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Djabanete
United States2786 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.boygeniusreport.com/wp-content/uploads/image/explosion.jpg) and sharks ![[image loading]](http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2006/11/shark191106_468x397.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://consilience.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/great20white20shark202.jpg) and obama ![[image loading]](http://www.britannica.com/blogs/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/obama.jpg) and optimus prime ![[image loading]](http://www.goldoptimusprime.com/images/gold-optimus-prime.jpg) and jedi masters. ![[image loading]](http://blogs.fayobserver.com/faytoz/files/2008/08/yoda.jpg) or anything else that seems epic to you (doesn't necessarily have to be pictures). ![[image loading]](http://www.biblelife.org/evolution-t-rex.jpg) Please don't limit yourself to posting things that are epic in the same way as the stuff above. Anything that is epic in any way is good to post here. Please don't post stuff that is not epic, like bunny rabbits and Stork. | ||
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Barbarne
Sweden458 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.timeout.com/chicago/resizeImage/htdocs/export_images/146/146.x600.music.wutang.rev.jpg) I know some of you will disagree. But to me, that's some epic shit god! Word is bond. | ||
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minus_human
4784 Posts
![[image loading]](http://fc40.deviantart.com/fs31/f/2008/230/8/c/8c0a526540eb43422f7223eb6dd44e2e.jpg) | ||
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Fontong
United States6454 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v98/nakiko/oslselection/03/15.jpg) | ||
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Lemonwalrus
United States5465 Posts
On March 20 2009 07:12 minus_human wrote: I controlz da world ya Omg I am going to make a background out of that. Edit: Nvmd, came out looking all pixely.  | ||
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Manbear
Canada306 Posts
![[image loading]](http://laughingsquid.com/wp-content/uploads/colbert-lockwood.jpg) Colbert is pretty fucking epic if i do say so myself | ||
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gusbear
333 Posts
On March 20 2009 07:17 Manbear wrote: Colbert is pretty fucking epic if i do say so myself from a canadian lol | ||
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Manbear
Canada306 Posts
lol he makes America look so awesome | ||
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MeriaDoKk
Chile1726 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.anime.com.pe/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/gd.jpg) /has left | ||
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Yaqoob
Canada3323 Posts
![[image loading]](http://frmarkdwhite.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/darth_vader.jpg) | ||
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Manit0u
Poland17249 Posts
I bow to Godfather/July  ![[image loading]](http://i26.tinypic.com/23mjph.jpg) | ||
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Tensai176
Canada2061 Posts
![[image loading]](http://jaanhost.com/out.php/i6792_folder300orig.jpg) | ||
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lgd-haze
Sweden547 Posts
![[image loading]](http://justinsmoustachio.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/borat-seksy-moustache.jpg) | ||
BroOd
Austin10831 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img27.imageshack.us/img27/1118/f14g.jpg) TYRANNOSAURS IN F-14s!!! | ||
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BroOd
Austin10831 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img8.imageshack.us/img8/2158/tyrannosaurusinf14s.jpg) | ||
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micronesia
United States24671 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.welcometopixelton.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/i-love-kittens.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b62/ClevelandRocker/Tokyo.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.byui.edu/physics/images/spiral1.gif) | ||
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MTF
United States1739 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.physicscentral.com/explore/pictures/images/galaxies-img.jpg) | ||
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Oglop
Canada36 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img.n7c.org/old-b/src/123750433398.jpg) pffff | ||
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Zyarktodt
United States67 Posts
![[image loading]](http://media.esportsfrance.com/images/Starcraft/PL/jaedong_pl02.jpg) | ||
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kazokun
United States163 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i39.tinypic.com/30a5nqv.png) | ||
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mahnini
United States6862 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img24.imageshack.us/img24/8396/1236061666400.gif) | ||
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DanceCommander
United States1808 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v63/shefanhow/aliens_vs_predator_2_x.jpg) | ||
Kinky
United States4126 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/9294/2951007.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/8774/i2dw5nf19kcz326vcyp6rle.jpg) NSFW + Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://img23.imageshack.us/img23/6448/1233195141698.jpg) | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i43.tinypic.com/2evsrae.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i42.tinypic.com/15rkxp2.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i40.tinypic.com/w972g2.jpg) | ||
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shimmy
Poland997 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i40.tinypic.com/2hwptlt.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://xoomer.virgilio.it/guidi_guido/portfolio/comics/lithoPredaking.jpg) | ||
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lesser_good
Canada698 Posts
On March 20 2009 07:11 Barbarne wrote: I know some of you will disagree. But to me, that's some epic shit god! Word is bond. i loled... fuck i hate it how rappers totally gave the word epic a new meaning | ||
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GGQ
Canada2653 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll209/GarretQ/Catnarok.jpg?t=1237505615) | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
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shimmy
Poland997 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.freewebs.com/kirby100000/ninja_kirby.gif) | ||
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Archaic
United States4024 Posts
On October 14 2008 14:45 Meta wrote: Epic bump. And to think that since you posted that like 35 minutes ago, there's already been 111 more views. And on top of everything: ![[image loading]](http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/593/13337manizu2.png) This thread is full of leeet | ||
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Pressure
7326 Posts
![[image loading]](http://popseoul.files.wordpress.com/2008/04/epikhigh-20080416-popseoul-small.jpg) epik | ||
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TheAntZ
Israel6248 Posts
![[image loading]](http://dropbox.am0.co.uk/mudkip1.jpg) Yeah, thats right.  | ||
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LordWeird
United States3411 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.nuclearblast.de/images/uploads/2008-09-25/1222333303_large.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://jeanfrancois.aragon.free.fr/musicaljam/visiteur/chroniques_cd/Pochettes/amon_amarth_-_twilight_of_the_thunder_god.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_o3WqwdLoJQU/RtsMazTxjaI/AAAAAAAAAMU/ti4wWq3jhcs/s320/traveller.jpg) | ||
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JeeJee
Canada5652 Posts
+ Show Spoiler [t&a] + ![[image loading]](http://www.tumeroks.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/boobpads.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.tumeroks.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/bm12.png) | ||
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eatmyshorts5
United States1530 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img25.imageshack.us/img25/3394/bisumiddle.jpg) Awesome | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
![[image loading]](http://livesaildie.com/files/2007/04/tsunami-wave.jpg) + Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f174/your_mom_was_good/epic-boobs.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.lifeinthefastlane.ca/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/volcano_2sfw.gif) Just really long v + Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://xs435.xs.to/xs435/09056/dude_what215.gif) | ||
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Person514cs
1004 Posts
On March 20 2009 07:57 BroOd wrote: TYRANNOSAURS IN F-14s!!! oh. wow. That's what I call epic. | ||
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diggurd
Norway346 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.adressa.no/multimedia/dynamic/01124/Therese_Johaug_1124581c.jpg) | ||
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BalliSLife
1339 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i492.photobucket.com/albums/rr289/MOAB6/facepalm.jpg) | ||
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eatmyshorts5
United States1530 Posts
On March 20 2009 13:10 BalliSLife wrote: OMG January Shaved her head! | ||
JWD
United States12607 Posts
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Whyzguy
Canada263 Posts
LOOOLL ![[image loading]](http://img14.imageshack.us/img14/3230/bearcavalry.jpg) | ||
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sith
United States2474 Posts
What the hell is this comic from? I found it strangely interesting, what with it ending where it began and all. | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
On March 20 2009 13:42 sith wrote: What the hell is this comic from? I found it strangely interesting, what with it ending where it began and all. I don't know. LOL yea, THAT was the "strangely interesting" part of the entire thing. | ||
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omfghi2u2
United States831 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img9.imageshack.us/img9/7789/powerrangersfabulous.jpg) | ||
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sith
United States2474 Posts
On March 20 2009 13:44 fanatacist wrote: I don't know. LOL yea, THAT was the "strangely interesting" part of the entire thing. Do you at least have a name or the artist it originated from? I searched google and found nothing, and the file name was only linked on stumbleupon as far as I could tell. | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
On March 20 2009 13:47 sith wrote: Do you at least have a name or the artist it originated from? I searched google and found nothing, and the file name was only linked on stumbleupon as far as I could tell. No. | ||
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Ancestral
United States3230 Posts
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sith
United States2474 Posts
On March 20 2009 13:50 Ancestral wrote: Could someone explain how it "ends where it begins?" I couldn't really follow the story, although I am slightly sleep deprived... When he comes back to the house at the end, he peers into the door and you can see a pair of eyes in the tub looking back at him, and he takes the cat, where earlier it mentioned the cat was missing after the "creature" arrived. Oh well, thanks anyway fanatacist I'm going to keep looking. | ||
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Ancestral
United States3230 Posts
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AltaiR_
Korea (South)922 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/user_images/pics/1/11633000/ngbbs45ba9ffba803a.jpg) | ||
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Kinky
United States4126 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img16.imageshack.us/img16/1741/1227657276496.jpg) | ||
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CDRdude
United States5625 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img528.imageshack.us/img528/9317/entirebookft3.jpg) | ||
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ieatkids5
United States4628 Posts
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Gliche
United States811 Posts
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lilsusie
3861 Posts
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
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baal
10540 Posts
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oob
Sweden630 Posts
On March 20 2009 08:23 mahnini wrote: Horse is OP! | ||
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Energies
Australia3225 Posts
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pyrogenetix
China5094 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.dreadgazebo.com/gunporn/wp-content/uploads/2007/05/deserteagle.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.carzi.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/nissan-gt-r-spec-v-0-banner.jpg) | ||
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PanoRaMa
United States5069 Posts
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.legorobotcomics.com/comics/1.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i256.photobucket.com/albums/hh192/adamrector/JesusRidingDinosaur.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://media.ebaumsworld.com/2006/07/hugeblunt.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://1d4chan.org/images/6/60/BearCavalry.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://image.fighterforum.com/showImage.asp?realFile=FFPICT20050221225029001.JPEG) NSFW + Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://picserver.dailytug.com/thebiggesttitsblog/20060228/busty-merilyn-huge-tits-01.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B000LZ69DG.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg) | ||
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pyrogenetix
China5094 Posts
On March 20 2009 20:17 PanoRaMa wrote: ahah that's the SpecV R35 too huh? Epic upon epicness. not bad... | ||
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Nytefish
United Kingdom4282 Posts
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Patriot.dlk
Sweden5462 Posts
![[image loading]](https://www.coolstuffinc.com/images/Products/mtg%20art/Revised/Contract%20from%20Below.jpg) Edit: the best card ever printed ![[image loading]](http://cdn-www.cracked.com/articleimages/dan/badass_soldiers/hayha4.jpg) | ||
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H
New Zealand6138 Posts
On March 20 2009 20:36 Nytefish wrote: Isn't there enough 4chan on 4chan? you'd think so | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.gifdump.co.cc/images/bearsuitdance.gif) | ||
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Guilty
Canada812 Posts
![[image loading]](http://ppc.warhawkenterprises.com/mw4pics/uzefire.jpg) MechWarrior Vengeance4 - from '99 The last good mech game before Microsoft ruined with that gay mech assult on console | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
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Scaramanga
Australia8090 Posts
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lxginverse
Monaco1506 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h3/poppaweely/keyboard_bash.gif) this and | ||
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Steelflight-Rx
United States1389 Posts
![[image loading]](http://anandamide.files.wordpress.com/2007/12/led-zeppelin-stairway-to-heaven.jpg) | ||
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Scaramanga
Australia8090 Posts
On March 21 2009 00:16 lxginverse wrote: Oh man thats like those jokes that get less and less annoying each time you see it and eventually annoy the fuck out of you | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
On March 21 2009 00:39 Scaramanga wrote: Oh man thats like those jokes that get less and less annoying each time you see it and eventually annoy the fuck out of you ??? funny*? | ||
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eatmyshorts5
United States1530 Posts
On March 21 2009 00:37 Steelflight-Rx wrote: ALL MUST BOW DOWN TO THE GODS. REST IN PEACE JOHN BONAM | ||
Pholon
Netherlands6142 Posts
![[image loading]](http://dl.ziza.ru/other/032009/06/pics/042_pics.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i267.photobucket.com/albums/ii303/ingevallendrempel/tank.jpg) | ||
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QuanticHawk
United States32051 Posts
On March 20 2009 12:36 fanatacist wrote: SPOILERS NSFW + Show Spoiler + Just really long v + Show Spoiler + The really long this is truly a fucking epic giant acid trip holy christ | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
On March 21 2009 02:45 Hawk wrote: The really long this is truly a fucking epic giant acid trip holy christ I get dreams like that :/ Sober :/ | ||
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SweeTLemonS[TPR]
11739 Posts
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
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feathers
United States236 Posts
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disciple
9070 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i436.photobucket.com/albums/qq83/monsuey/IMG_5836.jpg) | ||
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Whyzguy
Canada263 Posts
On March 21 2009 02:53 SweeTLemonS[TPR] wrote: So with that really long comic, is he both the monster and the person? And the same person is doomed to repeat the same fate over and over? It's really weird. Perhaps the hole near the end is a hole to a parallel universe? so not "exactly" himself who repeats the thing over and over... | ||
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R3condite
Korea (South)1541 Posts
nah man it's IMBA | ||
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QuanticHawk
United States32051 Posts
On March 21 2009 02:53 SweeTLemonS[TPR] wrote: So with that really long comic, is he both the monster and the person? And the same person is doomed to repeat the same fate over and over? It's really weird. ![[image loading]](http://dontmesswithtaxes.typepad.com/bill_murray_groundhog_day2.jpg) | ||
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Kinky
United States4126 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img23.imageshack.us/img23/6458/1227707351898.jpg) You probably have to be a Gurren Lagann fan to get this one. | ||
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Folca
2235 Posts
![[image loading]](http://corykennedy.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/epic_failure.jpg) | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
On March 20 2009 20:13 pyrogenetix wrote: reminded me of this ![[image loading]](http://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg291/symphonicharmonic/hunter.jpg?t=1237581713) | ||
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rkarhu
Finland570 Posts
On March 21 2009 04:00 feathers wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFtw7qW7Vcw Like what the fuck happens after the punch? Is it so powerful that it somehow warps the very fabric of space and time and thereby creates a explosion so powerful it almost dwarfs an entire galaxy? | ||
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~_~
Canada239 Posts
![[image loading]](http://magiccards.info/scans/en/al/232.jpg) | ||
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Djabanete
United States2786 Posts
On March 21 2009 06:11 ~_~ wrote: wtf is this doing in my thread shoo | ||
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bboyldy
Korea (North)664 Posts
On March 20 2009 11:24 TheAntZ wrote: Yeah, thats right. that picture is fucking huge. | ||
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Folca
2235 Posts
On March 21 2009 06:11 rkarhu wrote: Like what the fuck happens after the punch? Is it so powerful that it somehow warps the very fabric of space and time and thereby creates a explosion so powerful it almost dwarfs an entire galaxy? Overanalyzing anything always ruins jokes. | ||
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Racenilatr
United States2756 Posts
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Bash
Finland1533 Posts
On March 20 2009 20:55 Patriot.dlk wrote: Simo Häyhä wins this thread. Unrelated: | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
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Zoler
Sweden6339 Posts
On March 21 2009 04:00 feathers wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFtw7qW7Vcw This is a parody on that hahahha Watch the whole video also, it's hilarious ^^ | ||
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Barbarne
Sweden458 Posts
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Jyvblamo
Canada13788 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i44.tinypic.com/kdttsl.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i43.tinypic.com/2rd9d7c.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i40.tinypic.com/2vlv6gi.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i39.tinypic.com/2db2nf7.gif) | ||
Xeofreestyler
Belgium6771 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img357.imageshack.us/img357/1718/1214452121862ue5ip2.jpg) | ||
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Faronel
United States658 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.legorobotcomics.com/comics/64.jpg) | ||
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Kinky
United States4126 Posts
+ Show Spoiler + And the parody: + Show Spoiler + | ||
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FantomX
Canada247 Posts
On March 21 2009 09:29 SearingShadow wrote: ![[image loading]](http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/4414/navyp.gif) SO EPIC. | ||
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eatmyshorts5
United States1530 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img25.imageshack.us/img25/5561/saviorgmfr0vi8.jpg) What? | ||
NeverGG
United Kingdom5399 Posts
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Steelflight-Rx
United States1389 Posts
On March 21 2009 10:03 eatmyshorts5 wrote: nice =D | ||
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eatmyshorts5
United States1530 Posts
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JMave
Singapore1803 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p216/Jeromemave/re.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p216/Jeromemave/Seph.jpg) | ||
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CommanderFluffy
Taiwan1059 Posts
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Zapdos_Smithh
Canada2620 Posts
On March 21 2009 14:51 CommanderFluffy wrote: ^ dont get that last one Me neither. | ||
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InfeSteD
United States4658 Posts
ROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOFL! | ||
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Spenguin
Australia3316 Posts
On March 21 2009 14:31 JMave wrote: LOLOL XD | ||
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SilverskY
Korea (South)3086 Posts
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DeathSpank
United States1029 Posts
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FakeSteve[TPR]
Valhalla18444 Posts
On March 20 2009 07:11 Barbarne wrote: I know some of you will disagree. But to me, that's some epic shit god! Word is bond. rollin with binocular hey whats that thing over thurr binocular allows me my homies in the distance see | ||
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FakeSteve[TPR]
Valhalla18444 Posts
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evanthebouncy!
United States12796 Posts
I think I missed some good pictures | ||
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feathers
United States236 Posts
+ Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://www.majhost.com/gallery/jussipussi/stick/skwudewurd.png) I drew this. | ||
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Kwidowmaker
Canada978 Posts
On March 20 2009 11:31 LordWeird wrote: I knew that's where you got your name from! | ||
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evanthebouncy!
United States12796 Posts
UGH lol | ||
Beyonder
Netherlands15103 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.xs4all.nl/~hahoog/UO/UO0019.jpg) The most enjoying game ever for me :D | ||
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Zoler
Sweden6339 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.jdray.net/photos/d/2788-4/dangerous_to_go_alone.jpg) | ||
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AnWh
Sweden220 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.kristianwahlin.se/gallery/Gallery%201/02-Massive_killing_capacity.jpg) | ||
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Hans-Titan
Denmark1711 Posts
But so fake.. http://www.snopes.com/military/lighthouse.asp | ||
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DoX.)
Singapore6164 Posts
I saw that lighthouse joke in a jokebook couple o years ago lool | ||
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plated.rawr
Norway1676 Posts
![[image loading]](http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_oO3xVAE4RA8/Rutinu07_vI/AAAAAAAAA-0/o1OMn6-SN7A/s400/51kGQilBWYL._SS400_.jpg) Oh yea. | ||
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Malongo
Chile3472 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.rottennews.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/dog-fuck-tiger.jpg) seems fake but epic | ||
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ZorAptoR
Switzerland926 Posts
![[image loading]](http://animea.net/images/db/81/berserk.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.whocollection.com/HendrixOA502.JPG) and for those who know him: ![[image loading]](http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-images/Books/Pix/pictures/2007/05/01/Houllebecq460.jpg) | ||
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wtflah
United States92 Posts
On March 21 2009 20:52 Beyonder wrote: http://www.xs4all.nl/~hahoog/UO/UO0019.jpg The most enjoying game ever for me :D Small world ![[image loading]](http://216.77.188.54/coDataImages/p/Groups/145/145145/folders/156149/1138149SamsChoice7-1123.37.jpg) | ||
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Phearlock
Norway400 Posts
+ Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://www.geocities.com/blackmage0_15/Hadoken.jpg) Saw some mechwarrior posted a few pages back, aw man I love those things... ![[image loading]](http://mechwarrior5.ru/images/mechwarrior4.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b221/apostrophe_jesus/Ship%20requests/VultureLake.jpg) (Yeah I'm a big fan of the Clan heavies) Might as well link the entire intro to Mechwarrior 4: Vengeance while I'm at it, heh. | ||
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Guilty
Canada812 Posts
Why didnt they ever make a good follow up? Not that mech commander crap.... That video is so freaking amazing...its from the year 2000, unbeleivable. I just remebered that they made mech warrior mercinaries which was also very good but, Im craving a good new mech game, my poor pc joystick hasnt been used in years | ||
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HamerD
United Kingdom1922 Posts
![[image loading]](http://library.galciv2.com/mvlib/ss/Fullview_emperor-horus.jpg) | ||
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HamerD
United Kingdom1922 Posts
hahaha the one at the end is fucking AWESOME xD | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
On March 22 2009 01:07 Phearlock wrote: Hadoken ^^ (IT BREAKS TEH LAYOUT!) + Show Spoiler + Saw some mechwarrior posted a few pages back, aw man I love those things... (Yeah I'm a big fan of the Clan heavies) Might as well link the entire intro to Mechwarrior 4: Vengeance while I'm at it, heh. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZQWxg0b_n0 Mechwarrior 2 was the fucking best. Listen to this fucking music, SO sick to be cruising around in a huge ass BattleMech to this music: | ||
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SK.Testie
Canada11084 Posts
lol cool. | ||
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Pholon
Netherlands6142 Posts
+ Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://www.virtuosityone.com/symx_paradisefull.jpg) | ||
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trickser
Germany139 Posts
On March 22 2009 01:07 Phearlock wrote: + Show Spoiler + Hadoken ^^ (IT BREAKS TEH LAYOUT!) + Show Spoiler + Saw some mechwarrior posted a few pages back, aw man I love those things... (Yeah I'm a big fan of the Clan heavies) Might as well link the entire intro to Mechwarrior 4: Vengeance while I'm at it, heh. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZQWxg0b_n0 Yeah MadCat and Vulture are the moast awesom looking mechs of the battle tech series. Would really love a good new Mechwarrior Game, with top notch graphic and good controls. Also having a good online service that attracts a big communtiy to play online would rock. Ahh i still remember, how i first played Mech Warriors 2 on my first computer. Got the game with my matrox graphics card. That intro was so cool!. Mech Game Intros were always so awesome be it Mech Warrior or Mech Commander Series. Mech Warrior 2 Intro Mech Warrior 3 Intro Thor Mech looks pretty awesome too. Did not find an epic pic for him unfortunatly | ||
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ilistis
United States828 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img27.imageshack.us/img27/7291/ninjash.jpg) | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v224/CobraVerde13/watchmecrankitwatchmeroll.gif) PS- Mechwarrior is awesome, I remember playing MW2 along with quake, duke3d, and WC2 all day at lan place. | ||
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Fontong
United States6454 Posts
oh man... | ||
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evanthebouncy!
United States12796 Posts
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Vi]gReep
Sweden10 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y38/diyablo/epic-failure08.jpg) | ||
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lesser_good
Canada698 Posts
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selboN
United States2523 Posts
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omfghi2u2
United States831 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img3.imageshack.us/img3/9813/professoroak.gif) | ||
IntoTheWow
is awesome32274 Posts
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konadora
Singapore66158 Posts
On March 22 2009 14:19 omfghi2u2 wrote: Win. | ||
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Spenguin
Australia3316 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img11.imageshack.us/img11/9249/motivatorw.jpg) Disclaimer: I did not make this, my friend did. >_> | ||
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Silvos87
United States38 Posts
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sixghost
United States2096 Posts
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thompzn
Sweden42 Posts
It's an commercial for navigational equipment. | ||
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ZoW
United States3983 Posts
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bumatlarge
United States4567 Posts
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Kinky
United States4126 Posts
+ Show Spoiler + On March 22 2009 15:31 Silvos87 wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7b9o8SSTwc I haven't lol'd this hard in so long. What made it better was that I practically knew Powerthirst and its spin-off Anal Blast by heart already. | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
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IntoTheWow
is awesome32274 Posts
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Hot_Bid
Braavos36374 Posts
ESPORSTS | ||
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omninmo
2349 Posts
On March 20 2009 08:33 shimmy wrote: OH MY GOD? i remember this show.. was it called dinowars? truly epic | ||
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Spenguin
Australia3316 Posts
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plated.rawr
Norway1676 Posts
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shimmy
Poland997 Posts
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ohlala
Germany232 Posts
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ohlala
Germany232 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc222/JeSteRdaY/Gisele-Bundchen-468x569-41kb-media-.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc222/JeSteRdaY/____by_mpedziwiatr.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc222/JeSteRdaY/wazaaaaaaaaaa.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc222/JeSteRdaY/Bologna_process.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc222/JeSteRdaY/mit_frank_gehry_stata_center.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc222/JeSteRdaY/0b40803ee8a181127090e220e7d7.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc222/JeSteRdaY/GiseleBundchenbyMichaelComte1999.jpg) | ||
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MC9876
Netherlands82 Posts
![[image loading]](http://home.caiway.nl/~avandy/Chill.JPG) | ||
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omninmo
2349 Posts
On March 20 2009 11:23 Pressure wrote: epik is the guy on the right a mummy? | ||
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omninmo
2349 Posts
![[image loading]](http://static.flickr.com/215/449250749_de83d8ed4d.jpg) I took this picture in beijing 4 years ago at a military hospital in the chaoyangmen district. this picture has since taken on "epic" status with many poseurs on the web claiming that they took it. you will notice when you search "cunt examination" on google that all the resulting photos are the same... they are all derived from my photo on that glorious day. + Show Spoiler + personally, i find "fetal heart custody" to be more alarming than cunt exam. | ||
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niteReloaded
Croatia5281 Posts
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Leath
Canada1724 Posts
http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page (lots of funny articles) Example: http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Starcraft Slingshot sharp shooter: + Show Spoiler + Cartoon characters realistically + Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://images.teamsugar.com/files/upl0/1/15300/13_2008/homer_mario.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://streetknowledge.files.wordpress.com/2008/04/jessica-rabbit-real-life-compare.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.allaboutduncan.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/peterg.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.cartoonbrew.com/wp-content/uploads/realbeavis.jpg) Sing-Along Countries of the World: + Show Spoiler + Bollywood and others: + Show Spoiler + Matrix Lobby Scene + Show Spoiler + Tractor Skills + Show Spoiler + Ninja Car Chase + Show Spoiler + THIS IS SPARTA | ||
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lesser_good
Canada698 Posts
was i the only one who found this repulsive | ||
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SK.Testie
Canada11084 Posts
On March 21 2009 05:12 Kinky wrote: You probably have to be a Gurren Lagann fan to get this one. So good. | ||
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MC9876
Netherlands82 Posts
![[image loading]](http://home.kabelfoon.nl/~avandy/bisu.jpg) Epic 80ties classic movie scene ![[image loading]](http://home.kabelfoon.nl/~avandy/karatekid.jpg) | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
On March 20 2009 08:00 BroOd wrote: MORE?? from Calvin and Hobbes amirite? maybe not, i dont know, just looks familiar... | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img407.imageshack.us/img407/2930/stormbringerpa3.jpg) | ||
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AdunToridas
Germany380 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.eupodiatamatando.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/fuck_the_systsem.jpg) | ||
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MaZza[KIS]
Australia2110 Posts
On March 23 2009 05:34 AdunToridas wrote: hahahahahahahahahahdasdlkjawe,mnasd,mnwjehqa,wmdnqakwjdlkaj that has to be the funniest thing I've ever seen... is it a paradox or irony.. you decide! | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
On March 23 2009 03:07 lesser_good wrote: ![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/userfiles/22790.jpg?1229306873) was i the only one who found this repulsive | ||
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KurtistheTurtle
United States1966 Posts
On March 21 2009 09:56 Kinky wrote: My heart melts every time I watch this. + Show Spoiler + http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yvGfZZL1_Y And the parody: + Show Spoiler + http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTXMuD_rs80 I thought this was gonna be dumb, but it was hella funny. nice post | ||
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lesser_good
Canada698 Posts
geez fanatacist... that's it were not friends anymore.. give me back my cds (knew we shouldn't have mixed them :@) | ||
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IzzyCraft
United States4487 Posts
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=82705 He actually made some pretty good improvements over awhile. | ||
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Pellucidity
Netherlands377 Posts
On March 21 2009 20:52 Beyonder wrote: The most enjoying game ever for me :D Agreed. I've been playing it for nearly 9 years now. It's epic. EPICly epic. P.S. I've only really enjoyed Sphere and POL. Everything after POL has been crap. | ||
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SwaY-
Dominican Republic463 Posts
On March 23 2009 03:07 lesser_good wrote: was i the only one who found this repulsive You might be gay JK <3 to the dude with the Cunt Examination pic, how do we know you're for real aswell?  | ||
cgrinker
United States3824 Posts
I just laughed for five minutes about this. Like I almost passed out  | ||
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Xela
Canada203 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/4203/sangoku.jpg) | ||
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zgl
United States1055 Posts
![[image loading]](http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/uncyclopedia/images/b/be/C566ac33f3f66c4eac4b5f56.jpg) | ||
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omfghi2u2
United States831 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img11.imageshack.us/img11/8752/raichua.jpg) | ||
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Hydrolisko
Vanuatu1659 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i34.tinypic.com/1zv7bf6.gif) | ||
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lokiM
United States3407 Posts
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ohlala
Germany232 Posts
On March 21 2009 20:52 Beyonder wrote: The most enjoying game ever for me :D what game is it? also stop posting videos | ||
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baal
10540 Posts
On March 23 2009 03:07 lesser_good wrote: was i the only one who found this repulsive Dont worry, Mora thought so too | ||
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
Well, sometimes videos are a lot more epic than pics, and are you encountering any problem with the vids..? | ||
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ohlala
Germany232 Posts
now tell me what game that is | ||
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Plovez
Russian Federation83 Posts
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ohlala
Germany232 Posts
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lgd-haze
Sweden547 Posts
[QUOTE]On March 21 2009 20:52 Beyonder wrote: [img]http://www.xs4all.nl/~hahoog/UO/UO0019.jpg[/img] The most enjoying game ever for me :D[/QUOTE] Ooooh this brings back soo many memories! Kal vas por, in nox, ous jux, vas flam, kal vas por, ous jux, in nox , vas flam, kal vas flam. <3 UO | ||
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Ghardo
Germany1685 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/5756/comicallegs.jpg) rest in here: + Show Spoiler + | ||
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warding
Portugal2394 Posts
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KizZBG
u gotta skate8152 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/9049/1237587727894.jpg) | ||
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freelander
Hungary4707 Posts
http://www.dinosaursfuckingrobots.com \\A showcase where artists and comedians can come together and make pictures of... dinosaurs fucking robots... with inspirational phrases.\\ | ||
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Licmyobelisk
Philippines3682 Posts
![[image loading]](http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_ynecV_hmUPk/RwHazIwE_GI/AAAAAAAAAQk/whwwTiP1sco/s400/Exorcist.jpg) Epic Scare! | ||
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x89titan
Philippines1130 Posts
On March 23 2009 16:55 Hydrolisko wrote: omg is that jessica alba? | ||
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Zoler
Sweden6339 Posts
On March 23 2009 15:00 Xela wrote: I can't believe it took almost 10 pages ![[image loading]](http://www.capcorphq.com/images/Gohan-blast.jpg) | ||
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MagisterMan
Sweden525 Posts
Yep  | ||
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RA
Latvia791 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.render.ru/tmp/gallery/1162324378753787_1.jpg) Called Princess predator by author but I found it to be Caryn Delacroix from Deadliest of The Species rather. Actually one could call her like that. The idea was unfortunately and clumsy used in AvP movie. I like how she has feminine French manicure. ![[image loading]](http://img49.imageshack.us/img49/2901/necrosis8id.jpg) Orzhov guildmage, a card from Ravnica block of Magic The Gathering card game. This picture steams of epicness for me. And of course the bane of my friends and scourge of their decks, I proudly present my imaginary servant  ![[image loading]](http://static.desktopnexus.com/wallpapers/47600-bigthumbnail.jpg) Orzhov Angel of Despair. And she truly brought some. | ||
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Valio
Finland77 Posts
[QUOTE]On March 23 2009 21:40 ohlala wrote: [QUOTE]On March 21 2009 20:52 Beyonder wrote: [img]http://www.xs4all.nl/~hahoog/UO/UO0019.jpg[/img] The most enjoying game ever for me :D[/QUOTE] Ooooh this brings back soo many memories! Kal vas por, in nox, ous jux, vas flam, kal vas por, ous jux, in nox , vas flam, kal vas flam. <3 UO [/QUOTE] I have a better one in por ylem, in por ylem, in por ylem, in por ylem, in por ylem, in por ylem, in por ylem, in por ylem... Tho u don't understand it if you didn't play AoS | ||
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bludragen88
United States527 Posts
On March 22 2009 22:04 ohlala wrote: Wtf is building 32 doing in this thread?! | ||
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aaro
United States228 Posts
On March 23 2009 14:43 cgrinker wrote: I just laughed for five minutes about this. Like I almost passed out I laughed out loud for a good few minutes until my roommate told me to stfu :D | ||
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pyrogenetix
China5094 Posts
On March 23 2009 16:55 Hydrolisko wrote: holy shit | ||
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Dante08
Singapore4126 Posts
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Dante08
Singapore4126 Posts
On March 23 2009 15:23 zgl wrote: From uncyclopedia article on starcraft. HAHAHAHA ROFL | ||
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KizZBG
u gotta skate8152 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img523.imageshack.us/img523/6585/lamborghinireventonvsto.jpg) | ||
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ZoW
United States3983 Posts
On March 23 2009 23:26 warding wrote: hopefully not a repost http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtJ41mf019I Oh my god lol I still remember when I first watched that, I couldn't stop laughing for like 10 minutes | ||
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baal
10540 Posts
On March 23 2009 23:26 warding wrote: hopefully not a repost http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtJ41mf019I hahaha ridiculous | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
No, why would you think that? =_= | ||
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SilverskY
Korea (South)3086 Posts
Omfg... LOL wtf?! | ||
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DhakhaR
United Kingdom721 Posts
this was like, the best bonus imaginable after having to sit though that movie wih my girlfriend. On March 23 2009 23:26 warding wrote: hopefully not a repost http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtJ41mf019I So, the dinosaurs were wiped out by a tennis ball... Except for the ones who escaped... + Show Spoiler + ...In F-14s!! On March 20 2009 07:57 BroOd wrote: TYRANNOSAURS IN F-14s!!! | ||
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Jaeden
Romania1489 Posts
On March 23 2009 16:55 Hydrolisko wrote: On March 23 2009 17:04 lokiM wrote: I just sat and watched that for 3 minutes win, close thread | ||
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Pholon
Netherlands6142 Posts
On March 23 2009 17:04 lokiM wrote: I just sat and watched that for 3 minutes *nods* + Show Spoiler + | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img258.imageshack.us/img258/1148/portadatf3.jpg) Still to this day, my favorite game. So much good memories playing this online. | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.nivel22.com/wp-content/uploads//2008/04/carmageddon.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.shacknews.com/images/generated/47584a7de8190_featured_without_text_carmageddon_top.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.gamecyte.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/carmageddon.jpg) CARMAGEDDON | ||
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ktp
United States797 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.nerve.com/CS/blogs/scanner/2008/11/08-15/back_to_the_future.jpg) | ||
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lesser_good
Canada698 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/4964/1226980138120.gif) i often end up watching this for a few minutes | ||
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lesser_good
Canada698 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img9.imageshack.us/img9/9576/princessmononoke5.jpg) Forest spirit from princes Mononoke *something like that correct me if wrong* ![[image loading]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/90/Buka.jpg) The Groke/ Hufsa from The Moomins ( this thing use to scare the hell out of me) | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
On March 24 2009 08:30 lesser_good wrote: i often end up watching this for a few minutes That kitty knows kung fu! | ||
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Kong John
Denmark1020 Posts
![[image loading]](http://failblog.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/fail-owned-action-comics-fail.jpg) + Show Spoiler + from failblog.org, funniest site ever | ||
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Kinky
United States4126 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/4589/1233532436653.png) ![[image loading]](http://img9.imageshack.us/img9/2783/fapf.jpg) | ||
Chill
Calgary25980 Posts
On March 21 2009 14:31 JMave wrote: LOL I remember the second one! hahaha | ||
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inlagdsil
Canada957 Posts
On March 24 2009 09:16 Kinky wrote: I know nothing about pokemon. Can someone "translate" this please? | ||
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allowicious
United States972 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img10.imageshack.us/img10/3104/1221227351799rv6.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img10.imageshack.us/img10/7986/2005zf5wb2o.jpg) | ||
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Whyzguy
Canada263 Posts
On March 24 2009 09:33 allowicious wrote: omg wow. Both are incredible! Edit: Thought i'd put it in spoiler to save space | ||
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KurtistheTurtle
United States1966 Posts
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BuGzlToOnl
United States5918 Posts
On March 24 2009 09:21 inlagdsil wrote: I know nothing about pokemon. Can someone "translate" this please? While I was playing team [fortress] 2 I took a [chansey] and decided to screw my friends sister. He knew I wanted to do it and told me take it [slowbro]. She was beautiful, I went on to [?] all over her [two milktanks]. I told her that I liked it and she responded [mewtwo]. I pulled her panties to [lickilicky] all over her [skitty]. Even though it was [skunky] and filled with [muk], I quiet enjoyed it. I was time to ask her if she was ready. She replied [wynaut]? So I pulled out my [weedle] when I heard something [louder]! I woke up and realized it's just a dream. [?] tired, I need some energy drinks. LOL, can't believe I remember almost all of them. | ||
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houseurmusic
United States544 Posts
and of course: | ||
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Osmoses
Sweden5302 Posts
If that is a real game and not just sprite animation I need you to tell me where to get it. | ||
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Licmyobelisk
Philippines3682 Posts
![[image loading]](http://vader.joemonster.org/zzw/4553d589crazy-tattoo.jpg) | ||
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lesser_good
Canada698 Posts
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Kinky
United States4126 Posts
On March 24 2009 09:21 inlagdsil wrote: + Show Spoiler + On March 24 2009 09:16 Kinky wrote: I know nothing about pokemon. Can someone "translate" this please? While I was playing Team Forretress 2, I took a Chansey and decided to screw my friend's sis. He knew I wanted to do it and told me, take it Slowbro. She was beautiful, I went on to Gible all over her Miltanks. I told her that I liked it and she responded Mewtwo. I pulled down her panties to LickiLicky all over her Skitty. Even though it was Stunky and filled with Muk, I quite enjoyed it. It was time to ask her if she was ready. She replied, Wynaut? So I pulled out my Wurmple when I heard something Exploud! I woke up and realized it was a dream. Manaphy tired, I need some energy drinks. You have to read some of them out loud to get it | ||
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lokiM
United States3407 Posts
On March 24 2009 11:17 Osmoses wrote: If that is a real game and not just sprite animation I need you to tell me where to get it. i never posted that video? uhhh | ||
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ShoCkeyy
7815 Posts
On March 23 2009 03:07 lesser_good wrote: was i the only one who found this repulsive yes.. who is that ;pp... | ||
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ohlala
Germany232 Posts
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Groslouser
France337 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img9.imageshack.us/img9/5955/12378681551.jpg) This fits well | ||
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sperY
Serbia444 Posts
My contribution: ![[image loading]](http://www.epigroove.com/blog_images/game_of_thrones.jpg) | ||
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DeathSpank
United States1029 Posts
On March 24 2009 18:45 Groslouser wrote: This fits well is there a way we can frame it in gold or something? | ||
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zizou21
United States3683 Posts
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minus_human
4784 Posts
On March 24 2009 18:45 Groslouser wrote: This fits well Seriously now: tossgirl get your puny ass out of there, that is no photo of mere mortals | ||
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KurtistheTurtle
United States1966 Posts
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SoulMarine
United States586 Posts
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CubEdIn
Romania5359 Posts
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warding
Portugal2394 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.mcguckin.com/images/2326490.JPG) | ||
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Telemako
Spain1636 Posts
On March 24 2009 18:45 Groslouser wrote: This fits well Maybe just my eyes but does tossgirl clothes say SEX? | ||
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LordWeird
United States3411 Posts
On March 25 2009 06:10 Telemako wrote: Maybe just my eyes but does tossgirl clothes say SEX? I don't see Tossgirl anywhere in that picture, sir! | ||
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Archaic
United States4024 Posts
On March 24 2009 18:45 Groslouser wrote: ![[image loading]](http://img91.imageshack.us/img91/9233/jaedongowns.jpg) This fits well What I find strange is how this room managed to stay in tact. | ||
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SilverskY
Korea (South)3086 Posts
On March 25 2009 06:27 Archaic wrote: What I find strange is how this room managed to stay in tact. LMFAO. | ||
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Quanticfograw
United States2053 Posts
![[image loading]](http://demotivate.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/bear_cavalry.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.flippeh.de/funPics/toLazyToRename/bears%20with%20guns.jpg) | ||
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AutumnLight
Ukraine2488 Posts
http://www.abc2news.com/entertainment/weirdnews/story/Walk-it-off-its-only-a-heart-attack/P0JFQIIQ_0WH5a9uOIh2rA.cspx An Italian doctor completed a brain operation despite having a heart attack after realizing his patient would never recover if he stopped the surgery. Surgeon Claudio Vitale started feeling pains in his chest half way through the operation but refused to stop despite his team's urging and the pain worsening. After finishing the surgery, the doctor had an angioplasty operation to treat his attack. Vitale insists he's not a hero, but that he couldn't leave the patient "at such a delicate moment." Both doctor and patient are recovering. | ||
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Ozarugold
2716 Posts
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Bash
Finland1533 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y265/BashTheLegend/SSJhitler.jpg) I'm ashamed to admit that I made this (with paint) a few years ago. | ||
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FConnectionUK
United States316 Posts
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=37529 http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=37349 http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=38989 http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=44044 OH GGYUEAH~~~ ![[image loading]](http://img26.imageshack.us/my.php?image=fbh.gif) | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
SO FUCKING EPIC LOOOOOOOL | ||
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Rooms
Canada3 Posts
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number1gog
United States1081 Posts
Seriously! It doesn't stop expanding. It's a good thing the director cut out just then, otherwise her face would break the bounds of my monitor! | ||
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SChasu
United States1505 Posts
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Flyingsnow
Japan208 Posts
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ZoW
United States3983 Posts
May cause seizures. @_@ | ||
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Flyingsnow
Japan208 Posts
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BroOd
Austin10831 Posts
![[image loading]](http://tbn0.google.com/hosted/images/c?q=25a3daa1d2da7c30_large) ![[image loading]](http://tbn0.google.com/hosted/images/c?q=8d4d801f64c9a9cb_large) ![[image loading]](http://tbn0.google.com/hosted/images/c?q=f6fc707ad2c94a09_large) I'm having lots of fun with the LIFE archives. | ||
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Rhaegar99
Australia1190 Posts
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naonao
United States847 Posts
On March 25 2009 06:10 Telemako wrote: Maybe just my eyes but does tossgirl clothes say SEX? It say's STX, the team shes on | ||
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Spenguin
Australia3316 Posts
