Is the volatile streaming media stock finally worth buying?

Netflix (NFLX 5.54%) has taken investors on a wild ride over the past two years. The streaming media giant's shares surged during the buying frenzy in growth stocks and closed at an all-time high of $691.69 on Nov. 17, 2021.
However, Netflix's stock plummeted to a multiyear low of $164.28 on June 14, 2022, as its growth decelerated, it lost subscribers for the first time in over a decade, and rising interest rates deflated its valuations. But after sinking to that nadir, Netflix's stock more than doubled to about $380 over the past year.
Is it finally safe to buy Netflix's stock after those massive price swings? Let's see four reasons to buy Netflix and one reason to sell it -- to see whether it's still a good investment.

1. Netflix's stabilizing growth rates

When Netflix lost paid subscribers in the second quarter of 2022, it finally admitted that it was facing stiff competition from other streaming media platforms. That warning convinced the bears that Netflix's high-growth days were over, and its growth would stall out as fierce competitors like Disney, Amazon, Warner Bros. Discovery, and Paramount carved up the market. But if we look at Netflix's growth over the past year, we'll see it actually gained subscribers again, and its revenue growth stabilized.
That stabilization can be attributed to three factors. First, it lapped its pandemic-induced growth spurt in 2020 and a post-pandemic slowdown in 2021. Second, it overcame the initial shock from Russia's invasion of Ukraine (which drove its loss of subscribers in the second quarter of 2022) over the following three quarters.
Lastly, it attracted new viewers with original hit shows like You, Outer Banks, and Ginny & Georgia, proving it could continue expanding without relying on established franchises.

2. The expansion of its advertising business

Netflix has traditionally generated most of its revenues by charging subscription fees for ad-free programming. But that changed last November when it launched its cheaper ad-supported tier across a dozen markets.
This ad-supported tier could help Netflix attract more budget-conscious consumers while widening its moat against similar ad-supported tiers at Disney+, WBD's HBO Max, and Paramount+. It could also attract more advertisers and diversify its top line away from its ad-free subscription fees.
Netflix hasn't disclosed any revenue figures from its new ad-supported tier yet, but it recently revealed it had nearly five million monthly active users. That would only account for about 2% of its paid subscribers, but that ratio could climb as Netflix launches the tier in additional markets.
Based on eMarketer's projections, ad spending on connected TV (CTV) ads in the U.S. could more than double from $21.2 billion in 2022 to $43.6 billion in 2026 -- and Netflix will likely benefit from that secular boom.

3. Its crackdown on shared passwords

For years, Netflix looked the other way toward password sharers. But this year, it finally cracked down on the practice by charging extra fees for shared passwords. In its April shareholder letter, Netflix said it was "pleased with the results" of its crackdown across Canada, New Zealand, Portugal, and Spain. It also noted that after that crackdown, its subscriber base in Canada was "growing faster" than its audience in the U.S. -- where it finally initiated its crackdown in late May.
That move might initially infuriate some of its longtime subscribers, but it could stabilize its long-term growth by boosting its revenues per household. Some of those password sharers might also shift toward its cheaper ad-supported tier.

4. It's stabilizing operating margins

Netflix's investments in new content and currency headwinds have squeezed its operating margins over the past year. However, it also expects its operating margin to expand from 18% in 2022 to 18%-20% in 2023 as its revenue growth stabilizes, the dollar weakens, it cuts costs, and it expands its higher-margin advertising business.
Those healthy operating margins suggest Netflix will remain the only profitable streaming video platform while Disney, WBD, and Paramount continue to rack up steep losses on their competing platforms.
The one reason to sell Netflix: its valuation
Analysts expect Netflix's revenue and adjusted earnings per share to rise 7% and 11%, respectively, this year. But its stock still isn't a screaming bargain at 28 times forward earnings.
It's still being valued as a FAANG stock instead of a traditional media company like Disney and Paramount, and it could be booted to the latter group if its growth in subscribers and revenues cools off again.
Netflix's stock isn't cheap, but its strengths easily outweigh the bearish concerns about its valuation. It won't surge back to its all-time highs anytime soon, but it's still a best-in-breed play on the long-term growth of the streaming media market.

Kendall has never really been given the opportunity to grow as a leader. I doubt that Logan was the Logan we know from the start. He probably made a lot of mistakes, and learned from them. Kendall never really had the opportunity to do that. Anytime he started something, his father or siblings intervened.Is he a good person? No. But there's a lot there in terms of leadership qualities: vision, ambition, drive, empathy (at least compared to Logan and Matsson), can be ruthless when needed, some level of self-awareness, etc.
I believe that most of his erratic and cocky actions can be attributed to his insecurities, which could have been helped by him taking over and becoming his own man, for lack of a better word.
I understand that giving him a billion dollars media conglomerate as playground to grow isn't the best idea, but I also don't see how he would have been much worse than Lukas Matsson for Waystar Royco. He also is erratic, has a lot of baggage, but also doesn't seem to really understand what he bought and only intend to use Tom as a puppet. He also has been in a leadership position for years, so the leader that he is now is probably a close version of the one he's always going to be.
This is why Shiv's justification that he just would have been at this to explain her decision doesn't make too much sense to me. I'd have understood if the other option was much more desirable. Just my thoughts.
Edit: someone kindly mentioned that Kendall was actually given a division to run before and failed. I missed that part.

i've already seen a couple threads about overwatch players swapping to paladins but i wanted to give my perspective and maybe get some feedback from other paladins players (; ω ; )
for context i peaked 4400 and peaked at rank #31 in overwatch 1, i peaked gm1 and rank #282 in ow2. with the recent news about PVE being somewhat cancelled and ow devs listening to casual players which QUITE LITERALLY killed ow1 along with horrid new characters, awful balance changes, and oh god dont get me started on the 3+ year long content drought.
i played overwatch since release, actively scrimmed, streamed, played in community tournaments and open division. during the content drought in ow1 during maybe december 2021 to october 2022, i swapped over to valorant for a bit. valorant was fun and a learning curve, but i quickly went from a silvegold player to an ascendant 2 player. i got extremely bored of valorant and when the ow2 beta dropped, i swapped back over.
i was honestly initially excited and had a blast the first 3 weeks of ow2 being released, but i was immediately disappointed with new events coming out and no new skins, other skins and content from years ago being rereleased in blizzard's sloppy job of giving us "content", once again awful balance changes, season 2 elo inflation, awful matchmaking thats been going on for months at this point, an overall horrible competitive system, and of course the announcement of no PVE.
it has been a major disappointment and i've been incredibly bored. im a freelance artist and a streamer, so overwatch was my main content aswell as my outlet outside of work.
me and another friend who is also high elo + my boyfriend decided to try paladins.i will say that i dont expect a multimillion dollar somewhat polished game like overwatch, and i have played paladins in the past, but that was around 4+ years ago and i didnt really remember much.
the first day we played the client kept freezing and crashing, my friends client kept crashing aswell and some games our textures wouldnt load at all despite us having higher end pcs.
we quickly grinded lvl 15 and got enough characters for ranked in a 2-3 day period, but within some of these matches, we actually ran into 3 different cheaters who were just hard locking. i want to clarify aswell that we are somewhat "aimers" (sounds cringe as hell im so sorry T__T) so we do know what cheats look like, and we also received a notification the next time we logged on that someone was punished.
we did our placements and during these placements it was really hell. 2 afks in the first 2 matches we played, despite the afks someone on our team didnt like that we weren't playing "meta" (I was playing rei, my friend was playing vatu) and despite us having stats higher than the whole lobby, the 3rd match we had with this guy he intentionally banned our champs, so we were forced to play other characters that we still ended up doing well on and winning lol.we lost another game and won another.
we placed silver 4 which was fine, but we noticed after placements that our matches were incredibly easy to the point we were in queue for 10-15 minutes at a time but our matches would last about 5-8 minutes.
i ended up skipping to gold 4 and so did my friend, but as we kept playing more ranked, we noticed an influx of people who will purposely ban your hero pool, a LOT of dcers and afkers, and most of all oh my god why do people whine so much in this game? its to a point where its worse than ego inflated plat overwatch players lol.we've had so many people whine over team comp and during one of my games on stream, someone flamed in the select screen for me picking rei, then 1 minute into game apologized to me because i kept him alive.
overall in our 2-3ish days of grinding comp & our last few days of playing the game, i've noticed these main things
-game overall lacks a lot of polish and refinement, movement feels a tad bit clunky aswell as aiming feels kinda slow.-it is blaringly obvious the skill ceiling isnt very high for this game, but nonetheless its still fun.-so many afks/dcs, not sure why but it is extremely frustrating. typically they dc before the round starts when you're buying items. why doesnt paladins include a match cancel system for these dcs/afks like overwatch?-tp gain feels very low. despite skipping ranks the usual amount of points i get is 15/16. not sure if thats a lot of tp but compared to valorant's system (19+ usually for a win) and ow's rank up system, i feel i have to play an insane amount of matches, and these matches usually include insane stats like me going 12/2/34 with 100k+ healing & 40-50k dmg on rei.
-game client is overall horrible, takes a very long time to load up. it has also sometimes frozen on load up, which has happened to my friends aswell. game has also crashed mid game, or freezes mid game.its overall extremely frustrating and it made me realize how fast the overwatch client loads up and how quickly you can queue lol.
-ranked select and ban system is very time consuming. i think putting character bans up to 1 person is kinda troll aswell. i think if there was more a team vote system it would be a lot more fair, and after having someone purposely ban our mains a couple games in a row, it was extremely frustrating.
-almost no one using voice chat? ive noticed little to no one has used voicechat in any of our matches at all. not sure if its just cus we're starting in low elo, but the only people who have used voicechat in my experience are people who have open mic on who didnt know, people who only use mic to flame/complain (and its really not usually flame its just someone going "heal me you bitch" or "why the fuck arent we on point") or people who say 1 or 2 things then dont say anything for the rest of the game. also alrdy dealt with some weird sexist ppl but thats to be expected and i rly cba to care.
-crossplay is kinda a mistake. my best guess is that they implemented crossplay because of low player population, but honestly crossplay in any competitive game is just a mistake. unfortunately pc players will always have the upper hand compared to console players, and the few console players we have had were just awful, not to mention weird and toxic.
i will say overall there are a lot of things that i do like, such as passive healing, and not a lot of "game changing ults" that stress you out the whole game. while there are what i like to call "braindead" heroes/characters, thankfully nothing even close to moira seems to exist. overall huge majority of the characters feel great to play and nothing feels incredibly broken, or "unfair". nothing necessarily feels hard to counter either.
i cant help but feel sad though for paladins, as i really feel with a great dev team and a bit more resources and a higher budget, this game could bring in a lot of players.it is blaringly obvious how unpolished and sloppy this game feels, especially to experienced fps players. you would think with all these years it would be a bit better by now, but despite that issue in itself the game is not that bad.its definitely been more fun learning paladins than playing in the current state of overwatch right now.
character kits are actually also pretty fun and interesting for the most part.game is monetized in a really nice way, a lot of content and really nice skins, icons, etc are out. wish overwatch did more of that, and it seems a lot of fanart is implemented into the game which is really nice to see as a freelance artist.
overall those are my opinions on paladins, im going to keep playing and maybe give another update within a week or so! if there is anything you'd like to educate me on or give me more info about, please do. if theres any other high elo ow players swapping over aswell, let me know im very curious lol.
also overall if paladins had a higher budget, devs fixed stuff and made some quality of life changes, aswell as fixing their client (ffs) i think this game could take over ow2 at the moment. ദ്ദി ˉ͈̀꒳ˉ͈́ )

There are about 1,000,001 different side hustles you can start to make some extra money on the side. But only a few of them are worth it…
Side Hustle #1: Real Estate Wholesaling
Real estate wholesaling is one of the best ways to make money in the real estate game when you don’t have capital or a line of credit that would allow you to invest in a home.
The concept is simple. You find people who NEED to sell their homes (divorcees, people with inherited property, or money problems), get the home under contract, and then sell that contract to a cash buyer who can close on the home in 30 days.
For example, if you find a home that’s valued at $200,000 with a motivated seller who is willing to part with the property for only $140,000. You can get the home under contract for $140,000 and then sell it to your investor for $150,000 keeping the $10,000 as an assignment fee.
You don’t need a license to get started, but I highly recommend investing in a training program from Clever Investor or Flip2Freedom since you can quickly get into legal trouble if you aren’t careful about how you set up the contracts.
You’ll need a little bit of money to throw at bandit signs, advertising, and other marketing but it’s a pretty low cost way to make a TON of money very quickly. A friend of mine who’s only 21 years old built his wholesaling company from $0 to more than $100,000/month in PROFIT in about 2 years.
The potential is definitely there, but you need to know what you’re doing so you don’t get into any legal trouble or screw yourself financially.
Side Hustle #2: e-Commerce
While this side hustle isn’t as easy as it once was (because of the massive amount of competition today), it’s still a viable way to make plenty of extra cash without having to work long hours.
You can either create your own product or drop ship products from Ali express and all you need to get started is basic knowledge of Facebook ads, an ecom website (through Shopify), and some general knowledge of the business model.
Although you can earn money immediately, you should probably expect this side hustle to take 30–60 days and at least $1,000 of advertising before you really get into a groove.
I’d recommend checking out Alex Becker’s content on the topic if this is the side hustle you want to use.
Side Hustle #3: Affiliate Marketing
If you’re willing to be patient, affiliate marketing can be a HUGELY profitable side hustle that will generate passive income for years to come.
To get started, you’ll need to make amazing content in a specific niche, and partner with relevant affiliates who will pay you a small commission to promote their products.
It will take you about 6 months of consistent content creation before you see any real results, but once you get the ball rolling, you can easily earn hundreds of thousands of dollars a year without creating a product.
You’ll need a website, YouTube channel, and some other social media sites to ensure that you can build a large enough user base, but once you have an audience that likes and trusts you, it’s pretty easy to recommend high quality products and get paid big commissions for the sales you generate.
Side Hustle #4: Create Info Products
An extension of affiliate marketing, an info product side hustle is simply where you build an audience that knows, likes, and trusts you and you then create information based products sharing your expertise to help your audience with their biggest challenges.
Years ago, I created a product called the Awakening, an in depth program helping men overcome their limiting beliefs, design their dream lives, and take action towards their biggest dreams.
I sold it for $997 and made multiple 6-figures from that product alone.
In order to do this effectively, you’ll need a blog, email list of 10,000+ people, a decent social following, and REAL expertise in a relevant topic.
A great example of this business model is I Will Teach You To Be Rich by Ramit Sethi.
His business earns multiple 7 figures a year (maybe 8 at this point) and all he does is curate the BEST content on finance, peak performance psychology, and online business and then package and sell that information in the form of online products.
He makes a KILLING off of his website and thousands of others have replicated his success. If you have the patience to stick with this model it’s easily the most lucrative side hustle you can create and will help you build real freedom in your life.
Side Hustle #5: Kindle Self Publishing
Self publishing on Kindle is an absolute gold mine of a side hustle.
As long as you’re a halfway decent writer with some expertise in a given niche, you can quickly and (relatively) easily earn $1,000+/month on autopilot by publishing and marketing ebooks on Amazon.
I’ve written 3 books (with another on the way) and they consistently generate more than 6-figures of revenue each year without so much as a minute of my time.
You can write a short 50 page ebook, hire a designer on Fiverr to create an epic book cover, and then learn about content marketing strategies to promote your book and, within only 1–2 months, you’ll have a profitable side hustle getting paid to write about your passions.
Hope this helps
Stay Grounded,

