved between the lines just as the Strolimites before them. These three wore no armour, only the greens of Alizia upon their tunics. They stood beside the objects and began to reach their arms into the underside of it. Before the Vaunghe’s eyes the objects began to turn slightly, aiming even more directly at the wall.
One of the Vaunghe had enough of this display, and raised his bow. There were low winds on this day, and he was a good enough shot to reach at least one of the Alizian soldiers. He aimed his bow, finger on the drawstring, and released. It is likely that this arrow would’ve drawn first blood in this battle, however the arrow never reached its target.
In the split second before the release of the bow, the Vaunghe noticed the smoke billowing out of the bottom of the devices, the flames that shot out, and finally they noticed for not even a fraction of a second the object that shot out of the metallic thing, something white and red that hit the wall in an instant.
The wall shook, and the following barrage of these objects shattered any notion of divinity. Crashing and crumbling the rampart was launched, sending soldiers flying everywhere. The Vaunghe beside the wall were subject to the falling rubble, both the crumbling stone of the walls and the miscellaneous objects they had left upon the wall. All of the objects crushed the few Vaunghe left, save for the few sickly starving soldiers left inside the castle’s inner walls.
Down went the walls, such a harsh strike against the wall that nothing stood in the path of this monster. The roaring splattered through the castle, the screams of the falling wall waking the King himself from his slumber. Such a vast creation had fallen in seconds before the might of the Alizian’s, and now there was nothing left but to watch the battle unfold.
Smoke flooded the inner walls of the castle, casting the few remaining into fits of coughing and blindness. The walls finished their crumbling, and yet the roars didn’t stop. These were not the roars of the wall but the war cries of the soldiers outside, and they began to get louder, echoing through the walls of Dundis and into the ears of the weak nobles and soldiers.
Through the smoke they came, weapons raised and charging the weak. The few that tried to fight were slaughtered, cut down by a sea of green soldiers. Those that were choking, sputtering or raising their hands in defeat were spared, hauled through the hordes and into one of the stables facing the inner wall. They were to be tried and jailed, for no human regardless of their crime should be killed. It is simply not the Alizian way.
Out of the one hundred and fifty two people who were in Dundis, forty two had died in the wall’s destruction, and a further eleven were detained by the Alizian military. There was nothing that the Vaunghe could do, save for locking their doors, shield themselves and hold out for as long as possible. The Vaunghe forces built barricades in their castle, locking away the Alizian combatants for as long as possible. And during all of this Osmund waited. Waiting for his time to end this war, this travesty of battle that had gone on for too long, and that time finally came.
* * * *
Osmund stood alone atop the hill, and watched the madness unfold. The walls crumbled at the face of these weapons with no more effort than a straw house, and the plumes of smoke assaulted his men, although not to the extent of the inner wall. After a few moments of sputtering and choking the men cheered, for this was the moment that they had been waiting for, the end of such a long war now in the Alizian’s favour.
The Vaunghe capital was in shambles, their military long crushed underneath Osmund’s almighty power, and all that was left was the King. Hiding behind his walls as if he didn’t deserve this loss, this final failure in his life. Osmund was willing to spare as many people as he could, it was the Alizian code, but there would be no mercy for the King. This wasn’t one final battle between two great armies, that conflict happened weeks ago, this was the last breaths of a psychotic monarch being silenced amongst the last of his troops.
Osmund gazed longingly at Dundis, the ruined walls and advancing soldiers and doubted. He felt something was off, something was very wrong with all of this. His heart began to thump, as Osmund’s eyes turned every way to understand what was wrong, what abnormality was here. It grew and grew, Osmund began to shake at what was about to happen, nothing was right here Osmund should be somewhere else helping someone, there’s something wrong here something very-
Peace. Osmund’s heart stopped thumping, body stopping its perpetual shaking. He looked again to the marching troops, now almost entirely inside the walls, and looked back to his back, and the reserve Strolomites that now stood. They were cheering, marvelling at the success of the assault, and how the god’s gift had saved so much effort on their part.
Such strange creations composed of metal and flame, Osmund marvelled at the power the gods possessed. These devices were so unique in design Osmund doubted if any army could defeat them. The large red tubes they released could easily destroy an entire village by itself, but with one hundred of them an entire valley could be bathed in flames. Something truly abnormal in this world, something so parallel to the code of battle that no army would ever think of it.
The Vaunghe were once considered to be the greatest fighters, with the tournaments they created bringing forth the greatest warriors from throughout the land. Their dedication and power were unmatched in ferocity and violence, some called the Vaunghe the standing due to their unmatched will to always get back up. Osmund recalled his days in the tournaments, those peaceful days when he was not yet a hero to people, but a simple military man. He was still only Osmu back then, and yet even those of the time knew he would be something special. As Christoff used to say, ‘Ozzie you’re going places, big ones’. Osmund missed Christoff, It had been so long since their last meeting, and all Osmund wanted was to meet again one last time.
Osmund’s assistant came to him, a younger Strolomite by the name of Gizmu. Gizmu was rather muscular for a Strolomite, a strong figure contrasting his associates' plumper bodies, and stature was fairly tall for one of his people at 6’5 ft tall. Hazel hair protruded through a blue helmet, and for the first time Osmund considered what his assistant could look like. Gizmu was one of the many Strolomite’s who refused to show their face until military success, a tradition that Osmund respected. He had no doubt that Gizmu's true face would one day be revealed to him, as the man possessed genuine prowess in the fields of agriculture, something sorely missed in the modern military.
“Osmund, your team is preparing now, they’ll come soon. I advise you to prepare your armour sir, as it won’t be long before you’re sent in.” Osmund sensed mild concern in Gizmu’s voice, but didn’t pursue it.
“Thank you Gizmu, my friend. I’ll begin my preparations, tell the guests to meet me here when they are fully prepared. And do ensure they understand that there is still risk of injury on this mission, ensure each of them wears their armour.” Osmund’s voice was deep and echoed his long life, commanding a sense of authority amongst all Alizian forces.
Osmund left the hill, passing the cheering Strolomite’s and the peasant farmers who supported the army, and entered the rows of tents. They stretched out on either side, one for every four soldiers, until he reached his own tent. Entering Osmund was surprised to discover a fellow commander still asleep in his bed, snoring away peacefully.
Osmund removes his upper clothing, the clean tunic falling to the ground. While removing these clothes Osmund kicks the sleeping man in the leg, which doesn’t actually amount to anything rather than halting his snoring. Osmund kicks the sleeping soldier again, this time in the buttocks, which does a far better job of riling him. The man looks around wide-eyed, before settling onto the sight of the giant Osmund.
“Hey, why'd you kick me? I almost had a bleedin’ heart attack don’t you know not to meddle with a sleepin man?”
“Don’t you know that you were meant to be on the battlefield at the crack of dawn? I don’t know what kind of promotion you’re expecting when you aren’t even going on the battlefield. Do you really want to be Balmun forever?” Osmund spoke coldly, now reaching for his chestplate.
“Well no sir. But the thing is I actually have a very cunning plan, I thought of it all myself.” A smile falls upon the man’s face, whose head bears an uncanny resemblance to a potato.
