Paul Bergot (Harry Langdon) is a Belgian emigrant to the United States who has fallen in love with Mary Brown (Priscilla Bonner), a blind woman. They met as pen-pals when he was fighting in Europe during World War I. Mary even sent Paul a photo of herself.

Paul searches for Mary Brown by asking every woman he meets if she is Mary Brown. By accident he rescues her town from crooks and bootleggers.

''Da Capo II'' takes place 53 years after the events of ''Da Capo'', when Sakura Yoshino, weary of being alone for so long, wished upon a prototype artificial wish-granting magical cherry tree for a son—Yoshiyuki Sakurai. In the first arc, while Yoshiyuki attends Kazami Academy, beneath the school, he awakens Minatsu Amakase, a robot. Yoshiyuki helps her adapt to a life with humans despite robots being nothing more than mere tools. In the second arc, Yoshiyuki begins to harbor feelings for his stepsisters, Otome and Yume, the granddaughters of Jun'ichi and Nemu. However, the cherry tree starts malfunctioning, granting all wishes, regardless of how impure, which is causing numerous incidents to occur in Hatsune. The situation gradually worsens and Otome has to choose whether or not to wither the cherry tree, which would erase Yoshiyuki's existence in the process, so as to save Hatsune.

The game centers on the same island as ''Da Capo'' from the original story. Yoshiyuki Sakurai is the protagonist of the game. Sakura and Jun'ichi are the only returning characters, and Nemu is the only other ''Da Capo'' character to be mentioned by name. Moe, Mako, Kotori, Miharu, and Yoriko are also mentioned, but indirectly. Yume, Nanaka, Minatsu, and Sakura's themes are remixes of themes from previous Circus games. Yume, Minatsu, and Sakura's are remixes of Nemu, Miharu, and Sakura's from ''Da Capo'', and Nanaka's is a remix of Sayaka's from ''Suika''.

One night in Portsmouth, England in 1787, a press gang breaks into a local tavern and presses all of the men drinking there into naval service. One of the men enquires as to what ship they will sail on, and the press gang leader informs him that it is . Upon inquiring as to who the captain is, another man is told the captain is William Bligh (Charles Laughton) and attempts to escape, as Bligh is a brutal tyrant who routinely administers harsh punishment to officers and crew alike who lack discipline, cause any infraction on board the ship, or defy his authority in any manner.

The ''Bounty'' leaves England several days later on a two-year voyage over the Pacific Ocean. Fletcher Christian (Clark Gable), the ship's lieutenant, is a formidable yet compassionate man who disapproves of Bligh's treatment of the crew. Roger Byam (Franchot Tone) is an idealistic midshipman who is divided between his loyalty to Bligh, owing to his family's naval tradition, and his friendship with Christian.

During the voyage, the enmity between Christian and Bligh grows after Christian openly challenges Bligh's unjust practices aboard the ship. When the ship arrives at the island of Tahiti, where the crew acquires breadfruit plants to take to the West Indies, Bligh punishes Christian by refusing to let him leave the ship during their stay.

Byam, meanwhile, sets up residency on the island and lives with the island chief, Hitihiti (William Bambridge), and his daughter, Tehani (Movita Castaneda), and he compiles an English dictionary of the Tahitian language. Hitihiti persuades Bligh to allow Christian a day pass on the island. Bligh agrees, but quickly repeals the pass out of spite. Christian disregards the order and spends his day off the ship romancing a Tahitian girl, Maimiti (Mamo Clark). Christian promises her he will be back someday.

After leaving Tahiti, the crew begins to talk of mutiny after Bligh's harsh discipline leads to the death of the ship's beloved surgeon, Mr. Bacchus (Dudley Digges), and Bligh severely cuts water rationing to the crew in favor of providing more water for the breadfruit plants.

Christian, although initially opposing the idea, decides he can no longer tolerate Bligh's brutality when he witnesses crew members shackled in iron chains, and he approves the mutiny. The crew raids the weapons cabinet and seizes the ship. Bligh and his loyalists are cast into a boat and set adrift at sea with a map and rations to ensure their survival. Due to Bligh's steady leadership, they are able to find their way back to land.

Meanwhile, Christian orders that ''Bounty'' return to Tahiti. Byam, who was in his cabin during the mutiny, disapproves of what Christian has done and decides the two can no longer be friends.

Months later, Byam is married to Tehani, and Christian has married Maimiti and has a child with her, while the rest of the crew are enjoying their freedom on the island. After a long estrangement, Byam and Christian reconcile their friendship. However, when the British ship HMS ''Pandora'' is spotted approaching, Byam and Christian decide they must part ways. Byam and several crew members remain on the island for the ship to take them back to England, while Christian leads the remaining crew, his wife, and several Tahitian men and women back on board ''Bounty'' in search of a new island on which to seek refuge.

Byam boards ''Pandora'' and, much to his surprise, discovers that Bligh is the captain. Bligh, who suspects that Byam was complicit in the mutiny, has him imprisoned for the remainder of the journey across the sea.

Back in England, Byam is court-martialed and found guilty of mutiny. Before the court condemns him, Byam speaks of Bligh's cruel, dehumanising conduct aboard ''Bounty''. Due to the intervention of his friend Sir Joseph Banks (Henry Stephenson) and Lord Hood (David Torrence), Byam is pardoned by King George III and allowed to resume his naval career at sea.

Meanwhile, Christian has found Pitcairn, an uninhabited yet sustainable island that he believes will provide adequate refuge from the reach of the Royal Navy. After ''Bounty'' crashes on the rocks, Christian orders her to be burned.

In the year 1787, the ''Bounty'' sets sail from Britain for Tahiti under the command of Captain William Bligh (Trevor Howard). His mission is to collect a shipload of breadfruit saplings and transport them to Jamaica. The government hopes the plants will thrive and provide a cheap source of food for the slaves.

The voyage gets off to a difficult start with the discovery that some cheese is missing. Seaman John Mills (Richard Harris) accuses Bligh, the true pilferer, and Bligh has Mills brutally flogged for showing contempt to his superior officer, to the disgust of his patrician second-in-command, First Lieutenant Fletcher Christian (Marlon Brando). The tone for the months to come is set by Bligh's ominous pronouncement: "Cruelty with a purpose is not cruelty, it is efficiency." Aristocrat Christian is deeply offended by his ambitious captain.

Bligh tries to reach Tahiti sooner by attempting the shorter westbound route around Cape Horn, a navigational nightmare. The strategy fails and the ''Bounty'' backtracks eastward, costing the mission much precious time. Singlemindedly, Bligh makes up the lost time by pushing the crew harder and cutting their rations.

When the ''Bounty'' reaches her destination, the crew revels in the easygoing life of the tropical paradise – and in the free-love philosophies of the Tahitian women. Christian himself is smitten with Maimiti (Tarita Teriipaia), daughter of the Tahitian king. Bligh's agitation is further fueled by the fact that the dormancy period of the breadfruit means more months of delay until the plants can be potted. As departure day nears, three men, including seaman Mills, attempt to desert but are caught by Christian and clapped in irons by Bligh.

On the voyage to Jamaica, Bligh attempts to bring back twice the number of breadfruit plants to atone for his tardiness, and must reduce the water rations of the crew to water the extra plants. One member of the crew falls from the rigging to his death while attempting to retrieve the drinking ladle. Another assaults Bligh over conditions on the ship and is fatally keelhauled. Mills taunts Christian after each death, trying to egg him on to challenge Bligh. When a crewman becomes gravely ill from drinking seawater, Christian attempts to give him fresh water, in violation of the Captain's orders. Bligh strikes Christian when he ignores his second order to stop. In response, Christian strikes Bligh. Bligh informs Christian that he will hang for his actions when they reach port. With nothing left to lose, Christian takes command of the ship and sets Bligh and the loyalist members of the crew adrift in the longboat with navigational equipment, telling them to make for a local island. Bligh decides instead to cross much of the Pacific in order to reach British authorities sooner. He returns to Britain with remarkable speed.

The military court exonerates Bligh of any misdeeds and recommends an expedition to arrest the mutineers and put them on trial, but it also comes to the conclusion that the appointment of Bligh as captain of the ''Bounty'' was wrong. In the meantime, Christian sails back to Tahiti to pick up supplies and the girlfriends of the crew. Then they go on to remote Pitcairn Island—which is marked incorrectly on the charts—to hide from the wrath of the Royal Navy. However, once on Pitcairn, Christian decides that it is their duty to return to Britain and testify to Bligh's wrongdoing, and he asks his men to sail with him. To prevent this possibility, the men set the ship on fire and Christian is fatally burned while trying to save it.

The story revolves around the theft of two germ warfare agents, botulinum toxin and the indestructible "Satan Bug" (a laboratory-conceived derivative of poliovirus), from the Mordon Microbiological Research Establishment (similar to Porton Down). There is no vaccine for the "Satan Bug" and it is so infectious that any release will rapidly destroy all human life on Earth. With these phials of unstoppable power, a mad "environmentalist" threatens the country's population unless Mordon is razed to the ground.

Like other of MacLean's works, the plot involves layers of deception. The first-person narrator, Pierre Cavell, is initially presented as an embittered figure who has been successively fired for insubordination from the British Army, the Metropolitan Police Service, and finally from Mordon. Cavell is called in by former colleagues at Special Branch after being "tested" with a bribe to ensure that he is still honest. The novel gradually reveals that for the past 16 years Cavell has in fact been working for "the General", apparently a senior intelligence director and Cavell's father-in-law, and that these thefts are the culmination of a series of security breaches at Mordon that Cavell and the General have been investigating for at least a year.

During the theft the current head of security is killed with a cyanide-laced sweet, presumably given to him by an insider he trusted. A variety of scientists and support staff come under suspicion, and it emerges that several of them have been coerced by blackmail or kidnapping to help the principal villain, without knowing his identity. The villain releases botulinum toxin over an evacuated area of East Anglia, killing hundreds of livestock and proving that his threat to use the Satan Bug should be taken seriously. He takes Cavell's wife, Mary, hostage and sets off to London to blackmail the British government by threatening to release the "Satan Bug" in the City of London's financial district. The villain uses his hostage to capture Cavell and several police officers and attempts to kill them with botulinum toxin. Cavell escapes, though one constable is poisoned and dies rapidly. (For dramatic purposes this is from convulsions like nerve agent or strychnine poisoning, rather than the slower paralysis and respiratory failure usually associated with botulism.)

Cavell uses Interpol to discover the villain's true identity and infers that the villain's London plan is really to cause the City of London to be evacuated, allowing a criminal gang time to break into and rob major banks and then escape by helicopter. After losing a fight on board the aircraft, the villain explains his motives and jumps to his death, leaving the remaining phials of agent unbreached.

The episode follows three plot lines. In the first, Kira, Odo, and Cardassian ex-spy Garak are advising Damar on guerrilla tactics to use against the Dominion. Kira has a tense relationship with Damar's second-in-command, Rusot, who disdains her tactical advice and distrusts her motives.

En route to attempt to steal a Breen energy-dampening weapon, Damar receives word that his family has been executed by the Dominion. Kira responds to his outrage by reminding him that the Cardassians committed similar atrocities during the Bajoran occupation. Kira regrets her words, but Garak points out they may be what Damar needs to hear to dislodge his romanticized view of the Cardassian empire.

They successfully steal a Dominion ship equipped with the Breen weapon, but Odo collapses as the illness overtakes him. Rusot tries to convince Damar to let him kill Kira and take the Breen weapon for Cardassia alone. Damar kills Rusot, giving up his vision of restoring the old Cardassia and instead choosing to try to create a better one.

In the second plotline, Gowron has been sending General Martok on doomed offensives against the Dominion. Worf, a Klingon member of Starfleet, suspects that Gowron's strategies are meant to humiliate Martok, whom Gowron sees as a political threat, regardless of the consequences for the Klingon Empire. He urges Martok to challenge Gowron, but Martok refuses to consider the idea.

Lt. Ezri Dax points out to Worf that if men as honorable as himself tolerate corruption at the highest levels, there is no hope for the Klingon Empire. During a meeting in which Gowron presents another suicidal plan of attack, Worf calls out Gowron as dishonorable. This leads to a duel in which Gowron at first seems to have the upper hand; he breaks Worf's bat'leth and throws him through a glass display board. When Gowron approaches to finish him off, Worf fatally stabs him with a piece of the broken bat'leth. By Klingon law, this makes Worf the new Chancellor. Worf refuses the robe of office and hands it to Martok, reminding him that "Great men do not seek power. They have power thrust upon them". Martok becomes the new Chancellor.

In the third plotline, Chief Miles O'Brien suggests that Dr. Julian Bashir falsely announce that he has found a cure for the Changeling disease in order to lure someone from Section 31, who may know the actual cure, to DS9.

In 2086, civilization destroys itself in a nuclear Armageddon, as two factions who both develop an anti-radiation battlesuit completely immune to conventional weapons go to war against each other when diplomatic peace talks break down. In the following millennia, the survivors develop into a hardy but peaceful race, living a quiet agricultural existence.

One day, mysterious alien forces emerge from an old volcano containing a pre-war military base and attack, quickly conquering and enslaving the new breed of humans, and forcing the populace to work in mines. Many rebel against the mysterious overlords and one of these rebels, Tal, is instructed by his elders to seek out a legendary armoured suit - the Sacred Armour of Antiriad (the last word being a corruption of "anti-radiation"), which is in fact one of the pre-war battlesuits whose development originally instigated the diplomatic crisis that started the nuclear war. This armour is rumoured to render the wearer impervious to attack and, with its help, Tal hopes to defeat and overthrow the alien rulers of Earth.

However, the armour requires other equipment to be added to it in order to make it function fully. These include anti-gravity boots, a particle negator, a pulsar beam, and an implosion mine. The last add-on is the most important as it is the one needed to destroy the volcano the enemy uses as its base.

Part 1

In 1579, Elizabeth I refuses to marry. Her chief advisor, Lord Burghley, and her spymaster, Francis Walsingham, plan to have her wed the Duke of Anjou in order to cement an English-French alliance against Spain while her favourite, the Earl of Leicester, opposes the plan due to his own long-standing affections for her. Upon arriving in England, the Duke meets and courts Elizabeth, gaining her favour. She later decides not to marry him after Burghley dissuades her from following through due to negative popular opinion towards the match.

Over time, Walsingham gathers evidence to prove that Elizabeth's Catholic cousin Mary, Queen of Scots is plotting to have her killed. Elizabeth is reluctant to have Mary executed because of the war it would likely ignite between England and Spain. During a secret meeting, Mary gives Elizabeth her word that she does not want her dead. Elizabeth hesitantly gives Leicester command of the English campaign to assist the Dutch against Spain, which fails. Once it is proven that Mary has in fact been conspiring against Elizabeth's life, Mary is judged guilty of treason and later executed.

After negotiations between England and Spain fail, a fleet of Spanish ships are sent for England. Elizabeth gives Leicester command of the land forces and rides with him and his stepson the Earl of Essex to Tilbury, where they expect the Spanish to attempt a landing and where Elizabeth delivers a speech to the troops. The Spanish Armada is ultimately defeated, but Leicester falls gravely ill just as they learn of the English victory. Later, on his deathbed, Leicester bids Essex to take care of Elizabeth.

Part 2

By 1589, Elizabeth has made a favourite of Essex and falls in love with him. She is openly outraged when he takes part in an English military expedition to Lisbon against her wishes, but she forgives him in spite of his failure to take the city from the Spanish. She grants him 10 percent of a tax on sweet wines and a seat on the Privy Council, of which Lord Burghley's son Robert Cecil was also recently made a member. Essex and Cecil develop a rivalry, as illustrated by the affair of Elizabeth's physician Dr. Lopez, who is hanged based on evidence brought forth by Essex of his participation in a Spanish plot against Elizabeth, evidence proven questionable after the fact by Cecil.

Essex's political ambitions begin to clash with his devotion and loyalty to Elizabeth. As Elizabeth finds her young lover's behavior becoming increasingly worrisome, she draws closer to Cecil, who is named Secretary of State following the death of Walsingham. Essex is publicly hailed upon his return to England after taking Cadiz from the Spanish, but his relationship with Elizabeth begins to deteriorate. She and Cecil suspect Essex of secretly communicating with James VI of Scotland, son of Mary, Queen of Scots, a potential successor to the English throne. After Burghley's death, Elizabeth sends Essex to Ireland to put down a rebellion but he instead makes a truce and returns to England alone. Elizabeth puts Essex under house arrest.

Essex and his followers fail to start a rebellion in London and are captured. At his trial, Essex accuses Cecil of collaborating with Spain but has no evidence to prove this, and he is found guilty of treason and beheaded. Some time later, Elizabeth becomes listless, going for three weeks without eating before making her way to her bed and requesting a priest, saying she is minded to die.

In 2006, Dr. Kate Forster is leaving a lake house that she has been renting near Chicago. Kate leaves a note in the mailbox asking the next tenant to forward her mail, adding that the paint-embedded pawprints on the path leading to the house were already there when she arrived.

Two years earlier, in 2004, Alex Wyler, an architect, arrives at the lake house and finds Kate's letter in the mailbox. The house is neglected, with no sign of paw prints anywhere. During the subsequent restoration of the house, a dog runs through Alex's paint and leaves fresh paw prints right where Kate said they would be. Baffled, Alex writes back, placing the letter in the mailbox, asking how Kate knew about the paw prints since the house was unoccupied until he arrived. The dog, Jack, then becomes owned by both Kate and Alex within their places in time. On Valentine's Day 2006, Kate witnesses a traffic accident near Daley Plaza and tries to save the male victim, unsuccessfully. She impulsively drives back to the lake house, finds Alex's letter, and writes back.

Alex and Kate continue passing messages to each other via the mailbox, and each watches its flag go up and down as the message leaves and the reply arrives as they wait at the mailbox. They cautiously look around each time the flag changes, hoping to somehow spot the other. It is in vain as they are alone at the mailbox. They then discover that they are living exactly two years apart. Their correspondence takes them through several events, including Alex finding a book, Jane Austen's ''Persuasion'', at a railway station where Kate said she would have lost it, and Alex taking Kate on a walking tour of his favorite places in Chicago via an annotated map that he leaves in the mailbox. Alex eventually meets Kate at her then boyfriend's party; however, he doesn't mention their exchange of letters because it has not happened to Kate yet. When Alex writes to present-time Kate about their encounter, she replies that she remembers the meeting as a vague memory, wondering why Alex didn't say anything more to her younger self. Alex writes in response that this is their first "fight".

As Alex and Kate continue to write to each other, they decide to try to meet again. Alex makes a reservation at the Il Mare restaurant – two years into Alex's future, but only a day away for Kate. Kate goes to the restaurant but Alex fails to show. Heartbroken, Kate asks Alex not to write to her again, recounting the accident earlier that day. Both Alex and Kate leave the lake house, continuing on with their separate lives.

On Valentine's Day 2006 for Alex, Valentine's Day 2008 for Kate, he returns to the lake house after something about the day triggers a memory. Meanwhile, Kate goes to an architect to review the renovation plans for a house she wants to buy. A drawing of the lake house on the conference room wall catches her attention and upon asking, Henry Wyler informs her the artist was his brother, Alex, and Kate realizes that this was the same Alex with whom she had been corresponding. She also learns that Alex was killed in a traffic accident exactly two years ago to the day and realizes why he never showed up for their date – he was the man who died in Daley Plaza.

Rushing to the lake house, Kate frantically writes a letter telling Alex she loves him, but begs him not to try to find her if he loves her back. Wait two years, she says, and come to the lake house instead. Meanwhile, in 2006, Alex has gone to Daley Plaza to look for Kate. He stands across the street from the plaza, and just as it seems he is about to cross, he reaches into his pocket to look at a note from Kate.

At the lake house, Kate drops to her knees sobbing, fearing that she has arrived too late to stop Alex. After a long pause, the mailbox flag finally lowers; Alex has picked up her note before going to Daley Plaza. Not long afterwards, a familiar mint-green truck pulls up. She walks forward smiling as the driver, clad in jeans and a familiar tan jacket, approaches. She and Alex kiss and walk toward the lake house.

The plot concerns the title character, Aleksandr Ivanovich Luzhin. As a boy, he is considered unattractive, withdrawn, and an object of ridicule by his classmates. One day, when a guest comes to his father's party, he is asked whether he knows how to play chess. This encounter serves as his motivation to pick up chess. He skips school and visits his aunt's house to learn the basics. He quickly becomes a great player, enrolling in local competitions and rising in rank as a chess player. His talent is prodigious and he attains the level of a Grandmaster in less than ten years. For many years, he remains one of the top chess players in the world, but fails to become a world champion.

During one of the tournaments, at a resort, he meets a young girl, never named in the novel, whose interest he captures. They become romantically involved, and Luzhin eventually proposes to her.

Things turn for the worse when he is pitted against Turati, a grandmaster from Italy, in a competition to determine who would face the current world champion. Before and during the game, Luzhin has a mental breakdown, which climaxes when his carefully planned defense against Turati fails in the first moves, and the resulting game fails to produce a winner. When the game is suspended Luzhin wanders into the city in a state of complete detachment from reality.

He is returned home and brought to a rest home, where he eventually recovers. His doctor convinces Luzhin's fiancée that chess was the reason for his downfall, and all reminders of chess are removed from his environment.

Slowly however, chess begins to find its way back into his thoughts (aided by incidental occurrences, such as an old pocket chessboard found in a coat pocket, or an impractical chess game in a movie). Luzhin begins to see his life as a chess game, seeing repetitions of 'moves' that return his obsession with the game. He desperately tries to find the move that will defend him from losing his chess life-game, but feels the scenario growing closer and closer.

Eventually, after an encounter with his old chess mentor, Valentinov, Luzhin realizes that he must "abandon the game," as he puts it to his wife (who is desperately trying to communicate with him). He locks himself in the bathroom (his wife and several dinner guests banging on the door). He climbs out of a window, and it is implied he falls to his death, but the ending is deliberately vague. The last line of the (translated) novel reads: "The door was burst in. 'Aleksandr Ivanovich, Aleksandr Ivanovich,' roared several voices. But there was no Aleksandr Ivanovich."

The plot concerns two brothers and their sister, simply called "the Lady", lost in a journey through the woods. The Lady becomes fatigued, and the brothers wander off in search of sustenance.

While alone, she encounters the debauched Comus, a character inspired by the god of revelry ( , ''Kōmos''), who is disguised as a villager and claims he will lead her to her brothers. Deceived by his amiable countenance, the Lady follows him, only to be captured, brought to his pleasure palace and victimised by his necromancy. Seated on an enchanted chair, with "gums of glutinous heat", she is immobilised, and Comus accosts her while with one hand he holds a necromancer's wand and with the other he offers a vessel with a drink that would overpower her. Comus urges the Lady to "be not coy" and drink from his magical cup (representing sexual pleasure and intemperance), but she repeatedly refuses, arguing for the virtuousness of temperance and chastity. Within view at his palace is an array of cuisine intended to arouse the Lady's appetites and desires. Despite being restrained against her will, she continues to exercise right reason (recta ratio) in her disputation with Comus, thereby manifesting her freedom of mind. Whereas the would-be seducer argues appetites and desires issuing from one's nature are "natural" and therefore licit, the Lady contends that only rational self-control is enlightened and virtuous. To be self-indulgent and intemperate, she adds, is to forfeit one's higher nature and to yield to baser impulses. In this debate the Lady and Comus signify, respectively, soul and body, ratio and libido, sublimation and sensuality, virtue and vice, moral rectitude and immoral depravity. In line with the theme of the journey that distinguishes Comus, the Lady has been deceived by the guile of a treacherous character, temporarily waylaid, and besieged by sophistry that is disguised as wisdom.

Meanwhile, her brothers, searching for her, come across the ''Attendant Spirit'', an angelic figure sent to aid them, who takes the form of a shepherd and tells them how to defeat Comus. As the Lady continues to assert her freedom of mind and to exercise her free will by resistance and even defiance, she is rescued by the ''Attendant Spirit'' along with her brothers, who chase off Comus. The Lady remains magically bound to her chair. With a song, the Spirit conjures the water nymph ''Sabrina'' who frees the Lady on account of her steadfast virtue. She and her brothers are reunited with their parents in a triumphal celebration, which signifies the heavenly bliss awaiting the wayfaring soul that prevails over trials and travails, whether these are the threats posed by overt evil or the blandishments of temptation.

Returning to Wild Cat Island for their second summer holiday by the Lake, the Swallows find the Amazons and Captain Flint suffering from "native trouble". Great Aunt Maria has come to stay, and she is a stickler for "proper" behaviour; demanding that the Amazon pirates act like "young ladies", and be on hand and on time for meals. When they see the hound trail and forget the time Peggy says "all three meals" and Nancy says "We've fairly done it this time".

Despite this, Nancy and Peggy escape the Great Aunt and arrange a rendezvous, but on the way the ''Swallow'' hits Pike Rock and sinks. All are saved and the boat salvaged, but she needs repairing, so camping on the island is impossible. "Captain" John of the Swallows learns some valuable life lessons about following his instincts while commanding a ship, and has time to reflect on the accident while he fashions a new mast for Swallow. An alternative appears to replace camping on Wild Cat Island, as Roger and Titty find a beautiful hidden valley, ''Swallowdale'', up on the moors above the lake.

The Swallows discover a secret cave in Swallowdale, a trout tarn, the "knickerbockerbreaker", and enjoy new adventures of lakeland life. They meet local woodcutters and farmers, see a hound trail, and trek across the moors. The Amazons are only able to escape at intervals, and are punished for getting home late by being made to memorize and recite poetry. Eventually the Great Aunt leaves and the Swallows and Amazons mount an expedition to sleep under the stars on the summit of nearby commanding hill "Kanchenjunga" (in reality The Old Man of Coniston). While there, they discover a box with a small coin left by the Blackett's parents and uncle on climbing the "Matterhorn" thirty years earlier.

Next morning, Roger and Titty return to Swallowdale following trails through the bracken across the moor, while the elders ferry the Amazons' camping gear by boat. Both parties get lost in a thick and sudden fog. After it lifts the elders arrive only to find an empty camp. Titty arrives late after hitching a ride with some woodsmen, and explains that Roger sprained his ankle, and will be spending the night with Young Billy, the (old) charcoal burner. The next day the injured Roger is carried back to the camp on a stretcher.

The Swallow is finally repaired, and the book ends with a race and a feast, followed by a return to Wild Cat Island.

''The Resurrection of Broncho Billy'' is the story of a young man (Johnny Crawford) who lives in a big city in present time, but his dreams are of the Old West and its film heroes. Scenes of his everyday life take on the style of a Western film as he visits with old timer Wild Bill Tucker; he crosses a busy boulevard packed with traffic and we hear the sound of a cattle drive; he's late for work at the hardware store; at an intersection crosswalk he has a Western street showdown with a businessman as the light changes; he enters a saloon but has no I.D. for a beer; he is accosted in an alleyway; a pretty counter girl (Merry Scanlon) gives him soda but he realizes he has no money to pay for it.

Then he meets a lovely artist (Kristin Nelson) in a park who draws a sketch of him in an Old West setting, and he talks to her for a time on a park bench about the old west and western films. The Artist gets up to leave and we hear the sound of hoofbeats as he rides up to her in the old west. The artist gives him back the watch he lost in the alley scuffle, she floats up onto his horse and they ride off across the prairie as the Broncho Billy theme song is heard over the scene. He's taken her back to the magic old west that he loves.

The story is set in the present day, with significant flashbacks to times beginning in the early 1970s. The protagonist is Ellen Fischer, a liberal senator from California. She is preparing for a difficult legislative battle over the conservative president's nomination of a deeply conservative female judge to the Supreme Court. Amid numerous particulars of the informal and formal governmental process in the United States, Boxer unfolds her heroine's dilemma and her past simultaneously. The dilemma is presented by a journalist, Greg Hunter, with pronounced right-wing views. Hunter is a figure from the senator's past. They had been lovers while he was in college; he lost her to his roommate, Joshua Fischer. Joshua later dies in the middle of a campaign for Senate; Ellen steps into his place and wins, launching her political career. Now, Hunter has returned, bringing with him information that could derail the judicial nominee's appointment. Fischer is buffeted by new revelations about Hunter and a well-founded distrust of his motives.

In Chicago, Calvin "Babyface" Simms (Marlon Wayans) is a very short convicted jewel thief. He is seen getting released from prison and meeting up with his goofball cohort Percy (Tracy Morgan). Percy tells Calvin of a job involving stealing a valuable diamond, ordered by a mobster named Mr. Walken (Chazz Palminteri). After the successful robbery, the duo are almost arrested by the Police, but not before Calvin manages to stash the diamond in the purse of a nearby woman. The thieves follow the handbag's owner to her home where they discover a couple, Darryl (Shawn Wayans) and Vanessa Edwards (Kerry Washington), the former of whom is eager to have a child.

Calvin and Percy hatch a plot to pass Calvin off as a baby left on the couple's doorstep in order to get the diamond back. After learning that Child Services is closed for the weekend, Darryl and Vanessa decide to look after Calvin in the meantime. However, Vanessa's dad Francis "Pops" (John Witherspoon) has a bad feeling about Calvin. Friends of the couple find Calvin strange as well. Despite this, Calvin eventually takes a liking to having a family and starts to feel remorse for using them, especially when they throw him a birthday party (coincidentally on his actual birthday) as Calvin never had parents who’d throw him a party. Walken grows impatient and demands the diamond from Percy. Percy attempts to recover Calvin by posing as his father, but is thrown out by Darryl. Walken's men witness this and as a result believe that Darryl is Calvin.

Darryl and Vanessa decide to adopt Calvin but upon coming home from a date, they find Pops and Calvin having a fight as the former has discovered Calvin's secret. Pops is sent to a retirement home, but before leaving he tells Darryl to "check the teddy bear", referring to a gift he gave to Calvin earlier at his party. Darryl discovers the bear is actually a nanny cam and witnesses Calvin admit to his deception. Walken and his henchmen come by the house after Percy lies to get out of trouble; claiming that Darryl is his partner who has the diamond. In a series of comedic maneuvers, Calvin manages to rescue Darryl and have Walken and his men arrested. Darryl is given a substantial reward for the recovery of the diamond, and since Calvin saved his life, he doesn't turn him over to the police.

Before he leaves, Calvin thanks Darryl for taking care of him even though he wasn't really a baby and admits that he thinks Darryl would make a great father for a real child someday. As Calvin walks away, he begins to cry hysterically knowing he will miss the family very much. Darryl then decides to let Calvin stay and the two men become the best of friends. The film ends at some point in the future with Calvin and Pops playing with Darryl and Vanessa's real baby, who looks exactly like Darryl (Shawn Wayans' face superimposed on that of the baby).

Frank Allen is a professional speaker who lectures on time management. He lives by example: perfectly maximizing his efficiency through scheduling and planning his own life down to the minute. He dearly loves his wife, Susan, and their young daughter, Jesse.

On the day of an important seminar that could be his major break on the corporate lecture circuit, Susan changes their clocks by 10 minutes, to give him time to run a meaningless errand for her on this important day, but she moves them the wrong way. From missing the ferry to the career-damaging fact that he then arrives late to his lecture on time management, Frank experiences an off day. He loves his wife so much that, when the beautiful Paula crashes his hotel room, strips down and jumps on him, Frank excuses himself and heads home in the middle of the night.

While driving home through the night he sees a pregnant woman, Nancy, having contractions and gives the stranger a lift. At the hospital, Frank is asked to fill out some paper work. He mistakenly puts his own information down and the nurses at the hospital assume he is the father.

Before Frank arrives home, a nurse from the hospital calls attempting to reach "the father". Susan instantly believes it is Frank's baby and that he is cheating on her and leading a double life. When Frank arrives home, she refuses to let him clear up the misunderstanding and throws him out of the house within moments. Her reaction through the next few days remains over the top, refusing to talk to Frank and only allowing him to see Jesse after school.

Left with no choice but to provide scientific proof to Susan, Frank sees a doctor for a paternity test, but receives the diagnosis that he was never able to reproduce to begin with, since he has Klinefelter's syndrome. The undeniable truth about Jesse and, thus, Susan's own infidelity devastates Frank - but also explains why Susan so instantly presupposed that Frank was a cheater, treating him with unforgiving disdain and refusing to let him even try to clarify the situation.

A few days later, Nancy brings her baby to the Allens' house in hopes of thanking Frank for his kindness, finding only Susan at home. Nancy soon clears up the misunderstanding. Susan turns on a dime, ignoring her atrocious behaviour of the past few days and expecting Frank to simply come home, acting as if she is the one who has forgiven him. The damage is done, however, as Frank realizes that he was the only one in the relationship who was faithful, and goes through a withdrawal as he tries to comprehend how his daughter could not be his and how wrong his life turned out when he believed that he has always stayed straight and narrow.

After giving a life-changing speech about living on whim at his own time management lecture, he decides to live his life based on chance from that moment on. He starts his reformed outlook on life with the simple idea of possibility and randomness by basing his decisions on shuffling three index cards with written options and choosing one at random.

He goes on to have a one night stand with the woman he met at the bar but he’s too drunk to perform.

He realizes that Buddy is the father of his child and plots to kill Buddy. He lures him to the lake and try to kill him but they both fall into the lake and buddy saves Frank.

Buddy backs off and Frank realizes that he loves his family and forgives his wife and goes back to them.

In present day the groom realizes that he loves the daughter and decides to get married.

The Stooges are TV actors who are trying to sell ideas for their animated television show ''The Three Stooges Scrapbook''. Unfortunately, their producer does not like anything. He gives the boys ten days to come up with a gimmick or their show will be canceled. In the meantime the Stooges lose their accommodation when they are caught cooking in their room because Curly Joe turned up the TV-disguised refrigerator way too loud which distracted the landlady. The only affordable accommodation that will allow cooking is found in an advertisement in a newspaper. The home belongs to Professor Danforth (Emil Sitka) and it resembles a castle.

Professor Danforth is convinced that Martians will soon invade Earth. He persuades the boys to help him with his new military invention—a land, air and sea vehicle (tank, helicopter, flying submarine). In return, Danforth will create a new "electronic animation" machine for the Stooges to use in their television show. The boys think the Professor a crank but accept his eccentricities along with his accommodation. No one, especially the FBI listens to the Professor's cries for help but the boys apprehend Danforth's butler who dresses like a monster to terrify the Professor. In reality the butler is a Martian spy made to look like a human.

The Martians, meanwhile send two more alien spies named Ogg and Zogg who are not disguised as humans to Earth to prepare for the invasion. When Moe accidentally sends a television transmission of old films and scenes of the Twist craze through the Martian's communication device, they are offended and call off the invasion, opting instead to destroy Earth.

Meanwhile, the Stooges give the vehicle a test run. They mistakenly enter a nuclear test area, when their engine malfunctions. They land near a test rig where a test nuclear depth bomb is set up. The Stooges take the bomb, thinking it is a carburetor, and fasten it to the engine. Water, meant to detonate the bomb, shoots out of the testing rig. The military is bewildered by test's failure. With the bomb attached to the engine, the vehicle now performs beyond expectations, even going into space.

Later in the film, the Martians board the vehicle while it's parked and mount a ray gun on it. As they take off with orders to destroy Earth, the boys manage to get onto the craft to try to stop them and prevent the ray gun from destroying Disneyland. The Stooges are able to use one of the Martians' ray guns to separate the fuselage from the conning tower. The fuselage, holding Ogg and Zogg, crashes into the ocean, detonating the nuclear depth bomb. Clinging to the auto-rotating helicopter section, the Stooges survive, crashing through the roof of the television studio in the nick of time and saving their careers.

''Full Fathom Five'', based on the novel by Bart Davis, is set in the days preceding the United States invasion of Panama in 1989. , a fictional , rescues agents from Panama, and Peter MacKenzie (Michael Moriarty), the submarine's commanding officer, promptly falls in love with the beautiful Justine (Maria Rangel). Meanwhile, Panamanian rebels seize a Soviet submarine (the "Victor Three class submarine CCCP ''Kirov''") and threaten America with a nuclear attack on Houston, Texas. Only MacKenzie and his crew can stop the villains.

Worf is concerned that his son Alexander is not pursuing his Klingon heritage and has no desire to become a Klingon warrior. Captain Picard recommends that Worf should expose Alexander to more of his heritage at the Kot'baval festival at Maranga IV. When the ''Enterprise'' stops at Maranga IV as part of a routine mission, Worf takes Alexander to the festival and this appears to help Alexander become interested in the Klingon way of life. When the two of them are suddenly attacked by a trio of Klingon warriors, another Klingon arrives and helps them fight off the trio. He introduces himself as K'mtar, a gin'tak or adviser to the House of Mogh who has come to protect Worf. K'mtar joins Worf and Alexander as they return to the ''Enterprise'' while the crew investigates the attack.

With Worf's approval, K'mtar tries to train Alexander in the ways of the Klingon warrior, but this proves ineffective. K'mtar recommends that Worf send Alexander to a Klingon military academy, which would be harsh on Alexander but effective. Worf balks at the idea, and K'mtar threatens to invoke Klingon law to take custody of Alexander from Worf. When K'mtar pressures Alexander to join the academy, the boy refuses.

The ''Enterprise'' crew examine one of the daggers used during the attack on Worf and Alexander. It bears markings of the Duras sisters. Commander Riker gets intelligence from Quark at ''Deep Space Nine'' that helps the ''Enterprise'' crew locate the Duras sisters and accuses them of the assassination attempt. The sisters deny any involvement. When Worf presents the dagger, they recognize one marking as belonging to Lursa's son, despite the fact she has only just learned she has become pregnant.

Worf then finds K'mtar about to kill a sleeping Alexander, and immobilizes him. K'mtar is forced to reveal that he is really Alexander from 40 years in the future, having traveled back in time to prepare his younger self for an assassination attempt on his father. He had arranged the attack on Maranga IV to trigger a desire to protect Worf and had hoped to direct the young Alexander to take the warrior's path so as to prevent Worf's assassination later. Worf tells K'mtar that he could only die happy knowing that Alexander followed the course he wanted to take in life. With Worf's resolve and newfound appreciation for his son's interests, K'mtar is satisfied and returns to his own time.

Brecht's play revolves around Anna Balicke, whose lover (Andreas) has left to fight in World War I. The war is now over but Anna and her family have not heard from him for four years. Anna's parents try to convince her that he is dead and that she should forget him and marry a wealthy war-materials manufacturer, Murk. Anna agrees to this arrangement eventually, just as Andreas returns, having spent the missing years as a prisoner-of-war in some remote location in Africa. Believing that the poor proletarian Andreas cannot provide the kind of life for Anna that the bourgeois Murk can, Anna's parents encourage her to stick to her agreement. Eventually Anna leaves Murk and her parents and, against the backdrop of the Spartacist uprising, searches for Andreas. In the final scene they are re-united; to the sound of "a white wild screaming" from the newspaper buildings above, they walk away together.

The play dramatizes many of the grievances of the Spartacists in their uprising. The soldiers returning from the front felt that they had been fighting for nothing and that what they had before they left had been stolen. Murk, the war-profiteer who did not fight and who instead made a fortune from the fighting, and who attempts to steal the soldier's fiancée, symbolizes that feeling by the working class of having been cheated.

After missing a bus in the Swiss countryside, a 14-year-old Danish tourist, Vera Brandt, tries looking for help. She comes across a cottage and is attacked and beheaded by a stranger. Eight months later, her case is being inspected by forensic entomologist John McGregor and Inspector Rudolf Geiger of the Kantonpolizei, who note that Brandt is but the first of a series of murders against young girls, including McGregor's former assistant.

Meanwhile, Jennifer Corvino, the daughter of a famous American actor, arrives at the Swiss Richard Wagner Academy for Girls, chaperoned by Frau Brückner, who places her with roommate Sophie. While sleepwalking through the academy and out onto the roof, Jennifer witnesses a student being murdered. She awakens and flees into the woods, where McGregor's chimpanzee, Inga, finds her and leads her to him. Upon noticing the affection his captive insects have for Jennifer, McGregor comes to believe that she has a telepathic link with them. Back at the academy, the headmistress has Jennifer medically tested via EEG for her sleepwalking. The procedure makes Jennifer uneasy when she gets brief visions of the previous night's events.

The following night, the murderer kills Sophie, mistaking her for Jennifer as she is wearing the same sweater she wore when she witnessed the prior murder. Jennifer sleepwalks again and is led by a firefly to the scene of Sophie's death, where she finds a maggot-infested glove. She shows it to McGregor, who identifies the maggots as the larvae of Great Sarcophagus flies, which are drawn to decaying human flesh. He theorises that the killer is a necrophile who has been keeping his victims close to him post-mortem, unintentionally collecting the maggots on himself.

Later, when the other students taunt Jennifer over her connection to insects, she summons a swarm of flies that covers the entire building, then faints. Convinced that Jennifer is "diabolic" and possibly responsible for the killings, the headmistress arranges for her to be transferred to a mental hospital. Jennifer flees to McGregor's home, where the entomologist gives her a glass case with a Great Sarcophagus fly, suggesting she use it to find the murderer's lair. The fly leads her to the same cottage Brandt had found earlier and Inspector Geiger talks to the real estate agent in order to learn the identity of the house's previous occupant.

That night, McGregor is murdered in his home. With nowhere left to go, Jennifer calls her father's lawyer Morris Shapiro to take her back to America. He alerts Brückner, who offers to let the girl stay at her house overnight. Meanwhile, Geiger's investigation leads him to a mental hospital in Basel where he learns that a former staff member had been attacked 15 years before by one of the male inmates.

Upon arriving at Brückner's house, Jennifer notices that all the mirrors are covered, with Brückner explaining that she has a son who cannot stand to see his own reflection. Brückner insists that Jennifer take pills before she goes to bed; when she does so, she becomes sick and, assuming that the pills are poisonous, coughs them up. She attempts to call Morris but is knocked unconscious by Brückner. Geiger arrives and questions Brückner, who confirms that she had worked at the Basel mental hospital and been raped. She leads him to the basement and imprisons him.

After waking, Jennifer engineers her escape through the basement. There, she finds Geiger and falls into a pool infested with maggots and dead bodies. Brückner taunts Jennifer, but Geiger frees himself and furiously beats Brückner long enough to let Jennifer escape.

Jennifer finds Brückner's son, who has a hideously deformed face. He chases Jennifer onto a motorboat and tries to kill her with a spear, which perforates the boat's fuel tank and causes a leak. Jennifer summons a swarm of flies that attack the killer, causing him to fall into the water. Jennifer is also forced to jump into the water as the leaking petrol ignites, whereupon the child grabs her, but he is immolated by the flames.

Jennifer reaches the shore just as Morris appears. A severely injured and disfigured Brückner decapitates him from behind with a metal sheet and confesses that she murdered McGregor and Geiger out of fear that harm would have befallen her and her son. Before she can murder Jennifer, a wrathful Inga attacks Brückner and kills her with a straight-razor in retribution for McGregor's death. With the ordeal over, Jennifer and Inga embrace.

Rose Elliot, a poet living alone in New York City's Upper West Side, purchases a book from an antiques dealer, titled ''The Three Mothers''. The book, written by an alchemist named Varelli, tells of three evil sisters who rule the world with sorrow, tears, and darkness, and dwell inside separate homes that had been built for them by the alchemist. Mater Suspiriorum, the Mother of Sighs, lives in Freiburg. Mater Lachrymarum, the Mother of Tears, lives in Rome, and Mater Tenebrarum, the Mother of Darkness, lives in New York. Rose suspects that she is living in Mater Tenebrarum's building, and writes to her brother Mark, a music student in Rome, urging him to visit her. Using the clues provided in the book, Rose searches the cellar of her building and discovers a hole in the floor which leads to a water-filled ballroom. She accidentally drops her keys and enters the water to find them. After she reclaims the keys, a putrid corpse rises from the depths, frightening her. Rose manages to swim out and flee.

In Rome, Mark attempts to read Rose's letter during class. He is distracted by the intense gaze of a beautiful student, who leaves suddenly; Mark follows, leaving the letter behind. His friend Sara picks up the letter, and later reads it. Horrified by the letter's contents, she takes a taxi to a library and finds a copy of ''The Three Mothers''. Trying to find her way out, Sara becomes lost in the library basement and finds a room filled with boiling cauldrons. Sara is attacked there by a monstrous figure who recognizes the book. She throws the book to the ground and escapes.

Returning to her home, she phones Mark telling him to come and asks a neighbour, Carlo, to keep her company. The lights go out and both Sara and Carlo are stabbed to death by a gloved killer. Mark discovers the bodies and two torn fragments from Rose's letter. After the police arrive, he walks out of Sara's apartment and sees a taxi slowly driving by. In the back seat of the vehicle is the music student, staring at him intently. Mark telephones Rose and promises to visit, but the phone call is cut short. Rose sees two shadowy figures preparing to enter her apartment. She leaves through a back door, but is followed. Running into a decrepit laboratory, she is grabbed by a clawed assailant and guillotined with the glass of a broken window.

Arriving in New York, Mark goes straight to Rose's building, where he meets Carol, the concierge, and some of the residents, including a nurse who cares for elderly Professor Arnold, a wheelchair user who cannot speak. Mark encounters the sickly Countess Elise De Longvalle Adler, who tells him that Rose has disappeared. After the two find blood on the carpet outside Rose's room, Mark follows the stains. Inhaling a strange odour, he becomes ill and falls unconscious. Elise sees a black-robed figure dragging Mark away, but the figure stops and gives chase to Elise. The figure eventually finds her swarmed with rabid cats in a room and stabs her to death. Mark staggers to the apartment building's lobby where Carol and the nurse put him to bed.

The following morning, Mark asks Kazanian, the antique dealer who sold Rose ''The Three Mothers'', about his sister's whereabouts. However, the man provides no information. That night, Kazanian drowns several cats in a Central Park pond and falls into the water. Hundreds of rats from a nearby drain crawl over him, gnawing his flesh. A hot dog vendor hears Kazanian's cries for help and rushes over, but proceeds to kill him with a knife.

More strange deaths occur in the building, when Carol and Elise's butler, John, plots to take advantage of the Countess' death by stealing her valuables. A shocked Carol finds John's corpse in Elise's apartment, and drops a lit candle which starts a fire. Attempting to put out the flames, she becomes entangled in burning draperies and falls from a window to her death.

Mark uses the final clue from Rose's letter to discover that beneath each floor is a secret crawl space. He follows hidden passages to a suite of rooms where he finds Professor Arnold who reveals, via an electronic voice generator, that he is in fact Varelli. He tries to kill Mark with a hypodermic injection. During the struggle, Varelli's neck is caught in his vocal apparatus, choking him. Mark frees him, only to be told that he is still being watched as Varelli dies. Mark follows a shadowy figure to a lavishly furnished chamber, where he finds Varelli's nurse. Laughing maniacally, she reveals to him that she is Mater Tenebrarum. She vanishes, but re-emerges through a mirror as Death personified. However, the fire that has consumed much of the building enables Mark to escape from the witch's den. Debris crashes down on the fiend, destroying her.

Brian's gay cousin Jasper comes to Quahog with his Filipino boyfriend Ricardo, and he announces that they are going to get married. Everyone is delighted — except for Lois, who is against same-sex marriage. Later, Mayor Adam West reveals in the city center a solid gold statue of the Honey Smacks mascot Dig 'Em, and dedicates the statue to the servicemen who died in what he refers to as the "recent Gulf conflict". The cost of the statue puts the city in debt. In order to distract the townspeople, he proposes a bill outlawing same sex marriage. Meanwhile, Chris falls for Alyssa, a beautiful girl who belongs to the Young Republicans, and joins the group to impress her.

An enraged Brian vows to make West change his mind, getting 10,000 people to sign a petition to oppose the bill. Lois refuses to sign and takes Stewie to visit her parents. Before Brian can present the petition to the mayor, Chris burns it because Alyssa has agreed he may touch her breasts if he destroys the document, much to Brian's anger. Brian manages to get 10,000 more signatures on a new petition to show it to Mayor West, but West still won't change his mind and throws them out of his office window. Out of desperation, Brian takes a security guard's gun, and holds the mayor hostage.

Lois hears about Brian on TV, and then discovers that her parents do not love each other, and even raised her to believe that a heterosexual couple who hate each other have every right to marry while a homosexual couple who love each other don't. Horrified, Lois changes her mind on same-sex marriage, deciding that gay couples who love each other have the right to be together. She returns to Quahog to convince Brian to free the mayor, saying that if he pursues this any further, he will be hurting his own cause. Brian agrees, and ends the hostage situation. Since it has distracted the town from the Dig 'Em scandal, Mayor West agrees to drop the ban on gay marriage. Brian gives him a key for a Volkswagen Scirocco, and West drops the hostage charges. Jasper and Ricardo get married in the backyard of the Griffin house.

The story is set during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Japan has invaded China, and the Japanese attack the village where young Tien Pao and his family live. The family flees upriver in an abandoned sampan to the town of Hengyang. While the boy's parents go to a nearby American airfield to seek work with his younger sister, Tien Pao spends the day taking care of the sampan as well as three ducklings and the family pig, named Glory of the Republic. During a rainstorm, while Tien Pao is asleep, the sampan breaks loose from its moorings. Tien Pao is swept down the river. After a night in the raging waters, the storm abates, and Tien Pao finds himself floating in the area where his village used to be. He releases the ducklings in the river and heads for higher ground with his pig. He must travel over high mountains and through dangerous Japanese occupied territory to reach Hengyang.

As he journeys home, Tien Pao begins to starve and suffer from exhaustion. He witnesses terrifying scenes of violence. Once, he sees a plane strafe a Japanese military convoy, only to be shot down over the forest. Sitting on a big rock, Tien Pao watches the entire skirmish. He later comes upon the injured American pilot (whom he had met before during his stay at Hengyang river) and helps the man return to his unit. The American pilot is a member of the Flying Tigers, and the sixty men in the unit become the "sixty fathers" who care for Tien Pao. Tien Pao exhibits a strong will to continue to try to find his parents, an incredibly difficult task; with the help of the American pilot he finds an airfield similar to the one his parents once worked on. The pilot only wishes to show Tien Pao an airfield but Tien Pao finds his mother and is at last reunited with his family.

''Tracker'' is the story of Daggon, an alien life form who lands on Earth from the planet Cirron on a mission to recapture 218 prisoners who had escaped from the planet SAR TOP in the Migar Solar System in the form of "life forces," which then took over various human identities. He has a device to capture the life forces and contain them in spheres, after which he is to return them to SAR TOP. He lands in an abandoned field in the outskirts of Chicago where he takes on the form of an underwear model and adopts the name "Cole" from an underwear ad he sees on a billboard. He later meets Mel Porter, a Chicago bar owner with an outgoing British bartender that she inherited along with her grandmother's police bar. Though initially wary, Mel gradually comes to accept Cole and lets him stay, offering him some of her ex-boyfriend's clothes.

A brilliant scientist named Zin engineered the jailbreak from SAR-TOP prison, located 100 million light-years away from Earth. Zin created a wormhole, which allows almost instantaneous travel from the Migar solar system to Earth. The wormhole ends in Chicago, where Zin and the escapees have taken over the bodies of human beings and blended into society, but still retain some of their alien otherworldly abilities.

With an army of escaped alien convicts, Zin creates a criminal empire, not unlike the mafia, over which he can rule as Godfather supreme. However, as Cole will discover, Zin may have a larger agenda in mind than running illegal enterprises for profit, an agenda that might carry interplanetary implications.

Cole must find the fugitives and stop them before they can carry out their plans, using Mel's help and constant guidance to do so.

In 1962 Portland, Oregon, widowed, charismatic con artist Ray Weiler is raising his two daughters, teenaged Sonya and young Greta. His wife, Valery, died several years prior after a protracted battle with cancer. Ray spends his time constructing grandiose but unrealistic business ideas, and consistently manages to shuck financial responsibility. Though always developing a new enterprise, Ray was unable to afford his family more than a basement apartment for much of the girls' childhood. After Valery's death, Ray spiraled into a deep depression, and moved the family into a transient hotel in downtown Portland.

With the help of her father's persuasiveness, Sonya is able to enroll for her senior year at the elite Edgemont Academy, a preparatory school her mother also attended. She soon befriends Margaret, one of her classmates, and is taken under the wing of Mr. Webster, an English teacher who praises Sonya's writing abilities. One day, after being pestered by their landlord of their father's unpaid rent, Ray returns home with a large sum of money that he has acquired through a money laundering scheme involving a local mining company; Ray became involved through his fellow con artists, Eddie and Jarvis. Ray pays off his debts, and takes his daughters out for ice cream to celebrate.

Mr. Webster persuades Sonya to take college exams, despite the fact that Sonya cannot realistically afford to attend university. After applying to several colleges, Sonya is accepted by the University of California, Berkeley. Several days later, Jarvis arrives at the family's house with a gun, accusing Ray of having stolen money from him. Shortly after, Bud, the father of one of Sonya's classmates, presses charges against Ray for conning him out of money under the guise of a business investment. Ray is subsequently charged with grand larceny and fraud. After Mr. Webster puts up money for Ray's bail, Ray devises a plan to flee Portland and start a new life in Reno, Nevada, which infuriates Sonya. This sparks an argument which ends in Sonya telling her father she would have been better off without him, after which she and Greta exit the car, and Ray continues on to Reno.

The following morning, police arrive at the Weiler residence with a warrant for Ray. Greta is subsequently taken by child services, as Sonya, though now eighteen, does not have legal guardianship of her. Meanwhile, Ray arrives in Reno with Eddie, where he begins planning new schemes, but is remorseful of leaving his daughters behind. He drives back to Portland from Reno in the middle of the night, and returns to find his house empty. In the morning, Ray visits the home of the judge overseeing his case, and pleads that he protect Sonya and Greta from having to testify.

A day later, Sonya attends her senior graduation from Edgemont. After the ceremony, she apologizes to Mr. Webster for her father's actions, and tells him she plans on working a summer job to repay him. Moments later, Ray and Greta arrive at the graduation, escorted in a police car. Ray gifts Sonya an expensive writing pen as a graduation gift. In a voiceover narration, Sonya recounts the events of the years after, in which she raised Greta while her father served his prison sentence; after his release, he continued to be obsessed with business opportunities, particularly ones involving metals, ore, and space technology of the time. Some years later, Ray went into the mountains on an excursion, and froze to death.

After a long night of unfinished work, the morning dawns for George Dane, a writer whose life has grown too busy with his career and relationships. An expected breakfast guest appears and suddenly Dane is transported to a new environment, the great good place of the title. James does not describe this place as an unreal paradise. Guests even have to pay for service. The place seems more like a retreat or getaway resort, where Dane eventually recovers his peace of mind.

Dane spends three weeks at the place, and tells a Brother of his former life and the mysterious breakfast guest. Back in his usual world, Dane is eventually awakened by his servant after eight hours' sleep, and he realizes that his vision is gone. But the mysterious guest has straightened up his study, and Dane's life seems clearer and more manageable.

The novel is transcribed by 'Michael Moorcock' (the author's fictional grandfather) in 1903. Holidaying at the remote Rowe Island, he befriends Oswald Bastable, an ex-soldier stowaway who seems confused and disoriented beyond what could be explained by his opium addiction, and who is tormented by great guilt from an action he performed in his past. Bastable agrees to tell Moorcock the story, and begins his narrative with his experiences in North East India in 1902, sent as part of a British expedition to deal with Sharan Kang, an Indian high priest at the temple of Teku Benga, a mysterious and seemingly supernaturally powerful region. After a confrontation with Kang and his men, Bastable finds himself lost and alone in the caves around the 'Temple of the Future Buddha', where he is assaulted by a mysterious force and knocked into unconsciousness.

When he awakes, and escapes the caves, the Temple is in ruins, as if a great amount of time has passed. He is soon found and picked up by a massive airship, where he learns that it is in fact the year 1973, but not the one that the reader would recognise. In this alternate future, the First World War never happened, and the colonial powers continue to assert dominance over their empires—for example, India remains a British territory, though Winston Churchill had been viceroy in this alternate future as well as in Bastable's own.

At first, Bastable marvels at the wonders that await him in his 'future' — London is a clean and peaceful city, and the world seems to be a utopia, held in balance by the great empires. Gaining employment amongst the great airship armadas, however, he soon comes into contact with a troop of anarchists – among them a mysterious woman named Una Persson, and a Russian revolutionary named Ulianov. He initially maintains a patriotic resistance to their activities, but gradually discovers the truth: life is peaceful for the dominant empires but the seeming utopia of the empires' home countries is based on decades of unimpeded and unopposed colonial oppression, brutality and domination of their territories. As the First World War never happened to bankrupt the European colonial empires and begin the gradual liberalization and freedom of the colonies, imperialism remains unchecked and the world is greatly unfair and unjust. The United Kingdom, France, the Tsarist Russian Empire, the German Empire, Japan, the Italian Empire and the United States ruthlessly dominate this world and suppress anti-imperialist and anti-colonialist dissent.

