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Thursday, January 29, 2026

Shhhh! Digital Media Presents... The Butterfly Dragon: Heroes of our Own Reimagined: Episode 9 - The Fallen and the Risen (Started Wednesday January 29, 2026 17:00 EST)







Chapters

  1. Convergence (Finished January 28, 2026)
  2. Manufactory (Started January 29, 2026 13:00 EST)

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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 Presents:

The Butterfly Dragon - Heroes of our Own: Reimagined

by Brian Joseph Johns

Episode 9: The Fallen and the Risen

Manufactory

6 Years Ago
Toronto, Ontario
Canada


Alicia slipped in the door of her studio apartment, then pocketing her keys and quickly kicking off her shoes. After hanging up her blazer in the closet she made her way to the kitchen and placed the fixings for her salad in the fridge, by which time Mr. Frisker had jumped up onto the island countertop and Barker was running in circles around it once again, in some kind of manic display of happiness.


"My little twins are are hungry again?" Mr. Frisker rubbed the side of his face against her hand, while Barker stopped and barked once enthusiastically.


Alicia retrieved their cans of food from the cupboard and served them each a generous serving, which once again led to a calm silence in the apartment, with the exception of the eager sounds of their eating.


She then flicked on the large screen television after which she made her way to the second floor (with one leap), bounding the upper railing and landing softly on the other side.


She then stripped off her clothing, one garment at a time and eyed herself carefully in the mirror.


"Good. Nothing off about my body considering this is the ninth week since my having taken the Series Y formula, and over that time I've certainly put my new body through the rigors of extensive testing... in a matter of speaking," Alicia noted that her body and form were still as remarkable as the day she'd taken the formula.


Alicia then stepped into the bathroom, and from there, into the shower, where she washed the stresses and worries of her day down the drain.


"...more and more Torontonians have been reporting sightings of the mysterious masked woman in the trench coat. Just last week she was seen scaling 22 Front Street West, where she quickly disappeared from sight before onlookers could get a picture of her. Here's more from independent video journalist, Janice Yu," the anchor of CityTV Evening Edition announced as Alicia threw the weight of the day off of her shoulders in the shower.


"Last week, Toronto residents Ellen and Denny Smith were on their way to a local restaurant on Front Street when they spotted a woman in a long black trench coat scaling the side of 22 Front Street West: 'She was already halfway up the side wall when my wife and I spotted her. She seemed to be using various outcroppings, leaping up the wall in a series of leaps and bounds before she made it to the roof and disappeared,'" Janice, an attractive and assertive woman reported to her viewers.


"This is the fifth such sighting over the course of the last six months, which has some Toronto residents spooked. I'm here live with Police Detective Edward Farnham about these reports. Detective Farnham, what do you have to say about what these people are witnessing?: 'We're skeptical about these reports until we see some real evidence, though I should point out that if there are thrill seekers using Toronto buildings for publicity stunts or just seeking thrills, that you could end up seriously injured or even killed, not to mention that you might be putting others' lives at risk. Especially those who might try to copy you. There are proper channels one must go through to legally perform such displays, much the same as movie shoots must book with the city when they're shooting on city street locations,'" Detective Farnham responded to Janice's question.


"Detective, Is the Toronto Police Service investigating these reports?" to which Detective Farnham was pictured answering: "No. At this current time we have no investigation regarding these reports, though we have a number of patrol officers who are aware of the situation and are keeping an eye out just to make sure that nobody gets hurt," Detective Farnham replied.


"There you have it from Detective Farnham. As far as the mysterious lady is concerned, we'll just have to watch and wait until she reveals herself again. This is Janice Yu reporting courtesy of CityTV Evening Edition," Janice smiled for the camera before the scene switched the anchor desk.


"In other news, the warehousing and manufacturing sector has taken a hit in recent times, with a series of attacks by vandals against a number of such operations, leaving Toronto businesses questioning whether its safe to operate in the city. CityTV correspondent Nelson Ryder reports.


