Continued from here...

...feed terminated
...initiate reboot
...feed not found
...operator not found
...analyze last feed
...analyzation complete: termination event possible
...execute Spice Girl Protocol

Spice Girl Protocol.  The drone called Dave awoke from sleep at the command and detached himself from his perch on the hall’s ceiling.  Battery 100%  His flight path arced downward and into the safe house’s main sitting area, kitchen, dining room, office...scanning.  One bunkroom, another bedroom and another.  Occupant, 1; Jacinda Cross.  He increased altitude and activated his projector.  A blue, six-armed, dog-like cartoon alien appeared.  Dave’s speaker emitted a knocking sound since he’d break himself smashing into the door physically.  “Hello?”  The voice that called out belonged to the woman Cross knew as Amy Pond.

Routine.  It could be a comfort or a killer, depending on the person or circumstance for sure.  Order, chaos, time, purpose...these were all necessities in the wild world of rambling and things to contemplate as one is held captive by the decision of Fate.  Death.  What was death?  Nothingness?  Life then was what, the opposite?  And who had the answers?  Why wouldn’t they share?  Selfishness?  An old pact, ancient and secret?  What the hell was the point of it all?

The message was like all the others, nothing had been different.  Copy and paste.  They called and Nika, their weapon, dutifully answered.  Like she always had.  The drop was set in dense forest.  Romania or Ukraine?  The mountains and woods presented a rolling terrain welcomed for the challenge it offered and already she had crossed and recrossed the old borders so many times she’d stopped glancing at the HUD to see which country she occupied.  Old-growth trees grew up rather than out, no doubt compensating for their thick numbers, toward a sun that seemed farther away somehow.  It would get darker quicker here which wasn’t a problem really, just food for thought.  The length of the hike wasn’t abnormal either, especially for the times.  Gliding into this mess had been impossible for a couple of reasons.  Clearly the trees would have none of it and then her bosses were a paranoid bunch.  The exact location of the drop was only revealed by proximity.  As in you had to just fucking find it.  Sometimes that was rather maddening.  Whatever it was she was supposed to retrieve though had to be at least marginally portable as she was already two hours into this hike.  That put it in the middle range of the goody drops on the all-time list.  So, not bad.  Yet.

The micro drones cast a net around her.  Eyes and ears.  Still she used her own senses, only glancing at the HUD if something interesting popped up.  Which nothing did and that was great.  Time was passed singing to herself, mostly old cartoony songs from the stuff her parents had watched as kids and she was able to tuck her love interest neatly into a corner.  That Liv was there at all was significant.  A brief picture in minds-eye drew a dimpled smile.

Thirty minutes later saw a slight opening in the trees.  A squat camouflage polymer case beckoned.  Nika took a knee and the code she was given parted the lid.  There was a small hard-shelled pack, which she slung onto her back, no questions asked.  Why would she?  It wasn’t the first time.  She clicked the chest strap closed with one hand and reached for a box of what she assumed were the latest anti-evil darts.  Please and thank you.

The explosion, small and focused, caught her unaware.  Despite dampers and the armor of her helmet and face shield, the flare from the surgical blast did it’s job.  Nika staggered backward at the force of the concussion and fought to regain her footing.  A sustained ring drowned out all other sound and time.  The flash had birthed a million suns flaring bright yellow and blinding white before fading to black again.  She felt her boots on the rough ground as she backed away from the case.  One step, two.  Then the surface was smooth.  Made.  She reached out.  Where the forest air should be, was, only moments before.  Her gloved fingers touched glass and the world exploded into light.

She reached up into the belly of the car engine. The work on the Monero was steady, given the conditions she drove the car through. She told herself she kept an engine clean enough to eat on, but shit she always found some lame ass reason to procrastinate maintenance until it was too late. As it was, a pump needed replaced, but the modified block made the chore a pain in her ass. She stretched, and suddenly gasped. She pulled back her hand, finding a slice on her finger that she would normally ignore except it was going to make her grip slippery. To make things worse, the tubing sliced as well. Fuck.

Grym rolled the back brace out from under the engine and wrapped the wound up in a rag. Music thumped the interior of the warehouse. Daylight streamed from the filthy windows, few as there were. She used the bloody rag to wipe sweat from her neck as she kicked a portable a/c on her way to a locker. After rummaging around, she realized that was the last of the pumps and fired up a cue on her wallet.