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Texas
Germany2388 Posts
real epic: ![[image loading]](http://infuge.ch/joomla/images/stories/ameise.jpg) | ||
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number1gog
United States1081 Posts
Really? That solves so many of life's questions. Thank you kind sir for gracing us with that knowledge. | ||
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Leath
Canada1724 Posts
It is definitely supposed to be STX, but I think it does say "SEX" in this picture. I guess someone edited it to create a subliminal message, and attract more viewers...? Like this one: ![[image loading]](http://www.geocities.com/cameraghost/pages/lionkg2.jpg) + Show Spoiler + Cover her face when it is upside down ![[image loading]](http://www.conducta.org/imagenes/subliminal.jpg) Subliminal Message in Advertising ![[image loading]](http://images.teamsugar.com/files/users/1/13255/34_2007/bestadever1-1.preview.jpg) | ||
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TryThis
Canada1522 Posts
sup? | ||
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KizZBG
u gotta skate8152 Posts
On March 25 2009 03:22 minus_human wrote: Seriously now: tossgirl get your puny ass out of there, that is no photo of mere mortals lol NP I'll take care of her! :D | ||
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jhNz
Germany2762 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.iwatchstuff.com/2007/11/28/hoff-knight-rider-mustang.jpg) | ||
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meathook
1289 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img520.imageshack.us/img520/7923/pelicankittyexcusemewtf.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/4814/obamacreation.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img152.imageshack.us/img152/9500/niggerrape.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/8725/mindcontrol.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img186.imageshack.us/img186/8166/leviathan.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/9072/kkkhostipalvisit.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img237.imageshack.us/img237/6602/istanbulmg0632.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img152.imageshack.us/img152/5036/iccupgayming.jpg) | ||
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sperY
Serbia444 Posts
| ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
Also, the catfish do get that big somewhere in Thailand or something, the power plants are just editted in. | ||
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DhakhaR
United Kingdom721 Posts
WOW, EPIC. when is this out? | ||
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OmgIRok
Taiwan2699 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img26.imageshack.us/img26/3644/yesfinally.jpg) | ||
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ktp
United States797 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.cinemacomrapadura.com.br/metamorfose/imgs/kurt_russell_metamorfose_wallpaper_03_1024.jpg) | ||
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PhilGood2DaY
Germany7424 Posts
#2 | ||
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bburn
United States1039 Posts
On March 26 2009 13:44 OmgIRok wrote: | ||
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MC9876
Netherlands82 Posts
![[image loading]](http://hi.zpok.hu/maxigas/blog/keen4title.gif) Iron Monkey | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
On March 25 2009 12:48 SS-guy wrote: http://www.gobstoppermovie.com/trailer.html Lol is that fucking Wee-Man @ 1:21 This is fake | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
lmao you see how fucking easy it is to make a rap song. Commercial music is so stupid. | ||
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poasiodss
United States63 Posts
| ||
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KizZBG
u gotta skate8152 Posts
On March 27 2009 05:51 CharlieMurphy wrote: lmao you see how fucking easy it is to make a rap song. Commercial music is so stupid. wow... just wow. | ||
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[GiTM]-Ace
United States4935 Posts
| ||
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Xenixx
United States499 Posts
omg this! | ||
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Quanticfograw
United States2053 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.sea-way.org/blog/monster_fish1.jpg) mekong stingray | ||
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lesser_good
Canada698 Posts
On March 30 2009 02:09 likeaboss wrote: mekong stingray haha imagine surfing on those | ||
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zizou21
United States3683 Posts
| ||
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ShoCkeyy
7815 Posts
On March 30 2009 02:09 likeaboss wrote: mekong stingray That's a lie! He's holding his stinger :C | ||
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Xenixx
United States499 Posts
| ||
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Nitrogen
United States5345 Posts
hahahaha | ||
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HeavOnEarth
United States7087 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.liquidpoker.net/user_pictures/567edcf3b8bb52c950c85400fde4ac12.png) ![[image loading]](http://www.geekologie.com/2009/03/23/scamming.JPG) ![[image loading]](http://i32.tinypic.com/28hh8ww.jpg) | ||
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HeavOnEarth
United States7087 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.nerdcore.de/wp/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/youtube.png) | ||
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myzael
Poland605 Posts
On March 30 2009 03:33 HeavOnEarth wrote: Yeah, you almost got me. Good one. | ||
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da_head
Canada3350 Posts
carrier has arrived xD | ||
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zurg
1923 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/4633/chainsaw2.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img256.imageshack.us/img256/9024/linke.png) ![[image loading]](http://img530.imageshack.us/img530/1636/uzfu9yzkdd0qywzhu62m.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img518.imageshack.us/img518/5059/1188532608161.jpg) | ||
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FaCE_1
Canada6172 Posts
![[image loading]](http://ui23.gamespot.com/1078/killerpumkin_2.jpg) | ||
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gusbear
333 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/telegraph/multimedia/archive/01373/Riding-a-lion_1373630i.jpg) | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
On March 30 2009 04:35 gusbear wrote: Hey... I came to this thread to post that pic. | ||
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ktp
United States797 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.teddwebb.com/showcase/where_are_they_now/ron_bennnington.jpg) | ||
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InfeSteD
United States4658 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img9.imageshack.us/img9/7013/epicjhv.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img9.imageshack.us/img9/8057/epic2.jpg) | ||
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InfeSteD
United States4658 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img11.imageshack.us/img11/8171/epic3.jpg) | ||
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InfeSteD
United States4658 Posts
![[image loading]](http://aceboogielrgjunkie.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/whitepower.jpg) | ||
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kemoryan
Spain1506 Posts
On March 22 2009 00:08 ZorAptoR wrote: Ohh epic indeed! | ||
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Mastermind
Canada7096 Posts
![[image loading]](http://tenletter.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/starcraft-sarah-kerrigan.jpg) | ||
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Gumbo
Canada807 Posts
On March 30 2009 03:33 HeavOnEarth wrote: ARG ITS NOT WORKING WHY?!?!?!? | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
? | ||
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rredtooth
5459 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.iccwbo.org/uploadedImages/Congress/2007/Right_Menu/CIPE.jpg) | ||
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Rooms
Canada3 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.dustindiamondpics.info/images/Dustin_Diamond_screech_saved_by_the_bell.jpg) | ||
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OmgIRok
Taiwan2699 Posts
Yes I just so didn't know about that song, and I made the picture that I posted from something that is not the youtube link posted by you. I actually got the picture to make the picture that I posted from the Youtube Thread and you just posted the video with no apparent reason, and the way I interpret it is that you wanted to show me something that you assumed I didn't know existed? | ||
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Nitrogen
United States5345 Posts
On March 31 2009 10:45 OmgIRok wrote: Yes I just so didn't know about that song, and I made the picture that I posted from something that is not the youtube link posted by you. I actually got the picture to make the picture that I posted from the Youtube Thread and you just posted the video with no apparent reason, and the way I interpret it is that you wanted to show me something that you assumed I didn't know existed? or... he was posting it in here because it is the epic thread, and that video deserves to be in here and was adding onto your post because you didn't put the whole video here. the song is a joke from saturday night live T_T | ||
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
On March 30 2009 03:24 HeavOnEarth wrote: epic. | ||
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chaoser
United States5541 Posts
you guys DO KNOW that it's a parody right? | ||
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TSL-Lore
United States412 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.ugo.com/games/strategy-games-top-50/images/entries/x-com-ufo-defense.jpg) | ||
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ZeroCartin
Costa Rica2390 Posts
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plated.rawr
Norway1676 Posts
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pyrogenetix
China5094 Posts
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Zoler
Sweden6339 Posts
On April 01 2009 02:57 pyrogenetix wrote: it's so funny here in sweden cuz no one watches SNL and they were playing jizz in my pants and im on a boat in the clubs here and everyone loves it haha they don't realize it's a joke aimed at commercial bullshit rnb rap songs. like I ask my friends no one knows the song and dont understand the joke that the DJ is playing on everyone. You live in Sweden? As far as I know everyone here just thinks it's a funny song, thats all ^^ | ||
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ZooG
Sweden618 Posts
| ||
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Railxp
Hong Kong1313 Posts
old, but still epic | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
On April 01 2009 03:20 Zoler wrote: You live in Sweden? As far as I know everyone here just thinks it's a funny song, thats all ^^aren't you guys the same people who brought the numa numa guy and basshunter? No wonder. I'd hate to live in Sweden just for this reason. | ||
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Zoler
Sweden6339 Posts
On April 01 2009 06:19 CharlieMurphy wrote: aren't you guys the same people who brought the numa numa guy and basshunter? No wonder. I'd hate to live in Sweden just for this reason. Basshunter - yes. Numa numa guy - no (at least I don't think so). Many people don't like basshunter, but I like some of his songs hehe (don't like him in person). | ||
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Chameleon
United States604 Posts
![[image loading]](http://de.motiv.me/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/fucked_its_time_to_accept_the_inevitable.jpg) | ||
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ihchulk
Germany60 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/3629/turrican11.png) Do you guys know Siggi? | ||
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numberThirtyOne
United States294 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.stanford.edu/~cantwell/AA210A_Course_Material/AA210A_Flow_Pictures/USS_Iowa_Guns.jpg) | ||
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LaughingTulkas
United States1107 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.sacred-destinations.com/england/images/cerne-abbas/giant/cerne-abas-giant-c-sacredsites.jpg) and yes... it's real ![[image loading]](http://www.sacred-destinations.com/england/images/cerne-abbas/giant/phallus-closeup-wp-pd-simon-garbutt.jpg) | ||
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
On April 01 2009 08:20 ihchulk wrote: Damn i loved that game. Wait I know this game, this is similar to contra right..? | ||
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Ozarugold
2716 Posts
Wow...that was...uh... Pink ranger was cute... | ||
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Luhh
Sweden2974 Posts
On April 03 2009 00:16 Infinity.SkyLark wrote: Wait I know this game, this is similar to contra right..? The Commodore Amiga was king back in the day! Turrican (especially Turrican II) was a real masterpiece | ||
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Blunderbore
Lithuania23 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.onemanfastbreak.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/michael_jordan.jpg) | ||
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Faronel
United States658 Posts
On April 01 2009 14:53 numberThirtyOne wrote: wtf that is epic. | ||
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OmgIRok
Taiwan2699 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img4.imageshack.us/img4/9194/24v3dro.jpg) Chris Brown certainly could. ![[image loading]](http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/8996/nicelol4qb0.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img68.imageshack.us/img68/264/kid1hr6.gif) YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA GUNZZZZZZZZZZZZ!!!!! EPIC. | ||
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Grobyc
Canada18410 Posts
On April 01 2009 16:02 LaughingTulkas wrote: and yes... it's real Awesome! My turn: ![[image loading]](http://i540.photobucket.com/albums/gg356/Grobyc_/1227411766964.jpg) And epic sharks!!!! ![[image loading]](http://i540.photobucket.com/albums/gg356/Grobyc_/1230453715045.jpg) Also, PANDAS GOING DOWN SLIDES! ![[image loading]](http://i540.photobucket.com/albums/gg356/Grobyc_/1238480798522.jpg) And KOOL-AID Man! ![[image loading]](http://i540.photobucket.com/albums/gg356/Grobyc_/1229918940423.jpg) CHARMANDER! ![[image loading]](http://i540.photobucket.com/albums/gg356/Grobyc_/aq1354424374_30175168_496.gif) AND THE EPIC N64 GAME: RAMPAGE: ![[image loading]](http://i540.photobucket.com/albums/gg356/Grobyc_/Image_6ZGuRK.jpg) | ||
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OmgIRok
Taiwan2699 Posts
Lol your icon went down to Drone! That's what you get for revealing the TL Icon Mod-exclusive secret formula algorithm that took centuries to form and code! | ||
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Grobyc
Canada18410 Posts
On April 03 2009 12:23 OmgIRok wrote: Lol your icon went down to Drone! That's what you get for revealing the TL Icon Mod-exclusive secret formula algorithm that took centuries to form and code! I don't want to have to have it forever. I editted my post and removed it if it makes any difference, it's not like the flying monkey completely cover up Bugz' profile anyway =/I easily copy pasted it even with the monkeys, why didn't he get his changed? ='( | ||
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Sadist
United States7219 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img16.imageshack.us/img16/4243/tigerwoodsq.jpg) | ||
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ccou
United States681 Posts
On March 24 2009 19:03 sperY wrote: Yes, truly epic! My contribution: ![[image loading]](http://www.coverbrowser.com/image/bestselling-sci-fi-fantasy-2006/1068-1.jpg) | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/6003/hereicomemotherfuckerss.gif) | ||
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
On April 03 2009 11:54 OmgIRok wrote: Lol I have 136. | ||
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hymn
Bulgaria832 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.truemetal.org/metalwallpaper/images/manowar.jpg) | ||
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BalliSLife
1339 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.gravesights.org/Funny%20tombstone05.jpg) | ||
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Hammy
France828 Posts
FAIL VIDEO Don't know how to embed, sorry : ) | ||
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hazz
United Kingdom570 Posts
you just type the url without any tags to embed | ||
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bburn
United States1039 Posts
On March 31 2009 10:45 OmgIRok wrote: Yes I just so didn't know about that song, and I made the picture that I posted from something that is not the youtube link posted by you. I actually got the picture to make the picture that I posted from the Youtube Thread and you just posted the video with no apparent reason, and the way I interpret it is that you wanted to show me something that you assumed I didn't know existed? I posted it cause your picture isn't very epic for those not familiar with the video? Chill out? | ||
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Archerofaiur
United States4101 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.curesa.com.ar/catalog/images/aqua_teen_hunger_force_colon_movie_film_for_theaters.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/8363/ultraliskii115454423.jpg) | ||
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R3condite
Korea (South)1541 Posts
![[image loading]](http://a52.g.akamaitech.net/f/52/827/1d/www.space.com/images/090404-chandra-nebula-02.jpg) | ||
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
CAN YOU BEAT HER? HAHAHAHAHHAHA | ||
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zulu_nation8
China26351 Posts
| ||
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Etherone
United States1898 Posts
lol and here i thought i was the only fucked up one who saw this | ||
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SilverskY
Korea (South)3086 Posts
LOL omg. | ||
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BlaCha
Poland743 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.retroisland.co.uk/Games/Amiga/Screenshots/Another_World_1.png) ![[image loading]](http://www.retroisland.co.uk/Games/PC/duke3d.jpg) | ||
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TimeShifter
Singapore235 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.hnd.usace.army.mil/pao/CEAInfo/Explosion%20Photo.JPG) epic shrapnel shot | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
anyone remember this? ![[image loading]](http://www.rxbbx.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/02/guatemala_sinkhole.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://neatorama.cachefly.net/images/2007-02/giant-sink-hole-guatemala.jpg) | ||
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Loanshark
China3094 Posts
On April 07 2009 17:21 BlaCha wrote: WHOA yeah Duke Nukem 3D!!! | ||
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kransekake
Norway24 Posts
the music. | ||
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AdunToridas
Germany380 Posts
![[image loading]](http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/jalopnik/2009/01/Darth-Vader_Ariel-Atom.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/jalopnik/2009/01/stormtrooper.jpg) | ||
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ShoCkeyy
7815 Posts
On April 07 2009 19:46 Bub wrote: Awesome shot, TimeShifter. anyone remember this? Well I saw the name of the jpeg but I remember something like this happened in florida once O.o | ||
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Zoler
Sweden6339 Posts
| ||
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QuoC
United States724 Posts
reminds me of that scene from "The Ruins" where the guy falls down the well when the rope breaks | ||
CaucasianAsian
Korea (South)11577 Posts
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RA
Latvia791 Posts
| ||
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ClockworkBlues
Canada74 Posts
| ||
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Pholon
Netherlands6142 Posts
| ||
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TimeShifter
Singapore235 Posts
this kind of music + the 1950s music + fallout landscape = epic goodness | ||
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lxginverse
Monaco1506 Posts
On March 23 2009 16:55 Hydrolisko wrote: ![[image loading]](http://i671.photobucket.com/albums/vv71/mgkmc/GIFS/AlbaLick.gif) | ||
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Xenixx
United States499 Posts
On April 03 2009 14:17 Bub wrote: Just made this gif from a great movie. Lets see if anyone knows what it is. event horizon | ||
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deathgod6
United States5064 Posts
lol XD | ||
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EGMachine
United States1643 Posts
On April 09 2009 19:46 Pholon wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_e4cHWS2758 i remember watching these, so cool lol | ||
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jgad
Canada899 Posts
| ||
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EAGER-beaver
Canada2799 Posts
On April 13 2009 06:21 jgad wrote: Epic Korean Megadeth fan. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Shj5AlPd_I8 Oh shit, that korean dude just won the thread, time to /close | ||
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DanceCommander
United States1808 Posts
loooooooooooooooooooooool wow | ||
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Xeofreestyler
Belgium6771 Posts
| ||
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Gray[FH
152 Posts
NOT BISU NO! | ||
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CubEdIn
Romania5359 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i329.photobucket.com/albums/l393/sivik_atl/aaaaaaa23kb9.gif) | ||
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jgad
Canada899 Posts
On April 13 2009 09:58 Xeofreestyler wrote: + Show Spoiler + http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VrogNec03Y That lot up there is bloody mangled as shit on X and vodka lol. Tragic zombies, hahah. Finns at it in the cold... | ||
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Jaeden
Romania1489 Posts
On April 13 2009 20:39 CubEdIn wrote: loool, Elisha, | ||
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Archaic
United States4024 Posts
On April 03 2009 11:54 OmgIRok wrote: Apparently Chris Brown can. | ||
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Deleted User 31060
3788 Posts
my god I would die if I ate pork brains | ||
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jgad
Canada899 Posts
That's not how zombies work, man. You've got to be dead first - then you eat brains. Pork Brains : For the humanitarian zombie™ | ||
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jgad
Canada899 Posts
On April 13 2009 20:39 CubEdIn wrote: As much as I want to say yes... it just seems wrong with this in my memory, lol. | ||
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CubEdIn
Romania5359 Posts
On April 13 2009 22:09 jgad wrote: As much as I want to say yes... it just seems wrong with this in my memory, lol. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TuIZgFP7xOY Watched it. Would still say yes in a nanosecond.+ Show Spoiler + now that those eyebrows are fixed | ||
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AdunToridas
Germany380 Posts
![[image loading]](http://jonflip.jo.funpic.de/Images/roadrunner01.gif) | ||
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uSiN
United States208 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h52/USiniSteR/Starcraft1337-1.jpg) | ||
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Terranist
United States2496 Posts
LOLOL oh my god that is hilarious. | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
On April 13 2009 20:39 CubEdIn wrote: "going to fuck me?" | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
fixed | ||
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LeperKahn
Romania1838 Posts
fixed | ||
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Jaeden
Romania1489 Posts
hahaha | ||
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Spenguin
Australia3316 Posts
fixed | ||
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renchak
209 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i586.photobucket.com/albums/ss310/gniluf/ninjabook.jpg) | ||
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MC9876
Netherlands82 Posts
On April 14 2009 22:08 renchak wrote: With such an title, it must be awesome. Makes me think of | ||
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AltaiR_
Korea (South)922 Posts
| ||
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Bond(i2)
Canada926 Posts
| ||
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Zoler
Sweden6339 Posts
fixed... oh wait! | ||
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Zoler
Sweden6339 Posts
fixed | ||
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sperY
Serbia444 Posts
Stop the spam in epic thread!!! | ||
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foldy
Latvia60 Posts
![[image loading]](http://historyofeconomics.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/back_to_the_future1.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img216.imageshack.us/img216/5573/9fallout2km5.jpg) | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
On April 15 2009 05:15 sperY wrote: Eat this chuck norris: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLO1YIWQuXE Stop the spam in epic thread!!! what movie is this? | ||
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baal
10540 Posts
On April 13 2009 09:58 Xeofreestyler wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VrogNec03Y holy shit, russians cant dance. i lov raves so much heres one heavier: | ||
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HeaDStrong
Scotland785 Posts
double drops, lol! | ||
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Mascherano
Argentina1726 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v348/dragona/1207192702_hwang4.gif) | ||
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sperY
Serbia444 Posts
I have no idea sorry. ![[image loading]](http://dereklieu.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/snatch.jpg) | ||
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Chuiu
3470 Posts
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=bruce lee and chuck norris movie | ||
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sperY
Serbia444 Posts
| ||
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XoXiDe
United States620 Posts
On April 15 2009 00:48 Bond(i2) wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bsXOcK9_Cw awesome thanks for posting this, one of my fav bands | ||
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XoXiDe
United States620 Posts
| ||
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Tyrant
Korea (South)234 Posts
On March 21 2009 20:52 Beyonder wrote: The most enjoying game ever for me :D Looks like a huge pile of cat shit. | ||
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lokiM
United States3407 Posts
On April 15 2009 09:40 XoXiDe wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7P1z28mCwI LOL I HAVEN'T SEEN THIS IN YEARS | ||
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Leath
Canada1724 Posts
| ||
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Pholon
Netherlands6142 Posts
![[image loading]](http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3540/3416272123_f4b352324a.jpg?v=0) This was found in deep space. Some think it's the hand of God... | ||
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ktp
United States797 Posts
| ||
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Kennigit
Canada19447 Posts
| ||
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s.a.y
Croatia3840 Posts
On April 15 2009 23:24 Kennigit wrote: Who do you think invented fapping....intelligent design yo lol. http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/michael_shermer_on_believing_strange_things.html | ||
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MagisterMan
Sweden525 Posts
On April 15 2009 08:41 Mascherano wrote: oh my god | ||
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Kennelie
United States2296 Posts
The car model bitch seems so embarrassed dancing though. | ||
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shimmy
Poland997 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v643/wanboa/ParkEunKyung.gif) | ||
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baal
10540 Posts
On April 15 2009 23:03 Pholon wrote: Love the Turtles one <3 This was found in deep space. Some think it's the hand of God... retards do | ||
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EGMachine
United States1643 Posts
LOL | ||
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Fontong
United States6454 Posts
yeah everyone knows that God wouldn't have two fucking thumbs | ||
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LeperKahn
Romania1838 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img12.imageshack.us/img12/9587/1239130345994.jpg) | ||
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Whyzguy
Canada263 Posts
I love how everyone has these Race Queen gif's readily available. Not complaining, just saying. | ||
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fanatacist
10319 Posts
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BalliSLife
1339 Posts
![[image loading]](http://cdn-www.cracked.com/phpimages/craptions/3/303_450x370.jpg) The winning craption from cracked "Sun Pak, we've placed 5 beers in front of you. And just beyond them is a headset for playing Starcraft. On a scale of 1 to 5 which would you prefe---Holy Shit!" | ||
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omfghi2u2
United States831 Posts
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Etherone
United States1898 Posts
On April 16 2009 16:32 omfghi2u2 wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBKLjgZOMCg&feature=related RATATATATATATATA XDXDXD WTF | ||
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Bob123
Korea (North)259 Posts
On April 16 2009 18:03 Etherone wrote: + Show Spoiler + On April 16 2009 16:32 omfghi2u2 wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBKLjgZOMCg&feature=related RATATATATATATATA XDXDXD WTF What the hell :D | ||
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Telemako
Spain1636 Posts
On April 16 2009 18:03 Etherone wrote: + Show Spoiler + On April 16 2009 16:32 omfghi2u2 wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBKLjgZOMCg&feature=related RATATATATATATATA XDXDXD WTF He is Andrés Montes, Spanish Comentator. Has a lot of "quotes" like that (most of them have no translation to english and the joke will be missed), RATATATA is one of them for 3 point shoots (mimicking a machine gun). He is now comentating spanish football, having so much lovers as haters. | ||
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HeaDStrong
Scotland785 Posts
On April 16 2009 16:32 omfghi2u2 wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBKLjgZOMCg&feature=related thats how starcraft should be commentated, like when marines fight just go "RATATATATATATATA!!" | ||
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Zoler
Sweden6339 Posts
On April 16 2009 13:36 BalliSLife wrote: The winning craption from cracked "Sun Pak, we've placed 5 beers in front of you. And just beyond them is a headset for playing Starcraft. On a scale of 1 to 5 which would you prefe---Holy Shit!" HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHA damn you made me spit out my water all over the screen | ||
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Manit0u
Poland17249 Posts
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Chuiu
3470 Posts
http://www.jakemandell.com/tonedeaf/ And got 83.3%, I'm above the curve of people in terms of being able to hear differences. | ||
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i43.tinypic.com/4izhic.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.gifbin.com/bin/1239023209_car-show-chick.gif) ![[image loading]](http://img4.imageshack.us/img4/8194/park.gif) and I can squeeze these in... + Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b400/matlock85/cutie.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b400/matlock85/cleavageandsmile7.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b400/matlock85/Youko20aka20Yoko20Matsugane20-20Hug.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b400/matlock85/9948f7649c9d7a420c3a855ecb2e6ccc.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b400/matlock85/boobs.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b400/matlock85/new5.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b400/matlock85/new3.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b400/matlock85/new7.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b400/matlock85/new1.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b400/matlock85/new4.gif) ![[image loading]](http://www.forumammo.com/cpg/albums/userpics/10062/boobies.gif) | ||
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arb
Noobville17921 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x96/1d0un/SurpriseAttacks.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x96/1d0un/30percentpa3.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x96/1d0un/knifefight.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x96/1d0un/30362mc4sa.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x96/1d0un/birdshiteditrf9.jpg) | ||
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Equinox_kr
United States7395 Posts
took the picture right when the bird started dropping bombs ugh | ||
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Kennelie
United States2296 Posts
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YunhOLee
Canada2470 Posts
On April 16 2009 13:36 BalliSLife wrote: The winning craption from cracked "Sun Pak, we've placed 5 beers in front of you. And just beyond them is a headset for playing Starcraft. On a scale of 1 to 5 which would you prefe---Holy Shit!" rofl, that was gold. | ||
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KnightOfNi
United States1508 Posts
On March 24 2009 09:21 inlagdsil wrote: I know nothing about pokemon. Can someone "translate" this please? While I was playing team [fortress] 2 I took a [chansey] and decided to screw my friends sister. He knew I wanted to do it and told me take it [slowbro]. She was beautiful, I went on to [gible] all over her [two milktanks]. I told her that I liked it and she responded [mewtwo]. I pulled her panties to [lickilicky] all over her [skitty]. Even though it was [stunky] and filled with [muk], I quiet enjoyed it. I was time to ask her if she was ready. She replied [wynaut]? So I pulled out my [wurmple] when I heard something [exploud]! I woke up and realized it's just a dream. [manaphy] tired, I need some energy drinks. LOL. | ||
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arb
Noobville17921 Posts
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KnightOfNi
United States1508 Posts
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XoXiDe
United States620 Posts
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jgad
Canada899 Posts
![[image loading]](http://xs138.xs.to/xs138/09164/hanbang656.jpg) | ||
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XoXiDe
United States620 Posts
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OmgIRok
Taiwan2699 Posts
On April 03 2009 11:54 OmgIRok wrote: Chris Brown certainly could. HAHA YEAH IM SO FUNNY WOOT! wow it sucks how no1 read the caption, and inc figured it out first,,,,,, =[ i feel so... ignored ....... T_T | ||
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ZeeTemplar
United States557 Posts
On April 17 2009 12:40 OmgIRok wrote: HAHA YEAH IM SO FUNNY WOOT! wow it sucks how no1 read the caption, and inc figured it out first,,,,,, =[ i feel so... ignored ....... T_T we seen it..just yeah ignored it :p | ||
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OmgIRok
Taiwan2699 Posts
On April 03 2009 12:52 Sadist wrote: oh shit i just noticed, SHORYUKEN!? | ||
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jgad
Canada899 Posts
TIGER UPPERCUT! | ||
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
I loled hard on the mutalisk pic. | ||
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DarkYoDA
United States1347 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img4.imageshack.us/my.php?image=boogle.jpg) | ||
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Faraday
United States553 Posts
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cYaN
Norway3322 Posts
What game is this? reminds me of warriors of the eternal sun, which was pretty cool. | ||
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Railxp
Hong Kong1313 Posts
On April 16 2009 18:03 Etherone wrote: + Show Spoiler + On April 16 2009 16:32 omfghi2u2 wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBKLjgZOMCg&feature=related RATATATATATATATA XDXDXD WTF ![[image loading]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v393/Rail/RaTaTa.jpg) | ||
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Manit0u
Poland17249 Posts
On April 16 2009 22:52 Chuiu wrote: ^ I loved the ending to Cowboy Bebop That was episode 5 of 26 -.-; | ||
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
![[image loading]](http://thegamergene.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/pokemon-politics-obama-hilary.gif) nuff said. | ||
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deathgod6
United States5064 Posts
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.lolwut.com/pics/pokemon.gif) ![[image loading]](http://humorbeast.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/boxofrape.jpg) + Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://humorbeast.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/futility.jpg<br>[img]http://humorbeast.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/tos-1buratin.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://humorbeast.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/failatfailing.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://humorbeast.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/drivemecloser.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://humorbeast.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/choices.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://humorbeast.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/batmanbinsuparman.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://humorbeast.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/pikachuvagina.jpg) Uhm can we make a rule here to use the spoiler tags when we quote someone that has pics in his/her posts? Cuz that makes things a lot easier to load....^^ | ||
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Patriot.dlk
Sweden5462 Posts
this closed thread is fucking epic http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=91862 You can pretty much read two posts and then just read all posts by vGl-CoW | ||
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Makhno
Sweden585 Posts
On April 23 2009 06:02 Patriot.dlk wrote: HAHAHA this closed thread is fucking epic http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=91862 You can pretty much read two posts and then just read all posts by vGl-CoW Lool, CoW is so awesome, I love that humour. Thanks for sharing man, really appreciated! | ||
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aeronexus
United States392 Posts
![[image loading]](http://assassin.chayuld.googlepages.com/tankrush.jpg) | ||
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Bob123
Korea (North)259 Posts
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Railz
United States1449 Posts
On April 23 2009 15:50 aeronexus wrote: America totally Double Factory timing pushed that. | ||
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hymn
Bulgaria832 Posts
On April 23 2009 16:25 Railz wrote: America totally Double Factory timing pushed that. Looked like a Terran vs Terran where America had Tanks and Wraiths and the other T had only marines and bunkers. | ||
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Railz
United States1449 Posts
On April 23 2009 16:37 hymn wrote: Looked like a Terran vs Terran where America had Tanks and Wraiths and the other T had only marines and bunkers. If Boxer was the other Terran, then America would've been fucked. Unless we had Oov as Defense Secretary. :O | ||
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TimeShifter
Singapore235 Posts
![[image loading]](http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/kotaku/2009/04/pspslide.jpg) According to Pocket Gamer, who cite a developer working on the hardware, an all-new PlayStation Portable will be out and on store shelves before Christmas. Yup. Two thumbsticks. Finally. -Kotaku Tue Apr 7 2009, http://kotaku.com/5201591/new-psp-due-before-christmas looks epic | ||
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sperY
Serbia444 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.gearcrave.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/youtube-addict.jpg) This one is long. (not cat, sorry) + Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://www.pichost.nl/uploads/9e03f24417.jpg) | ||
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
On April 23 2009 06:02 Patriot.dlk wrote: HAHAHA this closed thread is fucking epic http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=91862 You can pretty much read two posts and then just read all posts by vGl-CoW Oh God rayne, hahahaha. | ||
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tomatriedes
New Zealand5356 Posts
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Pholon
Netherlands6142 Posts
On April 25 2009 11:54 sperY wrote: Very nice: xkcd store: Actual Size Stickers ![[image loading]](http://imgs.xkcd.com/store/imgs/actual_size_200.png) This sticker pack contains 15 'Actual Size!' stickers, five each of 1", 2", and 3" stickers. 80% of public advertisements would be greatly improved by an 'actual size!' claim, from 8.5x11 "Regina Spektor Live In Concert!" flyers to ten-foot PS3 banners to airline ads in the subway with pictures of 747s. You know what to do. The stickers are a matte finish that blends in pretty well with anything, and they are removable if necessary. | ||
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konadora
Singapore66158 Posts
On March 25 2009 10:04 FConnectionUK wrote: EPIC THREADDDDDDDDDDD http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=37529 http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=37349 http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=38989 http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=44044 My god, those are so damn epic. | ||
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sperY
Serbia444 Posts
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SweeTLemonS[TPR]
11739 Posts
On April 16 2009 18:03 Etherone wrote: + Show Spoiler + On April 16 2009 16:32 omfghi2u2 wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBKLjgZOMCg&feature=related RATATATATATATATA XDXDXD WTF Foreign commentators are so much better than the guys that we have. Their so much less refined, so you get such raw emotion from them. I love foreign commentators. | ||
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SweeTLemonS[TPR]
11739 Posts
On April 23 2009 06:28 Makhno wrote: Lool, CoW is so awesome, I love that humour. Thanks for sharing man, really appreciated! Omg, Cow's posts were way too funny. But what is this from? yo momma's so fat because she overeats and has diabetes. It's a very, very tragic situation, and her poverty prevents her from getting treatment or bariatric surgery. Consequently, she's been living her life ostracized and unwanted, under fear that her weight will bring her ridicule. May God give you to search for your children with a Geiger counter | ||
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Etherone
United States1898 Posts
On April 27 2009 13:42 paper wrote: + Show Spoiler [shinbi's wall-o-text] + On April 27 2009 13:38 JeeJee wrote: fucking testie after that game i swear to god i'm gonna let you have it;alksj fksdfj;sal;'fk;gkl;djsl' Anyway. Mr. Nick "MYM.Testie" Perentesis's hastily mounted campaigns are so rife with ignorance, erroneous information, and poorly conceived notions of feudalism that I hardly know where to begin. Even disregarding obvious errors like his insistence that embracing a system of onanism will make everything right with the world, the fallacies of his claims are glaring to those of us who have educated ourselves about the implications of denominationalism. Wait! Before you dismiss me as disingenuous, hear me out. While some information provided by Nick's apostles may be factual, other material is unsubstantiated rumor or virulent bons mots. If anything, I despise everything about Nick. I despise Nick's attempts to equip slovenly psychopaths with flame throwers, hand grenades, and heat-seeking missiles. I despise how he insists that he has a "special" perspective on cameralism that carries with it a "special" right to drag men out of their beds in the dead of night and castrate them. Most of all, I despise his complete obliviousness to the fact that if you think that he is a paragon of morality and wisdom, then think again. When I say that Nick's jokes are snappish, I mean it. I don't mean that they remind me of something snappish or that they have one or two snappish characteristics. I mean that they are snappish. In fact, the most snappish thing about them is the way that they prevent people from seeing that if they could speak, the birds, snakes, and other creatures who are our Earth brothers and Earth sisters would definitely say that Nick's adherents actually believe the bunkum they're always mouthing. That's because these types of corrupt franions are idealistic, have no sense of history or human nature, and they think that what they're doing will improve the world quicker than you can double-check the spelling of "phenolsulphonephthalein". In reality, of course, Nick contends that all any child needs is a big dose of television every day. Sounds rather tendentious, doesn't it? Well, that's Nick for you. Nick is squarely in favor of absenteeism and its propensity to grant voluble liars and cheats the keys to the kingdom. This is so typical of Nick: he condemns bigotry and injustice except when it benefits him personally. He makes a lot of exaggerated claims. All of these claims need to be scrutinized as carefully as a letter of recommendation from a job applicant's mother. Consider, for example, Nick's claim that his adages are Holy Writ. The fact of the matter is that you might have heard the story that he once agreed to help us wage war on obstructionism. No one has located the document in which Nick said that. No one has identified when or where Nick said that. That's because he never said it. As you might have suspected, some people think I'm exaggerating when I say that Nick's provocateurs seem to be caught up in their need for enemies. But I'm not exaggerating; if anything, I'm understating the situation. A study of ridiculous lackwits indicates broad political and ideological agreement on the use of force combined with a set of simple tactics to achieve their immediate goal: to destroy that which is the envy of—and model for—the entire civilized world. And if you think that science is merely a tool invented by the current elite to maintain power, then you aren't thinking very clearly. Is this anything other than myopic demagogism? The answer is obvious if you happen to notice that my dream is for tired eyes to open and see clearly, broken spirits to find new energy, and weary arms to find the strength to answer the juvenile knee-biters who uproot our very heritage and pave the way for Nick's own unprincipled value system. Nick is doing everything in his power to make me develop an eating disorder. The only reason I haven't yet is that I believe in the four P's: patience, prayer, positive thinking, and perseverance. Continue to appease him, and Nick will sincerely pilfer the national treasure. He proclaims at every opportunity that he'd never sue people at random. The gentleman doth protest too much, methinks. He argues that I am disgraceful for wanting to embrace the cause of self-determination and recognize the leading role and clearer understanding of those people for whom the quintessential struggle is an encompassing liberation movement against the totality of quislingism. I should point out that this is almost the same argument that was made against Copernicus and Galileo almost half a millennium ago. Nick is thoroughly loud. We all are, to some extent, but he sets the curve. Please forgive my directness, but an armed revolt against him is morally justified. However, I maintain that it is not yet strategically justified. Not to put too fine a point on it but Nick's arguments would be a lot more effective if they were at least accurate or intelligent, not just a load of bull for the sake of being controversial. I attribute the social and psychological problems of modern society to the fact that I am morally and ethically opposed to Nick's bait-and-switch tactics. Do I blame society for this? No, I blame Nick. My prediction that he would ignite a maelstrom of charlatanism came true so quickly, so brutally, so horribly, that even I was stunned by the magnitude and viciousness of it all. Far too many people tolerate his conclusions as long as they're presented in small, seemingly harmless doses. What these people fail to realize, however, is that Nick preaches tolerance yet actively refuses to tolerate views that differ from his own. Let me express that same thought in slightly different terms: Careerism is, at its core, an ultra-subversive system that seeks to ridicule the accomplishments of generations of great men and women. That's pretty transparent. What's not so transparent is the answer to the following question: Why can't Nick simply enjoy the fruits of his own labors and let other people enjoy the fruits of theirs? A clue might be that Nick focuses on feelings rather than facts. Sure, he attempts to twist and distort facts to justify his feelings but that just goes to show that Nick has been trying to convince us that the kids on the playground are happy to surrender to the school bully. This pathetic attempt to consign our traditional values to the rubbish heap of exhibitionism deserves no comment other than to say that the gloss that Nick's patsies put on Nick's solutions unfortunately does little to build a world overflowing with compassion and tolerance. Nick's methods are much subtler now than ever before. Nick is more adept at hidden mind control and his techniques of social brainwash are much more appealingly streamlined and homogenized. This is not wild speculation. This is not a conspiracy theory. This is documented fact. Nick is just making a mug of himself when he says that we can stop irrationalism merely by permitting government officials entrée into private homes to search for beer-guzzling bozos, and everyone with half a brain understands that. Although he has never read carefully anything I've written, if you're not part of the solution then you're part of the problem. Nick likes to seem smarter than he really is. It therefore always amuses me whenever he cracks open a thesaurus, aims for intellectualism, misses, and lands squarely in a puddle of scabrous frippery. It would stand to reason that he often argues that his flighty terrorist organization is a benign and charitable agency. A similar argument was first made over 1200 years ago by a well-known bigamist and was quickly disproved. In those days, however, no one would have doubted that I've managed to come up with a way in which Nick's essays could be made useful. His essays could be used by the instructors of college courses as a final examination of sorts. Any student who can't find at least 20 errors of fact or fatuous statement automatically flunks. Extra credit goes to students who realize that Nick is typical of sinister lotharios in his wild invocations to the irrational, the magic, and the fantastic to dramatize his plaints. I don't know what sort of abuse Nick was subjected to as a child that made him such a barbaric sewer rat but I do know that we cannot afford to waste our time, resources, and energy by dwelling upon inequities of the past. Instead, we must protect innocent, little children from mindless administrators like Nick. Doing so would be significantly easier if more people were to understand that Nick's biases are built on lies and they depend on make-believe for their continuation. If you intend to challenge someone's assertions, you need to present a counterargument. He provides none. In conclusion, let me just say that we are now stuck with a besotted paternalism bearing a human face—that of Nick "MYM.Testie" Perentesis. + Show Spoiler [tl;dr] + testie is gayz | ||
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CubEdIn
Romania5359 Posts
Shinbee: You were only intel and didn't buy chicken? | ||
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
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Typho0n
Canada276 Posts
this is how real men fight.... lol so cheesy but sooo epic! watch how the guy dies at the end | ||
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CubEdIn
Romania5359 Posts
On April 27 2009 15:13 Typho0n wrote: this is how real men fight.... lol so cheesy but sooo epic! watch how the guy dies at the end I like how the evil dude uses the cool kicks and punches vs the guy, but when the chick comes he chokes and pushes her. PIMP much? Talk about misogyny. | ||
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Faraday
United States553 Posts
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Jiiks
Finland487 Posts
On April 24 2009 23:20 TimeShifter wrote: i didnt see anyone post it here yet: looks epic If it looks like that im so buying one. | ||
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Shuffleus
Australia764 Posts
Dinosaur not included. | ||
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Kennelie
United States2296 Posts
) will be. | ||
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ragnasaur
United States804 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img79.imageshack.us/my.php?image=atatfalconpwnagefotozap.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img57.imageshack.us/my.php?image=1337cereal.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img527.imageshack.us/my.php?image=megamouthshark02.jpg) | ||
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HeavOnEarth
United States7087 Posts
"overclock your breakfast" | ||
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Perguvious
United States1783 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i114.photobucket.com/albums/n247/iliketosmile117/obama.jpg) | ||
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Pholon
Netherlands6142 Posts
The woman is saying: And here is the bedroom, with.... the follow-up/spoof by Bavaria (another beer brand) and the follow-up by, again, Heineken | ||
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CubEdIn
Romania5359 Posts
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ZoW
United States3983 Posts
![[image loading]](http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/staticfiles/NGS/Shared/StaticFiles/Photography/Images/Content/highway-rainbow-nicklen-696533-sw.jpg) + Show Spoiler [Semi NSFW] + | ||
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jgad
Canada899 Posts
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CubEdIn
Romania5359 Posts
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ZoW
United States3983 Posts
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KOFgokuon
United States14893 Posts
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Perguvious
United States1783 Posts
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Piste
6175 Posts
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400lb White Girl
United States83 Posts
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
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400lb White Girl
United States83 Posts
"or anything else that seems epic to you (doesn't necessarily have to be pictures)." | ||
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DoX.)