“And what is that?” Osmund halted his preparations briefly.
“Well if I say I was there but didn't actually go, who’d think I wasn’t? I can just sleep through it all until the battle is won and no one would be the wiser.” Osmund puts a hand onto Balmun’s fleshy shoulder.
“A fine plan, if I wasn’t your commanding officer you buffoon. By the gods I believe some divine creator mistakenly put a turnip in your head instead of a brain because no noble’s son has ever been as frankly idiotic as you have. You’re coming with me to the battlefield, and I suggest you get dressed or you’ll be facing the last of the Vaunghe army with your flopping cock dancing for all to see.” Balmun stood and began to slip some clothes on, as Osmund completed his own set of armour.
Osmund’s armour bore the mark of a noble family, some rich fools who wanted their family crest to be associated with a bloody conflict and a dangerous murderer. Osmund wore it because of the armour’s quality, customfit to encompass Osmund’s 9’5 ft tall body, something no other armour was able to achieve. Osmund’s height was always an oddity, reaching far above the average 8ft heights of most Alizian’s, and making him one of the tallest figures in the lands. It was this height and his skin’s colour that earned him the name of the black death, which he wasn’t particularly fond of due to the mention of his skin. And even then Osmund certainly didn’t feel like a black death, whatever that was meant to be, rather he felt like death itself. Osmund was to be fifty years old by the end of the week, and it showed on his body. The hair that was left on his head was grey, and while still possessing an impressive form Osmund’s body was not in its prime, he was old.
Osmund looked at himself in the full body mirror, grabbing his longsword and leaving the tent, dragging a half dressed Balmun with him. Back through the tents they travelled, back past the now eager Strolomite’s and atop the hill where Osmund’s infiltration team stood. In any other battle Osmund would’ve despised the one that left this group with him, a collection of subpar and mediocre soldiers with all the military future of an Otter in a stew. But then again Osmund’s battle history did feature a lot of important people dying under his watch, so perhaps this was for the better.
The force began with Edmun, a cross between a prostitute and a noble who unfortunately takes more from the noble. An egotistical brat, as well as a greedy goblin of anything that isn’t bolted down, Osmund had borne the unfortunate duty of his company for months, since the initial assault on the capitol. The man could barely hold a weapon, save for slight skill with a flail of all things which he wore by his side. It was a gold plated flail as well, specifically made for beating in the heads of the poor Vaunghe soldiers stupid enough to get close. Blonde hair obscured blue eyes that spoke to his red-light mother, in fact for a noble’s son Edmun had all the appearance of an incestuous dullard. The man had survived by pure luck, and was the only casualty that Osmund wanted his side to suffer.
The Enick twins Humun and Eumun were up next, named after their family crest of the god of alcohol Enick. In contrast to Edmun these were a pair of real soldiers, Osmund had seen the fruits of their labour many times. They were great at the art of flanking, Humon’s greataxe paired alongside Eumun’s spears proved to be an unbeatable combination. The only issue that Osmund had with the pair was their… peculiar relationship. While the two were great fighters, whenever they were together anything else became impossible to comprehend. Osmund had once caught the pair attempting to seduce a goat wearing a knight’s helm, and while they were drunk there is still clear evidence of idiocy amongst them. The pair were identical in appearance, burly figures of 8’5ft, short cut black hair and overgrown beards stretching down their faces, however the distinguishing feature between the two was Eumon’s cleft lip, which gave his speech a lisp.
Josmu was far more a scholar than a soldier, although Osmund enjoyed his presence greatly. Since they first met the pair had hit it off, often discussing each other’s lives in Alizian taverns across the kingdom. A gifted archer, Josmu was the son of two aspiring poets and enlisted into the military voluntarily to assist in the war efforts. Osmund had a great deal of respect for the man, and hoped that the two would one day have a drink together, and ruminate on the past once more.
And then there was Jumun, a gifted soldier and one of the few Osmund thought could take him in his prime. Long strands of red hair ran down her rough face, a pointed nose and peculiar eyebrow shape giving her a perpetual look of disappointment. At a height of 9’2 ft she stood almost toe to toe with Osmund, in fact there were many aspects about her that reminded Osmund of himself. The first was her attitude, she treated every war as a tragedy of its own, and yet she would never fail to perform against her enemies. Skilled in most weapons Jumun’s life had been long and arduous, her worn out armour covered in patches and dents. Osmund had offered her a new set of armour once, to which she vehemently refused, telling Osmund that she wished to end the war in the armour she started it in. Currently she held a single large sword nearly identical to his own, and Osmund predicted that she couldn’t wait for the battle to be over.
The group stood facing the smoking walls, watching the now descending Strolomite’s retrieve the three gifts from the gods. Pushing them back up the hill would take tremendous strength and a long time, which is why nearly double the number of Strolomite’s assisted in the endeavour. Osmund cleared his throat, prompting the looks of the team. All of their eyes were of Balmun, who was somehow already panting after a 2 minute drag through the ground. Osmund released the man and pushed him towards his new comrades, to which he sulked.
Osmund could see through the smoke of the ruins now, noting the strangely high number of bodies present from Osmund’s view. It appeared that there were more forces than originally estimated, as it was initially guessed there were around one hundred and fifty soldiers inside. Judging by the number of corpses inside those numbers clearly forgot to account for the possibility of trainees inside of the castle. This may be a slightly larger fight than initially predicted, although even supposing there were another hundred or so trainees locked inside rooms there were things Osmund could do against that.
“Alright then, good to see that some of you actually bothered to wake up today, Balmun, and I think we all know that this mission is going to end the war.” Balmun raised his hand.
“Yes Balmun?”
“Sir I have a very cunning pl-”
“Shove your plans up your slacker buttocks, you idiot. Now then, I’m gonna say this once, because quite frankly the more chances I give Balmun to interrupt the more likely I’ll butcher myself with this sword. Now then we are the backbone to the forces, our mission is to help take individual points of conflict from alternative points. We will accomplish this with the leaked maps of the castle gained from Vaunghe intelligence. Now then, originally it was believed that we were dealing with only around one hundred and fifty troops, but it looks like someone didn’t remember the number of rookie troops that are trained here, so we could be looking at a few more troops than expected.” Osmund saw the hand raised but tried to ignore it. The man with the potato for a head seemed adamant however, and raised his hand higher. When that didn’t work he raised both arms.
“By the gods what is it?”
“Well sir, what kind of weapons do you think they have?” Osmund stopped in his tracks, not expecting anything even related to an actual important question. A smile formed on his face, it seems that even fools can think every now and again.
“Decent question my friend, we can probably expect the basic mix of swords and axes, likely shields also, but we may have one or two archers running around however it’s unlikely any survived the wall’s collapse.”
“That is good Osmund, once we take a few down I need a weapon, I like the swords myself.”
“What’s wrong with your sword?”
“I left it in the tent sir.” Osmund cupped his hands into his face, cringing against the stupidity of this man.
“Listen…. just everyone follow me please, I mean by the gods man. Come on. Listen I don’t think we will need any armour with us today, we have the single thickest piece of meat just over there as we speak.” Osmund points towards Balmun, who turns to see what everyone is looking at. Without another word Osmund begins to walk down the hill towards the castle, muttering things that even the gods consider a little racy.