"Across the GTA, and out as far as Scarborough and Mississauga, Toronto is seeing elevated vandalism targeting warehousing and manufacturing sites, including a number of break-ins costing local businesses hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars thus far. I spoke with local real estate developer Elsen Wendell earlier today on the issue: 'We're seeing a rise in vandalism at a number of sites throughout the GTA, many of which have been my personal customers though I'd like to remind residents and business owners that these situations are isolated in nature and that the city of Toronto is still very much one of the safest places in the world to operate a business,'" Elsen, a well dressed tall man in his late forties with greying hair spoke to the reporter.


...


Near 22 Front Street West, Detective Farnham approached Janice as she and her videographer prepped their equipment for the return to the studio.


"I take it we're done here?" asked Farnham of Janice.


"Oh? Yes. We're finished. Thank you so much for your remarks about the situation. I'll see you again sometime I'm sure," Janice smiled at Farnham, who extended his hand.


"It was a pleasure," Farnham smiled and turned to return to his car, where his partner was standing, leaning against the side door.


"Old man on TV again? They need young man like me!" Somboon, a digital forensic specialist said to Farnham as he approached the car.


"That's national television, not Riverdale bozo," Farnham said to Somboon as he walked around the car to the driver's seat.


"Hey, watch it old man. I have family in Riverdale you know?" Somboon responded, opening the passenger door and getting in at the same time as Farnham.


"Not the district, I meant the television show, although when I was a kid, it was called Archie. You know. A lot of young people with hip hair cuts and all.  I guess you'd call it a yoap opera," Farnham started the car.


"A what?" Somboon confirmed.


"A yoap opera. A youth soap opera," Farnham carefully pulled the car out into traffic.


"I don't know where you are old man. Delerius maybe? Premature retirement might be a good idea. So what'd they ask you?" asked Somboon.


"They asked me about the trench coat woman... again..." Farnham told Somboon, seemingly dissatisfied.


"What did you tell them?" asked Somboon, really pressing it with his partner.


"What they're allowed to know," Farnham replied, quickly losing his patience with his partner.


"So you left out the part about how she's connected with the recent spate of vandalism?" Somboon continued pressing it.


"...and the part about how every time we arrive on the scene, there's just a bunch of unconscious thugs, who get cycled through the system faster than we can lock them up," Farnham looked to Somboon and smiled.


"We need stronger locks for them," Somboon replied with his own smile.


"We need better legal tools for the prosecutor in the forms of statutes and laws, and we need stiffer sentences and a better grip on parole. We need policy changes, not punishment hardware," Farnham responded.


"Yeah, whatever. Sometimes you think too much when you should act old man. So where to now?" asked Somboon, somewhat less abrasively.


"We're checking out a manufactory in the downtown towards Commissioner Street. I got a tip that Walton Norler's going to be there. Part of his new Business Edict, giving a tour of a new facility and building confidence amongst investors," Farnham told Somboon.


"Are we invited?" Somboon looked to Farnham, a humourously inquisitive look on his face.


"No. We're going as a safety measure. I'd love to catch the vandals during the commission of their crime," Farnham replied.


"So we're conducting a stakeout," Somboon went through the utility box in the dash and retrieved his thermal imaging camera.


"Yes, but off of the books. Besides, weren't you the one last week who was saying that we need more action?" Farnham asked Somboon as they turned left onto Commissioner's Street.


"I meant with the ladies! Not with the guns!" Somboon replied with a smile on his face and a wink to Farnham, telling his partner that he was only joking.


...


Alicia had by that time finished buckling the last clip on her boots, and had rolled up her black trench coat and her domino mask into a tiny bag which she slung over her shoulder as Mr. Frisker and Barker once again came running over to her.


"Alright. Mommy's got to go out for a bit and see if this Mr. Norler is just another one of the bad guys or if he's the real deal. You two make sure that you behave now," Alicia said to them as they watched her slip over to the door to the fire escape. She opened it and stepped out into the night.


