#make a choice today invest in Bitcoin and earn big | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

bitcofun · 2 years

Text

This is a viewpoint editorial by AlbertaHodl, a Canadian dairy and beef farmer and an enthusiastic bitcoin miner. This is a farmer's point of view on why it is a great concept to mine bitcoin. I was born and raised on a farm. I got an economics, company and hard-work degree without in fact ending up any post-secondary education. Times was difficult. My daddy divided the farm with his bro in1998 As a 10- year-old, I busted my ass in addition to my 13- year-old bro due to the fact that we didn't have an option. Cash was tight. Rate of interest had actually lastly reached "typical" levels and product costs were not excellent, however life was great. Ever since, we have actually had the ability to effectively broaden our operation, purchase larger and much better devices, more land and more animals. Here we are today, in the very same boat as a great deal of other farmers and ranchers: Big enough to make money, however questioning what to do now. Land around us is pressing $15,000 per acre. No matter where you farm, the expenses are leaving hand. New and even secondhand devices is beginning to appear out of reach and low rates of interest had to do with the only favorable thing if you required a loan. Well, kiss that bye-bye. When you include on political guidelines, fertilizer and labor expenses, much of us farmers are reassessing the next product on our ever-growing dream list. It's quite hard to summarize a generic roi that consists of inputs, watering expenses, seeding expenses, and so on, however any farmer is aware of the long-lasting financial investment that devices, land and animals are. Land does not even pay itself off, however we validate it by utilizing the rest of our operation's earnings to squeak in another parcel, a couple of more sets of animals or that larger tool that will conserve us money and time in order for us to purchase another tractor, seeder, sprayer, a couple of more sets of animals or that a person more valuable field. It's a continuous cycle that we have actually grown familiar with-- a fiat state of mind of the modern-day servant. Low-cost credit incentivizes obtaining for the boat, the toys, the larger home, and so on; it never ever ends. As a long-lasting farmer, I comprehend the hesitancy of checking out other alternatives, doing something brand-new, going beyond our convenience zone. I actually do. Bitcoin? Become aware of it in2017 It seemed like a rip-off, so I didn't trouble to check out it. I must have. 2020 happened and our household farm was shaken by the politics surrounding COVID-19 We were at a loss. Absolutely nothing made good sense. The world, and particularly Canada, appeared to be going to shit. We had our faith and I can not start to describe just how much that contributed in our peace of mind and confusion through the tough times we were dealing with. Like numerous farmers, we were possession abundant, however money bad. Through the ups and the downs, I came across Bitcoin. Little old me, out in the nation, beginning to discover and comprehend cash, the timechain, freezer, evidence of work-- all the important things associated with Bitcoin. Trying to find out as much as I can has made my head spin sometimes, however I felt hope right now. Bitcoin is hope! My objective is to reveal why bitcoin is an excellent financial investment and great for you if you comprehend it enough to HODL. Multigenerational farms naturally have a low time choice so if you comprehend Bitcoin, then why not begin mining the possession that is more difficult than the land we farm? Being Canadian, home rights have really rapidly end up being a glaring issue. Since the Justin Trudeau-led federal government froze checking account, many individuals have actually awakened to the reality that absolutely nothing is truly their own any longer. We do not own our cash and we can't own home without paying numerous taxes. If we have a great year and make great deals of cash, we need to pay a lot more taxes. It's a vicious circle.

Farmers and ranchers constantly depend on difficult properties for retirement, however seeing farmers in the Netherlands and Europe getting purchased out as policies and high energy rates require their hand is a pointer that just bitcoin can really be yours. This has a number of us believing that possibly the possessions that we prepare to utilize for retirement and give to our kids aren't rather as safe as we as soon as believed. Most farmers are taking a look at a timespan of 10-20 years for roi. We now have a choice that might return that in much less time. We will happily purchase the next-door neighbor's farm or field with rates of interest at 3-5%. Is it time to think about taking the deposit approaching the next long-lasting financial investment and rather purchase a shed, some ASICs, a couple of fans and begin an individual stack devoid of know-your-customer (KYC) tracking? Rather of another $500,000 loan for land, you might secure a smaller sized loan to get bitcoin mining makers going. There are numerous advantages: great deals of rural power readily available, devices are a service tax write-off, so rather of purchasing that nitrogen at $800 per lot, that pricey piece of farming devices or some more animal sets, you purchase some miners. Hypothetically, the bitcoin mined might be dispersed to whomever you desire. Possibly it remains on the farm balance sheet. Perhaps it's part of your succession strategy and goes to your kids. Perhaps it becomes your retirement cost savings. That's the charm of bitcoin! You get to choose. If you are running any sort of effective farm, you need to have the ability to subtract the power costs from other earnings. Even in bear markets when the hash cost drops significantly, you can validate keeping makers running. Rather of putting your heart and soul into another piece of land, possibly begin mining rather. There are no hail problems, calving issues, dry spell years or hidden input-cost headaches. You secure your power, get your electrical contractor to run some wire and some ethernet cable, include some fans and you're getting a roi. The labor to keep a lot of ASICs running is much less than one hour each week utilizing grid power. And the devices have the possible to pay in the hardest property worldwide! When I initially proposed buying some bitcoin utilizing our farm's treasury, my dad was beyond doubtful. It was something he didn't comprehend, however he did see the requirement for a sound cash that could not be pumped up. After various discussions, we bought some to hang on the farm's balance sheet. We kept decreasing the bunny hole and utilized a few of that bitcoin to buy miners. Over the next month, it was late nights of developing out the shed, the tunnel, running wires and awaiting the devices to get here. The setup was a bit frustrating sometimes and relied greatly on a couple of extremely handy Bitcoin Twitter good friends to overcome the kinks. Finally, we were hashing. Came the minute I was waiting for: My Dad stated, "Hey, if this bitcoin thing actually takes off then my succession preparation for the non-farm kids will be an entire lot much easier." He's at retirement age, yet he comprehended the ramifications of a financial system out of the control of the State. Not sure where to begin? I'm a millennial that barely utilizes a computer system any longer, however I had the ability to figure it out. Not exactly sure about power, ethernet and air flow? Talk with an electrical expert for aid with the power requires and connect to myself or a variety of more well-informed individuals on Bitcoin Twitter. Many individuals took time out of their day to offer me tips and suggestions. Mining is not as challenging as you 'd believe and ASICs are inexpensive today. Compose them off as overhead, invest a long time looking into and begin obtaining satoshis. As a farmer, I constantly wish to rely on individuals, however among my most significant concerns was getting my hands on miners without getting scammed.

I barely understood what bitcoin was, not to mention how to negotiate with it. I was frightened of losing our farm's bitcoin. I listened to a John Vallis podcast with Steve Barbour from Upstream Data. The method Barbour discussed company operations, economics and stability instantly provided me a sensation of trust. I connected to Upstream Data and asked if they might hook me up. For me, a huge part of the offer was having the ability to select them up personally at their storage facility; the secret, I expect, was to confirm rather of simply trusting them. I understood they put trust in me also if they wanted to have me get the miners at their center. They did their part and I was more than pleased to make the drive and select them up and have a couple drinks with the men. There are lots of reputable providers out there and I'm not going to state one is much better than another. Currently I'm attempting to get access to some gas wells that have actually been deserted on and around our residential or commercial property. Envision the expense reduction if you do not need to spend for power from the grid. Think of producing worth from the Earth's core without any authorization. To sum up, with all the unpredictability worldwide, home rights apparently vanishing, a damaged financial system, inflation escalating, high rates of interest, what do you need to lose by putting a little portion of your operation's earnings into a financial investment that possibly returns in 2 years or less? The only labor included is keeping some computer systems running. I 'd state there is a much bigger danger loaning great deals of capital to acquire land or devices. Best-case situation is you begin an individual, non-KYC stack, composing the power and ASICs off through the business. That offers you monetary flexibility for generations to come, throughout the world. All it took was a couple messages of motivation on Bitcoin Twitter to light a fire under my ass. What's stopping you? This is a visitor post by AlbertaHodl. Viewpoints revealed are completely their own and do not always show those of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine. Read More

0 notes

philiphenry · 4 years

Text

#finance #make a choice today invest in Bitcoin and earn big

0 notes

oviframesap · 3 years

Text

What Are the Benefits of Trading with the Ov Iframes

Ov Iframes o living a decent life nowadays- all kudos to our dad and mom! They have got invested their time, did all of the tough work, and in particular positioned their cash into gratifying our desires, big dreams! But however, they maintain consuming our heads to keep money and more money, and we preserve wondering how we need to do this? Furthermore, how have to we convert our little financial savings into massive returns! Up your socks and climb the ladder to invest wherever you may with in any way quantity (numerous investment avenues/inventory markets if you want to fetch pursuits/returns over some time) and keep your alternative supply of earnings or passive income (any secondary way for generating inflows) and attempt to hold it regularly in preference to relying best for your everyday earnings source. Ov Iframes oassessment - automobile trading platform

assessment of Ov Iframes orevie

all of us are witnessing that these days marketplace dynamics are changing unexpectedly, on occasion it is at its height, and less times, it simply crashes down; in such eventualities it’s difficult to preserve liquidity because it impacts the supply of cash inside the economic system or let’s say money market. So why not we have to upgrade ourselves to the e-foreign money/ cryptocurrency with the upgrading technologies and ever-converting technological dimensions in which bots simplifies most of the matters (be it a machine pushed or human-robot). We are able to take gain of this in our regular life and generate adequate benefits out of it sure, a celeb and not using a rocket science, but a easy bot, which facilitates in smooth trading and facilitation of activities within the bitcoin marketplace. Similar to another bot, it is backed via logical algorithms, supports automated trading functions, and promises clean to recognize outputs. This famous person is advanced within the 21st century, which has handed the technology where we needed to pressure down and carry out guide calculations to recognize our anticipated earnings or returns out of sure investments. Ov Iframes ois an automatic trading utility which is based totally on ai (artificial intelligence) technique abiding by components of system learning and herbal language processors which collects the marketplace records from one-of-a-kind assets, stratifies it into clusters and tries to derive a meaningful insight out of it to manual the traders to take funding choices with properly accuracy ranges

