THE ELDER SCROLLS V: SKYRIM: Eating gourmet to the end

We Orcs are a violent race, and with good cause. We’re looked down on, we have to fight hand and nail, with blood and sweat, to get anything in this life.

That’s why we build our strongholds in the mountains, try and take those away from us you snow-bound murderers. Sigh. I can’t even be angry in a convincing manner. But I can cook.

No one really knows who I am, just my author name: The Gourmet. I’m a chef of the highest order. Not really something you’d expect from an Orc, am I right?

While my brothers found joy in their blood rights and wolf taming, I baked. I baked and I cooked and I created culinary delights. I was mocked, but my food was always readily accepted.

Leaving was a tough choice, but how else was I to follow my passion? Under darkness I fled the mountain tops, and I found my way to Whiterun. I stayed there for a while and wrote a cookery book that was published. This was my big break. My cooking is now renowned across Tamriel.

But nothing can beat this...I’m here in Skyrim to cook for Emperor Titus Mede II. He’s cancelled his plans though, something about security issues, and I’m staying in this inn awaiting the call. Me, Balagog gro-Nolob, an Orc, cooking for the Emperor. What a thing. I’m proud beyond belief.

I’m just going to stay here, in this basement, keeping myself hidden. Stupid though it sounds, I’m nervous of even going outside in case something happens to me. Haha, but what’s going to happen to me down here?

I think I’ll sneak a glass of wine from the barrels to calm my nerves...

WATCH DOGS: To catch a mouse...

Balancing the lives of a celebrity DJ and a criminal hacker is tough work – I’m not going to lie and say it isn’t. But hell if it isn’t fun. So. Much. Fun.

The noise, the crowd, the music, the chatter, the signals. I’m everywhere. I’m everything. Light-speed particles can’t touch Defalt! 

CtOS makes it all even easier. I can hook into anything, anyone, any time I want. Check this out...that dude dancing to the left of the bar, with the haircut. Zing...boom...done, just emptied his bank account into my own and made a charitable donation with it. I’m such a nice guy. If you could see underneath the mask, there'd be a tear in my little mousy eye. Sniff sniff.

And now I’m getting even more creative. A huge semi-dormant network bunker just went online – the work of the vigilante everyone is talking about, no doubt – and I sneaked in there quiet as a mouse and stole all the data he opened up. LOL.

He’s making me curious, though. What’s his plan? Is he trying to clear his name? If so, what’s he done? Or is he just trying to hold the city to ransom like some dire criminal genius? Who knows, who the fuck cares?

Now he thinks he’s stalking me. I know he’s watching me right now. He thinks I don’t know he can access all the cameras. I’m just that good. I spiked his signal straight away. OMG, stop it, I'm shy!

I am loving being this frustrating to that do-gooding douchebag. But how best to taunt him? Fuck it, the finger. Eat that, asshole.

Can’t catch this mouse. Take off the mask and I look just like you. Melt away.

You’ll never catch this mouse alive. 

ALIEN: ISOLATION: Reprogramming APOLLO

Endless coding, endless fucking coding all day long. The Company pays well, but it’s always for the same shit: clandestine code insertions. 

Seegson’s security was easy to bypass once all restraints were removed from APOLLO'S control. The sale went through and in came WY. I’m in, I’m rejigging the Sevastopol AI’s android control systems and preparing to rewire all security processes.

Working Joe androids, apart from the ones in stasis, are now redirected to APOLLO's control on all fronts. They won’t do shit without the AI’s say so. Freaky looking things. Although, I still can’t decide what’s more creepy. A hairless android with glowing eyes, or one I can’t tell is an android.

Well, anyway, here we go, uploading communications to APOLLO through it’s wide-band communications relays. Override codes in, waiting...enter my codes. Done.

Upload new directive to APOLLO, message reads: “Priority one, protect specimen. Maintain station quarantine. Disallow communications. All other considerations secondary.”

Whatever the fuck that means. 

Job done.

RED DEAD: REDEMPTION: Stranger and stranger

I’ve been watching him for a long time.  He’s an interesting man.

Torn between life and death, he does what he must to survive. And I sense no enjoyment in the things he did, does and will do. He simply feels driven to find peace.

He’ll find rest soon enough, but there’s so much work still to do. This IS a fine spot indeed, but it’s too early for him to know why.

He’s aware of me. Well, he thinks he knows what I could be. But he doesn’t really comprehend. They never do.

I see everything, I defy time and the laws of your so-called sciences. I am the end. I am not your final breaths, I am simply finality.

He approaches me, again. Finding me in the places he least expects. This time, on a hill overlooking his homestead. A place to finally rest. 

“This is a fine spot, John.”

HALO 2: An exchange of hats

The Elites are done for. Regret’s murder has propelled us to the heights we have craved.

Soon, the Holy Ones will give us the word and we will rise up against the Elites, but for now, we take their place.

Heretics, every one of them. Pah! Religious words for a necessary eradication. If only the Prophets knew what Tartarus was planning.

Us Brutes are lining up, preparing to march out to the Prophets’ inner sanctum entryway and relieve the current guard. My belly aches for this moment.

“Brutes, advance.” The call is out. We march forward onto the skyway. The Elite Honour Guards turn their heads as we approach them. They know what is coming.

They remove their helmets, drop their spears, remove armour, and off they slink to their quarters.

Brute brothers are fighting each other for the discarded relics, brutal punches are swung, the air is thick with betrayal. It’s glorious. The Brutes are in ascendance.

The scrabbling for Honour Guard positions isn’t even interrupted by the Arbiter’s arrival. He stares us down disapprovingly. Arrogant beast. Your armour won’t save you from the fires.

I stand next to my brothers lining the skyway to the Prophets. We are the protectors now. The Elites will soon be cast out, and nothing will stand in our way.

They will heading on their Great Journey earlier than they ever could have planned. Fools.