A few minutes later and she'd flagged a taxi to drop her off at Lakeshore Boulevard and Saulter Street. From there, she was on her own as the mysterious trench coat girl.


...


Walton Norler led a group of six men, each of them attired in three piece business suits, through the new Tynan Pharmaceuticals Manufacturing facility, he with his own business jacket slung over his shoulders and the sleeves of his button down shirt rolled up as if he was ready to jump onto the production line himself.


"These facilities are amongst the most advanced in the world, and are being prepared for the next generation of medical pharmaceuticals being developed at our research facility. We've targeted markets that have been cash cows for generations, and with out next generation of treatments, we believe that we're going achieve supremacy over a number of diseases, though I'm going to wait until the CDA has approved them I can say more. Gentlemen, you're getting in on something that is truly going to change the world as we know it. It begins with our case studies of numerous patients over the years, continues on to our research wing, and will finally be resolved here, in our manufacturing facility. From here, we'll be shipping to pharmaceutical warehousing operations all over the world, and all in line with my better business edict," Norler assured the men, as they examined the facility.


"I thought pharmaceutical lines required centrifuges and clean rooms?" asked Rodney, one of the men familiar with investments involving the production of pharmaceuticals.


"Not this one, though we do utilize centrifuges, they aren't the large clunky ones with which you're familiar. They're micro-fuges. State of the art, high speed, chaotic turbulency capable. They're grouped in rows of six, by six in height. They achieve the same results in one eighth of the time per cycle, and process twice as much input material as their larger, clunkier cousins," Norler smiled, feeling a sense of relief that he'd spent the time researching the technical details for the tour of the plant.


"As for the clean rooms? We've integrated them into the manufacturing process. At several stages along the production line, we can divert materials to a mobile clean room stage, which can be plugged in at any point along the production line, and is entirely automated, or it can be manually operated by trained staff. Most use cases will involve automation, but our staff will always include at least three clean room process trained technicians. Staff who are essential to our production line and the monitoring thereof," Norler pointed out one of the mobile clean room modules, which appeared like a translucent stand up closet with a work table, shelves and a variety of tools.


At the top of these clean room modules were a series of three automated robotic arms, each of which possessed six dual jointed fingers, capable of manipulating precision tools with the utmost delicacy.


...


MissGvious sat at the driver's seat in her Lincoln Continental, parked a few blocks from the manufacturing facility. Beside her car were two unmarked vans, each of them full of her field operators as she liked to refer to them.


In her own car, there was Stakz in the passenger seat. He was a large fellow, as tall as her without about twice as much muscle, his vein popping arms having led to his nickname. In the backseat were Wakk and RokSteddi, two more of her thugz and along with Stakz, her backup when things got hectic.


"Yo! You ready Stakz? Wakk? RokSteddi?" she asked them, grabbing her phone from the tray between the front seats.


"Ima ready as I'll ever be!" Stakz was quick to respond.


"Lets go gurl!" Wakk replied.


"You know I'm with you gurl," RokSteddi added.


She dialed the phone and a man on the other end answered it.


"MissGvious I presume? How are you tonight?" asked Torman of her.


"So we're clear on this info you told me, right?" MissGvious got right to the point.


Torman cupped his hand over the phone and turned to Valerie, who sat beside him on the sofa as they watched City on a Hill.


"Honey, I've got to go take this call elsewhere. I'll be right back," Torman leaned over close to Valerie, who wrapped her arms around him and pulled him even closer.


"I want a kiss first," Valerie demanded of him.


He leaned in closer and gave her a quick peck on the lips.


"No. I want a real kiss," Valerie insisted.


He leaned into the kiss this time, remaining fixated on her lips for as long as he could without drawing the ire of his caller. He then leaned away from her and smiled.


"I'll be right back for more of that," Torman said to her as he got up.


He left the living room and the same giant screen upon which his father used to watch movies, and headed into the kitchen, where one of his security staff stood leaning against the counter, eating the last bits of a cookie.


"Mike. I'm going to need a minute," Torman said to the personal security specialist.


