Podcasts about ATV

At just 15 years old, Dakota Hibler is doing more than racing, she's rewriting what's possible. In this episode, we sit down with one of the youngest female pro ATV riders in the country to talk about her rapid rise through the ranks, her 2023 wins in the Women A class at WORCS, and making history with the youngest all-female team in Best In The Desert.Representing DirtHalo Racing, Dakota shares how she balances racing, school, and inspiring the next generation of women in motorsports. With grit, humility, and big goals ahead, Dakota's journey is just beginning, and she's already creating space for more young girls to chase their dreams on four wheels.Hit subscribe, share this with your crew, and stay tuned as ATV-TALK continues to spotlight the future of racing.

Join us at Bradgate Park in Leicester with Jules Acton, author, former podcast guest and Trust ambassador, while our regular host Adam enjoys a summer holiday. We meet senior park ranger Matt who gives us a tour as he explains his role in caring for the site and its amazing trees. We've come to the park to see one in particular: a magnificent 830-year-old oak. It's in the running for Tree of the Year 2025. This year's contest celebrates our cultural connections with trees, shining a light on those that are local landmarks, sources of passion, inspiration and creativity. Find out what makes Bradgate Park's oldest oak special and vote for your favourite by 19 September.   Don't forget to rate us and subscribe! Learn more about the Woodland Trust at woodlandtrust.org.uk Transcript You are listening to Woodland Walks, a podcast for the Woodland Trust. We protect and plant trees for people to enjoy, to fight climate change and to help wildlife thrive.  Jules: Good morning. I'm Jules Acton. I'm an ambassador for the Woodland Trust. I've been in this job for 10 years this month and it's been a fantastic 10 years. I've loved every day because I get to meet some amazing trees and woods and even more than that, I also get to meet lots of amazing people who love trees and woods and who are inspired by them. So Woodland Trust members, other supporters, staff and volunteers. And I think one of the reasons people love trees so much is not just for the fact they provide all the wonderful services they they store our carbon, they provide fresh air, they can help filter pollution. But they're also absolutely entwined in our culture. And that's been taking place over hundreds and thousands of years. So our, particularly our native tree species tree species are absolutely embedded in our culture, and every old tree has a story to tell. Now, the reason we're here today is that we're going to talk about Tree of the Year and the theme of the Tree of the Year is culture and the way trees are embedded in culture. Ten magnificent trees have been chosen by a panel of experts. Each has a wonderful story to tell, and members of the public can go and vote for their favourite tree on the Woodland Trust website.  We are here in Bradgate Park car park. It is a golden morning and we're surrounded by trees. I can see oak trees, hawthorns, birches, hazels. It's absolutely gorgeous with the dappled sunlight falling down on us through the leaves. We're here to meet a particularly special tree. It's Bradgate Park's oldest oak tree, and it's about 20 minutes walk from the car park. So I see my colleague Natasha. She's over there waiting at the edge of the car park, waiting for Matt. Hello Natasha.  Natasha: Hello. Ohh hi!  Jules: Can you tell us a bit about your role, Natasha and what you do at the Woodland Trust?  Natasha: Yeah, I'm a social media officer, so I just help create and schedule all social media content, jump on whenever there's an opportunity like today.  Jules: And today you're going to be helping with the recording.  Natasha: Yeah, getting a few clips behind the scenes of how we record the podcast so we can share that and a few bits for our website as well and YouTube.  Jules: Thanks Natasha. Now I think we have just seen somebody drive up who might well be Matt. He's he's appeared in a very groovy looking buggy. And here we go. I believe this is Matt. Hello.   Matt: Good morning, Jules.   Jules: Hello, Matt, hi, lovely to meet you.  Matt: Nice to meet you. Welcome to Bradgate Park.  Jules: Thank you. Can you tell us a little bit about your role, Matt?  Matt: So yeah so I've I've worked at Bradgate Park for just over 20 years now and main sort of roles on on the site are woodland management and caring for the ancient trees that we've got that that are of European importance. And I also get quite involved with the drystone walls and repairing them. I lead a a group of volunteers on a Thursday and as we go across the site, I'm sure I can show you some of the work that we've been doing.  Jules: Oh brilliant, and you're going to particularly show us a very special tree, I believe.  Matt: Yes, I believe we might be able to find that. Yeah, the tree is approximately 830 years old. It predates the Magna Carta and I'd certainly like to take you to the tree and tell you a bit more about it.  Jules: All right. We're just getting ready to go and all around us are people enjoying the park, there are some people walking up hills. There are lots of dogs. There's one very cute little brown dog that's having a little dip in, in a little stream, a little brook, really at the edge of the park and it's already quite a warm day, so I think it's having a nice little cool down.  We're back en route towards the special tree with the beautiful drystone wall to our right and across to the left are, well there's a tree, there's a plantation, and then there's also a sort of a bit of a wood pasture environment would you call it Matt, with some native trees dotted around in the landscape?  Matt: Yeah, very much so. So this is Hallgates Valley. We're looking across to Dale Spinney. The park itself is 830 acres, of which spinneys represent about 10% of the parkland area, so it's quite a large proportion. All the spinneys were planted on the, on the hilltops across the park, that's that's not just by chance. And they were created around about 1830s-40s by the 6th early of Stamford and and now we see the spinneys that we've got here today so you've got quite a mature, mature standard trees. Quite a lot are softwood, but then we've got a mixture of hardwoods in there. We certainly replant hardwoods in the spinneys.  Jules: How would you define a spinney as opposed to, you know, other kinds of woods?  Matt: Nice easy question *laughs*. I would I would say you've obviously got different names of woodlands and you know we're, we're, we're in Charnwood Forest, but a a forest isn't just trees, it's clearings. And I would say a copse is a small woodland. I would say the spinney is is probably like slightly larger than that and then you go up towards a wood. I could be totally wrong! *both laugh*  Jules: I like it though. So Matt you say, you've you've been here 20 years.   Matt: Yeah, 22.  Jules: 22. So you obviously love it. And what is it that keeps you here?  Matt: I was born in Leicester and came here as a young child playing and you know to end up working here as a job, it's certainly a nice place to be coming to and huge, beautiful surroundings, fresh air and and then I've I've just got a real passion for particularly the a lot of the heritage crafts that we keep alive on the estate. So yes, we go down and we manage the woodlands, but we're actually carrying out coppicing operations and that, they go back to the Stone Age and and then other work on the site for instance drystone walling, which we're approaching a gap now that we've been repairing and is obviously another heritage craft, and for me, I I just think it's really important that we're passing on these skills, heritage crafts on to the next sort of generation.  Jules: That that's brilliant. And do you do you train sort of volunteers or or is it staff members in in this kind of thing?  Matt: I've trained up to Level 2 in walling. That's something I I went up to Derbyshire to do. We've actually got another chap on site now, Leon. He's, he was in the armed forces and and and Leon is doing his levels in walling as well. I believe he's already got Level 1 and 2. He's working towards his 3, we might be able to pop and see him in a bit, but I guess the focus should be trees today *laughs*.  Jules: Yeah, well if we have time, that'd be great. See how we go.  Matt: This is certainly a large gap of wall that we've been doing on the estate. We've got 17 miles of drystone wall to maintain. The deer park itself goes back to 1241, but it's, the boundaries changed slightly over over the years and the largest extent of the deer park was probably around about 1550 and that would have, certain parts of the boundary are drystone wall and and that's obviously what what we're left with today and we need to maintain that. Not only does it keep the deer inside the park, which is obviously beneficial for a deer park, it's fantastic habitat for various, you know, sort of reptiles to live in and adders, grass snakes, things like that.  Jules: Fantastic, so we're looking at at one of the drystone walls and it's I'd say about shoulder height, would you say and it's a grey sort of almost sort of slaty looking stone actually, do you, can you tell us what kind of the stone it is?  Matt: Yeah so on on this side of the park, it's it's it's it's a little bit more slaty towards Newtown Linford, that's that's more of a granite, the walling that we do on the, that we we do on the park is is called random coursed walling. So yes, as we build the wall up, you start with the larger stones at the bottom and as the as the wall tapers up, it angles in, that's called the batter of the wall, you can see the frame we've got and that that we're working to, we've got the building lines in. So this one is 80 centimetres at the bottom, tapering up to 40 centimetres at the top. Originally this was actually a lime mortar wall and a lot of walls on the park are lime mortar, but it is possible to rebuild dry, but we do a mix a mixture of both on the estate.  Jules: That's great and it's just lovely to see these heritage practices being kept alive and you mentioned the coppicing as well, which is absolutely very much part of woodland culture going back centuries. I believe it goes back to the Vikings, maybe even earlier, I don't know if you know anything about the history of it, Matt?  Matt: Yeah, well, certainly the Stone Age coppicing going back, going back to the Stone Age, it's the process of cutting the tree down to ground level. Not all trees will coppice, certainly oak will. That's where Copt Oak gets the name from, coppiced oak. Hazel is the primary tree species that we are coppicing, certainly in Swithland Woods and we've got a management plan in place. We've we've just come to the end of a 10-year management plan that was supported by, there's a lady called Liz Sharkey who comes up with a great plan for us. We're just starting in, in November will be the next 10-year plan and the intention of that is to create the most diverse habitat that Swithland Woods is and it will create a mosaic of habitats, different age stands within the structure of the woodland and and part of that will be coppicing rotation and that will open up and the the the floor of the woodland, let light in and that will benefit bluebells and wood anemone and all the related bird species and invertebrates.  Jules: This is all music to our Woodland Trust ears. Thank you, Matt. Shall we continue on our little tour?  Matt: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I will turn this very loud... *banging*  Jules: *laughs* I'm not actually sure how to get out the car, but ohh, OK, yeah, yeah. Natasha's on it. Thanks Natasha. OK, so we are walking up to not the tree we're here to see, but we couldn't resist this one because it's really special and it's a gnarly oak tree, kind of growing out of what looks like a big craggy load of rocks. Yeah, Matt, could you tell us a bit more about this tree?  Matt: Yes, I can. So it's English oak and some of the, it's growing out of granite and some of the rocks on the park are actually some of the oldest rocks, certainly in Britain and and the world, 560-million-year-old rocks that we've got on the park and it's all part part of the designation, actually, of the park, it's a SSSI, geological interest in the park and also the veteran trees are also part of that designation and we have just become a National Nature Reserve as well, Bradgate Park.  Jules: Well, congratulations! Could you just explain the SSSI to us just so people understand what the abbreviation means?  Matt: It's a Site of Special Scientific Interest, so there's many layers to Bradgate Park, people might just want to come have a nice walk, enjoy the views, and people that might be more interested in the geology of the park, so we get a lot of people that are coming out and looking at the rocks and looking for fossils and they're able to from that age, the rocks on the park and then other designations that we've got are related to the ancient trees and and that all forms a a bigger picture that makes the park so important that it has to be protected.  Jules: Fantastic. And one of the things that I've just noticed on both this very old oak tree and also on the rocks are, there's a lot of lichens. They're gorgeous. So they're sort of just splattered with them, some of them just look like, like, little sort of paint splats, don't they? They are different colours, we've got white ones, green ones on the rocks, I'm looking at, sort of greyish ones. Some are crusty, some are very flat, which is I think the nature of lichens. Do you know much about the lichens?  Matt: I certainly know that we need to keep the lichens exposed to the sunlight, so we have to clear bracken so they're not getting shaded out. They take a long time to form and I certainly know that they need good clean air. So that is a good sign, if you're seeing lichens, you're in a good place as a human being.  Jules: Yeah, absolutely. And and one of the things about oak trees as well is because they, they're long-lived trees, they provide particularly important habitat for lichens, cause some, many lichens are really, really slow growing, so they need a very slow, you know, stable habitat, so whether it be the rocks or or the very old tree and you'll get different species associated with the different environments as well.  Matt: Yeah, exactly right. And and you can see as well as the being lichens on the rock, you look up into the oak tree and in to the, up the, into the crown of the tree and we are seeing lichens on on the oak tree.  Jules: Yeah. Aed one of the other things about lichens is that they are also embedded in our culture as well, so we use them to to make dyes, some people cook with them, so again, a bit like bit like the oak trees and and other native trees, they're really entwined in our cultural history. This isn't the tree we're here to see, but it's absolutely marvellous! So I, gosh, I hope this becomes, goes on the Tree of the Year shortlist at some point because it deserves it!  Matt: Well, it's nice to have more than one entry.   Jules: Yeah, that would be good, wouldn't it?  Matt: I guess it would in in increase the chances of winning, but seeing as it's the first time you've come to the park, Jules, I thought you may as well see this.  Jules: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I love it. It looks quite elephantine from this, elephantine I should say, from this angle with this sort of like this great, long limb sticking out, it's almost like a trunk isn't it and up into the into the blue.  Matt: It certainly is, and I think that's certainly going to be the word of the day. I'm not, I'm not certainly going to try and trump that!   Jules: OK, yeah, let's, let's, let's try and use it again, in the next stop! *both laugh* OK. We're going back to the car now the the buggy, the T, TVA. No, the, what is it?  Matt: The ATV *both laugh* As we go back towards the ATV, we can see a absolutely stunning tower on a hill. It's gorgeous. It's kind of like, well it looks like it's in a fairytale to me. Could you tell us a bit about that?  Matt: So Old John Tower was, they started building it 1784 and and it is a folly and it was somewhere that the Greys, the owners, the Earls of Stamford could entertain guests and around the base of the tower, the rear is the remnants of an old racetrack, at the side of the tower, there's an old stable block and the Greys were certainly great horse fanciers and they entered racehorses into various events and along the the the old racetrack there's still remnants of old furlong markers and they were able to entertain the guests, stand up on the the roof of the of the tower and get an idea of of how good the how well the horses were performing.  Jules: Brilliant. And and the the Greys being the family of Lady Jane Grey, is that right?   Matt: Yes, that's right yeah.  Jules: OK. So it's it's absolutely stunning. It looks like the sort of, yeah, if you're drawing a scene in a fairytale, you'd be drawing a little turrety round tower on top of a hill, wouldn't you? And there'd be probably Rapunzel at the top, letting down her hair. On this occasion we've got a, on this occasion we've got a a very fit looking person who's just run a ring around the bottom of the tower and is now running towards us, obviously making use of this wonderful environment to to keep up their fantastic fitness. Right. OK. Now we are going back to the vehicle. And I think is next stop the the tree, our destination?  Matt: Yes it certainly is.  Jules: OK, OK, brilliant. I think I've actually worked out how to get in this time, which is ohh no, Matt's letting me in, thank you, what a gent, thank you. Right, we are now out of the vehicle and we are walking towards the special tree. And how long, how much of a walk is it from here?  Matt: So I can see it already and I'd say we're only about 200 yards away from it.  Jules: *laughs* Ohh, I still haven't seen it!  Matt: I'm I'm I'm deliberately walking in a way that it's going to appear.  Jules: Oh he's hiding it from us.   Matt: Yeah. There we go, fallow deer.  Jules: Ohh, there's ohh my goodness two fallow deer. The beautiful spotty backs, sort of trotting away. And then they've stopped and have given, they're looking at us. They're not too shy, actually are they?  Matt: No, no, they're not.  Jules: They look just like double Bambi. They're very beautiful.  Matt: You'll you'll you'll notice on all the trees, and there's about a dozen smaller oak trees that we planted, and these are about 30 years old now. Again, you can see how we've we've literally topped the smaller trees and and that's because we don't want to leave these trees just to get huge a. and maidens and straight and tall. So we want these to be stunted and more open grown. And so we've cut the tops off and and thinned them slightly. And then, again, we're hoping that that will make them longer lived.  Jules: Yeah, yeah. And of course, the oak trees love a lot of light, don't they? And these have got quite a lot of light and space around them.   Matt: Yes.   Jules: Ohh, I can see it now. Oh my goodness. What a beast. How fantastic. So it does, so it's the Bradgate Park's oldest oak, isn't it, so does it have a name, another name beyond that?  Matt: I think people people give it various names but it's just ‘the oldest tree in the park' *laughs*  Jules: Yeah, yeah.  Matt: Trying, I suppose for many years we've tried to keep it a bit bit sort of secret. That's probably for the benefit of the tree and certainly, the fact that it's within a spinney, people aren't walking up to it, and that's helped the tree. I feel that it's in a, it's obviously found some good growing conditions and despite the general habitat of the park being poor, upland soil, shallow, it's found some incredible growing conditions here it's been sheltered so that it's not being exposed to too much, too much wind force. And also it's it's nice and open so as the, as you know sort of from midday to right through into the evening, it's gonna get plenty of light as well. So there's I think there's been a number of factors that have certainly helped to prolong the life of the tree.  Jules: Yes, absolutely. Wow, it is a stunner. So just to try and describe this tree, it it's immensely tall. It's probably about the size of a, what about the height of a house would you say?   Matt: Yeah it's a good, good 45 feet.  Jules: Yeah. And it's got a very gnarly bole. I call it a bole rather than a trunk because it's really big, broad, and it's kind of split into two, kind of more than two. And it's got some dead branches coming out the middle. It's got one gorgeous, great, long, twisted limb reaching out. And it's that that's they're they're propped up, but it's kind of snaking, isn't it, ooh, it's elephantine that's what it is! Yeah, let's use our favourite word of the day.  Matt: I'd I'd say it's definitely elephantine *both laugh*  Jules: Yeah. And you can see kind of, it looks like there's faces everywhere, aren't there? It's like in that they've dead bit of branch there, you can see like a sort of twisted sort of face and a great long nose. And ohh it's, what a beautiful beast. So Matt, could you tell us a bit about its cultural connection to human beings?  Matt: Well, it certainly, it it was aged back in 2014 by a tree consultancy called Bosky and we we obtained a grant funding to tag and map many, many trees across the estate of this, being one of them, and it was it was aged at 818 back then, which puts us at around about the 830 mark now. In terms of relations to humans, it predates the Magna Carta and one of the most notable former residents of Bradgate Park obviously being Lady Jane, when she was a child living on the park, the tree would have already been quite a mighty oak of about 300 years.  Jules: Gosh, so, so Lady Jane Grey would have known this tree.   Matt: Yes, yeah.  Jules: She would probably sat underneath it.  Matt: Which is somewhat remarkable.  Jules: Yeah. Maybe had a little picnic under here. *Matt laughs* That's what I would have done. Fantastic. And it's wonderful that you're protecting it and actually, despite this sort of really craggy bole, it's it's looking in pretty good health, isn't it, it's got loads of leaves all around. Are you feeling sort of confident about its its future given given how it is?  Matt: Well, certainly, yeah you you've you've pointed out the props and these props have been in place supporting certainly this this limb. If we walk around the other side of the tree, you can you can get a bit more of an impression as to what the props are actually achieving for the tree and in due course, and I believe we'll we'll probably upgrade these props, which are basically telegraph posts with Land Rover tyres that have been cut, which is certainly an effective way of doing things, but we have evolved the propping techniques that are now, you can see the tree in the distance over there by the compound that's called the Pheasant Garden. And there's a there's an oak tree there that supported by a prop and that is manufactured using metal, sort of steel work and then there's a cup section that's manufactured and then that that's a more sympathetic way of actually supporting that bough.  Jules: Yeah, yes.  Matt: Regarding, you know the actual cover of the foliage, like you say, totally agree that it's it's still got reasonable foliage cover, certainly certain things that we do have to watch out for is shade. And that is partly why we've cut the tops off the trees around it. But also you can see where we've got a bit of interference here with this Scots pine at the back.  Jules: Oh yes, it's actually actually touching I think, almost touching.  Matt: So that is something that we would look to keep keep in check. So this Scots pine, as as lovely as it is, that Scots pine is more like 70 years old, and we wouldn't want that to be shading out so that's something we'll we'll probably climb up there and just cut that, cut the limb off off the Scots pine and stop that, because you can see if we just leave that doing what it's doing, it's going to start shading out and it's really important that we keep the living mass of this tree, so there's a balance there between the living mass and the dead mass of the tree, the static mass. And it's that balance as a ratio for the tree, you know, if you, if you look at a younger tree there, you can say that almost almost 100% of of the of the crown of that tree is alive. Whereas you look at this tree and you start thinking maybe 50%. So the closer that ratio between the living mass and the dead mass is, the closer that gets more like to a one to one, then the the tree will will then gradually just just just be going into decline. So you know, the tree will not live forever but I'm pretty confident it's going to outlive us guys *laughs*  Jules: Yes. It's an amazing thought, isn't it? And it's obviously very loved and and and I think the importance is is not just about the tree itself, is it? So really ancient oaks like this, they support enormous numbers of species, some of which only live on ancient oaks. So that's why we need to protect this tree as much as we possibly can and also bring on those veteran oaks of the future that you you, you're, you're that you're you're doing just that, aren't you, here in the park. Absolutely vital.   Matt: Yeah, very much so, very much so. As we've driven across the park, we've seen various planting that's been supported by the Tree Council. And like you say, that has, that certainly has been planting more oak trees, but then also other nectar bearing species, rowan, blackthorn, hawthorn, gorse. And these are all important, like you say for the deadwood insects that, that, that live within the ancient oak tree and and then as the tree gets older it then develops more veteran features and those crags, holes are very important roosting habitats for, certainly for owls and bats.  Jules: Yeah. And so oak trees in the UK collectively support more than 2,300 species, some of which are completely reliant on oak trees. They couldn't survive without oak trees, and one of the things we were talking about earlier as we drove up was the fact that there are, you know, some, some beetles, for example, some longhorn beetles, for example, they spend their lives as larvae living in deadwood. But then the adults, they need nectar when they grow up, so again, it's really important to have those nectar sources nearby isn't it?  Matt: Yeah. So very, very much is. Yeah. And that's what we're looking to do on the park we are we are planting those, those supporting plants.  Jules: Fantastic. Wonderful. This incredible tree that we're standing in front of is one of the ten contenders in this year's Tree of the Year competition and the theme of this year's competition is culture and the the the the history and culture associated with trees in our world. Ancient oaks are absolutely threaded in our culture. I'm particularly interested in them, I wrote a book about about oak trees called Oaklore, and one of the things that I talked about was the way that the oak tree intertwines with our lives with with lots of different species, but also with human lives and with our culture. There were so many stories associated with the oak tree. One of my favourites is the story of Charles II and the Boscobel Oak. So before Charles II was, became king he was fighting the parliamentarians and he took a terrible drubbing at a battle. And he needed to escape. And he escaped to Boscobel House. And he was with this soldier called Colonel Careless, and this soldier suggested that they hide in the oak tree overnight rather than the house. And they did. And even though the parliamentarian troops were were wandering nearby, they didn't find the king and his soldiers, and they escaped. And eventually they returned and that led to the restoration of the monarchy. The thing I like about this story is the cultural links then go on and on. Because at that point, a day of national celebration was declared throughout the land, and that was 29 May and that became Oak Apple Day and everybody would party and if the best people at the party, the coolest people at the party, they waved oak branches and wore oak leaves and and if you were super cool, you had lots of oak apples on your, so little galls on your oak branches. And if you didn't have little symbols of oaks, then others were apparently within their rights to take a bunch of nettles and and and attacked you with nettles, which wasn't so nice. So it was also called Nettle Day. It was also known as Pinch Bum Day and Maids Ruin Day. The story goes on, but the other sort of fun cultural connection to that is it also came, it also brought about lots of pubs called the Royal Oak, and the last time I looked there were about 400 oak trees, 400 sorry pubs called the Royal Oak throughout the land, so the cultural tales just go on and on. And that's just the oak tree. But all of our native trees have some fantastic stories associated with them in. In fact every old tree has a story to tell. It's like us, like every older person, we've all got a story, a history to tell. Yeah. OK.  Matt: So yeah, we're just walking back from the oldest tree now, and we're just sort of musing over just that connection that human, humans have got to trees. I think it's the fact that an oak tree can sort of live centuries and really, that puts our lifetimes somewhat in perspective. And the fact that an oak tree can just go from the tiniest of acorns to a huge mass of of timber and that is just really fantastic, how you could you could cut open a tree and see all those different tree rings, those years of growth and then just sort of put that in context, what was happening was, was it Dick Whittington that was the Lord Mayor of London for the last time, was it was it the Battle of Agincourt, was it the Magna Carta? And and it's for people like you that actually write books about it, Jules, that can say it a lot better than me *both laugh*  Jules: No that was brilliant and we're not gonna cut this one in half though are we, Matt?   Matt: No, we're certainly not. And the fact that it's hollow, we just can't see those rings anymore.  Jules: No. Thank you. Brilliant. Right. This is our final leg on our walk and we're now in a polytunnel and it's really warm because the sun's beating down outside and it smells gorgeous and and we are surrounded by lots of little trees. Matt, can you tell us a little bit about these?  Matt: So the polytunnel was funded by the Tree Council and it's just very important that we're growing on oaks for the future from acorns that have been collected on site. So they've got the genetic continuity of the long-lived oak trees and hopefully they'll grow and carry on into long into the future.  Jules: And are they, is it a a mix of acorns from all different trees in in here or is it, or is, are you, are you taking them from specific trees?  Matt: It's yeah, it's a bit of a mix. Sometimes, you know, where where we can and where they're viable, if we if we get to the acorns from a veteran tree before the deer, then that's certainly something that we we're looking to grow on. So generally that's what we're that's that's where we'll try and harvest them from that, we've put a frame down before with a bit of a grill, so we can collect the acorns, but then they don't get eaten and that's certainly quite a good technique. And and then we we we grow on from the old trees where we can, yes.  Jules: They're really lovely. So we've got really tiny little trees with, some of them have got like, you know, about 5 or 6 leaves. And then they go up to sort of above our just above our heads. And I think what always strikes me is the, the the diversity in in leaf shape and colour that you that you see all around you. So even the same place within within oak trees, it's incredible, the different shapes and sizes you get, isn't it?  Matt: Yeah, it really is. And you know, look, looking some of the some of the oaks have been collected from Swithland Woods as well. And and where you've got a stalked leaf, that is a sessile oak.   Jules: Ah yes.  Matt: And and where you've got a a leaf that's coming off that isn't stalked, that is an English oak, but but that will have a stalked acorn.  Jules: Yes. So that's the the key way to tell the difference isn't. Yeah, brilliant. Thank you. I love it. The Bradgate Park oak is one of ten iconic trees across the UK in the running for the Tree of the Year competition. Other examples include the Tree of Peace and Unity in County Antrim. That's an iconic lime tree, I say a lime tree, it's actually two lime trees which are fused together so that the trunk has become bound as one and it's, they've become inseparable and as such they've become a symbol of harmony and hope. So newly married couples sit beneath that tree for a blessing and it became a particular symbol of peace and reconciliation when Tony Blair, David Trimble and John Hume met here in 1998 at the signing of the Good Friday Agreement. Another example is the Argyle Street Ash in Glasgow. This tree is growing right next to some historic flats and it's seen as a symbol of local resilience. It has survived all kinds of things, including Victorian industry, the Clydeside Blitz, recent development and so far, ash dieback. One of its cultural connections is that it was featured in a 1935 book by James Cowan. The book was called From Glasgow's Treasure Chest and in it he describes the tree as ‘quite the most graceful ash I have seen'. Well, that's enough of me. Meanwhile, thank you so much to Matt and Natasha. It's been great fun talking trees with you.  Thank you for listening to the Woodland Trust Woodland Walks. Don't forget to subscribe to the series on iTunes or wherever you're listening to us and do give us a review and a rating. And why not send us a recording of your favourite woodland walk to be included in a future podcast? Keep it to a maximum of five minutes and please tell us what makes your woodland walk special or send us an e-mail with details of your favourite walk and what makes it special to you. Send any audio files to podcast@woodlandtrust.org.uk. We look forward to hearing from you. 