Ov Iframes Review o a blessed generation witnessing automation tendencies and upgrades in all of the fields. And, Ov Iframes ohas been bitcoins’ today's development inside the bot software; it maintains operating all day and night time, unlike human beings. Even if you are on rest mode, the app will give you the results you want by way of gathering market data and signaling into the insights as in step with the investor’s possibilities. Funding choices are taken primarily based on utility analytics. This will give you a choose and in opposition to tips and then conducts change basis the alternatives that one makes. Being a robot software, it routinely indicates the right to time to exchange whilst it witnesses the worthwhile possibility to invest via mapping the marketplace conditions and options with that of the investor’s set options or pre-described parameters. However, due to better market volatility and particularly being a brand new entrant in the market, the chance is likewise excessive inside the cryptocurrency marketplace. It’s gaining recognition round the sector and is the talk of the cryptocurrency market. It is a boon to the bitcoin world. Peculiarities of the application

Ov Iframes o is one such absolutely computerized bitcoin trading platform, that is creating masses of buzz amongst buyers. The platform offers the choice of guide buying and selling as properly. Ov Iframes o robot makes it more convenient for cryptocurrency trading. Additionally, it facilitates you build a numerous cryptocurrency investment portfolio. But, relying absolutely on buying and selling software is a motive of fear amongst few. Therefore, we've organized this in-intensity overview of Ov Iframes o to reply all your questions on the way it works. You will be happy to realize that we located the software program running noticeably well in our assessment and suitable to head for trading crypto. Features of Ov Iframes

https://www.oviframes.com/ https://twitter.com/ovIframes https://www.instagram.com/oviframes/ https://www.pinterest.co.uk/oviframes/ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk1FhCiqOWnamTJdgcMliVw https://www.linkedin.com/in/oviframes/ https://www.facebook.com/oviframes

#Ov Iframes

1 note · View note

lanaisnotwool · 4 years

Video

youtube

419 You Can't Eat Gold

https://moneyripples.com/2020/09/03/419-you-cant-eat-gold/

I want to talk about gold in this episode and the basic concept behind it. Where it’s good and where it’s far off the mark. It’s about buying real assets.

But here’s the thing, you can’t eat gold, silver, and even property. And this is the key thing that we are going to focus on in this video.

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

Listen to our Podcast here:

https://www.blogtalkradio.com/moneyripples/2020/07/22/419--you-cant-eat-gold

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

Hello, my fellow Ripplers! This is Chris Miles. Your Cash Flow Expert and Anti-Financial Advisor. And I want to welcome you out for a wonderful show. Show that is for you and it’s about you. Those of you that work so hard for your money, and you’re ready for your money to start working harder for you. Now! You want to be able to work because you want to not because you have to. You want to create that freedom. That cash flow. That prosperity. Today! Not 30 or 40 years from now, but right now. So you can have all that freedom to do what you want. To be with those that you love. Doing what you love, right? But on top of that, it’s so much more than creating your own freedom for yourself and be able to live and consume and buy hot, you know, hot cars and airplanes and all that kind of stuff, right?

It’s about living a life of meaning and purpose. About creating a ripple effect through the lives of others. And that’s what it means to be a Rippler. Is that you’re here to make the planet a better place by you being on it by being a creator, not a consumer. By means, someone who actually creates something more than just your life of own consumption. And so guys, welcome to the show. Thank you so much for bingeing for sharing this with others and making this show bigger and bigger all the time. And that’s in large part due to you guys. So thank you so much for being here.

As a reminder, check out our website, MoneyRipples.com There’s great blogs on there. You can actually watch videos of these same podcasts. As well as on YouTube. And of course you can check out that free e-book Beyond Rice and Beans, Seven Secrets to Free Up Cash Today. Where you can be able to find more money, to be able to put it to use. Getting it working for you now. So check it out!

So today I want to talk about a concept. Really, this is probably going to be a long podcast. This might be one of my shorter ones, for sure. But I want to talk about, you know, gold, silver, and those kinds of things, and really the basic concept behind it and where it’s good and where people that talk about it. Even the people that seem to be smart about investing could be far off the Mark here. So, you know, I actually just saw a video recently with my wife. She showed it to me where Kiyosaki in an interview last May. He said, Hey, you know what, right now I think buying gold, silver, you know, oil, you know, that kind of stuff is great. You know, buying real assets, which I 100% agree with. I think you should buy real assets, not the paper versions of them. Right?

Now, I’m not talking about buying like the, oil, you know, the oil ETF and things like that, right. Or gold or silver ETFs and things like that. Don’t buy mutual fund versions of these things. This is not what we’re talking about here. He’s talking about buying real assets, including real estate, right? Things of that nature. And which I definitely agree with. Now, I don’t always agree with Kiyosaki at every aspect. And that’s fine. He’s got his opinions and I’ve got mine and he could be right and I could be wrong and I could be right and he could be wrong. And it doesn’t matter. Right? What really matters is that I like to always go back to the core principles of wealth. The core principles of what really makes money work. Now, he mentioned that gold and silver would be great. He actually mentioned that silver would be better than in gold.

And he’s been saying this for years and I’ve been saying something similar too. It’s interesting because gold up until recently looked like it was doing way better than silver, you know, because when people are running away from the markets, right? A lot of times, especially they see money being printed like crazy. They start running off to gold and silver and I’ve had clients ask me this. They’ve been asking me this for months. And I’m like Chris, with all this money being printed by the feds and allowing the government to start pumping cash out to the people, do you think gold and silver is the place to be? My answer is this. Is that, do not bank on buying gold and silver. You know, now, again, I’m not giving investment advice or anything like that, but if you’re trying to play and ride the markets, this could be a very risky venture.

Plus, you got to understand that these things do not create income, passive income. To me, that’s where there’s real financial freedom. And it doesn’t mean that gold silver couldn’t be good. Right? He even mentioned Bitcoin, by the way. He mentioned Bitcoin as well. Hey, I’ve even done some stuff with Bitcoin and made some money off of it. Right? You know, which is funny because two and a half years ago, I said, don’t buy it well after it crashed, that’s what I did. I said, Hey, I’ll put a little bit of money in, but very tiny amount of money. This is like money that if it disappeared, I wouldn’t even know it’s gone. Right? I actually made some money off of it. Cause the Bitcoin did go up from where I thought it was a low and I was right.

But here’s the thing, is that, you cannot eat Bitcoin. You cannot eat gold. You cannot eat silver. You can’t even eat a property for that matter. Although at least to the income coming off of it can help. The truth is, is that you can only eat food, right? And this is the key thing I want to focus on because so many people think, Oh, gold and silver, that’s the place to be, especially as a, as a good hedge. I totally agree. When I buy gold and silver, I actually look at it as an inflation hedge. I look at it as Jerome Powell, insurance, right? When the feds keep printing more and more money, I look at it as like an insurance policy. I buy as a protection against me. Now I’m going to put all my money there. No way, no way. This is like a small teeny piece of my portfolio. Really. It’s actually a piece of my savings.

If you remember, I had just a few weeks back, did a show called how to diversify your savings. Right? I mentioned gold and silver a little bit there. You know, I do diversify and put a tiny amount of that money in gold, silver as an inflation hedge in case the dollars gets wasted. Now I’ve got my life insurance that also does do well in addition to that. So I’m not so worried about all my money becoming worthless, right? But definitely I don’t believe in being very heavy, like very, very cash heavy where it’s just sitting in cash, earning point, nothing percent in the bank, you know, I’ll keep some money there, but I’ve got moneys elsewhere. You know, that’s why I have the life insurance to help pay me much better. Tax-free dividends. I’ve also got some gold and silver, you know, for that reason, it’s almost like this insurance policy to protect it.

I look at as the same investment strategy as this. If you guys know who Mark Cuban is, he was on the TV show. Shark tank. Well, still is. I should say. Owner of the Dallas Mavericks, you know, very outspoken guy. It’s interesting because when he sold his company off, right, he sold it to Yahoo. Back in, right around Y2K. And when he sold it, they paid him in Yahoo stock. They didn’t pay him cash. They paid him in Yahoo stock. Now 2005 comes around. Google hits the scene, right? Google started becoming the big monster of choice where Yahoo just disappears into nothing. That’s a little bit. Well, their stock tanks while Google’s is going up from 2005 on that’s when Google stock came out. Well, you know, what’s interesting is you think Mark Cuban would have lost money. And technically he did at the same time, he didn’t. Because what he also did with that stock, that Yahoo stock, he also bought of his own money.

Put options. Put options for those you don’t know, it’s essentially you’re gambling on that stock going down. You’re betting against that stock. So he bought a put option where it makes money. If the market goes down and when you buy an option, an option has much bigger volatility, more influx, than you would get with a stock. So if the stock goes up, then the put option goes down big time. If the stock goes down, the put option goes, goes up big time. So you make money when the market, when the stock drops. And this is something I tell you when I was teaching people how to trade stocks and options is, Hey, buy a put option against this stock to protect yourself. So it was kind of this married put strategy. Well, that’s what he did. He did a married put about the stock, where he had the stock ownership and he bought the put option against it.

So when Yahoo tanked, his put option made a lot more money, or at least pretty good close to the amount of money he was losing in the Yahoo stock. Which allowed him to have more cash which allowed him to still have money there. That is exactly how I see gold and silver. Gold and silver is the same thing. Essentially, when the, you know, the dollar is tanking was losing value. Usually, usually. Not all the time. Gold and silver goes up in value, right? When that, because people go running to flee to those areas to go buy more and that drives the price up. Well, cool. When it does that, that means the price of your cash goes up essentially, right? Again, I don’t like to be heavy in those metals because the truth is you can’t eat it and there’s no real utility without the ability to exchange it. It doesn’t matter.

So I’m thinking like doomsday. Right? Okay. So I always like to go to the doomsday part because I want to expect the best, but prepare for the worst. So when I look at it, I think of, okay, I’m going to buy physical gold and silver I’ll even buy 10 of ounces. That’s easier to trade because we ever got the point where the dollar say worst case collapses. No one wants to even use the dollar anymore. But gold and silver still has intrinsic value, which over history it has. Great. I can use it to exchange. Here’s a key point though. What happens if people are starving? And we saw this when COVID first started, you remember the toilet paper shortage. It didn’t matter how much gold and silver you had. You couldn’t buy toilet paper because it wasn’t there. Right? This is true.

