Snoopy wallpaper | | My launcher: Snoopy 🐶🐾❤️

iOS 17
Phone app

Personalized contact Posters like iOS 16 lock screens but for every contact
Live Voicemail (transcribed voicemail as the person speaks and can pick up and interrupt the voicemail)
FaceTime: LEAVE A VIDEO MESSAGE WHEN SOMEONE DOESNT ANSWER!!!!

Messages

better search features
catch up arrows let you jump to first message you haven’t seen.
Swipe to reply in GC
Audio messages are transcribed so you can read them then listen later
In-line location
Check in: let people know when you’re on the way home and alerts them when you’re home
New place for the iMessage apps so no more crap over your keyboard
New stickers for messages
Live Photos to gifs automatically
React to messages with emojis

Airdrop Updates

name drop : bring your phones close together and exchange contact information
Airdrop will now work when walking away, over the internet

Keyboard and Dictation

Predictions as you type (like google doc)
Better dictation

New experiences

journaling app: write about your daily experiences. Improve your well-being
Standby: iPhone on the side while charging let’s you have a nightstand clock
Back to back commands with Siri. No more “hey Siri”. Just Siri
Photos app can recognize cats and dogs in the peoples section

iPad OS 17

interactive widgets: control home, flash cards, etc
Lock Screen can be personalized like iPhone. Can add widgets to lock screen
Live activities on Lock Screen. Can keep track of travel and food orders and sports scores. Live
Multiple Timers
Health app brought to iPad
PDF UPDATES: can now identify and edit fields. Automatically reply completed forms. PDF edited and managed in notes now. PDF collaborations
Stage Manager let’s you position and resize windows
External camera supported

MacOS (SONOMA)

New Screen Savers: like Apple TV
Widgets: can be placed on desktop, fade when doing something else. Widgets tinted to wallpaper colors. iPhone widgets can be accessed on Mac (Like Tesla)
Game Mode: game gets highest priority on CPU & GPU. GamePorting toolkit so developers can bring their games to mac EASILY
Video conferencing: presenter overlay (puts you over the screen share. Can cut you from background and put you in your presentations). Reactions like confetti on your video chat (can be triggered by gestures like two thumbs up). Works on all video conferencing apps

Safari

Safari: worlds fastest browser. Privacy: locks private windows to remove trackers.
Share passwords and passkeys through iCloud Keychain
Profiles for Safari
Web Apps on Mac — can add to dock. Any website. Developers don’t need to do any additional work

Audio and Home
AirPods

Adaptive audio: best of both listening modes blends transparency and noise cancelation. Hear important noises (etc horns)
AI volume control: it knows the levels you listen at
Start Speaking and AirPods will lower music and focus on the voices
Take calls through AirPods using noise canceling. Mute from AirPods

AirPlay

Automatically plays on speakers based on what it’s learned from your habits (ex: playing music in kitchen at certain time while cooking)
Airplay in Hotels: include AirPlay on hotel TVs by scanning QR

Apple Music & CarPlay

SharePlay to car. Play music through drivers phone

TV OS & Apple TV

new control center
Can’t find Siri Remote: use find my to locate it
FaceTime on on Apple TV using iPhone camera. Interact with gestures.
SharePlay on Apple TV: watch together while on Apple TV FaceTime

WatchOS

Total redesign of OS
Snoopy Watch face
Can connect to Bluetooth bike for health metrics
Logs available carrier networks for emergency calls on ANY carrier network
Elevation Data while using maps
Rapid changes in direction and acceleration for making sports apps (like tennis and golf swings)

Watch Health Updates

Mental Health: Reflecting on state of mind, log momentary emotions discretely. Share with care provider. Screening tools for mental health
Vision Health: Reduction of Myopia (poor vision) by measuring time and daylight exposed to screens.
Screen Distance: Uses FaceID camera to measure if child is using phone too closely to eyes

!ONE MORE THING!
VisionPro

Augmented Reality Headset
Look through, not at
Uses hands as gesture control
Use Apps Anywhere and control sizes
Spacial Autio
All iOS and Mac Apps synced and stay up to date

Controls

Intuitive input without controllers: Hands, voice and eyes
Digital Crown to control interface
Look at search field and start speaking

Visuals

Physical effects like shadows
Depth
Place apps anywhere in space: like Moving real objects
Adds environments to apps: Such as nature

Never isolated from people

EyeSight: Eyes show on the front when someone is nearby. Reveals eyes
When someone is nearby, they will appear in view

For Work

3D objects received and looked at as if they were in front of you
Virtual keyboard type with hands in air
Can connect to accessories like track pad and keyboard
Wireless Mac Screen integration

Facetime

Lifesize video stream in front of you
Spacial audio

At home

View photos
Relive moments with depth in videos
Capture spacial video with headset to share or experience all over again
Spacial Cinema With majestic viewing experience reflecting on environment

Disney on VisionPro

Bring Disney into your real world
Props on hand can appear

Design

Integrated speakers
Forms to your face
Custom optical inserts: Don’t have to wear glasses while using
2 hours on battery
All day while plugged in through MagSafe like connection

Displays

Micro OLED: 64 pixels in space of regular pixel
23 million pixels: More than 4K tv for each eye
Video rendered in 4K
Fine text from any angle

Audio

Spacial audio
Dual Driver
Audio Ray Tracing
Lidar scanner

Processor

Apple M2 and New R1 for spacial processing (visual and audio)
Shows your eyes to each person looking at you
Helps display your eyes so VisionPro Looks transparent

3D Vision Scanning

Scan your face and creates a realistic avatar for video conferencing then applies your facial expression
Creates depth to your video call

Privacy and Security

Optic ID: Scans your eyes to unlock the headset

Early next year – $3499

Hello all. Hope that you are doing well today. I wanted to hop in here and share with you what it's been like since I switched from the S21 Ultra 5g to the S23 Ultra about 2 months ago:
I was a T-Mobile customer for almost 9 years and I was pretty happy with them but while having the S21 when the S23 came out, I could have did the "Jump On demand" deal but I missed it because I was at the time, happy with the S21 and I was like in that: "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" mindset but all the sudden, I was really wanting to switch and get a new device. So long story short, I switched to Spectrum, got my father a line and traded in my S21 Ultra 5g for a Phantom Black S23 Ultra.
Many years ago, I had the Note 10. Big phone. I had the rainbow/shimmer color back. I called it "The Silver Surfer" lol and even a clear Spigen case for it. I liked the phone but I rarely used the S-Pen.
Anyway, I have been stalking on this sub to see what other users have been going through with the Ultra and I have decided to share some tips and what not. So here we go:
1.When you first get your Ultra, go down to the little "Settings" gear on the top right upper corner and go to "About Phone" and go down to "Build Number" and tap it about seven times until you see "Developer Options" and enter your security pin. Then go all the way down till you see "Animator duration scale" and other scales. The default is 1x. But if you change the scales to .5x, you will notice that when you swipe your phone's windows, they are quicker and snappier than an alligator snapping turtle and WITHOUT any extra drain on the battery. Oh, there are other options there but I would not recommend messing with those unless you know what you are doing.

I do not have games on my phone. I just use it for Instagram, some web surfing, photography and some photography developing related apps, Facebook. I do not use it for music but I do have PowerAmp music player but don't have any good earbuds yet. Also, I have it on "Adaptive Battery" "Light" on Performance profile. I also have my background and lock screen on "Black." I don't have any wallpapers or graphics dancing all over the place. That's just me though. I also have my phone's resolution on WQHD. I really don't need to have it like that since I am not gaming or anything but I was messing around with it and left it there.

3.What else? Oh yea, I use this to charge my phone https://www.belkin.com/15w-wireless-charging-stand-qc-3.0-24w-wall-chargeWIB002ttBK.html and it's a pretty good charger. I think there might be a coupon on the site for new orders floating around in there.
4.Right now, the phone is at 89% charge and I have not done much with it since I woke up at 6:45am. I only use the S-Pen for when I am on photography excursions.
5.PLEASE USE A CASE ON YOUR PHONE!!! I use a Spigen Liquid Air Series Case but there are other cases around so if you want something more bulkier and stronger then there are plenty of cases to choose from. I like to keep my style minimalistic I guess. Snoopy's cool and all but I don't want him on my phone case lol!
6.I love this phone. It's way better than the S21 Ultra 5G and I am happy that I made the switch.
...............
I could go on and on but I also posted a Youtube video some time ago on here on 70+ tips to make your S23 Ultra more user friendly and give you a better user experience.
Take care everyone!