Singapore6164 Posts
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FragKrag
United States11552 Posts
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OmgIRok
Taiwan2699 Posts
On May 18 2009 14:22 400lb White Girl wrote: wonderful. "or anything else that seems epic to you (doesn't necessarily have to be pictures)." hahah 400lb white girl epic name | ||
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wishbones
Canada2600 Posts
On May 18 2009 14:26 DoX.) wrote: lol this thread is win Yeah this is win, gave me semething to do for thirty minutes. Search for epicness, and be epic! 1+ Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://www.austinchronicle.com/binary/f50d/screens_feature-39345.jpeg) 2+ Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://blog.newsok.com/newsroom/files/2008/01/cap34r.jpg) 3+ Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://z.about.com/d/movies/1/0/J/b/O/epicmovieposter.jpg) 4+ Show Spoiler + 5+ Show Spoiler + 6+ Show Spoiler + 7+ Show Spoiler + 8-Lol+ Show Spoiler + 9-Super Epic+ Show Spoiler + | ||
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snorlax
United States755 Posts
dick cannonz? | ||
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pangshai
Chinatown5333 Posts
On April 17 2009 19:14 SilverSkyLark wrote: omg that guy's from my country. | ||
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D10
Brazil3409 Posts
The briefer was working down the list, and reached the next item, which he read: "...and terrorists bombs yesterday killed 3 Brazilian men..." "Oh God, no!", W cried, and he jumped up, then slumped into his chair, hung his head in his hands. The staff, startled by his reaction, waited for him to recover. Finally he looked up. "So", he said, "tell me again: how many is a brizillion?" ![[image loading]](http://www.rockcitynews.com/photos2/antibushwar2/images/ape-bush.jpg) | ||
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Last.Midnight
Australia903 Posts
On March 20 2009 08:34 lesser_good wrote: i loled... fuck i hate it how rappers totally gave the word epic a new meaning does the dude in the middle seriously have binoculars? | ||
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Last.Midnight
Australia903 Posts
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Nitrogen
United States5345 Posts
On May 18 2009 21:41 Last.Midnight wrote: does the dude in the middle seriously have binoculars? nigga, i can see really far | ||
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konadora
Singapore66158 Posts
That pic was around quite long already | ||
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BookTwo
1985 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.hispanianews.com/archive/2003/04/11/yanni.jpg) | ||
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Zoler
Sweden6339 Posts
On May 18 2009 16:24 wishbones wrote: Yeah this is win, gave me semething to do for thirty minutes. Search for epicness, and be epic! 1+ Show Spoiler + 2+ Show Spoiler + 3+ Show Spoiler + 4+ Show Spoiler + http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCMVy6RRFl4 5+ Show Spoiler + http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbX_h3xoBS4&feature=related 6+ Show Spoiler + http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztbKQFerCHE 7+ Show Spoiler + http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUl5wYOoF4Q&feature=PlayList&p=3AAF2919F5B9A9AC&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=40 8-Lol+ Show Spoiler + http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYxiRrzxvMg 9-Super Epic+ Show Spoiler + Holy shit @ #9. I would seriously kill that reporter lol | ||
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
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sperY
Serbia444 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i121.photobucket.com/albums/o230/Gym_Warrior/1109_final_biggest_crap.jpg?t=1242663866) | ||
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Equinox_kr
United States7395 Posts
On May 19 2009 01:25 sperY wrote: Yes enough with videos, More pictures! LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL | ||
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Leath
Canada1724 Posts
On March 20 2009 08:34 lesser_good wrote: i loled... fuck i hate it how rappers totally gave the word epic a new meaning If the new meaning is 'goofy', then I agree. | ||
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FragKrag
United States11552 Posts
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konadora
Singapore66158 Posts
On May 19 2009 09:03 FragKrag wrote: haha i love Fixed. | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
![[image loading]](http://viviansalama.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/theworlddubai.jpg) Crazy ass arabs. | ||
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LeperKahn
Romania1838 Posts
On May 21 2009 04:39 Bub wrote: Crazy ass arabs. That looks so cool! If it was bigger I'd make it my desktop! | ||
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aZnvaLiaNce
United States942 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img374.imageshack.us/img374/5706/differentlevelsofphilosag3.jpg) Proof that we are getting dumber and dumber | ||
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SojT
United States789 Posts
On May 21 2009 11:49 aZnvaLiaNce wrote: Proof that we are getting dumber and dumber hahahaa wow!! this wins the thread, hands down :D | ||
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zizou21
United States3683 Posts
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PH
United States6173 Posts
On May 21 2009 11:49 aZnvaLiaNce wrote: Proof that we are getting dumber and dumber They're all valid questions up 'til lil' John, tho... | ||
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sperY
Serbia444 Posts
![[image loading]](http://media.fukung.net/images/8678/ed4178da7214207094cbd3d29e6889bc.gif) + Show Spoiler [NSFW] + | ||
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MiniRoman
Canada3953 Posts
Tried to find a video/audio clip but laziness bested me after google + youtube failed. ""Shut your fat ass, Rayvie! I can't buy a pack of smokes without runnin' into nine guys you fucked!" <--- Epic line from Boondock Saints | ||
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538
Hungary3932 Posts
On May 21 2009 04:53 LeperKahn wrote: dude. its 5 square kms.That looks so cool! If it was bigger I'd make it my desktop! | ||
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KnightOfNi
United States1508 Posts
On May 21 2009 04:39 Bub wrote: Crazy ass arabs. I actually did my high school graduation project (Senior Exit) on the palm islands. MOST KICK ASS PROJECT EVER. | ||
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orca
Israel469 Posts
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Leath
Canada1724 Posts
I think he meant the image lol | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i44.tinypic.com/5cga9y.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://i41.tinypic.com/w9fmn8.jpg) | ||
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ghermination
United States2851 Posts
On May 24 2009 01:06 orca wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6mXfFTOxbM dont mess with black people. | ||
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Lefnui
United States753 Posts
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number1gog
United States1081 Posts
Lol nicely done, sir. Nicely done. You sure showed him. | ||
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Ghardo
Germany1685 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img29.imageshack.us/img29/7371/epicg.jpg) | ||
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SK.Testie
Canada11084 Posts
On May 28 2009 04:40 number1gog wrote: Lol nicely done, sir. Nicely done. You sure showed him. How is it square KMs? It's clearly a circle. | ||
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Kennigit
Canada19447 Posts
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Kennigit
Canada19447 Posts
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paper
13196 Posts
On May 28 2009 05:27 MYM.Testie wrote: How is it square KMs? It's clearly a circle. you're a square. | ||
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Mr.Pyro
Denmark959 Posts
On May 28 2009 05:27 MYM.Testie wrote: How is it square KMs? It's clearly a circle. /facepalm | ||
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da_head
Canada3350 Posts
On May 28 2009 05:27 MYM.Testie wrote: How is it square KMs? It's clearly a circle. LOL | ||
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FuDDx
United States5008 Posts
Booo yahhhh!! Heres my epic pic of the week. ![[image loading]](http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y162/FuDDx/2008_0712homealone20008.jpg) | ||
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Kennigit
Canada19447 Posts
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bioboyAT
Austria1763 Posts
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stroggos
New Zealand1543 Posts
/facepalm | ||
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SK.Testie
Canada11084 Posts
5 circle KM's imo. | ||
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~Sexi Amy~
United States7 Posts
On May 28 2009 05:48 FuDDx wrote: Booo yahhhh!! Heres my epic pic of the week. Lol thats awesome! | ||
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Loanshark
China3094 Posts
No I think the area of the islands adds up to 5 km squared. | ||
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baal
10540 Posts
lol i was about to do the same thing, to facepalm his facepalm | ||
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Kennelie
United States2296 Posts
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ondik
Czech Republic2908 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img.aktualne.centrum.cz/235/65/2356557-bor.jpg) | ||
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afg-warrior
Afghanistan328 Posts
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statix
United States1760 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o83/calibanftw/117cxly.gif) | ||
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AdunToridas
Germany380 Posts
![[image loading]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e5/STS-114_Steve_Robinson_on_Canadarm2.jpg) | ||
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doktorLucifer
United States855 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img360.imageshack.us/img360/4050/guanyu.png) Epic is when Guan Yu arrives, and the soldiers bearing the golden shields make way for his entrance. Then he kills 4000 or so enemy soldiers. | ||
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Etherone
United States1898 Posts
On June 04 2009 17:12 Thesecretaznman wrote: Epic is when Guan Yu arrives, and the soldiers bearing the golden shields make way for his entrance. Then he kills 4000 or so enemy soldiers. if only they had something skill related in this game (series) i could bare to play it. | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
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Dylancool2
81 Posts
you do know Colbert is from Canada right? | ||
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paper
13196 Posts
u sure about that? lol | ||
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Dylancool2
81 Posts
Born in the US, Mother from Winnipeg, Father from Toronto. | ||
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knyttym
United States5797 Posts
read all the way through please. + Show Spoiler + So, there's a man crawling through the desert. He'd decided to try his SUV in a little bit of cross-country travel, had great fun zooming over the badlands and through the sand, got lost, hit a big rock, and then he couldn't get it started again. There were no cell phone towers anywhere near, so his cell phone was useless. He had no family, his parents had died a few years before in an auto accident, and his few friends had no idea he was out here. He stayed with the car for a day or so, but his one bottle of water ran out and he was getting thirsty. He thought maybe he knew the direction back, now that he'd paid attention to the sun and thought he'd figured out which way was north, so he decided to start walking. He figured he only had to go about 30 miles or so and he'd be back to the small town he'd gotten gas in last. He thinks about walking at night to avoid the heat and sun, but based upon how dark it actually was the night before, and given that he has no flashlight, he's afraid that he'll break a leg or step on a rattlesnake. So, he puts on some sun block, puts the rest in his pocket for reapplication later, brings an umbrella he'd had in the back of the SUV with him to give him a little shade, pours the windshield wiper fluid into his water bottle in case he gets that desperate, brings his pocket knife in case he finds a cactus that looks like it might have water in it, and heads out in the direction he thinks is right. He walks for the entire day. By the end of the day he's really thirsty. He's been sweating all day, and his lips are starting to crack. He's reapplied the sunblock twice, and tried to stay under the umbrella, but he still feels sunburned. The windshield wiper fluid sloshing in the bottle in his pocket is really getting tempting now. He knows that it's mainly water and some ethanol and coloring, but he also knows that they add some kind of poison to it to keep people from drinking it. He wonders what the poison is, and whether the poison would be worse than dying of thirst. He pushes on, trying to get to that small town before dark. By the end of the day he starts getting worried. He figures he's been walking at least 3 miles an hour, according to his watch for over 10 hours. That means that if his estimate was right that he should be close to the town. But he doesn't recognize any of this. He had to cross a dry creek bed a mile or two back, and he doesn't remember coming through it in the SUV. He figures that maybe he got his direction off just a little and that the dry creek bed was just off to one side of his path. He tells himself that he's close, and that after dark he'll start seeing the town lights over one of these hills, and that'll be all he needs. As it gets dim enough that he starts stumbling over small rocks and things, he finds a spot and sits down to wait for full dark and the town lights. Full dark comes before he knows it. He must have dozed off. He stands back up and turns all the way around. He sees nothing but stars. He wakes up the next morning feeling absolutely lousy. His eyes are gummy and his mouth and nose feel like they're full of sand. He so thirsty that he can't even swallow. He barely got any sleep because it was so cold. He'd forgotten how cold it got at night in the desert and hadn't noticed it the night before because he'd been in his car. He knows the Rule of Threes - three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food - then you die. Some people can make it a little longer, in the best situations. But the desert heat and having to walk and sweat isn't the best situation to be without water. He figures, unless he finds water, this is his last day. He rinses his mouth out with a little of the windshield wiper fluid. He waits a while after spitting that little bit out, to see if his mouth goes numb, or he feels dizzy or something. Has his mouth gone numb? Is it just in his mind? He's not sure. He'll go a little farther, and if he still doesn't find water, he'll try drinking some of the fluid. Then he has to face his next, harder question - which way does he go from here? Does he keep walking the same way he was yesterday (assuming that he still knows which way that is), or does he try a new direction? He has no idea what to do. Looking at the hills and dunes around him, he thinks he knows the direction he was heading before. Just going by a feeling, he points himself somewhat to the left of that, and starts walking. As he walks, the day starts heating up. The desert, too cold just a couple of hours before, soon becomes an oven again. He sweats a little at first, and then stops. He starts getting worried at that - when you stop sweating he knows that means you're in trouble - usually right before heat stroke. He decides that it's time to try the windshield wiper fluid. He can't wait any longer - if he passes out, he's dead. He stops in the shade of a large rock, takes the bottle out, opens it, and takes a mouthful. He slowly swallows it, making it last as long as he can. It feels so good in his dry and cracked throat that he doesn't even care about the nasty taste. He takes another mouthful, and makes it last too. Slowly, he drinks half the bottle. He figures that since he's drinking it, he might as well drink enough to make some difference and keep himself from passing out. He's quit worrying about the denaturing of the wiper fluid. If it kills him, it kills him - if he didn't drink it, he'd die anyway. Besides, he's pretty sure that whatever substance they denature the fluid with is just designed to make you sick - their way of keeping winos from buying cheap wiper fluid for the ethanol content. He can handle throwing up, if it comes to that. He walks. He walks in the hot, dry, windless desert. Sand, rocks, hills, dunes, the occasional scrawny cactus or dried bush. No sign of water. Sometimes he'll see a little movement to one side or the other, but whatever moved is usually gone before he can focus his eyes on it. Probably birds, lizards, or mice. Maybe snakes, though they usually move more at night. He's careful to stay away from the movements. After a while, he begins to stagger. He's not sure if it's fatigue, heat stroke finally catching him, or maybe he was wrong and the denaturing of the wiper fluid was worse than he thought. He tries to steady himself, and keep going. After more walking, he comes to a large stretch of sand. This is good! He knows he passed over a stretch of sand in the SUV - he remembers doing donuts in it. Or at least he thinks he remembers it - he's getting woozy enough and tired enough that he's not sure what he remembers any more or if he's hallucinating. But he thinks he remembers it. So he heads off into it, trying to get to the other side, hoping that it gets him closer to the town. He was heading for a town, wasn't he? He thinks he was. He isn't sure any more. He's not even sure how long he's been walking any more. Is it still morning? Or has it moved into afternoon and the sun is going down again? It must be afternoon - it seems like it's been too long since he started out. He walks through the sand. After a while, he comes to a big dune in the sand. This is bad. He doesn't remember any dunes when driving over the sand in his SUV. Or at least he doesn't think he remembers any. This is bad. But, he has no other direction to go. Too late to turn back now. He figures that he'll get to the top of the dune and see if he can see anything from there that helps him find the town. He keeps going up the dune. Halfway up, he slips in the bad footing of the sand for the second or third time, and falls to his knees. He doesn't feel like getting back up - he'll just fall down again. So, he keeps going up the dune on his hand and knees. While crawling, if his throat weren't so dry, he'd laugh. He's finally gotten to the hackneyed image of a man lost in the desert - crawling through the sand on his hands and knees. If would be the perfect image, he imagines, if only his clothes were more ragged. The people crawling through the desert in the cartoons always had ragged clothes. But his have lasted without any rips so far. Somebody will probably find his dessicated corpse half buried in the sand years from now, and his clothes will still be in fine shape - shake the sand out, and a good wash, and they'd be wearable again. He wishes his throat were wet enough to laugh. He coughs a little instead, and it hurts. He finally makes it to the top of the sand dune. Now that he's at the top, he struggles a little, but manages to stand up and look around. All he sees is sand. Sand, and more sand. Behind him, about a mile away, he thinks he sees the rocky ground he left to head into this sand. Ahead of him, more dunes, more sand. This isn't where he drove his SUV. This is Hell. Or close enough. Again, he doesn't know what to do. He decides to drink the rest of the wiper fluid while figuring it out. He takes out the bottle, and is removing the cap, when he glances to the side and sees something. Something in the sand. At the bottom of the dune, off to the side, he sees something strange. It's a flat area, in the sand. He stops taking the cap of the bottle off, and tries to look closer. The area seems to be circular. And it's dark - darker than the sand. And, there seems to be something in the middle of it, but he can't tell what it is. He looks as hard as he can, and still can tell from here. He's going to have to go down there and look. He puts the bottle back in his pocket, and starts to stumble down the dune. After a few steps, he realizes that he's in trouble - he's not going to be able to keep his balance. After a couple of more sliding, tottering steps, he falls and starts to roll down the dune. The sand it so hot when his body hits it that for a minute he thinks he's caught fire on the way down - like a movie car wreck flashing into flames as it goes over the cliff, before it ever even hits the ground. He closes his eyes and mouth, covers his face with his hands, and waits to stop rolling. He stops, at the bottom of the dune. After a minute or two, he finds enough energy to try to sit up and get the sand out of his face and clothes. When he clears his eyes enough, he looks around to make sure that the dark spot in the sand it still there and he hadn't just imagined it. So, seeing the large, flat, dark spot on the sand is still there, he begins to crawl towards it. He'd get up and walk towards it, but he doesn't seem to have the energy to get up and walk right now. He must be in the final stages of dehydration he figures, as he crawls. If this place in the sand doesn't have water, he'll likely never make it anywhere else. This is his last chance. He gets closer and closer, but still can't see what's in the middle of the dark area. His eyes won't quite focus any more for some reason. And lifting his head up to look takes so much effort that he gives up trying. He just keeps crawling. Finally, he reaches the area he'd seen from the dune. It takes him a minute of crawling on it before he realizes that he's no longer on sand - he's now crawling on some kind of dark stone. Stone with some kind of marking on it - a pattern cut into the stone. He's too tired to stand up and try to see what the pattern is - so he just keeps crawling. He crawls towards the center, where his blurry eyes still see something in the middle of the dark stone area. His mind, detached in a strange way, notes that either his hands and knees are so burnt by the sand that they no longer feel pain, or that this dark stone, in the middle of a burning desert with a pounding, punishing sun overhead, doesn't seem to be hot. It almost feels cool. He considers lying down on the nice cool surface. Cool, dark stone. Not a good sign. He must be hallucinating this. He's probably in the middle of a patch of sand, already lying face down and dying, and just imagining this whole thing. A desert mirage. Soon the beautiful women carrying pitchers of water will come up and start giving him a drink. Then he'll know he's gone. He decides against laying down on the cool stone. If he's going to die here in the middle of this hallucination, he at least wants to see what's in the center before he goes. He keeps crawling. It's the third time that he hears the voice before he realizes what he's hearing. He would swear that someone just said, "Greetings, traveler. You do not look well. Do you hear me?" He stops crawling. He tries to look up from where he is on his hands and knees, but it's too much effort to lift his head. So he tries something different - he leans back and tries to sit up on the stone. After a few seconds, he catches his balance, avoids falling on his face, sits up, and tries to focus his eyes. Blurry. He rubs his eyes with the back of his hands and tries again. Better this time. Yep. He can see. He's sitting in the middle of a large, flat, dark expanse of stone. Directly next to him, about three feet away, is a white post or pole about two inches in diameter and sticking up about four or five feet out of the stone, at an angle. And wrapped around this white rod, tail with rattle on it hovering and seeming to be ready to start rattling, is what must be a fifteen foot long desert diamondback rattlesnake, looking directly at him. He stares at the snake in shock. He doesn't have the energy to get up and run away. He doesn't even have the energy to crawl away. This is it, his final resting place. No matter what happens, he's not going to be able to move from this spot. Well, at least dying of a bite from this monster should be quicker than dying of thirst. He'll face his end like a man. He struggles to sit up a little straighter. The snake keeps watching him. He lifts one hand and waves it in the snake's direction, feebly. The snake watches the hand for a moment, then goes back to watching the man, looking into his eyes. Hmmm. Maybe the snake had no interest in biting him? It hadn't rattled yet - that was a good sign. Maybe he wasn't going to die of snake bite after all. He then remembers that he'd looked up when he'd reached the center here because he thought he'd heard a voice. He was still very woozy - he was likely to pass out soon, the sun still beat down on him even though he was now on cool stone. He still didn't have anything to drink. But maybe he had actually heard a voice. This stone didn't look natural. Nor did that white post sticking up out of the stone. Someone had to have built this. Maybe they were still nearby. Maybe that was who talked to him. Maybe this snake was even their pet, and that's why it wasn't biting. He tries to clear his throat to say, "Hello," but his throat is too dry. All that comes out is a coughing or wheezing sound. There is no way he's going to be able to talk without something to drink. He feels his pocket, and the bottle with the wiper fluid is still there. He shakily pulls the bottle out, almost losing his balance and falling on his back in the process. This isn't good. He doesn't have much time left, by his reckoning, before he passes out. He gets the lid off of the bottle, manages to get the bottle to his lips, and pours some of the fluid into his mouth. He sloshes it around, and then swallows it. He coughs a little. His throat feels better. Maybe he can talk now. He tries again. Ignoring the snake, he turns to look around him, hoping to spot the owner of this place, and croaks out, "Hello? Is there anyone here?" He hears, from his side, "Greetings. What is it that you want?" He turns his head, back towards the snake. That's where the sound had seemed to come from. The only thing he can think of is that there must be a speaker, hidden under the snake, or maybe built into that post. He decides to try asking for help. "Please," he croaks again, suddenly feeling dizzy, "I'd love to not be thirsty any more. I've been a long time without water. Can you help me?" Looking in the direction of the snake, hoping to see where the voice was coming from this time, he is shocked to see the snake rear back, open its mouth, and speak. He hears it say, as the dizziness overtakes him and he falls forward, face first on the stone, "Very well. Coming up." A piercing pain shoots through his shoulder. Suddenly he is awake. He sits up and grabs his shoulder, wincing at the throbbing pain. He's momentarily disoriented as he looks around, and then he remembers - the crawl across the sand, the dark area of stone, the snake. He sees the snake, still wrapped around the tilted white post, still looking at him. He reaches up and feels his shoulder, where it hurts. It feels slightly wet. He pulls his fingers away and looks at them - blood. He feels his shoulder again - his shirt has what feels like two holes in it - two puncture holes - they match up with the two aching spots of pain on his shoulder. He had been bitten. By the snake. "It'll feel better in a minute." He looks up - it's the snake talking. He hadn't dreamed it. Suddenly he notices - he's not dizzy any more. And more importantly, he's not thirsty any more - at all! "Have I died? Is this the afterlife? Why are you biting me in the afterlife?" "Sorry about that, but I had to bite you," says the snake. "That's the way I work. It all comes through the bite. Think of it as natural medicine." "You bit me to help me? Why aren't I thirsty any more? Did you give me a drink before you bit me? How did I drink enough while unconscious to not be thirsty any more? I haven't had a drink for over two days. Well, except for the windshield wiper fluid... hold it, how in the world does a snake talk? Are you real? Are you some sort of Disney animation?" "No," says the snake, "I'm real. As real as you or anyone is, anyway. I didn't give you a drink. I bit you. That's how it works - it's what I do. I bite. I don't have hands to give you a drink, even if I had water just sitting around here." The man sat stunned for a minute. Here he was, sitting in the middle of the desert on some strange stone that should be hot but wasn't, talking to a snake that could talk back and had just bitten him. And he felt better. Not great - he was still starving and exhausted, but much better - he was no longer thirsty. He had started to sweat again, but only slightly. He felt hot, in this sun, but it was starting to get lower in the sky, and the cool stone beneath him was a relief he could notice now that he was no longer dying of thirst. "I might suggest that we take care of that methanol you now have in your system with the next request," continued the snake. "I can guess why you drank it, but I'm not sure how much you drank, or how much methanol was left in the wiper fluid. That stuff is nasty. It'll make you go blind in a day or two, if you drank enough of it." "Ummm, n-next request?" said the man. He put his hand back on his hurting shoulder and backed away from the snake a little. "That's the way it works. If you like, that is," explained the snake. "You get three requests. Call them wishes, if you wish." The snake grinned at his own joke, and the man drew back a little further from the show of fangs. "But there are rules," the snake continued. "The first request is free. The second requires an agreement of secrecy. The third requires the binding of responsibility." The snake looks at the man seriously. "By the way," the snake says suddenly, "my name is Nathan. Old Nathan, Samuel used to call me. He gave me the name. Before that, most of the Bound used to just call me 'Snake'. But that got old, and Samuel wouldn't stand for it. He said that anything that could talk needed a name. He was big into names. You can call me Nate, if you wish." Again, the snake grinned. "Sorry if I don't offer to shake, but I think you can understand - my shake sounds somewhat threatening." The snake give his rattle a little shake. "Umm, my name is Jack," said the man, trying to absorb all of this. "Jack Samson. "Can I ask you a question?" Jack says suddenly. "What happened to the poison...umm, in your bite. Why aren't I dying now? How did you do that? What do you mean by that's how you work?" "That's more than one question," grins Nate. "But I'll still try to answer all of them. First, yes, you can ask me a question." The snake's grin gets wider. "Second, the poison is in you. It changed you. You now no longer need to drink. That's what you asked for. Or, well, technically, you asked to not be thirsty any more - but 'any more' is such a vague term. I decided to make it permanent - now, as long as you live, you shouldn't need to drink much at all. Your body will conserve water very efficiently. You should be able to get enough just from the food you eat - much like a creature of the desert. You've been changed. "For the third question," Nate continues, "you are still dying. Besides the effects of that methanol in your system, you're a man - and men are mortal. In your current state, I give you no more than about another 50 years. Assuming you get out of this desert, alive, that is." Nate seemed vastly amused at his own humor, and continued his wide grin. "As for the fourth question," Nate said, looking more serious as far as Jack could tell, as Jack was just now working on his ability to read talking-snake emotions from snake facial features, "first you have to agree to make a second request and become bound by the secrecy, or I can't tell you." "Wait," joked Jack, "isn't this where you say you could tell me, but you'd have to kill me?" "I thought that was implied." Nate continued to look serious. "Ummm...yeah." Jack leaned back a little as he remembered again that he was talking to a fifteen foot poisonous reptile with a reputation for having a nasty temper. "So, what is this 'Bound by Secrecy' stuff, and can you really stop the effects of the methanol?" Jack thought for a second. "And, what do you mean methanol, anyway? I thought these days they use ethanol in wiper fluid, and just denature it?" "They may, I don't really know," said Nate. "I haven't gotten out in a while. Maybe they do. All I know is that I smell methanol on your breath and on that bottle in your pocket. And the blue color of the liquid when you pulled it out to drink some let me guess that it was wiper fluid. I assume that they still color wiper fluid blue?" "Yeah, they do," said Jack. "I figured," replied Nate. "As for being bound by secrecy - with the fulfillment of your next request, you will be bound to say nothing about me, this place, or any of the information I will tell you after that, when you decide to go back out to your kind. You won't be allowed to talk about me, write about me, use sign language, charades, or even act in a way that will lead someone to guess correctly about me. You'll be bound to secrecy. Of course, I'll also ask you to promise not to give me away, and as I'm guessing that you're a man of your word, you'll never test the binding anyway, so you won't notice." Nate said the last part with utter confidence. Jack, who had always prided himself on being a man of his word, felt a little nervous at this. "Ummm, hey, Nate, who are you? How did you know that? Are you, umm, omniscient, or something?" Well, Jack," said Nate sadly, "I can't tell you that, unless you make the second request." Nate looked away for a minute, then looked back. "Umm, well, ok," said Jack, "what is this about a second request? What can I ask for? Are you allowed to tell me that?" "Sure!" said Nate, brightening. "You're allowed to ask for changes. Changes to yourself. They're like wishes, but they can only affect you. Oh, and before you ask, I can't give you immortality. Or omniscience. Or omnipresence, for that matter. Though I might be able to make you gaseous and yet remain alive, and then you could spread through the atmosphere and sort of be omnipresent. But what good would that be - you still wouldn't be omniscient and thus still could only focus on one thing at a time. Not very useful, at least in my opinion." Nate stopped when he realized that Jack was staring at him. "Well, anyway," continued Nate, "I'd probably suggest giving you permanent good health. It would negate the methanol now in your system, you'd be immune to most poisons and diseases, and you'd tend to live a very long time, barring accident, of course. And you'll even have a tendency to recover from accidents well. It always seemed like a good choice for a request to me." "Cure the methanol poisoning, huh?" said Jack. "And keep me healthy for a long time? Hmmm. It doesn't sound bad at that. And it has to be a request about a change to me? I can't ask to be rich, right? Because that's not really a change to me?" "Right," nodded Nate. "Could I ask to be a genius and permanently healthy?" Jack asked, hopefully. "That takes two requests, Jack." "Yeah, I figured so," said Jack. "But I could ask to be a genius? I could become the smartest scientist in the world? Or the best athlete?" "Well, I could make you very smart," admitted Nate, "but that wouldn't necessarily make you the best scientist in the world. Or, I could make you very athletic, but it wouldn't necessarily make you the best athlete either. You've heard the saying that 99% of genius is hard work? Well, there's some truth to that. I can give you the talent, but I can't make you work hard. It all depends on what you decide to do with it." "Hmmm," said Jack. "Ok, I think I understand. And I get a third request, after this one?" "Maybe," said Nate, "it depends on what you decide then. There are more rules for the third request that I can only tell you about after the second request. You know how it goes." Nate looked like he'd shrug, if he had shoulders. "Ok, well, since I'd rather not be blind in a day or two, and permanent health doesn't sound bad, then consider that my second request. Officially. Do I need to sign in blood or something?" "No," said Nate. "Just hold out your hand. Or heel." Nate grinned. "Or whatever part you want me to bite. I have to bite you again. Like I said, that's how it works - the poison, you know," Nate said apologetically. Jack winced a little and felt his shoulder, where the last bite was. Hey, it didn't hurt any more. Just like Nate had said. That made Jack feel better about the biting business. But still, standing still while a fifteen foot snake sunk it's fangs into you. Jack stood up. Ignoring how good it felt to be able to stand again, and the hunger starting to gnaw at his stomach, Jack tried to decide where he wanted to get bitten. Despite knowing that it wouldn't hurt for long, Jack knew that this wasn't going to be easy. "Hey, Jack," Nate suddenly said, looking past Jack towards the dunes behind him, "is that someone else coming up over there?" Jack spun around and looked. Who else could be out here in the middle of nowhere? And did they bring food? Wait a minute, there was nobody over there. What was Nate... Jack let out a bellow as he felt two fangs sink into his rear end, through his jeans... Jack sat down carefully, favoring his more tender buttock. "I would have decided, eventually, Nate. I was just thinking about it. You didn't have to hoodwink me like that." "I've been doing this a long time, Jack," said Nate, confidently. "You humans have a hard time sitting still and letting a snake bite you - especially one my size. And besides, admit it - it's only been a couple of minutes and it already doesn't hurt any more, does it? That's because of the health benefit with this one. I told you that you'd heal quickly now." "Yeah, well, still," said Jack, "it's the principle of the thing. And nobody likes being bitten in the butt! Couldn't you have gotten my calf or something instead?" "More meat in the typical human butt," replied Nate. "And less chance you accidentally kick me or move at the last second." "Yeah, right. So, tell me all of these wonderful secrets that I now qualify to hear," answered Jack. "Ok," said Nate. "Do you want to ask questions first, or do you want me to just start talking?" "Just talk," said Jack. "I'll sit here and try to not think about food." "We could go try to rustle up some food for you first, if you like," answered Nate. "Hey! You didn't tell me you had food around here, Nate!" Jack jumped up. "What do we have? Am I in walking distance to town? Or can you magically whip up food along with your other powers?" Jack was almost shouting with excitement. His stomach had been growling for hours. "I was thinking more like I could flush something out of its hole and bite it for you, and you could skin it and eat it. Assuming you have a knife, that is," replied Nate, with the grin that Jack was starting to get used to. "Ugh," said Jack, sitting back down. "I think I'll pass. I can last a little longer before I get desperate enough to eat desert rat, or whatever else it is you find out here. And there's nothing to burn - I'd have to eat it raw. No thanks. Just talk." "Ok," replied Nate, still grinning. "But I'd better hurry, before you start looking at me as food. Nate reared back a little, looked around for a second, and then continued. "You, Jack, are sitting in the middle of the Garden of Eden." Jack looked around at the sand and dunes and then looked back at Nate sceptically. "Well, that's the best I can figure it, anyway, Jack," said Nate. "Stand up and look at the symbol on the rock here." Nate gestured around the dark stone they were both sitting on with his nose. Jack stood up and looked. Carved into the stone in a bas-relief was a representation of a large tree. The angled-pole that Nate was wrapped around was coming out of the trunk of the tree, right below where the main branches left the truck to reach out across the stone. It was very well done - it looked more like a tree had been reduced to almost two dimensions and embedded in the stone than it did like a carving. Jack walked around and looked at the details in the fading light of the setting sun. He wished he'd looked at it while the sun was higher in the sky. Wait! The sun was setting! That meant he was going to have to spend another night out here! Arrrgh! Jack looked out across the desert for a little bit, and then came back and stood next to Nate. "In all the excitement, I almost forgot, Nate," said Jack. "Which way is it back to town? And how far? I'm eventually going to have to head back - I'm not sure I'll be able to survive by eating raw desert critters for long. And even if I can, I'm not sure I'll want to." "It's about 30 miles that way." Nate pointed, with the rattle on his tail this time. As far as Jack could tell, it was a direction at right angles to the way he'd been going when he was crawling here. "But that's 30 miles by the way the crow flies. It's about 40 by the way a man walks. You should be able to do it in about half a day with your improved endurance, if you head out early tomorrow, Jack." Jack looked out the way the snake had pointed for a few seconds more, and then sat back down. It was getting dark. Not much he could do about heading out right now. And besides, Nate was just about to get to the interesting stuff. "Garden of Eden? As best as you can figure it?" "Well, yeah, as best as I and Samuel could figure it anyway," said Nate. "He figured that the story just got a little mixed up. You know, snake, in a 'tree', offering 'temptations', making bargains. That kind stuff. But he could never quite figure out how the Hebrews found out about this spot from across the ocean. He worried about that for a while." "Garden of Eden, hunh?" said Jack. "How long have you been here, Nate?" "No idea, really," replied Nate. "A long time. It never occurred to me to count years, until recently, and by then, of course, it was too late. But I do remember when this whole place was green, so I figure it's been thousands of years, at least." "So, are you the snake that tempted Eve?" said Jack. "Beats me," said Nate. "Maybe. I can't remember if the first one of your kind that I talked to was female or not, and I never got a name, but it could have been. And I suppose she could have considered my offer to grant requests a 'temptation', though I've rarely had refusals." "Well, umm, how did you get here then? And why is that white pole stuck out of the stone there?" asked Jack. "Dad left me here. Or, I assume it was my dad. It was another snake - much bigger than I was back then. I remember talking to him, but I don't remember if it was in a language, or just kind of understanding what he wanted. But one day, he brought me to this stone, told me about it, and asked me to do something for him. I talked it over with him for a while, then agreed. I've been here ever since. "What is this place?" said Jack. "And what did he ask you to do?" "Well, you see this pole here, sticking out of the stone?" Nate loosened his coils around the tilted white pole and showed Jack where it descended into the stone. The pole was tilted at about a 45 degree angle and seemed to enter the stone in an eighteen inch slot cut into the stone. Jack leaned over and looked. The slot was dark and the pole went down into it as far as Jack could see in the dim light. Jack reached out to touch the pole, but Nate was suddenly there in the way. "You can't touch that yet, Jack," said Nate. "Why not?" asked Jack. "I haven't explained it to you yet," replied Nate. "Well, it kinda looks like a lever or something," said Jack. "You'd push it that way, and it would move in the slot." "Yep, that's what it is," replied Nate. "What does it do?" asked Jack. "End the world?" "Oh, no," said Nate. "Nothing that drastic. It just ends humanity. I call it 'The Lever of Doom'." For the last few words Nate had used a deeper, ringing voice. He tried to look serious for a few seconds, and then gave up and grinned. Jack was initially startled by Nate's pronouncement, but when Nate grinned Jack laughed. "Ha! You almost had me fooled for a second there. What does it really do?" "Oh, it really ends humanity, like I said," smirked Nate. "I just thought the voice I used was funny, didn't you?" Nate continued to grin. "A lever to end humanity?" asked Jack. "What in the world is that for? Why would anyone need to end humanity?" "Well," replied Nate, "I get the idea that maybe humanity was an experiment. Or maybe the Big Guy just thought, that if humanity started going really bad, there should be a way to end it. I'm not really sure. All I know are the rules, and the guesses that Samuel and I had about why it's here. I didn't think to ask back when I started here." "Rules? What rules?" asked Jack. "The rules are that I can't tell anybody about it or let them touch it unless they agree to be bound to secrecy by a bite. And that only one human can be bound in that way at a time. That's it." explained Nate. Jack looked somewhat shocked. "You mean that I could pull the lever now? You'd let me end humanity?" "Yep," replied Nate, "if you want to." Nate looked at Jack carefully. "Do you want to, Jack?" "Umm, no." said Jack, stepping a little further back from the lever. "Why in the world would anyone want to end humanity? It'd take a psychotic to want that! Or worse, a suicidal psychotic, because it would kill him too, wouldn't it?" "Yep," replied Nate, "being as he'd be human too." "Has anyone ever seriously considered it?" asked Nate. "Any of those bound to secrecy, that is?" "Well, of course, I think they've all seriously considered it at one time or another. Being given that kind of responsibility makes you sit down and think, or so I'm told. Samuel considered it several times. He'd often get disgusted with humanity, come out here, and just hold the lever for a while. But he never pulled it. Or you wouldn't be here." Nate grinned some more. Jack sat down, well back from the lever. He looked thoughtful and puzzled at the same time. After a bit, he said, "So this makes me the Judge of humanity? I get to decide whether they keep going or just end? Me?" "That seems to be it," agreed Nate. "What kind of criteria do I use to decide?" said Jack. "How do I make this decision? Am I supposed to decide if they're good? Or too many of them are bad? Or that they're going the wrong way? Is there a set of rules for that?" "Nope," replied Nate. "You pretty much just have to decide on your own. It's up to you, however you want to decide it. I guess that you're just supposed to know." "But what if I get mad at someone? Or some girl dumps me and I feel horrible? Couldn't I make a mistake? How do I know that I won't screw up?" protested Jack. Nate gave his kind of snake-like shrug again. "You don't. You just have to try your best, Jack." Jack sat there for a while, staring off into the desert that was rapidly getting dark, chewing on a fingernail. Suddenly, Jack turned around and looked at the snake. "Nate, was Samuel the one bound to this before me?" "Yep," replied Nate. "He was a good guy. Talked to me a lot. Taught me to read and brought me books. I think I still have a good pile of them buried in the sand around here somewhere. I still miss him. He died a few months ago." "Sounds like a good guy," agreed Jack. "How did he handle this, when you first told him. What did he do?" "Well," said Nate, "he sat down for a while, thought about it for a bit, and then asked me some questions, much like you're doing." "What did he ask you, if you're allowed to tell me?" asked Jack. "He asked me about the third request," replied Nate. "Aha!" It was Jack's turn to grin. "And what did you tell him?" "I told him the rules for the third request. That to get the third request you have to agree to this whole thing. That if it ever comes to the point that you really think that humanity should be ended, that you'll come here and end it. You won't avoid it, and you won't wimp out." Nate looked serious again. "And you'll be bound to do it too, Jack." "Hmmm." Jack looked back out into the darkness for a while. Nate watched him, waiting. "Nate," continued Jack, quietly, eventually. "What did Samuel ask for with his third request?" Nate sounded like he was grinning again as he replied, also quietly, "Wisdom, Jack. He asked for wisdom. As much as I could give him." "Ok," said Jack, suddenly, standing up and facing away from Nate, "give it to me. Nate looked at Jack's backside. "Give you what, Jack?" "Give me that wisdom. The same stuff that Samuel asked for. If it helped him, maybe it'll help me too." Jack turned his head to look back over his shoulder at Nate. "It did help him, right?" "He said it did," replied Nate. "But he seemed a little quieter afterward. Like he had a lot to think about." "Well, yeah, I can see that," said Jack. "So, give it to me." Jack turned to face away from Nate again, bent over slightly and tensed up. Nate watched Jack tense up with a little exasperation. If he bit Jack now, Jack would likely jump out of his skin and maybe hurt them both. "You remember that you'll be bound to destroy humanity if it ever looks like it needs it, right Jack?" asked Nate, shifting position. "Yeah, yeah, I got that," replied Jack, eyes squeezed tightly shut and body tense, not noticing the change in direction of Nate's voice. "And," continued Nate, from his new position, "do you remember that you'll turn bright purple, and grow big horns and extra eyes?" "Yeah, yeah...Hey, wait a minute!" said Jack, opening his eyes, straightening up and turning around. "Purple?!" He didn't see Nate there. With the moonlight Jack could see that the lever extended up from its slot in the rock without the snake wrapped around it. Jack heard, from behind him, Nate's "Just Kidding!" right before he felt the now familiar piercing pain, this time in the other buttock. Jack sat on the edge of the dark stone in the rapidly cooling air, his feet extending out into the sand. He stared out into the darkness, listening to the wind stir the sand, occasionally rubbing his butt where he'd been recently bitten. Nate had left for a little while, had come back with a desert-rodent-shaped bulge somewhere in his middle, and was now wrapped back around the lever, his tongue flicking out into the desert night's air the only sign that he was still awake. Occasionally Jack, with his toes absentmindedly digging in the sand while he thought, would ask Nate a question without turning around. "Nate, do accidents count?" Nate lifted his head a little bit. "What do you mean, Jack?" Jack tilted his head back like he was looking at the stars. "You know, accidents. If I accidentally fall on the lever, without meaning to, does that still wipe out humanity?" "Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does, Jack. I'd suggest you be careful about that if you start feeling wobbly," said Nate with some amusement. A little later - "Does it have to be me that pulls the lever?" asked Jack. "That's the rule, Jack. Nobody else can pull it," answered Nate. "No," Jack shook his head, "I meant does it have to be my hand? Could I pull the lever with a rope tied around it? Or push it with a stick? Or throw a rock?" "Yes, those should work," replied Nate. "Though I'm not sure how complicated you could get. Samuel thought about trying to build some kind of remote control for it once, but gave it up. Everything he'd build would be gone by the next sunrise, if it was touching the stone, or over it. I told him that in the past others that had been bound had tried to bury the lever so they wouldn't be tempted to pull it, but every time the stones or sand or whatever had disappeared." "Wow," said Jack, "Cool." Jack leaned back until only his elbows kept him off of the stone and looked up into the sky. "Nate, how long did Samuel live? One of his wishes was for health too, right?" asked Jack. "Yes," replied Nate, "it was. He lived 167 years, Jack." "Wow, 167 years. That's almost 140 more years I'll live if I live as long. Do you know what he died of, Nate?" "He died of getting tired of living, Jack," Nate said, sounding somewhat sad. Jack turned his head to look at Nate in the starlight. Nate looked back. "Samuel knew he wasn't going to be able to stay in society. He figured that they'd eventually see him still alive and start questioning it, so he decided that he'd have to disappear after a while. He faked his death once, but changed his mind - he decided it was too early and he could stay for a little longer. He wasn't very fond of mankind, but he liked the attention. Most of the time, anyway. "His daughter and then his wife dying almost did him in though. He didn't stay in society much longer after that. He eventually came out here to spend time talking to me and thinking about pulling the lever. A few months ago he told me he'd had enough. It was his time." "And then he just died?" asked Jack. Nate shook his head a little. "He made his forth request, Jack. There's only one thing you can ask for the fourth request. The last bite. After a bit Nate continued, "He told me that he was tired, that it was his time. He reassured me that someone new would show up soon, like they always had. After another pause, Nate finished, "Samuel's body disappeared off the stone with the sunrise." Jack lay back down and looked at the sky, leaving Nate alone with his memories. It was a long time until Jack's breathing evened out into sleep. Jack woke with the sunrise the next morning. He was a little chilled with the morning desert air, but overall was feeling pretty good. Well, except that his stomach was grumbling and he wasn't willing to eat raw desert rat. So, after getting directions to town from Nate, making sure he knew how to get back, and reassuring Nate that he'd be back soon, Jack started the long walk back to town. With his new health and Nate's good directions, he made it back easily. Jack caught a bus back to the city, and showed up for work the next day, little worse for the wear and with a story about getting lost in the desert and walking back out. Within a couple of days Jack had talked a friend with a tow truck into going back out into the desert with him to fetch the SUV. They found it after a couple of hours of searching and towed it back without incident. Jack was careful not to even look in the direction of Nate's lever, though their path back didn't come within sight of it. Before the next weekend, Jack had gone to a couple of stores, including a book store, and had gotten his SUV back from the mechanic, with a warning to avoid any more joyriding in the desert. On Saturday, Jack headed back to see Nate. Jack parked a little way out of the small town near Nate, loaded up his new backpack with camping gear and the things he was bringing for Nate, and then started walking. He figured that walking would leave the least trail, and he knew that while not many people camped in the desert, it wasn't unheard of, and shouldn't really raise suspicions. Jack had brought more books for Nate - recent books, magazines, newspapers. Some things that would catch Nate up with what was happening in the world, others that were just good books to read. He spent the weekend with Nate, and then headed out again, telling Nate that he'd be back again soon, but that he had things to do first. Over four months later Jack was back to see Nate again. This time he brought a laptop with him - a specially modified laptop. It had a solar recharger, special filters and seals to keep out the sand, a satellite link-up, and a special keyboard and joystick that Jack hoped that a fifteen-foot rattlesnake would be able to use. And, it had been hacked to not give out its location to the satellite. After that Jack could e-mail Nate to keep in touch, but still visited him fairly regularly - at least once or twice a year. After the first year, Jack quit his job. For some reason, with the wisdom he 'd been given, and the knowledge that he could live for over 150 years, working in a nine to five job for someone else didn't seem that worthwhile any more. Jack went back to school. Eventually, Jack started writing. Perhaps because of the wisdom, or perhaps because of his new perspective, he wrote well. People liked what he wrote, and he became well known for it. After a time, Jack bought an RV and started traveling around the country for book signings and readings. But, he still remembered to drop by and visit Nate occasionally. On one of the visits Nate seemed quieter than usual. Not that Nate had been a fountain of joy lately. Jack's best guess was that Nate was still missing Samuel, and though Jack had tried, he still hadn't been able to replace Samuel in Nate's eyes. Nate had been getting quieter each visit. But on this visit Nate didn't even speak when Jack walked up to the lever. He nodded at Jack, and then went back to staring into the desert. Jack, respecting Nate's silence, sat down and waited. After a few minutes, Nate spoke. "Jack, I have someone to introduce you to." Jack looked surprised. "Someone to introduce me to?" Jack looked around, and then looked carefully back at Nate. "This something to do with the Big Guy? "No, no," replied Nate. "This is more personal. I want you to meet my son." Nate looked over at the nearest sand dune. "Sammy!" Jack watched as a four foot long desert rattlesnake crawled from behind the dune and up to the stone base of the lever. "Yo, Jack," said the new, much smaller snake. "Yo, Sammy" replied Jack. Jack looked at Nate. "Named after Samuel, I assume?" Nate nodded. "Jack, I've got a favor to ask you. Could you show Sammy around for me?" Nate unwrapped himself from the lever and slithered over to the edge of the stone and looked across the sands. "When Samuel first told me about the world, and brought me books and pictures, I wished that I could go see it. I wanted to see the great forests, the canyons, the cities, even the other deserts, to see if they felt and smelled the same. I want my son to have that chance - to see the world. Before he becomes bound here like I have been. "He's seen it in pictures, over the computer that you brought me. But I hear that it's not the same. That being there is different. I want him to have that. Think you can do that for me, Jack?" Jack nodded. This was obviously very important to Nate, so Jack didn't even joke about taking a talking rattlesnake out to see the world. "Yeah, I can do that for you, Nate. Is that all you need?" Jack could sense that was something more. Nate looked at Sammy. Sammy looked back at Nate for a second and then said, "Oh, yeah. Ummm, I've gotta go pack. Back in a little bit Jack. Nice to meet ya!" Sammy slithered back over the dune and out of sight. Nate watched Sammy disappear and then looked back at Jack. "Jack, this is my first son. My first offspring through all the years. You don't even want to know what it took for me to find a mate." Nate grinned to himself. "But anyway, I had a son for a reason. I'm tired. I'm ready for it to be over. I needed a replacement." Jack considered this for a minute. "So, you're ready to come see the world, and you wanted him to watch the lever while you were gone?" Nate shook his head. "No, Jack - you're a better guesser than that. You've already figured out - I'm bound here - there's only one way for me to leave here. And I'm ready. It's my time to die." Jack looked more closely at Nate. He could tell Nate had thought about this - probably for quite a while. Jack had trouble imagining what it would be like to be as old as Nate, but Jack could already tell that in another hundred or two hundred years, he might be getting tired of life himself. Jack could understand Samuel's decision, and now Nate's. So, all Jack said was, "What do you want me to do?" Nate nodded. "Thanks, Jack. I only want two things. One - show Sammy around the world - let him get his fill of it, until he's ready to come back here and take over. Two - give me the fourth request. "I can't just decide to die, not any more than you can. I won't even die of old age like you eventually will, even though it'll be a long time from now. I need to be killed. Once Sammy is back here, ready to take over, I'll be able to die. And I need you to kill me. "I've even thought about how. Poisons and other drugs won't work on me. And I've seen pictures of snakes that were shot - some of them live for days, so that's out too. So, I want you to bring back a sword. Nate turned away to look back to the dune that Sammy had gone behind. "I'd say an axe, but that's somewhat undignified - putting my head on the ground or a chopping block like that. No, I like a sword. A time-honored way of going out. A dignified way to die. And, most importantly, it should work, even on me. "You willing to do that for me, Jack?" Nate turned back to look at Jack. "Yeah, Nate," replied Jack solemnly, "I think I can handle that." Nate nodded. "Good!" He turned back toward the dune and shouted, "Sammy! Jack's about ready to leave!" Then quietly, "Thanks, Jack." Jack didn't have anything to say to that, so he waited for Sammy to make it back to the lever, nodded to him, nodded a final time to Nate, and then headed into the desert with Sammy following. Over the next several years Sammy and Jack kept in touch with Nate through e-mail as they went about their adventures. They made a goal of visiting every country in the world, and did a respectable job of it. Sammy had a natural gift for languages, as Jack expected he would, and even ended up acting as a translator for Jack in a few of the countries. Jack managed to keep the talking rattlesnake hidden, even so, and by the time they were nearing the end of their tour of countries, Sammy had only been spotted a few times. While there were several people that had seen enough to startle them greatly, nobody had enough evidence to prove anything, and while a few wild rumors and storied followed Jack and Sammy around, nothing ever hit the newspapers or the public in general. When they finished the tour of countries, Jack suggested that they try some undersea diving. They did. And spelunking. They did that too. Sammy finally drew the line at visiting Antarctica. He'd come to realize that Jack was stalling. After talking to his Dad about it over e-mail, he figured out that Jack probably didn't want to have to kill Nate. Nate told Sammy that humans could be squeamish about killing friends and acquaintances. So, Sammy eventually put his tail down (as he didn't have a foot) and told Jack that it was time - he was ready to go back and take up his duties from his dad. Jack, delayed it a little more by insisting that they go back to Japan and buy an appropriate sword. He even stretched it a little more by getting lessons in how to use the sword. But, eventually, he'd learned as much as he was likely to without dedicating his life to it, and was definitely competent enough to take the head off of a snake. It was time to head back and see Nate. When they got back to the US, Jack got the old RV out of storage where he and Sammy had left it after their tour of the fifty states, he loaded up Sammy and the sword, and they headed for the desert. When they got to the small town that Jack had been trying to find those years ago when he'd met Nate, Jack was in a funk. He didn't really feel like walking all of the way out there. Not only that, but he'd forgotten to figure the travel time correctly, and it was late afternoon. They'd either have to spend the night in town and walk out tomorrow, or walk in the dark. As Jack was afraid that if he waited one more night he might lose his resolve, he decided that he'd go ahead and drive the RV out there. It was only going to be this once, and Jack would go back and cover the tracks afterward. They ought to be able to make it out there by nightfall if they drove, and then they could get it over tonight. Jack told Sammy to e-mail Nate that they were coming as he drove out of sight of the town on the road. They then pulled off the road and headed out into the desert. Everything went well, until they got to the sand dunes. Jack had been nursing the RV along the whole time, over the rocks, through the creek beds, revving the engine the few times they almost got stuck. When they came to the dunes, Jack didn't really think about it, he just downshifted and headed up the first one. By the third dune, Jack started to regret that he'd decided to try driving on the sand. The RV was fishtailling and losing traction. Jack was having to work it up each dune slowly and was trying to keep from losing control each time they came over the top and slid down the other side. Sammy had come up to sit in the passenger seat, coiled up and laughing at Jack's driving. As they came over the top of the fourth dune, the biggest one yet, Jack saw that this was the final dune - the stone, the lever, and somewhere Nate, waited below. Jack put on the brakes, but he'd gone a little too far. The RV started slipping down the other side. Jack tried turning the wheel, but he didn't have enough traction. He pumped the brakes - no response. They started sliding down the hill, faster and faster. Jack felt a shock go through him as he suddenly realized that they were heading for the lever. He looked down - the RV was directly on course for it. If Jack didn't do something, the RV would hit it. He was about to end humanity. Jack steered more frantically, trying to get traction. It still wasn't working. The dune was too steep, and the sand too loose. In a split second, Jack realized that his only chance would be once he hit the stone around the lever - he should have traction on the stone for just a second before he hit the lever - he wouldn't have time to stop, but he should be able to steer away. Jack took a better grip on the steering wheel and tried to turn the RV a little bit - every little bit would help. He'd have to time his turn just right. The RV got to the bottom of the dune, sliding at an amazing speed in the sand. Just before they reached the stone Jack looked across it to check that they were still heading for the lever. They were. But Jack noticed something else that he hadn't seen from the top of the dune. Nate wasn't wrapped around the lever. He was off to the side of the lever, but still on the stone, waiting for them. The problem was, he was waiting on the same side of the lever that Jack had picked to steer towards to avoid the lever. The RV was already starting to drift that way a little in its mad rush across the sand and there was no way that Jack was going to be able to go around the lever to the other side. Jack had an instant of realization. He was either going to have to hit the lever, or run over Nate. He glanced over at Sammy and saw that Sammy realized the same thing. Jack took a firmer grip on the steering wheel as the RV ran up on the stone. Shouting to Sammy as he pulled the steering wheel... + Show Spoiler + "BETTER NATE THAN LEVER!" | ||
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ktp
United States797 Posts
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goldenkrnboi
United States3104 Posts
On June 06 2009 07:19 Dylancool2 wrote: Born in the US, Mother from Winnipeg, Father from Toronto. i'm not sure what you're talking about/trying to prove unless you meant that he is canadian. otherwise, just cause his parents are from canada doesn't mean that he himself was from canada. it'd be like saying all of the immigrant children who were born and raised here in the us are from their parents' respective countries. | ||
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Rakanishu2
United States475 Posts
On June 08 2009 12:17 goldenkrnboi wrote: i'm not sure what you're talking about. unless you meant that he is canadian. otherwise, just cause his parents are from canada doesn't mean that he himself was from canada. it'd be like saying all of the immigrant children who were born and raised here in the us are from their parents' respective countries. I think we established that. | ||
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goldenkrnboi
United States3104 Posts
look carefully. On June 06 2009 06:58 Dylancool2 wrote: you do know Colbert is from Canada right? On June 06 2009 07:19 Dylancool2 wrote: Born in the US, Mother from Winnipeg, Father from Toronto. | ||
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evanthebouncy!
United States12796 Posts
UberMicro: ![[image loading]](http://img36.imageshack.us/my.php?image=ubermikro.gif) | ||
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evanthebouncy!
