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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your mind, a production of

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Speaker 1: iHeartRadio Good Evening.

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Speaker 2: My name is doctor Anton Jesson, professor of Monster Studies

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Speaker 2: here at the University. My assistant Maxwell and I are

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Speaker 2: still working out this whole pod casting thing, using the

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Speaker 2: antiquated technology at our disposal to record, edit, and co

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Speaker 2: opt a science podcast feed in order to attend to

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Speaker 2: the various monstrous correspondences we have to reply it. Given

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Speaker 2: all of this work and the demands of my own

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Speaker 2: other research projects, I hope you understand we can't possibly

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Speaker 2: do this more than once or maybe twice a year.

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Speaker 2: So let's go ahead and fire up the pneumatic tube,

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Speaker 2: remove the canister, and see what we have here. First,

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Speaker 2: spectacles please Maxwell. This one is written in small script.

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Speaker 2: It reads, dearest doctor Jessop, I confess that my husband

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Speaker 2: and I are writing to you at our wits end.

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Speaker 2: Our issue, you see, is our young son Bob. We've

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Speaker 2: tried everything we can think of to give him a

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Speaker 2: proper environment to nurture his inner darkness, but nothing seems

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Speaker 2: to take. When Bob was a toddler, we lived in

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Speaker 2: a house that we'd been garanteed had been built on

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Speaker 2: a former burial ground in which the headstones had been moved,

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Speaker 2: but the rotting bodies had not. We tried in vain

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Speaker 2: to interest Bob in the eerie voices that would manifest

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Speaker 2: in the post broadcast television static or the mysterious portal

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Speaker 2: to another dimension that had so obligingly manifested in his

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Speaker 2: bed room closet. Decaying corpses routinely burst from the swimming

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Speaker 2: pool and the beast rampage several times through our living room,

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Speaker 2: but Bob remained blissfully oblivious, playing with his blocks, or

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Speaker 2: horror of horrors, watching the loathsome sesame street. Thinking that

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Speaker 2: we understood the problem, we moved to a house that

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Speaker 2: was next to a proper cemetery, complete with tombstones, both

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Speaker 2: in the yard and even one inside the living room.

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Speaker 2: We set up playdates for Bob with a ghostly young

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Speaker 2: lady from the neighborhood, and hired the most unsettling babysitter

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Speaker 2: we could find, hoping that their bad influence would help

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Speaker 2: Bob achieve his potential alas even with witnessing multiple random

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Speaker 2: bat attacks by a curiously persistent member of the species

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Speaker 2: and mutilated corpses mysteriously piling up in the cellar. Bob

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Speaker 2: has persisted in his love of wholesome children's tes television,

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Speaker 2: and I shudder to say his model drain set. Doctor jessup,

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Speaker 2: Are we trying too hard with Bob? Would malign neglect

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Speaker 2: perhaps be a better strategy with our son? In our

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Speaker 2: loftiest dreams, we see him summoning forth Luke Thou or

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Speaker 2: Nikra Korraf. But perhaps we'd settle for him writing a

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Speaker 2: series of best selling hard novels that culminate in a

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Speaker 2: tone that drives the entire world insane. Whatever are we

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Speaker 2: to do? Yours, respectively be deviled near Boston, Ah, A

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Speaker 2: parent in question. Let's see well. First of all, I

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Speaker 2: share your suspicion of Sesame Street, though the count is

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Speaker 2: a good friend of mine. It really sounds as if

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Speaker 2: you've tried all the right things, providing your spawn with

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Speaker 2: the right environment and the right media, the right social

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Speaker 2: environment as well. I wish I could employ the expertise

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Speaker 2: of my colleague doctor Freudstein, but alas he no longer

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Speaker 2: answers my letters, my advice is to maybe lean into

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Speaker 2: the whole train set obsession. There are many wonderfully haunted

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Speaker 2: trains out there, and various monsters are drawn to their

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Speaker 2: strange energies. The late Professor Sir Alexander Saxton wrote some

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Speaker 2: rather excellent works on the Trans Siberian Railway and ancient

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Speaker 2: beings that wouldn't quite stay dead. Yes, Yes, encouraged the

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Speaker 2: training obsession. This next one comes to us from a

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Speaker 2: Rackney lacayas.

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Speaker 3: Told Dear Doctor Jessup, longtime listener, first time writer. Though

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Speaker 3: I think you might actually remember me. I took one

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Speaker 3: of your classes back in the summer of eighty seven,

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Speaker 3: major heat wave, a series of unsolved murders just off campus.