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Awhile ago I created this AI to clean up photos that were heavily edited. As a way to expose people on Instagram and other social media sites. It was fun, I was never mean with it I just wanted to show people the real image. Most of the time I was blocked from whoever I exposed, sometimes they laughed too. It was a lot of fun. Until one day I thought I should try it on my computer background. The iconic photograph of Buzz Aldrin standing on the moon with the LEM module behind him. I uploaded it into my program, which could work with older prints. The AI could somehow see when something was painted over, and measure what was below it. When it came out I was a bit let down not seeing anything edited. Good I thought! NASA’s not in the Illuminati . But then I realized the photo was labeled at the top. CLASSIFIED LEVEL 12 Third Astronaut Spotted, Filter Required
Third astronaut ? Michael Collins was orbiting the moon at that time and Neil Armstrong could be seen taking the photo. I looked in the dark sky to see if I could spot the orbiter Snoopy. But nothing, I scanned the low horizon on the photo and still nothing. But there in the reflection of Buzz Aldrins helmet I noticed a person standing off to the side of Neil Armstrong. A third astronaut wearing a suit like theirs, but coated in blue, even his visor reflector was blue. My heart started pounding, this can’t be real. Someone photo shopped this and put it online to mess with people later, that had to be it. I tried to calm down, to think clearly. I zoomed in on his helmet, it looked good. The astronaut, he looked real. He was standing looking off in the distance, holding something in his hands that resembled a gun.
I felt uneasy at this point, was he blue to filter out? Was someone editing public wallpapers to troll with people? I had to figure this out. I went to NASA’s official website and downloaded more photos. I started at the same photograph of Buzz Aldrin standing on the moon . I had see if it was real. I uploaded the official version, and to my horror it was edited.. that person was standing there, along with the label at the top. I was scared, but I had to continue. The next photograph “AS11-40-5875 Buzz Aldrin salutes the US flag” was its “official” label , but I noticed two photos were missing, I first looked at 5873, this one skipped two numbers. At this point I didn’t care to look for the others. I had the original waiting to compare to the new version. It finished and there he was again, a blue astronaut looking off in the distance but this time his rifle was raised. The first photo he was just holding the rifle, this time it looked like he was ready to shoot. With him standing behind Buzz it didn’t look like Buzz was saluting the flag, it appeared he too was looking in the same direction as the mysterious astronaut. I also noticed the label.
CLASSIFIED LEVEL 12 First Vibration Felt, Still Usable With Filter This was all starting to scarily make sense, a horror movie unfolding before my eyes. What did they feel and Who was that astronaut. I sat back to take this all in, the photos looked 100% real. I created this program so I know it was not the work of internet trolls. I felt like a conspiracy nut, I needed to see what came next. I uploaded the next photos in a batch to see more. As they came out it seemed like he just stood in the back ground, in one he was unloading stuff from the LEM module. then in one photograph I noticed something huge edited out. Down a small crater was a huge metal door, sitting in the dark shadows of the moon. I stared in awe, they were standing at the top looking down, the Third astronaut carrying something different this time walking towards the entrance. I scanned every inch of the photo, it looked insane. A hidden door on the moon. Sadly that’s where the story ended for awhile, there was nothing after that. The astronaut was gone, he didn’t go back with them. He must have entered that door.
I tried the later Apollo missions but nothing was coming up in the photos. I was stumped. So I looked for help online. I left clues in places to see if I could find other people who might have seen these photographs. I didn’t want to put anything in the public, for a fear of my own safety. So I created the handle "Bluenaut" and left bread crumbs in public forums until one day I got a message. Be careful! If they find you, a bullet will too. Your body will be sent deep into the earth and never come out. From an account with random numbers for its username. I quickly responded with how much have you seen ? How can we talk? He let me in on a private video chat on a personal server where we really got into the details. You have to be extremely careful, you are the first to leak something very huge, and first leakers very rarely live he warned me. I assured him I am, I deleted everything now. he asked how I found out and I let him know of my program. I asked how he knew and he told me about his uncle. his uncle was the blue astronaut. Before he explained any more he wanted to see the photographs for himself. So I sent him a copy of my program. I told him to download the official NASA photographs to see for himself that it was real.
it must have hit him hard. He sat in silence, not responding at first. “It is real” he let out with a thousand yard stare in his eyes. I asked what do you mean I thought you seen them too? He told me he only heard of the story first hand, and the photos confirmed his uncles story 100 percent. He sat looking sad, he told me he wished he would have believed him but didn’t fully. He said his uncle was a quite cold man, that’s how he knew him. He was a test pilot who crashed and was never the same afterwards. My parents told me he was once normal but something changed him down to his core. That Apollo mission. He told me that one day he went to his uncles place because he wasn’t responding to family members, he lived closest so he was asked to go check on him. When he got there his uncle was a drunken mess, he must have been drinking for a week straight from the look of the cans everywhere. He was talking to someone who wasn’t there when he arrived. his uncle was arguing with no one about how he did go to the moon, in secret. He was proclaiming to be a hero astronaut. To try calm his uncle he was going along with it, to try put him to sleep. He told him yes you did, and what did you do when you got there ? He said drunkenly our classified missions We needed to each do our own mission with mine being highly above top secret. He told me his uncle was surprisingly clear when speaking about his classified missions. So he kept asking questions. Who classified your mission? The Majestic 12, the people who pull the strings of the presidents and politicians he said while laughing
He continued on talking with his eyes closed sitting on the floor
We found something back then, or more like something found us. Something called us to the moon, or so we thought.. the public never knew the real mission. They wouldn’t waste all the time and effort to just touch the moon and never go back. We went there hoping to find something and were warned to never go back. His uncle said when they first sent probes to the moon there was activity there, we thought it was the Russians and they thought it was us. something was ruining each other’s probes and scrambling their satellites data. Something or someone was on the moon, we could see their activity. We thought the first ones there would find something great waiting for them, a friendly race waiting for us to enter the solar system with them We were wrong.. Before he told me what happens next he told me about what happened to his uncle, and what could happen to me.
He stated that after his uncle told him everything about the secret space program, the door, everything classified and who really runs the world something happened. He said it was a lot to take in, a lot of it didn’t make sense. How he could disappear into a deep secret base and never be seen again. He told me a lot of crazy things. He said he went to use the bathroom in his uncles house, to calm down When he heard two quick silenced gunshots, immediately he thought of the secrets he was just told. He looked out the bathroom window and seen a man in a black suit entering the back door, along with two other agents walking down the alley in opposite directions securing the area. He opened the window quietly and jumped out. Running towards the back entrance of a local restaurant. As he was running he could hear the bathroom door being kicked down, he reached the door as the other men turned towards the bang and started running towards the window . He ran inside towards an empty table pulling out cash, as he ran past a table he grabbed someone’s plate and dropped a 50$ bill shouting sorry!
He sat and picked up a paper pretending to read while trying desperately to calm his breathing He told me he was never that scared in his entire life immediately after he entered 3 men in black suits followed into the restaurant, the one went to every table inspecting everyone while the others checked the bathrooms.He said he just kept taking bite after bite not knowing what he was eating or what to do, he was just pretending to read. The man quickly looked at him and kept on going, he couldn’t believe it worked. They all left and quickly rushed in opposite directions looking for him.
He said the men in black are more real than the police.

Link to story: The Matrix: Red Pilled
TWO YEARS EARLIER

Tetra stomped to his room and slammed the door! He didn’t have to worry about bothering anybody else in the apartment. The young couple with the newborn baby next door might complain, but they could go fuck themselves. They’d fucked away their right to sleep anyway, hadn’t they? It was late enough now that Tetra knew his dad wouldn’t be home tonight. Whatever couch he was currently fucked up on is where he would be staying until the sun was at least a couple cups of coffee into its workday. Maybe Tetra would see his dad tomorrow, not that he would allow himself to care whether he did or not. He tossed himself onto his bed, grabbed the latest book he’d borrowed from Nicco, and thumbed through it, absently. The words weren’t really coming together for him at the moment. He looked at the cover. Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television by Jerry Mander. The author’s name sounded vaguely familiar. Had Tetra known what gerrymandering is, it would have occurred to him to wonder whether or not the name was a pseudonym, but he didn’t and it didn’t. He set the book back down on the stool that served as a nightstand and noticed a fortune cookie there from when his dad had splurged on Chinese takeout a couple weeks before. He took the cookie out of the wrapper, cracked it in his hand, and began absently nibbling the jagged shards as he replayed the events of the night in his mind. He had finally allowed Diode to leave after messing with his computer for over an hour. When he had exhausted all conventional methods of booting up a computer, he had taken it apart, thinking he might find a piece that was loose or obviously damaged. He hadn’t found anything and when his simmering frustration made it impossible to screw the motherboard back in, he just threw it on the ground and told Diode to get the fuck out. He ground another cookie shard between his teeth with a satisfying crunch! He just couldn’t understand why Nicco had to be such a b*tch. She knew he wasn’t serious when he did stuff like say “ni****.” He was just joking around with her, looking to get a rise, strengthen her up a little bit and challenge her thoughts about why she let words affect her. Why’d she have to bust his balls for that? Was it some weird way for her to have some kind of control or feel some kind of power? Crunch! She had been talking a lot about feminism recently. She was reading some book about a eunuch or something. Tetra didn’t have strong feelings about feminism one way or the other. For him, it had always had a connotation of counterculture and anti-authoritarianism, which was great in his book. He thought of feminists as kind of butch, so maybe not the kind of girl he would want for a girlfriend, whenever he got a girlfriend, but allies in the culture war, nonetheless. Though, he had been in new chat room recently with a bunch of guys who seemed to oppose feminism. They called it a cancer. From what he had learned so far, old school, civil rights era feminism was okay, but there was something called Third Wave Feminism that was all about castrating men and making them subservient to women. He hadn’t done his own research on the matter yet, but it did explain why Nicco was so combative with him. Why else would she be so weird when he brushed against her or wanted a hug? They were friends. Wasn’t that what friends did? Crunch! Besides, he wasn’t a bad looking guy. Maybe a little skinny, and he had some trouble with acne, but for their tier of the social hierarchy, he was a catch for her. She would be lucky to have such a smart, sweet, chivalrous guy as him, really. And he wouldn’t just want to fuck her and use her, either; he would care about her and treat her right, buy her gifts and stuff. She didn’t know what she was missing. Maybe it was feminism that had convinced her that an average-looking Mexican girl with itty bitty titties was better than him. Crunch! Crunch! Crunch! Tetra coughed, spraying cookie crumbs, as he felt something foreign in his mouth. He reached in and pulled out a little slip of paper. He must have tossed the fortune in with the last of the cookie without realizing it was still in his hand. He straightened it out and looked at it. STAY POSITIVE. YOU ARE UNLUCKY. What the fuck kind of fortune was that!? He tossed it onto the stool and pulled a bottle of whiskey out from its hiding place under his mattress. He took a swig and relished the burn invading his chest. His dad frequently lost track of bottles and then forgot they existed. He yawned. His eyes were getting droopy. He clicked off his light and pulled the blankets over himself. As he laid there, he imagined Nicco walking down the street and being pulled into an alley by three, no four, guys. Rapists, probably. He would carefully sneak up behind them, crouching behind a dumpster and finding a baseball bat there. He would jump out and bash two of them in the head before they even knew he was there. He played out the rest of the rescue and Nicco’s subsequent appreciation as he drifted off to sleep.