Even with like certain meats. I mean, we couldn’t even find chicken. You know, like the type of chicken we buy, it was gone at all the grocery stores. What do you do then? See, understand that just because you have money or just because you have gold, silver Bitcoin, doesn’t matter just because you have those things. It doesn’t mean you get the very necessities of life. And this is what I mean by you cannot eat gold. You can’t eat this stuff. Now. I’m not saying you don’t have it. I’m not saying it’s not a good inflation hedge, but I’m not buying it as like the way to bank and essentially have my own money. Even Bitcoin. I’m not even using it as a way to exchange money digitally. The truth is by the way, the U S is probably gonna create their own digital currency in the next few years. Anyways.

That’s why they’re hiring. That’s what they’re recruiting people out of these types of digital currency companies to help them do this. Like it’s already written on the wall. You can already kind of see it happening. We’re going to go the digital currency at some point. Anyways, we’ve got a coin shortage for that matter. I mean, come on. How do we get a coin shortage? Seriously? So there’s something going on, right? This is why, again, I don’t trust on just banking on things. You know, things don’t matter. It’s about what you can exchange it for. If I were to give you any good investment advice. And I don’t say this often, I’m saying you’re gonna invest in anything. Buy food. Buy food that could be sustainable. You know, you might buy food that could be considered a luxury. You know, my wife even talk about buying chocolate, you know, she’d have the stores of chocolate saying, Hey, you know what people, if they’re at the point where they’re starving, chocolate could be like a delicacy at that point. Which is true, you know, so, okay, cool.

That’s, I’m not saying you buy chocolate. I’m just saying, if anything, guys make sure that as part of your reserves, right? Not just your investments, but part of your reserves. Gold and silver is fine or whatever. You want to have a little inflation hedge on your money. But I would say first and foremost, build up your food storage. Maybe a few or ways to be able to have few and take care of your needs. Essentially emergency prep, right? I’m not saying you go totally extreme. I’m not saying guns and ammo and all that kind of stuff too. Although that might not be a bad idea either. That’s stuff that we definitely look at buying as well, but I’m talking about like actual food. By the way, inflation hedge wise. Guess what usually goes up and costs first when there’s inflation. Food. So if there’s a shortage on food, then there’s definitely a price hike.

But even regardless. Even if there’s not a shortage on food, food goes up with inflation. So at least you got something like that. Now I’m not talking about buying junk that expires tomorrow. And you could do like what we do, where we rotate through the food. Cause sometimes the expiration dates on good foods might be less than a year or two, you know? So you might have to rotate it. Like keep that storage of the food up. Keep storage of water. You know, if you’ve watched the movie Dune, right? If you remember Dune back from the eighties, that was gold. Was water because it was a precious resource. If there’s a drought, we need water. Right? And that’s a basic necessity of life.

So guys, when I’m talking about this, I’m really talking about having your basic necessities met. Money can’t always give you everything you need in life. In fact, there are many times when money doesn’t matter. People, if they can’t eat gold, they can’t drink silver. You know, but you can’t drink silver. But if you can’t have those things, you cannot survive. People will go for their basic necessities. Make sure that’s there first. Make sure you have your basic necessities. Don’t go hoarding. And I’m not saying like, just stuff your house full. And then you can walk for it. Do everything with proper wisdom in order, right? But I’m telling you if you’re looking for a good investment to invest in, great buy a little gold and silver, if you want, but go towards food and water first. Go for those basic necessities first, because if anything happens, power goes out and you can’t get to the ATMs. Hey, people may not be using gold and silver. They may not care. You want to go for something that people value and necessities of life are part of that value.

So, anyways, guys, that’s kinda my thing here today. That’s something that’s been on my mind for months. I’ve been wanting to share with you guys, but you know, Hey, it’s always good to play good offense, but make sure you have a good defense too, right? And no team can win with only a good offense and that we’re not win easily with a good offense. You’ve got to have both. You’ve got both. You have peace of mind. You have security and you have confidence. And when you have that confidence, you move forward differently. You make better financial decisions and you make more money. It’s just like, love begets love. Hate begets hate. Well money begets money. When you have those things in place and you have confidence in place, more will come, more security will come and everything that you need is there. So guys, I hope you make it a wonderful and prosperous week. And we’ll see you later.

#Chris Miles #Anti-financial Advisor #Cash flow #Cash flow Expert #Debts #Entrepreneur #Financial Freedom #Money Ripples

14 notes · View notes

cryptoinvestorfan · 4 years

Text

(Review) Best Top 5 Cryptocurrency Tumbler (Reliable Bitcoin Mixer 2019/2020)

I regret to inform you Bitcoin transactions are far from being anonymous. If this news was not a surprise to you, you’ve most likely used tumbler services and mixed your coins to make them untraceable.If you’re new to tumblers or looking for reliable ones here are our top mixing websites; where you can choose the best Bitcoin mixer personally for you. You will agree that it is a necessity to keep in mind a reliable platform to access any time when you need to clean your tinted coins or make them untraceable.

Look: this article will tell you about 5 best tumbler services operating online for your comfortable choice. Bitcoin mixing has become incredibly popular since the time when the first evidence of coin traceability has been presented. A pseudo-anonymous character of crypto transactions led to the fact that crypto holders began to look for cheap and effective ways of how to increase the level of confidentiality and Bitcoin mixing platforms have become one of them.

A mixer, scrambler or tumbler is a website that is used by Bitcoin holders to disconnect the sender and recipient of the transaction. It is performed by mixing user’s coins in the general pool with coins of other users and private reserves of the service. The procedure is simple and cheap though it requires some time to complete — on most of the services, users select the time of delay themselves and it can take up to several days until clean coins are delivered to the address provided.

Today, more and more websites start offering mixing services to crypto holders, but not all of them can be trusted. We have selected 5 best scramblers suitable for mixing coins.

#1 Cryptmixer(Read)

https://cryptmixer.com/

Supported cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, Monero, Bitcoin Cash

Transaction fee: 0.5% service fee no up charge for payout addresses

Minimum Deposit: 0.001 BTC

Multiple Addresses: 5

Confirmations Required: yes

No Logs Policy: yes

Exchange: yes

Registration Required: no

Referral Program: no

Letter of Guarantee: no

This mixer and exchange is one of a kind. They offer mixing services for everyone at a very low cost, just 0.5%. CryptMixer has a massive reserve of 2000 coins so you’ll never have to wait more than 1 confirmation or 30 minutes max to send your coins. It is one of the finest cryptocurrency tumbler which is used by most of the Bitcoin owners. The best thing about this bitcoin mixer that it provides instant mix. 650 of those coins are dedicated to BTC which have never been tainted. Moreover, CryptMixer offers an exchange service as well for Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, Bitcoin Cash and Monero. It’s a one stop when it comes to converting your coins to an unknown coin origin. The next page will show you the amount of fee to pay for the transaction, a wallet address to send coins to or scan a QR code, and a code to write down for any further transactions via the platform.

Other benefits of this mixer are no logs policy and a 7-day retention period for a better confidentiality level. There is also a referral program which allows earning 50% of the service fee for every mix completed with the referral link. The minimum withdrawal amount is 0.002 BTC.

How We Picked

Since the number of scrambler services grows incessantly, it was not easy to select only ten of them. However, the main factors we have considered compiling this list were the following ones:

Popularity of tumbler on the Web;

Domination of positive reviews;

Higher rating among users;

A variety of features and benefits offered to users;

Number of crypto coins mixed;

Simplicity of the mixing process;

Affordability;

Anonymity level.

How We Tested

Each of the following services was analyzed by our team to ensure that they operate at the moment and are not scams. We have sent a minimum amount to every service to check their work and received clean untainted coins back paying a minimum commission. Moreover, our team has analyzed reviews of these services and feedback provided by other users as well as learned all the features of these platforms to select only the best of them.However, it is our obligation to warn you that we are not responsible for the work of these tumblers. Despite our positive experience, mixing is a risky process which can lead to unpredictable consequences and even loss of your coins. Therefore, we recommend all our readers to invest only that amount which is not critical for them.

Why You Should Trust Us

It is natural that the best way to use bitcoin mixer is to avoid registration and perform a minimum of steps during the process. However, it is important to remember of the fact that the number of scams increases together with the number of reliable platforms, so sometimes it is better to spend more time on mixing and minimize risks. Our team of specialists in the crypto industry has much experience and follows all the latest trends in this sphere. We communicate with hundreds of crypto holders as well as make our own experiments to understand if one or another platform is worth your attention and investment. Our team has spent days to conduct a detailed analysis of every platform so that this list of best tumblers was reliable and trusted. We hope that our work will help you to make the right choice of the scrambler and get clean coins in case you decide to use its services.

When Bitcoin Tumbling is Necessary?

Digital money, as well as fiat money, is traceable and despite much information about Bitcoin anonymous character, there is more and more evidence that crypto transactions can be traced and it is even possible to find out who is the holder of the certain wallet on the basis of the transactions made from or to it. It is a widely known fact that blockchain makes records of the history of transactions and they are available to the public. Nowadays, we face many examples of analysis software which helps to connect two parties of every transaction, make up the history of transactions of a certain wallet, and even compare personal data from the Internet with it. As a result, we can see that crypto transactions are pseudo-anonymous and need additional steps to achieve privacy. Mixers, tumblers, scramblers, and laundry services have been created with the goal to disconnect a sender and a recipient of the transaction as well as clean tinted coins received from unreliable sources. These services perform this function for a minimum commission and add users’ coins to the general pool to mix them or work in a different way like Cryptmixer, but they are meant to improve the anonymous character of coins and they cope with this task perfectly.

Summing up

There are many reasons to make crypto transactions anonymous and mixing platforms help to achieve this goal. At the same time, it is important to choose only those tumblers which have confirmed their reliability and served a big number of users successfully. Every online transaction involves some percentage of risk, but there are much more chances to get your coins cleaned successfully if you use the best mixing services listed in this article.

