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The Cold: Captain's Log: Day 2
We set out with such great hopes. Was that only yesterday? We thought we would have it beat, and have it beat quick. We've faced the Colds before. Innumerous times have we fought, and lived. Yet this time is different.
The first day we lost the odorial sensors. It was a horrible sight, and the memories of all that goo will haunt me for the rest of my days. Last report that came in told us that there were still people up there, trying to clear it, but communication there is scarce.
We regained it during the first night, though with heavy losses; the vital communications are severely damaged. It's doubtful if we can even get reinforcements anymore.
Then the heavy blows started coming in. Audial, visual and sensual sensors got hit, hard and fast. Visual passed it the best thanks to quick work from our elite corps, but at this rate it will be lost within the week.
Then the worst case scenario came to happen: we lost contact with logistics. They had been reporting some casualties already during day one, but nothing that really mattered. Around noon today they stopped reporting. We're still not sure what happened, but we know that they've been hit hard.
At Headquarters we can see them stalking in the bushes every now and then. So far they haven't done anything major other than a couple of strikes before noon which we repelled fairly swiftly. The total damages are accounted for.
But with the losses of sensors we know for sure that they are nearby, perhaps even preparing their assault as I speak. Privates have been speaking of drums in the deep. As a security measure we've reduced communications to the furthest placements, which means that we will be suffering reduced overall coordination about now. We can't confirm it due to the poor quality of the remaining sensors.
We are preparing the final measures now. The proper rituals are being performed in this moment and I will be handing out release codes in a few minutes. It has not been invoked in generations and I am loath to do it again, but if neccessary, I will not hesitate.
Home Base has been informed of our preparations and are making their own. I will do my best for the next 12 hours, but if we have not succeeded by then, I shall have to plead for more time. I know that The Council can approve of it, though it has not happened yet in memory of either me or my closest lieutenants.
A cold hand runs down my spine when I consider the consequences of failure. No effort shall be spared to return our home to the glorious state it deserves.
This is Cptn. Lazarous IV, by the Deeps at 1900 hours.
*End of log.*
 Lazarous · Wed Dec 21, 2005 @ 07:25pm · 2 Comments |
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Yes, it's been snowing for half an hour now. It's only very light snowfall and it'll probably stop soon, leaving nothing more than some white here and there. It'll probably melt away in a few days as well. Like it did a few years ago when we got a good foot of snow which melted away to ice. Staying snow didn't come till mid November then.
Also, they're saying that this'll be the coldest winter in a decade. gonk
Lazarous · Fri Oct 21, 2005 @ 07:51am · 3 Comments |
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Hamburger Jack's stories have inspired me greatly. >__> To the extent that I felt I had to write something myself, in a similar genre. It's probably crap and it took me more than 4 hours to write (4 of the hours I'm supposed to be asleep), but a comment or two would be nice.
It was somewhere in the darkness of the Barton Town, only a stones' throw from the infamous Barton Burgers. On a bench by a fountain a pair of lightly dressed girls sat, speaking loudly about whatever occupied their minds for the moment sharing the contents of a box from BB.
Lazarous didn't particularly care for what they said, in fact, he had taken steps to ensure that he heard nothing of their mindless blubbering. He was seated behind a pile of sizable boxes in a dark alley with an overview over most of the square, the girls by the fountain in particular.
The alley was dirty, filled with garbage and bugs. The first two he was more than used to, having lived in a Junkyard for the past several years. The bugs were another business entirely; creatures in the Junkyard either tried to kill you or left you alone, but the bugs kept crawling down his shirt just for the hell of it. He cursed softly as he reached down his neck and squashed a small fly for what seemed like the millionth time.
The cloth of his worn shirt would get dirtier of course, but that was of little consequence. The shirt he had once bought along with the coarse cargo pants he wore and he considered them his working clothes. Ian had charged a hefty sum for them, but it was more than worth it - they had lasted for a good many years with only a couple dozen patches.
Though the clothes would easily have passed him off as some poor schmuck with an unhealthy bottle-per-day count, there was one thing that passed him off as something far more: A pair of multi-million headphones covered his ears and would have drowned out most of the noise of the surroundings even without blasting the recording of the Gaian Royal Orchestra concert from last week. As it was, not even a gunshot up close would be able to disturb him.