Max Lindquist returns to ATV-TALK with a full season behind him, a growing brand under his belt, and his eyes set on the future. In this episode, we catch up with Max to reflect on his recent race results, the evolution of his mindset, and how he's adjusting in a pro field that's shifting fast.We dive into what the recent retirements and lineup changes mean for competition, how ML2 Motorsports is expanding, and what it takes to build a personal brand while staying competitive at the highest level. Max opens up about the balance between passion and pressure—and what excites him most about where ATV racing is headed.From career goals to personal quirks, this episode gives you an inside look at a rider pushing forward on and off the track.Hit subscribe, share with your crew, and stay tuned for more stories from the front lines of ATV racing.

RitR Episode 71 is full of  6 7, cooking, getting cooked, gas, and 4 1 or something like that. Hear about NE-EDT races at Owosso Motorsports Park in Michigan. Jase White wins his first Pro race and more.  Later we are joined by Ryder Geist from Wisconsin. What does God's word say about working and trusting? Dragon Race Fuel Whitetail Hunts www.88livetoride.com All Terrain Motorsports www.rylandjohnsonracing.com

On this week's all-new episode of the Digging Deep ATVMX Podcast, we're breaking down one of the most unforgettable season finales in ATV motocross history. Legendary riders calling it a career — including one with a walk-off win. An undefeated season spoiled at the 11th hour. A sixth title for one of the sport's Mount Rushmore greats. The wildest Pro Am and Pro Sport battles imaginable. A WMX championship showdown. And the International Cup, too.I was in the announcer's tower for all of it…so I SAW EVERYTHING. Tears of joy, raw emotion, and moments we'll never forget — it's all here.Tune in now, and as always, thank you for DIGGING DEEP with us!Send us a textSupport the show

This week on Electrek's Wheel-E podcast, we discuss the most popular news stories from the world of electric bikes and other nontraditional electric vehicles. This time, that includes new e-bikes from Raleigh and Puckipuppy, police cracking down on super-fast DIY e-bikes, Priority Skyline review, a new Can-Am electric ATV, and more. The Wheel-E podcast returns every two weeks on Electrek's YouTube channel, Facebook, Linkedin, and Twitter. As a reminder, we'll have an accompanying post, like this one, on the site with an embedded link to the live stream. Head to the YouTube channel to get your questions and comments in. After the show ends, the video will be archived on YouTube and the audio on all your favorite podcast apps: Apple Podcasts Spotify Overcast Pocket Casts Castro RSS We also have a Patreon if you want to help us to avoid more ads and invest more in our content. We have some awesome gifts for our Patreons and more coming. Here are a few of the articles that we will discuss during the Wheel-E podcast today: Major e-bike maker hits pause on US imports after new tariffs Police stop and confiscate ‘incredibly dangerous 80 MPH' electric bicycle New e-trike boasts 960W motor, full-suspension and 500 lb capacity Raleigh launches new low-cost Bosch motor e-bike Tern just launched an Airstream e-bike and it looks kind of beautiful Priority Skyline review: A 12-speed automatic shifting throttle e-bike for a song Can-Am unveils new electric ATV that tows more than any gas model Here's the live stream for today's episode starting at 9:00 a.m. ET (or the video after 10:00 a.m. ET): https://www.youtube.com/live/Uiqcq9lX0BQ

From Texas ranch roads to 500-mile racecourses, Matt Horton is proving that grit, discipline, and drive still win in the desert. In this episode, Matt walks us through his journey from small local races to becoming the 2023 WORCS Pro-Am Champion—all while prepping for some of the most demanding races in off-road.We talk about what got him hooked on ATV racing, how he balances life on the road with race-day pressure, and why the Honda TRX450R has become his weapon of choice. With backing from industry icons like Duncan Racing, FMF, and Fasst Company, Matt reflects on the key moments that shaped his breakout season and the mental toughness it takes to chase wins in brutal terrain.Whether you're into long-format races, rider stories, or the heart behind the helmet this episode brings it all.Subscribe, share, and follow along as we dig into the future of desert racing with one of its rising stars.

Palmer Police are investigating an incident where officers punched and tased a 22-year-old Wasilla man at the Alaska State Fair on Sunday night. Plus, a Delta Junction teen is dead following a fatal ATV crash over the weekend, with community members still dealing with the news; and wildlife officials are asking residents in a Kenai neighborhood to be on high alert following a bear attack early Tuesday morning.

Galerijā "Māksla XO" atklāta angļu fotomākslinieka, gaismas un attēla pētnieka Deivida Penija jaunāko darbu izstāde „Atvērtie lauki”. Tā ir viņa pirmā personālizstāde Latvijā. Izstāde tapusi, Deividam Penijam sadarbojoties ar fiziķiem Karaļa koledžā Londonā (King's Kollege London).

Don Higbee didn't grow up chasing trophies he grew up chasing cattle. But somewhere between ranch work in Casper, Wyoming and lining up at GNCC and Baja races, he found a calling that's lasted over two decades.In this episode, Don takes us through his unexpected journey into off-road racing, including key breakthroughs like his runner-up finish at the 2017 Baja 500 and podium at the 2018 Baja 1000. We talk about what it's like juggling family life, dealership ownership, and brutal travel schedules plus the little rituals and road stories that keep it all human.Whether you're a racer, a fan, or someone who just loves a good story about grit and balance, Don's journey proves that you don't need to be flashy to be legendary—you just need to keep showing up.Don't forget to subscribe, share, and follow along for more stories from the world of ATV racing.

88livetoride ep70 features thoughts on recent retirements in the ATV race community, how we make ourselves the best version for others, injuries, G-mans STARK VARG, CARTER BUFF, and many other honorable mentions as well. Also have you heard about the new things Dylan Dworak has in store with 500RSGP...hear about it here! Whitetail Hunts Dragon Race Fuels www.110nutrition.com (code-remain) RJR allterrainmotorsports Remember to follow us and give us a rating on Youtube, Apple, Spotify, and Facebook

(00:00 - 4:03) It's Monday! Bob thinks he found his second calling. He was at the beach over the weekend and noticed Lifeguards driving around in an ATV he thought he could do that job! Bob Hasselhoff! (4:03 - 6:28) With only two weeks left of August we found a bunch of excuses that people used to call out of work, we pass them on to you. One of them is "I ran out of Toilet Paper". (6:28 - 10:00) Are your friends costing you money. On average it costs about $250 a month just to have friends. Whether that's going out to dinner or having a party. Millennials and Gen Z are opting not to have friends to save money. All this and more on the ROR Morning Show with Bob Bronson and LBF Podcast. Find more great podcasts at bPodStudios.com…The Place To Be For Podcast Discovery!

Send us a textDelaney Dunn's racing journey is one of perseverance, breaking barriers, and finding strength in what makes her unique. Racing for 11 years since age 15, this 26-year-old driver from Otis, Maine has transformed from an uncertain rookie into the newly-crowned "Queen of the Oval" in the Ladies Acceleration Tour.The path to Victory Lane wasn't straightforward for Delaney. After eight years without a feature win, she finally broke through at Oxford Plains in a rental race car - a moment she describes as feeling "like I won the Oxford 250." Her determination was tested further last year when she was involved in a viral crash with an ATV on track, an incident that could have ended her racing career. Instead, she bounced back stronger.What many don't know about Delaney is that she races while being on the autism spectrum, receiving her diagnosis at 17 after she had already begun racing. Rather than viewing this as a limitation, Delaney considers her autism a "superpower" that enhances her racing abilities, giving her a sixth sense when it comes to car handling and translating sensory input into actionable feedback for her crew.Now competing in a 2009 Chevy Cobalt in the Ladies Acceleration Tour's four-cylinder "hornet" division, Delaney races alongside women aged 16 to 56 at tracks throughout Maine and New Hampshire. She's achieved the remarkable feat of securing a top-three finish at every currently active racetrack in Maine, winning at three of the five venues.With four races remaining and points standings incredibly tight, Delaney remains focused on consistent performance to potentially claim the overall championship. For aspiring racers, especially young women, her advice is simple: "Start early, earlier the better." Her story stands as powerful proof that with persistence, support, and self-belief, remarkable achievements are possible regardless of your starting point or the challenges you face.Feel inspired by Delaney's story? Follow the Women's Motorsports Network for more profiles of extraordinary female racers breaking barriers and changing the motorsports landscape one lap at a time.Support the showFACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/womensmotorsportsnetworkandpodcast INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/womensmotorsportsnetwork/ LINKEDIN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melindarussell/ TIKTOK: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melindarussell/ X: https://x.com/IWMANation FACEBOOK Personal Page: https://www.facebook.com/melinda.ann.russell

Taylor Swift details falling in love with Travis Kielce. The mega-star who rarely does interviews tells all for two hours. From first date details to an easter egg explanation, Taylor lets us in on how she masterminds her life. Plus, how her mom won back her masters. Then, new clues that more surprises are coming. And, how her new album gets revenge on Kanye West. Then, Kim Kardashian sobs. Her tearful plea to Kanye caught on camera. Plus, Priscilla Presley accused. Did she pull the plug on daughter Lisa Marie to control Elvis' estate? Shocking claims from a $50-million lawsuit. And, Jamie Lynn Spears' teen daughter speaks out about the ATV accident that nearly killed her. Then, just wait until you see John Cena back in action… but covering up a hair transplant? To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Did you know you can see Oahu's Windward side in just one day without feeling rushed or missing the best spots?For many visitors, the east side is simply a scenic drive, but behind those stunning views are hidden beaches, lush gardens, and photo-worthy moments most travelers overlook.If you've ever wondered how to plan a one-day itinerary that combines jaw-dropping scenery, local secrets, and perfect photo ops, this episode is for you. Join professional photographer Heather Eijenga as she shares her must-visit stops, insider tips, and expert advice for capturing Hawaii's magic, whether you're using a phone or a DSLR.

In this episode, the guys chat with Morgan Frayser, Co Owner of Slick Rock Off Road Rental. He shares what it's like running a family owned off road rental business in one of the most challenging tourism environments in the country. From navigating a crushing 32% local tax burden to dealing with activist groups pushing for restrictions, Morgan reveals how politics, regulation, and environmental pressures shape adventure tourism. He also shares stories of rescue missions and the steep insurance hurdles that come with operating high risk rentals offering valuable parallels and lessons for watersport operators facing their own industry challenges. [SPONSORS] - This show is sponsored by Take My Boat Test and WaveRez.Show Links:Website: https://www.watersportpodcast.comFacebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/awgpodcastFacebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1155418904790489Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/awg_podcast/

TL;DR: When Gavin Newsom sweeps San Francisco's streets for an international summit, the press frames it as pragmatic urban stewardship. When Donald Trump orders a similar crackdown in Washington, D.C., it's cast as an authoritarian takeover. The cleanup looks the same; the narrative is worlds apart.In November 2023, Governor Gavin Newsom admitted plainly that San Francisco's sudden transformation—tent encampments gone, streets power-washed, graffiti scrubbed—was tied directly to hosting President Xi Jinping for the APEC summit. He likened it to tidying your home before guests arrive. Media coverage largely accepted the explanation: yes, the effort was timed for a diplomatic photo-op, but it was also evidence that the city could, when it wanted, restore order and civility.Fast-forward to 2025. President Trump, in his second term, orders a sweeping public safety operation in Washington, D.C. Federal agencies, the National Guard, and a temporarily federalized Metropolitan Police are deployed. The stated goals: end smash-and-grab retail crime, stop carjackings, dismantle open-air drug markets, break up illegal ATV takeovers, and make the capital safe for residents, tourists, and investors.The optics are similar: encampments cleared, streets quieter, police presence visible, sidewalks usable. But the coverage is very different. Newsom's cleanup is framed as a civic refresh; Trump's is depicted as a “coup,” a militarized occupation meant to “crush Black culture” and erase the city's character.Here's the double standard: The underlying actions—removing encampments, dispersing disorder, and signaling control—are nearly identical. The difference lies in the political framing. Newsom operates inside a media environment inclined to see him as a well-intentioned progressive trying to solve an intractable problem. Trump, by contrast, is cast as an existential threat; his motives are presumed malicious regardless of stated policy goals.This asymmetry mirrors the immigration debate. When Trump says he'll deport all 20 million undocumented immigrants, critics recast it as targeting only the most violent offenders—implying dishonesty or cruelty either way. In truth, violent offenders go to prison; it's the clean-record undocumented population that deportation actually affects. But reframing the policy into a moral litmus test changes public perception.The D.C. sweep fits the same mold. Supporters see it as long-overdue law-and-order; detractors see it as cultural suppression. To those inside the media's dominant narrative, Trump can never be normalized, and any exercise of executive authority is suspect—no matter how closely it resembles what a Democratic leader might do without controversy.The stakes go beyond partisan grievance. If public disorder is tolerated until an ally's event, but condemned as tyranny when an opponent acts, then public space becomes a proxy battlefield in America's endless political war. The broom is the same. The hands holding it determine the headline.

200 acres of prime hunting and recreational land just outside of Hill City MN.  5 -40 acreage parcels with the Hill River running through it.  A mix of tilable and wooded land with solid roads and trails through out it. Great for hunting and ATV enthusists.  Must see to truly appreciate.  $369,900- Chuck Carstensen RE/MAX Results 612-290-3809

It was 40 years ago today….On August 10th 1985 Michael Jackson purchased the Beatles song catalog from ATV, beginning one of the most legendary rock feuds of the 20th century. You could argue that it ended with Jackson's death in 2009. But you could also argue that it didn't…Andrew journeys through the entire Beatles recording career and plays one rarity from each year they were active.#paulmccartney #johnlennon #michaeljacksonListen, like and follow! IG: @toptrackpodEmail: toptrackpodcast@gmail.comFacebook: Top Track Bar and GrillBlueSky: @toptrackpod

GLP-1 shots can make your penis bigger, Howard Stern reactions, Green Dildo Coin, Spotify AI DJ, Jussie Smollett comeback, Maz quits on the Detroit Tigers, Jim's Picks: Butt Rock Songs, and Maxim Magazine in trouble for a 2007 article. Season 27 of South Park is on a roll. Even JD Vance dug it. Someone has taken credit for the green dildos at the WNBA games. It's a damn meme coin called Green Dildo Coin. If you needed another reason to take Ozempic (men only), some Reddit user is making a bold claim. Don't record on your phone when you ride an ATV. Howard Stern had the most bizarre "press conference" in Detroit in 1997 when he debuted on 97.1. Marc's been digging his Spotify AI DJ. A new Bonerline. Drew almost threw up today with the newest Diddy news. How many chances is this dude going to get? Special Forces Season 4 has a great cast. Some people are saying one of the contestants planted a noose on the set. Kelly Clarkson's ex has died at 48. She was not a fan of his. Drew Barrymore showed us her messy apartment.  Someone owes some people an apology. 2007 Maxim Magazine's Unsexiest Women. Tom had time for us after his medical procedure. Ennis Rakestraw is out for the year. Do the Detroit Lions really have it that bad at backup QB? The Detroit Tigers have really been on a rough stretch. Tom ran out of gas. More Howard Stern news...The 95 person staff were all blindsided. We go through a lot of comments from our YouTube video. Jim's Picks: Top 10 Butt Rock Songs. If you'd like to help support the show… consider subscribing to our YouTube Channel, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter (Drew Lane, Marc Fellhauer, Trudi Daniels, Jim Bentley and BranDon).

