This book is the story of a cowboy, Jack Burns, who lives as a transient worker and roaming ranch hand much as the cowboys of old did, and refuses to join modern society. He rejects much of modern technology, prefers to cut down any fence he comes across, will not carry any kind of modern identification such as a driver's license or Social Security card, and refuses to register for the draft. When his friend Paul Bondi, who is a philosophical anarchist, is jailed in Albuquerque, New Mexico, for refusing to register for the draft, Burns deliberately gets himself arrested in an attempt to break his friend out of jail, but winds up on the run from the law himself.

Bondi has been tried and is awaiting transport from county jail to federal prison but refuses to escape with Burns. As police have discovered that Burns has also never registered for the draft, authorities are intent on sending Burns to trial and eventually federal prison for violation of the Selective Service Act of 1948. Burns eventually escapes reluctantly leaving his friend behind. After a brief stop to say goodbye to Paul's wife, Jerry, and son, Seth, Jack heads into the Sandia Mountains, just east of Albuquerque, on horseback.

The police mount a manhunt and pull out all the stops to capture Burns, including helicopters on loan by the Air Force. If Burns can scale the mountain range, he figures he can escape under the cover of the forest on the other side. The police know this as well, so they position themselves to prevent that from happening.

John W. "Jack" Burns (Kirk Douglas) is a veteran of the Korean War who works as a roaming ranch hand much as the cowboys of the old West did, refusing to join modern society. He rejects much of modern technology and carries no identification, such as a driver's license or draft card. He cannot even provide authorities a home address because he just sleeps wherever he finds a place.

As Burns crosses a highway into a town in New Mexico, his horse Whiskey has a difficult time crossing the road, confused and scared by the traffic. They enter town to visit Jerry (Gena Rowlands). She is the wife of an old friend, Paul Bondi (Michael Kane), who has been jailed for giving aid to illegal immigrants. Jack explains his dislike for a society that restricts a man on where he can or can't go, what he can or can't do.

To break Bondi out of jail, Burns decides he himself needs to get arrested. After a violent barroom fight against a one-armed man (Bill Raisch) in which he is forced to use only one arm himself, Burns is arrested. When the police decide to let him go, he deliberately punches a cop to get himself re-arrested. He is now facing a probable sentence of a year in jail, which allows him to see Bondi, with a purpose of helping him escape. The town is a sleepy border town and the cops are mostly bored, occasionally dealing with minor offenses. The Sheriff, Morey Johnson (Walter Matthau), has to compel them to pay attention to their duties at times.

Joining Bondi in jail, Burns tries to persuade him to escape. He tells Bondi he couldn't spend a year locked up because he'd probably kill someone. Burns defends Bondi from the attention of sadistic Deputy Sheriff Gutierrez (George Kennedy), who picks Burns as his next target. During the night the inmates saw through one of the jail's bars using two hacksaw blades Burns hid in his boot. The deputy summons Burns in the middle of the night and beats him. Upon returning to his cell, Burns tries to persuade Bondi to join him in escaping. Bondi has accepted his two year sentence knowing he has a family waiting and has too much at stake to become a fugitive from the law. He decides to remain. Burns breaks out by himself and returns to Bondi's house, where he picks up his horse and some food from Bondi's wife. After the jail break, the Sheriff learns that Burns served in the military during the Korean War, including seven months in a disciplinary training center for striking a superior officer. He also received a Purple Heart and a Distinguished Service Cross with oak leaf clusters for his valor during battle.

Burns heads for the mountains on horseback with the goal of crossing the border into Mexico. The police mount an extensive search, with Sheriff Johnson and his Deputy Sheriff Harry (William Schallert) following him in a jeep. A military helicopter is brought in, and when the aircrew locates Burns, they relay his location to the sheriff. Whiskey is repeatedly spooked by the helicopter so Burns shoots the tail rotor, damaging it and causing the pilot to lose control and crash land.

Deputy Gutierrez also chases Burns. He sees the horse and is preparing to shoot when Burns sneaks up, knocking him unconscious with his rifle butt. Burns leads his horse up impossibly difficult, rocky slopes to escape his pursuers, but the lawmen keep on his trail, forcing him to keep moving. Surrounded on three sides, Burns' horse refuses at first to climb a steep slope. They finally surmount the crest of the Sandia Mountains and escape into the east side of the mountains, a broad stand of heavy timber, with the lawmen shooting at him. The Sheriff acknowledges that Burns has evaded their attempts to capture him. Burns is shot through the ankle during his dash to the timber.

Burns tries to cross Highway 66 in Tijeras Canyon during a heavy rainstorm on Whiskey but the horse gets spooked by the traffic and blinded by the lights. A truck driver strikes Burns and Whiskey as they are attempting to cross the road. The sheriff arrives and, asked by the state police if Burns is the man he has been looking for, says he can't identify him, because he's never seen the man he is looking for up close. Both seriously wounded, Burns is taken away in an ambulance and Whiskey must be euthanized.

In 1866, remorseful former border raider Glyn McLyntock is scouting for a wagon train of settlers to Oregon. While he is checking the trail ahead, he rescues Emerson Cole from being lynched for stealing a horse. Cole, who says the horse is "not exactly stolen", thinks he has heard of McLyntock, but does not pursue the subject. One of the pioneers in the wagon train is the eligible Laura Baile. That night, they are attacked by five Shoshone Indians and Laura is wounded by an arrow. McLyntock and Cole go out to deal with the Shoshones and Cole saves McLyntock's life in the process. McLyntock welcomes Cole, but Jeremy Baile, the leader of the settlers, does not trust Cole and does not believe that a man can change from bad to good.

When they reach Portland, Oregon, Laura remains there to recover. Cole also leaves the party saying that he wants to go to California to find gold. The rest, including McLyntock, go on to establish a settlement in the wilderness after making arrangements with a man named Tom Hendricks for the supplies they need for the winter to be sent on later ("the first week in September"). That night, they have a big party and meet a professional gambler named Trey Wilson.

With winter fast approaching and the supplies at least six weeks late, they begin to worry when the food runs low. McLyntock and Jeremy go back to Portland to investigate. They find that a gold rush has inflated prices enormously. Laura and Cole are working for Hendricks and have no intention of going to the settlement. Jeremy is not happy about his daughter being Cole's girl. Meanwhile, Hendricks has decided to sell their supplies for a much higher price to a mining camp. McLyntock secretly hires some men to load the supplies to take back to the settlement, but Hendricks finds out, instigating a shootout. Cole and Trey both side with McLyntock. When they are pursued, McLyntock sets up an ambush. Hendricks and some of his gang are killed, and the rest are driven off.

On the way to the settlement, some of the miners show up and offer an exorbitant sum for the supplies. The hired men begin thinking about commandeering the wagon train. Cole cannot resist the temptation of all that money and double-crosses his friend, but does not kill him. That proves to be a fatal mistake. McLyntock tracks them down and retakes the supplies with the assistance of Jeremy, Laura, and Trey. Cole brings some miners, but they are beaten off in a climactic gunfight at a river. McLyntock fights and kills Cole, and the current takes his body away. At the end, they reach the settlement with the supplies and it is apparent that Laura and McLyntock are now a couple.

In 1896, Jeff Webster (James Stewart) hears of the Klondike Gold Rush and he and friend Ben Tatem (Walter Brennan) decide to drive a herd of cattle to Dawson City, Yukon. On the way, he annoys self-appointed Judge Gannon (John McIntire) by interrupting a hanging in Skagway, so Gannon unilaterly confiscates his herd. After signing on to assist in taking supplies to Dawson, Jeff and Ben return to town to take the animals back to make them a part of the caravan and take off with Gannon and his men in hot pursuit. After crossing the border into Canada, Jeff uses a few well-placed warning shots to persuade Gannon's gang to give up the chase, but the judge promises to hang Jeff when he returns thru Skagway.

When Jeff gets to Dawson, he finds a widespread benign lawlessness, and ignores it as none of his business. He auctions off his herd for $2 per pound ($ /lb today) to new arrival Ronda Castle who had hired him, a saloon owner and one of Gannon's business associates, when she outbids Hominy, Grits and Molasses, co-owners of the local hash house. Both Ronda and French-Canadian gamine Renee Vallon are strongly attracted to Jeff. Now looking for their next adventure, Jeff and Ben use $40,000 ($ million today) of their proceeds to buy an existing gold claim, soon doubling their money.

Ronda sets up a saloon in partnership with Gannon, who begins cheating the miners out of their claims. Gannon and his gunmen show up to grab their share (and then some), making Dawson much more dangerous. Jeff stays out of it, instead planning to sneak out by river while Gannon is otherwise occupied. However, Gannon is tipped off when Ben buys extra coffee for the long trip; his men kill Ben and wound Jeff, finally forcing him to take sides.

Jeff calls Gannon out to settle the dispute man to man, but the villain arranges an ambush. Ronda rushes out to warn Jeff and is fatally shot in the back. Jeff kills Gannon in the ensuing gunfight and the rest of his gang agree to leave town, rather than fight all the fed-up longtime residents, who have finally found their courage and have armed themselves to directly face and resist the gang.

''Grandia'' is a set in a fantasy world where societies thrive in an era of increasing technological developments following the collapse of the ancient civilization centuries before. General Baal, leader of the militaristic Garlyle Forces, along with his son Colonel Mullen (Murren) and Mullen's love interest Lieutenant Leen, make their way to an archaeological site where treasures of the ancient people are believed to be resting. Justin, a young boy keen on adventure who lives in the port town of Parm just outside the dig site, travels to the area along with his friend Sue to investigate, as well as gather clues about an artifact left by Justin's missing father, the Spirit Stone. Slipping past the Garlyle soldiers into the ruins, Justin finds a holographic device that displays the image of a woman named Liete, who tells him that his stone holds great power, and he must travel far to the east in search of , the ancient city of knowledge, to learn of its true potential. Returning home, Justin avoids his mother and sneaks out to the docks early the next day to board a ship bound for the New World across the ocean while promising to become a great adventurer like his father.

Aboard the ship, Justin discovers Sue has stowed away, and meets with another young adventurer named Feena, who joins the two in saving the vessel from a haunted ship that appears in a fog. After a long journey, they arrive in the town of New Parm only to have Feena become kidnapped by the Adventurer Society's President, who wants her as his wife. Stealing her away, the three travel to a nearby ruin where they once again meet Liete deep inside, who tells them that Alent lies further within the New World beyond a massive continent-spanning wall known as "The End of the World". The Garlyle Forces intercept the three as they travel farther, and question Justin on his ability to manipulate ancient machinery within the ruins. Escaping their capture aboard a military train, the three make their way to a village at the foot of the great wall, where it is revealed that Leen is Feena's long-lost sister. Resolving to continue their journey, the team make their way up the wall, setting up camps along the way before eventually reaching the top, gaining access to the remainder of the continent on the other side.

Making their way through a forest, the three meet Gadwin, a beast-man and seasoned knight who sees potential in Justin and leads the three to the ancient Twin Towers in order to contact Liete again. After being intercepted by the Garlyle Forces once again, they make their escape, only for Sue to fall ill as they near another village. Fearing for her safety, Justin obtains a teleportation orb and lets Sue use it to return to Parm and continues onward with Gadwin and Feena to the bounds of the continent and yet another ocean. Justin then defeats Gadwin in a duel, the latter allowing Justin and Feena to have his boat, before leaving the party. Taking Gadwin's ship to another island, Justin and Feena begin to express their feelings for one another. Landing on a beach outside a beast-man village, the two meet Rapp, who asks them to help destroy a nearby tower that is emanating a dark energy and petrifying the land. Finding the tower to be controlled by the Garlyle Forces, the team meets with Milda, a beast-woman, inside and join her in destroying the source of the corruption, which turns out to be a plant-like creature known as "Gaia" being grown by Garlyle researchers under the orders of General Baal. After destroying the creature and taking a sample of its seeds, Justin is confronted by Leen who steals them back. Moving forward in search of Alent, the party meets a traveling merchant named Guido who leads them to his home town, where he acts as chieftain despite his young appearance, allowing them access to more ruins. It is here that Feena discovers innate magic powers that manifest in the form of wings when she is in trouble, and is promptly captured along with Justin's Spirit Stone by invading Garlyle soldiers and taken aboard Baal's flagship, the Grandeur. Baal reveals to her that he intends to revive a fully powered Gaia using the stone to take over the world and remake it to his own design. Justin, Rapp, and Guido manage to board the Grandeur and engage the Garlyle troops aboard before confronting Baal. Due to the self-destruct mechanism being activated by accident, the ship starts to fall apart, and Guido and Rapp end up getting separated from Justin, leaving him to face Baal alone. The general forces Justin to hand over the Spirit Stone by threatening Feena, but Baal keeps her hostage anyway. Justin therefore is forced to fight Baal, but learns during the fight that the madman had fused with Gaia. He knocks Justin off the burning ship, but Feena breaks free from Baal and dives after Justin. The Grandeur subsequently breaks apart in the air, apparently taking Baal and the Spirit Stone with it.

After reuniting, the party finally reaches Alent. Here, Justin meets Liete in person, who reveals to him that his stone is actually an ancient artifact forged by the Icarians, a race of powerful sorcerers who lived during the Angelou era, and was a gift to the humans who lived at the time to use as they pleased to bring prosperity, but when they became corrupted by dark desires, it instead gave birth to Gaia, who nearly destroyed the world. The Icarians sacrificed themselves to save the planet and humanity, and enacted a spell that two of their kind would be born into the world should Gaia ever be revived, destined to also sacrifice themselves to save the world until the next revival in an endless loop. Realizing Feena and Leen are the current revival of the Icarians, Justin sets off to save them from the Gaia-fused Baal, who now faces mutiny among his troops, including his son Mullen. With Gaia proving more than a match for the entire Garlyle army, Leen accepts her destiny and sacrifices herself to lower his defenses. Although Mullen pleads with Feena to finish Gaia, Justin argues that the problem can't be solved with more sacrifice since Gaia will just revive later. Thus Gaia must be defeated outright to end the cycle. Though Gaia defeats the troops and spreads its corruption around the planet, Justin is able to sum up the courage to face the evil with help from his friends, and travels to the underground heart of Gaia itself to destroy it and the Spirit Stone once and for all. With Gaia defeated permanently, the world experiences a new age of peace. Leen is also restored to life with Gaia's destruction. In an epilogue ten years later, Sue, now a teenager, re-unites with Justin and Feena who arrive home after nearly a decade of adventure, with children in tow.

The book begins a short time after Easter, and no one can remember the last sunny day. Mary Mary, a detective sergeant from Basingstoke, is being transferred to Reading, Berkshire. She hopes to be paired up with Detective Chief Inspector Friedland Chymes, a member of the Detective's Guild with multiple appearances in the fictional magazine ''Amazing Crime Stories'', but instead is paired up with Jack Spratt at the Nursery Crime Department, who is most famous for giant killing and for arresting the serial wife killer Bluebeard. Jack himself is living with his second wife, Madeleine, who moonlights as a photographer for certain prestigious events, and their five children: Pandora, Ben, Stevie, Jerome, and Megan. Madeleine is trying to rent the spare room in the house, but without much success. Jack's first wife could only eat fat and soon died.

The day after Mary is transferred, Humpty Dumpty is discovered dead outside of his residence at Grimm's Road, apparently having fallen off the wall. Jack's Superintendent, Briggs, introduces him to Mary Mary at the crime scene. Jack interviews some possible witnesses, including Wee Willie Winkie, the insomniac neighbor; Ms. Hubbard, the owner of the boarding house where Humpty stayed; and Prometheus, the titan from Greek mythology, the latter of which Jack offers to rent the spare room in his house to. They all describe Humpty as a nice egg, who generally kept to himself. Upon inspection of Humpty's room, Jack and Mary find some odd clues: several shares in Spongg Footcare, Reading's Footcare empire, a picture of Humpty with a girlfriend in Vienna, and a 28-foot-long strand of hair. They later interview Laura, Humpty Dumpty's ex-wife. When Jack returns home, he tells his mother that the painting of the cow his mother wanted to sell was fake and he only received some beans in return. Mrs. Spratt retorts that she had the painting valued years ago and that the auctioneer probably knows how incredibly valuable it is. She is so upset that she throws the beans out of the window, and Jack sees them bury into the ground by themselves.

There is another interview at a hospital called Saint Cerebellum's, this time with mad scientist doctor Quatt, and on their way to meeting her Jack notices the serial killer the 'Gingerbread Man'. Jack had been chasing the killer in previous cases and had to witness his colleague having his arms ripped off, only for the local newspaper, the Gadfly, to say that Chymes had caught the 'Gingerbread Man'. The interview with Dr. Quatt only reveals that she was Humpty's doctor. The conversation ends with Quatt showing Jack and Mary her latest experiment, a kitten's head sewn onto the body of a haddock.

A few days later, Jack and Mary team up with Superintendent Baker, Ashley (an alien who can only speak binary code) and forensic scientist Gretel Kandlestyck-Maeker. Humpty Dumpty's wife is found to have committed suicide at the biscuit factory, but it is suspected that she has been murdered. The woman had jumped into a chocolate vat and was sliced by the machines, but when the employees stopped the machine, it was too late. The police of the Nursery Crime Division find a suicide note, but Mary concludes that it was written by his wife by comparing it to her diary. The proof of suicide also comes from a witnessing employee who saw her jump in, and no one pushed her.

A few days later, the team are called in to investigate the recent death of Wee Willie Winkie. He was attacked with a large weapon, supposedly a broadsword, and a fifty-pound note was found in his hand, showing he was blackmailing the killer. Jack has his own problems at home when his mother calls him to sell a painting of a cow.

Jack next interviews Randolph Spongg. Humpty had been investing in their failing businesses in hope of a breakthrough, which never came. The interview take place in Spongg's strange house, where doors lead nowhere, some rooms revolve around and go-kart races inside the house itself are held commonly every year. They next interview Lola Vavoom, who lives in the room next to Humpty Dumpty in the block of flats. At the end of the conversation she tells them that Humpty's shower had been running for a whole year, before his death. The two men break the door, and Baker finds a skeleton in the shower.

The man is identified as Tom Thomm, son of a local flautist. His skin has been washed away by the shower water, and his skeleton is badly damaged. There are also five bullet holes in the shower curtain, three at waist height and two at foot height. Gretel says that when Tom was shot in the waist, he fell on the floor, where the two other shots hit his head. Jack then realises that Tom's killer was Humpty's wife: the three waist-height shots would have been head height for Humpty. His wife killed herself as she was sorry for what she had done.

Jack is interviewed by colleagues, and Friedland Chymes appears and warns Spratt that if he does not give the case to Chymes, he will be fired. Jack accepts that that may happen, and refuses to give the case away. Later on, they have a meeting with another industrialist, Solomon Grundy, whose wife is Rapunzel. When she takes off her hat and her hair falls to the ground, Spratt and Mary remember the 28-foot-long strand of hair found in Humpty's bedroom. Solomon shows them into a room with an abnormally large amount of security: a person going in has to wear no shoes in case of being detected. In the centre of the room is a puzzle piece, the sacred gonga, held in unbreakable glass. It has magic powers which he reveals to Jack and Mary by putting them on each side of the room. When Jack thinks of a number, Mary says it out loud. This was so amazing that Solomon decided to put it on display for everyone in Reading.

When an inspector is put in charge of watching Spratt and the others, Humpty's car, a Ford Zephyr, is found. As the car is about to be taken away, Jack realises that the front headlight has been removed and there is a wire feeding through it. He orders everyone to run away and the car explodes. Spratt and Mary then interview a woman who was divorced from Humpty. The woman claims that she killed Humpty out of jealousy by putting three poisonous tablets in his coffee. Jack then tells her that Humpty was shot, not poisoned, and that she is therefore innocent.

When Jack returns home, he notices a huge crowd of people around the house. His mother says that the beans that were thrown from the window had grown into a huge stalk. She has even made arrangements for the magical celebrity, the Jellyman, to see it when he arrives in Reading. Jack is told by Gretel that Humpty Dumpty was shot by someone from behind, which smashed through his shell and burst the albumen, sending a shock which cracked the whole egg.

When Mary, Spratt and the inspector enter Humpty's house, they wonder how Humpty got his money: he had no proper job and all he did was invest in failing companies. Their question is answered when they discover on the sofa a goose that lays golden eggs. On a further inspection, a giant verruca is found on another sofa. Jack then remembers a strange doctor, Horatio Carbuncle, who always made living things like the verruca. He killed Humpty Dumpty because he was investing in a company which got rid of verrucas. Humpty's wife killed herself because she thought that she had killed him, and Wee Willie Winkie was killed because he was blackmailing him. Jack is not sure about Tom, but thought the evidence is good enough. Mary then calls him into the next room and shows him the body of Carbuncle, shot dead.

Jack then remembers the verruca and the puzzle piece. If Randolph was the killer, he would have the best motive so that he could put the verruca under the floor of Solomon's room. Hundreds of people would come in bare-footed to see the puzzle piece, and the verruca would give off a gas which would infect all the people's feet with verrucas. They would turn to the only foot care product, made by Randolph Spongg, and the failing company would make thousands.

Jack is told that the man who shot Humpty was employed by Solomon Grundy, but Jack knows that Solomon is not the killer and sets off to find the real one, Randolph Spongg. Arriving at the house, the butler asks him to remove his mobile. The room becomes strange and starts to revolve. Jack enters a normal room with a mirror next, but he cannot see himself in the reflection. He sees Randolph and Lola come out of a trapdoor, and turns round, but sees no one. Randolph explains that this is his magic. Lola says that she is happy that Humpty is dead in the Ford Zephyr and reveals that she loves Randolph. Behind the two, the butler comes out of the trapdoor, but to Jack's surprise the butler is behind him. Jack is confused as he is standing in front of a mirror and cannot see his reflection, but that of Randolph and Lola, and the butler is the only one with a reflection. Randolph puts a sandwich with tin foil inside on a table and shines a lamp on it. He explains that the sandwich will crumple up under the heat, and when the corners of the tin foil touch, the house will explode. When they leave, Jack realises that it is not a mirror at all, but glass. He breaks it and finds a room on the other side, made exactly backwards. The butler had a twin brother who appeared on the other side, looking like he had a reflection. Jack stops the bomb, but the killers escape in a plane. After talking to Mary, he thinks that the car bomb was not intended for them, but for Humpty. He gets this idea because Lola said that Humpty died in the Zephyr, so was hoping he would be killed in it.

Moments later, Jack is informed by Gretel that Humpty survived the shot, and that instead, he hatched, because Dr. Quatt secretly fecundated him in vitro. The team are thrown into confusion as they try to find a giant chicken which they think Humpty hatched into. Spratt and Mary then return to his house to attend the arrival of 'his eminence' the Jellyman. When he looks at the stalk, Jack has an urge to climb it. The only people in the house are a few police officers, Spratt, Mary, the Jellyman, Madeleine and their children. The few police officers stationed outside the house are alerted, and one by one, a strange creature kills them all. The monster bursts into the house in an attempt to kill the Jellyman. Jack leads him outside and climbs the stalk, followed by the beast. When they are high up in the sky, the monster rips Jack off and he falls all the way through the garden shed. When Jack regains consciousness, he sees a chainsaw. He is reminded of the axe and takes it and begins hacking down the beanstalk, aiming for the beast to fall down. It jumps onto him and tries to kill him, but a voice behind it makes it stop. Dr. Quatt appears in front of Jack and tells him that she is the killer, whose aim was to kill the Jellyman all along. She is about to kill Jack, but Mary knocks her unconscious. The monster runs to her aid, picking her up and running away. Mary tries to kill them, but Jack tells her not to bother. The beanstalk topples over from when Jack tried to cut it down, crushing the monster and Dr. Quatt.

The end of the book is the explanation. Scientists take away the goose that lays golden eggs and cut it open to find out what makes it lay these eggs, but are disappointed to find only find a normal goose's insides. Jack explains to Mary that Humpty, although a good egg, had many friends and many enemies. His previous wife thought she killed him by poison, his wife thought she killed him by shooting him in the shower, Solomon Grundy thought he killed him by hiring a man to shoot him, Randolph Spongg and Lola Vavoom thought they killed him with a car bomb. But the real killer was Dr. Quatt, who injected him with the monster when he was having his appointments with her. Humpty's wife killed herself because she thought she killed him. Wee Willie Winkie saw Humpty hatch and knew it was her and blackmailed her. She made the monster follow her, and when she met him, the beast killed him with its claw. Her plan was to kill the Jellyman and used Humpty as a host to create the monster. She only wanted to kill one person, but a lot of others were the victim of her powerful, and short wrath.

A freighter docks at Deep Space Nine so one of its passengers may receive treatment for a condition called Kalla-Nohra, which was caused by a mining accident at a brutal labor camp called Gallitep during the occupation of Bajor. As the patient is a Cardassian, Major Kira has the man arrested as a war criminal, only to find his name, Aamin Marritza, is not listed for any crimes. Station commander Benjamin Sisko sees no option but to release Marritza, but Kira is adamant - Marritza is a Cardassian who was present at Gallitep, which is reason enough. Sisko decides to investigate further and has the man held in custody. Citing a conflict of interest, Sisko asks Kira to remove herself from the case, but her emotional plea and a promise that she will remain professional convince him to let her continue. When she interrogates Marritza, he says that he was only a file clerk at Gallitep.

A photograph from Gallitep reveals that the man being held is not Aamin Marritza but Gul Darhe'el, the "Butcher of Gallitep" who reportedly murdered thousands of Bajorans. When confronted with this information, the prisoner proudly admits to being Darhe'el. Kira is shaken. Darhe'el seems convincing; however, inconsistencies in his story begin to stand out. Gul Dukat, the Cardassian former prefect of the occupation, asserts that Darhe'el is dead – his funeral was widely attended, and half of the Cardassian population viewed his body in state. Furthermore, Darhe'el was not at the mining camp on Bajor during the Kalla-Nohra disaster and thus could not possibly have the syndrome. Dr. Bashir discovers that the prisoner has undergone cosmetic surgery, leading Kira to realize that he is indeed Marritza, but is deliberately impersonating Darhe'el.

Kira confronts the prisoner with this information. Marritza eventually breaks down in tears, branding himself a coward for not attempting to stop the atrocities at Gallitep. He begs Kira to prosecute him as Darhe'el, as he intended all along, insisting that Cardassia must be forced to admit its wrongdoings and Bajor must have the satisfaction of successfully prosecuting a Cardassian war criminal. Kira releases Marritza, realizing he is a good man so traumatized and remorseful from his experiences that he would give up his life to make amends. Kira escorts Marritza to a ship departing from the station. On the way out of the Promenade, Marritza is suddenly stabbed to death by a Bajoran. When Kira demands to know why, the Bajoran echoes her earlier sentiment: that being a Cardassian is reason enough. Kira, having had a change of heart, asserts that it is not.

The series is set in the far future of the 27th century. The last living descendant of the original Highlander fights against the evil dictator Kortan.

The story unfolds on post-apocalyptic Earth, after a meteorite collision nearly wipes out all human civilization after setting off nuclear weapons. Following this catastrophe, Connor MacLeod (the protagonist of the original film) and the other Immortals forswear the Game of fighting each other until only one Immortal remains to win the Prize. Instead, the Immortals swear to preserve human knowledge and help humanity. They cast away their swords and call themselves ''Jettators'' (from the French ''jette'', "thrown away".)

But one Immortal, Kortan, refuses to swear the oath, he still seeks the Prize and now wishes to dominate the world. Connor challenges Kortan to a duel and is vanquished and killed, as any Immortal who breaks the oath is destined to die. However, with Connor's death comes the prophecy of the rise of a new Immortal, unbound by the oath, who will defeat Kortan. Uncontested by the Jettators and nigh-unkillable by mortals, Kortan establishes an empire controlling most of the planet, which he rules from his fortress Mogonda.

Seven hundred years later, a Highland youth named Quentin is killed trying to defend his clan, the Dundee, from Kortan's slavers. He is the prophesied Immortal and returns to life. His dying mother reveals his true identity to be Quentin MacLeod from Clan MacLeod, "The Last of the MacLeods". Quentin meets the Jetattor Don Vincente Marino Ramirez, who becomes his mentor. Ramirez teaches Quentin about Immortals and his mission to confront Kortan, and trains him in combat.

Accompanied by Ramirez, his adoptive sister Clyde, and their pet Gaul, Quentin seeks out the Jettators to gain their Quickening and their knowledge, not by beheading, but by a ''sharing'' as MacLeod and the Jettator grasp the same sword simultaneously (although the effects are sometimes just as destructive to the surrounding area). In the wake of a sharing, the Jettator becomes mortal and often his or her sword shatters to signify this. With the wisdom of Ramírez and the Quickenings of the Jettators, Quentin may be able to destroy Kortan.

Despite being redesigned to attract a younger audience, the show was surprisingly mature/violent; it was not uncommon for minor characters to die, and while Quentin took other Immortals' power and knowledge without also taking their lives, Kortan still did it the old way, by beheading them. In addition, though essentially a good-versus-evil scenario, most of the characters on both sides were more than just black and white heroes and villains. Many of Kortan's henchmen are shown to have good characteristics and feelings, and even on occasion Quentin will be tempted by greed and be selfish, especially when offered the chances of immense power. Of course, ultimately, his good side always wins through. Some episodes involve Jettators making use of a loophole in their oath to challenge Kortan regardless, such as Matsuda, who built a cyborg to fight Kortan in his stead, or Cornell, who changed his name to Orion to be able to fight Kortan.

At a convenience store early in the morning, Juan (Gastón Pauls), a con artist, successfully scams one cashier, but he is caught when he attempts the same scam on a different cashier the next shift. Marcos (Ricardo Darín), who has been observing Juan, pretends to be a police officer and takes Juan away. Once they are far enough, Marcos reveals he is a fellow con man whose partner has recently disappeared. and asks Juan to be his partner for the day, an arrangement to which Juan agrees because his father, who is also a con man, is in jail and he needs to raise $70,000 quickly in order to bribe a judge.

Later that day, the chance to take part in an elaborate and potentially lucrative scheme arises when Sandler (Oscar Nuñez), a former business associate of Marcos, contacts him to ask for help selling a counterfeit sheet of rare stamps named "The Nine Queens". The potential mark is Gandolfo (Ignasi Abadal), a rich, corrupt, stamp-collecting Spaniard who is staying at the hotel where Marcos' sister Valeria (Leticia Brédice) happens to work while he waits to be deported the next day. Since there is insufficient time to properly check if the stamps are authentic, Gandolfo hires an expert (Leo Dyzen) to do a quick check and is satisfied by the confirmation he receives. He offers $450,000 for the stamps, with the exchange to take place that evening. Outside of the hotel, the stamp expert says he knew the stamps were forged and demands Juan and Marcos pay him to say they were genuine. The fake stamps are then stolen out of Juan and Marcos' hands by thieves on a motorcycle who, unaware of their value, toss them into a river.

To salvage the scheme, Marcos and Juan approach Sandler's widowed sister Berta (Elsa Berenguer), as she is the owner of the real stamps, which she agrees to sell for $250,000. Marcos says he can put up $200,000 and asks Juan to contribute the remaining $50,000, but he becomes suspicious since it is the exact amount of money he saved so far, but after visiting his father in jail he ultimately agrees to the arrangement.

Marcos and Juan buy the real stamps and go back to the hotel, where, after finding out Valeria is Marcos' sister, Gandolfo says he has changed his mind and will now only buy the stamps if he also gets to sleep with Valeria. She says her price for doing so is Marcos confessing to their younger brother Federico (Tomás Fonzi) that Marcos cheated both Valeria and him out of their family inheritance. After he does so, Valeria spends the night with Gandolfo, who pays for the stamps with a certified check the next morning. Juan and Marcos rush to the bank, only to see a crowd outside and learn the bank has crashed due to fraud by the management, making the check worthless. Juan, looking disillusioned, walks away, while Marcos sticks around to see if he can find a way to still get the money.

In the final scene, Juan arrives at a warehouse, where he greets the motorcycle thieves, Gandolfo, Sandler, Berta, and Valeria, who is Juan's girlfriend – revealing that the real con was to swindle Marcos out of $200,000 as revenge for all the times he cheated his family and his partners.

Germany's success in World War II has led to their invasion of the British Raj in 1947, resulting in the British Indian Army being decisively defeated. Rather than struggling for independence from the Crown, Gandhi and his friend Jawaharlal Nehru find themselves in the position of resisting Nazi occupation using the techniques that were successfully employed against the British. Although Nehru has a general concept of the inherently immoral nature of Nazi ideology, Gandhi thinks they still can be persuaded, not heeding the warning from an Austrian Jew named Simon Wiesenthal, who was able to flee occupied Poland to India.

The Nazis, however, led by Field Marshal Walther Model, are completely unmoved by Gandhi's strategy. They view themselves as a master race and have no moral qualms about killing those who resist non-violently (or even those who do not resist at all, if they are of a certain race). In the end the movement collapses as it proves unable to deal with the savagery of Nazism.

''The Zahir'' means 'the obvious' or 'conspicuous' in Arabic. The story revolves around the life of the narrator, a bestselling novelist, and in particular his search for his missing wife, Esther. He enjoys all the privileges that money and celebrity bring. He is suspected of foul play by both the police and the press, who suspect that he may have had a role in the inexplicable disappearance of his wife from their Paris home.

As a result of this disappearance, the protagonist is forced to re-examine his own life as well as his marriage. The narrator is unable to figure out what led to Esther's disappearance. Was she abducted or had she abandoned the marriage? He encounters Mikhail, one of Esther's friends, during a book launch. He learns from Mikhail that Esther, who had been a war correspondent against the wishes of her husband (the protagonist), had left in a search for peace, as she had trouble living with her husband. The author eventually realizes that in order to find Esther he must first find his own self. Mikhail introduces him to his own beliefs and customs, his mission of spreading love by holding sessions in restaurants and meeting homeless people living in the streets. He tells the narrator about the voices he hears, and his beliefs related to them. The narrator, who only too frequently falls in love with women, consults with his current lover, Marie, about his encounters with Mikhail. She warns him that Mikhail could be an epileptic. However, she also advises him to search for the Zahir as is his desire, even though she would prefer him to stay with her.

The narrator eventually decides to go in search of his Zahir. As it was Esther who had initially brought Mikhail from Kazakhstan to France, the protagonist suspects that she may in fact be in Kazakhstan. At first, he is curious about what made Esther leave, but later he realizes that troubles in her relationship with her husband may have been a major reason. As he discovers, she was interested in getting to know herself through the making of carpets. Eventually the narrator meets his Zahir and the outcome of this meeting constitutes the climax of the book. Through the narrator's journey from Paris to Kazakhstan, Coelho explores the various meanings of love and life.

In a recurring theme in the book, Coelho compares marriage with a set of railway tracks which stay together forever but fail to come any closer. The novel is a journey from a stagnant marriage and love to the realization of unseen but ever increasing attraction between two souls.

''Cobalt 60'' takes place in a post-apocalyptic, ''Mad Max''-like world inhabited by mutants, aliens, and other fantastic creatures. Its titular character embarks on a quest to avenge the death of his parents, murdered by the evil Strontium 90. After he succeeds in his quest, he inherits his father's kingdom, but prefers to return to his wild ways. ''Cobalt 60'' is very violent and quite graphic in its action scenes.

Paul Matthews (Tate Donovan) is a lonely biochemist with a crush on his unavailable co-worker, biologist Diane Farrow (Sandra Bullock). His friends take him to a gypsy on 34th and Vine named Madame Ruth (Anne Bancroft). After reading his palm and seeing absolutely no romance in his life, Ruth gives him a small amount of Love Potion No. 8 on a piece of paper. As a scientist, Paul has doubts and ends up throwing it in the trash when he gets home. Around this time, Paul's friends buy him the services of Marisa, but all they do is talk.

His cat gets into the trash and eats some of the potion, then meows and attracts all the other cats in the neighborhood. When Paul sees the results, he takes it to Diane, and they find out the "scientific" properties of it. After analyzing it, they decide to use themselves as human test subjects. Diane ends up attracting an Italian car mogul and the prince of England, ending up getting a makeover in the process, while Paul has a string of hookups with women in bars, supermarkets, cars, sorority houses.

Paul and Diane realize their romantic attraction to each other and become involved. Eventually, Paul plans a proposal to Diane; however, when he comes by her house to do so, she's not there. Later, she tells him she has fallen for Gary (Dale Midkiff). (We have seen Gary before, taking advantage of her loneliness to have sex with her.) Paul is devastated and decides he really wants to get her back. Marisa comes to his house to steal his stereo, and after trying the potion in his bathroom, she makes Paul gladly give her all his valuables, including the potion.

After "waking up" from his infatuation, Paul gets an idea, and Madame Ruth confirms that somebody looking like Gary has bought all the potion No. 8. He phones Diane to tell her Gary is using the potion on her, but Gary forbids her to talk to him. After weeks of unsuccessful attempts, Paul goes back to Madame Ruth, who gives him Love Potion No. 9, which will not create love, but remove things obscuring it (such as potion No. 8). But if Diane was never really in love with him, Paul will love her for his entire life and she will eternally hate him.

Paul asks three friends to help him force Diane to take No. 9, but they can't believe him. Marisa arrives at the house and uses No. 8 to rob all of them, proving the power of the potion. When they arrive at the house, Diane's friend and matron of honor tells them Diane and Gary are marrying in an hour, but that she suspects something is wrong with Diane. Paul explains, she agrees to give Diane the potion, and things go terribly wrong, but Marisa, having tricked Gary's potion bottle from him, causes havoc and effectively ends the wedding, which gives Paul the chance to drink Potion No. 9, kiss Diane and wait five minutes as per the instructions. The effect kicks in too late but in the end, Diane runs away from Gary into Paul's arms.

Inspired by true events, ''Loggerheads'' tells the story of an adoption "triad"—birth mother, child, and adoptive parents—each in three interwoven stories in the days leading up to Mother's Day, and each in one of the three distinctive geographical regions of North Carolina: Appalachian Mountains, Piedmont (a broad, gently hilly plateau) and Atlantic Coastal Plain.

In mountainous Asheville, Grace (Bonnie Hunt), an airport car-rental agent living with her mother (Michael Learned), quits her job and embarks on a long-delayed quest: facing the legal barriers that keep her from finding the son she gave up for adoption when she was a teenager. Across the state in Kure Beach, Mark (Kip Pardue), a young man obsessed with saving loggerhead sea turtles, meets George (Michael Kelly), a friendly motel owner, who offers him a place to stay. In the center of the state is the small town of Eden, where a minister's wife (Tess Harper) struggles to confront her conservative husband (Chris Sarandon) over their estrangement from their son.

Freeport City is a bustling, futuristic megacity with a population of 27,000,000 and described as a mix of New York, San Francisco, and Tokyo. Areas that are featured in ''Emergence'' include the Freeport Docks, Sintek Supremacy Tower, and Radek's hidden drugs lab on board a beached, derelict oil tanker.

Characters

2006

Colonel John R. Blade (player): Colonel Blade is the leader of HardCORPS and is "obsessed" with bringing Elexis to justice. Elexis Sinclaire: Elexis is the CEO of SinTEK Industries and wants to speed up human evolution. To do this, she has made a mutagenic drug called "U4". In 2010, UGO featured her among the 50 best girls in video games ("charming, brilliant, and an absolute fox with nigh-impossible proportions"). JC Armack: "A HardCorps hacker with a secret to keep" Jessica calls him "Skeeve". Jessica Cannon: The newest addition to Blade's core team at HardCORPS, Jessica is able to infiltrate most secure lockups with ease. She is voiced by the actress Jen Taylor. *Viktor Radek: Viktor Radek leads the Cartel, and is suspected of helping Elexis with U4 shipping. He is voiced by actor David Scully.

Steed and Peel are investigating Cartney, who is suspected of involvement in pranks on high profile political and business figures. Through subterfuge, Peel connects with Cartney, who is attracted to her. She overhears Darcy arriving and informing Cartney that he has arranged another prank. Steed infiltrates Darcy's residence and, after knocking out Cartney's housekeeper, Horace, finds a pair of rubber scissors. Real scissors are used on an electrified ribbon by an official opening the "International Friendship Club", killing him.

Darcy did not expect to be involved in murder and is distraught. Steed gets him drunk and, under the pretence of knowing him from a party, learns of the Hellfire Club, which is responsible for the pranks. Peel visits Cartney and discovers information that leads to the Club, an organization that engages in orgiastic rituals and which revels in "ultimate sins", replicating the historic Hellfire Club.

During a Club party, Darcy arrives and demands a meeting with the superiors on the "circle of justice", asking why they plotted a murder and implicated him. The centre of the circle opens as a trapdoor and Darcy is killed. On Peel's recommendation, Steed applies to join the Hellfire Club and is given two membership tests; firstly drinking a large amount of alcohol (which he does easily) and then removing a pea guarded by an axe-wielding member. Rather than trying to grab the pea, like another member who lost two fingers, Steed blows the pea away as the axe falls. Steed is welcomed by the group and overhears that the Club is planning a coup which will have the "whole country up in arms". The following day, Steed and Peel attend the next event, and spot a cache of explosives. Steed questions a drunk girl and deduces that the Club intend to blow up Culverston House, where three foreign leaders are staying. Peel re-enters in a "Queen of Sin" outfit, holding a snake. Cartney tells the group "She's yours to do with as you will". Members carry Peel, throwing rose petals on her. As the revellers watch a fight, Horace recognizes Steed and exposes him as a spy. Steed wins the ensuing sword duel against the club expert. Peel defeats two members laying out explosives underground, before being attacked with a whip by Cartney, who drops to his death through the trapdoor when his whip catches the switch.

Peter Brock (Michael Bryant) is the selfish and petulant head of a research team for Ryan Electrics. His team is developing a new recording medium that will give the company an edge over its Japanese competitors. They move into a new facility at Taskerlands, an old Victorian mansion renovated for their use. On arrival, they learn from estates manager Roy Collinson (Iain Cuthbertson) that the refurbishment of one of the rooms in Taskerlands remains incomplete. The builders refused to work in it because it is supposedly haunted. The room, with its stone walls, is a remnant of the original building, with foundations dating back to the Saxon era. The rest of the mansion was added on over the centuries.

Curious, the researchers explore the room and hear the sounds of a woman running, followed by a gut-wrenching scream. Jill Greeley (Jane Asher), an emotionally sensitive computer programmer, has a vision of a woman running up the steps in the room and falling, apparently to her death.

Inquiring of old records, Collinson finds records of a young maid who had died in the room in 1890 and that an unsuccessful exorcism had previously been performed on the property. Brock and Jill briefly meet with a local Vicar, who is also an archivist, but he fails to turn up records of the exorcism.

Brock hypothesises that it is not a ghost, but that somehow the stone in the room has preserved an image of the girl's death— this "stone tape" may be the new recording medium they have been seeking. Their scientific devices fail to detect any evidence of the phenomena the team experience, and different team members experience different phenomena: most are able to hear sounds, Jill can also see images, but another member of the team experiences no sensory input. Jill hypothesises that the "tape" does not produce actual sound or light, but instead interfaces with the human nervous system during playback to create the sensory impression of sound and vision. Some individuals are more sensitive to this than others. She surmises that the recordings are imprinted in moments of extreme emotion, like a kind of telepathy.

Excited by the possibilities presented by a recording medium that uses a person's senses as the means of recording and playback, Brock and his team move into the room. They bombard it with their technology, hoping to find the "stone tape" secret and have it play on demand. Brock is certain that the walls hold the secret, but he fails to develop a predictable method of triggering. Under mounting pressure to succeed, Brock uses every available instrumentation, only to be told, by Jill, that the presence she had felt earlier was now gone, apparently meaning that the "tape" has been erased. Brock's failures are compounded when his superiors signal their lost confidence in him, requiring him to share Taskerlands with a rival research team working on a new washing machine.

Embittered, Brock no longer wants anything to do with the stone tape. He disregards Jill's insistence that there is still more to learn about the room and her mounting concerns that it is dangerous to stop their research. As Brock directs the team to resume its past projects, the Vicar reappears, claiming to have found records of the unsuccessful exorcism, not in 1892, but much earlier, in 1760, before the house even stood.

Realising that the phenomenon occurring in the room is far older than the house, Jill theorizes that the stone tape can be recorded over again and again, like magnetic recording tape; the maid's death was simply the most recent and clearest recording. Independently continuing her research, Jill realizes that the maid's death was masking a much older recording, left many thousands of years ago. Brock cruelly dismisses her findings and forces Jill to take a two-month leave to prevent her from continuing her research.

When Jill returns to the room one last time, a powerful, malevolent presence from the much-degraded older recording besieges her senses. Like the maid before her, she dies while frantically trying to escape it.

During an inquest, Brock tries to save face by denouncing Jill as having been mentally unstable. Afterwards he orders that all of Jill's research be destroyed without reviewing it. The "haunted" room has been declared of historical importance by a preservation society, prohibiting development, destruction, or commercial use. He makes a final visit to the room and discovers to his horror that the stone tape has made a new, crystal-clear recording: that of Jill screaming his name as she dies.

Twenty-two years prior to the novel's events, twelve year-old Adam and his two best friends failed to come home after playing in the familiar woods bordering their Irish housing estate. The Gardaí find Adam shivering, clawing the bark of a nearby tree, with blood in his shoes and slash marks on his back. His friends are never found. He is unable to say what happened to them. Now using his middle name, Rob, he is a detective with the Murder Squad. His amnesia holds to the present day.

The plot of the novel circles around the murder of a twelve-year-old girl, Katy Devlin, whose case Rob and his partner Cassie Maddox are assigned to investigate. The body is found in the same woods where Rob's friends disappeared, at an archaeological dig site; and the coincidence is enough to make Rob nervous, though he insists to his partner that he is fine.

Cassie and Rob have been partners for a few years and get along famously, teasing one another and completing one another's thoughts. Cassie is one of the few people who knows the truth about Rob's past. There are many rumours that they are romantically involved, though both of them scoff at the idea, despite the fact that they live almost like a married couple, spending a lot of time at Cassie's cooking dinner for one another, drinking wine, and having Rob crash on Cassie's couch across the room.

Katy's murder takes the pair along many lines of investigation. Her death might be related to her father's protests against the new motorway meant to go straight through the dig site, or one of the students on the dig might have attacked her. She might have been abused by her father or someone else (her mother, twin sister, or older sister) in the family. She might have been previously poisoned over time. Or it might be related to the disappearance of Rob's friends, as a hair clip that one of his friends was wearing that day appeared near the crime scene.

These possibilities are investigated, but the detectives come up frustratingly empty-handed at every turn. The case messes with Rob's psyche as he tries to remember details about the two previous disappearances in case it would help. He tries spending the night in the woods, but freaks out and calls Cassie to pick him up. He's afraid to sleep again, thinking that he'll just have nightmares, and asks Cassie if he can sleep in her bed. They lie awake for awhile. until Rob kisses Cassie, and she reciprocates.

Rob feels immensely awkward after and can't go back to their normal jokey-insult ways, but he also feels that he can't start a relationship with her. Their partnership deteriorates just as they start to uncover new leads in the case, and they are unable to discuss the case and get along the way they used to.

Rob goes back to the dig site alone, where all the students are frantically digging before the site is shut down for the construction of the motorway. He comes to a realisation and calls in the forensics team again, who discover the location of the murder in a shed to which only three people have the key. After some heavy interrogation, one of the suspects confesses, though his motive is far from clear.

It becomes clearer when the suspect contends that he had been dating Katy's older sister, Rosalind. When questioned by Cassie, Rosalind denies it and any involvement in Katy's death, but she also makes a comment that Cassie is obviously sleeping with Rob. Cassie takes it in stride; but, after the interrogation, she has an idea of how to get a confession out of Rosalind: Go to her and admit sleeping with Rob and promise to keep her updated on the case if she promises not to tell.

Rosalind’s psychopathic tendencies get the better of her; and, once she knows that she has Cassie in her debt, she brags about the whole thing and how she got the murderer to come up with the idea by telling him that all three girls were being sexually abused by their father, but that Katy liked it and was therefore their father’s favourite. Rosalind also told him that Katy told their father lies to make him beat them and would watch and laugh and that, if Katy were gone, then they would be happy. She also admitted to Cassie that Katy was strong-willed and wouldn’t always do as Rosalind told her, so she had poisoned her to make her sick. After this confession, recorded on a wire, Cassie arrests her and takes her in; but, because Rosalind was a few months from turning 18 (though she had told Rob previously that she was already 18), the confession is invalid. She is released with a smug smile.

The Murder Squad Superintendent has learned that Rob is actually Adam Ryan and transfers him to menial desk work in the General Unit. He never returns to the Murder Squad. Cassie starts dating another member of the squad and eventually becomes engaged. Rob is heartbroken and calls her, but it's too late. He goes to the dig site to see the motorway construction has begun and thinks that he'll never regain his lost memories of that night.

The story takes place in the opening months of World War II. Josef Schwarz is a refugee who offers his visa and tickets for America to another refugee desperate to leave Lisbon. He does this in exchange for keeping him company throughout one night, a night in which he relates the story of his and his wife's frantic flight from Nazi Germany to Lisbon.

Protagonist Kelly "Special K" Bennett is a young dancer training under instructor Franco in Venice, California. Through her friend Adam, Kelly meets two street dancers, Ozone and Turbo on the boardwalk at Venice Beach. Kelly is enamored with their dancing, and all three become friends. This leads to their becoming their own dance troupe.

Franco tells Kelly that breakdancing is low-class and not a real art. He is disrespectful to Ozone and Turbo, and makes inappropriate advances on Kelly. She quits training with Franco. Later, Kelly attends a dance audition and is shut down by harsh directors.

Kelly then wanders to a breakdancing event where she finds Ozone and Turbo in the midst of a dance battle that they eventually lose against rivals "Electro Rock." Adam convinces Ozone and Turbo to teach Kelly how to breakdance. After training for a while, the three defeat Electro Rock. Kelly convinces the troupe to enroll in a dance competition. Kelly's agent friend, James, sees what the group can do and agrees to back them.

The competition requirements are traditional, socially respected styles of dance. The troupe walks before the judges in tuxedos, top hats and white gloves to give the impression of traditional dancers. Just before the audition starts, they rip off the sleeves of their shirts and show their true style. The judges are initially shocked and disapproving. Yet within two minutes of their audition, the judges recognize the troupe's talent and allow them to continue. The troupe earns a standing ovation from the judges and win the competition. The troupe's popularity skyrockets, and all three members continue dancing professionally and in the community.

In a mid-credits scene, Special K, Ozone, and Turbo meet James some time after the competition, who informs them about a new phenomenon known as "the electric boogaloo."

Garfield and Odie are outside harassing a neighbor's dog when the owner, Hubert, angrily calls the pound to capture them. When the dogcatcher arrives, Garfield flees, but Odie is too stupid to flee and is captured. Garfield decides to go home, but he is unable to tell Jon Arbuckle that Odie is in peril. Garfield soon realizes how boring life is without Odie around, so that night, Garfield decides to rescue him from the pound. Although Garfield successfully makes it to the pound, the dogcatcher captures him and later puts him behind bars. Garfield learns from another cat, Fast Eddie, that Odie is going to be euthanized the next day.

During the night, Garfield has a series of flashbacks of all the good times that he and Odie had playing together. The next day, Garfield tearfully watches the dogcatcher taking Odie down the hall to be euthanized. Meanwhile, a girl arrives at the pound for a pet and chooses Garfield. Garfield manages to see his chance to escape and when the cell finally opens, he runs out the cell and past the girl. The rest of the animals flood out of the cell after Garfield. Garfield rescues Odie from the dogcatcher by biting his hand. Garfield, Odie, and the rest of the animals escape from the pound by knocking down the door on the dogcatcher, who tries to stop them from escaping.

As the animals run to freedom, Garfield and Odie return to Jon's house, where they knock down its front door while Jon tries to fix it. Jon bets that Garfield and Odie were having fun during the night "singing on the fence, chasing cars," while he sat home and was worried himself sick about them. Garfield and Odie are bemused and they agree with Jon. At breakfast time, things return to normal as Garfield derides Odie's begging at the table, but decides to try it himself after seeing Odie get a steak from Jon. All Garfield gets from Jon is a plate of bacon and eggs, in which he angrily throws back in to Jon's face, admitting: "I'm only human".

In 1980, Operation Eagle Claw is aborted after a fatal helicopter crash, with the U.S. Delta Force evacuating to their C-130 transports. Among them is Captain Scott McCoy, who, against orders, rescues his wounded comrade, Peterson, from the burning helicopter before the team finally evacuates. McCoy expresses his disgust for the politicians and the military hierarchy that forced the mission to launch despite the risks, and announces his resignation.

5 years later, in 1985 a group of Lebanese terrorists hijack American Travelways Airlines Flight 282, a Boeing 707 flying from Cairo to New York City via Athens and Rome. Taking all 144 passengers and crew hostage on the Athens-Rome leg, the pro-Khomeini New World Revolutionary Organization (based on Hezbollah), led by two terrorists named Abdul Rafai and Mustafa, force Captain Roger Campbell and his crew to fly the 707 to Beirut, where they make demands to the United States government that, if not met, will result in the death of each of the hostages. During the crisis, they segregate the Jewish passengers from the Americans by forcing a reluctant flight purser of German heritage named Ingrid Harding to identify them. A Catholic priest, William O'Malley, joins the Jews in solidarity. Unbeknownst to the authorities, the Jewish hostages are then taken off the plane and transported to a militant-controlled area of Beirut, while a dozen additional henchmen are brought on board.

The flight departs for Algiers, where the terrorists release the female hostages and children. Meanwhile, Delta Force, led by Colonel Nick Alexander and a recalled-to-duty and newly promoted-to-Major McCoy are deployed to resolve the crisis. Once the female hostages are evacuated, they launch their assault, only to discover too late that there are additional hijackers on board. When the Delta Force blow their cover, Abdul kills a U.S. Navy Diver named Tom Hale. He then forces the pilots to return to Beirut and takes the remaining male passengers with him.

Upon returning to Beirut, the terrorists transport the passengers to a separate location, while the pilots and two male flight attendants remain in the 707. Working with a sympathetic Greek Orthodox priest, Israeli Army Intelligence prepares an operation to free the hostages. McCoy and Peterson are able to enter into Lebanon disguised as a Canadian television crew. In a prolonged campaign against the terrorists, the Delta Force bide their time to identify the terrorist leaders and locate the hostages. Once the hostages are located, Delta Force assaults the terrorist holdouts, freeing the hostages and evacuating them to the airport. During the battle, McCoy, Peterson, and their team hunt for Abdul and the Jewish hostages. They kill most of the militants but Abdul gravely injures Peterson and flees. While the commandos tend to Peterson, McCoy chases Abdul and tracks him down to an abandoned home. He then engages him in a vicious hand-to-hand fight, breaking Abdul's arm. As the terrorist leader prepares to shoot McCoy, he is killed when McCoy launches a rocket into his car.

With the hostages and rescue teams secured, the team seizes Flight 282 by secretly infiltrating the airfield through a cotton plantation. Using silenced weapons, Alexander and the Delta team kill the terrorist guards and save the crew. They board the 707 with all of the hostages, taking off to Israel just as McCoy storms the runway on his motorcycle; managing to board after destroying several terrorist jeeps. On board, the team tends to the wounded passengers and the dying Peterson. After having confirmed the hostages are safe and en route home, Peterson says his farewells to McCoy before succumbing to his wounds. In the main cabin the ex-hostages and Delta commandos join in a rousing rendition of "America The Beautiful", not knowing about Peterson's death, except for Alexander, Bobby, McCoy, and O'Malley. In Israel, the Boeing 707 lands safely and the hostages are greeted by their families, while Delta Force disembarks with Peterson's body in tow to their C-130. The team concludes their operation and departs for the United States amidst celebrations by the people.

''File #2'' is a continuation of the events that occur in the original ''Outbreak'', though the exact order of the scenarios is left ambiguous. Though there is no concrete "start" to the game, it ends with the execution of Mission Code: XX in which the government effectively nukes all of Raccoon City to eradicate the threat posed by the T-virus.

The first scenario listed is "Wild Things," in which Cindy Lennox leads the rest of the survivors to the Raccoon City Zoo in hopes of reaching a rescue helicopter on the other side of the zoo. Throughout the scenario, players are pursued by an array of animals infected by the virus, the most dangerous being the zombie elephant Oscar, who follows the players from area to area until he is either locked in the Elephant Stage or killed by the players. Should they reach the Front Plaza without killing him or locking him away, he will appear as the boss; otherwise, the zombie lion Max will be the boss. Once the players reach the end of the stage and board the tram, the tram stops, and the rescue helicopter is shown on fire in the distance, with the pilot dying of his injuries outside of the burning helicopter.

The second scenario, "Underbelly," follows the players' journey into a subway station and attempt to escape the city using a subway train. Before they can leave, however, another moving train runs into a pile of debris and explodes, awakening the "Giga Bite," an enormous flea, who the players later fight at the end of the stage. To initiate this fight, one of the players is kidnapped by the Giga Bite while waiting for their train to depart. After defeating the boss, if the players do not make it back to the train in time, they must find an alternate way out through the Substation Tower, which is through the ventilation shaft.

In the third scenario, "Flashback," Alyssa Ashcroft leads the survivors to a cabin in the woods where they are met by Albert Lester (Also known as Al), who promises to lead them to a neighboring town. He mysteriously disappears once the players reach a bridge leading to an abandoned hospital. There are two different paths where it depends on the gameplay;

• When the bridge breaks only in fifteen minutes, the player did not make it to the hospital without Lester, leaving the mystery of the hospital behind and allows to turn back to the remaining cabin where the player meets an injured woman named Regan, explains that her daughter Lucy is lost somewhere in the woods. Regan allows to gives Lucy's Pendant to the player, which she says will make Lucy more willing to trust you. When you approaches to the woods, each enemies and paths were changed. If the player saves Lucy who found on the shore, they will give you a reward. However, Regan told the player there is another suspension bridge that leads to the outside of the woods.
• When the players approaches to the bridge that leads to the hospital, she allows to investigate, unless, a masked ax-wielding man chases them throughout the scenario. Players must kill sections of a giant plant that has overtaken the hospital building by injecting it with a serum-filled syringe. The final boss is the core of the plant, which is later found out to be controlled by an infected Dorothy, Al's wife, who was experimented on in the hospital. Al is shown in the ending to have been leading people to the hospital to kill them in order to feed his wife in her plant form. If the player plays through the level as Alyssa, they will experience several flashbacks at different points in the scenario, as Alyssa and a friend who died at the hands of a zombified Dorothy once investigated the hospital's ethics years ago. The player could also get different endings depending on how many files the player collected in the hospital.

In the fourth scenario, "Desperate Times," finds the players in the Raccoon City Police Department defending themselves from zombies that have crowded outside of the station. By finding several plates, the players open a secret passage for one of the cops, Rita, to navigate and find help. Before she can return, the zombies break through the gates of the police department, and the players must defeat a certain amount (depending on which difficulty they chose) of them before completing the scenario. The players are forced to leave policeman Marvin behind as they drive away, while he locks himself in the room in which Claire or Leon (depending on whom the player chooses to be) finds him severely wounded in ''Resident Evil 2''.

In the final scenario, "End of the Road," David King leads the survivors to an Umbrella laboratory, where they are met by two scientists, Linda and Carter, who have returned to get the cure. Before they can leave, an alarm sounds, and a shutter closes the exit, which the scientists are unable to open. The lab is infested with hunters, which Carter fends off by awakening the Tyrant to fight for him. As the group is about to exit, however, the Tyrant turns on the players, killing Carter and throwing Linda from a ledge. The Tyrant then follows the players for the rest of the scenario. The players enter the sewers below the lab, where they find Linda alive. Depending on if the player whether or not killed the Tyrant, they are either washed away in the sewers with Linda or left behind to reach the upper levels themselves. Regardless, the players encounter a mutated Tyrant on the city streets. Players are given a chance to rescue Linda, who is shot by a sniper (who also shoots at the players), and must be carried by the player to the end of the stage. They can choose to escape by truck but must fight Nyx, the final boss, before doing so, or by helicopter, without fighting a final boss. Also, in the final scenario, there are four different endings.

• "Up and Away with Linda" is obtained by escaping the city by helicopter with Linda in possession.
• "Up and Away" is obtained by escaping the city by helicopter, but letting Linda die on the way or not finding her.
• "Run Like the Linda" is obtained by escaping the city by truck with Linda in possession.
• "Run Like the Wind" is obtained by escaping the city by truck, but letting Linda die on the way or not finding her.

Obtaining the first or the third ending grants the player the Good ending and epilogue for the character chosen, and obtaining the second or the fourth ending will grant the player the Bad ending.

The book starts with the murder of District Attorney Vargas, who is prosecuting a high-profile case. The subsequent investigation failing, the police assign the protagonist Inspector Rogas, "the shrewdest investigator at the disposal of the police," to solve the case. While he is starting his investigation, two judges are killed. After Rogas discovers evidence of corruption surrounding the three government officials, he is encouraged by superiors "not to forage after gossip," but to trail the "crazy lunatic who for no reason whatever was going about murdering judges." This near admission of guilt drives Rogas to seek out those wrongfully convicted by the murdered judges.

Rogas finds his likely suspect in Cres, a man who was convicted of attempting to kill his wife. Mrs. Cres accused her husband of trying to kill her by poisoning her rice, which she escaped only because she fed a small portion first to her cat, who died. Rogas concludes that he was probably framed by his wife, and seeks him out, only to find that he has sneaked away from his house. Meanwhile, another district attorney is killed, and eyewitnesses see two young revolutionaries running away from the scene. Rogas, close to finding his man, is demoted, and told to work with the political division to pin the crimes on the revolutionary Left.

From this point, Rogas finds Galano, the editor of a revolutionary paper, and has his phone tapped. This leads to Rogas discovering the Minister of Justice at a party with many revolutionary leaders. After this, he and the Minister have a discussion, where the Minister claims he would prefer the revolution, but feels the country is not ready. Following this, Rogas speaks to the President of the Supreme Court, who details a philosophy of justice wherein the court is incapable of error by definition. He also discovers that his suspect, Cres, is in the same complex as the President, but Rogas does not pursue him, hoping that he will kill the President. After Rogas realizes that Cres lives in the complex under a pseudonym and wasn't there to commit a murder, he meets with the Secretary-General of the revolutionary party. Both of them are killed. The book ends with the murder of the Secretary-General being blamed on Rogas.

A narrator states that, when asked about the Kennedy Assassination and the Warren Commission report, United States President Lyndon B. Johnson said he doubted the Commission's findings. The narration ends by mentioning that the segment did not run on television, and was cut from a program about Johnson at his own request.

At a gathering in June 1963, shadowy industrial, political and US intelligence figures discuss their growing dissatisfaction with the Kennedy administration. In the plush home of lead conspirator Robert Foster, he and the others try to persuade Harold Ferguson, a powerful oil magnate dressed in white, to back their plans for Kennedy's assassination. Fellow conspirator James Farrington, a black-ops specialist, labels this as "executive action". He shows the group that magnicide is indeed a viable option. He refers to the Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley assassinations as examples, as well as unsuccessful attempts including against Franklin Roosevelt in 1933. He explains these attempts were carried out by alleged lone fanatics; later scenes show the grooming process unwittingly undergone by Lee Harvey Oswald to fulfill precisely that role in the present conspiracy.