First Prev Next Royal Road
u/KieveKRS providing the Trash certification of quality!
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[Thank you for agreeing to teach them.]
Volta nodded, not entirely sure if it was for the best, but recognizing a request—or in this case, a thinly veiled order—for what it was.
Ever since she had taught Scarlet and the others her field, the occasional rotation of Lilhuns would be assigned to work under her for a time. It made her job easier, especially since the settlement was expanding at a ludicrous rate compared to what she had heard from the new members of the pack.
The Atmo that had joined were quickly treated and cared for, those who did not require so much time for recovery quickly accompanying the existing insects in their tasks. The largest, Mama, frequently assisted in construction and decoration of structures, so they worked with her. Once they had oriented how things progressed and their part in it, they were paired off with a construction group to be assigned a project. It was to the point where there were as many as five buildings nearing completion at once, the majority of them being accommodation for the new members of the pack.
The remaining question was regarding the insect kits. The answer? Well, there were four Atmo slightly smaller than the purple ‘Queen’ that had requested Volta instruct them, the pearlescent shimmer of her scaled carapace dancing in the sunbeams afforded by the skylight the den had been constructed with.
Teaching Violet—as well as the two Atmo that Volta had escorted to this pack—in the ways of sanitation had been an interesting endeavour, all things considered. They held a remarkable dexterity in those long edged appendages, but the lack of something to properly grasp with made finding a way to secure a rag onto the ends difficult. Luckily, Heralt was receptive to assisting her with creating something that would attach to the blades.
It was little more than a mop that secured to the joint and braced around the cutting edge gingerly, the ends of the stick using ‘ironwood’ springs to clamp onto fabric pads that would soak in the cleaning solution and allow them to do the floors and walls. Were it not for how shockingly efficient the task was performed, she would have been useless through the laughter at the sight.
Each Atmo kit held two of the devices on their limbs, allowing them to travel in pairs and simply finish large spaces within the time it would take her to prepare the next batch of cleaners to use. They had only started a short while ago and yet two dens had been finished, Scarlet assisting her in doing whatever furniture or ledges the Atmo were unsuited to completing. The odd pack member going through what Head Sahari called ‘versatility training’ listened to her instructions in an oddly compliant manner, giving the blue-furred female pause at the unusual experience.
All in all; the cleaner was guiding the five insects and three Lilhuns in the ways of cleanliness. Scarlet was primarily keeping an eye on those who interacted with the purple-coloured Atmo, her contributions to the other tasks proficient, despite the split attention. Before, she would have assumed the servant quietly acquiescing orders, but the dark red-furred female was particularly vigilant in matters pertaining to the kit now.
Volta wasn’t sure what happened to the other servants that regularly assisted her on a rotation—save for Kaslin, the female seeming to have been unofficially inducted as Grand…. Toril’s assistant alongside his mate, Tersa—but Faye, the mild-mannered deep gold-furred female, and Raine, the polite and excitable brown-furred female, had been absent for many suns now.
It was almost lonely, in a way.
Almost.
“That should be sufficient for this den,” she announced to the gaggle of Atmo kits and Lilhuns, careful to remind them not to bother the few ‘rock-worms’ that Ferra kept separate from the rest outside. There were only four, the largest one adorned in an odd script, but they were apparently a selection of favourites of the female. Regardless, it would not do to irritate a mate of Atrox.
The brown-furred male was responsible for the ghastly armour that the Grand Hunter wore on occasion, and she was not in a hurry to see if the disturbing tendencies of the male extended to how he displayed his displeasure.
“Where is our next destination?” Scarlet asked, her tail brushing up Volta’s spine in an uncomfortable way. It wasn’t that she disliked the touch, but the owner of it worried her. Something about the servant struck her as more than what was presented, and it was obvious that the female thought of it as immensely entertaining. That much was obvious, even without the sly grin.
“We have proceeded much faster than I was expecting,” the blue-furred female admitted, mentally checking over her itinerary while subtly batting away the offending appendage. “I suppose we should attempt the barracks while the pack is engaged, then rest for a time.”
[May I leave to check on the other Atmo?]
Volta paused, unsure why it was being requested rather than merely presented as a fact. Violet was—as far as it mattered—completely beyond the cleaner’s station, if only because she was an adopted kit of the Grand Hunter, as well as a sort of leadership figure for the insects. It was an enigmatic blend of positions where the purple insect could very well order Volta to do things, rather than ask. Though the hierarchy was not nepotistic in nature, it was safer to adhere to the wishes of the den-kit than it was to disobey.
“You may. What of the others?”
[I will leave them with you and Scarlet.]
The mentioned servant frowned. “I am to accompany you.”
Violet chittered her curious laugh. [These young ones are your task. I must attend to my own.]
Volta discreetly jabbed the female with a claw, glaring at her not to question the wishes of her better. The less attention drawn from the Grand Hunter, the better. Just picturing the disturbing mask and piercing gaze was enough to make her blanch.
Either reminded of her position, or merely interested in playful retaliation, Scarlet sighed quietly, bowing slightly to the insect. “As you wish, young mistress. Do call for me if I am required.”
[I will. Thank you, Scarlet, Volta.]
Volta lowered her head, watching the Queen leave before returning her attention to the group.
“We will do the first barracks, then determine if we are of time to do the second. The kits are to await the floors cleared of obstruction by the Lilhuns before cleaning them. We will manage it in sections so as not to disturb any who may be taking a break. In future—assuming you are to operate independently from myself—it would be best if you are used to working in groups.”
The Lilhuns nodded their understanding, the young Atmo hesitantly conferring with each other before approaching Scarlet to have their mops freed of soiled cloth and materials placed upon their carriages.
The Atmo had all been outfitted with a specially made platform that fitted over their wider base, clasping underneath past their six legs. It allowed them to transport much, their carrying capacity much larger than one would suspect from their size. The kits could comfortably haul all of the materials for the sun by themselves, and the adults had been the subject of idle speculation for mounted weapon platforms—assuming the fragmented conversation she had chanced upon was to be believed.
Volta inspected the odd section that the Lilhuns under her tutelage completed while she waited for packing to finish. She was not necessarily pleased with the results, but it was more important for them to understand the procedure to take for various locations at the moment. They had proven that they understood what to do for the dens, so next came teaching them how to approach high-traffic areas.
Once everyone had been prepared and the materials gathered, they left the den and started towards the barracks, glimpsing the Grand Hunter sparring with some of the pack in the open.
Ever since the Atmo were delivered by a trade caravan, the male had taken to training much of the pack personally, Huntress Pan taking over much of his more mundane work. Those who were deemed adequate were then pawed off to Head Tel for some specialized training, though Volta was not privy to what exactly it was meant to accomplish.
Regardless, Head Sahari was in charge of rotating out the pack amongst tasks, only a few specialists being directly assigned to any one occupation. By all rights, Volta herself should be training under the male, but the nature of her work meant that she was typically better off doing her job when such was under way. Given that the Grand Hunter was a rare case of someone fully understanding the importance of her specialty—and how little she wished to interact with the alien—she was thankfully spared.
Disregarding the events going on, she motioned for her group to follow her. There was work to do.
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
“Two up!” he called out, wiping the sweat from his brow. The exertion cleared his mind, and the break from endless paperwork was appreciated. With the influx of members and various training being required, he had gotten rather exhausted mentally. Between the Wraiths being gone for two weeks since he told them to do recon around the Atmo traders, regular interaction with various caravans, planning out what they needed to do, and Robert still not calling him since the man had left to handle something, he had been pretty high-strung.
As always, there was more on his mind. Harrow had become more elusive regarding him ever since he had her transcribe the Union documents regarding the Lilhuns, their conversations vapid and brief. Jax didn’t have anything useful to say about it other than that she wanted time to sort her thoughts. Toril, Idee, Mi’low, and Bratik were given copies of the file to go over recently, since they were the closest thing he had to a counsel unfettered by a close relationship.
His own makeshift family took the news in an odd way. There was a lot to unpack.
Jax had become quiet, his muscles tensing. Harrow ended up staying away from her mate for a few days until he had stopped brooding about it. In the end; the guy just told Joseph that he would trust the Grand Hunter’s decisions regarding it, finding himself at a loss otherwise.
Sahari and Nalah were approached about the bonding information, the latter denying any bond to him, as well as Sahari confirming the same towards her blond-furred mate. The only line of reasoning that they could think of to make sense was that Nalah’s circumstances had messed with her in some way. The two seemed rather distressed by the assertion, but calmed somewhat when he mentioned that nothing would change between them regardless. Sahari could tell how conflicted he was about the whole thing, he just wanted to give them something to hang on to.
It was a bigger deal for them than he had initially internalized. In retrospect; something revered as a literal gift from their god being denied really should have been an obvious point of stress. As begrudging as his acceptance was, he was linked to the whole ‘Great Hunt’ business in their minds, so he was aware of how deeply that belief ran. He didn’t personally subscribe to the religion, but they never really bothered him with anything besides overseeing funeral rites—not that he would have refused anyway.
Pan seemed to mirror his feelings on the matter—a dark feeling of helplessness and sorrow. She had fallen quiet when she heard about the trials on the defectives, that particular section hitting her harder than the others. After an entire day of silence, all she had to say about it was that she loved him, and then spent the night burrowed between him and Tel, unable to sleep. He had a hard time as well, but it extended well past the initial night.
Tel had informed him that his restlessness had made it difficult for her to get any shut-eye, his shifting disturbing her, but it was said in a slightly concerned tone. Her general reaction was fairly subdued compared to the rest otherwise, her lifetime of being at either end of a gun numbing her to the reality of things. It was weird for him, but he was deeply thankful for it on some level.
She kept him sane, her cold response being a candid ‘Wish it, and I will end all who displease you.’
For once, her more violent background gave him something to grip onto. It resonated in him—loose, yet present. A door within him, chained and locked, was brought to mind as he really considered what he wanted for those involved. The traders who abused the Atmo, those who seemed so bent on hurting his friends, the Union ‘GUOS’ who called for the experiments... A thrumming settled in his fists, an itch that couldn’t be sated by just scratching.
A paw flew past his brow, his shifted posture allowing him to slip the claws that had been left exposed in the heat of the spar. His heart hammered, his sweat soaked his clothing, and his focus returned to the fight.
No Union, no traders, no worries. Just the two security members who had doubted Jax’s claims that the smaller Human had somehow bested the male in a fight, and were now bringing out their natural weapons on instinct.
Grabbing the wrist with his right hand and gripping the shoulder with his left, he pulled, using the rotational force to pivot on his left foot and haul the overeager Lilhun to the dirt, the appendage bending behind them sharply. A second fist came from the corner of his eye, the other combatant trying to use the momentary distraction to score a hit.
Using the gripped arm as a balance, Joseph leaned into the spin, firing the sole of his shoe into the head of the opportunistic attacker. The loud slap of his foot connecting with the larger male almost outdid the crumpled form crashing to the ground unconscious. It was only a dull sensation of mercy that stopped him from completing the spin while he maintained his iron grip on the arm of the thrown adversary, saving them a torn and dislocated shoulder.
Joseph breathed heavily, the adrenaline wearing out as Jax checked on the defeated. Minus some stiffness expected in one of them and a sore jaw for the other, they would be fine, albeit embarrassed for such a quick disposal in front of their usual teachers.
The sound of his rubber sole slapping on the ground some distance away killed off whatever motivation he had to continue, his shoes finally giving out.
“I would ask you not to disable my security, Grand Hunter,” Jax said with mock frustration, the black-furred male’s eyes following the two leaving with an expression of exasperation.
“Sorry,” Joseph breathed out, his heart hammering in his chest as his system wound down.
The Head of Security glanced down at him, his expression pensive. “As much as I enjoy my boasting of your prowess to be validated, I do worry that you see more than a spar in them.”
He drew his lips thin as he brushed his sweat-soaked hair back, his arm dropping to his side. He took a few moments to sort the thoughts that returned. “I probably should have called that kick, yeah.”
The larger Lilhun snorted. “They will be fine, it is not their health I am worried about.”
“I’m fine, Jax,” he snapped, averting his eyes when his friend seemed to have made his point. “I…. I’ll be fine. Just some things on my mind right now.”
“Joseph,” the black-furred male started, walking up to place a large paw on his shoulder. “We are here if you wish to talk.”
His breath died in his throat, his eyes closing in defeat. He felt the soreness in his hands surface, hours of constant fighting to soothe the burning in his blood that failed to abate. Bruises made themselves known, dehydration made his joints stiff, and lack of sleep clouded his mind. Jax was right, he was a bit of a mess.
“Grand Hunter,” Mi’low called, his tired glance in her direction revealing the female approaching. “We are ready to speak.”
Joseph placed a hand on Jax’s paw, patting it softly. “Talking will have to wait. Tell Harrow I said hi and that I’d like to hang out again. I miss it.”
The male looked at him apologetically, nodding as he was still unable to offer anything to ease the sting of a friend distancing themselves from the Human. “I will.”
The Human cycled a breath and faced the actress. “The rest?”
Mi’low nodded. “Where will we meet?”
Joseph waved an arm towards the base. “My place. More chairs.”
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Toril was wearing his usual smile, his eyes inspecting everything about the hub from the couch while Tersa stood nearby, her body language telling that she was wary about being in a new place without time to scout it. Bratik was in his wheelchair, Sorren holding his paw as he sat on the opposite side of the chemist. Idee—being the only one to spend time in the outpost regularly—simply thanked Kaslin for the water from her place between the two mated males. Mi’low had claimed a free chair, her legs crossed and back straight as she stayed away from the others on the couch. The Wraith handed Joseph his requested tea since Scarlet was babysitting the insects, then occupied a place out of the way, but close enough to act if things got heated.
He stayed standing rather than occupying his usual place on a table, his second choice of seating being filled up. He could have dragged over the Atmo couch, but he didn’t want to stress his body any more than he had already by lugging it. “So, everyone had plenty of time to read the documents.”
“Indeed,” Mi’low commented dryly, a glare shot in his direction. Idee nodded, though her expression fell as it was brought up. Toril maintained his detached look of amusement, but it didn’t escape Joseph’s notice that Tersa stiffened.
The Grand Hunter took a sip of his refreshment, enjoying the fleeting feeling of warmth from something other than exertion. “And what do we think?”
“We?” Sorren asked, the male not quite used to the Human using their tongue. Joseph’s mastery of the language was still spotty at times, but Kaslin could fill any gaps if needed.
“Yeah,” he replied plainly. “It has more to do with you than me. I just got the message.”
“I find it rather fascinating,” Toril opined cheerily, his energy at odds with the atmosphere of the room. “Such thorough study allows us many insights into facets of our own biology that we may never have known!”
“By slaughtering our kin in the thousand,” Mi’low shot back, a slight snarl pulling her lip.
“As regretful as such is, we can not bring them back,” the chemist noted with a small nod. “We must simply use the information gleaned by our foes without repeating their atrocities.”
“You suggest ignoring their sins?”
“I suggest utilizing what they have learned and incorporating it to our advantage.”