"Sure thing Mr. Torman," Mike stepped away from the counter and walked out of the room and found his way to the front door, where he stepped out for a smoke.


"Yep. We're as clear as day on this. Norler's interference with the members of the board is what ultimately got your father killed. Norler's been playing us all for a very long time, but he's such a goody two shoes that he's almost untouchable," Torman explained to MissGvious.


"Ain't nobody untouchable. Especially the man who got my father done!" MissGvious said with an immeasurable pain and intensity, which left her lips as the ripest of contained anger.


"I'll believe it when I hear about it. I wish you luck, 'cause you're going to need it. He's a slippery one that one," Torman remained skeptical.


"Oh. And one more thing. You know that girl you used to go to school with? The Chinese one? The one that you really liked?" Torman said to her with a grin.


"You mean Heylyn or Helayne or whatever the heck her name wuz?" MissGvious confirmed with Torman.


"That's the one. She's connected to this whole deal that went down with your father's death. Turns out she's tampering in our affairs. Downtown. She foiled a robbery that involved one of your contacts. Samias. The guy from Montreal? Well it turns out that Helayne and her friends having exposed the corruption at her school before graduation, actually had repercussions that led the rival cartel to take out your father. Helayne's exposition of the school corruption exposed him as a  former hitman. Norler years later cut off one of their laundering operations, and after those two incidents, it was only a matter of time before they figured out the connection with your father. If you'd take care of Norler and Helayne, I think you'd be on the road to healing a wound that has for too long festered on your soul,"  Torman said to her, speaking like someone who cared about her.


"Norler? He's in that manufacturing plant right now, selling Tynan out. Helayne? She can be found at 240 Adelaide Street West. She just purchased the building and is overseeing work crews as they finish renovations. She'll be there with another girl. Monique. That's Samias' ex-girlfriend. She's  got a lot on him, and she needs to be taken out. After all, you want her as a witness against you in court now, would you?" asked Torman somewhat rhetorically.


"They'll both be done before this night's over," MissGvious assured Torman.


Torman pulled a notepad from his pocket and scratched the names of Norler, Helayne and Monique from it, drawing a thick line through each of them as he spoke.


"As long as we're clear on your info being accurate," MissGvious said to him, clarifying the facts with him one last time.


"Oh, I'm clear as can be on this. Trust me, I'm ever so clear," Torman smiled as he spoke.


"I'm going to get it done. I'll call you tomorrow, when me and my fellas might be needin' a new line of work. Maybe seeing as what I'm about to do will be helpin' you, you'll help me out too," MissGvious insisted.


"Call me tomorrow on this number," Torman smiled to her.


With that, MissGvious hung up.


Torman then left the kitchen and walked to the front door and opened it, handing his phone to Mike.


"Take this, and have the number changed immediately, though message all of my contacts except for MissGvious and her crew with the new number. Got it?" Torman explained to him.


"Sure thing boss," Mike responded, accepting the phone and pocketing it as he finished his cigarette.


Torman then returned to Valerie on the sofa and lay down with the side of his face resting against her breast.


"All finished?" asked Valerie.


"Certainly am. Just had to tie up a few loose ends," Torman smiled as he crawled up her body and found her lips once again.

...


MissGvious got out of the car first, and upon her stepping out the car, it was easy to see that she was wearing a purple skintight suit, like a gladiator or a wrestler, a pair of gauntlets, one on each wrist and even with a small cape. She affixed a mask over her eyes and wrapped her curly red and frilly hair up in a purple bandana, while the rest of her crew donned their tube masks.


...


"Somboon?" Farnham said quietly to his partner, who had leaned over against the passenger window of their concealed care and was now asleep.


Farnham leaned over the shook his partner.


Somboon awoke with a start, reaching for his service pistol.


"They pulled up a few minutes ago, with two vans. Look at that! They've got like twenty of 'em. Armed," Farnham told Somboon as he contacted the radio room.


"Why didn't you tell me?" Somboon asked Farnham in shock, as he rubbed his eyes.