Ordinarily he would never be blanking out one of his senses in this manner, but this night was special. Firstly, he would never be able to hear his prey anyways, and secondly, if he didn't have them he'd be forced to listen to that horrible AOL dialect. He had heard the typical phrases both once and twice too many and felt nauseous at the thought of hearing another "give goldz plz" or "i cyber u 4 goldz".
To keep the wolf away, you make sure he has nothing to eat. Perhaps it would be easier to just get rid of them all.... He shook his head and reached into his pocket for a sandwich, deciding not to ponder further on the subject. Too many hours with the Rattus shamans, I gather. Even starting to think like the pint-sized bastards.
As he bit into the sandwich he wondered briefly what the two girls would think of being watched in this manner, should they know about it. They'd probably think me to be both one and two kinds of pervert, he took another bite and smiled wryly. Which might've been both one and two kinds of true on another night. The fate of the imprompty hero? Though one might ask where the line between responsibility and heroism lies. And between taking responsibility and having it forced upon one...
It didn't matter, of course. No matter which train of thought he rode he'd never be able to escape the fact that the Junkyard was his responsibility, and all its inhabitants along with it. It'd be so much easier if he could get some reliable help, of course. Walking across the Junkyard took two to three days and to travel around it took would take nearly a week. Of course something was bound to get out every once in a while.
This time it was sneakier than most, though. Avoiding any larger detection by hiding in Bass'ken and only coming out to feed at night. It had brains and therefore it was dangerous. But at least it had a pattern - if a quite gory one - and that pattern said it would show up tonight. He couldn't tell for sure if it would be here, but it seemed most likely. Agatha would be having a sale on old glasses tonight, which meant every Exchanger and their Roro would show up, clogging the entire western half of Barton. This square was dark and empty, save for a pair of half-brained nooblets in bikini and the possible drunk passerby. Even a ten feet tall freakish heap of tentacles could appear and hunt relatively unnoticed.
Lazarous squashed another bug and finished the sandwich before turning back to the square. Grieg's " In Der Halle des Bergk�nigs" was just coming on and the careful trombones made a mysterius yet pleasant theme for the night.
Just then, as in the games he had played along to the music as a child, something started to rise out of the fountain. Except this time it wasn't his friends painted and decked out as small trolls, but a mass of greenish gray tentacles. Water slid off it like an oiled frying pan as it kept growing out of the water until it dwarfed the statue of a naked woman in the middle. The girls had heard nothing and continued chatting over the remains of their meal as the monstrosity started to reach toward them with its long, lithe tentacles.
Lazarous moved swiftly, pulling on a pair of thin, black leather gloves from his pocket. The knuckles and palm were covered with silvery wires and small metal plates. As he stood he picked up a large, empty crate that had been standing nearby and threw it into the square with a wordless shout. At the sound the girl looked up at last and froze as they saw the mass of writhing tentacles less than five feet away.
The crate seemed to hang in the air forever as it flew towards the fountain in a wide arc. He thought he could see every degree of its rotation in slow motion until it struck the creature. Except it didn't. When it was an arms length away, a pair of tentacles whipped out and struck the crate hard enough for it to shatter into a cloud of splinters and pieces of wood. Sharp, certainly, but the most trouble they would ever cause anyone would be for whoever had to clean up this mess in the morning.
Lazarous had never counted on the crate to be more than a distraction, though it had proved to be an even poorer one than expected. Nevertheless, as the first shrapnel started to hit the ground he had already covered a third of the distance across the square and was still picking up speed. The thing was still turning to face him when he reached the edge of the fountain and leapt towards it. He aimed towards where its face should be with both hands balled into fists and rotating his torso to gain power for a punch.
It was only as his shoulder was nearly yanked out of its socket that he noticed how much he had underestimated its speed. A tentacle snapped out and caught his guarding arm, tugging him upwards and into a half-circle path over the creature and down at full speed. He barely had time to grit his teeth and steel himself for the impact before he slammed onto the hard pavement back first. Reinforced protective weave or not, the number of stars he saw stated that his brashness had cost him at least one rib. His headphones had fallen off, too.
Again the tentacled tugged at his arm, dragging him across the pavement around the fountain and up, releasing him as it tossed him like a rag doll. He managed to twist enough in the air to see the stone wall he was about to make intimate contact with. Again his back hit first and he wondered detachedly if he'd be able to tell which ribs had cracked against the pavement and which against the wall.
As he fell to the ground the girls unfroze and sprung into action, doing a poor attempt at running away. One of them stumbled and fell face forward with a loud yelp. Lazarous noticed that she had long red hair - most likely what she would worry about the most in the morning if she survived. The other one, with the same hairstyle but of a blue color, didn't even bother looking back but ran off screaming into the night. He had always liked blue, but it didn't go very well in hair.
Focus, dammit! You're loosing it! Lazarous grunted and winced, slowly sitting up. He noticed that the creature was starting to move out of the fountain and towards the girl, a pair of tentacles already reaching for her ankle. It ignored the bench and just moved over it. It snapped in pieces under the weight of the creature. The girl seemed more concerned with rubbing her scratched arms than the approaching danger and didn't even notice what stood behind her. I should let it have her. How I wish I could just let it have her...
He staggered to his feet and supported himself against the wall as he shook his head to clear the dizzyness. The girl suddenly screamed and was hoisted into the air by a pair of tentacles tightly wrapped around her ankle. All I ask for is a minute, but no, even the monsters are stressing. He started to walk towards the creature again and found that some of his balance returned with each step he took. I could've been home in the Junkyard now. I'm sure there's something good on TV I'm missing tonight. He began to pick up the pace; the number of tentacles wrapped around the girl were increasing. It seemed feeding wasn't the very first thing on the creatures mind. Nah, that's delusionary. There's never anything good on TV.
He was running now and was approaching the thing rapidly like before. Unlike last time though, he now aimed at the tentacles holding the girl rather than at the creature itself. But I could've taken a real long bath in the hot springs by the North Chamber. As he leapt he rubbed the tips of his thumb and index fingers towards each other, activating the force-emitters on the gloves. Or I could've explored those wreckage caves by the Ruins.
He barely managed to avoid some tentacles reaching for him by twisting in the air. Vaulting over the girl he struck the the mass of tentacles holding on to her with palms open, releasing the force stored in the emitters. The tentacles under his hands more or less desintegrated and the remains scattered across the ground as green goo. Not to mention all those books I've been meaning to read.
Lazarous grabbed onto the now released girl as he flew past her and cradled her, using himself as a shield as they hit the ground and rolled. She screamed loud enough to make him wish he had his headphones again. The monster roared behind them as well, possibly in pain, but it was often hard to tell with these things. Or just discuss some with those Rattus shamans. They do have some good ideas sometime.
As soon as they stopped he pushed her away and got to his feet. The thing had greenish goo pumping from the torn tentacles and it was writhing more violently than before. But as its black eyes focused on him he saw that they were burning with anger rather than pain.
The creature roared again and rose to its full length before setting off towards him at terrifying speed. A quick look around found Lazarous just what he was looking for: a loose cobblestone a few paces away. He threw himself towards it and grabbed it, rolling to his feet. Focusing intently on the creature approaching he tossed the stone high into the air and activated the force emitters on his right glove.
The creature rushed towards him and rose up above him in a disgusting mass of writhing tentacles and green goo, preparing to fall on him. Just then the stone dropped into his reach and he smacked with his palm, like one would a volleyball. With the added force from the emitters the stone flew towards the creature like a cannonball, penetrating its tough hide without problem and passing on through it, eventually crashing into a building and coming to a halt, embedded in massive stone, high up on the facade.
The creature reared and pulled back with a shrill shriek. Goo running from the entrance and exit holes testified that the stone had hurt it, but it had hardly killed it. And this is why guns are inferior. If only people would realize that. As he thought it he realized that most gun-wielders would never meet a beast like this one where literally ripping it to pieces was neccessary.
He reached down on the ground and picked up another cobblestone. Briefly weighing it in his hands he tossed it into the air and sent it too flying through the beast. With a crash the stone embedded in the pavement on the other side and the beast shrank away further from him. It seemed tiny now that it was no longer so aggressive. Again and again he sent stones through the creature and into the pavement.
By now it was trying to retreat to the fountain, but it was only dragging itself along with a handful of tentacles, the others dragged limp behind and Lazarous gathered that he had managed to hit some equivalent of a spine somewhere. He picked up another cobblestone and held it in both hands as he approached the creature. Stepping past some limp tentacles he stood over it. It ceased its movement and looked towards him with its multiple balck eyes round and empty.
"The law states that none may leave the Junkyard other than the master and any visitors," he hadn't invoked the law in a long time and he wasn't even sure the thing understood him, but there was no way to be sure. "The punishment for trespassing is death."
He activated the force emitters in both gloves and aimed the stone at the creature. "I hereby ensure the following of the law."
As he activated the force emitters of both gloves the stone shattered between the competing forces, breaking it into massive amounts of sharp stone shrapnel which struck the creature like a shotgun blast. What remained was mostly green goo and the odd body part in the middle, surrounded by a tangle of tentacles.
With a sigh he stepped away from the mess and walked over to the fountain. Leaning down over the surface he pulled off his gloves and stuffed them back into his pocket before rinsing his face and hands from splatters of green goo. He then sat down on the edge of the fountain and gingerly felt his ribs. Three had cracked, and most of his chest was bruised, but the weave held them in place.
He sighed and looked around; Apart from the craters after his volleystones and the pile of monster parts there was nothing that wouldn't say this wasn't just some random act of vandalism. The girl had already run away, possibly to find her friend. They might speak of it, but who would believe them?
He reached into a pocket and pulled out a small metal ball, the size of a marble. Standing up he squeezed it hard and tossed it into the pile of monster where it emitted a slight flash as it struck. It would incinerate the remains effectively. Within a few hours there would be nothing left but ash and some scorch-marks. Only the craters wouldn't be enough for the police to start wondering.
He started towards his headphones but paused briefly by the crushed bench to pull out the remains of the Barton Burgers meal which he tossed onto the remains. Then he headed over to the headphones and picked them up. They were playing "Claire De Lune" by now, which he judged suitable enough. Putting them on he stuck his hands into his pockets and headed home, towards the Junkyard.
Lazarous · Sat Oct 01, 2005 @ 03:24am · 2 Comments |
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Aprils Fools and all that. xp I'd never give up on onlineness just because of failing grades. domokun
I will however be away for a while. I'm currently renting a computer at an Internet Café on a Ski Resort a good way from home. ninja I'll be home again on Wednesday...
Lazarous · Sun Apr 03, 2005 @ 03:42pm · 3 Comments |
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Well, what with school, spare time activities and a whole load of crap I'm feeling that I'm spending too much time online. xp (Sad but true) Unfortunately I also believe this to be the cause of deteriorating grades and similar bad stuff.
Therefore, I've decided that I'm gonna lay off all online activities for a while. IMing and such for a few weeks at least but I'll have to hold of Gaia till the summer. So don't be surprised if you don't see me around for a while. ^__^;
Feel free to drop a line by my Junkyard every once in a while to keep it from falling into the maws of Thread-death until I get back.
See you again sometime in June...
Lazarous · Fri Apr 01, 2005 @ 08:54pm · 2 Comments |
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The situation has been inflamed for a while now, I'd say - especially with the users having formed both the Gambino Army and the Von Helson Army. >__>;; They say they've made peace for the event, though.
spencer- kun As general of the Von Helson Army, I peacefully come to you to say that The Gambino's Army and ours have come to a peace agreement! 
***************************************
I can see it in front of me:
Setting: 8 hours into the Easter party - Admin office
Lanzer: Sooo...... stare
VHA & GA top officers: *Shuffles feet.*
Lanzer: Would you care to explain to me how exactly you broke Gaia? stare
VHA & GA: *In unison.* They started it! gonk We merely asserted our right of self-defense!
Lanzer: And since when exactly did "self-defense" involve 300 lbs of explosives? stare
VHA & GA: Yah, umm... We asserted our right of agressive self-defense? sweatdrop
Lanzer: Then there was the matter of the theft of the Von Helson sisters' panties...
VHA: We'd never steal items from our beloved idols! They'd have us deader than count Vladimir
GA: What would we do with that kind of filth? .__.
Lanzer: ...and using them for painting the walls with the blood of hapless bystanders.
VHA & GA: Oh.... sweatdrop We thought those were rags. Honest. sweatdrop
Lanzer: Further counts of charge are burning of the sisters' Vogue Magazine collection...
GA: sweatdrop
Lanzer: ...Unauthorized reinstatement of the Durem Defensive Works Cannon Batteries...
VHA: sweatdrop
Lanzer: ...burning of the sisters' clothing collection...
VHA: crying
Lanzer: ...for which the sisters wanted to thank the "cleaners"...
GA: gonk
Lanzer: ...illegal usage of alcohol as weaponry...
VHA: How should we know that the punch would react like that with the chandeliers! gonk
Lanzer: ...general stampeding...
GA: We weren't the ones who started using cattle prods! >__>;;
Lanzer: ...destruction of property worth more than all of the Exchange, 133 counts of molesting, 40 counts of murder, 642 counts of assault and 2 counts of raping dead fish. I do not want to know about the last one, thank you very much
VHA & GA: .__.;;
***************************************
In other news, I'll be away for the event. Gas said he'd pick up a couple of extra items for me if possible, for which I'm immensely grateful. 3nodding I'll just have to buy whatever other items exist later and I suppose there'll be plenty of event-plot-recaps to go through. sweatdrop
Lazarous · Sat Mar 26, 2005 @ 11:59pm · 3 Comments |
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When we first came there we had about twenty mins before the first session (which was at 14:00). So we headed to where my friend thought it was going to be (and made it in good time, even though we had to cross the University campus), but found that all the doors were locked. After checking around the building (and finding only locked doors xp ) all that time had passed. sweatdrop
So we figured it might be in their regular place, which for some reason they call "Finkan", which translates into "the Clink". So after asking around we got some directions. Unfortunately, those led to the local jail (which was placed in yet another corner of the campus). domokun
So we asked for the adress where we thought it might be and headed there (even though it turned out to mean yet another crossing of the campus). We found the general area, but not the place itself. >.> So we called home to find the exact adress, and were told that it was actually in the first place but you needed keycards to enter. xp So we headed back there and managed to talk a guy into letting us in and wandered around till we found the exact rooms. sweatdrop About an hour late.
Even though we were an hour late the game (Earthdawn) hadn't started yet. We sat for another hour or so and went through rules and the world and stuff. The DM was too easy to get going on the world. xp
Then we played some and were just about to enter the underground city we had just found when we had to stop because of the time. sweatdrop
I didn't get to do all that much either. >.> I played an orcish girl (16 years old) warrior with no skills other than fighting and pretty dumb. And I never even got to fight once. sweatdrop
Then came the next gaming session - Paranoia XP. xd Which was pretty awesome. The basic game idea is that everyone lives in a great underground city (Complex Alpha) after the Great Disaster. Everything is governed by a mad computer. sweatdrop
The players were so called "Troubleshooters" - which basically means that we find trouble and shoot it. The team had the mission of finding out why Production Unit 3 in section IME had reduced its production levels of "Cool Fun", which is the best (and only) ice-cream in CA. Everyone also had their secrets and their hidden agenda - of which most conflicted with the others'. xd A basic part of Paranoia XP is that everyone also have a set of Clones with the exact same memories and equipment, but without the blame and stuff. Basically extra-lives.
My goal was to destroy the databanks, since a member of my secret association had left some incriminating evidence there before being executed - but I had to watch out for my own party, since there was an IntSec (Internal Security forces) agent amongst the other members.
One of my friends was a member of a mutant-hating association and had the mission of finding the data left behond by a member of a rival organization - but he had to beware of IntSec agents in the party who wanted to blow it all up.
Another guy was a member of a secret mutant organization who suspected that there was a member of a mutant-hating organization in the party and he had to assassinate him - but he had to beware the possible IntSec agents who secretly supported the mutant-haters.
The last guy was an undercover IntSec agent who had to protect an NPC who was dead before the adventure even started. xd
Basically everyone started believeing the others to be IntSec forces. xd
The kill-score:
Armed IntSec forces tried to arrest me, so I detonated the C4 in my bag and blew up my friends and a school-class of 16 children.