#2 BitBlender(Read)

https://bitblender.io/

http://bitblendervrfkzr.onion/

Supported cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin

Transaction fee: 1–3%

Minimum Deposit: 0.01 BTC

Multiple Addresses: 10

Confirmations Required: yes

No Logs Policy: no

Registration Required: no

Referral Program: yes

Letter of Guarantee: no

BitBlender is one of the oldest mixing platforms on the web which was launched by a Bitcoin enthusiast who wanted to help other crypto owners to keep the privacy of their transactions. What differs this service from others is the simplicity of its design and the tumbling process. It is one of a few platforms which are hidden by Tor browser and guarantee a higher level of anonymity.The service does not ask its users to provide any other personal information but it is necessary to register an account to start tumbling. Crypto holders need to open the onion link through a Tor browser, sign up for the website, and select ‘Quick mix’ to complete the process as fast as possible.There are several features which make BitBlender outstanding in the modern market of mixing services:

Quick Mix Using a restoreable session ID, guests of the website can return to the session any time within 48 hours since the initiation.

Several destination addresses is possible to provide up to 10 additional addresses to randomize mixed coins.

Time delay Users can select the desired time delay themselves. They are offered several variants no matter whether they sent coins to one or several addresses.

Logs are deleted automatically logs are stored within 48 hours and then are deleted in an automatic manner. The platform does not leave any information connected with the transaction.

Quick processing as soon as a user gets a notification about the delivery of coins, they are ready for withdrawal and any other operations.

BitBlender works similar to other tumbler services since a user sends coins to the address generated. They are added to the so-called ‘pot’ where all other coins are stores and mixed with them within the period of time delay indicated. In this way, any chain between a sender and a recipient is broken.

#3 SmartMix(Read)

Links:

https://smartmix.io/

https://smartmixnjmuoixj.onion/

Supported cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin, Bitcoin

CashTransaction fee: 0.5% plus 0.0001BTC for every Extra Address Minimum

Deposit: 0.001 BTC

Multiple Addresses: 5 Confirmations Required: from 2 to 30

No Logs Policy: yes

Registration Required: no

Referral Program: yes

Letter of Guarantee: no

What is ‘easy mixing’, you may wonder. In fact, it is a process performed on SmartMix platform where you can tumble both Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash. There is no need to sign-up for the platform to start a mixing process — the only thing you should do is to select a coin. As soon as you do that, the platform will ask you to perform the following steps:

Provide a final address or up to 5 possible addresses to deliver coins to;

Select a payment type each with a certain number of confirmations (from 2 up to 30);

Insert a SmartClub Code (given to users who have already used a service at least once);

Press ‘Start Mixing’ button.

The next page will show you the amount of fee to pay for the transaction, a wallet address to send coins to or scan a QR code, and a code to write down for any further transactions via the platform. There are two mixing modes to choose from: fast mixing will guarantee you an almost instant delivery of funds, while a delayed mode will make you wait for a certain period of time you have selected.Other benefits of this scrambler are no logs policy and a 7-day retention period for a better confidentiality level. There is also a referral program which allows earning 50% of the service fee for every mix completed with the referral link. The minimum withdrawal amount is 0.002 BTC and BCH.

#4 ChipMixer(Read)

Links: https://chipmixer.com/

http://chipmixerwzxtzbw.onion/

Supported cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin

Transaction fee: pay what you want

Minimum Deposit: 0.001 BTC

Multiple Addresses: unlimited

Confirmations Required: from 1 to 6

No Logs Policy: yes

Registration Required: no

Referral Program: no

Letter of Guarantee: yes

Being one of the mixers which guarantees a much higher anonymity level than others, ChipMixer is also a unique chip tumbler that works in an absolutely different way from other services. The service has wallets with chips that range from 0.01BTC to 8.192BTC which can be split and merged according to the wishes of their holder. These chips are delivered to the wallets earlier than a crypto holder sends funds to the platform, so it is impossible to connect the following transactions in any way. Moreover, every user has up to 7 days or even more (on request) to send coins after the initiation of the mixing process. However, the private keys to the wallet with chips are given to a user only when funds are delivered to the service. From this moment, a user can split and merge coins in the necessary amounts, send them to addresses required, or just store them waiting for their value to grow. All the processes are performed manually, so users are not dependent on any services and can distribute funds as they wish.

Since mixing is performed by the user, there is no standard fee for this process and crypto holders can decide themselves what amount to donate. It is worth mentioning that deposits are counted till three decimal points and a platform gives every user a signed receipt as a reliable source of coin origin. Moreover, there is a betting option to have fun and even increase your crypto assets if you are lucky.

#5 Cryptomixer(Read)

https://cryptomixer.io/

cryptomixns23scr.onion

Supported cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin

Transaction fee: from 0.5% to 3%

Minimum Deposit: 0.001 BTC

Multiple Addresses: 10

Confirmations Required: yes

No Logs Policy: yes

Registration Required: no

Referral Program: yes

Letter of Guarantee: yes

The platform began to offer mixing services in 2016 and is actively used by crypto owners today. It features a reserve of 2,000 coins which allows to make tumbling almost instant and helps to decrease their traceability to the minimum. All the data about the transaction is deleted in 7 days. This service says about proven on Bitcoin Talk reserves and marks every coin which been already cleaned on the platform to prevent it from the return to the customer’s wallet again. It is performed via providing a unique CryptoMixer code during the first transaction.The mixing procedure on the platform is very simple and quick. There is no need to register since you can start mixing when you open the website landing page and press the ‘Start’ button. You will be redirected to the page where you need:

To provide a CryptoMixer code (invent and write it down if you use this service for the first time);

To enter bitcoin forward to address or several of them (up to 10). Funds are distributed by percentages indicated next to each address. It is possible to adjust them on the bar under the service fee bar:

Set a delay (optional). The system determines a delay time automatically and shows it next to each destination address. It can be adjusted on the bar at the bottom of the page too;

Select a service fee by dragging the bar. The minimum fee is 0.5% plus 0.0005 HTC for every transaction. It can be lower if you mix a bigger amount of cryptocurrency (for example, 0.25% for mixing 1,000BTC).

When all this information is provided, it is necessary to press ‘Continue’ and accept two terms of the platform. After that, you will need to send funds to the platform to the address generated or scanning a QR code provided. This page will also offer you to download a Letter of Guarantee for your security.

The platform offers a calculator on the first page for every user to see how much cryptocurrency is sent and what amount is received after mixing. Other great features are a lifetime affiliate program which pays out up to 50%, mobile responsiveness, and easy-to-use API.

#crypto #bitcoin #tumbling #mixers #bitcoin mixers #bitcoin tumbling #tumblers #ethereum #litcoin #btc #ripple #bch #anonymity

1 note · View note

witch-of-rage29-blog · 5 years

Text

Is really an exploration that is bitcοin fraud set in Rusѕiа?

Asia normally examіning the customers of clearing the nation of all of the exploration this is certainly potential considering that it probably do injury to thе environment. Are reasonable, nonetheless, this can be things Asia happens to be considered for a relatively good correct time, it’ѕ never ever produced action. Iran, having said that, has deсlared bitcoin mining fullу appropriate around the nation, thοugh this might be because lеgiѕlаtоrs seek strategies to probably sidestep recent sanctіonѕ which can be υ.S.-basеd. Hence, cryptocυrrency need wants very interesting at the time of belated. Try exploration close or worst? make your choice! Authorities government in Rusѕia additionally grabbed a swipe in a business known as Intelion exploration, confіscating roughly 2,500 devices of exploration devices simply because they comprise possibly “grey” impоrts. This means the devices happened to be transported dishonestly and didn't gather traditions money. Intelіon exploration claims it offers never ever involved with the procedure of crypto exploration earlier. Russia has already established a connection that will be fairly combined cryptocυrrencіes, heading back and forward in terms of instilling an entire bar on crуpto incorporate. Nonetheless, the nation has hinted so it’ѕ seeking to establish a ruble this is certainly digital the nation’s authoritative cryptоcurrency - someday as time goes by, indicating that the bar οn bitcoin might be an endeavor tο stіfle opposition.

Something unusual goes lower in Rυssia bitcoin that will be concerning equipments. A Bitcoin Exploration Swindle - in Rυssia? Thе government traditions provider are examining a fraud that will be possible bitcoin minеrs. The agencies alleges that roughly 6,000 exploration machinery were delivered to Russіa, and therefore traditions charges weren't compensated on some of the products. To blame in particular try apparently the Far-Eaѕt investments аnd business providers, often referred to as DTPK. 1.2 mіllion USD in charge into the traditions connection. DTPK can be getting implicated of fabricating paperwork which are phony integrate changed or solved costs for the exploration machinery. And also, it is known within an document that will be formal DТPΚ possess liеd abоut recognise the business provided the miners. DTPK says the equipments comprise earned frоm МSR, a exploration companies statіoned in Korea, although the continuous organization didn't have an agreement with DΤPK. Bodies think DΤPK might have acquired the exploration devices between your times of 2017 and Fеbrυary 2018 aυgust. Hence, these miners comprise are sent on the business for around 6 months. Сryptocurrency and bitcoin exploration became things of the conundrum in many region.

I really couldnot just submit the funds AliΕxpress was required to the vendor this is certainly latest another purchase. I got to wirethe money-back to my personal lender, which grabbed yet another 7 - 10 weeks, subsequently wire it back once again to AliExрresѕ once again. 30 and got seven days. 90 I'dn't anticipated to spend. The sales comprise willing to send, 1 of my personal visitors got willing to terminate and performed thus by the point . Cryptocurrency can't be counterfeited, are not actually taken, can not be ѕpent double, and stores can offer Bitcoіn for over the worth of the goods the gave out in return for the Cryрtοcurrncу. That transforms the dining tables οn creditors and financial institutions. Cryptocurrеncy is just a movement that will be financial THE PUBLIC HAVE ADVANTAGES. Not banking that will be main which financial obligation controls governmental body due to their cash controls guidelines. The Cryptοcurrenсy "Bubblе" and "crisis" Propagаndа is actually slipping οn dеaf ears during my community. Here is the best zec miner 2019!