Ferguson remains unconvinced, saying such schemes are "only tolerable when necessary, and only permissible when they work". Obtaining his approval is crucial to the conspirators, although Farrington proceeds to organize two shooting teams in anticipation that Ferguson will change his mind. One of the teams is shown during practice in the Mojave Desert, shooting moving targets at medium-to-long range. One of the shooters says that he can only guarantee the operation's success if he fires at a target moving below 15 miles per hour.

After one of their meetings, Foster and Farrington discuss their murky, paranoid fears about the future of the country under Kennedy, and the security of ruling-class white people across the globe. They both seem privy to plans known to the CIA that Ferguson, a civilian, is perhaps unaware of. Foster forecasts the world population in 2000 at seven billion, most of them non-white and "[swarming] out of their breeding grounds into Europe and North America". He sees victory in Vietnam as an opportunity to control the developing world and reduce its population to 550 million, ominously adding "I know; I've seen the data". He also states that the same methods can then be applied to unwanted groups in the United States: Asians, blacks, Latinos, poor whites, etc.

Ferguson watches news reports and becomes highly concerned at Kennedy's increasingly liberal direction: action on civil rights, adoption of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and nuclear disarmament. The decisive moment comes in an anti-Kennedy news report on the deteriorating situation in South Vietnam. It is followed by Kennedy's October 1963 decision (National Security Action Memorandum #263) to withdraw all US advisers from Vietnam by the end of 1965, effectively ending America's direct involvement in the Vietnam War. Ferguson calls Foster and tells him he now supports their project.

The scene of the shooting is described. As news of the assassination reaches the conspirators, the film surveys its effects. The shooters leave Dallas and the conspirators work to cover up the evidence. Farrington and his assistant Tim discuss the inconvenience of Oswald's survival. Tim approaches nightclub owner Jack Ruby, who stalks and kills Oswald. The plotters discuss the political fallout in Washington, D.C., concerned about retribution from Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and the believability of the plot. Foster states that "Bobby Kennedy is not thinking as Attorney General but as a grieving brother. By the time he recovers it will be too late". The conspirators agree that people will believe in the story because "they want to". Soon after, Foster receives a call from Farrington's assistant: Farrington has died of a heart attack at Parkland Hospital. The conspirators are now insulated from the link to the group that committed the killings.

Their work is not quite finished. A photo collage of 18 material witnesses is shown, all but two of whom, the film states, died of unnatural causes within three years of the assassination. A voice-over says that an actuary of the British newspaper ''The Sunday Times'' calculated the probability that all these people who witnessed the assassination would die within that period of time to be 100,000-trillion-to-one.

''Return of the Ewok'' focuses on the fictional account of Davis' decision to become an actor and act as Wicket in ''Return of the Jedi'' (notably, Davis refers to the film as ''Revenge of the Jedi'', its temporary pre-release title). It also follows his transformation into Wicket. As Warwick and as Wicket, he visits and interacts with many of the cast and crew of the movie and then characters of the movie. As Warwick, he goes to Elstree Studios where he interacts with the cast, both in and out of character. At one point, he even interacts with Luke Skywalker as he jumps out of a movie screen. As Wicket, he goes to the Death Star to see Darth Vader, and is chased by Boba Fett, eventually meeting Yoda on Dagobah.

As ''Voyager'' monitors a nebula with large quantities of the power source sirillium, Tuvok finds his hands shaking, and requests permission to go to sickbay. En route, he experiences a flashback that involves him trying to pull a young girl off a cliff to safety. The girl ends up falling, horrifying young Tuvok. Eventually, he arrives in sickbay, and collapses, convulsing on the floor.

In sickbay, Tuvok describes the memory, but insists the events he "remembered" never occurred. With no clear cause of his symptoms, he is dismissed with a device to monitor his readings in case such an event occurs again. That night, he attempts to build a "structure of harmony" in an effort to aid his meditation, but cannot stop the structure from collapsing. After a visit from Kes, he attempts again.

The next morning, he notes he had spent fourteen hours meditating, and still had no idea what the cause of the problem was. Ensign Kim could not find anything unusual with the nebula they were near, but Tuvok suggests they scan it for Klingon activity. B'Elanna Torres reminds him that the Klingon Empire is on the other side of the galaxy. Moments later, Tuvok sees the mental image again, and collapses once more.

In sickbay, the Doctor suggests the problem is a repressed memory, which in Vulcans can cause brain damage due to the conflict between the conscious and unconscious minds. The only possible course of action is to initiate a mind meld – normally undertaken with a family member. Tuvok explains he would go to one of the Vulcans on board but he feels Janeway is the best choice to assist him in locating and reintegrating the memory. During the meld she would be an outside observer of the memories, unnoticed by anyone but Tuvok.

When Tuvok initiates the mind meld, he attempts to take them to the cliff in his memory, but instead they appear on the USS ''Excelsior'', under attack by the Klingons. Explaining the attack, the memory moves once more, to three days before, when Praxis exploded. After learning about how Captain Kirk and Dr. McCoy were placed on trial for the assassination of the Klingon Chancellor, Captain Sulu attempted a rescue mission, which Tuvok was the only ''Excelsior'' crew member to protest.

In an effort to avoid confrontation with the Klingons, Sulu ordered an approach path through a nebula remarkably similar to the one ''Voyager'' was observing in the Delta Quadrant – the appearance causing Tuvok to recall the repressed memory once more, breaking the mind meld.

After a period of recovery for Tuvok, during which Janeway and Kim comment on the differences between Starfleet of the 23rd century and the 24th, they try the mind meld again – appearing once more on the ''Excelsior''. After a discussion about Tuvok's motivations for joining Starfleet, a small Klingon attack began. After Sulu claimed their navigational equipment had malfunctioned, Kang insisted upon escorting the ''Excelsior'' back to Federation space, to help them from getting lost again. Sulu agreed, but on the way out of the nebula they were in, came up with a plan to disable the Klingon ship by igniting the sirillium that was also present in that nebula. After this succeeded, they set course once more for Qo'noS, before being attacked again by three Klingon battlecruisers – an attack that killed Lieutenant Dimitri Valtane. As Tuvok watched Valtane die, the memory appeared once more, and in sickbay, the neural engrams destabilize, preventing the meld from being broken. On the ''Excelsior'', Sulu could suddenly see Janeway, who was supposed to merely be an observer. In an effort to blend into the memories, Tuvok takes Janeway to a time where she can steal Commander Janice Rand's uniform. In sickbay, the Doctor and Kes notice an irregularity in the memories, and deduced they were not in fact memories, but instead a virus. Using thoron radiation, they begin to kill the virus.

On the ''Excelsior'', the attack occurs once more, and Valtane dies when a plasma conduit behind his console explodes. The image of the girl on the cliff appears, but this time, it is Janeway who is letting the girl fall. As the Doctor continues the efforts to kill the virus, it tracks back, changing to Valtane, and then an endless stream of other children. Eventually, it dies, and Tuvok breaks the meld.

In sickbay, the Doctor and Kes explain what must have happened: the virus thrived on neural peptides, and hid itself by creating the false memory that the person bearing it would repress, so the virus could live in secret, and migrate from person to person as its hosts died.

Walking down a corridor, Janeway suggests that Tuvok missed those days, a suggestion Tuvok rejects. However, he admits that he is pleased to have been a part of them, and having experienced the memories, Janeway says she feels she was a part of them as well. As a result, Tuvok suggests that she could feel nostalgic for the both of them.

Barry is a private with the 101st Airborne Division of the United States Army, stationed at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, while Calpernia works as a showgirl at a transgender revue in Nashville, Tennessee. Barry's roommate Justin Fisher brings Barry to the club where Calpernia performs. When Barry and Calpernia start dating, Fisher, out of jealousy, participates in spreading rumors about Barry's alleged affair, which appeared to be a violation of the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy that forbids discussion of sexual orientation of military personnel. Barry faces increasing harassment and pressure, which explodes into violence over a Fourth of July weekend after Barry easily beats Calvin Glover in a fight. While Calpernia performs in a pageant in Nashville, Barry is beaten to death in his sleep by Glover with a baseball bat given by Fisher. The film ends with a discussion of the aftermath.

The film is set in Torrance, California on a Saturday night in the late 1970s.

An aggressive ex-convict known as "Crump's Brother" is picked up by a local teen while hitchhiking on the freeway and informs him about two women he intends to party with in Torrance Beach, across from the Frankie Avalon house. The teen then tells his friends about the women, one of whom, Tack, is motivated to go and find them.

Long-haired stoners Michael Hubbs and Joe Connolly drive around town looking for young women. They meet Tack, who tells them about the women and agrees to lead them to the location in exchange for a ride. They stop at the gas station and talk to their friend Crump, the gas station attendant, who tells them that the women are his brother's girlfriends. Joe and Hubbs lie to Crump that there is another party going so they can distract him and his brother from the women, in order to reach their location first. They leave Tack at the gas station and continue to Torrance Beach.

They arrive at the house and meet an extremely attractive young woman, Lanie, who sends them to a liquor store for alcohol. When they return, they meet the homeowner's daughter Jill, a jaded hippie who is Lanie's friend. Meanwhile, Tack convinces his nerdy friend Norm to take him to the beach. They arrive at the house and after a brief altercation, Tack convinces the group to go to a party in Palos Verdes, to Joe and Hubbs' irritation.

At the house party, Muldoon, the host, lets the women in but shuts everyone else out. Lanie leaves following an altercation with Muldoon and asks Joe to take her swimming in a neighbor's pool. The police shut down the party, and Hubbs and Jill locate Joe and Lanie next door. Lanie is impressed with Hubbs' aggressive behaviour, and the two walk upstairs to have sex, angering Joe.

Having had their beer confiscated by police, Tack and some others rob a liquor warehouse for beer, and head to the house. Joe and Jill partially reconcile but return to find Tack and the Guzzlers converging on the home. A fight breaks out between Joe and Tack and Jill runs inside, eventually letting Joe back in and locking the door.

After getting stoned, Hubbs tells Joe he has arranged for Lanie to perform fellatio on him as a "birthday present". Joe finds Lanie asleep, covers her up, and walks out to find Hubbs and Jill making out on the couch; Joe is upset but learns that Jill was the instigator. They are interrupted when Crump's Brother arrives outside and begins to break down the door. They flee to the kitchen but shortly afterwards, they hear the commotion subsiding; Jill's father, Warren, has returned from a college reunion and beaten the entire crowd of kids—including Crump's Brother—unconscious. Hubbs manages to escape by jumping through a window on the upper floor, but Warren catches Joe and holds him captive awaiting the arrival of the police. Warren is very overbearing and emotionally abusive towards Jill, and eventually, Joe stands up for her and begins fighting with Warren. Joe and Hubbs escape just ahead of the police. Enamored with Joe, Jill gives him her full name and geographical location so he can find her later.

The police arrest the entire group of drunken teenagers, and Joe and Hubbs escape in their car. Hubbs mocks Joe for his apparent cowardice in attempting to seduce Lanie and Jill, and talks negatively about Jill. Joe loses his temper and attacks Hubbs while driving, forcing him to acknowledge that Jill is "cool". Joe then plays the Blue Öyster Cult song "(Don't Fear) the Reaper" as the credits roll.

Following the credits, Joe and Hubbs are offered Blue Öyster Cult concert T-shirts outside a convenience store by two men, but Joe refuses because the shirts are bootlegs. The scalpers are played by actual Blue Öyster Cult band members Eric Bloom and Buck Dharma.

Oedipodea

It related to the story of Oedipus and the Sphinx, Oedipus was the king of Thebes in Greek mythology, while the Sphinx was a treacherous and cruel female evil creature in Greek mythology.

One of the two fragments of Oedipodeia in the epic cluster mentions the sphinx. From the existing fragments, it cannot be sure whether the sphinx set riddle. However, since Oedipus is the protagonist of this epic, there should be a description of his bravery and martial arts in the poem. Ancient Greek epic poems always describe stories of heroes. The protagonist of the epic does not necessarily need extraordinary intelligence but is usually depicted as a warrior. In Oedipus, no matter there was a puzzle plot to highlight Oedipus’ wisdom, the Sphinx is a monster defeated by force.

The fragment also shows that after Epicaste died, Oedipus remarried. Nevertheless, the four children were born by Epicaste rather than the result of incest.

Thebaid

As a chronicle, it records the quarrel between the two brothers Eteocles and Polynices, sons of Oedipus, which led to the war of the Seven against Thebes.

When Oedipus gave up the throne in Thebes, his sons Eteocles and Polynices reached an agreement on the inheritance of his father; Polynices took possession of the material property while Eteocles claimed the title of the royal family. Later, the exiled Polynices and Tydeus arrived at Argos at the same time and a fight breaks out. Adrastus, king of Argos, predicted that his daughter would marry a lion and a wild boar, which represents Polynices and Tydeus. To help Polynices regain the throne, Adrastus sent troops to assist him. However, Polynices and six other commanders failed in their expedition to Thebes. At the end of the poem, both Eteocles and Polynices were killed.

Epigoni

The ''Epigoni'' was closely related to the ''Thebaid'' because it focused on the second expedition to Thebes by the sons of the Seven after 10 years. In other words, it centered on the family of Oedipus, especially the generation of grandsons. The sons of the seven warriors were unsuccessful in surrounding Thebes. Instead, Epigones captured the city and destroyed it.

There was an extremely limited fragment in the poem. In fact, only the first line is known: "But now, Muses, let us begin on the younger men."

Alcmeonis

Only seven records of ''Alcmeonis'' are found in ancient literature. It tells the story of Alcmaeon killing his mother, Eriphyle, because she arranged for the death of his father Amphiaraus, whose murder is told in ''Thebaid''.

There is a lot of debate about whether to include the ''Alcmeonis'' in the epic cycle. However, Alcmaeon is an outstanding figure within the Theban saga. He is the son of Amphiaraus. His father was one of the seven people who failed the attack on Thebes (related to the ''Thebaid''), and he himself was one of Epigonoi (the son of seven people) who destroyed Thebes in the subsequent campaign. The legend of Alcmaeon corresponds to the theme of the Ancient Greek epic.

Set in Gaillon, Normandy, the movie tells the story of "good son" Franck (Jalil Lespert), who returns to his hometown to do a trainee managerial internship in the Human Resources department of the factory where his anxious, taciturn father has worked on the shopfloor for 30 years. At first Franck is lauded by both friends and family for breaking through the glass ceiling and becoming "white-collar". But very soon hidden envy and rivalries erupt. Franck forms a friendship with Alain, a young worker whom his father has mentored. This mentoring in the blue-collar workforce is contrasted with the cagier, trust-less mentoring Franck receives in the white-collar world from his own supervisor, Chambon.

Franck discovers that his boss is going to use Franck's field study on the proposed 35-hour workweek to justify downsizing - and that Franck's father is among those to be let go. This leads to a confrontation between the trainee and management, between the workers and the owners, and ultimately between son and father. In the emotional climax, Franck confronts his father and accuses him of imbuing him with a legacy of shame at being blue-collar.

The film tells the story of Vincent, a middle-aged man who is fired after having spent more than 11 years working for a prestigious consulting firm. Unable to admit to his family that he has been fired, the unemployed former executive continues to pretend he is going to the office every day. In reality, Vincent spends his time aimlessly driving the highways of France and Switzerland, reading newspapers, or sleeping in his car.

As time progresses, Vincent invents more and more elaborate lies, throwing himself into a vicious spiral of deceit. To sustain his bourgeois lifestyle, Vincent sets up a Ponzi scheme and is eventually enlisted into smuggling by career thief Jean-Michel. Murielle, Vincent's wife, after discovering her husband's "life of lies" attempts to bring him back into the realm of reality.

Setting

''Soul Reaver 2'' is set in Nosgoth, a fictional land with fantasy aspects. In the first game in the series, ''Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain'', the vampire Kain embarks on a journey to restore the Pillars of Nosgoth—nine supernatural edifices which are inextricably tied to the health of the land, but become corrupted. During his adventure, Moebius, a manipulative sorcerer, tricks Kain into orchestrating the destruction of the vampire race: Kain is left the last surviving vampire in Nosgoth. After restoring eight of the Pillars, Kain discovers that he would need to sacrifice his own life to restore the final corrupt one. Realizing that his death would ensure the annihilation of his species, he refuses to kill himself. This triggers the Pillars' collapse, and dooms the world to eternal decay, but enables Kain to live on and revive the vampire race.

By the time of ''Soul Reaver'', 1500 years later, Kain is a despotic emperor, his vampires dominate the land, and Nosgoth hinges on the brink of collapse. The Elder God, a demiurge-like entity, lurks beneath Nosgoth and controls the cycle of reincarnation; the vampires, whose biological immortality opposes his doctrine, are his enemies. In ''Soul Reaver'', Raziel—Kain's lieutenant—is executed by Kain, but The Elder God resurrects him and encourages him to exact revenge. Traversing the wasteland and murdering the vampires, Raziel confronts Kain, who attacks him with the Soul Reaver sword, imbued with a spirit which absorbs its victims' souls. The Soul Reaver shatters when it strikes Raziel, and the blade's spirit binds itself to his arm. His motives still mysterious, Kain lures Raziel through a time portal into Nosgoth's past.

In ''Soul Reaver 2'', it is established that, in Nosgoth, fatalism is an actuality—history is immutable, and all individuals are subject to predestination. Raziel, due to his paradoxical destiny, is the only exception to this rule—his presence enables temporal paradoxes to be triggered, altering history for better or worse. Kain relies on Raziel's free will in a bid to outsmart Moebius and resolve the dilemma he faced in ''Blood Omen'', ultimately hoping to enable both the restored Pillars and the vampire race to co-exist in the future. ''Soul Reaver 2'' opens as Raziel emerges from the time slip and is greeted by Moebius, having arrived in an era 30 years prior to the events of ''Blood Omen''. Two further time periods, 100 years after and 500 years before ''Blood Omen'' respectively, are also explored as the story progresses.

Characters

Raziel returns as the protagonist of ''Soul Reaver 2''. In ''Soul Reaver'', Raziel discovered that he was once a human and a leading member of the vampire-hunting Sarafan brotherhood, and his epiphanies drive the conflict in the story. Kain, the antagonist of ''Soul Reaver'', appears as a non-player character in cutscenes, urging Raziel to unearth his destiny. Moebius the Time Streamer, a sorcerer who was a villain in ''Blood Omen'' and had a cameo at the end of ''Soul Reaver'', is a primary antagonist of ''Soul Reaver 2'' who attempts to manipulate Raziel into destroying Kain - it is revealed that he is an agent of The Elder God, Raziel's ally and guide in ''Soul Reaver'', who is slowly established as a more sinister entity. Ariel, a specter bound to the Pillars who featured in ''Blood Omen'' and ''Soul Reaver'', returns, and the vampire Vorador, also from ''Blood Omen'', assists Raziel early in the game. The ancient vampire Janos Audron, a new character who was previously only mentioned in ''Blood Omen'', acts as Raziel's mentor towards the end of the story.

Story

The plot continues by summarizing the first game's ending: Raziel confronts Kain in Nosgoth's wasteland and pursues him through a portal leading to the past. Moebius, the leader of a vampire-hunting crusade in this age, coerces Raziel to re-embrace his former heritage as a Sarafan vampire hunter by killing Kain. Though Raziel is initially eager to do so, his enthusiasm wanes over time as he witnesses the ruthlessness of Moebius's soldiers. Kain, who is destined to die at Raziel's hands in this era, implores Raziel to thwart fate and instead facilitate his quest to restore the Pillars.'''Kain:''' If you truly believe in free will, Raziel, now is the time to prove it. Kill me now, and we both become pawns of history, dragged down the path of an artificial destiny. I was ordained to assume the role of Balance Guardian in Nosgoth, while you were destined to be its savior. But the map of my fate was redrawn by Moebius, and so in turn was yours... After he learns that Moebius serves The Elder God, and that he has thus been duped, Raziel faces a decision: indulge his lust for vengeance and submit to fate by killing Kain, or defy his cohorts and exercise his free will by exerting mercy.

While exploring this period, Raziel discovers evidence that two ancient races waged war in Nosgoth's distant past. One race created the Pillars to banish their adversaries, but the enemy race - the Hylden - retaliated with a curse which transformed the Pillars' architects into the first vampires. Kain explains that, had he sacrificed himself, the vampire race—the rightful inheritors of the Pillars—would have become extinct. Raziel chooses to spare Kain, causing a paradox; history reshuffles itself to accommodate the extension of Kain's life. He, however, refuses to indulge Kain's plans any further, instead opting to explore his own past. Vorador tells Raziel that the last of the ancient vampires, Janos Audron, held the key to Raziel's destiny, but Janos was murdered by the Sarafan five centuries ago.

Deciding to speak with Janos, Raziel orders Moebius to send him further back in time. Moebius deceives Raziel, instead conveying him over a century into the future, where he and The Elder God highlight the consequences of the Pillars' destruction to turn Raziel against Kain. Raziel navigates the future era and finds his own way back to the age of the Sarafan and Janos Audron;'''Raziel:''' At last, I had the means to open that ruined time-streaming chamber I discovered so long ago in the swamp. Now perhaps I could leave this wasteland, and return to an era when Janos Audron still lived. I had no choice but to act purely on blind faith. There was no way to tell what era this device was tuned to, and I had neither the knowledge nor the means to set the machine myself. I hesitated only briefly... then, throwing the switch, I hurled myself into oblivion, and relinquished my will to the hand of Fate. Beyond all hope, and against all probability, it seemed that the device had unerringly delivered me to the era I sought…The coincidence seemed too convenient to naively ascribe to Fate – but whether my opportune arrival had been orchestrated by Moebius, or some other influence, I didn’t know. If Janos Audron still lived, I would find him – but I was wary of further deception, and resolved to tread carefully. there, Janos presents Raziel with the Reaver, a younger version of the physical Soul Reaver blade which will later house a soul-devouring spirit. Suddenly, a group of Sarafan led by Raziel's former, human self launch an ambush, and Janos sacrifices himself. Raziel swears vengeance as Janos dies, and pursues the attackers. He uses the Reaver to kill them and his former self, and renounces his Sarafan past.

The wraith-blade attached to Raziel's arm, over-aroused after the deaths of the Sarafan, suddenly seizes control of the physical Reaver, and impales Raziel; Raziel, horrified, then realizes his destiny. He himself has always been the ravenous spirit inside the Reaver, and therefore is fated to be stuck in a time loop; the sword shattered against him in ''Soul Reaver'' because it was unable to consume itself. While his soul is being drawn into the sword, Kain emerges and tears the Reaver from Raziel's body, saving him in reciprocation and forcing history to reshuffle again. However, this paradox strains Nosgoth's history too far, enabling the Hylden to return and jeopardize his ambition to restore the Pillars. Amidst Kain's dismay and warning to not revive Janos Audron, Raziel slips back into the spirit realm and realizes that the wraith-blade is still bound to him, and despairingly laments that his destiny has not been changed, but merely postponed.

The show was focused on a group of warriors assembled by Raiden (spelled Rayden in the series) to defend Earthrealm from invaders who entered through portals from various other dimensions. The assembled warriors included Liu Kang, Kurtis Stryker, Sonya Blade, Jax, Kitana, and Sub-Zero, with Nightwolf functioning mostly as tech support but still entering the fray on various occasions. The warriors operated out of a hidden base from where Nightwolf and Rayden monitored portal openings; the warriors would fly dragon-shaped jets to deal with disturbances. Shao Kahn was something of an archvillain throughout the series despite appearing in only four of the series' thirteen episodes, being responsible for allowing other realms to invade Earthrealm.

The characters and their backgrounds were mostly continuous with the movie and Threshold's representation of the series canon, though many original characters exclusive to the program were introduced and some elements of ''Mortal Kombat 3'' were included. The episode plots themselves shared little relation with that of any of the games, though the character designs are based on their ''MK3'' and ''Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3'' sprites (except for Kitana, whose design looks like a blend of her ''MKII'' and her ''UMK3'' looks). Kung Lao, Johnny Cage, Mileena, Sindel, Goro and Kintaro were not shown or referenced in the show at all, while characters based on Reptile, Baraka, and Jade were featured.

The finale involved Kitana leading a rebellion from Outworld against Kahn. The most notable aspect of the show was that it provided the debut of Quan Chi, who would go on to become a major antagonist in the game series.

An American couple, Dr. Shane Brown and his wife June, go to Paris, ostensibly for their honeymoon. In reality, Shane has come to Paris to hunt down neuroscientist Dr. Léo Sémeneau and his wife, Coré, whom Shane once knew and was obsessed with. Despite having had a prolific career, Léo is now working as a general practitioner to keep a low profile. He locks Coré in their house every day, but she occasionally escapes and initiates sex with men before violently murdering them. To protect her, Léo buries the bodies.

Shane begins investigating Sémeneau's whereabouts. A doctor who once worked with Léo eventually gives Shane the couple's address, explaining that Coré is unwell. Meanwhile, two young men who have been casing the Sémeneau home break in, and one of them finds Coré in a boarded-up room. After she seduces him, they begin to have sex, but she violently bites him to death, ripping out his tongue with her teeth. When Shane arrives at the house, he discovers Coré covered in blood. She tries to bite him, but Shane is able to overpower her. As he strangles her, she drops a match, setting the house on fire. Shane leaves her to be consumed by the flames. Just after Shane departs, Léo arrives and witnesses the carnage and the dead Coré.

After Coré's death, Shane becomes strange and distant. While having sex with his wife, he stops and finishes by masturbating, then runs away from her and adopts a puppy. Finally, he goes to a hotel where he brutally rapes a maid and bites her to death, then showers and washes the blood from his body. His wife enters and the couple agree to return home.

Jack Frost is the lead singer in a rock band simply titled "The Jack Frost Band", based in the fictional town of Medford, Colorado, who make their living performing blues covers and an assortment of their own songs in the hope of signing a record deal. He returns to his 11-year-old son Charlie, who has just returned from a snowball fight against local bully Rory Buck. After they build a snowman in their front yard, Jack gives him his best harmonica, which he got the day Charlie was born, jokingly telling him that it's magical, and he will be able to hear it wherever he is. Jack promises his wife Gabby that he will attend his son's hockey game, but misses it in favor of recording a new hit song "Don't Lose Your Faith". To make up for it, Jack then promises to take his family on a Christmas trip to the mountains, but is then called in on a gig that could make or break his career. On his way to the gig, Jack realizes his mistake and borrows his best friend (and the band's keyboardist) Mac MacArthur's car to go to the mountains to meet his family. Unfortunately, Jack encounters a bad snowstorm that he is unable to navigate through due to the faulty windshield wipers and poor weather conditions. As a result, he swerves off the road, crashes the car, and is killed instantly (off-screen).

A year later, Charlie has fallen into depression over his father's death, to the point of withdrawing from all contact with his friends. One night, he makes another snowman that bears as much of a resemblance to Jack as he can remember and plays Jack's harmonica just before going to sleep. The harmonica turns out to be magical after all, as it revives Jack, transferring his spirit into the snowman. Jack attempts to greet Charlie, but instead ends up terrifying him by mistake. The next day, Charlie discovers Jack in his yard and attempts to run away from him, leaving Jack feeling humiliated once more, but still determined to go after his son. When Charlie winds up in the snowball battlefield, Jack pelts Rory and the other children with snowballs and escapes with Charlie on a sled. After losing them, Charlie realizes that the snowman is his father after Jack uses his nickname "Charlie boy". Jack reconnects with Charlie and teaches him the values that he never got to teach him. After some hockey lessons, Jack convinces Charlie to rejoin the team instead of continuing to grieve over his death, becoming their best player. In the meantime, Mac continues to be a friend of the family, while also becoming a father figure to Charlie at Gabby's suggestion.

As winter approaches its end, Jack begins melting and struggles to get to Charlie's hockey game, but is successful in doing so. Afterwards, Charlie decides to take Jack to the mountains where it is colder, but has a difficult time convincing Gabby to do so. Charlie comes across Rory, who also insults the snowman by asking which is more stupid. After Jack speaks in front of Rory by correcting his last sentence, Rory then sympathizes with Charlie not having a father and helps him sneak Jack onto a truck en route to the mountains. Jack and Charlie arrive at the isolated cabin that the family was going to stay at for Christmas before Jack's death. Jack calls Gabby, nonchalantly asking her to come to the cabin to pick up Charlie; Gabby is shocked, but recognizes his voice and obliges. Jack tells a disheartened Charlie that he has to leave. When Gabby arrives, the snowman shell dissipates, revealing Jack in an ethereal form. Jack tells Charlie he will be with him wherever he goes and, after saying farewell and giving his love to both his wife and son, returns to the afterlife.

In the closing moments of the film, Charlie plays hockey with his group of friends (which now includes Rory), while Gabby happily watches and Mac plays music on the piano. The final street scene shows that all the front lawns have snowmen on them.

David Locke (Jack Nicholson) is a television journalist making a documentary film about post-colonial Africa. In order to finish the film, he is in the Sahara in northern Chad seeking to meet with and interview rebel fighters who are involved in the Chadian Civil War. Struggling to find rebels to interview, he is further frustrated when his Land Rover gets stuck on a sand dune. After a long walk through the desert back to his hotel, a thoroughly dispirited Locke discovers that an Englishman (Robertson), who has also been staying in the same hotel, and with whom he had struck up a casual friendship, has died overnight in his room from a heart condition.

Locke decides to switch identities with Robertson. Posing as Robertson, Locke reports his own death at the front desk, where the hotel manager mistakes Locke for Robertson, and the plan goes off without a hitch.

In London, Locke's wife Rachel (Jenny Runacre) has been having an affair with a man named Stephen (Steven Berkhoff). Rachel feels guilt-ridden and torn when she is informed of her husband's death, which we see reported in a newspaper obituary. She approaches Locke's friend, Martin (Ian Hendry), a television producer, in an attempt to get in touch with Robertson to try and learn more about her husband's last days. Meanwhile, Locke, posing as Robertson, has flown to Munich with the dead man's belongings, including his appointment book, which directs him to a locker in the airport. It contains a document wallet with a price-list and several photocopied pages illustrating armaments. After leaving the airport, and apparently acting on a whim, Locke follows a white horse and carriage to a wedding in a baroque chapel, where he waits at the back of the congregation. Once the wedding has finished and the guests have gone, two men who were observing Locke at the airport enter and ask why he did not contact them at the airport. They ask for "the documents." After Locke hands them the papers from the locker, they give him an envelope of money and tell him that the second half is to be paid in Barcelona. It becomes apparent that Robertson was gun-running for the same rebels whom Locke had been trying to contact in the Sahara.

Prompted by Robertson's diary entries, Locke flies to Barcelona. There he spots his colleague and friend the TV producer Martin, who tries to track Robertson down on behalf of Rachel. Locke encounters an architecture student (Maria Schneider), credited only as The Girl, while trying to hide in a Gaudi building, La Pedrera. He asks her to fetch his belongings from the hotel so that he won't be seen there by Martin, who is casing the lobby. Martin overhears that she is collecting the baggage, and he confronts her outside, requesting that she take him to meet Robertson. She suggests that he follow her in a taxi, but by luck she manages to lose him. She and Locke leave Barcelona and become lovers on the run.

Flush with cash from the down payment on the arms he cannot deliver, Locke is nevertheless drawn to keep a meeting scheduled in Robertson's diary. His appointed contact, however, does not show up. Meanwhile, the men arranging the arms deal are abducted, interrogated and beaten by hitmen operating for the Chadian government.

Rachel receives Locke's belongings, returned from Africa. Having heard from Martin of his unsuccessful chase of the elusive Robertson, Rachel is shocked as she opens Locke's passport to Robertson's photo pasted inside. She heads to Spain to find Locke. The hitmen trail her. Rachel co-opts the Spanish police in her pursuit, but Locke and The Girl continue to flee. Locke eventually sends her away, instructing her to meet him later in Tangiers. She departs by bus for Almería.

Reaching the Hotel de la Gloria in the Spanish town of Osuna, Locke finds out that The Girl has returned and booked a double room, posing as Mrs. Robertson. He again tries to persuade her to leave. She exits the hotel and dawdles around the dusty square outside. The Chadian agents arrive at the hotel, enter, and depart just before the police arrive with Rachel Locke. The Girl joins them, and the group enter Locke's room, where they discover that he is dead. When asked by the police whether they recognized him, Rachel says that she never knew him, and the Girl says, "Yes."

The crew of Deep Space Nine rescue the Bajoran Tahna Los (Jeffrey Nordling) from a vessel that is being attacked by the Cardassians. They state that Tahna is a known member of a terrorist organization and demand his return, but Tahna asks for political asylum, pleading to his former friend Major Kira Nerys (Nana Visitor) for help. Commander Benjamin Sisko (Avery Brooks) grants his request. Later, Odo (René Auberjonois) spots Tahna with the Duras sisters (Barbara March and Gwynyth Walsh) making covert discussions. Tahna also seeks to gain the use of a runabout from Kira.

Dr. Julian Bashir (Alexander Siddig), thanks to his new-found friend Elim Garak (Andrew Robinson), overhears the Duras sisters planning to rendezvous with the Bajoran to give him a vial of bilitrium, a crystalline compound that can release a tremendous amount of power, but only if connected to an antimatter converter. Garak reveals why the Cardassians were chasing Tahna: he stole one from them, meaning he will have the component materials required to build a bomb.

With no solid evidence to act currently, the crew allow him to take a runabout and intend to arrest him after the transaction. Kira finds herself confused about her own past with the Bajoran resistance and where her current loyalties stand, and offers to go with Tahna in the runabout. Commander Sisko and Chief Miles O'Brien (Colm Meaney) wait in a second runabout nearby while Tahna and Kira complete the transaction. When the second runabout appears, Tahna realizes he has been set up; matters are further complicated by the arrival of the Cardassian warship.

Tahna orders Kira at gunpoint to return to the station, intending to collapse the wormhole with an explosive device, because then Bajor will have no motivation to invite Federation presence on Bajoran territory, which he sees as a new occupation. Kira lurches the runabout to one side, causing Tahna to fall over and allowing her to pilot the ship through the wormhole to the Gamma Quadrant; where she ejects the bomb causing it to explode harmlessly in space. However, Tahna has regained control of his weapon and orders Kira to return to the Alpha Quadrant. There, Sisko gives Tahna an ultimatum, either to give himself over to the station's authorities, or to wait to be destroyed by the Cardassians. Tahna hands over his weapon to Kira, and turns himself in; Kira explains that he may come to understand why this was the right thing to do someday.

The play is about Eugene and his older brother, Stanley, dealing with their parents' relationship falling apart as the brothers work together toward being comedy writers for the radio, and, eventually, television. They discover that their father, Jack, has been cheating on their mother, Kate. It is obvious to the family before Jack even admits it, and they try to find ways for Kate to cope with the loss when Jack may eventually leave. Jack reveals that the woman he has been seeing is dying.

When Eugene and Stanley find a job where they can write short comedic skits for the radio, they obscurely make fun of their own family. Jack can hear the similarities between the fictional family in the broadcast and their own family, and becomes outraged. He gets into a major argument with Stanley, which turns into an argument about Jack's affair. Later, Kate holds a nostalgic conversation with Eugene, revealing how she had tried to win his father's heart when she was younger.

Eventually, Jack leaves. Stanley and Eugene move out when they get the great offers for which they'd hoped. Kate remains in the house with her father, Ben (an elderly Jewish man with socialist leanings who provides the play with most of its warmth and humor), until Ben goes to follow his wife to Miami.

Set in an era "one hundred years from now", ''Ocean'' is a science fiction story that tells the tale of Nathan Kane, a United Nations special weapons inspector, and his mission to Cold Harbor, a UN research station in orbit around Europa.

The Harbor's scientists have discovered a set of nonhuman artifacts in the ocean deep below the ice that covers the moon, and further research reveals that the artifacts are the powerful weapons, wormhole-based transport system, and cryogenic resting place of a conquering warlike race of prehuman beings.

This culture's home world was located between Mars and Jupiter, and in their ongoing civil war against each other, they wrought great damage on Mars, which used to be a far more temperate, colonized Earthlike planet before its atmosphere was destroyed in the same conflict that also utterly destroyed their home planet, its remains eventually becoming the asteroid belt. This last act was apparently a threshold event of some kind that caused the culture to lay down their arms, possibly out of shame or out of fear of some kind of reprisal. As a result, they put themselves and their technology in suspended animation deep within Europa's ocean. One of the Cold Harbor scientists suggests that this was motivated chiefly by their inability to live with themselves. However, before doing so, the culture seeded Earth with the genetic material that allowed human life to grow.

However, thanks to the unscrupulous acts of the insane manager of a weapons testing facility also in orbit around Europa, owned by an interplanetary corporation named Doors, the race starts to wake up, putting the Earth itself at risk from the resurgence of the extremely powerful and violent precursor race, and Nathan and the Harbor scientists are practically the only ones that can stop them.

The story is set in the year 2704, when the Alliance of Space-Faring Alien Races (ASFAR), of which Earth is a member, suddenly turns against Earth and their fleet ravages the planet, starting a war. The player flies a powerful starfighter, the TV-202, in a series of missions to defeat the enemy. In Episode 3, the player learns that a huge supercomputer known as Xenocidic Initiative (X.I.), located on Proxima Seven, is responsible for the war. Their final mission is to eliminate it. A hidden mission can take place after the main plot only in the CD ROM version where the player must investigate a sudden metamorphosis of an unknown nearby planet and destroy the force that changed the face of the planet. It is revealed here that this force drove a man named Sy Wickens into insanity, and how the X.I. Supercomputer had "accidentally" digitized Sy Wickens' persona.

Three years after the death of his father, 16-year-old Jonathan Kelly (Robert Kersey) is still depressed and withdrawn. When he moves with his mother to the small New Hampshire town of Dunkirk, he is immediately drawn to David (David Snyder), a boy who shares his interest in the occult.

But when the boys try to satisfy their curiosity about a local ghost story, they discover that somebody is digging up graves in the oldest part of the cemetery, collecting human remains for a dark ritual.

The plot then revolves around the two boys' exploration of the town's surprisingly dark history while the ritual (and planned human sacrifice) approaches.

Princess Leigh-Cheri Furstenberg-Barcalona lives with her exiled royal parents King Max and Queen Tilli and their last loyal servant Gulietta in a converted farmhouse in Seattle. While a modern American high school student in most respects, Leigh-Cheri has an existentialist view of the cultural symbolism of her title of "princess" and wishes to use it for the good of mankind. To this end, she involves herself in many liberal and ecopolitical causes, including a liberal symposium called CareFest in Hawaii, where many progressive minds gather to present their ideas for improving the world. However, there is so much unnecessary infighting that Leigh-Cheri quickly becomes disenchanted. Leigh-Cheri is further demoralized by a beautiful blonde woman claiming to be an alien from the planet Argon, who denounces Leigh-Cheri for her red hair, stating red hair is a sign that Leigh-Cheri is descended from mutant, renegade Argonians.

In the middle of all this, Leigh-Cheri encounters outlaw bomber and fellow redhead Bernard Mickey Wrangle, known as the Woodpecker, who plans to blow up the CareFest. Leigh-Cheri places Bernard under citizens arrest, only to be drawn in by his outlaw philosophy, which teaches freedom is more important than happiness. Bernard is likewise charmed by Leigh-Cheri's romantic idealism, and the two fall in love. While drunk on tequila, Bernard accidentally blows up a UFO conference taking place opposite the CareFest, after which all the attendees witness a flying saucer escaping, leading Leigh-Cheri to believe the Argonian woman was really an alien.

Leigh-Cheri takes Bernard to meet her parents, but after Bernard accidentally kills Queen Tilli's pet lapdog, he slips out in disgrace. His visit to Seattle leads his recapture and return to prison. In solidarity, Leigh-Cheri transforms her attic bedroom into a copy of Bernard's prison cell, leaving her alone with only a bed, a lamp, and a package of Camel cigarettes. While contemplating the cigarette pack, Leigh-Cheri is drawn to the image of pyramids in the design and determines it is a secret message from the red-haired Argonians advocating self-determination, expressed by the word "CHOICE". Leigh-Cheri's self-imposed exile draws media coverage and causes a movement of people locking themselves away for various causes. Bernard learns Leigh-Cheri is behind the wave of self-imposed imprisonments and sends her a scathing letter for sacrificing both her freedom and her happiness—the antithesis of Bernard's philosophy—and leading others to do the same. Shortly thereafter, Leigh-Cheri is devastated to learn Bernard has been killed in an apparent escape attempt.

Leigh-Cheri leaves her attic exile and agrees to marry the handsome, wealthy Saudi Arabian prince A'ben Fizel on the condition he will build her a pyramid as a wedding gift. A'ben Fizel suspects Leigh-Cheri still loves Bernard and sets spies to follow her. While exploring the completed pyramid the night before the wedding, Leigh-Cheri discovers Bernard, alive, preparing to set up dynamite to destroy the pyramid. While the two reconcile, A'ben Fizel seals the pyramid, leaving the lovers to die.

Trapped for weeks, Bernard and Leigh-Cheri survive on wedding cake and champagne while they discuss pyramids, redheads, the Moon, the Argonian message on the box of Camel cigarettes, and the mystery of "how to make love stay." When their supplies run out, Leigh-Cheri decides to sacrifice herself to save Bernard by using the dynamite to make an opening while Bernard sleeps, determining sacrifice is the only way to make love stay. At the last moment, Bernard awakens and attempts to shield Leigh-Cheri from the blast, causing them both to be caught in the explosion.

The lovers wake in a hospital, alive but rendered deaf by the explosion. In the interim, Leigh-Cheri's father Max has died of a heart attack and Gulietta, revealed to be Max's illegitimate elder sister, has returned to her homeland to rule as queen. Leigh-Cheri and Bernard remain in love and live happily ever after.

Spider-Man and his allies must retrieve a mystical artifact first from the Kingpin, then Doctor Doom.

The return of an imaginary childhood friend, Dayo, helps a woman named Grace Connors through various crises, Grace struggles against her timidity to save her grandfather's restaurant. The arrival of her imaginary childhood friend spurs her on to success.

Just after the American Civil War, a former soldier, Hogan, rides up on a naked woman about to be raped by bandits. He kills the bandits and discovers the woman is a nun, Sister Sara, who is raising money to assist Mexican revolutionaries fighting French occupying forces. When Sara requests that Hogan take her to the Mexican camp he agrees, as he had previously arranged to help the revolutionaries attack the French garrison, in exchange for half the garrison's treasury.

As the duo heads towards the camp, evading French troops all the while, Hogan is surprised that the nun swears and drinks whiskey. While on their way to destroy a French ammunition train, Hogan is shot at by Indians and seriously wounded with an arrow. Sara is able to tend to his wounds, and she is able to set the charges that Hogan detonates to destroy the train. Eventually the two reach Juarista commander Col. Beltran's camp. Sara begs the local villagers for money needed to purchase dynamite for the assault on the garrison. In the lead up to the attack Sara reveals to Hogan that she is not a nun, but a prostitute posing as a nun because she is wanted by the French for her support of the revolutionaries. Although Hogan is shocked, the two team up to infiltrate the fort and let a squad of revolutionaries in through a trapdoor, while two other squads attack the gates and a fourth act as sharpshooters.

They expected the French army to be drunk for Bastille day but the destruction of the train has put the garrison on high alert. Hogan and Sara infiltrate the fortress by Hogan posing as a bounty hunter who has captured Sara and is turning her in for the reward. The ruse works, Hogan and Sara engage the French commanding officers while the garrison's gates are breached for the Mexican revolutionary forces to swarm through. A battle ensues; the French are defeated, and the Mexicans capture the fort. As promised, Hogan receives half the riches. Now wealthy and with his job completed, Hogan sets off with Sara, with whom he has fallen in love, to open a gambling house in San Francisco.

This is the tale of five Hairy Peruvians, the last of their kind, and an epic journey from the shores of old Peru to a new land at World's Edge, where the sun goes down. These are no ordinary adventurers, however, but "people of sensible size", which to us Tall Ones is very small indeed.

Several months after the destruction of Omega, Dr. Weil has assumed a dictatorial reign over Neo Arcadia, forcing many humans to flee. In response, Dr. Weil labels the escapees as Mavericks and begins to purge them as if they were Reploids.

A fleeing caravan led by a human journalist, Neige, is attacked by Dr. Weil's army. Zero, Ciel and a small band of Resistance fighters happen upon them and come to their aid. Neige explains they were en route to Area Zero, the crash site of the space colony Eurasia and one of the last natural habitats on Earth that can support human life. Shortly after parting ways, Zero learns of a plot called "Operation Ragnarok", meant to destroy all environments outside of Neo Arcadia in order to force humans to return and live under Dr. Weil's rule. Helping Dr. Weil on his quest are a group of violent Reploids called the Eight Einherjar Warriors. They are led by a military Reploid named Craft, who has a romantic history with Neige, thus creating conflicting thoughts within him.

After defeating four of the Einherjar Warriors, Area Zero comes under attack by Neo Arcadia. Zero defends it and is forced to battle Craft. Neige breaks up the fight, but she is kidnapped by Craft, who escapes. Zero chases him to a prison where Neige is held and eventually rescues her.

Later, Zero eliminates the remaining Einherjar Warriors, but Ciel intercepts a radio message from Dr. Weil. He announces he is going to use Ragnarok, an orbiting satellite weapon, to wipe out Area Zero. Before Dr. Weil can use it, Craft turns on him and fires Ragnarok at Neo Arcadia in an attempt to kill Dr. Weil, which leaves the city in ruins. Zero, deeming Craft to be too dangerous, defeats him, and Craft succumbs to his wounds.'''Craft:''' I've destroyed Ragnarok's remote control system. I am no longer your dog to yank around by the chain! '''Craft:''' Now I control Ragnarok! Your space cannon is no longer pointed at Area Zero... It's pointed at you and Neo Arcadia! '''Weil:''' Seduced by the sweet words of a woman! Unbelievable! You do realize how many humans and Reploids are living under my control! '''Craft:''' Are you saying I should play the loyal Reploid and follow you!? Not doing... Not thinking... Just waiting at your beck and call? And are you condoning the destruction of nature, struggling just to survive!? I... I will not let you take control! I've fought too long and too hard for humanity to let you! I will change the world! '''Ciel:''' What!? So you're going to attack Neo Arcadia instead!? There are still humans and Reploids there! Come in Resistance Base! Reploids are dispatched to help with the injured. (''Mega Man Zero 4'') Capcom Japan, 2005

Ragnarok moves on a crash course for Area Zero, and Zero makes his way there to find that Dr. Weil somehow survived the destruction of Neo Arcadia. Dr. Weil reveals that while he is human, he was made into a bionic-reploid hybrid by the people who exiled Omega and himself into space at the end of the Elf Wars. His new body is incapable of aging or dying, as it constantly repairs itself. Believing he can survive the impact of the crash and personally oversee the destruction of Area Zero, Dr. Weil fuses himself with the Ragnarok core and attacks Zero. After an intense battle and the destruction of Dr. Weil's body, Ragnarok breaks apart, but leaves Zero no means of escape.

Ciel runs through Area Zero where she learns that Zero did not teleport back.'''Rouge:''' Ragnarok... is... breaking apart... '''Rouge:''' Ragnarok has entered the atmosphere. Most of it will burn on entry... Impact with Area Zero has been averted. Mission... successful... '''Ciel:''' Zero! Come in Zero! Zero... please... Come in... '''Rouge:''' There's no response from the receiver... The connection has been lost... (''Mega Man Zero 4'') Capcom Japan, 2005 Heartbroken and distraught, Ciel runs off and ends up on top of a hill, where she breaks down in tears while pieces of Ragnarok burn through the atmosphere. Afterwards, she stands up and expresses her faith in Zero, hoping that he'll return someday while promising to carry on his mission of maintaining peace between humans and Reploids. The final scene shows Zero's shattered helmet somewhere in the desert.

The beginning of the game shows the player at a space research center known in-game as ''NAXA.'' Scientists have discovered a massive asteroid speeding toward the earth that, if made contact with, would end all life on earth.

The game then cuts to the protagonists, Lan Hikari and MegaMan.EXE (in this continuity a Network Navigator or NetNavi, an in-universe AI program), going shopping with their father. While in the electronics district, they find themselves pitted against a NetNavi known as ShadeMan, portrayed as having strong dark powers. Upon defeating ShadeMan, he disappears, dropping unknown data. It is revealed to Lan and MegaMan to be a ''DarkChip,'' a program described as unleashing great power at the cost of the Navi's soul (their goodness and well-being). The duo are warned to never use it under any circumstances.

The game cuts back to the scientists, who are now joined by some of the best scientists and researchers of various countries, including the duo's father. They come to the conclusion that the best way to avoid impact with the asteroid is to use a laser to move it off-course.

The game again changes to the perspective of the protagonists. The next in-game day, after the ShadeMan incident, Lan and MegaMan participate in the Den Battle Tournament, the local NetBattle tournament, and become the champions. After completing the tourney, they return home to find it burglarized by someone connected to the DarkChip. Upon investigation, they discover that the ''DarkChip Syndicate Nebula'' was behind the attack of their home, looking for the DarkChip the two possess. After defeating a Nebula member in battle, he warns the duo that the syndicate has their eye on them and the DarkChip.

With no leads to go on, the pair decide to go to the amusement park, only to find the animatronics going haywire. Lan and MegaMan find ShadeMan in one of the animatronic animals. In order to best ShadeMan, MegaMan has no other option but to use the DarkChip.

Now, without the DarkChip or ShadeMan, the duo decide to enter the Eagle/Hawk Tournament held by the amusement park. The team emerge victorious once again. After the tournament, they meet LaserMan, the leader Navi of Nebula, who shows MegaMan the DarkSoul lurking within him now that he has used a DarkChip.

Meanwhile, the scientists fire the laser at the asteroid, but it fails. One of the scientists, Dr. Regal, claims to have an idea and asks for a world-class Net Operator and Navi.

Naturally, Lan and MegaMan are invited to the Red Sun/Blue Moon Tournament, a competition explained as putting together the best of the best of NetBattlers. After winning the tourney, the duo are taken to NAXA and are briefed on the situation. It is explained that the asteroid has a computer in it and can be steered away from the planet. Before Lan has the chance to send MegaMan to the asteroid, Dr. Regal reveals himself as the leader of Nebula and had been planning all along to use the asteroid in his plan for world domination. Still, Lan is able to send MegaMan, where he once again meets LaserMan, as well as Duo, the Operating System of the asteroid. MegaMan defeats both of them and convinces Duo that the planet is worthy enough to not be destroyed. The asteroid leaves, and Regal appeared to have committed suicide in order to avoid legal prosecution, but was revealed to be alive in the sequel. Once again, Lan and MegaMan have saved the world from the latest crisis.

The plot of ''Mega Man Battle Chip Challenge'' involves the opening of a new netbattling tournament known as the "Battle Chip GP". Yai is sponsoring the event while the others enter it. Even Chaud enters the tournament, but only for official business. It turns out that there is some type of new organization behind the scenes of the tournament who will delete the winning Navi and take its data for themselves.

During a vacation in the United Kingdom, Harrison "Harry" Fox, Sr. (Jack Warden) and Harrison Fox, Jr. (John Rubinstein) inadvertently become the prime suspects in a murder case, and must go on the run in the British countryside with the whole of the police force on their trail.

Lou Peckinpaugh (Peter Falk), a bumbling San Francisco private detective, tries to prove himself innocent of his partner's murder while helping a bizarre array of characters recover a lost treasure.

In Little Italy in 1936, a young Aldo Trapani (voiced by Andrew Pifko) witnesses his father Johnny (Adam Harrington), a soldato in the Corleone family, being killed by the rival Barzini family. Don Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando/Doug Abrahams) comforts Aldo, telling him that when he is old enough and the time is right, he will have his revenge. Nine years later, in 1945, Aldo returns from World War II after serving in the U.S. Army. His mother Sarafina (Sirenetta Leoni) visits Vito during his daughter's wedding, telling him that Aldo has fallen in with a disreputable group of young thieves. Vito sends Luca Brasi (Garry Chalk) to find Aldo and recruit him into the family.

After teaching Aldo how to fight and earn protection money, Brasi sends him to meet Paulie Gatto (Tony Alcantar). Aldo helps Gatto and Corleone associate Marty "Monk" Malone (Jason Schombing) take revenge on two men who attacked the daughter of the local undertaker Bonasera, a friend of Vito's. He later goes with Brasi to meet Virgil Sollozzo (Richard Newman), a Tattaglia family-backed drug baron who seeks revenge against Vito for refusing to enter the cocaine trade. Vito has sent Brasi to pretend he is unhappy working for the Corleones and wishes to join the Tattaglia family in order to spy on them. However, Sollozo and Bruno Tattaglia (Joe Paulino) see through Brasi's deception and kill him. After killing Brasi's assassin, Aldo escapes to tell Monk what happened, just as an attempted hit on Vito happens nearby. After being taken to the hospital by Aldo and his son Fredo (Andrew Moxham), Vito appoints his eldest son, Sonny Corleone (James Caan), as acting Don.

At the Corleone compound, Aldo meets caporegimes Peter Clemenza (Doug Abrahams) and Salvatore Tessio (Abe Vigoda) and consigliere Tom Hagen (Robert Duvall). Impressed with Aldo's bravery, Tom promotes him to Enforcer, and Clemenza sends him to guard Vito in the hospital. Whilst there, Aldo meets Monk's sister Frankie (Jennifer Copping), with whom he soon starts a relationship, and Michael Corleone (Joseph May). A Tattaglia hit squad attempts to kill Vito, but Michael gets him to safety while Aldo defends Frankie and kills the assassins. Aldo and Michael are then threatened by corrupt police officers led by Captain Marc McCluskey (Doug Abrahams), who is on Sollozzo's payroll, but Tom arrives and claims that they are private detectives legally employed to guard Vito.

After being promoted to Associate, Aldo kills Gatto for selling Vito out to Sollozzo, and travels to Hollywood to help Corleone soldato Rocco Lampone (Michael Dobson) persuade ill-tempered studio executive Jack Woltz (Doug Abrahams) to give Vito's godson Johnny Fontane the starring role in a new film. Aldo and Rocco decapitate Woltz' prized stallion, and place the head in his bed as he sleeps, terrifying him into giving Fontane the role. After Aldo returns to New York, the Corleones purchase an apartment in Midtown for him and Frankie. Meanwhile, Michael plans to assassinate Sollozzo and McClusky, and arranges a meeting with them, feigning a desire to settle the dispute peacefully. Aldo plants a gun for Michael to use during the assassination, and then drives him to the docks so that he can leave for Sicily. After Vito is released from the hospital, he promotes Aldo to Soldato, making him a made man of the Corleone family.

After Frankie is killed by Tattaglia assassins on Bruno Tattaglia's orders, an enraged Aldo hunts Bruno down with Sonny's help, and eventually murders him. Later, Aldo witnesses Sonny speeding off in his car and follows him, arriving at a highway toll booth where he was ambushed and killed by a Tattaglia hit squad. Aldo kills the hitmen and interrogates their leader, who reveals that the hit was ordered by Don Emilio Barzini (Michael Kopsa). Devastated by Sonny's death and realizing Barzini is controlling most of the other families, Vito meets with the Five Families' heads to secure a peaceful resolution to their feud. In exchange for Michael's safe return to America, Vito promises to withdraw his opposition to their drug business and forgo avenging Sonny's murder.

Vito retires and eventually dies, while Michael becomes the new Don and promotes Aldo to Caporegime. Learning the FBI are investigating the Corleones and have an informant among them, Michael sends Aldo and Monk to a hotel where the informant is meeting with his FBI contact. Monk flees after killing the contact, while Aldo realizes that Monk himself is the informant and notifies Michael. Aldo is subsequently ordered to kill Monk, who, before dying, admits that he blamed the Corleones for Frankie's death and allied with the Cuneo family. Aldo also kills Tessio for setting Michael up to be killed by the Barzini family.

On the day of his nephew's baptism, Michael asks Aldo to assassinate the heads of the four families—Victor Stracci, Carmine Cuneo, Philip Tattaglia, and Emilio Barzini. While Michael attends the ceremony, Aldo carries out each hit with the help of Clemenza, Rocco, Willi Cicci (Gavin Hammon), and Al Neri (Terence McGovern), finally avenging his father's death at Barzini's hands. Michael then promotes Aldo to Underboss. If the player keeps playing at this point, and Aldo bombs all four rival family compounds, he becomes the Don of New York.

The movie is a rags to riches story. It begins in Harlem, New York, in 1958, and follows the girl group, Sister and the Sisters, which is made up of three sisters: Sister, Sparkle, and Delores. Stix, Sparkle's love interest and the group's manager, is able to help bring the group from "amateur nights to brief stardom before tragedy (dope, melancholia, the wrong man)" ensues and the group splits. Stix gives up on his music career and leaves the city and thus breaking Sparkle's heart. Sister is in an abusive relationship and is hung up on drugs while Delores leaves the city in pursuit of racial equality. In the end, after reconnecting after Sister's funeral, it is only Sparkle and Stix who climb the ladder to success.

The premise of the show was ESU, the emergency service unit of the NYPD and its handling of rescues, emergencies and SWAT team-required incidents in the city.

FBI Special Agent Anthony Hubbard (Denzel Washington) and his Lebanese American partner, Frank Haddad (Tony Shalhoub), intervene at the hijacking of a bus fully loaded with passengers, which contains an explosive device. The bomb turns out to be a paint bomb and the terrorists escape. The FBI receives demands to release Sheikh Ahmed bin Talal, a suspect in an earlier bombing. Hubbard eventually comes into conflict with Central Intelligence Agency operative Elise Kraft (Annette Bening), as he takes a terrorist suspect into custody and arrests Kraft. Later, another terrorist threat is made and a Metropolitan Transportation Authority bus is bombed. FBI captures a man named Samir Nazhde (Sami Bouajila), who admits to signing the visa application of one of the suicide bombers in the course of signing many applications for student visas in his job as a lecturer. However, Kraft insists that Samir is not a terrorist and that his continued freedom is vital to the investigation.

The terrorist incidents escalate with the bombing of a bus and a crowded theater and hostage-taking at an elementary school, and culminate in the destruction of One Federal Plaza, the location of the FBI's New York City field office, with over 600 casualties. In spite of objections, the President of the United States declares martial law and the United States Army's 101st Airborne Division, under General William Devereaux (Bruce Willis), occupies and seals off Brooklyn in an effort to find the remaining terrorist cells. Subsequently, all young men of Arab descent, including Haddad's son Frank Jr., are rounded up and detained in Downing Stadium. Haddad resigns in outrage. New Yorkers stage violent demonstrations against the Army and the profiling of the Arabs; the Army fights to maintain control. There are reports of Army killings.

Hubbard and Kraft, now revealed to be an intelligence operative named Sharon Bridger, continue their investigation and capture a suspect, Tariq Husseini. Devereaux's men torture and kill Husseini in the course of the interrogation. Afterward, Bridger tells Hubbard that Husseini revealed nothing of value because of the principle of compartmentalized information. Sickened, she finally admits that she herself provided training and support to militants opposed to Saddam Hussein's regime, working with Samir to recruit and train the followers of the Sheikh. After the U.S. cut their funding and left them exposed, she took pity on the few of them who had not yet been slaughtered by Hussein's forces, and arranged for them to escape to the United States, ultimately leading to the present situation as they turn their bomb making and covert skills on the country that now holds their leader. She and Hubbard compel Samir to arrange a meeting with the final terrorist cell. Hubbard convinces Haddad to return to the FBI.

A multi-ethnic peace march demonstrates against the occupation of Brooklyn. As the march is getting under way Hubbard and Haddad arrive at the meeting place, but Bridger and Samir have already left. Samir reveals to Bridger that he constitutes the final cell while in another sense he says, "there will never be a last cell." He straps a bomb to his body which he intends to detonate among the marchers. Hubbard and Haddad arrive in time to prevent him leaving but Samir shoots Bridger in the heart as she struggles to stop him. Hubbard kills Samir but despite their best efforts he and Haddad can only watch as Bridger succumbs to her wound after managing to recite certain lines of the second half of the Lord's Prayer and concluding with "Inshallah" – the Arabic phrase "God Willing".

Hubbard, Haddad, and their team raid Devereaux's headquarters to make an arrest for the torture and murder of Husseini. Deveraux insists that under the War Powers Resolution the authority vested in himself by the President supersedes that of the court which issued the arrest warrant. He then commands his soldiers to aim their assault rifles at the agents, resulting in a Mexican standoff. Hubbard reminds Devereaux that the civil liberties and human rights which he took from Husseini are what all his predecessors have fought and died for. Devereaux finally submits and is arrested. Martial law ends and the detainees, including Haddad's son, are given their freedom.

The film begins as a mini-documentary of New York City's 1973 Gay Pride parade and rally, with a young lesbian unabashedly declaring, "being gay is a very natural thing." The action cuts to the protagonist, David (Robert Joel), going through the ritual of being released from his vocation as a monk in a monastery. He then is seen as a public school teacher of English Literature in the New York City area, who spends his time off driving into the city to be with his "oldest friend from Schenectady," Alan (Jay Pierce) at a gay bar. One evening at the bar, David is singled out to dance by Mark (Curt Gareth), who portrays a businessman. They end up spending the night together, which at first seems like a one-night stand until David says he'd like to see Mark again, and Mark agrees. Not long after, the pair begin a monogamous relationship, and David moves in with Mark. But when Mark wants to have sex with other men, the relationship starts to break down. He rejects the idea of modeling a gay relationship on heterosexual marriage, and he is irritated that David wants to "keep pushing this romantic thing." Mark would rather have an understanding that either of them can have sex with other men when they feel like it, but this ends up alienating them from each other. Mark refuses to say, "I love you" until David playfully wrestles with him and tells him, "Say it...again...once more for good measure." After a year, though, David realizes that the two of them are just marking time. The two go to Fire Island for a weekend in an attempt to spice up their relationship, and although David tries to please Mark by entering an orgy, he can't go through with it. After a fight, David temporarily moves in with his friend Alan, who gives David an objective perspective on what happened. In a later encounter with Mark at Coney Island, David finally realizes that there can't be a reconciliation, as Mark is more interested in sex than a romantic relationship.

After a season of loneliness, David meets a divorced photographer named Jason (Bo White) at the 1973 Gay Pride rally which began the film. David and Jason go to Jason's apartment and talk. In Jason, a divorced dad, we meet another member of the gay community, one who was living a heterosexual life prior to coming out. He still socializes with his ex-wife, who goes with him on photo shoots. On a parental visit with their toddler son (P.J.) Jason tells his ex-wife that he is now seeing someone with whom he would be spending the upcoming Labor Day holiday. It appears that in Jason, David has found someone willing to pursue a romantic, committed relationship with him. Jason takes pictures of David while telling him things to say other than "cheese', and the film ends by showing the two men together splashing naked in the surf on Cape Cod.