* * * *
The ruins of Dundis stood firm in their strength, with the ruined walls blemishing what was once a grand fortress that none had penetrated. Tall spires protrude from the shapeless stone complex. Along the gateway was a path leading directly into the Dundis entrance, which stood slightly ajar. Fragments of the wall had crushed many parts of the outside, with simple wooden stables and trees crushed by the weight of the plummet of the debris. The architecture that remained spoke to the complexities of the Vaunghe, as spiralling patterns adorned the walls of the castle, interlaced with rare jewels that coated the walls. The Vaunghe were so fortunate with minerals that one could find them coating their walls, despite the fact that no one other than a fellow Vaunghe was ever meant to see such a thing.
A veil of embarrassment and determination clashed as the group descended the hill, weapons at the ready. The group had reached the ruins of the wall now, debris coating the grass and the bodies that were surely there. Even destroyed Osmund still felt some of that divine power the Vaunghe always babbled about, he felt the strength in the walls and not for the first time wondered why the gods would bestow such a gift upon such a vile group.
The group began clambering through the ruins, over the cracked pieces of stone and through the divine walls final remains. There was a smell here, the remnants of smoke colliding with the smell of blood, but there was a third smell, one that Osmund knew well. It was the smell of inevitability, heavy in the hair. That which is unlikely to happen always will happen, and when it does the smell adds to it all, the smell of fate and destiny runs through this place.
Inevitability hides everywhere, in the trees and the skies, carried by the wind through it all. From nature it was born, but in man it thrives, the building’s will one day fall, the kingdoms will fade away, and everything will one day lead to something else. From every beginning comes an end, and each end becomes a beginning, this is how it has always been. This place thought itself against such things, and inevitability infected its walls, creeping along slowly rotting the once great walls into a hellish nightmare. Now the bubble has burst, and the smell of inevitability crowds the world, taking over everything.
Moaning. A low whimper. A cry for something. Calls for assistance. A terrified yell. Osmund approaches the source of these noises, his team close behind. At the source of these screams is a Vaunghe soldier, somehow alive after the rampart’s collapse, covered in piles of stone and smoke. His outstretched hand reaches towards Osmund, who in turn takes it.
The man mutters something, sputters blood, and begins to fade. As he does, Osmund moves towards the rocks, feeling against it. Somehow the rocks aren’t as heavy as they should be, and Osmund slowly moves the rocks. The first and second rocks move, and after some struggling Osmund moves the third rock, revealing a bloody leg, spurting forward. Osmund realises how the man survived, the remains of a metal box squashed around him. As the rampart fell the man landed inside, narrowly missing an immediate demise. Now he sat, bleeding in and out of consciousness, and moaning for help. Osmund put his hands around the man, slowly lifting him, and moving forwards into the inner walls.
There are running medics here, and as they see Osmund’s approach they run to him, taking the injured man and placing him onto a table. The man may survive, they told Osmund, however his bleeding may take too much from him. As Osmund turns to leave he hears the voice, the message of the man.
“T-t-th-than-” It was shaky, interrupted by coughs and convulsions, but bore strength, and Osmund felt the ghost of a smile play upon him.
“It wasn’t an issue.” And with that Osmund left the tent, admiring the surroundings in focus for the first time. Eyes bore into him from his party, and yet no one said anything, they couldn’t. Many had called Osmund a monster in his time, they had seen him do bad things to bad people, and yet none would call him a monster, for there is no such thing. Osmund is not some black death, he’s another beast entirely.
For the first time Osmund admired his surroundings, the inner walls were now filled with wreckage, and looked back to the tent. It was amazing how quickly the medics could establish tents, the battle had occurred for less than an hour and already there were three tents established side by side. Besides the wounded Vaunghe soldier were three other injured soldiers, each seeming to be hit by a minor injury likely from the smoke inhalation.
The captured and surrendered were lined up against the castle's wall, being carefully monitored by over sixty members of the contingent. There were only around twelve or thirteen of the captured, smoke-covered and sputtering. On the ground were bodies, those rookies that tried so valiantly to protect what they cared for. They now lay, looking up to the sky blindly.
Osmund saw the bodies and felt his stomach turn. The desire came back. The shaking returned, alongside it the painful sharp stabbing thoughts. Everything changed, he forgot who he was. What kind of person would approve of this, what even was Osmund was he real or fake, how is he even conceiving things like this. What is reality and why is it real, why can’t he understand-
Silence. Peace. Osmund returned to himself, the shaking never happening at all. He looked down at the bodies and continued to walk. There was nothing he could do for them, not anymore. The eyes of his group bore into him, shattering something that had broken a long time ago. He raised his hand and motioned for his team to follow, leaving this travesty of death and life behind.
Footsteps. Osmund turned to their echoing sound, the way they bounced through the place was unbelievable, the way it echoed between the walls and the castle structure itself. Through open castle gates he ran, a messenger in green, sword in its scabbard and now approaching Osmund. The man tripped on something, a large rock of some sort, before standing, dusting himself off and reaching the group.
“Osmund, we have hit the enemy’s points of defence.” The man was young, maybe twenty, and no more than twenty five.
“And? Where are they?”
“There are three fronts, the first is in the scout’s tower where a group of Vaunghe are amassing weapons and barricades fast. We can no longer enter the tower, as the amount thrown down makes common entrance impossible. The second location is the garden, where we believe the last of the nobles and the King himself are. We’ve faced harsh opposition from the enemies, who have formed a wall of shields to protect the door. Finally we have the guard’s quarters, where a few amount of Vaunghe are in active combat as we speak, although that will likely be taken without need for intervention.”
“Good job soldier.”
“Thank you sir.”
Osmund removes a slip of paper from his garb, and admires it in the sunlight. It was a complex map of Dundis, including the secret passages and escape routes of the entire place. It cost the annulment of many Vaunghe men and women, but was worth all the effort. Consulting the map Osmund noted the existence of an escape passageway inside of the tower. It was obscured behind a wall, thus explaining the lack of windows on that side.
“Report back to your commander that we’ll begin with the tower, there are several clear passages into an alternative staircase. Launching a pincer attack we’ll defeat the enemy and allow for the redistribution of forces. By that time I expect the guard’s quarters to be taken, allowing us to completely overflow any opposition protecting the garden.”
“Yes Osmund, I will inform her now.” And with that the young warrior ran back through the castle’s long iron gates.
And thus, the final battle was upon them. Osmund looked upon Dundis, the last symbol of the people who had taken everything from him, the ones who had slaughtered so many innocents, so many that Osmund cared for, and now the end was finally in sight. But it didn’t feel like the end, Osmund could feel no conclusion approaching, it felt like something else, as if this was all leading into something more, some grand massacre the likes of which Osmund had never seen. There’s a darkness ahead, something far worse to come than the echoes of a fallen monarchy, and as Osmund stands he can feel it inside of him, gesturing sensually, awaiting his return to the beginning. In a mental prison of nonexistent existence lies the mother, a slight smile on her lips. She awaits the grasp of Osmund forevermore.