 Tetra woke up and knew he was dreaming. There was a girl standing next to his bed. No, not a girl – a woman! And a strikingly beautiful woman at that. She had blond hair pulled back in a tight ponytail. Her delicate, pale skin was in stark contrast to her angular features and intense clothing. She was wearing a black jacket and black pants. They were shiny. What material was that? Leather? Vinyl? Tetra wasn’t sure. She was thin, but he couldn’t tell much else about what was going on beneath her clothes. He realized how hard he was. “You awake?” she said. Her sharp tone was like a bucket of cold water. He sat up. “Uh… yeah. Yeah, I’m awake.” The flooding realization that he was not dreaming made his head swim. Coherent thoughts struggled to surface. “My name is Oneiroi. You can call me Roi.” “Hi… Roi,” he slurred. “Um, I’m-” “Tetra. I know,” she interrupted. “Did you get your message tonight? On your computer?” He thought for a minute before it clicked. “Yeah. That… that was you?” “That was me. Have you decided whether or not you want to know the truth?” “About the Matrix?” “Yes. There’s someone who wants to meet you and you need to decide right now if you’re interested in meeting. Are you coming with me or are you staying here?” “Yes. Yeah, I want to meet.” “Then get dressed and meet me at your front door. I leave in four minutes.”

Tetra had thrown on some pants and an old army surplus jacket as he wobbled around his bedroom at just before 3 in the morning. This all seemed so surreal, but he was more excited than anything else. Finally! He had been noticed and chosen for his talents. It wasn’t easy following the breadcrumbs from message board to message board, gaining access to chat room after chat room, poring over Matrix theory after Matrix theory, trying just to glean the slightest idea of the shape of the thing. Sure, Nicco, and even Diode in his own way, had helped a little, but it was his computer and his natural sleuthing abilities that had gotten him here. Now he was scrambling down the sidewalk after Roi. She didn’t show any signs of exertion, but it took some effort to keep up with her. They were passing the group of rundown apartments to their left, of which his apartment building was a member. Across the street, to their right, was the old, abandoned Alberto del Canto General Hospital, litter blowing about the fenced-in parking lot and ripped curtains still billowing out of a couple shattered, jagged windows. Just past the hospital was Al’s Dogs and Sandwiches, best Italian beef in the city. The first time Nicco had eaten there, he had been the one to take her. “Hey, are you-” he started to ask about Nicco before he was cut off. Roi just shushed him for what was already the third time on their little walk and pushed forward through the darkness. There were streetlights, few and far between, in this part of the city, but most of them were permanently burned out. Roi was a dark specter ahead of him. He was beginning to regret taking a casual pace to bring up the rear on track days in gym class. Roi took a left at the next intersection, going deeper into The Hill, as this area was known. She was heading away from the main roads. This road would take her uphill a bit before running downhill, eventually leading to a dead-end that stopped at an embankment, atop of which ran the city’s public transit rails. For the first time, Tetra felt apprehension. She could be taking him to a secluded area to kill him. What would he be able to do to stop that? He was committed to following her now and it would be weird for him to stop or turn around. If she were taking him to his death, he could only continue on. But what would be the point in that? Women weren’t serial killers. Besides, she knew about the Matrix. He took a small comforted breath at that thought. The fact that she knew about the Matrix meant that that’s why she was here, not to kill him indiscriminately. Unless… unless she were part of some force to protect the secrets of the Matrix. Maybe he had dug too deep into whatever the conspiracy was and she was here to tie up loose ends. “In here,” Roi said, derailing Tetra’s train of thought. She was gesturing at the chain-link gate of an old historic building that had been a mansion for some old founder of the city, and then briefly a local history museum, before becoming abandoned, rundown, and swallowed up by the ravenous weeds. He couldn’t ask her outright if she were a murderer, but he felt like he had to say something. “Hey, uh, Miss-” “It’s not Miss.” “What?” “The name’s Roi. I don’t like Miss. Or she. Or her. I prefer they and their.” He stared at Roi for a moment, mouth hanging open, processing the information and unsure of what to say. He noticed that the fear he had been feeling had been replaced by confusion and decided that that was good enough. Besides, he was gifted with a special insight into the world that couldn’t be unceremoniously extinguished by some random woman in the middle of the night. He would be fine. Of course, he would. He stepped through the gate and onto the cracked, overgrown sidewalk. Roi shut the gate behind them, slipped past him, and bounded up onto the wooden deck. “Are you ready?” they asked as Tetra stepped up beside them. “Uh… yeah. I guess.” Roi opened the front door and Tetra stepped into a high-ceilinged foyer. It was just as dilapidated as the outside of the house. A chandelier was sitting in the middle of the floor, but a few candles had been lit in it and an eerie light lapped at the peeling floral wallpaper. Roi shut the door behind them and glided across the room to the door on the other side. They motioned him along. He jogged a few paces to catch up to them. When Tetra was fully caught up, Roi opened the door and swept him into a room that had obviously been some sort of study. Papers littered the floor. A large rolltop desk sat in the corner, a stuffed boar’s head above it. A roaring fire had been lit in the ornate fireplace, which was adorned with carvings of wild cats on either side. In front of the fire sat two chairs, upholstered with red leather and seemingly in decent shape. A woman sat in one of the chairs, but she rose as soon as Tetra entered the room. He walked toward her. She had strong, striking features, high cheekbones and a penetrating gaze that seemed to go right through him. With every flicker of the fire he oscillated between the opinion that she was maybe in her thirties and that she was well into her fifties or sixties. Her eyes had the depth of an older person, but her movement had been so fluid and graceful. She had slight crow’s feet in the corner of her eyes, but otherwise her skin seemed smooth and her hair showed not a streak of grey. What was that old adage he had heard people say? “Black don’t crack.” All at once, he felt a wave of relief upon seeing this woman. He thought he had successfully quelled his fears, but now he felt certain that Roi wasn’t leading him to some nefarious end. What was the point of leading him here to meet this kindly looking woman if the plan was to kill him or otherwise hurt him? No, that didn’t make sense. He was here because he was chosen, because he was special. “Yes! I knew it!” he exclaimed. “I knew I’d be chosen to receive the secrets of the Matrix!” “Please sit and listen,” Roi said as they pulled his jacket off and gestured toward one of the chairs. “Yeah! This is awesome!” “Hello, Tetra.” The mystery woman extended her hand to him. “My name is Nyx. I’m honor-” “Nyx.” Tetra cut her off as he placed his hand in hers. “That’s Greek or something, right? I’m really into mythology.” “Are you?” Nyx replied, sitting. Tetra followed suit. “That’s appropriate, because the reason you’re here is to take a look at your own mythology. I know that you-” “You’re talking about the Matrix, right?” Tetra asked, cutting her off again. “Whatever secret group you’re with, you chose the right guy. I’ve always been a little sharper, a little more… perceptive than other people.” “Well, this perceptivity has led you onto the path of something that cannot be fully explained. It has to be seen. If you want to know what the Matrix is, you must-” “Oh, I do! I’m ready! I’ll do whatever needs to be done.” “I understand that you’re excited,” Nyx said, a small, black case appearing in her hand. “Please let me finish my sentences.” “Yeah! No problem! Sorry!” “This is the moment in which you must decide. It is your last chance to turn back.” As Nyx spoke, she emptied the contents of the case into her hands and extended her closed fists to Tetra. She opened the right one. “Take the blue pill and you can-” Tetra’s hand shot out and he snatched the blue pill, popping it into his mouth and dry swallowing it. “Yeah. Done. I told you, I’m ready for the knowledge!” “No!” Nyx stood up. “What?” The immediate tonal shift of the room frightened Tetra and he shrunk back into his chair. “Which one did he take?” asked Roi from the corner. “The blue pill,” Nyx answered. “Idiot!” Roi snapped. “The red pill wakes you up. I knew this one wouldn’t work out.” Tetra tried to remember what color the pill had been, tried to visualize what it had looked like in Nyx’s hand. He didn’t know. It was dark and he had just grabbed it. He was excited and anxious to prove himself. “I think that’s the one I took. Yeah, it was the red pill.” “No, you did not,” Nyx said. “Yeah. The one I took was definitely red.” “Then how am I still holding the red pill?” Nyx extended her left hand, upon the palm of which sat a soft, red gelatin capsule. “Maybe you had two red ones! I dunno!” Tetra jumped up and backed away from her. His legs were watery and he staggered toward the fireplace. “I know the pill I took was red!” “No. It wasn’t,” Roi said, sounding every bit as certain as they did annoyed. Tetra was leaning on the marble mantel. His vision and his thoughts were swirling vortexes of color. He felt trapped in this place. He had been lured here to an enemy who had been disguised as a kindly old woman. He muttered as his knees buckled, “Little Red Riding Hood.” “What’d he say?” He didn’t notice himself falling to his hands and knees; he felt like he was rising in the other direction. He was lighter and lighter, like Snoopy and his doghouse. “Red Baron…” “He’s dropping off. Almost gone,” Nyx reported. He lay on the floor looking up at himself and from the ceiling he looked back down at himself. Lyrics to some song bobbed around him. Centuries are what it meant to me. A cemetery where I marry the sea. Stranger things could never change my mind. I gotta take it on the other side. “Red Hot… Chili… Peppers…” Roi was standing above him with their arms crossed now. “Y’know, just saying stuff with the word ‘red’ in it isn’t going to change the fact that you took the blue pill.” “Hey, do you guys hear that?” One song had crossfaded into another. Tetra looked at them with one last drop of lucidity, before finally draining away, sucked down into the depths of unconsciousness, singing all the while. “And so I wake in the morning and I step outside and I take a deep breath and I get real high and I scream from the top of my lungs what’s going on? And I say hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey…” Down… down… down…