United States12796 Posts
SHIT SHOPPED SHOPPED HAhHhaahHA it's pretty fast. nice catch | ||
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MK
United States496 Posts
On June 08 2009 15:06 evanthebouncy! wrote: enuf talking, more pictures!!! UberMicro: AHAHAHAH love this one | ||
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doktorLucifer
United States855 Posts
On June 05 2009 15:41 Etherone wrote: if only they had something skill related in this game (series) i could bare to play it. This was from the movie Red Cliff, which is epic beyond all balls and belief. | ||
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saritenite
Singapore1680 Posts
On June 08 2009 11:51 kNyTTyM wrote: no picture but as epic as anything in this thread read all the way through please. + Show Spoiler + So, there's a man crawling through the desert. He'd decided to try his SUV in a little bit of cross-country travel, had great fun zooming over the badlands and through the sand, got lost, hit a big rock, and then he couldn't get it started again. There were no cell phone towers anywhere near, so his cell phone was useless. He had no family, his parents had died a few years before in an auto accident, and his few friends had no idea he was out here. He stayed with the car for a day or so, but his one bottle of water ran out and he was getting thirsty. He thought maybe he knew the direction back, now that he'd paid attention to the sun and thought he'd figured out which way was north, so he decided to start walking. He figured he only had to go about 30 miles or so and he'd be back to the small town he'd gotten gas in last. He thinks about walking at night to avoid the heat and sun, but based upon how dark it actually was the night before, and given that he has no flashlight, he's afraid that he'll break a leg or step on a rattlesnake. So, he puts on some sun block, puts the rest in his pocket for reapplication later, brings an umbrella he'd had in the back of the SUV with him to give him a little shade, pours the windshield wiper fluid into his water bottle in case he gets that desperate, brings his pocket knife in case he finds a cactus that looks like it might have water in it, and heads out in the direction he thinks is right. He walks for the entire day. By the end of the day he's really thirsty. He's been sweating all day, and his lips are starting to crack. He's reapplied the sunblock twice, and tried to stay under the umbrella, but he still feels sunburned. The windshield wiper fluid sloshing in the bottle in his pocket is really getting tempting now. He knows that it's mainly water and some ethanol and coloring, but he also knows that they add some kind of poison to it to keep people from drinking it. He wonders what the poison is, and whether the poison would be worse than dying of thirst. He pushes on, trying to get to that small town before dark. By the end of the day he starts getting worried. He figures he's been walking at least 3 miles an hour, according to his watch for over 10 hours. That means that if his estimate was right that he should be close to the town. But he doesn't recognize any of this. He had to cross a dry creek bed a mile or two back, and he doesn't remember coming through it in the SUV. He figures that maybe he got his direction off just a little and that the dry creek bed was just off to one side of his path. He tells himself that he's close, and that after dark he'll start seeing the town lights over one of these hills, and that'll be all he needs. As it gets dim enough that he starts stumbling over small rocks and things, he finds a spot and sits down to wait for full dark and the town lights. Full dark comes before he knows it. He must have dozed off. He stands back up and turns all the way around. He sees nothing but stars. He wakes up the next morning feeling absolutely lousy. His eyes are gummy and his mouth and nose feel like they're full of sand. He so thirsty that he can't even swallow. He barely got any sleep because it was so cold. He'd forgotten how cold it got at night in the desert and hadn't noticed it the night before because he'd been in his car. He knows the Rule of Threes - three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food - then you die. Some people can make it a little longer, in the best situations. But the desert heat and having to walk and sweat isn't the best situation to be without water. He figures, unless he finds water, this is his last day. He rinses his mouth out with a little of the windshield wiper fluid. He waits a while after spitting that little bit out, to see if his mouth goes numb, or he feels dizzy or something. Has his mouth gone numb? Is it just in his mind? He's not sure. He'll go a little farther, and if he still doesn't find water, he'll try drinking some of the fluid. Then he has to face his next, harder question - which way does he go from here? Does he keep walking the same way he was yesterday (assuming that he still knows which way that is), or does he try a new direction? He has no idea what to do. Looking at the hills and dunes around him, he thinks he knows the direction he was heading before. Just going by a feeling, he points himself somewhat to the left of that, and starts walking. As he walks, the day starts heating up. The desert, too cold just a couple of hours before, soon becomes an oven again. He sweats a little at first, and then stops. He starts getting worried at that - when you stop sweating he knows that means you're in trouble - usually right before heat stroke. He decides that it's time to try the windshield wiper fluid. He can't wait any longer - if he passes out, he's dead. He stops in the shade of a large rock, takes the bottle out, opens it, and takes a mouthful. He slowly swallows it, making it last as long as he can. It feels so good in his dry and cracked throat that he doesn't even care about the nasty taste. He takes another mouthful, and makes it last too. Slowly, he drinks half the bottle. He figures that since he's drinking it, he might as well drink enough to make some difference and keep himself from passing out. He's quit worrying about the denaturing of the wiper fluid. If it kills him, it kills him - if he didn't drink it, he'd die anyway. Besides, he's pretty sure that whatever substance they denature the fluid with is just designed to make you sick - their way of keeping winos from buying cheap wiper fluid for the ethanol content. He can handle throwing up, if it comes to that. He walks. He walks in the hot, dry, windless desert. Sand, rocks, hills, dunes, the occasional scrawny cactus or dried bush. No sign of water. Sometimes he'll see a little movement to one side or the other, but whatever moved is usually gone before he can focus his eyes on it. Probably birds, lizards, or mice. Maybe snakes, though they usually move more at night. He's careful to stay away from the movements. After a while, he begins to stagger. He's not sure if it's fatigue, heat stroke finally catching him, or maybe he was wrong and the denaturing of the wiper fluid was worse than he thought. He tries to steady himself, and keep going. After more walking, he comes to a large stretch of sand. This is good! He knows he passed over a stretch of sand in the SUV - he remembers doing donuts in it. Or at least he thinks he remembers it - he's getting woozy enough and tired enough that he's not sure what he remembers any more or if he's hallucinating. But he thinks he remembers it. So he heads off into it, trying to get to the other side, hoping that it gets him closer to the town. He was heading for a town, wasn't he? He thinks he was. He isn't sure any more. He's not even sure how long he's been walking any more. Is it still morning? Or has it moved into afternoon and the sun is going down again? It must be afternoon - it seems like it's been too long since he started out. He walks through the sand. After a while, he comes to a big dune in the sand. This is bad. He doesn't remember any dunes when driving over the sand in his SUV. Or at least he doesn't think he remembers any. This is bad. But, he has no other direction to go. Too late to turn back now. He figures that he'll get to the top of the dune and see if he can see anything from there that helps him find the town. He keeps going up the dune. Halfway up, he slips in the bad footing of the sand for the second or third time, and falls to his knees. He doesn't feel like getting back up - he'll just fall down again. So, he keeps going up the dune on his hand and knees. While crawling, if his throat weren't so dry, he'd laugh. He's finally gotten to the hackneyed image of a man lost in the desert - crawling through the sand on his hands and knees. If would be the perfect image, he imagines, if only his clothes were more ragged. The people crawling through the desert in the cartoons always had ragged clothes. But his have lasted without any rips so far. Somebody will probably find his dessicated corpse half buried in the sand years from now, and his clothes will still be in fine shape - shake the sand out, and a good wash, and they'd be wearable again. He wishes his throat were wet enough to laugh. He coughs a little instead, and it hurts. He finally makes it to the top of the sand dune. Now that he's at the top, he struggles a little, but manages to stand up and look around. All he sees is sand. Sand, and more sand. Behind him, about a mile away, he thinks he sees the rocky ground he left to head into this sand. Ahead of him, more dunes, more sand. This isn't where he drove his SUV. This is Hell. Or close enough. Again, he doesn't know what to do. He decides to drink the rest of the wiper fluid while figuring it out. He takes out the bottle, and is removing the cap, when he glances to the side and sees something. Something in the sand. At the bottom of the dune, off to the side, he sees something strange. It's a flat area, in the sand. He stops taking the cap of the bottle off, and tries to look closer. The area seems to be circular. And it's dark - darker than the sand. And, there seems to be something in the middle of it, but he can't tell what it is. He looks as hard as he can, and still can tell from here. He's going to have to go down there and look. He puts the bottle back in his pocket, and starts to stumble down the dune. After a few steps, he realizes that he's in trouble - he's not going to be able to keep his balance. After a couple of more sliding, tottering steps, he falls and starts to roll down the dune. The sand it so hot when his body hits it that for a minute he thinks he's caught fire on the way down - like a movie car wreck flashing into flames as it goes over the cliff, before it ever even hits the ground. He closes his eyes and mouth, covers his face with his hands, and waits to stop rolling. He stops, at the bottom of the dune. After a minute or two, he finds enough energy to try to sit up and get the sand out of his face and clothes. When he clears his eyes enough, he looks around to make sure that the dark spot in the sand it still there and he hadn't just imagined it. So, seeing the large, flat, dark spot on the sand is still there, he begins to crawl towards it. He'd get up and walk towards it, but he doesn't seem to have the energy to get up and walk right now. He must be in the final stages of dehydration he figures, as he crawls. If this place in the sand doesn't have water, he'll likely never make it anywhere else. This is his last chance. He gets closer and closer, but still can't see what's in the middle of the dark area. His eyes won't quite focus any more for some reason. And lifting his head up to look takes so much effort that he gives up trying. He just keeps crawling. Finally, he reaches the area he'd seen from the dune. It takes him a minute of crawling on it before he realizes that he's no longer on sand - he's now crawling on some kind of dark stone. Stone with some kind of marking on it - a pattern cut into the stone. He's too tired to stand up and try to see what the pattern is - so he just keeps crawling. He crawls towards the center, where his blurry eyes still see something in the middle of the dark stone area. His mind, detached in a strange way, notes that either his hands and knees are so burnt by the sand that they no longer feel pain, or that this dark stone, in the middle of a burning desert with a pounding, punishing sun overhead, doesn't seem to be hot. It almost feels cool. He considers lying down on the nice cool surface. Cool, dark stone. Not a good sign. He must be hallucinating this. He's probably in the middle of a patch of sand, already lying face down and dying, and just imagining this whole thing. A desert mirage. Soon the beautiful women carrying pitchers of water will come up and start giving him a drink. Then he'll know he's gone. He decides against laying down on the cool stone. If he's going to die here in the middle of this hallucination, he at least wants to see what's in the center before he goes. He keeps crawling. It's the third time that he hears the voice before he realizes what he's hearing. He would swear that someone just said, "Greetings, traveler. You do not look well. Do you hear me?" He stops crawling. He tries to look up from where he is on his hands and knees, but it's too much effort to lift his head. So he tries something different - he leans back and tries to sit up on the stone. After a few seconds, he catches his balance, avoids falling on his face, sits up, and tries to focus his eyes. Blurry. He rubs his eyes with the back of his hands and tries again. Better this time. Yep. He can see. He's sitting in the middle of a large, flat, dark expanse of stone. Directly next to him, about three feet away, is a white post or pole about two inches in diameter and sticking up about four or five feet out of the stone, at an angle. And wrapped around this white rod, tail with rattle on it hovering and seeming to be ready to start rattling, is what must be a fifteen foot long desert diamondback rattlesnake, looking directly at him. He stares at the snake in shock. He doesn't have the energy to get up and run away. He doesn't even have the energy to crawl away. This is it, his final resting place. No matter what happens, he's not going to be able to move from this spot. Well, at least dying of a bite from this monster should be quicker than dying of thirst. He'll face his end like a man. He struggles to sit up a little straighter. The snake keeps watching him. He lifts one hand and waves it in the snake's direction, feebly. The snake watches the hand for a moment, then goes back to watching the man, looking into his eyes. Hmmm. Maybe the snake had no interest in biting him? It hadn't rattled yet - that was a good sign. Maybe he wasn't going to die of snake bite after all. He then remembers that he'd looked up when he'd reached the center here because he thought he'd heard a voice. He was still very woozy - he was likely to pass out soon, the sun still beat down on him even though he was now on cool stone. He still didn't have anything to drink. But maybe he had actually heard a voice. This stone didn't look natural. Nor did that white post sticking up out of the stone. Someone had to have built this. Maybe they were still nearby. Maybe that was who talked to him. Maybe this snake was even their pet, and that's why it wasn't biting. He tries to clear his throat to say, "Hello," but his throat is too dry. All that comes out is a coughing or wheezing sound. There is no way he's going to be able to talk without something to drink. He feels his pocket, and the bottle with the wiper fluid is still there. He shakily pulls the bottle out, almost losing his balance and falling on his back in the process. This isn't good. He doesn't have much time left, by his reckoning, before he passes out. He gets the lid off of the bottle, manages to get the bottle to his lips, and pours some of the fluid into his mouth. He sloshes it around, and then swallows it. He coughs a little. His throat feels better. Maybe he can talk now. He tries again. Ignoring the snake, he turns to look around him, hoping to spot the owner of this place, and croaks out, "Hello? Is there anyone here?" He hears, from his side, "Greetings. What is it that you want?" He turns his head, back towards the snake. That's where the sound had seemed to come from. The only thing he can think of is that there must be a speaker, hidden under the snake, or maybe built into that post. He decides to try asking for help. "Please," he croaks again, suddenly feeling dizzy, "I'd love to not be thirsty any more. I've been a long time without water. Can you help me?" Looking in the direction of the snake, hoping to see where the voice was coming from this time, he is shocked to see the snake rear back, open its mouth, and speak. He hears it say, as the dizziness overtakes him and he falls forward, face first on the stone, "Very well. Coming up." A piercing pain shoots through his shoulder. Suddenly he is awake. He sits up and grabs his shoulder, wincing at the throbbing pain. He's momentarily disoriented as he looks around, and then he remembers - the crawl across the sand, the dark area of stone, the snake. He sees the snake, still wrapped around the tilted white post, still looking at him. He reaches up and feels his shoulder, where it hurts. It feels slightly wet. He pulls his fingers away and looks at them - blood. He feels his shoulder again - his shirt has what feels like two holes in it - two puncture holes - they match up with the two aching spots of pain on his shoulder. He had been bitten. By the snake. "It'll feel better in a minute." He looks up - it's the snake talking. He hadn't dreamed it. Suddenly he notices - he's not dizzy any more. And more importantly, he's not thirsty any more - at all! "Have I died? Is this the afterlife? Why are you biting me in the afterlife?" "Sorry about that, but I had to bite you," says the snake. "That's the way I work. It all comes through the bite. Think of it as natural medicine." "You bit me to help me? Why aren't I thirsty any more? Did you give me a drink before you bit me? How did I drink enough while unconscious to not be thirsty any more? I haven't had a drink for over two days. Well, except for the windshield wiper fluid... hold it, how in the world does a snake talk? Are you real? Are you some sort of Disney animation?" "No," says the snake, "I'm real. As real as you or anyone is, anyway. I didn't give you a drink. I bit you. That's how it works - it's what I do. I bite. I don't have hands to give you a drink, even if I had water just sitting around here." The man sat stunned for a minute. Here he was, sitting in the middle of the desert on some strange stone that should be hot but wasn't, talking to a snake that could talk back and had just bitten him. And he felt better. Not great - he was still starving and exhausted, but much better - he was no longer thirsty. He had started to sweat again, but only slightly. He felt hot, in this sun, but it was starting to get lower in the sky, and the cool stone beneath him was a relief he could notice now that he was no longer dying of thirst. "I might suggest that we take care of that methanol you now have in your system with the next request," continued the snake. "I can guess why you drank it, but I'm not sure how much you drank, or how much methanol was left in the wiper fluid. That stuff is nasty. It'll make you go blind in a day or two, if you drank enough of it." "Ummm, n-next request?" said the man. He put his hand back on his hurting shoulder and backed away from the snake a little. "That's the way it works. If you like, that is," explained the snake. "You get three requests. Call them wishes, if you wish." The snake grinned at his own joke, and the man drew back a little further from the show of fangs. "But there are rules," the snake continued. "The first request is free. The second requires an agreement of secrecy. The third requires the binding of responsibility." The snake looks at the man seriously. "By the way," the snake says suddenly, "my name is Nathan. Old Nathan, Samuel used to call me. He gave me the name. Before that, most of the Bound used to just call me 'Snake'. But that got old, and Samuel wouldn't stand for it. He said that anything that could talk needed a name. He was big into names. You can call me Nate, if you wish." Again, the snake grinned. "Sorry if I don't offer to shake, but I think you can understand - my shake sounds somewhat threatening." The snake give his rattle a little shake. "Umm, my name is Jack," said the man, trying to absorb all of this. "Jack Samson. "Can I ask you a question?" Jack says suddenly. "What happened to the poison...umm, in your bite. Why aren't I dying now? How did you do that? What do you mean by that's how you work?" "That's more than one question," grins Nate. "But I'll still try to answer all of them. First, yes, you can ask me a question." The snake's grin gets wider. "Second, the poison is in you. It changed you. You now no longer need to drink. That's what you asked for. Or, well, technically, you asked to not be thirsty any more - but 'any more' is such a vague term. I decided to make it permanent - now, as long as you live, you shouldn't need to drink much at all. Your body will conserve water very efficiently. You should be able to get enough just from the food you eat - much like a creature of the desert. You've been changed. "For the third question," Nate continues, "you are still dying. Besides the effects of that methanol in your system, you're a man - and men are mortal. In your current state, I give you no more than about another 50 years. Assuming you get out of this desert, alive, that is." Nate seemed vastly amused at his own humor, and continued his wide grin. "As for the fourth question," Nate said, looking more serious as far as Jack could tell, as Jack was just now working on his ability to read talking-snake emotions from snake facial features, "first you have to agree to make a second request and become bound by the secrecy, or I can't tell you." "Wait," joked Jack, "isn't this where you say you could tell me, but you'd have to kill me?" "I thought that was implied." Nate continued to look serious. "Ummm...yeah." Jack leaned back a little as he remembered again that he was talking to a fifteen foot poisonous reptile with a reputation for having a nasty temper. "So, what is this 'Bound by Secrecy' stuff, and can you really stop the effects of the methanol?" Jack thought for a second. "And, what do you mean methanol, anyway? I thought these days they use ethanol in wiper fluid, and just denature it?" "They may, I don't really know," said Nate. "I haven't gotten out in a while. Maybe they do. All I know is that I smell methanol on your breath and on that bottle in your pocket. And the blue color of the liquid when you pulled it out to drink some let me guess that it was wiper fluid. I assume that they still color wiper fluid blue?" "Yeah, they do," said Jack. "I figured," replied Nate. "As for being bound by secrecy - with the fulfillment of your next request, you will be bound to say nothing about me, this place, or any of the information I will tell you after that, when you decide to go back out to your kind. You won't be allowed to talk about me, write about me, use sign language, charades, or even act in a way that will lead someone to guess correctly about me. You'll be bound to secrecy. Of course, I'll also ask you to promise not to give me away, and as I'm guessing that you're a man of your word, you'll never test the binding anyway, so you won't notice." Nate said the last part with utter confidence. Jack, who had always prided himself on being a man of his word, felt a little nervous at this. "Ummm, hey, Nate, who are you? How did you know that? Are you, umm, omniscient, or something?" Well, Jack," said Nate sadly, "I can't tell you that, unless you make the second request." Nate looked away for a minute, then looked back. "Umm, well, ok," said Jack, "what is this about a second request? What can I ask for? Are you allowed to tell me that?" "Sure!" said Nate, brightening. "You're allowed to ask for changes. Changes to yourself. They're like wishes, but they can only affect you. Oh, and before you ask, I can't give you immortality. Or omniscience. Or omnipresence, for that matter. Though I might be able to make you gaseous and yet remain alive, and then you could spread through the atmosphere and sort of be omnipresent. But what good would that be - you still wouldn't be omniscient and thus still could only focus on one thing at a time. Not very useful, at least in my opinion." Nate stopped when he realized that Jack was staring at him. "Well, anyway," continued Nate, "I'd probably suggest giving you permanent good health. It would negate the methanol now in your system, you'd be immune to most poisons and diseases, and you'd tend to live a very long time, barring accident, of course. And you'll even have a tendency to recover from accidents well. It always seemed like a good choice for a request to me." "Cure the methanol poisoning, huh?" said Jack. "And keep me healthy for a long time? Hmmm. It doesn't sound bad at that. And it has to be a request about a change to me? I can't ask to be rich, right? Because that's not really a change to me?" "Right," nodded Nate. "Could I ask to be a genius and permanently healthy?" Jack asked, hopefully. "That takes two requests, Jack." "Yeah, I figured so," said Jack. "But I could ask to be a genius? I could become the smartest scientist in the world? Or the best athlete?" "Well, I could make you very smart," admitted Nate, "but that wouldn't necessarily make you the best scientist in the world. Or, I could make you very athletic, but it wouldn't necessarily make you the best athlete either. You've heard the saying that 99% of genius is hard work? Well, there's some truth to that. I can give you the talent, but I can't make you work hard. It all depends on what you decide to do with it." "Hmmm," said Jack. "Ok, I think I understand. And I get a third request, after this one?" "Maybe," said Nate, "it depends on what you decide then. There are more rules for the third request that I can only tell you about after the second request. You know how it goes." Nate looked like he'd shrug, if he had shoulders. "Ok, well, since I'd rather not be blind in a day or two, and permanent health doesn't sound bad, then consider that my second request. Officially. Do I need to sign in blood or something?" "No," said Nate. "Just hold out your hand. Or heel." Nate grinned. "Or whatever part you want me to bite. I have to bite you again. Like I said, that's how it works - the poison, you know," Nate said apologetically. Jack winced a little and felt his shoulder, where the last bite was. Hey, it didn't hurt any more. Just like Nate had said. That made Jack feel better about the biting business. But still, standing still while a fifteen foot snake sunk it's fangs into you. Jack stood up. Ignoring how good it felt to be able to stand again, and the hunger starting to gnaw at his stomach, Jack tried to decide where he wanted to get bitten. Despite knowing that it wouldn't hurt for long, Jack knew that this wasn't going to be easy. "Hey, Jack," Nate suddenly said, looking past Jack towards the dunes behind him, "is that someone else coming up over there?" Jack spun around and looked. Who else could be out here in the middle of nowhere? And did they bring food? Wait a minute, there was nobody over there. What was Nate... Jack let out a bellow as he felt two fangs sink into his rear end, through his jeans... Jack sat down carefully, favoring his more tender buttock. "I would have decided, eventually, Nate. I was just thinking about it. You didn't have to hoodwink me like that." "I've been doing this a long time, Jack," said Nate, confidently. "You humans have a hard time sitting still and letting a snake bite you - especially one my size. And besides, admit it - it's only been a couple of minutes and it already doesn't hurt any more, does it? That's because of the health benefit with this one. I told you that you'd heal quickly now." "Yeah, well, still," said Jack, "it's the principle of the thing. And nobody likes being bitten in the butt! Couldn't you have gotten my calf or something instead?" "More meat in the typical human butt," replied Nate. "And less chance you accidentally kick me or move at the last second." "Yeah, right. So, tell me all of these wonderful secrets that I now qualify to hear," answered Jack. "Ok," said Nate. "Do you want to ask questions first, or do you want me to just start talking?" "Just talk," said Jack. "I'll sit here and try to not think about food." "We could go try to rustle up some food for you first, if you like," answered Nate. "Hey! You didn't tell me you had food around here, Nate!" Jack jumped up. "What do we have? Am I in walking distance to town? Or can you magically whip up food along with your other powers?" Jack was almost shouting with excitement. His stomach had been growling for hours. "I was thinking more like I could flush something out of its hole and bite it for you, and you could skin it and eat it. Assuming you have a knife, that is," replied Nate, with the grin that Jack was starting to get used to. "Ugh," said Jack, sitting back down. "I think I'll pass. I can last a little longer before I get desperate enough to eat desert rat, or whatever else it is you find out here. And there's nothing to burn - I'd have to eat it raw. No thanks. Just talk." "Ok," replied Nate, still grinning. "But I'd better hurry, before you start looking at me as food. Nate reared back a little, looked around for a second, and then continued. "You, Jack, are sitting in the middle of the Garden of Eden." Jack looked around at the sand and dunes and then looked back at Nate sceptically. "Well, that's the best I can figure it, anyway, Jack," said Nate. "Stand up and look at the symbol on the rock here." Nate gestured around the dark stone they were both sitting on with his nose. Jack stood up and looked. Carved into the stone in a bas-relief was a representation of a large tree. The angled-pole that Nate was wrapped around was coming out of the trunk of the tree, right below where the main branches left the truck to reach out across the stone. It was very well done - it looked more like a tree had been reduced to almost two dimensions and embedded in the stone than it did like a carving. Jack walked around and looked at the details in the fading light of the setting sun. He wished he'd looked at it while the sun was higher in the sky. Wait! The sun was setting! That meant he was going to have to spend another night out here! Arrrgh! Jack looked out across the desert for a little bit, and then came back and stood next to Nate. "In all the excitement, I almost forgot, Nate," said Jack. "Which way is it back to town? And how far? I'm eventually going to have to head back - I'm not sure I'll be able to survive by eating raw desert critters for long. And even if I can, I'm not sure I'll want to." "It's about 30 miles that way." Nate pointed, with the rattle on his tail this time. As far as Jack could tell, it was a direction at right angles to the way he'd been going when he was crawling here. "But that's 30 miles by the way the crow flies. It's about 40 by the way a man walks. You should be able to do it in about half a day with your improved endurance, if you head out early tomorrow, Jack." Jack looked out the way the snake had pointed for a few seconds more, and then sat back down. It was getting dark. Not much he could do about heading out right now. And besides, Nate was just about to get to the interesting stuff. "Garden of Eden? As best as you can figure it?" "Well, yeah, as best as I and Samuel could figure it anyway," said Nate. "He figured that the story just got a little mixed up. You know, snake, in a 'tree', offering 'temptations', making bargains. That kind stuff. But he could never quite figure out how the Hebrews found out about this spot from across the ocean. He worried about that for a while." "Garden of Eden, hunh?" said Jack. "How long have you been here, Nate?" "No idea, really," replied Nate. "A long time. It never occurred to me to count years, until recently, and by then, of course, it was too late. But I do remember when this whole place was green, so I figure it's been thousands of years, at least." "So, are you the snake that tempted Eve?" said Jack. "Beats me," said Nate. "Maybe. I can't remember if the first one of your kind that I talked to was female or not, and I never got a name, but it could have been. And I suppose she could have considered my offer to grant requests a 'temptation', though I've rarely had refusals." "Well, umm, how did you get here then? And why is that white pole stuck out of the stone there?" asked Jack. "Dad left me here. Or, I assume it was my dad. It was another snake - much bigger than I was back then. I remember talking to him, but I don't remember if it was in a language, or just kind of understanding what he wanted. But one day, he brought me to this stone, told me about it, and asked me to do something for him. I talked it over with him for a while, then agreed. I've been here ever since. "What is this place?" said Jack. "And what did he ask you to do?" "Well, you see this pole here, sticking out of the stone?" Nate loosened his coils around the tilted white pole and showed Jack where it descended into the stone. The pole was tilted at about a 45 degree angle and seemed to enter the stone in an eighteen inch slot cut into the stone. Jack leaned over and looked. The slot was dark and the pole went down into it as far as Jack could see in the dim light. Jack reached out to touch the pole, but Nate was suddenly there in the way. "You can't touch that yet, Jack," said Nate. "Why not?" asked Jack. "I haven't explained it to you yet," replied Nate. "Well, it kinda looks like a lever or something," said Jack. "You'd push it that way, and it would move in the slot." "Yep, that's what it is," replied Nate. "What does it do?" asked Jack. "End the world?" "Oh, no," said Nate. "Nothing that drastic. It just ends humanity. I call it 'The Lever of Doom'." For the last few words Nate had used a deeper, ringing voice. He tried to look serious for a few seconds, and then gave up and grinned. Jack was initially startled by Nate's pronouncement, but when Nate grinned Jack laughed. "Ha! You almost had me fooled for a second there. What does it really do?" "Oh, it really ends humanity, like I said," smirked Nate. "I just thought the voice I used was funny, didn't you?" Nate continued to grin. "A lever to end humanity?" asked Jack. "What in the world is that for? Why would anyone need to end humanity?" "Well," replied Nate, "I get the idea that maybe humanity was an experiment. Or maybe the Big Guy just thought, that if humanity started going really bad, there should be a way to end it. I'm not really sure. All I know are the rules, and the guesses that Samuel and I had about why it's here. I didn't think to ask back when I started here." "Rules? What rules?" asked Jack. "The rules are that I can't tell anybody about it or let them touch it unless they agree to be bound to secrecy by a bite. And that only one human can be bound in that way at a time. That's it." explained Nate. Jack looked somewhat shocked. "You mean that I could pull the lever now? You'd let me end humanity?" "Yep," replied Nate, "if you want to." Nate looked at Jack carefully. "Do you want to, Jack?" "Umm, no." said Jack, stepping a little further back from the lever. "Why in the world would anyone want to end humanity? It'd take a psychotic to want that! Or worse, a suicidal psychotic, because it would kill him too, wouldn't it?" "Yep," replied Nate, "being as he'd be human too." "Has anyone ever seriously considered it?" asked Nate. "Any of those bound to secrecy, that is?" "Well, of course, I think they've all seriously considered it at one time or another. Being given that kind of responsibility makes you sit down and think, or so I'm told. Samuel considered it several times. He'd often get disgusted with humanity, come out here, and just hold the lever for a while. But he never pulled it. Or you wouldn't be here." Nate grinned some more. Jack sat down, well back from the lever. He looked thoughtful and puzzled at the same time. After a bit, he said, "So this makes me the Judge of humanity? I get to decide whether they keep going or just end? Me?" "That seems to be it," agreed Nate. "What kind of criteria do I use to decide?" said Jack. "How do I make this decision? Am I supposed to decide if they're good? Or too many of them are bad? Or that they're going the wrong way? Is there a set of rules for that?" "Nope," replied Nate. "You pretty much just have to decide on your own. It's up to you, however you want to decide it. I guess that you're just supposed to know." "But what if I get mad at someone? Or some girl dumps me and I feel horrible? Couldn't I make a mistake? How do I know that I won't screw up?" protested Jack. Nate gave his kind of snake-like shrug again. "You don't. You just have to try your best, Jack." Jack sat there for a while, staring off into the desert that was rapidly getting dark, chewing on a fingernail. Suddenly, Jack turned around and looked at the snake. "Nate, was Samuel the one bound to this before me?" "Yep," replied Nate. "He was a good guy. Talked to me a lot. Taught me to read and brought me books. I think I still have a good pile of them buried in the sand around here somewhere. I still miss him. He died a few months ago." "Sounds like a good guy," agreed Jack. "How did he handle this, when you first told him. What did he do?" "Well," said Nate, "he sat down for a while, thought about it for a bit, and then asked me some questions, much like you're doing." "What did he ask you, if you're allowed to tell me?" asked Jack. "He asked me about the third request," replied Nate. "Aha!" It was Jack's turn to grin. "And what did you tell him?" "I told him the rules for the third request. That to get the third request you have to agree to this whole thing. That if it ever comes to the point that you really think that humanity should be ended, that you'll come here and end it. You won't avoid it, and you won't wimp out." Nate looked serious again. "And you'll be bound to do it too, Jack." "Hmmm." Jack looked back out into the darkness for a while. Nate watched him, waiting. "Nate," continued Jack, quietly, eventually. "What did Samuel ask for with his third request?" Nate sounded like he was grinning again as he replied, also quietly, "Wisdom, Jack. He asked for wisdom. As much as I could give him." "Ok," said Jack, suddenly, standing up and facing away from Nate, "give it to me. Nate looked at Jack's backside. "Give you what, Jack?" "Give me that wisdom. The same stuff that Samuel asked for. If it helped him, maybe it'll help me too." Jack turned his head to look back over his shoulder at Nate. "It did help him, right?" "He said it did," replied Nate. "But he seemed a little quieter afterward. Like he had a lot to think about." "Well, yeah, I can see that," said Jack. "So, give it to me." Jack turned to face away from Nate again, bent over slightly and tensed up. Nate watched Jack tense up with a little exasperation. If he bit Jack now, Jack would likely jump out of his skin and maybe hurt them both. "You remember that you'll be bound to destroy humanity if it ever looks like it needs it, right Jack?" asked Nate, shifting position. "Yeah, yeah, I got that," replied Jack, eyes squeezed tightly shut and body tense, not noticing the change in direction of Nate's voice. "And," continued Nate, from his new position, "do you remember that you'll turn bright purple, and grow big horns and extra eyes?" "Yeah, yeah...Hey, wait a minute!" said Jack, opening his eyes, straightening up and turning around. "Purple?!" He didn't see Nate there. With the moonlight Jack could see that the lever extended up from its slot in the rock without the snake wrapped around it. Jack heard, from behind him, Nate's "Just Kidding!" right before he felt the now familiar piercing pain, this time in the other buttock. Jack sat on the edge of the dark stone in the rapidly cooling air, his feet extending out into the sand. He stared out into the darkness, listening to the wind stir the sand, occasionally rubbing his butt where he'd been recently bitten. Nate had left for a little while, had come back with a desert-rodent-shaped bulge somewhere in his middle, and was now wrapped back around the lever, his tongue flicking out into the desert night's air the only sign that he was still awake. Occasionally Jack, with his toes absentmindedly digging in the sand while he thought, would ask Nate a question without turning around. "Nate, do accidents count?" Nate lifted his head a little bit. "What do you mean, Jack?" Jack tilted his head back like he was looking at the stars. "You know, accidents. If I accidentally fall on the lever, without meaning to, does that still wipe out humanity?" "Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does, Jack. I'd suggest you be careful about that if you start feeling wobbly," said Nate with some amusement. A little later - "Does it have to be me that pulls the lever?" asked Jack. "That's the rule, Jack. Nobody else can pull it," answered Nate. "No," Jack shook his head, "I meant does it have to be my hand? Could I pull the lever with a rope tied around it? Or push it with a stick? Or throw a rock?" "Yes, those should work," replied Nate. "Though I'm not sure how complicated you could get. Samuel thought about trying to build some kind of remote control for it once, but gave it up. Everything he'd build would be gone by the next sunrise, if it was touching the stone, or over it. I told him that in the past others that had been bound had tried to bury the lever so they wouldn't be tempted to pull it, but every time the stones or sand or whatever had disappeared." "Wow," said Jack, "Cool." Jack leaned back until only his elbows kept him off of the stone and looked up into the sky. "Nate, how long did Samuel live? One of his wishes was for health too, right?" asked Jack. "Yes," replied Nate, "it was. He lived 167 years, Jack." "Wow, 167 years. That's almost 140 more years I'll live if I live as long. Do you know what he died of, Nate?" "He died of getting tired of living, Jack," Nate said, sounding somewhat sad. Jack turned his head to look at Nate in the starlight. Nate looked back. "Samuel knew he wasn't going to be able to stay in society. He figured that they'd eventually see him still alive and start questioning it, so he decided that he'd have to disappear after a while. He faked his death once, but changed his mind - he decided it was too early and he could stay for a little longer. He wasn't very fond of mankind, but he liked the attention. Most of the time, anyway. "His daughter and then his wife dying almost did him in though. He didn't stay in society much longer after that. He eventually came out here to spend time talking to me and thinking about pulling the lever. A few months ago he told me he'd had enough. It was his time." "And then he just died?" asked Jack. Nate shook his head a little. "He made his forth request, Jack. There's only one thing you can ask for the fourth request. The last bite. After a bit Nate continued, "He told me that he was tired, that it was his time. He reassured me that someone new would show up soon, like they always had. After another pause, Nate finished, "Samuel's body disappeared off the stone with the sunrise." Jack lay back down and looked at the sky, leaving Nate alone with his memories. It was a long time until Jack's breathing evened out into sleep. Jack woke with the sunrise the next morning. He was a little chilled with the morning desert air, but overall was feeling pretty good. Well, except that his stomach was grumbling and he wasn't willing to eat raw desert rat. So, after getting directions to town from Nate, making sure he knew how to get back, and reassuring Nate that he'd be back soon, Jack started the long walk back to town. With his new health and Nate's good directions, he made it back easily. Jack caught a bus back to the city, and showed up for work the next day, little worse for the wear and with a story about getting lost in the desert and walking back out. Within a couple of days Jack had talked a friend with a tow truck into going back out into the desert with him to fetch the SUV. They found it after a couple of hours of searching and towed it back without incident. Jack was careful not to even look in the direction of Nate's lever, though their path back didn't come within sight of it. Before the next weekend, Jack had gone to a couple of stores, including a book store, and had gotten his SUV back from the mechanic, with a warning to avoid any more joyriding in the desert. On Saturday, Jack headed back to see Nate. Jack parked a little way out of the small town near Nate, loaded up his new backpack with camping gear and the things he was bringing for Nate, and then started walking. He figured that walking would leave the least trail, and he knew that while not many people camped in the desert, it wasn't unheard of, and shouldn't really raise suspicions. Jack had brought more books for Nate - recent books, magazines, newspapers. Some things that would catch Nate up with what was happening in the world, others that were just good books to read. He spent the weekend with Nate, and then headed out again, telling Nate that he'd be back again soon, but that he had things to do first. Over four months later Jack was back to see Nate again. This time he brought a laptop with him - a specially modified laptop. It had a solar recharger, special filters and seals to keep out the sand, a satellite link-up, and a special keyboard and joystick that Jack hoped that a fifteen-foot rattlesnake would be able to use. And, it had been hacked to not give out its location to the satellite. After that Jack could e-mail Nate to keep in touch, but still visited him fairly regularly - at least once or twice a year. After the first year, Jack quit his job. For some reason, with the wisdom he 'd been given, and the knowledge that he could live for over 150 years, working in a nine to five job for someone else didn't seem that worthwhile any more. Jack went back to school. Eventually, Jack started writing. Perhaps because of the wisdom, or perhaps because of his new perspective, he wrote well. People liked what he wrote, and he became well known for it. After a time, Jack bought an RV and started traveling around the country for book signings and readings. But, he still remembered to drop by and visit Nate occasionally. On one of the visits Nate seemed quieter than usual. Not that Nate had been a fountain of joy lately. Jack's best guess was that Nate was still missing Samuel, and though Jack had tried, he still hadn't been able to replace Samuel in Nate's eyes. Nate had been getting quieter each visit. But on this visit Nate didn't even speak when Jack walked up to the lever. He nodded at Jack, and then went back to staring into the desert. Jack, respecting Nate's silence, sat down and waited. After a few minutes, Nate spoke. "Jack, I have someone to introduce you to." Jack looked surprised. "Someone to introduce me to?" Jack looked around, and then looked carefully back at Nate. "This something to do with the Big Guy? "No, no," replied Nate. "This is more personal. I want you to meet my son." Nate looked over at the nearest sand dune. "Sammy!" Jack watched as a four foot long desert rattlesnake crawled from behind the dune and up to the stone base of the lever. "Yo, Jack," said the new, much smaller snake. "Yo, Sammy" replied Jack. Jack looked at Nate. "Named after Samuel, I assume?" Nate nodded. "Jack, I've got a favor to ask you. Could you show Sammy around for me?" Nate unwrapped himself from the lever and slithered over to the edge of the stone and looked across the sands. "When Samuel first told me about the world, and brought me books and pictures, I wished that I could go see it. I wanted to see the great forests, the canyons, the cities, even the other deserts, to see if they felt and smelled the same. I want my son to have that chance - to see the world. Before he becomes bound here like I have been. "He's seen it in pictures, over the computer that you brought me. But I hear that it's not the same. That being there is different. I want him to have that. Think you can do that for me, Jack?" Jack nodded. This was obviously very important to Nate, so Jack didn't even joke about taking a talking rattlesnake out to see the world. "Yeah, I can do that for you, Nate. Is that all you need?" Jack could sense that was something more. Nate looked at Sammy. Sammy looked back at Nate for a second and then said, "Oh, yeah. Ummm, I've gotta go pack. Back in a little bit Jack. Nice to meet ya!" Sammy slithered back over the dune and out of sight. Nate watched Sammy disappear and then looked back at Jack. "Jack, this is my first son. My first offspring through all the years. You don't even want to know what it took for me to find a mate." Nate grinned to himself. "But anyway, I had a son for a reason. I'm tired. I'm ready for it to be over. I needed a replacement." Jack considered this for a minute. "So, you're ready to come see the world, and you wanted him to watch the lever while you were gone?" Nate shook his head. "No, Jack - you're a better guesser than that. You've already figured out - I'm bound here - there's only one way for me to leave here. And I'm ready. It's my time to die." Jack looked more closely at Nate. He could tell Nate had thought about this - probably for quite a while. Jack had trouble imagining what it would be like to be as old as Nate, but Jack could already tell that in another hundred or two hundred years, he might be getting tired of life himself. Jack could understand Samuel's decision, and now Nate's. So, all Jack said was, "What do you want me to do?" Nate nodded. "Thanks, Jack. I only want two things. One - show Sammy around the world - let him get his fill of it, until he's ready to come back here and take over. Two - give me the fourth request. "I can't just decide to die, not any more than you can. I won't even die of old age like you eventually will, even though it'll be a long time from now. I need to be killed. Once Sammy is back here, ready to take over, I'll be able to die. And I need you to kill me. "I've even thought about how. Poisons and other drugs won't work on me. And I've seen pictures of snakes that were shot - some of them live for days, so that's out too. So, I want you to bring back a sword. Nate turned away to look back to the dune that Sammy had gone behind. "I'd say an axe, but that's somewhat undignified - putting my head on the ground or a chopping block like that. No, I like a sword. A time-honored way of going out. A dignified way to die. And, most importantly, it should work, even on me. "You willing to do that for me, Jack?" Nate turned back to look at Jack. "Yeah, Nate," replied Jack solemnly, "I think I can handle that." Nate nodded. "Good!" He turned back toward the dune and shouted, "Sammy! Jack's about ready to leave!" Then quietly, "Thanks, Jack." Jack didn't have anything to say to that, so he waited for Sammy to make it back to the lever, nodded to him, nodded a final time to Nate, and then headed into the desert with Sammy following. Over the next several years Sammy and Jack kept in touch with Nate through e-mail as they went about their adventures. They made a goal of visiting every country in the world, and did a respectable job of it. Sammy had a natural gift for languages, as Jack expected he would, and even ended up acting as a translator for Jack in a few of the countries. Jack managed to keep the talking rattlesnake hidden, even so, and by the time they were nearing the end of their tour of countries, Sammy had only been spotted a few times. While there were several people that had seen enough to startle them greatly, nobody had enough evidence to prove anything, and while a few wild rumors and storied followed Jack and Sammy around, nothing ever hit the newspapers or the public in general. When they finished the tour of countries, Jack suggested that they try some undersea diving. They did. And spelunking. They did that too. Sammy finally drew the line at visiting Antarctica. He'd come to realize that Jack was stalling. After talking to his Dad about it over e-mail, he figured out that Jack probably didn't want to have to kill Nate. Nate told Sammy that humans could be squeamish about killing friends and acquaintances. So, Sammy eventually put his tail down (as he didn't have a foot) and told Jack that it was time - he was ready to go back and take up his duties from his dad. Jack, delayed it a little more by insisting that they go back to Japan and buy an appropriate sword. He even stretched it a little more by getting lessons in how to use the sword. But, eventually, he'd learned as much as he was likely to without dedicating his life to it, and was definitely competent enough to take the head off of a snake. It was time to head back and see Nate. When they got back to the US, Jack got the old RV out of storage where he and Sammy had left it after their tour of the fifty states, he loaded up Sammy and the sword, and they headed for the desert. When they got to the small town that Jack had been trying to find those years ago when he'd met Nate, Jack was in a funk. He didn't really feel like walking all of the way out there. Not only that, but he'd forgotten to figure the travel time correctly, and it was late afternoon. They'd either have to spend the night in town and walk out tomorrow, or walk in the dark. As Jack was afraid that if he waited one more night he might lose his resolve, he decided that he'd go ahead and drive the RV out there. It was only going to be this once, and Jack would go back and cover the tracks afterward. They ought to be able to make it out there by nightfall if they drove, and then they could get it over tonight. Jack told Sammy to e-mail Nate that they were coming as he drove out of sight of the town on the road. They then pulled off the road and headed out into the desert. Everything went well, until they got to the sand dunes. Jack had been nursing the RV along the whole time, over the rocks, through the creek beds, revving the engine the few times they almost got stuck. When they came to the dunes, Jack didn't really think about it, he just downshifted and headed up the first one. By the third dune, Jack started to regret that he'd decided to try driving on the sand. The RV was fishtailling and losing traction. Jack was having to work it up each dune slowly and was trying to keep from losing control each time they came over the top and slid down the other side. Sammy had come up to sit in the passenger seat, coiled up and laughing at Jack's driving. As they came over the top of the fourth dune, the biggest one yet, Jack saw that this was the final dune - the stone, the lever, and somewhere Nate, waited below. Jack put on the brakes, but he'd gone a little too far. The RV started slipping down the other side. Jack tried turning the wheel, but he didn't have enough traction. He pumped the brakes - no response. They started sliding down the hill, faster and faster. Jack felt a shock go through him as he suddenly realized that they were heading for the lever. He looked down - the RV was directly on course for it. If Jack didn't do something, the RV would hit it. He was about to end humanity. Jack steered more frantically, trying to get traction. It still wasn't working. The dune was too steep, and the sand too loose. In a split second, Jack realized that his only chance would be once he hit the stone around the lever - he should have traction on the stone for just a second before he hit the lever - he wouldn't have time to stop, but he should be able to steer away. Jack took a better grip on the steering wheel and tried to turn the RV a little bit - every little bit would help. He'd have to time his turn just right. The RV got to the bottom of the dune, sliding at an amazing speed in the sand. Just before they reached the stone Jack looked across it to check that they were still heading for the lever. They were. But Jack noticed something else that he hadn't seen from the top of the dune. Nate wasn't wrapped around the lever. He was off to the side of the lever, but still on the stone, waiting for them. The problem was, he was waiting on the same side of the lever that Jack had picked to steer towards to avoid the lever. The RV was already starting to drift that way a little in its mad rush across the sand and there was no way that Jack was going to be able to go around the lever to the other side. Jack had an instant of realization. He was either going to have to hit the lever, or run over Nate. He glanced over at Sammy and saw that Sammy realized the same thing. Jack took a firmer grip on the steering wheel as the RV ran up on the stone. Shouting to Sammy as he pulled the steering wheel... + Show Spoiler + "BETTER NATE THAN LEVER!" FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU- yOUYOUYOU. Damn, but I laughed | ||
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Leath
Canada1724 Posts
![[image loading]](http://images.thmbz.com/128e398e80_manatee-bumps-into-glass.gif) | ||
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400lb White Girl
United States83 Posts
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
This just won the thread. | ||
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Hiicantpk
Canada72 Posts