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Speaker 3: Monster science is one oh one. You had us dissecting

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Speaker 3: a Class three plasma fiend and the thing rose up

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Speaker 3: just five minutes into the necropsy, raging bubbling over. It

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Speaker 3: dissolved a TA before we knew what was happening. Everyone

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Speaker 3: else froze, but I knew what to do. I broke

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Speaker 3: the glass panel on the emergency box, whipped out the

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Speaker 3: revolver inside, and dropped the fiend with three rounds. You

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Speaker 3: still gave me a C on the necropsy that semester

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Speaker 3: total bs, But I like to think I found my

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Speaker 3: life's purpose that day, or at least that's how I

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Speaker 3: used to look at it. Monster slaying sounds sexier than

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Speaker 3: it is. It's not the desperate villagers who come calling,

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Speaker 3: it's the monster makers. I have a few regular clients

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Speaker 3: in the fringe sciences Zorka Calligar Courtner. You know, the type,

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Speaker 3: always pushing the boundaries, but never around to clean up

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Speaker 3: the mess, so they call me. It's hard to keep

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Speaker 3: good clients. The monsters generally catch up with them in

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Speaker 3: the end. But a special subset of my clientele don't

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Speaker 3: have to worry about that at all. They're the ones

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Speaker 3: who always get away with it. They have deep pockets,

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Speaker 3: deep powers, and an intense desire to stay out of

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Speaker 3: the limelight. I work a lot on behalf of her Grace.

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Speaker 3: We're not supposed to use her given name. Her cleaner

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Speaker 3: Walter rings me up every couple of months, a slippery

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Speaker 3: guy with serpent eyes behind tiny shades. We always meet

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Speaker 3: up at Noctua, this little bar downtown near the library.

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Speaker 3: He always tries to order me a Martinez.

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Speaker 2: It's a classic cocktail. You probably just haven't had a

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Speaker 2: good one. They make a good one here.

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Speaker 3: I don't do olive us.

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Speaker 2: Who doesn't do all of us?

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Speaker 3: I know I'm impossible. So what does her Grace need

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Speaker 3: me to handle? This time?

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Speaker 2: Another abarition?

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Speaker 3: Let me guess one of father's or did she lose

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Speaker 3: her temper again?

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Speaker 2: Miss Leia, and your name alone is an insult here,

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Speaker 2: but the Twelve tolerate you for your talents. Do not

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Speaker 2: mistake her Grace's silence for mercy.

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Speaker 3: I wouldn't dream of it.

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Speaker 2: Fantastic. Everything you need is in this file, along with

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Speaker 2: half your payment up front and pick up information for

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Speaker 2: the equipment. Now are you sure I can't tempt you

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Speaker 2: with a martini? We can start with a lemon twist.

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Speaker 2: I'm good.

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Speaker 3: You already know my ancestors. On one side of the family,

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Speaker 3: the former Kings of Arcadia, who served human flesh to

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Speaker 3: Zeus and were cursed as the first were wolves. And

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Speaker 3: on the other side, the master weaver, a Rakney, who

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Speaker 3: dared challenged her grace to a weaving contest, provoked the

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Speaker 3: gods with a tapestry that detailed the crimes of Mount Olympus.

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Speaker 3: The gray eyed goddess twisted her into a web spinning araknet.

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Speaker 3: I'm the convergence of two monstrous lineages, the Wolf and

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Speaker 3: the Spider, and I wouldn't exist at all if not

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Speaker 3: from modern science. The resurrection of ancient DNA. The biotech

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Speaker 3: company responsible Biogamouth didn't last long. When the Twelve discovered

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Speaker 3: the operation, they sent in their most horrifying enforcers, the Hecatonquarees,

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Speaker 3: the hundred Handed Warriors, though calling those horrendous appendages hands

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Speaker 3: is generous there the god's monstrous bioweapons meant to wage

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Speaker 3: war against immortal foes, so they made short work of

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Speaker 3: the scientists in their labs. But they spared the engineered

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Speaker 3: children of Biogamuth. Why threw away a useful tool? The

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Speaker 3: Twelve let us grow up in the world. They found

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Speaker 3: parents to raise us. My mom didn't know my true nature.

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Speaker 3: I looked like everyone else, really, and I just looked

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Speaker 3: like another infant in need of love. When she saw

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Speaker 3: the words Arachney Lacayan scribbled on my documents, she kept

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Speaker 3: it as my first and middle name. I took the

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Speaker 3: folder and left, better not to hang around too long

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Speaker 3: in her graces house anyway. I took the folder to

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Speaker 3: Butler's Coffee just off seventy Second, the one where they

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Speaker 3: hammer your laptop if you try to set one up.

