for two weeks every four months i become math’s biggest hater, and for the rest of the time im just an average hater (very sad and frustrated)

Chapter Forty-Four:

The One When Sunny Misses Her Big Brother Because Klaus Just Isn’t Himself

 

 

Sunny Baudelaire spent the rest of the day in the worker’s dormitory worriedly staring at the door waiting for her brother to come back. As the minutes and hours went by, Sunny began to get more and more worried. She had never been to an optometrist’s office before, so she didn’t know how long appointments usually took. She imagined that it wouldn’t take all day especially in a desolate town like Paltryville. She imagined that Klaus was the doctor’s only client all day which really worried her. What if Klaus was right when he said that the eye-shaped building was not a coincidence and it was a sure sign of villainy. What if Count Olaf was there and he had successfully kidnapped her brother? What if Count Olaf wastorturing Klaus demanding to know her location and Klaus refusing to give it up? She could feel hot tears streaming down her face with each new darker theory as to why her brother wasn’t back yet. It did not make her feel any better to see Phil return without her brother. What made that situation for Sunny even worse was that without her brother, most people had no idea what she was saying. She was an infant, and although her communication skills were impressive for her age, but not that impressive. 

When she had crawled over to Phil and asked him several times, “Ubi?” which was her way of saying, “Where is my brother!?” He just looked at her and shrugged his shoulders. Apologizing to her for not understanding what she meant. She then tried simply saying her brother’s name but all Phil would say in return is “he is at the eye doctors,” Sunny rolled her eyes angrily. She knew where he was, but she was confused as to why Phil had returned without him. She thought Phil was a nice guy like Charles...there’s no way he’d just let her brother get kidnapped or tortured...right? Unless he was part of Olaf’s troupe. But as she stared at her optimistic coworker, she concluded that he wasn’t any of the troupe members in disguise. But then she wondered if he was a new member of Olaf’s troupe. Then she thought of Kronk, a nice friendly man that had helped the Baudelaires back at Uncle Monty’s house. She wondered for a second if Phil could be him. The children never got to see his face since he wore a beekeeper’s hat the entire time. But Phil seemed more cheery and shorter than the man who had helped him. But of course, Sunny wasn’t so sure. But if he was Kronk, then she had a feeling that he would’ve stayed with Klaus through the entirety of the optometrist appointment. 

As Phil began cooking dinner, Sunny followed him into the kitchen. “Suus fieri?” she asked, which was her way of saying, “What’s happening to Klaus?” but again, Phil looked down at his infant coworker and gave her a small smile. 

“You wanna help me in the kitchen while you wait for your brother?” he asked her. Sunny frowned and shrugged her shoulders looking again towards the door of the dormitory. “Maybe it’ll help take your mind off things…”

Sunny reluctantly agreed and raised her arms to indicate to Phil that she was fine with him lifting her up. 

“See! ‘Atta girl!” he said cheerfully as he knelt to pick her up. “Nothing wrong with finding a silver lining in a dark cloud. You know when I was younger, my Aunt Julia would cook with me.” 

Sunny nodded her head and watched as Phil got to work making the damp beef casserole. She was interested to learn how to make the casserole even if it wasn’t the best thing she’d ever tasted. She remembered all the times that she would watch one of her parents cook and bake and how intrigued she was. She frowned thinking about how it was just her and Klaus now. She gave a small chuckle when she realized that as she grows older she may be the one in charge of feeding her older brother because when it came to culinary skills, Klaus heavily lacked in that department.

Sunny tried her best to find a silver lining in her situation as she tried her best to communicate with Phil about different ingredients he should try to add to the casserole to give it a new flavor. She knew he couldn’t fully understand her, so she became accustomed to pointing at a spice, asking what it is to make sure she was right with her assumption and when she wanted him to test the spice or ingredient in the casserole. She would simply say ‘try’. She and Phil had tried different combinations of spices that Sunny had suggested so by the time the casserole was nearly finished, both he and Sunny were beginning to feel a little full.

But as they cooked,  Sunny couldn’t help but feel that Phil was wrong. She could not find a silver lining no matter how hard she tried. She was trying her best to be rational when it came to Klaus still not coming home. All Sunny wanted was for her brother to come home and be safe. 

She tried to remember her last conversation with him, trying to determine if it was one she was proud of. She frowned when she realized that it wasn’t. It was the exact opposite actually. The last conversation she had with Klaus was more or less an argument between the two siblings, which was rare...although Sunny noticed that these arguments were becoming more and more frequent since their parents’ death and she hated that. She remembered how bitter and icy she was towards Klaus. She had dismissed all of his concerns acting as though he was being childish and paranoid. Sunny was now believing that Klaus had every right to be paranoid and childish when it came to Count Olaf’s location and the Baudelaires’ safety. She knew deep down that no matter what Klaus had said when they first got here about Count Olaf arriving would be considered ‘good news’ this time. She knew that that was bullshit, just Klaus’ strange but morbid way of being optimistic. She knew that he feared Olaf more than anything, although she didn’t know completely why. 

She wiped a tear from her eye as she remembered exactly what she said to him in response to him theorizing that Olaf was the new foreman. After he had pleaded with her that all he was doing was trying to keep her safe. ‘Curam me!’ she had shouted at him in an impatient tone dismissing his fears, fears that Sunny knew were completely valid and rational, even if she didn’t know the full reasoning behind them. This was her way of saying, “Goddammit Klaus! I don’t need you to keep me safe! I can handle my own, pretty sure I’ve done enough to prove that! Worry about yourself!” Sunny essentially had told her big brother in the rudest way possible that she did not need him. Something that wasn’t true at all. She did need him. She needed him as much as he needed her. She feared that this...this cold, bitter statement would be the last thing she ever says to her brother. She couldn’t help but sob a little as she sat on the kitchen counter watching Phil put the giant casserole in the oven. 

“Te requiro,” she whimpered looking up at the ceiling, this was Sunny’s way of saying, “Klaus, I need you…” she knew her brother couldn’t hear her but she hoped her parents, who she hoped was looking down on her and Klaus, could hear her thoughts. Because deep down, she needs them, too. She needed her family desperately, but even someone Sunny’s age understood that her parents were never coming back and all she had left was Klaus. 

She sighed angrily realizing that Klaus only babies her because that is essentially what her parents had asked him to do. By forcing him to make that stupid promise, they ensured that Klaus would be overly stressed and never able to cope with the misfortune that he suffered. The moment he made that promise to them, it was like Klaus lost the right to breathe and focus on himself. Which Sunny didn’t believe was fair at all. She understood that as the eldest, Klaus did have a responsibility to look after her more than she should have to look after him, but the way her parents went about it made her angry. They essentially told Klaus to solely care about Sunny and not himself, which even someone as young as Sunny could see that that was not good for his mental state. Putting so much pressure on a twelve-year-old, who now probably feels like he has to be more of a father figure than a brother is simply wrong. Sunny wholeheartedly believed that her parents should be ashamed of themselves. 

Sunny wished she could convince her brother that protecting what remained of their family was a fifty-fifty job. Not a ninety-ten job. But nothing she did had convinced her brother so far. That’s why she had gotten so testy in mill right before Klaus’ glasses broke. She was tired of him acting like he was the sole protector. She now realized that she shouldn’t have been mad at Klaus, he was just following the wishes of their parents. She should’ve been mad at her parents, and she was. Which also conflicted Sunny heavily. She loved and missed her parents and it killed her to feel angry at them seeing that they weren’t ever coming back but she couldn’t help it. She felt this way because, in a sick, twisted way, they had also broken Klaus. 

Oddly enough, Sunny and Klaus shared the same secret desire. Sunny wished that Klaus, too, had an older sibling. Preferably a sister. That could love and protect him like he loved and protected her. Maybe someone a few years older than him, not an extreme age gap like he and Sunny...although if they did have a sibling that much older than Klaus, that sibling could just adopt them. But Sunny wished that there were three Baudelaires, to her that seemed like a good number. Not that she would want to force all of Klaus’ stress and issues onto someone else...but maybe Klaus could help this magical older sibling with some of the responsibility, that way the responsibility of protecting this family would be either an equal third for all parties involved or maybe a forty-forty-twenty ratio, which seemed a bit more likely. But Sunny understood that that was never going to happen. It was just her and Klaus against the evils of the world. Now she feared that it was just her. 