"I did! You must have been asleep!" Farnham insisted as he requested backup.


"We should wait for the backup!" Somboon insisted.


"Those guys in that meeting with Walton Norler, they might not have that much time left!" Farnham explained to Somboon.


"So you're saying its better that we die too?" Somboon looked at their odds thoroughly.


"No. But the two of us, if we're careful, we might be able to delay them. Hold them off until the backup gets here," Farnham insisted, stepping out of the car and drawing his pistol.


Somboon shook his head, and grabbed both the shotguns and a box of ammo from the utility box.


"I must be crazy following you old man!" Somboon threw the shotgun at Farnham.


"If crazy is what we need to get the job done, then so be it. Just cautious and careful. When we bluff, don't give 'em an inch. Got it partner?" Farnham said firmly as he holstered his hand gun and checked the shotgun.


"I got it. Lets do it," Somboon said as he cocked the shotgun.

Manufactory


Alicia stood atop of the manufacturing building in the growing darkness of the evening, hunched over and peering through a large skylight, into the warehouse below. She could see that the lights were on but whomever was present on the production floor was beyond her direct line of vision. She concentrated until her heightened senses kicked in. She could see that the group meeting were located in another part of the manufacturing floor, about forty meters from her position.


She checked each of the panes of glass of the skylight until she found one that was slightly loose. Using her heightened strength, she managed to shimmy the glass loose, and eventually removed it from its place. She slipped through the opening onto the top shelf of a shelving unit immediately beneath her. She then replaced the glass and went about getting her bearings.


...


MissGvious watched as Stakz and Wakk pried the back door to the manufactory open with a pair of crowbars, her remaining crew of seventeen behind her, each armed with their own weapons, either melee based, or firearms. Most were packing pistols they'd procured on the black market, while others were armed with everything from knives to sledge hammers, each of them with their tube masks covering their face, and a baseball cap covering their head.


As Stakz gave his crowbar one last forceful push, the lock suddenly snapped and the door flew open before them.


MissGvious charged into the building, as Stakz and Wakk caught their breath.


"Whew! That was one tough door yo!" Stakz stood aside with Wakk as the others poured into the door.


"Yeah. I'm tinkin' maybe next time we should go in through a window," Wakk responded between breaths.


"I'm with you there bro. Lets get into it before MissGvious takes it out on our asses," Stakz said, following the last of their crew in through the door they'd just opened.


"Nobody touch a thing until I've taken out Norler! Ya hear?!!!" MissGvious ordered her crew as they fell in behind her.


...


Alicia heard the sound of the door lock breaking from the top of a shelving unit that was in the part of the manufactory where Norler and the investors were situated, though she continued watching over them and listening to their conversation.


"...and in case you're wondering, quality assurance has always been integral to our vision from the very start. Even in this state of the art production line, we've integrated modern technology that allows us to divert materials or finished products by various statistically derived factors into one of our six Q/A stations along the course of the production line. And just like the mobile clean room units, they're modular and can be relocated and plugged in to any other part of the production line, to accommodate different Q/A requirements," Norler explained to the investors as Alicia listened to from the top rack of the shelving unit.


"You see, we want to make sure that the vision of our genetic designers and researchers makes it from their minds and hearts, to the end of the production line and into the various containers that will eventually find their way to the shelves of your local pharmacist, and perhaps if that vision holds, change the lives of the people they help, for the better," Norler gestured to one of the quality assurance modules as he finished his delivery, taking a bottle of pills that had recently come off of the line and throwing it up into the air and catching it.


A tear welled up in Alicia's eye as she heard his words, and for a moment, she thought he was talking about her.


"What about the recent rise of alternative healing or naturopathic medicine? How do you intend to compete with that market?" asked on the investors.


"I've personally, under the recommendations of another board member, begun examining alternative medicine as alternate platforms to give our customers the means to augment their treatment. The first of our integrations will be a line in support of Traditional Chinese Medicine, whose treatments will be targeted at a niche market segment after extensive testing for interaction with western medicine, and make use of an international supply chain that will completement our western medicinal treatments. This is of course is all dictated by Health Canada and the rate at which they evaluate and approve such treatments," Norler added.


