#Data Feed Management Services

[leapfeed1]

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[mostlysignssomeportents]

Bossware is unfair (in the legal sense, too)

You can get into a lot of trouble by assuming that rich people know what they're doing. For example, might assume that ad-tech works – bypassing peoples' critical faculties, reaching inside their minds and brainwashing them with Big Data insights, because if that's not what's happening, then why would rich people pour billions into those ads?

https://pluralistic.net/2020/12/06/surveillance-tulip-bulbs/#adtech-bubble

You might assume that private equity looters make their investors rich, because otherwise, why would rich people hand over trillions for them to play with?

https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2024/11/19/private-equity-vampire-capital/

The truth is, rich people are suckers like the rest of us. If anything, succeeding once or twice makes you an even bigger mark, with a sense of your own infallibility that inflates to fill the bubble your yes-men seal you inside of.

Rich people fall for scams just like you and me. Anyone can be a mark. I was:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/05/cyber-dunning-kruger/#swiss-cheese-security

But though rich people can fall for scams the same way you and I do, the way those scams play out is very different when the marks are wealthy. As Keynes had it, "The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent." When the marks are rich (or worse, super-rich), they can be played for much longer before they go bust, creating the appearance of solidity.

Noted Keynesian John Kenneth Galbraith had his own thoughts on this. Galbraith coined the term "bezzle" to describe "the magic interval when a confidence trickster knows he has the money he has appropriated but the victim does not yet understand that he has lost it." In that magic interval, everyone feels better off: the mark thinks he's up, and the con artist knows he's up.

Rich marks have looong bezzles. Empirically incorrect ideas grounded in the most outrageous superstition and junk science can take over whole sections of your life, simply because a rich person – or rich people – are convinced that they're good for you.

Take "scientific management." In the early 20th century, the con artist Frederick Taylor convinced rich industrialists that he could increase their workers' productivity through a kind of caliper-and-stopwatch driven choreographry:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/08/21/great-taylors-ghost/#solidarity-or-bust

Taylor and his army of labcoated sadists perched at the elbows of factory workers (whom Taylor referred to as "stupid," "mentally sluggish," and as "an ox") and scripted their motions to a fare-the-well, transforming their work into a kind of kabuki of obedience. They weren't more efficient, but they looked smart, like obedient robots, and this made their bosses happy. The bosses shelled out fortunes for Taylor's services, even though the workers who followed his prescriptions were less efficient and generated fewer profits. Bosses were so dazzled by the spectacle of a factory floor of crisply moving people interfacing with crisply working machines that they failed to understand that they were losing money on the whole business.

To the extent they noticed that their revenues were declining after implementing Taylorism, they assumed that this was because they needed more scientific management. Taylor had a sweet con: the worse his advice performed, the more reasons their were to pay him for more advice.

Taylorism is a perfect con to run on the wealthy and powerful. It feeds into their prejudice and mistrust of their workers, and into their misplaced confidence in their own ability to understand their workers' jobs better than their workers do. There's always a long dollar to be made playing the "scientific management" con.

Today, there's an app for that. "Bossware" is a class of technology that monitors and disciplines workers, and it was supercharged by the pandemic and the rise of work-from-home. Combine bossware with work-from-home and your boss gets to control your life even when in your own place – "work from home" becomes "live at work":

https://pluralistic.net/2021/02/24/gwb-rumsfeld-monsters/#bossware

Gig workers are at the white-hot center of bossware. Gig work promises "be your own boss," but bossware puts a Taylorist caliper wielder into your phone, monitoring and disciplining you as you drive your wn car around delivering parcels or picking up passengers.

In automation terms, a worker hitched to an app this way is a "reverse centaur." Automation theorists call a human augmented by a machine a "centaur" – a human head supported by a machine's tireless and strong body. A "reverse centaur" is a machine augmented by a human – like the Amazon delivery driver whose app goads them to make inhuman delivery quotas while punishing them for looking in the "wrong" direction or even singing along with the radio:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/08/02/despotism-on-demand/#virtual-whips

Bossware pre-dates the current AI bubble, but AI mania has supercharged it. AI pumpers insist that AI can do things it positively cannot do – rolling out an "autonomous robot" that turns out to be a guy in a robot suit, say – and rich people are groomed to buy the services of "AI-powered" bossware:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/29/pay-no-attention/#to-the-little-man-behind-the-curtain

For an AI scammer like Elon Musk or Sam Altman, the fact that an AI can't do your job is irrelevant. From a business perspective, the only thing that matters is whether a salesperson can convince your boss that an AI can do your job – whether or not that's true:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/07/25/accountability-sinks/#work-harder-not-smarter

The fact that AI can't do your job, but that your boss can be convinced to fire you and replace you with the AI that can't do your job, is the central fact of the 21st century labor market. AI has created a world of "algorithmic management" where humans are demoted to reverse centaurs, monitored and bossed about by an app.

The techbro's overwhelming conceit is that nothing is a crime, so long as you do it with an app. Just as fintech is designed to be a bank that's exempt from banking regulations, the gig economy is meant to be a workplace that's exempt from labor law. But this wheeze is transparent, and easily pierced by enforcers, so long as those enforcers want to do their jobs. One such enforcer is Alvaro Bedoya, an FTC commissioner with a keen interest in antitrust's relationship to labor protection.

Bedoya understands that antitrust has a checkered history when it comes to labor. As he's written, the history of antitrust is a series of incidents in which Congress revised the law to make it clear that forming a union was not the same thing as forming a cartel, only to be ignored by boss-friendly judges:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/14/aiming-at-dollars/#not-men

Bedoya is no mere historian. He's an FTC Commissioner, one of the most powerful regulators in the world, and he's profoundly interested in using that power to help workers, especially gig workers, whose misery starts with systemic, wide-scale misclassification as contractors:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/02/upward-redistribution/

In a new speech to NYU's Wagner School of Public Service, Bedoya argues that the FTC's existing authority allows it to crack down on algorithmic management – that is, algorithmic management is illegal, even if you break the law with an app:

https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/bedoya-remarks-unfairness-in-workplace-surveillance-and-automated-management.pdf

Bedoya starts with a delightful analogy to The Hawtch-Hawtch, a mythical town from a Dr Seuss poem. The Hawtch-Hawtch economy is based on beekeeping, and the Hawtchers develop an overwhelming obsession with their bee's laziness, and determine to wring more work (and more honey) out of him. So they appoint a "bee-watcher." But the bee doesn't produce any more honey, which leads the Hawtchers to suspect their bee-watcher might be sleeping on the job, so they hire a bee-watcher-watcher. When that doesn't work, they hire a bee-watcher-watcher-watcher, and so on and on.

For gig workers, it's bee-watchers all the way down. Call center workers are subjected to "AI" video monitoring, and "AI" voice monitoring that purports to measure their empathy. Another AI times their calls. Two more AIs analyze the "sentiment" of the calls and the success of workers in meeting arbitrary metrics. On average, a call-center worker is subjected to five forms of bossware, which stand at their shoulders, marking them down and brooking no debate.

For example, when an experienced call center operator fielded a call from a customer with a flooded house who wanted to know why no one from her boss's repair plan system had come out to address the flooding, the operator was punished by the AI for failing to try to sell the customer a repair plan. There was no way for the operator to protest that the customer had a repair plan already, and had called to complain about it.

Workers report being sickened by this kind of surveillance, literally – stressed to the point of nausea and insomnia. Ironically, one of the most pervasive sources of automation-driven sickness are the "AI wellness" apps that bosses are sold by AI hucksters:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/15/wellness-taylorism/#sick-of-spying

The FTC has broad authority to block "unfair trade practices," and Bedoya builds the case that this is an unfair trade practice. Proving an unfair trade practice is a three-part test: a practice is unfair if it causes "substantial injury," can't be "reasonably avoided," and isn't outweighed by a "countervailing benefit." In his speech, Bedoya makes the case that algorithmic management satisfies all three steps and is thus illegal.

On the question of "substantial injury," Bedoya describes the workday of warehouse workers working for ecommerce sites. He describes one worker who is monitored by an AI that requires him to pick and drop an object off a moving belt every 10 seconds, for ten hours per day. The worker's performance is tracked by a leaderboard, and supervisors punish and scold workers who don't make quota, and the algorithm auto-fires if you fail to meet it.

Under those conditions, it was only a matter of time until the worker experienced injuries to two of his discs and was permanently disabled, with the company being found 100% responsible for this injury. OSHA found a "direct connection" between the algorithm and the injury. No wonder warehouses sport vending machines that sell painkillers rather than sodas. It's clear that algorithmic management leads to "substantial injury."

What about "reasonably avoidable?" Can workers avoid the harms of algorithmic management? Bedoya describes the experience of NYC rideshare drivers who attended a round-table with him. The drivers describe logging tens of thousands of successful rides for the apps they work for, on promise of "being their own boss." But then the apps start randomly suspending them, telling them they aren't eligible to book a ride for hours at a time, sending them across town to serve an underserved area and still suspending them. Drivers who stop for coffee or a pee are locked out of the apps for hours as punishment, and so drive 12-hour shifts without a single break, in hopes of pleasing the inscrutable, high-handed app.

All this, as drivers' pay is falling and their credit card debts are mounting. No one will explain to drivers how their pay is determined, though the legal scholar Veena Dubal's work on "algorithmic wage discrimination" reveals that rideshare apps temporarily increase the pay of drivers who refuse rides, only to lower it again once they're back behind the wheel:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men

This is like the pit boss who gives a losing gambler some freebies to lure them back to the table, over and over, until they're broke. No wonder they call this a "casino mechanic." There's only two major rideshare apps, and they both use the same high-handed tactics. For Bedoya, this satisfies the second test for an "unfair practice" – it can't be reasonably avoided. If you drive rideshare, you're trapped by the harmful conduct.

The final prong of the "unfair practice" test is whether the conduct has "countervailing value" that makes up for this harm.

To address this, Bedoya goes back to the call center, where operators' performance is assessed by "Speech Emotion Recognition" algorithms, a psuedoscientific hoax that purports to be able to determine your emotions from your voice. These SERs don't work – for example, they might interpret a customer's laughter as anger. But they fail differently for different kinds of workers: workers with accents – from the American south, or the Philippines – attract more disapprobation from the AI. Half of all call center workers are monitored by SERs, and a quarter of workers have SERs scoring them "constantly."

Bossware AIs also produce transcripts of these workers' calls, but workers with accents find them "riddled with errors." These are consequential errors, since their bosses assess their performance based on the transcripts, and yet another AI produces automated work scores based on them.

In other words, algorithmic management is a procession of bee-watchers, bee-watcher-watchers, and bee-watcher-watcher-watchers, stretching to infinity. It's junk science. It's not producing better call center workers. It's producing arbitrary punishments, often against the best workers in the call center.

There is no "countervailing benefit" to offset the unavoidable substantial injury of life under algorithmic management. In other words, algorithmic management fails all three prongs of the "unfair practice" test, and it's illegal.

What should we do about it? Bedoya builds the case for the FTC acting on workers' behalf under its "unfair practice" authority, but he also points out that the lack of worker privacy is at the root of this hellscape of algorithmic management.

He's right. The last major update Congress made to US privacy law was in 1988, when they banned video-store clerks from telling the newspapers which VHS cassettes you rented. The US is long overdue for a new privacy regime, and workers under algorithmic management are part of a broad coalition that's closer than ever to making that happen:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/06/privacy-first/#but-not-just-privacy

Workers should have the right to know which of their data is being collected, who it's being shared by, and how it's being used. We all should have that right. That's what the actors' strike was partly motivated by: actors who were being ordered to wear mocap suits to produce data that could be used to produce a digital double of them, "training their replacement," but the replacement was a deepfake.

With a Trump administration on the horizon, the future of the FTC is in doubt. But the coalition for a new privacy law includes many of Trumpland's most powerful blocs – like Jan 6 rioters whose location was swept up by Google and handed over to the FBI. A strong privacy law would protect their Fourth Amendment rights – but also the rights of BLM protesters who experienced this far more often, and with far worse consequences, than the insurrectionists.

The "we do it with an app, so it's not illegal" ruse is wearing thinner by the day. When you have a boss for an app, your real boss gets an accountability sink, a convenient scapegoat that can be blamed for your misery.

The fact that this makes you worse at your job, that it loses your boss money, is no guarantee that you will be spared. Rich people make great marks, and they can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent. Markets won't solve this one – but worker power can.

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

[creepyscritches]

I read your post about open enrollment for the ACA and was hoping you might expand on why you believe it would take years to dismantle. I've been terrified that with a Republican house/senate, Trump could just snap his fingers and make it go away within months of taking office. I'd love some reassurance that that's not possible.

Hiya, sure I can share some thoughts on the matter! First, it's very important to understand the ACA is a huuuuuuuuuuuuge system with subject matter experts in dozens of places throughout the process. I'm one of those SMEs, but I am at the end of the process where the revenue is generated, so my insight is limited on the public facing pieces.

What this means is that I am professionally embedded in the ACA in a position that exists purely to show what conditions people are treated for and then generate that data into what's called a "risk score". There's about 6 pages I could write on it, but the takeaway is that the ACA is

1) intricately interwoven with the federal government

2) increasingly profitable, sustainable, and growing (it is STILL a for-profit system if you can believe it)

3) wholeheartedly invested in by the largest insurance companies in the country LARGELY due to the fact that they finally learned the rules of how to make the ACA a thriving center of business

4) since the big issuers are arm+leg invested in the ACA, there is a lot of resistance politically and on an industry level to leave it behind (think of the lobbyists, politicians, corporations that will fight tooth and nail to protect their profit + investment)

The process to calculate a risk score takes roughly 2 years. There is an audit for the concurrent year and then a vigorous retro audit for the prev year - - this is a rolling cycle every year. Medicare has a similar process. These are RVP + RADV audits if you would like the jargon.

Eliminating the ACA abruptly is as internally laughable as us finishing the RADV audit ahead of schedule. If Trump were to blow the ACA into smithereens on day 1, he would be drowning in issuer complaints and an economic health sector that is essentially bleeding out. You cut off the RVP early? We have half of next RADV stuck in the gears now. You cut off the RADV early? No issuer will get their "risk adjusted" payments for services rendered in the prev benefit year (to an extent, again very complex multi-process system).

The ACA is GREAT for the public and should be defended on that basis alone. However, the inner capitalistic nature of the ACA is a powerful armor that has conservatives + liberals defending it on a basis of capital + market growth. It's not sexy, but it makes too much money consistently for the system to be easily dismantled.

Or at least that's what I can tell you from the money center of the ACA. they don't bring us up in political conversation because we are confusing to seasoned professionals, boring to industry outsiders, and consistently we are anathema to the anti-ACA talking points.

I am already preparing for next year's RVP for this window of open enrollment. That RVP process will feed into the RADV in 2026. In 2025, we begin the RADV for 2024. If nothing else, the slow fucking gears of CMS will keep the ACA alive until we finish our work at the end of the process. I highly doubt that will be the only reason the ACA is safeguarded, but it is a powerful type of support to pair with people protecting the ACA for other reasons.

I work every day to show, defend, and educate on how many diagnoses are managed thru my company's ACA plans. My specialty is cancer and I see a lot of it. The revenue drive comes from the Medical Loss Ratio (MLR) rule stating only 20% MAX of profit may go to the issuer + the 80% at a minimum must go back to the customer or be invested in expanding benefits. The more people on the plan using it, the higher that 20% becomes for the issuer and the more impactful that 80% becomes for the next year of benefit growth. It is remarkably profitable once issuers stop seeking out "healthy populations". The ACA is a functional method for issuers to tap into a stable customer base (sick/chronic ill customers) that turns a profit, grows, and builds strong consumer bases in each state.

The industry can never walk away from this overnight - - this is the preferred investment for many big players. Changing the direction of those businesses will be a monumental effort that takes years (at least 2 with the audits). In the meantime, you still have benefits, you still have care, and you still have reason to sign up. Let us deal with the bureaucracy bullshit, go get your care and know you have benefits thru 2025 and we will be working to keep it that way for 2026 and forward. This is a wing of the federal government, it is not a jenga tower like Trump wishes.

[stubz]

"CAPTAIN!" Calis bursted through the doors panting.

"Yes, Calis?"

"Ki- The humans...the human!" they panted.

"The humans?"

"Yes! I have...urgent news about them. Everyone, out."

The control goes quiet. All eyes on the captain and his second in command.

"Give the room to me and Commander Calis." When everyone leaves he sighs and takes a seat in his chair.

"Captain...the human has betrayed us. My scouts who follow General Morbius spotted Kim along with several other humans conversing with him. Numerous times have they seen them together...surely they have betrayed us."

The Captain looks at Calis and pulls out a drink. He sips it. "What I'm about to tell you does not leave this room." He motions for them to sit.

Calis sits and accepts the drink offered by their Captain. Strong yenx.

"When we discovered that Morbius was feeding classified information to enemy forces we had you follow him with your best scouts. And for a time that was sufficient...until recently." Calis nods.

They stopped the general from leaking information but they still have yet to gather enough evidence to charge him with treason. Not only that but he has gotten more cautious and rarely leaves his home when not at work.

"Well we went through the data base of the Coalition looking for clues or evidence to use when I stumbled upon Kim Greene's file. Here," he hands them the electronic document. "you'll see why Kim, along with some other humans, are conversing with the general so much."

Calis read over the document. At first glance it was nothing special. References, personal information, education, etc. normal things. Until they saw the green triangle next to one of the interview questions.

"...Why is she marked down for secret intelligence? In brackets, honorary...what is a honorary secret intelligence?"

"It's because she along with all the other humans you spotted have experience in befriending the enemy in order to report them to their superiors.

During her interview we asked about what was the toughest thing she had to do at her previous job.

The previous child centre she worked at had several people who were spreading false accusations against their fellow co-workers. One even falsely accused her mentor of illegal activity."

"At a child centre??"

"Yes, I can't believe it either. Carrying on, she was rather quiet at the time and always did her duty with a smile so the enemy ignored her. She used that to become a spy of sorts for her superiors who she respected very much.

Eventually she managed to gather enough information for them that they managed to fire and report the enemies to the proper authorities."

"Are the other humans like this?"

"In a way yes. Steven Smith one of our cafeteria chefs, worked at a restaurant as a waiter and has the patience of a god. He can be belittled, insulted, and be stuck in a never ending conversation that would rot your braincells without cracking."

"Something that would be perfect for the general."

"Indeed. Rebecca Cheng, worked at a cleaning service company and has mastered the art of being unseen whenever she wishes. She has caught several of her employers doing illegal acts or being unfaithful to their spouse simply because they forgot all about her.

And that's just the first few, we have at least a dozen of humans like them who are capable of hiding their presence while at the same time capable of 'befriending' the most unpleasant, foul, and infuriating beings."

"I shudder at the thought of going through the training they went through to achieve this."

The Captain regretfully shakes his head. "This wasn't training Commander...this was them adapting so that they may survive."

[iamgaygaygay]

Alright so two days ago my battery DRAINED like crazy. Like, it was almost dead by 4 pm where it usually has at LEAST 50%, but usually more than 60%. This is after the UI 7.0 update, universally hated.

Bonus Note: to turn off the stupid separate notifications/other panel thing, swipe down on the notification bar → click the edit button (the pencil) → click "panel settings" (top left) → change from "separate" to "together"

I went into my battery to see what was draining it...

Lo and behold, it's AI shit that nobody wants ✨

BUT don't panic, I figured out how to fix it! (Cut here so it doesn't clog up feeds) :)

You need to go to settings → apps and then click the filter button (see below if you don't know where it is, drawn very shakily in blue) and select "Show system apps"

To find our culprit, scroll down to the "P" apps, and click on "Personal Data Intelligence". Here's where it's draining your battery: the permissions that it automatically accesses for no reason but to (presumably) put AI stuff/options on there!

Clear the data first, I don't know if it actually did something but it made me feel better.

Now deny all of the permissions it has access to. It's going to show a pop up every time claiming that features of your device (AI features) won't work as intended and you're going to click "deny anyway" for ALL of them.

I don't know if it affected anything, but I also: blocked notifications, set default to other apps so that it wouldn't open, turned off background data usage (in the Mobile Data section)

Also, don't forget to make sure it can't change your system settings!! I don't know what it wants to change, but it might turn the permissions back on and continue draining your battery if you allow it to change system settings.

While you can't do it with this, with other apps you can change the battery usage to "restricted", meaning it will not run in the background (as much) and use less battery!

Here's the results from today, I have used it less than yesterday but it didn't even show up on the battery usage list so I think I fixed it!!

I've also done this process and/or deactivated (bolded ones are for sure AI or similar stuff) (these are my personal preference): AI Wallpaper, Android System Intelligence, Avatar Editor, Avatar Stickers, Bixby, Bixby Vision, Customization Service, Drawing Assist, Galaxy Avatar, Galaxy editing service, Galaxy Themes Service, Game Booster, Game Optimizing Service, Gaming Hub, Gemini, Google Location History, Google Play Services for AR, Hey Google Hotword, all of the "Knox" stuff, LiveEffectService, MDMApp, Meet Installer, Meta App Installer, Meta App Manager, Meta Services, MhsAiService, Modes and Routines, OK Google Hotword, Recommended Apps, Reminder, Samsung Checkout, Samsung Cloud, Samsung Cloud Assistant, Samsung Editing Assets, Samsung Intelligence Voice Services, Samsung Internet, everything with "Smart" in the beginning of the title, Video Effects, Voice Wake-Up, aaaaand WiFiAiService

Please let me know if there are any other AI apps or annoying system apps that I can turn off that I missed!

[fearfulfertility]

PATERNITY COMPOUND FINANCIAL SAVINGS

DRC, Facility Operations Command, Compound Oversight Unit

Date: [REDACTED]

Subject: Paternity Compound 124 Creative Cost-Saving Efforts

Executive Summary

Paternity Compound 124 in [REDACTED], Idaho, has demonstrated exceptional productivity and cost efficiency this quarter, primarily due to implementing creative new budget policies to optimize management. The data indicates significant savings and output increases, positioning Compound 124 as a model for future compounds.

Total revenue saved this quarter: $[REDACTED]

I. Implemented Cost-Saving Measures

Clothing Elimination Initiative

After an exhaustive review of material costs, the decision was made to eliminate medical gowns and paternity clothing for surrogates. This measure, dubbed the "Bare Necessity Protocol," is based on the premise that clothing offers no functional benefit to surrogates who are perpetually growing or confined to medical beds due to mobility issues.

Rationale: Eliminates clothing costs entirely and simplifies laundry operations.

Savings: Reduced laundry, textile, and replacement costs by 98%.

Revenue Saved: $[REDACTED]

"Honestly, it’s just practical. They’re swelling up fast, and we’d need new gowns every other day. It simplifies things for us." - Staff Feedback

“They’ve taken everything—my freedom, my body, my dignity—and now they’ve taken my fucking underwear too. It's embarrassing! Thank god this belly is a furnace!” - Surrogate Feedback

"One Size Fits All" Feeding Solution

The compound replaced most surrogate food options with a cost-efficient pudding substitute nicknamed "Big Berry Bliss." Each serving contains a carefully calibrated mix of high-calorie nutrients, tranquilizers, appetite stimulants, and growth hormones to promote fetal growth and docility.

Rationale: Simplifies meal prep, reduces dishwashing needs, and ensures surrogates receive consistent nutrition. Eliminate the need for personalized meals or cafeteria staff while ensuring continuous weight gain and docility. Minimize pharmacy visits by delivering hormonal therapy directly in the food.

Results: Food service costs were reduced by 82%, pharmacy staffing by 65%, and food waste by 20%. Staff food options will be maintained. With revenue saved, high-quality options can now be considered.

Revenue Saved: $[REDACTED]

"Big Berry Bliss is so easy—just scoop, serve, and go. Hell, we just hand them a tub of the stuff, and they choke it down, then ask for more." - Staff Feedback

“This stuff tastes like sugar mixed with cream. A few of us complained, but they told us we didn't have to eat it. But we need so many calories for these pregnancies... most of us lasted until dinner.” - Surrogate Feedback

Wheel-In Baby Showers

To reduce the need for consoling services and bolster surrogate morale with cost-effective activities, staff introduced a celebratory “babies shower” where surrogates are wheeled out of the paternity ward before being removed for childbirth. Activities include:

Rationale: Boosts surrogate morale and reduces the need for psychological services. Staff wearing party hats and blowing noisemakers (repeat usage). Playing uplifting music like "Push It" by Salt-N-Pepa and "Baby Got Back."

Revenue Saved: $[REDACTED]

"The baby showers are kind of fun. A little music, some confetti, and you’re done. Their pregnancy brain is so bad they are more confused and distracted than anything, which makes rolling them out all the easier." - Staff Feedback

“They roll me out in front of everyone, playing stupid songs and yelling, ‘Congratulations!’ like I’ve won some prize. All I feel is pain and exhaustion. It’s not a celebration—it’s a mockery.” - Surrogate Feedback

Open-Air Hygiene Zones

Replace bathrooms with “communal hygiene areas,” which repurpose the fire suppression systems to allow for high-capacity showering. Now, entire paternity wards of surrogates can be cleaned en-mass, reducing the need for staff to move surrogates for cleaning and reducing personal toiletries requirements.

Rationale: Centralized hygiene reduces staff requirements and water waste.

Revenue Saved: $[REDACTED]

"The open-air hygiene zones are genius. Just hose everyone down at once, and you’re done. It saves so much time, and I don't spend entire days scrubbing them down. And honestly, it’s kind of fun to watch. Like a pregnant car wash." - Staff Feedback

“They never warn us when they're going to shower us! One minute, you're watching TV... the next, they blast us with water like we’re livestock. No privacy, no warmth, nothing!.” - Surrogate Feedback

II. Efficiency Metrics

Cost Per Surrogate: $[REDACTED] (down 23%).

Medical: $[REDACTED] (down 19%)

Nutrition Services: $[REDACTED] (down 30%)

Housing: $[REDACTED]

Security: $[REDACTED]

Psychological Support: $[REDACTED] (up 18%)

Maintenance & Facility Upkeep: $[REDACTED] (down 16%)

Logistics: $[REDACTED]

Entertainment: $[REDACTED]

Administrative: $[REDACTED] (down 14%)

Conclusion

Paternity Compound 124 has demonstrated exceptional efficiency in meeting and lowering costs. While surrogate morale remains an area for improvement, the cost savings and output gains achieved through innovative strategies set a benchmark for other compounds.

"Efficiency is the cornerstone of progress. At Compound 124, we’ve shown that we can achieve extraordinary results with a little creativity and focus. While some may view these changes as unconventional, the numbers speak for themselves—every dollar saved is another step toward securing our future."

Report Submitted By: [REDACTED], Administrator, Paternity Compound 124

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To: Chief Operating Officer, Internal Affairs

From: Director [REDACTED]

Date: [REDACTED]

Subject: Investigation into Administrator [REDACTED] and Misappropriation of Funds at Paternity Compound 124

Chief [REDACTED],

It has come to my attention that while Administrator [REDACTED] has implemented a series of operational changes at Paternity Compound 124 that have resulted in documented cost savings of $[REDACTED], evidence has surfaced indicating the potential misappropriation or embezzlement of these funds.

Emerging discrepancies in financial records suggest that a significant portion of the funds saved through these initiatives has not been reinvested into compound operations or returned to the DRC’s central budget.

Effective immediately, Administrator [REDACTED] is to be placed on administrative leave pending a full investigation.

Internal Affairs will oversee a comprehensive audit of his financial transactions, operational decisions, and any personal accounts associated with him.

Administrator [REDACTED]’s measures to reduce operational costs have yielded undeniable financial benefits, and these measures should not be dismissed out of hand. I am directing that the relevant improvements he initiated be thoroughly assessed and, if appropriate, rolled out on a trial basis at other compounds.

Internal Affairs will take care of this quickly and without bias. If Administrator [REDACTED] is found to have misappropriated DRC funds for personal gain, I expect full disciplinary action.

Regards,

Director [REDACTED]

----------------

Click Here to return to DRC Report Archives

[liquidcrystalsky]

I just pulled this 2009 hp out of the dumpster what do i do with it. It has ubuntu.

if it's that old, probably wipe and reinstall. If you're doing ubuntu again first uninstall snap but there's a lot of neat self-hosting stuff you can do with an old PC.

I have a little RasPi in my basement which runs an RSS Feed aggregator(FreshRSS), some calendars(Radicale) and notes(Joplin) so they're synced between all my devices.

If the computer has the storage and a little bit of power for processing things you could also run something to sync all your photos (Immich) and files (Nextcloud, which also does images but i like Immich better for it) between ur devices so you can avoid having to use paid services which may or may not be selling your data or whatever.

You can have it run a self hosted VPN such as WireGuard which you can port forward so you can use it from anywhere, or you can use a service like Tailscale which doesn't require port forwarding, but it's not something you host yourself, they have their own servers.

You can also put all the services behind a reverse proxy (nginx Proxy Manager, NOT nginx, i mean it's good but it's much harder) and be able to access it through a proper domain with SSL(a vpn will already do this though) instead of whatever 192.168.whatever, again, only accessible by people On That VPN.

All things are available (and usually encouraged) to run through docker, and they often even have their own compose files so it's not too much setup. (it's maintenence to update things though)

Also have fun and play tuoys. Old computers run modern versions of linux much better than windows. just open it up see what u can do with it, get used to it, try to customize the desktop to how you like it, or try another one (Ubuntu comes with GNOME. please try another one). See what works and what doesn't (hardware will likely be the issue if something doesn't work though, not linux itself). Something like Plasma or Cinnamon works just like a normal windows computer but there's still a bit of that "learning how to use a computer" that you don't really get after using the same version of windows for 10 years.

[quirkyfries]

Hi there’s a tornado in my area rn but I’m spiteful like that. Random tsams/eaps headcanons be upon ye

Ruin still does those little audio log diaries. It helps manage his overflowing memory storage (read: old age = more memories to store) without compressing data files.

Bloodmoon sleeps with dog toys. Otherwise, they’d probably chew through whatever bedding material they had chosen that night. This was Ruin’s idea.

Eclipse can’t sleep with lights on in a room. Ruin can’t sleep without a light. The makeshift solution is a sleeping mask for Eclipse, but their actual compromise is a star projector.

Eclipse has to know where everyone is most of the time, especially after Charlie came into the picture. This is usually done with cameras and tracking via fazbear systems, but it’s an issue he has to work on, as it’s just a method to make him feel better about security now that there are people he cares about. At least one person has commented on there being a new nightguard.

Dark sun finds thrillers tacky, and prefers thought-provoking mysteries, bonus points for romance.

Most of them carry some kind of sanitizing wipe packet. For daycare attendants, these are for sticky messes and children. For those more familiar with tools, these are for tougher grime and are not suitable for sensitive (children’s) skin. Solar has both.

The eclipses (Eclipse, Solar, Ruin) are the most prone to damaging their rays. Eclipse sometimes hits doorways and doesn’t bother to fix cracked rays. Ruin is small enough for humans to reach his head. Solar peels the paint off of his. All three will pull or squeeze their rays in times of extreme stress, to varying degrees. Lunar is an exception for lack of rays. (Similarly, Sun fidgets with his rays, which is the source of this trait.)

While there are exceptions, Suns prefer tactile stimulation, Moons auditory, and Eclipses have no strong preference. Earth likes social interaction.

Animatronics have personalized UI that makes sense to them, which serves as their access point to their internal folders, like memory files, downloaded items, and executable programs. Bots that share an operating system/“brain” have the same UI. Diagnostics, software updates, and safety modes all require additional hardware (computers, parts and service devices, fazwrenches) to complete. Mindscapes are in AI chips, and multiple AIs in one mindscape happen when multiple AIs share the same operating system. Visual feed can be projected onto other screens with HDMI cables and vice versa, which can sometimes show that bot’s UI depending on what it is. For a more direct example of this think of the battery and blue borders you see in Security breach when Gregory is hiding inside Freddy.

Safety mode disconnects that bot from the Fazbear Ent. local network, meaning no tracking, no communication via local networks (which generally aren’t private anyway, most bots with access to phones prefer those), and no access to files that aren’t stored in that bot’s drive. This is meant to isolate a bot’s systems from the main network in case of a security breach (hah), make transportation of bots between locations easier, and make maintenance a smoother affair as there is no outside interference during the process. For the bots themselves, this is the equivalent of turning off your phone and going outside I mean focusing only on what’s in front of you instead of what’s going on in your area/social network. It’s possible to be stuck in safety mode. Depending on how much of a bot’s system relies on Fazbear Ent. Networks to function (such as a bot’s memory being stored in a Cloud, which is also ill advised between the bots themselves,) this can be mean a temporary personality/memory reset until those files get reconnected again. Bots do not need to be connected to the Fazbear ent networks to function, but it generally makes access to software updates easier due to being recognized as a company entity. It is possible for a private network to exist, but it’s considered foreign by Fazbear systems and can be more trouble than they’re worth. Moon and Eclipse have private networks shared with close friends and family for different purposes. Moon’s is mostly for emergency backups, and Eclipse’s is for security.

Animatronic’s memories are stored in the hard drives in their bodies. It’s possible to offload memory files into networks (Cloud) or external storage systems. If another bot had access to these clouds or external storages, they could experience the memories stored in them. Memory files include visual and auditory data, like a movie. AI/personality chips are the equivalent of a soul in that the AI is the product of a learning AI having experienced environments that supplied them information about the world AKA an Ai that developed a personality beyond their base programming, but they do not carry memories. For example, Eclipse V3-V4 is an Eclipse AI given incomplete memories, creating a disconnect in the AI’s learned behaviors and what it perceives as the source of that behavior, resulting in an incomplete backup. Backups are static/unchanging copies of integral memory files and the accompanying AI (As is in the moment that they are backed up.) Backups need to be updated as the animatronic it’s for develops.

[mariacallous]

The Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (Chirla) estimates that in recent days, around 300 migrants have been detained in California as part of raids carried out by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), in compliance with an order issued by the Trump administration.

This figure is based on collaborative reports compiled by the Rapid Response Network, an alliance comprised of dozens of organizations that provide support to migrants and disseminate information about immigration detentions and operations.

Angelica Salas, director of Chirla, described the raids as a phenomenon “never seen before” in the three decades she has been defending migrant communities, according to statements reported by The Los Angeles Times.

Jorge Mario Cabrera, spokesman for the same organization, told the EFE news agency that most of the detainees are not criminals, “as the US government has tried to portray them.” He indicated that most of those arrested are workers from Los Angeles, although arrests have also been documented in other parts of the state.

In the midst of intense protests against Trump's immigration policies, these operations are expected to continue in Los Angeles for at least 30 days, according to US representative Nanette Barragan, citing data provided by the White House. Likewise, an escalation of these actions is anticipated nationwide, after the administration announced its goal of making up to 3,000 arrests per day.

Several migrant-rights organizations have warned about possible violations of due process of people targeted by ICE. They have denounced ICE for restricting access to detainees on multiple occasions, which could limit their right to adequate legal representation.

Watching ICE

This situation has generated concern among the undocumented population, most of whom are of Hispanic origin, which has intensified the use of social networks to alert people about the presence of immigration agents in different regions of the US.

In a search conducted by the WIRED en Español team, several groups and pages were identified on digital platforms dedicated to receiving, verifying, and disseminating reports about ICE checkpoints, patrols, and raids. The origin of these profiles is diverse: Some are managed by well-known nongovernmental organizations and activist collectives, while others were created by private members of the migrant community.

The family of a man apprehended by ICE agents demands that the victim be returned. Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images

Alerts about operations are disseminated through direct messages, WhatsApp, or posts on each page's feed. In turn, it is possible to anonymously report the presence of immigration agents through private text messages or calls to specific phone numbers.

In general, users are asked for basic data such as time, date, city, state, and exact location of the operation, as well as photographs or videos when it is possible to document them. In addition to issuing real-time alerts, many of these pages offer free legal guidance, not only on migration issues, but also on labor rights, access to health, education, and other key services.

Some of the networks active in this work include:

Union del Barrio California

This grassroots pro-immigrant organization maintains an active presence on Facebook. It conducts community patrols to detect ICE movement, shares urgent alerts, and organizes workshops on legal rights.

Chirla

With constant activity on Facebook and other platforms, Chirla publishes notifications about raids, provides legal advice, and calls for citizen mobilizations in the face of new raids.

Stop ICE Raids Alert Network

This network distributes emergency alerts and offers assistance to people affected by ICE raids. In addition to its social network accounts, it has a web page that allows people to receive geolocalized notifications in real time.

Siembra NC

This organization operates primarily in North Carolina. Through its Facebook page, it promotes a whistleblower hotline (336-543-0353). Although its focus is on Alamance, Durham, Forsyth, Guilford, Orange, Wake, Randolph, and Rockingham counties, it has a statewide presence across North Carolina.

RadarSafe

This project uses the Common Alerting Protocol (CAP), a system for sending out digital emergency alerts, to provide secure information on immigration stops and operations. It also publishes community-submitted reports and verifies information with support from local residents.

Inmigración y Visas

Focused on immigration issues, this portal offers a WhatsApp channel where users can report raids, exchange experiences, and receive advice. It also shares informative content on its Facebook page and website.

SignalSafe

Adding to this assistance network is SignalSafe, an application created by a team of anonymous developers that provides real-time alerts on ICE activity. Through collaborative reporting, the app maps sightings of federal agents and unidentified vehicles, allowing migrants to avoid potential checkpoints.

Since Trump's return to the presidency, SignalSafe has gained widespread popularity. The tool allows the integration of various filters based on the user's location, type of activity by immigration authorities, and time range.

This platform is fed by citizen reports, which are verified by a group of specialized moderators. The system is bilingual, with support for Spanish and English, and has advanced security protocols to help protect user privacy.

Key Access

Given the growing number of raids in the United States and the lack of certainty about the safety of those detained in these operations, examples such as the above show that some sectors of the citizenry seem to have taken an active role in digital spaces against the implementation of immigration policies.

In this context, the widespread use of social networks among the migrant community has turned these platforms into key tools within the resistance movement. According to data from the International Organization for Migration, by 2023, 64 percent of migrants in transit through Central America, Mexico, and the Dominican Republic—mostly bound for the United States—had access to a smartphone and internet connection during their journey. Of these, 47 percent of men and 35 percent of women used these devices to access social networks.

This story was originally published on WIRED en Español and has been translated from Spanish.

[leapfeed1]

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[the-64th-gamer]

I feel like the last year has been a great push for me to slowly detach myself from giant companies and ensure what I do is in my control and ownership

Finally switched over to linux permanently

switched to firefox

enabled adblocker, sponsor blockers, and tracker removers

disabled autoplay and the recommendations sidebar on YouTube (highly highly encourage, though I still keep the homepage open so I can choose when to browse new suggested content rather than it pestering me)

downloaded all my tumblr posts and now host them parallel on my website (stuck here until we find some decentralized way of doing social media right)

cleared out 99% of my online storage to now be on multiple hard-drive backups

downloaded locally all my music

removed myself from basically every data tracking social media platform except this and YouTube

And now currently I'm trying to consolidate all my feeds into just an RSS reader.

It takes a long time and a lot of planning, but its very rewarding to take control over what you want to see, how you see it, how its formatted, ect. I find these are my steps to an easy transition off a certain service:

Download all your data and back it up. Now your account can be deleted at any time with no remorse.

Find browser extensions that enhance and modify the experience to what you might need. Use that to tangibly guide your preferences. Go ahead and remove the app on your phone if its there.

Research every alternative service and try them out. Begin moving certain activity exclusively to the alternative. Take time getting used to it and see if its better to try more alternatives.

Completely jump ship, delete the account, move all feeds or settings over.

Its an ongoing process but there's still probably a few more years of this to go through. Future plans are:

Completely remove all prior emails and self host a new one

Get off Discord entirely except for running the wiki server. It sucks that Discord is so prevalent. Probably move to various forums. Maybe look into some sort of forum management software such as how RSS feeds tame articles and videos into one place.

Setup adblockers directly into my router so ads won't even appear on phones.

Setup my phone to just straight up also run linux. There's a few mobile-designed linux platforms to look into until I decide.

[boombox-fuckboy]

Hey, @t0tally-n0t-3m0, figured this might be easier to read as a post. Here's 24 pods with nonbinary lead characters to get you started. There's more out there, so if anyone wants to add on, go for it.

Additional Postage Required: (Sci-Fi) Adventures of an interstellar courier who starts to get glimpses of the past from their packages.

Anamnesis (on the Tin Can Audio feed): (Mystery, Weird Fiction) Someone wakes in a temple in an empty town with no memory. Short, really nice sound design.

Badlands Cola: (Mystery, Supernatural & Horror elements) big city PI Sunny is hired to find information on a rural cult leader, and is drawn into a world of strange radio, horse enthusiasts, and dinosaur bones.

The Dead Letter Office of Somewhere, Ohio (one of two leads, you'll meet them halfway in): (Supernatural, Weird) Two workers for an Ohio dead letter office read the strange confiscated mail their organisation collects, and do some follow up investigation.

either: (Weird Fiction, Sci-Fi, Romance) An explosion at a duck factory sends a pet robot to another reality, connecting two very different (but both lonely) people.

Hello From The Hallowoods: (Supernatural Horror) A dramatic entity beyond your comprehension visits your nightmares to tell stories of the people (in varying degrees of human and alive) that inhabit the strange, deadly, and beautiful Hallowoods.

Inn Between: (Fantasy, Adventure) Ever wondered what the party gets up to at the tavern between D&D sessions? (Not a tabletop).

Jar of Rebuke: (Supernatural, Horror elements) An unkillable amnesiac scientist (they die, just have a hard time staying dead) investigates weird entities, makes friends, and eats a lot of tasty food in the strange town he lives in.

Khôra Podcast: (Sci-Fi, Adventure) Somewhere between inspired by and adapted from greek mythology, a space adventure following four mythological figures on their search for the golden fleece.

Less is Morgue: (Comedy, Horror elements) A ghoul and a ghost host a podcast about whatever they please in the ghoul's mom's basement, and manage to get off topic anyway.

Light Hearts: (Slice-of-Life, Supernatural elements) Three friends run a lightly haunted queer café. Upbeat and wholesome.

The Mistholme Museum of Mystery, Morbidity, and Mortality: (Weird Fiction, Supernatural, Horror elements) A friendly AI tour guide leads you on a tour of the Mistholme Museum, explaining the strange and often alternatural story behind each item. (To be clear, the nb lead is an AI with no concept of gender, but the creator is NB also and it is far from the only nb character.)

Monstrous Agonies: (Advice, Supernatural) An interpersonal advice show for supernatural entities and other people living liminally in the modern world.

ROGUEMAKER: (Sci-fi, Whodunnit) A commercial space flight explodes and passengers are left isolated in the escape pods, only connected for minutes at a time and unsure what happened, or why.

Second Star to the Left: (Sci-Fi) Audio logs of a colonist sent to a new world and her communications with the minder in charge of keeping her alive.

Sidequesting: (Fantasy) A wholesome podcast following Rion, an adventurer with a difference: they only do sidequests.

SINKHOLE: (Sci-fi, Weird Fiction) Forum posts from a data restoration community in a near future where the human brain is its own computer and one city hosts a massive void.

Skyjacks: Courier's Call: (Tabletop, Fantasy) Three young postal workers aboard a skyship go on various adventures. Kid-friendly but enjoyable for all ages.

The Starport Inn: (Supernatural, Mystery) An FBI agent sent to a rural town to solve a disappearance finds they've walked into something much stranger.

The Supernatural Protection Agency: (Supernatural) Call logs for a helpline that aims to solve the supernatural problems plaguing your life.

Tell No Tales: (Supernatural, Horror elements) Leo Quinn, secretary to the man in charge of the world's leading ghost removal service, interviews various ghosts in an attempt to create a device capable of actually recording them, in the hopes of taking down the company they work for.

Trial and Error: (Sci-Fi) Interviews with various AI as a scientist attempts to make sense of spontaneous machine sentience.

Under the Electric Stars: (Sci-Fi) A courier's failed heist to help their AI friend/navigator pulls them into a world of crime organisations and unethical science.

The Weird: (Tabletop, Supernatural, Comedy, Horror elements) The two staff members at The Department of the Weird travel America in their shitty Ford Fiesta to investigate various strange happenings

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

David Dark· 

"Americans aren’t helpless before the administration and its allies. Members of the Seminole Tribe of Florida are already opposing and protesting the Everglades concentration camp as a threat to sacred lands."

+

Mark Provost

Republicans are so focused on feeding Latinos to alligators they drowned their voters in Texas, along with dozens of children. Right now the only thing we know for certain is they will learn nothing from this tragedy.

In recent weeks, Republicans funneled $500 million from FEMA, or Florida taxpayers, to build Alligator Auschwitz. The truth is neither the White House nor Governor DeSantis will disclose where the money came from. Regardless of its origins, the funds could have floated the National Weather Service for a few more years.

In any case, residents of Texas are learning the reality of Trump's America: unless you are filthy rich, you will likely die early.

Make Americans Die Early is not a recent trend nor is it confined to Red States. Premature death is the most defining feature of being a U.S. citizen in the 21st century. The alarming statistics on premature deaths are conspicuously absent in other nations, with the exception of England—a nation cursed with an electorate whiter, dumber, and meaner than our own.

In recent years, America's infant mortality rates, maternal fatality, worker fatality, and premature deaths in general, have skyrocketed. There's been a lot of discussion about 'deaths of despair' among working class whites and lumpen proles. However, the comprehensive data clearly shows every gender, age, race, demographic, and income group regardless of region, are dying earlier than their peers in other countries. On the bright side, it's not like these early deaths don't come with durably higher corporate profit margins.

To be clear, I'm not celebrating or minimizing tragedies. They are predictable consequences of our decisions and they arrive with reliable frequency like dividend payouts to shareholders.

The flood deaths in Texas aren't the result of a natural disaster any more than the 40th right-wing mass shooting is a 'lone wolf' attack. From Hurricane Katrina to the poisoning of Flint's water, you can see the right-wing's fingerprints all over the crime scene.

We don't have to wait for the rivers to recede before seeing the pile of evidence...Elon Musk's DOGE dismantled the NWS, the NOAA, and the Small Business Administration, responsible for 95% of post-disaster relief funds to homes and small businesses. Amid the wreckage and debris is a competent federal and state government staffed with caring, thoughtful, committed civil servants. Texas officials were told ten years ago that the alarm systems along the river needed to be updated, but GOP lawmakers said they couldn't afford it and dismissed the stern warning.

What Texas could afford was more than $3 billion on a border wall, with only 8% complete. Any Mexican with a Home Depot saw can cut through the beams in a minute and walk through. The border wall cannot stop humans, nor can it stem the floodwaters, deadly heat, and wildfires, but it does prohibit the migration of endangered mammals and birds from ocelots, owls, quails, and road runners. Dozens of unique species are now absent from the area, demonstrating MAGA's commitment to mass killing extends beyond our own species. Residents who live near the border wall were recently horrified beyond belief after hundreds of wild animals perished along the wall while attempting to flee wildfires. The Zone of Interest isn't as comforting when you live on its periphery where the extreme violence is difficult to obscure.

The $20 billion in state funds committed to completing the Texas border wall could have instead reinforced river banks, fortified structures, and updated warning systems and emergency response. Or funded schools. Texas children who manage to survive smallpox, heatwaves, and rising floodwaters attend the nation's worst ranked schools and are plagued with lifetime illiteracy.

In Florida, officials will soon likely find themselves the target of voters' wrath, not to mention investigations into crimes against humanity, once they realize it was their tax money siphoned to build a concentration camp. Things don't look promising for ICE's snuff porn studio in the Everglades. The state's infamous shoddy construction contractors completed the site in eight days but it's already a foot underwater from routine afternoon showers. God knows how many innocent families will be drowned or die of disease and infestation behind its cages. Documents obtained by the Miami Herald show Trump and DeSantis plan to torture children there.

Outside Trump's death camps, escape routes for survival dwindle. Slow moving hurricanes the size of the continental United States, capable of dropping trillions of gallons of water hundreds of miles inland, will bear down on the Eastern Seaboard and carve it to pieces. The current annual cost of climate disasters is $400 billion to $1 trillion.

First on the chopping block is Florida, where 1 in 5 residents lack home insurance, real estate taxes are skyrocketing, and the state's rickety last resort insurance program is on the verge of insolvency. The state is governed lock, stock, and barrel by the dumbest people ever assembled in one legislature.

Warren Buffett spent a lifetime analyzing risk and making money in insurance markets. He recently warned investors that there's no guarantee that one of these historic climate disasters won't be immediately followed by more equally devastating storms. The storms will render vast swaths of the country uninsurable and uninhabitable much sooner than anyone realizes. I imagine after hundreds of miles of I-95 have been returned to the glades, Florida MAGA still won't realize they have bigger fish to fry than terrorizing trans kids and the people who fix their roofs.

The consequences of willful MAGA cruelty pile up—along with the bodies—without a single lesson learned. There's young women in Red States dying of pregnancy complications after spending their time on earth advocating for anti-abortion laws. Their families and church never express regret or remorse, just an offering of tears and worthless prayers.

You see MAGA's penchant for ritualistic atrocities when they continue voting for climate-denying politicians. You see this in right-wing parents refusing to vaccinate their children, which inevitably leads to disability and death. The parents seldom express regret, nor are they criminally charged with the reckless neglect or manslaughter they committed. It's understandable MAGA would off their kids because the alternative is inconceivable: admitting that highly trained doctors and scientists who spend their lives studying know what they're talking about.

Americans who live in MAGAvilles have already perished by the millions. It's suicide by way of preventable disease, addiction, climate denial, big trucks, unavailable housing, loose regulations around worker safety, food inspections, and infrastructure. There's a lack of good jobs and mental healthcare but there's plenty of poverty pay, pollution, and guns. Firearms are the leading cause of infant deaths and our most hallowed national symbol. We cling to the freedom to kill our children as a sacred right. White supremacy animates every aspect of MAGA's vision and policy agenda and functions as a comorbidity in all cases of premature death. MAGA never passes up an opportunity for collective annihilation.

The math is impossible to dispute but it isn't hard to follow: the more MAGA a community= more premature deaths. Their hooded ancestors in hell are lonely and want company.

These poor souls will expire without ever having been visited by a comedian like the late George Carlin, to poke fun at their flaws and maybe spark a moment of cognitive dissonance and clarity. Instead, they mainline Joe Rogan's lazy podcast and his band of bigoted bores in gentrified Austin. These MAGA jokesters say comedy has been banned because of woke. The truth is there aren't any more good jokes that don't come at MAGA's expense—or without their obliviousness.

In Trump's America, there's also no more FEMA, no more weather warnings, no more rural hospitals, no more disaster relief funds, no more skilled and strong workers to rebuild. There's no one to sow the seeds, steward the land, harvest the crops, transport food, cook meals, or spoon feed your decrepit MAGA grandpa in the nursing home. In the 2024 election, MAGA said they wanted lower grocery prices then voted for a man who declared war on the people who run our entire food chain.

When I say MAGA has killed millions and will kill millions more, it's not hyperbole. It's settled fact. Trump already has 1 million+ dead Americans under his belt from covid alone, the majority of which medical experts have categorized as excess, post-vaccine, preventable deaths. Trump's Medicaid cuts will add roughly 500,000 people to his body count over the coming decade, according to his alma mater the University of Pennsylvania. British medical journal The Lancet estimates DOGE's elimination of USAID will lead to 14 million excess deaths.

The only prayer for MAGA is learning how to shoot down hurricanes and white supremacy. Until then, God is coming to collect his people.

[tomorrowusa]

We really do need to be concerned about NOAA. Nitwits with Sharpies are no substitute for professional weather forecasting.

Forecasters at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) predict “above-average” activity this season, with six to 10 hurricanes. The season runs from June 1 to November 30. At least three of those storms will be Category 3 or higher, the forecasters project, meaning they will have gusts reaching at least 111 miles per hour. Other reputable forecasts predict a similarly active 2025 season with around nine hurricanes. Last year, there were 11 Atlantic hurricanes, whereas the average for 1991 to 2020 was just over seven, according to hurricane researchers at Colorado State University. A highly active hurricane season is obviously never a good thing, especially for people living in places like Florida, Louisiana, and, apparently, North Carolina (see: Hurricane Helene, the deadliest inland hurricane on record). Even when government agencies that forecast and respond to severe storms — namely, NOAA and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) — are fully staffed and funded, big hurricanes inflict billions of dollars of damage, and they cost lives. Under the Trump administration, however, these agencies are not well staffed and face steep budget cuts. Hundreds of government employees across these agencies have been fired or left, including those involved in hurricane forecasting. What could go wrong?

Warm seas act like jet fuel for developing storms. The Caribbean and the adjacent Gulf of Mexico have been getting hotter and hotter.

If this sounds familiar, that’s because the Caribbean has been unusually warm for a while now. That was a key reason why the 2024 and 2023 hurricane seasons were so active. Warm ocean water, and its ability to help form and then intensify hurricanes, is one of the clearest signals — and consequences — of climate change. Data indicates that climate change has made current temperatures in parts of the Caribbean and near Florida several (and in some cases 30 to 60) times more likely.

Thanks to DOGE, we have fewer forecasters studying worsening conditions.

[U]nder the Trump administration, hundreds of workers at NOAA have been fired or otherwise pushed out, which threatens the accuracy of weather forecasts that can help save lives. FEMA has also lost employees, denied requests for hurricane relief, and is reportedly ending door-to-door canvassing in disaster regions designed to help survivors access government aid.

Forecasting depends on observations and taking readings. There's less of that under Trump.

As my colleague Umair Irfan has reported, the National Weather Service is also launching weather balloons less frequently, due to staffing cuts. Those balloons measure temperature, humidity, and windspeed, providing data that feeds into forecasts.

Perhaps the only thing that might cause a reversal of this stupidity in the near future is back-to-back direct hits by hurricanes at Mar-a-Lago and the SpaceX launch site near the Texas-Mexico border.

Related: Trump disasters will become more expensive...

Trump​ Is Going to Raise Your Insurance Premiums

[quaranmine]

im not american and i just saw your recent posts about all the firings. what is going on, what do they gain from this??

What's going on? Basically a hostile takeover of the American government.

What do they gain from this? Money. Control. Privatization. More money into the hands of billionaires. It's not a coincidence that the richest man in the world is leading the charge.

They're breaking the govenment intentionally, and then when nothing works and everything is suffering, they'll privatize all the services. They'll cut government workers under the claim of saving money, and then hire contractors to work in the same positions for more money. I'm sure it's no coincidence that Elon Musk himself has had $18 billion in government contracts. Or that the State Department was going to buy $400 million in armored Tesla cars.

When the National Parks can't function under a skeleton staff and no limits on entry numbers, they'll sell the federal land to a corporation to run, and then they'll sell it again for mining and drilling. They'll deregulate all the environmental laws and worker protection laws to make sure that corporations can maximise the profit completely. It's easier to make money if you can just dump your toxic waste anywhere! Nothing being done right now makes any sense to help anybody but the richest people in the country.

Why are they going against the federal workforce? Well, the Republicans have been aiming to attack civil service as part of their platform. They say it is full of inefficiency and fraud, but make no mistake--Washington D.C., voted overwhelmingly blue, and that's part of their rage. They're literally putting federal employees--mostly black people!--on watchlists and doxxing them, for reasons that include donating to the Democratic party. (Federal employees are subject to the Hatch Act, which prevents them from campaigning on behalf of any political party or doing political activity at work, but as private citizens on their own time and property they may vote and donate how they choose.)

So, Elon Musk donates massive amounts of money to Trump's campaign during the election. He hosted giveaways of a $1 million dollars a day for swing state voters who would vote for Trump and somehow this was deemed legal. Trump wins, and in return for his service, Elon Musk is given a special government position and access to everything. It's called the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and they've installed people in major agencies to monitor employees, they've accessed the US Treasury, they've locked government employees out of IT systems that include the personal information of all federal employees, they've accesses sensitive government data, leaked classified information, and they're just getting started. They have access to the payment systems of Social Security and Medicaid, and Medicare. None of these people are elected, many are younger than me, and none have had background checks or clearance. One of them was fired from an internship for leaking company secrets so.....I don't really have confidence he won't leak national security secrets either.

The main thing DOGE is doing right now, other than possibly feeding all our data into AI and stealing it, is slashing the federal workforce. Shortly after Trump took office, DOGE via the Office of Personnel Management (OPM, a key player in this story) sent all 2.6 million federal employees a deferred resignation ("buyout") offer titled Fork in the Road. It's worth mentioning that "Fork in the Road" is the exact same email that Elon Musk sent to all the Twitter employees shortly before laying everyone off....and then he failed to pay them the promised severance. If federal employees accepted the offer, they'd be place on paid leave through September and have a chance to look for another job. Nevermind that much of what was promised wasn't legal. Nevermind that the probationary employees who took the offer found out yesterday that they never qualified in the first place and got fired anyway. Meanwhile, the daily Fork emails continued to use insulting language like that "the way to American prosperity" was for federal employees to "leave their low productivity public sector jobs and take a high productivity private sector job." The White House press secretary said that employees who didn't resign were ripping off the American people. Fox news says they should "get real jobs." Note that the demonization is intentional:

Russel Vought, one of the architects of Project 2025 (the rulebook they're following exactly), who is now the leader of the Office of Management and Budget, literally said the goal was to traumatize federal employees so they'd no longer want to go to work and the American people would hate them. Also, people have been able to use metadata to see that these Project 2025 people have been the ones writing various OPM government memos (some are not even government employees!)

The claim: federal employees are wasting taxpayer money with their....pesky jobs in public health, food inspections, veterans healthcare, wildfire support jobs. Note that federal employees are only 4% of the entire budget, and that there's roughly the same amount of them as there were in the 1960s, despite the population of the country rising since then. The job of DOGE: get rid of as many as possible.

So. Day one of the Trump presidency, he issued an executive order demanding the end of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) in government programs. Make no mistake that DEI is the new slur for POC and LGBT people right now (remember the watchlist earlier with mostly black people on it? Now look at claims that agencies are taking down posters of minority scientists.) And make no mistake they aren't also coming for the A that normally goes on the end of DEIA, for accessibility (disabled people.) Using this executive order they placed many government employees administrative leave pending termination. They've also interpreted this to include environmental justice. Trump also blamed the recent plane crash over the Potomac on people with disabilites, and DEI. Washington Post reports that the next step for DOGE is to start identifying "DEI-focused" positions that aren't explicitly about implementing DEI....so we can all guess what "type" of employees will be targeted.

Then, step two. Probationary employees. Government employees in the United States have civil service protections. This is because the government used to operate on a spoils system where each election, the new president would fire everyone and hire loyalists to him. Turns out that kind of shakeup every 4 years is bad, and it's better if you can get subject matter experts to stick around across administrations. So federal employees have legal protections against firing them at random. Trump is trying to eliminate that, by the way, by insitituting a broad recategorization of federal employees who are in "policy influencing positions" to be able to fire them at-will. (The definition of "policy influencing" here is intentionally so broad that it will affect most employees in the government regardless of whether they have any influence on policy or not.) Oh! And remember the Fork email? Yeah, there's language in those emails about employees who don't resign needing to be "loyal." Will they be required to be loyal to Trump?

But in the meantime while he waits to fire everyone else, they're going after probationary employees first. This is because for the first 1-2 years of service as a government employees, you can be removed easier (they still must justify bad performance though.) It's not just new employees--the probation can reset when you take a new position, so experienced people with many years of service were also let go simply because they changed jobs within the last year. Around 200k~ probationary employees are in the federal workforce, and thousands got fired in the last two days and thousands more will be fired by Tuesday. This includes brilliant scientists in the middle of projects, with some people saying there's no staff left to feed living animals that were under their care. They're firing CDC epidemiologists. Wildfire support personnel in the Forest Service. People who are doing emergency response work right now in LA for the cleanup are being fired during this, despite the fact they're working 7 days a week, 12+ hours a day (sooooo lazy though, right?) The Trump admin also accidentally fired a bunch of people in charge of nuclear weapons since they didn't know what their jobs actually were, and had to scramble to undo that. It's tax season in the US, and the IRS may layoff thousands of workers.

It shoud be noted that a lot of these firings were illegal, because probationary employees can be fired in the case of bad performance, but it's stupid to claim that 200,000 people are all bad performers. Many of these people have paperwork documenting a glowing performance review. They'll be sued. But Trump and Elon are moving fast and trying to break enough things that the courts won't be able to stop all of it in time.

Nobody else is safe either, of course. On Tuesday Trump passed an executive order demanding agencies to conduct large scale reductions in force (RIFs). There's no knowledge yet on just how many more people this will target in the future. I can't give you an estimate how many people will be fired in the next few months, but nobody is safe.

Why does this matter for the average person? Well, this will affect everyone in the US. It'll affect highway safety. It'll affect product recalls. It'll affect food inspections and food recalls. It'll affect clean water systems and air pollution reduction. It'll affect enforcement action against polluters. It'll affect public health. It'll affect research. It'll affect fair housing. It'll effect the economy and consumer protections. It'll affect banking. It'll affect farmers. It'll affect people who rely on food stamps, childcare services, etc. It'll mean that the public will have less recourse to get things fixed, less of a chance of getting help for issues. It will affect the private sector when contractors get fired. It will affect local and state government when the grants that fund their programs get pulled. It will affect nonprofit employees. It will affect universities. It will affect government funded programs like Poison Control. So much of government work is functionally invisible to the average citizen, and things will start breaking in the next year. This concentrated attack to dismantle the government is the first step to dismantling everything else.

[fivenightsatfreddysfanfiction]

Cascade - Part 2

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The wreckage of the lab hadn't done much to stop her attempts to pull together what scraps of Remnant lingered in the tunnels and caves for William Afton’s reconstruction. It did, however, make it more difficult for her to get access to the training data and primary A.I. for the aptly named Mimic endoskeleton. Without access to Mimic1 the risk that the Mimic endo would assume incorrect information into its replication of William Afton grew higher by the day.

She had barely survived the brat's attempt to destroy her, the Mimic, and her lab, but she had taken time to recover from her injuries. Too much precious time. Emelia’s Remnant, her soul, should still be safe, grafted carefully to an endoskeleton that she’d kept close by in the Parts and Service section of the Pizzaplex. William’s was still in ruins, fragments of his brilliant soul bound to the Mimic in desperate attempts to rebuild him with stolen Remnant and forcing the endoskeleton to ‘learn’ William’s mannerisms while the A.I in the server rebuilt his personality from records and recordings to serve as his foundation.

To become William Afton, so that his soul could latch on and regain those ‘memories’ and forge new Remnant of his own.

There was the alternative route back to the surface, but it was riddled with debris and dim lighting, and she would have to climb upwards to reach the cargo elevator. Difficult and painful, but doable for now. She’d need to transfer to a new body far sooner than she’d planned. If only she’d been able to buy out that damned pizzeria her former husband had financed to spite her; the co-owner of Circus Baby’s would have made for an ideal host, young enough to suit her and intelligent enough to satisfy her demands for brilliance to feed her own mind.

Surely one of her sleepers would awaken and come for her, right?

Onwards and upwards for now, she supposed. The Mimic endo was following after her, a bit slower, more curious with its surroundings, but once she got back to the Pizzaplex proper, it would join her. And then she’d find a way to get her hands on Project GGY to pull that precious data out of his brain and give it to Mimic1 where it rightfully belonged. That boy was far more trouble than he was worth after all.

.

===

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“Still no word from Mr. Fitzgerald?” Vanessa asked with a sigh as Ven settled back in his chair. He shook his head and her expression grew a bit pinched. “I see.”

“Without his information, Vincent really can’t make much headway in figuring out Gregory’s nightmare. I’m sorry about that,” the artist told her, “I asked Damien to go over to the Schmidt household with Stephanie and ask directly after he finishes checking on the security of the old home location.”

“Which is why you’ll be focusing on Sydney today.” Vanessa smiled ruefully, shaking her head a little, “Guess it was okay that Gregory went out to play with his friends after all.”

“The two of you are his guardians, right?” Ven asked, looking between her and Sydney already laying on the other sofa, “And Alex is working today, so who’s looking after Gregory?”

“Freddy went with him to Circus Baby’s. It should be okay since he got those modifications that lets him pass for a costumed person and your sister helped make him some clothes that fit,” Vanessa explained brightly despite her still strained look, “The nightmare has been bringing down his mood, so I thought a day of fun with his friends should cheer him up.”

Ven offered her a friendly grin of support before closing his eyes and letting himself drift back, Vincent coming forward to take his place and carry out the dream therapy. “I’m surprised you managed to convince him to let me in,” the counselor remarked, opening his eyes to focus the luminous white on Vanessa.

“Wasn’t easy, that’s for sure,” Vanessa admitted tiredly, looking over at Sydney’s sleeping face with his furrowed brow, “Whatever might be in his mind, he says he has it under control, but I don’t like how afraid of himself he’s become since we escaped the Pizzaplex. Vanny must have done something to him during one of her torture sessions with him.”

“I should be able to remove it after having recovered from getting thrown out of Gregory’s dream,” Vincent replied with a sheepish laugh, “Strong kid.” He closed his eyes again, preparing to reach out with his Remnant, “Alright, Sydney, same as before, okay? Try not to punch me this time!”

Sydney only grunted, frowning deeper in his sleep, and Vincent decided that was about as good of an answer he’d ever get before stretching out to synchronize his Remnant and slip into the dream.

.

Broken.

No.

Shattered.

Vincent crouched on a patch of floor that was half laminated wood, half concrete slab. Disconnected walls floated over gaps of murky black, furniture seemed to be resting over nothingness, framed photos drifted by with faces slashed and only one preserved.

The picture perfect false smile of a little girl in silent pain, cutouts of a hoodie and pants taped over the photo in an attempt to get rid of the sparkling chiffon dress she wore.

Vincent reached out to pull down the frame before it floated out of reach, examining it closer. No, not ‘she’; those eyes, that agony within them, that had to be a young Alex, begging his brother for rescue and freedom. “And he threw himself in front of you like a shield, fighting for any method that could get you out of an identity that wasn’t yours,” he muttered and released the frame, watching the photo float on.

From how the mindscape looked, Sydney clearly didn't have enough of his original Remnant and memories to fully build a solid foundation for his own identity. Router had been pouring in what little he could spare back when they were both ghosts and BellaRosa had filled in the rest with the gathered Remnant left behind by Meera’s grandmother, but none of it could restore lost memories.

All Sydney had to base his sense of self on was whatever survived the Trinity of Guards and whatever Alex told him about who he used to be, biased information. Maybe that was why Sydney was constantly afraid? Without a strong sense of self he could very easily be overwritten by whatever Remnant coding was implanted by Elizabeth Afton.

So then how did Sydney get whatever was implanted ‘under control’?

Vincent pushed off from the broken chunk of floor, exerting just enough Remnant control to let himself float and move through the mindscape. So far there wasn’t any sign of Sydney in the dream, so what was he-?

He frowned as faint whispers drifted past his ears, soft and dark and soothing. If he could just focus a bit more on them, maybe he could-.

He shook his head hard, a chill running down his back. This was Sydney’s mind and he still was capable of using words to destroy someone’s mental state. Vincent took a moment to check his own mental guards, strengthening them enough to deaden the whispers’ pull but not so much he’d accidentally sever the connection he made to Sydney.

Where was he?

Vincent drifted on, scanning the fragmented dream world in search of some sign of the dreamer.

An open crate spilling weapons into the air drifted past, pulling his attention to it. The ink black panther head stamped into the wood reminded him of Sydney’s past life alias and following the crate with his gaze drew him to finally see a large metal box in the distance, a smaller figure beside it. Was that where Sydney was?

Floating towards the box, Vincent was able to make out more details as he drew closer to it. It was more like a prison cell, all metal walls and a solid metal door. There was damage to it, like something inside had dented the walls and door in attempts to get out. Wrapped around the cell was a heavy chain, binding it, and Sydney sat on the ground in front of the door, gripping the ends of the chain in his hands.

He didn’t register Vincent touching down near him, dark bags under his eyes that remained lidded and fixed on the ground, grip on the chains tight despite the mix of old and fresh blood leaking between his fingers. Was this what he meant by keeping the Remnant code under control?

Vincent glanced up at the cell door, noting that there was a small window in it, darkness beyond the gap. There was a sliding panel to close over the window, but it looked broken in some way, so it couldn’t be closed.

As much as he wanted to look inside and see what form the coding took, Sydney’s condition was the more pressing issue. Vincent knelt in front of the man, raising a hand palm up to him in hopes he’d be recognized. His stomach twisted a little at the flinch Sydney expressed from the motion, the younger man pressing his back more firmly against the cell door.

“Not gonna hurt you. You aren’t the ghost I faced back then. Right now, you’re someone in need of help,” he explained softly. Sydney’s eyes finally lifted to his own, peering at him through the shadows cast by his hair hanging over his face. “Can you tell me what this dream is? What’s inside the cell?”

Sydney grit his teeth, baring them in a silent snarl as he clenched his fists around the chains, fresh blood trickling down the metal to add another coat to the dried splatters and streams. Vincent watched him for a moment, then sighed. So the self-imposed muteness persisted even in his dreams. That would make things a little bit harder to figure out and dispel.

He wasn’t trained for special needs children, far less a special needs adult. But a person in need of help was still in need of help so he’ll have to make do somehow.

Dull reverberating thuds sounded from within the cell, a rhythmic tapping that had Sydney freeze in place, eyes wide and breath catching before going quick and shallow. Vincent looked up at the door with a frown. What was going on?

He stretched his Remnant forward, cautious, probing, trying to get a feel for what was inside the cell. The sound of footsteps made him pause and he began to look over his shoulder to see who was approaching, Sydney making a soft sound of distress and huddling in place. Familiarity with the position from children who pleaded for parents not to be called sparked fury that he had to swallow down to keep a calming presence.

“Oh, did you bring someone in to tell you it’s okay to be a failure?” Alex’s voice rang out snidely, “Kind of dumb that you brought in the guy who’s the reason you’re like this.”

“Excuse me?” Vincent bit out, turning in place to narrow his eyes at the figure of Alex Herrera standing there with his arms folded over his chest.

“Don’t act innocent. Whatever you did to him destroyed so many memories, so much Remnant. It’s your fault he’s at risk now. If you hadn’t ruined him as Panther, he wouldn’t be this sniveling imitation on the brink of being eaten up by Afton tech.” Alex’s sneering grin was sharp and cold, matching the chill of guilt that sank teeth into Vincent’s mental shield.

He shook himself off hard, feeling the cloying Remnant slide away as Alex’s grin bared a flash of teeth. “All he lost were poisonous memories of a past that doesn’t need to be part of his life now. He has memories of his life as Sydney Herrera to build an identity on. He can still do that; you’re the one insisting he be someone he’s not!” Vincent yelled back.

“So it’s his own fault he doesn’t have a strong identity, then? Even with memories of being Herrera, his mind’s still fractured like this, so he’s the one who failed to build anything?” Alex asked with a chuckle, “Wow, victim blaming, much? You suck as a counselor.”

“That’s not what I said or meant! You’re twisting my words!”

“You’re the one who implied it, not me.”

“You’re misinterpreting my words on purpose!”

“Maybe you should have been more clear. Is this why you worked with kids? Can’t use your words right with adults?”

“You-!” Vincent growled and flinched back as the biting chill made itself more known again. His defenses, how much of them got worn down by the back and forth?! He poured in a bit more Remnant to rebuild them and glared at the smirking young man before him. That was insidious. “You must be the source of the nightmare.”

Alex’s imposter just winked at him before looking over at Sydney. “His nightmare? Sure, you could say that. I think of myself as the bringer of the truth he needs to hear, even if he doesn’t want to,” he replied, chuckling at the other man’s shiver. “I’ve been telling him, out there and in here; my wish was for Panther to be brought back with me, and I got this cheap imitation instead. I was robbed of my partner and I’ll beat him back into the right shape one way or another.”

Sydney clicked his tongue, shaking his head even as he grimaced at the words. Vincent stepped forward, holding a hand aside to block him from view.

“You’re not doing anything of the sort, and if the real Alex has been pressuring Sydney to be more like Panther then I believe we’ll be having words regarding that,” he growled and swept his hand up to face the smirking young man, calling up his Remnant to focus on him. “I’ll just have to dispel you first!”

He really should have stopped to consider why it seemed so easy to throw the wave of dispelling Remnant at the fake Alex, fueled by Ven’s serene nature to pay for Vincent’s anger towards the illusion trying to bring back someone who didn’t need to exist.

But he didn’t, just directed the wave to wash over the figure of Alex Herrera to strip it away and reveal what the truth was underneath. Some fragment of Afton programming, like the broken Vanny in Vanessa's head? Or something more complex like what Elizabeth had implanted in Gregory?

No. None of those.

Vincent’s expression twisted in confusion and faint alarm at the sight of a second Sydney Herrera standing there after the wave dispersed. He looked aside and down at the Sydney still sitting on the ground, head bowed and gripping the chains desperately tight.

“I.. don’t understand..,” the counselor said slowly. “Why are there two of you?”

“Inner voice,” the revealed Sydney replied, startling Vincent into taking a step back. He shrugged, a halfhearted gesture, and nodded in understanding. “Been a while since you heard us, so that reaction’s expected.” He paused, mouth twisting as he narrowed his eyes. “Is this what our voice sounds like?” he asked aloud, as if to listen to the whisper-soft and raspy sound more closely, “What did we sound like before? Been too damn long.”

What did this mean? Vincent narrowed his eyes as he tried to decipher this new puzzle. “The image of Alex saying those things about Sydney, about how he doesn’t match up with the memory of Panther.. that was the illusion. And you, Sydney’s own voice, are the truth hidden under it?” He scratched at the stubble on his chin thoughtfully. “So what was the illusion trying to mask? That you don’t want Sydney to be pressured by Alex into becoming more like Panther?”

“That I was the one saying everything the illusion did,” the second Sydney replied flatly. He tilted his head curiously at Vincent’s scowl. “You really aren’t very good at this when it comes to adults, are you?”

“Why would you say those things to yourself?!” Vincent asked the Sydney that still sat mutely at the box, “I thought you hated anything connected to Panther!”

“We do, but it’s still the truth,” the other Sydney replied in his place, pulling Vincent’s attention back to him. He gestured outward, at the broken and void-filled domain that was his ‘mind’. “Router made the deal to be reborn with Panther at his side. Alex made it through reincarnation, but we failed to be the Panther he wanted us to be. Sydney Herrera is opposing to Panther, but we want to do whatever we can to make Alex happy.”

A small, crooked grin spread on Sydney’s face, rueful and exasperated. “What would make Alex happy is Panther’s return, but we hoped that if we were good enough as just Sydney, maybe that would be enough instead.”

Vincent watched a ghostly image of a younger Sydney helping a much younger Alex into a small suit, dressed up as formal as could be. Vague impressions of judges and court documents floated over them before fading into mist. Sydney cleaning a small apartment while Alex ate lunch at a kitchen table, Sydney helping at a construction site while Alex attended school, Sydney performing all the acts and actions of a parent desperately trying to hold a family together in the face of the legal system and through it all Alex wore the same expression of frustration and dissatisfaction.

“But even if we were what Alex needed to gain his freedom, we weren’t what he wanted to gain his happiness,” Sydney sighed, looking down at the palm of one hand, forlorn and wistful. “We don’t have the memories to know how to be ‘Panther’ even though we have the skills. We can still break someone’s mind and spirit, still know how to gather background information, detect and feel the emotions of others, and combine it all in our words so we can heighten the emotions we want, twist the rest to be used as weapons.”

“Panther.. was an empath?” Vincent murmured in horror. Sydney just shrugged. “But, why put up the illusion of Alex saying you robbed him of his wish if you’re the one saying it?”

“Because it was easier to ignore if we could pretend it was just Alex saying it,” Sydney said dully, raising his arms to hold himself. “Because it’s the truth. We’re not Panther; he was promised Panther in the deal and instead he got us and he’s not happy and...” He fell silent and Vincent took a cautious step towards him.

A small laugh, broken and wet, burst from Sydney’s mouth as the grin returned, shaky and weak. “He’s our little brother. All we want is for him to be happy,” he said, his gaze moving from Vincent to the Sydney sitting at the metal box with the chains in his hands. “It’s a choice between what Alex needs and what Alex wants, and he’s been denied what he wants for two lifetimes already. We can’t deny him anymore. Not when we have the way to give it to him.”

...

The box.

Vincent spun around, staring at the metal as dull thuds began pounding out from within the box again. He had been looking in the wrong place for whatever Elizabeth had implanted in the younger man!

Slowly, painfully, Sydney got up from the ground, hands clutching the chains shaking. Their eyes met, luminous white ones wide with dawning horror and realization, ice blue ones bright with guilt and grief.

“You don’t have to listen to either of those voices,” Vincent said desperately, holding up his hands and approaching slowly. Maybe there was still a chance to turn this around. “You’re your own person and there’s value in being Sydney Herrera!”

“You say that, but you’re someone on the outside. I exist because of my brother, so he matters more.” Sydney glanced aside at the box, then sighed, bowing his head. “As long as Alex is looking for Panther, he’ll never see me. Both of them were right. This body was meant for the mercenary, not some amnesiac.”

“Whatever is in that box, don’t let it talk you into making a terrible mistake!” Vincent urged, reaching out towards the chains.

“He didn’t have to do much talking,” Sydney finally whispered, a tiny and tremulous smile on his face as tears welled up, “I did it to myself for him. Tell Vanessa.. I’m sorry I can’t be by your side anymore.”

He let the chains go.

The metal panels of the box exploded outward, knocking both men over in the gale that rushed from its epicenter, and booming laughter filled the air.

Vincent struggled to push himself up from the cracked floor, a sudden pressure in the mindscape weighing down on him that his own mental shield could barely counteract. Was this the result of whatever Remnant coding got put into Sydney’s head?

Wooden flooring gave way to concrete and patches of grass and foliage as he lifted his head to the sound of boots crunching sticks and leaves with every step. And then a voice he didn’t recognize but gave him chills all the same spoke up.

“Shadow Mine finally broke, hm? What more proof does anyone need to see how much of a failure he turned out to be?”

Vincent looked up in shock at the sight of a large, muscular man grinning widely down at him, hair cropped short and clad in black and dark gray. Was this what Panther looked like as a human? He flinched when the man reached down and grabbed him by the front of his shirt, dragging him up and closer.

“And you must be an external Remnant entity. A.. soul. Or a ghost. One of those things the Master File babbled about. Interesting data; something to send along to the main branch in a merge request later.” Panther murmured as Vincent stared up at him in alarm, hands gripping at Panther’s wrist. He looked around for help, spotting only Sydney still laying prone on the ground, as though all strength to even rise was gone from him in his despair. The emotion roiled out from him in a fine cold mist, sapping at Vincent’s defenses while they were still struggling to push against the pressure in the mindscape without severing the connection to Sydney.

Could he dispel this Panther on his own? The Trinity of Guards had been enough of an emotional force to rip apart Lucian’s ghost and almost fully rip apart Panther’s; he only somewhat survived thanks to Router escaping the hit and taking a portion of Panther’s Remnant with him back to his anchor in Fazbear’s Fright. Vincent pulled one hand free, gritting his teeth as he gathered up his Remnant into the dispelling wave and threw the cooling blue force into Panther’s face. That much positive aligned Remnant should do something, right?

Panther simply laughed again, the wisps of Remnant trailing into nothing around him. “Interesting,” he repeated and tilted his head. “Was that meant to do something?” He paused, then looked up at the endless murky expanse of the mindscape. “Watch me make this mind into my own.” he added with a smirk and gestured upward with his free hand.

Vincent had only a moment to understand the feeling of Sydney’s own mental shields -or were they Panther’s?- slamming into place before a scream tore out of his own mouth, his connection to Ven severed violently, painfully. His mind flashed to the multiple stabs that had riddled his body in his life that led to him bleeding out in that dark alley so long ago; this was so much more agonizing.

“Assimilating Shadow Mine’s Remnant isn’t enough to stabilize the mimicry. I need a proper killer’s mindset. If he isn’t enough, then I’ll just break you into the rest I need,” Panther crooned through Vincent’s pained screaming. “Records indicate Panther had a skill in psychological torture; you can fill in for that once I’ve reprogrammed you, Dream Eater. In the meantime, Elizabeth Afton still wants that woman’s body for her plans, and I’ll bet she’ll pay a pretty penny for it. Enough for me and Router to get back to rebuilding our business...”

.