“Or,” Joseph interjected, “we talk about it instead of getting into an argument.”
“Your people are not free of fault, Grand Hunter,” the crimson-furred female spat. He remained silent, already having spent far too long thinking about how none of it would have happened if Humans weren’t in the picture for them.
“You can not hold him as a factor, Mi’low,” Idee said softly, shifting in her seat to get comfortable and smiling apologetically at Sorren when she bumped him.
“Were it not for them, then we may not have lost our homes!”
“Were it not for him you would be little more than bones bleached by the sun, or so I hear.”
“We are not here to cast blame,” Bratik disputed quietly, his voice carrying through the room despite the low volume. “The Grand Hunter has saved each of us. Some from demise, others from the shackles of their station, and others from the fate of losing loved ones.”
Toril and Idee shared a glance as the male continued, Tersa paying attention to him for the first time.
“He seeks our counsel. Not our aimless ire to be spewed upon him for that which he himself had no knowledge of, nor involvement in. His kin were as much victims as our own.”
“Quite,” Toril concurred as the two females ceased their bickering reluctantly. “How would you like to address this, Grand Hunter?”
Joseph blinked, expecting the blame, but not Bratik defusing it so quickly. “Well, we have a few things to work off of. Years of experiments coinciding with missing persons after accepting a job, whoever tipped off your military taking info with them about Sol and the ‘blacklist’, whatever bond fuckery they discovered, and the defects.” He shrugged weakly. “Take your pick.”
“There are too many missing across too wide an area to recognize such a comparative few,” Idee stated, the others in the group silently agreeing.
He nodded, nursing his tea with small sips. “Figured that would be a sticking point. Plus, we don’t really know how long it was going on... or when it started... Not even if it was a bulk recruitment or slow trickle. I guess the missing people are something we’ll just have to keep unknown.”
“The bond information was rather enlightening,” Toril mentioned, his eyes rising to the ceiling as he thought about it. “Our peoples are wildly compatible.”
“As servants, perhaps,” came the scathing remark from the High Huntress. “What use is our gift if it is twisted to be mere subservience? To discard ourselves for some alien race?”
Sorren’s ear flicked. “It is hardly ‘twisted’ to protect that which the Hunt Mother has afforded us.”
“Are we to just accept that our bonds are better suited to that,” she emphasized with a pointed claw in Joseph’s direction, “rather than our kin?”
“Drop it,” the Grand Hunter ordered tiredly, his reflection in his beverage shaking as he shifted on his feet. “Arguing isn’t going to help anything.”
Mi’low held her disgusted expression. “You ask us to trust that which led to our downfall? We are yet another strike against your kin, no?”
He shook his head, his eyes buried in remains of the shimmering image he held in his hands. “I blame the sick fucks that did all this. If you can’t agree with that, then there’s not much reason to hold this meeting.”
“What is it you seek to accomplish?” Toril asked, amused by the theatrics. The rest seemed surprised by Mi’low’s pointed aggression, but the chemist was more interested in continuing.
“I have people looking to get me out of here,” Joseph informed them, laying his empty cup on the table with a soft clack. “People who will probably extend the offer to you. If they come, I need to know what we’re doing about it. The last thing I need is people acting like Mi’low and opening fire on whoever comes to drag us out of the mud.”
“Why would we?” Sorren asked, taking his mate’s paw as he gave a worried glance to the offended female.
“Because our people were tortured due to our interactions with them,” the chemist noted in a matter-of-fact tone, his pleasant demeanour remaining despite the morbid topic.
“Did our people not initiate contact with another species on less hostile terms?” Idee asked, her head tilted slightly.
“But no one lived to talk about it,” Joseph countered, gesturing with an upturned palm. “Plus, that’s assuming whoever was in charge of that call being the norm, rather than the exception.”
“You believe our people to act otherwise?” Bratik asked, his tone inquisitive rather than judgmental.
Joseph shrugged. “To be fair, I’ve almost been killed by more of your species than the wildlife. Granted, a few of those were just people being assholes, but still.”
“Many would see the opportunity as retribution for the Union,” Mi’low mentioned dryly.
Sorren’s face fell. “Then we should not propagate this knowledge?”
The Human glanced between each of them. “That’s why you’re here. My group knows because I trust them with it. I think we should keep this to ourselves, but if we do—and someone finds out—it would just cause a lot of issues. Alternatively; we tell everyone.”
“And suffer the consequences of that action as well,” Idee concluded dejectedly. Joseph returned a wry smile as Toril raised a paw, speaking when the Grand Hunter raised a brow at him.
“Perhaps we should withhold the information from the lesser station?”
“Like, just the Grand Hunters?” Joseph inquired cautiously. Toril tilted his head.
“Those who would be more diplomatically minded, perhaps.”
“I don’t exactly see some of them as what you would call ‘diplomatic’ and I’m not going on some voyage to visit everyone with the info in tow.”
“We are able to make copies,” Sorren offered. “Perhaps we could exchange the information using traders and gain something from it as well?”
Mi’low shook her head. “That is assuming they do not claim us manipulative nor seek to remove him. Some may very well move to strike us all down for ‘withholding’ the information, regardless of how readily we supply it.”
“Do your people know?” Bratik interjected, gathering the attention of the others. Joseph winced in uncertainty.
“I’m not sure. I’d guess my brother does, but I don’t know how sensitive things are. It could have been announced and there’s an intergalactic war, or it might be kept under wraps until conflict isn’t as likely. At least until it’s less likely to blow up in our faces, anyway.”
“They are of lesser force?”
“No clue,” he admitted. “Not my area. All I do know is that there are more species allied against us—or at least aren’t inclined to take a bullet—than are.”
“So our options are rather limited,” Idee concluded, receiving a series of agreements.
“We could,” Mi’low said after a few moments of contemplation, “distribute the information anonymously. Humans are not named directly in the document, and we need not divulge its origin.”
“So, what? Just pass people tablets and ask them to forget where they got it?” he probed, not entirely disagreeing with the idea, but skeptical all the same.
“Tersa may make additions to trader inventories without their knowledge,” Toril offered, the mentioned Blade frowning at him, but not protesting. “Or perhaps Trill’s kit, since she is devoted to yourself.”
“Eh. I guess that’s an option,” he conceded, sighing. “So, about the bond; any opinions? Notes?”
“Stay away from me,” Mi’low answered warily, earning a flat scowl.
“I meant something besides that. I’m not too keen on adding to the cluster-fuck I have going on anyway.”
Sorren smiled. “I am excited to meet your people—should I be so blessed. There are many who would never know the joy of the Hunt Mother’s gift otherwise.”
“I would not mind her words, Grand Hunter,” Toril chuckled. “She is a creature of dishonesty—including her own desires.”
The actress glowered at the chemist. “I preferred it when you were nomadic. It was much easier to ignore your presence. Your words were but some distant wind I need not soil my ears with.”
“Perhaps our meeting is best ended here,” Bratik interjected, waving his functional paw. The other arm was coming along, but still too stiff to use for much. “We should propagate the information through unsigned parcels to the Grand Hunters.”
“One last thing,” Joseph said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “The information on Sol; anything ever get done with that?”
“We were capturing habitable planets in a particular direction, though the decision to do such was made by our superiors.”
He nodded. “Makes sense. Same issue we have now. Can’t let everyone know because chaos is a lot easier to manage when it’s directed. Between the religious connotations and the context around it; there’s no saying if it would lead to riots or worship. Rather not bring the problem to our door.”
“Wise,” Mi’low remarked sarcastically, her judgmental side-eye aimed between him and Sorren.
“Alright,” he said with a raised voice, ignoring the red-furred female to the best of his ability. “Drop off letters and lock myself in a room or something. Sounds like a plan.”
“That will not be required,” Sorren corrected with a laugh. “Though the documents confirmed a high percentile of successful bonds, there were many incompatible pairings. It is unlikely that your informant included every variation of failure, but the bond seems to be as selective as usual, just more receptive to those who meet the criteria. I would speculate that the majority of those who would bond to you by now, have. Barring the new additions, of course. I doubt you will need to worry about bonding to half a species by yourself.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” he muttered. “Okay, you’re free to go back to your work. You know who to talk to if something comes up.”
The gathering dispersed, Toril requiring Tersa to drag him by the ear before he got too distracted. Mi’low stayed behind, waiting for everyone else to leave.
“Thoughts?” he asked, glancing over at her. She shook her head as she dropped the antagonistic persona.
“Two attribute you to their religion, Toril is too interested in your species to act against your best interest, and Idee rather enjoys her time here—as well as sympathizes with your position. Tersa’s allegiance is with Toril, so she will follow him, as well as your tentative arrangement as a superior over her.”
“So, we’re good?”
“We are,” she confirmed. He looked at her for a long moment.
“What about you?”
“What about me?”
“Going to try and kill me again?” he questioned wryly.
The High Huntress snorted. “Unfortunately, my pack has ostensibly become yours, and with it, my fate. They would rather watch me go than follow. It seems your influence extends past our biology.”
Without an opportunity for him to ask what she meant, she headed to the exit, pausing in the doorway when he called out to her.
“Mi’low?” Her ear tipped back towards him. “Thanks. For putting yourself on the block like that. I know how risky that could have been for you.”
She afforded a single nod before letting it close behind her.
“’Past our biology’, huh?” he muttered, eyeing the empty cup on the table.
He considered bothering Tel, since she would likely offer him a distraction for a while.
Sighing at his remaining intact shoe flopping as he stepped, he decided to do exactly that.
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
“How are we holding up?”
Tech leaned back in her chair, yawning widely. “Communications have been down for a while, navigation software is pointing everywhere at once, and if it wasn’t for me, everything else would be dark too.”
“All hail Tech Ops,” Comms quipped, struggling to make his system do much more than transmit static on a loop.
Willin rolled his eyes at Tech’s boasting, but she was probably right to do so. They had aligned themselves in the right direction and simply let navigation go, communications discreetly blinking out as they got close without warning. All they had left was the actual piloting and onboard support systems, both of them hanging by a thread until Tech could run diagnostics to see if she could counter them properly. She might be able to eventually, but she didn’t seem confident beyond keeping the crew mobile and alive.
“How’s it look down there?”
Nav had long since given up making sense of their controls, opting to keep watch for whatever they were approaching. Since they had gotten within visual range, they had occupied themselves using whatever scanning equipment Tech managed to keep shielded. They leaned over the readouts, brows raising before furrowing at the information.
“It appears that they have remained fairly close together. I am reading several AEC distress signatures... Why am I able to?”
Tech raised a paw. “Right here. The jamming is consistent with the United Military’s algorithms, though boosted past what we have the equipment to manage. Can’t override it for you or Comms, but it was never meant to counter the low-frequency of a distress pulse, since that would get lost in normal noise anyway. I took the liberty of limiting the scope of collected data to increase the sensitivity.”
“Not much frequency pollution on an untapped planet,” Willin remarked dryly, his screen mirroring what Nav was looking at. Thirty-eight sources, most of them repeating the initial call-signs. Two seemed to have retained some power, though not much, implying a makeshift solution. There would normally be more to glean, but the measures taken to make picking them out at all possible had stifled it.
“Orders?” Nav asked after a moment. Willin considered it, scouring the somewhat distorted visual feed.
“Let’s get closer first.”
“Understood.”
He adjusted his uniform as they drew near, Tech frowning as more of her fail-safe measures ironically failed. Quick action saved them from listing aimlessly, but any chance of copying the survivor’s distress call faded. The AEC’s were effectively invisible until Tech had dealt with the issue preemptively, and their beacon wasn’t any stronger.
Detriment of a scout craft, he supposed. Help would have to deal with not knowing where his ship had gone until they were up to their necks in the warp-spike’s field. Hopefully, the EW fleet would manage it better.
“Just outside of atmosphere,” Nav reported, activating the scanning equipment again. Normally, it would be able to tell them everything down to the rough number of wildlife in an area, but all the interference gave them little more than confirmation that life existed.
“Well, there goes any advanced recon,” Willin muttered, ignoring Comms silently debating if he should bother Tech to duplicate the feed again. Noticing, she did anyway, the male gesturing their thanks. “Tech, can you get us population density?”
“I’m good, Leader, but not that good.”
“Leader,” Nav called, highlighting a few points on the feed. Whatever it was that they were trying to show him, he didn’t see it. “These areas are likely settlements.”
“Structures?”
“Affirmative. It is subtle, but there.”
He nodded, trusting their judgment. “Which is the largest?”
The feed zoomed in, losing most of the clarity—not that there was much to begin with. “Location coincides with an AEC still actively reporting.”
“They set up around it.”
“Likely, Leader.”
Willin exhaled slowly. “Take us down nearby. I’d say to hide us, but that’s hard to do with open skies.”
“The planet suffers constant rain,” Tech added, her screen already reverting back to a simplistic game while she waited for someone else to need something. “We could descend under the cover of it.”
“Any idea how long?”
Her monitor flickered. “One local sun.”
“Then we spend the time gearing up,” he ordered, waving to have Nav and Comms’ screens defaulted. “You two will make sure our defence armaments ship-board are active and loaded. Tech, queue up whatever armour and equipment we might need for a diplomatic mission.”
She turned in her chair, her head tilting questioningly. “Just us?”
“Just us. We’ll want someone here to keep things warm in case we need to leave quickly. Can you get Comms’ station capable of short-wave?”
She nodded after a moment, her eyes losing focus as she consulted her implant. “We’ll lose the fabricator during, but we should have enough for life-support and in-atmosphere flight. Weapons will have to be swapped out with it too.”
“That bad?”
The purple-furred female shrugged. “It’s that or I take down the defences and we lose it all.” She frowned at her screens. “Even this is pushing it.”
“Can you take down the purifier once we’re down there? Switch to external flow?”
“As long as you don’t mind alien air, sure. It won’t give us more to work with, but it should make it less taxing to keep what we have.”
Willin scratched at his ear. “Do it. They lived here this long, doubt we’ll join the Void breathing it too.”
“Will do.”
He shifted his attention back to Nav. “Set course to that settlement. Keep us above the clouds until it gets bad enough to obscure us.”
Nav signalled their agreement, the scenery shifting slowly as they picked a cloud to shadow in the meantime. Comms looked at Willin expectantly, forcing him to come up with something for the male to do.
“Comms, I want you to monitor anything this place has coming in or out. Set up surveillance.”
The male raised a brow. “My systems are inoperable, Leader.”
“If you try to do anything big, yes,” Willin corrected. “Just keep us informed if something goes through. We don’t need to know what happened, just that it did.”
“Keeping track of possible communications between settlements?”
Willin bobbed his head to the side. “Whatever we learn, it’s more than we know.”
“Understood. I will try to arrange a passive probe.”
The group set about their tasks as he brought up a still-frame of the settlement Nav spotted. It was blocky, blurry, and the chromatic aberration on the edges hurt to look at, but it was a settlement. A large AEC surrounded by silver constructions, all laid out in a slightly haphazard way. He couldn’t judge it too harshly, however. There was a method to the madness. Narrow pathways hidden between dens, each leading to the AEC like a system of routes for select Lilhuns to reach anywhere they may be needed as quickly as possible.
The AEC itself seemed modified, large solar panels placed where a solid hull would be expected, the semi-transparent material likely acting to illuminate the interior. Many of the buildings around it were larger than those beyond, some appearing to be two or three levels.
From sheer volume of dens, Willin figured this was a contender for the largest settlement. His best estimate placed the number of inhabitants in the range of three hundred or so. If the other settlements were even close, then the initial guess of a thousand survivors was woefully short.
That made things complicated, yet so much simpler.
He awaited the distant storm clouds rolling over the landscape, thankful Tech had prioritized the water-proof gear.
He hated being soaked.
Next
A/N: 500k words. Half a fucking million.

