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Tuesday, September 9, 2025

Tales of the Sanctum: Era of the Spellbound - Episode 5: The Future That Never Was (Started September 9, 2025 7:00 PM EST)

Everything previously stated here still stands and was intended as stated and not the contextual opposite.

All of this content is and has been produced from 200 Sherbourne Street Suite 701, Toronto, Ontario, Canada from since April 19, 2012 by Brian Joseph Johns. I am both fav.inbox@gmail.com and brian.joseph.johns@shhhhdigital.com. Both accounts have always belonged to me since having created them.

The only person controlling me, is me, and I'm Brian Joseph Johns.

  [Spellbound - Siouxie And The Banshees] 


Do you like enigmatic characters, engrossing story, magic and the ever atemporal weave?

Play Baldur's Gate 3 [On Steam]


Chapters

  1. Distant Story
  2. Memories, Missives And Missions
  3. The Walk Into Darkness


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I'd like to point out that it was the incredible Gary Sinese Foundation that brought the issue of Veteran's rights to my attention. I've always had little respect for those who'd forget the great contribution made by those who've risked life and limb to defend those values that so many of us espouse. Perhaps the true measure of one's principles are by that for which they'd risk their life.

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In all truth, there's a good chance that thanks to the works of Edgar Allan Poe, Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain), William Shakespeare, Jane Austen, Jonathan Swift, Mary Shelley, Robert Louis Stevenson, Herbert George Wells, Jules Verne, Dr. Seuss, Stephen King, Clive Barker and Pierre Burton (for The Secret World Of Og and his ground breaking interview of Bruce Lee) that all of us are literate. Actually that goes back much farther to the Phoenecians and their first 22 character system of symbols. Literacy is important. Really it is. Literally. It allows us to approach our employer at the end of the week (with a big club) and ask: where my money?! Math important too. It help us count our thirteen fingers and toes.


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Shhhh! Digital Media

Brian Joseph Johns



Tales of the Sanctum: Era of the Spellbound

by Brian Joseph Johns


Episode 5: The Future That Never Was


Distant Story





Neville stepped back from the ocular, a large smile still upon his face.

"Whoa! That was sooo real, mate!" Neville remarked as he passed Wes on the way to the back of the line.

"Let Mr. Cooper have a go..." Mrs Trufflebury spoke as she stepped aside and allowed John, the tall athletic student access to the telescope.

"Pose for a photo with your students, love?" asked Mr. Trufflebury of her as he stepped back into the surrounding darkness, the observatory itself lit by a red light.

"Oh... alright. Come on Nelony! Get yourself in frame. You Too Shaela!" Mrs. Trufflebury insisted.

"Wait! Where's Mila?" she asked, looking around for her most artistically inclined student.

"Didn't want to lose my spot in line..." Mila responded, standing just behind Wes and John Cooper, who was now using the telescope, bent over and peering through the ocular.

"Don't worry. We'll get you back in place. Come on Mila..." Mrs. Trufflebury invited her and Mila indulged.

The four women stood before the telescope, Mrs. Trufflebury in the middle beside Mila, as they were the two shortest. Shaela and Nelony stood near the outside, while Wes' and Neville's faces just barely in frame when the Mr. Trufflebury snapped the photo thrice.

"For the yearbook," Mr. Trufflebury suggested.

"...And a great lesson there within. Now with the photo that my husband just took, who can tell me what the difference is between the camera, and the images of Saturn we've been looking at through the Norman Fisher's 155mm Refractor?" Mrs. Trufflebury asked of her students.

"Saturn's really really big, and the camera is really really small..." Mr. Cooper turned away from the telescope to answer Mrs. Trufflebury.

"Yes. That true, but what about the light that makes up the images? The light from the camera, and the light from Saturn?" asked Mrs. Trufflebury, reframing her question.

"It comes from the moon? The light I mean..." Mila tried her best to come up with a creative response.

"No. But  we do have a three quarter moon tonight and it is very bright, but the light that made it possible for us to take a photo, and the light of Saturn are two very different things. Who can tell us how? In what way that is?" she asked again.

"The light for the photo came from the camera flash," Neville replied.

"Correct, but what's the difference?" Mrs. Trufflebury asked again.

"The camera was really close to us, and Saturn is really, really far..." Nelony replied after thinking about the answer.

"That's correct. The flash of my husband's camera literally took less than one ten trillionth of a second to travel from the camera to us and then back to the camera again, whereas the light from Saturn, had to travel for one hour and eleven minutes to reach us. Can you tell us what that means?" asked Mrs. Trufflebury again with a smile on her face.

"When we take a picture, or look through a telescope, we're looking back in time?" Mr. Cooper replied, having finally pieced it together from the concepts they'd been studying over the last three days.