Bastable, a fair and honourable man, is outraged by the cruelty, injustice and horror revealed to him, and begins to fight for the oppressed peoples of the world (opposing, amongst others, his former friend in the airship service, Major Enoch Powell). Tragically, his actions result in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima at the hands of the anarchists.

The atomic blast knocks him loose from the alternate 1973, sending him to a new 1903. Wracked with guilt over his part in the destruction of countless millions of innocent lives, and dreading the 'future' of science and imperialism gone mad, Bastable makes his way to the caves of Teku Benga and returns to 1903, but alas, not his own original time. His experiences have altered him too much to settle into life in this new alternate universe; both his experiences and this sense of dislocation have driven him to opium. The novel ends with Bastable disappearing mysteriously, much to the 1903 Moorcock's amazement; and a postscript from the modern author Moorcock, establishing his grandfather's death on the Western Front in 1916.

Coming to the assistance of a nanny who is almost killed during a bungled hit-and-run assassination attempt, Richard Hannay (More) is surprised to find that there is no baby in her pram. Curious, he meets her at the Palace Music Hall where she has gone to see the act of Mr Memory (James Hayter). Afterwards, she goes back to Hannay's flat with him, where she reveals that she is a spy working for British Intelligence following a group called "The Thirty-Nine Steps"; all they know about their elusive leader is that he is missing the tip of a finger. The Thirty-Nine Steps are in possession of a set of top-secret plans for "Boomerang", a British ballistic missile project that could tip the balance of power in Europe. She tells Hannay that she must leave for Scotland immediately, but while Hannay is out of the room, she is killed by two hitmen.

Fearing he will be accused of her murder, Hannay decides to continue her mission and catches an ex LNER Class A4 hauled train to Scotland from King's Cross railway station, evading the hitmen outside his flat by adopting a milkman disguise.

During the journey, he has a chance encounter with Miss Fisher (Taina Elg), a netball coach at a boarding school for girls. He is forced to pretend they are lovers to avoid the police detectives who boarded at Edinburgh. However, Miss Fisher gives him away and Hannay jumps from the stationary train on the Forth Bridge.

He then meets Percy Baker (Sid James), a helpful ex-convict lorry driver who advises him to stop at "The Gallows", an inn owned by Nelly Lumsden (Brenda de Banzie), who was once imprisoned for practising the occult. She helps him pass the police patrols by disguising him in a cycle party (Freewheelers of Clackmannan) she is accommodating and creating a diversion with her husband.

Hannay eventually finds the house of the man he thinks he is looking for, Professor Logan (Barry Jones), but finds out that he has been tricked; the man is actually the spy ring's leader. He escapes and informs the police, but is not believed and has to jump out of the police station window. Hannay escapes in the back of a passing sheep transporter. He then poses as a lecturer in a Highland girls' boarding school, coincidentally where Miss Fisher works, and ends up giving a bizarre lecture on "the woods and the wayside in August". Miss Fisher recognises him and he is again taken into custody, but this time by two assassins posing as detectives. After he shouts out to Miss Fisher to telephone Scotland Yard about Boomerang, the assassins are forced to take her with them.

Hannay is handcuffed to Miss Fisher in a Ford Zephyr with the hitmen, who are taking them back to London. A burst tyre gives Hannay his chance to escape, but only having one hand to drive with, he crashes the car, forcing him to wander through the bleak Scottish Highlands handcuffed to Miss Fisher. Eventually, they chance upon a bed and breakfast run by Mrs MacDougal (Betty Henderson). Hannay hides their handcuffed condition and informs her that they are a runaway couple.

While Hannay sleeps, Miss Fisher frees herself from the handcuffs, but then overhears their pursuers inquiring about them and about The Thirty-Nine Steps. She realises her error and goes back to help Hannay, telling him the final rendezvous for the conspirators.

The finale is back in the Palace Music Hall where Hannay provokes Mr Memory into telling him where "The Thirty-Nine Steps" are, just as the police arrest him. Mr Memory has used his formidable memory to memorise the Boomerang plans. However, before he can reveal the secret, Memory is shot by the ringleader and the secret is safe, as the main conspirators are either dead or in custody.

Former actress Adela Cork owns the Beverly Hills property known as the Carmen Flores place, after the famous and tempestuous Mexican actress who previously owned the house. Flores was killed in a plane crash the previous year. The will of Adela's late wealthy husband Alfred says Adela should support his impecunious brother Smedley, though she merely lets him live in her house. Smedley dislikes living with Adela, who makes him drink yoghurt instead of cocktails. Adela's sister Bill, a former scriptwriter, is ghostwriting Adela's memoirs. Adela's impeccable butler Phipps is nervous that Bill, who was part of the jury that sentenced him to prison for safecracking a few years ago, will tell Adela about his past which he has kept secret, but she promises not to tell. Smedley hopes to find the late Carmen Flores's diary. He believes she wrote about her affairs with men who would pay to have it suppressed. Bill thinks Smedley needs looking after and wants to marry him, but Smedley has doubts about marriage.

In New York, Joe Davenport, Bill's former co-worker, asks Bill's niece Kay Shannon in a joking way if she will marry him. Kay likes him but turns him down because she thinks he is not serious. They both separately go to California. Bill suggests to Joe that they buy her literary agent's business for twenty thousand dollars. Bill wants Joe to fund the purchase, since he won a radio jackpot, but he explains that he has nearly spent all his winnings. Joe later meets Smedley, who looks rich, and gives him a car ride hoping for money. Adela has invited Kay and the rich Lord Topham to her house, hoping they will marry. Adela gives Phipps notice for looking around in her bedroom against her orders. He tells Bill that he was looking for the valuable diary of the late Carmen Flores, and has not found it. Joe comes to the house, having been invited by Smedley while they were out drinking. Smedley was celebrating because he found the diary, which is written in Spanish, on top of Adela's wardrobe. He has been offered fifty thousand dollars for it. By pretending to help translate it, Adela tricks Smedley into giving her the diary.

Bill reveals to Smedley, Kay, and Joe that Phipps is a safecracker, and suggests that he get the diary from Adela's safe. Phipps's cut will be five thousand dollars. He agrees. Late that night, they assemble to steal the diary. However, Phipps has been hired by movie mogul Jacob Glutz to play butler roles, and is unwilling to risk being caught burgling. Bill comes up with the idea to give Phipps strong drinks and taunt him into burgling the safe by suggesting he has lost his skill. Phipps becomes drunk and remarkably less formal, then goes to break open the safe after being taunted by Bill. Kay tells Bill that she loves Joe but thinks his proposals are too flippant, though Bill thinks he is just shy. Phipps fails to focus on his task and argues in a disjointed way with Smedley and Joe before falling asleep. Joe tells Bill he is too shy to propose to Kay seriously. Bill knocks Joe out with her only Mickey Finn drug, planning to make Kay sympathetic to him. Bill wakes up Phipps, who does not remember anything from when he was drunk. She claims Phipps knocked out Joe. Kay sees Joe unconscious and instantly goes to his side, as Bill planned. Joe recovers, and is happily surprised that Kay returns his feelings. Phipps apologizes and works on the safe. Smedley inadvertently makes noise and wakes up Adela.

Adela investigates but is stopped by Bill, who stalls by talking to Lord Topham. Topham loves Gladys "Toots" Fauntleroy, but they had an argument about her new hat. He sent a cable to England apologizing and awaits her reply. A sergeant and patrolman arrive, having been telephoned by Adela. Bill again stalls by talking to the policeman about their ambition to become actors. Bill keeps them occupied long enough for Phipps to finish his task and dismiss the policemen. However, Phipps refuses to give Smedley the diary and keeps it. Topham learns that Toots loves him still, making him very amenable, but he cannot lend Bill the money she needs for the literary agency because he can't spend his money out of England. Adela thinks Bill took the diary and telephones the police again. Bill convinces Phipps to give the diary to Smedley by pointing out that Phipps will be in trouble if the police find it. She also convinces Adela that Smedley could sue her for losing a diary he had an offer for, which would bring her bad publicity. She persuades Adela to pay him off with thirty thousand dollars, with a check made out to Bill. The two policemen return and are cheerful, having been hired as background actors. Later, Phipps says that the book he gave to Smedley was not actually the diary, and is not even in Spanish. Smedley protests that it is in Spanish and gives it to Phipps to show him, but Phipps takes it and drives off. Bill is amazed that Smedley has again been tricked out of the diary, and wants to look after him. She asks him to marry her and he agrees.

Julian Berniers returns from Illinois with his young bride Lily Prine to his family in New Orleans. His spinster sisters, Carrie and Anna, welcome the couple, who arrive with expensive gifts. Julian tells them that, though his factory went out of business, he did manage to save money. Although the sisters are skeptical, there is much talk of a long-hoped-for trip to Europe for the two sisters. In fact, Julian has money from a real estate deal that he pulled off with the help of Charlotte Warkins, a former lover, who is now in an abusive marriage.

Carrie is obsessed with her brother. Her jealousy, deriving from her sublimated incestuous desires for her brother, is aimed at Lily. Carrie tricks Lily into informing Charlotte's husband of a rendezvous between Charlotte and Julian, at which Julian was to give Charlotte her half of the money, and Charlotte then was going to leave her husband and flee town. Charlotte's husband sends thugs who beat up Julian, maim Charlotte, and take both halves of the money.

Julian discovers that Carrie manipulated Lily into making the phone call to Charlotte's husband by convincing Lily that Julian and Charlotte were going to leave together. After Carrie hurls insults at Julian and Anna, telling them they will both be failures, both leave the house. Julian finds and reconciles with Lily, and Anna leaves for Europe. Carrie is left alone, deluding herself into thinking they both will return one day.

Jack Dunne (Winkler), an amnesiac Vietnam veteran most likely suffering from a severe case of PTSD , escapes a mental ward in New York City intent on starting a business as a worm farmer in Eureka, California.

At the bus station, he accidentally meets Carol Bell (Field), a woman unsure of her engagement to a man toward whom she has confused feelings. Initially annoyed by Jack, Carol gradually warms to him as they set off on a trip through middle America towards Northern California: during the journey she has time to reflect on her impending nuptials as Jack tries to locate his three war buddies hoping to enlist them in his dream to start a worm farm.

It becomes clear that the first two friends Jack and Carol locate are in too poor condition to do much work of any kind. When a visit to the parents of the third results in the disclosure that the friend had died in the war, Jack, who knew as much but was in denial, relives the battlefield trauma of his buddy's death. Finally, Carol's compassion and caring enable Jack to come to terms with reality.

The ''Enterprise'' responds to a distress call from a Talarian vessel. They rescue five teenaged crewmembers - four Talarian, and one human, Jono (Chad Allen).

Jono keeps to himself, but shows strict obedience to Captain Picard, which together with some unexplained past injuries leads Doctor Crusher to suggest Jono may have been physically abused. It is determined that Jono is Jeremiah Rossa, a long-lost Federation citizen. His grandmother is a Starfleet admiral, and he was orphaned ten years ago when his parents were killed in a skirmish with the Talarians.

When the Captain introduces the topic of Jono's human family, Jono becomes angry. After persistent effort by Picard, Jono's memories of the attack begin to return and a friendship develops between Jono and Wesley Crusher.

A Talarian ship arrives. Its Captain, Endar, asks for a status on his son, who happens to be Jono. Endar had claimed Jono as his own son after the boy's parents were killed ten years earlier, in keeping with the Talarian tradition of adopting the children of slain enemies to replace children of their own who die in battle. Endar explains Jono's injuries as the products of a boy trying to impress his father by participating in high-risk activities; Picard seems satisfied and observes that Endar seems to care for Jono. Picard allows Endar to see Jono, but when Jono says he wants to stay with Endar, Picard suspects the boy is afraid to say he wants to stay in the Federation. Endar insists that Jono will come back with him, even if the result is war between the Talarians and the Federation.

Returning to his vessel, Endar calls for reinforcements, as Picard decides to try to convince Jono to stay. After Jono receives a message from his grandmother, Picard takes the boy to play a form of racquetball, where Jono breaks down and cries. The crew believes they are making progress with the boy, but that night, Jono stabs the sleeping Picard in the chest. The blade deflects off Picard's sternum, causing only a minor wound, but the problem of where Jono should live is now compounded due to the assault he has just committed.

When Picard learns that Jono feels he cannot betray Endar by befriending Picard, the Captain realizes he has been trying to impose his wishes on the boy. Just as Endar's patience is about to run out, Picard contacts the Talarians and lets them know he will let Jono go back. Jono bids Picard farewell with a Talarian ritual that is normally reserved for family members.

, 1963.

The novel is set in World War I and opens with a framing story in which a manuscript relating the main story is recovered from a thermos off the coast of Greenland. It purports to be the narrative of Bowen J. Tyler, an American passenger sunk in the English Channel by a German U-boat, , in 1916. He and a woman named Lys La Rue are rescued by a British tugboat. The tug is also sunk, but its crew manages to capture the submarine when it surfaces. Unfortunately, all other British craft continue to regard the sub as an enemy, and they are unable to bring it to port. Sabotage to the navigation equipment sends the ''U-33'' astray into the South Pacific. The imprisoned German crew retakes the sub and begins a raiding cruise, only to be overcome again by the British. A saboteur continues to guide the sub off course, and by the time he is found out it is in Antarctic waters.

The ''U-33'' is now low on fuel, with its provisions poisoned by the saboteur Benson. A large island ringed by cliffs is encountered, and identified as Caprona, a land mass first reported by the fictitious Italian explorer Caproni in 1721 whose location was subsequently lost. A freshwater current guides the sub to a stream issuing from a subterranean passage, which is entered on the hope of replenishing the water supply. The U-boat surfaces into a tropical river teeming with primitive creatures extinct elsewhere; attacked, it submerges again and travels upstream in search of a safe harbor. It enters a thermal inland sea, essentially a huge crater lake, whose heat sustains Caprona's tropical climate. As the sub travels north along the island's waterways the climate moderates and wildlife undergoes an apparent evolutionary progression.

On the shore of the lake the crew builds a palisaded base, dubbed Fort Dinosaur for the area's prehistoric fauna. The British and Germans agree to work together under Tyler, with Bradley, the mate from the tug, as second in command and Von Schoenvorts, the original sub commander, in control of the Germans. The castaways are attacked by a horde of beast men and take prisoner Ahm, a Neanderthal Man. They learn that the native name for the island is Caspak. Oil is discovered, which they hope to refine into fuel for the ''U-33''. As they set up operations, Bradley undertakes various explorations. During his absence Lys disappears and the Germans abscond with the submarine.

Tyler leaves the other survivors to seek and rescue Lys. A series of adventures ensues among various bands of near-human primitives, each representing a different stage of human advancement, as represented by their weaponry. Tyler rescues Lys from a group of ''Sto-lu'' ("hatchet men"), and later aids the escape of a woman of the Band-lu (spearmen) to the Kro-lu (bowmen). Lys is lost again, and chance discoveries of the graves of two men associated with Bradley's expedition leaves Tyler in despair of that party's fate. Unable to find his way back to Fort Dinosaur, he retreats to the barrier cliffs ringing Caspak in a vain hope of attracting rescue from some passing ship. Improbably reunited with Lys, he sets up house with her, completes the account of his adventures which he has been writing, and casts it out to sea in his thermos.

Professor Henry Morlant (Boris Karloff), a great Egyptologist, thinks that the ancient jewel which he calls the "Eternal Light" will give him powers of rejuvenation if it is offered up to the ancient Egyptian god Anubis. But when Morlant dies, his servant Laing (Ernest Thesiger) steals the jewel. While a gaggle of interlopers, including a disreputable solicitor (Cedric Hardwicke) and a fake parson (Ralph Richardson), descend on the Professor's manor to investigate or steal the jewel for themselves, Morlant returns from the dead ("when the full moon strikes the door of my tomb", he predicted before dying) to kill everyone who has betrayed him.

The school year ends with everyone at East High School looking forward to summer vacation ("What Time Is It?"). Troy Bolton is still dating Gabriella Montez, who decides to stay in Albuquerque with her mother. Troy eventually decides to look for a summer job to gain money for college.

Sharpay and Ryan Evans plan to spend the summer at their family's country club, Lava Springs ("Fabulous"), but Sharpay's summer plans also include pursuing Troy, whom she has arranged for to be hired at the club. However, Troy convinces the club's manager, Mr. Fulton, into hiring Gabriella and their close group of friends as well, including Taylor and Chad. Sharpay is enraged upon learning that Gabriella is working as one of the lifeguards but is unable to get her fired, so she orders Fulton to give them difficult tasks so they would want to quit. Fulton attempts to intimidate the group, but Troy rebuilds their confidence and convinces them that they can persevere ("Work This Out").

Troy continues to worry about funding for college. Sharpay senses his need and arranges for Troy to be promoted to the University of Albuquerque's senior basketball team, hoping that this will convince him to sing with her at the talent show. Meanwhile, Kelsi writes a song for Troy and Gabriella and they agree to sing with their friends in the show ("You Are the Music in Me"), not knowing that Sharpay is vying for his attention. In the extended version, Sharpay and Ryan trap Troy as he prepares for a date with Gabriella by performing their own song ("Humuhumunukunukuapua'a"), much to Troy's annoyance.

Ryan realizes he does not mean much to Sharpay anymore, as she is ready to blow her brother aside for the opportunity to perform with Troy. This leads to tension between the siblings, and Ryan angrily informs Sharpay that he will no longer obey her orders. Taylor and Gabriella invite Ryan to the baseball game, where he persuades the Wildcats to take part in the talent show ("I Don't Dance").

Troy and Gabriella's relationship is strained when Troy sees Ryan with Gabriella, sparking jealousy. Owing to a "promise" from Troy, he and Sharpay rehearse another song for the talent show (Sharpay's version of "You Are the Music in Me"). Troy also gets into an argument with Chad for abandoning his friends, due to his perceived change of personality after being promoted by Sharpay.

When Sharpay discovers that Ryan and the Wildcats are putting together their own performance in the show, she furiously orders Mr. Fulton to ban all staff members from performing. Gabriella confronts Sharpay about her interference and quits her job at Lava Springs. Troy overhears the exchange and tries to persuade Gabriella to change her mind. Gabriella expresses her loss of trust with Troy ("Gotta Go My Own Way"), leaves Lava Springs, and returns her necklace, which he had given to her after school ended.

Troy returns to work the next day to find that his friends refuse to talk to them, following his earlier argument with Chad. Kelsi silently shows Troy the notice from Mr. Fulton, causing Troy to question his own motivations ("Bet on It") and confronts Sharpay, informing her that he will not sing with her. He then reconciles with Chad and apologizes to the Wildcats for his absence. They convince him to perform in the talent show, which he does only under the condition that they are all allowed to perform as well.

At Sharpay's supposed instruction, Ryan gives Troy a new song to learn moments before the show. As Troy goes onstage, he asks Sharpay why she switched the song, and Sharpay is shocked to find that her brother tricked her. Troy sings the song ("Everyday"), until Gabriella and the Wildcats joins him onstage. In the end, Sharpay proudly presents her brother, Ryan, with the award for the talent show. After the talent show, all the Wildcats go to the golf course to enjoy the fireworks, and everyone in Lava Springs celebrates the end of the summer with a pool party the next day ("All for One").

The poem is a grimly realistic piece set in France during the Hundred Years' War. The doomed lovers Jehane and Robert de Marny flee with a small escort through a convincingly portrayed rain-swept countryside, to reach the safety of English-held Gascony. They are however intercepted by the treacherous Godmar and have a last despairing parting besides the "old soaked hay" of the title. The encounter takes place shortly after the Battle of Poitiers but the characters Godmar and Jehane are entirely fictional. Morris used the name of an English knight Sir Robert de Marny, who was born in Essex and fought at Poitiers but who did not die in the manner recited.

The Changeling infection has taken its toll on Odo; Bashir estimates he has no more than two weeks to live. Odo asks his lover, Colonel Kira Nerys, to return to her mission aiding the Cardassian rebellion against Dominion rule, rather than stay to watch him die.

Bashir falsely announces that he has discovered a cure, aiming to lure a Section 31 agent to the station. Agent Sloan takes the bait, and Bashir captures him and prepares to interrogate him with a memory-scanning device to learn the cure for the Changeling disease. When Sloan sees no way to get out of Bashir's interrogation, he kills himself. Bashir and O'Brien construct a device that will allow them to infiltrate Sloan's dying mind. They only have a short time to find the information they seek; when Sloan's brain shuts down, they'll die with him if they're still connected.

Upon entering Sloan's mind, they are greeted by a personification of his subconscious. This Sloan apologizes to his family for choosing Section 31 over them, and is about to give Bashir the cure when it is killed by a personification of Sloan's loyalty to Section 31. Bashir and O'Brien are seemingly shot by a figure defending Sloan's secrets, and discuss their friendship before attempting to continue the search.

They seemingly awaken back in Bashir's lab, their mission a failure. In fact, they are still inside Sloan's mind, as Bashir realizes when he sits down in his quarters to read: his book ends where he stopped reading the previous night, and then starts over from the beginning on the next page. Realize they have fallen for a stalling tactic, the two resume the search.

They find Sloan in a representation of his office, which is filled with secret data about Section 31, including the formula for the cure for the Changeling disease. Sloan taunts Bashir with the information in his mind – information that would allow Bashir to dismantle Section 31 once and for all. Bashir is tempted, and begins to read. With seconds left before Sloan's brain shuts down, O'Brien recognizes the trap and tells Bashir to get them out of Sloan's mind. Having obtained the chemical formula for the cure, Bashir administers the drug to Odo, curing him.

A singer, Sugar Kane (Linda Evans), is unwittingly being used for publicity stunts for her latest album by her agent (Paul Lynde), for example, faking a skydiving stunt, actually performed by Bonnie (Deborah Walley).

Meanwhile, Frankie (Frankie Avalon), duped into thinking he rescued Sugar Kane, takes up skydiving at Bonnie's prompting; she secretly wants to make her boyfriend Steve (John Ashley) jealous. This prompts Dee Dee (Annette Funicello) to also try free-falling. Eric Von Zipper (Harvey Lembeck) and his Rat Pack bikers also show up, with Von Zipper falling madly in love with Sugar Kane. Meanwhile, Bonehead (Jody McCrea) falls in love with a mermaid named Lorelei (Marta Kristen).

Eventually, Von Zipper "puts the snatch" on Sugar Kane, and in a ''Perils of Pauline''-like twist, the evil South Dakota Slim (Timothy Carey) kidnaps Sugar and ties her to a buzz-saw.

After his mother's death and with his sailor father away at sea, imaginative 11-year-old Eric Johansson is sent to live in a small fishing village with his mother's twin brother, Johnny Johansson. Eric's adventures in Gimli will help him to feel at home with his new family and come to terms with some pre-adolescent uncertainties while Johnny, burdened with unexpected fatherly duties, has to make some choices he avoided to face before.

The Solarion IV settlement is destroyed, and the Bajorans claim responsibility. Their homeworld Bajor was annexed by the Cardassians generations ago, and the Bajorans have been refugees ever since, and apparently some of them are using terrorism to draw attention from the United Federation of Planets.

Captain Picard meets with Admiral Kennelly, who tells him that the Bajoran responsible is a terrorist named Orta. Picard's mission is to find Orta, and to send him back to the Bajoran settlement camps where he can do less damage.

Kennelly assigns a controversial person to assist Picard: Starfleet Ensign Ro Laren, a Bajoran whose reputation is very poor. Kennelly insists she can help, and she comes aboard the ''Enterprise''.

Despite a difficult attitude, Ro works with the crew to locate Orta. Ultimately, they head to the third moon Vallor I where they believe he is based.

Meanwhile, Ro receives a secret communication from Admiral Kennelly and tells him all is going exactly as he predicted.

The next day, the away team prepares to beam down, but discover Ensign Ro had preempted them by beaming down six hours earlier. They follow her, and are promptly captured by Orta and his people. Orta, who was disfigured by Cardassian torture, tells them that he felt abducting them was necessary, and says that the Bajorans were not responsible for the attack.

Picard finds himself inclined to believe Orta, but confines Ro to quarters for her unauthorized beam down. Guinan, who has befriended Ro, goes to see Ro, and after learning there is more to what is going on that meets the eye, convinces Ro to talk to Picard.

Ro reveals that she is on a secret mission by Kennelly to offer Orta Federation weapons in exchange for returning to the camps. Given her experiences, she no longer knows what to do or whom to trust. Picard decides that the best course might be to actually take Orta back to the camps, and see what occurs.

However, as the ''Enterprise'' escorts a Bajoran cruiser to the camp, two Cardassian ships cross the border and demand the Enterprise leave the ship to them. Picard initially refuses, and the Cardassians give him an hour to reconsider. Far from helping, Kennelly insists that the Cardassian treaty is the more important issue and orders Picard to withdraw.

Picard withdraws, and the Bajoran cruiser is destroyed. However, suspecting a chain of events like this might occur, Picard had ensured no one was aboard, and had the ship operated remotely. Picard informs Kennelly that the Bajoran ships are so old and obsolete that they were incapable of even reaching the Solarion IV settlement, much less attacking it, and suggests that the Cardassians staged everything, hoping to find someone like Kennelly, naive enough to help them solve their problems.

With the mystery solved and the mission accomplished, Ro accepts Picard's offer to remain in Starfleet and join the ''Enterprise'' crew.

For the story read the article on the novel ''Corazón salvaje''.

Young-eon (Kim Ok-bin), the top singer at an all-girls school, is murdered by a music sheet cutting her throat in the opening scene. The next day nobody can see or hear her except her friend Seon-min (Seo Ji-hye), who can only hear her. The two attempt to find out what happened to Young-eon. Seon-min begins speculating that the music teacher must have killed Young-eon. The mystery behind her death is slowly unraveled as Young-eon has flashbacks of life before her death.

Seon-min befriends a strange and lonely girl at school named Cho-ah (Cha Ye-ryun), who can hear the voices of the dead, and she helps the two solve the incident. Meanwhile, the music teacher kills herself. Seon-min begins to doubt what Young-eon says after Cho-ah tells her that ghosts only remember what they want to, meaning Young-eon's memory may be incorrect. Young-eon's body is found in on top of the elevator.

Young-eon is running out of time to discover who the other ghost is; if her friend forgets about her, she will lose her voice. Some of the flashbacks include her mother, who is in a hospital. In one flashback, she talks to her mother about how she will learn to drive when she is old enough. Another features how her mother committed suicide by jumping off the top of the hospital. In the end, Young-eon is revealed to have driven her mother to suicide, and might have multiple personality disorder due to the trauma and guilt of encouraging her mother to kill herself. Young-eon brings tears to her music teacher's eyes when she asks the teacher to sing, leading the latter to contemplate suicide.

It turns out that Young-eon had been hearing the voices of her teacher and of the ghost, Hyo-jung, the whole time. Young-eon wanted the teacher dead to get rid of Hyo-jung's voice. Hyo-jung was a student and top singer at the school who fell in love with the music teacher. She has the same voice as Young-eon and they are both recorded in a song. Hyo-jung is revealed to have shot the music sheet at Young-eon's throat in the opening scene out of anger at losing her voice. Seon-min thinks Young-eon should move on but Young-eon is angered by her statement, since she wants nothing more than to live again. Young-eon kills Cho-ah and takes over Seon-min's body. She then walks alongside Seon-min's mother, talking about how, as soon as she is old enough, she will learn to drive.

A scene during the credits shows Cho-ah shouting in frustration, but voiceless.

Kramer is dating Leslie, a "low-talker" whom everyone struggles to understand due to her quiet speaking voice. When Jerry and Elaine have dinner with them, Kramer explains that Leslie is a fashion designer and has designed a new puffy shirt "like the pirates used to wear." Elaine tells Leslie that Jerry is making an appearance on ''The Today Show'' to promote a Goodwill benefit to clothe the poor and homeless. Leslie says something in response, but they cannot make out what it is. To be polite, they nod their heads. The next day, Kramer delivers the shirt to Jerry, who realizes that he had inadvertently agreed to wear Leslie's puffy shirt on ''The Today Show''. The idea of wearing such an ostentatious shirt while promoting a benefit for the poor outrages Elaine.

At a restaurant with his parents, George accidentally bumps into a woman who turns out to be a modeling agent. When she notices his hands, she declares they are beautiful and that he should become a hand model. He agrees, and in preparation for his first photo shoot becomes protective of his hands, having manicures and shielding them with oven mitts.

During the ''Today Show,'' host Bryant Gumbel repeatedly mocks Jerry's shirt, driving him to angrily denounce it on air. Leslie finally raises her voice to furiously call Jerry a "bastard". After the show, George arrives at the dressing room and takes off his oven mitts to show off his hands. When he mocks the puffy shirt, Leslie angrily pushes him, causing him to fall onto a hot clothes iron and ruin his hands, ending his hand model career.

Elaine is fired from the Goodwill benefit committee, Jerry is heckled about the shirt during his stand-up comedy, and Kramer breaks up with Leslie. The stores cancel their pre-orders and the unsold shirts are given to Goodwill. As Jerry, Kramer, Elaine, and George walk down the street, they see homeless men dressed in the puffy shirts. Jerry remarks that it is not a bad-looking shirt after all.

Juanita, a girl in a town that's populated by Hispanics, is raped and beaten. The only thing she says before falling into a deep coma is that her attacker is an outsider, a Gringo. Local Mexican-American Sheriff Vega arrests all three outsiders there are. All he can do is intimidating the prisoners so that one of them admits to being the attacker, or that the girl wake up to identify him. The girl dies, and her father prepares a lynch mob.

The sheriff can't get any help from the state, and even Mendoza, his deputy, is unwilling to help him. The sheriff takes the prisoners out of the jail in a trip to the closest city where they can be processed. But the prisoners, an unstable kid, a brutish man and a coldly intelligent youngster have other plans.

Just arriving at their newly bought land, Kent Taggart's family has their cattle stampeded and they are murdered by Ben Blazer and his son. Blazer results seriously wounded. Later in a fair gunfight Kent kills Blazer's son. With his last breath, Blazer sends three gunfighters to find and kill Kent: Vince August, Cal Dodge, and Jay Jason, who is a particularly talkative and vicious killer.

In his escape, Taggart heads towards territory that has fallen in Apache hands, followed by the gunfighters. In a semiabandoned town, Taggart helps a lady in trouble at a saloon, getting in return her help and the bartender's. Caught by the gunfighters, he manages to kill Cal and flee.

Later, he finds a couple who are fighting with Apaches. Taggart joins them, and also the gunfighters do. Vince results wounded, and Jay disarms Taggart. The couple helps him to escape.

With no horse or gun, Taggart hides in a rocky hill, where he gets caught by an old man, Adan Stark, and his daughter Miriam. They take him to their dwelling, where there is another young woman, Adan's wife Consuela.

They treat him as a dangerous prisoner, but later that night, Consuela visits him and makes unequivocal advances, promising Taggart riches and happiness if he takes her away from that place. They are surprised by Miriam, who stops the offering and the women have an angry exchange, but as has happened before, Miriam won't tell her father what his wife is doing.

The next day, when Taggart is escaping, he saves Stark's life from an Apache attack. Stark changes his mind about him, and shows Taggart the reason why they haven't left: a gold mine in the property. Stark fills a couple of bags with gold rocks and prepares to leave, before the next Apache attack.

Meanwhile, Jay has killed Vince because he had become a hindrance, so he arrives alone at the Stark place. Taggart explains he is a hired killer, and Jay explains he is pursuing a murderer. The Starks favor Taggart over Jay.

Later that night, Consuela visits Jay and makes unequivocal advances, promising him riches and happiness if he takes her away from that place. Jay is happy to oblige. Another Apache attack happens and Stark results wounded. Jay and Consuela escape with the gold; the Starks head to a fort, with Taggart ahead as a scout.

Jay and Consuela meet a cavalrymen supplies convoy and join them for protection. While they are traveling in one of the Cavalry wagons, Consuela tells Jay she has changed her mind and wants to leave him. Jay attacks her, leaves her for dead, gets the gold, horses, and manages to escape moments before the Apache surround and destroy the Cavalry convoy.

Jay arrives at the fort and asks for new horses to keep running. The officer in command asks whether he has seen the reinforcements they are expecting, Jay says he hasn't seen anything but the destroyed convoy. The officer orders Jay to stay and fight. Taggart pass by the rests of the convoy, reunites with the Starks, and later they arrive at the same fort.

And so, Taggart, the Starks and the soldiers must defend themselves from a fierce Apache attack while hoping for the reinforcements and Jay is trying to escape with the gold before Taggart sees him.

In the small town of Carcadie, Nova Scotia, 1903, a fisherman called Locky McCormick receives advice from Pacquet, the local shopkeeper: young Stella, the new doctor's maidservant, has received an inheritance and it would be a good idea to courtship her. Locky follows Paquet's advice.

Dr. Robert Richardson mets the MacDonald family: Black, the father, Aggie, his sister, and Belinda, who is a deaf-mute young woman. Her appearance is unkempt, almost wild. The family raises farm animals and grind local wheat into flour at their small mill. The doctor realizes that, although she cannot hear or speak, Belinda is very intelligent. Her father, her aunt, and the whole town call Belinda "dummy" and care little about her. Dr. Richardson befriends Belinda and teaches her sign language. She also learns to read, mathematics, how to read lips, and her appearance improves. Belinda's father and aunt realize she is a kind, loving young woman, and the family's relationship changes. Over time, the doctor's affection for her grows.

Meanwhile, Locky has noticed Belinda's beauty. One night when there is a dance in the town and he knows she is alone at home, he leaves the party surreptitiously, goes to Belinda's house, tries to seduce her and when she resist his advances, he rapes her.

When Dr. Richardson comes back from his trip, she finds her sad and unkempt; her family doesn't know why. Dr. Richardson brings her to a colleague who specializes in hearing, who tells him her deafness is irreversible but not hereditary; the baby she is expecting most probably will have a normal hearing.

Back in the town, the MacDonalds are saddened and angered, but it comes to Dr. Richardson explaining to Belinda what is happening to her. She refuses to reveal the father's identity, expressing it is unimportant, and welcomes her future child. Stella, who is about to marry Locky, leaves the doctor's service in anger, revealing him that the town's people believe he abused the poor dummy.

Belinda gives birth at home to a healthy baby boy, whom she names Johnny. Dr. Richardson tells Black that he is willing to marry Belinda, as he has grown into loving her. After Black agrees, Dr. Richardson proposes to her, and they kiss. He asks Belinda whether she understand what "marriage" means: she does.

Boycotted by the locals, the doctor goes away in search of a new home and a job position. He writes to Belinda saying he has found a small but pretty house for them and their son.

A stormy night, Locky goes to the MacDonald house to pay a debt. While Black is at the mill, he approaches at baby Johnny and talks lovingly at him, saying that he'll grow up to be as tall as his papa. Black hears that, realizes what Locky has done, and attacks him. In the fight, Locky kills Black. Then he makes things look as if an accident happened and flees.

Locky bribes Pacquet so in his capacity of member of the town's council the shopkeeper talks the town's people into signing a document that declares Belinda unfit to care for the child and award him to Locky and Stella. With that power, they go to take Johnny. Locky makes Stella to enter alone. She realizes that Belinda is a smart and competent mother, who will never give up her baby. Stella retreats and tells Locky that they have no right to take Johnny away. Locky tells his wife that he has the right because he is the father. When he goes to retrieve the boy, Locky pushes Belinda aside easily, but before he can unlock the door of the room where the baby is, Belinda kills him with her father's shotgun.

Belinda is arrested and goes on trial for murder. At the trial, it is discussed whether she knows the difference between right and wrong, and whether killing someone is wrong, to which she says (through an interpreter) that she knows, sealing her fate. Dr. Richardson demands that the reasons for her behavior be taken into consideration, but his efforts are dismissed. When called to the bench, he is asked whether he is Johnny's father, what he denies. The letter in which he called Johnny his son makes everyone believe that he is lying, and the prosecutor claims that Belinda killed Locky because he had found out that the doctor was the baby's father. At that point, Stella blurts out that her husband had confessed to be the baby's father, and with that it is understood that not only he was Belinda's abuser, but he had attempted maliciously to take away the baby from his mother. The judge dismisses the case as self-defense. Belinda is set free, and she, Johnny, Dr. Richardson and aunt Aggie leave together.

1885, a place between San Francisco and Sacramento. A mysterious Manchu man arrives in town, with his young companion Chung Wang, who is both his valet and, while being under a magical spell, a killer at his service. The Manchu is looking for a Shaolin priest with a price on his head: Kwai Chang Caine.

Caine is leading a quiet life working as a laborer at a warehouse, shielding his countrymen from the cruel foreman, when he gets involved in a crime. The young American missionary Reverend Lawrence Perkins, back from China and apparently insane, gained entrance to a local opium den where he was murdered by the Manchu man. In the course of a general raid of Chinese people led by the vicious Deputy Wyatt, Caine is brought to the open and the missionary’s body is found. Caine’s knowledge of Chinese drugs and weapons that signal the death was a murder and not caused by “the poppy” attracts the attention of Sheriff Mills, who uses his expertise in the investigation, but also makes of him a suspect.

Mrs. Sarah Perkins, the missionary’s widow, pleads for Caine’s help in finding the real cause of her husband’s death. Caine starts to investigate while helping the Asian-American family whose lodging he shares, and the Manchu’s young servant stalks him wherever he goes until Caine goes outside and confronts him. After a talk in which Chung Wang delivers him sad news about the Shaolin temple and demands to be taught kung fu, Caine invites him to share his lodging, offers him a job at the warehouse, and tries to teach the young man some humility before teaching him kung fu. This lasts until the next day when the young disciple gets into a violent fight with the warehouse’s foreman and when stopped by Caine, scorns his master’s pacifism. Caine dismisses him. Later, Caine sees Master Po in a vision, confirming the news from China and warning him of danger in a cemetery.

The Manchu’s search has put other people on Caine’s trail for the reward. Ching, the opium den’s host, sets a trap for him using Mrs. Perkins as bait, which results in her flight, both Ching’s accidental death and of a henchman of his in the ensuing fight, and Caine’s flight. Deputy Wyatt finds on Ching’s body Caine's Wanted poster. Later, Mrs. Perkins arrives at his father-in-law’s trading company, where she is rendered unconscious by the Manchu man’s henchmen. When Caine arrives, the Manchu identifies himself as the father of the Emperor’s Nephew who Caine killed in China, and reveals to him that Chung Wang is his son, fathered shortly before fleeing from China (''Kung Fu'', s3e15). Having retaken Chung Wang under his control, the Manchu commands him to kill Caine. After an epic fight, Caine escapes and rescues Mrs. Perkins from the Manchu’s henchmen, only for him to get arrested by Deputy Wyatt.

At the prison, Sheriff Mills visits Caine, who puts him on the trail to discover a web of corruption related to opium trade. The Sheriff promises to do his best to free Caine if he can prove him innocent. The Manchu also visits Caine; he summons him to a final fight at the local Chinese cemetery on the same date his son died. If Caine doesn’t show up, Chung Wang will pay for it with his life. When the Sheriff discovers the proof of the illegal trade, Deputy Wyatt murders him.

At the trial, Caine is accused of Ching and the henchman’s deaths, Reverend Perkins’ murder; and his situation as a wanted man in China is pointed at. He is found guilty and sentenced to death. Mr. John Martin Perkins III has decided to send his daughter-in-law to China to have his son buried there, and he talks with Deputy Wyatt about their mutual Manchu friend. Caine escapes from prison and takes Mrs. Perkins to a Perkins Trading Company warehouse to see the proof of the opium trade, demonstrating her father-in-law’s involvement. Mrs. Perkins goes to denounce the crime to a Federal Marshall, who happens to be also involved in the plot, so, no action is taken. There is nobody else to ask for help: Caine and Mrs. Perkins (who is developing feelings for him) continue the investigation together.

That night, they are watching over a building where the Manchu is testing a flamethrower when Caine is seen on the street by some of his henchmen. A fight ensues, resulting in a henchman burnt to a crisp. Amidst the generalized panic of the passersby, Deputy Wyatt takes Mrs. Perkins, supposedly, to a safe place. In reality, it is a kidnapping to attract Caine to his demise at a warehouse rigged with Manchu spear-throwing devices. In the following fight between Caine, the flying spears, and the corrupt law officer, both the Deputy and Mrs. Perkins are killed.

The next day, at the Chinese cemetery-park where Caine has buried the noble lady, he sees Master Po in a vision admonishing him to seek his inner strength. Then, the final confrontation takes place. In the course of the battle, neither Chung Wang’s martial ability nor the Manchu’s flamethrower nor his swords and magical powers combined are enough to overcome Caine’s kung fu mystical powers. It is revealed to Chung Wang that Caine is his father. Afterward, sitting peacefully in the park, playing his flute and watching Master Po smiling at them, Caine teaches his son to hear the grasshopper that is at his feet. Then, father and son walk together to fight against the opium trade ring.

In Los Angeles, Kwai Chang Caine (Darlow) leads a quiet and ascetic life in a house without locks, devoted to the “family business” of serving the community and teaching kung fu that he inherited, together with his name, from the lineage started by his great-grandfather.

One night, friends Johnny (Lee) and Mic (Ferrer) are committing a robbery of antiques. Johnny is determined this will be his last time. Mic inadvertently triggers a silent alarm. When they get out, a guard points at them with his gun. Mic flees. At that juncture, Johnny reluctantly uses his martial arts ability to fight the guard and attempts to reach his motorcycle, but Mic does not wait and escapes. The police arrives, and arrest Johnny.

The next day, Lt. Lois Poole (Kelly) calls Caine Sr. to tell him his son Johnny got arrested. At the police station, Caine Sr. wonders how he failed his son, whom he hasn’t seen in over a year. Lt. Poole presents him a proposal: as everyone is aware of his service to the community, Caine Jr. will be released under his custody until trial. Meanwhile, Johnny refuses to snitch on Mic, as the police are looking for the someone who is using young men to commit crimes.

During their walk toward Caine Sr.’s home, the father and the son argue: Johnny refuses to be called Kwai Chang and doesn’t want to have anything to do with the “family business;” while his father accuses him of using the knowledge and training he gave him for evil deeds. That Same night, Mic arrives surreptitiously at Johnny’s room to deliver him his share from the robbery’s earnings, and begs for Johnny’s help in another robbery which he desperately needs to pay his debts, which Johnny refuses.

The following day, Caine Sr. is giving a kung fu class and invites Johnny to do a demonstration. Johnny angrily attacks his father, who defeats him in front of all the students. That night, in an attempt to connect with his son, Caine Sr. takes him on a visit to a ghost town, where their ancestor Kwai Chang Caine (the main character from the original series) lived. They talk about how Kwai Chang arrived there, became the respected “wise man of the town”. When they are leaving, Johnny looks back and sees the ghostly figure of Kwai Chang at his house’s door. However, as soon as they return home, Johnny phones Mic secretly and accepts to participate in the next robbery, except that this time he wants to be a partner instead of just getting a share of the earnings.

The robbery happens to be the decoupling of a train wagon. To his dismay, Johnny finds out that they are stealing guns. The thieves escape unnoticed. When Johnny wakes up the next day, very late, his father announces he will be out for the day, helping someone. Johnny uses the opportunity to reunite with Mic and go to see the crime boss (Barto) for whom they work, to propose to him to become partners. At the warehouse where all stolen goods, the boss suspects Johnny is a traitor. They search him and find out that he carries a tape recorder. The criminals are about to execute Johnny when Caine Sr. appears. A fight ensues, in which the Caines overcome the criminals. Afterward, while the police are taking everybody in custody, Caine Sr. welcomes Johnny in the “family business”, and Lt. Poole announces that the charges against Johnny will be reduced, and maybe dropped.

Like his grandfather and namesake from the original series, Kwai Chang Caine (David Carradine) is a Shaolin priest who walked out of the past. Caine was the head of a temple in Northern California, where his son Peter (Chris Potter) also lived and studied, until the temple was destroyed in a fire caused by a renegade priest who believed the priests should serve as mercenaries. After the destruction of the temple, each believed the other had perished and went on their separate ways; Caine wandered and traveled, much as his grandfather had, while Peter became a foster child and eventually a police officer. The series begins when Caine comes to fictional Sloanville and ends up in the Chinatown section of town, where Peter's precinct is located, and they are reunited after 15 years.

Peter Neal, an American writer of violent horror novels, visits Italy to promote his latest work, ''Tenebrae''. He is accompanied by his literary agent, Bullmer and his assistant, Anne. Neal is unaware that he has also been followed to Rome by his embittered ex-fiancée, Jane. Just before Neal arrived in Rome, Elsa, a young female shoplifter, was murdered with a razor by an unseen assailant. The murderer sends Neal a letter informing him that his books have inspired him to go on a killing spree. Neal is soon contacted by the police in the form of Detective Germani and his partner, Inspector Altieri.

More killings take place. Tilde, a lesbian journalist, is murdered at her home along with her lover Marion. Maria, the young daughter of Neal's landlord, is later hacked to death with an axe after discovering the killer's lair. Neal notices that TV interviewer Cristiano Berti has an unusually intense interest in his work. That night, Neal and his Italian assistant Gianni watch Berti's house. Gianni approaches the house alone to get a better view and sees an figure hack Berti to death with an axe. However, Gianni is unable to see the murderer's face. He returns to Neal to find the novelist has been knocked unconscious on the lawn.

Germani discovers that Berti was obsessed with Neal's novels, and believes the killings will stop now that Berti is dead. However, Bullmer, who is having an affair with Jane, is stabbed to death while waiting for his lover in a public square. Gianni is haunted by the thought that he missed the importance of something he saw at Berti's house. He returns to the house and suddenly remembers that he had heard Berti confessing to his attacker: "I killed them all, I killed them all!" Before Gianni can share this detail with anyone, he is strangled to death from the back seat of his car.

Jane sits at her kitchen table with a pistol when a figure leaps through her window and hacks off one of her arms. The wound sprays blood over the kitchen walls before Jane falls to the floor. The killer continues to hack at her until she is dead, at which point Neal is revealed to be the murderer. Upon learning the details of Berti's sadistic murder spree, Neal recovered a previously repressed memory involving his murder of a girl who had sexually humiliated him when he was a youth in Rhode Island. The memory torments Neal and inflames his previously repressed lust for blood, driving him insane.

Inspector Altieri arrives at the house and Neal kills her. Germani and Anne arrive soon afterwards; when Neal sees that he cannot escape, he slits his throat in front of them. Finding the telephone out of order, Germani and Anne go outside to report the incident from the car radio. Germani returns to the house and is murdered by Neal, who had faked his own death. Neal waits inside for Anne to return, but when she opens the door, she accidentally knocks over a metal sculpture that impales and kills Neal. The horror-stricken Anne stands in the rain and screams repeatedly.

Act I

George Peyton returns to the United States from a trip to France to find that the plantation he has inherited is in dire financial straits as a result of his late uncle's beneficence. Jacob McClosky, the man who ruined Judge Peyton, has come to inform George and his aunt (who was bequeathed a life interest in the estate) that their land will be sold and their slaves auctioned off separately. Salem Scudder, a kind Yankee, was Judge Peyton's business partner; though he wishes he could save Terrebonne, he has no money.

George is courted by the rich Southern belle heiress Dora Sunnyside, but he finds himself falling in love with Zoe, the daughter of his uncle through one of the slaves. Dora, oblivious to George's lack of affection for her, enlists Zoe's help to win him over. McClosky desires Zoe for himself, and when she rejects his proposition, he plots to have her sold with the rest of the slaves, for he knows that she is an octoroon and is legally part of the Terrebonne property. He plans to buy her and make her his mistress.

Act II

McClosky ,intercepts a young slave boy, Paul, who is bringing a mailbag to the house which contains a letter from one of Judge Peyton's old debtors. Since this letter would allow Mrs. Peyton to avoid selling Terrebonne, McClosky kills Paul and takes the letter. The murder is captured on Scudder's photographic apparatus. Paul's best friend, the Indian Wahnotee, discovers Paul's body; he can speak only poor English, however, and is unable to communicate the tragedy to anyone else.

George and Zoe reveal their love for each other, but Zoe rejects George's marriage proposal. When George asks why, Zoe explains that she is an octoroon, and the law prevents a white man from marrying anyone with the smallest black heritage. George offers to take her to a different country, but Zoe insists that she stay to help Terrebonne; Scudder then appears and suggests that George marry Dora. With Dora's wealth, he explains, Terrebonne will not be sold and the slaves will not have to be separated. George reluctantly agrees.

Act III

George goes to Dora and begins to propose to her; while he is doing so, however, he has a change of heart and decides not to lie to her. He and Zoe admit to their love of each other; a heartbroken Dora leaves. The auctioneer arrives, along with prospective buyers, McClosky among them. After various slaves are auctioned off, George and the buyers are shocked to see Zoe up on the stand. McClosky has proved that Judge Peyton did not succeed in legally freeing her, as he had meant to do. Dora then reappears and bids on Zoe – she has sold her own plantation in order to rescue Terrebonne. McClosky, however, outbids her for Zoe; George is restrained from attacking him by his friends.

Act IV

The buyers gather to take away the slaves they have purchased on a steamship. They have realized that Paul is missing, and most believe him dead. Wahnotee appears, drunk and sorrowful, and tells them that Paul is buried near them. The men accuse Wahnotee of the murder, and McClosky calls for him to be lynched. Scudder insists that they hold a trial, and the men search for evidence. Just as McClosky points out the blood on Wahnotee's tomahawk, the oldest slave, Pete, comes to give them the photographic plate which has captured McClosky's deed. The men begin to call for McClosky to be lynched, but Scudder convinces them to send him to jail instead.

Act V

The men leave to fetch the authorities, but McClosky escapes. Stealing a lantern, he sets fire to the steamship that had the slaves on board. Wahnotee tracks him down and confronts him; in the ensuing struggle, Wahnotee kills McClosky. Back at Terrebonne, Zoe returns but with a sad heart, as she knows that she and George can never be together. In an act of desperation she drinks a vial of poison, and Scudder enters to deliver the good news that McClosky was proven guilty of murdering Paul and that Terrebonne now belongs to George. Despite the happiness Zoe stands dying and the play ends with her death on the sitting-room couch and George kneeling beside her.

The game starts in the town of Grove, where on the outskirts of town the ancient Dungeon Gate leads would-be adventurers to multiple levels of fame, fortune, and death. The player assumes the role of one of these adventurers, and is assigned a randomized quest at the beginning of the game that will take them to approximately the 40th-50th level of the dungeon. Along the way, randomized side-quests are made available to the player by the townspeople of Grove. Eventually, the player completes the primary quest by defeating the randomized boss monster.

The book follows the life of Simonides from the point of view of his older self. As a boy, silent and lacking confidence due to his extreme ugliness, he is brought up with strict discipline by his father, Leoprepes. He finds comfort in the love of his handsome older brother Theasides, and in music. When a travelling singer, Kleobis, visits Keos to perform at a wedding, Simonides begs to be taken on as an apprentice. This Kleobis does, and they leave together on their travels.

Under Kleobis' tutelage Simonides becomes a talented composer and performer, but he remains physically ugly. This proves a severe disadvantage when, after the fall of Kleobis' native city of Ephesos to the Persians, Kleobis and Simonides attempt to find a patron at the court of Polycrates of Samos. Polycrates is a connoisseur of beauty, in boys as much as in music or art, and Simonides' appearance is not a recommendation. Kleobis and Simonides find themselves out of fashion at court, and scrabbling for work.

Simonides travels back to Keos to enter a music contest, leaving Kleobis behind in Samos nursing a slight illness. He wins the contest, but discovers, on returning, that Kleobis has died.

Simonides now finds a patron in Peisistratus, the tyrant of Athens. He becomes a successful musician in that city, and after Peisistratos' death, his sons Hippias and Hipparchus continue the family's patronage. Through Hipparchos, Simonides is introduced to the hetaira Lyra, whose lover he becomes. Hipparchos himself is sexually oriented to boys, not women, and Simonides witnesses his eventual downfall, when Hipparchos uses his political power to punish the family of a young boy who rejects his advances, and the boy and his lover retaliate by murdering him. Here Renault draws on the tale of Harmodius and Aristogeiton, also known as the Tyrannicides (τυραννοκτόνοι), whose attack against the Peisistratid tyranny made them iconic personages of Athenian democracy.

In the late 19th century, the demonic troll Trantor transforms children into wooden dolls to feast upon their energy in Briarville, Missouri. The townsfolk capture him and seal him under an oak tree, with Phineas Worrell, one of the village elders and an ancestor of Ernest P. Worrell, establishing the seal. Trantor vengefully places a curse on the Worrell family, stating that he can only be released on the night before Halloween by a Worrell. As part of the curse, every generation of Worrells will get "dumber and dumber and dumber", until the dumbest member of the family is foolish enough to release him from his earthly prison.

One hundred years later, Ernest, a sanitation worker, helps a few of his middle school friends, Kenny Binder, Elizabeth and Joey, construct a treehouse in the same tree that unknowingly contains the dormant creature, after the mayor's sons demolished their own cardboard haunted house. When Old Lady Hackmore discovers this, she angrily leaves. Following her, Ernest learns the story of Trantor and idiotically reports it to the kids. Inadvertently, Ernest releases the troll. Joey is walking home from the treehouse when he hears something rustling through the trees. Joey slowly walks and slips down in a muddy hole. Trantor grabs Joey's wrist and turns him into a wooden doll. Ernest finds Kenny's dad, Sheriff Cliff Binder, and explains the situation but Binder does not believe him. After none of the townsfolk will assist Ernest because of the upcoming Halloween party, he mounts a one-man (and one-dog) defense operation in preparation for Trantor's appearance. Meanwhile, Trantor captures a boy on a skateboard as his second victim.

Tom and Bobby Tulip, hoping to exploit Ernest, sell him various fake troll traps, but one backfires on the mayor's sons and Ernest loses his job. Ernest, Kenny and Elizabeth return to Hackmore, where they learn that only "the heart of a child, and a mother's care" can defeat the troll. Later that night, Trantor claims Elizabeth as his third victim as he sneaks into her house while she is resting on her bed.

While Kenny and his friend Gregg are walking, Trantor uses Elizabeth's voice to lure Kenny away, then takes Gregg as a fourth victim. Despite parents being upset at their missing children, Mayor Murdock and Sheriff Binder still proceed with a Halloween party at the school, believing the missing children will be there. Trantor appears there and takes the mayor's oldest son as his fifth and final wooden doll. In the ensuing fight between Trantor and Ernest, Trantor turns Ernest's dog Rimshot into a wooden doll before being repelled by soft-serve ice cream on Ernest's hands. Kenny realizes that "mother's care" refers to milk and rallies a troll-fighting team to destroy them.

Back at the treehouse, Trantor successfully summons his army of trolls while Ernest unsuccessfully tries to stop them. The townspeople show up, only for the trolls to overwhelm and beat them up. Kenny and his friends arrive and begin destroying the trolls with milk. During the fight, Trantor escapes beneath the tree where he summons the powers of the underworld, making him invincible, especially to milk. Enraged, Kenny unsuccessfully tries to destroy Trantor, who also turns Kenny into a doll. With the other townsfolk now backing him up and telling him to douse Trantor in milk, Ernest realizes that milk weakened the troll children, while unconditional love ("the heart of a child") would weaken Trantor himself. He takes Trantor and dances with him while the mob watches, overloading him with love, and finally kisses his snot-ridden nose, causing Trantor to explode.

With Trantor's destruction, Ernest is proclaimed a hero. All of the wooden dolls are restored, including those from the early 19th century, and life returns to normal. Sheriff Binder apologizes to his son for doubting him and Ernest. Ernest is happy that his dog is also back to normal.

Brainiac crash lands on Earth and hijacks Lex Labs to collect Earth's data and amass the power of its weapons systems. Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen are sent to one of Lex Luthor's laboratories after Brainiac arrives on Earth on a meteor, successfully dodging the attempts made by Luthor's satellite to destroy any potential damage to the Earth in an attempt to boost his popularity against Superman as the true hero of the people. Superman shortly arrives and finds Brainiac downloading data from the computers with information relating the various forms of weaponry from LexCorp, including the laser-equipped meteor shield that had attempted to destroy Brainiac earlier. Using his ice breath, Superman is able to seemingly destroy Brainiac, after Superman and Brainiac had engaged in battle.

Witnessing the incident, and how his satellite could be used as an effective weapon against Superman, Luthor finds Brainiac's still intact brain chip and takes it to LexCorp, where he reactivates Brainiac. He then proposes that Brainiac, with the technology of LexCorp as well as Kryptonite, defeat Superman, and then Luthor step in to chase Brainiac away from the Earth, in front of the world to make him appear as Earth's true hero, where he will then be free to conquer other planets, leaving Lex in charge of Earth. Brainiac accepts the agreement, and proceeds to rebuilding and improving himself.

Meanwhile, Clark Kent contemplates the idea of revealing his secret identity to Lois. The opportunity presents itself when editor Perry White, due to staff shortages, sends both Kent and Lois to review a restaurant in Metropolis. During this time, however, Brainiac returns. Among his improvements is the ability to track down Superman based on his DNA. After another battle with Brainiac, Superman has been significantly affected by Brainiac's kryptonite power rays, and Lois is critically injured in the process. It is revealed that her blood has been infected with a kryptonite, metallic-based poison, that is galvanizing her blood cells and if not treated, would prove fatal.