It can’t be just her! She told herself. Klaus would never leave you! But she just couldn’t believe it right now.

“Soups on!” Phil yelled and Sunny looked up a bit confused. 

“Beef?” she asked pointing at the casserole. 

Phil smiled, “it’s an expression more or less meaning that dinner’s ready,” he explained as she nodded. 

“Klaus?” she asked miserably.

“He’s not back yet,” Phil replied. “Maybe he’s on his way back now.”

Sunny nodded but she could still hear her beating heart. She was more than worried now. She knew that last night, Sir called lights out at around 6 p.m., she didn’t want to go to sleep without Klaus being there with her. She had to do that oncebefore and she hated it! When Olaf kidnapped her and shoved her in a birdcage in hopes of making Klaus more complacent towards the blatant child abuse and in hopes of coercing Klaus to hand over the Baudelaire fortune to him, Sunny had to spend one night sleeping in that birdcage while who-knows-what was happening to her brother. She knew deep down inside that that was the night that Klaus had changed. Because he was normal before she was kidnapped and he was seemingly broken when she was rescued. So she never wanted to sleep away from her brother ever again.  

As Phil set a plate for Klaus right next to her, he also handed her a plate of a little bit of casserole seeing that she and Phil had tried many bites and were practically full. Sunny moved her food around with her tiny fingers, glancing at the door the entire time. After dinner, Phil cleared off the table but Sunny stayed seated where she was.

“I’m sure he’ll be back soon,” Phil said rubbing Sunny’s head. She gave Phil a hopeful smile but didn’t say anything. “Why don’t you play a game to pass the time,” he said handing her a deck of cards. 

She shook her head. “No tanks,” She replied, continuing to stare at the door for the remaining time that the lights were allowed to be on. 

“Lights out!” Sir’s loud booming voice came from the loudspeaker. Sunny’s heart sank into her stomach as she watched as the dorm lights flickered off. 

“No,” She whimpered. Phil walked over to her to blow out some of the candles that were still lit.

“Sunny?” Phil said. 

“Huh?” she replied absentmindedly. 

“Lights out,” he replied giving her a small frown.

“Check?” she asked pointing out the door. Phil looked down at the infant as she raised her arms again indicating to Phil that she wanted to be picked up.

“I’m telling you, Sunny, you have nothing to worry about.” 

“Peas,” she asked with her best puppy dog face, this was her cutesy way of saying, “Pretty please.”

Phil sighed but picked up Sunny. Sir had announced ‘light’s out’ but Klaus had still not returned from the optometrist’s, and the young Baudelaire infant was rightfully worried sick. Phil carried her across the courtyard and helped Sunny peer out the wooden gate that led out to Paltryville, and Sunny was instantly dismayed to see no sign of her big brother. 

“Come on, Sunny. I’m sure he’ll be back soon,” Phil replied as he carried Sunny back into the dorm, closing the door behind them. He set her down on the Baudelaire bunk and she began looking out the window to watch for him, she was so anxious that it took Phil explaining to her that the window was not a real one, but one drawn with chalk. Phil continued to insist that she had nothing to worry about but no matter how many times Phil tried to tell her otherwise, all she could do was worry about her older brother. 

“Becer!” she exclaimed, “I think I do, Phil! I think I do have something to worry about. Klaus has been gone all afternoon and I am immensely worried that something awful might’ve happened to him.”

Phil looked at the younger Baudelaire orphan. “I’m sorry. I just don’t understand what you are saying but I assume that you are worried. Which is fine, I know that to children, doctors may seem scary, but like I told Klaus, doctors are your friends and they can’t hurt you.”

Sunny sighed. “Uh-huh,” she replied tiredly, even though she knew that Phil was entirely wrong. Sunny knew that her optimist coworker meant well by telling her that ‘doctors are her friends’, but Sunny was worried that the optometrist who worked in the eye-shaped building was somehow connected to Count Olaf, a man who would do unspeakable things to her and her brother. But it was useless to try to explain this to Phil cause not only would his optimism get in the way of understanding the dangers her brother could be in, but Sunny also had a communication barrier that halted any conversation she could have withanyone. 

Phil began walking away from Sunny after giving her one more smile. “Maybe you’ll wake up in the morning and he’ll be right next to you,” 

“Suski,” she replied sadly, which meant, “I hope so, Phil.” 

Sunny laid on the bottom bunk of the Baudelaire bunk eagerly waiting for her brother to come home as she stared up to the top bunk. In minutes, Sunny was surrounded by the noises of her coworkers snoring. She did not try to sleep, she fought her exhaustion. She refused to sleep when her brother could be in danger. She could feel her dismay growing more and more with each second that passed. Sunny made a squeaky, sad noise as she tried to imagine where Klaus could be and what was happening to him. But one of the worst things about Count Olaf is that his evil ways are so despicable that it was impossible to imagine what would be up his sleeve next. Count Olaf had done so many horrible deeds, all to get his hands on the Baudelaire fortune, that Sunny could scarcely bear to think what might be happening to her brother. As the evening grew later and later, the younger Baudelaire orphan began to imagine more and more terrible things that could be happening to Klaus while she lay helpless in the dormitory.

Finally, she heard the creak of the dormitory door and a beam of moonlight shine in. She sat up quickly in the Baudelaire bunk trying to see if it was her brother. A relieved smile appeared on her face as she realized that it was her brother. 

“Klaus!” she whispered in a loud tone. But he just stood there motionless by the door. “Klaus,” she called for him. But he just stood there like a zombie. She lowered herself off the bunk bed and crawled quickly to him. 

“Sollicitus!” she said to him, which meant, “Klaus! I was so worried! You were gone so long!” She immediately hugged his legs but to her surprise, he didn’t even acknowledge that she was there. “No specks,” she muttered, which meant, “Wait...you’re not wearing your glasses...are they still being fixed?”

He still didn’t acknowledge her. She didn’t understand why he was ignoring her. Her heart sank. Was this because I said I didn’t need him? It wasn’t like him to be this dramatic when it came to one of their arguments.

“Sorry,” she said to her brother hugging his legs tighter. He continued to stay motionless, staring into the empty void of space. He was starting to freak her out. “Klaus?”

“Pingo?” she asked, which meant, “Klaus...what was it like inside the eye-shaped building?”

Weirdly enough, her brother who was barely blinking began to smile. 

“Hap?” she asked, which meant, “Why are you smiling?”

“I’m happy to be here, sir,” He muttered so low that Sunny wasn’t sure that she heard him correctly.

“No sir,” Sunny explained, “Sunny.” 

Klaus, once again, did not answer. He merely looked at his sister with wide, wide eyes, as if she were an interesting aquarium or a parade.

“ Klaus! ” she yelled. 

He did not answer again.

“Hoax,” she explained desperately, which meant, “While you were gone, I heard Sir talking to Charles. He said he made a deal to cover something up. There’s something bigger going on here.”

Again, he didn’t answer.

“ Klaus! ” Sunny yelled desperately.

“Shh!” one of the mill workers yelled.

“Be quiet!” another grumbled.

“Klaus...peas,” Sunny pleaded as her brother continued to stand there motionless.

She frowned and tugged on his pant leg. “Somnum?” she asked him, which meant, “I guess it’s been a long day. Would you like to go to sleep?”

“Yes, sir,” Klaus said as he started to walk towards the Baudelaire bunk. Sunny noticed that even his steps were awkward.

“Sis!” she whispered loudly as she followed him, which meant, “I’m not sir! I’m your sister!” 

Klaus laid down in the bunk staring up at the top bunk. “Shoos,” Sunny pointed out, which meant, “Your shoes are still on…”

Klaus didn’t react to what she said at all. Sunny used her teeth to gently untie Klaus’ shoes and pull them off her brother’s feet which was not easy for someone her size. 