"What about questionable market sustaining practices? Are your treatments in these new facilities working towards the ends of suppressing symptomology, or are your researchers working towards the ends of a cure, and if so, how does that affect our overall investment? If we cure our customers, then we'll have no more customers," asked another one of the investors.


"That's not entirely true. First of all, we work towards both goals: the suppression of symptomology as a means of relief, and curative treatments so that our customers can be freed from the bondage of illness. Curative treatments involve very intense long term investments in both research and engineering, often much longer than treatments that target symptomology, not to mention that what we learn in fighting symptomology often becomes indispensable in research targeting a cure. We prioritize both, but we never circumvent curative treatments on the basis that we'll be eliminating our customer base. What we learn in curative treatment research, often applies to the treatments of other diseases as well. Both their symptomology and their cure. There are a lot of people out there who need treatments that help them cope with symptomology, and in many cases, we're still a long way from a cure. Your investment won't ever be a dead end, though in all honesty, I wish that we were in the day and age that I could say that it was, because that would mean that nobody is getting sick, and unfortunately, that's just not the case," Norler explained to the investors as the sound of something falling from one of the shelving racks in another room broke the relative silence of the factory.


"What was that?" asked one of the other investors.


"I don't know. Maybe raccoon got in here somehow?" Norler turned in the direction of the sound, and heard agitated whispering voices there from.


 "If there's anyone else in here with us, this is a private facility and we're not giving public tours at this time," Norler said as he stepped in the direction that he'd heard the clatter.


Something flew at Norler from the darkness of one of the other rooms connected to the production line. It glistened as it spanned its trajectory, just amiss of Norler. He quickly and barely just stepped out of the way as the projectile plunged into the shoulder of one of the investors.


"Dammit! I'm shot!" he yelled, looking to his shoulder and seeing a knife handle sticking out of his body, the blade fully submerged between the top of his chest and his shoulder.


Norler turned in the direction of the injured man, not realizing that another blade was speeding at his back from the same darkness.


As the second knife was about to plunge itself into his back and possible sever his spinal cord, a mysterious blonde haired woman in a domino mask and a black trench coat landed on the floor behind him, catching the knife dead in the air.


"Gotta go handsome," Alicia said as she tossed the knife to the floor under one of the big machines, then leaping up and onto the shelving racks and disappearing into the darkness.


"I never miss!" MissGvious fumed as she charged into the room directly at Norler, this time wielding a large hunting knife.


Of her crew, those with guns took cover and setup their own firing line to cover the onslaught of those with close quarter weapons.


As MissGvious closed in on Norler, screaming as she charged at him, he turned and fell over backwards trying to get away from her.


Something fast landed beside her as she was about to plunge her knife into him. Alicia caught MissGvious' arm, and twisted it behind her back, throwing her off balancing and attempting to push her to the floor.


MissGvious quickly adjusted her stance and turned her body enough so to allow herself to free her arm. She wrenched her hand away, but her knife was gone.


"Its very dangerous to run with knives young lady!" Alicia said to her as she snapped the blade in half, tossing both useless pieces away.


MissGvious didn't waste a moment and instead took her onslaught to Alicia, allowing Norler a few moments to escape to his investor group and check on their safety.


"Take 'em all down yo!" MissGvious ordered her crew as she charged at Alicia.


MissGvious threw a fast punch at Alicia, who easily dodged it, leaping over MissGvious and landing behind her.


MissGvious didn't even bother to look, but instead delivered a side kick that connected with Alicia, sending her backwards and crashing over a conveyor belt, where she landed against the start switch on that segment of the production line. The production facility hummed quietly to life and began running the program it had been assigned during the previous day's tests.


"So, you're a trained one, are you?" Alicia leaped over the conveyor belt and confronted MissGvious once again.