The Howard Stern Show over at SiriusXM, more WNBA green dildos, kratom crackdown, a cop cam Karen, Andy Green update, a new China virus, and bad AI Katy Perry & Paul McCartney stories. Watch Drew on the Catching Up Podcast. A third dildo has been tossed on a WNBA court. A FOURTH dildo was thwarted. We're reminded of the best dildo video on the internet. Brooke Hogan sucks at music and being a daughter. She didn't attend Hulk's funeral. RIP Loni Anderson. Drew would rather nail Jan Smithers. BranDon does not look like this murderer. Howard Stern will not be renewed on SiriusXM. What will become of his 90 employees? Drew is interested in Kratom. Jim Bentley is on the mend following his ATV accident. Andy Green is still roaming the streets of NYC and telling stories. Kim Kardashian is out to find Amy Bradley from Amy Bradley Is Missing fame on Netflix. Wide mouth Carly Simon once nailed New York Mets star Keith Hernandez. Prince Harry quit his own charity. Kate Merrill is suing her former CBS TV station WBZ in Boston. We watch a beast of a woman battle with the police. The Woodward Dream Cruise is creeping up. Let Drew know about any Aston Martin events for his buddy, The Wild Man. Marc gets more crap for taking his kids to a Katy Perry concert. Did Katy Perry perform in Ferndale or is it just a BS AI story? Paul McCartney definitely DID NOT visit Phil Collins in the hospital. China has a new virus floating around. Todd Blanche and Ghislaine Maxwell had a 9-hour conversation just for her to say Trump didn't do anything. The transcripts may be released. Donald Trump misnamed Kristi Noem. Trump has also been de-banked. The brawl in Cincinnati won't go away. JD Vance's half-brother enters the mix. Check out this bike crash. Cameron Diaz is declared unrecognizable. If you'd like to help support the show… consider subscribing to our YouTube Channel, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter (Drew Lane, Marc Fellhauer, Trudi Daniels, Jim Bentley and BranDon).

Lomgtime Cleveland Police Dtetective Steve loomis joins Bob. They talk about the ongoing problem of street takeovers. He talks about what can be done to stop the mobs of dirtbikes, ATV's and cars roaming the streets and causing danger for the public.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Newly 18-year-old Lil Tay joins OnlyFans. WATP Karl takes down “hero Opie” & the end of The Really Good Podcast. Plus – a Katy Perry pass out, Diddy denied, Donald Trump v. Gayle King, Sydney Sweeney dividing America, and Drew Crime: Mr. & Mrs. Murder. Jim Bentley has been injured in an ATV accident. He'll be fine, but needs surgery. Marc rocked out at Katy Perry. A female fan passed out and collapsed on stage. Drew popped up on the Catching Up Podcast with Matt Shepard and Craig Monroe. Check it out later this week. Drew Crime: Mr. & Mrs. Murder is on Hulu now. Quadruple murderers are all the rage now. Rod Stewart is getting crap for his AI Ozzy Osbourne tribute. Noah Cyrus is HUGE. Lil Tay is now a Lil Whore on OnlyFans. She claims to have made over $1M in 3 hours. Who are these pedophilic simps? Diddy has been denied bail. Gina Huynh is a liar and on Team Diddy now. Drew is extremely happy to receive his ‘poop anywhere' card. WATP's Karl Hamburger drops by to show us Alex Stein's latest prank on MSNBC, rip into fallen radio star Gregg ‘Opie' Hughes, the fall of The Really Good Podcast starring Bobbi Althoff and more. The Donald: Donald Trump declares Gayle King “over” and Taylor Swift “not hot”. Gay Trump is the best Trump. Late Night is much different now than your parent's Late Night. How long will the Jeffrey Epstein files linger? Woody Allen wrote a charming note to Jeffrey Epstein. Erik Menendez is BACK in prison following kidney stones. More video of the Cincinnati beatdown is out featuring an n-word. The woman beaten has raised over $400k on GiveSendGo. Bryan Kohberger survivor Dylan Mortensen is cleaning up on GoFundMe. Sydney Sweeney is heckled for being in a “racist ad”. The POTUS has her back. Michael Weitzel can leave his MAGA hat on. If you'd like to help support the show… consider subscribing to our YouTube Channel, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter (Drew Lane, Marc Fellhauer, Trudi Daniels, Jim Bentley and BranDon).

As a Trauma Surgeon and Critical Care Specialist at Rapid City Hospital, Leslie Van Dyne, M.D. shares her unique perspective on caring for patients in a rural area known for outdoor adventure and seasonal risks. Dr. Van Dyne explains the differences between trauma surgery and emergency medicine, discusses caring for critical patients in the ICU and relates how activities like ATV riding, horseback riding and summer tourism impact the trauma cases she sees. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Groups of ATV and dirt bike riders wreaked havoc on Cleveland streets over the weekend; a gun was found in a diaper bag at a Columbus-area daycare facility; Vivek Ramaswamy held a town hall meeting in Cincinnati; College Football Coaches' Poll puts Ohio State at #2.

This week features a deep dive into the deep hollers of the Appalachians with a local to the mountains, fishing guide, and friend of the show Nick T. The guys start with a strange correlation with the country of Georgia cuisine, why younger brothers can never win, and a “small world” story between a TV host and Big Money Banks. Next the three get into the correct pronunciation, Jrad's time with the Appalachian Service Project, driving ATV's with snakes, life in the hollers, the best Appalachian food like pickled eggs, wild true and ghost stories alike only possible in this part of the country, associating with your county not city,