Feeling guilty, Superman obtains a sample of Lois' blood from the hospital and returns to the Fortress of Solitude where he analyzes Lois' blood using his Kryptonian technology. It is then when Superman discovers that the only cure for Lois' condition is to obtain a chemical substance, known as Argonium 44, from the Phantom Zone. However, Brainiac is able to locate Superman in his Antarctic retreat, and attempts to download the information of Krypton from Superman's computer. Superman then initiates a self-destruct sequence. Brainiac, not being able to locate Superman, presumes that he has been killed in the explosion. Superman had, in fact, gone into the Phantom Zone in order to find the Argonium 44, which would not only cure Lois and heal himself, but provide him with increased strength against Brainiac by shielding him from his kryptonite blast.

Brainiac returns to Metropolis where Luthor awaits in order to fulfill their agreement. Jimmy investigates Lex and realizes that he is working with Brainiac. Brainiac, however, intends to kill Luthor in order to conquer Earth, and had even removed the self-destructive component that Luthor had planted should Brainiac double cross him. Superman seemingly returns through a portal and cures Lois, but when bringing her out of the hospital, he realizes this experience is an illusion created by the Phantom Zone when Lois repeatedly goads him to stay with her and not go after Brainiac. After this, he is chased and attacked by several Phantoms before he actually escapes the Phantom Zone.

Returning to Metropolis, Superman and Brainiac engage in a lengthy battle, during which Luthor is injured in the crossfire. Mercy discovers Jimmy looking for evidence against Luthor and brutally attacks him. Eventually he takes over one of Lex's large, robotic exoskeletons and knocks her unconscious. Unfortunately, his camera is destroyed by his attack, relieving him of the chance to photograph evidence of Lex's schemes, much to his dismay. Superman seemingly defeats Brainiac and then returns to the hospital in order to cure the ailing Lois. But before Lois can take the cure, Braniac, who is now only a head, attacks the hospital and smashes the cure. Immediately afterwards, Superman finally destroys Brainiac by breaking his brain chip.

With the cure now destroyed, Lois faces certain death. Superman, regretting never telling Lois his true feelings then embraces her. It is then that his tears, containing Argonium 44 that had healed him earlier, makes contact with Lois, curing her. She presumes him to be Clark, but Superman, (having changed his mind for her safety) tells her he is just Superman. Later, Superman recovers a piece of his destroyed Kryptonian technology where he aims to rebuild his fortress. He then vows to quit his job at the Daily Planet in an attempt to prevent future harm to his loved ones, should any of his enemies discover his secret identity.

The movie ends with an injured Luthor facing criminal prosecution after the discovery of LexCorp's involvement with Brainiac's attack, and Lois racing to cover the appearance of Mr. Mxyzptlk (whose name Perry White struggles to pronounce) in Metropolis. Seeing Lois' eagerness to put herself in harm's way in order to cover a story, Superman goes back on his earlier decision to quit the Daily Planet so that he can be with Lois, as well as Metropolis' protector against the most powerful threats from the universe.

The story takes place in Istanbul, where a violent criminal organization led by Spider-Man surfaces in the city with counterfeit United States dollars. They also mutilate a woman's face via a boat propeller. A small task-force consisting of Captain America, Santo and Captain America's girlfriend, Julia arrives to help local police stop Spider-Man and his gang.

Julia, who has infiltrated Spider-Man's hideout, is captured and taken to a house in a remote location. She manages to send an SOS signal to the Captain. Captain America saves Julia and chases after Spider-Man, who manages to escape.

Meanwhile, Mexico's national superhero/wrestler, Santo, infiltrates the dojo that is used as a front for counterfeiting. After being captured, he manages to escape along with incriminating evidence.

Captain America and Santo raid a very important hideout where most of the counterfeiting operation is taking place. They manage to shut down the hideout while Spider-Man kills a couple, steals a statue and runs away.

Soon afterwards, another fight between heroes and Spider-Man begins. It is revealed that Spider-Man is able to spawn duplicates of himself when killed, as one Spider-Man is beaten to a pulp by Santo and another is strangled to death by Captain America.

Captain America and Santo then go undercover in a nightclub. Spider-Man's gang notice them and a fight occurs. The heroes are seemingly overpowered this time and are taken to Spider-Man's hideout. Once there Captain America and Santo act like they are fighting themselves to confuse their captors but manage to break out and eliminate most of the gang members. Spider-Man arrives at the end of the fight with his girlfriend, only to have her struck by a wild shot from the gun of one of his henchmen. He flees, with Captain America in hot pursuit.

Captain America catches Spider-Man and defeats him, only to hear the taunting laugh of yet another Spider-Man. The fight continues until each Spider-Man is dead.

As the heroes are about to leave Istanbul, Captain America sees what appears to be Spider-Man sitting in the back of a taxi and furiously runs to the taxi, grabs the person and immediately removes his mask only to realize that it was just a young boy wearing a red wrestling mask.

Jesus is crucified on Mount Golgotha. To the side of the crowd stands Barabbas. A violent man, a brigand, and a rebel, he cannot muster much respect for the resignation of the Man who died in his place. He is skeptical about the Holiness of Jesus, but he is also fascinated by His sacrifice. He seeks out different followers of Jesus in trying to understand Him, but finds that their exalted views of Jesus do not match his down-to-earth observation of Him. More important, since Barabbas has never been the recipient of love (the cornerstone of the Christian faith), he finds that he is unable to understand love and, hence, unable to understand the Christian faith. He says that he "wants to believe," but for Barabbas, understanding is a prerequisite for belief, so he is unable to.

Enslaved, shackled to another man named Sahak, and condemned to work in the notoriously life-shortening and infernal copper mines of Ancient Rome, Barabbas has an extraordinary crisis of faith, the exact nature of which is elucidated in the final portion of the novel. Barabbas's ultimate loyalties lie with the opaque, remorseless void that fed and surrounded his former life, manifested in the darkness of the night of his execution, which he surrenders himself to with his final breath.

Mamie Cutter is an American living in London. She supports herself by getting questionable people into fashionable social circles, in return for a fee. Her worthless but personable half-brother Scott Homer turns up at her apartment looking for a handout.

A particularly tough case for Mamie is a certain Mrs. Medwin, who is apparently beyond the pale even by the lax standards of current English society. But Scott comes to Mamie's rescue by charming the snooty Lady Wantrigde into inviting Mrs. Medwin to one of her exclusive parties. Mamie collects her fee and Scott becomes an unexpected social success.

Harvey Cheyne (Freddie Bartholomew) is the spoiled son of American business tycoon Frank Burton Cheyne (Melvyn Douglas). Harvey is shunned by his classmates at a private boarding school, and eventually suspended for bad behavior. His father therefore takes him on a business trip to Europe, travelling there by trans-Atlantic steamship. Mid-passage, Harvey falls overboard in the Grand Banks of Newfoundland. He is rescued by a Portuguese-American fisherman, Manuel Fidello (Spencer Tracy), and taken aboard the fishing schooner "''We're Here"'', from Gloucester, Massachusetts.

Harvey is shocked the schooner's captain, Disko Troop (Lionel Barrymore), intends fishing in the Atlantic for three more months. He fails to persuade the captain to take him back to New York nor can he convince him of his wealth; but Captain Troop offers Harvey temporary crew membership until they return to port. Harvey is reluctant to do real work but eventually accepts. Befriended by Captain Troop's son, Dan (Mickey Rooney), he becomes acclimated to the demanding fishing lifestyle. The ''We're Here'' fills with fish they catch. When a prank of Harvey's causes a fish hook to lodge in a crewman's arm, Manuel defends the boy.

In the climactic race back to the Gloucester, Massachusetts port against a rival schooner, the ''Jennie Cushman'', Manuel climbs to the top of the mast to furl the sail. However, the mast cracks and he is plunged into the icy sea, tangled in the rigging that will cut him in half. Manuel speaks to the cook in Portuguese and the cook tells the Captain: All the bottom half of him is gone, and he doesn't want the boy to see. He tells the captain to cut him free from the boat, knowing this will kill him. Harvey crawls out on the wreckage, crying and distraught, while the captain strikes blow after blow after blow with the ax until the rigging finally parts. Manuel kisses the cross around his neck and sinks below the water. The schooner returns to port and Harvey is reunited with his father, who is impressed by his son's maturity. Harvey grieves for Manuel, pushing his father away and wanting to stay on the ''We're Here,'' but Disko reassures Cheyne, telling him that there is room in Harvey's heart for both men and that once there he “will find Manuel mighty satisfactory company.” At the church, Harvey lights two candles, one from Manuel to his father and one from him to Manuel. His father overhears Harvey praying that someday he will be with Manuel again and follows the boy to Manuel's dory, floating near the ship. Harvey is inconsolable and begs Cheyne to leave him alone.

The next day, in front of the Fisherman's Memorial, he and his father join the Gloucester community in casting bouquets and wreaths on the outgoing tide in tribute to the men and boys lost during this fishing season. The last shot shows the Cheyne's car, speeding down the road with Manuel's dory on a trailer behind. Through the side window, we see that Harvey is laughing and gesturing, regaling his father with stories of his adventures. Dissolve to a close-up of a smiling Manuel and then to the Fisherman's Memorial.

A funny schoolgirl (Adah Glassbourg) becomes friends with a stand-up comedian called Tony Maroni (Jim Carrey) who is struggling with his career.

An old man named, Kim is telling his family history to his grand daughter, as she found the bones of his father.

When he was a boy, Kim's father was ill, when their lands flooded. His two buffaloes have no forage. Kim takes the two buffaloes in search of good grass. He joins Lap's herding team, but One of the two buffaloes dies.

Later he helps Det, who builds a new herding team with him, to reunite with his girl friend and their son, whom Det hasn't seen for 5 years.

When Kim hears his father is dying, he goes to U Minh. The father reveals the truth of Kim's ancestry. A couple of strangers help Kim put his father's corpse in a safe place in the water, until the flooding subsides and he can be properly buried.

Lap confirms what Kim's father told him as he died:--that Kim's true mother is the sister of Lap, whom Kim's father raped on a buffalo herding run.

Kim tries to rape Det's wife. Det dies in a skirmish between Lap's and Kieng's buffalo herding teams. Kim adopts Det's son, Thieu.

In a voiceover, Kim says that the Japanese came in to drive out the French, and then were themselves driven out. This political change does not seem to affect rural Vietnam.

A widowed schoolteacher, Anna, arrives in Bangkok with her young son, Louis, after being summoned to tutor the many children of King Mongkut. Both are introduced to the intimidating Kralahome, Siam's prime minister, who escorts them to the Royal Palace, where they will live, although Anna had been promised her own house. The King ignores her objections and introduces her to his head wife, Lady Thiang. Anna also meets a recent concubine, a young Burmese, Tuptim, and the fifteen children she will tutor, including his son and heir, Prince Chulalongkorn. In conversation with the other wives, Anna learns Tuptim is in love with Lun Tha, who brought her to Siam.

Anna still wants her own house and teaches the children about the virtues of home life, to the King's irritation, who disapproves of the influence of other cultures. She comes across Lun Tha and learns that he has been meeting Tuptim in secret. He asks her to arrange a rendezvous. The lovers meet under cover of darkness, and Lun Tha promises he will one day return to Siam and that they will escape together.

King Mongkut becomes troubled over rumors that the British regard him as a barbaric leader and are sending a delegation, including Anna's old admirer, Sir Edward, possibly to turn Siam into a protectorate. Anna persuades the King to receive them in European style by hosting a banquet with European food and music. In return, the King promises to give Anna her own house.

Sir Edward reminisces with Anna in an attempt to bring her back to British society. The King presents Tuptim's version of ''Uncle Tom's Cabin'' as a traditional Siamese ballet. However, the King and the Kralahome are not impressed, as the play involves slavery and shows the slaveholding King drowning in the river. During the show, Tuptim left the room to run away with Lun Tha.

After the guests have departed, the king reveals that Tuptim is missing. Anna explains that Tuptim is unhappy because she is just another woman in his eyes. The King retorts that men are entitled to a plenitude of wives, although women must remain faithful. Anna explains the reality of one man loving only one woman and recalls her first dance before she teaches the King how to dance the polka, but the touching moment is shattered when the Kralahome bursts into the room with the news Tuptim has been captured. For her dishonor, the King prepares to whip her despite Anna's pleas. She declares he is indeed a barbarian. The King then crumples, puts his hand over his heart, and runs out of the room. The Kralahome blames Anna for ruining him as Tuptim is led away in tears after learning Lun Tha was found dead and dumped into the river. That causes Anna to sever all ties as a governess and declare she will leave on the next boat from Siam.

On the night of her departure, Anna learns that the King is dying. Lady Thiang gives Anna his unfinished letter stating his deep gratitude and respect for her, despite their differences. Moments before the ship departs, he gives Anna his ring, as she has always spoken the truth to him, and persuades her and Louis to stay in Bangkok. He passes his title to Prince Chulalongkorn, who then issues a proclamation that ends slavery and states that all subjects will no longer bow down to him. The King dies, satisfied that his kingdom will be all right, and Anna lovingly presses her cheek to his hand.

On June 6, 1999, a team of archaeologists discovered an ancient doorway that, when unintentionally opened, awakened Baal, a forgotten demonic entity, and his army of evil creatures. Baal's army storms the humans and manages to seize a weapon of war that allows their master to rule over and enslave humanity. In desperation, humanity holds a council of war that plans a counterattack to recover the stolen weapon and eliminate Baal. It is decided to create the Time Warriors, a futuristic combat unit that must infiltrate, by teleportation, the enemy's lair. The stolen weapon has been scattered there and must be found because the fate of humanity depends on it.

Part one

Mouse introduces herself, and mentions her involvement in Paulie's "weird, Napoleonic act of self-assertion", though she does not specify exactly what it was that Paulie did, or even who she is. Mouse speaks of her distracted father, Morley, and her critical stepmother, Sal. She also tells the reader of the hump she has in her left shoulder as a result of a childhood bout of polio, which developed into kyphosis. Mouse has named the hump Alice, after her dead mother, and says that the hump is like a friend to her. Throughout the novel, Mouse's conversations with Alice provide comic relief and exposition on the story's dark events. In the second chapter, Mouse pauses the narrative and recounts details from Paulie's trial, something she continues to do sporadically throughout the novel. It emerges that Paulie committed a murder of some kind.

Mouse recalls how she was sent to the boarding school in Toronto- Bath Ladies' College- because her father had "an unfortunate inferiority complex about bringing up females" and because its headmistress, Vera Vaughan, was a distant cousin of Morley's. Mouse is nervous, keenly aware of her shyness and her physical shortcomings, and is bewildered by the strange atmosphere of the old-fashioned school. She meets the friendly janitor, Sergeant (who is a dwarf), and Paulie's brother, Lewis, whom she later catches shaving in her new dorm bathroom. Mouse meets Tory and Paulie that evening, immediately warming to the friendly Tory and taken aback by Paulie's brash manner. It is clear that, different as they are, the two have a very close friendship. Tory tells Mouse that Paulie's brother, Lewis, is her boyfriend, and that they are in love.

Mouse settles quickly, but not comfortably, into the school, picking up the lexicon and the consensus regarding the staff of the school amongst the students. The intensity of her fixation with John F. Kennedy is evident in the long, familiar letters that she sends him on a regular basis.

To both Mouse and Paulie's chagrin, Tory breaks her leg in a field hockey accident and is sent home for the rest of the winter term. Tiring of Paulie's volatile behaviour, Miss Vaughan orders Paulie to 'walk off' her frustrations at the school every evening after class, and assigns Mouse to accompany her. The two form a kind of bond, and Paulie soon reveals to Mouse that she doesn't have a brother named Lewis; it is actually her, masquerading as a boy, and that she has everyone fooled, even Tory. She takes Mouse to the shrine she has made to the 1933 film ''King Kong'', and sets Mouse a series of bizarre tests to prove that she, too, can 'be' a boy. These include: eating six bowls of tapioca pudding without vomiting, letting a match burn to the skin without crying, and managing to urinate whilst standing up.

After Mouse completes these 'preliminaries', she embarks upon three major tests: mastery over other men, mastery over women and mastery over nature; in the first, Mouse creates her male alter-ego 'Nick the Greek', and dresses as a boy for the first time. Mouse and Paulie pick a fight with boys from the nearby King's College, one of whom is Tory's elder brother, Rick. In the second, Paulie challenges Mouse to seduce an overweight girl from the local convent school, which she does, though the outcome borders on comical; the girl in question, Josie, is found to have known all along that 'Nick' was a girl, and bursts into tears when Mouse hesitates to caress her. In the third test, Paulie challenges Mouse to kill a pigeon.

Mouse's reluctance to do these tasks emphasises that her wish to be a man is not founded on a genuine desire to become one, or even on an attraction to girls. Rather, Mouse longs for the freedom that the men of the time enjoyed, which she believes she will never be able to experience as a woman.

In Tory's absence, teacher's pet Ismay Thom moves into Mouse and Paulie's dorm room. Her pushy presence aggravates Paulie, but Mouse warms to Ismay's eccentric but likeable character.

Paulie leads Mouse in a break-in to Mrs Peddie's private quarters, where they stumble upon correspondence between Miss Vaughan and Mrs Peddie, written years before. The letters detail an incident in which Miss Vaughan was assaulted by a police officer, who had seen her kissing Mrs Peddie. Paulie steals them, and hides them in Mouse's bedside drawer. When Mouse checks on them in the morning, they have disappeared.

In Tory's absence, Paulie's behaviour worsens, and she is banned from attending the Visitor's Luncheon at King's College. Mouse is taken there by her Uncle Winnie (her mother's brother) and his wife. Whilst there, she sees Tory with Lewis in the yard outside. Lewis is chased from the school, after being seen vandalising a statue. Amidst the uproar, the news is broken that President Kennedy has been assassinated.

Mouse is devastated by the news of the President's death, but is cheered by letters from Jack O'Malley, a King's College student she met at the Luncheon. Paulie's behaviour becomes increasingly sinister; she instructs Mouse to beat her with an old cane, and when she hesitates, Paulie beats her with it instead, hard enough to draw blood. Mouse admits that she continued to go along with Paulie's tests because Paulie's evil character absolves her of all the things in her life that she cannot change (i.e., not being worthy of Morley's love, not having any friends) and makes her even more innocent.

After performing in the Christmas show, Mouse is summoned to Miss Vaughan's office, where she is told that Morley has died from a sudden heart attack.

Part two

Mouse returns to her home in Madoc's Landing to bury her father. Though she seems cold and distant to the reality of his death, it is obvious that she is devastated. Her stepmother Sal, who is frequently heard as Mouse's voice of conscience, is revealed to be an alcoholic. Miss Vaughan attends the funeral, bringing Paulie, who tells Mouse that Rick is trying to stop Tory from seeing Lewis. Miss Vaughan asks Mouse to keep what she has discovered in her and Mrs Peddie's letters to herself.

Mouse resolves to never dress as a boy again, and meditates on her father's lack of affection for her. She concludes that he loved his work too much. Mouse returns to Bath College with keepsakes of his, one of them being a book on anatomy (he was a surgeon) and his old doctor's bag.

Part three

On returning to school, Mouse discovers that Paulie has been removed from her dorm room, replaced by Asa Abrams, and that Tory has returned. To her surprise, she receives quiet sympathy from her peers as well as her teachers, and is particularly touched by Tory's gift of a New Testament bible. Paulie has been forced to take Asa's old cubicle. Her exile makes her noticeably friendlier to Mouse. Paulie discloses that she (as Lewis) got into a fight with Rick and injured him with a knife, and that Tory was upset with her for doing it. Ismay tells Mouse that Paulie has been carving lurid stick figures on her bedstead and stealing her music scores, which Paulie laughingly denies.

Lewis drives Mouse to King's College on the evening of the Christmas dance, to pick up Jack O'Malley. The two make awkward conversation as Lewis drives to Canon Quinn's house to pick Tory up. Mouse sees Rick and Lewis arguing and scuffling at the door of the Quinns' house; Lewis returns to the van noticeably upset and without Tory. Once alone, Lewis reveals to Mouse that Rick had challenged Lewis to prove he was a boy by showing him his penis, and begins to cry.

Mouse eventually leaves Paulie, and joins Jack inside. They become involved in the festivities, drinking gin and "fooling around for the longest time standing up". Toward the end of the evening, Mouse breaks away and searches for Paulie, finally finding her in the tower washroom, her hair shorn and her face cut and bleeding. Paulie angrily brushes Mouse away when she tries to comfort her, and says that she's not giving up on Tory. They are distracted by Sergeant, who has dressed up as the school's dead founder, Miss Higgs, for the evening, and is tearing round the school on an antiquated Victorian bicycle. The girls try to follow him, but Mouse loses Paulie in the darkness. She looks for her in her room, and discovers Ismay's musical scores in there, along with pages ripped from her father's ''Gray's Anatomy''; the pages depict the male penis, and have been annotated by Paulie. Tired, and tipsy from the alcohol Jack gave her, Mouse goes to bed.

Mouse wakes early the next morning and, worried by Paulie's prolonged absence, goes to look for her in the tunnels beneath the school. She finds Paulie distressed, saying that Sergeant has fallen against one of the heating pipes and hurt himself. She takes Mouse to his prone body, then sends her to get the Czech groundskeeper, Willy. Sergeant is unconscious, and badly burned from falling against the scalding pipes. When Mouse returns with him, she finds Sergeant dead, and Paulie gone. Remembering what she found the evening before, a horrified Mouse suspects what Paulie has done. Lifting his costume skirts, Mouse sees that Sergeant has been castrated.

Mouse recalls details from Paulie's trial, and informs the reader what happened next; after removing Sergeant's genitals with one of Morley's scalpels, Paulie had stuck them to herself with tire glue, and presented herself to Rick Quinn in her chilling garb. She was arrested shortly after, and found to be too mentally unstable to take full responsibility for her actions; eluding jail, Paulie was sent to a mental institution for "rehabilitation". Tory was sent to another school (though the court heard that she continued to see Paulie whilst she was in custody), and Mouse was sent home to Madoc's Landing until the furor over her involvement in Paulie's crime had died down. She recalls a dream she had about Sergeant after his memorial service, and says she's glad that he didn't know it was not his friend Lewis who had killed him, but Paulie.

Now sixteen, Mouse looks back on her time at Bath's College, crediting the girls and women there who inspired her to be herself, and signs herself off as 'M.B.'

Morris Gedge is a librarian at a dull provincial library in England that is "all granite, fog and female fiction." He gets a welcome offer to become the custodian of the Shakespeare house at Stratford-on-Avon. Although Shakespeare's name is never mentioned in the story (James used the name twice in his ''Notebooks'' when he was planning the tale) it's obvious to whom "the supreme Mecca of the English-speaking race" is devoted.

Once installed as the custodian, Morris begins to doubt the chatter he is forced to give to tourists who visit the home. He starts to qualify and hesitate in his spiel. This brings anguish to his wife and a warning from the shrine's proprietors. Gedge finally decides that if silliness is what's wanted, he'll supply it abundantly. The last section of the story shows him delivering a hilarious lecture on how the child Shakespeare played around the house. Of course, receipts from tourists increase and Gedge gets a raise.

In 1947, Stingo moves to Brooklyn to write a novel and is befriended by Sophie Zawistowska, a Polish immigrant, and her emotionally unstable lover, Nathan Landau. Nathan is constantly jealous and, when he is in one of his violent mood swings, he convinces himself that Sophie is unfaithful to him, and he abuses and harasses her. A flashback shows how Nathan first met Sophie after her immigration to the U.S. when she nearly died due to anemia.

Sophie tells Stingo before she came to the U.S., her husband and father were killed in a German work camp, and she was interned in the Auschwitz concentration camp. Stingo later learns from a college professor Sophie's father was a Nazi sympathizer. When Stingo confronts Sophie with this, she admits the truth and tells him about her war-time lover, Józef, who lived with his half-sister, Wanda, and was a leader in the Resistance. Wanda tried to convince Sophie to translate some stolen Gestapo documents, but Sophie declined, fearing she might endanger her children. Two weeks later, Józef was murdered by the Gestapo and Sophie was arrested and sent to Auschwitz with her two children, Jan and Eva.

Nathan tells Sophie and Stingo he is doing groundbreaking research at a pharmaceutical company, but Nathan's physician brother tells Stingo Nathan has paranoid schizophrenia and all of the schools Nathan attended were "expensive funny farms". Nathan is not a biologist as he claims. He does have a job at a pharmaceutical firm, which his brother obtained for him, but it is in the library, and he only occasionally assists with research.

After Nathan believes Sophie has betrayed him again, he calls Sophie and Stingo on the telephone and fires a gun in a violent rage. Sophie and Stingo flee to a hotel. She reveals to him that, upon arrival at Auschwitz, she was forced to choose which one of her two children would be gassed and which would proceed to the labor camp. To avoid having both children killed, she chose Jan to be sent to the children's camp and Eva to be murdered in the gas chamber.

Sophie and Stingo have sex, but while Stingo is sleeping, Sophie returns to Nathan. Sophie and Nathan commit suicide by taking cyanide. Stingo recites the poem "Ample Make This Bed" by Emily Dickinson, the American poet Sophie was fond of reading.

Stingo moves to a small farm his father recently inherited in southern Virginia to finish writing his novel.

County Cork, Ireland, 1920. Damien O'Donovan is about to leave his native village to practice medicine in a London hospital. Meanwhile, his brother Teddy commands the local flying column of the Irish Republican Army. After a hurling match, Damien witnesses the summary execution of his friend, Micheál Ó Súilleabháin, by British Black and Tans, for refusing to say his name in English. Although shaken, Damien rebuffs his friends' entreaties to stay in Ireland and join the IRA, saying that the war is unwinnable. As he is leaving town, Damien witnesses the British Army vainly trying to intimidate a railway personnel for refusing to permit the troops to board. In response, Damien decides to stay and is sworn into Teddy's IRA brigade.

After drilling in the mountains, the column raids the village's Royal Irish Constabulary barracks to acquire revolvers, then uses them to assassinate four Auxiliaries. In the aftermath, Anglo-Irish landowner Sir John Hamilton coerces one of his servants, IRA member Chris Reilly, into passing information to the British Army's Intelligence Corps. As a result, the entire brigade is arrested. In their cell, Damien meets the train driver, Dan, a union official who shares Damien's socialist views.

Meanwhile, British officers interrogate Teddy, pulling out his fingernails when he refuses to give them the names of IRA members. Johnny Gogan, a British soldier of Irish descent, helps the prisoners escape, but three are left behind. After the actions of Sir John and Chris are revealed to the IRA's intelligence network, both are taken hostage. As Teddy is still recovering, Damien is temporarily placed in command. News arrives that the three remaining IRA prisoners have been tortured and shot. Simultaneously, the brigade receives orders to "execute the spies".

Despite the fact that Chris is a lifelong friend, Damien shoots both him and Sir John. Later, the IRA ambushes and wipes out a convoy of the Auxiliary Division, and in retaliation another detachment of Auxiliaries loots and burns the farmhouse of Damien's sweetheart, Cumann na mBan member Sinéad Sullivan. Sinéad is held at gunpoint while her head is roughly shorn, her scalp being wounded in the process. Later, as Damien treats her, a messenger arrives with news of a formal ceasefire between Britain and the IRA.

After the Anglo-Irish Treaty is signed, the brigade learns that a partitioned Ireland will only be granted Dominion status within the British Empire. As a result, the brigade divides over accepting the terms of the Treaty. Teddy and his allies argue that accepting the Treaty will bring peace now while further gains can be made later. Others oppose the Treaty, proposing to continue fighting until a united Irish Republic can be obtained. Dan and Damien further demand the collectivisation of industry and agriculture. Any other course, declares Dan, will change only "the accents of the powerful and the colour of the flag".

Soon the Irish Free State replaces British rule, and Teddy and his allies begin patrolling in National Army uniforms. Meanwhile, Damien and his allies join the Anti-Treaty IRA. When the Battle of Dublin launches the Irish Civil War, the Anti-Treaty column commences guerrilla warfare against Free State forces. As the violence escalates, Teddy expresses fear that the British will invade if the republicans gain the upper hand. His position is: "They take one out, we take one back. To hell with the courts."

Soon after, Dan is killed and Damien is captured during a raid for arms on an Irish Army barracks commanded by Teddy. Sentenced to execution, Damien is held in the same cell where the British Army imprisoned them earlier. Desperate to avoid executing his brother, Teddy pleads with Damien to reveal where the Anti-Treaty IRA is hiding the stolen rifles. In return, Teddy offers Damien full amnesty, a life with Sinéad, and the vision of an Ireland where Pro- and Anti-Treaty Irishmen can raise families side by side. Insulted, Damien responds by saying that he will never "sell out" the Republic the way Chris Reilly did and Teddy leaves the cell in tears. Damien writes a goodbye letter to Sinéad, expressing his love for her, and quoting Dan's words: "It's easy to know what you're against, quite another to know what you're for". But he says that he knows what he stands for and is not afraid to die for it and tells Sinéad to look after Teddy. At dawn, Damien dies before a firing squad commanded by a heartbroken yet obstinate Teddy. Teddy delivers Damien's letter to Sinéad who is distraught and heartbroken. She attacks Teddy and orders him to leave her land.

Debbie's favorite band is Dream Street, and her favorite member is Chris Trousdale. When Chris gets a fever while travelling on the Dream Street tour, in a haze, he strays away and ends up in Debbie's bed, much to the shock of his "Biggest Fan", who thinks she's in heaven. Debbie proposes that Chris stay with her and he agrees. So, over the week they spend time together and she secretly hides him so he can escape the pressures of being a pop star for a little while. Chris even attends high school with Debbie, while disguised as a nerd. Meanwhile, the band's managers are going crazy at the loss of the star, thinking he has been kidnapped. At the end of the week Debbie and Chris (in disguise) go to her high school prom where two jealous popular girls figure out Chris's true identity and tell the police about Chris's whereabouts, splitting him and Debbie up. They are eventually reunited on stage at a concert, ending in a sweet, final kiss and a performance by Dream Street.

Princess Adelina "Addie" is fearful and shy. Princess Meryl is bold and brave. They are sisters, and they mean the world to each other. Bamarre is plagued by a fatal disease called the Gray Death, which has three stages: Weakness, Sleep, and then Fever. While the weakness may last for hours to weeks, the sleep always lasts nine days, and the fever always lasts three. Bamarre also has specters, which lure travelers to their deaths unless exposed, sorcerers, ogres, dwarves, elves, gryphons, dragons, and fairies. Fairies, however, have not been seen since Drualt, Bamarre's greatest hero and subject of myths, went up to visit them after the tragic death of his sweetheart Freya.

The two princesses strike up a friendship with Rhys, the apprentice sorcerer helping their father. Soon after, Princess Meryl is suddenly struck ill with the Gray Death. Princess Addie has trouble coming to terms with the fact that Princess Meryl is going to die, while her elder sister tries in vain to prove her theory that the Gray Death might be cured if the person who is ill refuses to be sick, running when weak, staying awake when tired, etc. Since a prophecy from a long ago specter states that :''The Gray Death will be cured'' :''When cowards find courage'' :''And rain falls over all Bamarre''

When King Lionel returns just as cowardly as before, Princess Addie sets out to find the cure herself. Using a pair of seven-league boots and a magical spyglass from her deceased mother Queen Daria, a copy of ''Drualt,'' a camouflage cloak, a magic tablecloth from Rhys, some of Milton's herbs and Princess Meryl's sword Blood-Biter, Princess Addie successfully travels to the Mulee forest to find a specter, only to be tricked by one that took on the form of Rhys. The real Rhys makes her realize the truth, and she learns from the specter that a dragon would be her best bet for finding the cure. Rhys has to leave for the Sorcerers' Citadel, but not before Addie realizes that there's more behind their friendship.

After accidentally overcoming a pack of gryphons with her tablecloth, Princess Addie is found by the dragon Vollys and taken to her lair. Although dragons are solitary creatures, they are also lonely, so Princess Addie is forced to entertain Vollys to avoid a fiery demise in Vollys' stomach. She does this through her embroidery, which is her sole bold attribute. Although Princess Addie is terrified of the dragon, she learns that Vollys is always sad when she eats her "guests" after they have angered her one time too many. Princess Addie also learns the dragon version of Drualt's story, which portrays the hero as a villain who mercilessly kills noble dragons, including Vollys' mother. Vollys also tells Addie that the Gray Death came from her mother's corpse, a revenge for her death. Because she does not think Addie can escape, Vollys also tells Addie that the Gray Death can be cured by the water of a waterfall that flows from Mount Ziriat, the fairies' invisible mountain. She even tells Addie where the mountain is. Meanwhile, Addie learns through her spyglass that Meryl has entered the sleeping stage of the Gray Death, and later fever stage of the Gray Death.

Addie manages to escape Vollys with her boots, and returns to the castle. After reuniting with Rhys, Meryl tells Addie that she has until the next dawn to live. Addie tells them about the cure, and she and Rhys uses the seven-league boots to carry Meryl to the mountain. They end up outside the same village that refused to help Drualt's sweetheart due to their cowardice. Upon questioning, the isolated villagers say that although they have heard of the Gray Death, no one in the village has ever had it. The three also learn that all the villagers drink from a waterfall that comes from a mountain so tall and shrouded in mist that no one has ever seen it. Realizing that they are talking about Mount Ziriat, and the villagers are never sick because they drink the water, Rhys and the Princesses manage to find a few villagers courageous enough and willing to show them the waterfall, which is a few hours away, despite the dark night and the threat of ogres and gryphons. While they walk, Rhys confesses his love to Addie, and she does the same. Just as they reach the waterfall, though, the party is attacked by ogres, gryphons and an enraged Vollys. The sky begins to lighten, and Addie tells Meryl, who is having the time of her life in battle, to run to the water and drink. While she is running, though, Addie is caught by an ogre unexpectedly and screams in pain. Meryl runs back to rescue her when the first rays of sunlight come, just as rain begins to fall. Addie is knocked unconscious, Meryl falls to the ground, and wholes of light fly down.

When Addie wakes up, she learns from Meryl, who seems different somehow, that they were rescued by fairies and taken to the top of Mount Ziriat. The rain had fallen everywhere, curing all with the Gray Death except those who were too close to death to save. When Addie gained the courage to save her sister, and when the cowardly villagers redeemed themselves by helping Meryl and Addie, the fairies made water from their enchanted waterfall rain over all Bamarre. Meryl also tells Addie that she, too, was one of those on the brink of death when the rain came, so the fairies could not truly save her. However, they offered to transform her into a fairy and join them in an endless battle against fearsome, monstrous creatures, the outcome of which affects the world below. Meryl accepted the offer, and is now a fairy, unable to return with Addie. Addie also learns from Meryl that she is now with Drualt, who was also transformed after leaving Bamarre, and that he had been the presence Addie felt in her darkest hours, cheering her up and giving her the strength to go on. Rhys and Addie marry and live happily ever after, with Meryl as Fairy Godmother to their children and grandchildren, the first after hundreds of years. The book concludes with a Drault-like tale, recounting the adventures of the two Princesses of Bamarre.

The story is written in diary form, describing the impact of revolutionary thinking on the part of a family member.

Aristocrat Timotheus von Bock (the diarist's brother in law) writes a letter to the Czar criticising the way in which the Czar's family runs the country. He justifies this act by an oath made to the Czar to give an honest appraisal of the situation.

Von Bock is imprisoned as a traitor (although the reason for his imprisonment is kept secret, as is the letter) for 9 years before being released into house arrest on the basis that he is 'mad'.

The main character of this game, referred to as "you" by the game engine, is a treasure hunter. The player starts the game at the southern edge of the forest kingdom, with few possessions. An early encounter with the innkeeper of The Sword Inn may persuade the player to rent a small log cabin from him. In the cabin are some very meager supplies, such as a plain jug.

To progress through the game, the player must determine which characters to regard as friends, and which as foes. Some characters, such as a gorilla who attacks the player with a wooden club, are clearly presented as foes, while others are ambiguous.

There are two kingdoms - a forest and a desert - separated by a deep canyon. Each kingdom is ruled by a king, and the kings do not get along with one another. The player is told that the situation has got worse recently, and a royal from the forest kingdom is missing, the crime being attributed to the desert king. With two rich kingdoms at war, it is suggested that the player could take advantage of this and loot treasure from both sides. As the game progresses, the player finds it a challenge to transport spoils back to the log cabin, and is forced at times to choose between carrying a treasure and carrying a weapon, both types of object being at risk of theft if left unguarded.

The plot develops over time. In the original BBC Micro game, there were a limited number of locations and graphics. Some additions appear in the C64 version, though the plot is largely the same. The modern smartphone edition of the game yet more locations and some new plot twists.

''All About Anna'' tells the story of Anna (Gry Bay), a single woman who seeks to maintain an active sex life while staying clear of emotional involvement, after having been jilted by the love of her life, Johan (Mark Stevens). She has a relationship with Frank (Thomas Raft), but refuses to let him move in with her. When Johan shows up again after five years absence, she starts wondering how much longer she can maintain her emotional independence, and if that is what she wants. She has sex with him, loses his telephone number and cannot contact him. She ends her affair with Frank and when she is offered a job as costume designer in a French theatre, she decides to move to Paris. She leaves her flat to her flatmate Camilla (Eileen Daly) who asks her permission to rent out the now empty room to a friend of hers. This friend turns out to be Johan, and Anna meets him as she leaves for Paris, where the local stage actors Pierre (Morten Schelbech) and Sophie (Ovidie) offer new amorous temptations, but she worries about Johan finding a new love. In the end she returns to Copenhagen and, after mistakenly thinking that Johan has been unfaithful to her, she faces her fears of commitment and is reunited with him.

Bob Munro, a successful California beverage company executive, is struggling to reconnect with his dysfunctional family, which includes his materialistic wife, Jamie, his irritable and brash sixteen-year-old daughter, Cassie, and his mischievous twelve-year-old son, Carl, who is an aspiring weightlifter and likes hip hop. At a company picnic, Bob is embarrassed in front of his self-absorbed boss, Todd Mallory, by Cassie's militant friend, Gretchen, who hurls a bottle of schmaltz all over Todd's face for putting unhealthy drinks in schools. Looking forward to a big family vacation in Hawaii, the Munros are forced to cancel it when Todd, out of spite, tells Bob that he has to attend a merger meeting with the Alpine Soda company in Boulder, Colorado instead, or else he will be fired. Concealing the real reason for not going to Hawaii, he rents a garish RV from the dodgy dealer Irv and tells his family they are traveling to the Rockies, much to their dismay.

During their trip, the Munros have many mishaps, which include Bob damaging the parking brake, crashing into and running over various objects, flushing out a trio of raccoons with a stink bomb, and fixing a clogged sewage system. Along the way, the Munros meet another traveling family, the Gornickes, consisting of Travis, his wife Mary Jo, and their children, Earl, Moon, and Billy. Earl develops a romantic interest in Cassie, and Carl starts to like Moon, but thinking that the Gornickes are too strange for them, Bob and Jamie decide to ditch them. When they reappear at another stop, the Munros believe they are stalking them. Meanwhile, Bob tries to e-mail a proposal outline from his laptop, working in restrooms. Eventually, a hitchhiker steals it, leaving him with only a BlackBerry PDA, which he does manage to use to compose and wirelessly send his proposal to his company. The Gornickes then recover the stolen laptop after picking up the same hitchhiker and persuading him to return it.

Eventually, the Munros begin to enjoy their trip. In order to attend the meeting, Bob distracts his family by faking illness and sends them on a hike. The meeting is a success, and Bob is invited to talk to the whole company again the next day. Rushing back to his family in the RV, he takes a treacherous 4 wheel drive trail, and gets the huge RV stuck atop a mountain in the middle of the trail. He eventually manages to dislodge the RV from the mountain by getting on the front and rocking it until it eventually wobbles and tips forward enough to slide down from atop the mountain. Now riding on the front while it is traveling at a frenzied pace, Bob barely manages to return to his family in time. While Bob is attempting a similar ruse the next day, the parking brake fails again and the RV rolls into a lake. Bob comes clean about the true purpose of the trip, and his family becomes upset that he would treat them like that. Still needing to get to the meeting, he asks them for help, but they refuse. He retrieves one of their bicycles from the lake the RV rolled into and pedals off by himself. His family hitchhikes and is then picked up by the Gornickes, and soon realize how well they get along with each other.

Bob appears again, climbing atop the moving RV. He apologizes to his family, and they, in turn, apologize to him for their selfishness and reveal that they love him more than the lifestyle his job gives them. As support, the two families accompany Bob to the next meeting.

At the meeting, Bob starts his speech and it goes well, but then he has an epiphany and recommends against the merger, realizing that Todd's selfishness would destroy a great independent company. Todd gets upset and tries to dismiss Bob's claims, but Cassie backs her father up by saying Todd was outsourcing the company. In retaliation, Todd fires Bob on the spot. Carl gets angry at Todd and flips him over his shoulder, onto the ground. Bob tells Todd that he quits anyway. Bob soon retrieves the sodden-but-still-operable RV from the lake. At the end, he is offered a job by the owners of Alpine Soda, who want to go national independently with Bob. In addition, at the same time, the parking brake fails once again, causing the RV to roll backwards, flattening both a police car and the Alpine Soda company owner's car.

Ultimately, the Munros and the Gornickes dance and sing "Route 66".

It is 1824 as Beethoven (Ed Harris) is finishing his Ninth Symphony. He is plagued by deafness, loneliness, and personal trauma. A new copyist, Anna Holtz (Diane Kruger) is engaged to help the composer finish preparing the score of his symphony for the first performance. Anna is a young conservatory student and aspiring composer. Her understanding of his work is such that she corrects mistakes he has made (the mistakes were made deliberately), while her personality opens a door into his private world. Beethoven is initially skeptical, but he slowly comes to trust Anna's assistance and eventually grows to rely on her and view her with respect, and even with admiration.

Anna Holtz (as Beethoven always refers to her) is sent to be his copyist, but due to her gender, is constantly thought less of, and is mistaken for a serving girl, maid, and even a prostitute. Pushing past, though quite unhappily, from these assumptions, Anna proves herself to Beethoven, not only as a copyist, but also as his friend, and something of his protégé and heir as far as he is concerned. He gains much admiration of her, after she assists him by directing him, hidden among his musicians (although she can be seen from the top seats), as he simultaneously copies her movements to direct the orchestra during what would turn out to be his final concert on stage. Though Anna agreed to her romantic interest, Martin Bauer, that she would help him complete his symphony, and then immediately leave after showing him her work, she instead continues to assist him as his copyist. After seeing the admiration she has gained from Beethoven, Anna proceeds to show him a piece of music that she composed. Beethoven tactlessly and unknowingly insults her. Anna, more than ready not to return, continues to stay with her great aunt and the nuns at the convent. Anna is surprised when Beethoven, desperate to keep Anna in his employment and under his tutelage, bursts into the convent and begs Anna, on his knees, to come back and work as his equal on both of their music. He begins to teach her about Romanticism, music, and mostly, how to allow her artistic side freedom. Continuing his infuriating behavior, Beethoven smashes the model of Martin's bridge he built for an engineer's competition, thereby ruining Martin as well. Anna, angry, confronts Beethoven, asking him if he had ever considered that she loved Martin. Beethoven replies, "You don't love him." Upon hearing this, Anna angrily asks if she is supposed to love Beethoven instead. Beethoven again replies, "No. You want to be me." From here, Anna agrees that Beethoven did the right thing, and continues to work with him, pushing him past his hardships and failures, and then staying by his bedside until he died (on March 26, 1827). The movie ends though, with Anna finally embracing herself as an artist, unique from all other composers, including Beethoven, and readying herself for a promising future.

Though the film is directed very abstractly, leaving room for the audience to view Anna and Beethoven's relationship as that of a chaste romance, the characters remain very platonic, and could much more easily be viewed as a strong and close friendship, bordering on Beethoven even being viewed as a father figure of Anna's.

Don Boni (Orellana) is diagnosed with a deadly disease and decides to spend his last days doing good deeds. He leaves his wife and decides to help people. He then gets drunk and wakes up with a winning lottery ticket and realizes that the doctor who diagnosed him has been sent to prison for fraud.

The story opens late one Christmas Day in an antique store, presumably in London during the mid 1880s. A man named Markheim has come even though the store is officially closed, and the rather shady dealer points out that whenever he comes to visit after hours, it is usually to privately sell a rare item, claiming it to be from a late uncle's collection he inherited. The dealer hints his suspicions that more likely Markheim stole these items, although it has not stopped him from purchasing them, usually for an amount less than what his client asked for. Markheim visibly flinches at the dealer's not-so-subtle insinuations, but claims that he has not come to sell anything this time, but rather to buy a Christmas present for a woman he will soon marry, implying she is well off. Though somewhat incredulous, the dealer suggests a mirror as a gift, but Markheim takes fright at his own reflection, claiming that no man wants to see what a mirror shows him. Markheim seems strangely reluctant to end the transaction, but when the dealer insists that his visitor must buy or leave, Markheim consents to review more goods. However, when the dealer turns his back to select another item, Markheim pulls out a knife and stabs him to death.

Surrounded by mirrors and ominously ticking clocks, and with only a candle to light up the dark shop, Markheim spends some minutes recovering his nerve when he hears someone moving about upstairs, though he knows the dealer's maidservant has taken the day off and no one should be there. He reassures himself that the outer door is locked, searches the dealer's body for keys and then goes to the upper rooms where the dealer lived to look for money, which he intends to use to start a business. As he searches for the right key to open the dealer's safe, he hears footsteps on the stairs, and a man opens the door and asks, "Did you call me?"

Markheim believes the stranger is the Devil. Though he never identifies himself, the stranger is clearly supernatural; he says that he has watched Markheim his whole life. He tells Markheim that the servant is returning to the store early, so Markheim had best hurry or face the consequences. He also offers to show Markheim the right key to open the safe, although he predicts that Markheim's business will not be successful. Indeed, the stranger clearly knows that much of Markheim's life has been unsuccessful, consisting of gambling and petty theft. Instead of continuing to loot the house, Markheim tries to justify his life and conduct to the stranger, entering into a discussion of the nature of good and evil. The stranger refutes him on every point, and Markheim is at last obliged to admit that he has thrown his life away and turned to evil.

The servant returns, and as she knocks on the door the stranger advises Markheim that he can entice her in by telling her that her master is hurt, then kill her and have the whole night to ransack the house. Markheim retorts that while he has lost the love of good, he still hates evil. The face of the stranger undergoes a "wonderful and lovely change", full of "tender triumph", as he disappears. Markheim opens the door and tells the servant to call the police, for he has killed her master.

''Here Be Dragons'' is the first of Penman's trilogy about the medieval princes of Gwynedd and the monarchs of England. England's King John uses his out-of-wedlock daughter Joanna as a negotiating tool by marrying her to the Welsh noble Llewelyn to avoid war between England and Wales.

Joanna and Llewelyn's marriage is marred by resentment from Llewelyn's illegitimate son, Gruffydd. Joanna gives birth to two legitimate children, Elen and Dafydd. Growing animosity between the English and Welsh results in Joanna having to act as a diplomatic intermediary between her husband and her father, and the situation deteriorates when Gruffydd is taken hostage by John and narrowly escapes execution. Joanna becomes determined that her own son, Dafydd, will be his father's heir as ruler of Gwynedd, disregarding the Welsh law that all sons should receive equal shares of their father's inheritance. Family disagreements lead Joanna into an affair with William de Braose, who is several years her junior and whom she has met earlier in the story when he was a hostage in Llewelyn's household. Their affair is discovered and William is executed. Joanna is placed in secluded captivity, but at the end of the book Llewelyn comes to find her and offers her forgiveness.

The series is set during the 18th century, sometime between the period known as the 'Golden Age of Piracy' and the Napoleonic Wars, and follows the adventures of a misfit band of pirates led by Captain Butler (Craig Charles). However, the setting intentionally introduces historical anachronisms, as both Blackbeard and Admiral Horatio Nelson are portrayed in the series, and it is difficult to determine the specific time period.

In an isolated kingdom, people do not travel abroad because the kingdom is surrounded by high mountains and because they think there are ferocious dragons beyond the mountains. They think there are dragons because the royal cartographer, Mr. Gibberling, does not know what is beyond the mountains so in the blank areas on the edges of his maps he writes "HERE THERE BE DRAGONS".

The king wants fireworks for his daughter's birthday party, but the fireworks maker dies without passing on his skills to another. The king consults with his four advisers. The first adviser comes up with the idea of importing a medium-sized dragon with colored lights for the party. The king thinks this is a splendid idea and after some discussion the first three advisers assign the dragon hunting job to the fourth adviser, a young man named William.

William goes on a quest to find such a dragon, but all he captures is a lizard named Bell. The lizard promises William that he will produce a medium-sized dragon with colored lights for the party. At the party, however, Bell transforms himself into a huge, menacing, fire-breathing dragon named Belkis. The dragon, it turns out, is interested in only one thing—Mr. Gibberling's practice of writing "HERE THERE BE DRAGONS" on his maps. He says that there are very few dragons, they wish to be left alone, and disguise themselves as innocuous animals such as lizards to avoid humans.

He insists that Mr. Gibberling fly on his back and make accurate maps of the lands around the kingdom and eliminate all references to dragons. Mr. Gibberling then makes excellent maps of the whole region. But on one side of his maps is an enormous ocean with unknown lands beyond it. Since he does not know what is there he writes: "HERE THERE BE SEA SERPENTS".

John, Charles, and Jack are three Oxford scholars united by the death of Stellan Sigurdsson, John's mentor, who thereafter receive ''The Imaginarium Geographica'', which records mythical and fictional locations. When pursued by the anthropophagous, plural Wendigo, they are rescued by Bert, with whom they travel aboard the ship ''Indigo Dragon'' (captained by Bert's daughter Aven), to Avalon, and then to Paralon, the capital of the ''Geographica'''s 'Archipelago of Dreams', where they discover this Archipelago in an interregnum and discover that its social order can be restored by a descendant of Arthur Pendragon. Desirous of obtaining the royal 'Ring of Power', and thus the kingship, is the 'Winter King' (Mordred). Upon a visit to shipbuilder 'Ordo Maas' (Deucalion), the protagonists learn that the Winter King is using Pandora's Box to create the wraithlike 'Shadow-Born', his principal servants, from the citizens of lands conquered by himself. Fearing that the Winter King may gain an advantage by possession of the ''Imaginarium Geographica'', they visit its author, the Cartographer of Lost Places, in his refuge, the Keep of Time, where they discover that their servant 'Artus' is a descendant of Arthur. Knowing this, they challenge the Winter King to pitched battle, wherein the still-loyal Elves, Dwarves, and Centaurs etc. oppose Shadow-Born, Trolls, and Goblins while Charles and the badger 'Tummeler' close Pandora's Box in secret. On the battlefield, Jack accidentally causes the death of Captain Nemo, while John and Artus approach the 'Ring of Power' (a ring of standing stones resembling Stonehenge) to summon the Archipelago's dragons, who rout the enemy. Mordred is cast from the Edge of the World by the dragon Samaranth. Upon return to their own world, John, Jack, Charles, and Bert are identified as J.R.R Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and H.G. Wells.

The war had been going on for years between the Mendicant and the Zarlor races. It wasn't going anywhere so the Zarlors decided to hire outside help. There are six key installations on the Mendicant's home planet of Yorith. The first mission is the Cadmar Desert where you are to locate and destroy a super weapon. The second mission Mesort Swamp holds a secret base. Third mission is in the Docrit Sea where you have to destroy the Mendicant Navy. Forth mission titled Sedimor Domes is to attack a moon in the sector. Mardic Ice is the fifth mission where you fly to the ice caps of Mardi Koldavia, these ice caps are described as radioactive and here the Mendicants have built nuclear reactors, power plants and weapons factories. The sixth and final mission is Cedmite City the only city on the Mendicant planet, the Zarlors have ask for everything to be destroyed, all to be cleared out for colonisation.

In the aftermath of nuclear apocalypse, 99% of the survivors are sex Negatives – they become violently ill if they attempt to have sex. The minority sex Positives are forced to engage in carnal theater for the entertainment of the Negatives at Café Flesh. Everyone is excited about the arrival at the club of the famous Positive Johnny Rico, and one Negative woman is beginning to question her negativeness as she and her boyfriend grow more distant from each other.

Darren McCord is a French Canadian-born firefighter for the Pittsburgh Bureau of Fire now serving as the fire marshal for the Pittsburgh Civic Arena, after being unable to save a young girl from a house fire two years prior. During the 1995 Stanley Cup Finals between the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Chicago Blackhawks (a fictional rematch of the 1992 Stanley Cup Finals), a group of terrorists take the Vice President of the United States and several other VIPs hostage in a luxury suite. Former CIA operative Joshua Foss has the arena wired with explosives, and plans to blow it up at the end of the game, while having hundreds of millions of dollars wired into several off shore accounts.

Darren takes his son Tyler and daughter Emily to Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals as a birthday gift for Tyler. A spat between brother and sister causes Emily to run off before getting kidnapped by Carla, the sole female member of the terrorists (who is disguised as the local mascot Iceburgh after killing the original performer). Carla places Emily in the suite with the other hostages about to be executed. Not wanting his son to go missing, Darren orders Tyler to stay in his seat while he goes searching for Emily. Carla is about to kill Darren, but he evades her attacks in a fight and kills her. Afterward, Darren asks for a security guard's help, but the guard is another terrorist in disguise and reveals their criminal operation before being killed by Darren. Now aware of the situation, Darren finds a mobile phone in the executive offices and uses it to contact Secret Service Agent Matthew Hallmark; Hallmark advises Darren to stand by while the agents take charge. He angrily refuses, saying that he will handle this himself.

The Secret Service and the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police team up to surround the arena and a standoff ensues. Meanwhile, Darren manages to find and disarm a few of the bombs (as well as killing and evading a few of Foss' men), whilst Foss himself kills several hostages after the end of the first and second periods. Hallmark finally makes his way inside and meets Darren, who explains where the rest of the bombs are most likely located. Hallmark is revealed to be in league with Foss, and tries to kidnap Tyler, but fails. Hallmark then reveals his true self to Darren, who sets him on fire and ultimately kills him. Darren then uses Hallmark's phone to contact Foss, who taunts that he is holding his daughter captive.

As time ticks down, Darren disables more bombs, but is severely slowed by confrontations with Foss' men. At one point, Darren, dressed as the Pittsburgh goalie to escape the thugs, enters the game and successfully defends a shot on goal. As the third period runs down, Luc Robitaille scores the game-tying goal for Pittsburgh in the last second, prompting sudden death overtime and prolonging the game. Deciding that there's no time left to find the remaining bombs, Darren climbs to the roof of the arena. He fights off two of Foss' henchmen; one of them falls onto the score display, blowing it up. As the arena erupts into chaos, Darren advances upon the owner's box from above and forces his way in, rescuing Emily, the Vice President and the remaining hostages. Darren and Emily reunite with Tyler and set out to leave the arena.

Foss manages to escape and blend in with the panicking crowd. He sets off one of the bombs, flooding part of the arena, and recaptures Emily when she recognizes him. They head towards the top of the arena, where a helicopter is waiting to lift Foss away. Darren intervenes and saves his daughter before Foss could shoot her. As Foss attempts to flee, Darren shoots the pilot, causing the chopper to stall and fall into the arena, sending a screaming Foss to his death as the chopper explodes on impact with the ice.

Darren is led to an awaiting Pittsburgh Bureau of EMS medic unit while his children tell the paramedics of his heroism. As a contented Darren is loaded into the ambulance, it is presumed that he was restored back to his position.

To find his lost mother, the mission of his foster mother and his own personal quest, he must discover who trained Phèdre nó Delaunay's mentor, Anafiel Delaunay.

Imriel de la Courcel's blood parents are history's most reviled traitors, but his adoptive parents, the Comtesse Phèdre and the warrior-priest Joscelin, are Terre d'Ange's greatest champions.

Stolen, tortured, and enslaved as a young boy, Imriel is now a Prince of the Blood, third in line for the throne in a land that revels in art, beauty, and desire. It is a court steeped in deeply laid conspiracies ... and there are many who would see the young prince dead. Some despise him out of hatred for his birth mother Melisande, who nearly destroyed the realm in her quest for power. Others because they fear he has inherited his mother's irresistible allure - and her dangerous gifts. And as he comes of age, plagued by dark yearnings, Imriel shares their fears.

At the royal court, where gossip is the chosen poison and assailants wield slander instead of swords, the young prince fights character assassins while struggling with his own innermost conflicts. But when Imriel departs to study at the famed University of Tiberium, the perils he faces turn infinitely more deadly. Searching for wisdom, he finds instead a web of manipulation, where innocent words hide sinister meanings, and your lover of last night may become your hired killer before dawn. Now a simple act of friendship will leave Imriel trapped in a besieged city where the infamous Melisande is worshiped as a goddess; where a dead man leads an army; and where the prince must face his greatest test: to find his true self.