“Night,” Sunny whimpered as she used her teeth to pull the blankets over herself and her brother. She snuggled as close to him as she could, even kissing him on the cheek. But Klaus didn’t respond. He didn’t say goodnight. He didn’t say he loved her, he didn’t even kiss her forehead like he used to, and he didn’t even put his arm around her in the protective way that he had done ever since the fire. She looked at her brother with the same face that she had when Mr. Poe had informed the Baudelaire siblings about the fire. A face that detailed grief, sadness, and loss. She stared at her brother and although he was physically there with her, it seemed to her that she had lost him. Like the Klaus she knew was gone forever like her parents. “Loves,” she whispered as she watched Klaus close his eyes drifting away to sleep. She watched the way his mouth quivered, just as it had always done when he was fast asleep. She was honestly relieved to have him back, even if she didn’t feel relieved. 

Sunny laid there in her own miserable thoughts as she stared at her empty shell of a brother. She kept hearing herself argue with Klaus in her mind like it was on an endless loop. All Klaus was doing was keeping that stupid, unfair promise he made to our parents...and I yelled at him telling him that I didn’t need him. She thought to herself as she wiped a few tears from her eyes. He wanted to leave and run away...but I convinced him to stay. Now he’s acting strange. She choked on her sobs. This is all my fault.Sunny told herself as she softly rubbed Klaus’ forehead wishing that everything was normal between them. This is all my fault...and there’s no one else to fix it. Sunny sighed. She looked upwards and thought about her parents again. If her parents weren’t here to help her fix Klaus and she didn’t have another older sibling to help her save Klaus, then Sunny knew it was up to her to fix her brother. 

“Oath,” she muttered, which was her way of saying, “Mama...Dada...I promise I am going to fix this and take better care of Klaus. From now on this is a fifty-fifty deal.” There. Now both Baudelaire siblings made nonsensical promises to their dead parents. Sunny thought. Sunny knew, of course, that her parents had never guessed, when they forced Klaus to make that ridiculous promise, that the sort of trouble the siblings would find themselves in would be so ostentatiously--a word which here means “really, really”--horrendous. But this time, Klaus was the one clearly in trouble, and Sunny could not shake the feeling that it was her fault and it was also her responsibility to get him out of it.

She glanced at her brother one more time as her eyelids threatened to close. She had never seen her brother act so strangely before.”No leave,” she whispered to Klaus, which was her way of saying, “Come back...don’t leave me,”  as she huddled against her brother, peering at him as he slept, no matter how many times she looked at him, it still felt like her big brother had not returned and it was because of that that Sunny Baudelaire cried herself to sleep that night. Hoping and praying that when she woke up everything would be back to normal.

Natter #4    7/4/2020

MI MG Natter #4  4th July 2020I hope you all have had a happy fourth - all fingers still attached and tummies filled. Pickle seems to be getting used to the bangs this year, or perhaps he is a little deaf. Usually, at the first bang, he disappears and hides under my bed. This time he has wandered upstairs and downstairs and doesn't seem to register the bangs much at all - which is good.

I am in contact with a guy back home who runs a regular allotment (PeaPatch here) blog, giving timely advice and other information related mostly to veggie & fruit culture. I find this very helpful as he jogs my memory on those extremely rare occasions when I forget. I know you think that I never forget, but I have to admit that there has been the occasional lapse ever since I stopped eating peanuts. Strange thing that. His words for July remind us that this month is the time to sow seeds for Fall and Winter veggie crops such as Chicory (does anybody actually grow this?), Chinese Cabbage, Kohl Rabi, Lettuce, French Beans, Beetroot, Carrots, Radish, Turnips, and Peas - pick early varieties - early Snow peas are an especially fast to crop

.If you have had the forethought to already start Leeks from seed, now is the time to plant out those starts. The easiest way to do this is to use an old broomstick handle and thrust it vertically into the soil to a depth of about 5-6".Just drop the seedlings carefully, roots first into the holes and then just water in - that's all you need to do. The water will wash soil from the sides of the holes down onto the roots and it will remain cool and moist enough to thoroughly root the seedlings well. The idea of doing it this way, apart from the ease of planting and gaining support from the sides, is that the hole blanches the stem of the leek as it grows to gain more usable parts of the plant. If they are kept reasonably moist they should grow quite rapidly through the Summer and be ready to make fabulous potato-leek soup in time to keep cold days at bay. If you have never eaten P-L soup accompanied by chunks of Crusty artisan bread generously spread with butter - you haven't lived. Food of the Gods this! If you have been growing spuds and have lifted them already, you can follow with a crop of French beans to both nourish yourself and the soil, or if beans aren't your thing try a green manure crop such as Mustard. However, bear in mind that if you have ever had Club Root on your cabbage family plants, do not use Mustard as it is also a brassica. Use one of the Pea family, both for the Nitrogen root boost, but also for the foliage. And now for something completely different:- Once more my friend Valerie Robertson has presented her view on things English on the other side of the pond and is sent all over the world.

Val is a very  highly qualified State Registered Nurse who knows whereof she speaks.

Here we go.

From: Valerie Robertson GAG 14 Hope all is well with all. All Quiet in the Western Front over this way. Seattle’s CHOP was liberated leaving an appalling mess The pubs are open  today so the protesters have disappeared. BLMUK. is proving to be an embarrassment to those who donated, bent the knee and supported a cause that advocates the abolition of the nuclear family (that means dad is superfluous), defund the police,  destroy capitalism and support censorship plus the necessity for every white person to acknowledge that they are all subconsciously racist and privileged, and own up to the “fact” that every institution is inherently racist and disproportionally  White supremacy managed. That’s a big ask, which has bewildered the millionaire black footballers, academics & artists,   Labour leader Sir Keith what’s his name, (why would a Labour leader accept a knighthood?)  and all the national institutions taking the knee, which the other men in the street saw, as bowing to street fighter activists outrageous demands. Ie supporting racial divide and suppressing diversity of opinions and abolishing history. Our moral leader Canterbury Arch Runcton, is also confused. He’s a woke bloke that got it wrong at Easter. Streaming his Easter service from his kitchen with his toaster in the background. For God's sake, he must have a parlour with a row of books as a backdrop, in his palatial abode. He’s now having a think about the effigies in the Cathedral and wondering which ones to get rid of. Should he paint Jesus black?  Jesus loves all the children of the world, be they yellow, black or white. What about the brown ones?  They were precious in His sight too? He’s going to need a lot of colours. The Bournemouth beach sunbathing nutters are bright pink still. The Cambridge academia have just funded a two-year study into the history of slavery to enable the oiks to confront their iniquitous past and say sorry to all offended by history. Waste of time, as it’s been done before, over and over and you can’t change it. I’ve got a better idea for them to study.   Research the Benin bronzes. There are 3,OOO of them but only 500 left in Nigeria, the rest in Europe and USA museums. They are exquisite. The Portuguese kicked off the Atlantic slave trade in 1400 from the port of Benin with gold, which the Africans turned into these fantastic plaques, I think but not sure. I’m too busy doing my epidemic virus studies to go to the British Museum and find out. And we are not allowed yet, to visit Portugal unless keen enough to fly to Spain and walk across the border to check up on the museum artifacts in Lisbon. It’s good to see Lewis Hamilton constructively addressing inequality in the motor racing world.  The aggrieved black community can be placated and inspired by their own incredibly successful race if they listen. We have diversity, we have opportunity, we have laws, education, healthcare, social services, state welfare funding and overall, a tolerant multicultural society, who are very tired of the woke politically-correct champagne socialists agenda over the last decade.  There are deep social and economic injustices which are nothing to do with slavery or racial prejudice. Lewis Hamilton lives in Monte Carlo to save paying a hefty U.K. income tax liability. He was raised in Stevenage and lived in a council house with his family partially supported by the welfare state. Is he a philanthropist who promotes the welfare of others by donating money for schools etc.? No he’s not if he’s a British citizen tax evader. Is he a Monacoan now.? Is he a hypocrite? I don’t know?  Perhaps the academics can ask the uni students to research,  write a paper and make up their own minds. Estate agents will not in future be using Master Bedroom in their ads. Connotations of slave masters etc. Uncle Bens rice is to be repackaged without the jolly black man, Aunt Jemima also and awaiting more news re. MasterCard, Master chef, Master Mind, Headmaster ( the lefty teachers union still keeping schools shut) Masters degree, a tricky one for Cambridge. We are living with the virus and hanging in with our self-imposed restrictions and socially distancing. The copper masks and latex gloves worked a treat when John needed to visit the GP surgery for a blood test to check prostate antigen level insomuch not coughing. Although London has seen a slight rise in the R rate, no doubt due to the mass protests, the infection rate remains stable and patients being more successfully treated with drugs, to avoid intensive care. The disproportionate ethnic infection rate is due to blood group, genetic disparity, and body mass ratio, and a difference in the percentage of T cells. These cells decline with age and are responsible for fighting off infection without causing a major auto-immune response. People past 65, have very few left.   This theory explains why the young can come in contact with the virus but don’t succumb, however, if repeatedly exposed will catch it and manufacture antibodies and can still remain asymptomatic. Mass testing suggests that 40 percent of the population has been exposed with few symptoms, the silent spreaders who have the herd immunity. So we know the virus is still around and can’t trust the idiots to self-isolate if positive. All we can hope for is that they wear a mask and keep away from the elderly. Once the herd immunity and those who have recovered from it reach 60 percent, providing the medically vulnerable and fatties avoid it, the virus will find no host, cannot, therefore, multiply and shed and theoretically die away.  So it’s a balance. As the months go on there is hope for more preventive medication to alleviate the symptoms and of course a vaccine. Last October, the WHO  found that U.K. and USA  were the best in the world prepared for a pandemic.  Cameron had placed an order for millions of PPE equipment with a French company with the deposit to fund the manufacturer to make it.  By the time U.K. needed it, we got the deposit refunded but the stocks were needed in France and they had sold some items at a higher price,  to Italy.  That’s Globalisation for you and the free market. Meanwhile, a couple who were distilling boutique gin in the midlands, altered their equipment to distill hand sanitizers and viral cleansing fluids as NHS  were buying it in from abroad at an inflated price. They now supply the NHS cheaply and in the past 12 weeks have made 30 million pounds profit. Well done as they are donating a substantial amount to Covid research. No doubt as a tax saving incentive, but still commendable. There’s a lot to be said for self-reliance.  The govt. with its 80 strong SAGE - the Scientific, Advisory Government Epidemic advisors, have caused the pandemonium. At the outset, the models and graphs predicting the scale have been proved wrong. Simple precautions were overlooked.  Emptying geriatric wards, filling up care homes with staff untrained in infection control was scandalous. Mask wearing should have been made compulsory on public transport, supermarkets and shops at the outset and at least some sort of temperature checking and contact tracing at airports and ferries. So, onto local lockdowns and long term containment.  Boris is getting on with Brexit and left Hanlon to contain the virus,  Hope the strategy works. I have faith in the laboratory’s scientists and the trials and the guinea pigs testing the emerging vaccines. Meanwhile, tomatoes coming along, being well-nourished and in good shape and we are up to four playing again at croquet. Sainsbury delivering without hassle and Miles and Giles still surprising me with a tablespoon of Baharat in a nifty environment-friendly container. It made the lamb taste different. The kennels are open but missed the boat as all the  rescue dogs are  adopted and long waiting lists for puppies.