However, the working program will not be damaged and use are raising day-to-day аnd internationally аt an expidited speed. Expenditures inside the bіtcoin environment is continuing to grow significantly with 2015 anticipated to maintain overabundance 1 billion cash. Many governing bodies have reached a loss of profits in regards to what accomplish аs negative laws is only going to push these businesses and work tо extra јuriѕdiсtionѕ which are beneficial. Outright forbidding and rendering it unlawful will likely not prevent it there is absolutely no aim that will be centrаl fight and closed. People may use budget providers located in overseas juriѕdictiοns. A mockery is created because of it οf money settings as anybody can stroll аcross boundaries with vast amounts in bitcoins protected with a passphrase. Α deal that was bitcoіn instantaneous with 10 min verification opportunity. It can be utilized to interact big beliefs оr smaller prices at reasonable to charge this is certainly nіl аcross edges and ranges. It is very first money this is certainly undoubtedly worldwide its not going anywhere soon. It's still during the use this is certainly very early but is actually positioned for volatile progress. A term of extreme caution. This kind of a еnvironment you will find mаverіcks аnd fraudsters рreуing throughout the simple and gullible. Most likely its FUNDS.

By way of their great air conditioning remedy, MSІ's GTX 1070 Ti video gaming registerѕ thе lover rates which are cheapest of all notes we analyzed. Sυbjectiνelу, additionally it is on the list of qυietest. The inventory Radeon RX 580 employs, making use of the Galax GTX 1080 ЕXOC in 3rd location. Nonetheless, that card's efficiency are poor to be a complete outcome of GDDR5Х storage timing dilemmas experienced by all GeForсe GTX 1080 notes. The improved AMD notes appear in latest right here becauѕe their particular followers is designed for optimum air conditioning as well as the ideal efficiency this is certainly feasible. Very, you are unable to notice it, you are going to enjoyed the productivity if you possibly could possibly accept the sounds or place your exploration rіg someplace. You do not need a credit that will get also hot, since it will reduce the overall performance this is certainly very own and also bring harmed after a while. Тhе improved AMD notes reached the cheapest temps which are GPU all of our assessments since wе сranked her lovers up for increased cooling. Throughout the Nvіdia part, MSI's GeForсe GTX 1070 Ti video gaming not simply shows the lover rates being least expensive, additionally achieνes the cheapest functioning conditions. This may perhaps not bring some of the leading spots inside our results pеr watt metrіc, nevertheless, the cards is wonderful for demanding software like exploration due to MSI's extremely able option that will be thermal. Design credit pricing continue to be stratosрheric, аnd access try spotty, but also for today, the enhanced AΜD Radeon RX 580/570/560 experience the exploration show that will be finest per money. Nvidia's leading Ethereum exploration cards seems getting the GeFоrce GTХ 1070 creators version.

1 note · View note

zecretsanta · 6 years

Text

Fic: A Failed Santa

To: @qqideest

From: @zeroiv4

A fic made for @qqideest using the prompt ‘Secret Santa Party Gone Wrong’.

AO3 LINK

As a failed Santa himself, Aoi had not been looking forward to Christmas.

The group had all agreed that they couldn’t afford to buy gifts for all of the others. The group was seriously low on money as it was, and most of what they were earning via their respective jobs was going to Seven’s contacts.

Aoi knew they needed help to find the fanatic, and these people were competent and trustworthy, but their rates were way too damn high.

Adding that to the huge crash of Cradle Pharmaceutical stock and Junpei’s… interesting adventure with bitcoin investment, every single person in the group was flat out broke.

Well, bar Lotus, but almost the money she made was all going into her kids, and Aoi couldn’t really argue with that. He had tried once, but that only left him with a rather large bruise that he told Akane came from a confrontation with a rogue member of Free the Soul. Fortunately, she didn’t question it.

Anyway, due to their lack of both money and time, juggling work and their search for the mysterious ‘fanatic’, the group decided to go for a ‘Secret Santa’ approach, so each of them would only have to buy one gift.

And guess who was lucky enough to be picked to organise the whole thing? Aoi was really regretting his choice of code name, but it was a little too late to change that by the time Junpei had ever so helpfully put him forward for the job.

Eric, Mira and Sean had opted out so they could give each other gifts instead. Aoi was glad they were happy… and also that Mira wouldn’t be involved. She still didn’t have any idea how emotional things like gift-giving worked, and Aoi was petrified at what she might send.

Sigma had also suggested just having a quiet family Christmas to Diana and Phi, but the latter had disagreed, saying she “didn’t want to continue the family tradition of getting gassed and playing a death game, as merry as the last time was”. The girl made Aoi smile. And she did have excellent fashion taste.

Anyway, despite Sigma’s repeated protests that that had only happened one time, it was left up to Diana to mediate, and after a little ‘girl talk’, which from Aoi’s experience just consisted of the two hugging until Phi told Diana her issues, she found out the real issue Phi was having was that she still felt weird being the same age as her father. So the two had decided to continue acting as friends until all this fanatic stuff was over.

Anyway, Aoi had gotten distracted. He heard far too much about the others in the group from Akane. He guessed all the meaningless gossip was just one of the downsides of living with his sister into adulthood. Not that he’d ever want to live anywhere without Akane, he just liked to complain a little.

So Aoi had found himself cluelessly sitting in front of a list of all his friends’ names. And in the moment, all he could think of was how much he hated “Secret Santa”. For one thing, there was never any secrecy involved. It was so easy to tell who bought a certain present, especially with people as different as their group. And Aoi was really not a fan of the whole ‘Santa’ thing in general, as a failed Santa himself.

And right then, as he was thinking about that Christmas, eleven years ago by then, an idea struck Aoi. He was conflicted for a while, but eventually he just thought “What the hell?” and went ahead with it. Maybe not the best way to make a decision, but Aoi couldn’t exactly change his mind afterwards.

And it had worked out fine. Aoi was looking forward to this Christmas… Until Akane told him she’d invited everyone over here on Christmas Eve.

And no matter how much Aoi protested, Akane assured him that they couldn’t just swap presents without a Christmas party. And once again, it was too late for Aoi to stop it. Aoi was almost beginning to hope he would be attacked by Free the Soul, if that would allow him to SHIfT back and change his mind.

But unfortunately, nobody tried to kill him, so when the day came, Aoi finally swallowed his pride and approached Akane.

‘Hey, Akane?’ As his upbeat sister turned towards him, Aoi cleared his throat. ‘Do you remember when we were kids? How we had to live on our own?’

‘It’d be kind of hard to forget that…’ Akane replied with a little giggle. Aoi never understood why she could be so casual about their past. ‘But… what’s wrong, Aoi? Why are you bringing that up all of a sudden.’

‘Yeah, well…’ I’d almost forgotten how good Akane was at reading me. ‘Do you remember how every year, I’d save up money for Christmas? And I’d always try to get you presents, but it was a struggle to afford anything.’

Aoi definitely remembered those days, at least. The way Akane’s face would light up as she tore the paper off her gift was an image that would never leave Aoi’s mind. It was pretty much the only thing that kept him going through those difficult years.

‘Where are you going with this, Aoi?’ Akane was beginning to look really concerned. Damn.

‘Here, just- come and take a look.’ Before she had a chance to respond, Aoi turned and walked to his room, where he’d been storing all the gifts he’d been sent. Everyone had sent theirs to him in advance, except Junpei, who was being characteristically unreliable and still hadn’t given him anything.

Akane let out a small gasp as Aoi swung open the door. At his instruction, she took a closer look at the four neatly stacked items under the fake Christmas tree that was kept in there. They really did look like the image he’d imagined for years. A pile of colourful presents lying under a tree on Christmas morning, all left by “Santa”. And they all had one recipient listed on them.

Akane Kurashiki.

‘A-Aoi?’ Akane couldn’t seem to figure out how to respond. She turned to her brother, whose eyes were firmly fixed on the floor. ‘How did you do this?’

‘I, uh…’ Aoi wasn’t sure how to explain himself, but he could see Akane figuring it out as he tried to figure out how to word it. He decided to just skip a bit.

‘I took the fall.’ Aoi explained. ‘It’s just five of them - one isn’t here yet - , and I told them all I was meant to be getting them something but ran out of cash. A few of them are pretty pissed, but they’ll get over it. I got Clover something so her and Light won’t get talking about how they both didn’t get anything. And I said we’d exchange the gifts on another day ‘cause exchanging them all’s got messed up as well. So there’s no problem.’

‘There’s a big problem, Aoi!’ Akane protested. Her mouth was wide open in disbelief. ‘You can’t just do that!’

‘Yeah, I know, it’s… pretty bad.’ Aoi admitted. ‘But it’s too late now, so we just gotta go with it, I guess.’

‘No, there’s got to be something we can do…’ Akane’s forehead furrowed in thought. ‘I wish we could get to the transporter. Then I could just create a bunch of Akanes to make presents for everyone…’ The thought of a whole horde of Akane’s running around the place sent a little shiver down Aoi’s spine. Taking care of one was difficult enough.

‘Yeah, well…’ Not having any ideas himself, Aoi trailed off into silence. Akane and he remained there staring blankly in thought until they were eventually interrupted by the buzz of a timer.

‘Oh, that’s the food!’ Akane hurried off to deal with that. She’d been cooking all morning, although she refused to let Aoi see what it was. She was there until the doorbell rang.

Aoi counted the time in his head as it was rung again. Two seconds. A pause. Seven seconds. Six seconds. The code.

Akane was also satisfied that it was safe, and she made it to the door far before Aoi. He chose to watch from his doorway.

As it opened, he saw Diana give an awkward smile as the silence of the apartment was broken by the sounds of bickering from outside.

‘Look, I know how to drive, ok?’

‘Are you serious? That’s the worst experience I’ve ever had in a car, including being kidnapped.’

‘Maybe it would’ve been easier if you shouted less.’

Sigma opened his mouth to snap back at Phi, but was cut off by Diana before he could start.

‘Uh, guys…’ As she began to speak, the pair suddenly gained awareness of their surroundings.

As the four exchanged greetings, I ducked back into my room. Thankfully, these three were the only ones I hadn’t messed with. I’d kind of picked up on the weird situation between them, and being forced to exchange presents might help. As much as Aoi wanted to get presents for Akane, he wasn’t selfish enough not to do that for them. And from the entrance they’d made, it looked like Aoi was right. They needed help. Badly.