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Speaker 3: No computers, no headphones, just books and below average coffee.

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Speaker 3: I spread the file's contents out in front of me.

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Speaker 3: Despite Walter's insistence, I'd still half expected the same old

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Speaker 3: god drama. Due to some code of theirs, the Twelve

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Speaker 3: never killed directly and saved their own monstrous avengers for

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Speaker 3: more serious threats. Instead, they spitefully twisted the mortals who

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Speaker 3: spurned or insulted them, as they've done for millennia. It

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Speaker 3: then fell to me and people like me to slay

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Speaker 3: their creations. If they proved an inconvenience, that's the Twelve

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Speaker 3: for you. Far be it from me to understand the Gods.

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Speaker 3: The file, however, detailed something unexpected. My Quarry was another

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Speaker 3: child of the Biogamath project, engineered and cloned out of

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Speaker 3: resurrected lineages of ancient god touched DNA. The document listed

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Speaker 3: her classification and tight black script Arachne Lacayan. That was

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Speaker 3: my classification as well, the very words that became my

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Speaker 3: mortal name. The monster they tasked me with slaying was

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Speaker 3: at the very least my mad science sibling, if not

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Speaker 3: my double. The document gave her an individual name Ekrew.

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Speaker 3: That was it. No other form of identification under the

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Speaker 3: dangerous or objectionable behavior section. The profile mentioned interference with

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Speaker 3: Olympian operations, which was thoroughly vague and almost as an afterthought.

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Speaker 3: Mortal murders. The documents recommended beheading as the preferred mode

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Speaker 3: of slaying, which I suppose would be the preferred way

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Speaker 3: of killing me as well, and listed an address and

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Speaker 3: time for ideal interception of quarry. The gods are precise.

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Speaker 3: They know where you are, and with a margin of

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Speaker 3: something like a city block where exactly you'll be. All

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Speaker 3: they have to do is point you in the right direction.

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Speaker 3: An appointment card in the folder included the name of

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Speaker 3: a nearby flower shop and an order number. An hour later,

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Speaker 3: I pulled a double edged short sword from a box

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Speaker 3: of carnations. To say it was exceptional craftsmanship would be

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Speaker 3: an understatement. Hephestus himself had forged it in another world.

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Speaker 3: I brought a fingertip within an inn of the cutting

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Speaker 3: edge to test it, and the flesh began to smoke

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Speaker 3: ever so slightly. It would do the trick. The documents

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Speaker 3: told me where to go and when to do it.

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Speaker 3: Such is the exactitude of the gods, and such as

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Speaker 3: their view of mortal tools like me in their minds.

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Speaker 3: I'd merely been placed on a track, little more than

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Speaker 3: a machine, but I followed the instructions all the same.

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Speaker 3: The old warehouse towered over the surrounding neighborhood. None of

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Speaker 3: the children and old people looked in its direction, though

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Speaker 3: they stared at me with increasing suspicion as I walked

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Speaker 3: past them. And then the living neighborhood simply ended. The

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Speaker 3: buildings most adjacent to the warehouse were abandoned and boarded up,

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Speaker 3: as if some event horizon were crossed. And venturing so

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Speaker 3: deeply into the warehouse's shadow, I went to the predetermined

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Speaker 3: doors and found them chained and enough steel to shackle

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Speaker 3: an elephant. But even this was no match for my

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Speaker 3: favorite trick. My lineage is strange, you see. I pulled

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Speaker 3: off my left glove and moved my awareness to my

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Speaker 3: uncovered hand. I focused on my index finger and thumb.

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Speaker 3: I watched them elongate an arch into a pair of

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Speaker 3: lupine claws. I winced at the sudden pane of lengthening bone.