"Precisely. We're in the future from the moment of when the light rebounded from our subject, and traveled the distance from that subject all the way to our eyes. In the case of the camera, that time was so incredibly short that it was barely perceivable, but in the case of Saturn, it literally took an hour and eleven minutes to reach us. So that means that if something was happening on Saturn, that we wouldn't know about it until an hour and eleven minutes later. Like, if a gigantic storm like the one on Jupiter suddenly brewed, it would already be an hour and eleven minutes old by the time it reached us. So most of what astronomers look at when they're studying astronomical objects, are at astronomical distances and therefore, typically, they're looking at light that left or rebounded from the objects, anywhere from years to hundreds of millions of years ago. We're literally looking back in time," Mrs. Trufflebury pointed at the sky and towards the stars, as the motor on the telescope whirred to life once again, the operator aligning the telescope with their next subject.

"Mila? Why don't you do the honours of taking a first look?" Mrs. Trufflebury suggested to Mila, who'd been waiting for her turn at the telescope.

"Alright. This is exciting...!" she smiled as she stepped forward to the ocular under the red light.

She put her eye over the lens and a large brilliant star came to life in her vision. It was clearly very distant but ever so bright and full of specular detail. She had never seen anything so dazzling as it floated in the heavens above her, so clearly visible through the telescope's lens.

"What am I looking at?" asked Mila of Mrs. Trufflebury.

"You're looking at one of the stars in the constellation Lyra..." Mrs. Trufflebury gestured as if she were now holding an instrument like a tiny harp in her arms.

"That name... its so familiar. Like the name of someone that I know?" Mila responded, looking again into the telescope, absolutely dazzled by the star's brilliance.

"Bah! Maybe she's thinking liar or something?" Neville replied, immediately fitting his entire foot into his own mouth.

"You mean you! You peng!" Wes replied.

"I was only rubbin' ya wrong, Mila. Don't take it personal," Neville apologized early, for nearly the first time in his life.

"Now that was an improvement. Next time, hold it in," Nelony actually moved closer to Neville and took hold of his hand.

"Despite what Neville said thansk to a bad case of flatulence via his lungs, we're not talking about a liar. Its called a Lyra. An instrument much like a tiny harp, so magically powerful, that when Orpheus played it for the gods, they were literally moved to the ends of creation and all of the heavens," Mrs. Trufflebury explained to them.

"Many cultures throughout the world have used constellations to group stars together as part of the most recognized symbols associated with their culture and mythos, and this has been the case with nearly every culture throughout the world. So, the Lyra is just one example of how astronomy was intrinsically a part of early mythology and culture, as the ability to keep track of the stars and planets was connected to the belief that one could use the motion of the heavens to predict the future," she continued as they made their way towards the bus.


"They could foretell of a good growing season or a bad year for crops. Astronomy is one of the first sciences, and has played a very big part with the science of history, allowing us to connect records of history that coincided with astronomical phenomenon such as supernovae and eclipses that we know occurred thanks to the ephemeral record," they arrived just outside of the bus and they stopped as she continued her lecture.

"When I look up in the sky, I find it amazing that one of the things we have in common with those same people from thousands or even hundreds of years ago, is that we all look up and see familiar stellar bodies. Like Venus, the morning star. Like Polaris, the north star, though it wasn't always Polaris you know. At one time twelve thousand years ago, Vega was the Earth's north star, and in the year 13762, it will again be the north star, replacing Polaris as the guiding star of the north pole," she smiled as she continued, while her husband and the bus driver opened the boot and withdrew the containers holding their drinks and snacks.


"Your ancestors looked up and saw many of the same bodies in the night sky that we do now, so that's something that you have in common with them. Each and every one of them that looked and admired the heavens," Mrs. Trufflebury looked to the progress her husband and the bus driver had made.


"Oh perfect honey. Thank you so much," she said to her husband. 


"We'll take a fifteen minute break in the field, where we can enjoy these snacks we've brought with us, before we call it a night and get you all back to the school," Mrs. Trufflebury gathered the students and they returned to the bus, from where they grabbed a pair of coolers and pack full of the snack food they're brought with them.


Mila lay on her back beside Shaela, who lay beside Wes. A short distance away, Nelony and Neville lay beside each other, snuggled up close but keeping their attention to the stars.


"Its funny, when I heard that name... Lyra, I couldn't help but think about it being someone's name..." Mila explained to Shaela and Wes.


"You mean at school?" asked Wes.


"No. Not like a person we actually know, personally... like she's somewhere else..." Mila contemplated her memories as they their faces were lit by the night and the stars above.


"...like in the sky... the stars..." Shaela tuned in to her stream of consciousness.


"Yes... exactly! And with long flowing hair, like the Milky Way!" Mila's artistic side admired the blur of stars above, appearing like the folds of gold and platinum hair of some immense nymph.


"What's she doing up there?" asked Wes, very interested in their mutual hallucination.