The Forbidden

The novel begins with Imriel sitting down to read the letters that his mother, Melisande Shahrizai, has written him all these years. After the occurrences in Kushiel's Scion, especially with Canis in Lucca, he is now concerned with where she is and the influence she is trying to have on his life. The letters, while not exactly comforting, tell him much and help soothe some of his resentment. Phèdre nó Delaunay, his foster-mother, asks him if he wants to discuss them but he declines.

When he presents himself to the Queen, he tells her his decision to wed the Alban Princess Dorelei. He met her when he was eighteen and Prince Talorcan, Drustan's nephew and heir apparent, came to visit. While Drustan would like to name Alais as his heir, he cannot without risking another civil war. If Alais were to wed Talorcan, she would rule at his side but their children wouldn't inherit the throne, as Alba works by matrilineal succession. However, if Imriel were to wed Dorelei, his son would become Cruarch and Terre d'Ange's influence in Alba would not wane. For this reason, he agrees to wed Dorelei to preserve stability.

At the same time, however, he has discovered that he is attracted to his cousin, Sidonie de la Courcel. He knows that she feels the same. He is still the son of two infamous traitors and she is the dauphine. They cannot be together. Despite this, during the Midwinter Masque at the palace, Imriel and Sidonie kiss, and a secret relationship begins. Only Sidonie's lady-in-waiting, Amarante, and Imriel's best friend, Mavros, know of their relationship. They often assist Imriel and Sidonie and warn them if people are going to burst in and see them together.

Because of his impending wedding, Imriel begins to take lessons with Alais on Alban history, law, religion, and linguistic nuances. After these classes he would often meet Sidonie at her quarters and then they would use their few hours alone to make love. While Alais does not approve of their relationship, predominantly due to the necessary secrecy, she does nothing to stop them. During one of these lustful afternoons, Imriel tells Sidonie about what happened to him in Drujan (see Kushiel's Avatar). She listens calmly but is greatly saddened. She then asks whether he would still be willing to be cruel with her because she would very much like it. For once Imriel seems to be more comfortable and willing to try this, as long as it is with her.

Their relationship continues until the wedding. Imriel begins to get very frustrated that his consent to the wedding will soon rob him of another of the people he loves. He and Sidonie know they cannot be together and they suspect that they only like each other because it is forbidden. To release this frustration, Mavros takes him to Valerian House once again. Given that Imriel has been drinking, however, Mavros books them a showing rather than participating directly. This helps Imriel to deal with his past and the frustration caused by his situation and his Kusheline blood.

The Wedding

That summer, Prince Talorcan and Princess Dorelei accompany Drustan on his annual trip to Terre d'Ange in the spring. Dorelei is sweet and kind-hearted, but Imriel is distracted with his love for Sidonie. He still agrees to wed Dorelei though, because, as Sidonie herself said, they are likely only in love with each other because it is forbidden. As well, Sidonie is not yet eighteen and therefore can not cross her mother's will, making any true relationship with Imriel impossible. Even still, Imriel is sad to be leaving her. Dorelei, sensing that he loves another, says she is willing to share him, as she knows D'Angelines do, but that she herself will be only with him, as is Alban custom. Imriel takes this to heart but assures her there is no one else.

Before the wedding, Imriel and Sidonie meet secretly at a Temple of Elua. There the Priest vows to keep his silence but discourages the two from being so secretive and continuing a relationship that will inevitably hurt others. Nevertheless, he provides them with a private room for their final love-making.

Mavros Shahrizai also takes him on a bachelor's party. Imriel is frustrated, angry, and rough, being in the perfect mood for Valerian House. Mavros, however, makes sure that Imriel does not get carried away and is always safe and sane in his play.

The next morning is the wedding. This is a public affair with all persons of import in attendance. They are given many gifts, though Imriel's most cherished gift is that from Drustan's family: vambraces carved with the image of the Cullach Gorym, their family emblem (their ''diadh-anam''). Thus he is welcomed into the royal house of Alba. Imriel puts a good face on it but inside he feels nothing but sadness and a hollow feeling. It is hot, he is uncomfortable, and Sidonie is right there the whole time, watching him wed someone else. During the ceremony, Sidonie throws rose petals upon the couple. Imriel knows the true meaning of this: there is a passage in the ''Trois-Mille Joies'' that says to cover your lover in kisses is like falling flower petals. Everyone else at the wedding are happy, making Imriel's brooding and moping all the more poignant, though well-hidden.

Dorelei and Imriel make love that night, as Dorelei wishes to have a child, having lit a candle to Eisheth. In the following days, Imriel confesses to Dorelei that he is in love with someone else, to which she answers that she knows, but understands that theirs is a marriage of politics.

Eamonn arrives at court from Skaldia after winning the favor of his Skaldic bride Brigitta's family. Imriel tells to Eamonn of his relationship with Sidonie.

The party bound for Alba make preparations for their departure when Sidonie returns from her pilgrimage to Naamah's shrine. She and Imriel meet at a temple of Naamah for a last rendezvous before his departure.

The following morning, Imriel departs for Alba with a large D'Angeline escort, Drustan's family, Phèdre nó Delaunay and Joscelin Verreuil.

The Lust Trap

After the wedding, they travel across Alba to the Prince's new home, Clunderry, with Dorelei's family using the 'open roads' (the ''taisgaidh''), which are paths where no one is allowed to fight, be attacked or raided, and to which all Albans have access. During his first night on Alban soil, Imriel, missing Sidonie, fantasizes of her and pleasures himself, spilling his seed on the ground. Days later during his sleep he is woken by an irresistible lustful pull. He gets up and follows it. It leads him to a lone Alban woman, Morwen, who seems to have the ability to control him and wants him to have a child with her. Though he tries to refuse, the spell she has cast on him strong. Suddenly, some of the Albans from the escort interrupt them and the woman flees. The Albans tell him he was stupid indeed. By spreading his seed, filled with his lust and love, on the common soil, this woman has been given the tools to ensnared him by making a small ''mannekin'' of him, allowing her to call on him whenever she wishes. They also tell him that the two claw tattoos on her face means she is of the Maghuin Dhonn. The spell is strong and his only help is to go to an Ollamh, a religious druid-like figure.

The Ollamh casts a spell that binds his desire and makes him unable to feel the lust and pain he has been fighting throughout the series. The spell requires red ribbons to be tied to his wrists and ankles. Imriel must also wear a croonie-stone around his neck to protect himself. If any of these are taken off or broken, the spell will be broken and he will be under the woman's control again.

Imriel feels relieved and more clear-headed than he has been in months. There is a noticeable change in his mood. While he is still self-centered, he does not seem as sad as he was before and is able to grow to love. Dorelei, however, loses her visions of the future, saying that she feels as if a giant grey cloud were covering them from her sight. Still, Clunderry is peaceful and typical of an Alban noble's home. It is filled with people who are the salt of the earth. Though he is somewhat successful at winning over his household, many are still reserved about this new D'Angeline pretty-boy Prince.

Imriel earns their respect, however, when he stages a raid on a neighbouring lord, Leodan of Briclaedh. This lord has challenged him and wants to steal his cattle and horses, perceiving Imriel to be in a position of weakness. Imriel stuns everyone by staging a preemptive raid on him before Leodan can attack Imriel. Such raids are done mainly to prove a ruler's mettle during times of peace. Imriel manages to escape from multiple attackers with no injuries, earning him praise and respect from all. This also garners him the friendship of Urist, a guard of Clunderry of good renown and well liked by the troops.

On the ride back, Imriel is elated. He finally feels he is accepted and respected, not because of his birth but because he has earned it. Then he again feels the lustful pull supposedly bound within him. He is again seized by an outside force and he rides into a sheltered wooded area, where the woman is waiting. He tries to resist as much as he can, but his body responds to her regardless. The woman attempts intercourse, but they are disturbed before anything more can happen. During the encounter Imriel learns that one of his red ties has been cut off during the battle. When he arrives home he goes to the local Ollamh, who recasts the spell before he even attends the celebratory feast.

Life continues in the Alban holding, and Dorelei and Imriel manage to develop a loving relationship. Dorelei is most certainly in love with Imriel, but Imriel's love is weak compared to his feelings for Sidonie. Dorelei has become pregnant and Imriel can not wait for his child.

Imriel's cousin, Alais arrives at Clunderry. During her stay she grows and matures significantly. She has been learning the arts of the Ollamh and loves it. Though she does not love Talorcan, she is leaving open the possibility of love, and does not refuse him.

One night, a letter arrives. Sidonie writes to Imriel telling him that, despite the distance, she is still in love with him. She tells him to stay in Alba, however, for at least the first year. Dorelei had promised him that, if Imriel was not happy after the first year, he could leave her and move back to Terre d'Ange. They could be as Drustan and Ysandre and see each other half the year, or even less. While reading this letter, Imriel is shocked at his lack of emotions. He can barely picture Sidonie's face, and all feelings for her are muted. Thus he decides to take a risk by removing the croonie-stone while he re-reads the letter. He is filled with sorrow and love. He misses her terribly and still loves her as well. After a short while and reading the letter a number of times, he returns the croonie-stone around his neck and returns to his bed with Dorelei.

Death, Change, and Magic

By spring, Dorelei is nearing the end of her pregnancy. She and Imriel are looking forward to their first child, and while love has grown between to the two, Imriel is still distracted by his love for Sidonie, though he is always caring and loving to Dorelei. Imriel also feels a commitment to being a part of his child's life.

Soon after the Day of Misrule, however, Morwen appears out of the woods right in front of Clunderry's men. She remains on the ''taisgaidh'' roads, but demands to see Imriel. Imriel meets her with all of his guards, the Ollamh, Alais, and Dorelei who insisted on coming along. Morwen says she is willing to make a deal with Imriel: if he will come with her to the circle of standing stones and let her show him the future, she will give him his mannekin thereby freeing him of her magic. The circle is not far away and is on ''taisgaidh'' lands. Imriel does not trust her but she says that if he wants to bring his troops he may, so long as they stay outside of the circle. Imriel then asks the advice of the Ollamh. She does not trust Morwen as well and advises that before the ceremony and in the stone circle, Morwen should swear not to harm Imriel or any of his family. Morwen agrees without hesitation and with none of the tell-tales of a lie. Imriel says he will take the day to decide and give her his decision at sunset. Morwen agrees and leaves as though she had melted into the woods themselves.

Imriel and Dorelei discuss the proposal and come to a decision. Imriel will take a large escort of the troops to the circle with him and be careful. Dorelei will not risk herself or the child by coming with him and will stay in Clunderry with the remaining guards. While it is dangerous, the reward would be Imriel's freedom, restoration of Dorelei's visions, and security for their unborn child. They deem the risk is worth the reward. They also finally decide on the name of the child: Aniel if it is a boy and Anielle if it is a girl.

That evening, Dorelei helps Imriel put on his vambraces and prepare for his meeting with Morwen. At the edge of taisgaidh roads, Morwen waits. Upon Imriel's agreement, she leads them to the standing stones. Night has fallen, and though there are many of Imriel's men carrying torches, the circle still has an eerie look about it. Morwen tells him that he can not wear any metal within the circle and that the lights must be put out. He asks why and she only replies that that is how the spell works. To verify his safety, he asks her to make the pledge with the Ollamh first. Morwen and the Ollamh go into the circle. Morwen swears:

::''"No harm will befall Imriel de la Courcel of Clunderry this night, nor any member of his household, nor any person dear to him. I swear it by the stone and sea and sky, by all the gods of Alba, and by the diadh-anam of the Maghuin Dhonn. If I lie, let my magic be broken and my life be forfeit. Let every man and woman's hand be raised against me, let my name be gall on their lips. Let the gods and the diadh-anam forsake me, and let the land itself despise my footfall. Let my spirit wander for ten thousand years without solace."''

The Ollamh is satisfied and departs for the outside of the circle. Morwen leads Imriel into the circle, after telling him to take off his shoes. She seemingly lifts one of the standing stones and takes out her things from under it, letting it fall back down behind her. On the stone table, she places her things and takes some tea, which she drinks first before giving it to Imriel. He asks her what it is. She says it is mushroom tea and a gift of the earth. She then paints her eyelids and his. Picking up the stone knife and a leather bag she passes the bag to him. He feels the mannekin inside it. Morwen then suddenly cuts his bindings and all his love, lusts, and emotions come flooding back. Morwen then cuts her wrists and holds his hands. Waiting, the tea starts to have an effect. Eventually, he begins to see that the stones are telling him a story.

He sees a boy who is obviously his unborn son, Aniel. He sees Dorelei dead with Aniel holding on to him. He sees his son with Alais and then, as a teen, yelling at Urist. Then there is a pause. Morwen says this is because he has left Alban shores. He returns, however, and Imriel can see the glitter of intelligence in his eyes and glee at the causing of arguments. These arguments lead to wars between the tribes of Alba and the death of Talorcan. He is then named Cruarch and brings hundreds of D'Angeline soldiers to Alba, crushing all resistance. He sees women and children taken out of their homes and their homes being torched. He sees Aniel kill a wounded man begging for mercy. Aniel burns the sacred groves and drags away the standing stones. He is a fearless and cruel leader who hunts down the Maghuin Dhonn until all are gone, and redesigns Bryn Gorrydum into a D'Angeline city. Finally, Imriel begs her to stop and she does, letting go of his hands. "Your son is a monster, Imriel," she says.

Imriel asks why this is. She replies that she does not know, and at first the visions were of many possibilities. Dorelei would die before her second child is born and Imriel leaves Alban shores. At first, there was Imriel and Morwen's daughter to balance Aniel, but now all that remained was this one vision. Imriel asks if she considered that her intervention caused this in the first place, and whether she considered not getting involved. With deep sorrow, she said she had considered it.

Imriel hears horns and sees the flaws in Morwen. Realizing the cuts were deeper than he thought he learns an awful secret. Morwen has lied, harm is coming to Imriel's family. Her life is sacrificed for the good of the Maghuin Dhonn.

Imriel and his guards rush back to Clunderry, still under the effects of the mushroom tea. All is in a daze and blurry. The gates of the castle are open; Leodan of Briclaedh staged his counter cattle-raid on this night after hearing that the troops would be elsewhere. A giant bear is now trying to exit the castle. Imriel charges him, but is wounded by its paw and falls unconscious. When he wakes, he sees Dorelei lying on a table nearby, clearly dead.

Imriel falls into a deep depression. He has been severely injured by the bear, who is really the Maghuin Dhonn leader Berlik. He is transported to Bryn Gorrydum and being treated by an Eisandine healer. Alais would keep him company most days, but vengeance was what kept him alive; he wanted Berlik's death. The hunt for Berlik in Alba was unsuccessful, but Hyacinthe, the Master of the Straits, saw a large bear swim to Azzalle, across the straits. While he could not be sure it was Berlik, Imriel was. Imriel swears he will bring back Berlik's head and bury it at Dorelei's feet, a traditional custom in Alba. Urist promises to help him, as do a number of Clunderry's men.

The Long Hunt for Berlik

When Imriel is finally deemed to be well enough to ride, he tells Drustan of the arrangements, says goodbye to Alais, and departs for Terre d'Ange. In Azzalle, Urist and Imriel destroy the mannekin and cut his bindings. Imriel tells him who it was he loved all this time and, while shocked, Urist still dedicates himself to Imriel's service: "So you were good enough for the Cullach Gorrym, good enough to marry Dorelei mab Beidaia, good enough to beget Alba a successor, but not good enough for the Queen's daughter?"

They all ride for the City of Elua, dedicated to true love and the hunt for Berlik. Upon arriving at the Palace, Imriel immediately goes to Sidonie's quarters, sinks to his knees before her and wraps his arms around her waist. Ysandre walks in on the scene and is furious. Imriel walks out from the Palace, but not before Sidonie kisses him before the all those watching. Mavros offers the Shahrizai hunting estates outside of the City for Imriel and the Albans to stay out of the turmoil of the City. Sidonie comes to see him. After lovemaking, a royal escort led by Lord Amaury Trente come to take her back home. She refuses, saying she is a grown woman now over the age of majority, and that she will love who she loves freely.

Imriel learns that Phèdre and Joscelin still are not back from their mysterious journey, but he visits the house and has a pleasant visit with all. Upon gathering all the supplies and funding he needs, including from the royal coffers despite Ysandre's opinion of his affair with her daughter, he and the Albans depart for the north.

Their journey takes them through the Flatlands toward the new kingdom of Vralia. Imriel and Urist then book passage by boat to the capital of Vralia, following Berlik's trail. After being lost on an island for at least a month, they both make it to the capital Vralgrad. Urist is too injured to continue, however, and stays in Vralgrad. Imriel continues to follow rumours of Berlik south to the small town of Tarkov. Imriel has the unfortunate bad timing, however, to be in Tarkov for a Tartar raid. Seeing the scars on his behind left from Daršanga, the people think that he is a secret spy of the Tartars and put him in jail. He is stuck there for a long time with one other Tartar prisoner. He manages to escape through cunning, and helps free his Tartar companion so that he may be able to go back to the woman he loves.

From there Imriel follows the long-stale path of Berlik, or what he thinks is Berlik's path. He stops at a small Yeshuite Temple in Miroslas, the last reaches of civilization, and learns that Berlik stayed there for a time, seeking forgiveness. They try to discourage him from hunting down Berlik, but Imriel departs, still dedicated to his quest.

He spends many days and nights wandering the untamed forests in search of Berlik. He goes nearly mad with the silence, loneliness, and seemingly hopelessness of his mission. He is forced to send back his horse, hoping it will make it alive to a warm stable, for lack of sufficient food and fodder. Just before deciding that he must turn back before he starves, Berlik leaves him a sign. Following this trail he comes upon a small cabin that Berlik has built and obviously still lives in. There is a makeshift cross in his cabin and a fire still burning. Here, finally, Berlik appears. He is humbled and broken and asks only for his death, for only his death at the hands of Imriel can bring him atonement. Berlik tells him, "I prayed...I left a trail for you to follow, and I prayed that if you found me, the diadh-anam would accept my sacrifice as atonement, and not punish all of her people for my failure. When my magic returned to me, here in the woods, I knew it was so." Imriel asks why Berlik made it so hard for him. He replies, "Would you have come here with a humble heart if I had not?"

Berlik admits his mistakes, his fears, and admits that he should have trusted his gods more instead of only himself. He apologizes to Imriel and calls him "my avenging angel." As Imriel raises his sword, he knows the true meaning that Kushiel, the punisher of god, loved his charges too well. Imriel says, "I'm sorry," cuts off Berlik's head cleanly, and weeps.

After a day in Berlik's cabin, gathering more food and supplies, he departs back for his far-away home. After days of trudging, he is shocked to hear voices arguing in Rus and D'Angeline! They are not rescuers, however: they are soldiers from Tarkov, come to capture him. The D'Angeline they are arguing with is Maslin of Lombelon, sent by Sidonie to find Imriel. Maslin and Imriel manage to fight off the guards and make a truce of their once jealousy of each other. Maslin, it seems, has grown much in his travels as well. During their trek through the forests, Maslin ends up boiling Berlik's head for Imriel, in a sort of penance. It is disgusting work, but Maslin refuses to let Imriel do it. They then continue on their travels.

They travel together back to Tarkov. They try to disguise Imriel but Tarkov is the closest port for ferries headed to the city and eventually home. When they arrive in Tarkov, however, they find Phèdre and Joscelin, come to search for Imriel and join him on his long trek. Phèdre is arguing with the guards, trying to explain he is a royal Prince of Terre d'Ange and not a Tartar. While they do not believe her, none want to challenge them and grudgingly "allow" them to leave. In the capital, Joscelin meets his once pupil and now leader of the Yeshuites and most trusted advisor of King Vral, Micah ben Ximon.

As the weather improves, they take a boat back to the Flatlands and travel to Azzalle. Maslin chooses to stay in Vralia as a representative of Terre d'Ange, and because he has fallen in love with a local woman. Once they are back in Terre d'Ange, all are happy to report their arrival.

Truly Home

(this material is obtained from the preview at the end of the paper-back edition of Kushiel's Justice)

Imriel hurries back to Sidonie's side. The Queen has calmed down considerably but cannot countenance the relationship because of Imriel's parents. She cannot denounce it, however, because to do so would be to go against Elua's Precept.

He, Sidonie, Phèdre, Joscelin, and his Alban escort return to Clunderry to bury Berlik's head, fulfilling Imriel's promise. On their return to the City of Elua, they are greeted by a large group of people with black armbands, the victims of Melisande and Benedicte's machinations, showing a thumbs-down (see Kushiel's Mercy).

Three very different siblings: Hans-Jörg, a librarian who is a sex addict; Werner, a politician in a troubled marriage with a son who enjoys discrediting his father; Martin, who is now Agnes after having a gender-reassignment operation. Agnes works as a dancer and is suffering from unrequited love.

While Marilyn Monroe is enjoying her rise to stardom and iconic pop culture status, three childhood friends are happy enough to sneakily obtain racy pictures of her for their pubescent enjoyment. Once they mature (at least by age), Roy has his eyes set on joining the Military despite his strained relationship with his father. His buddy, Scott, has a prosthetic leg and is to be married soon to his darling significant other Becky, and his other pal, Ned, known affectionately as "Bleuer", works at a small town store and is not initially as anxious to partake on this crazed notion as his friends.

Thanks to Roy's Uncle, the three desirous and hapless friends shack up at his place out in California where they yearn to meet—if only for a brief second—the fabulous and stunning Miss Marilyn Monroe. Their quest leads to shenanigans and silliness ensues as they arrange the most brainless ideas to win over their idol. One includes corralling a "sad" cow to moo outside of Miss Monroe's luxurious residence, another has the guys speeding after Marilyn towards a nude beach and an entirely separate subplot has them dodging some bad guys that are after Roy.

Eventually, however, it is up to Marilyn to pity the trio's collectively desperate agony. The boys devise a clever scheme to avoid Miss Monroe's hawkish maid and Roy slips in the question, to which Marilyn refuses a date. This leads to further despair amongst the trio. They begin to regret coming out for the trip and they decide to go out on the town one last time.

Surprisingly, in a sudden twist, Monroe finally does agree to a date upon the sandy splendor of the Californian beach. Initially, while animosity has grown between the three friends, Roy is designated to be the lucky one that gets to hopefully "canoe" Miss Monroe, but nonchalantly, he passes off the opportunity to his buddy "Bleuer" who surprisedly agrees and treats the lovely Miss Monroe to a wonderful platonic night.

While Roy (in his macho way) is disappointed by Bleuer's effort, the boys return home to the sad news that Marilyn has abruptly died of a drug overdose. Back home, Scott continues his plans to marry his love, Becky, and Roy tussles with his father in the gym which leads to one last touching moment between the two before Roy is shipped out to boot camp. The last image seen is of Bleuer as he embraces his wild side and partakes in a wild telephone booth gathering that woos a local college girl in his favor.

The film's narrative consists of several interwoven subplots taking place in the town of Northfork, Montana circa 1955. A new dam is being built which will flood the valley of Northfork, and the town is in the midst of an evacuation. The narratives focus on several individuals who, for one reason or another, have yet to evacuate. Walter O'Brien (James Woods) and his son (Mark Polish) are on the evacuation team, helping to evacuate the last few inhabitants of Northfork. In return, the government will give them acres of lakeside property if they meet their evacuee quota. Father Harlan (Nick Nolte) is one such individual, who has stayed behind to care for Irwin (Duel Farnes), a dying orphan too weak to leave town. While the O'Briens and their co-workers encounter an array of unusual characters, Irwin discovers that he is the "unknown angel" through a suitcase with his angel wings in it and a bible with an angels feather telling his family 'story', and finds himself a family of angels (Daryl Hannah, Anthony Edwards, Ben Foster, and Robin Sachs) in his dreams, who he makes a deal with to take him 'a thousand miles'.

Kes and the Doctor notice a peculiar change in the remains of the Caretaker, the alien who trapped ''Voyager'' in the Delta Quadrant. They seem to be resonating in response to an unusual energy source. Remembering that the dying Caretaker had mentioned a female of his kind, Janeway wonders if she could be nearby. If so, a meeting with her could be their ticket home. As a precaution, Tuvok develops a toxin that could debilitate the female lifeform if she poses a threat. Following the energy trail, the crew comes upon a space-station inhabited by Ocampa, who fire on the ship.

Kes agrees to act as the crew's liaison to her people, and when the Ocampa leader, Tanis, boards ''Voyager'', she assures him that the crew comes in peace. In a private meeting, Tanis tells Kes that the female Nacene, Suspiria, is nearby. She has taken care of this group of Ocampa for 300 years, and has taught them to develop their psychokinetic skills. He shows Kes a sample of the powerful abilities she has yet to tap. Later, Tanis communicates with Suspiria, who demands that he deliver ''Voyager'' to her.

As Tanis leads the crew to Suspiria, he tutors Kes on her telepathic skills. The lessons nearly end in disaster when Kes tries to boil water with her mind and, to her horror, inadvertently boils Tuvok's blood instead. He collapses, writhing in agony.

Tuvok recovers from the near-fatal incident. Kes realizes the full potential of her mental powers when her mind causes the plants in the aeroponics bay to burn up. Tanis urges Kes to leave ''Voyager'' and live on the Ocampa space-station, where he says she will be embraced by Suspiria and surrounded by her own people.

Suspiria, who believes the lies spread by the Kazon and others about ''Voyager'', comes aboard. She tells Janeway that she will destroy them in retaliation for the crew's having killed the Caretaker. By the time Kes becomes aware of her monstrous plot, Suspiria has already attacked several officers. Kes, in turn, attacks Tanis with her expanded psychic abilities, and Tanis's pain temporarily incapacitates Suspiria. Janeway is then able to fire the toxin, subduing her. Janeway allows Suspiria and Tanis to leave the ship, while Kes remains with her friends on ''Voyager''.

Part I

Ensign Lon Suder, having been confined to his quarters for life as punishment for his murder of Crewman Darwin, has attempted to make amends by making several agricultural advancements. His homicidal tendencies seem to be well under control through the use of Vulcan mental disciplines learned from Tuvok. Seska calls ''Voyager'' stating that Commander Chakotay must rescue her and her newborn baby, since Culluh saw that the child was not his. Captain Janeway and Chakotay argue on whether or not to save his son, whether it is a trap or a real plea for help. In the ready-room, everyone thinks up ideas to fight the Kazon in the event of a trap.

An apparent defector of the Kazon is soon found on a stranded ship and taken on board to Sickbay, and explains his predicament, although Chakotay remains suspicious — especially when he mentions Seska's death. As ''Voyager'' travels further into Kazon space, facing heavier attacks that seem focused at the same general area of the ship, the man commits suicide in a violent explosion, which severely damages Suder's quarters and disables several of ''Voyager's'' systems. As ''Voyager'' is overwhelmed by the Kazon, Lt. Paris takes a shuttle to find a Talaxian colony for aid. ''Voyager'' is boarded and taken over by Kazon forces. Captain Janeway attempts to activate the ship's self-destruct sequence to prevent the Kazon from taking the ship, but the system that controls this ability was damaged in earlier Kazon skirmishes, revealing the true strategy of the Kazon.

Part II

The crew is marooned on a barren planet inhabited by primitive, hostile natives. Only two crew members are left on board ''Voyager'', the Doctor and Suder, who was presumed dead in the explosion. It is revealed by the Doctor that Culluh, not Chakotay, is the father of Seska's baby. Suder hides in the vents and Jefferies tubes of the ship, having a crisis of conscience after he is forced to kill a Kazon soldier.

Meanwhile, on the planet, crewman Hogan is devoured by a gigantic worm creature.The discovery of the remains of crewman Hogan's uniform by an alien species the Voth serves as a starting point for the plot of the later ''Voyager'' episode "Distant Origin" (Season 3 Episode 23). The natives of the planet kidnap Kes and Neelix. Chakotay attempts to negotiate for their return, but this fails and he, Kes and Neelix are forced to hide in one of the caverns that the giant worm lives in. The natives attempt to smoke them out with a fire.

Back at camp, Ensign Wildman's baby Naomi falls ill and Chakotay's team is still missing. Janeway gathers her own crew to search for Chakotay. Inside the caverns, a mis-step leads to a crew member being eaten by the worm. Janeway has Lt. Torres and two others distract the natives. The diversion works, allowing them to extinguish the fire and save the rest of the crew. The worm ends up buried under tons of rock dislodged by Tuvok and others as they escape.

Suder and the Doctor risk their lives to repel the Kazon. Suder, under orders from Paris, attacks the engineering section of ''Voyager''. He succeeds in sabotaging the ship's phasers, but is shot in the back by a dying Kazon and dies moments after. The Kazon then attempt to destroy Paris' shuttle but the sabotaged phasers overload, killing most of the Kazon and forcing them to abandon ''Voyager''. Seska herself is mortally wounded; she stumbles into Janeway's ready room and dies next to her child, who survived. Maje Culluh takes the baby and leaves.

Volcanic eruptions on the planet have forced the ''Voyager'' crew and the natives to migrate together. Chakotay gains the respect of the natives when he rescues one of their children from a lava flow. The leader of the tribe gathers together plants that heal Naomi. The crew and the natives both watch in bewilderment as ''Voyager'' descends to the planet to pick them up. Tom Paris greets Janeway and the crew on the bridge and tells of Suder's bravery. In Sickbay, Tuvok wishes that Suder may find the peace he could not in life. The natives wave farewell as ''Voyager'' departs.

In medieval Europe, a homeless orphan girl who has no name, and can recall being named Brat, attempts to nestle in a warm dung heap on a cold night. She wakes up to the taunts of village boys, and the words of the harsh and uncaring Jane Sharp, the local midwife. Jane takes the girl on as her apprentice and renames her "Beetle," but does not teach Beetle about midwifery for fear of competition.

Beetle learns what she can anyway, and starts to grow as a person through various experiences. She even has a chance to claim a new name, Alyce, after being mistaken for another girl with the same name. Alyce befriends a homeless, orphaned boy, who -with some prompting- names himself Edward after the King. She tells him to go to a local manor to get food and a job.

Jane helps a woman in labor with the help of Alyce, and word arrives the Lady of the Manor is in labor. Jane abandons the new mother to Alyce's care to the Lady. Alyce is kind to the woman and successfully delivers the baby, and the grateful parents pay her and name the child "Alyce Little." Soon after, a woman's son comes to Alyce asking her to deliver her baby. This is a more difficult birth, and Alyce is overwhelmed by her inability to help. Jane sweeps in and completes the job, and Alyce flees with her cat, not wanting to endure the shame.

In another town, she comes to an inn where the kindly owner gives Alyce work in exchange for food, and a scholar from Oxford, staying for the winter, teaches Alyce how to read and write. As time goes on, Alyce comes to miss little Edward. She returns to the village to check on him, and their reunion is like that of a brother and sister, but Alyce can't stay for long. She returns to the inn just in time to find a married couple begging for aid. It turns out the woman is in labor, but neither she nor her husband knew she was pregnant. Alyce is able to help, and the birth goes well, making Alyce realize that she truly wants to be a midwife. Filled with a new sense of self-purpose, she returns to the midwife's home and asks to be her apprentice again, declaring she won't stop coming to Jane's door until she's allowed back, and she will work harder than ever.

The story ends with Jane wordlessly letting Alyce in.

Judy Tanner, grieving after the murder of her husband Jack, desires to get revenge on the murderer. She submerges her identity into that of "The Extremist", an alias her husband went by in both his life as a patron of the most extreme sex clubs and as a hired assassin for a shadowy organization called "The Order". Judy eventually murders a woman she believes to be her husband's killer, but she later learns the real killer was a man named Patrick, the "Chief Hedonist" of the Order. Patrick claims he killed Jack in order to manipulate Judy into becoming the Extremist, and into killing an innocent woman, to "liberate" her from her bourgeois moral system.

After Judy goes missing, her neighbor Tony Murphy attempts to find her while discovering more and more about what "The Extremist" really is, and he is both ashamed and titillated by his discoveries. In his quest to find Judy, Tony's obsession prompts his wife and newborn child to leave him. He does eventually manage to track Judy down, after which a thoroughly indoctrinated Judy kills him to prevent him from exposing her activities or those of the order.

On John Conroy's property, the 2-year-old colts and fillies are mustered and brought to the homestead for horse breaking. Two of the colts are of very good stock, especially the beautiful and spirited colt sired by the famous racehorse Regret (John Conroy says that the colt is worth a thousand pounds (£1000) and that he wants the colt to eventually be the stud horse for the property).

Jim Ryan arrives at John Conroy's property following the death of his father. When he and Conroy's daughter, Kate, see each other, it is love at first sight for them both.

Jim, however, finds resentment at his presence at the station, both from John Conroy, the owner of the property, and the station's stockmen and station hands, with Dan Mulligan (the leading hand), disdainfully commenting "''We don't want any swagmen here''". Saltbush and McGinness McGee also make disparaging remarks about Jim Ryan's horse, with Saltbush sarcastically asking Jim if he bought his horse from a Mark Foy's catalogue, and McGinness McGee commenting that it was more likely that the horse had been saved from a glue factory.

John Conroy also comments that they have enough men working on the property already. Kate pleads with her father to give Jim a job at the property, and he finally relents, saying that Jim can help break the horses. John Conroy resents it when Jim Ryan says that he knows of a better way to break horses than the horse-breaking method being used at the property. However, John Conroy says that Jim could prove his expertise in horse-breaking by breaking the colt from Regret.

During the night, the Brumby herd gallops close to the homestead, and the colt from Regret breaks free from his tethers and joins them. John Conroy is furious at the loss of his prized colt, and unfairly blames Jim for what has occurred. Conroy decides to get all the crack riders (expert horse riders) from the stations near and far to muster at the homestead and hunt for the Brumbies, offering a reward of £1000, and angrily orders Jim to leave the property first thing in the morning.

The crack riders gather at the homestead the following morning, including Harrison, who made his fortune when Pardon won the cup (a reference to the President's Cup, a lesser known race held in Manindie, New South Wales). Another crack rider at the homestead was Clancy of the Overflow (who was a friend of Jim). Jim shyly turns up to join in the ride to hunt for the colt and Brumbies, but finds that, apart from his friend, Clancy, he is not wanted by anyone on the ride. Clancy convinces the others that, as both Jim and his horse were mountain-reared, they would be of great help in the ride.

The Brumbies are too quick for the riders and, when it becomes too steep and dangerous with wombat holes (burrows, where a horse could break a leg), all riders stop short of the dangerous descent — apart from Jim, who continues to chase the Brumby herd - finally bringing the herd (including the colt) back to John Conroy's property.

John Conroy is delighted to have his colt back again, and gives his approval to Jim marrying Kate. A concert and country dance, as well as a superb equestrian pageant, are then held in celebration and recognition of Jim's deed, and all ends happily.

1748 England is infested with highwaymen — men such as Will Plunkett (Robert Carlyle), a London-based criminal working with his partner Rob (Iain Robertson). When Rob is killed by Thief Taker General Chance (Ken Stott) after a botched heist outside debtor's prison, Plunkett must find a way to retrieve a large ruby that his partner had swallowed. What he doesn't know is that the incident was witnessed by James Macleane (Jonny Lee Miller), a socialite from the upper echelons of society, who had found himself in debtor's prison. Macleane sees the same ruby as his ticket out of debtors' prison and decides to steal it.

Plunkett ambushes Macleane and forces him to give up the ruby, but when they are discovered by Chance's men, Plunkett swallows it. While in Newgate Prison, the two form a partnership that utilizes Plunkett's criminal know-how and Macleane's social status to bribe their way out of prison. This tentative partnership leads to an unlikely alliance, deemed "The Gentlemen Highwaymen", where they gladly relieve the gentry of their possessions.

When Macleane falls for the beautiful Lady Rebecca (Liv Tyler), the niece of the powerful Lord Gibson (Michael Gambon), their plans to escape to America go awry. The pair part ways after a disastrous attempt to rescue Lady Rebecca from forced exodus, which leads to the death of Lord Gibson, and the discovery that Macleane has gambled away all of their funds.

Macleane is eventually captured and tried for Lord Gibson's murder, earning him a date with the gallows. Plunkett orchestrates a daring escape, aided by Lady Rebecca and the flamboyant Lord Rochester (Alan Cumming). After a tense chase through the city sewers that sees Plunkett exact revenge upon Chance, the three escape to freedom.

The scenario is the British capital of London in 2470. A ragtag group of human misfits with strange powers struggle against an occupying force of malevolent, shape-shifting alien beings.

After a disastrous guerilla assault on one of the invaders' living ships, the protagonists are attacked by the unstoppable Wardroid. Meanwhile, in the ruins of the Houses of Parliament, secrets are unearthed that may be the key to understanding the aliens' true motives.

The novel's protagonist is Fyodor Ivanych Lavretsky, a nobleman who shares many traits with Turgenev. The child of a distant, Anglophile father and a serf mother who dies when he is very young, Lavretsky is brought up at his family's country estate home by a severe maiden aunt, often thought to be based on Turgenev's own mother, who was known for her cruelty.

Lavretsky pursues an education in Moscow, and while he is studying there, he spies a beautiful young woman at the opera. Her name is Varvara Pavlovna, and he falls in love with her and asks for her hand in marriage. Following their wedding, the two move to Paris, where Varvara Pavlovna becomes a very popular salon hostess and begins an affair with one of her frequent visitors. Lavretsky learns of the affair only when he discovers a note written to her by her lover. Shocked by her betrayal, he severs all contact with her and returns to his family estate.

Upon returning to Russia, Lavretsky visits his cousin, Marya Dmitrievna Kalitina, who lives with her two daughters, Liza and Lenochka. Lavretsky is immediately drawn to Liza, whose serious nature and religious devotion stand in contrast to the coquettish Varvara Pavlovna's social consciousness. Lavretsky realizes that he is falling in love with Liza, and when he reads in a foreign journal that Varvara Pavlovna has died, he confesses his love to her and learns that she loves him in return.

After they confess their love to one another, Lavretsky returns home to find his supposedly dead wife waiting for him in his foyer. It turns out that the reports of her death were false, and that she has fallen out of favor with her friends and needs more money from Lavretsky.

Upon learning of Varvara Pavlovna's sudden appearance, Liza decides to join a remote convent and lives out the rest of her days as a nun. Lavretsky visits her at the convent one time and catches a glimpse of her as she is walking from choir to choir. The novel ends with an epilogue which takes place eight years later, in which Lavretsky returns to Liza's house and finds that, although many things have changed, there are elements such as the piano and the garden that are the same. Lavretsky finds comfort in his memories and is able to see the meaning and even the beauty in his personal pain.

Part one

Sue Trinder, an orphan raised in "a Fagin-like den of thieves" by her adoptive mother, Mrs Sucksby, is sent to help Richard "Gentleman" Rivers seduce a wealthy heiress. Posing as a maid, Sue is to gain the trust of the lady, Maud Lilly, and eventually persuade her to elope with Gentleman. Once they are married, Gentleman plans to commit Maud to a madhouse and claim her fortune for himself.

Sue travels to Briar, Maud's secluded home in the country, where she lives a sheltered life under the care of her uncle, Christopher Lilly. Like Sue, Maud was orphaned at birth; her mother died in a mental asylum, and she has never known her father. Her uncle uses her as a secretary to assist him as he supposedly compiles a dictionary, and keeps her to the house, working with him in the silence of his library.

Sue and Maud forge an unlikely friendship, which develops into a mutual physical attraction. After a time, Sue realises she has fallen in love with Maud, and begins to regret her involvement in Gentleman's plot. Deeply distressed, but feeling she has no choice, Sue persuades Maud to marry Gentleman, and the trio flee from Briar to a nearby church, where Maud and Gentleman are hastily married in a midnight ceremony.

Making a temporary home in a local cottage, and telling Maud they are simply waiting for their affairs to be brought to order in London, Gentleman and a reluctant Sue make arrangements for Maud to be committed to an asylum for the insane. Her health has already waned as a result of the shock of leaving her quiet life at Briar, to Gentleman's delight. After a week, he and Sue escort an oblivious Maud to the asylum in a closed carriage. However, the doctors apprehend Sue on arrival, and from the cold reactions of Gentleman and the seemingly innocent Maud, Sue guesses that it is she who has been conned.

Part two

In the second part of the novel, Maud takes over the narrative. She describes her early life being raised by the nurses in the mental asylum where her mother died, and the sudden appearance of her uncle, who arrives when she is eleven to take her to Briar to be his secretary.

Her induction into his rigid way of life is brutal; Maud is made to wear gloves constantly to preserve the surfaces of the books she is working on, and is denied food when she tires of labouring with her uncle in his library. Distressed, and missing her previous home, Maud begins to demonstrate sadistic tendencies, biting and kicking her maid, Agnes, and her abusive carer, Mrs Stiles. She harbours a deep resentment toward her mother for abandoning her, and starts holding her mother's locket every night, and whispering to it how much she hates her.

Shockingly, Maud reveals that her uncle's work is not to compile a dictionary, but to assemble a bibliography of literary pornography, for the reference of future generations. In his own words, Christopher Lilly is a 'curator of poisons.' He introduces Maud to the keeping of the books—indexing them and such—when she is barely twelve, and deadens her reactions to the shocking material. As she grows older, Maud reads the material aloud for the appreciation of her uncle's colleagues. On one occasion, when asked by one of them how she can stand to curate such things, Maud answers, ''"I was bred to the task, as servants are."''

She has resigned herself to a life serving her uncle's obscure ambition when Richard Rivers arrives at Briar. Although a heroin addict, he reveals to her a plan to help her escape her exile in Briar, a plan involving the deception of a commonplace girl who will believe she has been sent to Briar to trick Maud out of her inheritance. After initial hesitation, Maud agrees to the plan and receives her new maid, Sue, weeks later, pretending to know nothing about the plot.

Maud falls in love with Sue over time and, like Sue, begins to question whether she will be able to carry out Gentleman's plot. Though overcome with guilt, Maud does, and travels with Gentleman to London after committing Sue to the asylum, claiming to the doctors that Sue was the mad Mrs Maud Rivers who believed she was her own maid.

Instead of taking Maud to a house in Chelsea, as he had promised, Gentleman takes her to Mrs Sucksby in the Borough. It was, it turns out, Gentleman's plan to bring her here all along; and, Mrs Sucksby, who had orchestrated the entire plan, reveals to a stunned Maud that Marianne Lilly had come to Lant Street seventeen years earlier, pregnant and alone. When Marianne discovered her cruel father and brother had found her, she begged Mrs Sucksby to take her newborn child and give her one of her 'farmed' infants to take its place. Sue, it turns out, was Marianne Lilly's true daughter, and Maud one of the many orphaned infants who had been placed on Mrs Sucksby's care after being abandoned. Marianne revises her will on the night of the switch, entitling each of the two girls to half of Marianne Lilly's fortune. By having Sue committed, Mrs Sucksby could intercept one share; by keeping Maud a prisoner, she could take the other half. She had planned the switch of the two girls for seventeen years, and enlisted the help of Gentleman to bring Maud to her in the weeks before Sue's eighteenth birthday, when she would become legally entitled to the money. By setting Sue up as the 'mad Mrs Rivers', Gentleman could, by law, claim her fortune for himself.

Alone and friendless, Maud has no choice but to remain a prisoner at Lant Street. She makes one attempt to escape to the home of one of her uncle's friends, Mr Hawtrey, but he turns her away, appalled at the scandal that she has fallen into, and eager to preserve his own reputation. Maud returns to Lant Street and finally submits to the care of Mrs Sucksby. It is then that Mrs Sucksby reveals to her that Maud was not an orphan that she took into her care, as she and Gentleman had told her, but Mrs Sucksby's own daughter.

Part three

The novel resumes Sue's narrative, picking up where Maud and Gentleman had left her in the mental asylum. Sue is devastated at Maud's betrayal and furious that Gentleman double-crossed her. When she screams to the asylum doctors that she is not Mrs Rivers but her maid Susan, they ignore her, as Gentleman (helped by Maud) has convinced them that this is precisely her delusion, and that she is really Maud Lilly Rivers, his troubled wife.

Sue is treated appallingly by the nurses in the asylum, being subjected to beatings and taunts on a regular basis. Such is her maltreatment and loneliness that, after a time, she begins to fear that she truly has gone mad. She is sustained by the belief that Mrs Sucksby will find and rescue her. Sue dwells on Maud's betrayal, the devastation of which quickly turns to anger.

Sue's chance at freedom comes when Charles, a knife boy from Briar, comes to visit her. He is the son of Mr Way and, it turns out, the nephew of Mrs Cream. Charles, a simple boy, has been pining for the charming attentions of Gentleman to such an extent that Mr Way, the warden of Briar, had begun to beat him severely. Charles runs away, and has been directed to the asylum by Mrs Cream, who has no idea of the nature of the place.

With Charles' recognition of her helping Sue accept her own memories as fact, she quickly enlists his help in her escape, persuading him to purchase a blank key and a file to give to her on his next visit. This he does, and Sue, using the skills learnt growing up in the Borough, escapes from the asylum and travels with Charles to London, with the intention of returning to Mrs Sucksby and her home in Lant Street.

On arrival, an astonished Sue sees Maud at her bedroom window. After days of watching the activity of her old home from a nearby boarding house, Sue sends Charles with a letter explaining all to Mrs Sucksby, still believing that it was Maud and Gentleman alone who deceived her. Charles returns, saying Maud intercepted the letter, and sent Sue a playing card – the Two of Hearts, representing lovers – in reply. Sue takes the token as a joke, and storms into the house to confront Maud, half-mad with rage. She tells everything to Mrs Sucksby, who pretends to have known nothing, and despite Mrs Sucksby's repeated attempts to calm her, swears she will kill Maud for what she has done to her. Gentleman arrives, and though initially shocked at Sue's escape, laughingly begins to tell Sue how Mrs Sucksby played her for a fool. Maud physically tries to stop him, knowing how the truth would devastate Sue; a scuffle between Maud, Gentleman and Mrs Sucksby ensues, and in the confusion, Gentleman is stabbed by the knife Sue had brought with her to kill Maud. He bleeds to death. A hysterical Charles alerts the police. Mrs Sucksby, at last sorry for how she has deceived the two girls, immediately confesses to the murder: ''"Lord knows, I'm sorry for it now; but I done it. And these girls here are innocent girls, and know nothing at all about it; and have harmed no-one."''

Mrs Sucksby is hanged for killing Gentleman; it is revealed that Richard Rivers was not a shamed gentleman at all, but a draper's son named Frederick Bunt, who had had ideas above his station. Maud disappears, though Sue sees her briefly at Mrs Sucksby's trial and gathers from the prison matrons that Maud had been visiting Mrs Sucksby in the days leading up to her death. Sue remains unaware of her true parentage until she finds the will of Marianne Lilly tucked in the folds of Mrs Sucksby's gown. Realising everything, an overwhelmed Sue sets out to find Maud, beginning by returning to Briar. It is there she finds Maud, and the nature of Christopher Lilly's work is finally revealed to Sue. It is further revealed that Maud is now writing erotic fiction to sustain herself financially, publishing her stories in ''The Pearl'', a pornographic magazine run by one of her uncle's friends in London, William Lazenby. The two girls, still very much in love with each other despite everything, make peace and give vent to their feelings at last.

Property company chairman Hu Zian was attracted to his secretary Sun Yuxia's beauty and competence. One day after dinner when Hu was escorting Sun home, he received from a child on the street a box containing a mirror and two silver coins engraved with dragons. He was so frightened that he was absent from the office the following day. Sun went to visit him at home and Hu asked her to stay. Sun refused and left. In another occasion Hu asked Sun to follow him to inspection outside, during which there was a heavy downpour which soaked them both. They were forced to stay in a hotel, where Hu tried to force his intentions on Sun. Sun resisted with vigour and threatened to resign from office.

Enraged at Sun's stubbornness, Hu urged his driver to spread the rumour in the office that Sun had stayed with him in a hotel. As Sun was annoyed and embarrassed, Hu proposed to her. Sun laid down a list of conditions and demanded his acceptance before marriage. Hu agreed.

On the first night of their wedding Hu found that Sun had divided their bedroom into two partitions with an unlocked sliding door. Hu and Sun lived in one of these, and Sun's partition was decorated with mirrors. This frightened Hu so much that he remembered an early episode of his life: More than two decades ago, when the Second Sino-Japanese War was still going on, Hu worked in an inn under the name Hu Amao. One day he picked up two silver coins engraved with dragons and took them in possession, without knowing that they actually belonged to a traitor. One day a friend of the inn owner Tao Ajiu came and stayed in the inn. The inner owner and Hu collaborated to put him in trouble so that they could grab his valuables.

As the police were tracking down the traitor, they found the two silver coins under Tao's pillow. Tao could not prove his innocence but plunged to his death. Hu was so horrified that he could never forget Tao's dead face as reflected in a mirror. At midnight Hu escaped with the inn owner, who wanted to kill Hu but was instead injured badly. Seeing that Hu was so panicked, Sun asked him to tell her what happened, but Hu did not utter a word.

On the second night Hu made his way to Sun's partition, where he heard a terrible voice calling his old name. Hu was so scared that he fell and fainted.

When Hu recovered consciousness he was suspicious of Sun. He made an excuse to send her out and investigated into the matter. Finally he found that it was all Sun's plot and locked her up in the basement. Knowing that she could conceal no more, Sun admitted that she had approached Hu in revenge for her father, Tao. Furious at her plot, Hu wanted to kill her but Uncle Fan, the inn owner, appeared and fought with him. Eventually both men die, leaving Sun lost in her thoughts in front of the mirror.

The plot is initially the banal daily routine of a rich woman taking her son to piano lessons, and conversing with a working class man in a café, drinking wine all the way, then reaches a scandal at a dinner party in chapter 7, followed by a dénouement in the final chapter.

The story concerns the life of a woman, Anne Desbaresdes, and her varying relationships with her child, the piano teacher Mademoiselle Giraud and Chauvin. Chauvin is a working-class man who is currently unemployed and whiles away his time in a café near the apartment where Anne Desbaresdes' child takes piano lessons with Madame Giraud. After the fatal shooting of a woman in the café by her lover, Anne and Chauvin imagine the relationship between the lovers and try to reason why it occurred. Anne frequently returns to the café, before returning to her comfortable home, the last house on the ''Boulevard de la Mer'', which itself represents the social divide between the working- and middle-classes. In the climactic 7th chapter, she returns home late and drunk to a dinner party, then causes a scandal (and is subsequently ill, vomiting) whose consequences are seen in the 8th and final chapter.

Chicago college student Max Hanson (Jackson) is a talented artist and hockey player. Though more interested in the latter, he is under pressure from his mother, Sophie (Williams) to pursue a career in art, influenced by the fact that she put her own career aside to raise the family and has just landed a coveted position with a local art gallery. Max's father, Ed (Colm Feore), is a tax attorney with a more laid-back approach to his son's future, just wanting him to be happy.

While working at the local video store with best friends Orin (Christensen) and Kate (Amy Stewart), a cute girl comes in with her friends seeking a copy of ''Arachnophobia'', and Max is immediately smitten. After locating her on campus the next day, she introduces herself as Molly White (Pope), who already knows Max's name from his hockey jersey. She then gives Max her phone number and invites him to a party she's attending that night. Before long, Max and Molly are becoming an item, the two even managing to make love in his bedroom with his mother and younger sister Chloe in the house. However, Max soon finds out that Molly is a drug addict, as he accompanies her on a trek to score some heroin, which she promptly snorts.

Max invites Molly to Chloe's birthday party, and though she initially refuses to attend because it's the same night as a Smashing Pumpkins concert, she later relents. However, a minor argument erupts between her and Sophie, resulting in Molly leaving abruptly and putting the brakes on their budding relationship. Devastated, Max does his best to move on, but has a hard time doing so. Finally, he's taken to a party one night by Orin and Kate, where he promptly spots Molly. She asks if they can go somewhere and talk; he accepts, she apologizes, and the two make up.

The next day, Max visits Sophie at work and tries to express his feelings about Molly, but her response is less than positive. A short time later, Molly celebrates their new-found relationship by having them shoot up together in her apartment, and Max soon becomes hooked, neglecting his studies and job. Soon thereafter, Molly learns that she's three months behind on rent, and has a week to pay before being evicted. Not having enough money in his bank account to pay it, Max goes to the video store to get his paycheck, but having only worked two hours during the past week, that's all the pay he receives, and he is also given a pink slip. Sensing his friend may be in over his head, Orin offers to try to help Max, but all he wants is money to supposedly "fix the car" (though Orin sees right through this flimsy claim).

After returning home, Max takes $200 from Ed's wallet; when he gently attempts to approach the subject with his son, even offering to help him out of his financial situation, an argument erupts that culminates in Sophie striking Max. Feeling as though he can never go back home, Max and Molly (who was kicked out of her place) move in with her druggie friends. Not long after, Max shows up at the ice rink attempting to steal money from Orin in the locker room, but is caught in the act (during which time we learn Max has been kicked off the team).

Once back at the pad, Max catches Molly having sex with a man in exchange for drugs, and physically confronts him. Later, as their financial situation worsens, the couple is reduced to panhandling at the local mall, where Sophie spots Max, but says nothing until a few days later. After hearing this news, Ed and his other son Brian attempt to find Max, but are unsuccessful.

His addiction now totally out of control, Max tries to rob a local comic book store for drug money, but is caught by the police. Ed and Brian later bail Max out, and while Brian thinks he needs to be put into rehab, Ed insists he can take care of Max at home. However, the effects of withdrawal are in full swing, and it proves to be an uphill battle. Finally, after going into a rage, Max becomes unconscious and is taken to a hospital.

Once there, an arguments erupts between Ed and Sophie, with Sophie insisting that she did what anyone else would have done, but Ed retorts "that's a bunch of crap" and reminds her that neither he nor the kids made her stop painting; she did it all by herself, and that in her self-absorbed attitude, she failed to notice that all Max wanted was "to know it was OK to not be perfect".

The next day, a doctor informs the family that Max needs to get into a treatment program, but stresses the difficulty of doing so. However, while this discussion takes place, Max manages to slip out of the hospital and begins frantically searching for Molly, finally finding her in a sleazy motel room where she has died of a heroin overdose. Out of his mind with grief, Max shows up at Kate's apartment and begs her for money; when she refuses, he accuses her of "wanting" him and offers to prostitute himself. Enraged, Kate throws Max out of the apartment, but in his stupor, he takes a tumble down the stairwell.

The following morning, after his family had searched unsuccessfully for him, Max is brought home in a taxi, Kate by his side. Informing his mother of Molly's death, the two tearfully embrace, and as he prepares to leave for his month-long stay in rehab, he and Sophie finally reach an understanding. Sophie admits that she never saw Max for who he was and encourages him to be whatever he wants, telling Max that she loves him as the two embrace again. The film ends with Max saying goodbye to Brian and Chloe as he departs for rehab, before he and Ed drive away.

The Simpson family attend a church fundraiser for a new steeple. Ned Flanders wins a rubber duck racing contest and is awarded a computer, although he gives it to Marge because he does not have any use for it. Marge babysits Rod and Todd to repay the favor. She finds that all the games they play are boring and overly safe, such as a "sitting still contest," and helps Rod and Todd have fun by encouraging them to liven up.

With Marge spending so much time at the Flanders' house, Homer, Bart, and Lisa go to an animal sanctuary for retired film animals. Bart sees an elderly female chimpanzee named Toot-Toot and offers her some ice cream, only to be taken into her cage and "adopted." Ned comes home and sees Todd wearing a Band-Aid, having injured himself during one of Marge's games. Marge encourages Ned to let his kids start taking more risks, showing him a flyer for a child-safe activity center.

Marge takes Rod and Todd to the activity center. Ned follows her and is surprised to see Rod climbing a structure, yelling that he will get hurt. Rod gets worried and falls, chipping a tooth against the structure. A news broadcast plays about Bart's kidnapping, surprising Marge and causing Ned to view her as a bad mother. Following this, he starts child-proofing the house, although Rod and Todd protest and tell him that they liked having Marge over.

Lisa suggests that Toot-Toot is keeping Bart captive because her real son has gone missing. When Marge goes into the cage to talk to Toot-Toot, she escapes and climbs atop the unfinished church steeple. With Toot-Toot's son, Mr. Teeny, Rod climbs up the steeple and Ned encourages him. Toot-Toot happily reunites with Mr. Teeny and lets Bart go. In a mid-credits scene, Maude Flanders looks down from Heaven, proud that Rod is growing up.

The film opens in Victorian London on a December night in 1900. The first night of the season at the London Opera House finds the opening of a new opera by Lord Ambrose D'Arcy (Michael Gough), a wealthy and pompous man who is annoyed and scornful when the opera manager Lattimer (Thorley Walters) informs him the theatre has not been completely sold out. No one will sit in a certain box, Box #5, because it is haunted. Backstage, despite the soothing efforts of the opera's producer, Harry Hunter (Edward de Souza), everyone, including the show's star, Maria, is nervous and upset as if a sinister force was at work. When the body of a murdered stagehand swings out of the wings during Maria's first aria, pandemonium ensues.