A nomad scavenger treks through an irradiated wasteland and discovers a buried robot. He collects the pieces and takes them to junk dealer Alvy, who is talking with 'Hard Mo' Baxter, a former soldier, and Mo's friend Shades. When Alvy steps away, Mo buys the robot parts from the nomad and sells all but the head to Alvy. Intrigued by the technology, Alvy begins to research its background. Mo and Shades visit Jill, Mo's reclusive girlfriend, and, after an initially distant welcome where Jill checks them with a Geiger counter, Mo presents the robot head as a Christmas gift. Jill, a metal sculptor, eagerly accepts the head. After Shades leaves, they have loud, passionate sex, while being unknowingly watched by their foul-mouthed, perverted, voyeuristic neighbour Lincoln Weinberg via telescope.

Later, Mo and Jill argue about a government sterilization plan and the morality of having children. Jill works the robot head into a sculpture, and Mo says that he likes the work, but he does not understand what it represents. Frustrated, Jill says it represents nothing and resents Mo's suggestion that she make more commercial art to sell. They are interrupted by Alvy, who urges Mo to return to the shop, as he has important news about the robot, which he says is a M.A.R.K. 13. Before he leaves, Mo checks his Bible, where he finds the phrase "No flesh shall be spared" under Mark 13:20, and he becomes suspicious that the robot is part of a government plot for human genocide to address the planet's severe overpopulation crisis. Mo finds Alvy dead of a cytotoxin and evidence that the robot is an experimental combat model capable of self-repair; Alvy's notes also indicate a defect, a weakness to humidity. Worried, Mo contacts Shades and asks him to check on Jill, but Shades is in the middle of a drug trip and barely coherent.

Back at the apartment, the robot has reassembled itself using pieces of Jill's metal sculptures and recharged by draining her apartment's power network. It attempts to kill Jill, but she traps it in a room after the apartment's doors lock. Lincoln sees the robot close the blinds while trying to peep on Jill, and, after he briefly manages to open the apartment door, makes crude sexual advances towards her, and offers to override the emergency lock that traps them in her apartment. Lincoln dismisses her warnings of a killer robot, and, when he attempts to open Jill's blinds so that he can more easily peep on her, the M.A.R.K. 13 brutally kills him. Jill flees into her kitchen, where she reasons that her refrigerator will hide her from the robot's infrared vision. She damages the robot before Mo, Shades, and the apartment's security team arrive and open fire on it, apparently destroying it.

As Jill and Mo embrace, the M.A.R.K. 13 drags her out a window, and she crashes into her neighbour's apartment. Jill races back upstairs to help Mo, who is alone with the M.A.R.K. 13. Overconfident, Mo engages the robot in battle, and it injects him with the same toxin that killed Alvy. Mo experiences euphoria and a series of hallucinations as he dies. After Jill re-enters her apartment, the M.A.R.K. 13 sets her apartment doors to rapidly open and close; the security team die when they attempt to enter, and Shades is trapped outside. Jill hacks into the M.A.R.K. 13's CPU and unsuccessfully attempts to communicate with it; however, she discovers the robot's weakness and lures the M.A.R.K. 13 into the bathroom. Shades, who has managed to quickly jump through the doors, gives her time to turn on the shower. The M.A.R.K. 13 short circuits and is finally deactivated. The next morning, a radio broadcast announces that the M.A.R.K. 13 has been approved by the government, and it will be mass manufactured.

Raja, a mistreated Bengal tiger, escapes from a traveling circus, and it hides in the woods surrounding the small town of Scotia. The new arrival starts a panic, and the townsfolk want Raja killed with the exception of Julie Williams (played by Pamela Franklin), the sheriff's daughter. Julie wishes to capture Raja and put it in a zoo. To raise enough money to purchase Raja from the circus, she starts a campaign with the slogan "save the tiger" to rally children across the nation in the tiger's defense, resulting in national attention brought to the sleepy town. However, she, her father, and an Indian tiger trainer first need to find Raja before the National Guard, who are under orders to shoot the tiger on sight.

Like other entries in the series, ''Mega Man X5'' takes place in "21XX", an unspecified year in the 22nd century, where humans have adapted to life with intelligent android dubbed "Reploids". Months have passed since the events of Mega Man X4. The series' primary antagonist, a "Maverick" Reploid named Sigma has been revived once again. Sigma begins conducting research on the origin and design of the "Maverick Hunter" Zero and decides to discover how to unlock Zero's true power, hoping to destroy Sigma's nemesis X in addition. Sigma attacks the Maverick Hunters directly, intending to lose. When he does, he spreads a Maverick virus across the Earth, throwing it into chaos. Meanwhile, a Reploid mercenary named Dynamo is hired by Sigma to make the space colony Eurasia collide with Earth. The Hunters have only 16 hours to stop the collision. In order to prevent Eurasia from striking the planet, the Hunters pursue two options. The first option is to fire a powerful cannon called "Enigma" at Eurasia, vaporizing it. If the Enigma shot fails, the second option is to launch a space shuttle and pilot it into the colony, destroying it. To maximize their chances, X and Zero are dispatched to collect parts for the two devices with the aid of their new teammates Alia, Douglas, and Signas. The necessary parts to upgrade the Enigma and shuttle are held by eight Mavericks, and X and Zero must defeat them to claim the parts.

Whether the Enigma and shuttle succeed or fail is randomly determined by the game, although the Enigma's chances of working successfully are low even with all its parts, while the shuttle has a much higher probability of succeeding assuming all of the parts are collected. Whether the Enigma succeeds or fails, a new virus appears on the Earth, noted by Alia as the Sigma virus combining with the scraps from the colony. If the Enigma or the shuttle succeeds, X and Zero proceed to hunt for the cause of the virus. If the shuttle fails or if the time expires, the colony crashes, nearly destroying the planet; Zero then is infected by the virus. In either case, once the location of the virus' origin is discovered, the Hunters investigate. X and Zero penetrate a bizarre underground fortress. In the fortress, X and Zero cross paths, where mutual suspicion and mistrust leads to a duel between the heroes.

After the duel, the story diverges slightly. If Zero goes Maverick as a result of the virus, he sacrifices himself to save X from Sigma, and X continues on alone to defeat Sigma. If Zero does not go Maverick, he saves X and himself from Sigma, and both have a chance to confront Sigma. ''Mega Man X5'' has three possible endings. If Zero goes Maverick, X defeats Sigma, but is badly damaged. A mysterious figure recovers him, but also deletes all his memories of Zero. If Zero does not go Maverick, Sigma decides to make the Hunters' victory for naught by taking them down with him. X tries to save Zero but is ambushed by Sigma and both Hunters are critically damaged. Zero manages to finish Sigma off, then the endings diverge again depending on the player character. If Zero defeats Sigma, he reflects on his origin and life before dying. If X defeats Sigma, he inherits Zero's beam saber weapon and continues to fight as a Maverick Hunter.

Three weeks have passed since the events of ''Mega Man X5''. Zero is missing, presumed dead. As a result of the Eurasia space colony incident, Earth's surface has been rendered uninhabitable, forcing the human population to take refuge underground. An intelligent Reploid researcher, Gate, is searching through the ruins of Eurasia and finds something unusual. A week later, Gate goes mad as he completes an experiment, and declares his intentions to turn Earth into a utopia for high-class Reploids.

Meanwhile, X is awakened by Alia after a dream involving Zero, and she informs him of a large Maverick near Eurasia. He briefly encounters a being reminiscent to Zero, although the being appears distorted and discolored. X then meets a scientist named Isoc and his subordinate, High Max, who are in the search of the Zero-like being, which they identify as the "Zero Nightmare". Isoc invites all Reploids to join his cause to destroy the Nightmare phenomena, which is turning the Reploid population into Mavericks. However, this is revealed to be a ruse to lure Reploids to areas affected by the Nightmare, where they will become Mavericks under Gate's control.

X journeys to the suspected areas to investigate the Nightmare phenomena and rescue the Reploids who volunteered to help. He learns that Isoc's eight investigators have been infected by the Nightmare and become Mavericks. During his battles, X can also encounter the Zero Nightmare and defeat him. Following this, the real Zero appears, unaware of how he survived his battle against Sigma. Nonetheless, he reunites with X, and rejoins the Maverick Hunters to continue investigating the Nightmare.

Following the defeat of the eight investigators (or High Max), X and Zero meet Gate, who reveals he found a piece of Zero's DNA at the Eurasia crash site. The DNA drove Gate insane, and he created the Nightmare phenomena alongside the Zero Nightmare to help build his utopia.

The Hunters go to Gate's laboratory to put to a stop to his plans. Following Gate's defeat, he confesses he has rebuilt Sigma, and was using him as a trump card, but Sigma is a shell of his former self: a partially coherent, half-built body, with his programming still severely damaged. However, Sigma has enough strength to nearly kill Gate, and challenges X and Zero. With his sanity slipping, Sigma is once again defeated and one of three endings will occur, depending on which character defeats Sigma: If X defeats Sigma and previously defeated the Zero Nightmare, Zero is alongside X as he rescues Gate so that Alia, his former colleague, can try and revive him if she chooses to do so. The three make a pact to repair the devastated Earth, while Gate's ultimate fate is never revealed. If X defeats Sigma, but did not defeat the Zero Nightmare, Alia is instead with X at the end, who thanks him for rescuing Gate. X leaves Gate's fate up to Alia, which is left unknown. Zero is then shown to be alive, but refrains from revealing himself to X and Alia, despite the two being able to sense his presence. Zero says he'll be leaving the fighting to X for a while, as there's something he needs to do. *If Zero defeats Sigma, he is seen at a laboratory at an undetermined period in the future. Fearing that he still possesses the Sigma Virus and could become a Maverick, he requests to be placed in stasis. An unknown scientist agrees to help him, and seals Zero away for the next 102 years, presumably leading to the events of the ''Mega Man Zero'' series.

Following the Eurasia and Nightmare incidents, Reploids work diligently to rebuild the Earth. Growing weary of the seemingly never-ending Maverick Wars, X decides to retire in search of more peaceful solutions, leaving Zero in charge. In X's absence, Maverick activity rapidly begins to rise, which leads to the formation of an unsanctioned anti-Maverick vigilante group known as Red Alert. As the group grows more and more reckless, one of their members, a new generation Reploid prototype named Axl, decides to defect. Red, the group's leader, is angered by Axl deserting them and goes on a rampage to get him back.

Axl is chased through a city by a mechaniloid sent by Red Alert to retrieve him, and the ensuing chaos draws the attention of Zero. After a battle against the mechaniloid, Zero takes Axl into custody at Maverick Hunter HQ. In response, Red issues a challenge to the Hunters: he will release some Mavericks that Red Alert has in captivity, and whichever group can defeat the Mavericks first will gain possession of Axl. Zero goes into action without hesitation and Axl's remorse for what he has done fuels his desire to become a Maverick Hunter. As Zero and Axl battle Red Alert, Axl reveals that he possesses the ability to copy the DNA of other Reploids, making him invaluable to Red. X initially stays out of the conflict, feeling that it is pointless, but later joins in hoping to end the war quickly. Elsewhere, Red communicates with a mysterious figure known as "The Professor," who gives him additional power and shows him what Axl's copy ability can do. The Professor then takes possession of Red Alert, and orders Red to retrieve Axl.

Following the defeat of the Mavericks, the Hunters infiltrate Crimson Palace, the home base of Red Alert. There they defeat a reluctant Red and discover a rebuilt Sigma, who was behind Red Alert's corruption. Despite the Hunters defeating Sigma twice, he rises once again and punches Axl through a wall, before vowing to X and Zero that he will again return. Suddenly, Red reappears and Sigma attempts to possess him, but it turns out to be Axl (copying Red's DNA), who then proceeds to blast Sigma out of a window from the top of the palace.

The ending of the game depends on which character was used to defeat Sigma: * In X's ending, X adamantly refuses to train Axl to become a Maverick Hunter, thinking he is too young and immature. Signas tries to reason with X, warning him that they have not seen the last of the Mavericks. * Axl's ending shows him arguing with X regarding his future as a Hunter. Alia interrupts to inform them of a Maverick outbreak, to which Axl runs off to deal with, much to X's displeasure. * In Zero's ending, he has a nightmare in which X gains a strange desire to destroy all Mavericks, foreshadowing the rise of Copy X in ''Mega Man Zero''.

Background

In late 21XX,the Maverick wars are still going on, as if they can't end. In order to escape the war, humans planned to migrate to the moon and launched Jacob Project (プロジェクト・ヤコブ), in which the Jacob orbital elevator was in the Galapagos Islands. The conveyor belt connecting the earth and the moon is called "Jacob" (ヤコブ/雅各布), and it is spirally wound around this orbital elevator like DNA.

Origin

One night, while '''Mega Man X''' (codenamed "X") was on patrol, one of the transport compartment on the conveyor belt derailed and landed on Earth. As X approached the elevator, a team of "Sigma" emerges from the transport compartment. A purple-haired '''Reploid''' came out from the middle of the group and introduced himself as Lumine (ルミネ/露明尼), the head of Project Jacob. '''He''' explained that the purpose of replicating "Sigma" is to make these robots have powerful bodies, and the new generation of Reploid is immune to the '''Sigma virus''' and can replicate the robot's data to '''change its ability''' and '''appearance''' to assist in space development. X's doubts were temporarily dissipated.

Development

The plan seemed to be going well, until Vile（ヴァヴァ(VAVA)/霸法) V, kidnapped Lumine and helped Sigmar(シグマ(Shiguma)/西格瑪) spark mutant riots around the world.

The hunter team then went to various riot sites around the earth to investigate and destroy the leader and quell the riot. They encountered many provocations from Vile V and gradually knew that the riot was caused by Sigmar through robots infected with the Sigmar virus.The hunters learned that the riot leaders obeyed and convinced Sigma and laughed at the "new world" they wanted to build.

Later, the hunters wiped out the Maverick of the Jacob rail elevator and repelled the Vile at the top of the rail elevator. The hunters took the elevator to Gateway,that is the passage to the moon,where they defeated the Reploid enemy who copied the shape of the riot leader.After defeating all the leader's copies,the channel of Gateway was destroyed, and the hunters returned to the starting point to fight the "Sigma" who claimed to be using the orbital elevator to transfer their reploids to the moon and had been contacting the hunter base to challenge the hunters. He also announced his ultimate plan: to wipe out the "older generation of robots" and recolonize the moon with his "children." He revealed that all new generations of replicators have copies of chips containing his DNA.After the battle, he changed back to Guardroid and exploded, and the hunters found out that he was just a replica.

Climax

Finally, '''Sigma's Palace''' on Moon was found by hunters. The hunters reached the moon, came to Sigma Palace, cleared the Mavericks on the way, defeated Vile V, saw Sigma（unlike the previous series, he looks disheveled and barely held together） on the throne on the roof, and then fought him in a decisive battle. When Sigma is defeated (Normal Mode or Hard Mode, in Easy Mode Sigma is the final Boss), Lumine comes out of the shadows, congratulating the hunters for destroying Sigma. Then admitted he manipulated Sigma to get his DNA and was the mastermind behind the whole conspiracy. Lumine tells the hunters that in order to evolve, he and a new generation of Reploids will destroy humans and "outdated" robots.

Ending

After massive fights, Lumine was defeated, but he warned them that it was too late to stop what had already begun. When Axl (アクセル/艾克賽爾) approaches Lumine's body, a tentacle protrudes from Lumine's body, shattering the crystal on his helmet, knocking him unconscious.

The game's dialogue is slightly different, depending on which character defeats the Boss. While the hunters are returning from the orbital elevator to Earth, Zero(ゼロ/傑洛) wonders that Sigma has been destroyed, and X wonders if he no longer needs to fight as he ponders Lumine's words about evolution. Zero tells X not to let Lumine's words affect him, because the new generation of Reploids becoming Sigma can hardly be called evolution. Furthermore, he tells X that even if they are destined to be eliminated, when evolution happens, they still have to fight, not only with Mavericks, but with their own destiny. At the same time, a faint purple light emanated from Axel's shattered helmet crystal.

News of Lumine becoming a Maverick led to the ceasing of production of robots containing DNA-copy chips. However, the demand for their performance, due to advanced space development, was resumed a few years later.

''Mega Man Battle Network'' is set in an ambiguous year in the 21st century ("20XX AD") in an alternate reality to the original ''Mega Man'' series. Within the world of ''Battle Network'', the Net has become humanity's primary means of communication, commerce, and even crime. Users are able to "jack in" to the Net and other computerized devices, and explore their various aspects using program avatars called "NetNavis (Network Navigators)" as if they were physical locations. The Net and the inner workings of computers are displayed as a virtual world with which computer programs of all varieties, as personified in a humanoid form, can interact. Users often do so by accessing their NetNavis via a "PET (PErsonal information Terminal)" device. The plot of ''Mega Man Battle Network'' follows one such pair, Lan Hikari and his NetNavi MegaMan.EXE. Lan is a fifth grader in the town of ACDC. His father, Dr. Yuichiro Hikari, is one of the world's top scientists and NetNavi researchers. Not long into the story, Lan and MegaMan.EXE take it upon themselves to solve various criminal cases around ACDC involving other Navis and their operators. Some of the confrontations with the various criminals involve desperate, life-threatening situations including a bus rigged to explode, oxygen being cut off at a large party, the entire city's clean water freezing, and school students being re-educated as mindless slaves. The duo continuously crosses paths with Eugene Chaud, an official "NetBattler" commissioned by the government to investigate crimes on the Net. Chaud and his NetNavi ProtoMan.EXE act as rivals to Lan and MegaMan.EXE.

The protagonists eventually learn that the criminals are all connected to an organization called the "WWW (World Three)". The WWW intentionally infects computer networks with computer viruses so as to hinder their normal operations and hack vital information. The group is led by Dr. Wily, a former colleague of Lan's grandfather. While working together, Wily had specialized in robotics while Lan's grandfather specialized in networks, which eventually led to NetNavis. The government cut Wily's funding, opting instead to pursue Hikari's NetNavi project. Wily's goal throughout the game is to collect four super programs with which the "LifeVirus" may be constructed. The LifeVirus is a nearly indestructible virus capable of wiping out the Net and all associated devices. The protagonists infiltrate the WWW, but MegaMan.EXE becomes disabled. Chaud arrives and gives Lan a batch file from Dr. Hikari to restore his Navi. After receiving the file "Hub.bat", Lan questions his father about the name. It is revealed the MegaMan.EXE is actually a unique Navi made by Lan's father. When Lan's twin brother, Hub, died at a young age, Dr. Hikari transferred Hub's consciousness into the NetNavi MegaMan.EXE. This created a special physical and virtual bond between the two brothers. In the end, Lan and MegaMan.EXE manage to defeat Wily, destroy the LifeVirus, and restore peace to ACDC.

In the dark alleys of London, the notorious Jack the Ripper is committing a series of gruesome murders. Holmes and Watson, already intrigued by reports of the Jack the Ripper murders, become involved when they receive a parcel from Whitechapel containing a case of surgical instruments with the scalpel, possibly the murder weapon, missing. By a family crest on the box, they come into contact with the Duke of Shires who admits his elder son Michael Osborne dreamed of becoming a doctor. His younger son, Lord Carfax, tells them Michael has disappeared. Holmes deduces the instruments were pawned to a broker, Joseph Beck, who tells them that he received them from an Angela Osborne, who gave her address as a soup kitchen run by Doctor Murray.

Holmes and Watson meet Murray, also a police pathologist, after convincing Lestrade to let them view the body of the most recent victim, Annie Chapman. Holmes convinces Watson to go to the soup kitchen and make a fuss of looking for Angela. A disguised Holmes then follows Murray's niece Sally when she goes to meet Carfax. They explain Carfax was blackmailed by a man who threatened to tell his father that Michael, who was helping Murray at the soup kitchen, had married a prostitute. Carfax now works there himself but Michael was gone before he and Sally arrived. The blackmailer, Max Steiner, now runs a local public house.

The Prime Minister asks Mycroft Holmes to persuade his brother to investigate the Ripper case, unaware that he is already involved. Holmes and Watson nearly catch the Ripper when he kills another prostitute who invites him into her room. Holmes confronts Murray who explains that Michael had learned that Angela had assisted Steiner with the blackmail. During an altercation between the three of them, Angela was disfigured when acid was thrown in her face. Murray also reveals his crippled and mentally disabled assistant is Michael, the result of a brutal beating from Steiner. Holmes and Watson discover Angela in the upper room of Steiner's inn and she admits that she sent them the surgical instruments, having removed the scalpel herself, to get them involved. Holmes and Watson return Michael to his family.

During the night, Holmes discovers Carfax attempting to kill Angela in her room; he is the Ripper. The pub catches alight during a struggle; Carfax, Steiner and Angela are all killed in the blaze but Holmes escapes. He explains to Watson that Carfax had no way of identifying Angela so he killed every prostitute that he came across in the hope that one of them would be her. With all those involved dead, Holmes elects to keep the truth from the police.

In the small town of Concord, Massachusetts, during the Civil War, the March sisters—Meg (Janet Leigh), Jo (June Allyson), Amy (Elizabeth Taylor), and Beth (Margaret O'Brien)—live with their mother in a state of genteel poverty, their father having lost the family's fortune to an unscrupulous businessman several years earlier. While Mr. March (Leon Ames) serves in the Union Army, Mrs. March (Mary Astor), affectionately referred to as "Marmee" by her daughters, holds the family together and teaches the girls the importance of giving to those less fortunate than themselves, especially during the upcoming Christmas season. Although the spoiled and vain Amy often bemoans the family's lack of material wealth and social status, Jo, an aspiring writer, keeps everyone entertained with her stories and plays, while the youngest March daughter, the shy and sensitive Beth, accompanies Jo's productions on an out-of-tune piano.

The spirited Jo, a tomboy in search of male companionship, strikes up a friendship with Theodore "Laurie" Laurence (Peter Lawford), the grandson of the March's wealthy, but cantankerous neighbor, James Laurence (C. Aubrey Smith). Later that winter, Jo so impresses Mr. Laurence with her forthrightness and her beneficial effect on the brooding Laurie, that he invites the March sisters to a fancy dress ball at his sumptuous home. At the ball, Meg is courted by John Brooke (Richard Stapley), Laurie's tutor, and Jo consents to dance with Laurie while Amy and Beth breathlessly view the scene from their perch atop the staircase. Mr. Laurence's gruff demeanor is softened upon meeting Beth, who reminds him of the beloved granddaughter he lost, and when he learns of her musical talent, he offers her the use of his grand piano. The beautiful evening ends on a sour note, however, when Amy and Beth overhear the snobbish Mrs. Gardiner (Isabel Randolph) and her daughter gossiping about Marmee.

As the weeks pass, Laurie's affection for Jo grows, but Jo rebuffs him as a suitor, claiming that although she loves him as a friend, she will never marry. Meanwhile, Jo attempts to discourage Meg's deepening feelings for Mr. Brooke, fearing that a marriage will break the bond between the sisters. Spring arrives, and Marmee receives word that Mr. March has been wounded and sent to an Army hospital in Washington, D.C. Jo asks her wealthy Aunt March (Lucile Watson) for Marmee's train fare, but the two have a heated argument when the impatient Jo refuses to address Aunt March with the decorum the proud woman demands. As usual, Aunt March comes through for the family, but not before Jo has had her beautiful chestnut locks cut off and sold in order to pay for Marmee's trip. While carrying out Marmee's work for the poor in her absence, Beth contracts scarlet fever, and the distressed and frightened sisters realize how much they depend upon Marmee. Just as Marmee returns, however, Beth's fever breaks, and the entire family is reunited when Laurie arranges for the surprise return of Mr. March.

A few months later, Meg marries Mr. Brooke and Laurie asks Jo to marry him, but she turns him down, explaining that she is uncomfortable in high society and wishes to devote her life to writing. Greatly disappointed, Laurie leaves for Europe, and Jo, saddened by the seeming loss of both Meg and Laurie, who she considers to be her best friend, moves to New York to pursue her career. While boarding at the home of the Kirke family, Jo meets Professor Bhaer (Rossano Brazzi), the Kirke children's German tutor, who introduces her to art museums and the opera. Bhaer later agrees to read Jo's stories, but she is devastated when he later criticizes her work, dismissing it as sensationalistic. Bursting into tears, Jo reveals that she feels abandoned by Laurie and hurt that Aunt March, who had long promised her a trip to Europe, has taken Amy instead. After consoling Jo, with whom he has fallen in love, Professor Bhaer advises her to write from her heart, and Jo decides to return home where she is needed, for Beth is again very ill. Upon her return to the now nearly empty March household, Jo learns that her beloved Beth is dying and spends the next few weeks caring for the courageous girl, who bears her suffering without complaint.

After Beth's death, Jo assuages her grief by writing a novel entitled ''My Beth'', which she sends to Professor Bhaer for his opinion. Later, Meg, now the mother of twins, gently informs Jo that Laurie and Amy have fallen in love in Europe and are to be married. Although Jo is happy for the couple, she realizes for the first time how lonely she is and how much she wishes to be loved. A few weeks later, Laurie and Amy return as husband and wife, and the Marches joyfully celebrate the family's reunion. The festivities are interrupted when Professor Bhaer arrives with Jo's novel, which he has had published. However, when Laurie answers the door, Bhaer mistakenly assumes that Jo has married her friend; he politely declines Laurie's invitation to join the party, and departs. After Jo catches up to him, the two embrace and he proposes marriage. Jo happily accepts, then leads her future husband back to the warmth of the house, where her family awaits them.

Set in Concord, Massachusetts, during and after the American Civil War, the film is a series of vignettes focusing on the struggles and adventures of the four March sisters and their mother, affectionately known as Marmee (Spring Byington), while they await the return of their father (Samuel S. Hinds), who serves as a colonel and a chaplain in the Union Army. Spirited tomboy Jo (Katharine Hepburn), who caters to the whims of their well-to-do Aunt March (Edna May Oliver), dreams of becoming a famous author, and she writes plays for her sisters to perform for the local children. Amy (Joan Bennett) is pretty but selfish, Meg (Frances Dee) works as a governess, and sensitive Beth (Jean Parker) practices on her clavichord, an aging instrument sorely in need of tuning.

The girls meet Laurie (Douglass Montgomery), who has come to live with his grandfather, Mr. Laurence (Henry Stephenson), the Marches' wealthy next-door neighbor. The Laurences invite them to a lavish party, where Meg meets Laurie's tutor, John Brooke (John Lodge). During the next several months John courts Meg, Jo's first short story becomes published, and Beth often takes advantage of Mr. Laurence's offer for her to practice on his piano.

Marmee learns that her husband is recuperating in a hospital in Washington, D.C., after an injury, so she goes to Washington to care for him. During her absence Beth contracts scarlet fever from a neighbor's baby. She recovers, albeit in a weakened condition. The March parents return, and Meg marries John. Laurie confesses his love to Jo, who rejects him. When he snubs her in return, Jo moves to New York City to pursue her writing career, and she lives in a boarding house. There she meets Professor Bhaer (Paul Lukas), an impoverished German linguist. With his help and encouragement Jo improves her writing, and she resolves her confused feelings about Laurie.

Beth, debilitated, is near to death, so Jo returns to Concord to be with Beth and her family during this time. After Beth dies, a grieving Jo learns that Amy, who accompanied Aunt March to Europe, has fallen in love with Laurie, accepted his proposal and they return, having married. Upon their return, Jo is happy for Laurie and Amy, indicating it has turned out as it always should have been. Professor Bhaer then arrives from New York City, and with him he brings Jo's manuscript for Little Women, which is soon to be published. He confesses his love to Jo and proposes. Jo accepts, welcoming him to the family.

Odo has become worried at the number of new people arriving at Deep Space Nine due to the newly discovered wormhole. While talking with Quark in his bar, Odo observes a man he recognizes and demands he leave the station. The man refuses and the two get into a fight that is broken up by station commander Benjamin Sisko. Odo explains to Sisko that the man is Ibudan, who was a smuggler of goods to Bajorans during the Cardassian Occupation. Though considered a hero by some, Odo states that Ibudan let a young girl die when her parents could not afford the smuggled goods, and later killed a Cardassian officer. He has since gone free after the end of the Occupation. Sisko warns Odo that he cannot take action against Ibudan without any evidence of a crime being committed.

Later, Ibudan is found dead in one of Quark's holosuites. One of Ibudan's friends reports to Sisko and Major Kira that Ibudan was afraid Odo would kill him. No DNA is found at the scene of Ibudan's murder other than that of Ibudan and the officers investigating the crime; the general populace of the station start to become suspicious of Odo, whom they consider untrustworthy due to his unknown origin as a shapeshifter and his past association with the Cardassian regime. Sisko temporarily relieves Odo of duty as head of security. Dr. Bashir discovers that Ibudan was performing medical experiments on a strange material in his quarters despite having no training as a doctor or scientist.

The crowds on the station become more hostile to Odo, who is forced to hide in his office to avoid a mob forming outside. Bashir suddenly arrives with new evidence: Ibudan's medical sample has started growing into a clone of Ibudan. Sisko, Bashir and Odo determine that the murdered Ibudan was also another clone, set up to incriminate Odo. They discover the real Ibudan hiding on the station, and Odo arrests him for the murder of his clone, but receives no apologies from the inhabitants of the station.

In a side plot, DS9's operations chief Miles O'Brien struggles to help his wife Keiko O'Brien get used to living on the station, where she is unable to follow her interests. She decides to start a school to teach the children residing on the station.

The game takes place in a fictional urban city called Metro City. As the story unfolds, the city's local superhero named Vortex is outnumbered by gangs and killed. With the city's protector murdered, crime grows rapidly. Soon enough, the city's crime lords start fighting over control of the city, until a villain named Sutekh takes control, combining all the gangs into one. With the city completely overrun by Sutekh and the other crime lords (Rat King, Goliath, Lord Muck, and Ninja Mistress), it is soon devoured in crime. A vigilante named Mark (alias Nightshade) decides to step up and take the law into his own hands, vowing to rid Metro City of crime.

Outside of the occasional violence, the game is actually somewhat light in tone (even Nightshade himself is constantly being called "Lampshade" by everybody) and rife with various popular culture references. The ending gives credit to people for the "bad jokes."

Overview

The programme follows the work of a special police team that investigates "cold cases", which usually concern murders that took place a number of years ago, and were never solved. The team, composed of head officer Detective Superintendent Peter Boyd (Trevor Eve), psychological profiler Grace Foley (Sue Johnston), Detective Inspector Spencer Jordan (Wil Johnson), as well as a number of other supporting characters, uses evidence which has recently come to light, as well as contemporary technology to examine former evidence.

Initially, Boyd, Grace and Spence were accompanied by junior DC Mel Silver (Claire Goose), and stern forensic scientist Frankie Wharton (Holly Aird), however both left after the end of the fourth series. Felix Gibson (Esther Hall) and Stella Goodman (Félicité du Jeu) replaced them in the fifth series, before Eve Lockhart (Tara Fitzgerald) replaced Felix from the sixth series onwards. Katarina Howard (Stacey Roca) replaced Stella in series eight, while Sarah Cavendish (Eva Birthistle) replaced Katarina in series nine. Although the plotlines generally centre around the case, other storylines have been incorporated across the years, including Boyd's anger management issues and his being re-united with his son, Grace suffering from cancer, Spencer being shot at the hands of one of his former colleagues, and Mel's death, which creates a chain of events lasting across two series.

The show also addressed sensitive issues such as fanaticism within different religions, international organised crime, child abuse within the Catholic Church, war crimes in Bosnia, forced child labour, torture, homophobia and racism. The BBC issued disclaimers twice on the show when it touched upon issues sensitive to the Labour government of the time (once about banking frauds within the City of London establishment and once about the involvement of the UK in the Iraq war). Some of the issues were dealt with through the conflicting views of Peter Boyd (a white middle-class liberal) and Spencer Jordan (a black working-class conservative).

''The Body Farm'', a spin-off revolving around forensic scientist Eve Lockhart (Tara Fitzgerald), produced by Trevor Eve and made by his production company Projector, was commissioned by the BBC. However, after poor ratings and reviews, it was cancelled after one series.

While taking the usual shortcut home through the cemetery from Cool School High, Senior Spike O'Hara found a strange, glowing skull. He put it in his backpack to show to his anatomy teacher the next day which happened to be Halloween Eve. When Dr. Femur wanted to keep the skull for a special study, Spike was concerned because it appeared that the skull was bigger than it was the day before. Little did anyone know that the skull had begun transmitting its message to the realm of the dead. The ghouls had begun their assault...

Ghosts/demons have taken over Cool School High. They have turned the teachers and football team into demons. To make matters worse, they have kidnapped Samantha Pompom, the head cheerleader. The player assumes the role of Spike O'Hara as he tries to defeat the ghouls and rescue Samantha. He will have to explore more than 200 rooms and defeat a large number of enemies. There are items and weapons throughout the game that O'Hara can find to defeat the ghouls, though many of these items are well-hidden.

Yogi and his friends are assigned by Top Cat to go on treasure hunts around the world. They travel aboard their ship, the ''S.S. Jelly Roger''. Dick Dastardly and Muttley travel on their ship, the ''S.S. Dirty Tricks'', and try to beat Yogi and friends to the treasure by engaging in their usual dirty tricks.

The four boys wait at the bus-stop wearing gas-masks for defence from anthrax. Since the September 11 attacks, everything has changed in South Park: everyone is afraid of terrorists, American flags are plastered everywhere to show widespread patriotism and Stan's mother has become catatonic and lies on the couch all day watching the news. Upon arriving at school, the boys discover that they must, in response to President Bush's request for charity to Afghanistan, donate a dollar. The boys' dollars are sent to four Afghan kids who closely resemble them. Though their town is in ruins after excessive American bombing and the unconverted American money is unusable in Afghanistan, in return the four Afghan boys send the South Park boys a goat in the mail. The boys realize that their parents will not let them keep the goat and so they try to send it back to Afghanistan. Since only U.S. military planes are flying over the country, they can only do it by sneaking the goat aboard a military plane. They sneak into a nearby base, able to do so when the guards mistake the goat for Stevie Nicks there for a USO show; however, the boys wind up on the plane too, and are sent to Afghanistan.

The boys manage to find their Afghan counterparts, who refuse to take back the goat; furthermore, the two groups get into an argument over America. The South Park boys assumed that most Afghans liked America, but the Afghan boys reveal that they hate the country, viewing America as an evil empire plotting world domination. This angers the boys, as they cannot return the goat this way. After the boys leave to try to get home, they get caught by terrorists and are brought to the hiding place of Osama bin Laden, who is depicted as completely insane. He communicates by repeating the same few words over and over including "Durka", "Burka", "Jihad" and "Allah". Bin Laden makes a video tape revealing his hostages and again the U.S. Army mistakes the goat for Stevie Nicks and declares they must rescue her. The Afghan boys, finding out about this, go and rescue the American boys despite their argument, stating that if they do not help the innocent they are no better than America. Cartman, however, proclaims he will "take care" of Bin Laden. The U.S. Army storms the cave to rescue "Stevie Nicks". Amidst the firefight, Kenny and his Afghan counterpart are strafed by a U.S. helicopter, and after the reaction the boys wind up getting in yet another fight.

During the battle, Cartman and Bin Laden are fighting between themselves in a manner similar to the anti-German/anti-Japanese Looney Tunes and Disney's cartoon propaganda produced during World War II. Cartman ultimately tricks Bin Laden into donning an Uncle Sam costume and hands him a lit stick of dynamite as a microphone. Terrorists see Bin Laden in his costume and shoot him up before the dynamite explodes. The subdued and dazed Bin Laden is killed by an American soldier and the commander of the American forces proclaim the war is won. With the Taliban overthrown and Bin Laden dead, the boys say goodbye to the Afghan kids who still hate them. Stan replies with "maybe... someday... we can learn to hate you too." The Afghan kids reply positively, confusing Kyle. The troops celebrate their victory with a show by Fleetwood Mac and "Stevie Nicks." Before they leave, Stan sticks a small American flag into the ground, confusing Kyle, who thought the Afghan kids had talked Stan into not liking America. Stan replies, "No, dude. America may have some problems, but it's our home, our team. If you don't want to root for your team, then you should get the hell out of the stadium." The episode ends with Stan and Kyle saluting the American flag, saying "Go America" and finishing with "Go Broncos."

In ''The First Part'' (1663) Hudibras and Ralpho set out, seeking knightly adventure, and encounter a local bear-baiting which they agree that they have to prevent, though they disagree about exactly why. They first defeat, and are then defeated by, the townspeople, and in particular by Trulla, the characterful local prostitute, who gains the victory by pushing Hudibras, the “Mirrour of Knighthood”, off his horse, beating him with a rain of blows, then climbing up and standing on him. Hudibras owns her the victor, and strips off his armour and weapons. She mockingly throws her own mantle on Hudibras’s back, then locks him and Ralpho in the village stocks. They are finally rescued from the stocks by the rich widow, who bails them out on condition that once he’s free Hudibras will give himself the flogging he deserves.

''The Second Part'' (1664) begins with them debating whether it is permissible for Hudibras to break his oath to the widow, to not give himself a flogging, and then to lie to her. The discussion is interrupted by the approach of a riotous and noisy skimmington or charivari, which Hudibras mistakes for some pagan ritual. The skimmington procession pelts Hudibras and Ralpho with rotten eggs and attacks their horses; they make their escape, and go to find a pond to get clean in. After a further discussion Ralpho persuades Hudibras to consult the local conjurer, Sidrophel, but Sidrophel and Hudibras argue angrily and at length about what arts are lawful and what arts are unlawful. Exasperated, Sidrophel taunts Hudibras with having been humiliated at Kingston and Brentford Fair, and claims that it was his assistant Whackum who stole Hudibras’s cloak and picked his pocket. Hudibras points out that Sidrophel is drawing that story from the spurious “Part Two”, but nevertheless he sends Ralpho out to fetch a constable to charge Sidrophel with the possession of stolen property. Hudibras knocks Whackum and Sidrophel down and picks their pockets. Believing that they are both dead, Hudibras decides that since Ralpho is disrespectful towards Hudibras’s orthodox puritanism, he will leave Ralpho to come back with the constable, find the two bodies, and carry the can for the two deaths.

''The Third and Last Part'' (1678) begins with a satiric letter from Hudibras to Sidrophel, satirising the activities of the recently-formed Royal Society. The story then moves on: after the fight with Sidrophel and Whackum, Hudibras and Ralpho are now estranged, and Hudibras, determined to get his hands on the widow’s wealth, goes to her and lies about how he flogged himself, and then defeated Sidrophel and Whackum. Ralpho, however, was ahead of him, and has already told the widow the truth. She traps Hudibras into a long argument about the true nature of marriage (she pointedly maintains that men get married principally because they are after a woman’s money), which takes them till after sunset. This argument is interrupted by a loud knocking on the door. Terrified that it might be Sidrophel, Hudibras hides under a table in a nearby room, in the dark, only to find that he is being pulled out and trampled by what appears in the dark to be a group of demons; one cloven-hoofed demon, standing on him just as Trulla had done in Part One, makes him admit his intention to defraud the rich widow of her money; also to confess his lie about having scourged himself, and to confess his dishonesty and mercenariness, and more. Colonel Hudibras shows himself up as a dishonest, cowardly and superstitious fool. The demons then leave him, still in darkness, but there is, somewhere in the dark room, one remaining “blackguard sprite” who upbraids him in detail with all his deceits and cowardice. Hudibras finds him uncomfortably well-informed about his doings. As dawn approaches, Hudibras and the “blackguard sprite” escape from the Widow’s house, find Hudibras’s and Ralpho’s horses, and flee. Canto Two is a satiric disquisition on the turbulent state of puritan and national party politics in 1659–60. In Canto Three, as daylight breaks, Hudibras discovers that the “blackguard sprite” who upbraided him in the darkness was in fact Ralpho, who tells him that the cloven-hoofed demon who stood on him and questioned him was a local weaver in a parson’s gown, and that the widow heard every word, and laughed.

Ralpho goes on to persuade him not to pursue the rich widow directly, but to go to law against her for a breach of contract to marry, and get hold of her money that way. Hudibras consults a pettifogging lawyer in London, who advises him how to begin by writing the widow a letter that will entrap her into making statements on paper that Hudibras can use to pursue a breach of promise suit against her.

The widow reads Hudibras’s letter, smiles, and writes him a reply that avoids his trap, while spelling out in riotously contemptuous detail how right women are to despise men. Her last words, the very last words of Butler’s Third and Last Part, are a strongly-worded statement that men are inferior to women: she ends her letter, and the entire satire, with a clear statement that she has no intention to “Let men usurp Th’unjust Dominion, / As if they were ''the Better Women''.” (III:“The Ladies Answer to the Knight”, lines 381–2; p. 321)

Thomas Kresk is a loser—he isn't good at his job, he's been tossed out of his home, and his wife just dumped him for the marriage counselor. On top of all that, his longtime friend and mentor Gordon Freeman died tragically. Now he's depressed, and contemplating suicide. And yes, things get worse: a criminal named Avnet (Jeff Goldblum) has stolen three priceless coins, and decided to blackmail Bollingsworth (Tom Wilkinson), his billionaire partner in crime. After Kresk overhears this, he almost gets shot—and Avnet ends up impaled on a pair of barbers' scissors.

Now Kresk is in a considerably nastier situation, so he steals the gun and the coins. But things take a sharp turn when he hires a hit man named Mikey (Elijah Wood), and discovers that the hit man is only seventeen and emotionally traumatized by his parents' suicide. And that Kresk is falling for the cop/Playboy model Sgt. Meredith Kolko (Salma Hayek), and that his nephew Scottie (Devin Drewitz) has now swallowed the coins. Now Kresk is in over his head, and has to deal with the strange and sometimes dangerous people around him.

Major Kira is contacted by Alenis Grem, a Bajoran archivist who has discovered a computer record of Kira's time in a Cardassian prison camp; Kira is naturally skeptical, as she was never in Cardassian detention, but the records appear authentic. Kira arranges a meeting with Alenis to examine the files personally and leaves for Bajor, but Alenis soon contacts the station to report that Kira never arrived. Cardassian ex-spy Garak receives information that Kira is in the custody of the Obsidian Order, the feared Cardassian intelligence agency, and passes it on to Commander Sisko.

Awakening in a darkened room, Kira is warmly welcomed "home" by Entek, a Cardassian official. When she looks in a mirror, she is shocked to see that she has been surgically altered to appear Cardassian. She furiously rejects the idea that she is Cardassian, but is introduced to Legate Tekeny Ghemor, an officer of Cardassian Central Command, who claims that she is his daughter Iliana. Entek explains that she is a sleeper agent, altered to appear Bajoran and embedded in Bajor as part of a long-term covert operation.

Ghemor is upset that his "daughter" doesn't remember him, but is reassured by Entek that her memory will return, given time. Kira is upset and incredulous, especially when she is shown the preserved body of the "real" Kira Nerys. She declares the dead girl's body a fake, but begins to doubt her own memories, especially after viewing a video message recorded by Iliana before her mission.

After several escape attempts, she is interrogated by the Obsidian Order, but she refuses to provide them with information. Eventually, Ghemor, still believing her to be his daughter, offers to help her escape the harsher interrogation she will certainly suffer at the hands of the Order, revealing himself as a member of Cardassia's underground dissident movement. In a moment of insight, Kira realizes that the entire affair — her abduction, her "Cardassian" identity, her supposedly blocked memories — were all staged in an attempt to reveal Ghemor as a dissident.

Odo, Garak, and Sisko arrive in time to prevent the Order from taking Kira and Ghemor away for punishment. Garak shoots Entek, after remarking that "treason is in this eye of the beholder." Back at Deep Space Nine, tests reveal that Kira is definitely Bajoran. Ghemor understands that she is not really Iliana, but declares that he will never stop hoping that Iliana is alive and will return to him.

The story, told from the perspective of an older "local" man, begins as he is sitting around at a convenience store with a group of his friends during a heavy snowstorm. A young boy runs in, deathly afraid. The men recognize him as the son of Richie Grenadine, a local man who was injured some time ago in a work accident, and was given lifetime workers' compensation. With no need to support himself, Richie became a recluse, rarely seen outside the confines of his apartment except to purchase the cheapest of beer, although lately, he had been sending his son out to purchase his beer for him.

After speaking privately with Richie's son, a group of men including the narrator and store owner Henry decide to take the beer to Richie personally. On their way, Henry relates some of the terrifying experiences the kid had told him — of how one day his father drank a "bad" can of beer, implied to carry a mutagen, and since then has been slowly transforming into an inhuman blob-like abomination that detests light and craves warm beer. Spying on him one night, the boy saw his father eat a dead cat, causing him to finally seek help.

Arriving at Richie's home, the men confront Richie from behind his closed door, demanding that he come out. The odor pouring out from behind the door convinces the group that Richie was eating more than dead cats, speculating that he may be responsible for a recent rash of missing people. The men are horrified when Richie opens the door and shambles out, resembling more fungus than man. The rest of the men run off as Henry stands his ground, firing his pistol at the creature. The story ends with the narrator recalling how his brief glimpse of the creature made him realize it was in the process of dividing in two, and calculating the exponential growth the creature is capable of, as they sit at the convenience store, waiting to find out whether Henry or the creature survived.

In 1957, nine-year-old Jim Norman and his twelve-year-old brother, Wayne, walk to the local library to return Jim's books. They are attacked by a gang of local greasers. Wayne is stabbed to death by two of the older boys, but Jim escapes. Through random times in his life, Jim is haunted by nightmares vividly reenacting the murder.

In 1974, Jim is married and starts a new job as a high-school English teacher. All seems to go well until after the Christmas holiday. Jim learns that one of his students was killed in a hit and run accident. A new student is added to Jim's class. Jim recognizes the boy as Robert Lawson, one of the greasers who killed his brother. Lawson appears to be the same age as he was in 1957.

Another student falls to her death a week later, and another of the greasers, David Garcia, joins Jim's class. He also appears to be the same age as he was in 1957.

When the class troublemaker expresses to Jim his concerns about the suspicious new arrivals, then drops out of school to join a hippie commune, a third greaser, Vincent 'Vinnie' Corey, joins the class. Terrified, Jim calls an old acquaintance, Donald Nell, a policeman who knew him and his brother in 1957. Donald reveals that the three greasers died soon after Wayne's murder; they were fleeing police in a high-speed car chase only to collide with a telephone pole, causing all three to be electrocuted.

Jim does not tell his wife Sally about the greasers, believing it would be better for her not to know. Sally is killed while riding a taxi cab when the resurrected greasers force the vehicle off the road. Finally, after consulting a book of spells, Jim summons a demon; cutting off his own index fingers as a blood sacrifice, he asks that it defeat the undead greasers. In response, the demon takes the shape of Wayne, who overpowers the greasers and takes their souls to Hell. As it leaves, the demon promises that it will return, and Jim recalls a warning from the book: although demons can be summoned and banished, "sometimes they come back."

Several brigadier generals (American, British, and French) are unexpectedly taken prisoner by the Italian army while arguing military tactics in a sauna; this is a public relations disaster for the Allies. The brigadiers are held in an Italian villa, run by the benevolent Colonel Ferrucci, as a luxurious version of a prison camp. Being all of the same rank, none is in command and they are forced to plan escapes by committee, with predictably ineffective results.

Meanwhile, Allied headquarters devises a plot to free them by sending in Harry Frigg (Paul Newman). Frigg is a private in the U.S. Army, a malcontent who has a history of escaping from military stockades. As incentive, he is promised a promotion to sergeant after the generals have been freed. Accepting the mission, Frigg is "promoted" to major general so that he will outrank all the prisoners, assume command and lead the resultant breakout. Parachuted behind enemy lines, Frigg allows himself to be captured, and, as planned, is imprisoned in the same jail as the brigadiers. While they are initially skeptical of Frigg's rank, he has been given a few personal secrets about them that only a senior officer might be expected to know.

Frigg discovers a secret passage, which has potential for use during the getaway. It starts in his bedroom and takes him to the gatehouse outside the villa's fence where the owner of the property, Countess Francesca De Montefiore (Sylva Koscina) is living. The escape plan is put on hold when the two become romantically involved.

Eventually, it cannot be avoided any longer and the scheme is reactivated. On the eve of the group's intended breakout, Colonel Ferrucci announces that because of the low escape rate in the complex, he is to be promoted to general at midnight the following night. The group decides to put their plans off by a day to ensure the Colonel gets promoted, despite knowing that his rank will be stripped once they do escape. During the celebration, a German major arrives, and at midnight he announces that Italy has surrendered to the Allies, and everyone present are now his prisoners.

The Germans transfer the generals to a high-security prison camp for officers. Escape seems hopeless. Frigg confesses to being only a private, and is separated from the rest to be delivered to a basic holding camp for NCOs. Slipping away from his guard, he then breaks back into the officers' camp, subsequently freeing them all and capturing the Major in the process.

The film concludes with Frigg ending the war as a master sergeant; he is offered the opportunity to be in charge of a radio station, and a promotion to second lieutenant. While discussing the role, Frigg and his entourage pass the countess' castle. He dashes in to reunite with her and realizes that the villa is the perfect base for the radio station.

In 1933, a man named Chaney (Charles Bronson) witnesses a bare-knuckled street fight. Intrigued, he has the fast-talking "Speed" set up a fight for him. Chaney bets all of the six dollars he has on himself and quickly dispatches his younger opponent. Chaney and a suitably impressed Speed travel to New Orleans to match Chaney against local fighters at long odds, recruiting genteel but slightly decrepit cutman, Poe (Strother Martin) to tend to his wounds.

Chaney easily disposes of his next opponent, a Cajun hitter. When the hitter's sponsor refuses to pay up on the grounds that Chaney is a ringer, Chaney and his retinue force the sponsor to turn over the unpaid cash and trash his backwoods honky-tonk joint. For the next fight, Chaney must put up $3,000 instead of the expected $1,000 stake. To cover the shortfall, Speed obtains a loan from a gang of local mobsters headed by Doty (Bruce Glover). Chaney wins this fight handily. Gambling degenerate Speed blows all his winnings in a backroom craps game, leaving him unable to repay the loan sharks, invoking their anger.

Afterwards, Speed and Chaney disagree about selling a piece of Chaney to fish tycoon Chick Gandil (Michael McGuire), the sponsor of Chaney's most recent opponent. Gandil instead pays off Speed's debt and takes him hostage. Chaney must wager his entire winnings to fight a leather-clad professional prize fighter imported from Chicago named Street (Nick Dimitri) or Speed will be killed.

Chaney, who commands an inexplicable force of invincibility, prevails in the grueling bout, in a sense a craggy guardian Angel persona saving Speed. He gives Speed and Poe a generous cut of the winnings and departs alone into the night.

Born a princess of the Byzantine Empire, Anna is the eldest child of Emperor Alexius I Comnenus of the Byzantine Empire and his wife, Irene Ducas. With only one younger sister, Maria, Anna is her father's chosen successor and she is certain she will inherit the throne upon Alexius' death alongside her betrothed, Constantine Ducas. The emperor's mother and Anna's namesake, Anna Dalassena, is Alexius' most trusted adviser and strongly opposes Irene out of hatred towards the Ducas family for their intrigues. Under her manipulative grandmother, Anna learns statecraft and diplomacy, and Anna excels at all her lessons, becoming a brilliant scholar, and beginning a manuscript that will detail her father's reign.

When Anna is five, Irene gives birth to a son, John II Comnenus. While "barbarians" from foreign lands believe only a son should ascend to power, Anna is dismissive of their attitudes, as are Alexius and Anna Dalassena. However, as Anna matures into a young woman, her grandmother feels threatened by Anna's arrogance and intelligence, realizing that Anna will not be anyone's puppet. Her grandmother moves swiftly to support John as Alexius' successor, devastating Anna as she sees her dreams of power being taken away and given to her brother. Bitter at her grandmother's betrayal, Anna continues to assert she is the true heir to the throne and waits to avenge herself.

Anna's engagement to Constantine Ducas is broken because Constantine dies in war. She is married off to an older general, Nicephorus Bryennius. As the throne begins to grow further from her reach, Anna pours all her energy into her manuscript. When Alexius dies, John is recognized as the new emperor. Moving to seize what is rightfully hers, Anna conspires with Irene, who remains deeply opposed to Anna Dalassena, to depose John by poisoning him and to install Anna as empress. Anna is furious to find her tutor, Simon, who has revealed the conspiracy to John and Anna Dalassena. Out of leniency for his sister and mother, both Anna and Irene are banished to separate convents, never to contact one another, despite Anna Dalassena's demands that both be put to death as examples to the Ducas family. When Anna Dalassena protests that John would not have gotten the throne without her influence, John thanks her for obtaining the throne for him before informing her that he no longer needs her. His words effectively dismiss Anna Dalassena from the court, leaving Anna Comnena secretly impressed that her brother will not be a puppet of their grandmother. Characters: While she is refused most luxuries at the convent, Anna manages to bring her manuscript, which she has named the ''Alexiad''. Though she reluctantly admits that her brother has demonstrated himself to be a capable ruler thus far, she resolves to finish the ''Alexiad'' without mentioning her brother and be remembered for what she accomplished as a scholar.

''King's Knight'' follows a basic storyline similar to many NES-era role-playing video games: Princess Claire of Olthea has been kidnapped in the Kingdom of Izander, and the player must choose one of the four heroes (the knight/warrior "Ray Jack", the wizard "Kaliva", the monster/gigant "Barusa" and the (kid) thief "Toby") to train and set forth to attack Gargatua Castle, defeat the evil dragon Tolfida and rescue the princess.

Ernest Tilley and Bill "BB" Babowsky are rival door-to-door aluminum siding salesmen in Baltimore, Maryland in 1963, an era when "tin men," as they are called, will do almost anything—legal or illegal—to close a sale. BB is a smooth-talking con-artist who scams naive and comely young women with his sales pitches, while Tilley is a hapless loser.

They first meet when BB, driving his new Cadillac off the lot, backs into Tilley's own Cadillac. Though Tilley had the right of way, each man blames the other, and an escalating feud erupts between them.

After BB smashes Tilley's headlights and Tilley shatters BB's car windows in response, BB sets out to seduce Tilley's long-suffering wife Nora in revenge. Immediately after having sex with Nora, he calls Tilley to taunt him with the news. Tilley tells BB to keep Nora; he wants to be rid of her.

Meanwhile, both men have their own personal troubles. BB's older partner and mentor, Moe Adamson, is hospitalized with a serious heart condition. Tilley has a gambling problem and squanders what little money he makes betting on horse races, causing a rift with Nora. He is in debt to various creditors and the IRS, which begins confiscating his possessions for unpaid property taxes. Exhausted by their rivalry, the two men decide to play a game of pool to decide who should get Nora in order to end to their personal war. BB loses, but he does not honor the bet. He has fallen in love for the first time, and Nora moves in with him.

The newly formed Maryland Home Improvement Commission is investigating corrupt sales practices in the home-improvement industry. Both men are subpoenaed, and after giving testimony about their sales practices, the commission takes away both of their licenses. While Tilley gives up his license reluctantly, BB does so willingly as part of his new outlook on life. BB, seeing that Tilley has lost everything, including his car, takes pity on him and gives him a ride. Together, the two freshly unemployed men begin sharing ideas for a new business they can create for themselves.

Over a 24-hour period, 19-year-old Ari confronts his sexuality and his Greek background. Ari is obsessed with sex and has sexual encounters with multiple people, most of them gay, and attempts to fulfill the sister of one of his best friends. At the same time, he is facing problems with his traditional Greek parents, who have no clue about his sexual and drug taking activities.

During a business transaction between unscrupulous bar operator Quark and a pair of Miradorn twins, a visitor from the Gamma Quadrant, Croden, attempts to steal a valuable item. Odo intercedes, but not before one of the twins is killed. Odo takes Croden into custody, while the remaining twin, Ah-kel, vows vengeance.

Croden makes several comments to Odo regarding "Changelings". This piques Odo's interest, as he has never encountered another shapeshifter. Croden claims there were once shapeshifters on his homeworld, who were persecuted and driven off the planet. Croden claims to know of a place where they still exist, and tries to tempt Odo by offering to bring him to this colony. Odo is dubious of Croden's stories until Croden shows him a necklace containing a stone that changes shape. Dr. Bashir examines it and tells Odo that, given its composition, it could be distantly related to Odo.

Croden's homeworld demands his return, and Commander Sisko sends Odo to return him. Ah-Kel intimidates Quark into revealing that Odo has taken Croden to the Gamma Quadrant, and he pursues them to exact vengeance on Croden.

In the runabout vessel, Croden tells Odo that he was a political prisoner on his home planet, and most of his family was killed by the government. When Ah-Kel appears in pursuit, Odo is forced to release Croden to assist in evading Ah-Kel's ship. Croden navigates the Chamra Vortex, an asteroid field filled with unstable pockets called ''toh-maire'', and lands on a planet he claims contains the Changeling colony. On the surface, Croden's eagerness reignites Odo's doubt. Odo demands the truth of Croden's stories. Croden reveals that he has never actually met a Changeling; the shapeshifting stone he showed Odo was bought at a marketplace. Croden uses the stone to open a chamber he had left on the planet's surface, containing his daughter, whom he had put into stasis.

Ah-Kel fires on the planet, prompting the three to return to their runabout. A falling rock incapacitates Odo and Croden carries him back to the runabout. In the Vortex, Odo tricks Ah-Kel into firing on a pocket of ''toh-maire'', destroying the pursuing ship.

Ultimately, Croden decides to answer for his crime on his homeworld and asks Odo to care for his daughter; but Odo, indebted to Croden, finds a Vulcan ship that agrees to take Croden and his daughter back to Vulcan. Croden gives Odo his necklace containing the Changeling stone as a sign of thanks.

Rubí Pérez (Bárbara Mori) is a very beautiful but poor woman who is obsessed with money. She studies at an exclusive university thanks to the financial support from Cristina (Paty Diaz), her hard-working older sister. Rubí hopes to become rich by befriending rich people. She is best friends with Maribel de la Fuente (Jacqueline Bracamontes), a kind and wealthy young woman. Maribel has a paralyzed leg, which prevents her from having a normal social life. Rubí is actually jealous of Maribel's social status while pitying her disability.

Rubí meets Maribel's online boyfriend Héctor Ferrer (Sebastián Rulli), an architect, and his best friend Alejandro Cárdenas (Eduardo Santamarina), a doctor. Héctor intrigues her because she knows he is very rich, and marrying a rich man has always been her ambition to leave poverty behind. However, she finds herself falling in love with Alejandro. Héctor and Maribel get engaged. Rubí starts dating Alejandro, but when she finds out that he is from a middle-class background and is not rich, she dumps him, though it breaks her heart. Rubi's mother, Refugio tries to make Rubi see that money is not everything in life and that she will regret leaving Alejandro. However Rubí refuses to listen and then sets out to seduce Héctor.

Héctor quickly falls under Rubí's spell. On Héctor and Maribel's wedding day, Héctor leaves a devastated Maribel at the altar and elopes with Rubí instead to Cancun, where they get married. Rubí finally has the lifestyle and money that she has always dreamed of, although she's disowned by her family and friends. On their wedding night Hector tries to make love to Rubi, Rubi keeps thinking about Alejandro, which makes her run out to the beach crying. Despite this, she is still in love with Alejandro, though he vows to her that he would never forgive her for what she did to Maribel. Hector was supposed to move to New York and work on an important project, but is kicked out after he dumps Maribel at the altar. Rubí also meets a tycoon named Yago Pietrasanta, who is a womanizer and Rubi starts going out with him despite being still married to Héctor and also her mother and Alejandro's objections, Rubi also gets envious of her sister Cristina's happy relationship with Maribel's ex chauffeur, Cayetano and to separate them, she has him framed of theft by slipping on him a priceless jeweled necklace, sending him to jail days before their wedding. However, Cristina soon finds that she's pregnant with Cayetano's child and tells Refugio about it, who in turn asks for Rubí's help to release him from jail, but Rubí reveals to her mother what she did to Cayetano and a disappointed and ashamed Refugio disowns Rubí and dies from a heart attack before she could tell Cristina the truth about Cayetano. Later in Refugio's funeral, Rubí is shunned and driven away by Cristina and her neighbors, who found out that she caused her mother's heart attack and also gets disowned by Cristina.

Héctor decides to travel the world with Rubí, since he is not entirely sure that she has gotten over Alejandro. They are away for three years. When they return, Rubí discovers that Alejandro is now very rich and has a new wife named Sonia (Marlene Favela) and also meets Cristina's daughter, Fernanda, whom Rubí likes due to her resemblance to her. During an argument between Rubí and Sonia on a glass bridge, the floor below Sonia shatters, and she falls through the glass and dies. When Rubí is phoning Loreto, Héctor enters his wife's room and snatches the phone away from her. He accuses Rubí of going to see Alejandro, but Rubí claims that she went to see Marco instead of Alejandro. Enraged, Héctor pushes Rubí into the bed and makes love to her after Rubí attempts to warn her husband not to do this again. That night, Rubí and Héctor end up getting naked on a bed after making love. Rubí scolds her husband for being intimate with her, but Héctor tells her that, since they are married, Rubí is going to make love to him. Héctor makes love to his wife again. Rubí comforts Alejandro after Sonia's death and seduces him once again. He and Rubí become lovers.

When he hears that Rubí was at the scene when Sonia died, he has her arrested for murder. They seemingly hate each other now, but Rubí begins to feel love for him again when she learns that she is pregnant with his child. Because she does not want to divorce Héctor and lose her money and status, she lies and tells Héctor that the baby is his. She is released from jail, since it is ruled that Sonia's death was accidental.

Héctor overhears Rubí telling her friend Loreto (Miguel Pizarro) that the child is actually Alejandro's. Angry and humiliated, Héctor realizes that she never loved him, so he keeps her prisoner in her own home, intending to keep her and her child with him forever and away from Alejandro. Rubí manages to escape from Héctor with help from Loreto and Genaro, and the truth about who is the father of her child finally comes out. By now, Alejandro is aware that Maribel has been secretly in love with him and that he too has feelings for her, but he chooses to stay with Rubí for the sake of their baby.

Sometime later, Rubí saves her beloved niece Fernanda (Kristel Casteele) from being hit by a car; Rubí is hit instead and has a miscarriage. She blames Héctor for the miscarriage, since he has hit her before because of his jealousy. Héctor tries to prove that Rubí actually lost her baby after being hit by a car, but no one believes him except for Elena (Yadhira Carrillo). She is the assistant to the Count of Aragón and in love with Héctor. Héctor is fatally injured in a car accident and dies before he could tell Alejandro, who is performing Héctor's surgery and trying to save his life, the truth about Rubí.

Héctor left everything in his will to Rubí, much to his parents' chagrin. However, Elena, who hates Rubí, makes sure that all of Rubí's money is lost in the stock market, leaving Rubí poor again. Alejandro is unjustly charged with intentionally letting Héctor die on the operating table and is arrested, when the actual responsible was former hospital director Bermudez who secretly sabotaged the surgery to get revenge on Alejandro for getting him fired from the hospital and sent to jail. Immediately afterwards, the suspicions are proven unfounded and the charges against him are dropped, and Bermudez is arrested, though he accidentally shoots his son Ernesto, while he was saving Elena's life. Upon his release, Alejandro discovers exactly how Rubí lost their baby. It is also revealed that Elena is pregnant with Héctor's child, though he never knew it.