"She's holding something. Holding onto it. Like a baby..." Shaela looked over to Mila, and then to Wes, who blushed, cautious of looking to her for he'd be far too tempted to kiss her.


"She's holding the Earth. Protectively. Nurturingly. That's her baby... I've seen it before..." Mila continued as Shaela and Wes inched closer to one another, until they grasped each other's hands under the night sky.


Nelony and Neville did the same, Nelony feeding Neville her snack cake, and Neville feeding her his wine gums.


Not far from them, Mrs. Trufflebury sat beside her husband, Paul, and the two of them enjoyed their snack cakes beside each other.


"It was good. This night was definitely a success," Mrs. Trufflebury smiled to Paul.


"It certainly was. I really enjoyed this. We should do something like this once again before the end of summer. Something with the students," Paul suggested.


"Good idea. Got anything in mind? We're going to be going from astronomy to physics next week. Classical mechanics and kinematics," Mrs. Trufflebury explained to him.


"Why not bring them to play Croquet... or even Golf?"  suggested Paul.


"Excellent! Or we could go play Snooker! Lets look into this over the weekend. Sunday morning during our tea...?" asked Mrs. Trufflebury.


"That's an appointment honey," Paul's pinky caught hers and they remained pinky-locked for the remainder of their break.


Memories, Missives And Missions


Glynis had been having a difficult time sleeping, every night since their encounter with the girl with the pug puppy in her purse and the group of friends that had accompanied the girl, and she didn't know why.


Every day since they'd had that encounter, Gallea had been full of energy, and had even several times, taken her for a walk around the nearby lake, with which Gallea had acquired a sudden fascination.


Glynis during that time often had to act as if she wasn't making such good progress, but the truth was that since Gallea had become a part of her life, the symptoms of her Muscular Dystrophy and its ill effects upon her musculature had diminished significantly, and yet she wasn't sure of whether she should feel good about that fact, or guilty for it seeing as she'd not yet told her parents about her energetic and spirited copilot.


On the second day since having met her new friend, Glynis had even gone for such an excursion before Sally (their hired caregiver) had a chance to intervene on Glynis' plans. She'd been stopped about half way around the lake by a Constable on foot who'd been notified that she was missing.


The Constable accompanied Glynis back to their family home and when Sally saw that Glynis was safe, they thanked the Constable and after sending him on his way, a family meeting ensued on that same morning. 


By the afternoon, her parents, had taken her for an emergency evaluation of her condition on the grounds of her immense improvement. After running an hour's worth of tests, the Doctors at the center determined that Glynis' condition and muscle atrophy had greatly diminished and that she was rated according to the North Star Ambulatory System as having a mobility of 1 (on a scale of 0 to 2) for 14 of the 17 activities evaluated during such a test. Essentially, over the course of the four months since her last evaluation, she'd improved enough to achieve unsupervised outtings, absent of the usual required presence of a caregiver. Sally would however remain under their family's employ for the time being, but have her hours of presence reduced from a full day, to a half a day in the morning, leaving Glynis free to pursue unsupervised outtings. 


All of this of course was thanks to the secret presence of Gallea. What she did not know however, was that Gallea since having encountered the girl and her pug, had undergone changes to her own being.


On the same night that followed the day of Glynis' tests at the medical center, Gallea had once Glynis was asleep, disappeared into the area surrounding the city. The very same places with which she was familiar.


She sat on the boundary wall of a roundabout, invisible to the rest of London and the night that surrounded her, as she recalled a distant memory. Whose memory it was, she was unsure of for it included people she'd never seen with Glynis, and even involved her operating of a motor vehicle for one such person.


She was tall, in an imposing and almost amazonian way. Six feet tall at least, and with long golden hair and streamed down from her head and onto the shoulders of her body suit, flowing more like a waterfall than in strands. Her body suit was made of some kind of high-tech material and clung tightly to her body, though not in a revealing way so much as utilitarian. It was however quite appealing in an artistic sense as much so as it was fashionable.


Her hands were on the wheel of this car, a rather posh Bentley which drove like a dream, though in all honesty she could not remember ever having driven any other vehicle or model.


There was a man seated in the back who was somehow familiar to her. He was older than her own form, though she could not tell for certain for her own sense of temporality was still absent. He wore a black hat with a flat rim, and a black petty coat atop of his shirt and tie.


He sat quietly, the shadows of the back seat and roof keeping his face hidden from her as she peered at him through the rearview mirror.


"You know what we must do my dear, don't you?" asked the man of her, his face still hidden.


"In all honesty, I can't recall who you are, or even who I was," she responded to him honestly, as her memory had not included any details of her previous history beyond Glynis' body.


"You need not concern yourself with yourself. We are only concerned with two things my dear. Getting the girl and getting the dog. You do remember this place, don't you?" he asked her as their Bentley rounded the inner ring of the roundabout.