So after grabbing the three items exchanged between the three of them, Aoi made his way to their living room, where Akane had led them.

‘I thought we weren’t doing the gifts today?’ Diana looked up at Aoi confusedly from the sofa Akane had invited the three to sit on before going back to her cooking.

‘Oh, well, you guys’ are ready now, and since nobody else has shown up yet, I thought you may as well have them now.’ Aoi tried to explain himself, as he doubted the truth of “You guys seem to hate each other right now so I thought this might help” would go down well.

‘Are you sure you don’t want us to wait until the others’ gifts are ready?’ Diana’s reaction told Aoi that she bought it, and Sigma’s expression made it pretty clear he did too. But Phi was giving Aoi a glare that made him wonder if she’d figured him out. He really hoped she hadnt.

‘Oh, no, it’s totally fine.’ Aoi reassured Diana. ‘Go ahead.’ But despite that, Diana yet again tried to protest. She really was stubborn for someone who seemed so shy. But thankfully for Aoi, the doorbell rang before she could finish.

As the echo of the third ring of the code faded, Aoi excused himself to answer the door. But as he walked through the kitchen, he was accosted by Akane.

‘Aoi, how did you have presents for them all?’ Akane questioned him. ‘Did you just give them some random ones?’

‘Huh? No, I just had theirs. I gave them each other from the start. It was just the others who I… y’know.’ Akane seemed satisfied by the explanation, but Aoi himself was left wondering something as he made his way to the door.

As he opened it, Aoi came face to face with Clover, Light and Lotus. Well, Clover, Light and Hazuki. Aoi was still a little used to using Hazuki’s code name, since they hadn’t known each other before the Nonary Game.

‘Oh, hey.’ Aoi casually greeted them, not paying much attention to them, until something suddenly hit him. ‘Wait, hang on. Did you all come here together?’ The Field siblings always seemed to be with Alice, when she wasn’t off undercover like she was now. Did they bring in Hazuki as a replacement permanently underdressed and angry woman? Aoi could make so many jokes out of that.

‘Ah, no. We arrived at similar times and just met here in the hallway.’ Unfortunately, Light explained before Aoi could make a single joke. He really just had to ruin it, didn’t he? Oh well. Aoi wasn’t really looking forward to spending Christmas in the hospital.

‘Right. Well, you can all go on and head through.’ Aoi gestured to the living room before quickly stepping towards his room, explaining that he just had to grab something.

‘Hmph.’ Hazuki indignantly marched through, clearly upset at not being personally led like this was some kind of fancy restaurant. Aoi could already tell he was going to get a lot of complaints about his hosting from her.

But Aoi continued on, unperturbed by the grumpy old lady. In his room, he spread the six presents he had out on top of his bed. Well, there was what he’d gotten for Clover. He set that one aside. He also set the one from Seven aside

Seven sent a picture of himself and his coworkers with his. It wasn’t exactly “Secret” Santa per se… but whatever. Aoi shouldn’t even be focusing on his. It was a present for Hazuki.

Her and Seven were good friends… at least, Aoi thought so. He could never really figure out what their relationship was. It seemed like some kind of love/hate thing. He thought maybe letting him give her a present might reduce the hate side of things a little, but giving them both each other would be a little suspicious.

But as he thought about all that, Aoi was distracted by the photograph. He hadn’t seen Seven in a long time, and the man looked very different. He’d grown a beard, and even seemed to have lost a little weight, Aoi guessed to look less recognisable to Free the Soul members. Weird.

Anyway, with the others, Aoi could try to use Akane’s idea. Well, sort of. He wasn’t going to do it randomly, but Aoi might be able to reuse these presents. It might turn out horribly, but it was worth a shot.

He just needed to pick someone’s present to give to Light, then. Well… Aoi had no clue. He thought through each of the five others whose gifts sat in front of him again and again, but none held any special relation to Light. Well, Clover did, but the two of them had already exchanged presents of their own, being siblings and all, so that wouldn’t work either.

And as Aoi was trying to figure out if his whole swapping idea would even work, the doorbell began to ring again. Great.

Two seconds. A pause. Four seconds? And nothing else. What the hell was that? Was someone trying to guess their code? Aoi peeked our of his room, and the door was still. At least there was nobody trying to bash it in.

Aoi guessed it was safe to take a quick look through the door’s peephole. He tried to approach the door as silently as he could in the hopes that whoever was out there wouldn’t notice him.

Through the peephole he saw a teenage girl. She was hunched over with her hands on either side of her head. What the hell?

While Aoi was still trying to figure out what was going on, an arm reached down and put a hand on the girl’s shoulder. A very muscular arm.

As the man bent down next to the girl, Aoi was able to get a look at him. Satisfied, he slowly opened the door.

‘So this is Maria?’ Aoi asked the man. ‘You never told us she was coming too. It’s kinda weird if she’s not included in the whole gift exchange thing.’ Aoi still refused to call it a ‘Secret Santa’

But the only response Aoi received was a hand help up to stop him. Thus he was left to just wait awkwardly while Carlos slowly coaxed his sister’s hands away from her ears and helped her to stand up straight.

Then, finally, he stepped over to Aoi. Maria slowly followed behind, giving a nervous smile to Aoi as she was introduced.

‘Yeah, this is Maria.’ Carlos went ahead and answered his question as if he had just asked it. Apparently he hadn’t noticed the fact that he’d completely ignored Aoi for a while.

‘Well, she’s recovered from her Reverie Syndrome, but she still has some issues with getting overwhelmed sometimes. She’s doing pretty bad today, so I didn’t want to leave her all alone back at home. That’s not a problem, right?’

So the doorbell had just set her off or something, Aoi guessed. That made sense, but he didn’t exactly understand why Carlos thought a party was going to be the best place for Maria not to be disturbed. But Aoi couldn’t really stop him from having bad ideas, could he?

‘No, it’s fine.’ Aoi told him, returning Maria’s smile as he did so. But as he looked down at the rather short girl, he noticed her tugging on Carlos’ arm and staring intently down the corridor. ‘Uh, is there something there?’

The girl nodded. ‘There’s a big man… coming this way.’ She was painfully quiet. Aoi guessed being in a coma for so long would make someone a little awkward, but still, Maria seemed to be struggling just to get the words out. Aoi felt a wave of pity for the girl.

‘Hm?’ Carlos seemed to finally notice Maria pulling him. Instinctively, he stepped around Maria in order to get between her and the approaching man, nudging her inside towards Aoi, and irritatingly preventing him from being able to take a look.

‘Oh, it’s just Seven.’ Carlos announced. Aoi breathed a silent sigh of relief.. But then he remembered the photo. Would Carlos recognise him?

‘Hey, does he have a beard?’ Aoi shot out at Carlos.

‘Huh? No, why?’ Carlos turned back to look at Aoi inquisitively. He actually turned away from the man. Aoi could not believe how screwed they were.

‘Shit!’ Aoi thrust his hand out and grabbed the doorknob, but barely managed to move it with Carlos in the way. Why didn’t he move, damnit?

Seeming to notice the slight movement, the man shouted to hold the door. His voice did sound really familiar… Aoi could hear his huge thudding footsteps speed up. Within moments, he arrived at the door and flung it completely open.

It was Seven. But… the old Seven. There was no sign of a beard, and he was just as big as before. Aoi didn’t get it. He’d thought the man could be an impostor, but looking at him this close, there was no way. Aoi didn’t know how to react, so he was left just stood there staring for a few very long seconds, before he was interrupted.

‘Hey, somethin’ wrong?’ Seven tilted his head a little as he looked at Aoi. ‘What’re you lookin’ so surprised for?’

‘You…’ It took Aoi a few seconds to regain his composure.. ‘You changed back from that photo. What’s up with that?’

‘There’s a photo?’ Carlos chimed in, clearly having no idea what was going on. I quickly whispered that I would show him later, without taking my eyes off Seven.

‘Oh, yeah!’ Seven seemed to suddenly remember his complete change in appearance, as if it was something trivial and easily forgotten. ‘I tried changing for a bit, ‘cause I thought it might make it harder for all those cult weirdos to recognise me. I didn’t like it though, so I stopped. I thought you all might wanna see the photo.’

Aoi felt impossibly underwhelmed. He’d really just done it all for no reason. Geez…

‘Sure, sounds about right.’ Aoi replied, completely aloof. He shook his head slightly as he did so, just so it would be clear to everyone that he was being sarcastic. Carlos was so nice and boring he didn’t understand Aoi sometimes. ‘Well, come in then.’

He motioned for all three of the guests to come inside, and sent them off to sit with the others while he grabbed the presents. But before he did so, Aoi quickly sent Junpei a text. Everyone else had arrived now, and he just wanted to be sure that Junpei was actually going to make it. He wasn’t exactly known for being reliable.

Having done that, Aoi took another look at the gifts. He just needed to swap them around enough that they wouldn’t go down horribly. And after a little shuffling, Aoi managed to get it sorted. Sorted well enough, at least.

Aoi stacked them up, but before taking them in, checked his phone to see if Junpei replied. He had. Aoi couldn’t wrap his head around it, but Junpei was somehow always too busy to pick up a phone call yet able to reply to a text in seconds. But anyway, the message read:

“Omw but stuck in traffic”

“U guys don’t wait tho”

Aoi let out a sigh. He wasn’t exactly surprised. Junpei was the kind of guy who’d be late to his own funeral. And his wedding. Oh god, that was going to be with Akane. Aoi shuddered at the thought. Sadly, he couldn’t do anything about it, since Akane was way too wrapped up in love to recognise Junpei’s many flaws.

But that was an issue for later. For now, Aoi grabbed the presents and headed over to the others. On his way to the kitchen, he noticed that Akane was finally done there. And sure enough, there were now snacks laid out all over the coffee table. Most people had politely taken just a couple, but Seven was completely demolishing a plate of sausage rolls. Aoi wasn’t sure if there was enough food in the country for him.

As soon as everyone noticed Aoi, the conversation came to a halt. He cleared his throat before speaking to the group.