Quaranteam-Northwest: Part 7 Hillbilly Tactics. Based on a post by Break The Bar. Listen to the ► Podcast at Explicit Novels.   The TV flashed, losing a digital telephone ring, and I grabbed the remote from the table and accepted the call. "Hey, Harrison," said the man on the other end. He was another lab coat, and as best I could tell from the blurry background he was likely in the same facility or even the same room as Doctor Varma had been. This guy looked like he'd stepped right out of a corny television show though; he was blubbery in the way that a guy could be after a couple of decades of slow physical decline, with a burst of thinning silver hair that just needed the black streaks and some smudges on his face to look like he'd been catoonishly blown up. The bit of scraggly, messy scruff on his chin that looked unplanned made me a little self-conscious of my own currently messy beard. Erica had wanted me to grow mine out a bit so she could decide if she liked it longer or shorter, and Ivy didn't care, so I was looking even more like a mountain man than usual. "I'm Doctor McKenna, but you can call me Bill," he continued. "You're on Doc Varma's team?" I asked, putting two and two together. "Yep," he nodded. "I was supposed to do the follow-up interview with you but got caught up with some of the numbers in your case. Charlotte and I have both reviewed the content. Sounds like you had a bit of a wild time, huh? And don't worry, we're all getting pretty used to the graphic nature of our work these days so you didn't offend or embarrass anyone." "Well, that's something at least," I said. "I never thought I'd be having a conversation like that with a doctor. Or anyone." He got a wry grin at this and held up a hand to ease me. "Believe me, Harrison. I've been with the team from the start and we have had more than a few of these sorts of conversations based on the nature of the vaccine. Yours is definitely up there as a novel case of details, but it's only personal for you, not us." I just nodded, not knowing what to say. I hadn't considered how often sex must come up in their day-to-day work if they were specialists. "Now, I have; well, I can't say it's good nor bad news," Doctor Bill said. "Interesting for us, for sure. As I'm sure you're aware, as you have two partners already, the vaccine is supposed to only be transmissible from women to men for the purposes of diluting the effects on men. To be frank, no one here on the team had considered the possibility of transferring and initiating a bonding process from one woman to another through female ejaculate. It doesn't help that most of the science community, those that would even think of it, haven't exactly spent time studying female ejaculate to begin with. So your situation wasn't tested for, but as far as we can tell it still shouldn't have been able to happen." "So what does that mean, doc?" I asked. "It means that you, or one of your current partners, or some combination, integrated with the vaccine and imprinting process in an exceptional way. A variant response is how we're categorizing it at the moment, and to be frank it's not even one of the most surprising ones we've encountered as the testing continues to broaden. As best we can tell from your interview, it's likely that Miss Peters was vaccinated through the oral ingestion of the female ejaculate; all the markers of a normal imprinting process occur when you began actual sex together. "Now, the really interesting part of this on my end is obviously the fact that this happened at all, but following the results of the blood tests from the Testing facility up where you are, and the preliminary tests we've completed on the samples that got flown down to us here, we've found that it isn't likely to be a phenomenon that is worth pursuing. Unfortunately, while Miss Peters is certainly going to be imprinted on you to some degree, it also seems that the efficacy of the vaccine in her system will be well under our current rates. Right now our projection is that she will only have an efficacy rate of about thirty-five to forty per cent, while a woman who has undergone our current best practices has an efficacy of somewhere around the eightieth percentile." I had to rub my forehead and close my eyes for a long moment as I tried to parse everything he was saying. "So what does that mean, Doctor Bill?" I asked. "It means that Miss Peters is now part of your 'Team,' he said. "That's what I've been calling the groups of imprinted people colloquially around here, anyways. But where your other two partners have a high likelihood of staving off the Duo Halo virus, if Miss Peters is exposed she is about half as likely to resist initial infection or gain serious aid in fighting off an infection she catches." "So we've put her at risk by having casual sex with her," I said. "Fuck me, this is exactly the kind of shit that I was worried about when she asked to join in with us." "Yes and no," he said. "To be frank, it's entirely possible that her integration with the vaccine will grow and normalize over time with repeated exposure to you. The staff up there will book some follow-up blood draws to check in on that. One of the many things were are trying to understand about the vaccine is how sex bolsters imprinted partners. Generally, we haven't seen that happen for women, since they can't have more than one imprinted male partner, but the more partners men are in contact with the more efficacy we're seeing." "So you're saying she's stuck with me," I said. "She asked for no-strings-attached, and she got trapped into a sexual relationship." "You could look at it that way," he said. "But,” "But," Doc Varma said, coming into view on his end of the call and hovering over his shoulder. "I would remind you, Mr. Black, that she did choose to initiate a group sexual encounter with you and your partners. And once she is awake from the imprinting process, I would not be surprised if she feels content with the overall situation following any initial panic or shock." I leaned back in my chair and stared at the ceiling for a moment. "You know, when I first heard about this from Erica, I told her it sounded like some sort of brainwashing mind control shit? I couldn't believe she'd gotten the vaccine. But then everything was going so well that I stopped thinking about it. And Ivy was happy, and Erica's brother was partnered and they were both extremely happy. But this,” I sighed heavily and looked at the two scientists on the screen. "This is some fucked up, B-movie supervillain kind of shit. You guys realize that, right? Like, where is James Bond in all of this?" Bill frowned, but Doc Varma smirked just a little. "Yes," she said. "We are aware of how inappropriate many of the factors of the vaccine are, Mr. Black. It is a marvel of modern medicine, but we are still grappling with the necessities that come along with it." Together they ran me through what I needed to expect moving forward. Vanessa was going to be monitored until she woke up, so I would be spending the night where I was at. She'd get a complete physical, and they'd take more blood for testing before she'd be released into my care and we were brought back home. Then, depending on what she wanted, she would either be able to live with Erica, Ivy and I, or she could maintain some distance for the time being and only come to see me for the sexual encounters she would require. We would both receive follow-up check-ins from someone on the Vaccine testing team to draw more blood periodically to check if Vanessa's efficacy was changing, or if mine was. We hit the grocery store next, which ended up only allowing two people inside in a party at once. Dani wanted to look for some specific stuff, and Vanessa hadn't had her own kitchen to cook in for almost two years since she'd been eating cafeteria food on industrial construction sites, so I decided to hang out in the truck while they went in. I sent them with my credit card and reminded them of the staples we needed. They got in line outside the store, and I decided to enjoy the warmth of the afternoon and open the gate of my truck so I could sit outside. I watched Dani and Vanessa from across the parking lot, keeping one eye on them while I could. I could tell they were talking from the small hand motions. Neither of them talked with their hands like Erica or Leo did, but everything seemed friendly between them. "Excuse me?" I turned and realized I'd tunnel-visioned and completely lost track of my surroundings because a woman was standing about ten paces away from me. That wasn't like me at all. She was nervous, wringing her wrists as she stood awkwardly. She was a little scrawny, her clothes hanging off of her, and the eyes above her rough-looking mask were... not sunken, but sort of sad. "I'm sorry to bother you, Harri," she said. "I was just wondering if maybe you could spare a couple bucks? Things aren't really going well right now, and I've got my kids..." Living in Portland, I'd seen my fair share of homeless folks and beggars. Some of them were pushy and agitated, and others entirely shut down from their addictions. This woman didn't look homeless, but she definitely looked down on her luck. And down for enough time that it showed. She wasn't wearing even basic earrings but had the holes in her ears. There was a slightly less tan ring on her finger where I assumed a wedding band used to sit, but it was fading. Every major city in the United States had a homeless population. Some were worse than others, I knew that. The further south along the coast, the warmer it got, and the bigger the population. But out here in the sticks? In Jewell? Sure, we had the occasional drifter moving through. I'd never seen someone begging before. Things were really getting bad. "Uh, yeah, I can," I said, reaching for my wallet in my pocket. "I'm sorry, you know me but I'm not immediately recognizing you. Maybe it's the mask." She took a couple steps forward as I said I could spare her some cash, but looked away as I asked who she was. I kicked myself, realizing that her situation was embarrassing enough as it was. "Maybe you don't remember me," the woman said. "I was a year ahead of you in high school. Mary Duncan?" "Of course I remember you, Mary," I said. "It's just been a long time. You were a cheerleader I think, right? You did all the flips. You were really graceful." "Thanks," she said, and I could tell she was blushing behind her mask. I didn't have too much cash on me compared to what I used to carry for emergencies. I used to be a cash-only guy, at least around town. Knowing what my bank account looked like, I just pulled what I had and slipped down from the gate of my truck and set the bills on it, stepping back. "No offence, I don't think you stink or anything," I tried to joke. Mary's eyes went wide when she saw the bills, and she mumbled something as she stepped forward and I backed off a bit more so she could take them. It was maybe seventy dollars, but as she quickly looked through the bills I saw her get teary, and then she clutched the cash to her chest and collapsed to her knees, crying. I wanted to go and comfort her. Give her a hug. She was clearly overwhelmed and in a bad way, and back when we were in school she'd always been a cute, button-nosed girl with a soft smile and a big laugh. But I couldn't go to her. I couldn't rub her back or pat her shoulder or give her a hug. The best I could do was squat down from several feet away to get closer to her level. "Mary?" I asked. She sniffed hard and rubbed at her eyes. "Oh my God, I'm so embarrassed," she said. "You don't need to be," I said. "You said you have kids, right? How many?" "Two," she said. "Thomas is six now, and looks like his dad. My little girl Charlie is four. She wanted to go to school like her big brother this fall but..." But the schools were closed, and who knew how long they would be closed for? "And their Dad?" I asked. She sniffed hard again. "He went up to Portland to look for work after we both got laid off at the start of quarantine," she said. "I haven't heard from him since." "Fuck," I breathed out, hopefully not loud enough for her to hear. The guy could have abandoned his family like a shit, or just been overwhelmed and trying to find a way to make it right. Or he could be dead. "Mary, I'm sorry you're going through this. And I'm sorry if this touches another sore spot, but is your phone still active?" She nodded, touching the ragged little purse. I asked her to take it out and I immediately recognized that she'd probably downgraded her phone at a pawn shop, it was a beat-up old model barely above a flip phone. I gave her my number. "Call me the next time you need groceries, Okay?" I said. "Or if there's an emergency. Seriously, Mary." "I applied for food stamps, and welfare, but I haven't heard anything back," she said pitifully, like she was trying to explain her shitty situation. There wasn't any explaining. "The system is probably overloaded," I said softly. "Mary. I'm not pulling your leg. Go get groceries for you and your kids. I'll figure something out for you for next week, Okay?" "Harri, I can't just; I don't want to,” It was fucking stupid, but this woman who I remembered as that sweet girl was broken. I stood up and went to her, and pulled her to her feet and hugged her. She was tiny, and bony, in my arms. She'd probably been feeding her kids everything she could and taking the bare minimum for herself. "Stop," I said quietly as I held her, and she cried a little again. "You're doing what you can in a terrible situation, Mary. I'm doing Okay. Let me help." "Thank you," she whispered into my shirt, then sniffed behind her mask again and stepped away. 'Thank you, Harri." "Text me," I reminded her. "So that I have your number." "I will," she nodded. "I will." She left, headed towards the line outside the store, and I watched her go. Hopefully I wasn't going to pay for that moment of kindness with my life. But what was the point of being vaccinated and wealthy if I couldn't help a hurting woman? I sat back on the gate of my truck and saw the two big paper bags holding the meat I'd just bought. Hundreds of dollars' worth. I could have given her some, along with the cash. One of the chickens and some of the sausages. Kids liked sausage, right? Then I could practically hear my Mom's voice in the back of my mind. She'd been the giver in the family before she died. The volunteer. And she'd always said that you couldn't do your best for others without taking care of your family first. Seventy dollars would carry Mary and her kids for a few days at least. I could set up an account with Mason, connect her with Mrs. Branston for eggs, and cover her bill. I doubted I could do the same at the grocery store, but meat was always the most expensive part of meals anyways. I could drop a couple hundred bucks with her to help cover her other staples every few weeks. I looked down at my sweater, hoping again that I wasn't going to pay for this with sickness and death. What did those docs say? Eighty per cent effective, with more for each partner? I had three partners now, so I had to be like ninety per cent covered, right? The rest of my wait in the parking lot, unfortunately, wasn't peaceful. A guy with some parking lot road rage pounded on his horn at a woman who was loading her car. A half dozen teens skated through on skateboards, whooping and hollering and skirting by too close to people. None of them were wearing masks, and I saw a few of them spitting near people or fake coughing just to get a reaction out of them. I was trying to decide if I should call the emergency line, but they were gone as quickly as they arrived. Teens, rebellious and angry at the world, and most importantly bored and left to their own devices. Thankfully since I'd parked at the back of the lot they didn't really come near me. I did end up calling 911 when the fight broke out though. Two women were yelling at each other as they exited the store, both of them with full carts. I had no idea what they were shouting, but they definitely got the attention of everyone in the parking lot and the line. Then one lady pivoted and smacked her buggy into the other lady, and that one grabbed something out of the other's cart and threw it. "911 Emergency Services. Where is the emergency located?" "Yeah, I'm at the Green Grocer in Jewell," I said. "My name is Harrison Black. I need police services, a fight has broken out between two women in the parking lot and it's gotten physical." I could hear typing on the other end of the line. "I've dispatched a cruiser, sir, but the arrival time is at least twenty minutes. Is anyone's life in danger?" "Other than the pandemic?" I sighed. The women were grappled at this point, both of them trying to throw punches. "Hard to say. Neither of them are backing down and they've got a hold of each other and are swinging." "If you can, try to keep anyone else from getting involved, sir," the operator said. "And remember to keep your distance." "Fuck," I said as one of the ladies connected cleanly with the nose of the other. Blood started streaming down that one's face but it didn't stop her from clawing at the other with a snarl. "It's getting worse. There's blood now. Look, I'm not saying you have the authority to let me do this, but I've got my handgun in the truck and could pop one into the ground to spook them and try and disperse the issue." There was a long moment of silence on the other end of the line. "..... I mean, I'm not going to tell you to do that.... But..." "Understood," I said. I gave the operator my number, since I was sure the police were going to want to follow up with me, and then slammed the gate of my truck closed and went to the passenger side. Dani had returned the 1911 to its case thankfully, so I quickly slammed the magazine home and did a quick check to see it had one chambered before walking across the parking lot with the pistol held low and to the side. The women were scrapping on the ground at this point. A crowd had formed, not so close to each other to be shoulder to shoulder, but closer than they should have been. "Hey!" I shouted over the noise in my best military voice, but only the closest few people glanced over at me. One saw my gun and his eyes went wide. I sighed and shook my head, then pointed the muzzle at one of the little end-row barriers that had a sprig of a garden inside the concrete curb and pulled the trigger. The loud popping boom of the discharge quieted everyone real quick, including the fighting ladies as they all looked over at me. "Get the fuck out of here," I shouted. People scattered, including the two fighting ladies as they scrambled to recover their carts. I was pretty sure several items had gone missing from their shopping bags in the ruckus, claimed by other people who felt they needed them more. I just shook my head as I flipped the safety on and tucked the 1911 into the pocket on the front of my sweater. There were still a few people in line at the front of the store, along with an employee monitoring it, so I went over. It turned out to be the same teen as that time I'd been here with Erica and almost gotten in a fight myself. I gave him my name and let him know the police were already on their way. He said it wasn't the first fistfight he'd seen break out this week, let alone in the last month. "Kid," I said. "This job ain't worth your life." He shrugged. "I'm saving for college, and the bonus pay I'm getting as a front-line worker is adding up quickly." "College ain't worth your life either. Just saying." Dani and Vanessa came out of the store a little while later. I'd already returned the 1911 to its case and was sitting on the tailgate of my truck again. I explained to them what happened, both with Mary and with the fight. And I admitted to hugging Mary despite the danger. "I can walk home from here," I said. "We probably shouldn't get into the truck together. I'll need to,” "Harri," Vanessa interrupted me. "Shut up and get in the car. You're not in any danger, right? You're vaccinated. We're both vaccinated." "Yeah, but you are way less covered than the rest of us," I said. "It's not a big deal. It'll take a couple of hours of walking." Vanessa took it into her own hands and practically tackled me. "Oops, too late." "Vanessa!" I said in a panic and looked at Dani for help. "Lady made her decision," Dani shrugged. "We can either live in fear of it, or just do our best." So I ended up driving again, praying that Mary wasn't sick, which would mean I wasn't carrying it. I felt like an idiot all over again for hugging her, for risking everything to comfort her. But then I'd also seen that look on her face and I knew she'd needed it. Our last stop of the trip was Mrs. Branston's, but when I pulled into the front of her long gravel driveway I noticed that she hadn't put the flat of eggs I'd asked for in the usual spot. Frowning, I pulled out my phone and called her, but it went to voicemail immediately. "That's weird," I said. "Mrs. Branston is always home." "You want to go check on her, don't you," Vanessa said, not really a question. "Well, she's seventy and lives alone," I said. "She's not exactly ancient, but she's no spring chicken either." "Alright, let's go see what's up," Dani said. Then turned to Vanessa. "You're staying here though." "What?" Vanessa said. "Why?" "Because you already took one risk today, and I'm starting to like you too much to let you do two in a day," Dani smirked, then pulled up her mask. "Ugh, fine," Vanessa sighed. "Crack the windows for me at least." I did her one better and left the truck running with the AC on. Dani and I walked up the drive. It was long, but nowhere near as long as mine had been. The Branston's had built their house almost forty years ago; Victor Branston had worked at the local lumber mill, and his wife Hailey had started their side business of raising chickens and eggs after they built their single-story ranch house and barn. They'd had a son who had died in a drunk driving accident when I was still a kid, and a daughter who had moved away when I was still in middle school. At the top of the drive I tried calling again, and with no answer, Dani and I went to the front door and I knocked, then stepped back. "Mrs. Branston!" I called loudly. "You home?" Again, no answer. Shaking my head, I frowned beneath my mask and furrowed my brow. Her car was parked in front of the house, so she wasn't out. "Let's check in some windows," Dani suggested. "If she fell and broke her hip or something she might not be able to reach her phone." So that's what we did. It felt rude, peeking in her windows like that, but I let the MP side of me take over. I was looking into her kitchen when Dani gasped and motioned me to the other end of the side of the house. She was holding a gloved hand over her mask. I rushed over and looked in. It was Mrs. Branston's bedroom, and she was lying in the bed completely still. There was a dark stain around her mouth and nose and on the edge of some of the sheets. I recognized the dried blood. It looked like she'd been coughing it up. "Fuck," I sighed, stepping back from the window. Her sallow skin. Her sunken eyes. It was haunting. I called Emergency Services for the second time in less than an hour and reported it. "What do we do now?" Dani asked. "I'd say call her family, but I don't know her daughter's number. I think Mrs. Branston said she moved out east somewhere," I said. "We'll need to leave that to the police. Other than that?" I shrugged and looked around at the property. Hailey Branston had lived here going on forty years. Now there was no one. My eyes settled on the barn. "If nothing else, we should feed the chickens," I said. "No need for them to starve to death." "Good idea," Dani nodded and followed me towards the barn. Now, my worry had been that the chickens might be dead. I really wasn't sure how long it would take for chickens to starve to death, so I was preparing myself for the stink of not only a chicken coop but of dead bodies. What I wasn't prepared for was for the place to be empty. "What the fuck?" "This is weird," Dani said, looking at the rows and rows of empty cages. It was obvious this was a chicken operation. Just the bird poo around was enough to point to that. But there weren't any chickens. "How do fifty chickens just up and vanish?" I asked, wandering deeper into the barn. "It's not just the chickens," Dani said behind me. She was standing at a big bin near the front door with a big 'feed' label on it. She'd lifted the lid. "All their food is gone too except for a bit of mess at the bottom." I just shook my head, frowning as I looked around. Maybe there was some sort of metaphor here about Haily Branston's life, but all I was seeing was a crime scene. "Who the fuck finds out an old woman is dead, and instead of reporting it they steal all her chickens?" "An asshole," Dani said. "Assholes," I corrected. "This would have taken forever if it was just one person. There had to be at least two, probably more." I sighed. "Alright, we need to get out of here. We'll report it to the police when they get here." Dani and I went back down to Vanessa, filling her in on what we'd seen, and then waited. Thirty minutes later I called Emergency Services again on the non-emergency line, asking for an update on when we could expect someone to come out. "I'm sorry sir, but all our services are currently dispatched at the moment with active issues," the operator said. "We've got your report on file, and an ambulance will be dispatched when police are available. We have your name and number on file, we don't need you to stay on location." That was definitely not the norm for someone calling in a dead body, and it made me worried. "Alright," I said. "I just need to add something to the report then. After my previous call we checked in on Mrs. Branston's agricultural livestock. Someone has stolen all her chickens." "I'm... sorry?" the operator said. "Someone stole fifty-odd chickens," I clarified. There was another long moment of quiet from the other end of the line. "Chickens?" "Yeah, chickens," I said. A long sigh. "Alright, I added it to the report. Have a good day, sir." "You,” the operator hung up. "-too." "That sounded like it went great," Vanessa said sarcastically. "Yeah," I said, wondering what the fuck was happening to my home town. "I can't say that it did." Vanessa came jogging down from the office portables when the black sedan came rolling around the bunkhouses. After we'd gotten back from our big run, and Erica had berated me for taking a risk with Mary even while telling me how sweet a man I was, things had settled down. Leo's new partners had slept through the day with their imprinting, but we'd grilled up some extra sausages in case they woke up in the night and were hungry. I'd spent some time late in the afternoon with Ivy, and that night I'd slept with Vanessa on one side of me, and Ivy on the other while Erica spooned up behind her and rested a hand on my chest. We'd all been naked, but nothing overtly sexual had happened Vanessa had gone back to work in the morning, the first to wake up, and as she got ready and dug through her luggage Erica got up and made her coffee. The smell woke me up, and I realized it was 5:30 in the morning. It looked like our schedule was going to be changing with Vanessa in our lives. Breakfast was a quiet affair later in the morning; at least, quiet for us. Leo's RV was visibly rocking, and I had to assume Aria and India were up and the four of them were getting better acquainted. By the time Vanessa came back around for her breakfast break I'd already come in Erica, but Ivy had held off; apparently, the three of them had talked, and Vanessa only had about fifteen minutes for her breakfast break which meant a quicker-than-usual blowjob was necessary if she wanted some fun with her food. By mid-morning things had quieted down over at Leo's RV, and I'd left a platter of food wrapped with tinfoil on a chair next to the door. Ivy was just starting to get handsy with me, sitting on my lap and giggling with that look in her eye, distracting me from my drawing, when the crunch of tires outside the compound perked us up. The sedan ground to a halt, and Vanessa quickly came down to stand with Erica and Ivy and me. Agent Sourpuss was the driver again, and she just narrowed her eyes at us for a moment before turning back and speaking into the back seat. The door opened, and a woman in that same hooded coverall getup stepped out. "Hi," I said, stepping forward and offering her my hand. "I'm Harrison." "Kyla," she said through her mask, taking my hand and shaking it lightly. "I'm not really sure what you were expecting," I said. "I know things are weird and changing a lot for everyone, so if anything sounds like a problem just let us know and we can figure it out. The first of which is that, ah, these are my partners Erica, Ivy and Vanessa." "Allo!" Ivy said, stepping forward and wrapping the woman up in a hug. Ivy was still the shortest and most petite of the women, with Kyla standing around the same height as Vanessa. "Hi," Erica said, smiling warmly but not stepping forward, which I knew was because she knew the secret. In any other circumstance she likely would have been trying as hard as Ivy to be welcoming in an effort to dispel the weirdness. Agent Sourpuss rolled down the window. "Hey, you need to stop being so touchy. Protocol says you need to imprint as soon as possible." I sighed, glaring at her a little. "I hear you. Let's just make sure this is all Okay with her, yeah?" I turned back to Kyla, whose eyes were a little wide as she cautiously accepted the hug from Ivy. "Um, hello," she said, looking around at the construction site, and our ridiculous-looking compound. "There's a lot for us to explain," I said. "I can see that," she said. The more she talked, the more I heard a slight accent. It wasn't strong, not like Dani's, and I had to assume being the daughter of an Ambassador meant she'd grown up at least part of her life in the US or other places. Not to mention any training she'd received. "Are you Okay with this?" Erica asked her. "The idea of sharing space with a group of us?" "For what it's worth, I'm the newest and stumbled into it by accident, but it works for me," Vanessa chipped in. Kyla looked around again, then back at Sourpuss, and finally back to me. "It's the way things are," she said. "I can make it work." "Well, if you change your mind, you have until we start the imprinting process," I said. "Just say something and we can try to find you someone, or somewhere, else." She shook her head, then turned to Sourpuss again. "You can go." "Fine by me," the Agent muttered, raising her window and pulling the car away. I was almost sure I heard her mutter something about never wanting to come back again. "Come in," Erica said, gesturing to the fabric-draped entryway. "We'll show you around and can tell you what's up." Kyla followed Erica and Ivy in, but Vanessa hung back. "I need to get back to work," she said. "I'll come meet her later if you haven't dicked her down yet." I snorted and shook my head at her crassness. The only people who could get close to matching military folks in that way turned out to be construction workers. "Everything going Okay?" I asked. "Yeah, it's fine. Just getting the animals back in order after being away. They're going to be moving workers into the bunkhouses in the next few days so there's a lot to get ready," she said. She reached over and squeezed my hand for a second, but didn't step in for a kiss even though I could see her glance at my lips. "See you later?" "Absolutely," I said, and she started marching back towards the office portables. When I ducked back into our compound, Erica and Ivy had arranged the deck chairs into a semi-circle and Ivy was coming out of our place with a quartet of beers from the fridge. Erica was just gesturing for Kyla to take a seat. "We're all vaccinated," she was saying. "So if you want to get out of that getup you can." Kyla sat and sighed, lowering her hood and then taking off her medical mask. She was gorgeous. Her hair was a natural silky black with that smooth quality that Native Americans and East Asian folks shared, and she had cute little apple cheeks when she smiled softly in thanks as she accepted a beer from Ivy. Her skin was naturally tan, and she'd done her makeup to accent her ethnicity a bit rather than downplaying it, and knowing what I knew about her I wondered if that was a move to try and distract or seduce me. She had espionage training. She knew how to use her assets. "So Harrison," she nodded to me, then pointed at Ivy. "Ivy, and..." she looked at Erica. "Sorry, something with an E, right?" "Erica," my girlfriend clarified for her with a smile. "Right, Erica," Kyla said. "And the other was Vanessa?" "Right," I nodded. "Vanessa is actually a forewoman with the construction crews, so she had to get back to work." "Okay," she nodded. "And you all live in these trailers?" "RVs," I said. "And it's just temporary. My family owned this land for generations, and recently the government leased it from me and is building a residential compound. We'll be getting a house, and for now we've got these luxury RVs. But, uh, we're actually only living in that one. The other one is occupied by my friend and Erica's brother Leo and his partners." "So there's going to be five of us in there?" Kyla asked, raising an eyebrow as she looked over the RV. "Yes," Ivy said with a smile. "It's very nice on the inside. And the bed is very cozy." "The bed?" Kyla said, emphasizing the singular. "That's, uh, another thing," I said. "This is a little rude but, well Erica, Ivy and Vanessa are all bisexual. Are you;?" "I'm straight," she said. Erica just nodded, though I could tell out of the corner of my eye that Ivy was a little disappointed but tried to hide it. "That's perfectly fine," I said. "We'll figure out a sleeping arrangement so that you're comfortable." "I,” Kyla started, then glanced at Erica and Ivy for a moment and seemed to change her mind. "Look, I'm stepping into your thing here already, so I don't want to be a bitch. But could I just... Could I talk for a moment with the guy who I'm going to be bonding DNA with or whatever?" "Yes, absolutely," Erica said. "Do you want to go inside, or should we?" Kyla glanced over at Leo's RV. "Maybe we should," she said and stood up. I stood as well, patted Ivy's shoulder and met a glance from Erica as she tried to warn me to be careful without saying anything. Kyla and I went to the RV, and I opened the door for her and followed her in. "Sorry about the mess," I said. "Vanessa just moved in yesterday and we're trying to figure out what to keep here, and what to move into the storage containers." "It's... fine," Kyla said. She was looking down the length of the RV, through the open door to the bed. I could only imagine what she was thinking. "Let's just sit here," I said, offering her the bench as I took the chair by the Murphey table. I wasn't going to mention that we used the bench for fucking almost as much as the bed. "Ask me anything," I said as we sat. "I know this is all weird, and you must have a thousand questions and concerns." "I do," she said, and leaned back on the leather bench and took a deep breath. I just met her eyes as she looked me over again. Then she took a swig of her beer. "What do you do for money? How does all of this work?" she asked. "Well, up until a few weeks ago, my family house was about fifty yards that way," I pointed. "Right where that first big bunkhouse building is. I worked remotely as a concept artist, and Erica's brother Leo was my roommate. Erica joined us out here for quarantine. The federal government came and wanted to buy my land, but I negotiated a lease with them instead and they paid me a lot of money for it, along with building me, Leo and my sister houses. So if you're worried about finances living out here, you don't need to. I'm not stingy, though I'd prefer if we don't get super extravagant. I'd rather us be wealthy for a long time than super-rich for a short one, and with five people on the team... Well, yeah." "The team?" she asked. "It feels a little weird to call it a family right now," I said. "What with all the changes happening so fast. I think that's how most of us will end up, but I don't want to presume anything." She frowned, looking me up and down again. When she got that look on her face she was fierce and calculating. Focused. Then it broke and she cocked her head to the side just a touch. "Did they tell you I was coming?" "Um, yeah," I nodded. "I got a warning yesterday that you'd be here sometime in the next couple of days." She nodded slowly. "Okay. I mean, obviously we'll need to figure some things out, but I think I can live with... this. I'd like to wait a day and get to know you all a bit more before we do the imprinting though. I'm not really a 'sleep with a guy on the first day' kind of girl." "I'd be happy to wait as long as you like," I said. "But, ah, you may want to talk with the others about that feeling you've got. Apparently, it'll just keep getting stronger." "Right," Kyla nodded slowly. "Okay. I'll keep that in mind." Voices rose outside. Not angry, just a little animated. "Sounds like Leo and his girls are finally coming outside," I said. "I think you'll like Danielle, she's a pretty open book. I can't make any promises about the two new women though, they arrived yesterday and I haven't had a chance to meet them properly." "That sounds good," she said. "Any other questions, or do you want to go meet them?" I asked. "Um, yeah, actually," she said. She was still giving me a slightly weird, considering look. "Do you know?" "Know what?" I asked, trying to poker face without poker facing. She kept eyeing me. "Who I am." I sighed a little. "I was told that you're the daughter of an Ambassador," I said, covering the big lie with a little truth. "Does that bother you?" she asked. "Why would it?" I replied. "I'm part Native, part Japanese, I travelled a decent chunk of the world when I was in the military. In the US, you growing up in another country is about as different as if you grew up in an east coast city." "That's not what I meant," Kyla said, sitting forward and leaning her elbows on her knees, staring right at me. "I meant does it bother you that I'm a spy?" The problem with going toe to toe with a spy was that all of my usual methods of evaluating someone were already going off. As a teen I'd been a bit of a hillbilly, I'd been an athlete, and I'd been a kid from a family with generational grudge issues. Then I'd joined the military and I learned about professional backstabbing and politics, and then I'd become an MP and really saw some of the dumb and vile crap that Man could do to each other. I'd been trained to be aware, alert, and suspicious. Seven years out of the military had softened me, I was sure. But not that much. Maybe Grierson shouldn't have told me about Kyla's background. I was trying my best to not be suspicious, which I bet if I saw myself back on a recording I would have seen as a red flag. If I hadn't known about her, I could have just accepted her and hopefully my natural and trained instincts would have picked up on anything fishy. I sighed a little huff of a chuckle and leaned back in the Murphey chair, looking at Kyla across the RV. I'd been doing my best not to just really stare at her, to make a judgement scan of her to really assess her. Maybe that gave me away. Maybe not. She was beautiful, but I'd already judged that. Her Filipino heritage was strong, but wasn't so different from the natives that I'd grown up around that it seemed out of place or exotic to me. Not to mention the plenty of varied Asians I'd lived around in Portland. She was still wearing the bulky coverall so it was hard to judge her athleticism, but just the way she sat told me she was a physical person. She was sitting on the bench, which wasn't particularly tall, but her feet were pressed to the ground by the balls of her feet and toes, her heels raised. Even though she was leaning forward with her elbows on her knees she also wasn't slouching at all. She was a coiled spring, but with a loose tension. She wasn't on edge, but was a calmly controlled nervous. "It does," I said, answering the question she'd stunned me with for a moment. 'Does it bother you that I'm a spy?' Who asked that? Was it a game, or a test? Was she trying to be truthful because of the situation, or was she running a long con to gain my trust to inevitably betray me? How calculated was this move, and what were the variables? Was it a move at all? "But not the way you might think," I continued. "It's funny, I don't even know how much they told you about me. I think I mentioned outside that I was in the military at one point. I was an MP before I was discharged. You are exactly the kind of person I would have been worried about for an important part of my life. But now? Honestly, Kyla, I just don't want you to fuck up the family dynamic we're trying to build here. I don't want you to put any of the people out there in danger, on purpose or by accident, if you plan on trying to do something for your father or NICA." She gave me a long look back, evaluating what I said. If we were sitting across from each other with a chessboard between us, or cards, I would have said she was trying to read if I was bluffing or not. But this wasn't a game, and there weren't stakes on the line, and I thankfully got the impression she wasn't trying to read me. At least, not like that. She was reading me, but she was trying to form her opinion of me, just like I was trying to with her. "Have you ever killed anyone?" she asked me. I pressed my lips together and nodded. "I didn't see as much combat as others, but I got in a few firefights," I said. "I had a few confirmed kills, and likely several more unconfirmed. And one of my investigations as an MP turned into a shootout with some human traffickers that ended... badly. Fuck, I haven't talked about that with anyone since I got out. I'd prefer you not bring it up with the girls, or Leo. Please." "I won't," she said quietly. "Have you?" I asked. "No," she shook her. "I mean, I have enough training that I could, but that wasn't ever supposed to be my job. I; I'd rather maybe talk about my story if I get more comfortable with you, but I've never carried more than a knife and a can of mace in my purse for self-protection and haven't ever needed to use either of them." "Does it bother you that I know?" I asked her. "I feel like it should, but I don't think it does," Kyla said, pursing her lips a little in thought after she said it. "I just spent the last four years living a secret life, but I've always lived a double life. You know, which means... I don't know what it means. Which is a first." "I told Erica," I said. "I wasn't supposed to, I don't think, but she can read me like a book and I didn't want to keep it from her anyways." Kyla smiled a little. "I could tell," she said. "I only picked up on little things from you because of the way she was acting." That made me chuckle a little. "Well, at least that's something. I'm not a complete waste." "So what now?" she asked. "You know that I know that you know. Do we need to set some ground rules or anything?"