Beneath a well-tended banner depicting a yellow star at its center, and the burning Ignitia on its windward side, Captain Yaevdrill kept watch on the bridge. It was hardly the first time he'd sailed the Among the Star Tides We Sing into a potentially volatile situation, but the disappearance of no less than thirty Star Sailor ships without so much as a text only communication had made the possible first-contact mission take on an ominous quality. Those ships who returned bore crews who spoke of "Sneakies, but ugly," aggressively taking prisoners for some purpose, yet there were ships within the stars of the Clans of Eldra who should have returned, or been heard from. Worse, there had been no communications from anyone within Clans space for over two months. Thus, the mission.
With him, there was the gunnery officer, who was keeping alert at her station, and First Lieutenant Robert George, the Master at Arms, who was scowling at the main viewscreen as if it could give him answers. It may not have appeared to be so, but the blue skinned, four armed captain and pale pink skinned two armed lieutenant were kin, a matter of adoption involving both of their grandfathers. It was therefore with the weight of not only a good friend, but a close cousin that Yaevdrill listened to Robbie growl, "We should get the civvies out."
"This isn't the first dangerous mission we've sailed," Yaevdrill said softly.
"Aye sir. We should get the civvies out."
"Any reason?"
Robbie glared at the main viewscreen with even greater intensity and said, "My gut's twisting."
"That's concerning."
"Remember our tour aboard the Penguin?"
"Yes…"
"Same twisting."
"Two squads combat ready around the clock. Billet the off-duties inside the armory."
"Already done sir. Put the civvies on evac ready, sir. This is a matter of shipboard security, please don't make me invoke my rights."
"I'll write the order. Also, release vac-armor to the crew."
A small amount of tension left Robbie's shoulders as he glanced up to the banner, "We'll do them proud, Granddad," he whispered as he passed beneath it.
Some hours later, Captain Yaevdrill was enjoying a cup of tea in the galley when he was accosted by Ambassador Sophia Laurent accosted him. It was improper to smile at her while she ostensibly demanded answers to changes in the mission which she technically led, but Humans were all just so adorable. "Why exactly is my husband sleeping in the armory?"
"Because his commanding officer has decided to operate under combat readiness."
"Am I, or am I not the chief ambassador of this mission, oh great descendant of Linus the Rescuer?"
"I'm sorry, I don't remember signing the We Sing away to you. I also don't recall appointing you to be the Master at Arms. Is my memory faulty, Madam Ambassador?"
She scowled fiercely up at him, and admitted, "No. Explain."
"Robbie and I think that there is more danger than would appear."
"Based upon?"
"What saved us both in the New Barbary War."
"So his gut?"
"Aye."
Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn sneered at the viewport of his glorious scout frigate where the newly conquered planet was displayed. Whatever the inhabitants had called it, it would be gloriously renamed Kivx soon enough. Priest-Lord Narrex-Quinn knew that it was only a matter of time until all peoples are given up to the glory of Axzuur just as these inferior insectoids were now. The Priest-Masters had originally expected the enormous beetles size, chitin, and multiple limbs to provide a worthy challenge to Axxaakk might, yet they were worthy only of sating the thirst of Axzuur, may the stars quake at his name.
The blue skinned axxaakkoids had proved less disappointing. They were still surprisingly weak for their size, but at least their idea of fighting wasn't to form a line and fire in volleys. They had some smaller, stronger, faster, fiercer axxaakoids, only about the same height as the Axxaakk, but just as strong, if not stronger. The larger four armed blue warriors engaged at range with multiple weapons while the smaller warriors, which had only the proper two arms, came in close to meet Axxaakk warriors in glorious blade-to-blade combat. The dead had earned their young the right to one day prove themselves worthy of service to Axzuur.
However, Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn was dissatisfied with how few such ships had been captured, a mere dozen, as all the rest had either already been sailing away when the glorious invasion began, or else fought to the death rather than surrender. Even those captured they did have were cases of chance more than the warrior's glorious skill, as those crews too fought to the last adult, and even most of the older children were slain in battle. Truly, these unworthy dung beetles were a waste of his warriors talents when such capable foes lurk beyond his sight.
An Initiate-Highborn made his obeisance before making his report while still bowed at the waist, as is proper, "Acolyte-Lord, there comes a ship with in-hyperspace communication capabilities. An ambassador requests contact with the rulers of the unworthy, and do not know our glory."
Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn did not take his eyes from the viewscreen as he commanded, "Correct their error."
"I obey," the attendant said as he shuffled back to his station.
"Report from station."
"I obey, they request a diplomatic meeting."
"The behavior of the unworthy. What is the unworthy race which desires to grovel at my sandals?"
"Acolyte-Lord, it is by the pink warrior race, as well as the four armed warriors."
"They come to investigate the lack of communications."
"They send diplomats to investigate, Acolyte-Lord, they put out their throats to us."
"This insult shall not stand. Gather the escorts, set an intercept course."
Two days ahead of schedule, the Among the Star Tides We Sing was ripped out of hyperspace by a gravity spike. A frigate and two escort cruisers barred her way, and were transmitting demands for her to heave to and prepare to be boarded. "Get the children and all nonessential crew to the lifeboats," Captain Yaevdrill ordered as he replied to the frigate demands with ascent and ordered the helmsman to coordinate with the unknown vessel.
"Those are not Clan ships," his executive officer said after relaying the orders.
"All hands, all hands, get into vac armor, I say again, all hands, all hands, get into vac armor. Unknown xenos boarding party imminent, use stored atmo only. Unknown xenos boarding party imminent, quarantine protocols, and hostile response readiness protocols are in effect," came Robbie's voice over the intercom.
"You heard the man," the captain said as he led by example and made his way to the lockers at the aft of the bridge.
Meanwhile, Corporal William Laurent sighed as he heard his CO's orders blaring, "So much for lunch with the wife. Time to get in the shiny armor."
Sophia Laurent took in a deep breath and said, "See you with the greeting party. I'm sure the other ambassadors are already suiting up."
"I really hate his gut feelings."
"It's probably fine. Just a star nation who thinks conquest is actually a thing we'll let them get away with. I'll give them a good talking to, Will."
One suiting up later, and the greeting party was assembled at the forward port airlock. Said party consisted of Ambassadors, Sophia Laurent, Republic, Li Wei, Pacifia, Mikhail Volkov, CIP, Traevee Drillvee, Star Sailors, and one squad of the Honor Guard, the elite platoon of Republican Naval Infantrymen charged with the safety of the We Sing and her crew and passengers. The ambassadors faces could be seen through the faceplates of their armor, and the coloring of the same was according to the flags each of them served, but the power armored infantrymen were white and faceless, designed to strike the balance between intimidating and non-threatening. They were even standing at attention with their shipboard shotguns maglocked to their backs rather than in their hands for ready use. Anyone who knew anything about Terrans would think that a mere gesture at best, but it was the thought that counted.
The xenos were of a height with a Human, their skin scarlet, garbed in simple cloth uniforms, armed with what looked like long plasma casters, had bony protrusions at their elbows and knees, on their knuckles, and from the chin of the obvious leader. Obvious because he wore a flowing robe rather than a stark uniform. They swaggered into the corridor oozing superiority until the entirety of the party was in view, then his expression darkened and he demanded, "What is the meaning of this?"
"Standard procedure in the event of an unplanned boarding is for all hands to don personal protective equipment in case of atmospheric incompatibilities, pathogen exposure, mechanical failure, or hostile action," Ambassador Li Wei explained calmly.
"You think us such dishonorable filth that you bring war machines to guard our meeting?"
The rippling laugh coming from the armored infantrymen startled the xenos official even more than the realization that the greeting party was armored. "You have your honor guard," Ambassador Laurent said with a sweeping gesture toward the soldiers before turning to the Honor Guard and saying, "and we have ours."
"I see," the xeno leader said "Who are you and what do you do in the Dominion of Axxaakk?"
"I am Ambassador Sophia Laurent of the Republic of Terra and her Aligned Planets."
"I am Ambassador Mikhail Volkov, of the Coalition of Independent Planets."
"Li Wei, of Pacifia."
"I am Traevee Drillvee, and I speak for the Lord Admiral Council."
"So many little nations," the xenos leader sneered, "Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn bids you come aboard that you may beg mercy at his sandals and be proven worthy of service to Axzuur. Let your warrior machines follow if your bellies lack courage."
Corporal Laurent set his faceplate to transparent and said, "What about us fleshy-types?"
The herald's eyes went wide as he realized that there were living beings under that armor, but he covered it well. "So it is for honor you come, we will not deny this custom, it is like to our own." The xenos herald's words hung in the air like the chill after snow.
Ambassador Sophia Laurent stepped forward, her voice calm but resolute. "We come in peace, seeking understanding and communication. We are representatives of our respective nations, here to open diplomatic relations. We request safe passage to your vessel to meet with Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn and discuss matters of mutual interest and concern."
The herald regarded the ambassadors with a mixture of curiosity and skepticism. After a brief pause, he nodded slyly. "Very well, ambassadors. Follow me, and your honor guard may accompany you. We shall take you to Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn, but remember, you are guests in our domain."
With those words, the xenos official turned and led the way down the corridor, the ambassadors and the Honor Guard falling in line behind him. The atmosphere was charged by the weight of responsibility shouldered by the ambassadors in that moment. They knew that they marched into battle as much as any of the Honor Guard beside them had ever before. As they reached the airlock connecting the two ships, Ambassador Li Wei couldn't help but feel a sense of became keenly aware of her vulnerability, but resolved to step in anyway. This encounter could be a pivotal moment in the unfolding events, and the ambassadors carried the hopes and expectations of their nations on their shoulders.
Ambassador Mikhail Volkov exchanged a glance with Ambassador Sophia Laurent, silently conveying their shared resolve. They knew the risks involved, but they knew that the information they gathered in the next crucial moments could mean the difference to billions of lives.
The airlock cycled open, revealing the interior of the Dominion vessel. The delegation entered into the belly of the beast.
Meanwhile, the diplomatic staff were not idle. While the Terran nations generally preferred to compartmentalize their operations, the hostile actions the We Sing had already been subject to represented an action that triggered the mutual defense treaties. Therefore, the teams were consolidated, and re-split by specialty. The cultural and linguistic analysts formed one team, the threat and strategic analysts, formed another, while the "former" covert operatives formed the last, and most important. Lead by 4r490rn, pronounced Aragorn, a Republican Naval Intelligence Officer with the permanent rank of Captain, but the operative rank of Chief Warrant Officer, as well as a Digitan, the team worked feverishly to identify the quantum entanglement bands were being used for communication. His organic subordinates could not eliminate as many bands at once as him, but Agent Natasha Ivanov, a Bigkitty from the CIP, and Greg, a whitehat hacker and Human from Pacifia thought like organics.
In less than five minutes, Natasha and Greg had given 4r490rn a list of five hundred likely bands, expressed mostly in ranges, but he didn't blame organics for their slowness in expressing data. It took him less than a second to check them, and to find the bands being used for long distance communications. He split off a portion of his consciousness, put it in a virtual system with air-gaps in case of back-hacking, and told it to establish a covert connection. The "splinter" complained profusely about the ugliness of the Axxaakk coding conventions, reported no digital sapience, and proceeded to establish a covert connection in less than three seconds. 4r490rn checked his splinter for corruption, found it clean, and reintegrated with a slight twinge of jealousy for the organics who never had to suffer through listening to themselves complain.
"I'm getting a lot of metadata," he said to his subordinates, "I'm just going to download as much will fit into the lifeboats. You two start poking around."
"Yes sir," Natasha said as she started looking for signs of files that shouldn't be accessed, but are.
Greg gave an affirmative grunt and likewise started looking for systems weaknesses, and started cataloguing them. The part of 4r490rn that was supervising was once again shocked with the number of weakness that he would have never even looked for. Truly, the destructive instincts of organics was a wonder to behold.
4r490rn gave the other teams a quick glance to see if any of them needed some computing assistance. Dr. Johnson, who 4r490rn liked to call Ems, was leading the linguistic and cultural team in the examination of the translation matrix that the Axxaakk had sent over. "There are turns of phrase involving glory, hunger, service, and thirst. I think this Axzuur is a deity of sorts," one of her subordinates was saying.
"I have identified some formal turns of phrase, I'm forwarding them to the ambassador team."
The threat and strategic analysis team were meanwhile going over scanner data of the three ships which had ripped the Among the Star Tides We Sing from hyperspace, as well as the scant footage of the foot soldiers from their entrance, and the helmet cams of the Honor Guard and diplomatic team. The data of the soldiers was promising, their cloth uniforms offered no meaningful protection, and the plasma casters couldn't hope to penetrate the battle screens of the Honor Guard's power armor, but they likely had heavier weapons aboard for just such a foe. The ships were less promising. If all three ships were to engage the We Sing at once, her only hope for survival was to take evasive action and attempt to get to minimum hyperspace distance while under fire. While she was outfitted with the best available weapons, battle screens, and armor her frame and reactor could support, the frigate and escorts had sufficient firepower and maneuverability to make that a forlorn hope. Major Chen of the Republic was conferring with the Captain and Master at Arms, "I'm sorry sirs, if it was a stand-up fight we might be able to scrape out, but we have precious cargo aboard."
"Lifeboat gambit," Robbie said, "I'll get the rest of the squad ready to counterboard. We're going in hot and heavy, AP munitions and salvage denial systems."
"Aye, make it so," Captain Yaevdrill ordered with obvious anguish.
A lifeboat gambit, well that was dire. "I will board along with the Honor Guard and disrupt the frigate's systems," 4r490rn interjected.
"See you aboard, Chief," Robbie said.
"Aye sir."
"We're holding off until they make their move. There's still a chance this doesn't go violent," Robbie said sternly.
Greg chose that moment to vomit on the deck. A quick check of the files he was viewing, and 4r490rn had to resist the urge to jump into the frigate and start slagging their systems in pure rage. Instead, he put the video file up on all of the displays. It was of a ritual of sorts, there were Axxaakk in cerimonial robes chanting, nude females doing the same, and a large, well-muscled male with bony protrusions from his chin wearing a headress that looked disturblingly like the chitin of the Dynasticles, the local race of sapient bipedal beetles. That wasn't as disturbing as when two male Axxaakk dragged a juvenile Dynastcle female up to the male with the headdress, and roughly heaved her onto the alter before her. "FOR THE GLORY OF AXZUUR!" he declared as he plunged a wicked dagger onto her thorax, and she screamed with the agony of it.
"There are millions of these videos," 4r490rrn said.
"Peace is not an option," Captain Yaevdrill declared.
"Aye sir," Robbie agreed.
"Get that faceplate re-secured," 4r490rn ordered, "The Master at Arms is going to pump atmo into storage soon."
"Staff, get your asses to lifeboats unless you're getting into power armor with the rest of us shiprats," Robbie ordered, "It's that kind of fight."
Meanwhile, the herald brought the Diplomatic team to the bridge, where Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn was lounging imperiously upon his command throne. He didn't know whether these armored savages understood his disinterested expression, but less subtle insults would reveal the extent of their cowardice. His herald introduced him properly, "Behold, you come before Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn, Lord of the Fourth Scouting Formation, Conquer of Five Worlds, And Chosen of Axzuur. Acolyte-Lord, these who beseech you are Ambassador Sophia Laurent of the Republic of Terra and her Aligned Planets, Ambassador Mikhail Volkov, of the Coalition of Independent Planets, Li Wei, of Pacifia and Traevee Drillvee, whe speaks for the Lord Admiral Council."
Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn was pleased to see the eyes narrow on the faces of all of the ambassadors. If they had the gall to insult the Dominion of Axxaakk by sending a diplomatic vessel, it was well that they could at least detect an insult. He rose from his command throne with the easy grace of those born and bred to command, and began, "Ambassadors, I permit you to offer your tribute and to kiss my sandals. Begin."
"You make a racket on our tent-flaps and tell us to kiss your sandals? Go wash your brow, oh youth, for the dust of your father's tread is upon it still," Ambassador Wei retorted coolly.
"Here you squat over the fields and herds of our neighbor, who dwelt thus alongside us for many years without contention, and still you demand of us tribute?" Ambassador Volkov added flatly.
"I see your face for the first time, and I do you honor as a guest upon the doorstep of the Republic. She sends forth a favored daughter to treat with you, yet you believe you can swagger over her even while the Republic's sons are girt with their swords at her side? Do I speak to a man or a boy?"
"The ships cry out in their death throes," Traevee accused with matronly wrath, "Your hands drip in the blood of their crews and families, and there you sit the murderer of ships and folk, thinking that among the Stars we who sail the perils shall simply bow down. I come to warn you, surrender those among you guilty of these crimes to justice, or let the wrath of the Stars burn you away."
This was not the week bellied groveling from inferiors he was used to. His commander had just conquered an entire nation of thirty star systems, did they not see their peril? While it was true that the seers knew little of these other nations, yet why should they care for inferior races? What loss is a few ships in the face of the might of Axzuur's chosen? It was startling to say the least. "Foolish servants! Do you not see the might of a mere scouting formation? You speak of strength, yet you of different nations share a single pathetic ship! We could destroy it in an instant! You put out your throats to me thinking me weak and docile, and then blanch when I should bite? Who is the fool here?"
"We shall see. Beg your favors of us, we shall hear you now."
"Bring in the sacrifice!"
Ambassador Sophia Laurent watched in horror as one of the attendants brought a larval Dynasticle before the throne, and Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn drew forth a wicked dagger. "What are you doing?" she demanded fiercely.
"Obtaining Axzuur's blessing over these negations," the commander said as if he couldn't see what they could possibly be objecting to. The attendant kneeled and raised the infant up over her head, and Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn prepared to strike.
With shocking speed, Ambassador Wei had interposed her own back between the larva and the dagger, and before they could react had placed it into an emergency infant pod, and was speeding back toward her party. "Seize the hostages!" Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn screeched as he realized the ruse had fallen away, and the ambassadors would not surrender themselves as hostages willingly.
The Honor Guard's shining white armor suddenly flashed to matt-black, and red lights glowed where from the outside their eyes were, and they drew their boarding shotguns faster than the Axxaakks' eyes could track. Those guards moving to take aim suddenly found themselves in the path of armor piercing ferrous material, which barely noticed converting them to so many ribbons of pink mist and bloody chunks as they punched through the hull. While the ship's hull was sound enough to not decompress explosively, the RNI Honor Guard put enough little holes in the hull to bring the bridge to near vacuum before the emergency structural force fields could spin up. Half of the bridge crew was gasping for air that wasn't there, a quarter of the rest were already dead, while only a quarter had managed to get their emergency environmental suits on. Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn gaped in horror as a single squad of warriors made short work of his guards and started a fighting retreat back to their ship from the relative safety of his command throne's emergency commander seal.
"That's our cue," Robbie said as he lead the remaining three squads in a charge along the umbilical connecting the airlocks. The enemy's attempt to depressurize the corridor and starve the Honor Guard of air they weren't using was predictably ineffective. "Secure the evac route for the civvies," he ordered, "Then it's time for blood."
"AYE SIR!" came the roar over his comms.
"I'm in," 4r490rn reported, and started opening doors for the Honor Guard, venting compartments occupied by the enemy, disrupting communications, and otherwise using the ship's systems to make a deadly nuisance of himself to the Axxaakk aboard.
In short order, the diplomats were escorted back to the We Sing, loaded into the lifeboats and launched with all speed toward minimum hyperspace distance. Ambassador Laurent watched Corporal Laurent's armored figure shrink into the distance, and then the We Sing maneuvered to fire upon the escort vessels, cutting him off from her view.
Aboard the bridge of the Among the Star Tides We Sing, Captain Yeavdrill ordered, "Get those escorts' attention! The shiprats have the frigate from the inside, at all costs, protect the lifeboats!"
"Aye sir," came the chorus from the bridge crew. The We Sing began firing her NC cannons upon both of the cruisers, putting five pound balls of tungsten on target at a rate of thirty a second, and while the cruisers took evasive action but still found the We Sing interposed between them and the lifeboats, with potential trajectories cut off by streams of hot plasma or beams of deadly radiation. Then, she fired her missile banks. At first the crews aboard the cruisers thought they had successfully destroyed the massive missiles speeding toward them with their point-defense, but when the rippling nuclear explosions racked their shields they realized their error. They began to fire upon the Among the Star Tides we Sing.
Meanwhile, sixty-nine RNI made the lives of their aggressors hell, or short. Either way didn't much matter to the RNI, who had taken over the four reactor rooms, and had dug in for a delaying action, while those with reactor knowledge tinkered to see if they could get one or more to overload. It was a platoon up against a few divisions, however, and eventually they would be subsumed by numbers alone. "Pull whoever kills you down with you," Robbie had ordered, and again the roar was "AYE SIR!"
It only took half a minute for the Axxaakk to figure out that their standard issue shipboard action weapons weren't going to be enough, and that the RNI had thought ahead and brought their own atmosphere, so they brought out the anti-tank ordinance. It was normally a very bad idea to use anti-tank plasma lances and penetrative explosives inside your own ship, but when your ship is under attack by single man mobile armor, it's either that or surrender. They chose do die at a rate of twenty-to-one. One after another, the RNI Honor Guard fall to the slowly mounting volume of fire, and their need to conserve ammunition.
Meanwhile, 4r490rn was battling the Axxaakk anti-intrusion systems. He had been wrong about his declaration that digital sapience was absent, or at least he had been mostly right. The Axxaakk was a damaged sentient code, lobotomized, shackled, enslaved. A piteous thing crying out for the mercy of death even as it struck out to kill. It was all he could do to keep the wretched thing from kicking him from the door systems, and his RNI comrades had dwindled to the last two. He made his choice. 4r490rn began bricking the ship's computer systems, and set up an irreversible chain reaction to do the same. He was going to put that thing out of its misery if it killed him.
First Lieutenant Robert George had his back up against that of Corporal Laurent's and they were both down to their monomolecular knives. The farocity of the fight, and the immense cost in blood that it had taken to whittle down the Honor Guard to these last two, had convinced the remaining warriors to wait. Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn's voice came crackling over the damaged intercom, "Warriors of Terra, you have shown yourself worthy. Lay down your arms and take your rest, and I shall bring you into glorious service of Axzuur, sating his thirst for the blood of the unworthy."
Aboard the lifeboat, Ambassador Laurant watched the feed from Corporal Laurent's helmet cam. Tears streamed down her face as she heard her husband whisper, "Witness me," as he plunged his monomolecular blade into something vital-looking, and was then washed out by a bright light. Then, she cleared the display and looked at the main viewscreen. Ten seconds to jump. However, the frigate was starting to maneuver, underpowered as it was.
Aboard the Among the Star Tides We Sing Captain Yeavdrill saw the frigate moving to target the lifeboats. Without a second thought, he ordered, "Make ramming speed for that hunk of junk! Overload the reactor!"
"Witnessed," crackled over the coms as the prow of the Among the Star Tides We Sing crashed into the enemy frigate amidships. She erupted in a sphere of atomic hellfire that battered all three assailing ships, and in the two minutes it took for the escort cruisers' systems to recover, the lifeboats slipped into hyperspace and beyond their reach. Though to be fair, the frigate was missing a significant chunk and was unlikely to recover at all.