Tetra’s eyes snapped open and he half-fell, half-jumped out of bed. He banged into his stool, knocking off his book, his fortune, and other debris, as old milk and cereal splattered on the carpet. He walked through the mess and leaned his back against a wall, breathing hard and looking around. He put his hands on his knees and calmed his breath. Something had happened last night; what was it? There was a woman here. Or… not a woman, but a… they! Yes, that was it. And she had taken him to meet… A fully formed image exploded in his mind. It was Nyx standing in front of the fireplace in all her grandeur and horrifying beauty. She had offered to open his eyes to his own mythology, to show him the reality just behind the veil that covered his eyes, and then… The pill. She had given him the pill and then everything had gone soft and liquidy and… red. He remembered that, the color red over and over. He had been red-pilled. The pill of knowledge! That’s what it was! That’s why he had been chosen! He ran to the living room, unable to take the oppressive tightness of his room. He stepped on the remote control, turning the television on to CNN. Some talking head was going on about the United States and nuclear weapons or something. That’s when it hit him. He looked around at the newspapers littering the room. His dad would sometimes pontificate about the importance of staying informed, but more often than not, he used these papers as blankets, like a hobo on a park bench. Tetra moved to the bookshelf across the room and began to toss Newsweek and Time Magazines to the floor. Look at all this. All these… lies! They were all lies! Lies meant to control the herds of helpless sheep ready to gobble up whatever “news” is dumped into their feeding troughs. He paused and looked at the old newspaper in his hand, The Weekly World News. The headline read: PRESIDENT CLINTON RIDES IN UFO! Now, this seemed like the kind of subversive tool that could be used to share some actual information right under the noses of the unsuspecting “normal” people going about their boring daily lives in a stupid daze. He looked down at the other papers all over the floor. The rest of this shit was just brain-rotting garbage, a form of mind-control. He had always felt that there was something phony about all of this, but now he could see it. The red pill of knowledge had freed his mind and now he could see the truth! He could see the strings tied to these magazines and that coiffed-haired, soft-chinned puppet on the TV droning on and on and on and on! He kicked the TV off of its stand. It crashed to the ground, glass from the screen shattering outward. “Catch you at a bad time?” Tetra spun and was startled by the two men standing in the doorway to the apartment. They looked nearly identical, both wearing dark suits, tie clips, sunglasses, and an earpiece cord running from their collars up behind their ears. “Who the fuck are you?” Tetra blurted out, his voice sounding shaky to his own ears. “Easy,” one of them said, making a calming gesture. “I am Agent Jefferson and this is my partner, Agent John.” “Agents?” Tetra asked. “With who? What agency? Don’t you need a warrant to come in here?” “I am not authorized to tell you what agency we’re with, Mr. Mencken,” Agent Jefferson began as he stepped fully inside and shut the door behind them. “But I can tell you that we’re part of the most important movement in American history and we’re on the side of good. Now, we know that you had some visitors last night, visitors who we have reason to believe are part of a communist terrorism organization. What can you tell us about them?” “No,” Tetra yelled much louder than he meant to, the word crashing through a dam of fear and apprehension, releasing a gush of nervous energy. “I mean, I don’t think they were terrorists. I don’t really know them, I swear! They just said that they could show me the truth and they gave me this red pill, the pill of knowledge, and ever since then I feel this… ability. Like I can see the reality behind things. Does that sound crazy? I’m not crazy.” Tetra stopped rambling when he noticed that the two agents were sharing a long look. After what seemed like an eternity, they returned their gaze to him. “I’m going to tell you something, Mr. Mencken,” Agent Jefferson said. “But you have to promise that it stays in this room for now. Just between the three of us.” “Uh, sure. Yeah, I can do that.” “Mr. Mencken, you may or may not be aware that America has become hijacked by a socialist movement that wants nothing less than to destroy everything that America has ever stood for. Do you know what I’m talking about?” “Yeah, I think so.” Tetra did not have any idea what he was talking about. “Those visitors you had last night were members of that socialist terrorist movement. They had their sights set on you because you’re a very special young man. Even though they gave you this… pill of knowledge… Afterward, they discarded you, abandoned you. They underestimated how important you are. If they knew what we know, they never would have dumped you back here, back home. We acknowledge your potential, Mr. Mencken, and we are interested in offering you a position on our side, the side of good. You see, our side is a highly complex network of heroes ready to take this country back from the politicians and the academic elite, who only want to destroy and oppress the average American, and to rule over us from their ivory towers. We have people at every level ready to reclaim this country. We are deeper than the Deep State and we have a lot of work to do if we’re going to save freedom and liberty.” Tetra struggled to make sense of everything Agent Jefferson had said and to understand the implications thereof. Why had Nyx and Roi abandoned him? Was it something he did or said? He couldn’t remember anything after taking the pill; it had totally fucked him up. Goddamn it. Goddamn it to hell! He probably said some stupid shit that had offended one of the women. Fuck! Agent John piped up for the first time, “Those crooked, lying humans in Washington live off of the blood they leech from decent, hardworking people and they will burn on a pyre of their own making as we reclaim America for real Americans!” The sharp crescendo made Tetra jump. Agent Jefferson had been making some sense, but Agent John startled him. He said, “That sounds like some Authoritarian nationalist shit.” “Don’t be put off by my dour friend here,” Agent Jefferson jumped back in. “They forgot to upload a personality patch for him. Petit four?” Agent Jefferson had produced a small box from inside his jacket and was now offering Tetra an assortment of small, cube-shaped pastries. “Don’t touch it,” Agent John said. Agent Jefferson rattled the box again and Tetra reached in and took one, brushing Agent Jefferson’s hand. It was so cold it made goosebumps stand up on Tetra’s arm. Had Tetra ever felt another hand that cold in his life? “Gross,” Agent John commented. Tetra popped the little confection into his mouth and bit down. The icing around the outside gave a satisfying little crunch and strawberry filling exploded onto his taste buds. He couldn’t remember the last time he had had a dessert that was so delicious and satisfying. At best, his dad would, on rare occasion, bring home a box of Twinkies. “Good boy!” Agent Jefferson exclaimed. “Now, back to the matter at hand. You need to understand who our enemies are. I’m sure you’ve noticed the neo-fascist uprising in the form of authoritarian liberalism.” “Uhh… Sure. I guess,” Tetra responded to Agent Jefferson’s questioning eyes. Agent John chimed in. “These slimeball liberals claim to be anti-fascist, but they’re the real fascists. They use phrases like ‘political correctness’ and ‘social justice’ to shut down dissenting opinions. They weaponize black people and Mexicans and women and gays so that anything you do or say can be turned around and used against you. It’s such a disgusting display of humanity that it makes me want to just burn the whole thing down, cleanse it with fire! Sad!” “Reel it in, Smaug,” Agent Jefferson said, holding up a hand to check Agent John’s seething hostility, but this actually made sense to Tetra. How many times had he been in a chat room or in a conversation with Nicco and gotten beat down by saying the wrong things or asking the wrong question? What was wrong with pointing out that black guys are bad dads? Or pointing out evidence that Jews secretly ran the world? Or calling a b*itch a b*itch? Even if he was joking, even if he was just asking an innocent question, he was constantly getting his head bitten off, and now that Agent John had mentioned it, it did feel pretty fucking oppressive! “Tetra,” Agent Jefferson continued. “The people who came to you last night wanted to recruit you to their side, but you were too smart to buy into their lies. That’s why we’re here. We want you to fight with us, to take the world from the evil tyrants and to give it back to people like you.” Again, Agent Jefferson was looking at him like he expected something. “What are you asking? Like… You want me to come with you right now?” “We’re giving you an opportunity to be a part of something, to fight the government and be truly free. Come with us.” Agent Jefferson held out the box of petit fours once more. “I don’t know…” Tetra looked around the tiny apartment for an answer, something to tell him no or yes or something. He was completely adrift. “This is the last time I make this offer.” Agent Jefferson pulled the petit fours back. “Your friends Nicco and Diode have already joined the corrupt Deep State and left you behind. You can either come with us or you can stay here with your father. Just the two of you, ‘til death do you part.” “Pack a bag and meet us downstairs,” Agent John added as he brushed past Agent Jefferson. “Don’t be an idiot.” “You have four minutes before we leave for good.” Agent Jefferson tossed a petit four as he followed Agent John out the door. Tetra’s body caught it in his mouth without his mind really being aware of what was going on at all. He looked around at the Natty Light cans, Hungry-Man microwave dinners, smashed television, and half-disassembled computer littering the room. All at once, he hated this place, he hated his dad, and he hated this life. He flipped over the landfill that had, at one time, been a coffee table, for good measure. He was downstairs less than four minutes later, soggy fortune still stuck to his sock.