Quaranteam-Northwest: Part 8 Summer Plans Based on a post by Break The Bar. Listen to the ► Podcast at Explicit Novels.  At dinner I checked in with Ivy first, then Vanessa when she had finished for the day and joined us. I also made a point of stopping to check in with Dani to see what she was thinking about her new co-team members, who she thought would work out fine, and Kyla. "I think she's a lot quieter than the rest of us," Dani told me as we sat side by side near Leo's RV. "Which isn't a bad thing, obviously. She isn't as used to being around girls like us though. Erica worked with strippers because of her job, along with all sorts of other crazy people, so it's whatever for her. Kyla obviously isn't used to how open we all are about sex things." I pressed my lips together and nodded, watching her as she sat in a group with Erica, Vanessa and Aria chatting. She was obviously engaged, but didn't offer much to the conversation and seemed happy to listen. "Anything else?" I asked. "Anything weird come up?" "No. Should I be watching for something?" Danielle asked. "No, no," I assured her. "I just; Erica, Ivy, Vanessa; it's working. It's crazy, but it's working. I'm worried about Kyla messing that up." "It should be fine," Dani said, patting me on the shoulder. "Erica will Mom them into shape if things get out of whack, and if she's the problem you can just spank her until she apologizes." That made me snort and shake my head with a grin. "You and her talk too much." "Or maybe we don't talk enough," Dani grinned. We folded ourselves back into the larger conversations, me joining the group with Kyla while Dani went to sit with Leo, India and Ivy. As the sun was setting we busted out the fire pit and Vanessa pointed me towards the nearest brush piles I could harvest some wood from; it seemed she'd handily directed some of her workers to pile it within easy walking distance. Then, once the fire was crackling and we all had our drinks of choice, we told the new women our story. We started with Leo and I, then how Erica had joined us for quarantine. We both teased her about hearing her masturbating, which until that moment she hadn't realized had been the case and made her blush. Then we talked about the land lease, the construction, and the introduction of Dani, Vanessa, and Ivy. Vanessa told us how fucking crazy she thought we were at first, but after that first night around the fire she'd realized something weird but special was going on so she stopped judging and started getting a little jealous. Then Ivy told her perspective, stepping into a life with Erica and me. Then we had to tell the story of Vanessa joining us, which got rushed over really quickly and then had to be retold because even Dani hadn't gotten all the details. I'd purposefully sat beside Kyla around the fire, Erica taking the spot on the other side of me. As India and Aria started ragging on Vanessa for not giving them the full story in the initial car ride when they met her, Kyla leaned over to me. "Can we talk? In private?" "Sure," I said, nodding towards our RV. I leaned back in the other direction to Erica and kissed her cheek, and she met my eye and nodded. Inside the RV Kyla had taken the Murphey seat this time so I sat on the bench opposite her. "You still feeling alright?" I asked her. "No," she laughed. Inside, in the more steady light of the RV, I could see she was flushed even with her slightly darker Filipina skin. "I feel like I've got a fever, but it's concentrated in all my erogenous zones. I don't even like women but that story about Vanessa has me..." She blew out a long breath. "I don't know how much more sex talk I can take before I snap." "I can ask them to stop if you want. Or we can have that conversation if you think you're ready." "I'm; Yeah, I'm ready to talk," she said. She took another deep breath and sat up straighter, putting her hands on her knees like she was trying to focus herself. "You can ask anything you want, and I'll try to answer," I promised her. "I don't have questions," she said. "Well, I actually have lots of questions, but they aren't important right this second. Seeing you with Erica and Ivy, and meeting Vanessa. Hearing the way Leo and Danielle talk about you. I think I know what I'd be getting into if I do this with you. And to be honest, it sounds pretty greater considering the other options that the world seems to be moving toward right now. But I never want to be someone who just takes the easy thing because it's in front of them. I know a lot about you now, but you don't know much about me. And I'll tell you, pretty much anything you want to know, but there's something I need to know if you're Okay with. More than my past, more than whatever your government is worried about." "The only way to know is to ask," I said, trying not to let my own nerves out. Kyla, who had been steady throughout the day, was showing signs of anxiety amidst her hard pressure to keep herself under control. "If I don't like it, we can try and find someone else as soon as possible." "I don't want,” She bit her tongue, cutting herself off, and took a breath. "Harrison. If I do this, if I imprint on you, this is my out. I've been doing everything my father wanted since I was a kid. The only escape I ever had was through dance, and even that he took control of to make sure I was getting the best lessons and tutors and going to the best camps and schools. And even then, he and NICA used it as well. My entire life I've been pushed and trained and taught and used because I didn't matter and my country and my service did. I want a new life, Harri. But I want that life the way I want it. I want a big family. I was an only child, and my parents tolerated each other at best in a political marriage. I want six kids at least, more if we can. Fuck, I'll pop out an even dozen and be happy. Or maybe not, maybe I'll be happy earlier than that, but I know I want a lot of kids to love on and raise in a big, supportive family. "If you can handle that, and if Erica can handle that because I know she's going to need to agree to it too, then I swear to God I'll be loyal to you and only to you. My father, NICA, my country; I can leave them all behind and in the dust if you can promise me we'll try to make my dream life happen. And I promise I'll be the best, hottest housewife I can be for as long as you can keep me barefoot and pregnant. I'll make sure I'm fit and tight and everything I can be for you in between pregnancies, but God I want this, Harri. I've never told anyone this before, but I want it so fucking bad." I didn't know what to say. She was practically sobbing in her earnest desire for what she was asking. I just slid down to my knees on the floor of the RV and wrapped my arms around her and Kyla clutched at me as she panted hard. Not crying, but desperately trying to control herself. "Kyla, I would be an extremely lucky man if I can give that all to you," I said. "And I want to tell you yes right away, but you're right. I do need to check with Erica first. Do you want me to call her in to ask her now?" She hesitated a moment, then nodded and sat back on the chair, sucking in a deep and unsteady breath. I stood up and opened the RV door, sticking my head out. All three of my women looked over to me and I made what I hoped was a reassuring smile, then locked eyes with Erica and motioned her over with a head jerk. She joined us, shutting the RV door behind her. "What's up?" she asked. "Everything Okay?" I looked at Kyla. "Do you want me to ask, or you?" "I; You," she said after hesitating. I turned to Erica and reached out, holding her hand. "So, I know we had our conversation earlier, but I didn't realize this was coming or maybe we would have talked about it more seriously. Kyla is ready to join us, but she has an ask. Because of her own family past, one thing she wants more than anything is to have kids. A whole bunch of them. So she wants to know if you and I are Okay with that and willing for that to happen, or if we should try to find her someone else who can help her get the life she wants." Erica's eyes had widened as I was speaking and her jaw worked a few times before she could find the right words. Then she turned to Kyla and looked at her for a long, long moment before putting a hand on her shoulder. "That's the most important thing for you?" she asked quietly. Kyla nodded, then looked up to meet Erica's gaze. "More than anything else. And I want to do that with Harrison; God, I haven't even known him a day but it's like I can see it right there in front of me. He'd make a great husband and an even better father. I just know he's yours more than either of the others, and I couldn't risk saying yes to him without you saying yes to this." "God, fuck," Erica sighed, and I realized she was tearing up as well. She looked to me. "Yes, obviously, if it's what she needs then yes. But I guess now I need to stop taking the pill because I'm not just gonna sit by and not be in the running for the first mother of your child." Now it was my turn to be surprised. "But we just,” She kissed me to shut me up. "It doesn't matter," she said. "I love you, you love me. If the world implodes and we're all shot off into space, I still won't regret making a kid with you." She turned to Kyla. "Are you going to love him?" "I'm going to try," she said. "And I'll work harder at it than my parents ever did." "Then yes," Erica said. "But, and I'll only ever say this once and you need to listen to me closely, if this isn't the truth and you hurt Harrison or me or anyone else here then I swear to everything in heaven and hell that I will end you. Do we understand each other?" Kyla nodded, taking her seriously. "I do, and I won't." "Okay," Erica said, and leaned down and kissed her on the forehead. "You clearly need a fuck, so unless you've suddenly turned Bi then I should leave you to it." She turned to me and kissed me hard, and I hugged her to keep her close. "You're sure?" I asked her in a whisper. She nodded. "Rock her world, babe. Show her why she's one of the four luckiest women on the planet." She kissed my cheek, squeezed my fingers in hers, and then stepped away and out of the RV. Kyla looked like she was going to jump out of her seat. "So,” I started. Kyla stood up abruptly and grabbed me by the face, smashing her plush lips to mine. I naturally grabbed her by the waist as we started making out right there in the middle of the RV. She'd been wearing that bulky coverall the entire day and now she started to scramble to try and get it unzipped and off at the same time as trying to get me to get my shirt off, which just turned into an awkward mess of her hands moving back and forth between us. "Stop, stop," I murmured, pulling my lips from hers. She actually whined a little in her throat and then blinked in surprise at her own reaction. I picked her up and she wrapped her legs around my waist as I carried her back towards the bed. Like this, she was taller than me and she bent down to kiss me some more, making it hard for me to navigate. Thankfully it was a straight shot, and there wasn't a lip at the door to the bedroom area that I needed to duck under or step over. I found the bed with my shin and stopped and lowered her down onto it so we lay somewhere in the middle, me on top of her as we kept making out. Once we were done I pulled away and tugged off my shirt. "Fuck," she groaned, looking at me hungrily. "Not what you're used to?" I asked. She shook her head. "No, so much better." She raised her hands to my stomach and up to my chest, letting her fingers play through my chest hair. I couldn't help myself and I reached down and unzipped the coverall down to her belly button. Underneath, all she had on was a set of black bra and panties. On the one hand, I was starting to get mesmerized by her body very quickly, but on the other, I remembered in the back of my mind that she hadn't arrived with any luggage. I lifted her from under her arms and she let me help her pull the coveralls off, then raised her ass so I could pull them from her legs as well. I crashed back down onto her, now feeling her smooth skin on mine. Her body was everything I would have expected from a dancer; smooth and sleek all over, with toned muscling and a sort of feline grace as she moved around. "Where; are; your clothes; and things?" I asked between kisses. "They said; they would bring; them up; from Cali,” she replied. Then she stopped the kissing and looked up at me. "Seriously, I've got this fucking craving for your cock right now like I can't believe, Harri. I need you to fuck me so fucking bad." "Okay," I said, and then kissed her again as I reached under her to unsnap her bra. When she realized what I wanted she didn't even bother with the snap, she just yanked the black cups off her tits and the whole thing over her head. Her tits were a perfect size for my big hands to palm, a bit bigger than Ivy's but much smaller than Erica's, and her dark brown areolas were smooth and a little puffy, with two perfect nubs for nipples. I sucked on one, feeling how hard they were, but she was stretching to try and get my shorts off of me. She needed the imprinting. We could always explore each other more in the future. I leaned away from her, one hand still on her tit and holding her down, as I shoved down my shorts and boxers. For her part, she pushed her panties down to her knees and I pulled them the rest of the way off. Her cunt was a gorgeous brown, flushed darker than the skin above and slick with her chemically-induced horniness. Even her clit hood was a little pulled back, the softer pink of her clit just visible from being swollen. She was entirely bare, and I wondered if that was a personal choice or a seduction tactic she'd been told to follow. Not that I cared at the moment. I wanted to eat her out and taste her. I wanted to make this last, to wow her like Erica had said. Fuck, let's be real, I wanted to impress the seductive honey trap spy with my sex skills. "Fuck my brains out," Kyla demanded. "Fuck me until I can only ever think of you. Take me and make me yours, you fucking massive wall of American god." I could impress her later. Her cunt accepted my cock like a perfectly tailored suit. I slid in, and even though she was tight and her muscles were firm as hell as they clenched at me she was also extremely willing. That changed when I was almost all the way in though, but not from want of trying. Kyla came, her entire body rolling and arching as her cunt clenched down enough to almost start forcing my cock out. She grabbed me around the shoulder and hugged herself up, clinging to me, and her hips roiled as she thrust hard up and down. Her eyes were squeezed shut, her lips curled in an ugly snarl for a long moment, until the orgasm passed and she let go of me, falling a couple of inches back to the bed with a 'whumph.' "H-Holy fuck," she panted, looking up at me in confusion. "What was that? That,” She blinked rapidly. "Did no one tell you about the first orgasm?" I asked her. She shook her head, still blinking like she was trying to gain her focus. "Fuck me and tell me," she said. I started to slow-thrust, enjoying the delicious warmth of her as I leaned down a bit more, pressing my full body against hers as she spread her legs wider for me. "They told Erica in the information session that she should expect a massive orgasm the first time she ingested a man's precum, and the biggest one of her life when they ingest their actual cum." "She got an information session?" Kyla panted, looking slightly alarmed. "You didn't?" I asked, equally alarmed. We'd both stopped thrusting at each other, not sure what to do. "Fuck it, fucking fuck me," she said and rolled her body to get my cock deeper inside her again. I wasn't going to argue with that. We fucked like that, mutually, for a bit and then I took some more control and went up high on my hands for better leverage and started to fuck her harder. Kyla moaned and panted beneath me, then raised her lips up and sucked on one of my nipples, which was an oddly pleasurable surprise, and then she took some of my hairy pec muscle between her teeth and bit me lightly as she came again. "Ow," I said when she dropped back to the bed again. "Sorry," she panted. "I just; you're really fucking good." Huh, maybe I can impress the spy, I thought. "I'm getting closer," I told her. I'd had... well, not the most amount of sex I'd had in a day, but a bunch, so I wasn't entirely surprised I was lasting as long as I was. "Do you want to try something else?" "I want to try everything with you," she gasped and kissed me. "But... let me..." I disengaged with her, which made her moan like a whore, and she scrambled around on the bed until she was at the bottom corner on her back. Then she spread her legs wide into a full split, and then even wider until she had one leg practically parallel with her torso and the other was way out to the other side. If she was a clock, she would have been showing 10 o'clock. "Fuck me hard. Use my hole," she said, licking her lips. "Get your cock back inside; yes! Oh, fuck, Harrison. Make my cunt fucking squirm. Make your cunt squirm. It's yours now. I'm yours. My whole body. Fuck! I've never felt it like this before. I've never felt anything like this." I was crushing down into her in big, hard strokes and I could feel her cunt squishing with her juices and my balls slapping against her ass cheeks. I was hovering over her and a bead of sweat had trailed down to the end of my nose. Kyla opened her mouth and stuck her tongue out, licking it off of me. I lowered the rest of the way to her and kissed her hard, then hugged her tightly as I started pumping short and quick, barely leaving her cunt. "I can't wait to fall in love with you," I whispered to her. "I can't wait to make babies with you, and start a family." "Do it," she gasped. "Put a baby in me. Make my womb yours forever. Breed me, make me your breeding wife-whore. Love me, may-ari. Oh, fucking; that's what you are, you beautiful big bastard. You're my may-ari. My owner. I choose you. I choose; I,” I couldn't have stopped from coming in her if my life depended on it. She was pushing towards her own orgasm already, and her years of dance and other physical activity had turned her core into a vice that sucked at my cock like a hoover. I came as she lost her grip on her words, chanting about choosing me. She came as well, a scream quenched in her throat as her entire body flexed and tensed. I filled her up, releasing over and over in her, but I finished before she did and just went right back to fucking her since my cock hadn't gone soft yet and she was still coming. I only stopped when she went slack, her legs falling back to a more natural position, and her face went from that clenched teeth-gritting tension to a soft, satisfied smile. "Imprinting. Imprinting. Imprinting." I pulled away from her slowly, making sure she wasn't going to fall from the bed, and found that the entire bottom corner and the edge of the mattress were wet and sticky with juices. Along with my legs, crotch and hips. "Great, another squirter," I sighed. Not that I actually minded, but it just meant we'd be doing even more laundry in the tiny machine the RV held. I stood and, once I felt like I could be coordinated enough, I picked Kyla up in a cradle and lifted her higher on the bed and tucked her in. She was in the fetal position, still mumbling the imprinting sequence with that smile. I had to grab a new pair of shorts since mine had ended up in the splash zone, and I didn't bother putting on a shirt but did wipe myself down with some wet paper towel. Stumbling out of the RV, I was greeted by catcalls and applause. Looking around, the fire was still going and someone had stocked it higher with wood. Erica, Dani and Vanessa were all sitting in the Adirondack chairs, and Ivy was sitting curled up in Erica's lap. "Where are Leo and the girls?" I asked, trying my best not to let them show the embarrassment I knew they were going for with their teasing. "Aria and India were going to fuck, and invited Leo to watch," Dani smirked. "So I assume he's in there either jerking off, or fucking." "I don't need to picture that," Erica rolled her eyes. I stepped over and kissed Vanessa as she leaned her head back and reached up to hug me around the neck. Then I slipped around the circle to Ivy and Erica and kissed both of them. Dani opened her arms to me as well, so I hugged her and she kissed my cheek. "Congrats," she said as I pulled away. "Pops." "Oh, God," I groaned and looked at Erica. "You told them?" "Was I supposed to keep it a secret?" she countered. "I needed to talk it out with someone." Vanessa had stood from her chair and gestured for me to take her seat and went inside the RV, coming back out with some more beers. She passed them around and then sat on my lap similar to the way Ivy was with Erica. We sat that way for a while talking as the night sky played out above us. I'd always loved looking up at the sky out on the property, away from any major sources of light pollution. Now spotlights were lighting up the construction area a hundred yards away, where men and women were working through the night. The view was dimmed, and I wondered if it would ever be as clear again as it had been a month ago. Dani slipped off to bed first, and Vanessa grumbled that she had to be up in the morning for work so the rest of us went quickly. We never had discussed the sleeping arrangements, so I ended up sleeping next to Kyla, with Erica pressing her back to my side and holding my arm under her and around her stomach, with Vanessa spooning up to her and Ivy on the end on her back, snuggled partially under Vanessa. I