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Speaker 3: My nails sharpened into wicked claws. I pinched the claw

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Speaker 3: tips together, then pulled them apart to spend a single

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Speaker 3: thread of webbing that gleamed like silver even in the

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Speaker 3: deepest shadow. I looped the thread around the massive padlock,

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Speaker 3: and with a quick turn of my wrist, closed the

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Speaker 3: loop and severed the steel my strange legacy of wolf

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Speaker 3: and spider. I ventured into the darkness of the warehouse,

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Speaker 3: at first, encountering only the detritus of abandoned industry, dilapidated

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Speaker 3: machines of unknown purpose, and hints of the human work

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Speaker 3: force that once animated it all. But as I ventured deeper

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Speaker 3: into the space, other signs presented themselves. I passed fresh

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Speaker 3: wooden crates newly opened, and around them cast off plastic

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Speaker 3: and styrofoam padding some new industry, it would seem, pulsated

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Speaker 3: in the decaying husk of the old, And soon enough

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Speaker 3: I encountered signs of my quarry as well. I descended

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Speaker 3: a long hallway crisscross with lines of silver webbing much

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Speaker 3: like my own, and scattered beneath them the remains of

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Speaker 3: the dismembered bodies. My lap grown cousin could use her

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Speaker 3: threads as weapons. It seemed monofilament lines that, when pulled taut,

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Speaker 3: sliced through any one in their path. I knelt beside

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Speaker 3: one of the bodies. It was naked, humanoid and basic shape,

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Speaker 3: but more arthroopod in every other respect. Rows of tiny,

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Speaker 3: useless appendages lined its chest. I knew them well. These

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Speaker 3: were human louse hybrids, the accidental offspring of biogammus. Ancient

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Speaker 3: DNA experiments see Ectoparasitic lights sheese on the hair of

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Speaker 3: otherwise mummified bodies can preserve host DNA, making retrieval at

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Speaker 3: least seem possible. The science wasn't there yet, though, and

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Speaker 3: the cross contamination of human and lys's genetics birth monsters.

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Speaker 3: They often infested abandoned biogamath facilities. But I know what

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Speaker 3: you're wondering. Didn't the Hecatonkrees destroy all the biogammuth labs?

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Speaker 3: I wondered the same. I jumped at the sound and

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Speaker 3: glimpsed her a crew shoot across the inn of the hallway,

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Speaker 3: a figure wrapped in a tattered trench coat. I drew

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Speaker 3: the Divine sword. The threads of razor sharp webbing burned

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Speaker 3: away as I brought the blade near. I easily sheared

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Speaker 3: away the strands she'd used to slay the hybrids, as

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Speaker 3: well as the more subtle ankle level lines that she'd

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Speaker 3: loved to stop me, and so I followed her unobstructed,

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Speaker 3: into another vast factory space. Why you hunt me, cousin,

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Speaker 3: that's above my pay grade. We should talk, then, come out.

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Speaker 3: Let's talk. Not here. Something rushed me, and I ran

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Speaker 3: it through with my blade, but it was only her

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Speaker 3: empty trench coat. I saw her vanish behind a whole

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Speaker 3: industrial press, and so I dashed after her sword. At ready,

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Speaker 3: I narrowly managed to dodge and sever the threads of

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Speaker 3: razor webbing she'd left in her wake. I chased her

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Speaker 3: down another hallway, through another chamber with signs of recent habitation.

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Speaker 3: Here I passed not only fresh crates, but various tanks

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Speaker 3: and machines that unmistakably bore the logo of the Biogamuth Corporation,

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Speaker 3: the hand extending from a fiery double helix. It was

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Speaker 3: exactly the distraction she'd counted on. She'd flanked me amid

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Speaker 3: the lab equipment, and I felt loose webbing spin around me.

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Speaker 3: I pulled the sword up just in time to sever

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Speaker 3: it and keep her from pulling it taut around me

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Speaker 3: and threw me. As I brought the sword back with

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Speaker 3: the decapitation swing, but she was too fast. She recoiled

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Speaker 3: from the sword's lethal arc with maybe an inch to spare.

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Speaker 3: I saw her in full for the first time, illuminated

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Speaker 3: in the green glow of assortied biogamuth equipment. While I

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Speaker 3: could call on wolf and spider and do my one

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Speaker 3: little trick, she had embraced our lineage completely. She was

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Speaker 3: unclothed of human garments, but were splendent in her full monstrosity.

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Speaker 3: The animals we call spiders are just a shadow cast

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Speaker 3: by the form of God cursed a Rackney. So too

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Speaker 3: the twisted airs of Arcadia and the comparison of the wolf.

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Speaker 3: Human language fails in the face of a perfect monster.

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Speaker 3: There was a lupine wildness to her hair, which cascaded

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Speaker 3: in a flowing mane, down her spine and tail. Her

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Speaker 3: hands tapered into claws as long as my forearms, and

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Speaker 3: I saw the gleam of silver threads suspended between the tips.