“Four days for a fucking pump. I can buy one in an hour.” She spoke to nothing, cringing at the idea of waiting four days for delivery. Something about – eh, who the fuck cared.

Which meant, she was going to have to go out herself. Slapping a band aid on her hand, she shrugged on her jacket, slipped knives into ankle sheathes, and hid a compact 9mm in a back holster. Should suffice for a quick run to the store.

Name: Zephyr Lelantos aka “Zef” or Z

Age: 22 (2046) (Born 2024)
Origin: Artemida, Greece
Occupation: Atharim Hunter

Personality:

Zephyr is steeped in the tradition of carrying out her clan’s legacy. There is no room for wavering. She takes a no-nonsense approach to most things in her life — everything calculated to minutia. She is strong and hearty and is a brutal fighter who takes no prisoners. Zephyr does not like to wait and is highly impatient when she has to. She doesn’t believe in sugarcoating things, nor telling a lie unless that lies is to protect her clan or the very existence of monsters, gods and the Atharim. Zephyr is a vegetarian and while physical intimacy and sexual release can come from any willing partner, Zephyr is looking for the perfect father to provide her with ‘perfect offspring’ and her count down is ticking the older she gets as she can die at any time.

Description:

Zephyr has long light brown hair she keeps pulled up while on a hunt, but likes to let it down when on her own time. She has piercing blue eyes and plump lips. Zephyr wears little makeup, but she wears some to become like ‘others’ in the real world. She wears clothes that blend in to her surroundings (not in the camouflage sense but the not noticed sense). She owns a handful of outfits, but has an extensive credit backlog to purchase whatever she may require blending in. Zephyr bears the serpent biting its own tail tattoo, as all Atharim do, on her left forearm. The familial mark is part of a larger piece of Greek myth inspired imagery covering her back to include her left hand. The full tattoo tells the story of Atalanta and her descendants to end with a depiction of the west wind, her namesake, on her left hand just above the knuckles. Starting on the right side, Zephyr keeps track of all her kills immortalized in ink.

History:

Zephyr Lelantos was the first-born daughter of Lelantos Lyric and Maya, a poor Greek girl who Lelantos saved from poverty. Maya was given a place with his brother Micah Lyric and was paid to have at minimum two children. If the first were a daughter, then she would stay with Lelantos to be raised in the Atharim as per tradition, and the second would be hers to raise in Artemida with his brother and Maya. If the first child were male, Maya would raise the child until the second child was born. If both were male, then the second would come with Lelantos like he had when his mother, Lyric gave birth to two boys. Lelantos never knew his father, and neither had Micah. It would be Zephyr’s destiny to provide a female Atalanta heir, or take the youngest son of the two, as it had been since Atalanta first hunted.

Zephyr grew up with the tales of Atalanta, as the heir, it was her job to continue the line and pass the stories down as all before her had done. Lelantos taught her everything from reading and arithmetic to the legends of Atalanta and the Atharim. Lelantos sired a son by Maya when Zephyr was three. It would be Christof’s destiny to raise Zephyr’s second offspring.

The tradition was born of the need to continue Atalanta’s line and stories through the generations. While the secondary offspring did not hunt, they learned the same lessons. The same marks obtained. All to preserve the line. There would always be an heir to the Atalanta line.

Lelantos taught his daughter the arts of weapons, strategy and war. The war of the gods had long since been over, but they remembered like it was yesterday. They told the stories to the other Atharim. It was their stories that gave the Atharim purpose. There were other heirs, some as old as Atalanta’s line, some less diligent and forgotten why the Atharim waged war upon the gods. It was Zephyr’s job to remember why they fought and would continue to fight for mankind.

[[Age 5 (2029) - brutal murder of a person that Zephyr refused to meat afterwards]]

Lelantos spent the first five years of Zephyr’s life in Artemida — another tradition when the firstborn is a daughter. From the moment Zephyr opened her eyes after birth, she was in training. At first Lelantos would just tend to the newborns needs, telling his daughter of the legends and myths they were preserving. Zephyr’s bedtime stories were tales of Atalanta and her birth, her reckoning, each kill the first of their line carried out.

When Zephyr learned to walk her training truly began. Lelantos started honing her speed, and her balance. He taught fine motor skills.