With the show postponed and Maria refusing to perform again, Harry frantically auditions new singers. He finds a promising young star in Christine Charles (Heather Sears), one of the chorus girls. Lord Ambrose lecherously approves of the selection and invites Christine to dinner. In her dressing room, Christine is warned against Lord Ambrose by a Phantom voice. That night, Lord Ambrose attempts to seduce her, but as they are about to leave for his apartment, Harry saves her. On the ride back home, Christine tells Harry about the voice she heard.

Intrigued, Harry takes Christine back to the opera house, where in her dressing room, the same voice tells Harry to leave her there and go. At the same time, the rat-catcher (Patrick Troughton) is murdered by the Phantom's lackey, a dwarf (Ian Wilson). Investigating the murder, Harry leaves Christine by herself, where she is approached by a man dressed in black, wearing a mask with only one eye, The Phantom of the Opera. He tells her she must come with him, but she screams, and The Phantom flees. Harry comforts her and takes her home.

The next day Lord Ambrose sends a dismissal to Christine for refusing to come back to his apartment. Lord Ambrose chooses a more willing but less talented singer to take Christine's place. When Harry refuses to accept this, he is also dismissed by Lord Ambrose. Visiting Christine at her boarding house, Harry finds some old manuscripts that he recognizes as a rough draft of the opera he has produced. Questioning Christine's landlady Mrs. Tucker, he learns that it was written by a former boarder named Professor Petrie, who had been killed in a fire at a printing press that was to print his music. Making further inquiries, he learns that Petrie did not actually perish in the fire, but was splashed with Nitric Acid while apparently trying to extinguish the blaze, had run away in agony and was drowned in the River Thames. This is confirmed by the policeman who was in the area at the time, but the body was never recovered. Harry and Christine have a romantic day together. While having a moonlight carriage ride, Harry tells her about Petrie, and that he is convinced that Lord Ambrose stole Petrie's music. He leaves it at that, as he believes that the Professor is long since dead.

When Christine gets home, she is confronted by the dwarf and faints from fright and is carried off. When she wakes, she is in the Phantom's lair deep in the cellars of the opera house, and the Phantom (Herbert Lom) is playing a huge organ. He tells the frightened girl that he will teach her to sing properly and rehearses her with fanatical insistence until she collapses from exhaustion. Meanwhile, Harry, reinstated as the opera producer, is worried about Christine's disappearance. Pondering the story of the mysterious Professor, he checks the river where he had last been seen. At that same moment, he hears the echo of Christine's voice emanating from a storm drain and soon finds himself following the voice through one of London's water-filled sewers. The faint sound of the organ playing draws him down a tunnel where the dwarf attacks him with a knife. Harry subdues him and finds himself facing the missing Professor as Christine looks on from a bed (where she'd been sleeping).

Harry asks the professor what had happened in his past. In a flashback, the Phantom says that five years before, as a poor and starving composer, he had been forced to sell all of his music, including the opera, to Lord Ambrose for a pitifully small fee with the thought that his being published would bring him recognition. When he discovered that Lord Ambrose was having the music published under his own name, Petrie became enraged and broke into the printers to destroy the plates. While burning the music that had already been printed, Petrie unwittingly started a fire, then accidentally splashed acid on his face and hands in an effort to put it out, thinking it was water. In terrible agony, he ran out, jumped into the river, and was swept by the current into an underground drain, where he was rescued and cared for by the dwarf. The Phantom says that he is dying, but he wishes to see his opera performed by Christine. They both agree to allow him time to complete her voice coaching.

Several weeks later, on the eve of a performance of "Saint Joan," the Phantom confronts Lord Ambrose in his office. He rips off The Phantom's mask and runs out screaming into the night after seeing his terrifying face. The Phantom then watches Christine sing from the "haunted" box. Her performance brings him to tears as he hears his music finally presented. Listening enraptured to the music, the dwarf is discovered in the catwalks by a stage-hand, and in the chase, he jumps onto a huge chandelier poised high above the stage over Christine. As the rope begins to break from the weight, the Phantom spots the danger. He rips off his mask, leaps from his box to the stage, and pushes Christine safely from harm. The chandelier impales him before the eyes of the horror-stricken audience.

Keri Russell plays Katie Armstrong, an American student in Germany studying criminal psychology. She chooses a notorious subject for her thesis: the cannibal killer Oliver Hartwin (played by Thomas Kretschmann). Oliver dreamed of eating a willing victim and, thanks to the internet, he was able to find a volunteer, a young man named Simon Grombeck (played by Thomas Huber).

The story is told in flashbacks as Katie researches these men and their pasts. Events culminate in Katie's discovery of a snuff tape that documents the crime.

The film begins with an introduction by Walt Disney and his robot friend Garco, providing a brief overview of the episode. The overview starts with an animated presentation about mankind seeking to understand the world in which he lives, first noticing patterns in the stars, and developing certain beliefs regarding the celestial bodies. Theories from scientists and philosophers are discussed, including Ptolemy's inaccurate, but formerly-accepted geocentrism-related theories, as well as those of Copernicus's accurate and, now, confirmed heliocentric model. Life on other planets is considered, soon focusing on Mars. Ideas from science-fiction authors H.G. Wells and Edgar Rice Burroughs are brought to life with more colorful animation, and, as done before, science fiction comics of the time are parodied. This segment also features Kimball's comic tone and a cameo appearance by Donald Duck.

Later on, the program adopts a serious tone as it profiles each of the planets in the Solar System, explaining what would happen if a human were to live on each of them. The program claims that, whereas most of the planets are either too cold or too hot for life as we know it, life on Mars could almost be normal. This importance becomes the main focus of the rest of the film. Dr. E.C. Slipher then discusses the possibility of life currently on Mars. An extended sequence speculates at what the conditions on Mars might be like given sufficient water: cannibalistic plants, a trilobite-like creature which eats the dust left behind by dust storms, silicon-based lifeforms which rely solely on minerals for nutrition, leaving behind amazing and strange if ephemeral formations, and a slew of predators, including one that has radial symmetry and magnifies the Sun's rays to burn its hapless prey, and another which stuns with ultrasonics.

The program wraps up with what a trip to Mars would entail for a space crew and its vessels. Contributor/spacecraft designer Ernst Stuhlinger (accompanied by Wernher von Braun) presents his design and details regarding a unique umbrella-shaped Mars Ship: The top portion would be a revolving outer quarters ring providing artificial gravity for the crew of 20 under 'parasol' coolant tubes. At the other end, a sodium-potassium reactor would provide power to the midsection electric/ion drive. Attached upright would be a chemically-fueled winged tail-lander. The mission shown involves six Mars Ships with top speeds up to that take a 400-day spiral course to Mars. There, a crew would spend 412 days on the surface before returning to Earth.

Bradwen has two alternate paths that can be played through in ''Arthur's Knights: Tales of Chivalry''. Prior to choosing which path shall be followed, the game opens with the player in control of a young page (newly a squire) who trots off to converse with a gentleman by the name of Master Foulque, who, it would appear, is a librarian and historiographer. After some discourse with Master Foulque, the player is presented with the choice of deciding between a red book and a white book (determining which story, Celtic or Christian, respectively, of Bradwen shall be told).

Both stories take place shortly after the departure of the Romans from Britain. This epoch marks a time in which Christianity has been somewhat imposed upon the native populace of Britain thus majorly extinguishing what in the game is described as "an age of Kings and Queens, Monsters and Magic" (not to mention fairies and otherwise traditionally Celtic and pagan concepts). Controversy erupts when the decampment of the Romans leaves the British tribes in conflict over political power (thus leaving them disunited and therefore vulnerable to their common enemies, the Saxons). The barbaric Saxons pose a particular threat to reestablishing a semblance of order in the land. Bradwen's role in all this is to embark on a series of missions when his half-brother informs him of the necessity for a cure for Cadfanan, their father and king.

Ultimately, both Bradwens encounter fairies, dragons, King Arthur, Merlin, and even the Devil during travels through Camelot, the mystical realm of Avalon, and a plethora of other lands. Bradwen also, regardless of the religion to which he cleaves, eventually seek justice against the treacherous actions of his half-brother which develop during gameplay. Throughout the game are interspersed some historical facts about Roman Britain, post-Roman Britain, tidbits on the legend of King Arthur, and several allusions to Marion Zimmer Bradley's novel ''The Mists of Avalon''.

A brilliant evil scientist named "The Reverend" has created a powerful theocracy based on the idea of a rapidly approaching apocalypse. He uses his expertise to create four powerful "Horsemen of the Apocalypse", War, Plague, Beast and Death, in order to ensure this comes to pass. His former colleague, Trey Kincaid (voiced by Bruce Willis), is the only man with the know-how to stop the Reverend, but is locked up in jail and must escape in order to save the world.

Price plays the titular mad scientist who, with the questionable assistance of his resurrected flunky Igor, builds a gang of female robots who are then dispatched to seduce and rob wealthy men. Avalon and Hickman play the bumbling heroes who attempt to thwart Goldfoot's scheme. The film's climax is an extended chase through the streets of San Francisco.

The ''Enterprise'' has traveled to the Pentarus system where Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) must mediate a dispute among some miners on the fifth planet. Wesley Crusher (Wil Wheaton) receives word that he has been accepted to Starfleet Academy and, for his final mission, he will accompany Picard on his shuttle trip to Pentarus V. A distress call comes in from Gamilon V, where an unidentified vessel has entered orbit and is giving off lethal doses of radiation. Picard orders Riker to take the ''Enterprise'' to resolve that situation while he and Wesley travel in a shuttle sent by the miners, commanded by Captain Dirgo.

En route, Dirgo's shuttle malfunctions and they are forced to crash-land on the surface of a harsh, desert-like moon. Though they are unharmed, the shuttle is beyond repair, and its communication systems and food replicators are disabled. Dirgo admits he has no emergency supplies on board, so they are forced to search for shelter and water. With his tricorder, Wesley identifies some caves and a potential source of water some distance away, and the three set out across the desert. Reaching a cave, they find a fountain-like water source, but it is protected by a crystalline force field. Dirgo attempts to use a phaser to destroy the field, but this activates a burst of energy from the fountain which encases the phaser in an impenetrable shell and causes a rock slide; Picard pushes Wesley out of the way but is severely injured in doing so.

Meanwhile, the ''Enterprise'' has arrived at Gamilon V, finding the unidentified ship is an abandoned garbage scow filled with radioactive waste. Their initial attempt to attach thrusters to the barge to propel it through an asteroid belt into the Gamilon sun remotely fails, and Commander Riker (Jonathan Frakes) is forced to attempt to tow the barge themselves using the tractor beam, exposing the crew to the lethal radiation.

As Wesley continues to analyze the forcefield, Dirgo becomes impatient and attempts to breach the field again, but this time the energy burst encases him as well, killing him. Picard, weak from his injuries, gives Wesley advice about the academy, and tells him he is proud of him. Wesley refuses to give up. Meanwhile, on the ''Enterprise'', despite the rising radiation levels on board, which are nearing lethal, Riker manages to get the barge headed into the sun and speeds off to help in the search for the shuttle.

Wesley continues to study the fountain, and devises a plan to disable the force field. He fires his phaser at the fountain to attract the energy defense mechanism, but reprograms it using his tricorder to disable the field instead, and is finally able to access the water.

Shortly thereafter, the ''Enterprise'' locates the wreckage of the mining shuttle, and Picard and Wesley are rescued. As Picard is carried from the cave, he tells Wesley that he will be missed.

Someone has been killing women in LA and leaving the bodies drained of blood. The police planned a sting using a female officer, Detective Gwen Taylor (Denise Alessandria Hurd) however the killer was instead intercepted and captured by a group calling itself The Delphi Project. The Delphi Project is a secret government group intent on capturing and studying a live vampire and as it turns out the killer that they are after is actually a thousand year old vampire going by the name Simon Molinar (Jason Carter).

During the attempted capture Dr. Hirsch (James Kiberd) is killed by the vampire. A replacement doctor, Dr. Joe McKay (Garett Maggart) takes his place in the group. Out of the entire group Dr. Joe McKay is the first to treat the vampire like a person and not just as something to be studied. The group sets about a series of tests and experiments to study the vampire. As the experiments become crueler Dr. Joe McKay is left to wonder who is the true monster? The vampire or the very people he works for?

Unbeknownst to Dr. Mckay is that one of his superiors, Dr. Bassett (Jack Donner) has found out that Dr. McKay is one of the rare few who has the genetic predisposition to being able to be turned into a vampire. Dr. Bassett (without the rest of the team's knowledge) even provides Simon Molinar with a live victim. Dr. Bassett, himself, discarded the body. When the body is found this gains the attention of the local police. The group decides to destroy Simon Molinar once their experiments are finished but Dr. Bassett thinks it might be best to create a new vampire, one that has never killed before, to replace the vampire they intend to destroy.

Bassett locked Dr. McKay in a room with the vampire but Simon escaped instead of turning Dr. McKay into a vampire. During his escape Simon ripped the caduceus necklace from Dr. McKay's neck. It's a necklace that Dr. McKay never takes off and wore as a sign of healing and his Hippocratic oath. Simon Molinar stole this as a memento because of his growing fondness for Dr. McKay despite having been his prisoner.

Assistant District Attorney David Corelli (Caruso) is called to the murder scene of prominent businessman Kyle Medford, found bludgeoned to death in his San Francisco home by an antique hatchet. Police detectives Bob Hargrove and Petey Vesko find photographs in Medford's safe of Governor Lew Edwards (Crenna) having sex with a prostitute, later identified as Patrice Jacinto. During questioning, Patrice reveals that she and several other women were paid by Medford to have sex with wealthy men at his beach house in Pacifica. She also informs them that the most desired prostitute among the clients was a woman known only as "Jade". In a private meeting with Governor Edwards and aide Bill Barrett, Corelli is warned not to make the photographs public. Corelli is then almost killed when his brake line is deliberately cut and his vehicle goes out of control while driving down a steep hill.

The detectives find fingerprints on the hatchet belonging to Katrina Gavin, a clinical psychologist and former lover of Corelli's who eventually married his close friend, defense attorney Matt Gavin. When interviewed, Katrina explains that Medford gave her a tour of his antique collection on the day in question, but claims to have nothing to do with his death. At Medford's beach house, Corelli and the detectives find various drugs, alcohol, and sex toys, as well as hidden video cameras. They conclude Medford was recording the sex sessions to blackmail the men. Corelli is shocked to discover Katrina on one of the tapes; the revelation renews the detectives' interest in her as a suspect.

Patrice arranges to meet Corelli at a restaurant to discuss Jade's identity, but she is murdered in a hit-and-run attack by an unknown assailant driving a black Ford Thunderbird. Corelli, witnessing the murder first-hand, chases the assailants' vehicle in vain. The detectives discover the Gavins own a similar Thunderbird, so suspect Katrina of killing Patrice, but then find the actual vehicle used in the hit-and-run abandoned, suggesting that someone is trying to frame Katrina. Katrina is again brought in for questioning and is shown the sex tape. Matt, in his capacity as her attorney, ends the interrogation before she fully explains her involvement. When confronted at their home, Katrina admits to her husband that she did have sex with the man on the tape, due in part to her knowledge of Matt's many affairs.

Katrina visits Corelli at his apartment and tries unsuccessfully to seduce him. She admits having felt sexually liberated by sleeping with several men at the beach house. Meanwhile, the only witness to identify Katrina at the Pacifica beach house, a man named Henderson, is found murdered. Corelli informs the detectives at the crime scene that Katrina could not have killed him because he was with her at the time. Back at his apartment, Corelli is confronted by Matt, who holds him at gunpoint and angrily accuses him of sleeping with Katrina. Corelli denies it and persuades Matt that his wife's life is in danger. They hurry to the Gavin home, where Det. Hargrove, Barrett, and Pat Callendar have come to kill Katrina and search for the incriminating photos of the governor. Callendar is shot by Matt, but Barrett manages to escape. In the meantime, Hargrove tries to rape and kill Katrina, but Corelli and Matt arrive and Hargrove is shot by Matt.

Corelli goes to the governor for a guarantee of Katrina's safety by leveraging his possession of the photographs. The governor denies any knowledge of Hargrove or Callendar's actions, but insinuates they were both acting on his behalf. As she gets ready for bed at home, Katrina finds photographs laid out in her bathroom of her having sex at the beach house. Matt admits to Katrina that he killed Medford, certain that Medford eventually would blackmail them both. He then tells Katrina to "introduce me to Jade" the next time they "make love".

Three junior high school boys—Brad (Adam LaVorgna), Frank (Michael Patrick Carter) and Kevin (Brian Christopher)—travel from their bedroom suburb of Middleton to the city, bringing money with hopes of seeing a woman naked. They find a hooker named "V" (Melanie Griffith) who is willing to show her breasts. However, when they decide to head home, they find their bikes have been stolen, leaving them broke and stuck in the city. V speaks with her drug dealing pimp named "Cash" (Casey Siemaszko), and another hooker, Betty (Anne Heche). Cash has been skimming money that he sends to mob collector Waltzer (Malcolm McDowell), who in turn steals from his own boss, Jerry "The Pope" (Philip Bosco). V notices the boys outside in the rain and offers them a ride back home in Cash's car.

After they arrive at Frank's house, the car V was using suddenly breaks down so she goes inside to use the phone. Tom (Ed Harris), Frank's father, comes home and is surprised to find a woman in the house. Unbeknownst to V, Frank tells Tom that V is a math tutor and that she's giving lessons to Brad. Tom offers to repair her car in a few days when he is free from his science classes at school. With no other option, she accepts Frank's offer to stay in his tree house without Tom's knowledge. Frank begins a close friendship with V, hoping to set her up with his father. He tells her Tom has no problem with her "job," meaning the tutoring ruse, but she thinks he means her prostitution.

V learns from television that Cash has been murdered by Waltzer. She phones Betty only to discover that Waltzer is looking for her - Cash told him that she stole the money. She realizes that he is overhearing the conversation and hangs up. With V's car still broken down, she gets Tom's old bike from the garage and rushes to find him. He is on a field trip to the town's wetlands, undeveloped natural land that he is attempting to save from development. He is unable to repair her car any sooner, but she realizes that she is probably safer in Middleton, since Waltzer doesn't know where she is.

At school, Frank flunks a biology test about sex education and must give his class an oral presentation. He decides to use V as a mannequin and through a ruse distracts his teacher long enough to draw a relatively accurate female reproductive system on her skin-colored bodysuit. Tom and V go out on a date and both realize they are developing feelings for each other. While walking through town on their date, Tom and V run into Kevin's family. V recognizes Kevin's father, who is a client, but he initially says she has him mixed up with someone else before admitting to remembering her and says she was a dance teacher. Tom is impressed with how busy V is being a tutor and dance teacher; V then realizes that Frank had actually lied about Tom knowing about her prostitution. V explains herself to Tom, and their relationship grows. She reveals that her real name is Eve, which she thought was too biblical so she removed the “e”s. Kevin's father unwittingly calls her home phone number, which he had in his pocket notebook, in an attempt to purchase her services again. He talks to Betty and Waltzer, who happens to be there also, learns from Betty about the trip to Middleton, thus finding out where V is hiding.

V is terrified that Waltzer will find her so she decides to leave town but attends a school dance to say goodbye to Frank. Waltzer shows up to spoil their fun. A chase ensues, with Waltzer finally being eliminated. Anxious about her status and afraid to return to her old job, V goes to Waltzer's boss and relates how he has been cheating him. She asks to be "forgotten" by them. The older crime boss succumbs to her charms and he tells her he'll take care of things and that she doesn't need to be afraid anymore, while also allowing her to walk away from prostitution for good. V finds the stolen money in a backpack and uses it to buy the wetlands in Tom's name; it is also revealed that she purchased the ice cream parlor in town, so she can carry on with her new relationship.

The series revolves around the story of former Marine Force Recon Lieutenant Colonel Al Simmons, who worked as a government assassin in covert black ops. He was betrayed and killed by a man whom he believed to be his close friend (the man, later to be revealed as Chapel, burned him alive with a flamethrower during a mission). Upon his death, Simmons vowed revenge on Chapel and hoped that he would one day return to his beloved wife Wanda.

Because of his life as an assassin, Simmons' soul goes to Hell. In order to accomplish his vow, he makes a pact with the devil Malebolgia (who was the overlord on the eighth plane of Hell). The pact was a simple one: Simmons would become a soldier in Malebolgia's army (known as a "Hellspawn" or "Spawn" for short) in return for the ability to walk the earth once again in order to see Wanda. However, Simmons was tricked by Malebolgia: his body was not returned to him and he is returned to Earth five years after his death. He had been given a different body which was a festering, pungently cadaverous, maggot-ridden walking corpse that had a massive living red cape attached to it. Because his new body had been rotten for some time and was in an advanced state of decay, his face had become heavily malformed, to the point that he barely appeared human, which led to Simmons donning a mask in order to cover its grotesque appearance.

Upon his return to "life", Spawn seeks out Wanda, who had apparently got over the grief of having lost Al and married another man, Al's best friend Terry Fitzgerald with whom she had had a daughter, Cyan. Terry, a respectable man, works as an analyst for a man named Jason Wynn. Wynn is a powerbroker in the CIA and secretly a black market arms dealer, amongst other things (such as the head of secret government organizations within the NSA and National Security Council). Wynn is revealed to be the man responsible for the death of Al Simmons due to a disagreement that the two had between each other concerning their "work". Jason's actions would also prove dangerous to the lives of Terry, Wanda, and their daughter as well. Realizing that he is no longer the man in Wanda's life, Al swears to protect her and her new family.

The series depicts Spawn nesting in the dark alleyways, killing any who invade his newfound territory. Rejecting these actions as unworthy of Spawn's time and power, Malebolgia then dispatches another of his minions (a demonic creature known as the Violator that assumes the form of a short, obese clown) to try to persuade Spawn to commit acts of violence and savagery in the name of Hell.

Spawn struggles to fight the lure of evil, as well as seeking to escape being hunted by not only the forces of Hell, but by assailants from Heaven, who have a need to destroy the Hellspawns in order to cripple the forces of Hell so that they do not gain an edge in the escalating war between the two spiritual hosts. As the war intensifies, the line between the forces of good and evil become increasingly blurry. Spawn finds help along the way in the form of a disheveled old man named Cogliostro who was once a Hellspawn that overcame the demonic powers resting within, amongst a number of other characters.

In the last episodes of the series, Spawn learns how to shapeshift and, appearing as Terry, makes love to Wanda, impregnating her. It is revealed that there is a prophecy that the child of a Hellspawn will play the deciding factor in Armageddon, and may be the real reason Spawn was allowed to return to Earth.

Jesse is sixteen years old and works as an orca-researcher on a research ship called the ''Noah'' alongside his old friend Randolph. He's moved away from Glen and Annie who were promised by Randolph to keep him out of trouble. They suspect that Willy and his pod are being illegally hunted by whalers posing as commercial fishermen. Aboard just such a ship, the Botany Bay, Max Wesley, who is ten years old, takes his first trip to sea with his father, John, a whaler from a long line of whalers and learns the true unlawful nature of the family business. During his first hunt, Max accidentally falls overboard and comes face to face with Willy. From this point on, Max is working against his own father, teaming with Jesse and Randolph to save Willy from becoming a part of an underground market for whale meat. Jesse introduces Max to Willy properly after learning of Max's experience and how Max likes whales. Jesse goes to his and Randolph's head boss Drake about the threat to the whales, but he refuses to take action until Jesse manages to get proof.

Jesse manages to sneak on board the ''Botany Bay'' to steal a sample of the spears that are used to shoot the whales and discovers that the whalers are heading back out to go after Willy and his pod, using an audio recording of a song which Jesse plays on his harmonica as a lure for Willy, who won't realize that it's not Jesse until it's too late. Drake plans to call for help the next day, but knowing it will be too late then, Jesse, Randolph and one of their fellow researchers, Drew, steal the ''Noah'' research boat from her mooring and go after the whalers themselves. Max manages to buy them a little time by jumping into the water and forcing the whalers to pause their pursuit of the whales to perform a "man overboard" rescue for Max, which gives Jesse and his two companions enough time to catch up. John is angry because he learns that his son isn't on his side and believes that Max tried to sabotage the engine (Jesse had actually been the one who did this), but it doesn't stop him.

Jesse, Randolph and Drew use a flare gun and their boat's P.A. system to try to bluff the whalers into stopping, but when it doesn't work, Jesse rams the ''Noah'' into the ''Botany Bay'' just as they fire a harpoon, the jolt causing the harpoon to miss Willy and knocking John into the water. Willy tries to kill him, by biting at him, but Jesse and Max manage to convince Willy to spare him. Max's father then gets trapped under a net and nearly drowns as the net drags him down and ultimately comes face to face with Willy himself. This time, Willy, instead of killing him, saves him by pushing him to the surface and holding him there long enough for Jesse and Randolph to rescue him. The Marine Patrol arrive, having been summoned on the radio by Jesse before he rammed the ''Botany Bay'', and catch the whalers (who are stunned by Willy rescuing their boss) in the act and arrest them. Being saved by Willy causes John to realize that he was wrong about the whales and he apologizes to Max. John is not sure where to go from here as his whole life has been about whaling, but Max tells him he is his father and forgives him.

Later, Jesse, Randolph, Drew and Max witness the birth of Willy's son (the mother is an orca named "Nicky"). Max thought about using Willy's name until Jesse suggests Max's name for the newborn calf. The film ends with Willy, his family, and the rest of the pod swimming away out to the open sea.

A 28-year-old autistic woman named Molly McKay has lived in a mental institution from a young age following her parents' deaths in an automobile accident. When the institution must close on account of budget cuts, Molly is left in the care of her non-autistic older brother, Buck McKay, an advertising executive and perennial bachelor. Molly, who verbalizes very little and is obsessed with lining up her shoes in neat rows, throws Buck's life into a tailspin as she runs off her nurses and barges into a meeting at Buck's agency naked.

Molly's neurologist, Susan Brookes, suggests an experimental surgery in which genetically modified brain cells are implanted into Molly's brain. While Buck initially balks at the suggestion, he finally consents to the surgery and Molly makes a gradual but miraculous recovery, speaking fluidly and interacting with others in a normal way. Buck begins taking Molly to social events, like a production of ''Romeo and Juliet'', a baseball game, and expensive dinners. However, after a few months, Molly's brain begins to reject the transplanted cells and she begins to regress into her previous state. Both Molly and Buck must accept the eventual loss of Molly's cure and her regression into her previous state.

In the final scene of the film, Buck accepts Molly's autism and vows to remain in Molly's life by creating a room for her at his home that looks just like the room she had at the institution.

The human population is now 3 million highbred elite and 5 billion morons, and the "average" IQ is 45 (whereas today an IQ score of 100 is average, by definition). Several generations before the onset of the story, the small number of remaining 100-and-higher-IQ technocrats work feverishly to keep the morons alive.

The elite have had little success in solving "The Problem" (also called "Poprob", for 'population problem', in the story) for several reasons: * The morons must be managed or else there will be chaos, resulting in billions of deaths and "five hundred million tons of rotting flesh"; * It is not possible to sterilize all of the morons; * Propaganda against large families is insufficient, because every biological drive is towards fertility (the story predates the development of hormonal contraception).

The elite have tried everything rational to solve the population problem, but the problem cannot be solved rationally. The solution requires a way of thinking that no longer exists – Barlow's "vicious self-interest" and his knowledge of ancient history.

Barlow derives a solution based on his experience in scamming people into buying worthless land and knowledge of lemmings' mass migration into the sea: convince the morons to travel to Venus in spaceships that will kill their passengers out of view of land. The story predates the moon landing, and the safety of space travel is summed up in a description of a rocket that crashed on the moon. Propaganda depicts Venus as a tropical paradise, with "blanket trees", "ham bushes" and "soap roots". In a nationalistic frenzy, every country tries to send as many of their people to Venus as possible to stake their claim.

Barlow's help includes using his knowledge of Nazi propaganda tactics: postcards are sent from the supposedly happy new residents of Venus to relatives left behind, describing a wonderful, easy life, in the same way as fraudulent postcards were sent to relatives of those incinerated in the Nazi death-camps.

But Barlow is duped by his erstwhile assistants. Barlow does not realize that the elite despise him, as they despise all people from the past for not having solved The Problem earlier. In the end, Barlow is placed on a spaceship to Venus to share the fate of his victims and realizes that crime does not pay, just before he dies.

When a "simple child" named Bran who can run incredibly fast comes to Bec's demon-besieged rath, she and a small consignment of warriors go with him, including the chief's son, Connla, who is "largely untested" in battle; Goll, an old warrior; Lorcan and Ronan, two teenage twins; Fiachna the blacksmith; and Orna, a female warrior. During the journey, the group is attacked by demons, but luckily manage to hide near some ancient lodestones which protect them with powerful Old Magic. Eventually, Bran leads them to a crannóg, where everyone is dead except a druid, Drust. The druid tells them about a tunnel to the demons' world, and how he aims to destroy it. They go with him.

The group finds some horses which help them reach their destination in time, but Fiachna is soon abandoned after his wound becomes life-threatening.

Bec manages to force Bran through the closing tunnel at the last moment with the last of her magic, but is trapped as a result. Soon after, Lord Loss appears and tells Bec that when she appeared to absorb power from him several days earlier, Lord Loss had actually intended for that to happen so that she could close the tunnel. This is because Lord Loss is unique among demons, in that instead of wishing to slaughter all the humans in the world, he actually prefers to prolong the suffering for as long as possible. If the tunnel had remained open, countless other demons would have passed through and destroyed all of mankind within a matter of weeks, which would have ruined Lord Loss' "sport". After telling Bec this, Lord Loss reminds her of the geis that he had placed on her, and that he is bound by his word to kill her. Lord Loss sets his familiars upon Bec, and without any magic to defend herself with, she is easily overwhelmed and killed.

Commander Sam Keenan (Jean-Claude Van Damme), a decorated US Navy SEAL, is sent to the Eastern European nation of Moldavia to become the new security attaché at the US Embassy.

When he arrives, Keenan learns that Moldavia is in the middle of a civil war. At the embassy, Keenan meets with Ambassador George Norland (Colin Stinton), who designates Keenan as his "second in command" despite the traditional diplomatic hierarchy, which is contested by others afterward. Recently, the US installed a new government in Moldavia, which is led by Moldavia's newly elected president Yuri Amirev (Serban Celea). Amirev wants the nation to be run as a democratic republic, but under the command of Anton Tavarov (Velibor Topić), communist insurgents have caused a riot at the presidential palace, threatening the fragile stability of the country. The insurgents are loyal to Alexei Kirilov (Costel Lupea), the former brutal communist dictator of Moldavia.

When the palace guards start firing on the insurgents without Amirev's authorization, the insurgents storm the palace, demanding Amirev's head. Keenan volunteers to bring Amirev to the embassy. But events reach critical mass, and the insurgents open fire. Keenan barely makes it back with Amirev, but the fight isn't over yet. Fifty Americans are holed up in the embassy, and Tavarov and his massive army have arrived at the gates, with plans to crash the building and drag Amirev out by any means necessary. To add to Keenan's problems, Norland is killed by a rocket that was launched by one of Tavarov's men.

To defend the embassy, Keenan has only 15 Marines, CIA bureaucrat Frank Gaines (William Tapley), limited ammunition, and his martial arts skills to hold Tavarov's army off until American reinforcements arrive. To make matters worse, Keenan's girlfriend, reporter Michelle Whitman (Julie Cox), is one of the hostages. With Tavarov's crew getting in position for attack, a power struggle takes place between Keenan and Gaines; with help hours away, it will be up to Keenan to rescue the hostages.

When the supposedly loyal General Borgov (a personal CIA "asset" claimed by Gaines) arrives, he turns out to side with the insurgents but Keenan rescues the surviving personnel with help from arriving American military reinforcements.

A nuclear war has wiped out most of Earth's population. The film follows a group of survivors who are holed up in a secluded valley and must protect themselves from rising radiation levels, mutants, and in some cases, each other.

A homicidal, drug-addicted policeman who suffered an abusive childhood develops a relationship with a suicidal psychiatrist.

The film, which takes place in a fantasy setting, opens at a festival featuring Deathstalker and the wizard Nicias. Deathstalker once saved Nicias and the two go from village to village obtaining money by Nicias foretelling the future and showing his magic. During the festival, a hooded woman arrives to see Nicias. She is actually the princess Carissa bringing a magical stone hoping that Nicias has the other one, which when united, will at long last uncover the magical and rich city of Arandor of whom Nicias is the last of the city's descendants. Nicias does not possess the second stone, but knows it is south in Southland which is ruled by the evil sorcerer Troxartes. Troxartes has the second stone and wants the first so he can harness its power and rule more.

The festival is attacked by Troxartes's black-clad right-hand man Makut and his horse soldiers looking for the stone. Amid the slaughter and chaos, Nicias teleports away while the princess is saved from capture by Deathstalker and the two escape. She is nonetheless killed by a few of the unknowing soldiers and passes the stone and knowledge on to Deathstalker. He travels to the hot and wooded Southland where he meets the twin sister of Carissa, the feisty Princess Elizena who was sent from the North to marry Troxartes. Makut is searching for Deathstalker now and finds him again so Deathstalker hides in Elizena's tent but is alerted by her after she sees he held her with a twig instead of a knife. He escapes into an impenetrable valley where he is given shelter by two wild women, Marinda and her mother. Marinda has sex with Deathstalker and then lead him to their horses so he can escape since Makut has entered the valley. The mother, outraged at Marinda's absence, leads Makut to the horses, but Deathstalker has escaped. Learning that he is up against Deathstalker, Troxartes uses his power to awaken all the dead foes he defeated to catch the “legend.”

Elizena's guards were killed by Makut after he thought they were aiding Deathstalker. She accidentally meets Deathstalker who is camping in the woods. In the morning she leaves and is found by Troxartes who takes her back to his castle as his bride. Deathstalker trails them and infiltrates the castle by night, but is found by Troxartes himself who asks for the stone until Deathstalker is knocked unconscious and the stone retrieved. Troxartes figures out there is actually a third stone needed to harness the power so he puts his mistress to torture Deathstalker for the knowledge, but he escapes and ties her up. Heading for the stones, Nicias unknowingly teleports right near Troxartes in the castle who jovially captures him and intends to put him in his army if his magic cannot find the third stone.

In the woods at night, Deathstalker finds Marinda and runs into a few of the undead warriors near a camp fire recognizing Gragas who was killed in a fair fight between Deathstalker earlier. They are forced to do Troxartes's bidding because their souls are kept secure in jars so Deathstalker makes a deal to get the jars if they will help him against Troxartes. He also tells Marinda to go alert the northern band to come help in the fight against the castle. Elizena learns she is just being kept alive until the third stone is found so she leads Deathstalker to where Nicias is being kept. The third stone is accidentally discovered to have been hidden in the castle all along. The northern band arrives and the souls are released by Deathstalker so the undead warriors turn on Troxartes and his band. In the ensuing battle, Makut is killed by an arrow during a duel between Deathstalker. Troxartes kills Marinda and is then killed by Deathstalker during the fight. The three stones are united at last and it reveals the secret city of Arandor and peace is brought to the land. Deathstalker rides off into the sunset for further adventures.

15-year-old Tom is upset after his family moves from London to a rural house in Devon. He misses his friends, and family dynamics are strange. His Mum is in the late stages of pregnancy, his Dad is in the home-furniture industry. Tom and his 18-year-old sister Jessie are unusually close to each other, and everyone helps Mum during her pregnancy.

One night, Mum goes into labour and Dad drives the whole family to the hospital. The car crashes, but nobody is badly injured and a baby girl is born while Mum is trapped in the car. They all go to the hospital to get stitched up and they see Mum and the baby happy. Later, while coming home from shopping with Mum, Tom complains he doesn't know anybody, but she assures him he will make friends. When they arrive home, Tom enters the house through the back door and something catches his attention.

Tom confronts Jessie and asks about what he saw: Dad and Jessie, naked in a bathtub together. Jessie acts as if nothing happened, but he is adamant about what he witnessed. The family goes out to the pub, and Jessie introduces Tom to her boyfriend Nick, who drives Jessie and Tom down to the beach. They engage in awkward conversation before Jessie and Nick disappear, leaving Tom alone by the fire. The parents are furious with them for staying out all night without telling them, and Mum must restrain Dad from harming Jessie. Later, Tom tells Jessie that he suspects that her and Dad's behavior has been ongoing. Jessie neither confirms nor denies this, causing Tom to lash out in anger.

Later, Dad tells them he is going for a run. Full of suspicion and armed with a video camera, Tom follows Dad and Jessie into an old war bunker near the beach. Filming through a hole in the wall, he witnesses Dad sodomizing Jessie against her will. Tom walks off and, devastated, throws the camera into the sea.

Tom accuses Jessie of being sick because of her actions with their father. Jessie lets him burn her breast with a lighter to make him feel better, but this satisfies neither and he tells her it must stop. Later she takes Tom on a trip to London to see a friend, Carol, who attempts to seduce him at Jessie's behest, but stops when she walks in on them.

One night, Tom is woken up by Mum, who tells him they must urgently go to the hospital because the baby is unwell. Jessie drives Tom home from the hospital, leaving Dad with Mum and the baby. When they get home they see Lucy, who offers Jessie comfort if she needs it. Lucy appears to know something that the viewer doesn't. Later, Tom decides to cycle back to the hospital, where he sees baby Alice, and when Mum comes in they see blood in her nappy. He tells Mum never to let Dad near the baby and not to trust him, but leaves before she can respond.

When Tom returns home, Dad tells him that Mum called from the hospital and confronts him, saying he's lying, and Tom says he is telling the truth, whereupon Dad attacks him physically, saying that Tom is breaking up the family and that he will put Tom into care. Jessie is crying throughout, arms over her head covering her ears. Dad then leaves to see Mum.

Tom and Jessie lie next to each other in bed and Jessie thanks him for standing up to Dad. Tom and Jessie enter Dad's room after he returns. He continues to deny his behaviour and claims that Tom is making things up because he misses London, is unhappy, and is putting ideas into Jessie's head. Jessie backs Tom up, but is upset by Dad's continued gaslighting.

As Dad blusters, Tom realises that he will not change. He stabs Dad in the stomach with a kitchen knife. Dad screams in pain on the floor. Tom and Jessie watch him gasping and bleeding on the floor and then Tom runs from the house to go to the bunker. Jessie follows him there and comforts him silently. Tom asks what they will do now. He walks over and closes the door to the bunker.

In New York City, 1934, jazz singer Dot Clark and her shady gangster boyfriend, Louie The Lug ("An Earful of Music"), are introduced. After having an affair with the deceased Professor Edward Wilson, Dot is now technically his common-law wife and heiress to $77 million. She has to go to Egypt to claim the money, and sets off with Louie in hopes of getting the cash. Former assistant to Edward Wilson, Gerald Lane, informs the law offices of Benton, Loring, and Slade of Professor Wilson's death and the fact that Edward's son, Eddie Wilson, Jr, is the rightful heir to the money. Mr. Slade, the lawyer, goes to a barge in Brooklyn where Eddie is living with his adopted father, Pops, an old stevedore, and his three sons, Oscar, Adolph, and Herman, who roughhouse Eddie. However, Eddie is managing to live a nice life nonetheless, with his girlfriend, Nora 'Toots', and his care for all the kids on the barge. He dreams of the day when he will have enough money to live his own life outside of the dirty barge ("When My Ship Comes In"). Moments later, Eddie is informed that he has inherited the $77 million and boards a ship bound for Egypt to claim the money. Aboard the ship is Colonel Henry Larrabee, a gentleman from Virginia who sponsored Eddie, Sr's exploration endeavors and wants a share of the money, as well. Eddie befriends his beautiful niece, Joan, and Dot and Louie realize that they are not the only ones traveling to Egypt. In an elaborate scheme to trick Eddie into signing over the inheritance, Dot disguises herself as Eddie's mother and almost succeeds in duping him, but Louie ruins the plan at the last minute. Meanwhile, Gerald Lane has boarded the ship and he is revealed to be in love with Joan Larrabee.

In the ship's bar, the Colonel, Gerald, and Louie realize they are all traveling for the same reason, and Gerald calls Colonel Larrabee a liar. Joan overhears and becomes angry with him, much to Jerry's dismay. Louie tries to get Eddie to hand over the cash by trying to bump him off by pushing him off the ship's deck in a wheelchair. The duo thinks they have succeeded in getting rid of Eddie, but they are foiled again. Eddie tries to help Jerry win back Joan, and suggests they rehearse a number for the ship's concert the next evening. They rehearse ("Your Head On My Shoulder"), but Joan is still frosty toward him. At the ship's concert, Jerry, Eddie, Dot, Joan, and members of the chorus perform a big minstrel show number featuring a specialty tap by the Nicholas Brothers ("Mandy N' Me"). The ship lands in Alexandria, Egypt, and Joan is still angry with Jerry. Eddie, still convinced that Dot is his mother and Louie is his uncle, wants to see a magician performing at the ship's port. When the magician taunts Louie and calls him a coward, Louie gets in the magic basket and ends up getting beaten by Egyptian slaves. Eddie chases a little dog running through the marketplace and lands literally in the lap of the sheikh's daughter, Princess Fanya, who falls instantly in love with Eddie. She forces him to come with her back to the palace, where Eddie meets her father, Sheikh Mulhulla, and her fiancé, Ben Ali, who is extremely jealous. Fanya hyperbolizes the encounter with the dog, saying that Eddie saved her from a lion's attack instead of a puppy.

Eddie then is invited to stay at the palace, much to Fanya's delight. However, soon Sheikh Mulhulla learns of the Americans being in Egypt who have come to take the $77 million treasure that he believes is rightfully his. He tells Eddie about this and Eddie begins to worry about his mother and his uncle, along with the others. In a comical scene, the sheikh and Eddie smoke a hookah pipe and the sheikh tells him of the affair he is having with a famous dancer who lives in the village. The harem women try to seduce Eddie, but he is steadfast to remain faithful to Nora 'Toots' ("Okay Toots"). Princess Fanya has a plot to get Eddie to marry her, and she tells her father that Eddie kissed her on the camel when they first met. The sheikh then decrees that Eddie must marry Fanya or die, and has him suspended over a large bowl of soup. Eddie then agrees to marry Fanya, and is kept in a room on a dog collar until the next morning, when Ben Ali comes in with a gun in a jealous rage. Eddie convinces Ben Ali that he does not want to marry Fanya, and Ben Ali is convinced and lets him go. However, Joan, Jerry, the Colonel, Dot, and Louie arrive at the palace and are immediately accosted by the guards. In the tomb, Eddie and the men disguise themselves as the spirits of the sheikh's ancestors and tell him to let the Americans go free. The sheikh is so scared by the prophecies, he agrees to let them go on one condition: Eddie will never be able to see Fanya ever again. He agrees and boards a plane home to New York City, where he uses the inheritance to open a free ice cream factory with Toots, thus realizing their lifelong dream ("Ice Cream Fantasy Finale").

The episode opens with a rendition of the now-familiar ''Blackadder'' theme, followed by an on-screen narrative text:

The action opens with Prince Harry, the King, and the Queen discussing the war with the Spanish. They hope it will soon be over so they can fight the French. The Queen is in high spirits, as it is her birthday and she has been given the county of Shropshire as a present.

Prince Edmund, Duke of York is in his chambers with his servants Percy and Baldrick. He is clearly unhappy about the task he has been given, which is to arrange the festivities for both the Queen's birthday and the return of the Scottish hero Dougal McAngus to the court. He refers to his brother Henry as ‘the bastard’. Baldrick points out that if Henry actually was a bastard, Edmund would one day be King. When he finds out that the eunuchs scheduled to appear have cancelled, Edmund decides to have them executed. (‘This is a Royal command performance – there are only two options. Either you do it, or you don't do it. If you do it, you don't get paid. If you don't do it, you get beheaded.’)

Later, at a presentation in the great hall, the King gives McAngus all Edmund's lands in Scotland. Edmund is furious, and he, Percy and Baldrick plot to kill McAngus. Percy warns that the King will cut Edmund off if he thinks he has deliberately killed McAngus, so they agree to make it look like an accident. Baldrick suggests putting McAngus's head in the mouth of a cannon and firing it, but Edmund dismisses this as feeble.

Looking for the Scot, Edmund overhears him telling the Queen that his father sends her his regards. Edmund invites McAngus to act as the Scotsman in the play "The Death of the Scotsman", to be performed for the Queen's birthday.

Later, as Edmund is about to start the play, he discovers that McAngus is drunk. Percy and Baldrick begin the play, and are later joined by Edmund and McAngus. In the play, McAngus insults the Queen, then stabs Edmund with a fake telescopic sword. He is sentenced to be hanged from the gallows. Leaving the stage, Edmund instructs Percy and Baldrick to remove the safety hook from the gallows, and warns them that whatever happens, if the Scotsman lives, they will die.

Off-stage, McAngus tells Edmund about hidden love letters from the Queen to McAngus' father, casting doubts on the lineage of Prince Henry. McAngus is back on stage about to be hanged, before Edmund realises he needs him alive to show him the letters. He tries to stop the hanging from off-stage by cutting the noose with a spear, but it fails, so in a last-ditch attempt, he throws a sheet over his head, and enters the stage as the ghost of the Prince. He pleads mercy for the Scotsman, but Percy and Baldrick, mindful of his previous threat, are determined to carry out the execution. A comic fight sequence ensues, which ends with Edmund inadvertently hanging McAngus himself, but then holding him up to stop him choking.

A gleeful Edmund is shown the love letters that his mother wrote. He instructs Baldrick to have the court assembled in the morning, where he reveals the content of the letters which are dated November and December 1526. He begins to falter as he realises that this was nine months ''after'' Henry's birth, but nine months ''before'' his own; it is ''he'' who is illegitimate, not Henry. Edmund tries to pretend that McAngus has forged the letters, and challenges him to a duel to the death. Edmund instructs Baldrick to get the fake telescopic sword for McAngus, but Percy gives Edmund the fake instead. There is a big fight, which culminates in Edmund stabbing McAngus with the fake sword. On finding out that Edmund tried to set him up with the fake sword, McAngus is furious and is about to kill Edmund. When the King begs him for clemency, McAngus agrees, but only if Edmund begs for mercy.

Later, the King, Queen and Henry discuss the letters, which apparently turned out to be French forgeries. Edmund and McAngus are now supposed to be the best of friends. However, up on the tower, McAngus is peering down the barrel of a large cannon, at Edmund's request. Back in the King's chambers, a loud bang is heard. Edmund rushes in to announce that there has been a ‘terrible accident’.

The final shot is of the family coat of arms, inscribed with the motto: ''Veni Vidi Castratavi Illegitimos'' (‘I came, I saw, I castrated the bastards’).

French Colonel Philippe Leroux and Captain Paul Delmas are fleeing from the King's German Legion toward Sharpe's Light Company. Leroux has extracted the secret identity of El Mirador, Britain's most important spy in Spain, from a priest he tortured. Leroux kills Delmas and assumes his identity and then allows himself to be captured by Sharpe and his men, knowing that the British would never exchange an imperial colonel. Sharpe covets Leroux's sword, a finely crafted, superbly balanced Klingenthal heavy cavalry sword. As Captain Delmas, Leroux gives his parole to Major Joseph Forrest. Whilst he is being escorted back to Wellington's headquarters, he kills his escort and escapes on horseback towards Salamanca. Lieutenant Colonel Windham pursues Leroux on horseback, but Leroux kills him. He gains sanctuary in one of the three French-controlled forts outside Salamanca, after Father Curtis protects him from the locals.

Sharpe confronts Curtis, who explains that the Frenchman is in fact Leroux, and that he was protecting the city's residents against Leroux's revenge if the city were to be recaptured by the French. Sharpe takes an instant dislike to Curtis, whom he thinks is sympathetic to the French. In Salamanca, Sharpe is introduced to the breathtakingly beautiful Marquesa de Casares el Grande y Melida Sadaba, and to Captain Lord Jack Spears. Wellington's army arrives at Salamanca as part of their manoeuvring against Marshal Marmont's army. Major Michael Hogan is both disturbed and relieved when Sharpe gives him a list Leroux dropped; the list was stolen from Hogan and contains the names of many of his spies. Many of them have recently been tortured and killed by Leroux.

Frustrated at his inability to bring Marmont to battle on his terms, Wellington finally sends two battalions, including the South Essex, against three French battalions in an effort to provoke Marmont, but Marmont does not rise to the bait.

Following the battle, Wellington places Sharpe and the Light Company under Hogan's command (as he and his men can identify Leroux) to ensure Leroux does not escape from the French forts. The Sixth Division attempts to storm the forts by surprise, but the French have been tipped off and slaughter the attackers. Sharpe is invited to a party by La Marquesa, but decides not to attend. Nevertheless Lord Spears later persuades him to go. As he prepares to leave the party, one of the servants takes him to a garden for a private meeting with La Marquesa. She obliquely claims to be El Mirador, and begs Sharpe to protect her from Leroux. They become lovers (her fat old husband being away suppressing a revolt in Brazil); after a while, she tells him her first name is Helena.

After several days, the forts are assaulted again and quickly surrender. Sharpe and his men examine the French prisoners several times, but cannot find Leroux. After searching the wounded, Sharpe allows them to be taken to the hospital in Salamanca. After Harper discovers a disemboweled French soldier who does not appear to have a full complement of intestines, Sharpe realises that Leroux has disguised himself as a French soldier with a severe stomach wound. Leaving his jacket behind (he had taken it off due to the heat), Sharpe and Harper race to the hospital, disrupting Leroux's rendezvous with a confederate who has brought a horse for him. Whilst searching the hospital, Harper discovers Leroux and a struggle ensues. Harper is pushed down a staircase and knocked unconscious. Sharpe comes running and engages in a sword duel with Leroux until the blade of Sharpe's sabre is shattered. Before Leroux can kill him, a sentry comes to his aid, and Leroux flees. Leroux shoots Sharpe in the stomach.

The Light Company eventually realise that Sharpe and Harper are missing and Major Hogan is alerted. A search of the hospital finds Harper still unconscious, but Sharpe cannot be found. When his discarded trousers are found, it is believed that he was mistaken for a dead French soldier and buried in a mass grave. In fact, he has been taken to the death ward run by Sergeant Connolley in the dank basement. Sharpe, unrecognised, drifts in and out of consciousness, but refuses to die from a wound that is almost always fatal. Hogan and Harper resume the search. They finally find Sharpe, but he is barely clinging to life. While the army moves on, Harper and Isabella (the peasant girl Harper rescued in the Battle of Badajoz) minister to Sharpe. In the meantime, Hogan assigns Lord Spears and some men to discreetly guard El Mirador.

With time on his hands, Harper buys a sword and spends many hours working on it. Isabella tells him that Sharpe is on the road to full recovery. When Lord Spears visits, Sharpe, he suggests that Lord Spears is protecting El Mirador. Sharpe's knowledge of this surprises Spears and makes him uncomfortable, but he nevertheless confirms Sharpe's hunch. As Sharpe recuperates, Harper returns to the Light Company.

A month later, Hogan sends Sharpe a letter telling him that the French will soon be returning to Salamanca and that he must pack and leave. That evening, Father Curtis returns Sharpe's stolen rifle. Curtis tells Sharpe that one of his correspondents in Paris has discovered that Leroux has a multi-lingual sister named Hélène. Curtis believes that this must be La Marquesa. Hogan does as well, and asks Sharpe to feed her false information that Wellington intends to speedily retreat to Portugal, while remaining with one division as rearguard to fool the French into believing otherwise. Sharpe realises that Curtis is El Mirador, not La Marquesa. Whilst hoping that she is not a French spy, he does deceive her later that evening.

Sharpe, still not fully healed, rejoins Wellington's army, riding on a horse that was a gift from La Marquesa. Marmont, suspecting already that Wellington is racing for the border, has these suspicions confirmed by a message from La Marquesa and he sends his army in pursuit, enabling Wellington to spring his trap, and the Battle of Salamanca ensues. The French left is destroyed by a British cavalry charge. Marmont and his deputy are both injured, so General Clausel assumes command. The British Fourth Division (including the South Essex) attack the French centre, but are repulsed by a French counterattack. Sharpe seeing the South Essex being pushed back and realising that they need to stand firm in order to channel the French columns into a killing ground for the Sixth Division, cannot resist joining the battle. He gets the wavering Light Company to stand their ground, and the French column is crushed. The French withdraw under the protection of their still undefeated right, hoping to cross the bridge at Alba de Tormes and escape. Wellington believes that a Spanish garrison holds the bridge and that the French are trapped. Unbeknownst to him, however, the Spanish have fled, believing that the British have been defeated, and the French retreat proceeds unopposed.

Lord Spears conducts a solo charge against the fleeing French and is fatally shot. Sharpe comes to his aid. Spears is dying and he wants Sharpe to tell his sister that he died honourably and he tells Sharpe that he wants to die because he has the Black Lion (syphilis), which results in an ugly death. He tells Sharpe that he knew that Hélène was a French spy and that he had told Hogan this some time ago. Sharpe realises that he is lying and suspects that he is the traitor in the British headquarters who stole Hogan's list. He threatens to kill Spears by stabbing him in the back (which would make it seem like he was killed whilst running away). Spears relents and confesses. He had not sold out Curtis because Leroux already knew. but he did give Leroux the book in which Curtis had written down the details of all the agents in his network. Spears had been hoping that in exchange Leroux would give him a night with his sister, but instead, he gave him back his parole and promised to provide his sister with a dowry when he returned to Paris. Then, at Spears' own request, Sharpe shoots him in the head. He reports to Hogan that Leroux has Curtis's book.

Sharpe, Harper and Hogan pursue the retreating French through the night in an effort to intercept Leroux. In the morning, they catch up to him, but he is able to outrun them and gain the protection of one of three French infantry squares. The French infantry subsequently ambush a British/King's German Legion cavalry charge against the French cavalry. Against extremely heavy odds, the enraged cavalry succeed in breaking the squares, albeit with heavy casualties.

Sharpe corners Leroux. Leroux shoots at him, missing Sharpe, but killing his horse. Sharpe shoots Leroux, wounding him in the leg and causing him to be thrown from his horse. Leroux refuses to fight, preferring to surrender. Sharpe forces him to fight, threatening to kill him anyway if he does not. In the ensuing sword duel, Sharpe kills Leroux and recovers Leroux's sword and the coded book.

La Marquesa is allowed to leave Salamanca, since it is not in the British interest to create a scandal involving a high-ranking Spanish aristocrat. She encounters Sharpe, and is not particularly upset when she learns that Sharpe killed her brother. Sharpe chooses to keep Harper's present, feeling it is lucky, while throwing LeRoux's sword - which, despite its beauty, has only been used for evil purposes - into the river.

The film opens with a young boy running to meet his grandfather (played by Yune), who lies dying on his bed. The young boy sadly explains that he could not find the medicine required to cure his grandfather's ailment and wonders aloud who will take care of him after his grandfather dies. His dying grandfather attempts to reassure the young boy and explains that he should go to America. He further explains that when he was younger and working as a merchant marine, he met "the most beautiful girl" in America and tells the young boy that if he goes there, she will take very good care of him. As the young boy is asking how to find her, his grandfather dies and the film fades to black.

When it fades back in, quite some time has passed and the young boy, who is now an adult, has arrived in America and has begun working as a chef, catering to some gangsters in California. The gangsters, who call the man "Bruce" due to his resemblance to the famed martial artist Bruce Lee, are having trouble keeping their "boss of bosses" happy and are trying to come up with the perfect solution to distributing cocaine to all of their clients throughout the United States. Some previous attempts at moving the drug have resulted in busts and the boss of bosses is not happy.

Through a series of misunderstandings, Bruce makes it into the local newspaper as a hero, having thwarted an attempted robbery at the local market. Bruce's boss, Lil' Pete, sees the newspaper and quickly devises a plan, putting Bruce in control of moving the cocaine across the country and using Freddy, a stooge associated with the drug lords, as Bruce's limousine chauffeur. He convinces Bruce (who already wants to go to New York City to find the lady of whom his grandfather spoke) that he should drive to New York, not fly, as flying would rob him of seeing the beautiful countryside. Bruce agrees, and the rest of the film follows an unknowing Bruce delivering what he thinks to be Chinese flour to associates of the gangsters across the country, and the interactions he has with the people on this trip.

In the mining town of Gold Lick, Oregon, Jeff (Taylor Sharpe), a young fan of B-movie actor Bruce Campbell, and his friend Clayton (Logan Martin) go out to a cemetery to meet two girls, Big Debbie (Ariel Badenhop) and Little Debbie (Ali Akay). Jeff removes a medallion off the mausoleum, unleashing the Chinese god of the dead, Guan Di (James Peck), who kills Clayton and the Debbies while Jeff flees.

Meanwhile, Bruce Campbell is finishing filming for the fictional ''Cave Alien II'', and is promised a birthday surprise from his agent, Mills Toddner (Ted Raimi). Bruce meets Jeff, who kidnaps Campbell and takes him to Gold Lick in hopes that his hero can save the town from Guan Di. Upon arrival, Bruce assumes this is his birthday surprise from Mills, and thinks it is all a movie, despite a lack of cameras and a script, and agrees to "help". He learns about Guan Di in the town's hall, and during a dinner party, Bruce gets on the good side of Jeff's mother, Kelly (Grace Thorsen), who had initially been irritated by Bruce's behavior.

After gearing up at Gold Lick's gun shop, Bruce and many citizens of Gold Lick go out into the woods to take on Guan Di, which Bruce still thinks is part of a movie. Bruce then finds out that it is all real and flees Gold Lick, angering the townspeople, disappointing Kelly, and upsetting Jeff. As part of a running gag, an Italian painter (also played by Ted Raimi) constantly repaints the population sign every time someone dies, including himself. Bruce returns to his caravan to find that everyone, including his own dog, hates him a lot. He has a restraining order placed upon him by his ex-wife, Cheryl (Ellen Sandweiss), and finds that his "surprise birthday present" from Mills was just a singing prostitute named Kasey (Janelle Farber). Bruce is then called by Jeff, who informs him that he is going to take on Guan Di alone in spite of Bruce's retreat.

Kasey takes Bruce back to Gold Lick, where he is treated with contempt and tries to reconcile with Kelly. To rescue Jeff, they both drive to the old cemetery, in which they set up dynamite at the mausoleum and try to lure Guan Di inside with one of Jeff's cardboard cut-outs of Bruce, for which Guan Di does not fall. After kissing Kelly, Bruce decides to sacrifice himself (with bean curd playing a significant role in luring Guan Di) and the dynamite is blown up. He emerges from the debris alive, and hangs the medallion back onto the mausoleum wall to ease the spirit. Guan Di then also comes back to life, and at the last minute, as revealed, the whole scenario ''was'' a movie. Bruce argues with Ted Raimi about the cliche ending and turns it into a happy ending, which involves Bruce and Kelly married, living in a nice house with their son, Jeff, who is accepted into Harvard University. After the movie ends, Bruce asks, "What could be a better ending than that?", after which Guan Di appears and attacks Bruce.

The film begins with Bruce in Houston on a search for the American G.I. who helped Bruce when he was just a child in Korea. With little more than a name and a fuzzy memory of his hero, Bruce is determined to find G.I. Ernie Brown to thank and repay him with an antique Korean vase. After following a few dead-end leads, Bruce meets the students of a local karate studio, who introduce him to their martial-arts master, Master McLean. Thinking Bruce to be a karate master, McLean convinces Bruce to run the studio in his place while he takes care of some business. Bruce, accepting the role, dons a black belt and with his own goofy yet clever tricks convinces the students of his skills. While teaching, Bruce develops a bond with a young orphan and student, Billy, and eventually takes up a fatherly role and begins to mentor him.

During his free time, Bruce continues his search for Ernie Brown, which leads him to the massage parlor of the crime boss Mr. B. Before he can even meet with him, Bruce steps up in defense of Polly, one of the girls on Mr. B's payroll. Thwarting Mr. B's goon from harassing her, Bruce and Polly make a quick exit, Bruce unfortunately leaving his antique vase behind. The goons, fearful of the wrath of their boss, decide to give the vase to Mr. B as a gift in hopes his fury will be diminished. Upon seeing the vase, Mr. B develops a strange look as he exclaims that he has not seen a vase like it since the Korean War.

Bruce plays a game of hide and seek as the goons try their best to track down Polly, all the while in the background being followed by a detective investigating Mr. B. Many near misses and humorous situations occur, as Bruce and Polly evade the goons and try to recover the vase, including a dancer challenging Bruce's skills in a club to Bruce's misunderstanding and misusing of a gesture that he gives to a motorcycle gang, and even a mad bull that gives Bruce a ride into town. The climax begins when Mr. B's goons finally locate and kidnap Polly and knock over young Billy, causing him to hit his head and go into a coma.

With his young friend in a coma, Bruce sets out to find and rescue Polly, but he is discovered during his attempt and confronted by Mr. B. Upon hearing the goons' exaggerated claims of Bruce's skill, Mr. B makes Bruce a deal to pit Bruce against his champion fighter—the Executioner—with the agreement that if he wins, Polly and the vase will be returned. Bruce accepts the challenge and is soon in the ring, face to face with the massive and brutal Executioner. Of course, due to his lack of skill and the threat of Mr. B, Bruce is no match for the brutal fighter. At the last moment, though, Billy, having awakened from his coma and seeing Bruce fighting on television, wobbles to the ring and inspires his mentor to put on a sock and "Sock it to him". With this new determination, Bruce defeats the Executioner.

Mr. B, unhappy with Bruce's win, tries to go back on his deal, but is quickly surprised and arrested by the investigating detective.

Polly and Billy, joining Bruce in the ring, return his vase and congratulate Bruce on his victory. Much to their surprise, Bruce seems unhappy and he reveals the realization that Mr. B was his childhood hero Ernie Brown, but much to Bruce's surprise, the detective rushes into the ring, and calling Bruce by the name his hero gave him, announces ''he'' is actually the Ernie "Slim" Brown that Bruce had met as a child, but could not reveal this earlier due to being deep undercover. The reunion is sweet and swift; Bruce thanks him, gives him the vase, and the credits roll.

<!-- cast in the box

The film deals with the myriad complications arising from Venla's (Minna Haapkylä) desire to have a child. Her longtime boyfriend Antero (Kari-Pekka Toivonen) is reluctant, fearing that fatherhood will imperil his last chance to succeed in his speed skating career and by seeing his friend go through fatherhood. Antero does some extreme things to avoid getting Venla pregnant and she begins to be equally devious in her attempts to conceive. Venla seeks help from her bisexual co-worker at a fertility clinic and the relationship between the two begins to blossom amongst many setbacks.

The film is divided into five unrelated segments with the mirror on an antique dressing table serving as the plot device.

The first segment is set in a brothel in 16th-century China. A courtesan is murdered and her blood spills onto the mirror on her dressing table.

The second segment is set in Shanghai in 1922. Mary, an heiress to a large mansion, receives an antique dressing table as a birthday gift. She notices that there is something strange about the mirror and starts receiving eerie phone calls reminding her about her dark secrets in the past. She had an affair with a professor who already had a family. In order to silence him and take over his mansion, she poisoned him to death. One night, her two servants confront her, tell her that they are actually the professor's daughters, and avenge their father.

The third segment is set in Singapore in 1988 during the Ghost Festival. James, a lawyer, has a one-night stand with Lora and tries to get away in the morning but her burly brother, Roman (who speak Teochew dialect), stops him and forces him to marry Lora. Lora moves into James's house and brings along an antique dressing table that she inherited from her deceased parents. One day, a woman approaches James and offers him a million dollars to defend her son, who has been accused of raping a lady and murdering her boyfriend. Overcome by greed, James ignores his conscience, defends the accused in court, and wins the case. James gets into a car accident later and his face is injured so badly that he has to undergo reconstructive surgery. When the bandages are removed, James is horrified to see that he now looks exactly like the rape victim's deceased boyfriend.

The fourth segment is set in Hong Kong in 1999. An old woman and her granddaughter Yu are waiting for the latter's cousin Ming to come home from his overseas studies. When Ming returns, he brings along his girlfriend, Judy, and announces his decision to marry her. Yu becomes very jealous because she is in love with Ming. One day, Ming and Judy purchase an antique dressing table from a shop and bring it home. Yu finds the mirror very weird and starts feeling uneasy. Judy's pet puppy also keeps barking at her. One night, the puppy is brutally killed, and Ming's grandmother goes missing on the following night. Ming's grandmother is eventually found dead with her body dismembered. Yu is blamed for the murder and gets arrested by the police. Later, Ming brings Judy to the mirror and tells her that he knows she murdered his grandmother so that she could inherit his grandmother's fortune. Judy reveals her true colours and tries to kill Ming but misses her step and ends up impaling herself on a pair of scissors stuck to the dressing table.

The fifth segment is set in Taiwan in 2000. A woman approaches the antique dressing table and sees her eyeballs falling out from their sockets in her reflection in the mirror.

In Zimbabwe in the year 2194, Chief of Security General Matsika leads a battle against the gangs which terrorize the nation. His three children, Tendai, Rita, and Kuda, are kept in a fortified mansion to ensure their security. Seeking adventure to earn the Scout Badge, they escape the house with the help of the Mellower, a praise singer employed by their parents. The children then find themselves in the busy streets of Mbare Musika, where they are kidnapped and taken to Dead Man's Vlei, the lair of the She Elephant, a child trafficker. There, they are forced to work in the plastic mines. Their parents enlist the help of the Ear, the Eye, and the Arm, three mutant detectives. Ear has super-sensitive hearing; Eye has hawk-like vision; Arm has empathic powers which allow him to sense others' feelings and see into their souls.

Tendai realizes that the She Elephant is planning to sell them to the Masks, a gang who have evaded General Matsika's efforts to combat crime. The siblings escape to Resthaven, an independent country within Zimbabwe which aims to retain traditional African culture. Eventually, the children are banished from Resthaven.

The children seek help from the Mellower's mother, Mrs. Horsepool-Worthingham, who takes them into her care. Tendai discovers that the Mellower's mother is holding them for ransom. The She Elephant again captures the children and takes them to one of the Masks' secret lairs. The Masks take the children to the Mile-High MacIlwaine, a skyscraper which houses the Gondwannan Embassy, the real headquarters of the Masks.

While the Masks attempt to sacrifice Tendai to their gods, Arm is possessed by a mhondoro, a holy and legendary spirit of the land, who helps him to find the children. When Arm is knocked out, the mhondoro helps Tendai and his friends to incapacitate the Big-Head Mask, a manifestation of a Gondwannan god. When the children's parents arrive, the She Elephant crushes the Mask, and the mhondoro revives Arm. The gang is destroyed and their stolen wealth is redistributed among the poor. The children reunite with their parents, and General Matsika allows his children to have freedom.

Humanity is at war with a strange alien species known as the Krool. Young soldier Danny Franks is fighting on the planet Ararat, recruited by the renegades known as Bad Company after the destruction of his own platoon. As their name might suggest this is no ordinary group of soldiers; instead they are a collection of freaks and maniacs led by Kano, a Frankenstein's monster-like character with a secret kept in a little box.

The Krool

The Krool are an alien species that serve as the main foe in Bad Company. They are led by a being known as the "Krool Heart" on the unnamed Krool Home Planet. The "Krool Heart" controls the Krool race via its vast psychic mind. Whatever the heart thinks, the mind will obey.

The Krool have the technology to create "War Zombies", hybrids and other such monstrosities. Due to their sadistic behaviour, they have also created machines to extract the "soul" out of their human prisoners. They have also been known to employ sadistic brainwashed human captives as guards.

The Krool were ultimately responsible for creating Bad Company and their leader when they took half a human brain and inserted it into a Krool and vice versa thus creating the Krool-hybrid. In conversation between Mad Tommy and Danny Franks Tommy explains that the Krool have reached their evolutionary limit, while Humanity (specifically the two races' brains) are only using a fraction of their potential. This leads the Krool hybrid to lapse into insanity while Kano's human brain assumes dominance over the implanted Krool half-brain.

The Ararat War

The Ararat War was a war waged against Humanity. The Krool wanted to capture Ararat to add to their already extensive empire whereas the Earth elite needed it to evacuate to as Earth was on the verge of being destroyed by ecological catastrophe. They employed their "War Zombies" to attack the front line's defences. They finished off the survivors personally. Officially, the war ended when Ararat exploded but unofficially, the war continued on the Ghetto Planets, led by the remnants of Humanity who had survived the destruction of Earth.

Aftermath of the war

The second incarnation of Bad Company, now led by Danny Franks & consisting of the last Protoid (an alien shapeshifter) in existence, Sheeva a "Boom Baby", (genetically enhanced, and with the ability ''"...to make atoms dance..."'',) De Racine, one of the "Earth Elite" and a masochist called Rackman, track down a monster terrorizing the Ghetto Planets whilst looking for Kano, unaware that the two are one and the same. After finding and recruiting Kano, they use Protoids chameleon ship to head to the Krool Homeworld undetected in order to destroy the Krool once and for all. Sheeva, Rackman, De Racine and Protoid are killed, but the alien is revealed to have been a puppet of the true Protoid – the chameleon ship – who is trying to merge and replace the new Krool Heart. Instead, Danny takes the place of the Krool Heart, and Protoid is defeated. Afterwards, Danny/The Krool Heart allows the survivors and prisoners to leave the planet promising to make the Krool more passive, it being revealed that the sadistic excesses of the Krool had been due to the corruption and decadence of the old Krool Heart.

A few years later, Kano returns to the Krool Homeworld with a further incarnation of Bad Company. After a long battle, Kano and Bad Company managed to free Danny. As they leave, Kano elects to stay to continue fighting the Krool.

Eddie Jilette is a Chicago cop on the vengeance trail as he follows his partner's killers to New Orleans to settle his own personal score. Eddie flees through the Louisiana bayous with Michel Duval, the beautiful Cajun mistress of a murderous crime lord who aims to destroy the Chicago detective before he can avenge his partner's murder. Michel and Eddie fall for each other, although they clash repeatedly while handcuffed together as they attempt to elude the brutal underworld figure and his henchmen.

A group of journalists are investigating a highly secret document when they uncover a sensational story: that before the Second World War, in 1938, the first rocket was made in the USSR and Soviet scientists were planning to send an orbiter to the Moon and back. The evidence is convincing; it is clear that in this case, Soviet crewed lunar program cosmonauts were first.

The movie follows the selection and training of a small group of cosmonauts. The one who shines above the others (similar to the clear front-runners in the early historical Soviet space program) is Captain Ivan Sergeyevich Kharlamov (possibly a reference to the real-life cosmonaut Valentin Varlamov). He is helped into a space suit and loaded into the capsule, and the rocket lifts off for the Moon—but contact with it is soon lost.

Most of the remainder of the film seems to follow the search for information about what happened next, as the 1930s space program appears to have dissolved immediately after, with no reason given (but presumably as a part of Stalin's purges). It is implied that Kharlamov returned to Earth, but with no fanfare and apparently no assistance from the space program. A number of men are shown as suspected of being Kharlamov—the NKVD seems to be conducting a criminal investigation of the program and it is implied that those involved, including Kharlamov himself, are in hiding.

It seems that the capsule returned to Earth and landed in Chile, and that Kharlamov journeyed to the Russian Far East by way of Polynesia and China, yet feared capture on his return. His wife apparently covered for him when interrogated as to his whereabouts. Kharlamov is later found on the Mongolian steppes following the Battles of Khalkhin Gol, having suffered a severe traumatic brain injury. After undergoing psychiatric treatment in a sanitorium in Chita, he disappears. His wife later remarries.

The very end of the movie shows the only footage of the mission itself after launch, explaining it as a film which was found at the landing site in Chile and is currently in the possession of the Antofagasta Natural museum. First there is a brief clip showing Kharlamov piloting the vehicle, presumably on final approach to the Moon. Following that is an equally brief panorama of a lunar landscape with the capsule or lander (it's unclear whether this was a direct ascent Moon landing) resting on the surface, apparently taken by Kharlamov during lunar EVA. Both scenes are shown as stills on the movie's cover. Then there is a short clip of the other cosmonauts walking through a hangar with the 1930s space program director, and the credits roll.

Thelma Jordon shows up late one night in the office of the district attorney to report a series of attempted burglaries at her Aunt Vera's home. The district attorney, Miles Scott, is out, but she meets the assistant district attorney, Cleve Marshall, a married man, who would rather get drunk than go home. He asks her to join him for a drink and she agrees. Before Cleve can stop himself, he and Thelma are involved in a love affair. But Thelma is a mysterious woman, and Cleve can't help wondering if she is hiding something.

When her rich aunt is found shot dead, Thelma calls Cleve rather than the police, and he helps her cover up evidence that may incriminate her, but he believes her story that an intruder killed the aunt. When the district attorney arrests Thelma as the prime suspect, Cleve is in a unique position to help her due to his job. He arranges to prosecute the case and persuades the jury that a "reasonable doubt" exists due to evidence of an elusive "Mr X" (which he believes is Thelma's estranged husband). Thelma is acquitted. Her past, however, has begun to catch up with her.

Tony, her former lover, materializes again. She tells him she has successfully manipulated Cleve. She does not love him but he loves her. Their conversation reveals that it was Tony who conceived the scheme for Thelma to commit the murder and inherit Vera's jewels and money.

Cleve comes to the house and Thelma acknowledges that there is a relationship with Tony. Tony hits Cleve over the head, knocking him out so the two can escape. Unable to deal with her guilty conscience, Thelma causes a car accident that results in her accomplice's death and her own fatal injury. As she lies dying, she confesses the truth to the district attorney. However, she does not incriminate Cleve, saying she cannot reveal his name because she loves him. The district attorney tells Cleve that he will be disbarred for his actions, but he tells Scott that he was already confessing to his complicity when he heard about the car accident. He walks away to his new life.

Two years after the events of the first film, Nick Persons (Ice Cube) has married Suzanne (Nia Long) and moved her children, Kevin (Philip Daniel Bolden), and Lindsey (Aleisha Allen) into his apartment, as well as purchasing a 2007 Cadillac Escalade after he accidentally burnt up his Lincoln Navigator SUV. He has also sold his sports memorabilia store to his friend, Marty.

The family has also bought a Berger Picard pet dog and named it Coco. Kevin and Lindsey have both matured since the previous events. While getting ready for an interview with Magic Johnson to launch a sports magazine, Suzanne tells Nick that she is pregnant and they later find out that they will be having twins. Needing more space, Suzanne and Nick go check out a house in the suburbs.

They meet Chuck Mitchell Jr. (John C. McGinley), a local real estate agent/contractor, and after some talking, Nick decides to buy the house. The family then packs up their things and moves into the house, with Lindsey and Kevin (mostly the former) being against the move. However, as it turns out, Nick failed to get the house inspected first, and they soon find a mold infestation. While trying to resolve the mold issue, Chuck discovers even more problems with the house, and Nick becomes angry with him as he almost destroys it trying to fix them all.

Meanwhile, Lindsey sneaks out to go to a party with Chuck’s teenage employees, and when Nick finds out, he grounds her. Nick finally decides to fire Chuck, which causes all those working on the house to quit out of loyalty to Chuck, and Suzanne to take the kids and move into the guest house. After taking some time to think, Nick decides to fix the house on his own and also to apologize to Chuck, especially when he was told that his wife, a famous country singer, died a few years ago. Chuck responds by bringing his friends back to help.

When Suzanne goes into labor, with the hospital half-an-hour away, Nick, Kevin, and Lindsey have to deliver the babies. Chuck tries to get there, but his truck breaks down and he is forced to power walk down to the house. While she's still in labor, Nick gets a call from Magic Johnson. After Suzanne gives birth to identical twin boys, the movie ends six months later with a big BBQ in their backyard, at which Nick debuts his new magazine titled ''Are We Done Yet?'', based on his experience building the house.

Peter P. Peters (Fred Astaire) is an amiable American ballet dancer billed as "Petrov", who cultivates a public image of being a serious, demanding and temperamental Russian, though his employer knows the truth. Peters dances for a ballet company in Paris owned by the bumbling Jeffrey Baird (Edward Everett Horton), and secretly never wants to blend classical ballet with modern jazz dancing because they think it does not look very professional.

When Peters sees a photo of famous tap dancer Linda Keene (Ginger Rogers), he falls in love with her. He contrives to meet her (as "Petrov"), but she is less than impressed. They meet again on an ocean liner traveling back to New York, and Linda warms to Petrov. Their interactions spark a tabloid campaign that they are (or are perhaps not) married. Unknown to them, their associates create a publicity stunt "proving" their proper marriage. Outraged, Linda becomes engaged to the bumbling Jim Montgomery (William Brisbane), much to the chagrin of both Peters and Arthur Miller (Jerome Cowan), her manager, who secretly launches more fake publicity.

Peters (who by now has revealed his true identity) and Keene, unable to squelch the rumor, decide to actually marry and then immediately get divorced. Linda begins to fall in love with her husband, but then discovers him with another woman, Lady Denise Tarrington (Ketti Gallian), and leaves before he can explain. Later, when she comes to his new show to personally serve him divorce papers, she sees him dancing with dozens of women, all wearing masks with her face on them: Peters has decided that if he cannot dance with Linda, he will dance with images of Linda. Seeing that he truly loves her, she happily joins him onstage.

In an Italian neighborhood of Greenwich Village, cousins Charlie, a maître d'hôtel with aspirations of someday owning his own restaurant, and Paulie, a schemer who works as a waiter, have expensive tastes but not much money. Paulie gets caught skimming checks, and he and Charlie are both fired. Now out of work and in debt, Charlie must find another way to pay his alimony, support his pregnant girlfriend Diane, and try to buy a restaurant.

Paulie comes to Charlie with a seemingly foolproof robbery idea involving a large amount of cash in the safe of a local business. Charlie reluctantly agrees to participate, and they manage to crack the safe with help from an accomplice, Barney, a clock repairman and locksmith. But things go sour, resulting in the accidental death of police officer Walter "Bunky" Ritter, who had been secretly taping "Bed Bug" Eddie Grant. Charlie soon learns that the money that they stole belongs to Eddie.

The mob figures out that Paulie is involved, and not even his Uncle Pete, part of Eddie's crew, can help him. Eddie's henchmen cut off Paulie's left thumb as punishment.

Diane leaves Charlie and takes his money to support their unborn child, while Paulie is forced to work as a waiter for Eddie. He gives the mob Barney's name but initially refuses to identify Charlie as the third man involved. However, under pressure, he is forced to rat on his cousin. Barney leaves town and Charlie mails him his cut of the loot. When Charlie makes $20,000 on a horse, things begin to look up.

Charlie prepares for a showdown with Eddie, armed with a copy of the tape that the police officer had made. But at the last moment, Paulie puts lye in Eddie's coffee, and he and Charlie then casually walk away from Greenwich Village.

Mike Pillsbury is a teenage boy who believes that he is an alien and does not belong on Earth. Mike is injured during a football game and sees an alien as part of a hallucination. Mike wonders if football is the right sport for him, but his father, a former football player, insists he stick with the sport.

Mike is surprised when Katelyn Sandman, a popular girl at school, requests his help decorating the school for an upcoming Halloween dance party. Mike's foe, Scott Schriebner, who is a player on Mike's football team and a friend of Katelyn, sabotages the light and music equipment during the Halloween party. Mike, upset about the party, leaves and uses a satellite dish to send a message to outer space asking to be rescued. Lightning subsequently destroys the satellite dish.

The next day, an alien dog named Barnabus appears, with the ability to speak through a translating device. Barnabus explains that because of Mike, the stargate door has been opened. Barnabus tells Mike that he represents a galactic organization specializing in disaster relief and rights violations, and that he has arrived to answer Mike's plea to be taken off the planet. Barnabus explains that time is limited, as other aliens with ulterior motives are traveling through the stargate to find Mike.

Mike, who believes he is hallucinating, later meets The Bom, an alien lawyer insistent on having Mike sue Earth for millions of galactic credits for pain and suffering due to the planet's substandard living conditions. During a telephone conversation with Katelyn, Mike is disgusted by The Bom's way of consuming food, leading Katelyn to believe that Mike is distracted and not listening to her. The Bom angrily leaves after Mike refuses to sue. Mike's friend Nick believes that Mike is going crazy after being told about the aliens.

When Barnabus is informed of The Bom's visit, he tells Mike that he opened a can of worms by sending his message, as it signaled to the universe that Earth has advanced to a certain technological level. Because of this, Barnabus says Earth is no longer eligible for intergalactic protection for primitive life. Mike accepts Barnabus' offer to take him to a place where he can be alone, but first tries to make amends with Katelyn. However, the Loafer Alien arrives and prevents Mike from meeting with Katelyn, who believes he has rudely ignored her after insisting that they talk. The alien proposes becoming Mike's agent, representing him throughout the galaxy and eventually having him star in a weekly television show about his life as an immigrant. Mike declines the offer.

Nick is stunned when multiple aliens arrive with various offers for Mike. Katelyn visits Mike's house and becomes aware of the aliens. Mike prepares to make a deal with one of the aliens to be taken off the planet, but the aliens retreat as a Thoad – a dangerous alien that enjoys capturing rare specimens – approaches. Nick's young brother Jay unexpectedly arrives and is sucked into the stargate by the Thoad, and taken to the alien's home planet. Barnabus says the Thoad will continue capturing specimens until he finds the perfect one.

The children ask Scott to act as bait for the Thoad in order to get through the stargate to the Thoad planet, where the Thoad is safe from intergalactic authorities. Scott is initially skeptical about the children's alien claims, but they convince him that he is the perfect specimen for the job. The stargate opens to pull Scott in, briefly allowing Barnabus and the other children to go through it as well. Barnabus and the three children end up in a cave where the Thoad keeps his zoo of captured species from other planets. Among the specimens is an alien identical to the ones Mike described in his stories, although he is not sure how he could have knowledge of such a creature. The Thoad, in his human form, confronts Barnabus and the children.

The Thoad transforms into his frog-like alien form, but is then temporarily contained within a cage. Mike uses the Thoad's key to release the captured specimens, including Scott and Jay. Barnabus and the children return to Earth, but the stargate stays open long enough for the Thoad to follow them. Barnabus contacts the intergalactic police to have the Thoad arrested. At a football game, Barnabus informs Mike that his transmission has been deemed accidental and that Earth is classified again as a protected planet. Though Barnabus offers to take Mike with him, Mike accepts that Earth is his home and says farewell to his friend.

In 12th-century China, during Mongol rule, childhood sweethearts Jinha and Sullie are separated but vow to reunite. Orphan Jinha begins training in the Bichun martial arts and discovers his father was a swordsman murdered by the Mongol army. Meanwhile, Sullie's father, a Mongol general, arranges for her to marry a Mongol noble. Believing Jinha to be dead, Sullie marries the noble. Recovering from near-death, Jinha takes on the persona of bandit Jahalang, and begins an anti-Mongol crusade with the help of his army of warriors. Finally Jin-ha and Sullie are re-united, when Jinha's bandit warriors infiltrate Sullie's family manor.

A long time ago, Demonyx of the Dark Dimension attempted to invade the Light Dimension. After a long battle, the hero of the Light Dimension, Dragonlord, sealed Demonyx up by the power of the Mandara Talisman, at which time Demonyx prophesied that he would be back upon the appearance of the Red Evil Star.

Years later, an ominous red star appeared in the sky. Just then, five shooting lights came down toward the ground.

Rick Stalker was brought up by Kung Fu master Gen Lao-Tsu, and is alone in the mountains as usual brushing up on his Kung Fu skills when he comes upon a weeping angel missing her robe. He explores the mountain's caves and ends up encountering a gargoyle who is really a Tusk Soldier in disguise guarding the robe, which is embedded in a rock. Upon the return of her robe, the angel shows Rick a secret passage down the ravine, where he finds a mysterious orb.

Rick goes back to tell Gen the whole story. Gen apprises him that this orb is the Orb of Courage, and that Rick should cross the ocean to Gen's mother land China, where his fate is waiting for him.

Rick goes to China and enters the Shorin temple, the head temple of Kung-Fu, where he spars with Fusetsu, Ensetsu, and Rakan in three separate chambers. When Ensetsu is defeated by Rick, he gives him the Mirror of Mercury, stating that Rick may be the fighter for whom they have been waiting. In the final chamber, Rakan tells Rick that the Orb of Courage is part of the Mandara Talisman, which was used to seal up Demonyx a long time ago, and that Rick will have to locate all the broken pieces of the Talisman to seal him up again. While sparring with Rick, Rakan teaches him how to awaken his true power and transform into a Flying Warrior capable of utilizing sacred mirrors to block mystic spells and arcane swords to cast them. Upon defeating Rakan, Rick obtains the Sword of Vijaya.

The line to GTG's biological weapon research laboratory in Peru was disconnected when the office was covered with a mysterious black fog, which Rakan believes must have something to do with the Dark Dimension. Rakan exhorts Rick to enter in the tournament in Hong Kong that the president of GTG has decided to hold with the intent of deciding on the investigation party.

Wandering around in Hong Kong, Rick learns that there is a phantom blocking the entrance to the coliseum who can only be banished with the help of a bracelet that can be bought at Shunran's store for coin that can be obtained by fighting Jiangshi and fire-raining ghouls. But after Rick pays Shunran, she admits to not having it and instead tells him the password that will convince a certain dragon statue to grant it to an honest man. Rick ventures beyond the waterfall in search of the stone dragon, and finds it in a cave inhabited by a gargoyle who is really a Tusk Soldier in disguise guarding the Sword of Kirik. The dragon grants Rick the bracelet, and tells him that he will obtain the Orb of Wisdom from the phantom when he defeats him. Rick goes back and ventures through another cave guarded by a gargoyle who turns is really a Tusk Soldier in disguise and finds and defeats the phantom, gets the Orb, and enters the tournament. He fights Litron the martial artist, Thornram the kickboxer, Shiro the karate fighter, The Mad Ape the wrestler, and Slugger Sam the boxer. Shiro and Slugger Sam are in fact Tusk soldiers, each guarding a dragma. Rick, Mary Lynn, and Hayato Go are declared the winners of the tournament, and thus the members of the investigation party.

Once the triad is in airspace over Peru, one of Rick's orbs begins to flash, informing him that his traveling companions are Flying Warriors too. He places the Sword of Vijaya on their foreheads, then the three transform and jump out the plane. They fight their way to the jungle village, where they stumble upon the sole survivor of the first investigation party, Greg Cummings, who tells them that the demon Narga has been revived in the ruins at the entrance to the laboratory and joins their party, turning out to be a flying warrior himself. Pepe, who lives in a hut, tells them that they need to find a stone tablet in the ruins and place it in the statue of Narga so that the entrance to the laboratory can open behind the waterfall. The other villagers inform them that Narga cannot be defeated without the Sword of Kan and the Mirror of Venus, and that Maradora, a thief, is trapped in the ruins.

The party fights through more jungle, where they pass a bird who claims to be perched on the Tree of Spirits. Within the ruins, the party finds a talking jar upstairs that turns out to be Maradora, upon whom the spirits cast a spell for stealing their treasures. After bringing him back to the Tree, Rick reminds him of the spell that he needs to cast to turn back into a human. In this way, Rick obtains the Sword of Kan.

The party finds the stone tablet deep within the ruins and brings it to the statue of Narga upstairs, which slides over, revealing the Mirror of Venus. They go back to the waterfall, and fight Narga himself at the entrance to the laboratory. Only Rick's Fire Tornado, which the Sword of Kan affords him, is capable of bringing Narga back from hiding in the Dark Field. Defeating Narga, they go on into the laboratory, where they encounter several Tusk Soldiers and the dead body of the director of GTG. Dargon appears and forces Rick to participate in a second martial arts tournament, with more Tusk Soldiers participating, and Dargon himself defending the title.

After the tournament, the Moonlight Warriors invite the Flying Warriors to battle them in the Dark Dimension, where they have revived Demonyx. At Peking Restaurant in New York's Chinatown, the Flying Warriors meet the Shadow Cult, who are determined to access and root out the Moonlight Warriors, and pick up its young leader, Jimmy Cutler Jr., who turns out to be the fifth Flying Warrior. Jimmy informs the rest of the party that they will need to go deep within a decaying subway station in order to find the portal to the Dark Dimension.

They find the relief key deep within the abandoned subway, and use it to open up the portal to the dark dimension. They fight the Moonlight Warriors, Selenos, Lunatos, Seiros, and Zakros, for deeper access. Because they have through fighting obtained the orbs of Courage, Wisdom, Justice, and Love, as well as the five dragma of the Mandara Talisman, along the way, they are able to fight Demonyx; Jimmy Cutler Jr.'s Meteor Shower is able to force Demonyx to reveal himself; the five Flying Warriors combine to become Dragonlord, and seal Demonyx away until next time; then they head to New York.

A reputable judge Alfred McGuffin uncovers a citywide crime syndicate, and is kidnapped. The judge was a friend of Jack's father, so the cop is obligated to send a few hundred men to their graves in order to make things right. Before long, all hell breaks loose, so Jack and his K-9 cohort Shadow must take on a powerful mob in the fight of their lives to break the city's spiral of betrayal and corruption. In the end, the judge is murdered and although Jack gets the killer, goons of a high-ranking Russian crime lord named Blanchov get the judge's files. Jack's girlfriend Ruby is murdered by Blanchov and although Jack never retrieves the files (they were likely Hennesey's files from the first game), he goes after Blanchov for revenge. Jack kills Blanchov, but gets no satisfaction out of it knowing that Blanchov is just a highly placed puppet that can easily be replaced. Having lost Ruby, Jack has nothing to really live for anymore. Also he claims that who has him Dead to Rights as they got the files and he ended up with nothing.

After rejecting Ben, Anna tries to focus on her studies at Beverly Hills High. She and Sam partner up on an English project to create a short film based on ''The Great Gatsby''. They agree to film their project at V's, an exclusive spa and resort in the Ojai desert. Anna writes the screenplay, which impresses Sam and she begins to develop a crush on Anna, much to her confusion. At school, Adam asks Anna out on a date and she agrees, in hopes of getting over Ben, who continues to send grand romantic gestures.

Anna's older sister Susan arrives in Los Angeles and takes up residence at the Beverly Hills Hotel. Anna is concerned, especially since Susan claims to have checked out of rehab early but Susan brushes off her concerns. Susan meets Cammie, Dee, and Sam at the hotel and they all agree to join Sam and Anna at V's for the weekend.

Anna meets with her father's girlfriend, Margaret Cunningham, at her new entertainment agency that she co-founded with Clark Sheppard, Cammie's father. Anna accepts an after-school internship with Margaret and her first assignment is to escort a screenwriter to an upcoming industry party. When Margaret learns that Susan knows the screenwriter, she encourages Anna to bring Susan to the party as well.

Ben runs into Anna and Adam while they are on a date and he pretends his visiting cousin is also his date, which backfires. His cousin encourages Ben to go after Anna. Separately, Anna tells Sam and Susan that she only sees Adam as a friend and can't stop thinking about Ben. They encourage Anna to call Ben from the spa, which she does, but she immediately regrets it. Unbeknownst to Anna, Cammie also calls Ben and invites him to the spa but she is annoyed that he is only interested in seeing Anna.

At V's, Ben arrives and interrupts their filming. The group find themselves locked in a sauna and Susan encourages the group to admit their secrets to each other, namely that Dee is pregnant with Ben's baby. Sam reveals that Dee asked to borrow a tampon, proving the claim false. Anna calls the group out for being cruel to each other and she calls out Ben for being unable to be honest with her over the real reason he abandoned her on the boat.

Back in Los Angeles, Cammie convinces Susan to break her sobriety and she shows up drunk at the industry party, embarrassing herself and Anna. Sam, who had been filming the party, pretends that Susan's outburst is all part of the short film and helps Anna take Susan home. At Anna's house, Sam realizes she confused her crush with admiration of Anna and she encourages Anna to go on a getaway to clear her head from her family troubles. She secretly informs Ben where to find Anna.

Jonathan arrives and he and Susan have a big confrontation over her addiction. She admits that she was kicked out of rehab and she is angry with their father for successfully bribing an ex-boyfriend to stay away from her. Anna tells Sam and Jonathan to work out their problems instead of putting her in the middle. She heads to Santa Barbara where she runs into Ben. He admits the real reason he left her on the boat: his father is a compulsive gambler and threatened to kill himself after he got into heavy debt and Ben was embarrassed to admit his dysfunctional family to her. Anna forgives him and the two finally have sex.

Ben and Anna are now officially together but their reunion is interrupted when Jonathan, Anna's father, calls back Anna to bid farewell to her sister Susan, who has decided to enroll back into rehab. Anna. Anna considers their farewell to be intimate and is surprised when Ben tags along though she does not voice her displeasure.

Back at Apex, Margaret informs Anna that leaving an industry party to take a drunk Susan home was unacceptable and is about to fire her when Clark Sheppard intervenes. He takes Anna as his intern and assigns her to work on the new hit soap opera ''Hermosa Beach''. Anna meets the young and charming co-executive producer Danny Bluestone and enjoys working on a TV set, despite the unfamiliar terms and erratic actors. Ben gets jealous of Anna spending time with Danny and the Percys' driver Django and Anna becomes concerned that Ben is neglecting his studies at Princeton. After a heart to heart, the two break up again and Ben reluctantly returns to Princeton.

Meanwhile, Cammie feels increasingly deserted by her friends: Dee is enamored with her new boyfriend Stevie while Sam seems to be showing interest in Adam Flood. To further her dismay, her step-mother announces that her daughter, Mia, will be moving in. Cammie initially hates Mia, a secretive fourteen-year-old Valley girl, but takes her out shopping in order to not feel alone. Cammie kisses Adam at a party in an attempt to punish Sam but is pleasantly surprised at their chemistry.

She follows Adam to a Beck concert and the two are invited to a rave afterwards. Cammie and Adam kiss again but are interrupted by Dee who nonchalantly mentions she invited Mia along with her as well. Cammie's protective instincts kick in and the three go find Mia at the party and take her home. Cammie reveals to Adam that even though she doesn't like Mia, Mia reminds her of how she acted after her mom died. Cammie mentions that she wishes that she had a big sister to keep her from making stupid choices. However, the next day, Cammie becomes frustrated at Mia's self-destructive attitude and decides she can't be Mia's rescuer.

Meanwhile, Adam tells Cammie that they should slow down their relationship because he still has feelings for Anna. Enraged, Cammie leaks sensitive information about ''Hermosa Beach'' to the press under Anna's name. Clark fires Anna and forbids anyone from work associating with her. Anna tries to explain to Danny her side of the story but he sadly tells her that he can't been seen with her or else he will lose his career.

Sam helps Anna realize the true culprit and their plot for revenge comes to fruition at Cammie's 18th birthday party, where Cammie's credit and debit cards are publicly declined by the party planner and her BMW is towed. At home, Clark reveals that he knows Cammie was the true leak, thanks to Mia who collaborated with Sam and Anna to clear Anna's name.

In the morning, Adam shows up to comfort Cammie and the two go on a quiet date to the park while Clark half-heartedly apologizes to Anna for the mistake and offers her job back. Anna politely declines and then surprises Danny at his office. He leaves work early for her and the two go on a date.

Category:2004 American novels Category:American young adult novels

Category:Little, Brown and Company books

In the sixth volume of the series, the Narrator's past actions meet an equivalent resolution. The captive is now the fugitive. As in previous volumes, envy and distrust eventually reveal unsuspected and unwanted revelations, such as Albertine's homosexuality, which lead the Narrator to reconcile himself with his melancholy. Unfortunately, happiness still eludes him, and the marriages of his former friends pit him against his own misery, which he tries to cover with indifference.

At the beginning of the novel, Anna is at the beach with Danny, the producer she met while interning for Clark Sheppard on Hermosa Beach, learning to surf but can't seem to get it. The two end up having a conversation about one-night stands. Dan claims Anna isn't the type to have one but Anna claims that she would and that she doesn't think casual sex is bad even though she has only had sex with Ben, who has returned to Princeton. Her relationship with him is not certain between both of them but Anna thinks that them two have broken up or at least, are on a break.

Once Anna returns home she finds her mother ''and'' father on the couch in her father's house in Los Angeles having a drink. She finds this shocking because since the divorce, her parents couldn't stand to be in the same room. Her father explains that her sister Susan is coming out of rehab and that her doctor suggested that they meet her as a whole family.

Sam is also having her own family problems as her new stepmother Poppy has taken over the whole house to prepare for Sam's soon to be sister, Ruby Hummingbird. To Sam's further dismay, Dee has become fast friends with Poppy and even moves in to help with the baby preparations, causing Sam to feel ignored. She joins Anna at Las Casitas, not caring that the whole Sharpe family is supposed to appear on The Tonight Show together.

Meanwhile, Cammie and Adam's relationship is growing, but they have not had sex yet which Cammie finds strange. She tries to seduce him on the beach but Adam refuses and Cammie realizes he is a virgin, finding it sweet. Still, she doesn't want people to think she has lost her reputation as a vixen and so Cammie tells everyone she and Adam are having amazing sex, unbeknownst to him. Cammie and Adam do attempt to have sex throughout the course of the book but they are always interrupted. Eventually, she and Adam agree to wait until the time is right.

The two take shelter in a seemingly empty mansion as a thunderstorm begins while Kai and Eduardo realize the girls are missing. Eduardo calls Jackson Sharpe, who cancels the Jay Leno appearance to go to Mexico to search for Sam. A search party begins and in the morning, Sam and Anna are discovered by the guards of the owner who owns the place. The two explain their story and are rescued by Jackson and his helicopter. Anna is a little jealous and hurt that her own father didn't come also. Sam is confused when Eduardo acts coldly to her after they return to Las Casitas but shrugs it off as they are now going their separate ways. However, back in Beverly Hills, Sam throws a party with her friends who all eagerly demand to know the details of the rescue and Eduardo shows up to apologize for mistreating Sam and asks her out on another date. Also, Anna's parents once again part separate ways and she is relieved. With her head clear, Anna is finally able to surf properly, much to her delight.

Category:2005 American novels Category:American young adult novels Category:Little, Brown and Company books

The A-List crew, consisting of Sam, Anna, Dee, Parker, Adam, and Cammie decide to forgo the Spring Break school sponsored trip to Washington D.C. in favor of heading over to Las Vegas instead. Anna misses Ben, who is away at school, and she impulsively invites him to join her and their friends in Vegas too. She also mentions the trip to her best friend from New York, Cyn Baltres, who is impressed with the way Anna has reinvented herself.

Parker Pinelli is worried because he is secretly poor and doesn't have enough money to cover the expenses for their luxurious get away but refuses to confide in any of his friends, fearing they'll kick him off the A-list if they knew the truth. He tries to gamble but is unsuccessful as the Las Vegas laws forbid minors from collecting any winnings so he hooks up with a series of wealthier and older women to cover his costs. No one in the group notices and figure Parker is just a lady killer and decide to kick off their break with a "tacky showgirl outfit contest". The girls eagerly participate although Cammie sneaks away to an undisclosed location which causes Adam to worry that she is cheating on him.

At dinner, the group is joined by none other by Cyn and her boyfriend Scott Spencer, a handsome intellectual Anna secretly had a crush on before coming to L.A. The crew decides to visit a hypnotist, although Dee bows out in favor of trying to help the sinners of Las Vegas reform. Dee's friends are a little bit worried for her as this goes beyond her normal interests in New Age or spiritual fads. Dee has Ruby Hummingbird, Sam's new half sister, on the mind and she frequently calls Poppy in a worry, claiming that she and Ruby Hummingbird have a spiritual connection. Dee begins to hear voices and believes it is Ruby Hummingbird trying to contact her.

Meanwhile, at the hypnotist, Sam is the only one of her friends who doesn't get hypnotized and she watches in shock as everyone's secrets are revealed: Adam admits that sometimes he finds other girls attractive, Cammie admits that she feels Adam can be boring sometimes, and Anna admits her secret crush on Scott. None of them remember what they said and eagerly buy a recording of the show. Sam tries to convince the others not to watch but fails and now everyone is angry with everyone: Adam and Cammie begin to argue about their relationship and Cyn refuses to speak to Anna. However, all is forgotten when Dee suffers a mental breakdown and the crew rush to the hospital to see her.

Dee is fine, although she has elected to spend some time at Ojai Mental Hospital. Relieved that Dee is fine although saddened she won't be at BHH anymore, the group returns to their hotel. Scott takes Anna aside and tells her it wouldn't work out between them and Ana realizes she only liked the idea of him and agrees, although still extremely embarrassed. She makes up with Cyn who tells her that she isn't mad because Anna was secretly lusting for her boyfriend—she was mad that Anna never confided her crush in the first place. Cyn also tells Anna that she and Scott are about to break up, if Anna wants to make a play for him but Anna declines. Meanwhile, Sam finds Parker at the bar and finds out he is poor. She promises not to tell and is impressed with the way he refuses her offer to cover his expenses. Adam and Cammie make up and Cammie admits where she had been sneaking off to—to the house of a platonic family friend who lives in Las Vegas. Said friend invites the crew to his for a party.

At the end, before they go back to Beverly Hills, Ben shows up and Anna stays behind with him. They talk about their relationship and Ben confesses that he's seeing someone at school, Blythe, but it is not serious. In the end, Anna and Ben decide to get back together.

Category:2005 American novels Category:Little, Brown and Company books

Category:American young adult novels Category:Novels set in the Las Vegas Valley

Todd is a galactic explorer who, while in the Andromeda sector, discovered a starship and downloaded part of the captain's log. The log contains information on Slime World, a world teeming with disgusting life forms and the presence of valuable slime gems.

Multiplayer

In the multiplayer scenario there is one single seater escape capsule and the players must fight each other to get to it first.

''Pippin IV'' explores the life of Pippin Héristal, an amateur astronomer in 1950s France, who is suddenly proclaimed the King of France. Unknowingly appointed to give the Communists a monarchy to revolt against, Pippin is chosen because he was descended from the famous king Charlemagne. Unhappy with his lack of privacy, alteration of family life, uncomfortable housings at the Palace of Versailles and his lack of power as a constitutional monarch, the protagonist spends a portion of the novel dressing up as a commoner, often riding a motorscooter, to avoid the constrained life of a king. Pippin eventually receives his wish of dethronement after the people of France enact the rebellion Pippin's kingship was destined to receive. He returns to his home in Paris to find that nothing has really changed.

This video game was based on a ''Viking Child'' called Brian who must enter the Halls of Valhalla and do battle against the evil god Loki and his minions.

The film shows a fictional week in the life of Chuck Barris as the host and creator of ''The Gong Show'', through a series of outrageous competitors, stressful situations, a nervous breakdown (which compels him to run away and hide in the Moroccan desert) and other comic hijinks in his life and work on the TV show. Among the highlights included a group of men dressed as a Roman Catholic priest and three nuns lip-synching Tom Lehrer's song "The Vatican Rag", a man blowing out a candle with flatulence, and the uncensored version of Jaye P. Morgan's infamous breast-baring incident.

The player controls Lieutenant Shao Kai, a former naval officer of the Northern League fleet who was betrayed and left for dead by his brother, Admiral Shao Lung. Kai is rescued by a band of sea raiders known as the Shadow Clan, and joins them after proving himself worthy to their leader, Ped Zeng. He will bide his time with them awaiting his chance for revenge against his brother. Here he meets a formidable young woman who advises Ped and becomes the love interest. The Shadow Clan spends most of its time preying on the third faction in the game, the Jade Kingdom, who are primarily a mercantile power led by Lord Sri Brana. All are now in the path of Admiral Shao Lung's ambitions to create the Iron Empire. Lung has developed a monstrous warship named the Dragon and a powerful magic amulet to defeat anyone and anything in his way.

Dr. Alfred Morris (Zucco) is curious about the effects of an ancient nerve gas, used by the Mayans during rituals of human dissection to appease their gods. He takes medical student Ted Allison (David Bruce) under his wing to assist him with his experiments in using the gas on modern animals. Despite Ted's enthusiasm for the success of their effort to revive Morris's dead monkey Choco (who was earlier exposed to the gas and died) by using a fluid from the heart of another creature, Ted also has on his mind his girlfriend Isabel Lewis (Evelyn Ankers), of whom Morris has also become enamored.

Later, on the night of the duo's first experiment, Ted brings Isabel to Morris's house, where Morris notices Isabel's discomfort about her relationship with Ted. He confers with Isabel, saying that she does indeed need a man more involved with her love of music, secretly meaning himself. Isabel, however, is afraid of hurting Ted's feelings and getting him to understand what she wants, but Morris promises to take care of the situation himself. Unbeknownst to Isabel, Morris's evil plan involves destroying Ted by exposing him to the lethal Mayan gas the next day, and in effect, making him a mindless ghoul who, like Choco, must continually rely on the fluid of human hearts to survive (obtained by performing cardioectomies on freshly dead persons). This sets Ted and Morris on a grave-robbing spree through several towns where Isabel is also performing on her tour. Morris tries to get Ted to return home, but Ted is committed to being with Isabel whenever possible, whenever he is not in his unknowing ghoulish state. But, when Ted does become a ghoul again, Morris once more uses him to try to kill off the one person Isabel truly seems to love—Eric Iverson (Turhan Bey), her partner and pianist. Although his attempt is unsuccessful, Ted is able to obtain another heart, keeping himself alive.

Eventually the police, aided by ace reporter "Scoop" McClure (Robert Armstrong), realize that the mysterious "ghoul"-style killings are on the same route of Isabel's tour. McClure tries to set a trap in Scranton, the last city of Isabel's tour, by making it seem to the public that he is someone else who has recently died, and, by waiting in a coffin for the ghoul, nearly captures Ted and Morris once they arrive to perform another cardioectomy. However, Morris distracts McClure as Ted comes into view and kills him.

With Isabel back home, the police attempt to question her about why the killings were made in the same cities she performed in, but even though she claims to know nothing, she thinks for a moment how Ted and Dr. Morris are the only people associated with her that also have a knowledge of how to perform cardioectomies. She later performs for her home crowd, and Morris, in a last attempt to get Isabel for himself, sends Ted to kill "First Eric, then myself", as he constantly repeats under his spell. Before Ted becomes a ghoul, he is able to write a letter to Isabel that explains what happened to him and who did all of the killings. Plus, he exposes Morris to the gas just before he reverts to his ghoul state, and leaves to fulfill Morris's final bidding. Upon entering the stage where. Isabel is, he is promptly dispatched by detectives, just as he is about to shoot Eric, who read the note to Isabel that Ted left in his hands. She and Eric hold each other, knowing that Ted always intended the best for them, and that Morris was behind all of the trouble with which Ted and many others were involved.

Morris, meanwhile, being drained of nearly all life by the gas, almost succeeds in getting fluid from another heart for himself, but fatally collapses by the grave he is digging up. In the end, words that Ted said earlier to Morris are repeated: "It's all over, Doctor. There's nothing left of it now but you, and me, and... death!"

Three disparate travelers — a disillusioned preacher, an unsuccessful prospector, and a larcenous, cynical con man — meet at a decrepit railroad station in the 1870s Southwest United States. The prospector and the preacher were witnesses at the rape and murder trial of the notorious bandit Juan Carrasco. The bandit duped an aristocratic Southerner, Colonel Wakefield, into believing he knew the location of a lost Aztec treasure. While the greedy "gentleman" was bound to a tree and gagged, Carrasco assaulted his wife Nina. These events lead to the stabbing of the husband. Carrasco was tried, convicted, and condemned for the crimes.

Everyone's account on the witness stand differed dramatically. Carrasco claimed that Wakefield was tied up with ropes while Nina was assaulted, after which he killed the colonel in a duel. The newlywed wife contends that she was the one who killed her husband because he accused her of leading on Carrasco and causing the rape. The dead man "testifies" through a third witness, an old Indian shaman, who said that neither of those accounts was true. The shaman insists that the colonel used a jeweled dagger to commit suicide after the incident.

There was a fourth witness, the prospector, one with a completely new view of what actually took place. But can his version be trusted?

Struggling sculptor Marcel De Lange (Martin Kosleck) is depressed about events in his life, and decides to commit suicide. Just as he is about to kill himself, he sees a madman, known as "The Creeper" (Rondo Hatton), in the process of drowning, and saves him. Taking the disfigured man into his care, he makes him the subject of his next sculpture and calls it his best creation. When critics denigrate Marcel's work, he has the Creeper start killing them. Marcel becomes obsessed with Joan, a beautiful female reporter who believes the deaths are related. When Marcel invites her over and she sees Marcel's sculpture of The Creeper, she suspects that Marcel knows the killer. Later, Marcel decides that Joan knows too much and commands The Creeper to kill her. The Creeper is reluctant to do so, however, when he discovers that Marcel plans to turn him over to the police. The Creeper kills Marcel, and is about to kill Joan when he is shot by the police.

Peter Loew (Nicolas Cage) is a driven literary agent and an example of the stereotypical narcissistic and greedy yuppie of the 1980s: he works all day and club hops at night, with little in his life but alcohol, cocaine, one-night stands, and the pursuit of money and supposed prestige. However, he is slowly going insane and sees a therapist (Elizabeth Ashley) frequently. During these sessions, his declining mental health becomes clear through a series of increasingly bizarre rants which eventually begin to scare the psychiatrist. After taking home a girl named Jackie (Kasi Lemmons) from a club, a bat flies in through his window, scaring them both. At his next session he mentions to his therapist that the struggle with the bat aroused him. While visiting an art museum with Jackie the next day, he ditches her, and she later leaves an angry message on his phone.

Loew meets Rachel (Jennifer Beals) at a night club, and seemingly takes her home. As they make love, she pins him down, exposing vampire fangs, and bites him on the neck. The following morning, Loew is seen with an uninjured neck, serving coffee and making conversation with a non-existent Rachel, casting doubt on the reality of the previous night's events.

Loew cuts his neck shaving and applies a bandage to the spot, thereafter believing it to be the location of his vampire bite. He soon believes that he is turning into a vampire. He fails to see his reflection in mirrors and wears dark sunglasses indoors. When his fangs fail to develop, he purchases a pair of cheap plastic novelty fangs. All the while, he has delusions of Rachel visiting him nightly to feed on his blood. Shortly after, Loew experiences severe mood swings and calls Jackie back apologetically, asking to meet her at a bar. As he is about to leave, a jealous Rachel appears and beckons him back inside. A dejected Jackie eventually leaves the bar and leaves an angry note on his door asking him to leave her alone.

Loew constantly torments a secretary working at his office named Alva Restrepo (María Conchita Alonso), typically by forcing her to search through an enormous paper file for a contract. When she fails to find the contract, he at first browbeats and humiliates her, then visits her at home and tricks her into returning to work, and finally attacks and attempts to bite her at the workplace after hours. She pulls out a gun, and Loew begs her to shoot him. Since it is only loaded with blanks, she fires at the floor to scare him off. He eventually overpowers her, ripping her shirt open, pinning her to the floor as he attempts to bite her neck, while hallucinating that she is Rachel. Afterwards, overcome by despair, he takes the gun and fires it into his mouth, but is not harmed, attributing it to his supposed transformation.

Thinking he is a vampire, Loew goes out to a club wearing his novelty fangs and moves around erratically like the character Orlok from the film ''Nosferatu'' with a crazed look in his eyes. He begins to seduce a woman, but when he gets too grabby she slaps him, making Loew even more unhinged. He overpowers her and bites her neck, having taken out the fangs and using his real teeth, leaving the woman unconscious and bloody. He hallucinates another encounter with a disdainful Rachel.

Afterwards, Loew encounters the real Rachel dancing with another man on the dance floor. She appears to recognize him, but gives the impression that they have not been in contact for a long time. Loew attempts to manhandle her into revealing her fangs as her date fights him off. He screams that he loves her and accuses her of being a vampire as he is dragged off and expelled from the club by security.

Alva wakes up with her shirt ripped open, possibly thinking she was raped, and eventually tells her brother Emilio (Bob Lujan) who is enraged and goes after Loew with Alva to seek revenge. Meanwhile, Loew is wandering the streets, disheveled in a blood-spattered business suit from the previous night, excitedly talking to himself. In a hallucinatory exchange on a street corner, he tells his therapist that he raped someone and also murdered someone else. A nearby newspaper headline confirms the latter, as the girl he bit on the neck in the club is pronounced dead. As Loew returns to his now-destroyed apartment, Alva points out Loew to Emilio, who then pursues him inside the apartment block with a tire iron.

In the midst of an abusive argument with an imaginary romantic interest (supposedly a patient of his psychiatrist) Loew begins to retch again from the blood he had swallowed, then crawls under his upturned sofa on the floor, as though it were a coffin. Emilio finds Loew and upturns the sofa. Loew holds a large broken piece of wood to his chest as a makeshift stake, repeating the gesture he had made earlier to strangers on the street when he had asked them to kill him. Emilio pushes down on the wood and it pierces Loew's chest in a gruesome manner. Emilio flees the apartment. As Loew dies, he envisions the vampiress Rachel staring at him one last time.

Far above the Arctic Circle is based a TV channel, on which there is only one program—"No Exit". Melee and death in the air. University Professor John Stoneman is abducted be the channel owner. No way out and no chance to survive. For John Stoneman there seems to be no escape.

A prison bus flips on the road when it's cut off by another car. In the chaos, a man named Billy frees a man named Sam Gillen (Jean-Claude Van Damme) by taking a guard hostage. Sam and Billy escape in the car but Billy is fatally shot by a guard.

Sam buys some food from a roadside store and camps near a pond. He finds the money from their heist and listens to a tape recording left by Billy before pushing the car into the pond. That night, Sam sneaks up to a nearby house and sees a woman and her two children inside. He breaks in but is nearly discovered by one of the kids; he takes a salt shaker and leaves. The next night he breaks in again; the following morning, the boy (named Mookie) finds Sam's campsite.

Nearby demolition from real estate development disturbs Clydie Anderson, the owner of the home. Corrupt developer Franklin Hale seeks to drive her off the land with the help of his lackey, Mr. Dunston, and the local sheriff, Lonnie Poole, who is dating Clydie. One night, some goons attack Clydie and her children, but Sam arrives and fights them off. He claims he is camping and hunting on her land, and Clydie insinuates that he is not welcome, but offers him shelter in her barn out of gratitude. He also purchases her dead husband's old Triumph Bonneville motorcycle and repairs it with Mookie's help. Later Sam thwarts an attempt by Hale to ruin Clydie's farmland by coating it with oil.

A town council meeting gets heated when another resident, Tom, refuses to sell his land to Hale. That night, his goons burn down Tom's barn. Mookie (who discovers the fire) awakens Sam; Sam saves Tom and puts out the fire, further angering Hale. Noticing that Clydie is taking a liking to Sam, Lonnie beats him and demands he leave. While tending his wounds, Clydie and Sam have sex. Lonnie continues to grow suspicious of Sam and Clydie's relationship; he finds out Sam is a fugitive and informs Clydie, who tells him to leave.

Sam returns to his camp site, but Hale enlists the sheriff's department to hunt him down. Sam leads them on a motorcycle chase and ultimately escapes, but decides to return to Clydie. Running out of time and growing desperate, Hale and Dunston go to Clydie's house with guns and force her to sign over the land. Sam arrives just in time to stop them from burning down the house and kills Dunston. The police arrive and arrest Hale (who is holding Clydie at gun point); Sam allows Lonnie to arrest him, having decided to stop running but promises to return to Clydie and the kids, whom he loves.

As the new school year starts in September, Roy Straitley is looking forward to his 100th term at St Oswald's, where he has been teaching for 33 years. Having never married, he lives alone and has devoted his life to his career. His sitting room walls are full of pictures of "his boys", and St Oswald's represents his only family. He is slightly overweight and ugly by conventional standards (his nickname among his pupils is "Quaz", short for "Quasimodo"). Popular with the students, he adheres to the old principle of being "firm but fair" where teaching and disciplinary matters are concerned. An incurable optimist, Straitley is only uncomfortable when he has to deal with the opposite sex. He is a keen observer, and hardly anything connected with life at the school, however insignificant, ever escapes his notice. A firm believer in the advantages and importance of a classical education, he shuns computers, resorts to Latin to swear and insult his colleagues (which they do not understand), and opposes the idea of any competition between schools other than the kind which is carried out on the playing fields. Smoking Gauloises in his empty form room is his "one concession to the influence of the Modern Languages", and there is long-standing enmity between Straitley and Dr Devine, the Head of German.

The other masters are mostly set in their ways, St Oswald's having made an indelible imprint on their lives. There is Pat Bishop, the Second Master, who has also remained unmarried and who occasionally, at busy times, spends the night in his office doing administrative work. Always intent on mediating between rivalling factions, Bishop has been able to keep his affair with his secretary a secret so as not to blemish the school's reputation. There is Bob Strange, the Third Master, a bureaucrat unpopular with the pupils who has been trying for years to get rid of Straitley and force him into early retirement ("Young blood is cheaper."). There are the members of the German department ("Teutons", according to the old Latin master), among them Geoff and Penny ("League of") Nations, a married couple described by Straitley as hypocrites and sycophants. There is Tony Beard, head of computer science and ''eo ipso'' Straitley's natural adversary. And there is Isabelle Tapi, a part-time French teacher who is said to have made passes at each new male addition to the staff.

At the beginning of the new term, it is the "freshers" on whom Straitley focuses his observations. There are five of them, among them Jeff Light, a Games master who has become a teacher because he thinks it is an easy job; Chris Keane, who teaches English but actually wants to be a novelist; and Dianne Dare, an attractive young woman who teaches French.

The new term starts with a number of minor yet inexplicable occurrences. For the first time in his life, Straitley's register goes missing without ever turning up again. Also, his coffee mug is no longer at the place in the Common Room where it has sat for many years. Pupils report that various objects are missing from their classrooms or lockers. In particular, a 13-year-old Jewish boy from Straitley's form deplores the alleged theft of his expensive fountain pen, a Bar Mitzvah present. Presently, the boy's mother accuses the school and especially Straitley of anti-Semitism. Soon afterwards, a pupil in Straitley's class nearly dies, following another malicious trick, and closely guarded secrets in the lives of the St Oswald's staff are anonymously revealed. Life at St Oswald's begins to suffer a gradual disintegration. One morning, after the discovery of a computer virus on the school's computer system, Pat Bishop is arrested, because child pornography has been downloaded onto his computer and paid for with his credit card. Bishop denies this, but the damage to his career has been done. Meanwhile, a mysterious figure called "Mole" publishes in the local newspaper damaging allegations about St Oswald's.

Straitley begins to suspect that, not only are all these incidents orchestrated by the same malicious individual, but that this person is deliberately trying to bring down St. Oswald's.

The novel is written using Harris' typical split-narrative technique. The first narrator (indicated at the beginning of each chapter by a white King) is Straitley himself, and focuses on the day-to-day events at St Oswald's as the situation develops. The second is marked by a Black Pawn, and is the voice of the mysterious enemy within St Oswald's, whose identity is only revealed at the end of the book, and who, little by little, reveals the bitterness and hatred that drives a person to fake an identity, break the law and even to commit murder - all in the name of revenge.

The war between the alien Kilrathi Empire and the Terran Confederation has been over for several years. Confed is attempting to stabilize its economy and social structure. The Kilrathi survivors, now led by Melek nar Kiranka, retainer to the late Prince Thrakhath, are having greater problems than they had during the war, since their racial and societal makeup revolves around hunting and killing. Tension between the Confederation and the Union of Border Worlds has deepened, most recently with an attack on an unarmed medical transport. This transport is destroyed by a wing of mysterious fighters equipped with a new anti-ship weapon that incinerates the target's contents, leaving only a burning shell behind.

James 'Paladin' Taggart, a senior governor of the Assembly, declares that the Assembly must cast a vote on whether or not to declare war on the Border Worlds, with Admiral Geoffrey Tolwyn assigned to a fact-finding mission which will essentially decide the issue. Colonel Christopher 'Maverick' Blair, retired, is trying to make out a living on a desert world as a farmer, when he is recalled to active military service by Tolwyn. Within five minutes of Blair taking the cockpit, the station he's heading to is attacked by an Avenger-class fighter claiming Border Worlds allegiance. Border World claims that similar strikes that have occurred on their ships are ignored. Tolwyn assigns Blair to the TCS ''Lexington'' with the task of unraveling these tensions and getting to the bottom of the story. Blair is reunited with ''Lexington'''s new Captain William Eisen, Major Todd 'Maniac' Marshall, and Lieutenant Winston 'Vagabond' Chang. Blair also meets Lieutenant Troy 'Catscratch' Carter, a Kilrath-o-phobe who joined the military a couple of years too late.

Blair can find no concrete evidence, and no one can positively identify the harassing ships. Tolwyn transfers a new officer to the ''Lex'', Captain Hugh Paulsen, who replaces Eisen in command. After flying sorties under Paulsen's command, Blair either heads to the officer's lounge with Maniac or ventures down to the flight deck without proper authorization. If Blair heads to the lounge, Maniac abruptly leaves him at the lounge bar remembering "something he has to do." If Blair sneaks onto the flight deck, he witnesses Seether arriving in a shuttle and meeting Paulsen. Soon after, Paulsen calls Blair and Chang in for a surprise mission briefing: Eisen has defected to the Border Worlds and is fleeing in a shuttle, with Maniac piloting. Once in space, Vagabond announces that he is going to follow Eisen over. If Blair does not defect, he returns to the Lexington to meet a new cadre of pilots brought in by Paulsen. Blair flies with them for several missions before being confronted with a Border Worlds attack, led by Maniac, who gives Blair another chance to come over.

If Blair defects with Vagabond, he arrives with Eisen, Maniac, Vagabond and Catscratch at the BWS ''Intrepid'', an old ''Durango''-class carrier that has recently suffered damage from a Confed attack. Much of the senior staff has been killed, including Eisen's contact (and old friend) Captain Dominguez. The two officers currently sharing the command, Colonels Jacob 'Hawk' Manley and Tamara 'Panther' Farnsworth, assign Blair as Wing Commander for the flight group, and Eisen becomes her captain. Other ''Intrepid'' natives include Chief Technician Robert "Pliers" Sykes, Colonel John 'Gash' Dekker, head of the ship's contingent of Marines; and communications technician Lieutenant Velina Sosa, whom Catscratch quickly takes a shine to. Eisen confides that he's been in touch with connections back on Earth, and it seems that the nascent Confed-Border Worlds war is being instigated by elements within Confed. He defected so that he could hunt for proof of this. Blair and Maniac succeed in downing the Lexington, though Paulsen escapes in a shuttle with Seether. Seether kills Paulsen for his failure.

Pliers comes up with a jerry-rigged cloaking device and a "Manned Insertion Pod" - a coffin-sized torpedo that can be used to land ground troops. Blair takes them in against a communications station in the Orestes System, where Sosa and Vagabond collect valuable data on the conspiracy. Vagabond is killed in the gunfight.

Blair picks up a distress signal from the Kilrathi Melek and rescues the convoy. Melek brings flight recorder data of the sleek black ships using their incineration weapon against a Kilrathi transport. One of the ships pulls a move that Blair saw in the attack on the space port, using the ship's afterburners to supercharge and detonate an explosive mine which pushes the ship away at a faster rate. Hawk tells them that when he signed on with Confed, there was a rookie pilot on his ship, call sign 'Seether', who could pull off the maneuver. He also informs them that there was some talk of a 'G.E.' program, but that he never found out what it was, and Seether was transferred from the flight roster to Confed Intelligence Operations. Eisen leaves the ''Intrepid'', intent on returning to Earth and delivering the information to friends in high places; he leaves Blair as acting captain reporting to Border Worlds Rear Admiral Eugene Wilford. Finally, the ''Intrepid'' catches wind of a secret Confed freighter sneaking through the area. Blair subdues it so that Dekker and his boys can capture it. Pliers, clambering aboard in the aftermath, discovers a squadron of sleek black fighters and a single example of their incendiary weapon, called "Dragons" and "Flash-Paks" respectively.

The Telamon system is under biological attack. The vast majority of the colony, particularly Planet FT957, has died. Few survive the attacks, hale and untouched, evidently due to an innate immunity. The survivors at the colony recount that visiting Dragons dropped canisters containing a biological weapon. Blair traces the attacking Dragons to the Axius System, which he infiltrates. There he discovers a secret starbase, guarded by the TCS ''Vesuvius'', and manned by thousands of black-clad soldiers, including Seether, collectively known as the Black Lance. Blair learns that their leader is Admiral Geoffrey Tolwyn, who is instigating a war between the Border Worlds and Confed, with the goal being constant war-driven evolution of tactics and technology, to prepare the Confederation to meet the next hostile alien race. The Gen-Select Bioweapon, recently tested at Telamon, is the next obvious step in the plan: a virus that kills off all but the most genetically superior. Blair is spied by Seether and forced to fight his way out.

The ''Intrepid'', pursued by the ''Vesuvius'' and Tolwyn's Black Lance pilots, makes a run toward Earth, intending to stop Tolwyn from addressing Congress. Though helped by the intervention of the TCS ''Mount St. Helens'', sister ship to the ''Vesuvius'', and its new captain, Eisen, the ''Intrepid'' is unsuccessful in stopping Tolwyn. Blair duels Seether one-on-one above Earth and then lands at the Congressional Building.

Tolwyn delivers his report on the Border Worlds and Blair slips in. If Blair makes a silent entrance, Tolwyn alerts the chamber guards to arrest Blair and he is not given a chance to speak, instead being executed. If Blair instead chooses to make a dramatic entrance, Paladin gives him the chance to speak before the Assembly. Blair baits Tolwyn into revealing his true agenda and admitting his crimes.

If the player scores enough points against Tolwyn, the Senate votes against war. Tolwyn is then indicted and convicted for his actions; lacking an appeal, he hangs himself in his jail cell, rather than be executed. Blair will either regain his rank as Colonel and be seen helping Panther train new pilots at the Academy or using Black Lance assets to crush rebellions with Hawk at his side as the new Admiral, depending on the general tone of his choices throughout the game. If the player makes the wrong choices facing Tolwyn, Blair is convicted of treason and executed as the war begins. This also happens if at any time Blair is captured by Confederation forces after his defection. If Blair fails enough missions before his defection, he is simply sent back to his farm.

Ronald Miller is a typical high school nerd living in suburban Tucson, Arizona. He has spent all summer mowing lawns to save up for a telescope. At an opportune moment, he makes a deal with next-door neighbor and popular cheerleader Cindy Mancini. She had borrowed her mother's expensive suede outfit without permission to wear to a party, only to have wine accidentally spilled on it. Cindy reluctantly agrees to help Ronald look "cool" by posing as his girlfriend for a month for $1,000 (which was used to replace the ruined outfit), although she already has a boyfriend, Bobby, who is attending the University of Iowa.

Ronald then trades his nerdy, yet loyal, friends for the popular but shallow students, and undergoes a complete clothing and hair makeover under Cindy's direction. Over time, a bond develops between them. Cindy has Ronald read a secret poem she wrote that means a great deal to her. In turn, Ronald reveals his interests in astronomy and space travel. On their last date that Ronald paid for, Cindy begins to have real feelings for him and hints that she would like to kiss him, but he misunderstands. The next day at school, they stage a breakup in front of a crowd, but Ronald takes things too far and says some hurtful things about Cindy in front of her friends. She remains calm and distant, but informs Ronald that popularity is hard work and that he needs to make sure that he "stays himself." The next day, Cindy notices him behaving arrogantly at school, and becomes jealous when she sees him flirting with her best friends Barbara and Patty.

Ronald takes Patty to a school dance, where he performs a dance he learned from an African cultural show on public television he mistakenly thought was the latest dance craze performed on ''American Bandstand''. At first, the other kids are mystified, but they soon join in, and Ronald's new "trendy" dancing further increases his popularity. On Halloween night, he and some jocks drive to the house of Kenneth, Ronald's best friend, where the jocks test his loyalty by coercing him to hurl dog feces at Kenneth's house. Kenneth is lying in wait and catches Ronald, but lets him go before his father can call the police. Kenneth ignores him the next day at school.

At a New Year's Eve party at Big John's house, Ronald starts drinking and has a romantic tryst with his date, Iris, in the bathroom. Cindy walks by and hears Ronald reciting her special poem to Iris. Devastated, Cindy starts drinking even more. Later, Cindy's boyfriend, Bobby, unexpectedly shows up at the party. After Bobby learns about Cindy's "relationship" with Ronald, he breaks up with her. Cindy tries to explain that Ronald paid her to pretend they were dating, but Bobby does not believe her and walks out on her. In a drunken rage, Cindy reveals the truth about her and Ronald to the partygoers, and Ronald is immediately ostracized. Dejected, he leaves and spends the night in his garage crying himself to sleep. When school resumes, he finds himself a social outcast, by both the jocks and the nerds. His attempts to reconcile with both Cindy and Kenneth are rebuffed.

Ronald gets an opportunity to redeem himself at lunch when he sees Quint, a jock, bullying Kenneth after noticing Kenneth helping Patty with her math homework. Quint threatens Kenneth with physical violence if Kenneth does not go back to "his side of the cafeteria." Ronald intervenes, threatening to break Quint's pitching arm if he does not leave Kenneth alone. Ronald points out that the three were all friends at one time: when they were nine, Quint fell out of their treehouse and broke his arm and Kenneth and Ronald carried him twelve blocks to the hospital. Ronald confesses he was desperate to run with the popular crowd but had messed up by trying to buy his way in (unlike Kenneth, who was helping Patty out of a genuine interest in her), that the clique dynamic is "all bullshit" and that it is tough enough just being yourself, and walks away. Quint apologizes to Kenneth and they shake hands as the whole school applauds. Ronald officially redeems himself with his friends and Cindy.

Recognizing Ronald's worth, Cindy chooses to spend an evening with him rather than hang out with her friends, hopping on the back of his riding lawnmower. Ronald then asks Cindy to prom, and they kiss for the first time, as the Beatles' title song plays. The new couple then ride off into the sunset on the lawnmower.

The experienced detective Jo has a new partner, Kang who recently graduated from the Police Academy at the top of the class. The idealistic Kang always sticks to his principles and often conflicts with Jo, an amoral cop who always tries to take advantage of his position. Kang tries to win Jo over to his side, but fails. One day, a beautiful woman who works in a bar comes to the police station for help, and Kang falls in love with her. He starts going to the bar often to see her, and begins to become more like Jo. Jo is initially pleased at this, but later begins to experience a dilemma with Kang's change in attitude.

As with many of Bowie's works, the song is a dystopian narrative. One strand of the story concerns a man who helped revolutionaries establish a new order by, "open[ing] doors that would have blocked their way" and "ravag[ing] at my finance." The revolutionaries, "let him use his powers," so they could "infiltrate business cesspools/Hating through our sleeves." But "now [they] are strong" while the man "sits alone growing older" having been forgotten by those he helped. The other strand of the story describes the post-revolutionary world, revealing that it is not the utopia that had been hoped for. The mottoes of the new state are, "I will kill for the good of the fight for the right to be right," and "We can force you to be free." Near the end of the song, the narrator describes what has become of the revolution:

:A love machine lumbers through desolation rows :Ploughing down man, woman, listening to its command :But not hearing anymore.

One night when Mickey is fast asleep, he falls into a dream where a mischievous ghost traps a dream vision of himself inside a magic mirror. Stuck in a large mansion within an alternate universe that strangely resembles his own house, Mickey yearns to get back through the mirror to the real world in order to wake up from this dreamlike state; however, the ghost destroys the mirror and the pieces shrink and fly off to different areas around the house, which turns the magic mirror into a normal mirror. The player must direct Mickey to outwit and pull gags in order to get past enemies, obstacles, and the aforementioned ghost and recover the twelve broken mirror pieces he needs to go home again and search for twelve magic star containers (needed to pull gags) and items needed to help him throughout his quest. Whenever he finds a piece, it will fly back to the mirror, return to its normal size, and put itself back in place.

After repairing the mirror, Mickey prepares to leave, but the ghost stops him, revealing that it only brought him here so it can have someone to play with. The player could either choose to stay or go. Choosing to stay will make the ghost run off, leaving Mickey stuck in the alternate world until he reenters the mirror room where the player can choose to stay or leave again. If the player chooses to leave, Mickey says goodbye to the ghost and begins to go home, but the ghost decides to go with him (only if the player has collected all the mirror pieces). After Mickey wakes up, he goes downstairs to get something to eat. If the player repairs the mirror with all twelve pieces found, a model of the ghost is shown hanging on the ceiling fan and the ghost's laughter is heard, implying that the ghost is now residing in Mickey's house.

It is Lumpy's first Halloween with Winnie the Pooh, Roo, and their friends in the Hundred Acre Wood. The group discusses their plans for Halloween and for their first night of trick-or-treating. Tigger tells his friends about the dreaded Gobloon, a monster that comes out every Halloween to search for somebody to catch and will turn them into "jaggedy lanterns" if he catches them, but if the Gobloon is captured first, it will grant its captors one wish; Rabbit does not believe such a creature exists. After Pooh accidentally eats ''all'' of the trick-or-treat candy Rabbit collected from the Hundred Acre Wood, Roo and Lumpy set out to capture the Gobloon to wish for more. According to Tigger's directions on the map, they are able to go past the Creepy Cave then down the Slimy Slide and into the Tree of Terror later on. Entering the Creepy Cave, Lumpy and his lunchbox get stuck on some rocks, which leads Lumpy to believe that they're being followed. He desperately wants to go back, but Roo insists that they should press on, and eventually they find the Slimy Slide, and then the Tree of Terror.

When Roo and Lumpy reach the supposed Gobloon's lair, Lumpy loses his courage to catch the Gobloon. So Roo tells him the story from ''Boo to You Too! Winnie the Pooh'', when Piglet was afraid to go trick-or-treating, but gained his courage. Roo believes that if Piglet can conquer his fears, then so can Lumpy. An inspired Lumpy helps Roo set a trap for the Gobloon, but the two end up fleeing once they think the Gobloon is returning. After encountering and fleeing from a mysterious figure (which they think is the Gobloon), Lumpy gets separated from Roo and ends up stuck in the trap they had set for the Gobloon. Lumpy is heartbroken to be alone, as he and Roo had promised to stay together during the adventure. Roo finds a Jack-o'-lantern resembling Lumpy, which makes him think his friend has been caught by the Gobloon and turned into a jaggedy lantern.

Once back with the others, Roo recruits Pooh, Piglet, Tigger, Eeyore and Rabbit to help him capture the Gobloon and save Lumpy. The group arrives at the trap and believes the Gobloon is trapped, unaware that it is actually Lumpy. Roo wishes to have his friend Lumpy back, but becomes bitterly saddened when the "Gobloon" doesn't grant his wish. Hearing Roo's voice, Lumpy calls for him, but a loud thunder blocks it, prompting him to break his way out of the trap. Roo and Lumpy are happily reunited.

The group finally goes trick-or-treating and Kanga, who was the mysterious figure from earlier, throws a Halloween party for the friends, complete with Jack-o'-lanterns she had carved in everyone's likenesses. Lumpy's Jack-o'-lantern wasn't there, she explains she made one but must have accidentally dropped it—which turns out to be the Jack-o'-lantern that Roo found. With Lumpy's first Halloween being successful, everyone from the Hundred Acre Wood enjoys the Halloween party.

Max Thursday is an ex-cop and an alcoholic. The only job he can find is house detective at his pal Smitty's rundown hotel.

Ex-wife Georgia comes to him in a panic. Their young son Jeff is missing and so is her brother Fred Mace. She didn't report it, after being warned not to go to the police by Dr. Elder, who is a business acquaintance of Fred's.

The drunken Max confronts pistol packing Dr. Elder, looking for answers regarding his missing son, but the doctor knocks him out cold from behind. Max wakes up and is taken to police headquarters for questioning. He soon learns that Dr. Elder has been killed and he becomes the prime suspect. Georgia gives the cops a false alibi for Max, so the police have no cause to hold him, and he's released.

Now sober, Max learns that the doctor was involved in a diamond smuggling operation with Varkas, a known criminal. He learns from Varkas' helpful moll, Angel, that the gangster's men are holding Fred hostage.

Max is shot in the arm by Varkas' thugs. He goes to Georgia who stitches his wounds. When he recovers, he goes to Varkas' warehouse to look for Mace. He discovers that Varkas and his bodyguards are all dead.

Max finally realizes that his old friend Smitty is behind the whole scheme. Fred and little Jeff are rescued. Grateful Georgia embraces her little boy and welcomes Max back into the family.

Captain Picard, Counselor Troi, Chief Engineer La Forge, and Lt. Commander Data are on a runabout, returning to the ''Enterprise'' from a conference. As they near the ship, they encounter pockets of temporal disruptions that have very peculiar effects and could be lethal if they pass through them. They modify their sensors to avoid these and they find the ''Enterprise'' and a Romulan warbird frozen in time. The warbird has fired a disruptor at the ''Enterprise'', which had initiated a power transfer to the warbird.

Data and La Forge modify a set of emergency transport armbands to nullify the temporal effects, and Picard, Data and Troi transport aboard the ''Enterprise'' to investigate. The crew has been transporting Romulans aboard from the warbird, one of whom has fired on Dr. Crusher with his disruptor. The ''Enterprise'' warp engine has suffered a warp breach which, under normal circumstances, would consume the ship in seconds. Picard suffers "temporal narcosis" from standing close to the core breach, forcing them to return to the runabout, and La Forge takes Picard’s place. On the warbird, they find the crew attempting to evacuate the ship with the ''Enterprise'' s help; its main reactor, which uses an artificial quantum singularities, is undergoing a power surge. Investigating the engine closely, they find the singularity appearing odd and discolored. When Data scans it with a tricorder, time briefly moves forward on the ship (causing a cataclysmic core explosion), but then reverses back to its original point (restoring ships and crews). La Forge spots a Romulan who was not in the same place as before; the Romulan suddenly touches him, shocking them both. The shock is nearly lethal to La Forge, and they disconnect the shield to freeze him in time, hoping to care for him later, while they take the Romulan back to the runabout.

There, they find the Romulan is really a creature from trans-dimensional space. He admits that he and a companion were trying to recover the singularity from the Romulans—their young were accidentally placed there to incubate instead of in a natural singularity such as a black hole. In the process of trying to remove the singularity, they had created a power surge, and the Warbird sent out a distress call to the ''Enterprise''. The creature soon fades away, returning to its own trans-dimensional space.

Picard, Troi, and Data return to the ''Enterprise''. Data readies a remote-controlled tricorder aimed at the Romulan engine core to reverse time a few seconds so he can perform actions to prevent the pending disasters. After the warp core breach is averted in Engineering, Data is about to stop the power transfer, but is attacked by the trans-dimensional creature’s companion. He regains consciousness shortly thereafter, but must put a force field around the warp core to prevent it from breaching again.

Picard suddenly appears on the ''Enterprise'' bridge near Riker. The crew is surprised, but Picard orders them to continue to evacuate the Romulan ship, including La Forge, and to terminate the power transfer. In sickbay, Troi successfully pushes Dr. Crusher out of the way of the Romulan disruptor blast; the Romulan states he was firing at a trans-dimensional creature that had disguised herself as a Romulan and had not meant to harm Crusher. However, the warbird continues to go critical, and the power transfer from the ''Enterprise'' cannot be stopped. Picard remotely powers the runabout into the power transfer beam's path, disrupting it and allowing the ''Enterprise'' to move away, after safely recovering the warbird crew. Just as the warbird's engines go critical, the ship disappears, along with the remaining time abnormalities. As the ''Enterprise'' crew repair the ship, Picard promises to return the Romulans safely to their homeworld. At the close, Data is trying to examine human perception of time.

The film tells the story of a newly graduated Leningrad teacher, Yelena Kuzmina (played by Yelena Alexandrovna Kuzmina). She goes furniture shopping with her fiance, Petya, and in a fantasy sequence she imagines teaching a class of neat, obedient city schoolchildren. Instead, she is assigned to work in the Altai mountains of Siberia. Reluctant to leave, she appeals to remain in the city. Although her request is granted (by a faceless Nadezhda Krupskaya, seen only from behind), she is eventually spurred by the government's condemnation of 'cowards' such as her to accept the post.

Yelena arrives in a remote village, where the two authority figures are the feckless representative of the Soviet and the ''Bey'' — the local version of the kulak. The villagers live a primitive life, practicing shamanist religion (symbolised by the totem of a dead horse on a pole) and living entirely off their herd of sheep. The children become devoted to Yelena, but their education is hampered both by their primitive condition and by the insistence of the ''Bey'' that they work as shepherds rather than attending school. The representative of the Soviet refuses to help Yelena against the ''Bey''; although he has received posters calling on people to expel the kulaks from the collective farms, his only comment is that the posters "look pretty".

Undaunted, Yelena takes her lessons to the children working with the sheep. The ''Bey'', however, has illegally sold the sheep to some sheep traders, who begin to slaughter the animals. Yelena declares that she will travel to the regional centre to find out about Soviet regulations concerning dealings in sheep, but on the way she is thrown off a sled by one of the sheep traders and becomes lost in a snowstorm.

Yelena is found just in time by a rescue party from the village. They overthrow the representative of the Soviet and summon help for Yelena, who needs an emergency operation in order to survive. Telegraph messages to and from the capital result in an aeroplane being sent to rescue Yelena, who promises that she will soon return. The final shot of the film shows the aeroplane soaring above the totemic dead horse.

Main locations

Pella – the opening scene of the novel, capital city of Macedon. Pella is presented as a place of constant political struggles. It is where Alexander's childhood is spent and where most of the central relationships are formed.

Aigi – the closing scene of the novel, the old capital of Macedon, located higher in the mountains. It features a fortress near a waterfall, and is presented as the site of many important character shifts, such as loss of virginity, murder, and transformative religious experiences.

Mieza – site of a school for Alexander and the other sons of important Macedonian military leaders. Mieza is presented as a sort of Arcadian place of refuge from the wider politics of Macedon, a place of comradeship, learning, and love.

Thrace – Macedon's neighbor to the northeast. Thrace is presented as a wild, remote region which Philip's soldiers have occupied. Even more so than Macedon, Thrace remains a rough land of feuding warlords. It is noted for the blue tattoos of its inhabitants. Thrace is where Alexander first exhibits his military bravery and leadership, and where he and Hephaestion are hardened to the gruesome realities of war.

Athens – Macedon's antagonistic neighbor to the south. Athens is represented in the novel as past its glory days and ruled by petty, squabbling demagogues. It still, however, retains an aura of great respect for both Alexander and Philip as the birthplace of Greece's high culture.

Chaeronea – site of a massive battle which decides whether Philip's military hegemony will be able to spread into the more culturally advanced states of southern Greece.

Perinthos – a former Macedonian ally to the east which wavers in its support and is invaded by Philip. It is here that Alexander and Philip bond over a shared love of military tactics and Alexander saves Philip's life during an attempted insurrection.

Epiros – Macedon's neighbour to the west. Epiros is presented as a well-run, prosperous region in alliance with Macedon. It is the homeland of Olympias, who is daughter and sister of two of its successive kings. The marriage of Olympias to Philip as his chief wife ensures that Epiros remains friendly to Macedon, so that Philip can concentrate his army on northern, southern, and eastern expansion.

Persian Empire – though it is never visited in the novel, Persia is a looming presence affecting everything that happens in Macedon and its neighbors. It is the eventual goal of both Alexander and Philip to conquer Persia and its Great King. Persia is the old enemy invader of Greece and a land of fabled, opulent wealth.

Phocis – though it is never visited in the novel, Phocis serves as the pretext for Philip to become involved in the military disputes of southern Greece. Phocis' sacrilegious cultivation of fields meant to be reserved as holy land (and the resulting wealth which threatens their neighbours) is the impetus for the Third Sacred War.

Main characters

Alexander – The central character of the novel, followed from the age of 4 until his taking power over Macedon.

Philip – King of Macedon and Alexander's legal father. Alexander and Philip have an intense love-hate relationship. A central theme of the novel is whether Philip, who is often portrayed as arrogant, brutish, and crass, deserves the loyalty and love of Alexander. This is often tied to whether or not Philip is also Alexander's biological father.

Olympias – Alexander mother and Philip's chief wife. She is portrayed as a strong-willed survivor who uses emotional blackmail and a system of spies to protect her interests against her all-powerful husband. Through the novel, Alexander's relationship towards his mother changes from unswerving devotion to a more restrained loyalty.

Hephaestion – Teenaged friend of Alexander who becomes his unswervingly loyal life partner.

Pausanias – Bodyguard and lover of Philip, later elevated to captain of the bodyguards as compensation for a humiliating attack by a rival.

Demosthenes – Athenian political orator, diplomat, and soldier, portrayed as arrogant, selfish, and venal (The strongly negative portrayal of Demosthenes in the novel has been one of the main criticisms leveled against it). Demosthenes is the most visible antagonist against Philip's drive for empire.

Phoinix – Alexander's pedagogue, who provides him emotional solace and imaginative inspiration.

Leonidas – Olympias' uncle and Alexander's great-uncle. Leonidas serves as regent of Macedon during one of Philip's absences and seeks to toughen Alexander into an obedient, hard soldier.

Attalos – One of Phliip's generals. Early in the novel he attacks Pausanias as part of a romantic quarrel of honor. Later in the novel, he makes a bid for power by trying to replace Olympias with his own niece as mother of the next king.

Antipatros – Loyal regent during one of Philip's absences, Antipatros helps train Alexander in the civic demands of state administration. He is also the father of Kassandros, who is a minor villain in the story.

Chapter One

The novel begins with the memorable opening line, "The child was wakened by the knotting of the snake's coils about his waist." Alexander is four years old and his younger sister Kleopatra is still in a cradle. The snake which encircles him is a semi-tame house snake who has escaped from the room of Alexander's mother, Olympias. Alexander sneaks past his nanny, Hellanike, and into his mother's room to return it. The relationship between Alexander and Olympias is portrayed as affectionate and intimate, but he is already aware at a young age that she lies to her husband, Alexander's purported father, Philip, the king of Macedon.

Philip, who had been heard earlier singing and yelling drunkenly in the main hall, bursts into the cozy scene & embarrasses Alexander with his nakedness and verbal abuse of Olympias. Olympias responds with mockery of Philip's other lovers, his period as a hostage in Thebes, and the insinuation that Alexander is in fact not Philip's biological son. Phililp throws Alexander from the room, where he is comforted by a guard. Alexander claims he will murder his father when he's old enough, but the guard warns that it would be a sin, and tells Alexander that being abused will toughen him up for the aristocratic male rites of passage of murdering a wild boar and murdering a man. The guard also tells Alexander the tale of Heracles killing snakes as a baby, starting a lifelong fascination with Heracles in Alexander.

Alexander's family is further revealed when, three years later, he goes on a horse ride with a soldier he admires, Ptolemy. Alexander has heard around the barracks that Ptolemy is also the son of Philip, but Ptolemy explains to Alexander why this should not be repeated, as Ptolemy's mother is married to someone other than Philip. To overcome Alexander's great disappointment, Ptolemy becomes a blood brother with him.

Returning to the stables, Alexander sees horses dressed in the dazzling wealth of Persia. He learns that two Persian satraps who rebelled against the Great King have been given pardons and will be returning from exile in Macedon. Alexander entertains and questions the envoys who have come to bring them back, gaining useful military information because the amused envoys tell a child more than they would an adult. Alexander also flirts with the handsome youth who attends the envoys, and later dreams of riding off with him to see Persepolis after murdering a group of impudent Persian envoys.

The final sequence of Chapter One ends with Alexander allowed to join his mother in a women's rite dedicated to the god Dionysus because Alexander has not yet reached puberty.

Chapter Two

When Philip goes to war against Chalkidike, he puts Olympias' cold uncle, Leonidas of Epirus in charge as regent, and entrusts him with finding tutors for Alexander, who is now seven years old and considered ready to begin training for manhood. Leonidas forces Alexander into a Spartan lifestyle and the tutors try to tame Alexander's imagination into rote learning. Conditions are somewhat alleviated by an old family friend, Lysimachus of Acarnania, who encourages Alexander's dreams by referring to Alexander as the mythical hero Achilles and himself as Phoinix. In his mind, Alexander equates his father with Achilles' military colleague but personal enemy, Agamemnon.

Alexander has his first meeting with Hephaestion, although it is brief and they argue.

Philip returns from war, bringing crowds of slaves with him. He also marries a woman from Thrace to seal an alliance, causing mad jealousy in Olympias. In retaliation, Olympias appears on stage in a celebratory play, something which is allowed her as a priestess of Dionysos, god of theatre, but is still considered wildly shocking since only men are supposed to appear on stage. In the gossiping crowd afterward, Alexander slashes the leg of a man who he hears insulting his mother. To atone for attacking someone without warning, Alexander sacrifices to Zeus, and believes that the god speaks directly to him during the rite.

Chapter Three

Alexander is ten years old. Going to meet with his father, he notes that his father's newest guard, Pausanias of Orestis, has the kind of looks which Philip appreciates in lovers. Philip is preparing to hear envoys from Athens, who are coming to convince him against joining a war against Phocis, because they are afraid of his increasing power spreading into southern Greece. Chief among them is Demosthenes, who attempts to molest Alexander, mistaking him for a slave. Alexander is revenged when he reveals himself as Philip's heir just as Demosthenes is about to speak. Demosthenes is also humiliated because his speech is plagiarized by another envoy, Aeschines.

Alexander befriends a young Thracian, Lambaros, living at the court as a hostage, despite the snobbery which the other Macedonians display toward him.

Chapter Four

Alexander learns eagerly from his tutors, and bemoans the fact that he must sleep when there is so much he wants to do. His music teacher, Epikrates, encourages him to perform due to his great skill on the cithara, but Philip publicly humiliates Alexander for being too good a musician. Epikrates resigns, and Alexander runs away from home. He joins a soldier on leave in a tribal feud in the uplands of Macedon, making his first murder in battle and carrying the head of the victim back to prove his manhood to his father. Alexander refuses to claim the head of a second kill because the face reminds him of his father.

Returned to the palace, Alexander is given his own retinue of young men-at-arms. At a yearly horse fair, when Alexander is away from them looking at horses, the group gossips that King Philip had taken the guard Pausanias of Orestis as a lover, but then had moved on to someone else. Pausanias had insulted the new lover in jealousy, leading the new lover to be foolishly brave in battle to try to prove himself, and resulting in his death. To get back at Pausanias, the general Attalos, a friend of the dead man, had got Pausanias drunk and let the stable grooms gang rape him. Philip had promoted Pausanias to captain of the royal bodyguard to try to make it up to him, but had not punished Attalos, who was good general.

Alexander shows amazing courage and skill in taming the horse Bucephalus in front of the assembled chiefs at the horse fair. He re-meets Hephaestion (who he had first met six years previous) and is smitten. Alexander realizes that while talking with Hephaestion, he had forgotten all about running to tell the news of the new horse to his mother, the first time this has happened when he had big news to tell. Alexander burns a great deal of Persian incense to Heracles at a rite and is told by his great-uncle Leonidas not to be so wasteful of Persian riches until he is master of the lands where they grow, a sentiment which Alexander takes to heart.

Chapter Five

Alexander is nearly 15 and is studying the military histories of Xenophon. When they are hiding out together on a rooftop, Alexander convinces Hephaestion to climb to a dangerously high pinnacle. Hephaestion, who has become completely infatuated, likens Alexander to Zeus, and himself to Semele, realizing that a relationship with Alexander will always involve danger.

Philip leaves to install Alexandros, Olympias' brother, as the new king of Epirus, placing the loyal Antipatros as regent of Macedon. Alexander receives his new tutor, Aristotle, who sets up a school for Alexander and the sons of Philip's generals at Mieza. Among the comrades are Hephaestion, who is now accepted as Alexander's "shadow" by everyone, Ptolemy, Harpalos, Philotas, and Kassandros, whom Alexander does not like, but he must be included because he is the heir of the loyal regent Antipatros. At one point, they watch a play about Achilles and Patroclus, which further inspires the bond between Alexander and Hephaestion.

After some time at the school at Mieza, Alexander and his closest comrades are called to join Philip in besieging a fort. A military escort is led by Kleitos, brother of Alexander's former nanny, Hellanike. Alexander fights with great bravery, and interacts personally with the soldiers, earning their admiration. After the fall of the fort, he rescues a woman whose baby has been murdered, and whom Kassandros was attempting to rape. In an ensuing fight, the woman nearly kills Kassandros, and he is packed off home in disgrace. Alexander visits his boyhood friend, the former Thracian hostage Lambaros, on the return trip.

Back at school, the young men are shocked to hear of the torture and death of Hermias of Atarneus, a friend of Aristotle and loyal ally of Macedon, under arrest in Persia. Aristotle refers to all Persians as barbarians in anger, an insult which Alexander refuses to believe. Meanwhile, Philip deposes Kersobelptes of Thrace.

Alexander's family is reunited at the springtime Dionysia, held at the old capital at Aigai. His mother is jealous that Alexander and Philip have now bonded through their common passion for war. Caught up in the heterosexual furor surrounding the Dionysia, Alexander flirts with a serving woman, Gorgo, but later comes upon his father having sex with her. On the day of the festival, he watches the secret rites of the women on the mountaintop, although it is forbidden, and sees his mother murder Gorgo in her role as priestess of Dionysos. Sick with shame for having watched something forbidden, Alexander reasons that his mother has the right to wage war in the way of women just as his father does in the way of men, and that Olympias has actually killed far fewer people than Philip. Hephaestion comforts Alexander after the shock, and is relieved that Alexander did not have sex with any of the women returning from the mountain rites, as many of their friends did.

Chapter Six

The next spring, Alexander and Hephaestion finally have sex. It is something which Hephaestion has been longing for, but it leaves Alexander distant because, like sleep, it reminds him that he is mortal. When they return to the capital from school, the circle of men around Alexander are noticed to have taken up the southern Greek fashion of shaving, something which Philip views with distaste. Nonetheless, he leaves Alexander as regent when he goes off to war against Perinthos and Byzantion.

As regent, Alexander practices military skills himself and studiously trains the soldiers left to him, making them ready when he puts down a rebellion in Thrace. He is aided by his childhood friend, Lambaros, who knows the local terrain. Upon driving off the rebels, Alexander founds the city of Alexandropolis Maedica and then joins his father against Perinthos. There, he saves his father's life but Philip, ashamed, pretends to have been unconscious and to not remember it, losing some of the loyalty he had earned from Alexander in their shared battle plans.

On his return to the capital, Alexander is pressured by his mother, who is jealous of Hephaestion's influence, to engage in heterosexuality. He is kind to a hetaira at a party, but goes no further than kissing her gently. His mother then has a young woman smuggled into his room at night. Realising that the woman will be punished if she does not prove she has lost her virginity, and wanting his mother off his back, Alexander has sex with her. The next morning he sends the woman back to his mother with an expensive pin which Olympias had told Alexander to save for his bride someday, and the message that from now on he will choose his own lovers.

Chapter Seven

Philip decides that southern Greece must be invaded. Alexander is put in charge of a feint against Illyria to make the southern Greeks unprepared. Back at Pella, he questions his mother as to who is his biological father, but the novel leaves the answer a secret. Athens and Thebes ally against Philip. Sparta remains uninvolved. The Athenian army and the Sacred Band of Thebes are destroyed, with Alexander's courage and tactical skill making him a hero to the army. Philip's hegemony is recognised. Alexander represents Philip in Athens, where he is insulted when someone tries to offer him service from an enslaved sex worker. His blood brother and friend Ptolemy, however, takes up with the Athenian hetaira Thaïs.

On the way back to Pella, Philip's entourage stays at the castle of Attalos, the general who had years before planned the gang rape of Pausanias of Orestis, the chief of Philip's bodyguard. Alexander is shocked that his father is insulting Pausanias by making him stay the night at the home of his former rapist, but Ptolemy points out that the king has much else to think about and has probably put the event long out of mind. Pausanias does not eat or drink the entire time they are lodged at the home of Attalos.

Attalos gains another enemy in Olympias when it is announced that Philip will be marrying Attalos' niece. The marriage threatens Olympias even more than Philip's previous marriages because a son born to this wife would be completely Macedonian, and might be considered a better heir than Olympias' own son, Alexander. Alexander goes along with the wedding until Attalos prays that his niece will produce a "lawful, true-born heir" which Alexander takes as an insult and threat. He hurls a cup at Attalos' head, a huge offence against a host, then goes with his mother into exile in her native Epirus. Along the route of their flight, they take refuge at the house of Pausanias' wife. In Epirus, Alexander consults the oracle of Dodona, under the auspices of three priestesses reminiscent of the Moirai, and is given the answer of "yes" to two questions which the novel leaves a secret.

Chapter Eight

Through the mediation of Demaratos, Alexander and Olympias return to Macedon, but there is now a clear faction which supports them, and a second faction which supports Attalos. Philotas, one of the young men in Alexander's circle, is recruited by his father, the general Parmenion, to spy on Alexander for Philip. Olympias' own spies learn that Philip plans to marry Arridaios, the developmentally disabled son of a minor wife, off to the daughter of a ruler on the edge of the Persian Empire. Convinced that the prestigious marriage is meant as a slight to him, Alexander proposes himself to the foreign ruler as an alternate bridegroom through the secret negotiations of Thettalos, an admiring actor.

When he learns that Alexander has gone behind his back, Philip exiles several of the men who helped in the plot, including Ptolemy, whom Philip acknowledges to be his biological son. Hephaestion is not exiled, but is threatened with death if Alexander ever again commits an act seen as treasonous. Thettalos is brought before Philip in chains, and Alexander is forced to plead for his life.

Fed up with Olympias, Philip makes plans to marry her daughter, Kleopatra, off to Olympias' brother, the current king of Epirus. This will allow Philip to divorce Olympias while still retaining a marriage bond to the king of Epirus. About the same time, captain of the bodyguard Pausanias learns that Philip has brought up mention of his former rape again, although he had promised never to do so. The internal divisions of the family begin to spread out into the network of diplomats and spies working against Philip in occupied lands. Olympias hints at a new intrigue she has developed to bolster her position, but, fearful of Philip's retribution, Alexander refuses to hear it.

Alexander and Hephaestion both look ahead to the planned invasion of Asia, reasoning that if Alexander fights well for Philip, he will get back in his good graces. And if Philip dies in battle, then the best center of power will be with the mass of the army. Alexander plans to murder Attalos in Asia. Foreign agents convince Pausanias that Alexander agrees to a plot involving the captain of the guard by making a copy of one of Alexander's rings and using it as a token of agreement.

Meanwhile, Philip invites dignitaries from all over Greece for the lavish wedding of his daughter Kleopatra to Alexandros of Epirus. He sends for an oracle from Delphi concerning his invasion of Asia and receives the seemingly positive response, "Wreathed is the bull for the altar, the end fulfilled. And the slayer too is ready." Lavish floats of gods and goddesses are built to parade into the theatre where the wedding celebration will take place, with Philip named a god in addition to the Twelve Olympians. Feeling on top of the world, Philip decides to enter the stadium without his guards.

As Pausanias helps Philip from his horse, he stabs the king, then is cut down himself by other guardsmen. Everyone in the crowd, except Olympias, panics and flees the theatre. It is hinted that she and Antipatros may have been privy to the assassination. The float holding Aphrodite, goddess of love, is toppled in the panic. Alexander takes control of the guard, setting himself in position to claim the throne by the next novel in the series, ''The Persian Boy''.

The Yoshi family has just moved to the Tokyo suburbs, close to where the father Kennosuke's (Tatsuo Saitō) direct boss, Iwasaki (Takeshi Sakamoto), is staying. Kennosuke's two young sons Keiji and Ryoichi (Tomio Aoki and Hideo Sugawara) are supposed to be going to school, but owing to the threats of a group of neighborhood and school bullies, they decide to play truant. After the teacher speaks to their father, Keiji and Ryoichi have no choice but to go to school. They attempt to eat sparrow's eggs to get stronger so that they can get back at the boys, but an older delivery boy Kozou (Shoichi Kofujita) decides to help them out to threaten the bullies, and they emerge as the top dogs amongst the gang.

One of the neighborhood kids is Taro (Seiichi Kato), whose father is Iwasaki himself. The boys argue amongst themselves who has the most powerful father. Not long after, they visit Taro's home, where the office workers have gathered under Iwasaki, who screens some home movies for the amusement of the gathering. The two brothers witness on film how their father, who to them is stern and whom they look up to, plays the buffoon before his colleagues and boss.

Humiliated, they go home and decide that their father isn't such an important person after all. They throw a massive tantrum, and confront their father asking him why he has to grovel under Taro's father. Kennosuke answers that Taro's father is richer and holds a higher position than he does. Dissatisfied with this answer, the two decide to hold a hunger strike. Ryoichi gets a spanking from his father, but after the children have gone to bed, the father confides in the wife that he does not enjoy doing what he does. Both wish for a better future for their children.

The next day, the children attempt a hunger strike during breakfast, but succumb to a dish of onigiri. Kennosuke manages a reconciliation with them. The children say they would like to be a lieutenant general and a general respectively. On their way to school, they see Taro's father in a car, and they urge their father to go up and greet him. As Kennosuke takes a convenient car ride to work, the brothers walk to school with Taro and the rest of the gang.

Shingo Ogata, a 62-year-old businessman living in Kamakura and working in Tokyo, is close to retirement. He is experiencing temporary lapses of memory, recalling strange and disturbing dreams upon waking, and hearing sounds, including the titular noise which awakens him from his sleep, "like wind, far away, but with a depth like a rumbling of the earth." Shingo takes the sound to be an omen of his impending death. At the same time, he is repeatedly confronted with the passing away of friends and former fellow students.

Shingo observes and questions his relations with the other family members. He married his wife Yasuko after the untimely death of her older sister, whose beauty Shingo adored, considering both Yasuko and their daughter Fusako to be rather unattractive. Shingo has both fatherly and subtle erotic feelings for his daughter-in-law Kikuko, who calmly endures his son Shūichi's affair with another woman. When Fusako leaves her husband and returns to the family home with her two little children, Shingo starts to perceive the marital difficulties of his son and daughter as the result of not fulfilling his role as a father. In addition, Fusako blames him for marrying her to a man she did not want, and for preferring Kikuko over her.

Shingo's secretary Eiko helps him to find Shūichi's mistress Kinuko, a war widow, and learns of his son's mean and abusive behaviour towards her. Not only is Shūichi reluctant to his father's request to end the affair and treat his wife Kikuko with more respect, he even borrows money from his mistress to pay for Kikuko's abortion. Shingo is devastated, speculating if Shūichi's and Kikuko's unborn child might have been the reincarnation of Yasuko's older sister. Shūichi eventually leaves Kinuko when she expects a child, which she claims to be from another man and wants to keep. In the newspaper, Shingo and his family read about the suicide attempt of Fusako's husband, whom Fusako is about to divorce.

The early 1960s: In preparation for his Bar Mitzvah, a Jewish boy from a small Manitoba community with an overbearing family tries to navigate his coming-of-age with his family's condescension and bigotry using his sarcastic Jewish humor. The town's rabbi dies, and a subplot develops in which Max's father and grandfather (synagogue leaders) are saddled with a traditional Hassidic rabbi who sticks out like a sore thumb among the otherwise assimilated Jewish community. To make matters more difficult, Max likes a Catholic girl, with whom he later duets in a piano competition. The quirky, fun-loving rabbi tries to help him with his problems, yet harbours a secret ambition of his own.

In Hollywood in the late 1920s during the waning days of the industry's transition to sound film, producer and studio head Alfie Alperin (Malcolm McDowell) wants to produce an epic Western film about Wyatt Earp. Tom Mix (Bruce Willis) is cast as the great United States Marshal and the real Earp (James Garner) is on the set as a technical adviser.

While Earp and Mix, the "real" and "reel" western heroes, are involved in their film adventure, they also get caught up in an actual case of murder, prostitution and corruption with vicious gangster Dutch Keiffer Joe Dallesandro . Together, they try to straighten out the problems of the missing son of Earp's former girlfriend, Christina (Patricia Hodge). She is now the wife of studio boss Alfie Alperin and he is not pleased by Earp's investigation. Hostess Cheryl King (Mariel Hemingway) becomes romantically involved with Earp.

Alfie's sister, Victoria Alperin (Jennifer Edwards) is dating a notorious mobster and all three were at the scene of the murder of Madam Candice Gerard. Soon Earp unveils the true sadistic character of Alfie Alperin. Two of his accomplices, studio Chief of Studio Police Dibner (M. Emmet Walsh) whose interest is in protecting Alperin and corrupt Capt. Blackworth (Richard Bradford) turn nasty.

Mix and Earp get to fight a real gunfight at a real isolated ranch, with Mix telling Earp "I wish there was a camera here" before drawing a real gun.

After the death of Christina, matters become personal for Earp, leading to the explosive climax between Mix, Alperin, and Earp.

Emily Boynton, stepmother to the three Boynton children – Lennox, Raymond, and Carol – and mother to Ginevra, blackmails the family lawyer, Jefferson Cope, into destroying her late husband's second will that left them $200,000 each, which would free them from Mrs. Boynton's domination.

She takes the stepchildren and Nadine, her daughter-in-law serving as a nurse, on holiday to Europe. In Trieste, the great detective Hercule Poirot runs into an old friend, Dr. Sarah King. Sarah soon falls in love with Raymond Boynton, to Emily's disapproval.

Lady Westholme is introduced. She was born American but has had British nationality for the last ten years due to her marriage, during which she became an MP. She, her secretary and archaeologist, Miss Quinton, and lawyer, Jefferson Cope (the same) are also on their way to Jerusalem and Qumran.

The Boynton family are surprised to see Cope on board the ship. The adult step-children discover the existence of a second will since their father told Lennox before he died but no-one can prove this. Emily continues to bully her step-children. Cope is having an affair with Nadine which Emily discovers on board the ship. She (possibly) drugs Cope's wine but this is spilt when Nadine's husband thumps Cope having found an engraved cigarette case given to Nadine by Cope. Poirot observes the spill and keeps a close eye on the family when they disembark.

At the archaeological dig, Cope and Nadine, Raymond and Dr King go for a walk, but Lennox turns back upset by his wife's preference for Cope. Later the others return. Dr King notices an Arab man hovering over Emily. When she goes over, she finds Emily dead. Dr King thinks Emily died of a heart attack but Poirot points out it is wise to be suspicious when there is a death of someone who is widely hated. He asks Dr King to check her medical bag and she finds it disordered with an empty bottle of digitalis and there is a missing syringe.

Poirot deduces that Mrs. Boynton was injected with a lethal dose of digitalis, corresponding to a medicine she took that was usually administered by Nadine, in order that her death appear to be by natural causes. Since the family could have altered her medication without needing an additional syringe, he suspects an outsider.

There is an altercation in the street and a gun is fired. Dr King is accused but Poirot has her released so she can travel with him to meet the others for a 'picnic' where he plans to reveal what happened. Having suggested that all the step-children lied about seeing their step-mother alive when she was dead (thinking one of them may have done it and wishing to delay or protect them against discovery), he reveals the truth: Lady Westholme is the murderer. She was once in prison and Emily had recognised her from her time as a prison warden. To keep her quiet and maintain her status, Lady Westholme had resorted to murder.

In the town of Weaverton, signs of a circus are being posted. In Zeke MacGruder's barn, a group of boys are holding a meeting. Two brothers, Tommy (Chance Michael Corbitt) and Ben (Ryan Todd) are daring to climb Thunder Mountain, where it is said a giant lives. The boys take the dare and set out up the mountain. They get caught in a thunderstorm and barely escape getting hit by lightning (this is what gives Thunder Mountain its name). They take refuge inside a strange oversized log cabin. Whilst there, they find mysterious carved wooden figures. Suddenly, the giant returns and finds the boys hiding under a table, but they escape with one of the wooden figures and go back to town. When they reach home, they tell their family their amazing story, but no one believes them. The next morning, they set out with another boy, Zeke MacGruder (Daniel Pipoly) who doubts Tommy and Ben have seen the giant. Tommy and Ben's younger sister, Amy (Noley Thornton) follows them, but almost gets caught in a bear trap. The boys tell her to leave but she persists and continues following them.

The three boys watch the giant from the woods. Zeke excuses himself and runs away, but Amy steps out from the woods and introduces herself and her brothers to the giant, Eli Weaver (Richard Kiel). They help him with his chores including helping him plant young fir trees. The boys volunteer to get water for the trees and go in the cabin to fetch a bucket. When they do so they discover some of Eli's gold nuggets. Tommy puts a few in his pocket, and they go outside and fill the bucket with water. Eli's pet wolf shows up to check out the children and after this the children return to town. Amy discovers Tommy and Ben looking at the gold nuggets and they allow her to have one of them with the promise she won't tell their mother. Amy goes to the general store to buy candy, and offers to pay for the candy with the gold. Hezekiah Crow (Jack Elam) overhears Amy and says he is an expert in gauging whether a nugget is gold or not, and proclaims the nugget as being 'Fool's Gold.' But in trade he offers her tickets to his carnival, and she bargains for extra tickets. She goes to see Eli and invites him to dinner and gives him one of the carnival tickets.

Eli comes to Wilson's house for dinner, and after dinner he repairs their cuckoo clock. Hezekiah Crow's circus parades through Weaverton, hosted by Zeke's father, Mr. MacGruder (Ed Williams). The circus's many performers include a juggling act, a trained Asian elephant, a trained lion, a boa constrictor, a long-legged clown act, a camel, a high-jumping acrobat, and two white horses.

The final act arrives, a trained black bear act. This reminds Eli of the day that a giant grizzly bear (Bart the Bear) killed his parents. Amy admires a beautiful doll at a circus booth, and Eli throws balls to knock down pins. The booth is run by one of Hezekiah's sons (William Sanderson), who puts a rod through the pins so they can't be knocked over. But Eli's throw breaks the pins and he expects the carnival man to give Amy the doll, but instead he gives her an inferior doll. Amy is disappointed, and Eli grabs hold of the carnival man and lifts him in the air and then drops him on the ground. Eli hands the beautiful ceramic doll to Amy. A crowd has gathered around Eli and Amy's mother appears and scolds Amy for causing trouble. The crowd shout insults at Eli and Eli crushes the doll's head with one squeeze and warns the town to stay off Thunder Mountain. Amy tries to tell him to stay, but he says that he will not visit a town that's disrespectful to him and storms off. The next scene is at a bar, where several men (including old man Doc) are playing poker. Hezekiah and his two sons plot to go to Eli's cabin to obtain Eli's gold. Meanwhile, at his cabin, Eli burns the wooden statuette he carved of Amy.

Amy goes to see Eli and says she is sorry for what happened in town, and the two are friends again. Eli and Amy go for a walk in the woods and he shows her the biggest tree in the forest 'The General.' Tommy and Ben go to find Amy and at the cabin are accosted by Hezekiah Crow and his two sons. They kidnap Ben, knock out Tommy, and take Eli's gold. Hearing the approach of a posse, they escape out a window in the back of the cabin, leaving Tommy lying unconscious on the floor.