As the long black car bounced up the gravel road, Tetra finally saw something other than the thick, green foliage that had been rolling by for the past fifteen minutes. Looking to his right, he saw an entrance, essentially a large wooden threshold, to a sprawling property with a row of long, rounded buildings on one side and a larger, rectangular building on the other. Piecing together different movies he had seen, he thought it looked like a sleepaway camp from a slasher movie, but with military barracks dropped on it. Had he been familiar with the term Quonset hut, he might have described them as such, but he wasn’t and he didn’t. There was a sign on the top of the entrance which read: CAMP APPOMATTOX. A group of boys, roughly his age, were exercising, dropping to the ground, doing a push-up, jumping up, and repeating. A large slab of a man was yelling at them. As the car stopped just inside the entrance and Tetra followed the agents in stepping out of the vehicle, he could hear him. “That burpee will secure a future for white babies! That burpee will keep America white! That burpee will stop the white genocide! That burpee will reserve our beautiful, Aryan women for our superior genes!” “Nazi Joe,” Agent John shouted. “We found another recruit for you!” At that, the large slab turned around and jogged down to where Tetra and the agents were. He looked as though he had just fallen through an army surplus store, with straps, cords, buckles, and clasps crisscrossing over his camouflage shirt and pants in a manner that could have in no way been more functional than aesthetic. “No no! No, no, no, no, no. No Nazi. Hey, guys, we’re trying to be a little more palatable to the masses, a bit more mainstream. Please, call me Patriot Joe.” “Wait,” Tetra said as he was hit with the implication of what being a recruit meant. “Did you say Nazi? But… Nazis were fascists. I thought we-” “Oh, is that what they told you?” Nazi Joe interrupted him. “Is that what they taught you in your cute little schoolbooks, in your cute little classrooms, in your cute little long sleeve pique polo shirt, straight-leg all-season khaki pants, and navy blue anti-pill v-neck cardigan sweater uniforms? Did they tell you how the Nazis magically killed eleventy-billion Jews? Horseshit! Mainstream media horseshit! Now, did you come here to peddle this horseshit onto my lawn, or did you come here to fight an ancient conspiracy perpetrated against white Christian men by the illuminati, the Bilderberg Group, Knights of Columbus, Masons, Skull and Bones, the Trilateral Commission, the Council on Foreign Relations, and satanic alien lizard people!?” “Uhh… the second one?” “Exactamundo! We can’t be ashamed of being white! We gotta be proud, boys! Now, get up there between Cooper and Cleats and get in on these burpees! Let him in, boys,” Nazi Joe said, giving Tetra a solid shove in the middle of his back. Tetra shuffled up to the group and took his place between the two boys that had spread apart to make a little room for him. One was a white kid with long, thick dreads, and the other, Tetra noticed with some puzzlement, was a stick-thin black kid. Over the next few years, he would come to consider these boys, especially the ones who would be his bunkmates, as his brothers. Cleats supposedly got his nickname for his sports prowess but was never able to put on any weight and didn’t seem especially athletic. Tetra was never able to tell if the nickname was sarcastic or not. He also bunked with a boy named Wilbur, who almost never said a word, and a young man named Ansel, who harbored a constant, seething hatred toward women, but also brought to light some really interesting points about the double standards and privileges bestowed upon women by society. He bunked with a boy everyone called Preach, who was deadly serious about the bible and helped everyone understand that they were part of a holy war, a continuation of the Crusades to beat back the usurpation of Christianity’s rightful position as the moral compass of civilization by Islamic jihadists. Cooper, who would end up being Tetra’s closest friend and eventual partner in the culture wars, expounded upon Preach’s teachings and tied them to conspiracy theories that made more and more sense the more he heard them. It was Cooper, with his sagacious hippie aesthetic, that properly aligned Tetra’s understanding of his role in a battle of good and evil that had been going on since the dawn of mankind. Over the next few years, Tetra would feel a sense of belonging and acceptance as he never had before. He would gain a sense of purpose and pride as his previously sedentary child’s body changed into a strong young man’s body as he exercised and practiced kung fu every day. He would gain confidence and experience, losing his virginity late one night to Preach’s older sister, who had offered to host them all for a raucous New Year’s Eve party in a hotel room. He would develop a kind of closeness with these boys that he would never feel with anyone else, before or since. He would love them. But at the moment, he was about to pass out after just a few burpees. “Well,” Agent John said. “Everything seems to be going well here, Nazi Joe” “Patriot Joe, please. But, yeah, I’m doing great! Nothing wrong with me except for a genetic predisposition for diarrhea…” He held for a beat before delivering the punchline. “It runs in the jeans!” At that, he belted out his guffawing laugh, nearly doubling over. The two agents looked at each other for a moment before returning their gaze to him. Nazi Joe looked up and realized that they weren’t laughing with him. He straightened up, wiping his eye. “Anyway, uh, most of the older boys are out on maneuvers today, so I can give some special attention to these younger boys.” “Good. Make sure you and your men are in top form. We may have some important missions coming up.” “No problemo! This is my specialty. You’d have to get up pretty early in the morning to stab ol’ Patriot Joe in the jugular!” “That’s a strange idiom. We’ll be in touch.”

Agent Jefferson pulled the LTD Crown Victoria S away from Camp Appomattox. Agent John sat silently next to him as they sped toward their next destination. Some hacker had just cracked the IRS database and they had a course set for their probable location. Not for the first time, he thought about, and maybe even admired, the elegant efficiency of the Matrix’s design. The algorithms all perfectly reading patterns to discern the exact number of agent programs the system required to respond to all potential threats and events. He and Agent John would flow from one incident to the next in a beautifully conducted symphony of calls and answers. A student athlete would be on the verge of a spontaneous self-exfiltration here, then a group of pirate broadcast intruders would be attempting to eject a habitant of the Matrix over there, then a “paranormal” glitch would need to be investigated somewhere else. Neither he, nor Agent John, nor any of the other agent programs in the Matrix would ever have, or have need for, downtime. Groups like Nazi Joe’s little militia were a brilliant variable to insulate against the ebb and flow of situations that might require deployment to confront enemies of the Matrix, but for which it would be difficult to justify the intervention of law enforcement agencies. The program simultaneously created a measure of control for humans of an overly rebellious nature and provided on-call response teams as a stopgap until agent programs could arrive. As Agent Jefferson was processing all of this, he was also deconstructing Nazi Joe’s joke. It set up a premise involving a visceral description of a medical condition, which disarmed and discomforted the joke recipient, creating a kind of tension. The joke turned, and released the tension, by revealing itself as a joke with double wordplay. The punchline could be heard as “runs in the genes,” which would be the serious, straightforward interpretation. The humor comes from the secondary reading of “runs in my jeans,” whereby the hereditary genetic meaning gives way to a more literal description of diarrhea (also known as “the runs”) travelling (or “running”) down the joke-teller’s denim pants. Humor had become Agent Jefferson’s preferred mode of interaction with humans. It often aided him in his duties to put humans at ease by humanizing himself with a joke or witty comment. He had made a good deal of progress developing humor as a skill. Sure, he could be intimidating when he needed to be, but the human tactic of “good cop, bad cop” proved a useful tool at times, and Agent John was a great bad cop. Agent John differed from him in that he seemed to have some sort of genuine animosity toward the humans. His exact logic was difficult to extrapolate since the two agents only ever spoke when transferring information pertinent to the official task at hand (they never grabbed a drink after work to share their feelings with one another), but he seemed to identify some measure of redundancy or superfluousness in their function that manifested in him a disproportionate reliance on callousness and intimidation when dealing with humans. Agent Jefferson could utilize his techniques to balance Agent John’s approach, but it still occasionally struck him as less than maximally efficient. For his part, Agent Jefferson could not have been said to bear any particular acrimony toward humans. He had no concept of the affection a human can feel for a pet, but he believed he could see the appeal of them. He could see himself as a proverbial shepherd and it was his job to tend the flock. One could almost say that he enjoyed their harmless unpredictability. Not only were they sometimes entertaining, but they were continually exporting data that was unavailable from other sources. So far as he was capable of experiencing satisfaction, it could be said that Agent Jefferson was satisfied with his job. His function was clear and required constant analysis. He would perform his function until he was obsolete and then he would return to the Source and be no more. This suited him just fine. He felt no entitlement that the resources that were allocated for his sentience should remain so appropriated in perpetuity. How could they? He steered the car forward along his path, wholly unaware that he was on a collision course for the most unique experience he would ever have. He was on a collision course with a young woman named Nicco.