I snuck into the computer room and find the second guy already there. He tried to shoot me and I tried to beat him up. I ended up pretty wounded but he was unconscious. Then his gun malfunctioned and blew up, killing him and putting me unconscious. When I woke up I was judged guilty of treason and sentenced to medication. That clone later ODed on happy pills and ended up in a coma. sweatdrop
I snuck into the computer room to find the second guy, who had just shot the third guy. So I shot the second guy in the back and used his grenade to blow it all up. I later died when trying to stop a giant mecha from obliterating the place. sweatdrop
The last guy also died twice more. Once in a junk-press after saving a school-kid and once when falling into a heap of mutated ice-cream when trying to avoid the nuking of the mecha he was trying to stop.
In any case it was lots of fun. xd I also RPed yesterday, since we had wrap up an adventure from last Sunday. I should also go to bed about now since I need to get up for RPing tomorrow when we go on on the next adventure. sweatdrop
Lazarous · Sun Dec 05, 2004 @ 12:52am · 4 Comments |
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I like fishing. I currently have more than 8k worth of fish in my inventory. xd
So, about my day... This has definitely got to be one of the better days of my life. >_>
It started when I got up early enough to actually have time to eat breakfast before brushing my teeth. I then rode the bus into town and had plenty of time to listen to nifty music.
Upon arriving at the sports centre - where I have jiu-jutsu - I met my friends and discovered that the mood set music CD and the reworked rulebook for Mutant: Heirs of Doom had arrived. ._. Which is totally awesome just by itself.
Then during the class the instructor complimented my self defense strangling techniques and showed me some more. 3nodding
Then we headed to school and had a class council which was extremely entertaining. xd Then I listened to some speches about this and that in Swedish class and almost completely managed to work out what I'm gonna speak about on Friday. blaugh
Then lunch which was barely edible for a change - rather than purely vile - after which I escaped the school and headed into town for a driving class. After this I met up with my mother by the library and ran into the caretaker of the big place that has the theater, library, grown-up-people's school and a few other things. After talking to him I now have a chance at a job in the cinema they're going to reopen. blaugh Purely by chance.
After this I had my (fourth) driving exam which I passed(!) despite enormous nervousness. blaugh biggrin whee I now also have a theory about a driving examinator conspiracy to creep out every student in existance at the end of the exam. ._.
So I headed back to school in time for the remainder of my last class - netowrking, which was totally groovy - we were only a few people there and the work was purely interesting. I even got a chance to base some stuff on my programming classes from last year. sweatdrop
So then I get home fairly quickly and in the mailbox I find my brand new Visa card. xd I also find that my games have been sent from the store and should be arriving any day now. whee
So I start up the comp and find that Bot is online - though she has yet to reply to anything - and then that all the fish reported gone due to glitches have been sent to inventories, which means I got my Tootin' Tino! blaugh Thusly I earned nearly 3k on yesterday's fishing.
Good day, no? whee
Only bad thing I can come to think of is that my one shoulder hurts like hell. >.<
Following was stolen from Aeren who got it from Fuzzay who got it from Victrix who probably got it from somewhere else since I've seen it around before. 3nodding
Quote: 1. Tell me one thing you love about me. 2. Tell me two things you love about yourself. This one I'm particularly interested in, so make it good. I mean it. No self-deprication allowed! 3. Do this in your journal so I can tell you what I love about YOU - and if you've already done it, tell me so, so that I can go back and give you some love.
Lazarous · Wed Dec 01, 2004 @ 03:26pm · 4 Comments |
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What follows is read solely on personal initiative and is not required for any reason.
x.X I'm so friggin' tired... I've been sleeping four to five hours per night the last days to keep up with first homework, Zidane's pic (note to self: arrange for the payment when trading works) and the Halloween event. @_@ At least I had fun and got meh some items. ninja The lack of sleep would be the reason for my lousy behaviour and bad manners lately - including this journal entry. >.<
I hurt my thumb in jiujutsu last night when a guy kicked it during sparring. It hurt like then but now it hurts alot more... x.x Having trouble both extending and bending it... Can't grip stuff well either.
According to Pocky the pic is proceeding. >.> I still have to add Aqua and my Halloween ava.... >.< Gotta see to it soonish.
*Hungers for brains food.* domokun
I'm gonna bypass the trend evident in most journals and not say anything specific about the event. I've talked about that in so many other places that it wouldn't be hard to find out my opinion.
Lazarous · Mon Nov 01, 2004 @ 12:43pm · 6 Comments |
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