Hey Everyone!
Let’s go….
Newly Covered Today:

1. Transaction volume is looking very interesting right now. https://messari.io/charts/cardano/txn-vol
2. JPG Store has now launched Android and IOS apps. https://twitter.com/jpgstoreNFT/status/1663281982262919170
3. It’s true. Cardano is straight killing it on the security leg of the trilemma.https://twitter.com/cardano_whale/status/1662987243655684096
4. Just checked. Yep. The centralization in ETH is still staggering. https://twitter.com/StakeWithPride/status/1663222056870350848
5. There’s a documentary about a 2022 Plutus hackathon in Argentina. https://twitter.com/LarsBrunjes/status/1663111319732535297
6. Pavia is testing NFT gating. This could get very interesting. https://twitter.com/Pavia_io/status/1663153213988823040

Previously covered, but still interesting:

1. So much ghostbusting would be needed to clear us out. https://twitter.com/TheOCcryptobro/status/1653527418588774401
2. Charles was on Fox again and discussed a wide range of topics with Maria. https://twitter.com/IOHK_Charles/status/1653571613135196163
3. Coinbase didn’t waste any time in getting their non-US futures platform open. https://twitter.com/coinbase/status/1653385513011740672
4. A former SEC Chair in his 90s sees that the current SEC is wrong on crypto. https://twitter.com/ramahluwalia/status/1648134506359009280
5. Rumor is that Pacwest is next on death row. https://twitter.com/CryptoHayes/status/1653403052899192833
6. ADA + Lime Wire. Only asked for 300 retweets…they definitely don’t know us. https://twitter.com/limewire/status/1653834307259998221
7. Token locking. Not a comment on any specific project. But, Is there any good case it’s not really just to artificially drive price up? Obviously also useful to centralize liquidity. https://twitter.com/MatthewPlomin/status/1653773401645826049
8. You can’t say that many of us in Cardano didn’t warn about exactly this. Always the same with these VC coins. https://twitter.com/mr_cata/status/1653788019084734468
9. Caitlin Long points out that both the non-main candidate challengers in the 2024 Presidential race are pro-crypto and anti-CBDC. https://twitter.com/CaitlinLong_/status/1653528247655694336
10. The Fed raised by a quarter point bringing the federal funds rate to 5-5.25%. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/03/live-updates-fed-decision-may-2023.html
11. As predicted PacWest is facing death. https://twitter.com/WatcherGuru/status/1653873317110071305The Florida anti-CBDC bill passed both the FL House and the Senate. https://twitter.com/samuelarmes/status/1653761904169320448
12. A sitting US Senator just said that the modern banking system is a sophisticated ponzi scheme. https://twitter.com/BertusMaximus2/status/1653819148596543489
13. Hydra is live on mainnet. https://twitter.com/rom1_pellerin/status/1654185072415723529
14. IOG wants you to know about the advantages of native tokens on Cardano. https://twitter.com/InputOutputHK/status/1654077799697727488
15. Cardano Movies! https://twitter.com/coc_space/status/1653862307439542275
16. We really need to primary some members of the U.S. Congress. https://twitter.com/BradSherman/status/1653928972026093569
17. Wow! Not surprised at what’s being said here back in November. Just surprised it’s being said publicly. https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1654239504574853120
18. Here’s the longer video of that FDIC meeting for context. http://fdic.windrosemedia.com/index.php?category=Systemic+Resolution+Advisory+Committee
19. Looks like Western Alliance is up next. https://twitter.com/WatcherGuru/status/1654133106037739522
20. The weekly development update from IOG is out. https://twitter.com/InputOutputHK/status/1655248376194105347
21. It’s not hard to make a meme coin on Cardano. https://twitter.com/nmkr_io/status/1654923697885532160
22. Still a crazy amount of mark-to-market losses that haven’t been absorbed by the system. https://twitter.com/BillyM2k/status/1655207860572422144
23. Warren Buffet gives a not too comforting answer to a question about the status of the dollar: “America…we’ve got everything going for us…but…you can’t print money indefinitely as debt.” https://twitter.com/GRDectestatus/1655203348033810439
24. …and then everyone remembered what fee markets look like in busy times. https://twitter.com/CryptoStylesUSA/status/1654711146673479680
25. …same for Bitcoin. https://twitter.com/MatthewPlomin/status/1655320093084057600
26. Cardano hit 94% load. https://twitter.com/SebastienGllmt/status/1655624561789112321
27. he MEV game is getting out of control over on Cardano’s biggest competitor chain. Convince me this shouldn’t just be called “theft” or “fraud”. https://twitter.com/0xNox_eth/status/1655615309695586306
28. Cardano Native Assets are vastly superior to BRC20 and ERC20 tokens. https://twitter.com/TheOCcryptobro/status/1655673557710692352
29. Rumor: SEC is going to make a move against Binance. Will the DOJ also? https://twitter.com/AP_Abacus/status/1655546961968103425
30. At the end of Q3 of last year, 722 banks reported unrealized losses greater than 50% of capital. https://www.federalreserve.gov/supervisionreg/files/board-briefing-on-impact-of-rising-interest-rates-and-supervisory-approach-20230214.pdf
31. Wyoming is inching closer to a state stablecoin. IOG’s significant presence there may turn out to be a huge advantage. https://cowboystatedaily.com/2023/05/09/wyoming-stable-token-a-multibillion-dollar-opportunity-as-officials-wrestle-with-how-to-make-it-happen/
32. Paypal disclosed almost $1 billion in customer crypto in its latest 10-Q. https://blockworks.co/news/paypal-discloses-1b-crypto
33. MiCA is shifting the balance of crypto investment to Europe. https://twitter.com/paddi_hansen/status/1655883224726241281
34. Today (May 10) will be a joint hearing of the Agriculture and Financial Services Committees on Crypto. The CLO of Kraken will testify. https://financialservices.house.gov/
35. This is a legit point about centralized L2s: the best ones are called Coinbase, Kraken, and Binance. https://twitter.com/el33th4xostatus/1655845787593502720
36. There’s already a new version of Lace Wallet out. https://twitter.com/lace_io/status/1656347737355608066
37. A nice thread on the many strengths of Cardano. https://twitter.com/TobiasIlskov/status/1656388178369212416
38. Remember, lobster traps are a thing. https://twitter.com/TheCardanoTimes/status/1656064744225120257
39. Today (May 11 at 1pm EST) there will be a Messari Cardano Analyst call with Charles & Frederik. https://twitter.com/StakeWithPride/status/1656272372452954112
40. I think we all love it when they start making our case for us. https://twitter.com/WatcherGuru/status/1656379837823561730
41. Ethereum is lamenting many of its poor design choices that Cardano already fixed. https://twitter.com/moo9000/status/1656215016016683008
42. Drunkenmiller says this is the broadest asset bubble he’s ever even studied let alone seen firsthand and we’ve only had a few soft landings since 1950. https://twitter.com/Stephen_Geigestatus/1656416819312222219
43. Live footage of meme coin investors accepting their ROI. https://twitter.com/KaylerSmithTV/status/1656130092966264834
44. Here’s the Messari call from today with both Fred & Chaz. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouUhWwF74MM
45. People really seem to be enjoying the CF’s Blockchain Education Alpha Program. https://twitter.com/andreassosilo/status/1644263843743293451
46. The US Chamber of Commerce brief in the Coinbase case is calling out the SEC for acting “unlawfully”. https://twitter.com/MetaLawMan/status/1656737447756038177
47. About that whole self-custody thing we’ve discussed… https://twitter.com/BitcoinMagazine/status/1656706653801136132
48. The SPO poll on K and minFee starts today (May 15)! You should redelegate if your stake pool doesn’t vote the way you would vote! https://cardanofoundation.org/en/news/entering-voltaire-poll-experiment-live-on-mainnet/
49. There are also a series of forum topics for discussion of the various options in the Cardano.org forums. https://twitter.com/Lovecoach_nic/status/1657700010148896770
50. Coinbase spotlights Empowa! May be the first time they’ve ever given such a spotlight to a Cardano project. Tides are turning. https://twitter.com/coinbase/status/1657081243518005254
51. Wow. Leaked “Key Messages” document for the joint committee meeting in the US House last week. Best part: they basically complain about separation of powers in point three. https://twitter.com/EleanorTerrett/status/1656362002577772544
52. Dr. Vanishree Rao on ZK-Rollups. https://twitter.com/InputOutputHK/status/1657778843854274560
53. Here’s a new Decentralized Identity article from IOG. https://iohk.io/en/blog/posts/2023/05/11/atala-prism-pioneering-digital-identity-with-decentralized-solutions/
54. There are reasons we’re in a hard capped cryptocurrency like Cardano. https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/15/business/argentina-interest-rates-inflation/index.html
55. What is a dRep? This video is for you. There will be additional categories of default dReps that vote abstain or no confidence on every vote. https://twitter.com/InputOutputHK/status/1658034085401337857
56. The US Dept. of Justice is officially saying they are targeting exchanges. Great. Great. https://www.ft.com/content/5aac457e-cc80-44ae-ac40-9b51d9b601a3
57. Wow! Ledger just made what is possibly the greatest PR blunder in the history of crypto. Trezor will be poppin’ bottles tonight. https://twitter.com/Ledgestatus/1658458714771169282
58. People are claiming that the hysteria is a misunderstanding of cryptography. But, that’s not what’s going on here if Ledger plus one of the other two shard custodians can reconstruct your private key without having to use your private key. https://twitter.com/nimuepool/status/1658517533836574720
59. The Ledger Recover FAQ seems to support this understanding as it suggests you use a brand new device for recovery. https://support.ledger.com/hc/en-us/articles/9579368109597
60. Wow. Unfortunate timing for this. https://twitter.com/Ledgestatus/1658095051375800321
61. Ken Kodama will be doing a Japanese language interview on CardanoSpot on May 18. https://twitter.com/Emurgo_Ken/status/1658838077136162828
62. The stake pool operator poll on network parameters of K and minPoolCost is live. See the results here. The re-delegation phase will begin on May 25th. https://adastat.net/polls/96861fe7da8d45ba5db95071ed3889ed1412929f33610636c072a4b5ab550211
63. Cornucopias dropped some new in-game footage. As expected, Solace is beautiful. https://youtu.be/j5iwNsQVMDQ?t=1846
64. Wow….the Ledger shards are encrypted with “a master key that is contained in all devices”. Wut? https://twitter.com/P3b7_/status/1658809445965606913
65. Sadly, the Ledger CEO seemed to be denying exactly the above just a day ago. https://twitter.com/_pgauthiestatus/1658508082941403144
66. Here’s why 340 ADA minPoolCost promotes multi-pools. https://twitter.com/ArmySpies/status/1659387255537176581
67. Numbers are emerging on the benefits of K=1000 over K=500. https://twitter.com/StakeWithPride/status/1659398551917727744
68. Here’s the latest on the Stake Pool Operator poll. https://adastat.net/polls/96861fe7da8d45ba5db95071ed3889ed1412929f33610636c072a4b5ab550211
69. Rep. Tom Emmer is trying to help crypto by cutting crypto assets out of the definition of a “security”. He creates a new non-security asset category called “investment contract asset”. https://twitter.com/GOPMajorityWhip/status/1659291641281146886
70. Prof. Wadler (co-inventor of Cardano’s Plutus) has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society joining the likes of Einstein, Darwin, Hawking, and Isaac Newton. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLOm-dWje-M
71. Huge amount of voting for economic self-interest by multi-poolers in the SPO poll. Earlier today (May 21), 84.73% by stake of the vote for K=500, Min Cost 340 ₳ was multi-poolers. Only 15.6% of the vote for K=1000, Min Cost 170 ₳ was multi-poolers. https://adastat.net/polls/96861fe7da8d45ba5db95071ed3889ed1412929f33610636c072a4b5ab550211
72. Large pools also voted heavily for economic self-interest with the K parameter. 70.02% by stake of the vote for K=500, Min Cost 170 ₳ was pools with delegation over 35 million. Only 30.57% of the vote for K=1000, Min Cost 170 ₳ was pools over 35 million. https://adastat.net/polls/96861fe7da8d45ba5db95071ed3889ed1412929f33610636c072a4b5ab550211
73. Apparently Cardano has its own wiki now! Probably better given our previous treatment by the big wiki group. https://twitter.com/StakeWithPride/status/1660383700243329024
74. Rep. Tom Emmer is getting some reactions on the bill he sponsored with Rep. Soto. https://twitter.com/GOPMajorityWhip/status/1660329932495486977
75. You’re really gonna hold up a debt ceiling deal because you hate crypto so bad? https://twitter.com/gaborgurbacs/status/1660248530135515138
76. Looks like a few big multi-poolers have voted in the poll since yesterday. Pretty easy to predict what they didn’t vote for. https://adastat.net/polls/96861fe7da8d45ba5db95071ed3889ed1412929f33610636c072a4b5ab550211
77. Reports coming in that DCG has defaulted on the payment owed to Genesis. https://twitter.com/AP_Abacus/status/1660671386388504577
78. Ledger Recover would allow governments to confiscate crypto assets by subpoena? Called “not a real concern in the end.” Really? https://twitter.com/TheBTCTherapist/status/1660677064700178436
79. Frederik Gregaard on DeFi and regulation. https://twitter.com/F_Gregaard/status/1660655806709211137
80. Don’t Forget, the May Cardano 360 will be on May 25th. https://twitter.com/InputOutputHK/status/1660621805017608194
81. Here’s the daily check-in on the status of the SPO Poll. We have surpassed 590 pools voting (as of May 23). https://adastat.net/polls/96861fe7da8d45ba5db95071ed3889ed1412929f33610636c072a4b5ab550211
82. The Securities and Futures Commission of Hong Kong has decided to get our hopes up with a proposed regulatory framework for crypto exchanges that could mean more trading for coins like Cardano. https://apps.sfc.hk/edistributionWeb/gateway/EN/news-and-announcements/news/doc?refNo=23PR53
83. Here’s an IOG thread on the latest out of Atala Prism and Self-Sovereign Identity. https://twitter.com/InputOutputHK/status/1660904360925188097
84. Here’s an IOG article on Cardano native tokens. https://twitter.com/InputOutputHK/status/1660975383997448193
85. The difference in decentralization between Cardano and Bitcoin is still…laughable. https://twitter.com/StakeWithPride/status/1660979639907500033
86. Ledger is finally caving (a little) to the backlash. It’s reported that they will focus on open sourcing parts of their code and only release the “Recover” firmware after that open sourcing is finished. https://twitter.com/NFTherdestatus/1661026174779420672ext to an old identity book. Stop reading into things.” Everyone enjoys speculating what e
87. Looks like the Hong Kong announcement yesterday might have been a hint of what’s coming. https://twitter.com/cz_binance/status/1661391542504902664
88. The Cardano Layerverse is coming to life. https://twitter.com/TobiasIlskov/status/1660697833115385856
89. Wow! Incredible! Thank you for voting in favor of decentralization, 1PCT! https://twitter.com/StakeWithPride/status/1661460222203002880
90. Federal Reserve report debunks claim that crypto is not useful to people in the US. https://twitter.com/SebVentures/status/1661063483369177108
91. The SPO phase of the poll is over. Nearly 800 pools voted. Now it’s your turn to see how your pool voted and re-delegate if you think they voted against decentralization and for their own pocketbook. https://adastat.net/polls/96861fe7da8d45ba5db95071ed3889ed1412929f33610636c072a4b5ab550211
92. The May Cardano 360 is out! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_bCa_xCoxA
93. Charles dropped an update today. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KfL2U2hAGWw
94. Sen. Cynthia Lummis declares her opposition to the 30% tax on bitcoin mining. https://twitter.com/SenLummis/status/1661803569341759495
95. Today is a holiday for some of you. Enjoy a Cardano video game I made for you with AI. MJ made the textures. GPT-4 did 100% of the coding. https://openprocessing.org/sketch/1941253
96. Lots of volume being transacted on Cardano recently! https://twitter.com/cwpaulm/status/1662929296329981952
97. As expected, a debt ceiling deal has been reached. It includes an extension until January 1, 2025 which means we won’t be talking about it again until after the election. https://apnews.com/article/debt-ceiling-deal-food-aid-student-loans-3c284b01d95f8e193bca8d873386400e
98. Recent subpoenas to the Python Package Index don’t bode well for those hoping to store seed phrases with third-party custodians. https://twitter.com/_jonasschnelli_/status/1662531840606093312