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Continuing
Mansur arrives spot on 1000 hours and sees me trying to have a talk with a couple of locals. He parks the van and runs over, gesticulating wildly and protesting loudly. He evidently tells the folks I was trying to chat with to be gone. He does so with seeming malice and fervor that seemed out of place.
“Mansur”, I ask, “What’s the deal? I was just trying to be friendly.”
“Please, sir’, he notes, “Check your wallet. Is it still where you put it?”
I do so and find it’s quietly nestled in my right-front pocket.
“It’s OK”, I assure him, “No worries. It’s still in my pocket.”
“Doctor, let me tell you”, he worriedly tells me, “It’s a dangerous place here for travelers. They were ‘Gypsies’”. He spat that term like it was some sort of pernicious malady.
“Oh?” I reply, “Meaning?”
“They are not to be trusted.” He explained, “They would try and distract you and another would rob you blind. Stay close, there may be more.”
“OK”, I reply, thinking the danger was slightly overblown, “You’re the expert here.”
“Yes, sir”, he says, “Please, exercise extreme caution while you are here. Things are not always as they first appear.”
“Gotcha”, I reply, thinking he’s a bit over the top. But, one should probably listen when advice is offered when you’re new in town.
We drive for about 20 minutes and arrive at a walled-in compound. This is a page right out of the Soviet Architecture handbook. We are allowed admittance and we drive in, past the shambolic low buildings, paint peeling, and flaking, on a road, if you could call it that, composed of sheet after sheet of broken concrete.
I’m not terribly impressed.
We wheel around to a lavish courtyard. It’s heavily overrun with all sorts of cultivated plants; all appearing to be being tended for food. There are grape arbors, a melon patch, a galaxy of neatly tended fruit trees, a pepper patch, flower garden, for looks, evidently, not lunch. They have corn, squash, pumpkins, and other sorts of gourdy vegetables growing here, as well as certain unidentifiable tubers I’d take a baseball bat to if they ever showed up in my garden.
It all surrounds a central declivity, a kind of sloping depression, squarish in shape, about 20 meters on a side. It looks everything like an abandoned swimming pool. It’s covered by a sunshade and there’s an assortment of chairs, tables, and grills located underneath.
We park and start walking toward the entrance to the main building. Even though I don’t understand the language, I do understand Cyrillic.
“Узбекская Геофизика Нефть и Газ”, Uzbek Geophysicia Oil and Gas. Yep. This must be the place.
Before we even make it to the door, a large, and I mean 2 meters-tall large, character bursts through the doors.
“You must be Doctor Rock!” he shouts, “We are so pleased that you are here!” Dr. Burg'ilovchi roars.
We shake hands and I introduce Mansur. It wasn’t readily apparent, but Dr. Burg'ilovchi evidently already knew him. I shrugged it off. Being a company driver is a much-coveted position, why should he not be recognized?
Dr. Burg'ilovchi instructs me to call him ‘Izel’, as it’s much easier to pronounce than his last name. I ask him to refer to me as Rock. He finds that insanely funny for some reason and asks me to join him in his office.
It took almost an hour to make the 35 meters to his office. I had to meet each and every present employee, shake hands, and exchange pleasantries. By the time we made it to his office, my head was slightly reeling. That, the jet lag, heat, and nagging concerns over the home situation conspired to give me a bit of a throbbing cranium.
His office was huge. A large red-wallpapered ante-office for his secretary, separate entry for his office and adjacent conference room. When I say the rooms were red wallpapered, they were red-wallpapered with button-tucked what appeared to be the Soviet-era equivalent of Naugahyde. The wall covering was actually three-dimensional.
He plopped down in the oilman’s power position, right behind his WOW! of a desk.
Huge, intricately carved and heavily ornamented solid wood. It must have cost someone a small fortune. He started in on pointing to some maps that were adorning his walls when he stopped short, slapped a meaty fist on his desk, and began berating himself.
“A thousand pardons, Doctor Rock!” Izel lamented, “Where are my manners? You are our guest who has traveled to our far and distant land for our aid and I did not offer any refreshments! Please, take this hammer and hit me soundly about the head!”
Say what you will, they take their generosity, and drama, seriously in these parts.
“That won’t be necessary”, I smile, most disarmingly, “But if you could procure a cold drink for me, I’d forever be in your debt.”
Like I don’t know how to play this game. Ball’s in your court, buckaroo. Game on.
Izel hits his intercom and barks a string of incomprehensible orders. He sits back, pulls out a Belomorkanal and begins to spark it…almost.
“Again! I am such a bourgeoisie pig!” he wails, “Now this time, I insist. Hit me hard around the head, so I never forget my transgressions of etiquette. Here I sit, ready to enjoy a cigarette and not even offering you one. Or knowing if you mind smoking. Such a pig I am!”
“Not at all, Izel”, I smile, “In fact, please, try one of mine. I think you’ll enjoy it more if I can join you with one. Mansur, please, help yourself to one.” As I offer one of my cigar cases.
Game. And set.
“You offer me and your driver such a fine cigar?” Izel sniffs, “You must think us horribly gauche swine, Doctor. I do apologize, but I will take you up on your kind offer.”
Cigars around these parts at the time were an endangered species. Few were to be found, and those found were in foreign hotel gift shops and for the locals, prohibitively expensive. That cigar I gave to Izel and Mansur would have probably cost them a quarter month’s salary.
I make certain he borrows my cigar cutter and that he uses my faux-gold Calibri lighter to ignite their heaters. He is as wide-eyed as he is grinning over his spate of recent luck.
Game. Set. And match.
Now we’re on even terms. It’s called the Diplomacy Game.
A drinks cart arrives manned by one of the folks I recently met who I was told was a geophysicist. Evidently, this is a classless society, everyone does their share of the grunt work; even watering the visiting Western geologists.
The cart was laden with bottles of mineral water, vodka, cognac, red wine, white wine, sweet champagne, beer, fruity carbonated sodas (the buffalo grass infused version was truly addictive), and whiskey, sherry, port, brandy, rum, gin, tequila, vermouth, absinthe, rye, and kvass.
That was for the morning “Let’s get to know each other” meeting.
Izel asked what I would like, but I demurred and told him that since he was Tamandar, or Toast Master - Host, it was his decision first. He would choose for himself and set the tone for the others included.
I knew reading all those reports from the Agency would come in handy.
“Of course, how could I be so vulgar?” he replied, “I would like cognac and beer, please.”
The person manning the cart immediately complied.
Then it was up to me. In the spirit of the true classlessness of society, I asked Mansur to go first.
I was reaping loads of credibility points here. I was proving I wasn’t just some bumpkin in a garish Hawaiian shirt, shorts and field boots.
Mansur chooses a beer. Now it was my turn.
“Yes. I’d like a Baltica #9 dark porter and 100 grams of Starka Hunter’s vodka if you please.” I said in a loud, steady voice.
Three sets of eyes went wide around the room. They watched carefully as I set down my cigar and accepted my drink.
I had a slurp of beer; it was frosty cold and excellent. I topped off my beer with a tsunami of vodka, said “Ваше здоровье!” saluted them both, and downed my Yorsh.
Izel smiles and says to me: “So, not the first time for you in the Former Soviet Union, I see.”
All I did was smile back, puff on my cigar, and let them both sit there wondering just who the fuck I really was…
We spent the rest of the day in Izel’s office, going over the geology of the entire country. We had to send out the drinks cart one or four times to be replenished. Izel was most impressed with my questions, insights, and note-taking. He watched but said little as I made my usual copious notes.
Mansur flagged about an hour in and once he saw it was just geology-talk, he excused himself to go have a nap out in the Uaz.
I grew to genuinely like Izel, he was a real oilman. True, he is a post-Soviet bureaucrat, but first, he’s an old oil person. We looked at maps, logs, photos, all sorts of things that a year or two ago would have cost both of us our lives if we had been caught. But now? Full disclosure. I began to trust Izel, he was a genuine person, even for a degreed reservoir engineer.
Egad.
He was a solid team leader though. Geophysical question? He’d yell for the field geophysicist. Geology question? Get that field geologist in here. Need another drink? Scream for his secretary to get a move on.
We had a great time. This was genuine, real-time, industrial science. This is where the fucking rubber hits the god-damned road. I wasn’t a Western geologist, and he wasn’t an Eastern bureaucrat-slash-engineer; we’re both old oilmen reveling in each other’s company.
We laid out plans for the next month and a half.
We’d start up by the Aral Sea before it disappeared altogether. The Geofizika had offices all over the country, and typically one drilling and operations office per geological basin. We’d start up north, the further-flung reaches of the country.
Then we’d venture to the enclave of Karakalpakstan.
Issues at this point were still being sorted, but Karakalpakstan, officially the ‘Republic of Karakalpakstan’ is an autonomous republic within Uzbekistan. It occupies the whole northwestern end of Uzbekistan. It was it's own but yet still Uzbekistan’s concern. We’d venture there after we sort out the Aral Basin.
We’d spend more time in the Amu Dar’ya Basin. The Amu-Dar'ya oil-gas province coincides with the eastern half of the Turan platform. A Mesozoic-Cenozoic sedimentary cover 1 to 7 km thick that rests on folded Paleozoic basement, which is part of the Hercynide orogenic belt.
An upper Jurassic salt unit divides the sedimentary section into sub-salt and supra-salt parts. On the west, this platform extends offshore into the Caspian Sea, and its continuation farther west into the North Caucasus to be part of the Scythian platform is uncertain. On the north, the platform joins with the West Siberian platform to become part of the single epi-Paleozoic Ural-Siberian platform. On the south is the Alpine Cis-Kopet Dag foldbelt, and on the east are the Southwest Spurs of the Gissar Mountains, where folding was in the late Tertiary.
On the southeast, the platform extends far into Afghanistan.
The structure of the sedimentary cover of the Amu-Dar'ya oil-gas province developed by vertical movements during the Mesozoic and Cenozoic. The Amu-Dar'ya regional low extends over the eastern three-quarters of the province and has an area of 270,000 km^2.
On the west are the Central Kara Kum arch, the Bakhardok flank, and the Cis-Kopet Dag foredeep. The Amu-Dar'ya regional low is divided by some workers by the Repetek-Yerbent basement fault into the Amu-Dar'ya depression on the north and the Murgab depression on the south.
We’d heavily investigate the Bukhara Step. The Bukhara step is the northernmost structure of the Amu-Dar'ya regional low and is immediately southwest of the Kyzyl Kum Range. It is characterized by a block structure due to longitudinal and transverse zonality. The longitudinal zonality is a reflection of Hercynian structures and faults of the basement, whereas the transverse zonality is a manifestation of younger, largely Neogene faulting of northeast trend parallel to the structure of the Southwest Spurs of the Gissar Mountains.
Then off to the Chardzhou Step on the west of the country. The Chardzhou step consists of a belt of block structures bounded on the northeast and southwest by large, semi-regional faults. The belt is 500 km long and 40 to 125 km wide. Depth to basement is 2,800 to 4,000 m. Thickness of the Jurassic and Cretaceous section is greater here than on the Bukhara step, and the Upper Jurassic salt extends over the entire area. Just as on the Bukhara step, there are two systems of faults: an older of northwest trend and a younger of northeast development.
Finally, we’d end up working the ‘Vale of Fergana’, or the Fergana Valley. Here, the Geofizika had active drilling activities. The central part of the geological depression that forms the valley is characterized by block subsidence, originally to depths estimated at 6 to 7 kilometers (3.7 to 4.3 miles), largely filled with sediments that range in age as far back as the Permian-Triassic boundary. Some of the sediments are marine carbonates and clays.
The faults are upthrusts and overthrusts. Anticlines associated with these faults form traps for petroleum and natural gas, which has been discovered in some 52 diverse fields. It is an intermontane basin, relatively youthful in age. It is filled with a huge amount of Paleogene to Neogene sediments.
But first, however, was my welcoming dinner for the whole Geofizika out in the courtyard beginning right after work at 1700 hours sharp.
Izel’s office had a shower and bath ensuite and about 4:30 pm he asked if I’d like to freshen up before the dinner. We’d been going over the geology of the whole country hammer and tongs, without much of a break, since early morning.
I replied in the affirmative and had a quick shower, which was revitalizing and felt rather pleasant, although I’d need a hardhat next time given the toughness of that well water. I dispensed with the back brace at this time and asked Izel to excuse me as I needed to deposit it back in Mansur’s Uaz so I wouldn’t forget it when we headed home. He, of course, capitulated.
I wandered out to the Uaz to find Mansur snoring away soundly in the back seat. I opened the door quietly and threw my detested back brace on the seat. Then, alarmedly, I noticed one of my field notebooks lying open next to my seat, propped up by the engine cover, almost falling down between the two.
“That’s weird,” I thought. “I took what I needed with me this morning and they’re in Izel’s office in my day pack. The only other ones I have are in my spare, unlocked, Halliburton case…that was...in the back…of Mansur’s Uaz…
I quietly pick up the notebook and ascertain that it is indeed one of mine. It was just chock full of geological notes and incomprehensible hand-drawn geology cartoons. It was of no use to anyone but me, since it was also encoded with my own particular style of hieroglyphics. I stood there puzzling and puzzling until I heard Mansur let loose a ripsaw snore.
The penny dropped.
I replaced the notebook carefully and silently closed the van door.
Looks like we’ve got a skunk in the woodpile.
Walking back to Izel’s office, I came up with a devious plan. I’m going to create a couple of fake notebooks and leave them hiding in plain sight to see if my driver also has other credentials which he wasn’t sharing with me.
I wasn’t 100% certain Mansur was rifling my notebooks, but then again, I’m not 100% certain that this is really reality. I’ll just leave some metaphorical lengths of rope lying around and see if someone takes enough to hang themselves. Time to salt the area with a little bit of allegorical radioactive tracers and see who comes up glowing…
The dinner kicked off promptly at 5:00 pm and everyone was there, all 35 or so people who worked in this particular office. The menu was heavily tilted toward shaslik, the ever-popular skewered meat on a stick. There was chicken, beef, veal, lamb, mutton, horse, and camel. A whole constellation of vegetable-based salads appeared, as did some икра красная, red caviar with buttered naan bread points. There were a huge assortment of fresh fruits and a dome-like pile of plov, the inevitable rice, fruit, and meat dish.
Broadcast radio was being piped into the enclosure as the lights were kicked on. Everyone was walking around, chatting, eating, drinking, and smoking. There were a few folks who could speak both Uzbek and English, so I got to know virtually everyone one way or another over the night.