Disgusted by the all the damage that she has done, Alejandro pays Rubí a visit one last time and tells her that it is over between them: he has chosen Maribel. Rubí begs him not to leave her, even humiliating herself by getting down on her knees. He leaves her and begins to walk down the stairs. As Rubí follows him, running down the staircase while holding onto the rail and screaming that she will never let him go, she loses her grip on the rail, falls several stories down, and crashes into a glass table below.

To save her life, doctors have to amputate her leg. When Rubí wakes up, she finds out to her horror that her leg was amputated. Even more devastating, her beautiful face is now full of scars because of multiple glass cuts. However, despite this, Rubí still doesn't regret her actions and soon escapes from the hospital.

Finding the wedding date of Alejandro and Maribel, she shows up unseen at the church. She sights a gun through a crack on a door, targeting Alejandro, but she cannot bring herself to shoot him. She then aims at Maribel, but her sister Cristina, Maribel's maid of honor, is in the way and blocking a clean shot. Rubí relents and hides in a corner of the churchyard, despondent.

After the wedding, her niece Fernanda wanders over to Rubí's hiding place. Rubí shows her scarred face to Fernanda, but the little girl is not repulsed by it. On the contrary, she feels sympathy for her favorite aunt. When Rubí asks her if she would like to continue meeting her secretly and serve as an instrument to get her revenge and ruin Alejandro's life, Fernanda happily agrees. Rubí limps away, dressed in rags.

Eighteen years later, Fernanda (now played by Bárbara Mori) is all grown up, bearing a striking resemblance to Rubí, save for her blonde hair. She visits her aunt, who is living in a one-room flat. After hearing that Alejandro has returned to Mexico after years of living abroad, Rubí tells Fernanda that Alejandro and Maribel have a son, and that her job will be making both Alejandro and his son fall in love with her in order to destroy Maribel's family.

Alejandro is now the director of a hospital. One day he finds Fernanda in his office. He is utterly shocked, mistaking her for Rubí. She greets him without revealing her identity and by pulling him by his tie and bringing him in for what looks like a kiss. The screen caption, ''The End..?'' then appears.

Florida, 1969. 8-year-old Tommy Wheeler is incorrectly seen as mentally-impaired by many of the local townspeople. Tommy lives alone with his skanky mother, Connie Mae, a sex shop owner. This emotionally troubled child also struggles with painful memories of his abusive, estranged father, Tom, whose mistreatment he recreates in a self-flagellating manner by systematically subjecting himself to the sadism of the 12-year-old local bully, Bear Hadley. While the town barber, George Burgess, a psychotically religious zealot, obsesses over Connie Mae, Tommy fantasizes about watching the town fireworks from atop the local lighthouse. The boy finally realizes this dream, but when he descends, he happens upon a shocking discovery that changes his world forever by bringing a permanent end to his childhood innocence.

In London, a gang of criminals from Australia led by Jack Coombes (Bill Kerr) impersonate policemen to carry out robberies. Local gang leader "Pearly" Gates (Sellers), who operates from the cover of a French couturier, finds his takings cut severely, and blames rival crook "Nervous" O'Toole (Bernard Cribbins). When it emerges that they are both being scammed by the same gang, they join forces, along with Lionel Jeffries' Police Inspector "Nosey" Parker, to bring the so-called "I.P.O. mob" (I.P.O. - Impersonating a Police Officer) to justice. Nanette Newman provides the love interest, John Le Mesurier plays a senior policeman, and a young Michael Caine has a small and uncredited role as a young PC. Other uncredited roles include John Junkin (Maurice), Dennis Price (Educated Ernest), Cardew Robinson (Postman), Dick Emery (Man in Flat 307), Mario Fabrizi (Van Driver), John Harvey (Police Station Sergeant), Harold Siddons (PC in Basement Garage), Jack Silk (Police Station PC), Derek Guyler (non-speaking PC at Scotland Yard), Gerald Sim (Airfield Official) and Marianne Stone (“The bird in the front row” at Gangsters' Meeting).

In 1933 France, Christine (Richardson) is the maid of a well-to-do middle-aged widow (Julie Walters) and her teenage daughter (Sophie Thursfield). Her younger sister, Lea (May) is hired on the recommendation of Christine. The two sisters become increasingly alienated from their employer, separated by barriers between the classes. The employer and her daughter look down on the sisters for the most trivial things, and it soon becomes the norm for the two pairs of women to not even speak directly to each other.

With only each other to turn to, the relationship becomes sexual, adding to the tension between the sisters and their employer. Both of them deal with trauma brought on by strained relationships with their mother and others of the church. Over time, there are continual rumors of the employer’s daughter getting married and moving out. Christine becomes paranoid and jealous that Lea will go with her when that day comes, and she’ll be left nothing, but Lea assures her this isn’t the case. Christine fears she is a monster like her mother.

One day, the iron blows a fuse and burns the daughter’s blouse Lea was preparing. Short on money and time, the sisters resign to their fate; when their employer and her daughter angrily return from a shopping trip, Christine tries to explain what happened. The employer claims she knows what she’s done with her sister and they’ll never work again once word gets out. The sisters fly into a rage and brutally murder the employer and her daughter. The movie ends on a crime report detailing the state of their corpses as someone knocks on the mansion door. The naked sisters again cling to each other desperately as audio plays of an investigator questioning them on the murder, followed by Christine screaming for Lea.

Sittaford is a tiny village on the fringe of Dartmoor. Mrs Willett and her daughter Violet are the newly installed tenants of Sittaford House, a residence owned by Trevelyan, a retired Navy captain. They invite four people to tea on Friday afternoon: Captain Trevelyan's long-standing friend, Major Burnaby, Mr Rycroft, Mr Ronnie Garfield, and Mr Duke. At the suggestion of Mr Garfield, the six of them decide to play a game of table-turning. During this séance, at 5.25 pm, a spirit announces that Captain Trevelyan has just been murdered. Concerned for the Captain's safety in Exhampton, Major Burnaby says that he intends to walk the six miles there. There is a thick layer of snow on the ground and further heavy snowfall is forecast for later that evening. There is no telephone in Sittaford, and cars cannot manoeuvre in these conditions.

Two and a half hours later, just before 8 pm, in the middle of a blizzard, Major Burnaby is trudging up the path to the front door of Hazelmoor, the house in Exhampton where Captain Trevelyan now lives. When nobody answers the door, he fetches the local police and a doctor. They enter the house through the open study window at the back, and find Captain Trevelyan's dead body on the floor. Dr Warren estimates the time of death at between 5 and 6 pm. A fracture of the base of the skull is the cause of death. The weapon was a green baize tube full of sand.

Captain Trevelyan's will states that, apart from £100 for his servant Evans, his property is to be equally divided among four people: his sister Jennifer Gardner, his nephew James Pearson, his niece Sylvia Dering, and his nephew Brian Pearson (the three children of his other, deceased sister). Each of these four will inherit approximately £20,000. James Pearson is arrested for murder because he was in Exhampton at the time of the murder, trying unsuccessfully to get a loan from Captain Trevelyan.

While the official investigation is led by Inspector Narracott, James Pearson's fiancée Emily Trefusis starts sleuthing herself. She is assisted by Charles Enderby, a ''Daily Wire'' journalist who, after the murder, presented a cheque for £5,000 to Major Burnaby for winning the newspaper's football competition in Exhampton. Emily and Charles stay with Mr and Mrs Curtis in Sittaford, searching for clues. Mr Dacres, James Pearson's solicitor, tells Emily that things look much worse than they already imagined. James has "borrowed" money from his firm to speculate in stocks without the knowledge of the firm.

There are several red herrings. Brian Pearson came under suspicion when Enderby discovered him making a late-night rendezvous with Violet Willett; he is Violet's fiancé. He was not in Australia but had returned to England on the same boat with the Willetts. The Willetts' motive for moving into the isolated Sittaford house had no connection with Captain Trevelyan. They wanted to live close to Dartmoor Prison, where Violet's father was imprisoned. His escape from the prison three days after the murder was engineered by Brian Pearson. He and Brian would live with the Willetts as their manservants until the danger passed, but the prisoner was recaptured. Martin Dering created a false alibi because his wife Sylvia was watching him for divorce proceedings. Sylvia is Mr Rycroft's niece; Jennifer Gardner is Mr Garfield's godmother; and Mr Duke is an ex-Chief-Inspector of Scotland Yard.

Emily solves the mystery in Hazelmoor after finding Captain Trevelyan's ski boots hidden in the chimney, and two pairs of skis in different sizes. Major Burnaby is the killer. He engineered the table movements during the séance to make the spirit convey the message that Captain Trevelyan had been murdered. Instead of walking the six miles in two and a half hours after the séance, he went to his own house to put on skis, and skied the distance in about 10 minutes. He killed Captain Trevelyan at about a quarter to six. Then he cleaned his skis and put them in the cupboard. He hid Trevelyan's ski boots in the chimney to prevent the police seeing them, and thus possibly realising how quickly a person on skis could have travelled between Sittaford and Exhampton. Major Burnaby hoped that the second pair of skis, of a different size, would pass unnoticed.

Mr Rycroft, who is a member of the Psychical Research Society, reassembles five of the six original participants for a second séance at Sittaford House, the absent Mr Duke being replaced by Brian Pearson. The séance has scarcely begun, when Inspector Narracott steps in, in the company of Emily and Mr Duke, and charges Major Burnaby with the murder of Captain Trevelyan. Emily explains that Burnaby had lost a lot of money by buying rotten shares; his motive for the murder was to keep the cheque for £5,000. He had received the letter notifying him of the win on the morning of the day of the murder, contrary to what he told Enderby. Captain Trevelyan had won the competition but used Burnaby's name to send in competition solutions. In the final chapter Emily turns down a marriage proposal by Enderby – who has fallen in love with her during the investigation – because she still loves her fiancé James.

There is no single, authoritative version of the ''Sunjata'' epic, which could include over 40 episodes across all the known variants, but there are core, major components that are traditionally included. Bulman divides these components into: (1) paternal ancestry of Sunjata, (2) buffalo-woman tale, (3) birth and childhood of Sunjata, (4) exile of Sunjata, and (5) return and war with Sumanguru.

In ''Sunjata'', Naré Maghann Konaté (also called Maghan Kon Fatta or Maghan the Handsome) was a Mandinka king who one day received a soothsaying hunter at his court. The hunter predicted that if Konaté married an ugly woman, she would give him a son who would one day be a mighty king. Naré Maghann Konaté was already married to Sassouma Bereté and had a son by her, Dankaran Toumani Keïta. However, when two Traoré hunters from the Do kingdom presented him an ugly, hunchbacked woman named Sogolon, he remembered the prophecy and married her. She soon gave birth to a son, Sundiata Keita, who was unable to walk throughout his childhood. Sassouma was jealous of the child and mother and would make fun of Sundiata for his inability to walk and the ugliness he inherited from his mother.Feremu, Sokana. Sundiata – Short Version. Despite his physical weakness, the king still granted Sundiata his own griot at young age; this was in order to have them grow together and provide constant consultation as was the custom.

With the death of Naré Maghann Konaté (c. 1224), his first son, Dankaran Tuman, assumed the throne despite Konaté's wishes that the prophecy be respected. Sundiata and his mother, who now had given birth to two daughters and adopted a second son from Konaté's third wife Namandjé, suffered the scorn of the new king and his mother. After an insult against Sogolon, Sundiata requested an iron rod from the blacksmith Nounfari, which broke when he tried to use it in order to pull himself upright and walk. Only when he used a branch of S'ra (African baobab or Adansonian tree) was he able to walk. In one version of the epic, Sundiata is able to walk after his father dies and his mother orders him to do so. He then becomes a great hunter. Nonetheless, the hatred of Sassouma Bereté and Dankaran Toumani Keita soon drove Sundiata, his mother, and his two sisters into exile in the Mema kingdom. In one version of the epic, Sundiata and his mother are not exiled. Sogolon feels that she and her son are in danger because of Sassouma's jealousy and left to keep them safe. Neighboring kingdoms are unwilling to harbor Sundiata and Sogolon in fear of what Sassouma and her son would do, but the Mema people take them in.

While living in the Mema kingdom, Sundiata began to grow "as strong as a lion", and he fought with the greatest general of the Mema people, Moussa Tounkara. Sundiata became such a great warrior to the degree that he was made heir to the Mema throne. However, Sogolon encouraged him to "fulfill his destiny" and return to Mali to become king.

Meanwhile, Soumaoro Kanté, a historical leader of the Sosso people who rose to prominence after the demise of the Ghana Empire but who is portrayed in the epic as a cruel sorcerer king, attacked the Mandinka kingdom, causing Dankaran Toumani to take flight in fear. Before reaching Mali, Soumaoro had conquered nine kingdoms in the former Ghana Empire. The oppressed Mandinka people then sent for the exiled Sundiata. Forging a coalition of neighboring small kingdoms, Sundiata waged a war against the Sosso, finally Sundiata was later crowned with the title "Mansa," or "king of kings", as the first ruler of the Mali Empire. He soon set about organizing the nucleus of the empire, presenting the Gbara of nobles and notables at his coronation with an oral constitution known as the Kouroukan Fouga. His model for government would guide the empire into greatness. His exploits have even been compared to those of Alexander the Great by some griots.

Following the events of ''Might and Magic III'', the eight heroes of Terra - Sir Caneghem, Crag Hack, Maximus, Resurectra, Dark Shade, Kastore, Robert the Wise and Tolberti - attempted to pilot a seedship known as the "Lincoln" in pursuit of the Guardians, Corak and Sheltem, who were en route for the world of Xeen. However, an unknown problem occurred that caused the Terrans to drift off-course and eventually crash-land in the seas near Antagarich, on Enroth. At around the same time, two war parties, one of elves and the other of goblins, break off fighting each other when the eight heroes emerge from the sea in strange outfits. Both sides witness the heroes arguing over their mission before eventually splitting up into two separate parties and departing. While elves report what they saw to their leader, Gavin Magnus, the Immortal King of Celeste, the goblins report the same thing to Archibald Ironfist, the brother of King Roland and leader of the Necromancers of Deyja after forging an alliance with them shortly after fleeing from Enroth, when the adventurers of Might and Magic VI, taking residence in Antagarich to plan his next move. Intrigued with what they hear, the pair order a search for the strange beings.

Meanwhile, on the Emerald Isles, the wealthy Lord Markham organises a scavenger hunt, with first prize being the deeds to the Castle of Harmondale and its surrounding lands. A new party of four player characters takes up the challenge and wins the competition, becoming the new Lords of Harmondale, only to discover upon arriving to their new home that the castle fell into a dreadful state of dilapidation. After clearing out some unwelcome guests, and getting help from Hothfarr IX, king of the dwarves of Stone City, to repair their castle, the new Lords soon return to their restored castle only to find diplomats waiting for them, each representing either the human kingdom of Erathia or the elven kingdom of Avlee and asking the party to meet each kingdom's leader: King Eldrich Parson, leader of the elves of Avlee, and Queen Catherine Ironfist, leader of the humans of Erathia. Through them, the party learn why Markham was offering Harmondale as a prize; unbeknown to them, their new home lay in disputed territory that both Avlee and Erathia had laid a claim on, and has now resulted in both battles between both kingdoms, despite the efforts of an Arbiter in the matter, Judge Grey.

Having noticed that Castle Harmondale had been restored by the party, both Catherine and Eldrich each asks them to help in their dispute against the other by performing a feat of espionage that can gain them an advantage. The party find themselves either doing so within a period of a month, or letting their rival know of what they were asked to do. Eventually a major fight between the two kingdoms erupts in the Tularen Forest over who gets to take an important artifact - Gryphonheart's Trumpet. In managing to get it before the conflict ends (if the player arrives in time to learn of the battle), the party face the decision of handing it over to one of the leaders, granting that kingdom victory in the conflict, or pass it on to Grey, thus granting Harmondale independence from both kingdoms. A few months after the war began, Judge Grey passes away from natural causes, leaving the party to find a suitable candidate. Faced to decide between either Judge Fairweather, a representative of the wizards of Bracada, or Judge Sleen, a representative of the necromancers of Deyja, the party's choice eventually decides on the outcome of the war. If Judge Sleen is chosen, the war worsens and the necromancers use the corpses of the fallen to make an undead army, but if Judge Fairweather is chosen, the humans and elves come to a peaceful agreement and thus end their war over Harmondale. Following this, the party go to the city of their chosen "path" and meet with that city's leader, finding themselves undertaking a trial before meeting with their four advisers. Upon completing the trial, they soon find themselves working on a series of tasks for the advisers, who eventually reveal themselves as off-worlders and the Terrans that arrived on Enroth.

What was witnessed by the war parties of elves and goblins was not the full story - when the Terrans emerged from the sea, they soon fell into disagreement over their mission. While Resurectra, Robert the Wise, Crag Hack and Sir Caneghem, wanted to build a forgotten Gate created by the Ancients, capable of allowing them to reach the two warring Guardians and perhaps even the enigmatic Ancients themselves, the others, Kastore, Tolberti, Dark Shade and Maximus, wanted to revive the Ancients' broken Heavenly Forge, capable of creating futuristic weaponry beyond compare, and use it to conquer Enroth. Eventually, the two groups separated into two parties - one "good" and one "evil" - and began exploring Antagarich, but not before each party set up a trap on the "Lincoln" to prevent the other side from gaining control over it. While Kastore led the "evil" party and eventually secured places in Deyja beside Archibald in order to continue to research a way to revive the Forge, Resurectra led the "good" party and formed an alliance with Gavin in order to complete the Gate, with both finding that needed champions to get control of the seedship and recover an important device known as Oscillation Overthruster, to complete their instrument of victory.

Before the party can retrieve the device needed by Resurectra/Kastore, they first find themselves having do battle against the diabolical Kreegans (the devil-like race that featured in Might and Magic VI) and eliminate their monarch, Xenofex. Travelling to the Land of the Giants, the party soon receive a message from Archibald upon arrival, informing them that (regardless of their alignment) Kastore deposed him and took control of the Necromancers. Having become weary and guilt-ridden for his past crimes, he asks the players to enter the Kreegan's fortress and rescue Roland, in the hopes it will lift a death sentence put on him by Catherine. Rescuing Roland and defeating Xenofex, the party watch as the Ironfists reunite, before Archibald renounces his claim to Enroth's throne and departs in peace (which leads on into Heroes of Might and Magic III: Armageddon's Blade).

With the Kreegan dealt a blow, the party soon receive wetsuits from Resurectra/Kastore, and venture into the "Lincoln" battling droids and finally retrieving the Osciliation Overthruster. The story ends depending on the party's chosen alignment. If Light, Resurectra's party uses the Overthruster to complete the Gate, thus being transported to a neighbouring space station where the party meets Corak (that is, a second C.O.R.A.K. module Guardian - another appeared throughout Might and Magic II-V) who reveals the nature of the Ancients' war. If dark, Kastore's party uses it to revive the Heavenly Forge, thus producing an endless supply of futuristic weaponry capable of dominating the world. This ending was planned to be canonical, leading into the events of Heroes of Might and Magic III: Armageddon's Blade.

Backstory

''Might and Magic VIII'' takes place on the fictional world of Enroth, upon the continent of Jadame, and acts as a sequel to ''Might and Magic VII'' and ''Heroes of Might and Magic III: Armageddon's Blade''. Over a thousand years ago, the interstellar war between the Ancients and the Kreegan drove both races off of one of the Ancients' many colony worlds. During the millennium since, the original colonists and natives of that world built their own society and culture from the ruin, the stories of the Ancients and the Kreegan having long since passed into legend. Ten years ago, as depicted in ''Might and Magic VI: The Mandate of Heaven'', the Kreegan invaded the world. The heroes of ''Might and Magic VI'' destroyed the Kreegan Queen, and the last of the Kreegan were wiped out over the course of ''Heroes of Might and Magic III: The Restoration of Erathia'', ''Might and Magic VII: For Blood and Honor'' and ''Heroes III: Armageddon's Blade''. The Ancients, however, anticipating disaster should the Kreegan manage to gain a foothold on the world, had already enacted a scorched earth plan: rather than let the world fall into the hands of their ancient enemies, they would see it destroyed outright.

A servant of the Ancients, the planeswalker Escaton, arrives in the village of Ravenshore on the continent of Jadame. Approaching the center of town, he summons a giant crystal which unleashes an elemental storm across the continent. There is widespread destruction and the boundaries to the four Elemental Planes are breached. Now elementals and monsters from beyond the boundaries are threatening to invade, fulfilling Escaton's plan to draw the powers of the elements toward the crystal and destroy the world, and the player must assemble a party of heroes to prevent this.

The game features several recurring characters from previous titles in the series, including the Elemental Lords from Might and Magic II, the Ironfists from Heroes of Might and Magic, and the necromancers Sandro and Thant from Heroes of Might and Magic III.

Setting

The continent of Jadame is first introduced in this game, previously unmentioned in the series. The four elemental gateways appear in the four corners of Jadame: the Gateway of Earth on one of the Dagger Wound Islands (southeast), the Gateway of Water in Ravage Roaming (southwest), the Gateway of Air in the Murmurwoods (northwest), and the Gateway of Fire in the Ironsand Desert (northeast). In each case they cause an environmental disaster: a volcano in the Dagger Wound Island chain erupts and the tremors destroy the bridges that link the islands, the minotaur undercity in Ravage Roaming is flooded, the trees in a large area of the Murmurwoods are uprooted by the winds, and much of the troll settlement in Ironsand is destroyed by an explosion of fire. Escaton raised an enormous crystal in the centre of the city of Ravenshore, which acts as the portal to the Plane Between Planes, where the Destroyer resides.

The first character created by the player remains with the party for the entire game and is referred to as the "Acknowledged Champion of Jadame". This character leads the party through the adventures in the game.

Scenario

The initial character begins on the Dagger Wound Islands with low-level equipment, as a caravan guard employed by the Merchant Guild of Alvar. The pirates of Regna have used the cataclysm and resulting chaos to raid the Dagger Wound Islands. The pirates pose a threat to the player but are being continuously held at bay by native lizardmen. The characters must find a way to leave the Dagger Wound Islands and reach Ravenshore, the capital of Jadame, where their duty is to inform the Merchant Guild branch of the cataclysm. More evidence is required, so the party is commissioned to 'persuade' the smuggling ring in Ravenshore to send boats to gather more information. The smugglers are required as the Regnan pirates and their navy pose an increasing threat to other ships. The characters are next sent to the Merchant Guild of Alvar, in Alvar City. Here, Bastian Loudrin, the High Guildmaster, recruits the party into his service and requests that more evidence be brought to him of the lake of fire which allegedly formed in the Ironsand Desert. He asks that a witness be brought to Alvar. In the Ironsand Desert the characters locate a witness in the troll-inhabited town of Rust. This witness will not accompany the party to Alvar until his deceased brother's ashes are placed in the family tomb, which is also now infested with hostile creatures. When the characters return to Alvar with the witness, a doomsday prophecy is explained - that the destruction of the world is imminent unless the land stands united. The party must attempt to make alliances with the various 'factions' of Jadame, many of which are at war with one another. The minotaur city of Balthazar Lair has become flooded and in order to gain an alliance with the minotaurs, the characters must succeed in unflooding the lair. This must be done whilst fending off hostile water elementals. A choice must be made between allying with the dragons of Garrotte Gorge or with the Dragon Hunters; the latter are at war with the dragons. This must be done by retrieving an egg from the ogres in Ravage Roaming that contains the unborn heir to the King of the Dragons, Deftclaw. Returning it to the Dragons ensures their cooperation while entrusting it to the Dragon Hunters will gain their trust. Finally, a choice must be made between the Necromancers of Shadowspire or the Temple of the Sun in the Murmurwoods. To ally with the Necromancers, the characters must take with them the double-agent Cleric, Dyson Leland, who poses as a Necromancer, and steal the Nightshade Brazier, hidden in the Temple of the Sun, returning it to the Necromancer's Guild. To ally with the Temple of the Sun, the player, with Dyson Leland, must destroy the Skeleton Transformer in the bowels of the Necromancer's Guild. When this is accomplished, it is learned that the king and queen of Enroth are on their way to help, but are hindered by the Regnan fleet. The characters must find a way to sink the fleet. When the fleet is sunk, king Roland Ironfist and his wife, Catherine, arrive at Ravenshore with their sage, Xanthor. Xanthor says that he is able to fashion a key to gain access to Escaton's crystal and hence the Plane Between Planes, but that in order to do this, he must use Heartstones of the four elemental planes. The characters are sent to the elemental planes and battles his way through hordes of raging creatures to take the heartstones. Upon the completion of this quest, Xanthor is able to fashion a 'Conflux key' to Escaton's crystal. In Escaton's crystal the party battles creatures constructed from crystal, which are difficult to destroy. At the end of the crystal, the player must complete a puzzle to operate the portal to the Plane Between Planes. The Plane Between Planes is a place of utter chaos, which has the effect of driving weaker creatures mad. The characters battle creatures which are capable of causing insanity in the party members along with other hostile creatures. The characters must seek out Escaton in his palace. The palace is filled with Behemoths and other deadly foes whom you must fend off while searching for switches that open up different sections of the palace which will be audibly noticeable. (''There is one door that is visible with perception, but unlike any of the others it be open by clicking on it, only a switch will open this one'') After flipping the final switch, they may approach the Ancient's lair to learn that Escaton has imprisoned the Lords of the Elemental Planes. The player must answer three riddles in order to receive the keys to their four prisons. *When the lords of the planes have been freed, the characters return to Ravenshore to witness the destruction of Escaton's crystal and the restoration of peace to Jadame.

More than 14 years before the events of the series, a Japanese archaeologist named fell down the hole of the ruins on the mysterious Crow Island into the during his research on the . He was found and imprisoned by , the leader and general of the . A witch soldier named rescued him and later had a son named together. Jidan left her to seal the away in the , keeping the forbidden from turning the Human Realm into an empty haven for the and warlocks from their old, dying Magical Realm. During a voyage back to the Human Realm, Jidan was accidentally separated from his son, who would grow up to be a pirate on the . Jidan eventually married , with whom he had a daughter named . He taught their young daughter to believe in magic and use magic for happiness, with the True Book of Spells as a present for her 5th birthday. He left the family for the Magical Realm in search of his son, only to endure 6 years of imprisonment in , the underground capital city of the .

In the present day, Arusu finds herself in the Magical Realm at the age of 11, summoned by Lennon and the True Book of Spells. She is captured by some witches alongside a , only for to release her in gratitude for giving her a sweet chestnut, species of which do not grow wild in the realm. Arusu is initially delighted that her dream has finally been granted, however, she is not satisfied with the way of the witches, insisting that magic should only be used to make people happy. When she releases all the the witches have captured as the source of magic spells, she is tasked with removing the from and Eva, two apprentice witches of her age. During their attempts to recapture the fairies, Arusu and her new friends deal with the , an elite team of combat-oriented witches sent by Atelia, now one of the , for the same purpose. Arusu begins to live with her new friends in as Atelia arranges for her to live as an apprentice witch.

The reaches the day of the , which banishes apprentice witches who fail to pass at the age of 16 to the Human Realm, a fate all witches fear. During the evaluation, a huge attacks the realm, allowing the warlocks to find out that all the fairies have escaped. Arusu turns herself into stone to save the realm, only for to bring her back to life with her long hair. This causes Atelia to allow Qoo to stay in the realm because she is no longer a failed witch. Afterward, the warlocks invade the realm in search of the True Book of Spells, the 100 fairy species, and a witch, all of which they need to cast dark magic. With the help of the mysterious , Arusu and her group sneak into the Warlock Realm, where science dominates every aspect of life under a new rule. Arusu and her group accidentally reveal themselves as apprentice witches in disguise, forcing them to escape from the police. Arusu emerges from a coma to find herself healed and sheltered by , an old rebel who fights for the , the group of magic-using warlocks forced by the military dictatorship to live in the deserted . At the , Sheila learns from Sigma about the eventual destruction of their home realm, as well as the existence of the real portal to the Human Realm.

After Wil helps Arusu reunite with her group and save the fairies, she suggests to Sheila and Eva that they found the to protect magic and the fairies from the warlocks. During the celebration for the foundation of the Magical Girl Squad, Sheila drugs Arusu to send her on board , a ship carrying failed witches to the Human Realm. Under the order from the , Sheila spies on the Three Sages at night to find the traitor, the witch secured by the warlocks to cast dark magic, in hopes of removing the Curse of Eternal Youth from at least Eva. After surviving an explosion thanks to the True Book of Spells, Arusu returns to the Magical Realm with Lennon, who calls himself her "mirror". Discarded by his superiors for failure, Sigma becomes cellmates with Jidan and learns of the human's personal history. Eva begins to see a vision of a mysterious old man encouraging her to stay hopeful, causing her magic to become stronger than before.

During a meeting in the chapel, Atelia declares a full-scale war against the warlocks, scapegoating them for the destruction of the Magical Realm. The ensuing war is interrupted by Arusu, who screams to the masses that the witches and warlocks should work together to protect their home realm. The Magical Girl Squad and Lennon are invited by Atelia, who demands the True Book of Spells from them. She reveals that she broke the law of the witches and had a son named Lennon by Jidan, who stole the True Book of Spells 14 years ago, much to Arusu's shock. During a rebellion led by the special task forces, the warlocks mistake Lennon for Arusu and capture him away, threatening to kill both him and his imprisoned father unless he gives them the True Book of Spells. When the witches are approaching to fight back, , one of the commanders of the warlocks, declares the humans as a common enemy who keeps dark magic from saving all the citizens of the dying Magical Realm. Encouraged by Arusu, Atelia confesses her treachery and offers herself in exchange for her son, shifting the anger of the masses from him to herself. To get people to trust the humans, Arusu gives Grande the True Book of Spells in exchange for her father and Atelia as promised. During the destruction of Wizard Kingdom, Sigma rescues Arusu and helps her return with her friends, recognizing her as the savior foretold by his late father, who died in defiance of Grande's nefarious plans. When Luca and his men are looking for Jidan and Atelia at the bottom of , Jidan offers himself to save Atelia, leaving Arusu desperately searching for his body in vain. Eva suddenly loses her magic and grows weak from the plague that has afflicted many witches and warlocks as a sign of the destruction. The Magical Girl Squad temporarily surrender to Grande and the special task forces, who demand a mina fairy from them. After another visit from the mysterious old man, Eva accepts his offer to restore her magic with the True Book of Spells.

The witches and warlocks scream in despair as the Magical Realm crumbles through the fierce power of dark magic. Grande reveals to Sheila that Eva has darkness in her heart, allowing him to manipulate her into casting dark magic. Realizing that dark magic is made of hate, distrust, and despair, Arusu decides to save her friend despite her betrayal. Contrary to Lennon's warnings, Arusu manages to come back from the bottom of the Interdimensional Sea where she is dragged into the Human Realm by the . She feeds Eva a chestnut as a token of their friendship, saving the Magical Realm with the legendary in the process. Full of new hope for the future, all the witches and warlocks come together as one to rebuild their home realm. Sheila and Eva have the Curse of Eternal Youth removed from themselves by the Grand Master of Witches, who asks Arusu to stay and improve the Magical Realm, which the human girl refuses. After a tearful farewell, one of the interdimensional sirens takes Arusu home to Japan, where she finally reunites with both her parents.

The game begins in December 2000, with gangster Marcus Reed (voiced by Avery Waddell) arriving at the home of an associate who has betrayed him. Reed had been placed in charge of the organized crime empire run by his father, Isaiah "The King" Reed (Laurence Fishburne), who has been in prison for fifteen years. As an attempted hit was carried out on Reed in New York, someone stabbed Isaiah in jail. However, both father and son survived, and Reed now kills everyone who betrayed him. PDNY detective Terry Higgins (Mickey Rourke) then arrives on the scene. He is a close friend of Isaiah, and Reed's godfather, and he offers to cover up the killings, on the condition that Reed gets his life together.

Five years later, Reed is now a PDNY officer, working as a beat cop under the command of Lt. Deena Dixon (Mariska Hargitay). However, he has applied for and been accepted into the Organized Crime Unit run by Chief Victor Navarro (Esai Morales), where he is partnered with Higgins. On Reed's first night, Higgins heads for a meeting at a warehouse, telling Reed he doesn't need to know the details. Moments after Higgins enters the building, it explodes, killing Higgins. In the aftermath, Navarro returns Reed to Dixon's command. She tells him he can keep his recently earned promotion and work plainclothes, but is not to investigate Higgins' death, as Navarro wants the investigation to remain internal to OCU. Shortly thereafter, Reed is contacted by FBI Special Agent Gabriel Whitting (Christopher Walken), who informs him there is a mole in the OCU. Whitting believes Higgins was about to reveal the identity of the mole, which is why he was killed. Prior to his death, Higgins told Whitting to bring Reed into the investigation should anything happen. All Whitting knows about the mole is that they are in contact with four major crime organizations in Manhattan.

Reed's first investigation is the Magdalena Cartel, believed to be responsible for 75% of New York's cocaine trade. Higgins had made contact with socialite and philanthropist Teresa Castillo (Socorro Santiago), who he believed may be able to help him get inside the cartel. She gives Reed information leading him to the Magdalena safe house, where he chases down their leader, Rey (Paolo Andino). However, Rey turns out to be head of the Latin Lords, the main rival of the Magdalena Cartel; the Cartel was using Reed to take out their competition. Reed discovers Teresa's real name is Magdalena Rojas, and she runs the cartel. He arrests her, but she tells him she doesn't know who the mole is, only that as their information was always accurate, she knows it is someone high up in the OCU.

Reed next goes after the Palermo Mob. Whitting tells him that when the last Don was imprisoned in 1995, the mob went into decline. Recently, however, the remnants have begun to organize. Whitting believes a new Don has emerged, but is unsure who it may be. After taking down the mob's lucrative illegal organ operation and interrogating the new don's right-hand man Alfie, Reed is led to the family's don, Vincent Tuzzi (Fred Berman). When Reed interrogates him, he says he never met the OCU mole; all their business was conducted over the phone. All Tuzzi knows is that he has a Spanish accent.

Reed next investigates the Presidents Club; a gang run by five men using pseudonyms of former Presidents of the United States. They control the supply of a new drug called "Pop", a combination of ecstasy and cocaine. Four of the leaders call themselves Lincoln, Hamilton, Jackson and Grant. The overall leader is called Benjamin, who takes ironic pride in the fact that Benjamin Franklin was never President. Whitting sends Reed to a drug den in Harlem run by Lincoln (Phil Morris). Lincoln leads Reed to Hamilton (Richard Yearwood), who tells him the Yakuza have declared war on the Presidents, and Jackson is on his way to kill the Yakuza's leader, Kobi (Jeanne Mori). Reed saves Kobi from a drive-by shooting, and kills Jackson. Kobi tells him Benjamin's real name is Lionel Jones (Cornell Womack), a famed rapper and music producer. Reed heads to Jones' factory, arriving in time to see Kobi's men killed by Grant (Greg Eagles). Grant leads Reed to Jones' building, where Reed fights through Jones' men to his zen garden on the roof, seeing him kill Kobi. He interrogates Jones, who tells him he doesn't know who the mole in the OCU is, except that he calls himself "El Jefe."

Reed next goes after the Shadow Tong, a Triad outfit run by Leeland Shen (Jerry Ying). Whitting has only one way for Reed to make contact with Leeland; his step-sister, Vivian (Jennifer Chu) recently ran away, and Shen has been unable to find her. Witting tells Reed where she is, and Reed returns her to Leeland, pretending he wants to cut a deal for The King to distribute Leeland's merchandise in Harlem. Leeland puts Reed in contact with Lin (James Hong), who handles local distribution. However, Leeland discovers Reed is an undercover cop and orders Lin to kill him. Reed survives, and based on the information Lin has given him, goes to a Chinese dock ship where their human smuggling operation takes place. After he takes down the captain of the ship and interrogates him, Reed heads to Leeland's headquarters, where Leeland tells him he doesn't know who the mole is, but he does know a bribe is set to be picked up at a locker in Grand Central Station.

Reed calls Whitting, telling him he believes Navarro is the mole, and asking for a search warrant for the locker. Inside, they find the money, although Navarro claims he has been set up. In the good ending, Whitting arrests him, and, thinking the case closed, Reed heads home. However, in the subway, he is approached by Higgins. Reed immediately realizes Higgins was the mole all along; he knew Whitting was getting close to him so he faked his own death and then set up Navarro to take the fall. Higgins asks Reed to join him, offering him a bribe and threatens to expose his role in the massacre 5 years ago, but Reed refuses. He pursues Higgins through a subway car, eventually killing him. As a reward for Reed's work, Whitting promises to pull some strings to get Isaiah a hearing with the DA.

In the bad ending, Navarro kills Whitting when he tries to arrest him, and Reed pursues him into the subway, killing him. As Reed heads home, he is approached by Higgins. Reed is unsurprised, having realized Higgins had faked his own death. Higgins asks Reed to join him in Mexico, but Reed kills him. The game ends with Reed sitting in the subway station contemplating what to do with Higgins' money.

Ella is a lonely and misunderstood young woman living in a European duchy and is a lowly servant to her stepmother, the Widow Sonder, and stepsisters, Birdena and Serafina. She is shunned by the townspeople because of her anti-social behavior and nicknamed "Cinderella". In the face of ridicule, Ella boasts that she will live in the palace one day (as a fortune-teller once told her late mother).

Prince Charles, son of the Duke who rules the principality, has been studying abroad for years; his return being celebrated by three days of festivities and a ball on the final day. He starts to recall old memories he had of growing up there, including a small girl with unbearably sad eyes whom he saw when he was just a boy.

After getting into a spat with her stepfamily, Ella runs away to her favorite place, a small secluded pool on the Palace grounds. There she meets the eccentric town vagrant, Mrs. Toquet, who becomes her first friend.

The next day she returns to the spot, hoping to meet Mrs. Toquet, but instead finds Charles and his friend Kovin. Ella asks them where they are from and they tell her that they come from the Palace and that Charles is the son of the Chief Cook. Charles then recognizes Ella's eyes as those belonging to the girl he saw years ago. Ella thinks that he is making fun of her and pushes him into the pool.

The Sonder home is visited by their wealthy Cousin Loulou. Ella is supposed to be cleaned up to receive their guest, but her stepfamily is scandalized when they discover that she is barefoot. Ella remembers that she left her shoes at the pond and runs off to collect them, where she finds Charles waiting for her. Ella apologizes for pushing him into the water and he apologizes for hurting her feelings. Charles gives her an invitation to the Ball and a quick dancing lesson. After a waltz Charles steals a kiss and Ella runs away.

After the Widow Sonder, Birdena, and Serafina leave for the ball, Mrs. Toquet arrives, bringing a pair of glass slippers and one of Cousin Loulou's fancy ballgowns, claiming she has "borrowed" it for Ella's use. She has also arranged for a coach to take Ella to the palace and warns her to leave by midnight so as not to inconvenience the coachman's other clients.

At the Ball, Ella is besieged by young men wanting to dance with her, but she refuses to speak to anyone, trying to reach the Palace kitchens to find Charles. Charles learns of her presence and waltzes with her, revealing his true identity. The other guests note the unknown newcomer's exotic appearance and surmise (because of her short hair) that she is an Egyptian princess. As the clock strikes midnight, Ella runs off to escape her suspicious stepfamily, leaving one of her glass slippers behind, which is then picked up by Charles. While fleeing the palace, Ella's coach overturns and she is knocked unconscious; lying next to her on the ground are a pumpkin and several mice. Ella wakes up back home and is greeted by Mrs. Toquet, who informs Ella that everything she borrowed is back where it belongs.

Prince Charles informs his father that he has met the woman he wants to marry. Kovin, picking up on what he's overheard at the ball, hurriedly "explains" that Ella is an Egyptian princess. By the next morning, everyone has heard that the Prince has chosen an Egyptian Princess to be his bride. When Ella hears this news, she is devastated and decides to run away, first stopping at her favorite place to see Mrs. Toquet, to whom she bids farewell. Ella throws herself on the ground sobbing, until she looks up and sees the Prince, holding her lost glass slipper, which he declares will fit the foot of the princess he intends to marry. A crowd of gatherers, including Ella's stepmother and stepsisters, bow to Ella as she and the Prince ride off to the palace together. Mrs. Toquet, revealed to be Ella's fairy godmother, vanishes, returning from where she came.

This musical drama sweeps through a turbulent 40 years in popular singer Marika's (Sotiria Leonardou) life – and in the history of Greece – starting with the singer's birth in Smyrna, Turkey in 1917. Marika was deported to Greece along with all the other Greeks in Smyrna when she was seven years old, and a few years later, her parents started a career as a musician and a singer in a nightclub/bar. In the short space of one decade, Marika witnesses her father murder her mother, runs away from home, has a baby, and comes back to the nightclub to sing in an act with a childhood friend, Yorgos and a bouzouki player, Babis. Success finally comes at the expense of the suicide of another female singer at the club (named Rosa), but then Yorgos is exiled for political reasons, and she and Babis leave for other venues. Although Marika carries a torch for Babis, their relationship never seems to work out, and after many years and World War II go by, she sends her daughter away to a convent school (to later become a dancer in a cabaret, much to Marika's chagrin) and goes on a tour in America. She then returns to Greece to find herself supplanted by a younger singer named Matina who has caught the attention of Babis. Near the end of the movie, she is stabbed in the stomach the night of her reunion concert. Marika dies of her wounds and is buried by the people she sang with as they sing in her memory at the cemetery.

There have been hypotheses that the story is based on the life of Marika Ninou with Babis playing the part of Vasilis Tsitsanis. However, there are glaring differences between the film and the real life of Marika Ninou.

Marika Ninou only began singing after World War II. While she went to America, she never went with Vasilis Tsitsanis but in fact went with Kostas Kaplanis. She then returned to Greece and died of cancer. The film mentions a conflict with a singer named Rosa (Roza Eskenazi?) but no such incident has ever been documented.

Fourteen-year-old Amelia "Milly" Michaelson (Deakins) and her family move into a new suburban home shortly after the death of her father. Milly makes friends with her new neighbor Geneva, and Milly and her eight-year-old brother Louis (Savage), a budding military buff, have difficulty adjusting to their new schools, while their mother Charlene (Bedelia) copes with a demotion at work and her inability to learn how to use a computer. Louis is also plagued by bullies down the street who won't let him get around the block. During the first night at the house, Milly is in her bedroom talking to her pet bird. Something flies past the window, but when Milly goes to investigate she sees nothing.

Milly and Geneva observe Eric Gibb (Underwood), a boy with autism, living next door with his alcoholic uncle Hugo (Gwynne). Eric has never spoken a word in his life, doesn't like to be around people and exhibits bizarre behavior related to flying. Milly hears that Eric's parents died in a plane crash. Later that night, Milly and her family watch as Eric and three adults appear outside with Eric in a straitjacket and being restrained by two men. Milly later reveals to Geneva one night when Milly's mother is out for the evening that she finds Eric attractive.

Although Eric cannot communicate with anyone, he begins to react to Milly. Mrs. Sherman observes this interaction and asks Milly to keep an eye on Eric, explaining that because of Uncle Hugo's drinking, Eric is in constant danger of being taken by authorities and placed in a hospital. Milly works with Eric over the course of the school year and takes notes on his progress, which is slow at first. Milly notes excitedly the first time Eric smiles on his own rather than merely copying her own smile. Eric does nothing when Milly throws balls to him, except for one day when he spontaneously reaches out and catches a stray baseball flying toward Milly's head.

Strange occurrences, like Eric's apparent ability to appear in his own window one instant and in Milly's the next without any link between their homes, begin to make Milly question reality.

On a school field trip, with no one present except Eric, Milly falls off a bridge while trying to pick a rose. Knocked unconscious, she dreams that she wakes up in the hospital, with Eric sitting on the windowsill. After a conversation with him (albeit wordless on Eric's part), she becomes convinced he can fly. Eric gives her the rose she was trying to reach and then, taking her hand, leads her out of the window and the two begin flying. The two watch a fireworks display from a cloud before they share a kiss and return to the hospital window. After watching Eric fly off, Milly's dream becomes a nightmare as she sees her Dad in a hospital bed, dead, with a girl called Mona throwing a volleyball at her which knocks her out of the window.

Milly then wakes up in a hospital and tells her mother that Eric can fly and that he caught her as she fell. A shrink, Dr. Grenader, talks to Milly and tells her that Eric caught her as she only has a concussion and no serious injuries. Dr. Grenader, however, puts forth a more logical explanation and explains her belief that Eric can fly may be due to stress caused by the death of her father as he died from cancer.

Upon returning home, Milly notices the rose on her windowsill and becomes convinced that Eric can fly. When she shouts to Uncle Hugo about Eric's whereabouts, he replies by saying the institute has taken him away as Hugo was found drunk again. Despite the efforts of Milly and her family, they are not allowed to see Eric. As they leave, Eric tries to force the window open and is restrained by two men who try to sedate him. Another attempt by Louis to get around the block fails as the bullies tear his tricycle apart and to make matters worse, his dog Max is hit by a passing car and is taken to an animal hospital.

Later that evening, Milly thinks she spots Eric on his roof during a thunderstorm and after climbing into the attic, she finds Eric, who is soaked from the rain and shivering with cold. As Milly pulls a blanket around him, he pulls out a box and from within it, he takes out a ring which he gives to Milly.

When the authorities arrive at Eric's house the next day, Milly sneaks Eric out, and the police chase them to the roof of the school during a carnival. Eric turns to Milly and speaks her name, the first word he has spoken thus far. Milly asks Eric if he really can fly, and he smiles and nods his head. He holds her hand and the two fall off the building. Just before hitting the ground, Milly and Eric begin flying hand in hand in plain view of the crowd around the carnival, which follows Milly and Eric down the streets of their town, shocking Charlene, Louis, Geneva, and Uncle Hugo. Eric brings Milly to her own window, tells her he loves her, and kisses her before he says goodbye and flies away.

Milly is heartbroken, but quickly realizes why Eric had to leave: Over the following weeks, spectators, policemen, and scientists mob the town, looking for an explanation and taking all of Eric's belongings away to be analyzed. Milly speculates that Eric too would have been taken by scientists had he remained. It is revealed that Milly's father knew he had cancer, but kept it a secret from his family because he did not want them to worry. Rather than seek treatment, he said goodbye and committed suicide.

Despite all the ensuing media attention, Eric's story becomes an inspiration to the people closest to him in his neighborhood. Eric's uncle beats his drinking problem and gets an excellent job. The Michaelsons' dog Max gets better. Louis dominates the bullies down the street using a water gun full of urine. Charlene masters the computer at work. Milly regains interest in her life and relationships with those around her. The movie ends with Milly looking out the window waiting for Eric. As the sun sets, she throws out a paper airplane which flies ever upward.

Mike Mills is a teen with muscular dystrophy, whose destitute single mother placed him in a state nursing home, where he contends with being a young person in the clinic and with an abusive head nurse, while Wade Blank started ADAPT, a grassroots national disability rights group in Denver in the 1980s.

The game features three main story routes, known as '''Thanatos''', '''Pathos''' and '''Campus''', respectively. Each route goes for a different amount of "episodes", which can last between two and eight weeks of in-game time and focus on a specific segment of the story. Which route the player ends up on is primarily determined by the hidden '''Independence''' parameter.

The '''Thanatos''' route loosely adapts the story of the original show and spans 26 episodes. The first seven episodes of this route are compulsory in every playthrough. Like the original series, this route sees main character, Shinji, summoned to Nerv by his estranged father, Gendo Ikari, and tasked with piloting an Evangelion unit. He is placed under care of Misato Katsuragi, who functions as his guardian and parental figure. He and the other pilots, Rei Ayanami and later, Asuka Langley Soryu, must fight alien-like beings called Angels in order to prevent a disaster called the "Third Impact" from occurring. While it cuts out and changes certain things from the original series, the Thanatos route does not diverge from Neon Genesis Evangelion's plot in a substantial way. It adapts up to a brief version of ''"The Beast That Shouted "I" At The Heart of the World"'', and most endings it can culminate in resemble the final scene of ''The End of Evangelion''

After episode 7, the player will have the ability to move to and from Thanatos and the '''Pathos''' route, a version of events which follows basically the same plot outline but in a more comedic fashion. This route sees Shinji and the other characters doing a number of recreational activities to progress in the story, such as selling ice-cream, camping and synchronized swimming. This route also sees both Toji Suzuhara and Kensuke Aida becoming Eva pilots. It culminates in the Third Impact being prevented, as well as a number of additional, optional endings determined by the player's stats.

Starting in episode 21, the third route, '''Campus''', which loosely adapts the alternate, slice-of-life-esque world presented in episode 26 of the original series, may be unlocked by the player. This route sees Shinji attending class in a universe with no Evas or Angels, living a normal life as a teenage boy, where the staff at Nerv are now his teachers and the original ''Evangelion'' series is a fictional work written by him and Kaworu Nagisa in class. Mana Kirishima, the secondary protagonist of previous Evangelion video game ''Girlfriend of Steel'', is also now one of the students of class 2-A, and his mother, Yui Ikari, is alive and away on international work. This path culminates in one of two ways: either the player chooses to have Shinji end the ''Evangelion'' story with 'a happy ending in the new world', and the path will continue until episode 26 and give the player one of several Campus-specific ending combinations, or they will choose to end it by returning to the original world, and the path will terminate on episode 24 and return to the Pathos route instead.

All three main routes can be identified by the player by looking at the dialogue box shown in each episode. The Thanatos route's dialogue box has a dark grey border with the words 'Neon Genesis Evangelion' embedded above the character portrait. The Pathos route's dialogue box is a lighter grey with two green stripes on either side of the character portrait. The Campus route's dialogue box is purple with a gold trim around the edges. After episode 21, the player is locked into the route they're on, except in the case of Campus, which allows the player to decide between it and the Pathos route on episode 24.

The game also features an additional route, ''Kaworu Nagisa Education Project,'' which is unlocked when the player finishes a single playthrough of the main game. This route spans a single episode and sees the player take control of both Kaworu and Ritsuko Akagi in the place of Shinji and Misato. Ritsuko is tasked by Seele with educating Kaworu, their goal being for Kaworu to seduce Shinji, to distract him and allow them to use Unit-01 as the helm of the Human Instrumentality Project. This route can culminate in four endings.

In the prologue the protagonist meets an ambassador of the United States who on the subject of his thesis which is rejected. The ambassador convinces him to display his thesis in front of the public in the form of a novel. Chancellor complies, reluctantly, and soon becomes a famous novelist. The ambassador is revealed to be part of an organization known as Inver Brass. The organization is actually a group of intellectuals who intervene in political as well as economic matters when they think they are going off track. These intellectuals decide to assassinate J.Edgar Hoover, head of the Federal Bureau Of Investigation, on the grounds that they believe his private files contain damaging information on various political, military and other very important figures, and that Hoover uses this information to control them. When Hoover is assassinated by the work of the ingenious NSC official Stefan Varak, half of the files are not found. To get the remaining files Inver Brass recruit Peter Chancellor to get to the files, using him, by giving him a new subject for his novel, telling him that Hoover has been assassinated so that he will investigate further. From thereon Chancellor is trapped in a violent spiral, not knowing who his enemies are, desperately trying to finish his novel somehow.

Characters

• Peter Chancellor : the protagonist. A student by profession who becomes a novelist on the suggestion of Munro St. Claire.
• Stefan Varak (aka Alan Longworth) : an operative of the NSC. He works for Inver Brass and is the one who engineers the murder of J. Edgar Hoover as well getting Peter Chancellor to unknowingly work for Inver Brass.
• Munro St. Clair (aka Bravo) : an ambassador of the United States of America. Also a member of Inver Brass known by the name of "Bravo".
• Alison MacAndrew : daughter of General MacAndrew. She becomes a love interest of the protagonist during the course of the book.
• Quinn O'Brien : an operative of the FBI. An associate of Varak. He helps Chancellor and MacAndrew by giving them protection.
• Other members of Inver Brass known by codewords Paris, Christopher, Venice, Genesis and Banner.

Characters

The principal characters are Jian Campbell and his companions, a group of young adventurers who are caught up in a quest to save the world from the rising menace of the Vile Tribe. Jian himself is a headstrong delivery boy for Gad's Delivery who must often travel through monster infested lands to make his runs, and has trained himself in hand-to-hand combat accordingly. Lucia Collins is a kind-hearted yet bossy young girl who works with Jian, and has a natural gift for healing magic. Gabryel Ryan is a free-thinking young beast-woman who believes humans and beastmen should be considered equals, and fights with a combination of martial arts and magic dances. Flora Banks is a skilled marksman and healer who lives with her brother on the outskirts of the Frontier, a barren place that resembles the world of Lunar before the Goddesses' intervention. Rufus Crow is an adolescent Beastman and general of his nation's army who develops a rivalry with Jian after their first encounter, yet sees him as an ally soon after.

Primary supporting characters include Gad, manager and owner of Gad's Delivery Service where Jian and Lucia are employed, and Zethos, leader of the Beastmen and one of the world's strongest fighters who follows the old doctrine that his people are superior. The primary antagonist is Ignatius, member of the villainous Vile Tribe and expert magician who seeks to covet the power of the Goddess for himself. ''Lunar: Dragon Song'' is the first game in the series to not have Toshiyuki Kubooka as lead character designer, but rather as a design supervisor who made final decisions on each character's appearance and maintain a "distinct Lunar feel".

Story

The game takes place 1000 years before ''Lunar: The Silver Star'', making it the first game chronologically. The game opens with an explanation of the ''Lunar'' lore and how the Goddess Althena created a habitable place out of a barren wasteland and sent four powerful dragons to protect it. During the time of this game, Humans and Beastmen are still at odds with one another, and live in opposing towns across the world. The game stars a delivery boy named Jian Campbell who works in the busy port town of Searis delivering parcels and packages to anyone he is assigned. His best friend and partner, Lucia, often joins him in his excursions and helps him defeat monsters that litter the land. Along their journey, they get caught up in the legend of the dragons and, eventually, must put an end to an evil Dragonmaster who seeks to use their power to rule the world.

Miles O'Brien (Colm Meaney) and Julian Bashir (Alexander Siddig) crash-land their runabout on a planet that is home to several rogue Jem'Hadar. Their leader, Goran'Agar (Scott MacDonald), takes the two captive and asks Bashir to help cure his men of their addiction to ketracel-white, the drug that makes them loyal to the Founders of the Dominion. Goran'Agar has not needed the drug since he was stranded on the planet four years prior; he has concluded that there must be some substance on the planet that cured him of his addiction.

Bashir and O'Brien devise a plan to escape, but O'Brien's makeshift weapon is discovered. However, Bashir notes that Goran'Agar shows unusual mercy, and his conversations seem to indicate independence of thought and character. He decides he wants to aid Goran'Agar and his men, but O'Brien is convinced the Jem'Hadar will always be brutal killers regardless of whether they are dependent on the drug or not. Bashir eventually orders O'Brien to help him develop a cure by retrieving a piece of equipment from the runabout.

At the runabout, O'Brien escapes his guard. Meanwhile, Bashir concludes that there is nothing special about the planet that cured Goran'Agar of his addiction; through some biological fluke, he was never addicted in the first place. O'Brien finds Bashir, and when Bashir refuses to leave with him, O'Brien sabotages his work. Goran'Agar confronts them, but his merciful ways have lost him the loyalty of his men, and with no hope of a cure, he finds he has no reason to kill O'Brien and Bashir. He leads them to their runabout and asks O'Brien, a former soldier, to explain to Bashir why he cannot abandon his men, even if they would kill him if he stayed. On their way back to Deep Space Nine, O'Brien tries to explain to Bashir that all his efforts were intended to save him.

Meanwhile, Lt. Commander Worf (Michael Dorn) acclimates to living on DS9 and no longer being Chief of Security. He finds Quark dealing with a smuggler, and, frustrated by Constable Odo's apparent refusal to arrest the two, confronts them himself. Odo appears and explains to Worf that he wanted the deal to go ahead so that he could track the smuggler and break down the entire smuggling ring, but Worf's interference has made that impossible. Captain Sisko explains to Worf that life on Deep Space Nine has many grey areas that will take some getting used to.

Tommy Kelly is a fifteen-year-old sent to the Military Academy under an assumed surname. His father, a well-known crime figure, although now reformed, has made the family name so notorious that his relatives find it difficult to relate to society at large once the truth becomes known. At the school he makes friends with two other misfits, a cocky champion athlete and an overprotected son of a wealthy family who cannot adjust himself to the strict regimen. A senior cadet immediately becomes the nemesis of the three younger boys.

Kelly's family name is exposed and he faces ostracism from fellow cadets, except for his two friends who continue to support him. Ultimately, however, all the boys prove themselves to be fine, upstanding, patriotic young Americans on the eve of World War II.

Derek Bentley (Eccleston) is an illiterate, epileptic young adult with developmental disabilities who falls into a gang led by a younger teenager named Christopher Craig (Reynolds). During the course of the robbery of a warehouse in Croydon, in which Bentley is encouraged to participate by Craig, the two become trapped by the police. Officers order Craig to put down his gun. Bentley, who by this time has already been arrested, shouts "Let him have it, Chris" – whether he means the phrase literally ("Let him have the gun") or figuratively ("Open fire!") is unclear. Craig fires, killing one officer and wounding another. Because he is a minor, Craig is given a prison sentence for the crime. Meanwhile, Bentley is sentenced to death under the English common law principle of joint enterprise, on the basis that his statement to Craig was an instigation to shoot. Bentley's family makes an effort for clemency which reaches Parliament. However, the Home Secretary (who has the power to commute the death sentence) declines to intervene. Despite his family's efforts and some public support, Bentley is executed in 1953 within a month of being convicted, before Parliament takes any official action.

The core of the plot is the romantic triangle formed by the protagonist, a conscript soldier named Private Brigg; a worldly professional soldier named Sergeant Driscoll and Phillipa Raskin, the daughter of the Regimental Sergeant Major. The location is a British army base in Singapore during the Malayan Emergency.

Brigg and Phillipa are virgins in every sense of the word; they're both barely out of adolescence. Brigg is fearful of Phillipa's father and hardly dares go near her. He is equally afraid of the Malay and Chinese prostitutes in the nearby city. His only outlet is with his mates in the barracks, who fantasize endlessly about what they might do without actually knowing how to go ahead and do it.

Phillipa is getting more and more rebellious, eventually setting herself up with Sgt. Driscoll as a lover, while she leads Brigg on in the romance department. Brigg finally summons up the courage and the cash to approach a prostitute, called Juicy Lucy by the troops. The encounter starts disastrously but after Lucy realizes Brigg is a virgin, she takes pity on him and begins his education in her own way. This develops into a long-term relationship, at least for Brigg, who she calls affectionately "Bigg". Brigg tries not to think about what Lucy does when he is not with her.

Driscoll is seething with his own inner demons. He keeps taunting a Sgt. Wellbeloved with the phrase "Rusty nails!". Wellbeloved boasts constantly of keeping the Japanese busy during WW2, as a one-man guerilla army. Towards the end of the tale, the secret is revealed: Wellbeloved was a coward, and Rusty Nails was the nickname of the soldier he betrayed to the Japanese. Driscoll beats Wellbeloved to a pulp on behalf of the victim.

The novel crystallizes around violent incidents involving rioting in the city and an attack by Communist guerillas on a train. Several of Brigg's friends are killed. Brigg tries to find Lucy for solace, only to be told she was beaten to death by soldiers. (In the film, the locomotive destroyed was one of the last four used to haul mainline BR steam - the famous Fifteen Guinea Special.) Days before he is to be sent home, he confronts Phillipa with his frustrations, with unexpectedly pleasant results. For Phillipa, however, he is a passing fancy. Her sergeant awaits ...

Eventually Brigg and his remaining friends are about to embark for home. The final scene has them shouting the name of a laundryman, whom Brigg has mistakenly shot in the hand in an earlier episode, a certain Fuk Yew. It symbolizes their relation to Malaya and Malaya to them, when the tailor responds with the appropriate hand signal, using his damaged hand.

Nathalie's considerably older husband George (Harvey Keitel) is a prominent judge whose only weak spot is Nathalie herself. The two are newlyweds, spending their vacation at her family's remote island beach house. Lance (Craig Sheffer), who has known her since childhood, looks after the place. George goes on an overnight fishing trip with Lance to get to know him better.

Nathalie's a bit nervous, as it will be the first night she'll be apart from him since they got married. Her ex-boyfriend, Kent (Billy Zane) arrives, seemingly unannounced, but she welcomes the company. He tells her that his girlfriend recently left him because of his drinking problem. While Nathalie is in the bathroom, Kent grabs a bottle of vodka from her husband George's supply. He makes a pass at her, while drinking directly from the bottle. The evening ends with him passing out on her marital bed. Waking up on the sofa, Nathalie discovers Kent dead, apparently from alcohol poisoning.

Panicked and terrified, Nathalie quickly stores Kent's naked body in the cellar. When George returns from his fishing trip, she tries her best to conceal the night's events and act normal. As the two talk, George notices the cellar door under the dining table isn't completely closed. George stomps on the floorboard and corrects the problem. As Nathalie's panic intensifies, George finds the flowers and chocolate that Kent had given her. She admits he gave her a surprise visit while George was on the fishing trip, and that she put his body in the cellar.

They take the body to the nearby tool shed, debating over what to do. The situation is further complicated because Kent's clothes are missing and his neck was broken by George stomping on the cellar door. George's being a prominent judge and Nathalie's history of pill addiction make him feel they must dispose of the body themselves. Although Nathalie believes that the authorities should be notified and the situation explained, George insists that it is not possible.

While the two decide to dispose of his body in the ocean by tying him down with an old stove, Lance inadvertently shows up and the two are forced to rethink their original strategy. As Nathalie and George return home, they get into a heated argument. Nathalie criticizes George's annoying habit of strangely storing items in unconventional places, such as storing sausages in a cigar box. When George questions how Kent could have possibly died, Nathalie mentions his “weak heart” and the fact that he was drinking from George's personal liquor supply. George reveals that the liquor bottle which Kent drank from was actually not (ethyl) alcohol but methanol (methyl alcohol) which is poisonous. Kent's heart problems along with the disguised powerful liquid drug led to his death. As the two leave each other in frustration over not having disposed of the body, Nathalie goes for a swim.

Coming back from her swim, Nathalie notices Kent's white linen suit drying on the porch of Lance's house. She insists on taking the suit to clean it. Believing she's found a solution to their problem, Nathalie goes in search of George to tell him the good news. She spots George on the veranda. He has apparently already embedded Kent's dismembered body into the concrete steps. Horrified, Nathalie runs but is quickly captured by George. After taking her back to the house, tying and gagging her, George goes out to finish the job. Nathalie manages to free herself and goes to Lance. She explains the situation and is relieved by Lance's calm and support. Then Nathalie sees the missing postcard Kent had sent her in his house. Lance says he meant to give it to her but forgot.