A dog called Nigger, I imagine a black or brown Labrador,  who was loved and died in 1878, had a headstone in the animal cemetery in a Sussex village graveyard. The local stonemason has ground away the name as the villagers thought it might cause offence to visitors and that dog’s owners would understand as they were dead anyway and not around to ask permission. Just love kind people. The drought's over and it’s cool as we are and hope you are too. Take care Love from Val And from your fearless leader,Gordon

What are you thoughts on fire emblem heroes so far? And who's on your team?

lol okay buckle the fuckle in kids this is gonna be a ride

(also thank you for this ask and I’m sorry you’re about to get way more info than you probably wanted)

We’ll start with the short answer, so people who aren’t really here for a fucking Fire Emblem history lesson can dip:

Heroes is a fun little game that is honestly a good test to see if you’d like proper titles because the mechanics are identical. They use smaller versions of the original maps, and even pull a lot of the classic music. It’s fun, it works, and there are some nice nods to the older games. My team is Lazlow, Tiki, Niles, and Frederick, all four star or below because the gotcha gods hate me.

Here’s the long answer. Like, really long answer.

Fire Emblem is, historically, not what we’d call a raging success in the US. The first six titles were Japan-exclusive. So from 1990 until 2003, nobody in the US really knew or cared about Fire Emblem because there were no fuckin games for them to play. So what happened to change that?

Melee. Melee happened.

Marth and Roy (for whatever fucking reason I still don’t know why) were on the roster of the 2001 fighter Super Smash Bros. Melee and boy howdy were they popular. You may remember that all of their voice lines were in Japanese, and that’s because they literally didn’t have English voice actors, because there were no English Fire Emblem titles. To be fair FE didn’t use cutscenes at that point so there were probably no voice actors period but like whatever.

So Roy and Marth become like, overnight sensations, and that coupled with the success of Intelligent System’s other tactical RPG, Advance Wars, prods Nintendo to give it a shot and release Blazing Blade internationally for the GBA in 2003. Blazing Blade is the story of Eliwood, Roy’s father, as well as Lyn and Hector, two other big names in FE lore.

But Blazing Blade only sells so-so. In fact, over the next eleven years, Fire Emblem hits a slump, both in Japan and abroad. Titles like Sacred Stones (the first video game I ever played) Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn (why would you put a tactical RPG on anything other than a handheld literally why why why it makes no sense omfg) and Shadow Dragon (which is a rehash of the first game, Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light) all do pretty mediocre.

So now the year is like 2010-ish and FE’s not picking up it’s lost revenue or interest, so Intelligent Systems starts planning what is essentially going to be the franchise’s finale, and that’s Fire Emblem Awakening. Intelligent Systems pulls out all the fuckin stops to make the best game they possibly can so it will be a proper last hurrah. If Awakening didn’t sell well, Fire Emblem was going to be shelved forever.

Awakening, of course, due to many things like good advertising, the right platform, a really fucking solid game with cool new mechanics, likeable characters, a decent plot, and fucking gorgeous cutscenes, becomes the best-selling game in Fire Emblem’s twenty-three year history. Which leads to the somewhat awkward question of what the fuck do you do when the thing that was supposed to be your franchise’s finale becomes the most popular installment of the whole goddamn series?

Well, if you’re Nintendo, you try to recreate it.

That’s what Fates is: a recreation. They (understandably) want to make that magic happen again. So they put together the same artists, a lot of the same voice actors, and everyone’s favorite marriage-to-child mechanic (that just does not make sense in Fates okay I’m sorry I love it and I’m here for it but we all need to agree that it just doesn’t make sense) and Fates does pretty well. Fire Emblem’s back in business.

But you’re left in this curious situation where more than half of your fanbase is only familiar with two out of fourteen titles, so it’s hard to decide where to go. Awakening and Fates are not traditional Fire Emblem games. They are so very, very different in so many ways. The pace of the games, the length of the games, the unit-recruiting process, roster size, the way Support works, even the buying and selling and acquisition of weapons like…there’s just this huge gap. How do you bridge it?

A…mobile game, I guess?

Which like don’t get me wrong, Heroes’ shortcomings have nothing to do with its platform. Like I said before: it’s cute and it’s competent. My issue lies more in the marketing of the game.

I’m sure we all remember the polls that went on to decide which Fire Emblem greats were going to be playable characters in the game, right? And you could pick anyone. Literally anyone. It didn’t matter if they were only apart of your roster for a map and a half. It didn’t matter if they were an enemy unit. It didn’t matter if they were some like, random archer you got in the third chapter so you could learn about ranged attacks. You could vote for any character from any Fire Emblem game, period.

Except, that means it’s essentially boiling down to a popularity contest between twelve practically unknown or rarely known Fire Emblem titles and the two newest, best-selling, fan favorites. Which isn’t upsetting so much as it is, like, dumb? Like of course the majority of people are gonna vote for Chrom and Camilla, that’s what they know. One of the best Fire Emblem characters (in my opinion) is Prince Innes, from Sacred Stones. He has a hilariously arrogant attitude, is bold and brash, and a sick fucking sniper who constantly insists he should be on the front lines and not in the back of the party with the rest of the ranged attackers.