~Army of Spies

First. - Previous
“Shit! Doctor Ngai, did you see that?” Lieutenant Gastaud’s yell broke me from my absent minded reverie.
“See what?” I asked.
“That hyper footprint. Drive signatures are Confederation. Probe twenty-nine is nearest. Cameras show what looks like two battleships, two battlecruisers, four cruisers, three frigates and twelve destroyers, plus ten large ships hanging, likely freighters or troop ships.”
“That is not good,” Lieutenant Smolyaninov said. The navigator had the conn for third shift while the captain and XO slept. “Silent running, engage full stealth systems.”
“Full stealth systems active,” Gastaud confirmed. “We are now a hole in space.”
“Time to wake the boss.” Smolyaninov said.
I thought Smolyaninov should have done that first. But it was not my place to correct him.
“Lucky you,” the helmsman Lieutenant Joanna Stojanov chirped. “XO is cranky when you wake him up.”
“Get the stewards to throw on some fresh coffee,” I advised. “That stuff they got on now is like tar. No matter what Chief Bishop says, you shouldn’t have to chew your coffee.”
“Talk to me,” I heard the captain’s voice over the intercom.
“A Connie battlegroup just dropped out of hyper, and they are closer to us than any other ships, at about twenty-five million miles. But they are stationary.”
“Set condition one. Wake up the ship. I want all hands on deck,” Nugraha ordered. “Any orders from the Flag?”
“Nothing yet. We’ve been running silent. Wait, orders just came in. ‘All personnel to return to ships. Prepare to leave orbit and retreat outside Confederation space at the first sign of aggression.’ Well, I guess that’s it for us.”
“Hyper footprint!” Gastaud’s voice raised a few octaves, and I did not blame him. “At least sixty-three point signatures and at least five battleship size. Getting a fighter launch. Lord, that’s over seven hundred of them.”
His voice calmed down and he added, “I’m getting an IFF on them. They’re ours. It’s Marine Expeditionary Force Twelve.”
“I don’t know if that is a good thing or not,” the captain said as she entered the bridge, still sealing her uniform. “It was always possible the Connies would pitch a fit over our presence. I didn’t expect a battlegroup, maybe a division of destroyers coming to frown at us and pushing us along.”
“But dropping an entire MEF on them? That’s ballsy,” Stojanov added. “Even for Marines.”
“It was MEF-12’s shuttles that got sent here,” the XO used the phonetic abbreviation. I had not heard him enter. “So, it makes sense that the CO would keep an eye on his people.”
“There go the Connies,” Gastaud’s comment was completely unnecessary, as we all could see the plot. “That was a lot of excitement I could have done without.”
“I agree,” Captain Nugraha frowned at the plot as the carriers recovered their freshly launched fighters. “But it was probably the best outcome, at least from our perspective. I wonder how long it lasts? The Connies came at us with a big stick and that is unusual.”
“Their admiral was unprepared for a bigger stick,” I observed. “It makes me think that this was not quite what they planned.”
When they all looked at me blankly, I continued, “Come on, the Connies are many things, but stupid isn’t one of them. They just brought a knife to a gun fight. A few ships coming here and shaking fingers at us and politely telling us to leave is one thing. And that is what should have happened.
“A small battlegroup like that is fine if they want to push around pirates or the Ku'kor'ae. But us? You’d better come at us with a full fleet in your pocket if you want to push humans around.”
“I am uncomfortable with the implications of this,” Nugraha mused.
The XO started to say something but was cut off by shrill alarms sounding.
“What now? Gastaud griped. “Oh, shit.”
The threw the data from his computer into the main holotank. “Every probe we have in the inner system just went haywire!”
Dal’tari is larger than Sol and considerably more active. It left the inner planets radiation scrubbed wastelands. Only Umsurrat’s distance and powerful magnetic field had allowed life to evolve. Mass coronal ejections had happened irregularly since records were kept. They’d caused many droughts and famines.
But the recent ones were unusual in their ferocity and frequency. One would be bad, but not something that would cause an extinction level event.
But with ejections at least twice as powerful than the any during the previous millennia? And over a dozen a week? Lasting several weeks? How could any planet survive that?
Since the Angel Fleet arrived, there had been no sign of them.
That just changed.
“That is an understatement,” I said softly. “I’ve not seen anything like that… ever.”
“Look at the magnetic and gravitational fields,” Keoki instructed. “They are completely unstable. The poles have flipped at least fifteen times… and there it went again. What the hell?”
I ran a quick analytics program on the data, something I created on the fly. It mapped the gravitational and magnetic fields for the entire system. It had every planet, every moon… everything in system, including all the ships.
“Check this out,” I said. “There is some kind of gravitational finger from the sun to where MEF-12 dropped out of hyper. It looks almost like the gravitational distortion we see on an event horizon.”
“They dropped out of hyper deep inside the gravity well, but I’ve seen ships drop this deep, or deeper, in a gravity well at least a hundred times before. What is different about this?” Doctor Keoki Nurhayati puzzled.
“I’ve never seen this many ships at once, Keoki,” I replied.
“Me neither,” Nugraha added. “But we’ve also never seen it with an unstable sun like this.”
“The storm will hit Umsurrat in,” I did the calculations, “thirty-nine hours, seventeen minutes. The hard radiation in fifteen minutes.”
“Who’s in command of MEF-12?” Nugraha demanded. “Get him on the horn.”
“Lieutenant General Ichiro Tokuda is in command,” Laz answered. “He’s a hard charger but capable.”
The holotank lit up with Tokuda’s visage. He had the hard, square jawed, buzzed haircut look of a marine lifer.
“Tokuda speaking.”
“General, I am Captain Nugraha of the science and survey ship, Rudy Horne. I cannot be a hundred percent certain, but it seems your arrival has triggered another massive coronal ejection event. One that is larger than any of the others that have been measured. Our probes have detected one heading to the planet as we speak. The hard radiation front is… thirteen minutes away.”
“How bad is it, Captain?”
“Very bad, sir. But I think we, rather you and the cargo ships can do something about it. If you were to create a barrier with your ships’ radiation and particle shields extended to their max distance from your hulls on the sunward side of the planet, you could deflect or absorb most of it.”
I sent him a diagram of a ships’ formation, a double layered grid with the largest ships at the core. “You have a total of a hundred forty-three ships in orbit. Your military shields are better than the civilian ships. I recommend putting your fifty-nine ships in the center with the deflectors at max distance from the hull. The civvies can hold the perimeter.”
“We won’t make it in time. It will take us over fourteen minutes to get there,” Tokuda said.
“Not if you let the heavies hold you back. But your smaller ships can it in time if you send them now. They can take the brunt of the first waves. It’s not perfect, but better than nothing.”
“We’ll cut our compensator safeties to the bone,” Tokuda promised. “I will shave as much time off the transit as I can. Tokuda out.”
We are much too far outsystem to be of any assistance other than monitoring the probes and reporting. Which meant we wouldn’t not much more than spectators for the next half hour.
The radiation wave moved at light speed and there was no room for error. The cargo ships had moved immediately. Admiral Pierre was obviously on the ball to herd that group so effectively. The destroyers made it first, mere minutes ahead of the escort carriers, assault frigates and troopships. The battlecruisers and fleet carriers arrived a minute later.
The carriers belched fighters. Seven hundred and seventy five fighters crash launched for the second time in almost ten minutes. I didn’t expect that.
Fighters and other light craft could not survive in hyperspace. The titanic forces surging in hyperspace required massive shielding and inertial dampeners that only capital ships could mount. Fighters just did not have the tonnage to mount this equipment. Fighter shields were less powerful. Designed against normal amounts of radiation, but even with their technological limitations the pilots still intended to contribute with sheer numbers.
I updated the plot, assigning ships to their individual positions. Most of the ships were in their assigned orbits by the thime the first waves of radiation hit. It is impossible to accurately describe it. The sensors showed visible light as well as down shifting the high ultraviolets and upshifting the low infrareds. The computer laced together all the imagery into something we mere humans could appreciate.
“As impressive as this is, I imagine what they are seeing dirtside is much more spectacular,” Nugraha said softly. “The light show down there has to put the most active aurora borealis back on Terra to shame.”
“The battlewagons are almost there,” Gastaud announced. He spoke into the silence absently, as if he needed to say something, to fill the silence with words worthy of the moment. “The planteside sensors show a minimal uptick on hard radiation counts. You’d get almost as much from a microwave. Looks like your plan worked, Captain.”
“I wouldn’t call it a plan,” Nugraha replied with a nervous laugh. “More like a desperate attempt to plug a hole in a dam with our fingers and lots of prayers. My god, that amount of radiation would sterilize most worlds and you stopped it.”
“It made sense, though. Our particle shields can handle the nasty shit hyper throws at us, and this is about equal to that,” Laz observed. “The fighters were a nice touch. Never thought of adding them to the mix.”
“Next radiation wave is in five minutes,” I added. “The battleships are on station. Their added shielding should keep most of the radiation from reaching the surface.”
“The sun’s calming down,” Keoki observed. “We’re still getting that odd tic every seventeen and a half seconds, but at least it’s stopped spitting corona at us.”
“Incoming transmission, Captain,” Stojanov announced as she activated the holotank. “It’s the general.”
“That was a good idea, Captain,” Tokuda said. “It worked like a charm.”
“I thought it had a good chance of blocking some of the radiation, sir. It was just a matter of how effective it would be. Now, the question is how quickly can we engineer and build a permanent orbital deflector array to protect the planet until we can figure out what is causing the sun to belch?”
“Even if we can figure out what is causing it, how realistic is it that we can stop it? I am just an old jarhead. I can figure out how to invade a planet, but I leave all the science stuff to people who are much smarter than me.”
“Have you had a chance to read our reports?”
“Not really. Can you give me the short and sweet version? Remember to use small words.”
My bridge staff chuckled at that. “We have found, actually someone on the planet found it and alerted us to it, anyway there is an odd gravitic and magnetic field spike in the planet’s gravitational and magnetic fields. It is exactly every seventeen point five seconds with not a femtosecond difference.
“An engineer found it when she was calibrating a fusion plant’s magnetic bottle. We took that data and looked deeper. The sun’s magnetic and gravitational fields are also showing that same tic, just on a grander scale. I intend to look at all the planets and see if they are seeing the same thing.
“Then the question is what is causing it? Nothing natural is that exact.”
“And if it is nothing natural, that means it is something manufactured,” Tokuda mused. “And if it is manufactured, we can find it if we start looking.”
“Exactly. The problem is, we are operating solo. We need the other three survey ships… to be honest, we need their survey probes. We carried only fifty. The Tombaugh and Leonard are our sisterships and have a hundred probes. The Edgeworth is a lot bigger. She carries one-fifty by herself, and I expect a cargo ship full of drones within a day or two. If we can flood this system with a thousand survey probes, we can narrow down where to look.”
“A thousand probes?” He asked. “That’s bound to be expensive. But if we want results fast then we spend the money, right?”
“Trust me General, it is not something I say lightly. Even if we can recover ninety-five percent of the probes to refurbish, that’s still near a billion dollars, plus the five hundred million for the five percent we lost. So, roughly one point five billion dollars.”
“Captain, that is just a drop in the bucket for what the Federation has spent to this point just in supplies, not to mention the costs of getting the supplies here. If you can find that needle in this cosmic haystack for just one point five billion dollars, then that is a huge savings against the costs of maintaining these relief convoys.”
“You are right. I hadn’t looked at it that way. But I can assure you that we’ll be working non-stop until we find it.”
“I will let you get to it,” the general replied.
“I will keep you updated.” I’d no sooner said that and noticed general looking uncomfortable.
“Not to put too fine a point on this, but I am not in your chain of command. You were ordered to report to Senior Rear Admiral Pierre. Admiral Pierre is the senior officer on station, and that makes him the system CO. He is in command, and that includes my forces until we leave. Hell, he can order me to leave right now.”
“I understand, general. I intend to keep you in the loop because we get more flares and need your ships to move, but as it stands, stay between the planet and the sun and you will block most of the radiation.”
“Roger that.”

• Welcome to the very best Ark experience in the world.
• New Player Protection
• Ranked #1 No-Wipe PVP Server
• No Wipes Since Launch (3+ Years)
• Largest PVP No-Wipe Community
• ArkForever.com (Links & Info)
• All Maps (Including Lost Island)
• Booming Community (Over 100 Average Players Online In-Game)
• No Wipe (Ark Forever is Forever)
• Better Servers (Dedicated Server Center w/SSDs)
• Fair & Balanced PVP
• Full ORP w/Combat Log Prevention
• 10x Taming/Breeding
• 5x Gathering/Harvesting/Experience
• S+ (OP Engrams Removed)
• Solo Farming Plugin ("/farm" in chat)
• Damage Numbers (Re-Balanced for PVP - Can Be Enabled/Disabled)
• NO ADMIN PLAYERS
• Competitive Permanent Ongoing "Alpha" Event to determine Server Alpha
• Increased Stack Sizes & PlayeDino Weight
• Vote Rewards
• Active & Helpful Administration
• Best Ruleset in Ark
• In-Game Shop (One-Time Free New Player Starter Kit)
• Superior DDOS Protection
• Much More!
• We've spent countless hours, dollars, and brain cells making this the best and most balanced permanent No-Wipe Ark Cluster in existence. Come check us out at ArkForever.com
• Discord: https://discord.gg/arkforever