"I've been studying my whole life for this moment!" MissGvious continued her onslaught on Alicia as gun fire opened up around them.


"I hate to say it, but I'm still a little new at this. So just bare with me if you could?" Alicia dodged another one of MissGvious' punches, delivering a kick of her own which sent MissGvious flying across the room and into a shelving rack, and then to the floor.


"That one is going to cost you!" MissGvious got to her feet and adjusted her purple mask, then charging again at Alicia as the gunfire flew around them.


...


"Stay down and follow me! There's a steel storage room right there. It can be locked from the inside and out with a code. It'll keep us safe until the Police arrive!" Norler yelled to the investors, getting hold of the injured one and helping him in the direction of the storage room.


MissGvious caught sight of Norler again as she stood off against Alicia, and instead charged towards him, grabbing one of the steel rollers from a conveyor belt to wield as a weapon.


"You're going to die today!" MissGvious screamed at the top of her lungs as she charged at Norler, wielding the roller like a club with both hands.


Four of the investors had made it into the steel storage room, while the remaining two struggled to get there, one of them being the injured man. Norler's progress was cut short by a swift kick from MissGvious as she raised the roller in hand, ready to lay the killing blow.


When she went to bring it down upon him, she found she couldn't move it for the life of her. She turned to see Alicia holding onto it with one hand.


"The Purple Nacho Libre is being very naughty today," Alicia said to MissGvious, tossing the roller away.


"I ain't no Purple Nacho Libre. I'm the Purple Hood, you know what I'm sayin'?" MissGvious responded to Alicia.


"Your name needs a little work, but its definitely much better than the costume," Alicia smiled at her.


MissGvious threw another flurry of punches at Alicia as she lost control and flew into a rage.


Alicia dodged them easily, then leapt over a conveyor belt just narrowly missing an actuator arm as it lifted a container of pill bottles from one conveyor and loaded it onto another.


MissGvious tried the same move, but impacted with the high speed actuator arm on its return trip, which threw her twisting through the air into a cabinet on the other side.


When she got to her feet, Alicia was there and ready for her.


"I need backup! Now!" MissGvious yelled and Wakk appeared from the cacaphony on the production line, taking up behind Alicia with a hammer.


"Get your ass away from her blondie or Ima mess you up!" Wakk threatened Alicia.


Alicia dodged his hammer as he swung, laying a kick dead center of his solar plexus and launching him into a wall. MissGvious though had managed to land a serious punch to the side of Alicia's face, sending her into the control station nearest them.


Alicia shook it off, checking Norler's position as he approached the entrance to the steel storage room, then turning to face MissGvious again.


"That really hurt you know?" Alicia said to MissGvious as the sound distant sirens approaching could be heard.


"We gotta vacate! The Babylon is here!" MissGvious suddenly turned and fled her crew falling in behind her, one of them grabbing Wakk and helping him up from the floor.


Norler had just closed and locked the steel door of the storage room when two people appeared from a nearby door. 


"Freeze! Toronto Police Service!" Farnham appeared from another door on the far side of the production line, Somboon behind him, each of them packing a pump-action shotgun.


Alicia was now the only person still there. She turned to face Farnham and Somboon, raising her hands.


"Is this high enough?" asked Alicia of them, raising her arms as high as she could.


"That's a good start. Now don't try anything funny," Farnham ordered her.


"I won't, but that man with the gun behind you might..." Alicia said to them as she kept her arms in the air.


Both Farnham and Somboon immediately turned to face whatever Alicia had pointed out, but by the time they'd figured out that there was nobody there, they turned to see that Alicia was gone.


"She's reeeal sneaky," Farnham said to Somboon.


"She's kinda hot too," Somboon added.


"That's enough out of you..." Farnham replied as they checked the production floor.


...


MissGvious got into her Lincoln Continental, Stakz, Wakk and RokSteddi piling into the passenger seats.


The rest of her crew piled into the two vans, the three of vehicles then speeding out of the back parking lot and towards the exit, while eight Police cruisers filed in through the entrance to the facility.