Innes, of course, didn’t make the list. Because ten out of the chosen twenty male heroes were from Awakening or Fates (that ratio is 13:20 for the ladies if you were curious) So this game that was intended to like, I don’t even know, revive interest in old games or at least make them relevant, ends up not really doing that at all. Especially because out of the first eight chapters (that’s as far as I’ve gotten) four of ‘em explore the worlds of Awakening and Fates.

What about Path of Radiance? What about Sacred Stones? What about literally anything besides the last two games in the franchise because it’s not that I don’t like those games, it’s that you promised me a game that embraced all of Fire Emblem, and this ain’t it. Also you went to the trouble of giving Eirika official art and she’s not even a character you can draw what the actual fuck is she in this game or nah

BASICALLY (we’re almost done you almost made it) I think it will be interesting to see how Fire Emblem: Echoes plays out. Echoes is a remake of Fire Emblem Gaiden, a 1992 Japan-only exclusive that I, personally, know nothing about, but can tell you with relative confidence that it’s not like Awakening or Fates because nothing in FE is like Awakening or Fates. It’s coming out in May of this year and like…I’m really curious to see how the “newer” (and by the way newer does not mean in any way that you’re like less of a fan. I don’t care if the only Fire Emblem game you’ve played is Awakening, I’m just fucking glad you’re playing Fire Emblem, let’s be friends) fans will like it. The official description for it is: “Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia recreates classic Fire Emblem gameplay with a modern twist, mixing in exploration of dungeons crawling with enemies.”

I have never played a FE title that had a dungeon of any kind, unless you count the Tower of Valni from Sacred Stones. I don’t even know what that means in the terms of a tactical RPG but like, I guess we’ll see. 

tl;dr I like Fire Emblem a whole lot and will always be bitter over Eirika’s bullshit outfit in Awakening’s DLC

Thanks for reading!

BUT WAIT THERE’S MORE

Hi! I’m back again! And at this point lots of things have changed in regards to this post! Most notably: Heroes has added lots of older Fire Emblem characters to the game (including Innes which makes my earlier complaint look really dumb) and Echoes came out and it’s genuinely one of the best games I’ve ever played, and easily one of the best games in FE’s franchise.

Here’s the thing that past me writing this post didn’t get: newer fans are just as invested as old fans, they just don’t have as much to be invested in yet. I can prattle on and on about Sacred Stones and Binding Blade and Shadow Dragon and all the titles I’ve played, but newer players (under-fucking-standably) aren’t going to go back and play games with bad graphics from the late 90′s and early 00′s, so they just hang out with the titles they have played, which for some people, is just Awakening, or just Fates.

Echoes was universally adored by the fanbase. There were a couple times I saw comments like “well, where’s the avatar unit?” or “why can’t I marry other units and have kids?” and like, I wanted to be mad, because those aren’t staples of Fire Emblem, but if anything it’s Nintendo’s fault for making two games back-to-back that promoted the hell out of those features. How could someone who only played Awakening and Fates (which is the majority of this game’s base) know any differently?

And Heroes has really done well with bringing in more characters from other games. Every single game in the franchise (even fucking Tharcia 776) is represented by at least two characters, and they’re always adding more. I think they’re genuinely doing the best they can to please everyone, and the only people throwing a fit are "older” fans who think they deserve more because, what? They’ve put more time in? They’ve somehow “earned” it?

Nintendo is a business, and businesses rely on popularity to fucking succeed. That’s just how it works. Like it or not, the realistic faces of this franchise are characters like Lucina, Ryoma, Corrin, Camilla, and Robin. That’s just how it works. Characters like Math and Lyn will always endue because they’ve been built up as legends, but now there’s so many new characters, and so many new fans, so of course things have to change and the attention has to shift.

And new fans are picking up the old characters just as much!! Characters that haven’t gotten fanart in a fuckin decade are suddenly getting a bunch of attention, because a new fan pulled them in Heroes, didn’t know who they were but liked their design, and went to town.

tl;dr - you aren’t more important just because you’ve “been a fan” longer, it makes complete sense that Nintendo would shift the focus to games like Awakening and Fates, and if you’re waiting for a certain character to show up in Heroes give it some time.

That’s all for real this time.

Also my new team (if anyone cares) is Innes, Leo, Azura, and Raven. I don’t want to talk about how much money I spent trying to gotcha twelve year-old video game characters.

I, uh, I just really like Fire Emblem.

also for all the Path of Raidance and Radiant Dawn fans who sent me asks saying those games were the highest-selling games for their consoles: you’re wrong, and here are the fucking receipts

The truth you need to believe (2/6)

Survived exams but the procrastination fic is still going strong anyhow.

A thick layer of dust coated the inside of the warehouse, the absence of footprints damning for their mission. Reaper restrained the urge to scream in frustration. There had been a lot of empty warehouses over the past month. Empty warehouses where instead there should have been plentiful enemies. Every mission a missed opportunity. He has a moment of guilt, thinking about the mission in terms of people to feed off. Monster . It's just been...too long. The gnawing hunger pains never really stop anymore, in competition with the constant pain of regeneration. They’ve become more prominent, restricting the amount of thought Reaper can put towards the mission, both Talon’s and his. He needs to feed, soon. The thought that it should not have been so long adds to his growing unease. Is Talon still testing him? Testing his limits, how weak the lack of killing makes him? Perhaps calculating the ratio of man to monster? Or do they want him weak for other reasons? After all Talon assets are infinitely more loyal than Talon mercenaries.

The ingrate’s continual presence does nothing to belay that nagging suspicion. For every dead end where Reaper feels his frustration and hunger grow, the ingrate seems to take the hit without flinching. Like he knows why they found nothing. Like he knew before they got there. He’d almost voiced his suspicions at the last warehouse, had let slip that either Talon’s intelligence was slacking or something was wrong. The ingrate had just laughed before asking, “Anyone ever tell you, you’re paranoid?”

“Anyone ever tell you, you’re paranoid Gabe?” Jesse asked, curling up on Gabe’s chest. His fingers stroking gently through Gabe’s hair. And Gabe had said-

Reaper had walked off without responding. Which had probably been the ingrate’s intention. Two trips later and he still hasn’t fed, still hasn’t gotten a single straight answer from the ingrate. Not that that is out of the ordinary. He hasn’t gotten a straight answer from that man since the moment they’d been introduced. Smiling from behind Jesse’s empty eyes.

The ingrate comes up besides him now, looking vaguely apologetic. Reaper still isn’t sure if he’s actually capable of that emotion. “Orders are to regroup at the hotel in thirty, no stops.” Reaper closes his eyes, another pang in his stomach in response to the news. It’s not going to work but he has to-

“You never used to be so strict about orders. We’re finally in a big city, we could-”

“We cannot disobey direct orders,” said the ingrate without looking at Reaper. Just like he had the last few times Reaper had tried to conjole, threaten or otherwise convince the ingrate to disobey orders. The monotone in his voice makes Reaper's frustration compete with nausea. Another thing that had been off the past month. Every time anything contradictory to direct orders came up, the ingrate shut it down. Hard. Reaper had thought he’d gotten off with a slap on the wrist for the London debacle. Apparently it had been that and some remedial brainwashing. Reaper swore at himself under his breath. He’d tried to think of anyway he could have salvaged the situation but- every scenario made things just as bad if not worse. The only real way he could have avoided the ingrate being punished was if he hadn’t been so stupid as to hesitate to begin with. Another mistake he’s made that Mccree paid the price for. Just how many times could you fuck over the one person? Jesse was right to leave, he just didn’t run far enough.

The ingrate hadn’t seemed to have held a grudge though. At least as far as Reaper could tell. Jesse had a good poker face before Talon did- whatever they did to him. Maybe that’s what this is. The ingrate’s subtle revenge. Starving him out. But no, he wouldn’t dare interfere with Talon’s direct orders like that. Couldn’t. The thought made Reaper sick. He thinks he’d rather if it were personal. He’d been too complacent, too unwilling to put that faraway look in the ingrate’s eyes. A little afraid of what would happen if the ingrate’s ‘direct orders’ were contradicted. But he needs to feed. The gnawing hunger more intense than he’d felt since he woke up. He’d go back to the hotel as ordered then sneak out in the night. Hunt for the guilty. Perhaps if he’d been willing to settle for any innocent it wouldn’t have gotten this bad but he was not that far gone. Will never be that far gone. He has to believe that.  