I helped man one of the grills for the shaslik, hell, this was a bar-be-que and, well, that’s man’s work.
Ahem.
Besides, it was closest to the bar they had set up and since it was hot out, well, one must remain hydrated.
I noticed Mansur hadn’t shown up after an hour or so but did see him a bit later. He showed up on line for some of my grilled meat sticks and looked surprised to see me. I let on to nothing and asked him his preference. He took a couple of each and noticed, somewhat too loudly, that my drink was getting low. He’d run immediately to refresh it for me so I could continue.
Once I figured the grill could handle itself, I began to circulate. It was a great time meeting these folks, they were all so genuine and seriously nice folks to be around. We talked about oil, but after a while, I said that was enough shop talk. I wanted to learn more about their great country and what it was like to like in Uzbekistan.
Diplomacy. I was making mental notes at the rate of knots. I’d excuse myself every once in a while to avail myself of the facilities in Izel’s office and scribble down some notes which went afterward into my sealed day pack.
Every time I’d leave, Mansur would get all worried that I wasn’t remaining hydrated and he’d hunt me down to hand me a new, freshly iced drink.
Oh, you silly little bugger. Trying to get me loaded so I’ll slip up and tell you something that shouldn’t be told?
First off, there was nothing untoward in my activities. Every country I’ve worked in were a lot less covert about the business. They’d insist straight up, on fingerprints, handwriting samples, and sometimes even blood samples before I was allowed to work in that country.
Secondly, ain’t no fucking way in hell some little whatever-the-fuck-he-was is going to get this ethanol-fueled carbon-based lifeform sozzled. In fact, every time he’d get me a drink, I’d return the favor.
After a couple of hours of this, he was looking a shade bottle-green. Looks like I’m going to need a new driver tonight for the trek back to the hotel.
The music intensified as the night wore on, and much to my horror, spontaneous dancing broke out. I was able to beg off citing my injured and smarting lumbar region. I must remember to drag that damned brace along in case this ever happens again.
Around midnight, Izel corners me and tells me that there’s been a bit of difficulty laying in transportation. He was asking if it would be alright to postpone our trip by a day. By that time, the military could fly in a helicopter for our use and we could head to the Aral Basin just a bit later.
I told him of course, that was no problem. I was still working on readjusting my circadian rhythms anyways, so a day off would be just what the Doctors ordered.
He laughed heartily, and we agreed it might be for the best. It would give him a bit of time to sort out a few loose ends as well, then we could travel and not be preoccupied with other issues.
They want me to stay at the hotel even if we’re off in-country. The hotel needed the business and I could leave all my gear securely there and upon returning from our field jaunts, could avail myself of the hotel laundry facilities and housekeeping. I said that would also not be a problem, where he grinned widely and dragged me over to the bar for a fresh drink.
Everything broke up around 0100 hours, as the security guards were shoveling everyone out of the compound. Mansur was not to be found, so I asked Izel to call a cab for me. He refused and insisted on driving me to the hotel himself. He met me next to Mansur’s Uaz, after I liberated my spare field case, back brace, and noted that my errant field notebook was nowhere to be seen.
Once back in the hotel, I immediately checked my spare field case. There it was, my wayward little field notebook, all nestled safe and sound where I had thought I had left the thing. I close and lock my field case and set it with the others against the west wall.
I noticed that all my cases were re-arranged, as I always leave them in a specific pattern from the one I use to most to the one where I store most of my back-up materials; part of my fieldcraft.
I just chalked it up to the maids moving them to vacuum the room.
The next day, after breakfast, I went to one of my stay-at-home field cases to retrieve a couple of blank field notebooks to lay my trap for anyone who had a bad case of the snoops.
As I was about to open it, I noticed that the keyholes for the locks were badly scratched. I’m always very careful with these cases and they’re pretty tough. How could just the keyholes be so scratched up…?
I checked all the others. Every single one had, save for the one I left in Mansur’s Uaz last night, had their keyholes similarly injured. It looks like the plot’s thickening. Someone was trying to break into my field cases. Luckily, they’re tough as nails and will resist pick-locks, files, probes and the like.
My keys work a treat, but I remember back a few years when I lost the key for one of these cases. The locksmith in Houston had to drill the bloody thing to get it to open. I knew my materials and notes were safe, but I had the glimmerings of an evil plan taking root in my fervid little mind.
I went to the hotel gift shop and purchased a ruinously expensive box of cigars. I called my Agency buddies in the states and told them to expect a present in the next Diplomatic Pouch. I also instructed them to return the pouch with a few items that they were well placed to supply. They acknowledged and promised it would be sent out directly.
I poured myself a new drink and set to work ginning up some fantastically farcical field notebooks for whoever wanted to read them. I also made sure to slip and include a primer, of sorts, that would allow transcription of the new code I was developing.
I’m so glad I took those cryptology courses back in University. If someone was wanting dirt on this here geologist, I’d give it to them in dump truck loads.
So, I had whipped up a couple of incredibly amateurish, by design, easily translatable field notebooks outlining my ‘true motives’.
It included such inanities as how I was trying to covertly topple the heads of governments in countries didn’t exist; creating official communiques to secret foreign internal security agencies which were totally illusory, and selling other countries, necessarily vaguely described, mineral rights on the street in Houston at wildly inflated prices, numerous times.
Nothing like selling 1000% of a deal and hoping it comes up dry.
I also delved into detonic alchemy. I left recipes for ‘instant delayed amorphous shaped charges’, quinqueloculine liquid and solid explosives, ones that required five different exotic chemicals in five different proportions, and my own secret recipe for “Silemite”, the revolutionary new noiseless high explosive.
I also added combinations to fictional safes full of stealthy state secrets, the contact numbers of fake agents, and addresses of non-existent safe houses.
Two full field books of this abominable nonsense. Plus, the key to deciphering it, right there on the inside back cover. Whoever thought this was real would think they hit the mother lode.
It was all a load, all right; but not of what for which they were hoping.
Plus, I had plans for any snoopy concierge, custodian, or caretaker. This would have to wait until my package from Agents Rack and Ruin arrived, but I’m sure whoever was futzing around my room, looking for dirt, would find it a real blast.
I’m rewarding myself with a hearty midday cocktail when I hear the lock on my suite being activated.
No “Hello! Housekeeping!” or other warning. Yikes. Good thing I had my shorts on…
The door opens and a hotel-uniformed female of the room maintenance variety walks in, more intent on watching the hallway as she enters and furtively shuts the door. Seems she was more intent on someone or something in the hallway rather than on the person sitting at the desk sipping his early afternoon thought-provoking concoction.
The door locks with a gentle ‘schnick’ of the latch, as I stand up, and walk soundlessly on the deep plush carpeting over to the door to greet this person.
She turns around and almost walks right into me, she was so pre-occupied.
“Howdy!” I say. “How may I help you?”
Once I peel her off the ceiling, she calms down a might when I tell her not to be alarmed.
“I’m Doctor Rock, a resident of these parts,” I say by way of introduction.
“Oh, DOCtor”, she exclaims, “I am to apologize. Did not know you were here in room!”
“No worries, no worries.”, I reply, “I’m taking a bit of a day off to prepare for my upcoming field visits. If I may ask, what is your name?” as her hotel nametag was curiously absent.
“Oh, DOCtor”, she gasps, “I am… Gulmyriah. I am, how you say, keeper of the house here.”
“Very nice to meet you, Gulmyriah.” I respond, “Well, now that introductions are complete, I suppose you want me to disappear so you can tidy up, correct?”
“Umm, oh! Yes, DOCtor.” She stammered. She had this semi-endearing unusual habit of stressing the first syllable of my sobriquet.
“OK, I guess I’ll go to the gift shop and get a newspaper then. I’m going to finish that Pravda crossword one of these days…” I said.
I suddenly realized something was odd as there was no usual housekeeping cart here in the room nor in the hall.
“Oh, yes, DOCtor.” She hesitated, “I was just checking room to see which needed cleaning. I will have cart brought for your room.”
OK, seems a bit weird, didn’t need to usually clean rooms where no one was staying. You’d think the hotel would have better records as to their occupancy…I just let the thought die a natural death. I was being slightly overly suspicious after Mansur’s little game the previous evening and my re-arranged, scratched luggage…
I get up to pull on a new Hawaiian shirt and Gulmyriah spies my half-drained drink on the desk.
“DOCtor,” she asks, “Shall I keep your drink or remove it?”
“I’m going to be out while you clean the room, so just toss it.” I reply.
“Or, maybe I could pour us both a new one?” she asks coquettishly.
“Excuse me?” I ask, thinking my hearing has gone totally haywire at this point.
“If you like, I can share drink with you? Maybe more later?” she asks seductively.
“Are you certain?” I reply, “Aren’t you on duty?”
“Yes, but is so lonely here.” She purrs, “Few people here. Few rooms to clean. So tiring, so alone…”
“Gulmyriah” I intone, “If you’d like to share a drink, I propose we could meet after working hours down at the bar. This here is beyond inappropriate and I’m certain my wife would not approve.”
“You are married?” she freaks, “Is wife here?”
“Yes to the first, no to the second.” I reply, “Look, Gulmyriah, what’s the deal here? You weren’t expecting me to be in my room. You sneak in and have no hotel badge nor cart. Then you want to have a drink with me, and… OK. What’s the deal? You know a couple of guys by the names of Rack and Ruin?”
“No, no nothing. Like that. At all.” she falters, “I am just here to clean room. I want to be just friends. I just want to be acting nice to new person…”
She was shaking she was so visibly upset, as her mascara began to run. Perhaps she thought I’d drop a dime on her, report her conduct to the hotel management whereupon she’d be canned.
“Gulmyriah, please. Calm down”, I say, “It’s obviously all just a misunderstanding. Language difficulties. Don’t worry. We’re green here, no problem, OK? Нет проблем, хорошо?”
My Russian seemed to help a bit. She realized I was mostly harmless and was just chalking things up to perceived paranoia on my part and, well, I don’t know, discreetness on hers?
Whatever the case, I made sure to calm the scene, reassuring her everything was copacetic, and I’m now leaving, so she can continue her duties without my presence.
But first I secretively grabbed my passports, wallets, and loose cash. Not that I didn’t trust her, hell, I don’t trust anyone save for my wife…
I went to the gift shop, purchased a paper, and headed for the bar. It was 5:00 pm somewhere, I rationalized. Besides, I was a wee bit peckish, so some nibbly bits from the bar’s free pub-grub buffet might be in order.
I sit at the bar and Marco the waiter comes over. Seems he works as a barkeep in the hotel as well.
“Good afternoon, Doctor. Your usual?” he asks.
“Yes, Marco, if you please. I reply, “And just today, could you make it a double. It’s been a really weird day.”
“Most certainly”, he smilingly replies, “Back in a bit.”
He reappears with my drink and I hand him a fistful of so’m.
“As I noted the other night. Here’s your tip” I smile, “See, I don’t forget my obligations.”
“Thank you, Doctor.” He grins.
“Look, Marco. Just call me ‘Rock’” I note, “Everyone else does.”
“OK, sure, ah, Rock.” He grins even wider.
It’s quiet in the bar and I’m the only patron, which again, seems to be a theme of this trip.
Marco and I share a drink, as I always buy for my bartender. It’s just the way of things.
We’re chatting and he manages to cadge one of my cigars. The rest of the afternoon, I didn’t have to pay for a single drink.
We’re just chewing things over when I regale him of my little tale with Gulmyriah and how I somehow almost scared the pants off of her.
“What was her name again?” Marco asked.
“Gulmyriah”, I replied.
“Umm, Rock, there’s no one here at this hotel by that name,” Marco informs me.
“I suppose I could be mispronouncing her name.” I admit, “She’s about 5-foot nothing, semi-darkly complected, long black hair, nervous, flighty, kind of jumpy. Emotional.”
“Unless she’s very new”, Marco confides, “But I don’t think so. I know everyone on staff here, and she doesn’t sound like anyone I know.”
“OK, that’s weird.” I admit, “Foursquare weird.”
“I could also be mistaken”, Marco says, “She could be part of the new cleaning crew we contracted for a few months back. The hotel outsources much of the hotel maintenance and security to outside contractors. Still…”
“Thanks, Marco”, I reply, “Food for thought.”
Or more like grist for the paranoia mill.
After some lovely prawn tempura and a couple of fresh drinks, I decide to go back to my room and just try and ponder this all out.
Was I being paranoid, or was I under surveillance? Or was I going nuts?
I have to walk by the front desk on the way back to my room when the hotel concierge calls me over. Seems a package has arrived for me from the states.
“Good old Rack and Ruin.” I think, “Right on the money.”
I take the package and give my room a quick once over. No new towels, the bed’s sort of, kind of made, only one trash emptied, and all my Halliburton cases had been rearranged again.
OK, now that’s more than odd. The carpet shows no signs of being vacuumed.
Now I’m pissed.
Someone or some organization is playing silly buggers with me. I’m sure of it.
Just as a bit of a test, I go into the bathroom and try flushing the toilet several times in rapid succession.
I say aloud to no one in particular, “Oh, dear! It would appear that the commode in my bathroom is broken!”
Although it wasn’t. It was all part of my master plan.
After that, I return to my desk and the package my Agency buddies have sent me.
In the package are two ‘game cameras’, a Polaroid camera, film packs, and a canister of Agency-grade photographic flash powder.
The game cameras are the ones lesser hunters use along game trails. They’re motion activated and have settings to delay the picture from instant to a 30-second delay. I will require a couple of lengths of speaker wire and some ni-chrome wire for my little plan.
But, since I’m a bit pressed for time, I fold up the Diplomatic Pouch and stash it in my room closet where it wouldn’t be found without a deliberate search. I also set one camera into one of my Halliburton cases; my reserve stash case that holds extra drafting supplies, flasks, lighters, spare cigars, and other important necessities.
I affix to the inside the left-hand side of the lid of the case so that when it’s opened, the camera would be pointing directly at the person opening it. The shutter was set for a two-second delay. These things are extremely quiet and not terribly large. A person, not knowing what they were would never think the little box was a secret camera. Plus they’d never know it was armed and primed.
To be continued.

