atlas' stuff

...

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1OepfVUp-6c7LY38RbdZBkfh_twhxOBqZNhm66qipo9w/edit?usp=sharing

Excuse my language but

HOLLY SHIT.

That was one of the most sad and cool and devastating and interesting things I have ever read.

And my god I feel SO BAD FOR FREAK EVEN MORE NOW

I feel quite mad.

...

The Boss keeps giving me dirty looks, though I suppose it's deserved, considering I have spent the past few days going through old employee logs, bills and documents that I shouldn't really be able to access, instead of actually doing my job.

It's not an obsession, I assure myself. That would be like telling a detective that they are obsessed with the murderer they are investigating. They simply have to find out what happened.

As do I.

The pieces of the puzzle are settling into place, but things are incoherent without knowing what machine was running inside the holding cell. It is a useless toil without that crucial knowledge. I know for definite now that "Freak" had not been left in his mother's custody, nor his father's, for I found an older newspaper with his name in the obituary: a tragic suicide. It couldn't be a coincidence. And as for his mother, she now lived in a foreign country according to the documents I could find, but I had been explicitly told that Freak was staying local, in case of a new opportunity for him to come back and work for the company.

It made no sense. None at all, at least to me.

Where was he now? Is he still working here? In another unit? And I was never correctly informed? Or was he taken away—disposed of, perhaps, though it kills me to think of it.

Even if the poor child is dead, it would put rest to my wounded soul if I knew exactly what had happened. To make certain it wasn't a murder, it wasn't a case of he was systematically remover for his forward thinking. And to hope, and to wish that he still lives on, unharmed, even if optimisim only seems to come back to bite me in the end.

…

I plan to stay overnight in the building.

I am going to go into that room.

I will find out what happened. Whether I lose my job for it or not.

…

Today, out of pure curiosity, the dangerous type that gets the cat killed, I went and checked the building's over-all electricity usage. Everything appeared normal at the present—as to be expected, electricity use higher in rooms with more machines and servers. And so, boredom getting the better of me, I looked through the previous logs, going back through the years.

There was something wrong with the data provided. An anomaly.

The usage of electricity in the holding room spiked from a dead flatline to a steady, medium output (presumably that of a singular, relatively large automated machine?) that lasted the span of 3 years, before dropping out again…

What in that room was using electricity?

Who in that room was using electricity?

…

Three years is a long time, sure, but it didn't fluctuate.

Three years ago, he disappeared. 'Freak'—though I hate to call him by that, had apparently returned home to live in his mother's custody under mysterious, hushed circumstances. I still don't believe it. It had to be a cover-up.

He rarely ever spoke of his parents, whether it was because I was more of a father to him that his true father was, or whether it was something deeper; something lingering and uncomfortable.

I didn't question it until he disappeared. Too polite to pry. But if he had disappeared; gone back to his mother freely over staying where he felt most at home, why had he never mentioned them?

Lies. All of it.

There must have been a scandal. An issue that had to be dealt with or disposed of.

I will find him.

Or at least, find out what happened.

— Edward J. Appleby, 13/06/2026.

FREAK LOREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

I wonder if he remembers me. I was looking at some old code, earlier—a part of it I hadn't touched, and ran git blame. It brought up his name. His proper name, T-[REDACTED], not the horrible nickname he gave himself. It took me back to 2022.

He was like my kid: we spent so much time together, and he loved me like a father [ADDED NOTE—13/05/2025: his biological father, however, was a righteous man, but I could never see what was going through his head. He had a stoney eyed look, the type that could make someone's blood run cold if taken in the wrong way]. Partially because I would have to spend hours running through his code to fix it, too, but that's besides the point. [bitter chuckle]

Poor thing is probably working on something menial; on something corporate and dull and entirely uninteresting. I was told by my higher ups that his father decided he wanted him to live with his mother, but I never really believed that. It was probably something to cover up a scandal or the ethical concerns of a child working amongst adults. That's what I believe, anyways.

My job, however, hasn't changed much. Sure, it's less fun debugging code that's already efficient; code that doesn't occasionally set the servers on fire, but it's still my job and I need the wage to keep myself afloat. [pensive hum]

They're surely wasting his talent, if not including my own.

...

It was such a shame that they removed him from the team. I never did see him again. [sigh] But I continued working on his code throughout that period, as the last changelog entry I could find on the 'V-TM Add-On V2.4.1' code, the emotionally intelligent AI thing that was never really up my street, dated back to 2025. So I suppose they kept his code after he was (supposedly, might I add) sent away.

...

It's been three years since I last saw him. I hope he's doing okay out there.

[VOICE-NOTE SENT FROM PHONE OF E. APPLEBY TO [REDACTED]]

MY LORD?? there is no way I can follow you there!

okay so i bent the rules a little here

6 minute (??? ish) music piece basically a big mashup of all my pieces for ladj in one plus some bonus stuff . basically epic big orchestral piece but IM SOO EXCITED TO SHARE THIS WITH ALL OF YOU !!!!

AAAAAAAAAA imsuper happy with this

had to compress it slightly though so the sound quality might not be the best :sob: and the levels are slightly out with volume for some reason

[oh god . listening to it now and the quality is down the drain ough might have to send a google drive link later for the better version]