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Speaker 3: Her eyes were deep dark pools, the eyes of a

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Speaker 3: hunting spider like mine, beneath the spe lenses I wear,

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Speaker 3: And in that moment, Ekru was my reflection, not of

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Speaker 3: who I was, but of what I could be if

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Speaker 3: I only gave in to the power. She smiled her

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Speaker 3: sharp teeth at me. You should stand with us in

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Speaker 3: this light? What if I stand with them? Mortals you killed?

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Speaker 3: They choose to serve the tyrants of you when you

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Speaker 3: see what we've grown here. Though, I don't care about

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Speaker 3: Biogamuth or whatever titan they think they've resurrected this time,

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Speaker 3: not the tightening cuss. I think we sprang at the

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Speaker 3: same time. If deep down we were the same, then

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Speaker 3: I suppose our instincts and impulses were identical, though not

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Speaker 3: our weapons. I slashed my sword and felt one of

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Speaker 3: her razor webs spun so deftly in the air, sliced

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Speaker 3: clean through my shoulders. My left arm fell to the

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Speaker 3: floor in a cascade of blood, though not all of

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Speaker 3: it was mine. My monstrous double, my more perfect twin,

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Speaker 3: laid at either side of me, cleaved neatly into by

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Speaker 3: the fifestian sword. I let the weapon fall from my

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Speaker 3: remaining hands. Our collective blood hissed and smoked against its

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Speaker 3: otherworldly steel. I struggled to stay on one knee to

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Speaker 3: avoid collapsing from the sudden catastrophic blood loss, but I

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Speaker 3: am not quite human. I have never been, And so

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Speaker 3: I felt the wound rapidly clotting, the severed veins and

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Speaker 3: arteries stitching themselves closed. I used my teeth to pull

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Speaker 3: the glove off my remaining hand and let my claws

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Speaker 3: grow out, felt my fangs grow sharp. I'd completed my assignment,

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Speaker 3: but she was right. I needed to know how had

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Speaker 3: biogamas survived. What were they attempting to resurrect from ancient

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Speaker 3: artifacts and desiccated flesh. If not one of the Titans

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Speaker 3: of old, the parents and forerunners of the current long

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Speaker 3: declined dynasty of gods. Still faint, still barely able to

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Speaker 3: push ahead, I shambled deeper into that temple of abandoned industry,

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Speaker 3: into the otherworldly fusia glow of multiple grow tanks. I

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Speaker 3: saw the suspended flesh inside. If flesh it truly was.

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Speaker 3: This was no Titan or God, no genetic mixture of

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Speaker 3: their offspring. It was something infinitely more horrifying, more perfect. Still,

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Speaker 3: curtains of shredded silk obscured the great central vat. As

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Speaker 3: I stumbled toward it, I glimpsed wild shapes moving within

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Speaker 3: the glowing fluid. I fell to my knees. I raised

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Speaker 3: my clawed hand to draw back the veil. Anyway, just

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Speaker 3: thought you'd be interested to hear about all that love

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Speaker 3: the show. Say hi to Maxwell for me, iraqne la canne.

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Speaker 2: Ah very nice. I always crave the discovery of new monsters,

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Speaker 2: though alas I don't remember you specifically, too many future

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Speaker 2: monster hunters to keep track of, honestly. Finally, here's one more.

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Speaker 2: It reads, Dear doctor Jessip, who would win in a

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Speaker 2: battle between the Blob and my friend Reginald? Full disclosure

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Speaker 2: Reginald is a vampire. Hmmm, I have to go with

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Speaker 2: a blob on this one. Sorry, Reginald. Well, that's all

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Speaker 2: the time we have for today, Maxwell, if you would

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Speaker 2: in transmission.

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Speaker 4: Hey, everybody, regular listener Mail will return next week, but

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Speaker 4: thanks as always to doctor Anton Jessop for filling in

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Speaker 4: for Joe and me this week. This episode was produced

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Speaker 4: entirely by the excellent JJ Possway, Annie Reese's co host

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Speaker 4: of Savor and Stuff, Mom Never Told You, contributed her

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Speaker 4: voice acting talents to portray all a Rackney like Hans

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Speaker 4: And if you or someone you know happens to have

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Speaker 4: a question or two or some comments to share with

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Speaker 4: doctor Anton Jessop concerning monsters. You can email them to

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Speaker 4: us and we will forward them to him and his cohort.

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Speaker 4: He'll probably be back for a holiday episode before he

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Speaker 4: reached treats into his studies for yet another year, So

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Speaker 4: just send those emails to contact at stuffd blow your

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Speaker 4: Mind dot com.

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Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For

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Speaker 1: more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,

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Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows