#cancelled valve projects

[narklos]

Half-Life Links and Resources

I've put together all of the links I've collected over the years relating to Half-Life for you all to peruse and enjoy.

If you feel like I've missed something, shoot me an ask and I'll add it. :,)

Take a peek under the cut, and have fun!

Gordon Freeman's Bio

Raising the Bar (Book of HL1 and HL2's development)

Half-Life Magazine Archive

HL2's Original Opening Scene Script

TCRF's Proto HL2 Documentation

TWHL's Forums

My own collection of HL model references

My own collection of cut/unused G-Man voicelines

VCC Wiki (Treasure trove of unreleased Valve resources)

Project Beta (Archives HL2's development builds and art)

SourceRuns (Forum) (Wiki)

Archived City17 Forums

Leaked Beta HLA Ending (HLA basically had a hard reset on its development a year into the game's devcycle, that's a whole 'nother rabbit hole)

Cut HL maps in the Postal 3 Leak

HL2's E3 Presentation Assets (Tech Demo) (Trailer) (Assets) (Download)

Mike Shapiro (G-Man's VA) Singing the Blues!

HLA - Lost Radio in the Vault

The HLA Black Mesa Conspiracy Theorist (Many believe this to be Barney's hideout, as Barney was meant to appear in HLA but was cut)

HL2 EP2 Cut Citadel Destruction (Addon is no longer available)

An Unused G-Man Ravenholm Appearance

'Human Science' Pre-Vis (Cut Dr Breen speech from HLA)

Return to Ravenholm (Cancelled Episode 4)

Some forums going over the HL2 2003 Leak (Winamp) (Techspot) (Leak Download)

HL1's 1997 Alpha (Steam) (Project Beta)

Archived Facepunch Forums

Kerry Davis' Door Talk (This was during HLA's development but before the game was announced, and goes through a lot of the tech we'd see in the released game. Back then, HLA was known only in code leaks as 'HLVR'. Remember- HLA had a massive reset in its production!)

Gabe Newell Officially Announces HL3!!11

[follow-freeman]

The lost Half Life game, Codename: Gordon!

Codename: Gordon began development in mid-2003. Starting as a fan-project by Paul "X-Tender" Kamma. During development, the project was noticed by the co-founder of Nuclearvision Entertainment and the company soon began work with Kamma. Codename was originally planned to be released for the Nintendo DS, but upon being noticed by Valve, it was "adopted" by Valve and made an offical part of their Half Life roster.

"Initially, Codename: Gordon was supposed to receive several updates, including a second bonus game which would be unlocked after finishing the game. However, Paul Kamma announced that the update was canceled. The game is no longer available on the Steam store, due to Nuclearvision Entertainment's collapse, which leads to the official company's site' removal. As the access to the site is hardcoded into the game, Valve was forced to remove it from the Steam catalog. However, its depot hasn't been removed from content servers so the game is downloadable using protocol commands or command line parameters." -Half Life wiki

GAMEPLAY, CHARACTERS, AND INSTALLATION UNDER THE CUT!

Despite being hidden by steam, the game can still be downloaded for free. Copy " steam://install/92 " into your prefered search engine and there should be a steam popup allowing you to download. There's only six simple levels, and can easily be beat in under 15 minutes.

[blackmesa-official]

Normally we here at blackmesa-official are happy to commit to the bit at all times, but today we'd like to take a moment to break character, to deliver news of the upcoming games in Valve's release cycle!

Neon Prime - August 2024 An asymmetric five-player real-time strategy game, set on a formerly combine-occupied planetoid on the far side of Xen. Battle your way to the top of the ruined citadel, and take control of the core for yourself!

Currently unnamed Counter-Strike 2 Expansion Pack - September 2024 Terrorists are active in the snowy tundras of Siberia, and it's up to you to stop them! This expansion pack will add new cosmetics, maps, and missions to the game. Crossover cosmetics will also appear in Team Fortress 2 Winter cosmetic cases.

Half-Life 2: Episode 1 And A Half - April 2025 A fanmade project picked up by Valve to tide fans over while they wait for a new Half-Life release. Play through Half-Life 2 Episodes 1 and 2 through the eyes of Barney Calhoun in this 'wacky' take on the HL Universe!