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(vent post)
As nice as being androgynous is, I hate it when people actually ask the question. When I say boy it's "you don't look like a boy" (I'm almost 22, should actually be man or woman but I look like a child idk), same when I say girl. Happened a lot last year, no big deal because it was either little kids or adults but yesterday was the worst so far
Yesterday I used the boy's/men's changing room at the trampoline park (a place I frequent to practice flips, btw I hit a goal yesterday) and a group of teenagers asked exactly this question. I wanted to be honest for once and said non-binary, because the younger generation generally tends to be more open-minded and while I didn't get actual hate it was more...weird. "Oh, so you don't know what you are?" "Yes I do, I just told you" "what's in your pants" I HATE THAT QUESTION "did you have sex yet? How do you have sex" WHY DO YOU CARE "btw you are sexy" thanks I guess, but excuse me, what?!
Yeah I basically countered it with a bunch of jokes/snarky comments because how the hell am I supposed to stay serious with that bs. The creepiest yet "do you want to try it with me" NO, first off I'm like 10 years older 2. I'm not into dudes, especially this creepy/chase-y
I hope they grow out of it, teenagers are weird and on top I'm autistic and bad with social interactions in general. It's like that meme where it says "I fear nothing" (shows group of teenagers) "I fear ONE thing"
I went there a lot previously and it never happened, so I'm not afraid to go back there, I love doing tricks too much to stop, especially because of such a silly incident. What led up to it was just a conversation about flips and tricks, it changed so suddenly. I guess I just need to stay away from people next time or gravitate towards other adults (can't bring a friend, they aren't as sporty as me and one of them is blind, that's a really bad place to be for a blind person)
If you read this far, here's the goal I hit and surpassed: I wanted to do two backflips in a row, without any jumps in-between and managed to go up to FIVE in a row!