Her first word was oni. Her uncle Micah gave her a homemade Oni stuffed animal to scare away the nightmares. She loved the fluffy creature. But she would later learn they were far more dangerous and nightmares were not things easily frightened by monsters.

Zephyr learned to read from all religious texts. The Atalanta clan did not worship from any religion, but to understand the world, religion was a key and Lelantos taught from the Buddah Sutras, the Christian Bible, The Hindu Vedas, the Islamic Quran and Hadith, and the Jewish Tanach, Mishnah, Talmud and Midrash . But besides learning to read, these texts were unimportant to Zephyr’s education. Everything it required her to remember knowledge wise was that of the Atharim — no text to learn from, every story, every word was passed down from heir to heir, and secondary to secondary. Each word preserved in memory until Zephyr could recite it word for word.

When Zephyr turned 5 she and Lelantos left Artemida only to return on rare occasion, but it was no longer home. Lelantos took Zephyr on her first hunt — an Oni kill. Zephyr was show the body of the mangled victim and the mess remained in her vision. It would serve as a reminder for her remaining days that the monsters were dangerous — and most dangerous of them all were the gods. Zephyr refused to eat meat since the vision remained. Her father only smiled a knowing smile when she refused the dish. It was another long-standing tradition among the hunters of the Clan. Hunting was never for food for a hunter of the Atharim — it was always a calculated act to save mankind from the evils of the gods.

[[Age 6 (2030) - Lelantos pieces together that a young girl is a reborn god]]

Zephyr was too young to understand what happened in the beginning of the Return of the Gods, but her father told her the tale. He made Zephyr commit the tale to memory unlike all other hunts before it. Zephyr was six.

The story goes: A 14-year-old girl of Oberweid, Germany played with fire. First her childhood home burnt to the ground. The authorities ruled it an electrical fire after much deliberation, but the facts did not fit. Three months later the girl grew angry, so angry the man she was fighting with burst into flames spontaneously. No accelerant was found, but he burnt from the outside in. The third coincident happened in front of Lelantos Lyric himself. He witnesses the girl in a holding cell combust in self-sacrifice. The old gods had returned — there was no other explanation.

Lelantos had pieced together through other witness accounts the nature of the beast. But Lelantos didn’t put the fever and agony into context for several more strange occurrences throughout the years. Strange fires, raging storms out of nowhere, anything and everything that looked like a ‘freak’ accident drew Lelantos attention and he found the sickness in every one.

[[Age 10 (2034) - Zephyr’s first kill]]

Lelantos never let Zephyr come when he had to dispatch a child, that was a task for her older years. As had been the tradition for murdering humans. But at the age of ten it was time for Zephyr to find her feet — remembering and hunting was not their only job. Their job required the ability to kill the things that threatened humanity. First monsters — then the humanoid monsters that plagued the world and now with the gods being reborn into the world that would come for Zephyr sooner rather than later.

Her father took her into the woods where a dreyken lived. With her trusty cross bow, knives and a shotgun, Lelantos took Zephyr hunting. The tracked the creature to a cave where he kept his victims alive. He dragged the girl screaming through the forest. It was a careless mistake, but perfect for Zephyr’s first kill.

Screams of the girl echoed in the cave. She pleaded with the monster and when she saw Zephyr in the pale moonlight she cried out for help. The dreyken rounded on Zephyr at the tender age of ten, it thought to overpower her. But without hesitation Zephyr pointed the crossbow at the creature and let a single bolt fly. It missed and was on top of her before she could draw her gun. But her father stood ready with a blade through the base of the creature's neck before its talons found purchase in Zephyr’s right arm. A scar remains to the day of the talon that nicked her — a constant reminder never to miss.

Zephyr learned quickly from then on out. Her father allowing her kills more and more as she grew capable until he was there only to watch and be back up.

[[Age 13 (2037) - a godling sparked fire draws Zephyr and Lelantos to Sweeden - Seven]]

Zephyr had been all over the CCD and most of the known world by the age of 13. Sweeden was the last country on her map of visited countries. It was quite the fortunate happenstance that there was a fire with inexplicable data. They ruled the fire electrical, but even Zephyr knew that was probably not the case. Their sources were diligent in their findings but having no actual evidence to the contrary they could not state it was ‘magic’. But Lelantos followed the suspect for years. Not literally, but the searches eventually came up nothing, and the man seemed to no longer exist. The search algorithms were still in place, but even in 2046 there had been no resurgence matching the man in question.