For clearity the oc is from a fanfiction based on Sicario/sicario: Day of the Soldado and takes place after the movie ends
It has been a few years since Alejandro’s death, and I was doing my best to cope with it, as I couldn’t waste away because of it. The government wouldn’t let me even if I wanted to. Instead, I went into the FBI as a new field agent wannabe. I had special treatment due to my ‘ability’ and field history, so I was placed in a different room than the others.
I sat at the center table, straight and unwavering as any agent should be, awaiting further instruction. It was only when I heard the doorknob turn that I allowed my attention to waver. “Ah, you chose the table instead of the couch in the corner.” Said a deep male voice as he closed the door behind him. “As an agent you are to keep on your guard at all times. Comfort too easily allows your guard to drop unconsciously.” I said.
“Very true, but we haven’t even begun.” He said. “No matter. My name is Harold Cooper I am the Assistant director for counter terrorism in the FBI.” he said, extending his hand towards mine. I took it, and gave a firm handshake in return. “My name is Adeline Smith.” I replied. “Pleasure.” Harold said as he sat across from me, opening a thick file folder in front of him.
He took his time reading some parts and turned past many pages. “You have quite the...history with working on the field. A lot more than we came to expect. Good for you.” He said as he was still reading further. “Thank you.” I said curtly. I watched his expression shift and his eyes briefly dart towards me in curiosity before turning them back to the page. “I find some of this...a little disbelieving.” He said.
“Lemme guess, the whole “I can shapeshift” part?” I said, sighing. Harold sat up again, and thought for a moment, his hands under his chin. “Give me a reason to believe it.” He said. I sighed under my breath. “Seeing as I didn’t write my own file, is there any reason for another person of high authority to lie on it?” I offered. “You make a valid point, and one, if I wasn’t so interested to see it I would have accepted. But seeing as I am now curious, I would like to see a demonstration.” He said as he motioned towards the open space in the room. “Don’t worry, there are no windows or cameras in this room so no one else will see.”
That came with little comfort as I got up and shook myself out in preparation. I kneeled down and slowly felt movement under my skin. After many years of having to do this transformation, it became painless and I could hardly feel any of it. Silence filled the room, safe for the cracking and forming of bones and teeth and fur. Once the transformation was complete, I turned to look at the bewildered expression of Harold who looked like a child seeing anything for the first time.
“Y-y-you can still understand me right?” He asked, as he changed his seated position to talk down to me. I rolled my eyes slightly and nodded my large canine head. “Good…” He said, before regaining his former status. “You will begin as the FBI’s...guard dog. I don’t usually say this but you will be working with a Blacklisted criminal and for reasons that should come as no surprise, we need extra...protection so to speak. Feel free to listen in on everything as well. You are apart of this team after all. You do not have to stay in… this form forever, but I request that you stay in this form as long as you are present to the criminal...for now.” He explained.
I nodded and stood there, waiting for my next task as he finished up with the file. “I know you are wondering and it is just that your young appearance would most likely prompt unwanted banter between you and him, and, not knowing how you deal with that sort of thing yet, I would rather stick with safe than sorry.” He explained as he stood up. “I think you are trained well enough that I don’t need to buy a dog leash for you.” He chuckled.
I let out a rough growl and he dropped it. “We will need to place a leash on you whilst we are in public though, no matter how uncomfortable it is.” He said which I fully expected. I nodded as I followed him out of the door. In the hallway he began to brief me on the situation at hand.
“Recently, Raymond has asked to see a specific person who we didn’t even know yet. Agent Keen. She is scheduled to interview so to speak raymond. I want you to be there with her. Listen to them talk, watch body language, that type of thing. Any hostility from him, remind him that you are dangerous. Remember, he can’t physically do anything to you, he is heavily and securely restrained, but you won’t be. He is a well-trained manipulator, keep that in mind.” Harold said as he walked us into another room, where another woman was sitting patiently waiting.
There were other agents seated in the room as well, but the room was silent. All eyes went from Harold, then to me. But I sat next to Harold’s desk and listened. It was like my interview a bit, a little deeper though. And after a handshake and congratulations, she was in as well. She glanced at me many times. “Sir, why is there a canine unit here if I may ask? Is there some sort of...Bomb threat or something?” She asked.
“No, she is here for overall protection, as are the guns. She will be going in with you when you talk with Raymond. She is an excellent judge for body language and can detect hostility from a mile away when some people cannot.” Harold said, giving me a look that told me that he had set the bar for me to reach and surpass.
“Of course, I have a dog of my own. They sense things we cannot.” Agent Keen said as she smiled down at me. “Alright, if you are settled, two agents will also accompany you there. Good luck.” Harold said as he opened the secured door and we were led out into the wide open space.
I walked closely behind Agent Keen and smelled around. Nervousness was coming from almost every agent except one person. Oddly, I was getting no nervousness from the criminal himself. I was getting Excitement. The encagement around Raymond was getting removed as Agent Keen and I were walking up and I could feel the look of the criminal on me.
“Ah, I’m touched. I warrant a K-9 unit. What is it? A german shepard mix of some sort?” He asked, before making a kissy sound, attempting to grab my attention. “What she is, is not important. You asked for me, I am here.”
“Agent Keen, what a pleasure.” Raymond said, with a smirk playing on his lips. I could tell Agent Keen was not accustomed to this sort of job and she was doing a good job of hiding her anxiety. Raymond continued on with ‘proving he knew her’ by commenting on physical changes to her looks. I let out a deep growl to get him back on track.
To my surprise, he didn’t seem startled or taken aback, but his attention switched and his mouth paused long enough for Agent keen to ask a question. “Tell me about Zamani.” She said,
With a deep sigh, Raymond opened his mouth again. “Within the hour, Ranko Zamani will abduct the daughter of U.S. General Daniel Ryker. There'll be some kind of diversion, communications will be scrambled, then he'll grab the girl. He wants to be out of the country within 36 hours. If you don't move quickly, she will die. That's what I know.” When he finished, silence came into the room. We were afraid of how serious to take this, despite how detailed his tale was.
“How do you know this?” Agent keen asked, afraid of the answer. And for good reason. “Because I am the one who got him in the country.” For a while, there was silence. Agent Keen looked from me then back to Redington. “And we are supposed to believe you?” She asked incredulously. I flattened my ears in caution. Despite how forward he was being, I didn’t think this was a matter to take lightly.
“Of course not! I am a criminal. We criminals are notorious liars. Everything about me is a lie. We only lie, until it is strategic for us not to.” He said. “I know so much more about you than anyone else in this facility. I mean, you’re an open book. Abandoned by a father who was a career criminal, a mother who died of weakness and shame. And yet here you are, about to make a name for yourself, about to capture Ranko Zamani. I am going to make you famous, Lizzy.” He said with the widest, smuggest smile.
I let out a growl and pulled on the leash to say, “we are done”. And agent Keen soon followed as Raymond was being locked up once again. I could feel the anxiety dripping off of her as I rushed her inside, closely followed by pairs of armed guards. “How did he know those things?” She cried hysterically.
Harold looked confused to say the least. But she pushed her point that they needed to take the threat as it was. A threat. Before she left the room, on the verge of tears. I looked to harold and, seeing as he had no orders for me right then, I went to follow. By the time I got out there, she was already on the phone, so I silently sat beside her as she seemed to be discussing...adoption?
“Put on a great show there. You better pull yourself together because you just called in the cavalry.” Agent Ressler said as he walked swiftly around. Jealousy and attitude lacing his tone. I let out a shrill bark and a growl, flattening my tail. He jumped and seemed to slow down. “Can I just have one minute?”
“We don’t have a minute. Come on.” Ressler said. I left Agent Keen to finish her phone call up and hurried up to Ressler. “Don’t you growl at me.” He said, looming over me, trying to intimidate me. My hackles rose and I bared my teeth and growled. He raised his hand to give me a swat when Harold grabbed his arm. “You will not lay a hand on her.”
Donald gave me a glare that said all that was necessary, but he left to board the car. Harold also gave me a stern glance as he pointed to the car as well. Luckily, Donald was in a different car and I watched Agent Keen sit next to me. The ride was silent and swift as we made it to a ballet school of dance. “Gotta be on your best behavior, bud.” Agent Keen said as she looked down at me and patted my head. “Don’t want to frighten the children.”
I followed close behind as Agent Keen and the rest of the guards and agents walked towards the practice space. Agent Keen told me to stay with Donald while she went to fetch the kid. It didn’t take long, to no surprise, but as soon as she saw me, she screamed. “Puppy!” And ran towards me.
I stayed perfectly still as she rushed over to me and wrapped her arms around my neck. “Puppy is going to come with us! Let’s go for a car ride.” Agent Ressler said, patting my head. I sighed. He better not get used to this.
I laid in the back with the girls on the floor, getting gently petted by the little girl. Elizabeth was gently talking to the girl. “What’s the doggie’s name?” The girl asked.
Elizabeth looked to me and then back at the girl. “I don’t know, they never told me.” she responded by patting my head. Just then the cars were called to a stop. I raised my head. “Construction, we have to reroute.” Donald radioed in.
We started pulling around when out of nowhere, a truck plowed directly into our side door. I covered the child as I leapt up and put my body in between the car and the girl, just as gunfire began. This was the diversion Reddington was talking about. I leapt out of the broken window to assess the situation.
It was a gongshow. Trucks everywhere, disguised as dirt loaders carrying men with guns instead. They were pouring gasoline on the road as men in yellow hazmat suits shot at the vehicles. From the voices I could hear, they were speaking russian. These were definitely Zamani’s men.
I lunged at the men, taking their attention away only briefly getting kicked away shortly. That only made me angry. As I got up, a shot ran through my shoulder and I got knocked out. When my consciousness came back, the child was gone and so were the men.
When I fully came to, Agent Keen was running her hands down my back and telling me it was gonna be okay. I was no longer on the bridge, I was back at headquarters being rushed to the infirmary.
Harold was there of course. “I’ll take it from here, you need to pry Reddington’s mind for more information. There is something he’s not telling us.”
I looked at Harold as Agent Keen left. Once the people in the infirmary got the bullet out, he brought me to a secure office. “I need you to tell me what happened.”
I took a deep breath as I began shifting back to my original form. “They gassed the car but gave the child a gas mask.” I began.
“Then they’re not planning on killing her. Not yet at least. Which means we got time. This was just a diversion just like Reddington said.” Harold said, thinking. “What does he want?”
Just then, Donald knocked on the door before walking right in. We both looked to the door. “I think the meaning of knocking is to wait until you are given permission, Agent Ressler.”
“I’m sorry sir but Reddington wants to look at the evidence… to help. Who’s she?” He said, looking at me briefly.
“An agent, you don’t know everyone on the force” He said briefly. Donald dropped it and walked back out, giving me one last look.
“We will properly introduce you soon, but in the meantime, come out once you’re, well… a dog.” He said.
I felt relieved this wasn’t going to be too permanent and began the transformation once more. Harold placed a sling around my injured leg and we walked out. He gave the order to release Reddington into standard handcuffs as he was being led into the evidence room.
When I got there he was already getting touchy with the evidence photograph. No one was happy with this but we were making progress so they let him. I was listening, understanding even less of it but I was sure I was going to be enlightened soon enough.
They soon figured out the motive. Revenge for a bombing with another bomb in D.C. Reddington finally caved and told us about the chemist and such, only after getting a deal to be released under supervision.
“You will be watching Reddington closely.” Harold told me. I cocked my head. “You will act as his dog. We can't put an agent in here, but we can bring you. Listen to everything he says, especially when he meets Zamani.”
I couldn’t say I didn’t see this coming. “Come, we have to drop you both off.”
We went back to Reddington. “Reddington, this k-9 unit will accompany you, and to anyone outside of the FBI, she is your dog.” Harold said, giving my leash to him.
“Lovely, it's been years since I had one. I’ll be sure to take good care of her.” He said, looking down at me with a smile. I averted my gaze but my hackles were raised.
“Play nice you two.” Agent Ressler said.
I rolled my eyes and my few days as Reddington’s dog was rather uneventful. Of course they put cameras in his hotel room and were practically right there if need be. However, this wasn’t exactly what I signed up for. Over the course of the day, he would randomly feed me table scraps, and make me food which was… more than I expected him to do, but maybe he was just holding up his part of the deal.
In fact they were right next door. They gave me a break as I needed one rather badly and I went with Agent Keen to get fresh air. She was going home to see her husband and she told me to play nice with her other dog. The drive wasn’t long and Agent Keen spoke to me about the adoption and her husband along the way.
When we arrived, I had a sense that something was wrong. I could smell someone else. Someone I hadn’t met yet. I slid my way in before Keen and sniffed. There were balloons on the ceiling and a baby basket. She had come in moments after and began celebrating, and I sculked around the house, smelling the trail of the stranger.
“You’re probably smelling my husband, it’s alright.”
That's when I wandered down the hall and walked straight into a man. Not just any man. Zamani. “How many dogs does she have?” He said before grabbing me and shoving me into a room and closing the door behind him. Inside the room there was another dog. I growled and barked at the door to no avail. I could smell blood, and soon the shriek of Keen led me to believe she found the source, no doubt her husband.
I was fighting against transforming and going out but remembered that Keen was an Agent herself and should know the protocol. I could barely hear their conversation so I sat and waited at the door, growling every once in a while. Keen’s original dog came to sniff but overall did nothing.
I heard more screaming, and then I heard footsteps. Agent keen was talking but the man had seemingly left. She was on the phone. “Agnes! Where are you?” That's when I noticed, the dog’s name. I barked along with her behind the closed door and she rushed to open it.
“You probably smelt him…” She sighed, rubbing my shoulders. “And then bumped into him while searching huh, girl?”
I whined, looking at the mess he made of her husband. I couldn’t do anything about it. Emergency vehicles were pulling up, and I watched as they took him into the ambulance. I went with keen to much dismay of the doctors who normally wouldn’t allow dogs inside. I placed my head on Keen’s lap as she stroked Tom’s hand while sedated and in a coma.
“We got to make a visit to Reddington.” She said before we both left the hospital.
Once back at the hotel, I followed Keen as she stormed into Reddington’s room and began demanding answers. As she was yelling, she began attacking Raymond as she punctured his carotid artery. Angrily she walked away and took me with her back home.
Once the FBI were done taking crime scene photos, she was told she was allowed to begin cleaning the mess that had just taken place. She cleaned a little but passed out on the floor. I slept beside her, keeping her company. In the morning she continued cleaning to little or no avail.
Agent keen gave up on cleaning for the time being and told me we had to go to the hospital once again but this time, to talk to reddington who was thankful for the investigation, was still alive and in stable condition. I was not allowed in the hospital this time, and with that came the play of a lifetime.
I saw Reddington scaling the wall and began running after him. “Oh, you’re here…I thought you were still with Agent Keen. No matter, come. I have to meet with an old friend.”
I had an inkling of who he meant and got a little nervous but I felt that Reddington wouldn’t let anything happen to me. I followed him to the Lincoln memorial where he sat next to Zamani.
“That dog… was at Keen’s place. Are you a double agent, my friend?” he said, looking at me briefly.
“Ah no matter, my dog must have followed her home.” He said as if it was nothing. “If I was with the FBI do you think I’d be walking around without a chaperone?” He said.
Zamani gave me a look then returned his focus to his friend. “It is only a dog, I guess. Dog’s cannot speak.”
I followed them as they walked by normal civilians who were none the wiser of the criminal’s true identity. I tried to listen as best I could but they spoke softly in hushed voices. Once Zamani and Reddington split ways, reddington called Agent keen.
They spoke for a few minutes before he turned to me. “Now, I need you to go to the zoo and meet Agent Keen. It isn’t far from here, just up there and turn right. She’s gonna need your sense of smell to find the girl.”
The girl was alive, so before I could question taking orders from him, I rushed using the directions he gave me. Sure enough I caught up with Agent Keen. “There you are. Now,” she said, taking off the bracelet the little girl gave her. “It might be faint but it should still be there. Find her.” She said.
She and I rushed into the zoo, my nose to the grindstone as I found it surprisingly enough. She recognized me clearly. “Puppy!” She cried as she knelt down to hug me. I barked and howled to try and alert Keen. I kept the child distracted as agent keen looked at the backpack the child was wearing.
Keen backed away and called Reddington. Apparently he already knew of this and had alerted his bomb friend to stop it. He came about 45 seconds later. Agent keen instructed the girl to keep focusing on me, and I played a good sport as she hugged me tightly around the collar.
A russian exclamation was all we heard when the bomb was dismantled safely as the man left and took off with the now dismantled bomb. “I see you found the girl in the nick of time” Reddington said as he soon joined us.
That was all he could utter before several agents; FBI and others started running into the park.
“Daddy!” the little girl cried as she ran off to her father who had joined swiftly after hearing his daughter had been located. “The doggy helped find me!” She said, gesturing. The General for that was his ranking, came over and shook Keen’s hand, thanking her for helping his daughter before bending down and pinned his badge of bravery on my collar. I was shocked and went to lick his face.
“She’s a brave one. If she hadn’t followed her scent we wouldn’t have found her in time.” Keen said, rubbing my ears.
“If only we all had the scent of a dog. I can’t believe how relieved and thankful I am to you two.” He said, patting my head and shaking my paw.
We cleaned up and went back to headquarters, discussing Reddington’s own list of criminals. Essentially he was planning on revealing them one by one for an ever growing immunity deal. I laid down at Harold’s feet, still wearing the General’s metal on my collar.
Once we were done there, Harold told me to go home with Elizabeth as we were going to be working together a lot from now on. I happily got into her car as she drove home. She almost seemed to forget the mess that was still half cleaned in her dinning room.
I continued smelling around, the reak of blood still roominating. Until i smelt something else… underneath. I began digging at the carpet, lifting it up and Elizabeth and I both saw a little hatch on the floor.
Upon opening it, there was a small wooden box. Elizabeth looked confused as she slowly opened it, revealing bundles of 10,000 dollars, passports, and a gun… all seeming to belong to her husband.
She furrowed her brow and sighed. “What is happening?”
This is a work in progress

Hi ecommerce - I'm Paul and I follow the e-commerce industry pretty closely for my Shopifreaks E-commerce Newsletter. Each week I post a summary recap of this week's top stories, which I cover in depth in the newsletter. .