Facility Control - April 2026 Another portal-themed tech demo for an as of yet undisclosed new Valve technology. Play as GLaDOS and interface with the Aperture facility in this groundbreaking thirty-minute experience.

DOTA 3 - December 2026

Portal: Kore Kerfuffle! - June 2027 A VR rougelike where you play as Wheatley, guiding test subject after test subject in an effort to escape Aperture Science. Try, try again in this relentlessly addictive adventure!

TF Comics: The Playable Series - January 2028 The release of TF Comics #7 comes as a playable, interactive experience along with the first 6 comics, reimagined as a playable campaign for Team Fortress 2.

Half Life: Otis - December 2028 The Half-Life series concludes with a fantastic final entry. Play as rebel commander Otis Laurey over the course of his life. Escape the Black Mesa facility, fight against the combine, and lead the rebels to victory in this showstopping title.

Return to Ravenholm - October 2030 A bitter ex-employee of Arkane Studios leaks the source code for the cancelled Return To Revanholm on 4chan. Gabe Newell is summarily executed.

[mr-deep-downer]

the recent valve leaks, combined with engine update dumps, show a project called HLX is under full development. It has more new code than another other Source 2 title. Based on previous leaks, and hints in the HL2 doc, I would put a Half-Life 3 release date in the next 18 months at 90% certainty.

If you recall, Geoff Keighley, host and founder of the Game Awards, has had a closer relationship to Valve than any other journalist, going back to his "The Final Hours of Half-Life" article in '98.

Half-Life Alyx was supposed to announced at the 2019 game awards, but Valve canceled at the last minute due to technical bugs. Some people feel that Valve owes Geoff some big announcement because they canceled their last big announcement. So it's not like this speculation came from nowhere.

The other big speculation is The Witcher 4 is the big announcement. I think this is also very likely and in fact I'll be shocked if CD Projekt doesn't announce SOMETHING given the cryptic tweets and rumors.

Luckily we don't have to wait long to find out. I'll be watching this with my friends Superbowl style with snacks, drinks (i don't drink but everyone else does), etc.

okay 👍

[mightyflamethrower]

Since early 2021 we have witnessed somewhere between 7 and 8 million illegal entries across the now nonexistent U.S. southern border.

The more the border vanished, the more federal immigration law was rendered inert, and the more Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas spun fantasies that the “border is secure.” He is now written off as a veritable “Baghdad Bob” propagandist.

But how and why did the Biden administration destroy immigration law as we knew it?

The Trump administration’s initial efforts to close the border had been continually obstructed in the Congress, sabotaged by the administrative state, and stymied in the courts. Nonetheless, it had finally secured the border by early 2020.

Yet almost all its successful initiatives were immediately overturned in 2021.

The wall was abruptly stopped, its projected trajectory cancelled. The Obama-era disastrous “catch-and release” policy of immigration non-enforcement was resurrected.

Prior successful pressure on Mexico’s President Andrés Obrador to stop the deliberate export of his own citizens northward ceased.

Federal border patrol officers were forced to stand down.

New federal subsidies were granted to entice and then support illegal arrivals.

No one in the Democratic Party objected to the destruction of the border or the subversion of immigration law.

However, things changed somewhat once swamped southern border states began to bus or fly a few thousand of their illegal immigrants northward to sanctuary city jurisdictions—especially to New York, Chicago, and even Martha’s Vineyard.

The sanctuary-city “humanists” there who had greenlighted illegal immigration into the southern states suddenly shrieked. They were irate after experiencing the concrete consequences of their own prior abstract border agendas. After all, their nihilism was always supposed to fall upon distant and ridiculed others.

New York mayor Eric Adams went from celebrating a few dozen illegal immigrants bused into Manhattan, to blasting his own party by allowing tens of thousands to swamp his now bankrupt city.

But why did the Biden administration deliberately unleash the largest influx across the southern border in U.S. history?

The ethnic chauvinists and Democratic Party elites needed new constituents, given their increasingly unpopular agendas.

They feared that the more legal Latino immigrants assimilated and integrated into American society, the less happy they became with leftwing radical abortion, racial, transgender, crime, and green fixations.

Democratic grandees had always bragged that illegal immigration would create what they called “The New Democratic Majority” in “Demography is Destiny” fashion. Now they slander critics as “racists” who object to leftwing efforts to use illegal immigration to turn southwestern red states blue.

Mexico now cannot survive as a modern state without some $60 billion in annual remittances sent by its expatriates in America. But many illegal immigrants rely on American state and federal entitlements to free up cash to send home.

Mexico also encourages its own abject poor and often indigenous people from southern Mexico to head north as a safety-valve of sorts. The government sees these mass exoduses northward as preferable to the oppressed marching on Mexico City to address grievances of poverty and racism.

The criminal cartels now de facto run Mexico. An open border allows them to ship fentanyl northward, earn billions in profits—and kill nearly 100,000 Americans a year. Illegal immigrants pay cartels additional billions to facilitate their border crossings.

Do not forget American corporate employers. Record labor nonparticipation followed the Covid lockdown. In reaction to the dearth of American workers, the hospitality, meat packing, social service, health-care, and farming industries were desperate to hire new—and far cheaper—labor.

Human rights activists insist that the borders themselves are nineteenth-century relics. And the global poor and oppressed thus have a human right to enter the affluent West by any means necessary.

Many in the tony suburbs and in universities do not live anywhere near the border. So they pontificate on the assurance that thousands of unaudited illegal immigrants will never enter their own enclaves or campuses.

The result is elite bottled piety—but not firsthand experience with the natural consequences of millions chaotically fleeing one of the poorest countries in the world to pour into the wealthiest. Without background checks, vaccinations and health audits, legality, high-school diplomas, English-facility, skill sets, or capital, the result is an abject catastrophe.

Polls continue to show that the American people support measured, diverse, legal, and meritocratic immigration as much as they oppose mass illegal immigration into their country and the subsequent loss of American sovereignty on the border.

They understand what the Biden administration does not: no nation is history has survived once its borders were destroyed, once its citizenship was rendered no different from mere residence, and once its neighbors with impunity undermined its sovereignty.

Ending illegal immigration now depends solely on the American people overriding the corrupt special interests and leaders who profit from the current chaos and human misery.

[top-10-gifts]

Top 10 Scale Gifts for the Gadget Enthusiast

Finding the ideal present for the gadget lover in your life may be thrilling and difficult at the same time because technology is continuously changing, and gadgets are becoming an essential part of our lives. The appropriate gadget may make their world come alive, whether it's for a birthday, an anniversary, or to express gratitude. We've put together a list of Top 10 Scale Gifts for the Gadget Enthusiast to aid you in your search for the perfect present.

High-end headphones

There's nothing quite like immersing yourself in music or podcasts with a pair of high-quality headphones. For the audiophile in your life, consider options like the Bose QuietComfort 35 II or Sony WH-1000XM4. These headphones not only offer exceptional sound quality but also come with noise-canceling features, making them perfect for music lovers on the go.

Smartwatch or Fitness Tracker

Smartwatches and fitness trackers have become more than just timekeeping devices; they're personal assistants for tracking health and staying connected. Due to their abundance of health and fitness capabilities, app compatibility, and stylish designs, the Apple Watch Series 7 and Fitbit Versa 3 are both fantastic options.

Drone

Drones have taken the world by storm, offering a unique perspective and endless possibilities for creativity. DJI's Mavic Air 2 and Skydio 2 are top-notch options, equipped with high-resolution cameras, obstacle avoidance, and impressive flight capabilities. A drone is an excellent gift for both tech enthusiasts and photography lovers.

Virtual Reality (VR) Headset

Step into another world with a VR headset. Oculus Quest 2 and Valve Index provide immersive gaming experiences and access to virtual reality applications. VR headsets are perfect for those who crave a new level of entertainment and want to explore virtual realms.

High-Performance Laptop

A powerful laptop is essential for the tech enthusiast who wants power on the run. Choose laptops are notorious for their exceptional speed, stunning defenses, and portability, similar as the MacBook Pro or Dell XPS 15. These laptops work well for a variety of operations, including videotape editing and programming.

Smart Home Devices

Transforming a house into a smart home is a trend that continues to gain momentum. Smart home devices like Amazon Echo, Google Nest, and Philips Hue lights offer convenience and automation. They allow control over lights, music, security, and more with just a voice command or a tap on your smartphone.

Streaming Device

Cutting the cord has never been more accessible with streaming devices like Roku Ultra and Apple TV 4K. These devices offer access to a vast library of streaming services, including Netflix, Disney+, and Hulu, in stunning 4K quality. Streaming devices are perfect for binge-watchers and movie buffs.

High-Resolution Camera

Capture life's moments in stunning detail with a high-resolution camera. The Sony Alpha a7R IV and Canon EOS R5 are recognized for their superb image quality and adaptability. For photographers who want to capture landscapes, portraiture, or wildlife, these cameras are perfect.

Gaming Console or Accessories

Gaming is a passion for many gadget enthusiasts. Consider the latest gaming consoles like the PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series X. Enhance the gaming experience with accessories like gaming chairs, mechanical keyboards, or gaming headsets.

Tech Toolkit or DIY Electronics Kit

For those who love to tinker and build, a tech toolkit or DIY electronics kit is the perfect gift. Arduino Starter Kits and Raspberry Pi Bundles provide endless opportunities for creating gadgets, robots, and electronic projects.

Conclusion

In conclusion, it need not be difficult to select the ideal present for a gadget fanatic. With the top 10 scale gifts we've outlined, you can surprise your loved one with a thoughtful and exciting present that aligns with their passion for technology. Remember, the best gift is one that shows you know their interests and cater to their tech-savvy side.

[iodotsys]

Alright, this is explaining the DCMA on Portal 64. The creator even said in their announcement for cancellation "Because the project depends on Nintendo's proprietary libraries [...]" This means that there was a possibility that Valve themselves would face legal trouble FROM NINTENDO. Yep, its Nintendo at it again, not Valve.

If you would like to read more, here's an article explaining the situation:

For some good news on Valve's part, a recent prequel that was being made for Portal was just released on 1/6/24, a complete mod for Portal. Its called Portal Revolution. Valve don't seem to mind that at all, per usual Valve behavior.

As for the AI, here is the announcement from Steam, as it was not included in the original post. This includes the guidelines for usage.

One thing that people may find comforting is this line directly from the announcement. You will not be in the dark about what AI is used for:

"We will also include much of your disclosure on the Steam store page for your game, so customers can also understand how the game uses AI."

Hope this helps.

What a day to be a tf2 fan after what nonsense valve pulled. Ngl, I'm tired

[inews24]

Half-Life 2: Episode 3 doesn't exist because Left 4 Dead does

New Half-Life 2 documentary shows off never-before-seen footage of Episode 3. Image credit: Valve As part of this weekend’s special anniversary update, Valve has given fans a sneak peek of the cancelled Half-Life 2: Episode 3 project. As well as sharing stunning concept art and gameplay prototypes, the Half-Life 2 team reunited in the documentary to talk about the development of Episode 2. The…

[worthplaying]

'Risk of Rain' Developer Cancels Unannounced Project, Joins Valve Software

http://dlvr.it/TCmhJ8

[thewul]

design notes: remember how the air moisture collection ducts looked oversized, at 145% diameter each they account for 2.9 of the smaller air exchange collection ducts

so now there you have it, looking at the floor of the machines chamber, and at floodwater collecting platforms, the ones in deeper blue are actually deeper

where the oversized pipes that we had fulfill their role this time by going underneath the diesel tank,

and resurfacing in front where they connect under the floor of the machines room, not to 1 but to 2 pumps, and in turn to no return valves to expel floodwater

in fact we are so pleased to have them that we put them in red, next tapping into them for everything that needs a pump is the thing to do

we have represented a section of the air moisture collection duct running overhead that connects to these pumps after several cycles cooling the engines,

and so can other ducts, to provide us with water pressure in the main water tank, let's do just that, so if we reverse them, they look more like double pumps, units we obtain the following

so there we have it, an intake from the main water tank, again going underneath the fuel tank, and connecting to 2 pumps in series

then back to the water tank where going up well there's not much there, but that is where to water line arrives to the deck above, mainly to the kitchens and the cafeterias that we have

at any rate 2 pumps in serial is enough pressure to service all decks, including the tower, and providing outside water outlets, sprinklers for the Sky Deck glass surface

Why we have implemented the floodwater collection platforms underneath the air exchange platforms is that for all of our decks these are composed of steel mesh or perforated steel, except the sections on the jogging track of the Upperdeck where rubber is used, and of course Underdeck 02 where these are chambers and so in case of flooding the ship is geared like most submarines to seal the flooded sections, in this instance the sides of the ship but not only I am a poker player, I could be better, there's a few things I know however, poker is not just about showing your hand it is also very much about knowing when to fold it the air exchange collectors chamber floors of Upperdeck 02, directly overhead of these floodwater collection platforms, are folding sections that fold entirely in case of flooding, as the fans are connected to the chamber floors using flexible tubing providing direct access to the floodwater collection platforms

to finish with an important, key, topic about this ship, on this view and with the latest additional water tank maybe some of us are thinking that is too much water

like mentioned before the forward ballasts needn't be full height, they are in fact, although their surface is important half height and pretty flat possibly at 1.55, 1.65m of maximal height, and even less in front

I have also come to the conclusion that 1 frontal ballast equals 2 rear ballasts, where rear ballasts conversely are full height, and so in total all 6 ballasts balance themselves

in further considering the balance of the ship I have come to another conclusion, that the weight of its machines in the back balances its main water tank in front, and so these two should cancel each others as well

thus the center of balance of the whole ship should be located somewhere after the midsection of its fuel tank

one of the most, if not the most difficult, aspect of the project has been to determine the balance of the ship and especially as regards its ballasts, and maybe the greatest achievement of engineering and building this ship lies in its ability to dive or surface using just the right quantities of water in its ballasts and not more

in all fairness to oneself I doubt that a submarine can be balanced just using educated guesswork, so the project does rely as it should on a 3D conception and engineering stage, that said we still gave it our best shot as we ought to, determining that the answer to this question lies in the precise height of forward ballasts, ie their volumes

[leastparanoidandroid]

latest from Gamer News: valve announces that the half-life series will be postponed indefinitely — “but officially this time” — due to association with popular youtube series skibidi toilet.

“fuck it. i mean, we had a whole thing planned out. we were gonna do another game after half life: alyx, but at this point we’re just scrapping the entire damn project because everyone’s going to look at the g-man and go ‘woah, it’s the guy from skibidi toilet.’ we’re currently using the money that was supposed to be put into the project to buy all 360 valve employees human-sized hamster balls.” — gabe newell

when questioned further about the decision to cancel the game’s development, the valve ceo declined to answer, instead screaming indecipherably and extolling the value of running around in large plastic spheres.

[diabolus1exmachina]

Volvo P1800 (with Aston Martin DP208 engine) 

With the introduction of the Volvo P1800 in January 1960 in Brussels, the story of this unique car begins. The shape of the Volvo P1800 is the work (from 1957) of Pelle Petterson then working for Pietro Frua in Italy. The first series, starting with the model year 1961, was assembled in the UK by Jensen motors in West Bromwich. The bodies were delivered by train from the Pressed Steel company works in Lynnwood. The cars were powered by the proven Volvo B18 1.8 litre carburetted engine with 90hp. It was identical with the engine from the Volvo 122 S saloon which, according to Aston Martin chief Sir David Brown, was somewhat inadequate to power a proper sports car and he decided to commence a rather bold experiment. In March 1961 he commissioned his engineers to develop a 2.5 litre 4-cylinder engine with the potential to be sold in large numbers to various companies. The internal code for the project was DP208 and the project responsible was none other than legendary John Wyre (Astons racing manager responsible for Aston Martin’s 1959 Le Mans victory). He had a budget of 3’000 pounds available (the about 36’000 Swiss francs). The engineering team around (equally famous) Tadek Marek jumped at the task and shortened a existing DB4 engine by cutting off two cylinders. The crankcase, crankshaft and camshaft had to be designed and built from scratch while the liners, pistons and valves could be taken straight from the six cylinder DB4 engine. After the first three engines had been completed, Sir David Brown made an agreement with the then UK Volvo importer Charles Singer to test one of the units in a Volvo P1800 and he commissioned John Wyer with the task.

Over the following 12 months the car was tested extensively, among others by Marek’s wife and a successful corporation with Volvo should then have materialised. In the meantime, Volvo unfortunately had decided to terminate its corporation with Jensen due to major quality problems with the coachwork construction and painting process and had transferred the complete construction of the P1800 to the Volvo main site at Lundby near Göteborg in Sweden. Perhaps the - rather complex - engine proved to be too costly for Volvo; after all the P 1800 was advertised at below $4’000 in the USA, and the targeted weight saving could also not be realised. As a result, project DP208 was cancelled probably in 1964, with the test mule scrapped and the remaining engines used for other projects.

[kabillieu]

I've been trying not to liveblog my norovirus (or whatever this is) but I clearly need a release valve for complaining. Ugh, I haven't been sick like this since 2016. Gross. Gross. Gross.

Very much do not want to go to work tomorrow. I would outright cancel but it happens to be the week my students are presenting their midterm projects. If I feel even a little bit squidgy in the morning, though, I will cancel and figure it out on the backend.

Big kid is also sick. This makes four stomach bugs in about a month for him, poor thing.

[laughingmango]

1558w, complete, General Audiences, No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Kamila & Sissel (Ghost Trick), Jowd & Sissel (Ghost Trick), Yomiel & Sissel (Ghost Trick) Characters: Sissel (Ghost Trick), Kamila (Ghost Trick), Jowd (Ghost Trick), Yomiel (Ghost Trick) Additional Tags: Fluff, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Christmas Presents, Video Game Mechanics, baby engineer at work, professional ghost at work

For @azurefishnets... last year! But what’s a backlog amirite. Now it’s seasonal again!

Kamila shook her head.

“Too bad you don’t get it, Sissel, do you? It would be fun to work on this together.”

Talking to the cat was a tried and true pastime whenever she got a technical break from the absolute concentration her projects required. In that cozy wintry afternoon, brandishing a plastic welder that would be heating up for next minute or so, Kamila looked at her cat, at the pieces of the soon-to-be noise-cancelling earrings spread out on the table, at her apple tea in her favorite mug which had gone cold thirty minutes earlier but everybody knew that it was the thought that counted and that tea was more of a state of mind anyway, and felt at peace with the world.

Sissel could not quite say the same. What didn’t he get? Couldn’t he? He walked onto the table, feigning nonchalance as only a cat (or a ghost) could do, watching her solder three blue plastic rings and fasten them to an earrings base on one side and to a short chain on the other. At the other end of the chain were the blue silicone bits Alma put in her ears at night, the ones Sissel was not allowed to play with. The look of the plastic rings matched that of the silicone plugs – not the same, but they looked good together, as if they were always meant to be part of the same item. Sissel meowed: he got that much. Kamila set down the rings for a moment and sneaked him a scratch on the back, but did not seem to care for a follow-up to her statement.

The earrings were not the only item on the table. A small crawler robot retrofitted from one of Kamila’s early competitions was waiting for the finishing touches – its flashy new red coating was taking entirely too much to dry, as resin coatings are wont to do, and a bottle of ketchup stood next to it. Sissel slipped into the ghost world to paw at the bizarre contraption, still wondering. He understood soldering, he understood knitting, he knew it was bad when acrylics dripped out of their bottles. He understood checkers and had a beginner’s grasp on chess, and knew how to play mean card tricks with a small human help, so all in all, there was no reason to cut him out of the afternoon’s entertainment. He found the knack that made the little robot start and gave it a little ghostly push, out of boredom and contrarianism.

The robot grabbed the ketchup, surveyed the table, found what looked like a dish and was about to squeeze the condiment on Kamila’s tools when she reached for the off button.

“Sissel, no!” she snorted. “Not like that!”

She never could figure out how the cat pulled these pranks, and as a prospective scientist it stung like a personal failure. Still, as a prospective scientist, she had come to the irrefutable conclusion that it was none other than the cat who did it, and it felt like their little secret, and a bit of magic that brought a strange joy to her rigorous world.

“You silly kitten, you know you are my favorite tester in the whole wide world.” She fastened the welder to its holder and gave Sissel her undivided attention. “And I know you are very, very smart.” That netted her some understated purring that may or may not have been intended as a demure agreement. “And that you understand at least half of what I’m saying. The other half is the stuff you don’t want to hear so that doesn’t count.” Busted.

“But these are the presents I am making for my mom and dad, Sissy. We don’t know who your mom and dad are, so we can’t bring them presents!”

Kamila ran a hand through his cold fur, giving her full consideration to the scenario she had only evoked in a burst of mindless musing. “...or should we bring cat treats to the park next week? Maybe they’re still there and I would not want to be rude. I am very grateful to have you, you know.”

Was that all? Sissel headbutted her wrist when he grew tired of pretending to have a heartbeat and breathe, moving away to the other end of the table and staring at her with bright unblinking eyes.

Humans did love to overcomplicate things, really.

Yet that thought, or part of it, remained appealing.

So he set out to work.

It so happened that Jowd shared many traits with the quintessential cat. This was not always a help to Sissel, who had taken to spending most of his time among humans and sometimes felt like he missed out on the finer complexities of both species. It was, however, enough for him to know, deeply and intimately, that the way the detective went on and on about his upcoming work trip overseas was a desperate caterwauling, a call for help. He was so offended by the sheer fact of being expected to hold a speech at some conference that he neglected to share any details about it, or Sissel wasn’t paying attention on the rare occasions when he did, but what was clear was that the sole thought of leaving felt like torture.

Sissel, then, played a waiting game. He would need a stage for his trick: the right moment had to present itself at the police station, among a crowd of Jowd’s colleagues.

It rained; McCaw walked into the atrium and threw the wet plastic wrapping of a snack into the nearby trashcan. Sissel closed the lid when nobody was watching, letting the plastic fall toward the ground; a well-timed loosening of the radiator’s valve blew it away from the trashcan and close to Jowd’s feet. Now – and this was crucial to Sissel’s plans – Jowd had good eyes and lightning-quick reflexes. He would see the perilous transparent slip of plastic and sidestep to avoid it, even gaining a modicum of admiration from the bystanders. It would only garner more sympathy for his plight, then, when an improbable chain of events that began in the dusty spaces above the cupboards made a bowling ball fall on the desk next to where he’d landed, triggering the drawers’ spring-loaded latches at once and throwing all three drawers at Jowd’s calf with considerable strength. The man yowled in pain as he fell over and squinted at the last movement of this drawers disaster: a sheet of wrapping paper and a ribbon somehow flew out of them only to land exactly on his shoulder.

“Doctor’s gonna order some rest for this. You are welcome,” he said through the ghost world. Jowd’s laughter almost tore down the place and so Sissel congratulated himself upon a job well done: his dad had gotten his present.

His other dad would turn out to be a more complicated affair.

Not that anyone else in all his extended families had any claim to the title of “uncomplicated”, ever, but Yomiel remained the uncontested champion in the opposite direction and so Sissel tailed him for a few days, in and out of the ghost world, waiting for inspiration to strike. Yomiel’s new life needed… a dishwasher, a subscription to at least three computer magazines, a book called “Cooking for newbs” (spelling uncertain), a substantial supply of hair gel, a cat-shaped ladle and a cat-printed tie, Sissel learned, none of which were things a ghost cat could provide, unless a ghost cat felt like stooping to ghost crimes.

Rain again. It was a dark and stormy afternoon when Yomiel grabbed an umbrella and got ready to make a run to the convenience store down the corner; Sissel duly followed him inside the umbrella itself. They coasted a pile of junk discarded next to the wall of an abandoned building – broken chairs, a desk, file cabinets, cardboard boxes littered the sidewalk. Nothing special, nothing new. If not for his ghost senses, Sissel would have never given it a second thought. But that presence was there, undoubtedly. So Sissel jumped out of the umbrella and into a fire hydrant, and from there he frantically looked for the control unit of the nearest street lamp.

Sunlight was fading, and the city would soon bask in in its warm artificial lights, but that one street lamp lit up ahead of time to shine a spotlight on the pile of cardboard boxes. Yomiel raised an eyebrow under his shades. The street lamp went out and lit up again. Yomiel shot it a pointed look and approached the boxes underneath.

As he moved one of them aside, a kitten meowed at him, red fur darkened by the relentless rain. It was lost and hungry and had the biggest, roundest paws; Yomiel teared up as he tried to hold it and felt it hold him in turn. He cradled the kitten close to his chest and greeted it with his warmest, most private smile.

The whole street lit up.

“I know it was you, Sissel,” Yomiel whispered to the empty boxes. “You could’ve just told me! Who’s givin’ ya this knack for theatrics?”

“Statistically, you.”

“As if. I’m onto you. But… thank you, my friend.”

“...you are welcome. Just don’t name it after me, will you? Try to break the streak?”

“I’m not making any promises.”