I attended a middle school that had a shit ton of weird crud going on there, and one of those things was that very few girls were enrolled. It was a very small school, perhaps 50 to 60 students at most. Of that, there were 4 girls including myself. I only ever actually saw 2 of the other 3.
It really fucked with my gender, and I'm only now, a couple years after high school, able to slow down and destress enough to finally try to process it. It's highly likely part of why it did such a number on me was that puberty is often when we discard a child's gender identity for a more adult understanding of gender and sex, and I went through that in this very abnormal context, with my adults at home unaware anything was off at all.
I had, by that time, an ingrained sort of programming, to never cause unnecessary fuss with adults I didn't 100% trust to extend me grace and care. I also saw reminding adults that they did not have a room of 9 boys, they had 8 boys and a girl, as an unnecessary fuss. The only time my gender got me out of trouble instead of getting someone that everyone except my mum considered worth more than me into trouble, was the two times a boy hit me unprovoked, and even then he wasn't punished, it just got me out of a punishment for complaining because I was bigger than him so I should have taken it on the chin and not bothered the recess supervisor about it.
I wasn't exactly treated as a boy, but I wasn't always treated as a girl or considered any different from my classmates either. I was only a girl in the sense of what my paperwork said, and when the school, being a Catholic school, needed to be seen to be enforcing gender roles. Generally I was just treated as if I didn't have a gender unless the adults needed me to have one. By my classmates and the boys they were friends with, I wasn't exactly seen as a boy - but I was not treated how I saw them treat the three other girls in the building. I was often "just one of the guys".
Every time I reminded people I was a girl it just got me extra work or a mess to clean up or partnered for a project with a dangerous and violent classmate without proper supervision or a lot of unnecessary chaos or a canceled fun event, so I quickly learned not to do it and to answer to "Mr. [masculine form of my name]" and "boys" and "gentlemen". Saying nothing about gender got me treated the same as my schoolmates day to day, seen as a girl when it really mattered, and the whole thing treated as an elephant in the room.
At the time, I thought it wasn't what I really wanted, but there was no winning that situation, and the only choice I really had was assert my gender and get hell for making things harder for the adults to plan around, or say nothing, and get the best of both worlds and less trouble, as long as Mum and Dad didn't catch wind and I didn't end up in a gender clinic explaining to some counselor, I'm not trans, I just have to do this to keep the peace at school, and telling my parents that will only make it worse, their yelling and a hundred parent teacher conferences will get me nothing but retaliated against, so I guess I'll be back in two weeks to sit in here for another hour pretending to moan to you about my gender again. I told myself all I cared about was avoiding a fuss - and that was true to an extent, I stopped being so "who cares" about my gender when I was finally sent to a co-ed and very equally mixed and giant high school because there trying to be both depending on the situation was considered weird not convenient, but also I really liked that "avoiding a fuss" meant letting gender itself be an irrelevant thing and an elephant in the room.
In high school I caused a lot of unintentional fuss and found myself asked to explain things I wasn't even sure why I'd done, my first year, because I was behaving the way I was used to - gender didn't matter and it was easiest to do whatever the boys did, especially if I was wearing pants rather than a skirt. And then as I realised gender actually mattered and was binary in this setting, I super overcompensated and presented almost hyper feminine to cover up my bumpy first year and the ever present desire to act more like a boy or to present and behave like something in between.
Now as a young adult still struggling with that transition point between child and adult - I do identify as a woman, I feel like that sort of fits, but also there's those moments I'm asked for my pronouns and I hesitate, the moments that I notice a third gender category for "neither male or female" as well as the standard "male/female/prefer not to answer" and I think about sorting myself into that third category then decide against the fuss that'll cause later at home, the times I need the restroom and the place has a third gender neutral bathroom and I think about ducking in there, because I'm dressed like I used to dress in middle school and I don't want an incident like many other butch women who've been tossed out of a ladies room, and also a single occupant toilet might be cleaner and quieter, those times someone seems genuinely confused how to refer to me because my gender presentation is mixed and confusing and I get a huge rush out of it, those times while trying to buy clothes or shoes I get fed up in the womens section after an hour and find exactly what I wanted in the mens section in 5 minutes, the times I'm experiencing a huge frustration caused by women's clothing and the best solution I can find is to wear something typically thought of as mens' clothing, and the women suggesting it bitch that it's the best option but I just see the bitching as "this worked for another woman, so I can justify to my mum why I want to try it".
And I'd really like to blame that goddamn school. I really would. I don't think that's the whole situation - but in trying to make sense of it, I'd love to hear any experiences of any other women and AFAB individuals who had a similar experience in elementary or middle school, and if it did anything to you about your gender.