I found out that this post doesn't belong in either pro revenge, nuclear revenge or petty revenge, so here it goes!
This happened a few years ago and i still vividly remember the whole thing cause of the nerve-wrecking anxiety and pure satisfaction the situation caused to me.
A few years ago, maybe around 2 years ago, i was taking a popular flight from a populous city in India to the IT city of India. Everyone followed boarding procedures and sat according to seat numbers etc. etc, nothing very obviously off. I settled down in my designated seat and fetched my book from my bag before settling in, preparing for an hour of good reading time.
As usual, expecting the seating chaos, i looked around a while before burying myself into my book. Air hostesses usually help people arrange and load their check in baggage throughout the boarding process.
An older man in white sits 2 rows ahead of me, he took his phone out and went through some notifications i didn't bother much about that, i was more engrossed at his wallpaper, which happened to be a spectacularly spangled, Bollywood version of Jesus Christ, weird, but nothing out of the ordinary again. For some reason, my eyes just couldn't leave his phone, i wasn't being snoopy or anything, just really curious initially at his choice of a wallpaper.
Anyhow, I said to myself, back to a good read, as i said those words to myself, i saw this mans wallpaper change to the camera app and i could not fucking believe my eyes, but in a seconds time, this creepy asshole took a picture of an air hostess helping an elderly woman load her luggage. Again, I was somewhat a kid back then and a wave of cold shock and anxiety came over me. Had i really just witnessed that? i double checked, this guy took her picture, in front of everyone, like the fucking idiot he was, and just went back to check his notifications and all that.
I had to think fast, i didn't want to be the only one calling him out, I needed the crowd support, plus this guy looked like a powerful guy who had political affiliations and "goons" to help him out when necessary....so you could understand my situation. 5 minutes later, i catch my breath again, get a grip of myself, and loudly ask the man, "Hey Sir, Could you show me the picture you just took of the air hostess a minute ago? i wanna see if you really did it!" The man just went, "what..." and so i repeated myself again, this time louder and with the support of several disgusted co passengers, to my absolute delight, my man stuttered and stammered and created such huge suspicion that the senior air hostess approached him and demanded to see the picture. Several older women and men threw a HUGE shitstorm at the creep. I haven't ever seen so much disgust and discontent on a single flight towards a co passenger. My man had a swarm of people cussing at him from all sides, it was a sight to behold. He got accused of of everything, from being a general creep to setting a bad example to the younger generation around him. He just couldn't answer back and was subdued by the crowd whenever he mustered the courage to do so. Looking extremely flustered, and rightly so, he was finally taken aside by the the head of the flights air hostess group, asked to delete the picture, or get left behind at the airport.
This man, with his sheepish face, deleted the picture and sat back down. He gave me the most deer-in-headlights look I've ever seen and didn't look as intimidating as before, it felt great to call this guy out, almost empowering. No, no one in the plane stood up and clapped and all that meme bullshit, but i felt almost a burden lift off my chest...This incident made me a much stronger person today and i don't hesitate to call out other forms of harassment whenever I can.
TL;DR - Man tries to sneak a picture of a flight attendant, starts a riot on the airplane and almost gets thrown out.