[[Age 16 (2040) - Zephyr’s first godling hunt]]

Zephyr got stronger and faster. Smarter and wiser with each passing year. Her stomach for ending the life of the monsters was iron clad. Her father had given her harder and harder cases — raving wolfkin, possessed wefuke, rougarou, naga — but always the monstrous variety. On her sixteen birthday, her father gave Zephyr a single newspaper article as a present.

The article spoke of strange storms in the area — whirlwinds, tornados, freak lightning on a cloudless day coming from an insignificant town in China. “Your hunt.”

It was her final test — the object — find and kill the reborn god.

Tracking down the godling had been simple work. A boy of 19 was at the center of it all — even if he had been miles away from the accidents. Each time one of those accidents happened weeks later he fell ill — a tell-tale sign.

But the kill was much harder. The boy was attractive. He had inky hair with matching black eyes. He was a kind person from the outside. But the taint of the gods resided within. It took Zephyr three days before she could work up the nerve to pull the trigger — so to speak.

Zephyr choose to poison the well in which the family drew their water from killing all with in. Lelantos was proud and annoyed at her. She had done the job in the most efficient manner, but it had taken her time to preform the task. The method only worked because of the small town. Zephyr knew they would be the only casualties and no one would drink from the well, and by the time the authorities found it out they would be long gone.

[[Age 18 (2042) - A godling hunt goes poorly and Lelantos dies, Zephyr makes the kill in a heated revenge attack]]

Although Zephyr passed her final test and received her Atharim tattoo — the same one her father wore and his mother before her and her mother and on until the ends of time, Zephyr was given continual harder missions to complete by her father. They didn’t always hunt together, but on tricky missions such as the one shortly after Zephyr’s 18th birthday where her father found his true death.

It had been a common enough god hunt — or so they thought. Except this time there were two. They were in the heart of London where they found an ailing boy — people were saying he could make them do whatever they wanted. At first it started out with just his parents, and then later it happened with his teachers. It was an easy kill.

Lelantos broke into the boy's parents flat in the dead moonless night. The knife slid through the boy's throat like butter. But there a man walked into the room. Zephyr watched from the window where she kept guard and jammed all signals in and out of the area.

Zephyr watched from her hiding spot as a ball of fire erupted from the man’s hand and her father screamed. Lights around the neighborhood flipped on as the scream echoed through the open window. Zephyr escaped being seen but her father lie dead on the ground inside the house and a reborn god lived. Her anger overwhelmed her but she stopped running long enough to remember the explosives in her pack. No one would survive.

Zephyr planted charges around the house and before the police entered Zephyr pulled the trigger of the detonator. The flat and the ones surrounding it burst into a blaze larger than necessary. There was only a slight stab of guilt at the innocents lost, but it was for the good of mankind. Her father died a hero.

When her father died, she went home to lay his memorial with the rest of the Clan. And to tell Cristof of his loss. She mourned for three months — spending time with what remained of the Clan. Cristof was courting a girl with whom he wished to share the traditions with. He had the luxury of choosing not to allow her into the clan — their children would not be indoctrinated into the Atharim nor the clan. Though Cristof did not want to keep secrets from his family. Uncle Micah was his greatest influence and believed that a wider circle could keep the traditions. He and her father disagreed, and Cristof had listened to their father, but he share Zephyr’s dislike of lies. There were enough lies being told, family didn’t need to share in them.

Zephyr remembered a conversation before she left that had her promising to try to find love. “Christof, I can’t not have a child, it is my obligation to carry on the family line.”

He laughed, “I know big sister, but you can still find love and bear the heir. Promise me you’ll try?”

Zephyr could never say no to her brother. He’d been a pest when she was living there, but even on visits home he still held a special place in her heart. “I will try.” she promised, “But if I can’t, then I will use science.”

“Five years.” Christof demanded.

Zephyr sighed, “Fine.”

Three months passed quickly and Zephyr found herself on the road again hunting monsters and gods alike. She was alone now, but it didn’t stop her from experiencing life or the people and exchanges she could have on the interim until she found Mr. Right as she promised Christof. But there was a flaw in every man. And women while fun, didn’t help sire a child to be heir.