She suddenly recalled speeding around a corner with a bus in hot pursuit of their vehicle. A woman with shoulder length blond hair in a long black trench coat clung to its side, as the bus careened towards the outside of its sharp turn, nearly tipping over onto pedestrians on the nearby sidewalk.


The blonde haired woman in the trench coat, in a sudden feat of strength and acrobatics, poised herself perpendicular to the sidewalk extending out from the side of the bus. She then ran along a brick wall on the other side of the walkway, keeping the bus from tipping over onto the pedestrians or ploughing into the sidewalk and through them.


The woman Gallea saw seemed familiar to her. She recalled the blonde haired girl next to the Japanese girl with the pug, and weighed as to whether they might be one and the same.


"Nel... Nelony...?" Gallea mouthed the name as she journied through her memory.


"That name means nothing! It is only the girl and her dog that we are concerned with!" the man asserted to her aggressively, the shadows and darkness in the backseat seemingly spreading as his temper flared.


Gallea became so fixated on the rearview mirror and the man's sudden rage that she lost control of the car. The car skidded through the roundabout and out across a barrier and onto the nearest exit, knocking another car off of the road.


She then turned her attention to the front of the car as a tremendous flock of birds impacted the windshield. The sounds of their thudding bodies colliding with the layered glass was constant and unnerving as another woman floated down from air amidst the birds, and attempted to pierce the windshield with her booted feet.


For moment, between the feathers and bodies of birds, Gallea caught glimpse of another blonde haired woman. Her face was older, that of an adult and one nearly into her mid-thirties. She wore a beige long coat and an earthy green shirt and pants beneath it. Her hair was longer than shoulder length, and streaked with dashes of platinum and auburn brown, appearing almost like she were a clerk at a health food store, or the modern version of a hippy. She could have in fact as easily been wearing paisley, though Gallea assumed that interpretation of her memory and recall to be as such as a result of the Hitchcockian presence of birds.


She became so terrified during the memory that she tensed, and her foot extended onto the brakes of the Bentley. The car skidded sideways, colliding with the brick wall alongside of the road, sending the woman and her birds into the wall. All of those who collided, slid down its surface and did not get up.


Gallea awoke with a fright, once again looking out through Glynis' eyes as she finished her evening dinner.


"You're back?" Glynis could feel Gallea's presence once again.


"I am? Oh. I am," Gallea responded, now very confused by her experience and the flood of recent memories by which she'd been bombarded.


"You'll be happy to know that I managed a short walk today. To the grocery store and back, all by myself and even with a bag of vegetables!" Glynis said proudly as she put her utensils across her empty plate.


"I didn't know that I was gone that long..." Gallea once again seemed confused.


"Well, thankfully I made good progress because of you, but I'm thankful that I didn't have to rely on you all the same," Glynis responded, carefully getting up from the table and sliding her plate onto her forearm, balancing it as she took it over to the open dishwasher.


"I can help you with that," Gallea offered.


"No. Please? I want to do this for myself. I'm so grateful that you helped me to get this far, but please let me do this? For me?" Glynis stopped, the plate and utensils balancing precariously on her forearm.


"Alright, but I'm taking you for a walk tonight. An evening stroll, just you and I. Alright?" asked Gallea as Glynis resumed her goal of loading the dishwasher with her dishes and of her own effort and motor control.



The Walk Into Darkness



The sun had already long been down by the time that Glynis had left her home. She'd taken with her a special belt mounted walking light, which clung to her hips and remained relatively stationary as she walked, mostly without the assistance of the cane thanks to Gallea's help.


At her relatively quick pace, they exited her parents' home community and were on their way south along the road towards the Shepperton Open Water Swim.


"I really like it that you've taken such an interest in walking recently. I never got out much in this direction before. Its nice," Glynis said to Gallea, whose senses were focused on the road ahead as they turned east.


"This little lake is really quite picturesque. Very quaint all considered," Gallea responded as they continued along the darkened road, their ears already raw with the sound of crickets.


"Look at this home... Its absolutely gorgeous!" Glynis said as they passed a line of trees that had shrouded the property from the west.


As they passed by the front yard, the full breadth of the entryway into the house came into vision.


"That's a big one. I bet you could have some fun in there!" Gallea remarked as they passed the home, the motion sensing lights coming on as they rounded the end of the walkway.


In the backyard, which sat closest to the lake, they could hear the sound of squeaky barking, as if a dog had gotten itself caught in its leash.


"Did you hear that?" asked Glynis of Gallea.


"That sounded like a dog in need of help!" Gallea remarked, already playing into the secretive plan enacted by the man from her previous memories.


Glynis stopped, turned around and began walking back towards the front walkway when she spotted a latched wooden gate  near the side of the house allowing access into the back yard and dock areas.