knocked on the door and set the two big brown paper bags down on the stoop and backed away. The house wasn't 'old' per se, located in a neighborhood that had been developed almost twenty-five years ago, and hadn't been updated since it was first built. To be fair, there hadn't ever exactly been a housing boom in the area, so other than the one-off builds it was probably one of the newest places around. The inner front door opened and Mary looked out cautiously, then in surprise as she saw me. She hadn't texted me like I'd asked her to, and it had almost been a week since I'd seen her in the parking lot at the grocery store. She looked a little better, though not by much, and I wondered how far she'd been able to stretch that $70 I'd been able to give her then. "Harri?" she asked in surprise. "Hey, Mary," I said with a little wave. "How did you; Is this;?" "It wasn't that hard, Mary," I said. "I just made a couple of calls. You never texted me." "I know, I,” she hesitated, and then hung her head. "I was so embarrassed." "You don't need to be," I told her. "You're in a tough spot, and I'm not. I want to help out." "Mom? Who's at the door?" came a little voice from inside. A boy poked his head around Mary's hip, looking cute and curious. "It's an old friend of Mommies," Mary said. "He's just here to say hello." "Hey there buddy," I said, smiling as I pulled my mask down and waved, then let the mask snap back up and played like it had rocked me. The kid giggled. "My name is Harrison, but everyone calls me Harri on account of my big beard and hair." "That's a funny name," the kid said. "If you got rid of your beard, what would they call you?" "Hmm, that's a good question!" I said. "I don't know. Maybe you should ask your Mom, she knew me when I didn't have a beard." "We still called him Harri, baby," Mary said, smiling down at the boy and running her fingers through his hair. The kid had keen eyes and noticed the bags on the stoop and the food inside. "Is that for us?" "It is, kiddo," I said. "Could you help your Mom get it inside?" "Sure!" he said. Mary sighed and opened the screen door for him, and the kid came out in his socks and hefted up one of the bags and started carrying it in. "Harri, you don't need to,” "I made sure there are some snacks for the kids in there," I said, pretending like she hadn't been talking. "I know they aren't nutritious, but I figured you can bribe some good behavior for some Oreos and stuff every once in a while. There's also a bottle of merlot in that other one there, so you may not want the kiddo to lift it. He's a cute kid, by the way. I've got an order in down at the butcher's that I'm supposed to pick up tomorrow, so I'll be by sometime tomorrow afternoon with some meat for you guys too. Maybe I can meet your little girl then? Charlie, right?" Mary looked like she was about to cry, and I didn't want to push her over the edge so I tried to make it all like it wasn't a big deal. "Alright, Mary. See you tomorrow. Let me know if you need anything specific and I'll see what I can do, alright? Tell the kiddo not to eat all the gummy worms at once." I was halfway down the driveway to my truck when the screen door opened again. "Harri," Mary called. I looked back and she was standing on the porch, looking at me with tears brimming in her eyes and a happy frown on her face. From this distance, without a mask, I could still see her as the little button-nosed cheerleader I'd known. "Thank you." I just winked and waved, heading back to my truck. "That was really kind of you," Kyla said as I got in. "It's nothing," I said. "I knew her in high school and her husband's been missing for a while." Kyla took one of my hands from the steering wheel and wrapped her fingers in mine, looking at it. The casual intimacy was still new; the first couple days after her imprinting had been us feeling each other out, and her getting comfortable with the general openness to sex that was our new life. I'd made it a point to spend time with her, both sexually and non-sexually, each day and we were slowly starting to find a soft groove. "That's still kindness, Harri," she said. "You're sure she needs it? I don't want to see you getting taken advantage of." "I'm sure," I said. "Okay," Kyla nodded. "Then we'll help her. Now, let's continue this tour. I want to know everything I can about this little podunk, backwoods town I've been shipped off to." "Well, the first thing you should know is that I'm pretty sure it isn't big enough to be considered a town. Maybe a village?" "Oh, God," she laughed. "Not if you consider all the construction workers moving in." "True. I bet we're close to half-againing the local population at this point. Vanessa said we'll hit a thousand by the end of the week." "With that many," Kyla said. "We should have our house in, what, a few months?" "No idea," I said. "No fucking idea." "Fuck, it's already June," I groaned. It was hot as balls and I was regretting putting on my 'go out into the world' getup. "How did you miss the 1st?" Erica asked, also done up in her gear. "How did we miss Memorial Day?" I countered. "Oh, shit," Leo said, standing up from where he'd been sitting over near his RV. "You're right, we did miss Memorial Day. Should we do something?" "Like what?" I asked. "We could throw a party," Ivy suggested. "We could all dress up fancy and have a dance?" The surveyors had been needing Leo and me less and less lately and I was starting to get a little twitchy with how little I had to do. Quarantine before all of this really kicked off had been one thing, but now we didn't even have our big wide backyard to ourselves. When Erica had mentioned that she wanted to take a drive into Portland to pick up some things from the tattoo parlor and check her apartment I'd jumped on the chance and we'd made the plan. The girls were already starting to excitedly talk about planning our late Memorial Day celebration as I stretched and sighed, checking my watch. We'd been planning to leave right after lunch and it was already 3pm. Vanessa had taken an extended break since she'd worked late the night before and we'd had some one-on-one fun in the RV, which had been sorely needed for her. Where the rest of us were struggling to find things to keep busy and motivated, the last week had seen more and more responsibility and work landing in Vanessa's lap as the construction crews started to show up and move into the barracks. It meant there was an entirely new crew of cleaners, maintenance workers and delivery people under her supervision along with her 'gorillas.' Not to mention her wrangling of the other foremen and administrators on-site as her father handled the top-end details of the job. Every day it seemed like new equipment and supplies were being delivered and a third barracks was quickly being erected as even more hands were around. But an hour with Vanessa had delayed us, and when I was finally ready to go Dani was busy with Leo over at their place, and since she was coming with us Erica and I had to wait. Then Erica and Kyla were ensconced in a private conversation in our RV when Dani emerged ready to go, so we lost another half hour before the three of us were all finally dressed and prepped to leave. "Okay," I said loudly, trying to cut through the multiple party-related conversations. "We're all agreed we'll do a Memorial Day thing, but we're burning daylight. Erica and Dani, let's go." We took my truck, only needing one vehicle since we weren't hauling a ton of stuff like the last time. As we pulled around the site offices I spotted Vanessa walking with one of the other foremen in conversation and gave her a little double honk. She smiled and waved. Driving down the old driveway path there were now a half dozen wide offshoots winding off into the trees and closer to the highway there were big swathes of ground that had been cleared and were starting to get flattened by scrapers and excavators. Vanessa had mentioned that we'd end up with a couple of strip malls worth of stores to help provide for the eventual community; a convenience store, a clinic, a dentist, that sort of thing. Right at the end of the driveway a guard hut had been erected, little more than a fancy roadside fruit stall that could barely fit two people inside. I pulled up next to it and Erica rolled down the window. "Hey Patrick," I said, waving to the construction worker manning the booth and tracking the ins and outs. "Hey folks," the older guy said with a grin. He was supposed to be on the road crews but had arrived earlier than needed. I'd asked him once if standing in the guard booth all day working a clipboard was boring and he assured me that after three decades manning a 'Slow/Stop' sign in the middle of roads through sun, rain and sleet, the booth and the clipboard were welcome. "We'll be out for a few hours," I said. "Sounds good," he replied and made a note on his clipboard. Then he wiped at his eyes and cleared his throat, blinking. "Y'all didn't say anything about how bad the pollen got up here. I think my allergies are kicking up and I didn't bring any of my meds, I thought the North West was supposed to be wet." "It usually is. We'll pick you something up," Erica offered. "We need to stop at a pharmacy anyways." "We do?" I asked. "We do," Erica said, patting me on the knee. "Hah," Patrick laughed. "And here I thought you was some sort of Big Dog, Harri. But you're as whipped by your women as the rest of us." "See you in a bit, Patrick," I said. He waved us off, then covered his mouth to cough a little. "Poor guy," Dani said. "I'd hate if I had allergies like that." "We'll get him fixed up," I said as I pulled onto the highway and started heading in the direction of Portland. "It's been weirdly dry and hot so I'm betting the dust from the brush cutting is doing it to him." And I didn't think anything more of it. Erica unlocked the metal grate that pulled down over the front of the tattoo parlor and lifted it up on the rollers enough to uncover the door. The good news was that the whole thing with the 'Autonomous Zone' seemed to have burned itself out and Portland was no longer hosting big protests at the moment. The bad news was that only happened after a week of riots and several news-worthy moments of violence and vandalism. Thankfully the parlor wasn't on one of the major routes the riots had travelled down and there didn't seem to be any damage other than sprayed graffiti on the grate and some of the glass windows behind it. I'd pulled my truck right up over the curb and parked us as close as possible. The streets were as empty of people moving around as the last time we'd come into the city, except there was more trash. I'd seen old newsreels of when there had been major strikes in New York City back in the early 80s and it wasn't exactly that bad, but another couple of weeks and it might get there. Someone must have been doing collections, they were just overburdened or understaffed or something. I had to nudge a pile out of the way with the front of my truck to wedge into the open space, but it almost immediately proved worth it as a trio of ambulances came burning down the street with their lights running. If I'd parked on the street one of them would have needed to swerve out of the way and who knew if those extra seconds would be the difference between life or death for someone; not to mention the potential of the ambulance not swerving fast enough and clipping my truck. Inside the tattoo parlor Erica went straight to her bay and started unhooking and gathering her equipment. Dani was looking around at the place, grinning as she examined the wild decor. She would call out questions to Erica, who would tell her who had done what mural, or the brief story behind the broken surfboard hanging from the ceiling and the skateboard deck covered in almost a hundred different signatures. I spotted a photo on the wall and realized it was of Erica and all of her staff at the most recent DragonCon where they had put up a booth and done live tattooing. Erica had said beforehand she thought it might be a waste of time, but the owner of the parlor was a huge nerd and wanted to do it so it was her job to organize. I never had found out how it went, but she looked happy in the photo. I grabbed the frame from the wall and brought it over to her. "Do you want to bring this, too?" I asked. She glanced at it and paused her work, then smiled and hugged me. "That's sweet, Harri. Yes, absolutely." She took the frame and put it in one of the boxes we'd brought for her to carry stuff, then turned to me. "Hey, could you just empty all those drawers there into the boxes? Don't just dump them, but there isn't anything particularly fragile. It's mostly inks and cleaner solutions and stuff." "Sure," I said. "Thanks, babe," she said and kissed my cheek. "Dani and I are just going to slip through to next door." "Oh, God," I groaned. I hadn't realized that was her plan. "Don't worry," she grinned. "It'll all be fun for you, I promise." The owner of the tattoo parlor also owned the sex shop next door and had installed a door between the two since the clientele crossed over fairly consistently. Erica led Dani through the door, opening it with her key, and I could hear them laughing and giggling. By the time I was done with the drawers Erica had pointed out, placing what seemed like hundreds of little vials and bottles of inks and other liquids into the boxes along with some other art supplies, they hadn't come back. I went to the door and opened it, looking in. Erica glanced over, grinning as she held another box and Dani was placing something inside. "You want any porn, babe?" "What do I need porn for?" I asked. "I dunno," she said. "Variety?" "Ooh, this one is called 'Big Black Booties 15,'" Dani said, grabbing a DVD from a nearby shelf and waving it at me. "You don't have that kind of variety yet, Harri." I snorted and shook my head. "I'm perfectly happy with the booties at my disposal, thank you." Dani shrugged and put the DVD in the box. "I'll see if Leo wants it." "Gag!" Erica laughed, making them both start giggling. I had a feeling that was a running joke between them. "How are we paying for this stuff?" I asked. "Everything is turned off and we don't have any cash." "Artie told me I could Venmo him at a 75% discount," Erica said. "Plus anything with an expiry date I could have for free. So we've got a lot of lube now, along with a bunch of penis-shaped candy and some candy underwear." I sighed and shook my head. "Oh my God, we should take her with us," Dani said, pointing up on a high shelf where a creepily lifelike sex doll was sitting. "I think you mean rescue her," Erica said. "Harri, help me get her down." "Really?" I asked. "Yes," they both demanded. When we packed up the truck we had two boxes of Erica's tattoo gear and other possessions from the shop, another full box of Sex Shop stuff, and Dani was sitting in the back next to 'Sexy Susan' who had also happened to get dressed in a sexy nurse costume. They thought it was fucking hilarious, I just thought 'Sexy Susan' was a little creepy. Dani stayed down in the truck, taking the front seat as I pointed out that the 1911 was in its case under the passenger seat if she needed it, while Erica and I headed up to her apartment. The elevator had an 'out of order' sign on it, and Erica had to use her key to the building to get into the stairwell which she said she'd never had to do before. That was an immediate red flag to me, but I kept my cool to try and not worry her. "You know," Erica said as we climbed the stairs. All our sex cardio seemed to be paying off because we weren't puffing from the exertion yet. "You haven't officially asked me to move in yet." "What?' I asked. "Leo and I,” "That wasn't asking me to move in permanently," Erica cut me off. "That was just for quarantine." I rolled my eyes, knowing where she was going with this. At the next floor I grabbed her by the waist and pulled her to me, pulling down my mask and hers and kissing her hard and deep. "Erica Lacosta, will you move in with me forever and ever?" I asked her. "Yes," she grinned. "Yes, I will." She kissed me lightly to seal it, then sighed and we raised our masks and started climbing more stairs. "With that out of the way, I should really try and find a way out of my lease. Just because you have money doesn't mean I should be wasting mine on a place I'm not ever planning on moving back into." "I'll help with some research," I said. "I know there's all the clamor about halting eviction notices, but maybe there's something that will help. I could text Miriam, see if Captain Bloomberg knows anything offhand." "Hmm, maybe,” Erica started, but stopped as we reached her floor and found that door locked as well. "What the fuck?" she sighed and unlocked it. "Let me go first," I said. "Why? It's just..." As we entered the corridor Erica trailed off, seeing the tracks of dirty footprints in the hall and the spray paint on the walls. She immediately started to move forward, but I grabbed her arm and stopped her. "Wait," I said. "Look." I pointed at the big circles on the walls next to each door, but she clearly didn't understand what I was pointing out. "Those are FEMA search and rescue marks." Erica blinked once and was obviously unsure of what to say. "Let's just take it slow," I said. We walked down the hallway. Some of the doors were shut, but others looked like they'd been kicked in. "What do they mean?" Erica asked me, looking at the circles and the scribbles of letters and numbers on the walls. Each circle had an X dividing it into four parts, and each quadrant was marked. "The top part is the date the location was searched," I said. "5-24 means it happened May 24th, so a little over a week and a half ago. The left side is who did the search, the numbers are probably a military code for a National Guard unit. If it said PPD that would be the Portland police, or CDC or DEA or whoever. The right side is if there are any hazards." I pointed to one of the doors that were kicked in. "NE means 'No Entry.'" Then I pointed to another. "F/W means there's contaminated food and water." I pointed at another door, this one wasn't kicked in. "A 0 means no hazards. "What are the bottom parts?" Erica asked. I frowned and swallowed. "The crossed 0 means no one found. DB or DOA means dead bodies. LB means live people are, or were, inside." Erica looked at the carnage of the corridor, her eyes scanning the doors of her neighbors as she weighed the number of DBs. There weren't many 0s, but about half of the apartments were labelled LB and hadn't been kicked open. Half. We got to Erica's place around the hall corner, passing the old lady Diane's door. It was kicked in and labelled NE, DB. Erica poked the door with her boot and it swung in. Inside, other than the dirty boot prints, it looked generally neat and tidy... other than the pool of dark something that had dried on the kitchen linoleum. I grabbed Erica and held her as she gasped and her knees went weak. I pulled her away from the door and she saw that her own apartment had also been kicked in, but was labelled 0 hazards and 0 bodies. We went in and she sat down on the couch, burying her head in her hands. Kneeling in front of her, I cradled her head on my shoulder and hugged her tightly as the reality of the world settled on her. She cried, though not as long as she probably needed, as I talked her through what had probably happened. Enough people had gotten sick and called emergency services that they came to do a sweep of the building. They knocked on every door, and anywhere someone didn't answer they kicked it in. Then I assumed they had extracted the bodies. "I need to get out of here," Erica breathed. "Okay," I said. "Do you need me to grab anything? Did we forget anything last time?" "No, nothing," she shook her head. "Just get me out of here." I picked her up and carried her out. Erica wasn't Ivy or Vanessa, or even Kyla. She was a full-figured woman. But I carried her every fucking step, down every stair. She stopped me right at the doors to the building and had me let her down. "I don't want Dani to see me like this," she said. "Why?" I asked. "She would understand." "I know," she said, blinking under her ski goggles. "But if she sees me like this, she'll start thinking about what might be happening back home for her, and she doesn't need that." I held Erica's hand at the door for another minute as she breathed deeply and got control of herself, and finally she smiled at me and it actually travelled up to her eyes. "Thanks, babe," she said. "Love you," I said. "You too," she said and touched her forehead to mine since we were both masked and goggled. "Hey, Charlie," I grinned, waving to the little four-year-old as she sprawled in Mary's arms and waved back with her little grin. "Hi," she chirped. "Okay," Mary said, setting her daughter down. "Scoot, you. Let Mommy talk with Harri for a second. Go see what your brother is doing." "Okay," Charlie said and pounded off in the way only a four-year-old could. "You're looking more like yourself, Mary," I said. I was standing off the porch and we kept the screen door closed, but I had my mask lowered so she could see my face. She smiled softly and shrugged. "I don't feel like it, but thanks." "How are the kids doing?" I asked. "Well, I regret letting them eat sugar again," she smirked a little. "But they're good. Better than me, anyways, though Thomas misses his friends from school and keeps asking when he can go back to class." She laughed and wiped under one eye. "He used to hate going to school every morning, now it's all he wants to do." "We'll get there eventually," I assured her. "What about you? How are you doing?"