Her life was hunting.

[[Age 21 (2045) - New Atharim HQ opens in Moscow and visits - then heads out on another rumor’d godling hunt]]

And then came the call from the Regus himself in Moscow. An all hands meeting at the Bacaratt Mansion in the heart of the city itself. The Regus killed a man on stage — a father of a reborn god. Just deserts was her only thought. The Archangels were annouced and Zephyr laughed at the idea of a team meant to hunt gods. Though the gods were increasing in number, and in survivability of the Sickness. She left that up to them she’d continue her job — hunting gods, telling the stories to the Atharim she met. Reminding them why they hunted. They thought she was a crack with all the stories only she knows, but she knew her stuff and that was all that mattered to most of them.

Zephyr statyed in Moscow for three days after the all hands meeting browsing through the archives looking for stale cases or odd bits of information on other Atharim. And she found one. She left the regulars to their devices and went off to do her own thing.

[[Current day - returns to Moscow after the Ascendancy reveals himself to the world]]

Months later Zephry was lounging in bed after a man left her hotel room, he’d left the TV on she watched the televised reshaping of the world. The sheet that had been carelessly draped over her body fell when she sat up and watched the mousoleum reform into a arch. Moscow would become a safe haven for reborn gods now that the leader of most of the world was one. It would become her new hunting grounds.

He constantly checked the app during the trip. Every 10 or 15 minutes, it was open to see if the energy signature remained in place. No new alerts signaled activity, but in this case, no news was good news.

There were no direct flights. Elias was motion-sick on the train, part of why he was able to check the app all night. He wasn’t sleeping, but he wasn’t throwing up either.

Come morning, he rejected breakfast from a tray and sipped carefully on some kind of soda.

The train station was a welcome sight. The second he stepped onto the platform, the cool air rushed his face and he shook his hair loose from the ponytail, already feeling better. A few people looked at him strangely, which he found amusing, and carried on through the station.

It was hotter than he expected. A nice spring bristled Moscow, but this felt more like Kenab, Utah than anywhere he’d been since leaving. Sweat almost immediately prickled his skin, but he left his coat on, though let the buttons fall open as he walked, duster sweeping behind his feet.

He had only one small bag, which was slung over his shoulder. His uncle’s wallet was fully charged and he was ready to rent a boat until his stomach grumbled loud enough to disturb an elderly lady humped over beside him.

She said something under her breath about skinny kids before he rolled his eyes and searched for Asha. She had a point. There probably wasn’t a Taco Bell around here.

It was two weeks almost to the day since Durante made a wild accusation that he was a god.  That he had wielded the power that day in the hospital. Jer woke up with a mild fever. It was nothing really.  An aspirin or two would take care of it.  But it only got worse.  And with the fever the pain grew.

It felt like he was being stabbed and torn apart at the same time.  It was horrible.  Fever swept in the hallucinations.  He saw things.  Things he didn't want to see them.  His father, his mother, the men he killed.  The voices, the damage, everything he kept under wraps flooded in with the hallucinations.  

Jer was alone in his misery.  His small apartment near the old Bacaratt Mansion empty except for the echo's of his screams that could not be heard outside. He'd prided himself on the sound proofing for Atharim privacy.  But now, no one knew the pain and agony. There was not a sound anyone else heard no matter how loud Jer got.

So last week I watched the National Theatre Live's production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, and discovered that Bottom was played by Hammed Animashaun, who is going to be Loial. Waaay different part to the bookish Ogier, obviously, but I think he is going to be fantastic. He can do a super deep, boomy voice too.

I also started to watch Money Heist a while back on netflix, which has Álvaro Morte (Logain) and is actually pretty good. He plays a character that hasn't had too much screen time as yet, though I get the impression we will see more of him as time goes on (he's kinda the mastermind).

And today I watched a really cute romance with Joshua Stradowski (Rand) called Just Friends (you can rent it for a couple of quid on Amazon, it's a Dutch film not to be confused with others of the same name). I think he will do clueless farm boy very well. Also, he is far more ripped than I realised, haha.

Marcus Rutherford (Perrin) is in a British indie film about the London riots that I have ready to watch, though I haven't gotten around to it yet.

Some of the actors are famous and/or have been in well known things that I've seen as well. But anyone else seen anything with one of them in?