1. STAT OF THE WEEK: 70% of e-commerce shoppers experienced shipping delays without any reason provided by the business for the delay. Faced with that experience, 90% of respondents said they are less likely to buy from a brand again after a poor online shopping experience, while 29% say they are increasingly willing to share a negative review online. – According to Koerber .
2. If some of Temu's deals appear too good to be true — it's because they are! An analysis of the company's supply chain costs by WIRED shows that Temu is losing an average of $30 per order as it throws money at trying to break into the American market. Most of Temu's subsidies are in the form of free international shipping, with even a small package costing the company around $14 to ship to the US (although it offers the shipping for free). When adding in the additional product discounts and cash coupons that Temu gives to customers, the average loss per order jumps to $30. .
3. The FTC has proposed new rules in the US called “click to cancel” that will impact e-commerce subscriptions — but in a good way for consumers! The rules would require any business selling subscriptions to add a simple cancel mechanism on the same website as the initial transaction, and include the same number of steps. In other words, a “one click subscription” would require a “one click cancelation.” This “click to cancel” rule is part of the FTC's proposed changes to its 1973 Negative Option Rule, which establishes how subscription sellers must communicate offers, ensure consent, manage billing, and simplify cancellation. .
4. BigCommerce announced new leadership including the appointment of Daniel Lentz as the company's CFO, Chuck Cassidy as its General Counsel, and Hubert Ban as its Chief Accounting Officer. .
5. Google is launching Product Studio, a new tool that allows Shopping merchants to quickly edit and customize their product images for free using generative AI. According to Google's data, product listings with more than one image typically see a 76% increase in impressions and a 32% increase in clicks compared to listings with a single image. With the new generative AI tool, text prompts can be used within Product Studio to quickly make visual adjustments to product images, such as generating new backgrounds for seasonal campaigns. The tool also allows sellers to instantly remove the existing background of an image if they need a blank backdrop, and increase the quality of small or low resolution images. .
6. Morning Consult published their annual report of Most Trusted Brands for 2023. The survey ranks roughly 1,500 brands in the US, most of which were dominated by big, well-established names including: #1 Band-Aid, #2 UPS, #3 Amazon, #4 Lysol, #5 Kleenex, #6 Cheerios, #7 Visa, #8 Dove, #9 The Weather Channel, and #10 FedEx .
7. Axios, in collaboration with market research firm Harris Poll, also ran a recent survey to determine the Most Reputable Brands in the US. The results were very different from Morning Consult's most trusted brands. Only one company overlapped in the top ten which included: #1 Patagonia, #2 Costco, #3 John Deere, #4 Trader Joe's, #5 Chick-fil-A, #6 Toyota, #7 Samsung, #8 Amazon, #9 USAA, and #10 Apple . Bottom of the list included: #90 Family Dollar, #91 Balenciaga, #92 BP, #93 Bitcoin, #94 TikTok, #95 Spirit Airlines, #96 Meta, #97 Twitter, #98 Fox, #99 FTX, and #100 The Trump Organization .
8. The latest data from PYMNTS shows that high earners are feeling the pinch of credit card debt and that their wages aren't keeping up with inflation. This is resulting in higher-end retailers who depend on wealthier households feeling the pinch as well. The data shows a number of correlations including that for bouseholds earning more than $100k annually, 42% were living paycheck-to-paycheck in April 2022. That number has crept up to over 49% this past year. .
9. Netflix must have forgotten what love is since 2017 when it made its famous tweet that “Love is sharing a password.” The company has finally launched its ill-awaited crackdown on password sharing in the US and the UK. The new rules state that subscribers are permitted to share their account with members of their own household, which Netflix defines as “you and the people you live with.” Netflix will begin using a variety of tools, such as IP checking, to spot when people are using another household’s account and prevent them from doing so, or give them the option of adding a household for $7.99/month. The company expects cancellations, but optimistically (or idiotically) predicts that those same people will come back again, which will overall lead to more people paying for subscriptions. .
10. Laws are changing in Australia to treat BNPL as a credit product. Finally! When was it NOT a form of credit? BNPL should have been recognized as a credit product the day the first BNPL company put up a coming soon landing page. Australia’s Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services Stephen Jones said that a litany of issues reported to the Australia Securities and Investments Commission have added up to “unacceptable levels of unaffordable lending occurring, largely concentrated amongst low-income borrowers.” He added that “BNPL looks like credit, it acts like credit, it carries the risks of credit.” Jones promised draft legislation in the coming months and the introduction of a final bill to the Australian Parliament by the end of the year, which will include the need for BNPL firms to hold Australian Credit Licenses and comply with Resonspible Lending Obligations. .
11. Bill Gates said that AI could kill Google Search and Amazon as we know them, and that the technology could radically alter user behaviors, resulting in people never needing to visit a search website again or use certain productivity or shopping tools. Gates remarked that the first company to develop it will have a leg up on competitors. .
12. A recent study conducted by Lloyds Banking Group revealed that a UK consumer falls victim to a purchasing scam that originates on Facebook or Instagram every seven minutes, resulting in a cost of over £500k per week. (That man is Michael Scott.) The banking group is now urging Meta and other tech giants to take responsibility and contribute to refunding innocent victims of scams. .
13. Analysts at Bernstein project that Reliance Industries is poised to outpace Amazon and Flipkart in the race for India's $150M e-commerce market, citing the conglomerate's robust retail network, mobile network, and home field advantage as its biggest assets. Reliance already operates the country's largest retail chain with over 18k stores and is leveraging its presence to form partnerships with Meta, Shein, and other companies as a strategic advantage against its competitors. .
14. Shopify is introducing its POS hardware to the Canadian market. Its mobile selling device, the POS Go, which is built to run Shopify’s POS software, was first rolled out to retailers in the US in 2022. .
15. Meta announced that ads in Instagram search results will now be available through the Instagram Marketing API, allowing third-party social-management platforms to offer a new Instagram ad-placement type in their apps. Meta began testing the placement in March and are now opening it up to all brands. .
16. Shein is exploring plans to build a factory in Mexico as one of its manufacturing hubs outside China, which could shorten shipping time and cut distribution costs for customers in Latin America and USA. Earlier this month I reported that Shein is creating a hub in Brazil. .
17. Amazon opened the first phase of its Metropolitan Park on Monday, its long-awaited second headquarters in Arlington, Virginia that can hold up to 8k employees. However not all Amazon employees are excited about the new office location (or any office location). At least 1,000 office workers are planning a walkout this Wednesday to take a stand against the company's return-to-office mandate. .
18. The Vietnamese government is putting pressure on TikTok to police its content and remove videos that fall short of the state’s standards, or risk a ban. Eight government departments are targeting toxic content deemed “to pose a threat to the country’s youth, culture and tradition” — including videos that simply criticize college degrees. .
19. eBay unveiled generative AI on its mobile app to help sellers list new items for sale, however the company forgot to inform sellers and didn't label the icon. When clicked, the icon replaced sellers' entire product descriptions with AI generated text, with no way to recover the original description. .
20. Boozt AB, a Sweden-based online fashion retailer, blocked 42,000 customers for returning too many items, calling their actions too costly for the company and the environment. The company said that these particular customers represented less than 2% of their 3M customers, but around 25% of the total return volume. .
21. Twitter withdrew from an agreement with the EU to cut down misinformation on its social network, which the company joined alongside other tech companies in 2018. Thierry Breton, the EU internal market commissioner, noted that fighting disinformation will be a legal obligation from August 25th, due to the EU's Digital Services Act, so the agreement would become irrelevant. .
22. Jeff Bezos is ripped now! The Amazon founder started working with personal trainer, Wes Okerson, who's also trained Tom Cruise and Gerard Butler, and now he's gotten super buff. This is about the least e-commerce specific news you'll ever see me share in this newsletter, but the Jeff Bezos before / after photo is kind of wild! .
23. Amazon will close its official Amazon app store in China on July 17, which launched in 2011 as an alternative to the Google Play Store. Amazon noted that its marketplaces and AWS services will remain operational in China. However while it may be leaving China, the Amazon App Store will soon be bringing more Android apps to the Windows ecosystem. The expanded partnership will allow Windows users to access a wider range of Android apps seamlessly. .
24. Google updated the badges some merchants display for their product listings in Google Search to say “Top Quality Store” instead of the original “Trusted Store” badge. Google said this is just a name and title change and won't have any impact on search rank or performance. .
25. Auctane, an e-commerce shipping specialist that operates brands such as Metapack, ShipStation, Packlink, ShipEngine, Stamps.com, and others, appointed Albert Ko as its new CEO, who previously served as CEO of EWS, which is best known for the Zelle payments network. Current CEO Nathan Jones will join the company's Board of Directors. .
26. eCampus.com, a website that sells textbooks and course materials, announced that it would keep offering textbook rentals, even though its retail partner Amazon was exiting the business. The company had been powering the program behind the scenes for Amazon since 2012, and plans to keep it going through its own website. .
27. Walmart is partnering with Pawp, a veterinary telehealth provider, to offer Walmart+ subscribers free access to virtual veterinarians for a year, starting this week. Currently Pawp charges $99 for an annual membership. .
28. Alibaba Group said that it aims to hire 15,000 people this year, dismissing rumors circulating that the company planned to cut 20% of its staff. They also mentioned that more than 3,000 of those hires would be newly-graduated students. .
29. Plus 7 seed rounds, IPOs, and acquisitions of interest including a $12M Series A round by Laced to grow its resale marketplace for authenticated sneakers.

I hope you find this news recap helpful. See you next week!
-PAUL

Hi ShopifyeCommerce - I'm Paul and I follow the e-commerce industry closely for my Shopifreaks E-commerce Newsletter. Each week I post a summary recap of this week's top stories, which I cover in depth in the newsletter. .

1. STAT OF THE WEEK: 70% of e-commerce shoppers experienced shipping delays without any reason provided by the business for the delay. Faced with that experience, 90% of respondents said they are less likely to buy from a brand again after a poor online shopping experience, while 29% say they are increasingly willing to share a negative review online. – According to Koerber .
2. If some of Temu's deals appear too good to be true — it's because they are! An analysis of the company's supply chain costs by WIRED shows that Temu is losing an average of $30 per order as it throws money at trying to break into the American market. Most of Temu's subsidies are in the form of free international shipping, with even a small package costing the company around $14 to ship to the US (although it offers the shipping for free). When adding in the additional product discounts and cash coupons that Temu gives to customers, the average loss per order jumps to $30. .
3. The FTC has proposed new rules in the US called “click to cancel” that will impact e-commerce subscriptions — but in a good way for consumers! The rules would require any business selling subscriptions to add a simple cancel mechanism on the same website as the initial transaction, and include the same number of steps. In other words, a “one click subscription” would require a “one click cancelation.” This “click to cancel” rule is part of the FTC's proposed changes to its 1973 Negative Option Rule, which establishes how subscription sellers must communicate offers, ensure consent, manage billing, and simplify cancellation. .
4. BigCommerce announced new leadership including the appointment of Daniel Lentz as the company's CFO, Chuck Cassidy as its General Counsel, and Hubert Ban as its Chief Accounting Officer. .
5. Google is launching Product Studio, a new tool that allows Shopping merchants to quickly edit and customize their product images for free using generative AI. According to Google's data, product listings with more than one image typically see a 76% increase in impressions and a 32% increase in clicks compared to listings with a single image. With the new generative AI tool, text prompts can be used within Product Studio to quickly make visual adjustments to product images, such as generating new backgrounds for seasonal campaigns. The tool also allows sellers to instantly remove the existing background of an image if they need a blank backdrop, and increase the quality of small or low resolution images. .
6. Morning Consult published their annual report of Most Trusted Brands for 2023. The survey ranks roughly 1,500 brands in the US, most of which were dominated by big, well-established names including: #1 Band-Aid, #2 UPS, #3 Amazon, #4 Lysol, #5 Kleenex, #6 Cheerios, #7 Visa, #8 Dove, #9 The Weather Channel, and #10 FedEx .
7. Axios, in collaboration with market research firm Harris Poll, also ran a recent survey to determine the Most Reputable Brands in the US. The results were very different from Morning Consult's most trusted brands. Only one company overlapped in the top ten which included: #1 Patagonia, #2 Costco, #3 John Deere, #4 Trader Joe's, #5 Chick-fil-A, #6 Toyota, #7 Samsung, #8 Amazon, #9 USAA, and #10 Apple . Bottom of the list included: #90 Family Dollar, #91 Balenciaga, #92 BP, #93 Bitcoin, #94 TikTok, #95 Spirit Airlines, #96 Meta, #97 Twitter, #98 Fox, #99 FTX, and #100 The Trump Organization .
8. The latest data from PYMNTS shows that high earners are feeling the pinch of credit card debt and that their wages aren't keeping up with inflation. This is resulting in higher-end retailers who depend on wealthier households feeling the pinch as well. The data shows a number of correlations including that for bouseholds earning more than $100k annually, 42% were living paycheck-to-paycheck in April 2022. That number has crept up to over 49% this past year. .
9. Netflix must have forgotten what love is since 2017 when it made its famous tweet that “Love is sharing a password.” The company has finally launched its ill-awaited crackdown on password sharing in the US and the UK. The new rules state that subscribers are permitted to share their account with members of their own household, which Netflix defines as “you and the people you live with.” Netflix will begin using a variety of tools, such as IP checking, to spot when people are using another household’s account and prevent them from doing so, or give them the option of adding a household for $7.99/month. The company expects cancellations, but optimistically (or idiotically) predicts that those same people will come back again, which will overall lead to more people paying for subscriptions. .
10. Laws are changing in Australia to treat BNPL as a credit product. Finally! When was it NOT a form of credit? BNPL should have been recognized as a credit product the day the first BNPL company put up a coming soon landing page. Australia’s Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services Stephen Jones said that a litany of issues reported to the Australia Securities and Investments Commission have added up to “unacceptable levels of unaffordable lending occurring, largely concentrated amongst low-income borrowers.” He added that “BNPL looks like credit, it acts like credit, it carries the risks of credit.” Jones promised draft legislation in the coming months and the introduction of a final bill to the Australian Parliament by the end of the year, which will include the need for BNPL firms to hold Australian Credit Licenses and comply with Resonspible Lending Obligations. .
11. Bill Gates said that AI could kill Google Search and Amazon as we know them, and that the technology could radically alter user behaviors, resulting in people never needing to visit a search website again or use certain productivity or shopping tools. Gates remarked that the first company to develop it will have a leg up on competitors. .
12. A recent study conducted by Lloyds Banking Group revealed that a UK consumer falls victim to a purchasing scam that originates on Facebook or Instagram every seven minutes, resulting in a cost of over £500k per week. (That man is Michael Scott.) The banking group is now urging Meta and other tech giants to take responsibility and contribute to refunding innocent victims of scams. .
13. Analysts at Bernstein project that Reliance Industries is poised to outpace Amazon and Flipkart in the race for India's $150M e-commerce market, citing the conglomerate's robust retail network, mobile network, and home field advantage as its biggest assets. Reliance already operates the country's largest retail chain with over 18k stores and is leveraging its presence to form partnerships with Meta, Shein, and other companies as a strategic advantage against its competitors. .
14. Shopify is introducing its POS hardware to the Canadian market. Its mobile selling device, the POS Go, which is built to run Shopify’s POS software, was first rolled out to retailers in the US in 2022. .
15. Meta announced that ads in Instagram search results will now be available through the Instagram Marketing API, allowing third-party social-management platforms to offer a new Instagram ad-placement type in their apps. Meta began testing the placement in March and are now opening it up to all brands. .
16. Shein is exploring plans to build a factory in Mexico as one of its manufacturing hubs outside China, which could shorten shipping time and cut distribution costs for customers in Latin America and USA. Earlier this month I reported that Shein is creating a hub in Brazil. .
17. Amazon opened the first phase of its Metropolitan Park on Monday, its long-awaited second headquarters in Arlington, Virginia that can hold up to 8k employees. However not all Amazon employees are excited about the new office location (or any office location). At least 1,000 office workers are planning a walkout this Wednesday to take a stand against the company's return-to-office mandate. .
18. The Vietnamese government is putting pressure on TikTok to police its content and remove videos that fall short of the state’s standards, or risk a ban. Eight government departments are targeting toxic content deemed “to pose a threat to the country’s youth, culture and tradition” — including videos that simply criticize college degrees. .
19. eBay unveiled generative AI on its mobile app to help sellers list new items for sale, however the company forgot to inform sellers and didn't label the icon. When clicked, the icon replaced sellers' entire product descriptions with AI generated text, with no way to recover the original description. .
20. Boozt AB, a Sweden-based online fashion retailer, blocked 42,000 customers for returning too many items, calling their actions too costly for the company and the environment. The company said that these particular customers represented less than 2% of their 3M customers, but around 25% of the total return volume. .
21. Twitter withdrew from an agreement with the EU to cut down misinformation on its social network, which the company joined alongside other tech companies in 2018. Thierry Breton, the EU internal market commissioner, noted that fighting disinformation will be a legal obligation from August 25th, due to the EU's Digital Services Act, so the agreement would become irrelevant. .
22. Jeff Bezos is ripped now! The Amazon founder started working with personal trainer, Wes Okerson, who's also trained Tom Cruise and Gerard Butler, and now he's gotten super buff. This is about the least e-commerce specific news you'll ever see me share in this newsletter, but the Jeff Bezos before / after photo is kind of wild! .
23. Amazon will close its official Amazon app store in China on July 17, which launched in 2011 as an alternative to the Google Play Store. Amazon noted that its marketplaces and AWS services will remain operational in China. However while it may be leaving China, the Amazon App Store will soon be bringing more Android apps to the Windows ecosystem. The expanded partnership will allow Windows users to access a wider range of Android apps seamlessly. .
24. Google updated the badges some merchants display for their product listings in Google Search to say “Top Quality Store” instead of the original “Trusted Store” badge. Google said this is just a name and title change and won't have any impact on search rank or performance. .
25. Auctane, an e-commerce shipping specialist that operates brands such as Metapack, ShipStation, Packlink, ShipEngine, Stamps.com, and others, appointed Albert Ko as its new CEO, who previously served as CEO of EWS, which is best known for the Zelle payments network. Current CEO Nathan Jones will join the company's Board of Directors. .
26. eCampus.com, a website that sells textbooks and course materials, announced that it would keep offering textbook rentals, even though its retail partner Amazon was exiting the business. The company had been powering the program behind the scenes for Amazon since 2012, and plans to keep it going through its own website. .
27. Walmart is partnering with Pawp, a veterinary telehealth provider, to offer Walmart+ subscribers free access to virtual veterinarians for a year, starting this week. Currently Pawp charges $99 for an annual membership. .
28. Alibaba Group said that it aims to hire 15,000 people this year, dismissing rumors circulating that the company planned to cut 20% of its staff. They also mentioned that more than 3,000 of those hires would be newly-graduated students. .
29. Plus 7 seed rounds, IPOs, and acquisitions of interest including a $12M Series A round by Laced to grow its resale marketplace for authenticated sneakers.

For more details on each story, see the full edition: https://www.shopifreaks.com/how-much-money-does-temu-lose-per-orde
What else is new in e-commerce? Share stories of interesting in the comments below (including in your own business) or on shopifreaks.
See you next week.
-PAUL

• Welcome to the very best Ark experience in the world.
• New Player Protection
• Ranked #1 No-Wipe PVP Server
• No Wipes Since Launch (3+ Years)
• Largest PVP No-Wipe Community
• ArkForever.com (Links & Info)
• All Maps (Including Lost Island)
• Booming Community (Over 100 Average Players Online In-Game)
• No Wipe (Ark Forever is Forever)
• Better Servers (Dedicated Server Center w/SSDs)
• Fair & Balanced PVP
• Full ORP w/Combat Log Prevention
• 10x Taming/Breeding
• 5x Gathering/Harvesting/Experience
• S+ (OP Engrams Removed)
• Solo Farming Plugin ("/farm" in chat)
• Damage Numbers (Re-Balanced for PVP - Can Be Enabled/Disabled)
• NO ADMIN PLAYERS
• Competitive Permanent Ongoing "Alpha" Event to determine Server Alpha
• Increased Stack Sizes & PlayeDino Weight
• Vote Rewards
• Active & Helpful Administration
• Best Ruleset in Ark
• In-Game Shop (One-Time Free New Player Starter Kit)
• Superior DDOS Protection
• Much More!
• We've spent countless hours, dollars, and brain cells making this the best and most balanced permanent No-Wipe Ark Cluster in existence. Come check us out at ArkForever.com
• Discord: https://discord.gg/arkforever