Quaranteam-Northwest: Part 6 Lab Results and Quarantines Based on a post by Break The Bar. Listen to the ► Podcast at Explicit Novels.   The Docs signed off, leaving me alone in the little meeting room again. Not knowing when I would be able to leave, I decided to try and fall back on one of my old military instincts; sleep when you can. So I got comfortable in the chair, closed my eyes, and let myself drift into a fitful, not-quite-soothing sleep. "Harri," someone said, and I woke with a start as my shoulder was touched. "Urm," I grunted, and sniffed in a breath as I blinked rapidly and looked around. I was still in the room, and Miriam was smiling at me. She was dressed in fatigues here in the military office complex instead of her service dress blues and her hair was up in a standard military bun hidden beneath the standard issue cap. "Just like a grunt to take any reason for a nap," she grinned at me. "Come on. We can talk in my office." I stood, yawned and stretched, feeling something pop in my back and my shoulder from the uncomfortable position I'd been in. "Lead the way, Lieutenant Colonel," I said. She rolled her eyes at me a little but didn't say anything, just opening the door and walking through. I followed her back into that hallway where Brent had clocked me. He wasn't in the waiting room at the end of the hall. "Is Brent,” I started to ask. "He's waiting on another floor," Miriam said. "Refuses to leave until he sees his daughter is alright. It's making operations slow down over at the construction site, but I can't blame him." "Neither can I," I said, touching the tenderness of my black eye. Miriam led me through several very plain corridors lined with doors. None of them had windows to see in, and most had nameplate mounts but lacked names, and instead were labelled with numbers. It struck me as secretive, and that meant I was probably in the Air Force part of the building and not the Vaccine Test Center part. If they were trying to make people feel at ease joining an experimental program, these plain walls and doors forming a maze were not the way to do it. Confounding an enemy trying to sneak through this part of the building, though? It was perfect. I followed Miriam until she stopped at a seemingly random door and opened it, leading me into a large office. It had a large bank of windows, but extra-heavy curtains had been hung over them and were drawn shut to the point I wondered if they were nailed in place. One wall was entirely covered in a whiteboard with all sorts of coded writing on it. There were two desks in the room; the main desk was scattered with papers and a computer terminal, with a plush office chair tucked in behind it. The second desk had more stuff on it, but in neater piles, and Captain Bloomberg was sitting behind it at work. She glanced up at us as we entered and gave me a slightly judgmental look, before going back to the printout she was reading. The rest of the office space was dominated by file shelving units, a gun safe, and a leather couch that looked uncomfortable but was probably soft as hell. "Captain, could you give us five?" Miriam asked. "Of course, Ma'am," she nodded, set down the papers face-down and stepped around her desk to the door. She shot Miriam a quick look, and Miriam gave her one back, and the Captain left. If I had to guess it was to do with the fact that the office was probably full of classified material and information and the Captain was silently reminding her superior officer not to let me poke around or leave me alone in there. "Sit, please," Miriam sighed once the door was closed and we were alone, gesturing at the couch. I did, instantly sinking into it, and she sat on the other end and turned to me. "So, now that we know it's not life-threatening, you feel ready to get teased yet?" I snorted a little and scratched at my beard. "It's still a little raw," I admitted. "Just like how you fucked her?" Miriam asked with a grin. "Sorry, that's the only one." I shook my head and chuckled. There were few kinds of people who could be as morbidly crude and insulting, and mean it in the best way, as a military friend. "Seriously, Harri," she said. "I got a briefing on it. She's fine, you're fine. No one is in trouble." "Tell that to her father," I said. "And I can't blame him for probably wanting to kill me." "Yeah, well, tough shit for him," Miriam said. "We've expanded his Need to Know status and gave him some more info on the vaccine to calm him down. He's not happy, but he's not worried anymore. Seriously though, did you have to go and fuck my lead civilian contractor's daughter?" "We were friendly with her," I said, and let out a long breath. "Erica said she thought Vanessa might be a little interested. I don't think either of us expected her to show up on our proverbial doorstep and ask for a foursome." "I always did think Erica was a smart woman after we met," Miriam said. "Though I figured you'd lost a few brain cells since you weren't dating her at the time." "There's a whole story behind that," I said, waving her off. "I'm sure there is," Miriam smiled. "Doesn't mean it's a good excuse though." "Well, Vanessa seems to think you have a crush on me after she met you for all of two minutes," I shot back at her. Miriam flushed for a moment but didn't look away from me, still in command in her own office. "Vanessa might have been doing a bit of projecting," she said. "I'm not into hillbillies with bushy beards and big guts." "Ouch," I laughed, holding my stomach. Sure, I wasn't in the peak physical form I'd been in coming out of the military, but I hadn't gone that soft. Miriam and I continued to chat and laugh for a few more minutes until the Captain came back and then Miriam let me borrow some sound-cancelling headphones and hang out on their couch while they were working. They had food ordered in and Miriam and I ate dinner together while Captain Bloomberg ate as she kept working at her desk. It wasn't until I noticed that the faint bit of light leaking around the edges of the curtains was dimming that it had been a long day and I hadn't been able to contact Erica and Ivy. I asked Miriam if I could have my phone back just to update them, and she and the Captain had to discuss it for a long moment before they decided they could probably do the texting for me, but for security protocols I couldn't be given control of the phone. When my phone powered on it took a long moment for it to connect to service, and then it started buzzing like crazy and a bunch of messages came in. Miriam was holding it, and her eyes went a little wide as the message notification scrolled by. "Um," she said. "Well, it looks like you and your partners are... happy together." "Oh no," I groaned. "What did they send?" "Well, you have a whole bunch of messages from Brent Peters chewing you out, so there's that," Miriam said. "But, uh, well, there are photos from your partners." "Sorry," I shrugged, once again finding my face heating up at the exposure of my sex life. "It's fine," Miriam said. "It was my idea to do the texting anyways." She tapped around on the phone for a moment. "Alright, I'll just say 'Harri isn't allowed to use his phone right now. This is Miriam Abarbanel. He is fine, no trouble. Vanessa is also fine and healthy. They will return tomorrow.'" "That's fine," I said with a nod. I would have liked to tell them more, and that I loved them. And that they shouldn't have been trying to send me whatever scandalous photos they had considering I was in military custody at the moment. Miriam hit send and a minute later another text came through and she opened it, immediately rolling her eyes and setting my phone down. "What?" I asked. "Erica sent another photo, and I think it was for me," she said. "What? Really?" I asked. Miriam opened the photo again and turned my phone around to show me. Erica and Ivy were both sunbathing in the chairs, topless. The third Adirondack had a name tag written on a piece of paper and taped to the back of the chair that red 'Vanessa.' Beside it, they had put out another lawn chair and had quickly put another nametag on it that said 'Miriam.' I couldn't help the little snort of laughter that came out of me, and I covered my mouth to try and stop from giggling a bit. "I'm sorry," I said. Miriam laughed once and set my phone down. "You know, Erica is the right kind of trouble for you I think," she said. "You haven't spent enough time with Ivy," I countered. "That girl is mischievous. I bet the Vanessa one was Erica's idea to try and cheer her up, and the other one was Ivy." "If you've got any pictures from that Danielle woman, I wouldn't mind checking those out," Captain Bloomberg said from over at her desk. "Laura," Miriam said, a little shocked. "What? I told you when we first saw her, that woman could turn a bigoted granny gay," Laura said. "That's fair," Miriam said thoughtfully. "Hey, no arguments from me," I said. Miriam and the Captain ended up finishing their work days, though Miriam told me that she was on call 24/7 anyways and they stayed in apartments lower in the building. She offered to try and find me a free one to rest overnight, but I asked her if I could see Vanessa and stay in whatever medical room she was in. I didn't want her to wake up from the process and be alone. This started a silent conversation of sharp looks between Miriam and Laura, until Laura sighed. "She's not alone. Her father hasn't left her side since we let him see her. This is... let's call it a legal grey area at the moment. Technically you're not even extended family, so he would get precedent on deciding who can be there," she said. "But under the circumstances of the Vaccine imprinting, there's been some debate going around the legal circles of what constitutes a civil union. The matter's still up in the air, but there's a case to be made that you and she are now more intimately connected than she and her father. So I guess the question is do you want to push the issue?" "Oh, fuck," I groaned, and had to massage the bridge of my nose. "On the one hand, yes I want to see her. On the other, Brent deserves to be pissed at me and worried about her. Can I just talk to him?" "Honestly, Harri," Miriam said. "I think you should probably leave that whole conversation to Vanessa and how she wants to have it. Doesn't matter how much you defend yourself, you're still the guy that fucked that man's daughter in a pretty... degenerate seems too strong, but pervy is too weak. Anyways, you fucking her like that brought her here, and he's now aware that she's going to be intimately connected to you for a while." I puffed out my cheeks and let the air blow out slowly, unsure of what to do. "I can try talking to him," Laura offered. "But honestly, I don't know if it would do any good." "It's fine," I finally conceded. "He can be there, just find me another room where I can crash, and let me know when she's awake?" "I'll leave a standing order with the nurses," Miriam nodded. So, as Miriam and Laura finished up for the day, they sent for the night sentry who patrolled the floor and let him know I would be in the staff break room and was allowed to eat out of the cupboards and use the washrooms. Once the airman was gone Laura excused herself and left me with Miriam. "It was nice having you around, Harri," she grinned, dropping her command facade again. She put her hand on my upper arm and grinned, giving me a wink. "And I was joking when I called you fat." "Yeah, well, you really hurt my feelings," I fake-cried, making her laugh. "I'll see you tomorrow before you leave, alright? And I still expect that beer next time I'm up at the site," she said and gave me a peck on the cheek. "You got it," I said, and pecked her back. "And thank you for all of this today, by the way." "Happy to help," she said, and then escorted me to the room where I would spend the next seven hours. The sentry woke me up around four in the morning. I had Cheeto dust on my shirt and fingers, the bag I'd found in the staff room cupboard almost empty and crumpled up on my chest. "Sir, I've been asked to bring you down to the medical wing," he said. "Fuck," I said, blinking awake and standing up. "Uh, give me a second." I went into the men's washroom and quickly washed my hands and my face, and tried to get myself straightened out. Looking in the mirror, I could tell that I'd been running on empty for a bit, but I didn't look as bad as I might have if I hadn't been getting in some light napping at least. The airman brought me to the elevator and punched a button for about a dozen floors down, and when we stepped off of it, it was clear that we were in a more public-facing area, though the number of armed airmen on guard was actually higher. The floor was still quiet, this early in the morning, and generally featured a lot more stuff. There were glass panes and windows everywhere and the place looked like what I would picture a medical bay would in a not-too-distant future medical show. There were a few nurses around, but most of the rooms and beds were empty. We passed by one room that was sealed up with a little yellow light near the handle flashing 'Quarantine Active.' That got me gulping and moving. We turned a corner and I saw her. Vanessa was sitting up in a hospital bed, an IV drip hooked in to one arm. She was in a hospital gown and didn't have any of her usual makeup on, so she looked... sick wasn't the right word. She looked different enough that I noticed it, but it was like seeing Erica without her makeup that first time. It was different but I liked seeing the natural her. "Vanessa, I'm,” I started, but then she threw a magazine at my head. "Harri, I swear to God if you try and apologize to me, I'll throw another one," Vanessa said. She had a stack of a few of them on a little rolling bedside stand, where she also had a tray from a shitty cafeteria meal. "You look good, Vee," I said, changing my mind. She blushed and smiled. "No, I don't. Liar." "Okay, you look as good as someone in a hospital bed can," I said. "Come sit, Harri," she said, shifting herself in the bed and patting beside her. I did, and she took my hand in one of hers and lifted the other to brush a finger against my bruised eye. "The night nurse told me what happened when I woke up." I opened my mouth to apologize again but remembered what she'd said and clicked it shut. She smirked and squeezed my fingers. "Good, you're learning." "So you're not pissed off?" I asked. Vanessa leaned her head back on the pillows propping her up, taking a deep breath. "Maybe at the world, a little. But at you? Or Erica and Ivy? No. I went in there knowing what I was asking for, and you told me the risk. I decided getting off with you three was worth it." She broke into a small smile. "And from what I remember, it was pretty fantastic." "It was," I chuckled. "I mean, wild and filthy, but fantastic." She was looking at me, searching my face for something. I couldn't tell if she found it or not. "I spoke to my Dad. He told me he decked you pretty good but I wasn't expecting a full-on shiner." "He definitely got me," I said, touching my eye. "Wasn't as bad as I felt I deserved." "Yeah, well I told him if he does it again I'll deck him," she said. "And that if he tries to take any revenge on you, he's just punishing me." "Does that mean what I think it means?" I asked. She brought my hand up to her chest and put it over her heart. "Harri, I'm stuck with you no matter what at this point, but if you guys will have me I'd like to move into your crammed RV life. I thought you and Erica were cool since we met, and we know we're sexually compatible. The way I see it, I can either fight this thing just for the sake of fighting, or I can get on board the Harrison train and enjoy the ride." "Vanessa, I; God, I wish I had my phone right now," I said. "There's a picture the girls sent that you'll want to see." Vanessa rolled her eyes and her smile grew. "Oh, I got several pictures," Vanessa said. "I've already seen them. Why don't you have your phone?" "I was up on a secure floor," I said. "Lieutenant Colonel Abarbanel was actually the one to see them when she helped me message back that we were Okay." "Then you have some surprises waiting for you I think," Vanessa grinned. "But for now, you're all mine." She pulled me towards her and guided me into a kiss. Then she whispered into my lips as our noses rubbed against each other. "Pull the privacy screen around us." "Here? Really?" I asked. "My nurse actually encouraged it," Vanessa said. "She said we just need to try and keep it down." I stood up and went to the curtain built into the rolling track around Vanessa's bed and pulled it around us, blocking out the rest of the room, and the hallway beyond the glass observation doors. When I turned back to her, Vanessa was shrugging out of her hospital gown, her cute little tits jiggling. I kicked off my shoes and got up on the hospital bed with her, picking her up a bit and sliding her down into a laying position and tucking my head down to suck on one of her nipples. "Oh, Harri," she crooned, her hand running through my hair. Her nipples got hard quickly as I played my tongue over them, feeling the little boob around it tug and pull as I moved around. I popped off and raised my lips to hers again, giving her a kiss. "I didn't get to spend that much time telling you how beautiful and sexy I think you are," I said between kisses. "Harri, you don't need to lie," she said. "My boobs are tiny. I'm used to; Ah, fuck!" I cut her off by grabbing the tit I hadn't sucked on, squeezing it hard enough to make her hiss a little bit. I'd seen she liked a little rough pawing and play during the foursome, so I used it now to make a point. "If you ever tell me these aren't perfect, I'll spank you so hard you'll have my handprint on your ass for a week." "Fuck, Harri; Fuck," she groaned as I let my grip on her tit loosen, and then bent down and took that nipple into my mouth as well. "Fine. You like my tits. I believe you." "Don't just believe me," I said. "Vanessa, you said you thought Erica and I were cool when we first met. Well, I thought you were fascinating. This gorgeous, tough woman who knew how to take charge and make things happen. Beautiful from head to toe even when you were trying to downplay it for work. Now, you're going to lay back so that I can explore every inch of your gorgeous, perfect body." She looked like she was somewhere between beaming happily and crying, but she nodded. I started back up at her lips and kissed around her jaw and down her neck to her collar bone. Then down to her chest, where I teased her nipples some more, rolling one between my fingers while I tongued and lightly nibbled on the other. Once they were both standing proud and weren't about to go down, I helped her pull the hospital gown off until it was hanging from the arm with the IV in it, revealing the rest of her body to me. I kissed down her stomach to her bellybutton and pressed my forehead against her, kissing her fit stomach softly, then moving lower. I got to the point between her belly button and her mound where her scar was, and the Strength tattoo. I took my time there, kissing it, and tracing my finger along the letters of the tattoo. I turned back to look up at her face and she was pensive, staring at me with this worried look like I was going to change my mind about her. "Perfect," I told her again, "And strong as hell." My lips went further, down onto her mound where a smattering of hairs were poking out. She'd obviously shaved herself in the past, but not as recently as I bet she would have liked. But I didn't care, and I kissed along the stubble of her pubic hair, letting it play against my lips as my beard played against her skin. She spread her legs for me, and I slipped around on the bed so I was laying between them on my stomach, looking up at her. "Do you want me to do this here?" I asked her. "Harri, I want your cock inside me like nothing else," she said. "We'll get there," I grinned, and began to explore her cunt with my lips and tongue. I took my time, softly kissing and licking, searching every nook and cranny of her outer and inner labia. Then I did it again, sucking a little harder, nibbling just a touch, finding the sweet spots that made her legs quiver or her breath catch in a hiccup or gasp. Then I went deeper, peeling her open with my fingers to see the soft pink of her hole, and tasted and teased her. She mewled for me, clawing at the bed. I kept needing to move her leg back as it came up and wanted to curl in towards me until I just planted my hand on her thigh and pushed her open, holding her leg wide. Then I did the same to the other leg, pushing them back further, and I slowly licked from her hole up her lips to her clit hood, teasing the tip of my tongue under it before pushing it back with my upper lip and prodding her clit softly. "Making me... ugh!" Vanessa grunted with a girlish tone, gasping for air. I did it again and watched as another little orgasm rolled through her, her cunt flexing as her abdominal muscles clenched. Moving lower I kissed the inner curve of her ass cheek and looked up from between her legs to meet her gaze. She watched me, a little surprised, as I practically buried my nose in her cunt so that I could drive my tongue against her asshole. Her brow furrowed as I did it, and one eye twtiched as I teased the outer ring, then centered on it and nudged the tip of my tongue a little deeper. "Not here," she gasped suddenly, and I stopped. "I; not here," she said again. "Okay," I said, moving up from her ass and kissing the crook of her thigh. "Just like that?" she asked. "What kind of guys have you been seeing that don't stop when you say no?" I asked back. She blinked. "The kind who don't eat ass, and rarely eat cunt," she said. "So the wrong kind." "Then let me ask you; what do you want me to do now?" She closed her eyes and blew out a long breath through pursed lips, before opening them. "Get your pants off and fuck me while we make out. I want to feel you on top of me." I grinned and slipped off the bed, undoing my belt and kicking my pants off. I was already hard, and she was wet from my exploratory oral, so I got back up on the bed and got over her in a standard missionary position. "Like this?" I asked her. She reached down and got my cock in position, and wrapped a leg around my waist and ass to pull me into her. "Like this," she said with a grin as I slowly penetrated deeper into her. Vanessa was hot and clenched my cock in a rippling sensation as I drove in, slowly fucking into her until I was buried to my root. She grabbed my beard in her hand and pulled me into a kiss as we stayed still and connected. "Ow," I muttered into the kiss. "Sorry," she laughed, releasing my beard. "It's fine," I said and kissed her deeply. We made out, our tongues doing more work than my cock for a long moment, until we started grinding against each other. The rhythm built up slowly, less a pounding than a sensuous back and forth that felt more like dancing. Well, the best kind of dancing where my cock was inside of a beautiful woman. Our kiss broke as we panted against each other. "More," she gasped. "More what?" "More weight," she said. "I want to feel you." I lowered myself from my elbows, letting my body press down against hers like a too-heavy weighted blanket. "Umm," she groaned somewhere at the back of her throat. Her body felt tense under mine, but slowly loosened. I kissed the side of her neck, and she ran the heel of her foot down my leg and then back up to my butt. The soft whoosh of the glass door opening outside of the privacy curtain made us both stop moving. "Vanessa, you good in there?" asked a woman. "Yep," she said. "So good. Perfect." There was a long moment of silence, and then, "Oh. Sorry for interrupting. If you and Mr. Black can finish up, your Father was hoping to see you. I can stall him for ten minutes?" "Thanks," Vanessa called back, biting her lips. Two soft footsteps and the door whooshed again, settling closed. "Oh my God," Vanessa groaned. "I can do a lot in ten minutes," I said with a grin. "No, we have less than that," she sighed. "I need to get cleaned up and dressed first, and you need to be out of here before he gets here. But first I need you to fuck me hard and fast and give me your cum." So that's what I did. I raised up higher again to gain the leverage I needed and I started pounding into her with hard, steady strokes. Vanessa gasped, and soon we were back in that rolling rhythm of our hips except it was way more fucking than dancing. Our eyes never left each other, and when I went in for another kiss she bit my lip as she started to come. That pushed me towards my own edge, and I got myself there by reaching down and strumming my thumb against her clit just as she was coming down, pushing her right back into a second wave of orgasm as her body clenched and I released. "Fuck," I growled, thrusting my hips forward and emptying my balls into her. "Fuck, Vanessa!" She arched her back, silently screaming before she exhaled hard and released the tension. We both lay there panting for a long moment. "I really want to fuck you again," I said. "Right now. I'm still hard as a rock for you." "I can feel that, you fucking caveman," Vanessa laughed, cock drunk for the moment. "But I need to clean up and you need to go." "One more thing," I said, and kissed her again. I got my clothes on first and then helped her find and put on her pants. She hadn't worn underwear when she had come to visit us the morning before when this whole thing kicked off, so now she was going to be leaking my cum into her jeans. Her shirt was there as well, but she was still hooked up to the IV, which meant I had to leave the room and send a nurse to help her. I stopped at the edge of the privacy curtain, looking back at her. "Go," she motioned to me. "I'm not leaving. You can see my tits any time you want." Maybe I was cunt drunk, but I wanted to tell her I loved her. I just grinned and blew her a kiss and a wink before slipping out. Once she couldn't see me, I shook my head. I thought orgasms were supposed to give you post-nut clarity, I thought. I almost blurted that out, and no matter how compatible we were sexually I knew that wasn't the right thing to say at the moment. I found the nurse, who went to help Vanessa, while another one brought me back to the elevator where I was met by the night sentry again. He brought me back up to the waiting room I'd been in before, and I flopped onto the couch. "Harri. Harri, we need to stop meeting like this," Miriam said, and I blinked awake again as she was standing over me and smirking. "Fuck," I grunted. "What time is it?" "Just past 0600," she said. "We've got a couple of cars ready to drive you back home." "A couple?" I frowned. "Brent left earlier in his own vehicle," Miriam said. "But we're sending you back with two more partners for your friend Leo. I already spoke with Vanessa and she said she wanted to ride with them to try and help them stay calm through their vaccination." I closed my eyes again as I parsed what she was saying. "Okay, hold on. Leo is getting two new partners?" "From what I red they are a bisexual couple who wanted to stay together," Miriam said. I wiped the sleep from my eyes and sucked in a big breath through my nose. "Well, at least mine isn't the only RV that's going to be packed to the gills." Miriam brought me down to the underground garage for the building and handed my phone back to me. Two black SUV were idling, the windows all tinted to the point that I couldn't see a single thing inside including the drivers. I turned back to Miriam. "Just another day?" I asked her. "Hell no," she smirked. "You, Harrison Black, as the biggest pain in my ass since I took this posting." Then she pulled me into a hug. "But I wouldn't change a God damn thing about it. I'll see you once our on-site office is up and running." "I'm looking forward to it," I said, giving her a squeeze back. "Lieutenant Colonel." "That's Miriam to you, soldier," she said, pulling back with a smirk and kissing me on the cheek. The elevator bingled and I was shocked, or really mildly surprised, to see Agent Sourpuss leading two women bundled up in hooded jumpsuits with masks on. Sourpuss took one look at me and sneered, directing the two women to the front SUV and climbing in with them. "What was that about?" I asked. "Oh, she's pissed off because she keeps getting seconded to us for transportation detail," Miriam said. "I have no idea why, but she isn't happy about it." "No; Technically I'm pretty sure that was my fault, actually. But I meant the whole bundled up get up." "First, why am I not surprised you're a pain in the ass for other people as well? And second, it's new protocols coming up from California and the first testing area. I guess there have been some questions around whether vaccinated but unbonded women could contract or become carriers for the virus. It's the latest back and forth between the scientists." "Speaking of which," I said. "I know why I don't need to be all bundled up, but why don't you? Are you imprinted on someone?" "Me? No," Miriam said. "Not yet, anyway. I'll do it when they push the order out, for now we're still technically in the testing phase for a bit longer. Everyone who leaves the building and re-enters without being vaccinated is getting blood tested and quarantined; it sucks, but it leaves us able to work functionally instead of talking to each other through hazmat suits." The elevator bingled again, and this time it was Vanessa who stepped out as a sentry gestured her towards the front SUV. She saw me immediately and veered off course, coming to me. I wrapped her up in a hug and noticed Miriam giving me a hard-to-read look. "Hey," I said to Vanessa. "I hear you're playing therapy animal for Leo's new partners." "They asked me to," Vanessa said. "From what I understand, the nurses don't think the woman who is supposed to be doing it does a very good job at calming nerves." Miriam snorted a little but covered it with a cough, looking at me. "Well, I feel like I'm missing out on some more alone time with you, but I understand why," I said. "Do me a favor and try and feel them out a bit, see what they're like." "I will," she smirked and went on her tiptoes to give me a peck on the lips. "They're going to be our neighbors, after all." "Yes they are," I grinned and patted her butt. "See you at home?" "Fuck. Home," Vanessa said, backing away from me. "I haven't had one of those in a while. It's gonna be weird." She turned and strode to the SUV and got in the back. "That one might be trouble," Miriam said. "They're all trouble," I laughed. "See you sooner than later?" "Sooner than later," she grinned and winked. I went to the back SUV, which was apparently my personal chauffeur for the sole reason that Agent Sourpuss couldn't find an ounce of empathy in her. Hopefully there's a partition between the front and the back, I thought. I can check those pictures Erica and Ivy were sending me. When I opened the back door of the SUV to get in I had to stop. "Ah," I said. "That explains a lot." I slid in and shut the door. "Agent Grierson." The craggy-faced Agent smirked and nodded. "Harrison. When I heard there was an anomalous vaccination issue, I decided to check it out and lo and behold, it's my favorite redneck." "Did you just come to check-in, or are you looking to offload some more government cash on me?" I asked. The SUVs started moving, pulling out of the garage and into downtown Portland. "Kid, you know I don't need to come to see you to check in," he said. "And I don't have the time to just come shoot the shit, no matter how much I'd enjoy a good fuckin' day off once in a while. I'm here to ask a favor." "Well now you're just being coy," I said. "You know that I know you didn't have to let that lease thing through instead of a flat purchase, so you've got me cornered." "Well, the good news is that I'm not asking you to do anything underhanded," Grierson said. "I noticed you've recently taken on a security consulting contract and your clearance has been restored. I'm going to open it up a little bit more here, if that's alright with you." "Playful, then coy, then asking my permission? Jesus fuck, what are you about to ask me to do?" "Alright, kid. Here's the deal," Grierson sighed. "Sometime in the next few days you're going to get a new partner delivered to you. What I need you to do is keep an eye on her. She's the daughter of the Ambassador from the Philippines, and officially we've run her through the Oracle matching system as a diplomatic courtesy. What no one else knows, including people in that building we just left, is that her Oracle results didn't matter. I'm placing her with you, and scattering a few other Filipino nationals in safe little corners of the country, as a deal with the NICA." "Wait, that's the..." I had to wrack my brain going back to my Military Police training. "Isn't that the CIA of the Philippines?" "A much lesser version, yes," Grierson said. "On the official unofficial paperwork, it's a spy deal. We're going to take care of some of their valuable people who are here, and they're going to take care of some of our valuable people who are over there. The unofficial unofficial deal is that we don't have anyone over there, and the government of the Philippines is going to let us stage our latest espionage attempts into China from their shores. There's a fucking information blackout coming out of China right now, and other than satellite images we've got nothing on what's going on in there." "Okay, hold on," I said. "So am I taking in this Ambassador's daughter as payment for the US Government?" "No, you're taking her in because Kyla Bautista is also secretly a spy who just graduated from the University of Southern California with a degree in dance, and while she was there we suspect she turned at least four different Professors and research assistants into assets for NICA for Intellectual Property espionage. I'm scooping her up and putting her with you because you're so far off the radar that no one would think you're keeping an eye on her, and so that the Chinese can't find her if they figure out what's going on and want some revenge. But most of all, I'm putting her with you because, despite your record and stupid career choices after you left the military, you have the mindset to keep an eye on her without her or anyone else knowing that's what's going on." "This is all well and good, Grierson," I said. "But I've got three women imprinted on me already, one of them by mistake. How the hell am I supposed to add a fourth woman into the mix?" Grierson snorted. "Kid, I got news for you. By this time next year, I'd bet all that money I just put into your bank account that you'll look back and think what a naive question that was." I sighed and shook my head slowly. "What does her father think of her getting matched off like that? Does he even know?" "Oh, he was pissed until he got cut in on an early vaccination as well for his wife, along with his long-time second in command who he's been having an affair with, and his additional American mistress who is very black and very formidable, neither of whom the wife knows about. He seems to think it'll be fine." "Jesus," I sighed, shaking my head. "So what, is the OGA offering to pay me for spy sitting?" "No," Grierson said. "But there is an upside." "What's that?" "Like I said, Kyla Bautista graduated with a degree in dance. If I wasn't too fucking busy being ethical, I'd have just put her in my house. The woman is something else." "That's gross," I said, my face twisting in mild disgust. "It's reality, kid. Game it out; people need to fuck to save their lives. Even before this shit show people put a value on beauty over pretty much anything else. What do you think it's going to be like when the entire country is getting matched up?" "I don't know," I sighed. "That's; I don't even want to think about it." "And that's why they pay me and my people the big bucks," Grierson said. He tapped on the glass partition that separated us from the front seat, and the SUV began to pull over. "I'm not asking you to do anything you wouldn't have anyways. Just keep an eye on her for me, alright?" "Fine," I said. "But if she takes one look at me and asks for someone else, I can't do anything about that. I'm not forcing some woman into this." "Won't be a problem," Grierson said. The SUV came to a stop, and he stepped out. "Grierson," I said, and he turned back. "Miriam said someone pulled some strings to get her assigned where she is. Was that you?" "What?" Grierson raised an eyebrow. "You think I like you that much, kid?" "That wasn't an answer," I said. "Well, if it was me, I think maybe you owe me another one still," he said, then shut the door. Another car had pulled up behind us, which he got into, and it pulled a big U-turn in the middle of the empty street and drove back the way we'd come. The driver of my ride pulled back onto the street and sped up to catch the other SUV in our mini convoy, and I was left to my thoughts. I sighed and opened my phone. I didn't want to think about this Grierson thing. If it happened, then it happened and we'd deal with it. I went to my messages and opened the ones from Erica and Ivy. "Fucking hell," I sighed, looking at the lewd pictures and knowing that Miriam had seen them. "What am I going to do with three women?" Or four? Or more? I was going to need a bigger bed, and quickly. I stretched, feeling several somethings in my back and shoulders pop, as I got out of the back of the nondescript black SUV and felt the gravel of the construction site crunch under my boots. The place was bustling since we'd arrived mid-morning, and I saw more than a few of the workers taking looks over at me and starting to talk to each other. The rumor mill must have been burning hard since Vanessa had gotten carted off in a military helicopter and flown away. First things first, however, was to not unload two vaccinated-but-unbonded women into the middle of a construction site. I flashed a quick thumbs up through the passenger side window at whoever my driver had been; I'd never seen a face or heard a voice; and jogged up to the other vehicle and knocked on the passenger window. Agent Sourpuss rolled it down a moment later, scowling at me from the driver's seat. "What?" "I know you haven't been here for a bit," I said. "But if you drive around to the right over there you'll see our RVs and our little compound. Dropping the ladies off there would probably cause less of a, uh, scene." I could tell she wanted to argue with me but knew I was right. Instead of answering she just stabbed her finger down on the window button beside her and closed it in my face, then pulled the SUV around and headed in the direction I'd pointed. I walked along behind, and we rounded the second big bunkhouse building that was looking just about finished now and headed towards our compound. By the time Agent Sourpuss put the vehicle in park Erica and Ivy were already ducking out from behind the sheets hung between the corner of the RV and the storage container that we'd deemed the 'front door.' Leo and Danielle were right behind them. I wanted to go to my women, but I held myself back and instead opened the rear door of the SUV. Inside I saw that Vanessa was sitting in the middle row bucket seat, and I leaned in and kissed her quickly before offering her a hand down. "Don't go getting all chivalrous on me now, Harri," Vanessa grinned as she accepted my hand and swung out onto her feet. She looked back into the vehicle. "Come on, ladies. Leo's out here waiting for you." The two women, practically swimming in their baggy, hooded coveralls and masked up to boot, unbuckled and started climbing between the seats. I, however, was suddenly a little busy as I was hugged from behind by a small form that could only be Ivy. Beside me, Erica was pulling Vanessa into a hug as well. "I'm so sorry, hon," Erica said, squeezing the shorter woman tightly. "If I'd had any reasonable idea that this would happen,” "It's fine, Erica," Vanessa said, squeezing her back and giving her a kiss on the cheek. "Seriously. We'll talk about it, but I'm Okay with it if you are." "Hey you," I said in the meanwhile, turning at the waist to wrap my arm around Ivy's shoulder and hug her to me. "Hello, mon amour," Ivy sighed. "I missed you." "I missed you too, I've," I said, and leaned down and gave the short blonde a quick kiss. The first of the women had reached the door of the car, and Ivy let me go so that I could offer her a hand down. All I could see of her were her eyes and the skin around them; she was white but tanned heavily, and had soft grey eyes that were flicking around. "Let me help, miss," I said. She accepted, her gloved hand taking mine for a moment to step down, and I ushered her directly towards Leo and Dani. "This is Leo, and his better half Danielle." "Hey," Leo scolded me playfully, giving me a little punch on the arm as he grinned. "Hey, hon," Dani said, pulling the woman into a hug that seemed to surprise her. I turned back and Erica was helping the next woman down; she was white and paler than the first, and had dark green eyes. Soon she was getting the same hugging welcome as the first from Dani, as Leo looked both a little bashful and a little excited. "How about we head in and talk?" Erica suggested to everyone. "Ladies, Leo is my brother so I might be biased, but you're in good hands. And if he ends up sucking, then Dani's got you." "Hell yeah I do," Dani chuckled, nudging Leo with an elbow. "I wouldn't mind getting handled by either of you," the tan woman said through her mask. "God damn, girl. Your tits don't quit." "Thanks for noticing," Dani grinned and winked. She took both women by the hand and started leading them into the compound. "Come on, let's get you two fucked and settled." "Now that's one hell of a welcome offer," the other woman laughed. I laughed a little too, hearing the two as Leo quickly jogged ahead to hold the fabric door open for them. "Seriously, those two are gonna be something else," Vanessa said, shaking her head. "You got to talk with them?" Erica asked. "The whole ride here," Vanessa said. "Their names are Aria and India. Aria seems a little sweeter and the more rational one, while India is a hippy kid from hippy parents. They said they've been girlfriends for three years, and up until last year they 'worked' as sugar babies while Aria was finishing up her master's of communications." "Jesus," Erica sighed with a rueful smirk. "They're going to eat Leo alive."