On June 08 2009 11:51 kNyTTyM wrote: no picture but as epic as anything in this thread read all the way through please. + Show Spoiler + So, there's a man crawling through the desert. He'd decided to try his SUV in a little bit of cross-country travel, had great fun zooming over the badlands and through the sand, got lost, hit a big rock, and then he couldn't get it started again. There were no cell phone towers anywhere near, so his cell phone was useless. He had no family, his parents had died a few years before in an auto accident, and his few friends had no idea he was out here. He stayed with the car for a day or so, but his one bottle of water ran out and he was getting thirsty. He thought maybe he knew the direction back, now that he'd paid attention to the sun and thought he'd figured out which way was north, so he decided to start walking. He figured he only had to go about 30 miles or so and he'd be back to the small town he'd gotten gas in last. He thinks about walking at night to avoid the heat and sun, but based upon how dark it actually was the night before, and given that he has no flashlight, he's afraid that he'll break a leg or step on a rattlesnake. So, he puts on some sun block, puts the rest in his pocket for reapplication later, brings an umbrella he'd had in the back of the SUV with him to give him a little shade, pours the windshield wiper fluid into his water bottle in case he gets that desperate, brings his pocket knife in case he finds a cactus that looks like it might have water in it, and heads out in the direction he thinks is right. He walks for the entire day. By the end of the day he's really thirsty. He's been sweating all day, and his lips are starting to crack. He's reapplied the sunblock twice, and tried to stay under the umbrella, but he still feels sunburned. The windshield wiper fluid sloshing in the bottle in his pocket is really getting tempting now. He knows that it's mainly water and some ethanol and coloring, but he also knows that they add some kind of poison to it to keep people from drinking it. He wonders what the poison is, and whether the poison would be worse than dying of thirst. He pushes on, trying to get to that small town before dark. By the end of the day he starts getting worried. He figures he's been walking at least 3 miles an hour, according to his watch for over 10 hours. That means that if his estimate was right that he should be close to the town. But he doesn't recognize any of this. He had to cross a dry creek bed a mile or two back, and he doesn't remember coming through it in the SUV. He figures that maybe he got his direction off just a little and that the dry creek bed was just off to one side of his path. He tells himself that he's close, and that after dark he'll start seeing the town lights over one of these hills, and that'll be all he needs. As it gets dim enough that he starts stumbling over small rocks and things, he finds a spot and sits down to wait for full dark and the town lights. Full dark comes before he knows it. He must have dozed off. He stands back up and turns all the way around. He sees nothing but stars. He wakes up the next morning feeling absolutely lousy. His eyes are gummy and his mouth and nose feel like they're full of sand. He so thirsty that he can't even swallow. He barely got any sleep because it was so cold. He'd forgotten how cold it got at night in the desert and hadn't noticed it the night before because he'd been in his car. He knows the Rule of Threes - three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food - then you die. Some people can make it a little longer, in the best situations. But the desert heat and having to walk and sweat isn't the best situation to be without water. He figures, unless he finds water, this is his last day. He rinses his mouth out with a little of the windshield wiper fluid. He waits a while after spitting that little bit out, to see if his mouth goes numb, or he feels dizzy or something. Has his mouth gone numb? Is it just in his mind? He's not sure. He'll go a little farther, and if he still doesn't find water, he'll try drinking some of the fluid. Then he has to face his next, harder question - which way does he go from here? Does he keep walking the same way he was yesterday (assuming that he still knows which way that is), or does he try a new direction? He has no idea what to do. Looking at the hills and dunes around him, he thinks he knows the direction he was heading before. Just going by a feeling, he points himself somewhat to the left of that, and starts walking. As he walks, the day starts heating up. The desert, too cold just a couple of hours before, soon becomes an oven again. He sweats a little at first, and then stops. He starts getting worried at that - when you stop sweating he knows that means you're in trouble - usually right before heat stroke. He decides that it's time to try the windshield wiper fluid. He can't wait any longer - if he passes out, he's dead. He stops in the shade of a large rock, takes the bottle out, opens it, and takes a mouthful. He slowly swallows it, making it last as long as he can. It feels so good in his dry and cracked throat that he doesn't even care about the nasty taste. He takes another mouthful, and makes it last too. Slowly, he drinks half the bottle. He figures that since he's drinking it, he might as well drink enough to make some difference and keep himself from passing out. He's quit worrying about the denaturing of the wiper fluid. If it kills him, it kills him - if he didn't drink it, he'd die anyway. Besides, he's pretty sure that whatever substance they denature the fluid with is just designed to make you sick - their way of keeping winos from buying cheap wiper fluid for the ethanol content. He can handle throwing up, if it comes to that. He walks. He walks in the hot, dry, windless desert. Sand, rocks, hills, dunes, the occasional scrawny cactus or dried bush. No sign of water. Sometimes he'll see a little movement to one side or the other, but whatever moved is usually gone before he can focus his eyes on it. Probably birds, lizards, or mice. Maybe snakes, though they usually move more at night. He's careful to stay away from the movements. After a while, he begins to stagger. He's not sure if it's fatigue, heat stroke finally catching him, or maybe he was wrong and the denaturing of the wiper fluid was worse than he thought. He tries to steady himself, and keep going. After more walking, he comes to a large stretch of sand. This is good! He knows he passed over a stretch of sand in the SUV - he remembers doing donuts in it. Or at least he thinks he remembers it - he's getting woozy enough and tired enough that he's not sure what he remembers any more or if he's hallucinating. But he thinks he remembers it. So he heads off into it, trying to get to the other side, hoping that it gets him closer to the town. He was heading for a town, wasn't he? He thinks he was. He isn't sure any more. He's not even sure how long he's been walking any more. Is it still morning? Or has it moved into afternoon and the sun is going down again? It must be afternoon - it seems like it's been too long since he started out. He walks through the sand. After a while, he comes to a big dune in the sand. This is bad. He doesn't remember any dunes when driving over the sand in his SUV. Or at least he doesn't think he remembers any. This is bad. But, he has no other direction to go. Too late to turn back now. He figures that he'll get to the top of the dune and see if he can see anything from there that helps him find the town. He keeps going up the dune. Halfway up, he slips in the bad footing of the sand for the second or third time, and falls to his knees. He doesn't feel like getting back up - he'll just fall down again. So, he keeps going up the dune on his hand and knees. While crawling, if his throat weren't so dry, he'd laugh. He's finally gotten to the hackneyed image of a man lost in the desert - crawling through the sand on his hands and knees. If would be the perfect image, he imagines, if only his clothes were more ragged. The people crawling through the desert in the cartoons always had ragged clothes. But his have lasted without any rips so far. Somebody will probably find his dessicated corpse half buried in the sand years from now, and his clothes will still be in fine shape - shake the sand out, and a good wash, and they'd be wearable again. He wishes his throat were wet enough to laugh. He coughs a little instead, and it hurts. He finally makes it to the top of the sand dune. Now that he's at the top, he struggles a little, but manages to stand up and look around. All he sees is sand. Sand, and more sand. Behind him, about a mile away, he thinks he sees the rocky ground he left to head into this sand. Ahead of him, more dunes, more sand. This isn't where he drove his SUV. This is Hell. Or close enough. Again, he doesn't know what to do. He decides to drink the rest of the wiper fluid while figuring it out. He takes out the bottle, and is removing the cap, when he glances to the side and sees something. Something in the sand. At the bottom of the dune, off to the side, he sees something strange. It's a flat area, in the sand. He stops taking the cap of the bottle off, and tries to look closer. The area seems to be circular. And it's dark - darker than the sand. And, there seems to be something in the middle of it, but he can't tell what it is. He looks as hard as he can, and still can tell from here. He's going to have to go down there and look. He puts the bottle back in his pocket, and starts to stumble down the dune. After a few steps, he realizes that he's in trouble - he's not going to be able to keep his balance. After a couple of more sliding, tottering steps, he falls and starts to roll down the dune. The sand it so hot when his body hits it that for a minute he thinks he's caught fire on the way down - like a movie car wreck flashing into flames as it goes over the cliff, before it ever even hits the ground. He closes his eyes and mouth, covers his face with his hands, and waits to stop rolling. He stops, at the bottom of the dune. After a minute or two, he finds enough energy to try to sit up and get the sand out of his face and clothes. When he clears his eyes enough, he looks around to make sure that the dark spot in the sand it still there and he hadn't just imagined it. So, seeing the large, flat, dark spot on the sand is still there, he begins to crawl towards it. He'd get up and walk towards it, but he doesn't seem to have the energy to get up and walk right now. He must be in the final stages of dehydration he figures, as he crawls. If this place in the sand doesn't have water, he'll likely never make it anywhere else. This is his last chance. He gets closer and closer, but still can't see what's in the middle of the dark area. His eyes won't quite focus any more for some reason. And lifting his head up to look takes so much effort that he gives up trying. He just keeps crawling. Finally, he reaches the area he'd seen from the dune. It takes him a minute of crawling on it before he realizes that he's no longer on sand - he's now crawling on some kind of dark stone. Stone with some kind of marking on it - a pattern cut into the stone. He's too tired to stand up and try to see what the pattern is - so he just keeps crawling. He crawls towards the center, where his blurry eyes still see something in the middle of the dark stone area. His mind, detached in a strange way, notes that either his hands and knees are so burnt by the sand that they no longer feel pain, or that this dark stone, in the middle of a burning desert with a pounding, punishing sun overhead, doesn't seem to be hot. It almost feels cool. He considers lying down on the nice cool surface. Cool, dark stone. Not a good sign. He must be hallucinating this. He's probably in the middle of a patch of sand, already lying face down and dying, and just imagining this whole thing. A desert mirage. Soon the beautiful women carrying pitchers of water will come up and start giving him a drink. Then he'll know he's gone. He decides against laying down on the cool stone. If he's going to die here in the middle of this hallucination, he at least wants to see what's in the center before he goes. He keeps crawling. It's the third time that he hears the voice before he realizes what he's hearing. He would swear that someone just said, "Greetings, traveler. You do not look well. Do you hear me?" He stops crawling. He tries to look up from where he is on his hands and knees, but it's too much effort to lift his head. So he tries something different - he leans back and tries to sit up on the stone. After a few seconds, he catches his balance, avoids falling on his face, sits up, and tries to focus his eyes. Blurry. He rubs his eyes with the back of his hands and tries again. Better this time. Yep. He can see. He's sitting in the middle of a large, flat, dark expanse of stone. Directly next to him, about three feet away, is a white post or pole about two inches in diameter and sticking up about four or five feet out of the stone, at an angle. And wrapped around this white rod, tail with rattle on it hovering and seeming to be ready to start rattling, is what must be a fifteen foot long desert diamondback rattlesnake, looking directly at him. He stares at the snake in shock. He doesn't have the energy to get up and run away. He doesn't even have the energy to crawl away. This is it, his final resting place. No matter what happens, he's not going to be able to move from this spot. Well, at least dying of a bite from this monster should be quicker than dying of thirst. He'll face his end like a man. He struggles to sit up a little straighter. The snake keeps watching him. He lifts one hand and waves it in the snake's direction, feebly. The snake watches the hand for a moment, then goes back to watching the man, looking into his eyes. Hmmm. Maybe the snake had no interest in biting him? It hadn't rattled yet - that was a good sign. Maybe he wasn't going to die of snake bite after all. He then remembers that he'd looked up when he'd reached the center here because he thought he'd heard a voice. He was still very woozy - he was likely to pass out soon, the sun still beat down on him even though he was now on cool stone. He still didn't have anything to drink. But maybe he had actually heard a voice. This stone didn't look natural. Nor did that white post sticking up out of the stone. Someone had to have built this. Maybe they were still nearby. Maybe that was who talked to him. Maybe this snake was even their pet, and that's why it wasn't biting. He tries to clear his throat to say, "Hello," but his throat is too dry. All that comes out is a coughing or wheezing sound. There is no way he's going to be able to talk without something to drink. He feels his pocket, and the bottle with the wiper fluid is still there. He shakily pulls the bottle out, almost losing his balance and falling on his back in the process. This isn't good. He doesn't have much time left, by his reckoning, before he passes out. He gets the lid off of the bottle, manages to get the bottle to his lips, and pours some of the fluid into his mouth. He sloshes it around, and then swallows it. He coughs a little. His throat feels better. Maybe he can talk now. He tries again. Ignoring the snake, he turns to look around him, hoping to spot the owner of this place, and croaks out, "Hello? Is there anyone here?" He hears, from his side, "Greetings. What is it that you want?" He turns his head, back towards the snake. That's where the sound had seemed to come from. The only thing he can think of is that there must be a speaker, hidden under the snake, or maybe built into that post. He decides to try asking for help. "Please," he croaks again, suddenly feeling dizzy, "I'd love to not be thirsty any more. I've been a long time without water. Can you help me?" Looking in the direction of the snake, hoping to see where the voice was coming from this time, he is shocked to see the snake rear back, open its mouth, and speak. He hears it say, as the dizziness overtakes him and he falls forward, face first on the stone, "Very well. Coming up." A piercing pain shoots through his shoulder. Suddenly he is awake. He sits up and grabs his shoulder, wincing at the throbbing pain. He's momentarily disoriented as he looks around, and then he remembers - the crawl across the sand, the dark area of stone, the snake. He sees the snake, still wrapped around the tilted white post, still looking at him. He reaches up and feels his shoulder, where it hurts. It feels slightly wet. He pulls his fingers away and looks at them - blood. He feels his shoulder again - his shirt has what feels like two holes in it - two puncture holes - they match up with the two aching spots of pain on his shoulder. He had been bitten. By the snake. "It'll feel better in a minute." He looks up - it's the snake talking. He hadn't dreamed it. Suddenly he notices - he's not dizzy any more. And more importantly, he's not thirsty any more - at all! "Have I died? Is this the afterlife? Why are you biting me in the afterlife?" "Sorry about that, but I had to bite you," says the snake. "That's the way I work. It all comes through the bite. Think of it as natural medicine." "You bit me to help me? Why aren't I thirsty any more? Did you give me a drink before you bit me? How did I drink enough while unconscious to not be thirsty any more? I haven't had a drink for over two days. Well, except for the windshield wiper fluid... hold it, how in the world does a snake talk? Are you real? Are you some sort of Disney animation?" "No," says the snake, "I'm real. As real as you or anyone is, anyway. I didn't give you a drink. I bit you. That's how it works - it's what I do. I bite. I don't have hands to give you a drink, even if I had water just sitting around here." The man sat stunned for a minute. Here he was, sitting in the middle of the desert on some strange stone that should be hot but wasn't, talking to a snake that could talk back and had just bitten him. And he felt better. Not great - he was still starving and exhausted, but much better - he was no longer thirsty. He had started to sweat again, but only slightly. He felt hot, in this sun, but it was starting to get lower in the sky, and the cool stone beneath him was a relief he could notice now that he was no longer dying of thirst. "I might suggest that we take care of that methanol you now have in your system with the next request," continued the snake. "I can guess why you drank it, but I'm not sure how much you drank, or how much methanol was left in the wiper fluid. That stuff is nasty. It'll make you go blind in a day or two, if you drank enough of it." "Ummm, n-next request?" said the man. He put his hand back on his hurting shoulder and backed away from the snake a little. "That's the way it works. If you like, that is," explained the snake. "You get three requests. Call them wishes, if you wish." The snake grinned at his own joke, and the man drew back a little further from the show of fangs. "But there are rules," the snake continued. "The first request is free. The second requires an agreement of secrecy. The third requires the binding of responsibility." The snake looks at the man seriously. "By the way," the snake says suddenly, "my name is Nathan. Old Nathan, Samuel used to call me. He gave me the name. Before that, most of the Bound used to just call me 'Snake'. But that got old, and Samuel wouldn't stand for it. He said that anything that could talk needed a name. He was big into names. You can call me Nate, if you wish." Again, the snake grinned. "Sorry if I don't offer to shake, but I think you can understand - my shake sounds somewhat threatening." The snake give his rattle a little shake. "Umm, my name is Jack," said the man, trying to absorb all of this. "Jack Samson. "Can I ask you a question?" Jack says suddenly. "What happened to the poison...umm, in your bite. Why aren't I dying now? How did you do that? What do you mean by that's how you work?" "That's more than one question," grins Nate. "But I'll still try to answer all of them. First, yes, you can ask me a question." The snake's grin gets wider. "Second, the poison is in you. It changed you. You now no longer need to drink. That's what you asked for. Or, well, technically, you asked to not be thirsty any more - but 'any more' is such a vague term. I decided to make it permanent - now, as long as you live, you shouldn't need to drink much at all. Your body will conserve water very efficiently. You should be able to get enough just from the food you eat - much like a creature of the desert. You've been changed. "For the third question," Nate continues, "you are still dying. Besides the effects of that methanol in your system, you're a man - and men are mortal. In your current state, I give you no more than about another 50 years. Assuming you get out of this desert, alive, that is." Nate seemed vastly amused at his own humor, and continued his wide grin. "As for the fourth question," Nate said, looking more serious as far as Jack could tell, as Jack was just now working on his ability to read talking-snake emotions from snake facial features, "first you have to agree to make a second request and become bound by the secrecy, or I can't tell you." "Wait," joked Jack, "isn't this where you say you could tell me, but you'd have to kill me?" "I thought that was implied." Nate continued to look serious. "Ummm...yeah." Jack leaned back a little as he remembered again that he was talking to a fifteen foot poisonous reptile with a reputation for having a nasty temper. "So, what is this 'Bound by Secrecy' stuff, and can you really stop the effects of the methanol?" Jack thought for a second. "And, what do you mean methanol, anyway? I thought these days they use ethanol in wiper fluid, and just denature it?" "They may, I don't really know," said Nate. "I haven't gotten out in a while. Maybe they do. All I know is that I smell methanol on your breath and on that bottle in your pocket. And the blue color of the liquid when you pulled it out to drink some let me guess that it was wiper fluid. I assume that they still color wiper fluid blue?" "Yeah, they do," said Jack. "I figured," replied Nate. "As for being bound by secrecy - with the fulfillment of your next request, you will be bound to say nothing about me, this place, or any of the information I will tell you after that, when you decide to go back out to your kind. You won't be allowed to talk about me, write about me, use sign language, charades, or even act in a way that will lead someone to guess correctly about me. You'll be bound to secrecy. Of course, I'll also ask you to promise not to give me away, and as I'm guessing that you're a man of your word, you'll never test the binding anyway, so you won't notice." Nate said the last part with utter confidence. Jack, who had always prided himself on being a man of his word, felt a little nervous at this. "Ummm, hey, Nate, who are you? How did you know that? Are you, umm, omniscient, or something?" Well, Jack," said Nate sadly, "I can't tell you that, unless you make the second request." Nate looked away for a minute, then looked back. "Umm, well, ok," said Jack, "what is this about a second request? What can I ask for? Are you allowed to tell me that?" "Sure!" said Nate, brightening. "You're allowed to ask for changes. Changes to yourself. They're like wishes, but they can only affect you. Oh, and before you ask, I can't give you immortality. Or omniscience. Or omnipresence, for that matter. Though I might be able to make you gaseous and yet remain alive, and then you could spread through the atmosphere and sort of be omnipresent. But what good would that be - you still wouldn't be omniscient and thus still could only focus on one thing at a time. Not very useful, at least in my opinion." Nate stopped when he realized that Jack was staring at him. "Well, anyway," continued Nate, "I'd probably suggest giving you permanent good health. It would negate the methanol now in your system, you'd be immune to most poisons and diseases, and you'd tend to live a very long time, barring accident, of course. And you'll even have a tendency to recover from accidents well. It always seemed like a good choice for a request to me." "Cure the methanol poisoning, huh?" said Jack. "And keep me healthy for a long time? Hmmm. It doesn't sound bad at that. And it has to be a request about a change to me? I can't ask to be rich, right? Because that's not really a change to me?" "Right," nodded Nate. "Could I ask to be a genius and permanently healthy?" Jack asked, hopefully. "That takes two requests, Jack." "Yeah, I figured so," said Jack. "But I could ask to be a genius? I could become the smartest scientist in the world? Or the best athlete?" "Well, I could make you very smart," admitted Nate, "but that wouldn't necessarily make you the best scientist in the world. Or, I could make you very athletic, but it wouldn't necessarily make you the best athlete either. You've heard the saying that 99% of genius is hard work? Well, there's some truth to that. I can give you the talent, but I can't make you work hard. It all depends on what you decide to do with it." "Hmmm," said Jack. "Ok, I think I understand. And I get a third request, after this one?" "Maybe," said Nate, "it depends on what you decide then. There are more rules for the third request that I can only tell you about after the second request. You know how it goes." Nate looked like he'd shrug, if he had shoulders. "Ok, well, since I'd rather not be blind in a day or two, and permanent health doesn't sound bad, then consider that my second request. Officially. Do I need to sign in blood or something?" "No," said Nate. "Just hold out your hand. Or heel." Nate grinned. "Or whatever part you want me to bite. I have to bite you again. Like I said, that's how it works - the poison, you know," Nate said apologetically. Jack winced a little and felt his shoulder, where the last bite was. Hey, it didn't hurt any more. Just like Nate had said. That made Jack feel better about the biting business. But still, standing still while a fifteen foot snake sunk it's fangs into you. Jack stood up. Ignoring how good it felt to be able to stand again, and the hunger starting to gnaw at his stomach, Jack tried to decide where he wanted to get bitten. Despite knowing that it wouldn't hurt for long, Jack knew that this wasn't going to be easy. "Hey, Jack," Nate suddenly said, looking past Jack towards the dunes behind him, "is that someone else coming up over there?" Jack spun around and looked. Who else could be out here in the middle of nowhere? And did they bring food? Wait a minute, there was nobody over there. What was Nate... Jack let out a bellow as he felt two fangs sink into his rear end, through his jeans... Jack sat down carefully, favoring his more tender buttock. "I would have decided, eventually, Nate. I was just thinking about it. You didn't have to hoodwink me like that." "I've been doing this a long time, Jack," said Nate, confidently. "You humans have a hard time sitting still and letting a snake bite you - especially one my size. And besides, admit it - it's only been a couple of minutes and it already doesn't hurt any more, does it? That's because of the health benefit with this one. I told you that you'd heal quickly now." "Yeah, well, still," said Jack, "it's the principle of the thing. And nobody likes being bitten in the butt! Couldn't you have gotten my calf or something instead?" "More meat in the typical human butt," replied Nate. "And less chance you accidentally kick me or move at the last second." "Yeah, right. So, tell me all of these wonderful secrets that I now qualify to hear," answered Jack. "Ok," said Nate. "Do you want to ask questions first, or do you want me to just start talking?" "Just talk," said Jack. "I'll sit here and try to not think about food." "We could go try to rustle up some food for you first, if you like," answered Nate. "Hey! You didn't tell me you had food around here, Nate!" Jack jumped up. "What do we have? Am I in walking distance to town? Or can you magically whip up food along with your other powers?" Jack was almost shouting with excitement. His stomach had been growling for hours. "I was thinking more like I could flush something out of its hole and bite it for you, and you could skin it and eat it. Assuming you have a knife, that is," replied Nate, with the grin that Jack was starting to get used to. "Ugh," said Jack, sitting back down. "I think I'll pass. I can last a little longer before I get desperate enough to eat desert rat, or whatever else it is you find out here. And there's nothing to burn - I'd have to eat it raw. No thanks. Just talk." "Ok," replied Nate, still grinning. "But I'd better hurry, before you start looking at me as food. Nate reared back a little, looked around for a second, and then continued. "You, Jack, are sitting in the middle of the Garden of Eden." Jack looked around at the sand and dunes and then looked back at Nate sceptically. "Well, that's the best I can figure it, anyway, Jack," said Nate. "Stand up and look at the symbol on the rock here." Nate gestured around the dark stone they were both sitting on with his nose. Jack stood up and looked. Carved into the stone in a bas-relief was a representation of a large tree. The angled-pole that Nate was wrapped around was coming out of the trunk of the tree, right below where the main branches left the truck to reach out across the stone. It was very well done - it looked more like a tree had been reduced to almost two dimensions and embedded in the stone than it did like a carving. Jack walked around and looked at the details in the fading light of the setting sun. He wished he'd looked at it while the sun was higher in the sky. Wait! The sun was setting! That meant he was going to have to spend another night out here! Arrrgh! Jack looked out across the desert for a little bit, and then came back and stood next to Nate. "In all the excitement, I almost forgot, Nate," said Jack. "Which way is it back to town? And how far? I'm eventually going to have to head back - I'm not sure I'll be able to survive by eating raw desert critters for long. And even if I can, I'm not sure I'll want to." "It's about 30 miles that way." Nate pointed, with the rattle on his tail this time. As far as Jack could tell, it was a direction at right angles to the way he'd been going when he was crawling here. "But that's 30 miles by the way the crow flies. It's about 40 by the way a man walks. You should be able to do it in about half a day with your improved endurance, if you head out early tomorrow, Jack." Jack looked out the way the snake had pointed for a few seconds more, and then sat back down. It was getting dark. Not much he could do about heading out right now. And besides, Nate was just about to get to the interesting stuff. "Garden of Eden? As best as you can figure it?" "Well, yeah, as best as I and Samuel could figure it anyway," said Nate. "He figured that the story just got a little mixed up. You know, snake, in a 'tree', offering 'temptations', making bargains. That kind stuff. But he could never quite figure out how the Hebrews found out about this spot from across the ocean. He worried about that for a while." "Garden of Eden, hunh?" said Jack. "How long have you been here, Nate?" "No idea, really," replied Nate. "A long time. It never occurred to me to count years, until recently, and by then, of course, it was too late. But I do remember when this whole place was green, so I figure it's been thousands of years, at least." "So, are you the snake that tempted Eve?" said Jack. "Beats me," said Nate. "Maybe. I can't remember if the first one of your kind that I talked to was female or not, and I never got a name, but it could have been. And I suppose she could have considered my offer to grant requests a 'temptation', though I've rarely had refusals." "Well, umm, how did you get here then? And why is that white pole stuck out of the stone there?" asked Jack. "Dad left me here. Or, I assume it was my dad. It was another snake - much bigger than I was back then. I remember talking to him, but I don't remember if it was in a language, or just kind of understanding what he wanted. But one day, he brought me to this stone, told me about it, and asked me to do something for him. I talked it over with him for a while, then agreed. I've been here ever since. "What is this place?" said Jack. "And what did he ask you to do?" "Well, you see this pole here, sticking out of the stone?" Nate loosened his coils around the tilted white pole and showed Jack where it descended into the stone. The pole was tilted at about a 45 degree angle and seemed to enter the stone in an eighteen inch slot cut into the stone. Jack leaned over and looked. The slot was dark and the pole went down into it as far as Jack could see in the dim light. Jack reached out to touch the pole, but Nate was suddenly there in the way. "You can't touch that yet, Jack," said Nate. "Why not?" asked Jack. "I haven't explained it to you yet," replied Nate. "Well, it kinda looks like a lever or something," said Jack. "You'd push it that way, and it would move in the slot." "Yep, that's what it is," replied Nate. "What does it do?" asked Jack. "End the world?" "Oh, no," said Nate. "Nothing that drastic. It just ends humanity. I call it 'The Lever of Doom'." For the last few words Nate had used a deeper, ringing voice. He tried to look serious for a few seconds, and then gave up and grinned. Jack was initially startled by Nate's pronouncement, but when Nate grinned Jack laughed. "Ha! You almost had me fooled for a second there. What does it really do?" "Oh, it really ends humanity, like I said," smirked Nate. "I just thought the voice I used was funny, didn't you?" Nate continued to grin. "A lever to end humanity?" asked Jack. "What in the world is that for? Why would anyone need to end humanity?" "Well," replied Nate, "I get the idea that maybe humanity was an experiment. Or maybe the Big Guy just thought, that if humanity started going really bad, there should be a way to end it. I'm not really sure. All I know are the rules, and the guesses that Samuel and I had about why it's here. I didn't think to ask back when I started here." "Rules? What rules?" asked Jack. "The rules are that I can't tell anybody about it or let them touch it unless they agree to be bound to secrecy by a bite. And that only one human can be bound in that way at a time. That's it." explained Nate. Jack looked somewhat shocked. "You mean that I could pull the lever now? You'd let me end humanity?" "Yep," replied Nate, "if you want to." Nate looked at Jack carefully. "Do you want to, Jack?" "Umm, no." said Jack, stepping a little further back from the lever. "Why in the world would anyone want to end humanity? It'd take a psychotic to want that! Or worse, a suicidal psychotic, because it would kill him too, wouldn't it?" "Yep," replied Nate, "being as he'd be human too." "Has anyone ever seriously considered it?" asked Nate. "Any of those bound to secrecy, that is?" "Well, of course, I think they've all seriously considered it at one time or another. Being given that kind of responsibility makes you sit down and think, or so I'm told. Samuel considered it several times. He'd often get disgusted with humanity, come out here, and just hold the lever for a while. But he never pulled it. Or you wouldn't be here." Nate grinned some more. Jack sat down, well back from the lever. He looked thoughtful and puzzled at the same time. After a bit, he said, "So this makes me the Judge of humanity? I get to decide whether they keep going or just end? Me?" "That seems to be it," agreed Nate. "What kind of criteria do I use to decide?" said Jack. "How do I make this decision? Am I supposed to decide if they're good? Or too many of them are bad? Or that they're going the wrong way? Is there a set of rules for that?" "Nope," replied Nate. "You pretty much just have to decide on your own. It's up to you, however you want to decide it. I guess that you're just supposed to know." "But what if I get mad at someone? Or some girl dumps me and I feel horrible? Couldn't I make a mistake? How do I know that I won't screw up?" protested Jack. Nate gave his kind of snake-like shrug again. "You don't. You just have to try your best, Jack." Jack sat there for a while, staring off into the desert that was rapidly getting dark, chewing on a fingernail. Suddenly, Jack turned around and looked at the snake. "Nate, was Samuel the one bound to this before me?" "Yep," replied Nate. "He was a good guy. Talked to me a lot. Taught me to read and brought me books. I think I still have a good pile of them buried in the sand around here somewhere. I still miss him. He died a few months ago." "Sounds like a good guy," agreed Jack. "How did he handle this, when you first told him. What did he do?" "Well," said Nate, "he sat down for a while, thought about it for a bit, and then asked me some questions, much like you're doing." "What did he ask you, if you're allowed to tell me?" asked Jack. "He asked me about the third request," replied Nate. "Aha!" It was Jack's turn to grin. "And what did you tell him?" "I told him the rules for the third request. That to get the third request you have to agree to this whole thing. That if it ever comes to the point that you really think that humanity should be ended, that you'll come here and end it. You won't avoid it, and you won't wimp out." Nate looked serious again. "And you'll be bound to do it too, Jack." "Hmmm." Jack looked back out into the darkness for a while. Nate watched him, waiting. "Nate," continued Jack, quietly, eventually. "What did Samuel ask for with his third request?" Nate sounded like he was grinning again as he replied, also quietly, "Wisdom, Jack. He asked for wisdom. As much as I could give him." "Ok," said Jack, suddenly, standing up and facing away from Nate, "give it to me. Nate looked at Jack's backside. "Give you what, Jack?" "Give me that wisdom. The same stuff that Samuel asked for. If it helped him, maybe it'll help me too." Jack turned his head to look back over his shoulder at Nate. "It did help him, right?" "He said it did," replied Nate. "But he seemed a little quieter afterward. Like he had a lot to think about." "Well, yeah, I can see that," said Jack. "So, give it to me." Jack turned to face away from Nate again, bent over slightly and tensed up. Nate watched Jack tense up with a little exasperation. If he bit Jack now, Jack would likely jump out of his skin and maybe hurt them both. "You remember that you'll be bound to destroy humanity if it ever looks like it needs it, right Jack?" asked Nate, shifting position. "Yeah, yeah, I got that," replied Jack, eyes squeezed tightly shut and body tense, not noticing the change in direction of Nate's voice. "And," continued Nate, from his new position, "do you remember that you'll turn bright purple, and grow big horns and extra eyes?" "Yeah, yeah...Hey, wait a minute!" said Jack, opening his eyes, straightening up and turning around. "Purple?!" He didn't see Nate there. With the moonlight Jack could see that the lever extended up from its slot in the rock without the snake wrapped around it. Jack heard, from behind him, Nate's "Just Kidding!" right before he felt the now familiar piercing pain, this time in the other buttock. Jack sat on the edge of the dark stone in the rapidly cooling air, his feet extending out into the sand. He stared out into the darkness, listening to the wind stir the sand, occasionally rubbing his butt where he'd been recently bitten. Nate had left for a little while, had come back with a desert-rodent-shaped bulge somewhere in his middle, and was now wrapped back around the lever, his tongue flicking out into the desert night's air the only sign that he was still awake. Occasionally Jack, with his toes absentmindedly digging in the sand while he thought, would ask Nate a question without turning around. "Nate, do accidents count?" Nate lifted his head a little bit. "What do you mean, Jack?" Jack tilted his head back like he was looking at the stars. "You know, accidents. If I accidentally fall on the lever, without meaning to, does that still wipe out humanity?" "Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does, Jack. I'd suggest you be careful about that if you start feeling wobbly," said Nate with some amusement. A little later - "Does it have to be me that pulls the lever?" asked Jack. "That's the rule, Jack. Nobody else can pull it," answered Nate. "No," Jack shook his head, "I meant does it have to be my hand? Could I pull the lever with a rope tied around it? Or push it with a stick? Or throw a rock?" "Yes, those should work," replied Nate. "Though I'm not sure how complicated you could get. Samuel thought about trying to build some kind of remote control for it once, but gave it up. Everything he'd build would be gone by the next sunrise, if it was touching the stone, or over it. I told him that in the past others that had been bound had tried to bury the lever so they wouldn't be tempted to pull it, but every time the stones or sand or whatever had disappeared." "Wow," said Jack, "Cool." Jack leaned back until only his elbows kept him off of the stone and looked up into the sky. "Nate, how long did Samuel live? One of his wishes was for health too, right?" asked Jack. "Yes," replied Nate, "it was. He lived 167 years, Jack." "Wow, 167 years. That's almost 140 more years I'll live if I live as long. Do you know what he died of, Nate?" "He died of getting tired of living, Jack," Nate said, sounding somewhat sad. Jack turned his head to look at Nate in the starlight. Nate looked back. "Samuel knew he wasn't going to be able to stay in society. He figured that they'd eventually see him still alive and start questioning it, so he decided that he'd have to disappear after a while. He faked his death once, but changed his mind - he decided it was too early and he could stay for a little longer. He wasn't very fond of mankind, but he liked the attention. Most of the time, anyway. "His daughter and then his wife dying almost did him in though. He didn't stay in society much longer after that. He eventually came out here to spend time talking to me and thinking about pulling the lever. A few months ago he told me he'd had enough. It was his time." "And then he just died?" asked Jack. Nate shook his head a little. "He made his forth request, Jack. There's only one thing you can ask for the fourth request. The last bite. After a bit Nate continued, "He told me that he was tired, that it was his time. He reassured me that someone new would show up soon, like they always had. After another pause, Nate finished, "Samuel's body disappeared off the stone with the sunrise." Jack lay back down and looked at the sky, leaving Nate alone with his memories. It was a long time until Jack's breathing evened out into sleep. Jack woke with the sunrise the next morning. He was a little chilled with the morning desert air, but overall was feeling pretty good. Well, except that his stomach was grumbling and he wasn't willing to eat raw desert rat. So, after getting directions to town from Nate, making sure he knew how to get back, and reassuring Nate that he'd be back soon, Jack started the long walk back to town. With his new health and Nate's good directions, he made it back easily. Jack caught a bus back to the city, and showed up for work the next day, little worse for the wear and with a story about getting lost in the desert and walking back out. Within a couple of days Jack had talked a friend with a tow truck into going back out into the desert with him to fetch the SUV. They found it after a couple of hours of searching and towed it back without incident. Jack was careful not to even look in the direction of Nate's lever, though their path back didn't come within sight of it. Before the next weekend, Jack had gone to a couple of stores, including a book store, and had gotten his SUV back from the mechanic, with a warning to avoid any more joyriding in the desert. On Saturday, Jack headed back to see Nate. Jack parked a little way out of the small town near Nate, loaded up his new backpack with camping gear and the things he was bringing for Nate, and then started walking. He figured that walking would leave the least trail, and he knew that while not many people camped in the desert, it wasn't unheard of, and shouldn't really raise suspicions. Jack had brought more books for Nate - recent books, magazines, newspapers. Some things that would catch Nate up with what was happening in the world, others that were just good books to read. He spent the weekend with Nate, and then headed out again, telling Nate that he'd be back again soon, but that he had things to do first. Over four months later Jack was back to see Nate again. This time he brought a laptop with him - a specially modified laptop. It had a solar recharger, special filters and seals to keep out the sand, a satellite link-up, and a special keyboard and joystick that Jack hoped that a fifteen-foot rattlesnake would be able to use. And, it had been hacked to not give out its location to the satellite. After that Jack could e-mail Nate to keep in touch, but still visited him fairly regularly - at least once or twice a year. After the first year, Jack quit his job. For some reason, with the wisdom he 'd been given, and the knowledge that he could live for over 150 years, working in a nine to five job for someone else didn't seem that worthwhile any more. Jack went back to school. Eventually, Jack started writing. Perhaps because of the wisdom, or perhaps because of his new perspective, he wrote well. People liked what he wrote, and he became well known for it. After a time, Jack bought an RV and started traveling around the country for book signings and readings. But, he still remembered to drop by and visit Nate occasionally. On one of the visits Nate seemed quieter than usual. Not that Nate had been a fountain of joy lately. Jack's best guess was that Nate was still missing Samuel, and though Jack had tried, he still hadn't been able to replace Samuel in Nate's eyes. Nate had been getting quieter each visit. But on this visit Nate didn't even speak when Jack walked up to the lever. He nodded at Jack, and then went back to staring into the desert. Jack, respecting Nate's silence, sat down and waited. After a few minutes, Nate spoke. "Jack, I have someone to introduce you to." Jack looked surprised. "Someone to introduce me to?" Jack looked around, and then looked carefully back at Nate. "This something to do with the Big Guy? "No, no," replied Nate. "This is more personal. I want you to meet my son." Nate looked over at the nearest sand dune. "Sammy!" Jack watched as a four foot long desert rattlesnake crawled from behind the dune and up to the stone base of the lever. "Yo, Jack," said the new, much smaller snake. "Yo, Sammy" replied Jack. Jack looked at Nate. "Named after Samuel, I assume?" Nate nodded. "Jack, I've got a favor to ask you. Could you show Sammy around for me?" Nate unwrapped himself from the lever and slithered over to the edge of the stone and looked across the sands. "When Samuel first told me about the world, and brought me books and pictures, I wished that I could go see it. I wanted to see the great forests, the canyons, the cities, even the other deserts, to see if they felt and smelled the same. I want my son to have that chance - to see the world. Before he becomes bound here like I have been. "He's seen it in pictures, over the computer that you brought me. But I hear that it's not the same. That being there is different. I want him to have that. Think you can do that for me, Jack?" Jack nodded. This was obviously very important to Nate, so Jack didn't even joke about taking a talking rattlesnake out to see the world. "Yeah, I can do that for you, Nate. Is that all you need?" Jack could sense that was something more. Nate looked at Sammy. Sammy looked back at Nate for a second and then said, "Oh, yeah. Ummm, I've gotta go pack. Back in a little bit Jack. Nice to meet ya!" Sammy slithered back over the dune and out of sight. Nate watched Sammy disappear and then looked back at Jack. "Jack, this is my first son. My first offspring through all the years. You don't even want to know what it took for me to find a mate." Nate grinned to himself. "But anyway, I had a son for a reason. I'm tired. I'm ready for it to be over. I needed a replacement." Jack considered this for a minute. "So, you're ready to come see the world, and you wanted him to watch the lever while you were gone?" Nate shook his head. "No, Jack - you're a better guesser than that. You've already figured out - I'm bound here - there's only one way for me to leave here. And I'm ready. It's my time to die." Jack looked more closely at Nate. He could tell Nate had thought about this - probably for quite a while. Jack had trouble imagining what it would be like to be as old as Nate, but Jack could already tell that in another hundred or two hundred years, he might be getting tired of life himself. Jack could understand Samuel's decision, and now Nate's. So, all Jack said was, "What do you want me to do?" Nate nodded. "Thanks, Jack. I only want two things. One - show Sammy around the world - let him get his fill of it, until he's ready to come back here and take over. Two - give me the fourth request. "I can't just decide to die, not any more than you can. I won't even die of old age like you eventually will, even though it'll be a long time from now. I need to be killed. Once Sammy is back here, ready to take over, I'll be able to die. And I need you to kill me. "I've even thought about how. Poisons and other drugs won't work on me. And I've seen pictures of snakes that were shot - some of them live for days, so that's out too. So, I want you to bring back a sword. Nate turned away to look back to the dune that Sammy had gone behind. "I'd say an axe, but that's somewhat undignified - putting my head on the ground or a chopping block like that. No, I like a sword. A time-honored way of going out. A dignified way to die. And, most importantly, it should work, even on me. "You willing to do that for me, Jack?" Nate turned back to look at Jack. "Yeah, Nate," replied Jack solemnly, "I think I can handle that." Nate nodded. "Good!" He turned back toward the dune and shouted, "Sammy! Jack's about ready to leave!" Then quietly, "Thanks, Jack." Jack didn't have anything to say to that, so he waited for Sammy to make it back to the lever, nodded to him, nodded a final time to Nate, and then headed into the desert with Sammy following. Over the next several years Sammy and Jack kept in touch with Nate through e-mail as they went about their adventures. They made a goal of visiting every country in the world, and did a respectable job of it. Sammy had a natural gift for languages, as Jack expected he would, and even ended up acting as a translator for Jack in a few of the countries. Jack managed to keep the talking rattlesnake hidden, even so, and by the time they were nearing the end of their tour of countries, Sammy had only been spotted a few times. While there were several people that had seen enough to startle them greatly, nobody had enough evidence to prove anything, and while a few wild rumors and storied followed Jack and Sammy around, nothing ever hit the newspapers or the public in general. When they finished the tour of countries, Jack suggested that they try some undersea diving. They did. And spelunking. They did that too. Sammy finally drew the line at visiting Antarctica. He'd come to realize that Jack was stalling. After talking to his Dad about it over e-mail, he figured out that Jack probably didn't want to have to kill Nate. Nate told Sammy that humans could be squeamish about killing friends and acquaintances. So, Sammy eventually put his tail down (as he didn't have a foot) and told Jack that it was time - he was ready to go back and take up his duties from his dad. Jack, delayed it a little more by insisting that they go back to Japan and buy an appropriate sword. He even stretched it a little more by getting lessons in how to use the sword. But, eventually, he'd learned as much as he was likely to without dedicating his life to it, and was definitely competent enough to take the head off of a snake. It was time to head back and see Nate. When they got back to the US, Jack got the old RV out of storage where he and Sammy had left it after their tour of the fifty states, he loaded up Sammy and the sword, and they headed for the desert. When they got to the small town that Jack had been trying to find those years ago when he'd met Nate, Jack was in a funk. He didn't really feel like walking all of the way out there. Not only that, but he'd forgotten to figure the travel time correctly, and it was late afternoon. They'd either have to spend the night in town and walk out tomorrow, or walk in the dark. As Jack was afraid that if he waited one more night he might lose his resolve, he decided that he'd go ahead and drive the RV out there. It was only going to be this once, and Jack would go back and cover the tracks afterward. They ought to be able to make it out there by nightfall if they drove, and then they could get it over tonight. Jack told Sammy to e-mail Nate that they were coming as he drove out of sight of the town on the road. They then pulled off the road and headed out into the desert. Everything went well, until they got to the sand dunes. Jack had been nursing the RV along the whole time, over the rocks, through the creek beds, revving the engine the few times they almost got stuck. When they came to the dunes, Jack didn't really think about it, he just downshifted and headed up the first one. By the third dune, Jack started to regret that he'd decided to try driving on the sand. The RV was fishtailling and losing traction. Jack was having to work it up each dune slowly and was trying to keep from losing control each time they came over the top and slid down the other side. Sammy had come up to sit in the passenger seat, coiled up and laughing at Jack's driving. As they came over the top of the fourth dune, the biggest one yet, Jack saw that this was the final dune - the stone, the lever, and somewhere Nate, waited below. Jack put on the brakes, but he'd gone a little too far. The RV started slipping down the other side. Jack tried turning the wheel, but he didn't have enough traction. He pumped the brakes - no response. They started sliding down the hill, faster and faster. Jack felt a shock go through him as he suddenly realized that they were heading for the lever. He looked down - the RV was directly on course for it. If Jack didn't do something, the RV would hit it. He was about to end humanity. Jack steered more frantically, trying to get traction. It still wasn't working. The dune was too steep, and the sand too loose. In a split second, Jack realized that his only chance would be once he hit the stone around the lever - he should have traction on the stone for just a second before he hit the lever - he wouldn't have time to stop, but he should be able to steer away. Jack took a better grip on the steering wheel and tried to turn the RV a little bit - every little bit would help. He'd have to time his turn just right. The RV got to the bottom of the dune, sliding at an amazing speed in the sand. Just before they reached the stone Jack looked across it to check that they were still heading for the lever. They were. But Jack noticed something else that he hadn't seen from the top of the dune. Nate wasn't wrapped around the lever. He was off to the side of the lever, but still on the stone, waiting for them. The problem was, he was waiting on the same side of the lever that Jack had picked to steer towards to avoid the lever. The RV was already starting to drift that way a little in its mad rush across the sand and there was no way that Jack was going to be able to go around the lever to the other side. Jack had an instant of realization. He was either going to have to hit the lever, or run over Nate. He glanced over at Sammy and saw that Sammy realized the same thing. Jack took a firmer grip on the steering wheel as the RV ran up on the stone. Shouting to Sammy as he pulled the steering wheel... + Show Spoiler + "BETTER NATE THAN LEVER!" I read up to the 2nd bite part, and just stopped. Too epic and Too long for my 16 year old brain. | ||
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Archaic
United States4024 Posts
On June 24 2009 03:47 Hiicantpk wrote: I read up to the 2nd bite part, and just stopped. Too epic and Too long for my 16 year old brain. I remember when someone made a blog of this... It was quite a while ago though. | ||
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SilverSkyLark
Philippines8437 Posts