He nods to the ingrate and turns to leave the empty warehouse. The ingrate relaxes slightly at his acquiesce, no longer carrying a tension that is only noticeable in its absence. He sticks close. Has done through all these trips, this wild goose chase across the midwest. Talon’s orders no doubt.

He’s not yours anymore. He’s theirs.

They get to the hotel, the ingrate organising rooms while Reaper lingers in the shadows. He needs to keep out of sight, a wraith being a bit more suspicious than a cowboy here. He tries to hide his relief at having a chance to try and pull himself together. The trek from warehouse to here had been more exhausting than anticipated. Gentle wafts of smoke are coming away from him right now and he knows he’s running out of time. Needs to hunt soon. Since they’re technically at the hotel he could just leave right now without causing any contradiction in Mccree’s orders. No sooner than he thinks that, the ingrate is there holding the keys for two adjoined rooms. Soon. He just had to make it up the stairs, be away from Mccree’s sight. He doesn’t know why it's so important that he not disappoint Mccree. His thoughts feel slow. Like he’s losing wafts of brain matter in the smoke that surrounds him.

He feels Mccree’s hand on the small of his back, guiding him towards an armchair. Feels it connect more solidly when he doesn’t move at first. He- he thinks they caught the elevator up. Doesn’t recall for sure. Focus tunnel visioned on the hand on the small of his back. It’s so warm. It feels- he needs to feed. Before he kills the wrong person in his hunger. He’s not sure if he sits or falls but the chair is uncomfortable against his back. Cold. Inanimate.

“You okay?” Mccree asks. It’s clearly not the first time he’s asked. The concerned tilt of his brow would be more convincing if Reaper hadn’t seen the same expression on a hundred missions. With a hundred marks. Reaper more senses than sees Mccree’s flesh-and-blood hand comes towards his shoulder. That shining lifeforce, stronger than any other Reaper has seen. He ruthlessly suppresses the urge to take. To take everything. It doesn’t matter that it’s no longer Jesse. Reaper would rather die than be the cause of Jesse Mccree’s withered husk on the floor. He shudders and flinches back from the touch.

Mccree seems to take the hint and disappears from Reaper’s field of view. Probably to get Talon. You’ve left it too late. Reaper tries to ignore the thought. He’ll get up and hunt soon. He just-he just needs a moment to rest. More wafts of smoke are escaping him now. He needs to focus. To keep himself together. He blinks and somehow the minute hand of the clock has already completed half its circuit. He blinks again and it’s become dark. He’s not sure if it's because it’s nighttime or if the smoke is just obscuring his view. He needs to get up. Needs to feed on the life he can taste in the air. Needs to- Too late. Too late. The next he registers is a quiet murmur of voices coming closer. They’ve come they’ve come. Open your eyes. It’s a flickering thought, come and gone too quick for action. He feels his attention drift once more. Maybe I’ll finally understand what they did to Jesse. It’s what I deserve.

A hand touches his shoulder and suddenly he is awake again. He surges forward with little intent but to feed an all consuming hunger. Feels himself ripping the life force free from the body that contained it. There is screaming for a short moment, then silence. His eyes slowly focus in on the withered corpse on the floor. It takes an extra moment to register the hotel uniform.

“Glad I got him to touch you first boss. Looks like that might have hurt.” Reaper looks up in horror to see the ingrate a couple of paces back, for once his smile extending to his eyes.

It could have been him . I could have- who did I kill?

“What the fuck ingrate?” Reaper says, for once not even trying to hide his feelings. He’d have to know how he was feeling to do that. Relief? Revulsion? Full.

“Room service Gabe, surely you’ve heard of it?” the ingrate is still smiling, extending a metal arm as if to help Reaper off the floor. Reaper ignores it in favour of looking down at the husk below him again. Just a kid. Another innocent on the list . The bubbling anger he’s tried to suppress all month comes to the forefront now. He surges upward, limbs now solid and obeying his command.

“You and your bosses have been trying to stop me eating all month. Don’t fucking deny it. And now you, what? Force feed me a fucking innocent and expect me to be grateful???”

“I don’t know what you’re tal-”

“Don’t fucking lie to me ingrate. I’m sick of your fucking lies.” He’s sick of a lot of things. Sick of the way Talon keep testing him. The way he basically lives with an echo of his former love. Sick of death and lies and having absolutely nobody he can trust. Nobody to rely on. Reaper feels a pang of homesickness, not for Los Angeles, but the people of Overwatch who had his back. They’re all dead now. Dead or broken and remade like the man in front of him.

There is a look of consternation on the ingrate’s face. He looks to the corpse as well before giving Reaper a calculated look. After a moment he sighs, a decision clearly made. He turns to the stationary on a nearby desk and rummages for a pen as he continues to talk. “As I said, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I understand your frustration. We’ve had a few unlucky missions. It would be mighty hard to inhibit the diet of a man such as yourself. Perhaps if that man had not been so picky about what he eats there wouldn’t have been such a situation as what occurred here.”

The ingrate holds up the message he’s been working on at the desk. Stay furious. Bugs: fruit bowl, under the right bedside table - your room, above the window by the pot plant

Reaper finds himself suddenly flat footed. Righteous anger extinguished as his mind changes tracks into mission focus. Find bugs. Remove them. A third directive comes to him before he even starts to move. Make sure it's not Mccree’s fault

“You’re lying to me. You think I don’t know Talon is watching my every move???   You think I can’t sense those fucking electronics you lay out every night???” Reaper knocks the full fruit bowl to the ground, taking some pleasure in how it shatters. It’s been a long couple of months. The little electronic device crushes easily under his boot. First bug destroyed.

“I was willing to put up with some tests for the sake of taking down Overwatch, was willing to be partnered up with the likes of you but if this is how Talon treats its employees…” Second bug gone. Mccree rolls his eyes and gestures for Reaper to get on with it. Reaper takes some pleasure in watching him dodge when Reaper throws the bedside table from the bedroom to the living room. It hits the wall near Mccree’s head. He shrugs philosophically and stomps down on the remains, contributing to the general sounds of destruction.  

“I will have the respect I deserve! From them and from you ingrate. No more tests. No more wild goose chases. I will destroy Overwatch, with or without you!” Possibly too melodramatic but the grin on Mccree’s face is the realest he’s seen since...well a couple of months before everything went to shit. For a moment Reyes forgets the realities of their situation. It just feels too much like that time in Amsterdam where they got followed back to their hotel and had to fake a domestic and then noisy make-up sex until the men left in disgust. Well, the domestic was fake… Reaper shatters the pot plant by the window first, hoping it gives whoever is listening a headache before finally reaching for and destroying the third bug. He turns to survey the destruction of the room but the corpse on the floor destroys any fun he had been having. This isn’t Blackwatch. And the man in front of him isn’t Jesse.

Mccree follows his gaze, his smile becoming strained. They stand in silence for a moment, neither really willing to break the fragile peace they had established. Surprisingly Mccree breaks it first.

“You probably have about twenty minutes before they come to check if you killed me Ghost. Whatever you want, better make it fast.” Ghost . Reaper decided to ignore the pang in his chest. He wasn’t sure if it hurt more or less than the ingrate calling him Gabe. Now that they were finally alone he felt overwhelmed by the amount of things he wanted to ask. Needed to know. You’re wasting time.

The remains of the third bug are still crushed in his hand. He could start there. “You placed this right?”

“Yes. I cannot disobey direct orders,” Mccree said formally.  Reaper fought the shudder that came with those words. What the fuck had Talon done to him? Focus .

“Right. But protecting them…” He tried to keep his words vague. Who was to say if there were more bugs that Mccree didn’t know about. Or didn’t tell Reaper about.

“That’s more implied than direct.” So he only had to obey the letter not the spirit of the order. Reaper could work with that. Provided this wasn’t all orchestrated so that Mccree could earn his trust. Work with what you have. Work with what you have.

“Why have Talon been trying to starve me?” Reaper asked, deciding to start with the most pressing question.

“Well it just seems an awful shame somebody starving themselves through picky eating. Maybe that person just can’t be trusted with their own decisions and needs a helping hand.”

Translation: Talon likes assets, not mercenaries. But only if they can get away with it . Reaper couldn’t say he was surprised.

Mccree continued, “Take for instance this fella. Worried sick about the sick old skeleton in the corner. Weird a room service fella would do that, let me tell ya. He was of half a mind to go get a gurney,” Mccree kicked the corpse absent mindedly, “Don’t much matter now with you feeling better and him being dead.”

He was Talon? No, that wouldn’t- If the man was Talon, then they had been planning to take him today. Probably to turn him into another asset. Mccree knew that when hungry Reaper can take a soul through touch which means if the man was Talon, Mccree must have set him up. Or if the man was just some poor smuck then Mccree must have called room service. Which would mean Reaper had killed an innocent and Mccree had still disrupted Talon’s plans. There was something missing and Reaper still felt a little too addled to put it all together. He knew better than to trust this version of Mccree’s better nature. Jesse is gone. And the ingrate is a liar.

“You could have orchestrated all this yourself. In order to get me to trust you.” Reaper could swear he saw Mccree’s smile slip for a second before returning. He wasn’t sure if even the micro expression was real.

Anyone ever tell you, you’re paranoid Gabe?

“That’s not a question Gabe. And you’re running out of time,” Mccree said. He pointedly turned towards the clock. Reaper tried not to glare too hard. It was an implied question. Direct orders. Direct questions . Reaper wasn’t sure he liked being treated like a Talon handler. No scratch that. He knew he hated it.

“Just-just tell me why’d you help me?” Reaper asked. He would not let Mccree get to him.  

“Job security. Talon doesn’t need more assets. Widow and I do just fine.” Mccree was still staring at the clock. Reaper wasn’t sure what it meant that he could recognise one of Jesse’s old tells in the stillness. He never had before.

“That might be a reason but that’s not why.” Reaper felt his teeth starting to grind involuntarily. One straight answer Je-Mccree. Just one and I can leave you alone.

“Oh? How can you tell?” Mccree had turned to face him, the challenge written all over his face. An unspoken “You want to play? Well fine.”

I can’t. I’m guessing. Reaper tried not to lose his patience. “Just tell me the truth. What do you get from all this? What do you want?”

“I’m one of Talon’s dogs of war. We don’t want anything but Talon’s continuous prosperity,” Mccree pauses, pondering for a moment, “maybe some amusement to relieve the monotony. Luckily you’re amusing. All those contradictions. A founder of Overwatch, working for their destroyers.”

“I hate Overwatch. They did this to me.” Reaper remembers interrogating Jesse at 17. He’d already known how to obfuscate, dance around the damn answer and pull you where he wanted you to go. Twenty years later and he was a fucking nightmare.

“Did they?” Mccree asked with a knowing tone. Reaper hated it. “Yes, much like they did this to me, I guess. I hated them too for a time. Hated you all for leaving me behind. Leaving me to my fate. But you need to be careful Reyes. You still feel. You know Talon would take that away if they could. Leave you unfeeling. Like me.”

“I'm not him. I'm just his ghost.”

“We're all ghosts here darlin’. All liars too.” Reaper tries not to let anything show in the face of Mccree’s smirk. What the hell does he think he knows? “You may be a ghost but Gabriel Reyes: Blackwatch commander, he’s still in there. Still seeking logic where there is none. Trying to categorise people. Trying to categorise yourself. Trying to categorise me. God you’ve been trying to categorise me for years.”

“Not you. You’re not him.” Reaper would not believe them the same. Not after the innocents he’d seen this Mccree kill. As for himself, well. Before the explosion, before all the pain Talon and Overwatch had caused him, he liked to believe he was a good man. Once.

“There you go again. I’m just Jesse, stripped to the core darlin’. And you’re just Gabe after a series of really REALLY unfortunate events. They took my feelings, not my thoughts. You think I don’t know you?”

“At the core Jesse was a good man.” And I am not the man you remember.

“Nah, at your core you loved him. Which means you’ll never be able to reconcile how he became me. It’s beautiful to watch, I wouldn’t want Talon to take that away. Think of the joy you’d be depriving me of if you became their asset. I mean so much as I can still feel joy.”

Reyes wants to believe him, he does but- he can’t help but ask, “How can I trust you?”

There was real frustration in Mccree’s eyes now. At least Reaper thought it was real. “Now who’s the damn ingrate. I’m taking a lot more risks here than you are Gabe. There could be more bugs. I could be reeducated for telling you anything. What do you risk asshole? How can you trust me? How the fuck can I trust you?”

He was right to be angry. He was in a lot more danger for messing with Talon’s plan than Reaper was. If he was telling the truth. If

“Just...Just give me one true answer. Just tell me something I can believe.”

Mccree gritted out a reply, “Fine. I lied to you before. When I said I’m unfeeling. Sometimes I feel angry. Feel furious. Does that count?”

At Talon? At Overwatch? At me? It may have been the only straight answer Reaper had ever gotten out of this Mccree and he couldn’t bring himself to ask further. Was afraid Mccree would tell him the answer.

Time was running out. “So what are you going to tell them?”

“After the mission was a bust you got so awfully angry. Something was wrong. I called room service. Now depending on what you believe, this may or may not have been a signal to summon the nearest Talon agent. The good man Harold came to the door and I asked him to leave the food just inside. But Harold saw you were weak. Or maybe he was just a young man full of concern. Either way he put his hand on your shoulder and well you know the rest. You just got so furious that you decided to destroy all the bugs in the room. Probably something Talon will consider next time. Not that there should be a next time. I mean somebody died because you were hungry. Pretty dangerous to cause that again, don’t you think? How’d I do, could you tell when I was lying?”

No. No I couldn’t. “And when they ask what we talked about?”

“Well I tell them you tried to interrogate me on what Talon was up to and as was my way, I led you on a merry chase for answers that delivered none. They’ll believe me, I mean some of these poor suckers had to interrogate me when I was first captured and well...twenty minutes ain’t nothing on that.”

And then what did they do to you?   Reaper had a million more questions and no time. He felt a distinct level of empathy for those Talon interrogators and then horror at the thought. Mccree had given him little to no straight answers after all this time. Maybe he’d forgotten how? Talon could already be listening by now. He could have just killed another innocent. Talon surely would have known not to touch him though...unless Mccree didn’t tell them.

“Were you lying? I need to know,” Reaper asks in desperation knowing there is no real time left.

Mccree settles down on the couch. He no longer seems angry. No longer seems much of anything. “No you don’t. You just want to. It doesn’t matter. Believe the truth you need to believe.”

He wants to believe in Mccree. More than anything. Wants to believe Jesse was still in there and that's why he’d been saved above any job security or amusement. Wants to believe that it wasn’t all a Talon trick for Mccree to gain his trust. But needs to believe?

“Anyone ever tell you, you’re paranoid Gabe?” Jesse asked, curling up on Gabe’s chest. His fingers stroking gently through Gabe’s hair. And Gabe had said, “It’s not paranoia if they’re really out to get you.”

And look what happened to them.