On this week's all-new episode of the Digging Deep ATVMX Podcast, we celebrate the end of a legendary era.This past week, Chad Wienen quietly confirmed that the Briarcliff season finale will mark “the ‘Last Dance' of [his] full-time AMA Pro Racing career.” After more than two decades at the top of the sport, one of ATV motocross's greatest champions prepares to take his final bow.In this special episode, an emotional Chad Wienen joins us to reflect on his decision, what led him to it, what these last couple outings will mean to him, what's next—and so much more. This is a must-listen moment in ATV racing history and Digging Deep history alike.Tune in now — and as always, thank you for DIGGING DEEP with us!Send us a textSupport the show

En una nueva edición veraniega de nuestro podcast semanal, vamos a comentar las noticias tecnológicas de esta semana. Y una de ellas, una de las que más nos ha gustado esta semana, ha sido la novedad del paquete Apple Care One y la opción de robo y perdida añadidas al Apple Care de iPad y Watch.Os traemos una nueva noticia chorra de demandas a Apple de la cual la compañía ha salido airosa. De esta y de varias citas legales que ha tenido en los últimos días. Está en racha la compañía de Cupertino, que también ha conseguido en estos días que la Unión Europea acepte las modificaciones en la AppStore.Apple va a modificar la segmentación de edades  en su App Store. Y junto a esta medida, va a introducir otras destinadas a proteger a los menores de aplicaciones no recomendadas. Por ejemplo, aplicaciones que ni siquiera aparecerán visibles en sus tiendas de Apps.Por supuesto también comentaremos las novedades del mundo Beta, ademas de la cuarta entrega para desarrolladores, tenemos la primera pública, por lo que se da por hecho que ya está rodada. También comentaremos las novedades que nos aporta en CarPlay.Y como no, tendremos una ronda rápida de noticias y las novedades en aTV+. Para completar un nuevo podcast de nuestro Abierto por Vacaciones y del compromiso 7 de 7. Lo tenemos familia! Esperamos que estéis pasando un buen verano y que nos lo hagáis saber en nuestro grupo de Telegram. 

In this episode, we sit down with Chris Merrill to hear his harrowing story of survival. Chris was involved in a devastating ATV accident on the towering sand dunes of Southern Utah—an incident that nearly claimed his life and put his friend and his friend's son in grave danger. While driving the ATV, Chris unknowingly crested a steep cornice. The vehicle suddenly launched into the air, landing hard on its front end before tumbling violently down the dune. During the crash, Chris was thrown forward repeatedly, his face slamming into the steering wheel multiple times. The impact left him with a severely fractured jaw that spiraled around his skull. Listen in on how this experience affected Chris and his outlook towards life in general and the future ahead of him. Thanks Chris for being on the show!

Welcome the Leutz Family to RitR Podcast. Get to know Wyatt, Beth, Levi, and Leah in this episode. Lando and Dan discuss the double header at SVCC hosting the MWEDTs Rounds 4 and 5 Ohio Hunts Get your DRAGON RACE FUEL Follow us on Facebook www.rylandjohnsonracing.com www.keizerwheel.com

Watch on Philo! - Philo.tv/DTHRob proposes!!! And he tells her he wants to get married tomorrow! She says “you know my answers yes!”. They kiss and it's sweet, she's like I'm so happy I don't have to call you boyfriend anymore at my age. And then he tells her Paul is going to marry them and she's like what?! So we'll see. We find out that Ben Ayres did take the script from Lori and that he'll do what he can to get it into the right hands. Cut back to Gail looking real scared on the ATV. Suddenly, Tyler Hynes comes rolling up on an ATV and he says “my mom said I should come find 2 attractive women for some adventure”. He says Gail I know you're nervous, how about you hop on the back of mine and I'll help you. And Alicia is now like “wait I'm scared too”! Gail hops on and they get moving and Gail is loving life, holding onto Tyler Hynes. Cut over to Paige telling momma Kerry about her move. At first, she says it's a terrible idea. But she tells her that you know that I support you. It's time for you to do your own thing. Tyler pulls over and tells Gail it's time for her to try it on her own (plus he needs to give Alicia some love and ride with her cuz he's a gentlemen). She's nervous but she does it!!! You go Gail! Lori is proud of herself for handing over her script. She doubts anything will come of it but she did it and that's big for her. And her sister is so proud of her. After ATV riding, Tyler hangs out with Alicia and Gail and gives them a friendship pep talk that would make you run through a wall. They then all get rocks and write down something they want to let go of and they throw it into the water. Back on cruise, it's time for the pajama party, of course the 3 wise men do their dance. The women in the crowd are going nuts. It's time for Mr Shipmas - cruise version of finding Mr Christmas. Of course ripped Rob is competing. He tells Jonathan Bennett about the wedding and of course he's excited. Gail and Alicia are playing shuffleboard and of course Erin Cahill and Sarah Drew walk up. They're talking about friendship and they're all crying over the power of friendship. Back at Shipmas, Jonathan announces to the crowd about the engagement and Rob tells everyone that they're all invited. Rob does not win. Momma Kerry sees Taylor Cole sitting by herself in the empty dining room. She thanks Taylor for being such an active supporter of breast cancer awareness because Kerry beat breast cancer and they bond and it's sweet.   Lori and sister get back to their room and find a note on their door from Paul and Kimberley asking to meet. They have the script. Paul tells them that they checked out the first couple pages and then he pauses and that's it. 

In this episode of ATV-TALK, we sit down with rising ATV racer Mike Wise from Louisiana. Known for his lightning fast starts and consistency on the track, Mike shares his journey into the sport, what fuels his competitive spirit, and how he's turning heads on the amateur circuit. From small-town beginnings to standing out in the Open class, this episode is all about grit, passion, and chasing wins at full throttle. Whether you're a longtime fan or just getting to know the sport, Mike's story will leave you inspired.

Katlyn Harp Was Missing for 9 Days… Then They Found the Box When Katlyn Marie Harp missed her daily check-in with her twin sister, something felt off. Nine days later, that feeling turned into a nightmare when her decomposing body was found stuffed in a green metal box—hidden in the woods on land once owned by her husband, Vincent Harp. In this episode, we break down the chilling murder of Katlyn Harp and how her husband's lies unraveled under the weight of evidence. From surveillance footage showing him buying gloves to GPS pings placing him exactly where her body would later be found, investigators built a case brick by brick. Vincent Harp said his wife vanished in the night. But cameras caught him loading the box. Cell towers caught him near the dump site. And luminol caught blood on an ATV he tried to sell. The clincher? Her sister saw the box and recognized it from his truck. Police opened it and found Katlyn's remains—confirmed by a tattoo. Vincent Harp is now facing charges for homicide, corpse abuse, and evidence tampering. If convicted, he'll never see the outside again. Get the full breakdown of this disturbing case—including how a web of surveillance, digital tracking, and sisterly instinct brought a killer to justice. #katlynharp #vincentharp #metalboxmurder #truecrime #missingwife #forensicevidence #lifesentence #domesticmurder #cellphonetrap #crimesolved Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video?  Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/@hiddenkillerspod Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/ Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/ Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod X Twitter https://x.com/tonybpod Listen Ad-Free On Apple Podcasts Here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/true-crime-today-premium-plus-ad-free-advance-episode/id1705422872

Katlyn Harp Was Missing for 9 Days… Then They Found the Box When Katlyn Marie Harp missed her daily check-in with her twin sister, something felt off. Nine days later, that feeling turned into a nightmare when her decomposing body was found stuffed in a green metal box—hidden in the woods on land once owned by her husband, Vincent Harp. In this episode, we break down the chilling murder of Katlyn Harp and how her husband's lies unraveled under the weight of evidence. From surveillance footage showing him buying gloves to GPS pings placing him exactly where her body would later be found, investigators built a case brick by brick. Vincent Harp said his wife vanished in the night. But cameras caught him loading the box. Cell towers caught him near the dump site. And luminol caught blood on an ATV he tried to sell. The clincher? Her sister saw the box and recognized it from his truck. Police opened it and found Katlyn's remains—confirmed by a tattoo. Vincent Harp is now facing charges for homicide, corpse abuse, and evidence tampering. If convicted, he'll never see the outside again. Get the full breakdown of this disturbing case—including how a web of surveillance, digital tracking, and sisterly instinct brought a killer to justice. #katlynharp #vincentharp #metalboxmurder #truecrime #missingwife #forensicevidence #lifesentence #domesticmurder #cellphonetrap #crimesolved Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video?  Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/@hiddenkillerspod Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/ Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/ Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod X Twitter https://x.com/tonybpod Listen Ad-Free On Apple Podcasts Here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/true-crime-today-premium-plus-ad-free-advance-episode/id1705422872

I've been excited to get to this Bond film, mainly because everyone seems to really hate it. Diamonds are Forever was never a favorite of mine growing up but I never thought it was the worst! Well, now I get to see if as an adult, I feel the same way. Anita also has a real good laugh at villains crashing ATV's. Support the show on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/c/homevideohustle Check Out The Show On Goodpods - https://good-pods.app.link/n2LK61w5eEb More Movie Reviews on LetterBoxd - https://letterboxd.com/hvhpodcast/ Check Out Book Reviews on GoodReads - https://www.goodreads.com/.../168422134-home-video-hustle Watch Us On YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfN67zqLBcbJNJw1cHI0Hlw Get HVH Merch - https://www.teepublic.com/user/hvhpodcast Music By: @tradevoorhees Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Watch on Philo! - Philo.tv/DTHIt's photoshoot time! Everyone is out there waiting including Alicia and Gail. Gail is like last night, I let Alicia down. Not today! Kerry and her daughters are there and I'm pretty convinced Alexandrea doesn't wanna be there. Rob tells his girlfriend Donna about meeting Paul and Andrew on the ship but obviously doesn't tell her about what they talked about. Cut to Paul trying to get Tyler and Kimberley in on the wedding ceremony. So they show everyone getting like 7 seconds to take a picture with everyone. Hynes is down there just goofing off. Rob and Donna come in and Paul is like ROB - making him look awesome in front of Donna. Paige gives Tyler a bracket with her name in it which is wild. Afterwards, Alexandrea was like you should make another bracelet with your number in it. Gail and Alicia meet Betty Hynes who is just the best. They ask her “is Tyler the same on screen and off” and Betty says “he's the bad boy for Hallmark for a reason”. Betty is a star, Paige and Alexandrea are hanging out, and she tells her about moving back to California and how she is nervous to tell mom. Remember Nate and his grandmas? Nate is just soaking up people telling him happy birthday, and I can't stress this enough - it's not his birthday. They're shopping at the hallmark store when Erin Cahill walks up and Erin is like Nate you're the best, happy birthday. And they bond over their mutual love of their grandmas, and Erin buys them everything they have in their hands! Lori and her sister talk about how to get their Christmas screenplay in front of someone at Hallmark. Donna is in the gym now and of course Nikki DeLoach is there. What are the odds?! And they bond. She talks about her brain surgery, Nikki talks about a rabbi she really likes. It's sweet. Gail and Alicia are hanging out and Alicia is like hey I booked us an ATV excision in the Bahamas. Gail is not thrilled by this. But she agrees to give it a shot. Rob and Donna get together for drinks with Kerry and her daughters and it's a whole thing. They bond over surgeries and then Donna and Kerry's daughter go to the bar and  Rob tells Kerry his plan and she says her daughter will do Donna's makeup. Plan is really coming together! The script sisters magically bumped in Benjamin Ayers and Sarah Drew and she pitched them the script and they love it. She asks if they will read it and they just kinda stare at each other. Gail gets on the ATV and chickens out. So Kerry and her daughters go to swim with the pigs which is run by Shane Gillis doing a Bahamian accent. Afterward, Paige tells her mom she wants to move to California. She's not thrilled. And then episode ends with Rob, ring box in hand on the beach of the Bahamas, getting ready to propose. 

It's Seeking Sunday! Ben here, today Jacques, Hesse and I open the show up to all of you! That's right, we're only talking about what you all have suggested, namely JoJo Siwa's new song, Caitlyn's assistant/girlfriends ATV death, Grok becoming a Nazi, and r/anti-sex, a reddit dedicated to Sex Haters.

Get 20% off your first Mood orderwith promo code VIEWS https://mood.com Use our code for 10% off your next SeatGeek order*:  Sponsored by SeatGeek. *Restrictions apply. Max $20 discount https://seatgeek.oneRrlink.me/nK/VIEWS10 Welcome back to Viewssssss... Saturday upload! Hope you guys are doing great, we've got another hot podcast as David, Jason and Natalie return from their vacation in Thailand and Ibiza with a hot pod and all the scoop on what went on including: David's miserable ATV ride, Natalie's fleeting crush and Jason's report on flying halfway across the world. Also, David's lost interview with Noah Beck, a big reveal about Ilya and Jason feels bad after sex. And a story about a man with 30,000 Bitcoin that tried to marry two women. Check out Jason's podcast here: https://open.spotify.com/episode/00MvrO8mYsPokBAodmzEpS?si=-K3S07HQTdmmAs3Ksh8lrg Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

August 23, 2008. Blount County, Tennessee. After leaving his condo in Maryville, 51-year old Mike Hearon drives to his rural farm with plans to mow the lawn and some neighbours see him driving away from his residence on his ATV. Mike vanishes without a trace and the abandoned ATV is eventually found on a steep hill located a mile from his property. Mike's family suspects that he may have stumbled upon something he wasn't supposed to see and became the victim of foul play, but there is no evidence to work with and Mike is never found.  July 18, 2007. Ravalli County, Montana. 55-year old Barbara Bolick goes hiking in the Bitterroot Mountains on the Bear Creek Overlook Trail alongside a friend named Jim Ramaker. According to Jim, they were headed back down the trail together when he stopped at a scenic overview, but even though he only took his eyes off Barbara for about a minute, Jim claims that she vanished without a trace and he was unable to find her. A massive search effort fails to turn up any trace of Barbara and while Jim is not considered to be a suspect in her disappearance, there is no evidence to explain what happened. On this week's episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we explore two baffling missing persons cases involving victims who seemingly vanished into thin air in remote areas. Join us on Saturday, July 5 at 8:00pm ET for an online streaming marathon where we will be watching classic segments from “Unsolved Mysteries”. You can enter our screening room by clicking on this link. Additional Reading: https://charleyproject.org/case/michael-edwin-hearon https://archive.knoxnews.com/news/local/50-volunteers-join-search-for-missing-maryville-man-ep-411119166-359796801.html/?page=1 https://www.thedailytimes.com/news/family-of-missing-man-still-searching/article_26118160-9967-54c5-8f13-1aed52c1a285.html https://www.timesfreepress.com/news/2012/aug/27/missing-man-still-mystery-4-years-after/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/128530073/ https://www.wbir.com/article/news/local/mike-hearon-man-missing-in-the-mountains/51-354008626 https://www.wbir.com/article/news/special-reports/the-vanished/vanished-mike-hearon-missing-in-the-moutains/51-d4855ea8-13ba-4710-a534-0ce8f1dc8441 https://parkpredators.com/the-local/ https://charleyproject.org/case/barbara-assunta-bolick https://missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/ground-search-for-missing-woman-suspendedposted-on-aug/article_623e4d47-a337-5984-bfa5-aa64697c3439.html https://www.newspapers.com/image/411502280/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/352194122/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/352194127/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/352194122/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/352194127/ https://nbcmontana.com/news/local/missing-bitterroot-woman-still-a-mystery "The Trail Went Cold" will be appearing at the True Crime Podcast Festival, taking place at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel Boston North Shore in Boston, Massachusetts on July 18-20, 2025. To get a 20 % discount on tickets, please use our specialized promo code, “ROBIN20”, by visiting https://www.truecrimepodcastfestival.com/.  “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

For nearly two decades, Beau Baron has dominated the ATV racing world with an equally impressive motorcycle career running alongside it. Known for innovation, adaptability, and relentless drive, Beau has long been the guy pulling performance secrets out of a proverbial hat. But this time, the conversation takes a different turn.In this episode, we look at racing and life through Beau's eyes. From his early days on the bike to his current run leading the WORCS series (which he's already won 11 times), Beau reflects on the journey, the sacrifices, and what comes next.The love for the sport is still strong. But with sponsorships shrinking and family responsibilities growing, he's now weighing what life might look like beyond the racetrack possibly behind the controls of heavy equipment instead of a race machine.Will Beau Baron retire, or is it just talk? Can he clinch his 12th WORCS title? Tune in to find out then subscribe, share, and hit that like button. Thanks for being part of the ride!

Mike Esneault speaks with visual artist BJ Smith, and his mother Kim Smith. 20 years ago, BJ arrived at the hospital as the result of an ATV accident and given a 10% chance of survival because of a severe brain injury. They talk about the power of the arts as a healer and how creating visual art has had a profound impact on BJ's ongoing road to recovery.

High school senior died riding an ATV. Underage drinking at parties with parents Krystle had a 10pm curfew. Jeffrey is booked for a private tour at Martin guitars. Making a reservation for the wrong day. Charlie booked for the wrong flight to Alaska. Attire for flying. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Rover's shoulder pain has intensified. Aperol spritz dispenser. JLR has big plans for Friday in Allentown. Lazy eye and a lazy boob. Rover wants to buy JLR a new trendy swimsuit. Where is Duji? A man was found dead in a tank at a water treatment plant. Trump says the most fascinating things. The Liver King was arrested for making threats against Joe Rogan. Living like our ancestors. Is anyone on the show worried about WWIII? Where you would be safe on Earth from a nuclear war. Shooting down a satellite. Watching missile bases. Silos that held missiles in Ohio. A two-year-old boy is in a coma after a tourist threw him to the ground at an airport. High school senior died riding an ATV. Underage drinking at parties with parents. Krystle had a 10pm curfew. Jeffrey is booked for a private tour at Martin guitars. Making reservation for the wrong day. Charlie booked for the wrong flight to Alaska. Attire for flying. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

High school senior died riding an ATV. Underage drinking at parties with parents Krystle had a 10pm curfew. Jeffrey is booked for a private tour at Martin guitars. Making a reservation for the wrong day. Charlie booked for the wrong flight to Alaska. Attire for flying.

Rover's shoulder pain has intensified. Aperol spritz dispenser. JLR has big plans for Friday in Allentown. Lazy eye and a lazy boob. Rover wants to buy JLR a new trendy swimsuit. Where is Duji? A man was found dead in a tank at a water treatment plant. Trump says the most fascinating things. The Liver King was arrested for making threats against Joe Rogan. Living like our ancestors. Is anyone on the show worried about WWIII? Where you would be safe on Earth from a nuclear war. Shooting down a satellite. Watching missile bases. Silos that held missiles in Ohio. A two-year-old boy is in a coma after a tourist threw him to the ground at an airport. High school senior died riding an ATV. Underage drinking at parties with parents. Krystle had a 10pm curfew. Jeffrey is booked for a private tour at Martin guitars. Making reservation for the wrong day. Charlie booked for the wrong flight to Alaska. Attire for flying.

Carrie Bradshaw is on ATV and we don't know how to feel about it, but we do know that this episode through us for a loop. But before that, we discuss Call Her Daddy for some reason. And then we get into it all - Ryan Serhant is back, LTW is in Desperate Housewives territory, the show's attempt at taking on aging, Miranda is cat sitting, and that ending!!

In this powerful and eye-opening episode, we welcome Dr. Katie Lee, a trailblazing dentist, visionary entrepreneur, and author of "Saved by the Mouth." Dr. Lee is on a mission to reframe how we think about oral health—not as an isolated part of the body, but as a foundational element of systemic and especially female health. Dr. Lee's journey began at just 14 years old when a traumatic ATV accident forever changed her life. After enduring nine surgeries and dental implants, she learned firsthand the profound impact a healthy smile can have on a person's physical, emotional, and mental health. That experience sparked a calling to become the best dentist she could be—not just to treat teeth, but to heal the whole person. As the founder of The Collective Health Society, a groundbreaking fully integrated functional dental and medical center, Dr. Lee is at the forefront of oral-systemic health. She also serves as the Chief Clinical Advisor for the Dental Innovation Alliance and contributes to groundbreaking space health research with NASA, helping protect astronauts' oral microbiomes during space travel. In this episode, Dr. Lee unpacks the critical but overlooked links between oral health, fertility, and women's overall wellness. She challenges the outdated research models that treat women as "small men" and calls for a more holistic, ecosystem-based approach to women's health. What You'll Learn in This Episode: