24 Comments
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J. M. Elliott's avatar

I'm really enjoying this character, and the eerieness is just the right pitch. Also, I totally sympathize with Barry here (not sure what this says about me ;-): "But the older he got, and the closer he got to dying, the more he realized that he wouldn’t be able to save humanity before he keeled over and died and that this wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, because humanity might not be worth saving."

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Daniel W. Davison's avatar

Thank you, Jacquie! There’s a little too much of me in this character. 😂

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Honeygloom's avatar

This is so good!! I’m really enjoying this character.

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Daniel W. Davison's avatar

Thank you so much for the comment and restack, Honeygloom!!!! 🙏

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Caitriana NicNeacail's avatar

Felt a real chill down my spine at the end - great story!

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Daniel W. Davison's avatar

Thank you so much, SDG!!!

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Jennifer Morrow's avatar

Fantastic! Looking forward to part two.

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Daniel W. Davison's avatar

Thank you, Jennifer!

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Adrian P Conway's avatar

Super set up, Daniel.

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Daniel W. Davison's avatar

Thank you so much, Adrian!

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Redd Oscar's avatar

This was great. A gentle beginning that slowly drew me in and had me hooked by the second third.

On magazine hoarders, a man who lived near my mum died last year and his house was found stacked floor to ceiling with pulp magazines, records, old sci-fi/fantasy collectables, to the point where the upstairs floors were sagging. Apparently he ran an online store for it all but clearly had far more stock than needed. He had no known next of kin, though the search is on-going I believe, so the house has been boarded up, I presume with the collection inside.

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Daniel W. Davison's avatar

Oh my goodness that is so interesting. I’m a bit of a hoarder myself. I have 2.5 metric tons of paper products, ranging from authentic 16th century maps to dime-store pulps. I have no idea what’s going to happen to these things once I’m gone. 😩

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Redd Oscar's avatar

That souns like a cool collection, I love a good map, especially old ones. I have a couple of old ONS maps of places I've lived in England and it's fascinating seeing how they've changed, or how they haven't. How do you store that many things? Shelves? Garage? Treasure chest?

If there is no family who want it then museums, galleries, or even private collectors. I imagine a well ordered will could sort it out. Sorry for the slightly morbid thoughts.

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Daniel W. Davison's avatar

I don’t think it’s morbid at all. I love the ONS maps. I’m living abroad at the moment and have all of them in my flat. Next year I’ll be moving back to the U.S. and putting them in my retirement house that I’ll be buying. But regrettably I don’t have any immediate family or close friends that want all that stuff. I’ve left it all to a favorite bookstore of mine in my will. I was going to give it to my university library or my college but both said they weren’t accepting estate donations of books at this time.

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Redd Oscar's avatar

Good that they are close at hand and display-able. Good luck with the move!

It's a shame the uni nor college will accept them, though knowing that my local museums and galleries only have the capacity to display very little of their collections it's not too surprising university libraries are also "full".

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Liz Zimmers's avatar

Excellent! Can’t wait for more.

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Daniel W. Davison's avatar

Thank you, Liz!!! 🙏

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Daniel O’Donnell's avatar

Once again a great character and compelling setting makes for an excellent story, Daniel. Intrigued to see where it goes next 👍🏼

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Daniel W. Davison's avatar

Some of the qualities of this character are my own. 😂 Thank you so much for the comment, Dan!

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A. B. Frank's avatar

Excellent! Really interesting character and compelling story 👍🏼

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Daniel W. Davison's avatar

Thank you again, A. B.!!!

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EJ Trask's avatar

I love this character!!! cannot wait for the next installment(s?)

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Daniel W. Davison's avatar

Thank you so much, EJ! 🙏

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