Nathalie then believes that Lance knew Kent was coming all along and switched the alcohols to kill him. Horrified, she runs to George, believing him to be an innocent victim in Lance's murder plot. Lance, insisting upon his innocence, follows Nathalie outside to the beach. As Lance and Nathalie are confronted by George, the situation ends with George shooting Lance. Nathalie runs but is captured by George again. He has been drinking heavily and is completely disoriented but manages to cement Nathalie's legs in a metal container.

Revealing that he was behind the whole ordeal, George explains that he knew Kent was coming that night from the postcard he placed in Lance's mailbox to frame him and keep Nathalie from knowing about Kent's visit. He switched the liquor before the trip, hoping Kent would drink it and die. Afterward, George starts to have trouble walking and says that he can't see. Nathalie realizes that George has unknowingly drank the tainted liquor, and that Kent really did die of a heart attack. George then falls off the high rise veranda and is impaled by its spire. As a domino effect, Nathalie is thrown into the water and is unable to surface on her own due to her cemented legs. Luckily, a local beach patrol boat passes by and Nathalie is rescued.

The scene ends with Nathalie in her own boat telling the beach patrolman her story from the very beginning. The patrolman, behind her, asks for a beverage, and Nathalie tells him to check in the cooler under the seat. Unbeknownst to Nathalie, George had added some of Nathalie's medication to the water bottle which the patrolman is about to drink.

An overworked Chief O'Brien is attempting to repair numerous malfunctions throughout the station, including most of the station's food replicators. He unknowingly activates a device hidden in one of the replicators. Shortly afterwards, O'Brien begins showing signs of aphasia: he becomes unable to speak coherently, or comprehend spoken language.

Lt. Dax soon becomes aphasic as well. Dr. Bashir discovers that the aphasia is caused by a virus in the food created by replicators on the command level. People all over the station begin showing signs of infection. In addition to aphasia, the virus causes a dangerously high and potentially deadly fever in its victims. The station is put under quarantine to keep the virus from spreading.

Odo discovers that the bartender Quark has been selling food from a replicator in an unoccupied room on the command level, resulting in the contaminated food being spread all over the station. The virus mutates to become airborne, endangering the entire population of the station.

Major Kira soon finds a module in the last replicator O'Brien had worked on; Bashir discovers that it wrote the aphasia virus into the molecular pattern of any food being replicated. Bashir determines that the virus was engineered by a Bajoran terrorist during the time of the Cardassian occupation of Bajor.

The doctor who created the virus is long dead, but one of his fellow resistance fighters, Surmak Ren, is now the administrator at a Bajoran hospital. Kira believes Dr. Surmak may have knowledge of the virus, so she decides to bring him to DS9. At first, Commander Sisko refuses to allow Kira to leave, but she assures him she will not break quarantine. Kira flies to Bajor and transports Surmak directly to her runabout. Initially, Surmak refuses to help, but relents when Kira reveals that by being aboard the runabout, Surmak is also infected with the aphasia virus.

Meanwhile, virtually the entire crew is incapacitated. A freighter captain, desperate to avoid infection, tries to leave DS9 without clearance, and ruptures his ship's power core in the process. To prevent the resulting explosion from destroying half the station, the ship must be ejected from its dock. Odo recruits Quark, who is unaffected by the virus, to assist him in jettisoning the ship, and it explodes at a safe distance. Surmak is eventually able to create a vaccine for the aphasia virus.

A damaged, unidentified vessel from the Gamma Quadrant docks at Deep Space Nine for repairs. Its reptilian pilot, identified only as Tosk, is the first known life-form from the Gamma Quadrant to visit the station. Chief Miles O'Brien suspects Tosk is running from something due to evidence of weapons fire on his vessel. O'Brien befriends Tosk and tries to help him repair his ship. However, Tosk attempts to steal from a weapons locker and is put in a holding cell by Security Chief Odo (René Auberjonois).

Uniformed aliens arrive through the wormhole, beam onto DS9, and start a phaser battle with a team led by Commander Benjamin Sisko (Avery Brooks). The aliens fight their way into the brig where Tosk is being held. Sisko, O'Brien and Odo enter the room as one of the aliens (Gerrit Graham) expresses his disappointment at finding Tosk captured alive; Tosk, it transpires, is the alien Hunters' quarry. The Hunter commands Sisko to lower the forcefield and release Tosk, but Sisko refuses. They discuss the issue and the Hunter agrees to place the wormhole out of bounds for future hunts. As much as he detests this practice, Sisko believes that under the Prime Directive, the law forbidding interfering with alien cultures, he must release Tosk to the aliens.

After talking to the bartender Quark (Armin Shimerman), O'Brien realises that he can change the rules of the hunt before Tosk is taken away by the Hunters. He lies to Odo and convinces him to release Tosk into his care, claiming it is a Starfleet, not a Bajoran matter. O'Brien escorts the Hunter and Tosk to an airlock, but the Chief has it rigged to overload, knocking out the Hunter, allowing O'Brien to help Tosk escape. In Ops, Sisko is informed about the situation and tells Odo to pursue the duo at a leisurely pace, giving O'Brien time to help Tosk escape the station with the Hunters in pursuit. Later, an angry Sisko reprimands O'Brien for his actions; the Chief expresses his surprise at not being apprehended immediately by Odo. Sisko claims that he must have slipped up and smiles wryly after O'Brien has left his office.

In 2003, Mirabelle Buttersfield is an aspiring artist from Vermont who works at the evening gloves counter at Saks Fifth Avenue, Beverly Hills. Her quiet, orderly existence filled with both the mundane – futon furniture and an aging pickup truck – and the serious – a large student loan and a supply of antidepressants – is disrupted by the sudden appearance of two disparate men.

Jeremy is an immature, socially inept, penniless graphic designer for an amplifier manufacturer and an aspiring typographer who meets Mirabelle in a laundromat. Mirabelle, aching for meaningful contact, gives Jeremy a chance but it quickly fizzles after a halfhearted date, followed by a woefully underwhelming sexual encounter.

Ray Porter is an older, suave, wealthy, divorced logician who charms Mirabelle over several dates, one of which ends at his house. Mirabelle offers herself to him, and the morning after they have sex, Ray tells her that he does not intend for their relationship to be serious due to his constant travel between Los Angeles and Seattle. Each has a different understanding of this talk: Ray tells his psychiatrist that Mirabelle knows he will see other people, and Mirabelle tells her acquaintances that Ray wants to see her more.

Mirabelle and Ray embark on a lengthy affair, while Jeremy attempts to have one last liaison with Mirabelle before leaving as a roadie for the band Hot Tears, but she spurns him due to her relationship with Ray. While on tour, the band's lead singer introduces Jeremy to the world of self-improvement and how to better relate to the opposite sex. Mirabelle becomes increasingly devoted to Ray, who showers her with expensive gifts, such as paying off her student loans, instead of emotional affection. When Mirabelle's depression hits hard, as she has ceased taking her antidepressants because Ray makes her happy, he takes her to the doctor and cares for her, further deepening her reliance on him. Ray invites Mirabelle on a trip to New York, and has her fitted in the dress shop at Armani.

During a business trip, Ray has dinner with an old girlfriend who propositions him and he accepts, confessing the liaison to Mirabelle. Devastated, Mirabelle ends the relationship, abandons her trip to New York, and visits Vermont instead. While she basks in the warmth and familiarity of home, Ray calls to apologize for hurting her and asks her to meet him in New York. There, he takes her to a large party where she is the youngest guest and feels alone and out of place. At the hotel room, Ray wants to be intimate but Mirabelle rejects him.

Returning to California, Mirabelle encounters Jeremy on the way to an art show, and they arrive together. Her coworker Lisa, suspicious of Mirabelle’s new clothes, mistakes Jeremy for Ray, and Jeremy's self-improvement is obvious to everyone but Mirabelle. Lisa seduces Jeremy as they go back to her place and have sex. Mirabelle goes home with Ray. In the morning, Ray devastates Mirabelle by announcing his plans to find a bigger house in case he meets someone and decides to have kids. Jeremy calls Lisa, but learns she has no interest in anything but Ray Porter and his money.

Mirabelle permanently ends her relationship with Ray and, after a brief period of mourning, quits her job at Saks to become a receptionist in an art gallery. Jeremy pursues her again, properly, and they fall in love. Mirabelle is invited to show her work at the gallery, and Ray attends the opening with his new girlfriend, a gynecologist. Jeremy is clearly proud of Mirabelle, and their relationship is in stark contrast to Ray and Mirabelle, whose conversation is full of recognition yet noticeably strained. Ray apologizes for how deeply he hurt her and admits that he did love her and Mirabelle is visibly touched by his admission, and runs lovingly into Jeremy's arms. Watching the healthy, openly loving couple, Ray remarks that he feels a loss even though he had kept Mirabelle "at arm's length" to avoid the pain of their inevitable breakup.

A news reporting team cover a story in an Anatolian village where many people have seemingly died from pneumonia while a team of scientists try to find a cure. A terrorist group disguised as farmers attack and kill everyone there. Some days later, a former North Korean spy shows up at the South Korean embassy in Istanbul.

Meanwhile, in Hong Kong, Buck Yuen, an exercise equipment salesman, inadvertently foils a bank robbery and becomes a media celebrity. Later that night, a stranger called Manny Liu approaches Yuen and says that he is looking for men of Yuen's age and description on behalf of a terminally ill Korean man, Park Won-jung, who wants to pass his fortune to his long-lost son.

Yuen agrees and follows Liu's associate to South Korea to meet Park in a military hospital. Later, Yuen is approached by Carmen, a reporter, who asks him questions about Park. When Yuen returns to the hospital, he saves Park from a group of thugs and accepts Park's offer to play a "game" – if Yuen wins, he gets everything Park leaves behind for his biological son; if Yuen loses, he will still have fun. Park also gives Yuen a shiny crucifix similar to the one Yuen sees his parents holding in his dreams. After Park's death, Yuen scatters his ashes at his wife's grave and finds a message ("wait for me") engraved on the tombstone. After leaving the cemetery, Yuen and Carmen narrowly evade attacks from thugs. Yuen later realises that "wait for me" corresponds to a phone number of a bank in Istanbul.

In Istanbul, Yuen uses the crucifix, which turns out to be a stamp, to retrieve the contents of Park's safety deposit box. Shortly after leaving the bank, he encounters several robbers trying to steal his briefcase full of money. He holds off the robbers until the police show up and the robbers flee. While touring Istanbul, Yuen meets a mysterious Chinese woman, Yong, who has "wait for me" embroidered on her scarf. When Yuen asks her where she got her scarf, she arranges to meet him at a later date and time.

When Yuen is at a Turkish bath, he gets accosted by a group of thugs demanding that he hands over "the thing". After a long chase through the streets, Yuen finally escapes from them but shows up late for his meeting with Yong. Just then, Carmen and her colleague, Philip, approach Yuen and reveal to him that they are actually CIA agents. The "thing" that everyone is after is a biological weapon, Anthrax II, a more powerful version of anthrax. The weapon had already killed many people in Anatolia, which was chosen as a testing ground. Park developed brain cancer as a result of his involvement in the case. Yuen also learns that Zen, a crime lord, wants to buy the Anthrax II and had sent Yong to get close to Yuen to gather information.

Yuen meets up with Yong, who confirms she is working for Zen. Moments later, they are captured by a group of thugs and brought back to the Anatolian village. As the thugs are beating up Yuen to force him to tell them where the Anthrax II is, mercenaries attack the village and gun down all the thugs. In the ensuing chaos, Yuen escapes with Yong on a makeshift raft. They are picked up by Zen, who reveals that he sent the mercenaries to save them. Yuen also learns that Yong is a drug addict enslaved by Zen. Zen offers Yuen a new deal: more money and Yong's freedom in exchange for the Anthrax II. Although Yuen refuses, Zen still gives him time to find the Anthrax II.

Yuen recalls that there was a Bible in the safety deposit box so he makes his way to a nearby church and meets a priest who knows Park. The priest leads Yuen to the basement where Park temporarily stayed; Yuen finds two vials of Anthrax II there and a note saying "game over". Yuen then reluctantly hands over the Anthrax II to Zen in exchange for Yong. It turns out later that Zen had double-crossed Yuen by giving Yong a fatal dose of drugs. After Yong dies at the train station, Yuen gets arrested and thrown into prison but Carmen and Ashley bail him out. Carmen, feeling sorry for Yong's death, secretly reveals to Yuen that the CIA is meeting Zen the next day to discuss buying the Anthrax II from him.

Yuen takes matters into his own hands and tries to stop Zen at the airport. While Zen and his henchmen flee in a car, Yuen chases them, fights them and manages to get back the Anthrax II. However, the car gets stuck to the rear of a tanker, which soon catches fire. The tanker has to keep moving at a certain speed or else it will explode. After Yuen manages to save the driver and his son, the tanker is heading straight towards the edge of a disused bridge. Just then, Manny Liu appears in a helicopter and tries to pull Yuen out but fails. Yuen leaps from the tanker and grabs hold of the plastic bridge barrier as he swings down. He rolls down a slope, sustains severe injuries from the fall, and becomes unconscious. Liu searches Yuen for the Anthrax II, finds it and leaves.

When Yuen regains consciousness in hospital later, he learns from Liu that his entire adventure was actually a CIA mission arranged to be performed by him as an informal, non-official agent (an "accidental spy"). He was chosen because of his background as an orphan, his sharp intuition and excellent fighting skills. The dream of his parents is actually an illusion created by Liu, who added drugs into Yuen's drink to put him into a hypnotic state.

In a post-credits scene, Yuen, now officially a spy, delivers a briefcase to a drug dealer in Italy and tips off the police to arrest him.

Joe Cube is a high tech executive waiting for his company's IPO. On the New Year's Eve before the new millennium, trying to impress his wife Jena, he brings home a prototype of his company's new product (a TV screen that turns standard television broadcasting into a 3D image). It brings no warmth to their cooling marriage, but it does attract the attention of somebody else. Joe is suddenly contacted by a Momo, a woman from the fourth dimension she calls the All, of which our entire world (which she calls Spaceland) is like nothing but the thin surface of a rug.

Momo has a business proposition for Joe that she won't let him refuse. She is bent on making him start a company that will create a specific product that she will supply. The upside potential becomes much clearer for Joe once Momo "augments" him, by helping him grow a new eye on a 4D stalk, giving him the power to see in four-dimensional directions, as well as the ability to see into our dimension using a four-dimension perspective.

Jon Arbuckle becomes concerned about Garfield and his behavior after he and Odie mess up his house during the special's opening credits. While Jon drives him to the pet hospital, Garfield accidentally falls out of Jon's car and ends up getting lost in downtown. Garfield runs into a large gang of unfriendly alley cats known as the Claws. After Garfield antagonizes to the gang's leader, he flees into an abandoned Italian restaurant, where he is reunited with his estranged mother, Sonja. The building was actually Garfield's birthplace and where he inherited for his love for lasagna. Jon later calls a local newspaper to run a Lost and Found ad to find Garfield, though he decides to cut his ad short as it would cost him too much money.

The next day, Garfield meets the rest of his extended family, including his sickly half-brother Raoul, his cousin Sly, who is the security guard on watch for the Claws, and his tough maternal grandfather. Garfield is appalled to learn that everyone in his entire family are mousers. Meanwhile, the Claws finally track Garfield down, surround the entire building, and demand Garfield to come out. However, the family decides to fight the Claws instead of giving up Garfield to them. Garfield hides cowardly while his family fights the Claws and defeats them. Garfield's grandfather tells him that he is supposed to live with Jon instead. Reassured by Sonja that they all envy his normal life at Jon's house, Garfield tearfully says goodbye to his entire family and leaves. Frightened, tired and hungry, Garfield walks along a deserted street as it starts to rain. A car drives by and Garfield realizes that the vehicle belongs to Jon. Garfield chases Jon's car until he collapses on the sidewalk from exhaustion. When Odie finally spots Garfield unconscious, Jon pulls over to rescue him. Jon drives Garfield home and later puts him into bed for the night.

Garfield wakes up at Jon's house the next day and wonders if his entire experience with his family was real or not. Garfield glimpses Sonja looking at him through the window. As Sonja leaves Jon's house, Garfield smiles and emotionally whispers to her: "Thanks Mom, for everything".

Garfield wakes up early in the morning watching ''The Binky the Clown Show'' on TV, and learns that it is actually Halloween, causing him to become very excited about trick-or-treating that day. Garfield tricks Odie into thinking dogs are required to trick-or-treat with cats and give almost all of their candy to them, save one piece of candy for the dog. Odie is tempted by the minimal reward, and he and Garfield head for the attic to find costumes in an old trunk. After considering a number of options, Garfield decides that he and Odie will be pirates.

Garfield and Odie head out trick-or-treating amongst young children around the neighborhood that evening. When Odie expresses fear, Garfield assures him the scary characters they see are only children in costumes, only to lift some of the costumes and discover the characters are actually supernatural. By nightfall, Garfield and Odie arrive on a dock and Garfield decides to cross the river on a row boat to visit more houses. When Garfield tells him to put out the oars, Odie misinterprets the command and accidentally throws the oars overboard, leaving the boat adrift as the current takes Garfield and Odie down the river.

Soon, the boat arrives at an abandoned dock near a run-down mansion. They venture inside the home, thinking it is deserted, but are startled to find an old man sitting in an armchair. The man relates a story that exactly a hundred years ago, pirates, pursued by government troops, buried their treasure in the floor of the mansion and signed a blood oath to return for the treasure at midnight a hundred years later, even if it meant rising from the grave. The old man says he was the ten-year-old cabin boy whom the pirates had long ago. Garfield and Odie start to leave and Garfield asks the man if he wants to come too, but he has disappeared. The man steals their boat and leaves Garfield and Odie behind.

The longcase clock chimes midnight, and Garfield and Odie watch as a ghostly ship materializes on the river and pirate ghosts emerge from the water. Garfield and Odie hide in an empty cupboard as the ghosts reclaim their buried treasure from the floorboards of the house. As he and Garfield stay where they are, Odie sneezes and alerts the ghosts to their whereabouts. Making a run for it, Garfield and Odie jump into the river to escape, where Odie has to rescue Garfield as he cannot swim. Garfield and Odie are wash ashore and finds their boat with the candy still inside and untouched. They go home happy, and Garfield repays Odie's rescue by reluctantly giving him his rightful share of the candy. Afterwards, Garfield turns on the TV and watches the old man wearing his pirate hat and hosting an all-night pirate movie festival. Instead, Garfield turns off the TV and decides to go to bed for the rest of the night.

In an unspecified time in the future, a multi-national consortium sends six astronauts to Saturn to establish a helium mining factory to produce stabilized metastable helium ("meta"), a powerful rocket fuel, in the planet's upper atmosphere. If completed properly, each aeronaut will receive a billion dollars. With only enough "meta" to get them to Saturn, failure will cost them their lives. And all too soon the crew of astronauts crash-lands on a surface, which is actually the back of an enormous alien life-form. They dub the bizarre sting-ray-shaped creature that "swims" through Saturn's gaseous upper atmosphere "the Rukh". The creature is 4-kilometer-long and has two brains, both male and female. When part of their apparatus is swallowed by one of these giant birdlike beings, the crew needs to find a way to communicate and to be able to cooperate with the Rukhs so that they may survive.

The story of ''The Labyrinth of Time'' is loosely based on Greek mythology. The game begins during player's commute home from work. While aboard the subway, the player and their train car are suddenly sucked into an alternate dimension. An illusion in the form of the mythological character Daedalus explains that King Minos has forced him to oversee the construction of a labyrinth that spans the space-time continuum. Upon its construction, King Minos will invade and conquer all times and places with his supernatural powers. Daedalus pleads for the player to find a way to destroy the labyrinth before Minos can complete his conquest.

In-game terminals and journal entries reveal the extent of Minos's power. As explained by the lone archivist on a lunar library, a figure identifying himself as the king appeared simultaneously to all world governments in all time periods, seizing control of their militaries and erasing all written history. Minos's new abilities seem to extend beyond time travel; the scene of the king's tomb strongly implies that he rose from the grave.

Screenshot of the Maze Center

The labyrinth that the player explores spans many time periods and locations. Despite their incongruity, each area is thematically connected by the story of Martin Garret, a professor intrigued with discovering the tomb of the unnamed Sorcerer-King at a far-off ziggurat near Uxmal. Desperado Mad Dog Maddigan, the one man who knew the location of the Sorcerer-King's treasure chamber, was buried in the Western town of Revolver Springs, California, along with a map to the ziggurat's chamber. Revolver Springs, however, was destroyed in a fire on May 1, 1882, leaving the location of his grave a mystery. Garret was about to begin his second expedition to the ziggurat, but suffered from anxiety after losing his lucky shirt in a previous dig.

When the player finds the ziggurat, they can retrieve the shirt. They are also able to go back in time to Revolver Springs and pick up a newspaper explaining that the local graves were relocated to make way for a railroad extension project. The player leaves both for Garret to receive, changing history. With the encouragement and new information, Garret locates Mad Dog Maddigan and completes his expedition. Among the treasures brought back from the Sorcerer-King's tomb, Garret discovers a talisman that was reputedly used to destroy buildings.

The player must operate three levers in the ziggurat to reach the center of the labyrinth and take, among other items, the talisman to destroy its keystone. After dispelling an illusory Minotaur guarding the Maze Center, the player breaks the maze's keystone. This causes the labyrinth to unfurl at the seams. Daedalus appears in person to offer thanks for his freedom, then leaves to ensure King Minos can do no more harm. He leaves the player floating in an area that does not exist in time or space.

The game ends with a teaser for a sequel, ''The Labyrinth II: Lost in the Land of Dreams''. The sequel was never produced.

The story opens at a fabric dyeing mill. The quality of the dyes has noticeably worsened, and the factory owner, Wang, and his subordinate chief, Boss Wa, decide to hire some Manchu overseers to improve the work. Wang decides to cut the workers' salary to pay the mercenaries, and when the workers protest they are viciously thrashed.

When sitting in a tea house discussing their problems, the workers are joined by Chu Jen-chieh, a good-hearted small-time con man and the foreman's younger brother who is posing as a monk. He offers to help, but since he cannot actually do kung fu, he and the foreman's assistant, Ah Chao, devise a plan to trick the Manchu into reinstating the full salary pay, with Jen-chieh posing as the Shaolin's head abbot of 36th Chamber, San Te.

At first the scheme works, but Wang quickly works out that this man is an impostor, and has him driven away and his Manchu hirelings retaliate against the workers. Feeling guilty about what has happened, Jen-chieh leaves and heads for the Shaolin temple to learn the real fighting arts. His first attempts to enter by stealth are thwarted by the vigilant monks and his own bumbling, but eventually he manages to sneak his way in, just to run into the real San Te. He, too, realizes that Jen-chieh is not what he claims to be, but he announces that he wants to give him a chance: Jen-chieh is to build a set of scaffolds all around the temple and renovate the entire complex.

Somewhat reluctantly, Jen-chieh goes to work, but he is constantly distracted by the monks practicing martial arts in the 36th Chamber, which he can overlook from his high vantage point. Eventually, he begins to train himself in kung fu by using the conditions of his assignment to improvise training facilities. However, this causes him to lag behind in his work, and it takes him more than a year to finish the gantry. As soon as Jen-chieh announces that he is finished, San Te wants him to dismantle the structure and leave the monastery. Rebelling against this decision, Jen-chieh lands himself inside the chamber, and while trying to evade the abbot chasing him, he inadvertently manages to pass all hazards set in the chamber with ease. San Te finally corners him and forces him to leave, with a strange smile on his lips.

Jen-chieh returns to town to find that the conditions of the workers have worsened: Their salary has been cut by nearly half, and any who have protested had been laid off to eke out a meager existence. Elated by his return, some of the ex-workers begin to pester Jen-chieh with their high expectations, which leads to Jen-chieh instinctively and to his own surprise fighting them off with his newly acquired kung fu skills. The next morning, Jen-chieh appears at the dye mill and thrashes the overseers, using bamboo fibers (like the ones he used when building the scaffolds) to tie them up and incapacitate them, introducing his style as "scaffolding kung fu".

Once the overseers are dealt with, Wang and his bodyguards appear at the scene. Jen-chieh lures them out of the city to a mansion under construction, where he uses the building equipment and the tight quarters to his advantage. Finally overpowering Wang, he forces him to pay his workers their full wages again. Wang admits defeat, and Jen-chieh continues his training on the half-finished grounds.

Sally Farnham and her husband Alex inherit an old mansion from Sally's recently deceased grandmother. Shortly after moving in, she discovers a bricked-up fireplace in the basement den. The estate's handyman, Mr. Harris, tells her that Sally's grandmother had him seal it up after her grandfather died and that it is better to leave it the way it is. After he leaves for the day, she uses some of Harris' tools to try to remove the bricks herself. She fails, but is able to pry open a small side door used for removing fireplace ashes. Inside is not a fireplace at all but a large, dark, deep sub-basement. As Sally leaves the den, several whispering voices call her name from behind the fireplace, proclaiming that "She set us free."

Sally begins to feel unsettled in the house. One night she is awakened by voices whispering her name, and an ashtray mysteriously falls off her bedside cabinet. Alex dismisses her concerns and believes she is suffering from nervous tension. The next evening, something grabs her dress as she is walking down the stairs and she hears voices whispering "We want you." Freeing herself, she sees something scuttling away behind a curtain, which she believes is a small animal of some kind. Later, she hears the same whispering coming from behind the fireplace in the basement den. Alex remains unconvinced of her story, but makes sure the ash door is bolted securely shut.

The following night, Sally throws a dinner party for Alex's colleagues at his law firm. During the party, Sally sees a small, hideous goblin-like creature near her leg under the dinner table. She screams, but nobody believes what she saw and the creature quickly vanishes. Alex grows impatient with her and thinks she is becoming delusional. While Sally is in the shower, three of the goblin creatures turn out the lights so that they can attack her with a razor. As Sally turns the light back on, the creatures shriek and retreat from the brightness into the bathroom cupboards where they disappear. She tells Alex they should sell the house.

The following day, Alex goes away on business and Sally arranges to go and stay with her friend Joan. Before she goes, the creatures attempt to trip Sally down a flight of stairs, but they accidentally cause the death of her interior decorator instead. Sally tries to confront the creatures and asks them what they want, and they reply they want her spirit. Whoever frees them (as Sally did by opening the fireplace) must become one of them. Sally's doctor prescribes sedatives and her friend Joan stays with her. Joan begins to believe Sally's story. Alex remains unconvinced. He leaves to meet their handyman regarding the history of the house and the fireplace. Sally tries to stay awake but the creatures put sedatives into her coffee and cut the electricity. They lock Joan outside when she checks the circuit breaker. Sally manages to walk downstairs, but the creatures trip her in the dark. While she is semi-conscious, they drag her into the basement den and into the unsealed fireplace.

Sally, now one of the creatures, patiently waits for their next victim to move into the house.

Aliens who rule the planet Neptune realize that they have run out of their primary source of nutrition, "man-ham livestock," and decide to invade Earth to feed off the humans. They melt the polar ice caps, causing entire continents to sink under the ocean. The General of the Earth Defense Army begs a pirate called Narikeen to strike back at the aliens with his submarine, Sqoon. Narikeen, being of an evil nature, laughs at the pleas of the general, but reluctantly agrees to exterminate the aliens.

However, in the Japanese version, the message came from the United States of America's Pentagon and the message says in Romaji:

SOS...SOS... OTOTOSEIJIN NO SHINRYAKU ARI KYSOKU NI KAIMEN JOSYOSERI SQOON SYUTSUGEKI SEYO KAITEI NI HEIWAO!

U.S.A. PENTAGON

Lee Barrett, a private investigator and former intelligence agent discharged for his outspoken views, is approached by a man with a tempting offer to join a political organization opposing bioweapons. His refusal proves the correct response, as the man is an impersonator sent by his former boss, Eric Cavanaugh, to test his loyalty. Barrett is asked by Cavanaugh to investigate the murder of the security chief of Station Three, a top-secret bioweapons laboratory in the desert of southern California—and the disappearance of its director and head scientist, Dr. Baxter. After they arrive at the station and wait for a time lock on the sealed laboratory to open, they are advised by another scientist, Dr. Gregor Hoffman, to seal the laboratory using concrete. Hoffman informs them that there are two lethal bioweapons in the laboratory, a strain of botulinus that oxidizes eight hours after its release, and a recently developed virus that he calls the "Satan Bug", which could kill all life on Earth in a matter of months. Determined to discover what happened in the room and taking extreme precautions, Barrett enters to find Dr. Baxter dead, with the vials containing the "Satan Bug" and 1200 grams of botulinus missing.

A mysterious telegram leads Barrett to a nearby hotel where he has a surprise reunion with his old flame, Ann, the daughter of his superior, General Williams, who has flown in from Washington to supervise the investigation. Ann reveals that she sent the telegram, and that she has been assigned to Barrett as his partner, an arrangement neither minds. At her father's home, Barrett's speculation that a lunatic with a messiah complex is behind the theft is confirmed by a telegram, threatening to release the viruses unless Station Three is destroyed.

Barrett and Ann discover another scientist from the station (not heard from since the theft) is lying dead in his swimming pool. A phone call to the scientist's home reveals the name Charles Reynolds Ainsley, a reclusive millionaire crackpot and pharmaceutical tycoon who fits Barrett's profile and quickly becomes the focus of the investigation. After a demonstration incident in Florida proves the thieves' willingness to use the botulinus, General Williams receives a phone call threatening to release more of the toxin in Los Angeles County unless Station Three is closed. The caller hangs up before he can be traced, but not before confirming that he is Charles Reynolds Ainsley.

A police tip brings Barrett and Ann to the location of where a car broke down and was left abandoned during the evening of the theft. Deducing that the driver was involved, Barrett with Ann's help locates an airtight steel box containing the missing vials in a nearby stream, only to be confronted by two armed men, the thieves. They are taken with the box to the home of Dr. Hoffman, the other conspirator in the theft, who decides to take them hostage, unaware that they are being followed. It transpires that Veritti and Donald, the two men working with Hoffman, have hidden some vials with a time activating device in Los Angeles. At some point, the flask containing the "Satan Bug" is separated from the others by Hoffman, leaving the rest with Veritti and Donald, along with the hostages, despite an attempt by Barrett and Ann to overpower them. Soon the henchmen realize that they are being shadowed by two security agents in a car.

After a confrontation at an abandoned gas station, Veritti and Donald decide to lock the two agents along with Barrett and Ann in the garage. Realizing that the thugs intend to kill them, Barrett persuades them to keep Ann as a hostage, and as they leave they shatter one of the vials. Though both agents are killed, Barrett survives by forcing an exit and setting the garage afire. After an unsuccessful attempt to radio for help, he stops a passing car being driven by Hoffman, who has pulled a double cross on his own men. Barrett makes a deal to learn the location of the flasks in Los Angeles in return for the closure of Station Three, aware by now that Hoffman is actually Ainsley. After they hear an announcement on the car radio reporting the closure of Station Three (which Barrett knows is false, having arranged it earlier), they are intercepted by two men revealing themselves as security agents. Arresting Ainsley, they take him and Barrett in their car towards Los Angeles. Meanwhile, Veritti and Donald are killed at a roadblock in trying to escape, the flasks they are carrying are safely retrieved, and Anne is reunited with her father, who assures her Barrett may still be alive, his body not having been found at the gas station.

Barrett has realized that the "agents" driving him and Ainsley are more of Ainsley's security guards on their way to rendezvous with a helicopter flying above them. After single-handedly taking them down, he again confronts Ainsley, who threatens to break the flask containing the "Satan Bug", telling Barrett that he waited to steal the virus until the vaccine could be isolated, which is why Baxter and the other scientist were murdered. Now that the vaccine is in his blood, Ainsley is immune. He declares his willingness to destroy the world and then live on in it alone rather than give up the power he holds. The helicopter lands, piloted by another of Ainsley's men. Another uneasy deal is made between Barrett and Ainsley, and they fly off, eventually finding themselves above Los Angeles as it is being evacuated. In the meantime, a cryptic doodle left by Veritti leads Ann and the authorities to surmise that the other vials are hidden at the Los Angeles baseball stadium, and during an intense search, they are located in the ice of a concession stand, attached to a bomb.

Above in the helicopter, Barrett notes it is flying past Los Angeles, meaning Ainsley is pulling another double-cross. Barrett fights with the pilot who tries to throw him out of the helicopter, only to be thrown out instead. Barrett is in danger of falling out after him, but manages to pull himself back to safety. During the fight, Ainsley drops the flask containing the "Satan Bug", and as it is about to tumble out, Barrett grabs it at the last second. Having served as an army rescue helicopter pilot, Barrett successfully takes over the controls, then covers Ainsley with a gun, pointing out he has nothing now. Ainsley throws himself out of the helicopter rather than reveal the location of the missing vials, unaware that they are now safely disarmed. After contacting Ann and his superiors, Barrett prepares to land, commenting things are back to where they started.

After the climatic ending in the first movie, Alexander Duncan (McCloskey), is taken to a hospital where he is being operated on. He has flashbacks of his life, showing how he came to Hollywood as an inexperienced young man from rural Oklahoma.

He spends most of his time drawing instead of being a farmhand to his father, this causes his father to basically throw Alex out of the home; his reasoning being that as the oldest Alex needs to become a man and make it on his own now, and with six other people to feed, they just can't afford for Alex to be another extra mouth. His father is firm on this, and his mother is not able to change the decision. Alex packs a small bag and with whatever money he has, buys a bus ticket to Hollywood, California.

At the bus depot, a streetwise hustler named Buddy befriends him. Buddy takes Alex back to his apartment and lets him stay there for the night. The next day, Alex tries to find a job, but because of California's strict labor laws, he doesn't have any luck because he is still a minor. Alex sees male prostitutes hustling on the streets as a means of income, and becomes disheartened when he returns to Buddy's apartment and sees an older man walking out the door. Buddy gives him a realistic talk about survival, and convinces Alex to go to a client of his to make an easy $50.

Alex's flashbacks ends and he is in the present day. He awakens in the hospital to Dawn, and they reaffirm their love to each other. Dawn helps Alex as much as she can after he's discharged from the hospital and still recovering. Both are no longer hustling, and without money, Alex convinces Dawn to go back home to her small Arizona town to wait for him to come get her. He takes her to the bus depot to see her off, promising her that he'll come get her when he earns enough money.

He loses the job that Umber got him in the first movie as a stock boy in a department store because of his involvement with Swan, and is unable to get another legit job afterwards because of his previous prostitution recognition. He calls home and speaks with his mother, telling her he wants to come home, but his mother says no. Alex is desperate and frustrated, and resorts back to prostitution, getting picked up by an undercover police officer immediately.

At the police station while he's getting booked, he asks to contact Donald Umber, and is overheard by a psychologist named Ray Church. Alex gets released on Ray signing for him, vouching for his guaranteed court appearance. Ray tells Alex that Umber is no longer around town, but that he's a good friend of his, and asks Alex how he knows him. Alex says that Umber helped him and Dawn before. Ray takes Alex to a youth house for gay men, but Alex feels uncomfortable because he is not gay, and he leaves immediately after he gets there.

Returning to his apartment, the landlady tells him the rent is way overdue, and the mural that he had painted on one side of the wall is being covered over with a coat of fresh wall paint. In Arizona, Dawn isn't adjusting well to being back home, and longs to be with Alex again. While on his way to the post office, Buddy sees him on the streets and catches up with him. He convinces Alex to go on a double date with him and one of his clients and her friend.

They go to a nice restaurant and Buddy lends Alex a nice suit to wear. They enjoy good food and wine, and Alex opens up to his older date about Dawn. He begins to enjoy himself, and he starts to genuinely like his date, going back to her home for the night. In the morning she gives him cab money, and he gets upset that she viewed their night together as a transaction. He does not take her cab money, and finds out that she has a husband as well as paid Buddy for their date. Alex goes to Buddy's apartment and confronts him about it; he leaves Buddy's apartment for the second time after feeling disgusted with the whole situation. Since he's been evicted, and not wanting to stay at Buddy's, he ends up sleeping outside underneath a public playground.

The next day, he is loitering at an art museum and is noticed by a man named Charles Selby, who is a professional football player. Selby is a closeted gay, and he entices Alex with his lavish lifestyle, employing Alex as his current boy-toy. He's making good money under Selby's employment and companionship, but Selby is not naive to Alex's true intentions and feelings.

Selby and Alex run into Ray at a nightclub, and Ray reminds him of his court appearance. At court, Alex gets lucky and goes before a compassionate judge who dismisses his charges with a warning not to appear before her in court again. Ray also gives Alex some advice, stating that Selby is smart enough to realize that Alex is just using him, and that he should be prepared for when Selby replaces him.

When Alex goes back to Selby's home from court, he sees that Ray's warning has come true. Selby is enticing a new boy-toy with the same surfer posing photographs that he did with Alex. At a party that Selby is hosting, the realization that Selby is getting tired of Alex becomes more prominent. Ray tells Alex that he needs to start thinking about his own life; that he has no cause to be bothered by the new surfer boy because Alex was just hustling Selby anyway. He also states that whatever Selby might be as a closeted gay, he's not a hustler.

After dropping off Ray, Alex goes on a drug pickup for Selby, but the whole party gets caught when two stakeout detectives follows Alex back to Selby's. In Arizona, while buying a shirt for Alex, a man recognizes Dawn as a prostitute in Hollywood. Dawn runs out of the store mortified. In court, Alex tells the judge that he just wants to leave and get out of that town forever; the same judge that dismissed his charges the first time, is sympathetic to him again, and dismisses his charges again.

Ray drops Alex off at the bus depot, where he's bought a ticket to Arizona to get Dawn. As he's on the bus, he sees Dawn in the streets. He gets off of his bus and runs up to Dawn, telling her that he was on the bus coming to get her, and she should have waited for him at home. She told him about the incident at the store with being recognized by a former john, and that she just couldn't wait anymore.

The movie ends with Alex telling Dawn that they're going to a new place and will try their luck there. As they head back to the bus depot to decide where they want to go, they see a fresh new kid walking out of the depot down Hollywood Blvd. for the first time. They both look at the young kid, knowing the hardships he'll be faced with.

A sea plane flying on a stormy night malfunctions and crashes in the sea off the coast of The Bahamas.

Jared and Sam are lovers living a rustic life in a trailer, next to the beach in The Bahamas. Sam works as a guide in the local aquatic theme park, while Jared works a number of odd jobs in his field of passion, diving. His real dream is to find one of many treasure-filled merchant and pirate ships lost in the waters around The Bahamas. Derek Bates has similar dreams and a better boat, but Jared turns down repeated offers to work for him.

Jared's childhood friend, Bryce, and his girlfriend, Amanda (whom he just met the night before), come to visit. Bryce, a lawyer in New York City, has acquired the use of a luxury vacation house from a client he defended. While snorkeling, Jared finds artifacts on the sea bed that seem to stem from a ship wreck. The four of them investigate and find several other pieces that turn out to be the remains of legendary French pirate ship ''Zephyr''. They also discover the crashed plane and its cargo of cocaine—Bryce and Amanda want to recover it, but Jared refuses, dispersing the brick they retrieved into the ocean.

Needing money for equipment to salvage the treasure, Bryce and Amanda dive to the plane then try to sell a few bricks of recovered cocaine to local night club owner Primo. Primo turns out to be an associate of drug lord Reyes, to whom the cocaine belonged in the first place.

Jared, Bryce, and Amanda are threatened by Reyes, who demands that they retrieve his cocaine or face deadly consequences. When the trio inform Sam, she berates Jared for violating his principles by helping a drug lord. He tries to explain the situation, but she leaves him, saying that 'they' are over. After nightfall, Jared, Bryce, and Amanda dive at the plane wreck to salvage the cocaine and more artifacts. As they are moving the cocaine packs from the plane to their boat, Amanda is attacked and bitten on the leg by a tiger shark. They abandon the cocaine at the dive site to rush her to the hospital, where she dies. Hearing of the tragedy, Sam reunites with Jared, mourning for the loss of Amanda.

Sam insists on going to the police, and goes to the home of one of hers and Jared's close friends, a local cop named Roy. Roy turns her over to Derek Bates, knowing that he was Reyes' partner in the cocaine deal. Primo has captured Jared and taken him aboard Reyes' ship, where they find that Bates has killed Reyes and his entire crew, eventually killing Primo and Roy (when he tries to stand up for Sam) as well. Jared manages to escape after learning that Bates killed Reyes and learns of Sam's capture when he and Bryce try to contact her.

Jared and Bryce then set out to rescue Sam from Bates' ship, now nearing the cocaine plane. Sam is handcuffed and gagged with duct tape as Jared too is tied up. As they near the cocaine plane, Jared dives into the water and escapes his bonds, hoping to lure Bates and his men into the water as well. With the help of Bryce who has managed to hide in the plane, Jared is able to kill Bates' divers at the plane with the unintentional help of sharks, while their friend Danny helps Sam dispatch the men on Bates' boat after she manages to escape her shackles. Below, Jared and Bates are the only ones left. After getting Bryce to safety, Jared confronts Bates in the plane, eventually using an air tank as a missile by hammering off the valve. Bates dodges it, but it hits the fuel tank at the back of the plane, causing a major explosion, killing Bates. Sam jumps into the water and rescues Jared who manages to escape.

Six weeks later, the trio is salvaging the ''Zephyr'' on Jared's new boat. While trying to bring an old cannon to the surface, the rope breaks and the cannon sinks back down breaking a part of the ship. Jared is ready to call it a night knowing that Sam is more important to him than treasure, but Bryce who is unwilling to give up dives in again and shouts that he has found gold, much to his friends' excitement.

''Cyberia'' is set in the near future of the year 2027, five years after a global economic collapse. The world is under the dominion of two opposing superpowers, the First World Alliance in the west and the Cartel in the east. William Devlin, the leader of the FWA, receives word that a devastating weapon is being produced in a secret base in Siberia, referred to as the Cyberia Complex. Curious to unravel the mysteries of this weapon, Devlin pardons a cyber-hacker named Zebulon Pike "Zak" Kingston and charges him with the task of infiltrating the Complex and retrieving intel on the weapon being produced there.

Already getting wind of Cyberia's secret operations, the Cartel seizes control of the Complex with the same goal as the FWA–to discover the nature of the super weapon being produced by a third party. Zak is scheduled to rendezvous with an oil rig run by an FWA-contracted mercenary group managed by Luis Arturo Santos and his assistant Gia Scarlatti to pick up a TF-22 TransFighter, a sophisticated aircraft that will ensure Zak's arrival at the Cyberia Complex. Shortly after arriving the oil rig is attacked by the Cartel. After Zak and Gia defend the rig using gun turrets, the mercenaries, sensing betrayal, move to kill Zak by hunting him down and sabotaging the TF-22. Zak eventually steals the TF-22 and travels through several hostile locales en route to the Cyberia Complex; a mountain range infested with Cartel hoverfighters, a Cartel-run oceanlab, and a commuter tunnel are among the places visited by Zak. Eventually, the TF-22 reaches the Cyberia Complex and Zak proceeds to wreak havoc on the Cartel's analysis efforts.

While exploring the Complex, Zak encounters more than Cartel soldiers, as he is forced to eradicate the Complex scientists experimental virus which killed some of the Cartel soldiers. After purging the virus from the Complex, Zak uncovers the Cyberion, an amorphous collection of miniature robots, or nanites, that has achieved sentience. Devlin then contacts Zak and informs him that the cyber-hacker himself is a weapon, which Cyberion explains to mean that a high-yield explosive device has been implanted into Zak's brain. Upon reaching the Cyberion, Devlin had intended to detonate the device from orbit, eliminating the weapon and killing Zak simultaneously. Zak, frustrated over Devlin's betrayal and upon Cyberion's suggestion, merges with the Cyberion which defuses the explosive device in Zak's head. Together, Zak and the Cyberion launch into space to confront Devlin in the FWA space station. The station's defenses are slowly crippled until the Cyberion and Zak make the final move and kill the treacherous Devlin by destroying the station. The resulting shockwave causes the Cyberion/Zak amalgamation to lose consciousness while it plummets to Earth. Upon crashing, an FWA retrieval team led by a Doctor John Corbin is heard hoisting up the remains of Cyberion/Zak into a helicopter.

When a legendary British Intelligence (SIS) agent is murdered, fellow agent Miss Maxwell (Lois Maxwell) is sent to find the late spy's girlfriend, Miss Yashuko (Yashuko Yama), who is unwittingly in possession of valuable information. Maxwell discovers that Yashuko is in the care of Dr. Neil Connery, a cosmetic surgeon who uses hypnotism in his practice. Yashuko is kidnapped from a medical conference in Monte Carlo by Maya Rafis (Daniela Bianchi), as part of a plot by Mr. Thayer (Adolfo Celi), code name Beta, of the terrorist organization THANATOS. The Secret Service's Commander Cunningham (Bernard Lee) assigns—or rather, extorts—Connery to join the mission to find Miss Yashuko.

Connery hypnotizes a beautiful girl named Mildred (Agata Flori) to acquire information and discovers that Miss Yashuko is located in a Spanish castle belonging to Lotte Krayendorf (Anne-Marie Noé). Connery rescues Miss Yashuko and obtains critical intelligence. This information leads to the discovery of THANATOS's plan to build a super magnet, powerful enough to turn off all mechanical products from New York to Moscow. The weapon is being assembled in a Moroccan rug factory, where all the employees are blind. Miss Yashuko is murdered by Mildred before revealing any further information. Mildred is then killed by Juan (Franco Giacobini), Connery's aide.

After arriving in Morocco, Connery is invited by Maya Rafis to a party held by Thayer. During the reception, Connery discovers that Thayer is planning to assassinate the head of THANATOS, known as Alpha (Anthony Dawson), and he wants Connery to surgically alter an underling to become Alpha's double; however, Connery instead hypnotizes the underling into attacking Thayer, allowing Connery to escape. He warns Maya about his discovery as she leads him to the rug factory. Upon entering the factory, Connery realizes that it is actually producing strands of uranium, and the employees' blindness prevents them from discovering their dangerous role. Together, Connery and Maya track the final uranium shipment to Switzerland, where Thayer, having abandoned his plan to replace Alpha, has completed development of the powerful magnet and soon activates it. Together, with the help of a team of Scottish archers (as firearms are rendered inoperative by the magnet), Connery and Maya kill Thayer and most of his underlings before destroying THANATOS's Swiss base. After the completion of the mission, Commander Cunningham attempts to finagle Connery into continuing to work for him, but Connery hypnotizes Cunningham into departing for London immediately and leaving Connery in peace, allowing him, Maya, and an all-female yacht crew (formerly employed by Thayer) to enjoy a relaxing cruise.

Mike Wired, a World War II era fighter pilot is about to die in the sky in 1943, as bullets approach him before he can parachute to safety. Mike mysteriously somehow ends up being transported to a time with flying dinosaurs, which he manages to kill. He meets Paula, a survivor from ''Dino Crisis 2'' who speaks some English but is not able to speak long sentences. Traversing through the various stages under the guidance of Paula's father, Dylan, Mike defeats many different groups of savage dinosaurs using a special gun he gained, finally battling and defeating their intelligent leader, Trinity, which controlled the other dinosaurs. But despite falling in love with Paula, Mike must go back to just before his imminent death. Paula then edits the timescale to make the bullets vanish to prevent Mike from dying, and he is rescued by men on a boat, realizing that Paula was the one who saved him.

The game opens with Peter Parker explaining how he became Spider-Man, and the creation of the Venom symbiote. While researching a cure for terminal illnesses, Peter and Eddie Brock's fathers, Richard Parker and Eddie Sr., created a black liquid substance that can envelop one's body and heal them, in addition to granting them superhuman abilities. However, the two were tricked into selling the project to Trask Industries, and subsequently died in a plane crash, without ever getting to complete work on the 'suit'. Years later, Peter and Eddie reunite and discover the suit is their inheritance. After learning how his dad was cheated by Trask Industries, Peter tries to steal the suit and is covered by a portion of it. While it enhances his powers, the unstable suit also tries to consume him, forcing Peter to remove it. After discovering what Peter did and deducing his identity as Spider-Man, Eddie feels betrayed and takes the rest of the suit for himself, becoming Venom.

Venom attacks Peter, only to seemingly die after being electrocuted by a downed power cable. Meanwhile, Trask Industries employee Adrian Toomes, who witnessed the confrontation, contacts Bolivar Trask to inform him of the suit's capabilities. Three months later, while Peter has returned to his normal life, Eddie has been forced to feed on the life energy of civilians to prevent the suit from consuming him. One night, he attacks and defeats Wolverine to prove his superior strength. The following day, Spider-Man stops R.H.I.N.O., a giant, rhinoceros-themed mecha suit rampaging through Queens, and leaves its pilot, Alex O'Hirn, for the police. Meanwhile, Trask hires Silver Sable and her Wild Pack to capture Eddie, but he transforms into Venom and escapes after ravaging their forces.

During a field trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Peter senses Venom's presence nearby and defeats him. Eddie is captured by Sable, who Spider-Man assumes is working for S.H.I.E.L.D., and imprisoned inside an energy cage by Trask. Forced to test the Venom suit for him, he chases and defeats Electro. Spider-Man tries to intervene in their fight, but is knocked out by Electro. As S.H.I.E.L.D. agents led by Nick Fury arrive and arrest Electro, Eddie flees and returns to Trask. After Eddie reveals that he had more control over the suit in Spider-Man's presence, Trask remembers that Richard's DNA was used as the basis of the suit, and concludes that a DNA sample from Peter could be used to stabilize it. Deducing that Peter is Spider-Man, Trask sends Sable to track him down, but during their search, Eddie transforms into Venom and escapes.

Meanwhile, the Beetle, on the orders of his mysterious employer, releases the Green Goblin from S.H.I.E.L.D. custody and steals a vial containing a sample of the Sandman. After an encounter with Spider-Man, he escapes to the Latverian Embassy. Spider-Man later reluctantly agrees to infiltrate the Embassy after Fury asks him to, but ends up chasing the Goblin, who emerged from inside. Spider-Man subdues the Goblin, allowing S.H.I.E.L.D. to recapture him. Elsewhere, Venom defeats the Beetle when the latter attempts to collect a sample of the symbiote.

Sable later kidnaps Peter and attempts to deliver him to Trask, but he escapes and fights her. Venom arrives and kidnaps Sable, forcing Spider-Man to give chase. The confrontation leaves both Spider-Man and Venom exhausted, allowing Sable to deliver them to Trask. While Eddie is imprisoned, Peter is injected by Toomes with a makeshift sample of the symbiote, transforming him into Carnage. Venom escapes and defeats Carnage, before absorbing the symbiote off Peter, which gives him full control over the suit. He then attempts to exact revenge on Trask, but Spider-Man goes to warn him, leading Trask to attempt to escape via helicopter. When Venom tries to destroy the helicopter, Spider-Man stops and defeats him.

As S.H.I.E.L.D. arrives and arrests Venom and Trask, Peter retrieves some files from the latter, revealing that the plane crash that killed Peter's parents was caused by Eddie Sr. trying the Venom suit on board and losing control due to their incompatibility, just like Eddie. When Peter tells Fury that Eddie must see the files, Fury reveals that Eddie escaped. Days later, as Venom kills Trask in prison, Peter vocalizes his worries about Eddie to Mary Jane Watson, saying that he is not sure if he is scared ''of'' Eddie, or ''for'' him. Elsewhere, a partially transformed Eddie leaps from a skyscraper, turning into Venom just before he hits the ground.

Set around the year 2050. When Wee Ming, the daughter of a powerful Hong Kong Triad boss disappears, a trio of mercenaries search for her in the city. They have not been hired to find her, but they intend to kidnap the girl before her father's men locate her and hold her for ransom. Wee Ming has vanished into the fictional Shan Xi protectorate; Hana Tsu-Vachel, the lead character and femme fatale of the group, used to work in a brothel somewhere in that region.

Hana arrives in Hong Kong accompanied by her partners, Royce Glas and Jacob "Deke" DeCourt. What begins as a simple snatch and grab turns into a fiasco: The father of the runaway, Mr. Lam, attributes his fortune and power to a pact he made with demons long ago. Wee Ming, who is a paper doll given life, has been scheduled to serve as a sacrifice to Yim Lau Wong, the mythical "King of Hell". Hana's contact inside Mr. Lam's organization, Jin, is discovered, tortured, and left to die with a bomb strapped to his chest. Hana frees him, but he is killed shortly after. Meanwhile, Glas is attacked by a VTOL jet and forced to flee into Mr. Lam's building. After avenging Jin, Hana is captured and beaten by Mr. Lam and his thugs. Glas is able to rescue Hana, and the duo make their escape where they meet Deke in front of the hotel they are staying at. While listening to Jin's last message for Hana, the trio are forced off a bridge but are able to swim to a junk. While sailing down a river, Deke spots Wee Ming amongst a burning village. Deke and Glas give chase while Hana gets dressed, but all three are separated by the undead villagers.

They stumble upon a military train where the hostile soldiers shoot anyone on sight for fear of the villagers. Hana and Deke wreck the train trying to steal it, but Glas is able to find a jeep with Wee Ming sitting inside. She asks to be taken to a Madam Chen's restaurant, which doubles as a brothel, hoping to find answers about her existence. When Glas is caught sneaking in the brothel, Mr. Lam surprises him, cutting off his left arm. At the same time, Deke is murdered while trying to infiltrate the brothel from upstairs. Hana sneaks in by dressing up like one of the prostitutes, where she runs into Wee Ming again after she had been dragged off by Madam Chen, who is working for Mr. Lam. Wee Ming's powers activate, after being splashed with Deke's blood, transforming the working girls and Madam Chen's thugs into demons.

The one-armed Glas reawakens in a meat locker, surprised to find he is still alive; he surmises that Mr. Lam must be planning a slow death for him. Wee Ming arrives and tries her best to aid him. When Hana storms in to confront her former boss, Madam Chen, she learns that Chen is actually a demon in disguise. In the ensuing fight, Chen and her minions are killed, but Mr. Lam disappears with his daughter into a portal to Hell. Determined to save Wee Ming from whatever fate Mr. Lam has in store for her, Hana follows them into the portal, with Glas reawakening, and frees himself to give chase.

In a surreal journey through Hell, Hana meets the Black and White Guards of Impermanence who give her cryptic messages about her fate. Glas encounters the reanimated corpse of Deke, who is being tortured for the many murders he has committed. Deke takes on a grotesque demonic form and attacks Glas. After he is victorious, Glas promises to avenge Deke. Meanwhile, Hana confronts Yim Lau Wong, who explains that Hell has become overburdened with the souls of the guilty. Once Wee Ming is returned to the netherworld, Yim Lau Wong will be able to expand the reaches of Hell and consume Earth. Hana was chosen to look after Wee Ming because Yim Lau Wong desired someone "ruthless" to be her guardian.

Glas reappears and tries to kill Wee Ming, believing her to be the root of the chaos. During the tense standoff between Hana and Glas, the player is given a choice over which of them should die. This decision will determine the final boss as well as the subsequent ending. On the "Hard" difficulty setting, a third option will become available: spare the lives of both Glas and Hana. In this ending, the pair emerge from the smoldering wreckage of the brothel, where they find a befuddled Deke sitting on a toilet. Deke has no memory of being killed, believing he has taken a bump to the head, and asks how they made out on the "deal". As he hoists himself out of the pit, Glas is stunned to realize that his left arm has been completely restored. The three partners walk off into the sunrise to continue their exploits.

The entire plot consists of Alice traveling through the Alphabet as she goes along meeting new friends, or rather, creatures and obstacles. In the end, she awakes to find that not more than a few seconds have gone by and that it was all just a dream.

I: A Needle in a Haystack

The story begins with Alice busily talking to herself as she continuously tries to thread a needle through. To her dismay she continues to fail at this and she takes an extremely close look when she finds herself gliding through the air in an unknown world. She mentions how it was December at her previous whereabouts and how in Needle's Eye World it seemed to have a pleasant summer-ish feel to the place. When she finally falls to the ground she is cushioned by a haystack. When she emerges, she hears a distant call for "'elp". Alice soon discovers that they were the small whimpers of a Country Mouse, who believes that she is a comet. The Country mouse hereafter befriends Alice and informs her that she is not in a haystack, but an A-stack, or rather a messy pile of A's. She spots a few spelling bees, makes her way out of the haystack and continues in the direction of which she recalls seeing a beach from when she was flying.

II: A Tale with No End

Alice does not travel far before she meets two cats, yet upon taking a closer look, she discovers that both are joined at the tail. Alice questions them of their breed which they reply, as they finish each other's sentences "We're Siamese--". Unknowingly, Alice interrupts and discusses how Siamese are very different in appearance. The cats complete their statement and inform her that they were about to say Siamese-Twin Cats until she so very rudely interrupted. Alice apologizes as the cats begin to explain that one or the other is "as large as I am" or "as intelligent as I am" continuing in such a manner that their words are reduced to a mere "--'s I am--". After a short recovery from their long list, Alice decides that she will identify the cats by naming one Ping and one Pang. For if she mistakes one for the other, surely it must end up being the latter. Ping and Pang recite the poem "The Sands of Dee"; Pang forgets the last word of the poem, prompting a duel between them. The two cats instruct Alice to count twenty paces, but she mentions that she could "...count up to a hundred if I really tried." Thus, Ping and Pang begin to step away from each other, but before their duel begins, the sky darkens and rains down cats and dogs. When the peculiar shower of animals has stopped, Ping and Pang realize that they must attend the "vote." Alice follows them to find out what the vote is about.

III: "And Ninthly..."

The chapter opens with Alice following the Siamese Cats towards the vote. Suddenly, an Elephant rears about near her—the Country Mouse making a short return to frighten it. Alice decides not to frighten the mouse, but at least scare it off. Hereafter, Alice and the Elephant have a conversation about being afraid of little things, the Elephant retorting "I suppose ''you'' aren't afraid of insects, then?" After their short argument, the Elephant states that they will be "late for the speeches." Alice is then swept away by the Elephant towards the "Hide-and-Seek Park." Here, she overhears the conversation of the Grampus and the Italian Hairdresser (She knows he is Italian because he speaks in ''Italics''). The Emu begins its speech, but is constantly interrupted by the Crocodile, belonging to the Hairdresser, which is detained by an electric eel. Finally, the Emu finishes its speech and concludes with "And ''that's'' why I ask you all to vote for me!" In the end, after Alice inquires what he stands for, he recites a poem about the letter "F". After this, the vote transforms into an auction, and with the final cry of, "Going...going...''gone!''" everyone abruptly vanishes.

IV: Autobiography of a Grampus

Luckily, not everyone had vanished and Alice was left with both the Grampus and the Italian Hairdresser. The grampus promptly inquires if her name is "Boris". After a short discussion, the Grampus realizes that he has indeed written down the wrong name within his autobiography. He explains to Alice how forgetful he is, giving an example of how he sometimes "leaves home without an umbrella and returns with one". "This is why I have an autobiography," he said. "So that I don't forget!" Both the Grampus and Alice miss the train that he wrote that they would need to get on in his autobiography. He then points out that they are to be attacked by a band of blood-thirsty brigands. After he realizes that the blood-thirsty brigands are not coming, he asks Alice to tie him up. Soon after she "rescues" him and they board the next train. As they ride the train, the Grampus begins a discussion on the meaning of words. Promptly after their discussion, the Grampus notes that he does not want to be swept away by the hurricane mentioned in his book. Alice, not wanting to "create" a hurricane, comes to the conclusion of simply writing the word 'not' into his book. The train suddenly turns into a study room and, out of curiosity, Alice ventures out to discover what might lie upon the hill she had spotted in the distance.

V: Jack and Jill

When starting to climb the hill, Alice bumps into two people, or rather, 'stick figure people'. She realizes after a short conversation, that they are Jack and Jill from the nursery rhyme. Although, they are a quite rude rendition of the two. She states that she recognized them from the rhyme which prompts Jack to 'test' her. He says "If you know then surely you can do this!" Jack then asks, or commands, Alice to recite the poem forwards, backwards, and in French. Although Alice had no intention of it, she spat out the words as if it were second nature to her. Jack then states that due to the fact that she had 'caused' them to fall, she must now carry the eels or "L's" within their bucket to Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch. Alice sets off because she is too polite to say no in the first place.

VI: Lost-in-a-maze-ment

After a while's walk, Alice reaches a maze-like place with a sign that reads "Llabyrinth". To Alice's disappointment, she cannot get to the centre of the maze due to her childish logic of "If I take all lefts I'll be alright, but if I take all rights I'll be left! Left within the maze!". Alice comes across several confusing signs, many of which leading her back to the same place she was before. After a moment of despondency, she hears the Country Mouse; she attempts to follow it, but to no avail. She also attempts to throw one of the eels over the hedge as a signal, but fails, as it comes back like a boomerang. Eventually, she drops off to sleep. When she awakes, she sees what she assumes is a human, running past her. She follows it, and in time, arrives in the centre of the maze. After finding a large congregation of animals stuck in the middle of the maze, they attempt to go through a race for the food that the Welsh Rabbit (the one who she had followed into the centre) possesses.

VII: Alice Volunteers

In this chapter Alice is volunteered for her to go into the rabbit hole which the cluster of animals within the maze believe leads out. When going down the hole, she feels as if she is falling sideways, and describes it as an infinity sign. She contemplates things such as parallel lines meeting at infinity and how the sign looks like a tired eight. When she finally comes out, she is surprised to see where she is.

VIII: Queueing

IX: Swan Pie and Greens

she goes through

X: You

XI: The Battle of Letters

XII: Was It a Dream?

Christian Martin, a modest accountant in a large firm owned by Bertrand Barnier, surprises his boss by asking him for a 100% increase in his wages. Martin is on the point of proposing to a girl and doesn't want to ask for her hand in marriage while making a lowly accountant's salary.

After Barnier refuses to give him the raise, Martin tells him that he's stolen more than sixty million francs from him by falsifying the firm's accounting records. When Barnier threatens to report this to the police, Martin points out that as a consequence of the fraud Barnier has now submitted false income statements to the tax office, a serious crime. Barnier has no choice but to give in to blackmail and he agrees to give Martin the raise and name him vice-president of the firm.

Martin then reveals that the young woman whom he intends to marry is Barnier's daughter. In order to recover his sixty million francs, Barnier asks Martin to give back the stolen monies so that he can give them to his daughter as a wedding present.

Barnier learns that Martin converted the sum into jewelry and the jewels are in a bank. He tells Martin to get the jewelry, but Martin refuses without a signed document from Barnier stating that he will give the jewelry to his daughter as a wedding present. Barnier agrees and Martin leaves for the bank.

While Martin is gone, Barnier talks to his daughter Colette. Without mentioning Martin, he tells her that he's opposed to her marriage which causes her to break down and cry. On the advice of her maid Bernadette, Colette lies to her father and tells him that she's pregnant by her lover. Hearing this, Barnier decides to approve the marriage and give the sixty million francs/jewelry to Colette as a wedding present.

After Barnier's talk with Colette a young woman named Jacqueline Bouillotte comes to see him. She tells Barnier that she's in love with Christian Martin and that she lied to him and told him that she was Barnier's daughter. Barnier realizes that this means that Martin is not in love with his daughter Colette. It also dawns on him that he won’t be able to get his sixty million francs back from Martin or his daughter since they won’t be getting married.

Upon confronting Colette, Barnier learns that she's in love with Oscar the chauffeur. At that moment Martin comes back from the bank and Barnier gets the jewelry, now in a black suitcase, from him. Martin then learns that Jacqueline has lied to him about being Barnier's daughter, which causes them to argue and break up.

In the meantime Barnier has discovered that Oscar had joined a six-year polar expedition due to a "disappointment of love" (not being able to marry Colette.) Barnier tells Martin that he'll give him back the suitcase with the jewelry if he'll marry Colette. Martin hesitates and tries to put Barnier on to a new "pigeon": Philippe Dubois, Barnier's masseur.

During this time, Colette's maid Bernadette announces her resignation and packs her suitcase; she is going to marry Colette's former fiancé the Baron Honoré de la Butinière. Before she leaves the house Bernadette puts down her suitcase filled with clothes and accidentally picks up the suitcase containing the sixty million francs worth of jewelry.

Barnier tries to persuade his masseur to marry his daughter Colette, promising to give him the suitcase full of jewelry as a wedding present. Barnier almost has a heart attack when he opens the suitcase and finds clothes inside instead of jewels.

At this point, Martin comes back and tells Barnier that before he had gone to the bank, while they were discussing giving the jewelry to Colette as a wedding present, he had hidden a piece of paper among the documents. When Barnier had signed an agreement to give Colette the jewelry, he had also signed a document giving Martin banking power of attorney. This allowed Martin to divert sixty million more francs from Barnier's accounts. Martin offers to exchange this second stolen sum for the jewelry representing the first stolen sum.

Barnier gives Martin the suitcase with the jewelry thinking it's the suitcase full of clothes. However, unbeknownst to him Bernadette's driver had come back with the suitcase of jewelry and exchanged it for the suitcase of clothes. Barnier, thinking he's given Martin the clothes, invents an address for Jacqueline, Martin's true love, and sends him on his way.

After a series of comic errors, Barnier again finds himself with Bernadette's suitcase full of clothes. After a funny telephone conversation with the Baron, Bernadette's new husband, Barnier recovers the suitcase filled with jewelry from Martin who has discovered that the address Barnier had given him for Jacqueline is wrong. Barnier, pleased to have finally recovered the suitcase filled with jewelry confesses to inventing the address to get rid of Martin and tells him that Jacqueline (who had come back earlier) is in fact in Barnier's office.

While all of this is going on a lady named Charlotte enters the house. She's been sent by the employment agency to replace Bernadette as Colette's maid. She tells Barnier that when she was younger she worked for the Barnier family and that she had a daughter who is now engaged to a man named Christian Martin. Barnier realizes that the young woman being discussed is Jacqueline and Charlotte reveals that Jacqueline is in fact Charlotte and Barnier's daughter. Barnier needs several minutes to recover from the shock during which time Oscar returns home to Colette and all seems to end well.

However...while everybody is congratulating each other, Bernadette arrives thinking that there has been a mistake with the suitcases. Not wanting to disturb anyone she inconspicuously exchanges the suitcases. Barnier asks Martin to open the now famous suitcase, thinking that he is going to take the jewelry out of it and give it to his daughters as a wedding present. He has an apoplectic fit on seeing that it's full of clothes. Everybody jumps in cars, on motorbikes, and on bicycles to go to Bernadette's and recover the suitcase of jewelry once and for all.

Jon Arbuckle and Garfield take their third class airline trip to Paradise World, a cheapskate's version of Hawaii. When they arrive on the island, Jon and Garfield check in at a deserted motel and are soon disappointed to find out that there is no beach within sight, and only an empty swimming pool in the back instead. When Jon and Garfield enter their room, they find Odie hiding in their luggage. None of the trio has any fun until Jon, Garfield, and Odie plan to rent a car and search for a beach around the island. For a cheap price, they get a really nice and classic Chevrolet Bel Air to hit the beach and later begin to choose where to go when their car mysteriously speeds into a jungle on its own, stopping in the middle of a native village. Jon, Garfield, and Odie presume that they are in trouble until the natives begin kowtowing to their car. They meet the tribal chief (The High Ramma-Lamma), who explains that the villagers (The Ding-Dongs) learned English "from watching a lot of beach movies". In 1957, the Cruiser, a James Dean/Fonzie-styled legend, drove his car into the village and introduced the people to the 1950s pop culture. The Cruiser eventually saved the village by sacrificing himself and driving his car into a nearby volcano to prevent it from erupting. The village is dedicated to a 1950s lifestyle and believes that Jon's rental car is actually the same one the Cruiser owned.

In the village, Jon and Garfield find romance with the tribal princess, Owooda, and her cat, Mai-Tai. Meanwhile, the chief orders the village idiot, Monkey, to fix the car with Odie's assistance. Suddenly, the volcano begins to erupt and Owooda tells Jon that she and Mai-Tai must sacrifice themselves to save the village. However, the volcano rejects Owooda and Mai-Tai, and the village shaman, Pigeon, interprets that it wants the car instead and, if it does not have the car within thirty seconds, it will blow the island to pieces. Monkey and Odie make their last attempt to get the car fixed, which still does not work until Odie successfully taps the distributor cap with a hammer. The car finally starts and zooms through the village and up the volcano with Monkey driving and Odie hanging onto the hood. The car plummets into the crater, the volcano finally erupts, and the Cruiser's spirit and car's ghost drift out, speed off, and vanish into the night sky; the volcano is now at peace. Monkey and Odie are presumed dead until they climb out of the crater unharmed. Jon, Garfield, and the villagers finally carry Monkey and Odie back to the village in a hero's fashion.

Bruce Campbell plays William Cole, the wealthy CEO of a U.S. drug company who travels to Bulgaria with his wife, Jackie in the hopes of diversifying his company's financial interests. Cole is a stereotypical ugly American who constantly complains about the lack of Americanization of the former communist country. They're driven to a hotel by a taxi driver, and former KGB agent, named Yegor Stragov, in which Yegor gives William a ring to give to Jackie. While William is at the construction of a subway, Jackie secretly cheats on William with Yegor.

William gets back to the hotel and bumps into the hotel maid and gypsy, Tatoya, who kills men that date and dump her. Jackie then comes in, catches William kissing Tatoya and dumps him. William chases Tatoya, who had taken William's money and ring (which is revealed to be Tatoya's that she gave to Yegor when they dated), and Tatoya knocks him in the head with a pipe outside the hotel. Yegor witnesses this and so Tatoya kills Yegor with his own gun.

A vengeful Jackie has William’s life support plug pulled in hospital, and then goes to Gypsy Town where Tatoya lives and attempts to kill her, only to have Tatoya kill her by throwing her down a flight of stairs. Meanwhile, a still alive William wakes up in the warehouse of a Russian scientist named Dr. Ivan Ivanovich Ivanov, and his idiotic assistant Pavel, who had removed the damaged parts of William's brain and replaced it with healthy tissue from Yegor's. When William runs out of the warehouse, he discovers he can hear Yegor's voice in his head; together they both plan to "get the woman that killed us both". Jackie, who had also been picked up by Dr. Ivanov and Pavel, has her brain put inside a robot; and so she escapes and also plans to exact revenge on Tatoya.

William/Yegor and Robo-Jackie chase Tatoya around town. William gets involved in a car crash with his foot underneath a car and Tatoya makes another attempt to kill William by setting the leaking car gasoline alight. Jackie saves him and is presumed dead in the explosion. After avoiding some bar punks that believe William "raped Tatoya on her wedding day", William/Yegor begin suffering brain damage due to their cells not able to coexist in the same head. Jackie, who had survived the explosion, appears and attempts to kill Tatoya by throwing her off a bridge; until Tatoya stabs Jackie's brain, causing her to malfunction, and has Jackie thrown off the bridge. William chases Tatoya through the subway construction and the sewer and finally kills Tatoya by dropping her in sewer river, but not before taking back the ring. William and Jackie then confess their love for each other before Jackie's batteries finally die, as does William due to the brain cells of him and Yegor wearing out. Pavel brings William, Jackie and Tatoya's body back to Dr. Ivanov to fix them; as he had earlier found a way to make William and Yegor's brain cells coexist in the same head.

The movie ends with William back in the U.S. six months later, still sharing his body with Yegor's brain now completely synched and stabilized. He goes to a brain trauma benefit with Jackie, whose brain had been transferred into Tatoya's body.

After Elexis Sinclaire's disappearance at the end of ''SiN'', the mob boss Gianni Manero seeks to gain power from the remnants of Elexis' former company SinTEK. Manero produces new genetically engineered creatures (mutants) under secret supervision, but when some of these mutants break out and escape into Freeport City, the elite security force group HARDCORPS becomes aware of their existence. HARDCORPS leader John Blade, who starred as the player character in ''SiN'', sets out to set things right. Blade's hunt for Manero leads him to new locations of Freeport City that were not included in the original game, encountering new enemies and weapons along the way. Some elements of the game, such as whether a specific level is visited during the day or night, can change depending on the player's choices, such as whether a scientist's kidnapped daughter is saved from being killed.

Although Elexis Sinclaire never appears in ''Wages of Sin'', she is often referred to (in serious and humorous ways) throughout the game, and the ending hints towards her return (which occurs in ''SiN's'' official sequel, ''SiN Episodes'').

Maindrian Pace is a respectable insurance investigator who runs an automobile chop shop in Long Beach, California. He is also the leader of a professional car theft ring that steals and resells stolen cars, disguising them using vehicle identification numbers, engines, parts, and details (such as parking decals and bumper stickers) sourced from legitimately-purchased wrecks. As an insurance industry insider, Pace has one small idiosyncrasy: all vehicles stolen must be insured. Pace meets a South American drug lord who offers $200,000 up front, with an additional $200,000 upon completion of delivery, in exchange for the theft of 48 specific vehicles to be delivered to the Long Beach docks within five days.

The list ranges from limousines and semi-trailer trucks to vintage cars and exotics, rendering the order difficult to fill within the time limit. Nevertheless, Pace is confident that the order can be fulfilled by the deadline. Mapping out a basic strategy, the thieves scout out their vehicular targets, all of which have been given female code names. The plan goes smoothly—with even some of the more eclectic vehicles acquired with relative ease—but obstacles begin to mount. Chief of these difficulties is a yellow 1973 Ford Mustang, codenamed "Eleanor". The first Eleanor Pace comes across is occupied by its driver, so he steals it from the owner's house after dark and discovers it is owned by Harold Dwight Smith, a corrupt senior manager for a large insurance corporation.

An intoxicated Smith witnesses Eleanor being stolen from his garage and attempts to pursue Pace in a different car, but is stopped by the police; Pace quickly returns the Mustang back to Smith's home to make it look like the car was never stolen and that Smith was simply out on a drunken joyride. Further tension occurs when a white Cadillac Eldorado—stolen as part of the order—is found to contain several kilograms of heroin stashed in its trunk. Pace's brother-in-law, Eugene, sees the heroin as a profitable side business, but Pace disagrees, viewing the heroin as a threat to the security of the operation. Against Eugene's protests, Pace does not relinquish the heroin and, unbeknownst to Eugene, has the Cadillac and its contents burned.

The theft of all 48 vehicles is eventually completed, but the second Eleanor is discovered to be uninsured within hours of delivery to the docks. After pleas from fiancée Pumpkin Chase, Pace agrees to return it, but only because he is aware of a third Eleanor at the International Towers in Long Beach. Meanwhile, Eugene, learning of the Cadillac's fate, confronts Pace and angrily leaves, eventually tipping off the police about Pace and the third Eleanor. As a result of the tip-off, two detectives, Butch Stockton and Phil Woods, corner Pace as he exits the International Towers. A lengthy and destructive car chase ensues, covering six California cities from Long Beach to Carson. Pace manages to evade the police, but irreparably damages the third Eleanor in the process.

Desperate, Pace spots a fourth Eleanor Mustang at a car wash. Noticing an opportunity, Pace leaves the third Eleanor at the car wash and dupes the owner of the Mustang under the guise of being the car wash's manager. After a quick license plate swap and disguise removal, Pace leaves the car wash with the fourth Eleanor, leaving the wrecked third Eleanor for the Mustang's owner to find. The police, spotting the wrecked Mustang, quickly descend upon the scene to arrest the real car wash manager (who happens to match Pace's description), as Pace safely clears a police checkpoint in the fourth Eleanor.

The film begins with Hawkeye Pierce being treated at a psychiatric hospital by Sidney Freedman. It is revealed he suffered a nervous breakdown while working in the operating room. He tells Freedman about a recent beach outing by a busload of camp staff. They picked up some refugees and wounded soldiers on their return home. Forced to pull off the road to avoid an enemy patrol, Hawkeye remembers telling a refugee to keep her chicken quiet. In doing so the chicken was smothered and died.

Conditions back at the 4077 are chaotic with the camp now home to large numbers of refugees and prisoners of war. A wounded tank driver demolishes the camp latrine and abandons the tank in the camp. Charles Winchester leaves camp to perform his ablutions and meets five Chinese soldiers on a motorcycle-sidecar combination eager to surrender. The men are revealed to be musicians and Winchester marches them to camp while they play Oh! Susanna. B.J. eagerly takes possession of the motorcycle while Winchester begins to teach the prisoners classical music. Despite a language barrier, the musicians recognize Mozart's name and learn to play Mozart's Clarinet Quintet.

Margaret Houlihan and Winchester discuss their postwar careers. Houlihan is offered an Army administrative post while Winchester is disappointed to find his absence from Boston has let a less talented colleague take a coveted chief surgeon spot. Winchester receives a letter to the contrary, but becomes angry after learning from Klinger that Margaret had intervened in the selection process by having a relative pull strings.

Klinger falls in love with a refugee named Soon-Lee Han, who wants to return to the combat zone to find her missing parents. B.J. Hunnicutt receives repatriation orders and prepares to leave once Colonel Potter can get a replacement surgeon. The chaos in the camp is intensified by enemy mortar fire on the abandoned tank. Father Mulcahy loses his hearing while saving POWs under fire in their holding area. He swears B.J. to secrecy about the nature of his injury, afraid the Army will return him home, away from the local orphans he has tended throughout his time in Korea.

Hawkeye's treatment progresses and he reveals the woman on the bus had actually smothered her own baby. Hawkeye vents anger on Sidney for making him remember the true nature of the incident. Sidney explains it is necessary for his recovery and returns Hawkeye to duty. B.J. meanwhile is offered a chance to fly out in time for his daughter's birthday and leaves. Hawkeye returns to find B.J. left without a farewell, as Trapper John had earlier in the series. When the mortar fire intensifies, Hawkeye impulsively drives the tank into the camp garbage dump, prompting concern from the others. Sidney Freedman is asked to return to follow up.

A nearby forest fire causes the camp to relocate. A helicopter bringing B.J.'s replacement arrives, and it is revealed to be Hunnicutt himself, who travelled to Guam before he was sent back to Korea. He celebrates his daughter's birthday at a party for orphaned refugee children. Hawkeye is unable to watch the party due to his experiences, and discusses his postwar future with Sidney, fearing he can no longer be around children. When Hawkeye finds he is able to operate on an injured young girl, Sidney leaves the 4077th with Hawkeye's thanks.

Charles's musicians leave camp as part of a prisoner exchange, playing Mozart Clarinet as they depart. The ceasefire is announced ending hostilities in the war. The 4077 returns to its camp site with wounded soldiers continuing to arrive in the last hours of the war. Winchester discovers one of the musicians has been brought in dead and that the others have been killed. Dazed, he returns to The Swamp and tries to listen to the Mozart recording he used to teach the musicians but finds it no longer brings him joy and smashes it in anger.

The camp personnel throw a final party and reveal their postwar plans. Klinger will marry Soon-Lee and ironically, given his attempts throughout the series to be sent home, remain in Korea. Mulcahy officiates at their wedding while the camp is dismantled. Camp staff say their goodbyes and leave in different ways. Winchester apologizes to Houlihan for his earlier poor treatment of her and gives her a signed book of her favorite poetry. Houlihan says goodbye to Potter and B.J. before Hawkeye steals a long kiss. Potter takes a final ride on the horse that was gifted to him earlier in the series before donating her to the orphanage. Hawkeye and B.J. give him a final parting gift, a heartfelt salute, which Potter tearfully returns.

In the final scene of the series, B.J. gives Hawkeye a ride to his chopper on the motorcycle. Just before the chopper takes off B.J. shouts that he left a note this time and then rides off. As the helicopter lifts off, Hawkeye sees the word GOODBYE spelled out with rocks on the helipad. He smiles as the chopper carries him away.

Laurie Show was a naive and trusting sixteen year old girl (Jennifer Finnigan), that became entangled in the lives of Lisa Michelle Lambert (Marne Patterson) and her boyfriend Lawrence Yunkin. Laurie was initially befriended by Michelle, who later turned on her after Laurie was raped by Lawrence. Believing that Laurie was lying about the rape and that she had pursued Lawrence, Michelle began harassing and stalking Laurie, often with the assistance of friends. This harassment culminated in Michelle murdering Laurie in her home with the help of her friend Tabitha Buck. Laurie's mother discovered the body and Michelle, Lawrence, and Tabitha were quickly arrested. Lawrence pleaded guilty and testified against the other two girls in exchange for a reduced sentence, with Michelle and Tabitha receiving life sentences without parole.

Jon wakes up Garfield on Christmas Eve morning, telling him that they're going to the countryside to celebrate Christmas with Jon's family on their farm. Garfield is annoyed that they always go to the farm and the family never comes to Jon's house. During his drive to his family's farm, Jon talks about Christmases he had when he was a boy, with his parents, brother Doc Boy, and Grandma, while Garfield listens with great cynicism.

Upon arriving, Grandma and Garfield quickly grow a special bond. While Jon, Garfield, and Odie take a walk, Grandma spikes Mom's sausage gravy with chili powder, bragging that her sausage gravy just won the Greene County Fair. Jon and Garfield return for dinner, while Odie works on something secretive and then sneaks back into the house. After dinner, they decorate the tree. Jon asks Garfield to put the star on, as no one else can reach the top of the tree. As the family sings Christmas songs, Grandma tells Garfield about her beloved and deceased husband, whom she especially misses at Christmastime because of his unspoken, but obvious, love for the holiday. Afterwards, Mom asks Dad to read a book called ''Binky, the Clown Who Saved Christmas.'' Dad is reluctant, as he is tired of reading it every year, but gives in. At night, Garfield notices Odie's suspicious activity and follows him to the barn, seeing Odie making something out of a piece of wood, some wire, a plunger handle, and a hand rake. While there, Garfield stumbles upon some old letters and realizes they must be 50 years old.

On Christmas morning, just when it seems like all the presents have been opened, Garfield gives Grandma the letters he found in the barn. These letters were love notes written to Grandma by her husband from when they first met each other and married. Garfield also finds out that Odie has been busy making his ultimate Christmas gift: a homemade back scratcher. Garfield gladly thanks and embraces Odie for the gift he made. This is a rare glimpse at Garfield's softer side, as Garfield learns one of the true meanings of Christmas: "It's not the giving, it's not the getting, it's the loving!"

The story opens in Los Angeles with Dillon (Val Kilmer) who receives a phone call from Ray Burns (Mick Rossi) who has just been shot and desperately needs help. Dillon is a cleaner for a gangster named Eddie (Gabriel Byrne) and has been sent to assist Ray should he require it. After a colorful opening title sequence which follows Dillon's drive to the house, he finds Ray almost bleeding to death on a sofa. Removing all of the evidence, Dillon leaves carrying Ray to his car but not before he torches the house, destroying any evidence of Ray's presence. As Dillon and Ray drive away, Dillon struggles to keep Ray conscious and relates to him a story of a humorous encounter with a Mexican auto mechanic, which coins one of the catchphrases of the film: "I'm not gonna taco".

The story then flashes back to eight years earlier and introduces Riley (Patrick Bergin) as he admires some artwork in a London gallery. He receives a call on his cell phone from the crooked Detective Brice (Vinnie Jones), who informs Riley that there is a shipment of heroin coming in, and that he wants Riley to get a team together and steal it for him. Riley agrees to the job and tells Brice that he has just the man to do it, a petty thief named Ray Burns. Riley gives a menacing stare to the gallery attendant (Caspar von Winterfeldt) in one of the films funnier moments before leaving to meet with Ray.

After they discuss the details of the job at hand, Ray agrees to do the job and meets up with his team, which consists of Nathan (Sean Power) and Terry Rawlings (Trevor Nugent) son of infamous moblord Jack Rawlings (Roy Dotrice) and Terry's girlfriend, Cindy (Patsy Kensit). Together they begin plotting the heist: Nathan will go up to the roof and act as lookout while Ray and Terry break into the warehouse to steal the heroin. Unfortunately, during the heist, Nathan loses his footing and tumbles to his death, falling through a skylight and triggering an alarm, alerting the guards. Ray and Terry manage to escape with the drugs, but lose contact with each other.

Shortly thereafter, Brice calls Riley to inform him that the heist went terribly wrong, and that Nathan is dead. To cover his own tracks, he tells Riley to find a scapegoat, and Riley immediately names Ray. Meanwhile, Ray, who has gone into hiding, tries to call Terry but doesn't get an answer. He turns to Riley to find out what happened. Riley tells Ray that Nathan is dead and that Scotland Yard is looking for him, omitting the fact that Terry has handed over the drugs and that Brice is behind the whole heist. Ray decides he needs to disappear for a while and attempts to go underground, but before he can do so the police pick him up on an anonymous tip from Brice. Ray is convicted for the robbery and the manslaughter of Nathan, and is subsequently sentenced to eight years in prison.

Ray serves his time, but has no contact with the outside world, denying even his closest lover and girlfriend Maggie (Joanne Whalley) a visit. He also learns by reading the paper that Terry has died of a drug overdose. Saddened by the news, Ray vows to get revenge on Brice and Riley as soon as he is free.

While Ray is serving time, Riley and Brice continue their crooked ways, and Brice informs Riley that he has an incriminating video tape of London Charlie (Steve Jones) that could be worth some cash. He dispatches Riley to Los Angeles to blackmail London Charlie. Riley arrives in Los Angeles along with his girlfriend Samantha Fay (Sile Bermingham) in order to pick up the cash from Brice. Meanwhile, Ray is released from prison and contacted by London Charlie, who realizes that the only way he can escape his dilemma is to have Riley terminated. He knows Ray is out to avenge his time in prison and so pays him $100,000 to come to Los Angeles. Brice, aware of Ray's release and suspicious that he may be up to something, instructs an underling, Danny, (Andy Nyman) to keep an eye on him and find out what he can about his plans. Danny confronts Ray in a busy London street and brings the situation to a head when he makes a comment about Ray's former girlfriend Maggie, whom Ray has not seen since he went to prison. Ray angrily headbutts Danny, telling him to leave him alone. Danny reports this back to Brice, who still believes Ray is up to something.

Ray is soon contacted by Jack Rawlings, Terry's father, who beckons him to come and visit. The two have a long talk about Terry and Ray tells Jack how sorry he is for Terry's death. Jack feigns compassion and tells Ray that he wants him to go after the guy who set them up, namely Riley, and gives him a contact in Los Angeles, Eddie, who can help him with the job. Ray is to pick up $100,000 at Jack's club from Big Frankie (Adam Fogerty) and then get on a plane to Los Angeles to hunt Riley down.

Upon arrival, Ray immediately goes to London Charlie's house (which is revealed to be the one seen in the beginning of the film) to meet with him. Ray is told that there is $100,000 in a bag that he is to take to Riley and use to recover the tape. Once he has the tape, Ray is to kill Riley and bring the tape back to London Charlie. Ray leaves and begins to cover his tracks by checking into two separate motels. He then makes a call to Eddie to pick up a car for use in Los Angeles. That night he picks up the car and meets Eddie, who is waiting for him in the back seat. Eddie tells him there is a pistol in the glove box and that he doesn't want to get involved in any of the nasty business. Ray acknowledges the request and takes off into the night.

The next day, Riley is waiting to meet with London Charlie. He is surprised by Ray, who shows up at his door carrying a bag of cash. Ray has hidden the pistol outside of the apartment and so is clean when he is frisked by Riley. The two have a heated discussion about what happened eight years ago and Riley makes light of Terry's death, much to Ray's chagrin. Ray gives the bag of cash to Riley, who angrily informs him that the amount is only half of what he and London Charlie had agreed to, and ordering him to get him the rest if he wants the tape. Ray exits the apartment, retrieves his pistol, then goes back inside and demands the tape from Riley at gunpoint. Riley refuses, and Ray shoots him once in the chest, then once in the back of the head, killing him.

Ray searches the apartment for the tape, but only finds a key to a room at a nearby hotel. Ray returns to his first hotel to wash Riley's blood off of himself before he goes to check out the other hotel. Meanwhile, police are investigating the shooting death at Riley's apartment. Detective Allen (Bruno Kirby) arrives on the crime scene and discovers that there is a link to a nearby hotel—the same hotel Ray is also heading to. Detective Bartow (Mark Siciliani) and Officer Chris Anders (Aaron Gallagher) are dispatched to investigate. At the hotel they find Samantha Fay, who is startled by their appearance. When the officers inform her that there has been an incident and they need to take her to the station to answer some questions, she reluctantly agrees. Officer Anders escorts her out, leaving Detective Bartow to search the room. Ray arrives as they are leaving, running into Bartow as he attempts to enter the room. Ray attempts to keep his cool, especially when Bartow tells him he is a police officer. He questions Ray as to how he knew Riley, and Ray innocently says they recently met and that they had arranged to grab a drink. Bartow is suspicious and asks Ray if he would have any objections to coming down to the station for some questioning. Ray has no choice but to agree, and they leave together.

At the station, Ray and Samantha are questioned for hours and hours by Detective Allen and Detective Drummond (Anthony LaPaglia). The situation is tense, and they both have a tough time keeping calm. Eventually they are both let go, but not before Samantha is told that Riley is dead. Both leave the station within a couple of hours of each other and head in different directions, Ray to pick up his things at the second motel, and Samantha to pick up the tape and a gun which Riley had left in a safety deposit box earlier that day. Samantha then heads to London Charlie's house to square things away with him and avenge Riley's death. She shoots London Charlie dead in his pool just as Ray arrives to say goodbye. Ray and Samantha have a Mexican stand-off. The now-useless tape is thrown into the pool, and Samantha slowly backs out of the house, leaving Ray to sort out the mess. As Ray sits to contemplate his next move, he doesn't notice Samantha sneaking back inside, who shoots Ray in the back. Samantha leaves and Ray is left in a pool of blood, but still alive. The scene from the film's opening replays as Ray picks up the phone to call Eddie and reaches Dillon, who comes to clean up his mess.

Dillon finally gets Ray to a secure location, and Ray pays him off so that he can return to London, where he recuperates for several days in the care of Maggie. Ray thinks quickly about what he should do when he receives a phone call from Eddie, telling him that Jack Rawlings wants to see him on the rooftop of a car-park in Chinatown later that evening. After Eddie hangs up, he anonymously calls Brice and tells him about the meeting. Brice is confused, but eager to settle the score with Ray. He calls Danny to tell him that he should follow Ray to the meeting and kill him.

While Danny circles the streets of London in an attempt to find Ray, he stumbles on Maggie and follows her back to her flat. Ray, meanwhile, is visiting with Cindy, whom he had rescued from the streets prior to his departure to Los Angeles and had given shelter to while she attempted to recover from her drug habit. Danny forces his way into Maggie's apartment and, after roughing her up, takes Ray's remaining money and returns to his place. When Ray returns, he grabs Maggie and they head over to Danny's flat. Ray breaks in and finds Nikki (Meredith Ostrom) clutching the bag of money and Danny jamming on drugs. Ray also hears a recording on Danny's answering machine of Brice telling Danny to kill him. Ray kills Danny, then takes the tapes from the answering machine and the bag of money. He and Maggie then leave to head to the rendezvous in Chinatown.

Brice arrives at Danny's place a little later after Nikki has called the police, and finds Danny dead. Brice also notices that the tapes from the machine are missing and now has no choice but to show up on the car park rooftop for the inevitable showdown.

Following a catastrophic earthquake twenty years prior, Tokyo, along with most of the world, has sunk into the ocean during a large-scale land subsidence. Aika Sumeragi is a salvage agent, a person who digs up submerged artifacts from the cities below. She works for a small company run by Gozo Aida, and takes on fairly dangerous jobs. In the first story, she and Gozo's daughter Rion, search for material called the Lagu. However they are captured by Rudolf Hagen, an effeminate but over-sexed man who wants to use the Lagu to transform the world, destroying its inhabitants, and replacing them with an army of young women called the Delmo Corporation who will carry his progeny. Alongside Rudolf is his obsessive sister Neena Hagen, who is jealous of Aika when Rudolf desires to have Aika for himself. Aika has a special bustier that, when activated, transforms into a battle bikini that gives her extraordinary fighting powers. Following the defeat of the Hagens, the Delmo Corporation girls seek other methods to foil Aika in episodic stories.

In the early 21st century, astronomers detect what appears to be a distant gamma-ray burster, a black hole engulfing another star many light years away. The data are bizarre and troubling, because only 13 hours later, a second burster appears, which, given the great distance between stars, would be impossible. Eventually, the astronomers realize that the black hole, rather than being incredibly far from us, is actually heading towards the Solar System, and moving our way at considerable speed. Stranger still, it seems to be moving under its own will; it is an intelligent being itself. This age-old cosmic being reveals that it had been born seven billion years ago and had become a wandering entity, feeding on asteroids, planets and various space debris, projecting itself forward in space through the process. Through the billions of years of its existence across the expanse of time and space, this intelligent entity has learned of many ancient civilizations in the universe. The black hole eventually sends a message to the people of Earth; it "desires converse". The black hole is willing to share the knowledge it had gained throughout the ages in return for the chance to "chat" with the humans. But eventually, something about the nature of the life-form is revealed. It prefers to learn about people by having their minds uploaded to it and demands that the best and brightest of Earth be sent to it in this way.

The three astronomer protagonists: Benjamin Knowlton; his cancer-stricken wife, Channing; and the British Astronomer Royal, Kingsley Dart, must save the Earth and all of humanity from annihilation at the hands of this entity that they dub the Eater.

At Roseland, an older lady, May (Wright), with a light step, looks for the memory of her husband in the ballroom's mirrors. Stan (Jacobi), a cheerful older man steers May to brandy alexanders and away from her past.

Pauline (Copeland) is a middle-aged widow with the means to pay for the services of a younger gigolo, Russell (Walken) and share champagne with her Roseland friends, the dance teacher Cleo (Helen Gallagher) and the shy divorcee, Marilyn (Chaplin). Both Marilyn and Cleo fail to break Russell's attachment to the lifestyle that Pauline provides.

Rosa (Skala), a former Schrafft's cook and wannabe dance superstar makes it her mission to win the peabody prize with her older partner, Arthur (Thomas) who is desperate to marry her.Harris, Art. ''The Lives and Times Of Roseland Ballroom''. The Washington Post. 13 January 1978

The Griffins invite their neighbors over for game night. While playing ''Trivial Pursuit'', Lois uses questions from the preschool edition for Peter in order to let him win. When Peter wins, he brags to everyone, believing himself to be smarter than everyone else. Irritated at Peter's arrogance, Brian challenges Peter to take the MacArthur Fellows Program test to prove he is a genius. The results of the test show that Peter is not a genius; in fact, the results show that, technically speaking, Peter is "mentally retarded". Peter sinks into depression after being publicly labeled as retarded. While driving home with Lois, Peter accidentally knocks down Tom Tucker. Tucker, recognizing Peter as "the retarded fellow", does not press charges, and Peter realizes his condition means he can get away with anything.

While testing the limits of what he can get away with, such as interrupting church attendants by having a Bible fight, kicking open the stall doors in a girls' bathroom, and saying "testicles" through a microphone at a fast food restaurant, Peter goes behind the counter and sees a "Fryolator" and wants to take it home. However, he accidentally drenches Lois with hot grease, scalding her. While she is recovering, Child Protection Services take away Peter's custody of Meg, Chris, and Stewie on the grounds that Peter is mentally unfit to look after them. The three are placed in the care of Cleveland. When Brian tells Peter that he just has to show that he is a good parent, Peter thinks that the best way to do that is to show what a bad parent Cleveland is, so he brings seven prostitutes into Cleveland's house. This does not work as Agent Jessup sees through the plot and Cleveland orders Peter and five of the prostitutes out. In a last attempt, he appeals to the court for custody of his kids, but he is denied and avoids imprisonment only because the judge forgets that prisons exist.

After returning home and accepting that the Griffins may never be together again, Lois walks in, revealing she has completely recovered and reobtained custody of the kids. Peter is overjoyed that everything is back to normal, as well as the fact that Lois will smell like French fries for the next six months.

In his first day at his new school, a then twelve-year-old Ritsuka Aoyagi meets a mysterious twenty-year-old male named Soubi Agatsuma. Soubi claims to be a good friend of Ritsuka's brother, Seimei, who was murdered 2 years earlier. Upon the inspection of Seimei's abandoned computer files, Ritsuka discovers that an organization called was responsible for Seimei's death.

As Ritsuka quickly discovers, Seimei and Soubi acted as a pair involved in spell battles invoked by carefully selected words. Now Soubi is Ritsuka's 'sentouki', or Fighter Unit, and Ritsuka is his 'Sacrifice'. Together, they challenge Septimal Moon to find out the truth behind Seimei's murder and the reason for Ritsuka's amnesia, and form an intimate bond as they unravel the mystery.

Frankie Wilde is a British music producer and a DJ based in Ibiza. After years of playing in night-clubs he loses his hearing, first apparent when he hears a high-pitched whine instead of an Arsenal football match on TV. At this time, Frankie is making his next album with his "two Austrian mates" Alfonse and Horst, but his hearing degrades rapidly and progress stagnates. Frankie refuses to acknowledge his problem until a gig in Amnesia, when he cannot hear the second channel in his headphones and must crossfade one song into the next without being able to beatmatch them. When the crowd boos him, he throws the turntable and the mixer onto the dance floor, and is forcibly removed from the club.

Frankie agrees to see a doctor, who tells him he has lost hearing in one ear and has 20% left in the other. He warns Frankie that unless he stops abusing drugs and listening to loud noises, he will soon be completely deaf, and even the use of his hearing aid would only further degrade his hearing. During a recording session, Frankie confesses the full nature of his hearing loss to Alfonse. He inserts his hearing aid to demonstrate and, overwhelmed by the sudden sound exposure, leans close to one of the monitor speakers. Before he can react, a frustrated Horst smashes a guitar into an amplifier whose volume Frankie has maximized. The noise is excruciating and the feedback bursts his eardrum, knocking Frankie unconscious. The damage leaves him permanently deaf.

Without his hearing, Frankie cannot complete his album. He loses his recording contract and his manager Max abandons him. Soon after, his wife Sonya leaves him. Frankie shuts himself into his home, which he has "soundproofed" with pillows in a desperate bid to recover his hearing, and his drug use intensifies. He sinks into a heavy depression, repeatedly throwing his body against the walls, and wrapping Roman candles around his head, either an attempt at suicide or a drastic way to recover his hearing, but dives into the pool before they ignite. Frankie flushes all his drugs down a toilet, but is once again tormented by a vision of a menacing coke badger, and when he fights and kills it, he learns that the badger is, in fact, himself.

Frankie finds a deaf organization and meets Penelope, who coaches him in lip-reading. They become close, and eventually intimate. He confides his unhappiness at losing music, and she helps him perceive sound through visual and tactile methods instead. Frankie manages to devise a system for mixing songs, in which he watches an oscilloscope trace while resting his feet on the pulsating speakers. Using this system, he manages to produce a new mix CD (''Hear No Evil'') entirely by himself. He delivers it to Max, who is wildly pleased – particularly by the potential of exploiting Frankie's disability to increase record sales. He has Frankie take part in promotions that are increasingly offensive and insensitive to deaf people, of which Penelope disapproves.

Max convinces Frankie to play live at Pacha as a career comeback, despite Frankie's insistence that he has nothing to prove to his critics. The gig goes exceedingly well, and many claim it shows even greater talent than his early work. After the show, Frankie and Penelope disappear from Max and the music scene altogether. In a talking heads sequence, characters speculate on where he is now, if alive. As the film ends, we see Frankie disguised as a homeless street musician, who is met by Penelope carrying their child. They affectionately walk together down a street unrecognised. Additionally, we see Frankie teaching a group of deaf children how to perceive sound like he does.

Jack Mosley is an alcoholic, burned-out NYPD detective. Despite a late shift the night before, his lieutenant orders him to escort a witness, Eddie Bunker, from local custody to the courthouse 16 blocks away to testify on a police corruption case before a grand jury at 10 a.m. Bunker tries to be friendly with Mosley, telling him of his aspirations to move to Seattle to become a cake baker with his sister who he has never met, but Mosley is uninterested, and stops at a liquor store. They are suddenly ambushed by a gunman, and Mosley drags Bunker to a local bar to take shelter and call for backup. Mosley's former partner, Frank Nugent, and several other officers arrive. Nugent and his men are part of the corruption scheme, and he tells Mosley that Bunker is not worth defending as his testimony will likely expose several corrupt officers, including Nugent. The corrupt cops try to frame Bunker for firing at an officer before they try to kill him. Mosley intervenes, rescuing Bunker and fleeing.

Mosley briefly stops at his sister Diane's apartment to retrieve guns and ammo, and learns the police have already approached her about his activities earlier that day. He and Bunker take steps to further elude the police, and Mosley is wounded in the process. They become cornered in a run-down apartment building as Nugent and his men search floor by floor. Mosley calls the district attorney to arrange for help, but purposely gives the wrong apartment number, suspecting there is a mole involved. Mosley and Bunker are able to escape onto a passenger bus, and as the police follow them, Mosley is forced to treat the passengers as hostages. The bus crashes into a construction site and is soon surrounded by the ESU. Aware that Nugent will likely order the ESU to raid the bus, risking the safety of the passengers, Mosley allows the passengers to go free, using their cover to allow Bunker to sneak off the bus in the confusion. Mosley finds a tape recorder in the discarded possessions on the bus, and prepares a farewell message to Diane.

To his surprise, Bunker returns to the bus; while Nugent is ready to fire on him, Nugent is made to stand down by a superior officer. Bunker has come to see Mosley as his friend and wants to be there for him to see this through. Bunker's tenacity convinces Mosley to get to the courthouse, and he manages to drive the bus into an alley, temporarily blocking the police from following them. He finds that Bunker has been wounded, and calls Diane, a paramedic, to bring an ambulance around to help, despite knowing she will be followed. Diane cares for Mosley and Bunker's wounds, though Bunker still needs further treatment at a hospital. As Diane's ambulance drives away, the police stop her but discover the ambulance is empty; she had a second ambulance pick up Mosley and Bunker that would not be under similar surveillance. Meanwhile, Mosley reveals to Bunker that should he testify, not only will Nugent be convicted but so would Mosley as one of the corrupt cops. Mosley gets off a block from the courthouse and wishes Bunker luck with his bakery, instructing the paramedic to take Bunker to the Port Authority and put him on a bus for Seattle. Bunker promises to send him a cake on his birthday.

Mosley continues to the courthouse, where the police and ESU are waiting for him, as well as the district attorney. Mosley enters the courthouse building through the underground garage, encountering Nugent alone, who tries unsuccessfully to dissuade him from testifying in Bunker's place. Mosley enters the courthouse proper, where one of Nugent's men tries to shoot Mosley but is killed by one of the ESU snipers. Mosley informs the district attorney that he will testify in exchange for Bunker having his record expunged, also revealing that he had recorded the conversation with Nugent in the garage on the tape recorder, which he submits as evidence.

Two years later, Mosley is freed from prison. He celebrates his birthday with Diane and other friends, and is surprised to find that the cake had indeed come from Bunker, who has been successful in starting "Eddie & Jack's Good Sign Bakery" in Seattle.

In the year 1123, Godefroy Amaury de Malfête, Count of Apremont and Papincourt, saves the life of his beloved sovereign, King Louis VI "Le Gros" (''"The Fat"'') from the sword of a "horribilis" Englishman.

For this action of bravery, the King makes him Count of Montmirail and promises him the woman he loves, the beautiful Frénégonde de Pouille. On his way to the castle to marry Frénégonde, Godefroy takes a witch prisoner, and she drugs his drinking flask. Hallucinating, he believes the Duke of Pouille, father of his future wife, is a ferocious bear, and kills him with a crossbow bolt. During the Duke's funeral, Frénégonde refuses to marry Godefroy because of the tragedy; meanwhile, Godefroy's servant, the disreputable Jacquouille la Fripouille, steals the Duke's jewels at end of the funeral.

In an attempt to repair his mistake, Godefroy asks the wizard Eusebius to send him back in time to a moment before he shot the Duke. The old wizard muddles his magical spell, accidentally sending Godefroy and Jacquouille to the year 1992. There, they immediately run into trouble. Godefroy attacks a postman driving his car, mistaking him for a Moor in a devil's chariot; when he meets his descendant, Béatrice de Montmirail, an aristocrat who looks exactly like Frénégonde, she calls the Gendarmerie, who first imprison him, then as Béatrice thinks Godefroy is her distant cousin suffering from amnesia, take him to a mental hospital. Jacquouille, meanwhile, is befriended by Ginette la Clocharde ("Ginette the Tramp" in French), an attractive vagrant they meet early in their adventure.

Béatrice, thinking Godefroy to be her long-lost stuntman cousin Hubert, gets Godefroy out of the mental hospital and takes them back to her home, much to her husband (who greatly dislikes the fact of the two being in their home) Jean-Pierre's dismay. There, various culture-shock comedy ensues as Godefroy and Jacquouille attempt to fathom modern household appliances, such as flooding the bathroom by leaving the tap open, using an umbrella as a pike to roast a leg of lamb and setting it on fire, washing their hands in the toilet, trashing the bathroom during their baths and wasting all of the family's 6,000 FF Chanel No. 5, greatly angering Jean-Pierre.

Seeing the family seal on Godefroy's hand, Beatrice assumes he stole the jewel from the castle de Montmirail, now renovated into an expensive hotel. They go there and meet the owner of the castle, the effete Jacques-Henri Jacquard, the unwitting descendant and close likeness of Jacquouille (they react to each other with mutual disgust). The jewel on Godefroy's hand starts to burn as they get closer to the castle, where the present-day version of the seal is. The two seals explode and destroy Jacquard's brand new Range Rover.

Godefroy books a room for the night and reopens a secret passage known only to him. There he finds a letter telling him to go to a certain address, where an aged Monsieur Ferdinand, the last descendant of the wizard Eusebius, gives him the potion that will return him to the year 1123. Jacquouille, however, wants to stay, enjoying Ginette's company and having proved more adaptable than Godefroy in discovering toothpaste, modern clothing and other amenities of the future. Furious at his behavior, Godefroy finally brings him to the hotel room by force.

While Godefroy is talking with Béatrice, Jacquouille swaps jackets with his descendant, closes the curtains, dims the lights, drugs Jacquard and puts him on the bed in his place. In the dark, Godefroy gives Jacquard (thinking it is Jacquouille) the potion which then sends him back to the year 1123. Godefroy equally comes back just in time to stop himself from shooting Frénégonde's father, and the deflected crossbow bolt kills the witch who caused the whole misadventure by drugging Godefroy's flask. The bewildered Jacquard finds himself stranded in the past in the role of Godefroy's servant as Godefroy leaves on horseback with Frénégonde.

Slipper-on-the-Water is home to a clan known as the Periods, who are descendants of Fooley the Magnificent or the Great Fooley, who 440 years before the book opens constructed a balloon, flew to the land beyond the mountains and returned with a case of curiosities. They hold high offices in Slipper-on-the-Water, have very high opinions of themselves and have a "Council of Periods" that rules the village. Also living in the village are a group of Minnipins referred to as "Them" by the other villagers. These include Gummy, Walter the Earl and Curley Green. "Them" shun the tradition-based existence of the other Minnipins. One night, a Minnipin named Muggles wakes up and sees fires in the Sunset Mountains in the West. While digging for treasure, Walter the Earl discovers a vault under his house and finds iron chests that contain ancient scrolls, swords, armor and military trumpets. The scrolls reveal that Fooley the Magnificent's story and contain ominous warnings from Walter the Earl's forebear Walter the Obtuse saying that the vault will be found when it is needed for the protection of the Minnipins.

The mayor returns from the annual meeting of village mayors with news that there will be a contest to find the finest village in the Land Between the Mountains. The winning village will win the legendary and sacred Gammage Cup. The villagers are excited but the Periods convince the villagers that "Them" will ruin their chances of winning the cup. During a town meeting, the Periods outlaw "Them". Mingy, the curmudgeonly money-keeper who resists spending money for "fancying up the village" is also outlawed. Along with Muggles who has become involved with "Them" because of her seeing the fires on the Sunset Mountains.

The "Outlaws" paddle up the river to Gummy's stone cabin on The Knoll. They move in but the cabin is too small for all of them and decide to sleep outside until a new house is built. Muggles organizes their working efforts and after much progress is made, they explore the Old Mines in the Sunset Mountains. Walter the Earl brings an iron sword from the vault. Inside the mines the sword glows as a warning, and they hear tapping sounds. After this phenomenon occurs again, they assume that the legendary enemies of the Minnipins known as The Mushrooms have returned and are preparing to attack, and they hold a council of war.

Muggles decides that Mingy should reconnoiter the Old Mines while the rest of the "Outlaws" wait behind. In the mines, Mingy sees several hairless creatures with mushroom-colored skin round bellies and big ears and wearing tight, brownish-white clothes. Over 200 of them emerge from the mines. Mingy concludes that these must be the Mushrooms and tries to return to the others, but his is foot is trapped in the rocks. The rest of the Outlaws rush to save Mingy as the Mushrooms swarm to capture him. They chase most of the Mushrooms away but four of them capture Mingy and carry him into the mountain. Gummy chases them into the Old Mines and returns after he is hit by a poisonous spear.

The group return to Gummy's cabin to tend to his worsening wound. Curly Green and Muggles stay and defend Gummy while Walter the Earl returns to Slipper-on-the-Water to raise an army to fight the Mushrooms. Walter the Earl tries to tell the Periods mayor and council about the coming Mushroom army but they will not listen. He decides to raise the village without the help of the Periods. He is successful, but the Periods tell the villagers the Walter is deranged and the villagers are uncertain what to do. An eerie chanting is heard from the mountains.

In the Old Mines, the Mushroom chief refuses to kill Mingy. One of the Mushrooms is scratched by a poison spear and Mingy watches as a white substance is used on the scratch, and thinks this may help his foot. After the Mushrooms leave to fight, he puts some on his foot, which feels better. The Mushroom army attacks the cabin where Gummy, Curly Green and Muggles are hiding. Gummy becomes weak because of the poison from the spear and Curly Green is knocked out while Muggles wards off the Mushrooms. The Minnipin army attacks and a fierce battle ensues. As the Mushrooms flee back into the Old Mines, Mingy sets a heap of mats on fire, making it impossible for the Mushrooms to escape. They rush out to escape the flames and are defeated by the Minnipin army. Mingy emerges from the cave holding the pot of white substance which is used cure Gummy and the injured Minnipins soldiers.

The Period village council regrets expelling the Outlaws and no longer cares about winning the Gammage Cup. The villagers celebrate the return of the soldiers and the five Outlaws. The three judges of the contest arrive. Witnessing the happy scene, they decide that Slipper-on-the-Water is the most deserving village and leave the Gammage Cup in the town square.

Brittany Aarons (Danielle Panabaker) is a regular teenage girl, one of the many who has a crush on popular pop singer Jordan Cahill (Taran Killam). However, she is bored of living a suburban existence and pines for excitement. At school, she meets a new girl, Natasha Kwon-Schwartz (Brenda Song), who informs Brittany that she moved to suburbia from several years on and off living in Europe and New York. Brittany's other friends dislike Natasha for her nonconformism, but Brittany pursues a friendship with her. Upon finding out that Jordan is filming a video nearby, Brittany invites Natasha to join her and her fangirl friends to watch the shoot. Jordan, at the video shoot, expresses dislike for the shallow new single, wanting to sing his own lyrics, which his record company denies him. When Jordan and his team knock into Brittany and Natasha after the shoot, Eddie (Jordan's assistant, best friend and confidante) and Brittany accidentally pick up one another's phones in the ensuing mess.

Brittany tries to return "Eddie's" phone but is denied entry at Jordan's hotel. Once they get a hold of Eddie and figure out the phone is Jordan's, they demand to speak with the pop star before they would return it, which Eddie refuses. Natasha convinces Brittany that it would be fun to mess with Jordan, and change his image. They prank call his hair stylist, get her to cut off all his hair, and get a new wardrobe for him. Along the way they find that Jordan's life is not the life he chooses, but rather the one his record company wants for him. At first he is terrified that his personal barber gave him a major haircut, but eventually accepts it as the first step towards a break from his manufactured image, enjoying his new wardrobe and look, which he thinks Eddie procured. Eventually, the girls demand Eddie have Jordan perform at a rally hosted by Brittany's mother to save a local landmark, which was previously failing to draw attention.

Jordan gets a hold of Brittany after Eddie confesses to the whole situation, and Jordan explains everything to her. She and Natasha make up from a falling out, and go to meet up with him while being chased by the record company who are tracking his phone. They send his lyrics for one of his songs "More Than Me" to everyone through Brittany's phone, ditch his phone and get a ride to the rally with Brittany's sister. At the rally, Eddie tries to stop Jordan from appearing but ultimately supports him, and the landmark is preserved. Brittany, Natasha, and Brittany's fangirl friends become dancers in the music video he was making at the beginning of the movie, which now features Eddie replacing Jordan. It is shown that Brittany and Jordan keep in touch, and although he invites her to go to New York with him (over the phone), she declines, saying things are really exciting in her suburban town.

The part of the story taking place in England where Johnny's father has enlisted is told mainly through letters sent back home to his family. Through the letters it is possible to tell that the November 25 until December 26, 1914. At the beginning of the book Johnny and his family live in London, however Johnny is sent to live with his Aunt Ivy in the town of Cliffe soon after his father enlists. His mother moves to the town of Woolwich, also sending letters to Johnny every chapter, to help support the war by getting a job making weaponry in a factory.

A main theme of the book is the pointlessness and irrationality of war. After the protagonist, Johnny Briggs, misses school for two days in order to have more time to build his Guy Fawkes, he is forced to spend every Wednesday and Saturday afternoon at his teacher's house. There, his teacher, Mr. Tuttle, tutors him on classic literature, mainly the ''Iliad''. They both draw direct parallels between the events of World War I and the events of Homer's novel.

It is during the beginning of the book that he is bullied, but when saved by Sarah is entirely ungrateful and says "a girl for a friend is like no friend at all." This is why he leaves the school. When she saves him from being thrown in the fire he starts to see her as a friend.

At the beginning of the book, Johnny's father appears enthusiastic about going to war, so much that at the beginning he is frustrated that he lacks the half-inch of height required to enlist. After the required height is lowered, he joins the war and is moved to the front line afterward. As the war continues, it takes its toll on Johnny's father's health, physique, and mentality. Johnny's father sends his son a newly whittled and painted soldier with every letter, but his creations appear increasingly grotesque throughout the book. This is reflected in the model of himself that he had sent. The brown paint of his clothes turns a moldy green, the wide grin on its face fades to a grim, mournful expression, a hairline crack comes down his chest, and a knothole begins to form in its chest.

The book comes to a close when Johnny stops playing with his nutcracker soldiers, and brings them together for the Christmas Truce of 1914. The war continues without Johnny's interference, and his father returns four years later in 1918. Johnny's mother dies from sulfur poisoning in 1923, demonstrating that some of the most valiant sacrifices of World War I came not from the front lines, but from the work force at home.

At the end of 1931, Nin finds herself dissatisfied with being a timid, faithful wife to her banker husband, Hugh Parker Guiler. Nin and her husband contemplate the possibility of opening their relationship, and determine that it would threaten their marriage. However, when Anais meets June Miller, she is magnetically drawn to her and perceives June to be the most beautiful and charismatic woman she has ever met. Nin pursues an extremely intense, ambiguous, sexually charged friendship with her. When June leaves, Nin becomes involved with Henry, and begins an uninhibited sexual and emotional affair with him, which prompts an intellectual and sensual awakening. A friendship is formed between the two that was maintained throughout both artist's lives.

The Russian writer Andrei Gorchakov travels to Italy to research the life of 18th-century Russian composer Pavel Sosnovsky, who lived there and committed suicide after his return to Russia. He and his comely interpreter Eugenia travel to a convent in the Tuscan countryside, to look at frescoes by Piero della Francesca. Andrei decides at the last minute that he does not want to enter.

Back at their hotel Andrei feels displaced and longs to go back to Russia, but unnamed circumstances seem to get in the way. Eugenia is smitten with Andrei and is offended that he will not sleep with her, claiming that she has a better boyfriend waiting for her.

Andrei meets and befriends a strange man named Domenico, who is famous in the village for trying to cross through the waters of a mineral pool with a lit candle. He claims that when finally achieving it, he will save the world. They both share a feeling of alienation from their surroundings. Andrei later learns that Domenico used to live in a lunatic asylum until the post-fascistic state closed them and now lives in the street. He also learns that Domenico had a family and was obsessed in keeping them inside his house in order to save them from the end of the world, until they were freed by the local police after seven years. Before leaving, Domenico gives Andrei his candle and asks him if he will cross the waters with the candle for him.

During a dream-like sequence, Andrei sees himself as Domenico and has visions of his wife, Eugenia and the Mary as being all one and the same. Andrei seems to cut his research short and plans to leave for Russia, until he gets a call from Eugenia, who wishes to say goodbye and tell him that she met Domenico in Rome by chance and that he asked if Andrei has walked across the pool himself as he promised. Andrei says he has, although that is not true. Eugenia is with her boyfriend, but he seems uninterested in her and appears to be involved in dubious business affairs. Later, Domenico delivers a speech in the city about the need of mankind of being true brothers and sisters and to return to a simpler way of life. Finally, he plays the fourth movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and immolates himself while an onlooker imitates the action of him writhing on the ground in agony.

Meanwhile, Andrei returns to the mineral pool in Bagno Vignoni (Val d'Orcia) to fulfill his promise, only to find that the pool has been drained. He enters the empty pool and repeatedly attempts to walk from one end to the other without letting the candle extinguish, as he experiences signs of his illness. When he finally achieves his goal, he collapses and dies. The final shot shows Andrei and a dog resting on the ground of Abbey of San Galgano, with a countryside with a wooden house in the background.

Karen (Sally Field) and Mack McCann (Ed Harris) are happily married with two daughters, seventeen-year-old Julie (from Karen's previous marriage) and six-year-old Megan. One afternoon while Karen is out shopping, Julie is violently raped and murdered, which Karen overhears on the phone. Detective Joe Denillo assures the McCanns there is enough DNA evidence to find and convict the killer, and encourages Karen to seek counselling.

At a support group, Karen meets people in similar circumstances, including Albert and Regina Gratz, and Sidney Hughes. During the meeting, Karen overhears Albert talking to Sidney about something which alarms Regina. Meanwhile, the DNA tests reveal Julie's killer to be Robert Doob (Kiefer Sutherland), a delivery driver with a criminal record. However at the trial, Doob is released as the defence did not receive a sample of the evidence, and the judge dismisses the case. Karen and Mack are horrified as Doob walks free.

Mack is desperate to return to a normal life, but Karen cannot stop thinking about Doob. She finds out where he lives and keeps detailed records of his movements. Karen follows Doob while he goes out on deliveries and attempts to warn a female customer, but the woman only speaks Spanish and does not understand her. Karen later learns that the murderer of the Gratzs' son has been killed in a drive-by shooting, just days after being released from prison. Angel, also in the self-help group, tells Karen the best way to get over her grief is to focus on having good experiences with her living daughter, making Karen realizes she has been so fixated on Doob that Megan has been deprived of her attention.

Doob discovers Karen is stalking him and goes to Megan's school. When Karen comes to pick Megan up, Doob deliberately intimidates her and threatens to harm Megan if she continues following him. Worried for Megan's safety and with her sanity declining, Karen approaches Sidney, who admits the drive-by shooting was set up by him and Martin. Karen demands their help and they agree to find a weapon, train her, and plan the murder, but tell her she has to carry it out. Karen agrees and they begin plotting. She also joins a self-defense class, which helps her gain more confidence, helps rekindle her sex life with Mack, and improves her relationship with Megan. Sidney gives Karen a gun.

Angel reveals that she is really an undercover FBI Agent investigating vigilante activity within the support group, and warns Karen not to kill Doob. Karen then calls Sidney to tell him she cannot go through with it, but later changes her mind when she learns the Spanish customer she tried to warn about Doob has been raped and murdered. Karen is furious when Doob again walks free because, as the grocery delivery man, his prints and hair/carpet fibers belong in the house. He even wore a condom to prevent leaving DNA, something he didn’t do with Julie.

Karen sets a trap to lure Doob into her home while Mack and Megan are out of town, so that she can say killing him was self-defense, and it works. Despite Doob's attempts to fight back, Karen ultimately shoots Doob dead after a struggle. Denillo arrives on the scene and tells Karen that he knows the truth and that she has not fooled him, to which she replies, "Prove it." He decides to tell his colleague that it was a "clear case of self-defense". When Mack arrives, he sits beside her, holding her hand, also knowing what she has done.

Said's world revolves around Nabawiyya, his former wife, and Sana', his daughter. Once in love with the former, she has now betrayed him by marrying his friend 'Ilish. Central to the making of Said Mahran is also Ra'uf 'Ilwan, his one-time criminal mentor, who used the same revolutionist rhetoric, but now, being a respected journalist and businessman, is in seeming opposition to Said, whose outlook hasn't changed. These perceived betrayals throw the protagonist into the utmost confusion and his initial calculation in revenge becomes ever more a wild flailing against the whole world. Only Nur, a prostitute, and Tarzan, a café-owner, provide Said with any aid and support from the world at large which is closing in on him, yet in time even they cannot help him.

Laura Hoff, an only child, is a reclusive young woman who lives with her mother, Mari, in a working-class home in Scarborough, Yorkshire, England. She is known as LV (short for Little Voice) because of her soft, shy, and childlike speaking voice. She flees reality, hiding away in her bedroom, listening to records and impersonating the voices of American and British artists such as Marilyn Monroe, Gracie Fields, Judy Garland and Shirley Bassey; her love of songs is her only source of strength since her beloved father's death. Her mother, a promiscuous woman with countless affairs, dumps a man when her passion wanes.

Billy, a telephone engineer who installs their new telephone, approaches LV on the pretense of giving her information pamphlets. Things improve when Mari is seeing Ray Say, who manages third-rate acts; he hears the girl sing, spots her gift and vows to make her a star, while Mari, who dislikes singing, still doubts her. Ray arranges for LV to sing at a club owned by Mr. Boo. But her performance is a failure as she is overcome by stage fright and only sings a few lines. Ray sees that LV needs encouragement on stage and works with Mr. Boo to organise a big band, lights and a new dress to give her confidence.

Ray gives her a pep talk, persuading her to perform by portraying her act as a tribute to her father. LV agrees to sing again, but only as a one-off. LV envisions her father sitting in the club as she performs; she brings the house down and is a storming success. Ray thinks she is his ticket to the big time and arranges for a London agent to come and see LV perform the following night. As Ray, Mari and Mr Boo toast their future success, LV murmurs that she agreed to sing only the one time and slumps to the floor.

The following night LV passively remains in her bed while the selfish natures of Ray and Mari are very much revealed: Ray's futile attempts to goad LV are dashed, and Mari still scorns and prods her. At the cabaret club, the London agent finally loses patience after several third-rate acts fill the time in LV's absence and leaves. Ray storms into the club and sings "It's Over" on stage, as his career disappears before everyone's eyes.

Meanwhile, the faulty wiring at LV's home finally starts a fire, trapping LV in her upper room where she is rescued by Billy. In a final showdown with her mother, after being wrongly accused by her mother of arson, LV responds by screaming in her mother's face. Blaming her for her father's death and blaming her own meek nature on Mari's domineering attitude, she walks away saying her name isn't Little Voice, it's Laura.

Mari is left by everyone, Ray is facing his debt collectors, and Laura is saved by her discovery of self-confidence.

The film opens in the 16th century, when Ukraine, Russia, Poland and elsewhere in eastern Europe were divided into small sections and principalities that fought each other or against one enemy: in this case, the Ottoman Empire. It starts with a battle raging between the Turks and the Poles. The Poles are losing until the Cossacks arrive to save the day. However, it turns out that the Poles were merely holding back so that they could treacherously attack the Cossacks after they won the battle for them. As a result, the Poles become masters of Ukraine and the Cossacks are subjugated. Taras Bulba, one of the Cossack officers, returns home to raise his family but now it is under Polish dominion.

Several years later, Taras sends his two sons, Andriy (Tony Curtis) and Ostap (Perry Lopez) to the academy at Kiev, to obtain a Polish education. There, the eldest son, Andriy, falls in love with a Polish princess Natalia Dubrov (played by Christine Kaufmann), to the ire of the locals, who treat the Cossack brothers like scum of the earth. Ultimately, the brothers are forced to flee Kiev, returning to their father’s house on the Ukrainian steppes.

There, word comes that the Poles want the Cossacks to raise an army to help them in a new war in the Baltic region. When Andriy objects, he is accused of being a coward. This is a serious offense that can only be resolved by a test of courage. Andriy and his accuser ride and jump their horses over a chasm until God chooses which one is right by having the accuser fall to his death. Taras embraces Andriy’s lead and plans to betray the Poles and take back Ukraine.

Assuming command of the Cossacks, Taras leads them to Dubno, where the Poles are expecting him to join them. Instead, the Cossacks attack the Polish army and drive it back into the city. The Cossacks then lay siege to the city. Hunger and disease set in and Andriy, fearing for the life of his Polish lover, sneaks into the city in an attempt to rescue her. He is captured and she is condemned to be burned at the stake for the crime of loving a Cossack. To save her, Andriy agrees to lead a raiding party to bring cattle into the starving city.

Meanwhile, the Cossacks have grown bored with the inactivity of the siege and a large number of them have departed for home. When the Polish commander realizes the weakness of the Cossacks against the raiding force, he orders his whole army to attack. Taras Bulba encounters his son on the field of battle and kills him for his betrayal before joining the general retreat to the edge of a cliff. There, the Cossacks who left the siege to go home, rejoin the battle and large numbers of men and horses, both Cossack and Polish, are pushed over the edge to their deaths in the river below.

The movie ends with the Cossacks victorious and entering Dubno. Andriy is to be buried there, as “... it is now a Cossack city.” By the words of Hetman Taras Bulba, the Cossacks will not treat the Poles as badly as they were treated by them: "We will not ravage. We will not pillage. We will burn out the plague, and open the supply wagons, and feed the people of ''our'' city."

The series was set in the year 2500 AD and followed the adventures of the crew of the galactic patrol ship '''Phoenix Five''', "the most sophisticated craft in the Earth Space Control Fleet." This handpicked team consisted of '''Captain Roke''', a typical heroic Kirk-style commander with a solution to every problem; '''Ensign Adam Hargraves''', his stalwart young second-in-command always ready to shoot first and skip the questions; compassionate young navigator '''Cadet Tina Kulbrick'''; and their clunky, glass-domed Computeroid robot '''Karl'''. Together they patrolled the outer galaxies defending the innocent and warding off the repeated plots and attacks of the evil balding, blue-skinned humanoid '''Zodian''' of Zebula 9 and the eccentric pointy-eared renegade scientist '''Platonus'''.

Zodian originally appeared in ''Vega 4'', and he and his head-shaped twin computers '''Alpha''' and '''Zeta''' were in the first 13 episodes of ''Phoenix Five'', then were replaced by Platonus and his Cockney-accented computer '''Tommy''' for the latter half. This was due to a production break caused by the untimely death of producer Peter Summerton. He was replaced by John Walters.

The story is set on the fictional ''Fighting Fantasy'' world of Titan, on the continent known as The Old World. A powerful artifact known as the Crown of Kings, which bestows magical powers of leadership upon its owner, has been stolen from the land of Analand by the cruel Archmage of Mampang Fortress. With the Crown, the Archmage will be able to gain leadership of the lawless and brutal region of Kakhabad and begin an invasion of surrounding kingdoms. The player takes on the role of the lone hero, referred to only as the Analander, who has been dispatched to retrieve the Crown, thereby averting the invasion and saving Analand from terrible disgrace. The quest itself is divided between the four titles in the series:

''The Shamutanti Hills'' :Details the player's attempt to navigate the hills and plains surrounding Analand while defeating various monsters and avoiding traps. ''Kharé – Cityport of Traps'' :Relates the player's attempt to pass through the city of Kharé and find the four lines of a spell required to open the Northern Gate and allow an exit from the city. ''The Seven Serpents'' :The player crosses the Baklands, a vast and dangerous wasteland, attempting to find and defeat seven magical serpents: servants of the Archmage who are travelling to warn their master of the Analander's approach. ''The Crown of Kings'' :The final adventure details the player’s attempt to find and penetrate Mampang Fortress – stronghold of the Archmage – and defeat the enemy before reclaiming the Crown of Kings.

In 1603, in feudal Japan, a young man is being chased by four samurai on horseback. As they go into the woods, a mysterious woman emerges from the underbrush and watches closely. However, the samurai eventually capture and take the youth, revealed to be a prince named Kenshin, with them.

In the present, two years after the events of the previous film with the defeat of The Shredder and The Foot Clan, April O'Neil has been shopping at the flea market in preparation for her upcoming vacation. She brings gifts to her friends, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, in their underground lair to cheer them up. Michelangelo is given an old lamp (the lampshade of which he wears as an impression of Elvis Presley in "Blue Hawaii"), Donatello is given a broken radio to fix, Leonardo is given a book on swords, and Raphael is to receive a fedora but, having stormed off earlier, he is never formally given it. For Splinter, she brings an ancient Japanese scepter.

Back in the past, Kenshin is being scolded by his father, Lord Norinaga, for disgracing their family name, but Kenshin argues that his father's desire for war is the true disgrace. Their argument is interrupted by Walker, an English trader who has come to supply Norinaga with added manpower and firearms, and Kenshin leaves his father's presence to brood alone in a temple. There, he finds the same scepter and reads the inscription: "Open Wide the Gates of Time".

In the present, April is looking at the scepter and it begins to light up, with mysterious winds blowing around her. She is then sent back in time, while Kenshin takes her place; each wears what the other was wearing in their local space/time. Upon arrival, April is accused of being a witch, but Walker deduces she has no power and has April put in prison to suffer. Back in the present, Kenshin is highly distressed upon seeing the turtles and calls them "kappa". After learning from Kenshin of the situation, the turtles decide to go back in time to get April. However, according to Donatello's calculations, they have to do it within 60 hours, otherwise the scepter's power will disappear due to the space-time continuum being out of sync. They bring in Casey Jones to watch over Kenshin and the lair, and use the scepter to warp through time. When doing so, the turtles are replaced by four of Norinaga's Honor Guards, who are confused at their new surroundings.

Back in time, the turtles awake on horseback and make a poor show of riding their steeds. During the confusion, Mikey (who is carrying the scepter) ends up riding off alone into the forest and gets ambushed by the mysterious woman from earlier and an unseen person takes the scepter. The others go to search for April at Norinaga's castle, where their identity as Honor Guards allows them cover in their search. After following Niles, one of Walker's thugs, into the prison, the turtles rescue April and also free another prisoner named Whit (locked up for trying to start a mutiny against Walker, and who bears a striking resemblance to Casey), but their sloppy escape ends up leaving them all alone in the wilderness and without a clue where to go. Meanwhile, in the present, Kenshin is getting impatient and anticipates a fight from Casey. Casey instead introduces him and the Honor Guards to television hockey, which manages to calm them down for the time being.

Out in the woods, the turtles, April, and Whit are again attacked, this time by villagers mistaking them for Norinaga's forces. The attack stops when Mitsu, leader of the rebellion against Lord Norinaga, unmasks Raphael and sees that he looks just like one of her prisoners. The turtles realize that she is talking about Mikey and accompany Mitsu to her village. When they arrive, the village is being burned down by Walker's men. As the turtles help the villagers save it, Mikey is let out by a pair of clueless soldiers and joins in the fight. Walker is forced to retreat, but the fire continues to burn and has trapped a young boy named Yoshi inside a house. Michelangelo saves Yoshi from the fire, then Leonardo helps him recover by performing CPR; this earns the turtles the gratitude and respect of the villagers.

As Walker continues bargaining with Lord Norinaga over buying guns in exchange for gold, the turtles spend some time in the village. Donatello decides to have a replica scepter made so they can get back home, while Michelangelo teaches some of the people about pizza and later tries to console Mitsu about Kenshin, whom she is in love with. Raphael also gets in touch with his sensitive side through the child Yoshi, and teaches Yoshi how to control his temper. Back in the present, the Honor Guards from the past are quickly adjusting to life in the 20th Century, and Casey decides to challenge them to a hockey game. To Casey's dismay, the Honor Guards think hockey is about beating each other up, having watched the same on television. Meanwhile, Kenshin and Splinter fear that the ninja turtles will not return home in time before their sixty hours are up.

In the past, the replica scepter is completed, but an argument between Michelangelo and Raphael ends up breaking it. To make matters worse, Mitsu informs them that Lord Norinaga has agreed to purchase Walker's guns and will attack the village in the morning. However, when Raphael sneaks off to visit Yoshi, he is surprised to find the original scepter in the child's possession. The turtles are overjoyed to see it but are angry at Mitsu for hiding it and essentially forcing them to fight her war. However, Mitsu's grandfather clarifies that it was ''his'' idea to have the turtles fight in her place.

Suddenly, Whit betrays everybody, captures Mitsu and takes the scepter with him, and the turtles return to Norinaga's palace to save her. After rescuing her, they are cornered by Norinaga and are made to fight waves of his soldiers. The turtles respond by freeing the prisoners in the palace, starting an all-out war on the palace grounds. After a while of fighting, Leo defeats Lord Norinaga in a heated sword duel, comedically finishing him by cutting his hair and then trapping him inside of a bell. Deciding to cut his losses, Walker takes the scepter and tries to escape to his boat. When cornered by the turtles at the dock, Walker throws the scepter into the air as a distraction. The turtles catch the scepter, while Whit (who reformed after Walker went back on a deal they had made) launches a fireball from a catapult at Walker and knocks him off the dock to his death.

The turtles are now ready to return to their own time, but Mikey says he would rather stay with Mitsu. Raphael decides he wants to stay as well because he feels like the Turtles are appreciated in Japan unlike back home. The other turtles and April try to convince them otherwise until Kenshin activates the scepter and makes the decision harder. After a long debate (which included Mitsu telling Mikey to keep his promise about Kenshin returning to the past), Michelangelo reluctantly agrees to go home with his brothers, but just barely misses grabbing the scepter in time. The Honor Guards switch back with the Turtles (all except for Michelangelo). Fortunately, the last remaining Honor Guard Benkei activates the scepter and swaps places with Mikey just before the scepter burns out.

In the past, Norinaga admits surrender to Mitsu and Kenshin (who hand the scepter to him), and the two lovers share a tender reunion. Meanwhile, Michaelangelo is depressed over the thought of growing up, but Splinter cheers him up by performing the "lampshade Elvis" impression, and the rest of the turtles join in with a final dance number.

The play deals with Larry Doyle, originally from Ireland, but who has adopted English cultural customs and manners to fit in in England and Tom Broadbent, his English business partner. They are civil engineers who run a firm in London. They go to Roscullen, where Doyle was born, to develop some land.

Doyle has no illusions about Ireland while Broadbent is taken with the romance of the place. Broadbent, a lively man who is seemingly not always aware of the impression he makes, becomes a favourite of the people. Before the play is over, it is clear he will marry Nora Reilly, the woman waiting for Doyle (who is more than happy to let her go) and become the area's candidate for Parliament after Doyle refuses to stand. Doyle has also 'called in' all his loans given "so easily" to the locals against their homes and intends (as he had planned all along) to make the village into an amusement park.

Another major character is the defrocked priest Peter (Father) Keegan, the political and temperamental opposite of Broadbent, who becomes suspicious of him upon his arrival and warns the locals against him.

In a room at a university campus in 1970, white and black students argue about an impending student strike. Mark (Mark Frechette) leaves the meeting after saying he is "willing to die, but not of boredom" for the cause, which draws criticism from the young white radicals. Following a mass arrest at the campus protest, Mark visits a police station hoping to bail his roommate out of jail. He is told to wait but goes to the lock-up area, asks further about bail for his roommate, is rebuffed, calls out to the arrested students and faculty and is arrested. He gives his name as Karl Marx, which a duty officer types as "Carl Marx". After he is released from jail, Mark and another friend buy firearms from a Los Angeles gun shop, saying they need them for "self-defense" to "protect our women."

In a downtown Los Angeles office building, successful real estate executive Lee Allen (Rod Taylor) reviews a television commercial for Sunny Dunes, a new resort-like real estate development in the desert. Instead of actors or models, the slickly produced commercial features casually dressed, smiling mannequins. In the next scene Allen talks with his associate (G.D. Spradlin) about the greater Los Angeles area's very rapid growth as the two drive through crowded streets.

Mark goes to a bloody campus confrontation between students and police. Some students are tear-gassed and at least one is shot. As Mark reaches for a gun in his boot, a Los Angeles policeman is seen being fatally shot, although it is unclear by whom.Canby, Vincent. [http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=9E04E2DB1F3FE034BC4852DFB466838B669EDE "Screen: Antonioni's 'Zabriskie Point'".] ''The New York Times'', February 10, 1970. Retrieved: February 2, 2010. Mark flees the campus and rides a city bus to suburban Hawthorne, California where, after failing to buy a sandwich on credit from a local blue-collar delicatessen, he walks to Hawthorne Municipal Airport, steals a small Cessna 210 aircraft and flies into the desert.

Meanwhile, Daria (Daria Halprin), "a sweet, pot-smoking post-teenybopper of decent inclinations,” is driving across the desert towards Phoenix in a 1950s-era Buick automobile to meet Lee, her boss, who may or may not also be her lover. Along the way Daria is searching for a man who works with "emotionally disturbed" children from Los Angeles. She finds the young boys near a roadhouse in the Mojave desert, but they tease, taunt, and grab at her, boldly asking for "a piece of ass,” to which she asks in reply, "Are you sure you'd know what to do with it?"

Daria flees in her car. While filling its radiator with water, she is spied from the air by Mark, who buzzes her car and then flies only 15 feet over her as she lies face down in the sand. He throws a T-shirt out of the window of the aircraft for her to pick up. Daria goes from upset to curious and smiling during this sequence.

They later meet at the desert shack of an old man, where Mark asks her for a lift so he can buy gasoline for the aircraft. The two then wander to Zabriskie Point, where they make love. As they begin, other unidentified young naked people are shown playing sexually on the ground, their wild games sending up thick clouds of white dust from the desert floor.

Later, a California highway patrolman suspiciously questions Daria. Hidden behind a portable toilet meant for tourists, Mark takes aim at the policeman, but Daria stands between the two of them to block this, apparently saving the policeman's life before he drives away. Daria asks Mark if he was the one who killed the cop in Los Angeles. He states that he wanted to, but someone else shot the officer first and that he "never got off a shot".

Returning to the stolen aircraft, they paint it with politically charged slogans and psychedelic colors. Daria pleads with Mark to travel with her and leave the aircraft, but Mark is intent on returning and taking the risks that it involves. He flies back to Los Angeles and lands the plane at the airport in Hawthorne. The police (along with some radio and television reporters) are waiting for him, and patrol cars chase the aircraft down the runway. Instead of stopping, Mark tries to turn the taxiing aircraft around across the grass and is shot dead by one of the policemen.

Daria learns about Mark's death on the car radio. She drives to Lee's lavish desert home, "a desert Berchtesgaden" set high on a rock outcropping near Phoenix, Arizona, where she sees three affluent women sunning themselves and chatting by the swimming pool. She grieves for Mark by drenching herself in the house's architectural waterfall. Lee is deeply immersed in a business meeting having to do with the complex and financially risky Sunny Dunes development. Taking a break, he spots Daria in the house and happily greets her. She goes downstairs alone and finds the guest room that has been set aside for her, but after briefly opening the door, she shuts it again.

Seeing a young Native American housekeeper in the hallway, Daria leaves silently. She drives off, but stops to get out of the car and look back at the house, her own imagination seeing it repeatedly blown apart in billows of orange flame and household items.

Barbara Stanwyck and Robert Ryan Mae Doyle returns to her hometown, the fishing town of Monterey, California, after 10 years on the East Coast. Joe, her fisherman brother, is not pleased to see her, but accepts her back into the family home. His girlfriend Peggy is more welcoming. When Joe asks Mae about the rich man whom she had been seeing, she explains that he was a married politician. He died and left her some money, but his wife and relatives took her to court and won.

Mae begins to date Jerry D'Amato, a good-natured, unsophisticated fisherman with his own boat. Mae instantly despises Jerry's friend, Earl Pfeiffer, a bitter, dissatisfied film projectionist. Mae's politician lover had made her feel more confident in herself; in stark contrast, Earl has a low opinion of women and makes no attempt to hide it. His wife is a vaudeville performer who is frequently away on tour.

Earl, sensing a kindred restless spirit, is attracted to Mae right away. Jerry is oblivious to the tension between the two and soon asks Mae to marry him, despite her warning that she is not good for him. Mae accepts, even though she does not love or even respect her future husband, for security and in the hope that she can change.

A year after having a baby girl with Jerry, Mae becomes bored and restless. Earl, now divorced, makes a move on Mae. She resists at first, but then begins an affair with him. Jerry's uncle Vince, who bears a grudge against Mae, knows of the affair and tells his disbelieving nephew. When Jerry confronts the couple, Mae admits that she wants to leave Jerry to be with Earl.

After a few drinks and some prodding by Vince, Jerry finds and starts strangling Earl until Mae arrives and breaks up the fight. Jerry leaves, horrified that he came close to killing his friend. When Mae goes home to take her baby away, she finds the crib empty. Earl tries to coax Mae to leave with him anyway, without the baby, but Mae refuses. After trading bitter recriminations, she breaks up with him. Later, Mae repents and convinces Jerry to take her back.

The original version of the plot proposed involvement of munitions runners and government agents, focussing more on the super-explosive formula hidden in the idol. This was rewritten during production, but some elements remain, such as the otherwise nonsensical final chapter name "Operator No. 17" and Ula Vale's unexplained periodic use of disguises in the first few chapters. (Ula Vale was originally written as a government agent using "Operator No. 17" as her code name; this plot element was dropped from the revised script, but only after some scenes from the earlier shooting script had been filmed, along with the main title cards.)

Several plot elements bring the characters together in search (and pursuit) of the Guatemalan idol known as The Green Goddess: Tarzan's friend D'Arnot has crash landed in the region and is in the hands of a lost tribe of jungle natives; Major Martling is leading an expedition to find the fabled artefact for a powerful explosives formula hidden within it; Ula Vale's fiancé died in an earlier expedition to rescue the artefact for its archaeological benefit, and so she starts one of her own in his honour; and Raglan has been sent by Hiram Powers, Ula's lawyer, to steal the valuable idol for himself. In addition to containing the explosives formula, the idol also holds a fortune in jewels.

Tarzan, Ula and Major Martling locate the lost city containing the idol and rescue D'Arnot from the natives who worship it in the 70-minute-long first episode. However, Raglan escapes with the Green Goddess and heads through the jungle for the coast. Tarzan and the others pursue him across the jungle, encountering many perils, including recapture by the natives to whom the idol belonged. The adventures end out at sea, where, during a hurricane, they are able to permanently secure the idol while Raglan is killed by another of Powers's agents because of his failures. The murderer perishes when the ship sinks.

Returning to Greystoke Manor in England with Tarzan, Ula consigns the explosives formula to fire in the final episode, where she and Tarzan also recount several adventures from the first part of the serial to an assembled party of friends and colleagues.

Kevin Manley (Skeet Ulrich), a Los Angeles travel agent, receives the message that his grandpa has passed and left everything to him. However, he must go to Alaska in order to collect his inheritance. He leaves Canoga Park (Los Angeles), quits his job, despite his boss warning him that he will give up and decide to come back begging for his job back, and heads to Anchorage, Alaska.

Upon arrival, Manley finds out that if he proves he is manly by participating in the yearly Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race he can obtain the land that his grandfather left to him and if he doesn't participate, the land wouldn't be signed over.

While in Alaska, he meets some other participants including: the beautiful Bonnie Livengood (Natasha Henstridge), the stupid English Carter (Rik Mayall), ex-sheriff Ned Parker (Lochlyn Munro) and the local attorney Clive Thornton (Leslie Nielsen) who initially informed him of conditions of the race.

Manley eventually discovers a box of various items that had belonged to his grandfather that included a fur cap and coat, a sword, and a diary which informed Manley that his grandfather had found gold on the land with a relative of a participant he had met earlier, Bonnie Livengood.

While preparing for the event, two other participants, Clive and Carter, attempt to sabotage Manley's chances at winning the race so they can get the land and the gold. Clive promises to pay Carter a thousand dollars if he could prevent Kevin from entering or even finishing the race. Carter succeeds in stealing Kevin's team of huskies and burning down the shed containing his sled, tent, and supplies.

Despite his losses, Kevin uses some of his remaining savings to buy a new sled, a tent, some winter clothing, and food supplies for him and his dogs. He also buys a new team of dogs to replace the ones he lost: Farty, a Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever, Trooper, a German Shepherd, Pierre, a black poodle, Barker, a large dark-brown wiry-haired mongrel, Gumly, a large St. Bernard, Snowflake, a white American bulldog, and a Jack Russell terrier named Riddles.

After the Iditarod race begins and the teams head off into the wilderness, Kevin begins to learn how to survive on the trail and face the perils that seem to pull on him. He and his dogs begin to form a bond of friendship. Along the trail, Kevin rescues Bonnie from Parker, who was in the process of trying to rape her, and gives him the "Canoga Park Coffee Zap", in which he pours hot coffee on his private area. Shortly afterwards, Bonnie and Kevin form a deep relationship and fall in love with each other.

Clive and Carter, who are both anxious to have Kevin lose, try several plans to stop Kevin from finishing the race. Carter cuts half of one of the lines attached to the sled, in which it snaps free as the team rush on down the trail and Kevin has an accident, but is rescued by an Indian tribe and nursed back to health. Another night, Clive and Carter scatter strips of meat around the camp, which attracts a grizzly bear that tears down Kevin's tent and scares him and his dogs off. After the duo blow up Kevin's grandfather's cabin with dynamite, Kevin soon finds out of Clive's and Carter's plan and warn them both to stay away from him and his team.

While camping in a snow cave during a blizzard, Bonnie and Kevin discover a map inside Kevin's jacket that belonged to his grandfather. The map tells them of a place known as Wolf Mountain, where Kevin believes that his grandfather hid his gold. When the storm clears, they reach Wolf Mountain and recovered the chest full of gold nuggets underneath the snow.

Unfortunately, Clive and Carter arrive, take the chest of gold, and take Bonnie hostage after burying Kevin in the spot where they uncovered the gold. However, Kevin orders his lead dog, Farty to dig him out and he follows Clive and Bonnie all the way to Nome, which is the finish line of the Iditarod Sled Dog race. He manages to beat Parker and Carter, wins the race, and races onward to cut off Thornton's escape. He rescues Bonnie and Clive draws out a gun and fires at them, but he misses. The bullet glances off several metal objects inside an abandoned garage and finally hits an oil barrel, which blows up the garage with Clive inside it. At the same moment, the gold survives the explosion and falls around Bonnie and Kevin, who are surprised and overjoyed.

Clive, who had recently survived the explosion, and Carter are arrested for their actions against Kevin and Bonnie, and Kevin is rewarded with the prize money of the race, a gold cup, and a bouquet of flowers, which he gives to Bonnie. He asks Bonnie to marry him and she happily agrees. With some of the prize money and his grandfather's gold, Bonnie and Kevin get married, build a new cabin, and settle down with their dogs and their first child, a baby girl.

Setting

The game's world consists of five nations, spread across two large continents and a series of islands and archipelagos. The western continent consists of a mixture of rugged canyons in the west and wide plains and forests, to frozen tundra and snowy mountains and forested valleys in the east. The continent is shared between the Western Frontier in the west, based upon the United States and whom the player controls throughout the campaign, and the Tundran Territories in the east, based upon Russia. The eastern continent consists of a desert province in the west, called the Dune Sea, and a large gothic-themed landscape in the east, which is home to the nation of Xylvania, a country based on a mixture of pre-World War I Germany, modern Romania, vampires, and Gothic themes. The southern seas consist of several islands, including a large archipelago to the south of the western continent, which is home to the Solar Empire, a nation based upon Japan with a mixture of traditional Japanese and high-tech futuristic themes.

Characters

The game's main protagonists are the commanding officers of the Western Frontier - General Herman, the leader of the Frontier forces; Colonel Austin, a resourceful officer; and Brigadier Betty, a young, energetic woman, whose uniform is based on a cheerleaders outfit. Leading the Tundran Territories are its officers - Tsar Gorgi, the country's former ruler who believes in strength; Marshall Nova, Gorgi's son and successor, devoted to modern progress and peace; and Major Nelly, an experienced female officer. Leading the Solar Empire is its ruler, Empress Lei-Qo - a wise woman with mystical powers. Their main antagonists are the commanding officers of Xylvania - Kaiser Vlad, the country's ruler; Kommandant Ubel, a hulking monster of a man; and Countess Ingrid, a devoted female pilot veteran.

Story

Following a previous war between the Western Frontier and Tundran Territories, both sides maintain an uneasy truce with each other, while maintaining a constant vigil of each other's forces at the demilitarized zone along their borders. General Herman, head of the Frontier's armies, agrees to a suggestion made by his subordinate, Brigadier Betty, to hold a military exercise for their troops to ensure they remain fit for duty. During the exercise, a recon scout spots several Tundran armored divisions invading their territories at the command of Tsar Gorgi. Having recently been succeeded by his son Marshal Nova as the country's new political and military leader, Gorgi despised the promise of peace between the two nations and decided to strengthen his nation's might by secretly invading and defeating the Frontier, effectively ending the truce between the two nations. Learning of his father's actions, Nova forbids Gorgi from participating further in the war he started, determined to end the conflict himself with his second-in-command, Major Nelly, leading Tundran forces.

As the Frontier forces begin to start winning the conflict, defeating Tundran forces in a series of battles, Gorgi travels to Xylvania, a country that had been ravaged by the rivalry of the two nations, to form a pact with its leader Kaiser Vlad. However, Vlad betrays him by having bombers, commanded by his subordinate Countess Ingrid, attack both armies. Horrified by this, Gorgi goes into exile out of shame for his actions. Weakened after the Xylvanian assault, both Herman and Nova call a ceasefire between their armies, effectively ending the conflict. Both nations decide to join forces, forming the Alliance of Nations, in order to retaliate against the Xylvanians as they prepare to attack both countries.

Seeking to weaken their enemies, the Alliance conducts operations within the Dune Sea, in order to prevent their enemies from drilling for nerocite, an essential resource used as vehicle fuel. Despite difficulties in their final battle, the Alliance is aided by Gorgi, after he comes out of exile to assist in the conflict in his own personal fighter. Although the Xylvanians are driven out for good, Gorgi is mortally wounded by Vlad's right-hand man Kommandant Ubel. Before dying, Gorgi apologizes to Nova for his actions, leaving his son to vow for revenge for his father's death. Learning that the Xylvanians seek to invade the Solar Empire, Colonel Austin, a Frontier officer, has the Alliance make contact with its leader, Empress Lei-Qo, in order to offer assistance in repelling Vlad's invasion, in exchange for her assistance in invading Xylvania.

As the Alliance begins invading into Xylvanian territory, Ingrid decides to take action to stop the invasion. Stealing an ancient sword from Vlad, Ingrid uses it to awaken the country's ancient army, known as the Iron Legion. In doing so, Ingrid is driven insane by the Legion's power, causing her to attack both the Alliance and Xylvanian forces. Finding themselves forced to stop the Legion, the Alliance fights towards the Legion's source of power, the Cenotaph, and destroy it. In the wake of its destruction, Lei-Qo arrives and kills Ingrid, ending her madness and the threat of the Legion. Following the conflict, the Alliance finally reaches the Xylvanian capital of Vladstag, and defeat the last remaining forces guarding it. Although Vlad escapes, the Alliance captures Ubel, imprisoning him. With the Xylvanians defeated, the Alliance celebrates the end of the war, though Nova points out to Betty that his father left him a parting lesson - in order for him to strive for peace, he must be prepared for war.

Doug Chesnic is a Secret Service agent who takes great pride in his job, performing his duties with the utmost professionalism. His assignment for the last three years has been a severe test of his patience. Doug is in charge of a team stationed in Ohio to protect Tess Carlisle, the widow of a former U.S. President.

Tess is well known for her diplomatic and philanthropic work, but seems to regard Doug less as a security officer and more as a domestic servant—not unlike her chauffeur, Earl, or her nurse, Frederick.

Doug's assignment with Tess comes to an end, so he is eager to be given a more exciting and challenging assignment. Tess decides that she wants him to stay, and Doug's assignment is extended.

Doug regards it as beneath his professional dignity to perform little chores around the house or bring Tess her breakfast in bed. Tess orders him to do so, even to fetch her ball during a round of golf. When Doug defies her, Tess contacts a close friend—the current President of the United States—to express her displeasure. The annoyed President—under the impression Doug is substandard—chastises him by phone.

The bickering between Doug and Tess continues, even in the car. While alone with Earl, Tess orders him to drive off, stranding her bodyguards. A humiliated Doug must phone the local sheriff—not for the first time—to be on the lookout for her. He fires Earl when they return, but Tess countermands that decision.

After returning from a hospital checkup, Tess watches old television footage of her husband's funeral, concentrating on a momentary glimpse of Doug among the mourners, overcome with grief. She makes an effort to get on his good side, sharing a drink and a late-night conversation. She explains that she is not close to her children, in part due to the awkward upbringing they had as political family. Morale for the agents improves when Tess tells them that the President will be visiting her late husband's presidential library, but his subsequent cancellation lowers her spirits.

During a day out, Tess and Earl take off again without Doug on another apparent joy ride. When they don't return that night, Doug and his security detail realize Tess was likely kidnapped and contact the FBI. The FBI's investigation reveals Tess' recent dizzy spells were caused by an inoperable brain tumor (which she had indirectly told Doug about) and eventually, the car is found with an unconscious Earl but no Tess. Earl is found with small crescent-shaped burns on the back of his neck which Doug soon suspects was caused by Tess, fighting back with the car's cigarette lighter.

In Earl's hospital room, Doug and FBI agent Schaeffer question the chauffeur. He gets nervous and defensive when he sees Doug holding the lighter and attempts to frame him for the kidnapping. Furious, Doug threatens to shoot off the chauffeur's toes, one by one, until he confesses to them where Tess is being held, even going so far as to shoot one toe. Earl admits that Tess is being held captive by his sister and her husband.

The FBI and Secret Service raid the kidnappers' home and arrest them. When they find Tess buried, but alive, beneath the floor of the farmhouse, Doug and his agents volunteer to do the digging. Tess then insists that her Secret Service detail accompany her to the hospital.

Upon being released from the hospital, Tess refuses to obey the hospital rule that patients must be discharged in a wheelchair. Doug tells her, using her first name for the first time, "Tess, get in the God damn chair." After a brief pause, Tess complies, pats Doug's hand and says, "Very good, Douglas. You're going to be all right."

The titular Riddle-Master is Morgon, the Prince of Hed, a small, simple island populated by farmers and swineherds. The prince, inexplicably, has three stars on his forehead.

Morgon's sister Tristan discovers that he keeps a crown hidden under his bed. He explain that he won it in a riddle-game with the ghost of the cursed king Peven of Aum. When Deth, the High One's harpist, discovers this, he explains that another king, Mathom of An, has pledged to marry his daughter Raederle to the man who wins that crown from the ghost.

Accompanied by Deth, Morgon sets forth to claim his bride. En route, the ship is sunk by mysterious shapechangers. Shipwrecked, Morgon loses his memory and the power of speech. When Deth finds Morgon again, after he has regained both, Morgon resolves to travel to question the High One about the shapechangers. The High One's home, located in the far north on Erlenstar Mountain, is seldom visited. As Morgon and Deth travel the length of the realm, they are repeatedly attacked by the shapechangers, and Morgon learns more and more perilous knowledge concerning the three stars and the great powers which come with them. He also comes to know personally the land rulers of Ymris, Herun, Osterland, and Isig.

The novel is a tale of a group of people caught by the spell of the mysterious and enigmatic Mischa Fox - the enchanter - possibly foreign, definitely wealthy, and said to have great, perhaps mystical powers. Peter Saward, a scholar, is in love with Rosa Keepe. Ten years previously, Rosa refused Fox's marriage proposal, and is currently engaged in an affair with two Polish immigrants, the Lusciewicz brothers. Rosa's brother, Hunter, edits a suffragette magazine. The fearsome Calvin Blick, Fox's despised agent, is attempting to buy the magazine for Fox, and performs other machinations. The adventurous, willful Annette Cockeyne, age 19, drops out of school to learn from real life, but gets in over her head, especially after she becomes a target of Fox's attention. John Rainborough, a bureaucrat, suffers from unrequited love and threats to his authority from his "typist," Miss Casement. Nina the dressmaker clothes both Annette and Rosa, and is meanwhile one of Fox's agents, or perhaps his slave.

The story is told in the first person, and the nameless detective known only as The Continental Op investigates a theft of diamonds from the Leggett family of San Francisco. The plot involves a supposed curse on the Dain family, said to inflict sudden and violent deaths upon those in their vicinity. Edgar Leggett's wife is a Dain, as is his daughter Gabrielle. The detective untangles a web of robberies, lies and murder. It is discovered that Gabrielle Leggett is under the influence of a mysterious religious cult and is also addicted to morphine.

Gabrielle escapes from the cult and marries her fiancé Eric Collinson, but bloodshed continues to follow her. The Continental Op, on behalf of four successive clients, investigates the reason behind all the mysterious, violent events surrounding Gabrielle Leggett, which he eventually uncovers. The concluding chapters of the novel contain a detailed description of how the Op weans her from her drug habit, and the novel ends on a hopeful note.

Born with spina bifida and hydrocephalus, 12-year-old Justin Yoder uses a wheelchair and lives with his overprotective parents and his athlete brother, Seth (Patrick Levis). Justin is unable to play any sports due to his disability, however, he still is determined to get a trophy of his own. For guidance, he turns to God, who takes form of famous race car driver Bobby Wade (Tuc Watkins), who appears throughout the film.

Justin attempts to try out for summer baseball league; however, he is rejected due to his disability. He enters a chess tournament, but despite being placed in younger category than his actual age due assumptions about him using a wheelchair, he loses the tournament.

After leaving the tournament disappointed, Justin finds himself at a car show where he sees his neighbor, Vic Sauder (Roger Aaron Brown), who is attending with his vintage red Corvette. Justin assists Vic in winning the contest for best car in exchange for the associated trophy. Vic stops by to deliver the trophy but leaves when he is informed Justin is not there. Justin visits Vic’s home and when there is no response, Justin enters the garage and attempts to retrieve the trophy from a high shelf. The attempt causes the shelf to fall, landing on the prized Corvette, damaging the car.

Justin helps Vic clean the garage as punishment and the two develop a bond, however, Vic does not allow Justin to go near the shed on the property. Despite the warning, when Vic is running errands, Justin looks through the windows of the shed and sees multiple trophies inside. He enters and discovers more awards along with a soapbox racer. He starts a projector that plays a film of a young girl competing in soapbox racer, however, he is caught by Vic who demands that he leaves.

After reconciling with Vic and attending an soapbox race together, Justin, his father, and Vic build a soapbox racer. To accommodate his disability, his father and Vic build a customized handbrake that they name the "Justin Brake”. Meanwhile, Seth feels ignored by his father who consistently misses his baseball games and is revealed to be in therapy during a fight with Justin.

During a race, Justin crashes and is hospitalized due to spinal fluid build up. He is permitted to race in the All American Soapbox Derby after the winning competitor of the penultimate race drops out. On their way to the derby, Vic reveals to Justin that his daughter, Becca, who was also a soapbox racer competitor, died in a swimming accident and his wife died a year afterward. Seth convinces the Rules Committee to allow Justin to compete with a handbrake rather than the regulation foot brake after contacting the media, leading to the brothers' reconciliation. Justin ultimately wins the tournament.

In the final scene, Justin asks God if people are perfect when they go to Heaven. In response, God shows him a vision where there are angels with and without wheelchairs to which he happily replies "Perfect".

As a tribute to Justin, live footage of him is shown before the closing credits.

The poem tells how Lord Marmion, a favourite of Henry VIII of England, lusts for Clara de Clare, a rich woman. He and his mistress, Constance De Beverley, forge a letter implicating Clare's fiancé, Sir Ralph De Wilton, in treason. Constance, a dishonest nun, hopes that her aid will restore her to favour with Marmion. When De Wilton loses the duel he claims in order to defend his honour against Marmion, he is obliged to go into exile. Clare retires to a convent rather than risk Marmion's attentions.

Constance's hopes of a reconciliation with Marmion are dashed when he abandons her; she ends up being walled up alive in the Lindisfarne convent for breaking her vows. She takes her revenge by giving the Abbess, who is one of her three judges, documents that prove De Wilton's innocence. De Wilton, having returned disguised as a pilgrim, follows Marmion to Edinburgh where he meets the Abbess, who gives him the exonerating documents. When Marmion's host, the Earl of Angus (Archibald Douglas) is shown the documents, he arms De Wilton and accepts him as a knight again. De Wilton's plans for revenge are overturned by the Battle of Flodden. Marmion dies on the battlefield, while De Wilton displays heroism, regains his honour, retrieves his lands, and marries Clare.

The Simpsons visit a Chinese restaurant, where Homer is hired to write Chinese fortune cookies after complaining that the current fortunes are unimaginative. One of his fortunes says "You will find true love on Flag Day". This cookie makes its way to Mr. Burns on, coincidentally, Flag Day. Eager for true love at last, Burns and a reluctant Smithers spend the evening womanising at a wealthy social gathering and a strip club. With mere minutes left in the day, Burns finds a cop ticketing his car, which he had parked in the middle of the road. After discovering the cop is a beautiful woman named Gloria (voiced by Julia Louis-Dreyfus), Burns asks her out on a date. Gloria warily accepts, much to Burns' delight and Smithers' chagrin.

After a pleasant first date at the carnival, Burns asks about another date but Gloria is about to turn him down when Homer runs by. Burns asks Homer to vouch for him to Gloria, so Homer regales her by listing Burns' many exploits. After Gloria agrees to a second date, Burns enlists Homer to be his "youthful advisor", accompanying the couple on their next date at the disco hall, and even carrying Burns and Gloria up the stairs when they go to have sex. In these cases, Burns overcomes his weakness and extreme age by means of a powerful aphrodisiac (made from an extract of the "pocket fox", a species which only existed for three weeks in the 16th century).

Eventually, during a date at the bowling alley, Burns decides to ask Gloria to marry him. She says yes. As Burns goes off to get some champagne to celebrate, Snake comes to rob the bowling alley, and is surprised to see Gloria, who turns out to be his ex-girlfriend. Despite Gloria's protests, Snake kidnaps her and Homer. When Burns finds Gloria's ring, dropped in the commotion, he assumes she ran off with Homer. Snake takes Gloria and Homer to his hideout. Though Gloria says she loves Burns, Snake vows he can change. The police arrive and confront Snake. Homer tries to escape but instead sets Snake's house on fire. Snake and Homer get out and Burns runs in to save Gloria, however he is soon overcome by the smoke and Gloria is then seen carrying him to safety. Although initially grateful, Gloria begins to reminisce about Snake, causing her to break up with Burns and become Snake's girl again.

At a library sale, Homer buys a book on world records published by Duff. After boring everyone with world record trivia, Homer gathers the whole town to build the world's tallest human pyramid. When Jimbo and Kearney move their hands just before the record is claimed, the pyramid collapses into a giant sphere that rolls through town, collecting Agnes Skinner, Hans Moleman and a suicidal man about to jump from a ledge onto the street. The entire town rolls to a truck-weighing station and the Duff record book officials declare Springfield the world's fattest town, ahead of Milwaukee.

The townsfolk are happy to have broken a world record, but Marge worries the whole town is overweight. She learns that nearly everything they eat contains sugar. After complaining to Garth Motherloving (nee Hitler), head of the Motherloving Sweets and Sugar Company, Marge sues the sugar industry with the help of Gil and Professor Frink. Judge Snyder, after Motherloving's attempt to bribe him with a briefcase full of sweets, sides with her and bans all sugar products in Springfield, angering Homer and most of the town.

The whole town goes cold turkey and suffers from intense sugar withdrawal. Homer joins a secret group — led by Motherloving — which illegally schemes to return sugar to Springfield. Homer embarks with Bart, Apu, Mr. Burns and a cartoon vampire named Count Fudge-ula to smuggle sugar from the island of San Glucos. After evading a police boat, Homer brings the sugar to Springfield's docks.

When Marge pleads with him to dump the cargo, Homer has two choices: obey Marge and press the ''Drop Cargo'' button or bring the sugar to Motherloving by pressing the ''Obey Bad Guy'' button. Homer drops the cargo and the sugar falls into the water near the Springfield docks. All Springfieldians — even those who seemed happier and healthier without sugar — jump into the harbor and drink the sugar water and eat any sea creatures covered in sugar. Snyder, realising that he may have overstepped his authority, declares the sugar ban over and dives in, too. Marge is upset and considers giving up changing the world, but Homer tells her that he loves her when she tries to make the world a better place.

Dutch documentary film director, Jan Holman, goes to the Czech Republic to make a film about curing alcoholism. At an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting he finds a man named Jaromir Nohavica who becomes his friend. Another friend of Nohavica, Karel Plihal, becomes mute, and Nohavica decides to start a tour with the band Čechomor to help cure him. When Jan Holman follows with his camera in tow, he finds many inexplicable events along the way.

The episode is primarily Major Winchester's recurring taped conversation to his parents in Boston, interspersed with scenes supporting his assessments of his co-workers and the incidents therein. It begins with Hawkeye begging Winchester to take officer of the day duty so he can spend a weekend in Seoul with a nurse. Winchester refuses at first, but then relents only to stop Hawkeye's incessant begging.

Winchester then proceeds to describe the co-workers to his parents, in this order:

• Colonel Potter - "a tough, bandy-legged little mustang", but "he paints." While posing for a portrait for Potter, Winchester begins to beg for a transfer, but Potter refuses. The exchange between Potter and Winchester escalates, and Potter emphatically ends it by telling Winchester he will not be transferred as he completes the painting of Winchester with his mouth open.

• Radar O'Reilly - a "myopic farmboy" responsible for the day-to-day operations of the 4077th. Winchester attempts to bribe Radar with a case of Grape Nehi into using the camp telephone to call Tokyo (presumably Colonel Baldwin, who had him sent to the 4077th) to arrange a transfer. When Radar tells him he is not allowed to use the phone for this purpose per Potter's orders, Winchester angrily removes the Grape Nehi.

• Major Houlihan - a "head nurse who is part seductress and part Atilla the Hun".

• Father Mulcahy - a "cock-eyed optimist who sounds like Dennis Day".

• B. J. Hunnicutt - a "relatively inoffensive chap". B.J. pulls a prank on Winchester by switching his uniform pants first with those of a heavier soldier, prompting Winchester to overeat. Soon after, B.J. switches the pants to those of a thinner soldier, prompting Winchester to jog around the compound in an attempt to lose weight. After he leaves to jog, B.J. quips to Hawkeye, "Tomorrow, he gets taller!"

In a subplot, Hawkeye's repeated attempts to embark on his weekend in Seoul are interrupted by his surgical duties. When he is finally able to leave after a 38-hour surgery session, he is too tired to go and falls asleep on his cot. Winchester then concludes his tape to his parents as follows:

"Finally, a peaceful moment to conclude this tape. The would-be lothario Pierce is fast asleep, and the 38-hour day is done."

As he continues speaking, he tries to pour himself a cup of tea but is unable. He opens his teapot to find his tea has been replaced by a rubber chicken. He concludes the tape by saying, "Now, Mother and Dad, I will put this as eloquently and succinctly as I can...get me the hell out of here!"

Former U.S. Marine Corps Force Reconnaissance Scout Sniper Thomas Beckett (Tom Berenger), who was discharged after his finger was amputated in the first film, is met by CIA officer James Eckles (Dan Butler) and Colonel Dan McKenna (Linden Ashby) at his home. Despite losing his index finger he uses to shoot, Beckett still has the capability of firing a gun. Considering this, along with his impressive career from his time in the Marine Corps, Beckett is given a mission to assassinate renegade Serbian General Mile Valstoria (Peter Linka), who is responsible for conducting hit-and-run ethnic cleansing operations in the Muslim-populated areas of Serbia. The CIA fears that Valstoria's actions are threatening to inflame a larger conflict in the region. Beckett agrees to participate, but requests that an additional man, a spotter, must come with him. Beckett is introduced to his spotter, Jake Cole (Bokeem Woodbine), an experienced U.S. Army sniper who is on death row for killing a federal officer who allegedly betrayed him. Cole is released and offered a pardon if he takes part in the mission.

After being dropped off into Serbia, Beckett and Cole make their way to a Catholic basilica. There, they meet an underground resistance member named Sophia (Erika Marozsán). Sophia takes them to her apartment, which is perched high above the designated area where Valstoria is due to show up, near a government building. The next morning, Beckett assassinates his target. Valstoria's killing puts the city into lockdown. After their original extraction point is compromised, Cole and Beckett are forced to find an alternative plan. When they hitch a ride on a public tram, nearby soldiers stop the vehicle and try to arrest them, but the two operatives take over the tram and ram it into some police cars. They soon exit the tram, running through the streets. Cole is captured and put into a prison where Valstoria's men keep their so-called 'special enemies', but Beckett is able to escape.

Beckett meets Sophia that night, and the two make a plan to rescue Cole. With the help of Sophia's brothers, Zoran and Vojislav (Ferenc Kovács and Barna Illyés), the next day they box in military trucks carrying Cole and a fellow prisoner to a prison where Cole was to be executed. They ambush the convoy and then help Cole and Pavel (Tamás Puskás), who is a pacifist and political dissident, out of the truck and into a van that Zoran brought. Cole admits to Beckett that the assassination of Valstoria was set up to get Cole caught and then rescue Pavel from jail and brought out of Serbia. That night, at an abandoned factory that was meant to be the designated extraction zone, the group is ambushed by a tank and infantry. Both Vojislav and Zoran are killed in the attack and, after escaping from the factory through a sewer, Beckett orders Sophia to break off from the group and leave.

A distance away from the factory, Pavel insists that they should head to Komra, a Muslim town where a friend of Pavel's, Nauzad (Zoltán Seress), lives. As the group meets Nauzad, he offers to help get the men to the border by getting them to a bus that would get them there. Within a couple of hours they are on their way but, as they cross a river, they come across an unexpected checkpoint and end up heading to Simand, the secondary extraction point, on foot. Meanwhile, Cpt. Marks (Can Togay) inspects the bus that the three men just departed from and suspects that they are attempting to head to Simand. Marks orders a tracker, (Béla Jáki), to take his special forces unit to Simand.

As the three men arrive at Simand, they are ambushed by the special forces team in a forest outside of town, and Pavel suffers a slight flesh wound in the arm. After the trio kills the entire team, they are forced to proceed into town. The tracker holes up in the town factory and snipes down the team. Beckett demands that Cole take Pavel to the extraction zone while he deals with the tracker. Cole is severely wounded by the sniper, but Beckett picks him off. Pavel and Becket carry the wounded Cole into the helicopter and leave, just as Serb reinforcements led by Cpt. Marks arrive. In the helicopter, Beckett and Pavel look at Cole as he is badly wounded. Cole says, "Freedom!" and succumbs to his wounds.

In 1898 the US government decided to intervene on the side of the Cuban rebels in their struggle against Spanish rule. Assistant Navy Secretary Theodore Roosevelt decides to experience the war first hand by promoting and joining a volunteer cavalry regiment.

The regiment, later known as the Rough Riders, brings together volunteers from all corners of the nation and all walks of life. They include a stagecoach robber, Henry Nash, and patrician men.

When Roosevelt and his men finally land on Cuba, they face ambush, intense enemy fire, and a desperate, outnumbered charge up a defended hill.

''It is the story of the relationship between journalists Dan Hanson (Kevin Bacon) and Lorie Bryer (Elizabeth Perkins) told twice – once from each perspective. The male story was directed by Ken Kwapis and the female story by Marisa Silver. At the time, Kwapis and Silver were engaged and they married soon after the film was released.''

Dan and Lorie are writers of obituaries and weddings, respectively, and later rival editorial page contributors at the ''Baltimore Sun''. Shortly after starting their rivalrous, side-by-side columns between conservative Dan and liberal Lorie, it's a case of opposites attract. Close to three years after the column and their relationship commences, a morning talk show appearance inspires a local channel to offer them a TV program. The point-counterpoint talk show will present their opposing views on various civic issues.

Their great differences cause sparks to fly and ratings to soar. One day on air, they create a great scene, which piques the public's interest, while simultaneously causing their breakup. We then see the film is then split, the first half showing us his perspective of the three years of their relationship up until the on-air scene and the second half, hers.

Dan is initially shown to be a womanizer and commitment-phobe. Early on, Lorie helps him hide from one woman he's jilted, later she sees his flirtatious interaction with women she perceives to be excessively sexily dressed and not very bright. He sees himself as a wolf, needing to be free. Then we see him mishearing and reading items on a menu, all connected to serious relationships and settling down.

As Dan and Lorie get to know one another, they both discover they have feelings for each other. She carefully orchestrates their first close encounters, making it appear that she's avoiding another man, so that he dances with her. She subtly lets him know she's just dumped her boyfriend so he knows she's available and they have dinner together.

Once they are resettled in their new office space as columnists, Lorie says she loves him, but Dan doesn't reciprocate. Obviously something he's not comfortable saying, he goes to a therapist but still can't say it. Finally he tells her he loves her while she's sleeping. Unbeknownst to him, she has heard him and we see she is staggered.

We come to the fateful live scene with the mug. Moments before they step on-stage, they argue in the green room. Lorie discovers Dan had heard from Linda (Sharon Stone), and had made lunch plans with her. Jealous because of their past history, she asks if he'll ever marry her and he tells her no.

On the day of what is meant to be their last show, Dan pre-records his rebuttal. Then, Lorie does a live redo response to the previous day's topic the merger (of two highways--a thinly veiled reference to their relationship), saying the proposal was a bad idea. She shows that her mug is clean, alluding to an off-handed remark he made, saying if he one day achieves that she cleans the bottom of her mug, he would consider their relationship a success. The studio shows Dan's prerecorded rebuttal to the proposal, equally reneging on his view, accepting the proposal. Then he directly apologizes to her, asking for another chance, and then reappears on stage, and they embrace.

In 1931 in Paris, France, Anaïs Nin is in a stable relationship with her husband Hugo, but longs for more out of life. When Nin first meets Henry Miller, he is working on his first novel. Nin is drawn to Miller and his wife June, as well as their bohemian lifestyle. Nin becomes involved in the couple's tormented relationship, having an affair with Miller and also pursuing June. Ultimately, Nin helps Miller to publish his novel ''Tropic of Cancer'', but catalyzes the Millers' separation, while she returns to Hugo.

AMS Agent G's further investigation on the 1998 Curien Mansion incident leads to his mysterious disappearance upon his discovery of the remnants of Dr. Curien's operations in Venice, Italy, where a zombie outbreak takes place.

On February 26, 2000, American AMS agents James Taylor and Gary Stewart are dispatched, along with Amy Crystal and Harry Harris, to investigate and evacuate the populace of Venice. They suddenly encounter the impish Zeal, who had recently dealt with G. Upon finding a wounded G alive in a local library, James and Gary converse with him. G gives them a field journal showing the bosses and their weak points. The pair are then met with a massive undead horde, similar to the kind from the Curien Mansion incident. They continue on, trying to save the town's civilians from the zombies.

During the chaos, James and Gary face Judgment; consisting of Zeal and his giant, headless, axe-wielding armoured puppet Kuarl. After killing it, they meet up with Amy and Harry, who split up and try to meet at Sunset Bridge (or the wharf, depending on the player's actions). Upon getting there the group faces off with The Hierophant, an aquatic fishlike humanoid which heads an assault on Venice's waterways and Central Plaza. Upon defeating it, James, Gary, Amy and Harry get on a boat and continue through the rivers.

It is revealed that the zombies were created by Caleb Goldman, the man who financed Dr. Curien's creations during the Curien Mansion incident. It is also revealed that Goldman created the new zombies and released them into the city. Goldman leaves a message on Amy's phone, inviting them to meet him at the Colosseum, which Harry fears to be a trap. James and Gary split up again, and face off with a group of five fiery serpents known as The Tower. After killing the mother serpent, they receive a phone call for help from Amy, before getting cut off. The two quickly race to the Colosseum only to discover Amy and a wounded Harry, injured by Strength, a giant, chainsaw-wielding zombie which wounds Harry and chases James and Gary throughout the arena. After they kill it, James and Gary push on, while Amy tends to Harry's wounds. They drive over to Goldman's tower, fighting a revived Judgment, the Hierophant, and Tower.

Upon reaching the headquarters, they are confronted by Curien's masterpiece, The Magician, who was also revived by Goldman to oversee the birth of The Emperor, a shapeshifting crystalline entity with mastery over magnetism designed to protect nature from humanity. After defeating the Magician, they head to the top of the tower to confront the Emperor. In its prototype stage, the Emperor is not as strong as Goldman had hoped, and falls to the AMS agents. In order to evade being arrested, Goldman commits suicide by throwing himself off the roof of his building.

Players are given different endings based on the following conditions: * If a solo game was finished as either player 1 or 2 * If both players defeated the last boss * Number of continues * Points earned

In the good ending, James and Gary run into Thomas Rogan, the main character from the first game, who tells them that G and Harry are all right, and that they should head off to their next battle "as long as they have the will to live" (in the case of James) or "as long as there is an answer" (in the case of Gary). In the normal ending, as James and Gary leave the building, they are greeted by G, Amy and Harry, as well as a large group of civilians, who thank them for their help. In the bad ending, James and Gary run into a zombified Goldman outside the building. As the screen goes white, a gunshot is heard.

Anya finally gets back into her old vengeance demon ways by helping a girl get revenge on an entire fraternity by having a spider demon tear their hearts out. Anya herself feels deep remorse about the event, even though Halfrek tries to encourage her to continue. Willow, returning to college, discovers the frightened and crying girl and the remains of the fraternity in the frat house, so she confronts Anya and offers her help in giving up her vengeance work; but Anya acts stubborn and defensive. When Willow tells Buffy and Xander, all three fear the worst of Anya. Buffy is determined to kill Anya; Xander, who still loves her, cannot believe Buffy could do such a thing. He claims that Buffy is hypocritical since she is so quick to kill Anya but ignored what her vampire lovers have done - Buffy reminds him that she killed Angel because it needed to be done and Xander cheered her on.

Buffy and Xander track Anya back to the frat house, where the two women fight as Xander tries to stop them. Buffy stabs Anya, seemingly killing her, but Anya's demon side prevents her from dying. Willow calls forth Anya's boss D'Hoffryn, using the talisman he gave her while trying to recruit her as Anya's replacement. When he interrupts the fight between her and Buffy, Anya begs him to reverse the spell she did – even though she knows the cost of reversing such a spell is the life and soul of a vengeance demon. Anya is ready to die, even if Xander does not want her to, but D'Hoffryn instead summons Halfrek and kills her as the price to bring back the fraternity boys, wanting Anya to live and suffer through her guilt rather than die. D'Hoffryn also turns Anya back into a human. A distraught Anya leaves and tells Xander not to follow her, wondering what her purpose is outside of their relationship now that she is mortal again.

Best friends Bud "Squirrel" Macintosh and Doyle "Stubs" Johnson live together in Arizona, but their environmentalist girlfriends, Jen and Monique, dump them due to their immaturity. Driving back home, they pass by the Bio-Dome, where scientist Dr. Noah Faulkner is about to seal his team in for a year without outside contact. Mistaking the Bio-Dome for a mall, Bud and Doyle go inside to use the bathroom, only to be sealed in along with the scientists. Dr. Leaky, the project's investor, discovers them and demands their removal, but Dr. Faulkner refuses, claiming it would destroy the purpose of the experiment, so Bud and Doyle remain. Although things initially go smoothly, this proves to be a mistake, as Bud and Doyle continue their antics, harming themselves and destroying many of the scientists' projects. The scientists plead to Dr. Faulkner, but he only relents after the two find a secret stash of junk food and experiment with laughing gas. The two are then banished to the desert environment section, and after three days of isolation, they discover a key in the lock of one of the windows, which opens a back door, and they escape the Bio-Dome.

As Bud and Doyle are receiving a pizza delivery at the dome, they learn Jen and Monique are attending an environmental party with other men, so decide to outdo the party and hold one inside the Bio-Dome to win them back. The party backfires, as it throws the experiment into chaos and Jen and Monique disavow the boys. The scientists prepare to exit out of the desert through the door, but realizing their idiotic actions, Bud and Doyle intervene and demand they all stay and restore the dome to full health, arguing that the real world itself is currently not a pristine environment, with Doyle swallowing the key as a last resort. The group subdues the situation and begins to fix the dome together, while the boys and the scientists bond with each other as a team, and Bud and Doyle's efforts in restoring the dome soon draw a large group of fans and supporters, including Monique and Jen. Meanwhile, Dr. Faulkner, who had disappeared the night of the party, has gone insane and is starting plans to blow up the dome with homemade coconut bombs.

After several months pass and Earth Day approaches, Bud, Doyle, and the team successfully restore the dome, but on the night before the doors reopen, Bud and Doyle discover Dr. Faulkner, hoping to apologize to him and make amends. He tells the two that he is rigging pyrotechnics for the door-opening ceremony and gets them to help plant the items, unaware they are really bombs. Once Bud and Doyle are left alone with the bombs, they goof off with one of the coconuts, and after a failed long pass, they discover their dangerous nature. They alert the others and try to exit the dome early, but the door cannot be opened until the clock hits zero, when the bombs will detonate. Bud and Doyle run back into the dome to find Dr. Faulkner and get him to deactivate the bombs. After a chase and struggle, they knock him out and use a remote to disable the coconuts.

With the Bio-Dome experiment complete, the team gets ready to exit the now-open door, but as they begin to walk out, Dr. Faulkner returns with one last coconut bomb, trips, and the bomb detonates at the entrance. Bud, Doyle, Jen, and Monique bid farewell to the Bio-Dome scientists and drive off, where Doyle yet again has to use the bathroom and the car is seen driving toward a mysterious nuclear power plant. Dr. Faulkner, meanwhile, has escaped the dome through the desert window door, having retrieved the key Doyle swallowed, and flees through the desert pursued by police.

Two LAPD policemen, Hank Rafferty and Charlie Reed, investigate a warehouse heist and discover a gang of thieves, one of whom kills Charlie before they escape.

Meanwhile, Earl Montgomery's lifelong dream to become a police officer is thwarted when he flunks police academy for accidentally causing an explosion. After Hank receives a warning from Detective Frank McDuff after interfering with the investigation of Charlie's death, he meets Earl when Hank notices him trying to get into his car after locking his keys inside. When Hank questions Earl, Earl race-baits and insults Hank to the point of getting himself arrested. A bumblebee comes along, to which Earl is allergic, causing him to panic. From afar, it appears as if Hank is brutalizing Earl when he is actually attempting to shoo the bee away by swatting it with his baton; a man catches the incident on videotape. Because of the incriminating evidence and a spiteful Earl lying about the accused brutalizing, Hank is terminated from the police force and charged with aggravated assault against Earl. He is sentenced to six months in prison.

After being released, Hank takes a job as a security guard and continues investigating Charlie's death. Noticing an alarm being tripped at a soda warehouse, Hank goes to investigate. Earl, who is working for the same security company, is on duty at the warehouse but is slacking off. Hank interrupts the heist, and a gunfight erupts with the thugs, during which Hank and Earl cross paths again. The two give chase to the thieves but are pulled over by the police for speeding.

One of the thieves drops a cell phone, which leads them to a semi-trailer truck. Inside the truck, Hank and Earl find the thieves' van. Earl tries to hotwire the van but accidentally triggers the alarm, alerting the thieves. After a brief shootout, Hank and Earl drive the van out of the truck and escape. Inside the van are what look like ordinary beer kegs; Hank has them examined at a foundry, where they learn that the kegs are actually made of an atomic aerospace alloy, which is worth millions. Hank takes the van and the kegs to the house of his ex-girlfriend, Denise. They broke up after Hank was arrested, and Hank asks Earl to tell Denise the truth about the "assault". Earl promises, but when he sees that Denise is an attractive black woman, he breaks his promise and starts hitting on her, playing the victim again. This causes another fight between them, and Denise kicks both of them out. After a heated argument, Hank punches Earl in the face, before storming off. Later, the pair is cornered by police, learning that they are suspects in the earlier shootout. They escape and Hank realizes that the thieves must have an inside man in the police department.

That night, the pair trace the van's owner to an address and stake out the place, but Earl rushes inside on his own and is confronted by the thieves. Hank arrives just as Earl is shot in the leg, and before escaping, he recognizes one of the thieves, Nash, as Charlie's murderer. When Hank takes Earl to Denise to get his wound treated (which turns out to be simply a graze), a bee flies into the house and Earl runs for cover, making Denise realize that Hank's story about the "assault" on Earl was actually true. She slaps Earl for lying and reconciles with Hank.

Based on something overheard from Nash, they follow him to a meeting at a yacht club and witness him talking to McDuff, who is revealed to be Nash's inside man. Hank and Earl share everything they know with Hank's former boss, Lieutenant Washington, and then pretend to approach McDuff, offering to sell him back the "beer kegs" for $1 million. However, Nash learns about their plans and takes Washington hostage first. During the confrontation the next day, Earl and Hank meet with McDuff, Nash, and their men near the coast, rescuing Washington and accidentally starting a shootout, but the trio manage to kill or apprehend most of Nash's gang, including McDuff. Hank is shot, but he survives and kills Nash by dropping a nearby crane's lifting hook onto an unstable slab of rock that Nash is standing on, catapulting him into the ocean and finally avenging Charlie's death.

Six more months later, in honor of their heroic actions, Hank is reinstated in the LAPD and Earl is admitted to the force, and they are made partners. The two encounter a situation similar to where they met, in which a man is apparently locked out of his car. Earl helps the man but learns that he is actually a thief. He successfully stops the thief by shooting at the car, but the vehicle explodes soon after.

Jonathan Harker is an estate agent in Wismar, Germany. His employer, Renfield, informs him that a nobleman named Count Dracula wishes to buy a property in Wismar and assigns Harker to visit the Count and complete the lucrative deal. Leaving his young wife Lucy behind in Wismar, Harker travels to Transylvania, to Count Dracula's castle, in a journey that lasts four weeks, carrying with him the deeds and documents needed to sell the house to the Count. On his trip, Harker stops at a village inn, where the locals plead for him to stay away from the accursed castle, providing him with details of Dracula's vampirism. Ignoring the villagers' pleas as superstition, Harker continues his journey, ascending the Borgo Pass on foot and eventually arriving at Dracula's castle, where he meets the Count, a strange, almost rodent-like man, with large ears, pale skin, sharp teeth, and long fingernails.

The Count is enchanted by a small portrait of Lucy and immediately agrees to purchase the Wismar property, especially with the knowledge that he and Lucy would become neighbors. As Jonathan's visit progresses, he is haunted at night by several dream-like encounters with the vampiric Count. Simultaneously, in Wismar, Lucy is tormented by night terrors, plagued by images of impending doom. Additionally, Renfield is committed to an asylum after biting a cow, apparently having gone completely insane. To Harker's horror, he finds the Count asleep in a coffin, confirming for him that Dracula is indeed a vampire. That night, Dracula leaves for Wismar, taking several coffins filled with the cursed earth that he needs for his vampiric rest. Harker finds that he is imprisoned in the castle and attempts to escape through a window via a makeshift rope fashioned from bedsheets. The rope is not long enough, and Jonathan falls, severely injuring himself. The next morning, he awakes on the ground, stirred by the sound of a young Romani boy playing the violin. He is eventually sent to a hospital and raves about 'black coffins' to doctors, who assume that the illness affects his mind.

Meanwhile, Dracula and his coffins travel to Wismar by ship via the Black Sea port of Varna, thence through the Bosphorus and Gibraltar straits and around the entire west European Atlantic coast to the Baltic Sea. He systematically kills the whole crew, making it appear as if they were afflicted with the plague. The ghost ship arrives, with its cargo, at Wismar, where doctors – including Abraham Van Helsing – investigate the strange fate of the vessel. They discover a ship's log that mentions their perceived affliction with the plague. Wismar is then flooded with rats from the ship. Dracula arrives in Wismar with his coffins, and death spreads rapidly throughout the town. The desperately ill Jonathan is finally transported home, but he does not appear to recognize his wife when he finally arrives. Lucy later encounters Count Dracula; weary and unable to die, he demands some of the love that she gave so freely to Jonathan, but she refuses, much to Dracula's dismay. Now aware that something other than plague is responsible for the death that has beset her once-peaceful town, Lucy desperately tries to convince the townspeople, but they are skeptical and uninterested. From a book given to Jonathan by the people in Transylvania, she finds that she can defeat Dracula's evil by distracting him until dawn, at which time the rays of the sun will destroy him, but only at the cost of her own life. That night, she lures the Count to her bedroom, where he proceeds to drink her blood.

Lucy's beauty and purity distract Dracula from the call of the rooster, and at the first light of day, he collapses to the floor, dead. Van Helsing arrives to discover Lucy dead but victorious. He then drives a stake through the heart of the Count to make sure that Lucy's sacrifice was not in vain. In a final ironic twist, Jonathan awakens from his sickness, now a vampire, and has Van Helsing arrested for the murder of Count Dracula. He then states enigmatically that he has much to do and is last seen riding away on horseback, garbed in the same fluttering black as Dracula.

Frank Jessup (played by Robert Mitchum) makes his living driving an ambulance, but he dreams of running his own repair shop, fixing sports cars. One evening, while responding to an emergency call, he meets a beautiful heiress, Diane Tremayne (Jean Simmons). One date leads to another, and before long Frank has alienated his intended, Mary Wilton (Mona Freeman). And when the Tremayne family offer Frank a job as a chauffeur, with his own rooms on the estate, he accepts.

One afternoon, as Diane's father and stepmother start their car to drive to town, their vehicle mysteriously reverses when geared to drive forward. As a result, it careens backwards down a steep cliff, violently killing both occupants. Since Diane is the sole heir to their fortune, she comes under suspicion for murder. Also, because authorities suspect the vehicle's transmission was toyed with, suspicion is cast on Frank. The defense attorney (Leon Ames) for Frank and Diane urges they marry because ‘All the world loves a lover. Juries are no exception.’

The trial ends in acquittal. However, Frank immediately tells Diane he is ending their sham marriage. Consequently, Diane's mental condition deteriorates, and her sense of guilt elicits her own confession to Frank that she was behind the mechanical manipulation that caused the death of her parents. In the end, Frank makes one last trip to the Tremayne estate to clean out his rooms. He then waits for a taxi to take him to a bus station, but Diane offers to give him a ride instead. Once she puts the car in gear, Diane accelerates backwards, crashing down the same cliff where her parents were killed. As a result, Frank and Diane perish.

In 1889, young Englishwoman Vicky Barton (Simmons) and her brother Johnny (David Tomlinson) arrive in Paris to see the Exposition Universelle. This is Vicky's first time in Paris, and after checking into a hotel, she drags her tired brother to dinner and the famous Moulin Rouge. She finally retires for the night, while Johnny has a late-night drink. When English painter George Hathaway (Bogarde) drops off his girlfriend, Rhoda O'Donovan (Honor Blackman), and her mother (Betty Warren) at the hotel, he asks Johnny for change for a 100 franc note to pay a carriage driver; Johnny lends him 50 francs and gives him his name and room number.

The next morning, Vicky finds a blank wall where Johnny's room used to be. When she questions hotel owner and manager Madame Hervé (Cathleen Nesbitt), the latter claims she arrived alone. The room number now adorns the common bathroom. Madame Hervé's brother Narcisse (Marcel Pontin) and the day porter (Eugene Deckers) back up her story.

Frantic, Vicky goes to see the British consul (Felix Aylmer), followed secretly by Narcisse. She has no proof of her brother's existence, so the consul can only suggest she find a witness, Nina (Zena Marshall), the hotel maid who attended her. Nina had informed her that she was going up in a balloon with her boyfriend at the Exposition that day. Tragically, she is too late. Before she can talk to Nina, the balloon ascends, bursts into flames, and plummets to the ground, killing the two passengers.

Vicky tries the French police commissaire (Austin Trevor). He questions Madame Hervé and her brother, but can find nothing amiss in their story. Since her room has been reserved for only two nights, Vicky has to leave the hotel. Madame Hervé offers her a ticket home to England, which she is forced to accept, as she has little money left. However, unbeknownst to either party, Rhoda O'Donovan has been asked by George Hathaway to deliver a letter containing his loan repayment to Johnny. Not finding his room, Rhoda slips the envelope under Vicky's door, where she finds it.

Vicky goes to see George. When he confirms having met her brother, she bursts into tears. He offers his assistance. George notices there are six balconies, but only five rooms on the floor, and finds the missing hotel room, the entrance having been covered over to be part of the wall.

Under questioning by the police, Madame Hervé reveals where Johnny has been taken. It turns out that he became sick with bubonic plague during the night. The news would have been disastrous for the Exposition, so he was secretly taken away to a hospital. George brings along Doctor Hart (André Morell), who tells Vicky her brother has a chance of living.

Season One – ''Chiquititas 1995''

Soon after Gabriela gave birth, the baby was taken away by her father, Ramiro Morán, a snobbish man who wasn't accepting that his daughter had a romance with one of their servants, so he told her the baby was stillborn. Ramiro sent the girl, Milagros, to the orphange he had created, the "Rincón de Luz". Mili grows up there with eight other little girls who are actual orphans: Georgina, Cinthia, Vero, Michelle, Romina, Laura, and Maru. Spearheaded by Mili, the oldest among them, the seven chiquititas became a family. The girls are supervised by Ernestina, the rigorous janitor who is usually a victim of their pranks, and the adorable Spanish cook Saverio. Emilia administrates the house, and is beloved by the orphans. Jimena is an orphan brought into the manor from the streets; though the girls welcome her, she doesn't get along with them at first until Mili calms her down; Mili and Jimena become good friends.

The girls' lives are touched by an adorable young woman named Belén who lives with her fumbling brother Felipe "Piojo", and her friends Leticia and Clarita. Together, they make a family for Sol, Leticia's little daughter. Belén, Leticia, and Clarita work for the Moráns' industries, and in the factory Belén meets Ramiro's oldest son Martín. Martín and Belén fall for each other, infuriating Ramiro, who tries to keep them apart because Belén is part of a lower social class. Belén and Martin help Mili search for her true identity, finding out the first clues about the little girl's past.

Martín is back from London because of his sister's emotional status. Over the years, Gabriela has lived in deep depression, believing her father's lies about her baby being dead. Her condition is gradually softened by Mili herself, both unaware of their blood ties. The Moráns' secret is also kept by Carmen, Ramiro's ambitious sister, who wants his fortune for her own. Carmen takes Emilia off her position as Rincón de Luz's administrator, assuming her place and frustrating the little girls. For Carmen's ire, Ramiro nominates his much-younger fiancée Ginette as the new administrator. Ginette feigns friendliness to the orphans, but she actually wants to assume their house, which Ramiro supposedly took from her father. Her intentions are eventually discovered by Jimena.

Ramiro blackmails Belén, making her break up with Martín. A repentant Ramiro decides to reveal the truth he has kept, but dies in a car crash. Believing she is no longer in love with him, Martín leaves with a now-sane Gabriela. Belén's sadness over his departure lessens when she meets Dr. Facundo Brausen after Jimena suffers a serious accident.

Season Two – ''Chiquititas 1996''

Carmen is once again Rincón de Luz's administrator. Facundo and Belén are in love, although she still misses Martín. Jime insists that her two friends Roña and Corcho are admitted into the manor as the first boys to live there. Carmen opposes this, but the Juvenile Court intervenes and allows them to stay, a decision that leads to Mosca's definitive return and the arrival of Guille. Erestina is replaced by Matilde, a smart and uncanny woman who discovers the secret about Mili and reveals it to Carmen, who lands in the hospital. In her absence, Belén assumes the position of administrator, struggling against the Court to stay with the children, using her social-assistance learning. She also becomes a mother to Sol after Leticia's sudden death, moving into the manor with the little girl and Clarita.

Clarita becomes a dance instructor to the little girls, and her skills lead her to become a professional dancer. Cinthia and Laura are adopted and new interns, such as Tamara and Mecha, increase the family inside the Rincón de Luz manor.

Season Three – ''Chiquititas 1997''

Carmen manages to close down the house and separate the group administered by Belén, but she and the kids receive help from the mysterious Pedro Vega, who donates his old mansion to them. Alongside Facundo, Piojo, and Tommy, Belén and the ''chiquititas'' find the huge, gorgeous manor at the corner of the Pasaje del Sauce. They're astonished by the attractive facade, but inside is a creepy place full of traps and secret passages; it's inhabited by a mysterious woman named Elena and her granddaughter Lucia. Belén introduces them to the Magic Window ("La Ventatina de los Sueños"), which allows them to gaze at their deepest dreams and illusions. Similar to the Window is the Magic Mirror, in which they must look with only one eye, to watch their dreams become true. The group gives the place a complete makeover and the Juvenile Court allows them to live there. Elena wants them out of there and far away from Lucia, so she torments them constantly. Roña discovers the little girl hidden in the inner parts of the manor, and he and Belén battle the hag to free her. Lucia gradually becomes part of the family, thanks to Roña.

The kids must also interact with new neighbors, starting feuds, making friends, and discovering first love: Jimena falls for Matías, and Mosca develops a troubled relationship with Delfina, the spoiled girl next door. Facundo moves to the house in front of the manor to become closer to Belén and the orphans. Belén and the kids receive a Brazilian orphan named Mora and a young boy named Nico who loves flying and aircraft and dreams of being reunited with his aircraft-pilot father.

However, their relationship as a group starts to be torn apart by Facundo's ex-fiance Andrea and the unscrupulous Alejo Méndez Ayala, who wants his daughter Sol back.

Meanwhile, as Gabriela and Mili become closer each day, Carmen shadows them, trying to keep them from realizing their true ties.

Mili is still blind, so Gabriela invites her to live with her, feeling that her home is more secure than the manor. Mili despairs about leaving Belén, her best friend Jime, and the other ''chiquititas'', until Jime realizes that it will be better for her. Carmen bond with ambitious orphan Caro understands it will be better for her. Carmen creates a bond with Caro, the ambitious orphan, to assume her place as Gabriela's real daughter. The girl desires everything Mili has, including her boyfriend Paul. But Belén discovers everything Carmen was trying to hide. At the Mothers Day, she receives a gift made by the grateful orphans and reunites them to tell the story behind the creation of the Rincón De Luz institution, revealing that Mili is the main reason for it. The girl becomes hysterically excited after finding out she finally found her family, but is hijacked by an angry Carmen. All the orphans' attempts to save Mili go wrong, but Carmen's final plan fails when Gabriela herself discovers the desperate captive girl. With mother and daughter reunited, Carmen is arrested and sent into rehabilitation, pleading for their forgiveness. Gabriela tells her they expect Carmen's regeneration so they can become a real family. Mili says goodbye to Belén, Jime, and the other ''chiquititas'' and leaves with her mother. Belén and the orphans then travel to Walt Disney World.

Season Four – ''Chiquititas 1998''

Belén and the orphans celebrate a party at their street, the Pasaje del Sauce, but the event is ruined by an unknown saboteur. Six new orphans (the older ones Patricio, Martina and Micaela and the tiny ones Nacho, Catalina and Luna) are added to the group. Patricio is a problematic and troublesome boy, whose behaviour is a consequence of his traumatic past. He does not get along with the other orphans and becomes a challenge to Belén. Martina is an attractive but ambitious girl, who causes jealousy in Georgi. Mosca and Delfina's relationship is intensified, and Belén meets Alejo's supposed identical twin brother, Manuel. Unlike his brother, Manuel is an adorable, sweet-hearted saxophonist, who gives help to Belén and the orphans whenever they need (even softening Patricio's behaviour). However, his presence does not eases Sol's longing for her father.

Like Mili, Jimena is reunited with her mother after discovering that Mosca is her brother only by her father's side. A tragedy reaches the life of the ''chiquitita'', when her mother is shot to death during and expedition in the jungle. Lost in the forest, she used her memories and clues from the other kids to survive (such as creating a sundial), and well as Belén's messages about keeping faith and hope. She makes friends with a monkey and meets Yago, a jungle boy who knows everything about wild life and lost her father. When Jime is rescued by Manuel and Mosca, she takes Yago with her to the manor. The boy takes some time to adjust himself into the civilized life. Elena returns, now rich after inheriting Vega's fortune, decided to take revenge on Belén and the orphans, after taking off Lucia from her.

Georgi is reunited with her older sister and her family, and emotionally leaves the group and the manor. After they start a relationship, Manuel asks Belén in marriage, which she accepts. At the wedding ceremony, Belén tells the orphans that she and Manuel are planning to adopt them all. However, at the same night she discovers the truth about him, through an unknown woman, that being that Manuel and Alejo are in effect, the very same person. Heartbroken with such a lie, she runs away from him. As he follows her, Alejo is hit by a car and ends up seriously damaged. Even after everything they have been through, Belén takes care of Alejo, as a new admin is introduced to the manor. Belén has lost her position after her decision of adopting the orphans, and the Court replaces her by Martirio. Initially adorable with the kids, Martirio reveals her true face as the manor's ultimate hag. Applying severe punishments and methods on them, she plans to stay with their permanent custody. Belén and Alejo fight on court against Martirio, using video messages sent by Georgi and Nico, who are grateful for everything Belén did for them. Belén also exposes to the judge the horrible conditions of a previous institution Martirio took over. She is sent in jail as Belén and Alejo win the orphans's custody, adopting them all. Belén gives her children the Book of Life, in which she writes about the future of each of them.

Season Five – ''Chiquititas 1999'' – A new beginning

In a reebot of the first series,Maria is a little girl who lives in the streets with some other kids. Somehow, she received the Book of Life written by Belén, and from her messages Maria believes that she and her friends will find a place to live altogether, just like the Rincón de Luz manor. The group meet some other homeless kids and discover a huge granary in their way. The place is inhabited by an enormous tree and a nice but lonely old man, named Joaquín. He welcomes the group in his place as the kids ease her loneliness. The barn is located nearby a mansion which belongs to Joaquín's son Juan Maza, where he lives with his seven children (Mariano, Ines, Javier, the twins Luisana and Titán, Juanita and Agustín). The loss of their mother shattered Juan's relationship with them. The family receives a distant teenager cousin, Candela, whose differences cause issues between her, Mariano and Ines. Candela brings her little brothers Hosana and Facundo with her.

Juan is engaged to an ambitious woman, Pía Pacheco, who has just arrived with her little daughter Tali and personal assistance Elza. Despite Juan is not sure about his feelings for Pía, their wedding ceremony is materialized, but it is interrupted with the arrival of Ana, a sweet-hearted woman, who falls with her balloon right on their wedding cake. Juan falls in love instantly for Ana, and she is well received by Joaquín and the orphans, settling in their granary. Ana talks to Anita, an angel in the form of a young girl only her is able to see. She also notices that Juan's children are living in sadness or emotional need, and starts touching and changing their lives (starting from Javier). Ana's presence also changes the situation between children and father, as Pía becomes increasingly annoyed with her presence. The barn becomes a legal orphanage and receives new children.

The orphans start interacting with the Maza children and with Candela, who develops a troubled relationship with Mariano. She actually is unsure between him and Matías, a handsome neighbor boy. The attention and love Candela receives from everyone cause intense jealousy in Ines. Despite Pía's attempts to separate them, Ana and Juan become lovers, and she decides to ruin their family starting with the orphans. She sends Bautista and Santiago to the Hogar de las Sombras, a horrible child prison, soon before Ana and Juan's wedding. The couple tries to avoid her decision, but since Pía legally assumed the orphanage, Ana authorizes believing the boys are going to a travel. Ana and Juan get married and Candela chooses Mariano over Matías. The orphans emotionally say goodbye to Ana, and Candela is left on their care. However, Pía hires thugs to get rid from the children (the orphans and the Maza kids). Mariano loses contact with his father and he and Candela attempt to escape with the kids from her men, until the group is caught. Candela realizes Pía is mentally ill and Mariano discovers she legally assumed the children. Their last attempt is to fly in Ana's balloon, but only Mariano and Candela are able to flee. As the couple lift off, they are told by Camila to be happy together. The group is then taken to the Hogar de Las Sombras, where they are reunited with Santiago and Bautista. In the horrible place, they have to deal with its rigorous janitors and violent interns, until Maria mitigates them using the messages written in the Book of Life. The group decides to escape from the child prison, struggling against its guards. While they escape, Pía insanely burns the granary, dying in the fire. As the kids flee from their prison, Maria has a vision of Ana and Juan in the skies, and realises that is the right moment to find the Rincón de Luz manor, their last chance to have a family again.

Season Six – ''Chiquititas 2000'' - Journey back to the manor

Ana and Juan died in a plane crash, Pía burned down the granary and the children escaped from the Hogar de las Sombras. The group formed by Felipe-nicknamed "Mexicano" or "The Mexican" by the others-(Felipe Colombo, who played Felipe is, in fact, Mexican-Argentine), Tali, the Maza children (Luisana, Titán, Juanita and Agustín) and the granary orphans (Camila, Bautista and Maria) was left in sadness, all of them homeless and hopeless. Juanita ended up traumatized and became unable to communicate. Fearing being sent back to the horrendous child prison, the ''chiquititas'' need to find a new place to live. María decides it is the perfect time to find the original Rincón de Luz described in her Book of Life, which she faithfully keeps. Following a magic shooting star, the group is led to the house on the corner. The manor seems to be abandoned and scary, as they find the place completely covered in branches and leaves. However, the sinister facade actually covers an utopic place full of toys, puppets and dolls. Camila insists the group is invading a private property (which in fact they are doing), but the Magic Window in the attic reveals that they actually found the Rincón de Luz manor. The orphans glare as a spiritual Belén appears, welcoming them home and stating that, even after all the sorrow the children have been through, they shall not stop dreaming and keeping their faith. The kids then discover that the place was sold to a Phantom of the Opera-like mysterious figure named Refael Sander. He was involved in an accident in which he lost a son and got half of his face burned. Since then he has lived in bitterness in the dark, hidden places of the Manor with half of the face covered with a mask, as the place became known as a haunted house. His only company is Enzo the Valet, a bald, funny man who initially lurks and scares the newly arrived children. Camila insists to him that, since they are orphans in an orphanage, they will not leave the manor. As time goes by, Sander allows the children to live in his house, as he discovers that there is a possibility of one of them to be his lost son. Juanita is the first one among them to meet him, and they become good friends. Paula, Sander's deceased wife twin sister, arrives with a girl named Olivia. Paula believes the manor belongs to her and still is in love with Sander, and Olivia is a troublesome compulsive liar. She is ordered by Paula to get as closer to the orphans as possible. She then intervenes in both Camila and Felipe, and Luisana and Bautista relationships.

A young and brave woman named Luz arrives in the manor, after she runs away from her abusive and very violent boss and Maria immediately recognizes her as their "mother", because of Camila's jealousy. Sander secretly watches Luz and falls in love for her. As she discovers the story behind the manor, Luz is decided to bring him to life again. The younger girls discover a library in which fairytales come to life; the manor also hides a magical world inhabited by elfs, where Maria befriends a tiny elf named Tok.

Season Seven – ''Chiquititas 2001''

As Luz, Sander and Juanita go in search for his lost son, who is supposedly still alive, the orphans are left under the cares of Enzo. However, the Juvenile Court hires a vicious woman named Lidia to be in charge of the house's administration. After Lidia starts ruling their home, the children are once again deprived from their dreams and good life. Camila and Luisana are worried since Felipe and Bautista have not sent news since their travel, some time before Luz and Rafael's wedding. They were actually kidnapped by Paula's henchmen, and had to cause a car crash to escape from them. Felipe falls unconscious and Bautista loses his memories. They are rescued by Miki, an adorable girl who lives in a trailer. As Felipe awakens, he notices that Bautista has amnesia and tells him they should go back home. Even without remembering anything, Bautista goes with him and they take Miki with them, away from her abusive mother.

After her mother dies, a young girl moves to the neighborhood, and starts working at a nearby bar. She is Mili, the original ''chiquitita'' and the reason the original orphanage was created. Mili comes back following her memories of her life in the manor, alongside her friends Jime, Georgi, Guille, Mosca and everybody else, and foremost, following Belén's lessons. She is decided to help the orphans ruled by Lidia (who had blocked up the Magic Window), giving back their dreams and their happiness. To deceive Lidia, she joins the manor as a "rigorous" janitor named Greta. Mili receives help in her mission from Enzo and his brother Renzo, and from the handsome bar owner Ramiro. She reveals herself to the kids, but they do not believe in her words with the exception of Maria. Aspiring their house, Lidia tries to send the kids back to the Hogar de las Sombras and ties up Ramiro and Mili to chairs after she discovers her true intentions. Ramiro manages to escape, releasing Mili. As the kids struggle against the guards, Bautista recovers his memories while saving Luisana from them, and the group runs back to the manor. Mili, Ramiro and the orphans are reunited, but Lidia performs her final act even though she is arrested. Stating that if the house will not belong to her then it will not be anyone else's, Lidia reveals to Ramiro that she has implanted explosives in the manor. He desperately runs towards the place, in order to evacuate it. After everybody apparently leaves the manor, Tali misses Agustín and Mili goes back to rescue him. As they run out, the manor explodes, leaving the kids in desperation. As an insane Lidia delights, Mili tells her that she is wrong, and nothing will knock down their home, if the ''chiquititas'' stand together. The group is surprised by a white radiance in the sky, which reveals itself to be Belén. She states that the Rincón de Luz will always exist while each child in the world keep his or her dream, and while love exists, as the manor magically starts rebuilding itself, amazing the orphans. Among them, the orphans that lived with Mili (Jime, Corcho, Georgi, Mosca and the others) appear one by one.

Maria passes on the Book of Life to other orphaned children, and as her family formed by her fellows, Mili and Ramiro is shown, she ends the story by telling the audience to never give up their dreams, and if sometime they grow up and think they have lost them, to just look deep inside the heart, where will always be their ''chiquitita'', giving them care.

Magali Garcia (Jorgelina Aruzzi) is a strict businesswoman who got pregnant in the past, and after revealing it to her father Vítor (Ernesto Claudio), was sent to an abandoned place. The Garcias' servant, under Vítor's orders, took the baby to an orphanage and lied to Magali that her baby was stillborn. The repentant servant later told Magali the truth, which made her hate her father. Magali started looking for the baby, and when she is sure it lives in the ''Modelo Dumont'' orphanage, she goes there under a new identity: the sweet, adorable, funny, offbeat Lili, helped by her best friend Lúcia (Mariana Richaudeau). In this guise as Magali's distant cousin, she assumes a maternal figure to the orphans. Lili also meets Terezinha (Mariana Briski), an arrogant housekeeper the kids see as an "evil witch"; the orphanage's owners Julieta (María Carámbula) and Pierre (Alejo García Pintos) Dumont; and their spoiled children Marcel (Luciano Ruiz) and Talita (Delfina Varni). The Dumonts are an ambitious, greedy, perverse avaricious family. Kili (Gastón Ricaud) is the orphanage's handsome, adorable chef, and he and Lili soon fall in love. The ''chiquititas'' of this series are Miki, Guta, and Mosquito, teenagers forming a loving triangle; the younger orphans are Luana, Anita, Nando, Paula, Pulga, Josep, Eduardo, and Francisco.

Freewheeling Jim Masters returns home after a 20-year absence, during which he was declared dead, to find that his wife, Nancy, is about to marry Sam Sloane, a stable local man in Carmel, California. She must now choose between her ex-husband and her new fiancé. The Masters daughters are also upset that their irresponsible father has re-entered their lives after so long an absence. Meanwhile, the youngest daughter, Buff, is drawn to tough-guy Gabriel Lopez, a man that reminds Jim Masters of himself.

In 2017, ex-army officer John Henry Brennick and his wife Karen are attempting to cross the Canada–United States border to Vancouver to have a second child. Strict one-child policy forbids a second pregnancy, even after their firstborn died, so Karen wears a magnetic vest to conceal her pregnancy from the security scanners. But a guard notices the vest and raises the alarm.

Brennick is caught, believing Karen to have escaped, and sentenced to 31 years at the Fortress, a private maximum 30-level security prison run by the Men-Tel Corporation. To maintain discipline, all inmates are implanted with "Intestinators" which induce severe pain or death as a form of physical control and mental conditioning. The prison is run by Director Poe, who oversees Zed-10, a computer that monitors day-to-day activities. The prison is located underground, in the middle of the desert, inside a deep pit that can only be crossed by a retractable bridge, while the prisoners are kept in overcrowded cells secured by laser walls.

John is imprisoned with inmates Abraham, a model prisoner who works as Poe's manservant and is awaiting parole; D-Day, a machine and demolitions expert; Nino Gomez, and Stiggs, who tries to extort John. John learns his wife has been captured and is held in an upper level with his unborn child who, being illegal, is now officially owned by Men-Tel and will be confiscated at birth.

Stiggs has a friend, Maddox, who repeatedly intimidates John; the two are involved in a brawl which culminates with Maddox being shot by a security turret before he falls to his death. John manages to grab Maddox's Intestinator and gives it to D-Day before he is taken away to be subjected to a mind-wipe procedure as punishment.

Poe, infatuated with Karen, tells her that if she lives with him, he will treat John well and release him from the mind-wipe chamber. She accepts to help John. Poe is revealed to be a cyborg, powerfully enhanced by Men-Tel cybernetics. Four months later, a heavily pregnant Karen manages to use her access to the prison computer in Poe's quarters to help John by restoring him from his mind-wiped state. Karen steals a holographic map and gives it to Abraham to give to John. Meanwhile, D-Day dismantles Maddox's Intestinator and uses a magnetic component to pull out the others' Intestinators.

During their next work shift, John's group puts their Intestinators in an air-duct and stage a brawl, causing Zed to trigger the devices and blow the duct open to prepare their escape. Poe promptly flushes the duct with steam and sends in "Strike Clones", networked cyborgs armed with flamethrowers and machine guns. Stiggs surrenders and gets shot dead, but the rest of the group kill a Strike Clone, steal its weapon and use it to kill the remaining clones.

Zed alerts Poe of Karen's actions. He reveals to her that her child, like all MenTel-owned babies, will be extracted in a fatal Caesarean to be made a cyborg. Abraham and Karen resist, but are powerless against the cyborg Poe and Abraham dies of strangulation.

Hijacking one of the gun turrets and using it as an elevator, John's group travels to Zed's control room. John takes Poe hostage and orders him to release Karen. Poe gives the order, but Zed refuses the command, stating that Men-Tel does not engage in any negotiations during hostage situations and a gun turret blasts Poe, blowing him to pieces and leaving John's group with no leverage. Once brought over to the core computer, D-Day hacks into Zed and accesses a powerful feedback virus confiscated at the start of his sentence. He manages to activate the virus after being shot and incapacitated, causing a complete systems crash and all automated security to fail which releases all of the prisoners who escape. John and Gomez rescue Karen, hijack a truck, and they escape to Mexico where Karen enters labor in an abandoned barn and gives birth to her and John's child.

First Book

Aurora describes her childhood in Florence, growing up as the daughter of a Tuscan mother and an English father. Her mother died when she was four, leaving her father to raise her. He was a scholar and imparted to her knowledge of Greek and Latin and a love of learning. Her father died when she was thirteen, and she was sent to England to live with his sister, her aunt, in Leigh Hall, her family's ancestral home. Her aunt tried to educate her in what she considered a ladylike manner, but Aurora discovered her father's old library and read scholarly books on her own.

She read many of Shakespeare's famous works and fell in love with his writing style and aspired to be a great writer like him one day in her life.

Second Book

This book starts on Aurora's twentieth birthday. Her cousin, Romney Leigh, proposes marriage to her. He is skeptical about her poetic ability, telling her that women do not have the passion, intellectual capacity, or redemptive qualities to be true artists. Because of this, and because she feels that he is too wrapped up in his social work and ideals to be a good husband, she angrily rejects him. Aurora's aunt chastises her for refusing him, telling her that because he is the male heir, he will inherit all of the estate and Aurora will be left with nothing. Shortly afterwards, her aunt dies. Romney attempts to give Aurora money, but she refuses it, deciding to go to London to make her living as a poet.

Third Book

This book opens in Aurora's London apartment. She has been writing small popular poems for magazines, which have earned her an enthusiastic following among romantic young men and women, but she is dissatisfied. The great works of art of which she felt she was capable have arrived stillborn – she has the inspiration, but somehow cannot get it onto the page. While she works, frustrated, a visitor arrives for her, a Lady Waldemar. She is beautiful but sharp and sarcastic, and Aurora does not like her. Lady Waldemar explains to Aurora that she is in love with Romney, so much so that she lowers herself to do charity work with him, but Romney has decided to marry instead one of his lower-class ‘projects,' Marian Erle (whose name is a pun). She wants Aurora to speak to Marian and then to Romney and convince them of their foolishness. Aurora, partly out of curiosity and partly concern for Romney, goes to visit Marian and hears her life story: Marian's drunken mother tried to sell her into prostitution, and to escape it she ran away and became ill, eventually being taken into a poor hospital. There Romney found her and assisted her in getting work as a seamstress.

Fourth Book

Marian continues her story, relating how Romney continued to aid her and ultimately proposed marriage to her. Aurora asks her if she is sure he truly loves her, to which Marian replies that Romney loves everything. She assures Aurora that despite her lower-class status, she will be a loving and devoted wife to him. Before Aurora can answer, Romney enters Marian's room. He and Aurora awkwardly trade words, and she tells him she approves of Marian. He walks her home, and during their conversation she becomes confused about her own feelings for him. A month passes, and it is time for Romney and Marian's wedding – but Marian sends a letter in her place to the ceremony, telling Romney that she is not good enough for him. The crowd at the wedding assume that Romney has seduced and abandoned her, and attack him. Romney is devastated, and searches for Marian for days, but cannot find her. He and Aurora have a conversation about their respective disappointments with their missions; Romney can neither make a dent in the poverty he sees all around him nor gain the respect of the people he tries to help, while Aurora still has not succeeded in writing a real work of Art.

Fifth Book

Aurora discusses her further attempts to write. She tells how she is determined not to be constricted by her woman's role but is doubtful that the modern age presents opportunities for epic poetry, writing, "Ay, but every age / Appears to souls who live in't (ask Carlyle) / Most unheroic". As the book continues, she grows more and more desperate, crying out to her muses and gods for inspiration. She confides that she has not seen Romney Leigh for almost two years, but she has heard that he has turned Leigh Hall into a refuge for the poor. At a stifling, insipid evening party at one of her well-born friend's houses, she learns that Romney is engaged to marry Lady Waldemar, and bitterly reflects that "He loved not Marian, more than once he loved/Aurora." She decides that to find inspiration, she must travel to Italy, her mother's land, and in order to get the money sells some of her father's old books, as well as her own unfinished manuscript.

Sixth Book

This book begins with Aurora in France, presumably on a stop-over on the way to Italy. She wanders Paris with her head in the clouds, enjoying the atmosphere of history and the beauty that surrounds her. Suddenly, she catches a glimpse of a familiar face – it is Marian Erle. Frantically, Aurora follows her, losing her in the crowd eventually, but not before seeing that Marian is carrying a child. She is shocked, but resolves not to judge her harshly and tries for a week to find her, finally running into her by chance at a flower market. Marian takes her to her poor room, where she shows Aurora her baby boy. Aurora reproaches Marian for being promiscuous, but Marian angrily replies that far from it, she was attacked and raped and left pregnant. She explains to Aurora that Lady Waldemar convinced her that Romney did not truly love her, and sent her to France with her lady's maid. The lady's maid left her in a brothel, where she was raped and almost driven insane, but she managed to escape.

Seventh Book

Marian continues to tell Aurora her story: she was taken in by a kind lady as a maid, but was summarily fired when her pregnancy became apparent. Despite this, she could not bring herself to be unhappy: she was overjoyed that out of her dreadful experience, she could have the wonderful experience of motherhood. Aurora, after hearing Marian's story, apologizes profusely to her for misjudging her and offers her a ‘marriage' of sorts – she will protect Marian and her son and take them to Italy with her. Marian gratefully accepts. Aurora decides not to inform Romney that she has found Marian, but writes an angry letter to Lady Waldemar, telling her she knows of her disgraceful conduct towards Marian. Marian's presence, however, constantly brings Romney to Aurora's thoughts. She is surprised when a friend writes to her to congratulate her on her book – the manuscript she sold to get to Italy. She decides that perhaps it was better than she thought. She finds no particular inspiration in Italy, however, finding instead constant bittersweet memories of her childhood.

Eighth Book

Several years have passed. Aurora, Marian, and the boy are living in a villa in Florence. Suddenly, Romney Leigh arrives, having discovered their whereabouts through a friend of Aurora's. Aurora, believing him to be married to Lady Waldemar, is cold with him. He tells her that he has read her book and believes it to be good and true Art, and tells her that he has reconsidered the judgmental strictures he passed on her previously. He relates to her the sorry failure of his attempts at social reform: after he converted Leigh Hall into a refuge, stories went around the village that it was a prison and a mob burned the whole thing to the ground. Aurora expresses her sympathy, but tells him she still cannot think well of his wife. Romney is surprised, and tells her that he is not married to Lady Waldemar, although he has a message from her to Aurora. Aurora tears it open, and reads it.

Ninth Book

Aurora reads Lady Waldemar's letter, which claims that she did not intend to hurt Marian, only to remove her. Her scheme did not work; even after Marian was gone, Romney did not love her. She tells Aurora, in a vitriolic tone, that she, by her letter forcing Lady Waldemar to tell Romney that Marian lived, has doomed him to a loveless life with her, when he is truly in love with Aurora. Aurora, somewhat shocked both by the letter's contents and the angry rhetoric, dazedly asks Romney what he will do now, and he answers that he will marry Marian and raise her child as his own. Marian refuses him, however, stating that she prefers to remain as her child's only guardian and devote her life to him, rather than a husband, and that she has realized that what she thought was love for Romney was rather hero-worship. She leaves, urging Romney to talk to Aurora. They converse, and forgive each other for any wrongs they have done to each other over the years. Romney admits to Aurora that he is blind. Aurora, in tears, confesses to Romney that she loves him, and has finally realized it; and also realizes that, in loving him, she will be able to complete herself and find her poetic muse once more. The poem ends with Aurora and Romney in a loving embrace, as she describes the landscape for his unseeing eyes in Biblical metaphors.

The film, entirely presented in infrared vision, begins with an out-of-focus closeup of Johnny (played by Cunningham) babbling incomprehensibly while being interviewed by an unseen man. At one point, Johnny mumbles the word "ma-ma" twice, after which the man asks if he wants his mother to come in. This causes Johnny to start breathing erratically and lose control, so the man gives Johnny a sedative injection to calm him down.

The video cuts to a fluorescent light turning on, a mouse crawling over a press-sticker credits list, followed by the title, "Rubber Johnny", which is shown written on a condom in a backwards-playing shot of it being pulled off a penis.

Johnny sits recumbent in his wheelchair with his oversized head hanging over the back of it. He starts dancing along to the Aphex Twin track "Afx237 v.7" while his chihuahua watches. His dancing involves him performing balancing tricks with his wheelchair and deflecting light beams with his hands. A door opens and Johnny is interrupted by an aggressive male voice. During this, Johnny is sitting upright in the wheelchair. The voice yells at him indistinctly, a slap to Johnny's face is implied, and the door is slammed shut.

Johnny snorts a large line of cocaine. He screams in the dark and then hides behind a door, avoiding white light beams. Johnny's face smashes repeatedly into a glass surface, and each time chunks of his face articulate the vocals in the song. He is interrupted a second time by the voice, after which Johnny once again reclines back in his wheelchair and babbles at his chihuahua.

The credits roll over a night scene of a train passing in the distance.

The movie opens with the murder of New York City Detective Lieutenant Danial Lombardy, his body discovered in Hong Kong waters.

Three strangers arrive on the same ship at the Portuguese port of Macao, lying 30 miles off of the then British protectorate of Hong Kong: Nick Cochran, a cynical-but-honest ex-serviceman, Julie Benton, an equally cynical, sultry, and well-traveled night club singer, and Lawrence Trumble, a jovial traveling salesman who deals in coconut oil, silk stockings, cigars, and contraband.

Corrupt police lieutenant Sebastian notifies casino owner and underworld boss Vincent Halloran about the new arrivals. Halloran has been tipped off about an undercover New York City policeman out to lure him into international waters so he can be arrested by British police for the murder of Detective Lombardy. With only three strangers to choose from, Sebastian informs Halloran that Nick is the cop. Halloran hires Julie as a singer, in part to find out what she knows about Nick. He then tries to bribe a puzzled Nick to leave Macao, but Nick is interested in getting to know the curvaceous Julie better and turns him down.

Later, Trumble offers the broke Nick a lucrative commission to help him sell a hot diamond necklace, which he accepts as a means of getting a nest egg to start a life together somewhere with Julie. However, when Nick shows Halloran a diamond from the necklace, Halloran recognizes it as part of the same cache he had sent to Hong Kong only a week earlier to be sold. Now certain of Nick's identity, he lays a trap for Nick, who gets knocked out and taken prisoner.

Nick is guarded by two thugs and Halloran's girlfriend and head ''croupier,'' Margie. Worried that Halloran is planning to dump her for Julie, the jealous Margie helps Nick escape, with instructions to take Julie with him when he goes. The thugs discover Nick is missing and headed by Halloran's murderous henchman, Itzumi, pursue him on a wild chase down to the waterfront. When Trumble happens on the late-night fracas he tries to help Nick, and, mistaken by the thugs for him, is killed. Before dying he tells Nick about having used him in an attempt to entrap Halloran, and the police boat patrolling offshore to capture the dangerous fugitive from justice if he can still be lured beyond territorial waters.

When Nick tries to get Julie to go away with him, he learns that Halloran has invited her on a trip to Hong Kong to retrieve his expensive necklace, a rendezvous he instructs her to keep. Nick lurks by the dock and disposes of Itzumi. Taking his place at the helm of Halloran's boat, he steers the unsuspecting kingpin toward the waiting police. After a violent fistfight with Halloran that leaves the mobster unconscious in the water, Nick swims him over to the British authorities.

The movie ends with Nick and Julie in a clinch, implying they will head home together to the United States, she having earlier expressed her homesickness to him and he sharing that Trumble had cleared up an outstanding shooting charge against him in New York that lad left him an involuntary exile ever since.

Lolla-Wossiky, a troubled, one-eyed, whiskey drinking "Red", leaves General Harrison's fort and heads north in order to find his "dream beast", the spirit that can save him from the pain of his memories. On his journey, he meets Alvin Miller Jr. and assists him in making an ethical decision that will shape his life forever. In appreciation, Alvin heals Lolla-Wossiky's painful memories, allowing him to give up alcohol and become in touch with the land once again. Lolla-Wossiky grows into "the Prophet" although he prefers to be known as Tenskwa-Tawa. Lolla-Wossiky preaches both pacifism and separatism, believing that "Reds" should live west of the Mississippi and "Whites" should live east of it.

Meanwhile, Lolla-Wossiky's brother, Ta-Kumsaw, tries to rally "Reds" behind his belief that their land should be defended violently. When Alvin Miller Jr. and his older brother Measure travel to the place of his birth (where Alvin is expected to become apprenticed to the Hatrack River blacksmith) the two brothers are captured by 'Reds' (Native Americans) sent by William Henry Harrison to intentionally create conflict. Ta-Kumsaw, sent by Lolla-Wossiky, rescues the brothers from torture and death. Measure leaves the "Reds" only to be captured by William Henry Harrison's men and subsequently beaten to the brink of death. Ta-Kumsaw accompanies Alvin to the holy site of Eight-Face Mound where they meet up with Taleswapper, an old friend of Alvin. Using the spiritual powers of the Eight-Face Mound, Alvin is able to heal Measure from afar. Measure is then able to stop some of the slaughter of Lolla-Wossiky's followers by villagers and William Henry Harrison's men over the alleged kidnapping and murder of Alvin and Measure Miller.

The peaceful people of Gandahar are suddenly attacked by an army of automata known as the Men of Metal, that march through the villages and kidnap their victims by turning them to stone. The resulting statues are collected and then transferred to their base. At the capital city of Jasper, the Council of Women orders Sylvain to investigate. On his journey, he encounters the Deformed, a race of mutant beings who were accidentally created via genetic experimentation by Gandahar's scientists. Despite their resentment, they are also threatened by the Men of Metal and offer to help Sylvain.

Sylvain later saves Airelle, a Gandaharian woman. Together they discover the Men of Metal's base, where the frozen Gandaharians are taken through a large portal and are seemingly assimilated into more Men of Metal. The two stow away on a nearby boat which heads towards the middle of the ocean where they encounter Metamorphis, a giant brain. Sylvain and Airelle are captured and confronted by Metamorphis, who tells them that although the Men of Metal believe that he is their leader, he did not create them nor order their attack. He states that he does not want to see Gandahar fall, and that he needs time to figure out the connection between him and the Men of Metal. He then returns Sylvain and Airelle to Jasper where they learn that Metamorphis, like the Deformed, was also an experiment by Gandaharian scientists. Due to his rapid growth and increasingly violent behavior, he was abandoned in the ocean. Sylvain is ordered to kill Metamorphis with a special syringe. Sylvain returns to Metamorphis, who maintains his innocence but reveals that the Men of Metal come from the future via the portal Sylvain saw earlier. He then urges Sylvain to kill him in a thousand years, as the syringe would have no effect on him now. A skeptical Sylvain agrees and Metamorphis puts him into stasis.

A thousand years later, Sylvain awakens just as they had agreed. He comes across the Deformed, who explain the true nature behind the Men of Metal: Due to Metamorphis's now advanced age, his cells can no longer regenerate, which drove him to create the Men of Metal and order them to go back in time to capture the Gandaharians so he could absorb their cells to continue living, killing the Gandaharians in the process. The metal comes from Metamorphis's dead cells metallizing with time. The Deformed, however, were abandoned as they were considered undesirable. Sylvain and the Deformed then agree to work together. The Deformed fight off the Men of Metal and rescue the remaining Gandaharians while Sylvain goes to face Metamorphis alone. The Deformed destroy the reservoir supplying Metamorphis with new cells, distracting him long enough to let Sylvain inject the syringe into Metamorphis which kills him. Sylvain, along with the Deformed and the Gandaharians escape through the portal back to their time.

Mr. Pye travels to the Channel Island of Sark to awaken a love of God in all the islanders. His landlady on the island, Miss Dredger, quickly becomes a devout follower of his teachings, and even agrees to allow the person she hates the most, Miss George, to stay in her house. As Pye does good works he gradually feels a stinging feeling on his back. On further investigation he discovers that he has started to grow angel's wings, and after consulting with a Harley Street doctor, he concludes the best thing to do is to stop doing good deeds, and instead does bad deeds.

He engages in some deliberately malicious acts, and after a time this results in him growing horns on his forehead. He is unable to decide what to do, but eventually decides to reveal his horned condition to the islanders, who chase him to the edge of a cliff, from which he flies, using his wings.

In Kenosha, Wisconsin, Darcy, editor at her high school paper, and her steady boyfriend Stan are in their final year of high school and already have been accepted at good colleges. Before Darcy goes to the University of Wisconsin to study journalism, she will go on a trip to Paris with her mother for her graduation present, while Stan will go to Caltech to study architecture. With the help of Darcy's best friend Lila, Darcy and Stan spend a weekend together and Darcy becomes pregnant. They announce the pregnancy to their families at Thanksgiving. Neither Darcy's single-parent mother Donna nor Stan's Catholic parents are very supportive. Respectively, they urge the young couple to have an abortion or give up the baby for adoption. Darcy plans to have an abortion, but does not go through with it, much to Stan's relief.

At Christmas, the couple announces their plans to keep the baby, causing a break between them and their parents. They rent a decrepit apartment and marry to the cheers of their friends, despite the fact that without parental consent the marriage is not legal. At the urging of her high school guidance counselor, who explains that other girls will want to emulate her and become adolescent mothers themselves, Darcy drops out of high school but works toward her GED. Prom is interrupted by Darcy's water breaking. Although baby Thea (short for Theodosia) is healthy, Darcy suffers from post-partum depression, unable to even hold her daughter, and Stan struggles to pay the bills on a part-time job salary. Only when Darcy hears an intruder (who turns out to be Stan's father) and picks up her baby protectively does she break from her depression.

Without telling Darcy, Stan sacrifices his Caltech scholarship because there is no married housing at the school for undergraduates. Stan and Darcy’s relationship starts to crumble with fights. Although Stan takes a second dead-end job, the bills pile up, and the couple finally moves in with Donna, which alienates Stan and Darcy, and causes Stan to drink heavily. Local neighborhood girl Michaela informs Darcy of the scholarship deception so she enlists Stan's best friend Chris in a plan to ensure he takes the scholarship and go to college after all. The plan entails throwing Stan out and annulling the marriage. Stan has a bad reaction to the news and later in the night goes into a rage outside their house. Stan reconciles with his parents, but is heartbroken over the split with Darcy, who does not change her mind but becomes visibly angry at her mother's cold attitude.

At Darcy's night school graduation, Stan arrives to inform Darcy that he has applied for scholarships to the University of Wisconsin–Madison for them both. Darcy lets slip her role in the Caltech deception with Chris, and Stan chases after her as she drives away. Darcy finally tells Donna that Stan is a good man, that she loves him and Donna can either embrace them as an entire family or watch them live their lives without her. Donna finally lets go of her hurt over the abandonment of Darcy's father and informs Stan about her daughter when he seeks her out. They reconcile at the school, intending to go forward with their plans to attend college in Madison in the fall as well as setting a curfew for Thea.

In Namibia, a Sangoma named Joe Niemand recites a story about Dust Devils—anthropomorphized desert winds that roam the highways to hunt and kill humans.

One Dust Devil kills a woman who had picked him up for sex, then burns her house and leaves her corpse in the car. Meanwhile, in the town of Bethanie, Sgt. Ben Mukurob receives a phone call with strange voices speaking, as does Wendy Robinson in Johannesburg, South Africa. In the morning, the man burns down Saarke's house & leaves in her car. In Johannesburg, Wendy's husband Mark accuses her of cheating on him, leading her to leave him and drive to Namibia. Investigating the scene, Sgt Ben Mukurob and Captain Beyman find strange pictographs on the wall. Joe tells him that they are magic symbols, but Mukurob is skeptical. The Dust Devil is picked up by Wendy, a woman who had left her husband after he accused her of infidelity. When he sees another of his kind hitch-hiking, Dust Devil tells Wendy to drive past him, then disappears from the car. Meanwhile, two police officers find human remains in a camper near where Wendy picked up Dust Devil.

With Dust Devil secretly watching, Wendy stops at a small motel for the night and tries to commit suicide but stops herself. Wendy goes to her car the next morning and finds Dust Devil inside, who tells her that she fell asleep the day before. Meanwhile, Beyman gives Mukurob documents about similar murders dating back to 1908. Wendy and Dust Devil reach the Fish River Canyon, as Wendy's husband Mark arrives in Namibia and begins his search for her. Joe tells Mukurob that the murders are the work of the "naghtloper", a shape-shifting demon who gains power over the material world through ritual murder. The naghtloper must keep moving to work the ritual, but if he is tricked to step over a kierie stick, he will be bound to one spot and his power can be taken. Joe gives Mukurob a kierie and a sacred root to burn to prevent the naghtloper from possessing him after it is killed.

When Wendy discovers human fingers among Dust Devil's belongings, he tries to kill her but she escapes. Mukurob and Mark pursue them, but Dust Devil causes them to crash the car in a dust storm. Mukurob leaves Mark at the car and heads into the storm, telling him that he has a chance since the naghtloper only takes those who have nothing to live for. He finds Wendy reaches the abandoned town of Kolmanskop but is stabbed by Dust Devil. Mukurob blocks Dust Devil's path with the kierie, and Wendy uses Mukurob's shotgun to kill Dust Devil as he proclaims his love for her. Wendy walks into the desert past Mark and the car, lies on the road and pulls over a fleet of army Casspirs. Joe believes she has been possessed by the Dust Devil.

Dr. Marcus Monserrat (Boris Karloff) is an elderly practitioner of medical hypnosis. He lives with his wife Estelle Monserrat (Catherine Lacey). He has invented a device which would allow him to control and feel another person's experience using the power of hypnosis. They decide any youngster will do as their test subject. Dr. Marcus Monserrat selects and invites Mike Roscoe (Ian Ogilvy) to his house, with an offer of a 'new experience'. He uses the device on Mike and the procedure is successful: He and Estelle can feel everything Mike feels, and can also control him.

After the procedure, they decide to send Mike away to conduct the experiment over distance. Mike returns to the club where his girlfriend Nicole (Elizabeth Ercy) is waiting for him. Mike takes Nicole to his apartment, and they swim in the pool. Marcus and Estelle are able to experience everything Mike feels. While Marcus wants to publish his work, Estelle wants to make up for lost time and to experience new things. She convinces a reluctant Marcus to continue with their arrangement with Mike.

Next day, Estelle sees a fur jacket in a store and convinces Marcus to use Mike to steal the jacket. Marcus reluctantly agrees on the condition that they will not do it again. While Mike is at Nicole's apartment, Estelle and Marcus make Mike steal the jacket. Mike leaves without informing Nicole, who decides to go a night club with Alan (Victor Henry). Despite a cop getting involved, Mike successfully steals the jacket.

Estelle realizes that they could do anything they want without any consequences. Estelle wants to experience the thrill of speed. So Estelle and Marcus make Mike borrow Alan's bike and ride very fast with Nicole on the pillion seat. When Alan confronts Mike, Estelle makes Mike assault him and his boss, Ron (Alf Joint). Estelle enjoys the experience but Marcus is shocked. He tries to prevent the fight but Estelle's mind turns out to be stronger. When Marcus confronts Estelle, Estelle assaults Marcus and destroys the experimental device, thereby preventing Marcus from reversing the experiment.

Mike blanks out every time Estelle and Marcus control him. A confused Mike visits his friend Audrey (Susan George), but Estelle makes Mike kill her. Mike then goes to the night club and hooks up with pop singer Laura (Sally Sheridan). Alan and Nicole see Mike taking Laura out of the night club. The couple are dropped by a taxi in a deserted street where Mike orders Laura to sing. When she fails to follow his instructions, he kills her too.

The following day, Alan tells Nicole he believes Mike might have killed the girls. Alan wants to inform the police but Nicole convinces him to talk to Mike first. The police track Mike with help of the taxi driver. Alan and Nicole confront Mike about Laura but Mike does not remember anything. Under the influence of Estelle, Mike attacks Alan again and escapes in a car. Police investigators track down Mike, and in the ensuing chase, Marcus interferes with Estelle's control. Mike's car crashes and catches fire. Back at the apartment, Estelle and Marcus are both dead due to burn injuries.

The novel opens as the family and the victim are introduced through the perspective of Sarah King and Dr Gerard, who discuss the behaviour of the family. Mrs Boynton is sadistic and domineering, behaviours which she may have carried over from her original profession of prison warden. Sarah is attracted to Raymond Boynton, while Jefferson Cope admits to wanting to take Nadine Boynton away from her husband, Lennox Boynton, and the influence of her mother-in-law. Having been thwarted in her desire to free the young Boyntons, Sarah confronts Mrs Boynton whose apparent reply is a strange threat: "I've never forgotten anything – not an action, not a name, not a face." When the party reaches Petra, Mrs Boynton uncharacteristically sends her family away from her for a period. Later, she is found dead with a needle puncture in her wrist.

Poirot claims that he can solve the mystery within twenty-four hours simply by interviewing the suspects. During these interviews he establishes a timeline that seems impossible: Sarah King places the time of death considerably before the times at which various of the family members claim last to have seen the victim alive. Attention is focused on a hypodermic syringe that has seemingly been stolen from Dr Gerard's tent and later replaced. The poison administered to the victim is believed to be digitoxin, something that she already took medicinally.

Poirot then calls for a meeting and explains how each member of the family has, in turn, discovered Mrs Boynton to be dead and, suspecting another family member, failed to report the fact. None of the family would have needed to murder the victim with a hypodermic, since an overdose could have been administered much more effectively in her medicine. This places the suspicion on one of the outsiders.

The murderer is revealed to be Lady Westholme who, prior to her marriage, had been incarcerated in the prison in which the victim was once a warden. It was to Lady Westholme, and not to Sarah, that Mrs Boynton had addressed that peculiar threat; the temptation to acquire a new subject to torture had been too great for her to resist. Disguised as an Arab servant, she had committed the murder and then relied upon the suggestibility of Miss Pierce to lay two pieces of misdirection that had concealed her role in the murder. Lady Westholme, eavesdropping in an adjoining room, overhears that her criminal history is about to be revealed to the world and commits suicide. The family, free at last, take up happier lives: Sarah marries Raymond; Carol marries Jefferson; and Ginevra takes up a successful career as a stage actress and marries Dr Gerard.

Comrade Bingo

Various groups make speeches in Hyde Park, including a communist group called "Heralds of the Red Dawn". One of them, a bearded man, denounces the Idle Rich to a crowd. Bingo Little's uncle, recently titled Lord Bittlesham, approaches Bertie. He owns Ocean Breeze, a horse on which Bertie has bet money for the Goodwood Cup. Presently, the bearded man loudly insults them.

Bertie later meets Bingo at a club. Bingo is in love with Charlotte Corday Rowbotham, a member of the Red Dawn. To impress Charlotte, Bingo joined the Red Dawn. He wore a beard to not be recognized, and was the man in Hyde Park. He wants to win enough money on Ocean Breeze to marry Charlotte, but has no capital to bet with. He invites himself to Bertie's flat the next day, and will bring Charlotte, as well as her father Rowbotham and Comrade Butt, both members of the Red Dawn.

The next day, they arrive at Bertie's home and dine. Rowbotham advises Bertie to join their group. He disapproves of Jeeves being a servant. Bingo and Charlotte flirt, and Comrade Butt, a rival for Charlotte's affections, is jealous. Bertie dislikes Charlotte.

Bingo Has a Bad Goodwood

Bertie meets Bingo and Lord Bittlesham in front of a club. Bittlesham is nervous. He has received a threatening letter from the bearded man. After Bittlesham leaves, Bingo shows Bertie that his uncle paid him fifty pounds to investigate the threat. Bingo will bet the money on Ocean Breeze.

Bingo and Charlotte spend time together. Jeeves meets with Comrade Butt one evening, and reports that Butt feels rejected.

At Goodwood, Bertie is disappointed when Ocean Breeze loses. Meanwhile, Lord Bittlesham is concerned because the bearded man, secretly Bingo, is there giving a speech. Bingo, who has lost his wager on Ocean Breeze, rants passionately against wealthy horse owners. Comrade Butt then speaks, but is less successful with the crowd than Bingo. After noticing Lord Bittlesham, Butt excites the crowd by exposing Bingo as Bittlesham's nephew, which gets Bingo in trouble with his uncle.

Two days later, Bertie learns that Bingo intends to go to the country for a while. Jeeves explains to Bertie that he informed Comrade Butt about Bingo being Lord Bittlesham's nephew. Pleased, Bertie tells Jeeves he may take the notes and coins on the dressing table, which amounts to fourteen pounds, one shilling, six pence, and a halfpenny.

The book's frame narrative and premise is that "after dabbling in radical politics", Adolf Hitler emigrated to the United States in 1919 and became a science fiction illustrator, editor, and author. He wrote his final science fantasy novel ''Lord of the Swastika'' in six weeks in 1953, shortly before dying of cerebral hemorrhage (possibly caused by tertiary syphilis); ''Lord of the Swastika'' subsequently wins the Hugo Award and the "colorful uniforms" described therein become a regular feature of cosplayers at science fiction conventions. Hitler's other published works include the long-running fanzine ''Storm'' and the novels ''The Master Race'', ''The Thousand Year Rule'', and ''The Triumph of the Will''.

In a faux review following the main narrative, presented as written by (fictitious) Dr. Homer Whipple of New York University, we learn more about the background of the alternate history in which Hitler emigrated to the United States. Without Hitler's leadership, the Nazi Party fell apart in 1923 and the Communist Party of Germany succeeded in fomenting a German communist revolution in 1930. As this alternate history continues, there is reference to a "Greater Soviet Union" which took over the United Kingdom in 1948, and whose influence is growing in Latin America by 1959. The fact that Whipple refers to World War I as "the Great War" implies that there has been no equivalent of World War II in this world. The core element in the historical backstory of ''Lord of the Swastika'' is a nuclear apocalypse but Whipple gives no indication about such weapons really existing in this alternate reality.

Whipple also discloses that the Empire of Japan has retained its militarism, with reference to its bushido code of conduct, while the United States vacillates against the Greater Soviet Union's ascendancy. Due to the Greater Soviet Union threat, the United States and Japan have a close military and strategic alliance. Japanese militarist values are much admired in the United States. Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and the United States (collectively called the Pacific Pact) are the only major powers standing between the Greater Soviet Union and total control of the globe—yet most Americans seem unable to be roused to deal with the looming Soviet danger. Whipple wonders what the emergence of an American leader like Feric Jaggar, the hero of ''Lord of the Swastika'', could accomplish. Finally, there is a casual mention that, while in this history Nazi Germany never came into being, it is the Soviets who have undertaken a systematic genocide of the Jews of Europe in this world's version of the Holocaust.

''Lord of the Swastika'' is lauded for its qualities as a great work of heroic fantasy. To further hammer the point, in an early edition, actual science fiction writers wrote fictional statements of praise for "Hitler's" writing skills for Spinrad to use as blurbs on the novel's back cover. Irony abounds in Whipple's review, as he argues author Hitler is obviously wrong in assuming that not much more than midnight rallies and phallic symbolism would create a large number of supporters for a movement. "After all", Dr. Whipple says, "it can't happen here", a reference to the political novel ''It Can't Happen Here''.

Novel within the novel—''Lord of the Swastika''

''Lord of the Swastika'' opens in the year 1142 A.F.—"After Fire", the global nuclear war referred to as the "Time of Fire" which brought about the end of the civilization of the technologically advanced "Ancients" and the current despoliation of most forms of life. The gene pools of almost all life forms are corrupted by the radioactive fallout. Few examples of the baseline human form can be seen, and most of humanity are mutants with blue skins, lizard scales or parrot beaks, or wizened half-breed mutants and normal-seeming but inhuman "Dominators", who desire to rule the ruined world with their mind-controlling powers.

The pure and strong young "Trueman" (so named for the lack of mutations in his DNA) Feric Jaggar returns from the outlands of Borgravia where his family was exiled by the treaty of Karmak with the surrounding mutant states to his ancestral land, the High Republic of Heldon, which was founded on the principles of killing mutants and keeping humanity pure. He arrives only to find its rigor slackened and corrupted by the "Universalists", pawns of the sinister Dominator country Zind, which seeks to corrupt Heldon's pure human gene pool into the mutant diversity that rules the rest of the world. Indeed, in the very first portion of Heldon that Feric enters, the customs fort where entrants are tested to see whether they are pure and free of mutation, he is outraged that mutants are being allowed into Heldon on day-passes, that the fort is under the spell of a Dominator, and that the tests are so lax that impure specimens are being granted citizenship.

In Heldon proper, Feric dines in the "Eagle's Nest" tavern, and mulls over the question of how to change this situation. Should he enter politics or the military? Feric witnesses the oratory of Seph Bogel, leader of the Human Renaissance Party, who speaks eloquently but ineffectually to the crowd about the need for human purity. Fired by his words, Feric is inspired to take control of the listening crowd and leads a mob to the same border post, there to slay the Dominator (or "Dom") who had quietly disguised himself as a clerk to sway the immigration decisions in favor of mutants. At Bogel's invitation, he assumes leadership of the Party, which Feric later renames The Sons of the Swastika, and the two travel on to Walder—the second city of Heldon—to meet the party inner circle and begin the great task.

Their journey is interrupted when their steam-powered vessel is waylaid by the outlaw petrol-powered motorcycle gang, the Black Avengers. Jaggar, however, senses that these men may be of use to his cause and challenges their leader, Stag Stopa. The rules of the Black Avengers only allow a member to challenge the leader, and so he and Bogel are taken back to their headquarters for Feric to be initiated. Feric acquits himself mainly in the drinking of ale and in running the gauntlet of torches on a motorcycle. He and Stopa duel with truncheons, and Feric's truncheon breaks. Desperately he reaches out and defeats Stopa with the legendary "Great Truncheon of Stag Held"—which can only be wielded by a descendant of the last true King of Heldon, Sigmark IV. The Black Avengers immediately pledge fealty to him, and become the "Knights of the Swastika".

From this event, Jaggar assumes a hereditary right to be the leader of Heldon and embarks on a violent crusade for genetic purity, drawing a massive following, staging outdoor rallies and raising an army personally loyal to him. He is elected to the Council and stages a coup d'état when he forces the Council to admit to treason and a Zind plot against Heldon. Confirming his suspicions, the Universalist member of the Council turns out to be a Dom. Feric summarily executes him with the Great Truncheon. Jaggar coerces the Council into granting him complete executive power and then has them shot. Immediately after assuming power Jaggar puts down an imminent coup by Stopa, who has been corrupted by the fleshly pleasures of Zind.

Backed by the army and the adoring multitudes, Feric sets about the great task of re-invigorating the military, ordering the production of tanks and fighter jets, the establishment of the Swastika Squad (SS)—a legion of the purest and most manly men that can be found via the "Classification Camps", which examine all citizens of Heldon (killing the Doms and sterilizing or exiling all relatively impure humans). After repelling a Zind attack through Wolack, Heldon annexes its western and southern neighbors, beginning with Borgravia. In the course of the Helderisation of its neighbors Jaggar orders, at the suggestion of Bors Remler, that all mutants are to be euthanised rather than exiled.

Months later, his scientists report that they are near to rediscovering the secrets of atomic bombs, but that Zind is making efforts to dig up relics of the Ancients, which might salvage its own complement of nuclear weaponry. Noting the damage such weapons had done, Feric orders such research ended, and determines to wipe out Zind and every last Dom before they can unleash the Fire. Soon enough, Zind begins to rally its troops from their reverse in Wolack. The final invasion of Zind is hard fought: the main Helder force, under the command of Lar Waffing, takes the southwestern oil fields needed for resupply, while the secondary force fights a delaying action against the vast bulk of the Zind army to the north towards the Zind capital, Bora. Needless to say, the forces of Heldon prevail and the Zind army is destroyed and burned, down to the last mindless "Warrior". The central city is reduced to a cinder in a firestorm (akin to the bombing of Dresden in our world).

The last Dom, apparently a leader and with immense mental powers, is discovered hiding in a command bunker. The Dom has anticipated military defeat and, before Feric has the pleasure of killing him, triumphantly reveals that the Doms had salvaged and rearmed one of the ancient nuclear weapons. It is a doomsday weapon, and he triggers the failsafe. After Feric and his cohorts have evacuated Bora, a cobalt bomb detonates, and as the Dom planned, its fallout utterly corrupts the gene pool of Heldon. If any of its citizens, including Feric, reproduce, they will produce the mutants that they had previously sought to obliterate.

Feric orders the sterilization of the entire Heldon nation, including himself, and, in a final desperate gamble, orders the SS scientists to redouble their efforts to develop the next Master Race from cloning the perfect specimens of the SS. Eventually they succeed and millions of the new master race are produced in 'reproduction works' to complete the cleansing of the Earth. At the novel's close, Heldon has mastered interstellar travel. As a consequence, an initial starship, full of 300 of these seven-foot, blond, super-intelligent all-male SS clones in suspended animation, is launched into space to initiate Heldon's own galactic empire. The SS clones also have a clone of Feric to lead them. This inaugural rocket is launched on a voyage to Tau Ceti and will become the first of many.