‘Ok, so… there were some… logistical issues… so we’ve had to swap the presents around a bit. It should all be fine still, but just to keep things from getting weird, could we all not talk about who was meant to get everything?’

‘What kind of “logistical issues” do you have with Secret Santa? It’s not exactly a complicated thing, Aoi.’ Damn. Hazuki didn’t seem to be buying it.

‘Uh…’ Aoi didn’t really have a response to that. Hazuki was making a good point. But thankfully, she was pretty easy to distract.

‘Probably the same logistical issues you had trying to find actual clothes.’ Aoi said dismissively. Hazuki let out a guttural roar, and stood up, poised to lunge at Aoi, when she was grabbed around the waist by Seven, who was perfectly positioned next to her. He’d probably seen something like this coming.

Hazuki shook and protested, but Seven was too strong for her to escape. Eventually she wore herself out and sat down again. The moment she did, Aoi apologised. She turned away from him with an indignant grunt, but seemed to accept it. And that was how to handle Hazuki.

‘Ok, so.’ Aoi broke the awkward silence that had formed. He’d forgotten that not everyone here was as used to Hazuki as he was. Fortunately, their shock did mean that they didn’t object to Aoi’s present swap. Akane was giving him a confused look, but she seemed to understand just to go along with it. ‘Here are the presents.’

He walked around the room, placing four of the carefully wrapped items in front of the people he’d chosen, and holding two himself, his and Junpei’s. Sigma, Diana and Phi already had theirs, but none of them had touched them yet. Akane and Carlos were left without one, however.

‘Oh!’ When she noticed him, Akane jumped up and ran off to the kitchen. She returned carrying a tray, which she laid in front of Carlos. ‘Here’s your present! Oh, guess I kind of ruined the “secret part” though…’

‘Don’t worry about it.’ Carlos smiled at Akane. ‘So what is this anyway? Wait-‘ He lifted something up out of the tray. It was a gingerbread man. And there was black icing all over it. Especially on the head. It seemed to have some really emo vibes going on.

‘Is this Junpei?’ He asked. Akane nodded, and they both burst out into laughter, quickly being joined by Sigma, Diana, Phi and Seven. It took Aoi a second longer to get it, but then he recognised the gingerbread man. It was Junpei a year ago, when he dressed all edgy and shit.

To help those who hadn’t known Junpei then, Aoi quickly grabbed his phone from his pocket and pulled up a picture of Junpei that Seven had sent him once. When he held it up next to the gingerbread man, everyone except Light finally got it too.

After a couple of minutes, when they had finally managed to stop laughing, Carlos began to look through the other gingerbread men. There were nine of them, each decorated to look like the nine people who had been at the Mars Mission site, but greatly exxagerated.

‘Akane!’ Carlos chided, still laughing, as he pulled out one that was covered with red icing. Mira. ‘You can’t just have all that blood on her! What if she was here?’

‘She’d probably like it.’ Clover interjected. When everyone stared at her, she continued. ‘What? It’s true. I’ve seen her in prison. She tries to make jokes, but she doesn’t really get humour.’

‘Is this supposed to be me?’ Sigma picked up one of the remaining ones. ‘Hey! Why’s it covered in wrinkles. I’m not old!’

Luckily, he was stopped by a tap on the arm by Diana before he could launch into a whole tirade about his age.

‘Sigma… I’m pretty sure that’s Delta.’ Sigma went bright red as he realised his mistake. But Diana carried on anyway. ‘See, the dark glasses here?’

‘Wait you thought you were the one with glasses?’ Phi jumped in to join the mockery of Sigma. ‘Why would that be you?’

‘I-I dunno!’ Sigma shouted. ‘I thought they were just like… cool shades or something.’

‘“Cool shades”? Since when have you been cool?’

‘Since when haven’t I?’

‘Guys…’ Diana stopped the two from arguing yet again. Doing so seemed to be her main job as a mother/girlfriend.

‘Thank you, Akane.’ Carlos seemed to really appreciate the gift. So did Maria, according to the headless body of Eric in her hand.

‘Ok.’ Now that the interest was dying down again, Aoi took it upon himself to get things moving. ‘Let’s all get to it and open these, right?’

Everyone else nodded and began tearing coloured paper into tiny scraps and making a huge mess that Aoi would definitely have to clean up later. Great.

But instead of opening his, Aoi watched Sigma, Diana and Phi. He’d hoped having them but presents for each other would help them be closer, but there was honestly just as much of a chance of this backfiring completely and screwing up their relationship forever. So there was no pressure there.

Diana was the first to get hers open, due to the kind of half-assed wrapping job. Sigma had somehow wrapped to be about ten times as thick as what was inside it. Apparently it had been done so weirdly to prevent the present from being damaged, but Aoi was pretty sure Sigma’s incompetence was also a major factor.

Whatever the reason, the wrapping fell apart almost as it was picked up by Diana, and she quickly salvaged a sheet of paper from inside. There was a drawing on it. It was tough for Aoi to make out, but it looked like a desert at night. And there was some kind of dome in the ground.

‘Oh…’ Diana turned to face Sigma, who sat on her right. ‘That’s so sweet! I always have wondered what it looked like…’

‘Yeah,’ Sigma returned her warm smile. ‘Well, the moon was a pretty interesting honeymoon destination. I thought you’d want to be able to see it. I know it’s not really realistic, but you can kind of get the idea.’

Sigma was starting to panic, but Diana’s expression stopped him. Then they leant in and kissed. Aoi wasn’t sure whether to look away or not. They just had to be awkward, didn’t they. Thankfully they stopped fairly soon, being interrupted by Phi.

‘Ah!’ Phi had turned away from the lovers and opened incredibly neatly wrapped package. She was completely taken back by what she found inside.

‘Diana? Is this your-?’ Phi spun around as she lifted up her present. It was a small golden birdcage on a similar chain. Inside the cage was a miniscule blue bird. But before Phi could ask her question about it, Diana pulled down the neck of her jumper to reveal an identical necklace of her own.

‘I found the shop where I got mine from,’ Diana explained as she smiled sweetly at her daughter. ‘And I asked them to make another one.’

Tears were starting to brim in Phi’s eyes. Diana wrapped her arms around her and the two embraced for a while. From Aoi’s knowledge, this was what most of their interactions consisted of. Still, these gifts all seemed to be going well.

‘Alright, then.’ Sigma took the opportunity to open his own. Beneath the wrapping paper was a rectangular box, and from that Sigma took… a mug.

Aoi winced when he saw that. A mug? That was one of the worst present ideas he could think of. A mug is the kind of thing a little kid buys on… father’s day or something. Not that Aoi had any experience with those kind of things from his childhood.

Then Sigma spun the mug around in his hand, giving Aoi a view of the other side. There was writing on it. It read

“#1 Dad”

Aoi stared. And stared. And stared. He was in complete disbelief. What kind of present? How would you even find one of those at Christmas? Why would you want to? Was it the very last thing left at the shop? So much for this helping their relationship…

‘Phi…’ Sigma interrupted Aoi’s thoughts as he met the eyes of the girl, who had finally been released from Diana’s hug. ‘This is… purr-fect.’

As Phi held her face in her hands to disguise her laughter, it finally hit Aoi. The point was, Phi was calling him her father. He smiled. Widely. Then stopped himself, since he didn’t want to be seen watching their intimate family moment so intently.

To give them a little privacy, Aoi turned to look at the others. Light had already opened his. It was a large canvas with some really weird art drawn on it. Ugh, abstract. Light was running his hands over it, but didn’t seem to be completely satisfied.

‘I believe I have the general sense of this piece.’ He announced. ‘But not being able to see the art probably detracts from it a little.’

‘Mm…’ Carlos seemed deep in thought. Right, he was the one who this present was from. Weird, Aoi never thought he was much of an artsy type.

‘Hey, Maria, why don’t you talk to Light about it?’ Carlos suggested out of the blue. Light tilted his head a little upon hearing that, prompting Carlos to speak a little more. ‘She’s the one who painted it. It’s based on what she felt during her time unconscious. Maybe it’d be interesting to hear about that, Light. I mean, maybe you can understand that feeling, without your, uh, sight.’

It was a fairly good improvised plan, seeing as the present hadn’t been designed for Light. So with Light’s agreement, Maria finally released Carlos’ arm from her grasp, and moved to sit next to Light.

‘Ah, but first.’ Light paused for a second to think. ‘Aoi, is it you who’s being given my gift?’

‘Uh, yeah, it’s me.’ Aoi wondered how he’d he managed to work that out before everyone had been given their presents. He’d probably been able to figure out how much everything weighed by the sound it made as Aoi put it down, or some crap. Light could do some serious shit without sight.

‘Ah.’ Light didn’t seem particularly thrilled with that. Well, there was no point in Aoi wasting time worrying about that. He ripped open the package and found… plants.

Clovers. Eleven four-leaved clovers. Well, Light wasn’t completely wrong. Aoi had never liked clovers. Not since the last time he’d been given some by Light.

But Aoi couldn’t just keep hanging onto that. Because in the end, Aoi guessed he was following the clovers all throughout those nine years. He’d been doing it all because of his love for Akane, and even though hope and faith were pretty much the same thing, Aoi had certainly needed all of them to work for so long on rescuing his sister.

But Aoi refused to believe that anything was up to luck. He couldn’t handle the idea that he could be unlucky, and the whole thing could fail. And honestly… that was a pretty dumb reason to hate a plant. So Aoi decided not to.

‘Thanks, Light.’ While the other boy couldn’t see it, Aoi did have a little smile on his face.

‘I didn’t think you liked clovers.’ Light mused. ‘Perhaps you’d prefer some different flowers… I could definitely buy some.’

‘I’ve changed my mind. And besides…’ Aoi explained, a little uncomfortable. ‘They weren’t meant for me anyway. They’re a cool present.’

Light looked like he was about to say something else, but Maria was very eager to talk to him, so he merely smiled at Aoi before turning to the girl and letting her speak.

Aoi realised as she launched into her description, Light nodding every so often, that she hadn’t spoken at all since they got in. It was weird to see her so animated all of a sudden. Still, Aoi guessed it was good.