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A one-shot. Vote (the pointy thing upwards) and enjoy!
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The Xeno looked like he should be sitting on a Cathedral somewhere pissing rain down on the tourists. He also wouldn’t shut up
“I told you, I’m not a fucking engineer, pilot, Superman or whatever other weird ideas you have about humans. I’m a Xeno Paleoarchelogist and I’m wearing the wrong pants for a pirate attack. My grant doesn’t cover it and neither does my health insurance.”
The crests on his annoying companion raised in surprise, “Well I have no idea what that means but it must be useful! I have better pants that you may borrow if that would help?”
Warren held on to his chair tightly as another explosion rattled his teeth. Twenty minutes ago he had been enjoying the peace of a dull commute with a good book. Now he was in serious shit with nothing but whatever the Xeno equivalent of a nerd was. He should have known from the way the guy had lit up like it was his fucking birthday on sitting beside a ‘real’ human on his trip into the dark.
When the shaking calmed down he looked at his unlikely companion, “I study history, your history, everyone's history and see what matches up with ours. In particular, I study the utilisation of fire in prehistory as an indicator of future galactic development.”
He might as well have been speaking in pig-Latin and asking for a donation for the rebuilding of Pompei for all the Xeno seemed to understand.
The Xeno seemed to be considering something and then spoke in a sudden burst as if he was afraid the universe might interrupt him, “I am Ni’urn, Senior-Second Programmer of the Third-Shift of Numbers of Importance and I also study. I study combinations of numbers and I recommend the best ones. I cannot be captured by pirates! My department would be horrified!”
This was the problem with dumb translations since Warren heard ‘office geek that lived in a basement’ when he was actually being told, “I am the Second in Command of the third sector of our planet's military: space. I study patterns of warfare within the galaxy and our local space and recommend countermeasures to deal with foreseen problems. My death or capture will result in confusion and possible overreaction by our military.”
What Ni’urn heard from his new human companion was, “I am a human specialist responsible for fire and I am without my equipment.”
The obvious solution was to find some way for the human to utilise his skills in fire, a most useful thing in a battle with pirates.
Ni’urn ran the numbers in his head, “We are on a civilian ship from the In’Tec people. They make poor ships but cheap. Since your people stopped their previous activities I must think that they are unfamiliar with important things like escape pods since we have not been offered one. My projections indicate that this ship was probably refitted from a pirate vessel. Do you concur?”
Warren looked around at the slightly squashed cabin and took a wild guess, “Sure, why not? If these guys were pirates then either they are still working with them or they might have held onto some of the systems they used to use. No one gives up firepower if they can help it. I’m not sure how that helps us!”
Ni’urn added that to his numbers, “I concur. It is a most useful insight. We have just under eighteen minutes before the ship either surrenders to slavers and thieves or fails completely and explodes so I propose we seek to take immediate control of the vessel. I have sufficient understanding to undertake to pilot the vessel and you will be responsible for finding and using the weapons you believe they have concealed. Do you concur?”
Warren was still struggling with the ‘Eighteen minutes until we die’ when the Xeno grabbed him and pushed him forward towards the door. He thought the creature had been driven mad with fear and decided to chance it on his own. The Xeno had babbled something about Escape Pods so he pulled open the door and began running. He no longer cared where he was running to but he was damned sure of what he was running away from.
He was nearly back to rational thought when someone suddenly appeared in front of him and raised a weapon towards his face. Warren needed those brown pants really badly but he was moving too fast to stop so he tried to drop his head, just as the much-abused ship's systems flickered and the gravity went offline for a second.
To Ni’urn it appeared as if the human had sprinted at unbelievable speed from the cabin and when one of the pirates had dropped his camouflage to shoot him he had simply lowered his head and charged his assailant. He watched the pirate shatter as the human seemed to fly into him, its weapon thrown wildly and his armour crushed against the corridor wall. He hurried to catch up.
Warren took the blow to his head badly and felt blood begin to trickle into his eyes. Without thinking he pushed the blood away and leaned down to the Xeno he had crashed into. Shit. He couldn’t help him and didn’t particularly care but he thought he should not leave the creature with a weapon. He himself had never used one and had no idea of how the thing worked but maybe he could give it to someone in authority. Later. He began running again with the gun forgotten in his hand as the blood and pain narrowed his eyes. How fucking big was this ship anyway? The escape pods must be near the pilot, it made no sense otherwise.
‘Remarkable’ Ni’urn said to the dead pirate. “I have heard the human expression that you never know what will hit you but I didn’t realise it was literal.” He stepped over the corpse and followed his fire human.
The problem with running around like headless poultry is that it always ends badly for someone. Warren was finding that out the hard way as he found himself with a bleeding head, a raging headache and absolutely no idea of where he was on the ship. On the upside, no one seemed to be shooting at him or the ship. He stopped for breath and began to calm down and then he heard the footsteps. Someone was coming.
Ni’urn was growing more and more curious as his human friend threw himself forward into the maze of corridors without pause. If he was willing to entertain the thought he would have said the route that he was taking was…unusual, but it had evaded all the crew and pirates and he had brought them safely to the bridge. He had followed the thumping feet as they echoed down the shaky corridors and until then heard them falter and stop. Good, he had not been forgotten and his ally was obviously waiting for him to catch up.
He reflected that perhaps they hadn’t avoided anyone but that any enemy hearing the thumping human's arrival, seeing it covered in its lurid red blood and casually holding a weapon had simply gotten quickly out of the way.
------
On the bridge of the unfortunate ship the Beautiful Bounty there were two very unhappy Captains. One of them was dressed slightly less formally than the other but they could not be mistaken for anything other than family, bickering in front of some heavily armed men, “I told you we had a human and a high-value target. The human is some academic, not a warrior, just a teacher. He’s not important. We need the local, the Command Staff guy. He’s the one making all the plans around here.”
The In’tec pirate laughed, “Really? Because I can see the same cameras that you can and the human has already slaughtered one of mine in cold blood, stolen his gun and is now tearing through the ship looking for the rest of us. He’s probably going to be outside the door in a few minutes. I’m done. I’m not fighting a human again. You weren’t there. Even if I kill him the rest of his kind will come looking for me and they never fucking stop! You do whatever the fuck you want but me and my men are out of here.”
The Captain of the Beautiful Bounty seemed to shrink, “But I…I turned off the defences to do this. I’m screwed. I’ll spend years in a penal colony when they read the incident report. The local guy is really important...I’m fucked.” He seemed to realise that he had thrown his entire life into the toilet for nothing. If the pirates wouldn’t fight, his crew definitely wouldn’t and he didn’t want to face the creature alone. He looked at the vid as the crazed and bloodied creature ran towards the bridge, towards him.
The whole room heard and felt someone - something- run heavily towards the door and then stop. Then silence.
The In’tec pirate shook himself, “Fine, you can come with us. Now.” He turned to the bridge staff and his own men, “Move or you stay to deal with that fucking mad species.”
He didn’t waste any more words, running to his breaching craft that was currently embedded in the bridge and followed by every crewman on the bridge. It was a well-practised manoeuvre for most of them and it took less than a minute for them all to pile through the joining fields.
----------
Warren groaned when the annoying Xeno suddenly reappeared. He had tried to figure out the weapon but it wasn't made for humans, it was some weird thing that you obviously needed the correct training to use. He still held it in case he needed to hit something but then he wiped some more dried blood out of his eyebrows and finally realised he had been an idiot to the innocent Xeno, “Good to see you again. I’m afraid the ‘fight or flight ‘ instinct is strong in my people but I shouldn’t have behaved so poorly. Since we are both still here I assume the pirates are boarding? Do you have any suggestions? Are you uninjured?”
Ni’urn was pleased to see the human was alert and capable of intelligent questions.
What he understood was that his ally was pleased with his survival and looking for his understanding and preferred countermeasures. An admirable trait that was so rare in warriors. It still looked like a horror but that's aliens for you.
“I believe this is the correct door. I estimate that we will succeed if you enter first. When you have subdued the bridge I will then take control of the navigation and bring us to safety. You must find fire control and prepare to disable the pirate ship. They should not be permitted to rampage in the system or seek revenge against us.”
The human seemed to consider it for a moment and then handed him the weapon. Of course, he was probably feeling protective. This was a trait he had read about in his Intel reports of the species. They must be bonded in the humans mind. Well, that was slightly embarrassing.
Warren looked at the gun and gave up. He handed it to the Xeno, maybe he had seen them in the movies or done basic training. From what the nerd said they needed to take the bridge and then find the weapons before the pirates blew the ship up to cover their tracks. Another deadline. “Alright, you wave that thing around and let me take a swipe at anyone still standing. We are both going to die.”
Ni’urn assumed that that was some warrior's creed and tried to respond, “Indeed, but not today.” He pointed at one of the doors leading off from the corridor, “That is where we must go. I will open it and you will act. I shall endeavour to cover you with the gun but it is not recommended for use on a ship and would probably destroy vital systems should I try. I shall, as you suggest, ‘wave it about’.”
All Warren heard was that the Xeno didn’t know how to shoot and the door was right in front of him. His plan to run into the pointy-end had been correct it seemed. He just nodded and pushed hard on the door.
Ni’urn was surprised when it shifted easily under the human's hand. Breaching the bridge was always notoriously difficult but the human didn’t even slow down.
Warren figured the various fire and damage alarms currently ringing through the ship had opened every lock, especially on a civilian ship that carried his people. Any engineer he had ever met would have melted it down for ballast if it didn’t. He opened the door to an empty room.
“Well, that was easier than I expected. Go do your thing and I’ll see what they have to play with.”
He couldn’t believe it, he wasn’t going to get shot. Whatever the pirates wanted they had taken and left. He was just a bystander but what the fuck… he watched the Xeno move with the fussy authority of someone that spends their days at this kind of shit. The guy seemed to grow a foot taller when he began programming or piloting or whatever the hell he was doing.
He found a panel on the Captain's console. It looked like it had been nailed on and it was definitely not supposed to be there. It had a big red button and a sign that read ‘Emergency’ in several languages but most of them were incorrectly spelled, something that always annoyed him. He hit the button and nothing happened. Surprise. Thirty seconds later he had pried it off to find a small screen and six buttons, four with arrows, one kind of beige and one red.
He hit the beige one and the screen seemed to flicker until another ship appeared. The pirate? There was no one else for a dozen light-years. It even came with crosshairs that suddenly turned green when it thought it was pointing at the right thing.
Revenge. His or theirs..who would ever know? He didn’t but he hit the red button anyway.
-----
Ni’urn was struggling with the debriefing. “It is as I have told you: once I had informed the human of our predicament he acted immediately, killing the first pirate we encountered and seizing its weapon. It then evaded all opposition until it reached the bridge and waited for my instruction. Once we had breached the bridge he sought out the hidden weapons system and annihilated the pirate ship. I piloted us into safe space and he immediately disembarked and left for Earth space. I do not understand why you are having issues with this. It is plainly visible on the recovered files and I have no reason to lie about the event. I was hardly heroic, I took no part except the piloting of the ship once we were safe.”
The supervisor looked sympathetic, “You are aware of their XCC? Their central authority for any…events that take place outside their space. They report that the human, the one that you refer to as Warren, has no memory of any such details. Apparently, a Xeno ‘that was good with numbers’ looked after the whole thing. He has refused the bounty on the pirate ship and the salvage of the Beautiful Bounty.”
Ni’urn didn’t have anything left to add, but he could read these numbers.
The supervisor continued, “The XCC has sent us the documentation signing any and all such claims to you. If the vast amount of money wasn’t enough, the humans have also offered you free transport and employment should you choose to move to their space. You cannot work in intelligence for us when a foreign power is taking such a close interest in you.”
The supervisor stood up and Ni’urn shakily followed, “It is the opinion of this commission that you will be transferred into Xeno relations and provided with a rebuilt Beautiful Bounty as your ship. Your Captain papers and license have been issued along with the bounty on the pirates. Your ship will remain in the control of our fleet until your retirement and then will pass to you. Congratulations, Captain Ni’urn.”
My Patreon, if anyone wants to support my writing and you can drop into my channel on Discord or buy me a coffee. Also Human Altered on Royal Road