On June 08 2009 11:51 kNyTTyM wrote: no picture but as epic as anything in this thread read all the way through please. + Show Spoiler + So, there's a man crawling through the desert. He'd decided to try his SUV in a little bit of cross-country travel, had great fun zooming over the badlands and through the sand, got lost, hit a big rock, and then he couldn't get it started again. There were no cell phone towers anywhere near, so his cell phone was useless. He had no family, his parents had died a few years before in an auto accident, and his few friends had no idea he was out here. He stayed with the car for a day or so, but his one bottle of water ran out and he was getting thirsty. He thought maybe he knew the direction back, now that he'd paid attention to the sun and thought he'd figured out which way was north, so he decided to start walking. He figured he only had to go about 30 miles or so and he'd be back to the small town he'd gotten gas in last. He thinks about walking at night to avoid the heat and sun, but based upon how dark it actually was the night before, and given that he has no flashlight, he's afraid that he'll break a leg or step on a rattlesnake. So, he puts on some sun block, puts the rest in his pocket for reapplication later, brings an umbrella he'd had in the back of the SUV with him to give him a little shade, pours the windshield wiper fluid into his water bottle in case he gets that desperate, brings his pocket knife in case he finds a cactus that looks like it might have water in it, and heads out in the direction he thinks is right. He walks for the entire day. By the end of the day he's really thirsty. He's been sweating all day, and his lips are starting to crack. He's reapplied the sunblock twice, and tried to stay under the umbrella, but he still feels sunburned. The windshield wiper fluid sloshing in the bottle in his pocket is really getting tempting now. He knows that it's mainly water and some ethanol and coloring, but he also knows that they add some kind of poison to it to keep people from drinking it. He wonders what the poison is, and whether the poison would be worse than dying of thirst. He pushes on, trying to get to that small town before dark. By the end of the day he starts getting worried. He figures he's been walking at least 3 miles an hour, according to his watch for over 10 hours. That means that if his estimate was right that he should be close to the town. But he doesn't recognize any of this. He had to cross a dry creek bed a mile or two back, and he doesn't remember coming through it in the SUV. He figures that maybe he got his direction off just a little and that the dry creek bed was just off to one side of his path. He tells himself that he's close, and that after dark he'll start seeing the town lights over one of these hills, and that'll be all he needs. As it gets dim enough that he starts stumbling over small rocks and things, he finds a spot and sits down to wait for full dark and the town lights. Full dark comes before he knows it. He must have dozed off. He stands back up and turns all the way around. He sees nothing but stars. He wakes up the next morning feeling absolutely lousy. His eyes are gummy and his mouth and nose feel like they're full of sand. He so thirsty that he can't even swallow. He barely got any sleep because it was so cold. He'd forgotten how cold it got at night in the desert and hadn't noticed it the night before because he'd been in his car. He knows the Rule of Threes - three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food - then you die. Some people can make it a little longer, in the best situations. But the desert heat and having to walk and sweat isn't the best situation to be without water. He figures, unless he finds water, this is his last day. He rinses his mouth out with a little of the windshield wiper fluid. He waits a while after spitting that little bit out, to see if his mouth goes numb, or he feels dizzy or something. Has his mouth gone numb? Is it just in his mind? He's not sure. He'll go a little farther, and if he still doesn't find water, he'll try drinking some of the fluid. Then he has to face his next, harder question - which way does he go from here? Does he keep walking the same way he was yesterday (assuming that he still knows which way that is), or does he try a new direction? He has no idea what to do. Looking at the hills and dunes around him, he thinks he knows the direction he was heading before. Just going by a feeling, he points himself somewhat to the left of that, and starts walking. As he walks, the day starts heating up. The desert, too cold just a couple of hours before, soon becomes an oven again. He sweats a little at first, and then stops. He starts getting worried at that - when you stop sweating he knows that means you're in trouble - usually right before heat stroke. He decides that it's time to try the windshield wiper fluid. He can't wait any longer - if he passes out, he's dead. He stops in the shade of a large rock, takes the bottle out, opens it, and takes a mouthful. He slowly swallows it, making it last as long as he can. It feels so good in his dry and cracked throat that he doesn't even care about the nasty taste. He takes another mouthful, and makes it last too. Slowly, he drinks half the bottle. He figures that since he's drinking it, he might as well drink enough to make some difference and keep himself from passing out. He's quit worrying about the denaturing of the wiper fluid. If it kills him, it kills him - if he didn't drink it, he'd die anyway. Besides, he's pretty sure that whatever substance they denature the fluid with is just designed to make you sick - their way of keeping winos from buying cheap wiper fluid for the ethanol content. He can handle throwing up, if it comes to that. He walks. He walks in the hot, dry, windless desert. Sand, rocks, hills, dunes, the occasional scrawny cactus or dried bush. No sign of water. Sometimes he'll see a little movement to one side or the other, but whatever moved is usually gone before he can focus his eyes on it. Probably birds, lizards, or mice. Maybe snakes, though they usually move more at night. He's careful to stay away from the movements. After a while, he begins to stagger. He's not sure if it's fatigue, heat stroke finally catching him, or maybe he was wrong and the denaturing of the wiper fluid was worse than he thought. He tries to steady himself, and keep going. After more walking, he comes to a large stretch of sand. This is good! He knows he passed over a stretch of sand in the SUV - he remembers doing donuts in it. Or at least he thinks he remembers it - he's getting woozy enough and tired enough that he's not sure what he remembers any more or if he's hallucinating. But he thinks he remembers it. So he heads off into it, trying to get to the other side, hoping that it gets him closer to the town. He was heading for a town, wasn't he? He thinks he was. He isn't sure any more. He's not even sure how long he's been walking any more. Is it still morning? Or has it moved into afternoon and the sun is going down again? It must be afternoon - it seems like it's been too long since he started out. He walks through the sand. After a while, he comes to a big dune in the sand. This is bad. He doesn't remember any dunes when driving over the sand in his SUV. Or at least he doesn't think he remembers any. This is bad. But, he has no other direction to go. Too late to turn back now. He figures that he'll get to the top of the dune and see if he can see anything from there that helps him find the town. He keeps going up the dune. Halfway up, he slips in the bad footing of the sand for the second or third time, and falls to his knees. He doesn't feel like getting back up - he'll just fall down again. So, he keeps going up the dune on his hand and knees. While crawling, if his throat weren't so dry, he'd laugh. He's finally gotten to the hackneyed image of a man lost in the desert - crawling through the sand on his hands and knees. If would be the perfect image, he imagines, if only his clothes were more ragged. The people crawling through the desert in the cartoons always had ragged clothes. But his have lasted without any rips so far. Somebody will probably find his dessicated corpse half buried in the sand years from now, and his clothes will still be in fine shape - shake the sand out, and a good wash, and they'd be wearable again. He wishes his throat were wet enough to laugh. He coughs a little instead, and it hurts. He finally makes it to the top of the sand dune. Now that he's at the top, he struggles a little, but manages to stand up and look around. All he sees is sand. Sand, and more sand. Behind him, about a mile away, he thinks he sees the rocky ground he left to head into this sand. Ahead of him, more dunes, more sand. This isn't where he drove his SUV. This is Hell. Or close enough. Again, he doesn't know what to do. He decides to drink the rest of the wiper fluid while figuring it out. He takes out the bottle, and is removing the cap, when he glances to the side and sees something. Something in the sand. At the bottom of the dune, off to the side, he sees something strange. It's a flat area, in the sand. He stops taking the cap of the bottle off, and tries to look closer. The area seems to be circular. And it's dark - darker than the sand. And, there seems to be something in the middle of it, but he can't tell what it is. He looks as hard as he can, and still can tell from here. He's going to have to go down there and look. He puts the bottle back in his pocket, and starts to stumble down the dune. After a few steps, he realizes that he's in trouble - he's not going to be able to keep his balance. After a couple of more sliding, tottering steps, he falls and starts to roll down the dune. The sand it so hot when his body hits it that for a minute he thinks he's caught fire on the way down - like a movie car wreck flashing into flames as it goes over the cliff, before it ever even hits the ground. He closes his eyes and mouth, covers his face with his hands, and waits to stop rolling. He stops, at the bottom of the dune. After a minute or two, he finds enough energy to try to sit up and get the sand out of his face and clothes. When he clears his eyes enough, he looks around to make sure that the dark spot in the sand it still there and he hadn't just imagined it. So, seeing the large, flat, dark spot on the sand is still there, he begins to crawl towards it. He'd get up and walk towards it, but he doesn't seem to have the energy to get up and walk right now. He must be in the final stages of dehydration he figures, as he crawls. If this place in the sand doesn't have water, he'll likely never make it anywhere else. This is his last chance. He gets closer and closer, but still can't see what's in the middle of the dark area. His eyes won't quite focus any more for some reason. And lifting his head up to look takes so much effort that he gives up trying. He just keeps crawling. Finally, he reaches the area he'd seen from the dune. It takes him a minute of crawling on it before he realizes that he's no longer on sand - he's now crawling on some kind of dark stone. Stone with some kind of marking on it - a pattern cut into the stone. He's too tired to stand up and try to see what the pattern is - so he just keeps crawling. He crawls towards the center, where his blurry eyes still see something in the middle of the dark stone area. His mind, detached in a strange way, notes that either his hands and knees are so burnt by the sand that they no longer feel pain, or that this dark stone, in the middle of a burning desert with a pounding, punishing sun overhead, doesn't seem to be hot. It almost feels cool. He considers lying down on the nice cool surface. Cool, dark stone. Not a good sign. He must be hallucinating this. He's probably in the middle of a patch of sand, already lying face down and dying, and just imagining this whole thing. A desert mirage. Soon the beautiful women carrying pitchers of water will come up and start giving him a drink. Then he'll know he's gone. He decides against laying down on the cool stone. If he's going to die here in the middle of this hallucination, he at least wants to see what's in the center before he goes. He keeps crawling. It's the third time that he hears the voice before he realizes what he's hearing. He would swear that someone just said, "Greetings, traveler. You do not look well. Do you hear me?" He stops crawling. He tries to look up from where he is on his hands and knees, but it's too much effort to lift his head. So he tries something different - he leans back and tries to sit up on the stone. After a few seconds, he catches his balance, avoids falling on his face, sits up, and tries to focus his eyes. Blurry. He rubs his eyes with the back of his hands and tries again. Better this time. Yep. He can see. He's sitting in the middle of a large, flat, dark expanse of stone. Directly next to him, about three feet away, is a white post or pole about two inches in diameter and sticking up about four or five feet out of the stone, at an angle. And wrapped around this white rod, tail with rattle on it hovering and seeming to be ready to start rattling, is what must be a fifteen foot long desert diamondback rattlesnake, looking directly at him. He stares at the snake in shock. He doesn't have the energy to get up and run away. He doesn't even have the energy to crawl away. This is it, his final resting place. No matter what happens, he's not going to be able to move from this spot. Well, at least dying of a bite from this monster should be quicker than dying of thirst. He'll face his end like a man. He struggles to sit up a little straighter. The snake keeps watching him. He lifts one hand and waves it in the snake's direction, feebly. The snake watches the hand for a moment, then goes back to watching the man, looking into his eyes. Hmmm. Maybe the snake had no interest in biting him? It hadn't rattled yet - that was a good sign. Maybe he wasn't going to die of snake bite after all. He then remembers that he'd looked up when he'd reached the center here because he thought he'd heard a voice. He was still very woozy - he was likely to pass out soon, the sun still beat down on him even though he was now on cool stone. He still didn't have anything to drink. But maybe he had actually heard a voice. This stone didn't look natural. Nor did that white post sticking up out of the stone. Someone had to have built this. Maybe they were still nearby. Maybe that was who talked to him. Maybe this snake was even their pet, and that's why it wasn't biting. He tries to clear his throat to say, "Hello," but his throat is too dry. All that comes out is a coughing or wheezing sound. There is no way he's going to be able to talk without something to drink. He feels his pocket, and the bottle with the wiper fluid is still there. He shakily pulls the bottle out, almost losing his balance and falling on his back in the process. This isn't good. He doesn't have much time left, by his reckoning, before he passes out. He gets the lid off of the bottle, manages to get the bottle to his lips, and pours some of the fluid into his mouth. He sloshes it around, and then swallows it. He coughs a little. His throat feels better. Maybe he can talk now. He tries again. Ignoring the snake, he turns to look around him, hoping to spot the owner of this place, and croaks out, "Hello? Is there anyone here?" He hears, from his side, "Greetings. What is it that you want?" He turns his head, back towards the snake. That's where the sound had seemed to come from. The only thing he can think of is that there must be a speaker, hidden under the snake, or maybe built into that post. He decides to try asking for help. "Please," he croaks again, suddenly feeling dizzy, "I'd love to not be thirsty any more. I've been a long time without water. Can you help me?" Looking in the direction of the snake, hoping to see where the voice was coming from this time, he is shocked to see the snake rear back, open its mouth, and speak. He hears it say, as the dizziness overtakes him and he falls forward, face first on the stone, "Very well. Coming up." A piercing pain shoots through his shoulder. Suddenly he is awake. He sits up and grabs his shoulder, wincing at the throbbing pain. He's momentarily disoriented as he looks around, and then he remembers - the crawl across the sand, the dark area of stone, the snake. He sees the snake, still wrapped around the tilted white post, still looking at him. He reaches up and feels his shoulder, where it hurts. It feels slightly wet. He pulls his fingers away and looks at them - blood. He feels his shoulder again - his shirt has what feels like two holes in it - two puncture holes - they match up with the two aching spots of pain on his shoulder. He had been bitten. By the snake. "It'll feel better in a minute." He looks up - it's the snake talking. He hadn't dreamed it. Suddenly he notices - he's not dizzy any more. And more importantly, he's not thirsty any more - at all! "Have I died? Is this the afterlife? Why are you biting me in the afterlife?" "Sorry about that, but I had to bite you," says the snake. "That's the way I work. It all comes through the bite. Think of it as natural medicine." "You bit me to help me? Why aren't I thirsty any more? Did you give me a drink before you bit me? How did I drink enough while unconscious to not be thirsty any more? I haven't had a drink for over two days. Well, except for the windshield wiper fluid... hold it, how in the world does a snake talk? Are you real? Are you some sort of Disney animation?" "No," says the snake, "I'm real. As real as you or anyone is, anyway. I didn't give you a drink. I bit you. That's how it works - it's what I do. I bite. I don't have hands to give you a drink, even if I had water just sitting around here." The man sat stunned for a minute. Here he was, sitting in the middle of the desert on some strange stone that should be hot but wasn't, talking to a snake that could talk back and had just bitten him. And he felt better. Not great - he was still starving and exhausted, but much better - he was no longer thirsty. He had started to sweat again, but only slightly. He felt hot, in this sun, but it was starting to get lower in the sky, and the cool stone beneath him was a relief he could notice now that he was no longer dying of thirst. "I might suggest that we take care of that methanol you now have in your system with the next request," continued the snake. "I can guess why you drank it, but I'm not sure how much you drank, or how much methanol was left in the wiper fluid. That stuff is nasty. It'll make you go blind in a day or two, if you drank enough of it." "Ummm, n-next request?" said the man. He put his hand back on his hurting shoulder and backed away from the snake a little. "That's the way it works. If you like, that is," explained the snake. "You get three requests. Call them wishes, if you wish." The snake grinned at his own joke, and the man drew back a little further from the show of fangs. "But there are rules," the snake continued. "The first request is free. The second requires an agreement of secrecy. The third requires the binding of responsibility." The snake looks at the man seriously. "By the way," the snake says suddenly, "my name is Nathan. Old Nathan, Samuel used to call me. He gave me the name. Before that, most of the Bound used to just call me 'Snake'. But that got old, and Samuel wouldn't stand for it. He said that anything that could talk needed a name. He was big into names. You can call me Nate, if you wish." Again, the snake grinned. "Sorry if I don't offer to shake, but I think you can understand - my shake sounds somewhat threatening." The snake give his rattle a little shake. "Umm, my name is Jack," said the man, trying to absorb all of this. "Jack Samson. "Can I ask you a question?" Jack says suddenly. "What happened to the poison...umm, in your bite. Why aren't I dying now? How did you do that? What do you mean by that's how you work?" "That's more than one question," grins Nate. "But I'll still try to answer all of them. First, yes, you can ask me a question." The snake's grin gets wider. "Second, the poison is in you. It changed you. You now no longer need to drink. That's what you asked for. Or, well, technically, you asked to not be thirsty any more - but 'any more' is such a vague term. I decided to make it permanent - now, as long as you live, you shouldn't need to drink much at all. Your body will conserve water very efficiently. You should be able to get enough just from the food you eat - much like a creature of the desert. You've been changed. "For the third question," Nate continues, "you are still dying. Besides the effects of that methanol in your system, you're a man - and men are mortal. In your current state, I give you no more than about another 50 years. Assuming you get out of this desert, alive, that is." Nate seemed vastly amused at his own humor, and continued his wide grin. "As for the fourth question," Nate said, looking more serious as far as Jack could tell, as Jack was just now working on his ability to read talking-snake emotions from snake facial features, "first you have to agree to make a second request and become bound by the secrecy, or I can't tell you." "Wait," joked Jack, "isn't this where you say you could tell me, but you'd have to kill me?" "I thought that was implied." Nate continued to look serious. "Ummm...yeah." Jack leaned back a little as he remembered again that he was talking to a fifteen foot poisonous reptile with a reputation for having a nasty temper. "So, what is this 'Bound by Secrecy' stuff, and can you really stop the effects of the methanol?" Jack thought for a second. "And, what do you mean methanol, anyway? I thought these days they use ethanol in wiper fluid, and just denature it?" "They may, I don't really know," said Nate. "I haven't gotten out in a while. Maybe they do. All I know is that I smell methanol on your breath and on that bottle in your pocket. And the blue color of the liquid when you pulled it out to drink some let me guess that it was wiper fluid. I assume that they still color wiper fluid blue?" "Yeah, they do," said Jack. "I figured," replied Nate. "As for being bound by secrecy - with the fulfillment of your next request, you will be bound to say nothing about me, this place, or any of the information I will tell you after that, when you decide to go back out to your kind. You won't be allowed to talk about me, write about me, use sign language, charades, or even act in a way that will lead someone to guess correctly about me. You'll be bound to secrecy. Of course, I'll also ask you to promise not to give me away, and as I'm guessing that you're a man of your word, you'll never test the binding anyway, so you won't notice." Nate said the last part with utter confidence. Jack, who had always prided himself on being a man of his word, felt a little nervous at this. "Ummm, hey, Nate, who are you? How did you know that? Are you, umm, omniscient, or something?" Well, Jack," said Nate sadly, "I can't tell you that, unless you make the second request." Nate looked away for a minute, then looked back. "Umm, well, ok," said Jack, "what is this about a second request? What can I ask for? Are you allowed to tell me that?" "Sure!" said Nate, brightening. "You're allowed to ask for changes. Changes to yourself. They're like wishes, but they can only affect you. Oh, and before you ask, I can't give you immortality. Or omniscience. Or omnipresence, for that matter. Though I might be able to make you gaseous and yet remain alive, and then you could spread through the atmosphere and sort of be omnipresent. But what good would that be - you still wouldn't be omniscient and thus still could only focus on one thing at a time. Not very useful, at least in my opinion." Nate stopped when he realized that Jack was staring at him. "Well, anyway," continued Nate, "I'd probably suggest giving you permanent good health. It would negate the methanol now in your system, you'd be immune to most poisons and diseases, and you'd tend to live a very long time, barring accident, of course. And you'll even have a tendency to recover from accidents well. It always seemed like a good choice for a request to me." "Cure the methanol poisoning, huh?" said Jack. "And keep me healthy for a long time? Hmmm. It doesn't sound bad at that. And it has to be a request about a change to me? I can't ask to be rich, right? Because that's not really a change to me?" "Right," nodded Nate. "Could I ask to be a genius and permanently healthy?" Jack asked, hopefully. "That takes two requests, Jack." "Yeah, I figured so," said Jack. "But I could ask to be a genius? I could become the smartest scientist in the world? Or the best athlete?" "Well, I could make you very smart," admitted Nate, "but that wouldn't necessarily make you the best scientist in the world. Or, I could make you very athletic, but it wouldn't necessarily make you the best athlete either. You've heard the saying that 99% of genius is hard work? Well, there's some truth to that. I can give you the talent, but I can't make you work hard. It all depends on what you decide to do with it." "Hmmm," said Jack. "Ok, I think I understand. And I get a third request, after this one?" "Maybe," said Nate, "it depends on what you decide then. There are more rules for the third request that I can only tell you about after the second request. You know how it goes." Nate looked like he'd shrug, if he had shoulders. "Ok, well, since I'd rather not be blind in a day or two, and permanent health doesn't sound bad, then consider that my second request. Officially. Do I need to sign in blood or something?" "No," said Nate. "Just hold out your hand. Or heel." Nate grinned. "Or whatever part you want me to bite. I have to bite you again. Like I said, that's how it works - the poison, you know," Nate said apologetically. Jack winced a little and felt his shoulder, where the last bite was. Hey, it didn't hurt any more. Just like Nate had said. That made Jack feel better about the biting business. But still, standing still while a fifteen foot snake sunk it's fangs into you. Jack stood up. Ignoring how good it felt to be able to stand again, and the hunger starting to gnaw at his stomach, Jack tried to decide where he wanted to get bitten. Despite knowing that it wouldn't hurt for long, Jack knew that this wasn't going to be easy. "Hey, Jack," Nate suddenly said, looking past Jack towards the dunes behind him, "is that someone else coming up over there?" Jack spun around and looked. Who else could be out here in the middle of nowhere? And did they bring food? Wait a minute, there was nobody over there. What was Nate... Jack let out a bellow as he felt two fangs sink into his rear end, through his jeans... Jack sat down carefully, favoring his more tender buttock. "I would have decided, eventually, Nate. I was just thinking about it. You didn't have to hoodwink me like that." "I've been doing this a long time, Jack," said Nate, confidently. "You humans have a hard time sitting still and letting a snake bite you - especially one my size. And besides, admit it - it's only been a couple of minutes and it already doesn't hurt any more, does it? That's because of the health benefit with this one. I told you that you'd heal quickly now." "Yeah, well, still," said Jack, "it's the principle of the thing. And nobody likes being bitten in the butt! Couldn't you have gotten my calf or something instead?" "More meat in the typical human butt," replied Nate. "And less chance you accidentally kick me or move at the last second." "Yeah, right. So, tell me all of these wonderful secrets that I now qualify to hear," answered Jack. "Ok," said Nate. "Do you want to ask questions first, or do you want me to just start talking?" "Just talk," said Jack. "I'll sit here and try to not think about food." "We could go try to rustle up some food for you first, if you like," answered Nate. "Hey! You didn't tell me you had food around here, Nate!" Jack jumped up. "What do we have? Am I in walking distance to town? Or can you magically whip up food along with your other powers?" Jack was almost shouting with excitement. His stomach had been growling for hours. "I was thinking more like I could flush something out of its hole and bite it for you, and you could skin it and eat it. Assuming you have a knife, that is," replied Nate, with the grin that Jack was starting to get used to. "Ugh," said Jack, sitting back down. "I think I'll pass. I can last a little longer before I get desperate enough to eat desert rat, or whatever else it is you find out here. And there's nothing to burn - I'd have to eat it raw. No thanks. Just talk." "Ok," replied Nate, still grinning. "But I'd better hurry, before you start looking at me as food. Nate reared back a little, looked around for a second, and then continued. "You, Jack, are sitting in the middle of the Garden of Eden." Jack looked around at the sand and dunes and then looked back at Nate sceptically. "Well, that's the best I can figure it, anyway, Jack," said Nate. "Stand up and look at the symbol on the rock here." Nate gestured around the dark stone they were both sitting on with his nose. Jack stood up and looked. Carved into the stone in a bas-relief was a representation of a large tree. The angled-pole that Nate was wrapped around was coming out of the trunk of the tree, right below where the main branches left the truck to reach out across the stone. It was very well done - it looked more like a tree had been reduced to almost two dimensions and embedded in the stone than it did like a carving. Jack walked around and looked at the details in the fading light of the setting sun. He wished he'd looked at it while the sun was higher in the sky. Wait! The sun was setting! That meant he was going to have to spend another night out here! Arrrgh! Jack looked out across the desert for a little bit, and then came back and stood next to Nate. "In all the excitement, I almost forgot, Nate," said Jack. "Which way is it back to town? And how far? I'm eventually going to have to head back - I'm not sure I'll be able to survive by eating raw desert critters for long. And even if I can, I'm not sure I'll want to." "It's about 30 miles that way." Nate pointed, with the rattle on his tail this time. As far as Jack could tell, it was a direction at right angles to the way he'd been going when he was crawling here. "But that's 30 miles by the way the crow flies. It's about 40 by the way a man walks. You should be able to do it in about half a day with your improved endurance, if you head out early tomorrow, Jack." Jack looked out the way the snake had pointed for a few seconds more, and then sat back down. It was getting dark. Not much he could do about heading out right now. And besides, Nate was just about to get to the interesting stuff. "Garden of Eden? As best as you can figure it?" "Well, yeah, as best as I and Samuel could figure it anyway," said Nate. "He figured that the story just got a little mixed up. You know, snake, in a 'tree', offering 'temptations', making bargains. That kind stuff. But he could never quite figure out how the Hebrews found out about this spot from across the ocean. He worried about that for a while." "Garden of Eden, hunh?" said Jack. "How long have you been here, Nate?" "No idea, really," replied Nate. "A long time. It never occurred to me to count years, until recently, and by then, of course, it was too late. But I do remember when this whole place was green, so I figure it's been thousands of years, at least." "So, are you the snake that tempted Eve?" said Jack. "Beats me," said Nate. "Maybe. I can't remember if the first one of your kind that I talked to was female or not, and I never got a name, but it could have been. And I suppose she could have considered my offer to grant requests a 'temptation', though I've rarely had refusals." "Well, umm, how did you get here then? And why is that white pole stuck out of the stone there?" asked Jack. "Dad left me here. Or, I assume it was my dad. It was another snake - much bigger than I was back then. I remember talking to him, but I don't remember if it was in a language, or just kind of understanding what he wanted. But one day, he brought me to this stone, told me about it, and asked me to do something for him. I talked it over with him for a while, then agreed. I've been here ever since. "What is this place?" said Jack. "And what did he ask you to do?" "Well, you see this pole here, sticking out of the stone?" Nate loosened his coils around the tilted white pole and showed Jack where it descended into the stone. The pole was tilted at about a 45 degree angle and seemed to enter the stone in an eighteen inch slot cut into the stone. Jack leaned over and looked. The slot was dark and the pole went down into it as far as Jack could see in the dim light. Jack reached out to touch the pole, but Nate was suddenly there in the way. "You can't touch that yet, Jack," said Nate. "Why not?" asked Jack. "I haven't explained it to you yet," replied Nate. "Well, it kinda looks like a lever or something," said Jack. "You'd push it that way, and it would move in the slot." "Yep, that's what it is," replied Nate. "What does it do?" asked Jack. "End the world?" "Oh, no," said Nate. "Nothing that drastic. It just ends humanity. I call it 'The Lever of Doom'." For the last few words Nate had used a deeper, ringing voice. He tried to look serious for a few seconds, and then gave up and grinned. Jack was initially startled by Nate's pronouncement, but when Nate grinned Jack laughed. "Ha! You almost had me fooled for a second there. What does it really do?" "Oh, it really ends humanity, like I said," smirked Nate. "I just thought the voice I used was funny, didn't you?" Nate continued to grin. "A lever to end humanity?" asked Jack. "What in the world is that for? Why would anyone need to end humanity?" "Well," replied Nate, "I get the idea that maybe humanity was an experiment. Or maybe the Big Guy just thought, that if humanity started going really bad, there should be a way to end it. I'm not really sure. All I know are the rules, and the guesses that Samuel and I had about why it's here. I didn't think to ask back when I started here." "Rules? What rules?" asked Jack. "The rules are that I can't tell anybody about it or let them touch it unless they agree to be bound to secrecy by a bite. And that only one human can be bound in that way at a time. That's it." explained Nate. Jack looked somewhat shocked. "You mean that I could pull the lever now? You'd let me end humanity?" "Yep," replied Nate, "if you want to." Nate looked at Jack carefully. "Do you want to, Jack?" "Umm, no." said Jack, stepping a little further back from the lever. "Why in the world would anyone want to end humanity? It'd take a psychotic to want that! Or worse, a suicidal psychotic, because it would kill him too, wouldn't it?" "Yep," replied Nate, "being as he'd be human too." "Has anyone ever seriously considered it?" asked Nate. "Any of those bound to secrecy, that is?" "Well, of course, I think they've all seriously considered it at one time or another. Being given that kind of responsibility makes you sit down and think, or so I'm told. Samuel considered it several times. He'd often get disgusted with humanity, come out here, and just hold the lever for a while. But he never pulled it. Or you wouldn't be here." Nate grinned some more. Jack sat down, well back from the lever. He looked thoughtful and puzzled at the same time. After a bit, he said, "So this makes me the Judge of humanity? I get to decide whether they keep going or just end? Me?" "That seems to be it," agreed Nate. "What kind of criteria do I use to decide?" said Jack. "How do I make this decision? Am I supposed to decide if they're good? Or too many of them are bad? Or that they're going the wrong way? Is there a set of rules for that?" "Nope," replied Nate. "You pretty much just have to decide on your own. It's up to you, however you want to decide it. I guess that you're just supposed to know." "But what if I get mad at someone? Or some girl dumps me and I feel horrible? Couldn't I make a mistake? How do I know that I won't screw up?" protested Jack. Nate gave his kind of snake-like shrug again. "You don't. You just have to try your best, Jack." Jack sat there for a while, staring off into the desert that was rapidly getting dark, chewing on a fingernail. Suddenly, Jack turned around and looked at the snake. "Nate, was Samuel the one bound to this before me?" "Yep," replied Nate. "He was a good guy. Talked to me a lot. Taught me to read and brought me books. I think I still have a good pile of them buried in the sand around here somewhere. I still miss him. He died a few months ago." "Sounds like a good guy," agreed Jack. "How did he handle this, when you first told him. What did he do?" "Well," said Nate, "he sat down for a while, thought about it for a bit, and then asked me some questions, much like you're doing." "What did he ask you, if you're allowed to tell me?" asked Jack. "He asked me about the third request," replied Nate. "Aha!" It was Jack's turn to grin. "And what did you tell him?" "I told him the rules for the third request. That to get the third request you have to agree to this whole thing. That if it ever comes to the point that you really think that humanity should be ended, that you'll come here and end it. You won't avoid it, and you won't wimp out." Nate looked serious again. "And you'll be bound to do it too, Jack." "Hmmm." Jack looked back out into the darkness for a while. Nate watched him, waiting. "Nate," continued Jack, quietly, eventually. "What did Samuel ask for with his third request?" Nate sounded like he was grinning again as he replied, also quietly, "Wisdom, Jack. He asked for wisdom. As much as I could give him." "Ok," said Jack, suddenly, standing up and facing away from Nate, "give it to me. Nate looked at Jack's backside. "Give you what, Jack?" "Give me that wisdom. The same stuff that Samuel asked for. If it helped him, maybe it'll help me too." Jack turned his head to look back over his shoulder at Nate. "It did help him, right?" "He said it did," replied Nate. "But he seemed a little quieter afterward. Like he had a lot to think about." "Well, yeah, I can see that," said Jack. "So, give it to me." Jack turned to face away from Nate again, bent over slightly and tensed up. Nate watched Jack tense up with a little exasperation. If he bit Jack now, Jack would likely jump out of his skin and maybe hurt them both. "You remember that you'll be bound to destroy humanity if it ever looks like it needs it, right Jack?" asked Nate, shifting position. "Yeah, yeah, I got that," replied Jack, eyes squeezed tightly shut and body tense, not noticing the change in direction of Nate's voice. "And," continued Nate, from his new position, "do you remember that you'll turn bright purple, and grow big horns and extra eyes?" "Yeah, yeah...Hey, wait a minute!" said Jack, opening his eyes, straightening up and turning around. "Purple?!" He didn't see Nate there. With the moonlight Jack could see that the lever extended up from its slot in the rock without the snake wrapped around it. Jack heard, from behind him, Nate's "Just Kidding!" right before he felt the now familiar piercing pain, this time in the other buttock. Jack sat on the edge of the dark stone in the rapidly cooling air, his feet extending out into the sand. He stared out into the darkness, listening to the wind stir the sand, occasionally rubbing his butt where he'd been recently bitten. Nate had left for a little while, had come back with a desert-rodent-shaped bulge somewhere in his middle, and was now wrapped back around the lever, his tongue flicking out into the desert night's air the only sign that he was still awake. Occasionally Jack, with his toes absentmindedly digging in the sand while he thought, would ask Nate a question without turning around. "Nate, do accidents count?" Nate lifted his head a little bit. "What do you mean, Jack?" Jack tilted his head back like he was looking at the stars. "You know, accidents. If I accidentally fall on the lever, without meaning to, does that still wipe out humanity?" "Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does, Jack. I'd suggest you be careful about that if you start feeling wobbly," said Nate with some amusement. A little later - "Does it have to be me that pulls the lever?" asked Jack. "That's the rule, Jack. Nobody else can pull it," answered Nate. "No," Jack shook his head, "I meant does it have to be my hand? Could I pull the lever with a rope tied around it? Or push it with a stick? Or throw a rock?" "Yes, those should work," replied Nate. "Though I'm not sure how complicated you could get. Samuel thought about trying to build some kind of remote control for it once, but gave it up. Everything he'd build would be gone by the next sunrise, if it was touching the stone, or over it. I told him that in the past others that had been bound had tried to bury the lever so they wouldn't be tempted to pull it, but every time the stones or sand or whatever had disappeared." "Wow," said Jack, "Cool." Jack leaned back until only his elbows kept him off of the stone and looked up into the sky. "Nate, how long did Samuel live? One of his wishes was for health too, right?" asked Jack. "Yes," replied Nate, "it was. He lived 167 years, Jack." "Wow, 167 years. That's almost 140 more years I'll live if I live as long. Do you know what he died of, Nate?" "He died of getting tired of living, Jack," Nate said, sounding somewhat sad. Jack turned his head to look at Nate in the starlight. Nate looked back. "Samuel knew he wasn't going to be able to stay in society. He figured that they'd eventually see him still alive and start questioning it, so he decided that he'd have to disappear after a while. He faked his death once, but changed his mind - he decided it was too early and he could stay for a little longer. He wasn't very fond of mankind, but he liked the attention. Most of the time, anyway. "His daughter and then his wife dying almost did him in though. He didn't stay in society much longer after that. He eventually came out here to spend time talking to me and thinking about pulling the lever. A few months ago he told me he'd had enough. It was his time." "And then he just died?" asked Jack. Nate shook his head a little. "He made his forth request, Jack. There's only one thing you can ask for the fourth request. The last bite. After a bit Nate continued, "He told me that he was tired, that it was his time. He reassured me that someone new would show up soon, like they always had. After another pause, Nate finished, "Samuel's body disappeared off the stone with the sunrise." Jack lay back down and looked at the sky, leaving Nate alone with his memories. It was a long time until Jack's breathing evened out into sleep. Jack woke with the sunrise the next morning. He was a little chilled with the morning desert air, but overall was feeling pretty good. Well, except that his stomach was grumbling and he wasn't willing to eat raw desert rat. So, after getting directions to town from Nate, making sure he knew how to get back, and reassuring Nate that he'd be back soon, Jack started the long walk back to town. With his new health and Nate's good directions, he made it back easily. Jack caught a bus back to the city, and showed up for work the next day, little worse for the wear and with a story about getting lost in the desert and walking back out. Within a couple of days Jack had talked a friend with a tow truck into going back out into the desert with him to fetch the SUV. They found it after a couple of hours of searching and towed it back without incident. Jack was careful not to even look in the direction of Nate's lever, though their path back didn't come within sight of it. Before the next weekend, Jack had gone to a couple of stores, including a book store, and had gotten his SUV back from the mechanic, with a warning to avoid any more joyriding in the desert. On Saturday, Jack headed back to see Nate. Jack parked a little way out of the small town near Nate, loaded up his new backpack with camping gear and the things he was bringing for Nate, and then started walking. He figured that walking would leave the least trail, and he knew that while not many people camped in the desert, it wasn't unheard of, and shouldn't really raise suspicions. Jack had brought more books for Nate - recent books, magazines, newspapers. Some things that would catch Nate up with what was happening in the world, others that were just good books to read. He spent the weekend with Nate, and then headed out again, telling Nate that he'd be back again soon, but that he had things to do first. Over four months later Jack was back to see Nate again. This time he brought a laptop with him - a specially modified laptop. It had a solar recharger, special filters and seals to keep out the sand, a satellite link-up, and a special keyboard and joystick that Jack hoped that a fifteen-foot rattlesnake would be able to use. And, it had been hacked to not give out its location to the satellite. After that Jack could e-mail Nate to keep in touch, but still visited him fairly regularly - at least once or twice a year. After the first year, Jack quit his job. For some reason, with the wisdom he 'd been given, and the knowledge that he could live for over 150 years, working in a nine to five job for someone else didn't seem that worthwhile any more. Jack went back to school. Eventually, Jack started writing. Perhaps because of the wisdom, or perhaps because of his new perspective, he wrote well. People liked what he wrote, and he became well known for it. After a time, Jack bought an RV and started traveling around the country for book signings and readings. But, he still remembered to drop by and visit Nate occasionally. On one of the visits Nate seemed quieter than usual. Not that Nate had been a fountain of joy lately. Jack's best guess was that Nate was still missing Samuel, and though Jack had tried, he still hadn't been able to replace Samuel in Nate's eyes. Nate had been getting quieter each visit. But on this visit Nate didn't even speak when Jack walked up to the lever. He nodded at Jack, and then went back to staring into the desert. Jack, respecting Nate's silence, sat down and waited. After a few minutes, Nate spoke. "Jack, I have someone to introduce you to." Jack looked surprised. "Someone to introduce me to?" Jack looked around, and then looked carefully back at Nate. "This something to do with the Big Guy? "No, no," replied Nate. "This is more personal. I want you to meet my son." Nate looked over at the nearest sand dune. "Sammy!" Jack watched as a four foot long desert rattlesnake crawled from behind the dune and up to the stone base of the lever. "Yo, Jack," said the new, much smaller snake. "Yo, Sammy" replied Jack. Jack looked at Nate. "Named after Samuel, I assume?" Nate nodded. "Jack, I've got a favor to ask you. Could you show Sammy around for me?" Nate unwrapped himself from the lever and slithered over to the edge of the stone and looked across the sands. "When Samuel first told me about the world, and brought me books and pictures, I wished that I could go see it. I wanted to see the great forests, the canyons, the cities, even the other deserts, to see if they felt and smelled the same. I want my son to have that chance - to see the world. Before he becomes bound here like I have been. "He's seen it in pictures, over the computer that you brought me. But I hear that it's not the same. That being there is different. I want him to have that. Think you can do that for me, Jack?" Jack nodded. This was obviously very important to Nate, so Jack didn't even joke about taking a talking rattlesnake out to see the world. "Yeah, I can do that for you, Nate. Is that all you need?" Jack could sense that was something more. Nate looked at Sammy. Sammy looked back at Nate for a second and then said, "Oh, yeah. Ummm, I've gotta go pack. Back in a little bit Jack. Nice to meet ya!" Sammy slithered back over the dune and out of sight. Nate watched Sammy disappear and then looked back at Jack. "Jack, this is my first son. My first offspring through all the years. You don't even want to know what it took for me to find a mate." Nate grinned to himself. "But anyway, I had a son for a reason. I'm tired. I'm ready for it to be over. I needed a replacement." Jack considered this for a minute. "So, you're ready to come see the world, and you wanted him to watch the lever while you were gone?" Nate shook his head. "No, Jack - you're a better guesser than that. You've already figured out - I'm bound here - there's only one way for me to leave here. And I'm ready. It's my time to die." Jack looked more closely at Nate. He could tell Nate had thought about this - probably for quite a while. Jack had trouble imagining what it would be like to be as old as Nate, but Jack could already tell that in another hundred or two hundred years, he might be getting tired of life himself. Jack could understand Samuel's decision, and now Nate's. So, all Jack said was, "What do you want me to do?" Nate nodded. "Thanks, Jack. I only want two things. One - show Sammy around the world - let him get his fill of it, until he's ready to come back here and take over. Two - give me the fourth request. "I can't just decide to die, not any more than you can. I won't even die of old age like you eventually will, even though it'll be a long time from now. I need to be killed. Once Sammy is back here, ready to take over, I'll be able to die. And I need you to kill me. "I've even thought about how. Poisons and other drugs won't work on me. And I've seen pictures of snakes that were shot - some of them live for days, so that's out too. So, I want you to bring back a sword. Nate turned away to look back to the dune that Sammy had gone behind. "I'd say an axe, but that's somewhat undignified - putting my head on the ground or a chopping block like that. No, I like a sword. A time-honored way of going out. A dignified way to die. And, most importantly, it should work, even on me. "You willing to do that for me, Jack?" Nate turned back to look at Jack. "Yeah, Nate," replied Jack solemnly, "I think I can handle that." Nate nodded. "Good!" He turned back toward the dune and shouted, "Sammy! Jack's about ready to leave!" Then quietly, "Thanks, Jack." Jack didn't have anything to say to that, so he waited for Sammy to make it back to the lever, nodded to him, nodded a final time to Nate, and then headed into the desert with Sammy following. Over the next several years Sammy and Jack kept in touch with Nate through e-mail as they went about their adventures. They made a goal of visiting every country in the world, and did a respectable job of it. Sammy had a natural gift for languages, as Jack expected he would, and even ended up acting as a translator for Jack in a few of the countries. Jack managed to keep the talking rattlesnake hidden, even so, and by the time they were nearing the end of their tour of countries, Sammy had only been spotted a few times. While there were several people that had seen enough to startle them greatly, nobody had enough evidence to prove anything, and while a few wild rumors and storied followed Jack and Sammy around, nothing ever hit the newspapers or the public in general. When they finished the tour of countries, Jack suggested that they try some undersea diving. They did. And spelunking. They did that too. Sammy finally drew the line at visiting Antarctica. He'd come to realize that Jack was stalling. After talking to his Dad about it over e-mail, he figured out that Jack probably didn't want to have to kill Nate. Nate told Sammy that humans could be squeamish about killing friends and acquaintances. So, Sammy eventually put his tail down (as he didn't have a foot) and told Jack that it was time - he was ready to go back and take up his duties from his dad. Jack, delayed it a little more by insisting that they go back to Japan and buy an appropriate sword. He even stretched it a little more by getting lessons in how to use the sword. But, eventually, he'd learned as much as he was likely to without dedicating his life to it, and was definitely competent enough to take the head off of a snake. It was time to head back and see Nate. When they got back to the US, Jack got the old RV out of storage where he and Sammy had left it after their tour of the fifty states, he loaded up Sammy and the sword, and they headed for the desert. When they got to the small town that Jack had been trying to find those years ago when he'd met Nate, Jack was in a funk. He didn't really feel like walking all of the way out there. Not only that, but he'd forgotten to figure the travel time correctly, and it was late afternoon. They'd either have to spend the night in town and walk out tomorrow, or walk in the dark. As Jack was afraid that if he waited one more night he might lose his resolve, he decided that he'd go ahead and drive the RV out there. It was only going to be this once, and Jack would go back and cover the tracks afterward. They ought to be able to make it out there by nightfall if they drove, and then they could get it over tonight. Jack told Sammy to e-mail Nate that they were coming as he drove out of sight of the town on the road. They then pulled off the road and headed out into the desert. Everything went well, until they got to the sand dunes. Jack had been nursing the RV along the whole time, over the rocks, through the creek beds, revving the engine the few times they almost got stuck. When they came to the dunes, Jack didn't really think about it, he just downshifted and headed up the first one. By the third dune, Jack started to regret that he'd decided to try driving on the sand. The RV was fishtailling and losing traction. Jack was having to work it up each dune slowly and was trying to keep from losing control each time they came over the top and slid down the other side. Sammy had come up to sit in the passenger seat, coiled up and laughing at Jack's driving. As they came over the top of the fourth dune, the biggest one yet, Jack saw that this was the final dune - the stone, the lever, and somewhere Nate, waited below. Jack put on the brakes, but he'd gone a little too far. The RV started slipping down the other side. Jack tried turning the wheel, but he didn't have enough traction. He pumped the brakes - no response. They started sliding down the hill, faster and faster. Jack felt a shock go through him as he suddenly realized that they were heading for the lever. He looked down - the RV was directly on course for it. If Jack didn't do something, the RV would hit it. He was about to end humanity. Jack steered more frantically, trying to get traction. It still wasn't working. The dune was too steep, and the sand too loose. In a split second, Jack realized that his only chance would be once he hit the stone around the lever - he should have traction on the stone for just a second before he hit the lever - he wouldn't have time to stop, but he should be able to steer away. Jack took a better grip on the steering wheel and tried to turn the RV a little bit - every little bit would help. He'd have to time his turn just right. The RV got to the bottom of the dune, sliding at an amazing speed in the sand. Just before they reached the stone Jack looked across it to check that they were still heading for the lever. They were. But Jack noticed something else that he hadn't seen from the top of the dune. Nate wasn't wrapped around the lever. He was off to the side of the lever, but still on the stone, waiting for them. The problem was, he was waiting on the same side of the lever that Jack had picked to steer towards to avoid the lever. The RV was already starting to drift that way a little in its mad rush across the sand and there was no way that Jack was going to be able to go around the lever to the other side. Jack had an instant of realization. He was either going to have to hit the lever, or run over Nate. He glanced over at Sammy and saw that Sammy realized the same thing. Jack took a firmer grip on the steering wheel as the RV ran up on the stone. Shouting to Sammy as he pulled the steering wheel... + Show Spoiler + "BETTER NATE THAN LEVER!" That fell flat... | ||
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MaZza[KIS]
Australia2110 Posts
On June 08 2009 11:51 kNyTTyM wrote: no picture but as epic as anything in this thread read all the way through please. + Show Spoiler + So, there's a man crawling through the desert. He'd decided to try his SUV in a little bit of cross-country travel, had great fun zooming over the badlands and through the sand, got lost, hit a big rock, and then he couldn't get it started again. There were no cell phone towers anywhere near, so his cell phone was useless. He had no family, his parents had died a few years before in an auto accident, and his few friends had no idea he was out here. He stayed with the car for a day or so, but his one bottle of water ran out and he was getting thirsty. He thought maybe he knew the direction back, now that he'd paid attention to the sun and thought he'd figured out which way was north, so he decided to start walking. He figured he only had to go about 30 miles or so and he'd be back to the small town he'd gotten gas in last. He thinks about walking at night to avoid the heat and sun, but based upon how dark it actually was the night before, and given that he has no flashlight, he's afraid that he'll break a leg or step on a rattlesnake. So, he puts on some sun block, puts the rest in his pocket for reapplication later, brings an umbrella he'd had in the back of the SUV with him to give him a little shade, pours the windshield wiper fluid into his water bottle in case he gets that desperate, brings his pocket knife in case he finds a cactus that looks like it might have water in it, and heads out in the direction he thinks is right. He walks for the entire day. By the end of the day he's really thirsty. He's been sweating all day, and his lips are starting to crack. He's reapplied the sunblock twice, and tried to stay under the umbrella, but he still feels sunburned. The windshield wiper fluid sloshing in the bottle in his pocket is really getting tempting now. He knows that it's mainly water and some ethanol and coloring, but he also knows that they add some kind of poison to it to keep people from drinking it. He wonders what the poison is, and whether the poison would be worse than dying of thirst. He pushes on, trying to get to that small town before dark. By the end of the day he starts getting worried. He figures he's been walking at least 3 miles an hour, according to his watch for over 10 hours. That means that if his estimate was right that he should be close to the town. But he doesn't recognize any of this. He had to cross a dry creek bed a mile or two back, and he doesn't remember coming through it in the SUV. He figures that maybe he got his direction off just a little and that the dry creek bed was just off to one side of his path. He tells himself that he's close, and that after dark he'll start seeing the town lights over one of these hills, and that'll be all he needs. As it gets dim enough that he starts stumbling over small rocks and things, he finds a spot and sits down to wait for full dark and the town lights. Full dark comes before he knows it. He must have dozed off. He stands back up and turns all the way around. He sees nothing but stars. He wakes up the next morning feeling absolutely lousy. His eyes are gummy and his mouth and nose feel like they're full of sand. He so thirsty that he can't even swallow. He barely got any sleep because it was so cold. He'd forgotten how cold it got at night in the desert and hadn't noticed it the night before because he'd been in his car. He knows the Rule of Threes - three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food - then you die. Some people can make it a little longer, in the best situations. But the desert heat and having to walk and sweat isn't the best situation to be without water. He figures, unless he finds water, this is his last day. He rinses his mouth out with a little of the windshield wiper fluid. He waits a while after spitting that little bit out, to see if his mouth goes numb, or he feels dizzy or something. Has his mouth gone numb? Is it just in his mind? He's not sure. He'll go a little farther, and if he still doesn't find water, he'll try drinking some of the fluid. Then he has to face his next, harder question - which way does he go from here? Does he keep walking the same way he was yesterday (assuming that he still knows which way that is), or does he try a new direction? He has no idea what to do. Looking at the hills and dunes around him, he thinks he knows the direction he was heading before. Just going by a feeling, he points himself somewhat to the left of that, and starts walking. As he walks, the day starts heating up. The desert, too cold just a couple of hours before, soon becomes an oven again. He sweats a little at first, and then stops. He starts getting worried at that - when you stop sweating he knows that means you're in trouble - usually right before heat stroke. He decides that it's time to try the windshield wiper fluid. He can't wait any longer - if he passes out, he's dead. He stops in the shade of a large rock, takes the bottle out, opens it, and takes a mouthful. He slowly swallows it, making it last as long as he can. It feels so good in his dry and cracked throat that he doesn't even care about the nasty taste. He takes another mouthful, and makes it last too. Slowly, he drinks half the bottle. He figures that since he's drinking it, he might as well drink enough to make some difference and keep himself from passing out. He's quit worrying about the denaturing of the wiper fluid. If it kills him, it kills him - if he didn't drink it, he'd die anyway. Besides, he's pretty sure that whatever substance they denature the fluid with is just designed to make you sick - their way of keeping winos from buying cheap wiper fluid for the ethanol content. He can handle throwing up, if it comes to that. He walks. He walks in the hot, dry, windless desert. Sand, rocks, hills, dunes, the occasional scrawny cactus or dried bush. No sign of water. Sometimes he'll see a little movement to one side or the other, but whatever moved is usually gone before he can focus his eyes on it. Probably birds, lizards, or mice. Maybe snakes, though they usually move more at night. He's careful to stay away from the movements. After a while, he begins to stagger. He's not sure if it's fatigue, heat stroke finally catching him, or maybe he was wrong and the denaturing of the wiper fluid was worse than he thought. He tries to steady himself, and keep going. After more walking, he comes to a large stretch of sand. This is good! He knows he passed over a stretch of sand in the SUV - he remembers doing donuts in it. Or at least he thinks he remembers it - he's getting woozy enough and tired enough that he's not sure what he remembers any more or if he's hallucinating. But he thinks he remembers it. So he heads off into it, trying to get to the other side, hoping that it gets him closer to the town. He was heading for a town, wasn't he? He thinks he was. He isn't sure any more. He's not even sure how long he's been walking any more. Is it still morning? Or has it moved into afternoon and the sun is going down again? It must be afternoon - it seems like it's been too long since he started out. He walks through the sand. After a while, he comes to a big dune in the sand. This is bad. He doesn't remember any dunes when driving over the sand in his SUV. Or at least he doesn't think he remembers any. This is bad. But, he has no other direction to go. Too late to turn back now. He figures that he'll get to the top of the dune and see if he can see anything from there that helps him find the town. He keeps going up the dune. Halfway up, he slips in the bad footing of the sand for the second or third time, and falls to his knees. He doesn't feel like getting back up - he'll just fall down again. So, he keeps going up the dune on his hand and knees. While crawling, if his throat weren't so dry, he'd laugh. He's finally gotten to the hackneyed image of a man lost in the desert - crawling through the sand on his hands and knees. If would be the perfect image, he imagines, if only his clothes were more ragged. The people crawling through the desert in the cartoons always had ragged clothes. But his have lasted without any rips so far. Somebody will probably find his dessicated corpse half buried in the sand years from now, and his clothes will still be in fine shape - shake the sand out, and a good wash, and they'd be wearable again. He wishes his throat were wet enough to laugh. He coughs a little instead, and it hurts. He finally makes it to the top of the sand dune. Now that he's at the top, he struggles a little, but manages to stand up and look around. All he sees is sand. Sand, and more sand. Behind him, about a mile away, he thinks he sees the rocky ground he left to head into this sand. Ahead of him, more dunes, more sand. This isn't where he drove his SUV. This is Hell. Or close enough. Again, he doesn't know what to do. He decides to drink the rest of the wiper fluid while figuring it out. He takes out the bottle, and is removing the cap, when he glances to the side and sees something. Something in the sand. At the bottom of the dune, off to the side, he sees something strange. It's a flat area, in the sand. He stops taking the cap of the bottle off, and tries to look closer. The area seems to be circular. And it's dark - darker than the sand. And, there seems to be something in the middle of it, but he can't tell what it is. He looks as hard as he can, and still can tell from here. He's going to have to go down there and look. He puts the bottle back in his pocket, and starts to stumble down the dune. After a few steps, he realizes that he's in trouble - he's not going to be able to keep his balance. After a couple of more sliding, tottering steps, he falls and starts to roll down the dune. The sand it so hot when his body hits it that for a minute he thinks he's caught fire on the way down - like a movie car wreck flashing into flames as it goes over the cliff, before it ever even hits the ground. He closes his eyes and mouth, covers his face with his hands, and waits to stop rolling. He stops, at the bottom of the dune. After a minute or two, he finds enough energy to try to sit up and get the sand out of his face and clothes. When he clears his eyes enough, he looks around to make sure that the dark spot in the sand it still there and he hadn't just imagined it. So, seeing the large, flat, dark spot on the sand is still there, he begins to crawl towards it. He'd get up and walk towards it, but he doesn't seem to have the energy to get up and walk right now. He must be in the final stages of dehydration he figures, as he crawls. If this place in the sand doesn't have water, he'll likely never make it anywhere else. This is his last chance. He gets closer and closer, but still can't see what's in the middle of the dark area. His eyes won't quite focus any more for some reason. And lifting his head up to look takes so much effort that he gives up trying. He just keeps crawling. Finally, he reaches the area he'd seen from the dune. It takes him a minute of crawling on it before he realizes that he's no longer on sand - he's now crawling on some kind of dark stone. Stone with some kind of marking on it - a pattern cut into the stone. He's too tired to stand up and try to see what the pattern is - so he just keeps crawling. He crawls towards the center, where his blurry eyes still see something in the middle of the dark stone area. His mind, detached in a strange way, notes that either his hands and knees are so burnt by the sand that they no longer feel pain, or that this dark stone, in the middle of a burning desert with a pounding, punishing sun overhead, doesn't seem to be hot. It almost feels cool. He considers lying down on the nice cool surface. Cool, dark stone. Not a good sign. He must be hallucinating this. He's probably in the middle of a patch of sand, already lying face down and dying, and just imagining this whole thing. A desert mirage. Soon the beautiful women carrying pitchers of water will come up and start giving him a drink. Then he'll know he's gone. He decides against laying down on the cool stone. If he's going to die here in the middle of this hallucination, he at least wants to see what's in the center before he goes. He keeps crawling. It's the third time that he hears the voice before he realizes what he's hearing. He would swear that someone just said, "Greetings, traveler. You do not look well. Do you hear me?" He stops crawling. He tries to look up from where he is on his hands and knees, but it's too much effort to lift his head. So he tries something different - he leans back and tries to sit up on the stone. After a few seconds, he catches his balance, avoids falling on his face, sits up, and tries to focus his eyes. Blurry. He rubs his eyes with the back of his hands and tries again. Better this time. Yep. He can see. He's sitting in the middle of a large, flat, dark expanse of stone. Directly next to him, about three feet away, is a white post or pole about two inches in diameter and sticking up about four or five feet out of the stone, at an angle. And wrapped around this white rod, tail with rattle on it hovering and seeming to be ready to start rattling, is what must be a fifteen foot long desert diamondback rattlesnake, looking directly at him. He stares at the snake in shock. He doesn't have the energy to get up and run away. He doesn't even have the energy to crawl away. This is it, his final resting place. No matter what happens, he's not going to be able to move from this spot. Well, at least dying of a bite from this monster should be quicker than dying of thirst. He'll face his end like a man. He struggles to sit up a little straighter. The snake keeps watching him. He lifts one hand and waves it in the snake's direction, feebly. The snake watches the hand for a moment, then goes back to watching the man, looking into his eyes. Hmmm. Maybe the snake had no interest in biting him? It hadn't rattled yet - that was a good sign. Maybe he wasn't going to die of snake bite after all. He then remembers that he'd looked up when he'd reached the center here because he thought he'd heard a voice. He was still very woozy - he was likely to pass out soon, the sun still beat down on him even though he was now on cool stone. He still didn't have anything to drink. But maybe he had actually heard a voice. This stone didn't look natural. Nor did that white post sticking up out of the stone. Someone had to have built this. Maybe they were still nearby. Maybe that was who talked to him. Maybe this snake was even their pet, and that's why it wasn't biting. He tries to clear his throat to say, "Hello," but his throat is too dry. All that comes out is a coughing or wheezing sound. There is no way he's going to be able to talk without something to drink. He feels his pocket, and the bottle with the wiper fluid is still there. He shakily pulls the bottle out, almost losing his balance and falling on his back in the process. This isn't good. He doesn't have much time left, by his reckoning, before he passes out. He gets the lid off of the bottle, manages to get the bottle to his lips, and pours some of the fluid into his mouth. He sloshes it around, and then swallows it. He coughs a little. His throat feels better. Maybe he can talk now. He tries again. Ignoring the snake, he turns to look around him, hoping to spot the owner of this place, and croaks out, "Hello? Is there anyone here?" He hears, from his side, "Greetings. What is it that you want?" He turns his head, back towards the snake. That's where the sound had seemed to come from. The only thing he can think of is that there must be a speaker, hidden under the snake, or maybe built into that post. He decides to try asking for help. "Please," he croaks again, suddenly feeling dizzy, "I'd love to not be thirsty any more. I've been a long time without water. Can you help me?" Looking in the direction of the snake, hoping to see where the voice was coming from this time, he is shocked to see the snake rear back, open its mouth, and speak. He hears it say, as the dizziness overtakes him and he falls forward, face first on the stone, "Very well. Coming up." A piercing pain shoots through his shoulder. Suddenly he is awake. He sits up and grabs his shoulder, wincing at the throbbing pain. He's momentarily disoriented as he looks around, and then he remembers - the crawl across the sand, the dark area of stone, the snake. He sees the snake, still wrapped around the tilted white post, still looking at him. He reaches up and feels his shoulder, where it hurts. It feels slightly wet. He pulls his fingers away and looks at them - blood. He feels his shoulder again - his shirt has what feels like two holes in it - two puncture holes - they match up with the two aching spots of pain on his shoulder. He had been bitten. By the snake. "It'll feel better in a minute." He looks up - it's the snake talking. He hadn't dreamed it. Suddenly he notices - he's not dizzy any more. And more importantly, he's not thirsty any more - at all! "Have I died? Is this the afterlife? Why are you biting me in the afterlife?" "Sorry about that, but I had to bite you," says the snake. "That's the way I work. It all comes through the bite. Think of it as natural medicine." "You bit me to help me? Why aren't I thirsty any more? Did you give me a drink before you bit me? How did I drink enough while unconscious to not be thirsty any more? I haven't had a drink for over two days. Well, except for the windshield wiper fluid... hold it, how in the world does a snake talk? Are you real? Are you some sort of Disney animation?" "No," says the snake, "I'm real. As real as you or anyone is, anyway. I didn't give you a drink. I bit you. That's how it works - it's what I do. I bite. I don't have hands to give you a drink, even if I had water just sitting around here." The man sat stunned for a minute. Here he was, sitting in the middle of the desert on some strange stone that should be hot but wasn't, talking to a snake that could talk back and had just bitten him. And he felt better. Not great - he was still starving and exhausted, but much better - he was no longer thirsty. He had started to sweat again, but only slightly. He felt hot, in this sun, but it was starting to get lower in the sky, and the cool stone beneath him was a relief he could notice now that he was no longer dying of thirst. "I might suggest that we take care of that methanol you now have in your system with the next request," continued the snake. "I can guess why you drank it, but I'm not sure how much you drank, or how much methanol was left in the wiper fluid. That stuff is nasty. It'll make you go blind in a day or two, if you drank enough of it." "Ummm, n-next request?" said the man. He put his hand back on his hurting shoulder and backed away from the snake a little. "That's the way it works. If you like, that is," explained the snake. "You get three requests. Call them wishes, if you wish." The snake grinned at his own joke, and the man drew back a little further from the show of fangs. "But there are rules," the snake continued. "The first request is free. The second requires an agreement of secrecy. The third requires the binding of responsibility." The snake looks at the man seriously. "By the way," the snake says suddenly, "my name is Nathan. Old Nathan, Samuel used to call me. He gave me the name. Before that, most of the Bound used to just call me 'Snake'. But that got old, and Samuel wouldn't stand for it. He said that anything that could talk needed a name. He was big into names. You can call me Nate, if you wish." Again, the snake grinned. "Sorry if I don't offer to shake, but I think you can understand - my shake sounds somewhat threatening." The snake give his rattle a little shake. "Umm, my name is Jack," said the man, trying to absorb all of this. "Jack Samson. "Can I ask you a question?" Jack says suddenly. "What happened to the poison...umm, in your bite. Why aren't I dying now? How did you do that? What do you mean by that's how you work?" "That's more than one question," grins Nate. "But I'll still try to answer all of them. First, yes, you can ask me a question." The snake's grin gets wider. "Second, the poison is in you. It changed you. You now no longer need to drink. That's what you asked for. Or, well, technically, you asked to not be thirsty any more - but 'any more' is such a vague term. I decided to make it permanent - now, as long as you live, you shouldn't need to drink much at all. Your body will conserve water very efficiently. You should be able to get enough just from the food you eat - much like a creature of the desert. You've been changed. "For the third question," Nate continues, "you are still dying. Besides the effects of that methanol in your system, you're a man - and men are mortal. In your current state, I give you no more than about another 50 years. Assuming you get out of this desert, alive, that is." Nate seemed vastly amused at his own humor, and continued his wide grin. "As for the fourth question," Nate said, looking more serious as far as Jack could tell, as Jack was just now working on his ability to read talking-snake emotions from snake facial features, "first you have to agree to make a second request and become bound by the secrecy, or I can't tell you." "Wait," joked Jack, "isn't this where you say you could tell me, but you'd have to kill me?" "I thought that was implied." Nate continued to look serious. "Ummm...yeah." Jack leaned back a little as he remembered again that he was talking to a fifteen foot poisonous reptile with a reputation for having a nasty temper. "So, what is this 'Bound by Secrecy' stuff, and can you really stop the effects of the methanol?" Jack thought for a second. "And, what do you mean methanol, anyway? I thought these days they use ethanol in wiper fluid, and just denature it?" "They may, I don't really know," said Nate. "I haven't gotten out in a while. Maybe they do. All I know is that I smell methanol on your breath and on that bottle in your pocket. And the blue color of the liquid when you pulled it out to drink some let me guess that it was wiper fluid. I assume that they still color wiper fluid blue?" "Yeah, they do," said Jack. "I figured," replied Nate. "As for being bound by secrecy - with the fulfillment of your next request, you will be bound to say nothing about me, this place, or any of the information I will tell you after that, when you decide to go back out to your kind. You won't be allowed to talk about me, write about me, use sign language, charades, or even act in a way that will lead someone to guess correctly about me. You'll be bound to secrecy. Of course, I'll also ask you to promise not to give me away, and as I'm guessing that you're a man of your word, you'll never test the binding anyway, so you won't notice." Nate said the last part with utter confidence. Jack, who had always prided himself on being a man of his word, felt a little nervous at this. "Ummm, hey, Nate, who are you? How did you know that? Are you, umm, omniscient, or something?" Well, Jack," said Nate sadly, "I can't tell you that, unless you make the second request." Nate looked away for a minute, then looked back. "Umm, well, ok," said Jack, "what is this about a second request? What can I ask for? Are you allowed to tell me that?" "Sure!" said Nate, brightening. "You're allowed to ask for changes. Changes to yourself. They're like wishes, but they can only affect you. Oh, and before you ask, I can't give you immortality. Or omniscience. Or omnipresence, for that matter. Though I might be able to make you gaseous and yet remain alive, and then you could spread through the atmosphere and sort of be omnipresent. But what good would that be - you still wouldn't be omniscient and thus still could only focus on one thing at a time. Not very useful, at least in my opinion." Nate stopped when he realized that Jack was staring at him. "Well, anyway," continued Nate, "I'd probably suggest giving you permanent good health. It would negate the methanol now in your system, you'd be immune to most poisons and diseases, and you'd tend to live a very long time, barring accident, of course. And you'll even have a tendency to recover from accidents well. It always seemed like a good choice for a request to me." "Cure the methanol poisoning, huh?" said Jack. "And keep me healthy for a long time? Hmmm. It doesn't sound bad at that. And it has to be a request about a change to me? I can't ask to be rich, right? Because that's not really a change to me?" "Right," nodded Nate. "Could I ask to be a genius and permanently healthy?" Jack asked, hopefully. "That takes two requests, Jack." "Yeah, I figured so," said Jack. "But I could ask to be a genius? I could become the smartest scientist in the world? Or the best athlete?" "Well, I could make you very smart," admitted Nate, "but that wouldn't necessarily make you the best scientist in the world. Or, I could make you very athletic, but it wouldn't necessarily make you the best athlete either. You've heard the saying that 99% of genius is hard work? Well, there's some truth to that. I can give you the talent, but I can't make you work hard. It all depends on what you decide to do with it." "Hmmm," said Jack. "Ok, I think I understand. And I get a third request, after this one?" "Maybe," said Nate, "it depends on what you decide then. There are more rules for the third request that I can only tell you about after the second request. You know how it goes." Nate looked like he'd shrug, if he had shoulders. "Ok, well, since I'd rather not be blind in a day or two, and permanent health doesn't sound bad, then consider that my second request. Officially. Do I need to sign in blood or something?" "No," said Nate. "Just hold out your hand. Or heel." Nate grinned. "Or whatever part you want me to bite. I have to bite you again. Like I said, that's how it works - the poison, you know," Nate said apologetically. Jack winced a little and felt his shoulder, where the last bite was. Hey, it didn't hurt any more. Just like Nate had said. That made Jack feel better about the biting business. But still, standing still while a fifteen foot snake sunk it's fangs into you. Jack stood up. Ignoring how good it felt to be able to stand again, and the hunger starting to gnaw at his stomach, Jack tried to decide where he wanted to get bitten. Despite knowing that it wouldn't hurt for long, Jack knew that this wasn't going to be easy. "Hey, Jack," Nate suddenly said, looking past Jack towards the dunes behind him, "is that someone else coming up over there?" Jack spun around and looked. Who else could be out here in the middle of nowhere? And did they bring food? Wait a minute, there was nobody over there. What was Nate... Jack let out a bellow as he felt two fangs sink into his rear end, through his jeans... Jack sat down carefully, favoring his more tender buttock. "I would have decided, eventually, Nate. I was just thinking about it. You didn't have to hoodwink me like that." "I've been doing this a long time, Jack," said Nate, confidently. "You humans have a hard time sitting still and letting a snake bite you - especially one my size. And besides, admit it - it's only been a couple of minutes and it already doesn't hurt any more, does it? That's because of the health benefit with this one. I told you that you'd heal quickly now." "Yeah, well, still," said Jack, "it's the principle of the thing. And nobody likes being bitten in the butt! Couldn't you have gotten my calf or something instead?" "More meat in the typical human butt," replied Nate. "And less chance you accidentally kick me or move at the last second." "Yeah, right. So, tell me all of these wonderful secrets that I now qualify to hear," answered Jack. "Ok," said Nate. "Do you want to ask questions first, or do you want me to just start talking?" "Just talk," said Jack. "I'll sit here and try to not think about food." "We could go try to rustle up some food for you first, if you like," answered Nate. "Hey! You didn't tell me you had food around here, Nate!" Jack jumped up. "What do we have? Am I in walking distance to town? Or can you magically whip up food along with your other powers?" Jack was almost shouting with excitement. His stomach had been growling for hours. "I was thinking more like I could flush something out of its hole and bite it for you, and you could skin it and eat it. Assuming you have a knife, that is," replied Nate, with the grin that Jack was starting to get used to. "Ugh," said Jack, sitting back down. "I think I'll pass. I can last a little longer before I get desperate enough to eat desert rat, or whatever else it is you find out here. And there's nothing to burn - I'd have to eat it raw. No thanks. Just talk." "Ok," replied Nate, still grinning. "But I'd better hurry, before you start looking at me as food. Nate reared back a little, looked around for a second, and then continued. "You, Jack, are sitting in the middle of the Garden of Eden." Jack looked around at the sand and dunes and then looked back at Nate sceptically. "Well, that's the best I can figure it, anyway, Jack," said Nate. "Stand up and look at the symbol on the rock here." Nate gestured around the dark stone they were both sitting on with his nose. Jack stood up and looked. Carved into the stone in a bas-relief was a representation of a large tree. The angled-pole that Nate was wrapped around was coming out of the trunk of the tree, right below where the main branches left the truck to reach out across the stone. It was very well done - it looked more like a tree had been reduced to almost two dimensions and embedded in the stone than it did like a carving. Jack walked around and looked at the details in the fading light of the setting sun. He wished he'd looked at it while the sun was higher in the sky. Wait! The sun was setting! That meant he was going to have to spend another night out here! Arrrgh! Jack looked out across the desert for a little bit, and then came back and stood next to Nate. "In all the excitement, I almost forgot, Nate," said Jack. "Which way is it back to town? And how far? I'm eventually going to have to head back - I'm not sure I'll be able to survive by eating raw desert critters for long. And even if I can, I'm not sure I'll want to." "It's about 30 miles that way." Nate pointed, with the rattle on his tail this time. As far as Jack could tell, it was a direction at right angles to the way he'd been going when he was crawling here. "But that's 30 miles by the way the crow flies. It's about 40 by the way a man walks. You should be able to do it in about half a day with your improved endurance, if you head out early tomorrow, Jack." Jack looked out the way the snake had pointed for a few seconds more, and then sat back down. It was getting dark. Not much he could do about heading out right now. And besides, Nate was just about to get to the interesting stuff. "Garden of Eden? As best as you can figure it?" "Well, yeah, as best as I and Samuel could figure it anyway," said Nate. "He figured that the story just got a little mixed up. You know, snake, in a 'tree', offering 'temptations', making bargains. That kind stuff. But he could never quite figure out how the Hebrews found out about this spot from across the ocean. He worried about that for a while." "Garden of Eden, hunh?" said Jack. "How long have you been here, Nate?" "No idea, really," replied Nate. "A long time. It never occurred to me to count years, until recently, and by then, of course, it was too late. But I do remember when this whole place was green, so I figure it's been thousands of years, at least." "So, are you the snake that tempted Eve?" said Jack. "Beats me," said Nate. "Maybe. I can't remember if the first one of your kind that I talked to was female or not, and I never got a name, but it could have been. And I suppose she could have considered my offer to grant requests a 'temptation', though I've rarely had refusals." "Well, umm, how did you get here then? And why is that white pole stuck out of the stone there?" asked Jack. "Dad left me here. Or, I assume it was my dad. It was another snake - much bigger than I was back then. I remember talking to him, but I don't remember if it was in a language, or just kind of understanding what he wanted. But one day, he brought me to this stone, told me about it, and asked me to do something for him. I talked it over with him for a while, then agreed. I've been here ever since. "What is this place?" said Jack. "And what did he ask you to do?" "Well, you see this pole here, sticking out of the stone?" Nate loosened his coils around the tilted white pole and showed Jack where it descended into the stone. The pole was tilted at about a 45 degree angle and seemed to enter the stone in an eighteen inch slot cut into the stone. Jack leaned over and looked. The slot was dark and the pole went down into it as far as Jack could see in the dim light. Jack reached out to touch the pole, but Nate was suddenly there in the way. "You can't touch that yet, Jack," said Nate. "Why not?" asked Jack. "I haven't explained it to you yet," replied Nate. "Well, it kinda looks like a lever or something," said Jack. "You'd push it that way, and it would move in the slot." "Yep, that's what it is," replied Nate. "What does it do?" asked Jack. "End the world?" "Oh, no," said Nate. "Nothing that drastic. It just ends humanity. I call it 'The Lever of Doom'." For the last few words Nate had used a deeper, ringing voice. He tried to look serious for a few seconds, and then gave up and grinned. Jack was initially startled by Nate's pronouncement, but when Nate grinned Jack laughed. "Ha! You almost had me fooled for a second there. What does it really do?" "Oh, it really ends humanity, like I said," smirked Nate. "I just thought the voice I used was funny, didn't you?" Nate continued to grin. "A lever to end humanity?" asked Jack. "What in the world is that for? Why would anyone need to end humanity?" "Well," replied Nate, "I get the idea that maybe humanity was an experiment. Or maybe the Big Guy just thought, that if humanity started going really bad, there should be a way to end it. I'm not really sure. All I know are the rules, and the guesses that Samuel and I had about why it's here. I didn't think to ask back when I started here." "Rules? What rules?" asked Jack. "The rules are that I can't tell anybody about it or let them touch it unless they agree to be bound to secrecy by a bite. And that only one human can be bound in that way at a time. That's it." explained Nate. Jack looked somewhat shocked. "You mean that I could pull the lever now? You'd let me end humanity?" "Yep," replied Nate, "if you want to." Nate looked at Jack carefully. "Do you want to, Jack?" "Umm, no." said Jack, stepping a little further back from the lever. "Why in the world would anyone want to end humanity? It'd take a psychotic to want that! Or worse, a suicidal psychotic, because it would kill him too, wouldn't it?" "Yep," replied Nate, "being as he'd be human too." "Has anyone ever seriously considered it?" asked Nate. "Any of those bound to secrecy, that is?" "Well, of course, I think they've all seriously considered it at one time or another. Being given that kind of responsibility makes you sit down and think, or so I'm told. Samuel considered it several times. He'd often get disgusted with humanity, come out here, and just hold the lever for a while. But he never pulled it. Or you wouldn't be here." Nate grinned some more. Jack sat down, well back from the lever. He looked thoughtful and puzzled at the same time. After a bit, he said, "So this makes me the Judge of humanity? I get to decide whether they keep going or just end? Me?" "That seems to be it," agreed Nate. "What kind of criteria do I use to decide?" said Jack. "How do I make this decision? Am I supposed to decide if they're good? Or too many of them are bad? Or that they're going the wrong way? Is there a set of rules for that?" "Nope," replied Nate. "You pretty much just have to decide on your own. It's up to you, however you want to decide it. I guess that you're just supposed to know." "But what if I get mad at someone? Or some girl dumps me and I feel horrible? Couldn't I make a mistake? How do I know that I won't screw up?" protested Jack. Nate gave his kind of snake-like shrug again. "You don't. You just have to try your best, Jack." Jack sat there for a while, staring off into the desert that was rapidly getting dark, chewing on a fingernail. Suddenly, Jack turned around and looked at the snake. "Nate, was Samuel the one bound to this before me?" "Yep," replied Nate. "He was a good guy. Talked to me a lot. Taught me to read and brought me books. I think I still have a good pile of them buried in the sand around here somewhere. I still miss him. He died a few months ago." "Sounds like a good guy," agreed Jack. "How did he handle this, when you first told him. What did he do?" "Well," said Nate, "he sat down for a while, thought about it for a bit, and then asked me some questions, much like you're doing." "What did he ask you, if you're allowed to tell me?" asked Jack. "He asked me about the third request," replied Nate. "Aha!" It was Jack's turn to grin. "And what did you tell him?" "I told him the rules for the third request. That to get the third request you have to agree to this whole thing. That if it ever comes to the point that you really think that humanity should be ended, that you'll come here and end it. You won't avoid it, and you won't wimp out." Nate looked serious again. "And you'll be bound to do it too, Jack." "Hmmm." Jack looked back out into the darkness for a while. Nate watched him, waiting. "Nate," continued Jack, quietly, eventually. "What did Samuel ask for with his third request?" Nate sounded like he was grinning again as he replied, also quietly, "Wisdom, Jack. He asked for wisdom. As much as I could give him." "Ok," said Jack, suddenly, standing up and facing away from Nate, "give it to me. Nate looked at Jack's backside. "Give you what, Jack?" "Give me that wisdom. The same stuff that Samuel asked for. If it helped him, maybe it'll help me too." Jack turned his head to look back over his shoulder at Nate. "It did help him, right?" "He said it did," replied Nate. "But he seemed a little quieter afterward. Like he had a lot to think about." "Well, yeah, I can see that," said Jack. "So, give it to me." Jack turned to face away from Nate again, bent over slightly and tensed up. Nate watched Jack tense up with a little exasperation. If he bit Jack now, Jack would likely jump out of his skin and maybe hurt them both. "You remember that you'll be bound to destroy humanity if it ever looks like it needs it, right Jack?" asked Nate, shifting position. "Yeah, yeah, I got that," replied Jack, eyes squeezed tightly shut and body tense, not noticing the change in direction of Nate's voice. "And," continued Nate, from his new position, "do you remember that you'll turn bright purple, and grow big horns and extra eyes?" "Yeah, yeah...Hey, wait a minute!" said Jack, opening his eyes, straightening up and turning around. "Purple?!" He didn't see Nate there. With the moonlight Jack could see that the lever extended up from its slot in the rock without the snake wrapped around it. Jack heard, from behind him, Nate's "Just Kidding!" right before he felt the now familiar piercing pain, this time in the other buttock. Jack sat on the edge of the dark stone in the rapidly cooling air, his feet extending out into the sand. He stared out into the darkness, listening to the wind stir the sand, occasionally rubbing his butt where he'd been recently bitten. Nate had left for a little while, had come back with a desert-rodent-shaped bulge somewhere in his middle, and was now wrapped back around the lever, his tongue flicking out into the desert night's air the only sign that he was still awake. Occasionally Jack, with his toes absentmindedly digging in the sand while he thought, would ask Nate a question without turning around. "Nate, do accidents count?" Nate lifted his head a little bit. "What do you mean, Jack?" Jack tilted his head back like he was looking at the stars. "You know, accidents. If I accidentally fall on the lever, without meaning to, does that still wipe out humanity?" "Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does, Jack. I'd suggest you be careful about that if you start feeling wobbly," said Nate with some amusement. A little later - "Does it have to be me that pulls the lever?" asked Jack. "That's the rule, Jack. Nobody else can pull it," answered Nate. "No," Jack shook his head, "I meant does it have to be my hand? Could I pull the lever with a rope tied around it? Or push it with a stick? Or throw a rock?" "Yes, those should work," replied Nate. "Though I'm not sure how complicated you could get. Samuel thought about trying to build some kind of remote control for it once, but gave it up. Everything he'd build would be gone by the next sunrise, if it was touching the stone, or over it. I told him that in the past others that had been bound had tried to bury the lever so they wouldn't be tempted to pull it, but every time the stones or sand or whatever had disappeared." "Wow," said Jack, "Cool." Jack leaned back until only his elbows kept him off of the stone and looked up into the sky. "Nate, how long did Samuel live? One of his wishes was for health too, right?" asked Jack. "Yes," replied Nate, "it was. He lived 167 years, Jack." "Wow, 167 years. That's almost 140 more years I'll live if I live as long. Do you know what he died of, Nate?" "He died of getting tired of living, Jack," Nate said, sounding somewhat sad. Jack turned his head to look at Nate in the starlight. Nate looked back. "Samuel knew he wasn't going to be able to stay in society. He figured that they'd eventually see him still alive and start questioning it, so he decided that he'd have to disappear after a while. He faked his death once, but changed his mind - he decided it was too early and he could stay for a little longer. He wasn't very fond of mankind, but he liked the attention. Most of the time, anyway. "His daughter and then his wife dying almost did him in though. He didn't stay in society much longer after that. He eventually came out here to spend time talking to me and thinking about pulling the lever. A few months ago he told me he'd had enough. It was his time." "And then he just died?" asked Jack. Nate shook his head a little. "He made his forth request, Jack. There's only one thing you can ask for the fourth request. The last bite. After a bit Nate continued, "He told me that he was tired, that it was his time. He reassured me that someone new would show up soon, like they always had. After another pause, Nate finished, "Samuel's body disappeared off the stone with the sunrise." Jack lay back down and looked at the sky, leaving Nate alone with his memories. It was a long time until Jack's breathing evened out into sleep. Jack woke with the sunrise the next morning. He was a little chilled with the morning desert air, but overall was feeling pretty good. Well, except that his stomach was grumbling and he wasn't willing to eat raw desert rat. So, after getting directions to town from Nate, making sure he knew how to get back, and reassuring Nate that he'd be back soon, Jack started the long walk back to town. With his new health and Nate's good directions, he made it back easily. Jack caught a bus back to the city, and showed up for work the next day, little worse for the wear and with a story about getting lost in the desert and walking back out. Within a couple of days Jack had talked a friend with a tow truck into going back out into the desert with him to fetch the SUV. They found it after a couple of hours of searching and towed it back without incident. Jack was careful not to even look in the direction of Nate's lever, though their path back didn't come within sight of it. Before the next weekend, Jack had gone to a couple of stores, including a book store, and had gotten his SUV back from the mechanic, with a warning to avoid any more joyriding in the desert. On Saturday, Jack headed back to see Nate. Jack parked a little way out of the small town near Nate, loaded up his new backpack with camping gear and the things he was bringing for Nate, and then started walking. He figured that walking would leave the least trail, and he knew that while not many people camped in the desert, it wasn't unheard of, and shouldn't really raise suspicions. Jack had brought more books for Nate - recent books, magazines, newspapers. Some things that would catch Nate up with what was happening in the world, others that were just good books to read. He spent the weekend with Nate, and then headed out again, telling Nate that he'd be back again soon, but that he had things to do first. Over four months later Jack was back to see Nate again. This time he brought a laptop with him - a specially modified laptop. It had a solar recharger, special filters and seals to keep out the sand, a satellite link-up, and a special keyboard and joystick that Jack hoped that a fifteen-foot rattlesnake would be able to use. And, it had been hacked to not give out its location to the satellite. After that Jack could e-mail Nate to keep in touch, but still visited him fairly regularly - at least once or twice a year. After the first year, Jack quit his job. For some reason, with the wisdom he 'd been given, and the knowledge that he could live for over 150 years, working in a nine to five job for someone else didn't seem that worthwhile any more. Jack went back to school. Eventually, Jack started writing. Perhaps because of the wisdom, or perhaps because of his new perspective, he wrote well. People liked what he wrote, and he became well known for it. After a time, Jack bought an RV and started traveling around the country for book signings and readings. But, he still remembered to drop by and visit Nate occasionally. On one of the visits Nate seemed quieter than usual. Not that Nate had been a fountain of joy lately. Jack's best guess was that Nate was still missing Samuel, and though Jack had tried, he still hadn't been able to replace Samuel in Nate's eyes. Nate had been getting quieter each visit. But on this visit Nate didn't even speak when Jack walked up to the lever. He nodded at Jack, and then went back to staring into the desert. Jack, respecting Nate's silence, sat down and waited. After a few minutes, Nate spoke. "Jack, I have someone to introduce you to." Jack looked surprised. "Someone to introduce me to?" Jack looked around, and then looked carefully back at Nate. "This something to do with the Big Guy? "No, no," replied Nate. "This is more personal. I want you to meet my son." Nate looked over at the nearest sand dune. "Sammy!" Jack watched as a four foot long desert rattlesnake crawled from behind the dune and up to the stone base of the lever. "Yo, Jack," said the new, much smaller snake. "Yo, Sammy" replied Jack. Jack looked at Nate. "Named after Samuel, I assume?" Nate nodded. "Jack, I've got a favor to ask you. Could you show Sammy around for me?" Nate unwrapped himself from the lever and slithered over to the edge of the stone and looked across the sands. "When Samuel first told me about the world, and brought me books and pictures, I wished that I could go see it. I wanted to see the great forests, the canyons, the cities, even the other deserts, to see if they felt and smelled the same. I want my son to have that chance - to see the world. Before he becomes bound here like I have been. "He's seen it in pictures, over the computer that you brought me. But I hear that it's not the same. That being there is different. I want him to have that. Think you can do that for me, Jack?" Jack nodded. This was obviously very important to Nate, so Jack didn't even joke about taking a talking rattlesnake out to see the world. "Yeah, I can do that for you, Nate. Is that all you need?" Jack could sense that was something more. Nate looked at Sammy. Sammy looked back at Nate for a second and then said, "Oh, yeah. Ummm, I've gotta go pack. Back in a little bit Jack. Nice to meet ya!" Sammy slithered back over the dune and out of sight. Nate watched Sammy disappear and then looked back at Jack. "Jack, this is my first son. My first offspring through all the years. You don't even want to know what it took for me to find a mate." Nate grinned to himself. "But anyway, I had a son for a reason. I'm tired. I'm ready for it to be over. I needed a replacement." Jack considered this for a minute. "So, you're ready to come see the world, and you wanted him to watch the lever while you were gone?" Nate shook his head. "No, Jack - you're a better guesser than that. You've already figured out - I'm bound here - there's only one way for me to leave here. And I'm ready. It's my time to die." Jack looked more closely at Nate. He could tell Nate had thought about this - probably for quite a while. Jack had trouble imagining what it would be like to be as old as Nate, but Jack could already tell that in another hundred or two hundred years, he might be getting tired of life himself. Jack could understand Samuel's decision, and now Nate's. So, all Jack said was, "What do you want me to do?" Nate nodded. "Thanks, Jack. I only want two things. One - show Sammy around the world - let him get his fill of it, until he's ready to come back here and take over. Two - give me the fourth request. "I can't just decide to die, not any more than you can. I won't even die of old age like you eventually will, even though it'll be a long time from now. I need to be killed. Once Sammy is back here, ready to take over, I'll be able to die. And I need you to kill me. "I've even thought about how. Poisons and other drugs won't work on me. And I've seen pictures of snakes that were shot - some of them live for days, so that's out too. So, I want you to bring back a sword. Nate turned away to look back to the dune that Sammy had gone behind. "I'd say an axe, but that's somewhat undignified - putting my head on the ground or a chopping block like that. No, I like a sword. A time-honored way of going out. A dignified way to die. And, most importantly, it should work, even on me. "You willing to do that for me, Jack?" Nate turned back to look at Jack. "Yeah, Nate," replied Jack solemnly, "I think I can handle that." Nate nodded. "Good!" He turned back toward the dune and shouted, "Sammy! Jack's about ready to leave!" Then quietly, "Thanks, Jack." Jack didn't have anything to say to that, so he waited for Sammy to make it back to the lever, nodded to him, nodded a final time to Nate, and then headed into the desert with Sammy following. Over the next several years Sammy and Jack kept in touch with Nate through e-mail as they went about their adventures. They made a goal of visiting every country in the world, and did a respectable job of it. Sammy had a natural gift for languages, as Jack expected he would, and even ended up acting as a translator for Jack in a few of the countries. Jack managed to keep the talking rattlesnake hidden, even so, and by the time they were nearing the end of their tour of countries, Sammy had only been spotted a few times. While there were several people that had seen enough to startle them greatly, nobody had enough evidence to prove anything, and while a few wild rumors and storied followed Jack and Sammy around, nothing ever hit the newspapers or the public in general. When they finished the tour of countries, Jack suggested that they try some undersea diving. They did. And spelunking. They did that too. Sammy finally drew the line at visiting Antarctica. He'd come to realize that Jack was stalling. After talking to his Dad about it over e-mail, he figured out that Jack probably didn't want to have to kill Nate. Nate told Sammy that humans could be squeamish about killing friends and acquaintances. So, Sammy eventually put his tail down (as he didn't have a foot) and told Jack that it was time - he was ready to go back and take up his duties from his dad. Jack, delayed it a little more by insisting that they go back to Japan and buy an appropriate sword. He even stretched it a little more by getting lessons in how to use the sword. But, eventually, he'd learned as much as he was likely to without dedicating his life to it, and was definitely competent enough to take the head off of a snake. It was time to head back and see Nate. When they got back to the US, Jack got the old RV out of storage where he and Sammy had left it after their tour of the fifty states, he loaded up Sammy and the sword, and they headed for the desert. When they got to the small town that Jack had been trying to find those years ago when he'd met Nate, Jack was in a funk. He didn't really feel like walking all of the way out there. Not only that, but he'd forgotten to figure the travel time correctly, and it was late afternoon. They'd either have to spend the night in town and walk out tomorrow, or walk in the dark. As Jack was afraid that if he waited one more night he might lose his resolve, he decided that he'd go ahead and drive the RV out there. It was only going to be this once, and Jack would go back and cover the tracks afterward. They ought to be able to make it out there by nightfall if they drove, and then they could get it over tonight. Jack told Sammy to e-mail Nate that they were coming as he drove out of sight of the town on the road. They then pulled off the road and headed out into the desert. Everything went well, until they got to the sand dunes. Jack had been nursing the RV along the whole time, over the rocks, through the creek beds, revving the engine the few times they almost got stuck. When they came to the dunes, Jack didn't really think about it, he just downshifted and headed up the first one. By the third dune, Jack started to regret that he'd decided to try driving on the sand. The RV was fishtailling and losing traction. Jack was having to work it up each dune slowly and was trying to keep from losing control each time they came over the top and slid down the other side. Sammy had come up to sit in the passenger seat, coiled up and laughing at Jack's driving. As they came over the top of the fourth dune, the biggest one yet, Jack saw that this was the final dune - the stone, the lever, and somewhere Nate, waited below. Jack put on the brakes, but he'd gone a little too far. The RV started slipping down the other side. Jack tried turning the wheel, but he didn't have enough traction. He pumped the brakes - no response. They started sliding down the hill, faster and faster. Jack felt a shock go through him as he suddenly realized that they were heading for the lever. He looked down - the RV was directly on course for it. If Jack didn't do something, the RV would hit it. He was about to end humanity. Jack steered more frantically, trying to get traction. It still wasn't working. The dune was too steep, and the sand too loose. In a split second, Jack realized that his only chance would be once he hit the stone around the lever - he should have traction on the stone for just a second before he hit the lever - he wouldn't have time to stop, but he should be able to steer away. Jack took a better grip on the steering wheel and tried to turn the RV a little bit - every little bit would help. He'd have to time his turn just right. The RV got to the bottom of the dune, sliding at an amazing speed in the sand. Just before they reached the stone Jack looked across it to check that they were still heading for the lever. They were. But Jack noticed something else that he hadn't seen from the top of the dune. Nate wasn't wrapped around the lever. He was off to the side of the lever, but still on the stone, waiting for them. The problem was, he was waiting on the same side of the lever that Jack had picked to steer towards to avoid the lever. The RV was already starting to drift that way a little in its mad rush across the sand and there was no way that Jack was going to be able to go around the lever to the other side. Jack had an instant of realization. He was either going to have to hit the lever, or run over Nate. He glanced over at Sammy and saw that Sammy realized the same thing. Jack took a firmer grip on the steering wheel as the RV ran up on the stone. Shouting to Sammy as he pulled the steering wheel... + Show Spoiler + "BETTER NATE THAN LEVER!" took me an hour to read, but I finished it. That is..... THE..... LONGEST.... SETUP.... FOR A JOKE..... EVERRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i183.photobucket.com/albums/x210/2pure2/122438AbandonThread.gif) nsfw+ Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://i183.photobucket.com/albums/x210/2pure2/052555superbee.gif) ![[image loading]](http://img141.imageshack.us/img141/1664/anibollywoodhorseslide.gif) lol indian movies ![[image loading]](http://img99.imageshack.us/img99/2875/funny1u.gif) ![[image loading]](http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/2350/fw2clujpg.gif) ![[image loading]](http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/3792/gifbinbubblebreak.gif) ![[image loading]](http://img510.imageshack.us/img510/8210/sl2vqe.gif) ![[image loading]](http://img37.imageshack.us/img37/6402/image001tnu.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i183.photobucket.com/albums/x210/2pure2/182033evolution.gif) ![[image loading]](http://i183.photobucket.com/albums/x210/2pure2/184630vizzini-1.gif) | ||
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Ghardo
Germany1685 Posts
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CubEdIn
Romania5359 Posts
On May 28 2009 04:59 Ghardo wrote: Who is the artist? I remember having a drawing from the same person on my desktop like 8 years ago. It was a blimp going through a canyon or something like that. I've been looking for similar stuff for ages. | ||
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kroko
Finland2136 Posts
![[image loading]](http://s3.amazonaws.com/data.tumblr.com/V3plvX2eRi14eisuC1oBZiQTo1_1280.jpg?AWSAccessKeyId=0RYTHV9YYQ4W5Q3HQMG2&Expires=1246213975&Signature=fLdU6ZZBs7h5Q4%2BT6IP4%2F%2Bgy71A%3D) Everytime I see that pic Xzibit laughing, I lol... edit ; link Click Wrong topic anyway, was supposed to go to 'Random image topic'... | ||
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lokiM
United States3407 Posts
On June 30 2009 19:03 kroko wrote: Everytime I see that pic Xzibit laughing, I lol... doesn't work | ||
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Caphe
Vietnam10817 Posts
![[image loading]](http://vnexpress.net/Files/Subject/3B/A1/0B/C6/1.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://vnexpress.net/Files/Subject/3B/A1/0B/C6/2.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://vnexpress.net/Files/Subject/3B/A1/0B/C6/3.jpg) | ||
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IntoTheWow
is awesome32274 Posts
poor sea lion.Can't believe the people that come to the southern part of my country and pay to see that | ||
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FragKrag
United States11552 Posts
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InToTheWannaB
United States4770 Posts
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MeriaDoKk
Chile1726 Posts
On July 01 2009 13:48 IntoTheWow wrote: Ugly pic poor sea lion.Can't believe the people that come to the southern part of my country and pay to see that Pay to see that????? why? | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
(the reason the don't just outright attack it like sharks, is because they are scared of getting bitten) | ||
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kdog3683
United States916 Posts
On May 28 2009 05:27 MYM.Testie wrote: How is it square KMs? It's clearly a circle. hehe | ||
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Caphe
Vietnam10817 Posts
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ShaperofDreams
Canada2492 Posts
On June 08 2009 19:07 Thesecretaznman wrote: This was from the movie Red Cliff, which is epic beyond all balls and belief. Should I watch the American version (2.5 hours) or the Chinese version (4 hours)? I plan to see it today. | ||
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Caphe
Vietnam10817 Posts
Since Red Cliff is actually divided in two parts(in China as well) I think you should watch both parts in Chinese with English subtitles.. | ||
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Ghardo
Germany1685 Posts
On June 30 2009 18:47 CubEdIn wrote: Who is the artist? I remember having a drawing from the same person on my desktop like 8 years ago. It was a blimp going through a canyon or something like that. I've been looking for similar stuff for ages. i'm sry idk *edit* found artist plus source: http://www.maniakart.com/ http://www.moddb.com/mods/iron-grip-the-oppression/news/iron-grip-artwork | ||
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Chuiu
3470 Posts
On July 01 2009 15:34 ShaperofDreams wrote: Should I watch the American version (2.5 hours) or the Chinese version (4 hours)? I plan to see it today. There is no american version, there is only a two part chinese movie with english subs. | ||
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Ghardo
Germany1685 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img199.imageshack.us/img199/8060/109607.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img196.imageshack.us/img196/7913/200136.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img31.imageshack.us/img31/417/214191.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img3.imageshack.us/img3/4051/meimeik.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://img191.imageshack.us/img191/1111/123480.jpg) | ||
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Dyllyn
Singapore670 Posts
On June 30 2009 18:47 CubEdIn wrote: Who is the artist? I remember having a drawing from the same person on my desktop like 8 years ago. It was a blimp going through a canyon or something like that. I've been looking for similar stuff for ages. This has been my desktop paper forever and i love the concept. Does anyone know if it's from a series or a game or a book or something? | ||
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closed
Vatican City State491 Posts
![[image loading]](http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/wallpaper/img/2009/07/jul09wallpaper-2_1280.jpg) | ||
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FragKrag
United States11552 Posts
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BalliSLife
1339 Posts
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BalliSLife
1339 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img37.imageshack.us/img37/6402/image001tnu.gif ) does anyone know if that pedestrian died? | ||
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kaliax
United States48 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img30.imageshack.us/img30/8500/wtfala.jpg) | ||
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NonFactor
Sweden698 Posts
On July 02 2009 10:04 BalliSLife wrote: does anyone know if that pedestrian died? He didn't. I saw this on some TV show where they did say he took terrible terrible damage. And had he been a few inches to the left or right from where he got hit, it would have been instant death. | ||
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IntoTheWow
is awesome32274 Posts
No idea | ||
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pianoblack
Canada24 Posts
[url=http://www.legorobotcomics.com/comics/1.jpg]http://www.legorobotcomics.com/comics/1.jpg[/url] i ROFL'D so harrrrd ohhh buttfuuuuuuuck | ||
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Marine50
Australia1764 Posts
On July 02 2009 22:47 NonFactor wrote: He didn't. I saw this on some TV show where they did say he took terrible terrible damage. And had he been a few inches to the left or right from where he got hit, it would have been instant death. thats crazy. He starts to run towards the end but doesn't have enough time. Yikes | ||
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pianoblack
Canada24 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g12/trelayne/ScreenShot1.jpg) Surprised no one has WoW-dropped yet... ![[image loading]](http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g12/trelayne/Epic_Lewtz_by_ComputerSherpa.jpg) | ||
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Husky
United States3362 Posts
But heyyyyy, what do I know about WoW | ||
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pianoblack
Canada24 Posts
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Triple7
United States656 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.5inall.com/gundam/gimages/burning.jpg) | ||
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ActualSteve
United States627 Posts
On March 23 2009 16:55 Hydrolisko wrote: She would not survive my punishment. | ||
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Chuiu
3470 Posts
On July 05 2009 11:07 Marine50 wrote: thats crazy. He starts to run towards the end but doesn't have enough time. Yikes He's not running, the animation is sped up. | ||
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Eishi_Ki
Korea (South)1667 Posts
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stafu
Australia1196 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img80.imageshack.us/img80/4636/sonny.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://www.hkfilm.net/sonny2.gif) ![[image loading]](http://www.cinemasterpieces.com/thestreetfighter.jpg) ![[image loading]](http://images.starpulse.com/Photos/pv/Sonny%20Chiba-2.jpg) (Bonus) + Show Spoiler + | ||
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konadora
Singapore66158 Posts
On July 02 2009 22:47 NonFactor wrote: He didn't. I saw this on some TV show where they did say he took terrible terrible damage. And had he been a few inches to the left or right from where he got hit, it would have been instant death. omg i almost died laughing | ||
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Promises
Netherlands1821 Posts
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lokiM
United States3407 Posts
yeah some1 almost dieing from getting hit by a car is so funny LOL | ||
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epicdoom
United States489 Posts
On July 07 2009 01:01 lokiM wrote: yeah some1 almost dieing from getting hit by a car is so funny LOL Note the bold part of konadora's post. Sound familiar? | ||
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lokiM
United States3407 Posts
On July 07 2009 01:05 epicdoom wrote: Note the bold part of konadora's post. Sound familiar? No i don't, i guess i don't understand the joke =\ sorry | ||
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CubEdIn
Romania5359 Posts
On July 07 2009 00:43 Promises wrote: I'm a boarder myself but this looks pretty epic to me: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYNpo8QPweY countered. | ||
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arb
Noobville17921 Posts
On July 05 2009 12:05 Triple7 wrote: i was actually going to watch this today, such an awesome show | ||
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Promises
Netherlands1821 Posts
Feck me I gotta see that ^^ So far I've mostly watched Absinthe films (which are all great btw, particularly Ready and Optimistic), and a few from Standard Films. I'll see if I can find this one^^ | ||
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Leath
Canada1724 Posts
On July 07 2009 01:23 lokiM wrote: No i don't, i guess i don't understand the joke =\ sorry Can someone explain to me as well, I did not get it. Sounds like something Klazart would say... but doesnt give me any hints o_O | ||
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Nitrogen
United States5345 Posts
On July 08 2009 07:50 Leath wrote: Can someone explain to me as well, I did not get it. Sounds like something Klazart would say... but doesnt give me any hints o_O terrible terrible damage said by dustin browder in one of the sc2 battle reports, the tvz one i think. | ||
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Chuiu
3470 Posts
On July 08 2009 07:50 Leath wrote: Can someone explain to me as well, I did not get it. Sounds like something Klazart would say... but doesnt give me any hints o_O It was in Battle Report 2. http://www.starcraft2.com/features/battlereports/2.xml | ||
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Promises
Netherlands1821 Posts
On July 07 2009 07:55 Promises wrote: Feck me I gotta see that ^^ So far I've mostly watched Absinthe films (which are all great btw, particularly Ready and Optimistic), and a few from Standard Films. I'll see if I can find this one^^ Movie was fecking awesome btw, great music, great still shots, great everything. | ||
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CubEdIn
Romania5359 Posts
On July 09 2009 19:04 Promises wrote: Movie was fecking awesome btw, great music, great still shots, great everything. Yeah it's one of my faves. I liked Absinthe's too, but this and First Descent were amongst the coolest. Also Optimistic was really nice. | ||
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Bub
United States3518 Posts
http://skoften.net/index/gallery/picdump_96 | ||
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HeaDStrong
Scotland785 Posts
+ Show Spoiler + ![[image loading]](http://farm1.static.flickr.com/78/200620941_9b41df9a7d.jpg?v=0) | ||
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LCC
Canada348 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i99/hitomikanzaki88/BEARSEMEN.png) | ||
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bao235
Norway97 Posts
On June 08 2009 11:51 kNyTTyM wrote: no picture but as epic as anything in this thread read all the way through please. + Show Spoiler + So, there's a man crawling through the desert. He'd decided to try his SUV in a little bit of cross-country travel, had great fun zooming over the badlands and through the sand, got lost, hit a big rock, and then he couldn't get it started again. There were no cell phone towers anywhere near, so his cell phone was useless. He had no family, his parents had died a few years before in an auto accident, and his few friends had no idea he was out here. He stayed with the car for a day or so, but his one bottle of water ran out and he was getting thirsty. He thought maybe he knew the direction back, now that he'd paid attention to the sun and thought he'd figured out which way was north, so he decided to start walking. He figured he only had to go about 30 miles or so and he'd be back to the small town he'd gotten gas in last. He thinks about walking at night to avoid the heat and sun, but based upon how dark it actually was the night before, and given that he has no flashlight, he's afraid that he'll break a leg or step on a rattlesnake. So, he puts on some sun block, puts the rest in his pocket for reapplication later, brings an umbrella he'd had in the back of the SUV with him to give him a little shade, pours the windshield wiper fluid into his water bottle in case he gets that desperate, brings his pocket knife in case he finds a cactus that looks like it might have water in it, and heads out in the direction he thinks is right. He walks for the entire day. By the end of the day he's really thirsty. He's been sweating all day, and his lips are starting to crack. He's reapplied the sunblock twice, and tried to stay under the umbrella, but he still feels sunburned. The windshield wiper fluid sloshing in the bottle in his pocket is really getting tempting now. He knows that it's mainly water and some ethanol and coloring, but he also knows that they add some kind of poison to it to keep people from drinking it. He wonders what the poison is, and whether the poison would be worse than dying of thirst. He pushes on, trying to get to that small town before dark. By the end of the day he starts getting worried. He figures he's been walking at least 3 miles an hour, according to his watch for over 10 hours. That means that if his estimate was right that he should be close to the town. But he doesn't recognize any of this. He had to cross a dry creek bed a mile or two back, and he doesn't remember coming through it in the SUV. He figures that maybe he got his direction off just a little and that the dry creek bed was just off to one side of his path. He tells himself that he's close, and that after dark he'll start seeing the town lights over one of these hills, and that'll be all he needs. As it gets dim enough that he starts stumbling over small rocks and things, he finds a spot and sits down to wait for full dark and the town lights. Full dark comes before he knows it. He must have dozed off. He stands back up and turns all the way around. He sees nothing but stars. He wakes up the next morning feeling absolutely lousy. His eyes are gummy and his mouth and nose feel like they're full of sand. He so thirsty that he can't even swallow. He barely got any sleep because it was so cold. He'd forgotten how cold it got at night in the desert and hadn't noticed it the night before because he'd been in his car. He knows the Rule of Threes - three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food - then you die. Some people can make it a little longer, in the best situations. But the desert heat and having to walk and sweat isn't the best situation to be without water. He figures, unless he finds water, this is his last day. He rinses his mouth out with a little of the windshield wiper fluid. He waits a while after spitting that little bit out, to see if his mouth goes numb, or he feels dizzy or something. Has his mouth gone numb? Is it just in his mind? He's not sure. He'll go a little farther, and if he still doesn't find water, he'll try drinking some of the fluid. Then he has to face his next, harder question - which way does he go from here? Does he keep walking the same way he was yesterday (assuming that he still knows which way that is), or does he try a new direction? He has no idea what to do. Looking at the hills and dunes around him, he thinks he knows the direction he was heading before. Just going by a feeling, he points himself somewhat to the left of that, and starts walking. As he walks, the day starts heating up. The desert, too cold just a couple of hours before, soon becomes an oven again. He sweats a little at first, and then stops. He starts getting worried at that - when you stop sweating he knows that means you're in trouble - usually right before heat stroke. He decides that it's time to try the windshield wiper fluid. He can't wait any longer - if he passes out, he's dead. He stops in the shade of a large rock, takes the bottle out, opens it, and takes a mouthful. He slowly swallows it, making it last as long as he can. It feels so good in his dry and cracked throat that he doesn't even care about the nasty taste. He takes another mouthful, and makes it last too. Slowly, he drinks half the bottle. He figures that since he's drinking it, he might as well drink enough to make some difference and keep himself from passing out. He's quit worrying about the denaturing of the wiper fluid. If it kills him, it kills him - if he didn't drink it, he'd die anyway. Besides, he's pretty sure that whatever substance they denature the fluid with is just designed to make you sick - their way of keeping winos from buying cheap wiper fluid for the ethanol content. He can handle throwing up, if it comes to that. He walks. He walks in the hot, dry, windless desert. Sand, rocks, hills, dunes, the occasional scrawny cactus or dried bush. No sign of water. Sometimes he'll see a little movement to one side or the other, but whatever moved is usually gone before he can focus his eyes on it. Probably birds, lizards, or mice. Maybe snakes, though they usually move more at night. He's careful to stay away from the movements. After a while, he begins to stagger. He's not sure if it's fatigue, heat stroke finally catching him, or maybe he was wrong and the denaturing of the wiper fluid was worse than he thought. He tries to steady himself, and keep going. After more walking, he comes to a large stretch of sand. This is good! He knows he passed over a stretch of sand in the SUV - he remembers doing donuts in it. Or at least he thinks he remembers it - he's getting woozy enough and tired enough that he's not sure what he remembers any more or if he's hallucinating. But he thinks he remembers it. So he heads off into it, trying to get to the other side, hoping that it gets him closer to the town. He was heading for a town, wasn't he? He thinks he was. He isn't sure any more. He's not even sure how long he's been walking any more. Is it still morning? Or has it moved into afternoon and the sun is going down again? It must be afternoon - it seems like it's been too long since he started out. He walks through the sand. After a while, he comes to a big dune in the sand. This is bad. He doesn't remember any dunes when driving over the sand in his SUV. Or at least he doesn't think he remembers any. This is bad. But, he has no other direction to go. Too late to turn back now. He figures that he'll get to the top of the dune and see if he can see anything from there that helps him find the town. He keeps going up the dune. Halfway up, he slips in the bad footing of the sand for the second or third time, and falls to his knees. He doesn't feel like getting back up - he'll just fall down again. So, he keeps going up the dune on his hand and knees. While crawling, if his throat weren't so dry, he'd laugh. He's finally gotten to the hackneyed image of a man lost in the desert - crawling through the sand on his hands and knees. If would be the perfect image, he imagines, if only his clothes were more ragged. The people crawling through the desert in the cartoons always had ragged clothes. But his have lasted without any rips so far. Somebody will probably find his dessicated corpse half buried in the sand years from now, and his clothes will still be in fine shape - shake the sand out, and a good wash, and they'd be wearable again. He wishes his throat were wet enough to laugh. He coughs a little instead, and it hurts. He finally makes it to the top of the sand dune. Now that he's at the top, he struggles a little, but manages to stand up and look around. All he sees is sand. Sand, and more sand. Behind him, about a mile away, he thinks he sees the rocky ground he left to head into this sand. Ahead of him, more dunes, more sand. This isn't where he drove his SUV. This is Hell. Or close enough. Again, he doesn't know what to do. He decides to drink the rest of the wiper fluid while figuring it out. He takes out the bottle, and is removing the cap, when he glances to the side and sees something. Something in the sand. At the bottom of the dune, off to the side, he sees something strange. It's a flat area, in the sand. He stops taking the cap of the bottle off, and tries to look closer. The area seems to be circular. And it's dark - darker than the sand. And, there seems to be something in the middle of it, but he can't tell what it is. He looks as hard as he can, and still can tell from here. He's going to have to go down there and look. He puts the bottle back in his pocket, and starts to stumble down the dune. After a few steps, he realizes that he's in trouble - he's not going to be able to keep his balance. After a couple of more sliding, tottering steps, he falls and starts to roll down the dune. The sand it so hot when his body hits it that for a minute he thinks he's caught fire on the way down - like a movie car wreck flashing into flames as it goes over the cliff, before it ever even hits the ground. He closes his eyes and mouth, covers his face with his hands, and waits to stop rolling. He stops, at the bottom of the dune. After a minute or two, he finds enough energy to try to sit up and get the sand out of his face and clothes. When he clears his eyes enough, he looks around to make sure that the dark spot in the sand it still there and he hadn't just imagined it. So, seeing the large, flat, dark spot on the sand is still there, he begins to crawl towards it. He'd get up and walk towards it, but he doesn't seem to have the energy to get up and walk right now. He must be in the final stages of dehydration he figures, as he crawls. If this place in the sand doesn't have water, he'll likely never make it anywhere else. This is his last chance. He gets closer and closer, but still can't see what's in the middle of the dark area. His eyes won't quite focus any more for some reason. And lifting his head up to look takes so much effort that he gives up trying. He just keeps crawling. Finally, he reaches the area he'd seen from the dune. It takes him a minute of crawling on it before he realizes that he's no longer on sand - he's now crawling on some kind of dark stone. Stone with some kind of marking on it - a pattern cut into the stone. He's too tired to stand up and try to see what the pattern is - so he just keeps crawling. He crawls towards the center, where his blurry eyes still see something in the middle of the dark stone area. His mind, detached in a strange way, notes that either his hands and knees are so burnt by the sand that they no longer feel pain, or that this dark stone, in the middle of a burning desert with a pounding, punishing sun overhead, doesn't seem to be hot. It almost feels cool. He considers lying down on the nice cool surface. Cool, dark stone. Not a good sign. He must be hallucinating this. He's probably in the middle of a patch of sand, already lying face down and dying, and just imagining this whole thing. A desert mirage. Soon the beautiful women carrying pitchers of water will come up and start giving him a drink. Then he'll know he's gone. He decides against laying down on the cool stone. If he's going to die here in the middle of this hallucination, he at least wants to see what's in the center before he goes. He keeps crawling. It's the third time that he hears the voice before he realizes what he's hearing. He would swear that someone just said, "Greetings, traveler. You do not look well. Do you hear me?" He stops crawling. He tries to look up from where he is on his hands and knees, but it's too much effort to lift his head. So he tries something different - he leans back and tries to sit up on the stone. After a few seconds, he catches his balance, avoids falling on his face, sits up, and tries to focus his eyes. Blurry. He rubs his eyes with the back of his hands and tries again. Better this time. Yep. He can see. He's sitting in the middle of a large, flat, dark expanse of stone. Directly next to him, about three feet away, is a white post or pole about two inches in diameter and sticking up about four or five feet out of the stone, at an angle. And wrapped around this white rod, tail with rattle on it hovering and seeming to be ready to start rattling, is what must be a fifteen foot long desert diamondback rattlesnake, looking directly at him. He stares at the snake in shock. He doesn't have the energy to get up and run away. He doesn't even have the energy to crawl away. This is it, his final resting place. No matter what happens, he's not going to be able to move from this spot. Well, at least dying of a bite from this monster should be quicker than dying of thirst. He'll face his end like a man. He struggles to sit up a little straighter. The snake keeps watching him. He lifts one hand and waves it in the snake's direction, feebly. The snake watches the hand for a moment, then goes back to watching the man, looking into his eyes. Hmmm. Maybe the snake had no interest in biting him? It hadn't rattled yet - that was a good sign. Maybe he wasn't going to die of snake bite after all. He then remembers that he'd looked up when he'd reached the center here because he thought he'd heard a voice. He was still very woozy - he was likely to pass out soon, the sun still beat down on him even though he was now on cool stone. He still didn't have anything to drink. But maybe he had actually heard a voice. This stone didn't look natural. Nor did that white post sticking up out of the stone. Someone had to have built this. Maybe they were still nearby. Maybe that was who talked to him. Maybe this snake was even their pet, and that's why it wasn't biting. He tries to clear his throat to say, "Hello," but his throat is too dry. All that comes out is a coughing or wheezing sound. There is no way he's going to be able to talk without something to drink. He feels his pocket, and the bottle with the wiper fluid is still there. He shakily pulls the bottle out, almost losing his balance and falling on his back in the process. This isn't good. He doesn't have much time left, by his reckoning, before he passes out. He gets the lid off of the bottle, manages to get the bottle to his lips, and pours some of the fluid into his mouth. He sloshes it around, and then swallows it. He coughs a little. His throat feels better. Maybe he can talk now. He tries again. Ignoring the snake, he turns to look around him, hoping to spot the owner of this place, and croaks out, "Hello? Is there anyone here?" He hears, from his side, "Greetings. What is it that you want?" He turns his head, back towards the snake. That's where the sound had seemed to come from. The only thing he can think of is that there must be a speaker, hidden under the snake, or maybe built into that post. He decides to try asking for help. "Please," he croaks again, suddenly feeling dizzy, "I'd love to not be thirsty any more. I've been a long time without water. Can you help me?" Looking in the direction of the snake, hoping to see where the voice was coming from this time, he is shocked to see the snake rear back, open its mouth, and speak. He hears it say, as the dizziness overtakes him and he falls forward, face first on the stone, "Very well. Coming up." A piercing pain shoots through his shoulder. Suddenly he is awake. He sits up and grabs his shoulder, wincing at the throbbing pain. He's momentarily disoriented as he looks around, and then he remembers - the crawl across the sand, the dark area of stone, the snake. He sees the snake, still wrapped around the tilted white post, still looking at him. He reaches up and feels his shoulder, where it hurts. It feels slightly wet. He pulls his fingers away and looks at them - blood. He feels his shoulder again - his shirt has what feels like two holes in it - two puncture holes - they match up with the two aching spots of pain on his shoulder. He had been bitten. By the snake. "It'll feel better in a minute." He looks up - it's the snake talking. He hadn't dreamed it. Suddenly he notices - he's not dizzy any more. And more importantly, he's not thirsty any more - at all! "Have I died? Is this the afterlife? Why are you biting me in the afterlife?" "Sorry about that, but I had to bite you," says the snake. "That's the way I work. It all comes through the bite. Think of it as natural medicine." "You bit me to help me? Why aren't I thirsty any more? Did you give me a drink before you bit me? How did I drink enough while unconscious to not be thirsty any more? I haven't had a drink for over two days. Well, except for the windshield wiper fluid... hold it, how in the world does a snake talk? Are you real? Are you some sort of Disney animation?" "No," says the snake, "I'm real. As real as you or anyone is, anyway. I didn't give you a drink. I bit you. That's how it works - it's what I do. I bite. I don't have hands to give you a drink, even if I had water just sitting around here." The man sat stunned for a minute. Here he was, sitting in the middle of the desert on some strange stone that should be hot but wasn't, talking to a snake that could talk back and had just bitten him. And he felt better. Not great - he was still starving and exhausted, but much better - he was no longer thirsty. He had started to sweat again, but only slightly. He felt hot, in this sun, but it was starting to get lower in the sky, and the cool stone beneath him was a relief he could notice now that he was no longer dying of thirst. "I might suggest that we take care of that methanol you now have in your system with the next request," continued the snake. "I can guess why you drank it, but I'm not sure how much you drank, or how much methanol was left in the wiper fluid. That stuff is nasty. It'll make you go blind in a day or two, if you drank enough of it." "Ummm, n-next request?" said the man. He put his hand back on his hurting shoulder and backed away from the snake a little. "That's the way it works. If you like, that is," explained the snake. "You get three requests. Call them wishes, if you wish." The snake grinned at his own joke, and the man drew back a little further from the show of fangs. "But there are rules," the snake continued. "The first request is free. The second requires an agreement of secrecy. The third requires the binding of responsibility." The snake looks at the man seriously. "By the way," the snake says suddenly, "my name is Nathan. Old Nathan, Samuel used to call me. He gave me the name. Before that, most of the Bound used to just call me 'Snake'. But that got old, and Samuel wouldn't stand for it. He said that anything that could talk needed a name. He was big into names. You can call me Nate, if you wish." Again, the snake grinned. "Sorry if I don't offer to shake, but I think you can understand - my shake sounds somewhat threatening." The snake give his rattle a little shake. "Umm, my name is Jack," said the man, trying to absorb all of this. "Jack Samson. "Can I ask you a question?" Jack says suddenly. "What happened to the poison...umm, in your bite. Why aren't I dying now? How did you do that? What do you mean by that's how you work?" "That's more than one question," grins Nate. "But I'll still try to answer all of them. First, yes, you can ask me a question." The snake's grin gets wider. "Second, the poison is in you. It changed you. You now no longer need to drink. That's what you asked for. Or, well, technically, you asked to not be thirsty any more - but 'any more' is such a vague term. I decided to make it permanent - now, as long as you live, you shouldn't need to drink much at all. Your body will conserve water very efficiently. You should be able to get enough just from the food you eat - much like a creature of the desert. You've been changed. "For the third question," Nate continues, "you are still dying. Besides the effects of that methanol in your system, you're a man - and men are mortal. In your current state, I give you no more than about another 50 years. Assuming you get out of this desert, alive, that is." Nate seemed vastly amused at his own humor, and continued his wide grin. "As for the fourth question," Nate said, looking more serious as far as Jack could tell, as Jack was just now working on his ability to read talking-snake emotions from snake facial features, "first you have to agree to make a second request and become bound by the secrecy, or I can't tell you." "Wait," joked Jack, "isn't this where you say you could tell me, but you'd have to kill me?" "I thought that was implied." Nate continued to look serious. "Ummm...yeah." Jack leaned back a little as he remembered again that he was talking to a fifteen foot poisonous reptile with a reputation for having a nasty temper. "So, what is this 'Bound by Secrecy' stuff, and can you really stop the effects of the methanol?" Jack thought for a second. "And, what do you mean methanol, anyway? I thought these days they use ethanol in wiper fluid, and just denature it?" "They may, I don't really know," said Nate. "I haven't gotten out in a while. Maybe they do. All I know is that I smell methanol on your breath and on that bottle in your pocket. And the blue color of the liquid when you pulled it out to drink some let me guess that it was wiper fluid. I assume that they still color wiper fluid blue?" "Yeah, they do," said Jack. "I figured," replied Nate. "As for being bound by secrecy - with the fulfillment of your next request, you will be bound to say nothing about me, this place, or any of the information I will tell you after that, when you decide to go back out to your kind. You won't be allowed to talk about me, write about me, use sign language, charades, or even act in a way that will lead someone to guess correctly about me. You'll be bound to secrecy. Of course, I'll also ask you to promise not to give me away, and as I'm guessing that you're a man of your word, you'll never test the binding anyway, so you won't notice." Nate said the last part with utter confidence. Jack, who had always prided himself on being a man of his word, felt a little nervous at this. "Ummm, hey, Nate, who are you? How did you know that? Are you, umm, omniscient, or something?" Well, Jack," said Nate sadly, "I can't tell you that, unless you make the second request." Nate looked away for a minute, then looked back. "Umm, well, ok," said Jack, "what is this about a second request? What can I ask for? Are you allowed to tell me that?" "Sure!" said Nate, brightening. "You're allowed to ask for changes. Changes to yourself. They're like wishes, but they can only affect you. Oh, and before you ask, I can't give you immortality. Or omniscience. Or omnipresence, for that matter. Though I might be able to make you gaseous and yet remain alive, and then you could spread through the atmosphere and sort of be omnipresent. But what good would that be - you still wouldn't be omniscient and thus still could only focus on one thing at a time. Not very useful, at least in my opinion." Nate stopped when he realized that Jack was staring at him. "Well, anyway," continued Nate, "I'd probably suggest giving you permanent good health. It would negate the methanol now in your system, you'd be immune to most poisons and diseases, and you'd tend to live a very long time, barring accident, of course. And you'll even have a tendency to recover from accidents well. It always seemed like a good choice for a request to me." "Cure the methanol poisoning, huh?" said Jack. "And keep me healthy for a long time? Hmmm. It doesn't sound bad at that. And it has to be a request about a change to me? I can't ask to be rich, right? Because that's not really a change to me?" "Right," nodded Nate. "Could I ask to be a genius and permanently healthy?" Jack asked, hopefully. "That takes two requests, Jack." "Yeah, I figured so," said Jack. "But I could ask to be a genius? I could become the smartest scientist in the world? Or the best athlete?" "Well, I could make you very smart," admitted Nate, "but that wouldn't necessarily make you the best scientist in the world. Or, I could make you very athletic, but it wouldn't necessarily make you the best athlete either. You've heard the saying that 99% of genius is hard work? Well, there's some truth to that. I can give you the talent, but I can't make you work hard. It all depends on what you decide to do with it." "Hmmm," said Jack. "Ok, I think I understand. And I get a third request, after this one?" "Maybe," said Nate, "it depends on what you decide then. There are more rules for the third request that I can only tell you about after the second request. You know how it goes." Nate looked like he'd shrug, if he had shoulders. "Ok, well, since I'd rather not be blind in a day or two, and permanent health doesn't sound bad, then consider that my second request. Officially. Do I need to sign in blood or something?" "No," said Nate. "Just hold out your hand. Or heel." Nate grinned. "Or whatever part you want me to bite. I have to bite you again. Like I said, that's how it works - the poison, you know," Nate said apologetically. Jack winced a little and felt his shoulder, where the last bite was. Hey, it didn't hurt any more. Just like Nate had said. That made Jack feel better about the biting business. But still, standing still while a fifteen foot snake sunk it's fangs into you. Jack stood up. Ignoring how good it felt to be able to stand again, and the hunger starting to gnaw at his stomach, Jack tried to decide where he wanted to get bitten. Despite knowing that it wouldn't hurt for long, Jack knew that this wasn't going to be easy. "Hey, Jack," Nate suddenly said, looking past Jack towards the dunes behind him, "is that someone else coming up over there?" Jack spun around and looked. Who else could be out here in the middle of nowhere? And did they bring food? Wait a minute, there was nobody over there. What was Nate... Jack let out a bellow as he felt two fangs sink into his rear end, through his jeans... Jack sat down carefully, favoring his more tender buttock. "I would have decided, eventually, Nate. I was just thinking about it. You didn't have to hoodwink me like that." "I've been doing this a long time, Jack," said Nate, confidently. "You humans have a hard time sitting still and letting a snake bite you - especially one my size. And besides, admit it - it's only been a couple of minutes and it already doesn't hurt any more, does it? That's because of the health benefit with this one. I told you that you'd heal quickly now." "Yeah, well, still," said Jack, "it's the principle of the thing. And nobody likes being bitten in the butt! Couldn't you have gotten my calf or something instead?" "More meat in the typical human butt," replied Nate. "And less chance you accidentally kick me or move at the last second." "Yeah, right. So, tell me all of these wonderful secrets that I now qualify to hear," answered Jack. "Ok," said Nate. "Do you want to ask questions first, or do you want me to just start talking?" "Just talk," said Jack. "I'll sit here and try to not think about food." "We could go try to rustle up some food for you first, if you like," answered Nate. "Hey! You didn't tell me you had food around here, Nate!" Jack jumped up. "What do we have? Am I in walking distance to town? Or can you magically whip up food along with your other powers?" Jack was almost shouting with excitement. His stomach had been growling for hours. "I was thinking more like I could flush something out of its hole and bite it for you, and you could skin it and eat it. Assuming you have a knife, that is," replied Nate, with the grin that Jack was starting to get used to. "Ugh," said Jack, sitting back down. "I think I'll pass. I can last a little longer before I get desperate enough to eat desert rat, or whatever else it is you find out here. And there's nothing to burn - I'd have to eat it raw. No thanks. Just talk." "Ok," replied Nate, still grinning. "But I'd better hurry, before you start looking at me as food. Nate reared back a little, looked around for a second, and then continued. "You, Jack, are sitting in the middle of the Garden of Eden." Jack looked around at the sand and dunes and then looked back at Nate sceptically. "Well, that's the best I can figure it, anyway, Jack," said Nate. "Stand up and look at the symbol on the rock here." Nate gestured around the dark stone they were both sitting on with his nose. Jack stood up and looked. Carved into the stone in a bas-relief was a representation of a large tree. The angled-pole that Nate was wrapped around was coming out of the trunk of the tree, right below where the main branches left the truck to reach out across the stone. It was very well done - it looked more like a tree had been reduced to almost two dimensions and embedded in the stone than it did like a carving. Jack walked around and looked at the details in the fading light of the setting sun. He wished he'd looked at it while the sun was higher in the sky. Wait! The sun was setting! That meant he was going to have to spend another night out here! Arrrgh! Jack looked out across the desert for a little bit, and then came back and stood next to Nate. "In all the excitement, I almost forgot, Nate," said Jack. "Which way is it back to town? And how far? I'm eventually going to have to head back - I'm not sure I'll be able to survive by eating raw desert critters for long. And even if I can, I'm not sure I'll want to." "It's about 30 miles that way." Nate pointed, with the rattle on his tail this time. As far as Jack could tell, it was a direction at right angles to the way he'd been going when he was crawling here. "But that's 30 miles by the way the crow flies. It's about 40 by the way a man walks. You should be able to do it in about half a day with your improved endurance, if you head out early tomorrow, Jack." Jack looked out the way the snake had pointed for a few seconds more, and then sat back down. It was getting dark. Not much he could do about heading out right now. And besides, Nate was just about to get to the interesting stuff. "Garden of Eden? As best as you can figure it?" "Well, yeah, as best as I and Samuel could figure it anyway," said Nate. "He figured that the story just got a little mixed up. You know, snake, in a 'tree', offering 'temptations', making bargains. That kind stuff. But he could never quite figure out how the Hebrews found out about this spot from across the ocean. He worried about that for a while." "Garden of Eden, hunh?" said Jack. "How long have you been here, Nate?" "No idea, really," replied Nate. "A long time. It never occurred to me to count years, until recently, and by then, of course, it was too late. But I do remember when this whole place was green, so I figure it's been thousands of years, at least." "So, are you the snake that tempted Eve?" said Jack. "Beats me," said Nate. "Maybe. I can't remember if the first one of your kind that I talked to was female or not, and I never got a name, but it could have been. And I suppose she could have considered my offer to grant requests a 'temptation', though I've rarely had refusals." "Well, umm, how did you get here then? And why is that white pole stuck out of the stone there?" asked Jack. "Dad left me here. Or, I assume it was my dad. It was another snake - much bigger than I was back then. I remember talking to him, but I don't remember if it was in a language, or just kind of understanding what he wanted. But one day, he brought me to this stone, told me about it, and asked me to do something for him. I talked it over with him for a while, then agreed. I've been here ever since. "What is this place?" said Jack. "And what did he ask you to do?" "Well, you see this pole here, sticking out of the stone?" Nate loosened his coils around the tilted white pole and showed Jack where it descended into the stone. The pole was tilted at about a 45 degree angle and seemed to enter the stone in an eighteen inch slot cut into the stone. Jack leaned over and looked. The slot was dark and the pole went down into it as far as Jack could see in the dim light. Jack reached out to touch the pole, but Nate was suddenly there in the way. "You can't touch that yet, Jack," said Nate. "Why not?" asked Jack. "I haven't explained it to you yet," replied Nate. "Well, it kinda looks like a lever or something," said Jack. "You'd push it that way, and it would move in the slot." "Yep, that's what it is," replied Nate. "What does it do?" asked Jack. "End the world?" "Oh, no," said Nate. "Nothing that drastic. It just ends humanity. I call it 'The Lever of Doom'." For the last few words Nate had used a deeper, ringing voice. He tried to look serious for a few seconds, and then gave up and grinned. Jack was initially startled by Nate's pronouncement, but when Nate grinned Jack laughed. "Ha! You almost had me fooled for a second there. What does it really do?" "Oh, it really ends humanity, like I said," smirked Nate. "I just thought the voice I used was funny, didn't you?" Nate continued to grin. "A lever to end humanity?" asked Jack. "What in the world is that for? Why would anyone need to end humanity?" "Well," replied Nate, "I get the idea that maybe humanity was an experiment. Or maybe the Big Guy just thought, that if humanity started going really bad, there should be a way to end it. I'm not really sure. All I know are the rules, and the guesses that Samuel and I had about why it's here. I didn't think to ask back when I started here." "Rules? What rules?" asked Jack. "The rules are that I can't tell anybody about it or let them touch it unless they agree to be bound to secrecy by a bite. And that only one human can be bound in that way at a time. That's it." explained Nate. Jack looked somewhat shocked. "You mean that I could pull the lever now? You'd let me end humanity?" "Yep," replied Nate, "if you want to." Nate looked at Jack carefully. "Do you want to, Jack?" "Umm, no." said Jack, stepping a little further back from the lever. "Why in the world would anyone want to end humanity? It'd take a psychotic to want that! Or worse, a suicidal psychotic, because it would kill him too, wouldn't it?" "Yep," replied Nate, "being as he'd be human too." "Has anyone ever seriously considered it?" asked Nate. "Any of those bound to secrecy, that is?" "Well, of course, I think they've all seriously considered it at one time or another. Being given that kind of responsibility makes you sit down and think, or so I'm told. Samuel considered it several times. He'd often get disgusted with humanity, come out here, and just hold the lever for a while. But he never pulled it. Or you wouldn't be here." Nate grinned some more. Jack sat down, well back from the lever. He looked thoughtful and puzzled at the same time. After a bit, he said, "So this makes me the Judge of humanity? I get to decide whether they keep going or just end? Me?" "That seems to be it," agreed Nate. "What kind of criteria do I use to decide?" said Jack. "How do I make this decision? Am I supposed to decide if they're good? Or too many of them are bad? Or that they're going the wrong way? Is there a set of rules for that?" "Nope," replied Nate. "You pretty much just have to decide on your own. It's up to you, however you want to decide it. I guess that you're just supposed to know." "But what if I get mad at someone? Or some girl dumps me and I feel horrible? Couldn't I make a mistake? How do I know that I won't screw up?" protested Jack. Nate gave his kind of snake-like shrug again. "You don't. You just have to try your best, Jack." Jack sat there for a while, staring off into the desert that was rapidly getting dark, chewing on a fingernail. Suddenly, Jack turned around and looked at the snake. "Nate, was Samuel the one bound to this before me?" "Yep," replied Nate. "He was a good guy. Talked to me a lot. Taught me to read and brought me books. I think I still have a good pile of them buried in the sand around here somewhere. I still miss him. He died a few months ago." "Sounds like a good guy," agreed Jack. "How did he handle this, when you first told him. What did he do?" "Well," said Nate, "he sat down for a while, thought about it for a bit, and then asked me some questions, much like you're doing." "What did he ask you, if you're allowed to tell me?" asked Jack. "He asked me about the third request," replied Nate. "Aha!" It was Jack's turn to grin. "And what did you tell him?" "I told him the rules for the third request. That to get the third request you have to agree to this whole thing. That if it ever comes to the point that you really think that humanity should be ended, that you'll come here and end it. You won't avoid it, and you won't wimp out." Nate looked serious again. "And you'll be bound to do it too, Jack." "Hmmm." Jack looked back out into the darkness for a while. Nate watched him, waiting. "Nate," continued Jack, quietly, eventually. "What did Samuel ask for with his third request?" Nate sounded like he was grinning again as he replied, also quietly, "Wisdom, Jack. He asked for wisdom. As much as I could give him." "Ok," said Jack, suddenly, standing up and facing away from Nate, "give it to me. Nate looked at Jack's backside. "Give you what, Jack?" "Give me that wisdom. The same stuff that Samuel asked for. If it helped him, maybe it'll help me too." Jack turned his head to look back over his shoulder at Nate. "It did help him, right?" "He said it did," replied Nate. "But he seemed a little quieter afterward. Like he had a lot to think about." "Well, yeah, I can see that," said Jack. "So, give it to me." Jack turned to face away from Nate again, bent over slightly and tensed up. Nate watched Jack tense up with a little exasperation. If he bit Jack now, Jack would likely jump out of his skin and maybe hurt them both. "You remember that you'll be bound to destroy humanity if it ever looks like it needs it, right Jack?" asked Nate, shifting position. "Yeah, yeah, I got that," replied Jack, eyes squeezed tightly shut and body tense, not noticing the change in direction of Nate's voice. "And," continued Nate, from his new position, "do you remember that you'll turn bright purple, and grow big horns and extra eyes?" "Yeah, yeah...Hey, wait a minute!" said Jack, opening his eyes, straightening up and turning around. "Purple?!" He didn't see Nate there. With the moonlight Jack could see that the lever extended up from its slot in the rock without the snake wrapped around it. Jack heard, from behind him, Nate's "Just Kidding!" right before he felt the now familiar piercing pain, this time in the other buttock. Jack sat on the edge of the dark stone in the rapidly cooling air, his feet extending out into the sand. He stared out into the darkness, listening to the wind stir the sand, occasionally rubbing his butt where he'd been recently bitten. Nate had left for a little while, had come back with a desert-rodent-shaped bulge somewhere in his middle, and was now wrapped back around the lever, his tongue flicking out into the desert night's air the only sign that he was still awake. Occasionally Jack, with his toes absentmindedly digging in the sand while he thought, would ask Nate a question without turning around. "Nate, do accidents count?" Nate lifted his head a little bit. "What do you mean, Jack?" Jack tilted his head back like he was looking at the stars. "You know, accidents. If I accidentally fall on the lever, without meaning to, does that still wipe out humanity?" "Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does, Jack. I'd suggest you be careful about that if you start feeling wobbly," said Nate with some amusement. A little later - "Does it have to be me that pulls the lever?" asked Jack. "That's the rule, Jack. Nobody else can pull it," answered Nate. "No," Jack shook his head, "I meant does it have to be my hand? Could I pull the lever with a rope tied around it? Or push it with a stick? Or throw a rock?" "Yes, those should work," replied Nate. "Though I'm not sure how complicated you could get. Samuel thought about trying to build some kind of remote control for it once, but gave it up. Everything he'd build would be gone by the next sunrise, if it was touching the stone, or over it. I told him that in the past others that had been bound had tried to bury the lever so they wouldn't be tempted to pull it, but every time the stones or sand or whatever had disappeared." "Wow," said Jack, "Cool." Jack leaned back until only his elbows kept him off of the stone and looked up into the sky. "Nate, how long did Samuel live? One of his wishes was for health too, right?" asked Jack. "Yes," replied Nate, "it was. He lived 167 years, Jack." "Wow, 167 years. That's almost 140 more years I'll live if I live as long. Do you know what he died of, Nate?" "He died of getting tired of living, Jack," Nate said, sounding somewhat sad. Jack turned his head to look at Nate in the starlight. Nate looked back. "Samuel knew he wasn't going to be able to stay in society. He figured that they'd eventually see him still alive and start questioning it, so he decided that he'd have to disappear after a while. He faked his death once, but changed his mind - he decided it was too early and he could stay for a little longer. He wasn't very fond of mankind, but he liked the attention. Most of the time, anyway. "His daughter and then his wife dying almost did him in though. He didn't stay in society much longer after that. He eventually came out here to spend time talking to me and thinking about pulling the lever. A few months ago he told me he'd had enough. It was his time." "And then he just died?" asked Jack. Nate shook his head a little. "He made his forth request, Jack. There's only one thing you can ask for the fourth request. The last bite. After a bit Nate continued, "He told me that he was tired, that it was his time. He reassured me that someone new would show up soon, like they always had. After another pause, Nate finished, "Samuel's body disappeared off the stone with the sunrise." Jack lay back down and looked at the sky, leaving Nate alone with his memories. It was a long time until Jack's breathing evened out into sleep. Jack woke with the sunrise the next morning. He was a little chilled with the morning desert air, but overall was feeling pretty good. Well, except that his stomach was grumbling and he wasn't willing to eat raw desert rat. So, after getting directions to town from Nate, making sure he knew how to get back, and reassuring Nate that he'd be back soon, Jack started the long walk back to town. With his new health and Nate's good directions, he made it back easily. Jack caught a bus back to the city, and showed up for work the next day, little worse for the wear and with a story about getting lost in the desert and walking back out. Within a couple of days Jack had talked a friend with a tow truck into going back out into the desert with him to fetch the SUV. They found it after a couple of hours of searching and towed it back without incident. Jack was careful not to even look in the direction of Nate's lever, though their path back didn't come within sight of it. Before the next weekend, Jack had gone to a couple of stores, including a book store, and had gotten his SUV back from the mechanic, with a warning to avoid any more joyriding in the desert. On Saturday, Jack headed back to see Nate. Jack parked a little way out of the small town near Nate, loaded up his new backpack with camping gear and the things he was bringing for Nate, and then started walking. He figured that walking would leave the least trail, and he knew that while not many people camped in the desert, it wasn't unheard of, and shouldn't really raise suspicions. Jack had brought more books for Nate - recent books, magazines, newspapers. Some things that would catch Nate up with what was happening in the world, others that were just good books to read. He spent the weekend with Nate, and then headed out again, telling Nate that he'd be back again soon, but that he had things to do first. Over four months later Jack was back to see Nate again. This time he brought a laptop with him - a specially modified laptop. It had a solar recharger, special filters and seals to keep out the sand, a satellite link-up, and a special keyboard and joystick that Jack hoped that a fifteen-foot rattlesnake would be able to use. And, it had been hacked to not give out its location to the satellite. After that Jack could e-mail Nate to keep in touch, but still visited him fairly regularly - at least once or twice a year. After the first year, Jack quit his job. For some reason, with the wisdom he 'd been given, and the knowledge that he could live for over 150 years, working in a nine to five job for someone else didn't seem that worthwhile any more. Jack went back to school. Eventually, Jack started writing. Perhaps because of the wisdom, or perhaps because of his new perspective, he wrote well. People liked what he wrote, and he became well known for it. After a time, Jack bought an RV and started traveling around the country for book signings and readings. But, he still remembered to drop by and visit Nate occasionally. On one of the visits Nate seemed quieter than usual. Not that Nate had been a fountain of joy lately. Jack's best guess was that Nate was still missing Samuel, and though Jack had tried, he still hadn't been able to replace Samuel in Nate's eyes. Nate had been getting quieter each visit. But on this visit Nate didn't even speak when Jack walked up to the lever. He nodded at Jack, and then went back to staring into the desert. Jack, respecting Nate's silence, sat down and waited. After a few minutes, Nate spoke. "Jack, I have someone to introduce you to." Jack looked surprised. "Someone to introduce me to?" Jack looked around, and then looked carefully back at Nate. "This something to do with the Big Guy? "No, no," replied Nate. "This is more personal. I want you to meet my son." Nate looked over at the nearest sand dune. "Sammy!" Jack watched as a four foot long desert rattlesnake crawled from behind the dune and up to the stone base of the lever. "Yo, Jack," said the new, much smaller snake. "Yo, Sammy" replied Jack. Jack looked at Nate. "Named after Samuel, I assume?" Nate nodded. "Jack, I've got a favor to ask you. Could you show Sammy around for me?" Nate unwrapped himself from the lever and slithered over to the edge of the stone and looked across the sands. "When Samuel first told me about the world, and brought me books and pictures, I wished that I could go see it. I wanted to see the great forests, the canyons, the cities, even the other deserts, to see if they felt and smelled the same. I want my son to have that chance - to see the world. Before he becomes bound here like I have been. "He's seen it in pictures, over the computer that you brought me. But I hear that it's not the same. That being there is different. I want him to have that. Think you can do that for me, Jack?" Jack nodded. This was obviously very important to Nate, so Jack didn't even joke about taking a talking rattlesnake out to see the world. "Yeah, I can do that for you, Nate. Is that all you need?" Jack could sense that was something more. Nate looked at Sammy. Sammy looked back at Nate for a second and then said, "Oh, yeah. Ummm, I've gotta go pack. Back in a little bit Jack. Nice to meet ya!" Sammy slithered back over the dune and out of sight. Nate watched Sammy disappear and then looked back at Jack. "Jack, this is my first son. My first offspring through all the years. You don't even want to know what it took for me to find a mate." Nate grinned to himself. "But anyway, I had a son for a reason. I'm tired. I'm ready for it to be over. I needed a replacement." Jack considered this for a minute. "So, you're ready to come see the world, and you wanted him to watch the lever while you were gone?" Nate shook his head. "No, Jack - you're a better guesser than that. You've already figured out - I'm bound here - there's only one way for me to leave here. And I'm ready. It's my time to die." Jack looked more closely at Nate. He could tell Nate had thought about this - probably for quite a while. Jack had trouble imagining what it would be like to be as old as Nate, but Jack could already tell that in another hundred or two hundred years, he might be getting tired of life himself. Jack could understand Samuel's decision, and now Nate's. So, all Jack said was, "What do you want me to do?" Nate nodded. "Thanks, Jack. I only want two things. One - show Sammy around the world - let him get his fill of it, until he's ready to come back here and take over. Two - give me the fourth request. "I can't just decide to die, not any more than you can. I won't even die of old age like you eventually will, even though it'll be a long time from now. I need to be killed. Once Sammy is back here, ready to take over, I'll be able to die. And I need you to kill me. "I've even thought about how. Poisons and other drugs won't work on me. And I've seen pictures of snakes that were shot - some of them live for days, so that's out too. So, I want you to bring back a sword. Nate turned away to look back to the dune that Sammy had gone behind. "I'd say an axe, but that's somewhat undignified - putting my head on the ground or a chopping block like that. No, I like a sword. A time-honored way of going out. A dignified way to die. And, most importantly, it should work, even on me. "You willing to do that for me, Jack?" Nate turned back to look at Jack. "Yeah, Nate," replied Jack solemnly, "I think I can handle that." Nate nodded. "Good!" He turned back toward the dune and shouted, "Sammy! Jack's about ready to leave!" Then quietly, "Thanks, Jack." Jack didn't have anything to say to that, so he waited for Sammy to make it back to the lever, nodded to him, nodded a final time to Nate, and then headed into the desert with Sammy following. Over the next several years Sammy and Jack kept in touch with Nate through e-mail as they went about their adventures. They made a goal of visiting every country in the world, and did a respectable job of it. Sammy had a natural gift for languages, as Jack expected he would, and even ended up acting as a translator for Jack in a few of the countries. Jack managed to keep the talking rattlesnake hidden, even so, and by the time they were nearing the end of their tour of countries, Sammy had only been spotted a few times. While there were several people that had seen enough to startle them greatly, nobody had enough evidence to prove anything, and while a few wild rumors and storied followed Jack and Sammy around, nothing ever hit the newspapers or the public in general. When they finished the tour of countries, Jack suggested that they try some undersea diving. They did. And spelunking. They did that too. Sammy finally drew the line at visiting Antarctica. He'd come to realize that Jack was stalling. After talking to his Dad about it over e-mail, he figured out that Jack probably didn't want to have to kill Nate. Nate told Sammy that humans could be squeamish about killing friends and acquaintances. So, Sammy eventually put his tail down (as he didn't have a foot) and told Jack that it was time - he was ready to go back and take up his duties from his dad. Jack, delayed it a little more by insisting that they go back to Japan and buy an appropriate sword. He even stretched it a little more by getting lessons in how to use the sword. But, eventually, he'd learned as much as he was likely to without dedicating his life to it, and was definitely competent enough to take the head off of a snake. It was time to head back and see Nate. When they got back to the US, Jack got the old RV out of storage where he and Sammy had left it after their tour of the fifty states, he loaded up Sammy and the sword, and they headed for the desert. When they got to the small town that Jack had been trying to find those years ago when he'd met Nate, Jack was in a funk. He didn't really feel like walking all of the way out there. Not only that, but he'd forgotten to figure the travel time correctly, and it was late afternoon. They'd either have to spend the night in town and walk out tomorrow, or walk in the dark. As Jack was afraid that if he waited one more night he might lose his resolve, he decided that he'd go ahead and drive the RV out there. It was only going to be this once, and Jack would go back and cover the tracks afterward. They ought to be able to make it out there by nightfall if they drove, and then they could get it over tonight. Jack told Sammy to e-mail Nate that they were coming as he drove out of sight of the town on the road. They then pulled off the road and headed out into the desert. Everything went well, until they got to the sand dunes. Jack had been nursing the RV along the whole time, over the rocks, through the creek beds, revving the engine the few times they almost got stuck. When they came to the dunes, Jack didn't really think about it, he just downshifted and headed up the first one. By the third dune, Jack started to regret that he'd decided to try driving on the sand. The RV was fishtailling and losing traction. Jack was having to work it up each dune slowly and was trying to keep from losing control each time they came over the top and slid down the other side. Sammy had come up to sit in the passenger seat, coiled up and laughing at Jack's driving. As they came over the top of the fourth dune, the biggest one yet, Jack saw that this was the final dune - the stone, the lever, and somewhere Nate, waited below. Jack put on the brakes, but he'd gone a little too far. The RV started slipping down the other side. Jack tried turning the wheel, but he didn't have enough traction. He pumped the brakes - no response. They started sliding down the hill, faster and faster. Jack felt a shock go through him as he suddenly realized that they were heading for the lever. He looked down - the RV was directly on course for it. If Jack didn't do something, the RV would hit it. He was about to end humanity. Jack steered more frantically, trying to get traction. It still wasn't working. The dune was too steep, and the sand too loose. In a split second, Jack realized that his only chance would be once he hit the stone around the lever - he should have traction on the stone for just a second before he hit the lever - he wouldn't have time to stop, but he should be able to steer away. Jack took a better grip on the steering wheel and tried to turn the RV a little bit - every little bit would help. He'd have to time his turn just right. The RV got to the bottom of the dune, sliding at an amazing speed in the sand. Just before they reached the stone Jack looked across it to check that they were still heading for the lever. They were. But Jack noticed something else that he hadn't seen from the top of the dune. Nate wasn't wrapped around the lever. He was off to the side of the lever, but still on the stone, waiting for them. The problem was, he was waiting on the same side of the lever that Jack had picked to steer towards to avoid the lever. The RV was already starting to drift that way a little in its mad rush across the sand and there was no way that Jack was going to be able to go around the lever to the other side. Jack had an instant of realization. He was either going to have to hit the lever, or run over Nate. He glanced over at Sammy and saw that Sammy realized the same thing. Jack took a firmer grip on the steering wheel as the RV ran up on the stone. Shouting to Sammy as he pulled the steering wheel... + Show Spoiler + "BETTER NATE THAN LEVER!" I don't know whether I should laugh or cry. It was both funny and beautiful at the same time. The story was great. Love it. | ||
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Pawsom
United States928 Posts
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3 Lions
United States3705 Posts
I can't believe I took the time to read that all at once. | ||
DivinO
United States4796 Posts
On May 28 2009 04:59 Ghardo wrote: Your carrier has arrived. | ||
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Eggplant
United States120 Posts
![[image loading]](http://ihasahotdog.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/cute-puppy-pictures-edward-puppy-hands.jpg) | ||
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HiOT
Sweden1000 Posts
![[image loading]](http://gfx.aftonbladet-cdn.se/multimedia/dynamic/00997/facebook4_997766l.jpg) | ||
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SpiritAshura
United States1271 Posts
On August 16 2009 06:53 Lobbo wrote: lol fail | ||
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BanZu
United States3329 Posts
+ Show Spoiler + | ||
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Eniram
Sudan3166 Posts
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XenOsky
Chile2268 Posts
![[image loading]](http://danirodriguez.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/rayos-volcan-chile.jpg) | ||
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konadora
Singapore66158 Posts
On August 16 2009 06:53 Lobbo wrote: wtf owned lol | ||
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StorrZerg
United States13919 Posts
On August 17 2009 13:11 XenOsky- wrote: this would be sic for a wall paper | ||
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InToTheWannaB
United States4770 Posts
wow wtf is that like a forest fire+ a lightning strike at the same time? thats pretty sick. | ||
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blomsterjohn
Norway463 Posts
![[image loading]](http://aszune.xsa.ch/uploads/abydost/2009-08-12_150057_18844.jpg) | ||
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Kong John
Denmark1020 Posts
On August 18 2009 23:34 blomsterjohn wrote: Might have been posted but I seriously cant stop giggling about that one lol | ||
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Kennelie
United States2296 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t166/eliben03/australiaday.jpg) | ||
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Kong John
Denmark1020 Posts
![[image loading]](http://www.epicallyfunnypictures.com/FunnyPictures/ORLY/ZeldaORLY.png) | ||
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EsX_Raptor
United States2801 Posts
hahaha | ||
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Kong John
Denmark1020 Posts
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Holgerius
Sweden16951 Posts
On August 16 2009 06:53 Lobbo wrote: AHAHAHA! I laughed so hard at that one. Pwned! | ||
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Deleted User 3420
24492 Posts
it is my wallpaper lol | ||
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ShAsTa
Belgium2841 Posts
http://tineye.com/search/626465f860acb4e6705de075ef0f64f7c946ea78 | ||
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