Natter #5  4th July 2020

MI MG Natter #5 4th July 2020I hope you all have had a happy fourth - all fingers still attached and tummies filled. Pickle seems to be getting used to the bangs this year, or perhaps he is a little deaf. Usually, at the first bang, he disappears and hides under my bed. This time he has wandered upstairs and downstairs and doesn't seem to register the bangs much at all - which is good. I am in contact with a guy back home who runs a regular allotment (PeaPatch here) blog, giving timely advice and other information related mostly to veggie & fruit culture. I find this very helpful as he jogs my memory on those extremely rare occasions when I forget. I know you think that I never forget, but I have to admit that there has been the occasional lapse ever since I stopped eating peanuts. Strange that. His words for July remind us that this month is the time to sow seeds for Fall and Winter veggie crops such as Chicory (does anybody actually grow this?), Chinese Cabbage, Kohl Rabi, Lettuce, French Beans, Beetroot, Carrots, Radish, Turnips, and Peas - pick early varieties - early Snow peas are especially fast to crop. If you have had the forethought to already start Leeks from seed, now is the time to plant out those starts. The easiest way to do this is to use an old broomstick handle and thrust it vertically into the soil to a depth of about 5-6". Just drop the seedlings, roots first into the holes and then just water in - that's all you need to do. The water will wash soil from the sides of the holes down onto the roots and it will remain cool and moist enough to thoroughly root the seedlings well. The idea of doing it this way, apart from the ease of planting and gaining support from the sides, is that the hole blanches the stem of the leek as it grows to gain more usable parts of the plant. If they are kept reasonably moist they should grow quite rapidly through the Summer and be ready to make fabulous potato-leek soup in time to keep cold days at bay. If you have never eaten P-L soup accompanied by chunks of Crusty artisan bread generously spread with butter - you haven't lived. Food of the Gods this! If you have been growing spuds and have lifted them already, you can follow with a crop of French beans to both nourish yourself and the soil, or if beans aren't your thing try a green manure crop such as Mustard. However, bear in mind that if you have ever had Club Root on your cabbage family plants, do not use Mustard as it is also a brassica. Use one of the Pea family, both for the Nitrogen root boost, but also for the foliage. And now for something completely different:- Once more my friend Valerie Robertson has presented her view on things English on the other side of the pond. From: Valerie Robertson GAG 14 Hope all is well with all. All Quiet in the Western Front over this way. Seattle’s CHOP was liberated leaving an appalling mess The pubs are open  today so the protesters have disappeared. BLMUK. is proving to be an embarrassment to those who donated, bent the knee and supported a cause that advocates the abolition of the nuclear family (that means dad is superfluous) defund the police,  destroy capitalism and support censorship plus the necessity for every white person to acknowledge that they are all subconsciously racist and privileged., and own up to that every institution is inherently racist and disproportionally  White supremacy managed. That’s a big ask, which has bewildered the millionaire black footballers, academics, artists,   Labour leader Sir Keith what’s his name,  and all the national institutions taking the knee, which the other men in the street saw, as bowing to street fighter activists outrageous demands. Ie supporting racial divide and suppressing diversity of opinions and abolishing history. Our moral leader Canterbury Arch Runcton, is also confused. He’s a woke bloke that got it wrong at Easter. Streaming his Easter service from his kitchen with his toaster in the background. For God's sake, he must have a parlour with a row of books as a backdrop, in his palatial abode. He’s now having a think about the effigies in the Cathedral and wondering which ones to get rid of. Should he paint Jesus black?  Jesus loves all the children of the world, be they yellow black or white. What about the brown ones?  They were precious in His sight too? He’s going to need a lot of colours. The Bournemouth beach sunbathing nutters are bright pink still. The Cambridge academia have just funded a two-year study into the history of slavery to enable the oiks to confront their iniquitous past and say sorry to all offended by history. Waste of time, as it’s been done before, over and over and you can’t change it. I’ve got a better idea for them to study.   Research the Benin bronzes. There are 3,OOO of them but only 500 left in Nigeria, the rest in  Europe and USA museums. They are exquisite. The Portuguese kicked off the Atlantic slave trade in 1400 from the port of Benin with gold, which the Africans turned into these fantastic plaques, I think but not sure. I’m too busy doing my epidemic virus studies to go to the British Museum and find out. And we are not allowed yet, to visit Portugal unless keen enough to fly to Spain and walk across the border to check up on the museum artifacts in Lisbon. It’s good to see Lewis Hamilton constructively addressing inequality in the motor racing world.  The aggrieved black community can be placated and inspired by their own incredibly successful race if they listen. We have diversity, we have opportunity, we have laws, education, healthcare, social services, state welfare funding and overall, a tolerant multicultural society, who are very tired of the woke political correct champagne socialists agenda over the last decade.  There are deep social and economic injustices which are nothing to do with slavery or racial prejudice. Louis Hamilton lives in Monte Carlo to save paying a hefty U.K. income tax liability. He was raised in Stevenage and lived in a council house with his family partially supported by the welfare state. Is he a philanthropist who promotes the welfare of others by donating money for schools etc.? No he’s not if he’s a British citizen tax evader. Is he a Monacoan now.? Is he a hypocrite? I don’t know?  Perhaps the academics can ask the uni students to research,  write a paper and make up their own minds. Estate agents will not in future be using Master Bedroom in their ads. Connotations of slave masters etc. Uncle Bens rice is to be repackaged without the jolly black man and awaiting more news re. MasterCard, Master chef, Master Mind, Headmaster ( the lefty teachers union still keeping schools shut) Masters degree, a tricky one for Cambridge. We are living with the virus and hanging in with our self-imposed restrictions and socially distancing. The copper masks and latex gloves worked a treat when John needed to visit the GP surgery for a blood test to check prostate antigen level insomuch not coughing. Although London has seen a slight rise in the R rate, no doubt due to the mass protests, the infection rate remains stable and patients being more successfully treated with drugs, to avoid intensive care. The disproportionate ethnic infected is due to blood group, genetic disparity, and body mass ratio, and a difference in the percentage of T cells. These cells decline with age and are responsible for fighting off infection without causing a major autoimmune response. People past 65, have very few left.   This theory explains why the young can come in contact with the virus but don’t succumb, however, if repeatedly exposed will catch it and manufacture antibodies and can still remain asymptomatic. Mass testing suggests that 40 percent of the population has been exposed with few symptoms, the silent spreaders who have the herd immunity. So we know the virus is still around and can’t trust the idiots to self-isolate if positive. All we can hope for is that they wear a mask and keep away from the elderly. Once the herd immunity and those who have recovered from it reach 60 percent, providing the medically vulnerable and fatties avoid it, the virus will find no host, cannot, therefore, multiply and shed and theoretically die away.  So it’s a balance. As the months go on there is hope for  more preventive medication to alleviate the symptoms and of course a vaccine. Last October, the WHO  found that U.K. and USA  were the best in the world prepared for a pandemic.  Cameron had placed an order for millions of PPE equipment with a French company with the deposit to fund the manufacturer to make it.  By the time U.K. needed it, we got the deposit refunded but the stocks were needed in France and they had sold some items at a higher price,  to Italy.  That’s Globalisation for you and the free market. Meanwhile, a couple who were distilling boutique gin in the midlands, altered their equipment to distill hand sanitizers and viral cleansing fluids as NHS  were buying it in from abroad at an inflated price. They now supply the NHS cheaply and in the past 12 weeks have made 30 million pounds profit. Well done as they are donating a substantial amount to Covid research. No doubt as a tax saving incentive, but still commendable. There’s a lot to be said for self-reliance.  The govt. with its 80 strong SAGE - the scientific, advisory government epidemic advisors, have caused the pandemonium. At the outset, the models and graphs predicting the scale have been proved wrong. Simple precautions were overlooked.  Emptying geriatric wards, filling up care homes with staff untrained in infection control was scandalous. Mask wearing should have been made compulsory on public transport, supermarkets and shops at the outset and at least some sort of temperature checking and contact tracing at airports and ferries. So,  on to local lockdowns and long term containment.  Boris is getting on with Brexit and left Hanlon to contain the virus,  Hope the strategy works. I have faith in the laboratory’s scientists and the trials and the guinea pigs testing the emerging vaccines. Meanwhile, tomatoes coming along, being well-nourished and in good shape and we are up to four playing again at croquet. Sainsbury delivering without hassle and Miles and Giles still surprising me with a tablespoon of Baharat in a nifty environment-friendly container. It made the lamb taste different. The kennels are open but missed the boat as all the  rescue dogs are  adopted and long waiting lists for puppies. A dog called Nigger, I imagine a black or brown Labrador,  who was loved and died in 1878, had a headstone in the animal cemetery in a  Sussex village graveyard. The local stonemason has ground away the name as the villagers thought it might cause offence to visitors and that dogs owners would understand as they were dead anyway and not around to ask permission. Just love kind people. The drought's over and it’s cool as we are and hope you are too. Take care Love from Val And from your fearless leader,Gordon