"The ground looks a little awkward here... could you please...?" asked Glynis nervously as she spied a  landscaping work area around the side of the house that was half-way finished.


A few deep holes and some piles of gravel screening pocked the pathway into the back, worrying Glynis as they ventured forth.


Gallea positioned her essence within Glynis in such a way so as to reinforce her strength and to give her added agility. Glynis immediately felt the difference, her muscles suddenly ceased their nearly constant aching atrophy and became solid and unyielding.


"That's quite the difference..." Glynis remarked, not even needing the cane as she easily navigated the rough surface that would have posed difficulty even for those not struggling with her same health challenges.


Out of interest and amusement, she climbed the tallest of the piles of gravel screening, and slid down the other side, miraculously without stumbling or falling over.


"Easy there..." Gallea elicited out of concern.


"Sorry, but that was fun. I've never done that before..." Glynis responded with a big smile on her face.


When they rounded the corner of the house and found the backyard gate, they once again heard the anguished barking of a little puppy, not fifteen feet from where Glynis now stood. She unlatched the gate and began making her way around to where she heard the puppy.


Her hip light caught sight of the small pug, whose tail began waving frantically as he tried to touch down with his front paws, as he balanced precariously on his back paws. Glynis immediately saw that the dog's leash, a rather long run of line, had become tangled in the back deck's rail, and had basically left the poor pup without slack enough so that it could stand on all four paws. It instead had been forced to stand on two for the last hour, though the leash wasn't wrapped around the puppy's neck, but rather his chubby little abdomen.


"Oh, thank goodness. The owner used a body leash, so he should be alright..." Glynis leaned down and began untangling the puppy's leash until eventually she found the end. 


When she had, she quickly wrapped it up in her arms and led the dog down to the dock, where the puppy quickly relieved himself (both number one and two) and then tried to pull Glynis down to the nearby sandy shore of the tiny beach.


"Careful. I know I can swim, but I'm not certain if I'll be able to swim for you..." Gallea warned Glynis, who nodded affirmatively in acknowledgement.


"As much as I'd love nothing more than to try it, I'll leave that one on my bucket list for another day," Glynis replied jokingly as she urged the puppy back up towards the deck to where she'd seen both a dish full of food, and a water dish nearby.


As she got close to the back sliding door, another motion sensing light came on, this time illuminating the home's rear entryway into the kitchen and lavish dining room area.


Glynis examined it with intense interest, admiring the polished granite floors and the pastel walls, each  section of which presented a work of art, employing immense use of the golden ratio for their placement, and asymmetry for their esthetic.


"This is... absolutely remarkable. Who could live here at this place?" asked Glynis when the light from a vehicle that had entered the lake road from the south illuminated the deck upon which they were standing as the school bus drove up and towards the front entryway, stopping just outside.


"Looks like we're going to find out first hand..." Gallea remarked, keeping a close eye on the puppy.


Glynis instead of running for the front, decided to take a seat on one of the chairs on the back deck. The puppy upon her doing so leapt up and onto her lap, walking in circles several times as he attempted to make a bed for himself before flopping down onto his chomps and watching the interior of the house from her lap. His eyes flicked back and forth between the kitchen (whose lights had just come on), and Glynis, who watched calmly as the house's owner, accompanied by a slew of others arrived at the sliding door.


A pretty Japanese lady stepped out onto the back deck through the sliding doors, leaving it open for her friends, all of whom followed.


"Is everything alright?" asked Mila, looking to the thin blonde haired girl who now sat on a chair upon her deck.


Happiu~isuka's tail began waving, though he made little effort to get up after having spent that time trying to make it comfortable, not to mention his exhaustion from having spent an hour balancing on his back paws.


"I'm Glynis. Your puppy here? I heard him barking as if he needed help, so I came around the side of the house and found him tangled up in his leash. I hope that you don't mind?" asked Glynis of Mila, as Wes and Shaela looked around to make sure there was nobody else hidden in the yard.


"This is the only house on this stretch of road. What were you even doing here?" asked Nelony defensively as Neville stepped out from the kitchen, shoving another snack cake into his gullet.


"I'm sorry if I scared..." Glynis began responded, when Mila noticed the cane leaning against the back railing of the deck.


"Is that yours?" asked Mila, pointing to the cane.


"I'm sorry. Yes it is. I don't often walk this far but I've had a few good days recently..." Glynis explained to Mila.


"Well thank you for rescuing my little friend here. He certainly seems to be very grateful, if not a little tired I imagine?" Mila smiled as she leaned over to smother Happiu~isuka in attention, if not robbing him of every last shred of his dignity in front of their new house guest.


"Is everything alright Mila?" asked Mrs. Trufflebury, her husband Paul just behind her as she peered out onto the back deck from the sliding kitchen doors.


