breadbox's Samizdat publications

[Associated Samizdat] Players across the land today were seen performing strange, irrational acts. Though some write it off as harmless, others suspect an epidemic and fear for their own sanity.

/dev/joe, Ackanomic's Scorekeeper, respected member of the Vulcan party, and a player known to all as being a paragon of rationality, visited Guy Fawkes' Tower of Futility today, where he apparently spent hours staring at the statues. He then made a public announcement that he was hearing voices in his head.

Almost immediately after this, Malenkai, another respected member of the community and holder of many Functional Offices, admitted to everyone that he was hallucinating. He spoke of travelling great distances, and of creating loud music, and described vivid, inappropriate colors. Then, he announced to everyone present that he was now "the Prophet of the Golden Frog".

As if this weren't bad enough, he then announced that he was going to start work on building a mind control laser. He also proceeded to submit a long, rambling proposal, with trinkets attached as bribes, that had no effect other than to give himself an Automatic Sculpture.

All this took place, of course, after /dev/joe and Malenkai faced off in their recent Duel. Nobody could quite discern the true nature of their disagreement, for they concealed it by speaking in nonsense syllables. It is now believed by some that this was the first sign of their mental derangement.

Ackazen Bascule, who has of yet exhibited no unusual behaviors himself, seemed unconcerned, and wrote it off as "treasure fever".

Nonetheless, others, who choose to remain nameless, are concerned for the safety of our Functional Officers, and, by extension, the whole of Ackanomia. This group of Ackazens grows as more evidence arrives that something is wrong.

Since the outbreak's beginning, /dev/joe has admitted to misreporting the truth of the Machine that goes *ping*, and Malenkai has claimed to have either lost old records of deceased players, or to have NEVER HAD THEM. Such failures are practically unheard of from either of these players, much less both at the same time, and the rest of Ackanomia is beginning to wonder how much can be chalked up to coincidence.

Other signs of bizarre activity can be seen at the Financial Market, where a Scroll of Crumble is currently being auctioned off at over 1000% percent its estimated material value, and in the public fora, where an unprecedented number of players are showing signs of snowgod's disease, or "afflicte de snowgod".

[Associated Samizdat] In the land of rules, Heisenberg is the new king. Uncertainty is the new watchword in Ackanomia as threads continue to unravel.

* By far the most significant split swings on the knife of CFJ 402. Though not a Paradox, nonetheless Malenkai's latest Cycle Win dangles from the decision that awaits this document. Originally decided in his favor, it was unsurprisingly appealed to the Supreme Court, where it languishes. Their decision was overdue as of last Saturday.

Immediately after the due date, ThinMan, Ackanomic's Praetor and, more importantly Acting Justice for the vacationing mr cwm, went on vacation himself. At press time it was uncertain if mr cwm had yet to resume his post or if Malenkai himself, as Speaker, would be permitted to stand judgement on his own CFJ.

* There are currently no less than SIX cases on the Supreme Court's docket. This is a record that has only been allowed to happen once before, almost a year ago. During that time there were as many as ten different threads, multiplying the work of the Functional Officers beyond calculation and causing reality to take on an uncomfortably fuzzy cast.

This time around, the various Harfers have only publicly admitted to having identified three distinct threads. However, in at least one of those threads, the amount of points needed to win is the lowest it has been since the first month of Ackanomic's existence. Robert Sevin's recent sweep at the voting booths have rocketed him to first place, quite possibly putting him in a position where he could not only reach the Magic Number with the lowest score in history, but also cause an entire Cycle to be played out within a thread split!

* As the players attempt to follow the trebled times they find themselves in, the effect of the strain can be seen throughout the activities of Ackanomia's everyday business. Duels and Politeness Moons crop up and break through the cement that holds the game together. Quite likely another fad of Witchhunts will soon follow, if history is any indicator.

Is a similar strain in evidence in the Ackanomic Court, the place where resides the only players that can begin the untangling of the game? Unable to determine the status of mr cwm, and knowing from prior attempts that Malenkai would refuse to talk to "mudrakers who hide behind sanctioned unaccountability" [not a direct quote --legal dept.], we attempted to interview Justice breadbox.

* breadbox answered his door on the twentieth knock. "Who is it this time?!" he screeched, flecking yours truly with inky spittle. Unkempt and feral-looking, he added: "I told the others everything I know already, and I'm not going to repeat it again! Can't you see I'm busy?" He then slammed the door in our faces, and after half an hour we determined that no amount of knocking would convince him to answer it again.

Since he quite rudely gave us no opportunity to explain our reasons for visiting, we felt completely justified in bugging his home. However, this proved to be of only slightly more value, as most of what we recorded were only the sounds of a keyboard being manipulated (sometimes in an apparently creative fashion). The only "speech" we managed to capture seemed to be mainly mutterings intended for his own ears, and one brief monologue to an answering machine. What we could glean is transcribed herewith:

"Piece of [expletive] .... Oh, thanks for nothing! What the [expletive] is THAT supposed to mean? This is completely ambiguous! What am I supposed to do with [expletive] this? [expletive] it!? .... Who wrote THIS [expletive] part? Whoever it is, I'm gonna kill em if I ever get the [expletive] outta this mess .... [unintelligible] ... Holy [expletive], non sequiter or WHAT?! No wait, didn't I see that mentioned earlier? Where's the [expletive] notes I made last night? .... Oh, creeping [expletive] on a [expletive]. This isn't gonna work. [expletive]. This is HOPELESS! [expletive]! ... [previous expletive repeated several times with varying inflections] ... I'm back to square one on this ... Oh, [expletive]. That does it. Where's the phone? ... [unintelligible] ... [expletive], he's never home when you need him .... yada yada yada, come on .... mr cwm! Hey! This is breadbox! Where are you? I'm [expletive] stuck! I TRIED xyzzy, and it said that nothing happens! What [expletive] gives?!"

At this point, breadbox apparently threw the phone down and fell onto his couch, where we found him face down, asleep and muttering, when we stopped by later to retrieve our microphones.