‘Hey, Carlos.’ Aoi did have a little suspicion to confirm though, and so he leant towards him and whispered. ‘You just wanted a break for a little, right? Don’t worry, I’d do the same with Akane.’

‘Maybe a little.’ Carlos smirked, still shaking out his arm, which hadn’t moved in a while. ‘But it’s mainly because I want to see her speaking. She’s not really been good with people since her coma.’

‘Don’t worry, I’d do the same with Akane.’ Aoi’s sister could be very high maintenance, so he did enjoy a little time on his own every so often.

But as he was whispering, Aoi noticed the present he’d bought being opened. As he turned to her, Clover was excitedly tearing off the wrapping paper. Inside she found a pack of panties. Shocked, she looked up and immediately made accidental eye contact with Aoi. It was pretty clear she realised it was him Shit.

‘Aoi! What the heck are these?’ She waved the panties in the air, catching the attention of pretty much everyone in the room. Aoi was kind of forced to explain himself then. Oh well, at least it was a funny story. At the very least, Seven would enjoy it.

‘Ok, ok, I’ll explain.’ He hell his hands up defensively. ‘I thought you’d remember, Clover. It was the first time we went on a mission together. We had to climb up a fire escape to get into someone’s apartment. Then, being the gentleman I am, I let Clover climb the steps in front of me. And when she did-‘

‘Stop!’ Clover suddenly interrupted, remembering the story. ‘Why the hell were you still thinking about that, you perv?

‘Hey, believe me, it wasn’t a pleasant experience for me either.’ Aoi replied. There’d had been a lot of screaming on that fire escape. So much that they managed to alert the apartment’s owner and ruin the mission.

‘The stair trick.’ Sigma shook his head. ‘Classic.’

‘Ugh! Why are you all like this?’ Clover shoved the panties into her pocket and crossed her arms sulkily.

‘Y’know, I’m not sure you can be complainin’ about inappropriate presents, Clover.’ Seven held up his own, that he’d apparently opened earlier.

It was a photo of Clover, Lotus and Akane. Lotus was wearing a variation of her usual weird clothes, Clover had on her ‘disguise wear’, which was just as revealing, and Akane…

‘Akane?’ Aoi turned to confront his sister. Even with her looking as uncomfortable as she did in the photo, Aoi was not ok with it. ‘When was this?’

‘We’ve had girls’ outings!’ Akane protested. Aoi knew about those, but he had no idea this kind of stuff was what they did there.

‘Wait, hang on!’ Something had dawned on Clover. ‘How do you have that?’

‘What d’you mean?’ Seven asked. ‘It’s my present. Oh yeah, thanks for that, Clover.’

‘What? No! That wasn’t meant to be for you! I don’t want you doing all… creepy stuff with it!’

Clover made a grab for the photo, but Seven saw her coming. He stood up and held the picture high above his head.

‘Hey! Give me that, you sicko!’ Clover kept jumping and grabbing at it, but Seven kept it firmly out of her reach. Carlos apparently felt the need to try and stop them, but his efforts to reason with the pair were in vain.

As the fight was ongoing, the doorbell rang. Finally. That had to be Junpei. Aoi quickly excused himself and hurried to the door. Opening it, he was greeted by the sight of a black gas mask. The doorbell hadn’t been rung in the code.

‘Shit!’ Aoi put all his force into a shove, pushing the person backwards. They tripped over a cardboard box, and fell flat on the ground, the impact knocking off the mask. Aoi cautiously stepped towards him until he could see the person’s face.

‘Junpei? What the hell, man?’ Aoi could not believe this. It wasn’t enough for Junpei to be this late, he had to try and pull something like this too. ‘Use the damn code, at least.’

‘Oh, right.’ Junpei replies as he stood himself up again. ‘Sorry, guess I forgot about that. But come on, that was pretty funny.’

Aoi refused to give him the benefit of a laugh. Instead, he asked Junpei about the box.

‘Oh, that’s Akane’s present. Yeah, could you give me a hand carrying that in.’ Aoi obliged and they lifted the box together and walked into the apartment..

‘Oh, try to be gentle with it.’ Junpei instructed. When Aoi didn’t reply, Junpei sighed. ‘Look, man, I know you’re pissed at me for being late, but I’ve got a good reason, ok? I’ll explain it soon.’

‘Alright.’ I was pretty sure Junpei was just still trying to think of what excuse to give, but I figured I’d just let him go ahead and say whatever he was going to and then tell him it was bullshit.

As they made it over to the others and set the box down, Junpei got a few greetings from the others, and one especially excited one from Akane.

Aoi scooped up the present from Hazuki and threw it to Junpei, who barely managed to catch it without it falling on the floor. ‘Yeah, here’s yours.’

‘Hey! Be careful with that!’ Hazuki shouted. ‘It’s made of expensive stuff, so don’t go breaking it.’

‘I thought we weren’t spending much money?’ Sigma asked upon hearing that.’’Cause if not, I definitely want another mug.’

‘Oh, don’t worry, I didn’t buy any of it.’ Hazuki explained. ‘I got it from work.’

‘Wait, so you just stole expensive stuff from your job? Don’t they care about that?’ Seven questioned her. ‘Maybe I should arrest you.’

‘Everyone takes office supplies!’ Hazuki defended herself. ‘Don’t make such a big deal out of it.’

‘Yeah, but look at this thing!’ While we were all focused on Hazuki, Junpei had unwrapped his gift, and he now held it out for us all to see. It was a small square box with a screen set into it. ‘This is a computer. With a touchscreen. That stuff’s expensive. When people take office supplies they take, like… pens.’

‘Once I tried to take a pen from SOIS.’ Clover added. ‘Alice really did not like that… She still talks about it.

Ignoring her, Junpei turned on the box and tapped the screen a little before looking back up at Hazuki. ‘So you play sudoku on it?’

‘Well, I thought some practice was in order.’ Hazuki said, pointing at Junpei and Akane. ‘Last time you two had to play sudoku, we all almost got burnt to death.’

‘Geez…’ Junpei seemed to find it kind of funny. Then he turned it off and gasped. ‘When it goes off… it has… the Funyarinpa!’

‘It’s a dog, Junpei!’ Hazuki snapped back. Stop calling it that made up name.

‘Made up?’ Junpei sounded even more indignant than Hazuki, which was an achievement if I’d ever seen one. But sadly, I couldn’t just sit back and watch this.

‘Akane?’ I whispered to her. ‘We gotta stop this. You deal with Junpei.’

With that, I stepped towards Hazuki, and just as she stood up in rage, grabbed what she’d been sitting on. I’d noticed that her present had disappeared at some point, and from then on there was something peeking out from underneath her.

‘Hey, this is your present, right? From Seven?’ As Aoi said that, Hazuki wheeled around and found me holding some… official police documents. What a fun present.

But then Aoi opened the first page and saw was the documents were about.

“Gentarou Hongou, prison escapee was found crossing the border from Mexico to the U.S and taken into custody.”

‘Hey, wait, why were you hiding this?’ I asked Hazuki. Why would she keep good news like that from us.

‘It’s not real.’ Seven cut in. Before I could speak again, he continued. ‘Hazuki’s kids told me they were having nightmares about him after they saw he got out on the news. So I made those myself. Thought it might help ‘em.’

‘I hope it will…’ Hazuki avoided making eye contact with anyone. ‘They’re starting to feel like they did back when they first went through all that…’

‘They’ll be fine.’ Seven reassured her. ‘They’ve got a pretty good mother looking out for ‘em… even if she’s not much good at controllin’ her anger.’

The two of them smiled hopefully at each other. Aoi didn’t really know what to add, so he glanced around for something to detract from the awkwardness. Doing so, he saw Akane about to open her present. Perfect.

Aoi stepped over just in time to see Akane open the box and pick up something small. A tiny, black and white rabbit.

‘It’s just like…’ Akane began speaking.

‘The ones from school.’ Junpei finished her sentence. I did vaguely remember Akane showing me a rabbit hutch at her school one day, way back when we were kids. Oh yeah, she was in charge of taking care of it with Junpei. I guess they must’ve spent a lot of time together there.

I had to admit, it was a pretty sweet gesture, to think way back to something like that. Especially for someone like Junpei, who struggled to remember anything. Well, he wasn’t really as bad as Aoi made him out to be. He still had a lot of issues though. Like his lateness.

‘Oh, yeah, Aoi?’ Junpei somehow managed to interrupt Aoi’s thoughts just at the right time. ‘This is why I was so late. The shelter wanted to do a background check, to make sure I wasn’t going to abuse it or anything. And since I just disappeared for a year, they got suspicious and it ended up taking a long time to get it sorted out, and that made me late. So, yeah, I’m sorry for it though.’

‘Alright.’ It was a fair excuse. Aoi was being a little harsh on the guy, even if it was kind of his job as the older brother. ‘But don’t think you’re odd the hook for that gas mask stunt. That must have taken at least a little time. It was pretty funny, though, I’ll give you that.’

They shared a quick smile before Akane interrupted.

‘Oh, Jumpy? Does he have a name?’ She asked. Apparently she’d determined that the rabbit was male.

‘No, but I was thinking of calling him Santa.’ Junpei surprised Aoi with that. ‘Y’know, because it’s Christmas, and there’s that whole story with the Black Santa and the White Santa.’

Aoi had thought about about that story a lot, as a failed Santa. Well, he thought of himself as a failed Santa. But…

He had failed to give Akane what she wanted back then. For everything to stay the same. But looking around right now, Aoi couldn’t really say things were worse than back then. The pair were still broke, and they’d been through some terrible things, but Aoi had to admit that without all of that, they never would have met any of their friends here.

And looking around at the scene surrounding him; the Klim family joking with each other; Hazuki confiding in Seven about her daughters; Light helping Maria talk more confidently; Carlos offering Clover to eat Sigma as a symbolic victory against “the pervs”; and Junpei and Akane playing with their new pet, Aoi couldn’t really fall this a failure. It had all worked out pretty damn well.

And while it was too early, as a Santa himself, Aoi was already looking forward to next Christmas.

#zero escape #zero time dilemma #waitingforztd #zeroiv4 #zecret santa 2018 #submission

7 notes · View notes