"Thank you so much for a wonderful evening Mrs. Trufflebury. I think we're alright here. My puppy just had a little tangle issue, but someone from the community nearby managed to rescue him..." Mila assured her teacher.


"Alright. Does anyone else need to be dropped off?" asked Mrs. Trufflebury of the crowd.


"We'll be staying here tonight if its all the same?" Neville suggested, looking to Nelony invitingly and then to Mila.


"There's more than enough room. You're all welcome to if you'd like," Mila invited them.


"I'm game for that," Wes responded.


"Me too. We could tell some ghost stories out here by the dock..." Shaela savoured the opportunity.


 "Alright. We're going to take the rest of the students home. We'll see you next week then. Monday at 11 in the AM. Don't forget..." Mrs Trufflebury left with Paul, and the two of them got on board the bus, which then drove off with the six remaining students into the night.


Glynis began her attempt to get up, first grabbing her cane and then trying to coax Happiu~isuka from her lap. When the dog refused to move, Mila took notice and began laughing.


"The invite applies to you as well," Mila offered.


"Sure... I'd love to stay. I'm Glynis by the way," Glynis held out her hand, though Mila nodded a few times and bowed for her.


"I'm Mila. These are my friends Shaela, Nelony, Neville and that upstanding fellow there is Wes. Everyone, meet Glynis," Mila introduced her to them and vice versa.


"So what's the cane for? A fashion statement or something?" asked Neville, checking it out for himself.


"Becker MS, actually..." Glynis responded, causing Neville to nearly fall over as he leaned onto the cane in jest.


"I'm so sorry... And just when I was almost cured... I didn't mean that either...!" Neville responded awkardly, Nelony of all people suddenly jumping in to save him.


"Don't mind him. He has a horrible case of foot-in-mouth disease. Potentially progressing into a second stage, if he keeps it up, at which point it becomes a case of girlfriend-absentia," Nelony joked with Glynis, who laughed at both of their antics and her attempt at saving face for her boyfriend.


"Keep in mind that's coming from a woman who holds regular conversations with birds," Neville responded in his own defense.


"Alright. If you're staying, I've got to get to being a good host. I've got a full fridge and cupboards. Some drinks too if you're of age and health?" Mila asked her guests as she stepped into the kitchen, waiting near the sliding doors for their orders.


"I'm going to help her, because I already know she's going to prepare a platter. I'd rather spend my time and company with our host as well, rather than have her waiting on us all the time," Shaela offered, stepping into the kitchen with Mila.


"Surprise us!" Wes suggested.


"I love surprises!" Nelony responded.


"Me too!" Glynis smiled, this being the first night in her life that she'd been invited by friends as a guest to an emerging dinner party.


"This sounds fun!" Gallea added, though nobody except Glynis could hear her.


"Alright. Take a seat and make yourselves at home, and we'll have this party started in no time. I take it you're alright for a drink too Glynis? Any medication issues or risks?" asked Mila of she opened her fridge.


"I should be alright for a few. I haven't taken any thing for the last couple of days. I've had a sudden bout of good health actually. Good timing too, seeing as I've never been out, especially to anything with friends or a party or anything like that," Glynis responded.


"We're honoured that we could be your first," Wes smiled to Glynis as Shaela arrived with the first tray of their drinks.


"Oh these look good! Did you make these little umbrellas Mila?" asked Nelony in reference to the little rice paper umbrellas that Mila and Shaela had adorned a strawberry with atop of the daquiris they'd made for the women.


"They're part of a kit actually. They're cute, aren't they?" Mila responded from the kitchen as she began organizing the food on the nearby island counter.


A moment later and Shaela brought out a pair of pint glasses, one each for Wes and Neville. They contained expertly poured Sapporo with a shot of Rose's Lime Cordial.


Glynis took a sip from her drink, and then quickly sat up and pulled her phone from her pants pocket, rousing Happiu~isuka from his slumber upon his smelling their drinks and the food whose aroma had traveled through the kitchen doors out onto the deck.


"Hi Mum? I'm alright! Really. I must met some friends from around the corner. You know the big home over by the Shepperton Open Swim? Yes... Her name is Mila. Well, she and her friends invited me to stay for a dinner party... Alright. If I need anything, I'll give you call. Thanks Mum, Dad. Love you both," Glynis finished her conversation and then pocketed her phone just as Happiu~isuka jumped down from her lap and made his way over to the kitchen doors.


"So Mila, what do you do?" asked Glynis of her, getting to her feet and walking only slightly with the help of her cane.


"I'm a visual artist. Mostly painting, but I do sculpting as well. If you give me a bit, I'll give you a tour,"  Mila offered as she prepared their food.


"I'm taking an arts program myself, at the medical center?" Glynis revealed to Mila.


"That's wonderful! I didn't even realize they taught there. What's your favourite style?" asked Mila of Glynis.