How to dress presentably when I: 1. Only* wear knit (nonwoven) fabrics 2. Can't stand things touching my neck
Please help, I want to wear nice clothes but all I find comfortable is t-shirts and pajamas
*Very few exceptions: I will wear stretch wovens as pants for short lengths of time and I have a woven winter coat

Gray and black striped socks
Light blue pajama pants with white clouds
Beige A Clockwork Orange t-shirt
A headband with pastel macarons

Am I the only one who thinks ‘influencer’ sarati on Snapchat is highly rude?
Today I asked an honest question, on why her daughter Emma is always wearing the same shirt. She claims it’s pajamas. Whether she’s right or wrong, don’t care. But she actually replied to my response & started it off with “I know you don’t have kids because of this comment”.. then proceeded to explain why Emma always wears that shirt. When in fact I do have a child. I have a 15 month old daughter. 😂 She acts like she knows everything about everything. To me, that’s very triggering. Instead of just responding kind, she had to be a little bitch about it. Immediate unsubscribe
No one told you to go ahead & get knocked up months after having your child. Grumpy pants

Today has been a really good day. I mean, I felt great mentally, after I smoked weed in the morning. And I still feel positive.
Physically I feel kinda gross still. I woke up very congested, as usual, and then shortly after I took my meds I got super nauseous and threw up. I'm not sure if it was because I was so congested or if my meds did something weird. But they're the same meds as usual?
I had an appointment with the allergist, who did an exam and said that it looked like I was getting better. Which, after I blew my nose it stayed pretty clear? So that was cool. And face pain wasn’t so bad as it has been. He told me that if I wasn’t feeling better after a few days, give them a call and he’d give me antibiotics. But there’s no need right now since I’m getting better. I’m happy to skip the extra meds. He did tell me that if I needed to I could take 2 of my daily allergy pills for 2 days in a row (instead of 1), and then after that, Benadryl. Next week I’m back to getting my allergy shots. If I had Thursday off I could go back and get the shots but my insurance won’t let me do both shots and an appointment on the same day and I should be working for the rest of the week. I renewed my allergy shots contract, paid for all that. I had to meet my deductible, which was another $90ish, but now after this I don’t pay copay for shots.
When I got home I smoked a bowl, and then was feeling really positive. I put together an outfit, because I had the energy for that. Even wore a necklace and earrings. No makeup though. Don’t want anyone getting any expectations. I mostly dress like a tired mom every day. Men’s T-shirts (I’m more comfortable in that cut) and stretchy pants.
Work has been alright, there’s been lots of stuff to do. They hired a teen services librarian, who interviewed me a few months ago about the facilities. She seems alright. She was always a friendly patron. I train her on some stuff on Thursday. The cataloger is out getting married and whatnot, so I’m teaching her about cataloging. Why they can’t wait until the cataloger comes back, IDK. They should have my supervisor train her, just because it’s hilarious. My supervisor is awful about giving instructions. She points and says “there, there, and there, and then you type xyz, and click there, and click there, fill in the info, and you’re done. Got it? Remember to put the stickers.” The stickers? “Yeah look at the other books and see how it’s done.” Right. “And there’s your whole lesson now do this whole cart.” It’s funny making flyers for her, too, because she’s so vague on what she wants. She wants a flyer for ___________ event. But she doesn’t give you any info on the event. What do you want to put on the flyer? “Oh I don’t know just something about ______ event.” What do you want me to put about that event? “Oh just information.” What information? “I don’t know, I think it’s on google somewhere. Something about t-shirts and I don’t know, you know. Say something nice.” Right. Other people actually give me the content they want me to put on the flyers. Links to websites, pictures…ideas on what they want it to look like…
D made some fantastic mashed potatoes today, to go with broccoli and (air)fried chicken drumsticks. I was not a fan of the chicken, but when am I ever? Just, the mashed potatoes, so good. And there are those “Drumstick” ice creams still in the freezer (edit - ice cream at work not home) so I totally just took a break to eat one.
I’ve been listening to LeVar Burton Reads on Spotify. I’ve got the podcast saved on other podcast apps, but I do like Spotify. I listened to a story earlier about time travelers. Now I’m going to try to finish an episode of Haystacks & Hell, an XSDA podcast. This episode is all about the main guy’s deconstruction and deconversion, which like, I guess is important. I just don’t really remember why I drifted away from the church in the first place. I’ve never tried to explain myself. Maybe it was because I prayed so much and I tried so hard and their god didn’t care? Maybe because my mom was so sick and in so much pain for so long and their god didn’t care? If he is was real, they say he’s all powerful, he could have done something. But he didn’t, and he doesn’t. If he’s real, he’s a dick and I want nothing to do with him.
Alright, enough ranting about my hatred for god and christianity. I've gotta get back to work. It's my late day. I'm drinking my coffee and eating, so when I get home to do bedtime I'm (hopefully) not too grumpy.
How are you? How's your day?
Edit: Just realized I forgot to say "hello" at the beginning of this post. I just launched right in and started talking. Hello my friends!

I was at a bus stop. I did everything right. I was on a busy road, only had five minutes to wait, minding my own business...I've been so vigilant about checking to make sure I'm not being followed, avoiding people who look like they might try to bother me. But I looked down at my phone and then suddenly there's a forty-something year old man in front of me telling me I have such a pretty smile and how cute I am. I didn't even look at him. I didn't see him coming. Then suddenly he's all up in my face and I just froze. I didn't know what to do. He asks if I've ever kissed a man, then suddenly says "gimme a kiss" and leans in for one. I yeeted out of the way and said "no thanks I'm good!" He started asking a ton of personal questions and thought I was so hilarious and shy. He finally left me alone. But all I can think is how lucky I was. Lucky he didn't get aggressive. Lucky he didn't go further. I'm just so angry. Angry at myself for freezing and not just telling him to fuck off. Angry that no one takes me seriously when I say I'm anxious about someone on the street. They don't see what those men do when I'm alone. I'm so angry that I can't just live. I can't just feel pretty and take the bus safely. I've finally started to feel better about myself and now I feel like I have to cover up even more. I was wearing baggy pants and a giant coat and it still wasn't enough. I'm so anxious about summer coming because I'll have to deal with it even more and it's so infuriating. I just wanna look and feel cute and comfortable without some dude as old as my father thinking my existence equals free sex. Taking the bus is already anxiety inducing, and now I'm just fucking terrified to go back out there.

I received a virtual gift card for a free pair of Blue Delta custom jeans, but unfortunately I'm not a denim guy. I'm looking to sell the gift card for around half the cost. All denim runs $450 per order - I'm seeking $175 OBO
Blue Delta Jeans is a bespoke pant maker based in Tupelo, Mississippi. They have been around since 2012 but are more of a niche in the denim market. They're partnered with ESPN, several athletes and college sports teams.
There is a virtual fitting for measurements and crafting your jeans. You would follow the steps here to build your pair https://www.bluedeltajeans.com/pages/virtual-tailor and enter the gift card code at checkout.
The code is eligible for one free pair of any style denim offered in their collection here: https://www.bluedeltajeans.com/collections/mens-denim
Let me know if you have any questions/are interested, thank you

hello! im transmasc and id like some help with clothes! ive been doing ballroom for a couple of months now and id like to try wearing semi-formal however i dont know too much about mens clothing and even less about whats best to dance in -_- do you guys have any recommendations for what textiles to go with and what type of pants are best?