Alicia watched from the roof as the MissGvious drove around the building, the two vans following behind her car.


"Maybe I can find out a little more about her?" Alicia said to herself, then turning and sprinting as fast as she could towards the end of the roof.


 She leapt out into the air and fell quietly, landing on the roof of one of the vans, softening her impact carefully by bending her legs as she fell flat and gripped the sides of the van's roof.


"Yo?! Did you guys hear anything?" asked Stubz in the back of the van.


"Are you kiddin'? My ears is still ringin' from all that shootin' in there yo," Mooch responded.


"What?" responded Boomz to both of them.


On the roof of the same van, Alicia laid low and hung on as the van sped towards Lakeshore Boulevard East.


...


Farnham and Somboon had secured the back office and the part of the production floor where the storage room was situated as their backup arrived, entering the building in groups with their weapons drawn.


Somboon was busy working on overriding the digital lock on the storage room door with a portable computer from his kit.


"Got it old man!" he assured Farnham, as the magnetic lock hummed and unlatched.


"Open the door. I'll check it," Farnham ordered Somboon, his pistol in hand as he opened the big door.


"We need an ambulance. We've got an injured man here..." Norler immediately confronted Farnham, who peered into the storage room and caught sight of the man with the knife sticking out of his shoulder.


"Don't remove the knife! Leave it. If you remove it, you might cause more damage or he might bleed to death!" Farnham yelled to them.


"We need paramedics here immediately!" Somboon turned and yelled to his peers on the Police force.


"So, did blondie cause all of this or was it the gang?" asked Farnham of Norler, holstering his pistol.


"No. She's definitely not one of them. She saved my life. She might have saved all of us. She kept them all at bay while we fled into this storage room," Norler advised Farnham, who listened carefully.


"I guess you have a guardian angel then. Is there a reason that the production line is running?" Farnham asked Norler.


"No. Someone must have accidentally hit it during the fray. I'll shut it off if it will make things any easier," Norler responded, stepping out of the storage room and over to the production line control panel where he hit the stop button.


The production line quickly shut down while all of the robotics tucked themselves away in their storage and maintenance position. 


The room went from the ongoing noise of production to a sudden silence as the investigators began arriving one by one, setting up the crime scene.


...


"Looks like we made it!" Stakz said to MissGvious.


"They ain't followin' us. They ain't even seen us," Wakk added.


"So where to sis?" RokSteddi asked of MissGvious.


"We're going to get that Helayne chick. I ain't ending this night before I at least get one of them. Someone has to pay for what they did to my father!" MissGvious said as she drove.


Atop of the van, and inside of Alicia's jacket, her phone's silent ringer rang, though with the bumps and ride of the vehicle, she couldn't hear it or feel it.


...


Myung kept her phone to her ear as she sat at home, waiting for Alicia to answer. When it rolled over to her answering service, she left a message:


"Hi Alicia. It's Myung again. Listen, I think Helayne is in some real trouble, and that we should try to find her and help her. Call me when you get this message," Myung said before hanging up the phone.


She then dialed another number and waited for an answer.


"What is it Myung?" asked Aikiko, answering her phone.


"What, no Dragon's Eye Security Dominatrix anymore?" asked Myung sarcastically.


"I don't make fun of your business, so don't make fun of mine. What do you want?" Aikiko responded.


"I haven't been able to get a hold of either Helayne or Alicia and I'm worried sick about them," Myung said to Aikiko as she picked up and took the last bite of her Gimbap.


"Well, while you were busy making your dinner after work, I managed to locate Helayne's new place of business. Its on the corner of Duncan Street and Adelaide Street West. Now, if you're as good a friend as you say you are, then why don't we meet down there in fifteen minutes. I mean you're practically around the corner from there, and me, I'm a short distance too," Aikiko said to Myung.


"Really? You found it? Ok, I'll meet you in fifteen minutes on the north east corner of Duncan Street and Adelaide. See you soon!" Myung hung up.


To be continued...

Brian Joseph Johns

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...


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



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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