"I really love doing pastel work. It seems to fit with the limited motion of my fingers. I tend to use the heel and cuff of my left hand. Can't really do detail, but I've learned some amazing techniques for making what I call faded detail," Glynis told Mila, taking a sip from her daquiri.


"Oh, that's good!" Gallea responded to the sudden sensation.


"Very good!" Glynis added aloud, to which Mila smiled as Shaela cut a line of asparagus beside her.


"She's clinically cheerful. I'm not," Shaela looked at Glynis with an edgy smile, causing Glynis to giggle slightly.


"You're into industrial dance or something?" asked Glynis, now intrigued by her style.


"Gothic industrial. Legacy and modern. Siouxie. The Damned. Belfegore. Nitzer Eb. Love and Rockets. Cabaret Voltaire..." Shaela dropped a few names.


"Never heard of them..." Glynis responded.


"Neither have we..." Nelony added sarcastically from the table on the deck.


"Are you kidding me? They're so cuff! You've got to hear them..." Wes spoke up in their defense, getting up from his chair and making his way over to Mila's stereo.


He cued up one of Shaela's playlists over Mila's Mac Air Drive, and hit play.


...


Out of doors on the other side of the house and down the street from the front walkway, a car pulled up and came to a stop on the side of the road. The driver engaged the parking break and turned off the engine, taking her keys with her as she stepped out.


"We're only going to be here for a short time?" Susan asked of her guest.


"No. We're going to be here for a good time. We need that girl and that dog, and I've already got an insider working on it," Susan's guest responded to her brashly.


"And if I don't go along with your plan?" asked Susan.


"Then they'll find your car here by the side of the road a few days from now, but no body, as you'll have been completely devoured by my friends by that point. You remember the ones. The creepy crawly ones? Shadowy? Non-corporeal. Carnivores from an alternate plane?" she reminded Susan of what had happened in the bathroom of the city buildings only a few days earlier.


"You can use those things to frighten me, but you're taking on a handful of people. Youth from what you explained. How can you, who has no body whatsoever, rely upon me, who has no skill useful for what you're seeking of  me?" asked Susan, suddenly realizing that logistically speaking, her body guest was in way over her head.


"You're my body. I'm your mind. Just follow my lead and you'll find that you have abilities beyond your wildest imagination..." Mianamor explained to Susan from inside of her body.


"Lets get this over with," Susan Gardener stepped away from her vehicle and along the side of the road in her heels, as she approached the front walkway of Mila's house.


"The place is lit like a strip mall! You expect us to sneak in there?" asked Susan.


"No," Mianamor used Susan's body to weave the air around them, drawing elusive fibers of energy from the air and folding them over and onto each other perpetually until they began to resemble shadows.


She then forced them downwards, streaming from her fingertips into the ground, where they crept until they reached a nearby utility pole. The stands of darkness climbed the pole upon reaching the wires, spread throughout the community. A few seconds later and the power grid for the entire quadrant of south west London was blackened and without power.


...


As Wes went to return to his seat, the lights and music suddenly stopped, and the darkness of night hit them like a wall.


In the kitchen, a red light suddenly flickered on, and Mila looked to a closed cabinet built into the wall.


"Don't panic. Just a power outtage. Wes? Can you check out my backup here?" asked Mila of Wes, whose technical skills surpassed her own.


"Sure. You've got a backup?" asked Wes, shocked by the prospect.


"The house came with its own generator, so rather than have it removed, I simply had it upgraded, but I've never used it. That's where a handy fellow like you comes in," Mila smiled at him through the red light, and Shaela kissed his cheek softly as he passed them both on his way to the cabinet.


Meanwhile, Nelony had by that time found her way to Glynis, who stood motionless in order to avert any disaster that might befall her should she attempt to walk without seeing anything.


"I've got you love," Nelony grabbed her hand, and guided her back to where Neville was seated and from there, found her seat and tucked her into it.


Outside, another group of red lights came on.


"Found the backup lights. Still trying to get the generator to work..." Wes navigated the generator's console via the four cursor keys.


He found a portion of the system menu, and activated the generator. The kitchen lights came on, as did the appliances, and out back, the speakers once again came to life:





To be continued...


I'm Brian Joseph Johns, the writer of all of this content. I'm European Canadian (writing from 200 Sherbourne Street Suite 701, Toronto, Ontario, Canada) and my own love interest is Southeast Asian (but not Filipino with all due respect). I am heterosexual but I support LGBTQ2 rights, if they support my rights and my identity. If not, then look to someone else to protect your rights and the same goes for anyone else. 

To my readers and those who appreciate my effort, thank you and have a great day! I hope I was able to in some small way inspire you to contemplate or consider the world in a different way, either complimentary to your own views, or even challenging them on occasion. 

Thank you for reading my writing.


Brian Joseph Johns
https://www.shhhhdigital.com
https://www.shhhhdigital.ca

Credits and attribution:


Special Thanks To Rocket Fuel Lakeshore Blvd West, perhaps the best place in history to get a coffee, circa 2001-2004. Miss you all very much.

Artwork: Amy Wong, Wendy Pusey, Ghastly, Birdman, Brian Joseph Johns, Daz3D, Unreal Engine...

Tools: Daz3D, Corel Painter, Adobe Photoshop, Lightwave 3D, Blender, Stable Diffusion (Easy Diffusion distribution), InstantID, Sadtalker, Google Colaboratory, Microsoft Copilot (Windows 11), Hitfilm, PhotoPea (a great web based Photoshop stand-in if you're on a low budget or in a pinch), Borderline Obsession...


Deepai.org Various AI based on demand artwork and images via text prompt or image enhancement


DeepSeek AI for suggestions on exercises to improve aspects of describing scene and settings with a more sensory focused grammar.

InstantID by: Wang, Qixun and Bai, Xu and Wang, Haofan and Qin, Zekui and Chen, Anthony. Research Paper Title: InstantID - Zero-shot Identity-Preserving Generation in Seconds.

Sadtalker by: Zhang, Wenxuan and Cun, Xiaodong and Wang, Xuan and Zhang, Yong and Shen, Xi and Guo, Yu and Shan, Ying and Wang, Fei.
Research Paper Title: SadTalker: Learning Realistic 3D Motion Coefficients for Stylized Audio-Driven Single Image Talking Face Animation.

Gratitude: Our Mentors, Senseis, Sifus, Sebomnims, lifetime inspirations, family, friends, the Nomads (ask Stanton about that one), the Music, the Movies, the Theatre, the Arts, ASMR, (both YouTube and Bilibili and the many other creators on those platforms), the Gaming and Developer communities and of course, the audience.

Martial Arts (in the words of real experts and at least one comedian): https://brucelee.com (home of the real Dragon and an entire family of inspirations), http://iwco.online International Wing Chun Organization (International presence of a very scalable intensity martial art, protected and developed by Shaolin Nun Ng Mui) and the alma mater of Jinn Hua's own specialized variation thereof, https://iogkf.com International Okinawan Goju-Ryu Karatedo Federation (even Hanshi had his teachers), https://itftkd.sport International Taekwondo Federation (Here there be Taegers), https://tangsoodoworld.com Tang Soo Do World (the path of Grandmaster Chuck Norris), https://www.aikido-international.org International Aikido Federation (how else would Navy Chef Steven Seagal liberate a Nimitz Class Aircraft Carrier from a team of hijackers?), https://www.stqitoronto.com Shaolin Temple Quanfa Institute (The City Of Toronto's own Shaolin Temple), https://www.enterthedojoshow.com Master Ken's Ameri-Te-Do presence (If we can't laugh at ourselves, then we can at least laugh the loudest at others, and other Zen)

Magic (performance, illusion and perhaps the real thing): Magic Week Archive (I'm currently growing this section so stay tuned)

Special thanks to Aitrepreneur, Mickmumpitz, Hugging Face and the YouTube educational content producers, including those catering to the AI content production pipeline and of course AlphaSignal.

Shi Heng Yi Shaolin Training For Self Mastery 
A reknowned Sifu under whose tutelage you can study the theory and practical applications of the Shaolin Arts for health, physical and mental wellbeing in every day life

Shi Heng Yi Shaolin Training For Self Mastery 
A reknowned Sifu under whose tutelage you can study the theory and practical applications of the Shaolin Arts for health, physical and mental wellbeing in every day life

Jesse Enkamp: Karate Nerd
Jesse, a reknowned Sensei who runs his own dojo, explores the world of Martial Arts, traveling to many exotic locations to meet practitioners of a variety of different arts

Sensei Rokas: Martial Arts Journey
A reknowned Sensei of Aikido who in seeking to understand the roots of Aikido and its applications, seeks to stress test its effectiveness in a number of real world situations while studying its history

Seamus O'Dowd
An extensive growing archive Katas, Techniques and Waza (mostly Shotokan)

Iaido: Train For Katana Mastery Like Samurai 
The original weapons focused curriculum under which Samurai became masters of their art

Tapp Brothers Exercise For Better Motion 
Extensive courses for calisthenics and body strength, stamina and flexibility

Special thanks to Canva for inspiring other creators and giving them the tools

Special thanks to Captain Crunch and his wonderful sister!

Special thanks to Bandcamp for giving indie music artists a home under one roof

Something to give you perspective: The very first teacher had no formal education, didn't graduate and was self taught, but only because they had no other choice. We do.

This content is entirely produced in Toronto, Ontario, Canada at 200 Sherbourne Street Suite 701 under the Shhhh! Digital Media banner.

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