Meanwhile, in the woods, the grizzly approaches and Eli fights it and knocks it out with a tree branch. Amy runs for the cabin and Eli limps along after her. Amy arrives at the cabin and runs to her mother. The posse do not ascertain what is going on and assume Eli has taken Amy's brothers and set out to catch him. While being stalked, Eli is wounded in the leg and has to hide. He hides under a pile of leaves and surprises one of the men of the posse who has caught his leg in his own bear trap. He takes the man's gun and takes the trap off the man's leg. The posse burns Eli's cabin as revenge for their mistaken belief he kidnapped the children.

Amy and her mom return to town with Tommy. The kidnappers go to the MacGruder's house to steal their belongings and Eli tracks them down and frees the MacGruder's and Ben. Hezekiah Crow tries to trick Eli and escapes out a window. Eli follows him and Hezekiah comes face to face in the dark with the true Giant of Thunder Mountain - the grizzly. Caught between Eli and the bear he surrenders to Eli and the posse.

The movie concludes with the town asking Eli if he would become their sheriff, and promise to rebuild his cabin. Eli says he must return to the mountain, but leaves as their friend.

Scientists discover that a violent storm is heading toward New York City and begin the warning process throughout the city. They believe that something is wrong with the natural barometer patterns and that an unprecedented event is imminent. A sudden eclipse of the sun verifies their notions and it seems that global destruction is near. Telegraphs from Rome and London explain days of unending earthquakes and state "The End of the World is at Hand." Tremendous earthquakes hit the Pacific Coast, killing millions, and it is reported that the entire western coast of the US has been demolished. The earthquakes have also caused major tsunamis in the oceans and disaster is just moments away.

Martin Webster (Sidney Blackmer) and his wife Helen (Lois Wilson) prepare for the oncoming disaster by gathering their children and some essentials and head for a high rock formation to escape the floods. Martin leaves Helen and goes back to the house to get more food and clothes, but the destruction of New York begins. Buildings crumble from earthquakes and tsunami waters envelop the city. Martin returns to find his wife and daughters are nowhere to be found. In the aftermath, grief-stricken Martin builds a shelter and tries to survive on his own.

Surviving in a cabin in another part of the New York City outskirts, two men, Jepson (Fred Kohler) and Norwood (Ralf Harolde), find Claire (Peggy Shannon) unconscious and washed up on the shore. As she recovers, the men start feuding and become very possessive. When Claire realizes the situation, she becomes uncomfortable and flees across the water for safety as she is a world-class swimmer, leaving the men angry and vengeful. Jepson kills Norwood and begins to search for Claire, vowing to bring her back.

Claire washes up on another shore, where Martin finds her this time. Martin and Claire become good friends and eventually fall in love. Meanwhile, in a nearby town, survivors have gathered together to start a new civilization. Among these survivors is Martin's wife, Helen, and their children. Tom (Matt Moore), one of the townsmen, found Helen in the aftermath, and has been taking care of her ever since. He has also fallen in love with her, but Helen is convinced that Martin is still alive.

Jepson teams up with a gang of thugs who help him find Claire and Martin and eventually trap them in a tunnel. The townspeople stumble upon the situation and save Martin and Claire and bring them back to their new found city. Once they arrive, Martin finds his children and discovers his wife is alive and well and goes to her. Claire and Tom are devastated.

After the reunion, Martin explains to Claire how he is in love with both his wife and with her and that he will not choose. Helen visits Claire and they have a painful discussion in which Claire says she will not give up Martin. However, when Claire sees Martin with his wife at the town meeting her heart breaks and she runs to the ocean. She swims away as Martin is left watching her go.

Prologue

[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos001.html start]-[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos006.html end]. Haas is infected with SRMD. Nyerere, at Mars' request, assigns Benjamin Prester (his best agent) a partner, Caprice Quevillion.

Reflecting the Dark

[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos007.html start]-[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos038.html end]. Benjamin meets Caprice at Feynman Station, observed by Dryden's network of Marlowes. They board Caprice's ship, Qin Shihuangdi, and head for the Moon, where Djaya Sumatera tells them of rumors that an anonymous poster on a Ganymede server has been talking about revolutionary AI, which could be the product of mad science. Warned and aided by the Mars group mind (acting through Caprice), Benjamin and Caprice escape an attack by Haas' robots.

The Waters Above the Heavens

[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos039.html start]-[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos120.html end]. Mars analyses the remains of the robots, which use technology from many places, especially some Ganymedan software; Benjamin consequently decides to head to Ganymede. A call to information broker Taro Watanuki on Von Hayek Station (a space colony at Earth's L4 point) reveals that the robot's software was probably written by Benjamin's old friend Manny Delger. After a six-day trip to Ganymede, Benjamin and Caprice track Manny down, discovering that he has been skipping his SRMD medications. Manny admits to writing the software to network the Marlowes, which would allow them to form a group mind similar to the Martians. They visit the anonymous server on Io through which Manny's client communicated; Caprice "accidentally" hacks into their network, discovering that Manny's communications were relayed through another server on Earth.

Haas and his robots track Benjamin and Caprice to Io, then towards Mars for a gravity boost to either Earth or Venus. They obtain ship access codes from Beatriz Juruna and use them to take over (via a software perversion attack) several ships on similar routes to Qin's, then use the weapons of the Solar Navy destroyer ''Gorbachev'' to destroy Qin's shipbody. Caprice saves Qin's cogence core, escapes with Benjamin, and re-enters the Martian atmosphere using only the technology she is wearing (primarily the vector field and gravity blades).

A Saint Abroad and a Devil at Home

[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos121.html start]-[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos202.html end]. Benjamin and Caprice impact safely on Mars, where they are rescued by Fabula and Syuzhet and taken to Alnaschar City. Benjamin meets Caprice's family, who help him replace the equipment lost in the demise of Qin's original shipbody (including a new railgun etched with a unicorn and rainbow by Wei). In the person of Mrs. Waters, the "President of Mars," Mars reveals it knows Benjamin was once a mad scientist.

Haas makes contact with Rocco to obtain equipment that he can't create with an autofactory he stole, then later takes over the whole mob by eliminating the capos above Rocco. He reveals his Master Plan; he is going to sell robots to all the governments of the Solar System; robots built at cut-rate prices made possible by his use of a stolen Martian autofactory; robots with overrides that will put them firmly under his command at an unspecified future date.

The Fire that Severs Day from Night

[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos203.html start]-[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos422.html end]. While everything else is going on, Benjamin flashes back to his days as a mad scientist in 2141, building robots with Manny and Djaya to take over the world.

He and Caprice board the new (and much improved) Qin and use the faster-than-light breaker gate to reach Earth quickly. They discover that the anonymous server has been destroyed in a viral attack, but Caprice reconstructs a broken molecular memory card to retrieve the information they need. She analyzes the data and discovers a call to a restaurant in Gagarin City on the Moon where there had been a conversation between Haas in holographic telepresence and Juruna in person. Benjamin and Caprice visit the restaurant and pressure the maitre d' to copy the corresponding security camera information, from which Mars identifies Juruna. They serve a search warrant on Juruna's home and pressure her into identifying Haas (and Rocco) by threatening to "take him down the hard way."

From sightings of Qin by Dryden's network of Marlowes, Haas realizes the Martians have FTL travel and not just FTL communication.

Rocco decides to attempt to gain some leverage to use against Haas. Greta discovers that Benjamin is after Haas. Henri discovers Haas' background was faked and identifies Oswald as someone who knows where to find him. Greta pressures Oswald to identify Haas' island base.

Benjamin and Caprice travel to Venus, where the inhabitants hate and fear Martians. Caprice pretends to be from Earth, and asks Venusian Immigration's Martian detector (Sally the AI) to let her pass into Astarte City without warning. They track Rocco to Cafe Sabella, where Benjamin, though wounded, overcomes Rocco and Greta and gets Rocco to reveal Haas' location. Dryden captures Caprice by breaking her connection with Mars, rendering her catatonic and convincing Mars she is dead.

Benjamin convinces Nyerere to let him continue the case despite his injury, his (apparent) loss of Caprice, and his extreme emotional stress (all of which can bring about an SRMD relapse). Caprice recovers enough to talk to Dryden. Benjamin heads for Haas' base, constructing an electricity gun ("It's a ''ball lightning'' gun.") as he goes.

Caprice convinces Dryden to let her out; Haas sends his robot army, including a particularly large robot named Pindar, to the city to mop up Rocco's mob and make a convincing (if perhaps premature) show of strength. Pindar himself captures Rocco and Greta by disabling the police paddy wagon carting them off to jail.

Caprice talks Dryden into sending a Morse code signal via one of his observer drones (the Marlowes) to Sally, the Martian AI implanted in a customs security machine at the spaceport; Sally relays the news to Mars, and flies off (converting her housing into a flying weapon) in search of Caprice's exact location.

Meanwhile, Benjamin has infiltrated Haas' base and coerced Chaucer into leading him to Haas; Chaucer attempts to trap him with another Pindar robot, but the battle between Pindar-2 and Benjamin ends in a stalemate and the two wind up talking it out. Benjamin convinces Pindar-2 and Chaucer - by treating the sentient AIs as his equals - that he wants their boss to be taken alive and unharmed, and that treatment will actually be beneficial to Haas.

Sally intercepts Haas' fleet of robots en route back to their base and engages in a pitched battle with them. Pindar-1 attempts to use the same nanotech/consciousness-disrupting weapon that was deployed by Dryden to capture Caprice, but Sally manages to avoid the weapon's field of effect and retaliates by trapping the entire fleet at the bottom of a massive void in the ocean.

Finally, Benjamin and Caprice confront Haas, and manage to bring him to reason thanks to Benjamin's intimate knowledge of SRMD and how to handle it. Caprice uses her nanotech and psychology to keep Haas' robots from interfering, and all ends well.

Epilogue

[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos423.html start]-[http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos435.html end] Benjamin and Caprice start a new life.

In the south of England, at an isolated laboratory near a small village, physicist Dr. Laird (Alec Mango) is assisted by American scientist Gilbert Graham (Forrest Tucker). They are performing a series of advanced and dangerous experiments with magnetic fields, while using massive amounts of power in equipment never designed to carry such loads. An accident occurs and injures another assistant, after which a request for a replacement sent to the Ministry of Defence brings Brigadier Cartwright (Wyndham Goldie) down to investigate. He is accompanied by a woman computer expert, Michele Dupont (Gaby Andre), who helps to solve Laird's power problem, but not the larger risks inherent in his experiments.

Cartwright is impressed when an interrupted experiment transforms several pieces of steel, not in the test chamber, into useless lumps of powder. His report convinces the Deputy Defence Minister Gerald Wilson (Geoffrey Chater) to make Laird's project a top priority. He sends down a full security team, led by counter-espionage expert Jimmy Murray (Hugh Latimer). It soon becomes clear, however, that enemy agents are the least of the dangers around Laird's project: The hyper-magnetic fields that he has generated have been affecting the ionosphere, causing unnatural weather patterns, threatening ships at sea hundreds of miles away, and also weakening the magnetic shield that protects the surface of the Earth from cosmic rays. A sudden burst of cosmic radiation from deep space causes brain damage in one local man, turning him into a homicidal maniac, while also causing the insect life to mutate in the area around the village and laboratory.

In the midst of this growing threat to the world's safety, a mysterious "Mr. Smith" (Martin Benson) arrives in the village. He is well-spoken, with little knowledge of ordinary life, but a great deal of knowledge about magnetic fields, while offering strong opinions about the dangerous experiments that Dr. Laird is conducting. Murray is positive that he is a spy, but Graham and Dupont decide that there is less threat from him than from the obstinate Dr. Laird, who plans on continuing his risky work. Even with "Mr. Smith" s dire warnings, the forest adjacent to the village is soon swarming with gigantic insects and other mutated monsters. Graham's and Dupont's best efforts fail to stop Dr. Laird, and so they alert the authorities to investigate and send in the military. Later, when leaving the laboratory, Dupont is threatened by the encroaching monsters and becomes trapped in the web of a giant spider. The army arrives in time and is able to destroy all the mutations, saving her life.

"Mr. Smith" reveals to Graham that he is an alien from another world (withholding its name). Later, Graham explains to Dupont, Murray, and Cartwright that "Mr. Smith" is actually an alien emissary from a "Planet X", while also informing them that Laird has gone mad and plans to continue his dangerous experiments. "Mr. Smith" explains that his mission is to warn humanity of the likelihood that Earth's orbit will be destabilized if the magnetic experiments will continue. They are already a threat to "Planet X", having caused the crash on Earth of one of their flying saucers. "Mr. Smith" is asked to help stop Dr. Laird, but being an emissary, he is at first reluctant. However, now faced with a continued threat, he agrees. They quickly leave and go back to stop Dr. Laird, who has already started up his equipment. "Mr. Smith" in the meantime has summoned his flying saucer using a hand-held device, positioning it directly above the laboratory. It fires down multiple rays that obliterate the building. With the coming disaster averted, the alien says his goodbyes to Graham and Dupont and walks to the landed saucer. It quickly becomes just an oval of light ascending into the night sky.

The story revolves around three dancers who are forced to reconcile their differences and pasts. Travis (Swayze), Chrissa (Niemi), and Max (De La Pena) were three students of master choreographer Alex McGrath, but they had a falling out many years ago over a particularly difficult piece that Alex had choreographed specifically for them. Unexpectedly, McGrath dies. This reunites the three, who agree to attempt the dance piece once more to save his company. In the process, however, they all reopen old emotional wounds that had never properly healed. Travis and Chrissa have a daughter together, Bree. Bree wishes to follow in her mother's footsteps of dancing and even takes any opportunity to steal her mother's Pointe shoes and dance around the house in them. It is realized that Max should be the new head of the company. Travis, Chrissa and Max each want to quit for good at some point. But finally all grudgingly follow through and come full-circle as dancers.

Louie Kritski is a heartless slumlord who was born into money, thanks to his ruthless father, "Big Lou" (Vincent Gardenia), also a slumlord. However, the tables turn on Louie when he's threatened with prison for his failure to keep his New York City slum up to code. The judge gives him another option, which he accepts: he must live in a vacant apartment of one of his own shoddy run-down apartment blocks until he brings it up to livable standards.

The sentence is an effective house arrest; Louie is not allowed to leave the apartment except for routine exercise, grocery shopping, medical emergencies and business relating to building repairs. In addition, Louie is not authorized to make any changes to the apartment he has been assigned unless all other apartments had the same upgrade beforehand. At first Louie is adamant that not one repair will be carried out, and will wait until his father bails him out. However, Louie has a change of heart after meeting and getting to know the building's residents, including a small-time hustler named Marlon (Ruben Blades), and a struggling street boy named Tito (Kenny Blank).

Over time, Louie grows more sympathetic with their problems and makes amends for his greediness through actions such as donating space heaters to the tenants to help them cope with the winter. Unfortunately, Big Lou Kritski is the owner of the property in title, and he resists his son's entreaties to spend money to improve the tenements. When Louie confronts Big Lou who is about to set fire to his own tenement, all the residents appear on the roof to back up Louie. The film ends with Louie's building completely refurbished, Marlon becoming the new super, and all the tenants gathered outside to see Louie off with a gift: his Corvette—which had been completely stripped of its parts shortly after he first arrived—fully restored. A grateful Louie drives away as a large man appears and angrily demands to know who stole his car; all the tenants point in the direction in which Louie drove off in.

400 years in the future, the Earth is occupied by human-like invaders. The Earth's former president and cabinent live in exile on a remote planetary system. The two planets maintain a cold and uneasy realationship, until war is imminent. The book's hero, young Micheal Wireman, returns to Earth from exile along with a shipment of rifles to assist the rising insurgency on Earth. Often surprised by the book's twists, the awkward young Wireman discovers himself and 'frees' Earth from the invaders.

While California University of the Sciences Professor Douglas McCadden explores the tomb of the ancient Egyptian king Tutankhamun, an earthquake causes a wall in the tomb to collapse, revealing a hidden chamber. Inside, Douglas finds a mummy in a sarcophagus. Unbeknownst to Douglas, the "mummy" is not the body of a dead Egyptian, but an extraterrestrial alien in suspended animation, being wrapped up and buried alive thousands of years before and covered with a dormant, green fungus.

The body is brought back to California and Douglas has it examined by Dr. Ken Melrose and X-rayed by student Peter Sharpe before a big press conference about the discovery. While reviewing the X-rays, Peter notices there are five crystals around the "mummy's" head. Peter steals the crystals and makes new X-rays to cover up his theft. He sells four of the crystals to students who are unaware of their origin. The second set of X-rays overdose the body with radiation. This causes the fungus to re-activate and the alien to awaken from suspended animation.

At the press conference the next day, one of the students touches the fungus on the sarcophagus, which eats away one of his fingers. The sarcophagus is then opened in front of the press to reveal that the mummy is gone. Ken and his colleague Dr. Hayworth attempt to identify the fungus and destroy it.

At first, everyone assumes that the mummy's disappearance is because of a fraternity prank. However, University President Wendell Rossmore wants to pin the "theft" on Douglas, so that he can give the Egyptian department's directorship to his flunkie, Dr. Bruce Serrano.

Meanwhile, the "mummy" tracks down the students who have the stolen crystals. The crystals are crucial components of an intergalactic transportation device that will allow the alien to return to its home planet. The alien violently reclaims its crystals, and, when he brutally attacks a female student, Lt. Plummer is called in to investigate the crime. As more students turn up dead or injured, Plummer believes that he is on the trail of a serial killer.

While Plummer conducts his investigation, Douglas translates the hieroglyphic text from the sarcophagus. He hopes it will reveal the identity of the mummy. The text reveals that Tutankhamun found the alien in a coma-like state. Thinking that the unconscious alien was a god, Tutankhamun and his attendants touched it and were killed by its infectious fungus. The king and the alien were then buried together in the king's tomb. Douglas, having figured out that the "mummy" is an alien, makes the connection between the alien and the crystals. He then traces the stolen crystals back to Peter, who admits to the theft and gives Douglas the one crystal he kept for himself.

In the end Douglas, Wendall, Bruce, two students, a security guard and the alien all end up in a boiler room where the alien has set up its transportation device. The alien activates the device by placing the last recovered crystal on it; his mummy wrappings disintegrate, revealing his true form. The security guard urged by Bruce shoots at the alien, but Douglas leaps in front of the alien to protect it. As Douglas lies injured the alien takes his hand, and the two disappear. A single crystal is left where the alien stood. Bruce grabs the crystal, and the fungus begins to destroy his hand, as the film ends stating: "To Be Continued." No sequels or tie-in media have been produced that continue the story.

After falling from an apartment building at the end of the first film, Duane Bradley and his hideously deformed brother Belial are taken to the hospital. Their unusual situation draws media attention, making it impossible to lead a secret life. They're rescued from the hospital by Granny Ruth, who saw their story on the news. She takes them to her home, where she and her granddaughter Susan care for an extended family of similarly deformed individuals. Among these individuals is Eve, who is similar to Belial in that she is a bodiless torso. Traumatized by how she has been treated prior to Ruth rescuing her, Eve is mute and spends most of her time in the attic. A few years pass and as Eve and Belial fall in love, Duane's resentment of Belial grows. He hasn't forgiven Belial for Sharon's death and wishes to live a life without being surrounded by "freaks", as previously he had been unable to leave Belial due to their psychic bond.

During all of this a sleazy reporter named Marcie and her equally sleazy photographer has been looking for the Bradley brothers in order to bring them to justice. Upon discovering the freaks Marcie decides that she will expose them to the world, forcing Ruth and the others to stop her. They kill the photographer, as well as a private detective that was assisting Marcie. Duane tricks Marcie into allowing the freaks into her home under the guise that Belial wants an interview; Belial mutilates her face, turning her into a freak as well.

That night the freaks celebrate their victory while Eve and Belial consummate their relationship in the attic. Seeing this as an opportunity to finally be free of Belial, Duane approaches Susan and asks her to run away with him. She's horrified that he would leave his brother and reveals that she, too, is a freak. She has been pregnant for six years as her baby refuses to leave her womb. This shatters the last of Duane's psyche and he kills Susan by pushing her out a window. He then goes to Belial and forcibly sews him to his body. The film ends as Ruth and the others discover what Duane has done, and stare at him horrified.

Fifteen-year-old Genevieve Gage and her best friend Tiana Moore are typical high school students in Helverton, Colorado who spend their idle time chatting with strangers in chat rooms. After chatting with another apparent student who goes by the screen name of "Captain Howdy," Genevieve and Tiana decide to attend a party at Captain Howdy's house, which is a trap. When neither Genevieve nor Tiana returns home by the next morning, Genevieve's mother, Toni, alerts her husband, local cop Mike Gage. With the assistance of a younger cop named Steve Christian, Gage begins searching for Genevieve and Tiana. The case takes an unexpected turn when Tiana's car is pulled out of a lake with Tiana's tortured body inside and no sign of Genevieve.

Mike discovers that Captain Howdy is into "body art," including significant tattooing, piercing, branding, and scarification. But it is not until Mike's niece Angela Stravelli informs him of Genevieve's penchant for meeting strangers through the Internet that Mike gets his first lead. Meeting the Captain Howdy online, Mike attempts to get Captain Howdy to invite him to a party. Despite the plan going awry, he later figures out Captain Howdy's location and finds his torture chamber. There, Gage finds Genevieve naked and bound, with her mouth stitched shut, as well as five other teenagers who are in similar predicaments. After a brief struggle in which Captain Howdy gets shot, Mike arrests him and discovers his real name is Carlton Hendricks.

Mike thinks he has closed the case. But a year later, Hendricks is declared not guilty by reason of insanity and he is put in the Meistrich Psychiatric Institute, only to be released three years later. Doctors at the Meistrich Institute state that Hendricks, who has been diagnosed as a schizophrenic with a severe chemical imbalance, is okay as long as he is on his medication. So, Hendricks moves back to his old neighborhood. While taking his medicine, Hendricks is timid and apologetic about what he did, but the memories of what Hendricks did are still fresh in the minds of Helverton's residents. Many people are not happy about Hendricks's release, especially an activist group led by Jackson Roth and Catherine "Sunny" Macintosh.

One night, while Roth's teenage daughter, Kelly, is out, a fearful Roth jumps to the conclusion that Hendricks has taken her. Roth calls Catherine and several others and they kidnap Hendricks. During this, Hendricks accidentally drops his medicine bottle, and it is run over by a car. Roth and the group then beat Hendricks and hang him from a tree. As Roth, Catherine, and the others leave, it starts raining and the rope, which turns out to be weak, snaps, saving Hendricks's life. However, the near-death experience, something he had mentioned hoping to attain earlier on in the film, reverts him to being Captain Howdy, this time with revenge on his mind.

After recovering, Hendricks kills Roth's wife Madeline in front of Roth before knocking him unconscious and then kidnapping him. Hendricks also kidnaps Catherine before contacting Mike at the police station. After hanging up with Mike, Hendricks brutally tortures Roth and Catherine. The next day, Toni calls Mike and tells him that Genevieve is missing. When Mike gets home with Steve, Hendricks's face is on Toni's computer screen. Hendricks has Genevieve and her mouth is stitched shut again. Hendricks tortures Genevieve while Mike and Toni watch the screen. After Hendricks disconnects, Genevieve, Roth, Catherine and a few other victims are soon found alive, but brutally tortured, by officers responding to a call. That night, after leaving the torture scene, Mike tracks Hendricks back to the club Xibalba. After a long struggle, Hendricks stands ready to kill Mike with a large meat hook chained to the ceiling. However, Mike sinks the hook into Hendricks's back, slams Hendricks into a wall, and then uses the hook to lift Hendricks off the floor. After Hendricks taunts Mike, Mike pours a flammable liquid on Hendricks, and presumably kills Hendricks by setting him on fire.

Peter Piper, a photographer, visits a laboratory where a spider plant with teeth has been created. Piper attempts to take a picture, but is bitten on the bottom by a plant coming down from the ceiling.

Piper leaves the lab via a back door, sits in a dark alley, sweating, and begins to turn green. His molecular structure is shown to be changing with the text "This means something very nasty is happening". When he wakes up, he finds that when he stretches, plants shoot from his arms. He is also able to climb walls. Suddenly, a sweeper, who is also crawling on the wall and cleaning the walls, appears there.

Piper is then shown sitting on a roof, when he sees that Jane-Mary is getting mugged. He goes to save her, but he realizes that he needs a costume. He appears in the alley in a Red Indian costume, a fairy costume and eventually in his green Spider-Plant suit. He saves Jane-Mary, who falls in love with him. He suggests to her that he might be Peter Piper, only to be told that Piper is a loser and a creep. Later Spider-Plant man is seen saving the day around London including helping to retrieve Demo song tapes for the singer and reality TV star Peter Andre.

Spider-Plant Man is then shown landing in an alley late at night where another man says he is his enemy. Peter guesses that he is the Green Goblin, Doctor Octopus, the Itchy Skull, or The Human Man, but it appears to be Batman. The Caped Crusader tells him that he is really angry that no one cares about him anymore and that everyone only wants spiders nowadays. He no longer has the Batmobile, owning only a dilapidated "Bat-Clio". Even Robin has abandoned him. "Apparently he was only in it for the money." Piper tries to help Batman but tells him he has much more important things to do. Suddenly Batman tells Piper that he has kidnapped Jane-Mary and demands him to give up being a Super Hero or she will die but luckily Piper quickly guesses that Batman has trapped her on top of the Tower Bridge and rushes off to save her.

Spider-Plant Man swings through London, wondering where Tower Bridge is, while Batman, who couldn't get his Bat-Clio to start, takes the Underground to Tower Bridge. Jane Mary is bound to a flag on Tower Bridge by Batman. Spider-Plant Man and Batman begin to fight, where they are mistaken by a reporter for Fathers 4 Justice activists. Peter fires a spider plant at him, followed by Batman throwing his Batarang and the battle goes on.

Batman's sidekick Robin (played by Tony Robinson) arrives, and makes a deal with Batman for 20% of the profits on Batman products and a Robinmobile and starts attacking Piper. Whilst hanging from Tower Bridge, Spider-Plant Man makes a deal with Robin for 25% on all pajama sales and his own cereal brand with real marshmallows, Robin switches sides and attacks Batman. Batman is punched off the tower and lands on the reporter. He then punches a Fathers 4 Justice supporter and hijacks a little kid's scooter and gets away.

Spider-Plant Man and Jane-Mary start to kiss. Robin tells Peter it's time to go and moments later Peter punches him. He then asks Jane-Mary whether she will marry him, and she responds, "Who's asking me, Spider-Plant Man or the man behind the spandex?" He replies, "You choose". Jane-Mary is then shown lying in the sun on a beach, next to Piper who is still in his Spider-Plant suit. Piper then turns to the audience, smiling as then a web shoots out with the words "END"

''Trust'' concerns the unusual romance between two young misfits wandering the same Long Island town. When Maria (Shelly), a recent high school dropout, announces her unplanned pregnancy to her family, her father dies of heart failure, her mother immediately evicts her from the household and her boyfriend breaks up with her. Lonely and with nowhere to go, Maria wanders her town in search of a place to stay. Along the way, she meets Matthew (Donovan), a highly educated and extremely moody electronics repairman. They begin an unusual romance built on their mutual admiration and trust.

Fredrick Bronski runs a large ensemble show out of Warsaw. Despite the relative success the show receives, the majority of the cast are annoyed by the fact that Fredrick nitpicks who does what, in particular his wife Anna, whom he regularly tries to undermine despite her getting the lion's share of praise. This leads her to begin an affair with RAF pilot Andre Sobinski behind Fredrick's back, but the fling is cut short by the Nazi invasion of Poland forcing Sobinski to return to England.

As the Bronski Theater struggles to remain open in spite of Gestapo censorship, Sobinski and the rest of the RAF's Polish squadron commiserate with Polish radio freedom fighter Dr. Siletski, leading to him acquiring messages to people in the Polish Underground when he says he intends to return to Poland to lead the fight there. However, when Siletski fails to recognize Anna Bronski's name despite having claimed to have lived in Warsaw, Sobinski and his superiors realize that Siletski is a Nazi sympathizer who intends to sells the names to Gestapo leader Erhardt. Sobinski air drops into Warsaw and meets up with Anna and Fredrick, who have been forced to move in with Anna's personal hairdresser Sasha after their home was turned into Gestapo Headquarters.

Knowing that Siletski and Erhardt have never met in person, Fredrick uses a dinner date Siletski forced on Anna to pose as Erhardt. He successfully retrieves the list from Siletski, but unwittingly blows his cover when he reveals Anna's affair with Sobinski. Siletski tries to escape in the confusion but Sobinski shoots him down, forcing Fredrick to pose as Siletski to not only get Anna out of S.S. custody, but fool the real Erhardt when he comes calling. He manages to lead him in the wrong direction of the Polish Underground, but when his cover's nearly blown when he attempts to rescue Sasha, who was poised to be sent to a concentration camp for being homosexual, the theatre troupe manage a quick rescue.

Knowing the ruse won't be able to hold for much longer, Sobinski and the Bronski Theater plan to use a special show viewed by Hitler as a smokescreen to get themselves (and the sheer number of Jewish refugees Fredrick unwillingly sheltered) out of Occupied Poland. Despite hiccups in the performance and Hitler's airport security catching on to the deception, the group escapes and makes it to England. In gratitude for their heroics, the English government allows the Bronskis to perform in London, where Anna, to Fredrick and Sobinski's horror, begins yet another affair with a soldier.

The player characters go on a quest to find the fabled Soul Gem, a legendary artifact of great power. They must gather the four parts of a key granting them entrance to the Ghost Tower.

Inverness was the fortress of the great wizard Galap-Dreidel, whose magic raised a great stone tower within a formidable keep. The tower was built to house Galap-Dreidel’s most prized possession, an eldritch jewel called the Soul Gem, which could steal life from any creature. The monsters and magic of the tower kept the gem safe for many years, but when Galap-Dreidel vanished, Inverness was seized and its tower was destroyed.

No sign of the Soul Gem was ever found, but local folk talk of seeing a ghostly vision of the tower of Inverness on fog-shrouded nights. Seeking to discover where the Soul Gem was hidden, the characters descend beneath the ruined tower, discovering four pieces of magical metal that bond together to form a key. The key opens the doors to the central chamber beneath the tower, which holds a time portal that takes the characters back to the age when the tower of Inverness was still standing.

Each level of the tower is a deadly gauntlet meant to destroy intruders. Passing through levels of air, earth, fire, and water (the latter featuring reversed gravity) eventually leads the characters to the top of the tower. The Soul Gem is there, but its magic tries to steal the souls of the characters even as they try to claim it.

Tournament version

Players may choose from one of five pre-determined characters listed in the module. All of the characters are in the dungeon of the Duke Justinian Lorimnar of Unst for various crimes and charged with the task of recovering the Soul Gem for the Duke:

Hodar - A sorcerer practicing forbidden magic specifically outlawed by the Duke

Zinethar - A priest who led a temple revolt against the Duke's citizens

Lembu - A fighter who killed the palace guard captain and 11 of his men in a barroom brawl

Discinque - A thief who attempted to steal jewels from the crown, only to fall off the wall on top of the guard patrol

Li Hon - A monk indentured into the Duke's service by her monastery in lieu of tax payment

The Duke, after providing gold for the characters to equip themselves, also provides a magic item (the Amulet of Recall) which teleports the party back to the Duke, no matter where they are. After equipping is complete, the palace guard escort the characters to the ruined site of the ghost tower, where players must then figure out actions on their own how to best enter the tower and recover the gem. Tournament Points are added, or deducted, from both team and individual scores depending on how characters choose to handle the situations they encounter. These include a chess room, a "frozen bugbear" room, a "tunnel" room, and others.

When the proper keys from this level are gathered and activated, the party (unbeknownst to them) travel back in time within the Tower, where more challenges await, among them elemental levels of the newly restored tower.

The final level of the tower houses the Soul Gem, which is behind a force field that must be broken before the characters can claim it. Should the characters survive, they use the amulet to return to the Duke and keep all treasure they find (subject to 20% tax). The "twist" at the end is that any character that was killed by the gem can be restored to life by the Duke's Seer.

Published version

The characters are hired by the Duke to recover the gem, but are not provided starting gold nor subject to the 20% treasure tariff of the spoils. Also, unlike the tournament version, which often specifically states how much damage characters take from certain actions, in the non-tournament version characters are subject to normal random damage rolls. Additional encounters and traps are also added, which are marked "Not for Tournament Use" in the module.

''White Plume Mountain'' is set in the ''World of Greyhawk'', a campaign setting for ''Dungeons & Dragons''. The module is a dungeon crawl, precipitated by the theft of three magical, sentient weapons: a trident named ''Wave'', a war hammer named ''Whelm'', and a sword named ''Blackrazor'' (all three were introduced in this adventure). The weapons' former owners each received a copy of a taunting poem, instructing them that the weapons are located in White Plume Mountain. The poem is signed by the wizard Keraptis, who thirteen hundred years ago descended into the volcanic mountain with a company of gnomes and disappeared. The player characters' goal is to follow the same path and retrieve the weapons from Keraptis' lair.

The adventure is divided into 27 encounters across a 16-page module. Encounters are varied and each presents its own challenges. Encounter seven necessitates characters jumping from platform to platform above a sea of hot mud whilst evading erupting geysers; this in turn leads to encounter eight and a room of permanent darkness where a vampire guards Whelm. Encounter 17 occurs in a giant but fragile bubble located above a boiling lake, with the players needing to defeat a giant crab and retrieve Wave without damaging the bubble. Encounter 26 involves negotiating a magical ziggurat populated by various monsters (including sea lions, giant crayfish, giant scorpions, and manticores) before encounter 28, a battle against an ogre mage who possesses Blackrazor. A final challenge on departing is an encounter with two to four efreet if the characters have succeeded in taking two or three of the magical weapons.

''The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun'' is an adventure that takes place in the World of Greyhawk. This adventure starts with an incident from ''The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth''. ([https://books.google.com/books?id=UMY9AAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover preview]) The player characters (PCs) discover the temple while trailing a gang of norkers from the caverns. The PCs search hazardous mountain passes to find the lair of the monsters inside the temple. The adventurers are drawn into the story by a gnomish community and travel to the temple. After battling their way in, the PCs explore the temple chambers, which contain mundane creatures and new monsters from the ''Fiend Folio'' supplement.

During their exploration, the characters may reach chambers of the temple in which religious rituals were performed, and risk insanity and death as they encounter remnants of worshipers of the imprisoned god Tharizdun. To progress further, the characters must enact portions of the rituals of worship of Tharizdun, traveling into an underground sub-temple, and magically opening an inner sanctum called the Black Cyst. Having advanced this far, the characters are likely to be driven insane, killed outright, or permanently trapped within the underground temple.

''Isle of the Ape'' is a scenario in which the player characters encounter a gargantuan ape on an isolated island.

The module includes two new magic spells, and uses rules from the ''Unearthed Arcana'' rulebook.

According to ''From the Ashes'', this adventure was set in a demiplane accessed via Castle Tenser.

''Mordenkainen's Fantastic Adventure'' is a three-level dungeon adventure scenario intended for use with high-level player characters, and features the appearances of characters from Rob Kuntz and Gary Gygax's original Greyhawk campaign.

The module begins when the players are informed that a pair of impassable doors has been discovered under the abandoned Maure Castle. Suspecting that these iron doors lead to fantastic treasures, many have tried to gain access, and all have failed.

The adventure is broken up into physical "levels", the first is entered through the doors. Once the players find a means of bypassing the doors, they are presented with a fairly open dungeon with several rooms placed throughout. Each area includes its own challenge, ranging from images that come to life and attack to pools of dangerous fish to a climactic encounter with an iron golem.

On the second level, the party encounters the first modern occupant, Hubehn and his guards, and eventually his master, Eli Tomorast. Eli is an insane mage, bent on the collection of arcane knowledge at all costs. He is in these dungeons to study them and the treasures which they contain.

The final level is populated by worshipers of a demon named Kerzit, which Tomorast had set up as a false god. These worshipers include a band of gnolls, a group of mages (one of whom is surprisingly trigger-happy) and a pair of torturers.

The climax of the module is an encounter with the demon Kerzit himself.

The narrative begins with a young advertising man, Aubrey Gilbert, stopping by a bookstore named "The Haunted Bookshop" in the hopes of finding a new client. Gilbert meets the proprietor, Roger Mifflin. Gilbert does not succeed in selling advertising copy, but is intrigued by Mifflin and his conviction concerning the value books and booksellers have to the world. Additionally, Gilbert is intrigued by the fact that his firm's biggest client, Mr. Chapman, is a friend of Mifflin and has asked Mifflin to undertake the education of his daughter, Titania Chapman, by hiring her as an assistant.

Gilbert returns to the book store, meets Titania, and falls in love with her. Meanwhile, mysterious things start to happen: a copy of Thomas Carlyle's ''Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell'' disappears and reappears, Gilbert is attacked as he travels home, a pharmacist neighbor of Mifflin is observed skulking in the alley behind the bookstore at night speaking to someone in German, and an assistant chef at the Octagon Hotel has posted an ad in ''The New York Times'' promising a reward for a lost copy of ''Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell''. Gilbert starts to sense that something nefarious is afoot. He suspects that the gregarious Mifflin is involved in a plot to kidnap Titania, and he assigns himself the job of protecting her.

Meanwhile, Mifflin begins to train Titania in the booksellers' trade. His focus is so centered on books and their content that he fails to note the unusual things that are occurring.

Gilbert takes a room across from the bookstore in order to keep eye on things, and believes his suspicions confirmed when he sees the pharmacist let himself into the bookshop with his own key late at night. Gilbert breaks into the bookshop in an effort to find evidence to prove his suspicions, but only manages to frighten and anger Titania.

Gilbert learns that Mifflin is to take a day trip to Philadelphia, and follows him in the belief that the trip is a part of the "kidnapping" plot. In Philadelphia Gilbert confronts Mifflin with his suspicions, telling him of all the things that have occurred. The two realize that a third party had lured Mifflin away from the shop. They call the bookshop and learn that the pharmacist has left a suitcase of books there for someone else to pick up. Mifflin tells Titania to hold on to the case until he returns.

Mifflin and Gilbert return to the bookshop and find it locked. Inside, the pharmacist and an associate of his have tied up Mrs. Mifflin and are menacing Titania with a gun.

A fight ensues, part of the bookstore is destroyed by a bomb, and the pharmacist escapes. The only casualties of the bomb are the pharmacist's partner and Mifflin's dog, Bock. Mifflin even affects to be pleased as the blast knocked down books he'd forgotten he had.

In the final chapter of the book Gilbert and Mifflin learn what the true plot was: The pharmacist was a German spy who had been using the bookshop as a drop-off point. He was a specialist in making bombs, and had hidden a bomb in one of President Woodrow Wilson's favorite books. The pharmacist's co-conspirator was the assistant chef at the Octagon Hotel. He was to be part of the crew on the ship Wilson was to travel on to peace talks in Europe, and was to plant the bomb in Wilson's cabin in an assassination plot. The pharmacist was captured by police, and killed himself.

Mr. Green awakes to find that his girlfriend, Lara Morgan, has left their apartment. He battles a hangover to find a cryptic note left by her, dispensing little but a warning against entering certain "significant" doors and nonsensical instructions for leaving them if passed through. Green immediately leaves to search for the woman, whom he has known for only a few days but has already grown to love. His quest takes him through one such door to an alternate world, made apparent to Green by conspicuous elements such as its unusual currency. An accident lands Green in a psychiatric hospital, where he meets a radical from his world using the name William North (a patient), a boxer named Joe Joseph and his manager Eddie Walsh (also a patient).

North organizes an escape from the Hospital, accompanied by Green and exploited by Walsh, who makes his own escape. The two take refuge at the Grand Hotel in the outskirts of the city, while Green begins to realize what a dangerous man he has been indebted to. North brings him to a play accompanied by members of his revolutionary group which is raided by police. Green and North narrowly escape capture and death, though they lose each other.

Green returns to his hotel paranoid of capture by the police. He finds that the doctor he consults for minor burns suffered during the raid and subsequent fire at the theater, the waitress at the hotel restaurant, and even the stylist at the hair salon beneath it all seem to work for the police organization that is tracking him. He leaves the hotel hoping to learn more, but is locked out upon his return and must accept a car ride from the waitress, Fanny. They go to an Italian restaurant which Green recognizes as being from his world. He and Fanny discuss the little they know about North's gang, the two worlds, and Lara.

The alternate world is nearly identical to his, the one of contemporary America, save for a few societal and physical disparities. The people from "There" (as Green comes to think of it) are physically identical to those from Here, but for that the men naturally die from sex. Technology seems to be generally inferior There, although some anomalies such as seemingly magical and remarkably articulate robotic dolls exist, perhaps invented to suit matriarchal needs. Roads and buildings seem to be in similar places, though occupied by different establishments and patrons. Time passes much more quickly Here, although they both seem to be in the same general era. There is no indication when passing between the worlds, though the doors between them seem to be accessible only to certain people and those who they know. Objects can accompany people between the worlds, though they may eventually filter themselves back to the world of their origin.

When they leave the restaurant, Green returns to his own world through its door, but Fanny inadvertently follows Lara's aforementioned instructions and remains in her own. Green finds that, though he had only been in the alternate world for perhaps four days, he has been missing from his own for over a month. He is told that he must receive a medical checkup before he can return to work, and in doing so it is revealed that he has now made eight visits to a psychiatrist for a "breakdown". He is hospitalized, but released after admitting that the alternate world was most likely a dream. Over the next few years he returns to his previous life as a salesman, forgetting about Lara and There.

He is briefly returned to the other world while shopping and is reminded of its existence. Shortly after returning to his world he is contacted by Lara. They meet at the Italian restaurant and, after some coaxing, she reveals more to him about herself and the other world. Throughout the story Green had been exposed to hints that his girlfriend exists in both worlds. She had appeared as a doll he found in the other world, on his television at the first hospital, stepdaughter of Klamm (presidential cabinet member searching for North), as a famous actress and model There, and was also referred to There as 'the goddess'. Now she had taken the alias of receptionist Lora Masterman at his psychiatrist's office. She admits to being an immortal being from the other world, occasionally joining his world to enjoy relationships with men she could sleep with without killing, such as Green, Klamm, and a 19th-century sea captain.

Lara flees Green through the restaurant's door and they reenter the alternate world. They reunite at a boxing match where Joe is attempting to take the heavyweight title and North is using as a political publicity stunt. North interrupts the fight with gunshots, perhaps attempting to kill Green, but is subdued by Joe after a brief brawl. Green is taken to a hospital for injuries sustained and reunites with Fanny. She is instructed to keep watch of him, but he escapes her vise. The novel ends with Green exiting the city in a cab, still in the alternate world, eager to start a new life devoid of the burdens of his old.

In 1997, forensic psychiatrist Dr. Jack Gramm testifies at the trial of suspected serial killer Jon Forster, dubbed "The Seattle Slayer" by police. Gramm's testimony and expert psychiatric opinion are crucial in the conviction of Forster for the attempted killing of Janie Cates and the murder of her sister Joanie, who was drugged, hanged upside down and killed after the killer invaded the sisters' apartment. Upon receiving a guilty verdict from the jury, Forster taunts Gramm, saying "Tick-tock, Doc."

Nine years later, as Forster's execution date approaches, several similar torture murders occur. Gramm, now teaching at the University of Washington, is questioned by a lawyer from the Attorney General's office as well as FBI Special Agent Frank Parks. The latest victim, Dale Morris, is revealed to be a former psychology student of Gramm's; they attended the same party the night before. On the way to his class, Gramm receives a phone call from someone using a voice changer, informing him that he has 88 minutes to live. He reports the call to his lesbian secretary, Shelly, asking for a risk assessment profile of suspects.

Gramm receives another phone threat while teaching and becomes suspicious of his students, particularly Mike Stempt. The dean of students, Carol Johnson, interrupts the class to report a bomb threat. Evacuating, Gramm finds threats written both on the classroom's overhead projector and on his car, which has been vandalized in the parking garage. Gramm is then met by his teaching assistant, Kim Cummings, who offers to help find the perpetrator. In the stairwell, Gramm encounters one of his students, Lauren Douglas, attacked by an unknown assailant and reports the assault to campus security.

Gramm and Kim go to his condo, where a package has been delivered. The package contains an audio tape of his kid sister, Kate, crying for help before being murdered. Gramm concludes that someone accessed his secure files to obtain the tape. Kim's ex-husband, Guy LaForge, appears with a gun at the apartment door, but is shot and killed from behind by an assailant masked by a motorcycle helmet. A fire alarm is triggered by the sudden onset of smoke and the shooter flees through the crowd outside. Shortly after, Gramm's car explodes, having been rigged with a bomb.

Renting a cab, Gramm explains to Kim that his sister was killed decades earlier, when he left her alone in his apartment; the crime took exactly 88 minutes. Next, Gramm and Kim visit Sara Pollard, a woman Gramm slept with the night before, but find her murdered in her apartment with evidence incriminating Gramm. Carol calls Gramm and makes comments suggesting that she is the killer, demanding that Gramm meet her at his office. Shelly arrives at Sara's apartment and advises Gramm that she suspects Lauren was the one who stole the audio tape of Kate's death. Kim disappears from the apartment and later calls Gramm with a threat similar to Carol's, also demanding he meet her at the office.

Through prison visitation records, Gramm deduces that Forster's appeals attorney "Lydia Doherty" is a pseudonym for Lauren, surmising that she set up the frame on orders from Forster. Kim calls again, instructing Gramm to come to another nearby location on campus, where he finds Carol hanging over a seventh floor balcony; Kim is tied up and gagged nearby, held at gun point by Lauren. Lauren forces Gramm to "confess" on tape that he gave false testimony at Forster's trial. Special Agent Parks arrives and shoots Lauren, causing both Carol and Lauren to partially fall from the balcony. Gramm saves Carol from completing the fall, but Lauren comes loose and plummets to her death. When Forster calls asking to speak with Lauren, Gramm informs him of Lauren's death. He quips "Tick-tock, tick-tock, you got 12 hours to live," before throwing the phone into the void. Gramm flashes back to interactions with Kate and Janie Cates, then pockets the device that recorded his "confession". He shares knowing glances with Parks and Kim before walking away.

In fact, it retains virtually all of the original text of the story. Maslennikov does everything possible to create a “realistic” version of the tale, using costumes which accurately reflect the period, filming exclusively in Sankt-Petersburg, and even limiting his soundtrack to period music (compositions of Dmitry Bortniansky). Even the epigraphs at the beginning of each brief chapter are printed on the screen.

In order to hold to Pushkin's text, a narrator (played by Alla Demidova) appears in the streets and salons of St. Petersburg, convincingly telling the story in Pushkin's words. She begins narrating as she opens the door to the dining room of Narumov (played by Konstantin Grigoriev), where several aristocratic guards officers have been playing cards all night. Their game is observed by Hermann/Germann (played by Viktor Proskurin), an officer of the corps of engineers (and thus not of the high aristocratic class of the other officers). He seems fascinated by the card game, and is very attentive to the conversations of the guards officers. Germann is an ethnic German, and seems to fit the Russian stereotype of a thrifty German: he does not gamble because he is not willing to risk losing “that which is necessary in order to gain that which is superfluous.”

As the night is coming to an end, one of the officers, Count Pavel (“Paul”) Tomsky (played by Vitaly Solomin) tells a story from the youth of his now aged grandmother, who once gained a huge gambling debt in France, and supposedly approached the mysterious Count Saint-Germain for help. Tomsky goes on to state that the Count gave her a winning card combination, and she won back enough to pay off her gambling debt. Tomsky further states that his grandmother, now in her eighties, refuses to share the secret with anyone in his family. Tomsky gets a bit carried away with his story, saying that Cardinal Richelieu had been madly in love with his grandmother. The famous Cardinal Richelieu (1585-1642) was before his grandmother's time, so we can only assume he was referring to the less celebrated Louis-François-Armand du Pless Richelieu (1696-1788), a French marshal and grand-nephew to the renowned Cardinal and statesman. Also, the mention of Count Saint Germain (1710-1784), a mysterious character associated with the occult, makes the story seem a bit fantastic, and the other officers may have taken note of this, but Germann takes the story quite literally.

The elderly countess Anna Fedotovna (played by Elena Gogoleva) is attended by a young companion (a “ward,” probably an impoverished distant relative) called Lizaveta Ivanovna (played by Irina Dymchenko), and Germann begins to seek a way to initiate a romance with Lizaveta in order to gain access to the elderly countess and her secret.

After negligently causing the death of the countess, Germann is visited by her ghost, who tells him the secret of the 3 cards. Germann is now confidant that he can use the secret to win a fortune. He uses his contacts among the guards officers to gain entrance to the elite card game of Chekalinsky (played by Innokenty Smoktonovsky), where he risks his modest fortune in an attempt to gain fantastic wealth.

The German stereotype has been turned inside out - Germann has gone from being sober, hard-working and thrifty to being obsessed with gaining a quick and easy fortune, and this proves to be his undoing.

The story of Saladin (Ahmed Mazhar) portrays the title character, ruler of the kingdoms surrounding Jerusalem, during the events of the Third Crusade. The film starts with Jerusalem, which is under the authority of the Christians of Europe, having its Muslim pilgrims slaughtered by the Christians in the holy lands. Saladin upon hearing this news seeks the reclamation of the holy lands in a short, almost impossible campaign. He succeeds in taking back Jerusalem, which leads the powers of Europe to organize the Third Crusade with the combined forces of the French king (Omar El-Hariri) and the German emperor under the leadership of Richard the Lionheart of England. Saladin succeeds in preventing the recapture of Jerusalem, and in the end negotiations between himself and Richard (whom Saladin admires as the only honorable infidel leader) leave the Holy Land in Muslim hands.

The movie also has a subplot involving the Christian '''Issa El Awam''' (Salah Zulfikar), and the Crusader '''Louisa''' (Nadia Lutfi). At the beginning, both first meet when Issa accidentally comes upon her when she's taking a bath, and after he turns away waiting for her to get dressed before he takes her prisoner due to being a Crusader, she shoots an arrow at him and escapes. Eventually, after Issa in turns spares her life twice, Louisa chooses to give up her arms as a Crusader and becomes a nurse. This leads to the two falling in love and marrying each other, with Louisa choosing to remain in Jerusalem with him.

Jerusha Abbott was brought up at the John Grier Home, an old-fashioned orphanage. The children were completely dependent on charity and had to wear other people's cast-off clothes. Jerusha's unusual first name was selected by the matron from a gravestone (she hates it and uses "Judy" instead), while her surname was selected out of the phone book.

One day, after the asylum's trustees have made their monthly visit, Judy is informed by the asylum's dour matron that one of the trustees has offered to pay her way through college. He has spoken to her former teachers and thinks she has potential to become an excellent writer. He will pay her tuition and give her a generous monthly allowance. Judy must write him a monthly letter because he believes that letter-writing is important to the development of a writer. However, she will never know his identity; she must address the letters to Mr. John Smith, and he never will reply.

Judy catches a glimpse of the shadow of her benefactor from the back, and knows he is a tall long-legged man. Because of this, she jokingly calls him Daddy-Long-Legs. She attends a "girls college" on the East Coast. She illustrates her letters with childlike line drawings, also created by Jean Webster.

The book chronicles Judy's educational, personal, and social growth. One of the first things she does at college is to change her name to Judy. She designs a rigorous reading program for herself and struggles to gain the basic cultural knowledge to which she, growing up in the bleak environment of the orphanage, never was exposed.

During her stay, she befriends Sallie McBride (the most entertaining person in the world) and Julia Rutledge Pendleton (the least so) and sups with them and Leonora Fenton.

Twelve years after the destruction of the Kilrathi homeworld, the Terran Confederation is building several ''Midway''-class megacarriers, brainchild of Navy Commodore Christopher 'Maverick' Blair. The first one, the ''Midway'' herself, is undergoing her shakedown cruise, with Blair along for the ride.

The player takes the role of 2nd Lieutenant Lance Casey, son of the venerable Major Michael "Iceman" Casey from ''Wing Commander I''. He and his best friend Max "Maestro" Garrett have been assigned to the ''Midway'' as members of the ship's junior Diamondback Squadron, led by Lieutenant Jean "Stiletto" Talvert. Blair, Colonel Jacob "Hawk" Manley and Major Todd "Maniac" Marshall compete for control of the Black Widow Squadron. In charge of the ''Midway'' two squadrons is CAG Patricia Drake, while Captain Eugene Wilford serves as her skipper. Commander Aurora Finley heads up the "Sciences Division", while Colonel John "Gash" Dekker leads the ship's contingent of Marines. Finally, Blair's old love interest Rachel Coriolis has returned as the ship's Chief Technician.

The ''Midway'' receives a distress call from a Kilrathi cruiser in the H'rekkah system, and Marshall, Manley, Casey, Talvert and Garrett are sent to investigate. Casey is placed in command of his flight; Stiletto intends to test the rookie pilot's reputation. They find the cruiser has been destroyed, and attackers come out of the nearby asteroids. In order to alert Confed HQ of the invaders, who have been codenamed Nephilim, Casey, Blair and Dekker fly out to an abandoned Confed relay station. The Nephilium have been lying in wait, and Blair is captured. Casey defends the station from attackers until reinforcements arrive.

The ''Midway'' is tasked with defending Kilrathi colonists in the T'lan Meth system. Casey finds himself on Hawk's wing several times, and learns more about his father. Once, when still a rookie aboard the TCS ''Tiger's Claw'', Manley lost a wingman, and was a complete wreck for some time. Only one pilot volunteered to fly on his wing, and had to fight off nearly an entire squadron of Kilrathi until Hawk could get his act together. That pilot, Major Michael "Iceman" Casey, eventually ejected from his damaged fighter and was scooped up by the Kilrathi; the family was told instead that he was killed during a Kilrathi ambush. While Casey and Manley are assisting a wing of Kilrathi fighters, Hawk advises that they turn on them in revenge for old grievances. If Casey agrees, both he and Hawk will become hostile to the Kilrathi; if he declines, Casey and Hawk are temporarily on bad terms. The Kilrathi also withhold assistance at a later juncture if Casey attacks them. Finally, the Marines retake a captured Kilrathi starbase, on which the Nephilim held a number of human prisoners, though only one remains: Commodore Blair.

Reports filter in of a Nephilim superweapon: a plasma cannon that can destroy an entire fleet with one blast. Casey leads a raid to steal the weapon, which is subsequently grafted onto the ''Midway''. Because of incompatibilities between Nephilim and Terran technology, the plasma gun does not work as intended, and Casey assists in its firing by delivering a primer charge to an enemy ship. This results in the complete annihilation of the hostile fleet. If ''Midway'' attempts to charge the weapon again, she runs a two-thirds risk of a fatal backfire.

The ''Midway'' moves on to the Kilrah system, where the Nephilim's wormhole gate is still pumping out ships. Casey leads an attack on the gate, which is controlled by seven shielded towers. Casey and Talvert escort Dekker's Marines in and then combat waves of Nephilim fighters, while the Marines land and deactivate the shields on the towers so that Casey can destroy them one by one. Blair, flying in on his own shuttle, lands at the last remaining tower and deactivates its shields. The Nephilim Warlord who kidnapped Blair is within the tower; Blair, distracted by this higher priority, does not escape before the explosion. Casey returns to the ''Midway'' and the Confederation as a hero. Blair is declared missing in action.

Ukridge is introduced to the reader as a childhood friend of the narrator, later revealed to be James "Corky" Corcoran, who having been expelled from school for sneaking out of the school grounds to attend a fair has travelled the world undertaking all manner of enterprises. He is now, much to Corky's surprise, living with his wealthy aunt near Wimbledon Common and dressing smartly. All this soon ends, however, when Ukridge appears in Corky's London apartment, dressed after the old manner and accompanied by half-a-dozen Pekingese dogs. He announces to Corky that he plans to run a school for dogs, training them up as performers for the music hall, and promptly departs for Sheep's Cray in Kent.

Some weeks later, Corky receives an urgent telegram from Ukridge, and travels to Kent. There he finds Ukridge in his usual state of financial embarrassment and returns to London to ask mutual friend George Tupper for the necessary funds. Tupper coughs up happily and forms a plan to approach Ukridge's Aunt Julia in order to gain capital to fund Ukridge's scheme. Corky returns to Kent, where he finds Ukrdige enraged that his landlord, angered at not being paid, has kidnapped Ukridge's dogs. They visit the landlord, and pay him the money, but he finds the dogs have escaped, and in his contrition at having ruined Ukridge's business, agrees to refund Ukridge's rent and pay his remaining debts to local tradesmen. Ukridge and Corky return to Ukridge's house, where they find the dogs, Ukridge having secretly retrieved them overnight. They are about to decamp when Corky breaks the news about Tupper's plan, at which Ukridge quivers with shock: the dogs were in fact purloined from Aunt Julia. Upon hearing Aunt Julia's voice inside Ukridge's cottage, Corky slips away and leaves Ukridge to face the music alone.