• I prefer Reversible or PayPal invoice since Grailed incurs sales taxes for buyers and sellers.
  
• Grailed Account/Feedback (1830+ transactions) Reversible Account/Feedback (150+ transactions)
  
• Prices are honored across platforms and please don't hesitate with questions or concerns!
  

Size	Fit	Brand	Name	COND. (1-10)
48	M	Acne Studios	Silas MA-1 Bomber Jacket	9.5
5	34-36	And Wander	Climbing Pants	9
L	33-34	And Wander	Oversized Cargo Pants	10
M	S-M	Arc'teryx Veilance	Blazer LT (sleeves altered)	9.5
S	S	Arc'teryx Veilance	Demlo	9
S	S	Arc'teryx Veilance	Nemis Jacket	9
L	34-35	Arc'teryx Veilance	Secant Comp	9
L	33-35	Byborre	O2L Pants	10
M	M-L	Byborre	Suit Jacket	10
L	33-34	CAYL	Poly Zip Cargos	9
10	10.5	Converse x Moncler x Fragment Design	Chuck 70 Low	9.5
40	7-7.5	Diemme x Nonnative	Dweller Trainer	9
42	9.5-10	Diemme x Nonnative	Dweller Trainer	9
M	M	Engineered Garments	Banded Collar Shirt	9.5
M	XL	Guerilla Group	20S-E-BT01-BL	10
OS	OS	Gramicci x F/CE	Jet Cap	10
M	M	Homespun Knitwear	Knitwear Longsleeve Thermal	10
1	S-M	John Elliott	La Paz Jacket	8.5
34	33-35	Maiden Noir	Easy Pants	8.5
30	31-33	Nanamica	Cordura Cargo Pants	9
S	L-XL	Nanamica	Garden Shirt	10
10.5	10	New Balance	M1500KGW	6.5
10.5	10	New Balance x Hanon	CT-300 "Phoenix"	8
3	L	Nonnative	Dweller Blouson Cotton Sweat	9.5
2	32-33	Nonnative	Hunter Cotton Ripstop Cargo Trousers	8.5
S	30-32	OAMC	Cropped Troop Pants	9
0	28-30	OrSlow	107W	9.5
28	28	Outlier	Slim Dungarees	9.5
28	28	Outlier	Future Slimworks	9.5
M	S-M	Patagonia	R2 Fleece Jacket	7.5
L	33-34/M-L	RandT	Casual Suit	9
29	29-30	Railcar Fine Goods	Spikes X067 14.4oz Double Black Selvedge	8.5
34	33-34	Stone Island	Chino Pant	7
43	10-10.5	Stone Island Shadow Project	STEP-ON SLIP-ON_SUEDE / LEATHER Sneaker	9.5
10	10-10.5	Suicoke	KAW-Cab	8.5
10	10-10.5	Suicoke	ZAB	9.5
S	S	Uniqlo x Jun Takahashi	Easy Jacket	9.5
OS	OS	Unused	UH0311	9.5
M	M	Wings + Horns	Officer Shirt (modified)	8

• I prefer Reversible or PayPal invoice since Grailed incurs sales taxes for buyers and sellers.
  
• Grailed Account/Feedback (1830+ transactions) Reversible Account/Feedback (150+ transactions)
  
• Prices are honored across platforms and please don't hesitate with questions or concerns!
  

Size	Fit	Brand	Name	COND. (1-10)
48	M	Acne Studios	Silas MA-1 Bomber Jacket	9.5
5	34-36	And Wander	Climbing Pants	9
L	33-34	And Wander	Oversized Cargo Pants	10
M	S-M	Arc'teryx Veilance	Blazer LT (sleeves altered)	9.5
L	34-35	Arc'teryx Veilance	Secant Comp	9
L	33-35	Byborre	O2L Pants	10
M	M-L	Byborre	Suit Jacket	10
L	33-34	CAYL	Poly Zip Cargos	9
10	10.5	Converse x Moncler x Fragment Design	Chuck 70 Low	9.5
40	7-7.5	Diemme x Nonnative	Dweller Trainer	9
42	9.5-10	Diemme x Nonnative	Dweller Trainer	9
M	M	Engineered Garments	Banded Collar Shirt	9.5
3	M	FDMTL x Zanter	Zanter x Printed Boro Repair Jacket	8.5
M	XL	Guerilla Group	20S-E-BT01-BL	10
OS	OS	Gramicci x F/CE	Jet Cap	10
M	M	Homespun Knitwear	Knitwear Longsleeve Thermal	10
1	S-M	John Elliott	La Paz Jacket	8.5
L	33-35	Karrimor	Rigg Shorts	9.5
34	33-35	Maiden Noir	Easy Pants	8.5
L	M	Mountain Research	G.P. 1+1 Ombre Plaid Shirt	8.5
L	M	Mountain Research	Tribe A Tee	7.5
30	31-33	Nanamica	Cordura Cargo Pants	9
S	L-XL	Nanamica	Garden Shirt	10
10.5	10	New Balance	M1500KGW	6.5
10.5	10	New Balance x Hanon	CT-300 "Phoenix"	8
M	M	Noah x New Order	Technique Hoodie	8.5
3	L	Nonnative	Dweller Blouson Cotton Sweat	9.5
2	32-33	Nonnative	Hunter Cotton Ripstop Cargo Trousers	8.5
S	30-32	OAMC	Cropped Troop Pants	9
0	28-30	OrSlow	107W	9.5
M	S-M	Patagonia	R2 Fleece Jacket	7.5
L	33-34/M-L	RandT	Casual Suit	9
L	M	Sassafras	Tie-Dye Pocket Tee	8.5
US L	L	Snow Peak	Dobby Sashiko Noragi Jacket	9
M	M	Snow Peak	Recycled Nylon Ripstop Down Vest	9
M	33-34	South2 West8	Convertible 2-way Pant	9.5
34	33-34	Stone Island	Chino Pant	7
43	10-10.5	Stone Island Shadow Project	STEP-ON SLIP-ON_SUEDE / LEATHER Sneaker	9.5
10	10-10.5	Suicoke	KAW-Cab	8.5
10	10-10.5	Suicoke	ZAB	9.5
3	S-M	Undercover	Finger Angel Tee	7.5
3	L-XL	Undercover	Undercover Records Tee	10
2	S-M	Undercover	UC1B3817 T-Shirt	10
3	L-XL	Undercover	We Make Noise Not Clothes Tee	10
S	M- L	Uniqlo x White Mountaineering	Fleece Oversized Long-Sleeve Jacket	9.5
OS	OS	Unused	UH0311	9.5
M	M	Wings + Horns	Officer Shirt (modified)	8